It’s time, once again, for a return to The Beginner’s Guide to Modern. This my long-running but periodic series where I cover the fundamentals of Modern for those new to the format. Though, as happens with a series that’s four years old at this point, I’ve already covered all the fundamentals and obvious misconceptions long […]
sideboarding
The earth is round, the pope is catholic, and Destructive Revelry belongs in the sideboard of every Modern Burn deck. While the first and the second principle might be unbreakable, I’d like to smash the third one to smithereens. In this article I’ll explain why I think Destructive Revelry is overrated in Burn, and lay out […]
“Control is dead” has long been a mantra of those unsatisfied with Modern. But UWx control decks have had impressive showings lately on the competitive circuit—just last weekend, both Jeskai Control and UW Control made Top 8 at GP Prague and SCG Baltimore, respectively. Thanks to Search for Azcanta and Teferi, Hero of Dominaria, it’s […]
Standard is nearing rotation but that doesn’t mean we’re lacking for action. Eddie covers the cards to hold and fold this week, including key foils, promos, and Pauper staples.
Mardu Pyromancer and Ironworks are wildly successful Modern decks right now, and for good reason: the former attacks from multiple angles while making excellent use of the format’s premier abusable resource, the graveyard; the latter is an artifact-based combo deck that’s at once tricky to disrupt and unintuitive to play against for most opponents. So […]
Happy (almost) Independence Day America! For Fireworks Day Eve, I have been inspired to go back to the Beginner’s Guide. Recent spoiler discussions and in-game observations made me realize that I have a lot more Modern basics to cover. I’ve danced around this a few times, but never actually discussed building a Modern sideboard. I’m […]
Dominaria has many solid Modern candidates (and some questionable ones) but none have generated quite as much buzz as Damping Sphere. The hysteria may have died down, but many players are still high on the card. Given the context of the card, this is hardly surprising. However, I am not convinced. There are a number […]
Nothing is harder to see than the obvious. This is the problem of teaching Magic to new players. Whether you humiliatingly miss an on-board win, or your “missing” keys are on the table right in front of you, it happens to everyone. It can even apply to knowledge. It is easy to forget how daunting […]
If you’ve been playing Modern over the last few months, you may have noticed an interesting trend in the metagame results: no one deck is top dog. While a familiar cast of characters inhabits the top of the charts, it seems as if any one of them can do well in a given tournament, all […]
Hello, everyone. My name is Andrew Dang. I placed 67th in Grand Prix Las Vegas playing an Affinity build of my own design with Bomat Courier. I began experimenting with Courier soon after the release of Kaladesh, and initial results led me to believe the card had promise. After nine months of testing and honing […]
Sideboarding is without a doubt one of the most essential and difficult-to-master skills in Magic: The Gathering. In tournament Magic, you play more sideboard games than pre-sideboard games by a wide margin, and the difference between sideboarding well and sideboarding poorly will frequently be a deciding factor in your eventual match result. In a format as wide […]
When you talk to players about their Modern decks, most of them can tell you why they like their deck. Perhaps the play patterns fit their style or they have good things to say about the deck’s relative power level. This is good information to have—but identifying a deck’s weaknesses is more important when it […]
When you first get into Magic, you’ll undoubtedly have a lot of questions to ask. As you traverse your way through your early Limited and Constructed endeavors, you’ll only find the number of questions increasing for a time. Magic is a very difficult game, after all. Eventually though, if you want to see competitive success, […]
