The Oath of the Gatewatch spoilers are upon us, and it seems like every other day Wizards reveals a Modern hopeful. Battle for Zendikar, Oath’s universally panned predecessor, is even making waves in the format as Bx Eldrazi Processors continues to pick up steam. New decks don’t always come from new cards, though. Modern’s vast card pool […]
Tech
Welcome to 2016! Or, should I say, welcome to the Year of the Eldrazi! Cthulhu’s brood has been assimilating the Modern masses for about a month now, starting with EternallyRamza’s inconspicuous showing in an MTGO League on November 30 and culminating in Matthew Dilks’ 10th place run at the recent StarCityGames Open in Cincinnati. Every online Modern […]
Hello Modern Nexus! I’m Peter Niemeier and I’m here to talk about the aggressive, red prison deck I designed and piloted to a 15th place finish in the StarCityGames Modern Classic event in Las Vegas on December 13th. I had never played Modern before and the first game of Round 1 during SCG Las Vegas […]
When I predicted Scapeshift would hit the Top 8 of Grand Prix Pittsburgh, I expected a traditional Temur shell built around the namesake finisher. Thien Nguyen skipped the countermagic and went right for the kill. Piloting an explosive, linear, and focused Scapeshift list, Nguyen blasted his way to a 7th place finish at the Grand Prix. Was […]
Two of the Dragons of Tarkir Commands need little introduction. Kolaghan’s singlehandedly put Grixis on the top-tier Modern map. Atarka’s has been buffing every Burn, Zoo, hybrid, and red-green aggro strategy since the spring. These cards have secured pedestals as format staples, capping off a block that gave us Swiftspears, fetchlands, black Goyfs, Bloodbraid Rhinos, and […]
Hello, loyal readers! Fear not, the clickbait garbage of Buzzfeed and Facebook has not spread to Modern Nexus. You will not find “How To Save $40,000 With One Simple Trick”, “Five Ways to Save Your Failing Marriage” or “Personal Trainers Hate Him” nonsense here. What you will find is grounded, common sense information backed up […]
What’s up guys! Welcome back to my Modern Nexus Video Series, where we take a deck in the format and run it through some matches on Magic Online. This week we have Grixis Control, my one true love, my pride and joy, my constant companion. Grixis Control is my favorite deck in Modern, and I’m […]
When I began paging through the results from StarCityGames’s State Championships, I didn’t expect much in the way of innovation. After all, Modern players are terrified of brewing, or at least of brewing diligently enough to perfect a recipe (Hoogland and Chapin are notable exceptions to this rule). So I was pleasantly surprised to find a host of novel […]
Hey guys! Welcome to Episode 5 of our Modern Nexus Video Series, where we pick a sweet list and run it through some matches on Magic Online. This week we have Luis Scott-Vargas’ Bringing Gifts deck, which he talked about a little while ago on the Mothership. This deck features the traditional Four-Color Gifts Ungiven […]
Hey guys! Welcome to Episode 4 of our Modern Nexus Video Series, where we pick a sweet list and run it through some matches on Magic Online. This week we have our very own Retreat to Coralhelm/Knight of the Reliquary combo deck; Knightfall! We talked about this list and gave a walkthrough and some strategy […]
Sometimes it’s worth remembering where you came from and seeking knowledge and tech from the past. The 2015 World Championship brought unexpected decks to the forefront with Living End and Bogles making waves almost out of nowhere. While those decks appear to have had their moment and then quietly vanished Yuuya Watanabe’s UW Control shell […]
Since Origins was spoiled I’ve been tuning iGrow, a Delver deck abusing Day’s Undoing to crush the midrange strategies that have historically oppressed my buggy buddy since Abrupt Decay’s printing. It worked, but at the cost of dedicating an entire sideboard to beating the aggressive decks that benefitted from my mainboard set of Undoings. With today’s […]
I have always loved the GBx archetype since it uses discard, removal, and efficient creatures to battle the entire format. Through tuning and experience nearly any matchup is winnable, a rarity in the rock-paper-scissors style of Modern. Within GBx, there are two popular variations that attack from different angles: Jund and Abzan. Abzan tends to […]
