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Pro Tour Aether Revolt: Day Two (Live Updates)

by SaffronOlive // Feb 4, 2017

Welcome back to our round-by-round coverage of Pro Tour Aether Revolt! Yesterday was one of the stranger day ones of a Pro Tour in recent memory. Typically the first few rounds feature some odd decks as at least some teams find a spicy brew that they think can break the format. Yesterday we had a total of one brand new deck in Grixis Emerge show up on coverage, and then for the rest of the day, we watched GB Constrictor against Mardu Vehicles against Copy Cat combo, with a tier two deck thrown in every now and then.

In one sense this is disappointing—one of my favorite aspects of a Pro Tour is seeing what new decks the pros come up with. On the other hand, the big three decks do represent a good format with Mardu Vehicles being the aggro deck, GB Constrictor being the midrange deck, and Jeskai Copy Cat (the most popular Copy Cat build) being the control deck. Filling in the gaps we have some other builds of Copy Cat that are true combo decks. So while we missed out on seeing Paradox Engine, the expertise cycle, Paradoxical Outcome, and Inspiring Statuary, we do have what looks to be a somewhat ideal metagame with all of the meta-archetypes being represented.

As a result, today is going to be about which of these decks can separate themselves from the pack. If we end up with a relatively even mixture of these decks in the top eight (with a darkhorse or two slipping in), the metagame will look quite healthy. Conversely, if one of the big three decks manages to put three, four, or five players into the top eight, this perception will change quickly (especially if this deck happens to be Copy Cat, then we'll hear endless calls for a banning).

The Round 8 Judge Call

One other thing before we get to day two coverage: One of the biggest conversations over night was about a judge call in Round 8. There was so much discussion about it that Wizards decided to release an explanation. As far as I can tell, here's the important facts. In the situation in question a player said "combat," with the intent to go to the beginning of combat and crew a vehicle (this was obvious because he immediately attempted to crew a vehicle). However, according to tournament rules, "combat" is a shortcut that means "go to declare attackers step." The situation was complicated by the fact that the player in question clearly didn't speak English as a first language. In the end, the judge ruled that the player was in his attack step and didn't have the opportunity to crew a vehicle. The player then went on to lose the game as a result (although he did end up winning games two and three to take the match).

This situation might sound strange, but there is a good reason for this rule (well, was a good reason for the rule). In the old days of Magic, things didn't really happen on the beginning of combat step, so this shortcut made sure people couldn't angle shoot or rules lawyer their opponent with things like Cryptic Command. However, in the past few sets, Wizards started printing a lot of "at the beginning of combat" triggers like Toolcraft Exemplar (which gives a reason to crew Vehicles on the beginning of combat step). So in current day Magic, the rule that was intended to reduce rules lawyering and angle shooting actually helps to facilitate what it is trying to prevent. Thankfully Wizards stated in their announcement that they would look into the rule after the tournament, so hopefully they will come up with a fair solution that will help solve the an issue that has become increasingly important thanks to modern set design. Until then, if you play in a tournament, be very careful with the words and timing you use for your "beginning of combat" triggers.

Round 12

We kick off constructed for the day with an interesting matchup: GB Constrictor against Jeskai Control (without the Copy Cat combo). While the combo builds of the deck were by far the most popular, there was a small contingent of players who left the combo on the sideline and instead went with Dynavolt Tower as a finisher along with Torrential Gearhulk. The big question here is what's the advantage of leaving the combo out of the deck. LSV has an interesting answer from the booth: since so many of the Jeskai Control deck are playing the combo, non-combo Jeskai Control players can take advantage of opponents playing like they have the combo (for example, leaving up removal) even though they don't. Unfortunately in game one, Lucas Blohan (the Jeskai player) can't find his third land drop and dies to a board full of creatures buffed by counters from Winding Constrictor (including Longtusk Cub, which is an interesting addition to the GB Constrictor deck, considering you get an extra energy counter from Winding Constrictor and it puts +1/+1 counters on itself). In game two, the powerful GB deck presents threat after threat and the removal from Jeskai Control simply can't keep up.

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One thing that is clear watching GB Constrictor is that Winding Constrictor is an absurd Magic card. In some ways it reminds me of Smuggler's Copter in the sense that if the GB player has it on turn two that survives, they are suddenly extremely favored to win. There are just so many incidental +1/+1 counter synergies that the deck building cost is extremely low. You already want Tireless Trackers, Rishkar, Peema Renegades, and Verdurous Gearhulks, so it's incredibly easy to slot in the snake and make a good deck great.

For our inter-round Deck Tech, Willy Edel gives us the list for Grixis Improvise:

Round 13

The biggest news of Round 13 happens before the gameplay even starts with the day two metagame breakdown, and the results are fairly surprising. Take a look at some of the big decks and then we'll break it down.

First off, the baseline: all in all, 62.6% of players made day two which means that conversion rates worse than 62.6% mean a deck performed badly and above this number means the deck performed well (although these numbers are slightly complicated by the limited rounds, which could cause players who did well in constructed to miss day two).
Let's start with the biggest shocker: Jeskai Copy Cat Control was the worst deck on day one of Pro Tour Aether Revolt. In fact, that's the worst conversion rate of any deck that has seen significant Pro Tour play since I've started tracking the data a couple of years ago. A conversion rate of 36.1% is pitiful.
This said, the problem might not by so much with Jeskai Copy Cat in specific. While regular Jeskai Control did well, most control decks performed poorly on day one of Pro Tour Aether Revolt with UR Control posting a 53.3% conversion rate, Grixis Control a 42.9% conversion rate, and UB Control a 50% conversion rate. So why did most control decks have a bad day one?
The answer is Mardu Vehicles, which is looking like the breakout deck of the tournament. Many players correctly predicted Jeskai Copy Cat Control to be one of the most played decks at the event and discovered that Mardu Vehicles had a great matchup against the slow control/combo deck. As a result, Mardu Vehicles was not only the most played deck on day one of Pro Tour Aether Revolt, but it posted the best conversion rate of the eight most-played decks at 75.8%.
The other big winner is GB Constrictor/Delirium which combined put about 70% of their players into day two.
As for the less played decks (which should be viewed skeptically since the sample size is small), both RB Aggro (88.9% conversion rate) and GB Tokens (81.8% conversion rate) performed extremely well while Grixis Improvise (the spiciest deck we've seen on coverage so far) stumbled to a 28.6% conversion rate—the worst of any deck with more than one player.
The best news? The single Paradoxical Outcome player from day one managed to make day two! Here's hoping that it can put together a run and post a good finish with the deck.

As for the gameplay of Round 13, we start off with what is shaping up to be the most important match up of Pro Tour Aether Revolt: GB Constrictor in the hands of Ken Yukuhiro against Mardu Vehicles from Alexander Hayne. The narrative of the event is that Mardu Vehicles is great against Jeskai Copy Cat, but not all that good against GB Constrictor, which would suggest that GB Constrictor should be a favorite for multiple top eight slots since Jeskai Copy Cat doesn't have much of a presence here on day two. In game one, the GB Constrictor deck ends up missing its third land drop and the Mardu Vehicles deck drives its way to a quick victory. In game two, it's Heart of Kiran that takes over the game playing both offense and defense with the help of recurring Scrapheap Scroungers for crewing, but in the end it was Walking Ballista that gave Yukuhiro the exact amount of damage he needed to steal the game from Hayne. In the deciding game, the Mardu Vehicles deck gets off to a bit of a slow start which allows the GB deck to take over the game with the combination of Winding Constrictor and Walking Ballista.

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At this point, maybe the biggest question (at least from a more meta perspective) is whether or not control decks had a bad weekend because they misread the metagame (and underestimated the resurgence of Mardu Vehicles, which wasn't a very popular deck the first two weeks of Aether Revolt Standard) or if they simply don't have enough tools to keep up with powerful vehicles from Mardu and efficient threats from the Green-Black decks. When Smuggler's Copter and Emrakul, the Promised End were banned, it seemed that control might have a chance to compete. But it's starting to look like the new enemies of control (Heart of Kiran and Winding Constrictor) are still enough to keep control decks at bay.

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Speaking of the Standard bannings, it's pretty clear from the Pro Tour Aether Revolt metagame that the banning that looked least impactful at the time—Reflector Mage—was actually the most impactful as far as what decks are viable. Both Vehicles and GB Delirium are doing find without their namesake cards, and even Aetherworks Marvel is getting by in smaller numbers, but the UW Midrange/Flash deck—the best deck in the format not long ago—doesn't even have a presence. In fact, I don't think we've seen a single Archangel Avacyn all weekend.

Our inter-round Deck Tech is a spicy Elder Deep-Fiend Saheeli Rai deck by Gerry Thompson:

Round 14

Round 14 kicks off with an aggro mirror, the ultra aggressive BR Aggro list against Mardu Vehicles. While the sample size was small, if you think back to the day two metagame breakdown, you'll remember that RB Aggro was the most successful deck on day one of Pro Tour Aether Revolt, putting eight of its nine players into day two. If it really is fast enough to get in under Mardu Vehicles (and also GB Aggro), there's a chance that we'll see more of this deck over the next couple weekends. In game one it was the forgotten Aether Revolt vehicle Aethersphere Harvester swinging the race for Mardu Vehicles. Game two starts poorly for the RB Aggro player as he mulligans, keeps a one-lander, and never really gets off the ground.

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Yesterday we talked a bit about how the lack of new decks might make Pro Tour Aether Revolt comparatively quite on the finance front, and that seems to be coming true. Looking over the biggest winners of the day, it's Paradox Engine (which hasn't shown up one on camera and might not even be in a single deck at the Pro Tour), followed by Tireless Tracker, Disallow, and Heart of Kiran. However, all of these changes are relatively small, with the biggest increase in the bunch being just 12%. Typically we see cards doubling up based on good Pro Tour performances, so the impact of Pro Tour Aether Revolt is minimal to say the least. Of course, this could change based on the top eight: if one deck takes up multiple slots, those cards are a good bet to spike.

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I mentioned a moment ago how Aethersphere Harvester was impactful on this round's feature match, and if we look ahead to the future of Standard, it could be even more important. With Heart of Kiran being such an important part of the format, having a 3/5 flying blocker that can occasionally gain lifelink seems strong, not to mention the vehicle's power to break open aggressive mirrors and swing a race. While costing three-mana might seem like a draw back, we've seen a lot of decks using Fatal Push as a key part of their removal package, which might mean that being one more mana actually makes Aethersphere Harvester better. As such, while the story of Pro Tour Aether Revolt will likely be Heart of Kiran and Winding Constrictor, I wouldn't be surprised to find that Aethersphere Harvester is one of the breakout cards over the next couple of weeks.

Our inter-round Deck Tech is Four-Color Aggro by Jason Chung:

Round 15

We start off with our first glimpse of Jeskai Copy Cat Control, which isn't surprising considering nearly two thirds of players on the deck dropped out on day one. In theory, this is the nightmare matchup for Jeskai and the resurgence of Mardu Vehicles is likely one of the main reasons that control decks had such a poor weekend. As a result, it will be interesting to see how this match plays out.

Just kidding. It actually wasn't very interesting at all. Jeskai Copy Cat Control was absolutely run over by Mardu Vehicles, and it didn't even look close. In a world of five-mana wrath effects, playing control against aggro is already challenging, and doubly so in a format full of vehicles that don't get hit by any sorcery speed removal. The Jeskai Copy Cat Control deck is a control deck fighting with one hand tied behind its back because the deck has to dedicate eight slots to combo pieces that are actively bad when they are not winning the game (as Ben Stark pointed out during his interview yesterday).

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Let's take a minute to talk about Copy Cat in relation to how Pro Tours actually work. As of right now, as I write this just two rounds before the top eight, Jeskai Copy Cat Control is clearly one of the biggest losers of Pro Tour Aether Revolt by the numbers. This said, since the deck was so heavily played on day one, even with a horrible performance, it is still the third most played deck on day two. As a result, it's completely within the realm of possibility that we have multiple Jeskai Copy Cat decks in the top eight. If this happens, the abysmal day one performance won't really matter, because come Monday the focus is almost exclusively on the decks that made the top eight. People will quickly forget how bad the deck was on Friday and Saturday, and it could even be that the narrative will change to Jeskai Copy Cat being a winner.

The point of all this is two-fold. First, the possibilities for redemption for a deck at a Pro Tour are endless. It wasn't that long ago that Matt Sperling made Top 4 at a Pro Tour with Abzan while Abzan was the worst performing deck in the tournament. While there will be a handful of people digging through the numbers, for the casual observer, it's just so much easier to assume that decks that made the top eight are good. Second, when it comes to judging a deck, try to look beyond the top eight. There's so much variance in Magic and in a 16 round tournament (with a limited a portion!), it's not as simple as "the top eight decks are the best decks."

Round 16

We've reached the end of the swiss, with six players likely locked for the top eight heading into the round (based on the assumption that the top three tables draw) leaving just two slots available. The win-and-ins feature Lucas Esper Berthoud (sadly not playing blue, black and white) on Mardu Vehicles against Dimitris Triantafillou on GB Constrictor, a matchup that has become synonymous with Pro Tour Aether Revolt. In game one the Mardu Vehicles deck gets off to a super fast start having both Heart of Kiran and Aethersphere Harvester in the early turns of the game along with a couple of crew members, but in the end a forgotten attack with a Needle Spires allows the GB Constrictor deck to steal the game. In game two, Chandra, Torch of Defiance takes over the game for Mardu Vehicles, and Berthoud continues on to take the match. Meanwhile on a back table, PVDDR and Ben Reuben battle it out for the final seat in the top eight in another GB Constrictor against Mardu Vehicles matchup. In the end, both Mardu Vehicles decks come out on top, which gives us a top eight featuring a massive six Mardu Vehicles decks. Congrats to the following players who made it in the top eight at Pro Tour Aether Revolt!