With the addition of new Shadows over Innistrad staples, Dredge is making waves in Modern. Sheridan advises how to invest intelligently in the new powerhouse.

Wizards loves touting Modern as “wide-open,” a claim bolstered by the format’s incredibly diverse pool of viable decks. With so many options available to them, deckbuilders are bound to ask broader questions about archetype superiority. Is Allies just a worse Merfolk? Goblins, a worse Zoo? Bubble Hulk, a worse Grishoalbrand? Whatever the answers to these questions, someone will play those […]

Sometimes, innovation takes time. Endless nights of preparation, countless hours of practice, hundreds of games contributing to spreadsheets of statistics that inform close, calculated changes. In Magic (and Modern especially), this is the most common form of innovation we see. Death’s Shadow Zoo lists tend to fall in one of two camps, but within those […]

Few would disagree that the banned list in Modern is a net benefit to the format, facilitating its legendary diversity and ensuring games remain more or less interactive. There is, however, a certain curiosity that’s hard to shake off—just what would our beloved format look like completely freed from all its shackles? No-banned-list Modern tournaments […]

Ah, the first PPTQ of the season. When hope springs anew, the Colorado metagame is still in its default, Burn-heavy state, and everyone thinks that their preparation was absolutely flawless and that this one is theirs for the taking. Then I usually bomb out of the Top 8, everything goes into wildly overblown flux when some […]

Today’s deck can perhaps most accurately be described as a motley pile of stuff. If you were paying attention last week, you may have seen this bizarre little deck pop up in the Top 8 of the Star City Games Columbus Classic in the hands of Jack Rumpf. Michael Kinney certainly took notice—he decided to run a list […]

I remember scrolling through Eldritch Moon spoilers and passing over Bedlam Reveler, the last card I hadn’t read that day. The image was in Portuguese, and my hopes were low. “A 3/4 for 8,” I actually thought to myself. “There’s no way I could ever have a use for this card.” But I read it anyway, and […]

13 months ago I wrote my second-ever article for Modern Nexus, focused entirely on a then-rogue strategy called “Suicide Zoo,” or Death’s Shadow Zoo.  (I also did a Video Tech, which you can watch here!) Championed strongly by Frank Karsten and Fabrizio Anteri, the deck put up splashy results in Magic Online Dailies (yes, those forgotten things) […]

It’s finally here, folks! I know everyone has been waiting patiently for the June metagame report, and I’m extremely happy to bring it to you today. I’ve undergone something of a crash course over these last few weeks familiarizing myself with Sheridan’s methods (and mammoth Google Docs spreadsheet) that allow us to operationalize the tiers in […]

Good news, everyone! Modern PPTQ season starts this week, and we have metagame data to work with! Jason has promised that the June update will happen tomorrow, but for today lets examine the first results from our new post-Eldritch Moon metagame. Frankly, I don’t expect much to have changed, mostly because it was the release weekend […]

This week’s Deck of the Week hails from the SCG Classic in Worcester from two weeks ago. Eli Kassis is a name some of you might recognize as one of the principle deckbuilders who has worked to put Retreat to Coralhelm combo on the map. He helped Bant Knightfall break out to much fanfare at the Invitational in […]

In my early experiments with delirium, I found Tarfire invaluable as a card that efficiently stocked the graveyard with card types. Its especially Modern-relevant effect soon made the card an obvious include in most of my Traverse the Ulvenwald brews. Another card I tried, Architects of Will, also guaranteed two types in the graveyard for a one-mana investment. But […]

With Modern PPTQ season on the horizon, players round the world are turning their attention to our beloved format. Standard fanboys and Limited snobs alike will force themselves into our happy place, challenging our dominance and superior format knowledge as they attempt to wrest Regional PTQ invites from our deserving arms. In their ignorance, they […]