Naya Hexproof

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Happy Saturday MTG peeps,

We are freshly returned from the Friday Night Magic event last evening at OMG! Games here in Barrie, Ontario.  As spring break is wrapping up this week, attendance was only slightly deminished with a field of 36 players.  As with most gaming stores around the world, popular decks are approximately reflected to that of the winning decklists from Magic: the Gathering Online.  Mono-Black (and mon-blue devotion to a lesser extent), Esper Control, Jund Monsters, and a variety of others.  

We took along a Naya (green / white / red) Hexproof or 'auras' decklist, whose strategy employs as the name suggests, slapping strong auras on hexproof creatures.  Although we did not make Top 8 with 3 wins and 2 losses, we do feel that with a few fine adjustments (perhaps a card or two from MTG Mint Card), we can break through.

Here's the list as it stood yesterday.  Starting off with the auras you want to enchant your creatures with, there are full booksets of four each for -
• Chained to the Rocks (removal)
• Ethereal Armor (buffs)
• Madcap Skills (buff and conditional evasion)
• Unflinching Courage (lifelink 'n' trample)

Creatures can be a little less straight forward with regards to choices - 
• Gladecover Scout and Witchstalker are definitely essential and a four-of by default.
• There is a two / two split with Voice of Resurgence and Fleecemane Lion which may be adjusted via sideboard.
• The local meta-game requires additional punch through and a deckset of Ghor-Clan Rampager fits this role and is used mostly for it's Bloodrush ability

Other spells included -
• A deckset of Boros Charm, whose flexibility provides additional pump, protection from board sweepers and a nice ping for 4 damage which won two matches last night.
• Just two (other two in sideboard) of Selesnya Charm which can exile the new 'god' cards, provide pump / trample or a surprise blocker.  This card was sided-out most games for Mizzium Mortars.

Lastly, the mana-base to make it all run - 
4 forest, 1 plains, 4 Temple Garden, 4 Stomping Ground, 4 Sacred Foundry, 3 Temple of Triumph, and 2 Temple of Abandon.  We thought the scry-lands were decent and helped reduce bad draws.

Not altogether bad and we think there is room for improvement - your constructive criticism is most welcome!

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Metagame Shift March 2014

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Happy Thursday MTG peeps,

Today we want to yatter about the ever changing and evolving standard constructed metagame for Magic: the Gathering.  In the most general terms we will be noting the peculiarities and ever changing fortunes of our challenges at the casual Friday Night Magic event locally at OMG! Games in Barrie, Ontario.  When we will speak on to the 'metagame', we really are attempting to address the popularity of certain decklists, or archetypes, which at some times can be distilled down to just how well less than a handful of cards perform in their stack of sixty cards.  The MTG Realm group essentially avoid the 'popular' decklists or strategies and attempt to game against these with our funky / fresh and sometimes downright odd card choices.

Anywhoos - to set the stage, the following cards were or still are depending upon where you are the top dogs -

Yep - Mono-Black devotion.  Card draw with Underworld Connections, disruption via Thoughtseize (and/or Duress), spot removal with Hero's Downfall, early threats with Pack Rat, mid-game threats via Nightveil Specter / Desecration Demon and a bomb of a punchline with Gray Merchant of Asphodel (aka 'Gary').  Impressive.

What we finally after quite some time decided to play against this was a relatively fast aggro strategy in the form of Rakdos Aggro -

This build had some nice things to offer with hasty threats to get early beats in before the hammer came down.  Within a few weeks however we found that we had to play Slaughter Games more and more as control decks such as Blue / White Control started to find its pace in the metagame.  If our Rakdos Aggro was unable to deliver a win by turn five at the latest, it was essentially game over as counterspells, bounce, Supreme Verdict cleared the deck or kept it clear and any loss of life was restored with Sphinx's Revelation.

To this end we turned our thoughts to a hexproof strategy and got a few card singles from MTG Mint Card to pull together a 'Naya Auras' thingy.  Here's the juice to it -

The Critters

The Auras

Some Control / Removal

Mana Base

We're hoping that this new tact will get us to Top 8 and from our derping around at the kitchen table, things do looking promising.  Tomorrow at Friday Night Magic will of course be the real test and we'll let you know how things went.

Happy brewing!
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