Mono Blue Wizards (Top 4 at a Standard Open)

July 15, 2012 | Posted by Dee

In my opinion, Adam Prosak’s Mono Blue Wizards deck was the breakout deck of this weekend’s Starcitygames Standard Open in St. Louis.

He got top four and his deck had six copies of M13 cards. He played 3 Augur of Bolas and 3 Talrand, Sky Summoner in the main deck.

For a low cost of two mana, Augur of Bolas gives you card advantage, blocks 2/2s all day long, and beats up Snapcaster Mage in a fight.

Talrand can dominate the battlefield by giving you a bunch of flying Drakes, often at instant speed.

Check out Adam’s decklist below.

Mono Blue Wizards

Creatures (16)

Spells (26)

Lands (18)

Sideboard (15)

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You need to play a lot of instants and sorceries to make Augur of Bolas and Talrand effective. Once you add all those instants and sorceries, you can also take advantage of them with Delver of Secrets and Snapcaster Mage.

Phantasmal Image is a nice addition to the deck. It can copy Augur of Bolas and Snapcaster Mage to give you card advantage. Also, it kills Geist of Saint Traft, which can be a problem if you don’t have an early Talrand.

Talrand gives you an army of 2/2 flyers, which are great for blocking Delver of Secrets.

Adam has a whopping 10 spells that trigger Talrand’s ability for zero mana. It’s no surprise to see Gut Shot. This card is common in Delver decks to fight mana creatures like Birds of Paradise and Avacyn’s Pilgrim.

Mental Misstep is an interesting choice. It’s definitely a metagame call. If your metagame has a lot of Ponders, Vapor Snags, and Gut Shots, Mental Misstep is a good main deck card.

Mutagenic Growth is good against Gut Shot. Also, it’s a nice surprise against Bonfire of the Damned and Whipflare.

Gitaxian Probe is the best free spell because it’s good in all matchups and you have the option of paying mana instead of life (unlike Gut Shot and Mutagenic Growth).

Ponder, Thought Scour, and Vapor Snag give you more cheap spells for Talrand. Ponder and Thought Scour can find more instants or sorceries so you can easily have a big turn where you generate multiple Drake token creatures.

Vapor Snag is great at clearing out blockers so you can attack with your army of blue creatures. The bounce spell is often devastating when you combine it with Snapcaster Mage.

The deck only has 2 Mana Leak. It’s a solid, flexible card but it doesn’t combo that well with Talrand because it’s more expensive than the sorceries and other instants. Plus, many people are playing Cavern of Souls to stop counterspells.

I like the two equipment cards. They are good against mass removal and they give the deck a different angle of attack. Plus, they are just really powerful cards.

There is a wide variety of decks in different colors so I think 1/1 split between Sword of Feast and Famine and Sword of War and Peace is a good idea. Of course, you should tweak the equipment mix to fit your local metagame.

The new M13 creatures are pretty good with the Swords. Augur of Bolas has high toughness for a two mana creature so he’s hard to kill by gang blocking when he’s wielding a Sword. Also, he usually gives you a card. If your opponent kills him with a pinpoint removal spell like Doom Blade, you’re usually ahead on the exchange.

Talrand, Sky Summoner can give you multiple Drake tokens to keep you from running out of creatures to equip.

Adam only plays 18 lands but that’s okay because he has twelve cheap draw spells, Snapcaster Mage to flash them back, and Augur of Bolas to find them. Plus, most of his cards are cheap to cast.

The deck is not actually mono blue. It splashes white for Moorland Haunt in the main deck and Restoration Angel in the sideboard.

I like the white flash Angel because it can replace Talrand in matchups where Talrand is not that good. For example, against decks with Bonfire of the Damned or Slagstorm, Restoration Angel is a better four-drop.

The 1 Cavern of Souls in the sideboard is pretty useful against counterspell decks because Delver of Secrets, Augur of Bolas, Snapcaster Mage, and Talrand are all Wizards.

If you need help with sideboard plans for this deck, give me some decks in your local metagame and I’ll try to come up with good sideboard strategies.

Filed Under Standard