For the past two seasons of block, WoTC has managed to include a viable, cheap, Rx aggressive deck in the format. In ISD block, the boros aggro deck with hellrider was briefly the bogeyman of the format following the banning of lingering souls and intangible virtue, while many of us are still scarred by the double BTE into firefist striker into dynacharge draws of the mono red deck in the last format. It's not unreasonable to think that these decks were seeded into the meta by WoTC as a way to give players, particularly on MTGO, a budget-friendly entry point into competitive constructed. This week's article is going to look into whether they've managed to do it again in Theros block through one of the block's stronger limited archetypes - RW heroic.

Metagame statistics

This is the first full week of statistics, and the metagame is starting to settle down so the stats are starting to give a good insight into the future shape of the format. Here's the week's numbers (note that I've added the total deck count to the graph now):

This week was the rise of three colour decks as people become more comfortable with using scrylands to fix their mana for them, and the format in general becomes more known allowing the most powerful and relevant cards from a third colour to be splashed. Some things stand out from this, especially compared to the first week of the format:

GRx monstrous may have a huge target on its head, but it's actually increased its presence in the metagame. There are three builds represented in the category - GR with nykthos (26 decks), without (18) and naya (15). For the 2-colour version, there's still no clear consensus as to whether to include nykthos or not, although I do note that more are including 1 copy and less are using 3-4 within that group, so I would suggest the consensus (which would match my personal experience) is moving towards that it's not a core card in the deck. The naya versions are becoming much more popular - they're essentially the core GR deck but splashing white for elspeth at the expense of some of the burn.

may have a huge target on its head, but it's actually increased its presence in the metagame. There are three builds represented in the category - GR with nykthos (26 decks), without (18) and naya (15). For the 2-colour version, there's still no clear consensus as to whether to include nykthos or not, although I do note that more are including 1 copy and less are using 3-4 within that group, so I would suggest the consensus (which would match my personal experience) is moving towards that it's not a core card in the deck. The naya versions are becoming much more popular - they're essentially the core GR deck but splashing white for elspeth at the expense of some of the burn. BWR has entered the metagame in force, making up the vast majority of the RWx control category (22 decks, compared to 6 of the "big boros" style which appeared last week). This is the format's first real control deck, packing full sets of anger of the gods, hero's downfall, read the bones, thoughtseize and with some combination of elspeth, sun's champion, stormbreath dragon, purphoros, god of the forge and akroan horse (!!) as finishers. This deck is new but absolutely the real deal, being played by some very good players and making up to 30% of the winning decks in some daily events. The fact that it plays two sets of on-colour scry lands (along with more scrying from read the bones) means the mana isn't as horrible as you might think.

has entered the metagame in force, making up the vast majority of the RWx control category (22 decks, compared to 6 of the "big boros" style which appeared last week). This is the format's first real control deck, packing full sets of anger of the gods, hero's downfall, read the bones, thoughtseize and with some combination of elspeth, sun's champion, stormbreath dragon, purphoros, god of the forge and akroan horse (!!) as finishers. This deck is new but absolutely the real deal, being played by some very good players and making up to 30% of the winning decks in some daily events. The fact that it plays two sets of on-colour scry lands (along with more scrying from read the bones) means the mana isn't as horrible as you might think. Heroic aggro crashed off a precipice, down from 20% last week. I'm speaking more about this deck today, but things don't look good for its long term position in the metagame.

crashed off a precipice, down from 20% last week. I'm speaking more about this deck today, but things don't look good for its long term position in the metagame. The other category remains quite robust, with no less than 10 different decks appearing in the category - everything from 4-colour goodstuff (see below) to GWB to BUG to mono blue and "big" mono red devotion.

I love deckbuilders who answer the question of "which awesome cards should I play?" with "all of them". I'm slightly disappointed that rc6311 didn't manage to jam stormbreath dragon in here, but he does have cards with double-mana symbols in every other colour which takes some major cojones. The glue which makes the deck work (at least once) is that it's a base-green deck with full playsets of sylvan caryatid and nylea's presence, and the deck is just playsets of basically every individually awesome card in the non-red colours, with a slight concession to aggro in the form of 2x pharika's cure substituting for the other to polukranos's. I'm not sure if it's got staying power, but this certainly gets points for ambition.

4-colour greed rc6311 (4-0) THS Block Constructed Daily #6162837 on 10/27/2013 Creatures

4 Keepsake Gorgon

2 Polukranos, World Eater

4 Reaper of the Wilds

4 Sylvan Caryatid

14 cards



Other Spells

4 Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver

4 Elspeth, Sun's Champion

4 Hero's Downfall

4 Nylea's Presence

2 Pharika's Cure

4 Thoughtseize

22 cards

Lands

9 Forest

3 Swamp

4 Temple of Deceit

4 Temple of Mystery

4 Temple of Silence

24 cards



Sideboard

3 Arbor Colossus

3 Fade into Antiquity

2 Pharika's Cure

3 Prognostic Sphinx

4 Voyaging Satyr

15 cards



Heroic aggro

Single set block decks often begin life as limited archetypes. With a shallow card pool, turbocharging a limited strategy (populate in RTR, human and zombie tribal in ISD) is a good starting point for a constructed deck. That seems to be what H.Saito (no relation) did, and he was rewarded with a 4-0 in the very first THS block daily:

RW heroic H.saito (4-0) THS Block Constructed Daily #6118190 on 10/16/2013 Creatures

3 Akroan Crusader

3 Akroan Hoplite

2 Anax and Cymede

3 Cavalry Pegasus

3 Fabled Hero

4 Phalanx Leader

2 Soldier of the Pantheon

20 cards



Other Spells

4 Chained to the Rocks

4 Coordinated Assault

2 Dragon Mantle

3 Gods Willing

3 Spear of Heliod

16 cards

Lands

8 Mountain

12 Plains

4 Temple of Triumph

24 cards



Sideboard

2 Magma Jet

1 Cavalry Pegasus

2 Glare of Heresy

1 Gods Willing

2 Hammer of Purphoros

2 Hopeful Eidolon

3 Peak Eruption

2 Priest of Iroas

15 cards

1 Cavalry Pegasus2 Glare of Heresy1 Gods Willing2 Hammer of Purphoros2 Hopeful Eidolon3 Peak Eruption2 Priest of Iroas

The name of the game here is to boost your weenies into massive threats, that may even get out of burn range before your opponent can cast it (particularly with come into play tapped scry lands in the picture), using gods willing to protect the creature that you voltron up. Phalanx leader is a key part of the strategy, as it pumps everyone on your team, even the soldier tokens from akroan crusader, and spear of heliod does the same. The mana base is pretty awkward, especially with a double-white two drop, but incidental scry from temple of triumph and gods willing as well as the cantrip on dragon mantle helps out. I'm not sure that Saito quite appreciated the awesome power of cavalry pegasus in this deck. Every other creature in the deck is a human so this lets you bypass all those green and red monsters (and mana dorks) on the ground to fly over for the win. It's particularly nasty to make your akroan hoplite fly, he gets really big, really quickly.

Other people have tried different variations. I won't look into the (much less popular) blue heroic variants in this article, but there have been versions of the heroic aggro deck in both mono red and mono white. Mono white has been the more popular of the two versions, in fact some form of mono white heroic placed three times in the daily on 22 October. Here's one of them:

Mono W heroic Matteso (3-1) THS Block Constructed Daily #6118382 on 10/22/2013 Creatures

3 Cavalry Pegasus

4 Fabled Hero

4 Favored Hoplite

1 Leonin Snarecaster

4 Phalanx Leader

4 Soldier of the Pantheon

4 Wingsteed Rider

24 cards



Other Spells

4 Battlewise Valor

4 Dauntless Onslaught

4 Gods Willing

3 Spear of Heliod

15 cards

Lands

21 plains

21 cards



Sideboard

2 Divine Verdict

2 Evangel of Heliod

4 Glare of Heresy

2 Hopeful Eidolon

3 Hundred-Handed One

2 Ordeal of Heliod

15 cards

2 Evangel of Heliod4 Glare of Heresy2 Hopeful Eidolon3 Hundred-Handed One2 Ordeal of Heliod

The problem of mono white becomes apparent from looking at or playing with this list. White has all of the cool heroic creatures, but only one of the good enablers (gods willing). Battlewise valour is extremely mediocre and dauntless onslaught is only marginally better than coordinated assault, but costs triple the mana. Cheap heroic spells are very important in this deck as they allow you to hold them up, or play them, while still developing your board. The effect on onslaught is powerful, but a straight one mana "target two creatures" would be simply better in a surprising number of situations with this deck. What does mono red look like then?

Mono red aggro newguto (3-1) THS Block Constructed Daily #6118284 on 10/19/2013 Creatures

4 Akroan Crusader

3 Arena Athlete

2 Borderland Minotaur

3 Deathbellow Raider

2 Ember Swallower

2 Fanatic of Mogis

4 Firedrinker Satyr

2 Minotaur Skullcleaver

22 cards



Other Spells

2 Coordinated Assault

3 Dragon Mantle

1 Hammer of Purphoros

4 Lightning Strike

2 Magma Jet

3 Ordeal of Purphoros

3 Titan's Strength

18 cards

Lands

20 Mountain

20 cards



Sideboard

1 Demolish

15 cards



Red has the exact opposite problem. It's got sweet enablers like coordinated assault, titan's strength and ordeal of purphoros (more on that later), but no heroic creatures to put them on. In fact, this is less of a "heroic" deck than a straight weenie red aggro deck with a slight devotion sub-theme. Note that unlike the white creatures, none of the red heroic creatures get bigger when you target them, making it basically impossible for this deck to get its creatures out of burn or anger of the gods range - a serious weakness in a meta where the GR deck is maindecking 4-8 burn spells (primarily to combat opposing voyaging satyrs and black deathtouch dudes), and control decks running anger of the gods (to take out mana dorks and small black creatures) are getting more popular.

Given the very real weaknesses of the mono coloured lists, which more recently are tending towards more midrangey devotion/nykthos/god strategies, I think RW is the only possibly viable strategy out of the non-blue heroic decks. Here's a more recent example, which I think is much better than the initial list I posted above because it's now identified what the deck needs to do to win - build up a single large creature out of burn range very quickly, and swing in with it. The best way to do that is with favored hoplite (which this runs 4x over akroan crusaders) into ordeal of purphoros. Ordeal is very all in, and obviously weak to voyage's end, but it's the only real hope that this deck has of beating opposing burn spells. It's also pretty dirty to be able to do 10 damage by the third turn with a single one drop (attack for 3 on turn 2, attack for 4 on turn 3 and sac the ordeal for 4 damage). This deck has a very real chance of building up one of its threats to be able to tangle with a polukranos and win by the time the hydra hits the field, and if it manages to god's willing a key burn spell and then get a cavalry pegasus going early it can be downright scary. If I was going to play this deck tomorrow, this is what I'd be using:

RW heroic mark 2 sai199orz (3-1) THS Block Constructed Daily #6118382 on 10/22/2013 Creatures

4 Akroan Hoplite

1 Anax and Cymede

4 Cavalry Pegasus

4 Fabled Hero

4 Favored Hoplite

4 Phalanx Leader

2 Soldier of the Pantheon

23 cards



Other Spells

4 Coordinated Assault

4 Gods Willing

4 Ordeal of Purphoros

2 Spear of Heliod

14 cards

Lands

8 Mountain

11 Plains

4 Temple of Triumph

20 cards



Sideboard

3 Hammer of Purphoros

4 Hopeful Eidolon

4 Lightning Strike

4 Portent of Betrayal

15 cards



How to play it

I went into playtesting for this deck thinking that it was your standard sort of aggro deck, just with a few more combat tricks than normal. I thought the idea would be to curve out with early creatures and then close the game out with some massive boosted attacks, a-la dynacharge boosted beats from RTR block. That is not how this deck plays out. For starters, being a 2-coloured deck with heavy coloured mana requirements and poor fixing, you get some super awkward hands, and that just isn't conducive to a consistent curve-based aggro strategy. I started screenshotting some of my hands when I started playing it, and very stopped after drawing these beauties within my first 5 matches:

If your aggro deck can draw an opening hand of 2-3 lands and 4-5 spells and not have a single castable spell or zero relevant threats, you know you're dealing with something a bit different. I found the fact that chained to the rock needed exactly a mountain to be cast was particularly annoying (and one of the reasons I don't think it belongs in the deck) - you can see there the hand with two of them in it and both white and red mana was still unable to cast it. With this deck you WILL be throwing back a lot of opening hands, and you will also be keeping hands that don't put down any creatures before turn 3 - you aren't just throwing down creatures, curving out and turning them sideways. The deck plays out as a highly synergistic aggro-combo deck, where you want to land an unstoppable threat and then protect it. If you have a hand with a good threat (preferably favored hoplite), it's fairly often correct to play your creatures off-curve and leave up god's willing at all times. Many decks simply fold if you can protect an ordeal on favored hoplite backed up by cavalry pegasus.

Speaking of pegasus, that's the glue which pulls this deck together and pulls you out of all sorts of holes. There's not that many flyers in the format, if you can land and protect the pegasus, you'll be able to walk over a huge number of opposing decks. And if you're left unchecked with any reasonable heroic creature + a buffer in hand, you'll usually be able to outrace your opponent. The heroic creatures get very big very quickly if you're triggering them, and you can get in more early hits than other decks to push the race further in your favor. I also found the destroy text on spear of heliod to be not-irrelevant if you do find yourself in a race. It's obviously painful to take 8 to the face from polykranos, but if that's their only threat then they can't even realistically attack with it a lot of the time.

Using the above list as a template, the cards you want to look at taking out when sideboarding are ordeal (against decks where you just don't think you'll be able to land it safely, especially those with unconditional removal), akroan hoplite (against burn-heavy decks, as it can rarely grow bigger) and some number of anax and cymede and fabled hero where you need to lower your curve. (Hammer of purphuros) is good against decks with minimal ground presence and lots of anger of the gods (ie. BWR), hopeful eidolon and lightning strike are obviously for opposing aggro/tempo decks and portent of betrayal is actually a super important card against stormbreath dragon decks. Without portent, there is very little this deck can do against a resolved stormbreath. As it's often not a particularly fast deck, stormbreath will hit the table a reasonable amount of the time and having protection from white means that it can block most of your team with impunity, which is incredibly awkward. It's even immune to (chained from the rocks) and divine verdict, so there's basically no good permanent answers to the card in these colours, so portent gets the nod as a necessary evil against that brick wall.

How to beat it

I've already mentioned that a huge proportion of the decks in the metagame include tools which are very strong against all but the most perfect draws from this deck, most notably cheap burn and anger of the gods. That's probably why this strategy seems to be on the wane already, having no 4-0 finishes outside of the first daily event and making up a much smaller portion of the field in the second week of the format. For that reason, I wouldn't recommend trying to tech for it specifically, the only key is to play smart against it if you do face it. I would generally advise playing your removal spells on your turn - that way if it's counteracted by a pump spell, you don't take the additional damage from the pump. Also, if your opponent ever taps out of white mana, killing whatever's on the field is your #1 priority - don't try to get greedy and hope to 2-for-1 them when they play an ordeal, because gods willing is a very realistic threat and that combined with a resolved ordeal is going to be very hard to deal with.

Another tip is to avoid blocking without removal mana backing you up, if you can possibly do so without dying. This is especially relevant for the black deck, where blocking some massive threat with baleful eidolon on turn 2 looks very attractive, but coordinated assault completely blows you out whereas if you had waited a turn until you had hero's downfall open then you are the one doing the blowouts instead. Be cautious with your removal, the deck plays a lot of card which look like must-kill threats, but if you have a lot of big ground blockers then saving your burn up for cavalry pegasus and fabled hero might be a good idea - hopefully you can keep your ground pounders bigger than theirs. Finally, as a control deck be mindful of (portend of betrayal) post-board. You should be reluctant to land a stormbreath dragon unless you absolutely have to. Try to use elspeth, sun's champion or akroan horse as your win-cons instead of the dragon, if possible, because if you don't have two in play then one of them is fairly likely to hit you.

At the start of this article, I asked the question as to whether WoTC had succeeded in making a cheap aggro deck again as an entry into the format, and constructed play in general, for people on MTGO. I have to say the result is mixed. I actually find the deck really interesting. It's much more involved to play both with and against than the mono red deck from RTR block, and it really is fun having your 2-drop fight an arbor colossus and win. As I feared when I first heard about the heroic concept, though, the deck's just too inconsistent at the moment though to be a legitimate top tier contender. If you're interested in testing the format on the cheap, I recommend trying out the list I highlighted above, because it does do some sweet things, and as the format matures and moves away from aggro people will start loading up on slower cards opening up a window for ordeals to get you free wins. But this isn't the best deck in the format by a long shot.

Next week, I'll be looking at the deck which is making a pretty strong argument to be the best one in the format - GR monstrous.