This deck is designed to be competitive in the Modern format, but I could use some feedback from some experts! Here's the rundown:
Creatures: Tarmogoyf is the best tempo beater in the game, enough said. Snapcaster Mage provides immense value and can also put pressure on your opponent's life total when need be. Mutavault and Creeping Tar Pit are all stars in this deck--the low amount of creatures means that they do double duty. These four are your win condition (Instructions: Turn them sideways --> Profit).
Spells: Many of these cards, such as Mana Leak, Remand, Abrupt Decay, and Thoughtseize are very common in a tempo/control shell. Some not so common choices are:
Piracy Charm
. Never heard of it? How odd! It is incredibly versatile, having four modes: Pump a Goyf, kill a one toughness creature (Bob/Tiago), make your opponent discard, and with Spreading Seas, make a Goyf unblockable. That's four tempo friendly options for 1 mana at instant speed, that can be flashed back with Snapcaster! Don't knock it 'til you try it. This thing is surprisingly good.
Speaking of Spreading Seas... Announcing the dark horse of the deck! It can come out of nowhere to soft lock your opponent out of the 1 color they needed to cast their finisher or removal, replacing itself with another card in your hand. In other blue matchups it's less often useful, at times no more than a cantrip, but it has the added bonus of fixing your lands if for some reason you find yourself short a blue source (curse you Blood Moon!).
Wrench Mind is the next surprise in this list. Hymn to Tourach is good enough for BUG Delver in Legacy, so why not the next best thing in Modern? Discarding 2 for 1 is always a good deal, you'll find. Additionally, in Modern, artifacts are often key combo pieces or hosers; forcing an opponent to choose between their combo/hate cards and two others can set them way behind and tell you about their plan. Keeping them in topdeck mode while you draw answers is a recipe for victory! This card is a godsend in the control/combo/midrange matchups, though less effective against aggro.
Geth's Verdict--Shroud effects are a huge pain. Bogles, Geist, Thrun, and Etched Champion are all annoyingly immune to most removal. So we take a different route--we make them sacrifices to our glory! Generally, you should be countering/killing anything that attempts to hit the board, so they should rarely have more than 1 creature out, making this card good removal for us. The extra ping is a nice bonus.
Sideboard:
I have no local meta, so it's hard to build a real sideboard. This is what I would field at a Grand Prix or other large competition:
-
Annul
is a great answer for a large number of threats in the meta, from Splinter Twin to Cranial Plating to... a lot of stuff.
- Batterskull adds inevitability vs midrange/control decks.
-
Deathmark
stifles Zoo, Pod, and Hatebears.
- Engineered Explosives is our value wrath against Zoo, Merfolk, and Faeries.
- Relic of Progenitus adds a little graveyard hate to the mix.
- Hurkyl's Recall swings our odds against the very popular Affinity.
- Pithing Needle lobotomizes Planeswalkers, Mindslaver, Pod, AEther vial, etc.
- Scavenging Ooze grants us access to a potentially huge body and source of lifegain, plus graveyard disruption.
- Spellskite shores up holes against Burn and rogue strategies.
- Shadow of Doubt makes it pretty hard to lose against Pod and Scapeshift.
Matchups:
For a complete matchup guide against the top decks in the format, click HERE! This section is still under construction and will be coming soon :)
Drawing Board
Thinking about swapping out one
Piracy Charm
for a
Disfigure
. This would make me marginally better vs aggro/midrange and slightly worse against combo/control. It also helps me win Tarmogoyf standoffs, which can be huge.
Twisted Image
is some crazy tech I might just be mad enough to run. I highly doubt it, but the tempo value is almost too much for me to resist.
I'm considering adding another Spellskite to the board due to its strength against rogue strategies. I'm unsure what to take out though. Scavenging Ooze and
Deathmark
are the first on the cutting room floor, simply because they're already in multiples. It's a tough meta call to make.
Thanks for your help! Feel free to sleeve it up and tell me your results--the more real feedback I can get, the better!
