Every now and again, a combo deck from MTG’s past will make a surprising resurgence. We saw this soon after Tarkir: Dragonstorm released as Devoted Druid combo unexpectedly put up some solid results.
Now, out of nowhere, a unique take on Modern Infect managed to make top eight of a Magic Online Modern Challenge. Infect was a force to be reckoned with before the release of Modern Horizons sets but faded into oblivion over the last few years. Could the deck be poised for a comeback? Let’s take a closer look and see what the archetype is trying to accomplish.
Main Gameplan
Infect is an old-fashioned strategy that relies on winning the game via poison counters rather than regular damage. Once your opponent receives ten poison counters, they lose the game.
We saw a similar mechanic return to Standard a few years back in the form of Toxic, but there’s a pretty big difference between Toxic and Infect. With Infect, your opponent gets a number of poison counters equal to the damage you deal. As such, Infect threats in particular deal more damage alongside pump spells.
With this in mind, the Infect deck plays some very efficient creatures in the form of Blighted Agent and Glistener Elf alongside a plethora of pump spells. Inkmoth Nexus makes an appearance as well, doubling as a land and a creature. Inkmoth Nexus plays a crucial role, helping you beat Sorcery speed removal or board wipes.
Combining Scale Up with Might of Old Krosa or Groundswell immediately makes any of your 1/1 Infect creatures into a lethal threat. This deck is capable of killing as early as turn two, though this doesn’t happen often.
Sometimes, though, it’s better to wait to go for the kill until you can back things up with protection spells. Vines of Vastwood and You See a Guard Approach help you win through disruption that isn’t just damage-based.
An Interesting Approach
Where this deck starts to separate itself from Infect decklists of old is with the inclusion of a playset of Venerated Rotpriest. Venerated Rotpriest doesn’t have Infect itself, so it doesn’t have the same explosive presence that Glistener Elf or Blighted Agent provide. Instead, though, what makes Venerated Rotpriest special is that it helps you win the game outside of combat.
Early on, you can poke away with Venerated Rotpriest and your other Infect creatures to slowly build up your opponent’s poison counters. From there, if your opponent goes to kill any of your threats with Venerated Rotpriest in play, they’ll take additional poison as a result.
In response, you can protect your creatures, which in turn will give your opponent even more poison counters. March of Swirling Mist combines especially well with Venerated Rotpriest, as it can let you target multiple of your creatures at once.
There are games where you’ll have multiple copies of Venerated Rotpriest in play, and you can use March of Swirling Mist proactively targeting your whole board to send a bunch of poison counters to your opponent. Having this upside on a card that naturally protects you from board wipes like Toxic Deluge is nice.
March is a bit of a narrow card, since it doesn’t synergize quite as well with your Infect creatures. After all, if your opponent tries to remove one of your creatures in combat, you’d much rather have a traditional protection spell that doesn’t phase out your creature so you can still get damage across. The good news, though, is that in games where March isn’t important, you can always pitch it to Force of Negation.
The playset of Force of Negation is an intriguing deckbuilding decision but makes a lot of sense in the current metagame. Being able to interact with the multitude of combo decks such as Storm or Belcher for free makes the matchups much easier. You’re always free to pitch Force to March of Swirling Mist to make it cheaper, too, so the card isn’t just dead in creature matchups.
Between March, Force, Blighted Agent, You See a Guard Approach, and Stock Up, you have plenty of blue cards to reliably enable March and Force. Of course, hard casting either card isn’t too bad, especially if you have Noble Hierarch in play.
Treacherous Metagame
Unfortunately, while it’s really cool to see Infect make a splash in Modern once again, that doesn’t mean the deck is super well positioned. In fact, a number of the top decks in Modern are very tough to beat.
Boros Energy has access to cheap removal to keep you off balance. Goblin Bombardment is a nuisance and is extremely hard to play around. Your creatures don’t block particularly well, and you don’t have much in the way of removal. This means that Ocelot Pride and Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer have the potential to run away with games themselves.
Izzet Prowess, which is on the rise, presents a quick clock backed up by removal. The fact that your Infect creatures die to Lava Dart doesn’t help the situation.
Similarly, your one-toughness creatures all match up poorly against Orcish Bowmasters out of Dimir Murktide. There’s a reason Infect has been contained in Modern for the most part for years.
This doesn’t mean Infect can’t spike an event. Most of the prevalent combo decks in Modern don’t feature tons of removal. Couple that with your absurdly fast clock, and you’re in business. Infect is sweet. If you’re going to give this deck a shot, though, just expect some polarizing matchups and for the die roll to play a big factor.