[Top 10] Best MTG Decks That Wreck Hard Right Now

[Top 10] Best MTG Decks That Wreck Hard (April 2021)
Updated:
30 Jun 2021

Now that we are past the Kaldheim experimentation phase, we can now have a pretty stable metagame in Standard. The usual mono-colored decks are still here but the decklists have been altered. There are a lot of familiar decks in here but you may also see some surprise decks that are making a comeback to the Standard meta. 

10. White Weenie

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What’s good about this deck?

  • Strength in numbers is a really powerful term as it can overwhelm the board really quickly
  • In this mono-white deck, cheap creatures can easily deal loads of damage to the opponent
    • Since you are using small creatures, giving them indestructibility is key especially when blocking
  • Cards like Seasoned Hallowblade are really powerful as they can deal with many different creatures and still stay on the board

How to play this deck effectively

  • As much as possible, keep dropping your creatures on the board
  • This can help you deal immense pressure on the opponent and make them commit to something that they don’t really want to do
  • Pick your battles. You can launch an overwhelming attack but be careful of counterplay

Decklist

  • 1 Lurrus of the Dream-Den
  • 2 Halvar, God of Battle
  • 2 Reidane, God of the Worthy
  • 2 Legion Angel
  • 4 Skyclave Apparition
  • 4 Luminarch Aspirant
  • 4 Seasoned Hallowblade
  • 4 Selfless Savior
  • 4 Alseid of Life’s Bounty
  • 4 Giant Killer
  • 3 Maul of the Skyclaves
  • 2 Shadowspear
  • 20 Snow-Covered Plains
  • 4 Faceless Haven

9. Mono-Blue Snow

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What’s good about this deck?

  • With the re-introduction of Snow permanents in the Standard meta, mono-blue is one of the colors that greatly benefitted from it
  • Mono-blue has been out of the scene for quite some time now and its comeback is pretty great
    • The synergy of snow permanents is not that strong on paper. However, when you actually play them, they pack a really strong punch

How to play this deck effectively

  • Similar to the powerful mono-blue tempo deck before, the key here is to string together decent turns
  • The cards alone are not that very dynamic so you need to build upon your previous turns
  • You can establish the board easily since the spells are cheap and then transition to a mid-game where you respond actively to your opponent’s moves

Decklist

  • 4 Ascendant Spirit
  • 4 Brazen Borrower
  • 3 Gadwick, the Wizened
  • 3 Cosmos Charger
  • 2 Into the Roil
  • 1 Negate
  • 3 Behold the Multiverse
  • 4 Saw It Coming
  • 3 Essence Scatter
  • 4 Alrund’s Epiphany
  • 4 Shark Typhoon
  • 21 Snow-Covered Island
  • 4 Faceless Haven

8. Dimir Control

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What’s good about this deck?

  • This deck offers a lot of options for the removal of the opponent’s threats
    • Dimir Control is abundant on spot removal as well as board wipes making it  a good anti-creature/anti-aggro deck
  • You have cards that can quickly turn the tide in your favor
    • Midnight Clock can give you a lifeline against mill decks, allowing you to negate their mill strategy

How to play this deck effectively

  • Know which cards to counter or remove depending on their relative strength in the game
  • Since you have a bunch of counterspells, you can counter almost every non-creature spell they play
  • Against creature-heavy decks, you need to assess which creatures are more powerful as the game progresses so that you know who to target with your removals

Decklist

  • 2 Murderous Rider
  • 2 Midnight Clock
  • 1 Cling to Dust
  • 1 Eliminate
  • 1 Soul Shatter
  • 2 Negate
  • 3 Heartless Act
  • 2 Graven Lore
  • 4 Saw It Coming
  • 4 Behold the Multiverse
  • 2 Shadows’ Verdict
  • 2 Bloodchief’s Thirst
  • 2 Extinction Event
  • 4 Shark Typhoon
  • 2 Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
  • 2 Crawling Barrens
  • 1 Castle Vantress
  • 4 Temple of Deceit
  • 4 Clearwater Pathway
  • 4 Fabled Passage
  • 6 Snow-Covered Swamp
  • 5 Snow-Covered Island

7. Mono-Green

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What’s good about this deck?

  • This deck is pretty flexible in terms of strategy depending on your opening hand
    • You can play this a ramp deck to prepare for very dynamic turns or you can play this as a tempo deck, ensuring that you build upon your previous turns

How to play this deck effectively

  • The first step in playing this deck effectively is knowing if you have a ramp draw or a tempo draw. Knowing how to distinguish which is which can help you tune your game plan to what you have
    • If your early plays involve Tangled Florahedron, Castle Garenbrig, and Lovestruck Beast then you can play for a more dynamic endgame
    • If you have a good curve on your hand then make sure that you maximize your mana every turn 

Decklist

  • 2 Elder Gargaroth
  • 2 Scavenging Ooze
  • 2 Questing Beast
  • 3 Yorvo, Lord of Garenbrig
  • 3 Tangled Florahedron
  • 4 Kazandu Mammoth
  • 4 Lovestruck Beast
  • 4 Stonecoil Serpent
  • 4 Gemrazer
  • 2 Blizzard Brawl
  • 3 The Great Henge
  • 2 In Search of Greatness
  • 2 Vivien, Monster’s Advocate
  • 4 Castle Garenbrig
  • 2 Faceless Haven
  • 16 Snow-Covered Forest

6. Four-color Cycling

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What’s good about this deck?

  • You can easily gain card advantage while padding up your Cycling cards
    • Card advantage is crucial in decks like this as you need to have a dynamic turn every turn
  • This deck is no longer the one-trick pony that it once was
    • With the addition of cards like Improbable Alliance, you can have a more versatile deck that does not only rely on a single win condition

How to play this deck effectively

  • Just like the earlier iteration of cycling, you just need to cycle your cards at the opponent’s end step to prevent them from hitting you with discard shenanigans
  • Play your creatures if you really need to
    • Getting at least two creatures on the board that benefit from cycling is already enough as you can already deal a lot of pressure with them

Decklist

  • 3 Drannith Healer
  • 4 Drannith Stinger
  • 4 Flourishing Fox
  • 4 Valiant Rescuer
  • 2 Shredded Sails
  • 4 Startling Development
  • 4 Zenith Flare
  • 3 Boon of the Wish-Giver
  • 3 Memory Leak
  • 4 Go for Blood
  • 3 Footfall Crater
  • 3 Improbable Alliance
  • 3 Ragrin Triome
  • 1 Clearwater Pathway
  • 1 Blightstep Pathway
  • 2 Brightclimb Pathway
  • 4 Riverglide Pathway
  • 4 Needleverge Pathway
  • 4 Hengegate Pathway

5. Adventures

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What’s good about this deck?

  • This deck caters to a lot of aspects that you would want in a Standard deck
    • It can play ramp and aggro but can sustain threats even up to the later stages of the game
  • The creatures also have a very high synergy with the other cards in the deck so you get a feel of one complete deck

How to play this deck effectively

  • Depending on your opening hand, you can play this deck a multitude of ways
    • Use the early game to gain early advantage that you can keep up to the mid to late stage
  • Deal early damage to the opponent to force removals and board wipes
    • You can easily rebuild your board after a removal spell or board wipe so you won't have a lot to worry about

Decklist

  • 3 Toski, Bearer of Secrets
  • 4 Lovestruck Beast
  • 4 Edgewall Innkeeper
  • 4 Clarion Spirit
  • 4 Giant Killer
  • 4 Bonecrusher Giant
  • 4 Jaspera Sentinel
  • 4 Embercleave
  • 3 Adventurous Impulse
  • 3 Showdown of the Skalds
  • 4 Fabled Passage
  • 4 Cragdrown Pathway
  • 4 Needleverge Pathway
  • 4 Brachloft Pathway
  • 4 Forest
  • 2 Mountain
  • 1 Plains

4. Rakdos Midrange

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What’s good about this deck?

  • The combination of red and black in a deck almost always means that it is an aggro deck
  • You can play this deck aggressively in the early parts of the game but this deck peaks at the midgame

How to play this deck effectively

  • Use the early stage of the game to pressure your opponent 
    • Developing your board state while also pressuring the opponent to commit to a different strategy to stop your early pressure is the key to utilizing this deck effectively
  • Use your removal spells
    • Once you have your board state set up, you can start targeting the opponent’s big threats using your removal spells
    • This can help pave the way for more dynamic turns on your end which almost always guarantees victory

Decklist

  • 4 Kroxa, Titan of Death’s Hunger
  • 2 Valki, God of Lies
  • 4 Elderfang Disciple
  • 4 Acquisitions Expert
  • 3 Magmatic Channeler
  • 2 Mire Triton
  • 1 Pharika’s Libation
  • 1 Kazuul’s Fury
  • 2 Hagra Mauling
  • 3 Village Rites
  • 3 Heartless Act
  • 2 Bloodchief’s Thirst
  • 4 Inscription of Ruin
  • 1 Mire’s Grasp
  • 4 Fabled Passage
  • 1 Castle Locthwain
  • 4 Temple of Malice
  • 4 Blightstep Pathway
  • 6 Swamp
  • 5 Mountain

3. Rakdos Sacrifice

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What’s good about this deck?

  • This deck no longer needs any introduction as it is still one of the most powerful decks since it entered Standard
  • It singlehandedly dismantled multiple meta decks with its very unique gameplay

How to play this deck effectively

  • Without the Cat-Oven combo, your gameplay shifts to a more control-type deck
  • The sacrifice mechanic of this deck applies to your opponent more than it applies to you
    • If you can’t deal with the opponent’s threats through removal or Bonecrusher Giant, then let them sacrifice it

Decklist

  • 2 Rankle, Master of Pranks
  • 3 Immersturm Predator
  • 3 Woe Strider
  • 4 Bonecrusher Giant
  • 4 Kroxa, Titan of Death’s Hunger
  • 4 Mire Triton
  • 3 Village Rites
  • 2 Kazuul’s Fury
  • 4 Claim the Firstborn
  • 4 Tymaret Calls the Dead
  • 3 The Akroan War
  • 4 Fabled Passage
  • 1 Castle Locthwain
  • 4 Temple of Malice
  • 4 Blightstep Pathway
  • 5 Mountain
  • 6 Swamp

2. Mono-Red Aggro

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What’s good about this deck?

  • You don’t really need to strategize deeply when using this deck
  • If you want a quick and fun match, you can just whip out this mono-red aggro and just dominate the opponent
    • It is really quick with a lot of cards that can sustain your aggro even until the later stages of the game

How to play this deck effectively

  • There’s not much to think about when playing this deck since it relies mostly on turning your creatures sideways
  • One tip, though, is that as much as possible, never use your Torbran as a creature. Don’t use it for attacks or blocks unless completely necessary

Decklist

  • 4 Anax, Hardened in the Forge
  • 3 Torbran, Thane of Red Fell
  • 4 Robber of the Rich
  • 4 Bonecrusher Giant
  • 4 Fervent Champion
  • 4 Fireblade Charger
  • 2 Rimrock Knight
  • 1 Phoenix of Ash
  • 2 Dragonkin Berserker
  • 4 Embercleave
  • 4 Frost Bite
  • 4 Faceless Haven
  • 1 Castle Embereth
  • 19 Snow-Covered Mountains

1. Sultai Ultimatum

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What’s good about this deck?

  • With the Yorion companion, you get incentivized to play all the good stuff in Sultai
    • Since there are a lot of powerful cards in this color combination, throwing in a Yorion makes it a lot more powerful
  • It is a deck that captures multiple strategies into one
    • You have a lot of ramp in this deck, you also have a bunch of counterspells and card advantage engines, and most importantly, you have huge threats

How to play this deck effectively

  • The early stages of the game are dedicated to ramping and controlling the board of the opponent
  • If you get over the early game by reducing the potential threat that the opponent can bring, then you already have a good chance of dominating in the late game

Decklist

Yorion, Sky Nomad - companion

  • 1 Valki, God of Lies
  • 4 Mazemind Tome
  • 4 Heartless Act
  • 2 Jwari Disruption
  • 1 Erebos’s Intervention
  • 1 Mystical Dispute
  • 2 Disdainful Stroke
  • 1 Eliminate
  • 2 Extinction Event
  • 2 Alrund’s Epiphany
  • 2 Shadow’s Verdict
  • 3 Sea Gate Restoration
  • 4 Cultivate
  • 4 Emergent Ultimatum
  • 2 Shark Typhoon
  • 1 Kiora Bests the Sea God
  • 2 Elspeth’s Nightmare
  • 4 Binding the Old Gods
  • 4 Wolfwillow Haven
  • 4 Omen of the Sea
  • 4 Zagoth Triome
  • 2 Ketria Triome
  • 4 Fabled Passage
  • 4 Barkchannel Pathway
  • 4 Darkbore Pathway
  • 4 Clearwater Pathway
  • 3 Swamp
  • 3 Forest
  • 2 Island
 

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