What decks have crystallized as the decks to beat?

[perm]

And what are their MUs? I am curious. I'd like to try to put them into a normal form matrix, just for fun and to help teach myself. Maybe some insight could be gleaned from it

[SpikeyMikey]

And what are their MUs? I am curious. I'd like to try to put them into a normal form matrix, just for fun and to help teach myself. Maybe some insight could be gleaned from it

Nothing has really crystallized yet. At least, not on a pro level. Zoo, in its various forms, of course. Cat Sligh, Big Zoo, Domain Zoo, good old-fashioned regular Naya Zoo and my personal favorite, the LD Zoo from Worlds. And Affinity. Splinter Twin is still out there, but I think it's going to see less play now after a less-than-spectacular showing at Worlds. I've seen a lot of people on MWS with WW. They somehow always seem to open with Serra Ascendant followed by turn 2 Martyr of Sands for 12+ life. People are still trying out a variety of control decks, none of which are particularly effective, but the most common ones are Gifts/Tron, U/B or Esper Teachings, U/W Snapcaster variants and 5cc Cruel Ultimatum control builds. Oh, and occasionally, although it seems to be dying out, I'll see something that looks like a port of Legacy RUG Tempo.

Then there are the decks I don't ever see, but I know are still a force to be reckoned with. Jund comes to mind. So does Burn. B/G Deathcloud is still decent.

[hi-val]

The Grove of the Burnwillows/Punishing Fire combination is growing in popularity. We've seen it in Zoo, control decks and in Twin decks (with TFK). I think it's wise to look at how your deck will be affected by it. Remember that cards such as Extirpate and Surgical Extraction aren't perfect - Grove is a mana ability. If I had the mana and the space, I'd be playing either Sowing Salt or Memoricide on my board if I were weak to the combo. It's ever-present and barring a banning in December, Modern is going to be strongly influenced by it.

[SpikeyMikey]

The Grove of the Burnwillows/Punishing Fire combination is growing in popularity. We've seen it in Zoo, control decks and in Twin decks (with TFK). I think it's wise to look at how your deck will be affected by it. Remember that cards such as Extirpate and Surgical Extraction aren't perfect - Grove is a mana ability. If I had the mana and the space, I'd be playing either Sowing Salt or Memoricide on my board if I were weak to the combo. It's ever-present and barring a banning in December, Modern is going to be strongly influenced by it.

Are you seeing it actually increasing in popularity though? It's been around since pre-Philly but I felt like people gave up on it after testing with it. It's slow and only effective against midrange strategies. It matches up poorly against most Zoo builds. I agree that it's important to consider but I'm not sure I'd specifically board against it unless it just rolled over me; it wastes space that could be used on better things and as such should preclude itself from higher tables. Of course, that could change. If the WW builds are still as popular come Lincoln, Fires can be good against them as it kills everything short of a pumped Ascendant.

[hi-val]

It was all over Worlds. Once you hit 5 mana, it dominates the game. I'm not following daily results, but I'm confident saying that it's the combo to build around or beat.

[SpikeyMikey]

It was all over Worlds. Once you hit 5 mana, it dominates the game. I'm not following daily results, but I'm confident saying that it's the combo to build around or beat.

On my count (and I only counted once, so there's some room for error):

There were 95 decks at 4-2 or better on day 3.

21 of those ran Grove/Fires. 25% of the 6-0 decks ran Grove/Fires (Nakamura, 4 Grove, 3 Fires but also Gifts)

74 of the 4-2+ decks did not run Grove (and so I'm assuming did not run Fires either, although I didn't look too closely). 75% of the 6-0 decks did not run Grove/Fires, even though 3 were in the colors/archetypes (Nakamura's Gifts deck that ran it plus Zoo and RUG that did not).

Now I don't know the total field saturation of Fires vs. 4-2+ penetration. So perhaps all 21 Grove/Fires decks made 4-2 or better or maybe only a quarter did. I just don't know. And it could have a heavy influence on the metagame, but I don't think it will. It was supposed to be one of the format defining pairs going into Philly and it just flopped.

I think it's something to be aware of. Personally, I've dismissed it as being too clunky and not good enough. If Punishing Fires were 3 damage, I'd absolutely run it. But spending 5 mana to kill a Wild Nacatl just doesn't excite me. Of course, what I do is irrelevant, since I'm going to make up 0.1% of the field at Lincoln. But I don't think enough people are going to be sucked into Grove/Fires going into it unless multiple authors at SCG or CFB start pushing it as the next big thing.

It's good against Melira, I think, simply because they have low toughness creatures. But it's bad against Zoo and since Zoo is almost twice as popular as any other deck, that makes it a bad card to be running. It'd be like playing CB in a metagame with double the Fish presence of a usual tournament. You can't possibly dodge 28% of the field through a major tournament.

I think a safer plan would be that if you can afford the space, running a couple of Tectonic Edges.

[hi-val]

This is relevant to the discussion, too:

http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/modern/23170_Wild_Nacatl_Cometh_A_Worlds_Modern_Analysis.html

It was this kind of statistical analysis that got me interested in Melira decks in the first place. Check it out if you'd like to see what performed at Worlds.

[perm]

So can anyone give general MUs and tiers, or just distribution of the deck types?

[JACO]

I think it's something to be aware of. Personally, I've dismissed it as being too clunky and not good enough. If Punishing Fires were 3 damage, I'd absolutely run it. But spending 5 mana to kill a Wild Nacatl just doesn't excite me. Of course, what I do is irrelevant, since I'm going to make up 0.1% of the field at Lincoln. But I don't think enough people are going to be sucked into Grove/Fires going into it unless multiple authors at SCG or CFB start pushing it as the next big thing.

It's good against Melira, I think, simply because they have low toughness creatures. But it's bad against Zoo and since Zoo is almost twice as popular as any other deck, that makes it a bad card to be running. It'd be like playing CB in a metagame with double the Fish presence of a usual tournament. You can't possibly dodge 28% of the field through a major tournament.
There is this sentiment that Grove is poorly positioned because you have to spend a bunch of mana to kill stuff. The reason it is insane is because it's virtual and real card advantage the longer the game goes, and you are making much better use of your mana every turn. It absolutely destroys any of the 'quick' decks, Elves, any other little peasants (like Melira), kills Planeswalkers pretty easily (Elspeth and Gideon are problematic for Lightning Bolt), and is just 'ok' against big creature decks.

For example, let's say you play a Wild Nacatl, and on your end step I kill it with Punishing Fires. On your next turn you play another one, and I kill that as well. On your next turn you draw a land and play it and don't cast a creature. What happens? You get burned to the face, and it cost me almost nothing other than whatever untapped mana I had not used on my turn.

There is a reason Punishing Fires dominated the big Extended tournament where it was legal; because it's efficient, provides inevitability, and is generally better than most other tertiary or complementary strategies within a deck. You don't necessarily have to build around Punishing Fires for it to be awesome (see: Jund).

[SpikeyMikey]

I feel like the 5-0-1 Martyr/Proc deck from Worlds is probably the best mainstream deck right now. It deals with most Zoo builds pretty handily and it's difficult for most midrange decks to handle. Combo decks tend to be a little more sketchy and from what I've heard, heavy control builds with lots of sweepers and counters beat it. But since 28% of the meta was Zoo and that number will probably be the same or higher going into the PTQ season and into the GP in Lincoln.

So Zoo is the deck, Martyr/Proc is the deck that beats the deck. Interestingly enough, the next level from there is probably a variation of Andrew Roistan's LDZ that I've been promoting for the last couple weeks. A timely Bust will shut down their recursion engines, both Emeria, the Sky Ruin and the forecast on Proclamation of Rebirth (as well as their ability to hardcast it, obviously). At that point, Zoo can win through them, as long as it can find a way to handle the Serra Ascendants.

[Mr. Safety]

Not trying to troll here, but I have finally found myself loathing this format. It seems like every deck is a pathetic compromise of what it could be. I thought I could get past losing Faeries, Affinity, Dredge, Hex-Depths, Thopter-Sword, Hypergenesis, and Combo Elves being nuked from the format. I guess I can't.

The past few months have made me realize that legacy is a much more fun format to be involved in, therefore more deserving of my time and money.

The real push over the edge comes from the fact that the way to beat zoo is to run Boom//Bust...in zoo. When the decks are all zoo-variants and brews attempting to beat them, it gets really boring, really fast.

[hi-val]

Come on, this Heartless Summoning deck looks like a hell of a lot of fun to play:

http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/boab/172

[SpikeyMikey]

Come on, this Heartless Summoning deck looks like a hell of a lot of fun to play:

http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/boab/172

How is 31 rares and 5 mythics "Building on a Budget"? It looks more like "building casual decks with bad cards".

To be fair, Mr. Safety, Boom/Bust isn't what's going to help you beat other Zoo decks (unless they're domain Zoo with that sketchy ass mana base). It's what's going to help you beat the Martyr/Proc deck that beats Zoo.

There is still Rafiq Bant. And if you're a fantastic player, there's Ooze combo. It's a powerful deck, it's just so skill-intensive that you'd have to be a dedicated combo player to really get full value out of it.

[Mr. Safety]

I understand there are decks that beat zoo...what I'm saying is that those decks are boring.

What I wouldn't give to get the aforementioned high-caliber metagame back...

[SpikeyMikey]

I understand there are decks that beat zoo...what I'm saying is that those decks are boring.

What I wouldn't give to get the aforementioned high-caliber metagame back...

So... Play Bant. Swinging with a Vendilion Clique for 8 is not boring. Big numbers are always exciting :)

[Mr. Safety]

Swinging for 8 with Vendilion Clique is indeed boring...after you've done it a bunch of times.

What would be exciting would be frantically trying to make sure you have an answer to a turn 3 Hypergenesis and then swinging for 8 with VC once you have control over the game.

I'm an aggro/control player at heart, and I think it's boring to just trade body-blows like a boxing match of aggro vs. aggro. Sure it's part of the metagame experience...but jeesh, give me some tension! Does that guy have Glimpse of Nature or not? I think a lightning-fast format would be awesome...while WotC thinks it stinks.

[hi-val]

Swinging for 8 with Vendilion Clique is indeed boring...after you've done it a bunch of times.

What would be exciting would be frantically trying to make sure you have an answer to a turn 3 Hypergenesis and then swinging for 8 with VC once you have control over the game.

I'm an aggro/control player at heart, and I think it's boring to just trade body-blows like a boxing match of aggro vs. aggro. Sure it's part of the metagame experience...but jeesh, give me some tension! Does that guy have Glimpse of Nature or not? I think a lightning-fast format would be awesome...while WotC thinks it stinks.

We have that format though - Vintage is a really swingy format. I think the trend away from formats where it comes down to "did you draw the maindeck stopper on turn 2?" is fine.

[Mr. Safety]

Well reasoned...I don't play Vintage, so I have no experience with it. Is it really that fast? Because maybe I should be playing Vintage...

[Tammit67]

I'd be really surprised if a seismic assault/loam deck does not materialize. You have all the pieces you'd want with KotR and Assault/loam and the rest of the deck can be tailored.

[Jay_Gatz]

Lack of cycle lands hurts assault-loam too much

[Phoenix Ignition]

I'd be really surprised if a seismic assault/loam deck does not materialize. You have all the pieces you'd want with KotR and Assault/loam and the rest of the deck can be tailored.

Easier said than done. I've fallen short on both seismic swans and most people including me haven't gotten an aggro loam to work. No Mox Diamond (or 2 mana chance on turn 1) is really tough.

[Tammit67]

A couple people around me have been playing Birds for the one drop in an aggro loam thing. Its been beating pretty much every grindy deck (preboard), particularly creature based ones. The KotR's are so amazingly huge.

Not as good as mox diamond, but a jund loam deck seems fine. If i remember, it had birds, lotus cobra, explore, bloodbraid and the above.

[Phoenix Ignition]

A couple people around me have been playing Birds for the one drop in an aggro loam thing. Its been beating pretty much every grindy deck (preboard), particularly creature based ones. The KotR's are so amazingly huge.

Not as good as mox diamond, but a jund loam deck seems fine. If i remember, it had birds, lotus cobra, explore, bloodbraid and the above.

It's not the 3 mana on turn 2 that the deck needs as much as the 2 on turn one for bob or a similarly good play.

[kwelts]

Well reasoned...I don't play Vintage, so I have no experience with it. Is it really that fast? Because maybe I should be playing Vintage...

Vintage is so fast that some games you may not even be able to draw your first card. Lotus into voltaic key and time vault = infinite turn loop first turn.

[Tinefol]

I wouldn't say that. Almost all decks in vintage play a shitload of counters/discard and/or artifact disruption (Null Rod for fish, prison elements for workshop decks, chalice/leyline for dredge). Games turn out into somewhat long wars of attrition and oftentimes go into topdeck mode for both).

[conboy31]

Vintage is so fast that some games you may not even be able to draw your first card. Lotus into voltaic key and time vault = infinite turn loop first turn.

I kept track all the vintage events and side events I played at gencon these last two years. IIRC I played something like 40 games of vintage and only once did an actual t1 happen (I vault/keyed a TPS player).

Though, sometimes the game was essentially over ie fatestitcher dredge.