Up until recently, many players considered Pioneer a dead Magic: the Gathering format. But Wizards of the Coast announced the return of Pro Tours and the first one will feature Pioneer. This reinvigorated players’ interest in the format.
If you haven’t been keeping up with Pioneer, you may need a brief breakdown of the metagame. I’ll cover several of the format’s most prevalent decks in this article, plus showcase a few extra fun options.
The Pioneer Metagame
Looking at Pioneer’s metagame, there is a diverse range of decks with every type of strategy being well-represented. There are strong options for control, midrange, aggro, and combo players.
Let’s break down a few of the most popular decks in Pioneer!
Azorius Control
This is your traditional control strategy that uses counterspells and board wipes to keep the battlefield clear before landing a tricky threat such as
Teferi, Hero of Dominaria
Teferi, Hero of Dominaria
+1: Draw a card. At the beginning of the next end step, untap up to two lands.
−3: Put target nonland permanent into its owner's library third from the top.
−8: You get an emblem with "Whenever you draw a card, exile target permanent an opponent controls."
, or Shark Typhoon.
You can pass your turn with mana open and leave your opponent guessing as to whether you have
Absorb
Absorb
Counter target spell. You gain 3 life.
,
Memory Deluge
Memory Deluge
Look at the top X cards of your library, where X is the amount of mana spent to cast this spell. Put two of them into your hand and the rest on the bottom of your library in a random order.
Flashback {5}{U}{U} (You may cast this card from your graveyard for its flashback cost. Then exile it.)
, or the new addition, The Wandering Emperor.
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Winota Midrange
This deck puts explosive amounts of power on the battlefield. It does this by ramping into Winota with
Elvish Mystic
Elvish Mystic
{T}: Add {G}.
and Prosperous Innkeeper, attacking with a field full of non-Human creatures, and using Winota to “cheat” big threats into play such as Tovolar’s Huntmaster.
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Hidden Strings Combo
This all-in combo deck uses its namesake card, Hidden Strings, and
Vizier of Tumbling Sands
Vizier of Tumbling Sands
{T}: Untap another target permanent.
Cycling {1}{U} ({1}{U}, Discard this card: Draw a card.)
When you cycle this card, untap target permanent.
to untap Lotus Field multiple times in a turn, making a ton of mana to cast Emergent Ultimatum.
The goal of casting Emergent Ultimatum is to put an
Omniscience
Omniscience
You may cast spells from your hand without paying their mana costs.
into play, allowing you to cast all your spells for free. From here, you can win by casting Approach of the Second Sun twice in one turn.
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Mono-Red Aggro
This is Pioneer’s version of the typical Modern Burn deck. It will occasionally splash white for Boros Charm and white sideboard options.
But for the most part, Red-based aggressive decks aim to play efficient prowess creatures like Monastery Swiftspear and Soul-Scar Mage and boost their stats with burn spells such as
Play with Fire
Play with Fire
Play with Fire deals 2 damage to any target. If a player is dealt damage this way, scry 1. (Look at the top card of your library. You may put that card on the bottom.)
and Skkewer the Critics.
Chandra is a difficult-to-answer threat that provides card advantage, ramp, and direct damage to your opponent. And Eidolon is a classic Burn card that taxes your opponent’s life total whenever they play cards that cost three or fewer mana.
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Other Pioneer Strategies
Niv-Mizzet Reborn is a midrange deck that plays spells of every color pairing. The legendary dragon can dig through the top of your deck and draw Dreadbore, The Scarab God, and Bring to Light.
Fires of Invention was banned in Standard but it is still legal in Pioneer. This is another five-color deck that aims to Transmogrify creature tokens into Angent of Treachery.
Izzet Phoenix decks play a high density of instants and sorceries to reanimate Arclight Phoenix from the graveyard or transform Thing in the Ice.