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Hello everyone! With Alchemy’s release, everyone has been focused on the aforementioned format, but that’s not the only one that’s been impacted. Although there wasn’t an excess of cards released, there were still a few that had a big impact on not just Alchemy itself, but Historic!
Historic’s power level is much higher than an advanced Standard set so significantly fewer options have made the cut, but there have still been some metagame shifts as a result. This article will encompass both Bo1 and Bo3 Historic as I’m talking about trends in totality, not necessarily the specific metas as that can be ascertained by looking at the tier lists. With that, I’ll be using Bo1 lists as examples, but the logic will also apply to Bo3 and you can pick up good lists from the Bo3 Tier List. Let’s get into it.
- Arena Historic (BO1) Metagame Tier List and Rankings: Alchemy: Innistrad – December 2021
- Traditional Historic (BO3) Metagame Tier List and Rankings: Alchemy: Innistrad – December 2021
IT’S AN INQUISITIVE WORLD, WE’RE JUST LIVING IN IT
It isn’t much of a surprise or a secret, but when Alchemy first came out it was pretty clear that one card stood head and shoulders above the rest.
Inquisitor Captain is one hell of a Magic card. It’s pretty much an additional copy of Collected Company so any decks that can make use of that could make use of this as well. Last meta Snapshot I said that Historic was being inundated with Selesnya decks between Humans, Heliod, and Enchantress. With Inquisitor Captain, those decks got yet another tool to combat the metagame with.
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Despite Selesnya Humans putting up solid numbers, I believed that it’s success may be short lived. The deck is definitely powerful and pretty synergistic, but it’s far from impossible to beat. After all, just a pile of creatures and 4 Collected Company is a solid strategy, but can be picked apart with Wraths and single target removal.
However, Inquisitor Captain completely changes that dynamic. Wrath effects went from being back breaking against humans to just good as they can pretty easily replenish their board and individual removal spells went from good to just mediocre as it’s hard to 1 for 1 it now.
Finally, The scariest part about Inquisitor Captain is that it’s likely going to be changed, but to a cast trigger. Humans isn’t looking to abuse Inquisitor Captain with Flicker effects or Glasspool Mimic so the most reasonable changes to the card are likely to not even impact the deck at all.
Although great, Inquisitor Captain is not the only change to the Humans shell. Since rebalanced cards were changed in both Alchemy and Historic, Luminarch Aspirant got caught in the crossfire. I actually liked the change to Luminarch and thought it was a little obnoxious for Standard/Alchemy play, but it is unfortunate that a fine tool for Humans took a big hit.
Fortunately, where one human leaves, another enters. Sigardian Evangel has been an absolute powerhouse in Alchemy and I’m sure it will perform well in Historic as well. It hits hard, it interacts, and it’s yet another grindy tool for the Humans deck. Considering Humans now has a multitude of cards that can inherently 2 for 1, it’s going to be hard to dethrone them.
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As I said before, Humans wasn’t the only deck to gain with Captain and is likely not even the deck that got the most from it! Heliod Combo was making strides up Tier 2 as it had a great end game engine as well as solid aggressive elements. The main issue with the deck was the consistency element as assembling the combo was difficult with only 4 Collected Company.
Now that the deck has Inquisitor Captain as well, everything has changed. Not only does their aggressive plan work better as you’ll get a bunch of life gain triggers from creatures entering the battlefield, but you can easily stumble into the combo as well! It’s going to take some time to find the exact numbers for the deck, but this is definitely one of the top decks to look out for.
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The final meta deck to gain a lot from Alchemy has to be Angels. I’ve never been a big fan of Angels as they’re really good at beating creatures, but struggle against pretty much everything else. Like the other decks though, Inquisitor Captain gives the deck a layer of consistency it didn’t have before, and with access to Blue, a better sideboard.
Furthermore the deck got Angel of Unity as another 2 drop which was another issue I had with the deck, not enough good early plays. Soul Warden was decent, but really only good with Resplendent Angel and Speaker of the Heavens would rarely trigger. Angel of Unity can grow your creatures to help them dodge Red removal and Wraths while also gaining you life which is a huge plus.
ANTI-CREATURE DECKS ON THE CASE
Metagames are cyclical and ever changing. If a certain deck or decks are starting to dominate, the Arena meta tends to course correct pretty quickly. Despite Historic not being the popular format right now, we can already see that happening.
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Auras is nothing new and has been a mainstay in Historic since the release of Kor Spiritdancer (even if it’s not as popular as it used to be), but we’re going to see it start gearing itself more and more towards creatures. For example, maxing out on Hushbringer is a direct response to the influx of Inquisitor Captain we’re seeing in the metagame. If you haven’t played Hushbringer against Selesnya decks, you are absolutely missing out. This card is incredible in any list that can afford to play it and I expect to see a lot more of it in the coming weeks.
Beyond the Hushbringer, it has more modest reactionary measures like 4 Arcane Flight and the Aether Tunnel to circumvent creatures as much as possible. All this said, Auras has been around for awhile, has any off meta deck gained ground?
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Rakdos Arcanist has been in a sad spot for a long time. It’s really good against creature decks and ok against midrange decks, but struggles with decks that can go way over it like Five-Color Niv-Mizzet which has remained a popular choice. That said, Selesnya can really struggle when you machine gun all their creatures down, something that this deck specializes in. No matter how many 2 for 1s Selesnya plays, a discard spell into Dreadhorde Arcanist is still going to be a huge beating. If the right build of this is found that can combat the bigger decks as well, I expect this deck to go from near unplayable to one of the best choices in the format.
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The final anti-creature deck to go from mediocre to great is Jeskai Creativity. This deck mostly suffered from their game plan simply not being strong enough for a lot of decks in Historic. There was a lot of removal and counterspells floating around for awhile so a 7/7 could only do so much against a deck not focused on just creatures.
Similar to Arcanist though, with the amount of creature decks around it’s now a really good time to have protection from them! Beyond just the combo game plan, the deck has (finally) adopted the Magma Opus package which I’ve been a big fan of since Creativity has been a popular option (I miss you Temur Creativity). Finally, since the deck is a Blue deck at heart, you can easily build your board to beat the other big decks of the format as your main board is pretty much devoted to beating creatures already. I expect Jeskai to be a big hit in tournaments in the coming weeks.
THE UNEXPECTED DECK THAT COULD BE GREAT RIGHT NOW
Considering the meta is pretty split into Inquisitor Captain decks and decks looking to beat it, you would think that it would be difficult to find a deck that can actually capitalize in this meta. Although there probably are a few reasonable options that could accomplish that, there is one particular deck that I’ve liked for awhile that seems extremely well positioned right now.
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Death’s Shadow is a cool deck as it has a major advantage over other White strategies, it can play both Hushbringer and Containment Priest happily. Between maxing out on copies of both of those cards and removal spells, your creature matchups should be quite excellent. What about the anti-creature decks? Having huge creatures, Adanto Vanguard, and hand disruption should help you out there as well! Furthermore, if Jeskai Creativity is specifically your concern, Containment Priest is one of the best answers around for it!
A concerning matchup is Golgari Food, but this build with Containment Priests, Hushbringer, and 4 Portable Hole should definitely make that matchup much better than it used to be. I’m definitely a bit biased, but having a deck that can play Hushbringer, Containment Priest, and not fold to the ant-creature decks is the perfect way to circumvent the metagame.
Overall, Alchemy has made Historic a bit more polarized on how you want to build your deck, but those polarity shifts tend to breed really interesting cat and mouse dynamics that are hard to find in established metagames. I don’t know about you, but I’m excited for when Historic comes back into the limelight!
Thank you for reading!
