Izzet Prowess Modern: The Tempo Deck That Draws Cards
Izzet Prowess Modern is the cheapest competitive deck in the format — a blue-red tempo engine built around Symmetry Sage and Ledger Shredder that turns every cheap spell you cast into a body and a card. The core idea is simple: cast a creature, then resolve two or three cheap spells, and the Magecraft and prowess triggers stack into one enormous swing. According to recent MTGGoldfish archetype data, the deck has been a consistent player in Modern for years, and a full paper build comes to roughly $200.
This guide walks through the 75-card Modern list, the 10 cards that make the deck work, how it wins through the prowess payoff line, the matchups you need to know, and what a proxy-first version looks like for players who want the experience without any of the paper price tag.
| 📋 Table of Contents | |
|---|---|
| 1. | Deck Identity |
| 2. | The Decklist |
| 3. | The 5 Key Cards |
| 4. | How Izzet Prowess Wins Games |
| 5. | Matchups: The Ones You Need to Know |
| 6. | Sideboard Strategy |
| 7. | How to Get Started |
Deck Identity
The Decklist
The 75-card Modern list breaks down as:
Source: makeproxycard.com · Modern 2026 build · View on MTGGoldfish
The list splits into three blocks. Twelve cards are threats (Symmetry Sage, Delver, Ledger Shredder, Brazen Borrower). Six are pure card advantage cantrips (Consider, Opt) and card engine (Alchemist’s Retrieval, Crackle with Power, Faithless Looting, Omen of the Sea). The rest is interaction — removal (Lightning Bolt, Mutagenic Growth), counterspells (Spell Pierce, Negate), and one very expensive two-for-one.
The mana base is the interesting part. Only the four Islands and two Mountains enter untapped, which is exactly ten untapped sources across fifteen lands. Stormcarved Coast, Shivan Reef, and Fabled Passage all enter tapped or sacrifice themselves, so you spend a turn with fewer mana than the land count suggests. Shivan Reef also taps for colorless, which is what pays for the two red-only cards in the deck without needing dedicated red sources.
Cost breakdown, from Scryfall’s current pricing across all 75 cards:
The single line item that matters is Force of Negation. Strip those two cards and the whole 75-card list costs $103. That is the real reason this deck is known as a budget option — it is cheap in every sense except one premium slot.
- Mainboard — 45 spells: 4 Symmetry Sage · 4 Delver of Secrets // Insectile Aberration · 4 Ledger Shredder · 4 Brazen Borrower // Petty Theft · 4 Consider · 4 Opt · 4 Alchemist’s Retrieval · 4 Lightning Bolt · 3 Crackle with Power · 2 Faithless Looting · 2 Mutagenic Growth · 2 Omen of the Sea · 2 Spell Pierce · 2 Negate
- Mainboard — 15 lands: 4 Island · 4 Stormcarved Coast · 3 Shivan Reef · 2 Fabled Passage · 2 Mountain
- Sideboard — 15 spells: 2 Force of Negation · 2 Negate · 2 Spell Pierce · 3 Opt · 2 Consider · 2 Faithless Looting · 1 Omen of the Sea · 1 Delver of Secrets // Insectile Aberration
- Mainboard spells (45 cards): ~$86
- Sideboard (15 cards): ~$100 — but $94 of that is two Force of Negation at $47 each
- Lands (15 cards): ~$12
- Total: ~$197
The 5 Key Cards
Symmetry Sage — The Magecraft Engine
Symmetry Sage is a one-mana 0/2 flyer with Magecraft: whenever you cast or copy an instant or sorcery spell, target creature you control has base power 2 until end of turn. That is the whole deck in one card. Every cheap spell in the list is not just an instant — it is a +2/+2 on whatever you already tapped out to.
The important detail is that Magecraft targets a creature you control, which means the Sage pumps itself. Cast Sage for one mana, then resolve Consider, Opt, Spell Pierce, and a Lightning Bolt in the same turn, and you are attacking with an 8/8 flyer. Sage is also the only permanent in the deck that wants you to cast as many non-creature spells as possible, which is precisely the plan the rest of the list is built around.
At four copies and $0.15 each, Sage is the cheapest card in the deck and the one the deck least tolerates losing. It is also fragile — two toughness dies to an Unholy Heat or a lightning blast — so most players run it alongside Ledger Shredder’s three toughness as a way of making sure their pump target survives the turn.
Source: Scryfall — Strixhaven Mystical Archive #56, illustrated by Jehan Choo.
Delver of Secrets // Insectile Aberration — The Turn-1 Threat
Delver of Secrets is a one-mana 1/1 that transforms during your upkeep: look at the top card of your library, reveal it, and if it is an instant or sorcery, transform into Insectile Aberration, a 3/2 flyer. That trigger is not random, it is under your control, and it depends entirely on how you sequenced your draw spells on the turn before.
This is why the cantrips are not optional. The correct line is to hold a Consider or Opt until the end of the turn before your flip, use it to put an instant or sorcery on top, and then transform on the following upkeep with full information. Because Izzet Prowess runs sixteen cards that are instants or sorceries, the flip is close to an afterthought once the deck is built right.
Once transformed, Delver is a 3/2 flyer — and with Symmetry Sage pumping it via Magecraft, a single Consider can turn it into a 5/5 on the swing. The 1/1 front also means Delver can be cast on turn one and still do useful work if the opponent blanks your top three cards, which is exactly what the deck wants: a cheap threat that rewards patience.
Source: Scryfall — 17th Edition, illustrated by Lius Lasahido.
Ledger Shredder — The Connive Engine
Ledger Shredder is a two-mana 1/3 flyer that connives whenever a player casts their second spell each turn — connive meaning draw a card, then discard a card, and if you discarded a nonland card it gets a +1/+1 counter. In a deck built to cast four spells a turn, a card that triggers on the second one is effectively a card advantage engine that pays out every single turn.
The critical clause is whenever a player casts their second spell each turn — not whenever you do. When you connect Ledger Shredder against a five-drop combo deck, their second spell feeds your card draw too. Shredder is also the deck’s best pump target: a 3-toughness flyer with counters survives a single removal spell, which means your Magecraft pump survives with it.
At $9.04, Shredder is the most expensive creature in the list and the reason the deck is not quite as dirt-cheap as its reputation suggests. At four copies it is also the deck’s biggest source of variance: two Shredders on the same turn each connive, and the second one to resolve has already drawn its counter.
Source: Scryfall — Streets of New Capeda #46, illustrated by Mila Pesic.
Alchemist’s Retrieval — The Recursion Engine
Alchemist’s Retrieval is a one-mana instant: return target nonland permanent you control to its owner’s hand. For one mana you can pick up a Ledger Shredder, a Delver of Secrets, or a Brazen Borrower and replay it, generating fresh triggers every time. With cleave for one extra mana it can also return an opposing permanent instead — the line that turns a dead artifact or planeswalker into a removal spell.
In the deck’s best line, you cast Alchemist’s Retrieval to return Ledger Shredder to your hand, replay Shredder the same turn, and watch the connive trigger fire again on the second spell. Two Shredders, two connives, two cards drawn, for three mana. Repeat the line and the deck grinds out very long games against control decks that expected to out-draw you.
Alchemist’s Retrieval is the card that makes the list a recursive engine rather than a simple creature deck. It is a four-of at $0.17, which means the recursion plan costs almost nothing to build — you get an endless line for less than a dollar in paper.
Source: Scryfall — Innistrad: Crimson Vow #47, illustrated by David Auden Nash.
Brazen Borrower // Petty Theft — The Two-for-One
Brazen Borrower is a three-mana 3/1 flash flyer that can block only creatures with flying, and its adventure, Petty Theft, costs one blue mana and returns an opposing nonland permanent to its owner’s hand. In a format where every free spell is a threat, Petty Theft removes a permanent for one mana without changing your main-deck plan at all.
The flyer half solves a specific problem: it blocks the creatures that beat your Sage and Shredder in the air, and it can be cast at instant speed so you can flash it in as the fourth spell in a turn when you have already resolved three cheap spells. Casting Borrower for four turns its base power to 8 with a single Consider.
At $0.53 across four copies, Borrower is both the second-cheapest threat in the deck and the reason the deck has any interaction against non-creature strategies. Modern lists with graveyard engines or artifacts generally fear Petty Theft more than they fear Lightning Bolt.
Source: Scryfall — Starter Deck Cup #190, illustrated by Eric Deschamps.
How Izzet Prowess Wins Games
The deck wins through card advantage converted into a single enormous attack. You resolve cheap spells for their value, the Magecraft and prowess triggers stack on your creature, and you hit for an amount that no deck in the format has a blocker for. Then you draw a card and do it again next turn.
1. Early game (turns 1-3): Play Delver of Secrets on turn one, or Symmetry Sage if you want the pump engine online faster. Turn two, resolve Consider or Opt to set up your Delver flip or dig for a Ledger Shredder. Play Shredder on turn two or three and start conniving on every turn where you cast two or more spells. 2. Mid game (turns 3-5): This is where the deck wins. Cast a threat, then resolve three or four cheap spells after combat damage has already been declared — or before it, depending on the pump math — and swing with a Sage or Shredder pumped to lethal. Draw a card from Magecraft or connive and hold the threat up for the next turn. 3. Late game (turns 6+): Recursion and raw card advantage take over. Alchemist’s Retrieval re-casts Shredder and Borrower, Crackle with Power clears the board at instant-scale damage, and Faithless Looting digs for the piece you need. You win by having more cards than they have answers.
Most games end with a single unblocked hit from a pumped flyer. Games where the pump gets answered fall back to Alchemist’s Retrieval loops, which eventually assemble enough value to win through raw card quality.
Matchups: The Ones You Need to Know
Against Burn (favored): Your creatures are all flyers with three or more toughness, which means Shock and Skewer cannot kill a Ledger Shredder or a Brazen Borrower. Shivan Reef taps for red mana at the cost of one life, and that single life tick is usually irrelevant next to the twenty-three damage you are taking in turn four. Sideboard in extra Spell Pierce for Goldspan Dragon, and Faithless Looting to dig past the early burn spells.
Against Domain Ramp (unfavored): This is the deck’s worst matchup and the reason it sits at Tier 2-3 rather than Tier 1. Four-color decks ramp into Haymaker and Gyrocopter faster than a two-color shell can assemble a pumped 10-power attack, and they simply resolve haymakers before your clock is online. Kill Haymaker with Lightning Bolt and race — that is the entire game plan, and it is not always good enough.
Against Murktide Regent (favored): Every card advantage spell in your deck strips a card from their hand before the Regent flips. Once you are casting four spells a turn, Dragon’s Rage Channeler cannot win the race — each card it burns is one you replace with a fresh draw. Ledger Shredder connives on their second spell too, so even a resolved Fiery Impulse feeds your engine.
Against Jeska non-creature combo (favored): Force of Negation is the answer. Exile a blue card from hand and counter a noncreature spell for free, exiling it so it cannot be recurred — two-for-one against every combo piece in the format. In the graveyard the deck’s own recursion is just recursion, so a resolved combo piece often beats you anyway; race the graveyard with Alchemist’s Retrieval.
Sideboard Strategy
The 15-card sideboard is built around three core plans:
Every card in the sideboard is an instant or a creature with an instant-speed ability, which means you can hold the entire sideboard through your main phase and deploy it at the moment it matters. Shivan Reef’s colorless tap is what pays for Force of Negation in the two games where you need to cast it on the opponent’s turn.
- Plan 1 (Free spells / Combo): Force of Negation (2), Negate (2), Spell Pierce (2) — six counterspells, four of which can be deployed at effectively no mana cost thanks to Force of Negation’s exile clause. Every free spell in Modern is answered by a two-for-one.
- Plan 2 (Speed / Burn): Opt (3), Consider (2), Faithless Looting (2) — seven cards of pure card selection for the matchups where you need to find a specific answer on a specific turn. Looting is the best of them because it digs three deep with flashback.
- Plan 3 (Threat / Grindy): Omen of the Sea (1), Delver of Secrets // Insectile Aberration (1) — two additional permanents for the matchups where the plan is to draw more cards and eventually win on card quality.
How to Get Started
Building Izzet Prowess in paper costs roughly $197 in October 2026, based on Scryfall’s current pricing across all 75 cards. Strip the two Force of Negation and the list costs $103. For players who want the experience without the price tag, proxying the entire 75-card list costs about $80 at MakeProxyCard — Symmetry Sage, Ledger Shredder, and Alchemist’s Retrieval all print at tournament quality with sharp text and accurate colors, and because the deck is so cheap to build you can experiment with the list freely every time the meta shifts.