The Best and the Worst decks in Modern

Modern is a wide format, and right now it’s also quite wild! Many decks can win the game even as soon as turn two, and the interaction is being replaced by speed in executing the gameplan. The “skill” of mastering a deck is still really important, because executing mulligans is now a priority, but also the deck selection matters a lot.

With that in mind, let’s try to divide all the decks into some understandable categories. 
One of the things I hate about most of the tier lists is the lack of context for the picks. What’s a tier 1 deck? What’s the difference between a tier 1 and a tier 1.5? 
Also, do I have any chance if I only have tier 3 decks?

I decided to make those categories a bit more understandable; keep in mind that all the decks in the picture are capable of winning a MTGO Challenge (so it’s likely the same for any RCQ). 

Best Decks

These decks have a good matchup against most of the field, while having solid plans against unknown opponents / on average.

Goryo’s Vengeance 
I do believe it’s the sweet spot for Goryo. The deck is capable of playing an interactive game with removals and Thoughtseize until an Atraxa gets reanimated. This flexible Control-Combo plan is possible thanks to Psychic Frog, the perfect card to play on turn two after an interaction. Goryo is the best Frog deck, as it’s capable of using all of the frog’s text. 
The huge card advantage swing given by Atraxa allows the deck to play “unfair” zero-mana interactions such as Force of Negation and Solitude. 
This deck existed in the format for a while, but right now it’s super well positioned because it matches really well the combo decks, and can often grind fair strategies such as Boros and blue decks.

Neobrand
Neobrand is the best combo deck in the format, as it can provide turn two kills but is also capable of playing slower games. The deck can maindeck strong interactions like Pact of Negation and Consign to Memory, which allows it to either go all in with a protection spell or make sure not to lose. 
Consign to Memory is in a great spot right now, as many decks are playing Eldrazi Temple and Kozilek’s Command, but the card is also decent in many specific spots (i.e. to counter Atraxa’s trigger). 
The sideboard is built to beat most of the hate, even featuring a “small transformational side” with Ice Fang Coatl and Abhorrent Oculus.

SOLID CHOICES

These decks either have strong plans but lose to a portion of the field, or are too slow to match the gap vs the best decks. All those decks get better with skill, and are often played by experts (or overlooked by players who don’t have enough reps).

Yawgmoth
Funnily enough, the deck is nowadays more of a Young Wolf deck than an actual Yawgmoth deck, but Yawgmoth itself is still powerful enough in the deck to deserve some copies. Here’s the main problem: the deck is never as fast as the other combo decks (Neoform, Storm, Amulet) but with the right build and mulligans, considering Thoughtseize and silver bullets such as Fulminator Mage, Yawg can generally still win by slowing down the opponent and eventually winning the game. 
Against fair decks the infinite life combo with Wolf + Cauldron + Ballista + Dredger’s Insight is still real, and the rest of the deck is built to add consistency, with Rumbles and Zeniths.

Broodscale
One of the best-performing decks in the Pro Tour, and huge in the format. I think the deck is really good, but tends to struggle against Goryo and Neobrand, and tends to have issues against other decks like Boros. While it’s probably the best Eldrazi Temple deck, it has a huge target on its head as most of the “other” decks tend to play a playset of Consign + some removals. Still, Kozilek’s Command is a messed-up card, and casting Emrakul on turn 4 is good enough to deserve a spot amongst the good choices of the format.

Boros 
As many of you may know, Boros is my favourite deck. Right now, the deck is still decently positioned, but the way it plays is radically different. You have to mull a lot of hands to try to find “the nuts”, and accept that some games are out of reach. I recently added Solitudes to the deck to gain some tempo while developing the board. 
The deck is still the most consistent “fair” deck in the format, and you can toy with the sideboard to try to beat most of the meta. White cards in the sideboard have always been the best ones, and especially right now effects like Rest in Peace or Clarion Conqueror are huge. Also, Blood Moon is a great card to have in the main.

OKAY DECKS

Decks that are either really solid but lack power, or have a strong A plan that can’t interact well with the meta.

Amulet 
The deck is still really strong and provides a good number of turn three kills, but it’s not impossible to win on turn two. The axis the deck operates on is really tough to interact with, mostly because there aren’t many disenchants in the format, and there’s no real punishment for lands / deck search, and Primeval Titan is an endgame threat for 6 mana. The issue is that now the meta is really fast and sometimes Amulet just loses to whatever the opponent is doing before enacting its main plan.

Tron
Another really consistent deck that lacks gameplay against some of the best decks. The deck is also way different when it’s on the play than when it’s on the draw, since on turn three you might die without having played a single spell. 
The best part of the deck is the eldrazi lands, but the deck isn’t really the best eldrazi deck (which is Broodscale), and eventually most of its spells are irrelevant against decks like Amulet or Broodscale. Still, the deck tends to perform well in big tournaments as it has a good matchup against “other decks”, and can win random inevitability games against everyone by playing turn two TKS into turn three Karn + problematic artifact.

Affinity
This deck is great at producing problematic threats that win the game in three turns. Munitions / Saga / Kappa are awesome, especially if you develop them starting from turn one. The problem is that sometimes it’s not enough, and the deck folds against better plans (such as Broodscale or Boros). The sideboard helps, but diluting your plans means you’re trading raw power for “consistency”, which eventually evens the game for both players. 
With that being said, the deck is still good and skill-rewarding, and can easily take down events with a bit of luck and solid plans.

Belcher
This deck is the most consistent combo deck, but can’t win the game before turn four. Featuring a lot of interactions and counters is huge considering the amount of combo decks that you can slow down, but sometimes the lack of the right interaction might cause an instant loss. Belcher is also a deck that has multiple pressure points, since Consign to Memory, Vexing Bauble, and Clarion Conqueror are problematic cards that a lot of people play.

TRAPS

Decks that are supposedly good, but either too slow / hard to tune / inconsistent / strictly worse versions of something that’s already good.

Slow decks
RW Land Destruction has been the flavor of the month on MTGO, before people realized that on turn three the game can end and a pile of stone rains and path to exile isn’t doing much to stop this plan. I also am a firm believer that a lot of people get randomly tilted by this deck and start to play worse than average, ending up taking random losses.

Living End and Prowess are cool decks, but a bit inconsistent and definitely too slow for the format. Prowess requires a huge setup of cards to win the game on turn three, assuming the opponent didn’t interact and has no way to do anything against an opposing turn three kills OTD. Postboard it gets a bit better, but that’s also the same for opposing decks. 
Living End is just a meme in my eyes, and another deck that wins games because people ignore it or aren’t familiar with what the deck does (in fact, there’s at least one person on twitch chat that always asks me to bring in a Containment Priest each time I face it).

Grixis Reanimator is a strictly worse copy of Atraxa: Grixis has just a weaker plan of reanimating Archon instead of drawing 10 cards and swinging for 7 lifelink with Atraxa or Griselbrand. Also, Prismatic Ending is way better than Fatal Push in the Amulet / Broodscale format.

Trudge and Storm are inconsistent combo decks. Storm is probably alright, as it can kill the opponent on turn two with a very specific combination, and tends to end the game between turn 3 and 4. The problem is, you totally lack interaction for opposing combos, and denials on your enablers are a huge pain and slow you down by at least one turn. So, unless I am a storm aficionado, I don’t see why picking up the deck over any other combo at the moment.

Trudge is a different story. I just feel that the deck is a way worse broodscale with the upside of doing a broken play on turn two, which is totally random, as it requires you to flip one of your six big eldrazi on Fight Rigging trigger, and forces you to play horrible cards to make it work. I can see the deck having hot streaks, but after I tested for a while it was far from being consistent and personally a feel-bad deck.

WEAK, BUT WELL POSITIONED

These decks all play a mixture of strong disruption spells, but lack of a good or consistent plan A.

I am not surprised UB Frog is doing well in challenges, as those events represent mostly the winners’ metagame each round, and Frog has all the tools to beat combo decks. The issue is that your main plan is really fragile and the deck tends to do nothing (besides disrupting) when Frog is not in the opener. This also means you have to deckbuild your deck in a very specific way to make it work, leaving eventually some matchups uncovered that you might have trouble answering. Esper Blink feels on the same page: Solitude + Ephemerate is great in some games, as well as Overlord + Phelia. The issue is that your single cards are often super weak, and you get rolled by decks full of standalone cards. The mana base is also often an issue in short games, as you need multiple colors to cast all your spells.

This is the same issue with UW Control, but in a different manner: UW is huge at dealing with the board, and does an okay job answering the stack; since the main plan is really weak and inconsistent (either playing Narset, stick it, and then play Day’s Undoing or hoping that opponent doesn’t have answer to Sceptre+Chant lock) it’s always not the best choice, also because the average power level of your cards is weak… you’re playing Day’s Undoing!

Necrodominance and Mill suffer from the opposite problem: they have a strong A plan, with some interactions (either countermagic, discard spells, graveyard hate, or surgical extraction effects), but those might not align well against the opponent’s plan, which is usually better compared to your A plan. I feel (as I stated in my previous article) that Necrodominance is close to being a good deck, but needs the right metagame, perfect deckbuilding, and maybe a couple more good cards; Mill, instead, is in the perfect metagame, as the deck always had good matchups against combo, but the deck isn’t great on average and sometimes endgames are a nail-biter. Still, I think the strategy might be overlooked at the moment.

INTERESTING BREWS

Deck that caught everyone’s attention after doing well at the PT or in challenges, despite being fairly new and underexplored.

Cosmogoyf, Oswald, Devoted Druid, and Song of Creation share the same goal: killing the opponent as soon as possible, which is sometimes on turn three. 
Cosmogoyf is a spell-based deck, built with hypergeometric math: 6 cards of each combo piece (Cosmogoyf and Thud) in a shell that can accommodate the combo perfectly. The deck is all in, doesn’t match well against interaction and sometimes ends up short for a T3 kill, but it’s incredibly consistent at doing its thing. I am liking how Kanister is working on the deck, and I will keep an eye on his progress if I want to pick it up. 
Oswald and Song of Creation both share the “breach set up” of Moxens and Emry+Tamiyo, and can be really explosive, playing for the combo or playing a midrange game with a combo top end. I can see some holes in the plan, like being a bit soft to Vexing Bauble or being a bit too full of air when you need to interact, but still both decks are probably something worth looking into for upcoming tournaments. 
Devoted druid is probably the best of the bunch, as it can deliver really quick wins and it’s really consistent and resilient. The deck can be easily hateable postboard tho, and I can see it being better if the meta isn’t really prepared for it.

Apart from those decks I mentioned, there’s a plethora of other viable strategies that can be played and maybe are good enough to race the top contenders: I often see Hollow One doing well, as well as UW Energy or weird Eldrazi Shells. 
I am curious to see what will be played in the next weeks: the RC is in a couple of months, so there’s space to innovate, but also it’s time to learn the engines!