Metagame: The Winning and Losing Decks of Pro Tour Aetherdrift

The Pro Tour has always been one of the most important tournaments in Magic: The Gathering. In addition to serving as a showcase for new cards in competitive formats, it serves to dictate the Metagame - many new strategies emerge, established decks are duly answered, and the list of best archetypes changes with each innovation presented in the matches.

With Aetherdrift, it was no different: in addition to the rise of Domain Overlords as the potential "new" best deck, strategies such as Azorius Control returned to the competitive scene, while established archetypes, such as Dimir Midrange and the various variants of Bounce seem to be declining, as shown by the win rate spreadsheets of mathematician Frank Karsten.

In this article, we evaluate the performance of the main archetypes of Pro Tour Aetherdrift and highlight the main winners and losers of the tournament, as well as which decks players should keep an eye on in the coming weeks!

Domain Overlords

Domain Overlords was the standout deck of Pro Tour Aetherdrift. Despite having been performing consistently in Challenges for months, the variant that mixes Zur, Eternal Schemer with the Duskmourn Overlords cycle has gained Ride’s End as a cheap and efficient removal that interacts with Up The Beanstalk.

Being the most present archetype in the Top 8, starring in a semifinal and the finals, in addition to having a winrate of 55%, it is likely to become the deck to beat in the coming weeks - and although the statistics say that it is disadvantaged against Gruul Mice and Mono Red Aggro, the results of the Top 8 show that it is possible to adapt well to these matches without giving up victories in the others.

Azorius Control

All Azorius Control needed to get back into the Metagame was an efficient source of selection and card advantage, and Stock Up, which has shown results even in Modern and Legacy, has given the archetype the tools to return to the Metagame with a bang, having the highest win rate among the archetypes with a relevant Metagame share.

The matchup against Domain looks slightly unfavorable based on the numbers, but the sample size (3-4) is not clear enough to give a solid result. Outside of that, every game Azorius Control has faced at the Pro Tour has been relatively favorable or average for the archetype, making it a potential new contender.

Azorius Omniscience

In terms of sample size and win percentage, I believe that Azorius Omniscience is the true winner of this Pro Tour in raw numbers, and one of the reasons is the fact that it is favored against Domain Overlords and Jeskai Convoke to the detriment of the matchup against Mono Red and Gruul, but with the advantage that the other bad matchups it has in the current Metagame are from archetypes that performed poorly in the tournament and should be declining in the coming weeks.

This is a good time for players in Standard, since the two archetypes with the best raw win rate in the Pro Tour are in this color combination, and it is up to the player to choose whether they prefer a more solid matchup against Aggro, where Azorius Control excels, or against Domain, where Omniscience is the best option.

Jeskai Convoke

Jeskai Convoke is in a similar position to Azorius Control, but with less impressive numbers: except for the Domain match, it had a positive rate against most relevant decks in the format, while the decks it performed worse against are archetypes that should decline in the coming weeks.

It is worth mentioning that it had no games against Azorius Control in the Pro Tour, and technically the matchup is unfavorable for Convoke, since Azorius has multiple copies of Temporary Lockdown, Day of Judgment and Beza, the Bounding Spring in the maindeck.

Mono Red Aggro

Mono Red Aggro outperformed Gruul Mice in aggregate matchups, while a significant portion of the decks it lost to are strategies that are expected to decline by April, except for two archetypes: Jeskai Oculus and Azorius Control - if either of these grows too much, its position in the Metagame could be seriously compromised.

Dimir Midrange

How the mighty have fallen. Once the best deck in the format, Dimir Midrange had the worst win rate of the tournament among the most played archetypes and certainly made the list of worst win rate conversion of an archetype in Pro Tour history.

The message is clear: Dimir Midrange, like the other traditional variants, aretoo fair for today's Standard, and with Domain - a natural predator of Midranges - being the best deck, there are few reasons left to try playing it until the release of Tarkir Dragonstorm brings a new Metagame.

Golgari Midrange

Golgari Midrange didn't do as badly as Dimir, but the overall result of the archetype is essentially the same: its strategy is too fair for today's Standard Metagame, and even in the games where it excelled, the new variant with Bushwhack and Phyrexian Obliterator proved more efficient.

Bounce (Esper Pixie, Esper Paragon, Dimir Bounce)

Except for the Dimir version, the Bounce variants didn't do as badly as expected for a Metagame with all the cards and archetypes to deal with it, but their matchup against most of the winners of this Pro Tour is very unfavorable, and regardless of the version, dealing with the constant ETBs of Domain or a Temporary Lockdown set in the Azorius Control maindeck means having to rework the entire archetype.

Many Bounce players should migrate to the Orzhov version in the coming weeks, which had the highest win rate of the event.

Selesnya Cage

The math is simple: Selesnya Cage was born to respond to Bounce decks. If Bounce is in decline, it will get considerably worse, and added to the horrendous matchup against Domain, it finds itself in a very disadvantaged position in the coming weeks.

Gruul Leyline

Despite Lucas Duchow's results and the fact that he reached the Top 8 of the Pro Tour, Gruul Leyline remains less consistent and with worse results than Gruul Mice or Mono Red Aggro, and given the situations we witnessed in Duchow's matches in the Top 8, it is clear that the archetype is still inconsistent and relies too much on luck to be a rising competitor.

Domain Overlords

Domain Overlords was the standout deck of the Pro Tour, winning the tournament, and was already a popular strategy in Challenges before the event, so it's likely to grow in the coming weeks, and the next Metagame dilemma will revolve around what the best counter to it is.

Azorius Control

Azorius Control has countless fans and enthusiasts in Magic: The Gathering and has been absent from the current Standard season so far. With Stock Up and the best win rate of the most represented decks, players have a good reason to try the archetype in MTGArena ranked play, Magic Online, and RCQs.

Golgari Mill

Zevin Faust made it to the Top 8 of his first Pro Tour using a relatively unknown deck in the Metagame, with a theme that many players enjoy, and with the consistency and support that only Up the Beanstalk can provide.

All of these factors helped put Golgari Mill on the radar for some time. Additionally, this deck is very cheap to craft in Magic Arena compared to other archetypes, which should help keep its popularity high in ranked play.

Golgari Obliterator

Golgari Obliterator runs basically the same core as Golgari Midrange, but with the “combo” between Phyrexian Obliterator and Bushwhack to ruin the opponent's board, giving it a layer of “unfairness” that many decks need to compete in Standard today.

It is likely that many Midrange players will opt for this variant in the coming weeks over the more traditional versions.

Orzhov Pixie

Despite the low sample size, Orzhov Pixie was the archetype with the highest win rate at Pro Tour Aetherdrift, and given the decline of more traditional versions of Bounce, it is very likely that players will experiment with variants like this, more oriented towards long games, in the coming weeks.

Bant Gearhulk

Brightglass Gearhulk was one of the biggest additions to Standard from Aetherdrift, and this deck makes the most of it by mixing it with cards like Mockingbird, Warden of the Inner Sky and a dozen quality one-drops, and there's plenty of room for growth and evolution in this archetype in the coming weeks.

Izzet Repurposing Bay

Repurposing Bay and Radiant Lotus were two of the most hyped cards from Aetherdrift during the preview season, and they found their way into Standard in a deck focused on using the absurd amount of mana generated by the Lotus for a Boommobile whose Exhaust ability deals lethal damage to the opponent.

This deck has potential and the Metagame isn't exactly ready to handle it today, making it a viable option for competitive events or ranked play in the coming weeks.

That's all for today!

If you have any questions, feel free to leave a comment!

Thanks for reading!