This article is a recap of what happened to modern in the last 3 months, along with some specific predictions about what will happen in the modern meta-game in the next 3 months.
A few months ago I spent some time writing about how Magic: The Gathering meta-games tend to evolve over time in a predictable way. At the time I included this delightful (and graphically questionable) image to put at the top.
While I don’t think this image perfectly captures the mtg circle of life, I do think it’s an amusing indicator of what things magic players expect to beat what things. I think it also represents the circle we all tend to move around when deciding on decks. Magic’s older formats have had some huge shakeups in the last few months with the advent of the London mulligan, War of the Spark, Modern Horizons, the faithless looting ban, and the stoneforge mystic unban. These changes have in many ways reset the modern and legacy formats. I think this provides an excellent opportunity to evaluate the modern meta-game, try a guess at where they’re heading, and generally check in and see if my previous article has any merit.
The funniest part about a modern meta-gaming article is that it is a largely pointless endeavor. Everyone will show up with whatever they feel like, no matter how bad it is (*cough* uw control *cough*). Even better, no matter what actually happens in the future, my predictions will look correct( but not overwhelmingly so) because every reasonable deck remains at less than 5, but more than 1 percent of the meta. I do, however, plan to point out which decks I think are well positioned and which are not. By “well positioned,” I of course mean, “is the most efficient way to do a very linear thing.” Mostly I’ll just make fun of bad decks, because it’s much easier to punch down.
Disclaimer: Just because I say a deck is poorly positioned, or even bad, this does not mean you shouldn’t play it. Any deck can top 8 a modern event, especially if they win the match up lottery. Modern, more than any format, is a place where you can play whatever deck you want and still have a reasonable chance at winning some games. The margins are smaller because the match ups could be anything, even a boat.
First, let’s start with the customary greeting in mtg articles, a picture of the mtggoldfish metagame (9/16).
Most of these decks seem like reasonable piles of cards. Minus of course, bring-to-niv.
Let’s talk historically. How did we get here? and how did pillar of the paruns become a $35 card? First, the London mulligan unleashed a wave of tron and dredge onto an unsuspecting populace. This filled the format with oodles of combo and big mana decks. Then, Modern Horizons added so many highly playable cards to the format that it made some linear decks overly linear and needed to be banned (Hogaak). The initial wave of busted graveyard decks took a strong strike to its consistency, which unlocked some of the slower linear decks (Valakut, tron, burn). Stoneforge came out of exile, which led to the false belief that finally the promised time had come, making modern a fair and linear format again. This led to people jamming stoneforges into their control decks and just about any other deck that will tolerate it. This leads us to now, where I believe the format is re-learning how to linear without it’s good buddy faithless looting.
From here, we being to look at what is actually happening. I put the graphic back up with numbers added so that I can show contrast between that image and this one:
Stoneforge is the new face of midrange and niv I just wanted to have an explosion on top of (additionally, it is a card in a control deck). Also of note, stoneforge doesn’t actually beat burn, one of many reasons why burn is a popular deck at the moment. We also see urza and death’s shadow standing over the smoking ruins of midrange and control, which seems appropriate. Urza and shadow are also weirdly midrange adjacent, like many “fair” decks that happen to have a combo win in modern.
From here, I would define the 1 tier decks of modern to be whirza, burn, and Valakut. Shadow, tron and humans are mighty close, I’ll call them tier 1.5 for simplicity. Jund is probably on top of the heap for tier 2, followed by just about everything else down there in garbage tier territory. If your goal is to maximize your win percentage playing modern, I recommend not playing modern. If you insist, I would recommend a deck in tier 1.
As the format settles I expect modern to follow the trajectory it always follows and linearize quickly as busted decks find the most efficient way to murder each other. My specific predictions from here I shall bulletize for review later, much in the manner of a financial article. My specific predictions I will give percentages based on mtggoldfish meta percentages; these percentages are largely useless, but provide a metric by which you can prove to me how wrong I am.
- I suspect that the number of whirza players will increase over time as it holds a splinter twin-like hold over the meta. I expect over 6% in the next 3 months.
- Burn may slowly dry up as a tier one deck as it receives more attention and more sideboard slots. I expect less than 4% in the next 3 months .
- I expect other linear options such as affinity and mono red prowess to increase in play as the number of fair decks decreases. I expect hardened scales affinity to be in the top 10 by next year.
- I expect stoneforge mystic will slowly dwindle into irrelevancy unless buoyed by play in unfair decks such as whirza or creature combos. It will be played way more than it’s win-rate should allow. I expect no more than 4 stoneforges in any GP top 8, but I do expect it to represent more than 2% of the meta at any given time.
- Valakut will remain a solid choice that is criminally underrepresented in the meta (check out the Valakut website, it’s great and it got me on the pro tour one time). I expect no more than 3% of the meta.
I will revisit these points next year to see how things did. In traditional modern fashion, I expect some kind of massive shakeup will happen early next year and render everything said in this article useless beyond repair.
In the meantime, may you never draw more than 3 lands playing burn. Unless they’re horizon lands, those are probably fine.