Hello everyone. I'm back, once again, to bring you some fun and innovative Standard decks you can use at your weekly Friday Night Magic event or just against your friends. Last week, I showed you three mono-colored decks, and I'll continue that this week by finishing off the colors of mana, plus once additional deck that is nearly colorless. Let's get started.

Mono-Black Braids's Sacrifice

Our first stop this week is at a Mono-Black deck that wants to take advantage of the powerful ability found on Braids, Arisen Nightmare. Let's take a look at the deck.

Mono-Black Braids's Sacrifice | WOE Standard | SlothMtg, aetherhub.com user

• Creatures (18)
• 1 Jadar, Ghoulcaller of Nephalia
• 1 Phyrexian Obliterator
• 2 Tenacious Underdog
• 3 Lord Skitter, Sewer King
• 3 Sheoldred, the Apocalypse
• 4 Braids, Arisen Nightmare
• 4 Spiteful Hexmage

• Planeswalkers (2)
• 2 Ashiok, Wicked Manipulator

• Instants (5)
• 2 The Witch's Vanity
• 3 Candy Grapple

• Sorceries (6)
• 1 Back for Seconds
• 1 Rankle's Prank
• 2 Beseech the Mirror
• 2 Gix's Command

• Enchantments (5)
• 1 Virtue of Persistence
• 4 Hopeless Nightmare

• Lands (24)
• 23 Swamp
• 1 Takenuma, Abandoned Mire

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This deck includes a couple of ways of creating creature tokens that make excellent sacrificial candidates. As long as you don't already have any creatures that have decayed, Jadar, Ghoulcaller of Nephalia will create a 2/2 Zombie creature token that has decayed at the beginning of your end step. At the beginning of combat, you'll create a 1/1 Rat creature token while you have Lord Skitter, Sewer King in play. Any of these tokens should be your first choice to sacrifice to Braids.

In addition to creatures, you could also choose to sacrifice an artifact, an enchantment, a land, or a planeswalker. Doing so will have the same effect as sacrificing a creature. In fact, this deck has a pair of cards that create roles that can be sacrificed with Braids's ability. The third chapter of The Witch's Vanity creates a Wicked Role token that will be attached to a creature you control. When this role is put into a graveyard from the battlefield, your opponent will lose one point of life. There's also Spiteful Hexmage, who creates a Cursed Role token for one of your creatures. Since this role makes the enchanted creature's base stats 1/1, you'll be more than happy to sacrifice this enchantment.

Mono-Blue Tempo

The final mono-colored deck I have for you is Mono-Blue Tempo. This deck has been in Standard for a while, with very minimal changes. Let's take a look at it.

Mono-Blue Tempo | WOE Standard | MTGA-Assistant-Meta, aetherhub.com user

• Creatures (12)
• 4 Delver of Secrets
• 4 Haughty Djinn
• 4 Tolarian Terror

• Instants (25)
• 1 Flow of Knowledge
• 2 Shore Up
• 2 Slip Out the Back
• 4 Consider
• 4 Curate
• 4 Fading Hope
• 4 Make Disappear
• 4 Thirst for Discovery

• Enchantments (2)
• 2 Bitter Chill

• Lands (21)
• 20 Island
• 1 Otawara, Soaring City

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Having all those instant spells allows you to end your future turns with mana available much of the time. You can use that mana to counter your opponent's spells with this deck's only counterspell, Make Disappear. The rest of the time, you can bluff that you have a counterspell, and play one of the numerous instant spells that allow you to draw additional cards instead. You can also play both Slip Out the Back and Fading Hope to temporarily remove your opponent's threats from the battlefield.

There is one new card from Wilds of Eldraine in this deck, Bitter Chill. This enchantment will tap one of your opponent's creatures permanently, or at least until they find a way to remove Bitter Chill. If that does happen, you'll be able to pay one mana to scry 1 and then draw a card, so not all is lost.

Mostly Artifacts

The final deck I have for you is also technically a mono-colored deck, but I like the fact that it is strongly focused on artifacts. Let's check it out.

Mostly Artifacts | WOE Standard | MtgMalone, aetherhub.com user

• Creatures (24)
• 3 Gingerbrute
• 3 Liberator, Urza's Battlethopter
• 3 Surge Engine
• 3 Syr Ginger, the Meal Ender
• 4 Iron Apprentice
• 4 Living Lectern
• 4 Patchwork Automaton

• Instants (6)
• 3 Disruption Protocol
• 3 Thirst for Knowledge

• Artifacts (7)
• 2 Hylda's Crown of Winter
• 2 Portal to Phyrexia
• 3 The Mightstone and Weakstone

• Lands (23)
• 21 Island
• 2 Otawara, Soaring City

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Having all of your creatures be artifacts also benefits Patchwork Automaton in a similar way. While it's on the battlefield, this Construct will gain a +1/+1 counter whenever you cast an artifact spell. That artifact spell doesn't have to resolve for Patchwork Automaton to gain the +1/+1 counter. This will make it a huge threat, and your opponent might have some difficulty removing it from play due to its Ward 2 ability.

This deck also includes one of my favorite new artifacts, Hylda's Crown of Winter. By tapping Hylda's Crown of Winter, you can tap a target creature. If you use this ability on your opponent's turn, you'll have to pay one mana. Usually, you'll use it on their turn, just before they declare attackers, tapping down their biggest threat. Then, use it again on your next turn, tapping down their best defender. Doing this removes two of their creatures from battle, allowing you to swing in more effectively.

Wrapping Up

Mono-Colored decks are great to use when a new set releases. They usually require you to obtain fewer new cards, but they can still pack a punch. After a new set has been out for a few weeks, I've usually been able to acquire more of the new set, allowing me to build multicolored decks, which is what we'll start looking at next week.

What do you think of these decks? Feel free to share this article with your friends anywhere on social media. And be sure to join me here again next week as I continue my search for innovative decks in Standard. I'll see you then!

- Mike Likes