Modern Metagame Breakdown: Top decks of July 2022

Join me as we explore the top performing Modern decks of the month!

Events

On Magic Online, there are 2 challenges for each format, each weekend. These events are usually pretty large and are a great source for competitive data. There are also some other major events that are worth checking out. Click the links below to see the top results in each of those events:

• July 2nd Challenge
• July 3rd Challenge
• July 4th Super Qualifier
• July 9th Challenge
• July 10th Challenge
• July 16th Challenge
• July 17th Challenge
• July 23rd Showcase Challenge
• July 24th Challenge
• July 30th Challenge
• July 31st Challenge

As for paper events, below you can find all the 100+ player events:

• July 8th 1pm SCG CON Syracuse trial
• July 8th 4pm SCG CON Syracuse trial
• July 9th SCG CON Syracuse 30k
• July 30th NRG Chicagoland 10k

Top Decks

After compiling all the Top 8 results from these events, I will discuss below which decks had the most top finishes. Make sure you are aware of these decks when you plan for a tournament; it is likely they will show up at the top tables.

Izzet Murktide

The best performing deck this month was Izzet Murktide by a long shot. While our data shows Murktide has a 50% win-rate, it launched 27 players into top 8’s of the major events this month. This is more than double of any other deck. Interestingly, Murktide did not win any of these events, but you can’t ignore the sheer number of top 8’s the deck put up.

Azorius Hammer

The next best performing deck was Hammertime. Most lists you see these days are Azorius, but occasionally Mono White still puts up results. Hammer is a deck people frequently underestimate, myself included. People assume it is easy to hate out but it can be surprisingly hard to interact with and can win very fast. Hammer placed 13 times in the Top 8’s, including winning 1 challenge. Similar to Murktide, our data shows only a 50% win-rate overall. This is often because you see a large number of people trying out these decks and not everyone is gonna finish well. Watch out for Hammer, it may be way better than you expect!

Amulet Titan

Amulet put up 9 finishes in the Top 8’s of the major events in July. I can’t say I am happy to see this, as I really don’t like facing Amulet personally. I almost always lose to it somehow or another. Our data shows Amulet to have an overall win-rate of 52%, which is above the 2 others listed earlier but seems to get less top results. I find Amulet both very hard to play with and against. The recent printings of Boseiju, Who Endures and Urza's Saga have really given Amulet a boost at both beating and dodging hate. The top players on this deck are really skilled and it is always cool to see the complex lines they come up with to smash you in the face with a Primeval Titan.

Living End

Living End has an overall win rate of 53%, the highest of the 4 decks I am discussing today. It put 8 lists into Top 8’s this month, including winning a challenge, and the Showcase Challenge. A lot of players I know believe Living End is the best deck in Modern and looking at results you can understand why. This is another deck that looks easy to hate out but is deceptive because of how much interaction they play. It combos by using Living End to reanimate your entire graveyard of creatures with cycling abilities. You would think you can easily remove the graveyard and be fine but End is designed to fight hate. In additional to cards Rhinos plays like Force of Negation, Force of Vigor, and Subtlety, End is 4-colors so it can support Grief. All this interaction makes it a lot harder to hate out than your first glance may think.

Additional Information

Well, that is all I got for today. Murktide, Hammertime, Amulet and Living End were the top 4 performing Modern decks of July 2022. Be sure to check out the links at the top of the article to see all our data and more deck lists. We have way more data for Modern than any other format and it is impossible to cover it all in this article. Thank you all for reading!