Some cards whose price had raised too much in the last two years have been reprinted as well. In this category we find Fulminator Mage, Noble Hierarch, Spellskite, Remand, Splinter Twin and Daybreak Coronet. In the case of the later two, these cards have appeared in the collection without the combo cards that make them work in Modern (Deceiver Exarch for Twin, and any other aura for Coronet). Kiki-Jiki+Pestermite was a combo that was very present in the first Modern Masters format, and probably they wanted to avoid it; however, not making room to cards like Rancor and some totem armors and/or hybrid mana auras from Shadowmoor/Eventide to make Daybreak Coronnet playable in the format is a clear mistake. The conclusion is clear: if you get a money rare, don't expect to win Limited games with it.
Finally, there are the missing cards from this set. There are many cards that were printed in the first Modern Masters edition that didn't appear in this new edition, like Blood Moon, Engineered Explosives and Vedalken Shackles. In order to make room to new additions, specially if they're rare cards, you need to cut older cards, so there's little to complain about it. However, after two editions there are some cards that haven't been printed yet. The most flagrant case is Serum Visions. With the scry ability being present in Theros, we all thought (or hoped) that the card would be reprinted in that block; we didn't only get the original one, but nothing remotely similar. Now it hasn't been reprinted in Modern Masters again, and its price is skyrocketing.
Once the understanding of the game has improved, Wizards have realized the best decks are both consistent and versatile, something you can only achieve with the control of what you draw via cantrips. Modern is a format in which you can't have it all and you are forced to make a choice: the consistent deck that has a very streamlined plan but can be easily hated, or the versatile deck that has reactive cards that can be useful in a large amount of match-ups, but will still have some unwinnable pairings and, since there aren't completely versatile answers against the full metagame, can still draw the wrong ones against a given opponent.
Other effects that Wizards seem to dislike are stealing creatures (not only Shackles disappear, but Sower of Temptation and Threads of Disloyalty haven't been reprinted), preventing players from searching their libraries (Shadow of Doubt and Aven Mindcensor haven't made the cut twice, while Leonin Arbiter could have been reprinted this year but it wasn't as well) and cheating fatties into play (Goryo's Vengeance and Through the Breach). Inquisition of Kozilek hasn't been printed too, but it appeared in the Modern event deck a year ago.
Overall, the selection of cards in Modern Masters 2015 is pretty good, and if we only look at money cards even better than in the previous Modern Masters edition (something we should already expect from the price increase). The price of some of the reprinted cards is already falling down, so May is a good month to start building or completing your Modern pool, before there is the rebound effect that we observed with the original Modern Masters edition.
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Spells that kill creatures are already very efficient in Modern, but broad efficient answers are scarce, other than Thoughtseize (and Inquisition of Kozilek). However, for every deck out there, we could list a handful of very powerful hate cards that completely destroy it... but then are close to useless against the rest of the field. So either we get broad efficient answers, or better ways to find the narrow ones. Perhaps Enlightened Tutor (or a worse version that forces you to discard card as additional cost, 2x1 against you) would solve more things in Modern than Counterspell.
Possible solutions:
1. Print good answers in Standard, where Mana Leak is de facto banned because it's too strong. We'd have to ask design team to look for alternative costs easy to pay in Modern but not in Standard (delve anyone?) that don't lead to the reprint of Ancestral Recall at common frequency this time.
2. Look banlist to strong answer cards being banned. Mental Misstep? It warped Legacy because it was abused by blue decks in a format which is already unbalanced towards blue. It also made the format slower, which wouldn't be bad news in Modern. Problem is the same way it counters unfair cards (Stirrings, Looting, Amulet, Vial), it hits the most efficient answers in the format (discard, removal, itself). I guess this is even more unlikely to happen, but I always like to bring it up.
3. Make reactive decks that slow down the format stronger. Unbanning Twin could help that. Then I'd start building my deck with 4 of Deceiver Exarch, Splinter Twin, Snapcaster Mage, Lightning Bolt, Serum Visions, Remand, Scalding Tarn... and I'd have half the deck done before deciding its game-plan. Twin kills deckbuilding creativity. I don't know about the impact Stoneforge Mystic could have.
4. Try to circumvent 1. with some Modern specific products. Declare Commander sets legal in Modern, print paper only sets that aren't launched in Arena or something along those lines.
As for Jace, it depends on the build of Faeries we're aiming to build. In this more tempo deck, he can give you some value by bouncing any of your own creatures, or playing the occasional Brainstorm, but I doubt you'd ever use his ultimate (unless somehow your opponent had gained infinite life and hadn't been able to deal infinite damage to you), or his +2 more than once in a single game. There is the dream of playing a Mistbind Clique the turn after playing Jace, and gain 5 extra turns using the -1, but thinking of that scenario is kitchen table deckbuilding; specially, when it's hard to fit more than 2 Jaces in such a deck.
However, I don't know if you could take this original Yuuta's list, replace Ancestral Vision for Jace and call it a deck. In that case, the minimum number of Jaces you'd need would be 3, and probably 4 would be better.
As for the challenges...
2: I understand some people might be uncomfortable playing Liliana at this spot when they're holding a hand with so many blue cards, but if you have her in your decklist, I can't think of a better time to play her than this scenario. Additionally, Liliana is the closest thing you have to discard to secure the risky play of Mistbind Clique with just a Mutavault to champion against a deck with Fatal Push. Casting turn 5 Mistbind Clique into turn 6 ultimate isn't aiming for the long game, but for establishing a board position from which the Tron player should never be able to recover. What you shouldn't do is playing Creeping Tar Pit pass, holding mana up to Mana Leak an Ancient Stirrings/Sylvan Scrying/Expedition Map/Oblivion Stone; this play does not advance your game plan at all, and you can't chicken out of a Fatal Push. Might consider it if you have Bitterblossom into play (hence the reason why so many people complain they can only win if they resolve an early Bitterblossom).
Challenge 1:
You're at 2 life against a Burn opponent, who's finally run out of cards. It's your main phase turn 5 and you only have Creeping Tar Pit, Island and Darkslick Shores into play, and 2 Vendilion Clique, Spellstutter Sprite, Fatal Push, Bitterblossom and Mistbind Clique in hand. He's dealt 6 damage himself through the game. Choose your play. Is it still possible to win?
Challenge 2:
Now against Tron, it's turn 3 and you feel safe on the play after playing Spreading Seas on your opponent's first Tron land and then him playing Blooming Marsh. He also has a Expedition Map into play. You have Creeping Tar Pit, Polluted Delta, Island, Liliana of the Veil, Mana Leak, Cryptic Command and Mistbind Clique in hand and Mutavault and Darkslick Shores into play. How do you sequence your next turns? I think this one needs no clues.
3 Vendilion Clique
3 Mistbind Clique
2 Snapcaster Mage
3 Opt
4 Fatal Push
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
2 Thoughtseize
2 Remand
3 Mana Leak
2 Cryptic Command
2 Liliana of the Veil
4 Polluted Delta
4 Darkslick Shores
4 Mutavault
3 Creeping Tar Pit
1 Secluded Glen
1 Field of Ruin
2 Watery Grave
3 Island
1 Swamp
3 Spreading Seas
2 Engineered Explosives
2 Collective Brutality
1 Surgical Extraction
1 Countersquall
1 Disdainful Stroke
1 Spell Snare
1 Ceremonious Rejection
1 Liliana, the Last Hope
1 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
1 Batterskull
I took it to a tournament this weekend and went 6-0: 2-1 against 8Rack, 2-1 against Titanshift (with Through the Breach), 2-0 against Burn, 2-0 against Titanshift, 2-1 against BG Tron and 2-1 against Titanshift again: a very varied metagame.
About the low number of lands, I was mana screwed in just two games (not counting the ones against 8Rack), and still managed to win one of them against Burn, so eventually I lost as many games to misplays than to extreme bad luck. On the sideboard, Spreading Seas turned out to be better than expected. I'm also happy I could set up the combination of Liliana of the Veil into Mistbind Clique, which I never had, despite knowing these two cards pair with each other pretty well for years.
About how to play the deck, just get the habit of counting how many turns can it take you to win the game, how many turns can it take for your opponent to do so, and play accordingly.
However, my idea is that decks that try to not let your opponent play normally are a better home for Jace to shine than good stuff decks, where it could be just a clunky card that you need to board out in half the match-ups you play, and I believe it still applies even if the Bridge example is still unexplored or turns out to not be good enough.
I haven't tried the new Jace to evaluate it, and even the experience with my decklist is pretty limited. Liliana, the Last Hope has the advantage of being not only good in those match-ups in which (almost) any planeswalker is good, but also against small creature decks. Against fair slow decks, not only her ultimate gives you the inevitability, but her -2 is very useful with so many creatures with good etb triggers. I see that against combo decks, at some point you can play Jace, get a body and then start cycling bad cards, while Liliana will be completely useless; but game 2, you should probably be boarding any of them out anyway.
4 Snapcaster Mage
1 Tasigur, the Golden Fang
4 Bitterblossom
3 Liliana of the Veil
2 Liliana, the Last Hope
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Thoughtseize
4 Fatal Push
1 Hero's Downfall
3 Mana Leak
3 Cryptic Command
2 Perilous Research
4 Darkslick Shores
4 Mutavault
4 Polluted Delta
2 Watery Grave
4 Island
2 Swamp
1 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
2 Engineered Explosives
2 Nihil Spellbomb
3 Collective Brutality
1 Disfigure
2 Ceremonious Rejection
2 Disdainful Stroke
2 Tectonic Edge
I wanted to take advantage of the new planeswalker rule to play both Lilianas in the main. Planeswalkers force you to play a more tap-out game, so discard becomes better than counterspells. I also wanted to try Perilous Research, which has many synergies with some cards in our deck, since we have tons of fodder to its sacrifice effect: chumpblockers, planeswalkers that are being attacked, Bitterblossom that's going to kill us, or creatures you want to get back in hand with Liliana, the Last Hope. However, all these scenarios are very situational and more often than not you'll be holding it with no use; that's what happens to cards you don't want to play more than one copy. I don't know if the right replacement would be a 25th land or an extra cantrip. The manabase is also wrong; if the idea of playing with enough basics to have the (remote) possibility of casting all the spells in your deck under a Blood Moon still makes sense to you, then you should cut a Creeping Tar Pit for an extra fetchland. If not, I'd cut 2 basic lands for dual sources.
On the other hand, I'm happy with the changes I made to the sideboard. Probably it's still not perfect, but it looks better than the one I had been playing before.
The PPTQ didn't go particularly well. I started 0-2, taking some bad mulligan decisions, but kept playing just for fun to win 4 rounds in a row.
I've always felt Mistbind Clique was the most reliable win condition of Faeries, so the only choice was whether you wanted to play it sure with Ancestral Vision, or wanted to grind your opponent and play it earlier with discard. However, now that Fatal Push is replacing Lightning Bolt in the format, and that all green midrange decks play Collected Company, Mistbind Clique looks worse than ever. Without it, the Faerie core is now reduced to just Bitterblossom, Spellstutter Sprite and Mutavault.
The two proposed solutions are either committing to the long game (Takahashi list), or adding this core to Grixis decks (Mackl list). I find this second solution quite smart, since you double your threats with Bitterblossom and make your deck less dependent on its graveyard than traditional Grixis Control and less vulnerable to Fatal Push than Death's Shadow decks.
I have started playing the Takahashi list. There are some details that I didn't like when I first saw it, like 4 Snapcaster Mages with just 15 cards you can give flashback in the maindeck, no room for massive removal in the board (even if Damnation's role is mostly filled by Liliana and Collective Brutality from the board, Engineered Explosives might still be necessary), having no life gain in the maindeck (without any way of getting rid of Bitterblossom and playing the long game), or playing 15 bad maindeck cards against Eldrazi Tron and only having 8 cards in the board you can bring in.
Probably I should look for those Huynh decklists I've despised all this time for not playing Mistbind Clique as well.