![]() ![]() The Great Churnīeginning in May, the middle of the year saw what I'm going to call the Great Churn. Dredge was able to sneak through the cracks and continue to find success until the end of the month. The only reason to attack Phoenix's graveyard is Phoenix itself, and so players relied on Surgical Extraction, to my consternation. Dredge is very resilient to one-shot hate, but struggles against persistent hate. Ironically for a graveyard deck, Dredge was able to piggyback off Phoenix's success thanks to Phoenix diluting anti-grave sideboard cards. The usual players from 2018 continued to put up numbers and see success, none more than Dredge. Outside Phoenix, the metagame looked rather unremarkable. At the start of May, it looked like Phoenix's reign was coming to an end, as predation had kicked in and the metagame was adapting. Reflector Mage is also very strong in a matchup where opponents rely on the bounce-able Thing in the Ice as board interaction. Of the options, Humans made the most sense in that role, since Thalia, Guardian of Thraben, the natural enemy of velocity, was an integral piece of the deck. By the end of the month, Humans had situated itself as a clear challenger to Phoenix. Players had caught on that the key to fighting Phoenix wasn't actually going after Phoenix itself, but the cantrips that fueled the engine. However, in April, the tide began to turn. Phoenix took over as Modern's most successful deck judging by Top 8s and Day 2 presence during March 2019. Thing in the Ice proved to be a house against creature decks and a surprisingly robust threat in its own rite. Izzet Phoenix's high velocity let it play a very consistent gameplan while Manamorphose and Faithless Looting allowed it to blitz any deck that couldn't disrupt its engine. With Ironworks gone, the metagame began to coalesce around Arclight Phoenix. ![]() Therefore, they decided to preemptively nuke Ironworks, the presumptive best deck the metagame then largely reverted to its 2018 state. ![]() There was also the problem of Ironworks being really boring to watch. The deck had started showing up in quantity at events despite a relative drought, and was beating hate despite its weaknesses being known. Krark-Clan Ironworks had tremendous success in the hands of Matt Nass early in 2018, and Wizards was concerned about its non-interactivity and resilience eventually taking over Modern. From the ScrapheapĢ019 kicked off with the metagame being disrupted by an unexpected banning. The future is impossible to predict, but can be guessed at given current trends today, we'll search for those that appear to persist despite the metagame's churn. Another part consists of identifying trends that may influence the 2020 metagame. Part of the process involves charting the ups and downs of a wild year in Modern. Just like last year, today I'll be looking back on 2019's metagame. Having spent the year tracking those twists and turns, it's now time to recap and learn from them. Applied to Magic, such proverbs encourage every player to duly note how the metagame evolves and develops over a competitive year. In Modern, those who do not observe the metagame are doomed to be passed by. The saying goes that those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it. ![]()
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