dknight27

Thought scour hits hard because decks run lots of delve and snapcasters. This deck has 2 delve cards, and by the time you get to them you will have more than enough material, so i would say opt is the better fit. Personally, i think opt is the best tactics card for modern control, as instant speed helps a lot both early game and late, and the pre-scry sees fewer cards than serum visions but cuts down on the useless topdeck lands in hand.

Not trying to start a fight here, just saying that in competitive modern you are giving opponent 2-3 turns minimum to hit you with an inquisition of kozilek, thoughtseize, negate, remand, logic knot, mana leak, abrupt decay, vendilion clique, or spell pierce which will shut you down cold, and the saturation of these cards in competitive modern is nearly 90%.

Also, because you have no direct interaction at all, and only 3 nodes and 4 halos for indirect interaction, you are extremely vulnerable to the devastatingly fast win conditions that are also supersaturated in modern, like delver, goyf, young pyromancer, scavenging ooze, or the fast zoo critters. So, assuming opponent has the interaction to stop your turn 3 drop, which is almost inevitable in competitive modern, you are going to see a win condition dropped followed by interaction that stops you from gaining control, and the win condition is off to the races before you get anything on the field. What's more, even if your deck does what you want and opponent doesn't pin you down in the first 3 turns, you are still looking at dropping 1 card per turn for the next several turns, giving opponent time to catch up.

Games 2 and 3 are a variable, as some decks run lots of non-critter hate in the board and some don't.

I'm not saying its a bad idea or a bad deck, i love prison builds and mechanics. I'm just saying in competitive magic, including modern, the most important variable by far is speed, and if you let opponent dictate the pace and get ahead you will most likely lose, so by dropping the 3-drops to more 2-drops and 1-drops you will statistically do better.

I personally always want to work in dark confidant in builds like this, but that's me. And ya, Claim would be perfect. If you needed to you could morph this into grixis and go for it, but I don't think it's necessary. Looks good as is.

Unfortunately Rofellos is banned

Is this supposed to be competitive? Also, are we working with any budgetary issues?

This is sleek as can be. Good work

I would think search for azcanta would fit nicely in here. Clearly this deck wants to grind out a long game, and azcanta in either form does that fantastically.

Fair enough, it is right at home in builds like this

Even with 26 lands, a casual glance at this looks too top heavy for me. You won't be playing anything turn 1 or 2 basically ever, turn 3 will most likely be choked out, and by then it wont matter when you hit the stride this deck wants at 4-5 drops.

Just my thoughts

I'm not the biggest fan of maxed out niv's in here. You don't want to see it early whatsoever, and 4 copies is gunna translate into a lot of dead draws. Just my thought

Have you had good play with 4 claim//fame? I'm personally not into running 4 of semi-conditional cards as they can give bad openings hands and draw some mulligans and dead draws. This deck has 18 delicious targets, and it's vexing devil's best friend, all of which are fantastic, just wondering if you'd considered dropping it to 3 so you are more likely to not see it in the opening hand where it doesn't have a direct benefit.

What format are you looking to run this in? Just casual?

Transmuter is a 4 drop that dies to literally every form of removal in magic and has to survive a turn before it can be used.

The curve on this build is really really high, even for a 24 land build

I think brutality is going to work better. Salvage won't fetch non-critters, which is what I want it to fetch (besides the mill), and brutality combos perfectly with life from the loam, and helps a touch with the bleeding from confidant.

I'm not a fan of 2 copies of ancestral vision, as you won't be seeing it often in the opening hand and its a horrendous top deck. But that's me

Even for a casual build, I'm seeing an imbalance between the curve, the lands, and the accel in here. 24 lands is fine, especially with the man lands and tactical lands, which i love, but not when combined with the accel vs curve you have going here. 3 birds and 2 cultivates and 24 lands is overkill. I would drop out the cultivates. 24 lands and 3 birds is more than enough.

I've also never been a fan of novablast worm in builds like this, as you are running more than a third of your deck as critters, so he will nuke you just as hard or harder than opponent. There are better options for big baddies, and if you are using him for the critter removal, you could always just up the spot removal (white has tons).

Just my thoughts, I know it's a casual build but still worth mentioning

Im thinking of swapping out grisley salvage for collective brutality. Thoughts?

There are a few areas of improvement I see that could be made in here. Supernatural stamina and bontu's monument don't do what decks like this want to do, which is hit the ground fast and hard and maximize the material.

This is how I would build a modern rat deck.

https://www.mtgvault.com/dknight27/decks/modern-rats-3/

Pure speed and swarm with enough discard to protect yourself

Unfortunately this deck is WAY too 3-drop heavy, and has too high a curve to be able to compete in modern. Basically nothing is going to get done till turn 3 (assuming you have the 3 lands), and even then it will be turns of dropping 1 card per turn until you field the 5th or 6th land, and by then opponent will already have what he needs or be able to say no to whatever you're doing.