I guess I would want to clarify what you mean by a "martyr" list. When I responded to "martyr life" I took that as another name for Soul Sisters, which I would contend is not a control deck. Looking at the deck in your sig I would say that it is most certainly not control. It is really a beatdown deck that serves to gain CA through reanimation. It has some removal spells, but that is not the primary play of the deck. You most certainly could have a mono white control that uses life gain to stall while you control your opponent's game somehow, but the control elements will almost certainly be pillow fort/tax soft lock cards.
Most white lists I have seen in this thread absolutely count as control, and almost all are pillow fort decks. The "pillow fort" aspect of pillow fort decks is just a stall and is not explicitly control. It's what you do with the rest of the deck that tilts it in to control or not. When you are talking about mono-white control strategies to go with the stall of pillow fort then prison/tax is really the only remotely viable option. A classic example from last year would be this deck a few pages back:
That is the kind of deck this thread has been talking about since day one. The card names change, but it is still a mono-white control deck that uses pillow fort/tax/prison cards as the primary means of control.
Mono-White Control is always going to have some pillow fort and prison aspects to it.
Having removal spells does not a control deck make. If that was the case then every deck in Modern would be control decks. Martyr Proc is not a control deck because it has removal, it is a beat down deck because it uses creature CA to simple beat the opponent down. That is the strategy of the deck. The removal just helps it do that. A control deck's primary goal is to control how your opponent can and can't play the game. In Martyr Proc the combo (Emeria) aspect is more critical than the removal.
A draw go style control deck (if there was one in Modern) controls by way of saying "No. That thing you want to do? Now you can't do it."
A mono-white prison/tax/pillow fort deck says "Okay. That thing you want to do? It will now cost you more to do it, and eventually that cost will be too great for you." They will have to run some small number of damage dealers in order to, and may also run a few hard "no!" cards like Nevermore too.
Martyr Proc says "no" to people trying to kill you through anything, but infinite damage, by gaining insane amounts of life turn after turn or fogging every turn. Against an aggro deck you say no by throwing up shields with Squadron Hawks and Ghostly Prisons that you just recur saying "no" to there creatures. Everything in the deck is designed to gain life or control combat. While every creature in the deck could be your win con, you typically aren't racing. You just sit there and grind them out until you have more resources than they can deal with. It's not a pure draw go control strategy, but it definitely is a tap out control deck.
Most white lists I have seen in this thread absolutely count as control, and almost all are pillow fort decks. The "pillow fort" aspect of pillow fort decks is just a stall and is not explicitly control. It's what you do with the rest of the deck that tilts it in to control or not. When you are talking about mono-white control strategies to go with the stall of pillow fort then prison/tax is really the only remotely viable option. A classic example from last year would be this deck a few pages back:
That is the kind of deck this thread has been talking about since day one. The card names change, but it is still a mono-white control deck that uses pillow fort/tax/prison cards as the primary means of control.
Mono-White Control is always going to have some pillow fort and prison aspects to it.
Reprint Opt for Modern!!
FREE DIG THOROUGH TIME!
PLAY MORE ROUGE DECKS!
Martyr Proc Thread
Esper Relicblade Thread
Standard:
Mardu Superfriends
Turbofog
A draw go style control deck (if there was one in Modern) controls by way of saying "No. That thing you want to do? Now you can't do it."
A mono-white prison/tax/pillow fort deck says "Okay. That thing you want to do? It will now cost you more to do it, and eventually that cost will be too great for you." They will have to run some small number of damage dealers in order to, and may also run a few hard "no!" cards like Nevermore too.
Reprint Opt for Modern!!
FREE DIG THOROUGH TIME!
PLAY MORE ROUGE DECKS!
Martyr Proc Thread
Esper Relicblade Thread
Standard:
Mardu Superfriends
Turbofog
Is mono white control still viable in 2022?