This week I am bringing two similar brews with Monastery Mentor in Modern. When my anti-burn article went live two weeks ago my salt was met with a lot of negative feedback. It was also met with agreement, and I was challenged to design something playable in Modern with Monastery Mentor by twitter user CCDrash @TirelessLhur. The main suggestion was in a Jeskai shell, though I felt slotting Mentor into the similar WR Blood Moon deck was a decent idea as well as the deck is mainly cheap removal spells.
Due to this split in views I decided to try both.
WR Mentor
Lands (22)
4 Arid Mesa
4 Inspiring Vantage
4 Marsh Flats
2 Mountain
4 Plains
4 Sacred Foundry
Creatures (7)
4 Monastery Mentor
3 Simian Spirit Guide
Spells (31)
2 Ajani Vengeant
3 Apostle’s Blessing
4 Blood Moon
2 Cathartic Reunion
1 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
2 Condemn
4 Gut Shot
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Lightning Helix
4 Mishra’s Bauble
1 Path to Exile
Patriot Mentor
Lands (24)
3 Flooded Strand
4 Hallowed Fountain
2 Irrigated Farmland
4 Island
1 Mountain
2 Plains
1 Sacred Foundry
3 Scalding Tarn
4 Steam Vents
Creatures (5)
2 Monastery Mentor
3 Snapcaster Mage
Spells (30)
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Lightning Helix
2 Logic Knot
3 Mana Leak
2 Mishra’s Bauble
3 Path to Exile
3 Remand
4 Serum Visions
2 Spell Pierce
1 Temporal Trespass
3 Thought Scour
I am not going to fully break down each deck but I will chat a bit about the decks and explain the differences in numbers of certain cards that are shared between the two different style of builds and why they are there.
WR Mentor
The WR version follows a much more Sun and Moon style of deck where we hope to lock them out a bit using Simian Spirit Guide to play an early Blood Moon. The rest of the deck is generally removal and planeswalkers for value. Here I have added Monastery Mentor as a way to take advantage of all the spells that we are running to go very wide and close out a game quickly rather than relying on keeping a four mana planeswalker on the table for several turns while potentially drawing Emrakul, the Aeons Torn (a fifteen-mana creature) that will often be a dead draw without Nahiri, the Harbinger. I have added a full set of Mishra’s Bauble as a way to immediately get free prowess and be able to add some form of cantripping to allow us to multi spell the same turn cycle that we play our Mentor.
For this variant I have included a full set of Gut Shot as another easy turn three prowess value play. Gut Shot in Modern is probably very undervalued currently. It answers all the mana dorks and Vizier out of the Collected Company decks, most of the creatures in affinity, every creature out of infect and will often be unexpected whenever it is cast. I have also added a pair of Cathartic Reunion as a way to turn a slower land-heavy hand into gas for a Mentor.
Patriot Mentor
The Patriot version follows a fairly traditional control route featuring the usual removal in Lightning Bolt, Lightning Helix, and Path to Exile. Using a combination of these alongside countermagic like Mana Leak, Remand, and Spell Pierce we can keep our opponent off balance for multiple turns. When we are able to play multiple spells in a turn, we will drop Monastery Mentor and begin chaining spells. I have only included two Mishra’s Bauble in this build since we already have the cantripping of Remand, Serum Visions, and Thought Scour.
I have included Thought Scour for the cantrip, the ability to fuel Snapcaster Mage, as well as delve from Logic Knot and Temporal Trespass. Trespass was the sweet and spicy add in that I gave to the deck having been inspired by Time Walk in Vintage Mentor—where you can make a few tokens, Time Walk and then have the ability to kill after casting a few spells.
Initial Thoughts
While I am not entirely sure if Mentor is really viable in Modern, these decks were very fun to brew and play around with and I imagine they could be a blast to play. Thank you for the challenge CCDrash and I hope you like the two different decks. If you test them be sure to check in with me and let me know how it went!
Happy brewing to each and every one of you. If anyone has an idea for a brew that they would like to see, I will gladly take requests and challenges on twitter or in email at brewmesomespice@gmail.com.
Aaron Gazzaniga works part time at a game store and in his off time has been an avid magic player/brewer since 2003. Having begun in Odyssey Standard Block and always favoring control and prison style decks, we come to this moment in time where Aaron finally gets to talk about and share his ideas. If you want to contact Aaron tweet @aarongazzaniga