Post AER Humans

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Happy Tuesday MTG Peeps,

Following up with yesterday's post on the new Magic: the Gathering standard constructed season, we wish to elaborate on to our very first build.  This decklist was essentially planned several weeks ago with the target to make the most use of an existing decklist we already had all or most of the components to and then supplementing it with new Aether Revolt cards.  Why? Because the market for pre-ordered card singles is tumultuous and a minor modification to an existing list is safe harbour.

We do have a predilection for Tribal strategies since we first started playing MTG in Lorwyn and we have had some small measure of success at Friday Night Magic with Humans.  The beating heart of the early Human build was Thalia's Lieutenant (bringing +1/+1 counters), a pump effect with Always Watching, and a bunch of 'white weenies'.  There are some very solid choices to be made in secondary colours of Red and Green as well.  

To this end, here is our very first decklist with new Aether Revolt cards for this Friday Night Magic event at our local gaming store, OMG Games, here in Barrie, Ontario.

The full list is linked over here and does have the following notes -

Standard White / Red Humans (evaluating for new post Aether Revolt) appropriate for a Friday Night Magic play environment. Bulk of cards carries over from previous sets. Approximate cost (paper) should be close to $100, putting this build near to budget players.

NOTES: New Aether Revolt card choices

Use of new AER Metallic Mimic to add synergistic support with Thalia's Lieutenant.

Using new AER Kari Zev, Skyship Raider which fits onto curve into 2-drop, limited evasion with menace.

NOTES: Other card choices

Shock, Stasis Snare (has flash!) and Authority of the Consuls may be beneficial when playing against new standard combo of Saheeli Rai + Felidar Guardian.

Inventor's Apprentice relies upon Clue Tokens generated from Thraben Inspector and Metallic Mimic for buff but may be replaced with Town Gossipmonger  Flip

An argument may be valid to add another Always Watching given the expected 2/1 Monkey Tokens from Kari Zev, Skyship Raider and 1/1 Human Tokens from Hanweir Garrison. NOPE - non-tokens only - Thanks Travis ! :)


Sideboard card choices are entirely dependent upon your local meta-game.

We plan on playing this for a few weeks to get a feel as to how soft our local meta-game is to this.  Should things go sideways and we require a much faster deck (to take on the new CopyCat standard combo), then we have packed a parachute with a Red / Green energy decklist which we will yatter about in our (hopefully) next post to MTG Realm.

For reference, here is plain text R/W Humans list (no Pia Nalaar) -

Spells - 40
4x Expedition Envoy (BFZ)
4x Thraben Inspector (SOI)
4x Inventor's Apprentice (KLD)

4x Thalia's Lieutenant (SOI)
4x Metallic Mimic (AER)
3x Kari Zev, Skyship Raider (AER)

3x Thalia, Heretic Cathar (EMN)
3x Lantern Scout (BFZ)
3x Hanweir Garrison (EMN)

3x Shock (AER)
3x Declaration in Stone (SOI)
2x Always Watching  (SOI)

Lands - 20
8x Plains
4x Mountain
4x Inspiring Vantage
2x Needle Spires
2x Hanweir Battlements

Sideboard - 15 Cards
1 x Shock (AER)
3x Gryff's Boon
2x Authority of the Consuls
1x Declaration in Stone (SOI)
2x Repel the Abominable
2x Fragmentize
3x Stasis Snare

1x Always Watching  (SOI)
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