Treasured Find: Standard Pursuit of the Precious

Note: This article was translated from Chinese by AI and may contain errors. Read the original Chinese version.

Introduction

In the stories of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, The One Ring lets its wearer slip into the shadow world, imperceptible to creatures of the real world, much like Whispersilk Cloak granting unblockability and the inability to be targeted. At the same time, The One Ring magnifies the holder’s desires, bringing the Deadly Disputes of struggle and murder, building its results on sacrifice. Both abilities are on a single card, Gollum’s My Precious, which fits the story’s flavor well, but in constructed, can these two mismatched abilities actually be made to work together?

Deck Analysis

When it comes to a card that fits both the sacrifice theme and the attack-alone theme, there really is one in the Standard card pool: Obsessive Pursuit. Every turn it automatically creates a Clue that refills your hand, and when you attack it puts +1/+1 counters on a target attacking creature equal to the number of permanents you sacrificed this turn, and if that number is three or more it also grants lifelink. We have built with this card before; see the earlier article Obsessive Menace for details. This time’s decklist is as follows:

Decklist

• Main damage dealers: The Sackville-Bagginses, Squall, SeeD Mercenary, Kambal, Profiteering Mayor

The Sackville-Bagginses: A creature version of Deadly Dispute, your dear distant relatives. When these Bagginses enter, they can turn a creature or artifact into a Treasure and a card in hand, which amounts to a one-shot ramp. Although the body is only 2/2, it has a passive ability that hits your opponent whenever you sacrifice a token, so it is quite threatening just sitting on the battlefield.

Squall, SeeD Mercenary: A brooding big boy who works extremely well with My Precious. He can grant double strike to an attacking creature wearing My Precious and/or carrying counters from Obsessive Pursuit, instantly doubling the damage. If he goes into battle himself, he can recur sacrificed permanent cards for reuse, and overall the fit is surprisingly good.

Kambal, Profiteering Mayor: The Consul who drifted from Kaladesh to Thunder Junction, a legend for token decks that can also counter token strategies. His 2/4 body has a decent survival rate, he drains whenever your own tokens enter, offsetting the life-loss side effect of Obsessive Pursuit, and the first time each turn your opponent creates tokens he makes the same number of copies, giving you powerful answers against decks of the same type.

• Sacrificial fodder: Greedy Freebooter, Novice Inspector, Voice of Victory

A sacrifice deck can’t do without offerings made specifically to be sacrificed. First is the professional fodder Greedy Freebooter, a precious one-drop that makes a Treasure when it dies, and with The Sackville-Bagginses it can take you to five mana on turn three. Novice Inspector is a one-mana 1/2 that hands you a Clue, a filler creature that doesn’t cost you cards, and its two toughness can occasionally work wonders. Last is the mobilize engine Voice of Victory, which gives you two Warrior tokens whenever it attacks and also has a passive that stops your opponent from casting spells during your turn, letting your creatures put on My Precious at leisure without being removed in response.

• Removal and support: Dusk Rose Reliquary, Get Lost, The Ooze, Fountainport

The removal picks cover artifacts, enchantments, creatures, and planeswalkers, answering threats from nonland permanents across the board. Dusk Rose Reliquary answers artifacts and creatures, costs only one mana, and comes with a one-time sacrifice that triggers an additional effect; Get Lost answers enchantments, creatures, and planeswalkers, and its side effect of handing your opponent Map tokens also benefits you when you have Kambal, Profiteering Mayor.

For support, The Ooze provides graveyard hate while producing Mutagen tokens that pump up size, helping boost your hitting power and trigger sacrifice effects. Last, Fountainport is a self-sufficient token-making utility land that can create tokens and also cash tokens in for cards.

Gameplay Demo

Compared to a traditional sacrifice deck, this one can’t knock out the opponent through self-powered plays alone and is closer to a red-white style of token attacks mixed with direct damage. In testing, Kambal was surprisingly good in the current Standard environment, and even against non-token decks he gets at least some value. The performance of My Precious is also beyond doubt, especially once it’s worn by Squall: basically one swing rebuilds the board and two swings send your opponent home, and the satisfaction of pulling it off is unmatched.

Conclusion

Time flies, and next week we return to the home series Reality Fracture. Just from the previews released recently I can feel how much fun it will be, and I can hardly wait to try it. Let’s say a temporary goodbye to the collaboration sets and get ready to embrace a big helping of Jace!