MTG Salvation

The problem with think twice is that it was always the worst card in the deck, but we never had anything better, so we played it. With search printed, it was harder to justify, but the cards did different things, and it was still playable. Now with jace, he warps our whole deck. We only have so much room for card draw, and we can't play everything.
Think twice is nice-ish against blue mirrors, but we still have esper charm, and as I said, we're likely going to be favored in blue mirrors anyways.
I could definitely be wrong, but this is coming from someone who never liked having to play think twice to begin with. If I can replace it and feel like I've improved my deck, I will do so, and now might be the time.

Depends on which aggro deck, but against decks like affinity, elves, humans, bogles, hollow one, or fish, im not worried.
If burn, bushwhacker zoo, dredge, etc, become the popular aggro decks, I'll start to worry.



If I had to just "slot jace in" I'd probably start here. Its really hard to say how correct a lot of this is though. I'm inclined to keep 1 rev, as it can be snapcastered if we need 2, or jace brainstormed if we need 0.
I didn't love SfA before, I'm not sure how much better it is here. Maybe cutting them for something else is better. I don't know.
A lot of removal now, as I think jace wants a lot, and aggro will likely be popular for a while post-jace.
Fewer lands because no WSZ and only 1 secure.

Out of work more thoughts.

@Cody
I think Miracles are memey and probably not good enough but it actually is probably worth testing first to verify it.

Regarding U/R Jace probably still goes in to some deck that looks to play against creature decks by comboing them out (i.e Breach
Emrakul or Twinless twin. Jace gives them another wincon by itself and more draw power to find their game ending combo. They also both have good play vs fair blue decks.

I don't think Azcanta/Jace is an either or. Jace is encouraging you to cut lands because he's already better than the current end game and hes less mana intensive. This leads me to believe like Cody says you don't want think twice because we don't care about land drops 8 9 and 10 anymore. Part of the CA engine has to go because 4x Jace is all card draw anyway. Azcanta is nice on several angles because

1. It helps us find our (fewer) lands with the self mill.
2. It turns into a land itself
3. Azcanta is now finding way better stuff.

Point 1 and 2 are really important because when you cut lands you need a way to compensate for mana screw and Azcanta is actually much better at doing that then think twice.

Since we are cutting all of our think twices and some land and some top end cards (Sphinx's Rev) to stuff our deck with Jace's and presumably more interaction our Azcanta activations are going to be significantly more powerful then before. If you don't have Jace you always want to find Jace and then when you have Jace just pulling more countermagic or more removal or whatever is just very strong.

I don't like Cryptic as much because the days of having 12 lands out and casting 2 Cryptic commands and some other stuff in the same turn are over. They're over because at that point Jace has already won you the game. I just want to be low to the ground and ride Jace out. It's still a very powerful card for sure and I definitely undervalued all the other modes of it with my earlier post. I don't think you cut it completely.

I think you're right that the Esper Charm plan is probably good enough vs the straight UW control deck. The U/Rx decks with the pseudo tempo plan (i.e. bolt snap bolts, maybe spell quellers on our end step for the control versions or instant speed combo other ones) with the addition of Jace as a "now I have card draw engine too" are what have me more concerned.

Incidentally not being in 12+ land world anymore is why im not sure a

Other
Hero's Downfall is a card I thought about later which I really like but the BB is hard to cast man. Cast out could be good too.

I'm wondering if everyone in blue is now a remand deck.

I'm currently in a military school as one of the few civilians that get sent here-- FA49 14 week school for those of you in the service--so I'm busy with 10-hour class days.

My quick thoughts:

1. White sun's zenith is gone. Probably also the double revelation, though one rev and/or one secure could probably still make the cut, just not as a primary gameplan. I was already on 25 lands, this probably means 24 or 23.

2. The best jace shell is probably blue moon: bolt, remand, blood moon, jace bounce your dude is backbreaking against non-red decks.

3. Jeskai probably picks up two copies over ajani or whatever with few other changes, and gets a good % boost in a few matchups.

3. UW doesn't benefit a ton from this. JTMS is good in their already favorable matchups and specifically weak against the cards that were good against UW beforehand. I honestly would still split with jace AOT, heavy on AOT.

4. Grixis is in an interesting spot. I think that it'll be good at resolving and defending jace while fighting over opposing jace, but I'm not at all sure that it isn't better to just play 18 or 19 land grixis shadow and play a pair of jaces in the 75, for much the same effect.

5. I think the way forward with esper in the light of JTMS is tapout. I just picked up my foil inquisition of kozileks and fnm promo lingering souls, and I'll probably pick up foil pushes soon. I don't know if the build is gideons and jace to bury the opponent, or if it's still grinding snapcasters and creature land beats, but I think that regardless it's discard spells, lingering souls, and jace for esper.

6. Please don't jam four jaces. The correct number is probably two, with an optional third copy in lieu of other win cons, but be mindful that everyone and their brother is going to play dreadbore or needle effects and diversifying your win cons is important.

Cipher, here. Old email got deleted so I couldn't do the twitch registration...

I definitely think 4 Jace is right. I think 4 Jace is likely going to be right for most midrange/tempo decks, now. If 4 Jace is too much, you probably will have to play another deck that can utilize 4 Jace. I honestly think this was a terrible move by WotC and that the end result is a Legacy-style 4-Color midrange best deck that will be a pain to play against. What we needed was a card advantage engine that couldn't be exploited by midrange/tempo, like Dig Through Time was.

Speaking of decks that can use 4x Jace...I think UW Miracles is seriously a candidate for best actual Control deck, once someone figures out how to make it work. Definitely another thread, though.

I'm in agreement with Cipher. When I started playing Legacy miracles I went from 2 jace to 3 jace to 4 jace on my own. Just how Reid Duke drew it up. MB spellsnare is back for dreadbore + 2cmc countermagic and you just need the right sideboard stuff to deal with the pithing needles/ whatevers your opponent plays. There's about to be a massive homogenization of the blue decks. You can't play literal 4 color because DRS isn't legal but the attrition decks are going to be real.

Thoughtseize + IoK your way into resolving Jace seems like a strong enough line. Real question now is White even worth it? Souls is okay vs Jace but if you only get 1 half of it down it feels too slow to me. KCommand and bolt are so good. Which Gideon are you talking about? Gideon, Ally of Zendikar? He might be good enough to make white worthwhile.

I think amalek's first 3 points are right on the money. (Jeskai being the control version and not the tempo version. I don't think that deck plays mainboard jaces).
Too early to say for UW, I think. That deck always needed more card advantage, and now having little gideon + jtms is a solid combo.

I don't think 4 jaces is necessarily correct. I think some decks will want 4, but we're still looking for the deck thats best against the field at large. Jace does not guarantee that.
I honestly don't think 4c pile is going to make it into modern. The format is too different, and burn is actually good in modern. (Burn is already great vs czech pile, but its unpopular enough that it doesn't matter). Things like tron and eldrazi and dredge are also going to be problematic for this potential pile deck.

Worth noting that most miracles decks don't play 4 jace. Even pre-top ban, this was generally the case. 2-3 is by far the most common numbers.
Card is good, sure, but you can't always play too many.
In modern, playing too many is even worse, IMO. Having a lot of early interaction is more important (in legacy 1-2 forces/counterspells/plows/terminus goes a long way, in modern you often need more than 2 before you can safely start deploying things like jace).
On top of that, brainstorm + fetch to shuffle away extra jaces can happen in legacy. In modern, we need to resolve a jace for this to happen.

It is possible that souls + brutality + jace becomes the top dog, but I feel that deck still struggles too much against things like tron, valakut, etc, that our deck handles well.

As to what a 4c midrange deck looks like, what color are we dropping? I have to imagine we're base u/b, but we could play UBwg, UBwr, or UBgr.



I've played a similar deck to this (basically jeskai tempo + kolaghan's command) and I'm dubious this deck actually wants mainboard jaces.


Maybe we have very different visions of 4color midrange, but none of these look like the new tier 1 to me.

I think miracles won't be good in this format without atleast portent. Brainstorm and top (rip) did a ton of work in setting up miracles, and I don't think you can consistently set up terminus in the early turns in modern.
I wonder if some kind of bant midrange has legs. Geist, queller, tireless tracker, knight of the reliquary, thragtusk, gideon planeswalkers, nissa planeswalkers, now jace, coupled with paths, counterspells, maybe boardwipes, could all be good stuff.
In particular nissa vital force I think is a really strong card, that has never seen much play in modern.
Hell, even U/G might be alright with jace, but I imagine splashing for removal will turn out to be worth it.
Who knows if thats the best build either though.
Ashiok + jace, maybe in just U/B could also be pretty sweet, though I have to imagine it won't match up terribly well vs the anti-jace decks, by and large.
I don't have any scapeshifts (and have no desire to pay 50$ a piece for them), but I could see rug scapeshift being pretty good going forwards.
I also will point out that blue moon is probably well positioned as well. This is probably the first thing I'll play once I get a hold of jaces.


Last take: esper midrange with jace:

No gideons, no lilianas. Maybe those are better. Maybe not.

I am aware that most legacy miracles lists aren't on 4 Jace. And it is possible to get away with it in legacy, because you have 4 brainstorms 4 ponders 2+ portents azcanta and a full suite of snapcasters to flash them back (and end up finding your Jaces). Opt/Serum Visions/Thought Scour don't even remotely compare. Jace is the best card in whatever deck Jace goes into and to maximize your ability to resolve your best card you will play 4 copies of it. The fact that it gets rid of any spare copies is just a nice bonus.

When I started playing legacy I was firmly in the "I want to play draw go. I want to play instant speed. I only want 2 Jaces and I'll like it camp." After playing with it you find out how powerful and warping the card is.

There's going to be a lot of weird stuff that hasn't been tried before and its probably best for readability to keep all the greenish attrition stuff out of this thread. Not that it won't have any legs.

Edit: i took Cipher's post to mean a blue-jund style midrange attrition deck when he said 4-C style. Not actually playing 4 colors of mana. It's obviously way too painful in modern (which is also why I said w/o DRS.) Maybe someone can try it with dorks I guess.

Amelak's #5 is exactly where I ended up. Esper Draw Go has always been stretched thin and Jace's existence makes other blue decks far more of a threat. I don't think there's any reason to play it anymore. Discard spells to push Jace through and Lingering Souls to protect is the first thing I'd try.

Could jace be what makes ancestral vision viable in esper? Think a turn 1 suspend, turn 2 remand/leak, turn 3 mind rot, turn 4 jace? Ideally I've always wanted my wraths turn 4 but jace provides the oppurtunity to brainstorm fetch shuffle even a mediocre visions away while still gaining absurd CA. I got rid of all but one of my JtMS awhile back so i wont be able to take advantage of him with the recent spike(honestly contemplating selling my last one now lol). I also agree shifting to a more proactive midrange style would suit JtMS very well. The lingering souls discard method is definately an avenue to take here although I'd like see esper stay the control deck that I've always known.

I think a lot of people just haven't had a chance to play with Jace, yet. Should be an interesting couple of months in the Modern world. I first started on UW Miracles in 2012, when every list had 4 copies. It wasn't until the Delver decks with Stifle became so popular that people started trimming Jace. You basically never lost if you untapped with him; it was just that he had to resolve against piles of Delver decks and you had you couldn't hold up Counterspell or Top mana against combo decks.

That's in Legacy, where people basically don't put 4 CMC cards in their decks unless they run acceleration. 4 CMC in Legacy is the equivalent of 5 CMC in Modern. That being true, I find it hard to believe that any other late-game card advantage engine is even a consideration when Jace is legal. Of course, there aren't really many playable decks with card advantage engines to begin with. BG Midrange tries it, as does UWx Control. Most GBx decks just have a couple of 2-for-1s sprinkled in with no actual way to draw extra cards.

Just like in Innistrad Standard, you're probably going to end up playing 4 because Brainstorm + fetch is practically worth 4 mana by itself. If it soaks up damage, so be it; they're not sending that to your face and you've got 3 more Jaces to draw later. Jace even closes the game against combo decks in 6 turns. That's as fast as most planeswalkers, and you're fatesealing them the whole time. Maybe baby Gideon is cheap enough to still see play, but I think all the other UW planeswalkers are officially obsolete. Jace, the Mind Sculptor is bad against strategies that go wide, but that's basically every planeswalker.

I hadn't considered that Deathrite Shaman isn't here to fix mana, but I'm not sure that people won't just play Birds of Paradise to fit 3 colors in. If Death's Shadow is able to compete with slower Bloodbraid Elf Jund decks maybe it's all an overreaction, but if Jund is the new best Midrange/Tempo deck then I think it won't take much to splash blue for Jace. Or perhaps more accurately you run BUG and splash red for Bloodbraid and Kolaghan's? I suppose that deck would only run 2 Jaces in place of 2 Liliana, or something.

I mean, you gotta understand...the Man-o'-War ability is an absurd tempo play, and Brainstorm in a format with fetches is filthy.

Quote from Blasienstein »

Could jace be what makes ancestral vision viable in esper? Think a turn 1 suspend, turn 2 remand/leak, turn 3 mind rot, turn 4 jace? Ideally I've always wanted my wraths turn 4 but jace provides the oppurtunity to brainstorm fetch shuffle even a mediocre visions away while still gaining absurd CA. I got rid of all but one of my JtMS awhile back so i wont be able to take advantage of him with the recent spike(honestly contemplating selling my last one now lol). I also agree shifting to a more proactive midrange style would suit JtMS very well. The lingering souls discard method is definately an avenue to take here although I'd like see esper stay the control deck that I've always known.

I think you're on the right track, but I don't think it's Ancestral that gets better since it competes with Jace, itself. I think you more want singletons to help him lock out combo decks, or more situational removal that helps you get to Jace, like Spell Snare.

I never played with Jace in Worldwake Standard, where people combined him with Inquisition. Something tells me targeted discard would push you to play a "blue jund" deck, and that it only was a thing back then because of all the mirrors.

I personally want to start with UW Control and play more Spell Snares, Runed Halo, and a Crucible main. If I'm playing Esper, it's difficult, and I think Esper Charm gets trimmed. That or you go with Amalek0's suggestion to only run 2, in which case it's just a small value-add to the draw suite.

I suppose this decks biggest weakness was always the "meh" factor, where you should crush a matchup but then play some divinations before just fizzling out. Would you want to add Jace to that over something like Glimmer of Genius, though? The card assumes you have board control, whereas in a draw-go deck you normally ignore the board and try and get away with funneling as much mana as you can into card draw on early turns. Think Twice -> Esper Charm -> Jace the Mind Sculptor isn't great unless you're playing another deck that doesn't utilize positional advantage.

Jace + ancestral is a bit of a combo, but esper doesn't have the room to play that much card advantage. As I've said, we already have esper charm.
For straight uw, ur, or ub, jace + av could be common. For rug bbe + jace + av, it'll certainly be there to set up cascades.

I disagree that other UW planeswalkers become obsolete. 4 mana gideon is a very good clock, and 5 mana gideon/elsepth sun's champion are some of the few planeswalkers that are actually good against a decent board, which makes them role players that jace can't replace.
Stuff like narset or tamiyo were already too fringe to really be "replaced".

Part of the draw to DRS is that it does so much more than just fix mana. I'm not sure midrange decks in modern are going to be looking to play birds of paradise. Noble hierarch might be slightly better, but it doesn't produce black mana for discard/lilianas, etc, so unless some kind of bant deck turns up, mana dorks seem like a miss.

I think U/B splash green for goyf/decay and splash white for souls/path could be possible (remotely similar to the list I posted, though maybe more resembling a b/g midrange shell) Hell, maybe lingering souls in the board, or maybe no souls at all.
if baleful strix were in the format, I'd be more excited for some kind of grixis midrange or 4c midrange deck, but without something like that, its a little weaker.


I don't think cards like runed halo and crucible make as much sense with jace. Halo in particular doesn't protect him, which makes it a lot harder to justify a slot maindeck. Crucible is a little better, but it also prioritizes a value-plan that ignores the board.
The meh factor has always been there, and thats one of the points about cutting think twice for more action now.
On the other hand, brainstorm effects are best getting rid of that sort of consistency effect.

Esper JtMS:

Maindeck (60)
3 Snapcaster Mage
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
3 Ancestral Vision
2 Fatal Push
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Path to Exile
1 Secure the Wastes
2 Spell Snare
3 Remand
2 Esper Charm
3 Lingering Souls
1 Sphinx's Revelation
3 Cryptic Command
2 Supreme Verdict
2 Search for Azcanta
2 Celestial Colonnade
1 Creeping Tar Pit
1 Drowned Catacomb
4 Flooded Strand
1 Glacial Fortress
2 Hallowed Fountain
2 Island
2 Plains
4 Polluted Delta
1 Shambling Vent
2 Swamp
2 Watery Grave

A rough list I came up with. Gonna proxy the 2nd jace and collonades since I was dumb and sold mine lol. I think remand could easily be leak or countersquall instead. StW is still here for early chump blocks and possible snap interactions. I want to find a slot for tasigur too. He's become a recent favorite finisher in my current build. Could probably forgo the SR too, but I like to draw all the cards.

Quote from Sifr »

Quote from Blasienstein »

Could jace be what makes ancestral vision viable in esper? Think a turn 1 suspend, turn 2 remand/leak, turn 3 mind rot, turn 4 jace? Ideally I've always wanted my wraths turn 4 but jace provides the oppurtunity to brainstorm fetch shuffle even a mediocre visions away while still gaining absurd CA. I got rid of all but one of my JtMS awhile back so i wont be able to take advantage of him with the recent spike(honestly contemplating selling my last one now lol). I also agree shifting to a more proactive midrange style would suit JtMS very well. The lingering souls discard method is definately an avenue to take here although I'd like see esper stay the control deck that I've always known.

I think you're on the right track, but I don't think it's Ancestral that gets better since it competes with Jace, itself. I think you more want singletons to help him lock out combo decks, or more situational removal that helps you get to Jace, like Spell Snare.

I never played with Jace in Worldwake Standard, where people combined him with Inquisition. Something tells me targeted discard would push you to play a "blue jund" deck, and that it only was a thing back then because of all the mirrors.

I personally want to start with UW Control and play more Spell Snares, Runed Halo, and a Crucible main. If I'm playing Esper, it's difficult, and I think Esper Charm gets trimmed. That or you go with Amalek0's suggestion to only run 2, in which case it's just a small value-add to the draw suite.

I suppose this decks biggest weakness was always the "meh" factor, where you should crush a matchup but then play some divinations before just fizzling out. Would you want to add Jace to that over something like Glimmer of Genius, though? The card assumes you have board control, whereas in a draw-go deck you normally ignore the board and try and get away with funneling as much mana as you can into card draw on early turns. Think Twice -> Esper Charm -> Jace the Mind Sculptor isn't great unless you're playing another deck that doesn't utilize positional advantage.

I was thinking the same thing recently. U/W was where I started in modern with a gimicy silence/ render silent PW build. Now that I've got alot of good control staples I've been wanting to revisit and the JtMS unbanning seems like a good time to do that. Also I don't think that ancestral visions gets better with jace as foretold took that slot, jace just treats it as a draw 4 scry 2 effect. Shuffling the two worst cards awayy with the fetch is a plus. I mean jace+fetchlands is pretty absurd as it is.

I played miracles from 2013 until the top ban (the ban was the impetus to rebuy a tabernacle and return to my greatest love).

I played Jace the entire time he was in standard, and I jammed him briefly in thopter-depths extended.

Some of you are seriously overestimating jace. Couple of things to keep in mind:

1. Jace is not a healthy planeswalker. He comes down squishier than literally every other walker except liliana of the veil if he has to protect himself. Unlike all of the gideons or other jace/new lilly/nahiri, jtms does not come down on turn four against two creatures and live for you to untap and clean up.

2. This is not legacy. Casting jtms with protection is doable on turn four, with a cb, preset top of library and force available. In modern, that's like having seven mana and two interactive spells plus the jace.

3. This is not legacy. Everybody in modern puts you under immense pressure. In legacy, this is not really the case because everyone slows down to interact with combo. In modern tapping out on turn four will just leave you dead against most combo AND most aggressive decks if you aren't wrathing them.

4. This is not legacy. Lingering souls is the biggest nightmare for jtms decks in legacy without terminus, and is hard to fight through with terminus. In modern, every aggressive deck can go that wide OR big enough to smash jace pretty easily if they aren't already on lockdown.

5. Bricking out on jace is a thing. The biggest selling point on jace heavy builds in legacy was that your win cons were blue for better force of will handling in combo matchups and easier fetching around moon/back to basics plans. In modern, outside of blue moon you aren't worried about the mana, and we don't look for "blue" as an objective benefit to a card.

6. Modern has bolt. Very few legacy decks (comparatively) have bolt. This applies both on the "jace on 3 is not safe even on an open board" side AND on the "your life total is so pressured you can't afford to slow down to win with jace, you have to stabilize at a real life total" sense.

Lantern doesn't benefit much from having Jace if at all. You're better off using more dig spells.

Quote from amalek0 »

I played miracles from 2013 until the top ban (the ban was the impetus to rebuy a tabernacle and return to my greatest love).

I played Jace the entire time he was in standard, and I jammed him briefly in thopter-depths extended.

Some of you are seriously overestimating jace. Couple of things to keep in mind:

1. Jace is not a healthy planeswalker. He comes down squishier than literally every other walker except liliana of the veil if he has to protect himself. Unlike all of the gideons or other jace/new lilly/nahiri, jtms does not come down on turn four against two creatures and live for you to untap and clean up.

2. This is not legacy. Casting jtms with protection is doable on turn four, with a cb, preset top of library and force available. In modern, that's like having seven mana and two interactive spells plus the jace.

3. This is not legacy. Everybody in modern puts you under immense pressure. In legacy, this is not really the case because everyone slows down to interact with combo. In modern tapping out on turn four will just leave you dead against most combo AND most aggressive decks if you aren't wrathing them.

4. This is not legacy. Lingering souls is the biggest nightmare for jtms decks in legacy without terminus, and is hard to fight through with terminus. In modern, every aggressive deck can go that wide OR big enough to smash jace pretty easily if they aren't already on lockdown.

5. Bricking out on jace is a thing. The biggest selling point on jace heavy builds in legacy was that your win cons were blue for better force of will handling in combo matchups and easier fetching around moon/back to basics plans. In modern, outside of blue moon you aren't worried about the mana, and we don't look for "blue" as an objective benefit to a card.

6. Modern has bolt. Very few legacy decks (comparatively) have bolt. This applies both on the "jace on 3 is not safe even on an open board" side AND on the "your life total is so pressured you can't afford to slow down to win with jace, you have to stabilize at a real life total" sense.

So what I'm hearing is: "Jace is great in Legacy because it's slower than Modern"...

We'll just have to see. I think once a UW or UWR player jams Jace on an empty board the obsolescence of other control late-game cards will be apparent, but maybe there is something to the go-wide decks in Modern taking off in popularity. Of course, with the exception of that Bant Spirits deck they're all fresh meat UWR, so there's that. And I still agree with what guys like Brad Nelson are saying about Jace's greater impact on the format:

Quote from On the unbanning of Jace »

As for Modern, I'm unsure just like everyone else. It may make the games more fun, but also could put a damper on the format. Luckily Modern is Modern, and by that I mean a giant dumpster fire of a format. There's a million decks that don't interact well with each other, and for many that's the selling point. The unbanning of Jace, the Mind Sculptor perpetuates the fact that threats dominate answers in the format. WotC's decision to bring this card back just goes to show that they want Modern to be the format where you do cool stuff, and hope it's better than the cool stuff your opponent's doing.

I can't call exactly what the deck will look like, but I can't help but believe there's a "blue Jund" deck on the horizon that will warp the format.

I've been jamming this list today to find flaws against several decks today with a couple of buddies. I played the deck back against each deck 3 times only swapping remands for leaks then countersquall to see how each fared. Long post incoming.

Esper JtMS:

Maindeck (60)
3 Snapcaster Mage
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
3 Ancestral Vision
2 Fatal Push
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Path to Exile
1 Secure the Wastes
2 Spell Snare
3 Remand
2 Esper Charm
3 Lingering Souls
1 Sphinx's Revelation
3 Cryptic Command
2 Supreme Verdict
2 Search for Azcanta
2 Celestial Colonnade
1 Creeping Tar Pit
1 Drowned Catacomb
4 Flooded Strand
1 Glacial Fortress
2 Hallowed Fountain
2 Island
2 Plains
4 Polluted Delta
1 Shambling Vent
2 Swamp
2 Watery Grave

Jund: always a good match up for esper. Felt a bit shakier than it usually does though. Mana leak felt the best here, only lost once due to 3 discard spells on an IoK, path, and snap by turn 2 on the draw. They hit goyf on turn 3. Visions proved pretty good here when it came down turn 1 or 2.

Lantern (whir): this version is worse against lantern than any other I've played. The lack of instant speed draws hurts this math up. I did win once when a vision kicked off suspend and I had them draw 3 to get in lethal with snaps and tarpits. Countersquall was the better CS when they let me keep it.

Lantern (G/B): see above. Much worse though because of surgical extraction. Lost all 3.

Madcap Storm: won 2 lost 1. Lost to a turn 3 empty the warrens for 8 dudes and couldn't hit a sweep. He madcapped me one game on turn 2 while I had path in hand. Countersquall and spell snare did most the heavy lifting.

R/W Norin Sisters: I know this deck isn't really in the meta but it's my pet deck. Thalia sucks but spell snare takes chambers away. This deck is extremely weak to board wipes and also durdles alot in the beginning. Won 2, also first time I hit a turn one visions suspend into a jace on turn five. Draw seven put the two worst back on top, I felt so dirty. Leak was better here unless they have 4 lands.

Burn: feels like a bad matchup but I pulled 2 wins barely. Without rest for the weary this match is tough. Spell snare was awesome as was countersquall. Shambling vents was also great the one time I pulled it. Jace just died immediately though.

B/W tokens. Great matchup for esper. Won all three, spell snare was mostly dead though. Verdict is the best card here. Stabilize the board, slam jace, profit! Again countersquall was epic in this matchup too.

G/W Company: this deck can come out fast and strong. I felt like I was favorable but they just keep top decking critter after critter. I'd knock them down and they climb back up with a CoCo after a sweep. Lost 2, won 1. Remand was alright I guess, leak didn't do much and countersquall was dead except to CoCo and path.

U/B Control: ahh the mirror, sort of. He had jace AoT, and the games ended up being whoever hit their jace first. Also batterskull was a nightmare. Lost 2 as I only saw jace once and he was a well timed top deck turn 6.

Well I've been playing magic for almost 10 hours now with the same deck and am brain dead now lol. Imo I think it needs more sweeps in the main. The deck is also more aggressive than I thought with the four manlands. Jace fateseal or brain storm followed by bounce a dude collonade beats is pretty solid. Countersquall ended up being the better performing CS although without remand I found my self top decking a few times.

I still need to test against hatebears, abzan (junk, druid and finks builds), tron and a few others to see where the deck truly lies. If you don't count the lantern matches the deck ran 13-8, if you include lantern 14-13. So the deck feels solid, most games were close with only 1 blowout from esper. Also i think it needs more discard, only hit IoK a few times in the opener. I'm totally open to suggestions about the build and possible sideboard options, stony and RiP are shoe-ins for sure. I also thiink jace should be a 3 of as I didn't hit him alot of games. Lingering souls was also the reason I won most games, so maybe a 4 of?

I have been off Think Twice for a while, SfA makes that card obsolete imo. With SfA and JtMS there is no reason to play Rev and TT. I don't even think StW or WSZ are necessary. Jace is so many things in 1, his value for this deck is insane.

I was thinking of something like the following (with tweaked numbers of course):


I know people on here don't like Serum Visions because of the obsession with playing at instant speed but the card is very, very good, especially at finding sideboard cards. Keep in mind this is a rough draft but I think Jace really makes the deck competitive. We have game against the other control decks thanks to Charm, have game against aggro thanks to being able to cut TT/Rev, and have arguably the most powerful finisher in the format.

Could even throw in some number of Blessed Alliance/Spell Snare depending on what the meta looks like. Possibly Field of Ruin/Spreading Seas if Tron becomes relevant.

Right now I think it will be Jace decks vs. Aggro/Combo so perhaps Thoughtseize sideboard?

Also the Baneslayer could be an Elspeth or whatever your threat of choice is. I like Baneslayer for the life gain but to each their own

I think draw-go is probably not where you want to be. JTMS is significantly better with a board presence to protect him. I absolutely agree that discard + removal + jace is where you want to be in modern right now. This is what I'll be playing in a 4-rounder sunday (yes, my shop is switching a day early. It'll just sanction as casual).




Deck obviously will need mb and sb tuning, but this is where I'm starting for the new format.

I expect to gradually fall back to more countermagic and less discard, but at least initially I want to stick walkers cleanly to see how they hold up and gradually dial back to the right mix of enablers and power spells.

It's a brave new world gents. All the rules are obsolete; it's time to rewrite them ourselves. Lantern broke the format starting from here. Now that we have jace, it's our turn to shine.