It feels like forever since Splinter Twin was banned in Modern, ushering in a dark era for Snapcaster Mage until its recent revival as a part of Grixis Death’s Shadow. Even though everyone knew Twin was mostly a control deck, leveraging the threat of the combo to win fair games more often than it won unfairly, the control part of the deck hasn’t been able to stand alone in the format.
You really need a win condition that can turn the corner from a lopsided battlefield, even if it doesn’t win the game on the spot. Today’s list incorporates just such a win condition in Through the Breach and Emrakul, the Aeons Torn.
Your first reaction may be that a five-mana, seemingly sorcery-speed win condition isn’t appropriate for a deck that operates mostly at instant speed, but Through the Breach can be cast on your opponent’s end step and you’ll untap with whatever creature you put onto the battlefield, so you get to deploy the combo reactively if the situation dictates that you do, a key part of the combo that lets you easily maneuver into situations where your opponent’s mana is overtaxed.
With Splinter Twin and Deceiver Exarch replaced by two new combo pieces, the only cards that you need to replace are the two Pestermites. This list goes with Blood Moon over them, giving you another card that can win the game by itself and freeing up precious sideboard space so you can prepare for more of Modern’s various fringe decks.
The rest of the deck is straight out of Splinter Twin from years ago. The cards are still good, although the red removal isn’t great against Death’s Shadow and delve threats. That was true for Twin against Tarmogoyf and they always managed, so I don’t expect it to be much a problem here, though if it is, you can splash black for Fatal Push, Terminate, and Kolaghan’s Command.
Would it be awesome or kind of sad if this same shell with the next-best win condition had just been sitting there and the entire community missed it?
Maybe both?
Creatures (8)
Lands (24)
Spells (28)
