Wow! What a weekend of MTG that was! Not only did we have the World Magic Cup, we also had the SCG Invitational AND a Standard SCG Open.

Let’s start with the World Magic Cup (WMC) where the big question leading in to the tournament was what would the teams bring to try and solve the unique problem that is Unified Standard. Unified Standard is where a WMC team, made up of 4 players (3 playing at any one point and a coach), had to make 3 decks that, when added together, make a completely legal 225 card deck. The puzzle this year was not where the power cards of the format would be distributed but how would the mana work out? The norm in Standard has been to play powerful 3 colour decks and splash a 4th or 5th colour, thanks to the combination of Fetch Lands and Battle Lands.

The general consensus across the field was that there were 2 premier decks that a team could run, with a final deck being made from the leftovers. Almost all of the teams split their decks with the fetchlands being paired Wooded Foothills + Bloodstained Mire and Flooded Strand + Polluted Delta, with Windswept Heath being split across the two. The third deck often ran no fetches and provided the most diverse range of decks, from Temur Megamorph to B/W Warriors and Mardu Midrange to G/U Eldrazi.

So let’s look at what the winning team played:

Esper Dragons – 1st Place, World Magic Cup

Andrea Mengucci – Seat A

Creatures:                                                                                                     Sideboard:

4 Dragonlord Ojutai                                                                                    1 Painful Truths

2 Dragonlord Silumgar                                                                               1 Ultimate Price

4 Jace, Vryn’s Prodigy                                                                                  3 Arashin Cleric

Spells                                                                                                           3 Monastery Mentor

1 Crux of Fate                                                                                              1 Tasigur, the Golden Fang

4 Duress                                                                                                       1 Dispel

1 Languish                                                                                                    1 Dragonlord’s Prerogative

1 Painful Truths                                                                                           1 Infinite Obliteration

1 Complete Disregard                                                                                1 Negate

4 Dig Through Time                                                                                    1 Surge of Righteousness

3 Foul-Tongue Invocation 

4 Silumgar’s Scorn

3 Ultimate Price

2 Utter End

Lands:

4 Flooded Strand

1 Haven of the Spirit Dragon

6 Island

4 Polluted Delta

3 Prairie Stream

3 Shambling Vent

3 Sunken Hollow

2 Swamp

The Esper deck utilised many of the cards from its current Standard list, including the Dragonlords and Jace, Vryn’s Prodigy. There was little, to no compromise, on the cards it got to use and sported its’ full complement of removal spells, counters and sweeps.

Temur Megamorph – 1st Place, World Magic Cup

William Pizzi – Seat B

Creatures:                                                                                                    Sideboard:

4 Bounding Krasis                                                                                         1 Disdainful Stroke

4 Deathmist Raptor                                                                                      1 Stratus Dancer

4 Den Protector                                                                                             2 Surrak Dragonclaw

2 Heir of the Wilds                                                                                        2 Dispel

4 Rattleclaw Mystic                                                                                       2 Encase in Ice

4 Savage Knuckleblade                                                                                4 Radiant Flames

Spells:                                                                                                            2 Rending Volley

4 Collected Company                                                                                    1 Roast

2 Disdainful Stroke

4 Fiery Impulse

2 Negate

2 Temur Charm

Lands:

1 Cinder Glade

3 Forest

4 Frontier Bivouac

2 Island

3 Lumbering Falls

2 Mountain

1 Prairie Stream

2 Shivan Reef

4 Windswept Heath

2 Yavimaya Coast

Temur finally got it’s day in the sun, with the WMC allowing the deck to demonstrate the raw powerful of some of the, somewhat, under-used cards in Standard. Cards like Savage Knuckleblade and Bounding Krasis got to do their thing, with the aid of Rattleclaw Mystic! Even Deathmist Raptor should it’s head with if it’s ever present guardian Den Protector! Even a pet card of mine, Temur Charm, got to come out and play, it has so much potential but always seemed to get set aside for other cards.

Atarka Red – 1st Place World Magic Cup

Marco Camiluzzi – Seat C

Creatures:                                                                                                     Sideboard:

4 Abbot of Keral Keep                                                                                  1 Hordeling Outburst

2 Lightning Berserker                                                                                  4 Chandra, Fire of Kaladesh

4 Monastery Swiftspear                                                                               1 Goblin Heelcutter

4 Zurgo Bellstriker                                                                                       1 Yasova Dragonclaw

Lands:                                                                                                           2 Arc Lightning

4 Bloodstained Mire                                                                                    1 Boiling Earth

3 Cinder Glade                                                                                             2 Rending Volley

1 Forest                                                                                                          3 Roast

9 Mountain

4 Wooded Foothills

Spells:

4 Atarka’s Command

3 Become Immense

3 Temur Battle Rage

4 Titan’s Strength

4 Wild Slash

4 Dragon Fodder

3 Hordeling Outburst

The Atarka Red deck…. well, there’s not a lot to add here that hasn’t been spoken about before. The deck continues to utilise cheap, haste creatures to combo with Temur Battle Rage and Become Immense or Titan’s Strength. The Italians appear to have identified the metagame correctly and included Arc Lightning and Boiling for the mirror, as well as tokens styled decks, alongside Chandra, Fire of Kaladesh for extra game against control decks.

The other popular deck at the WMC was the Rally the Ancestors deck, whether it be strictly Abzan or 4-Colour.

The five most popular cards at the WMC were; Radiant Flames, an effective sideboard answer against many deckl; Herald of Kozilek, that Team Scotland used to great effect to reduce mana costs; Dragonlord Ojutai, a card that continued its dominance in the Esper Dragons deck; Become Immense + Temur Battle Rage (OK so this is two cards), this combo continued to demonstrate its power at the WMC; Collected Company, this card was the lynch pin of the Temur decks and the question will be whether this card can help push Temur in mainstream Standard events?

Back across the pond SCG were running their last event in the lead-up to the Player’s Championship, with a lot of hopeful players looking to lock up the final slot the end of year event. The Invitational has traditionally been a mix of Standard and Legacy, but due to popular demand SCG had changed the format to be a mix of Standard and Modern! Players would use their standard deck for 4 rounds and their modern deck for the next 4, this would be repeated on Day 2 and their Standard decks for the Top 8. Let’s take a look at the winning Deck Lists:

1st Place – Star City Games Invitational

Caleb Sherer – Affinity

Creatures:                                                                                                      Sideboard:

4 Arcbound Ravager                                                                                      1 Etched Champion

3 Etched Champion                                                                                       2 Hangarback Walker

4 Memnite                                                                                                      2 Spellskite

4 Ornithopter                                                                                                 2 Blood Moon

4 Signal Pest                                                                                                   2 Ghirapur Aether Grid

3 Steel Overseer                                                                                            2 Ancient Grudge

4 Vault Skirge                                                                                                 1 Dismember

Lands:                                                                                                           1 Nature’s Claim

4 Darksteel Citadel                                                                                      1 Slaughter Pact

1 Swamp                                                                                                       1 Whipflare

4 Blinkmoth Nexus

3 Glimmervoid

4 Inkmoth Nexus

Spells:

4 Cranial Plating

4 Springleaf Drum

2 Welding Jar

4 Mox Opal

4 Thoughtcast

1st Place – Star City Games Invitational

Caleb Sherer – Abzan Aggro

Creatures:                                                                                                     Sideboard:

3 Den Protector                                                                                           4 Pitiless Horde

4 Siege Rhino                                                                                                2 Painful Truths

4 Snapping Gnarlid                                                                                      2 Planar Outburst

4 Warden of the First Tree                                                                          2 Rising Miasma

2 Wingmate Roc                                                                                           2 Self-Inflicted Wound

4 Anafenza, the Foremost

Spells:

2 Silkwrap

4 Abzan Charm

2 Dromoka’s Command

2 Murderous Cut

Lands:

2 Forest

2 Plains

2 Canopy Vista

4 Flooded Strand

2 Llanowar Wastes

4 Shambling Vent

1 Smoldering Marsh

1 Sunken Hollow

4 Windswept Heath

4 Wooded Foothills

Caleb had a bit of a nightmare start to his tournament, starting out 3-3 and needing to rattle off consecutive wins to even stand a chance to make the Top 8. The commentator’s quickly picked up on Caleb being a player to watch, due to the outside of making the Player’s Championship, and what a fairytale story it made!

Caleb chose to be aggressive in the tournaments, his choice of decks clearly indicating this. Affinity, or Robots, is one of the premier aggro decks in modern, and can often play out like a combo deck, normally leaving your opponent dead on turn 3 or 4.

Abzan Aggro was Caleb’s choice for Standard, a deck that is flexible, can be controlling and turn the corner quickly to take the victory. It often relies heavily on Siege Rhino, Gideon, Ally of Zendikar and Den Protector to win the late game. But we’ve all seen, read or played enough of Abzan by now!

I just want to quickly touch on the first SCG Open of the new season, where my favourite Pro player Brian Braun- Doing-it-right (BBD) took down the Open with Jeskai Black to win his first ever Open event. Brian has risen to prominence over the last couple of years, winning two GP titles, but always felt like the bridesmaid of the SCG circuit, well now he can be the BBriDe thanks to this:

1st Place – Star City Games Open

Jeskai Black – Brian Braun-Duin

Creatures:                                                                                                  Sideboard:

2 Monastery Mentor                                                                                   3 Arashin Cleric

4 Soulfire Grand Master                                                                             1 Dispel

4 Jace, Vryn’s Prodigy                                                                                 3 Negate

2 Tasigur, the Golden Fang                                                                        1 Ob Nixilis, Reignited

Spells:                                                                                                          2 Duress

4 Crackling Doom                                                                                        1 Exert Influence

1 Dispel                                                                                                         2 Radiant Flames

4 Fiery Impulse                                                                                            2 Roast

3 Kolaghan’s Command

2 Ojutai’s Command

2 Utter End

3 Painful Truths

2 Roast

2 Treasure Cruise

Lands:

1 Island

1 Mountain

1 Plains

1 Swamp

4 Bloodstained Mire

3 Flooded Strand

3 Mystic Monastery

4 Polluted Delta

2 Prairie Stream

2 Shambling Vent

2 Smoldering Marsh

1 Sunken Hollow

Riderless* Jeskai has picked up in popularity recently, in part thanks to the innovations of Todd Anderson and Tom Ross, and BBD borrowed the list from the Roanoke crew and piloted it to first place. Painful Truths continues to be the cornerstone of U/B decks in all formats, even showing up in Legacy, and is definitely a card you should be looking at when building your next deck list!

This was a slightly briefer Weekend Review than I had initially planned, there was soo much coverage to watch and digest that I’ve only touched upon the highlights in this article. I’ll be back with a look back at my own weekend with my adventures in modern over the weekend.

As always, I’d love to hear your thoughts, comments or feedbacks in the comments section below!