The MTG Arena Plane-cation Chronicles event is on its second week and we are visiting the world of Ixalan! Treasure Constructed format returns for this event, and we will look at the rewards, duration, and various decklists.

Event Information

Duration: August 4 2019 to August 6 2019 (take note! The total event time is 51 hours – we’ve had lots of players missing out on the previous event due to this reduced duration)

Start : August 4 2019 8 AM PT (15:00 UTC)

: August 4 2019 8 AM PT (15:00 UTC) Sign up End : August 6 2019 8 AM PT (15:00 UTC)

: August 6 2019 8 AM PT (15:00 UTC) End: August 6 2019 11 AM PT (18:00 UTC)

Format: Treasure Constructed

Cost: Free

Match Structure: Single matches (BO1)

Rewards: New Basic Land Art that can be used in any of your decks for cumulative wins (up to 6) throughout the event duration as below:

1 Win : Rebecca Guay Forest and 1000 Mastery XP

: Rebecca Guay Forest and 1000 Mastery XP 2 Wins : Rebecca Guay Plains

: Rebecca Guay Plains 3 Wins : Rebecca Guay Island

: Rebecca Guay Island 4 Wins : Rebecca Guay Swamp

: Rebecca Guay Swamp 5 Wins : Rebecca Guay Mountain

: Rebecca Guay Mountain 6 Wins: Unhinged Mountain

2 Wins – Rebecca Guay Plains

3 Wins – Rebecca Guay Island

4 Wins – Rebecca Guay Swamp

5 Wins – Rebecca Guay Mountain

1 Win – Rebecca Guay Forest

6 Wins – Unhinged Mountain

What is Treasure Constructed?

Below is the description of the event from the official source.

At the beginning of your upkeep, create an artifact Treasure token which you can sacrifice for a mana of any color! Dinos, pirates, and merfolk, oh my! These sun-soaked shores have so much to offer, from sunken ruins to golden cities. And treasure. Let’s not forget about the treasure. So set sail under the Immortal Sun and be sure to explore everything this plane has to offer!

Each player has the Treasure Token Factory emblem enabled in this format, which creates a Treasure token at the beginning of each player’s turn.

Treasure Constructed is not a new format – it was last available end of March, when Ravnica Allegiance was the latest set. We have had two new sets since then, so we can expect to have more interesting (or not interesting) strategies this time round.

Building Your Treasure Constructed Deck – Tips and Strategies

For this event, there are no other special rules – you are free to build a 60-card (or more) deck from all the available sets so far (not just Ixalan and Rivals of Ixalan!). Consider the following factors when building your Treasure Constructed deck.

1. More, Faster Mana

You are fast tracking your mana curve in this format. Whether you want to play as many small spells as possible, or just play one big spell early, you can do that much faster than in a normal game of Magic.

The below table shows how much mana you can potentially have if you were to not use the Treasure Tokens each turn and you were to make play a land each turn.

Turn 1 2 Mana Turn 2 4 Mana Turn 3 6 Mana Turn 4 8 Mana Turn 5 10 Mana

2. Less Lands, More Spells!

Because we get a definite source of mana each turn, we can afford to play less lands in our decks and pack in more spells, unless we are playing a Scapeshift deck. I’m no math-magician to do exact calculations, but after we consider the overall mana curve of our deck (aggro, midrange or control), we can maybe afford to play 2 to 4 less lands in our deck.

These are also best-of-one matches – which means MTG Arena also applies a small algorithm to our starting hands to “smooth out” our starting hand. This means we have a greater chance of having a reasonable spell-land ratio – and definitely will contribute to us having to mulligan less!

3. Less Color Restrictions

Treasure Tokens can generate any colored mana – combined that with our fantastic mana base currently available in Standard, we can truly take our deck building to the next level in greediness.

You can consider a core base of a 2-3 color deck, and splash for a few cards you would want, without the need to add lands to accommodate those cards.

4. Artifact Synergy

Treasure Tokens are artifacts, and there are definitely cards that synergize with them to build around if you happen to have them lying around and collecting dust.

Oh, and did you know Karn, the Great Creator shuts down your opponent’s Treasure Tokens? Whoever resolves this card first will have a huge advantage and it just might come down to that if enough people are aware of it. You can even build a sideboard with artifacts you can fetch as a silver bullet against your opponent with its minus ability.

Unfortunately, cards like Sorcerous Spyglass doesn’t work here because Treasure Tokens have a mana ability.

5. Token Synergy

Woodland Champion can grow each turn, and can become a must-answer threat just for two mana. Mayhem Devil is awesome in this format as it can benefit from both sides sacrificing Treasure Tokens! Crafty Cutpurse can perhaps be used against decks that try to mass generate Treasures. Finding a home for cards like these should not be too difficult.

6. Treasure Synergy

Revel in Riches provide an alternate win condition to go with the theme of the event but it just might be a bit too slow for this event. However if you are looking for a bit of fun, this is the direction you want to go. There are a few other cards that help you generate Treasure Tokens…

7. Wildcards and Standard Rotation

As this is also virtually a risk-free casual event (other than your time spent), wildcards should not be used specifically for this event if possible, especially with the Standard rotation coming up. Check out our variety of decks below (more to be added throughout the duration of the event) to see what will suit your collection and play style.

You can of course, just bring your current best Standard deck and maybe tweak it here and there with the consideration of the above factors.

Our Top Decklist Choices

Here are some decklist ideas for this event. We tried to showcase a variety of options to exploit the Treasure Tokens as much as possible, as there are numerous strategies to tackle this event. Have fun brewing!

Mono Red Aggro – Treasure Constructed

This is the kind of deck you want to play if you want your 6 wins quickly and not look back.

Rakdos Aristocrats – Treasure Constructed

Based on the deck used by Dave Sea in Fandom Legends, this deck features Mayhem Devil which is awesome in this format. It damages your opponent when you and your opponent sacrifices a Treasure Token. How good is that? Aristocrats have always been just a little bit shy to be good in Standard, but in this format it might be king with Mayhem Devil.

Selesnya Tokens – Treasure Constructed

The traditional tokens deck get a nice boost in consistency due to the Treasure Tokens. Woodland Champion is the latest addition from Core Set 2020 which gets a +1/+1 counter each turn (Treasure Tokens count) and synergizes well with the rest of the deck. Ajani, Strength of the Pride is there just in case you cannot push through your opponent with just your creatures.

Golgari Midrange – Treasure Constructed

This deck is not fancy but Assassin’s Trophy, Field of Ruin and Casualties of War all have the capability to destroy lands. This might be super effective against opponents playing less lands, and less Basic Lands in their deck for this format. Against aggro decks, it has the typical Wildgrowth Walker explore package to stabilize and Command the Dreadhorde should the games go long. A third turn Carnage Tyrant is also not out of the question, and difficult to deal with. Hydroid Krasis is basically a free splash here, and we’ve incorporated it into the deck.

Dimir Tezzeret – Treasure Constructed

This deck is my favorite for this event. We mentioned earlier Karn, the Great Creator can prevent your opponent from activating their Treasure Tokens – well, it can do much more. It can grab your sideboard cards in a pinch (you can tailor it as you see fit) and allows us to grab our combo piece for the deck. Since Tezzeret, Master of the Bridge allows us to play free artifacts, we can bounce two Guardians of Koilos with each other, and generate thopter tokens with Sai, Master Thopterist.

Mystic Forge is a new addition to this deck that makes the deck even more explosive. Keep in mind the deck has minimal interaction with your opponent, so it may be weaker against control decks. Only downside to this deck are the niche cards that you won’t probably use that often.

Revel in Riches Esper Control – Treasure Constructed

This deck is Esper Control, with a slight twist – it includes Revel in Riches as its alternate win condition, as well as a Mastermind’s Acquisition to grab stuff from the sideboard. I felt including additional treasure synergy cards seemed a bit too slow, so the strategy is to stabilize with your control package, and keep generating Treasure Tokens until you can win with Revel in Riches. With this deck, you don’t want to miss land drops and save Treasure Tokens until you absolutely need them.

More coming soon!

Wrapping Up

As always, you can hit us up on our Discord or Twitter, or leave a comment below if you have any feedback, and share what other decks you played to reach 6 wins in this event – we want to know all the juicy builds!

The next Plane-cation event starts next week August 11 and ends August 13, and we will keep everybody updated as more information is available. There is also the Ravnica Allegiance Ranked Draft which is now also available, so check out our guides if you want to succeed in this format!