October 14th Modern Daily Event recap

For those of you who didn't had the chance to watch the live stream this is what happened:

After I wrote the article about my UWR Kiki-Midrange deck I received some feedback, mostly people interested in playing with my list and asking me about changes / updates / sideboarding. So far the results have been extremely positive, as far as I know, an Italian player Won an Italian Modern Open and received a cash prize of 1500 € and both Frederico Bastos and Joao Gonçalves who played my list at the White Gargula League tournament Top 8'd.

I haven't playtested much with the deck, I played the Cascais tournament (5-2) mostly against Jund. There are a lot of Modern decks I only have a vague idea how they work, or what cards are they playing. For example, I only discovered during Round 6 in Cascais that Violent Outburst was Instant. It was my first time playing against or actually seeing Living End in action.

Both the Italian and the Portuguese players expressed concern about certain matchups. The deck was favorable matchups but also has some very unfavorable ones. It is impossible to be prepared against everything in a format as wide as Modern. Even Jund has bad matchups.

With that in mind, I changed the whole SB, built heavily against Pod decks, because I wanted to try as many cards as possible against them in order to better develop a strategy. Frederico Bastos said he lost twice to pod, and altough I haven't played against it yet after I've done the major changes to the January list I also feel it might not be enough.

Round 1 I played precisely against Pod, not only Pod, but also the same player who beat Frederico Bastos in the Top 8 of the White Gargula tournament: Luis Gobern.

He mulliganed Game 1, never got a Pod on the table, and I had some topdecks to contain his side, and I say contain because it was temporary, I couldn't control his development. I managed to attack for lethal the turn things could get out of control with Chord of Calling.

G2 he mulliganed and stalled on 2 lands for a while, never resolved a pod, and I didn't get to try any of the sb cards.

1-0

Round 2: I played against GR Tron. Another not so good matchup. My January version has very little chances of winning against this deck. It was the same as round 1, he mulliganed, had weak draws, and I contained the tron long enough to attack for lethal, and didn't had the chance to try sideboard cards. I also played against Tron in Cascais and won, but I don't feel it's a good matchup.

2-0

Round 3: Infect

Lost Game 1 which was balanced altough better for him, because I didn't know there was a Green instant that pumped and granted Hexproof (Vines of Vastwood if I'm not mistaken)

Lost game 2 from an very favorable, almost unlosable position because I miscounted my mana: I had 4 lands in play and was holding Path to Exile, Lightning Bolt, Lightning Helix (plus more stuff). These instant removal spells cost 4, so I draw Sacred Foundry and played tapped. Then realized didn't had 2 white mana and lost. Also didn't know there was a Pump spell that costed ZERO mana, so I should've played Path instead of Helix.

Punted 3 times, in 2 games in no more than ten turns total both games. Lost because of it.
It was the first time I saw that deck in action, I'm sure next time, I'll be more aware of the tricks.

2-1

Round 4: Grixis Delver

Won G1 where I had no idea what he was doing. I just couldn't understand any of his plays.

G2 I mull to 5 and run out of resources, G3 I mull to 6 and never drew white mana despite multiple Remands. In both these games, since I was in a bad position, my opponent's plays were much more focused: He just threw everything at me, as fast as he could, including main phase Coral Merfolks (I mean, Snapcasters) just to attack for 2. Of all the 4 matches, this was the one I wouldn't mind replaying.

2 - 2

This daily event was awkward I felt my opponent's drew poorly in my unfavorable matchups, and I felt I drew poorly in a decent matchup. The key moment for not profiting was punting several times against Infect.

Afterwards I asked if any of the viewers of the stream had a Pod deck who wanted to battle, since I couldn't test any of the sideboard cards properly, and a Brazilian friend volunteered for the task. I won 2 quick matches, where I felt the Pod deck had once again draws that underperformed. I went 3-0 in matches against Pod decks, but I'm sure that's not representative, I estime it more accurate results to be 1-2 and probably closer to 0-3 than 2-1.

I already have intensive testing with this deck against Jund, I'm looking to do the same in the future against Pod. Message me If you're interested in playing Pod against me.

It seems there are many lovers of the Modern format in Portugal even when it's not relevant at competitive level, since many stores run several Modern tournaments a month. It also seems to be a very large and strong Portuguese participation for the upcoming Grand Prix Antwerp, ab event I plan to attend as well, and therefore the reason I'm focusing on Modern right now.

Thank you for watching yesterday and / or for reading this recap.

Tiago Chan