MTG typal deck gets a Pro Tour top 8 for the first time in years

Typal decks are back

If you are a Magic: The Gathering Commander player, it's very likely that you have a deck built around typal strategies: Elves, Humans, Merfolks, and, for the true visionaries, Chairs. However, if you're into competitive Magic, then building your deck around a shared creature type hasn't been a viable strategy since Pro Tour Berlin in 2008. (I'm sure there have been exceptions in between, and that readers will be quick to point them out in the comments!) Well, Pro Tour Lorwyn Eclipsed just changed that.

Veteran player Eduardo Sajgalik scored a Top 8 finish at the latest Magic Pro Tour, piloting an Izzet Elementals deck fueled by new cards from the Lorwyn Eclipsed set, which heavily features Elementals. Going into the tournament, Elementals decks represented a mere 3.9% of the field, otherwise dominated by Nature's Rhythm decks. Another deck called Izzet Spellementals was more represented, but it doesn't rely too much on typal synergies. Sajgalik's great result showcases a deck that could be considered a blast from the past, with 27 out of 27 creatures being Elementals, including four Roaming Thrones, an essential card for typal strategies.

In a post on X, Sajgalik thanked Jake Koenig, who is credited for popularizing this list; and his team, Worldly Counsel, who helped him finalize the deck before submission. The injection of powerful cards from Lorwyn Eclipsed made this strategy viable, including enablers such as Flamebraider and Ashling, Rekindled, which can ramp you into your big Elementals. It also relies heavily on the new cycle of Incarnations, such as Deceit, Wistfulness, and Vibrance. Of course, the true star of the deck must be Sunderflock, a card that can bounce your opponent's entire board and has seen a big spike in price after this breakout performance.

It's great to see a new set have such a big impact on competitive play. This Pro Tour was praised for the variety of decks seen and the great gameplay displayed in the matches, but it's likely the situation would have been very different if it weren't for the recent bans. Taking broken cards such as Vivi Ornitier off the field, along with the influx of new cards, helped Standard flourish again. Seeing a typal deck reach Top 8 after so much time was an unintended consequence, but one that will surely make many players happy. And while many were clamoring for the ban of Gran-Gran or to hit the Izzet Lessons deck in some way, it seems that the meta simply evolved to make that deck less dominant (Elementals and Reanimator are both strong against it).

Usually, typal decks require too much synergy and have a hard time fighting through removal, so they couldn't adapt to the modern evolution of competitive Magic. But Lorwyn Eclipsed is the first truly typal-focused set in a long time, and apparently the gamble paid off — at least for Elementals. This deck can boast high-impact single cards, such as the Incarnations or Sunderflock, so you don't really need to build a big board of creatures that boost each other to win, giving it an edge over classic typal strategies.

Christoffer Larsen took home the biggest prize with his Dimir Excruciator deck, but Sajgalik achieved an excellent third place, gaining good prize money and invitations to both Pro Tour Secrets of Strixhaven and the next World Championship. We'll see if Elementals will remain a viable strategy in Standard for a long time, or if it will be swept away by the next influx of cards in the ever-growing format.