Hey everyone! I’ve just updated the Historic tier list which you can check out here for Bo3 and here for Bo1, and it provides a ranking of all the decks with a summary of each archetype along with its weaknesses.
A lot has changed since the last update so in this article I’ll be breaking down all of the changes including new decks which have emerged since the last update and where they’ve landed on the tier list, any tweaks to existing archetypes whether through new cards from Duskmourn or other new innovations, and any recent movement within the tiers too. Let’s get into it!
This is a list I built at the start of last season and it’s a 4 color sacrifice combo deck that gets to leverage Ajani, Nacatl Pariah + Goblin Bombardment better than most decks which is arguably the best ‘fair’ synergy in Historic right now, and has access to an infinite combo so the deck attacks from a lot of different angles and has a variety of very strong starts.
The combo here involves Samwise Gamgee, A-Cauldron Familiar, and a free sacrifice outlet such as Goblin Bombardment or Bartolomé del Presidio. With Samwise Gamgee in play if you cast A-Cauldron Familiar it drains the opponent for 1 and creates a food token, you can then sacrifice A-Cauldron Familiar to your sacrifice outlet causing it to go to the graveyard, you can then bring it back from the graveyard with the food token draining the opponent for 1 and creating a food token again thanks to the Samwise Gamgee passive ability and you’re back to square one, so this combo provides infinite drain and sacrifice triggers.
Speaking of which Birthing Ritual is one of the strongest cards in the deck which enables you to assemble the combo a lot more consistently since it can find all three pieces, and it can find Ajani, Nacatl Pariah more consistently to assemble your powerful Goblin Bombardment synergies.
Weaknesses: Opposing Goblin Bombardment can be tricky to play through since it’s great at keeping you off the combo since it can kill Samwise Gamgee at instant speed, and can prevent Ajani, Nacatl Pariah from flipping at instant speed as well so it’s an effective way to stop both sides of your deck which is why A-Haywire Mite is very important post-sideboard.
Additionally Stone of Erech shuts off your ability to combo and prevents Ajani, Nacatl Pariah from flipping as well as denying your death triggers from Unlucky Witness and Goblin Trapfinder but you have both A-Haywire Miteand Fragment Reality as counterplay to that. Finally there are some other hate cards that are capable of shutting off both sides of your deck such as Hushbringer.
Tier placement: This list has been putting up very good numbers on Untapped in addition to the great winrate I had at the start of the season, and was also the list that the #2 (Shellon) and #3 (LordGrim) players on ladder were using to finish the season that’s just ended. The deck is both fast and resilient with multiple angles of attack, and is still putting up great winrates even after the meta has had time to adapt so I’ve put this in tier 1 and it very much feels like one of the decks to beat right now.
I also recently wrote a full in-depth deck guide about the deck for MTGAzone Premium which you can check out here if you’re interested:
This is another list I’ve started seeing more of recently and is the closest thing to a pure conventional midrange deck we have right now. This list is looking to cheat powerful creatures into play via either Sorin, Imperious Bloodlord or Persist. Both Saint Elenda and Vein Ripper can be cheated into play with Sorin, Imperious Bloodlord, and all of the creatures outside of Saint Elenda can be brought back from the graveyard with Persist.
As a midrange deck you can also pivot well into sideboard games thanks to cards like A-Haywire Mite to answer graveyard hate, extra discard spells against control and combo etc, and you also gain access to Culling Ritual in green which is excellent against all of the Lurrus of the Dream-Den decks.
Weaknesses: The Sorin, Imperious Bloodlord side of the deck is vulnerable to both discard spells and cards like Pithing Needle, and the Persist side of the deck is vulnerable to graveyard hate so your proactive gameplan is vulnerable to a variety of sideboard cards. Additionally as a pure midrange deck where your primary gameplan is relatively slow compared to the rest of the format, you’re really reliant on your early interaction lining up well which won’t always happen.
Tier placement: Whilst the deck does have a powerful proactive gameplan and has good quality cheap interaction, you’re far too reliant on your early interaction lining up well to consistently beat a lot of the top tier decks that are both very fast and resilient, so while a deck like Boros Auras and Izzet Wizards will likely struggle against this list, decks like 4 Color Samwise, Selesnya Devotion, and even Jeskai Control will be able to go over the top of you fairly easily unless your interaction lines up perfectly so I’ve put it into tier 3 for now.
This is another new list I built very recently thanks to some big new additions to the archetype from Duskmourn. This is a deck built around suiting up your creatures with Auras and growing them very quickly to be able to race and close out the game whilst also dominating the battlefield and making it difficult for the opponent to attack past. Light-Paws, Emperor's Voice and Kor Spiritdancer are the two key threats in this list which turn all of your auras into card advantage whilst also growing incredibly quickly.
The deck runs a decent threat density alongside this to ensure you’re not really soft to early discard spells or spot removal with Esper Sentinel providing psuedo-protection against the opponent’s early removal and being a good creature to suit up with auras since its tax effect scales with its power, Giver of Runes which is great at protecting your big creature such as Light-Paws, Emperor's Voice and Kor Spiritdancer and can be used offensively to attack past blockers via protection, and Amped Raptor which helps you find your key creatures more consistently but can also hit an aura and start growing itself quickly.
Recent additions from Duskmourn in Shardmage's Rescue and Sheltered by Ghosts have been a huge boost to the power of the deck providing you with a maindeck protection aura which can also be used offensively, and a piece of very flexible maindeck interaction that also provides two very valuable keywords in lifelink and ward 2.
Speaking of which the deck also runs a number of 1 ofs which we can tutor for with Light-Paws, Emperor's Voice in specific situations and are reasonable to draw as well. Post sideboard getting access to Hushbringer is also a big deal since it’s really good against 4 Color Samwise, Mardu Sacrifice, Devotion, and Primal Prayers combo which are all decks that can potentially race you, so that can really flip those matchups on their head.
Weaknesses: Since your whole gameplan revolves around loading a bunch of auras on a creature you’re vulnerable to both instant speed removal and early discard spells since if the opponent can keep all of your creatures off the board you’re just left with a bunch of unplayable auras – this list is reasonably threat dense and always having access to Lurrus of the Dream-Den can helps in a lot in situations like that but it can often slow you down enough where the opponent can race you.
Additionally being in Boros you don’t have great counterplay to board sweepers – Loran's Escape gives you some counterplay to destruction based sweepers and Fragment Reality can help against Temporary Lockdown, but Divine Purge specifically is very tricky to deal with.
Tier placement: This has honestly felt like a top tier contender to me during testing and I was debating putting it into tier 1 because I feel it has good tools to beat a lot of the top tier decks with a naturally good matchup against Devotion, and Hushbringer being very effective against the sacrifice decks.
Having said that the deck has only really just emerged meaning the meta hasn’t really had time to adapt so I’ve put it in tier 2 for now until we get more data, and until we see how the format evolves. If other decks adapt and start running more spot removal in the sideboard, or control decks pivot to maindecking high numbers of Divine Purge for example then I’m not sure it’ll retain as high a winrate but time will tell.
I’ve also written a full in-depth article on this deck very recently too which you can check out on MTGAzone Premium here if you’re interested:
Next up I’ll be going over changes to any existing archetypes whether that’s new cards from Duskmourn, other innovations, or movement within the tier lists. I won’t be providing a summary for these lists so if you want a general explanation of how these decks works I recommend checking out the tier list which you can find here which has a summary of each list along with their weaknesses.
This not only improves a lot of tricky matchups and is the best card in devotion mirrors, but it accelerates your proactive gameplan and means you’re very unlikely to run out of gas proactively even though you’re running fewer 3+ drops than some previous builds.
Then gaining access to Portable Hole via Karn, the Great Creator gives you cheap interaction which is very valuable in a number of matchups such as the sacrifice decks, and especially Boros Auras and Izzet Wizards, where pure mono Green variants would have to wait until 5 mana for Skysovereign, Consul Flagship.
One other fairly recent addition we got from Bloomburrow is Scrapshooter which this list is running as a 1 of to give you more consistent access to artifact or enchantment removal without needing Karn, the Great Creator. Finally one last innovation is Shifting Woodland as a 1 of which can be used to re-use Mindslaver, and copy Elesh Norn, Mother of Machines at instant speed to shut off ETBs for the turn.
Tier placement: Even though some decks have emerged recently that should have a good matchup against Devotion like Boros Auras and 4 Color Samwise combo, the deck is still incredibly powerful and capable of stealing matches even against unfavored matchups due to the variety of fast starts it has, and has some counterplay to bad matchups via Karn, the Great Creator targets like Stone of Erech and Portable Hole so I’ve left it in tier 1, not to mention the wide variety of other decks that Devotion goes over the top of.
If a deck like Boros Auras ends up being incredibly popular then I could see this moving down since that seems like a very difficult matchup for Devotion even with this new build, but right now it still feels like one of the best decks in the format, and finished #1 at the end of the season just gone in the hands of Acurn who pioneered this variant.
Tier placement: There haven’t really been any new innovations in Jeskai recently outside of maybe Tajic, Legion's Valor in the sideboard but the deck remains very strong and was one of the only decks I was considering moving up to tier 1 alongside 4 Color Samwise and Devotion since it can be tweaked to have a good matchup against most of the top decks right now.
Strict Proctor in particular seems great right now against both of the sacrifice lists, Mono Green Devotion, and part of the Auras deck, and Jeskai is one of the worst matchups for the new Boros Auras list since it doesn’t have great counterplay to sweepers so Jeskai feels in a decent spot right now. However it still feels a little inconsistent to me due to the whole Lotus Field/ Stifle package leading to some awkward draws, and a lack of counterspells and sweepers in the maindeck can leave you soft to non-creature based combo like Shifting Woodland, and the sacrifice decks respectively game 1 so I’ve put it at the top of tier 2 instead.
Tier placement: Similar to Jeskai control there hasn’t really been many new tools or innovations in the Mardu lists recently but they’re still very strong. This was definitely the best deck in the format for a while after the last round of rebalances but the 4 Color Samwise deck feels like the better of the two right now since the combo angle of attack and getting to play Birthing Ritual over cards like Village Rites which are a quite bit worse means that the 4 Color list is faster (which really helps against decks like Devotion, Auras, and often Jeskai), and has better quality engine cards that enable you to grind into longer games.
Additionally since both decks are similar and account for a decent portion of the metagame, a lot of other lists are running hate cards which hit both lists and I’ve even seen people maindecking Stone of Erech which makes life very difficult for Mardu so I’ve moved it down to tier 2 because it doesn’t quite feel on the same level as 4 Color Samwise and Devotion. The emergence of Boros Auras might work out in Mardu’s favor more though since Mardu can afford to run spot removal more easily than 4 Color Samwise and Claim the Firstborn in particular is so strong against Auras, but the format hasn’t really had time to adapt yet so we’ll have to see how that plays out.
This is a list that has gotten a really nice new tool from Duskmourn in Kona, Rescue Beastie, and this new list I’ve been working on has been testing very well so far and I plan to cover it in a deck guide very soon.
The big issue with Shifting Woodland decks in Historic was that they were incredibly reliant on their namesake card to win which meant that you’re very soft to graveyard hate – the deck ran cards like A-Haywire Mite as answers and is able to refill the graveyard very quickly again so it definitely was able to beat it, but it often slowed the deck down enough where the opponent could beat you while you’re trying to refuel.
The addition of Kona, Rescue Beastie to the deck is huge since it gives you a way to cheat your big permanents into play even if the opponent has graveyard hate which makes the deck way more resilient and difficult to beat since it’s attacking on two fronts. The quality of instant speed removal in Historic isn’t great either with only Fragment Reality and Fatal Push being the two commonly played pieces of interaction that can kill Kona, Rescue Beastie the turn it enters (and a lot of decks struggle to trigger revolt on Fatal Push at will) which means if you can tap it the turn it comes down, it will work a lot of the time in most matchups.
Initially I toyed with the idea of using cards like Springleaf Drum and Smuggler's Copter to tap it the turn it entered but you really want almost all of your cards in the deck to set up both ends of the combo and help you find your win condition when you have Omniscience in play and these cards just didn’t do that so they just didn’t work well in the shell.
Arena of Glory on the other hand is a really low opportunity cost way of tapping Kona, Rescue Beastie the turn it enters which can also be found via all of the other cards you’re using to find Shifting Woodland.
This does have a couple of issues such as needing to run Commercial District in order to have enough forests and plains where both Shifting Woodland and Arena of Glory will be entering untapped consistently (although surveiling is very valuable in this archetype), and it means that Kona, Rescue Beastie can also be stopped by the opponent blocking in combat, but it’s worked out very well so far, and like Shifting Woodland it can be pulled off on turn 3 thanks to Malevolent Rumble and Utopia Sprawl.
Additionally since Karn, the Great Creator is your win condition it also lets you gain access to a toolbox of cards that can help slow down the opponent’s proactive gameplan such as Tormod's Crypt for Woodland mirrors, A-Haywire Mite to answer hate cards, Stone of Erech to stop the sacrifice decks etc., as well as proactive cards that can help you combo such as Reckoner Bankbuster which lets you tap Kona, Rescue Beastie by crewing it, Brass's Tunnel-Grinder which can set up your graveyard and refuel your hand under Omniscience if it’s full of lands, and The Mightstone and Weakstonethat can let you continue comboing under Omniscience if you have no cards in hand whilst also doubling up as removal against creatures like Sheoldred, the Apocalypse.
Having said that there’s no maindeck removal whatsoever in this list which forces you to race in most matchups, so if the metagame shifts and requires some interaction you could consider swapping out Cache Grab for Cathartic Pyre for example, or revert back to previous builds that weren’t running Kona, Rescue Beastie and could therefore fit in more interaction like the list below.
One new innovation that has been seeing a decent amount of success is Stormcatch Mentor which we got in Bloomburrow which enables you to cast Flame of Anor for 2 mana, and Mentor's Guidance for 1 mana whilst also being a decent threat on its own.
This swap does obviously require replacing Expressive Iteration with A-Mentor's Guidance which does come with its downsides since it makes you more vulnerable to spot removal (if the opponent kills your last remaining wizard with the trigger on the stack you only get 1 trigger) but it also enables you to cast it on turn 2 after Soul-Scar Mage or A-Symmetry Sage without losing a card like you would with Expressive Iteration so there are tradeoffs.
Additionally it usually involves trimming Dreadhorde Arcanist to make room and is 1 toughness which makes it more vulnerable to Goblin Bombardment so it’s not completely clear what the best build is, but it’s looked good so far.
Tier placement: Wizards as an archetype has struggled since the big power spike provided by Modern Horizons 3 – the rebalances has given the deck a bit more breathing room and it naturally has a decent game 1 against 4 Color Samwise combo, but all of the other decks in the format have gotten a lot stronger recently whereas Wizards hasn’t really gotten any major upgrades in a while so it’s definitely fallen off compared to the rest of the format.
It also really struggles against decks with good quality interaction like Jeskai Control and Mardu Sacrifice, Fanatic of Rhonas has made the Devotion matchup a lot closer which used to be a very good matchup, and Boros Auras is another matchup which can be tricky so the deck is a lot worse off than it used to be which is why I’ve moved it down to tier 3.
This is another archetype that has undergone a number of tweaks since the rebalances. The first of these is replacing Galvanic Discharge with Fragment Reality, not only because Galvanic Discharge got a lot worse post-nerf only producing 2 energy, but also because the flexibility Fragment Reality provides really helps to give you outs to problematic cards such as Elesh Norn, Mother of Machines from Devotion which shuts off the majority of your deck.
Additionally with the energy synergies getting worse Unstable Amulet has been replaced with Cache Grab as an additional Malevolent Rumble effect (which is one of the best cards in the deck so getting a similar effect is big for consistency) which can find Jarsyl, Dark Age Scion and all of your combo pieces whilst also filling the graveyard for Jarsyl, Dark Age Scion as well.
If Auras does continue to be popular then I could even see moving Shove Aside to the maindeck over Cache Grab since they’re really good alongside Jarsyl, Dark Age Scion, and they have good targets even against most of the field right now even control thanks to cards like Strict Proctor.
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Alth is an MTG Arena grinder who has been #1 on the ladder multiple times and is always looking to bring new ideas and archetypes to the format and push them to the top spots on the ladder. You can follow him on Twitter and YouTube.
