Last weekend, the MtG: Eternal Discord hosted another Timeless tournament.  This was the first tournament since the addition of Chrome Mox into the format, and everyone came prepared to deal with the fast combo decks that have been putting up great winrates on ladder.  What ended up happening was an over-correction towards anti-combo, with the tournament meta being dominated by control decks, which was a surprise to many.  Control decks performed well overall, with 4 control mages making the top 8.  Unfortunately, Control failed to claim the trophy, with Aggro and Combo taking 1st and 2nd place, respectively.  Lots of innovation happened in the tournament, with both new decks and revived old archetypes putting up results.

Before we get into the breakdown, I’d like to thank the team from MtG:E for organizing the tournament – especially alfalfa1 and JayIsADino for putting up their own money for the $200 prize pool.

First Place

Those who know timeless know that three things are inevitable – frogs, combos, and energy going under you.  Rank 1 historic grinder Käpälä proved that Mardu Energy still belongs at the top of the meta, even without the ability to run Chrome Mox or fast mana.  Käpälä’s version packs a lot of discard, which served him very well into this combo-vs-control meta.  4 copies of Thoughtseize and 4 copies of Juggernaut Peddler backed up by some of the most efficient creatures ever printed is a surefire recipe for success.  Käpälä had a nearly-undefeated 7-1 record across the whole tournament, with his only loss was to the second-place deck during the Swiss Stage.  It seems like Mardu’s reign of terror at the top of the meta may continue, even in the post-mox meta.  For any readers looking to get into Timeless or learn Mardu Energy, Korae has a sideboard guide in moxfield.  Käpälä also uploaded footage of his Top 8 to YouTube.

Second Place

Timeless Youtuber and discord guy Korae took 2nd place with a Rogue deck.  Shift And Tell is an older deck, having had a strong presence in the meta after MH3, but had fallen off significantly in recent months.  The deck struggles to win versus faster combo decks leveraging cards like Chrome Mox, Dark Ritual, and Necropotence – and had been completely absent from the meta in the past month.  What the deck lacks in speed, it gains in resiliency.  It has the ability to win from the graveyard without actually needing to resolve a spell to get omniscience into play, and it can control the board versus creature decks incredibly well with Ugin’s Binding, Nulldrifter to trigger Binding’s ability, and The One Ring.  Korae brought Shift and Tell to the tournament, predicting a field full of Control Decks and Balemurk decks, and was rewarded for this gambit.  Few players chose to register faster combo decks, and the majority of the field was on control.  Because of this, Korae went 7-1 on the day, only losing to Käpälä’s Mardu Energy in the finals.

Third Place

Phantomime took third place with an innovative control build.  Ever since the addition of Psychic Frog and Orcish bowmasters to the format, Tempo and Control builds have always been based around the blue and black colors, using these efficient creatures as their win conditions.  With a downtick in Orcish Bowmaster’s popularity in the meta, Phantomime innovated by leveraging red cards as tempo pieces and win conditions.  Ragavan provided a powerful turn 1 tempo play that could get under combo decks, Phlage provided eventuality and board control versus creature decks, and Lightning Bolt shored up the removal suite.  Two copies of little-played Teferi, Time Raveler also proved incredibly valuable in Control mirrors, as Teferi dodges most of the commonly-played black and white removal spells.

Fourth Place

Fourth place was claimed by another innovative control build, this time piloted by Freeyourmind.  This version truly embodied “gandalf” control, opting for pure blue-white without any splash colors.  This decklist was very well-prepared for an open decklist tournament, with cards like Curse of Silence in the maindeck able to take advantage of the extra knowledge gained.  This deck also contained several bold meta calls, such as maindeck Commandeer and Meddling Mage, which are great into a combo+control meta.

Fifth Place

liamthebean takes fifth place with an incredibly unique Madness build.  Liam’s build opts to play significantly less interaction than a usual aggro deck in order to put on the clock FAST.  This proved incredibly successful against many of the control builds, as they were overwhelmed by multiple scaling threats hitting the battlefield at once.  Liam’s only loss came to Shift and Tell, as his deck had little way to interact with their combo, and the rakdos aggro gameplan could be entirely contained by repeatedly playing The One Ring.

Sixth Place

Expert Blue Mage and Timeless Youtuber Chestheir took 6th place with his Esper control list.  This particular flavor of Esper has been taking ladder by storm over the last week, popularized and refined by Chestheir and Novos.  This version of controls packs eight free counterspells in Flare of Denial and maindeck Subtlety in order to contain the explosively fast decks of the Timeless format – especially Energy, Balemurk and Dark Ritual combo.  Of course, with every innovation comes a tradeoff, and this configuration left the deck vulnerable to other control decks and graveyard combo like second place Shift And Tell.  Chestheir went 3-1-1 in Swiss, losing the control mirror to 4th place Freeyourmind in the top 8.

Seventh Place

Kelvandil was one of the few players to register fast combo in this tournament, and was rewarded with a top 8 finish.  Kelvandil piloted the incredibly fast and explosive Orzhov Belcher deck, capable of wins as early as Turn 1.  Orzhov Belcher has proven to be one of the fastest combo decks in the meta, and is format-warping enough to demand almost all other decks in the format run 0 or 1 mana answers to the spell combo plan.

Eighth Place

Fanver also ran it down with Esper Control, using a slightly modified version of Chestheir’s list.  Fanver had decent success with the list in Swiss, going 3-2 with good tiebreakers, but ended up getting paired versus Shift And Tell in the top 8, losing to that deck for the 2nd time in the tournament.

Thanks For Reading

Hopefully this article provided some useful insight into the Timeless meta as we head into TheGathering’s $1k tournament series.  Over a hundred have already signed up, so make sure you register ASAP if you’re interested in playing!