Modern was the focus of the weekend at #SCGMKE. With Eye of Ugin banned and both Ancestral Vision and Sword of the Meek now legal, there were a lot of questions about what the format would look like, and if it’d be a healthy one.
Well, so far, the format looks awesome.
With nine different archetypes at 5% or more on Day 2, and not a one above 10%, the format is very diverse. There are midrange decks, control decks, aggro decks, and a nice mix of combo decks of all sorts (though not as much focus on the hyper-fast ones). Ancestral Vision is showing up in healthy numbers and is certainly not omnipresent in blue decks. Sword of the Meek has only show up in a couple of decks, but it is present and not ruining the format. Eldrazi Aggro is still a strategy, but it represents less than 5% of the field (instead of 40%).
It’s hard to ask for too much better of a Modern GP metagame. Let’s take a look at how it broke down:
|
Archetypes |
Day 2 Metagame |
|
Jund |
10.0% |
|
Burn |
9.3% |
|
Blue Control* |
9.3% |
|
Abzan Company |
8.6% |
|
7.9% |
|
|
Infect |
7.1% |
|
Zoo** |
7.1% |
|
Elves |
5.0% |
|
Abzan |
5.0% |
|
G/R Tron |
4.3% |
|
Merfolk |
3.6% |
|
R/G Eldrazi Aggro |
3.6% |
|
Kiki-Chord |
2.9% |
|
2.9% |
|
|
Misc Combo Decks*** |
7.1% |
|
Misc Artifact Decks**** |
3.6% |
|
Misc White Aggro***** |
2.9% |
*Blue Control = Roughly 1/3 Jeskai, 1/3 Grixis, 1/3 Blue Moon/Temur/Four-Color
**Zoo = Mostly Wild Nacatls, but includes 1 R/G Aggro, 1 Goblins, and 1 Allies
***Misc Combo = 2 Hexproof, 2 Goryo’s Vengeance, 2 Mono-Blue Turns, 1 Ad Nauseam, 1 Jeskai Ascendancy, 1 Red Dragons, 1 Storm
****Artifact Decks = 2 Affinity, 2 Thopter-Sword, 1 Lantern Control
*****White Aggro = White Aggro, Soul Sisters, Eldrazi Taxes, Abzan Eldrazi
Notice anything missing?
What happened to Affinity?
I mean, don’t get me wrong. Thopter-Sword is insanely good against Affinity, but that’s three people. There were only two Affinity decks in all of Day 2!
I think there’s a little variance going on, but there’s also something to be said about the sheer volume of Ancient Grudges and Stony Silences floating around. I would guess Affinity makes a comeback by the time GP Los Angeles rolls around.
That’s a lot of decks. Let’s try condensing the data a little, looking at just the strategies that are more than 5% of the Day 2 field.
|
Archetypes |
Day 2 Metagame |
|
G/B/x Midrange |
15.0% |
|
Linear Aggro* |
10.0% |
|
Blue Control |
10.0% |
|
Zoo/White Aggro |
10.0% |
|
Burn |
9.3% |
|
G/R Eldrazi/Tron |
8.6% |
|
Abzan Company |
8.6% |
|
7.9% |
|
|
Infect |
7.1% |
|
Misc Combo Decks |
13.6% |
*Linear Aggro = Elves, Merfolk, Affinity
When was the last time a format was this evenly split, this many ways? Also, take a look at the mix of blue decks. Merfolk, Scapeshift, Infect, that’s not a lot of Ancestral Vision. In fact, out of the blue control decks, barely half of them even feature it.
Maybe we should change that.
One of those macro-strategies stands out a bit, being a bit more represented, and that strategy is G/B Midrange. The Jund decks alone make up 10% of the field, and Abzan is conceptually fairly similar. The highest-finishing Jund deck on the weekend was Joshua Carlson, with this fairly straightforward take on the archetype:
Creatures (14)
- 4 Dark Confidant
- 4 Tarmogoyf
- 1 Kitchen Finks
- 3 Scavenging Ooze
- 1 Huntmaster of the Fells
- 1 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
Planeswalkers (4)
Lands (24)
Spells (18)
Worth noting that Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet shows up in Carlson’s maindeck. You’re going to be seeing a lot of that in the months to come. Kalitas is certified Modern-strong.
Living through Lightning Bolt is a big deal, as is dodging Inquisition of Kozilek. Lifelink is obviously great, but the Zombie-making and potential growing is does a better job at what Olivia Voldaren used to do. Finally, Kalitas’s strength as an anti-graveyard card is absolutely backbreaking against Abzan Company (not to mention any Arcbound Ravagers foolish enough to still show up).
For reference, here’s the Abzan Company deck that has been showing up more and more lately:
Creatures (30)
- 4 Birds of Paradise
- 3 Eternal Witness
- 2 Wall of Roots
- 1 Orzhov Pontiff
- 4 Kitchen Finks
- 1 Murderous Redcap
- 3 Noble Hierarch
- 3 Viscera Seer
- 1 Spellskite
- 2 Melira, Sylvok Outcast
- 1 Scavenging Ooze
- 1 Fiend Hunter
- 2 Voice of Resurgence
- 2 Anafenza, Kin-Tree Spirit
Lands (23)
Spells (8)
Abzan Company is a moderately fast combo deck that excels in resiliency. It’s got bullets to foil combos and more two-for-ones than most midrange decks want to try to grind through. I believe it also represents opportunity for blue mages, as the latest builds of Abzan Company aren’t as anti-blue as past ones have been; for instance, two Voice of Resurgence instead of four, and no discard.
The highest-finishing Ancestral Vision deck was Michael Majors with his 16th-place Grixis Control deck:
Creatures (9)
Lands (24)
Spells (27)
Michael Majors is great. He’s talented at both picking and tuning decks, and as usual, I like what he played this weekend. And not just because it’s Grixis. His use of three copies of Kalitas is awesome, particularly with Inquisition of Kozilek to help protect it and Kolaghan’s Command to get it back.
Seal of Fire is a perpetually underrated and underappreciated option in Modern. While it doesn’t work with Snapcaster Mage, it does let us play our hand more proactively, spending mana when convenient, instead of when we need something to die. This is particularly valuable against Infect, but it’s also just a nice way to make sure we don’t have to discard to our Ancestral Vision. Besides, dropping Kalitas when you have a Seal of Fire on the table that you can use, but haven’t yet? That’s just clean living!
Goblin Dark-Dwellers plus Ancestral Vision is a mondo combo! While Ancestral Vision doesn’t work with Snapcaster Mage (since it has no casting cost), it does work with the Dark-Dwellers, which only care about whether it has a converted mana cost of three or less. Along with Kolaghan’s Command, I could actually see increasing the Dark-Dwellers’ role in the deck. Maybe something like:
Creatures (9)
Lands (23)
Spells (28)
It’s only a relatively minor tweak, but I’m not so sure the format needs the Dark-Dwellers in the maindeck. That said, if we could get some Boom // Busts in here…
Creatures (9)
Planeswalkers (2)
Lands (24)
Spells (25)
This brushes up against one of the big questions facing blue decks today. Do you need to attack your opponent’s manabase? For instance, Blue Moon is still a viable option:
Creatures (8)
Lands (22)
Spells (30)
Thing in the Ice is an exciting addition to the format!
It’s pretty easy to come up with four sorceries and instants to wake this thing up, and a 7/8 body is huge. It starts as a 0/4, so it’s hard to Lightning Bolt and decent at blocking. The bounce ability is a great tempo play, but also super-sweet with Snapcaster Mage and Pia and Kiran Nalaar, resetting the enters-the-battlefield triggers.
Even still, I’m not sold on Think Twice as the card drawer of choice. Can we get some sweet, sweet Ancestral Vision action in here?
Creatures (8)
Lands (22)
Spells (30)
Now we’re talking! I could get into something like this.
That said, my first thought with U/R Ancestral Vision is actually more along some aggressive Monastery Swiftspear lines. Maybe something like this:
Creatures (16)
Lands (19)
Spells (25)
Ancestral Vision does a mean Treasure Cruise impression, which really encourages us to keep the costs down and the tempo high.
Even though it’s not a combo with the permission or the Ancestral Vision, I wonder if we’re supposed to still play a little Abbot of Keral Keep action. Personally, I’d rather make room for a couple of Young Pyromancers, maybe trimming a permission spell and a land. I don’t know. What I do know, is that I’m just not that into this creature right here:
Sorry, little buddy. It’s not out of the question or anything. It’s just that the format is really aggressive, which means lots of cheap removal for when the Delver does flip. Besides, it’s just not that great a blocker, and we’ve got better options now, like Stormchaser Mage.
Another possible home for Ancestral Vision is in Faeries, although nothing along those lines has been proven to work in Modern, so there might need to be some reimagining of the strategy.
Creatures (8)
Planeswalkers (2)
Lands (26)
Spells (24)
● Is it possible that we want fewer than four Bitterblossoms?
● Should we be more of a Liliana deck?
● What about Jace, Vryn’s Prodigy?
● Or (heaven help us) Pack Rat?
● Do we need more lifegain? Maybe Tribute to Hunger or Batterskull or Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet?
● Are we really playing zero Spell Snare, zero Thoughtseize?
● What does it take for Mistbind Clique to make a comeback?
● Should there be more Snapcaster Mages?
● Should we play a third color?
● Could we possibly add Thopter Foundry, Sword of the Meek, and Thirst for Knowledge?
I tried sketching a Thopter-Sword build of Faeries, but pretty quickly, the question of why I was even focusing on Faeries got loud. Thopter Foundry is sweet at counteracting Bitterblossom, sure, and Sword of the Meek is respectable with both Spellstutter Sprite and Bitterblossom, but it’s hard to make room.
Instead, let me leave you with what I’m thinking for Thopter-Sword:
Creatures (2)
Lands (22)
Spells (36)
Inspired by GerryT’s Thopter-Sword deck from here, my main change is moving away from Gifts Ungiven. Instead, I’m looking to play a more traditional control game and just try to survive. We’re not short on ways to spend our mana durdling anyway, and I feel like this might be a good spot to be even less fancy.
Okay, okay, I guess I gotta mention one more deck. After all, this was definitely the coolest Ancestral Vision deck to cash #SCGMKE:
Creatures (1)
Planeswalkers (1)
Lands (23)
Spells (35)
- 4 Time Warp
- 3 Exhaustion
- 4 Serum Visions
- 3 Remand
- 3 Gigadrowse
- 4 Ancestral Vision
- 2 Cryptic Command
- 1 Elixir of Immortality
- 4 Temporal Mastery
- 4 Dictate of Kruphix
- 3 Part the Waterveil
Sideboard
I’ve always enjoyed decks like this and could imagine a new version with Fevered Visions, maybe Blood Moon. Of course, if we’re aiming to take a whole lot of extra turns, maybe we just need to get down to the business of finding a build of Thopter-Sword that uses this little gem…
Obviously, Thopter-Sword plus Time Sieve is usually game if you’ve got five mana a turn. However, even when you aren’t all the way there, there are a lot of cantrip artifacts. Sword of the Meek can still help fuel Time Sieve pretty effectively, particularly on Myr Servitor. Besides, I am not sure you need to be able to take all of the turns. If you have a Disciple of the Vault, each extra turn is worth a lot…