“Goryo’s Vengeance! I know that one. That’s the card that beat me on turn 2 last week at Modern FNM! I hate Goryo’s Vengeance.”
“Yes, Timmy, but what if I told you that wasn’t all the card can do? You can play a value Goryo’s Vengeance.”
“What’s that, mister?”
“It’s a Goryo’s Vengeance that puts a big monster onto the battlefield but doesn’t necessarily win the game immediately, so the game is a bit more interactive.”
Okay, I know the idea of a value Goryo’s Vengeance seems strange, but it makes some sense. If you don’t have to dedicate your entire deck to winning the turn you cast it, you have plenty of space for some much-needed interaction. Anger of the Gods, Collective Brutality, Path to Exile, and Lightning Axe let you handle much of what Modern is going to throw at you, so you have time to cast and Flashback a Faithless Looting to set up your combo.
You can still assemble an explosive draw and reanimate Griselbrand on turn 2, but rather than end the game on the spot with Nourishing Shoal letting you draw most of your deck, you’ll just draw seven to fourteen cards and use that to assemble a kill. I know, I know, drawing only fourteen cards isn’t very exciting, but sometimes you just have to make do.
Part of assembling that kill is likely going to be Gifts Ungiven plus Unburial Rites. If you draw the latter, you can discard it to hand size, along with another creature, and flash it back to have a permanent threat. If you draw Gifts Ungiven, you can cast it for only the other two pieces and your opponent is forced to put them both in your graveyard. They’ll also be super-impressed by your unintuitive use of the card.
Lingering Souls cements this deck as a graveyard value-centric one rather than combo, since no combo deck has ever wanted to cast a spell that puts two Spirit tokens onto the battlefield. You’re still susceptible to graveyard hate, but your suite of solid cards and interaction means that you will be much more effective at buying time to find your answers to it, at which point you should be able to bury your opponent with a powerful reanimation target.
Or, you know, you could just cast Goryo’s Vengeance, splicing Through the Breach onto arcane, and attack your opponent with Emrakul, the Aeons Torn and Griselbrand like you’re playing Legacy combo. It’s hard to teach an old dog new tricks, Timmy.
Creatures (11)
- 1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
- 1 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
- 2 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
- 1 Jin-Gitaxias, Core Augur
- 1 Griselbrand
- 1 Obzedat, Ghost Council
- 1 Blood Baron of Vizkopa
- 2 Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
- 1 Linvala, the Preserver
Planeswalkers (1)
Lands (24)
Spells (24)
