8. Reality Heist
I'll be upfront in saying that this card is a pretty distant eighth in comparison to the rest of the list. It is fighting to replace 1-2 Thoughtcast in UWx Affinity decks, which are already fringe, and maybe a couple slots in Urza, if that ever goes back to being a real deck. Thoughtcast is easier to cast and cheaper to cast, and in Affinity, U is hugely cheaper than UU. Additionally, Affinity's cards are pretty similar to each other, so you're just looking for more cards as opposed to specific cards. Finally, you're often hoping to find the non-Artifact cards like Urza's Saga, Urza, Lord High Artificer, or Ingenious Smith in the late game, not more copies of Springleaf Drum. On average, your artifacts cost 1 mana (outside of Thought Monitor) and your non-Artifacts cost 2-3 mana. This means that the expected mana you're getting out of Reality Heist is about 2, which will be a pretty low-variance 2, whereas the mana you're getting out of Thoughtcast will be a much higher variance 3ish.
There's also the risk that Reality Heist whiffs on hits, and I'm very much considering hitting only one Artifact a whiff. If we assume you play Nassif's recent UW Affinity deck below, replacing two Thoughtcast with two Heists, and you are able to cast Heist on Turn 5 for two mana, then you have 22 remaining hits in your deck out of 48 cards. This is a reasonable-ish assumption, as the expected number of artifacts you draw in the first 12 draws is 5.4, but it loses some integrity since many of your non-Artifacts (Smith and Stoneforge) find more Artifacts, thinning the possible hits in the deck. Regardless, this assumption gives a roughly 92% chance of two or more hits, which is reasonable. For comparison, Collected Company cast on Turn 4 in Heliod gives roughly a 90% chance of hitting two more more creatures, and that's typically acceptable despite the crappy mana dorks and such. Both Heist and Company are 99% to find at least 1 hit.
All said, whether you play Heist likely comes down to the quality and mana value of the artifacts in your deck. In current builds of Affinity, I might try one to start, but Thought Monitor and Nettlecyst are the only things really worth hitting, so Thoughtcast seems better. If Affinity is built to maximize Heist, then by definition you make Heist better, but I'm not sure you're making the deck better.
7. Eiganjo, Seat of the Empire
The Channel-lands look great, particularly for Standard and Pioneer. For Modern, I do think Eiganjo is decent as a one-of in decks like Death and Taxes and maybe UW Control. In Taxes, the fact that it's an ability and not a spell means that Thalia actually reduces the cost by 1 instead of taxing it, which is nice. Of course, Taxes hasn't been very competitive since the printing of Prismatic Ending to hate on Aether Vial, and it's unlikely this Land would be enough to bring it back.
UW Control, on the other hand, is quite good in the format, but I'm not sure Eiganjo has a spot in the deck. UW could cut one of the two Plains for it, but it's then increasing its susceptibility to Blood Moon, losing the ability to hardcast Solitude. It could maybe cut the mainboard Dovin's Veto if the format moves toward being more creature-heavy than planeswalker heavy, but that's close.
Of course, Eiganjo with Wrenn and Six is just The Abyss against creature decks, which might pull some Wrenn players back toward Naya Saga with Prismatic Ending, but I'm not sure Eiganjo is enough of a pull away from Jund.
Fundamentally, I'm not sure that Eiganjo has an easy home right now, but it's a powerful enough spell/land that it's worth keeping in mind, and it will probably show up in Modern at some point.
6. Lion Sash
While many of the staples of Old Modern have faded away over the years, Scavenging Ooze has stuck around. A cheap, two-mana creature that eats graveyards and gets bigger, the Ooze has been go-to hate for a long time.
Lion Sash is a Scavenging Ooze that can be found off Stoneforge Mystic, grows for exiling not just creatures, but permanents, and can dodge removal by being equipped to a creature. It's a really interesting variant of ScOoze, but is powerful enough to merit being included somewhere in the 75 of any Stoneforge decks. The ability to take up only one slot, but have 5 ways of finding it is appealing, upping the odds you'll have it just when you need it against Reanimator or Living End. The new take on ScOoze feels appropriate to White, granting the color yet another tool for Modern, but one that feels different enough from the original to be interesting.
5. Experimental Synthesizer
Arcum's Astrolabe broke Modern in seven different ways, but in Urza decks, it primarily did one thing: it drew a card, and then stuck around as an Artifact. It could then be tapped to Improvise, sacrificed to Thopter Foundry, looped with Goblin Engineer, and tapped for mana with Urza. The mana-filtering was occasionally relevant, but it was everything else that the Whirza deck cared far more about. I often pined for an artifact which was just: U – Artifact – When [CARDNAME] enters the battlefield, draw a card.
Experimental Synthesizer is the Red version of the Blue artifact I wanted for Urza. It's a one-mana Ichor Wellspring that can sac itself to make a body. The only downside of this card is that it's not really a Turn 1 play. At the earliest, you'd play it on Turn 2 and hope to hit a land or a 0 or 1. By Turn 5, it's just better than Astrolabe (in Urza specifically).
But here's the thing: this might be the piece needed to tie the deck together. So many one-mana artifacts have been printed for Urza recently (Esper Sentinel, Portable Hole, and now Moonsnare Prototype as well), that playing it on Turn 2 is going to hit a large fraction of the time. And even when it doesn't, the Urza shell could consider adopting Deadly Dispute, generating tons of advantage off Synthesizer.
This card has a lot of potential, and I'm excited to see what it can do in Urza.
4. Hidetsugu Devours All
This card is super good against Lurrus of the Dream-Den decks, which means it's super good against two of the best decks of the format: Hammertime and Death's Shadow. The downside of this card is that it can't be played in Lurrus decks, which are the primary BR decks of the format. The question then becomes whether this could get played out of something like 4C Blink, where Abundant Growth and a single Triome could make it highly accessible post-board. It seems unlikely that a bigger Grixis deck could emerge, as it's hard to imagine how it wouldn't just be a worse version of Shadow. Of course, some players will use this as a way to justify a return to Boomer Jund, but, well, we know how that'll turn out.
It's a powerful card that matches up well against some of the best decks in the format; the question at this point is who will figure out how to play it first.
3. Moonsnare Prototype
This is an incredible tool for artifact decks like Urza. You always have spare artifacts lying around (Portable Hole, Experimental Synthesizer, Treasure, Bauble, etc), which makes this a colorless, one-mana mana rock. Creature-light Urza decks have often resorted to Talismans as the best artifact accelerants in the format, but Moonsnare Prototype feels closer to Mox Opal than to a Talisman.
Admittedly, the restriction to colorless mana hurts, as it means you can't play Moonsnare + a 0-mana artifact and use them to cast a colored spell like Portable Hole, Esper Sentinel, or Emry, Lurker of the Loch. Even so, it's a significant step up, and I'm looking forward to seeing how it plays. Together with Experimental Synthesizer, we might be able to bring back Whirza.
2. Colossal Skyturtle & Mirrorshell Crab
Colossal Skyturtle in particular is likely to see some play in Living End as either a replacement for Brazen Borrower//Petty Theft or as #5+. It will usually bounce stuff, but in grindier games, it can rebuy a Cascade spell, a Force, or a Cycler.
Mirrorshell Crab is an interesting sideboard option for Living End, as it's an uncounterable three-mana Mana Leak that powers up Living End. The three mana is definitely awkward, as you won't be able to use it to protect a Violent Outburst as a Force of Negation would, but it does deal with more proactive answers such as Teferi, Time Raveler.
Skyturtle is the real prize here, but I did want to mention Crab as a possibility on the fringe.
1. Boseiju, Who Endures
Surprising absolutely nobody, Boseiju, Who Endures is the number one card for Modern from Kamigawa. Amulet of Vigor can play one which is fetchable with Primeval Titan, Expedition Map, and Tolaria West. Jund can play one and loop it with Wrenn and Six. It incidentally kills Urza's Saga, Colossus Hammer, Sigarda's Aid, Chalice of the Void, opposing Amulets or Maps, the list just goes on and on. The fact that it does all this uncounterably while stapled to a Land is an absurd level of maindeckable versatility. It's certainly not too powerful, but it's flexibility will make it a mainstay of Green Modern decks for years to come.
Ryan Normandin is a grinder from Boston who has lost at the Pro Tour, in GP & SCG Top 8's, and to 7-year-olds at FNM. Despite being described as "not funny" by his best friend and "the worst Magic player ever" by Twitch chat, he cheerfully decided to blend his lack of talents together to write funny articles about Magic.
