UW Cycling

Modern Casual Control Cycling Exile Flying Theme/Gimmick Tokens Value Engine WU (Azorius)

ShieldOfHolyShadows

Land (23)

• 4x Flooded Strand
• 4x Glacial Fortress
• 8x Island
• 3x Plains
• 4x Seachrome Coast

Sorcery (3)

• 1x Approach of the Second Sun
• 2x Boon of the Wish-Giver

Creature (10)

• 2x Containment Priest
• 4x Curator of Mysteries
• 4x Wall of Omens

Instant (11)

• 4x Hieroglyphic Illumination
• 4x Neutralize
• 3x Renewed Faith

Enchantment (11)

• 3x Astral Drift
• 4x Cast Out
• 4x Drake Haven

Artifact (2)

• 2x Abandoned Sarcophagus

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Maybeboard

Instant (4)

• 1x Censor
• 1x Countervailing Winds
• 1x Forsake the Worldly
• 1x Silence

Sorcery (1)

• 1x Decree of Justice

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I've always loved drawing cards, so the fact there's a mechanic devoted to cantriping with upside is basically my dream.

Note: No sideboard because I exclusively play casual kitchen table magic. Maybe I'll add a real sideboard someday.

Synergies:

• Abandoned Sarcophagus + Astral Drift + Drake Haven --- This is a Cycling deck and these are the backbone. Astral Drift is used mainly defensively to block opponent strategies and attacking creatures while also bouncing any problem defenders. Drake Haven makes chump blockers and essentially serves as an endless supply of cards that read "2 cmc, 2/2 flying, Draw a card" and is the deck's wincon. Abandoned Sarcophagus effectively lets you draw your entire graveyard and gives you no maximum hand size.
• Astral Drift + Containment Priest --- Fun way to exile your opponent's creatures permanently. The more copies of Astral Drift you have on the battlefield, the better this is.

Cards I will never cut/Cards that are core:

• Astral Drift --- Super solid card but I'm pretty sure three copies is the right call. 3 mana cycling is awful when compared to the 1 mana options and it offers utility more than it wins the game itself. Worth noting: if you have the board stabilized, it's typically best to cycle it for the extra card and then replay it with Abandoned Sarcophagus.
• Drake Haven --- I know running four copies is a bit non-traditional but in a deck with so few ways to actually kill the opponent, I need as many copies as possible just for redundancy if a deck is actually running interaction.
• Abandoned Sarcophagus --- A card you need to see basically every game but don't want more than one at a time. With this much card draw, two copies is a safe number.
• Containment Priest --- I can't believe they reprinted this into a Standard format. Board wipes are powerful and this effect is amazing synergy, but I haven't had enough opportunities to really test it. This is where NOT running the normal suite of ETB cards with Astral Drift really pays off so I don't wipe my own creatures. Also functions as an answer to decks that are trying to cheat cards out, like Quicksilver Amulet or certain graveyard decks.

Cards I will probably never cut/are universally useful:

• Cast Out --- Instant speed targeted exile that cycles for 1.
• Flooded Strand --- Mana fixing and deck thinning. Used to be run with Countervailing Winds, but is slightly less valuable now.
• Neutralize --- Hard counter that can be recurred. If Drift or Drake Haven won't stop a card, this card usually will. Generally an upgrade over Countervailing Winds.
• Hieroglyphic Illumination --- One mana cycling is good. Instant speed draw two is good. Also the only card that increases your cards in hand.
• Glacial Fortress --- Checklands are just so nice, usually giving both colors starting from turn 2+.
• Curator of Mysteries --- This is such a solid card that is awkward to cast. 4 mana for a flying 4/4 that will scry multiple times per turn is great, but spending 4 mana upfront in a deck that acts almost exclusively at instant speed is very painful. On the other hand, including a flying 4/4 is a secondary wincon if the Drake havens are destroyed.

Cards under evaluation/have underperformed the past/are situationally useful

• Renewed Faith --- 2 mana cycling is a lot worse than 1 mana cycling. However, this is one of the few cards in the deck that can stop aggro and casting it later with Sarcophagus is a lot of total life from a single card.
• Seachrome Coast --- Mana fixing early when you need it and only enters tapped once you already have mana. Not a Plains / Island but guarantees you can start digging with cycling the first couple of turns.
• Secluded Steppe --- I recently threw these in when I saw that running 21 lands was very feast-or-famine and every once in a while I got completely starved out of white mana. They're usually cycled away, but they're there as insurance. If I don't have enough white to cycle them out, then I obviously need some extra white mana in play.
• Approach of the Second Sun --- Fun little card, especially with so much card draw. Biggest problem is obviously the 7 CMC, which doesn't leave open enough for a counterspell to protect it a lot of the time. Ideally, it's better to just beat your opponent in the face with more drakes. Unfortunately awkward against both aggro (too expensive) and control (only enough room for one copy), but it's nice to have a little bit of extra inevitability just in case.

Cards that are interesting/strong but I don't necessarily plan on adding:

• Elixir of Immortality --- The deck PROBABLY doesn't need this, but I've playtested against some really control-heavy decks where decking out is a real possibility. Advantage of using Elixir over similar effects are that 1) afaik it's the cheapest CMC for its effect, 2) restores some life to help buffer against aggro, 3) shuffles itself with only one copy in the deck, and 4) technically activates at instant speed. The biggest drawbacks are that it's also the effect most vulnerable to removal and you REALLY don't want to shuffle your graveyard back into your library unless the only other option is losing the game.
• Irrigated Farmland --- There's not a lot of situations where I would spend two mana to cycle away a dual land. If I'm playing a dual land, I'd rather take one that can enter untapped. Mana flood CAN happen which is the only thing keeping me considering this, but IMO setting up early is more important than slow fuel late game.
• Flourishing Fox --- The awkward thing about Flourishing Fox is that it wants to be played immediately instead of being cycled, but then you start to run lower on cards in hand than you'd expect. Cycling first and bringing them back with Abandoned Sarcophagus is probably the play, but then they don't scale nearly as high or as quickly.
• Censor --- This effect is so much worse than the other non-cycling versions of the counterspells, but it just fits well into the deck. In my experience, this card is better against high-quality aggro decks than the average kitchen table deck, but it only gets used once on exactly turn 2-3 and then never again.
• Search for Azcanta   --- Putting things in the graveyard with Abandoned Sarcophagus in play is actually anti-synergy and honestly the deck already has enough card draw.
• Teferi, Hero of Dominaria --- Just slightly too slow, I don't like planeswalkers, and I have no space.

Date added	5 years
Last updated	2 years
Key combos	Abandoned Sarcophagus + Astral Drift + Drake Haven Astral Drift + Containment Priest
Legality	This deck is Modern legal.
Rarity (main - side)	28 - 0 Rares 14 - 0 Uncommons 7 - 0 Commons
Cards	60
Avg. CMC	2.38
Tokens	Drake 2/2 U