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Post Khans of Tarkir: Midrange decks

Let me first warn anyone who think getting 3 mana of different colors in turn 3 is easy: it's nearly impossible without the help of Birds of Paradise, Mox Diamond or Noble Hierarch - we don't have them in Standard. Even in a format with Birds, Noble Hierarch, Cavern of Souls, we seldom find players using 3 cmc wedge creatures like Doran, the Siege Tower (it's a 5/5 for 3 mana!). It's because without 1st turn mana ramp card more secure than 0/1 creatures, a 3 cmc card can't enter on turn 2, then the relative card advantage of it drops largely when opponent has 4-5 mana on his/her side to develop. Therefore, the 3 drops in KTK are not the reasons we build decks with according colors.


On the other side, some of the 4 cmc wedge creatures do look quite relevant to serious decks. Discussions have been triggered on the possibility that Junk, which includes Siege Rhino as the 4 drop, replaces Jund after rotation.
Now it's the time we should take into account logical thinking. The current 4 drops in most midrange decks are: Desecration Demon, Polukranos World Eater and Xenagos, the Reveler. Is Rhino, a 4/5 that drains 3 life better than Poluskranos? Is it a replacement for Desecration Demon? Needless to say, it doesn't match Xenagos on resistance of removals.

Situation on 5 drops may not not favor KTK wedge decks, either. I can't find a wedge card beating Stormbreath Dragon or replacing Blood Baron of Vizkopa. Instead I think although Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker isn't a better planeswalker than Nissa, it kills Strombreath Dragon and Elspeth, Sun's Champion. Sarkhan 's mono color enables it to be in current mono red decks, Jund planeswalkers, WR burn and GR monsters, we don't need to build a KTK wedge color shell for it.

Having analyzed the previewed cards, I didn't find a strong evidence that currently dominating midrange decks are turning into KTK wedge decks.

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