Standard: The Curse of Mono

Has there ever been a time when a format has been so dominated by mono-colored decks? Mono green aggro and mono blue control firmly established themselves as tier one decks during the French Regionals. Tooth and Nail is basically a mono green deck, sometimes splashing red or black and sometimes running as true mono green. White weenie is, of course, white, and mono black Death Cloud has been a force at least since Cranial Extraction made a splash at States last year. Finally, there are various mono red decks which are probably “tier 1.5” and vary from straight out creatureless sligh decks to more control-oriented decks with Pulse of the Forge.

So you can now choose your color and stick to it and have a viable, tournament quality Standard deck. This situation leads to a number of questions.

First, is this good or bad? Overall I would argue that it’s good since it points to a diversity which was sorely lacking during Affinity’s reign. Amazingly, even mono-colored decks were too slow to keep up with the insanity which was Affinity. However, I’ve always felt that mono-colored decks to some extent go against the spirit of the game. The very fact that dual lands were included in Alpha to me points to an intention for players to play with decks of more than one color. This is just a philosophical or personal preference issue but I think it makes the game less interesting if everyone is playing mono-colored decks. They also tend to make land destruction a non-viable choice but many would argue that’s a good thing.

Second, how did this come about? I think it has to do with the quality of the artifacts in the last five sets. Artifact block, remember? As it turns out there were a lot of good artifacts in the Mirrodin block which let decks like Tooth and Nail function. Even if Tooth were still available post rotation it will lose Darksteel Colossus, Sundering Titan, Triskelion, Duplicant, and Platinum Angel, which constitute most of the attractive Tooth targets. It’s also interesting to contemplate that the card which single-handedly revived white weenie is Umezawa’s Jitte, a legendary, rare artifact. Who would have predicted that? Jitte also brings mono green up a notch although it’s not included in all builds. And how will mono blue decks fare against white weenie or green aggro without Vedalken Shackles? Even the loss of Stalking Stones and Guardian Idol will hurt mono blue and mono black as it removes one of the relatively few creatures from those decks. Mono-red decks even get into the act by using Blinkmoth Nexus as recurring damage or Shrapnel Blast targets.

Third question, how long can this continue? As I just alluded to, the loss of the Mirrodin block will be devastating to many or even most of the current top decks. We don’t know what will be reprinted in Ninth Edition but it’s unlikely cards like Jitte and the Colossus will see time in a standard set (try explaining the ramifications of Indestructible to someone trying to learn the game). It’s hard to imagine mono blue and mono green decks being as effective as they are now since both of those lose other staples: mono blue loses Condescend in addition to those key artifacts while mono green loses Troll Ascetic, Rude Awakening and Beacon of Creation which should seriously slow those decks down. Even white weenie will lose the two amazing Swords, Mask of Memory and Bonesplitter.

It’s also being hinted on Wizard’s site that Ravinca, the next block, will encourage multi-color decks. We don’t know exactly what that means yet but when you couple those hints with the green mana fixers from Champions of Kamigawa (Sakura-Tribe Elder and Kodama’s Reach) it should not be difficult to build competitive decks which actually use two colors. It’s also been hinted that the allied-color pain lands will be back in Ninth Edition but it’s difficult to tell if that’s really going to happen or if it’s just wishful thinking.

So enjoy those mono-colored decks in Regionals this year. It looks like their days may be numbered.