Now that Dominaria’s Prerelease is over, the brewing season has begun. Players are plugging in likely candidates, looking for the missing pieces in their decks. While there are plenty of interesting new cards in Dominaria, I’m still stuck on a reprint. I’ve been working on verifying my belief that Skirk Prospector is the real Modern standout. The […]
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I knew when I wrote Colorless Eldrazi Stompy Mini-Primer: Play Tips that I was leaving out plenty of juicy information. Not on purpose, of course; there’s just only so much I can fit in one article, or that comes to me at one time. It’s been recently pointed out to me by spectators that I […]
Ah yes, everyone’s favorite archetype, Bogles. A deck so frequently complained about that we can’t even agree on how to pronounce its name. Hate it or love it (I imagine many more exist on the hate-it side), it’s been around for a while and isn’t likely to go anywhere. The hexproof mechanic is certainly what […]
Modern decks may fade away or rotate, but they never really die. They linger on in the hearts of adherents and their competitive records. Every time a card that might make the old deck return to glory is printed, you can bet the resurrection machine will be rolled out again. This time it’s Goblins’s turn, […]
With each new set, new cards enter Modern, and it’s been the case for the past few years that new sets impact the format in some way. Dominaria is no different; the expansion contains a few cards sure to succeed in the format, as well as some enigmas and some clearly overrated cards. In this […]
Throughout Modern’s history, decks have risen and fallen in popularity. One of the most critical factors driving these shifts on the metagame ladder are changes to the card pool; a new set or a timely edit to the banned and restricted list can send a deck’s stock soaring or tumbling. However, not all of the […]
I fully intended to play in SCG Milwaukee last weekend. I’d been practicing and preparing for weeks, tuned my deck, and even made the travel arrangements. Then the two great powers of plan ruination, unexpected work and bad weather, derailed my plans. However, I’m not one to let all that work go to waste. Instead […]
The Modern community is ruthless in its dismissal of new decks. When one hits the scene (and one frequently does), pundits invariably point out instances of tension on paper: these cards can’t possibly work together, the sentiment goes. And yet, the deck placed high enough to draw that attention in the first place. Tension is […]
Hollow One has risen to become one of the most played decks in the format. Logan Nettles, Jaberwocki on both MTGO and Twitter, compiled data from the recent MOCS monthly event. He found that Hollow One had a metagame share of 12.7% in that event as well as a win rate of 61.60%—the highest in […]
The phrase “I know it when I see it” is rather cliché and typically unhelpful. It is also frequently true: there are phenomena that are easy to observe and record, but actually defining them is a struggle. For instance, physicists cannot agree on a Grand Unified Theory despite broad agreement on its components; philosophical debates […]
After seeing the leaked Dominaria spoilers for the first time, one of my first orders of business was to try out Mox Amber in Modern. I brainstormed a couple of possible shells before settling on something radically different from what David ended up choosing: a UBx midrange deck. In this article, we’ll take a look […]
As the metagame continues to settle after the unbans of Jace, the Mind Sculptor and Bloodbraid Elf, an interesting dichotomy has arisen: some players claim that the presence of these powerful four-drops has made the format faster and less interactive, while another sector espouses the opposite belief. I took it upon myself to find out […]
There is a reason that games have rules: without them, everything would just be Calvinball. Rules provide structure, cohesion, and comprehension. To mess with them is to risk your game flying apart. Magic is no different. Draw one card, play one land, each land produces one mana, use that mana to pay the cost of […]
