[GoR] Grixis Mid (Standard)

A draft of the Grixis build I'm working on for when MTGA's open Beta releases on 27Sept

Thanks to the manabase, threats and access to Vraska's Contempt as a catch-all removal, it seems pretty clear that Grixis is going to be a solid shard going forward during GoR's Standard, and I see two probable directions for it :

• A very proactive Midrange build, based on good 3-4-5 mana threats, including Legion Warboss and a handful of removals to clear the way, but few value cards and counterspells, similar to Jeskai Midrange when Goblin Rabblemaster was in Standard. Although it might be a thing immediatly, I suspect it might take the second expansion with Blood Crypt & Rakdos's pals to really hit the mark.
• A more classic draw-go Control based on Countermagics, efficient removals, Chemister's Insight, Ral, Izzet Viceroy, some amount of Expansion // Explosion (I'll talk about that card later), and Mission Briefing as a premium versatility card to flashback relevant things at every stage of the game. Although I believe GoR will be the best moment for that deck to shine (as Grixis's two actual Shocklands make it blue-based, which make it the only draw-go Control deck reliably able to use Mission Briefing, while Ravnica n.2 will bring Hallowed Fountain to the table and make Esper & Teferi, Hero of Dominaria viable again), I just don't love draw-go Control in particular as I like the high risk/reward of sliding in a good creature halfway through my disruption fiesta.

The present build is as Beta as MTGA as I'm running a Midrange curve of powerful threats, a couple of removals and Thought Erasure, alongside a pinch of Control elements (Azcanta, Mission Briefing, Sinister Sabotage, Chemister's Insight, Ral and Expansion // Explosion) to see how they perform and to make up for the lack of Blood Crypt, driving us towards more Blue cards. I also like the idea of playing a bunch of different targets for Mission Briefing to emphasize its versatility, instead of having few choices with it, like only removals/counterspells, which tends to happen in Draw-Go Control decks.

Here are the cards I'm still about and here are my arguments for them :

• Expansion // Explosion. Although I do think it's better in a draw-go deck, just like Sphinx's Revelation, I think this card is very wrongfully going under the radar of a lot of people. Sphinx's Rev basically made UWx Control decks work back in RtR Standard; 1 extra colored mana is not the end of the world when the spell is supposed to be cast for 7+ anyway; killing a thing is arguably better in general than gaining a bunch of life, and Expansion is a fine way to make your X spell not a dead card in the early game. Forking a 4 or - CCM spell is basically forking anything that's not an X-spell, as we really don't play 5+ instants/sorceries nowadays (Cruel Ultimatum reprint, anybody ?) and prefer running permanents that generate value. And I'm gladly up for forking a Cast Down, a Vraska's Contempt, an opposing counterspell or a Thought Erasure against a juicy hand.

• Blood Operative : This guy is kind of an enigma to me, as it's really well designed and seemingly has a lot of potential, especially since so much Surveil cards are just well-rounded good cards that'll easily take 10+ slots in your deck (the Doom Whisperer+Blood Operative is just the icing on the cake); it's good against aggro and control; it's even fine when it chumpblocks and gets regularly recast for 3 when you have a bunch of Surveil cards. It's still dependent on what's getting played on the Aggro side of the battlefield. If First Strikers, Chainwhirlers and 4+ toughness Green creatures are the norm, I'm not sure Operative is going to do his job, although he technically forces them to keep a blocker for it as gaining 3 life off of his Lifelink basically negates one of their attack; so either way he always gains you time, is hard to completely stop, which fits the Midrange-Control philosophy of my deck better than a Legion Warboss that would require much more cheap removals