In our latest installment of DEKTEK we’re going to take a look at a Naya Midrange deck that I’ve been piloting to 2 very successful finishes in the past month. It took first at my local FNM on December 7 / 2012, and just yesterday brought me into the top 8 of a 48 player charity tournament! I really like this deck because of its consistency. It has ramp, fat creatures, removal, card draw… everything you’d want in a midrange deck. While it may seem inferior to Bant because it doesn’t have the huge CA that Sphinx’s Revelation and Jace, Architect of Thought bring to the table, its threats are for the most part quicker to play and more diverse.
Here it is:
CARL SZALICH’S MIDRANGE NAYA DECK
SPELLS (10)
4x Farseek
3x Searing Spear
3x Bonfire of the Damned
Bonfire and Farseek are pretty self explanatory… one is ramp the other is Bonfire. Bonfire is just amazing, and I can’t believe that its price had dropped from the $40 it was commanding a few months ago to the modest $20 it’s at now. When Gatecrash is released and inevitably Boros becomes a thing again, I wouldn’t be surprised to see it jump back to at least $30. People have forgotten how good it is!
One of the questionable choices in this deck (I don’t question it, but others do) is running Searing Spear over Selesnya Charm. I like the reach Searing Spear gives you more than the versatility of the charm. Yes, charm really shines against decks like “Hoof, There It Is” where you want to exile their creatures, or decks that run Thundermaw Hellkites and other fatties, but when your opponent drops a Huntmaster of the Fells, or you need to deal with a flipped Delver of Secrets it’s really not all that great. Sure the +2/+2 and trample is sometimes relevant as well, but being able to burn out a Planeswalker, kill a Centaur Healer they’re using to block your Thragtusk, or just doming your opponent for that last 3 damage are all super relevant plays as well. With all the fast aggro running around, I feel that it’s better positioned right now. There are few things that feel better than Spearing an attacking Silverblade Paladin and blocking the now doublestrikeless chump it was soulbonded to, or causing that annoying Rancor to fizzle when they try to cast it.
CREATURES (24)
4x Avacyn’s Pilgrim
2x Centaur Healer
3x Daybreak Ranger
4x Huntmaster of the Fells
4x Restoration Angel
4x Thragtusk
3x Thundermaw Hellkite
If you’re playing green, you’re playing Thragtusk. If you’re playing Thragtusk, you’re probably going to find some way to squeeze Restoration Angel in there as well because that’s probably the strongest “combo” in standard right now. We all know about how great a play it is to blink Tust with Angel so I won’t elaborate on it further. However, there are a few other cards in here that also play nice with Angel: Thundermaw Hellkite, Huntmaster of the Fells, and Centaur Healer! For that reason (and the fact that she’s amazing in her own right) I play her as a 4x.
Huntmaster is incredible in both of its modes, and Thundermaw has proved to be so powerful that I bumped it to 3x instead of what seems to be the standard 2x. That leaves a card that most of my opponents tell me is terrible, and has caused the most debate (and outrage!) when they see it: Daybreak Ranger. I don’t understand why more people don’t play this card… it’s amazing. It has singlehandedly won me matches I had no right winning. Sticking a T2 Ranger and just letting it flip has spelled the end of many an aggressive deck. I can literally just sit back and play out threats while my opponent sits there with a pile of creatures in hand they can’t even cast because it will just die in a fight. I chose to play him over the universally accepted Borderland Ranger in that slot. Sure, there has been a game or two when Borderland Ranger could have gotten me that crucial basic land, but more often than not he’s just a chump blocker that does nothing impressive save get me more mana when I’ve already got a full board. He can’t lock my opponent out of a game the way Daybreak does, and he’s 1000% better to draw in the late game when both you and your opponent are looking for answers. Heck, you can even get tricky and announce him as a blocker and fight pre-combat damage to get a juicy 2-for-1!
I got laughed at when I played him… but the laughter turned to tears when he owned the board all by his lonesome.
PLANESWALKERS (2)
2x Garruk, Primal Hunter
I’ve never used his ultimate and frankly, that doesn’t bother me in the slightest and I consider it a blank. When I’ve got a Tusk on the board I’ll often even just play him and use his -3 right away just to draw 5. Against control and midrange he’s especially savage and does both things they don’t want to see happen: Draw you cards AND recover from Terminus / Divine Verdict. There is a reason his value has doubled from $6 to $12 in the past month.
LANDS (24)
4x Temple Garden
4x Sunpetal Grove
4x Rootbound Crag
4x Clifftop Retreat
2x Kessig Wolf Run
2x Cavern of Souls
2x Forest
2x Mountain
Nothing special here, really. If I wasn’t lending out my other Cavern of Souls to a friend I’d probably run a 3rd over a Mountain since this is a creature based deck. I have no need of a basic Plains since I’m not running Borderland Ranger but with 12 sources main + the 2 Caverns I haven’t found it to be an issue.
SIDEBOARD (15)
3x Rest in Peace
2x Centaur Healer
3x Flames of the Firebrand
3x Rhox Faithmender
2x Acidic Slime
2x Sigarda, Host of Herons
I don’t think I thought through my board properly, as many of the cards didn’t come in when I thought they would. I really feel like I wasn’t shoring up on my worst matchups enough (Hoof / Control) and was focusing too much on beating aggro which my deck is already really good at. I’d have to do a more formal breakdown of take outs vs put ins to really narrow down why it wasn’t working the way I wanted, but this is the way it’s currently configured. As much as I love them, I don’t think this deck needs the Rhox Faithmenders and could use more Acidic Slime and Rest in Peace more. Slime shines against control and the midrange mirror, and the Centaurs + Thragtusk + Huntmasters are enough lifegain (and threats!) to normally win the aggro matchup. This deck just doesn’t need the help against little red men and their zombie brethren.
· -3 Rhox / +2 Slime +1 RiP = New Sideboard?
MATCHUPS / SIDEBOARDING STRATEGIES
1) Against aggro it has a great game 1, and only gets better after sideboarding.
· -2 Garruk -1 Thundermaw / +3 Flames of the Firebrand
· -2 Farseek / +2 Centaur Healer
Again we’re just trying to reduce our casting costs so that we can survive long enough to trump their little people with our bigger guys. That brings our lifegain count up to 12 cards (Healer, Huntmaster & Thragtusk) and all of them can be blinked for super value with Restoration Angel. Losing the Farseeks is OK because of the reduced CC of our spells, and Flames is easily a 2-for-1 and sometimes a 3 for one. Even if it hits a single threat it still buys you time, which is all you really need.
2) Midrange vs. Midrange is often just a grinding match, so you need to be sure that you’re threats are consistent and that every card counts. Just like last time I suggest removing cards that end up dead on the draw late game in order to keep applying pressure while they may stall out.
This strategy was super relevant for me yesterday when in a mirror my opponent was drawing farseeks as I continued drawing gas. After our match he criticized my choice to remove cards like Pilgrims and Farseeks in exchange for Slimes and Sigardas, but blowing up his Kessig Wolf Runs and creating 5/5 hexproof walls is what won me that crucial game 3.
· -2 Avacyn’s Pilgrim / +2 Acidic Slime
· -2 Farseek / +2 Sigarda, Host of Herons
I sometimes also like a few Flames of the Firebrand if they’re running their own Pilgrims and Huntmasters.
· -2 Centaur Healer / +2 Flames of the Firebrand
I just LOVE LOVE LOVE resolving my aforementioned pet card Daybreak Ranger in these matches. He is the trump that they just don’t have access to. Think outside the bun, folks! :P
Against U/W Flash. “Hoof There It Is”, and other reanimator strategies you obviously want to bring in your RiP’s. Healer is not so great against them so is an easy board out, and I’d also consider removing Farseek. Again, I’d play 4x RiP in the board since it’s one of this decks problem matches so:
· -2 Healer -2 Farseek / +4 Rest in Peace (<- new board)
3) It seems like midrange has become the new rage, so I don’t see a lot of dedicated control decks these days. However, it seems like they’d still wilt to Sigarda, and Acidic Slime basically reads: “When your opponent casts Sphinx’s Revelation, they draw one less card and gain 1 less life”. It also slows them down enough that you can hopefully keep them off of Angel of Serenity mana, and provides more threat density. Speaking of threat density, I don’t like removing creatures from the deck if I don’t have to because everything counts when they’re likely boarding into a full complement of Divine Verdict and at least a few Terminus. Even the lowly Centaur Healer has a purpose!
· -4 Avacyn’s Pilgrim / +4 Acidic Slime (<- new board)
· -2 Farseek / +2 Sigarda, Host of Herons
I’m not entirely convinced that this is correct, but for now I think our 24 lands are enough to see us through to the late game which is where Control decks will actually start to cast their own spells as well. Pilgrim just gets killed with their board sweep so isn’t as efficient as Farseek in this matchup.
SO FAR, IT’S MY FAVORITE!
I think if I had to choose only one deck to play week after week, it would be this one. Its threat diversity is amazing, and it has a great matchup against almost every deck. It’s a lot of fun to play because you get to use all the most broken cads available in standard, and has a lot of built in card advantage so you never really feel like you’re falling behind. The fact that it got me really close to winning a pretty big tourney yesterday is also a testament to its power. Keep swinging with those Hellkites!
PLAY ERRORS, PLAY ERRORS…
I also want to mention that knowing the rules inside and out really do give you a huge advantage in professional play. In my T8 match I basically lost to not being familiar enough with the rules to have a go against a much more experienced player (I was paired against Kyle Duncan, a former member of the Canadian National team!). It all came down to understanding priority, and I messed it up twice to basically give my shot at T4 away.
Suffice to say: If your opponent plays a Huntmaster of the Fells, don’t follow it up on your turn by playing one of your own. They will just pass their turn, and since active players triggers will resolve last, their Huntmaster will flip first, killing yours. After it happened in G1 I had the opportunity to do something similar with my Daybreak Ranger against him, but I messed it up. The important thing is that I learned a valuable lesson that I will bring with me to all of my future matches, so in SOME ways (yes I’m trying to look on the bright side here) it was a good thing. (Rationalized! Lol)
This segues us nicely into my:
THOUGHT OF THE DAY
It’s OK to be wrong. Nobody is perfect, and we can’t possibly know the answers to everything all the time. Sometimes making mistakes is actually beneficial… as long as we learn from them and avoid their repetition. Don’t let a fear of being wrong stop you from doing something that you may enjoy. Instead ask questions, or look things up. We all want to protect our egos, and when someone says “well actually, that’s not entirely correct…” we have a tendency to become defensive instead of open minded to the possibility that we aren’t infallible. Learning and evolving involves the occasional mistake here and there, and nobody can possibly expect you to be omnipotent.
How did this little rant come about? Well my Canadian friends can probably relate to this especially well at this time of the year:
On our way back from my friend Erics place after lunch break of the tourney, I remarked: “Man, you should be wearing a hat, you’re going to catch a cold!” To which he replied: “Ummm… you catch a cold from germs and viruses, it has nothing to do with the weather”. I, of course, having been raised on the old adage of “wear layers and bundle up or it will be the death of you” got defensive and took it as a personal affront to my intelligence. I didn’t make a big deal out of it, but it definitely had me thinking what world he was living in to possibly think that.
… A little internet research at home later revealed his statement to be true.
· Ear aches? Check.
· Lowered immune system making you more susceptible to a cold? Check.
· Actually being the CAUSE of a cold / flu? NOT check.
So let’s end this with a quote that has been immortalized in every 80’s child minds for decades now:
“Now you know, and knowing is half the battle!”
Yo Joe indeed! :)
Cheers!
Carl Szalich
Follow me on Twitter! @Psilence6K
Follow me on Twitter! @Psilence6K
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