Welcome to The Weekly TopDeck.

You might remember we ran a newsletter back in 2024. Consider this a revival, a spiritual successor of sorts: now weekly, with a broader scope across the industry, and a wide variety of writers across many games and expertise.

This week, Jase Sanders (the youngest TopDeck Invitational player ever) argues why playing wheels is losing you games of cEDH.

Jon Rosum from ChallengerTCG breaks down the new Set 3 Riftbound meta with Regional Qualifier Sydney on the horizon.

Let’s get into it.

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Wheel of Fortune effects are often included in midrange decks. The number three cEDH player breaks down why you’re wrong to do so.

By Jase Sanders

It’s turn one. You’ve just kept the best possible hand of all time. Land, Esper Sentinel loaded up and ready to go. The player in front of you casts a turn ONE, seat ONE Wheel of Fortune. Your dear old friend Esper sentinel makes his way to the graveyard, and for WHAT? The Wheel player triumphantly declares that they did something, and when the turn cycle makes it back around to them what do they do? NOTHING RELEVANT. Because instead of keeping a hand with an actual gameplan, they decided that hand terrorism was the best way to win a game of cEDH.

Hello, I am Jase Sanders and today I'm here to explain why Wheel of Fortune sucks. Now there's some caveats here obviously, aggressive decks like Ral, Monsoon Mage and RogSi benefit from the game states Wheel creates.

I'm not arguing for the exclusion of Wheel from every deck, but I will be arguing that Wheel in a majority of decks it's played in is actually unplayable garbage. This is mostly in the context of the most played deck, Blue Farm; as I am ever so experienced in that very balanced pile of cards. Do know though, that in my objectively correct opinion as creator of cEDH, Wheel in any deck trying to play towards the midgame as Blue Farm does is WRONG. 

In theory decks like Blue Farm should have more cards in hand than any other deck at the table. It has the most draw engines and more access to them. You shouldn't be looking to put the table at parity when you are ahead.

Casting Wheel of fortune puts a level of randomness into the game that almost never works out in the caster’s favor. This is mostly due to the fact that the mana development in midrange decks is absolutely abysmal. Spending three mana on wheel only to end up at parity with your opponents who spent zero mana for the effect is in fact, not great. Usually when you go to cast Wheel on turns two-three it soaks up most of your mana and you have to do the dreaded WHEEL PASS.

Wheel with a substantial amount of mana left over usually converts to a win in most positions, but it's the fact that wheel requires a large amount of mana development to be strong as a “card draw spell” and the fact that games often end within the turn cycle of a wheel being cast that make it a poor include for midrange decks. Even casting Wheel late is unnecessary as another tutor performs the same function as a “Win the game card” without giving your opponents more resources.

It is worth mentioning Wheel in combination with cards like Orcish Bowmasters and Smothering Tithe. My answer is, if you have those cards in play you are likely winning anyway and Wheel puts you in a vulnerable position especially in comparison to something like another tutor. You are coping if you think Wheel plus Tithe is a whole reason to play a card.

So If Wheel is medium early, medium in the midgame, and medium in the late game WHY ARE WE PLAYING IT?

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Regional Qualifier Sydney is two weeks away. Jon Rosum from ChallengerTCG breaks down the decks he’s preparing for in this brand new meta.

By Jon Rosum · ChallengerTCG

The ChallengerTCG squad has been hard at work, and these are my personal top 5 decks that you need to have a strong plan for going into RQ Sydney to give yourself the best chance to succeed at the event!

We have a new Challenger approaching in Unleashed in the form of Leblanc, Deceiver. She has put up several results online and is certainly “unique” in how this deck approaches the game. This deck utilizes Karthus as the main engine piece and a bunch of Deathknell triggers to generate some form of advantage.

The creature synergy package isn’t relatively new outside of Leblanc, Fragmented but the Legend ability provides a lot of power for this deck. The removal suite in Order is nothing short of powerful, as we have seen in Viktor decks in Set 1 / Set 2, which is why I think this will be a top contender going into RQ Sydney.

The menace from Set 1 is back with a vengeance because of Elder Dragon, which is miles better than any big creature we have seen so far in the past two sets.

This list won the S3 Chengdu City Challenge in China, and while the tournament was B01, I think the way this deck is constructed is close to what we will see in RQ Sydney. Having the bulk of your threats as Elder Dragon just means you can almost fully rely on it as a stabilization tool and this list focuses on using Heedless Resurrection and Last Rites to ensure Elder Dragon loops to lock your opponent out of the game.

I truly believe that purple will be the go to color pairing for Aurora because of the cards mentioned above along with card selection / filtering provided by Stacked Deck / Scryer’s Bloom / Lunar Boon.

The boogeyman from Set 2 is still here and you better be respecting it going into RQ Sydney. The deck did receive a notable upgrade in Vex - Apathetic, Evelynn - Entrancing and Star-Crossed while maintaining the incredibly powerful core.

I predict this deck to still be quite popular and one of the best decks in the format, even though I think that Ferrous Forerunner’s time as the end-all be-all menace is over you still need to have a very good plan against this because of how efficient the deck is.

We have seen this archetype in Set 1/2, and it receives some considerable upgrades. Both Rengar, Trophy Hunter and Master Yi, Tempered provide consistency and raw strength that will make this a very consistent linear deck.

Rengar, Trophy Hunter is going to be a card you will have to consider when trying to conquer / interact into 5 open energy so don’t allow yourself to get blown out by this or you might just lose the game on the spot.

Very similar to what we saw Barczek take to Top 8 Lille with some refinements from Set 3. The biggest question is whether Stellacorn will continue to make the cut, with Rengar / Vilemaw you are incentivized to try to hold and less so trying to mimic the movement strategy, which is nice for card flow but not very good at ending the game as soon as possible which I think Yi wants to do.

The tempo deck of the format and my personal favorite, this deck is trying to use Diana, Lunari and Hwei, Brooding Painter along with the legend’s ability to ensure that you continuously win combats and generate a lot of cards. Having a champion unit that you can play on turn 1 on the draw is nothing to scoff at either.

I will be working extensively on this deck in the weeks to come, and I think it will be one of the more popular choices at RQ Sydney because of how flexible the color pairing is.

The sheer power that Dazzling Aurora gained from Elder Dragon can’t be understated and will be the go-to play pattern for the deck moving forward. In terms of Draven, sure Ferrous Forerunner lost a lot of power but you gained so much consistency and power with Vex, Apathetic and Evelyn, Entrancing that we will continue to see this midrange menace run rampant in the metagame.

I am very excited to continue to figure out Set 3. If you want to feel best prepared for RQ Sydney, Vancouver, and Hartford, you’re going to need to have a very good plan for these decks, especially against Aurora and Draven.

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