I thought about running Chalice of the Void in the sideboard, even mainboard similar to it's legacy cousin, but the more and more I saw it and how it goes with our deck I don't think it's that needed in the modern version.
I decided to go with Stubborn Denial in the sideboard over Spell Pierce mainly because we can manage to have four or more power on board by the time we see real non-creature spell; the value for just one U.
I traded out the Spellskite's for Tidebinder Mage's because merely for the synergy and it is an answer that can present a threat where Spellskite cannot.
Here is the version of the deck I will be running:
I personally do not think that with the unbanning of Sword of the Meek will have that much of an impact into competitive modern. Sure we have access to a really neat combo but the main issue with the Sword of the Meek + Thopter Foundry is that their is already too much graveyard AND artifact hate in modern to where people that were already sideboarding for match ups with graveyard usage and artifact shenanigans. Just hype for right now, Surgical Extraction, Abrupt Decay, Extirpate, Rest in Peace, Leyline of the Void, and many many more are all still viable and worthy cards to combat that strategy.
This might be weird coming from a blue player but I actually think that Ancestral Vision is just not good enough for Modern. Sure, on turn one suspending it is nice but that then gives an opponent 4 turns to do whatever they want and potentially have an answer ready for it when it gets off suspend. Realistically a deck running it will usually see it actually cast on turn 5 under normal circumstances. It's just too slow and I would rather any other time just cast Serum Visions and cantrip my way to a faster win condition or control the board. Any point after the first two or three turns this card is essentially dead space in our hand. Unbanning Ancestral Visions was a smart move by WotC because it legitimately does not break the format.
I've played my share of Eldrazi decks in the past weeks to know that the deck is absolute cancer for the modern format. Their is absolutely no way to argue for it. A deck so oppressive and dominating the numbers of decks in all major events along with small local game store modern events that I've seen people flat out quit modern until e deck gets banned in April. I honestly don't understand why the deck was emergency banned after the Pro Tour. Never has a Pro Tour been that dominated by one deck archetype, not to mention other events following it show the same domination as well.
What could happen: Let us not forget that the really only other deck that manages to at least keep up behind Eldrazi as of right now is Affinity and for which is a deck that is long overdue for a neutering. In the eyes of WotC and community outcry, they could ban Eldrazi Temple AND Cranial Plating / Arcbound Ravager / Mox Opal take your pick on which one is more disgusting in the deck.
What will honestly happen: Wizards will ban the Eye of Ugin in order to not completely kill the deck and keep some remnants of it alive, Affinity will survive to tell another tale until the next Modern Pro Tour depending on how dominant it will be without our friends the Eldrazi.
I now ask you all this question. What will you do if anything in the Eldrazi deck gets banned? What will you do if nothing gets banned and Wizards punts in the opportunity to take down this deck. Will modern survive another three more months of Eldrazi Winter?
I find it amazing the amount of people that defend the new domination of Eldrazi decks and state that nothing needs to new banned from the deck. Never have I seen in the modern format such a huge surge and domination of the meta by a single deck.
The Eldrazi menace is severely hurting the diversity and playability of modern currently. It has now gotten to the point to where many players now either follow the trend and build the deck from its high performance ratio or the vast others build their current decks to combat the new decks which as of now is slim to none.
The Pro Tour showcased some of the best players in the modern format and seeing he numbers of Eldrazi decks show up from the first day of the Pro Tour, all the way to e last matches of the top 8, something is definitely not right.
I personally see this deck lasting only 2 more months and expect a swift cutting block.
Modern as of right now is not a safe format for anyone in the competitive circles.
If someone were to add a 3rd color, white is definitely the strongest in comparison of adding black or green. It honestly depends on the play style. White give the deck a more tempo play style while U/R has access to run mainboard Blood Moon and got punished as badly while splashing a third color to the flow. Same goes for adding black in that regard. At this point it is definitely preference of the matter. I know if I was to splash a color it would be white since it gives the best answers to threats and utility.
For all that think control is dead, they're wrong. Did any counterspells get banned? Last I checked only Splinter Twin got banned. We still have all the components to what makes control good like Snapcaster Mage, Cryptic Command, Remand, Spell Snare, Blood Moon, Vendilion Clique, etc. What we have to do now is actually think for ourselves what is good. Yeah the pros are gonna come up with something possibly at the Pro Tour but it doesn't mean we can't experiment and find our own groove in the mean time. We're control players for the reason, so it's our divine right to stop others from playing their janky cards and combos but at the same time make sure we control the board to slam down our win condition. So for all that are worried control is dead, it is not, it just means now we have to get out of our comfort zone of what Splinter Twin did to us to where we didn't deviate and now allows us to brew some awesome new stuff.
I also think the modern staples FNM cards of last summer was a success and they are likely to reconduct that experience. It seems like a good incentive to make us go to more FNM, especially during the summer, and crack some new packs with draft in hope to open a non-rare way to expensive modern staple.
Furthermore, it allows them to react way more quickly as they decide the fnm cards way less in advance than any preconstructed deck or supplemental product.
FNM promos of Inquisition of Kozilek would be very nice along with Might of Old Krosa. Sad to say I don't see that happening until the next Modern Masters set come out, hard to say.
I'm generally not a Standard player but upon opening a couple booster boxes of Battle for Zendikar I really liked how the UBR Eldrazi worked with one another.
It managed to do well game one of matches, mainly because I caught my opponent off guard and they didn't know what to expect. After game 1... Lets just say it was generally harder. I know this deck can be improved but it was fun to build.
The deck generally had the theme of everything in it was colorless (minus Ob Nixilis Reignited) and was heavily reliant on Herald of Kozilek, without a doubt my favorite uncommon from BFZ. Once I got one or more of them on the field, practically everything in the deck cost less and could counter for pretty cheap and get Ugin, the Spirit Dragon online faster in control games.
Have any of you come in contact with this style of deck or something similar? Tell me what you think could be added, taken out, or gone a different route. As stated, I am more of a Modern player so Standard isn't my forte by a long shot.
Coming from a die-hard blue player I will rank my favorite counterspells from pure power.
1). Force of Will - A counterspell that essentially can cost zero mana? Count me in! Any deck in which the format permits Force of Will should abuse the fact of it and use it for it's sheer power.
2). Mental Misstep - Another counterspell that can cost zero mana at the cost of 2 life. This spell is seriously broken. If Force of Will wasn't a thing, this spell would honestly be #1. In magic, the player that can land a powerful turn 1 play like a Sensei's Divining Top, Sol Ring, or any extremely powerful CMC 1 spell in the game. Seriously banned in modern for a GOOD reason.
3). Mana Drain - An awesome 2 CMC counter spell with a nice perk of getting usable mana during your first main phase of the next turn equal to the countered spells CMC in the form of C mana
4). Foil - The only reason why this spell isn't #3 on my list is because in order to play this spell for free, it requires the player to discard an Island AND another card from their hand to play the spell for free. A counterspell that can be cast for zero mana is still extremely high on the list of counterspells.
5). Counterspell - Is this really much of a surprise? One of the best counterspells in Magic is honestly Counterspell. A 2 CMC hard counterspell, doesn't get much better than that.
6). Commandeer - I learned the love of this spell from playing Commander with friends and when I first started playing Magic in general. Another possible zero mana counterspell (exiling two blue cards from our hand) with the added bonus of taking the noncreature spell from our opponent and using it for our own desires.
7). Swan Song - This one may be a surprise to many but I think this is more powerful than many like to admit. 1 one CMC counterspell! I mean come on, that is pretty good! HOWEVER their is a stipulation, it cannot counter: Creatures, Artifacts, or Planeswalkers. The spell also gives the owner of the countered spell a 2/2 blue bird token with flying.
8). Dispel - I feel this counterspell is underrated and deserves to be higher on this list but the fact of the matter is that it only counters one kind of spell, instants. This is the ultimate answer to other counterspells from opponents.
9). Cryptic Command - This is a great counterspell, extremely usable and versatile. One of my favorite thing about this particular counterspell is that it is so much more than just a counterspell. This counter can bounce a permanent, tap all creatures an opponent controls AND draw us a card (granted we can only choose 2 of the four). Because this spell has so many options gives this spell the versatility it needs. The only downside and reason this spell isn't higher on the list is it's CMC is 4, 1UUU. Counterspells are supposed to be as cheap as possible and anything honestly exceeding 2 must be extremely good.
10). Remand - Maybe because I am major Modern player but this spell is extremely good for what it does. An opponent that sees this counter hit the stack knows that their spell isn't really fully countered but instead suspended until they have the mana to cast it again by putting it back into their hand, all at the same time allowing us to draw a card. A soft 2 CMC counterspell that gives are opponent the illusion of being able to do something later but in actuality all good blue players have a better more lethal counter waiting in the background.
Honorable Mention goes to:
Spell Snare - A one CMC counterspell that counters another spell with CMC 2 exactly. The only reason is why this did not make my cut is that this spell is so limiting to what it can do and honestly see majority play in Modern. ASIDE from that, this is an extremely powerful.
Pact of Negation - A hard counterspell that is cast for zero mana, yes you saw right, zero. BUT and this is quite a big BUT at that but this spell does have it's downside of at the beginning of our next upkeep we must pay mana in order to not loose the game instantly. A zero CMC counterspell is ridiculously good but at a price in the follow up which could hurt us later on in the game if we aren't prepared to pay the steep price.
Daze - A counterspell that can be cast for zero mana on the stipulation of having an Island already in play. This is a good early game counterspell which can get rid of small threats but in the later game this counterspell is just too weak for having the drawback of an opponent paying only 1.
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Those are my top 10 counterspells in all of Magic and I know their are a lot more than deserve to be on this list and should but this is the first 10 I can honestly recall at first and am most familiar with being the most powerful in all of Magic. I hope you all enjoyed my description and explanation of these top 10 counterspells in Magic!
I wouldn't be surprised if Modern event decks got scrapped along with the standard ones. I mean seriously, the first modern one got bashed at least as bad as the worst standard ones.
This.
As of 2016, WotC doesn't want you buying a precanned deck worth a bucket of warm spit. No Event Decks (modern or standard) no clash packs, premium decks, nothing. They want you on the booster lotto, drafting, or second handing at LGS who crack packs to fill cases. Prebuilt decks to them (and to the majority of players) are traps for n00bs and casuals.
The Origins clash pack was too good a value (CoCo, Rhino, Heath, Dromoka's Command), and the Eldrazi ED had two staples (Hangerback and Warden) which made both too good a value; you could build a usable standard Abzan with 4 clashes and some dirt cheap extras. That's not going to sell boosters.
I might be wrong, but the fact no Clash Pack was announced for Gatewatch and no ED for Innistrad 2 had me thinking we won't see another usable premade deck for a long time. Duel decks and intro decks only going forward.
It's sad to say but I think you're right on key for this. The event deck was nice in theory and did manage to reprint some nice useable staples (Inquisition of Kozilek, Path to Exile, Relic of Progenitus, etc.); however, it was pretty entry level and needed some major tweaking to be modern competitive.
The Origins Clash Pack was amazing in offering us Collected Company, Siege Rhino, Windswept Heath, etc. but Wizards is not going to break the bank with these nice pre-constructed decks, booster packs is their money cow and for good reason.
Probably because out of all the colors in modern..blue shows up the most often.
Well... I would honestly say that Red is the color that is more prominent in Modern. Most of the tier 1 decks incorporate red: Jund, Burn, UR Twin, Affinity, RG Tron. While on the other hand blue makes up only: UR Twin, Amulet Bloom, and Affinity (sometimes). Blue isa strong color but by itself is very lacking and is used as a utility most of the time and struggles to have win conditions, which is why UR Twin was so consistent.
Is it time to take Emrakul out of the 75 altogether then? That is what I am getting out of the last few posts.
Emrakul, the Aeons Torn is honestly too slow right now in the meta, when Twin was still in Modern and how the meta tended to favor more midrange decks performing well Emrakul was honestly a good game closer in the late game. The problem now is that the meta is far more aggro orientated and Emrakul would rarely be cast and could honestly be replaced with a slow that could benefit the deck, possibly a card to get around mainboard hate against non-basic land decks like Tron.
I got GQ'd into Surgicaled once against Lantern Control before. I survived long enough to land Wurmcoil into Karn, boot Ensnaring Bridge, GG. With Thought-Knot Seer (and Wastes), Essence Depleter, and Thragtusk in my current 75, I'm confident that a little GQ-Surgical, Crumble to Dust, or protected Blood Moon won't stop me completely. ...As long as my opponent has no clock.
A lot of the former Twin decks are shifting to a more mainboard land hate against Tron & B/X Eldrazi. Fulminator Mage has spiked lately due to more land hate centered decks like Grixis Control, honestly expecting Blood Moon to also go up in price as well in the coming days leading to and possibly from the Pro Tour,
I did a few practice games with a friend yesterday and I find Ugin, the spirit dragon quite annoying. He enters the battlefield and exiles our complete board. Are there any suggestions, what to board against an Ugin? I thought about pithing needle. But this would be another sideboard card, that needs to fit in.
Edit: I probably don't have the budget for gaddock teeg btw. But I#m considering it, if Tron really sees more play.
No doubt that Tron will be the majority of the meta now. Gaddock Teeg may very well be the best option, but Pithing Needle is definitely a good budget option that does the same thing.
2x Dakmor Salvage
20x Swamp
Planeswalker (4)
4x Liliana of the Veil
Sorcery (16)
4x Inquisition of Kozilek
4x Raven's Crime
4x Thoughtseize
4x Wrench Mind
4x Surgical Extraction
Enchantment (4)
4x Shrieking Affliction
Creature (2)
2x Phyrexian Obliterator
Artifact (8)
4x Ensnaring Bridge
4x The Rack
4x Blackmail
3x Dismember
4x Extirpate
4x Smallpox
I decided to go with Stubborn Denial in the sideboard over Spell Pierce mainly because we can manage to have four or more power on board by the time we see real non-creature spell; the value for just one U.
I traded out the Spellskite's for Tidebinder Mage's because merely for the synergy and it is an answer that can present a threat where Spellskite cannot.
Here is the version of the deck I will be running:
4x Cursecatcher
4x Harbinger of the Tides
1x Kira, Great Glass-Spinner
4x Lord of Atlantis
4x Master of the Pearl Trident
4x Master of Waves
3x Merrow Reejerey
2x Phantasmal Image
4x Silvergill Adept
4x Æther Vial
Enchantments (5):
1x Sea's Claim
4x Spreading Seas
Instants (2):
2x Vapor Snag
Lands (19):
2x Cavern of Souls
11x Island
1x Minamo, School at Water's Edge
4x Mutavault
1x Oboro, Palace in the Clouds
2x Dispel
2x Echoing Truth
4x Hurkyl's Recall
2x Pithing Needle
2x Relic of Progenitus
1x Stubborn Denial
2x Tidebinder Mage
Let me know what you all think, critiques?
This might be weird coming from a blue player but I actually think that Ancestral Vision is just not good enough for Modern. Sure, on turn one suspending it is nice but that then gives an opponent 4 turns to do whatever they want and potentially have an answer ready for it when it gets off suspend. Realistically a deck running it will usually see it actually cast on turn 5 under normal circumstances. It's just too slow and I would rather any other time just cast Serum Visions and cantrip my way to a faster win condition or control the board. Any point after the first two or three turns this card is essentially dead space in our hand. Unbanning Ancestral Visions was a smart move by WotC because it legitimately does not break the format.
What should happen: Eye of Ugin & Eldrazi Temple should be banned (or at the very minimum Eldrazi Temple). Eldrazi Temple is perhaps the more dangerous if the two because if Eye of Ugin gets banned, it does not kill the deck, it shifts them to playing the Heartless Summoning rendition that saw some play for a bit or some other horrid abomination. Eldrazi Temple turn 1 & 2 still means a Thought-Knot Seer being slammed on the field.
What could happen: Let us not forget that the really only other deck that manages to at least keep up behind Eldrazi as of right now is Affinity and for which is a deck that is long overdue for a neutering. In the eyes of WotC and community outcry, they could ban Eldrazi Temple AND Cranial Plating / Arcbound Ravager / Mox Opal take your pick on which one is more disgusting in the deck.
What will honestly happen: Wizards will ban the Eye of Ugin in order to not completely kill the deck and keep some remnants of it alive, Affinity will survive to tell another tale until the next Modern Pro Tour depending on how dominant it will be without our friends the Eldrazi.
I now ask you all this question. What will you do if anything in the Eldrazi deck gets banned? What will you do if nothing gets banned and Wizards punts in the opportunity to take down this deck. Will modern survive another three more months of Eldrazi Winter?
The Eldrazi menace is severely hurting the diversity and playability of modern currently. It has now gotten to the point to where many players now either follow the trend and build the deck from its high performance ratio or the vast others build their current decks to combat the new decks which as of now is slim to none.
The Pro Tour showcased some of the best players in the modern format and seeing he numbers of Eldrazi decks show up from the first day of the Pro Tour, all the way to e last matches of the top 8, something is definitely not right.
I personally see this deck lasting only 2 more months and expect a swift cutting block.
Modern as of right now is not a safe format for anyone in the competitive circles.
FNM promos of Inquisition of Kozilek would be very nice along with Might of Old Krosa. Sad to say I don't see that happening until the next Modern Masters set come out, hard to say.
Here is the deck list I ran at a couple of FNMs:
2 Fathom Feeder
4 Herald of Kozilek
3 Salvage Drone
3 Sludge Crawler
1 Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger
2 Ulamog's Despoiler
2 Ulamog's Nullifier
Instants (12):
3 Anticipate
3 Dispel
2 Brutal Expulsion
4 Spell Shrivel
1 Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
1 Ob Nixilis Reignited
Sorceries (4):
2 Painful Truths
2 Radiant Flames
Lands (25):
4 Bloodstained Mire
4 Island
4 Mountain
4 Polluted Delta
2 Smoldering Marsh
3 Sunken Hollow
4 Swamp
2 Brutal Expulsion
2 Clash of Wills
2 Crumble to Dust
1 Dispel
2 Roast
3 Ruinous Path
2 Sire of Stagnation
1 Wild Slash
It managed to do well game one of matches, mainly because I caught my opponent off guard and they didn't know what to expect. After game 1... Lets just say it was generally harder. I know this deck can be improved but it was fun to build.
The deck generally had the theme of everything in it was colorless (minus Ob Nixilis Reignited) and was heavily reliant on Herald of Kozilek, without a doubt my favorite uncommon from BFZ. Once I got one or more of them on the field, practically everything in the deck cost less and could counter for pretty cheap and get Ugin, the Spirit Dragon online faster in control games.
Have any of you come in contact with this style of deck or something similar? Tell me what you think could be added, taken out, or gone a different route. As stated, I am more of a Modern player so Standard isn't my forte by a long shot.
1). Force of Will - A counterspell that essentially can cost zero mana? Count me in! Any deck in which the format permits Force of Will should abuse the fact of it and use it for it's sheer power.
2). Mental Misstep - Another counterspell that can cost zero mana at the cost of 2 life. This spell is seriously broken. If Force of Will wasn't a thing, this spell would honestly be #1. In magic, the player that can land a powerful turn 1 play like a Sensei's Divining Top, Sol Ring, or any extremely powerful CMC 1 spell in the game. Seriously banned in modern for a GOOD reason.
3). Mana Drain - An awesome 2 CMC counter spell with a nice perk of getting usable mana during your first main phase of the next turn equal to the countered spells CMC in the form of C mana
4). Foil - The only reason why this spell isn't #3 on my list is because in order to play this spell for free, it requires the player to discard an Island AND another card from their hand to play the spell for free. A counterspell that can be cast for zero mana is still extremely high on the list of counterspells.
5). Counterspell - Is this really much of a surprise? One of the best counterspells in Magic is honestly Counterspell. A 2 CMC hard counterspell, doesn't get much better than that.
6). Commandeer - I learned the love of this spell from playing Commander with friends and when I first started playing Magic in general. Another possible zero mana counterspell (exiling two blue cards from our hand) with the added bonus of taking the noncreature spell from our opponent and using it for our own desires.
7). Swan Song - This one may be a surprise to many but I think this is more powerful than many like to admit. 1 one CMC counterspell! I mean come on, that is pretty good! HOWEVER their is a stipulation, it cannot counter: Creatures, Artifacts, or Planeswalkers. The spell also gives the owner of the countered spell a 2/2 blue bird token with flying.
8). Dispel - I feel this counterspell is underrated and deserves to be higher on this list but the fact of the matter is that it only counters one kind of spell, instants. This is the ultimate answer to other counterspells from opponents.
9). Cryptic Command - This is a great counterspell, extremely usable and versatile. One of my favorite thing about this particular counterspell is that it is so much more than just a counterspell. This counter can bounce a permanent, tap all creatures an opponent controls AND draw us a card (granted we can only choose 2 of the four). Because this spell has so many options gives this spell the versatility it needs. The only downside and reason this spell isn't higher on the list is it's CMC is 4, 1UUU. Counterspells are supposed to be as cheap as possible and anything honestly exceeding 2 must be extremely good.
10). Remand - Maybe because I am major Modern player but this spell is extremely good for what it does. An opponent that sees this counter hit the stack knows that their spell isn't really fully countered but instead suspended until they have the mana to cast it again by putting it back into their hand, all at the same time allowing us to draw a card. A soft 2 CMC counterspell that gives are opponent the illusion of being able to do something later but in actuality all good blue players have a better more lethal counter waiting in the background.
Honorable Mention goes to:
Spell Snare - A one CMC counterspell that counters another spell with CMC 2 exactly. The only reason is why this did not make my cut is that this spell is so limiting to what it can do and honestly see majority play in Modern. ASIDE from that, this is an extremely powerful.
Pact of Negation - A hard counterspell that is cast for zero mana, yes you saw right, zero. BUT and this is quite a big BUT at that but this spell does have it's downside of at the beginning of our next upkeep we must pay mana in order to not loose the game instantly. A zero CMC counterspell is ridiculously good but at a price in the follow up which could hurt us later on in the game if we aren't prepared to pay the steep price.
Daze - A counterspell that can be cast for zero mana on the stipulation of having an Island already in play. This is a good early game counterspell which can get rid of small threats but in the later game this counterspell is just too weak for having the drawback of an opponent paying only 1.
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Those are my top 10 counterspells in all of Magic and I know their are a lot more than deserve to be on this list and should but this is the first 10 I can honestly recall at first and am most familiar with being the most powerful in all of Magic. I hope you all enjoyed my description and explanation of these top 10 counterspells in Magic!
It's sad to say but I think you're right on key for this. The event deck was nice in theory and did manage to reprint some nice useable staples (Inquisition of Kozilek, Path to Exile, Relic of Progenitus, etc.); however, it was pretty entry level and needed some major tweaking to be modern competitive.
The Origins Clash Pack was amazing in offering us Collected Company, Siege Rhino, Windswept Heath, etc. but Wizards is not going to break the bank with these nice pre-constructed decks, booster packs is their money cow and for good reason.
Well... I would honestly say that Red is the color that is more prominent in Modern. Most of the tier 1 decks incorporate red: Jund, Burn, UR Twin, Affinity, RG Tron. While on the other hand blue makes up only: UR Twin, Amulet Bloom, and Affinity (sometimes). Blue isa strong color but by itself is very lacking and is used as a utility most of the time and struggles to have win conditions, which is why UR Twin was so consistent.
Emrakul, the Aeons Torn is honestly too slow right now in the meta, when Twin was still in Modern and how the meta tended to favor more midrange decks performing well Emrakul was honestly a good game closer in the late game. The problem now is that the meta is far more aggro orientated and Emrakul would rarely be cast and could honestly be replaced with a slow that could benefit the deck, possibly a card to get around mainboard hate against non-basic land decks like Tron.
A lot of the former Twin decks are shifting to a more mainboard land hate against Tron & B/X Eldrazi. Fulminator Mage has spiked lately due to more land hate centered decks like Grixis Control, honestly expecting Blood Moon to also go up in price as well in the coming days leading to and possibly from the Pro Tour,
No doubt that Tron will be the majority of the meta now. Gaddock Teeg may very well be the best option, but Pithing Needle is definitely a good budget option that does the same thing.