For new decks, I'm at least a little interested in trying out
Kalamax, the Stormsire,
Zaxara, the Exemplary, and some sort of Cycling deck (can't decide on if I'd be using
Gavi, Nest Warden, the shark partners, or pivoting the deck to a four or five color list).
In Color Wheel Order for my current crop:
Sai, Master Thopterist: Probably nothing. Nothing new at least. As a monoblue and silver midrange beatdown deck, a block full of Battlecruisers and Wedge powerups has not much to offer. For reprints, I'd be thrilled to add
Arcane Signet and
Scavenger Grounds to the deck but Sai is like 6th in line among my decks and probably 10th in line for my wife and I's collection so he can keep dreaming. Ditto testing out
Bonder's Enclave which I'm sure would be fine but not great in Sai and amazing elsewhere. COMPANION CHECK: N/A
Daretti, Scrap Savant: I thought everything above would be true here, as Daretti is the Artifact Control deck to Sai's artifact aggro deck, but Red actually got some goodies here.
Surly Badgersaur looks spicy for this deck - discarding lands to gain Treasure is particularly awesome but the other triggers are far from useless. Also digging
Deflecting Swat - I've started finding
Wild Ricochet a bit clunky and would love to upgrade to Swat instead.
Lavabrink Floodgates is also interesting for sure; I wouldn't run a 4-mana rock that only made two (for instance the deck obviously runs
Thran Dynamo, but doesn't bother with
Hedron Archive,
Firemind Vessel, or even
Nyx Lotus), and I wouldn't run weird political boardwipe on 4 CMC either - but adding them together on the same card and making it one I can recur over and over with Daretti is at least worth testing. It breaks my heart to see a new mono-red walker and have him be unplayable for my deck but still some exciting stuff. COMPANION CHECK: N/A
Yuriko, the Tiger's Shadow: As one of my least played and most hated decks, Yuriko will have a tough time arguing for any copies of
Fierce Guardianship or
Deadly Rollick (or the reprinted
Arcane Signet) we obtain but man does she want them sooooo bad. I've also done the math to see that
Heartless Act is likely an upgrade to Go for the Throat or some other removal spell. Unsurprisingly, not a lot else appeals - ironically I'd be more inclined to run
Avian Oddity if it was also a billionty mana like Green and Black's members of this cycle, but here it feels like both modes are just too bad to play and the CMC isn't enticing enough to lure me into running it to dome people. COMPANION CHECK: Nope. The idea of dropping all my 1s and emphasizing 0s to get my ninjas is amusing but ultimately feels suicidal. Even if I could, Yuriko fails the test for
Gyruda, Doom of Depths - I only ever pay two for her, but that isn't what the Demon Kraken asks.
The Gitrog Monster:
Boneyard Mycodrax is an amazing card and easily replaces
Graveblade Marauder; while it is dead on turn 3 sometimes in a way marauder isn't, the Scavenge ability is a spicy way to win the endgame which is something my list occasionally sputters and struggles with. Ditto
Fiend Artisan which will replace either
Liliana's Elite or
Boneyard Wurm if I can acquire one - it's near-strictly better than both in this deck, with similar power but also the ability to randomly Green Sun's Birthing Pod out key toolbox cards. It may be too crazy to add, honestly - I can't handle that kind of tutoring power usually and use it to drag games to a halt. This deck probably makes the best claim to
Bonder's Enclave as it would love to move to even more lands - 44 just doesn't feel like enough. Those are the windmill slam obvious adds but I'm at least vaguely interested in
Skull Prophet,
Heartless Act,
Deadly Rollick, and
Daring Fiendbonder. All in all a great set for the Great Frog Monster, almost enough to ameliorate my salt and rage at having a cycling block and not getting a bicycle land
COMPANION CHECK: Nope. I think I could cut almost every noncreature, nonland card from the deck and feel okay for
Umori, the Collector - I'm already sitting at like 85 creatures + lands - but the deck simply falls apart without
Life from the Loam. It's the single best card in my 99 and I've avoided running Entomb and Gravebreaker Lamia specifically to stop myself from nabbing it every game; to cut it would be to cut the heart from the build.
Vorel of the Hull Clade: This just in: water is wet, the sun is hot, and
Fierce Guardianship is amazing. Of my decks Vorel probably makes the best claim - the deck is mana-greedy, needs ways to protect itself from being blown out by boardwipes, and usually has the commander on the table, but I suspect we'll only acquire one and it will go to the wife's Faeries or Merfolk. Outside of that,
Slippery Bogbonder is the only card really on my radar to be honest, and even that's a bit of a stretch. Granting Hexproof + pulling counters at instant speed is for sure interesting, especially in how it interacts with
Doubling Season and/or
Primal Vigor. But four mana is a lot and the deck's four-slot is already really crowded with all-stars like
Forgotten Ancient,
Master Biomancer,
Renata, Called to the Hunt,
Spike Weaver, and
Fathom Mage all of which feel crucial and better. I'm not running
Mystic Snake or
Frilled Mystic currently, and arguably either of them are a more reliable way to protect my board than Bogbonder.
Tidal Barracuda faces a similar barrier to entry; flash is great and I've loved every game I've landed
Vivien, Champion of the Wilds, but that 4-slot is packed and arguably
Yeva, Nature's Herald is a better fit if I wanted another "Flash it all" enabler. I would also be open to testing
Primal Empathy, but currently this deck's problem is not that it struggles to keep snowballing; it is that it struggles to recover from blowouts, something I'm not sure Empathy helps with. Disappointingly nothing else gets me too excited - the deck's mana is greedy enough that colorless lands are a hard sell, and I'm not convinced
Nesting Grounds or
Bonder's Enclave do enough to justify it. Mutate is on-point for Simic, but also feels like it'd constitute a major realtool of the deck for minimal power gains. COMPANION WATCH: No thanks.
Keruga, the Macrosage is a mediocre payoff that doesn't justify cutting all my crucial 2 CMC ramp. Yeah, I'm aware I can "cheat" that problem with stuff like
Search for Tomorrow but it would still feel bad (and cut a lot of the deck's power) to lose stuff like
Sol Ring,
Gyre Sage, and
Incubation Druid.
Sevinne the Chronoclasm: Despite being a Flashback deck and this year rewarding Cycling, there are so many great goodies for Jeskai that Sevinne has plenty to look forward to. The first and most obvious inclusion is
Twinning Staff - this card is so exciting for Sevinne that I can't handle it.
Whirlwind of Thought is also pretty darn crazy obviously; for flavor and style I don't know if it replaces
Secrets of the Dead or
River Kelpie but it probably should as it triggers off of all casting and not just flashback. Of course I badly want
Raugrin Triome. A fetchable triland would fix this deck's occasional color woes, and the cycling is still very relevant as it means this can be pitched if I'm flooded and then recurred later with
Sun Titan or
Sevinne's Reclamation, further ensuring those cards can help "ramp". For that same reason I may test out
Raugrin Crystal in addition to or instead of
Commander's Sphere. Those are the cards I'd snap add to the list - but wait there's more! This is the first deck with blue in its identity that doesn't necessarily windmill slam
Fierce Guardianship - I don't always have Sevinne out and it isn't 110% better than
Negate as a result, but I'd definitely love to try it. The other free spells are less exciting - Sevinne is already 50% indestructible and redirecting a spell is less interesting than copying, countering, or stealing it. I'd also be curious to test out the partners (
Brallin, Skyshark Rider and
Shabraz, the Skyshark) and
Rielle, the Everwise as I have a lot of looting in my list, and
Vadrok, Apex of Thunder,
Surly Badgersaur, and
Channeled Force also look pretty cute. COMPANION WATCH: Sevinne fails the test that both
Zirda, the Dawnwaker and
Yorion, Sky Nomad set, and is a good "exhibit B" for why
Lutri, the Spellchaser got autobanned.