Gearing up for Grand Prix Richmond!

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Newsletter
Thursday, May 4th

If you need a break from the stress of new Standard, Grand Prix Richmond is all about Limited! But we understand if you're still exploring the recently refreshed Standard format after #SCGATL. Gerry Thompson is making his finds for the format public knowledge this week! For all of you on your way to Richmond for Amonkhet Sealed and Draft, Ryan Saxe is putting your skills to the test! And if you need a dose of new brewing brilliance for Modern, you can always count on Conley Woods! Good luck to everyone in Richmond! May your sealed pools be busted!

— Danny West, Content Coordinator

Andrew Jessup
Standard Open

Doug Lambert
Modern Open

Sam Lowe
Standard Classic

Initial Amonkhet Testing Results!
By Gerry Thompson  

Basically, the decks that beat Mardu are the ones that go over the top of it, as it's been doing to everyone else. Decks with an expensive, sorcery-speed top-end couldn't compete with the Felidar Guardian / Saheeli Rai combo, and therefore couldn't compete in the format, despite having at least one great matchup.

While having some disruption obviously helps against those sorts of decks, it's definitely not enough to seal the deal. In order to accomplish that, you're going to need a clock. Since Mardu's best route for beating slower, more powerful Standard decks was by becoming slower and more powerful itself, it's absolutely ripe for combo decks to prey on it. Mardu's efficient removal and midrange mirror breakers don't do much against spell-based combo decks. If you want to win, you're going to need to threaten lethal damage by Turn 5.

Mardu's transformational sideboard plan into Planeswalkers is going to be classic midrange, and Sorin, Grim Nemesis would cement that even further. It used to be the go-to Planeswalker for outclassing mirrors, but that might not be a viable strategy with Glorybringer in the mix.

May 20-21
Team Constructed

May 27-28
Modern

June 10-11
Modern

Draft Digest: Trial Of Consensus
By Ryan Saxe  

There really wasn't much of a consensus on what the correct picks were for my last article. Now that I've drafted the format a substantial amount, I'm quite sure I can speak on this. Rags // Riches, as I mentioned, is confirmed an absolute bomb. Aggressive decks are king in this format; the exert two-drops are so good. Rags just kills an abundance of relevant cards, and that's all there is to it. Yes, Infest would be a great first pick in this format.

As far as the second pick, I have gone higher on both Cartouche of Ambition and Bloodrage Brawler. Given how good Rags // Riches is, I would take the Cartouche, especially given that I have Trial of Ambition. The Trial-Cartouche synergy is obviously good, but it really is even better than I thought! Also, the Cartouche of Ambition is a key card to non-aggro decks in this format, because it can be very difficult for the aggressive decks to beat it. Hence it goes quite well with our Rags // Riches.

So even though aggro is the way to go, you can draft control decks. It's why I expect this to be one of the greatest formats of all time. Will this pack set us up for a sweet aggro deck or control deck?

Modern Insanity:
My New Amonkhet Brew
By Conley Woods  

The good news is that, while Waste Not is a little variable in output, we are forcing the opponent to discard so many cards that we will often get the desired result we seek. Essentially every deck in the format is going to be playing with lands anyway and mana is really the only essential aspect of Waste Not for us. Extra cards and Zombies are still welcome, but in order for our engine to run as smoothly as possible, the extra mana goes a long way.

So at this point, we have an engine concept in place and we have at least one payoff that can win us the game in Waste Not. Specifically, we are talking about the Zombies at this point, and while they do win the game, I would not call them the most reliable win condition. First, we can't necessarily count on our opponent running enough creatures in their deck for this to even be threatening. Second, we don't really want to expose ourselves to sweepers and Maelstrom Pulse if we can avoid it. We are going to want something to really seal the deal in immediate fashion. Hmm...