Burkek & KrazyCaley's Standard Analysis - Bloodhall and 5CC

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burkek

13 December 2011

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Standard meta-analysis:

Decks from invitational to watch out for:

R/b Bloodhall and Five Color Control

Notes from KrazyCaley in italics.

R/B Bloodhall:

This deck is beautiful. This is in my opinion an improved rdw. It takes the key cards in the rdw deck and adds a lot of other powerful cards to replace the rest, such as Olivia Voldaren. This deck was, in my opinion, one of the best innovations that came out of the invitational, and the best innovation for standard.

I liked this deck when I first ran into it yesterday. This deck looked at the current RDW and, like me, was dissatisfied with it. Thus, everything in the original RDW that sucked was taken out and replaced with slightly bigger, MUCH nastier stuff. The reliance on Chandra's Phoenix and more and better burn spells, plus of course Shrine of Burning Rage and the namesake Stensia Bloodhall make this a MUCH more powerful deck against control and midrange decks while sacrificing just a little speed.

Here is the deck: R/B bloodhall

Strengths:

The short answer to this is the whole deck, but I will do a more detailed analysis anyways.

This deck is particularly good against slow-developing control decks such as Solar Flare, U/B Control, U/W Gideon control, and the like.

Batterskull: This is a recurring artifact that has life link and vigilance, what is there not to like?

The problem with the original RDW is that removal of any kind just kills it dead. Batterskull is one of many cards that tries to fix the problem by including more effects that are resistant to removal (and in this case, counterspells as well.

Shrine of Burning Rage: Beats control, and is a major factor in every other match up. This card is one of the corner stones to any deck that runs it.

This deck makes original RDW go, and it is no different here. This card is still the most dangerous one present in the deck.

Chandra's Phoenix: This card is a recurring shock, dealing 2 damage a turn. It is a good tempo and very difficult to kill permanently. This card is another key player taken over from rdw directly.

Olivia Voldaren: The card that has been getting so much press, this card is incredibly powerful. This card is a game winner and it will contribute significantly to your deck's damage output.

This is the creature the deck relies on against other midrange creature-based decks. It can certainly be dangerous if left alive, but is generally too vulnerable.

Koth of the Hammer: Another very powerful card. This card provides an additional 4 damage a turn and can eventually allow you to turn all your untapped mountains to become Geistflames every turn. This card overall will add a lot of damage to your deck.

Notice how I cannot now just dismiss this card as "the obvious counterspell target." In RDW decks that run it, you could save your counters for this because nothing else short of the shrine would be particularly threatening. Now there are LOTS of threats.

Volt Charge: proliferates and bolts, its pretty good in a deck with koth, Olivia, shrine, and stromkirk.

Slagstorm: bye aggro.

This deck wishes Volcanic Fallout was still around so that Olivia Voldaren wouldn't die to their board-sweeper.

Devil's Play: A powerful late game card that can almost be viewed as a win condition.

Fireball-du-jour. Great because it comes back, continuing with the recursion theme.

Stensia Bloodhall: This card means you will never run out of burn. You get an over-costed shock every turn while this is in play.

I hate to see this card as a control player. I can have total control of the board and still die to this thing. Yet another reason to run Ghost Quarter, as if you didn't have enough.

The sideboard is full of great answers also, containing cards such as Doom Blade, witchbane orb, and Manic Vandal.

Overall this deck is powerful throughout the entire game. Its midgame plan is probably the strongest point for this deck, but it will perform well in late game regardless. It has a lot of the most powerful cards in the format and it allows for a lot of damage to win before the end game ever occurs.

Weaknesses:

This deck has the same weaknesses as RDW, at least on a basic level. Destroy their shrine and batterskull and kill their creatures and they will probably be left helpless, but you still need to worry about koth and Stensia Bloodhall even then.

Ironically, this midrange deck is, I would say, probably weakest against OTHER midrange decks. This deck's paranoia about removal serves it well against control, and its own suite of answers helps it out against the yet-more-aggressive decks, but it definitely sacrifices something against other midrange decks, such as Wolf Run or humans. This deck has no real answers to a Titan overwhelm backed by Kessig Wolf Run, and a plausibly bad draw might leave it vulnerable to that deck's Inkmoth Nexus. The matchup against humans will depend on how much can be netted by Slagstorm, and whether or not Olivia Voldaren will stay on the board. If Slagstorm can't be used at an efficient level, and if Olivia goes away, humans wipe the floor with this deck simply because their midrange is better than Bloodhall's, if more vulnerable to other decks.

Ghost Quarter: for Stensia Bloodhall

Slagstorm: It may not permanently kill Chandra's phoenix or Olivia (since she is actually a 6 drop disguised as a 4 drop), but it will at least potentially clear most of the board.

Slagstorm will only buy you time.

Day of Judgment: it kills all their creatures; it is a good bet against this deck.

Even Day will only buy you time.

Oblivion Ring: The BEST card to have against this deck, it gets rid of koths, phoenixes, and shrines. This card is absolutely great in its versatility in this match up.

Oblivion Ring, as ever, is incredibly good against this deck. It's incredibly good against MOST decks, but ESPECIALLY one that relies so much on removal resistance. Bring 4x.

Ancient Grudge: Very useful against shrines

Surgical Extraction: Good against the phoenixes.

So to summarize, solar flare is a really hard matchup, but almost no other deck has access to most of your weaknesses, so I think this deck is pretty well positioned in this meta, particularly if someone finds a way for it to better play around solar flare.

I've seen about 4 or 5 or so Solar Flare vs. Bloodhall matchups, and Bloodhall won all but one of them. The main problem tends to be Bloodhall itself. A well-timed Olivia Voldaren can also render the usual Sun Titan fetching Phantasmal Image copying Sun Titan ad infinitum play very dangerous for the Flare player. Solar Flare WILL win if it survives, but that is a very big if.

5 Color Control

5 color control was an innovation played by Gerry Thompson to great effect, only losing with it twice in the whole tournament (both times to the deck that eventually won 2nd). A quick side note, Adam played the illusions deck he was running amazingly; doing every single choice perfectly and overall was an incredible, incredible player. But Gerry Thompson's 5 color deck featured so much innovation, it was incredible. It is a deck that I would look for in the future also; as it was just such an interesting deck list it will promote a lot of interest.

I LOVE this deck. This is the kind of deckbuilding mad science that I appreciate greatly.

Ok so here is the list:

5 color control

Strengths:

Pristine Talisman: It ramps, it negates moorland haunts, and it is able to be brought back by sun titan, making it quite a good card in a meta-game full of u/w illusions.

This card alone can single-handedly forestall defeat at the hands of an aggro deck.

Oblivion Ring: This card removes everything relevant except a couple hexproof creatures.

Best white card in standard.

Pacifism: after play testing, apparently it was determined that the 4th oblivion ring as a pacifism made the most sense, there are a lot more creature threats than non-creature threats. Still, it is a very interesting choice.

This makes complete sense to me. The reason is that Sun Titan, when fetching this card, allows it to be hooked onto creatures that have hexproof, since they were not cast, and therefore do not target! And Thrun, the Last Troll plus Geist of Saint Traft make for some very good reasons to run a Pacifism to be fetched out of the graveyard.

Ratchet Bomb: again this destroys u/w illusions, which has no creature with higher cmc than 3, and it often goes off for 0 to kill any flipped card as well as the moorland haunt tokens. Then it's brought back with sun titan for more fun later.

This card is lights-out for a lot of decks, actually.

Sun Titan: This card's ability is perfect for this deck. With so many low cmc permanents, this card's utility is very difficult to match in any format when it is used in this deck.

The deck is built around this card. If you're going to Memoricide something, Memoricide this.

Phantasmal Image: kills legendaries (including Geist of Saint Traft and Thrun, the Last Troll) as well as can double up and give you 2 sun titans for the price of 1.

Keeping the classic Solar Flare play in effect.

Blue Sun's Zenith: Late game, this draws you enough cards to flat out win. It's hard to beat an opponent who plays control and just got to draw 4 cards in a single turn.

This card makes more sense than Think Twice, etc. for this deck, since it can afford to wait.

Desperate Ravings: Quickly becoming the format's card draw of choice.

Mana Leak + Dissipate: COUNTER MAGIC!

Gut Shot: it deals with all the pesky 1 toughness things in the format, such as stromkirk noble, tokens from moorland haunt, and any illusion.

And Inkmoth Nexus of course.

Elsh Norn, Grand Cenobite: The “cruel ultimatum” of the standard format. This card will win you the game against almost any deck.

It's not QUITE as decisive as Cruel Ultimatum since it can be killed, returning everything to normal. Still, either she dies, or you do.

Day of Judgment: One of the best boards clears ever printed.

Ponder; a card draw so good it's banned in one format and restricted in another.

Unburial Rites; cheaper sun titans and elesh norns.

And it comes back.

Also the sideboard is full of good stuff such as Ancient Grudge, Nihil Spellbomb, and Timely Reinforcements to help cover any holes already in this deck.

The deck has an answer for more or less everything. Thanks, 5-color!

Weaknesses: For the first time, I have to say I have no idea. It is definitely a beatable deck, but I cannot think of any particular matchup where it is at a severe disadvantage. As I said, it lost twice during the tournament to an incredibly well played u/w illusions deck, but it beat a lot more on the way to finals. The biggest think I can think of is that if you take out its sun titans and elsh norn, then the only creature left to kill you is phantasmal image. Also, by take out, I mean exile so that unburial rites aren't use able. Any input here would be much appreciated. I might revisit this deck later if it continues to perform well with more information on it, but for now I am still looking at all the tech in this deck and wondering, is there a way to beat this deck consistently in the current meta?

If you can resolve Memoricide against it or otherwise get rid of Sun Titan as a threat, you will kill it. Also, a deck that has an answer for everything is less likely to have the RIGHT answer- this tends to make it vulnerable against decks that can swarm it quickly enough, though that will depend on the draws of the five color deck.