A week ago, at Players Tour events in Brussels and Nagoya, the combo of Inverter of Truth and Thassa's Oracle took the tournament by storm. While it didn't ultimately win the tournament, it defined the newest evolution of a rapidly shifting Pioneer format.
In Phoenix, it was time for the next step.
Lotus Field and Underworld Breach came together to ignite a already existing archetype with a jolt of explosiveness. Breach took the deck to the next level, and with the consistency provided by the card, the obscene amount of mana that can be produced by Lotus Field and effects like Hidden Strings that untap lands can now be funneled into a win on the spot. And even when things don't go according to plan, Fae of Wishes allows that mana to turn into something Ugin, the Spirit Dragon to wipe the field and take control. The deck was hyped by a slew of pros entering the tournament, and everyone was attempting to prepare for it.
All of which is a long way of saying that Lotus Breach more than delivered on the hype.
The deck boasted the highest conversion rate of any deck in the field. 58% of the deck's pilots advanced to Day 2 (which required a record of 5-3 or better), and it increased its metagame share by 6%, the most of any deck in the field.
Breach is obscene, by the way. There is going to be a LOT of copies in the top 8, and just about everyone I know playing it had absurd records. #PTPhoenix
— Luis Scott-Vargas (@lsv) February 8, 2020
Here's how the full Day 2 metagame breaks down:
| Deck Name | Copies in Day 2 | Conversion Rate from Day 1 | % of Day 2 Field |
| Dimir Inverter | 30 | 41.67% | 24% |
| Lotus Breach | 19 | 57.58% | 15% |
| Bant Spirits | 15 | 32.61% | 12% |
| Sultai Delirium | 14 | 48.28% | 11% |
| Mono-Red Aggro | 10 | 27.78% | 8% |
| Mono-Black Aggro | 9 | 32.14% | 7% |
| Sultai Inverter | 4 | 26.67% | 3% |
| Azorius Control | 3 | 20.00% | 2% |
| Mono-Black Vampires | 3 | 33.33% | 2% |
| Simic Ramp | 2 | 33.33% | 2% |
| Azorius Spirits | 2 | 66.67% | 2% |
| Mono-White Heliod | 2 | 11.11% | 2% |
| Sram Auras | 2 | 66.67% | 2% |
| Izzet Phoenix | 1 | 100.00% | 1% |
| Jund Aggro | 1 | 100.00% | 1% |
| Jund Delirium | 1 | 100.00% | 1% |
| Orzhov Midrange | 1 | 100.00% | 1% |
| Izzet Aggro | 1 | 100.00% | 1% |
| Orzhov Doom Foretold | 1 | 100.00% | 1% |
| Esper Control | 1 | 33.33% | 1% |
| Golgari Midrange | 1 | 100.00% | 1% |
| Naya Zoo | 1 | 100.00% | 1% |
| Gruul Aggro | 1 | 50.00% | 1% |
Here's how the top six decks fared from Day 1 to Day 2 in terms of metagame share.
- Lotus Breach: +6%
- Dimir Inverter: +4%
- Sultai Delirium: +3%
- Bant Spirits: -1%
- Mono-Back Aggro: -1%
- Mono-Red Aggro: -2%
All in all, it seems that Lotus Breach is here to stay. With two giant leaps in just two weeks, it clear that Theros Beyond Death (don't forget about Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath) has completely reinvented the Pioneer metagame.