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4 Wasteland
You don’t really have to think about tuning the mana base because it’s always the same 19. You have four Underground Sea, four Polluted Delta, basic Island, basic Swamp, Undercity Sewers. Then you usually include two blue fetches and two black fetches so you have equal opportunities to fetch both basics. This is especially important against 8 Moon, also known as Dragon Stompy. I personally value style and like old border so I play two Flooded Strand and two Bloodstained Mire but there may be some really fringe benefits of splitting them up against Pithing Needle or representing another deck. And of course you play four Wastelands, especially now that Harbingers don’t kill Sagas anymore. The only possible adaptation is if you have a bigger build, for example with Dauthi Voidwalkers instead of Nethergoyfs, you can add a second Undercity Sewers as a 20th land and go down to two Daze. The second Sewers also makes you look like Reanimator and if you dont play Goyf, high-level opponents may sideboard incorrectly.
We are a blue Tempo deck so no surprises here, all four-offs except only three Daze because we are slightly slower then red Tempo and have 19 lands.
There is the basic core of Nethergoyfs and Tamyos and Orcish Bowmasters. You play at least three of each but I always play 4 Nethergoyf and 4 Orcish Bowmasters. Some people play less Nethergoyfs and play more Baleful Strix but here I only cover the variant with at least three Nethergoyfs. You almost always play one or two Brazen Borrower just as a catch-all answer to stuff like Ensnaring Bridge or Chalice of the Void. And the name of the game of this deck is consistency so this fits really well, as you want to have an out to a lot of things.
Bowmastering at their endstep to draw the Brainstorm out is OK sometimes. APNAP comes into play: Active players triggers go on stack first. On their turn if they Brainstorm you play Bowmasters, ping something, they draw 3 triggering Bowmasters 3 times and triggering Tamiyo’s flip, resolve brainstorm, flip goes on stack, then your 3 Bowmasters triggers, and hopefully kill their Tamiyo, so probably not a good play, but on our turn these triggers are switched. This allows you to consider flipping Tamiyo at odd times in the face of a Bowman if you have an answer to their consequent boardstate. Often against Bowmasters mirrors, just using your mana efficiently to sorcery speed a clue away from Bowmasters mana is correct.
People were initially skeptical but most play 4 now for good reasons. Large and cheap beater, good blocker, enables Kaito and can even sometimes come back from the grave in grindy matches. Can grow Murktide Regent for lethal, weak to an anti-graveyard meta (Rest in Peace, Nihil Spellbomb, Leyline of the Void, Dauthi Voidwalker). Against izzet try to play at 3/4 or with instant speed growth to 3/4.
Murktide Kills faster against combo and control but Barrowgoyf stabilizes extremely well. Murktide is immune to Fatal Push but dies to Pyroblast. Barrowgoyfs main can free a sideboard slot but can backfire against UB Reanimator. Blue count g1 is a consideration here, how many decks in the upper meta is Barrowgoyf good against vs Murktide? Murktide: Reanimator, Izzet, UB Tempo, Oops, can mention others but those are the main perks. Barrowgoyf: Red Stompy, Izzet, UB Tempo.
Can bounce stuff that Fatal Push doesn’t hit, like Murktide Regent, Chalice of the Void, Ensnaring Bridge, Marit Lage, a flipped Tamiyo and much much more. While bounce is less powerful than removal in a vacuum, UB doesn’t have flexible 2 mana removal spells like Molten Collapse or Witherbloom Command, so this is currently our best option. Maybe Wizards will print a UB command in the future? Can also bait an opponent to play Orcish Bowmasters on the 3/1, allowing you to follow up with your own Bowmasters.
Kills most relevant creatures in Legacy, so play 4.
Core cantrips, 4 of each are required, but I sometimes board out a Ponder.
Formerly niche card but since the Frog ban firmly established as a two of value engine that is hard to remove and can disable creatures like Murktide Regent or even Emrakul. If you are attacking with a creature with power >3 on MTGO, set a stop at the damage step and ninjitsu Kaito in, you get the damage and the planeswalker, very good with Barrowgoyf and Murktide situationally. It’s important to set a stop in combat because if you play with stops there, your opponent will know you are not Reanimator because you have Kaito in the deck. Important to consider stun and tick up timing: If you stun something first you are at 2 loyalty, they lose one stun counter, now if you draw with Kaito you will need to tick up on the next turn in order to stun again if you havent found an answer. The boardstate will determine the right move but important to consider. Remember you can ninjutsu your Kaito with another Kaito.
Besides the obvious applications it also grows your own Murktide Regent. You must consider Spellbombing when the opponent could play Murktide Regent next turn, so pay attention to the number of cards in your opponents graveyard. Against reanimator you need a bit more nuance here, can you beat Murktide otherwise? Do you have FoW? Can you afford to unlock their graveyard? Undercity Sewers can help you make hard decisions by informing you of your next draw if it is desireable or not. Are you about to draw a push and you have hydroblast in hand but they have a red creature and a problematic red permanent for example.
Easy for Izzet to remove but still a must deal with card early on, probably not the right choice for a bolt meta. Insane against certain decks. I [Minyafriend] have cast The One Ring and Karn against Forge, Sheoldred against Doomsday, Maelstrom Wanderer against mississippi river, Undercity Informer with Faerie Macabre in hand against Oops, Doomsday against Doomsday. It allows you to protect your own play if Force of Will is exiled, Fable of the Mirrorbreaker spamming your own Bowmasters, just use your imagination. The floor is pretty good and the ceiling is crazy high. Best friends with thoughtseize and counterspells.
Eco:
Eco:
Harbinger of the Seas: I love this card. It punishes bad mana bases out of control, Breakfast and Sagas (not for long). (this was written before the rules change)
Minyafriend:
I played a few challenges with Web and found it very underwelming, main point is that Urzas Saga untaps level 1 because it doesn’t have the other abilities yet. Current lands does not get punished enough by this card. Pithing needle seems better if you want to stay UB and stop land strats.
| turn | stops Oops completely | side benefits | counterplay | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Leyline of the Void | 0 | yes | enchantment removal, bounce | |
| Faerie Macabre | 0 | no | Can be found with Barrowgoyf, combat trick for Nethergoyf, the only card that does not care about Teferi. | discard, Stifle |
| Surgical Extraction | 0 | no | Also good against Life from the Loam and Uro, combat trick for Nethergoyf, in rare cases discard and win condition library removal. Can be bought back by Tamiyo. | discard, countermagic |
| Nihil Spellbomb | 1 | depends | Cantrips. Great support to kill opposing Dragon’s Rage Channeler’s and Nethergoyfs. Can prevent Murktide Regent. | EE on 1, artifact removal, bounce, countermagic |
| Grafdigger’s Cage | 1 | yes | Stops Green Sun’s Zenith and Mystic Forge but not Living End and Beseech the Mirror! Also prevents them from reanimating out of your own graveyard but also stops your own Nethergoyf from coming back. | EE on 1, artifact removal, bounce, countermagic |
| Ghost Vacuum | 1 | no | Win condition in the rare case you get to 6 mana. Often prevents Delirium and Murktide Regent. | EE on 1, artifact removal, bounce, countermagic |
| Unlicensed Hearse | 2 | no | Can eventually attack and block so you don’t risk overboarding against hybrid decks. Almost always prevents Delirium and Murktide Regent. | artifact removal, bounce, countermagic |
| Dauthi Voidwalker | 2 | yes | Also a clock and can use their opponent’s cards against them. Keeps Dragon’s Rage Channeler and Nethergoyf small and prevents Murktide Regent if played early enough. | creature removal, bounce, countermagic |
As someone who experiments a lot with off meta sideboard cards I want to tell you what doesn’t work to make future exploration easier.
Eco:
Winter Orb used to see play out of aggressive daze decks to force the opponent to play on your terms while you attack them with a Delver. These days, Blue/Black Tempo is closer to a Midrange deck and can’t take advantage of it - mainly due to Tamiyo’s clues and 3-drops.
Winter Moon is interesting but very unreliable between opposing basics, Mox Diamond and your own need to fetch duals I’m certain games. Add in the fact that multiple Boseijus see play, and you end up with a very temporary false sense of security against Lands.
Eco on the red splash:
I want to splash red if I go to Italy and play paper. Haha. I loved this splash when Show and Tell and Stock Ups were heavily played. Let’s say Painter became a 15% deck, then I would love Meltdown as well.
Red-based Daze decks with Delver or Cori-Steel Cutter are more explosive and kill faster, have reach through Lightning Bolt and bring powerful red sideboard cards like Pyroblast and Meltdown. UB Tempo is slower, has a more stable mana bases, can go longer through card advantage with Tamiyo and can kill high toughness creatures easier with black removal spells.
In paper, I represent bauble triggers with blank cards to not forget them.
In most matchups, Tamiyo is the best T1 play in a vacuum while Nethergoyf can also be good on T2 because it doesn’t do much dmg T2. However because Tamiyo is so strong in fair blue mirrors, it can often be better start with something else like Thoughtseize to clear away a removal spell or Ponder for a Brainstorm or Daze so that you can protect Tamiyo better. Also sometimes a t1 Nethergoyf can die to damage line bolt or Bowmasters. Bowmasters t2 is good against decks that don’t have their own Bowmasters. Ideal curve is Tamiyo Bowmasters Kaito. Against combo you need to know the earliest they can reasonably win so e.g. vs oops you can never tap out for Tamiyo but vs sneak show them T1 combo is improbable so T1 Tamiyo is good.
For a Tempo deck you have a surprisingly good end game when Tamiyo and Kaito draw you extra cards which against some decks let’s you just out control them once you stem the initial onslaught.
Eco: Playing fast is important because it lets you slow down and take your time with hard, game-deciding decisions. Practice your Ponders, land drops, short cuts and using F6 at strategic moments where you don’t give up bluff equity. It’s the same in paper; play fast (and make your opponent play fast as well using the judge) from turn 1 of the game. We should not cheat with slow play and then when game two finishes with 8 minutes on the clock start playing fast there.
Traditionally you would wait with your spells to get the best result, e.g. wait if you really need to push an opponents creature or something else comes. However this deck is quite mana hungry with all the cards you draw and the clues to crack, so it may often be correct to be quite liberal with your spells to maximize mana efficiency. Even if you don’t suspect your opponent is on nonbasic land hate it is often almost free to get basic swamp and basic island so always consider this even if you think it unlikely. A great game plan of this deck is to stick an early Tamiyo and then protect it and disrupt the opponent with Wasteland, Force, Daze and removal. Nethergoyf doesn’t really fit that plan but it is the only card that really does damage early which can actually end the game reasonably fast other than Murktide which comes later. This deck is super fun but is also hard to play, you need a lot of practice and care not to timeout, it is much more value focused and slower than Delver.
Minyafriend:
I do not agree to liberally fetch basics. It hinders your ability to double spell and makes Wasteland much better late in the game. Basics are a trap in this deck but a necessary evil due to Blood Moon. If you play Harbinger, then you have to consider the Swamp at some point. This is thinking that deserves nuance but I think more often than not we are hurting ourselves with fetching basics. Wasteland is often more important as a mana source for clues than to pick off an opponent’s land, we want to draw clues and ninjitsu katios and cast Barrowgoyfs. Wastelanding can open ourselves up to Daze, wastelanding can seriously harm our progression. I need to smell blood or have good information to blindly wasteland the opponent.
Normally you want to attack first and then cast your spells to get more information but Nethergoyf often prefers the other way around so if you spells get countered you may attack for more. Sometimes you don’t have a land in the graveyard and it’s good to fetch before attacking. Against damage based removal, consider delaying Nethergoyf until it survives. For example T1 Ponder, T2 Brainstorm fetch Nethergoyf plays around Lightning Bolt. Alternatively you can also just fetch and Ponder and bait them into bolt, then save it with an instant. You can force a delirious DRC to attack, then clear their graveyard with Nihil Spellbomb in the attack step, then block and kill it with Nethergoyf. Don’t forget the escape ability, as long as you don’t have a Grafdigger’s Cage in play.
Try to leave a fetch land or bauble uncracked if 3 and 4 mana creatures like Nadu are relevant in the matchup. Against Moon Stompy, Fatal Push is often useless as you can not fetch with a Blood Moon in play, so consider leaving a clue uncracked as long as you don’t play Null Rod. You can target any creature with Fatal Push, even if it doesn’t have an effect.
Does not hit Brazen Borrower and Broadside Bombardiers.
Relevant artifact creatures: Constructs, Painter’s Servant,
Kaito is not a planeswalker on the owners turn, you need to choose creature in that case! So if they have an additional creature you need to wait until your turn to remove it. Creatures with Flash can make it unreliable, like Orcish Bowmasters, Endurance or half of Death and Taxes.
Flipping Tamiyo T2 means a T5 ultimate if not stopped which mostly wins the game. Don’t forget to play around Orcish Bowmasters.
The current meta is high on fatal push which is why Murktide is often a great counter to the meta removal.
Personal pet card but I don’t play it without Delver because you don’t have 4 DRC and 4 Mishra’s Bauble, so you only have Brainstorm (reactively), Ponder (proactively), and Fetchland + maybe Scryland (hopefully). It’s great against all kinds of blue cantrip decks, whether it’s combo, control or tempo.
Great T1 nonsense protection in the current meta. Even if you see them as something else online, everyone seems to play Reanimator now. Doesn’t stop LED -> Echo. Prevents Murktide, shrinks DRC to block it or kill it with Bowmasters.
Sometimes they have a dual land and a Gaea’s Cradle in play and you have to consider which to Wasteland, don’t always automatically kill Cradle as you might be able to mana screw them completely if they have no land in hand, though it is dangerous against decks with a lot of one drop creatures like Elves.
I don’t know why most people don’t do this, but I almost always bring in my Harbingers of the Sea against Saga decks because having a 3 mana 2/2 that kills a Saga and does more later is really strong on it’s own as long as you remember to fetch basic swamp beforehand. You can Wasteland it with the first trigger on the stack so they never get mana. You can Consign to Memory any of the chapter abilities but not the activated one to create a token.
Most of the time it’s correct to force it, Wasteland on the opponents turn if you have FoN in hand, even if they have no mana, they may play Elvish Spirit Guide.
Both UB tempo and many other meta decks have lots of variable-sized creatures, mostly related to card types in the graveyard.
Examples:
Undercity Sewers can be a hail Mary to hope for a favorable flip or you may even guarantee it with a Brainstorm.
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If you come from a control background you probably prefer to set up with cantrips early but early threats can snowball the game much better, especially Tamiyo. Of course this heavily depends on the matchup, for example vs Oops your best T1 play is Nihil Spellbomb and your second best is Thoughtseize. If you are on a single blue source, think about how probable it is that you get Wastelanded depending on what the opponent shows you. Orcish Bowmasters are often better later in Bowmaster mirrors but against decks with no removal like Show and Tell mainphasing it as early as possible is often good.
The deck is generally good against linear combo and red-based tempo decks but struggles against bigger fair decks.
The currently most played and probably strongest deck even after the Grief, Frog and Troll bans is a tempo combo hybrid that puts you in constant danger from two angles: If you keep or even mulligan to a hand with grave hate and Force of Will, they may just out-tempo you with Tamiyo, Orcish Bowmasters, Murktide Regent, Brazen Borrower or Barrowgoyf. If you have threats and removal they may just reanimate a Fattie and against tempo the game is mostly over if a single Fattie hits the battlefield. However since the Frog ban, the tempo part of the deck is much weaker, especially before sideboarding, so you should prioritize not dying to their combo and your tempo plan will most likely win against theirs. Very skill testing, but good matchup for us if we have two Nihil Spellbomb in the main deck, just be prepared to fight over end of turn Petty Theft into their turn Reanimate. They have a sideboard juke to board out Entomb, Animate Dead and the Fatties and board in more creatures like Barrowgoyf and more removal. However then they are just a worse tempo deck than you are so it’s probably best for them to not juke, unless they expect you to over-prepare for the reanimation plan.
Before the Grief ban, graveyard hate from hand was bad due to Grief but I often get my Grafdigger’s Cage bounced by Brazen Borrower or killed by Engineered Explosives and lose anyways. Since the Grief ban your hand is a bit safer so cards like Surgical Extraction and maybe even Faerie Macabre should be better now. It’s also super hard to win two games in a row on the play and draw, so having mainboard grave hate like Nihil Spellbomb really helps.
Minyafriend:
Identify what kind of UB Reanimator you are playing against. Do they have push main, Inquisition of Kozilek in the sideboard, they go harder on combo, no midrange plan other than Tamiyo, no Bowmasters? Are there Murktides and Barrowgoyfs main? Then it’s midrange with I-win-button. Stifles and murktides main indicate tempo/combo. Voidwalkers main usually read as UB reanimator, probably midrange sideboard plan. Are they a Wasteland version? Definitely heavily recommend looking up opponents in challenges to see what style they are known for and make decisions accordingly. This deck has ALOT of options to build around. I don’t recommend siding out Force of Will even with Dauthi Voidwalkers.
In: All graveyard hate (normally I have 2 mainboard and another 2 sideboard). Don’t board in FoN as it’s not good against their fair plan and also avoid Consign to Memory, as they probably board out Animate Dead.
Out: Shave Daze, Wasteland, maybe 1 Fatal Push if you don’t see Voidwalkers. All Barrowgoyfs as they are too dangerous to get reanimated against you. I used to board out 4 Wasteland but you need the mana against Daze and to crack clues and you want to keep them below 5-6 mana for hardcast FoW, and the Ghost Vacuum in case they being that in.
Alternative: If you have 4 mainboard Dauthi Voidwalker, you can board out Force of Will instead and keep Barrowgoyfs.
it’s sometimes hard to know whether you are versing the mirror or UB Reanimator after G1 unless you see Nethergoyf, Kaito or mainboard Fatal Push (UB Tempo) or Entomb, Reanimate, Atraxa, Archon of Cruelty or Animate Dead (UB Reanimator). The second Undercity Sewers is also an indicator but not always. When in doubt it’s better to assume Reanimator if you aren’t sure because it is played so often but I would not shave on Fatal Push then.
Mostly played by ellaone on MTGO, who has a lot of experience and will outplay you if you make a single mistake. Take your time, mulligan to enough turn 1 interaction and never give them an opening to combo. Double Daze + Surgical is not enough on the draw as the zombies will kill you in three turns after memories journey even if you surgical the Thassas Oracle. TODO: update, its more widely played now
This is one of the few matchups where I mulligan aggressively for turn 1 interaction they are so fast. With Force of Negation you may have to force Dark Ritual because their combo pieces are creatures. They may have a pivot to creatures (if you don’t see Pact of Negation) or to Goblin Charbelcher, but that is not great for them because your countermagic still works against it.
Out:
Slightly unfavored matchup but can be beat by fetching basics ASAP and focusing on staying alive through the early turns. Hopefully they run out of haymakers before you run out of answers. Hydroblasts and Consign to Memory are most important here but Goyfs are great as well. Null Rod?
Minyafriend:
Not a big fan of Null Rod. Try not to get your Goyfs Furied but what can you do.
Bad matchup but can sometimes be beaten by Harbingers of the Seas, hopefully they don’t stick a Saga on 2 before that enters.
Force of Negation is good because it prevents Life from the Loam from coming back. Similarly if there is a lot of lands it may be worth it to switch one of your graveyard hate pieces to Surgical Extraction. A single Surgical is a nice against Loam and as you have so many dead cards like Push and Bowmasters it is surely better than those and can get rid of some other card as well in a pinch. Harbinger is still great, you may just need to Wasteland a Saga first in some spots which complicates things a bit. Consign to Memory is not great but still better than Bowmasters and Push, it can counter an artifact or a Saga Trigger or maybe Bojuka Bog or something else. You can try Tsabo’s Web if it is a lot of lands (never tried it though).
Super fun to play and much loved by the community but even with the new Rakshasa’s Bargain it does seem to compete at the absolute top of the meta game right now so the play rate is currently not that high. Theoretically it is built to counter Tempo decks such as UB because it has more value while still having enough threats to not being clunky, but due to the high power level of the current UB cards it is still somewhat even, as Tamiyo or Kaito can often outvalue them if they don’t have multiple Beans out. A flipped Tamiyo can easily be killed by Witherbloom Command but Kaito is very hard to stop for them, as they usually only play a single Sheoldred’s Edict, so focusing on T3 Kaito is often a great path to victory, for example by starting with basic Island and Swamp so that they can’t delay Kaito with Wasteland. There are different variations with a lot of potential one or two-offs so keep in mind what they could have, such as Spell Pierce, Daze, Stifle, Wasteland or Endurance, but don’t overrespect them because you are the aggressor and the chance of them having any such particular card is low.
Minyafriend:
I do bring in Force of Negation at the very least on the draw as you will be up a card already and you really do not want Beanstalk or Carpet to resolve.
After boarding, prevent Carpet of Flowers at all costs, then you may be able to Tempo them out or lock/kill them with your additional nonbasic hate of choice (Harbinger, Price of Progress, …). Fortunately they don’t usually play more than one or at most two Carpets in the Sideboard, which I don’t understand because this card can single handedly win vs Tempo.
Sheoldred’s Edict is much more flexible than Fatal Push because it can also kill Murktide and a flipped Tamiyo. We don’t board in Force of Negation because it’s too much card disadvantage and they play a lot of creatures too. As always, replace Harbinger with your other nonbasic hate of choice if you have it, such as Price of Progress with a red splash. Against nonstandard variations with 3-4 Uro instead or in addition to Murktide you may board in a Surgical extraction if you have it.
Fatal Push is bad against most of their deck but depending on your other removal you may need to keep two in depending on how many Tamiyos and Endurances they play.
Eco:
Brazen is fine vs Beanstalk if you’re happy waiting for the Murktide to show up. You can keep it
Very bad matchup but fortunately not widely played. It sucks to keep Fatal Pushes in but 2 are needed against Tamiyo.
Super difficult to play against as they have so many different threats and you never know what they are up to this game. Nihil Spellbomb is often bad as they keep priority between sacrificing Lion’s Eye Diamond and casting Echo of Eons. Null Rods are very strong here, then you just need to beat the huge construct tokens, Engineered Explosives is also great.
Unfavored because we don’t have Delver and Bolt to close out games quickly and we also don’t run Counterbalance to lock up the game, so we give them lots of time. They have compact kills like LED+Echo so just stopping them once often isn’t enough and they can also kill us with large constructs if we don’t immediately have Wasteland for Saga or with Echo + Bowmasters. Can be vastly improved with 1-2 Null Rods. Powder Keg/Filigree Silex/Engineered Explosives also helps but Powder Keg is the best as it also kills artifact lands. After playing this matchup a lot I realized: Nihil Spellbomb is not good enough as it only works against Gaea’s Will but not against Echo + LED due to the way priority works, so I switch them out for Grafdigger’s Cage in sideboarding (which doesn’t prevent Beseech but at least Echo). Their Sagas are so deadly that I bring in 2 Harbinger of the Seas just to prevent that, it’s also often a lock with Null Rod.
Most of the time it’s correct to counter Veil of Summer as they often play that into Echo + LED. Tamiyo is an out to Empty the Warrens goblin tokens but it’s often hard to flip her if you don’t have Brainstorm and have a Null Rod in play as Clues are artifacts. Consign to Memory can counter multiple Saga triggers
Weaker storm deck in a vacuum but due to Cabal Rituals it does not fold to your Null Rod alone.
Good matchup but can easily be lost if you misidentify the critical turn after which you don’t tap out anymore. Play too passive and you get buried by their Stock Ups but play too aggressive and they just combo you out. I like a single Sheoldred’s Edict as an out to Emrakul. Unfortunately Kaito does not count as a creature in your hand so you cannot bring it in with Show and Tell.
The mono blue basic land variant is very hard to deal with as they ignore most of your preboard interaction (Fatal Push, Wasteland, Nihil Spellbomb) and puts you into the rare position that you may have blanks in your board after sideboarding. Fortunately that version has a very low playrate as most include some nonbasics so you get value out of Wasteland.
After the ban of Sowing Mycospawn, the deck is much less oppressive but still structurally favored due to Chalice of the Void and a long stream of large, potentially uncounterable threats.
In: Force of Negation, Consign to Memory and Harbingers of the Seas are good against both of them. In: Consign to Memory, Force of Negation, Harbingers of the Seas Out:
Similar to UB Tempo and UB Reanimator, there are two decks with a common core that are hard to differentiate.
In: Force of Negation, Consign to Memory and Harbingers of the Seas are good against both of them.
Out:
Because of Glaring Fleshraker, you may have to keep a few Fatal Pushes in. If you land Null Rod, you need to be aware of Nexus making white mana for portable hole.
Can have a green splash for Crop Rotation. Bad matchup but gets better with 1-2 Null Rod.
Minyafriend:
Funnily enough Bant Nadu is a bad matchup.
Flodope from the other side:
I would say as a Bant Nadu player I don’t like very aggressive starts out of the ub tempo deck, like fast Nethergoyfs backed up by Wasteland and Orcish Bowmasters, which make my cantrips costly when I try to dig out of the situation, an early Grafdiggers Cage hurts. Sometimes I see toxic deluge boarded against me which is not so nice. Teferi can be very good but also quite awkward, I like additional Endurance against UB Tempo more than multiple Teferis, because they handle Nethergoyfs and can prevent Murktides.
Minyafriend: Breakfast I find to be pretty good as we are fairly well equipped to deal with their creatures. Just pay attention to what their next turn could be and if you can play around it do so. T2-T3 are sensitive times where you can just lose games you shouldn’t out of the blue if you are careless.
Games can go long so: Out: daze In: removal
Their manabase is shaky so it is reasonable to think OTP daze can be useful. Just pay attention to how the opponent plays. I rarely if ever bring it in but is Consign considerable so you dont lose to saga tokens and Thoracle trigger? If you play Harbinger then I would not bring consigns in. I think you can beat this deck without the Consign but im starting to wonder, some breakfast players are even bringing in Soul Cauldron.
Eco:
Against Breakfast, I don’t bring in graveyard hate any more (keeping Nihil is good) because every card in my deck is good against them.
Sheoldred’s Edict is nice because it does not target so it can sometimes trade 1 for 1 with Nadu.
I used to board out Nethergoyfs to go for a control play style with Harbinger as the finisher but after the Saga rules change this is more risky and is also weak into Teferi uptick + combo next turn.
Eco:
Breakfast / Tempo DD / Reanimator sideboarding: These decks are good because they ask tough questions of their opponent. Against Breakfast, I don’t bring in graveyard hate any more (keeping Nihil is good) because every card in my deck is good against them. Thoughtseize, Push, Force, Bowmasters. Tempo DD with Tamiyo, Barrowgoyf and Murktide, I’ll have removal spells for + Forces. Reanimator is the same logic; graveyard hate, removal spells and Forces.
TODO: update, this was written in frog times Its pure combo version, Turbo Doomsday is a fast and resilient combo deck where your classic tempo plan of early threats + disruption works well. One of the few matchups where Grixis is much better as they don’t have Wasteland to punish a greedy mana base and Pyroblast, Lightning Bolt and Molten Collapse (hits Vexing Bauble, Tamiyo in both forms, and other creatures) are really good against them. Still, we are a tempo deck and they are a combo deck so we are still favored if we play tight. Trying out Doomsday yourself really helps to understand what they try to do and how to prevent that.
However many Doomsday pilots choose to include tempo or control elements, which changes again after sideboarding, making sideboarding and playing against them a high-skill affair. It takes more skill for them to beat you but most Doomsday players are experts, so never underestimate them and always give your best at any moment, as they might surprise you and win at any time if you make a single mistake.
Online it is really important to look them up as seeing their exact decklist is crucial to best line up your cards with theirs. In paper at least you see most of their preboard configuration after Doomsday, though they might hide some critical card on the bottom of the pile. If I know their sideboard includes lots of creatures, I assume they are bringing them in because they are at their best versus tempo, so I assume they are cutting combo cards. While versions are on a spectrum, here are some general archetypes:
Turbo tries cast actual Doomsday at all costs with cards like Personal Tutor, Cabal Ritual and Vexing Bauble. Control can include The One Ring and splash green for Veil of Summer (quite good against blue-black) and white for Teferi, Time Reveler. Tempo is currently very popular and can partially or even completely sideboard out of the combo for creatures such as Tamiyo, Murktide Regent and finally Barrowgoyf, which mostly replaced Sheoldred, the Apocalypse.
In general you want to focus on creatures removal against tempo but reduce removal and As sideboarding depends so much on their configuration, here are some card specific tips:
Counterbalance, Orcish Bowmasters and Tamiyo are amazing against all versions and should always stay/be brought in. Murktide Regent can be cut against turbo as it attacks on T4 at the earliest where the Doomsday player may already have won. Creature removal obviously depends on their creatures. It’s not worth bringing it in only against Thassa’s Oracle and hard cast Street Wraith. However in most cases they will bring in at least some creatures, so cutting all removal is very risky. Black removal mostly hits all their creatures, though Hard grave hate like Faerie Macabre is never worth it, though Surgical can be brought in as a hail Mary to shuffle their deck post Doomsday (or exile Doomsday after you discard or counter the first one) if they include so few creatures that you can sideboard out so much removal that you have nothing better to bring in. Value grave hate like Nihil Spellbomb and Unlicensed Hearse is only good against Murktide Regent, though it can also sometimes shrink Barrowgoyf. Unlicensed Hearse can also grow and eventually kill them. Force of Will may be boarded out if you think they take out the combo completely, though I still like it as it can efficiently answer Dark Ritual + X on card parity. Force of Negation is great against turbo and control, e.g. if you see Personal Tutor, Cabal Ritual, The One Ring, Teferi, Vexing Bauble(?). Stifle works both against Fetchlands and against the Oracle trigger, so if you have it I would always keep it. Consign to Memory
Eco:
Vs Doomsday you should look for Personal Tutors, Cabal Rituals and 2nd green cycler+2nd Street Wraith. If they have those, they are focused on Combo. If they have creatures, you can trim a Wasteland and not bring in Consign.
Minyafriend:
Be aware Stifle is a thing. In: blasts, removal, goyfs Out: FoW, Thoughtseize
Eco:
Black Daze vs. Red Daze is a cool matchup where they fold to a lot of your cards. Play the matchup some more, and you’ll win more games for sure. Focus on stopping aggression and accepting Daze instead of falling behind too much. Sometimes we can respect Daze, but if you respect it too much, you will get run over. Build basics if possible.
Before Cutter was printed this was the main red variation and a good matchup for UB as you can kill all their threats one-for-one and outvalue their Druids. If you can kill an unflipped Delver or a non-delirious Dragon’s Rage Channeler with Orcish Bowmaster you should be miles ahead, but that is easier said then done, so don’t allin on that as you are already favored most of the time. Barrowgoyf is extremely hard to handle for them.
Your Nihil Spellbomb timing is very important here: If they have a delirious Dragon’s Rage Channeler then using it in the attack step can be used to chump block it with a Nethergoyf or an Orc Army token. However a resolved Murktide is often a huge problem for you and once it is in play the Spellbomb may even grow it, so you may have to use it earlier. Taking away Delirium can also be useful to save your creatures from Unholy Heat.
Stopping the Cutter is a priority because it snowballs out of control quickly and if they get a second one they often one-shot you even from close to 20 life. Beware of their combat tricks as they can get lots of prowess triggers and even give Murktide Regent haste by equipping the Cutter. Engineered Explosives may be necessary to survive long enough to stabilize with a Barrowgoyf. On the draw you may have to cut one Kaito and you also may need to keep in some Forces even though they are bad against Pyroblast because the Cutter is so deadly and produces multiple threats.
Grindy go-wide aggro deck that we are disadvantaged against without Toxic Deluge but with the current MTGO meta it is hard to justify that sideboard slot. Still winnable without if you get an engine (Tamiyo, Barrowgoyf, Kaito) into play ahead of them, then you may be able to keep their board clean and outvalue them.
Barrowgoyf is the perfect creature for matchups like this but they also have a lot to deal with it like Swords to Plowshares and Static Prison, see if you can play around Galvanic Discharge at least.
If you see green-producing lands, they may be on Food Chain (rare), adapt accordingly with more countermagic.
Similar to Boros Energy in that they are a go-wide aggro strategy but their creatures are weaker individually and have better synergy, such as Lackey into Muxus. Bring in in removal, Barrowgoyf and Blue Blasts, board wipes if you have them. Board out Nihil Spellbomb and Daze, shave Wasteland. If possible I would play around Blood Moon but not if it puts you too far behind as they don’t always have it in the sideboard and may not bring it in.
Austrian Challenge @ Gamestore (Linz, Austria) 1st place by Simon Ritter 2025-06-21
A fair Green-Black creature deck with a lands subtheme, sometimes with Natural Order for Atraxa. Like most fair non-blue creature decks, it is structurally advantaged against blue tempo decks. It doesn’t require critical mass so they aren’t stopped by Force of Will and they have mana dorks so they aren’t that impacted by Daze and Wasteland. Still I would keep Force of Will in for tempo because you are disadvantaged in the late game. It is hard to beat for Tempo without board wipes like Rough/Tumble due to their large number of creatures.
They have a slew of combat tricks that they are probably much more experienced with than you so think twice before blocking a seemingly stupid attack. Putting any land from their library into play with Elvish Reclaimer and Wight of the Reliquary can do the following:
However they usually don’t play Dark Depths and Maze of Ith.
On the positive side they can’t interact with countermagic outside of Veil of Summer. Also they can’t block fliers outside of Endurance and Birds of Paradise (rarely played).
They usually seem to have enough mana so I board out some Dazes and often leave the mana dorks alone though it depends on the situation. Orcish Bowmaster is nice even though they don’t draw many cards but you can kill (Ig)noble Hierarch, Birds of Paradise and so on. Be careful not to confuse Wight and Knight: Wight sacrifices creatures and grows with them in the yard, Knight sacrifices plains or forests and grows with lands in the yard. Grist is really confusing: You can’t Force of Negation it, Grafdigger’s Cage doesn’t stop it from coming into play, it grows Wight. But when it’s in play you can’t kill it with creature removal. Grist is very dangerous because if it gets going you never get any creatures into play and you lost the game. At least you can hit it with Orcish Bowmasters, attack it with a flyer (if Grist doesn’t kill it, maybe a Brazen Borrower), but best to just counter it or the Green Sun’s Zenith for 3. They play 4 Green Sun’s Zenith so it may be worth it to board in Grafdigger’s Cage so they can only get Grist and a GSZ for 4 mana you can hopefully Daze or Force at that time. Due to the low play rate it’s not worth it to play sideboard hate specifically for them but there is some overlap like Toxic Deluge that is great vs Nadu as well. Traditionally, Submerge is often played in tempo if you expect lots of green creature decks but with black removal not caring about the toughness of creatures, UB does rarely play it. Hard graveyard hate like Surgical Extraction is not worth it due to it being card disadvantage but graveyard hate that can also be a threat is very useful to shrink their X of the Reliquary, for example Emperor of Bones or maybe Unlicensed Hearse or even Nihil Spellbomb. You can block a big creature with Tamiyo and then brainstorm to flip it before damage. If they have Orcish Bowmasters their trigger goes on the stack first and Tamiyo flips first and fizzles the triggers.
Similar to the creature part of Cradle Control with a single Cradle and a white splash for Swords to Plowshares and Knight of the Reliquary instead of or in addition to Wight of the Reliquary. Hard to say exactly what they play as it is pretty rare so keep your eyes open for cards like Stoneforge Mystic, Thalia, Guardian of Thraben, Mother of Runes and maybe even the Dark Depth’s Combo.
They play Wastelands so start with basics to keep from falling behind in tempo. Additional tricks: Lands in the graveyard grow Knight of the Reliquary (+2/+2 through a fetchland) Karakas can bounce a legendary creature such as Tamiyo.
Sideboarding: Similar to Cradle Control
TODO: update With the example list I would -1 Wasteland -4 Daze -1 Nihil Spellbomb +1 Hearse +1 Barrowgoyf +1 Sheoldred’s Edict +1 Toxic Deluge +1 Long Goodbye +1 Brazen Borrower Their Plan: Their plan is already good so they won’t change much, probably Collector Ouphe out and Choke in.
TODO
Grindy fair deck that aims to win a battle of attrition. Even though Force is a two-for-one I would still keep it, sometimes you can protect an Engine like Tamiyo or Kaito long enough to outvalue them. Be careful with fetching and brainstorming, they could Dark Ritual into Bowmaster and (postboard?) Opposition Agent. Value-grave hate like Nihil Spellbomb is fine.
Good matchup if you have enough Barrowgoyfs. Can also race with Nethergoyf.
Consign to Memory against Riftbolt may also be worth it and it pitches to Force.
You can also shave on Wasteland but Barrowgoyf T3 is important.
Their plan:
They will bring in Pyroblast. Sometimes they have Roiling Vortex or Ensnaring Bridge so I would keep a Brazen Borrower in if there isn’t anything better.
Ultra grindy creatureless matchup which you may win on the clock on MTGO if they go for Ensnaring Bridge, but in paper you have to play fast and be ready to call a judge to prevent slow play. They have lots of creature removal but struggle with planeswalkers, so going for a quick Tamiyo ultimate may help. Ensnaring Bridge is annoying but can sometimes be handled using creative thinking. Besides preparing a lethal attack (take Sudden Edict into account) and then using Brazen Borrower, you can for example create Kaito emblems for a few turns and Ninjutsu it from a Tamiyo or use one of the many other ways you have to shrinking and growing your creatures before and after the attack. As the deck is rarely played competitively expect lots of variations and adapt to what you see.
A unique graveyard deck that requires very specific answers to beat but you shouldn’t tune your sideboard in an open field because of the extremely low play rate. Good matchup as long as you have enough grave hate. 2 mainboard Nihil Spellbombs really help.
Play carefully, focus on sideboard, mulligan, early turns. Don’t let spells through too quickly, think what you want to counter! E.g. against most other decks you often let LED resolve but here you should counter it. Mulligan for grave hate, they are the beatdown. If you don’t have grave hate, stick early threats, counter their enabler (anything that discards cards) and try to kill them quickly. Be careful with Thoughtseize if they are low on cards because you might win them the game by being forced to discard a dredger.
TODO: some disagree with that and keep Force in, update Always the first thought when I build a sideboard is that I want to have exactly as many cards to bring in as I want to bring out. The easiest way to achieve that is number of Thoughtseize + Forces main = number of BEB + removal + creatures side (not counting Harbinger) The reason for the Thoughtseize-BEB switch is that DRC + Bolt kill you quickly. It’s OK to have 1-2 FoW in your mapping isn’t perfect, can also board out 1 Daze and keep in 1 Force on the draw. You have a great tempo matchup as you can remove almost anything, only Murktide, Counterbalance and Kaito can be difficult to handle.
*TODO: update (other people have other opinions on sideboarding)
The most aggressive variants, focus on survival first. In: BEB, removal and creatures Out: Thoughtseize, Force of Will
UB Delver/Tempo In: Removal and creatures Out: Force of Will (% Meta game)
Quick Tips: Assume UB Reanimator due to higher play rate until you see Nethergoyf, Kaito or main deck Nihil Spellbomb, most of the other cards are unfortunately shared between both decks. Don’t forget about Kaito! For example you should always block Tamiyo if you can. It’s very hard to remove for UB except with combat damage, so get creatures on the board quickly.