I kind of think the meta has already been determined by the prototype builds that have been posted, at least until the pro-tour, then maybe a few duels-adapted versions of those decks may spring up.
Right now I'd say:
Boros Vehicles (biggest slice of the meta)
Dimir Tezzeret artifacts
Izzet thopters
Artifact combo
Mono-red Rdw
Some RG energy aggro/midrange
G/X Ramp and variants

What do you think?

Won't Suntal Hawk stay at the top?
I dunno but I guess boros vehicles will probably stay up there, not fully meta savvy.

Only until it gets rotated out during the almond cat update, because its meta breaking op.

I mentioned this a few times already, but this is the first expansion where I've got no idea what could be top tier. Not even a "GW Humans/Kozilek" idea either. In terms of fairly solid certainties, and ignoring whether they stick as tier 1 decks or not, I think the early meta will be:

1. Two versions of U/B Artifacts. One slow and control, the other aggressive focussing on early Touch or Colossus level threats. This is one of the archetypes everyone is most excited to try, and it looks like the hardest to get right. There's a deck there, potentially a top tier one, but its all in the testing now.

2. Boros Vehicles, which got a couple of new upgrades but largely remains the same. We may see some more combo heavy versions with Dreadnaught + Modification.

3. G/B Midrange or Ramp. Yahenni's Expertise makes holding out one more turn far less tempo wrecking with it's free cast clause compared to splashing Red for Radiant Flames. Black is probably now the best support colour with Fatal Push as well.

4. Grixis Control. Probably with more of a leaning into splashing Red than splashing Black. Jeskai loses a lot of its appeal with creatures ducking under counterspells, Red removal hitting far less threats in these other decks, and White getting nothing in the way of instant speed removal that copes.

5. Izzet Artifacts. There's Thopters, there's Vehicles, and there's combo decks being tried out. How well they hold up will depend on more inventive minds than mine.

6. Bant...something...There's plenty of good stuff here, pretty much every expansion since OGW has had some version of Bant in the top 5 decks of the season.

7. Obligatory RDW. We got Shock and the Pirate, those were solid upgrades the deck wanted. Also, there's miserable players who just play RDW from start of season to end with nothing in between.

8. Gruul Energy. Got a lot of cards to test out, but it also got a solid answer in Fatal Push. How well this deck does depends on how well decks running Black do from now on I think.

There's other stuff but those will be the most common things in the first 2 weeks I reckon. So if I was to take a guess at the best positioned of these decks, it would be G/B. Rec Sage is still the best Artifact removal in Duels, and there's a lot of Artifacts in the other archetypes. Green also has access to good creatures early on to hold back aggressive decks such as Renegade and Advocate, as well as the fantastic Druid. Black brings the very well positioned Fatal Push and Expertise, with Grasp of Darkness having more value than Murder currently. So it has the best control elements, whilst playing some of the better threats in Duels.

That's my guesses lined up, and I can see a few ways they end up collapsing, it's al; very exciting!

We'll need to try it first hand within the Duels environment, but at this point I'm simply interested into:

• R/B sac aggro. Similar to Socur's showdown shell, therefore slightly RNG but not that hard to drive.
  
  It doesn't care about the new sweepers and kill spells. Sacrificing creatures can either fatten your few crats spells or enable refielding the board, while actually activating Revolt whenever you see fit.
  
  The few exile tools we've gotten through AER would only slow down the opponent.
  
  
• U/B artifacts. Old list, few new tools, going for improvise.
  
  
• U/R Bounce & Burn. Just because I love Izzet.
  
  
• Usual Bant bounce control. Although I prefer other stuff.

I would've loved it if they had gone deeper with improvise.
Hell, if Sweatworks Brawler had 1 less cmc, Mono red aggro with artifacts would've looked so better to me.

Revolt as well, is just an aggressive mechanic.
There's only one instant spell, no flash creatures, enchantments and Solemn Recruit only work on YOUR end step.
Blocking for revolt will only net extremely few opportunities, which specific shells can actually circumvent.

Still not seeing how it can be useful besides refielding aggro or crats shells, and that actually goes back to the first R/B.


If AER had gone more onto control, I'd have waged onto Jeskai/Sultai control/mill, but the aggro is still present, and I'm simply looking at the fact that the kind of R/B aggro we got, hasn't left the battlefield since SOI.

I don't see why Rakdos Madness/Recursion would suddenly disappear, or am I missing something?

Edit: Got ninja'd! Lol!

Like B3 I have no idea what top tier is. Nothing is hugely reliable. I've got twelve decks or so and not one of them do I think, "here we go!" when I pick it the way I used to pick a super spikey deck in the past, like Origins Thopters or something.

Speaking of which, are love Elk for rekindling an old flame of mine

Off of first guesses:

Everything will be in similar places; () vehicles will still be good, as well as energy.

Control is interesting; depending on the matchup; more of a rock paper scissor thing, but overall I expect it to still be decent.

Artifacts will go up in one way or another. (Thopters, Combo, Aggro, etc.)

With the addition of Druid of the Crowl, I'm expecting midrange decks to become more of a threat. Ramp is also another deck we'll probably see more of.

Token decks will be more valuable, and aristocrats will be more rejuvenated.

I'm expecting more enchantment and artifact hate to become more common; for instance, someone might run the full set of Fragmentize.

Will post more thoughts and speculations later on.

I still expect W/R or G/R vehicle aggro (with the higher curve, the slower version) to completely demolish everything else in terms of power and consistency

Energy will be back strong, which will bring aggro-control back.

WR Vehicles, BR Vampires, UR Thopters, & GR Energy will receive minor upgrades but will still dominate the top of the pack.

UR Tutelage & Wx Humans will still show up amongst the top as well!

As for additions to the meta-game, I think Druid of the Cowl will move every deck with G mana higher up into the rankings. This includes the BG Delirium, Abzan, Superfriends, Ramp, Bant and others!

The next metagame is shaping up in my opinion to the THEE most diverse we've ever seen.

Okay; my predictions:

A) Good decks that will stay good

1) Vehicles
Vehicles got a bunch of new toys. I believe Sram lessens the need to splash Black for Scrounger greatly enough that we will mostly see RW Vehicles.
Vehicles will have two ways to go. One of them being red-heavy and more aggressive (with the Dreadnought/Modification combo); one of them white-heavy and lenient towards Midrange. Sram and Peacekeeper Colossus fit both of these strategies quite well.
Definitely the material to stay a top-tier deck.

2) Counterspell-based control
The archetype got improvements for some slots, but will generally stay the same. Fatal Push is a strong incentive to go Black, which is why we will see Grixis or Esper versions of this deck predominantly.
Baral's Expertise might be played as additional sweepers, lessening the need for the third colour (though I don't think it can be dropped entirely yet).
The deck might take a hit during the beginning of the format when not all of the archetypes are well-known enough to fine-tune the deck; but we will see more of it further down the season. Still top-tier I think.

3) Burn
Shock at common is a huge boon to all of the Burn players - aggro-, combo- and control-oriented alike.
Aggressive versions will likely be mono-red; these decks also got Kari Zev as well as maybe Invigorated Rampage and Kari's Expertise.
Combo versions will likely be Izzet; Control versions either Izzet or Grixis; very similar to what they look like now. Maybe Baral finds home in one of the decks, more likely the Control shell, but I kinda doubt it.
Overall; serious contender at one of the better decks again.

4) Energy Aggro
One of the most over-hyped decks during KLD IMO; what the deck lacked was consistency. AER kinda fixed this flaw giving the deck some more good options; but I think the deck still feels a tad underpowered.

5) Madness Aggro
Didn't get too many new cards, but the deck might be solid enough that it's still really good despite that.

B) New decks or decks that will have a resurgence
6) Superfriends
They're back for more. AER finally gave Abzan the threat density and the cheap removal it needed to say goodbye to those clunky 4-coloured manabases; and the deck repays with consistency making it the main contender for Superfriends decks. My list has seen limited testing, but it feels very strong; and assuming Sjookwave conceived his list on his own he came to a very similar conclusion (our lists are a whole 2 cards apart). After going dark for a season or two, this could be the deck to beat for AER.

7) Artifacts/Improvise
Solidly in Grixis colours; these decks attempt to use the artifact support and Improvise cards coming from AER.
Technically Izzet Thopters is not a new deck, but it kinda falls into this category and all of the other ideas are new.
Probably the decks with the highest amount of new cards; this makes it really tough to outline a final build for this deck (not even the direction is clear; combo deck with Mechanized Production, midrange with Thopters or Improvise in general or aggro with Thopters or the Vedalken (somewhat in line with what CGB posted)) but it seems to be the consensus that there is a deck; and a good one at that.

8) Revolt
Another deck that uses many new cards; basically the deck wants to play out like Aristocrats and profit using Revolt cards. The deck will play Abzan colours; currently Orzhov and Selesniya are looked at the most. Currently it looks like the deck won't quite get there, but it definitely something we can keep an eye out for.

9) Elves
A driving force during ORI/BFZ, Elves didn't take Jagged-Scar Archers' departure well at all. However, very surprisingly AER brought a ton of support for Elf decks with Narnam Renegade, Druid of the Cowl, Lifecrafter's Bestiary and maybe another card or two. These cards probably won't push Elves towards top-tier, but the deck will be playable again and thank god for that.

C) Other
10) Mill
Being a really good deck during EMN, Mill's biggest problem was that Fevered Visions turned from being helpful towards being a liability in KLD due to the set's more aggressive nature. With the format likely slowing down a bit, Mill might see a slight resurgence; however Burn has proven to be a generally more reliable wincon.

11) Ramp
Druid of the Cowl is definitely a huge boon to ramp decks; as is Monstrous Onslaught (a more reliable boardclear than Chandra's Ignition). Both of these cards give Ramp a ton of new options; we'll see whether Ramp makes a resurgence. In my mind, it was one of the most underrated decks during KLD; I'd be prepared for it.

12) Humans
If Humans make an occurrence during AER; I'd think Azorius or Boros is the way to go. Azorius got Skyship Pirate, an evasive Human that can pile on +1/+1 counters from Renown/Thalia's Lieutenant/Collective Effort; Boros got Kari. While Selesniya got some support as well, the colour combination was the weakest for Humans IMO and that doesn't look like it's gonna change. I don't think the decks will be top tier, but they won't be a slouch.

13) Bant Tempo
Maybe the deck I'm the most unsure about. On one hand Bant has been good for quite some seasons now and it got some possible new tools (Sram's Expertise comes to mind). On the other hand, this is the deck that has been just not top tier for several seasons, and it didn't get THAT much new stuff. Playable for sure, good yes, top tier I doubt.


Okay, that was a wash.

This I would say is very possible, I have many interessting U/B deck ideas in mind, since black got some good supportive new cards.

I wonder if there will be deck's with the new revolt mechanics around, I guess some white-green aggro could work, since there, we have
many creatures with revolt effects available.

RDW - kinda decks will come up for sure

I can't see anything other than vehicle aggro being the strongest deck, but maybe control has enough tools now to build a deck that is a PIA to play anything other than more control against...man I hate those games!

Do we have any semi-reliable T3 wins possible with the new cards?

T1 - Plains, Consulate Dreadnought.
T2 - Clifftop Retreat, 2x Toolcraft Exemplar.
T3 - Mountain, Siege Modification on Dreadnaught.

Not super reliable, but the big threat cards are both uncommon. Probably the most consistent turn 3 win in our pool, plenty of ways to make it an easy turn 4 kill in that deck instead.

Yeah, I just threw everything I thought was viable into Magic Duels Helper and cut back based on requirements, curve etc. Isn't that how everyone builds mythic.dec?

And I agree Abzan is really well placed now. Fatal Push is a huge boon, making the early game a lot more forgiving. We have multiple mana fixing/acceleration options (though Cowl only tapping for annoys the hell out of me - I seriously wanted to include it, but the priority is having double colours ASAP, so Deathcap and Caravan it is). Ajani and his Oath are very welcome additions, along with Yahenni's Expertise and Heart of Kiran... and these are just the cards that made the cut: there are a lot more perfectly viable options.

Yeah that makes some pretty filthy T4 Start Your Engine plays

If it weren't for Fatal Push, I'd have nightmares of 3 or 4 vehicles swinging turn 4 off of Start Your Engines. Can only Murder one at instant speed lol.

IDK more of the same but I am still going to prowl with my WBG deck just tuning it to get better.

How about orzhov vehicles? It might punish boros and still have the access to the goodstuff.