All Your Deck Belong to Us
Win Conditions
Uhm... Well... No. We'll get to that...
Card Choices
Enchantments
Shared Fate
: The crux of the whole deck. The text is a bit confusing, so here it is as simply as I can put it: Any cards that you draw comes from opponent's deck and any card they draw comes from your deck, with the upside(?) that the cards are EXILED face down, and don't go into your hand. Pretty neat, huh?
Creatures
Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
: This fella has taken all formats by storm. Whether you play standard, modern, legacy or vintage, if you play competitively you've probably seen this guy show up to the party at least a couple of times. He's a power house. And before you think it, I'll answer the question; 'but what if your opponent hits of
Shared Fate
?'. Well here's the neat thing: he's a 0/2. Yep, that's all. If they activate him sure, they draw a card (out of your deck), but when he flips he enters the battlefield under YOUR control, so your opponent basically just netted you potentially the strongest planeswalker legal in modern.
Before
Shared Fate
resolves it's another story; he'll increase the card quality of your hand for a while and then net you what feels like infinite value. Come on, who doesn't want a
Snapcaster Mage
they can reuse over and over again?
Keranos, God of Storms
: This guy is fantastic. Seriously. His text states 'the first card you DRAW on each of your turns', which is key. He is a great source of removal and card advantage once you have stabilized, and if your opponent casts him off of your
Shared Fate
then he sits around and twiddles his thumbs, as with
Shared Fate
in play neither player can actually draw any cards! The only way he can be bad for you is if your opponent can get his devotion online and start beating you in the face with him, but if they have that much of a board state you've probably already lost.
Instants
Fiery Impulse
: Due to the need for absolutely no win condition in this deck,
Lightning Bolt
unfortunately CANNOT be used, as this could lead to your opponents burning you out eventually. Because of this,
Fiery Impulse
makes a showing in its place as a 1 CMC 3 damage instant to a creature is still pretty darn good.
Path to Exile
: The catch all of the deck. Whether you're against anything from Jund, to Dredge to Grixis control, it can and will kill any threat they produce. It does the job when
Fiery Impulse
falls short.
Izzet Charm
: Since this deck is all about removal and not allowing your opponent to do anything whatsoever,
Izzet Charm
is a great versatile tool in the Seal of Fate arsenal. Providing card draw, instant speed removal and another way to counter your opponents incoming
Amulet of Vigor
, it is a must have in this list.
Spell Snare
: This card is a beast. No joke. As much as it seems oddly specific and useless at times, I dare you to think of a deck that this completely whiffs everything. Even
Battle of Wits
decks run
Storm Crow
.
Go for the Throat
: Battling for the title of 'Best 2 Mana Removal in Modern' with
Abrupt Decay
, this is a card to be reckoned with. This is effectively filling the roll of
Path to Exile
most of the time, but with the upside of not
Rampant Growth
ing your opponent. If you can cast this over
Path to Exile
, most of the time you want to. It also has an awesome interaction with
Spellskite
, since you can't redirect it to it. This means when the infect player you've been matched with swings in for the kill with their 7/7
Glistener Elf
their
Spellskite
won't get in the way (beware of
Vines of Vastwood
though!)
Mana Leak
: Due to
Remand
's 'return that spell to its owner's hand' clause, this card is a no-go, as when you start casting your opponent's
Tarmogoyf
and they counter if with your
Remand
they gain a way to end your fun. Enter
Mana Leak
, the best next thing.
Muderous Cut: Simply put, sometimes you need to kill something for 1 black mana. You can also use it to help control when
Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
flips.
Sorceries
Supreme Verdict
: A sweeper against midrange/slightly slower aggressive decks like Junk and Jund. Very efficient, very effective.
Painful Truths
: As much as this card may look unimpressive, it is FAR from that. Once stabilized, drawing 3 cards for 3 mana is VERY powerful, even if it is at the cost of 3 life. Trust me, try it before you say no.
Idyllic Tutor
: A nice bit of tutoring action for when you're ready to drop a
Shared Fate
or are in dire need of
Keranos, God of Storms
to get rid of those annoying
Wild Nacatl
your opponent keeps dropping.
Inquisition of Kozilek
: This along with
Thoughtseize
can completely tear apart an opponent's hand. Removing their threats you just can't deal with at the moment before they even get chance to cast it is a great feeling. Best of all they are completely redundant if your opponent hits one off of
Shared Fate
as they remove cards from your hand, whereas
Shared Fate
exiles the cards and you can play them AS IF they were in your hand.
Thoughtseize
: See
Inquisition of Kozilek
. Run as a 2 of because as much as 2 life isn't much of a price to pay, it adds up against aggressive decks, and since the matchup isn't great to begin with doing it more than twice can just plain get you dead.
Serum Visions
: A lovely bit of card selection in the early game, this card can smooth out your draws beautifully and help you hit the cards you need when you need them.
Serum Visions
is also tasty in combination with
Shared Fate
as you can get rid of that
Go for the Throat
your opponent was about to get off of
Shared Fate
and leave on top a
Watery Grave
so you can finally finish smacking them about with their
Tasigur, the Golden Fang
and end their suffering.
The Sideboard
Anger of the Gods
: Great against aggressive creature decks like zoo and affinity. That's pretty much all there is to say on this.
Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver
: Possibly my favourite card in the deck along with
Keranos, God of Storms
(and of course
Shared Fate
) she can tear up your opponents deck whilst supplying you with ample threats. She's currently a 2 of in the sideboard but I'm maybe looking to move one into the main if she seems good enough. Fantastic against midrange decks and almost as good against control, she provides our deck with alternative win condition. Potentially the part though is that you can bring her in WITHOUT siding
Shared Fate
out, as your opponent can't hit anything that threatens us out of our deck. Even if they tick her up they're effectively milling themselves!
Celestial Purge
: An clean answer to our opponent's
Keranos, God of Storms
(the one they own, not ours). Can be a nice bit of tech against some decks running spicy one-ofs or unexpected decks too.
Dispel
: Because sometimes you can counter
Cryptic Command
for 1 blue mana.
Duress
: Great to have access to in matchups that have planeswalkers that you can't deal with (
Karn Liberated
,
Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
). Also good against burn, zoo, coontrol and other decks that run a lot of non-creature spells. This is here over more
Thoughtseize
since against burn and zoo you don't want to be paying life against them.
Ghostly Prison
: A decent answer to Dredge decks, this also helps against token strategies and decks that tend to go wide. If they can poop out creatures faster than you can kill them, consider bringing it in.
Keranos, God of Storms
: An extra copy in case they can somehow get rid of the first post-sideboard (eg.
Utter End
).
Rest in Peace
: For those pesky Dredge decks. From what I can tell, Dredge seems to be an absolute nightmare for this deck since they can just put their dredgers back in their hand to then cast, and keep returning
Bloodghast
s and all manner of nasty things without even needing their own cards. These are perhaps the most crucial part of the sideboard as they help defeat one of the worst matchups.
Spellskite
: A great piece of tech against Infect decks, Boggles and burn, and can be a way to protect threats that you deploy once
Shared Fate
has hit the table.
Stony Silence
: I'm not gonna lie, Affinity is not a great match up, simply because they deploy too many threats too quickly.
Stony Silence
helps with that. A lot.
Anyway guys and gals, thankyou for reading my guide to this ridiculous monstrosity of a deck. Please leave a comment below and any suggestions you may have will be much appreciated. If you like the deck or just love pushing buttons please +1, every one counts!