StarCityGames.com Open Series: Louisville

The second Standard tournament after the release of New Phyrexia has finished (For the most part). I'll be looking at some of the top decks that made it in, and criticizing some as well. Check it out.

First, I would like to congratulate AJ Sacher on his Jedi mind tricks. If you haven't watched the game I'm referring to, it was the round 7 featured match, game 2. AJ stares down his opponent, who happens to have lethal damage on the board, for two turns, almost being able to pull out of it. Very impressive playing.

Now, on to the decks. First of all, if you haven't seen the results yet, here you go.

A quick breakdown:
Top 8 contained 7 Caw-Blades of various forms, including one called Exarch-Blade. The lone non-blade deck was a Black/Red Vampires deck piloted by Matthew Landstrom.

The remaining Top 16 decks contained 5 more Caw-Blade variants, a goblin deck, a Soul Sisters deck, and Hawkward (the best deck name ever).

First, I want to say that this Top 16 is very disappointing, but at the same time it's not soul-crushing. The fact that in the Top 16, 12 of the decks are minute variants of the same deck type, that is disappointing. But the fact that a couple of "fun" decks made it into the 16 is a little bit of a silver-lining.

I consider the top 8 pretty boring over all. A bunch of caw-blade variants, and a Vampires deck that is running 3 cards out of New Phyrexia. Not very exciting. The Exarch-Blade deck looks pretty interesting, using Exarch and Frost Titan to give you even more board control, but still, it's just another X-Blade deck.

Outside of the Top 8, but still in the Top 16 was a very nice Soul Sisters deck.

Deck
Artifacts 1 Batterskull 1 Sword of Body and Mind 1 Sword of War and Peace Artifact Creatures 4 Phyrexian Metamorph 3 Spellskite Creatures 4 Ajani's Pridemate 4 Leonin Relic-Warder 4 Serra Ascendant 4 Soul's Attendant 3 Squadron Hawk 4 Stoneforge Mystic 4 Suture Priest	Basic Lands 8 Plains Lands 4 Glacial Fortress 3 Glimmerpost 4 Kabira Crossroads 1 Seachrome Coast 3 Tectonic Edge	Sideboard: 1 Mortarpod 1 Sword of Feast and Famine 2 Hex Parasite 1 Spellskite 2 Kor Firewalker 3 Honor of the Pure 3 Brave the Elements 2 Divine Offering

This deck is a lot of fun to play with. I played this deck for a little bit last week on MWS, and for a while it was pretty much a rogue deck, with a lot of people not understanding what you were doing.

First, you have the infinite life combo. A Leonin Relic-Warder on the battlefield, plus Suture Priest or Soul's Attendant, you then play Phyrexian Metamorph. When Metamorph enters the battlefield, you copy the Leonin Relic-Warder. That triggers the Relic-Warder enter the battlefield trigger, and lets the Metamorph exile itself, which then immediately returns the Metamorph to the battlefield, allowing you to start all over. Each time Metamorph cycles, you can gain a life off of Suture Priest or Soul's Attendant's ability.

One of the side effects of running Suture Priest and Spellskite is that you have a high win percentage against most Splinter Twin decks, depending on their exact composition of course. Spellskite will allow you to redirect the casting of Splinter Twin, meanwhile Suture Priest will kill your opponent off if they create an arbitrary number of Deceiver Exarchs. 8 maindeck cards that ruin a deck by accident is nothing to laugh at.

Mainboard this deck has several win conditions. First, you have the Stoneforge Mystics which are able to tutor up the win condition of Batterskull, or any of the various Swords that you need. Secondly you have Serra Ascendant, which is more often than not a 6/6 Flying Lifelink for 1 mana, which is insane efficiency. Finally, you have Ajani's Pridemate. I feel Pridemate is the flimsiest of the win conditions, due to him needing counters in order to be good. With so many people playing Into The Roil, and Jace, The Mind Sculptor, you will find him being bounced back into your hand very often, which negates all those counters that you worked on to him.

An additional bonus to running this deck is that you are essentially in mono-white. This gives you access to some amazing side board cards to help beat just about any deck out there.

The final benefit of this deck is the cost. This deck is insanely cheap to build considering how well it does. If you are just getting into Standard, this is the deck I would recommend to you, especially with the plummeting price of Stoneforge Mystic.


The next deck that I would like to talk about is Hawkward.

Deck
Artifacts 4 Glint Hawk Idol 2 Shrine of Loyal Legions Artifact Creatures 4 Memnite 4 Phyrexian Revoker 3 Porcelain Legionnaire 4 Signal Pest 4 Steel Overseer 3 Vault Skirge Creatures 4 Glint Hawk	Enchantments 4 Tempered Steel Instants 3 Dispatch Legendary Artifacts 3 Mox Opal Basic Lands 11 Plains Lands 4 Contested War Zone 3 Inkmoth Nexus	Sideboard: 1 Batterskull 1 Hammer of Ruin 1 Shrine of Loyal Legions 1 Sword of War and Peace 2 Hex Parasite 1 Phyrexian Metamorph 3 Stoneforge Mystic 1 Dispatch 2 Divine Offering 1 Ajani Goldmane 1 Plains

This is essentially a straight aggro deck, and I like it. I played a similar version to this deck after New Phyrexia was leaked, Porcelain Legionnaire, Shrine of Loyal Legions, and Vault Skirge, combined with the utility of Dispatch, makes this deck possible.

The great thing about this deck, is that it can easily be as explosive as Kuldotha Red was in its heyday. Meanwhile you have some awesome lasting power that K-Red didn't because of several card interactions. Glint Hawk Idol, who is immune to mass removal, and is a Flier, able to get in where K-Red couldn't. You also have Shrine of Loyal Legions, which can swarm your opponents. Finally, you have a "Lord" that isn't a creature in the form of Tempered Steel.

One thing that I would like to comment on regarding this deck list is the sideboard. Obviously it served him well, but I'm not sure I agree with some of his choices. I can think of few matches where you would want to sideboard in Stoneforge Mystic. Nearly every color has access to artifact removal, and they will likely slide in all that they can against this deck, meaning nearly any equipment that you get out will be removed in very short order.

Secondly, I feel Hex Parasite should be a mainboard choice. He kills Planeswalkers all by himself. Nearly every single deck that you will run into at a tournament will have Planeswalkers in it.

That's all I have for you today, thanks for reading.