Sam explores Modern from the pyromancer’s perspective, taking R/W Burn out for a spin in order to get a feel for the deck ahead of Grand Prix Charlotte this weekend!
Dragons of Tarkir has been released since the last time I really worked on Modern, and the card that seemed most impressive to me in that set was Atarka’s Command. While it seems like people have gravitated more toward Collected Company and a card I missed entirely, Kolaghan’s Command, I still want to see if Atarka’s Command is as good as I expected it to be.
The first game was very close, but I was able to win the race because my opponnt didn’t have a way to gain lifelink. In the second game, it’s possible that taking a line that conceded to lifelink was wrong, but I wasn’t sure that I could beat it by playing the other way. The third game was anticlimactic, but you’ll have some of that.
Round Two
It’s a little difficult to parse exactly how I lost that first game. I think my hand was just a bit too clunky and my opponent was better able to capitalize on a creature. I didn’t expect to win either of the next two, but using Lightning Helix and conservative play to keep a high life total and play Kor Firewalker, combined with drawing the right lands in time was able to carry the match.
Round Three
I thought the first game was going pretty well, but I guess the point of that deck is that sometimes it just kills you out of nowhere. The second game played more like how I was imagining things–I figured I’d have enough removal to answer the creatures and could win fairly quickly with incidental damage and a bit of pressure. After seeing Spellskite and Wild Defiance in the third game, I realize that my opponent might have been more prepared for my plan than I’d considered, and maybe things were actually pretty bad for me.
Round Four
Goblin Guide into Searing Blaze against a creature deck on the play is incredibly difficult to beat. I still could have lost the first game if my opponent had hit with Collected Company though. Wall of Roots was very good against me in the second game, of course, and made the matchup feel pretty rough. A perfect start against a stumble in the third game gave me the win. Ultimately, I think the matchup is close. The Abzan deck has a ton of great cards against burn, but they take a lot of damage from their lands, and all the removal is very good against their basic game plan.
Closing Thoughts
I only used Atarka’s Command as a Skullcrack in those game, and it mattered that it was hard to cast. It still seems good enough in theory that I think it’s worth playing, but it didn’t feel that much better than Bump in the Night. I can see how this hasn’t really changed the Burn deck’s position much overall, and I wonder if Atarka’s Command needs to be played in a deck that has a big more creature presence than this to really shine.
