Our league finalists had to invent a whole standard deck, along with making up ideas for a variety of standard sets to go in it! This week is Bradley Rose’s entry, and you’ll learn about it along with us.
The Challenge
You will each design a standard, 60-card constructed deck (we’re letting you slide on sideboards, this time) with the following characteristics and deck skeleton.
Deckname: Jund Builder Bear
Deck Colors: Black, Red, Green
Archetype: Artifact Sacrifice Midrange
5 four-ofs (nonland)
4 three-ofs (nonland)
1 two-of (nonland)
2 one-ofs (nonland)
1 land
Across your submission, we expect to see three new custom mechanics. Lastly, we also want to see the different sets from your custom standard represented in the deck.
-13 unique cards submitted
-No limitations on rarity and/or card types.
-At least three custom mechanics
-One card named “Builder Bear”
-At least one card designed in the Black, Red, and Green color identities.
-An artifact sacrifice deck generally plays artifacts with the intent to sacrifice them for value/board presence/damage; Midrange decks tend to hold the center of the Aggro to Control spectrum and have tools for playing both aggressively and defensively.
-Use card flavor, card names, set symbols, etc. to show off the breadth of your standard environment (3-6 unique sets represented across your submission.)
-A 250 word blurb to describe your deck (can be a sales pitch, a tournament report, a deck tech, etc.) Please keep your blurb to words.
Brad’s Blurb
Maria Bartholdi: “Welcome back to Day 2 of Pro Tour Ghirapur! I’ll be throwing it over to Riley for a deck tech with one of the rising stars of this tournament.”
Riley Knight: “Thank you, Maria. With me now is Bradley Rose, who is piloting a fresh build of Jund Builder Bear. And is currently UNDEFEATED!”
Bradley Rose: (laughs) “Yeah! Unreal. Never Day 2’d before.”
RK: “I’ll knock on this wooden table for ya. Anyway, for those unfamiliar with the deck, what’s the game plan?”
BR: “This is based on the Builder Bear shell popularized with the release of Tubular Times at Galaxy Mall. With Ghirapur: Wonder of Kaladesh, Gonti’s Family Ring adds powerful disruption to the deck. This is key to keeping the artifact sacrifice engine going while still keeping a midrange strategy.”
RK: “How did you arrive at the changes for this list?”
BR: “Mainly removed some, well, removal from Brawlstadia: Let’s Rock!. Too redundant and slow alongside other options. But don’t sleep on Amplified Shock. Sacrificing a Blood token and burning the player discounts Ravenous Sandwurm twice!”
RK: “What gives this deck an advantage this weekend?”
BR: “A couple of Surviving Andesperi cards work well with the meta since gifting Blood tokens with Vampire’s Herald doesn’t help most decks in the field. Those same decks don’t play much of the latest set’s new artifact creatures—great news for Blood Hunter.”
RK: “Bradley, thanks for chatting with us! Was a pleasure.”
BR: “Likewise!”
RK: “Back to you, Maria!”
The Decklist
4x Gonti’s Family Ring
4x Builder Bear
4x Candygoyf
4x Vampire’s Herald
4x Amplified Shock
3x Zöe, Smashing Guitarist
3x Blood Hunter
3x Ravenous Sandwurm
3x Fatal Frequency
2x Heavy Metal Axe
1x Awakened Mall Attraction
1x Gremlin Mode
Land: Bloodboil Bog
The Cards!
(images coming later… see the presentation in the mean time)