I won’t deny that the energy mechanic is powerful, and is capable of warping the meta that forces players to either play with it or prepare to play against it. With high quality creatures that grow bigger, self protects, generates card advantage and creates a wide board presence using energy as a resource is a recipe for huge success.
Using 3 colors is not a problem either for the energy decks because of its natural ability to fix its mana thanks to Attune with Aether, Servant of the Conduit and Aether Hub.
The deck’s synergy is extremely fluid that praying for it to screw on mana, or not have enough cards in hand, or not have a creature in play is almost impossible. In my experience facing energy decks, leading with Attune into Longtusk Cub, into Rogue Refiner quickly sends a tilting sensation down my spine.
What to do in an energy heavy meta? Well as the saying goes — if you can’t beat them, join them. But never copy. Never.
Black isn’t known for great energy cards so I won’t waste time jamming weak energy cards into it. But what Black is great at is killing creatures in one go. Since other energy decks use creatures to win, then we should have this department in check.
Bontu’s Last Reckoning is the premier early sweeper which helps you get back into the game in exchange for a turn essentially. Thanks to our choice of colors, we can also use Cut // Ribbons. Cut is by far the strongest damage-based spell against creature at 2 mana. While Ribbons is a great way to surprise your opponent and steal the game once his life totals get pretty low.
Against early aggression, we will have standard’s best early spot removal.
I chose Fatal Push over Shock and Magma Spray because we need to respect the Longtusk Cub. Nothing exterminates pesky growing cats better than pushing it off the cliff.
We won’t be running any creatures which means we have some space to run Planeswalkers suite and Jund has some of the juiciest walkers.
Nissa is our offensive Planeswalker which can send a 5/5 land creature into the red zone. She’s also a Regrowth on a stick allowing us to get back other permanents and other Planeswalkers. Her ultimate is extremely easy to pull off and the card advantage this brings is huge.
Chandra is our removal Planeswalker. She’s great at taking down dudes with her -3 ability. On top of that she also helps ramp us to bigger spells later in the game, or provide some sort of card advantage. Her ultimate, if we get there, is a win condition on its own.
Vraska is our defensive Planeswalker which is good at cluttering the board with 2/2 pirates. At 6 starting loyalty, she’s very difficult to remove and a single tick up allows her to remove 2 permanents and still live to do it again. Her ultimate is also great because if we can get the opponent to 1 life, then the next card should end the match soon after.
Lastly, we will use all our spells to fuel Dynavolt Tower which is another win condition for us. Yes, we won’t be running creatures but we will play as much instants and sorcery as we can to maximize Tower.
Here’s my Jund Tower Deck Tech:
Artifact: 4
4 Dynavolt Tower
Planeswalkers: 6
2 Nissa, Vital Force
3 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
1 Vraska, Relic Seeker
Sorcery: 16
4 Duress
4 Attune with Aether
3 Live Fast
3 Bontu’s Last Reckoning
2 Cut // Ribbons
Instant: 11
3 Fatal Push
3 Lightning Strike
3 Harnessed Lightning
2 Vraska’s Contempt
Land: 23
4 Blooming Marsh
3 Dragonskull Summit
3 Rootbound Crag
3 Canyon Slough
3 Mountain
4 Swamp
3 Forest
Sideboard: 15
2 Lost Legacy
2 Disposses
3 Abrade
1 Vraska’s Contemp
3 Appetite for the Unnatural
4 Doomfall
The deck behaves like Temur Tower decks of old but leans towards control elements more than anything. Not running creatures mean we can fully utilize sweepers without any drawback. Playing black also puts us in a better position against control decks which is now a tough archetype to beat.
The reprint of Duress is perfect for the main board because it gives us a peek on what we’re up against to better play out our cards. It’s also a cheap way to get free energy from Dynavolt. From the sideboard we have Doomfall and Lost Legacy to further attack the opponent’s hand. If the control player is kept busy countering to protect his hand, he won’t get the chance to cast draw spells. If he plans to dish out a Torrential Gearhulk, then you can always lead with a discard spell and then kill the Gearhulk after things have resolved.
I’m dishing out multiple decks before I forget them so I hope you’re enjoying what you’re seeing so far!
Ciao!
Vanson
Forbidden Alchemy 