Standard: Azorius Enchantments - Deck Tech & Sideboard Guide

Duskmourn has brought a new Aggro to Standard - Azorius Enchantments combines cards that benefit from the use of enchantments with the reprint of Ethereal Armor to create a strategy where, at the same time as pressuring the opponent, you can interact with their board with cards like Sheltered By Ghosts.

In this article, we delve deeper into this new proposal in Standard and present a guide to the main matchups of the current Metagame!

This is the standard list used by most players last week. As the Metagame continues to adapt to Duskmourn, I see no reason to add anything different from it this week.

Azorius Enchantments is essentially a synergistic Aggro: most of its creatures have some interaction with enchantments, and the enchantments serve to protect your creatures until they grow enough to win the game - or until a combination with Ethereal Armor gives the opponent a surprise hit-kill.

Cards like Enduring Innocence interact, for example, with Gremlin Tamer as well, which in turn puts more bodies on the board to be targeted by enchantments.

Another interaction is between Ethereal Armor and Fae Flight, where we guarantee evasion for the creature with the greatest power - Fae Flight also interacts, along with Shardmage’s Rescue with Sheltered By Ghosts to prevent favorable trades from the opponent when trying to destroy the enchanted creature.

This mix of synergy and straightforward gameplan makes Azorius Enchantments one of the most fun decks in Standard today - and it can produce good results that put it at the forefront of the current Metagame.

Maindeck

Our creatures give us benefits for playing enchantments. Optimistic Scavenger grows quickly and can easily get out of control in a three-turn sequence with Inquisitive Glimmer followed by Sheltered by Ghosts and Ethereal Armor, becoming large enough to hold any Aggro.

Gremlin Tamer puts more bodies on the board with each enchantment, being the equivalent of Young Pyromancer in the deck. This protects our strategy from spot removal and mitigates games where we draw the wrong half of the list.

Entity Tracker is our source of card advantage. Its Flash ability allows us to use it as a combat trick against Aggro, but we usually want to have it in play to generate value with our Auras.

Inquisitive Glimmer reduces the cost of our enchantments and allows for more explosive turns in the early game, including the possibility of playing Enduring Innocence and a one-drop on the third turn to draw a card.

Enduring Innocence is also another source of card advantage and its body with Lifelink gives us more breathing room against Prowess. Its interactions with Gremlin Tamer keeps the gas running.

Ethereal Armor is another reason to play this deck. As you progress through the game, it gets stronger, and the chances are that enchanting a creature with it and attacking unimpeded will lead to an instant win - and when it doesn't, First Strike basically allows it to survive any combat.

Sheltered by Ghosts is one of the most powerful Auras to be released on Standard in a long time. In addition to offering protection in the form of Ward and Lifelink against Aggro, it is also an unconditional removal. There are games where it will generate a very unfavorable trade due to a well-applied removal, but we have ways to mitigate that possibility.

Shardmage’s Rescue and Fae Flight basically serve to protect our creatures from spot removal. Fae Flight also grants Flying, and we can combine it with Ethereal Armor or a big enough Optimistic Scavenger to end the game in a few turns.

Ossification is a flexible slot, but board interaction is essential in today's metagame, and having an enchantment that does the job is better than including cards like Destroy Evil in this list.

Sideboard

We have two more copies of Ossification for games where we need to be more interactive, especially against Aggro, where we also include Elspeth's Smite to deal with small creatures for one mana.

Destroy Evil deals with unwanted enchantments and big creatures. We typically use it against Domain Ramp, but we can include it against Midranges that have many copies of Preacher of the Schism and Sheoldred, the Apocalypse or to deal with the Mirror.

Kitnap is another excellent card for games against large creatures. Interestingly, it can also enter the mirror because we can steal a large creature from the opponent, but we need to be careful with Hexproof spells, so I tend to avoid it.

Negate is the standard answer in the format today when we need to deal with something that is not on the board and unconditionally. There is no reason to use another counterspell in its place today.

Gruul Prowess

IN

OUT

Dimir Midrange

IN

OUT

Domain Ramp

IN

OUT

Rakdos Lizards

IN

OUT

Mono White Tokens

IN

OUT

Boros/Jeskai Convoke

No changes. Our sideboard doesn’t have enough relevant answers for this matchup, and it’s basically defined by a race between who can explode first: our deck with Ethereal Armor or them with Knight-Errant of Eos.

We have an advantage because Sheltered by Ghosts can exile tokens and still give Lifelink to our biggest threat, so Convoke needs a very fast clock to not fall behind.

Azorius Enchantments

IN

OUT

There are other lines we can follow in this matchup, but the outcome usually comes down to who can best respond to the opponent in the early game and maintain their momentum as the match unfolds. Gremlin Tamer does not interact with this proposal.

We can remove all copies of Enduring Innocence to play with Kitnap, but this proposal is only valid if the opponent's side out is on Hexproof spells, which I would not recommend.

That's all for today!

If you have any questions, feel free to leave a comment!

Thanks for reading!