Greetings and Salutations my fellow spell slingers!

Today I have a special treat for you all, and I intend to make it a new tradition. Here at MTGA Artisan our Cup tournaments are held regularly so that we can test our mettle in the fires of Glorious Battle! Battles of wit and cunning where innumerable choices, that we make long before the event as well as the days we face off, eventually lead to one player 'hoisting the Cup' as the tournament champion (And accruing those, oh so sweet, prestige points).

I have often wondered how these dangerous and influential wizards have come to sit atop the podium of power… and, with this, we will see a little more closely what goes into the making of a Champion Cup tournament list.

Today the one and only Kombat (aka Yawgmoth) joins me to answer a few questions about his winning Caves stack that has, in my opinion, a somewhat absurd power level for a few reasons (which we'll get into). Without further adieu, your StA Cup Champ!

The air goes chill, heavy and damp as a dark wizard glides around the corner and through the door. Heavy black robes fall around the figure all the way to the ground, watching their movements you realize he must be floating rather than walking! You cannot see his face, but you can see the bright shine in his eyes. This being has certainly been down in the caves for some time…

The gruesome head of a Leech the size of a house peers through the door trying to follow its master! With a wave of his arm, our guest waves the creature away before taking the hotseat

SCITHOS: Greetings Kombat!

First off, I wanted to say congrats on the win! You made it to the top against 24 of your fellow Artisan aficionados in the event that lasted a few weeks. No mean feat to be sure!

So, you played a very interesting caves list, a deck that I have found to be very hard to stop. The threats, interaction package, the card advantage and the namesake caves are all top tier. Mind giving us a little slice of why you chose the deck and how it came together?

The process of creating the Sultai Caves deck

The first versions

KOMBAT: Thank you, I got to say It had some challenges and required some luck but this isn't the first iteration nor the last. I'd say this caves midrange archtype has evolved quite a bit over the last year and really struggled at first to find some ground. I'd been playing in the HA, and recent TA cup events so I decided to try something new.

Initially I had the idea to try to attack the shrine/lessons meta with a midrange brew in my 2nd STA event and, without having much knowledge of the meta or matchups, I tossed together a mardu caves list. The idea was simple: Attack graves, blow up enchants, and have threats that could handle lots of creatures.

Kombat - Mardu Caves Standard Artisan Cup - January 2026

https://melee.gg/Decklist/View/039e6b9d-df02-4f13-ae08-b3d000ab2f48

But I ran into a matchup against Remmerio's Temur caves that really got my gears turning after seeing the potential of spelunking and stock up in this blue green value engine of a deck.

Remmerio - Temur Caves - Standard Artisan Cup - January 2026

https://melee.gg/Decklist/View/56c5da76-12b8-4451-82d4-b3d1012b3f97

After this event, the printing of Lessons from Life, and loads of testing with a temur list. I felt like there had to be a better build; something with cleaner interaction that could stand its ground vs creature decks but had enough power to take over. So I started testing A LOT and with a little help from Opulent Palace, and a better understanding of the meta, I came up with what I thought was the deck. Super resilient to creature decks, some counter play and answers for roots, shrines, and massive value payoffs with Lessons from Life and stock up, and with a top end that basically kills/removes a creature from play with Omega, Heartless Evolution.

Kombat - Sultai Caves Control - Standard Artisan Cup - April 2026

https://melee.gg/Decklist/View/d012177e-57f6-4849-a86e-b42c008a66c2

The life gain from spelunking, Omega and Gargantuan Leech really help stabilize this mid/control version. Gargantuan Leech being able to play it as early as turn 4 would do wonders for me in the next event. Though the down fall, I did not realize Shoot the Sheriff could hit certain creature types and after going 5-0 with this list into the elim bracket I ran up against Alan with his mono blue flash playing a warlock creature Voracious Tome-Skimmer:

Alan Jones - Mono Blue Flash - Standard Artisan Cup - April 2026

https://melee.gg/Decklist/View/0822e124-4b2d-4de0-9952-b42d008b1ae9

Unable to remove his value engine I quickly got buried in value, controlled by cheap blue interaction, and lost. With Alan standing as runner up to finals and knowing winning a rematch wasn't likely I had really regretted my interaction choices, even after a 5-0 run in the Swiss. I felt stuck.

The final winning list

Enter the next STA Cup.

I cleaned up my removal package and tried to bring in some tools for the mirror and control build (like Bandit's Talent). I did little testing with it but was very impressed.

After the success of Malicious Eclipse in the previous event I opted to keep 3 copies because it really does wonders vs low to the ground fast creature piles and bounce builds. I added basic lands to ensure faster turn 3 plays like Stock Up or Spelunking. A full 4 copies of Fell went in, which was just a clean removal spell, the only real condition is that it's a sorcery. This wasn't a huge downside because this deck wants to tap out and push the card advantage as much as possible only holding up a mana or two for cheap interaction like spell snare or some of the sideboard options. The utility of Damage Control Crew really impressed me. It can easily be a way to return Lessons from Life or bring back a Gargantuan Leech, or exile an artifact/enchant while giving you a 3/3 body.

Lastly, from the board, Rite of Renewal could easily restock your deck with threats late game and give you 2 more Leeches that would likely cost 1 mana.

Kombat - Sultai Caves - Standard Artisan Cup - July 2026

https://melee.gg/Decklist/View/077f4c49-4d7b-442a-b6b8-b48700a74b17

I still feel this deck has room for improvement and as long as the shell is maintained it's really versatile, like a true midrange deck.

What makes the Caves deck so strong

SCITHOS: Awesome rundown! I love to know the path that a deck follows before it makes it to the top spot, and I'm sure a lot of others will be stoked to hear the journey also. The nuance and unique picks for this list are more interesting when we know why.

Don't you love it when a deck gets under your skin and you grind on it for a long period of time? That's where the true gold is found.

Since our fortunate (far too brief) slice of time where we were able to buy thousands (literally) of Common and Uncommon wildcards, I have since built this deck and played it a number of times. It truly is a list set apart in the format for the strength of every one of its facets.

Beyond the incredible non-land inclusions in this 75, I gotta say that I really feel it's the lands, the Caves themselves, that puts this deck squarely above. When you run out of steam late game and have 10 lands on the table, you can just crack them for more spells. No other control deck can do that to the same degree (or any deck really). The other thing that I think might be overlooked is Cavernous Maw. A powerful and efficient man-land in a format with Zero other manlands (Ghitu Encampment notwithstanding). I swear, if Maw didn't have the cave restriction, I would play it in basically every deck I make.

Tournament match-ups: opponents and strategies

In regards to the event itself, and considering some of the interesting lists in the top 8, I'm curious how you felt about the decks you faced. Were they more-or-less what you expected, or did you feel you were wading into a total rogue-deck rampage?

KOMBAT: I felt like the decks I thought I would see made an appearance, although I was expecting a shrines deck to see some play, as it's been a performer.

Izzet control, which I lost to in the Swiss rounds, gave me a run for it and I had a little luck on my side. I felt like the matchup is very even but takes some timing and specifically holding answers for certain problems. The list was strong and we had some very interesting close games. I think bandits talent is decent here but I would like to look specifically at this match and make a few modifications to gain favor.

Obviously, I dodged Alan this time around in finals but I would say Nowhere to Run was the specific counter play I thought about when preparing for this event. It answers the Tome skimmer problem as it gets around the hex proof he can give it.

I thought merfolk might play in a similar fashion, using all this cheap interaction while trying to get under the control decks, but again dodged that matchup. I think I would make some adjustments for counter play for these interactive low curve decks. They seem to do well enough to make top 8.

The monsters deck was interesting. It really was just lacking the card advantage but I've seen that the list has been updated to include some value cards like lessons or stock up

SCITHOS: I tested with JayGravy and his Monsters before the tournament and even came close to playing the deck myself. In the end I flipped last minute because I felt I was running out of gas too often (It was a mistake, ha). As powerful as the build was that he ran this tournament, with Lessons and Stock up it sounds a lot scarier!

I was actually a bit shocked to see a merfolk deck in the finals, but absolutely loved it! Fish decks have been a little piece of Magic: The Gathering's history since the very beginning, and it was great to see the archetype bring home a top 8 finish!

I actually had interest in trying out a Merfolk pile since Heroes gave us Attuma, Atlantean Warlord. After putting a rough list together, I will say it feels very strong. Kills fast and has the interaction to support. Surely this won't be the last we see of the Merfizzles in StA!

You've played that Izzet Control list yourself in the past if I remember correctly. A strong list for sure, but I bet your knowledge of its inner-workings helped in the match.

My next question was going to be 'what would you say your most difficult matchup was on the day?'. Sounds like Jeskai Control gave you the biggest challenge so far, was there a match that you felt was even harder to push through?

KOMBAT: I ran up against a mono black discard list which I figured would be close to even like the control matchup. The last event playing against R/B goblins I felt was a scary matchup. I ran into the same issue with my shoot the sheriff removal though with them having a warlock goblin I couldn't target. It was basically a blood artist deck but the leech and eclipse got me through most of the rough spots.

I'll say control was the hardest but it's also the design because it's also running the Eddy crab and Tolarin Terror which can just end the game out of nowhere so attacking the yard is key to slow them down and trading a leech is better than waiting for them to remove it. Ancient Vendetta came in to name one of the two threats leaving them with only four 5/5s to win with some of which got milled. This makes it very difficult for the deck to find multiple copies and overwhelm you. It's cheap interaction can get under you and if you're unable to slow down the mana cost reduction you'll quickly get run over.

SCITHOS: It's very true; the Terror lists, with graveyards left unchecked, are truly difficult to fight through. With their "Terrors" coming down at one or two mana, messing with your attacks or just being difficult to kill through ward and countermagic, it can be a tough match for any deck.

Vendetta is a card that I really like having a couple copies of in the board. It can take care of problematic threats before they become threatening, and also mess with decks that, like in your example, rely on a very small number of threats.

The state of the Standard Artisan format

I've got a couple more questions just to pick your brain about the format and Artisan in general.

In Standard Artisan, in general, how do you feel about the health of the format? Any decks, strategies or specific cards you feel are unbalanced at all? Anything that you would say may need to be watched?

KOMBAT: I think standard artisan has a lot of decks that are viable and it's got a rock paper scissors feel about it. Right now I think insidious roots is the best deck and always puts up results with an experienced pilot. The lessons packages and shrines list didn't see as much play this time around but I feel are still very powerful options. Seeing so many new brews every event finds success is a really good sign of its health.

My only concern in artisan in general atm is a newly introduced alchemy card inspiring easel. The card advantage and mana fixing/ramp off this 2 mana rock has been way overtuned and I think it will prove that it probably needs to be restricted or banned in HA, though I feel there's room for something like this in Timeless.

Overall I think that artisan as a whole is extremely healthy. The best thing we could get are the uncommon tri lands for example esper and grixis to help expand the mana bases to support 3 colors. We finally got a jund land and I've already started brewing as someone who's always been midrange player.

SCITHOS: I would agree with you on all counts.

I think that Standard Artisan itself is beautifully healthy. This last tournament definitely showed that the format is far from "figured out" and that any reasonable strategy can be competitive if you do the testing and the tweaking.

Stepping outside Standard Artisan for just a moment, I similarly agree that the only card I really roll my eyes at across Timeless and Historic Artisan is the Easel.

The power level trend of the newer Alchemy cards (which used to be very good in the past, but reasonable) is somewhat concerning. But I suppose we'll just have to wait and see whether the decks that use the card become truly degenerate and dominant.

A View of Artisan's Future

Final question before I'll let you go!

Is there anything you are looking forward to in the future, in Artisan, Magic: The Gathering in general, or else wise?

KOMBAT: Just more brewers, more players, more good events all for artisan. This format inspired me so much I actually built an artisan cube in paper and have played it quite a few times. Magic Arena I hope continues to release older sets, and lately we have been getting things like extra sheets in sets. I haven't seen anything like a Historic release in some time or something to introduce a wave of new cards outside of a set release. There's so many cards or rarity shifts that could happen and the format might see new additions eventually.

SCITHOS: I couldn't agree more. Artisan has rekindled an appreciation for this game in me that had gotten beat down. The old spirit of MTG lives here, and I had thought it may have been lost.

I have definitely loved to watch the format grow in the months I've been coming to this server.

I am also really hoping that some of the older cards get added/shifted so we can make use of them! There are so, so many that were fine as rares in the past, but just can't compete with the rares of contemporary Magic: The Gathering.

Well Kombat, this has been a total treat. Thank you for taking the time to have this conversation with me, and for the thoughtful and thorough answers. I know life these days can be pretty hectic and I appreciate it.

Any final words for our readers before I let you go?

KOMBAT: To close, I want to thank the community managers and organizers for kindling the fires that bring everyone together. I know I'm not alone when I say that you are appreciated for your efforts. If anyone would like to donate or buy them a coffee, the server's Patreon is here:

https://www.patreon.com/cw/MTGAArtisan

SCITHOS: An excellent plug! I support the server through Patreon myself, and it feels good to give a bit back to the community that has honestly given me so much.

Wishing you all the best in the next events!

Well, there you have it folks! A solid look into the inner machinations of your Standard Artisan Cup winner, not to mention you current Champion in the Season Rankings on MTGA Artisan. Hope you enjoyed it as much as I did!

Our next Cup tournament, kicking off August 18th, will be the format with the whole shibang and all the trimmings, Timeless Artisan. Fast and brutal, totally unrelenting, and always a blast to play. I am already looking forward to getting the next winner into the hotseat to see what makes them tick. Maybe the MTG gods will have a sense of humor and let me interview myself! Ha!

Until next time, Happy spell-slingin' my wizards.