(Editor’s note: This article was supposed to be published just before GP Vienna)
Hi Everybody,
I usually talk about limited formats but this time, with GP Vienna coming up this weekend, I’d like to discuss standard.
Everybody knows that in the current standard (and GP Albuquerque makes it even clearer) Mono-Black and Mono-Blue Devotion are the decks to beat. They use different strategies and that makes it difficult to build a good deck that is able to deal with both.
In the last PT I played Mono-Red. It was not the Devotion deck brought by ChannelFireball team but the aggressive one, because I thought Esper was one of the most played decks by far.
Here is my Mono-Red Aggro decklist:
Creatures
4 Ash Zealot
3 Boros Reckoner
4 Burning-Tree Emissary
4 Chandra’s Phoenix
4 Fanatic of Mogis
3 Firedrinker Satyr
3 Firefist Striker
4 Rakdos Cackler
Spells
4 Lightning Strike
4 Magma Jet
2 Shock
Lands
19 Mountain
2 Mutavault
Sideboard
1 Act of Treason
1 Boros Reckoner
4 Burning Earth
2 Mizzium Mortars
1 Mutavault
3 Peak Eruption
3 Skullcrack
I ended the tourney with a miserable 6-4, paired against no Esper decks but some Mono-Blue Devotion and WB mid-range. Mono-Blue is really hard to fight with aggressive decks. It is strictly built to win against those decks, and Master Of Waves surely closes the deal against Mono-Red. This means that Mono-Blue seemed a really bad match for my deck. I had problems keeping up the pressure, due to ground blockers such as Frostburn Weird and Omenspeaker, while my Chandra’s Phoenix was unable to pass through Nightveil Specter or a well grown Cloudfin Raptor. In addition, Tidebinder Mage loses you a lot of tempo and Master Of Waves‘s protection from Red definitely seals the possibility of attacking.
In that case, what should the game plan be? We should deal some damage in the early game, destroy some blockers for our Chandra’s Phoenix to get through, reflect some damage with Boros Reckoner and accumulate devotion for Fanatic Of Mogis. Fanatic is the only way to win this match, and it is not that efficient. We need at least two of them win.
Mono-Black is not an auto-win but it is a good match for this deck and Esper is probably even better! So how can we improve the deck to beat Mono-Blue Devotion, or at the very least lose less to it? There aren’t many options here. We need to deal with a lot of creatures and they are difficult to destroy with fire, because they are either too big (Frostburn Weird) or because they have protection (Master Of Waves). Killing Master Of Waves is crucial but Red is unable to do that. It’s not the best of plans to hope that your opponent chooses to block (or attack) with it and play Skullcrack, removing the preventing part of the Red protection. We need something that can kill it unconditionally! We should evolve the original decklist and add a color to take care of the threats. White gives us access to one of the strongest removal of standard: Chained to the Rocks. It is a super removal spell able to manage almost everything except for Blood Baron Of Vizkopa. Let’s see an example from MODO:
Creatures
4 Chandra’s Phoenix
4 Rakdos Cackler
Spells
4 Boros Charm
4 Chained to the Rocks
4 Lightning Strike
4 Magma Jet
4 Shock
4 Skullcrack
2 Toil // Trouble
4 Warleader’s Helix
Lands
10 Mountain
4 Sacred Foundry
4 Temple of Silence
4 Temple of Triumph
I tested against Mono-Blue and this time the problem was not Master Of Waves anymore but the fact that he won before I could. I didn’t have the same board presence and instead had a lot of fires. Mono-Blue is still an aggressive deck after all. If you consider that post board your opponent has some counterspells too, I was in an even worse spot: there was no way I could even win the borderline matches if my opponent countered the right card (which often was Warleader’s Helix).
So how about a deck featuring the same aggressive board with the addition of Chained to the Rocks? This is the list that I’m now testing:
Creatures
2 Ash Zealot
2 Firefist Striker
4 Boros Reckoner
4 Burning-Tree Emissary
4 Chandra’s Phoenix
4 Fanatic of Mogis
2 Firedrinker Satyr
4 Rakdos Cackler
Spells
4 Lightning Strike
4 Boros Charm
4 Chained To The Rocks
Lands
12 Mountain
4 Temple Of Triumph
2 Temple Of Silence
4 Sacred Foundry
It has a good board presence as well as a way to deal with Master of Waves. It is extremely aggressive and this means that we can take full advantage of Chained to the Rocks removing early Frostburn Weird on the play to apply a lot of pressure.
Even if the matchup against Mono-Blue improved a bit, we would pay the price by playing 6 lands that come into play tapped in an aggressive strategy that wants to curve-out. Chained to the Rocks helps deal with an early Desecration Demon which would otherwise not be easy to overwhelm if some removals take care of our dudes. Our burn spells are not able to deal with both Nightveil Specter and Tidebinder Mage so we should probably remove a pair of Boros Charm for two Magma Jet
We can change the game plan by removing some of the highest drops, such as Fanatic of Mogis, Boros Reckonerand Firefist Striker to endorse a strategy featuring Young Pyromancer and more burn spells such as Magma Jet, Skullcrack or Warleader’s Helix
Creatures
4 Young Pyromancer
4 Rakdos Cackler
4 Firedrinker Satyr
4 Burning-Tree Emissary
Spells
4 Chained to the Rocks
4 Lightning Strike
4 Boros Charm
4 Shock
4 Magma Jet
4 Skullcrack
Lands
4 Sacred Foundry
4 Temple Of Triumph
2 Temple of Silence
10 Mountain
Playing MD cards such as Skullcrack greatly improves matches like Mono-Black Devotion or Esper and Young Pyromancer may be able to stop Master’s tokens alone, which is great. We can add Warleader’s Helix to this deck but it is a questionable decision since it costs a little too much for a deck with only 20 lands. I will try a list with a pair of them instead of the full set of Magma Jets.
Mono-Red seems to be one of the best decks if your field is without Mono-Blue Devotion. You can improve this bad match by including White and playing one of the two decklists mentioned.
That’s all for today.
See you in Vienna!
Samuele Estratti