Honestly, I think the Phoenix deck is still the 'strongest' in the environment. The Crane and Scorpion decks that did so well at Krakow were the ones actively playing cards to stop the Forebearer's combo. So we see lots of cancels, we see a decent number of Peasant Advice to remove the bird before it's charged out, stuff like that.
The eventual winner, Konstantios, had build his deck to meta against the decks metaing Phoenix. There are some great notes from him at the bottom of the article that really sum it up.
Phoenix players might be able to adjust their strategy to move away from the 'raw power' style and add in more subtlety. I'm a little surprised the Master of Gisei Toshi isn't making the cut, as it would make their spells more reliable, but I'm not a Phoenix player so there might be some reason. They're already playing Ancestral Shrine to try deal with the Scorpion matchup, so there's definitely a meta back and forth happening.
It'll be interesting to see how Nova goes. The difference between Gencon and Krakow might be regional, as suggested, with the US environment more focused on fine tuning the 'best deck' while the EU environment is more focused on working out the meta cards needed to 'beat the best deck'. Now all the EU decks are posted though, we might see the US meta shift? Or will US players mentally backflip and claim that the Forebearer's deck isn't the best deck anyway?
