MTG Salvation

What if wizards printed a legacy-only set with duals that were strictly worse but by very little, like "when this land enters the battlefield, if you control 7 or more lands, you lose 1 life"?

That would be the ultimate loophole around the reserved list. Other than that there are plenty of legacy staples that could be reprinted that aren't on the reserved list, like FoW.

But that's just wishful thinking. Wizards would rather just let legacy die in lieu of standard and modern. Modern is fun but I hate standard.

Thinking of building High Tide as my first legacy deck. Are candelabras and fetches the only major investment into the deck? My LGS allows 8 proxies.

Every deck has its ups and downs, but which modern decks are generally considered to have a decent shot at winning any given matchup?

Have straight UR all-in lists been doing well lately? I am thinking of building one because I can't really afford Snapcaster Mages, and according to the primer, the deck can perform decent without it given that it is not on the tempo route.

Quote from Oopssorryy »

For me it was the printing of eidolon of the great revel. If burn ever falls out of the top tier, storm will have a much better chance at a resurgence. Luckily Wizards is printing a lot of red looting effects, so maybe one day we will be able to really break them.

Forgive me for not knowing, but how exactly do red looting effects help against the burn matchup?

Quote from Oopssorryy »

Quote from JackyDawg »

So I am thinking of building Storm as my first modern deck, as I always loved the idea of it as well as the challenging play. But before I pull the trigger on it is there any match-ups that are just absolutely terrible for storm other than burn? There are a few burn players at my local game stores, more than average combo players (Living end, Ad Naus, and Bloom Titan mainly), and well rounded for the rest.

Right now there are quite a few bad match ups. I would call most BGx build a bad match up due to discard, Abrupt Decay targeting our engines, and fast pressure. It's pretty much the same story with Grixis Control, but swapping out the AD for counter magic. I love storm, but it's more of a fun deck than a super competitive one, at least that is how I see it.

That's what I find disappointing. I heard storm was quite a strong deck back before pod and cruise were banned.

Honestly, I just want a fun combo deck. I am totally sick of playing mono-red aggro in standard. Booooooring . I am also testing out some Ad Naus and Bloom Titan lists, but I will have to scout my local meta more and playtest more before I can make a decision.

Cockatrice: TheDawg

Looking for friendly people to test and practice with.

So I am thinking of building Storm as my first modern deck, as I always loved the idea of it as well as the challenging play. But before I pull the trigger on it is there any match-ups that are just absolutely terrible for storm other than burn? There are a few burn players at my local game stores, more than average combo players (Living end, Ad Naus, and Bloom Titan mainly), and well rounded for the rest.

Quote from Ayiluss »

You could try Infect. It's combo deck that trier to win through infect mechanic. It's linear deck so I'm not sure you would like that given you don't like burn but if you like combo and challenging decks this might be a deck for you.

To be honest infect was what I was leaning toward at the start, primarily due to the initial budget factor of it. How much does infect rely on fetches to be effective? Is it just an obvious upgrade for fatter wallets or is it like having Snapcasters in Delver?

Cards I own: 2x Breeding Pool, 4x Serum Visions, 1x Emrakul. Willing to use these as trade fodder if need be.

Styles I like: combo mostly, but control is also fun. I like decks that are fun and challenging to play (No burn, too monotonous for me)

I will be playing mostly with friends, but I want to try to go to FNM's as much as possible.

It would be great if I could build a budgetized version of the deck (<$150) to start out and still be relatively solid, and then upgrade it over time.

Guess you are probably right. I should focus more on the combo rather than tokens if I am playing 3 colors.
And on the matter of Polymorph, I am testing out a UG version of it in Cockatrice too. Not sure if I will go Esper or Simic yet.


(The only reason I have Emrakul in there is because I already own one.)
This one is under-budget, so it will probably get some upgrades if I go with it.

Quote from LtGlitter »

Since you are playing blue it might be a good idea to throw in some copies of remand or mana leak.
If you want a mana rock it might be better to play dimir signet or azorius signet instead of springleaf drum, since you dont need an untapped creature to get the mana.

I am running Springleaf Drum because it allows me to power out Polymorph on turn 3 if I have it in hand, and with lots of tokens and Intangible Virtue, it shouldn't be too much of a problem.
As for counterspells, I am working on that now

I saw this deck on Gathering Magic's "Playing on a budget" series and I immediately thought, "I wanna build that". It is not the exact deck, but shares the same concepts.
Most of this is built around the modern event deck.


One thing I am definitely not sure about is the manabase. I am running 23 lands, which think is fine, but it is the land choice I am puzzled about. I am not sure how much blue and black I need in my manabase in order to reliably play both my black spells and polymorph when I get it.

Suggestions/ideas appreciated!

I do have to say, after testing this deck seems pretty good for the price. Nice primer!

So, they are all pretty similar, but what are the advantages and disadvantages of each one over the other?
And, which is your favorite?