There Are Pandas, and Then There Are Pandas.
And this isn't either of them! The Pandas we're talking about here, are watches, not bears. And what got me thinking about them (again) was a link posted this morning by @cm.rook who pointed a few of us to the very attractive (and not terribly priced) Yema "Rallygraph" Panda which, in it's most traditional arrangement, looks like the one on the left, but can also be had in the version on the right: The model on the left is a true Panda, while the model on the right is called a reverse Panda. The reason for that distinction is clear--Panda bears, only come in the first arrangement. Now at this point, everyone should be thinking about the most well-know Panda, The Rolex Panda, which is actually a Daytona, and among Rolex Daytonas, the most famous of which is the Paul Newman Daytona, which was famous first, because it was Paul's, and second because it sold at auction for $17.8 million (US Dollars). The story of that auction is well-known so I'll only...
Nov 8, 2019
Since this event essentially forced Team Massdrop to split into three separate testing groups, one for each format: Standard, Modern, and Legacy, we looked outside of our team to recruit other players to assist us in our testing. The primary testers of the Ghalta deck for this Pro Tour were myself, fellow Massdrop East teammate Tommy Ashton, and DC local and King of Mortgages Brendan McKay.
Here is the deck I landed on for the 25th Anniversary Pro Tour in Minneapolis:
13 Forest 4 Woodland Cemetery 4 Blooming Marsh 3 Hashep Oasis 3 Greenbelt Rampager 4 Llanowar Elves 3 Resilient Khenra 4 Scrapheap Scrounger 3 Thrashing Brontodon 4 Steel Leaf Champion 3 Rhonas the Indomitable 3 Ghalta, Primal Hunger 1 Skysovereign, Consul Flagship 4 Heart of Kiran 4 Blossoming Defense
1 Skysovereign, Consul Flagship 2 Nature's Way 3 Hour of Glory 1 Karn, Scion of Urza 1 Nissa, Vital Force 2 Vine Mare 2 Vivien Reid 1 Naturalize 1 Thrashing Brontodon 1 Ghalta, Primal Hunger
I ended up with a 9-5 individual record with the deck at the Pro Tour. I consider myself a below-average constructed player at the Premier Play level, so this result was quite good for me. I’d like to preface this article with a note that much of the material here was taken from the Ghalta portion of our testing logs, with major contributions from the aforementioned Tommy and Brendan, as well as Massdrop pros Jon Stern and Mark Jacobson who also brought some variation of the deck to Minneapolis. Going into the Pro Tour we did not think the deck had many (if any) bad matchups. The deck had the best and most regular nut draws in the format – I was able to cast Ghalta on turn three twice during the Pro Tour - and the deck has the staying power to win long games as well. Due to the mana and tempo advantage of Llanowar Elves the deck can win games without hitting its fourth land drop. If you flood on lands you have mana sinks like Resilient Khenra, Rhonas the Indomitable, and Hashep Oasis to make use of the extra resources. The deck has resilient threats that get very diverse post board. Thrashing Brontodon gives you answers to difficult to interact with decks like God Pharaoh’s Gift, while still keeping up pressure and only having to leave open one mana (two if you want to protect with Blossoming Defense).
A few notes on cards we were considering
Which brings us to Thorn Lieutenant. Given my initial reaction when reading the spoiler, I was shocked to see four copies of Thorn Lieutenant in the successfully performing decks. It doesn’t crew Heart, doesn’t do much in terms of ramping to Ghalta, doesn’t hit hard, the 1/1 elf it leaves behind is mostly irrelevant, and since the Ghalta deck wins through haymakers as opposed to grinding, the six mana pump ability felt out of place and difficult for the deck to optimize.
So one of the first questions we needed to answer was “Lieutenant or Khenra?” We did extensive testing of both and landed on the side of the Amonkhet jackal. In the mirror Khenra is miles better letting you attack for large amounts in spots where you’d otherwise be trading or have to pass the turn. Against red-based decks, Khenra lets your Scrapheap Scroungers attack past Goblin Chainwhirler. Against control decks, Khenra comes back out of the graveyard as a legitimate threat for a one-time, six mana investment as opposed to six mana each turn. Khenra crews Heart of Kiran the turn it comes out, and it also lets you attack with Rhonas much more often. There’s obviously value in Lieutenant’s pump ability, but too often it’s just a 2/3 for two and that’s not good enough in a deck that is interested in casting 4/4 fliers for two mana and 5/4 with evasion for three mana, and turn four 12/12 tramplers. The targeted ability isn’t entirely irrelevant, but most decks can ignore a 2/3 so it often is.
Side note: In the last round of the PT I was paired against a Japanese player in the mirror. After the match we exchanged decks and checked out what the other was playing. I noticed he was running Thorn Lieutenant and asked what he felt about the card after 14 rounds of Pro Tour play. His answer: “Hate!”
Matchups:
RB Chainwhirler
Unlicensed Disintegration is really good against Ghalta. The more they play, the worse things are. Conversely, this is another reason we upped the Blossoming Defense count to 4. If you’re able to play around Unlicensed, you can turn a game winning play by them into game over for 1 mana.
Game 1 is typically a race, and we found that post board it usually is as well. The long game is usually a problem for green because RB has targeted removal for most of our threats, and the top end of their curve (Phoenix, Glorybringer, Chandra, Hazoret) will grind down the green deck.
The positive is that green’s creatures are bigger and better than theirs. Rhonas and Skysovereign are big problems for them. Chainwhirler gets Elves, but they’ve already done a lot of their damage by that time and the 3/3 first strike body only lines up well with Scrapheap and that can be temporarily fixed with Khenra. Be considerate before using your Blossoming Defenses to push through. It may be the right play, but sometimes you’re better of protecting something else from a removal spell later.
+1 Skysovereign, Consul Flagship +3 Hour of Glory (+2 on play) +1 Nissa, Vital Force -3 Thrashing Brontodon -1 Scrapheap Scrounger (-2 on draw)
Grixis Control
To clarify we used “Grixis Control” to describe decks that are essentially UB splashing Bolas. Maybe a few red removal spells, but no Chandras, Glorybringers, and certainly no Chainwhirlers.
We were pleasantly surprised at how well this matchup went in testing. UB was a challenging matchup for this deck previously, but the addition of red seemed to slow them down. And if they play red removal spells over Cast Down, they’re at a further disadvantage. Blossoming Defense is just backbreaking vs them, and often times games came down to whether green had the Defense or not. However, the matchup turns distinctly into their favor if they are able to bridge the gap and untap with a Scarab God or get Liliana and Nicol Bolas planeswalkers going.
+1 Nissa, Vital Force on the Play +1 Skysovereign, Consul Flagship on the Draw +2 Vivien Reid +2 Vine Mare +3 Hour of Glory +1 Karn, Scion of Urza -3 Greenbelt Rampager -3 Thrashing Brontodon -3 Ghalta, Primal Hunger
Ghalta Mirror
The increase in this deck’s popularity is why we added the 4th Ghalta to the sideboard. It’s the most important card in the matchup followed by Heart of Kiran followed by Rhonas.
+2 Nature’s Way +1 Ghalta, Primal Hunger +3 Hour of Glory +1 Thrashing Brontodon -1 Skysovereign, Consul Flagship -4 Scrounger and -1 Elephant on Draw -3 Elephant and -2 Scrounger on the Play -1 Blossoming Defense
UW and Esper Control
This is a matchup that I struggled with throughout all of my testing, but Matt Lackey, one of the people we collaborated with, found a successful strategy vs the UW and Esper control matchups. Here are his thoughts on how to play vs them:
“The green stompy deck is a heavy favorite against the UW deck and a slight favorite against Esper decks. The way you beat the Teferi decks is non-intuitive and the games pre and post-sideboard play out differently enough that it's almost like two matches. Having said that I went 6-1 against Teferi decks at the RPTQ and my overall match win % against Teferi decks online was ~75% over a medium sized sample.
Philosophy of the match:
The most important thing to understand about UW is that their cards cost too much. Most of the UW lists we were playing against had ~3 Settle, ~4 Cast Out, and some number of Glimmer and Hieroglyphic Illumination. They compensate for this by playing wildly impactful cards that let them catch up on mana (Settle, Teferi, and Gearhulk.) The goal of the matchup is to never let them catch up on mana.
Game 1:
In game 1, your goal is to establish an early board presence (hopefully through Heart and a driver) and start beating in as fast as you can until they pass the turn with Settle mana up. As soon as this happens, you're going to immediately shift into a grinding strategy. You should never attack with more than 1 creature into open Settle mana, and if you don't have Blossoming Defense you should play your Brontodons in main phase A to make sure that they can't efficiently cast Seal Away or punish your single creature attack with a cast out. One thing to be mindful of is how robust your board is to Fumigate. While most of the lists are skimping on Fumigates, you should try to assemble a board with Scroungers, Rhonas, vehicles, and creatures that you're ok with dying. A board of 3 Steel Leaf Champions or Ghalta, Steel Leaf, Brontodon will let them Fumigate very profitably and invalidate this strategy.
When they play Teferi, he becomes your primary target unless you are able to attack for lethal with some backup (Brontodon or Blossoming Defense.) If this deck untaps with Teferi, they will be able to start playing multiple spells a turn and invalidate your strategy. He is always Kill on Sight. If you have the option to play something on your 5 other than Skyship (e.g. Khenera + Rhonas activation) you should do that instead of playing Skyship. Skyship is not at its best in this matchup, but getting the last couple points in against Teferi can be nice.
One last note-- Rhonas is an absolute beast in this matchup. He allows you to make weird single-creature attacks that can still punish their life total. Do not run your Rhonas into a Disallow or Essence Scatter if you can avoid it.
Game 2:
Things actually get better after you sideboard. You get to bring in more enchantment removal (that doubles as a way to beat Lyra) and planeswalkers. Your goal in games 2 and 3 is to actually play into the strategy that we tried to avoid in game 1. Give them the right price to Settle the Wreckage (but don't get blown out if you can avoid it-- this could look like attacking with a Khenra and a Steel Leaf into 4 open mana) if it allows you to stick Nissa, Karn, or Vivien. If you play a Karn, immediately use the minus ability. They'll likely have to answer on their turn (Cast Out or Teferi activation) so you don't get a second activation and you want to generate value to put them on the back foot.”
+1 Karn, Scion of Urza +2 Vivien Reid +1 Nissa, Vital Force +1 Thrashing Brontodon +1 Naturalize +2 Vine Mare -3 Ghalta, Primal Hunger -1 Skysovereign, Consul Flagship -1 Blossoming Defense -3 Greenbelt Rampager
Mono Red
This matchup is generally favorable if they are not able to combine Soul Scar Mage with lots of non-combat sources of damage. Hedge your play on the defensive side until you can land an active Rhonas or Ghalta. Post sideboard games are a bit different as their plan is to go bigger with Phoenixes and Glorybringers.
+3 Hour of Glory +1 Skysovereign, Consul Flagship +1 Ghalta, Primal Hunger +1 Nature’s Way -3 Thrashing Brontodon -1 Rhonas the Indomitable -2 Scrapheap Scrounger
UW Gift
Brontodon shines pretty big here. You’re able to get an early board advantage and completely stymie their ability to turn the corner with a single Brontodon out. Don’t overextend as they often play Fumigate and/or Settle main deck. Postboard the matchup becomes similar to UW Control, except they have a lot of creatures you don’t care about instead of counterspells.
+1 Naturalize +1 Thrashing Brontodon +1 Vivien Reid +2 Hour of Glory +1 Nissa Vital Force -4 Blossoming Defense -1 Skysovereign, Consul Flagship -1 Ghalta Primal Hunger
Mono U Artifact Storm
Ghalta should be a big favorite here. Steel Leaf Champion is extremely problematic for a deck full of low power creatures and the main deck Brontodons help keep their problem artifacts off the board. Make sure to keep up Blossoming Defense for their Baral’s Expertise.
+1 Thrashing Brontodon +2 Vivien Reid +2 Nature’s Way +1 Naturalize -1 Skysovereign, Consul Flagship -3 Greenbelt Rampager -2 Resilient Khenra
Bonus: Turbo Fog
Sadly the deck as we built it for the Pro Tour is quite weak to the Nexus of Fate fog deck. I played against Turbo Fog once at the Pro Tour and lost quite badly. Admittedly I would have won one game had I not played around Settle the Wreckage, but alas at that time I had no idea the deck runs zero copies of that card in the maindeck. Since then, I have heard some anecdotal claims that Skysovereign is decent in the matchup since it is a way to attack planeswalkers that gets around fog effects. Also I have heard that destroying Gift of Paradise hinders the Turbo Fog deck a lot. Taking these with a grain of salt, I'd probably sideboard with my Pro Tour deck like this:
+1 Thrashing Brontodon +2 Vivien Reid +1 Naturalize +1 Skysovereign, Consul Flagship +1 Nissa, Vital Force -4 Blossoming Defense -2 Greenbelt Rampager
Clearly the sideboard will need to change a bit assuming Turbo Fog becomes a player in the new metagame. Lost Legacy is the first card that comes to mind that would likely be very good again the fog decks, but the double black mana commitment may be too taxing. Sorcerous Spyglass is an easy inclusion to the sideboard, but I anticipate the fog decks bringing in answers to cards like this. If the Turbo Fog decks becomes a large player in the metagame, perhaps adopting the blue splash for Commit/Memory and Negates in the sideboard is where this deck will end up.
Previous Articles · Meet the Massdrop Teams: http://dro.ps/mtg-team-announce · *2nd* at Pro Tour Ixalan: http://dro.ps/ixalan · Unclaimed Creature Types: http://dro.ps/ari-creatures · Why I Never Drop From Tournaments: http://dro.ps/eric-nevergiveup · The Art of Sideboard Construction - Sultai Energy: http://dro.ps/jon-sideboard · A Commoner’s View on Pauper: http://dro.ps/mark-pauper · Blue Moon Beach Control: http://dro.ps/scott-bluemoon · Top 5 Modern Decks: http://dro.ps/pascal-modern · Storm in Vintage Cube: http://dro.ps/ben-storm · An Early Look at Rivals for Standard: http://dro.ps/shaun-rivals · A Standard Approach to Evaluating New Cards: http://dro.ps/rob-newcards · Drafting Rivals of Ixalan: http://dro.ps/tim-ixalan · Team Sealed Secrets: http://dro.ps/eric-secrets · Steal My Standard Ideas: http://dro.ps/tommy-secrets · Vexing Devil. Any Questions?: http://dro.ps/jon-devil · Team Massdrop Rivals of Ixalan Limited Primer: http://dro.ps/ari-primer · Gestation of RG Eldrazi: http://dro.ps/ben-gestation · Top Tim Tournament Training Tips: http://dro.ps/tim-tips · What Makes Someone Bogle?: http://dro.ps/tommy-bogle · A Pauper Adventure: http://dro.ps/pascal-pauper · Blue Moon at GP Phoenix: http://dro.ps/rob-bluemoon · Brawling into Dominaria: http://dro.ps/scott-brawling · Looking at The Current Lands(cape) of Legacy http://dro.ps/jarvis-land · Deconstructing Dominaria Limited: http://dro.ps/jon-dominaria · Diving into Dominaria Standard: http://dro.ps/mark-dominaria · What are your.. drives?: http://dro.ps/tommy-drives · Top 10 Cards for Dominaria Modern: http://dro.ps/rob-dominaria · Brewing Standard with Dominaria: http://dro.ps/pascal-dominaria · Dominaria Team Sealed: A Case Study: http://dro.ps/tim-dominaria · Battlebonding in Vintage and Legacy: http://dro.ps/jarvis-battlebond · Decks I Almost Played at PT Dominaria: http://dro.ps/ben-dominaria · RB Chainwhirler for the Non-Aggressive Player: http://dro.ps/jon-chainwhirler · Top 4 at GP Vegas: http://dro.ps/mark-top4vegas · Return to Core Set Limited: http://dro.ps/eric-core · Drafting Rares with Core Set 2019: http://dro.ps/ari-core · Tuning Jeskai Control in Modern: http://dro.ps/shaun-jeskai · Secrets of Sealed - http://dro.ps/eric-sealed · A Spike's 1v1 Commander Notes, Parentheticals, and Asides - http://dro.ps/tommy-spikes