All of these cards are easy to find and insanely affordable so if you're looking for a fairly competitive FNM modern deck but don't have the cash, this is the deck for you.
The Game Plan:Turn 1:
Akroan Crusader
or
Stream Hopper
-- These are both decent starts because on turn two you can either start creature flooding or get a cipher onto a potential flying creature.
Turn 2: If you have a Young Pyromancer get it onto the field ASAP, otherwise, stack ciphers on your
Stream Hopper
or cast whatever low cast spells you have on
Akroan Crusader
to start getting tokens out.
Turn 3: Best case scenario is that you now have
Akroan Crusader
and Young Pyromancer on the field, and a "Can't be blocked" spell and one or two cipher cards in hand. If you're sitting on a Distortion Strike and two
Trait Doctoring
then cast those bad boys on your
Akroan Crusader
and swing for a grand total of eight 1/1 tokens with a guaranteed four more on your next turn just for swinging with
Akroan Crusader
Turn 4: You've now flooded the field with creatures and summoning sickness is a thing of the past. If you have a
Massive Raid
on hand then burn a 1 cost card if you have it to get another creature or two on the field, otherwise save the mana for a
Dogpile
. Swing with everything and deal as much damage as you can then kick your opponent while they're down with a
Dogpile
or
Massive Raid
.
Other tricks to keep in mind:Hidden Strings can also be used on your own land to cast additional spells each turn. If you find yourself lacking for mana but have multiple low cast cards, they come in really handy.During the heat of battle it's very easy to forget cards hiding at the bottom of the graveyard and it can be alarmingly easy and very effective to pull a surprise flashback Artful Dodge for either an attack or a miracle blocker on your opponents turn.When using
Dogpile
, it has to be cast prior to resolving attack damage because it affects "attacking creatures". I like using it after blockers have been declared to try to catch an opponent off guard.
Things don't always go according to plan and sometimes an opponent with catch you off guard with a turn two ratchet bomb on the field just waiting to go off but this deck makes it easy to rapidly flood the field for very little mana, control opponent's big baddies, and just be a general pain the butt. GLHF
