Metashaker deckbuilding contest #9 results

For the past two weeks you have been sharing your awesome ideas for the decks with us. Now the time has come to conclude which ideas are the best.

This time the task was to make use of Mistral Guide — a card that has a very interesting mechanic but does not see much competetive play. We will start by analyzing the card and then provide a few deck examples — our Metashaker finalists! Alright, let's begin!

Mistral Guide — Card Analysis

Mistral Guide is a 4 cost 4/4 creature which is actually a good body against red and Frog-Tossers. However, for a 4 land requirement this card is too bad in terms of raw power, not even comparable with other high land requirement creatures like Thyrian Golem, Grove Guardian, Bomb Slinger and Manta Rider. What Mistral Guide gives you though is a strategic advantage — and how much value can you gain from it depends on your deck and how you play it.

The ability to grant dash to your creatures can be very useful, especially in multicolor decks. Non-neutral creatures can only be played on specific lands. So, for example, if you developed a mountain in a "Garudan spot" it means that you cannot summon Wind Soldier there for a double-collect trade. With Mistral Guide you can push your creatures to the desired spot where you normally could not summon them.

The ability is also great for slow decks that has a lot of high land requirement cards. Since these decks focus on developing special lands early game, you might not have a lot of agressive lands. However, with dash you don't need those because you can push your creatures to the enemy side of the map.

Flying with Dash is an extremely strong combination. There is a reason why Rebel Glider cannot harvest faeria and that is exactly the reason why Mistral Guide has that high land requirement. The ability basically allows you to summon creatures on ocean tiles — whereas you opponent has to make lands to summon harvesters in a double collection spot you can do that right away! Imagine that you play against a mid-range deck which goes for the same side as you. Both of you fight for the wells, he spends all his resources to clear your creatures and deny your collection. But if you have Mistral Guide on board, you can push a creature to the wells on the opposite side of the board without giving up on the other wells. Thanks to Mistral Guide's ability, instead of using Power Wheel to develop lands on the opposite side you could use it to gain faeria and draw cards.

Aside from these general strengths there are several specific synergies Mistral Guide has:

• Although Khalims Follower is most commonly used in rush, it is actually one of the best harvesters in the game. Follower is especially good if you manage to summon it in a double collection spot and this is extremely easy to do with Mistral Guide's dash and flying!
• Haste creatures in general work really well with Mistral Guide. Better positioning may allow you to trade with an enemy creature hiding in the back and also it may allow your haste creatures to harvest an extra time. And since they also gain flying, Golden Aviary + Mistral Guide + haste might be a very good combo.
• There are several creatures that require a better positioning to gain benefit: Axe Grinder, Mystic Beast, Bomb Slinger, Blazing Salamander, Daring Adventurer and others. Mistral Guide may help you out really well with triggering their effects. And yes, gifts activate after Guide's dash so you can summon Axe Grinder near your well, push it to the enemy well and gain the +1/+1 buff.
• Mobile creatures can probably gain the most value out of Mistral Guide's ability. Creatures with charge and jump positioned in the right spot can threaten enemy creatures while being in a safe spot themselves. Flying is also a great addition to charge and jump especially if you have extra mobility like Flash Wind and Oradrim Fanatic because you don't have to build many lands to move your units around and trade with enemy creatures.
• With Mistral Guide you can summon several creatures on a single land created by Path to Paradise so that all of them recieve the attack buff.
• If you sacrifce a creature to summon another in its place adjacent to Mistral Guide (Demon Wrangle, Oath to Oblivion), the summoned creature does get flying and dash from the Guide. Oblivion Rider summoned by Oath to Oblivion is especially good since it has charge 3.
• Creatures with jump summoned adjacent to Mistral Guide can dash to any space within 2 tiles, not just in a straight line. Not sure if it is a bug or a feature, but jump + dash interaction seems cool.

This is for sure not a complete list of Mistral Guide interactions but this is it for now. It's time to announce the winners of Metashaker #9!

Mistral Gagnant

The first deck is made by ima and it features lots of positional creatures like Daring Adventurer, Blazing Salamander, Axe Grinder and Bomb Slinger. These creatures are quite non-consistent because their usage is restricted and can only get high value in specific scenarios. This deck focuses entirely on getting full value from these card by utilizing Mistral Guide's ability and securing important lands with Earthcraft and Path to Paradise. Overwhelm your opponent with big Adventurers and Axe Grinders, don't let your opponent hide from your Salamanders and Bomb Slingers and finish the game with Path to Haste combo.

For the 1st place ima recieves 5000 gold. Congratulations!

RY Angry Mistral

The second deck is made by Sunekichi. This deck makes use of Mistral Guide by throwing angry creatures closer to the opponent. 3 cost 5/4 Axe Grinders and Shaytan Demons are difficult for your opponent to deal with, especially if they are summoned right next to you. Even if they were not, Oradrim Fanatic and Syland Horsemaster might help them out to get closer to enemy creatures. Horsemasters are especially good with Mistral Guide because charge 3 works really well with flying. Fire Elemental is also a very good addition to the deck because with the help of Mistral Guide you can push your Elemental closer to the enemy orb and develop an agressive mountain for Bomb Slingers and Firebringers (remember that Elementals create a land after the Mistral Guide's dash which means you can step on an enemy land and create a mountain nearby).

For the 2nd place Sunekichi recieves 2500 gold. Congratulations!

Altar Control

The last deck is made by kodlaci and features Altar of Souls. Slaugthering Shadow is a strong but fragile creature. With the help of Mistral Guide you can summon them closer to your opponent and thus forcing him to have an answer. But even if he does have an answer to one Shadow, dealing with a Shadow army might be problematic. This deck also has several early game harvesters like Village Elder and Deathwish Ghoul which can be later sacrificed into Demon Wings and Oblivion Riders and pushed to the front with Mistral Guide. Besides, this deck has a lot of high attack creatures which might help your Shaytan Monstrosity grow really big. Remember to always look for lethal when you have a Monstrosity on board because with this amount of high attack creatures and sacrifice mechanics you may be able to buff Monstrosity to 20 attack for the OTK!

For the 3rd place kodlaci recieves 1000 gold. Congratulations!

Honorable Mentions

• TimShakh's GRY Angry Mistral Zoo
• ArdentEspio's Slaughering Monstrosity
• Ramora's RY Mistral Control
• Chrunox's Guided Missles
• SuperbLizard's Flying Beastmasters

Closing words

Thank you everyone for sharing your awesome ideas! Watch Luuu90's Metashaker #9 deck submissions review to take a look at some other submissions as well and to know what he thinks about them.

That's it for now. See you later! Check the news on the Hub or offical Faeria discord #tournaments channel if you don't want to miss next Metashaker!