While considering the above, I had also been borderline dared to brew a deck based on the new Magic Origins mythic, The Great Aurora. I love a good, wacky brew, and I’m known for giving these sorts of ideas a good brew before I dismiss them. Playing Scapeshift in Modern made me initially try to think of a way to combo kill my opponent with Aurora, but Standard is currently lacking in any sort of land-based kill condition. The only land that really had any sort of relevant and abusable ETB effect was radiant fountain. Sure, there’s scrylands that would be able to offer virtual card advantage in a post-aurora scenario, but if we’re able to spend 9 mana in standard and not have already lost the game, I don’t think getting a couple of scry triggers out of the deal would be worth it. But if our game plan is to live long enough that we can cast The Great Aurora with more cards than our opponent, resetting the nonland permanents (AKA things that kill us) and giving us a favorable position with a lot of lifegain triggers, wouldn’t that be the dream against aggro? I think it would.
Now that I was rolling with the idea of brewing “The Great Aurora”, with an emphasis on beating the aggro meta, I knew what problems I was trying to face. This is the first iteration of the list.
Deck: Aurora of Karametra
Creature (6)
Planeswalker (2)
Other Spells (27)
Land (26)
4x Forest
4x Island
4x Plains
Sideboard (15)
2x Dissipate
1x Negate
If you look at the list, you’ll probably notice it has very obviously defined game plan for each stage of the game. The early game plan is simple, you need to stall. Embodiment of Spring is the most on-plan card in the deck. Not only does it advance our game plan of ramping up to 9 mana, but it offers a roadblock in the early game. There’s a lot of commonly played early drops that Embodiment can block. Some examples are Zurgo Bellstriker, Firedrinker Satyr, Kytheon, Soulfire Grand Master, elvish mystic, Nissa Vastwood Seer, tokens, etc. Since you’re often leaving up early turn 2-4 mana up, you can still build-your-own-fog by blocking a creature and sacrificing it in response. Arashin cleric is a little less subtle, but it gets the job done. Arashin cleric gains us much needed life while we accelerate into the Aurora, and it blocks early drops just as well. Both of these cards also dodge one of the scariest red aggro tech cards being played in Searing Blood.
The midgame plan is also linear. We play the full four copies of End Hostilities, which plays much nicer in our deck than the normal control deck as we are often able to play this card on turn four if we need to. Clash of Wills, Dig Through Time and Ojutai’s Command all allow us to interact with our opponent while we dig for Aurora, and explosive vegetation helps us find the mana to cast it.
The overarching game plan of the deck is a little more tricky than just living through the early turns. We need to keep the number of permanents our opponents control in check while advancing ours. Cards like Dig Through Time, Explosive Vegetation and Ojutai’s command help us create value scenarios where we get up on our opponents on cards. Countering creatures with command and wrathing their board with End Hostilities also puts permanents in their graveyard, which don’t count towards the Aurora. These little advantages are critical towards setting up a scenario where casting The Great Aurora gets us ahead.
How you cast The Great Aurora will make or break the game. Ideally at the end of their turn you can flash in a Dictate of Karametra to take full advantage of the Aurora when you cast it. Floating mana through the resolution, or pouring it into a Secure the Wastes to flood the board with permanents will make the Aurora work in your favor in a much more explosive way than in the grindy fashion mentioned earlier. Every mana you put into a Secure the Wastes will add to your permanent count and increase your advantage over your opponent.
The easiest way to take advantage of a resolved Aurora is to cast it while floating a large amount of mana with the Dictate before you do it. Between mana floating after resolution and all your lands reentering the battlefield, you should be able to assemble a board presence before your opponent can recover, whether it be with Elspeth, Ugin, or a Secure the Wastes. Getting back your radiant fountains and scrylands will allow you to generate tangible space to work with while your opponent attempts to rebuild. The game usually comes to an end at the hands of either a planeswalker, or an absurdly large Secure the Wastes. In most games Learn From the Past becomes necessary to get your win conditions back since you often have to use them in your setup for the Auroras.
I had a ton of fun running the deck at Game Day. It’s very silly on the surface even though there’s a lot of play to it. Everyone wanted to watch games and take a look through the list. I was undefeated heading into the final found of the swiss, and drew into the top eight. Unfortunately I was unable to make it past quarterfinals, where I had hit the bad end of variance and missed too many land drops. My win percentage was much higher than I had anticipated with such a silly deck.
There’s more testing to do before I can tell if the deck is truly worth investing time into, but if you enjoy taking standard to it’s limits and casting ridiculously large spells that are usually reserved for games of commander, then I think this deck is worth checking out. I hope you’ll join me as I continue working on the deck these coming weeks. This has been Ariel with Wizardden.com, and I hope you’ve enjoyed another of my crazy ideas.
Updated Aurora of Karametra:
Creature (6)
Planeswalker (2)
Other Spells (27)
Land (26)
4x Forest
4x Island
4x Plains
Sideboard (15)
3x Negate
1x Ugin, The Spirit Dragon
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