MTG Modern Bans: Analyzing the Impact on the Current Meta

Modern Bans are HERE and it is Time to Check on the Meta!

Explore the latest MTG Modern bans and how they reshape the meta. Stay ahead with insights on deck adjustments, new strategies, and choices post-ban.

This past week, Wizards gave us some bans that were desperately needed. In addition to that, we even got some that many would say were not needed. Some of the cards that were on the ban radar came out unscathed this time, with conjecture that they may end up being banned later. We were all positive that Nadu was going to get banned, and the format was suffering while in the waiting room for that. One ban in Modern that we did not expect, however, was for Grief to be banned. It was still a broken card, but with a lot of the cards printed in MH2, it appeared to have been powered down a bit compared to the rest of the cards out there. The good news is that a lot of the decks that played it were able to adapt around it, but what we really want to check on today is how the meta looks in general. Similar to the last article, we will look at the decks that round out the top tier, and what decks we should look to see taking the spot as our best deck for the format. Let's get to the Modern Meta check-in.

What Deck is the Best?

We'll get to that pretty quickly here, and it was also rather obvious - Boros Energy is taking the meta by storm currently. It is able to snowball so much, and has cheeky elements of control that allow the deck to simply do its thing uninterrupted. It is well-rounded and has bunches of life gain. Many decks in the format do not run board wipes, and those decks tend to suffer against Boros. Let's take a look at the list itself.

Total Cards:

Boros Energy has multiple top 8 finishes since the recent bans, and this deck particularly won the Modern Challenge on the 27th. It is becoming increasingly popular, and opponents are getting punished by the fact that the deck plays Blood Moon. There are so many decks in the format that run little to no basic lands, that players often get locked out. It is such a unique situation for an aggro deck to be able to lock out opponents from casting any spells, and it ends up being just what the deck needs. Aside from Blood Moon, there are some incredibly powerful engines that help this deck tick.

Relevant Cards

This card is quickly becoming one of the best one mana spells in all of Magic. It sets up multiple engines within Boros Energy, and even has use in other decks because of the life gain and ability to give other creatures flying. It gains life as soon as another creature hits the battlefield, so it immediately triggers Ocelot Pride. Having this card in your hand with Ocelot and a couple lands almost guarantees an instant keep.

Raptor rounds out the perfect curve for the deck, because a lot of the spells are three mana or less, and it simply allows you to just cast all kinds of value spells for free as early as turn two. If you had Guide of Souls on the board on turn one, you can pretty much cast any card in the deck with Raptor. It allows for the deck to snowball on turn two, and if it is on the play, you better hope you have some type of board wipe, because things are going to get out of hand.

Phlage has found its way into a few different decks in Modern. It is used as a win condition in some control decks, and in energy decks, it is an awesome finisher. The deck runs Arena of Glory so that Phlage can be cast from the graveyard and given haste. This can lead to it dealing 12 damage the turn it comes out from the graveyard.

This card is heralded by many as the best removal spell in the format, simply due to the efficiency it can provide. It can hit creatures or planeswalkers, and in many situations, that makes it better than Fatal Push. The fact that it can also hit creatures with a mana value higher than four also makes it ridiculously valuable. The deck is already amassing as much energy as it can, so this just perpetuates the value train that is already in motion.

Magic the Gathering Card - Ajani, Nacatl Pariah - MTG Circle

Lastly, we had to mention Ajani. We couldn't leave out such a legendary planeswalker, even if de-sparked. It is also incredibly easy to have Ajani flip into the planeswalker and start doing ridiculous amounts of damage. There are so many creatures in the deck that demand to be removed, and that can easily get Ajani, Nacatl Pariah // Ajani, Nacatl Avenger transformed. The amount of valuable one and two mana spells in this deck create a catch-22 for most opponents. It creates a situation where you feel as if there is no good option for targeted removal, which is why it is so important to have a board wipe against this deck.

Other Decks Making a Splash

Eldrazi Breach

Eldrazi Breach decks are absolutely eating right now. They are able to ramp up to five mana very quickly, and put powerful Eldrazis on the battlefield. The deck has multiple top 8 finishes throughout the last two Modern Challenges, and it doesn't appear to be going anywhere. It used to have to worry about Nadu going basically infinite on turn three, now it is the deck that can knock it out of the park on that same turn. Even if it isn't casting a huge Eldrazi on turn three, it can also blow up lands as early as turn three with Sowing Mycospawn. It ends up being pretty ridiculous, because you aren't able to search your library for another land. If you are facing this deck and are on the draw, the turn three Mycospawn can almost be a death sentence. The deck also plays Trinisphere in the sideboard, which cuts off so many of the relevant spells in the meta. Making everything cost at least three mana in a format where everyone is trying to cast spells for either free, or as little as possible creates havoc for those who are not prepared. It also allows the Breach Player to slow down the game and ensure that they get to five mana. The versatility of the quick kill but also being able to slow down the game, blow up lands, and have their say over the board state is the reason that they are starting to call it Eldrazi Control.

I personally played against the person who created this deck in a Modern RCQ in Delaware, and he piloted it to perfection. It was a swift 2-0 victory for him, and others are quickly picking up on the fact that the deck is multiple types of broken.

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I am a Magic The Gathering competitive player, and streamer. I specialize in homebrew decks. My favorite formats are: Standard, Pioneer (Explorer on Arena), and EDH. I first started playing MTG in 2001, and have played on and off since then.

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Check out more content by Numbskull

Explore the power of Rakdos Dragons in this midrange Magic: The Gathering deck. Unleash combos, removal, and ramp for competitive edge in Standard.

This Deck is Sneaky Good! Get Ready for RAKDOS Dragons!

You didn't think I could only give you one dragon deck, did you? I honestly saw too many fun options to do just Boros, so today I'm bringing you another. This one steers toward the more midrange, good ol' honest Magic side of things. I wanted to center a deck around something that is more consistent with the status quo of dragons: carnage and destruction. We have plenty of removal in this deck, and a creature that doubles as a board wipe when needed. Since we aren't doing a super fancy combo in this deck, I wanted to add element of ramp to get to the higher mana spells that we have in the deck. We will be able to use early creatures to help out with that, and also a new fancy artifact. We will torch the board and force our opponents to be more resilient than we are, while flying over the top of what they might manage to keep on the board. Let's take a look at the deck and then I'll tell you some of my favorite things about it. You can see some of the fun that we will have right off the bat with this deck. We are looking to smash aggro decks, and still punish other decks that don't play to the board. Although this one has fewer dragons on paper, we have a few permanents that can actually turn into them, and this leads to some cheeky interactions. Let's check out some of the new cards from Tarkir Dragonstorm that are in this deck, and then we will go over some fun combos! Key New Cards

It's Time to Mobilize the Aristocrats with Mardu Combo!

There is an ongoing argument in both Standard and Pioneer currently. What color combination is the best for aggressive decks? We have seen people try out Jeskai Aggro to try and incorporate the best of both worlds between Azorius Aggro, and Boros Aggro. Some like to stick with Gruul Aggro because of the high rolls that it allows for, and there is also an argument that sometimes all you need is mono red - and the results have proven as much in major events. There has been a bit of a surge of some Mardu Aristocrat/Sacrifice decks, and today's list will follow that to some degree. We went a little bit more aggro-based, but there is a combo element to it, along with a healthy sideboard that should provide for balanced gameplay. We will look to get a bunch of creatures onto the board, and then create a bunch more based on the amount that we have, while punishing the opponent when they die. If that isn't enough, the go-wide strategy should also allow us to swing for ample damage at an ample pace. A new ability called Mobilize that is being brought to us in Tarkir Dragonstorm is going to allow us to pull off some pretty powerful swings in combat. Mobilize allows us to create a bunch of tapped and attacking 1/1 tokens based on either the number behind it, or circumstances that pertain to "X." Something that is particularly fun is that we can benefit from our creatures dying, because the mobilize ability requires us to sacrifice the creatures that we get from mobilizing at the beginning of our end step. This is yet another deck that can allow us to win on the end step which is always fun. Another fundamental reason why I think the deck is good is because we are rewarded for something that would normally be considered a setback. If you find enough ways to turn negatives into positives, it usually can translate into the small margins that win you a match. Enough of me blabbing. Let's take a look at the cool new cards! Key New Cards

Demons Are Getting New Toys, and This Deck is ROTTEN

We have seen the vast majority of the cards that will be released in Tarkir Dragonstorm, and the excitement is definitely building. Magic players are expecting this to meet the hype that Duskmourn brought us, and hopefully more. We were left a bit underwhelmed with Aetherdrift, but this is proving to be all but a filler set. It's something that is so easy to be excited for. Who doesn't love dragons?! Anyone with an ounce of nerdiness is interested as soon as they hear the word. Although I don't have a dragon deck for you today, I am going to do my obligatory Mono Black Deck for the new set. If you have read my articles in the past, you know that I do one every set - and this one is no different. We finally have enough cards from Tarkir to give me what I needed to make a new-and-improved Demons list for you. We have a new one that will let us pull off some combos on earlier turns, and hopefully have a better body early on to put pressure on aggro decks. I think that should give us a better shot against the meta, since the threat of a 5 damage crackback can definitely give someone extra things to consider in combat phases. He also isn't a bad creature to discard, as he has an ability to activate from the graveyard. This will help us against the bounce/pixie decks. We have ample graveyard hate and removal for the graveyard combo decks, so I like most of our matchups against the current meta. The only thing we will have to see with time is if the meta shifts with this monster of a new set. We really have some fun cards to add here, and we are adding another type of threat to the deck. We have historically not used our graveyard for much, but now we are able to get additional value from it with a new addition. Our sideboard even has a dragon with an adventure that reads like The Meathook Massacre! I've said enough, let's check out these cards. Relevant New Cards

Free Dragons = Turn 4 Wins!

We are officially in the perpetual spoiler season of the MTG year, and Wizards has not been disappointing us. Most people can get behind a set centered largely around dragons, and it definitely helps that the plane itself is one that we have wanted to see them bring back for a long time. Over a decade later, we are going back to Tarkir. I played a good bit of Magic and did a lot of deck building the last time we had some fun dragons on Arena, and I knew that this set was going to call me back to those days. My favorite archetype a couple of years ago was Boros Dragons. I largely played that in the Alchemy format, but I am going to bring you a Boros Dragons Standard Deck today. We are going to take advantage of a combo that is used in Standard currently, but we are going to use a different payoff this time. We are going to cast dragons for FREE and then either they will have the opponent dead just from entering, or we will hopefully have a way to give them all haste! We will take a look at the new cards that are awesome. Then I'll let you know about the combo that will help us get there. We want to keep the board as clear as we can for our dragons and then slam them all on the board at once to clean things up. We also have some smaller creatures that we can use to chump block earlier in the game. When needed, we also have board wipes to deal with other creatures. New Cards from Tarkir Dragonstorm

I See a Monument and I want it Painted Black

It's been a few weeks since Aetherdrift came out, and we are starting to see the cards that are standing out in the meta. We didn't expect the set to change things too much with regard to what we have been seeing. What we did get from it is a nice supplement to many other decks. Although we did not get a ton of format-shaping cards, we have seen a couple that have lit up fringe archetypes. What I've brewed for today plays off of a familiar archetype, and it was one that we kind of already had, but it allows us to pivot in a certain way and get additional value from it that we may not have gotten in the past. One of the biggest things that our deck can do is have plenty of action on the end step/cleanup step. It's an interesting scenario because usually when we think of the cleanup step at the end of each turn, we remove damage, and we discard to hand size. Usually discarding to hand size is pretty much the final step, and there aren't any triggers... until now. We will be using Monument to Endurance to have triggers when we discard to hand size, and get additional value from it. Now we don't care if we end the turn with nine or ten cards in hand, because we are going to benefit from it. This will help us possibly get in some finishing damage against our opponent, or get extra value. It is worth noting that this will cause triggered abilities on the cleanup step, and this is something that our opponents can respond to. This has historically been a point in the turn where no player can respond to actions. We'll take a look at the relevant cards in the deck, and then I'll detail a few fun combos that we may see during gameplay. Relevant Cards

We've had a Couple of Weeks to Try Achievements on MTG Arena, and I have Opinions

The economy on MTG Arena has always been a pain point, and a grand debate over how far a digital version of a card game should go to ensure players feel as if they are getting proper value for their time. Wizards has two different versions of its beloved game on the internet, and they both seem to have their benefits and drawbacks. On February 11, Arena launched the Achievement System to reward players for hitting milestones in-game, and completing specific tasks. While it is always fun to do these kinds of things in each game, something that gamers always do is assess whether the reward for doing so in-game is worth putting forth the extra effort for the task. While there are some things in the achievement tab that I believe to be kind of fun, and certain things that I know people will want, I view the entire thing as largely a waste of time. Today we will look at why the new feature on Arena simply isn't enough for what the game should have, and what it could be. The Good and The Bad There are plenty of things that we love about Arena, with how it is the easiest way to play our favorite decks from Standard, and not spend thousands of dollars in doing so. It is probably the most efficient way to try out decks. We also love the wildcard system. Although it is not the easiest to obtain them, it is great that a rare/mythic wildcard could buy a rare/mythic card that is of any value and it still just costs one wildcard. This was especially helpful in getting a play set of Sheoldred, the Apocalypse. I still don't have a play set in paper simply because I don't want to spend that much money on it, but on Arena it was easy. I had the wildcards to do what I needed. The only part where this may be lacking is the economy itself. What if we could earn wildcards for hitting certain achievements (I.E. the achievement tab giving us wildcards instead of sleeves, etc.)? I believe that the rewards from this new feature being solely cosmetic underscores the ongoing issue of the economy on Arena simply not being enough for us.

This Deck is Sneaky Good! Get Ready for RAKDOS Dragons!