Zaueski yeah, that thing is horrendous.

I can't guarantee myself a win against it each time, while making my Sideboard work for a range of other decks.

It will very much be up to who draws best.

I hate that kind of matchup. Coming soon to a LGS near you!

Would Ghirapur Orrery Work in this deck?

McSky23 it helps if you link a card like this - Ghirapur Orrery - so the other person doesn't have to look it up.

The Orrery would see me drawing FOUR cards at the start of every turn.

I think you might have overlooked this at the start of my description:

"If this deck ends up with only one or two cards in hand THAT IS A VERY GOOD THING."

If I used Ghirapur Orrery I would be struggling to keep my hand at one or less cards.

I agree that this deck needs help against control matchups. After playing a non-sideboarded best-of-3 against my UB Control deck(http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/how-to-win-in-amonkhet/), the cows only had a shot in one of the games, but couldn't get there. Though Lay Bare the Heart is a great hand disruption spell, I firmly believe Transgress the Mind is the card you want in that slot. With Torrential Gearhulk being the centerpiece of any control list in this format, you NEED that exile to keep your opponent from getting value out of their spell regardless of your hand disruption.

Of COURSE this deck won't beat a Control deck PRE-SIDEBOARD.

Lay Bare the Heart is NOT just for the Control matchup.

You can't just build your Sideboard for one deck.

Where Torrential Gearhulk is concerned, Lay Bare the Heart and Transgress the Mind have exactly the same effect, unless the deck has recursion.

In my mind, if you have a very poor matchup pre-sideboard, you should devote slots purely to that matchup unless you're okay just losing that match (which is okay if you don't expect to see it very much). I believe control decks will become popular in Amonkhet Standard just with a glance at the MTGO SCL's.

If you set up your Sideboard for one matchup you open yourself up to be defeated by other decks that it's not set up for.

I agree. However, my point is that, since Control is such a bad matchup for this deck, Transgress the Mind and a couple grindy spells can be used to improve the matchup post-board. I think, since you have access to the best removal spells in MtG (being both and ) you have a great post-board plan against aggressive decks. At this point, you have only to improve your game-plan against grindy midrange and control decks. These decks usually have considerable graveyard interaction.

I love this deck, I upvoted. I found this while I was building my own Tribal Minotaurs. I have a couple questions though:

1. Why didn't you include Merciless Javelineer?

2. Have you considered using Key to the City instead of Throne of the God-Pharaoh? It gives you another simple discard method, and it gives you another way to easily attack in for simple damage, including Neheb, the Worthy.

Thanks in advance for taking time to answer!

Bano42 this deck is very finely tuned.

Every part is necessary for its game plan.

I only wanted one type of Minotaur in the 4 drop slot.

If you give your Minotaurs Trample in the late game it finishes things faster with their First Strike and their +2/0.

Therefore Ondu Champion did the job.

Throne of the God-Pharaoh is amazing. It lets damage escalate very quickly.

It's not been unusual to hit for an extra 3 life on each turn, with it on the field. Even with two Creatures, 5 damage becomes 7 damage.

What I also like about it is, if a Creature becomes chump blocked, it will still do some damage.

It also works with the Exert Minotaur, as it does 1 damage the turn after it has been Exalted.

I'll think about Key to the City. I can't see it offering the same value.

So, my build is pretty similar. But I prefer 4 Fiery Temper to fling, just because you can discard it to Bloodrage Brawler and get some value there. I think it might be worth it to explore some madness subthemes, since the deck is already discard heavy. But I really do like this build, and will probably be taking something like it to FNM this week.

Argeaux

I understand now why not the Merciless Javelineer. I ended up taking him out of my deck as well, I thought his ability read differently than it really does.

I really really want to love Throne of the God-Pharaoh! I bought a play-set the moment I saw it. Having not play-tested it myself, I feel like it might play a bit slow, but I do see the value in it, especially with exerted Minotaurs. I just thought I would recommend Key to the City as well because I feel like it works well conceptually with this deck: it offers a discard opportunity, it allows a free attacker in (an easy way to get Neheb in), and it offers you another draw late-game if you got stuck with a Land and need to try again.

Thanks again, and great deck!

Orliosis22 I'm aware of the interaction between Bloodrage Brawler and Fiery Temper.

I don't like it for this deck.

I only have 3 Brawlers and I like to get them out on Turn 2.

You can't Madness cast the Fiery Temper on that turn.

The Turn 3 slot is for other Minotaurs with excellent abilities.

As I only have 3 Brawlers, the connect between me playing them and having Fiery Temper in hand is slight.

Finally, there are cards I prefer that deal more damage to Creatures.

I don't wish to play a Madness subtheme, as that is not my vision.

Bano42 in my experience Throne of the God-Pharaoh speeds things up, not slows things down.

I understand exactly what Key to the City does. I'm not thick.

I'm not convinced that having to discard a card each time I want to activate it is a great idea, in a deck where very few extraneous cards will be in hand.

Argeaux; you know how I love your decks; however they're built. And I do enjoy playtesting them against my decks.

So I took this for a spin in a BO3. I took the first two, but that 2nd game almost got me as your post sideboard deck does do things to ruin my day. Having said that I don't know how you would respond in this situation

You have all this open mana, I am wide open with no walkers and no blockers; but all my mana is open and 4 cards in hand. You have a single Minotaur Sureshot and can pump it up to deal lethal to me. You have seen in GM1 that I do have Torrential Gearhulks. You have no cards in hand; and I do have a Grasp of darkness in my yard

Would you go for the kill; hoping that I didn't have a Torrental Gearhulk in my hand; in which case I would bring back the Grasp to kill your Sureshot?

AgentGreen I need to know how much mana I actually have available.

How much mana do you have available?

I also need to know what our life totals are.

Do I have Throne of the God-Pharaoh on the field?

Also, how recently have I looked at your hand with either Collective Brutality or Lay Bare the Heart?

My gut says to attack, because I am trying to run you out of cards, basically.

So, if you play your Torrential Gearhulk and cast Grasp of Darkness, you now have two less cards.

You can do that to kill my Minotaur anyway, so I might as well have a go.

Attack, wait to see if you kill my Minotaur, if you don't I pump the shit out of it.

I should also point out that I need to readjust my Sideboards as I've replaced Fling with Supernatural Stamina.

Another little nasty sting for Control decks.

I was talking with my partner about playtesting this morning.

It can tell if your deck works, but can't REALLY tell you how it fares against other decks.

In case you hadn't noticed, when most people playtest, their deck wins.

How do you lull your Opponent in with a false sense of security, or "trick" them, when you can see both hands?

I don't know how everyone else tests but I will force my deck to make mistakes, when I test. To mimic what I would do IRL.

The only REAL testing ground comes when we take our decks to tournament.

Most of the time, when that happens, mine perform how I want them to.

Therein lies the other issue. We're playing in our local meta, not the Tappedout meta.

tl;dr playtesting is not as conclusive as we think it is.

I built my own variant off your decklist, and I've found that Fling and Supernatural Stamina have great synergy together. If you play a Bloodrage Brawler turn 2, then turn 3 you can swing with the Brawler, buff it with Supernatural Stamina, and use Fling on it after combat damage is dealt. Your Brawler will return to the battlefield tapped after being sacrificed, and you'll have dealt an easy 12 direct damage on your second turn if your opponent has nothing out.

gameguy957 where is your list?

What did you remove to have both of those cards in?

Probably too many "ifs" in that scenario for me, but glad that it's working for you.

Let the record show that I waited for one year to put Ondu Champion in a deck.

I didn't forget about you, buddy.

Argeaux here's my list:

CREATURE SPELLSAhn-Crop Crasher x3Bloodrage Brawler x4Neheb, the Worthy x3Minotaur Sureshot x4Cursed Minotaur x4Ondu Champion x3Zulaport Cutthroat x1

NON-CREATURE SPELLSMagma Spray x4Supernatural Stamina x4Fling x4Cut / Ribbons x1Throne of the God-Pharaoh x1Hazoret's Monument x2

LANDCanyon Slough x1Evolving Wilds x2Mountain x11Swamp x8

A lot of my deck is based off what I already had or could get from my local shop.

gameguy957 it's funny, at first I only had 3 Ondu Champion.

Soon became apparent what a champ that card is.

So, I think where we are veering off is that you go for that early damage, whereas I am happy to eke out a few extra points of damage a Turn with Throne of the God-Pharaoh.

Then we both curve up into the one-two knock out of Neheb, the Worthy + Ondu Champion.

Let me know how the deck ends up playing for you.

This deck is brutal, so many ways to kick your opponent's ass, and when it gets going it's very hard to stop.

Argeaux How does this fare against Maru Vehicles or Snakie deck; which is the likely successor post kitty ban

gameguy957 I don't know why you didn't put your deck on Tappedout.

Kind of the reason why this site exists.

Anyway, I made it.

You can find it here, if you want to copy it: Grab Em by the Horns

AgentGreen it outraces both of those decks.

#1 Mardu Vehicles is forced to start blocking, or risk taking too much damage.

This warms up faster than Snek Deck.

As you say, this constantly pulls off crazy board states out of nowhere. It's all the extra +2/0 everything gets, when your hand size drops down to 1 card just before you attack.

We've started testing it in paper and it plays the same as on here.

It really confuses Opponents as to what plays they should make. Spot removal really doesn't have much effect on it either.

Supernatural Stamina has been testing well. Glad I made that switch.

So, did I make the right play in that game hypothetical you set up before?

In your hypothetical set up; I did have a gearhulk; dropped it and grasped your critter. You then started to draw into your lands while my hulk started bashing you to death and you couldn't draw into your unlicenced disentigration. You tried to cast a creature only to have it countered

So basically, no matter what play I made, my draw was gonna let me down.

Land flooding is why I remove two lands when playing against Control.

We're any of the games Sideboarded?

I already know that I can't beat Control Pre-Sideboard.