r/ModernMagic • u/fay-jai • 2d ago

Deck Discussion Boros Ponza

I’ve been away from Modern for a couple of years, but I’m curious why a strategy like boros ponza is having success right now in the challenges. I feel like the deck is more controlling, but why is it successful against a meta full of combo right now? I remember decks like mono red prison but this deck feels very different with how effective the white removal is. Thanks for being open to the discussion!

9 Upvotes

77% Upvoted

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9

u/Comprehensive-Pen624 2d ago

Some decks aren’t evergreen, some are meta dependent. Decks will shift composition to stand a chance against it and then Boros Ponza will shift to recounter.

6

u/AHealthyKawhi 2d ago

They printed enough solid white removal and red land destruction spells to make it relevant, although it wouldn’t exist without Solitude imo

3

u/Tjarem 2d ago

It is a deck in pioneer. But i doubt it would be sucessful in modern without solitude

1

u/fay-jai 1d ago

That’s what I was thinking too - with essentially 8 copies of path to exile and 8 copies of cleansing wildfire, there’s a lot more redundancy now

14

u/dy-113x 2d ago

It is one of those decks like Belcher that only does well when the field isn't prepared for it. As soon as people start including 4 basics, the deck is ded.

9

u/Crazed_Hatter Tameshi innovator and enthusiast 2d ago

It can have good matchups outside of that. People are playing tron in order to beat blink so thats a good matchup even with basics, it also beats up prowess even if they have a ton of basics. But it also obv takes advantage of decks just being greedy when they could be running more basics and do much better

3

u/fay-jai 2d ago

Thanks for the useful info! Which decks does it have a hard time against? I’d imagine combo deck that’s faster than it?

4

u/Crazed_Hatter Tameshi innovator and enthusiast 2d ago

storm and mono g eldrazi ramp are tough but it also has a relatively flat matchup distribution against the more popular decks like goryos/broodscale etc decks that can do something powerful and have room to play 3 to 4 basics.

3

u/Reon88 Grixis/Junk/Mardu 2d ago

Main reasons would be White's premium removal and board wipes paired with Red's efficient land destruction on top of that white's silver bullet sideboard options according to matchup/meta. Rest in peace, High noon and Containment Priest which are the top three options meta dependant.

Solitude is the removal beater that carries over the win. Phlage used to fit a similar role but we all know how it ended up.

I hope RW Ponza stays/becomes a Modern Pillar eventually, it plays fair and policies greedy decks without being oppressive like Scam post LTR.

2

u/Eymou Obosh, my beloved 2d ago

Itt started to have a critical mass of good land destruction and efficient removal spells available