Ever wish you could play Jund, without having to sit around looking at your opponent's hand all day? Yes? Great, do I have the deck for you! Behold Naya Moonblade featuring Swords, Birds, Moons and more!
My idea for this deck began with a package of 6 different cards:
Birds of Paradise
,
Noble Hierarch
,
Lingering Souls
,
Magus of the Moon
,
Sword of Feast and Famine
, and
Sword of Fire and Ice
. While not all entirely synergistic, I like the idea of rushing out early disruption, and playing a fair game from there on out. Turn 2 Moon-effects and turn 3 Swords coming online sounded fantastic to me, and so here we are. Ultimately, the goal of the deck is to run threats from as many angles as possible. While not offering the combo finish, the deck can kill on the ground, through the air, through blockers with protection, or via attrition on a Moon plan. Keeping versatile, and able to pivot as the game progresses is where the deck shines.
Running a very dork-heavy roster of the full 8 Modern all-stars, the deck consistently hits its major plays early enough to shut down some of the quickest openers in the format. Turn 2
Magus of the Moon
allows for easy steals of Game 1, with the option to cut into
Blood Moon
post-board when expecting things such as
Anger of the Gods
and
Lightning Bolt
.
When the early Moon plan is not going to do the trick, we can hit other oppressive strategies like ramping into a Sword to come online for turn 3. There are a number of fair decks in the format where a Sword this early in the game is absolutely back breaking to try and get through/defend against. Aside from the many bears and lhurgoyfs as candidates for the Swords, the deck runs a suite of 4
Birds of Paradise
and 4
Lingering Souls
allowing ample routes to ship the swords in to the opponent's dome for the triggered abilities.
When all else fails, the deck can revert to its roots and run like a good ol' fashioned midrange creature list (... which is what it is).
Tarmogoyf
and
Bloodbraid Elf
provide serious threats that require near-immediate answers from the opponent if they don't want to quickly fall behind. Add this on top of Moon/Sword oppression, utility creatures like
Voice of Resurgence
and
Scavenging Ooze
, and maindeck
Path to Exile
+
Lightning Bolt
and this shell begins to flex its strength against the current Modern format.
Due to the deck's inherent "go wide, go big" strategy,
Worship
has found a spot in the maindeck to help sustain us through the grindy fair matchups, as well as some of the interaction-free linear combo decks are without enchantment hate for Game 1. While a 1-of means
Worship
is not a card we will see often, it's sturdiness will shine in both early combo matchups where we ramp it out with a dork or two, as well as the sluggish games, where we trade top decks for top decks. In many cases,
Worship
will win the top deck war.
