Greetings, Dear Reader. I would like to shift gears from writing about Modern for a moment and focus on standard. The format has become dominated by Illusions (kind of). Which means that Day of Judgment decks are having more success. Given these facts, what should you be playing? Well, something that beats both of those strategies, obviously! Now, call me a one-trick pony, but I believe you can do exactly that with G/W. Prepare yourselves, as this deck is going to be my grand unvailing of Molten-Tail Masticore.
Yea, call me crazy, go back and re-read that line...I said Molten-tail Masticore. This card got a lot of hype when it was released and saw some limited play in Fauna Shaman decks in previous standard formats. Since then the card has seem literally no play and all the hype was dismissed. This card may not be what I think it is, but I do know that it still does very powerful things.
In a deck like G/W this card can come down on turn 3 if you have the right hand to support it. This means that against a control deck with a hand full of creatures this robo-cat can be your entire game plan. Having the ability to swing for 4 and/or dome your opponent for 4 in the same turn makes for a pretty wicked clock (especially against some of the durdle decks that are popping up now). The other way to use this creature is as a follow-up to an opponents Wrath effect. They put 2-3 of your creatures in the graveyard and you start with ammunition. Mooreland Haunt has shown us how powerful having a way to use your graveyard in a creature deck can be.
Masticore gives our G/W Township deck something similar (and more powerful, in my opinion) to Mooreland Haunt without running another colorless land. We also get a bonus, Masticore is more versatile than Mooreland Haunt. Have you ever tried to kill a titan with 2 Haunt activations? Yea, that doesn't work out so well. With your opponent at 4 your Haunt gives them at least 3 turns to draw another answer (on an empty board). Mooreland Haunt also gets set back by board wipes. All of these shortcomings can be overcome by Masticore, but there are a couple of downsides.
First, Masticore can be countered. One of the biggest advantages to Mooreland Haunt is the fact that your opponent can't interact with it outside of land destruction. Another downside (which can partially be played around) is point destruction. As long as you leave 2 mana up when Masticore resolves he will live through anything short of 2 removal spells or a Revoke Existance. So, play around/through counterspells (every countered Mirran Crusader is 4 to the dome later!) and Masticore can give this deck the reach it has needed for the past few weeks.
So, without further ado, the list:
Artifacts:
3 Mortarpod
Enchantments:
3 Oblivion Ring
Creatures:
4 Birds of Paradise
4 Avacyn's Pilgrim
4 Mirran Crusader
4 Blade Splicer
3 Fiend Hunter
3 Molten-Tail Masticore
3 Hero of Bladehold
Planeswalkers:
3 Garruk Relentless
2 Elspeth Tirel
Lands:
4 Razorverge Thicket
4 Sunpetal Grove
4 Gavony Township
8 Forest
4 Plains
I explained how to beat control decks well enough with Masticore, but I didn't talk about Illusions. The list should be pretty self-explanatory on that front, Garruk and Mortarpod are your best friends. I have had nothing but success against Illusions in the past with this archetype. The addition of more Fiend Hunters to the maindeck further bolsters that matchup. The sideboard should be pretty standard, some combination of Elesh Norn, Thrun, Celestial Purge, Timely Reinforcements, and graveyard hate.
So, feel free to take this baby for a spin and make sure to let me know how it goes. I am especially interested in other peoples impressions of Masticore in this format.
If you are going to GP Austin this weekend make sure to get ahold of my via twitter @CapnTopDeck. I would love to meet you and play some games! I will be rocking this G/W list in the Invitational qualifiers/FNMs/Win-a-Boxes when not in the Main Event, and you should too. So, shoot me some feedback on twitter and make sure to listen to the podcast that I lend my voice to, Planeswalker Asylum over at couchpirates.com!
After tutoring up Emrakul against his control opponent in Modern Ali Aintrazi (@AliEldrazi) said these words about his opponents concession: "He's probably seen enough hentai to know where that was going."
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