Against the Odds: PlaceholderSubType476 is the New Slivers (Standard)
Hello everyone, and welcome to another edition of Against the Odds! This week, we're heading to Standard to play some changelings. In fact, every single creature in our deck is a changeling, which means each creature in our deck is all creature types, from Sliver to Pirate to Brushwagg to . . . PlaceholderSubType476?!? Why would you want to build a deck around underpowered changeling creatures? While the changelings themselves might be a bit weak in a vacuum, being all creature types means we get to play some super-strong tribal payoffs that no other decks in Standard can play because of their lack of support, like Thrumming Hivepool and Throne of the Grim Captain! Can the plan work? What are the odds of winning with Slivers. . . err. . . Pirates. . . or PlaceholderSubType476 tribal in Lorwyn Eclipsed Standard? Let's get to the video and find out!
Against the Odds: PlaceholderSubType476 Tribal
The Deck
As I mentioned in the intro, we're a changeling deck today! Every creature in our deck is a changeling, which means it is all creature types. While the Lorwyn Eclipsed changelings are stronger than many from the past, in general, our creatures are still a bit below the curve, with Feisty Spikeling being a 2/1 for two with sometimes first strike, [[Mischievous Sneakling] a 2/2 with flash, and Bloomburrow holdover Three Tree Mascot a mana-fixing 2/1.
Our three-drop changelings are our stronger creatures. Chomping Changeling gives us a Reclamation Sage, and a surprising number of Standard decks have at least some good artifacts or enchantments to blow up. Mutable Explorer ramps us a Mutavault, giving us another changeling creature in our mana base. Finally, Taurean Mauler is our most above-the-curve changeling based on stats. While it starts off as a 2/2, it grows whenever our opponent casts a spell, which means it often ends up as the biggest thing on the battlefield if it lives.
As you can probably see, changelings aren't especially strong creatures, especially compared to the best threats in Standard. Sadly, there's no one-drop changeling in the format, which would have been super helpful for our deck. So, why are we playing a deck with exclusively changelings? The creatures have one strange superpower: they count as every creature type. While our creatures themselves might not be that strong, they enable a couple of super-unique and very strong payoffs.
Payoff number one is Thrumming Hivepool, which takes advantage of the fact that all of our changelings are Slivers. The six-mana artifact has affinity for Slivers, which means every changeling we get on the battlefield reduces its cost, and it's incredibly strong once it's on the battlefield, giving all of our creatures double strike and haste, along with making two 1/1 Sliver tokens on our upkeep. It turns out that if you take all of our somewhat underpowered changelings and give them haste and double strike, they actually become pretty busted. On defense, having a wall of first-strike creatures makes it super hard for our opponent to attack. But more commonly, the double damage that [[Thrumming Hivepool] offers lets us close out the game in just a couple of big attacks. Even if things go poorly and our opponent can wrath our board, the 1/1 Sliver tokens it makes in our upkeep can close out the game.
Backing up Thrumming Hivepool is Throne of the Grim Captain, which isn't quite as strong but still very good. It starts off as a two-mana artifact that taps to mill two cards. But we can exile four changelings (since they all count as Dinosaurs, Merfolk, Pirates, and Vampires) and pay four mana to flip it into The Grim Captain, as 7/7 hexproof, menacing, trampling, lifelinker that makes our opponent sacrifice something when we attack and also puts one of the creatures we crafted into play tapped and attacking. Throne of the Grim Captain allows us to turn all of our dead changelings into a real threat. And if The Grim Captain survives (it's hard to kill thanks to hexproof, but wraths and edicts can still do it), its massive lifelinking body quickly takes over the game!
For removal, we have. . . even more changelings! While Nameless Inversion and Crib Swap might not be the most traditional removal spells, they are the best options for our deck for two reasons. First, they can do a cute trick with Throne of the Grim Captain. If we get a Nameless Inversion or Crib Swap in the graveyard, we can actually exile it to help craft Throne of the Grim Captain. While the craft mechanic says you must exile four permanents of the type from the battlefield, it just asks for "cards" of the right type from the graveyard, which means a Nameless Inversion or Crib Swap counts as a Pirate, Dinosaur, Vampire, or Merfolk—whatever type we happen to be missing. While we can't cheat the spells into play with The Grim Captain's ability, that's fine because they help speed up the flip into The Grim Captain significantly.
The other reason for the changeling removal spells is our mana base, which is hilariously good at casting changelings but hilariously bad at casting non-changeling spells unless they are colorless (which is also why we're playing two colorless payoffs rather than Unholy Annex // Ritual Chamber or other colored options). Cavern of Souls and Secluded Courtyard are my favorite cards in the deck since we can name literally any creature type and use them to cast our changelings. This makes part of the fun of the deck trying to make our opponents laugh by choosing the most ridiculous creature types possible. (Personally, I think PlaceholderSubType476 is the best, but I've seen some argue that PlaceholderSubType473 is even better in the current meta.)
We also get a bunch of five-color lands with upside that only work with specific creature types. For example, Bucolic Ranch is one of the strongest lands in our deck. Not only does it let us make mana of any color to cast Mount spells (and our changelings are Mounts), but we can also pay three to look at the top of our library and put that card in our hand if it's a Mount (or to the bottom if it's not). Jasmine Dragon Tea Shop makes mana of any color for Allies (and our changelings are Allies), while potentially making us some Ally tokens. Finally, Maelstrom of the Spirit Dragon makes mana for Dragons, and we can sacrifice it for four mana to tutor up a Dragon, which includes not just all of our creatures but also both of our removal spells as well. And being able to sacrifice a land to tutor up Crib Swap to exile our opponent's finisher is surprisingly powerful!
Wrap-Up
Record-wise, I went 11-10 with the deck, good for a 52% win percentage, which is way better than I expected. I was expecting this deck to win closer to 30% of the time, so winning half the time was surprisingly great! Thrumming Hivepool is such a crazy card that it can even make a pile of changelings work, and we had some sweet Throne of the Grim Captain games too! If you decide to try the deck, my biggest piece of advice is to mulligan aggressively to find a finisher. I tried to keep some hands with just changelings and without any of our payoffs, and those hands almost never worked. The changelings just aren't strong enough on their own. But with a Thrumming Hivepool or Throne of the Grim Captain, they are actually super funny and fun!
Conclusion
Anyway, that's all for today. What's the funniest creature type to name with Cavern of Souls in this deck? Let me know in the comments! As always, leave your thoughts, ideas, opinions, and suggestions, and you can reach me on Twitter @SaffronOlive or at SaffronOlive@MTGGoldfish.com.
