MTG Top 10: The MOST BROKEN Standard Decks Of All Time | Magic: the Gathering | Episode 618

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[@anthonypeters3005]

Still hoping for Top 10 Basic lands

[@ElPanadero18]

Since there are 11, I’m curious which one wouldn’t make the list.

[@youraverageddnerd1843]

​@@ElPanadero18I'd have to guess Wastes, but I could definitely be wrong

[@HamSandwich-xk3om]

Forests, definitely. I stopped using them ever since "elvish spirit guide" was released...

[@thewaytoneverify]

Islands would be number 1. Blue is such bullshit most of the time

[@vario6492]

💧💧💧💧💧💧💧💧💧💧

[@Orcasgt22]

Imagine the standard deck that could have been with Oko, Uro, Once Upon A Time, Veil of Summer and Growth Spiral.

[@brycedouglas620]

Don't forget companions as well. Why not throw in a free Jegantha in the sideboard. What the hell was Wizard's thinking during those two years smh.

[@RiptornRory]

Then add in Nexus of Fate and Wilderness Reclamation. It'd truly be the Most.Broken.Deck.Ever. (to which I think Nexus had rotated, but to have had to face all those and probably just Arboreal Grazer and 28 Lands....Would be like just letting the Phyrexians win.

[@ecpmath5658]

don't forget field of the dead :)

[@andrewsparkes6275]

And as things rotated, we'd lose some pieces but some would still be playable in the Omnath deck too in the next Standard!

[@joelmonteiro1419]

@@brycedouglas620 they had a new design team with pro tour veterans and a new competitive philosophy in mind (I think it was called FIRE? not sure). It was a disaster.

[@discocrisco]

Suggestion: Weird decks. Strange decks that came out of left field to see some competitive play. Like the Spinerock Knoll combo deck that happened during Time Spiral and Lorwyn standard.

[@Sauvenil]

Or "Project 420" with the -1/-1 counters canceling the +1/+1 counters, or the Mirror Entity combo that works by activating it infinite times for x=0 and manipulating the stack.

[@theopreston8507]

oh this is a great idea, id love to see this!

[@BigDrew49]

I think this video may already exist. I only say this because I remember and older video where he showcased "Owling Mine", a deck noone ever expected to be as successful as it was

[@Sauvenil]

@@BigDrew49 I played Owling Mine at a recent Modern tournament. It was hilarious. Added a new twist to it with Aether Tradewinds and Mystic Sanctuary too.

[@guardianeifie]

Would Lantern Control fall in this category?

[@monogreen]

One thing that makes looking at Broken Jar so impressive is that outside of Megrim, every card in the deck either sees substantial legacy play or is banned in that format entirely. A lot of those banned cards are restricted in Vintage also.

[@ben_clifford]

For me, it was a fun time to be a Magic player. I got hear hushed whispers of all these broken things at tournaments, while all the while me and my friends were enjoying the new powerful cards for our decks.

[@SirZapdos]

Fires of Invention with pre-nerf companions is probably #11. One could do absurd things like cheating out and blinking Agent of Treachery on the same turn thanks to Lukka and Yorion. The early game was stalling with cards like Birth of Meletis, Omen of the Sun, T3feri and Narset. Even for an 80-card deck, the mana and the gameplan were surprisingly consistent.

[@joelmonteiro1419]

I absolutely despised that deck. I clicked the video expecting to see it.

[@bl4klotus]

Pre rule change Yorion Lukka Fires was pretty strong, I agree!

[@najawin8348]

Have you heard of the Ultimate Standard tournament? They do a bracket tournament each year with the different broken Standard decks. Win 2x and you get Hall of Famed. Current rankings for the HoF are (in desc order) Spiral Blue, Memory Jar, Simic Food, 1998 Academy, and UW Delver.

[@aappaapp6627]

Where can I find it?

[@najawin8348]

@@aappaapp6627 Google "ultimate standard mtg". Or search on yt, they upload a few of the games.

[@ryanwondertroll]

awesome, nice

[@mayaklein2995]

I first started playing magic in fall 2019.... that was a wild few years. I didn't mind all the busted decks because it added excitement for me and I mostly played limited or grinded standard games on arena with fun decks that wouldn't have been competitive even if there weren't busted decks in the format. Only now am I realizing what a normal standard looks like and how unusual 2019-2021 was in magic's history.

[@jenniferwilliams9612]

Nizzahon, speaking wholly for myself, I would love to see more deck history videos! Even if only once a month, those videos are fun, and I enjoy them.

[@JPPorcaro]

12:18 - it wasn't only the power level that got us all (myself included) to leave, it was the sudden changing of the card frame. This set was the first 'block' to have the new frame. Magic survived the high-powered combo winter just a few years earlier.

[@strawhataddison]

I'm surprised Necropotence didnt make the list.

[@NizzahonMagic]

Necro was never banned in Standard.

[@vario6492]

At number ten it's 2019 deck! At number nine it's 2019 deck! At number eight it's 2019 deck!...

[@Imabirdhaww]

This would be a fun tournament to see which deck gains the top power spot among these powerhouses.

[@Windowlick_]

Oko's not restricted in vintage btw. Certainly though there's two other planeswalkers from 2019 that are restricted

[@gorghor]

This. Nor was he ever restricted in vintage.

[@littlemrdoom5997]

Saheeli cat combo will always be the most absurd thing to me. How do you miss something like that IN THE SAME SET Edit: same block, not set, not any less baffling to me tbh

[@CrushedAria]

Same "block" not the same set

[@eleronpfoutz7823]

Or how they thought Attune With Aether wasn't going to go in every deck with energy and Green?

[@gregorystiver7198]

The answer to that is the same as skullclamp, last second changes without being looked at. Sovereign originally only targeted artifacts and creatures like how a bunch of kaladesh cards could, but they made it any permanent late in development to synergize with the Oath of Nissa enchantment cycle without thinking about saheeli

[@nickhughes8179]

Wizards R&D and upper management are Splinter Twin marks and tried to sneak it in. They held off on banning Twin in Modern for years, because most of Wizards had $2000 Twin decks. Splinter Twin as a card is an overpowered design mistake that leads to extremely linear play, repetitive games, and oppressed formats as the deck just hates out everything with its legions of free and one CMC counterspells. Even Modern Goblins was too slow for that design mistake of a deck.

[@2rare2die26]

Deceiver Exarch/Splinter Twin or KikiJiki/Pestermite were both standard legal decks before Saheeli Cats.

[@Sakura_Matou]

Memory Jar was before my time but I heard of the Deck's reputation, heard about it so much in fact I play many of the cards that were used in that deck in my Sheoldred The Apoc. commander deck I get many looks from people that are like "Did she really just do that?"

[@jackvogel701]

If you ever do something like this again, I think something like “peak metagame percentage” would be a cool statistic if you could get it. Cool video as always!

[@JD-gk7eh]

I do think it's worth noting that the breakout Academy deck was not in Standard but in Extended at Pro Tour Rome 1998. Interestingly, only Tommi Hovi made T8 with that deck. I guess others hadn't figured it out? Also remember that the rules of the time had sets become legal not on release day but on the 1st of the month after release. Urza's Saga became legal in all formats on November 1, 1998 and that Pro Tour was 11/15. The banning of Academy and a few other cards came in December 1998 and again, the ban took effect 30 days after it was announced. So Academy decks were legal in November and December of 1998.

[@yoav.kats6328]

I remember when Omnath and Uro were together in standard and then Uro got banned which just made all the non-Omnath decks worse (except mono red but they cant race with Omn)

[@dylanmiller9162]

Shouted with joyous exultation when I saw Broken Jar, easily my favorite deck to hear about. So clean and simple and just…unstoppable

[@TheGloriousLobsterEmperor]

Who cares about standard? Not this guy! There's only one format that matters and it's the one that's the subject of the epic video idea "Top 10 Vintage Cards (Minus Power 9)"!

[@King_of_the_Shrooms]

They should have named the deck “Survival of the Nightmare”

[@marcoottina654]

nice! also "recurring of the fittest" is nice too :D

[@Ragnarok2kx]

My favorite thing about Memory Jar is that the art literally shows it being broken.

[@Goten40373]

great video as always. lol this brings back memories. i always loved some of theese decks and hated some to .

[@jays.6843]

I'm convinced that Oko single handedly killed a lot of people's love for the game.

[@elliot.6995]

I'm surprised you didn't mention the snafu from Wizards initially not banning Felidar Guardian, then reversing course only a few days later while denying that the emergency ban was due to player outcry instead of more MTGO data.

[@karlgrylls2406]

Worth mentioning: Before Omnath got banned, WotC banned Uro in order to weaken the deck. But Uro wasn't a problem at all and everybody knew that. In fact, it was clear to everyone (yes, including WotC) that Omnath needed to see the hammer but WotC didn't react. Everybody knew that WotC was too wimpsy to ban a card they just released. After the first big tournament, where the first 20 Decks were all the same (4-colour Omnath), they finally banned him. Unbanning Uro at the same time seemed to be logic, but that didn't happen. All of this let you know that WotC was in the believe of being inerrant which was very wrong and this discrepance between own believes and reality didn't leave you with good hopes for the future

[@FakeLifeGames]

I played Magic a very long time ago, and I went to my first Pro Tour Qualifier back in 1999.... I believe it was an extended event in that narrow window where Memory Jar was legal.... And a lot of the people who weren't playing Memory Jar were playing crazy High Tide/Stroke combo decks using all the same fast mana. Never went to another big tournament, and I completely stopped playing the game shortly after that.

[@timetwister15]

Mirage block's ProsBloom deserves a mention. And Ice Age block's Necropotence deck can replace some decks here. Necro decks were similar to Affinity's dominance during their time. Hence "black summer".

[@llongone2]

I absolutely hated Recurring Survival...it was so oppressive and hard to interact with. Whenever we get a terrible Standard meta deck (like Omnath Ramp), I just think, "At least it's not Recurring Survival". Recurring Nightmare is the most appropriately named card of all time. Oh, wait...Tolarian Academy Combo was even more of a nightmare. I lost a tourney final to that deck a week before it got banned. But at least it had short life.

[@awildsylveon9896]

The oko/once upon a time/veil deck is my current favorite in Arenas Timeless format. Add some other nutty value cards like Fable of the Mirror Breaker, Uro and Minsc & Boo and you get a pretty ridiculous midrange strategy. Veil mostly hangs out in the sideboard these days though

[@evelezpuma]

Lol when energy is #10 you already know the list is gonna be insane. Love the vid!

[@firethunder834]

Pausing at #9 here to mention: Scapeshift and Field of the Dead were only legal together in standard for one month. They printed Field in M20 to finally have a payoff for Scapeshift which was printed in the previous core set and rotated out of standard a month later.

[@SpaceStormy]

Surprised to not see Yawgmoth's Bargain on this list which was a deck that could win T1 more often than you would expect

[@1234millerz]

Another banger

[@SeanLarsDogma]

I lived through Combo Winter. Dang I’m old. 😆

[@chillaxbro107]

I’m surprised ramunap red wasn’t on this list, it was extremely dominant for a long time and required multiple bans to fall out of favor

[@darkPrince10101]

I'm curious if the original channel-fireball or similar decks abusing the fact that Magic didn't have a four-of card-copy limit yet weren't included because they were before standard was officially a format, or were they just simply not as powerful as the stuff we saw in combo winter with broken jar?

[@NizzahonMagic]

It wasn't included for the first reason you mentioned. Channel Fireball where you could just play all channels and fireballs and fast mana was definitely better than everything on this list.

[@jayz3479]

Am I allowed to play the oko deck nowadays? (I’m new to magic)

[@E_Squiggle]

I guessed the number one before the start of the video, I feel so proud of myself 👌

[@felipepereira214]

I would like to understand someday the Innistrad block bans.

[@ben_clifford]

"Banned Cards: Most of them" earned my like

[@jmauer9988]

Forgot about the Necro summer!

[@FlawlessRythym]

I almost think Ramunap Red (Hazored) belongs on the list or maybe an honorable mention. That was such a miserable and consistent deck at the time. I played Orzhov vampire midrange and I remember vividly getting wrecked by that deck if I had a single bad topdeck. It even got Ramunap Ruins banned.

[@Carubidul]

This. Plus Nexus of Fate decks which were even worse. Say what you will about Ramunap Red, atleast it was fast at killing you.

[@michaelmorris4515]

Randy Bheuler did a tournament of broken decks - Memory Jar beat Tolarian Academy in the final.

[@Der_Freibeuter]

Decks that might have a shot at Top10: Necropotence in 1996 aka Black Summer. Dark Ritual, Hypnotic Specter and Necropotence legal at the same time. Speak about card advantage... ProsBloom in 1997. The first ever real combo deck feasted on unsuspicious opponents who didnt know how to react to such a threat as well as the pre-5th Edition rules allowing a player to drop below zero life without losing as long phases did not change. Cascade Jund in 2009. While not a super fast deck, Cascade Jund buried opponents in card advantage Elf and Nail in 2004. Ravager Affinity was no match to the Skullclamp-supercharged monstrosity that either drowned you in Elves or slammed monsters like Darksteel Colossus or Sundering Titan on T3 on a regular basis.

[@edoardosalvai2759]

Rakdos hazoret could have been an honarable mention

[@darriusskyler8493]

Siege rhino std days were pretty shitty not gonna lie The days of theros std, you either played devotion to black with pack rat and gary or blue devotion with master of waves and that dumb dimir 3 hybrid creature from RtR

[@dajmahal]

The oko deck is the reason i stopped playing standard on arena

[@jenniferwilliams9612]

My two favorite decks in Magic history are ravager affinity, and Tolarian academy combo in Type II…. I guess that makes me a terrible person…. lol or at least a terrible magic player. 12:48

[@mikotagayuna8494]

The most broken standard decks will always be from the first Pro Tour because of how they forced every list to have Homelands cards. You have never really known existential dread until you're facing the prospect of a Veldrane of Sengir or a Reveka, Wizard Savant on the wrong side of the table.

[@donaldwiggins9890]

That was such a fun format. I built a janky combo deck with Lands Edge and Necropotence that ran 67% land.

[@nickalasmontano1496]

Hell yeah

[@andrew4life05]

There should be a tournament where all the pro players who won a GP with those decks play against each other's to find out who had the most busted one !

[@jrRabet]

No mention of faeries from lorwyn?

[@gabrielstafford5174]

I thought Omnath Ramp is stronger than Feldowar combo and Oko decks due to the very strong consistency of the deck. Too good for aggro and can win the grindy games due to all the card advantage.

[@chapmanandchapmanproductio974]

Damnit !!! Ahhhhh you rock!!!!!!!

[@mrpinguimninja]

I was curious if my favorite deck of all time would show up on the list, and I guess second place is nice enough

[@marcoottina654]

what about the top weirdest deck that actually got points or were close to getting them?

[@NizzahonMagic]

I did do top 10 jankiest decks to top 8 a big event. That sounds like what you are looking for.

[@marcoottina654]

@@NizzahonMagic thank you so much ^^ it will surely be a fun video :D

[@bobfranklin2572]

Surprised Affinity wasn't number 1 tbh. Then again im still fairly new😅

[@superbaas8822]

The decks ahead of it were just on a completely different level.

[@Drezha3]

I loved energy but there was an easy way to fix energy. Make the aetherborns steal energy when they cause combat damage. Edit: or make glint-sleeve syphoner steal energy and produce it if none could be stolen. Plus make more like it

[@Paulthored]

I had Oko. Never got to Play before the Ban.😢 And he's such a easy fix...

[@superbaas8822]

The best fix to him is to not start his loyalty so rediculous for a 3 mana walker and give him multiple ways to ramp it. He should have startes at 2, so making an Elk left him exposed to the Elk removing him. This also made him vulnerable to Rending Volley even if he +2'd, a card designed specifically to beat other blue walkers at the time even through countermagic.

[@thetimebinder]

Turns out, artifact blocks break the game.

[@kitsunedragoon]

Kind of surprised Pros Bloom didn't make the list. I believe there was a ban way back when to nerf the deck back under control.

[@NizzahonMagic]

It was a Block deck.

[@Der_Freibeuter]

@@NizzahonMagic Just like Affinity. ProsBloom used Meditate as Card Draw and some counters from different editions as protection so its wasnt just a block deck in its later variants.

[@NizzahonMagic]

@@Der_Freibeuter I have a whole video about Pros Bloom on the channel. I know these things. But the version that actually dominated a format and got banned into oblivion was a block deck.

[@devilbhrothesavage2807]

Energy is highly underrated. Cardmarkt did a tournament where they played every standard deck that won worlds against each other and the final was energy vs hazored.

[@2424Lars]

Oko is not restricted in Vintage

[@PJB-bh8bn]

I have no idea why simic oko does not have at least one or two great henges in it 😢

[@dem7556]

Top 10 cards whose art sold for the most

[@jesterbomb123]

Top 10 most busted modern decks? Bloom titan and Hogaak?

[@85mcarnold]

If you don’t think the #1 spot deserves it’s honor, check out Randy Buehler’s original Gauntlet of Greatness. It’s a lot of fun.

[@ElfHostage]

Wow. No Thragtusk?

[@geeknseek]

It’s Wednesday my dudes

[@chapmanandchapmanproductio974]

This guys actually legit I admit it

[@daveslater2858]

Infect, and rock ?

[@someguy99]

Caw-blade is 7!?!? I thought for sure it would be in the top 3!

[@NizzahonMagic]

Haha yep. It was great, but I think everything ahead of it is even more busted. Obviously.

[@tobynburke4959]

Oko is not restricted

[@carneyartglass9099]

Your videos are kind of impressive I bet a lot of people get value from them. I’m designing a card game. Lol I want to have flip book images on the backs of the cards instead of major logos.

[@bch9124]

Necropotence.

[@ownageDan]

Hazored

[@Methylimidazol]

Field of the Dead would be such a nice, interesting and balanced card, if it was Legendary.

[@Carubidul]

Nah. Landfall on a land is a bad idea. Hell, landfall itself is an inherently busted mechanic.

[@bedwablackburn]

Oh yeah.... I remember Megrim Jar.... 😑

[@wrongturn5089]

Affinity and Energy decks were pure poison

[@RibusPQR]

ha ha silly me, I thought Oko would be at the top

[@vivecanada1]

What kept Hazored off the list?

[@NizzahonMagic]

It almost did. I just didn't feel it dominated quite as much as these did.

[@vivecanada1]

@NizzahonMagic Didn't it have more tops than Energy from Amonkhet forward (so after Ramunap got printed) and then had success after 2 cards got banned as well, winning a world championship and a second protour? I feel it was more dominant than Energy or Golos in those ways. (Side note, it also won the world championship winning decks tournament CardMarket ran earlier this year, beating Energy in the finals.)

[@avaraportti1873]

1. Forest 2. Island 3. Lietuva 4. Kugelmugel

[@superbaas8822]

What's hilariously biased about this, is all 10 decks featured islands in them, while only a few ran forests.

[@wintervoid324]

Academy should have been #1. No other standard deck has had a 5% or so chance to win before your opponent was able to take a turn, let alone having a average win of T3. State that year I played 10 rounds (7 qualifying and and 3 in top 8) and of those games I had one T1 win and another player had one against me (Played against about 40% Academy decks).

[@cax1175]

How close was an Eldrazi Winter deck to making this list?

[@NizzahonMagic]

Not close at all. Eldrazi Winter was a modern thing.

[@littlemrdoom5997]

To be fair I get decks and formats mixed up all the time too

[@cax1175]

​@@NizzahonMagic My bad. WOTC gives so much attention to standard now, I kind of forget sometimes.

[@tuqann]

Curious how most of the broken decks that lead to card bans include blue... I'm not saying blue as a color is problematic, but I also find it curious that people who enjoy playing blue mana centric decks are sociopaths 🤷🏻‍♂️

[@MrTinkerPig]

Number 3 pushed me away from magic. 10 years later I came back on return of ravnica

[@kh1129]

No Eldrazi Winter? /sadface

[@NizzahonMagic]

Nope, that was really only a thing in Modern.

[@seilaoquemvc2]

Its funny how the people behind commander banlists haven't learned a thing from history like this and keep all the fast mana and all tutors legal in a format where the only strategy that leads to a winrate above 25% is to combo kill the entire table.... hahaha

[@timmyg316]

I still don't get how Oko was so bad. I faced him several times he wasn't so bad. Stuff today is way worse I think

[@superbaas8822]

Then you left the kitchen table and faced literally any other player on the planet. Oko was extremely dumb. He straight up warped the game around his existance.

[@timmyg316]

@@superbaas8822 don't be disparaging. Oko didn't really have an affect against all decks.

[@superbaas8822]

@@timmyg316 Consider people started main decking Noxious Grasp to deal with Oko, and were winning events having made this choice. History literally tells you that you are wrong. The best players in the world tell you that you are wrong.

[@Carubidul]

Because he has removal on a +1. If you fon't know why that's broken, well...

[@timmyg316]

@@Carubidul making something a 3/3 isn't removal. If you only have 1/1s Okos ability makes them stronger. There was a life gain deck at the time that utterly wrecked Oko. I ran it and never had a single problem.

[@mattjayce2339]

Memory Jar is so insane that it (its artwork specifically) led to the term "broken" which we still use to mean "overpowered" in TCGs to this day.

[@NizzahonMagic]

I think that's a folk etymology. People used broken before 1999.

[@GellyVelly]

Oh huh all 10 decks had blue in them. Every single one. It's a good thing the 5 colours are balanced and there isnt one colour that totally ignores the colour pie and is overpowered in every format, cause man that would suck....

[@marcoottina654]

... which is green can burn everybody (with cards like Squall Line), draw a ton, destroy and kill, ramp, cheat big stuff (creatures, at least), ... the only thing green still does not is countering, but I bet that a Questing Beast 2.0 will come up with some flashy counter ability. And it's uncounterable, of course, like Allosaurus Shepherd (a 1/1 for G that should have costed GGG *_at least_* )

[@GellyVelly]

@@marcoottina654 True true, gotta look out for them Squall Lines!

[@marcoottina654]

@@GellyVelly yeah, and "Storm" stuff or whatever they are called: green and/or red spells with X in the mana cost and dealing X damage to all [flying / non-flying] creatures an players

[@superbaas8822]

​@@marcoottina654you said this literally in the face of evidence to the opposite. Try again buddy.

[@milesgreb3537]

think there is some regency bias in this list.

[@markchaney4469]

Shame no necro deck

[@crawdaddy2004]

I miss Caw-Blade.

[@chriswrite4933]

REBELS!!!!! You either played rebels or you had that 1 guy who just played anti rebel.

[@NizzahonMagic]

That was mostly a Block deck. Probably the most broken Block deck of all time, though.