Greetings, once again! Prepare yourself for another incredible edition of
McLaren’s Musings!
Today we dare to explore a topic that is extremely sensitive. One that will
make your Islands Boil, your permanents disappear, and cause you to skip
through your declare attackers phase.
That’s right, today we discuss the dreaded trio of lands: Urza’s Tower,
Urza’s Power Plant, and Urza’s Mine, and the decks they appear in.
Don’t wait until it’s too late and you find your children playing Tron
decks. Sit them down and talk to them about the addictive and potentially
harmful side effects of casting turn 3 Karn Liberated. Now!
“Alright, Shaun. How Did This Happen?”
It all started with a fella named Urza.
Urza was a dude that had a brother named Mishra, and apparently married
someone named Kayla bin-Kroog. But all you really need to know about Urza
is that he was a dude who liked to make artifacts.
“Wait. Kayla bin-What?”
Doesn’t matter. Pay attention.
It turned out Urza wasn’t very good at making artifacts. Just look at
Urza’s Armor or Glasses of Urza, which you don’t need to use to know your
Tron opponent is going to naturally have all three Tron lands on turn 3.
Urza’s true and lasting legacy was that he built a bunch of power plants,
mines, and towers to help him build all his overcosted and useless trinkets
and baubles. It turned out these lands were way better and more fun to play
with than anything else he was inventing, much like when you buy a child an
expensive toy and they just end up playing with the box it came in.
The one thing Urza forgot to build was a salt mine, but that quickly became
unnecessary, since your opponents will provide more than enough salt every
time you play a turn 1 Tron land against them.
“I Hate Tron Lands! Where Did They Come From?”
Patience, children!
Urza’s lands first appeared in the set Antiquities, which
basically means old, and old Magic cards do some funky things.
So why are we still playing with these old lands, lands that are so old
they break the conventional rules of how mana is produced? Nowadays they
would never print a land that easily produces two mana *cough* Eldrazi
Temple *cough* Eye of Ugin *cough* let alone three.
It is widely know that everything new is better (citation needed.) Move
over, old people, us hip young kids are here to stay, probably forever. The
best thing about being young? You stay that way for all time.
You jelly.
There’s a reason why museums are painting over dusty old masterpieces. Old
art is being replaced by “Modern Art” like
Campbell’s Soup Cans
. Because it’s confusing and makes you think, mostly about how hungry you
are. Urzatron doesn’t make you think. You just play the lands and you win.
Maybe it’s time to make some Modern changes to the Urza lands.
“Give Us a Decklist Already.”
Creatures (6)
Planeswalkers (6)
Lands (20)
Spells (28)
Here we have the Tronniest Tron deck that ever Tronned. Satisfying and
interactive.
Classic green and red for festive cheer anytime of the year. Christmas!
I like the idea of Pyroclasm because Tron is secretly just a Control deck,
and Pyroclasm is the perfect little card to buy you time against swarmy
creature decks. Oblivion Stone and Ugin, the Spirit Dragon get to act as
the colorless Planar Cleansing dreams are made of to mop up the bigger
threats.
Creatures (6)
Planeswalkers (6)
Lands (19)
Spells (29)
Wow, what an exciting change from red Tron decks. Instead of Lightning Bolt
and Pyroclasm, you get access to Fatal Push and Collective Brutality! It’s
like a completely new deck!
“No. It Isn’t.”
It is nice you can customize your Tron deck depending on what you expect
the metagame to look like. Pyroclasm if you expect a bunch of Elves and
Affinity, Fatal Push for Death’s Shadow, Collective Brutality for Burn and
combo. See? Different.
Scavenger Grounds is also a sweet addition, since you have so many ways to
tutor up lands, and now you have a land that eats graveyards.
Creatures (6)
Planeswalkers (6)
Lands (19)
Spells (29)
Nope, I’m not dealing with a white splash. I just can’t handle all these
different colors. Next you’ll be telling me there’s a version of Tron with
blue in it. Sickening.
Creatures (9)
Planeswalkers (5)
Lands (19)
Spells (27)
Ahhh, now this I can get behind.
Hearty, rustic, wholesome, simple.
Good honest Tron. Adding a little Wall of Roots for taste.
The beauty of Mono-Green Tron is how resilient the deck is against land
destruction hate cards when you’re not worried about getting other colors,
have plenty of basic lands, and have Wall of Roots!
If only there were a way to make it even simpler and just remove all the
colors entirely.
Creatures (20)
- 1 Wurmcoil Engine
- 1 Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger
- 2 Endbringer
- 4 Reality Smasher
- 4 Thought-Knot Seer
- 4 Matter Reshaper
- 4 Walking Ballista
Planeswalkers (3)
Lands (24)
Spells (13)
Ahhhh, my eyes! I take it back! We’ve gone too far and
created a monster!
I don’t trust cards that refer to other cards or that refer to themselves
in their text box. Just look at Gate to the Afterlife or Squadron Hawk. You
know they are just asking for trouble.
Urza’s Tower, Urza’s Power Plant, and Urza’s Mine not only refer to other
cards, but also refer to themselves! It’s not natural, I tells ya!
What ever happened to nice simple cards like Giant Spider? Nice reliable
stats. It has reach. It’s a Spider. Nice safe card. Unless you’re a Wind
Drake.
Nowadays everything has to be less like Giant Spider and more like Arachnus
Spinner. I know I said old things were worse than new things earlier, but
it turns out new things are bad too.
Actually, Arachnus Spinner is great and now I want to cast it with Tron
mana. Maybe the lesson here is that Spiders are cool.
“I Hate How You Have to Figure Out Which Ones Make How
Much”
Right?!
Bad symmetry! Urza lands have bad symmetry! You can’t just have Urza’s
Tower adding three mana and the other two adding two mana. It’s simply not
done! That would be like if one Magic color got card drawing,
Counterspells, Mind Control effects, Capsize, and Time Warps, and the rest
got… oh.
The Good
Tron is a unique type of deck that does cool things. It’s nice for a format
like Modern to have a diverse metagame, and Tron helps that.
Tron has been around forever. You could’ve been playing Tron in Modern
since 2012. I remember playing U/W Tron with Gifts Ungiven and Unburial
Rites back when I could play in PTQ’s… and back when PTQs were a regular
thing.
The Bad
Tron has been around forever. If you’ve played Modern regularly for the
past five years, you’ve probably played against a bunch of Tron decks,
which does get old.
Games are non-interactive, lopsided, and usually quite easy. Usually you’re
winning by a lot or your opponent is winning by a lot, and that’s often
based on whether you draw Tron quickly or not.
The Experience
I look down at my mulligan to six on the play. It’s not a good hand.
Time to mulligan to five.
As I shuffle, I begin to contemplate life.
Am I a monster, trying to win like this?
I used to stand for something. I used to run four copies of Tectonic Edge.
Now there’s a card you can be proud of, a card of champions. Do what cards
you play represent who you are, or are we all just trying to get a win here
or there every now and again?
Was the hate too much? Ghost Quarter, Crumble to Dust, Spreading Seas,
Fulminator Mage, Blood Moon. That’s what you encounter if you’re even lucky
enough to draw a decent hand.
It’s time to make a change. It’s time to go back to my roots. It’s time to…
draw my five-card hand and see turn 3 natural Tron and Karn Liberated!
Nevermind. Suck it, opponent!
Final Review: 57/60 playables.
So Tron is a deck where you automatically win if you draw Tron and
automatically lose if you don’t draw Tron. Yup, I think distilling it down
to such a general statement accurately sums it up.
I think it’s also fair to say that I remember when Magic was about skill and not about drawing the right cards. There was a time when
what cards you drew had nothing to do with whether you won or lost. You
could win through sheer Force of Will and massive amounts of clenching if
you believed in the heart of the cards.
You know what, it is time for a change! It’s time for Tron to move
aside.
It’s time for the Mines to cave in, the Power Plants to have a meltdown,
and the Towers to… actually let’s skip the Towers.
These lands must be banned in Modern! Not just one, but all three! To send
a message! Come on everyone, if we work together we can make it happen!
Who’s with me!
It’s time to ban Tron, and while we’re at it, unban Splinter Twin and
free Jace, the Mind Sculptor!
…
The truth is it will never happen. The shadow of Karn will Tower over us
for all eternity.
If you can’t beat em, join em.
It’s a Karn eat Karn World Breaker out there. You have to decide what Ugin
do about it. Sit back and let everyone else Tron you out while you tap your
land for one mana like a chump? No! It’s time to seize life by the Spheres
and the Stones. Somehow, I’ll make a mana out of all of you.