Bloomburrow Store Championships/Player’s Championship Qualifier 9 Recap
This past weekend was the Bloomburrow Store Championships as well as our ninth Player’s Championship Qualifier, where we had 19 players playing the Standard format! There was a lot of hype online going into these Store Champs, not just for the extreme value Wizards of the Coast provided in these Urza’s Saga and Shark Typhoon promos, but also just for the Standard format itself! For a long time there had been a lingering disappointment with Standard from years past, but it’s back and better than ever! This Top 8 has multiples of all the classic archetypes of magic: Aggro, Midrange, Control, and Combo! This format truly is a brewer’s paradise, as shown by Tijler de Jong, putting a copy of a Gruul Terror of the Peaks combo deck into the Top 8! The deck that took it all down however, was a Gruul Prowess deck piloted once again by the author of this article, me! Let’s take a look at my aggressive cards of choice as well as the rest of our Top 8 lists!
Travis Benedict – Gruul Prowess (1st)
Matt Bailey – 4-Colour Reanimator
Galone Seto – Mono White Control (3rd-4th)
Adam Joyce – Mono White Control (3rd-4th)
Brad Perry – Golgari Midrange (5th-8th)
Brandon Mullen – Mono-Red Mice (5th-8th)
Tijler de Jong – Gruul Surprise (5th-8th)
Christopher Brackley – Rakdos Midrange (5th-8th)
The sweetest deck in the room just may be Tijler de Jong’s Gruul Surprise deck, a strategy reminiscent of Tooth and Nail. After seeing this list I had to get some more information on how it worked, and Tijler was nice enough to help me out and answer a few questions!
TB: So I heard someone was out there comboing with Terror of the Peaks! As far as I was aware it was just a big dragon that dealt some damage. How exactly does this combo work?
TDJ: I want cards that can count up to 20 when I have a Calamity out, she’s the main combo of the deck. Calamity + Terror of the Peaks, 4 damage up front, 15 from the Terror being saddled. Calamity + Railway Brawler swings in for 30 trample. Just big things that count to 20 on their own, but are good in a monsters deck.
TB: That sounds so sweet. Are you usually looking for a combo kill? Or are you more of that “monsters” kind of deck, and happen to have this one shot if it comes up?
TDJ: It tends to be more of a one-shot deck with Smuggler’s Surprise. You can set it up pretty easily, but if you don’t get Calamity, your creatures are generally just huge and hard to deal with. Trumpeting Carnosaur bringing another spell, Vaultborn Tyrants and Outcaster Trailblazers bringing cards and life for essentially all of your creatures to draw into the horse.
TB: That’s so awesome! So what do you think the matchups are like with this deck? What would you really want to see across the table from you, and what would you want to avoid at all costs?
TDJ: I don’t mind aggro with Muerra and Spinewoods Armadillo’s bolstering life and ramping all in one go, but it’s still my weakest matchup. Midrange is a good match because I have the chance to 20 someone out of nowhere. Anything running Elesh Norn, Mother of Machines or Doorkeeper Thrull are hard to get past though, as it turns off all my value engines.
TB: Awesome, sweet deck and good work on the Top 8!
That wraps up our Bloomburrow Standard Store Championship/Player’s Championship Qualifier! We have 4 more Qualifier slots left as we head into the last quarter of the year, and our next Qualifier will be Modern on September 28th!
Get ready for Spooky Season, because the next Standard set is Duskmourn: House of Horrors! We’ll be running Prerelease events September 20th-22nd, pre-register online to guarantee a spot! Standard is in a fantastic place now, with great options in every possible archetype! Missed out on this event but want to play some of this sweet format? Standard Showdowns are every Friday night at 6:30!
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Written By: Travis Benedict Pro Tour Competitor, Cat Lover |
