Modern Metagame Update: November 2020

Welcome back for the second monthly Modern Metagame Update here at Card Kingdom! On the second Friday of each month, I’ll be recapping major MTGO tournament results from the month prior. Let’s get right into the tournament results!

Tournament Results

Tournaments and the data they provide paint a clear picture of what decks are succeeding in the Modern metagame. Since we have access to only digital Magic at the moment, I’ll be taking data from MTGO Challenges and Preliminaries, which tend to be more representative of the top of the metagame than leagues. 

Publication qualifications that Wizards of the Coast uses are as follows:

Preliminary events: 3-2 or better
Challenge events: Top 32
Showcase events: Top 32

Due to the nature of how decklist data is published — and the wide variety of decks in Modern — much of the data has a sample size too small to use. I’ve chosen to put the bar at fifteen or more publications in the last month so that we have some data to actually chew on. While the decks with fewer than fifteen published results are all still valid decks — some of them even winning premier events (I’ll cover that later) — it would simply provide an overload of information.

Even with these restrictions, the assortment of decks we’re covering here is still incredibly diverse. Eleven different decks had fifteen or more publications, and all ten major events were won by different decks. Compared to last month, there are two additional decks that cleared publication bar, and two additional tournament winning decks. 

Deck Popularity	Monthly Change
4C Omnath	+1
Rakdos Shadow	-1
Eldamari’s Toolbox	Previously Unranked
Humans	-1
Amulet Titan	Previously Unranked
Oops All Spells	Previously Unranked
Heliod Combo	Previously Unranked
Mono Red Prowess	Previously Unranked
Copycat	Previously Unranked
Death & Taxes	-6

With six previously unranked decks in the top ten this month, it’s clear that we’ve seen some significant metagame movement. Some amount of that is due to the consolidation of the various Uro decks into 4C Omnath, which opens up some other spots on the list. The being said, the overall number of Uro decks is down from 92 to 64. Rakdos Shadow, Humans, and Death & Taxes are the other mainstays that are back from last month. 

Modern continues to be a format run by Field of the Dead, which shows up in 4C Omnath, Eladamri’s Toolbox, and Amulet Titan. However, the remainder of our Top 10 includes aggro decks like Rakdos Shadow, Humans, Mono-Red Prowess, and Death & Taxes that are trying to get under the Field decks before the powerful land comes online. The remainder of the Top 10 are combo decks — Oops All Spells, Heliod Combo and Copycat — that are all focused on ignoring Field of the Dead and winning the game without the red zone (at least in a traditional sense). 

Event Winning Decks

I want to shout out the players that successfully navigated their way through the major MTGO events in order to earn their deck some hardware. 

4 Color Uro by Bernastorres, 1st Place, Modern Champs

Humans by Darkiundsa, 1st Place, Modern Challenge

Oops All Spells by Sodeq, 1st Place, Modern Challenge

Death & Taxes by 6argamel, 1st Place, Modern Challenge

Eldrazi Tron by Samcaster-Mage, 1st Place, Modern Challenge

Ad Nauseam by patheus_84, 1st Place, Modern Challenge

Druid Combo by PietroSas, 1st Place, Modern Challenge

Lurrus Jund by coliobeware, 1st Place, Modern Challenge

Mono White Heliod by NHA37, 1st Place, Modern Challenge

Recommendations

Truthfully any of the decks that show up in the Top 10 above have proven to be reasonable choices in Modern. The 4C Omnath decks have been in the top two decks along with Rakdos Shadow for the last two months, which makes them easy picks. However, I understand not wanting to be the boogeyman, so if you’re looking to play anything other than 4C Omnath, I would recommend a deck that can leverage Blood Moon, given how powerful it is against the Omnath and Primeval Titan decks. Ponza is one option, but I believe it’s too vulnerable to the aggressive options in Modern, which means you need to be faster. That steers you toward either Rakdos Shadow or Mono-Red Prowess; both decks get to lean on Blood Moon, and both have enough interaction to handle the creature combo decks. 

Rakdos Shadow by Michael Rapp

Mono-Red Prowess by MHayashi

Conclusion

Another month down, another pile of data to share with you all. Hopefully, if you’re looking for a deck to play for your next tournament, you’ve found it here. Perhaps you already have a deck picked out, and this data helps you tune your flex slots or sideboard to help exploit important metagame trends or weaknesses. Either way, I hope this gives you an excellent reference point in order to make your decisions with confidence. 

Until next time, you can always find me on Twitter at @RappaciousOne, and remember to stay safe.