Coinciding with the arrival of Bloomburrow, Standard is officially in its post-rotation state. This past weekend, even before Bloomburrow cards were implemented on Magic Online, we got a glimpse of what strategies might best survive and thrive with rotation happening. To our surprise, Domain decks performed quite well, even with the loss of “Triome” variants from Streets of New Capenna.
One archetype that completely fell off the map, however, was Temur lands. Losing the cycle of common lands from Streets of New Capenna that naturally go to the graveyard (like Brokers Hideout) was too much for a deck that relied of Aftermath Analyst to pull ahead. The good news for fans of Aftermath Analyst strategies, at least, is that various decks built around the powerful engine have been popping up in other non-rotating formats.
In a recent Magic Online Pioneer Challenge, a unique combo shell revolving around Aftermath Analyst and the Streets of New Capenna lands managed to get ninth place. Meanwhile, roughly a week ago, Constructed aficionado Dom Harvey posted an undefeated league result with a rather convoluted Amulet Titan variant pairing Aftermath Analyst and Shifting Woodland. Perhaps there’s hope for Aftermath Analyst to continue to flourish after all.
Aftermath Analyst and Mana Production
- Mana Value: 1G
- Rarity: Uncommon
- Stats: 1/3
- Text: When Aftermath Analyst enters the battlefield, mill three cards. 3G, Sacrifice Aftermath Analyst: Return all land cards from your graveyard to the battlefield tapped.
The Pioneer Aftermath Analyst combo shell that just put up a solid performance is not technically a new idea. A little over a month ago, popular MTG streamer d00mwake posted a Youtube video where he briefly explains the deck’s combo elements and end goals, then showcases some gameplay footage. While some of the card choices are different this time around, the basic principles remain the same.
The deck is focused on a few different synergies, all of which play well together. The first involves Aftermath Analyst and the Streets of New Capenna lands we mentioned earlier. These lands are rather unique. Instead of producing mana themselves, they let you search up a basic land when they enter the battlefield and end up in your graveyard. This provides a ton of fuel for Aftermath Analyst, making the card an incredible mana engine.
These lands also work perfectly alongside Nissa, Resurgent Animist and Omnath, Locus of Creation. Even though you’ll usually be making one land drop per turn, playing one of these lands and searching up a basic land will give you two landfall triggers. In the case of Nissa, you’ll get to dig for an Elf or Elemental card (which will end up being either another copy of Nissa, Omnath, or Aftermath Analyst). For Omnath, you’ll get a big burst of mana out of the deal.
This brings us to the next piece of the puzzle: Spelunking. Spelunking is absolutely amazing in this deck. It completely negates the downside of these lands by letting the basics you find enter untapped. Activating Aftermath Analyst with Spelunking out typically nets you a ton of mana. With access to cards like Escape to the Wilds, you’ll never have a shortage of things to spend your mana on.
Finally, we have the Bring to Light package. Bring to Light is an excellent toolbox element. Need life gain? Grab Omnath. Need card advantage? Tutor up Escape to the Wilds. The world is your oyster. Of course, if you have Spelunking already in play, you’re probably going to be searching up a different card…
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The Scapeshift and Splendid Reclamation Combo
- Mana Value: 3G
- Rarity: Rare
- Text: Return all land cards from your graveyard to the battlefield tapped.
As you may notice from the decklist, there are singleton copies of both Scapeshift and Splendid Reclamation. Once you have five mana and Spelunking in play, you can use Bring to Light to search for Scapeshift and eventually generate infinite mana. You have to grab two copies of Lotus Field as well as Mystic Sanctuary and The Hunter Maze as four of your lands off of Scapeshift.
Despite the fact that you don’t control three other Islands, because Mystic Sanctuary is entering untapped thanks to Spelunking, you’ll get to put Bring to Light back on top of your deck. Between the two copies of Lotus Field and Mystic Sanctuary, you can float seven mana. Then, you’ll sacrifice both Lotus Fields, Mystic Sanctuary, and another land other than The Hunter Maze to the Lotus Field triggers.
Now, you can use The Hunter Maze to draw Bring to Light and recast it, this time grabbing Splendid Reclamation. Splendid Reclamation will bring back the same lands you sacrificed. From here, you can use Mystic Sanctuary to put Splendid Reclamation on top instead of Bring to Light and follow similar steps as earlier to draw Splendid Reclamation. Splendid Reclamation only costs four mana, so you’ll have mana floating when you cast it again.
As such, casting Splendid Reclamation over and over will net you infinite mana. Once you find a copy of Worldsoul’s Rage, you’re free to dome the opponent for a boatload of damage.
This intriguing and rather perplexing combo gives the deck a high level of inevitability. Unfortunately, Aftermath Analyst and Splendid Reclamation are weak to graveyard hate, but it’s easy to churn through your library to find an answer. If you’re looking for a place to play your Aftermath Analysts now that rotation has occurred for Standard, this deck is certainly sweet.
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Aftermath Analyst and Shifting Woodland
- Rarity: Rare
- Text: Shifting Woodland enters the battlefield tapped unless you control a Forest. Tap: Add green. Delirium- 2GG: Shifting Woodland becomes a copy of target permanent card in your graveyard until end of turn. Activate only if there are four or more card types among cards in your graveyard.
Beyond Pioneer, we also felt that this cool variant of Modern Amulet Titan using Aftermath Analyst deserved a shout out. This combo is extremely finicky, but lines up well in the face of traditional removal. The big objective is to copy Aftermath Analyst in your graveyard with Shifting Woodland, then sacrifice Shifting Woodland, putting all lands, including itself, from your graveyard onto the battlefield.
If you have Spelunking or Amulet of Vigor in play, once you return Lotus Fields and enough mana sources to the battlefield, you can float a bunch of mana before sacrificing some lands. With this mana, you can activate Shifting Woodland again copying Aftermath Analyst, sacrifice it, and repeat this process to net a ton of mana over time.
Dryad of the Ilysian Grove and Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle can let you convert this loop into infinite damage. Primeval Titan acts as the ultimate land tutor to help set things up. Executing combo lines in this deck is rather intricate, so for simplicity’s sake, we’re not going to go too in-depth.
Dom Harvey mentioned that he’s excited to try Lumra, Bellow of the Woods in this deck, and that the deck may get more appealing if Nadu, Winged Wisdom bites the dust. At the end of the day, it’s nice to see such a powerful card in Aftermath Analyst get some love beyond just Standard.
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