SCG Philadelphia this weekend brings another Team Constructed Open. Did you expect to see two versions of Eldrazi Tron down below?
Harlan Firer
My team’s lineup is Mono Red in Standard, Four-Color Whirza in Modern, and Four-Color Snow in Legacy. I’m in the Legacy seat, so let me explain that one.
Legacy Four-Color Snow Pile
| Creatures (7) 2 Baleful Strix 3 Snapcaster Mage 2 Leovold, Emissary of Trest Planeswalkers (5) 3 Wrenn an Six 2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor Spells (27) 4 Arcum’s Astrolabe 4 Brainstorm 4 Ponder 3 Inquisition of Kozilek 4 Force of Will 2 Abrupt Decay 2 Fatal Push 2 Liliana’s Triumph 2 Kolaghan’s Command | Lands (21) 4 Polluted Delta 4 Prismatic Vista 1 Misty Rainforest 1 Volcanic Island 1 Tropical Island 1 Bayou 1 Badlands 3 Wasteland 3 Snow-Covered Island 1 Snow-Covered Forest 1 Snow-Covered Swamp Sideboard (15) 3 Plague Engineer 2 Force of Negation 1 Fatal Push 3 Red Elemental Blast 4 Tarmogoyf 2 Surgical Extraction |
I’m of the opinion that outside of some niche metagame scenarios, you should be playing a fair blue deck in Legacy if your goal is to win the tournament. I put my nose to the Grindstone testing for this event—no really, I ran into Painter’s Servant a lot on MTGO. I came away with Four-Color Snow as my choice for SCG Philly this weekend.
After testing almost every variant of Delver of Secrets, some with Wrenn and Six and some without, I learned that they are not the proper home for this powerful new planeswalker. Wrenn is much more at home in an archetype that can put good use to extra mana built up over several turns of ticking up, and this deck does exactly that.
Another thing I really can’t stress enough about playing fair decks in Legacy is building your deck to function off of basic lands, especially now with Wrenn making Wasteland even more popular. Being able to play through Wasteland and Blood Moon means you don’t take as many free losses and get to play more Magic. Isn’t that what we all want to do?
Chad Harney
My team’s lineup is Jund Dinosaurs in Standard, Dredge in Modern, and Four-Color Delver in Legacy. Standard is my seat.
Jund Dinosaurs
| Creatures (26) 4 Marauding Raptor 4 Otepec Huntmaster 4 Rotting Regisaur 4 Ripjaw Raptor 4 Shifting Ceratops 4 Regisaur Alpha 2 Ghalta, Primal Hunger Spells (10) 4 Commune with Dinosaurs 3 Shock 3 Collision // Colossus | Lands (24) 4 Stomping Ground 4 Overgrown Tomb 2 Blood Crypt 4 Rootbound Crag 2 Dragonskull Summit 4 Unclaimed Territory 4 Forest Sideboard (15) 3 Thrashing Brontodon 1 Carnage Tyrant 3 Duress 2 Veil of Summer 3 Flame Sweep 2 Noxious Grasp 1 Cast Down |
Jund Dinosaurs is a metagame call, plain and simple. If I had to lay out the Standard metagame, I’d pick Mono Red, Mono Blue, Vampires, Risen Reef decks, Feather, and Esper. I’m fairly happy with the Mono Red, Mono Blue, Feather, and Esper matchup. Midrange Risen Reef decks and Vampires are about even, and usually goes to the person on the play.
Nexus matchups are the thing I least want to see, but a turn two Otepec Huntmaster into turn three Rotting Regisaur can still make quick work of them. I’m also hoping people learned that deck isn’t good after last weekend.
Also it’s Dinosaurs. DINOSAURS.
Ally Warfield
My team’s lineup is Jund Dinosaurs in Standard, Izzet Phoenix in Modern, and Four-Color Delver in Legacy. I am teaming with my teammate Drake Sasser (Modern) and our team dad/manager Rudy Briksza (Legacy), which leaves me in the Standard seat! Dino time.
Jund Dinosaurs
| Creatures (27) 4 Marauding Raptor 4 Otepec Huntmaster 4 Rotting Regisaur 4 Ripjaw Raptor 4 Shifting Ceratops 4 Regisaur Alpha 3 Ghalta, Primal Hunger Spells (8) 2 Domri, Anarch of Bolas 4 Commune with Dinosaurs 2 Collision // Colossus | Lands (25) 4 Stomping Ground 4 Overgrown Tomb 1 Blood Crypt 4 Rootbound Crag 4 Dragonskull Summit 4 Unclaimed Territory 2 Woodland Cemetary 2 Forest Sideboard (15) 2 Thrashing Brontodon 1 Domri, Chaos Bringer 4 Duress 2 Veil of Summer 3 Flame Sweep 3 Noxious Grasp |
After SCG Worcester last weekend, a clearer idea of the Standard metagame presented itself, with most of the Day Two decks praying on each other. There was a lot of Simic Nexus, Esper Hero, Mono U Tempo, and BW Vampires. Going into this weekend, I set my sights on testing Mono U and Vampires, but I quickly realized that Jund Dinosaurs is the best choice for this weekend, with a good matchup against all of these decks. It’s about time Jund takes the spot as the “Best Deck” again.
This deck benefits heavily from the London Mulligan. We can now afford to mulligan to better hands that include one of our two drops, Marauding Raptor or Otepec Huntmaster. You want to mulligan to these cards so you can efficiently tempo out the rest of your threats on turn three and four, including Shifting Cerotops, Ripjaw Raptor, and Regisaur Alpha.
With the addition of Core Set 2020, we also get access to a powerful 7/6 for only three mana: Rotting Regisaur. This card alone is a good enough reason to play Jund instead of Gruul Dinosaurs. On top of all this, Rotting Regisaur almost turns on a two-mana Ghalta, Primal Hunger on it’s own! I am very confident with my Standard testing and selection. See you all in Philly!
Matt Dilks
I will be taking over the modern seat for this event, and I’ll be piloting Eldrazi Tron.
Eldrazi Tron
As much success as I have had with Amulet Titan, how do I keep putting it down? I think it’s a fine choice but not the best. Golos, Tireless Pilgrim is a card I wanted to mess with more.
Okay, so not Amulet—but why not Phoenix? I’m feeling a major resurgence of midrange and Chalice of the Void and wasn’t winning as much as much as I was leading up to the last open, so I decided to drop it for now. Chalice is kinda lowkey great in Modern, and with the new mulligan you almost always have it on turn two.
Karn, the Great Creator gives you an incredible sink and tutor package if you are able to Tron up on turn three. The static ability also hoses decks like Grixis Urza. Eldrazi Tron has some holes certainly, but I’m hoping I can lean on a powerful manabase and powerful teammates when those matchups come up.
Bonus I would probably play Dinos in Standard and GB Depths with Elvish Reclaimer in Legacy.
Jess Estephan
This week I’d recommend playing the following decks for each format:
- Standard: Esper Hero or Boros Feather
- Legacy: RUG Delver/CaNaDiAn ThReShOlD
- Modern: Eldrazi Tron
In preparation for Mythic Championship Barcelona, I’ve been testing a wide range of decks in an attempt to both discern and penetrate the format. Ultimately, Eldrazi Tron is what I would register were I to play SCG Philadelphia this weekend.
Eldrazi Tron attacks along multiple axes, making it a strong contender in the current iteration of the Modern format. It dominated the Modern Challenge two weeks ago, giving us a variety of Maindecks and Wishboards to consider, but this is the list I’d go with:
Eldrazi Tron
Drake Sasser
Modern Izzet Phoenix
| Creatures (10) 4 Arclight Phoenix 4 Thing in the Ice 2 Crackling Drake Spells (32) 4 Serum Visions 4 Thought Scour 4 Sleight of Hand 4 Lightning Bolt 4 Faithless Looting 2 Pyromancer Ascension 4 Manamorphose 2 Finale of Promise 1 Flame Slash 2 Gut Shot 1 Echoing Truth | Lands (18) 4 Scalding Tarn 1 Polluted Delta 1 Flooded Strand 3 Steam Vents 4 Spirebluff Canal 1 Fiery Islet 3 Island 1 Mountain Sideboard (15) 1 Beacon Bolt 2 Aria of Flame 2 Anger of the Gods 3 Ravenous Trap 1 Flame Slash 1 Magmatic Sinkhole 3 Force of Negation 2 Blood Moon |
Surprise! I am the Modern seat for my team and I am going to be playing Izzet Phoenix. This list is extremely close to the list I made top 8 of the SCG Classic in Worcester with, and I was extremely happy with most of the card choices there. I have made a few adjustments to the sideboard however. I feel that Jace, the Mind Sculptor is much lower-impact with the rise of Magmatic Sinkhole and Aria of Flame. The mirror is where the card shined the most, and now it only continues to overperform against the traditional fair decks of the format. I also shaved a Spell Pierce for another Force of Negation because that card continues to overperform.
I havent done extensive testing for the other formats, but if I was playing Legacy I would play either Temur Delver or Izzet Delver. Anytime there is a viable Delver deck I am more than happy to play it. For Standard I would play Jund Dinos, as that deck has looked incredibly impressive when watching my teammates play with it.
Dom Harvey
I’m running back Hogaak in Modern, while my teammates are taking Jund Dinosaurs in Standard and BG Depths in Legacy.
Modern Hogaak
| Creatures (32) 4 Bloodghast 4 Carrion Feeder 2 Golgari Thug 4 Gravecrawler 4 Hogaak, Arisen Necropolis 4 Insolent Neonate 2 Stinkweed Imp 4 Stitcher’s Supplier 4 Vengevine Spells (9) 4 Faithless Looting 2 Darkblast 3 Lightning Axe | Lands (19) 4 Polluted Delta 3 Verdant Catacombs 3 Blackcleave Cliffs 2 Blood Crypt 3 Bloodstained Mire 2 Overgrown Tomb 2 Swamp Sideboard (15) 3 Assassin’s Trophy 2 Fatal Push 3 Leyline of the Void 2 Nature’s Claim 1 Plague Engineer 1 Shenanigans 3 Thoughtseize |
Is the ‘Gaak back? It’s not the scourge of Modern it was just a few weeks ago, but this new iteration is still scarily powerful. In a format where people aren’t respecting Dredge, you see people moving to “soft” graveyard hate or shaving it altogether.
The notable features of this list compared to similar shells are the plentiful removal (since most of the fair-ish decks rely heavily on creatures to race or stabilize against you) and the Dredge cards (which add a lot of heft to Insolent Neonate and allow faster Hogaaks). It’s unclear how much hate there will be or what the best way to fight it is, so the green splash for Trophy is a fine hedge.
This deck has pros and cons compared to Dredge but I expect to see at least one of them do well. Faithless Looting‘s reign of terror isn’t over just yet.
Standard is wide open right now, with a broad range of decks across the spectrum putting up results. When it’s so hard to gain an edge, there’s a lot to be said for a deck that has strong threats across the board and can leverage its sideboard well. People were clamoring for Ancient Stirrings to be banned in Modern recently, and Commune with Dinosaurs is even better! (…right?)
With Wrenn and Six and other cards making Modern Horizons look like Legacy Horizons, people act like they forgot about Depths. The blue decks are becoming increasingly inbred to fight each other; many have few answers to Marit Lage and are worse than ever at stopping it from entering play. The rise of these decks has pushed out some of Depths’ harder matchups; this is the least popular Swords to Plowshares has been in quite a while. Plague Engineer is also a useful pickup for the Depths sideboard. With more time I’d look at Depths shells that can incorporate Wrenn and Six themselves (beyond just classic Lands); I’ll likely start there for SCG Syracuse.