This is the deck that I took to GP Vancouver, or close to it anyway. It's designed to attack and Abzan and Twin-dominated metagame, and to fix some problems I have with the way that Modern D&T lists are generally constructed. It is mostly notable for the inclusion of Blood Moon, Spellskite and
Kor Firewalker
in the mainboard as hedges against popular lists in the format.
In general, I feel that Modern D&T lists have too high a curve and focus too much on cute interactions involving Flickerwisp or Restoration Angel with Kitchen Finks or Blade Splicer. The latter two cards do little for D&T's overall gameplanto make the game difficult for the opponent as it punches them in the face with evasive threats. Meanwhile, Restoration Angel costs four mana and isn't particularly good with Aether Vial. With Goyfs on the ground, I think that an airforce is important, but I would prefer to use
Serra Avenger
, which plays much better with Vial and is good at fighting Lingering souls due to vigilance. Aven Mindcensor also makes Path to Exile and Ghost Quarter a lot better, so I wanted to run a couple of them.
The Mirran Crusaders are to hold down the ground against Abzan, though I'd normally prefer Brimaz, King of Oreskos if I wasn't expecting a lot of BWx. There wasn't room for King Kitty in this deck as WW spells are actually difficult to cast with all of our colourless lands. I left in two Blade Splicers to shore up Affinity.
Sword of War and Peace comes out against everything except Tokens and Control, but helps fight through souls and keep up pressure. Chained to the Rocks is a fifth Path to ExileI'm not sure how much of an upgrade it is over Sunlance, but I wanted to try it as I was running mountains anyway. I think the jury is still out.
I didn't run any utility lands because of their potential effect on my greedy manabase and becasue of Blood Moon. I could see Horizon Canopy as a 23rd, which would let me self-correct if I flooded out.
The biggest mistake in the mainboard was probably Phyrexian Revoker, which was in there to fight Affinity and turn off Sorin, Solemn Visitor and Liliana of the Veil. I was pretty sad to draw it most of the time. Firewalker in the mainboard was sometimes a letdown, but often amazing. Spellskite is an honorary hatebear was also fantastic.
Most of the sideboard options are pretty obvious. I made a concession to a single four drop in Wilt-Leaf Liege, and had pretty good success with it against Abzan. My stingy manabase again made it difficult to cast, though, so it might come out unless I go up to 23 lands. Ratchet Bomb is there to blow up tokens but I still feel that's not a particularly great matchup for me. Again, Revoker felt awkward here, so I could see cutting him for Leonin Relic-Warder, which would allow me to attack Bitterblossom more directly. Spirit of the Labyrinth was not great and is actually bad against
Vendillion Clique
, so it should probably become something more immediately useful.
If I were to run it back again tomorrow I would probably cut all the Revokers and the Spirit for a Horizon Canopy and a fourth Flickerwisp or
Serra Avenger
in the mainboard and at least one Leonin Relic-Warder plus maybe Pithing Needle in the sideboard.
