Pro Tour Hour of Devastation is upon us!

Posted On 3:07 PM // Leave a Comment

Newsletter
Thursday, July 27th

As you read this, we're just hours from Pro Tour Hour of Devastation kicking off! Lots of SCG's own are in Kyoto, Japan fighting for glory and trying to solve the best Standard format we've seen for some time! Will it stay that way? Is this a format that can be as solved as the last few? Ross Merriam seems to think so, which is why he's recommending a few decks to embrace (and a few to avoid!) Jadine Klomparens has the definitive guide to viewing the big event, and Jim Davis is running back his special predictions column as well!

So who will it be come Sunday? Can Gerry Thompson achieve the unthinkable by going back to back? Will Brad Nelson solve Standard in time to remain the world's foremost master of the format? Or will it be someone else sneaking up from out of nowhere? Standard: It's been too long since you were this fascinating. We're thrilled to have you back!

— Danny West, Content Coordinator

Ross, Stevens, and Keith dominate the competition at SCG Atlanta!

Travis Ryder
Standard Classic

Alex Vess
Modern Classic

Zachary Koch
Legacy Classic

Enjoy Standard While You Can!
By Ross Merriam  

With #PTHOU coming up this weekend, the murky picture of the format will crystallize as it shrinks around a top tier of decks and those decks that are best able to compete with that tier. Unfortunately, I am not in Japan preparing for this Pro Tour, so I wanted to give you all some insight into what the players who are preparing are thinking about as they work through testing the format and their and their team's brews.

Personally, I think the most important and vastly underrated aspect of Magic is asking the right questions. Doing so allows you to frame the problem in any way you wish, giving you complete control of how you frame the issue and thus an ability to crop out things you think are irrelevant and concentrate on the most important parts.

Even with two weeks of testing in a secluded house on a great team, you're not going to be able to fully entertain every idea and test every brew. Executive decisions have to be made that are going to create the best use of resources for the team. With that said, here are the primary questions I think the players this weekend are facing (in no particular order), and my first attempts at answering them.

August 12-13
Modern

September 1-3
Standard

September 16-17
Modern

The Viewer's Guide To
Pro Tour Hour Of Devastation
By Jadine Klomparens  

Championship events are not business as usual. They are the culmination of weeks or months of effort and are the final chapter in the history of the season, heavily influencing how we remember all the events that preceded them. There are always expectations going into them, and watching that final event either meet those expectations or subvert them is half the fun. But all of this significance is lost on those just tuning in for the final game without knowledge of all the circumstances that set the stage.

If you're reading this, I'm sure you play Magic. But maybe Standard isn't quite your thing. Or maybe you love Standard, but haven't been able to play very much during the last couple of weeks because work got super-busy. There are a lot of valid reasons to not be intimately familiar with the current Standard format despite being an avid Magic player. But regardless of why you're currently a little lost in Standard, you need the context of the format to get the most out of your Pro Tour viewing experience.

Every Magic player deserves to enjoy the Pro Tour to the fullest. But getting the necessary context isn't easy. Sure, it's simple to go pull up the last two weeks of SCG Tour® results and look at the winning decklists, but the necessary context is so much more than just knowing what decks exist in the format. There's knowing which decks are on top right now, and which are just starting their ascent; which decks everyone will be ready for, and which are on such a downturn as to barely be expected; what the story of the format so far is, and what to watch out for in its next, most important chapter.

Five Predictions For
Pro Tour Hour Of Devastation
By Jim Davis  

Earthshaker Khenra is one of the best aggressive red creatures printed in a very long time, as it provides not only a great early attacker but solves the biggest problem of aggressive red decks: mana flood. At #SCGATL I actually found myself often wanting to draw my sixth land because eternalizing Earthshaker Khenra was just that good. Adding this to the reach that Ramunap Ruins gives the deck in conjunction with Sunscorched Desert yields quite the recipe for aggro success.

The issue is that everyone relevant is already aware of this information.

For those unfamiliar with the terminology, when I say "Level 0" deck, I mean that Mono-Red Aggro will be the baseline deck for the format. Deck discussion will begin with "Can it beat Mono-Red Aggro?" and anyone unsure about what to play will likely just default to it as the "best deck" in a vacuum.

To win a Pro Tour, you often want to be two steps ahead on Level 2. Most people are aware of what the Level 2 deck of the Pro Tour will be, and work to build a deck that is independently good and has a great matchup against it. Typically the decks that do best are the ones built to do well against those Level 1 decks while also having game against the Level 0 deck.