Roadmapping Standard And Modern!

Planning out a million trips to play Magic is easy.

Actually going through with them, however, is a huge challenge for me.

Traveling takes a big toll on my body, and I sometimes have to take a weekend off to decompress and unwind. Last weekend was one of those weekends. I’m in
a dead heat for the top sixteen on the Players’ Championship Leaderboard, so going to the two local IQs seemed like a no-brainer. Instead, I decided to not
overextend myself and make sure I was physically ready for the month ahead of me.

To start with, we had back to back IQs in my local area, and conveniently, Ross Merriam had a Grand Prix to get ready for. The Grand Prix is much more
important for him than the IQs were for me, so I made sure I set as much time as possible to help him figure things out. One thing I’m relentlessly seeking
to do is making sure my friends are as prepared as they could possibly be, even if it costs my own success. Nothing makes me happier than seeing my friends
succeed. Call it selfless to a fault, I know. It’s something I’ve always done, and I get great satisfaction from it.

Ross was sure he was going to play R/W/x, but he wasn’t sure what the “x” was going to be, or if there was going to be an “x” at all. The first order of
business was to work on the R/W Aggro versus G/R Devotion matchup and see what broke which way. We were deadlocked after about three hours worth of
matches, both of us scratching our heads.

We couldn’t figure it out.

I’m generally very proficient with figuring these things out, as I know a lot about big creature midrange and ramp strategies in general, but this time, I
couldn’t do it. We both felt favored, and we both knew what cards mattered and what didn’t, but there wasn’t anything that we could muster from that time.
It’s tough because we only had this one day to work on it, and we had other things to tackle as well, like the U/B Control matchup.

Fortunately, we had the foresight to be ready for this. He didn’t know that I knew, but I was already set on trying to convince him on Mastery of the
Unseen.

You can’t see me!

This card is not the Stone Cold Stunner against control. It can still be countered on the draw, is a bit worse against U/W Control, and much worse against
Sultai Control. This is, however, your best way of having something to set-and-sort-of-forget against them until they handle it, and it also keeps you from
expending resources and threats until they do, which is a huge boost from “hope they stumble,” or some other analogous concession to a turn 1 Dismal
Backwater.

We practiced some games on both sides. This was my first game with U/B Control, and sequencing is extremely important. I always knew this, but actually
doing it yourself is a totally different animal. It didn’t take long for Ross to be convinced though, so even if that’s all we really got for the rest of
the day, it was still a successful day in my book.

At this point, we switched to Jeskai to see how differently things played out against U/B. When I played Jeskai, I got crushed, and when we switched, I
still got crushed. The sample size was too small to really get discouraged, and I know that Ross is a far superior player than I am, but there were little
things that I definitely picked up on that I can hope to apply to my own game, and I think that’s one of the ways he hopes to help me. We have a solid
amount of chemistry when we work. I’m very good at preparation and getting things where they should be, and Ross is very good at taking what he has into
the actual battle and applying them.

We liked where Jeskai was against U/B, but with the Mastery of the Unseen tool unlocked, it became much less attractive to splash the third color. A brief
bit was on Jeskai Tokens, but I think it got dismissed as a nod toward consistency. Mardu was also brought up, but he never thought the deck was good, in
which I contested and eventually gave up. Even if I did convince him, I knew he wouldn’t play it because he hates those kinds of decks anyway.

We knew that he wouldn’t play it, but I still thought it was going to be played more. If Devotion is good, Crackling Doom is good.

Now it was time to run G/R Aggro against R/W. I was pretty high on Gather Courage as a way to combat Wild Slash, but the large amount of red creatures made
things a bit more difficult to fully support it. Having about eighteen or so green creatures would be ideal in this kind of deck, but I could only get
about thirteen, so I tried a build that jammed all of the three-drops and only had a couple of Shaman of the Great Hunt and Stormbreath Dragon above that.

I played one match, and I was off of it.

Despite being very high on certain cards and strategies, I’m not married to an archetype. I think it’s foolish to do that. The goal is to win the
tournament, not to satiate my desire to play certain cards for no reason otherwise. If I don’t think it’s good, I’m not playing it. I know that I’ve said
it before, but the point is there and it needs to be driven home. I understand that some people’s goals may differ from mine, but that makes the point even
more necessary to understand.

Next, there was Abzan Aggro, a deck I knew I was close to playing, but was kind of unsure on how to build it.

I started with this:

Abzan Aggro

Anthony Lowry

Test deck on 02-23-2015

Standard

Creatures (25)

Planeswalkers (1)

1 Sorin, Solemn Visitor

Lands (25)

Spells (9)

Sideboard

I wanted a way to go lower to the ground without sacrificing the bulky side of the deck. Joe Bernal was not wrong when he said Warden of the First Tree is
insane. Elvish Mystic seemed nice to have, as it made up for the lack of explosiveness. I didn’t need explosiveness though, I just needed to be Abzan
Aggro. Courser of Kruphix made sense, but I wanted to jam!

I was running into a major crossroads that involved Warden of the First Tree, however. I either run Wardens and eschew cards like Heir of the Wilds,
Thoughtseize, or additional threats on 2, or I don’t run them and leave myself with less to do with my mana in exchange for having more straight up
powerful threats. Do I want to be threatening and play to the board, especially on the play? Do I want to have the raw power of Thoughtseize at my
disposal? Do I want to risk having Thoughtseize as a dead draw when I don’t need it, where Warden would be pretty good? Do I even want four Wardens?

So, in typical fashion, I agonized over this decision for about 29 hours, and registered this:

Abzan Aggro

Anthony Lowry

7th Place at Star City Games Invitational Qualifier on 02-22-2015

Standard

Creatures (22)

Planeswalkers (1)

1 Sorin, Solemn Visitor

Lands (25)

Spells (12)

Sideboard

I was basically on my own for Modern though, and I wasn’t really in the mood for wasting time talking about how good or bad the format is from players who
really only play the format once in a while, or who try to make it like Legacy. Not every format is bad if it can’t be broken or if you aren’t doing well
in it. Those that really spend time on the format consistently do well, and it punishes those who aren’t always on it. Harsh? Sure, but there’s a reason
why the Larry Swaseys and Patrick Dickmanns of Modern are among the few players that have weight on the format. It doesn’t matter to me if it’s a good Pro
Tour format, and whether it is or not has no bearing on if it’s a good format in general. If there’s a problem, find a solution. If you can’t find a
solution, approach the problem differently.

I was still really excited to play Lowry’s Greatest Hits: Volume 4, but I was having trouble figuring out the smaller details. I was really high on Blood
Moon though, and I think it’s important to have that type of “free win” angle in any deck you play. I was also pretty high on Jeskai Twin, as it’s the best
version of Twin for a midrange game, and Living End felt strong as well, especially if you have a good sideboard for it. I’ll probably hit up Travis Woo
and heed his advice. He is a master, even though he doesn’t play in as many events as the lot of us.

Baltimore is a bit different because there’s never been a Modern Open before, and I can’t treat it like a Grand Prix because of how different Modern is
from the other formats. I can usually play decks that muscle their way through the field and can afford a really, really bad matchup. There also isn’t
nearly as much Abzan on the lower levels of Modern events, so pushing the envelope on what your deck can do is much more encouraged.

Take risks. Don’t be afraid of doing what feels right. Just let your intuition go to work.

Four-Color Gifts

Anthony Lowry

Test deck on 11-30--0001

Modern

Creatures (7)

Planeswalkers (2)

Lands (25)

Spells (26)

Sideboard

Baltimore is going to be fun!