Magic the Gathering Blue Moon Blog

TheRealNanMan

United States1471 Posts

September 05 2015 21:22 GMT

I posted up a BLOG with a poll listing some of the modern decks that I currently run. A couple days ago I checked the polls and they were looking pretty even.

Blue Green Tron (3)
11%
Black White Tokens (2)
7%
Infect (4)
15%
Merefolk (4)
15%
Mill (4)
15%
Blue Moon (5)
19%
Twin (1)
4%
Bant Hexproof (2)
7%
8 Rack (1)
4%
Burn (1)
4%
Final votes as of 9/5/15 can be seen below
+ Show Spoiler +

So it looks like we'll be blogging Blue Moon, I'll just go in reverse order so next will be Mill, Merefolk, Infect, Blue Green Tron, Black White tokens, Bant Hexproof, Twin, 8 Rack, Burn.

So a lot of people both love and hate blue. Blue gives you access to two of the best things in magic card draw and counter magic. Red gives you access to removal and direction damage. So combining the two just seems like a great idea.

There are a lot of different control decks running around Jeskai(American) Blue white red, Esper Blue White Black, Grixis Blue Black Red, or the more simple Blue White or Blue Red.

Just like there is a meta game in Starcraft II or Hearthstone Magic currently has it's own meta. Right now it is dominated by 3 color decks Abzan( Black White Green) Jund (Black Red Green) and Grixis (Blue Black Red) are the 3 most dominating tri-color decks in modern at the moment. With that in mind I decided to pick Blue moon as my control deck of choice.

Brief history of the deck.
I first heard of this deck during the born of the gods pro tour, February of 2014. Lee Shi Tian made top 8 with this deck. During the pro tour Lee's team which consisted of 8 players all ran this deck. 7 of the 8 made day 2 of the event and Lee made top 8. Now I know the meta has changed but the deck is still a very solid control deck.
[image loading]

What is this deck designed to do.

The deck is a control deck so disruption is the name of the game. Someone tries to play a spell you counter it. Someone tries to play a creature you kill it. So what makes the blue moon deck different? Extra disruption, being able to lock your opponent out of casting spells all together and stealing any creature they might play. So how do we do this? Blood Moon + Show Spoiler +

and Vedalken Shackles + Show Spoiler +

. Blood moon makes all non basic lands mountains. Modern is full of non basic lands Shock Lands + Show Spoiler +

, Fetch lands + Show Spoiler +

, and Man Lands + Show Spoiler +

. If you manage to play enough basics or destroy my blood moon to play a big creature I just steal it with Vedalken Shackles.

My list.

[image loading]

So my list is a little different from Lee Shi Tian's list. He opted for the devotion style.

(Your devotion to a color is the number of mana symbols of that color in the mana costs of permanents you control. There are cards that count devotion to each of the five colors
A permanent that costs [image loading]

adds one to your devotion to blue.)

His devotion style takes advantage of his threads of disloyalty and spreading seas to make a bunch of tokens off of Master of Waves + Show Spoiler +

. There has been a shift in the mana cost of creatures after the Khans of Takir block. Most modern creatures cost 2 or less mana before this set but after the resurgence of delve mechanic most of the creatures to worry about jumped up to 5-6 mana cost (Tasigur + Show Spoiler +

Gurmag Angler + Show Spoiler +

). With that in mind I decided to adjust my deck and rework the creature base by adding in young pyromancer + Show Spoiler +

. Every time I play a instant or sorcery spell I can produce a 1-1 elemental. That doesn't seem like a huge threat but it is more of a delay tactic until I can assemble the cards I need.

How do you win with this deck?
I talked about stalling out using young pyromancer until I can beat you down with your own creature. Or using Batterskull + Show Spoiler +

or Keranos, God of Storms + Show Spoiler +

I tried running a two of Batterskull but with so much artifact hate in the sideboard and all the decks running Kolaghans command + Show Spoiler +

main board I've decided against it. I'm also running a one of Vendilion Clique + Show Spoiler +

which is a solid threat on its own.

So what is this deck missing?
Right now I'm missing Spell Snare from the main board, which counters a spell that costs 2 mana. So that targets quite a lot, most counter spells like mana leak or remand cost 2 man. There are some powerful 2 cost creatures Tarmagoyf, Blighted Agent, Scavenging Ooze, and Dark Confident. Also there isn't much creature removal in the main board of this deck. So sometimes you can get over run in game 1, that's another reason why Lee Shi Tian's deck ran the vapor snags to help against creature decks.

Would I recommend this deck?
For those that enjoy a deck that shuts down what your opponent is able to do this deck is for you. You destroy creatures, steal creatures, lock down lands, and prevent people from playing cards in general. There are a lot of cards that can be interchanged based on your stores individuals meta. Overall though the deck is solid in the main meta. This deck is not something I would recommend for people just getting into the format though. The deck is like most control decks they get better based on personal knowledge of the format. If you aren't sure what spells to counter and what spells to go it makes it hard to play. Also the price tag for the deck is also super high compared to most decks. I'd also recommend proxying up the deck and testing it out with some friends if it sounds like something you'd be interested in playing.

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