Veil was back breaking to any control shell. It effectively worked as a 1 mana Cryptic Command that would blank any other interaction you could accomplish that turn. Your best case scenario was having two pieces of removal or two counters to get past it.

 

So what is everyone brewing for Theros’s release?

At the moment I am tinkering with about 4 versions of U/W ranging from Midrange to control, G/B Midrange, U/G Ramp, Mono white lifegain/devotion and Gruul for when I am tired of actually giving my turns more than four seconds of thought. I want to try some variant of Esper control, but I am having trouble justifying it over U/W if I am not playing a Hero Shell.

Has anyone built G/W enchantments? I am curious as to its good/bad match ups and what it’s angle in the meta is from a firsthand perspective. Especially as I know it destroys U/G Ramp and I expect to see it A fair amount in the upcoming standard event.

Speaking of the upcoming standard event, what does everyone intend to play? I think I am going to use my most recent iteration of U/W control as it feels pretty well tuned. If anyone else is interested in the list I will happily post it when I get home from work.

 

Will play monowhite Devotion. I disagree with the thought that you don't need think the lines through though, since if you stumble you will lose. You're a proactive deck with little disruption, and Simic ramp is much bigger than you. Hitting your threats on curve is vitally important to not getting run out of the game.

 

I'm digging G/W aura/enchantments. The Selesnya Auras of Majesty precon was the first I played when Arena went to open beta so nostalgia factors in. Season of Growth and Setessan Champion are great engines. I only have the rares and mythics from drafts I've run so it's pretty barebones and I still need to figure out removal and such. I also like Archon of Sun's Grace as a bit of a curve topper and alternate constellation payoff. That card came in super clutch for my prerelease pool.

Only played a handful of bo1 standard but it's a fun, straightforward beatdown deck.
Lost pretty hard to Fires but expected because that deck is ridiculously consistent and multiple tempo-breaking boardwipes and bounces are awful.
Cavalcade dumpstered, other monored is slightly favored if they run out of gas and I survive from lifelink. Rakdos oven cats looked favorable but massacre girl became a race to sac my alseids to deny triggers.
Saw a ton of mirror matches, Warbriar's 0/2 and fight made a big difference. Getting Heliod on board for 2 and devotion active by tune 4 is also neat.
Outside of bogles matchups, control seems as strong as ever. Have a renewed hatred for dimir hand hate, too.

 

Historic Ranked is back and just in time, standard was feeling a bit stale. Haven't 100% settled on a deck yet, but I am really liking Hoogland's Yarok Field deck and have struggled to improve it. I am curious if anyone else is grinding historic or wants to test, especially now that we have a functional-ish friend's list. For anyone who does, my display name is Medfly#02633, feel free to add me, I can make pretty much any standard list and a healthy percentage of good historic builds. With a lot of us currently off from work, or expecting to be in the near future, it seems like a good time to get some games in.

 

Anyone else still active on Arena? I am messing around with historic lists and want to see if I can get them Obliterator Rock and to work. Any help in testing would be appreciated. I can make most standard or historic lists to help others test as well .

I had also forgotten how tedious the grind is, took a few month break which led to my rank decaying way back to the bottom. Luckily the climb back into Platinum was pretty easy, but I have the feeling it will be a slog from here.

 

I believe I found a format *more* broken than vintage. This is a drafted deck from the PAX Supreme Cube draft.