$8 Modern

[Technics]

I absolutely love zubera decks. You can run a whole mess of board wipes with them too if you want so you don't need a sac outlet those are probably pretty good against the other decks too. Added bonus is there are so many board wipes that you don't even need Pyroclasm or other cards that might be over a quarter.

Board wipes are better because then they all see eachather hit the bin for maximum zeberaness. I just grabbed a list off the mothership since what I used to run involved fecundity and damnation which is way more than the 8$ budget here. However the core is dirt cheap so there is a ton of room to build it out to any budget you want.

[Zilla]

Hi. I'm kinda necroing this thread, but someone axed me to tell how it went when I finally got around to playing this silly format, and I did, so I am.

Not having any idea at all where to start, I originally built frafen's All-In Red list from page one of this thread. Got all the cards for it and everything. I then playtested the deck with a friend of mine who plays a lot of Pauper. He happened to have a few decks that were fairly close to legal in this format. From playing with him I determined that I'm really not really a fan of All-In Red. It's not frafen's fault; I just realized I disliked the deck for the very reason I originally chose it: it's incredibly simple and straightforward, with very little variation from game to game. You typically go all in on a single threat and your opponent either has answers or they don't. If they do, you just lose. It turned out, my opponent frequently did. And even when he didn't, winning didn't feel that fun. Long story short, I wanted something with slightly more interactivity.

Ironically, I ended up building a modified version of my friend's Pauper Mono-G Stompy and taking that to the first tournament. This was the list:

Mono-G Stompy

3 Nettle Sentinel
4 Skarrgan Pit-Skulk
4 Young Wolf
3 Dryad Militant
2 Vault Skirge
4 Silhana Ledgewalker
2 Nest Invader
3 Garruk's Companion

4 Vines of Vastwood
3 Gather Courage
3 Hunger of the Howlpack
4 Giant Growth
3 Bonesplitter

18 Forest

Cost-wise I only had like 4 cents left over, so no sideboard.

I didn't keep notes because the tournament was in a bar and I was too busy sipping Maker's to write stuff down. In a nutshell:

A lot of people weren't able to make it so it ended up just being me and 4 other guys. It was a real casual affair (obviously.) We just played each other person there 2 out of 3. I went 0-2, 1-2, 2-0, 2-0. I lost badly to a B/W Midrange deck with lots of removal, Oblivion Rings, Vampire Nighthawks, Tidehow Scullers, etc. The second match was against a guy with a combo deck that sacked artifacts to draw cards and gain life and then generate 4/4 angel tokens with an enchantment based on life gain that I don't remember the name of. Third match was against a guy with a Zombie combo deck that I never really saw work because I won so fast. I felt bad because he got kinda mana screwed both games. Last guy had beaten every other person there with a U/R midrange deck with a bunch of ramp, burn, mass removal, Wildfire, and Frost Titan. Again, I never saw any of that because I won so fast, but I think I got lucky there. He sideboarded in Pyroclasms and shit but never managed to draw them. I won both games against him by or before turn 5.

I'm told that people rarely bring the same deck to these tournaments, so next time the meta will be completely different. This little experience reminded me that I still like Magic, so I've spent a bunch of time researching budget Modern (heretofore I had played exactly zero Modern and knew nothing about the format.) I've built and tested roughly 30 different decks on Cockatrice. The vast majority of the decks I've tried have been terrible, but a few have been pretty good. There's a U/R counter-burnish deck based on Flashback cards and Burning Vengeance that was surprisingly effective, a solid Mono-B Control deck that works well, and what I think is probably one of the strongest decks in the format, a budget version of B/W Tokens. It's done really well in testing, and it's what I'll be taking to the next one of these little tournaments:

B/W Tokens

Creatures (4)
4 Tidehollow Sculler

Token Generators (16)
4 Midnight Haunting
4 Spectral Procession
4 Lingering Souls
4 Raise the Alarm

Buffs (8)
4 Intangible Virtue
4 Honor of the Pure

Removal (5)
3 Murderous Cut
2 Condemn

Disruption (4)
2 Castigate
2 Duress

Lands (23)
4 Scoured Barrens
10 Plains
9 Swamp

Sideboard (15)
3 Nihil Spellbomb
3 Disenchant
2 Celestial Flare
1 Duress
2 Stain the Mind
3 Zealous Persecution
1 Harsh Sustenance

Anyway, this is probably way more information than anyone cares about, but I've been having a lot of fun experimenting with the format. If anyone feels like trying it out with me, I can always use people to test with on Cockatrice. :)

[Bed Decks Palyer]

That WB deck you plan to use is really nice. I like the "duals" in there. Those are really nice cards. Shame that all of our lgs turned into "real" decks only. (Or EDH deathtrap.) If there'd be anyone to play casually with, I'd build piles of such piles.

[kirkusjones]

Zilla, could you post some of the other decklists you've messed around with? I've been playing EDH with one of my students, but I'd like to have him try other formats/have games we can squeeze into a lunch period.

[Zilla]

Like I said, the majority of the lists I tried were pretty crappy. Aside from Mono-G Stompy and B/W Tokens, the other two decks I have the most faith in are:

U/R Burning Vengeance

3 Desperate Ravings
4 Geistflame
4 Shock
3 Think Twice
4 Faithless Looting
4 Pillar of Flame
4 Pyroclasm

3 Mana Leak
2 Dissipate

4 Burning Vengeance
2 Secrets of the Dead

10 Island
13 Mountain

The Shocks can be Bolts if you're not worried about sticking hard and fast to the $8 rule. Just slow the opponent's creatures with removal in the early game, draw a bunch of cards and fill your yard, then win the long game with flashback cards + face damage from Burning Vengeance. The maindecked Pyroclasms do a lot to keep it in the game against fast aggro. Because the majority of the format is very creature based, and this runs zero creatures, your opponents often have many dead cards pre-board. Behind B/W Tokens, this is my favorite deck in the format.


Mono-Black Control

4 Chittering Rats
3 Gatekeeper of Malakir
4 Gray Merchant of Asphodel
2 Gurmag Angler
4 Vampire Nighthawk

3 Disfigure
3 Geth's Verdict
2 Murderous Cut
2 Tendrils of Corruption
1 Corrupt
3 Drown in Sorrow
3 Duress
3 Sign in Blood

23 Swamp

This deck capitalizes on the fact that the vast majority of the decks in the format are creature-based. By and large, it wrecks these decks hard. It actually doesn't have a strong game against the B/W Tokens deck though, because most of its removal is 1 for 1, and Tokens tends to be able to win that war of attrition. Still a fun deck to play. Vampire Nighthawk is one of the strongest creatures in the format, imo.


EDIT: Here's a list my friend was testing against me with decent results. It's classic weenie aggro and clocks in at a whopping $5:

Mono-White Soldiers

4 Boros Elite
2 Celestial Flare
4 Dryad Militant
4 Elite Vanguard
3 Kor Aeronaut
3 Loyal Cathar
4 Soldier of the Pantheon
2 Veteran Armorsmith
3 Veteran Swordsmith
4 Precinct Captain

3 Raise the Alarm
1 Journey to Nowhere
2 Spear of Heliod
1 Sunlance

20 Plains

[frafen]

You could play a deck without creature to punish decks that play lots of creature removals. I have started developing a creatureless control deck, you could call it "burn aggro-control" since the deck can play both roles (and for this reason the gameplan isn't as linear as classic burn). The main engine of the deck is ghirapur aether grid that in this deck is almost as good as koth of the hammer ultimate.

A 8$ version of the deck could be:

2 lightning bolt
4 pyrite spellbomb
4 galvanic blast
4 shrapnel blast
2 staggershock
2 burst lightning

4 conjurer's bauble
4 chromatic sphere
4 prophetic prism
4 ichor wellspring

3 ghirapur aether grid
3 thoughtcast

4 darksteel citadel
2 swiftwater cliffs
1 izzet boilerworks
3 ghitu encampment
1 hellion crucible
6 mountain
3 island

total 7,3$

You could also maindeck pyroclasms to help against aggro but maybe isn't necessary. Also you could consider some mana leak or izzet charm as counterspells. For the sideboard is nice ensoul artifact but it'll be hard to fit it in the 8$ budget.

[Zilla]

Thanks for the list, frafen. It looks like a similar concept to the U/R Burning Vengeance list I posted above, except using artifacts and Aether Grid over flashback and Burning Vengeance. I'll give your list some testing and let you know what I think.

[frafen]

You are welcome. I'm not too sure about the mana base since I never played this version. I like wandering fumarole but it's out of budget. If you want you could try some number of faerie conclave, radiant fountain (maybe with more izzet boilerworks), blighted gorge in place of the islands.

The UR Burning vengeance deck looks pretty good, I would only add 2-3 dual lands to make the mana base a bit better. I would try izzet boilerworks since it's good in combination with faithless looting.

EDIT Just realized that probably terrarion is better than chromatic sphere.