Revolution, November, 2023

The third tournament of Revolution’s ninth rotation concluded this past month at Grand Prix Thorne Chapel! With a new month came the return of a fan-favorite format: Revolution Eternal! Featuring all of the sets that have ever been legal in Revolution, from Secrets of the River Cities to Theros: Age of Trax, Rev: Eternal is a deckbuilder’s paradise! And to make things even more exciting, GP Thorne Chapel came right off the heels of a large-scale power level adjustment designed to bump up cards that hadn’t quite made the cut in Revolution proper so that they could have a second chance to shine in an eternal format. Fourteen players brought thirteen unique decks that spanned archetypes such as mono-green aggro, UR storm, GC ramp, and WB aristocrats. 

The finals brought together two similar, but very different decks. In the right corner, CoolBeens brought a deck they called “Blessing Breakfast”, which includes a two-card infinite combo including Spikemane Lion (or, more properly, its blessing, Spikemane Cloak) with any equipment that costs 0 to equip, such as Tactical Skis, which has the added bonus of granting Ward {2} for protection. But Blessing Breakfast is far from an all-in combo deck; the deck also plays a decent Naya beatdown shell fueled by the tempo and card advantage brought by Rogue’s Palace Cardshark. 

But in the left corner stood Mattelonian, with a very different take on an aggressive Naya deck. Mattelonian’s eloquently-named “Naya Beat You to Death” dispenses with all the card advantage and combo outs that Beens brought to the table in exchange for consistent and brutal amounts of damage. Cybres-Clan Arbiter and Codename: Viridian lock down the board and keep the opponent off of key noncreature spells, Elemental of Surprise and Justiciar Overseer provide a surprising amount of damage seemingly from nowhere, and Wilderkin Behemoth and Michal, the Anointed are beefy boys that end the game quickly. 

After three hard-fought games, Mattelonian emerged victorious! When asked about the secrets to his deck’s success, Mattelonian remarked "It's gotta be wilderkin [behemoth]. [Codename] Viridian was probably the strongest part of the deck as a linchpin, but wilderkin being largely uninteractable... due to lack of higher costed removal is also huge." Mattelonian also remarked that despite their impressive finish, there were still aspects of the deck they'd like to tune–what game-ending threats to run, which mana dorks to play, et cetera. All in all, congrats to Mattelonian for an awesome finish, well fought to CoolBeens for figuring out a unique and powerful 2-card combo that no one had ever played before, and if you'd like to try your hand at what Mattelonian started, remember: if you’re interested in playing some awesome custom magic, the best time to join the revolution is now!