Strange Mono-White Tron Deck Surprisingly Dazzles in Major Event!

One strategy that has stayed consistent for many years in Modern has been Tron. Despite constant fluctuations in the metagame over the years and a plethora of elite cards getting introduced each set, this potent strategy revolving around the power of Urza’s Tower Urza’s Tower {T}: Add {C}. If you control an Urza's Mine and an Urza's Power-Plant, add {C}{C}{C} instead. , Urza’s Mine Urza’s Mine {T}: Add {C}. If you control an Urza's Power-Plant and an Urza's Tower, add {C}{C} instead. , and Urza’s Power Plant Urza’s Power Plant {T}: Add {C}. If you control an Urza's Mine and an Urza's Tower, add {C}{C} instead. has remained steady.

What’s interesting, though, is just how many different variants of Tron have put up results in Modern. Mono-green Tron is certainly the most popular and has stood the test of time. Sylvan Scrying Sylvan Scrying Search your library for a land card, reveal it, put it into your hand, then shuffle. adds some extra consistency towards assembling all three Tron Lands as quickly as possible.

However, multiple other variants have had success. Mono-blue Tron has popped up every now and again as a more interactive strategy. Eldrazi Tron maximizes the power of Eldrazi Temple Eldrazi Temple {T}: Add {C}.
{T}: Add {C}{C}. Spend this mana only to cast colorless Eldrazi spells or activate abilities of colorless Eldrazi. and can steal games with Chalice of the Void Chalice of the Void This artifact enters with X charge counters on it.
Whenever a player casts a spell with mana value equal to the number of charge counters on this artifact, counter that spell. . We’ve even seen combo-style Tron decks featuring Mystic Forge Mystic Forge You may look at the top card of your library any time.
You may cast artifact spells and colorless spells from the top of your library.
{T}, Pay 1 life: Exile the top card of your library. get their time in the spotlight.

Today, we are going to focus on a version of Tron that is relatively new and has flown under the radar. This deck recently made top 32 of the Magic Online Modern Showcase Challenge, with an attendance of over 200 players. Is this deck the real deal? Let’s find out.

Tron Core

The main goal when utilizing the Tron Lands is, unsurprisingly, to generate a massive mana advantage. While this deck doesn’t have access to Sylvan Scrying, it does still get to make use of Expedition Map Expedition Map {2}, {T}, Sacrifice this artifact: Search your library for a land card, reveal it, put it into your hand, then shuffle. as a way to find a missing Tron piece. This mono-white Tron deck, in a similar sense as mono-blue Tron, isn’t quite as reliant on assembling Tron by turn three. Instead, the objective is to use a slew of interactive elements to delay the game and at some point, assemble Tron and use the excess mana to your advantage.

There are a few payoffs that, while castable in the mid-game, get significantly better with Tron Lands in the mix. First, this deck utilizes a playset of The One Ring The One Ring Indestructible
When The One Ring enters, if you cast it, you gain protection from everything until your next turn.
At the beginning of your upkeep, you lose 1 life for each burden counter on The One Ring.
{T}: Put a burden counter on The One Ring, then draw a card for each burden counter on The One Ring. . Not only does The One Ring provide a huge boost of card advantage, but it helps dig for any missing Tron Lands. Once you have all three in play, the extra mana can help you convert those extra cards into board presence.

This leads to our second major payoff: Karn, the Great Creator Karn, the Great Creator Activated abilities of artifacts your opponents control can't be activated.
+1: Until your next turn, up to one target noncreature artifact becomes an artifact creature with power and toughness each equal to its mana value.
−2: You may reveal an artifact card you own from outside the game or choose a face-up artifact card you own in exile. Put that card into your hand. . Karn is fine to cast without access to all three Tron Lands but gets significantly better when you have tons of mana to work with. Then, you can use Karn to tutor up a huge haymaker like Sundering Titan Sundering Titan When this creature enters or leaves the battlefield, choose a land of each basic land type, then destroy those lands. or Cityscape Leveler Cityscape Leveler Trample
When you cast this spell and whenever this creature attacks, destroy up to one target nonland permanent. Its controller creates a tapped Powerstone token.
Unearth {8} to win the game with. Of course, you can always grab utility Artifacts like Ensnaring Bridge Ensnaring Bridge Creatures with power greater than the number of cards in your hand can't attack. or Cursed Totem Cursed Totem Activated abilities of creatures can't be activated. when necessary.

Beyond The One Ring and Karn, there are a couple one-ofs that can singlehandedly swing a game in your favor when you have lots of mana at your disposal. Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger When you cast this spell, exile two target permanents.
Indestructible
Whenever Ulamog attacks, defending player exiles the top twenty cards of their library. is the ultimate win condition, helping you shut the door in grindy games. Meanwhile, Ugin, the Spirit Dragon Ugin, the Spirit Dragon +2: Ugin deals 3 damage to any target.
−X: Exile each permanent with mana value X or less that's one or more colors.
−10: You gain 7 life, draw seven cards, then put up to seven permanent cards from your hand onto the battlefield. can reset even the scariest of board states, leaving behind a must-answer Planeswalker that threatens to win the game by itself. Most of these cards are rather typical inclusions in Tron decks, so this begs the question: what does white have to offer?

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Top-Notch Interaction

As mentioned, mono-white Tron and mono-blue Tron have some similarities. Rather than focusing on getting a mana advantage as quickly as possible, both of these Tron variants want to interact on the early turns. As such, they are less reliant on a quick mana boost and less vulnerable to hate pieces like Blood Moon Blood Moon Nonbasic lands are Mountains. as a result.

By far the most important piece of interaction that would draw a player to play white in their Tron deck is Solitude. Solitude is excellent and preventing you from falling behind. As a free disruptive element, it pairs nicely with Karn by making it significantly more likely you get to untap with the powerful Planeswalker. Likewise, Solitude is strong in conjunction with Then One Ring, keeping your life total high while you continue to draw cards.

The printing of Reprieve Reprieve Return target spell to its owner's hand.
Draw a card. also played a big role in the development of the mono-white Tron deck. Between Solitude, Oust, and various board wipes like Wrath of God Wrath of God Destroy all creatures. They can't be regenerated. , this archetype has plenty of Creature interaction. Reprieve is an excellent insurance policy against unfair strategies. For instance, getting to Reprieve Living End Living End Suspend 3—{2}{B}{B}
Each player exiles all creature cards from their graveyard, then sacrifices all creatures they control, then puts all cards they exiled this way onto the battlefield. or Crashing Footfalls Crashing Footfalls Suspend 4—{G} (Rather than cast this card from your hand, pay {G} and exile it with four time counters on it. At the beginning of your upkeep, remove a time counter. When the last is removed, you may cast it without paying its mana cost.)
Create two 4/4 green Rhino creature tokens with trample. can be devastating for the opponent.

To help answer a wider array of problematic permanents, Get Lost Get Lost Destroy target creature, enchantment, or planeswalker. Its controller creates two Map tokens. (They're artifacts with "{1}, {T}, Sacrifice this token: Target creature you control explores. Activate only as a sorcery.") and March of Otherworldly Light March of Otherworldly Light As an additional cost to cast this spell, you may exile any number of white cards from your hand. This spell costs {2} less to cast for each card exiled this way.
Exile target artifact, creature, or enchantment with mana value X or less. show up here, too. This deck is well-equipped to deal with Creature heavy-decks as well as Urza’s Saga Urza’s Saga (As this Saga enters and after your draw step, add a lore counter. Sacrifice after III.)
I — This Saga gains "{T}: Add {C}."
II — This Saga gains "{2}, {T}: Create a 0/0 colorless Construct artifact creature token with 'This token gets +1/+1 for each artifact you control.'"
III — Search your library for an artifact card with mana cost {0} or {1}, put it onto the battlefield, then shuffle. shells.

Finally, a cool inclusion in this deck is Search for Glory. Search for Glory is a nice resource to have when you have all your requisite Tron Lands in play. It can grab Ulamog, any of your Planeswalkers, select one-ofs like Elesh Norn, Mother of Machines Elesh Norn, Mother of Machines Vigilance
If a permanent entering causes a triggered ability of a permanent you control to trigger, that ability triggers an additional time.
Permanents entering don't cause abilities of permanents your opponents control to trigger. , and The One Ring. You can even search for Snow-Covered Plains in a pinch if you’re light on Lands, which is a nice option to have.

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Strengths and Weaknesses

While mono-white Tron does have some similarities to the more popular mono-green Tron, there are some major differences when it comes to the strengths and weaknesses of the strategies. Mono-white Tron is much stronger against hate pieces like Blood Moon or Magus of the Moon Magus of the Moon Nonbasic lands are Mountains. out of Izzet Murktide. Simultaneously, mono-white Tron has the necessary disruption to avoid falling too far behind against Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer Whenever Ragavan deals combat damage to a player, create a Treasure token and exile the top card of that player's library. Until end of turn, you may cast that card.
Dash {1}{R} (You may cast this spell for its dash cost. If you do, it gains haste, and it's returned from the battlefield to its owner's hand at the beginning of the next end step.) and counter magic.

Mono-white Tron also does a much better job at keeping fast Creature decks like Hammer Time in check. This shouldn’t be too shocking, given the wide range of removal present in the mono-white Tron deck. These removal spells can help in a variety of matchups, including Golgari Yawgmoth and Rakdos Scam.

Where the big weakness of mono-white Tron lies in comparison to mono-green Tron is in matchups where the removal isn’t super impactful. Decks like Scapeshift Scapeshift Sacrifice any number of lands. Search your library for up to that many land cards, put them onto the battlefield tapped, then shuffle. combo that can win the game without committing much to the board are hugely problematic. In these types of matchups, you really need to get a mana boost early and slam a quick haymaker, which mono-green Tron does a significantly better job of.

Speaking of which, mono-green Tron has a huge edge over mono-white Tron in the pseudo-mirror for similar reasons. There are also decks like Dimir Mill that, between the presence of Field of Ruin Field of Ruin {T}: Add {C}.
{2}, {T}, Sacrifice this land: Destroy target nonbasic land an opponent controls. Each player searches their library for a basic land card, puts it onto the battlefield, then shuffles. , Surgical Extraction Surgical Extraction ({B/P} can be paid with either {B} or 2 life.)
Choose target card in a graveyard other than a basic land card. Search its owner's graveyard, hand, and library for any number of cards with the same name as that card and exile them. Then that player shuffles. , and a win condition in milling that is hard to mess with, completely wreck mono-white Tron on all levels.

With this in mind, if you want to play mono-white Tron, be prepared for some polarizing matchups. When your white removal spells are strong, you’re probably in decent shape. Otherwise, you may be in for a rough time. Still, if you like Tron but are tired of losing to quick starts from aggressive decks or an abundance of hate pieces from the opponent, consider giving this unique variant a whirl.

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