Aether Vial is one of the most storied cards in Magic's history. While it saw some play in Standard when it was legal, it has always been a hallmark of eternal formats like Extended, Legacy, and Modern, being the card that supports tribal and creature heavy decks.

So, what if I told you that it may be correct to cut Aether Vial from Modern Merfolk?

Time Stamps:

00:04:22 - Match 1

00:12:54 - Match 2

00:32:57 - Match 3

00:43:31 - Match 4

01:00:59 - Match 5

SprawlFolk | Modern | Jim Davis

• Creatures (30)
• 2 Lord of Atlantis
• 2 Noble Hierarch
• 2 Realmwalker
• 4 Master of the Pearl Trident
• 4 Merfolk Trickster
• 4 Merrow Reejerey
• 4 Silvergill Adept
• 4 Svyelun of Sea and Sky
• 4 Tide Shaper

• Instants (4)
• 4 Collected Company

• Enchantments (4)
• 4 Utopia Sprawl

• Lands (22)
• 1 Forest
• 3 Island
• 2 Mutavault
• 4 Breeding Pool
• 4 Flooded Strand
• 4 Misty Rainforest
• 4 Polluted Delta

• Sideboard (15)
• 4 Force of Negation
• 3 Subtlety
• 3 Collector Ouphe
• 3 Relic of Progenitus
• 2 Dismember

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Going to be honest it was a tough league for actually drawing the card Utopia Sprawl!

While it may seem like an odd card to splash in a mostly Mono-Blue deck, the reality is threefold. One, Modern has gotten very fast, to the point that Merfolk isn't really interactive enough to not just try to go fast itself. Two, Prismatic Ending has made relying on low land-Aether Vial hands a liability. And three, Svyelun of Sea and Sky is by far the best merfolk in the format and should be built around - turn two Svyelun is very very good.

The extra mana allows for Collected Company to shine, while Merrow Reejerey also plays amazingly with Utopia Sprawl allowing you to double untap for mana.

We saw some issues with the deck in this league against hyper linear decks like Burn and Hammertime which will need to be addressed with better sideboard plans, but this is a new and very interesting take on one of Modern's oldest archetypes!