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[MTGO] 1 Year, 100 Tix – October Report

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Welcome back to the October report of the “100 Tix, 1 Year” project. There are just two months left to go.

Despite high hopes, October was the second month to post losses during the course of the project. It wasn't disastrous, but it was certainly a step in the wrong direction.

This month, the unlocked article from my "Nine Months of Portfolio Management" series is Part 10 – Conclusion. This article summarizes the lessons learned from these nine months of speculation on MTGO, the "to-do's" and "not-to-do's." I also discussed some important take-home messages that, in my opinion, are still very valid.

Today I'll comment on the lackluster month of October and discuss why, after everything, a significant amount of profit can still be made before the end of the project.

More information about the 1 Year, 100 Tix project can be found here:

October by the Numbers

The value of the account at the end of October is 481.7 Tix. With a loss of 22 Tix (or -4.4%) compared to September, it was not quite what I expected.

Here's a graph of the account's value since the beginning of the project in January.

Bankroll

The situation here is similar to the February-April period. Hopefully November and December will be just as good as May and June.

As I'll detail below, this little dip is attributed to the performance of a few select positions, while the rest of my specs are faring okay. This is not an excuse for the disappointing results of October, but simply to highlight that not everything this past month was doom and gloom.

Summary of the Specs

Here's a snapshot of the account as of October 31st.

Not much has changed since last September. I was counting on decent growth from my Standard positions, specifically those from Magic Origins (ORI). I only added a few positions in October, including Haven of the Spirit Dragon, Kolaghan, the Storm's Fury and Obstinate Baloth.

In order to make room for incoming Modern and Innistrad opportunities, this past month I sold Sunscape Familiar, Pillar of the Paruns, Monastery Mentor and Ghostfire Blade. On average these netted a decent but less than extraordinary profit.

In the wake of Pro Tour Battle for Zendikar (BFZ), prices went all over the place. I may have missed some selling opportunities, but these swingy price fluctuations are more the result of speculative activity than a true reflection of the cards' value.

Thankfully, many positions have stabilized as I'm writing this. Several are already heading back up, this time with a much more organic and sustainable growth.

On the other hand, the positions I placed the most hope in, the ORI painlands, have provided nothing but disappointment. Nothing leads me to believe they'll improve significantly before the end of this adventure.

What Went Wrong?

Looking at the October results from a different angle reveals that not everything went bad. Instead, I could almost argue that everything is in pretty good shape except for a few positions--positions which, however, weigh heavily on my bankroll.

Blame It on the Painlands!

Since I was so confident about them, I invested more Tix in ORI painlands compared to other positions. All combined, the five painlands represented about 20% of my bankroll at the time of purchase.

At the end of October, they held 90% of their prior value, totaling a loss of ~42 Tix for the account.

In other words, the rest of the account is actually up by 20 Tix. This isn't anything to brag about, but it means the fundamental logic behind the rest of my specs was sound.

It's worth considering why the painlands are underperforming. In the Standard meta, they've been pushed almost entirely to the sidelines by the BFZ tango lands.

The latter combine extremely well with basics and the KTK fetchlands. Current Standard decks are either four colors with 8-10 fetchlands plus 6-8 tango lands, or in two-color allied pairs. Neither are interested in enemy painlands.

Is this the end of the painland spec? No, but we may have to wait until KTK rotates out of Standard in April to see them take off.

Unfortunately, this will be way too late for the "100 Tix, 1 Year" project. Consequently I may be outing them before the end of the project, but if you've invested in painlands my advice is to hold them until next Spring.

A Matter of Timing, as Always

Did I miss the opportunity to sell Liliana, Heretical Healer or Warden of the First Tree during PT BFZ? Should have I sold Siege Rhino before the PT when it was at 2.5 Tix? Maybe, maybe not.

Pro Tours are always crazy times for prices. One appearance on camera and prices shoot through the roof; one Top 8 missed and prices plunge. It's easy to say selling into the PT hype was the best move, especially weeks later when you've already seen prices come down. Predicting the outcome in the thick of things is trickier.

Ultimately, my decision not to sell wasn't as bad as it may appear in this October report. At the time I evaluated the account, many prices were bottoming. A few days later as I'm writing this report, Liliana and Warden are already back up, getting closer every day to their prices during the last Pro Tour.

Now that the ripple effect of the Pro Tour is coming to an end and supplies of KTK, FRF, DTK and ORI are drying up, these sets have room for sustainable growth. This should hopefully leave me enough time to sell most of my Standard specs at a reasonable profit.

Finish Strong

Now that we're clear of new set releases for the next four months, Standard and Modern prices should go up. Concerning this project specifically, things have to happen before January 1st, 2016, in less than two months.

Fortunately prices have already rebounded and are higher than just a week and a half ago. Warden of the First Tree, Liliana, Heretical Healer, a bunch of my MM2 positions, and my newly acquired Innistrad positions are all currently up.

Time is running out for the "1 Year, 100 Tix" project. In the months that remain, I'll try to take advantage of small profits on any position and look for interesting quick flips before the gong rings.

 

Thank you for reading,

Sylvain Lehoux

Insider: Beyond Magic – Applying Finance Skills to Other Areas

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If you're like most of our readers here on Quiet Speculation, you have developed a very specific skill set, whether through reading articles, buying and selling, or running a store.

The brokers on Wall Street have the same type of skills; they just apply them on a much larger scale and usually with other people’s money. You are most likely working with a smaller budget, trying to use your knowledge to pay for your hobby or make some extra money on the side.

Regardless of your goals, the skills are the same. And there's no reason they can't be applied to other financial situations.

Today I'd like to show how these skills can be generalized to other, non-Magic areas of finance. I'll describe a situation I ran into at the Fantasy Flight World Championships which I was able to capitalize on. Along the way we'll highlight the basic skills I applied to turn a profit.

Step 1 - Identify an Opportunity

The first skill I want to outline for you today is identifying an opportunity. Listening to what other players are saying about the next big deck or an underrated card are key components of this process. We all rely on others to some degree.

Take a glance, for instance, at almost any Magic finance article. Somewhere in that piece of writing, you are likely to find the writer mentioning a specific card or cards which, in their opinion, are likely to increase or decrease depending on the situation.

They are giving out advice and ideas about possible opportunities. It’s your job to analyze those thoughts for accuracy and then act if you believe the reward is worth your risk.

Asking questions is key. If someone is passionate about a possible spec, they will have good reasons for their stance. Make sure you understand their argument, and if you agree, you can use that knowledge to your benefit.

We can apply this skill to things outside of Magic too, as I did at the Fantasy Flight World Championships this past week.

If you follow me on Twitter (@mtgjedi), then you most likely know that I attended that event for a game called Star Wars: X-wing Miniatures. This is the best miniatures game I’ve ever played. In the year since I started I've had a ton of fun, and also gotten fairly good at it.

The World Championship is held for all of Fantasy Flight’s games simultaneously, so when we checked in they gave us a nice package of free stuff for all their games.

As I was waiting for the event to start, I heard some players discussing the promo cards we received. Apparently, one of them was worth quite a bit of money. Immediately I heard opportunity knocking.

As we got to talking, I discovered that many of the promos were valuable, due to being relatively rare and unique. Think of them like Regional PTQ promos, except instead of being foil, they have alternate, extended art.

Opportunities come in all manner of sizes. For us here at Quiet Spec, they are usually rectangular pieces of cardboard with a specific logo, but don’t limit yourself to that one thing.

I’ve heard successful stories about Magic finance people diving into classic video games, other collectible card games, even things like digital copies of DVDs. Learn the skills and apply them wherever you see fit.

Step 2 - Take Action

I didn't fare well in the event, but I was able to make the most of the trip anyway. After the event, I changed gears and went into dealer mode.

If you are confident in an investment, you have to be willing to take the risk. At first, I started small.

I made a conservative bet on the most in-demand promo and bought a couple copies from other players. Together with my copy and my other promos, I started creating some eBay listings right there at the convention. In situations like this, it’s best to seize the opportunity as quickly as possible before it's gone.

This initial purchase went astoundingly well for me. Not only did I make money on these cards, I sold them in less than a day. To top it off, the other promos I listed sold extremely quickly as well.

It’s rare to see a return on your investment so quickly. In those cases where you do, it may signal additional opportunities to profit.

3. Profit, Now What?

I could have been content covering my flight to Minneapolis, but instead I sought out more sellers.

In this unfamiliar market, I had plenty of uncertainty brewing my head. To figure out the price trajectory of these promos, I tried to apply another basic Magic finance skill--determining the level of demand.

Understanding the desirability of cards, better known as demand, is key to any buy. This comes into play with every season of preorders, when we as financiers are forced to project the future price of the new cards. It's a difficult task, but if you can identify underpriced preorders, you can profit from them even in this market dictated highly by technology and media.

While I was dissecting my eBay listings, I pondered whether they sold so quickly because I was among the first to list them, or because the demand was truly there. How badly did people really want these?

It seemed the circumstances wouldn't happen again, so I decided to push my advantage and reinvest my entire profit margin into more cards.

As far as I know, I was the only one buying promos onsite. The only dealer there was the store owner and he wasn’t buying. Singles for these games typically aren't for sale, as their distribution model is different from Magic (they are so-called Living Card Games, or LCGs.)

Just like when a new set releases, there was very little data to base my buy prices on. A couple cards had solid trends on eBay that gave me good numbers to go off of. But data on most of the cards was very sparse, so I had to base buy prices on rough estimates of their value.

In some cases, I bought too high and my margin was quite small; in others, I bought very low and ended up with a huge profit margin. With nearly all cards involved though, I made some profit.

Generalized Knowledge

I had a terrific experience deciphering this new finance puzzle that had been plopped down in front of me. And of course, the situation relates back to Magic finance.

If you're creating your own buylist for your Magic inventory, you can follow other sites' example, but you might miss out on potential for your specific store. Customizing your buylist to your precise needs will lead to larger gains and provide the cards your community needs more often.

However you make your money, only you can decide what to do with your profits. If you are running a business, I recommend reinvesting as much as possible. That sequence leads to the most growth in the shortest amount of time.

If you are just starting out in the finance community, make a small investment and then use those profits to fuel your next one. You can snowball a small sum of money into a much larger one if you're careful about what you invest in and liquidate quickly to lock in profits.

Hopefully this analogy didn’t lose your interest because as you can see, it correlates directly to Magic. I may have been investing in cards from other games, but the process is the same.

Fetch Lands & Commander 2015

There was an error retrieving a chart for Misty Rainforest
There was an error retrieving a chart for Scalding Tarn

You may recall last week that I discussed the possible reprinting of fetch lands. My instinct was that we'd see them in the Commander 2015 product, which turned out to be incorrect. Nevertheless, I don't regret moving half a dozen extra fetches and turning them into a different investment.

After a quick overview of the new Commander decks, it seems there are few cards of note. The decks may be good fun for the multiplayer community but I don’t like them from a financial perspective.

The only cards I see worth mentioning are the new Commands, called "Confluences." This cycle looks strong for any multiplayer setting, and players of this type won’t be satisfied with just one copy. Fans of Commander and other multiplayer formats typically have lots of decks built. These are the type of fair, yet powerful cards they are looking to jam in every deck in their arsenal.

Mystic Confluence

Of the cards in this cycle, only Mystic Confluence is more than $3-4. All five of these cards seem like a great long-term hold to me. To touch briefly on buylists again, I will be buying all of these cards at a high percentage. That's due partly to the casual crowd that populates my store, but also to the potential growth I see in them.

As for fetches, we now have a decision to make. Each of us needs to decide whether or not we think Wizards will reprint these enemy fetch lands in Shadows Over Innistrad.

If you think it’s unlikely they'll be in that set, start acquiring these lands immediately. Without a mass reprint, the influx of fetches from Khans of Tarkir will only hold the price down for so long.

Personally, I think the second installment of Innistrad is the perfect place for these lands to reappear. The introduction of that set to Standard will mark the exit of Khans of Tarkir and Fate Reforged. The enemy fetches would pair perfectly with the full ten Battle lands that will be legal.

Would that make mana too good? Only time will tell, but my bet is fetch land reprints in April.

~

When do you think the fetches will be reprinted again? Have you used your Magic finance skills in another area? Let me know in the comments.

Until next time,
Unleash the Finance Force!

Mike Lanigan
MtgJedi on Twitter
Jedicouncilman23@gmail.com

Insider: QS Cast #12 – Modern Recap and City in a Bottle

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Play

This week, the guys chat about the RPTQ series, including a by-the-numbers recap of Top 8 decks. Then the cast turns it over to Kelly to ask him how he *really* feels about Old School Magic and its attendant price spikes.

Douglas Linn

Doug Linn has been playing Magic since 1996 and has had a keen interest in Legacy and Modern. By keeping up closely with emerging trends in the field, Doug is able to predict what cards to buy and when to sell them for a substantial profit. Since the Eternal market follows a routine boom-bust cycle, the time to buy and sell short-term speculative investments is often a narrow window. Because Eternal cards often spike in value once people know why they are good, it is essential for a trader to be connected to the format to get great buys before anyone else. Outside of Magic, Doug is an attorney in the state of Ohio.  Doug is a founding member of Quiet Speculation, and brings with him a tremendous amount of business savvy.

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Insider: MTGO Market Report for November 11th, 2015

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Welcome to the MTGO Market Report as compiled by Sylvain Lehoux and Matthew Lewis. The report is loosely broken down into two perspectives.

A broader perspective will be written by Matthew and will focus on recent trends in set prices, taking into account how paper prices and MTGO prices interact. Sylvain will take a closer look at particular opportunities based on various factors such as (but not limited to) set releases, flashback drafts and banned/restricted announcements.

There will be some overlap between the two sections. As always, speculators should take into account their own budget, risk tolerance and current portfolio before taking on any recommended positions.

Redemption

Below are the total set prices for all redeemable sets on MTGO. All prices are current as of November 9th, 2015. The TCG Low and TCG Mid prices are the sum of each set’s individual card prices on TCG Player, either the low price or the mid price respectively.

All MTGO set prices this week are taken from Goatbot’s website, and all weekly changes are now calculated relative to Goatbot’s ‘Full Set’ prices from the previous week. All monthly changes are also relative to the previous month prices, taken from Goatbot’s website at that time. Occasionally ‘Full Set’ prices are not available, and so estimated set prices are used instead.

Nov9

Theros Block & M15

The set price of Theros (THS) is back plumbing the depths it reached just prior to the online release of Battle for Zendikar (BFZ). At this price level, selective purchases of mythic rares and Modern playables is warranted.

Speculators who have not built a position in THS should consider accumulating at these prices, though the continued downtrend in paper means there is no price support from redemption at this time.

Magic 2015 (M15) and Journey Into Nyx (JOU) saw continued price gains this week, pushing the early October bottoms further into the rear view mirror. Even Born of the Gods (BNG) got into the action this week, rising from the 15 tix level it sat at for most of the past month.

The next big signal to pay attention to for these sets is the bottoming in paper of M15 and THS. Once that occurs, price gains on these sets will be slow and steady.

Tarkir Block & Magic Origins

Cards from the Tarkir block sets see ups and downs week to week, but the overall trend on these sets is higher. The peak in Standard prices is usually reached between December and March, and there's no reason to expect these sets to act otherwise. Speculators should hold onto their cards until the market begs them to sell.

Dragons of Tarkir (DTK) and Magic Origins (ORI) have potential candidates for selling and then rebuying. Since these sets will continue to be Standard-legal until the Fall of 2016, the risk on buying into DTK and ORI singles is lower. A longer speculative window gives powerful cards a chance to find a favorable metagame.

Thunderbreak Regent is a good example. It has already seen a price spike to 8 tix but is now closer to 4 tix. Expect this card to take another run at 8 tix over the course of the next six months.

On the booster front, DTK has gotten back into the high 3 tix range, and is thus at a natural price ceiling. With boosters available for sale in the MTGO store for $4, secondary market boosters have a difficult time going much higher than 4 tix while "in print."

Both FRF and KTK boosters still have room to run, so hold onto these boosters until they get closer to 4 tix.

Battle for Zendikar

The newest set continues its downtrend, dropping 13% this week with no end in sight at the moment. For speculators, the decision is an easy one to avoid this set at the moment. Only junk rares and mythic rares priced at 0.01 tix and 0.4 tix or less, respectively, can be considered.

If a junk mythic rare gets featured in a Saffron Olive brew, like Part the Waterveil did yesterday, the short-term gains can be impressive. This card doubled overnight and was available for 0.4 tix or less for the second half of October.

The release of Oath of the Gatewatch (OGW) in January will trigger a shift in the draft format from triple Battle for Zendikar (BFZ) to one booster of BFZ and two of OGW. This means speculators should look to OGW release events for the probable bottom on cards from BFZ. Accumulating tix in advance will ensure speculators can acquire cards from BFZ at a good price.

On top of that, BFZ boosters will be a low-risk speculative strategy to keep in mind for February. The switch from three BFZ boosters per draft to one will reduce the relative value of all BFZ boosters in player's collections and the price will drop as a result.

Savvy speculators should be confident that any BFZ booster priced at 3.5 tix or less will eventually rebound to 4 tix as the available supply of boosters gets consumed by drafters.

The only caveat is if prizes are somehow skewed to award significantly more BFZ than OGW, but the switch to prizes dominated by Play Points makes this a small possibility. Booster specs are a slow and grindy speculative strategy, but they have proven to be quite predictable since the switch to Play Points in August.

Modern

Modern prices are up. While the MM2 Total Set Price index has been steadily up for the past few weeks, the Modern Total Format Price index only rose by 1.6% between October 15th and last Wednesday (Nov 4th).

As of Monday, however, the same index had appreciated by 4% in less than a week. This doesn’t seem like much, but it’s a clear sign of the recent upward pressure on prices all across the Modern format.

For the first time since the release of MM2, both MMA and MM2 versions of Tarmogoyf nearly reached 60 Tix this past weekend. That's a 30% increase from the low 45 Tix found earlier this September.

[tt n="Tarmogoyf" a=5]

An easy way to keep track of the recent moves is to sort through the Movers and Shakers and Modern Staples lists on Mtggoldfish.com. Among the top gainers this week are several Innistrad and Return to Ravnica block cards.

After a week of triple ISD flashback drafts, Geist of Saint Traft, Stony Silence and Past in Flames have gained a solid 20% in the past few days. Olivia Voldaren has even seen its price jump from 2.5 Tix to more than 5 Tix in a week or so.

The five ISD checklands also rebounded nicely from their floor reached during the Halloween event. These and other ISD positions should keep increasing in value as we head into Winter.

While Snapcaster remained flat during the flashback event, its price has also bumped up by now. Although speculators should not expect the blue mage to double in value before 2016, it remains one of the strongest picks for speculative purposes.

SM

November 2nd was the cutoff date for redemption of RTR, GTC and DGM, which means cards from that block are no longer supported by the digital-to-paper bridge. From a local high early this October, RTR block prices seemed to have found a floor last week.

Return to Ravnica block is full of Eternal staples, including the shocklands, Abrupt Decay, Voice of Resurgence, Deathrite Shaman and Rest in Peace. With an imminent need for Legacy staples for the Season 12 MOCS, and Modern interest that will crescendo for the weeks to come, this is the perfect opportunity for speculators to stock up on positions from this block.

[tt n="Abrupt Decay" a=5]

M14, a set that includes Mutavault, Scavenging Ooze and Archangel of Thune, has also lost the support of redemption. Keep an eye on prices from this core set along with RTR block.

Legacy & Vintage

GP Seattle was held this past weekend, featuring Legacy. The Day 2 metagame of the GP was fairly diverse, with all the major archetypes represented. Sultai (BUG) deck variants were the most present, followed by Miracles, Death and Taxes, Elves, Grixis Delver, Temur Delver and Lands.

Jarvis Yu took first place with Lands, one of the most expensive decks in Legacy. That high cost transfers to MTGO as well, mostly due to the requirement of a playset of Rishadan Ports and Wastelands.

Central to the Legacy powerhouse deck that is Miracles, Counterbalance has almost topped its previous peak from last Summer with a price tag above 15 Tix.

The absolute record high of 25 Tix could be reached again in a couple days during the Legacy MOCS preliminaries. The end of the month is expected to be the best selling window for speculators holding the blue enchantment, as well as other Legacy specs.

CB

The last time Black Lotus was priced over 120 Tix was about six months ago. This price is likely to be reached again by the end of the week.

Similarly, the other P9 pieces finally find themselves on a durable upward trend, spanning the last month or so. With the next Power Nine Challenge scheduled on Saturday, November 28th, speculators should expect prices to keep climbing until then.

[tt n="Black Lotus" a=5]

Pauper

Despite the success of Lands this weekend, Crop Rotation is plunging from its 3 Tix height posted at the end of October.

As of yesterday, the price is under 2 Tix. After such an abrupt spike it's unsurprising to see the price correct itself, especially considering the relatively small demand from Legacy and Pauper players on MTGO.

Still in the “falling star” chapter, Mental Note has one more time reached its floor. It's now priced in the 0.3-0.5 Tix price range, with 1 Tix as a high fluctuation limit and 2 Tix as a record high. Angler Delver is surely not a very popular Pauper deck these days but the blue instant from Judgment may be worth a shot.

MN

Finally, a note on the artifact lands from Mirrodin. The most played of these, Seat of the Synod, Great Furnace and Ancient Den, appear to fluctuate with enough variation for the careful Pauper speculator to take advantage of. This kind of recurrent fluctuation is what makes Modern so profitable--these should be no different.

Targeted Speculative Buying Opportunities

None

Targeted Speculative Selling Opportunities

DTK boosters

No More PPTQ IQs

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Wizards announced a policy change yesterday stating that WPN premier events and third party events can no longer be combined to form one event that offers prizes for WPN and a third party circuit. That is to say that the same event cannot offer an RPTQ invite and an SCG Invitational invite, or GP byes and TCG points, for example.

The announcement states that the change was made to avoid confusion. I personally hadn't seen or heard about any such confusion by players with regard to combined prize support, but I'm not surprised that such confusion occurred. The bigger news here, at least from the perspective of players who slog it out at IQs and PPTQs every weekend, is that there will no longer be the issue that winning a PPTQ will disqualify you from playing some IQs merged with PPTQs.

There was an error retrieving a chart for Coalition Victory

This is definitely a positive change, though I'd say if the intention of this policy is to avoid confusion about prize support that some form of minimum prize support beyond the RPTQ invite for PPTQs should be regulated. From my experience this has been the most disappointing and confusing aspect of PPTQ prizes. Maybe some day.

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Ryan Overturf

Ryan has been playing Magic since Legions and playing competitively since Lorwyn. While he fancies himself a Legacy specialist, you'll always find him with strong opinions on every constructed format.

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Insider: Cash or Credit? – Maximizing the Value of Trade-ins

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Welcome back, readers!

This week's article is on a subject that comes up a lot in our forums. People want to know whether they should get cash off their buylist submission or go for trade-in credit.

While there may be a few exceptions, most stores offer credit bonuses for buylist submissions. They understand reducing cash outflow while maintaining the same stock inflow is a win-win. The question becomes, do these bonuses ultimately benefit the buylister?

The best place to start is obviously to know what the trade-in bonus is for all the major stores.

Store Name Trade-in Bonus Notes
Card Kingdom 30.00%
Star City Games 25.00%
Troll and Toad 25.00%
Channel Fireball 30.00%
Coolstuff Inc 25.00%
Isle of Cards 20.00%
Cape Fear Games 20.00%
ABU Games 35.00%
Adventures On 0.00% +5% if buylist matches what is submitted (cash or credit)
Mythic MTG Varies Credit bonus based on card

 

The other half of the equation is the buy price itself. A higher trade-in bonus will be offset by corresponding lower buylist prices.

The best way I can illustrate this is to show an example. Let's say you have 4x Deathmist Raptors in NM condition you want to trade in, and you want to maximize your value.

There was an error retrieving a chart for Deathmist Raptor

The buylist prices on Deathmist Raptor are as follows:

Store Name Trade-in Bonus Buylist Price Credit per Card
Total Credit
(4x Copies)
Card Kingdom 30.00% $9.75 $12.68  50.70
Starcity Games 25.00% $10.00 $12.50  50.00
Troll and Toad 25.00% $10.00 $12.50  50.00
Channel Fireball 30.00% $12.00 $15.60  62.40
Coolstuff Inc 25.00% $14.00 $17.50  70.00
Isle of Cards 20.00% $15.75 $18.90  75.60
Cape Fear Games 20.00% $12.50 $15.00  60.00
ABU Games 35.00% $11.92 $16.09  64.37
Adventures On 0.00% $11.50 $11.50  46.00
Mythic MTG Varies $9.00 $10.00  40.00

 

Credit

The most obvious takeaway here is that a great trade-in bonus doesn't necessarily equate to the best deal. If you look at the three stores with the highest trade-in bonus, only ABU offers one of the three highest "credit per card."

Picking the store with the highest "total credit" allows us to maximize our trade-in credit, but that's only useful when the store has something we want. So the other major factor at play is the sell price(s) at the store in question.

After all, if they charge twice as much for singles (this is a bit extreme, but it makes the principle easy to explain), then getting the highest buylist price may still not be the optimum play.

Let's delve a little deeper and compare the sell prices of the different stores. We'll use one of my favorite speculation targets right now, Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite, as an example.

There was an error retrieving a chart for Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite

Right now I'm sitting on 13 Elesh Norns from Modern Masters 2015 (MM2015). She's amazing in EDH and casual, and is a great Modern target. She has only two printings, both at mythic from relatively short print runs. I would not be opposed to picking up more, so she seems a good card to purchase off of trade-in credit.

A brief note on Isle of Cards. The chart shows them as offering the highest credit per card, but the caveat is they only deal in Standard cards. If you're looking to sell or purchase anything else, you'll have to move to the next option. If you're looking to transact only in Standard cards, however, they're the best option by far (as their sell prices are competitive as well).

Elesh Norn currently sells at each store for the following:

Store Name Elesh Norn (MM2015) Sell Price
Card Kingdom $12.99
Starcity Games $12.69
Troll and Toad $14.99
Channel Fireball $11.99
Coolstuff Inc $12.99
Isle of Cards N/A
Cape Fear Games $12.95
ABU Games $12.59
Adventures On $13.99
Mythic MTG $12.99

 

Now it's just a matter of running the numbers side by side to maximize the number of copies of Elesh Norn we can get from each store by trading in our Deathmist Raptors.

Store Name Total Credit Elesh Norn (MM2015) Sell Price Number of Copies
Card Kingdom $50.70 $12.99 3.90
Starcity Games $50.00 $12.69 3.94
Troll and Toad $50.00 $14.99 3.34
Channel Fireball $62.40 $11.99 5.20
Coolstuff Inc $70.00 $12.99 5.39
Isle of Cards $75.60 N/A N/A
Cape Fear Games $60.00 $12.95 4.63
ABU Games $64.37 $12.59 5.11
Adventures On $46.00 $13.99 3.29
Mythic MTG $40.00 $12.99 3.08

 

Credit Winner

Thus the winner is Coolstuff Inc. This store will allow you to convert the Deathmists into a full five copies of Elesh Norn, with an extra $5 credit left over.

This is the best and easiest approach when you have just a few cards you're trying to sell and pick up. Things get more unruly when your buylist is larger, and when you don't know exactly what to pick up (or want to bank the credit for later).

The calculations above took me about five minutes, and that was to sell just one card (Raptor) and buy one other card (Elesh Norn). About half this work was done by QS's Trader Tools program, so you can expect more doing it by hand.

Five minutes doesn't sound bad, but compounded over, say, 40 cards, it comes to 3.33 hours! When you consider that your time has value, this means trying to squeeze every penny out of this method may not be worth it.

Cash

Even if acquiring copies of Elesh Norn were still your goal, another option would be to take the cash for the trade-ins, and buy the singles elsewhere (eBay or TCG Player, most likely).

If we go back to our credit table for Deathmist Raptor, we see that Isle of Cards is paying the highest cash price at $15.75. So if we sold them our Deathmist Raptors we would get $63 cash.

Checking TCG Player for the lowest prices on MM2015 Elesh Norn, we see the options below. The first image shows the price with shipping included, and the second image shows the item price only. We want to look at the latter because combining on shipping for multiple copies may yield cheaper overall costs, even if the individual shipping cost is higher.

Elesh Norn TCG prices
Price + Shipping
tcg elesh norn item price only
Item Price Only

 

We'll also look at eBay prices:

elesh norn ebay prices

Cash Winner

It looks like eBay is on the expensive side, so TCG Player is our best option here. As this is a speculation target, we'll only pick up NM copies.

So going the cash route, we could get the five cheapest copies (with shipping included) for a total of $55.54. This would leave us with $7.46 cash in pocket.

Overall Winner

For our example, the clear best option is to sell our Deathmist Raptors to Isle of Cards, take the cash option, and buy Elesh Norns on TCG Player.

However, it's important to note this outcome is related to this exact pair of card choices. If we were selling a different card, or picking up a different card, the outcome might well be different.

It's worth taking the time to do these types of comparisons to maximize your return on trade-ins, especially for large quantities of the same card. Just don't forget to factor in your time costs.

Grand Prix Pittsburgh Deck Previews

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We are within two weeks of the next big United States Modern Grand Prix in Pittsburgh and if you are anything like me, you have a lot of preparation to do. For me, the biggest challenge before a big event like this is picking the right deck, making sure it is tuned properly, and I have the reps with the deck. The first place I like to look for deck ideas is the last major event, which for us is Grand Prix Porto Alegre.

Knight of the Reliquary banner

The Top 8 for GP Porto Alegre is very odd compared to where I would have expected the meta to go after the World Championship and Grand Prix Oklahoma City. Let us start with the winner’s deck:

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Naya Zoo

Naya Zoo, by Marcus Paulo de Jesus Frietas (Grand Prix Porto Alegre, 1st Place)

Creatures

4 Knight of the Reliquary
3 Loxodon Smiter
4 Noble Hierarch
2 Qasali Pridemage
2 Scavenging Ooze
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Voice of Resurgence
4 Wild Nacatl

Instants

2 Collected Company
1 Dromoka's Command
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Path to Exile

Planeswalkers

1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant

Lands

3 Arid Mesa
2 Forest
1 Ghost Quarter
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Kessig Wolf Run
1 Plains
2 Scared Foundry
1 Stirring Wildwood
1 Stomping Ground
1 Temple Garden
4 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills

Sideboard

1 Ancient Grudge
2 Blood Moon
2 Grim Lavamancer
1 Magus of the Moon
1 Rending Volley
2 Spellskite
1 Stony Silence
2 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
2 Unflinching Courage
1 Worship

This deck relies less on Collected Company than the similar version that Paul Rietzel played at Grand Prix Charlotte to great success.collected company In addition, two Blood Moons and a Magus of the Moon help to shut down decks like Amulet Bloom and steal free wins in a deck that already applies a lot of pressure. This is the quintessential beatdown deck that can interact with other aggressive decks like Affinity while still being able to fight on a more midrange axis if needed. It also has some of the most explosive starts in the format outside of Affinity, while still having interaction and the ability to fight against GBx decks by applying massive pressure early with catch-up cards like Collected Company. I really like how Marcus's Zoo list looks on paper, but I am not sold it is the deck to bring to Pittsburgh. That said, if you are weak to Blood Moon effects, this deck should definitely inform your sideboard decisions.

Alternatively

Next from the finals was another Naya deck, this one focusing more heavily on burn spells with some creatures, a design popularized by Patrick Sullivan of StarCityGames. This version plays very similar to Burn, but gains Wild Nacatl as another potent early game threat. I am not a fan of this deck, but I have a personal bias against Burn. In a format where I feel there are very powerful proactive decks, I do not think Burn is a great choice. However, if the meta shifts towards some slower decks or decks that cannot handle early creatures and early pressure, this is an upgrade to the traditional Burn deck. The other thing I dislike about this deck is it looks exactly like it did a few months ago. It did not impress then and, with no changes now, it continues to be unimpressive.

Many Shades of Knight

Looking over the rest of the Top 8, there is an interesting four-color Knight of the Reliquary, Retreat to Coralhelm combo deck, a Hexproof deck, a Tron deck, Twin, and a Living End build. While Hexproof, Tron, Living End, and Twin have been staples of varying degrees in Modern history, I want to look at the four-color deck that is the big surprise deck from this Top 8.

Four-Color Knight, by Caio Amaral (Grand Prix Porto Alegre, 4th Place)

Creatures

2 Birds of Paradise
4 Geist of Saint Traft
4 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Noble Hierarch
3 Qasali Pridemage
1 Scavenging Ooze
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Wild Nacatl

Instants

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Path to Exile

Enchantments

2 Retreat to Coralhelm

Planeswalkers

2 Elspeth, Knight-Errant

Lands

4 Arid Mesa
1 Breeding Pool
1 Forest
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Kessig Wolf Run
1 Plains
1 Sacred Foundry
2 Stomping Ground
1 Temple Garden
4 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills

Sideboard

1 Ancient Grudge
2 Fracturing Gist
3 Grim Lavamancer
2 Kor Firewalker
2 Negate
1 Qasali Pridemage
2 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
2 Unified Will

Retreat to CoralhelmThis deck combines the best of Naya Zoo while also adding blue for countermagic out of the sideboard and  the Retreat to Coralhelm combo. I think this deck is very interesting and while numerous people have experimented with the Knight-Retreat combo, I think the numbers for this particular list are very impressive. Most of the combo versions of this deck try to force four of each piece into the main 60, losing the ability to play the pure aggressor role in matchups where the combo is too risky (such as GBx). I really like its early-game emphasis with mana acceleration into very powerful two and three-drops to quickly close out the game.

Geist of Saint TraftThis deck also uses Geist of Saint Traft on turn two to put almost every deck on the back foot, leveraging cards like Lightning Bolt and Path to Exile to clear the way for the Geist’s glass-cannon offensive. The synergies within this deck are very impressive and while they are not quite as streamlined as the Naya Zoo list that took first, I feel this deck can transform into a midrange strategy more effectively than the other Zoo deck, which simply hopes blind aggression is good enough versus GBx and Grixis Control. This is one of the few decks I would heavily consider for Grand Prix Pittsburgh, but you should consider proxying out the deck and getting in reps before you start considering it seriously. This style of deck has some obvious lines, but Knight provides many intricate sequences and an inexperienced pilot will make mistakes.

Old Standbys

Moving past Grand Prix Porto Alegre, let us look at which format pillars remain good choices you should consider moving into the Pittsburgh weekend. Both styles of GBx decks are still very good and while Jund continues to grow in popularity, Abzan continues to remain present and remind players about the strength of Lingering Souls in the format.Lingering Souls Having discussed the viability of both of these decks in Grand Prix Pittsburgh, I believe both will need a sideboard overhaul to crack the Top 8. The current Modern environment feels too hostile towards GBx and with the decline in Grixis decks, the GBx decks have lost a good matchup from the format's top-tier . Consider shelving those Liliana of the Veils and moving Tarmogoyf to different decks. I do not think either of these decks is in prime position to have a breakout performance without some serious sideboard and maindeck shakeups. Especially looking at the Top 8 from Porto Alegre, there are many hostile decks. If the meta looks similar to Porto Alegre, I expect GBx will not crack Top 8 as many of those decks are bad matchups and current builds have a very difficult time adjusting to the axis those decks want to fight on, especially Tron, Living End, and the Naya decks.

Arcbound RavagerAffinity continues to be a mainstay within those of the Modern community that have put in the hours to reach high levels of skill with the deck. However, with the decline of Merfolk, Affinity lost one of its Tier 1 matchups in a similar way to the GBx decks. Unlike the GBx decks, Affinity continues to be a deck I would recommend if you have the reps in and have further tuned the sideboard with the inclusion of some number of Blood Moons and a way to fight through the Naya decks. My prediction is that the two types of Naya decks will be very popular at Grand Prix Pittsburgh and I do not think that is a good thing for Affinity pilots since Ancient Grudge will be everywhere. I still believe that a very experienced pilot with a solid maindeck and specialized sideboard could easily destroy countless players and reach the Top 8, but I still do not think Affinity is the deck to play if your goal is to win the tournament.

Next up is one of the decks that I think is a very strong deck that is worth considering for the Grand Prix: Amulet Bloom.Primeval titan This deck has over-performed in most of the Modern tournaments where big name players have appeared with this deck in tow. One of the biggest reasons you see these fantastic players continually putting up results with this deck is that the skill ceiling for Bloom is insanely high. In addition, the deck’s combo aspect of closing out a game on turn two to three with moderate frequency is very tempting: free wins are very important in a 15 round event. I believe with some updated sideboard cards such as additional Seal of Primordiums, Bloom can fight through the higher than average Blood Moon count I expect in Pittsburgh. However, this increased number of Blood Moons is a real concern and even the most adept pilot is dead in the water to a Blood Moon without Seal in play, or a Forest on board to cast Seal. This is a deck that crumbles to Blood Moon and while I do not normally play decks with that kind of weakness, the ability to simply learn this deck and play a very unfair game in some amount of matches is very appealing to me for a long event.

Next up is Splinter Twin. I am not sure why, but this deck continues to feel like a poor choice for open events.Twin While one pilot tends to make Top 8 of most Modern Grand Prix, it still feels like a deck that is not favored versus skilled opponents with either Abrupt Decay or Path to Exile. Recent Twin lists tend to remove black and return to their UR roots, allowing for better mana and access to Blood Moon. I suspect if people continue playing GBx for the Grand Prix, despite the decks feeling much worse of late, I expect the Twin players in the room to struggle versus those decks as well as the Naya decks that can interact and apply massive pressure early. While Twin players can adapt their sideboard effectively to fight these decks, it still feels like an uphill battle that does not end in a solid payoff. For Grand Prix Pittsburgh I would not play UR Twin unless you have put in the hours to master the deck and even then, I do not think Twin is in a place to take down this tournament.

Having looked at many of the major decks in the format as well as the results for Grand Prix Porto Alegre, I think that assuming you are an expert pilot in the deck of your choice, the decks I would consider bringing are Amulet Bloom and Naya Zoo.Blood Moon These decks are very strong proactive decks that have free win elements and can rumble versus most of the format. However, I believe there is a tier of decks just below these two decks that are worth considering if you know the deck well and have a sideboard to fight these Blood Moonand combo decks. These decks include Affinity, Living End, GR Tron, Naya Burn, Four-Color Knight and Scapeshift. Just below this tier of decks are decks I would not recommend bringing regardless of individual skill with the deck. Decks within this tier include Infect, GBx decks, UR Twin, and Merfolk. These decks are not up to the task of winning the Grand Prix in my eyes and while I still have plenty of testing to do for the Grand Prix, I do not think any deck from this tier will be a serious contender to take down the Grand Prix.

One of the big challenges of predicting the meta for an open field event in Modern specifically compared to some other formats is that there is an element of comfort that players rate very highly in Modern specifically. For Grand Prix Richmond, one of the phrases repeated over again was “Play what you know,” but I think this is a very dangerous phrase for bigger tournaments. With a few weeks between the Grand Prix, do not be afraid to learn these newer decks or learn a deck that is poised to do well. Put that well-loved and studied deck on the shelf and explore your options while you still can and if you still believe old faithful is the right deck to bring, at least you have gained something from these few weeks in experience. Moreover, the more decks you know inside and out, the better you will play against them in the tournament.

Two Days, Two Robberies- Help Bring Scum to Justice

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This Sunday a store that I partner with in Eu Claire Wisconsin was broken into and burgled. The store in question, d20 Legendary Tabletop Games, is offering a substantial reward to anybody with information on the burglary, though unfortunately to my knowledge there aren't any leads. The Reddit thread on the robbery can be found here.

Yesterday, Meta Games Unlimited in Springfield, Missouri was broken into as well. Luckily, the scum who burgled them was particularly stupid scum, and a photo of him is available from their security system. The Reddit thread regarding this robbery can be found here.

If you have any information regarding either burglary or can identify the low-life pictured in the second thread, please contact these game stores so that justice can be served.

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Ryan Overturf

Ryan has been playing Magic since Legions and playing competitively since Lorwyn. While he fancies himself a Legacy specialist, you'll always find him with strong opinions on every constructed format.

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Insider: Eighteen Modern Tournaments – RPTQ Recap

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Last weekend Wizards put up the Top 8 decklists of eighteen Regional Pro Tour Qualifiers (RPTQs) in the Modern format. This week, we'll be taking a look at the lists and the trends.

First and foremost, note that these tournaments required winning a previous PPTQ to qualify for, so the field of entrants were on the better end of play skill and card access. This makes the data all the more enticing; it's comparable to Day 2 of a Grand Prix.

If you're intent on attending GP Pittsburgh or another large Modern event soon, this article will prepare you for the field. And no matter what, you'll get a great financial view on the current state of Modern.

The Data

To make the data more readable, I made a spreadsheet of the Top 8 decks. (You can find Wizards' original post here.) A few notes on the methodology:

  • I aggregated general strategies together. "Grixis" contains mostly Grixis Control along with a few Young Pyromancer lists.
  • Twin, at twenty copies, was divided evenly across U/R, Grixis and RUG Twin.
  • Collected Company is mostly G/W Bears with a trio or so of Kiki-Jiki combo decks.
  • These are all of the decks; if it's not on here, then the 146 players who top-eighted passed on the deck. Consider those decks unplayable in Modern.

Blue Is Hard to Find

Splinter Twin is the most represented deck. The lists ran 3-4 Snapcaster Mage and some flirted with Jace, Vryn's Prodigy. Beyond that, we had nine Grixis decks and five other control decks based on blue.

That makes up less than a quarter of the metagame. Jace and Snapcaster are still good cards, with the latter being the principle draw to blue. But the format is pretty antagonistic to blue strategies.

Jund, for example, gives blue decks of all sorts a fit unless they're playing Scapeshift. Jund and its cousin Junk are everywhere. The numbers skew toward Jund particularly in the Asian events, but the deck is heartily represented all around.

My suggestions based on this are specifically limited to the Splinter Twin deck. If you're intent on playing Snapcasters, this is the only realistic home for them.

The card itself, Splinter Twin, is a phenomenal buy right now. It's the bedrock of one of the best decks in Modern and the recent Modern Masters printing has dropped the price enough to make getting them worthwhile again.

Twin is, unfortunately, a deck that rarely gets upgrades from new printings. Its core is the untapping creatures paired with efficient counterspells and cantrips. That last part is unlikely to improve, since Wizards thinks that even Impulse is just a little too good.

I hold out hope that the red-blue manland in Oath of the Gatewatch will be good, but I expect it to have a lame and terrible ability. Is it too much to ask for a 5/5 flying dragon for 4UR?

Don't Write Off Affinity Just Yet

As the second most popular deck in the roundup, Affinity is still tremendous.

Kolaghan's Command drove the deck back a bit, but it has developed laterally with Ghirapur Aether Grid to answer spot removal. When players skimp on their Vandalblasts and Pyroclasms, Affinity comes roaring right back.

I talked with Chaz Volpe earlier this week, and he suggested Steel Overseer as a fine pickup right now. I heartily agree; it gets no respect in a Lightning Bolt world, but it does a fine job of impersonating the best card in the deck, Cranial Plating.

Bloom Titan & R/G Tron Still a Force

While these two decks operate on similar axes, there's no one card that hoses both. Blood Moon is great against Bloom Titan and only okay against Tron. Meanwhile, Fulminator Mage and Sowing Salt are stellar in reverse.

This means you can't devote sideboard spots to both decks with one card. You have to decide if you're going to lose to one, or over-sideboard in hopes of stopping them.

The Bloom Titan deck is capable of some ridiculous early starts, and getting a hate card like Blood Moon out on turn four can sometimes be far too late. R/G Tron is more beatable; Splinter Twin has a treat of a match against it, for example.

The deck, however, shreds Jund with an early Karn, a roll-down from Ugin or a board sweep from Oblivion Stone. That was its original claim to fame and it's still potent at beating the $2,000 menace.

If I'm boarding to beat only one of the two decks, it will be against R/G Tron. Bloom Titan is so capable of shrugging off interaction and hate cards, I've been wondering when the Summer Bloom ban is coming.

Collected Company Proves Jamming Creatures Still Works

The Collected Company decks had a strong showing, with a dozen Top 8 appearances and a few wins. The deck's strategy is simple: run out the cheapest green and white creatures and use a handful of instants to interact.

This sounds like a deck that combo could roll, but between Qasali Pridemage and Dromoka's Command, good luck sticking a Splinter Twin. Same story for Jund when they're discarding Loxodon Smiter to your Liliana of the Veil.

The deck's main weakness is to a sweeper like Wrath of God, but if you look at the results that card is nowhere to be seen.

Consequently, I like this deck going forward. It's not budget by any means; it starts with Tarmogoyfs and ends with Aven Mindcensors, after all. However, it has more meat than Jund can deal with and thanks to Collected Company, sometimes the deck leaps forward on the board.

Quick Hits

  • Only ten Burn decks surprised me. That deck is still Tier One, though I hate to say it. Ask Lee Shi Tian what he thinks of Lava Spike.
  • With eighteen different deck types represented (without further subdivision), Modern is a healthy format.
  • My pick going forward is Scapeshift, since it can overload on nonbasic land hate while still maintaining a lot of its own inevitability against Jund.
  • This is a metagame that disrespects Lightning Bolt and honors Path to Exile. Just about every list doesn't care about one dumb burn spell, but Path causes actual problems for many of these decks. It's a shame that white is poorly represented right now.
  • Yes, that's a Norin the Wary-Genesis Chamber combination deck. Thankfully, it didn't win.
  • Elves put two copies in the Top 8, both running four copies of Dwynen's Elite. I have played against that card. It is berserk. It means that Heritage Druid almost always comes alive on turn two, for example. Foils are $4, a reasonable buy-in from here.

Next week, we'll look at a raft of Standard and Modern lists, with an eye on GP Pittsburgh. Look at the data and then hop to the comments section to tell me which deck you think should have made the list, or which archetype surprised you!

-Doug

Insider: Two Post-RPTQ Modern Buys

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We're in between major Modern events for the next few weeks, so you might have missed the Regional Pro Tour Qualifier (RPTQ) lists Wizards posted last week.

With almost twenty Top 8's posted, representing some of the best up-and-coming players, the RPTQs give us a useful sneak peek of the metagame leading up to Grand Prix Pittsburgh. This will help us figure out what's poised to make Modern waves and, by extension, which cards we should buy before their profile rises.

As we've seen before, you don't want to get too far behind a post-Grand Prix price spike!

Previous Big Event Gainers

Today, we'll look at two Modern cards that were already well-positioned even before the RPTQs. I'll be drawing on the RPTQ lists as well as some metagame trends I observed in my October metagame breakdown on Modern Nexus last week.

Players qualify for the RPTQ either by winning a PPTQ or with Silver pro status, so we're looking at a metagame where the average player is better than at a weekend StarCityGames venue. This lets us use the RPTQ Top 8's as November indicators for our October metagame trends.

Based on the October metagame data and the first round of RPTQ lists, I noticed two cards you'll want to keep your eye on as we get closer to Pittsburgh. You'll have to decide whether to buy now or to wait until the eve of the event, but if history is any indication, the game of Modern finance always goes to the swift.

Hangarback Walker

This Standard all-star had a huge showing at the RPTQ and is in a great metagame position to do even more. Hangarback Walker is seeing extensive Modern play in Affinity and Jund these days. I fully expect it to become a mainstream staple in Affinity's 75, and a regular element of the Jund core.

There was an error retrieving a chart for Hangarback Walker

Affinity was the most played deck in Modern in both September and October. Although its metagame share declined between those two periods, it's still the deck you are most likely to see at a Modern event.

Following Affinity's 1.7% decrease from September to October, we know the deck is looking for new cards to make up for its weaknesses, and Hangarback fits that bill nicely.

The Walker is a great mid-game threat that starts by going big and ends by going wide. Stick a Cranial Plating on it to create a must-block threat. When the Walker dies, take to the skies with the remaining tokens.

Walker is much more effective against Stony Silence than many of Affinity's threats, and with the exception of Etched Champion, is the only Affinity staple that laughs Ancient Grudge out of the room. Decks are more prepared for Affinity than ever before, and Hangarback stacks up nicely against the varied hate.

Assorted Affinity Hate in Modern

We saw a ton of Hangarback Affinity at the RPTQ scene last weekend. Roughly 50% of Affinity decks used at least one copy of Hangarback in the maindeck, with one build relegating it to the sideboard. I expect we'll see more Affinity pilots adopting Walker as we get closer to Pittsburgh, especially if the format tends towards fairer decks where Hangarback really shines.

Walker might be leaving the biggest impression on Affinity decks, but you can also find the artifact creature in Jund.

Yasunori Baba piloted a Hangarback Jund list to 2nd place in Tokyo, a finish that should definitely pique our interest. With 144 players, the Tokyo RPTQ was the largest event in the series, representing a well developed Japanese Magic scene that is never light on innovation.

Hangarback and Jund Synergy

Yasunori's list couldn't take better advantage of Hangarback.

Dark Confidant flips the effective four-drop for just zero life, allowing Jund to play more curve toppers while actually lowering Bob's average life loss.

Dead Walkers grow Tarmogoyf by feeding it an artifact, or get recurred with Kolaghan's Command. A returned Walker gets even nastier in the late game, when you have more mana to dump into the artifact and when the 1/1 thopters are more likely to break open a stalled board.

Finally, Pia and Kiran Nalaar can hurl thopters at enemy creatures or straight to the face. The recurring Shock gives Jund a level of reach normally reserved for Snapcaster/Bolt decks.

From a price perspective, Hangarback isn't the cheapest investment target in Modern. You can do a lot better than $14 when speculating on singles, but there's a lot of upside to this card.

Walker is also seeing plenty of Standard play right now (see Brent Clawson's GP Indianapolis-winning Abzan Aggro list), and cards with dual Modern/Standard playability tend to command huge pricetags. Jace, Vryn's Prodigy is a particularly outrageous example of this.

If you have Hangarbacks, hold onto them as they keep carving out a Modern niche. If not, look for a dip in price if Abzan decks lose ground in Standard, and definitely think about picking them up when Magic Origins rotates out next year.

Rise // Fall

Some of you will probably have to look up Rise // Fall, especially if you are a newer entrant into Modern who hasn't yet embarked on the Great Gatherer Search for Modern Playables.

That's about the only place you would've found this oddball split card from the old Ravnica block. Get used to it, because there's a good chance we'll start seeing more of the versatile Grixis uncommon as the metagame evolves.

Rise Fall

It's no secret that fair decks aren't exactly where you want to be in Modern.

On the one hand, you have Jund. The BGx mainstay enjoyed significant success in October, both at the share-of-the-metagame level and the event level. It's one of the top three most played decks overall, and had a decent conversion rate at SCG Dallas and GP Porto Alegre. At the GP, it was the most played deck on Day 2.

Then there's Grixis, which has wallowed around the 2%-4% metagame share range since August and is struggling to cast Cryptic Command in a field that often wants to win on turn three.

What's a Grxis mage to do? Get faster.

The New Face of Grixis

We've seen a bunch of "Grixis Control 2.0" since the summer, notably Michael Majors' list which he piloted to a 5th place finish back at SCG's Charlotte Open in August.

Majors' innovations saw scattered adoption after Charlotte, but it was only recently that we've seen a concerted shift towards faster Grixis cards. Danny Jessup piloted a Grixis Midrange list to 22nd at the recent SCG Open in Dallas, and we saw RPTQ examples of this in Marc Beaulieu at Montreal and Chi Hoi Yim at Roswell.

Rising pro player and Grixis aficionado Trevor Holmes recently wrote about the evolving Grixis shell on Modern Nexus. Rise // Fall is an integral piece of this discard-packing, removal-heavy strategy.

The split card gives Grixis a few edges. For one, it's often a Hymn to Tourach against the land-light aggressive decks in Modern. You know what I want to do in Modern? Cast Hymn to Tourach. That sounds as unfair on paper as it feels in a game, and you won't know it until you give it a try.

This mode gets significantly worse against the 24+ lands used by fair decks, but it's exceptional in the Burn, Affinity and Gruul Zoo matchups.

There was an error retrieving a chart for Hymn to Tourach

The Rise mode packages an Unsummon and Raise Dead into a single card, which gives you decent interaction against enemy decks and recursion for your delve fatties.

It's also an excellent way to leverage Jace, Vryn's Prodigy's fragile body. Losing Jace to a Lightning Bolt is fine against decks with limited damage options (losing it to a Searing Blaze is significantly worse). Rise brings Jace back for more action, buying you tempo from the wasted damage spell and tempo again from the bounce.

As long as Grixis players use Jace to control the board, particularly with all the two-mana removal options like Terminate, Dreadbore, and Go for the Throat, Rise // Fall will be a necessary inclusion.

There was an error retrieving a chart for Jace, Vryn's Prodigy

Hangarback Walker sees multi-format play and is already $14 based on a few months of playability. Rise // Fall is the opposite, a niche Modern sleeper that's laughably undervalued at around a dollar. Dissension didn't see a lot of opened packs, so the card's ceiling is much higher than the current price tag suggests.

Foil Rise // Falls already got hit with a buyout (good luck finding one for less than $40 right now) but if you can pick one up for under $20 then don't miss out.

Grixis decks didn't have a lot of luck from August through October, but their fortunes seem to be reversing as players try out new midrange-oriented builds.

Rise // Fall is integral to this approach, especially as players start using more Jace, Vryn's Prodigy. We all remember the Kolaghan's Command increase earlier this year, and Rise // Fall could easily follow that trajectory as Grixis decks pick up traction.

More RPTQ Action to Come!

Wizards promised to publish the rest of the RPTQs after this last weekend, so keep an eye out for those lists later this week. Assuming we get some cool tech out of those events (I'm hoping for some more Protean Hulk- Footsteps of the Goryo results!), I'll be back next week with more Modern investment targets.

What other cards did you notice at the RPTQs? Any Modern sleepers you see rising as we get closer to Pittsburgh? Bring it down to the comments and I'll see you all next week!

Breaking Turn Three with Bubble Hulk

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Editor's note: Clinton Whitehurst is an experienced Bubble Hulk pilot with recent PPTQ and RPTQ Top 8s on the deck. Clinton has also worked with Justin Maguire on the strategy, who piloted Bubble Hulk to a Top 16 finish at the SCG Dallas Modern Open.

When most people hear the word "Goryo", they think of Goryo's Vengeance, which is probably the most powerful card still legal in Modern for its effect. Griselbrand and Emrakul make for very powerful Vengeance targets that can end the game as early as turn one. This article, however, is not about that "Goryo".

Protean Hulk art

I'm talking about Footsteps of the Goryo, a long overlooked uncommon from probably the worst set of the Modern era. In a format without Force of Will, Daze, and Wasteland there isn't much from stopping you from casting this card on turn three and winning the game.

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"How Does it Work?"

I'll get this out of the way first since this seems to be the most frequently-asked question and it will be much easier to follow this article if you know how the combo works.

  • When Protean Hulk dies to the Footsteps trigger, you get to fetch Body Double and Viscera Seer.
  • Double copies your dead Hulk.
  • Sacrifice your Doubled Hulk to go get Reveillark and Mogg Fanatic.
  • Ping your opponent with Fanatic.
  • Sacrifice your Reveillark to Seer. Target your Mogg Fanatic and Body Double with its leaves-the-battlefield ability.
  • Both Fanatic and Double return to play. Have your Double copy the now dead Reveillark.
  • Use Fanatic again to ping your opponent.
  • Sacrifice your newly cloned Reveillark: this is were it gets a little tricky. You'll probably have to go a bit slow and explain it a few times for your opponent. When the trigger goes on the stack Body Double will already be in the graveyard where he reverts to his printed text with power 0. This lets you target the Double and the Fanatic again. From here on out its just rinse and repeat.

That's the basic loop from the Hulk first dying to your opponent dying and it's always the same. What comes before all that? I'll get to that in a bit, but first here's a history lesson.

Bubble Hulk's History

FlashThe year is 2007 and Wizards decides to remove all power level errata from all cards. This brings Flash from obscurity to Legacy powerhouse overnight, and just a few months before a Legacy Grand Prix. Much like during the old days of Affinity Block Constructed, you either came to GP Columbus to beat Flash decks or played it yourself. The deck went on to put three copies into the Top 8 with Steve Sadin coming out on top with his own Hulk Flash build. Unfortunately, the DCI didn't tolerate this for long and quickly banned Flash in Legacy and later restricted it in Vintage. Outside of the Hulk's death loop, the Legacy decks looked nothing like today's builds. The Modern version is more closely related to the old Extended Bubble Hulk deck, using discard engines and reanimation.

That brings us all the way to the very first Modern Pro Tour. There were two dedicated Hulk decks in the PT Philadelphia field, but unfortunately, that Modern format was just a bit faster than turn three decks. Neither of their pilots, Gaurav Gaitonde and Shaheen Soorani, did particularly well, but their lists started to look like the ones we see today. Here's Gaitonde's:

Bubble Hulk, by Gaurav Gaitonde (PT Philadelphia, 2011)

Sorceries

4 Ponder
2 Preordain
3 Footsteps of the Goryo
3 Ideas Unbound
2 Thoughtseize

Creatures

2 Body Double
1 Mogg Fanatic
4 Protean Hulk
2 Reveillark
2 Viscera Seer

Instants

4 Peer Through Depths
4 Seething Song
2 Summoner's Pact
4 Through the Breach

Lands

2 Blood Crypt
4 Gemstone Mine
1 Island
4 Marsh Flats
1 Mountain
4 Scalding Tarn
2 Steam Vents
1 Swamp
2 Watery Grave

Sideboard

3 Ancient Grudge
3 Firespout
2 Inquisition of Kozilek
4 Pact of Negation
3 Wipe Away

After the Pro Tour and the first wave of bannings, the deck fell into oblivion and would probably never have been seen again... at least, until Dark Ascension was printed. Dark Ascension gave the deck new life with Faithless Looting. This was the one card the deck needed to push it back into a competitive deck: all the other tools were already in place.

When Dark Ascension came out it was already a few PTQs into the season. I had been putting up okay results with my favorite deck back from 2004, Affinity, but I kept coming up short of Top 8 and was ready for something new.

It was a typical Friday night before a PTQ, and we were all hanging out at our LGS when Justin Maguire showed me this new Modern deck he had built. He told me to goldfish it a few times and see what I thought. I was blown out of the water at how consistently this deck killed on turn three. I had to play this thing the next day at the PTQ, so the mad rush to find all the cards for it began.

Here was the list that he gave me:

Bubble Hulk 2.0, by Justin Maguire

Instants

3 Seething Song
3 Through the Breach
2 Summoner's Pact

Creatures

2 Body Double
1 Mogg Fanatic
4 Protean Hulk
2 Reveillark
3 Viscera Seer

Sorceries

4 Serum Visions
1 Sleight of Hand
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Faithless Looting
4 Ideas Unbound
4 Footsteps of the Goryo

Lands

1 Island
1 Mountain
1 Swamp
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Misty Rainforest
3 Gemstone Mine
2 Steam Vents
2 Watery Grave
1 Blood Crypt

Sideboard

1 Grave Titan
2 Pact of Negation
2 Echoing Truth
3 Steel Sabotage
2 Early Frost
1 Through the Breach
2 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
2 Inquisition of Kozilek

Don't get too excited about this list. It was early 2012: Seething Song wasn't banned and Deathrite Shaman had yet to be printed. Me and my greedy nature wanted something faster than this list, and although Modern doesn't have many cheap or free accelerators, Time Spiral block gave us Simian Spirit Guide to help achieve the speed I wanted. Guide is both free and uncounterable, so I cut the Probes for the Simians. With Guides in the deck, it was now possible for insane turn one and two kills. They might have been a little magical Christmasland, but they were definitely possible. Justin ended up making Top 8 of the PTQ that day only to lose to a singleton Mana Tithe in both of his Top 8 games.

Let's fast forward three years to get to the present day. Here's the short-version-history of those intervening years:

  • Deathrite Shaman and Rest in Peace get printed
  • Izzet Charm and Lightning Axe get added to combat DRS
  • Seething Song gets banned. Through the Breach and Emrakul get cut and replaced with Makeshift Mannequin
  • Scavenging Ooze becomes Modern legal
  • Deathrite Shaman gets banned
  • We return to Through the Breach, add Pentad Prism, and cut SSG
  • Onslaught fetches become Modern legal

That brings us to present-day 2015. As you can see, the last three years have not been nice to graveyard-based Modern decks, but I persisted through and adapted. I just love playing this deck too much now, and the thought of attacking someone to win just bores me.

Bubble Hulk Today

Here is my current version of the deck, featuring Makeshift Mannequin. Through the Breach is still a great option to use instead: you can check out Justin Maguire's 12th place list from the recent SCG in Dallas for a great example of Breach in action.

Bubble Hulk, by Clinton Whitehurst

Creatures

4 Protean Hulk
2 Reveillark
2 Body Double
3 Viscera Seer
1 Mogg Fanatic
4 Simian Spirit Guide

Instants

3 Makeshift Mannequin
3 Izzet Charm
1 Lightning Axe
3 Pact of Negation

Sorceries

4 Footsteps of the Goryo
4 Faithless Looting
4 Serum Visions
3 Taigam's Scheming

Lands

4 Polluted Delta
3 Scalding Tarn
1 Bloodstained Mire
2 Steam Vents
2 Watery Grave
1 Blood Crypt
1 Island
1 Mountain
1 Swamp
3 Gemstone Mine

Sideboard

3 Leyline of Sanctity
3 Swan Song
1 Pyroclasm
1 Grave Titan
1 Murderous Cut
1 Steel Sabotage
1 Echoing Truth
1 Lightning Axe
2 Pithing Needle
1 Slaughter Pact

We already know how the combo works, so now I'm going to break down all the remaining cards so you can see how the Bubble Hulk list comes together.

The Dudes

When it comes to the creature part of the combo, there really isn't much you can change outside of shaving a Viscera Seer or Reveillark. Without Legacy's Brainstorm, however, this is a risky move. I tried going down to two Seer, but I didn't like how it left you open to removal. Also, if you ever drew one, your combo could be stopped mid-searching for lack of targets in the deck. With three, you get one Seer you can cast without worry, knowing you still have two left in your deck.

ReveillarkThe ideal way to go off is to fetch up all your pieces minus one Reveillark: the second copy of the Elemental is completely useless once you start the combo. By grabbing all your Seers and Body Doubles before you get the Fanatic, you can play around all forms of removal and the only way to stop you will be graveyard disruption. Another tip: after you get your Reveillark and Fanatic out, don't bring back the Fanatic right away. Return both Body Doubles back as Reveillarks first, then start to combo. This way, if your opponent tries to stop you at any point, you can just respond and start over with your second Double. Or you can get a Seer back if they have something like four Bolts in-hand trying to stop you. I just want to reiterate that if sequenced properly no amount of removal will ever stop the combo. This seems to be a common misconception I hear when the deck is being discussed.

There are other options for the kill slot: Mogg Fanatic, Death Cultist, and Bile Urchin. A strictly worse Cultist, Urchin is the worst of the three, only hitting for lifeloss without any gain. Cultist at least drains life when you use him, although I admit infinite life is pretty useless when your opponent is at -32543634 life. If you aren't comboing, it's just "gain one life", which is not worth it. Mogg Fanatic is the best of the bunch because he kills a bunch of problematic creatures. For example, Thalia, Guardian of Thraben is a pain for this deck and slows us to a crawl. Killings Birds of Paradise or Noble Hierarch is nice too, along with pinging infect creatures, Mono U Tron's Platinum Angel, and the occasional Aven Mindcensor.

Summoner's PactSummoner's Pact can be used as your virtual fifth Protean Hulk, although this is usually one of the first cards I cut when boarding. It is a very risky and hard-to-make-work card, but we maindeck it to add consistency. Be careful when using it though! This card will kill you 99% of the time if your combo fails. Another option in this slot would be a Gifts Ungiven, aka four-mana Entomb. Ultimately, I would only play Summoner's Pact if i was using the Through the Breach version. It becomes much harder to make Pact work when you need to cast it, discard Hulk, and win the game that turn. Paying for double green just isn't going to happen.

The Dig

Faithless Looting and Serum Visions are the core of your dig spells and should never be less than four-ofs. These two spells give you the consistency you need to win on turn three and four. Izzet Charm/Ideas Unbound/Taigam's Scheming make up your flex spots, and I go back and forth on which I want more of in the deck.

Izzet Charm is a Swiss Army Knife for this deck. Ideas just has raw power. Either way, there's room for 6-8 of these in the deck. Depending on what kind of metagame you expect you can plan accordingly.Izzet Charm I like Ideas Unbound when I know I won't be getting attacked very much. It lets you sculpt your hand faster and dig deeper for the disruption you'll need. I prefer Charm in more aggressive metagames, where the ability to double your dig as Shocks makes it invaluable. Scavenging Ooze is always your biggest target. In aggressive formats, Charm lets you do nothing on the turn before you go off if you're using Footsteps, endstep discarding Hulk before untapping and killing them. Charm is always better post-board once graveyard hate is a bigger factor. Nothing feels worse than going turn two Ideas Unbound, discarding Hulk, only for your opponent to untap and drop an Ooze, Nihil Spellbomb, or Relic of Progenitus. I often board out 2-3 Ideas for this very reason every game. As a final thought on Charm, its counter mode isn't all that good (two-mana for Spell Pierce is mostly awful), but it's still sometimes relevant so don't write it off. Also, if you choose to play Makeshift Mannequin over Breach, you want at least 3-4 Charms as ways to target the Hulk to kill it.

Taigams SchemingTaigam's Scheming is the newest addtion to the deck. At first I was hesitant to try Scheming, mainly because it meant cutting Ideas (which reads "draw three cards"). But after Zac Elsik (the Lantern Control Guy) did some testing with it, he convinced me to run Scheming. The sorcery digs five cards deep and you can leave the card you need for the win next turn on top of your deck, safe from discard spells. Scheming also pairs well with the Mannequin version as you always want Hulk in the yard, but it can also be used in the Breach version as Justin did with his own two copies.

Sleight of Hand and Gitaxian Probe are also available to add consistency. The deck's primary goal is always finding the Hulk itself, as it has the least number of copies of the combo pieces, and Sleight/Probe do this well. Justin's list is a good example of how you would fit them in the deck

Finally, although not technically "dig", Lightning Axe is a great discard outlet and removal rolled up in one. It can be found in the maindeck or sideboard depending on how creature-heavy the metagame is.

Pentad Prism and Simian Spirit Guide

Pentad Prism has been better than I thought it would be, especially after using Simian Spirit Guide for so long. You'll use Prism the same way whether you are playing the Breach or Footsteps version. Cast your dig spell turn one, and then play the artifact turn two for two different colors. On turn three, either cast Looting and Footsteps (no third land required) or drop the third land and cast Through the Breach. Neither of those lines are possible with Guide, as both would require an additional land.

Body DoublePrism can also be used to hard-cast Body Double or Reveillark: finding white mana in this deck is not easy. On rare occasion, Prism can also help cast Hulk or Grave Titan. Outside of casting Double, it was almost impossible to actually hard-cast the other creatures. I'm not saying you want to be casting them, but Prism still gives you more options as games go late or if your graveyard is cut off. That said, I would only ever run prism in the Breach version and not the Mannequin one. Also, if you're relying on Prism, watch out for those Abrupt Decays and Kolaghan's Commands.

On the other hand, I would only ever use Simian Spirit Guide if you are running the Mannequin version. Breach needs the two-mana burst to get to five on turn three, whereas Mannequin only needs a single burst mana to be played on turn three. SSG also opens the Simian Spirit Guidedeck up to turn two wins with Footsteps, and not much is needed to describe how awesome that is in Modern. Even if not powering out a turn two win, Guide is at its best when used to cast surprise Mannequins or Charms. For example, assume it is turn three, you have a Hulk in the yard already, three land in play, and both Footsteps and Mannequin in hand with an SSG. 9 out of 10 times, I will just pass the turn (the 10th time would be my opponent is tapped out and then I use Footsteps). After passing the turn you basically get to let the opponent decide when they want to die. If they want to cast anything on your end step you can Mannequin then. Or you can wait until their end step to use it as counter bait before untapping and casting Foosteps.

Both Prism and Guide give you burst-mana utility needed to pay off spells or hard-cast creatures, which is something you should never forget. You can always assemble the combo by casting these creatures, whether or not you have Footsteps or Mannequin. Even if you don't have Fanatic right away, you can set up the infinite scry loop to find him with just Lark, Seer, and Double. No Hulk needed at all!

Business Spells

Despite its focus on the reanimation spell, the deck can't completely rely on Footsteps as it would never be consistent enough to be playable. We need combo pieces 5-8.Through the Breach After Seething Song was banned, I went looking for a replacement for Through the Breach. The next closest thing is Makeshift Mannequin, although it requires a different build than the Song/Breach version. Mannequin has a few benefits Breach doesn't enjoy. Because Mannequin grants effective immunity to Path to Exile and bounce, you can easily go all-in on Mannequin with SSG on turn three. Mannequin also steamlines your lines of play, because you don't have to decide between keeping Hulk for Through the Breach or discarding it for Footsteps. With seven reanimation spells, the answer is always the same: discard the Hulk. In total, there will always be four Footsteps and 2-3 of either Breach or Mannequin.

I have toyed around with a Gifts Ungiven/Unburial Rites package before, but it's just too slow and clunky. I did, however, like using Gifts alone as a four-mana Entomb, and post-board you could add four pieces of disruption for your combo turn. I could see putting Gifts back in the deck in the future, but without adding Rites. Another similar experiment I tried was cutting all the SSG and added maindeck discard and Snapcasters. This slowed down and diluted the deck too much for my liking, and did not perform well.

Everything Else

I love Pact of Negation in both this deck and format.Pact of Negation Without Daze and Force of Will, figuring out what you opponent might be holding or what you need to play around is elementary. Remand, Mana Leak, and Cryptic Command are Modern's most popular counterspells currently seeing play, and this is a very good thing for this deck. Remand doesn't actually counter the spell in the first place, so if they don't kill you on their next turn, they better have another answer for when you jam Footsteps on them after you untap. Cryptic is almost as weak against us. At four mana, it's very hard for an opponent to avoid telegraphing when they do and do not have the spell. Even if they do have it, Pact sets you up for a huge turn four blowout.

Let's say you have Pact in hand and try to go for a turn three combo when your opponent has three mana open. This gives them a chance at playing two spells, be they Mana Leak and Path, Remand and Spell Pierce, or some other combination of cards. But if we let the opponent make their fourth land drop to allow them to Cryptic Command our spells while we are tapped out, then we've got them cold with Pact. The best thing about Pact is that it is free, your opponents will almost never expect it, and it can lead to plenty of enemy misplays.

Celestial ColonnadeHere's another example of Pact in action. Say you have a turn three kill setup when you untap but haven't played a spell yet (or just cast Serum Visions). Your opponent has Mana Leakand Path in hand and plays Celestial Colonnade for their land when they have an untapped land they could have played instead. Why would they do this? In the early turns of the game, Bubble Hulk does not give much as to what is going on. All it looks like is some Grixis Control, Grixis Twin, or maybe Storm deck. With no creatures in sight, it just doesn't seem worth having both Path and Leak open when an opponent needs to have four mana up on turn four to cast their Cryptic. Not playing Colonnade on turn three could potentially screw the opponent out of Cryptic mana. Here, Pact gives you the win against an otherwise reasonable play line. Another example, this one from the Twin matchup, is where the opponent tries to tap a land during your upkeep or Clique you during the draw. Pact the creature and, with the Twin player tapped out, winning is just a short endstep away.

Also, don't forget you can Mannequin on your opponent's end step and then Pact a counterspell. Next turn, with your pact trigger on the stack, kill your Hulk and your opponent before you ever need to pay for the Pact!

CounterfluxWhen Pacting, be careful for Counterflux, which you sometimes see out of the Twin, Scapeshift, and UWR Control sideboards. Pacting a Mana Leak doesn't do any good when they have Counterflux backup, and you can't even Pact the Counterflux itself.

The manabase is about a good as it will ever be now thanks to the addition of Onslaught fetchlands from Khans of Tarkir. The manabase once had Misty Rainforest in the Polluted Delta slot, and I wanted to scratch my eyes out every time I needed a Blood Crypt and only had Rainforest. Blood Moon had also been on an upswing this last year and not being able to fetch a basic Swamp was abysmal. You can run Bloodstained Mire in the Scalding Tarn slot if the dollar cost is too high to acquire them, but it will lead to more damage taken as the first color the deck usually needs is blue. 18 or 19 lands with three basics is the most you'll ever want to have. One-land hands in this deck are very keepable thanks to our card selection available.

Sideboarding

Untitled Deck

3 Leyline of Sanctity
3 Swan Song
1 Pyroclasm
1 Grave Titan
1 Murderous Cut
1 Steel Sabotage
1 Echoing Truth
1 Lightning Axe
2 Pithing Needle
1 Slaughter Pact

Leyline of Sanctity MM2015The three or four Leylines are a rather new addition to the sideboard and have proved themselves worthy to remain in the board. Modern has always been full of discard and stopping those effects is great for this deck. You also have 10 looting spells to discards useless ones later in the game. Moreover, Burn has seen a huge surge in popularity and status recently, and Leyline can buy you the extra turn you need against them you might not get otherwise. If you choose to forego the Leylines, their spots should be filled with discard spells: Inquisition of Kozilek and/or Thoughtseize.

Emrakul, Grave Titan, and the third or fourth Breach are also frequent board members of this deck. Emrakul doesn't really need much explaining, and the extra Breach comes in when the Eldrazi does, mainly for decks that play Path or decks you need to slow down like Tron, Scapeshift, or other control builds. My board above doesn't run Emrakul or Breach, but Justin's sideboard did at Dallas.

The Grave Titan is a happy little accident that happened when I could not find a third Emrakul for the first event I played with the deck. He is more than reasonably castable in this deck, thanks to Prism or SSG, but his hidden mode is making infinite 2/2 Zombies to beat opposing Leylines. It only works with 2 Body Doubles though, so if one gets exiled then I'm afraid you need to start attacking. Here's how the play works:

  • Start with your Viscera Seer in play and start the combo sequence.
  • Instead of recurring Mogg Fanatic, recur both Body Doubles, one as Reveillark and one as Hulk.
  • Sacrifice the Hulk Double to find Titan.
  • Sac the Titan, then sac Lark, recuring both Body Doubles (one as Lark and one as Titan).
  • Repeat, leaving two Zombies behind with each loop.

For me, those eight cards are must-includes in the board, leaving us with seven flex spots. If you play with Mannequin, it opens up four more board slots, which you'll definitely need since you're 100% in on the graveyard plan.

Here is a laundry list of cards that can be used and have been in the board at one time or another. Refer to this list when I reference removal spells to board in. As far as which ones, I would recommend looking at the board I listed above as a starting place to build your own, or just copy what you see here.

  • Countermagic: Swan Song, Steel Sabotage
  • Bounce: Echoing Truth, Hurkyl's Recall (also Steel Sabotage)
  • Discard: Duress, Thoughtseize, Inquisition of Kozilek
  • Sweepers: Anger of the Gods, Pyroclasm
  • Spot Removal: Slaughter Pact, Wear // Tear, Lightning Axe, Murderous Cut
  • Anti-Control: Defense Grid, Boseiju, Who Shelters All
  • Dudes: Grave Titan, Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
  • Utility: Pithing Needle, Torpor Orb (hilarious when opponents board these in against us)

You'll notice a few common themes among all these board cards: they either support Emrakul, beat a Leyline, or deal with hate cards. I've always built sideboards with this in mind when it comes to combo decks. Hate cards for hate cards have proven to be the most effective tool to get you a W. Discard is for their counters, Rest in Peaces, Oozes, and Deathrites (in the good old days). Needle the Oozes or Relics. Swan Song a billion different things. Slaughter Pact their Linvalas, Aven Mindcensors, and, just for good measure, more Oozes.

Before we get to the matchups, let's go over what to board out. You never want to board out more than 7-8 cards. Any more and you start diluting the deck too much. Thankfully, you board out the same cards 90% of them time.

  • First to go are Pact of Negations, mostly against all non-blue deck. Replace them with Swan Songs when you need early counterspells, especially against decks like Bogles that can play turn two Rest in Peace or Suppression Field.
  • One Makeshift Mannequin or Through the Breach.
  • 1-2 Taigam's Scheming. These dig deep, but mainly get cut due to their sorcery speed which can be a liability in games 2-3 when your opponent has access to grave hate.
  • 0-4 SSG or Prism. Boarded games naturally go slower and you can afford to cut ramp as you have time to find land drops.
  • Lightning Axe, Summoner's Pact, Gitaxian Probe, or Sleight of Hand. More free cuts if needed.

These are the only card you should be taking out when boarding.

The Matchups

There aren't really bad matchups for this deck, but there are powerful cards you have to watch out for. Recognizing what deck you are playing against is crucial to determining what cards you should expect and play around. You need to do this by turn two at the latest in order to play correctly. Try not to get distracted by everything your opponent is doing. All those Wild Nacatls, Tasigurs, Tarmogoyfs, etc. are nice and all, but they are irrelevant and don't interact with you outside of your life total.

These are some of the important cards to know and what decks play them.

  • Thoughtseize (try to contain your excitement if they ever Thoughtseize a Hulk), Inquisition: Jund/Junk
  • Path to Exile: Abzan, UWR Delver, UWR Control, Naya Company, Bogles
  • Scavenging Ooze: Zoo, Jund/Junk, Abzan Company, Elves, RUG Twin
  • Thalia, Guardian of Thraben: Hatebears, Zoo
  • Aven Mindcensor: Junk, Hatebears, Abzan Company
  • Shadow of Doubt: Twin, UWR, Grixis
  • Vapor Snag: Merfolk, Delver
  • Eidolon of the Great Revel: Burn
  • Faerie Macabre: Living End
  • Suppression Field: Bogles
  • Relic of Progenitus: Tron, Merfolk (this is not the end all be all: treat it like Standstill. Get them to crack it then move on or get lucky and have them tap out)

That's about it. Keep in mind that this is only some of the maindeck hate you will see in Modern. Much more dangerous hate is waiting in the boards of some decks, but that comes with the territory of playing combo. Here are a few cards out of sideboards that just shut you down and why Breach/Emrakul can be better than Mannequinn.

  • Rest in Peace: Bogles, UWR
  • Grafdigger's Cage: Affinity, Scapeshift, Hatebears
  • Surgical Extraction: Lantern Control (it can be countered but not really played around)
  • Counterflux: Twin, UWR
  • Leyline of the Void: Living end, Jund
  • Night of Souls' Betrayal: Jund
  • Slaughter Games: Jund, Tron
  • Anafenza, the Foremost: Abzan Company (A new one to watch out for)

I'll go over a couple of common popular decks for what to bring in, but remember, it is up to you to study current lists to get a feel for what graveyard hate each deck is playing or what they could be playing. Boarding incorrectly can easily cost you a match. As some general notes, Echoing Truth and Grave Titan should be coming in for almost every post-board game (Truth moreso than Titan due to its catch-all nature). In the interest of space, I won't be listing these two additions below, so keep them in mind. Finally, the Emrakul and extra Breaches are best boarded in against decks like Jund, Abzan, Tron, and Scapeshift.

Twin Variants
1-2 Pithing Needle
2-3 removal spells
2-3 Swan Song

Jund/Abzan/Abzan Company
2-3 removal spells (for Ooze only
3-4 Leyline (not against Company)
1-2 Pithing Needle

Burn
2-3 Swan Song
1 Pyroclasm
2-3 removal spells
3-4 Leyline

Infect
3 removal spells
2-3 Swan Song
1-2 Pithing Needle
1 Pyroclasm

Affinity
1-2 removal spells
2-3 artifact hate
1-2 Pithing Needle
1 Pyroclasm

Living End
2-3 Swan Song
1-2 Pithing Needle

Elves
2-3 removal spells
1 Pyroclasm
1-2 Pithing Needle

Tron
2-3 artifact hate
1-2 Pithing Needle

Grixis Control/Grixis Midrange
2-3 Swan Song

Merfolk
2-3 artifact hate
1-2 Swan Song

Bogles
2-3 Swan Song
2-3 discard
1 Pyroclasm on the play

Closing Tips and Tricks

Before we close, I want to give you some advice on mulligans, as well as highlighting some strategic tips and corner-case situations.

  • Mulligans: Bubble Hulk will mulligan a lot, and it does so quite well. Mulligans are your friend. Do not be afraid to mulligan with this deck, because it gives you a free shot at finding a Hulk.
  • Keepable Hands: This deck has many, many lines of play, and it has taken me years to see and master them all. This means there are also lots of keepable hands. The best thing I can recommend to you is sleeve up or proxy the deck and go to town with goldfishing it. Remember though that real games of Magic will be your best practice, especially boarded games, so start grinding your local Modern events to learn the ins and outs of how the deck works
  • Beating Auriok Champion: The Champ has protection from red and black and has the Soul Sister effect. Beating this card requires nothing extra or special. Remember that your combo is done at instant speed. Every time Champ triggers for Lark and Mogg Fanatic coming into play just respond by sacrificing your Goblin, let damage resolve, sac Lark again and repeat. Your opponent will be dead with 40+ "gain 1 life" triggers on the stack.
  • Exiled Mogg Fanatic: Sometimes in games 2-3, the board states get awkward or your Fanatic gets exiled and you need a way to win. Assume you have boarded in Emrakul and have your combo going, but no Fanatic in sight. You can loot away Emrakul and, with its trigger on the stack, sac your Lark (Body Double) and return himself to the battlefield as a permanent Emrakul, not just one that dies at EoT. Sadly the only time I ever pulled this off I was defeated by a pair of Ornithopters and instant-speed-equipped Cranial Plating.

Obi Wan Trick

Thanks for reading! If you have any questions about the deck, take it to the comments, or find me on Facebook or Twitter (caw_86).

Deck Overview- Modern Time Warp

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If you subscribe to the theory that fun is zero-sum, then you probably love the idea of taking extra turns. Joshua Bova's third place list from the Premier IQ in Philadelphia should fit your style perfectly.

Modern Time Warp

Creatures

1 Thassa, God of the Sea

Spells

1 Jace Beleren
1 Elixir of Immortality
1 Howling Mine
4 Dictate of Kruphix
2 Cryptic Command
2 Gigadrowse
4 Remand
2 Spell Snare
2 Telling Time
1 Part the Waterveil
4 Serum Visions
4 Temporal Mastery
4 Time Warp
3 Walk the Aeons

Lands

20 Island
1 Calciform Pools
1 Dreadship Reef
1 Ghost Quarter
1 Mikokoro, Center of the Sea

Sideboard

1 Laboratory Maniac
1 Aetherize
1 Dispel
2 Hibernation
3 Hurkyl's Recall
1 Snapback
2 Spell Pierce
2 Vapor Snag
2 Wipe Away

The win condition of choice here is Thassa, God of the Sea, who can usually close out games in three or four turns with a little help from the devotion of Dictate of Kruphix. Thassa's indestructibility will prove too much for most decks to handle, and Gigadrownse will cover your bases if you think your opponent has access to Path to Exile. The miser's Part the Waterveil also steps in as a backup win condition when awakened. A miser's Elixir of Immortality provides a backup plan in case all of your finishers fall victim to Thoughtseize.

There was an error retrieving a chart for Thassa, God of the Sea

Temporal Mastery is a bit unwieldy as a Time Walk, but Serum Visions and Telling Time are decent enough enablers for the miracle mechanic. The nut draw for this deck involves hitting Temporal Mastery as an early drawstep as a blue Explore.

There was an error retrieving a chart for Temporal Mastery

Congratulations to QS Writer Brian Demars!

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Our own Brian Demars made it to 3rd place at Grand Prix: Seattle yesterday. He was slinging Jeskai Miracles, a deck that can grind out a game and win spectacularly. You can see Brian's decklist here and read his Semifinal match against eventual winner Jarvis Yu as well.

If you're an Insider, you can expect to see Brian's take on the investments of Legacy, his State of the Format and a great tournament writeup on this site... as soon as he has time to unpack!

With his victory, Brian has qualified for Pro Tour: Oath of the Gatewatch in Atlanta, too!

Douglas Linn

Doug Linn has been playing Magic since 1996 and has had a keen interest in Legacy and Modern. By keeping up closely with emerging trends in the field, Doug is able to predict what cards to buy and when to sell them for a substantial profit. Since the Eternal market follows a routine boom-bust cycle, the time to buy and sell short-term speculative investments is often a narrow window. Because Eternal cards often spike in value once people know why they are good, it is essential for a trader to be connected to the format to get great buys before anyone else. Outside of Magic, Doug is an attorney in the state of Ohio.  Doug is a founding member of Quiet Speculation, and brings with him a tremendous amount of business savvy.

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