Zendikar Rising Spotlight: Ruin Crab in Nonrotating Formats
In the last few years, mill decks have gained new removal and counterspells, but no useful mill cards. This lack of support is the main thing that keeps them from moving up in the meta. How likely is it that a new and, in the case of this deck, better Hedron Crab helps with this issue in Modern and other formats?
Times have been a little sad for mill players, in particular those favoring the Modern format. , , , and set the bar pretty high for mill effects. Without additions of a similar caliber, the Modern Dimir Mill archetype sometimes takes a slight turn toward Sultai and solidifies as a semi-control deck that just happens to have a mill win condition. In a field full of aggressive decks, Dredge, and , it is facing many obstacles, but with about to arrive, things might change.
Not only do we finally get another mill card that is worthy of main-deck spots, we're receiving a strictly better Hedron Crab, one of the deck's more iconic cards. The old and the new crustacean basically work the same, but there are two big upgrades: Ruin Crab does not target players and its toughness is bigger by one. and cannot stop it. What catches everyone's eye is that its ability is limited to milling opponents, but this is not a downgrade for our deck. Legacy Dredge variants and Modern lists may care about that — Mill decks do not.
Modern
The question is not if will be included in Dimir-based Mill, as I am certain that a playset is a must. It is whether to play it instead of or in addition to it — and if the latter is the case, how many copies of which Crab? Since these are some of the best early-game options for the archetype, I am certain that we will be looking at "8 Crab" decks in Modern soon enough. This is the easy part, actually. It's much harder to predict the numbering in other formats.
Mill players shall rejoice as a better Hedron Crab is on the way
I am not that fond of this deck not having many creatures, but I still think should be one of the first cards to go. Cards such as and are great in this meta, while I also like the recent inclusion of . All of these find themselves showcased in Jim Davis's Dimir list. Sacrifices need to be made for the better, however, so here's how I'd shape the update early on:
Modern Crab Mill
Main Deck
Sideboard
1
4
4
2
4
2
1
4
4
1
4
4
4
3
4
4
4
2
4
1
1
3
2
2
2
2
2
There are no new sideboard options — at least there were none when I wrote this line — so I wouldn't change a single card there just yet. All in all, I think that this deck will greatly benefit from a new set of Crabs as these increase the deck's overall consistency. Looking at the current top strategies, I would not splash another color. The player's life total with this deck is already endangered enough as is.
Other Formats
Unfortunately, I'm currently not seeing any Standard potential whatsoever. Sure, is a card, but it interacts with card draw, not with additional mill effects. Many of them, such as and , are leaving Standard, which leaves the new Standard without a critical mass. Other than , all of the new mill cards revealed at the time of writing seem mostly underwhelming.
Vintage
A while back, a Sultai combo deck made waves in Vintage. It featured multiple ways to win on the first turn, one of them being . All that's needed is the enchantment, the Crab, two lands or other mana sources to cast them, and a land like or that can return to hand by itself. This leaves life to make eighteen land drops resulting in 54 cards milled.
As another way to kill the opponent the deck included . This method requires a higher initial mana investment but recoups all life lost to Fastbond triggers, which really is no small deal. Alternatively, can step in to prevent the damage Fastbond deals to its owner. This is the original list by Magic Online user SamuraiFunn, otherwise known as Eric Freytag:
Eric's Crab Shack, 7th place, Vintage Challenge on December 10
Main Deck
Sideboard
1
1
2
3
4
1
4
2
4
1
1
1
1
4
4
3
1
1
1
1
2
1
1
1
1
1
1
4
1
1
1
3
1
1
2
4
3
2
3
This deck has a goal of specifically milling the opponent when going the Crab route, so is an autoinclude here as well. I'm not convinced that we'll be seeing playsets of both Crabs, but I do think that this deck might benefit from including more than four. I am no Vintage expert, but if anything is certain, it's that Ruin Crab will kick out Hedron Crab. The fate of the latter depends on testing results.
Pioneer
Unlike Standard, Pioneer might stand a chance of getting a dedicated mill deck. Due to not being legal here, the idea was almost a nonstarter from the beginning. With Ruin Crab now available, maybe Dimir Mill actually gets a shot. The only card that is now really missing is, you've guessed it, . But at least this is a weaker format, so maybe it still manages to do well. Another big one is , though can serve as a replacement. The mana base cannot be as good as in the Modern version, but perhaps the playstyle can.
Pioneer Mill
Main Deck
Sideboard
2
2
3
2
1
1
2
3
2
1
4
3
4
4
3
4
2
4
4
1
3
4
1
2
2
3
3
1
2
2
Modern Mill sometimes splashes green, so why not try and imitate this trend in Pioneer? is just that strong. Similarly to Uro, is rarely a dead draw, so I think that the reasons for splashing green are already plentiful enough. may be banned, but green still increases the amount of sideboard options too.
can be surprisingly powerful when timed right, especially with so many targets. The same goes for , as it earlier even used to see play in Modern. Also worth mentioning is the fact that it has great synergy with .
is, rather lowkey, the card that just about might make all this work, though. It also goes along with both and , both great lands. That's not to mention that it's quite a big threat itself. Unfortunately, decks are still lurking around the halls of Pioneer, so I'm not sure about the deck's playability at this point. It probably isn't very competitive anyway, so this may be a good starting point for future reference. At the end of the day, in whichever way all of this plays out, this is still a push in the right direction for mill decks in all three of the mentioned formats.
Opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and not necessarily Cardmarket.
