Naya Chaotic Transformation #957 Mythic

The idea here is pretty straightforward: create creature tokens and artifact tokens using cards that don\’t actually have creature or artifact in their type line, so that when you cast Chaotic Transformation and target those tokens you\’re guaranteed to hit Titan of Industry and Portal to Phyrexia (as long as you still have a copy in the library).

The beauty is, the way we accomplish this is using three of the very best cards in standard in Fable of the Mirror Breaker, Wedding Announcement, and Wandering Emperor! That means that even though we\’re trying to do something a bit janky, getting there ends up being a lot less awkward than you might expect. As such, the deck is able to hold its own reasonably well until you\’re able to do your thing.

I\’ve found my matchups against mono-black (and really just about anything black-based) to be hugely favorable. Most mid-range matchups are favorable as well. White- and red-based aggro and mono-blue tempo are tough. Control really just depends on the specific build and what they\’re trying to do.

Key cards:

Chaotic Transformation
The namesake card. Of course we play four.

Fable of the Mirror Breaker
This card does pretty much everything else the deck needs to do all by itself – if all goes according to plan it supplies you with three targets for Chaotic Transformation in creature (Shaman token), artifact (treasure), and enchantment (Fable/Reflection). It also lets you dig for the Chaotic Transformation or whatever else, and lets you loot away a Titan or a Portal if you have one stuck in your hand. Reflection of Kiki-Jiki can also do broken things with Titan of Industry if the game gets to that point. It\’s great on turn three, and when the game goes long and you find yourself running out of gas it\’s a great way to get back in it. This deck would not be playable without it.
One thing to remember – the text on Chaotic Transformation says \”until they reveal a card that shares a card type with it.\” That means if you target the Reflection of Kiki-Jiki (after Fable flips) there\’s no way to know whether you\’ll hit a creature or enchantment. There\’s a chance you might hit a Titan… but you\’ll probably hit an enchantment given the deck construction. That doesn\’t necessarily mean you shouldn\’t target it though, usually you\’d rather keep the Reflection but sometimes you\’d rather get a fresh enchantment and restart the value from the beginning. Read the situation.

Wedding Announcement
Of course, sometimes things don\’t go according to plan with Fable. Opponents love to kill that Shaman right away, leaving you with no creature and no treasure and thus no Transformation targets. Wedding Announcement does a better job putting creatures on the board, and it\’s nice that the first 1/1 is totally expendable (even as just a chump blocker if needed) since two more are coming. If you have Big Score in hand (and especially if you have both Big Score and Chaotic Transformation already), Wedding Announcement ends up being a better turn three play than Fable.

Wandering Emperor
Simply a great card and we\’re happy to play four of her, though if you want to experiment with cutting one feel free to do so. More often than not we\’re using the -2 to exile a threat and gain some life and then the -1 to make a creature target for Chaotic Transformation. Unfortunately that finishes off the Emperor, so if your life total isn\’t under major threat you might -1 twice instead. That way when you cast CT you can target the (still alive) Emperor in order to reset her back from 1 to 3 and get an additional activation that turn. Sometimes it\’s also correct to flash her in on your attack step to use the +1 to allow your Shaman to survive.

Big Score
It ramps, it provides artifacts to target, and it lets you dig for the key cards (while looting away the 7-drops and 9-drops you don\’t want to be holding). Obvious 4-of. When games go long, make sure to keep a land in hand in case you topdeck a Big Score (or a Fable or Bitter Reunion, for that matter). 

Titan of Industry and Portal to Phyrexia
The payoffs. I play three of each. There are games you wish you had four (against control, mostly), but you also don\’t really want them in your hand in most games (though hardcasting a Titan as early as turn five isn\’t out of the question in a deck with Big Score). You could try 4 Titans and 3 Portals as a compromise.

Other card choices:

The remaining eight non-land cards are a bit more flexible, but here\’s where I\’ve settled.

Bitter Reunion
This was my most recent addition to the deck and the card that put it over the edge and allowed me to rocket to and through Mythic last month. I tried Thrill of Possibility first and was already pretty happy with it, as getting rid of something and going digging on turn 2 is a pretty good thing for this deck to be doing. Compared to Thrill, the main downside is that it\’s not an instant. The upside is worth it though: It leaves behind an enchantment that you can target with Chaotic Transformation. It can provide haste, allowing you to win the same turn you play CT instead of the next turn (really crucial against Azorius Control and other Farewell decks) and occasionally allowing you to do some really stupid stuff with Reflection of Kiki-Jiki. Remember, when you cast CT you can target one of the lands you just tapped, so that land replaces itself and the new land allows you to pay the 1 to grant haste. It\’s also nice that it resolves first and then you discard, meaning counter spells aren\’t a two-for-one. Putting one in play with CT probably isn\’t a best case scenario, but remember that you don\’t have to target the enchantment if you don\’t want to! This card is another reason to always keep one last card in hand whenever possible.

Fateful Absence and Soul Partition
Mostly these are here to slow down aggro decks but occasionally you end up targeting your own stuff as well, so they do sort of have modes. With Fateful Absence you can target, say, a 1/1 from Wedding Announcement to turn it into an artifact or a draw instead, or put a Titan in the yard to save it from getting exiled so you can bring it back with Portal the next turn. Soul Partition only adds the 2 mana tax to your opponent\’s cards, so you can use it as a way to save something and replay it. I\’m not really sure which one I prefer, so I\’m on two of each right now.

Lands:

I\’m not convinced the lands are optimized. Too many tap lands? Not enough green sources to allow for the occasional hardcast Titan? is 26 lands too much or just right? My choices have worked for me, but that doesn\’t mean they couldn\’t be better.

Hall of Tagsin
Expensive backup plan to generate some artifacts to target with Chaotic Transformation. Why not?

Eiganjo, Seat of the Empire
Good enough to play one, not important enough to play more

Sokenzan, Crucible of Defiance
Making two 1/1 tokens (with haste) is totally in line with what this deck wants to be doing anyway, so I play two and think of the second one as a spell. Just remember, if you have a Sokenzan down as a land and you\’re casting Chaotic Transformation, ALWAYS TARGET THE SOKENZAN as your land target. You don\’t want to risk targeting a different land, hitting the second Sokenzan, and having to sac one.

Cards I\’m not playing:

Any other green cards
This deck is really more Boros than Naya. The green lands are there to allow for the occasional hardcast Titan, but so far I haven\’t found any other green cards that are better than the Boros options above. The Weatherseed Treaty is solid, but I don\’t think it\’s as good as either of our three drops. Careful Cultivation and Teachings of the Kirin can make a creature token on turn 2, but hitting either of them with Chaotic Transformation when targeting an enchantment seems bad. The one green card that I do really like, even though I\’m not playing it, is…

Stimulus Package
If it didn\’t stretch our mana this one might be good enough to play. I love that you can decide whether you want two treasures, two creatures, or (usually) one of each. I also love that it\’s an enchantment that basically provides all its value up front, so once it does that you\’re very happy to target it with CT and turn it into something fresh. But I don\’t love that it costs green mana, and I don\’t love that it\’s a four-drop.

Red removal
You could make a case for the one-mana red removal spells. The problem is they don\’t do anything against Sheoldred, while the white removal does… and Sheoldred can be pretty backbreaking against a deck that employs Big Score, Bitter Reunion, and Fable of the Mirror Breaker. The same can be said for cards like Excavation Explosion; the powerstone might be nice, but three damage isn\’t really where you need to be, especially on turn three at sorcery speed.

Red board wipes
Brotherhood\’s End seems tempting, but it\’s a three drop. We have better things to do turn three. As nice as it may sound to wipe their board, when it comes to preserving your life total you end up preventing nearly as much damage by just killing a single thing a turn earlier on turn two (when you can afford to play removal) as you do killing multiple things on turn three (when you can\’t).
Burn Down the House seems like an obvious fit in that not only can it wipe the board but also it can provide tokens. Unfortunately the timing just doesn\’t work out all that well. Turn five is a turn when you could be playing Chaotic Transformation, if you were able to Big Score on turn four. If all you\’re doing turn five is wiping the board (and potentially wiping away some of your own tokens you worked so hard the last few turns to create), it\’s probably because you weren\’t able to get your plan off the ground and now your life total is getting dire… what makes you think you\’re going to be able to get going now faster than they\’re going to be able to recover and finish the job? Answer: you won\’t. You want to be clearing their board with a Portal, not with this.

There\’s a reason all eight of my flexible cards above are two-drops, because that\’s what this deck needs, not more three-, four-, and five-drops. So with that in mind, here are some other two drops I considered and tried that didn\’t quite make the cut:

Thrill of Possibility
Good card, I just think Bitter Reunion is better.

Sunset Revelry
This card can feel so awkward. If you can make two 1/1s and also draw a card on turn two that\’s absolutely busted. A little life gain doesn\’t hurt either. But so far in the games where I\’ve tried it I\’ve never seen more than one mode resolve at a time. If you\’re on the play you\’ll probably get the cantrip, but no creatures. If you\’re on the draw you\’ll probably get the creatures, but no cantrip. And you really can\’t afford to be greedy and play this later, as you need to be doing better stuff later. At sorcery speed with no guarantee you\’ll even get one mode, let alone two, it\’s just not good enough.

Now, all that said it is fun that there are eight cards in this deck (maybe more if you want to try trimming a copy of Emperor or want to try lowering the land count) that are flexible enough to play around with. So get out there and start making some chaos!