It's time. Get the plates. We're serving Teferi. For the longest time this planeswalker has bothered the living hell out of me. I'm only glad that
Nicol Bolas, Dragon-God
has arrived to make things more stable. I'm still playing with the idea that Amass could be an ideal control/mid-range ability, but for right now I'm cleaving pretty closely to traditional, and current Grixis Midrange in Standard. I'm open to ideas as far as pushing the Amass theme more, but not going into a creature based deck. I don't want zombies, and I don't want tribal, I'm looking to stay more control, and just splashing a few creatures here and there. There's a big reason for that, and generally speaking it is because Esper Control remains at the top of the meta. There is a reason for this, and while some decks like RG Aggro have shown some promise, and will be much stronger, I still think Esper will be at the top for some time. Temur is showing some explosive and spicy ideas, Sultai will be strong still I believe, and RG Aggro will also get stronger. All of these decks have one thing in common though; they largely get bent over by Esper. Largely because of fucking
Teferi, Hero of Dominaria
and no thanks to
Teferi, Time Raveler
showing up we've got ourselves a Class A-1 Criminal on our hands here. Some have said, why not play the M19
Nicol Bolas, the Ravager
? Well, b/c
God-Eternal Kefnet
makes him look like a side of cold french fries. To boot, Keffers is a much easier spell to cast and recurs himself. I am tempted to drop 3 in the deck, and cut a
Hostage Taker
.
Anyway, back to the main point, midrange/control base, and lets branch out from there. Aggro decks were the largest problem for this deck on the whole, but
Enter the God-Eternals
really does just shut that shit down. I'm hoping this is the case. Couple this with board clears, and some very aggressive sideboarding and that should be neutralized. Most of my board is dedicated to killing Esper Control and Aggro. I'm tempted to still shove
Vraska's Contempt
in here some place, but the
The Elderspell
really just does it better, faster, and better. This deck is weak against cards like
Rekindling Phoenix
and other recursive creatures, but then again, if the phoenix comes back I've got some other ideas. Cards like
Ashiok, Dream Render
in conjunction with
Enter the God-Eternals
can mill and or remove recursive Gods, and murder any version of any phoenix around.
So far, I'm having issues thinking on increasing God-Eternal Kefnet's ability, b/c it is spicy. Sadly, cards like
Augur of Bolas
don't trigger him, and cards like
Opt
just seem lacking. Of course there's
Chemister's Insight
but we're again back in the 4 mana range, and we have a very high CMC as it stands. Obviously a WIP, input is appreciated. Again, trying to stay into control/midrange.
Edit 1: Removed some cards, namely maindeck counterspells, I needed more instant card draw, so
Chemister's Insight
is back. I've also added
Widespread Brutality
because I find it fascinating how much it really does just win.
Edit 2: Dreadhorde Invasion and Liliana are a go for launch. We are going deep on Amass now. The token help with Liliana is good stuff. More importantly she is even more hate and her removal ability is sick. Tokens die, that’s fine. I draw cards from her too as a result.
Edit 3: Liliana is definitely now staying after tonight. She’s a great alternative win-con if Bolas is countered. She works in this deck frighteningly well. Next, Ritual of Soot is a dead card. It kills your tokens, which is bad, and well whilst it does remove creature like Krasis and other threats it does not assist as well as you want it to for four mana. In its place I’m adding two Invade the City. Why? In the control match up they dominate. You won’t always have any target whatsoever for ETGE, you’ll board them out, and sometimes even board out your Widespread Brutality depending on a few factors. These Amass, and in one instance I basically would see a potential 10/10 token for three mana hit the board. It’s pretty huge in this deck. Narset’s Reversal is handy facing Temur Reclamation or Jeskai Control. Do not board that in against Esper. Just don’t.
Edit 4: Performance update: Honestly, I'm starting to think Dreadhorde Invasion is almost worth a third copy some place in the deck. I might cut one Duress in the sideboard and put another one there for control match ups. It is absurd how powerful it is against Esper, and right now, I think that's 100% the deck to beat in the current meta. We'll see what happens, but I know that card is powerful beyond people's understanding at this point. Liliana still continues to be a TOP performer. She is so powerful that I think you could run 4 Liliana and 2 Bolas and win a lot of matches. Her high starting loyalty, rather simple mana cost, and ability to absolutely crush your opponent's board are nuts. In addition, her card draw seems to come from nowhere, and for free thanks to so much control being in the meta. Every time they remove a creature, your opponent has to ponder giving you card advantage. One game I had an amass token, and 3 zombies on the board, and my opponent tapped for a board clear and then stopped, and looked picked up Liliana. He looked at my two card hand and knew this was a bad situation right off the cuff. He opted to not wipe my board, and during his endstep I tossed out a Commence the End Game and he just scooped b/c it was certainly lethal. A 3/3 Army became an 8/8 unit and with two other tokens on the board he knew it was over. Of course I was already ahead and it was win-more, but he easily could have made the call to wipe the board, and let me have cards, but he opted not to. The result was that he just paid a lethal price. Those kinds of plays really do make Liliana potentially the best walker in the set, and she's incredibly undervalued I believe at like $20. She's worth every bit of $30+ for certain. Nicol is still very much up there, but I think she's on par with him in terms of sheer board flex. She opens up entire avenues of attack in a great many decks.
Edit 5: Added 2 Vraska's Contempt to the sideboard for exile options. I want these versus Phoenixes, and other cards that need an exile versus a destroy spell. The problem with Bedevil is that while it's an amazing spell that also resolves many of the same issues, it does not exile. The deck also is sort of weak to flying creatures. I don't come across many phoenixes these days, but when I do, I should have an option open. Liliana and Rampage are great destroy effects, as is Nicol himself, but I'll need to leverage an exile spell in order to avoid the two for one control spend on a creature with heavy recursion. Even ETGE works to destroy, and then mill a god off the top if it recurs.
Edit 6: So, as it turns out Narset herself is far, far, more powerful against Temur Rec than just Reversal. She all but shuts it off. The same can be said for Esper. Anyway, she's a handful if resolved, and is a great lightning rod away from your other walkers. I'm going to also advocate running one copy of Ugin place of one copy Dreadhorde Invasion. While Dreadhorde I love seeing, I'm finding Ugin will do things in the control match up that makes siding out one Liliana well worth doing. Ugin also removes enchantments, which this deck has an issue doing. I've also decided to add back Deliver Unto Evil versus the control match ups. I'm finding that to be of value in several ways.
Sidenote 1: I'm very aware that Grixis Control is also a deck. This is not that deck. Grixis control leans heavily on spells, and even uses counterspells like
Ionize
and other spells like
Ritual of Soot
. It might even run things like
Moment of Craving
. This isn't the setup I'm shoooting for. I'm using control aspects with a board state. I'm not looking to watch paint dry. I do enjoy the occasional creature poke for some damage. Murdering someone with a 19/19 Amass token is fun sometimes as well as killing someone with a Nicol or Lili Ult. Dimir Midrange is coming up into its own thing as well. That's always another hot deck, but again, this deck isn't that either, b/c of the splash of red. I think the conjunction of Amass, control-esque board clearing, discard spells, and planeswalkers leads to this form of midrange. Having flexibility in your win conditions is crucial I think right now. Going the control route for Grixis I feel you just fall flat. Aggro defeats you, as it has for the last full on year. Going the full featured creature/zombie list I think also falls flat, because even with
Lazotep Plating
there's still so much removal out there you'll just be reaching. Staying in the middle means you have a variety of options. Keep planeswalkers on the table, keep spells on the table, keep a some board presence around, and you'll be ok.
Edit 7: I've been playing standard for two weeks, and my current W/L record is 9W 7L. Things I've noticed that impact me: MONO RED. We have to make changes b/c its everywhere. So, main deck we're going two
Tyrant's Scorn
, and putting
Dreadhorde Invasion
in the sideboard. I'm seeing a lot less control match ups, and midrange is becoming a thing as well. Bant Flash and Esper Hero lock in my picks on those two cards.
Ugin, the Ineffable
become a staple in the sideboard against a lot of decks. Even against Red, the card is good. He comes out and just delivers value immediately. It's tough picking between his draw power and Liliana's amazing removal. I love both really. Nicol is performing great, but he's targeted quite a bit. The singleton of Deliver Unto Evil in the board is probably on the bubble, once I find a decent replacement in the three drop slot. I just don't know what besides Ashiok. I might turn that into a singleton Disdainful Stroke.
Edit 8: I went Top 8 in a local tourney where we were playing for a box of Japanese boosters, divied up among the top 8 players. I did fairly well. Anyway, but yeah I amended the deck some more. I've added two
Nicol Bolas, the Ravager
to the main deck to smooth out the intense curve. I added two more
Tyrant's Scorn
and removed two copies of
Augur of Bolas
because in a four set he's just not that great. Two seems to be the right amount.
Liliana, Dreadhorde General
is still a keeper, but she's an alternate win-con game one.
Edit 9: I've made one final adjustment, in that I'm leaning in on trying
Search for Azcanta
and I have a belief that its ok because I've added enough low mana removal in the form of
Tyrant's Scorn
to suppress aggro.
Angrath's Rampage
solves low to the ground planeswalkers as well. I'm gonna try it, and if it fails, then I'll pop back over to the Augur. I'm also putting
The Elderspell
back in the mix. I'm finding people are now unabashedly using Sakhan the Masterless to basically build entire flights of walker dragon armies then swing out. This sort of top end needs a remedy.
Edit 10: This list is now optimized for the current meta. Phoenix and Jeskai Walkers showed up and I destroy them. 4C Midrange shows up, and I own them. No deck with multitudes of Planeswalkers stands up against this. In addition, main deck Ego, if you’re smart, is perhaps the most powerful card here. Ashiok, Contempt, Ego, and Narset rip Phoenix decks to shreds. It’s an absolute thrill to just hunt down birds like this.
Edit 11: I've been doing a lot of work with this, and have again, tweaked the deck to combat the onslaught of walkers and the meta. Pray I tweak it no further.
