Sweet deck, +1! I am so jealous of your alters!

I hate you

Jk good deck seems legit.

Thanks! It's not really in a good spot right now. Everyone's prepared for graveyard use. Terminus is a lot harder to beat than Supreme Verdict, and Terminus is a lot more popular these days.

Ya I feel like modern magic has gone into a somewhat repetitive slot in which either control draws game-ending cards like Terminus or some aggro deck just beats your head in with a stick. Kinda done.

1 QUESTON:

• 4 Anger of the Gods is not too much excessive? You may cut 2 or 1 Anger of the Gods to put any copy of Surgical Extraction, Engineered Explosives, Blood Moon, or another useful card for the sideboard.

Greets, TheSimikBOat :)

Spirits, humans, dredge, phoenix, and hollow one are all vulnerable to Anger of the Gods. In addition, anger is the only clean answer that I know of to those decks. All of those are also pretty sucky matchups in game 1. Given all of that I really want to draw Anger as often as possible post-board. I think it's the card that I board in most often of my sideboard cards.

OK. Thanks for the aclariment.

Looking to get into modern and loving the look of this deck. How is it performing? From the comments it seems its been under-performing as of late and you haven't been playing it as much? I'm not very familiar with modern meta, have been a standard player since I got back into the game.

Welcome to the format! I haven't played this consistently since summer of 2017. Last summer I played The Angry Insect (Grixis Delver) and now I play Flame On (Grixis Control).

This deck was really good when Splinter Twin and Jund were at the top of modern. Especially when Jund relied on Abrupt Decay, which this deck is very good against. In those days decks would only send creatures to your graveyard. Perfect when you're playing Bloodghast in the shell of a fair deck.

The problem now is that Terminus tucks creatures instead of destroying them. Bloodghast is no longer a persistent threat against the decks we need to grind out. And decks like Spirits and Humans are not as susceptible to Terminate as we need them to be.

This deck was a ton of fun in its day, but modern has grown since then. I discourage you from playing this deck because there are much better options available which do similar things. What kind of strategies do you like? What is it about this deck that you like? I'd be happy to try to point you towards a deck that is both your style and suited for the current modern meta.

I like decks that can play out in multiple ways, with some level of interaction, which was what immediately caught my interest with this deck. I have a hard time playing "pure" aggro or pure control etc, I just get a bit bored, but also don't have the cash to build a deck for each strategy. Of course, I would expect it to be very difficult to have a deck be a blend of strategies without losing some strength or consistency. If it helps at all, I've been playing mostly budget izzet Drakes in standard, since it scratches that itch of feeling like control and midrange together, and lots of interaction. I suppose I usually lean towards midrange. I've also been considering trying dredge, as I had a bunch of dredge cards from Ravnica when I played as a kid and the mechanic always interested me. I'll check out the two lists you mentioned, I appreciate any pointers you might have.

Midrange is what lies in between pure aggro and pure control. The problem with midrange is that it tends to be expensive.

My understanding of Dredge is that it's a weird and cool deck the first 10 times you play it. Then you realize every game is the exact same and it gets boring. Put library into graveyard, put graveyard into play, turn things sideways.

The most interactive and successful deck in modern is the BGx variants - Jund and Rock (BG) are popular now, but Abzan was popular once upon a time and could be again. They also come with a $1500 price tag and don't work well on a budget.

Mardu Pyromancer, Grixis Death's Shadow, and Jund Death's Shadow are also highly interactive midrange decks. Grixis and Pyromancer are also much cheaper than the BGx decks.

Arclight Phoenix is really popular in modern right now and comes in a UR and a mono-R version. I think they're pretty similar to the standard version. If you want my personal opinion, they are a passing phase and will be nearly gone in 2 months, but I also don't know the deck very well. It could definitely stick around for longer. The good news about the Phoenix decks is that they can be built really well on a budget.

Luckily, there are a lot of decks that aren't in tier 1 / tier 2 that are great budget decks. And they tend to be aggressive but interactive.

Some kind of zoo deck could be a good fit. They play aggressive creatures but back them up with burn spells and Path to Exile to clear the board of creatures.

Budget UR Delver is also a popular deck for players getting into modern, but I think budget Phoenix is better right now.

Mono-W death and taxes is also a great budget deck. It's surprisingly interactive and actually pretty fun.

If you want to play interactive I think you have to play something with red, white, or black. That way you have Lightning Bolt, Path to Exile, or Fatal Push, which are the staple removal spells in modern.

If you want to play midrange I don't recommend green because Tarmogoyf is expensive and in every green deck.

Blue is also expensive because of Snapcaster Mage, but not every blue deck needs it.

I hope this long rambling helps at least a little. What's your target budget for building a modern deck? How competitive do you want to be?

Another thing I was worried about with Dredge, is basically "Oh, Leyline of the Void? Scoop." seeing as Dredge seems to be very popular now, and I would expect a lot of graveyard hate from sideboards. I get the impression that color wedges in modern tend to play similarly? As in if you're playing Bant youre very likely playing spirits, if you're playing Jund you're running Bloodbraid, Tarmogoyf, and Dark Confidants, etc etc (Ok I forgot about Jund Shadow clearly). But then again, this is just what I see from top 8 lists and the such so this might be un-representative of the actual meta outside of top 8? Many of the archetypes you've listed look pretty interesting, I suspect I will have a hard time deciding which way to go in. I looked at your Flame On list as well, very interesting. I think I'm going to start by watching some pro gameplay of Jund and Death's Shadow. Once I've built up some staples and experience I'd like to try brewing/tweaking something a little off-meta but still competitive, but for now I just want to learn. That said, I have a room mate with many important modern cards that is willing to let me borrow as many as I like (we rarely play non-EDH at the same time, and have the same sleeves), so for the time being once I decide what archetype or colors I want to play, I'll proxy the expensive cards for playtesting, and then borrow those cards when I play at the LGS, so my deck budget is highly flexible. I'd like to be pretty competitive, as even if I have good games going 0-4 gets frustrating, but most importantly I just want to play a deck I enjoy. I plan to play at modern FNMs so it definitely doesn't need to be top 8 GP/PTQ material unless I just happen to find top tier deck I love playing. Since I've been playing Drakes in standard, I do know that I would like to try something different, so phoenix is out for me. Your comments are very helpful, I'll be referring back to them over the coming days as I explore a bit more. I really appreciate it.

Seasoned Pyromancer seems like it could be a good new inclusion from MH1. +1 for Countersquall , I love that card!

Seasoned Pyromancer is definitely an upgrade for this deck. This deck probably also wants to find room for Force of Negation since you can tap out and still keep up countermagic.

Nonetheless, the graveyard decks are absurd in modern right now and I can't play this deck while people have Leyline of the Void in their main

Sadly that’s exactly why I can’t play my Esper deck anymore

I'm not surprised, but that's so sad. Your esper deck is what graveyard decks should look like in a healthy meta. It is in a 3-way tie for my favorite deck on this site. Except, now that TheAlexGnan is gone, I guess it's just a 2-way tie.

ToolmasterOfBrainerd ❤️

What will you do now with the ban of Faithless Looting ? You can replace it with Cathartic Reunion or with Thrill of Possibility .

Also, you will need less graveyard hate in the sideboard. And I think that great additions in the side can be Collective Brutality and Abrade , because of Burn and Whirza, that are popular decks right now.

Honestly I think the best thing to do is add more Collective Brutality and Jace, Vryn's Prodigy  ^Flip. Playing bad loot effects is definitely not the right way to adapt.

As sad as it is to lose this deck, it was completely unplayable because of the other graveyard decks, and modern is now in a better place without looting.

ToolmasterOfBrainerd just switch over to my esper list, you will love it