To set the scene a little bit, this was the first Grand Prix I had played in since August of the previous year and between then and now I had played 5 Magic events. In total.
So to get ready for this event I played somewhere between 15-20 leagues on magic online. Initially my testing was going tits up rather quickly. In the first half of my testing my best results were a pair of 3-2s with 6 or so 2-3s and a couple of 1-4s. Before this I’m not sure if I ever got results this bad with a deck before. Even with Death Shadow, which I went 2-2 with at local events.
And in histories past this might have sent me spiraling, but with the help of time apart from Magic and just enjoying games and being mesmerized by the variance/my play and now years of therapy (get into it) I found myself laughing at my own stupidity and my opponents top decks rather than needing to buy a new mouse at 3 am.
Welcome back dear reader, oh how I’ve missed you! After a long holiday season, followed by three more weeks of stuff that wasn’t me writing another article, I’m back with the fifth installment of Madman, Genius or Both? This time I’ll be taking a look at a fresh take on two classic strategies that have been smashed together with a twist.
Before we get down to business, I have to briefly mention that the Modern metagame has been impacted dramatically by the recent bannings of Oko, Thief of Crowns, Mox Opal, and Mycosynth Lattice. And although I haven’t personally been playing tons of Modern since the bannings (or before then, to be fair), from perusing the 5-0 lists, the format looks much healthier to me. One of the things I like to check when I look at the 5-0 lists is whether or not multiple copies of Jund are 5-0ing. This is not necessarily scientific, BUT – I believe Modern Jund represents the middle of the archetype spectrum of a pure customizable mid-range value deck. If Jund can win in Modern, it usually means that lots of different decks can also win, which seems to be the case right now. The recent 5-0 Modern lists also reveal a wide variety of winning decks, which is fantastic. Sorry to all those #affinityforlife players whose hearts are broken, but you had a good run. The good news for now is that there are so many different decks and strategies in Modern that it makes constructing a good sideboard extremely challenging. Speaking of sideboards, the deck we’ll be looking at today offers an awesome plan post-board against decks that side out all of their creature removal. Without further ado, let’s get to the list!
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).
Friends don’t let friends bring Niv to anywhere
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.
Gaak / Gaak’d [Verb][i] Informal : To Abuse graveyard synergies in conjunction with Vengevine and/or Hogaak, Arisen Necropolis to create an Obscene amount of power in a single turn; usually between 12 and 20, spread across 3 – 7 creatures. In Conjunction: Got Gaak’d; Gaak’d em, getting Gaak’d.
I cast a Nihil Spellbomb on my first turn and still got Gaak’d.
Force of Vigor allowed me to Gaak on my turn 2 while removing their leyline on turn 1
Magic Fest Las Vegas is the largest tournament in North America every year. Featuring 2 main events, a handful of unique and Vegas-exclusive events, dozens of artists, cosplayers, and more, Magic in Sin City is always one for the books. This year’s Modern main event will almost certainly be the last chance you have to cast Hogaak, the Arisen Necropolis , which you should if your intentions are to take it down.
I don’t feel that I need to convince anyone on Hogaak’s power…but just in case you don’t fully understand all the reasons why this deck should not exist:
Hogaak is the first modern deck we have seen in a long time that is both doing the most powerful, consistent thing and can shove through most sideboard cards. The shell of 14+ spells that bin multiple cards at a time mean that “soft hate” cards like Nihil Spellbomb , Ravenous Trap , and Surgical Extraction are low impact. Similar to flashback spells, cards like Gravecrawler and Hogaak really take advantage of how priority works by not granting the opponent a window to take action between entering and leaving the graveyard. Half the time I see a Ravenous Trap in a Phoenix player’s hand, it either does not come online until it is too late or punishes a loose Hogaak player that could have given up 1-2 power or sequenced better to play around it.
When Nihil Spellbomb and Scavenging Ooze end up not being enough to check the graveyard, most decks have no choice but to play a “hard hate” graveyard card like Leyline of the Void, Rest in Peace , or Yixlid Jailer . Normally this is needed as at least a 4-of if not more through a split between hard and soft hate because of how you basically need you board card in your opening hand. The resilience of Hogaak to soft hate allows the deck to only worry about hard hate. As a result the deck can play the best possible answers to these cards and simply ignore basically everything else.
Force of Vigor is one of the most powerful cards for green, proactive strategies that Modern has ever seen. This 0 mana play not only answers a Turn 1 leyline, but multiple Leylines. Picking off an additional board card or trinket such as an Aether Vial or Expedition Map can be quite impactful since most decks are required to keep anemic hands that contain lands and a sideboard card. Everything about this card is insane; costing 0 mana rather than 1 is more of a difference than you might think. Forcing a Leyline in response to a Turn 1 Thoughtseize is one of the many spots where this card outperforms previous options like Nature’s Claim . This is not a factor on the play of course, but the 1 mana can quite often be the difference from Gaaking on turn 2 and turn 3. Finally this card functions as multiple removal spells in board games against prison and chalice strategies. Converting this and an extra Satyr Wayfinder into an answer to multiple bridges on turn 4 onward is something unique that most playable board cards cannot do. Force of vigor has not existed long enough to prove its merit outside of this deck, but it has great applications in big mana decks like Amulet, Titanshift, and Tron as an answer to blood moon that does not require a basic.
Some people really do not want to lose to Hogaak and play either an excessive amount of hate or just jam 4 Leyline where you would not expect to see it. Although you could board in Force of Vigor against Humans and Storm as a hedge, the deck’s engine is close to a mediocre zoo deck on stats alone. Most hands with multiple Gravecrawlers and a Lightning Axe can normally cross the finish line by themselves when against a mountain of grave hate or see all your payoff creatures stripped by a few Surgical Extractions. In some matchups like UW control and Red Prowess, zoo beats becomes your primary game plan. Celestial Colonnade decks have a very hard time dealing with recurring threats; Hogaak and Vengevine basically serve as a Spellskite to protect your Gravecrawlers and Bloodghasts from Path to Exile . Similarly Mono-Red Phoenix and Prowess can have up to 4 Surgical Extractions and can be raced when either they run out of creatures or draw too many cards that do not affect the board.
I had the pleasure to cast Hogaak at Mythic Championship Barcelona this summer and played against Leyline of the Void decks in 7 of my 10 matches. Out of those 7 I went 4-3 and won a total of 4 games having never attacked with a Hogaak or Vengevine. One of these losses were a result of my opponent missing their second land drop until turn 4 but a normal graveyard deck like Dredge really has no way to capitalize on something like that if they open with an unanswered board card. Carrion Feeder can get big. Wayfinder helps you cast Vengevine which on an open board hits hard. Gravecrawler is a Savannah lion with upside. This is an Aggro-Combo deck at its core and can execute either plan very well.
The List:
Here’s What I would play at Vegas this weeekend
Disclaimer: At least 30 of the spell slots are consensus in most lists, leaving 10 up in the air. I would advise you not to put too much weight on a particular list doing well since the 10 flex slots are most likely not what won the pilot most of their games. You could probably 3-2 or 4-1 a league if you put 10 cards from your last Modern Horizons draft in these slots. That being said, after playing a few hundred matches with a dozen or so configurations and consulting with a few friends I trust, I feel very confident in my choices.
The Core:
Almost every list begins with these 32 cards and I would not try to cut any of these. Some of these get worse post board but in a world where everyone and their mother is playing Leyline of the Void you are almost always boarding in 6+ cards. It is important to remember that you are playing the strongest and most consistent deck legal (somehow) in Modern. This means that if both you and your opponent execute their gameplan, gaaking will likely go over the top.
The Flex Slots:
2 Golgari Thug – Yes this card is Terrible most matchups after game 1. That’s ok. As mentioned before this deck boards a lot of cards in a lot of matchups. I dismissed this card forever in my testing and did not end up playing it in Barcelona. I initially thought this card was a velocity card until I played with it. Thug actually functions as a consistency slot and is comparable to a 5th and 6th wayfinder that you can actually find from a wayfinder. I thought Thug would only be good in the mirror because it allows you to consistently recast Hogaak after they trade off. As mentioned before, if you can successfully Gaak there’s almost nothing playable in modern that will stop you game 1. After turn 3, most spots you would draw a Satyr Wayfinder given the option; this is exactly that, a 2 mana 1/1 that mills 4 cards. Most hands or flips containing a Thug have a near-guarantee that you can Gaak by the third turn.
3 Insolent Neonate – Anyone that tells you this card is bad or does nothing has likely not tested it for themselves. Neonate functions as a pseudo Mishra’s Bauble , having mana small effects and synergies that add up to a well deserved slot. Most game 1s Neonate serves as a cycling Show and Tell , putting a Bloodghast, Vengevine, or Hogaak into play from your hand. Neonate also bins a convenient 5 cards in conjunction with Golgari Thug and helps you reach a critical mass of discard outlets.
Burn and Mono-Red Phoenix are extremely popular choices right now because of how well they can punish Hogaak when they miss on their flips and lootings and can burn you out before you untap with your 16 power of Hogaak, Vengevines, and x/1s . Neonate absorbing a chump block on a prowess creature, similar to Sakura Tribe-Elder , can often be the difference between untapping and not. Postboard elsewhere, Neonate is a proactive play to make on turn 1 when you expect to cast either a Trophy or Force of Vigor on turn 2.
20 Lands / Dryad Arbor – I think of this more as a 19 Land deck, counting Dryad Arbor as a spell. It’s nice to have a third fetchable green source but the “land count” in this deck really refers to your black source count. Dryad Arbor Really does it all. At surface value this card lets your fetches convoke Hogaak and surprises a counter on carrion feeder. I played Dryad Arbor in my list in Barcelona, which was an open decklist event, and the card still proved worthy without the surprise element. Most matches postboard are about sticking a hogaak through whatever hate the opponent may have; Dryad arbor allows your fetches to count for 2 mana towards Hogaak as opposed to 1 which is very relevant when functioning on low resources.
Because of how priority works in magic Arbor’s presence alone puts the opponent into awkward spots anytime you fetch with a creature in play. This leads to great exchanges for you such as bolting/pushing gravecrawlers and stitcher’s suppliers just to avoid getting Gaak’d. Anyone who has played Bogles or Infect probably understands all the additional value the card such as converting useless fetches (hello Satyr Wayfinder) and a timely chump block or ambush attacker on a planeswalker. Arbor’s presence also allows you to set up specific plays or traps or scenarios. One example of this is where you fetch against a Spellbomb or Crypt; If they do not respond you Gaak them and if they do you get a normal land and play a Supplier or Wayfinder to gaak them anyways.
Dryad Arbor does have a cost of playing less black fetches. If this is something you are worried about, you can play a 2/2 split of Wooded Foothills and Bloodstained Mire.
3 Lightning Axe, No Assassin’s Trophy – Similar to Neonate, Axe helps reach a critical mass of discard outlets while being both a proactive and reactive play. Humans will definitely be a top 3 deck at Vegas and Axe can win you a race, save your looting from a Kitesail Freebooter , or kill a Phantasmal Image on Hogaak. When Lightning Axe is a dead card it has a floor of either popping your suppliers or saving a creature from Path to Exile , none of which Assassin’s Trophy can do. When Trophy is bad it is quite Anemic. The drawback of ramping your opponent in game 1 is much more real than in a postboard game and can often allow a deck like Tron to go over the top of you. Having outs to Ensnaring Bridge game 1 in theory sounds nice but is such a rarity when it wins you the game. Casting Trophy on a bridge cast by a Karn often buys you a single attack since you are ramping the ramp deck as well as bringing them much closer to Karn-Lattice lock, Ugin, the Spirit Dragon , All is Dust , etc. Lightning Axe can also be cast on turn 2 in conjunction with a hogaak in some hands.
Also, have you seen this guy’s face?
He doesn’t look afraid to me. Remember you are the boogeyman of the format, not some deck playing basic Wastes or Arcum’s Astrolabe .
The scope of cards this deck cares about in game 1 is just not enough to justify a clunky card you actively do not want to draw in the majority of spots.
What I Would Not Play:
MD:
Hedron Crab – Playing with this card feels great. Most times you cast it with a fetch you flip a bunch of cards and feel like your deck is working perfectly. But then you look down at your board. You see a Steam Vents you fetched out on turn 1, you see a Gravecrawler it cannot cast. You see a satyr wayfinder and your other land is a Blood Crypt. You have a Hogaak and 2 Vengevines that crabby boy found you…but you just can’t bring them into play. Crab is very good in the mirror game 1 like thug but has a much larger cost. Warping your manabase for a 1 drop that you actively want to board out makes your red match up significantly worse. Unlike supplier and Wayfinder, Hedron Crab only performs at a playable level on turn 1 or 2 and is a pretty abysmal topdeck. Many of the games where crab looks like a great card are games you would likely win because you registered Hogaak in modern.
Altar of Dementia – This fits somewhere between Hedron Crab and Assassin’s Trophy where the games you win via mill are either games you were going to win without it and the games you are not are so slim that it is hard to justify a slot. Without bridge it’s hard to call the self mill value enough to want over simply a Golgari Thug or Wayfinder.
Cryptbreaker/ Lotleth Troll – Both of these cards are more or less sideboard cards that cannot really justify a board slot and end up in the main. Having the effect of a near indestructible slammer against jund is very nice or a howling mine when under ensnaring bridge or a mirror. The issue with playing these 2 is that they are cards you not only want to board out most of the time but just don’t want to draw in most game 1s. If I mulligan to 6 and see one of these, I’m almost always shipping it to the bottom or wishing I put a different card in my deck. Cryptbreaker also requires a boardstate where drawing a card is worth more than 5 damage and Lotleth Troll is just not a Modern power level card on its own.
Leyline of the Void – Leyline main is TERRIBLE outside of open decklists: half the time you find this on a mulligan you have to bottom this or save it to bin to looting. This made much more sense when it also protected your Bridge from Below.
Darkblast – I did not include this in my list but I think this is a very reasonable card to play. Wrenn and Six has pushed many creatures this answers out of the meta but the card is very strong in the mirror. Before Turn 2 Darkblast can prevent a Hogaak from going on the stack and afterwards allows yours to eat theirs in combat.
SB:
Shenanigans – This card would be a consideration if Force of Vigor did not come out in the same set. I’ve already made my point about Force so I won’t repeat myself.
Fatal Push – This is in theory a good sideboard card, however most creatures we can simply ignore or save a Lightning Axe / Trophy for. It’s hard to justify a slot for creature removal when the most impactful board cards from creature decks are non-creatures.
The Sideboard:
Similar to the Maindeck, I feel you really only need 10 of the 15 slots for the deck to function, those being the middle and right-hand column above of
4 Leyline of the Void – All that really matters in postboard games is resolving Hogaak First. Play 4 of this.
3 Force of Vigor – See above, this card is the best card in the sideboard.
3 Assassin’s Trophy – Trophy being a catch-all is nice for many reasons. Matchups like UW, Jund, and Humans you never really know what you will need to answer. Against UW you often need an answer to not only Rest in Peace, but also haymakers like Baneslayer Angel and Monastery Mentor . Jund attacks your graveyard from almost every angle via Nihil Spellbomb, Scavenging Ooze, Leyline, Surgical Extraction, and sometimes extreme cards like Ashiok, Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet , or some other nonsense.
These 5 Slots are not really necessary but I think this is the best way to hedge for the meta:
2 Collective Brutality – As said before Basic Mountain decks have the highest potential to punish you for stumbling and this is a great hedge for that matchup.
2 Thoughtseize – Weather or not it’s good people like to play UW and Allosaurus Combo. Thoughtseize is a great anti-nonsense valve and also has lots of equity against Green Tron which can be needed sometimes.
1 Plague Engineer– Just a good card in modern as well as the Mirror. Postboard mirrors are all about landing a Hogaak first. Engineer does a wonderful job of delaying this and in the worst case trading for Hogaak himself in combat.
Conclusion
Never forget that you are the boogeyman of modern and you are the one asking the questions. Goldfish a ton, get used to the sequencing, and enjoy the last tournament of the Hogaak era. You are making history!
