Choose Your Formats
Summer is a strange season for Constructed Magic. In the past, summer was block constructed season, but with Wizards substituting the Standard PTQs earlier on the season, block constructed fell by the wayside. That means that the competitive Magic world is really only working on decks and strategies for their country’s respective Nationals, and later for worlds. Right now, all constructed formats are in a sort of holding pattern, waiting for the next big changes.
Let’s walk through all the formats, see where they are, and where they are going.
Ravnica Block
I’ll start with Ravnica block. Right now, this format has probably seen all the evolution it will ever see. All three parts of the Ravnica block have been released, and that will be it. Without block PTQs, people are not going to spend a lot more effort on breaking the format, so what is being played now is probably going to remain the metagame for the foreseeable future. That said, it is a pretty interesting format.
The 800 gorilla of the format appears to be the UGB decks. These decks play a bunch of mana acceleration, including Farseek and Civic Wayfarer, and often play Rolling Spoil to slow thier opponents. They also play Compulsive Research and Remand to draw cards, as well as Carven Caryatid to stop beatdown. Thier kill cards of choice are Simic Sky Swallower and Skeletal Vampire. The decks round out thier pools with some mix of utility cards, including some split cards, Twisted Justice, or a host of individual tweaks. The deck is very powerful, but very expensive.
Other three color decks also tend to be based in green, because green has the good mana fixers. Farseek and Civic Wayfarer also power the GWB decks, whether those decks are built around Loxodon Hierarch and Angel of Despair or around Glare of Subdual. I have seen both played to some success.
I don’t really have a good categorization for all the aggro decks being played. I seem to face RB Rakdos fairly often, but I see everything else on occasion.
The competitive side of Ravnica block constructed is quite expensive and fairly cutthroat. The tier one decks are powerful. If you play in the queues or tourney practice room, expect to face those decks. On the flip side, the version of the format played in the casual constructed is much more casual and wide open. A lot of people new to online are playing in this format, some with what are not much more than glorified draft decks. People are also playing Witch-Maw Nephilium decks, Warp World, Dredge, Eye of the Storm and a ton of other strangeness. None of these is broken, and none seem to be really tournament worthy, but they are interesting. The casual room basically offers fun games, and the format delivers that.
I’m enjoying goofing off in this room, with this format, quite a lot.
Standard
Standard is as diverse as it has ever been. The number of decks which have a reasonable chance of winning any given event is huge. I remember many, many past formats where I could count the number of tier one decks on one hand. In the past, even when a number of playable decks existed, there were usually a couple very good decks, and a fringe of decks that exploited those decks.
That isn’t true now. Here’s a partial list of decks that would have a decent shot at winning the next Standard PE:
Ghost Husk
UR / Izzetron
Zoo
Simic Aggro Control
Gruul Beats (aka Heezy Street)
Firemane Angel Control
URg Tron with Simic Sky Swallower
Ninja Stompy
Dark Boros
UWG Counterpost
GBW Hierarch Control
Reanimator
Heartbeat combo
Snakes
Masterpiece
Magnivore
And that’s just off the top of my head. I know I’m missing some.
Standard is quite competitive. The aggressive, beatdown decks can kill you very quickly. The control decks are very solid. A lot of people have spent a lot of time and effort on the format, and that shows. That said, a number of very janky decks have had good results in certain tournaments. For example, a mono-red Goblins deck did T8 a regionals.
Anything can happen.
It just is much more likely to happen if you know exactly what your deck is supposed to do, tune it carefully, test it a lot, and have some luck.
In the paper world, two tournaments are coming soon, and players are wondering if those tournaments might produce new decks or new ideas.
The first, the Amateur Championships, is in California next weekend. Am. Champs. used to be at Origins, in Columbus, but has migrated to another convention. The tournament is limited to players that have never earned any pro player points, but such tournaments can produce deck ideas that later become more mainstream. People seem more willing to take a risk at Am. Champs., so some unusual stuff does appear there first.
The following weekend will bring US Nationals. US Nationals runs three days: one of Ravnica drafts, one of Coldsnap drafts and one of Standard. The pros have been testing for that format, and some may have new deck ideas. Only time will tell.
In the paper world, the results of standard at US Nationals will be meaningless, since Coldsnap will become Standard legal the following week. Coldsnap will change some decks, and possibly the metagame. However, the results of US Nationals will be relevant to MTGO Standard, since Coldsnap won’t become Standard legal online until mid August. Decks debuting at US Nationals will be competitive for at least a couple weeks before being affected by the cold.
Standard is one of the most played formats online. No matter what type of deck you prefer, you can probably build a competitive version. About the only impediment is the cost of the decks. Most of the tier one decks are multicolored, and the lands necessary to make those decks work are not cheap. It is possible to build versions of those decks that do not run dual lands, but those decks are slower and less consistent – and the current Standard format massacres decks that are slow and inefficient.
Extended
The Extended format is not seeing much activity in the paper world right now. US Nationals is devoting two days to drafting, so it will not include any Extended competition. The same is true of the other National Championships I know of. That means that the only place that Extended is regularly being played, at the moment, is online.
The Extended format has a number of archetypes. The defining deck, however, is probably the Ichorid / Psychatog decks originally created by John “Friggin” Rizzo over on StarCity. Ichorid burns through it’s deck to create flying Ichorids and Psychatogs, and is very fast.
Another common archetype are evolved versions of the Solitary Confinement decks (now with 100% less Solitary Confinement). These decks dig for cards by cycling Onslaught lands, then recouping them with Life from the Loam. The decks kill with beatdown, including Loxodon Hierarchs and, occasionally, Terravores, and by pitching lands to Seismic Assault.
R/W aggro decks, and RWB decks relying on Bob (Dark Confidant) for card drawing also appear fairly common, but they either win or lose quickly. As a result, I have not seen enough of these decks to have a good handle on the decklists.
The main control deck seems to be Isochron Scepter variants, with its namesake imprinting cards like Fire // Ice, Orim’s Chant and Lightning Helix, or even Mana Leak and Counterspell.
Tooth and Nail decks are also still having some success.
Personally, I am still playing a GB Bob deck, because I have the cards and like the deck. It is not tier one competitive, but I have a reasonable chance in the casual play tournament practice room, and I like it. I may take it to an Extended PE, but I don’t expect to have a real shot at T8. Extended is a format for those with a lot more money invested in the game than I have, so I’ll just play Extended with the paper cards, or casually.
Prismatic
Prismatic is the online version of 5color. The deck construction rules are similar, although the paper 5color format is a lot more complex. Paper 5color plays the Power Nine, the original dual lands, and cards like Chaos Orb. Prismatic is, I have to admit, a pale shadow of the real thing. (I should note that I am on the 5color rules council, so I’m biased.)
The basics: minimum 250 cards, at least 20 cards of each color, all good tutors are banned. Consistently getting the right mana colors used to be a challenge in 5color, but the Onslaught fetchlands, coupled with Ravnica dual lands, mean that you can pretty consistently cast whatever you have by turn three.
This is not a poor man’s format. A full set of Onslaught fetchlands is a couple hundred TIX. A full set of Ravnica block duals is a couple hundred more – not to mention the cost of cards that actually do things. Personally, I don’t have anything like the collection necessary to play competitive Prismatic, and my computer is slow enough that searching 250 card decks stresses the video card. Searches are slow. I’ll stick to paper 5color, but that may change once I get more cards.
I make an exception for Singleton Prismatic. It’s prismatic – 250 cards, 20 each color – but with the additional restriction that you cannot play more than one copy of any card other than basic lands. Singleton Prismatic is, obviously, less consistent, and newer players with smaller card pools have a much better chance of a good game in this format. It is a lot of fun – the only downside is that making a deck takes some time, effort and thought.
Sometime I’ll provide a decklist, but not today. Listing 250 cards, and adding 250 links, is more work than I’m willing to do right now.
Tribal
Tribal constructed is a format in transition. It has two version: Standard and Classic. Standard Tribal uses the current standard card pool, with two limitations: first, decks must have 20 cards with the same creature type, and, second, certain cards, like Umezawa’s Jitte and Coat of Arms, are banned. Classic has the same restrictions, but can pull from the entire online card pool.
A lot of people have built decks for classic tribal. The powerhouse decks are extended staple decks, with enough tribe members stuffed into the deck to make it Tribal legal. Tooth and Nail and Isochron Scepter decks head the list. The classic format also includes a couple decks built around Aurioch Salvagers.
Generally, I don’t see much point in playing the classic tribal format. If you want to play combos, there are plenty of formats for that. Tribal was deliberately created to feature creature combat, and that’s what – at least in my opinion – the format should have.
Wizards tried to control that problem by recasting Tribal as a standard-card-pool-only format. Standard tribal is not the answer I would have chosen, had I been in charge. Right now, some of the best standard decks already rely on creatures, and those decks transport easily into standard Tribal. The top eight decks from the last big tribal event were a mix of Greater Good (technically spirits), Ghazi Glare (also technically spirits) and Snakes (three guesses which tribe that one was – and it also had Glare of Subdual.) You could try playing decks like Goblins in Standard Tribal Wars, but I would not recommend it. It is going to be very difficult to beat decks packing Wrath of God, Hideous Laughter and the Yosie / Greater Good lockdown. Difficult – unless you mess with thier mana.
Hmmmm.
Here’s a decklist based – roughly – on a Goblins deck that Toby Homer used to T8 a regionals last month. His deck was based around Jitte – this version replaced Jitte (now banned in the format) with Blood Moon and Thoughts of Ruin. Mess with their mana indeed.
GOBLINS:
16 Mountain
4 God’s Eye – Gate to the Rekai
4 Akki Avalanchers
4 Boros Recruit
4 Frenzied Goblin
4 Akki Raider
4 Goblin King
3 Taste for Mayhem
4 Seal of Fire
4 Volcanic Hammer
4 Char (or Flames of the Blood Hand)
3 Thoughts of Ruin
4 Blood Moon
The goal is to get a Blood Moon down really fast, thereby shutting down all the multicolor decks relying on duals, bounce lands and so forth, then mountainwalk over for the win.
At least, that’s the theory.
The Tribal PEs are, like all the for-prizes events, a bit serious. Tribal games in the casual rooms can be a lot more fun.
Momir Vig Basic
This has got to be the cheapest “constructed” format that actually has premier events. MVB requires decks that consist of 60 basic lands and the Momir Vig avatar. That’s it. You play lands, then use Momir Vig’s ability to summon random creatures.
I have referred to MVB as “slot machine Magic.” You pay your mana, pull the handle and see what pops up. It’s too random for my tastes, but some people like it.
Freeform
The last official online “format” is freeform. For all three of the people that still play freeform, here’s what Coldsnap will bring with it. I call the deck “Just Die Already.” If this deck wins the die roll, it wins the game. Period. Forty to the head on turn one, unless the player gets really unlucky.
Just Die Already
7 Mountain
7 Chrome Mox
5 Serum Powder
21 Surging Flames
Surging Flames is an instant that deals two damage to target creature or player, and has “Ripple.” Ripple means that you reveal the top four cards of your library, and you can play any revealed copies for free. Those copies also have Ripple, so they reveal more copies, and so forth.
On average, this deck should play out like this:
Turn one: Mountain, Chrome Mox imprinting Surging Flames, cast Surging Flames.
Surging Flames Ripples out, on average, two more Surging Flames.
Each of those Ripples out two more Surging Flames.
et cetera, et cetera, et cetera ad nauseum,
until the opponent is dead.
I don’t really think much of the freeform format. Yes, you can get totally broken decks if you relax the four of rules, etc. I have been playing against broken and near-broken decks in real Magic for years. I remember playing against Academy and High Tide, and Bargain. I also remember playing Unglued and Unhinged, and decks with unrestricted Ancestral Recalls.
Yes, you can get truly stupid stuff if you change the rules. So what.
I’m not impressed by Freeform.
Conclusions
Overall, I think most of the constructed formats are worth playing. WotC has done a pretty good job of balancing them. About the only down side is the cost of the cards. If you can get the cards, Extended is a blast. If your collection is more shallow, try Ravnica block constructed, or tribal.
It’s all good.
Some other time, I’ll look at the multiplayer formats, or the non-sanctioned formats (e.g. Pauper Deck Challenge or Rainbow Stairwell Highlander), but those will be other articles.
PRJ
“one million words” on MTGO