Triple Theros was my first limited PTQ Top 8, and last weekend marked my third, with the second and third both being triple Khans. With a second place finish in the Theros PTQ, two Top 4 finishes with Khans and a Modern Top 8 in-between, you might say I'm hungry.

I don't believe that I'll have much of any opportunity with Khans limited to qualify for the Pro Tour, but there are tons of Standard PTQs and PTQQs on the horizon. While my ultimate goal is to win a PTQ of any format, Standard is the final frontier of even Top 8ing for me, and it's a focus of mine as a player at this point in time.

I played the Standard Super IQ this weekend at the Fantasy Flight Game Center--home of the most reasonable on-site french fries I've ever had at a Magic tournament as well as holder of a liquor license--and it went decently. 5-3 for 27th place in a field of ~140. I think the biggest obstacle to my success was that I was playing too close to a stock deck, which didn't give me as good of a chance at success as doing something unexpected.

This is what I registered:

The Elspeths do some serious work in this deck. After your opponent spends time battling quick, must-answer threats like Mantis Rider and Goblin Rabblemaster, they will often find themselves completely out of gas against the format's most powerful six drop. While Elspeth fits more seamlessly into decks like Abzan with their "just play all the good spells" nature, she still plays well here for those games where you're just not reasonably able to burn your opponents out.

On that matter, though, it really felt throughout the course of the tournament that I was only ever able to burn out opponents when the game wasn't particularly close.

More often, I would find myself at the mercy of Siege Rhinos and clocks much faster than using all of my mana to do four damage to my opponent. It seems to me that I would give myself the best chance of winning by either eschewing some burn spells for cards better at playing a controlling game, or to play a lower curve that lends itself to winning more games with burn faster.

I believe that the burn elements of this clan are much more powerful relative to other options than the controlling elements.

Not for nothing, it also might just be time (or even past time) to dump any Elspeths you have with the Elspeth versus Kiora duel deck on the horizon.

When I first picked up Jeskai, I noted that Seeker of the Way was a complete turd. It was the only creature in the deck that wasn't a must-answer and was often a Grizzly Bears with minimal upside. I chose the route of cutting the card, though supplementing it with more efficient threats could be the best way to utilize the amazing burn available in this format. I don't know if there is another two-drop creature that I especially like for this strategy, but there's a certain Modern and Legacy all-star that has my attention.

It would definitely take some retooling of the manabase to make a one-drop appealing in this deck. In particular, I don't think this inclusion is possible without playing at least eight painlands and would likely warrant some number of Mana Confluence. Our goal is to be extremely fast with the ability to burn out the other fast decks, which Seaker of the Way and Jeskai Charm help regain the life lost to our manabase.

Additionally, we'll be able to demolish the other aggressive decks by playing what I believe may be the most underplayed card in Standard:

Maybe it's the excitement over gold cards. Maybe it's the fascination with midrange. Maybe it's because everything is just good and a lot of people don't give red much respect, but this card being generally unplayed strikes me as a huge opportunity.

Particularly, this makes combat with Monastery Swiftspear and Seaker of the Way so much better. Say the opponent has a Courser of Kruphix. They might be fine blocking either of your creatures to save some life and trade you one-for-one. With Searing Blood, however, you get to make that trade in addition to getting in for 3 damage.

This is a non-trivial factor when Jeskai Charm and Stoke the Flames are legal. Now imagine that your opponent is just playing creatures that Searing Blood kills outright.

I'll also leave you to ponder how Searing Blood matches up against these two Planeswalkers:

I like the idea of hoarding Searing Bloods on the cheap. The card is serviceable for Modern and Legacy, and it won't take much for it to start showing up in Standard. With over 80% of PTQQs being Standard, I would find it hard to believe that you won't be able to get at least $1 a piece from anybody looking for them the morning of a tournament, and I definitely see it maintaining that price for its eternal relevance.

Cards like Siege Rhino and Polukranos, World Eater are still problematic. We do have answers, though.

I've been a fan of Suspension Field, and depending on how the final decklist ends up looking, finding a way to make Chained to the Rocks work is within the realm of possibility. They're certainly annoying opposition, but they're far from unbeatable.

Being as red as I want to be for a Monastery Swiftspear/Searing Blood deck does, of course, come with a cost, and that is Flooded Strand and therefor Dig Through Time become a lot more difficult to utilize.

I like the idea of sideboarding Dig against more controlling decks and possibly maindecking one, but if this deck ends up being inferior to other Jeskai builds, the loss of Dig would most likely be where the blame falls.

Putting it all Together

Everything above in mind, this is a rough draft of the kind of deck I want to start battling with:

The manabase is a pretty big question mark. That's a lot of painlands, and that Flooded Strand is arguably wrong. Notably, this deck is going to be generally very unhappy if it has both the Plains and the Island in play and draws another non-red land, so there is definitely a risk there. It's a work in progress, but this might be the start of something beautiful.

As for the sideboard, I'd stick with things like Erase, counterspells, and probably Magma Sprays. Dig Through Time or Treasure Cruise also probably belong there to fight things like Dimir control. I'm much more concerned with hammering out the manabase and getting the numbers more concrete for now.

Have any thoughts on the deck? Think it's more reasonable to just play Boros or monored if we want to cast Searing Blood? Have another idea on underplayed cards that could shake up Standard? Let me know in the comments!

Thanks for reading.

-Ryan Overturf
@RyanOverdrive on Twitter