Historic Metagame Breakdown May 6th 2021

Last week we saw Historic condense into a lean, efficient format. This week we saw decks take advantage of the ability to target this new, narrow metagame. While the green aggro decks were still a dominant presence in the metagame, the control decks finally came out to play:

combo decks in particular finally reached a point of consistency with the most recent builds. They have a combo finish but are essentially control decks with tutor spells and a four-card combo package. Now that these decks are playing the maximum number of tutor spells, they're able to quickly assemble a kill while having access to important effects like board wipes far more regularly.

Azorius Control and Jeskai Control also had solid weekends, exceeding my expectations. This new, narrower metagame is much easier to answer, and good tuning was heavily rewarded this weekend. The control tools in Historic are incredibly strong as long as you know what you need to answer. I expect to see one or the other of these decks swallow the other as we discover which control deck is better suited to the current metagame.

There's not a whole lot new to say about Gruul Aggro or Selesnya Company. Both decks performed well despite the obvious target on their heads. The new kid on the block was Simic Aggro, a mono-green

aggro deck splashing as a removal spell/countermagic split card. After a good showing in SCG's Friday satellite events, Simic Aggro was incredibly popular throughout the weekend.

The final "breakout" decks of the weekend were Orzhov Auras and Jund Sacrifice, both of which are powerful decks people seemingly forgot about. I expect people to continue to ignore these decks in favor of flashy new archetypes like Pact Combo and Simic Aggro.

Historic is starting to resemble Modern, where the format has a powerful top tier of decks but a swath of decks you can expect to see in every tournament. While the winners' metagame looks narrow and condensed, the full metagame has very few decks over 10% share. This shouldn't affect your deck choice much, but it does mean that your sideboard needs to remain flexible. This week's top decks are heavily focused on creatures and their answers, but keep an eye on the decks that can sidestep this axis of interaction.

empties your library and wins the game. It sounds simple, but the rest of your deck has to be singleton, including lands. While initial versions of Pact Combo used , lists have now moved to playing two copies of each of your combo pieces so that you can more consistently find one of each and win the game.

is a natural companion replacement that works well with the consistency tools in this deck like , , and . The real key is that these decks now play the maximum number of tutor effects to more consistently assemble the combo.

There are Grixis versions that splash for a few red cards, but this is the stock list going forward. I expect people to play this deck more than they should, as much like Dimir Inverter and Splinter Twin, competitive players absolutely love combo-control decks. If you want to punish these decks, play Dimir Rogues and bury them in tempo.

Chase Masters wasn't messing around. This new variant of Jeskai Control is very cognizant of the creature decks and is all about slamming the door on them with

. It's also aware of the weakness this opens up against other control decks, and is packing a full playset of in the 75. If the metagame continues to warp around the green aggro decks, this is exactly where I want to be.

That said, Azorius was the more successful variant this weekend.

may not be the most powerful removal spell in the format, but it isn't weak to 4-toughness creatures like . The Simic Aggro matchup in particular is much, much better for Azorius, as is the matchup against Orzhov Auras. As the metagame shifts and responds to the presence of control decks I expect Azorius Control to be the better variant this weekend.

In a format with turn-four combo kills,

, and the storm mechanic, somehow the litmus test is a red-green creature beatdown deck. One-cost mana dorks are still one of the most powerful effects in Magic, and contributes to some truly absurd starts.

If you want to ask questions while everyone else tries to answer them, this is the deck. To all the Burn players upset that their deck is bad: sandydog Top 8'd both events this weekend with Gruul Aggro. Follow the Mono-Red Master and get your beatdowns on with an extra color until WotC unbans

.

Selesnya Company continues to just be a pile of good cards that showed up in the finals of a tournament for the third week in a row. I've already spoken on this deck at length for the past two weeks, and despite the shift in the format Selesnya Company continues to put up excellent results.

I do think Selesnya Company players should start to make small changes to address this new format, but don't go overboard— the core is still incredibly strong, and

is still a good way to fight through the control decks. I just want to see some tech to shore up the matchups against the new Jeskai Control decks and the Pact decks, two of the worst matchups this past weekend.

and are great threats to outsize Gruul Aggro and get around , but a lot of the remaining matchups are depressingly bad. Selesnya Company is a strongly unfavored matchup and the matchups against Izzet Phoenix and Orzhov Auras look nigh unwinnable.

I think Simic Aggro is a reasonable tier 2 deck, but I do not recommend it for this weekend. I think decks like Izzet Phoenix and Orzhov Auras are positioned for a good run, and Selesnya Company isn't going anywhere.

After weeks of telling people they should play Jund Sacrifice, I'm finally telling you to stop. Jund Sacrifice was a great choice while creature decks were rampant and there weren't any combo decks to ruin the parade. Pact Combo is likely to be one of the more popular decks this weekend, and while we'll still see a lot of creature decks, Gruul Aggro and Simic Aggro are both bad matchups because their creatures are simply too large and evasive. On top of that, I expect Orzhov Auras to pick back up again this week.

Dimir Rogues has a bit of a rough weekend as it continues to struggle against the green aggro decks, but a spike in combo and control decks means Dimir Rogues is primed for success. I expect to see these decks do what they did in Standard to address similar issues: maindeck sweepers. I wouldn't be surprised to see

trimmed or cut entirely to make room for .

Orzhov Auras has a really good matchup spread and I'm shocked to see it so underrepresented. It dominates the green aggro decks and its biggest predators (other than Azorius Control) are missing from the format.

Izzet Phoenix was quitely the most successful deck of the weekend. It struggled slightly against Gruul Aggro and Pact Combo, but it performed incredibly well against Selesnya Company, Simic Aggro, and both Jeskai and Azorius Control. Right now Izzet Phoenix is in a sweet spot where its interaction matters and opposing interaction doesn't. I don't know how long this will last, but Izzet Phoenix is positioned incredibly well for the upcoming weekend.

Izzet Phoenix looks like a great place to be, and I'd be tuning this list up until the last second for any events this weekend. The core of this version originates from Andrea Mengucci, and I really like the threat suite. The answer suite and sideboard are where it gets tricky.

The split of

, , and depends heavily on how the metagame shifts later this week. If Simic Aggro drops off is less appealing and I can maindeck another to make sideboard space. If Jeskai Control supplants Azorius Control, I can forgo to make space for another . There are a lot of small tuning spots that make a huge difference because Izzet Phoenix sees so much of its deck each game.

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Tournament wise I'm taking a week off for rest and for Mother's Day (you didn't forget, did you?) but I'm very excited to see how Historic continues to adapt as well as get a look at the Standard format that's been on the back burner for a few weeks. Is it as solved as people say, or will there be new innovations in the $5K Strixhaven Championship Qualifier this weekend? It should be a great weekend for both formats, and I'm looking forward to the results.

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