1 Intro

I want to preface this primer by giving you the disclaimer that this article is not about the Mox Opal wizards deck, if you came here looking for that. I also want to clear up a big misconception about this deck. It is not a midrange deck, and it is definitely not a tempo deck. It might look like that at first, playing cards like Tamiyo, Inquisitive Student // Tamiyo, Seasoned Scholar , Lightning Bolt and Counterspell that are generally associated with Delver-like strategies, and its certainly possible to build a tempo deck around Flame of Anor , but this deck (or at least my version) is a control deck, more similar to Madcap Experiment , Through the Breach or Blue Moon decks of old. In most matchups, we want to trade a lot and force a small game, in which we are favored because we only play 20 lands and a lot of great topdecks like Thundertrap Trainer , Snapcaster Mage , Flame of Anor and Expressive Iteration , allowing us to outgrind our opponent.

2 Decklist & Card Choices

2.1 Maindeck:

• Flame of Anor : This is the key card of the deck, and its easy to see why. As long as you control a wizard, this is at least a 2 for one if not better. The whole deck is built around maximizing this cards value.
• Tamiyo, Inquisitive Student // Tamiyo, Seasoned Scholar : Tamiyo is a great value engine that also synergizes very well with Flame of Anor . Only costing 1 mana allows us to play her early while holding up interaction.
• Thundertrap Trainer and Snapcaster Mage : The other wizards in our deck. Trainer can come down early and enable Flare of Denial or be cast for 6 mana late to outvalue our opponent. Similarly, Snappy can be a blocker + removal spell turn 3, a second Counterspell midgame or a 4 for 1 with Flame of Anor late. Both also generate their value on etb but are good on the battlefield because of Flame and Flare, so your opponent will have to make the decision of using removal they would want for Tamiyo or Drake on 1/2s and 2/1s or giving you the value of keeping them on the battlefield.
• Lightning Bolt and Galvanic Discharge are both premium removal and one of the main draws of the deck. Having access to 7 1 mana removal spells is key in a format lead by Energy and Prowess
• Tune the Narrative : This cant enables Galvanic Discharge to hit bigger threats like Overlord of the Balemurk and Territorial Kavu while not being a completely dead cards against combo decks. It can also help flip a Tamiyo if needed.
• Preordain is the glue of the deck. Often times you need to hit your landdrops or find specific answers. Preordain does all of that while still allowing you to keep open mana.
• Expressive Iteration is a great topdeck late and can search for removal early. However it's a bit clunky early so we only play 1.
• Sink into Stupor // Soporific Springs is a flexible Maindeck answer to a lot of threats we struggle to deal with otherwise, like Emrakul, the Promised End
• Counterspell , Spell Snare , Flare of Denial and Invert Polarity are your counterspell suite. Spell Snare is very well postioned in the current meta since it answers key cards from almost all top decks like Ajani, Nacatl Pariah // Ajani, Nacatl Avenger , Psychic Frog , Cori-Steel Cutter or Basking Broodscale . Invert Polarity is a Cancel at worst and wins the game on the spot at best. Since we play a lot of card selection we can play one-offs like this more easily, which also make Snapcaster Mage better.
• Crackling Drake with Arena of Glory is our wincondition. This "combo" gives the deck inevitability, which gives us the freedom of using all of your ressources on stopping our opponents gameplan. Its the most compact wincon the archetype offers, and Drake is also a decent draw mid-late by itself.

2.2 Sideboard:

• Jace, the Mind Sculptor provides an excellent answer to a resolved Ketramose, the New Dawn , Psychic Frog , Harbinger of the Seas and Murktide Regent , which makes him a great tool against Blink and Murktide decks. Both of them struggle to remove planeswalkers and their key threats are weak to his -1.
• Flashfires : This card is great against Boros and Zoo by default, since it hits most of their lands (or all if your opponent has Leyline of the Guildpact on the battlefield) making it a one-sided Armageddon . This also has the additional upside of shutting of both decks Phlage, Titan of Fire's Fury lategame plan.
• Fire Magic gives us a clean answer to Ocelot Pride that still allows us to keep up spell snare for Ajani, Nacatl Pariah // Ajani, Nacatl Avenger or Goblin Bombardment . It's another 1 mana answer to Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer and can clear the whole board for 3 mana against energy or prowess.
• Blood Moon : While it definitely got nerfed by the saga changes, this card can still be excellent against Broodscale, Titan and Zoo.
• Consign to Memory , Summary Dismissal and Obsidian Charmaw : These are all concessions to our worst matchup, Eldrazi Ramp. Consign lets us interact with their cast triggers and counters their threats for little mana. Dismissal over the fourth consign might seem bad at first, but it gives us an out to Cavern of Souls into Emrakul, the Promised End . Charmaw is probably the most important card for the matchup, since he slows our opponent down, can answer Cavern and gives us pressure, which is something we lack in the Matchup
• Ghost Vacuum gives us a cheap answer to Phlage, Titan of Fire's Fury , Unearth and a lot of other graveyard based threats/engines.
• Engineered Explosives isn't particulary amazing in any matchup, but good in most. It can answer Ajani, Nacatl Pariah // Ajani, Nacatl Avenger + Goblin Bombardment , Psychic Frog and Orcish Bowmasters , Amulet of Vigor , Construct's from Urza's Saga and much more.

3 Matchups and Sideboarding

Boros Energy:

SB Plan

+ 2 Flashfires , 1 Fire Magic , 1 Ghost Vacuum , 1 Engineered Explosives , 2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

- 1 Thundertrap Trainer , 1 Preordain , 1 Tune the Narrative , 2 Flare of Denial , 1 Invert Polarity , 1 Crackling Drake

Gameplan

The matchup against Energy is split into two parts, the earlygame and the mid-lategame. The first part starts on turn 1 and generally lasts to turn 3 or 4, after which the second part starts. Part 1 is all about mana. Energys early threats are all very mana efficient and have the ability to snowball. We, especially on the draw, generally don't have enough mana to answer all of their threats immediatly. This means the energy player will generally leave the earlygame with some kind of resource advantage, and each players objective during the early game is to maximize/minimize that advantage.

There are 3 types of resources fought over early: Our lifetotal, the number of creatures they control, and Goblin Bombardment . We can't preserve all of these resources, so we have to figure out which resources (or lack thereoff) will be most relevant in the mid-lategame. For example, if we have Flashfires in Hand, we might let Goblin Bombardment and Phlage, Titan of Fire's Fury (not escaped) resolve since we now only care about keeping their board clear till we can destroy all of their lands.

The energy player can often force Bombardment otp since we can't answer both Bombardement and a t1 Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer (or Ocelot Pride preboard), but doing so makes it a lot easier for us to keep their board clean, since they take their whole second turn off.

The mid-lategame is mostly about our opponent trying to close out the game by abusing the value advantage they gained. Often times this happens through Phlage, which they can escape 2-3 times, forcing us to still have enough interaction in hand to answer him. Preboard this means we should to be conservative with our counterspells early if possible, postboard we Ghost Vacuum and especially Flashfires give us much better answers. Since we will already be at a medium-low lifetotal when we get to the mid-lategame and the Boros deck has a lot of strong draws, we are incentivized to close the game quickly. This means we want to get Crackling Drake and Jace, the Mind Sculptor online as fast as possible or land a Flashfires early. Keep in mind that you should uptick Jace when you play him if possible to dodge Phlage, Titan of Fire's Fury and Galvanic Discharge . Another relevant thing to know is that the 0 ability from Ajani, Nacatl Pariah // Ajani, Nacatl Avenger creates a reflexive trigger after creating the 2/1 Token. This gives us an opportunity to use Fire Magic to kill their board including the new token before we would take damage.

Eldrazi Ramp

SB Plan

+ 3 Consign to Memory , 1 Summary Dismissal , 3 Obsidian Charmaw , 1 Blood Moon

- 1 Thundertrap Trainer , 1 Preordain , 1Expressive Iteration , 4 Galvanic Discharge , 1 Tune the Narrative

Gameplan

This matchup is very different from most of our other matchups, since we don't actually have inevitability. The Eldrazi deck just has bigger threats than Crackling Drake like Emrakul, the Promised End and cast triggers we can't interact with .This means, instead of focussing on "how not to lose", we actually have to be proactive and focus on "how to win". Unfortunately, this is quite difficult for the deck, since we don't have any relevant pressure and our counterspells don't do much. Preboard we are very far behind, we generally only win games where we can play multiple "threats" (Tamiyo, Ambush Viper, Drake t4) early, counter most of their spells and they don't draw more gas.

Fortunately postboard we get a lot more tools. The most important one is Obsidian Charmaw , since it gives us early pressure while also slowing down our opponents. The second key piece is Consign to Memory since it allows us to interact with their cast triggers. Summary Dismissal is essentially another copy of Consign that gives us an out to an Emrakul cast of Cavern of Souls . I will mostly write about this matchup postboard, since we just lose to a ton of hands game 1 no matter what we do, while we can (and have to) win both postboard games.

This matchup is all about time. We want to buy as much time as possible before the eldrazi deck gets their engine going. Countering a Talisman or Utopia Sprawl is essentially the same as a Stone Rain , so its completely fine to use a counterspell for that. The most important fight of the game is about their 4 mana spell. Writhing Chrysalis and Sowing Mycospawn both set them up for a 7 mana play next turn, and Sowing Mycospawn can even search for Cavern of Souls . Its crucial for us to delay/counter this play as much as possible. This can even mean bolting a spawn made from Malevolent Rumble . Since countering the cast trigger from these creatures is so crucial, we generally don't want to use Consign to Memory on a Talisman early, unlike Counterspell or Spell Snare .

Succesfully emerging from the earlygame means we have reached a game point where we have some amount of pressure in play (ideally an Obsidian Charmaw ), while our opponent is still around 3-4 mana without too many resources left. Our focus now shifts towards protecting our threat from removal like Kozilek's Command and making sure they don't resolve lategame haymakers like Emrakul, the Promised End . Since we also wont be left with too many resources, this means our counterspells now become more important and we often can't afford to use them on cards like Utopia Sprawl anymore. We should also make sure to always know how much mana they are short of Emrakul. We might want to hold a Lightning Bolt in hand to finish them off sooner, but if they are only 1 mana short of Emrakul, maybe we should use it on an Eldrazi spawn instead.

Prowess

SB Plan

+ 1 Fire Magic , 1 Engineered Explosives

- 2 Flare of Denial

Gameplan

Prowess has 3 gameplans that we need to be able to answer:

• 1: an aggressive draw that can kill us turn 3 or 4
• 2: a Cori-Steel Cutter draw where they outgrind us with monk tokens.
• 3: a grindy game where they plot multiple Slickshot Show-Off to put pressure on us and then cast Iterations till they have enough resources to force our hand.

We can handle an aggressive draw quite well since we play a lot of removal, but we have to respect Mutagenic Growth . This can mean holding off on using a removal spell till post combat, so we don't get completely blown out. If they have multiple threats, 2 Galvanic Discharge can be a great answer too. Let's say our opponent has 2 Slickshot Show-Off and casts Violent Urge targeting one of them. In response we cast Galvanic Discharge on it, to which they respond with Mutagenic Growth . We can now let growth resolve and with Discharge still on the stack cast our second one targeting the other Slickshot. Then we spend 2 energy to kill it, leaving us with 1 energy. We let the second Discharge resolve, going up to 4 energy which allows us to kill the Slickshot through the Mutagenic Growth . Tune the Narrative can do the same. Having Galvanic Discharge and/or Lightning Bolt in our opening hand is really important to handle this gameplan.

On Paper we can also answer Cori-Steel Cutter quite well since we have good answers in Spell Snare and Flame of Anor , but if we take too long to find them, it will have already generated too much value. This means having one of them in our starting hand (or a Counterspell on the play) is crucial.

The third gameplan wouldn't be that difficult to answer on itself, because our deck is full of card advantage, but since we have to make mulligan decisions with scenario 1 and 2 in mind, its often quite effective. Flame of Anor is our best card here since we won't be punished for keeping up mana, but keep in mind that you might need it to answer Cutter (or Abhorrent Oculus postboard) later. We should counter Expressive Iteration if we can since it essentially answers two of their cards. Snapcaster Mage and Tamiyo are also great against this gameplan since they force cards out of their hand/generate card advantage. If our opponent plays this plan we want to focus on not falling behind/getting ahead on cards without opening us up for a lethal Slickshot attack.

Zoo

SB Plan

+ 2 Flashfires , 1 Blood Moon , 3 Consign to Memory , 1 Ghost Vacuum

- 1 Thundertrap Trainer , 2 Preordain , 1 Expressive Iteration , 3 Spell Snare

Gameplan

The Zoo matchup really depends on whether or not they start with Leyline of the Guildpact . If they don't have it, we are favored as long as we don't get snowballed by a turn 1 Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer . Flame of Anor lines up really well against their threats, and Counterspell is great if your opponent plays one threat per turn on average. Our gameplan should focus on removing their threats and then pulling ahead when they're out of gas.

If they have the Leyline, we have to make sure Scion of Draco doesnt resolve since our only out to resolved Leyline + Scion is Sink into Stupor // Soporific Springs (Or a stalemate through Crackling Drake and Tamiyos +2). This means we have to be more conservative with our Counterspells and also places a lot more value on Consign to Memory in our opening hand, since its our only answer to a turn 2 Scion if we are on the draw. However, they won't always have the combo, as the odds aren't that high and they can't really afford to mull agressively towards it to then get blown out by Consign to Memory , so if we have a strong 6 or 7 without an immediate answer to Leyline + Scion we should probably still keep it.

They also play Phlage, Titan of Fire's Fury , so we need to close out the game at some point before we get outgrinded by it. Similar to the Boros Matchup, Flashfires is the best card to do that. Keep in mind that Territorial Kavu dies if our opponent doesn't have any lands in play.

Frog

SB Plan

+ 2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor , 1 Engineered Explosives

- 1 Preordain , 1 Flare of Denial , 1 Lightning Bolt

Gameplan

This is another matchup that plays very different in the earlygame compared to the mid-lategame, so i will look at them separately.

The Earlygame is all about Psychic Frog (and to a smaller degree Tamiyo, Inquisitive Student // Tamiyo, Seasoned Scholar ). Our answers don't really line up well against a resolved frog, even using 2 bolts/discharges can be dangerous if they have mana open. This means we really want to answer it on the stack, which means having Spell Snare and Counterspell otp holds a lot of value. Playing Thundertrap Trainer and holding Flare of Denial open can be ok, but keep in mind that they can kill it at the end of our turn with Fatal Push , so if we have another answer we should wait with the Trainer. Similarly, the Frog deck doesnt have many (if any depending on the build) answers to resolved planeswalkers, so flipping Tamiyo early can be very valuable. However, the Frog deck does have answers to Tamiyo before she flips, so stopping Psychic Frog should still be our top priority. For example, we're on the draw and they play Polluted Delta go. We have the choice between casting Tamiyo, Inquisitive Student // Tamiyo, Seasoned Scholar and keeping up Spell Snare . We should keep up Snare, since playing Tamiyo means we lose to eot Fatal Push into turn 2 Psychic Frog . If they do manage to resolve one, our best answers are 2 of Lightning Bolt or Galvanic Discharge , and Flame of Anor . Keep in Mind that you don't have to spend any energy on Galvanic Discharge , which means if they pump their frog in response we should use the first one to just get enough energy to make the second one kill, so we wont get blown out as hard by interaction. Bluffing a second removal spell can also be good enough sometimes. Postboard we get Jace, the Mind Sculptor , who can just bounce the frog, so we are more incentiviced to use our removal on the Frog even if we can't kill them, because that leaves them with less cards in hand to answer Jace.

After we have managed to get through the earlygame, our focus should be to make the game smaller. We are favored in a small game because Psychic Frog gets a lot easier to answer, Jace, the Mind Sculptor and kicked Thundertrap Trainer are more likely to resolve and we have better topdecks than our opponent. We can achieve this by creating smaller fights over cards like Flame of Anor or Orcish Bowmasters . We don't want to create those fights on our turn, because that leaves us with a mana disadvantage on our opponent's turn, which allows them to resolve key threats like Murktide Regent easier. It's ok to cast Tamiyo, Inquisitive Student // Tamiyo, Seasoned Scholar or Thundertrap Trainer on our turn with more mana open, but if our opponent has an answer we can't afford to fight over it. In our opponents endstep we can afford to fight over cards like Snapcaster Mage or Flame of Anor , since we untap next turn and threaten Jace, the Mind Sculptor .

Oculus

SB Plan

+ 2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor , 1 Ghost Vacuum

- 1 Preordain , 1 Thundertrap Trainer , 1 Expressive Iteration

Gampelan

While this might look like basically the same deck, the matchup plays very different. This version plays a lot more threats, while having a worse lategame, so its gameplan against us just consists of slamming as many threats as possible while disrupting our answers. Since our lategame is much better, we only have to focus on stopping their threats. This means once again we should only use our counterspells on their threats, not to protect our own spells. When making decisions on which removal to use, always keep Force of Negation in mind.

Esper Ketramose

SB Plan

+ 2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor , 2 Flashfires

- 1 Preordain , 1 Expressive Iteration , 1 Flare of Denial , 1 Tune the Narrative

Gameplan

To understand this matchup, lets look at the ways they can beat us:

1. Stick a Psychic Frog early
2. Get Ketramose, the New Dawn online
3. Overwhelm us early with Overlord of the Balemurk + Phelia, Exuberant Shepherd or Flickerwisp

How can we prevent this?

1. Like in the Frog matchup, Spell Snare , Counterspell , double removal
2. Either never let Ketramose resolve or make sure it can't get online
3. Kill Phelia, counter Overlord/Flickerwisp, kill Overlord with Flame of Anor

This is basically a value matchup. We want to create as many equal or positive trades as possible. Our Opponent's cards (besides Overlord of the Balemurk ) can only create value through synergy, so if we can break up this synergy we will eventually outvalue them. Once again we don't want to fight over our spells (e.g. Fatal Push on Tamiyo), since breaking up their synergy is more important. We have to respect Phelia, Exuberant Shepherd , Ketramose, the New Dawn and Psychic Frog if possible, which may mean keeping up Bolt for Phelia or Counterspell for Ketramose instead of tapping out for Thundertrap Trainer etc..

BW Blink (no Ketramose)

SB Plan

+ 2 Flashfires , 1 Fire Magic , 3 Consign to Memory

- 1 Tamiyo, Inquisitive Student // Tamiyo, Seasoned Scholar , 1 Preordain , 2 Flare of Denial , 1 Invert Polarity , 1 Expressive Iteration

Gameplan

This version of the Blink deck is a lot easier for us to handle, since they don't have as many snowball options and more of a "fair" gameplan where our removal really shines. Early we have to make sure we can prevent Phelia -> Overlord, other than that they don't have many ways to pull ahead on cards. Try to kill Aether Vial as soon as possbile, since it allows the to get around our counterspells and overwhelm us on mana early. Consign to Memory can both counter Aether Vial and stop all of their triggers, most importantly, you can counter the delayed trigger from Phelia, Exuberant Shepherd and Flickerwisp to prevent the exiled creature from coming back.

Belcher

SB Plan

+ 3 Consign to Memory , 1 Engineered Explosives

- 3 Galvanic Discharge , 1 Expressive Iteration

Gameplan

The Belcher players plan is to set up one big turn where they can force a Goblin Charbelcher (or Tameshi, Reality Architect ) through our interaction with Flare of Denial , Disrupting Shoal and Spell Snare . We can't really prevent them from doing this, since we don't have anything worth fighting big enough fights over that would make the game smaller.

This means, we instead have to get as many counterspells as we can ourselves and prevent them from getting Flare of Denial online. Spell Snaring their turn 2 play is super valuable, since it makes Flare of Denial worse and prevents them from 2-for-1-ing us. Spell Snare also doesn't have many other targets in the deck. Its ok to delay casting Tamiyo, Inquisitive Student // Tamiyo, Seasoned Scholar for a turn if it means holding up Spell Snare.

We generally don't want to counter Lotus Bloom , since that loses to Tameshi, Reality Architect . This doesn't necessarily apply to Whir of Invention , especially if you have a Flame of Anor in Hand, since they can't recurr Lotus if it doesn't go to the grave, and Flame can handle whatever threat they could get through next turn.

The Belcher Player will try to "bait" us into smaller fights (e.g. Razorgrass Ambush // Razorgrass Field on tamiyo. Generally we can't afford to fight these fights, unless we for example have multiple spell snares that would otherwise be dead.

Amulet Titan

SB Plan

+ 3 Consign to Memory , 1 Summary Dismissal , 1 Blood Moon , 3 Obsidian Charmaw , 1 Engineered Explosives

- 2 Spell Snare , 4 Galvanic Discharge , 3 Lightning Bolt

Gameplan

Titan has 3 Gameplans to beat us:

1. Fast kill (t2/3)
2. Urza's Saga constructs
3. Get to 6 mana, then cast more "I win the game" spells than we can answer

We can answer their fast kills most of the time, but we have to respect them, which might mean not playing Tamiyo turn 1. While we board out some removal, Flame of Anor is great at killing constructs and both Blood Moon and Obsidian Charmaw can disable Saga completely. This means we can mostly focus on 3. (while respecting 1. and 2.). However, keep in Mind that with the new Saga changes, we don't want to play Blood Moon if our opponent has a Saga on chapter 2, since that would allow them to make constructs for the rest of the game.

This plays out similarly to the Belcher matchup in the sense that both players try to find more resources than the other. However since they're more constrained by mana and don't have any protection, they will usually only cast one threatening spell per turn, so we have more freedom to tap some of our mana in our turn to dig for more interaction. When deciding how much mana/interaction you will need in their turn, think about how much mana they can have and which game enders they can cast off that. Scapeshift wins off of 4 lands and 1 Amulet of Vigor effect, Primeval Titan needs two but depending on the rest of the hand one can be enough and Cultivator Colossus doesn't deterministically win but often puts them too far ahead. Getting Tamiyo down early is once again great, since the clues give us something to do with your open mana ifwe didn't need to counter anything and lets us dig for more interaction.

One card that can give us a lot of trouble though is Cavern of Souls , which they can search with Tolaria West . If we don't have Blood Moon in play we can still answer it with Obsidian Charmaw , but only the turn after they played it. Our only outs to an uncounterable Titan on the stack are Summary Dismissal and Sink into Stupor // Soporific Springs , so we should try not to play Sink as a Land if possible.

Broodscale

SB Plan

+ 3 Consign to Memory , 1 Summary Dismissal , 3 Obsidian Charmaw , 1 Blood Moon , 1 Engineered Explosives

- 1 Thundertrap Trainer , 1 Snapcaster Mage , 2 Preordain , 1 Expressive Iteration , 1 Tune the Narrative , 1 Counterspell , 2 Flare of Denial

Gameplan

This deck also has 3 gameplans, which at first glance also look very similar to Titan's, but actually play out very different because of the different answers they require.

1. Fast combo kill
2. Saga constructs
3. Overwhelm us late with multiple combo attempts or Emrakul

The fast Combo Kill is a lot easier for us to handle because it can't happen on turn 2 and folds to our removal (but keep in mind that some lists play Snakeskin Veil ). The Saga plan is also less impressive because we don't board out Lightning Bolt and Galvanic Discharge .

The real threat in this matchup is Emrakul, the Promised End . We can't really answer a resolved Emrakul, which wouldn't be a problem if they didnt also play Cavern of Souls . This means removing Cavern with Obsidian Charmaw is really important, as well as digging for Blood Moon and Summary Dismissal , since they can slowroll the Cavern till they have the mana to cast Emrakul. Its important to always be aware how much mana they are short of Emrakul and play accordingly. Sink into Stupor // Soporific Springs + Consign to Memory can also answer Cavern + Emrakul, but they can often just cast it again in 1-2 turns, so it's only an emergency solution. If you can Sink the Emrakul but can't answer the trigger and have an Arena of Glory in play, exert it in their endstep so they can't exert it in your turn.

Storm

SB Plan

+ 3 Consign to Memory , 1 Summary Dismissal , 1 Ghost Vacuum

- 1 Preordain , 1 Expressive Iteration , 3 Galvanic Discharge

Gameplan

Compared to combo decks like Broodscale and Titan, this combo deck doesn't have a Saga plan, which makes it easier for us to beat. The 2 ways the storm player will try to win are a fast combo (possible as soon as turn 2) or a long game where they can outvalue us with Reckless Impulse and Wrenn's Resolve .

Lightning Bolt and Galvanic Discharge are great answers to Ral, Monsoon Mage // Ral, Leyline Prodigy , while Consign to Memory can deal with Ruby Medallion . Spell Snare (and later Flame of Anor ) can answer both. Removing/Countering these cards as soon as possible is the best strategy in this matchup, since it's really hard for the Storm player to go off without them. This means we generally don't try to counter rituals or impulse draw spells unless we are far ahead/it's their last card digging for more action. The other key card we want to counter is Past in Flames . Your opening hand should have an answer to at least one of the cost reducers to prevent dying to a fast combo kill. We do cut some Discharges postboard since we have a lot of other answers and discharge doesn't do anything else. Keep in Mind that they can potentially flip Ral in reponse to a removal spell, so the best timing to kill it is in response to a Ral trigger.

If they play the long game, our gameplan is similar to the belcher matchup. They will try to accumulate enough ressources to fight through our interaction, while we dig for more interaction and try to get on the board. Their impulse draw spells can give you a lot of information on how much mana you will need to hold up. For example, if they're low on cards in hand and exile 2 more draw cards, they will likely use their next turn to cast both of them, giving you time to set up as well.

Tamiyo, Inquisitive Student // Tamiyo, Seasoned Scholar and Flame of Anor are the 2 best cards in the matchup. Both allow us to keep Interaction open without wasting the mana, and Flame answers all of their key cards. Some Storm players also bring in Empty the Warrens as a sideboard juke, which loses to Tamiyo's +2 Ability.