VML Season 13 Week 7 Metagame Update

It’s the final week of season 13 regular play, and many players decided to experiment! Let’s take a look at the stats leading into the playoffs.

Last Week’s Results

Last week’s winningest deck was Jeskai Convoke, with 4 players and a 75% game win rate. This deck has been bubbling around in the meta for a little while, and this was its best week yet.

Following that is the current scourge of Standard, Azorius Tempo, with 11 players and a 66.7% win rate. Domain Ramp rounds out the top three with 13 players achieving a 63.6% win rate.

Golgari Midrange had its first good week post-Duskmourn release. The deck has had a struggle since week 3, but it pulled off a strong resurgence with 7 players earning a 57.1% win rate.

Mono-White Token Control, last week’s most popular deck with 17 players, had 46.7% win rate.

Top Decks vs Top 3

Each week, I list the deck archetypes that have been the most successful against last week’s popular decks in VML. The suggested counterpicks are based only on data from VML season 13. As the season goes on and we get more data, this segment will get more accurate. (Note: Duskmourn has definitely thrown off the matchups; I’ll still do cumulative results for this segment, but in the post-season wrap-up I’ll note any big difference between pre- and post-Duskmourn.)

Mono-White Token Control

Overall Win Rate: 62%

Counterpicks: Domain Ramp (78.8% game win rate vs Mono-White Token Control, 3 matches), Jeskai Convoke (55.6% win rate, 3 matches)

I’ll also note that Jeskai Convoke and Azorius Aggro have done well vs the Boros Token Control that’s similar to the Mono-White builds (66.7% win rate and 2 matches each).

Domain Ramp

Overall Win Rate: 61.6%

Counterpicks: Azorius Control (55.6% win rate vs Domain Ramp, 3 matches), Azorius Tempo (53.3% win rate, 5 matches)

Azorius Tempo

Overall Win Rate: 62%

Counterpicks: Mono-White Token Control (55.6% win rate vs Azorius Tempo, 3 matches)

Week 7

Gruul Prowess is back with a vengeance this week, with 18 players and a 16.1% metashare. Players seem to be split now on whether or not to run Leyline of Resonance Leyline of Resonance , with many opting to run more removal cards in the mainboard instead.

Golgari Midrange is in the midst of a resurgence, with 15 players and a 13.4% metashare, though many seem to be experimenting with what exactly should go into a Golgari Midrange deck. A few are running the powerful combination of Unholy Annex // Ritual Chamber Unholy Annex Ritual Chamber
and demons like Archfiend of the Dross Archfiend of the Dross , while others are trying out Unstoppable Slasher Unstoppable Slasher (and at least one deck is running both!).

Mono-White Token Control (and Mono-W with splashes of blue or red) has 14 players and a 12.5% metashare, while Domain Ramp has 12 players and a 10.7% metashare. Our fifth deck of the week with double digit players, Dimir Midrange, has 11 players and a 9.8% metashare.

The Other category, representing decks with 2 or fewer players, has a strong showing this week, with 28 players and a 25% metashare.

Spice Corner

Each week, I showcase some of the most unique decks in the VML meta (defined as “there is only one person playing this deck” and, as much as possible, showing brews from different players). This week’s most unique decks are Clara Lehenaff’s Bant Blink, january’s Izzet Room Control, and Josh’s Esper Reanimator.

Clara’s “Toxic Lesbian Relationship (Vannifar x Atraxa)” is a deck that aims to cheat out Atraxa, Grand Unifier Atraxa, Grand Unifier and Valgavoth, Terror Eater Valgavoth, Terror Eater by playing them as face down cards then blinking them for full value. Vannifar, Evolved Enigma Vannifar, Evolved Enigma lets her play big creatures (and other 7+ mana cards) face down from hand, and Unnerving Grasp Unnerving Grasp offers a manifest dread option. There’s also the option of Make Your Own Luck Make Your Own Luck , which can plot the big cards for a later turn if there are no blink spells in-hand.

january’s “Staggered Garage // Load-Bearing Drywall” is a room-based control deck aiming to get value from the draw engine Roaring Furnace // Steaming Sauna Roaring Furnace Steaming Sauna
and the creature generation of Smoky Lounge // Misty Salon Smoky Lounge Misty Salon
. The deck runs a solid package of removal and counterspells to support the main game plan, as well as Ral, Crackling Wit Ral, Crackling Wit and Chandra, Hope's Beacon Chandra, Hope's Beacon for creature-generation, draw, and burn.

Josh’s “Tiny Reanimator” is a reanimation deck focusing on 3 mana and smaller creatures, like the ever-present Abhorrent Oculus Abhorrent Oculus , midrange staple Preacher of the Schism Preacher of the Schism , and the difficult-to-remove Enduring Innocence Enduring Innocence . In fact, there are only three sources of blue mana in this deck, so the easiest way it can get an Oculus onto the field is by reanimation. The deck has plenty of options to do so, with 11 mainboard reanimations spells (including Zoraline, Cosmos Caller Zoraline, Cosmos Caller for repeatable reanimations) and 15 self-discard/mill/surveil effects (like Tinybones Joins Up Tinybones Joins Up and Bitter Triumph Bitter Triumph ).

Full and up-to-date weekly stats can be found here. This season, all my stats articles will be posted the day after decklists are released, due to my schedule this semester making Tuesdays hellish.