Alright, one of these again. This is my personal approximation of what a general tierlist would be, don't get all mad if your "super competitive Ragnar list" isn't on here. Just give your justification, a list if you can, and if it's actually good, I'll make the change.
The list is organized into tiers. A description of each of the tiers can be found below. Here's my basic run-down of the archetypes that each deck is classified by.
Deck Archetypes
Stax
Stax is a deck archetype that denies opponents their mana or their permanents. This is achieved in several different ways. Some decks use MLD and artifact hate, and run a high density of dorks (Selvala). Some decks run a lot of artifacts, then run stuff like Winter Orb and Stasis (Brago). Some decks use recursion and grindy advantage, as well as mass boardwipes (Daretti). Stax decks are very good right now, as the redundancy of most decks (Static Orb, Winter Orb, Rising Waters, Hokori) wasn't as impacted by the loss of partialing as much as combo decks. Most powerful stax decks will usually get a lock piece down by turn 4 or 5, but sometimes as early as turn 2. Most stax decks will run a way to escape their locks. With Teferi, he can -1 to pay for Stasis. Brago can untap mana rocks, and Daretti can sac and reanimate rocks. The decks will usually have a combo finish, but some decks win through combat damage.
Combo
Combo is a deck archetype that, simply put, comboes. However, the biggest cards in the archetype are the enablers. For example, Zur is one of the best combo decks in the format right now. The deck utilizes the enablers Doomsday and Ad Nauseam. These cards make it easy to find your combo, and Zur's ability to tutor up Necro is strong. Decks like these run a lot of tutors and sometimes a high density of cantrips. Storm is another strong combo archetype, with conventional and High Tide variants. Most combo decks goldfish on turn 4 or 5, but sometimes as early as turn 3.
Control
Generally regarded as one of the weakest archetypes, Control needs to run some sort of draw engine. The fact that most competitive EDH games are 4-player makes it so that most counterspells that you play will be card disadvantage. The top control decks run their draw engines as their generals (Damia, Azami), and they usually act as the "policeman" of the table, keeping the combo decks in check. These decks almost always have a combo finish, helped by the fact that they have counterspell protection. Note that there are no tier 1 control decks.
Hybrid
These decks fill the general "midrange" niche of competitive EDH. This archetype has varied gameplans, so I'll give my analysis of the hybrid deck that I have the most experience with, Yisan. The deck is a toolbox deck, utilizing Yisan's tutor to put creatures into play to consistently counter the enemy gameplans. My deck is tuned for my local meta, running cards that may be suboptimal like Tajuru Preservers and Soul of New Phyrexia, which are hosers against my meta. The deck tutors up its hate pieces, and has many, many combos, as well as the Avenger of Zendikar into Craterhoof finish. The decks often do very well against Stax decks, but do well against all kinds of decks.
Tier Description
Tier One
These decks are the best of the best. They can be expected to regularly show up at competitive tables, and can easily chew through casual tables. They're not unbeatable, but they are among the strongest EDH decks. Most decks are resilient to most forms of interaction, and can win through some weaker stax pieces. The decks should win more than 25% of their games.
Tier Two
Only slightly worse than tier 1, these decks can decently hold their own against tier 1 decks, and can win some of the time. While generally weaker, these decks are still quite powerful. The big setback for these decks is usually either that they are a turn slower, they're inconsistent, or they have some "silver bullet" that is easily found (Pithing Needle against Azami, Rest in Peace against Mimeoplasm).
Tier Three
These decks are still competitive, but are worse than tier 1 and 2. They can are usually a few turns slower than the best decks, or have consistency issues that keep them out of higher tiers. They can sometimes win against higher decks, but most of the time they just get outclassed.
Tier Four
These decks are usually hard to win with. They are either inconsistent, easily hated out, or slow. Most "good" aggro decks go in this tier, as dealing 120 damage through combat usually isn't a powerful wincon. These decks are hard to win, and they will probably lose against better decks. The decks can occasionally steal wins against better decks, but they generally aren't very good.
Thanks for reading this! I'm going to add spoiler tags when I have the time. I'm very open to suggestions, and if you can make a good argument for moving something up or down, I'll probably make the change. Thanks!
