Elves has been a fringe deck in Modern for many years now. In Modern, the deck loses access to its Legacy haymakers like Glimpse of Nature and Natural Order. That said, games of Modern can be more about grinding than about explosive advantages. As a consequence, Collected Company has been an incredible engine for grinding games out by finding lords and Shaman of the Pack. However, the deck has always been a little high variance, and has struggled to find the correct balance between acceleration and mana sinks. Elvish Clancaller may change all of that:

Green-Black Elves | Modern | NashPeters, 5-0 Modern League

• Creatures (35)
• 3 Ezuri, Renegade Leader
• 4 Dwynen's Elite
• 4 Elves of Deep Shadow
• 4 Elvish Archdruid
• 4 Elvish Clancaller
• 4 Elvish Mystic
• 4 Heritage Druid
• 4 Llanowar Elves
• 4 Shaman of the Pack

• Instants (4)
• 4 Collected Company

• Sorceries (3)
• 3 Lead the Stampede

• Lands (18)
• 4 Forest
• 1 Horizon Canopy
• 1 Pendelhaven
• 4 Blooming Marsh
• 4 Cavern of Souls
• 4 Gilt-Leaf Palace

• Sideboard (15)
• 2 Abrupt Decay
• 4 Damping Sphere
• 1 Maelstrom Pulse
• 3 Reclamation Sage
• 2 Scavenging Ooze
• 3 Shapers' Sanctuary

Buy This Deck Export text format

One of the big questions for Elf decks is what combination of Collected Company, Chord of Calling, and Lead the Stampede to play. One of the strengths of this deck is that Lead the Stampede is a powerful engine to help beat control decks. Because you're not trying to assemble the Devoted Druid combination, you can instead play Lead the Stampede as a way to stay ahead on cards. This deck is far better at grinding and maintaining threatening board presences than previous iterations of this archetype.

If you're looking for a fair version of Elves, this seems like a very solid list. You've got early pressure, Clancaller and Ezuri, Renegade Leader as ways to convert early board presences to lethal damage, and Shaman of the Pack to steal games out from under your opponents. With Jeskai control and other spot removal decks being so prevalent for the time being, reliance on creature combinations to close out games is a weakness rather than a strength.