Welcome Magic lovers!
With another six weeks until the massive Standard rotation hits, with the arrival of Bloomburrow on August 2nd, many players on Magic Arena have been taking time away from the now three-year-old format to play with the all-new Modern Horizons 3 set which dropped online last week. It's currently legal in Timeless and Historic, and while these online-only formats can be a blast to play, many competitive players look forward to specifically engaging with these special sets in Limited, as they're often very fun and well-balanced. Additionally, this one will also be the official draft format of the upcoming Pro Tour.
To that end, we'll be giving an overview of the Modern Horizons 3 draft environment on Arena, how the format looks after the first week of drafting, and some suggestions on how to steer your drafts in the right direction.
Be Proactive
First and foremost, when delving into a new set, one must ask themselves: what is the 'speed' of the format? This generally refers to how quickly and consistently decks will be able to kill their opponents in a typical game. For example, a format with a lot of aggressively-costed, high-power one and two-mana cost creatures at common, or a format where a lot of the cheap creatures have abilities that encourage them to attack, such as first strike, menace and flying, would be considered a 'fast' format. Sets with mechanics that encourage aggression, like the toxic mechanic in Phyrexia All Will be One, also contribute to making a format much faster, as they generally encourage attacking as often as possible. Alternatevely, a format with insufficient or expensive removal may also fall on the 'fast' end of the spectrum. Examples of formats like this are the aforementioned Phyrexia All Will be One, The Brothers' War and the original Zendikar set.
Modern Horizons 3 is almost certainly going to rank as a format that skews toward the 'fast' side, with many efficiently-costed creatures with aggressive stats, particularly in the Eldrazi camp. With over forty different mechanics, not all are going to lend themselves to an aggressive strategy, however, many of the ones that are printed at common certainly do. These include the abilities that fall under the 'modified' umbrella, such as bestow, outlast, backup and reinforce. The decks that rely on the energy-producing mechanic are also generally making a lot of cheap, early plays and snowballing very quickly before reaching the mid-late game. The Eldrazi are also overpowered for their mana costs, and despite being a bit trickier to cast due to their colorless requirements, the set is so full of fantastic colorless mana-fixing that it hardly seems to be a drawback.
Thus, the first lesson regarding the Modern Horizons 3 format is: make sure you draft plenty of early plays, including lots of two-mana spells, in order to either beat the opponents down with a proactive strategy, or stave off the onslaught if the enemy is the one employing the aggressive plan. There are many color combinations that can be aggressive in this format, with the most common being red-green, green-white, red-white and red-black. The colors green, white and red have the highest concentration of excellent early plays to the board, while the red-black deck is a bit of an outlier as it specifically revolves around an artifact synergy to enact its aggressive plan.
The Eldrazi
Indeed, the commons with the highest win rate (according to 17lands data) all belong in these colors, including the incredible Writhing Chrysalis, with an eye-watering 66.1% win rate at the time of this writing. Despite being four mana, not three, it has such an outsized impact on the board once its cast that it propels its pilot far ahead in the game. It stonewalls the opponents early rush by putting three creatures on the board on turn three, after an early Malevolent Rumble. It ramps its pilot up to six mana on turn four in order to slam a large threat which will certainly dwarf whatever else had been played up to that point. No threat to ramp into? Well, the Chrysalis can simply grow itself into a huge threat by sacrificing Eldrazi spawn for mana. It's hard to overstate how insane this common is, and is often one of the main reasons to be in these colors. In fact, green, red and blue are the colors where one will find the looming Eldrazi menace, and they are one of the strongest archetypes in this Limited format. With plenty of two and three-mana creatures that ramp one's mana by producing Eldrazi spawn tokens when they're cast, these decks can often play seven mana spells, or higher, by turns four or five. These huge, alien creatures often dominate everything else on the battlefield when they come down, and usually require an unconditional removal spell to deal with effectively. When determining whether or not one should jump in on this archetype, keep an eye out for the excellent, uncommon support cards in the form of Path of Annihilation and Kozilek's Unsealing, which can help ramp into and power up one's Eldrazi monsters. This strategy can be very difficult to beat once it gets up to seven or more mana, which means the key to taking it down is to go low and fast in order to kill the opponent before they can get to that stage.
Naya Aggro
Speaking of low and fast, the white-red and white-green decks are excellent at achieving victory in the minimum number of turns. It doesn't matter whether its an energy or modified subtheme that the deck is going for, commons like Hexgold Slith, and Inspired Inventor will do good work either way. Curving into the excellent Aerie Auxiliary can usually put the aggressive deck far enough ahead on the board that the opponent can't get back into the game easily. The gold, two-mana cards like Conduit Goblin and Faithful Watchdog are really what pulls these aggressive decks together, helping to force through damage while also contributing to the deck's subtheme. Powerful uncommon spells like Scurry of Gremlins, Reckless Pyrosurfer or Amped Raptor can be cast to create a huge board out of nowhere or to pump the team and swing for lethal damage.
Excellent removal in the form of red burn spells Galvanic Discharge, Fanged Flames and Reiterating Bolt as well as white unconditional removal like Static Prison, Expel the Unworthy and Dog Umbra, which can cleanly deal with any oversized Eldrazi. Even green gets some excellent, cheap 'punch' spells in Horrific Assault, Signature Slam and Stump Stomp. This gives the aggressive decks many ways to clear a path for their creatures to get through and end things quickly, so be on the lookout for these cards and prioritize them highly if one is taking this route during the draft.
Izzet Energy
The energy decks tend to cluster around the color combinations of blue-red, red-white and white-blue, and can be extremely potent if one manages to get enough of the engine pieces during the draft. These include Izzet Generatorium, Bespoke Battlewagon, Phyrexian Ironworks and Roil Cartographer. However, even just having a critical mass of cards that produce energy when they resolve is usually enough to craft a powerful energy deck. Power uncommon cards like Amped Raptor and Unstable Amulet, alongside the aforementioned Roil Cartographer, help produce card advantage, while Cyclops Superconductor, Emissary of Soulfire and Thriving Skyclaw produce three energy when they resolve, which can really give the deck an energy boost when it needs it.
The red energy-based removal like Galvanic Discharge and Reiterating Bolt can do amazing things in a properly-tuned energy deck, like taking down a 7/7 Eldrazi for one mana or blasting three or four creatures by replicating several times. While many of the energy creatures may seem underwhelming on their own, like Smelted Chargebug or simply adding more energy to the pool when they enter the battlefield is already excellent for red-blue player, as the payoffs are so overpowered. Beware the energy deck that starts amassing half a dozen energy or more, as they will certainly be capable of doing some very powerful stuff.
While there is a lot more to be said about the format, we're out of space today, so please check back in for the next part in our Modern Horizons 3 draft format breakdown!