GRN Standard: 5C Omniscience

5C Omniscience Decklist: https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/1392308#paper

It’s Tuesday O’Clock! Time for a Deck Tech

I will be streaming this deck at noon MST on Saturday, October 13th. You can find my twitch channel at https://www.twitch.tv/TuesdayTastic.

With the return of Ravnica, comes the return of guildgates. Guildgates are the budget land of choice for many deck builders, and it is great having them back in Standard. This time their reintroduction came with a few new tools that care about guildgates. With the help of Circuitous Route and Guild Summit can a 5 color to deck built around guildgates do any good this Standard season? Let’s find out!

The 2 cards that made me want to build with guildgates are Circuitous Route and Guild Summit. An Explosive Vegetation and a Phyrexian Arena for guildgates are really tempting to build around. Knowing that I wanted to build a deck based around guildgates, I looked into what options a 5C deck could leverage. Almost immediately I discovered Jodah, Archmage Eternal. Being able to spend only 5 mana to cast anything is a very unique effect, and when the cards you are casting are as impactful as Omniscience, you know you are doing something powerful.

Omniscience is game-breakingly powerful, but it’s only as powerful as the cards in your hand. Fortunately, upon looking at all of the options we have above 7 mana, another card caught my eye. Zacama, Primal Calamity is probably one of the best spells that a super-ramp deck can cast. When you spend your first few turns ramping, it is very easy to fall behind whatever your opponent might be doing. With Zacama however, you get a 9/9 body, and up to 3 very relevant effects that can completely change the flow of the game. With this, Omniscience, Pelakka Wurm and more, the payoffs are certainly there if you can cast these cards.

One card that I was excited to test with was Chamber Sentry. Walking Ballista was one of the strongest cards during its tenure in Standard, and seeing an option that was only available for 5 colors piqued my interest. However, after some testing, I realized that in a deck that is never casting things on curve to begin with, a 5 mana 5/5 on turn 6 that can’t actually kill anything until the next turn was just too slow. By the time I’d be casting a decently sized Chamber Sentry, I’d much rather be casting Omniscience. And when you cast Omniscience and this is your only payoff in hand, you feel kind of stupid. Apex of Power also disappointed, simply due to the mana that it produces being a single color instead of multiple. If you could choose any combination of colors, Apex of Power would be a phenomenal inclusion in this deck as being able to dig for a Zacama would be a vital part of this deck’s power.

One deck that this format is currently lacking is super-ramp. There is a lot of power to be had at 7 mana and higher, and exploiting that can give you a real competitive advantage. Being able to cast Jodah, Omniscience, and Zacama all in the same turn is backbreaking and can turn around any game. The format is beginning to slow down and is starting to turn into a massive midrange fest. Going over the top of all the Golgari and Jeskai decks with cards like Zacama and Apex of Power is both powerful, and exciting. And having the guildgate spice only makes it that much better. Thank you all for reading, I hope you have a great week and an amazing Tuesday!

5C Omniscience Decklist: https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/1392308#paper