Mythic Championship VII Metagame Breakdown and Analysis

All 67 Mythic Championship VII Standard decks have now been revealed for the upcoming tournament! In this article, we review how the Standard metagame is shaping up after the banning of Oko, Thief of Crowns, Once Upon a Time and Veil of Summer and what the players at the highest level of competition decided to bring to the table. We will go through each deck archetype, individual card choices and predictions on their performance.

Metagame Breakdown

You can click on the deck archetypes in the table below to view all decklists.

Jeskai Fires – 17.9%

Jeskai Fires by Matthew Nass (matthewlnass) – Mythic Championship VII

Jeskai Fires is the most popular deck of the tournament. Deafening Clarion is a staple card in this archetype, which is the why none of the other players are using aggressive decks (except one player). Sphinx of Foresight has now also become an integral part of the deck that acts like Once Upon a Time for Jeskai Fires.

The presence of Teferi, Time Raveler also does not bode too well for decks that rely on instants and counterspells, such as Temur Reclamation, Flash decks and Azorius Control. The Fae of Wishes package is also trending down as it proves to be a bit too slow and in best-of-three, it may be better to deploy a more concentrated sideboard strategy. All decklists are pretty streamlined at this point, where the difference is mainly one or two interaction cards and obviously the sideboard.

Sacrifice Decks

Jund Sacrifice – 13.4%

Jund Sacrifice by Carlos Romão (CarlosRomao) – Mythic Championship VII

Golgari Sacrifice – 11.9%

Golgari Sacrifice by Stanislav Cifka (StanCifka) – Mythic Championship VII

Rakdos Sacrifice – 4.5%

Rakdos Sacrifice by Teruya Kakumae (witch) – Mythic Championship VII

The Sacrifice decks, if lumped into one category with the premise that they all use the powerful Witch’s Oven and Cauldron Familiar engine makes up for the biggest representation in the metagame, next to its biggest rival Jeskai Fires.

Obviously, each version have their differences; the Jund version accommodates Mayhem Devil and Korvold, Fae-Cursed King, whereas the Golgari version has a better mana base and can still run interaction spells such as Murderous Rider in their place and even go for cards like Bolas’s Citadel as in the above sample deck. The Rakdos version is a different deck that is much more aggressive in nature.

The key card that makes the Jund and Golgari version stand out is the use of Casualties of War, that will usually have two or more targets, with the prevalence of artifacts and enchantments such as Fires of Invention, Witch’s Oven and Trail of Crumbs.

Golgari Adventures – 11.9%

Golgari Adventures by Reid Duke (Reiderrabbit) – Mythic Championship VII

Golgari Adventures by Chris Kvartek (Kavartech) – Mythic Championship VII

Golgari Adventures has been a stable presence in the ever changing metagame, and though they all rely on Edgewall Innkeeper and Adventure cards, there are different builds of the deck that makes them completely different to each other. Reid Duke decided bring the more value-oriented version containing Lucky Clover, and Casualties of War, whereas the other version has cards like The Great Henge, Vivien, Arkbow Ranger and Rotting Regisaur for more of a beatdown strategy.

Flash Decks

Izzet Flash – 9%

https://mtgazone.com/deck/izzet-flash-by-shahar-shenhar-shahar-mythic-championship-vi/

Simic Flash – 6%

Simic Flash by Javier Dominguez (Thalai) – Mythic Championship VII

The two groups of Magic Pro League players brought with them two flavors of the flash decks. What is interesting is how the Simic Flash decks have evolved to be more mana ramping, with the inclusion of Growth Spiral and Nissa, Who Shakes the world. It forgoes the usual inclusion of cards like Brineborn Cutthroat and Spectral Sailor to strengthen matchups against Jeskai Fires and Sacrifice decks. However, it is important to note that Teferi, Time Raveler is its worst enemy and will be interesting to see how far these decks can go.

Temur Reclamation – 4.5%

Temur Reclamation by Miguel Guerrero Leon (Mogwai) – Mythic Championship VII

As with the above Flash decks, Temur Reclamation does not fare well against Jeskai Fires as it is usually slower and is weak to the opposing Teferi.

Control Decks

Azorius Control – 4.5%

Azorius Control by Kohei Yoshino (kiteon) – Mythic Championship VII

Azorius Control is one of the few control decks left in the metagame. Planar Cleansing replaces Time Wipe as the sweeper of choice, to catch the non-creature cards causing havoc on the metagame.

Esper Control – 1.5%

Esper Control by Alexander Hayne (Hayne) – Mythic Championship VII

MPL member Alexander Hayne is the sole pilot of the Esper Control deck, which should fare better without Veil of Summer as it brings cards like Thought Erasure back to life. Lack of aggro decks in the metagame also make the deck better than usual.

Ramp Decks

Simic Ramp – 4.5%

Simic Ramp by Andrea Mengucci (Mengu09) – Mythic Championship VII

The deck to watch in the tournament, this deck uses the powerful Risen Reef engine to power out End-Raze Forerunners from hand or via Finale of Devastation. I am on the skeptical side due to the presence of Deafening Clarion and Bonecrusher Giant, but the deck can do some truly broken things if left unchecked.

Sultai Ramp – 3%

Sultai Ramp by Luis Salvatto (LuisSalvatto) – Mythic Championship VII

This deck aims to power out Casualties of War early, crippling opponents before they can do anything meaningful. The mana base looks quite scary, as it even plays Gadwick, the Wizened .

Other Adventures Decks

Temur Adventures – 1.5%

Temur Adventures by Jean-Emmanuel Depraz (JiRock) – Mythic Championship VII

Temur Adventures was first introduced to the world by littlebeep, who reached #1 Mythic with the deck last season. It uses Lucky Clover and high value Adventure cards such as Fae of Wishes and Beanstalk Giant to overwhelm your opponent.

Jean-Emmanuel Depraz, the runner-up of Mythic Championship V chose to go rogue and put his faith into the relatively unknown deck. Having played the deck a bit myself, I can attest to its power and it looks even better in an environment with no aggro decks.

Gruul Adventures – 1.5%

Gruul Adventures by Esther Trujillo (SliverQueen) – Mythic Championship VII

The only true aggro deck of the tournament. I was a big fan of the deck but the loss of Once Upon a Time hurt it too much. Even now it is not favored against Jeskai Fires, though the Embercleave is nice against Sacrifice decks.

Other Fires Decks

Five-Color Fires – 3%

Five-Color Fires by Ken Yukuhiro (deathsnow) – Mythic Championship VII

Ken Yukuhiro used Mardu Knights to reach top 8 of Mythic Championship V, and here he brings another spicy brew. This Fires of Invention deck features Niv-Mizzet Reborn and four copies of Casualties of War.

Rakdos Fires – 1.5%

Rakdos Fires by John Rolf (JrolfMTG) – Mythic Championship VII

This deck was first introduced by Ben Weitz, who used the deck to reach #2 Mythic in November’s ladder season. It is a hybrid of Rakdos Sacrifice and Jeskai Fires, with God-Eternal Bontu being the key card, and even better if you have Cavalier of Flame in play. Covetous Urge is a nice inclusion in the deck, which works really well with Fires.

Jund Fires – 1.5%

Jund Fires by Elizabeth Rice (Elioftheveil) – Mythic Championship VII

This unique Fires deck includes both Casualties of War and Cry of the Carnarium to target the metagame and a bunch of strong red and green creatures.

Final Predictions

Our prediction for the top 8 is as follows:

• 2 Jeskai Fires
• 2 Jund Sacrifice
• 1 Golgari Sacrifice
• 1 Simic Ramp
• 1 Izzet or Simic Flash
• 1 Temur Adventures

Who do you think will reach the top 8 and go all the way to the top? What are your predictions for this tournament? Let us know what you think in the comments below, and join our Discord to discuss everything related to MTG Arena!