The best combo deck of the format, Lotus Field, is not intact; Lotus Field itself is Arena-legal, but the crucial Thespian's Stage, Hidden Strings, and Pore Over the Pages are not.
It's possible there's a new Lotus Field deck waiting to be built, though, since the card is absurd
Combining Narset with Timetwister-like effects is powerful in Pio right now. Narset herself is on Arena, but Day's Undoing, Collective Defiance, Dark Deal, and Whispering Madness aren't.
Emergency Powers and Commit/Memory are the only wheel effects that are, afaik
As far as my favorite deck, Arclight Phoenix: the Historic version is full of non-Pio cards like Faithless and DRC. Arena is missing lots of the Pio cards like Cruise and Temporal Trespass. Lots of the cards *are* on Arena, though, so I bet you could still build it somehow
I suspect Naya Winota will be the best deck in the Explorer format initially, since it's mostly intact with a few swaps.
Lightning Axe was in Jumpstart, and is listed as Historic-legal, so it likely *is* on Arena? I can't tell for sure. If so, that'll be a key anti-Winota card
Karn is Arena-legal, and has a pretty extensive toolbox of tutor targets available, but will likely struggle without Nykthos to ramp him out. I could definitely see some Karn deck being a major player, though, as the effect is really strong vs Anvil/Cat/Oven decks
Overall I think Explorer will be pretty different from the #MTGpioneer we're used to, at least until WOTC adds a reprint Anthology set or two.
Either way, it's exciting to see WOTC paying attention to Pio again and paving the way towards adding the format to Arena👍
/thread
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