Jund has been around forever in Modern. Really, it’s been around since before Modern existed. And it has survived the loss of Bloodbraid Elf and Deathrite Shaman, two seemingly cornerstone cards, yet has remained among Modern’s top tiers for the duration.
Even more impressively, it has remained largely unchanged, occasionally incorporating a new card like Kolaghan’s Command or Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet, but the core of Tarmogoyf, Dark Confidant, and Liliana of the Veil along with appropriate discard spells and removal has remained constant.
Until now.
Delirium has proven to be a powerful mechanic in Standard and has made some inroads in Modern, but nothing to this level. This is a completely redesigned Jund deck that looks a bit more like a Delver deck in how it uses Traverse the Ulvenwald and Mishra’s Bauble to facilitate a low land count and trim some of the more expensive cards in the deck to stay lean. Traverse also enables the two copies of Bedlam Reveler, which is both a cheap, efficient threat and a means of accruing card advantage with the loss of Dark Confidant.
Dark Confidant is a casualty of the redesign because it encourages you to play a longer game, where this version is more aggressive. It has eight burn spells and uses Grim Flayer as a harder-hitting early play that can also accrue a significant advantage in a longer game.
Liliana of the Veil is the other sacred cow that has been cut, since it is another card whose immediate impact is unimpressive relative to its effectiveness in long games. It may seem strange to cut a planeswalker when you’re adding the delirium sub-theme, but it simply doesn’t fit strategically with what the deck is doing, whereas Tarfire and Mishra’s Bauble slot in quite easily.
This diversification of card types to fuel delirium has the added bonus of making your Tarmogoyfs gigantic. Anyone relying on Dismember or Roast is going to be disappointed to see a 5/6 or 6/7 across the battlefield, a problem you don’t have to worry about with Abrupt Decay and Terminate. With the reach this deck has, every point of damage matters so you can close out games as quickly as possible.
Modern has a tendency towards stagnation since the barrier to entry for new cards is so high and it doesn’t get played as often as Standard. Jund Midrange’s persistence in the metagame is perhaps the prime example of that. Breathing new air into the archetype is a great way to bring some excitement to Modern if you’re feeling bored with it, not to mention a great way to take your opponents by surprise and win some games.
Creatures (13)
- 4 Tarmogoyf
- 1 Scavenging Ooze
- 1 Courser of Kruphix
- 1 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
- 4 Grim Flayer
- 2 Bedlam Reveler
Lands (21)
Spells (26)
