So I'm curious, Ally, what type of deck are you playing in the current format? This topic kind of got me back into it, because I'd pretty much forgotten how much I used to love it, and I started watching videos from the Pro Tour and checking out the current metagame again.
So yeah, I'm curious.
There's three types of decks that I generally play. The main deck type that I usually end up playing is aggro. My favorite Magic color has always been red, so my primary deck type in the past has almost always been some sort of red/green beatdown deck. The second type of deck that I generally play is some sort of green combo deck, one that involves setting up a near-infinite mana base and going in for a HUGE kill. I like combo decks that generate a TON of mana, and let you play HUGE cards. And the third type of deck that I like to play is some sort of variant on a Red/White control deck. And by control, I usually mean burn. But I always design these decks as if they were control decks... using efficient card-advantage creatures like Solemn Simulacrum to give me card advantage, blowing up enemy creatures with the likes of Slagstorm and Pyroclasm, and then going for the face with red's amazing late-game finishing creatures and burn-spell combos. (Again, red is my favorite color in Magic, but I really don't like the typical "Red Deck Wins" method that focuses on weenie creatures, like Goblin decks and the like. I tend to prefer the burn spells.) In fact, this was the kind of deck that I played during my last venture into Standard, during last year's Innistrad / Scars of Mirrodin format.
I'll occasionally try playing a blue/white control deck, but usually it's just for purposes of playtesting against. Blue has always been my nemesis from day 1 of my Magic playing, and the color that consistently kept beating me, and beating me, and annoying the freaking hell out of me because it stalled the game so much and countered every damned thing that I played. I am SO glad that counterspells and bounce have been powered down in recent years. Playing against a million Psychatog decks during Odyssey block almost made me want to quit the game because they were so damned annoying.
Anyway, I've been analyzing the current metagame for a while now, and MAN, I must say, beatdown decks are just completely SICK right now. There's like three 2/2 creatures that can come out on the first turn, and Burning-Tree Emissary and Lightning Mauler are just sick, sick, sick! And I thought Zoo was good during Ravnica block. But now it's just completely ridiculous. So that's the deck that I'm going with right now... my own variation on the Red/Green beatdown deck, with some white splashed so that I can also play Boros Charm, and get Boros Reckoner out more consistently. I was playing around with it on LackeyCCG the other day, and again, I'm surprised how absolutely sick Red/Green is these days compared to the old days of Invasion and Odyssey when blue was severely overpowered. I mean, sheesh, I had people giving up by turn three against me, because I was already swinging for 6 damage on the 2nd turn after going Rakdos Cackler, Burning-Tree Emissary, Lightning Mauler, smash, while they still only had one land in play. Yeah... pretty sick. Methinks I like this format!
I'm also very much a fan of the Bant control deck style that Melissa DeTora used during the Gatecrash Pro Tour. I really like seeing a control deck that is primarily creature-based rather than based on counterspells. There are some excellent mechanic combos in that deck that I really admire. I played around with this type of deck before during Mirrodin block, but never really used it competitively, but yeah, I like this type of deck a lot when it works.
