Aggro Affinity Primer

Posted on by
1

This is a rough draft of something i was once going to type up and publish somewhere but pauper is probably going to change on june 20th so here it is for now:

Aggro Affinity in Pauper

Affinity was the original Bad Boy of Pauper, responsible for what was the format’s only banning for a long time (Cranial Plating). With the MTGO release of Scars of Mirrodin, Affinity got enough new tools to push it back to the forefront. Galvanic Blast is a one-mana fireblast nearly 100% of the time, and Auriok Sunchaser and Carapace Forger are hugely oversized bears for their costs. Combined with the blazing speed of Frogmite and Myr Enforcer, Affinity’s ability to play out a powerful army quickly and refill its hand is unrivaled in the format. Decks like White Weenie and Goblins can match the creature numbers Affinity puts up, but can’t come close to its power level. The ability to draw huge amounts of cards quickly is just icing on the cake.

Affinity decks can largely be divided into two types: those with Atog and those without it. Here’s a sample Atog decklist:

Maindeck
1 Ancient Den
4 Great Furnace
4 Seat of the Synod
4 Tree of Tales
4 Vault of Whispers
4 Atog
4 Carapace Forger
4 Disciple of the Vault
4 Frogmite
4 Myr Enforcer
4 Chromatic Star
2 Fling
4 Galvanic Blast
2 Prophetic Prism
3 Scale of Chiss-Goria
4 Springleaf Drum
4 Thoughtcast

Sideboard
1 Ancient Grudge
1 Gorilla Shaman
4 Hydroblast
3 Krark-Clan Shaman
4 Pyroblast
2 Scar

Atog Affinity decks are largely reliant on their namesake card, usually in a combo with either Fling or Disciple of the Vault. This gives them the ability to kill out of nowhere extremely quickly, but it relies on resolving an Atog and some combination of landing an attack, resolving Fling, and multiple Disciples. Perhaps this was an acceptable scenario in the earlier days of Pauper, but a combo requiring the resolution of two red cards is simply too inconsistent today.

A Quick Metagame Breakdown

Tier 1 Decks: Mono-U, UR Post

Tier 1.5 Decks: Affinity, Storm (depletion and Invasion-sacland), Goblins, Infect

Tier 2 Decks: MBC (rats decks), White Weenie, Green Stompy, other Post variants (Mono-G, UB)

Allowing Delver of Secrets in an underpowered format where 4x Brainstorm is legal was asking for trouble, and Mono-blue decks have been giving it in spades. With UR post not content to fold, these two decks have been battling it out for the top spot in Pauper. However, neither has a good way to deal with multiple fast strong creatures, leaving Affinity an opening to enjoy success as a sort of “metagame deck”. What the two top decks share is a heavy blue component, giving them access to Hydroblast. One Hydroblast is enough to keep Atog/Fling Affinity on the back foot, and two makes the matchup nearly unwinnable for the robots. Relying on a deck that folds to Hydroblast is a quick way to an 0-2 in today’s Pauper format, but the strength of Affinity to pump out large creatures at a blazing pace has never been more relevant.

Maindeck
4 Ancient Den
4 Great Furnace
4 Seat of the Synod
4 Tree of Tales
1 Vault of Whispers
4 Auriok Sunchaser
4 Carapace Forger
4 Frogmite
2 Krark-Clan Shaman
4 Myr Enforcer
2 Somber Hoverguard
4 Chromatic Star
4 Galvanic Blast
2 Prophetic Prism
2 Rush of Knowledge
3 Scale of Chiss-Goria
4 Springleaf Drum
4 Thoughtcast

Sideboard
4 Ancient Grudge
4 Hydroblast
1 Krark-Clan Shaman
3 Pyroblast
3 Scar

Getting rid of the awkward, vulnerable combo allows us to pile creature after creature into this deck. Let’s look at the deck card by card.

17 lands: 4 of each color in the main, with a Vault of Whispers in the 17th slot. The Vault is in over a Darksteel Citadel to help with casting Scar out of the sideboard.

Mana Rocks and Building Blocks: 4 Springleaf Drum, 4 Chromatic Star, 2 Prophetic Prism. Trying to cast all the different spells in this deck is certainly ambitious, and having fixers that are artifacts, replace themselves, and accelerate your curve is crucial.

Creatures: 4 Frogmite, 4 Myr Enforcer, 4 Carapace Forger, 4 Auriok Sunchaser, 2 Somber Hoverguard, 2 Krark-Clan Shaman. 20 creatures, and 18 of them well above the power curve. The two Shamans are in over 2 hoverguards to move the curve downward slightly, as well as to stabilize shaky 1 land + drum starts. Additionally, this deck has two bad matchups in game 1 (infect and storm) and the Shaman gives us a fighting chance in each of those matchups before we get to pull the heavy artillery out of our sideboard.

Spells: 4 Galvanic Blast, 4 Thoughtcast, 2 Rush of Knowledge. Galvanic Blast and Thoughtcast are such insane value it’s impossible to leave them out of the maindeck. Rush of Knowledge isn’t a new innovation, but its synergy with cheating mana costs is at its best in this deck. Casting it with a Hoverguard, Enforcer, or Frogmite is great, and having to use it with a Scale merely feels “fair”.

The Secret Best Card In Pauper: 3 Scale of Chiss-Goria. This card is an absolute house. It looks INCREDIBLY underwhelming, but the effect is backbreaking. The first time you attack a Sunchaser into a flipped Delver or a Forger into two 2/2s and slam a Scale for the blowout you’re going to feel on top of the world, I promise. Scale of Chiss-Goria’s other hobbies include accelerating Myr Enforcers out on turn 2 and brutally vaporizing Phantasmal Bears.

The Sideboard:

The wonderful thing about a five color deck is that you can literally play whatever 15 cards are best for the metagame. This lets us play complete hosers for every deck that has a legitimate chance of beating us.

4 Hydroblast: If Goblins or Burn steals game 1 from us, we want to be able to consistently take down the next two.

3 Pyroblast: A concession to the format’s best deck, this is basically a split Vindicate/Force of Will against mono-blue for one mana.

3 Scar: I initially wrote off the five straight matches I lost against infect as variance (don’t do this) but after I watched a friend play the matchup from the infect side I developed a grudging respect for the deck’s consistency. However, no amount of pump will save a Glistener Elf from a state-based scar death at the end of the turn. Gorilla Shamans don’t respond well to scars either, and the fact that you can cast this off your Vault is relevant when your lands are under siege by a crazed monkey.

1 Krark-Clan Shaman: Bringing the total up to 3 post-board, the Shamans combine with the Hydroblasts and Scars to help Affinity have a fighting chance against Infect and Storm.

4 Ancient Grudge: Aside from the obvious Affinity matchup, consider bringing this in against White Weenie and other Bonesplitter decks.

General Notes

Affinity is a very linear deck that heavily rewards practice and familiarity. Much of the decision-making in the deck comes from sequencing and protecting your plays from an Ancient Grudge or Shattering Pulse that would sever your curve. Although most of the deck skill comes from practice, I can provide a few general and specific tips:

If you don’t have a creature you can cast on turn 2, play Springleaf Drum over Chromatic Star on turn 1 when you have the choice. Springleaf Drum on turn 1 is basically Mox Opal if you have a second-turn creature and is key to helping you explode up the curve.

2) Cast spells before paying for them. On a slow turn 2 where you have to Thoughtcast off two non-blue lands and a Star, make sure you cast the spell and then pay the cost, as floating mana will bring the cost up to 2U because you lose an artifact. On a related note, be careful not to blow yourself out by sacrificing your third artifact to Krark-Clan Shaman with a Sunchaser on board.

3) Don’t be afraid to burn your Stars. Once you have a Prism or Drum on board, you can start cycling your Stars from the battlefield to draw into additional gas since it’s unlikely you’ll need the mana fixing.

Mono-Blue Control, Pre-Sideboard

This is generally an attrition war. Stop them from hitting you with Ninja of the Deep Hours, and save your Galvanic Blasts for Spire Golems (ideal) or flipped Delvers when you’re under pressure. Remember that you can use Scale to kill off Phantasmal Bears. If possible, hold your creatures until you can play them through Daze and Force Spike, although the number of decks running these cards is going down. If you kill a Spellstutter Sprite with its ETB trigger on the stack, it doesn’t count itself in the countering math, letting you sneak a spell that would otherwise be countered past the permission.

Sideboarding:

-2 Rush of Knowledge, -1 Krark-Clan Shaman

+3 Pyroblast

The matchup improves after sideboarding, as they don’t have many cards with much utility against artifacts. However, they’re able to win the long game with Serrated Arrows, Echoing Truth, and Oona’s Grace. The post-sideboard role for affinity is beatdown, and the idea is to land a quick Carapace Forger or Myr Enforcer and ride it to victory, Pyroblasting their attempts at permission as you race. This matchup is roughly 55-45 as they are generally better game 1 but Affinity’s Pyroblasts help you win games 2 and 3.

UR Post, Pre-Sideboard

This is possibly our strongest game 1 in the format. UR Post is lumbering at best in game 1, and their removal spells are too slow and weak to stop our curve. Scale of Chiss-Goria is an absolute blowout against Flame slash on your 4/4s, and Steamcore Weird on your x/2s. If the game goes long, they can stabilize with multiple Glimmerposts, but game 1 is usually easy to take. Don’t be afraid to mulligan into an aggressive hand.

Sideboarding:

-2 Krark-Clan Shaman, -2 Rush of Knowledge

+4 Hydroblast

UR post has access to a slew of artifact removal, which makes the post-sideboard games difficult. One thing that Aggro Affinity has over traditional Fling Affinity is a decreased reliance on artifacts. Even if they destroy some of our artifacts, it’s difficult for them to stop a Carapace Forger, Auriok Sunchaser, or Somber Hoverguard. The post-board plan is largely the same as pre-board: come out of the gate blazing and deal them 20 before they can stabilize. Use the Hydroblasts to counter removal on your critical artifacts, and try to race their slow gameplan. Shattering Pulse is the easiest to deal with, but many UR Post decks are running Ancient Grudge, which countering half of is often enough. If they side into Gorilla Shaman, side for game 3 as follows:

On the Draw:

-3 Thoughtcast, +3 Scar.

On the Play:

No Changes

This gives you 11 cards (4 Hydroblast, 4 Galvanic Blast, 3 Scar) that can deal with a turn 1 Gorilla Shaman on the draw. This seems like an overreaction, but if the monkey isn’t dealt before they untap for turn 2, it’s often impossible for Affinity to win the game. I’d put this matchup at 55-45 due to their slew of red sideboard options and their weakness in game 1.

Goblins:

The little green men find a foothold in another format, and it’s a strong one. Luckily, Affinity is probably their worst matchup. With creatures that just don’t stand up to ours, it’s hard for them to win if they don’t have a spectacular curve into a big Bushwhacker turn. Be careful of Mogg Raider interactions, but Game 1 isn’t particularly difficult.

Sideboarding against Goblins:

+4 Hydroblast

-2 Rush of Knowledge, -2 Krark-Clan Shaman.

Wheeeeeeeeeeee. Four cards that absolutely crush whatever they try to do. If they bring in Gorilla Shaman, take out 3 Scales for 3 Scars. Post-board they don’t usually have anything stronger than smash to smithereens. If you’re ahead on the board, save the Hydroblast for a Bushwhacker.

Affinity, Pre-Sideboard

Affinity is largely a coin flip in game 1. Concentrate on killing their Disciples to stop them from being able to kill you outside of the combat step, and don’t be afraid to block their Atog with a 4/4, trading your creature for 2 artifacts. The Hoverguards and Sunchasers will often be enough to take game 1 in the air, and Rush of Knowledge is a huge trump on a stalled board if the game goes long.

Sideboarding against Fling Affinity:

-2 Rush of Knowledge, -2 Somber Hoverguard, -2 Krark-Clan Shaman, -3 Scale of Chiss-Goria

+4 Ancient Grudge, +2 Hydroblast, +3 Scar

Sideboarding against No-Fling Affinity:

-2 Somber Hoverguard, -2 Krark-Clan Shaman

+4 Ancient Grudge

The Rushes come out against Fling Affinity because they’re too slow to handle the Atog pressure, and the Hydroblasts can counter Fling or destroy Atog, and also help against the artifact hate that they bring in. In post-board games, the key is to slowly grind out board position, stopping their combo from going off while filling the board with creatures. Use Scars aggressively to shut down their Disciples.

Storm, Pre-sideboard (Depletion or Sacland)

Storm sucks. Affinity is the most powerful fair deck in pauper, which is why the goblins matchup is so good and the MUC/post matchups are fine, but Storm just kicks us in the junk by attacking from a completely different angle.

Pre-board we’re leaning hard on our Krark-Clan shamans, and I highly recommend mulliganing a hand like

Land, Land, Land, Prism, Scale, Enforcer, Enforcer

This hand is wonderful for fair matchups. A pair of Enforcers on turn 3 with a scale and the prism cantrip is very strong. However, without some interaction on the early turns you’ll have way too much trouble dealing with storm’s flood of goblins that they can consistently get out by turn 3 or 4.

A hand like:

Land, Land, Land, Land, Land, Star, Krark-Clan Shaman

is perfectly keepable. Unless they stumble greatly, you just cannot beat this deck game 1 without a Shaman.

Sideboarding against Storm:

-2 Rush of Knowledge, -3 Scale of Chiss-Goria, -2 Somber Hoverguard, -1 Thoughtcast

+4 Pyroblast, +3 Hyrdoblast, +1 Krark-Clan Shaman

Post-board the game slows down greatly. While you’ll generally want to save your Hydroblast for a Goblin Bushwhacker (or a manamorphose if you catch them using all their mana for it), feel free to fire the Pyroblasts at any draw spell, including Gitaxian Probe, although Ideas Unbound is your ideal target.

It’s very likely that they’ll have some sort of creature kill game 2 (either Spark Spray or Lava Dart) to deal with the Shaman, but there’s nothing we can do except run them out and counter the spell where we can. Their anti-hate slows down the combo and gives us more time to establish board presence and grind out a win.

Mono-Green Infect, Pre-Sideboard

This matchup is another mess. Frankly, the idea is to block forever. Their “free” spells (Mutagenic Growth and Invigorate) hurt our ability to Galvanic Blast their guys when they’re tapped out. If they don’t crush us with a turn two kill, we can start filling the board with large creatures that we’re happy to trade for their pump spells. A quick note: if a Rot Wolf attacks as a 4/4 and we block with an x/4 and use a scale to make it survive combat, it doesn’t actually die until the following upkeep (in most cases) so they don’t get the card.

Sideboarding against Infect:

-2 Rush of Knowledge, -3 Scale of Chiss-Goria

+3 Scar, +2 Krark-clan Shaman.

Post-board, being able to Scar their x/1s is very strong, and the shaman gives us a source of damage that doesn’t get stopped by an unkicked Vines of Vastwood, as well as another blocker. This is probably our weakest matchup, but it takes up so little of the metagame currently that I’m fine with using three sideboard slots and taking wins where we can get them.

Affinity has very strong matchups against most of the Tier 2 or lower decks, so I won’t spend too much time on specific matchup notes.

Mono-Black (Rats!):

Resolving a Thoughtcast or a Rush of Knowledge in game 1 makes it almost impossible to lose. Don’t hold excess lands in your hand, as a Chittering Rats can just time walk you out of nowhere. Play out everything you can and try not to let them draw the game with a huge crypt rats activation.

Sideboarding against Mono-Black:

No Changes! Hooray!

White Weenie:

The second-best artifact deck in the format, White Weenie does an admirable job of juggling Bonesplitters on Squadron Hawks, and not much else.

Sideboarding against White Weenie:

-3 Scale of Chiss-Goria

+3 Ancient Grudge

If it’s a build with Suture Priests, sideboard in 2 Ancient Grudges and 1 Scar.

Mono-Green Stompy:

I don’t know about this deck. Most days it seems like a worse infect deck and then they do some wizardry with Quirion Ranger and all of a sudden you’re dead. Luckily, we can usually just outclass their creatures by going bigger.

Sideboarding against Mono-Green Stompy:
-2 Krark-Clan Shaman

+2 Scar.

Mono-Green Post:

This isn’t a real deck anymore, I don’t think. Fly over everything with Sunchasers and Hoverguards and kill them while they waste time fetching Aurochs.

Matchup Percentages based on absolutely no data:

MUC: 55%
UR Post: 55%
Goblins:65%
Fling Affinity: 50%
Aggro Affinity: 50%
Storm: 40%
Infect: 35%
MBC: 65%
WW: 60%
Stompy: 60%

MOCS Season 4

Posted on by
Reply

a-wooooooooooooooooooooo

I don’t know if grinding up to the two byes is going to matter because I’ll either get a great (phantom m12) pool or not but i guess having the two byes will be “important” because maybe then i can t8 without six gorehorn minotaurs or whatever it’ll take to t8 this dumb format

Greatly Exaggerated: Grafdigger’s Cage, Dredge, and You

Posted on by
1

(Author’s note: when I say “dredge”, I’m referring to a legacy deck with some nonzero amount of ichorids and mana-producing lands, with or without LEDs)

The idea that dredge is dead is not a new one. Dredge hate has been around since before dredge cards and will continue to be printed. Dredge decks do bigger, better, more unfair things than any other deck in legacy, and if there weren’t so much hate, some of the key cards would need to be banned. The best card against dredge in recent memory was mental misstep, and dredge players were able to adapt into manaless dredge to avoid getting enablers countered. But ding, dong, the wicked misstep is banned and traditional dredge lives on.

The newest hot piece of hate on the block is Grafdigger’s Cage. This card stops creatures from entering the battlefield from the graveyard (shutting off narcomoeba, ichorid, bloodghast, and dread return). Additionally, the Cage prevents spells from being cast from the graveyard, shutting off the actual flashback casting of dread return, along with cabal therapy. Now that know how the Cage works, the $64,000 question: So What? The card doesn’t do anything new or better than the old anti-dredge standbys.

The responses to Grafdigger’s Cage have been things like “selling off all my dredge cards!” “best dredge hate or bestest dredge hate?” “well, that’s it, dredge is dead.” The Cage is interesting and powerful, but it does very little to impact dredge players.
Dredge hate generally comes in two flavors: wiping the graveyard (leyline, relic, crypt, grunts, trap, wheel of Sun and moon) and making the graveyard unusable (jailer and gaddock teeg). Cage falls into the second category, but it’s nowhere close to as good as jailer. The glaring downfall of Cage is simple: it doesn’t stop you from dredging. it doesn’t stop cards from being put into your graveyard, and it doesn’t even stop bridge from below from triggering. Admittedly, this isn’t particularly simple to do under the Cage, but hardcasting ichorid or chumping with golgari thugs isn’t impossible. (and on the subject of golgari thug, his ability to flip a creature that deals with the Cage is completely unchecked)
What grafdigger’s cage does is allow the player that casts it to sit behind a false sense of security while his or her opponent dredges and dredges, eventually firing off an end-of-turn nature’s claim or chain of vapor before charging in with a horde of fiery zombies.

The clearest parallel, gameplay-wise, is between cage and leyline. the dredge deck has a small amount of play while these are active, but needs to get rid of them for a “big turn”. However, when leyline is bounced, the dredge player has to start from scratch, while the Cage allows them to simply go off with a huge graveyard already piled up. Additionally, and this is the big one as far as anti-hate is concerned, _Cage can be therapied_. Like any other dredge hate that doesn’t enter the battlefield on turn 0, a dredge player can strip multiple cages before they have the chance to be played. The argument for Cage over leyline is that it can be tutored and re-cast if bounced, but let’s be realistic: no dredge player is going to bounce the Cage without a big turn lined up, and cage does nothing to stop a board presence if the turn gets passed back with a horde of zombies with brains on their brains. When cage is removed from the battlefield, it doesn’t go with the graveyard-clearing fury of a crypt or relic; it’s more of a “well, I hope I slowed you down a little!” In any situation where cage is good (against dredge), one of many other cards is better. One of the arguments in favor of Cage against dredge is that it’s tutorable (by trinket mage, for example). this is reasonable if it’s pulled to the battlefield immediately, but leaving a known card in hand against the best cabal therapy deck in the format is hardly advisable.

Against decks that can’t function without returning creatures from the bin or pulling them from the library (R.I.P. Panglacial Wurm), Grafdigger’s Cage is going to be incredible. Birthing pod decks, Natural Order decks, Green Sun’s Zenith decks, and traditional reanimator builds will all be hit hard by the Cage. However, seeing the Cage across the table is going to be bittersweet for a dredge deck, because it’s inconvenient but could be a better card. The best thing for dredge’s future is if people start replacing real dredge hate with less useful catch-alls like Grafdigger’s Cage.

Dredge hate needs to either come down turn 1 or activate at instant speed, unless it has a backbreaking effect like yixlid jailer. Cage is nearly useless off the top on later turns and doesn’t do anything at instant speed. It doesn’t stop the actual act of dredging, and it doesn’t stop the dredge player from digging with breakthrough, careful study, and faithless looting to find an out.

This shouldn’t be taken to mean that Grafdigger’s cage is not a powerful card, or even a good one, as it’s going to make its presence felt immediately across all formats. It’s certainly impressive and clamps down on all sorts of degenerate decks. However, it’s not unbeatable, it’s not overpowering, and it’s definitely not the stones against dredge.

so now it’s time to leave and make it alone

Posted on by
Reply

As you might have guessed from the awful title of this blog, I have 3 byes in Baltimore. who knows, maybe this will be my big break. a quick recap of the gpt:

I played Reid duke’s wolf run pod with an identical 60 and a sideboard tuned to beat control, wolf run, and humans.
round 1 – UB jace mill.
game 1 he managed to kill my t1 birds and most of my threats, but a +10/+0 jens managed to take him out.
game 2 I declared it to be Prime Time on turn 4, and had the autumn’s veil for his dissipate. eventually overwhelmed him with lands.

round 2 – wolf run red.
Game 1 I had to mull to 5, and just wasn’t ever in the game.
Game 2 I mulled to 5 again, but had a Day to punish his overextension and was able to claw back in after grudging a nexus and win the game.
Game 3 he was stuck on lands and I was able to develop my board much faster and take the match.

round 3 – Wolf run red (same 75 as previous round I think)
both games I was just crushed. pretty sure I didn’t play perfectly, but I felt like there wasn’t anything I could do.

round 4 – mono black control/ infect
game 1 i was in a pretty bad spot, but was able to stop his obliterators (mostly) painlessly with acidic slimes. I went over the top with wurmcoil through two obliterators, abusing the trample/deathtouch interaction. Game 2 I boarded in my wrath effects and felt pretty silly looking at 2 obliterators holding a blasphemous act. “well, I guess I can sac 26 permanents…” landing a Titan, however, gave me a safe (enough) buffer to kill the obliterators without losing too much of my board.

top 4 – wolf run red.
Game 1 he won the roll and spheres of the suns ensured he hit his titans first, and i just got run over.
game 2 i managed to steal a win when he karn’d my nexus instead of either my emissary or my jens, and i was able to take karn out before he got out of control.
game 3 he used his first 3 turns to set up sofaf on a bird, but I had the ancient grudge when he swung the second time, which killed his tempo. I jumped ahead and managed to land an elesh norn, stopping him from surprise-killing me with the sondag special (nexus+wolf run)

Finals – mono black infect.
neither of these games was particularly close. in game 2 he landed curse of deaths hold, which let me cycle emissaries and power out elesh norn, restoring my ability to nexus him out.

so, Baltimore. home of the ravens and…I won’t lie, I have no idea what’s in Baltimore. home of the ravens and site of John lance’s first GP win, hopefully.

First day of QP grinding..

Posted on by
Reply

…has not been good. a 1-1 in a block 8-man and a 2-2 in a daily pauper event have not gotten me off to a flying start. I think both lists need to be redone. also i apparently slowrolled my last round opponent in the pauper daily and i feel pretty awful about it! i don’t know how golgari brownscale works :<

so, no QPs at the moment. Probably going to do a little more playing tonight and try to hit 3 or so.

Wolf Run From the Ground Up

Posted on by
Reply

First of all, and I know this isn’t breaking news, Kessig Wolf Run is absolutely insane. There are definitely other cards that are very strong in standard. Hero of Bladehold is fantastic, Snapcaster Mage is in the conversation for best invitational card ever, and Tempered Steel and its flying metal buddies surprised nobody at worlds by exhibiting the typical block-deck-crushing-post-rotation that happens in fall sets. However, Kessig Wolf Run is just the most powerful thing in standard, and its colors have traditionally had no problem getting enough mana to be lethal. In this post I’m going to outline the three major wolf run archetypes, give my opinions on card selection, and recommend what I think is the best version for the coming weeks.

Picking a color combination (The Green, The Red, And The Brown-y)

Because of green’s fantastic ability to ramp and fetch lands, wolf run decks are usually situated with a green base featuring primeval titans.however, aside from casting primeval titan, the lands in a wolf run deck don’t have to do much, which allows for flexibility and customization. The three most popular ways to customize the deck from the green base are to go mono-green with forests supporting Dungrove Elders, to splash red for easier Wolf Run activations and sweepers, and to use colorless mana to allow greater utility from lands.

The Red

Brian Sondag’s “Wolf Run Ramp” was the breakout deck of the Star City Games Open in Nashville, TN on October 8th, and was the first glimpse Magic players got of the combination of Inkmoth Nexus and Kessig Wolf Run.

3 Solemn Simulacrum
3 Wurmcoil Engine
1 Acidic Slime
1 Birds of Paradise
3 Primeval Titan
4 Viridian Emissary
4 Beast Within
4 Garruk, Primal Hunter
4 Green Sun’s Zenith
4 Rampant Growth
3 Slagstorm
9 Forest
3 Mountain
4 Copperline Gorge
4 Inkmoth Nexus
2 Kessig Wolf Run
4 Rootbound Crag
Sideboard:
1 Ratchet Bomb
3 Sword of Feast and Famine
2 Tree of Redemption
1 Viridian Corrupter
4 Ancient Grudge
3 Thrun, the Last Troll
1 Slagstorm

With 3 Mountains, 4 Copperline Gorges, and 4 Rootbound Crags, Sondag’s original version of Wolf Run commits heavily to Red, but the four Slagstorms allow him breathing room against aggro while ramping up to Titans. The red version of Wolf Run fell out of style during most of October and November, but Junya Iyanaga cut through worlds with a massively retooled version featuring 4 Inferno Titans, 2 Devil’s Plays, 4 Galvanic Blasts, 1 Shock, and 4 Slagstorm.

1 Birds of Paradise
4 Inferno Titan
4 Primeval Titan
4 Solemn Simulacrum
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
2 Devil’s Play
4 Galvanic Blast
2 Green Sun’s Zenith
4 Rampant Growth
1 Shock
3 Slagstorm
4 Sphere of the Suns
4 Copperline Gorge
5 Forest
4 Inkmoth Nexus
3 Kessig Wolf Run
6 Mountain
4 Rootbound Crag
Sideboard
2 Ancient Grudge
4 Autumn’s Veil
1 Beast Within
1 Slagstorm
2 Sword of Feast and Famine
2 Thrun, the Last Troll
2 Tree of Redemption
1 Viridian Corrupter

Iyanaga’s deck used both colors to their full potential, with the red burn spells holding off quicker decks until he could land one of his eight (!) titans and lock the game up. With a 3-0 (9-1) record through the top 8, Iyanaga had no problem sending his more aggressive opponents packing, and no problem taking down the World Champion title. G/R Wolf Run is now the premier color combination for Wolf Run ramp decks, but the success of the Green and Brown versions warrants a close look if you’re looking to build a standard deck featuring Kessig Wolf Run.

The Green

The philosophy of green decks is to use a high number of forests, which supports large Dungrove elders and Garruk, Primal Hunters for card advantage and nearly-unstoppable threats.Wolf Run Green has the most raw power of any deck in the wolf run archetype, and possibly the most in standard. Every forest that wolf run green drops onto the battlefield not only makes the wolf run pumps more lethal, but passively beefs up the hexproof Dungrove Elders. WR Green boasts bigger creatures than anyone else in the format, and the combination of hexproof and trample makes it nearly impossible to outclass this deck’s big creatures and card draw. Here’s the breakout WR Green deck, which player of the year Owen Turtenwald used to breeze through Wisconsin states in October.

4 Birds of Paradise
2 Llanowar Elves
4 Rampant Growth
4 Dungrove Elder
4 Solemn Simulacrum
3 Beast Within
4 Primeval Titan
1 Wurmcoil Engine
2 Batterskull
4 Garruk, Primal Hunter
3 Green Sun’s Zenith
1 Acidic Slime
1 Kessig Wolf Run
1 Mountain
2 Inkmoth Nexus
20 Forest
Sideboard
2 Arc Trail
2 Ancient Grudge
2 Thrun, the last Troll
2 Sword of Feast and Famine
2 Blasphemous Act
1 Wurmcoil Engine
1 Garruk Relentless
1 Tree of Redemption
1 Viridian Corrupter
1 Inkmoth Nexus

The deck blasted through the swiss rounds without losing a game, and took down the top 8. The deck and sideboard feature a toolbox for Green Sun’s Zenith and cards like Thrun, the Last Troll and Viridian Corrupter play well with the high number of forests. The green version of Wolf Run has the biggest creatures and the most reach, coming from the huge Dungrove Elders and the 4 Garruk, Primal Hunters.

Wolf Run Brown

However, the Wolf Run variant that I think deserves the most attention is the still-underrated Wolf Run Robots, or Wolfball. Wolfball uses colorless artifacts to ramp to titans, which allows the player to use colorless lands for utility, letting the deck max out on useful things like Ghost Quarters, Kessig Wolf Runs, and Glimmerposts. The original Wolf Run Robots was developed by Travis Woo and Gavin Verhey, and played to a states Top 8 by both Travis and myself, but Corbett Gray turned heads with the deck when he made the Top 8 of the SCG Open in Las Vegas two weeks later.

4 Sphere of the Suns
1 Copper Myr
2 Myr Battlesphere
4 Palladium Myr
4 Solemn Simulacrum
3 Wurmcoil Engine
1 Birds of Paradise
4 Primeval Titan
1 Viridian Emissary
2 Beast Within
4 Green Sun’s Zenith
4 Rampant Growth
10 Forest
1 Mountain
1 Buried Ruin
1 Ghost Quarter
4 Glimmerpost
4 Inkmoth Nexus
4 Kessig Wolf Run
1 Rootbound Crag
Sideboard:
2 Tumble Magnet
2 Myr Battlesphere
1 Tree of Redemption
2 Ancient Grudge
2 Thrun, the Last Troll
4 Blasphemous Act
2 Ghost Quarter

The fact that the deck doesn’t have to rely on colored mana early means that Corbett got to play things like Buried Ruin and Ghost Quarter maindeck, giving him options he could use to fight the hate that the field started packing. In the current Standard metagame, it seems like everyone is trying to run you over with Delvers and Champions and Stromkirk Nobles, and the best way to fight that is to get Glimmerposts early and often. The presence of Glimmerposts also means that you can be more aggressive with Primeval Titan attacks, since they boost your life total. I’m likely biased because I’ve been playing the same 75 since mid-October, but I feel like Wolf Run is still the most powerful thing in standard, and the best way to fight the aggressive metagame is to transform and roll out with some Myrs.

I’m planning to write about the IPG changes soon, but I should probably wait until Wizards figures out what they’re trying to do before I attempt to decipher it. Thanks for reading!