So with Ahmonket out, I was super excited to brew up all the decks but whats funny is that every deck that i was excited to brew up weren't very good. It wast until I decided to take a step back and look at the cards did I see potential in other cards. I knew i wanted to play with Regal Caracal because why wouldn't you want to play a deck with a Cat version of Cloudgoat Ranger. I knew I wanted to play with Plague Belcher because a 5/4 Menace for three is just too powerful to pass up and Approach of the Second Sun was just too awesome not to try. Its a reasonable alt Win-Con and you an easily set yourself up with draw cards in blue
So this first deck was probably the most frustrating to play. I just looks decent on paper...screen...whatever. It looks fine on paper and it just never did what it was suppose to do. I tried to include Channeler Initiate and it was just so underwhelming. Before you look at Blisterpod and dismiss it, it was actually really really important to the deck. Having a turn 1 play was actually really important, It adds push back against Mardu and gives you some points of damage against control decks. I added Festering Mummy because I was running into a lot of Mono White aggro decks/ RW human decks that would overwhelm the board so i did my best slow them down when i could.
Hapatra was very, very good. So good that she was a lightening rod to removal every single time that she hit the board and if gone unchecked against midrange decks, she would be able to slow them down with Deathtouch snakes.
Nest of Scarabs was pretty much got the deck the wins when I won. I would overwhelm the board and force my opponent to make unfavorable blocks by attacking with tokens and cards like Plague Belcher.
Overall the deck didn't feel too great. It looks like you have the potential to get some really good sized creatures out for cheap and minimal disadvantage but it never happened for me
4x Festering Mummy
4xBlisterpod
4x Exlempar of Strength
4x Nest of Scarabs
4x Crocodile of the Crossing
3x Hapatra's Mask
3x Hapatra, Vizier of Poisons
3x Plague Belcher
2x Grasp of Darkness
2x Splendid Agony
2x Ruinous Path
1x Decimator Beetle
This is probably my favorite deck that I was playing after the release of Amonkhet and how could it not be the most fun. I won all of my games in the 1v1 Ques and I had a blast doing it. The deck is pretty straight forward. Survive, draw cards, play Second Sun and that's it. The only deck that gave me a little bit of trouble was a BW Gideon Tribal deck that ended up exiling all of the Second Sun copies I had and forced me to rely on the Outburst token and Curators to win. It was annoying but i got there. I have 3 copies of Regal Caracal in the board but i didn't have an issue with exiling my cards in game one. Dovin Bann got some decent play and did a lot of work if he was played early. Had a game where my opponent would rather attack Dovin instead of hitting my life total and I was able to stall enough to get the win.
PSully said that the appropriate number of Second Suns in the deck is 3 and while PSully has more wins and knowledge about the game than I do, I respectfully disagree. Every time I cast the first Second Sun, i always wanted to draw another one instead of waiting X turns to draw it. Sometimes having to wait X turns isn't good enough and you cant wait that long or you will die. There were several times where if i hadn't had the second or third copy in my hand, I would have died the very next turn. Having a 4th to me feels almost crucial to the deck.
There are a bunch of cards that I actually really wanted to try in this deck, like new Gideon, Fumigate and Jace, but i didn't want to disrupt the structure of the deck.Also, out of all the new cards that I i managed to get a hold of and try, Drake Haven was actually the most lackluster of all the new cards. And when I say that I mean in this particular deck, not as a card in general. The card is fantastic, just not here. You will be spending your time cycling when you should be or could be digging for Second Sun.
Overall, I had a blast playing this deck. I am always trying to make a control deck work when new sets are introduced into standard and I am really glad i gave Approach of the Second Sun another look at.I was a delight to play
3x Immolating Glare
4x Anticipate
4x Renewed Faith
3x Cast Out
2x Glimmer of Genius
4x Hieroglyphic Illumination
1x Trial of Knowledge
4x Curator of Mysteries
3x Dovin Baan
2x Planar Outburst
2x Descend upon the Sinful
4x Approach of the Second Sun
This tokens deck was fun, seemed kind of slow, didn't really do much when i needed it. I messed up with the Cartouche and Oketra making 1/1 vigilance creatures which doesn't work with Throne of the God-Pharaoh... yeah oops.
Also, having Procession at 4cmc really sucks. if it was at 3cmc, the card would be good...great and i probably would have won more games than i did. at 4cmc you are deciding to either cast Procession or play the Expertise and combo it with Collective Effort or play a Trail of Strength. now Trial of Strength might actually be the 2nd best card in the deck. Combine it with the Cartouche and it was very hard to remove from the board.
I'm not sure how many Oaths is the right amount. Sometimes id draw too many and more than too many times i wouldn't draw it when i needed it. There were times where i thought i should cut it out entirely but i liked pumping the whole team for 2 mana and was too lazy to find a replacement
4x Cartouche of Solidarity
3x Immolating Glare
4x Sero Exhibition
2x Oath of Ajani
3x Throne of the God-Pharaoh
3x Collective Effort
3x Trial of Strength
2x Anointed Procession
1x Oketra the True
4x Sram;s Expertise
3x Regal Caracal
Yeah, so these were some of the decks that I was playing the first week or so after the set came out. It was a nice run through of some cards that caught my eye and out of all the decks i played, Second Sun won the most and was the most fun deck to play. I really feel like there is a Tokens deck that doesn't just have Gideon and Nissa as the token makers. Also, i realize that Gideon and Nissa make tokens, but i didn't have either of them soooo that was kind of out of the picture.
