History of the Deck

1. The Standard Origins (2000)

Replenish first broke out at the 2000 World Championship, where Hall of Famer Tom van de Logt took it to a Top 8 finish. This old Type 2 build used artifact ramp like Sky Diamond and mana denial from Rishadan Port to slow opponents down. A tutor package of Mystical Tutor and Enlightened Tutor kept it consistent game to game, while a single copy of Energy Field bought time against aggro while the deck set up its combo.

2. The Parallax Tide Era (Pre-Ban)

As Premodern grew into a serious competitive format, deckbuilders figured out that Parallax Tide could act as a one-sided Armageddon. Running a full four Seal of Cleansing, you could activate Tide targeting five opposing lands, then sacrifice Seal to destroy Tide in response to its own exile triggers. Since Tide left the battlefield before those triggers resolved, its return-to-play clause resolved while nothing had been exiled yet. Once the stack cleared, the targeted lands were gone for good—no Opalescence required.

Backed by maindeck disruption like Tsabo's Web to shut down utility lands, Parallax Tide Replenish was a clear tier-1 deck right up until it got banned.

3. The Post-Ban Resurgence

When format curator Martin Berlin banned Parallax Tide to cut down on repetitive, non-interactive land locks and its high win rates, a lot of players wrote the deck off—figuring Replenish couldn't survive without its main mana-denial combo.

But dedicated pilots adapted fast. Replenish has always been a combo-control deck at heart, so losing Tide just meant reworking those slots into other locks and interaction. By moving the main endgame piece to Decree of Silence and shoring up the maindeck with counters like Abeyance and Mana Leak, the deck proved it didn't need early land destruction to stay a tournament heavyweight.

See the modern post-ban configuration in our Maindeck Analysis, or explore proven tournament-winning builds on the Tournament Lists page.