Bant Snojutai Blade

Modern* Competitive Control GWU (Bant) GWUB Midrange WU (Azorius)

btreuther

Land (24)

• 2x Breeding Pool
• 2x Field of Ruin
• 4x Flooded Strand
• 1x Hallowed Fountain
• 1x Minamo, School at Water's Edge
• 4x Misty Rainforest
• 2x Mystic Sanctuary
• 1x Snow-Covered Forest
• 5x Snow-Covered Island
• 1x Snow-Covered Plains
• 1x Temple Garden

Instant (13)

• 2x Archmage's Charm
• 2x Cryptic Command
• 3x Force of Negation
• 2x Mana Leak
• 4x Path to Exile

Artifact (6)

• 4x Arcum's Astrolabe
• 1x Batterskull
• 1x Sword of Feast and Famine

Creature (13)

• 2x Dragonlord Ojutai
• 4x Ice-Fang Coatl
• 4x Stoneforge Mystic
• 3x Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath

Planeswalker (2)

• 2x Teferi, Time Raveler

Sorcery (2)

• 2x Supreme Verdict

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Sideboard

Instant (11)

• 4x Aether Gust
• 2x Celestial Purge
• 2x Ceremonious Rejection
• 1x Dovin's Veto
• 2x Veil of Summer

Planeswalker (2)

• 2x Ashiok, Dream Render

Sorcery (2)

• 2x Timely Reinforcements

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Bant Control featuring Dragonlord Ojutai.

Dragonlord Ojutai

AND

Stoneforge Mystic

AND

Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath

Why Dragonlord Ojutai?

Dragonlord Ojutai, arguably one of the best beaters in UW control, is one of our finishers. Coupling him with Minamo, School at Water's Edge allows him to be resistant to removal. If he connects, his Anticipate ability provides card advantage and selection, which allows for us to find a way to seal the game.

Teferi, Time Raveler is a mainstay that forces the opponent to play at sorcery speed. With him on the board, Dragonlord Ojutai is protected during out turn, thus guaranteeing getting in for damage and Anticipateing. We can then select a card that can further protect him during our opponent's turn.

The addition of Force of Negation also helps a lot for this strategy. This card allows us to tapout to resolve Dragonlord Ojutai and be able to prevent a planeswalker or other problematic cards from resolving.

He is expensive, and is vulnerable to removal when he's tapped. As a result, many may not consider him to be modern playable. He can be effective on his own, but with the right supporting cast he can really shine. One of the features of this deck is to make him as good as possible. This focus is one reason why Minamo, School at Water's Edge, three Teferi, Time Ravelers, and the counter suite are played. While these cards make him better, they also support our overall game plan through their ability to shut down opposing strategies.

Why Stoneforge Mystic?

Why Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath?

Card is busted

The List

Card Draw, Selection, and Advantage

Like other UWx strategies this list relies on some amount of card draw, selection, and/or advantage to provide an assortment of answers to what our opponent is doing in order to slowly pull ahead and take control of the game.

- Ice-Fang Coatl - Instant speed card draw again allows us to draw towards lands or action. Even if s/he is immediately removed, the card replaces itself

- Arcum's Astrolabe - One drop artifact that draws a card. It also increases our count for Ice-Fang Coatl's deathtouch ability AND can fix our mana.

- Cryptic Command - One of the modes allows us to draw a card.

- Dragonlord Ojutai - If he connects he provides us card selection and advantage.

Removal

This list is designed to play the longer game, but is capable of closing the game much quicker than typical UWx lists. Regardless, the removal suite is important in order to survive various stages of the game as well as clear a path for our creatures.

- Path to Exile - One of the best ways to remove creatures in Modern, and a reason to play . Can handle any creature, no matter what size. If I could play a 5th one, I would.

- Ice-Fang Coatl - Acts as a removal spell when three other permanents are on the field. Flash in and block/killing a large threat is very strong.

- Supreme Verdict - Uncounterable Wrath-effect. We do not maindeck this because we do not want to kill our own creatures, although, there could be an argument for maindecking it. One in the sideboard in case we want to board into a more destructive list.

Pressure and Finishers

Pressure is applied with our creature base mainly through the air.

Ground force: Stoneforge Mystics and Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath.

Air force: Ice-Fang Coatl and Dragonlord Ojutai.

- Dragonlord Ojutai - A 5/4 hexproof (when untapped) flying beater that provides card advantage and selection.

Permission Suite

After all, this is a control deck, and the way this list controls the game is disrupting the opponents game plan through countering spells. Due to the wide assortment of strategies in Modern alongside the perennial issue of having the right answer to the question your opponent is asking, finding the right counterspells can be tricky. Running too many counterspells isn't typically a good idea either. Moreover, in a format where Cavern of Souls is legal (and used), counterspells are next to useless. As such, my focus here is to provide a tight permission suite of hard counters that is good most of the time. This list runs 8 hard counterspells main; however, the four Cryptic Commands are much more than "just" counterspells as they fuel the various lines in the mid-to-late game.

- Force of Negation -

- Mana Leak -

- Archmage's Charm -

- Cryptic Command - Hard counter, but also a powerful toolbox card for the mid-to-late game. Really like when I hit my fourth land drop and have mana up for this card. 4 in the maindeck. Can be difficult to cast, but this is a based deck and there are plenty of ways to make sure we have at least by our fourth land drop.

- Dovin's Veto - Cheap hard counter for instants. 2 in the sideboard. Great for control mirrors or instant heavy lists.

NOTE - I do not play Remand in this list. While it is a great tempo card that cycles itself, I want counters that get rid of the card for good.

Mana Base

Being in requires a tailored mana base. Functionally, this list splashes for Ice-Fang Coatl and a few sideboard cards. Our goal, therefore, is to have by turn two to flash in our flying snake. This list runs 8 fetches, including 4 Flooded Strands and 2 Misty Rainforests and 2 Prismatic Vista. These 8 fetches all allow us to retrieve all our colors, which minimizes the damage we take to get to for Vendilion Clique and for Cryptic Command. We have three fetchable sources, including 2 Breeding Pool, 1 Temple Garden, and 1 Snow-Covered Forest. The only other issue to consider is the need for with Supreme Verdict, Settle the Wreckage and Winds of Abandon overload cost, but this is not too challenging, and is mostly a post-board issue.

- We run 7 snow-covered basic lands (5 Snow-Covered Island, 1 Snow-Covered Plains, and 1 Snow-Covered Forest) which allows us to be resistant to Blood Moon and count towards Ice-Fang Coatl

- Field of Ruins are played to deal with Tron lands, creature lands (e.g., Inkmoth Nexus, Raging Ravine, card: creeping tarpit etc.), and utility lands (e.g., Gavony Township, Cavern of Souls, Eldrazi Temple, Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle, etc). Two total.

- Minamo, School at Water's Edge allows us to untap Dragonlord Ojutai to give him hexpoof again. It also allows us to untap our Vendilion Clique for blocks.

Strategies and Lines of Play

This deck will function at times like other UW control-midrange builds supported by a proactive gameplan.

As you will hear modern is a turn three format (maybe more like turn 2.5). Pure control decks in modern struggle mostly because of the wide array of aggressive linear strategies that exist. They simply do not stay alive long enough and durdle far too long. It benefits to have the a proactive element, alongside the more reactive spells.

As a result, the aim of this list is to control the game through hard, powerful counterspells and to utilize Ice-Fang Coatl as a control card, which also allows us to become the aggressor a lot quicker than other control lists.

- Eventually we want to get to the point where our Cryptic Commands can help us take over the game through tapping down the opponent's team, countering stuff, bouncing pesky permanents, and/or card advantage.

- Late game we can chain Cryptic Commands with Snapcaster Mages to counter stuff and tap down the opponent team. Bouncing Snapcaster Mages back to our hand allow us to do utilize our graveyard as an extension of our hand.

- When using Cryptic Commands, we must keep in mind--at all times--there are more options than counter/draw. For example, we can counter something and bounce a tap land or creature, potentially putting our opponent back a turn, which would be a solid tempo play.

- Including three Vendilion Clique may seem a one too many, however, this is a card I really enjoy seeing, and is almost always played on the opponent's turn. Three strategies include: 1). flashing in on opponent's draw step to "clique" away whatever card I am unable to deal with; 2). During opponent's combat phase as a surprise blocker; or 3). End of opponent's turn to get a threat on the board or bait a counter to resolve Dragonlord Ojutai. I often don't expect Vendilion Clique to live for very long, but getting a hit or two in, and perhaps a block can be great. You'd be surpirsed how many games I've won on the back of this card. Don't forget synergy with Minamo, School at Water's Edge for blocks

Feedback is welcomed, especially on configurations that bring added value and synergy. Please +1 if you like the build or at least think it's interesting! Thanks for looking!

Top Ranked	Achieved #8 position overall 9 years ago
Date added	9 years
Last updated	4 years
Legality	This deck is not Modern legal.
Rarity (main - side)	7 - 0 Mythic Rares 32 - 0 Rares 6 - 15 Uncommons 8 - 0 Commons
Cards	60
Avg. CMC	2.56
Tokens	Phyrexian Germ 0/0 B, Soldier 1/1 W
Folders	decks, cool decks, Tight knits , Good Modern Decks, Modern, Maybe, Deck Ideas, Cool Stuff, Want to build, Saved decks, Mdn