Why not just wait and see how Fatal Push effects things.
To just drop the 1-2 blow and eliminate ~5 decks from the format outright, just seems a little intense, and over reacting to me...
Print new cards to help the format. Don't just ban everything out of the format.
I'm not sure I understand the logic of this argument. If one mana removal spells were the answer infect would already see a much lower share of the meta. Path and Bolt are already the most played spells in Modern. Adding another one mana removal spells doesn't change much.
Infect can easily pump out of Bolt range, and Path ramps them into more threats and pumps.
Neither are even remotely comparable to Fatal Push.
Sure they are, most of the cards Infect runs to protect its creatures give hexproof or pro colors.
There is a reason that Jund and Grixis Delver are infects worst matchups: Lightning Bolt, Abrupt Decay, Terminate.
There has always been good removal in the format, fatal push doesn't change that at all. It just gives more viable removal to colors that have much worst options like Esper, Dimir, ect.
Why not just wait and see how Fatal Push effects things.
To just drop the 1-2 blow and eliminate ~5 decks from the format outright, just seems a little intense, and over reacting to me...
Print new cards to help the format. Don't just ban everything out of the format.
I'm not sure I understand the logic of this argument. If one mana removal spells were the answer infect would already see a much lower share of the meta. Path and Bolt are already the most played spells in Modern. Adding another one mana removal spells doesn't change much.
Honestly, thats a really bad example. Your opponent played fairly terrible. He/she could have blinked steel wall a number of times and actually would have put you on a faster clock.
This is a good reason why blood moon is great for the format. It helps police alot of the broken stuff. Honestly i think wasteland would be fine in modern and would help the single color decks and punish the super greedy ones. I wish they would print it but it aint gonna happen.
Maybe a 1C Tap to destroy nonbasic. So halfway between wasteland and Tec Edge. Strictly worse than wasteland so it shouldnt mess with legacy or reserved list.
Totally agree. Modern's mana bases are just a bit too good I think. Although I guess the counter-argument would be that a new avenue of attack would push the format more towards linearity and away from interactiveness. Still, there should be a way to punish the greedy decks other than just Blood moon.
There is, Burn is the deck that punishes fetch shock. I really don't think we need something else to make 3 color decks unplayable. Cards that lock people out easily don't make for good games of magic. The only deck I can think of that needs to be punished for its manabase is Tron and even then it has enough of its own weaknesses that its unnecessary.
Lol no worries, that's why its out there. I hope Thopter Foundry breaths new life into UW tron or at the very least provides an alternative build. Especially with Eye of Ugin banned it encourages experimentation.
You can force it with Gifts
Crucible of Worlds/Academy Ruins/Sword/Thopter.
I think this makes Esper Draw-Go way more playable, but Gifts for Unburial Rites might be better for us.
Porque no los dos? Why not both?
Here is a theoretical deck I had made before. I didn't do serious playtesting with the concept, but it's where I'm going to start
Do you play modern often, because here is a list of cards that see play in modern printed in the last year or two:
Khans/onslaught fetches which weren't legal until reprinted in Khans
Tasigur
Gurmag Angler
Kolaghan's Command
Eidelon of the Great Revel
Monastery Swiftspear
Atarka's Command
Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger
Ugin
Collected Company
Siege Rhino
Pia and Kiran Nalaar
Harbinger of the Tides
Has seen fringe modern play:
Dragonlord Ojutai
Monastery Mentor
Elspeth, Sun's Champion
Oblivion Sower
Blight Herder
Wasteland Strangler
Bring to Light
Battle for Zendikar dual lands
Brimaz
Courser of Kruphix
Outpost Siege
Scrylands
Anticipate
Not to mention thoughtseize, cryptic command, v clique, remand, mox opal, etched champion, and dark confidant all saw reprints that dropped their prices considerably. And Wizards has more then proven they are willing to reprint tarmogoyf every modern masters set. Shock lands were reprinted in RtR which is usually the worst part of nonrotating formats.
Wizards has made a pretty good effort of keeping modern in reach of players. Its arguable your "investment" is better in modern as the prices only tend to go up unlike standard.
Has anyone been trying Mina and Denn, Wildborn? I've played some matches with it in a straight RG scapeshift and rebuying valakut triggers made a difference. Its a 4/4 for 4 which is a passable rate and has a relevant ability. Maybe no more then a one of but its a solid beater and played a pivotal role in two matches.
Generally I play affinity but I wanted a 2nd deck that was grindy midrange. Wanting to look at other colors besides green for junk and jund I had a playset of Abbot of Keral Keep. I think the card is sweet and I think may even be the red creature in the 2 drop cycle.
I started with Abbot and Dark Confidant. The card flow was really good with both but Bob necessitates main-deck life gain which Rakdos does not do efficiently (compared with other color scavening ooze and huntmaster/siege rhino). The deck was really good at grind opponents down but had a hard time closing out. I tried it with and sans Liliana of the Veil. The deck seems to operate better on the aggro side of the midrange spectrum. Unlike Junk we don't have Lingering souls to pitch and we do not have Tasigur, Scavening Ooze, or Tarmagoyf to utilize a stacked grave yard from Liliana, so she was clunky. To mitigate life loss I switched Bob for Phyrexian Arena and put in Pack Rat as a closer. No Bob means we can run higher CMC and mained thundermaw. Abbot does a decent job of cleaning up if you can lay down a few instants/sorceries but Pack Rat with Arena and Thundermaw also do a good job of finishing opponents.
So that was a brief history.
Here is a discussion of some of the cards.
Bolt: Not much to say that hasn't already been said.
Inquisition/Thoughtseize: Disruption slows down opponent and clears the way for a creature to start bashing or keep your opponent from comboing
Grim Lavamancer: Gives us a way to utilize our graveyard, and get in extra damage. I loathe to run 2 as the 2nd one is usually dead as 1/1 with no ability.
Relic of Progenitus: Delve makes relic super relevant right now. Cantripping is never dead and can trigger abbot. Also makes your Goyf matchup better.
Abbot: A sorcery speed cantrip dude. Gets pretty big when you have a full hand. Bob and Snapcaster have proven a 2/1 body can get in the red zone in modern. He can be a 2 drop if you want him to be but I usually wait until turn 3 to at least hit a land. Like any card of this variety, he has a high ceiling but can sometimes disappoint.
Pack Rat: A little more underwhelming in modern then it was in standard, but if you have a reliable card engine or if you are flooding he can put the hurt on your opponent like no other. Few cards deal with rats profitably outside of Maelstrom Pulse or if you run it out with no protection.
Terminate: Best removal in these colors
Kolaghan's Command: The main reason this deck can be viable. Incidental damage is always good when you are making your opponent discard or recurring a dude. A very impressive engine when you can lock out your opponents draw for a turn and get back abbot or flamespeaker.
Phyrexian Arena: Generally a worse dark confidant (No body, costs 3). But the games tend to go long and this card will kill you a lot less. Relevant when up against aggro or burn and works well with pack rat as it keeps your hand full.
Prophetic flamespeaker: A somewhat odd card. Flamespeaker eats up Bobs and Snapcaster and non pumped tokens. BR lacks a lot of good beaters in this slot but flamespeaker runs away with the game when he makes contact with your opponent. 2 virtual cards is amazing and accelerates you in the midgame.
Chandra Pyromaster: 1 damage on an empty field her 0 also helps you draw an extra card. This could also be outpost siege. Chandra does more work in helping getting damage in where as outpost is harder to interact with.
Pia and Kiran Nalaar: A red huntmaster without life gain. 1/1 fliers are always good as Lingering souls has shown. Being legendary and 4 makes me not want more than 1 right now. The ability can be used to kill with reach and I've also used it to kill a deceiver exarch.
Thundermaw: 5/5 hasty flier hits hard. I would make this stormbreath if/when path to exile makes a resurgence as the best removal.
Lavaclaw Reaches: A subpar manland compared to others. However, its firebreathing ability is super good at killing opponents and has won more then its share to justify the slot.
Mutavault: Synergy with pack rat and a great man land. Can block etched champion and is really the best choice given our other manland options suck (no treetop village equivalent).
Rakdos's Return is a flex spot. I had been trying a fourth Kolaghan's Command and a Blightning in this spot. But Rakdos's Return is a great mana sink late game and being Sorcery speed works well with abbot and prophetic flamespeaker. Could be another terminate, I have tried Gatekeeper of Malakir in this slot as well.
Sideboard:
Languish: This could also be anger of the gods. I think Languish might be better as sometimes affinity can get their dudes out of anger's reach by the time you it and can hit a slightly bigger knight of the reliquary and hits Etched Champion. Needs more testing between the two.
Olivia Voldaren: Best modern creature in these colors, breaks open the mirror against jund/junk and tokens.
Vampire Nighthawk: Lifegain and deathtouch. Can help you race against other creature decks and can take down a delve creature.
Molten Rain: Tron is a matchup that you realistically won't be winning most games, but this helps and is relevant against other midrange decks. Hits manlands in midrange/affinity.
Rending Volley: Twin
Rakdos Charm: Graveyard decks, affinity, kind against twin (its "cute" and most twin decks may be expecting it).
Slaughter Games: Generic catchall for combo
The sideboard may need some tweaking but for now this is what I'm testing. I could maybe use swords which pair well with Flamespeaker, but as a general philosophy I don't like them since they are mana intensive and die to abrupt decay. Other possible sideboard cards are Suffer the Past and Whithered Wretch and Shatterstorm (between bolt, terminate, rakdos charm, and Command we seem to have it covered, but if charm ever goes out I want to make sure i'm covered against affinity).
All in all, the deck has been fun and fairly powerful. It can hang with Jund/Junk though realistically it's probably more in their favor. I would really need more testing in that area to be sure. Seems solid against Twin and we are low enough to the ground to race combo when backed by disruption. Grixis Control seems like it could be a good matchup as they are very threat light (especially the current Jace heavy variants) and we have better card advantage engines. Zoo would probably be tough but may be manageable, burn might be okay if you can deal with early creatures as your dudes hit harder in the late game and they hurt themselves so much, but I don't think the match up is great, taking out the bobs helps considerably however.
All of that is to say this is a 50/50 deck with a slightly worse burn match up. Affinity looks like it could be manageable but it would need to be tested.
I'm 3-0 against Twin, 1-0 against Grishoalbrand, 1-0 against taking turns (I assume that's what it was, I've never played against it before), 1-0 against monowhite humans(?), 1-0 against Jund, 0-1 against tokens (not unexpected given its good against other midrange decks).
Xmage is not always the best results to go off of due to the variety of decks and your opponents don't get paired based on winnings like on a daily, but the results seem promising.
The overall philosophy is disruption with incidental damage (Kolaghan's Command, Molten Rain, Rakdos's Return) and pulling ahead with virtual and actual card advantage (Abbot, Prophet, Chandra, Kolaghan's Command). I've been most impressed by Flamespeaker, that card is sweet when he hits the first time.
The initial draw to this shell back in August was being resilient to bloodmoon and being able to play it yourself. I don't think bloodmoon is nearly as well positioned as it was around the Protour when Bloom Titan was the boogeyman. So what is the draw now? Easier manabase (2 color vs 3 color), a more aggro style midrange deck, The card advantage is real in this deck from Chandra, Flamespeaker, Phyrexian Arena, Abbot. Its been fun swinging with Flamespeaker and casting abbot off of him.
The draw is also if you want to play midrange without having to shell out for Goyfs. I'm not going to lie and say this is a superior alternative to goyf because it cannot be matched in efficiency. But if you want to play a similar style to jund with a slight twist, this is a great start. The printing of Pia and Kiran Nalaar (a 4 drop value threat available to mono red) Kolaghan's command (one of the most efficient cards playable right now), and Abbot made Rakdos a lot more viable.
The deck is not 100% perfect but I like the way it plays so far.
This deck is a little rough and I just based on Michael Segal's list from this last weekend since it had incorporated gifts already. It could be that some of the noncreature spells needs to be reworked. This deck would probably be good with some number of thirst for knowledge due to being able to recur two drops from the graveyard via Titan and Emeria. Also works well with Mortor Pod and Aether Spellbomb as they are artifacts which can be cycled if you know they won't be good in a match. Iona gives a solid plan against Storm and Grisholbrand if you can get her out before the go off. Elesh makes affinity much better game 1 as the only answer they have is to go all in on ravager and manland to make them big enough to survive or double blast, however that seems really bad for them.
Sideboard will need to be reworked. I'm not sure if its correct to make the two sideboard wraths into Wrath of God and Day of Judgment for gifts piles given how good supreme verdict is right now in a blue dominated field. I think this deck could be quite solid to try out. Numbers might need to be tweaked and something like adding some Talisman of Progress might not hurt or Mindstone which has been used in Emeria titan decks in the past to help turn on turn Three gifts and it works well with Titan.
Hey, I've been watching this deck for a while since its been putting up some decent results lately. The list that went top 20 this weekend was pretty interesting. The only problem the deck seems to have is going to time. I saw that he was running a singleton gifts which seems like a natural inclusion with emeria. I would venture to say that going up to two or three gifts ungiven along with a singleton Iona and Elesh and Unburial Rites and cutting down to 2 Titans would give the deck an extra dimension. The deck would look a lot like Solar Flare (which it is similar to already anyways), but Gifts Ungiven might be a good way to accelerate what the deck wants to do and give it a few ways to actually end the game earlier. Unburial Elesh is a good way to kill affinity and slow down zoo. Unburial Iona helps against burn and Gifting for Iona, Sun Titan, Elesh and one other cards seems good when you have Emeria online. It also wouldn't hurt to run a singleton Godless Shrine to help with the fear of Unburial Rites getting stuck in hand.
On the plus side, Iona and Elesh were recently printed and are not hard to acquire.
Also note I don't think this would be necessarily better then what the deck is doing currently, but it might be something to test that could have a big pay off.
http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/shadow-ascendancy/
Sideboard was copied from somewhere else, if there is something you find odd I would not know why its there other than being a wish board.
4x Birds of Paradise
2x Breeding Pool
4x Cathartic Reunion
3x Cerulean Wisps
4x City of Brass
4x Faithless Looting
4x Fatestitcher
4x Flooded Strand
4x Glittering Wish
1x Hallowed Fountain
2x Island
4x Izzet Charm
3x Jeskai Ascendancy
4x Mana Confluence
4x Serum Visions
4x Shadow of the Grave
1x Steam Vents
4x Sylvan Caryatid
Sideboard
1x Aurelia's Fury
1x Bound/Determined
1x Detention Sphere
1x Flesh / Blood
1x Hydroform
1x Jeskai Ascendancy
1x Meddling Mage
1x Mind Grind
1x Reborn Hope
1x Research/Development
1x Scarscale Ritual
1x Supply/Demand
3x Swan Song
Sure they are, most of the cards Infect runs to protect its creatures give hexproof or pro colors.
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/archetype/modern-infect-16996#paper
There is a reason that Jund and Grixis Delver are infects worst matchups: Lightning Bolt, Abrupt Decay, Terminate.
There has always been good removal in the format, fatal push doesn't change that at all. It just gives more viable removal to colors that have much worst options like Esper, Dimir, ect.
I'm not sure I understand the logic of this argument. If one mana removal spells were the answer infect would already see a much lower share of the meta. Path and Bolt are already the most played spells in Modern. Adding another one mana removal spells doesn't change much.
For reference.
Honestly, thats a really bad example. Your opponent played fairly terrible. He/she could have blinked steel wall a number of times and actually would have put you on a faster clock.
There is, Burn is the deck that punishes fetch shock. I really don't think we need something else to make 3 color decks unplayable. Cards that lock people out easily don't make for good games of magic. The only deck I can think of that needs to be punished for its manabase is Tron and even then it has enough of its own weaknesses that its unnecessary.
That looks exactly like a list I posted back in December on tappedout: http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/uw-tron-with-foundry/
Khans/onslaught fetches which weren't legal until reprinted in Khans
Tasigur
Gurmag Angler
Kolaghan's Command
Eidelon of the Great Revel
Monastery Swiftspear
Atarka's Command
Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger
Ugin
Collected Company
Siege Rhino
Pia and Kiran Nalaar
Harbinger of the Tides
Has seen fringe modern play:
Dragonlord Ojutai
Monastery Mentor
Elspeth, Sun's Champion
Oblivion Sower
Blight Herder
Wasteland Strangler
Bring to Light
Battle for Zendikar dual lands
Brimaz
Courser of Kruphix
Outpost Siege
Scrylands
Anticipate
Not to mention thoughtseize, cryptic command, v clique, remand, mox opal, etched champion, and dark confidant all saw reprints that dropped their prices considerably. And Wizards has more then proven they are willing to reprint tarmogoyf every modern masters set. Shock lands were reprinted in RtR which is usually the worst part of nonrotating formats.
3 of the top lands in modern were printed in Khans: http://www.mtggoldfish.com/format-staples/modern
Wizards has made a pretty good effort of keeping modern in reach of players. Its arguable your "investment" is better in modern as the prices only tend to go up unlike standard.
Edits: Spelling and missed siege rhino
3x Blood Crypt
4x Bloodstained Mire
1x Graven Cairns
3x Lavaclaw Reaches
3x Mountain
3x Mutavault
4x Swamp
2x Relic of Progenitus
4x Lightning Bolt
1x Grim Lavamancer
3x Inquisition of Kozilek
4x Abbot of Keral Keep
2x Terminate
3x Thoughtseize
3x Pack Rat
3x Phyrexian Arena
3x Kolaghan's Command
3x Prophetic Flamespeaker
1x Rakdos's Return
1x Pia and Kiran Nalaar
2x Chandra, Pyromaster
1x Thundermaw Hellkite
4x Molten Rain
1x Olivia Voldaren
2x Rakdos Charm
2x Rending Volley
2x Slaughter Games
2x Vampire Nighthawk
Generally I play affinity but I wanted a 2nd deck that was grindy midrange. Wanting to look at other colors besides green for junk and jund I had a playset of Abbot of Keral Keep. I think the card is sweet and I think may even be the red creature in the 2 drop cycle.
I was initially inspired by this deck: http://www.starcitygames.com/article/29436_Video-BR-Midrange-In-Modern.html
I started with Abbot and Dark Confidant. The card flow was really good with both but Bob necessitates main-deck life gain which Rakdos does not do efficiently (compared with other color scavening ooze and huntmaster/siege rhino). The deck was really good at grind opponents down but had a hard time closing out. I tried it with and sans Liliana of the Veil. The deck seems to operate better on the aggro side of the midrange spectrum. Unlike Junk we don't have Lingering souls to pitch and we do not have Tasigur, Scavening Ooze, or Tarmagoyf to utilize a stacked grave yard from Liliana, so she was clunky. To mitigate life loss I switched Bob for Phyrexian Arena and put in Pack Rat as a closer. No Bob means we can run higher CMC and mained thundermaw. Abbot does a decent job of cleaning up if you can lay down a few instants/sorceries but Pack Rat with Arena and Thundermaw also do a good job of finishing opponents.
So that was a brief history.
Here is a discussion of some of the cards.
Bolt: Not much to say that hasn't already been said.
Inquisition/Thoughtseize: Disruption slows down opponent and clears the way for a creature to start bashing or keep your opponent from comboing
Grim Lavamancer: Gives us a way to utilize our graveyard, and get in extra damage. I loathe to run 2 as the 2nd one is usually dead as 1/1 with no ability.
Relic of Progenitus: Delve makes relic super relevant right now. Cantripping is never dead and can trigger abbot. Also makes your Goyf matchup better.
Abbot: A sorcery speed cantrip dude. Gets pretty big when you have a full hand. Bob and Snapcaster have proven a 2/1 body can get in the red zone in modern. He can be a 2 drop if you want him to be but I usually wait until turn 3 to at least hit a land. Like any card of this variety, he has a high ceiling but can sometimes disappoint.
Pack Rat: A little more underwhelming in modern then it was in standard, but if you have a reliable card engine or if you are flooding he can put the hurt on your opponent like no other. Few cards deal with rats profitably outside of Maelstrom Pulse or if you run it out with no protection.
Terminate: Best removal in these colors
Kolaghan's Command: The main reason this deck can be viable. Incidental damage is always good when you are making your opponent discard or recurring a dude. A very impressive engine when you can lock out your opponents draw for a turn and get back abbot or flamespeaker.
Phyrexian Arena: Generally a worse dark confidant (No body, costs 3). But the games tend to go long and this card will kill you a lot less. Relevant when up against aggro or burn and works well with pack rat as it keeps your hand full.
Prophetic flamespeaker: A somewhat odd card. Flamespeaker eats up Bobs and Snapcaster and non pumped tokens. BR lacks a lot of good beaters in this slot but flamespeaker runs away with the game when he makes contact with your opponent. 2 virtual cards is amazing and accelerates you in the midgame.
Chandra Pyromaster: 1 damage on an empty field her 0 also helps you draw an extra card. This could also be outpost siege. Chandra does more work in helping getting damage in where as outpost is harder to interact with.
Pia and Kiran Nalaar: A red huntmaster without life gain. 1/1 fliers are always good as Lingering souls has shown. Being legendary and 4 makes me not want more than 1 right now. The ability can be used to kill with reach and I've also used it to kill a deceiver exarch.
Thundermaw: 5/5 hasty flier hits hard. I would make this stormbreath if/when path to exile makes a resurgence as the best removal.
Lavaclaw Reaches: A subpar manland compared to others. However, its firebreathing ability is super good at killing opponents and has won more then its share to justify the slot.
Mutavault: Synergy with pack rat and a great man land. Can block etched champion and is really the best choice given our other manland options suck (no treetop village equivalent).
Rakdos's Return is a flex spot. I had been trying a fourth Kolaghan's Command and a Blightning in this spot. But Rakdos's Return is a great mana sink late game and being Sorcery speed works well with abbot and prophetic flamespeaker. Could be another terminate, I have tried Gatekeeper of Malakir in this slot as well.
Sideboard:
Languish: This could also be anger of the gods. I think Languish might be better as sometimes affinity can get their dudes out of anger's reach by the time you it and can hit a slightly bigger knight of the reliquary and hits Etched Champion. Needs more testing between the two.
Olivia Voldaren: Best modern creature in these colors, breaks open the mirror against jund/junk and tokens.
Vampire Nighthawk: Lifegain and deathtouch. Can help you race against other creature decks and can take down a delve creature.
Molten Rain: Tron is a matchup that you realistically won't be winning most games, but this helps and is relevant against other midrange decks. Hits manlands in midrange/affinity.
Rending Volley: Twin
Rakdos Charm: Graveyard decks, affinity, kind against twin (its "cute" and most twin decks may be expecting it).
Slaughter Games: Generic catchall for combo
The sideboard may need some tweaking but for now this is what I'm testing. I could maybe use swords which pair well with Flamespeaker, but as a general philosophy I don't like them since they are mana intensive and die to abrupt decay. Other possible sideboard cards are Suffer the Past and Whithered Wretch and Shatterstorm (between bolt, terminate, rakdos charm, and Command we seem to have it covered, but if charm ever goes out I want to make sure i'm covered against affinity).
All in all, the deck has been fun and fairly powerful. It can hang with Jund/Junk though realistically it's probably more in their favor. I would really need more testing in that area to be sure. Seems solid against Twin and we are low enough to the ground to race combo when backed by disruption. Grixis Control seems like it could be a good matchup as they are very threat light (especially the current Jace heavy variants) and we have better card advantage engines. Zoo would probably be tough but may be manageable, burn might be okay if you can deal with early creatures as your dudes hit harder in the late game and they hurt themselves so much, but I don't think the match up is great, taking out the bobs helps considerably however.
All of that is to say this is a 50/50 deck with a slightly worse burn match up. Affinity looks like it could be manageable but it would need to be tested.
I'm 3-0 against Twin, 1-0 against Grishoalbrand, 1-0 against taking turns (I assume that's what it was, I've never played against it before), 1-0 against monowhite humans(?), 1-0 against Jund, 0-1 against tokens (not unexpected given its good against other midrange decks).
Xmage is not always the best results to go off of due to the variety of decks and your opponents don't get paired based on winnings like on a daily, but the results seem promising.
The overall philosophy is disruption with incidental damage (Kolaghan's Command, Molten Rain, Rakdos's Return) and pulling ahead with virtual and actual card advantage (Abbot, Prophet, Chandra, Kolaghan's Command). I've been most impressed by Flamespeaker, that card is sweet when he hits the first time.
The initial draw to this shell back in August was being resilient to bloodmoon and being able to play it yourself. I don't think bloodmoon is nearly as well positioned as it was around the Protour when Bloom Titan was the boogeyman. So what is the draw now? Easier manabase (2 color vs 3 color), a more aggro style midrange deck, The card advantage is real in this deck from Chandra, Flamespeaker, Phyrexian Arena, Abbot. Its been fun swinging with Flamespeaker and casting abbot off of him.
The draw is also if you want to play midrange without having to shell out for Goyfs. I'm not going to lie and say this is a superior alternative to goyf because it cannot be matched in efficiency. But if you want to play a similar style to jund with a slight twist, this is a great start. The printing of Pia and Kiran Nalaar (a 4 drop value threat available to mono red) Kolaghan's command (one of the most efficient cards playable right now), and Abbot made Rakdos a lot more viable.
The deck is not 100% perfect but I like the way it plays so far.
Open to suggestions and questions, thanks!
3 Emeria, the Sky Ruin
4 Flooded Strand
4 Ghost Quarter
3 Hallowed Fountain
1 Godless Shrine
2 Island
7 Plains
Creatures
3 Court Hussar
3 Lone Missionary
2 Pilgrim's Eye
2 Sun Titan
4 Wall of Omens
1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
2 Aether Spellbomb
2 Detention Sphere
1 Dispel
3 Gifts Ungiven
1 Spell Pierce
1 Unburial Rites
2 Mortarpod
2 Negate
4 Path to Exile
2 Supreme Verdict
This deck is a little rough and I just based on Michael Segal's list from this last weekend since it had incorporated gifts already. It could be that some of the noncreature spells needs to be reworked. This deck would probably be good with some number of thirst for knowledge due to being able to recur two drops from the graveyard via Titan and Emeria. Also works well with Mortor Pod and Aether Spellbomb as they are artifacts which can be cycled if you know they won't be good in a match. Iona gives a solid plan against Storm and Grisholbrand if you can get her out before the go off. Elesh makes affinity much better game 1 as the only answer they have is to go all in on ravager and manland to make them big enough to survive or double blast, however that seems really bad for them.
Sideboard will need to be reworked. I'm not sure if its correct to make the two sideboard wraths into Wrath of God and Day of Judgment for gifts piles given how good supreme verdict is right now in a blue dominated field. I think this deck could be quite solid to try out. Numbers might need to be tweaked and something like adding some Talisman of Progress might not hurt or Mindstone which has been used in Emeria titan decks in the past to help turn on turn Three gifts and it works well with Titan.
On the plus side, Iona and Elesh were recently printed and are not hard to acquire.
Also note I don't think this would be necessarily better then what the deck is doing currently, but it might be something to test that could have a big pay off.
Is it because in modern their is more to do with your mana already?