Overdriven! 57

Posted on March 18, 2013 by BlippyTheSlug

Modern: Huge Tracts of Unexplored Land

It has been said of Modern: “The most important thing about Modern is diversity. It’s by and far the most open format right now, there are huge tracts of land no one has explored. It’s the new frontier of competitive Magic.” and “The nice thing about Modern is that the format is very open. There’s a lot of room to explore and find decks that can work.” And just to hammer that point, here are maps from some recent explorations:


This is definitely the craziest new deck I have seen in quite a while. Fellow CerealKillaz ninja grapplingfarang shows off his very nasty Red Tide build. This monstrosity, which has the possibility of swinging for 15 on Turn 2, is a little unpredictable, but, oh man! Imagine if you would…

Turn 1: Faithless Looting, put two Vengevines in the graveyard.
Turn 2: Burning-Tree Emissary, Manamorphose to make the GR into RR, and kick Goblin Bushwacker. While that’s on the stack your two Vines explode out of the graveyard. Sha-WING!

Or take a look at this Turn 1 board state from the final match of that event. Turn One!!!

“I can’t say enough good things about this deck. It packs most of the same punch as the other R/G Aggo decks out there, but also has Vengevine and Goblin Bushwacker fueled nut draws.” – Gerry Thompson


I asked grap: If this deck were a song or movie, what would it be?


I am going with a little bit odd choice and going with Wedding Crashers. The movie is basically about 2 guys who will try with every girl possible and hope something works even though most will obviously reject them. The deck basically just wants to spit a ton of strategies out in the same way and hope one the opponent can’t deal with.

You mean, there’re strategies other than “Hulk smash!”?

Try to power out Blood Moon, saving up a few guys to get 6-10 goblin tokens with Warrens, etc. Hulk Smash is main thing, but throw a bunch of shit at the wall and see what sticks is really what the deck is about.

A more recent build, which also went 4-0 (but didn’t show up in the published lists because it wasn’t the highest-attended event that day. GRRRR!!!) shows Manamorphose swapped out for Myr Superion, for Goyfs 5-8.

This deck is crazy, yo!

The mainboard for this deck is card for card identical to the one from Gavin Verhey’s Reconstructed column on February 26th. You can look here for a detailed breakdown of this deck by the master himself.

The Splinter Twin combo works by slapping down either a Deceiver Exarch or Pestermite during your opponent’s end step. Then, on your turn, you attach Splinter Twin to it, make however many hasty guys you need, and swing. This is a mainstay combo deck of the Modern meta, and has been around “forever”. Splinter Twin is usually UR(g), using the G splash for Ancient Grudge flashback. The deck also shows up often as “straight” UR.

This particular Splinter Twin build splashes W for Path to Exile and Restoration Angel in the main board.

But take a look at that sideboard! Those are the major components for a completely different deck. Take out the Exarchs, Mites, and Splinter Twins, slide in some swords, spells, and Cliques. Poof! Now it’s UWR Control! Surprise!

I do love transformational sideboards. Always have, always will. Splinter Twin also has a long history of being hidden in transformational sideboards. A good example of this is the Splinterstorm deck. This is a Storm deck that sideboards into Splinter Twin. I have seen Splinter Twin decks that transform into Hive Mind, as well.

Since this initial list came out, this deck has shown up nine times in the lists, including a 4-0 finish. This makes it already the number-two player in the Splinter Twin submeta.

Woo hoo! What have we here? To me, it looks like a mashup of Tokens (Honor of the Pure, Auriok Champion,Spectral Procession, Lingering Souls) and Haterator (Tidehollow Sculler, Inquisition of Kozilek, Thoughtseize, Zealous Persecution), with a dash of Boros (Steppe Lynx, Figure of Destiny). As I have said so often before: you can’t argue with results!

This is one of the coolest “burn” decks I have seen in quite a while, it borders on being LD/Midrange. While the traditional Lightning Bolts and Lightning Helixes (Yes, I know that should be “Helices”!) are there, when was the last time you saw Karn outside of Tron? Or Koth & Ajani, for that matter? Woo hoo! Left-field nastiness!

Blood Moon and Molten Rain ensure your opponent’s manabase suffers horribly, unless your opponent is also on RDW. Or some other monocolored strategy that uses only basic lands. Then not so much. But since shocks and fetches are almost de rigeur for Modern, more often than not, the mana denial package here is evil. Evil! EVIL!!

Rather than the cheap (mana cost wise) critters like Vexing Devil, Hellspark Elemental, Goblin Guide, etc., this deck uses ramp cards like Boros Signets and Everflowing Chalices to help pump out the mana for the more expensive fatties.

PTQ Wrap-up

Blarg. Blarg, blarg, blarg. Blarg!

While working with the PTQ meta, and getting the final results in, I somehow managed to bork the whole thing into non-existence. Blarg. No way am I going to re-enter 3 months (2, actually, if I only did the post-ban stuff) worth of data in the time left until my submission deadline; I’m not even going to try. Blarg. This makes me a very angry (at myself) panda.

The Modern PTQ season is now over. But there will be more! When WotC announced that they were adding a fourth PT to the schedule, that meant a corresponding PTQ season, as well! I’m sure one or two of those will be Modern.

GP San Diego

As usual, a Modern GP falls on the weekend after my submission deadline. Blarg. Some day… somehow… I’ll be able to bring you some GP info one short week after the fact, instead of a timewarpy disjointed ramble two weeks later when it’s old hat.

The Modern format is still very much a wide-open playing field, and new decks are still popping out every week. Witness the lists above, for recent examples. With Gatecrash in the rotation, Modern has been fermenting very nicely over the past few weeks. I’m hoping that this fermentation will result in a surprise Top 8 from this event where we’ll see something other than The Usual Suspects.

UWR Midrange and its cousin UWR Control have been making solid inroads into the online meta. 4CC Gifts (in both Esper G and Esper R) have been sailing in, as well. U Tron, GRuul Zoo, and Tribal Flames (aka Experiment Zoo) should not be counted out. BUG Midrange is lurking in the shadows. Summer Bloom combo decks have been sighted, as well, even though it’s still the dead of winter here. I believe there is a good chance of surprises.


Overdrive! #86 Champion: trainboy / Artificial Eggs
Overdrive! #87 Champion: rittmeyer / U Tron
Eurodrive! #66 Champion: Robin 88 / Splinter Twin
Eurodrive! #67 Champion: olioolli / Melira Pod
Decks from all Overdrive! can be found here.
Decks from all Eurodrive! can be found here.

 


Where Angels Fear To Tread #47
Players: 24
4-0: Ice0verlord, ellmaris ~ 3-1: fliebana, Odero, SekKuar Deathkeeper, pk23
Where Angels Fear To Tread #48
Players: 21 (I played to even the pairings)
4-0: olioolli, pk23 ~ 3-1: ellmaris, nightshadex101, SBena, justcanceled
Decks from all WAFTT events can be found here.

The One Year Anniversary of Where Angels Fear To Tread is coming up soon: WAFFT #51 will be on March 31, 2013.


By now you probably know I like to give out “promos” for special events. This event will be no different. Every player entering will receive one Where Ancients Tread, with all 4-0 players getting a foil playset.

Interesting Tidbits

On April 6, MTGO will host a Modern format GPT for GP Portland, which takes place May 10–12. Details here.

MTGO will host a Modern Masters Limited PTQ for PT “Friends” on July 6. Woo hoo! So now we know that at the very least, Modern Masters will be available online at that time. I’m hoping that the online release is a little sooner than that, tho! It’d be nice to get some practice in before a PTQ…

Modern attendance looks to be tapering off with the end of PTQ season.