| Have you solved the Eldrazi problem yet? I spent the last weekend trying to solve it on Magic Online, but came up quite short in my efforts. It's not to say that the various takes of Eldrazi in Modern are unbeatable, but it sure is a tougher nut to crack than I anticipated. Cards like Ensnaring Bridge and Living End are very powerful against the aliens that are running roughshod over Zendikar, but somehow Thought‑Knot Seer and company keep finding a way to come out on top. What is one to do? Is it time to give in and try to find the best Eldrazi deck? That's what many appear to be doing, as I have seen B/R Eldrazi, Mono-Red Eldrazi, and even Temur Eldrazi in the past few days. Or, do you try to beat the Eldrazi? Lantern Control looks to be great against Modern's newest deck, but that deck is very tough to play unless you're Zac Elsik or Sam Black. If you're like me, you're still deciding what to do. But as the days go by and #SCGLOU creeps closer, it's time for all of us to make a decision. Well, except for Matthias Hunt, Ryan Overturf, Nick Miller, and the rest of the @SCGLive crew. They'll be watching all of the crazy Modern action unfold this weekend in the Derby City as we all finally find out whether someone can stop the Eldrazi. Jace, Gideon, Nissa, and Chandra couldn't beat them. Can someone on the SCG Tour? Find out this weekend at twitch.tv/scglive! — Cedric Phillips, Media Manager @CedricAPhillips |  |  | Creating A Monster Modern is the talk of the town, but when it comes to figuring out Standard, Brad Nelson is on it. After a conversation with SCG Tour rising star Andy Ferguson, Nelson made Top 8 of the MOCS Playoff Event with an updated version of Bant Company. How does Brad feel about the deck? Read along to find out! |  | Ross VS. Majors: U/R Twin VS. U/R Eldrazi Many lamented the banning of Splinter Twin as the powerful enchantment enabled a resilient strategy that kept many explosive decks in check. But would Splinter Twin being legal have stopped Eldrazi from dominating the Pro Tour? Ross Merriam and Michael Majors decided to test that theory. |  | Video: Living End In Modern With everyone trying to figure out the best way to beat Eldrazi in Modern, who better to join the fray than a Modern Pro Tour champion? Shaun McLaren decided to dust off his non-Jeskai wand to give Living End a spin through an Eldrazi-infested metagame. Did the powerful sorcery get the job done? Watch and see! | | | | | It looks like we're all in luck! Justin Parnell, Stephen Green, Jonathan Suarez, and Wes Wise bring us the second installment of Random Goodness in Episode 5 of Commander VS. Find out which Commanders are given out and who can rise to the occasion when the variance knob is turned to 11! |  | | Colorless or U/R? As the SCG Tour rolls into #SCGLOU this weekend, that's the main question people will be asking. Which flavor of Eldrazi will be more prevalent, and which should they play? With Pro Tour Oath of the Gatewatch showing that Eldrazi Mimic, Reality Smasher, and friends are a real force to be reckoned with, you're either going to Louisville prepared to handle the alien monsters or to play them yourself. I would choose the former, taking a list that gained very little from the new set and should be fast enough to match up with all but the fastest Eye of Ugin-enabled starts. My choice for the weekend would be Goryo's Vengeance. | | This list is based on the deck Bob Huang took to the finals of #SCGCHA with some changes for personal preference to adjust for the post-PT metagame. Jace, Vryn's Prodigy  I know Bob is not a huge fan of Jace in the list, preferring Night's Whisper and Izzet Charm in the two-drop card-draw slots. With the Eldrazi decks dealing so much damage so fast, I would prefer to not hit myself for two life when I likely need to stay above 14 life in order to draw enough cards to go off when Griselbrand hits the battlefield. Jace gives me early card draw and can later flash back Serum Visions or a Goryo's Vengeance. Don't forget that you can also Vengeance back a Jace, tap it, and flip your Jace to avoid losing it to exile. Through the Breach  This is probably the most versatile card in the deck. You will win a non-zero number of games just by powering out an early Through the Breach and dropping Worldspine Wurm on the battlefield. It's also how we're winning most of our games, using it to get Borborygmos Enraged on to the battlefield to throw lands at our opponent. We're aided in both these tasks by the fact that Through the Breach is actually cheaper to splice than it is to cast, which works particularly well with Nourishing Shoal being free. Alternately, I guess we can also just put Griselbrand on the battlefield? Yeah, that might be OK. Desperate Ritual  I would play four copies of this card if I could fit them in, which is very different from how other players build the deck. I am more aggressive in going for the win than most, and having the extra ways to get to four mana once I have a hand full of cards enables that. Having the extra Desperate Rituals also gives our deck the Splinter Twin-like feel of "I cannot tap out against them" because we could get up to five mana from nowhere and just win. An important tip: if you can splice one Rituals onto another, do so. In fact, it's almost always correct to splice a Ritual any time you have an extra 2 mana since there is very little downside. Nourishing Shoal  It's almost impossible to win with this deck without Worldspine Wurm being involved, but I would consider Nourishing Shoal to be the key card in the deck. Yes, it's the key to being able to draw our deck once we reanimate Griselbrand. Yes, it lets us get a Borborygmos Enraged on the battlefield for a discount thanks to splice. It's also insurance against aggro, a way around the otherwise-bad-news Chalice of the Void on two, and can be exiled by another copy of Shoal in a pinch. Izzet Charm  The versatility of this card is impressive in the deck. Being able to discard Griselbrand at the end of the opponent's turn lets us untap and reanimate it without needing extra mana sources. The two damage to a creature is incredibly important in a world with Meddling Mage, Gaddock Teeg, Scavenging Ooze, and Phyrexian Revoker. Countering non-creature spells protects us from Pithing Needle, Rest in Peace, Ensnaring Bridge, and Relic of Progenitus. The best part is when you get to respond to a Living End by casting Izzet Charm and discarding both Griselbrand and Borborygmos Enraged. If you like the look of this deck, I would suggest getting in as much practice as you can between now and Saturday morning. Many of the lines require practice, and knowing when to draw seven more and when to reset is not the easiest. The payoff is that you get a deck with several Turn-2 kill draws, consistent Turn-4 wins, and even a possible (though unlikely) Turn-1 win. It can win through a lot of disruption, and only the most aggressive of decks can keep it from drawing enough cards to find the other combo pieces. Good luck this weekend! — Chris Lansdell, @lansdellicious | | Results from the 2016 Regional Championships are in, and Season One of the SCG Tour has four Open weekends remaining before the Invitational in Columbus! Many players on the POY Leaderboard locked up some SCG Points at their respective Regionals, but Brian Braun-Duin made the biggest move by taking first place in Nashville. BBD's run at the Pro Tour may have been cut short by the Eldrazi, but he made the most of his weekend by taking control of Colorless Eldrazi and winning the title in Nashville for 15 SCG Points. His finish launched him into a three-way tie for third place in the Player of the Year race alongside Nerd Rage Gaming teammates Caleb Scherer and Joe Lossett. Speaking of Lossett, the Miracle Man made the Top 8 of the Regionals in San Diego with his trusty G/R Tron deck. Lossett's Regional Top 8 comes on the heels of his Legacy Classic win in Columbus and Standard Open Top 8 in Atlanta, combining to be quite the three-event stretch for the two-time Players' Championship competitor. |  | | Jeff Hoogland joined Lossett with a Regional Top 8, adding to his lead in the Player of the Year race. Hoogland piloted Kiki-Chord to a Top 8 in Chicago, adding six more SCG Points to his growing total this year that includes back-to-back Modern Open Top 8s. Andrew Tenjum received four SCG Points for his Top-16 finish at the Chicago Regionals, allowing him to stay just ahead of the three-way logjam at third on the Leaderboard by one point. Gerry Thompson, who joined BBD on his excursion to Nashville, missed playing for Top 8 with Colorless Eldrazi to also earn four SCG Points with a Top-16 finish of his own. This allowed him to climb one spot, swapping spots with Todd Stevens to stay firmly in two-bye territory on the SCG Tour. Tom Ross, Todd Anderson, Ali Aintrazi, and Harlan Firer all came away with 2 SCG Points for their Top-32 performances at Regionals. Anderson stays just inside the Top 16 on the leaderboard, while Firer tries to make up ground on Scherer, Lossett, and BBD. Aintrazi and Ross climbed a spot each as they continue to fight for a bye and look to make it back to the Players' Championship. Though movement was minimal over the past two weekends, players will be looking to make bigger moves as the SCG Tour hits Louisville this weekend for a Modern Open. Will Hoogland or Stevens make a third-straight Modern Open Top 8 in a new Eldrazi-flavored metagame? Can Andy Ferguson string together a third Open Top 8 in a row? Or will a new face bust into the Player of the Year leaderboard as Bobby Fortanely and Brian Huffman did in Season One? Watch #SCGLOU on twitch.tv/scglive all weekend long to find out! |  |   If you would like to unsubscribe and stop receiving these emails please click here. |
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