Much Abrew: Dragonback Analyst (Standard)
Hello everyone, and welcome to another edition of Much Abrew About Nothing! Dragonback Assault is one of the coolest mythics from Tarkir: Dragonstorm, and today, we're going all-in on its Dragon token–making power with the help of Aftermath Analyst and Lumra, Bellow of the Woods to reanimate all the lands from our graveyard. You probably remember that Temur Analyst was a very real Standard deck last year, before Streets of New Capenna and its janky fetch lands rotated, but the plan has fizzled since rotation, mostly because of the lack of good fetch lands. But Dragonback Assault might solve this problem because with the enchantment on the battlefield, we don't actually need that many lands entering to make a lethal board full of Dragon tokens. And thanks to all of our land reanimation, we potentially can do this every single turn until our opponent finally runs out of answers! How good is Dragonback Assault? Is Aftermath Analyst back? Let's get to the video and find out!
Much Abrew: Dragonback Analyst
Discussion
- Record-wise, we went 3-2 with the deck, giving us a solid 60% win rate in a small sample size.
- The plan is to make Dragonback Assault as strong as possible. The six-mana enchantment works like an expensive sweeper for small creatures when it enters. Then, once it's on the battlefield, it's basically a Rampaging Baloths that's harder to kill and makes flying Dragons rather than ground-bound Beasts.
- The primary synergy pieces for Dragonback Assault are our janky fetch lands. We're playing four Fabled Passage and three Evolving Wilds. These lands work especially well with Dragonback Assault since they'll double-trigger the enchantment, giving us two 4/4 Dragons for playing a single land! We also have Spelunking in our deck, which helps take away some of the downside of playing lands that come into play tapped while also enabling some massive turns in the late game.
- While playing an Evolving Wilds and making two Dragon tokens is nice, that's not nearly spectacular enough for our deck. As such, we're playing four Aftermath Analyst and two Lumra, Bellow of the Woods to reanimate all the lands in our graveyard. One of the weird aspects of our deck is that we're not playing any other self-mill cards (although both Analyst and Lumra mill a bit when they enter), so, unlike old Aftermath Analyst decks, we're not likely to have a turn where we reanimate a massive amount of lands. But we don't really need that. Our hope is to get at least five of our fetch lands in our graveyard, which means every Aftermath Analyst and Lumra, Bellow of the Woods will make at least 20 power of flying Dragons with Dragonback Assault when they reanimate our lands.
- In the mid-game, we can play a Lumra or Aftermath Analyst, reanimate our fetch lands, make a bunch of Dragons, and then leave our fetch lands sitting on the battlefield. If our opponent doesn't have a sweeper, they'll die to our Dragons. If they do have a sweeper, we can crack all of our fetches on their end step to rebuild a lethal Dragon board. Sadly, this plan stops working in the late game since we'll eventually run out of lands to fetch, although this doesn't really matter. Even once we run out of basics, we can still reanimate all our fetch lands to make Dragons and then sacrifice them, failing to find a basic, to set up our next Aftermath Analyst or Lumra, Bellow of the Woods.
- We're also playing two copies of Worldsoul's Rage in the deck, which does a couple of things. It can work as a backup to Aftermath Analyst and Lumra, Bellow of the Woods, as yet another way to reanimate lands and make Dragons. But in the late game, it can also just kill our opponent directly by throwing a ton of damage at our opponent's face.
- We can also combo off with Nissa, Resurgent Animist and Spelunking. If we can get a Nissa down, we'll make a mana every time a land enters. And with Spelunking letting all of our lands enter untapped, we can make a ton of mana by looping Aftermath Analyst and Lumra, Bellow of the Woods, potentially enough to kill our opponent with a single Worldsoul's Rage!
- The rest of the deck is sort of Domain-esque. We've got Overlord of the Hauntwoods and Nissa, Resurgent Animist to ramp alongside Spelunking. Up the Beanstalk and a couple of Atraxa, Grand Unifiers draw us tons of cards, while Day of Judgment, Sunfall, and Leyline Binding give us some removal to keep our opponent's threats in check.
- So, should you play Dragonback Analyst in Tarkir: Dragonstorm Standard? While our sample size is small, I think the answer is yes! The deck felt solid, and I found it super fun to play. Making a lethal board of Dragons turn after turn is hilarious! If you like weird graveyard synergies and making a massive horde of Dragons, give the deck a shot!
Conclusion
Anyway, that's all for today. As always, leave your thoughts, ideas, opinions, and suggestions in the comments, and you can reach me on Twitter @SaffronOlive or at SaffronOlive@MTGGoldfish.com.
