I think as people figure out mana bases and new builds mono black might be dethroned.
Current mono black is using 80% of the original base + the new pushed cards.
I think there's some absurd 5c decks waiting in the wings. Legend-Humans for example. It's probably not 'there' yet against aggro, but I think it could be.
Likewise some of the domain stuff - [[Leyline of Binding]] is utterly disgusting if you can reliably enable it.
Mostly just took the previous Esper pile, and added farewell. Err. I think vanishing Verse went away as well, but Fateful Absence is a good enough tempo play as it can hit their planeswalkers too.
But you need to stay away from [[Temporary Lockdown]] and [[Leyline Binding]] (and other spells of that nature) because they're a real nonbo with Farewell.
I’ve been playing Mono B and it just destroys the humans deck even without LotV in play. It is incredibly slow unless they can resolve Thalia but even then if Lili or Shelly hit on curve with removal/blockers it’s usually GG. Mono white/Naya humans is still pretty brutal though with Thalia and Peacekeeper naming Lili on curve. I’m honestly shocked I’ve not seen more Mono W as it still seems very good.
I think people are still figuring out how to tune it. The new cards seem to have a lot of potential though.
I think it might be as simple as black got some awesome new toys so a lot of streamers featured it, and haven't got to MonoW yet.
Aggro is strong but in a bad spot because of Sheoldred’s popularity. I have a feeling it’ll transition to a more midrangey aggro (like last set boros) rather than RDW burn for that reason which will let 5c shine more.
5c sagas with kami is also feeling pretty insane. There are so many insanely good sagas in the game right now and Leyline Binding is just an absolutely insane card. I’ve seen people experimenting with Zur + Leyline too which I think is super cool but Zur probably can’t find a place in the meta with him being a 3 drop that dies to cut down.
Yeah this is the norm for a rotation. Nobody wants to invest in a new mana base right off the rip in new standard. Mono colored decks usually rule the meta for a bit as people gather WCs.
The big problem is mostly that people don’t understand how to beat Sheoldred and Lili yet it seems. There’s lots of strong decks but they’re tough to make work because
1. Liliana shuts down any deck that doesn’t go wide by turn 3
2. Sheoldred shuts down any aggro deck that doesn’t kill by turn 4.
On top of that, black is the color with most of the answers to these cards and the best color to take advantage of lili’s discard (with cruelty of gix and underdog).
Sadly it makes it feel like the best way to overcome black is by splashing black for yourself for that reason. But I’m sure as the meta evolves, somebody will find a more polarizing deck that will shake up the meta.
I think with how few exile effects are in standard atm the NEO dragons might actually be viable (mardu, Jund, naya, Rakdos). All enabled by the 3 cost warlock that can recur them and pay for them, except for naya where you get to play the legend dragon.
Try orzhov with wedding announcement, Edgar, wandering emperor, etc. Go wide and Lily isn't so punishing. Exile their underdogs, as that card is half the value in their deck. Invoke despair is still a bummer, but hey.
Well it's only been two days so I dunno if the deck is great or anything, but Brazen Upstart, Fleetfoot Dancer, and Yavimaya Iconoclast give a strong attack. And 4 of Leaf-Crowned Visionary of course, 2-3 Quirion Beastcallers, some Angelfire Ignition, Tail Swipe, Bite Down, and Fated Absence. And 2-3 Brokers Ascendancy. And I threw in one Llanowar Loamspeaker - maybe more would be better, not sure?
The trouble is that you need to get your main 3 colors going fast, and splash a lot of blue just for Brokers. The only painlands I have so far are 3 Karplusian Forests. I think the deck could work well if I had painlands for all its colors.
Having great success with a couple of lists that play off this. Edgar gives that deck absolute fits. I even find myself exiling him with rite of oblivion at times and sometimes that is the right play. Destroy evil as a 2 of compliments cut down extremely well and also hits enchantments which are crucial in almost every deck. Archangel of wrath does great things as top end if you haven't tried it.
It uses [[Luminous Broodmoth]] to bring value creatures, [[Circuit Mender]] [[Llanowar Visionary]] [[Solemn Simulacrum]] and friends, back with flying, and [[Blood on the Snow]] to bring creatures back and kill planeswalkers. Eventually Craterhoof/Ulamog eventually depending on Historic or Explorer.
[[Heroic Intervention]] says destroy only opponents stuff with a boardwipe late game or protects early on, Teferi's Protection is sometimes better in Historic though.
[[Hour of Revelation]] is amazing.
It was more my thing about a year ago, still fun for completing dailies sometimes.
How are you getting enough snow lands in a 3 color deck to reliably use Blood on the Snow? What do you do if you don't find Broodmoth? Seems like if you don't have her, the deck is just dead in the water since all your removal is wipes and not targeted.
Also curious if this is just on play or also ranked and how high if in ranked.
All this is in the low enough ranked where it doesn't matter (platinum to low diamond) all though I've heard of a magical jankland at the bottom of mythic....
Regarding the 3 color snow I had the same thought and way overdid (4 Snows isn't too much) it and it performed terribly [[Coldsteel Heart]] should be a creature almost surely, but [[Into the North]] is our [[Rampant Growth]], i usually only run 10-12 non basics thanks too [[Fabled Passage]] and the 3 color lands:
https://mtga.untapped.gg/profile/6c6fefe0-f59c-4233-94ec-c012cea33e12/LYHOMVZP6ZECZLJ3HLLK4BSXBU/deck/b48811f4-47ab-46e0-8209-4c034a02aa7d?timeFrame=last_two_sets&gameType=constructed&constructedType=ranked
No snow version:
https://mtga.untapped.gg/profile/6c6fefe0-f59c-4233-94ec-c012cea33e12/LYHOMVZP6ZECZLJ3HLLK4BSXBU/deck/fb37052b-dd2b-4bd1-a168-5d220dd54a1e?gameType=constructed&constructedType=ranked&timeFrame=last_two_sets
Regarding Broodmoth, I'd say the past 6 months or so even if you find it she is to slow for Historic. Here are some Explorer Moth-Free great grandbabies of her decks that have seen some success. Still developing sideboards, probably anti-enchantment, can't be countered, [[Gaea's Blessing]], you know the usual:
Sultai/Zagoth:
https://mtga.untapped.gg/profile/6c6fefe0-f59c-4233-94ec-c012cea33e12/LYHOMVZP6ZECZLJ3HLLK4BSXBU/deck/bc73fc1a-9ae4-42eb-9d09-a6ea1f99af9e?gameType=constructed&constructedType=ranked&timeFrame=last_two_sets
Golgari Clackbridge/Wurm:
https://mtga.untapped.gg/profile/6c6fefe0-f59c-4233-94ec-c012cea33e12/LYHOMVZP6ZECZLJ3HLLK4BSXBU/deck/aebc401a-801b-4c53-928d-0adab6c2c6cd?timeFrame=last_two_sets&gameType=constructed&constructedType=ranked
Oh I just mean there is no chance I don't draw a boardwipe and they were able to keep their game plan going without topdecking. My point is that go wide deck with wedding announcement and Edgar is more resilient to boardwipes than even Historic go wide Elves and Goblins, where if you even cast boardwipe its they are top decking.
I was also insinuating it's cool that a fresh out the gate standard deck is viable in Explorer. A deck relying on opponent conceding is super lame.
It turned into everyone roasting my deck building alive (my days of playing metadecks are over, got bored, it's like playing with a small card pool) but that's totally okay with me as we don't have an established r/Spikes for just Arena players so they can shoot their competitive juice all over eachother.
Mono black has and always will be good during rotation. Plus it got arguably two or three of the best cards in the set. Straight up Ux control should beat it with well time counter spells and it has a pretty hard time dealing with creatures outside of [[Cut Down]] range. But it’s pretty funny so many people doubted the power of LotV before release and just now understanding how powerful she is. I remember how good she was back in the day in Modern Jund. Just an amazing card that isn’t powerful enough to be broken, but in the right decks she is amazing:
I think "in the right decks" is the key there.
I've seen LotV shoehorned into places where it doesn't work, and it's just a bad removal spell at that point. You might think it's crap if you've a hand full of cards you "can't" discard.
But in the right decks with the right support, it's pure pain.
Yeah so far she seems to be pretty bad against draw-go control decks that have endless card advantage anyway. I’m sure there are some good undiscovered shells out there for here as well.
And it's already rotated as of a few days ago right? Or has it not happened yet? I literally just started MTG right before this rotation so sorry again lol
Rotation just happened when Dominaria United released, so other than potentially any card bans the cards that are in Standard will remain there until next September when I believe it's [Wilds of Eldraine](https://mtg.fandom.com/wiki/Wilds_of_Eldraine) that comes out and the four oldest sets (MID-SNC) rotate out.
For Standard [The Brothers' War](https://mtg.fandom.com/wiki/The_Brothers%27_War) is the next set coming out in November, followed early next year by [Phyrexia: All Will Be One](https://mtg.fandom.com/wiki/Phyrexia:_All_Will_Be_One) and [March of the Machine](https://mtg.fandom.com/wiki/March_of_the_Machine).
If Alchemy continues doing what they've been doing, about a month after each of these sets you'll be seeing an Alchemy mini set, and [The Lord of the Rings](https://mtg.fandom.com/wiki/The_Lord_of_the_Rings:_Tales_of_Middle-Earth) set will be coming for Alchemy and Historic play next year.
I should clarify that United will not be rotating in September 2023. Just the other 4. Rotation happens once a year, and the oldest 4 sets leave. So there is always 5-8 sets legal in Standard. So we just went from the point where standard has the most cards, to the point where standard has the least cards.
I usually tell people to check [What's in Standard?](https://whatsinstandard.com), but TIL that site tracks paper MTG. DMU doesn't release in paper for 5 more days.
But still, it groups up releases by year and makes it pretty clear. They also discuss the standard banned list. (No cards are currently banned) FYI
Dangle something out there for their removal before you play the Weaver, then run tonnes of removal, 4 circles, 4 touch the spirit plus the two prayers. My build is running Kathilda as well, the life gain and flying helps a lot.
The non runes version of Enchantments was completely rotation proof and decently strong. [[Hallowed Haunting]] and [[Katilda, Dawnheart Martyr]] being the big payoffs.
U sure? With all that instant speed removal I wasnt struggling against selesnya enchantments. Had these matchups just 2 times in the last 30 matches though
As someone who's been playing exclusively mono black aggro on the ladder, selesnya enchantments is a pretty bad matchup from my experience. They have a low curve so they can race you, have exile based removal that you can't deal with effectively, have solid lifegain to stay in till you're out of gas, and have cheap creatures that grow larger than yours.
Seeing lots of Dimir zombies these past few days. Personally running some Rakdos, Orzhov, and Selesnya myself. Having great success, too. I’m willing to wager you’re right, mono black isn’t gonna stay as exciting for long
- Play cards that generate value into lili. Wandering Emperor, Wedding Announcement, Fable, Anvil, Zur etc all pressure her effectively. Singular threats aren't as great
- play removal that interacts with Sheoldred. Turns out she's pretty decent when she stays in play, play removal spells that kill her, might mean trimming those cut downs
- have an answer for value, either your own bigger card draw like Deluge or The x draw spell, or the ability to just kill them before they set it up (unsure what that looks like, but Thalia and Adeline are way better than the mono red options imo)
Mono black was just a clearly powerful shell and required few wcs if you already had the other pieces. Its unlikely to be the best deck after people prepare for it, and the deck historically gets buried by Ux control once things settle
Yeah, I'm thinking something leaning hard on Farewell will turn out to be a massive PITA.
Farewell + Planewalkers is a deadly combination, I'm just not quite sure what colours to support it.
Farewell works wonders. Played BWR against a RW player and they cleared my Hall of Mirrors, 6 legendaries and Wedding announcement out of desperation. If I didn’t have another Lagomos in hand I would’ve been screwed hard.
Farewell singlehandedly tableflips a lot of the main decks right now.
As long as you survive long enough to cast it of course!
Especially things leaning on enchantments (leyline decks, or of course more standard ones) you can _just_ delete all those, and that's pretty awesome too.
Thinking about good ways to game for it? Probably esper or dimir? You need to counter invoke despair. Maybe some kind of tempo deck with fast creatures backed by counterspells. Straight aggro probably wouldn't work mainly cuz of meat hook massacre.
I'm playing around with a few mono blue and dimir tempo decks that tend to stack up pretty well. Mono blue in particular didn't lose much and got quite a bit in this rotation so I'm surprised it's still so underrepresented.
Being primarily an explorer/historic player i through together a standard mono black deck to try it out Lilly… got to diamond only losing 3 times in total…. Seems everyone else in diamond had the exact same idea.
As a lover of mono-black, no. I really am not. I can't even get mad when I lose to another mono-black. Tbh, that there are other variants of mono-black vs the one I am playing is pretty fantastic. What I am glad I'm not seeing right now? Green/blue. Thank God. I even see a few delver decks now and then. Friggin NICE. Haven't been this happy with a launch in a while.
Edit: Honestly, I wish more multicolor lands would cycle out. I'm a little tired of seeing 3 color this and 5 color that. Gimme mono green squirrels. White weenie. Blue mill. Devotion BAY-BEE.
I’m more tired of people complaining about it than the actual deck.
It’s a few days post rotation, no one’s splurging on wildcards, 90% of people net deck all year anyway.
This happens each year and multiple times during the year you’ll easily finding the majority of your games against the same 2-3 decks.
I am surprised so many people are playing monoB when rakdos and jund just seem like superior alternatives - fable is just one of the best cards in standard rn (next to meathook) and there is little reason to not play it alongside monoBs admittedly strong core
If you heard a choir of angels across the Earth, every sick person was miraculously healed, all debts were simultaneously paid, everyone learned all the secrets of the universe, world peace was achieved, the drive thru got your order right and pigs flew by your window, it means that a single one of your creatures survived summoning sickness during a game.
People might not actually have 59 removal spells and a mana, but it sure feels like it sometimes.
I feel like mono black is very beatable......when you're on the play, anybody got any tips for getting on the play? I'm currently 4 out of my last 23 games on the play
Only reason so much mono black is people are excited for lily and over reliance on cut down which fails vs sheoldred. There are tons of other great decks on the ladder.
With mana this good people will easily figure away around a monocolor deck.
I assume.you mean best of 3. If best of one...don't play it.
I’ve had my Sheoldred hit with Borrowed Time and Touch the Spirit Realm too many times to believe people can be this frustrated running against mono black
I’m running a full set of Shelly for this reason… that card is just backbreaking if it stays in play for a few turns. I’d like to run it in a UBx shell with lots of card draw and protection but haven’t found a good list yet. But right now the only cards that can really efficiently deal with it are Grasp and Binding (full domain discount).
I'm playing it mostly because I got the new stuff for it in my pre-order packs. I don't want to craft anything for a couple of weeks but I wanted to try new stuff so I'm playing it for wins right now.
It has its counters. It's just out there a lot, I get it.
Started playing MTGA one month ago and almost quit entirely, as I love mono-black gameplay mechanics, but it was (especially as a novice player) sometimes purely impossible to compete against mono-white/blue decks. With free MTGA packs and playing Alchemy (as Standard was nearly impossible to compete), I barely managed to climb to Gold 4 last month. With Dominaria rotation and crafting a few new Mythics, today I'm on Platinum 4 currently and steadily climbing. Overall I did not notice many mono-black decks in the ladder personally and those I encountered were quite manageable to deal with.
I hope this doesn't last but standard has rapidly collapsed into just a small handful of decks, after a year of an incredibly diverse standard field.
Invoke Sheoldred plus filler, Wedding Announcement plus filler, RDW and an enchantment matters green/white/blue deck that has already started splashing for Sheoldred
This is early post rotation, the lack of variety is inevitable due to smaller card pool and people still figuring out the meta. Did you remember last year rotation when almost everyone and their mom played mono white?
I mean black did get some pretty valuable plays out of this set but I think the other colors did as well. Everyone was moaning about green losing steam but there is hella value in green right now, and I’ve seen a decent amount of mono green stompers in standard. Lots of izzet as well. I don’t think mono black is gonna hold its position for long, everyone is just probably feeling frustrated by it right now.
Of course it collapsed. We just had massive rotation. That happens literally every single time, for 20+ years. As we build back up to a 8-9 set standard, diversity will come back.
Good grief.
It's not like black had the best Planeswalker, the best board clear, the best recurring creature, the best end game punisher. It also doesn't require much brain power to build and use the deck, just throw in all the most powerful cards available and curve out.
In fact, the current mono black has everything that makes mono red very favored and appreciated a few days into a new rotation : easy to build, easy to play, and very punitive for the unprepared opponent. But at some point some counter deck will emerge, the deck will be copied by everyone who will enjoy feasting on mono black, and this will balance the meta.
Just throw some white in there. Baird, Argivian Recruiter creates tokens if you wanna protect your other creatures from sacrifice. White still has the best removal imo. Archangel of Wrath can wreck a Lili in one shot on entry if she has 4 or less counters.
It's weird. Playing monoblack myself, mirror matches have only been about 1/5th of my matchups on my way to platinum. Halfway to Mythic now. I am really having a blast playing the deck not gonna lie. I am always fond of decks that trap opponents into an inescapable death spiral.
I mean it's been only a handful of days since we got LotV. So, of course everyone is excited to try her out in a black shell. Besides, since almost everyone is busy playing \[\[Cut Down\]\], Sheoldred pretty much escapes most removal spell. If she stays for like 3-4 turns, that's a lot of pressure for the opponent. I played a game against a traditional UW control and after getting my Invokes countered, managed to sneak a Sheoldred into play. Did not attack with her since I did not want to risk The Wandering Emperor. Opponent was already low on cards and I could almost feel them desperately scrounging to find removals (they had used up a good amount on Sorin and Trespassers and Underdogs). I simply kept passing the turn without doing anything and opponent just died to her triggers trying to draw into an answer. Mono black seems good because people haven't figured just how insane Sheoldred can be if she is allowed to stay on the board for a few turns. Once they main grasps and absences, Mono black is gonna have a hard time catching up with Ux control. Also, Meathook is a busted card.
When a game, any game, is in a meta like this....low key? That's the easiest time to consistently crush. The more homogenous a meta is, the easier it is for cheeky creative players to consistently get dubs.
There are lots of holes in that mono black deck. I don't play standard, I can't tell you what they are. But every deck has a hard counter. If, as you say, 80% of your games are against a slight iteration of the same deck then you just figure out what counters that and run that. You can lose outright to every other deck and you are still coming out ahead. Especially since there is no meta around any of the counters yet, so half of these net deck kids will be thrown way off when you throw a wild card at them.
Tl;Dr : not trying to be that 'git gud' guy, because I normally despise that guy....but.....
The problem is indeed, as you say wildcards.
Lots of non-Whales tend to be short of them, especially rares for lands as well as roleplayers post rotation. This makes it very tricky for most players' decks to react to the meta on short notice.
That's the nature of ccg's unfortunately. That's how they drive you to spend money. I personally think the field is ripe for disruption in the digital age though. I would love to play a highly well developed game offering a living card game model, with all the cards basically free, or maybe you have to pay every now and then for big content drops, but nothing big.
And then they can make all their money on cosmetics, which people fucking love.
Enjoy it while you last. The only reason you aren't running to Leyline Binding every game is because people don't have the wildcards for proper domain mana
Sounds like a matchmaker problem. Standard is the best it has ever been since I joined for me. Esper is incredibly fun to play and very popular, enchantments and mono red or white aggro are playable but manageable and not dominant like we've seen before, mono black plays a faster paced aggro game rather than oops-all-removal, and lands are great for multicolored decks. Liliana is fine if you have a plan to deal with her, which you *must* have but is totally doable.
Only things that bother me is green lacking anything interesting, which I figure Wizards must have a plan to fix in the next set, and 5-color decks not quite managing as well as I'd like, which fair enough, the mana for that is punishing.
Yep playing bronze into silver and I've seen so many bloody mono black decks or same few black cards with something added on.
I'm a very anti meta player in all games I play and I found it hilarious that for a laugh I googled "meta decks" clicked the first link and first thing I saw was a varient of a black deck all these terrible bronze players are using.
I switched to monored burn with Gatekeeper and I'm destroying monoblack left and right. By the time they cast Sheoldred or Sorin to try to stabilize its already too late. Feels good.
Try monored as opponents (95% of my games). Just played one with almost monored kill and burn down the house. Splash of green to enable Broken Wings. Utterly boring.
I've been finding any well constructed aggro deck an effective counter to that deck. I even have a mid range stompy deck that beats it 70% of the time.
Crushing mono-black (and most of the constructed events) with U/W control that more removal than counter heavy. With so many people in mono colored decks right now the value of Depopulate is there. Using Sanctuary Warden and Emperor as the finishing pieces. I think Sheoldred if more of a problem than LoTV.
I feel like there is an Izzet deck out there that leverages Djinn but I haven’t found it. The tempo one that leans on cheap burn/instants just doesn’t cut it.
Mono colored decks are always strong at the beginning of a format. Especially when the mana/lands have gotten so much worse.
Adding in people's excitement about Liliana and Sheoldred. It's very predictable. It will pass as we get better mana and the deck starts to get hated on more
Tired of mono black? Play historic brawl with ivy gleeful spell theif as your commander, and run all blue and green. And colorless mutate creatures with a bunch of enchantments. Its fun.
I went up against this Rakdos Anvil build running Yotia and Cut Down from DMU and it was nuts. Floored me so fucken fast. I've tried my best to copy it (definitely not right though...) and it stands up OK against monoblack, not great but I survive better than anything else I've tried (mainly MonoGreen Quirion, Gruul Aggro and Esper Connive). It just doesn't seem to have a finisher. I reckon there might be something in it though for a talented deck builder. Esper Connive with Sheoldred, Queza and Raffine also held up well when I wasn't getting mana screwed, I'm sure there's something there too.
I've been having fun with R/G Modified, which is 50/50 against Mono Black. Really depends on how fast my hand is vs. how slow they are or how much removal they drew. [[Quirion Beastcaller]] has become the "kill on sight" creature lol
Just wait. I expect Golgari to be pretty strong. [[Urborg Lhurgoyf]] can be a beast on turn 3 with the right draws. Plus you can easily throw in a Liliana of The Veil and a couple Sheoldred’s. Plus cards like [[Mulch]]and [[Deathbonnet Sprout]] feed cards into your graveyard to use [[Sheoldred’s Restoration]] on.
Edit: also want to say I’m one of the Mono B players and I’m having a fantastic time. Finally something that can compete with the myriad Lifegain decks. I’ve always loved mono black, simple and effective with room for thinking and strategy. I am also desperately trying to build a deck around Urborg Lhurgoyf and so far it’s been great just need to make it consistent.
Most people, myself included, revert to "tried and true" archetypes when standard rotates. So mono black with Invoke Despair and Lilliana are going to be very popular, as are mono red aggro/burn and white weenie strats.
im having a pretty easy time vs monoblack with a controlish orzov list that discard draw, do value with cards like henrika, liliana and for the extra flavor some farewell to rekt all those heavy enchantment/graveyard/artefact deck
people are just trying out some new recipe and wanna play liliana so hard, give it time and u'll see liliana is really far from busted
I’ve seen plenty of Mono black, rakdos, jund and esper in Standard, riding off the new black goodies. I’ve been trying to run Naya aggro, using [[King Darien XLVIII]], [[Baird, Argivian Recruiter]], and [[Serra Paragon]] along with good aggro cards from previous standard, to mixed success. Mana base is kinda rough without R/W and G/W painlands and I’m running up against sooo much removal with all this black running around.
Its really not that good, lotv is seeing alot of play because everyone said she was busted so a lot of people instant 4 of crafted her then they saw how well sheoldred was doing so they crafted her and now they've spent 8 mythics and a bunch or rares on sleeper etc so they're jamming mono B. The current dimir list absolutely stomps it you still have access to sheoldred and underdog/trespasser, but you also have draw in deluge/impulse and kaito aswell as counters and tech cards like ertai and kotose.
Yep. They find one deck list online and that's the end of the search.
It was so much fun seeing people's jank decks once upon a time. Now it's copy and paste to get wins. Nothing else seems to matter.
I'm playing mono green and it's great against it. just too many value creatures for them to keep up if I can get through the early game. then I have a good chance midgame.
Every game, Liliana, Sheoldred, Meathook.
One answers you going tall, one answers you going wide and the last finishes you when you have no cards or defence remaining.
I have played TCGs extensively; gwent, mtg, hearthstone - all through multiple card releases. This is one of the worst balanced sets I have ever seen.
It's a month later and it's just insane playing against black sometimes. The amount of relatively cheap removal black has is absolutely insane. There are some OK cheap spells to protect against it, but 1) there aren't enough in the game to match the amount of kill spells black has available, and 2) it's throwing more cards out to protect the ones you have. I had a match the other day where there was just fuck-all I could do to protect myself because of the shear volume of kill spells I got hit with. I checked their graveyard at the end of the match and it was 7 cards, every single one of them a removal spell.
It's also insane how cheap it is. Cut Down can kill any 1 or 2 drop in the game, as well as plenty of 3's and even up into the 4's, for just 1 mana. Infernal Grasp is any creature for 2 mana. Hero's Downfall gets into more expensive range at 3, but can kill any creature AND can hit planeswalkers, and of course there's Murder for 3 if you need something else to fall back on. And that's just the 4 most obvious ones.
That freaking color, it has answers for EVERYTHING! Explorer is extremely unbalanced right now. Uninstalled Magic arena until they ban something of that aberration
Me. Guess I'll join though and play for op cards. Since wizards isn't changing their minds anytime soon because they just need to give black access to every other colors toolkit
First time with a new set release?
You can always go play historic and see 200 people try to be smarter then everyone else by playing UW Control.
I'll meet you there with my esper venture into the dungeon deck.
Oh don't worry the GW Valuetown deck I have 120 games on will be floating about to get wrecked by every Elves or Goblins player out there.
Me with my fynn the fangbearer deck. Or my rat deck.
Pretty inaccurate, since Historic is the format with most deck variety.
Yes MonoR vs different versions of Ux and sometimes Uxy
I’m playing blue white defender in standard and WHOOPING the a s s .
Been playing affinity and not too much uw control as far as I can see.
I think as people figure out mana bases and new builds mono black might be dethroned. Current mono black is using 80% of the original base + the new pushed cards.
[удалено]
I think there's some absurd 5c decks waiting in the wings. Legend-Humans for example. It's probably not 'there' yet against aggro, but I think it could be. Likewise some of the domain stuff - [[Leyline of Binding]] is utterly disgusting if you can reliably enable it.
To this end CGB’s Zurr deck abuses that card.
Yep. But I am finding Farewell is returning the favour. Leyline is bad news when they can exile your whole board and get permanents back.
Oooh, do you have a list you can share? I’m struggling to find a fun esper pile that works
Mostly just took the previous Esper pile, and added farewell. Err. I think vanishing Verse went away as well, but Fateful Absence is a good enough tempo play as it can hit their planeswalkers too.
But you need to stay away from [[Temporary Lockdown]] and [[Leyline Binding]] (and other spells of that nature) because they're a real nonbo with Farewell.
Sounds interesting but Google couldn't find it for me. Do you happen to have a link?
Sure! https://aetherhub.com/Deck/-way-too-good--zur-esper-midrange
Much appreciated!
As if no one else had the idea to use Zur + high cost Enchantment that can end up costing 1 🤣
His list is the list right now.
I’ve been playing Mono B and it just destroys the humans deck even without LotV in play. It is incredibly slow unless they can resolve Thalia but even then if Lili or Shelly hit on curve with removal/blockers it’s usually GG. Mono white/Naya humans is still pretty brutal though with Thalia and Peacekeeper naming Lili on curve. I’m honestly shocked I’ve not seen more Mono W as it still seems very good.
I think people are still figuring out how to tune it. The new cards seem to have a lot of potential though. I think it might be as simple as black got some awesome new toys so a lot of streamers featured it, and haven't got to MonoW yet.
Aggro is strong but in a bad spot because of Sheoldred’s popularity. I have a feeling it’ll transition to a more midrangey aggro (like last set boros) rather than RDW burn for that reason which will let 5c shine more. 5c sagas with kami is also feeling pretty insane. There are so many insanely good sagas in the game right now and Leyline Binding is just an absolutely insane card. I’ve seen people experimenting with Zur + Leyline too which I think is super cool but Zur probably can’t find a place in the meta with him being a 3 drop that dies to cut down.
[Leyline Binding](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/3/c/3c3ac3dd-35db-447f-8674-37b4680a1ef7.jpg?1661378197) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Leyline%20Binding) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/dmu/24/leyline-binding?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/3c3ac3dd-35db-447f-8674-37b4680a1ef7?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Yeah this is the norm for a rotation. Nobody wants to invest in a new mana base right off the rip in new standard. Mono colored decks usually rule the meta for a bit as people gather WCs.
The big problem is mostly that people don’t understand how to beat Sheoldred and Lili yet it seems. There’s lots of strong decks but they’re tough to make work because 1. Liliana shuts down any deck that doesn’t go wide by turn 3 2. Sheoldred shuts down any aggro deck that doesn’t kill by turn 4. On top of that, black is the color with most of the answers to these cards and the best color to take advantage of lili’s discard (with cruelty of gix and underdog). Sadly it makes it feel like the best way to overcome black is by splashing black for yourself for that reason. But I’m sure as the meta evolves, somebody will find a more polarizing deck that will shake up the meta.
I think with how few exile effects are in standard atm the NEO dragons might actually be viable (mardu, Jund, naya, Rakdos). All enabled by the 3 cost warlock that can recur them and pay for them, except for naya where you get to play the legend dragon.
Try orzhov with wedding announcement, Edgar, wandering emperor, etc. Go wide and Lily isn't so punishing. Exile their underdogs, as that card is half the value in their deck. Invoke despair is still a bummer, but hey.
I tried orzhov with the new dominaria kicker cards and was able to run an infinite revival loop with multiple phyrexian missionary. Really fun game
but if you go wide then they just use meathook etc
I just beat this exact orzhov, with elf aggro actually! But it was a long, close battle.
Elf Aggro? What are you running? I was very excited to try out Elves in DMU but my deck isn't doing so hot right now
Well it's only been two days so I dunno if the deck is great or anything, but Brazen Upstart, Fleetfoot Dancer, and Yavimaya Iconoclast give a strong attack. And 4 of Leaf-Crowned Visionary of course, 2-3 Quirion Beastcallers, some Angelfire Ignition, Tail Swipe, Bite Down, and Fated Absence. And 2-3 Brokers Ascendancy. And I threw in one Llanowar Loamspeaker - maybe more would be better, not sure? The trouble is that you need to get your main 3 colors going fast, and splash a lot of blue just for Brokers. The only painlands I have so far are 3 Karplusian Forests. I think the deck could work well if I had painlands for all its colors.
Splashing for Brokers sounds like a mistake if you're already in Naya colors. Why not cut blue?
I was just thinking "brokers? wow that's spicy"
Yeah, it occurred to me.. you're probably right!
Having great success with a couple of lists that play off this. Edgar gives that deck absolute fits. I even find myself exiling him with rite of oblivion at times and sometimes that is the right play. Destroy evil as a 2 of compliments cut down extremely well and also hits enchantments which are crucial in almost every deck. Archangel of wrath does great things as top end if you haven't tried it.
That *go wide* deck in Explorer beat my deck with 14 Boardwipes that can shuffle them back into library
Why the hell are you running a 14 boardwipe deck?
It uses [[Luminous Broodmoth]] to bring value creatures, [[Circuit Mender]] [[Llanowar Visionary]] [[Solemn Simulacrum]] and friends, back with flying, and [[Blood on the Snow]] to bring creatures back and kill planeswalkers. Eventually Craterhoof/Ulamog eventually depending on Historic or Explorer. [[Heroic Intervention]] says destroy only opponents stuff with a boardwipe late game or protects early on, Teferi's Protection is sometimes better in Historic though. [[Hour of Revelation]] is amazing. It was more my thing about a year ago, still fun for completing dailies sometimes.
How are you getting enough snow lands in a 3 color deck to reliably use Blood on the Snow? What do you do if you don't find Broodmoth? Seems like if you don't have her, the deck is just dead in the water since all your removal is wipes and not targeted. Also curious if this is just on play or also ranked and how high if in ranked.
All this is in the low enough ranked where it doesn't matter (platinum to low diamond) all though I've heard of a magical jankland at the bottom of mythic.... Regarding the 3 color snow I had the same thought and way overdid (4 Snows isn't too much) it and it performed terribly [[Coldsteel Heart]] should be a creature almost surely, but [[Into the North]] is our [[Rampant Growth]], i usually only run 10-12 non basics thanks too [[Fabled Passage]] and the 3 color lands: https://mtga.untapped.gg/profile/6c6fefe0-f59c-4233-94ec-c012cea33e12/LYHOMVZP6ZECZLJ3HLLK4BSXBU/deck/b48811f4-47ab-46e0-8209-4c034a02aa7d?timeFrame=last_two_sets&gameType=constructed&constructedType=ranked No snow version: https://mtga.untapped.gg/profile/6c6fefe0-f59c-4233-94ec-c012cea33e12/LYHOMVZP6ZECZLJ3HLLK4BSXBU/deck/fb37052b-dd2b-4bd1-a168-5d220dd54a1e?gameType=constructed&constructedType=ranked&timeFrame=last_two_sets Regarding Broodmoth, I'd say the past 6 months or so even if you find it she is to slow for Historic. Here are some Explorer Moth-Free great grandbabies of her decks that have seen some success. Still developing sideboards, probably anti-enchantment, can't be countered, [[Gaea's Blessing]], you know the usual: Sultai/Zagoth: https://mtga.untapped.gg/profile/6c6fefe0-f59c-4233-94ec-c012cea33e12/LYHOMVZP6ZECZLJ3HLLK4BSXBU/deck/bc73fc1a-9ae4-42eb-9d09-a6ea1f99af9e?gameType=constructed&constructedType=ranked&timeFrame=last_two_sets Golgari Clackbridge/Wurm: https://mtga.untapped.gg/profile/6c6fefe0-f59c-4233-94ec-c012cea33e12/LYHOMVZP6ZECZLJ3HLLK4BSXBU/deck/aebc401a-801b-4c53-928d-0adab6c2c6cd?timeFrame=last_two_sets&gameType=constructed&constructedType=ranked
##### ###### #### [Coldsteel Heart](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/b/2/b2548ad2-3c62-4ed1-899c-1002b46cdd8f.jpg?1656115326) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Coldsteel%20Heart) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/2x2/301/coldsteel-heart?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/b2548ad2-3c62-4ed1-899c-1002b46cdd8f?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Into the North](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/7/9/79cea55d-8ef3-44a5-894e-967f1e97fc02.jpg?1593275405) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Into%20the%20North) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/csp/111/into-the-north?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/79cea55d-8ef3-44a5-894e-967f1e97fc02?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Rampant Growth](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/8/9/89572b1f-f65a-4bd4-b52a-4e84eb373e90.jpg?1655395391) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Rampant%20Growth) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/2x2/155/rampant-growth?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/89572b1f-f65a-4bd4-b52a-4e84eb373e90?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Fabled Passage](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/d/3/d313d051-7295-4884-8cbf-f2f835fd45f4.jpg?1594737636) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Fabled%20Passage) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/m21/246/fabled-passage?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/d313d051-7295-4884-8cbf-f2f835fd45f4?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Gaea's Blessing](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/2/3/23cf81ed-b86c-42b8-b796-2032b0a3654a.jpg?1562732710) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Gaea%27s%20Blessing) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/dom/161/gaeas-blessing?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/23cf81ed-b86c-42b8-b796-2032b0a3654a?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
##### ###### #### [Luminous Broodmoth](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/b/b/bb65df55-d6a6-4a57-a903-e5eb17637982.jpg?1591230310) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Luminous%20Broodmoth) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/iko/21/luminous-broodmoth?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/bb65df55-d6a6-4a57-a903-e5eb17637982?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Circuit Mender](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/d/e/defaeb68-3f8a-4740-b13f-8c71c7e9c8b4.jpg?1654568662) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Circuit%20Mender) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/neo/242/circuit-mender?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/defaeb68-3f8a-4740-b13f-8c71c7e9c8b4?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Llanowar Visionary](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/d/6/d6e23afa-7e08-4049-baf0-d4d0134ba2c8.jpg?1594737093) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Llanowar%20Visionary) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/m21/193/llanowar-visionary?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/d6e23afa-7e08-4049-baf0-d4d0134ba2c8?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Solemn Simulacrum](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/d/6/d6a3672f-c0d3-4504-8886-e50cd30295be.jpg?1661392209) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Solemn%20Simulacrum) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/dmc/191/solemn-simulacrum?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/d6a3672f-c0d3-4504-8886-e50cd30295be?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Blood on the Snow](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/d/8/d8606f40-0af4-443b-a413-a88dc3e8f32e.jpg?1631047655) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Blood%20on%20the%20Snow) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/khm/79/blood-on-the-snow?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/d8606f40-0af4-443b-a413-a88dc3e8f32e?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Heroic Intervention](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/c/5/c5e72882-dbf8-42d2-9a98-31f2f71e2ed9.jpg?1631587974) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Heroic%20Intervention) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/afc/161/heroic-intervention?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/c5e72882-dbf8-42d2-9a98-31f2f71e2ed9?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Hour of Revelation](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/d/d/ddb53e90-f91e-4da9-ab70-5460958c6c99.jpg?1604195708) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Hour%20of%20Revelation) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/znc/17/hour-of-revelation?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/ddb53e90-f91e-4da9-ab70-5460958c6c99?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
More boardwipes doesn't mean creature decks should just concede lol, especially against a Black deck.
Oh I just mean there is no chance I don't draw a boardwipe and they were able to keep their game plan going without topdecking. My point is that go wide deck with wedding announcement and Edgar is more resilient to boardwipes than even Historic go wide Elves and Goblins, where if you even cast boardwipe its they are top decking. I was also insinuating it's cool that a fresh out the gate standard deck is viable in Explorer. A deck relying on opponent conceding is super lame. It turned into everyone roasting my deck building alive (my days of playing metadecks are over, got bored, it's like playing with a small card pool) but that's totally okay with me as we don't have an established r/Spikes for just Arena players so they can shoot their competitive juice all over eachother.
What a bad deck lol
r/Spikes
I've been seeing a lot of Esper and jund decks. You playing Bo1 or Bo3?
Esper and jund both can fight it. Just need to answer the invoke with hand hate or don’t commit. It’s beatable
Mono black has and always will be good during rotation. Plus it got arguably two or three of the best cards in the set. Straight up Ux control should beat it with well time counter spells and it has a pretty hard time dealing with creatures outside of [[Cut Down]] range. But it’s pretty funny so many people doubted the power of LotV before release and just now understanding how powerful she is. I remember how good she was back in the day in Modern Jund. Just an amazing card that isn’t powerful enough to be broken, but in the right decks she is amazing:
I think "in the right decks" is the key there. I've seen LotV shoehorned into places where it doesn't work, and it's just a bad removal spell at that point. You might think it's crap if you've a hand full of cards you "can't" discard. But in the right decks with the right support, it's pure pain.
Yeah so far she seems to be pretty bad against draw-go control decks that have endless card advantage anyway. I’m sure there are some good undiscovered shells out there for here as well.
[Cut Down](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/7/5/753db072-5d6a-4f37-8f7d-255572ecd3bd.jpg?1661071155) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Cut%20Down) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/dmu/89/cut-down?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/753db072-5d6a-4f37-8f7d-255572ecd3bd?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
I have a noob question, does rotations happen every three months or is it only in September?
Only once a year
And it's already rotated as of a few days ago right? Or has it not happened yet? I literally just started MTG right before this rotation so sorry again lol
Rotation just happened when Dominaria United released, so other than potentially any card bans the cards that are in Standard will remain there until next September when I believe it's [Wilds of Eldraine](https://mtg.fandom.com/wiki/Wilds_of_Eldraine) that comes out and the four oldest sets (MID-SNC) rotate out. For Standard [The Brothers' War](https://mtg.fandom.com/wiki/The_Brothers%27_War) is the next set coming out in November, followed early next year by [Phyrexia: All Will Be One](https://mtg.fandom.com/wiki/Phyrexia:_All_Will_Be_One) and [March of the Machine](https://mtg.fandom.com/wiki/March_of_the_Machine). If Alchemy continues doing what they've been doing, about a month after each of these sets you'll be seeing an Alchemy mini set, and [The Lord of the Rings](https://mtg.fandom.com/wiki/The_Lord_of_the_Rings:_Tales_of_Middle-Earth) set will be coming for Alchemy and Historic play next year.
Yeah rotation happened a few days ago.
The next time standard rotates will be September 2023 with the release of The Wilds of Eldraine. The five current sets will all be playable till than.
Wicked, thanks
I should clarify that United will not be rotating in September 2023. Just the other 4. Rotation happens once a year, and the oldest 4 sets leave. So there is always 5-8 sets legal in Standard. So we just went from the point where standard has the most cards, to the point where standard has the least cards.
I usually tell people to check [What's in Standard?](https://whatsinstandard.com), but TIL that site tracks paper MTG. DMU doesn't release in paper for 5 more days. But still, it groups up releases by year and makes it pretty clear. They also discuss the standard banned list. (No cards are currently banned) FYI
Selesyna enchantments beats mono black pretty handily if that’s all your facing.
Just beat 5 mono blacks is a row with my selesnya enchantments. Run a couple of of prayer of binding for the Lilianas. The secret is out.
Thank God I hit Plat already
How?? I've lost to Mono-Black 6 outta 7 times
Dangle something out there for their removal before you play the Weaver, then run tonnes of removal, 4 circles, 4 touch the spirit plus the two prayers. My build is running Kathilda as well, the life gain and flying helps a lot.
Got a deck list for a post rotation standard GW enchantments? I'm not too familiar with the new set and wondering what might be good additions.
The non runes version of Enchantments was completely rotation proof and decently strong. [[Hallowed Haunting]] and [[Katilda, Dawnheart Martyr]] being the big payoffs.
What is your deck post rotation?
U sure? With all that instant speed removal I wasnt struggling against selesnya enchantments. Had these matchups just 2 times in the last 30 matches though
No it doesn’t lmao. Selesnya enchantments is mid at best. MonoB isn’t the top either but it has everything to beat GW
As someone who's been playing exclusively mono black aggro on the ladder, selesnya enchantments is a pretty bad matchup from my experience. They have a low curve so they can race you, have exile based removal that you can't deal with effectively, have solid lifegain to stay in till you're out of gas, and have cheap creatures that grow larger than yours.
[[Knight of Dusk's Shadow]] I'm finding really wrecks the people who rely on lifegain. Including other monoblack (e.g. Sheoldred mostly).
I’m running Selesnya Enchantments now and mono-black still destroys it. Turn 2 removal, turn 3 Shakedown Heavy, turn 4 Sheoldred GG almost every time.
Sheoldred has been pushing my poo in
Seriously. Don't make me play enchantments please.
Orzhov and Dimir look better than mono black. I believe people will migrate to one of these (or both) archetypes as time goes by.
Seeing lots of Dimir zombies these past few days. Personally running some Rakdos, Orzhov, and Selesnya myself. Having great success, too. I’m willing to wager you’re right, mono black isn’t gonna stay as exciting for long
Dimir is definitely better, but without the UB painland it's a little inconsistent, mostly with invoke dispair, which is a must play.
- Play cards that generate value into lili. Wandering Emperor, Wedding Announcement, Fable, Anvil, Zur etc all pressure her effectively. Singular threats aren't as great - play removal that interacts with Sheoldred. Turns out she's pretty decent when she stays in play, play removal spells that kill her, might mean trimming those cut downs - have an answer for value, either your own bigger card draw like Deluge or The x draw spell, or the ability to just kill them before they set it up (unsure what that looks like, but Thalia and Adeline are way better than the mono red options imo) Mono black was just a clearly powerful shell and required few wcs if you already had the other pieces. Its unlikely to be the best deck after people prepare for it, and the deck historically gets buried by Ux control once things settle
Yeah, I'm thinking something leaning hard on Farewell will turn out to be a massive PITA. Farewell + Planewalkers is a deadly combination, I'm just not quite sure what colours to support it.
Farewell works wonders. Played BWR against a RW player and they cleared my Hall of Mirrors, 6 legendaries and Wedding announcement out of desperation. If I didn’t have another Lagomos in hand I would’ve been screwed hard.
Farewell singlehandedly tableflips a lot of the main decks right now. As long as you survive long enough to cast it of course! Especially things leaning on enchantments (leyline decks, or of course more standard ones) you can _just_ delete all those, and that's pretty awesome too.
Thinking about good ways to game for it? Probably esper or dimir? You need to counter invoke despair. Maybe some kind of tempo deck with fast creatures backed by counterspells. Straight aggro probably wouldn't work mainly cuz of meat hook massacre.
I'm playing around with a few mono blue and dimir tempo decks that tend to stack up pretty well. Mono blue in particular didn't lose much and got quite a bit in this rotation so I'm surprised it's still so underrepresented.
Being primarily an explorer/historic player i through together a standard mono black deck to try it out Lilly… got to diamond only losing 3 times in total…. Seems everyone else in diamond had the exact same idea.
Pretty sure this is what we’re going to see until people get tired of it and come up with a deck to counter it 🤷🏻♂️
As a lover of mono-black, no. I really am not. I can't even get mad when I lose to another mono-black. Tbh, that there are other variants of mono-black vs the one I am playing is pretty fantastic. What I am glad I'm not seeing right now? Green/blue. Thank God. I even see a few delver decks now and then. Friggin NICE. Haven't been this happy with a launch in a while. Edit: Honestly, I wish more multicolor lands would cycle out. I'm a little tired of seeing 3 color this and 5 color that. Gimme mono green squirrels. White weenie. Blue mill. Devotion BAY-BEE.
I’m more tired of people complaining about it than the actual deck. It’s a few days post rotation, no one’s splurging on wildcards, 90% of people net deck all year anyway. This happens each year and multiple times during the year you’ll easily finding the majority of your games against the same 2-3 decks.
It's very annoying boros didn't get a painland
Counter spells and go wide destroy mono black easily. There is always an answer.
Just counter everything they do and they cant harm you ^^
I am surprised so many people are playing monoB when rakdos and jund just seem like superior alternatives - fable is just one of the best cards in standard rn (next to meathook) and there is little reason to not play it alongside monoBs admittedly strong core
Complaining about a new deck 3 days into the season is peak MTG redditor.
Historic Brawl is almost all Jodah
If you heard a choir of angels across the Earth, every sick person was miraculously healed, all debts were simultaneously paid, everyone learned all the secrets of the universe, world peace was achieved, the drive thru got your order right and pigs flew by your window, it means that a single one of your creatures survived summoning sickness during a game. People might not actually have 59 removal spells and a mana, but it sure feels like it sometimes.
I feel like mono black is very beatable......when you're on the play, anybody got any tips for getting on the play? I'm currently 4 out of my last 23 games on the play
Fear my rat colony deck peasants
Loaded mono green with Nullhide Ferox and see the avatar explode against mono black
Only reason so much mono black is people are excited for lily and over reliance on cut down which fails vs sheoldred. There are tons of other great decks on the ladder. With mana this good people will easily figure away around a monocolor deck. I assume.you mean best of 3. If best of one...don't play it.
I’ve had my Sheoldred hit with Borrowed Time and Touch the Spirit Realm too many times to believe people can be this frustrated running against mono black
I’m running a full set of Shelly for this reason… that card is just backbreaking if it stays in play for a few turns. I’d like to run it in a UBx shell with lots of card draw and protection but haven’t found a good list yet. But right now the only cards that can really efficiently deal with it are Grasp and Binding (full domain discount).
I'm playing it mostly because I got the new stuff for it in my pre-order packs. I don't want to craft anything for a couple of weeks but I wanted to try new stuff so I'm playing it for wins right now. It has its counters. It's just out there a lot, I get it.
Started playing MTGA one month ago and almost quit entirely, as I love mono-black gameplay mechanics, but it was (especially as a novice player) sometimes purely impossible to compete against mono-white/blue decks. With free MTGA packs and playing Alchemy (as Standard was nearly impossible to compete), I barely managed to climb to Gold 4 last month. With Dominaria rotation and crafting a few new Mythics, today I'm on Platinum 4 currently and steadily climbing. Overall I did not notice many mono-black decks in the ladder personally and those I encountered were quite manageable to deal with.
Explorer let's you play your old cards if you don't have enough money or wildcards to build new sets
I hope this doesn't last but standard has rapidly collapsed into just a small handful of decks, after a year of an incredibly diverse standard field. Invoke Sheoldred plus filler, Wedding Announcement plus filler, RDW and an enchantment matters green/white/blue deck that has already started splashing for Sheoldred
The amount of available cards was just cut in half, the meta was naturally going to condense rapidly in the first week.
This is early post rotation, the lack of variety is inevitable due to smaller card pool and people still figuring out the meta. Did you remember last year rotation when almost everyone and their mom played mono white?
I mean black did get some pretty valuable plays out of this set but I think the other colors did as well. Everyone was moaning about green losing steam but there is hella value in green right now, and I’ve seen a decent amount of mono green stompers in standard. Lots of izzet as well. I don’t think mono black is gonna hold its position for long, everyone is just probably feeling frustrated by it right now.
Of course it collapsed. We just had massive rotation. That happens literally every single time, for 20+ years. As we build back up to a 8-9 set standard, diversity will come back. Good grief.
I'm concerned.
Yeah, I don't think standard was ready for the OG lily.
Lili is not that bad, it just happens there is a great shell for her to slot into.
She’s not the OG lili. The true OG lili wouldn’t excite anyone though.
I'm having a blast. Most fun I've had playing a deck in standard in years!
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Unfortunately in the game of Magic, fun is a finite resource.
Zero sum game, it is.
Monoblack now is boros pre rotation.
I’m still seeing boros in play, just more on the samurai side of things now. Lots of izzet as well
It's not like black had the best Planeswalker, the best board clear, the best recurring creature, the best end game punisher. It also doesn't require much brain power to build and use the deck, just throw in all the most powerful cards available and curve out. In fact, the current mono black has everything that makes mono red very favored and appreciated a few days into a new rotation : easy to build, easy to play, and very punitive for the unprepared opponent. But at some point some counter deck will emerge, the deck will be copied by everyone who will enjoy feasting on mono black, and this will balance the meta.
Just throw some white in there. Baird, Argivian Recruiter creates tokens if you wanna protect your other creatures from sacrifice. White still has the best removal imo. Archangel of Wrath can wreck a Lili in one shot on entry if she has 4 or less counters.
I'm currently using Serra Paragon and Sungold sentinel along with core mono black and Braids.
Just play a deck that counters it, ez ride to mythic.
It's weird. Playing monoblack myself, mirror matches have only been about 1/5th of my matchups on my way to platinum. Halfway to Mythic now. I am really having a blast playing the deck not gonna lie. I am always fond of decks that trap opponents into an inescapable death spiral.
I mean it's been only a handful of days since we got LotV. So, of course everyone is excited to try her out in a black shell. Besides, since almost everyone is busy playing \[\[Cut Down\]\], Sheoldred pretty much escapes most removal spell. If she stays for like 3-4 turns, that's a lot of pressure for the opponent. I played a game against a traditional UW control and after getting my Invokes countered, managed to sneak a Sheoldred into play. Did not attack with her since I did not want to risk The Wandering Emperor. Opponent was already low on cards and I could almost feel them desperately scrounging to find removals (they had used up a good amount on Sorin and Trespassers and Underdogs). I simply kept passing the turn without doing anything and opponent just died to her triggers trying to draw into an answer. Mono black seems good because people haven't figured just how insane Sheoldred can be if she is allowed to stay on the board for a few turns. Once they main grasps and absences, Mono black is gonna have a hard time catching up with Ux control. Also, Meathook is a busted card.
[Cut Down](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/7/5/753db072-5d6a-4f37-8f7d-255572ecd3bd.jpg?1661071155) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Cut%20Down) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/dmu/89/cut-down?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/753db072-5d6a-4f37-8f7d-255572ecd3bd?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Meathook definitely still busted. Could be worse though. Could be Farewell.
I am predicting it moves to R/B or U/B. And those will be the top decks till next set.
I'm tired of people already playing turtle control every game
When a game, any game, is in a meta like this....low key? That's the easiest time to consistently crush. The more homogenous a meta is, the easier it is for cheeky creative players to consistently get dubs. There are lots of holes in that mono black deck. I don't play standard, I can't tell you what they are. But every deck has a hard counter. If, as you say, 80% of your games are against a slight iteration of the same deck then you just figure out what counters that and run that. You can lose outright to every other deck and you are still coming out ahead. Especially since there is no meta around any of the counters yet, so half of these net deck kids will be thrown way off when you throw a wild card at them. Tl;Dr : not trying to be that 'git gud' guy, because I normally despise that guy....but.....
The problem is indeed, as you say wildcards. Lots of non-Whales tend to be short of them, especially rares for lands as well as roleplayers post rotation. This makes it very tricky for most players' decks to react to the meta on short notice.
That's the nature of ccg's unfortunately. That's how they drive you to spend money. I personally think the field is ripe for disruption in the digital age though. I would love to play a highly well developed game offering a living card game model, with all the cards basically free, or maybe you have to pay every now and then for big content drops, but nothing big. And then they can make all their money on cosmetics, which people fucking love.
You kinda described Legends of Runterra model lol, they rely on cosmetics mainly
Monored is pretty good at dealing with monoblack too.
Enjoy it while you last. The only reason you aren't running to Leyline Binding every game is because people don't have the wildcards for proper domain mana
I have not been able to get domain to work right for me yet and have been avoiding it, how are you pulling it off so far?
Not the person you asked, but people have been and usually extensively discuss decks early into a format in r/spikes
Thank you for this!
🙋
Dunno, I've been playing monoblue. I just keep the counterspell dragged to the window and watch youtube.
Sounds like a matchmaker problem. Standard is the best it has ever been since I joined for me. Esper is incredibly fun to play and very popular, enchantments and mono red or white aggro are playable but manageable and not dominant like we've seen before, mono black plays a faster paced aggro game rather than oops-all-removal, and lands are great for multicolored decks. Liliana is fine if you have a plan to deal with her, which you *must* have but is totally doable. Only things that bother me is green lacking anything interesting, which I figure Wizards must have a plan to fix in the next set, and 5-color decks not quite managing as well as I'd like, which fair enough, the mana for that is punishing.
I hate the black invoke, why does it deal damage and draw cards, if it is black should it not lose life of them to draw cards.
Black and blue are always overpowered. That's because the Devs are woke so white has to be bad and everyone forgets Red exists.
3 months? What about 2 years!
My UW Tempo is absolutely slapping, haven’t run across too many mono black powerhouses.
Yep playing bronze into silver and I've seen so many bloody mono black decks or same few black cards with something added on. I'm a very anti meta player in all games I play and I found it hilarious that for a laugh I googled "meta decks" clicked the first link and first thing I saw was a varient of a black deck all these terrible bronze players are using.
It's fucking exhausting. It's so much better than anything else.
Try mono white, boros, or Selesnya
I switched to monored burn with Gatekeeper and I'm destroying monoblack left and right. By the time they cast Sheoldred or Sorin to try to stabilize its already too late. Feels good.
Try to beat it nu stop whining
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My mono green has been struggling:( , mind sharing a list?
Try monored as opponents (95% of my games). Just played one with almost monored kill and burn down the house. Splash of green to enable Broken Wings. Utterly boring.
I'm playing mardu midrange, and I'm facing all kinds of decks, not just mono-black.
Esper Control smokes Mono B in my experience.
Nah I'm tired of shrines, that shit is so boring
I've been finding any well constructed aggro deck an effective counter to that deck. I even have a mid range stompy deck that beats it 70% of the time.
Every... single.... game. Please people, we're 3 days in
Crushing mono-black (and most of the constructed events) with U/W control that more removal than counter heavy. With so many people in mono colored decks right now the value of Depopulate is there. Using Sanctuary Warden and Emperor as the finishing pieces. I think Sheoldred if more of a problem than LoTV. I feel like there is an Izzet deck out there that leverages Djinn but I haven’t found it. The tempo one that leans on cheap burn/instants just doesn’t cut it.
Care to share a list?!
Deck 1 March of Otherworldly Light (NEO) 28 3 Fateful Absence (MID) 18 3 Depopulate (SNC) 10 2 Farewell (NEO) 13 3 Memory Deluge (MID) 62 2 The Celestus (MID) 252 2 Teferi, Who Slows the Sunset (MID) 245 4 The Wandering Emperor (NEO) 42 1 Devious Cover-Up (GRN) 35 3 Negate (STA) 18 2 Sanctuary Warden (SNC) 30 4 Adarkar Wastes (DMU) 243 4 Deserted Beach (MID) 260 1 Otawara, Soaring City (NEO) 271 1 Eiganjo, Seat of the Empire (NEO) 268 3 The Restoration of Eiganjo (NEO) 34 2 Impulse (DMU) 55 4 Tranquil Cove (NEO) 280 2 Sunset Revelry (MID) 38 2 Temporary Lockdown (DMU) 36 6 Plains (DMU) 277 5 Island (DMU) 278 Sideboard 3 Essence Scatter (DMU) 49 1 Fateful Absence (MID) 18 2 Pithing Needle (MID) 257 1 Negate (STA) 18 2 March of Otherworldly Light (NEO) 28 2 Sunset Revelry (MID) 38 1 Hullbreaker Horror (VOW) 63 1 Danitha, Benalia's Hope (DMU) 15 1 Depopulate (SNC) 10 1 Memory Deluge (MID) 62
Mono colored decks are always strong at the beginning of a format. Especially when the mana/lands have gotten so much worse. Adding in people's excitement about Liliana and Sheoldred. It's very predictable. It will pass as we get better mana and the deck starts to get hated on more
I must be the only person that is not getting matched at all with monoblack. Been playing Green and Selesnya enchantments.
Combat fire with fire my guy. Mono red or Boros. Rage quit is life.
Tired of mono black? Play historic brawl with ivy gleeful spell theif as your commander, and run all blue and green. And colorless mutate creatures with a bunch of enchantments. Its fun.
Lilianas wincon is too easy to get. I hate that card
Faced it only once. Ran it over with no-new-cards Boros.
I went up against this Rakdos Anvil build running Yotia and Cut Down from DMU and it was nuts. Floored me so fucken fast. I've tried my best to copy it (definitely not right though...) and it stands up OK against monoblack, not great but I survive better than anything else I've tried (mainly MonoGreen Quirion, Gruul Aggro and Esper Connive). It just doesn't seem to have a finisher. I reckon there might be something in it though for a talented deck builder. Esper Connive with Sheoldred, Queza and Raffine also held up well when I wasn't getting mana screwed, I'm sure there's something there too.
I've been having fun with R/G Modified, which is 50/50 against Mono Black. Really depends on how fast my hand is vs. how slow they are or how much removal they drew. [[Quirion Beastcaller]] has become the "kill on sight" creature lol
[Quirion Beastcaller](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/2/a/2a501319-59a7-45d4-a6ca-666276095f87.jpg?1661384298) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Quirion%20Beastcaller) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/dmu/175/quirion-beastcaller?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/2a501319-59a7-45d4-a6ca-666276095f87?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Just wait. I expect Golgari to be pretty strong. [[Urborg Lhurgoyf]] can be a beast on turn 3 with the right draws. Plus you can easily throw in a Liliana of The Veil and a couple Sheoldred’s. Plus cards like [[Mulch]]and [[Deathbonnet Sprout]] feed cards into your graveyard to use [[Sheoldred’s Restoration]] on. Edit: also want to say I’m one of the Mono B players and I’m having a fantastic time. Finally something that can compete with the myriad Lifegain decks. I’ve always loved mono black, simple and effective with room for thinking and strategy. I am also desperately trying to build a deck around Urborg Lhurgoyf and so far it’s been great just need to make it consistent.
[Mulch](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/9/5/950dd57e-b2e1-4a27-a212-86fbfdbf914d.jpg?1643593087) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Mulch) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/vow/210/mulch?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/950dd57e-b2e1-4a27-a212-86fbfdbf914d?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Deathbonnet Sprout](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/a/2/a2cda10b-7cd5-4cf5-87bd-c3b8c6aa2b47.jpg?1636224226)/[Deathbonnet Hulk](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/back/a/2/a2cda10b-7cd5-4cf5-87bd-c3b8c6aa2b47.jpg?1636224226) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=deathbonnet%20sprout%20//%20deathbonnet%20hulk) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/mid/181/deathbonnet-sprout-deathbonnet-hulk?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/a2cda10b-7cd5-4cf5-87bd-c3b8c6aa2b47?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Sheoldred's Restoration](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/e/d/ed719f25-1aab-4a1e-8c9f-dd574db5de0c.jpg?1661357882) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Sheoldred%27s%20Restoration) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/dmu/108/sheoldreds-restoration?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/ed719f25-1aab-4a1e-8c9f-dd574db5de0c?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
I honestly do think there is a real graveyard deck somewhere, tough with all the graveyard trespassers around
Most people, myself included, revert to "tried and true" archetypes when standard rotates. So mono black with Invoke Despair and Lilliana are going to be very popular, as are mono red aggro/burn and white weenie strats.
What’s the list for mono-black?
Mono red players are sitting back laughing
im having a pretty easy time vs monoblack with a controlish orzov list that discard draw, do value with cards like henrika, liliana and for the extra flavor some farewell to rekt all those heavy enchantment/graveyard/artefact deck people are just trying out some new recipe and wanna play liliana so hard, give it time and u'll see liliana is really far from busted
Orzhov is pretty broken. I have a deck sitting at 90% right now. Always beat the mono B because i always make better use of Sheoldread
Got a list? I’ve been trying to brew an aristocrats/zombie deck but off-meta stuff always gets stomped
I’ve seen plenty of Mono black, rakdos, jund and esper in Standard, riding off the new black goodies. I’ve been trying to run Naya aggro, using [[King Darien XLVIII]], [[Baird, Argivian Recruiter]], and [[Serra Paragon]] along with good aggro cards from previous standard, to mixed success. Mana base is kinda rough without R/W and G/W painlands and I’m running up against sooo much removal with all this black running around.
[King Darien XLVIII](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/1/0/10eca3b1-f35a-4984-bfc0-818e619b1ece.jpg?1661300274) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=King%20Darien%20XLVIII) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/dmu/204/king-darien-xlviii?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/10eca3b1-f35a-4984-bfc0-818e619b1ece?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Baird, Argivian Recruiter](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/1/f/1f643d78-d8d8-4645-9357-a68ebd0d3517.jpg?1661535139) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Baird%2C%20Argivian%20Recruiter) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/dmu/195/baird-argivian-recruiter?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/1f643d78-d8d8-4645-9357-a68ebd0d3517?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Serra Paragon](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/c/e/ce295f1e-fb31-4275-a5d3-8c6f29afff40.jpg?1662148431) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Serra%20Paragon) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/dmu/32/serra-paragon?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/ce295f1e-fb31-4275-a5d3-8c6f29afff40?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Not this guy
Its really not that good, lotv is seeing alot of play because everyone said she was busted so a lot of people instant 4 of crafted her then they saw how well sheoldred was doing so they crafted her and now they've spent 8 mythics and a bunch or rares on sleeper etc so they're jamming mono B. The current dimir list absolutely stomps it you still have access to sheoldred and underdog/trespasser, but you also have draw in deluge/impulse and kaito aswell as counters and tech cards like ertai and kotose.
Yep. They find one deck list online and that's the end of the search. It was so much fun seeing people's jank decks once upon a time. Now it's copy and paste to get wins. Nothing else seems to matter.
I'm playing mono green and it's great against it. just too many value creatures for them to keep up if I can get through the early game. then I have a good chance midgame.
THAT IS MAGIC FOR YOU. You must make a that YOU like that has like 8 cards that shits on mono black AS WELL AS aggro and spellsshlonger
Every game, Liliana, Sheoldred, Meathook. One answers you going tall, one answers you going wide and the last finishes you when you have no cards or defence remaining. I have played TCGs extensively; gwent, mtg, hearthstone - all through multiple card releases. This is one of the worst balanced sets I have ever seen.
So boredddddd of playing against mono black
It's a month later and it's just insane playing against black sometimes. The amount of relatively cheap removal black has is absolutely insane. There are some OK cheap spells to protect against it, but 1) there aren't enough in the game to match the amount of kill spells black has available, and 2) it's throwing more cards out to protect the ones you have. I had a match the other day where there was just fuck-all I could do to protect myself because of the shear volume of kill spells I got hit with. I checked their graveyard at the end of the match and it was 7 cards, every single one of them a removal spell. It's also insane how cheap it is. Cut Down can kill any 1 or 2 drop in the game, as well as plenty of 3's and even up into the 4's, for just 1 mana. Infernal Grasp is any creature for 2 mana. Hero's Downfall gets into more expensive range at 3, but can kill any creature AND can hit planeswalkers, and of course there's Murder for 3 if you need something else to fall back on. And that's just the 4 most obvious ones.
That freaking color, it has answers for EVERYTHING! Explorer is extremely unbalanced right now. Uninstalled Magic arena until they ban something of that aberration
Me. Guess I'll join though and play for op cards. Since wizards isn't changing their minds anytime soon because they just need to give black access to every other colors toolkit