by Johnny Cycles, June 6th, 2024
Hello! Welcome to another edition of Keeping Modern Janky! This week, I’m returning to one of my favorite archetyes – Lukka Surprise – to try and cheat in Emrakul, the Aeons Torn using Lukka, Coppercoat Outcast. But instead of filling the deck with 1-drops to transform into the spaghetti monster, we’re running some of Modern’s best 2-drop creatures. Will the loss of mana dorks make us to slow to compete in Modern? Or will the added value of cards like Tarmogoyf and Orcish Bowmasters win games all on their own? Let’s find out!
For the deck tech, break down, and game play from my Gruul Lukka Surprise deck, click here. I’ll sum up our primary gameplan with this:
Decklist – Jund 2-Drop Lukka Surprise
by Johnny Cycles
Format: Modern
Creatures (13)
| 4 Orcish Bowmasters | |
| 4 Tarmogoyf | |
| 4 Questing Druid | |
| 1 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn |
Planeswalkers (4)
| 4 Lukka, Coppercoat Outcast |
Artifacts (4)
| 4 Mishra’s Bauble |
Enchantments (6)
| 3 Footfall Crater | |
| 3 Bitter Reunion |
Spells (10)
| 3 Fatal Push | |
| 4 Lightning Bolt | |
| 3 Thoughtseize |
Lands (23)
Sideboard (15)
| 2 Engineered Explosives | |
| 3 Veil of Summer | |
| 3 Assassin’s Trophy | |
| 3 Brotherhood’s End | |
| 4 Leyline of the Void |
Deck Tech
I discuss in detail the benefits of adding to this archetype here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dqun7BMHAUM
Why 2-Drops?
Mana dorks are terribly fragile in today’s Modern due to cards like Orcish Bowmasters, Wrenn and Six, and Fire // Ice, not to mention all the other commonly played removal in the format. Thus, our plan to ramp into Lukka, Coppercoat Outcast on turn 3 using 1-mana creatures was always a fragile one. Still, alongside Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer and Fable of the Mirror-Breaker, we were able to win some games. Taking the deck into Black and adding Karn, the Great Creator also proved beneficial, as it gave us another viable win condition.
And that’s what the deck needs. We can’t be all in on the Lukka-Emrakul plan and expect to be competitive. It’s also not very much fun, to be honest. Our 2-drop creatures give us another avenue to victory, while often serving a secondary purpose beyond the potential to become Emrakul, the Aeons Torn.
Tarmogoyf is the most vanilla of our 2-drop options, yet our fastest closer once we’re in the fair, Jund beat-down plan. But even Tarmogoyf brings something to the table beyond a big beater: card draw. We are incentivized to play as many card types as possible, and Mishra’s Bauble is a free artifact that replaces itself, while also providing us with key information. Not to mention it digs for our combo pieces.
A quick aside about Bauble. Its synergy with fetch lands is widely known and abused. But it also synergizes quite nicely with the new surveil lands from Murders at Karlov Manor. For those who’ve been watching my videos for awhile now, you know I tried these surveil lands in a lot of decks before cutting them with some choice words for how they cost us whole turns by entering tapped. However, I think in the Lukka archetype, they are perfect. After all, we’re a combo deck that needs to find its pieces. These lands are made for this purpose.
Back to the 2-drops…
Orcish Bowmasters does what anyone who’s been playing Modern knows: kills 1-toughness creatures for breakfast and punishes card draw for dessert. For us, it brings a crucial second body to the battlefield that insulates us from losing our 2-drop to an Archon of Cruelty trigger, as we see in one of our matches, or to Liliana of the Veil. It doesn’t stop our opponent from sniping the relevant body with Sheoldred’s Edict, which sees quite a bit of play, but even Orcish Bowmasters can’t do it all.
Finally, we get to our all-star 2-drop, Questing Druid. I’ve played this card in a variety of decks with mixed results. In Gruul Dragons, the card draw was nice, but we didn’t have many ways to grow the Druid. In Jund Souls of the Lost, it showed off its power much better.
Of all the decks I’ve played the Adventure spell in, though, it’s at its best in Lukka Surprise. Seek the Beast gives us yet another way to dig for our combo pieces, while we have a bunch of ways to grow the creature half to make it a legitimate threat. Of course, we often won’t even care about growing it, as we really just want to make it an Emrakul, the Aeons Torn.
A Fair Jund Deck…
…doing Jund things is how this deck plays out. That is, until we stick a Lukka, Coppercoat Outcast and win the game with Emrakul, the Aeons Torn.
And that’s how I’d describe this deck. We’re a fair Jund deck with an “Oops, I won the game” combo. We can play a grindy game, manage the board, and win with undercosted threats, or we can go over the top of it all and annihilate our opponent’s board while hitting for 15.
Sound fun to you?
Let’s get to the game play!
Friendly League Match 1 vs. Humans
Friendly League Match 2 vs. Hammer Time
Friendly League Match 3 vs. Indomitable Creativity
Friendly League Match 4 vs. Burn
Friendly League Match 5 vs. Caves/Lands
Overall League Record: 3-2
Wrap-Up
The deck did what we set out to do. We got both Emrakul and 2-drop beats wins. Our fair Jund plan was able to manage what most of our opponents were doing long enough for us to win in one of those two ways. Our two losses came against aggressive decks: Hammer Time and Burn. Both are known entities with which our deck has the tools to compete. Hammer Time, in particular, is a deck we have a solid game against both pre- and post-sideboarding. Burn, meanwhile, is a tougher draw, as we have no lifegain. Even without shocking ourselves, living to turn 5 or 6 to attack with Emrakul is a big ask without it. It’s possible we should tweak our sideboard to find room for something like Pulse of Murasa or Haywire Mite.
Overall, the deck was a lot of fun to play. I really like playing a Jund strategy without being all in on the grindy, midrange plan of winning. Having our top end makes the deck feel like its one Lukka away from winning, no matter the board state. This is as powerful and exciting as it sounds.
If you enjoy playing both Midrange and Combo, then I recommend trying this deck out. It’s got a foot in both archetypes in a way that makes it greater than the sum of its parts.
Let me know in the comments what you think! How would you change the deck? What 2-drops would you play? Would you add Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer to the deck even though we’d never target it with Lukka, Coppercoat Outcast?
Thanks for reading and watching!
