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Main » Articles » Five Decks You'll Play This Weekend

Five Decks You'll Play This Weekend

Brandon Isleib
Posted on December 30, 2015
 Reddit

Welcome to Gathering Magic's weekly quintet of decks you should be aware of this weekend, whether you're playing a major online event, going to a Grand Prix, or hitting Friday Night Magic. This week, there are plenty of spicy Modern decks to discuss, including some that stand to become better with Oath of the Gatewatch, so it's as exciting as an end-of-year metagame gets.

Auld Land Syne

Here's what went 3–1 or better in a Modern Daily at least twice this week (Bold = won a Daily):

  • Abzan: 8

  • Red-Green Tron: 6 (won 2)

  • Jund: 5

  • Melira and Company: 4

  • Zoo: 4

  • Ad Nauseam Combo: 2

  • Affinity: 2

  • Black-Green Infect: 2

  • Mardu Midrange: 2

Abzan and Jund were on vacation for a couple weeks; now, it's come back to find their teenage combo kids ran amok with the metagame. It looks like Papa Rhino and Mama Liliana have cleaned up the mess. "Looks like a Storm came through here!" (Brandon does a rim shot, drops mic, and picks mic back up in embarrassment.)

Abzan is increasingly influenced by Zendikar:

Abzan ? Modern | whateverfor

Shambling Vent is showing up increasingly with Stirring Wildwood to create a greater depth of threats than most Modern decks get; Shambling Vent and Stirring Wildwood both costing 3 mana to activate gives them an edge over Raging Ravine, and their toughness gives them an edge over Lavaclaw Reaches. For Abzan and Jund's choices, I'm very interested to find out whether Oath of the Gatewatch will produce a B/G creature land.

But it's Painful Truths that's broken out this month, in the sideboard here and in occasional main decks, more in Abzan than Jund since Abzan has more life-gain. Painful Truths's path to Modern is a little weird, coming from both chronological directions in Legacy and Standard. It's an alternative to Dark Confidant for decks with some more expensive spells. It's also an alternative in price, although it moved out of junk rare pretty quickly of late, so if Dark Confidant has been pricing you out of black decks in Modern, consider Painful Truths as part of your seventy-five.

Unfortunately, R/G Tron didn't place on Christmas, but it had plenty of other good finishes:

R/G Tron ? Modern | JuicyRabbit

Some versions run Pyroclasm in the main deck instead of Relic of Progenitus; some prefer a more diverse creature base for Eye of Ugin to find. Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger is agreed on as an inclusion, though the number is debated. JuicyRabbit has gone for three here, clearly desiring to rely on drawing it naturally instead of becoming frustrated that Emrakul, the Aeons Torn or Platinum Angel or Sundering Titan isn't the right call against a particular opponent. Ulamog can exile permanents; Ulamog can kill in a couple swings; it's good enough.

The sideboard not only has Void Winnower, which annoys several decks, but also Orbs of Warding. Unlike most Tron cards, Orbs of Warding can be cast fairly quickly, and while it can't show up faster than the sometimes-sideboarded Leyline of Sanctity, it has additional utility, most notably shutting down Storm's main deck and post-’boarded win conditions.

Jace, Vryn's Prodigy has been finding new homes in Modern, and Grixis Control certainly makes sense as a home for him. But I didn't expect his new sidekick:

Obzedat Grixis ? Modern | twop

Those of you playing two Standard rotations ago will remember with fondness (or disdain) the trick with Whip of Erebos and Obzedat, Ghost Council—stacking end-step triggers could cause the Whip to "lose track" of Obzedat, giving you a permanent blinky Obzedat for your troubles. Goryo's Vengeance and Obzedat work exactly the same way . . . but so do Goryo's Vengeance and any of the Magic Origins Planeswalkers if you can meet their transform condition on the turn Goryo's Vengeance brings them out. Jace, Vryn's Prodigy's condition is pretty easy to meet, at which point Goryo's Vengeance has reanimated a Planeswalker for 2 mana at instant speed. It's a potent direction, and while there aren't other prominent creatures to swap seamlessly into the strategy, Grixis Control has had enough staying power to make this a real deck.

Two Spicy Zendikarbonaras

You can't have meatballs every meal . . . two of Zendikar's main themes received a fair amount of exploration in the leagues this week. First up is the big guns:

U/B Eldrazi ? Modern | xthebloodyninex

B/x Eldrazi has been on the fringes of the metagame, using Eldrazi Temple and Eye of Ugin as a tribal variant of Tron now that there's a critical mass of Eldrazi spells to find and cast with them. Relic of Progenitus is more central to making this deck run versus its inclusion in Tron since, here, it fuels Blight Herders to go wide while also ramping. W/B Eldrazi variants have been running Path to Exile as the complement to Relic of Progenitus, processing the exiled cards with Blight Herder or Wasteland Strangler. Instead of white here, blue gives access to Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver, a threat in its own right that also conveniently exiles three cards at a time; just a couple activations can fuel the rest of the game.

Blue also gives access to Drowner of Hope, who can add to the ground presence; the tap ability's also a preemptive counter to any Emrakul, the Aeons Torn strategy, like reanimator or Through the Breach. Last, there's Serum Visions for consistency. The sideboard has red for Crumble to Dust and Slaughter Games; both are fine Modern cards anyway, but the exile clause gives them synergy with Eldrazi that isn't available anywhere else.

If you want the Allies to win, there are a couple of ways to go, though most of them run through Collected Company. A Naya list running Expedition Envoy, Firemantle Mage, and Lantern Scout went 5–0 in a league this week; it had Return to the Ranks in the sideboard. Another deck decided to return Allies to the ranks that had never been in the ranks to begin with:

Bant Allies ? Modern | redground

Although this deck can function as a serviceable beatdown deck thanks to Hada Freeblade, Mirror Entity, and a load of mana sunk into Mirror Entity from Harabaz Druids real and fake (e.g. Jwari Shapeshifter or Phantasmal Image impostors of Harabaz Druid), the real plan is to self-mill with Halimar Excavator and then sink Harabaz Druid and identi-friends' mana into a huge Return to the Ranks. If they're all returned at once, all the Halimar Excavator triggers might be enough to mill the opponent out on the spot; if they're not, the Mirror Entity activation next turn is probably enough. That the same suite of creatures can enable a combat victory or a mill victory makes this an unusual deck, and like with the Eldrazi deck above, Oath of the Gatewatch might bring tools to push this deck into a higher tier.

Conclusion

Oath of the Gatewatch is the last chance for a while to help the tribal Eldrazi and Ally strategies in Modern, and if the creature-land cycle is completed, some more midrange decks might be viable. Heading into 2016, there should be plenty of reasons to keep following Modern, and soon enough, Standard will have some new cards that aren't Siege Rhino. That all sounds lovely to me; I hope it will live up to my on-the-spot hype.

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TAGS articles, metagame, constructed, magic online, analysis, modern, decklist, brandon isleib, 5 decks, five decks, five decks you'll play this weekend

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