There are several decks I'm thinking about working on in Standard right now, but I assume you're probably most interested in seeing how the deck I recently had success with plays. So here's my update of the deck I played at Grand Prix Charleston:
Creatures (27)
- 4 Avacyn's Pilgrim
- 4 Champion of the Parish
- 4 Mayor of Avabruck
- 4 Precinct Captain
- 3 Restoration Angel
- 4 Silverblade Paladin
- 1 Sublime Archangel
- 3 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
Lands (24)
Spells (8)
There are some other changes I'm thinking about, but let's start with the most basic. This is the deck I played in Charleston with a Rogue's Passage over a Gavony Township and an extra Nevermore in the sideboard over a Garruk Relentless.
I think Rogue's Passage is probably bad, but some people have said they like it, so I thought I'd try one out to compare.
Round 1: Deathtouch Pingers
It's amazing that I never saw a single spell from my opponent other than the Peddler/Staticaster combo and possibly more amazing that I won despite that. This kind of thing makes the Oblivion Rings extremely important. I don't want a lot of them because you never really need more than one per game and you want to stay aggressive, but a third certainly wouldn't be out of line, particularly if Staticaster and/or Somberwald Sage pick up.
As I mentioned during the games, there was a little bit of playing around Staticaster, but they were largely plays I would have been making anyway. You always want to focus on just killing decks like this, but it's important to not let them get more value than the minimum if you can help it. In this case, in game 1 I soulbonded with the creature that did the most damage because it was also the safest, but there are other times when it's right to soulbond with a weaker creature so that their removal spell can't get the best of both worlds.
For my next games, I'm going to try another change that I've been thinking about. I'm going to cut the second Sublime Archangel for the fourth Selesnya Charm and test an Ulvenwald Tracker in that sideboard slot. Tracker is pretty weak in this deck because I don't have a lot of big guys to fight with, but he's pretty good at picking on Elves and especially Somberwald Sage. I think I'd like to be a little better set up in that matchup.
Round 2: Mono-Red Aggro
In all three games, Rogue's Passage was or would have been slightly worse than Gavony Township, but this isn't the matchup for it. I don't think there's a lot to say about the first two games. Game 3 was pretty interesting, but I think I covered everything I was thinking about in the video itself.
Round 3: Jund
The Jund matchup is very scary. If they have a good curve of removal into a good monster, it's extremely difficult to win. That said, your draw can be too fast for their removal, especially if Thalia is involved and you're on the play, and you do have a few answers to their monsters.
This was another data point against Rogue's Passage, which I'm pretty sure is bad, but there's no real reason for me not to keep trying it out.
The keep in game 2 played out really badly. There's a good chance I shouldn't have kept it, but I'm not sure if that's just results talking.
Round 4: Bant Control
That's a very hard matchup. It's impressive that I was able to grind him out in a long game in game 1, but winning the match is definitely difficult when his deck is biased that much toward beating aggro (he had a lot of cards that are very bad in the mirror in his maindeck). Restoration Angel was awesome for him in games 2 and 3, which demonstrates how important Selesnya Charm is against decks that have Restoration Angel.
Thanks for watching,
Sam
@samuelhblackon Twitter
About Sam Black
Sam Black was a member of Team USA 2008, taking home the Team World Championship crown in Memphis. He also placed in the Top 8 of GP Barcelona and GP Singapore 2009, GP Gothenburg 2010, GP Atlanta 2012, and GP Yokohama in 2013 and made Top 4 of PT Phildalphia 2011.