Standard with M13

Hi, my name is Thomas Overton, I am here to tell you about all the random ideas that I come up with about magic the gathering.  M13 is right around the corner and there are some cards that I am super excited are being newly printed and those that are coming back to us.

Delver of secrets is by far the best thing to be doing in standard right now.  Because of this the delver mirror is a very popular subject.  People have been trying things to beat a the problem card Geist of Saint Traft.  From main deck Phantasmal Images to playing Blade Splicers to beat Geist.  However we have a few black cards that have seen little standard play in the past couple years that I think could swing the delver deck in a different direction.  First we have Vampire Nighthawk that is going to be returning in m13.  This card is a great solution to Geist of Saint Traft and it also helps fight against Restoration Angel and Delver of Secrets.  Next is Duress.  This card seems like its mediocre but it can easily punish a lot of sketchy keeps that Delver players often have due to cards like ponder and other cantrips.  Duress also works well with probe allowing you to get the maximum value out of all your discard spells.  Another discard spell that sees criminally no play is Despise.  Despise could be awesome because of the creature light nature of delver decks.  Turn one on the play you can despise and take delver or whatever creature is in their hand.  Here is a list that is what looks to me something like what I want to be playing once M13 is here:

U/B Delver

Creatures

4 Delver of Secrets

4 Vampire Nighthawk

4 Snapcaster Mage

2 Tarland, Sky Summoner

2 Phantasmal Image

Spells

4 Ponder

3 Mana Leak

2 Gitaxian Probe

2 Dispise

2 Duress

2 Tragic Slip

2 Dismember

4 Vapor Snag

2 Forbidden Alchemy

Lands

4 Darkslick Shores

4 Drowned Catacombs

7 Island

7 Swamp

Sideboard

2 Grave Titan

1 Swamp

2 Phantasmal Image

2 Duress

2 Black Sun's Zenith

2 Dissipate

2 Ratchet Bomb

1 Tamiyo, the Moon Sage

1 Sword of War and Peace

This list is obviously tentative but you get the advantage of black removal that can help in all match ups without playing cards like gut shot.  The one part I really don't like about this list is the lack of the card Restoration Angel.  Angel provides so much of an instant speed threat in the vein of Cryptic Command/Mistbind Clique and it is the absolute nutter butters with all the cards that U/W Delver can play.  A card that I hope will make up for the lack of Restoration Angel is Tarland, Sky Summoner.  This card reminds me a lot of Emeria Angel back in the days of Caw Blade, except this time Tarland seems even better with the point of Delver decks abusing cheap instants and sorceries.  Imagine resolving this guy on five mana with a Gitaxian Probe and a Ponder in hand.  Thats eight power you have just made off of five mana which rivals the interaction between Restoration Angel and Blade Splicer.

Obviously this might be all for naught as the Banned and Restricted Announcements are in two days but hopefully whatever is said there will make a format that is a bit more open than it is now.

Until next time,

Thomas Overton

@darkwingduckz on twitter