Get To Know Your Metagame: Mythic

Features

KrazyCaley

13 May 2010

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Mythic, so called because it features four or five mythic rare cards and plenty of regular rares, is not the deck you want if you are on a budget. Mythic comes in two flavors nowadays- with and without Eldrazi Conscription. We'll talk about both.

Core cards (Basically always there)

Baneslayer Angel, Lotus Cobra, Knight of the Reliquary, Noble Hierarch, Birds of Paradise, Rafiq of the Many, Finest Hour.

If you're running Mythic Conscription-style, then you will also undoubtedly have Sovereigns of Lost Alara and Eldrazi Conscription, of course.

Secondary cards (Depends on the build)

Rampaging Baloths, Thornling, Rhox War Monk, Jace, the Mind Sculptor, Mind Control, Admonition Angel, various counterspells and assorted paraphernalia.

How it works

The cards that Mythic runs are so expensive because they are really, really good. Baneslayer Angel is a flying, first striking, lifelinking 5/5 badass for a mere 5 that HAS to get blasted by a removal spell before it takes over the game by itself. Lotus Cobra, in combination with the deck's fetch lands, can produce obscene amounts of mana very early in the game. Rhox War Monk, Knight of the Reliquary, and Rafiq of the Many, in combination with Finest Hour and perhaps some of the associate fatties noted above, bring the pain. In Conscription builds, getting Sovereigns of Lost Alara to activate will win the game automatically if you can't kill the soon-to-be-enchanted-with-Eldrazi Conscription creature.

How to beat it

Bring removal. The deck has nasty monsters, but their heavy casting costs means that you can get some very good value for a Terminate or Maelstrom Pulse. Consuming Vapors punches this deck right in the solar plexus, as does most mass removal. You have to have a fairly high number of answers, or else this deck will kill you with nasty monsters VERY quickly. It is not uncommon to see a turn 3 Baneslayer Angel against this deck, and before you know it, Finest Hour and Rafiq will be out there, and you will be looking at game over before turn 5.

If you pick your fights and blast the right creatures (or all of them), this deck is very beatable. This deck HATES Nemesis Trap, if you're brave enough to run it in your sideboard, and any other efficient removal. Jund and other B/R decks are especially pleased to draw their Blightnings and other discard spells against Mythic, which then has to throw $50 cards into the trash. Some builds do run counterspells, so beware, but typically it'll just be a few Negates to protect its creatures and nothing more.

You have to mulligan aggressively against this deck. If you don't have removal, or SOME answer for Baneslayer Angel and Co. in your opening hand, you will probably lose. Don't be afraid to throw away an otherwise good 3 land, 4 spell hand if it's got no answers, unless you're SURE you can put up enough damage quickly enough, keeping in mind that Mythic has lots of ways to gain life.

Good sideboard choices

Terminate, Consuming Vapors, Day of Judgment, Infest or Volcanic Fallout, Mind Rot, Doom Blade, Deathmark, etc. Path is not such a great choice because this deck DOES want to get a bunch of mana out.

Tomorrow's Meta: U/W Control