Companions Nerfed!! Being an Agent of Treachery is punishable by death and the Fires of Invention have been extinguished. In these current times standard shake-ups are almost as common as set releases and rotations. This latest one gives us the ability to explore some spaces that had been pushed aside recently. Today I want to talk about Heraldic Banner. Not only because it is primed to be a very good card now. Heraldic Banner is also the perfect card for the month of June. So let’s take a delve into the different kinds of pride we can celebrate.
Banner Red | Standard
Obosh Decks are possibly still a thing, but it cannot be cast on curve any longer. The Heraldic Banner red still has plenty of play and if we remove the limitation of odds only then a few old friends can be played once more. Embercleave and Obosh were very similar in their role so going back to the cleave makes the most sense for our strategy. Time will tell if Steam-Kin is still our best 2-drop, but it is reliable and gives us the extra mana for the Experimental Frenzy in the sideboard.
Black Flag | Standard
Mono-Black banner decks appeared at the beginning of Ikorea when Aaron Barich stormed Magic Arena with her first drafts. The deck shortly fell off however in favor of Red just being the superior Obosh build. I wanted to revisit black with some ideas from that list. Serrated Scorpion is our 3rd one-drop in this list over Cauldron Familiar since we are not running Oven at this time. Fiend Artisan is our new 2 drop in this shell. The ability to tutor for Murderous Rider is helpful here and if the Fiend gets large enough it can equip Shadowspear pretty well.
Let’s go back to 2019!
White Flag | Standard
Heraldic Banner kicked off during Throne of Eldraine with a very quick Mono-White list that was catching most of the meta off guard. Punishing any deck that was not Jund Sacrifice. Returning to that shell we make a couple of changes with some newer cards printed since. Elspeth fits in this list perfectly, and I am returning Shepherd of the Flock to the list to fizzle Bonecrusher Giant’s Stomp and other targeted removal. This also gives us a really good balance for using Fight As One out of the sideboard for having targets on both modes.
As you can see this is just some of the aggression you can take in the new standard. Board Wipes will be less “free”, and Lurrus will be showing up a lot less as a companion. Yorion and more expensive companions will still see Companion play, but I wonder what is next for our nightmare cat…… Remember to wave your Banners this month and show your pride. Speaking of Pride. You know who also has a lot of pride? Cats! Standard has cats across many colors, but enough of them share the color white that we can play a banner deck. Additionally 2 of the companions are also cats! While our other lists focused on what we can do without companions, I couldn’t resist seeing Kaheera at the helm. I can’t be the only one who forced Charmed Stray in limited before.
Cat Banner | Standard