I've been bouncing between Solar Gold and Mythic for a while. Whenever I try playing anything but my strongest decks, I just drop like a rock (and sometimes even when playing my best decks). On the other hand, those decks are getting stale and I need some variety. Also, with the collapse of MJ card prices, stressing over Weekend Ranked performance just isn't worth it to me. The competitive players need to keep their power rankings up for tournaments, and they are welcome to it!
Today I've got 3 decks/games from my weekend ranked.
- Anubians. I've never really played them much, so it's newish to me.
- Zombies: a new list after removing Faith Breaker (cheap deck!)
- Flourish Nature: Nothing new about it. I just like it 馃槉
Anubians
Deck Code:
GU_1_1_CCcCCcCCbCCbKBzKBzGCbGCbBBTBBTCDvCDvBAuBAuKCIKCIKCBKCBBDEBHMGAHGAHKCJLAKKCMKCMLALLALKCTKCT
Remember when I said sometimes I drop ranks even when playing meta decks? Well this would be one of them. Good players - or at least those with experience playing Anubians - are winning 60-70% of games with decks like this. I'm not, but with practice maybe. The game below is a satisfying win against control magic.
I think I played this game decently, but not great. I got rid of removal in the mulligan assuming I wouldn't need it. Luckily I drew a Priestess and Necro.
At 3 mana, I made the decision to push 8 damage with the priestess rather than hold her until 6+ mana and LOTD. The game got a lot harder when he found his Gleamweaver and was able to remove both my Priestess and Necromancer because of that decision. I wasn't deck peeking, so I had no idea if he even had the card. Tough call.
At 5 mana I misplay. Not realizing I only had 2 anubians left in the void. I should have played Dangerous Ritual to draw and then probably Heirloom to clear the gleamweaver.
The Lightning Talisman doesn't bother me much with LOTD in hand. Then with spare ragnaroks we cleared it easily.
The fun starts - as it always does with control magic - at 7 mana. Blade gives us our desperately needed Priestess. I decided to only bring 5 anubians back. I needed the Priestess on board when all Reaver's died. This left him in a bad spot. If he kills my creatures he dies. If he doesn't, he dies. His main out was to kill me with face damage. Honestly, I'm surprised he didn't have the Wyrmbreath.
Zombies
Deck Code:
GU_1_1_CCcCCcBEpBEpIBxIBxKCBKCBCEWCEWIBZIBZCDSCDSIADIADCEaCEaIAJIAJIACIACIAKIAKKCRKCRCCeCCeCAgCAg
I like my zombie deck. It's cheap, and you can swap out the Binders for Axewomen and then the deck is only ~$20. Every card is maxxed 2x which according to my recollection gives us like an ~80% shot to draw at least one of either Obelisk or Necroscepter. Unfortunately, as you'll see in my vid, that 20% of the time happened to me a lot this weekend.
Zombie probably isn't the best deck this weekend. Light is really popular and (like deception) runs all the tools needed to shut zombies down. Levy/Extortionist your Obelisk. Vesper your scepter. In my one win against light, I went first and played Void Banshee on turn 1. I never saw my zombie cards until the end of the game. It was just big nethers and removal cards and they could never establish board. The only way to win, and it doesn't happen often.
In this game, our opponent was able to take control of the board on the very first turn and then casually shut us down for the entire game. I may have actually lost the game at 5 mana though. CoG on the Pacifist was right, but then I should have played Heirloom to clear the acolyte. It may not have mattered. What I really needed this game were my early big nethers and I just never found them.
After going 50/50 with the deck over 6 games, it feels like too much removal and not enough creatures. It may just be small sample size though. I played against a nature deck with a 3x charm buffed broccoli and couldn't find the Curse of Greed to save my life. (I won that game anyway because nature is terrible right now lol.) Obelisk is honestly questionable in the meta. Light just levies it. Mage uses it's various bolts + GP. Deception can steal it from you which basically means you lose the game.
Flourish Nature
Deck Code:
GU_1_5_GAwCAuCAuCEyCEyHAEHAECATCATCAvIASBCCBCCKBWKBTKBTCBxCBxIATIATKBVCEcCEcCByCByICHICHIDVIDVIAR
Probably my favorite deck at the moment. In one of my previous articles I wrote about swapping in LV cards. I tried it, but honestly don't like it as much. The deck synergy here is just really nice. I'd guess it's favored against aggro light. The problem is control decks just destroy it. With no ward, your only hope of getting anything to stick is Charm or getting Feral Shapeshifter down on curve. This is a fun/strong deck in Gold and below, but Mythic is full of $2k control decks and you'll be lucky to win 1/5 against them.
However, here is the power of Dalia against non control!
At 4 mana, I know Lightnight Striking a 3/3 is questionable. It may not have been the right play, but I opted for favor and it worked out. Turn 5 is GG. Dalia hits the board and fills it up. Zombies have no good answer. Maybe Guild Enforcer that some decks still run could have kept him in the game a bit longer.
Conclusion
I'm going to do some more experimenting. I've got an Amazon Deck that looks a lot like my flourish deck. Charm and Sudden Bloom don't care what tribe your creatures are, and the warded Amazons are a bit harder to clear. I also want to try out a mid range War deck with the new cards. Maybe they'll work well. Maybe I'll find myself in Shadow 馃槃