Heartless Summoning, The White Whale of Modern

By Faithless Brewing

Friday, December 11, 2020

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Faithless Brewing, Episode 84: Heartless Summoning

 

Heartless Summoning holds a special fascination for Modern brewers. So much of the card screams “broken”: it’s low cost, splashable, and provides massive cost reduction. The drawback of shrinking your creatures can be a combo enabler in itself. Effects like this are very rare, and very dangerous.

 

And yet, after 10 years, the ugly truth is that Heartless Summoning has yet to find any tournament success. Many have tried, and many have failed. Just four 5-0s are recorded in the last three years. Most brewers have cut their losses and given up the quest. For a few, the card has become an obsession, such as this modern day Captain Ahab who has uploaded 106(!) Heartless lists to MTGGoldfish in the past six months alone. 

 

So what does the future hold for Heartless Summoning? Modern has changed drastically in the last two years, and new tools are always being added. Is it possible that a broken Heartless deck is just waiting to be discovered? Or are we also doomed to failure as we chase Modern’s white whale? We’ve got five new decklists and a half-dozen more bizarre ideas, so let’s find out!

 

Decklists for Episode 84 can be found here: https://faithlessbrewing.com/heartless-summoning-the-white-whale-of-modern/

 

Also in this edition: 

* When Should You Play One-Ofs in Modern?* Picks of the Week: Blood Sun Jeskai, Goblins, and Hysterical Emrakul* Testing results with Sea Gate Stormcaller: Grixis Arcanist Shadow, Naban Vial Wizards, and Izzet Drake Whack

 

Happy brewing!

 

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