Hollowfang

Modern Combo Primer RBW (Mardu) Reanimator

Delphen7

Creature (21)

• 4x Asmoranomardicadaistinaculdacar
• 3x Flameblade Adept
• 4x Greasefang, Okiba Boss
• 4x Hollow One
• 3x Seasoned Pyromancer
• 3x Street Wraith

Land (20)

• 4x Blackcleave Cliffs
• 4x Blightstep Pathway  ^Flip
• 4x Mountain
• 1x Plains
• 4x Prismatic Vista
• 3x Swamp

Sorcery (12)

• 4x Burning Inquiry
• 4x Goblin Lore
• 4x Unearth

Artifact (7)

• 4x Parhelion II
• 3x The Underworld Cookbook

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Sideboard

Creature (6)

• 3x Kataki, War's Wage
• 3x Magus of the Moon

Enchantment (6)

• 3x Leyline of the Void
• 3x Roiling Vortex

Instant (3)

• 3x Abrade

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As a starting note, I would love some feedback. I'm still figuring out what style of writing people enjoy in primers

Intro

Greasefang Reanimator has been seeing explosive success in Pioneer and Explorer. But where is it in Modern? A low tier Glass Cannon D=

Well, we ought to remedy that. Greasefang as it is wants to do 2 things:

• First, it wants to get Parhelion II in the graveyard and Greasefang, Okiba Boss on the battlefield by turn 3
• Then it wants Greasefang to survive its trigger so that we can reanimate and crew Parhelion

If all goes well and the opponent has absolutely no interaction, then Greasefang wins. The problem is that this is Modern. Let's play Spot the Difference real quickly.

Spot the Difference

Greasefang loses to all these cards:

• Endurance
• Solitude
• Brazen Borrower
• Lightning Bolt
• Fatal Push

MTGGoldfish's list of the most played cards in Modern:

• Endurance
• Solitude
• Brazen Borrower
• Lightning Bolt
• Fatal Push

Greasefang is in trouble. So how do we help him?

Although various streamers have been trying CoCo lists, I've turned to a Hollow One shell.

Hollow One is really good at filling its graveyard, but tends to struggle if its threats are dealt with immediately. Greasefang adds a redundant backup plan that can go off as fast as Turn 2 while also splitting the deck into a dual threat; we have the Hollow Ones & Flameblade Adepts as aggressive threats on the field, but we can also pull a graveyard based Greasefang win out of nowhere.

Adapting the Hollow One deck to fit Greasefang (History of the list)

To start, I looked at a bunch of Hollow One lists to get a general idea of construction and built my own version of the typical lists.

First Iteration

I wanted to go all in on the self discard part of the plan to get aggressive with Greasefang. Because of the random nature of Burning Inquiry and Goblin Lore, I wanted Unearth to get Greasefang/Asmor back from the grave in case they were discarded. I cut Flameblade Adepts, Ox of Agonas and Vengevines as they were the cards I felt synergized least with the Greasefang plan.

Second Iteration

The deck lacked early game power and Kitchen Imp felt lackluster. After asking around for suggestions at my LGS, the two most common answers I heard were Flameblade Adept and Seasoned Pyromancer, both of which I'd been thinking of.

I cut the Kitchen Imp and threw in Flameblade Adept, because I felt the Seasoned Pyros would make the curve too high. The deck immediately had a higher win rate. Flameblade allowed me to get super aggressive in the early game and turned my discard spells into more than just discard.

Third Iteration (Current Iteration)

The deck felt a lot better, but I didn't have a good midgame, especially when I didn't have the Greasefang plan online. I also had trouble finding both pieces of the Greasefang combo, but it would've won most games if I had. Finally, I occasionally didn't have enough mana.

After examining the list, asking around at the LGS again to confirm my suspicious, and some soulsearching, I regretfully cut my favorite cards in the list; the Blazing Rootwallas. The Rootwallas just didn't synergize with the rest of the list, especially because I didn't have Vengevines. They never contributed meaningfully to combat and always felt like a bad draw.

I relented to the curve issue and tried Seasoned Pyromancers on the premise that they draw cards lategame, dumped the cards I wanted to, and created multiple bodies. I also added another Mountain to accommodate the red influx and to help with mana consistency.

This is the iteration I'm currently testing; and results are very promising

Mainboard

Hollow One Shell

• Hollow One: The namesake card of Hollow One. If we discard 3 or more cards, he's free to cast. Also has cycling which is sometimes relevant

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• Burning Inquiry: This card lets us discard lots of cards, and even lets us cast Hollow One turn 1. It's useful for dumping Greasefang and Parhelion and enables us to cast Asmor

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• Goblin Lore: The companion to Burning Inquiry. Costs 1 more, but is not a net loss in physical card advantage

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• Street Wraith: Pay 2 life, draw a new card. Cheapens Hollow One and effectively makes the deck 56 cards. This is the one card that lets us cast Asmor turn 1

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• Flameblade Adept: With all this discarding going in the deck, this card can get highly aggressive. Menace is icing on the cake

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• Seasoned Pyromancer: Gives us selective discard, redraws, and blockers. It even gives us more blockers when its in the graveyard!

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• Asmoranomardicadaistinaculdacar: The only removal in the deck. She also grabs Cookbook and is a decent creature at 3/3

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• The Underworld Cookbook: Tutored by Asmor, this lets us selectively discard cards while gaining us life. Can also return Greasefang in a pinch.

Greasefang Plan

• Greasefang, Okiba Boss: Decently sized, but the notable ability here is that it can return a Vehicle on combat

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• Parhelion II: If you have to reanimate a vehicle turn 2, this is the one you want. Attacks for essentially 13 flying, leaves behind bodies, and has high enough CMC most removal doesn't affect it. This card is backbreaking for most decks

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• Unearth: With all the discarding going on in the deck, there is a chance that we could discard Greasefang. This allows us to get him back from the grave, even if we don't have white mana. With Unearth we can even attack with Parhelion turn 2! Unearth also gets back Asmor, which is also decent

Sideboard

• Magus of the Moon is mostly for Tron, but is incidental hate against a lot of decks
• Leyline of the Void is great for Yawgmoth, various DRC lists, and Living End. Extras can be pitched to Underworld Cookbook too

Unfortunately Hammertime and Money Pile are two of our worst matchups, so I'm currently testing the following cards:

• Roiling Vortex to primarily hate on money pile as it stops Omnath's lifegain and punishes them for evoking elementals
• Kataki, War's Wage taxes Hammertime in the long run
• Abrade stops Hammertime from killing us out of nowhere.

With Magus of the Moon also being relevant against both of these decks we should have a good postgame. All 3 of these cards have uses against other decks in modern as well.

Tips and Tricks

• A set of D&D dice is very helpful for the random discard, as they allow you to easily pick a dice with sides close to the number of cards in hand

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• Try and hold a card in hand instead of discarding everything in case you draw an Asmor

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• T1 Burning Inquiry generally favors you much better than your opponents. I've won entire games off T1 Inquiry (Tron had all 3 pieces go to the grave and they conceded when I cast a free Hollow One), and it usually gives you helpful information about the opponent's deck

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• There is only 1 white source in the deck, so keep that in consideration when casting discard spells.

Relevant Rulings

• The angels from Parhelion II don't enter tapped, because Parhelion doesn't say they enter tapped. So they can block through the next turn cycle if your opponent lives

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• Greasefang can crew Parhelion the turn it comes in, as the crew keyword does not explicitly contain the {T} symbol, so summoning sickness does not affect that

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• If the opponent lets you pass to combat, Greasefang immediately triggers. They can't stop it at that point (They technically have to remove Greasefang after you pass priority on your main phase, but before combat occurs)

If you've made it this far, I hope you enjoyed the primer, and thanks for checking out my list!

Date added	2 years
Last updated	2 years
Legality	This deck is Modern legal.
Rarity (main - side)	3 - 0 Mythic Rares 28 - 12 Rares 13 - 3 Uncommons 8 - 0 Commons
Cards	60
Avg. CMC	2.75
Tokens	Angel 4/4 W w/ Vigilance, Elemental 1/1 R, Food