Playing Bo3 Ladder on MTG Arena
grixis control 2-0
grixis midrange 2-1
Grixis Control 2-1
Grixis Midrange 1-2
RDW 2-0
Sultai Midrange 2-1
Esper Control 2-1
Esper Midrange 2-0
RDW 2-1
Boros Midrange 2-0
Mono Green Stompy 2-1
Gruul Midrange 2-1
Mono Blue Agro 2-0
Grixis
Game 1
Matchup seems good. We are way better at draw go, and a lot of their removal is dead vs just a few walkers. When it is not dead, we are generating card advantage from Liliana, Dreadhorde General or Ugin, the Ineffable.
Board games
On the play,
+4 Thief of Sanity +2 Duress +2 Narset, Parter of Veils +2 Prison Realm
-2 Cry of the Carnarium -3 Kaya's Wrath -2 Cast Down -1 Teferi, Hero of Dominaria -1 teferi, time reveler
Thief is much better on the play than not. A turn 3 unanswered thief will win the game by himself. We also bring in narset to cancel their draw spells and find the cards we want. Grixis still doesnt have a good answer to enchantment removal so we bring in the prison realms. Realms hit all of Grixis' major threats and lets us scry. Our game plan is to disrupt hand enough and resolve a turn 3 thief, or hold up counter magic/removal for their thief. If the thief beats don't work out we have answers for their threats until we flip azcanta for advantage, or resolve a walker with counter back up.
On the draw
+2 Thief of Sanity +3 Duress +2 Narset, Parter of Veils +2 Prison Realm +1 Eldest Reborn
-2 Cry of the Carnarium -3 Kaya's Wrath -2 Cast Down -1 Teferi, Hero of Dominaria -1 teferi, time reveler
Similar to the other matchup, but we cut 2 thiefs for an eldest and another duress. We need to play more reactive this game since they can resolve the turn 3 thief. Their curve is also disgusting and we need to make sure our answers are ready.
Esper Control
Game 1
Ahhh the Mirror. Lots of brews going around. Game 1 is a bit of a toss up. This list has a more diverse threat pool than some running liliana and ugin. Basically whoever resolves their walker, or flips an azscanta first and untaps wins game 1.
Board games
+3 Duress +4 Thief of Sanity +2 Narset, Parter of Veils
-2 Cast Down -2 Cry of the Carnarium -3 Kaya's Wrath
On the play, we have a similar game plan as we do against grixis. Disrupt hand, play Azscanta, or Thief on curve if possible, then go to town. If not, you can save an azscanta to bait out counterspells, or play a thief with protection. Try to use disruption to create an opening to resolve thief, or a walker, and win. Narset, and Teferi, Time Raveler are very very strong here. Eliminating their ability to counter, or draw cards while generating your own advantage will win most matchups. On the draw, everything still pretty much applies, except we are more reactive. The most proactive you can be is with hand disruption, but if you thought erasure on 4 mana without a veto, they might have 2 playable threats next turn and then you are out of luck. Best to always keep some form of counter removal, available to deal with their threats before you untap.
RDW
Game 1
This and white weenies are why we almost always mulligan a hand with no interaction. RDW nuts will generally win game 1. We do have tools though to win, and RDW nuts does not hit super often. Cry wipes away all the besky creatures. Blast Zone also hits a lot of their creatures on drop. We have cast downs and mortifies to keep them at bay and absorbs to keep us alive. We just have to survive the initial assault to win.
Board Games
+1 Moment of Craving +1 Oath of Kaya +2 Prison Realm
-2 Search for Azcanta
Flip -1 Chemister's Insight -1 Teferi, Hero of Dominaria
Moment and oath are early life gaining removal, and prison realm is just more early game removal. We survive the first 4 turns and we generally make it home.
Mono Green Stompy/Gruul Midrange
Both of these decks have pretty terrifying draws. Our game plan against both is pretty similar though. Just answer what we can and resolve our stuff. We want to try to save our single target removal as long as possible and deal with their stuff with board wipes. Single removal can be used to protect our teferi's win they land. Gruul has domri who can take over if left unanswered too. Very Scary, but still very winnable.
Board Games
+2 Prison Realm +1 Oath of Kaya +4 Thief of Sanity +1 Eldest Reborn
-2 Search for Azcanta
Flip -2 Cry of the Carnarium -1 Teferi, Time Reveler -1 Chemister's Insight
vs Gruul -2 Thought Erasure
vs Stompy -2 Dovin's Veto
We bring in more removal, and value cards. Thief wins on curve on play or draw if unanswered. Search is a bit too slow and Cry of the carnarium doesn't seem to hit a lot of their threats. Teferi, time reveler doesn't really do much and chemisters is not what you want to see staring down a full board. Gruul we keep in veto because of their planeswalkers. Stompy we keep in thought erasure because they don't have the walkers.
Sultai Midrange
Game 1
This game is quite the grind fest. They are the only midrange deck that keeps up in card advantage. Our goal is to use a board wipe to stabilize, then get a walker with some single target removal for protection. They are usually slow enough to wait on a board wipe, but sometimes you need to nuke down all those nasty value creatures. We survive till a walker lands and then win.
Board Games
+2 Narset, Parter of Veils +4 Thief of Sanity +1 Hostage Taker
-2 Cry of the Carnarium -1 Teferi, Hero of Dominaria -4 Thought Erasure
All of our board cards effect the big bad jellyfish in some way. Narset turns it off and generates us a bit of advantage, Thief of sanity forces them to play a weak jelly, or we get to steal it, and Hostage taker straight up steals it for us. Cry again doesnt hit enough stuff, teferi is not very good when behind on board and we are a little worried of unmorred ego so we diversify the threats. Thought erasure doesn't really do enough here, because of all the recursion they have.
White Weenies
Game 1
This is the main reason cry is in the main board. Their board gets out of control fast. We need to ensure luxodon doesnt land, and that banalia doesnt make huge knights and cry cares not for indestructible. White weenies will either blow their load early and we wipe them away, or they play it a bit slow and we can wait it out and resolve our threats.
Board Games
+2 Prison Realm +1 Moment of Craving +1 Oath of Kaya
-1 Chemister's Insight -2 Search for Azcanta
Flip -1 Teferi, Hero of Dominaria
We being in the enchant removal to deal with besky indestructible creatures as well as moment for the same purpose. Oath helps us survive till the big walkers come out. My favorite play here is playing Teferi, Time Raveler and then casting an instant speed Cry of the carnarium. This deck is similar to RDW in that sometimes it just gets there and you cant do anything. I think the matchup is a bit better here.
