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GP Birmingham was the first major Standard tournament featuring the new cards from Dominaria and, wow, what a difference a set makes.
Simon Nielsen won the Standard event with B/R Vehicles, and was joined by five other B/R Vehicles decks, a U/W Control deck, and a G/B Constrictor in the Top 8, with nary a Scarab God in sight. B/R Vehicles also dominated the Top 32 with 15 copies, and when you add in the three W/B variants, Vehicles made up over half of the Top 32. Here’s the complete breakdown:
- 15 x B/R Vehicles
- 4 x U/W Control
- 3 x W/B Vehicles
- 2 x G/B Constrictor
- 2 x Mono Red
- 1 x Mono Green
- 1 x B/R Aggro
- 1 x Grixis Chainwhirler
- 1 x U/B Midrange
- 1 x U/W Gift
- 1 x Grixis Energy
Is B/R Vehicles Really a Vehicle Deck?
While the coverage team was eager to label decks like Nielsen’s Vehicle decks, the reality is that the only Vehicle in the maindeck is Heart of Kiran. This raises the question: are these really Vehicle decks, or just aggressive B/R decks that include one of the most broken new card types in recent memory?
The deck doesn’t even include cards like Toolcraft Exemplar or Veteran Motorist, though some do include the strictly worse Inventor’s Apprentice, instead, plus some Aethersphere Harvesters in the sideboard. Aside from the occasional Apprentice, the only real Vehicle “synergy” is playing Karn, Scion of Urza, from which you can remove a counter to crew Heart of Kiran. But that’s not so much a synergy as just playing two busted colorless cards in the same deck.
Anyway, I clearly have an opinion on the matter and it’s extremely likely the name will stick. What do you think? Let us know at @HipstersMTG on Twitter.
Massive Changes to Brawl’s Banned List
In an unsurprising move, Wizards banned Baral, Chief of Compliance from the new Brawl format last week. Baral made up more than 35% of the metagame and nearly had a 65% win rate, both of which are absurd numbers, and clearly needed to be banned. Wizards also realized that allowing a cheap, colorless card like Sorcerous Spyglass to completely shut down every Planeswalker commander wasn’t very fun and banned it as well.
In the same announcement, Wizards also unbanned (in Brawl) all the cards that are currently banned in Standard…except for Smuggler’s Copter. That means that you can now play Aetherworks Marvel, Felidar Guardian, Attune with Aether, Rogue Refiner, Rampaging Ferocidon, and Ramunap Ruins in your favorite Brawl decks. It also means that Brawl and Standard will now have different ban list going forward.
Additionally, the starting lifetotal for 1v1 Brawl matches is being reduced to 20 life (down from 30) and colorless commanders, like Karn, can use any number of a single type of basic lands in their deck.
Battlebond Previews Start Next Week
Battlebond, the new draftable Two-Headed Giant set, releases on June 8, 2018, and previews start next week. To whet our appetite, Wizards revealed the new cycle of dual lands coming in the set.
Dual lands that come into play untapped?! Well, if you have more than one opponent. If only they had basic land types!
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