None

jchacona, 1 year ago

Modern Horizons 3

Romer, 1 year ago

• Add White Orchid Phantom, remove Dreamshackle Geist. - A 2/2 flying first strike for is a great, aggressive body. Swapping for the slow geist.
• Add Witch Enchanter  ^Flip, remove Demolition Field. Removal on a land? Sounds great! Dropping Demo Field since I added land removal above.
• Add Razorgrass Ambush  ^Flip, remove Plains. Surprise combat trick on a land? Sounds great!
• Add Sink into Stupor  ^Flip, remove Island. Surprise counterspell or removal on a land? Sounds great!

Modern Horizons 3

Romer, 1 year ago

Is 5 MDFCs too much? Should I be replacing Khalni Ambush  ^Flip with Bridgeworks Battle  ^Flip? Hey, let's just run 5, see how it plays and we can always adjust in the future.

• Add Fanatic of Rhonas, remove Whisperer of the Wilds. Strict upgrade. Now the greatest mana dork ever.
• Add Collective Resistance, remove Krosan Grip. Both removal and protection. Love a good modal option.
• Add Disciple of Freyalise  ^Flip, remove Forest. Potential source of cards.
• Add Bridgeworks Battle  ^Flip, remove Forest. Another potential fight spell.

Total Overhaul

TotallyNotAMimic, 1 year ago

Lotho, Corrupt Shirriff helps give the deck the extra gas it needed. Final Showdown is good back pocket support or disruption.

None

Ardees, 1 year ago

In Echoes of Eternity, out Chimil, the Inner Sun.

In Glaring Fleshraker, out Scrap Trawler.

In The One RingGC, out Trading Post.

NEW GATES!!

onua1, 1 year ago

Ok first things first, Fable of the Mirror-Breaker  ^Flip was cut from the list since it is 1) realistically too good for this deck, and 2) The Huntsman's Redemption is surprisingly versatile, and reasonably does the same category of things as Fable.

Now, MH3 exists, and the new changelingesque deck is born. We have received the following relevant cards:

Talon Gates of Madara

Planar Nexus

Sage of the Maze

Wonderscape Sage

The two new gates are pretty cool, especially Talon Gates of Madara; it is removal and another gate, so it is an auto include, will likely replace Plaza of Harmony . Planar Nexus is unfortunately just a worse Heap Gate in this list, so it wont make the cut.

Sage of the Maze seems too good to be true: a mana dork and a new wincon to turn gates into dudes! Amazing, I must add it. Might repalce Nine-Fingers Keene, but not 100% sure.

Lastly, Wonderscape Sage. This one seems not so great, but in this deck, is a free draw on every bounce of a land, given the high gate density. This one is a long shot addition, and will likely not happen, but who knows. I guess I will, but this list has a mind of its own.

There are also 2 new cards in the sideboard, The Day of the Doctor and Yenna, Redtooth Regent. The saga is functional card advantage that finds legends and shrines, and Yenna creates duplicates of all sagas and shrines. The Doctor who card may not make the cut due to it being universes beyond, it doesnt seem fitting for this list. Yenna might not replace anything, and be only goodstuff. They are still on the adding list, for now.

Land Exchange

IQuarent, 1 year ago

IN: Urza's Cave

OUT: Kher Keep

Kher Keep was never that good i the first place. It was okay. Had some synergy with Skullclamp and the surprise blocker was sometimes nice when desperate. However, what is essentially another copy of Valakut seems significantly better.

Update 2: Nikachu Wins a Pioneer Challenge

Skyhawk360, 1 year ago

Just noticed as I was updating that I didn't have 60 cards main because I didn't write 4x Sentinel of the Nameless City on this list, fixed that.

personal changes from update 1: - out 1 island, in 1 Boseiju, Who Endures I would make this a forest to keep it at 3 basics, but I'm not sure. I wanted the extra green source because the next change

• out 1 Kumena's Speaker, Out all copies of Mistcaller . +2 Jadelight Spelunker , +3 Mist-Cloaked Hearld Nikachu had mentioned wanting to test out swapping mistcaller due to it being very unhelpful in the same way other merfolk staples were played before he started testing the deck: It doesn't do the job it wants to do. As a 1 drop 1/1 it doesn't work with a turn 2 Pilgrimage. And as a way to combat Phoenix, Sorin Combo and Amalia, its not great because all 3 decks will target it with removal the turn before they go for the combo, forcing you to sack it early. I've experienced that logic from both sides of the match up as a long time Izzet Spells player myself and having played the deck more after posting this list. Me and Nikachu tested seperately and we're both had great results with Mist-cloaked Herald (check out his recent gameplay video where he tests both cards). He also liked Jadelight Spelunker, and ran it in his list that won the 6/9/2024 Pioneer Challenge. I'm splitting the difference till I test it myself and get enough rares to grab a full playset on Arena

• out 3 Make Disappear +4 Witness Protection (maybe?). between updates I tested 2x CoCo and reafirmed my opinion: I found it lacking cause the creatures we play aren't powerful enough. Nikachu tried it as a longshot to fight Phoenix and Slickshot, but said he missed having the frogs in main. I'm of the same mind, though I'm not 100% on running 4/2 split between it and Piranhas. But Mono Green is on the rise cause they figured things out, so I'm ok with hedging against them. On a relevant note, I'm keeping 6 frog effects in the main as Nikachu said his only change to his winning list would be to go down to 2 Jadelights and in 2 Piranhas, cause he was constantly making that sideboard almost every match. My only difference with his main 60 is that I don't trust being on 24 lands, but don't want to follow other players down to 22. so I'm splitting the difference with 11 1 drops and staying to my prefered 23 lands.

Matchups and Meta Thoughts: - Phoenix and Slickshot are our only decks we have a bad time with still, and Phoenix seems like the better of the 2 to try and fight for even matchups. the Biggest problems are Cruise (go figure :p ) and Ledger Shredder, which stone walls us and grows bigger then our creatures can. Frogging a Shredder gives us a chance, but infinite cantrips and Cruise find another one too fast for us to find another frog. Phoenix beats Merfolk in the long game due to, at worst, a 2 turn clock of flyers that can come out of nowhere. and they can keep us from going too fast or too big with cheap removal. - Nikachu says our Amalia Matchup is 50/50 even though he beat 3 in a row in the top 8. I feel like we have an edge, but long games are a coinflip as they can just wip out the win from nowhere. like the black midrange decks, settle in for a long grind and play carefully. - Mono Green might be troublesome, jury's still out. I've found that a healthy amount of frogs swings our favor, but long games result in too many big boys with trample for our tokens to chump. I need more experience against them to get a feeling. - Black midrange decks fold to us cause we win the top deck war and our frog effects turn their best cards into, well, frogs. Its still a miserable game to play against them just on the count of discard effects being REALLY annoying, imo. - Control is supposed to be easy as long as you can stick and keep a Pilgrimage, but I'm running into trouble tracking their counterspells when they have so many of the new Spree cards that act like swiss army knifes. Nikachu believes its just a free win, so I'm assuming I just need more experience. - Random decks that pop up on the Arena Ladder: every loss is fuel to win later. Usually I get punished for tapping out on turn 3 and a deck just randomly goes infinite with something I've never seen before. Most of the time I can smell SOMETHING coming, but I end up not trusting my gut and going for a greedier play. When in doubt, hold up that interaction!

Nikachu will be returning his focus to Modern for a time due to MH3. I'll probably try to make more updates to this as time goes on in an effort to keep conversation going. Merfolk Community talks the most about pioneer in our discord, go find the link on FishMTG reddit.

Experimental Change

IQuarent, 1 year ago

IN: Explore, Ancient Greenwarden, Wight of the Reliquary, Scavenging Ooze

OUT: Growth Spiral, Life from the Loam, Dreamscape Artist, Body Double

I have many things to say about these changes. I was hard pressed for cuts, so let's get to the explanations.

Dreamscape Artist is a pet card of mine. I've heard some pretty severe criticisms of this card, but I like it quite a lot, and it almost always pulls it's weight. There are a few problems with it, however. For one, its bad late game; it doesn't have a chance to do it's thing if you draw it late. For two, if you activate it multiple times, it doesn't take long before you run out of basics. For three, it's very slow. For these reason, even though the lands enter untapped and the discard fuels the grave, out it comes. Is Wight of the Reliquary a better card? Yes. Will it be useful in more situations? That remains to be seen. It's certainly pretty monstorous with Field of the Dead, I will say that much.

Life from the Loam is a great card, but it's also slow. The deck needed another 6 drop for Birthing Pod besides Bane of Progress, so Im putting Ancient Greenwarden back in. It won't really hurt the curve much since Im cutting Body Double (which I will get to next). Since the deck now has two things that put lands straight into play from grave, Explore comes back in over Growth Spiral. Ive always liked Explore more anyway, even if Growth Spiral is "better".

Finally Body Double. This card is just the commander but worse in most cases. Since it doesn't exile like the comnander does, it was nice to squeeze more value out of Rune-Scarred Demon, but this is a pretty narrow use case, and I don't find it to be as helpful as gravehate would be. This deck really needs gravehate because the main win condition is Living Death. Bojuka Bog might be on standby, but Scavenging Ooze is an oldy but a goody I forgot about but had laying around. The incidental lifegain is also nice to combat the decks very painful mana base.

Wight and Scavenging Ooze I feel will be good includes because they both get huge and the deck has three cards that sac to draw equal to power. They are also both great with Seedborn Muse. I am concerned with the removal of Life and the Artist that the deck won't fill it's grave consistently anymore, but I thought Id make the changes, playtest it, and see if that actually happens.

None

BBQblackbear, 1 year ago

Removed Eloise, Nephalia Sleuth, she's just a little out of place here, card draw is nice but not that nice. Replaced with Undead Warchief, Ramp and Lord effect.

Just a Big Update Including WHO, LCI, OTJ and LTR

Romer, 1 year ago

I originally built this trying to be a little more casual but Jodah is so powerful that my opponents can't treat it casually. So if I'm going to take all their removal and be treated like a huge threat... I guess I need to be a huge threat capable of battling through the hate. Also swapping some protection spells for creatures that provide Ward.

Add

• Captain Sisay - an obvious inclusion of an all-star, repeatable legendary tutor who is also legendary
• Vampiric TutorGC - a tutor for whatever I happen to need that I don't have to reveal
• Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite - pump my team, weaken my opponents to help get my attacks through
• Faeburrow Elder - fantastic ramp in a 5-colour deck
• Bloom Tender - fantastic ramp in a 5-colour deck
• Birds of Paradise - cheap 5-colour ramp
• Nature's Lore - standard, solid ramp to grab whichever shock land I need
• Farseek - standard, solid ramp to grab whichever shock land I need
• Aragorn, the Uniter - mega utility as I cast other spells
• Kenrith, the Returned King - great, broad utility to ensure I'm maximizing my mana
• Chulane, Teller of Tales - fantastic card advantage and ramp as I follow my existing gameplan
• The One RingGC - best-in-class card draw
• Rhystic StudyGC - best-in-class card draw
• Vega, the Watcher - legendary creature who synergizes with Jodah's cascade ability to draw me cards (also flying is nice and it's lower in the curve)
• Rona, Herald of Invasion  ^Flip - card filtering that synergizes with all my legendary creatures
• Kutzil, Malamet Exemplar - mostly for protection on my turn but the card draw is also nice
• An Offer You Can't Refuse - cheap counterspell to protect my board
• Deflecting SwatGC - vital protection for Jodah
• Flowering of the White Tree - cheap protection for the legendary team that also pumps them and is also legendary itself
• K-9, Mark I - cheap protection
• Blacksmith's Skill - cheap protection
• Annie Joins Up - Double my Jodah cascade triggers, other Legendary creature triggers and some bonus damage to throw around

Remove

• War of the Last Alliance - replacing with a better tutor
• Search for Glory - replacing with a better tutorGC
• Maelstrom Wanderer - too expensive and slow
• Lagrella, the Magpie - underwhelming and a little clunky
• Karn's Temporal Sundering - not what I'm going for
• Yawgmoth's Vile Offering - too expensive and slow
• Glissa Sunslayer - deathtouch blockers are nice but I'm replacing with more impactful options
• Kolvori, God of Kinship  ^Flip - replacing with better ramp
• Gwenna, Eyes of Gaea - replacing with better ramp
• The Kenriths' Royal Funeral - replacing with better ramp
• Toski, Bearer of Secrets - I often don't attack until I'm swinging to eliminate a player (or two or three) and I want cards well before that.
• Djeru and Hazoret - neat but a little cute. swapping for something more impactful
• Surrak and Goreclaw - I have other sources of haste
• Exotic Orchard - fewer lands, more ramp
• The Grey Havens - fewer lands, more ramp
• Ertai Resurrected - replacing with a cheaper counterspell
• Prosper, Tome-Bound - replacing with better card advantageGC
• Linvala, Shield of Sea Gate - replacing with other protection
• Tamiyo's Safekeeping - scaling back on the volume of instant-speed protection effects
• Swift Reconfiguration - scaling back on these
• Loran's Escape - scaling back on these
• Eerie Ultimatum - I love the idea of this to rebuild quickly after a board wipe but it's so expensive to cast and rarely is my graveyard full enough to really take advantage of this

Mainboard Updates v.2

Andramalech, 1 year ago

Refreshed the deck description and list in order to reflect a new direction with construction and use. I really enjoy Nekusar as a commander and getting to use him in many different facets has led to him being my most casual, comfortable commander to duel with. The use is very straight-forward for me and I really like getting to just be in a multiplayer setting where chaos and discord can reign supreme. Please feel free to check out the huge overhaul of the list and discuss it with me. Thanks!

None

VeniVidiVorthos, 1 year ago

There's been a few new skeletons lately, and Modern Horizons 3 added a pretty tasty new card in Buried Alive! So, we're trying it out.

None

VeniVidiVorthos, 1 year ago

Modern Horizons 3 came along and gave us a new toy to play with in Metastatic Evangel. So far, so good!

Card Changes

sloneketters, 1 year ago

Kindred Discovery for Path of the Enigma Skyhunter Strike Force for Knight of the Last Breath Reconnaissance Mission for Sigiled Sword of Valeron The Circle of Loyalty for Mind Stone Austere Command for Fell the Mighty Crib Swap for Swords to Plowshares Wonder for Syr Elenora, the Discerning Cavalier of Night for Knights of the Black Rose Knight-Errant of Eos for Xerex Strobe-Knight Teferi's Ageless Insight for Read the Bones Benalish Marshal for Arvad the Cursed Glen Elendra Liege for Syr Konrad, the Grim Thistledown Liege for Josu Vess, Lich Knight Silverblade Paladin for Foulmire Knight Battle Angels of Tyr for Liliana's Standard Bearer Cavalier of Dawn for Distant Melody Guardian of Faith for Unbreakable Formation Damn for Time Wipe Talisman of Hierarchy for Commander's Sphere Talisman of Dominance for Maul of the Skyclaves Chromatic Lantern for Promise of Loyalty The Council of Four for Worthy Knight Door of Destinies for Elenda and Azor

First test

Drachos, 1 year ago

Thoughts: Land Destruction is lacking... I am not sure its an issue but definitely worth experimenting with. I need to be careful with Open the Way. Its a great Ramp spell but can be an issue because of its 2 green requirement. More testing needed but might need to be replaced with Map the Frontier if its not reliable enough. Thus far no other card feels dead BUT Galadriel's Dismissal is worth considering for its ability to protect things cheaply. Specifically it maybe better then Whispersilk cloak.

More mill support

Cheatcounters, 1 year ago

Realised I need faster ways to fill the graveyard, added cards like Out of the Tombs and Vault 21: House Gambit to accrue more value and mill/discard high cost enchantments to reanimate.

Deck has a sub-theme of land recursion

linsl81, 1 year ago

Removed Life's Legacy for Conduit of Worlds and Budoka Gardener  ^Flip for Living Twister. Realise there is now a sub-theme of playing lands from the graveyard for more landfall triggers.

Card Change

thegreatgodloki, 1 year ago

Out:
1 Fabled Passage
1 Temple of the False God

In:
1 Soporific Springs  ^Flip
1 Fell Mire  ^Flip

Updated History of Deck Changes and added Fell Mire  ^Flip and Soporific Springs  ^Flip to Breakdown of Card Categories under Utility Lands

None

sanddeviljack, 1 year ago

Making changes. Working on cuts (9).

None

Noire_Samhain, 1 year ago

Out- Surrak and Goreclaw In- Emissary Green

Modern Horizons 3 Updates

KaloShin, 1 year ago

Normally I just add cards to the list, but from now on I'll be including the reasoning as to why I think the card deserves to be here. Modern Horizons 3 adds a LOT to red, giving it more flexibility than we're used to. There's a few other cards from prior sets I'll talk about too.

Memory Vessel

Memory Jar has already proven itself as an incredible card for Red, so it makes sense I would want to include it here. Couple problems though : You can't recur it, and you give your opponents MORE of an opportunity to use the cards they draw. While this card is good in decks like Zada or Purphoros, it definitely has problems and is probably the first card I would cut if a better draw option came out.

Junktown

There's next to no reason for a Mono red or even a dual color deck to not wanna run this. It's untapped, it gives card draw without affecting selection, it's just great. In a lot of ways this is better than the previous entry on this list, as it is very hard to counterspell.

Return the Favor

There's a few metas and play patterns where this card will be an absolute bop. You can copy your own degenerate effects, or an opponents, or use it as a counterspell to protect your win condition.

Embrace the Unknown

Retrace is the reason this cards showing up. We no longer have to run weird cards like Chandra's Regulator to disperse our flooded hands. It results in card advantage where filtration cards fall short.

Lamplight Phoenix

Normally, I'd say that I'm tired of seeing a dumb barely playable phoenix every spoiler season, but the ability to recur this card is effortless for many red decks outside of Daretti or Feldon. In Purphoros, this card can close out the game fast by using your graveyard.

Pyretic Charge

Filters while also allowing you to potentially finish a player off. The plot cost isn't bad either.

Pinnacle Monk  ^Flip + Sundering Eruption  ^Flip

No reason not to run this card in most decks. If the life matters, don't pay it or cast the spell. We get to run recursion in our land slots, and this is why this card is here along side Sundering Eruption.

Flare of Duplication

What a fucking great card. So many red decks will just sac their commander to this and obtain obscene value.

Wheel of Potential

Lets you actively draw instead of impulse draw. Most of the time, opponents wont exile their carefully sculpted hands, so this will just be an easy draw spell. If you run easy Energy generators its cool too!

Null Elemental Blast + Kozilek's Command + Eldritch Immunity + Warping Wail + Eldrazi Confluence + Selective Obliteration

Your mono deck will very often just have colorless mana in spades so that you can shore up your colors weaknesses. As a result, mono decks can often turn into a "Dual Color" deck with MH3's colorless cards. Warping Wail was always able to be included, but only if you accidentally could support it, as it wasn't powerful enough to just try and include on its own, but cards like Eldritch Immunity give red powers it literally isn't allowed to get normally. Eldrazi Confluence lets you protect your commander, ramp you, and remove cretures. Selective Obliteration lets you remove enchantments as well. Can't wait to include Eldrazi Magic in my red decks and see how it works out.

Siege Smash

Split second turns this normally awful mana value into some of the best interaction red has ever received. Isochron Scepter players are vomiting, defecating, and crying in the streets.

Great Train Heist

Another combat step at 4 mana and having upside with excess mana is pretty good.

Molten Duplication

Talon Gates of Madara

Unconditional removal that is very hard to counterspell really beefs up Reds interaction.

Lazotep Quarry Sac, colored mana, colorless mana for Eldrazi magic, and recursion, all in a land slot. We take those.

Horizon of Progress

Lot of utility, ramp, all in a land slot.