Pilfering Pioneer with Theros: Beyond Death

Hello internet, my name is Blue, and today I thought I’d finally do an article over my namesake. I’ve yet to do an article over a blue deck, so I’m changing that right now. With Theros: Beyond Death spoilers wrapped up, I’m super excited to get to work with the new cards, and I’m completely blown away by the additions to what I’m presenting you with. So let’s get into it, shall we?

So as you may or may not have guessed, I’m going over mono-blue devotion in Pioneer today, but it’s not the most traditional build. Most builds I’ve noticed are really heavy on counters and try to go over the top with a small creature enchanted by Curious Obsession. This build, however, I really wanted to try and focus on the new cards from Theros; most notably, Thassa’s Oracle. Joining it are Thassa, Deep-Dwelling herself and Threnody Singer.

One-Drops

The easiest way to begin talking about this deck is to go up the curve. In the 1-drop slot, I had four different options to choose from, and all were really close, but I ended on Spectral Sailor for the late game mana-sink and Mausoleum Wanderer for the early game protection it provides. The other choices were Judge’s Familiar and Siren Stormtamer. Tamer almost made the cut, but it can’t counter a T1 Thoughtsieze on the play, where Wanderer can, so it barely snuck it out and Familiar would’ve been the choice for budget purposes but Sailor is a spirit, so there’s the very fringe upside presented in Wanderer with Sailor also in the deck. There are also two copies of Rapid Hybridization per suggestions on Facebook. I didn’t think of it as a reasonable card in this format, but I think it’s at least worth testing.

Two-Drops

In the 2-drops, I had several options as well, but I landed on the two aforementioned Thassa’s Oracle and Threnody Singer, as well as the most obvious choice, Merfolk Trickster. I considered Merfolk Harbinger, but through the opinions of others, I came to the conclusion that it’s too slow and overcosted when casting with flash and it doesn’t do enough on its own as a 2-drop. Two of my choices here are indeed new cards from Theros so I chose them because I want to try them out and I believe they have a good potential to be incredibly powerful cards. Thassa’s Oracle allows for early game card filtering and if you get your devotion high enough, it can, in theory, win the game on the spot. As for the Siren, I believe as a 1/3 flying body that can shrink down opposing creatures during combat, it can make attacks bad for the opponent. The same is true for Trickster, except instead of shrinking the creature, it takes away its abilities. This means a bunch of small creatures can block to kill a Questing Beast or allow us to tap down a Ghalta, Primal Hunger for a turn.

Three-Drops

Next up in the 3-drop slot, there were, again, a TON of choices, and I’m still not confident that I have the correct ones, but I decided to go with Tempest Djinn, Brazen Borrower, Thassa, God of the Sea, and Gadwick, the Wizened. Djinn has the potential to get massive with 19 out of our 22 lands being islands, I’m confident it will be a powerhouse. Obviously it will be a target, but that’s more removal not going at our later threats, so I’m happy with it. Brazen Borrower doesn’t even need an introduction. It has very quickly become one of the best cards from Throne of Eldraine and I’m not surprised. It’s an incredibly powerful card. Sadly though, 4 copies are over $100 in paper and almost $150 tix on Magic Online, so they are without a doubt the bulk of the price tag on the deck. If you want, you’re welcome to play with something else, but I wouldn’t recommend playing any version of mono-blue in pioneer without them. They are more than worth the investment. Next, Thassa, God of the Sea is an undercosted, powerful card that provides card filtering at your upkeep and can allow you to get in with a huge Tempest Djinn or either Thassa as they’re both pretty big creatures for their mana cost. lastly, in the threes, a single Gadwick, the Wizened almost didn’t make the cut, but I felt like I wanted a reason to play Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx in the lands so he’s here to allow us to refill our hand. Besides that, the ability to tap down attackers or blockers can be a huge advantage and help keep us alive or close out the game.

Four-Drops

Finally at the top of the curve for the creatures, two very simple cards in the 4-drop slot. First, Thassa, Deep-Dwelling to allow us to get even more value out of some of the previous cards and it serves a similar purpose as Gadwick by allowing us to tap down opposing creatures. Not only that, but it is in itself a massive creature. For the very last of the creatures, you all knew it was here, Master of Waves is the entire reason to play this deck. With a good curve, a single Master on T4 can pump out seven tokens, in addition to itself for a total of eight 2/1 bodies for only four mana. Even more incredible, Protection from Red means Master is just an auto-win against any red-based deck in the format since it can block infinitely and attack unimpeded. Just don’t get too low on life beforehand.

Lands

The mana base is super simple. 19 Islands, 2 Caslte Vantress, and 1 Nykthos Shrine to Nyx. If you decide not to play with Gadwick, I wouldn’t play Nykthos. It serves no purpose since we only need it for a massive X on Gadwick and can make our mana bad with so many blue symbols necessary to cast our cards.

Sideboard

Lastly, let’s discuss the sideboard. For control and planeswalker-heavy decks, there are three copies of Negate, two copies of Mystical Dispute, and two copies of Sorcerous Spyglass. to interact with the graveyard based decks like Arclight Pheonix and dredgeless Dredge, there are two copies of Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver. For green and red decks, there is one copy of Aether Gust and two copies of Tidebinder Mage. In addition to that for other aggro decks, one Reality Shift and two Jace, Architect of Thought. I don’t think this sideboard is perfect, but I do think it has a good way of fighting several different decks. Below is the full decklist with paper prices as of this article courtesy of MTGGoldfish. Clicking the image will open the deck in a separate tab.

Wrap-Up

This deck isn’t the most traditional and I don’t believe I’m done with it, especially with zero tests done with the new cards. Hopefully, when Theros is released, I’ll get to play around with it a bit and see if the new cards are actually worth adding to the deck or not. If they aren’t, I’ll just switch over to a more traditional mono-blue devotion deck. Is there anything I missed? Do you think there should be something here that I didn’t include or failed to mention? Let me know in the comments below or on Twitter @TwoBlueUntapped or @MTGOracle. That’s it from me today. This is Blue, signing out!