Kamigawwa: Neon Dynasty brings a bunch of awesome new cards into the Standard environment, and we had our first round of official Standard tournaments over the weekend. As to be expected, there’s a bunch of fantastic decks that came out to play. The Standard meta looks fairly fresh for the moment, so here’s 3 incredible decks that you have to try coming out of week 1 Standard.
Naya Enchantments
The first deck to come up is Naya Enchantments. Neon Dynasty brought in a TON of enchantment support, including a bunch of awesome Sagas. The deck goes fast and hard and is a great option for laddering.
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What’s sweet about this deck is that it’s leveraging an under utilized card set from Kaldheim, Runes. We’re also leveraging
Jukai Naturalist
Jukai Naturalist
Lifelink
Enchantment spells you cast cost {1} less to cast.
to make our enchantments cheaper. This lets us draw through our deck at a reasonable cost with our Runes.
Our payoffs include
Kami of Transience
Kami of Transience
Trample
Whenever you cast an enchantment spell, put a +1/+1 counter on this creature.
At the beginning of each end step, if an enchantment was put into your graveyard from the battlefield this turn, you may return this card from your graveyard to your hand.
,
Hallowed Haunting
Hallowed Haunting
As long as you control seven or more enchantments, creatures you control have flying and vigilance.
Whenever you cast an enchantment spell, create a white Spirit Cleric creature token with "This token's power and toughness are each equal to the number of Spirits you control."
and a single copy of
Michiko’s Reign of Truth
Michiko’s Reign of Truth
(As this Saga enters and after your draw step, add a lore counter.)
I, II — Target creature gets +1/+1 until end of turn for each artifact and/or enchantment you control.
III — Exile this Saga, then return it to the battlefield transformed under your control.
. Ultimately this is the aggro deck of the three, and is doing generally very well even in tournaments. The list above is from Max Dore, who took 2nd at the most recent Pizza Box Open.
Jeskai Combo
Next up we have a Jeskai Combo deck. There isn’t a clever name for this, but the combo in the deck is very cool. The shell may look familiar, almost like a Jeskai Turns shell, but we aren’t Turns-ing as much anymore.
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The combo in this deck involves a couple of very strong cards, and one that honestly, I didn’t even knew existed. First off, we want to get into play
Lier, Disciple of the Drowned
Lier, Disciple of the Drowned
Spells can't be countered.
Each instant and sorcery card in your graveyard has flashback. The flashback cost is equal to that card's mana cost.
, and your friend and mine,
Goldspan Dragon
Goldspan Dragon
Flying, haste
Whenever this creature attacks or becomes the target of a spell, create a Treasure token.
Treasures you control have "{T}, Sacrifice this artifact: Add two mana of any one color."
. Then, we want to have a copy of
Show of Confidence
Show of Confidence
When you cast this spell, copy it for each other instant and sorcery spell you've cast this turn. You may choose new targets for the copies.
Put a +1/+1 counter on target creature. It gains vigilance until end of turn.
. With this, we can target our Goldspan, a bunch of times and make a bunch of copies and make a big dragon to end the game.
We play a very Control style game plan, and while we still can do some Turns action with
Alchemist’s Gambit
Alchemist’s Gambit
Cleave {4}{U}{U}{R} (You may cast this spell for its cleave cost. If you do, remove the words in square brackets.)
Take an extra turn after this one. During that turn, damage can't be prevented. [At the beginning of that turn's end step, you lose the game.]
Exile Alchemist's Gambit.
, it’s a way to help us win the game, rather than a full blown win condition. This list took 2nd place at a qualifier event ran by Crokeyz’s.
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Esper Planeswalkers
The last deck that we have today is one that’s close to my heart. I love Super Friends decks, and this one is pretty awesome. This deck is Esper Super Friends.
We’re playing a very controlling game plan, with a ton of removal, but we are playing 14 Planeswalkers in this deck. The two new ones that we leverage here are
Kaito Shizuki
Kaito Shizuki
At the beginning of your end step, if Kaito entered this turn, he phases out.
+1: Draw a card. Then discard a card unless you attacked this turn.
−2: Create a 1/1 blue Ninja creature token with "This token can't be blocked."
−7: You get an emblem with "Whenever a creature you control deals combat damage to a player, search your library for a blue or black creature card, put it onto the battlefield, then shuffle."
, and
The Wandering Emperor
The Wandering Emperor
Flash
As long as The Wandering Emperor entered this turn, you may activate her loyalty abilities any time you could cast an instant.
+1: Put a +1/+1 counter on up to one target creature. It gains first strike until end of turn.
−1: Create a 2/2 white Samurai creature token with vigilance.
−2: Exile target tapped creature. You gain 2 life.
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Some of the new key removal pieces that we’re playing include
March of Otherworldly Light
March of Otherworldly Light
As an additional cost to cast this spell, you may exile any number of white cards from your hand. This spell costs {2} less to cast for each card exiled this way.
Exile target artifact, creature, or enchantment with mana value X or less.
and
March of Wretched Sorrow
March of Wretched Sorrow
As an additional cost to cast this spell, you may exile any number of black cards from your hand. This spell costs {2} less to cast for each card exiled this way.
March of Wretched Sorrow deals X damage to target creature or planeswalker and you gain X life.
, and
Farewell
Farewell
Choose one or more —
• Exile all artifacts.
• Exile all creatures.
• Exile all enchantments.
• Exile all graveyards.
. Farewell is particularly great here because we can use all of the modes with very little recourse because it doesn’t hit Planeswalkers. This list here took 3rd place in Crokeyz’s tournament, and was piloted by Eliott_Dragon.
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These are only a few sampling of cool things happening in Standard, and the format is feeling pretty fun right now. We’ll see how long this lasts, and if the big players from last format make their way back into the fold in the coming weeks.