Gonna talk about Modern Horizons 2 in this post, but let's talk about Historic a little first.
Here's a list for my first foray into Kolaghan's Command land. I'd recently been on a Dragonsguard Elite and Young Pyromancer kick, but maybe Knight of the Ebon Legion is just the way to go. It's less splashy, but it's only one mana and it's never awful. Also, I already was down on Esika's Chariot after lots of decks started playing Prismari Command, and now with Kolaghan's Command it looks even worse.
Kolaghan's Command itself has been a solid addition, but I wouldn't say it's solving any problems we have already. What's great about it is that making the opponent discard a card is excellent in this deck, whereas it might be worse in other builds, since we have so much discard already. Also getting back a creature has some great value, since they could be Ooze or Ebon Legion, hence the power of Inscription of Ruin. But popping off their cheap creatures and gaining some value is already something that Bonecrusher Giant does really well, and gaining some card advantage with some flexibility added in is something that Inscription does really well. I like it, but I don't think it makes the deck broken or anything.
With that out of the way...
It's been a while since I played or wrote about Modern, so let's get into it. This thing looks awesome.
I'm not the hugest fan of mana dorks. It's kind of not really the game I like to be playing. But opponents who play Noble Hierarch end up having such a huge advantage that it changed my mind in Modern. In spite of my efforts to always reduce the average mana costs in the spells in my decks, I still lose games with cards in my hand I didn't have time to cast. Everything in the format is better when it gets into play faster, and being able to keep pace is huge.
As for whether or not this is going to see play in Modern Jund, I think it kind of has to. It's too good. If Deathrite Shaman taught us anything, it's that even if you're not in the market for mana acceleration, when it's really good you should just play it anyways. You'll get a boost when you draw it and you'll be fine when you don't.
Speaking of that, what, if any, changes need to be made to accomodate this? We're going to be playing a deck that is capable of acceleration, but won't draw it every game, and also won't be expecting it to survive that often when we do draw it. This means we can't go hog wild and play all four drops or whatever. But when we do in fact draw it, we need to make sure the cost of the cards in our hand is worth the boost in mana. Hierarch does basically nothing in a hand full of all one drop spells. Jund loves cards that are versatile, but what we are looking for now are cards that are versatile in their mana cost, or get much better if they land earlier.
Liliana is already a huge one, of course. A second turn Liliana is backbreaking against a lot of decks. Also, Liliana is a card that rewards us for emptying our hand quickly, since her +1 doesn't affect you if your hand is empty. So yeah, play Liliana in Jund, got it. Liliana the Last Hope also looks solid, since you're a turn earlier getting to ultimate, and more likely to pick off an opposing X/1. Note that there will be more X/1s in the format after MH2, including opposing Hierarchs. Bloodbraid also likes to hit the board early, but Hierarch isn't going to be the greatest cascade, so that's a maybe. Hexdrinker and Scavenging Ooze are cards that you can pump excess mana into, and also are threatening enough to win the game on their own, which makes a less threat-dense deck still able to compete. Dark Confidant and Kolaghan's Command are excellent at giving you card advantage, recovering from the low-impactness of the Hierarch, and Ignoble Hierarch is excellent at making sure you can cast your new found cards.
I don't know if you want to play Abundant Harvest in a deck with Hierarch. Harvest is good at giving you action when you want it and mana when you want it, and Hierarch throws a wrench in that plan. Hierarch does, however, let you use your Harvest for spells more often, and/or helps alleviate the fact that the spell you find essentially costs and additional green mana. I could be convinced either way.
Thoughtseize and Inquisition of Kozilek specifically are not excellent with Hierarch. The point discard spells are good because they are cheap, and they pare the game down so you can grind the opponent out. Hierarch gives you extra mana, which means it doesn't matter as much that they're cheap, and is low impact by itself, making it hard to grind the opponent out. One thing that Hierarch does, though, is make your life total less of a problem, since you're less likely to get run over by fast opposing starts, or you can afford to play shocklands tapped more often. That makes Thoughtseize look a little better than Inquisition. Plus, Thoughtseize is a better answer to Wraths and Cryptic Commands and stuff, which is the best way for the opponent to get back in the game after a quick Hierarch start. I expect to see fewer discard spells overall and leaning more towards Thoughtseize with Hierarch in the deck.
Castle Locthwain is a card that strikes me as working nicely with Ignoble Hierarch. You can empty your hand faster, you don't have to worry about your life total as much, and you'll be in the market for drawing more action to make up for the Hierarch itself. Creature lands like Treetop Village and Raging Ravine accomplish this as well, and work nicely with the Exalted trigger, but enter the battlefield tapped, which kind of dampens the benefit of the Hierarch anyways.
I'll touch on Grief for a bit, but I don't think it's actually that great. What Grief has going for it in future versions of Jund is that it's solid in hands that have Ignoble Hierarch and in hands that don't. 3/2 Thoughtseize guy for four mana looks much better when you cast it on turn three and it actually attacks for four, and using Unmask starts to look better when you're trying to keep up on tempo because you didn't draw your Hierarch. My initial evaluation is that Grief isn't what we want to be doing in Jund, but I could certainly be wrong about that, given its flexibility.
Tourach, on the other hand, I really like. Similarly to a card like Valki, the unkicked version of the card isn't something you'd play by itself, but can do some work and make life annoying for the opponent. Protection from White is kind of a big deal, and it grows with a lot of the cards in the deck, including Liliana and Kolaghan's Command, but also extra copies of itself. It gets around the legend rule because your opponent discarding two cards and putting two +1/+1 counters on your creature is a fine thing to be doing. Plus, if you can get it to trade off early, you might be able to finagle a way to get it back in your hand with Liliana the Last Hope or Kolaghan's Command and nail 'em later on.
The kicked version of this card is a monster. Random discard is extremely powerful. Lots of times this will be nabbing the last two cards in their hand, so it doesn't matter, but when you hit their Scapeshift or whatever out of a full hand, it's incredible. Add to that Tourach himself will just kill them super fast and you've got a card that's just incredible. It does everything we want in a deck with Ignoble Hierarch, since it's better the earlier it comes down, it's a fast clock, it recoups the card advantage lost from Hierarch, and it's got a safety valve for when you don't have the Hierarch and just need to get something on the board quickly. A truly incredible card.
So I've seen a lot of folks talking about Ragavan on the ol' World Wide Web. Some have called it the best red one drop ever, and possibly even the best one drop creature in Legacy. But it seems like most of the hoard of Jund fanatics out there are silent on Ragavan. If Ragavan is as good as they're saying it is, I think it's great in Jund, and here's why. Consider Ohran Viper.
Why does Jund not play this card? Well, because it's situational in that it has to attack to do anything, it doesn't have a ton of toughness, it's not that great on defense, drawing an extra card doesn't help that much, it doesn't actually close the game. That's all true, but the real reason we don't play Ohran Viper is because it costs too much mana. If it cost one mana, we'd play it. Ragavan is good because it's way cheaper than it should be. It gives you a bunch of options and a random assortment of value that you can do whatever you want with, for just one mana. If the best one drop creature is in your colors and the only condition it has to make it effective is that your opponent has a life total, then you should play it.
I like that Ragavan can act as a pseudo Ignoble Hierarch for when you don't draw one in your newly Hierarch-tuned deck. Also, Ragavan looks like it's exceptional with Hierarch, in that it likes to attack for three on the second turn, right into any one power creatures they might have, and that you want to have extra mana with which to cast the cards you steal with Ragavan.
Thoughtseize and Inquisition are nice with Ragavan, since they clear out opposing removal for it, and the bevy of removal we play also helps clear the way for Ragavan to get in. I'm not a hundred percent sold on Ragavan being an automatic four of, since it's legendary, but jeez. It gets around the legend rule by just winning the game if they don't kill it. What a card.
Here is an early sketch of what the deck might look like. Please disregard the dollar amounts next to the cards, it will only make you sad.
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Those four cards are the main ones I'm interested thus far from this set, but there's a lot to like here. I'm sure more cards will trickle in for Jund, and there's plenty of cool stuff to talk about outside of Jund colors. I've been interested in getting the ol' Magic Online account up and running again to play some Modern, but we'll see. I can play Jund in Historic free to play, and Jund in Modern is, ah, not. I'd love to make some Modern Jund content again like I did a while ago, including in the early stages of this blog and my Youtube channel. That about does it for today, thanks for reading.
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