As of right now, Magic: The Gathering’s Standard format isn’t in a great place. The recent bans may have dealt with the hyper-Aggro decks that once ran things, but now they’ve been replaced by similarly dominant Midrange lists. What’s worse, new problem cards seem to be emerging within those decks. Thankfully, things are looking a little more hopeful in Modern. There’s a good mix of decks in the format currently, and Edge of Eternities has enabled a few more, including an updated version of Hardened Scales.
This is a deck we haven’t seen properly for quite some time. While it shows up sporadically in Challenges and Leagues, its meta share is ultimately negligible. According to regular Hardened Scales player KePs, however, “EOE gave the archetype more cards than MH3.” KePs proved this point rather neatly when they took the deck to a 5-0 finish in yesterday’s MTGO Modern League. With new tools and fresh results on its side, this could be the start of a serious comeback for Hardened Scales.
Edge Of Eternities Brings Hardened Scales Back!
Modern Hardened Scales feels, in a sense, like two archetypes rolled into one. Naturally, it makes great use of the titular enchantment to place extra counters on its creatures, but not quite in the way you’d expect. Rather than run a bunch of green creatures that gain counters, it leans on the Modular mechanic instead.
Modular creatures gain +1/+1 counters on entry and can then redistribute all of their counters on death. This means the synergy with Hardened Scales here is huge. You’ll get an extra counter when the creature enters, then another one when it dies and moves its counters elsewhere. This interaction turns normally innocuous creatures like Zabaz, the Glimmerwasp into legitimate threats.
Into this established strategy, Edge of Eternities adds some very spicy new pieces. Terrasymbiosis, for example, is a full-on three-mana draw engine in this deck. Once per turn, it lets you draw cards equal to the number of counters you place on a creature. With Hardened Scales out, this will pretty much always draw you at least two cards a turn. It works on your opponent’s turn, too, so if you have Arcbound Ravager, the deck’s best Modular creature, out, you can draw even more via instant-speed sacrifice. Naturally, it works even better when you’re offloading a bunch of counters via Modular.
Joining Terrasymbiosis we have Loading Zone. In some ways, this is like copies five and six of Hardened Scales in the deck. Granted, you can only use it for one turn if you Warp it out for one, but it’s actually better than Hardened Scales since it doubles your counters, rather than just adding one. It’s a nice bit of redundancy, and particularly effective at creating huge draw turns with Terrasymbiosis.
Counter Play
Terrasymbiosis and Loading Zone are both great Edge of Eternities pickups for Hardened Scales. They give the deck a ton of draw power and explosive potential, letting it play on a different axis than before. On a less exciting, but no less important note, the deck also nabbed Gene Pollinator as a key upgrade.
This is essentially a better Springleaf Drum on a body, letting you tap any permanents for mana instead of just creatures. This gives it a ton of synergy with the numerous utility artifacts in the deck, like Tormod’s Crypt and Welding Jar. Hardened Scales is a mana-hungry deck, so a piece like this goes a long way. The fact that it’s an artifact creature means it can accept Modular counters in a pinch, which is another big advantage.
These new cards help smooth out the overall strategy of Hardened Scales. The game plan remains the same as always: stack a bunch of counters on a relevant creature and end the game. Typically, you’ll want to abuse Ravager’s sacrifice ability to stack two counters at a time, then shift those over onto a Zabaz or Walking Ballista to end the game. Now, however, the deck has more draw, mana, and doubling to help get it there.
As with most artifact decks in Modern, this one also gets to enjoy some of the format’s best cards. Mox Opal is an easy speed boost for the deck, and Urza’s Saga helps grab a ton of its key cards. Most notably, it can pick up the deck’s lone copy of The Ozolith, which can sustain your Modular shenanigans single-handed, even without a valid host.
Built To Last?
KePs’s 5-0 result above is the first real success Hardened Scales has had in Modern for a while. The last comparable result was LordEgg’s League 5-0 back in June, to put things into perspective. With all of the new support from Edge of Eternities, however, the deck has a real chance to break back into the metagame.
Since it’s such a small-time list, there’s little hard matchup data available for Hardened Scales. Based on the deck alone, however, the biggest problem is likely speed. Where most big Modern decks, Boros Energy, Domain Zoo, can develop their gameplans just by running out creatures, Hardened Scales has to take time off to cast its supporting enchantments. Hardened Scales isn’t too much of a tempo loss, but Terrasymbiosis can really set you back. Your opponent could very well be casting Phlage on the same turn, after all.
The deck does have ramp in Mox Opal and Gene Pollinator to address this, but it’s a significant weakness. Without these enchantments, you’re left with a very sub-par Midrange deck with an artifact theme. Naturally, this makes you vulnerable to Wear/Tear, Meltdown, and Wrath of the Skies, all very popular cards in Modern.
On the other hand, once Hardened Scales gets going, it’s hard to stop. It can build huge threats quickly, letting it compete with Modern’s aggressive players on board. It can also push for explosive wins via Zabaz or Ballista, which gives it a pseudo-combo edge that its competitors lack. With a bit more refinement, I could easily see the deck reclaiming a solid meta position with these new Edge of Eternities tools.
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