This weekend saw our first standard tournament with Ixalan in the mix, and just as importantly without the terrors of Battle for Zendikar and Shadows over Innistrad blocks. Many people predicted that Energy and Red, as decks that lost little to nothing in the rotation, would dominate the field. They were right.

Not for lack of creativity, many players turned up with a variety of new, inspired decks bolstered by Ixalan’s powerful new tribes and themes. Dinosaurs, Vampires and Pirates turned up in droves, but the raw consistency of decks that have been tuned into deadly weapons over the last few months of Standard play proved powerful enough to crush the new competition.

Putting aside Ramunap Red, the talk of the tournament was an innovation from Ixalan that made its presence felt in a pair of older decks –  Gifts and Energy – Hostage Taker.

Hostage taker is an incredibly powerful effect, generating a three for one if uncontested. Whilst it dies to most of the red removal, Vraska’s Contempt and a revolted Fatal Push, the payoff if you get away with it makes it well worth the investment. So, how best to maximise this card? How about an old favourite?

Blossoming Defence is the spell that took Danny Jessup to the top 4 this week, and claimed the title in the hands of his brother Andrew. The one mana investment asks very little for this deck, and helps to maximise the power of other cards in the deck, such as protecting the key piece Winding Constrictor, or helping a Longtusk Cub to connect. With the red decks leveraging Shock and Lightning Strike, this is a powerful way to regain some tempo and defend your board presence, as well as to ambush Earthshaker Khenras and exerted Ahn-Crop Crashers. Whilst many players tried to squeeze the powerful pirate into an existing Temur/4-colour Energy shell, taking the base of a G/B Energy deck with a lower curve paid off dividends this week against the slew of Ramunap Red – having more powerful early plays and specifically Fatal Push was an excellent choice for the weekend. In addition, moving away from Verdurous Gearhulk in the face of a field of Abrades is a particularly gutsy call, and as the format slows down over the next few weeks I would expect the construct to make a comeback.

Many people expected Mardu Vehicles to make more of a showing, and whilst it managed to slot a singleton copy into the top 64 I’d expect this to be an exception rather than the rule. Standard is as ever dominated by what the mana will let you get away with, and we’ve just gone from a format with incredible mana and a vast array of dual lands to relatively few, and focused around the allied colour pairs. As such, “wedge” decks (Jeskai, Mardu, Abzan etc.) will really feel the hit to their consistency unless propped up by cards like Attune with Aether. Where Mardu got to rely on Spire of Industry alongside Thraben Inspector, with many fewer artifacts the mana becomes much worse. In the face of the lean, mean killing machine in Ramunap Red, blanking a turn due to colour constraints will often cost the game by itself.

An innovative use of Hostage Taker made top 8 in the hands of Brennan DeCandio in his Esper God-Pharoah’s Gift deck. The first time it hits the table it’ll often just eat the first removal spell, given the lack of good targets out of the Gift deck, and just buy you somewhere from a half- to a full-turn. However, once you get the chance to recur it with God-Pharaoh’s Gift for free, you’ll get the chance to remove an opponent’s creature and cast it the same turn for a huge tempo swing, as well as provide an answer for sticky threats like The Scarab God and Hazoret the Fervent. Once again, this deck gets to benefit from access to the wider slew of allied colour lands, as well as Concealed Courtyard.

It’d be remiss of me not to talk about the updates to the most represented deck in the day 2 field. Whilst at the tail end of last Standard format the Red deck grew up to 25 lands and started reaching for multiple Chandra, Torch of Defiance and Glorybringer, this time around the successful lists kept their land count and curve as low as possible, with many reaching for Ixalan’s Rigging Runner. The lower curve variant is very well positioned to punish opponents with clunky manabases and lumpy curves. Next week I’d expect much of the same to be successful, however the option to reach higher out of the sideboard with an extra Mountain or Scavenger Grounds. This will to allow you to swap in more high impact threats in the face of opponents who are better prepared with Fatal Pushes, Authority of the Consuls and Magma Sprays once the format begins to settle and people begin respecting the big Red monster again.

Overall I’m really excited for the future of the format. What deck are you planning on playing Hostage Taker in first?