Thanks to the nature of Magic’s relentless power creep, it’s rare for old cards to continually do well in competitive formats. Dark Confidant, a nostalgic Modern super staple from the past, for example, was recently reprinted in MTG Final Fantasy, but has seen little to no play as a result. Not only is this card unable to compete in Modern anymore, but it can’t even break into the current state of Standard. The same is true for all kinds of old powerhouses, like Tarmogoyf and Liliana of the Veil.
Despite this, old strategies occasionally reappear in new contexts. That seems to be the case for one old combo used to cheat Emrakul, the Aeons Torn into play way back from Shadows Over Innistrad. Nine years after its original release, Nahiri, the Harbinger has reappeared in Modern, thanks to a new league 5-0 and a top 16 Modern Challenge result.
Teaching an Old Dog New Tricks
This new take on Modern control features a full playset of Nahiri, the Harbinger coupled with a lot of control elements commonly seen in current lists. For four mana, Nahiri certainly feels a bit clunky by today’s standards, but there are a lot of reasons to run the card in the current Modern metagame. The card’s -2 ability, in particular, excels against the field.
Repeatable artifact and enchantment removal is currently at its best. Too many top-tier Modern decks hinge on the card types, making repeated removal a surefire way to victory. Urza’s Saga, in particular, is extremely potent, commonly appearing in Amulet Titan, Affinity, and Basking Broodscale Combo. Just removing one Saga is usually not enough in these matchups, so Nahiri’s ability to deal with the threat and stick around is extremely important.
Thankfully, if your opponent isn’t a strategy focused on enchantments or tapped artifacts, Nahiri is also capable of removing tapped creatures. There are a lot of cheaper and more efficient ways to remove creatures in this deck, but it allows Nahiri to function as creature removal in an emergency.
While repeatable enchantment removal is the most important aspect for Nahiri, the Harbinger, her other abilities are also strong. Nahiri’s +2 helps filter away dead cards, which is extremely important for a slower deck. This ability also helps the card tick up surprisingly fast if your opponent has no way of punishing it, unlocking Nahiri’s -8 ability.
Nahiri’s Ultimate has been used to cheat Emrakul, the Aeons Torn before, but it hasn’t been a particularly viable strategy for a long time. The combo, nevertheless, makes an appearance here, slamming the door shut if your opponent doesn’t pay attention to the Planeswalker. Swinging for 15 damage and Annihilator 6, one hit with Emrakul is usually enough to end any game of Magic.
While Emrakul is mainly in the deck for this purpose, it does have a few secondary functions. In extremely long games, which control aims to create, casting this card naturally is not out of the question. It can also defend against niche mill strategies, which are undoubtedly an awful matchup otherwise.
Slowing Down the Game
The rest of this Jeskai Control list takes advantage of recent metagame changes to showcase some interesting innovation. A full playset of High Noon, in particular, is extremely unusual, but it makes a lot of sense. This stops core plays in many top-tier Modern decks at the moment. In addition to shutting down every combo deck under the sun, Prowess and Affinity decks rely on multispelling on consecutive turns to create value. Among the top 10 Modern decks right now, only four are unaffected by the hatepiece.
Perhaps the most important aspect of High Noon, however, is that it makes your Planeswalker plan way more effective. When both players are limited to only casting one spell per turn, the value created by your repeatable effects gets multiplied. A total of 10 Planeswalkers appear in this deck to take advantage of this, including control classics Teferi, Time Raveler and Teferi, Hero of Dominaria.
Other innovations are smaller, but important. Unholy Heat, for example, is making a quick resurgence thanks to the rise of six toughness creatures. Clearing a Primeval Titan, Phlage, Titan of Fire’s Fury, or Quantum Riddler for just one mana is an incredible deal.
All of this creates an interesting control strategy ready to take down some of the most popular decks in Modern. That said, there’s a reason why control isn’t among the top-ranking decks at the moment.
Too Fast to Stop
While this control list has all the tools to take down Modern’s most popular strategies, it will still prove to be too slow occasionally. Play/draw will matter a lot when playing this deck, as the faster decks in the metagame can get under a lot of your answers before you can even deploy them.
Affinity, for example, is capable of casting Kappa Cannoneer as early as turn one. While Supreme Verdict does provide an answer for this nightmare scenario, stopping an early Kappa Cannoneer before High Noon resolves is extremely difficult for this deck. Your best bet is to remove Pinnacle Emissary with Solitude before it makes too many tokens, but you won’t always have this card at the ready on turn one.
Similarly, Ruby Storm and Amulet Titan are capable of turn two wins while playing around the cheaper interaction that this deck has. This, once again, is extremely hard to beat if you start on the draw since High Noon won’t come down in time. Turn two wins are admittedly rare in Amulet Titan, but turn three ones backed with High Noon removal are more common.
Finally, this control strategy doesn’t look the best against graveyard-centric strategies. This makes Goryo’s Vengeance a difficult-looking matchup since you’ll have to continually fight off imminent death once Atraxa, Grand Unifier hits the graveyard.
While this control deck has a lot of interesting ideas going for it, this exact shell might be a bit hit or miss depending on the luck of the draw. Nonetheless, this result from MTGO players ScreenwriterNY and Higusol proves that the deck has the potential to compete with Modern’s best.
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