Hello and welcome back to the State of Modern, our monthly rendez-vous with all things Modern, including big tournament reports, the decklists and prices for the archetypes that are currently the most successful in the meta, and an up-to-date ban list. If you never tried your hand at Modern, this is the right place to know everything you need to know in order to begin; and if you're already into it, it can still be a good way to make sure you know everything that's happening in the format.
The series archive is here.
Let's start a new ride!
THE BIG EVENTS
Here's the latest Modern events with at least 200 players, ordered chronologically. Find the archetypes below. It's a Hogaak-less world!
September 8:Team Modern at MagicFest Indianapolis Players: 990 Winner: Kevin Brown with Burn, Joseph Karani with Stoneblade, Mohamad Qadi with Whirza Top 4: Burn/Stoneblade/Whirza, Burn/Stoneblade/Humans, Death's Shadow/Eldrazi Aggro/Jund, UrzaTron/Whirza/Whirza
Pictured: Brown on the left, Karani at the center, Qadi on the right.
September 8:Mythic Championship Qualifier at Bologna (Italy) Players: 220 Winner: Stefano Vinci with Humans Top 8: Humans, Hardened Modular, Humans, Valakut, Burn, Death's Shadow, Jund, Whirza
September 9:MTGO Modern PTQ Players: 411 Winner: Volollo with Death's Shadow Top 8: Death's Shadow, Stoneblade, EldraTron, Whirza, Burn, Creatures Toolbox, Whirza, UrzaTron
September 13:Mythic Championship Qualifier at MagicFest Ghent Players: 318 Winner: Lev Ducenko with Humans Top 8: Humans, Death's Shadow, Burn, Stoneblade, Amulet Titan, EldraTron, Infect, UrzaTron
September 15:Mythic Championship Qualifier at MagicFest Ghent Players: 404 Winner: Jan Stadler with Dredge Top 8: Dredge, Death's Shadow, EldraTron, Whirza, Bant Soulherder, Monored Flame, Valakut, UW Control
September 15:Team Modern at MagicFest Ghent (Belgium) Players: 1440 Winner: Esther Trujillo with Jund, Joel Calafell with Whirza, Ruben Perez with Whirza Top 4: Jund/Whirza/Whirza, Dredge/Stoneblade/Whirza, UrzaTron/UrzaTron/Whirza, Burn/Death's Shadow/Stoneblade
Pictured: Perez on the left, Trujillo at the center, Calafell on the right.
September 15:StarCityGames Modern Classic: Syracuse Players: 243 Winner: Anderson LeClair with UrzaTron Top 8: UrzaTron, Death's Shadow, Amulet Titan, Creatures Toolbox, Amulet Titan, Whirza, UrzaTron, Valakut
September 16:MTGO Modern PTQ Players: 402 Winner: asnook with Jund Top 8: Jund, Whirza, Creatures Toolbox, Dredge, EldraTron, Stoneblade, Whirza, Stoneblade
Update: So, how does the Modern meta look like in a post-Hogaak world? As varied as ever, I'd say, but with considerably less Dredge at the top. The new buzzword has to be "Urza", a name that recurs many times within the lists of the most successful archetypes, be it through his Tron lands, or as the great artificer himself.
With the departure of Hogaak, Arisen Necropolis, indeed, it's time for Urza, Lord High Artificer to take up the mantle of most impactful card from Modern Horizons. But of course we're also starting to see the consequences of Stoneforge Mystic being now free to roam the meta for the first time.
It's perhaps too early to tell if the September scenario is in any way indicative of the form the meta will assume going forward, but we've had 16 major tournaments since that pivotal August 26 announcement, and those provide a good chunk of high-profile data throughout their 136 Top-8 placements. It's therefore worth compiling them and have a look at the numbers, even just to see for how long they'll hold. Keeping in mind that two of those tournaments (the main event, or "Grand Prix", at MagicFest Indianapolis and MagicFest Ghent) were three-man team competitions, here's where we land right now.
FIRST PLACES
Whirza: 6 (3 in team)
Burn: 3 (1 in team)
Jund: 3 (1 in team)
Humans: 2
Valakut: 2
Death's Shadow: 1
Dredge: 1
Stoneblade: 1 in team
Tron: 1
TOP 8 PLACEMENTS
Whirza: 25 (7 in team)
Tron: 20 (3 in team)
Burn: 19 (3 in team)
Stoneblade: 15 (4 in team)
Death's Shadow: 10 (2 in team)
Valakut: 7
Dredge: 6 (1 in team)
Jund: 6 (2 in team)
Creatures Toolbox: 4
Humans: 4 (1 in team)
Amulet Titan: 3
UW Control: 3
Eldrazi Aggro: 2 (1 in team)
Hardened Modular: 2
RDW: 2
Spirit Aggro: 2
Bant Soulherder: 1
Infect: 1
Merfolk: 1
Naya Zoo: 1
Niv-Mizzet Reborn: 1
Rakdos Midrange: 1
Whirza is the name that more widely established itself for all the decks with Urza, Lord High Artificer, which also usually run Whir of Invention. I had called them "Urza Foundry" so far (since a lot of reports referred to them as just "Urza", which was both dull and confusing), because their most common endgame is the infinite combo between Thopter Foundry and Sword of the Meek, which has caused some of these lists to start running Stoneforge Mystic) as well, to have more consistent access to the Sword. They are sometimes called "Whir Prison" when they incorporate Karn, the Great Creator fetching Mycosynth Lattice from the graveyard to shut down the opponent. Here's as an example the list with which Sean Belisle won the PTQ at MagicFest Atlanta. You can appreciate how these are stealthily five-color decks, since they run red sources for Goblin Engineer, Galvanic Blast and Pyrite Spellbomb, black sources for the Foundry and the activation of Nihil Spellbomb, and even green sources for Assassin's Trophy and Tireless Tracker off the sideboard (which also contains more black cards). White is actually only present on the Foundry, and not strictly needed.
Tron decks never stopped thriving in Modern, and mostly come in classic monogreen form, but EldraTron still makes the occasional appearance.
Burn is the dominant force in the meta by overall impact, amounting to at least 11% of the Top-8 lists, if we include all of the recorded events, not just the major ones. Burn is increasingly hard to tell apart from RDW – my rule of thumb is, if it just features Goblin Guide and Monastery Swiftspear as creatures that are meant to connect (as opposed to Eidolon of the Great Revel and Grim Lavamancer, which are merely burn enhancers), then it's Burn. But we also get new related designs like this Monored Flame list, trying to go all-in during a big turn that coincides with the third chapter of The Flame of Keld.
This Rakdos build could also be considered a member of the RDW family, even if it takes it into the midrange area by sort of cross-pollinating with The Rock's disruption elements – except the resident "The Rock" here is the very goddess of whacking, Hazoret the Fervent.
Stoneblade is a collective moniker for all the builds that coalesced around the advent of Stoneforge Mystic into Modern, minus those that follow a more focused artifact route with Urza and Whir of Invention. They Stoneblade lists are more commonly Azorius or Jeskai. They're sometimes called "Geistblade" because Geist of Saint Traft is often the designated blade carrier.
Among the archetypes that seem to endure the meta changes and clinging to their positions: Death's Shadow, Valakut, Jund. Humans keeps declining, while the once influential UW Control has almost disappeared, suggesting that the UW Control players might have just flocked to join the Urza bandwagon. In spite of everything, Dredge is still somewhat around and winning events, which goes to show the dogged determination of its aficionados (although it must feel sad to be such a devoted Dredge player these days). Here's what a current Dredge list looks like.
In this time of meta turmoil, a few peculiar brews are showing up in unexpected places (that Niv-Mizzet Reborn list that Top-8-ed MCQ Atlanta needs to be properly investigated). One that seems destined to carve out its own niche is Bant Soulherder, which revolves around the namesake creature from Modern Horizons. Once again, I'll let LegenVD explain and demonstrate it to you in this video. It's a pretty rad deck.
