Top 5 Coolest Modern Horizons 3 Cards for Modern

Modern Horizons 3 is slated to release very soon and shake-up the games most popular competitive format, Modern. There are plenty of cool cards in this article I am gonna go through my top 5(ish) coolest cards and some of the awesome things to do with them. This list is not the top 5 most powerful cards but rather some of the things that I think will be the most fun and interesting new aspects of modern.

1. Primal Prayers

First off, Primal Prayers is a 4-mana green enchantment and is a member of a new cycle of cards balancing old powerful cards by adding the energy mechanic. Primal Prayers is Aluren. Aluren allows both players to cast all creatures with MV 3 or less for free and as though they had flash. Aluren was a long time combo deck in legacy that abused this ability to cast creatures for free to win the game. Primal Prayers makes a couple changes, it is one sided, so your opponent can’t cast things for free, and while all creature spells mana value 3 or less still can be cast as though they had flash they now cost a single energy as opposed to being completely free. The enchantment gives two energy when it enters so at a minimum of 2 creatures can be cast for free.

This enchantment is super cool and I am very excited to build around it. Guide of Souls, a new card gives a life and an energy whenever a creature enters which when combined with Primal Prayers creates normal Aluren, all creatures are effectively free. Primal Prayers and Guide of Souls combo with Acerak the Archlich. The three cards can drain an opponent for infinite life and whatever value is also obtained by infinitely repeating the Dungeon of the Mad Mage or the Lost Mine of Phandelver. Recruiter of the Guard also was printed into Modern with MH3 and can tutor for Guide of Souls. (If you wanted to go into a fourth color Recruiter of the Guard can find Guide of Souls as well) When you can cast all 3 mana or less creatures for free, I am sure there will be plenty of other combos present.

2. Nadu, Winged Wisdom

Next up, Nadu, Winged Wisdom is another combo piece that looks like a ton of fun. Nadu gives all creatures you control the ability “Whenever this creature becomes the target of a spell or ability, reveal the top card of your library. If it’s a land card, put it onto the battlefield. Otherwise, put it into your hand. This ability triggers only twice each turn.” This is a great protection ability to generate value, however when combined with Shuko, a one mana equipment with Equip 0, or Lightning Greaves another equip 0 equipment, you are triggering every creature twice a turn to effectively draw/ramp 2 cards per creature. This is pretty good, but the deck can theoretically combo kill the turn Nadu comes down if the deck includes Zero drop creatures like Ornithopter, Memnite, and Shrieking Drake (maybe Faerie Imposter) to also combo by resetting the limit on Ornithopter and Memnite. Two Shrieking Drakes can also loop each other as long as there is mana available which Nadu facilitates by putting lands into play. Eventually when the deck is empty a Thassa’s Oracle can win the game. Combo protection like Pact of Negation, Force of Denial (if there are sufficient blue creatures in the decklist) and Spell Pierce each are great. Step Through’s wizard cycling also finds Wizards and is a hard to interact with Tutor for Nadu. Stoneforge Mystic and Urza’s Saga both can find Shuko and Stoneforge can find Lightning Greaves. This deck looks like a ton of fun.

3. Wight of the Reliquary

Wight of the Reliquary is a play on another awesome card, Knight of the Reliquary. Both cards search for lands and put them onto the battlefield to grow larger, but the new Golgari Variant has some key differences. Wight gets +1/+1 for each creature in the graveyard while Knight gets +1/+1 for each land. In the same vein, Wight sacrifices a creature to search for any land and Knight sacrifices a land to search for any land. This opens up awesome plenty of awesome new avenues of deck building. While Knight keeps your land count the same, Wight works great with Bloodghast repeatedly sacrificing it and then returning it to the battlefield. Gravecrawler costs mana to bring it back but because Wight is a zombie you can sacrifice Gravecrawler and then recast it each turn. There are plenty of super cool lands that can be found like Bojuka Bog, Sejiri Steppe, and Urza’s Saga. Khalni Garden even creates a token to sacrifice if you are ramping towards a big payoff.

4. White Orchid Phantom

White Orchid Phantom is an awesome tool for Death and Taxes. The new two mana card is both a solid body and on entering the battlefield destroys a nonbasic land. It’s controller can search for a basic land, however it is very easy to run out of basics for many decks as they often only run 2-3. Ephemerate-ing the Phantom can really mess with a decks mana and Leonin Arbiter, also referred to as Cat Jesus, can stop your opponent from searching at all in the first place. 4 Ghost Quarter, 4 White Orchid Phantom and 4 Leonin Arbiter creates a very consistent and powerful land destruction plan that will either run the opponent out of lands or they won’t be able to search in the first place. Thalia, Guardian of Thraben also makes casting spells difficult further synergizing with the mana disruption plan. All together, White Orchid Phantom is a super cool new addition to the strategy that will hopefully breathe life into the archetype.

5. Ruby Medallion & Ral, Monsoon Mage

Finally, Ruby Medallion and Ral, Monsoon Mage look like great cards for a mono-red storm deck! Ruby Storm is already an archetype in legacy based on Ruby Medallion. Ruby Medallion being an artifact is for harder to interact with and reduces the cost of all the rituals in the deck. A current weakness of storm in modern is how easy it is for opposing decks to remove Baral and Goblin Electromancer. Galvanic Relay supports this archetype as well providing a storm card that allows for really strong set up and the new Ral also is a great storm card, filling in the roll of a cost reducer and with enough storm threatens to flip into a planeswalker and -8 to cast a on of free spells.

Overall, Modern Horizons 3 will provide tons of cool new cards to brew with, and while there are plenty of powerful inclusions it doesn’t look like it will have a similar effect to Modern Horizons 2 where a couple cards gained tons of dominance. The cycle of free spells in the set look fairly balanced! Let me know in the comments what you are excited to build around or what cards your favorite deck has gotten! (I know I’ll be writing plenty about Yawgmoth and MH3 soon enough)