Standard Tournament Decks and Report: August 2023 The Pizza Box Open

Hi! My name is Vertyx and I will go over the top finishes of the Standard Pizza Box Open that took place on the weekend: August 13, 2023. Lets go take a look at all of the interesting decks people chose to register in the tournament!

Top 8 Decks

Compared to Standard Challenges, this top 8 is very diverse with not a single deck being in multiples!

1st place taken down with Dimir Midrange. A deck that has a bunch of powerful threats and premium interaction which in combination makes one of the strongest decks in the format. Combining creatures, removal, counterspells and potent planeswalkers gives this deck a very straightforward gameplan.

2nd place was taken down with Rakdos Artifacts. This deck uses a lot of artifacts to ramp itself with powerstones so that it gets access to a bunch of mana as early as possible. If you manage to achieve that you start to hardcast The Mightstone and Weakstone or Cityscape Leveler to take over the game!

3rd place was taken down with Esper Legends. A deck that maximizes on legendary threats in the Esper colors to create a really strong midrange creature strategy. Thanks to the mana support of the format with Plaza of Heroes this deck is able to play all of the mana intensive broken legends without a huge drawback. Also this list has some spicy one of cards that are not often registered.

4th place was taken down with Selesnya Enchantments. This deck maximizes on playing enchantments and using them to get various synergies either it be threats or card draw.

5th place was taken down with Domain Ramp. An old classic that aims to ramp into Atraxa, Grand Unifier to obliterate the opponent with value. The deck is weaker into aggro strategies, but with the format being full of midrange the deck has a chance to shine in the metagame.

6th place was taken down with Esper Control. A control deck that has an access to a bunch of powerful effects so its able to keep up with all of the strong midrange decks. It has access to everything it needs including boardwipes, removal, counterspells and planeswalkers.

7th place was taken down with Rakdos Breach. Another older deck that might have been forgotten since it did not put up much results recently. Consisting of a Rakdos Midrange shell but also aiming to hardcast Breach the Multiverse, this deck has a lot of ways to interact with the battlefield while having a strong top end that should be able to close the game out.

And the last 8th place was taken down with Esper Midrange. A deck that enhances the Dimir Midrange strategy with white to get access to other powerful cards. The list has similar threats and interaction like Dimir Midrange (for example Sheoldred, The Apocalypse or Make Disappear) but it also has access to really powerful white cards like Wedding Announcement and The Wandering Emperor in the maindeck.

Overall: 1 copy of Dimir Midrange, 1 copy of Rakdos Artifacts, 1 copy of Esper Legends, 1 copy of Selesnya Enchantments, 1 copy of Domain Ramp, 1 copy of Esper Control, 1 copy of Rakdos Breach and 1 copy of Esper Midrange!

Lets go take a look at the decklists.

1st place was taken down with Dimir Midrange by Love Janse!

This deck is one of the best decks in standard and it accomplished that for a good reason. Combining powerful threats like Gix, Yawgmoth Praetor and Sheoldred, the Apocalypse with interaction like Go for the throat or Make Disappear and potent planeswalkers like Kaito Shizuki or Liliana of the Veil makes this deck able to attack the battlefield from various angels while having control over it! Great threats and strong interaction is sometimes all you need to win.

Overall a very powerful deck in the format that also gifted the pilot 120$ thanks to the finish in the tournament!

2nd place was taken down with Rakdos Artifacts by Darth Xero!

This deck wants to win with a bunch of artifacts! Combining artifact ramp like Automated Artificer or Thran Spider with interaction that also ramps like Gix's Caress or Excavation Explosion and removal like Go for the throat or Sheoldred's Edict this deck is able to slice through the early game. And when you get to enough mana you start to hardcast cards like The Mightstone and Weakstone or Cityscape Leveler to take over the game!

Overall a really fun deck centered around one of the most iconic card types.

3rd place was taken down with Esper Legends by Soma Kőrösi!

A deck that has been in the format for a long time. Taking an advantage of all of the broken legendary cards that esper colors have to offer, this deck has a lot of power when it gets to curve out its spells. Surprisingly this rotation has a lot of strong legendary cards like Thalia, Guardian of Thraben, Sheoldred, the Apocalypse or Rona, Herald of Invasion which makes this deck especially strong.

This exact decklists of course has some of the best legends like the above mentioned, but it also has some interesting legendary creatures that are not often played like Ludevic, Necrogenius or Queza, Augur of Agonies. Of course the threat package is strong, but another great part of the deck is the mana support that includes Plaza of Heroes which lets you cast almost every spell in your deck and the Kamigawa lands like Otawara, Soaring City where its ability gets cheaper with every legendary creature you control.

4th place was taken down with Selesnya Enchantments by Jonathan Shortall!

This deck abuses all of the enchantments the format has to offer, to create a potent deck that is able to create a bunch of value with them. Either it be making your cards cheaper with Jukai Naturalist or getting huge threats with Hallowed Haunting, this deck has a lot of ways to interact with the field while also putting on pressure! This deck might look slow from the beginning but after it gets its cards onto the battlefield it becomes really easy to win fast.

5th place was taken down with Domain Ramp by Carlo Favretto!

An “old classic” of the format that aims to win the game by hardcasting Atraxa, Grand Unifier! The deck is rather slow in the early game since it mostly ramps with Topiary Stomper or Invasion of Zendikar and removes a few threats with Leyline Binding or Ossification but it starts to shine when it gets to 7 mana! That is because you get to cast your Atraxa to take over the game. Especially midrange decks can struggle against this strategy making it a great choice into the midrange dominated format.

6th place was taken down with Esper Control by Evgenii Medvedev!

A true control deck that takes an advantage of a lot of strong effects like Sunfall, Make Disappear or Memory Deluge so its able to keep up with all of the midrange decks that dominate the format! This exact variant also uses a lot of planeswalkers like Kaito Shizuki, Teferi, Temporal Pilgrim or Vraska, Betrayal's Sting so this exact decklist is able to grind even more with an access to all of these cards!

7th place was taken down with Rakdos Breach by Lordan!

A long forgotten deck that got to a top finish in this event! Since the bans, Rakdos based midrange decks quickly vanished from the format, but this pilot chose to try it anyway and managed to get to a great result.

The core of the deck looks like a classic Rakdos Midrange deck that consists of a bunch of removal like Go for the Throat or Brotherhood's End and strong threats like Bloodtithe Harvester or Sheoldred, the Apocalypse, but this deck also plays a shell that supports Breach the Multiverse and The Cruelty of Gix. That includes Big Score so you are able to find those cards way easier and Etali, Primal Conqueror which acts as the main payoff to get with Breach the Multiverse or reanimate with The Cruelty of Gix!

And the last 8th place was taken down with Esper Midrange by Francesco Cardarelli!

This deck uses the Dimir Midrange shell and enhances it with white to get access to other powerful effects! As with most Dimir Midrange shells this one also plays the broken threats like Sheoldred, the Apocalypse or Tenacious Underdog, powerful interaction like Go for the throat or Make Disappear and potent planeswalkers like Kaito Shizuki or Liliana of the Veil to create one of the most powerful shells in the current standard rotation!

With white this deck also gets access to another great planeswalker that also serves as removal which is The Wandering Emperor and a really strong enchantment which is Wedding Announcement. Together combining the Dimir shell with some really strong white cards makes this deck an interesting deck choice

A really interesting event with a very diverse top 8 which is always a nice thing to see. I am always happy to see diverse formats since it opens up the metagame for a lot of decks which you can try to play! I hope you enjoyed the article and see you soon.