Torrential Gearhulk is an amazing finisher against combo decks. It fails as a standalone win-con against Control decks, but it remains a solid value play in this scenario, nonetheless. Now, take Prison for example. Their defensive means are EE, Bridge, Chalice, and Pithing Needle/Sorcerous Spyglass, all of which fail against Gearhulk with the exception of Bridge, which I can now focus on dealing with. Gearhulk cannot be dispatched by a simple Walking Ballista, Baral, Lightning Bolt, and Grapeshot making it a much stickier threat than Snapcaster Mage, or Vendilion Clique in the respective matchups. Gearhulk also trumps Trons sideboard plan of boarding in midrange powerhouses like Thragtusk and Thought-Knot Seer, which would have been very difficult to deal with otherwise, or at least difficult to sideboard against.
Vedalken Shackles has a couple of predators that make it look silly, namely Kolaghan’s Command. Luckily Kolaghan’s Command is at an all-time low. Vedalken Shackles is essentially how I plan to win against Phoenix, Jeskai’s Snapcaster Mage, Humans, Merfolk, maybe even Dredge. I think Shackles is better than a huge lifelinker, which would have been my second choice to stop recursive threats, simply because it only costs 3 mana to set it up, and once it is in play, you can activate it at your convenience. Snapcaster Mages suffers being grounded making him only a 1-for-1 against Phoenix given that a PtE is in the graveyard, but Shackles is always an immediate 2-for-1. I started with 1 Shackles, and now I’m at 3, because it has been performing so well. I also appreciate that it can be fetched by Search for Azcanta.
Glimmer of Genius essentially ‘enables’ Cryptic Command and Torrential Gearhulk. One of Cryptic Commands weaknesses is that its mode to improve one’s position in case the opponent decides not to do anything is rather poor (bounce, draw in a draw, go stalemate), and this is where Glimmer chimes in. Also, I want my control deck to actually have a draw-engine. It was a delight seeing Sukenik running 4 Hieroglyphic Illumination in his Jeskai deck, nonetheless, I think Glimmer of Genius is better. The reason is essentially this: If I spend four mana doing nothing, I at least want to get there the following turn; Glimmer of Genius is calculated risk.
Censor gives the deck a critical mass of early-game interaction without over committing on interaction, which would have been just bad deck building or what I would call over metagaming. Censor’s default mode for turns 2-4 is countering, past that I most often just cycle it.
We can only run 1 Negate max, the disadvantage of missing out on creatures is real. As long as actual counterspell is not reprinted Logic Knot is far and away the best counterspell we have access to, I always run 2-3 depending on the deck’s ability to dump cards into the graveyard. Cards like Negate, Remand, Absorb look great on paper, but Logic Know is much better, even though it looks so inelegant and unaesthetic compared to actual counterspell.
Another observation: 3-mana spells work poorly with ETB tapped lands, whereas 2-mana spells work just fine. The problem is, if I need to tap out on turn 2 to play my counterspell and on turn 3 to play my 3-mana spell, I only have turn 1 left to get my tapped land into play. This leads to unnecessary fetch-shocking.
EDIT: Maybe I should add a couple of words regarding my mana curve, which looks completely ridiculously at first glance. This deck is build under the assumption that turn 2 Censor (or any counterspell/PtE), and turn 4 Verdict/Cryptic is good enough to win games in Modern. The fact is, on the play this is pretty much always the case, and on the draw, the rate is still acceptable. The way I see it: One big difference between Modern and Legacy is that global effects like Cryptic Command and Verdict are much better in Modern, because there are no such cards like Daze. So playing exactly one card per turn is good enough if that card is called Cryptic Command, Verdict, Gearhulk, Shackles. There is no need to double spell.
4 Celestial Colonnade
4 Flooded Strand
3 Scalding Tarn
6 Island
1 Plains
4 Field of Ruins
4 Hallowed Fountain
Draw: 10
4 Glimmer of Genius
4 Censor
2 Search for Azcanta
4 Cryptic Command
4 Supreme Verdict
4 Torrential Gearhulk
3 Vedalken Shackles
Velocity: 9
4 Path to Exile
3 Logic Knot
1 Negate
1 Spell Snare
4 Ravenous Trap
3 Timely Reinforcements
2 Return to Dust
2 Stony Silence
2 Dispel
1 Condemn
1 Negate
Torrential Gearhulk is an amazing finisher against combo decks. It fails as a standalone win-con against Control decks, but it remains a solid value play in this scenario, nonetheless. Now, take Prison for example. Their defensive means are EE, Bridge, Chalice, and Pithing Needle/Sorcerous Spyglass, all of which fail against Gearhulk with the exception of Bridge, which I can now focus on dealing with. Gearhulk cannot be dispatched by a simple Walking Ballista, Baral, Lightning Bolt, and Grapeshot making it a much stickier threat than Snapcaster Mage, or Vendilion Clique in the respective matchups. Gearhulk also trumps Trons sideboard plan of boarding in midrange powerhouses like Thragtusk and Thought-Knot Seer, which would have been very difficult to deal with otherwise, or at least difficult to sideboard against.
Vedalken Shackles has a couple of predators that make it look silly, namely Kolaghan’s Command. Luckily Kolaghan’s Command is at an all-time low. Vedalken Shackles is essentially how I plan to win against Phoenix, Jeskai’s Snapcaster Mage, Humans, Merfolk, maybe even Dredge. I think Shackles is better than a huge lifelinker, which would have been my second choice to stop recursive threats, simply because it only costs 3 mana to set it up, and once it is in play, you can activate it at your convenience. Snapcaster Mages suffers being grounded making him only a 1-for-1 against Phoenix given that a PtE is in the graveyard, but Shackles is always an immediate 2-for-1. I started with 1 Shackles, and now I’m at 3, because it has been performing so well. I also appreciate that it can be fetched by Search for Azcanta.
Glimmer of Genius essentially ‘enables’ Cryptic Command and Torrential Gearhulk. One of Cryptic Commands weaknesses is that its mode to improve one’s position in case the opponent decides not to do anything is rather poor (bounce, draw in a draw, go stalemate), and this is where Glimmer chimes in. Also, I want my control deck to actually have a draw-engine. It was a delight seeing Sukenik running 4 Hieroglyphic Illumination in his Jeskai deck, nonetheless, I think Glimmer of Genius is better. The reason is essentially this: If I spend four mana doing nothing, I at least want to get there the following turn; Glimmer of Genius is calculated risk.
Censor gives the deck a critical mass of early-game interaction without over committing on interaction, which would have been just bad deck building or what I would call over metagaming. Censor’s default mode for turns 2-4 is countering, past that I most often just cycle it.
We can only run 1 Negate max, the disadvantage of missing out on creatures is real. As long as actual counterspell is not reprinted Logic Knot is far and away the best counterspell we have access to, I always run 2-3 depending on the deck’s ability to dump cards into the graveyard. Cards like Negate, Remand, Absorb look great on paper, but Logic Know is much better, even though it looks so inelegant and unaesthetic compared to actual counterspell.
Another observation: 3-mana spells work poorly with ETB tapped lands, whereas 2-mana spells work just fine. The problem is, if I need to tap out on turn 2 to play my counterspell and on turn 3 to play my 3-mana spell, I only have turn 1 left to get my tapped land into play. This leads to unnecessary fetch-shocking.
EDIT: Maybe I should add a couple of words regarding my mana curve, which looks completely ridiculously at first glance. This deck is build under the assumption that turn 2 Censor (or any counterspell/PtE), and turn 4 Verdict/Cryptic is good enough to win games in Modern. The fact is, on the play this is pretty much always the case, and on the draw, the rate is still acceptable. The way I see it: One big difference between Modern and Legacy is that global effects like Cryptic Command and Verdict are much better in Modern, because there are no such cards like Daze. So playing exactly one card per turn is good enough if that card is called Cryptic Command, Verdict, Gearhulk, Shackles. There is no need to double spell.