Table of Contents
- This Week’s Top Performers
- The Deck’s Looking To Break In / Next Best Options
- Decklists in this Article
- Rakdos Midrange – April 7, 2022 Alchemy Metagame Snapshot
- Rakdos Sacrifice – April 7, 2022 Alchemy Metagame Snapshot
- Grixis Midrange – April 7, 2022 Alchemy Metagame Snapshot
- Mardu Midrange – April 7, 2022 Alchemy Metagame Snapshot
- Gruul Werewolves – April 7, 2022 Alchemy Metagame Snapshot
- Naya Runes – April 7, 2022 Alchemy Metagame Snapshot
- Izzet Mill – April 7, 2022 Alchemy Metagame Snapshot
Hello everyone! Starting with this week, we’re going to be acting upon a new initiative! We want you to have the most up to date information on the formats, and initially, we did that by providing deck guides to fill out your knowledge. However, we realized that we could still do more so we’re looking to be updating each formats tier list biweekly as well as provide analysis on the standout decks, whether they stand out for their strength, weaknesses, or they have a large change in positioning. As always, you can find the link to the complete tier lists below.
- Arena Alchemy (BO1) Metagame Tier List and Rankings: Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty
- Traditional Alchemy (BO3) Metagame Tier List and Rankings: Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty
The latest rebalancing changes to Alchemy, will not likely affect the current metagame too much (if at all). There are no nerfs, and it buffs existing underplayed archetypes – Warriors and Elves tribal. It may end up becoming decent like Orzhov Venture, but still may find themselves hard to power through all the value currently manifesting in Alchemy. Let’s get into it.
This Week’s Top Performers
Rakdos Midrange
Creatures (9)
Instants (9)
Sorceries (13)
Lands (23)
60 Cards
$351.88
Creatures (9)
Instants (9)
Sorceries (13)
Lands (23)
60 Cards
$349.98
Sideboard
15 Cards
$119.22
If you’ve been following Alchemy at all, this should come as no real surprise to you. Ever since Alchemy: Kamigawa came out (and arguably even before then), Rakdos has been the top dog with nothing really coming close to usurping it. The deck just has way too many powerful tools, too much card advantage, and too much power to be toppled right now.
Maybe there’s some non-Rakdos deck that can contest it, but I definitely haven’t seen it yet. The efficiency of this deck is pretty unreal and it’s very surprising there were no changed addressed in the card rebalancing. We’ll see if anything can at least challenge Rakdos in the future, but I’m certainly not holding my breath.
Rakdos Sacrifice
- Find more Rakdos Sacrifice decklists in our deck database
- Check out our latest Rakdos Sacrifice deck guide
Lands (23)
60 Cards
$227.92
Lands (23)
60 Cards
$227.92
Sideboard
15 Cards
$75.03
If you’re not a fan of Rakdos Midrange, maybe Anvil is more your speed. Anvil shares many of the same elements that the midrange deck does, but rather than leaning on interaction heavily, it looks to grind people out with Anvil. I’ve heard murmurs that Anvil has a good midrange matchup, but I’m personally not convinced as Midrange is so malleable that it can board to beat pretty much anything.
Nevertheless, Anvil is definitely a great archetype right now and if you like the play style, I think it’s a great option.
Grixis Midrange
Planeswalkers (4)
Creatures (10)
Enchantments (4)
Lands (25)
60 Cards
$321.1
Planeswalkers (4)
Creatures (8)
Enchantments (4)
Lands (25)
60 Cards
$311.66
Sideboard
15 Cards
$161.33
Unfortunately this is where Alchemy is at right now. If you don’t want to play Rakdos, splash Blue to try and beat it! Grixis offers the same package that Rakdos does, but is a bit more teched for the mirrors than the other variants. While this is likely worse in an open field, for something like the MCQ coming up this weekend, this may be the ticket to beating through the endless Rakdos matchups you would likely find.
The Deck’s Looking To Break In / Next Best Options
Mardu Midrange
Planeswalkers (6)
Lands (26)
60 Cards
$461.45
Planeswalkers (6)
Artifacts (1)
Lands (26)
60 Cards
$469.77
Sideboard
15 Cards
$181.41
The last form of Rakdos, I promise! Rather than trying to be hyper efficient with Painful Bond, Mardu moves up the curve a bit to play a litany of Planeswalkers and more expensive threats. Although this deck is certainly powerful, I have to question how well it could match up against the Duress and Citystalker Connoisseur of Rakdos.
That said, since you’re playing a more threat dense deck, you’re going to be a bit stronger in a top deck war as well so this may match up better than it looks.
Gruul Werewolves
- Find more Gruul Werewolves decklists in our deck database
- Check out our latest Gruul Werewolves deck guide
Creatures (25)
Instants (2)
Enchantments (4)
Lands (24)
60 Cards
$159.83
Creatures (25)
Instants (2)
Enchantments (4)
Lands (24)
60 Cards
$159.83
Sideboard
15 Cards
$24.26
Now this is a welcome surprise! It seems that every deck in Alchemy right now is just an iteration of Rakdos, but in that it leaves an opportunity. If Rakdos is becoming more inbred to beat mirrors, they’re likely cutting removal. If they’re cutting removal, it’s time to race!
Werewolves is fast, powerful, and punishing to any opponent who is durdling around for too long. If Rakdos cares about aggro it’s probably going to be too difficult to win, but I can’t imagine that Rakdos could justify many slots at the moment which could mean this is an excellent time to get aggressive.
Naya Runes
Creatures (16)
Sorceries (4)
Enchantments (18)
Lands (22)
60 Cards
$175.24
Creatures (16)
Sorceries (4)
Enchantments (18)
Lands (22)
60 Cards
$175.24
Sideboard
15 Cards
$58.59
In a similar vein to Werewolves, if Rakdos is becoming less about interaction, Runes could make a comeback. The deck has a great ability to grind, and although it’s not as efficient as Rakdos, can be significantly faster to catch opponents off guard. If you play a heavily Rakdos teched version like this one maxing out on value enchantments, I could definitely see this being a reasonable answer in a field of inbred Rakdos decks.
Izzet Mill
Instants (25)
Sorceries (13)
Lands (22)
60 Cards
$115.15
Sideboard
7 Cards
$3.41
Instants (25)
Sorceries (13)
Lands (22)
60 Cards
$115.15
Sideboard
15 Cards
$16.35
By playing Painful Bond, you want your curve to be really low to make the best use of it. What card also likes decks with low curves? Tasha's Hideous Laughter! Mill could be a great way to game this meta as a copied Laughter could deal some serious deck damage to any Rakdos opponent and is definitely worth a consideration right now.
There’s a lot of different iterations of Mill right now, but I like avoiding Ruin Crab for now and focusing solely on Laughing the opponent to death. Furthermore, since Rakdos isn’t a particularly fast deck, you’ll have a good amount of time to set up a combo and ideally kill them in one fell swoop!