Modern has been shaken up in a big way in the last few weeks; we’re still seeing the fallout from the Shadows over Innistrad banned and restricted announcement. The banning of Eye of Ugin appears to have brought a surge of aggressive decks featuring Goblin Guide and Wild Nacatl. On the other end, we’ve seen a number of different takes on Thopter Foundry. This leaves a more traditional combo-control deck like Scapeshift in a strange spot, because cards like Cryptic Command aren’t great when you’re fighting Goblin Guide and Thopter Foundry and you have to be able to trigger Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle enough times to win through a turn or two of Thopter Foundry plus Sword of the Meek. Tmac0544 may have the answer with this return to basics:

R/G Ramp ? Modern | Tmac0544, 5-0 Modern League

• Creatures (14)
• 1 Inferno Titan
• 2 Courser of Kruphix
• 3 Obstinate Baloth
• 4 Primeval Titan
• 4 Sakura-Tribe Elder

• Spells (21)
• 2 Pulse of Murasa
• 2 Summoning Trap
• 1 Scapeshift
• 2 Farseek
• 2 Harmonize
• 4 Anger of the Gods
• 4 Explore
• 4 Search for Tomorrow

• Lands (25)
• 3 Forest
• 7 Mountain
• 1 Blood Crypt
• 1 Bloodstained Mire
• 2 Cinder Glade
• 3 Stomping Ground
• 4 Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle
• 4 Wooded Foothills

• Sideboard (15)
• 3 Ancient Grudge
• 2 Chandra, Flamecaller
• 2 Damping Matrix
• 1 Duplicant
• 1 Hornet Queen
• 1 Krosan Grip
• 3 Lightning Bolt
• 1 Pithing Needle
• 1 Seal of Primordium

Buy This Deck

There are a number of very interesting things about the way this deck is built. First, notice the distinct lack of Scapeshifts in this deck. Rather than single-mindedly focusing on hitting seven or eight lands and resolving a Scapeshift, this deck wants the ability to go bigger. You can accomplish this by playing Primeval Titan alongside the full four Valakuts and an abundance of mountains to trigger them. This gives you the ability to deal absolutely enormous quantities of damage if the game goes on long enough and allows you to use your first few Valakut triggers as removal spells to stabilize the board without threatening your ability to actually win the game.

It’s also important to note this deck has shifted away from counter spells. Instead, this deck plays sweepers to clean up aggressive creatures, Summoning Trap to fight counter spells, and Pulse of Murasa to get extra points in the aggressive matchups. Pulse is particularly strong because it can pick up fetchlands to ensure that you hit a land drop, Sakura-Tribe Elder to function as a blocker plus a ramp spell, or a Primeval Titan later on in the game.

This deck is exciting because it shows a huge shift in the format. Rather than Scapeshift trying to race, you have to be able to beat both the early aggressive starts, but also win a long game where your opponent can gain large quantities of life. Tmac0544 accomplishes both of these goals in a rather elegant way by focusing on the Green and Red cards over the Blue cards, which allows the deck to interact more proactively with the format.