Metagame Mentor: The First Standard Results After the Bans

Whats up, and welcome again to Metagame Mentor, your weekly information to the highest decks and newest Constructed developments on the trail to the Professional Tour. This previous weekend marked the beginning of a round of Regional Championship Qualifiers (RCQs) in Customary, a format that simply underwent an enormous upheaval with the banned and restricted announcement on August 10. With Badgermole Cub, Stormchaser’s Expertise, and Gran-Gran all banned, Customary has been cracked broad open, leaving extra room for a wide range of methods to seek out aggressive success.

On this article, I will stroll by means of the outcomes and classes from the primary Customary occasions after these bans took impact, together with an outline of essentially the most impactful new playing cards from Magic: The Gathering® | The Hobbit™.

Standard is a rotating 60-card format that at the moment permits enlargement units from Wilds of Eldraine ahead. Customary will not rotate within the fall of 2026. As a substitute, the subsequent main Customary rotation will happen in early 2027, aligning with the Prerelease of Nauctis: The Sunken Realm.

To find out the form of the metagame following the bans and the discharge of Magic: The Gathering | The Hobbit, I analyzed almost 300 profitable event decks from August 11 by means of August 17. That is not a big pattern dimension, however it affords a useful first glimpse. My dataset was comprised of each printed Magic Online Standard Challenge decklist from this time interval, together with a number of dozen high decklists from varied RCQs across the globe.

To point out which decks are dominating the highest tables, I assigned factors to every deck primarily based on its rectified variety of internet wins, calculated because the variety of match wins minus losses, with unfavorable values adjusted to zero. By combining these factors throughout all occasions, every archetype’s share of the entire rectified internet wins blends reputation and efficiency right into a single, complete metric: the winner’s metagame share. An summary is supplied within the following desk, the place every archetype title hyperlinks to a top-performing decklist that intently displays its mixture construct.

In last week’s article, I wrote in regards to the affect of the bans and proposed 4 pillars of the brand new metagame, none of which misplaced a card: Mardu Discard, Izzet Spellementals, Dimir Excruciator, and 4-Shade Management. I additionally highlighted Dimir Midrange as a promising new contender with room to breathe now that a number of beforehand problematic playing cards are gone. All of those decks have certainly been distinguished on the high tables of Customary tournaments thus far, principally within the anticipated builds. That article due to this fact stays a helpful introduction to the brand new Customary panorama, significantly for understanding the methods that originally appeared greatest positioned to capitalize on the bans.

However as the primary week of tournaments has unfolded, the image has develop into significantly extra nuanced. The metagame has proved remarkably various, with all kinds of different decks additionally placing up sturdy outcomes. Within the the rest of this text, I will add to last week’s framework by highlighting the opposite widespread and profitable selections which have emerged. These embody decks that survived the banning of a key card, established archetypes which might be breaking out, and modern methods constructed round playing cards from Magic: The Gathering | The Hobbit.

3 Ba Sing Se
1 Demolition Area
4 Earthbender Ascension
4 Escape Tunnel
4 Esper Origins
4 Fabled Passage
14 Forest
4 Icetill Explorer
2 Eager-Eyed Curator
4 Llanowar Elves
1 Meltstrider’s Resolve
3 Mightform Harmonizer
1 Royal Remedy
4 Sapling Nursery
4 Sazh’s Chocobo
2 Shared Roots
1 Surrak, Elusive Hunter


1 Eager-Eyed Curator
1 Leatherhead, Swamp Stalker
2 Meltstrider’s Resolve
4 Mossborn Hydra
2 Soul-Information Lantern
2 Surrak, Elusive Hunter
3 Torpor Orb

Mono-Inexperienced Landfall could have misplaced Badgermole Cub, however that was by no means a necessary piece of the deck. This Problem-winning decklist changed by the Cub with a mix of Eager-Eyed Curator and Shared Roots. These swaps are pretty typical, and lots of Selesnya Offense gamers additionally changed Badgermole Cub with Eager-Eyed Curator and/or Nice Divide Information. One other minor tweak on this Mono-Inexperienced Landfall checklist stems from the diminished stress to reply an opposing Badgermole Cub or Gran-Gran. In consequence, the principle deck accommodates fewer Meltstrider’s Resolve than earlier than, making room for extra copies of Sapling Nursery.

Mono-Inexperienced Landfall emerged from the bans trying good, sporting loads of instruments for the brand new metagame. It could nonetheless use Llanowar Elves to ramp into Icetill Explorer or Mightform Harmonizer—a method that retains a lot of its energy even with out Badgermole Cub. In the meantime, the most effective methods to defeat Mono-Inexperienced Landfall was with the Nature’s Rhythm decks that used Badgermole Cub alongside a plethora of mana-generating creatures to go excessive. Mono-Inexperienced Landfall now not has to fret about that deck. Whereas Mono-Inexperienced Aggro was barely weak to Izzet Spellementals, Sunderflock is much less devastating when it isn’t returning earthbent lands.

All in all, Mono-Inexperienced Landfall stays a top-tier contender within the new Customary atmosphere, main the best way at 13% of the winner’s metagame. Given this, we would even see the reemergence of Selesnya Landfall because the better-positioned competitor within the Landfall mirror.

4 Abandon Attachments
4 Accumulate Knowledge
3 Artist’s Expertise
4 Combustion Method
1 Emeritus of Ideation
4 Firebending Lesson
1 Flashback
4 Nice Corridor of the Biblioplex
3 Hallowed Fountain
2 Iroh’s Demonstration
3 Island
2 It will Quench Ya!
4 Jeskai Revelation
1 Mistrise Village
3 Riverpyre Verge
3 Spirebluff Canal
4 Steam Vents
3 Inventory Up
2 Sunset Go
4 Pill of Discovery
1 Three Steps Forward


1 Avengers Disassembled
2 Day of Judgment
2 Disdainful Stroke
1 Emeritus of Ideation
1 Flashfreeze
1 Ghost Vacuum
1 Negate
4 Worth of Freedom
1 Ral, Crackling Wit
1 Sphinx of the Remaining Phrase

Jeskai Classes misplaced Gran-Gran, making it harder to allow one-mana Classes or an early Jeskai Revelation. Nonetheless, many Jeskai Classes gamers caught with the archetype, changing Gran-Gran with Artist’s Expertise. Monument to Endurance could be too troublesome to set off constantly with out Gran-Gran as a further discard enabler, however Artist’s Expertise is a superbly cheap card for the deck. Certain, it prices extra mana than Gran-Gran for its rummaging and cost-reduction impact, however there are clear similarities with out being weak to creature elimination.

In the meantime, Accumulate Knowledge and Combustion Method stay strong interactive spells that present a worthwhile payoff for specializing in Classes, whereas playing cards like Firebending Lesson and Abandon Attachments are completely playable enablers. The deck’s total recreation plan is just like 4-Shade Management, utilizing Pill of Discovery to speed up right into a devastating turn-five Jeskai Revelation, however the Classes package deal can rival the 4-Shade interactive spells, particularly when Artist’s Expertise ties all the pieces collectively.

4 Amalia Benavides Aguirre
2 Aunt Could
3 Bleachbone Verge
4 Case of the Uneaten Feast
4 Hid Courtyard
2 Dalkovan Encampment
4 Godless Shrine
2 Goldmeadow Nomad
3 Haliya, Guided by Gentle
4 Hinterland Sanctifier
4 Lunar Convocation
2 Moseo, Vein’s New Dean
3 Multiversal Passage
6 Plains
4 Increase the Previous
2 Resolute Reinforcements
3 Starscape Cleric
4 Voice of Victory


2 Cathar Commando
2 Darkish Confidant
3 Deep-Cavern Bat
2 Erode
2 Ghost Vacuum
2 Kutzil’s Flanker
2 Requiting Hex

Through the spherical of Regional Championships just a few months in the past, Orzhov Life Acquire was basically non-existent. Historically, life-gain methods have bother succeeding in aggressive Greatest-of-Three Customary. Nonetheless, the deck has emerged as a fringe contender since then, and it got here by means of the bans fully unscathed. With respectable finishes throughout Magic On-line and tabletop RCQs, it represented a powerful 8.3% of the winner’s metagame over the previous week.

The important thing enablers within the deck are Hinterland Sanctifier and Case of the Uneaten Feast. Each time a newly getting into creature features you 1 life, Amalia Benavides Aguirre instantly explores; Haliya, Guided by Gentle can simply draw playing cards; and Lunar Convocation offers extra worth on every of your finish steps.

Past that core, the lists start to diverge. The most typical construct provides interactive playing cards like Deep-Cavern Bat, Erode, and Vacancy. But Traft received a Magic On-line Problem with a special strategy that includes Increase the Previous and extra two-drops. Opponents will usually destroy your creatures, and Amalia Benavides Aguirre‘s discover means may put creatures into your graveyard. Once they all return, the ensuing burst of life achieve alongside Starscape Cleric may even be deadly on the spot. This seems to be like a deck value watching.

4 Burst Lightning
3 Channeled Dragonfire
4 Employed Claw
4 Magda, the Hoardmaster
4 Magmatic Hellkite
20 Mountain
4 Nova Hellkite
4 Sarkhan, Dragon Ascendant
4 Shock
4 Smaug the Magnificent
3 Soulstone Sanctuary
2 Sunspine Lynx


2 Ghost Vacuum
3 Magebane Lizard
2 Scorching Shot
2 Sear
2 Slagstorm
2 Sunspine Lynx
2 The Legend of Roku

Essentially the most-played new card from Magic: The Gathering | The Hobbit is Smaug the Magnificent. Final week, I highlighted its potential in Boros Dragons, and certainly the legendary Dragon has appeared in six Boros Dragons decks in my information set. However Smaug was much more widespread in Mono-Pink Aggro, the place it appeared in seven decks. The construct proven above, which reached the High 8 of a 50-player Magic On-line Problem, doesn’t have a hyper-aggressive curve, as an alternative combining 4 one-drop creatures with twelve monumental Dragons to make sure a robust late recreation.

The dream curve begins with Sarkhan, Dragon Ascendant, then you may play Smaug the Magnificent as early as flip three and assault with two huge fliers. Alternatively, in case your two-drop is Magda, the Hoardmaster, Magda will create a Treasure earlier than Smaug’s assault set off resolves, letting you deal harm to an opposing creature. Employed Claw is one other glorious enabler for Magda, permitting the deck to quickly stockpile Treasures or offering one other path to a turn-three Smaug.

1 Deserted Air Temple
4 Abhorrent Oculus
1 Agna Qel’a
4 Cosmogrand Zenith
4 Floodfarm Verge
4 Get Misplaced
4 Hallowed Fountain
4 Serving to Hand
4 Island
2 Kiora, the Rising Tide
4 Leonardo’s Method
4 Meticulous Archive
4 Most Decrepit Outdated Hen
4 No Extra Lies
4 Picklock Prankster
4 Plains
4 Practiced Offense


2 Clarion Conqueror
2 Erode
3 Requisition Raid
4 Spell Pierce
2 Spell Snare
2 The Eagles Are Coming!

Past Smaug the Magnificent, a bunch of different playing cards from Magic: The Gathering | The Hobbit noticed play. For instance, I encountered Plunder the Trollshaws in Dimir Management; Gandalf, Goblins’ Bane in Izzet Fling; Most Decrepit Outdated Hen in Azorius Oculus; The Queen of Dale in 5-Shade People; and Dwarven Mauler in Boros Tools. These final three, specifically, are particularly promising.

Most Decrepit Outdated Hen successfully helps you to run eight copies of Picklock Prankster, providing a robust Journey spell that may arrange your recreation plan. This deck desires to mill Abhorrent Oculus and return it for a single white mana with Serving to Hand. Going from 4 to eight self-mill results on flip two significantly improves the consistency of the deck’s recreation plan. Furthermore, in a deck that quickly mills itself, Most Decrepit Outdated Hen can also be an affordable turn-one play, rapidly changing into a 2/2 flier or serving to to pay the sneak value on Leonardo’s Method. Thief_Of_Crowns took this checklist to a High 8 at a Magic On-line Problem, and it has severe potential.

1 Practiced Offense
2 Key to the Aspect-Door
3 Celestial Reunion
1 Elektra, Daughter of the Hand
1 King T’Challa
1 Karai, Way forward for the Foot
1 Trustworthy Rutstein
1 Captain America, Tremendous-Soldier
1 Miles Morales
1 Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.
1 Bruce Banner
2 The Wondrous Wasp
2 Spectacular Spider-Man
2 Jennifer Walters
2 Cloak and Dagger, Entwined
2 Serah Farron
2 Zack Honest
2 The Queen of Dale
3 Cecil, Darkish Knight
3 Aang, Swift Savior
3 Arachne, Psionic Weaver
1 Plains
1 Forest
2 Overgrown Tomb
2 Hallowed Fountain
2 Godless Shrine
3 Temple Backyard
4 Beginning City
4 Secluded Courtyard
4 Cavern of Souls


3 Winnowing
1 Soul-Information Lantern
2 Daybreak’s Truce
2 Mai, Scornful Striker
1 Relaxation in Peace
2 Torpor Orb
1 Chomping Changeling
1 Monica Rambeau
1 Settle the Wreckage
1 The Sentry, Golden Guardian

5-Shade People is one other present fringe technique which may have the best instruments to compete now that the bans have opened the format. Due to Cavern of Souls and Secluded Courtyard, the deck can play all the very best People throughout all 5 colours. Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. is one other glorious match for such a deck. Each creature within the deck is famous, and the payoff is Serah Farron, who simply transforms and boosts all of your legends. The checklist proven above reached the High 4 of an RCQ.

With a deck stuffed with legends, there’s all the time a threat of getting caught with a number of copies of the identical card in your hand. Fortunately, Magic: The Gathering | The Hobbit introduced two useful additions that assist resolve the issue. The Queen of Dale helps you to discard redundant legendary playing cards, turning them right into a recent card and a 1/1 Human Soldier token. Key to the Aspect-Door is arguably even higher in that position, turning extra legends into easy card benefit. Whereas it could take some work to excellent all the cardboard selections and discover the best variety of legendary creatures, these additions might elevate an already viable technique into a real aggressive contender.

1 Bofur, Dependable Guardian
3 Burst Lightning
4 Cavern of Souls
2 Dáin Ironfoot
4 Dáin’s Firm
3 Dwarven Mattock
4 Dwarven Mauler
1 Erode
4 Inspiring Vantage
4 Kíli the Resourceful
4 Leyline Axe
1 Mabel, Inheritor to Cragflame
2 Mountain
2 Plains
4 Sacred Foundry
2 Samurai’s Katana
2 Skateboard
4 Sunbillow Verge
3 The Lonely Mountain
2 Thorin Oakenshield
3 Thorin, Mountain-king
1 Zack Honest


1 Boros Attraction
2 Chandra, Spark Hunter
2 Daybreak’s Truce
1 Erode
1 Fíli the Pathfinder
2 Excessive Midday
1 Monica Rambeau
2 Relaxation in Peace
2 Sear
1 The Tremendous Hero Civil Struggle

The deck that gained the most important variety of playing cards from Magic: The Gathering | The Hobbit is Boros Dwarves. The dream draw begins with Leyline Axe in your opening hand; Bofur, Dependable Guardian on flip one; and Kíli the Resourceful on flip two. This instantly provides you a permanent story, letting you equip the Axe without spending a dime. As the two/2 double striker offers 4 harm and features 4 life, you get an 8-point life swing on flip two!

Bofur, Dependable Guardian
Dwarven Mauler
Kíli the Resourceful
Thorin Oakenshield
Dáin’s Firm
Dáin Ironfoot
Thorin, Mountain-king
Dwarven Mattock
The Lonely Mountain

Alternatively, Dwarven Mauler into Dwarven Mattock helps you to assault for 4 on flip two. In a while, Thorin, Mountain-king can re-equip the Axe whereas dealing free harm, whereas The Lonely Mountain helps set off Kíli to attract a card in your opponent’s flip. This deck is full of these sorts of pleasant synergies, and Zompatanfo took it to a 5-0 end in a Magic On-line League. Whereas it could take some work to excellent all the cardboard selections, any deck that generates an 8-point life swing on flip two whereas establishing an environment friendly card-draw engine deserves consideration.

The present spherical of Regional Championship Qualifiers options Customary because the designated format for in-store Constructed occasions. Based mostly on the primary outcomes because the bans and the discharge of Magic: The Gathering | The Hobbit, Mono-Inexperienced Landfall, Dimir Midrange, Mardu Discard, and Izzet Spellementals have emerged because the main decks within the winner’s metagame. But it is also a deck builder’s paradise the place nearly something appears attainable, and the format will little question proceed to evolve quickly over the approaching weeks.

If you would like to place your Customary abilities to the check, yow will discover an RCQ occasion close to you thru your local game store or your regional organizer’s website. And in case your aspirations lengthen past changing into the hero of your native store, remember to take a look at Magic Spotlight: Fracture, an enormous open-field Customary event held on the finish of October in Hartford and Beijing. With a recent metagame and a lot high-level Customary competitors on the horizon, the approaching months promise to be a wonderful time to dive into the format.