Red Decks Remain Dominant Despite New Standard Competition

Last updated on October 5, 2025

Tersa Lightshatter | Illustration by Olivier Bernard

Marvel’s Spider-Man, the latest Universes Beyond Magic set, launched globally for tabletop exactly a week ago, while digital MTG players on MTGO and MTG Arena got it three days earlier, on Tuesday 23.

How big of an impact has Spidey & friends (& villains) had on Magic's Standard format thus far?

Not much, at least judging by the latest results from MTGO Challenges, where Izzet Vivi Cauldron and Red Deck Wins still dominate the top cut, with a light sprinkling of Orzhov Aggro and Dimir Midrange decks.

Izzet Cauldron and RDW Still Dominate Standard

Vivi Ornitier – Illustration by Toni Infante

It's not too rare for the strongest decks in Standard to remain the first couple of weeks after a new set launches. We had a very clear example of this dynamic during Tarkir: Dragonstorm: Cori-Steel Cutter wasn't a card that impressed Magic players during previews, and it took a couple of weeks for the archetype to take over the format.

Izzet Vivi started the week with a #1 spot in the MTGO Challenge 32 last Monday, making 50% of the Top 8 and grabbing the first two spots. RDW claimed 3 slots, Orzhov Aggro snuck one deck into the top cut, and in the rest of the Top 16 (not shown below) we find three Dimir Midrange decks and a couple of control decks.

Source: MTGTop8

The tables were turned a bit yesterday, with mono-red aggro snatching the #1 spot of yesterday's MTGO Challenge 32, placing a whopping 5 out of 8 top spots. The interesting thing here is that the top RDW deck differs quite a bit from the usual build, and goes for a full playset of Leyline of Resonance. 

Source: MTGTop8

Like on Monday, the rest of the Top 16 has a couple of Dimir Midrange and control decks.

Spider-Man Sightings

SPM cards haven't had much of an impact thus far, but they can still be found.

Norman Osborn showed up as a two-of in the Izzet Aggro build that took down a Standard Challenge last Saturday, although it seems to have been more of a fluke and has not showed up at the top since then.

But there was an RCQ in Spain where a Sultai Aggro build, with several SPM cards, that managed to get on top of a field rife with Vivis and Mountains.

Source: MTGTop8

Alexander Gimenez's Sultai Aggro goes for a full playset of Superior Spider-Man, and also makes room for two copies of Radioactive Spider.

In fact, Superior Spider-Man looks like one of Spider-Man's most promising cards right now: A Superior Reanimator deck is also doing quite well in Standard…

Source: MTGTop8

… and it's even making a splash in Modern!

Incoming Standard Bans

Nova Hellkite – Illustration by Raymond Swanland

It looks pretty much certain by now that Wizards of the Coast will have to act according to what they said in their Banned and Restricted Announcement from a month ago, where they noted that “Vivi Ornitier is warping the Standard format and likely needs to go.”

As they correctly noted back then, Vivi Cauldron decks do have a weak spot, namely mono-red aggro. But there doesn't seem to be a third deck that can break their stalemate and stranglehold on the Standard metagame, making it too stale.

“Our next banned and restricted announcement will be on November 10,” the article says. “We'll be watching closely to see how Standard develops, but we're prepared to take action given the current state of the format.”

It's impossible to predict how the metagame will look afterwards… and a bit pointless, even, since Avatar: The Last Airbender will arrive two weeks after the incoming bans, and that set may change things even further.