How To Win More With Mono Blue Djinn | MTG Arena Budget Deck Guide & Tips

[@MTGDjinn]

Thank you for this deck video. I now use a slight variation and am maintaining a 58% win rate with it. Bravo

[@gameschooldadMTG]

Nice work!

[@jendak2653]

Will you share your changes?

[@Bled00]

I started playing MTG like 3 weeks ago, because a friend of my played it and taught me a bit. Me being an obsesive nerdy guy, have eaten lots of content (yours specially because the way you explain things for newbs, it makes it easier to grasp). I started playing with you budget monored and have above 50-60% win rate and was fun and still his. Builded this deck 1 week ago and I sucked with it... BUT! Now that I sort of understand a little bit better what are treaths and what not, I'm having a blast! Feeling more like if I was playing sort of a chess and getting a better understanding of different decks. Monored doesn't allow (at least to me) that type of analisis, just smack fast and try to combo it. So thank you for your content, has been really useful and entertaining!

[@gameschooldadMTG]

I'm glad you've found my videos really helpful. Let me know if you have any other questions that aren't covered 👍

[@fiskebent]

I'm playing this deck on my new F2P account and it's great to see someone else play it. At 23:05 I think you had lethal if you played Thirst and phazed out Sheoldred. Then swing in for 15. At 27:40 when you couldn't Negate the Ossification, you clicked 'Resolve' too quickly :) Thx for the video!

[@gameschooldadMTG]

Thanks for your comment. You're right on both counts there, I need to pay more attention when I'm recording! :)

[@SlayerCerri]

Great video! I've been playing a similar build to this and while it might not make me any friends, it gets the job done.

[@arnaubonetbiesca3751]

I just start using this deck today (still new in the app) and I won more than 10 in raw. Awesome deck for the value

[@gameschooldadMTG]

That's great to hear. Keep it up :)

[@chaiirstm]

But where did you got all the wildcards to build this?:D I‘m also a new player and seeing all these „budget decks“ but can‘t build any because I don‘t have enough wildcards…

[@gameschooldadMTG]

@@chaiirstm it will be harder to build decks as a new player, wildcards will be in much shorter supply, so you have to be really careful with them. If you haven't looked up the free pack codes yet, do that and you'll get a bunch of wildcards from opening those packs. If you still want more wildcards after that, just spend your daily gold on the latest packs (March/Aftermath if you just want to play Standard) and open them for more wildcards. This deck only uses 4 rare wildcards along with the common/uncommon cards, so it's one of the easiest to craft. I try to keep budget decks to 5-10 rares at most in general, because lots of top decks take 30-40+ rares, which is impossible for new players.

[@knightlingwolfe]

Nice video! Though it didn't change the outcome of the game, you missed lethal against mono black @23:05. You could have marched Shelly, then cast thirst, making your djinn at least a 10 and swung for lethal.

[@gameschooldadMTG]

Yeah I noticed that when I watched it back 😅👍

[@TheStanislavson]

Mirror mono blue matches are the best. You both try to outplay each other, but as a main rule of thumb, the one with bigger mana pool has the more options and sometimes i succeed at baiting the other player, negating something that's not important and leaving an opening for my plan.

[@gameschooldadMTG]

They can be fun, as long as they don't go on forever!

[@SlayerCerri]

I love counter spell slap fights! I played a game like that last night and it was just back and forth countering and bouncing and then my opponent Witness Protectioned my Djinn. I lost but I couldn't help but laugh.

[@CursedRat4u]

Just started the game recently and build a Mono Blue Tempo deck, only difference is im using Slip out the Back for the moment instead of March of Swirling Mist. Loved this video helped me get a better grasp of how to play the deck, and im glad you showed the times where you lost to your oponent albeit it was a close one. Also i had a pesron who was playing a deck that used a creature that basically took the "instant" cards out of my graveyard and gave him a +1/+1 counter to the creature which basically made my djinn etc weaker, i guess thats a natural counter deck to mine ? I couldn't really stop it ...

[@michaelgriffith7033]

I truly hate facing this deck.

[@dannelellis6340]

seriously

[@emilmaihorn4567]

Really? Because I really love playing it xD

[@brofenix]

Oooh really cool to see this deck play. This and a mono red aggro deck might be what I try to build first :) I just started MTGA this week :)

[@gameschooldadMTG]

Welcome to the game, I hope you're enjoying it so far. Those two decks are definitely the ones I would recommend to any new players to start with. They're both super cheap and very effective, and they use very different tactics, so they show different sides of the game 👍

[@mikemichal7181]

Super useful video! Love it or hate it, this deck takes some skill to pilot properly. You need to have some feel for the decks you are likely to face so that you know what's important to counter because, contrary to popular opinion, you can't just counter everything.

[@gameschooldadMTG]

Sometimes if you counter the first 2 or 3 spells, the opponent can just quit early, but if you want to have more reliable success it's true you have to know what to counter and what to let resolve, and that partly comes from knowing what else your opponent might play

[@joeneeld9427]

I'm exactly the same. I don't generally like blue, but I've started using this deck for dailies instead of mono red because it wins more and still has pretty fast games.

[@gleonard3626]

Maybe you could do a tutorial on how to use the "March of ..." cards from Kamigawa Neon Dynasty! I burn through my timeouts trying to get them to resolve so I just Slip Out the Back like in the budget version you linked. At 17:38, the math was 1 blue + 1 colorless for Thalia - 1 colorless due to Djinn + 1 colorless to phase one creature + 1 for ward = 3 total mana, correct? But the ward isn't factored into the spell cost as you are paying so you only paid 1. If you wanted to phase the Coppercoat Vanguard there, would it have been click on Make Disappear, submit 1, pay 0? So total mana cost would've been 2 for the spell and ward on the Intrepid Adversary? The order of operations is very confusing for me in MTG Arena!

[@gameschooldadMTG]

You're correct about the cost, and the ward cost comes after the actual casting. If I wanted to also phase the Coppercoat as well, I would have had to exile one of the cards from my hand, which would have meant the total cost would have been one less overall (-2 from exiling the card, +1 for an additional target). The math can be a little hard to track in situations like that!

[@richardmorrow4712]

Has this deck had success in the (Admittedly early) LCI meta? any recommended upgrades/adjustments?

[@gameschooldadMTG]

I haven't used it much since Ixalan came out as I've been playing mostly draft games. With the addition of Cavern of Souls, there's definitely a slightly reduced effectiveness of counterspells, which this relies on a lot, although counterspells should still be useful for protection and against other non-creature spells. There's also a new blue card, Confounding Riddle, which is good as a replacement for Impulse/Moment of Truth and can be a counterspell if needed. I'll have to test it out more to see how it does.

[@Miro1989one]

like it got some version like that in the row to build :-) started with mono red than black and i think i go on with the blue one next

[@vitortakara7090]

you can use essence capture instead of essece scatter since it's just an upside for the same cost

[@gameschooldadMTG]

The only reason I don't use Capture is because it costs double blue, so it doesn't get the discount from the Djinn, and the +1 counter is not usually game-changing considering how quickly the Djinn scales up anyway.

[@vitortakara7090]

@@gameschooldadMTG true, i noticed it mid gameplay

[@RacoonJ11]

ossification already entered and negate cant counter ETB effect abilitys and so on... it was not a spell anymore at this point to counter... thats what you missed

[@gameschooldadMTG]

Thanks - I wasn't paying attention for a moment, but you're absolutely right :)

[@soulrver7]

This helped a ton, thanks!

[@gameschooldadMTG]

Glad to hear it 👍

[@TheKetsa]

27:45 you let the spell resolve and then want to negate the ETB effect :p

[@gameschooldadMTG]

Yeah, I realised afterwards 🤦

[@nicolastomalino1285]

check the fastest and cheapest monored took me to mythic in may with only 4 rares (sokenzan or a mountain is barely the same) just pump up the Scamp, hit and sacrifice to curve out the damage Deck 19 Mountain 4 Lightning Strike 4 Monastery Swiftspear 4 Play with Fire 4 Ancestral Anger 2 Reckless Impulse 4 Kumano Faces Kakkazan 1 Sokenzan, Crucible of Defiance 4 Phoenix Chick 1 Squee, Dubious Monarch 2 Feldon, Ronom Excavator 4 Blazing Crescendo 4 Cacophony Scamp 1 Voldaren Thrillseeker 2 Wrenn's Resolve

[@chriskhoraji4333]

I built the deck exactly as listed in the description but it says its illegal for spark ranked as Alchemy ??? Im peobably bei g dumb but pls help i love Blue !

[@gameschooldadMTG]

Yeah these are Standard decks, and Alchemy has had some cards rotate out since September. I've made an Alchemy-legal version of the deck which you can find here: aetherhub.com/Deck/beat-spark-rank-with-budget-mono-blue Enjoy!

[@tornero94]

are there any upgrades to the deck if you want to further invest on it?

[@gameschooldadMTG]

This deck is so naturally budget-friendly that I don't think there are many other upgrades you could add to make it better. I've seen some people playing at least one copy of See Double, which can be used to make a copy of a Djinn before a final attack, or copy a big draw spell to reload your hand. Apart from that it's pretty effective as it is.

[@SlayerCerri]

One swap I made was using Essence Capture in place of Essence Scatter. It costs 2 blue mana instead of 1 and 1 which is fine since we are only running blue, and it still allows me to counter a creature spell but also lets me add a +1/+1 counter to one of mine. I snuck in a Hullbreaker Horror for some more bouncing fun and a couple of Unblinking Observers to tap for the extra mana to get him out or to squeeze in an extra counter or whatever might be needed. So far my 2.0 seems to have a similar win rate to the original setup so I don't think I ruined it too much, lol

[@gameschooldadMTG]

@@SlayerCerri The only reason I don't have essence capture is because costing 2 blue means it can't benefit from the Djinn discount and the extra +1 counter usually wouldn't be needed. Sounds good though, if it works for you 👍

[@SlayerCerri]

@@gameschooldadMTG That's a very valid point, regarding the Djinn discount. But by same token, if he's out he can get a +1 and a +1 from the spell hitting the graveyard. I'm still playtesting so I may decide to change back if it really doesn't come into play that much.

[@ethangodlieb]

Would you run any chrome host sea sharks in here to counter any board wipes?

[@gameschooldadMTG]

The shark can work because you can make loads of incubators and I think it's generally good or have more than just 4 Djinns and 4 Terrors in the deck. That's why some people also play Delver or the 1 mana Faerie in there too. But if you have Fading Hope, Slip Out The Back or the blue March, you can also avoid boardwipes that way too, or just counter them.

[@patrykK1028]

You can get the rare Djinn from Jump-in

[@zackleat5260]

Mono blue made me want to throw my toaster into a swimming pool when I played against it, so now I’m here to join it

[@gameschooldadMTG]

Yeah it can be really frustrating to play against because they always seem to have the perfect play 😅

[@moistfungus3780]

Just got into mtga after awhile away googled best standard decks in 2023 made this one. Today I learned I am apparently scum for this.

[@gameschooldadMTG]

I think this is just a fun deck to play, and people don't like playing against it because they love to complain. All play styles are perfectly valid.

[@l0lan00b3]

So many cards and decks to play in standard def not as dull as mlming lol If you didn't get an email from arena telling you than I'll let you know standard sets aren't rotating this year!

[@Priwen-CCG]

How can I get those gandalf sleeves? or is it gone now?

[@gameschooldadMTG]

I got them in the LTR Pre-Order bundle. I don't think they're available anywhere else at the moment.

[@Priwen-CCG]

@@gameschooldadMTG Sad hours but it is what it is. Thx for the reply xD

[@parazightsporch2523]

Maybe you could talk about why you think this deck is well positioned in the current metagame. We really don't need the cards read to us or win rate percentages.

[@gameschooldadMTG]

The intent of the video is pretty closely linked to the win rate and winning more games with one of the most budget friendly decks in standard, so making sure people understand the cards is a big part of it. To be honest I don't know what I would say about the deck compared to the current meta. Counterspells are always going to be good, especially against big ETB effects like Etali and Atraxa have, and the Djinn can win games all by itself as long as you're not facing too much graveyard hate.

[@parazightsporch2523]

@@gameschooldadMTG mono u is pretty tier 3 right now. Why even bother with it. It can't beat the real control decks or mono black, all of which are performing better according to stats.

[@gameschooldadMTG]

@@parazightsporch2523 according to untapped.gg, mono blue has a 55.6% win rate in Platinum. Mono Black has about 56.3% at best. Azorius Control is listed as 56%. I'd say that's all pretty close. The difference being that this deck only needs 4 rares and those are much more wildcard expensive. That's why 👍

[@spupergames7771]

I cant find a lot of those cards like consider. Just not showing up

[@gameschooldadMTG]

It's probably defaulted to Alchemy where some of the cards have rotated out. You can change it to Standard and they'll show up if you have them.

[@juancarlosjimenezgarcia7492]

am i able to play this deck in Alchemy?

[@gameschooldadMTG]

Yes, all the cards in this deck are available in Alchemy as well. There might also be some other cards that work well in it that aren't legal in Standard, but I don't know for sure.

[@xBLACKxMAGICx-d1w]

❤

[@markd9318]

I too like to punish nerds for trying to have fun

[@marvinbido4073]

I think people find me toxic for playing this Deck xD

[@gameschooldadMTG]

People don't like Mono Blue, but it's a valid deck just like any other 👍

[@marvinbido4073]

@@gameschooldadMTG yeah. I mean it is not a 100% win. I have lost against some tricky opponents. It definitely can be counter

[@elliotstaveley682]

Please no! Let’s not encourage more people to adopt this BS play style. Midrange & Jank content only ;)

[@johnyred9303]

The most dumb deck. 15 counters...10 draw cards...and djinn. Genius. But standard is the most trash format nowdays in history of magic. Thank you wotc

[@gameschooldadMTG]

What I've learnt from social media in the past year is that people will complain about everything. Mono red is dumb, board wipes are dumb, counterspells are dumb, removal is dumb, combos are dumb. You don't have to like it, but they're all valid ways to play the game.

[@Incident00]

Actually you can put this "genius" tag to literally every deck in this game and some people would agree. Trash format? Historic and Alchemy are way more trashy to me...just keep playing your fav stuff and don't disrespect other play styles just because you don't like them. I've seen it too many times in all CCGs out there😉