RPTQ Prep Week 0

Once again, I'll be attempting to chronicle my preparation process for the upcoming Modern RPTQ. Since I won the PPTQ in early September, I haven't played much Modern at all. I spent a lot of time practicing limited for GP Denver. I've also been messing around on MTG Arena (short review: I like it). Otherwise, I haven't been playing much at all.

I'm calling it Week 0 to go over what little I have done that wasn't focused testing for RPTQ. At this stage, it is most likely I'll be playing Bant Spirit again. I won the PPTQ with it, and it won the most recent GP, so I don't see much reason to switch to something else. However, I'm always willing to try something new, and when I get my brew hat on I can play a bunch of random stuff just for fun.

Kelvin Chew Bant

I put together the Kelvin Chew Bant list in paper to play between rounds at GP Denver. I only played it against UW Control. I could not see how this deck ever wins despite playing a lot of cards I like quite a bit. UW is probably not the best matchup. Voice of Resurgence is unplayable against Terminus. It has similar style to the Todd Stevens style GW deck I had success with last year, but is more tempo oriented without any larger creatures to pressure the opponent. I'm sure it is fine, and the Jaces and Teferis I had in the SB were very strong but it didn't seem like anything special.

One thing I noticed while sleeving this deck though was how good Meddling Mage is, especially with Spell Queller. Meddling Mage is one of the reasons Humans is so strong, and I found in games against UW I was actively looking for all the Mages I could find with this deck. With those lessons in mind, I decided to try something new.

Meddling Mage Spirits

Merfolk master Nikachu has been playing a few copies of Peek in his latest lists. Given the similarities of Merfolk and Spirits, I wondered about including Peek in a straight UW shell. It gives another turn 1 play, and could also allow for playing Meddling Mage. Many Spirits decks play Thalia, a card I'm not a huge fan of in the list. I thought Meddling Mage could fill that slot, especially with Peek in the deck. I played this list in a MTGO league and did not have much success. Peek making your cards costs 1 more off the top was very annoying, and the Meddling Mages didn't do enough when I resolved them. I was still rusty a bit so maybe that lead to some losses, but I don't think this is the upside for sticking with two colors.

Merfolk, yet again

I'll probably always go back to Merfolk every few months. I just enjoy it so much, even when I know its much worse than Humans and Spirits now. After seeing the not-so-obvious-to-me synergy between Noble Hierarch and Aether Vial, I decided to go back to my Noble Hierarch Merfolk CoCo list and add Vial back in. I also finally got to play some reps with Merfolk Trickster in Modern. You don't have a basic forest so Field of Ruin can be a problem for casting CoCo, but Tideshaper Mystic can always help fix your mana. The deck was surprisingly resilient, much more so that Spirits or Humans thanks to Silvergill Adept and some spice in the SB like Kumena and Jace. Overall the deck is fine, but adding green doesn't really get you enough SB cards to make it worth it to me.

Combo Elves

One final deck I attempted to play was a more combo-focused Elves list with Cloudstone Curio and Beast Whisperer. The thinking was that Beast Whisperer could be a Glimpse of Nature you can Summoner's Pact for. I don't have the exact list I played but it was almost entirely 4 ofs with singleton Walking Ballista and Craterhoof Behemoth. I found that actually trying to combo off on MTGO is a huge pain. Also I don't think you have time to take off a turn to cast Cloudstone Curio in Modern, though it was very good without going infinite, just looping Elvish Visionary and Dwynen's Elite could really get out of hand. Beast Whisperer was probably 1 mana too expensive. If it didn't die to Lightning Bolt it may have more potential. Glimps of Nature you can cast for value early (say turn 3 or 4) just to draw a few cards and set up for future, but Beast Whisperer doesn't let you do this. Drawing multiple Summoner's Pacts while trying to play a fair game was very terrible.

Next Week(s)

I have one other brew I may play if I have time, but otherwise I imagine it's going to be focused entirely on Bant Spirits. There still seems to be lots of variations and no real consensus yet on several cards. I want to start honing in on exactly what I want and like.