6 cmc 3 spells seems excessive; Between SB and MD I would play 8 MAXIMUM. And that really depends on your meta. But jitte is a real pain for this deck if active while you are flames of the blood handless or don't have sulfuric vortex active.
Yeah sulfuric vortex > everlasting torment except for against aggro that 2 life to your dome can matter tons.
Reason ankh isn't played is because it is a really iffy card; and no one plays artifact burn with shrapnel blast and artifact lands that I know of. But if you get it down early it can really hurt because fetching costs them 5 life which seems to be a quarter of their life.
Rock type decks can play hymn; as well as team america. But MBA usually plays jitte now since nearly every build runs bob and they use jitte to negate the lifeloss and also because jitte is a house while active because you creature can kill virtually anything sans dreadnought.
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First off, what does everyone think of Ravenous Trap as opposed to Tormond's Crypt as a sideboard card? It seems to do everything that latter cannot, but it cannot slip under counters should they be running them.
Lava Spike = 3 damage, Mogg Fanatic = 0 to X damage. The latter dies to removal, which virtually all your opponents are packing. I'd go for Lava Spike if I were to decide between the two.
Concerning Iona: Apart from splashing a second color, I don't think you can.
If you HAD to have graveyard hate, I would consider Relic of Progenitus, since it cantrips.
I read an article by an Extended Dredge player stating he thought the best defense against his deck was to split the graveyard hate, i.e. no ONE card is best. So, you might run Ravenous Trap, Relic, and Tormod's Crypt.
I'm going to use
2 Ingot Chewer
2 Smash to Smithereens
2 Shattering Spree
As far as white is concerned, I've got 4x Anarchy and 2 Pithing Needle. The other 3 cards are undecided. Possibly Red Elemental Blast, Ensaring Bridge, or 1 of Ravenous Trap, Tormod's Crypt, and the Cantrip graveyard removal.
I also really like the idea of Stingscourger maindecked. Possibly run him over Keldon Marauders.
I may be maindecking Suluric Vortex. I have not decided. The problem with that is the curve. I don't want to rid myself of the only out I have against Zoo and Goblins. 2 Volcanic Fallout is in there against my best matchup, fish. If I have not completely destroyed them, that will only add insult to injury. I fear Angel Stax Stompy, Dragon Stompy, and Bridge (Iona). I also wouldn't be surprised if there were suicide black decks floating around, or even Confident Countertop.
Also, does Ingot Chewer cost 3 under Trinisphere?
fallout/flamebreak should be equally good against gobbos, though the break is a bit better against zoo because it allows you to kill creatures not named goyf or thoctar. dragon stompy shouldn't be that bad if you can avoid the chalice at 1. I'd maindeck some smash to smithereens for that. sulfuric vortex should be golden against stax decks. and yes, ingot chewer costs 3. after all costs are paid, trinisphere checks. if it's not 3, then it becomes 3. however, shattering spree at replicate for 2 gets around sphere, counterspells, etc, and multiple artifacts. that would be my suggestion for a sideboard card.
For those who actually maindeck Vortexes, what are your experiences with its utility compared to its vulnerability? Three sweepers and three vortexes already puts the 3drop count up to 6 (not counting Rift Bolt) even before Flames of the Blood Hand and other 4-for-3 spells, so it quickly starts to unbalance our curve.
My experience with Vortex is that it shuts off more than it turns on. Jitte, StP and locks like CounterTop are more common than Quasali Pridemage. I don't bother with stuff like FotBH. Vortex is like a slow Char anyway (or an improved Flame Rift, depending on how long it lasts) with a no life gain clause thrown in. I have 8 3cc spells MD and have not found that to be a problem. I posted some stastistical simulations supporting this a few pages back.
But I totally forgot Pox, so you were right about that one. That's probably because I've never seen Pox playing so I didin't remember it was there. By the way, what kind of a matchup Pox is to us?
One of the absolute best ones. They do lots of damage to themselves and can't win very quickly.
How can I prevent my deck from scooping to a reanimated Iona, Shield of Emeria?
Any form of GY hate or Disk works well.
If you HAD to have graveyard hate, I would consider Relic of Progenitus, since it cantrips.
I read an article by an Extended Dredge player stating he thought the best defense against his deck was to split the graveyard hate, i.e. no ONE card is best. So, you might run Ravenous Trap, Relic, and Tormod's Crypt.
In my opinion, Ensnaring Bridge is the best graveyard hate.
Agreed. I've dropped GY hate in favor of Bridge, but if Iona becomes a problem, I might go for either 2x Relic or a 1/1/1 split between Relic/Crypt/Trap. So many nice things to fit in the SB!
Also, is Flame Break just as good as Volcanic Fallout in a meta surround by goblins, fish, and zoo?
Others have commented on this already, but Fallout is also better against Goblins running Rishadan Port, since the instant speed means you can get it through under a port with only 3 lands in play. Just a small extra detail to consider.
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So the tournament would be next saturday, and I thought to ask is it fine to play flame javelin? (Because I couldn't get those sulfuric vortexes, so instead of those) I took browbeats out of the deck. And I added those pithing needles to side, and took everlasting torments out
If that's what you have, then by all means run them. As 4-for-3s go, Flames of the Blood Hand and Pulse of the Forge have more tricks to them; as mono-red you don't really need the option to pay colorless, which is Jav's strength. (Well, ok you can also kill a Rhox War Monk or Thoctar.)
Many decks get by without running 4-for-3s, so you may want to look elsewhere first, e.g. Incinerate.
If that's what you have, then by all means run them. As 4-for-3s go, Flames of the Blood Hand and Pulse of the Forge have more tricks to them; as mono-red you don't really need the option to pay colorless, which is Jav's strength. (Well, ok you can also kill a Rhox War Monk or Thoctar.)
Many decks get by without running 4-for-3s, so you may want to look elsewhere first, e.g. Incinerate.
Flame Jav does get by Counterbalance, though. Or it should.
Please read the thread, or at least the primer, before posting. Lacking that, at least give some explanation for card choices that otherwise seem horrible. For example:
Browbeat has been soundly beaten down. Running Incinerate before Chain Lightning is silly. In general, Ankh is considered poor nowadays. Isochron really doesn't belong: I'd rather cast 1-drops than turn a 1-drop into a recurring 2-drop. Shrapnel blast is powerful, but too conditional. In general, don't run any non-land permanents. Run 4 Fireblasts: you'd rather see multiples and Scry them away than not see any: they're just that powerful.
What did Mr. Pridemage and Krosan Grip have to say about it then? When I talked to them, they seemed positive about the possibility for a 2-for-1.
Did you notice how trying to fit Shrapnel Blast forced you to cut back on Fireblast - perhaps the best card in the deck - as well as run Wasteland targets? Do you think 12 artifacts is enough to support 4x Blast (hint: google some extended lists where Shrapnel Blast is a necessary evil)?
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Thanks for the report, and props for beating CounterTop and storm combo. You faced a tough field but fared well despite not having the exact list you wanted to.
Your merfolk opponent was wise to spend his counters on marauders as they are big threats to his game plan. As you experienced yourself, keeping a 1-land hand is a no-no IMO, even if you do have a "god hand" otherwise. It's tempting when you have 3x REB, but I guess those ran into daze effects causing his threats to resolve all the same.
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Just wondering...does anyone have extensive experience using Flame Rift? I love the power; I just want to know if anyone's had issues with how much life it takes off you.
@mrdown2urth: yeah my friend runs flame rift in his burn deck and he really likes the extra damage he deals because of it
he runs a deck that almost always has a turn 3 or 4 win
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@mrdown2urth: yeah my friend runs flame rift in his burn deck and he really likes the extra damage he deals because of it
he runs a deck that almost always has a turn 3 or 4 win
Flame Rift is a way to increase your chances of a turn 3-4 win, but it's also a way of increasing your chances for a turn 3-4 loose. You pay mana and a card to make it so that both players start at 16 life.
If you want to increase your chances of a turn 3 win, it's actually more worth while to run Shard Volley. Why? To get a t3 win, you need precisely the following:
3 Lands
4 Bolts (3-for1s)
1 Fireblast
1 spell dealing at least 4 damage and costing no more than 2 mana.
That's 9 cards - all you'll see by t3 if you're OTP. Do you know which of these four conditions is the hardest to fulfill, statistically? At first glance, it seems like Fireblast, because you can only run 4 of those. But OTOH, you only need one, and can't afford to draw two if you want to win by turn 3 (unless you're OTD).
The odds of at least one Fireblast by turn three is actually pretty good: 49% chance. The odds of getting at least 4 bolts by turn three however, is only 18% (!!) provided you run 16 bolts. If you run 2 additional bolts (Shard Volley is the only real option), you've increased that probability to 26% instead, which is quite a significant increase.
The 2cc spells that can deal 4+ damage by turn 3 are:
*Price of Progress: Though this is conditional
*Keldon Marauders: Slightly less conditional than PoP, but still
*Fork: Though this is bad top deck
*Flame Rift: But it also helps you loose
All of them have their kinks, but the important observation is that as long as you run a grand total of 5 of these or more (most lists run 3-4 PoP and 3-4 Marauders), you still have a better probability of getting one of these than getting a Fireblast (that is more than 50%), so your deck doesn't benefit as much from work in this department.
Of course, if we take into account that most opponents will deal 1 point of damage to themselves through a fetch land, it suddenly becomes OK for 1 of those bolts to be a 2-for-1 like Shock instead. However, if you want to increase your chances of getting 4 bolts to at least 50%, you need to run 24 of them! That's at least 6 2-for-1 effects (assuming you can only support 2 Shard Volley), which increases the risk of drawing 2 of them.
The real problem with 2-for-1s is that they're only good if you're aiming for a turn 3 win. If your wish for a turn 3 win doesn't come true (and it suffices that even one of the four conditions above isn't met), you're not really limited by mana anymore, and 3-for-2 effects like Incinerate would be better. And there's also meta issues like Chalice@1 that discourages playing too many 1cc spells. Incidentally, if your opponent deals a single point of damage to himself, Incinerate will also fill the "2cc spell" slot in the list above just as well as Flame Rift, without dealing damage to yourself.
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I've never run anything less than 2 maindecked Shard Volleys ever since they were printed. You can totally, absolutely, and gladly sac those two extra Mountains... Volleys are that good.
he runs a deck that almost always has a turn 3 or 4 win
Then he's not running anything like the decks we're talking about here. I play a very aggressive, 3-for-R heavy deck with maindecked Flame Rifts and last time I did a battery of goldfishing, I was looking at a 4.5 turn goldfish kill average. I didn't get a 3 turn kill in 30 games. If your friend is winning games against opponents a full turn earlier on average, either he's cheating, playing totally inept opponents, discovered some totally awesome new strategy that we'd all love to hear about, or some combination of the above.
Against Counterbalance, Chalice, discard, life gain, chill, Sinkhole, and our topdeck giving us what we don't want, a 3.5-turn average kill becomes a pleasant dream but nothing more. I challenge you and your friend to present us with a decklist that proves me wrong.
Of course, if we take into account that most opponents will deal 1 point of damage to themselves through a fetch land, it suddenly becomes OK for 1 of those bolts to be a 2-for-1 like Shock instead.
As I said before elsewhere, that's technically true but I wouldn't count on it being applicable in many cases, as you admitted. I just wanted to reiterate that this is a dangerous way of thinking, and that while their fetches, Horizon Canopies, and Bobs may make our job easier, every deck has a disruptive component that will make our job harder.
If you're going to goldfish against an imaginary 19-life opponent, I'd start with 5 cards in hand, to simulate the spells and lands that you're going to lose or have invalidated. At this point, you're no longer goldfishing but actually trying to simulate an active opponent.
Reading comprehension for the win? He's saying the chance of drawing at least one Fireblast within the first 9-10 cards of the game is roughly half, and his numbers look reasonable. He's not talking about the chance that the next card drawn is a Fireblast.
"Loss" or even the slightly incorrect "lose" but definitely not "loose." You're a writer!
I hang my head in shame.
Seriously, some words are more difficult for us non-natives (though I tend to check them up more when writing articles). Like loose/lose, pour/poor, if it's "ie" or "ei" on words like perceive and achieve. I also hate the verbs lie/lie - some conjugations always seem to get confused or even worse express an alcalic detergent (lye). And don't get me started with parking in drive ways and driving in park ways, when to hyphen "meta" with other words (infact, I never met-a-hyphen I liked) and so on.
Reading comprehension for the win? He's saying the chance of drawing at least one Fireblast within the first 9-10 cards of the game is roughly half, and his numbers look reasonable. He's not talking about the chance that the next card drawn is a Fireblast.
Exactly. These are not estimates, nor calculations that you can do by hand (unless you have a serious fetish for Riemann sums). AFAIK, there are two options: Hypergeometric distributions, or monte carlo simulations.
I don't have a program to do monte carlo simulations (which could tell exactly how likely you are to get a t3 win hand, for instance), but anyone can do hypgeomdists in Excel or using a free on-line calculator. I believe I've linked to this one before: http://www.adsciengineering.com/hpdcalc/
To ask the "at least 1 fireblast" question by cards 1-9, simply input from top to bottom:
60
4
(blank)
9
0
0
The last numbers (0 and 0) means it will calculate from exactly 0 cards to exactly 0 cards, which will yield a result of 51% total for exactly 0 fireblasts in the first 9 cards. That means more than zero (or at least 1) fireblast has a 49% chance of happening. The odds of exactly one fireblast is 38%. Two fireblasts in the first 9 cards will happen fully 9% of the time, whereas 3-4 fireblasts happens less than once in a hundred games.
Those running 3 fireblasts have a 34% chance of seeing exactly 1, and a 5% chance of exactly 2 in the first 9 cards. This tells us there is some merit to running 3x Fireblast, because you halve the number of games where you'll see 2, while only reducing the chances of seeing one with 4%. OTOH, you'll still see double fireblasts 5% of the time, and it isn't necessarily a bad thing either, plus Magma Jet helps you tweak the land-to-fireblast ratio (something that doesn't come across in these simulations). So in short, I think it's better to run the full playset to increase the chances of seeing at least one every game.
To get the "at least four bolts" data, just input 60/16/(blank)/9/0/3 and add up the probabilities. 1 minus that sum is the probability that you'll get 4+ bolts.
There are a number of such calculations you can do to help tweak your burn deck without getting fooled by random playtesting results. Like how much land to run. Playtesting is good for the stuff that statistics and common sense can't decide on.
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Whoops, sorry Urdjur. Your flag and location should have made it obvious but as a typical self-centered American I assumed you were as well. I definitely agree that English is a horribly confusing language. Yet more evidence that the best designs don't always become the most popular. :hifive::pals:
He's saying the chance of drawing at least one Fireblast within the first 9-10 cards of the game is roughly half, and his numbers look reasonable. He's not talking about the chance that the next card drawn is a Fireblast.
Then its my bad on that, and I apologize to urdjur for the post. Please post more references on where you get your numbers (as a writer, you should know this too as it helps keep away posts like mine).
I've been trying out Nevinyrral's Disk in the SB and so far I'm tentatively optimistic. The need arose from a recent expansion in my meta of strategies within decks that could previously be handled by specific answers. As these decks have diversified, I find that my burn sideboard gets more and more pressed for space and I want more general answers.
For example, take DreadStill. Against versions packing 4x Dreadnought, I happily boarded 3x Shattering Spree, since the nought was a quicker way to loose against them than being stuck in a CounterTop lock. But I had to board against the CounterTop part too, so in the end I was forced to take out quite a lot of burn. Then I ran into a goyf version running only two noughts but 4 goyfs. This makes boarding artifact hate less attractive, but the risk of loosing to an early nought is still there.
The advantage with Disk is that it handles everything at once, if it gets through. Counterbalance and any threats go away simultaneously. In addition, it handles ALL the problem enchantments and artifacts that can prevent burn from winning.
The downside is of course its slowness. There are faster answers, but they are much more narrow. Thus, I think 2-3 Disks could effectively round out and diversify a SB, if backed up with some faster answers as well. Specifically, I think they should replace the Vexing Shusher spot, as they are especially useful against Chalice/Trinisphere and CounterTop, without being vulnerable to StP, burn or BEB.
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Interesting idea. The most difficult part may be Countertop, who'll most certainly run 6+ counterspells in addition, and will prefer to save them (we assume a competent opponent) for tricks that Countertop can't handle. Our tight manabase makes a 4-drop susceptible to Daze and Spell Pierce, though Spell Snare misses. We might add BEBs to get around countermagic, but that will up the requirements to 5 land. Have these issues manifested at all against a control-heavy Countertop deck (which admittedly is becoming less popular now)?
Another issue is the increased popularity of Pridemage, which can be dropped and activated during the Disk's vulnerable turn. Would Zoo take out Pridemage when facing Burn?
I take it that you don't run Sulfuric Vortex? That works well against control but it gets whacked by the Disk.
Yeah sulfuric vortex > everlasting torment except for against aggro that 2 life to your dome can matter tons.
Reason ankh isn't played is because it is a really iffy card; and no one plays artifact burn with shrapnel blast and artifact lands that I know of. But if you get it down early it can really hurt because fetching costs them 5 life which seems to be a quarter of their life.
Rock type decks can play hymn; as well as team america. But MBA usually plays jitte now since nearly every build runs bob and they use jitte to negate the lifeloss and also because jitte is a house while active because you creature can kill virtually anything sans dreadnought.
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First off, what does everyone think of Ravenous Trap as opposed to Tormond's Crypt as a sideboard card? It seems to do everything that latter cannot, but it cannot slip under counters should they be running them.
Also, is Flame Break just as good as Volcanic Fallout in a meta surround by goblins, fish, and zoo?
How good is Vexing Shusher in the sideboard against fish?
Is the inclusion of Lava Spike better then Mogg Fanatic?
How is maindecked Sulfuric Vortex treating those who play them?
How can I prevent my deck from scooping to a reanimated Iona, Shield of Emeria?
Currently I am running this for my sideboard, but I still can't figure out how not to scoop to stax. The matchup is just not in my favor.
4 Anarchy
2 Smash to Smithereens
3 Vexing Shusher or 3 Red Elemental Blast
2 Pithing Needle
2 Ravenous Trap
2 Shattering Spree
Lava Spike = 3 damage, Mogg Fanatic = 0 to X damage. The latter dies to removal, which virtually all your opponents are packing. I'd go for Lava Spike if I were to decide between the two.
Concerning Iona: Apart from splashing a second color, I don't think you can.
I read an article by an Extended Dredge player stating he thought the best defense against his deck was to split the graveyard hate, i.e. no ONE card is best. So, you might run Ravenous Trap, Relic, and Tormod's Crypt.
In my opinion, Ensnaring Bridge is the best graveyard hate.
J
19 Mountain
Spells:
4x Lightning Bolt
4x Chain Lightning
4x Rift Bolt
4x Lava Spike
4x Volcanic Fallout
4x Fireblast
3x Magma Jet
2x Sulfuric Vortex
4x Keldon Marauders
4x Hellspark Elemental
That is a total of 56 cards, as I am unable to lay my hands on a playset of Price of Progress.
Any suggestions for the remaining 4 cards?
Burn
2 Ingot Chewer
2 Smash to Smithereens
2 Shattering Spree
As far as white is concerned, I've got 4x Anarchy and 2 Pithing Needle. The other 3 cards are undecided. Possibly Red Elemental Blast, Ensaring Bridge, or 1 of Ravenous Trap, Tormod's Crypt, and the Cantrip graveyard removal.
4 Keldon Marauders
4 Chain Lighting
4 Lighting Bolt
4 Lava Spike
4 Incinerate
4 Magma Jet
4 Rift Bolt
4 Price of Progress
2 Flamebreak
2 Volcanic Fallout
4 Fireblast
20 mountain
I also really like the idea of Stingscourger maindecked. Possibly run him over Keldon Marauders.
I may be maindecking Suluric Vortex. I have not decided. The problem with that is the curve. I don't want to rid myself of the only out I have against Zoo and Goblins. 2 Volcanic Fallout is in there against my best matchup, fish. If I have not completely destroyed them, that will only add insult to injury. I fear Angel Stax Stompy, Dragon Stompy, and Bridge (Iona). I also wouldn't be surprised if there were suicide black decks floating around, or even Confident Countertop.
Also, does Ingot Chewer cost 3 under Trinisphere?
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My experience with Vortex is that it shuts off more than it turns on. Jitte, StP and locks like CounterTop are more common than Quasali Pridemage. I don't bother with stuff like FotBH. Vortex is like a slow Char anyway (or an improved Flame Rift, depending on how long it lasts) with a no life gain clause thrown in. I have 8 3cc spells MD and have not found that to be a problem. I posted some stastistical simulations supporting this a few pages back.
One of the absolute best ones. They do lots of damage to themselves and can't win very quickly.
Any form of GY hate or Disk works well.
Agreed. I've dropped GY hate in favor of Bridge, but if Iona becomes a problem, I might go for either 2x Relic or a 1/1/1 split between Relic/Crypt/Trap. So many nice things to fit in the SB!
Others have commented on this already, but Fallout is also better against Goblins running Rishadan Port, since the instant speed means you can get it through under a port with only 3 lands in play. Just a small extra detail to consider.
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If that's what you have, then by all means run them. As 4-for-3s go, Flames of the Blood Hand and Pulse of the Forge have more tricks to them; as mono-red you don't really need the option to pay colorless, which is Jav's strength. (Well, ok you can also kill a Rhox War Monk or Thoctar.)
Many decks get by without running 4-for-3s, so you may want to look elsewhere first, e.g. Incinerate.
2) Use the right number of each card.
3) Know your probabilities.
4) Print your deck lists; make yourself and your judges happier.
Flame Jav does get by Counterbalance, though. Or it should.
(U/B)(U/B)(U/B) JUMP IN THE LINE, ROCK YOUR BODY IN TIME
(R/W)(R/W)(R/W) RISING FROM THE NEON GLOOM, SHINING LIKE A CRAZY MOON
(U/R)(R/G)(G/U) STEALIN' WHEN I SHOULD HAVE BEEN BUYIN'
Browbeat has been soundly beaten down. Running Incinerate before Chain Lightning is silly. In general, Ankh is considered poor nowadays. Isochron really doesn't belong: I'd rather cast 1-drops than turn a 1-drop into a recurring 2-drop. Shrapnel blast is powerful, but too conditional. In general, don't run any non-land permanents. Run 4 Fireblasts: you'd rather see multiples and Scry them away than not see any: they're just that powerful.
2) Use the right number of each card.
3) Know your probabilities.
4) Print your deck lists; make yourself and your judges happier.
Did you notice how trying to fit Shrapnel Blast forced you to cut back on Fireblast - perhaps the best card in the deck - as well as run Wasteland targets? Do you think 12 artifacts is enough to support 4x Blast (hint: google some extended lists where Shrapnel Blast is a necessary evil)?
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Your merfolk opponent was wise to spend his counters on marauders as they are big threats to his game plan. As you experienced yourself, keeping a 1-land hand is a no-no IMO, even if you do have a "god hand" otherwise. It's tempting when you have 3x REB, but I guess those ran into daze effects causing his threats to resolve all the same.
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(U/B)(U/B)(U/B) JUMP IN THE LINE, ROCK YOUR BODY IN TIME
(R/W)(R/W)(R/W) RISING FROM THE NEON GLOOM, SHINING LIKE A CRAZY MOON
(U/R)(R/G)(G/U) STEALIN' WHEN I SHOULD HAVE BEEN BUYIN'
he runs a deck that almost always has a turn 3 or 4 win
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Flame Rift is a way to increase your chances of a turn 3-4 win, but it's also a way of increasing your chances for a turn 3-4 loose. You pay mana and a card to make it so that both players start at 16 life.
If you want to increase your chances of a turn 3 win, it's actually more worth while to run Shard Volley. Why? To get a t3 win, you need precisely the following:
3 Lands
4 Bolts (3-for1s)
1 Fireblast
1 spell dealing at least 4 damage and costing no more than 2 mana.
That's 9 cards - all you'll see by t3 if you're OTP. Do you know which of these four conditions is the hardest to fulfill, statistically? At first glance, it seems like Fireblast, because you can only run 4 of those. But OTOH, you only need one, and can't afford to draw two if you want to win by turn 3 (unless you're OTD).
The odds of at least one Fireblast by turn three is actually pretty good: 49% chance. The odds of getting at least 4 bolts by turn three however, is only 18% (!!) provided you run 16 bolts. If you run 2 additional bolts (Shard Volley is the only real option), you've increased that probability to 26% instead, which is quite a significant increase.
The 2cc spells that can deal 4+ damage by turn 3 are:
*Price of Progress: Though this is conditional
*Keldon Marauders: Slightly less conditional than PoP, but still
*Fork: Though this is bad top deck
*Flame Rift: But it also helps you loose
All of them have their kinks, but the important observation is that as long as you run a grand total of 5 of these or more (most lists run 3-4 PoP and 3-4 Marauders), you still have a better probability of getting one of these than getting a Fireblast (that is more than 50%), so your deck doesn't benefit as much from work in this department.
Of course, if we take into account that most opponents will deal 1 point of damage to themselves through a fetch land, it suddenly becomes OK for 1 of those bolts to be a 2-for-1 like Shock instead. However, if you want to increase your chances of getting 4 bolts to at least 50%, you need to run 24 of them! That's at least 6 2-for-1 effects (assuming you can only support 2 Shard Volley), which increases the risk of drawing 2 of them.
The real problem with 2-for-1s is that they're only good if you're aiming for a turn 3 win. If your wish for a turn 3 win doesn't come true (and it suffices that even one of the four conditions above isn't met), you're not really limited by mana anymore, and 3-for-2 effects like Incinerate would be better. And there's also meta issues like Chalice@1 that discourages playing too many 1cc spells. Incidentally, if your opponent deals a single point of damage to himself, Incinerate will also fill the "2cc spell" slot in the list above just as well as Flame Rift, without dealing damage to yourself.
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Then he's not running anything like the decks we're talking about here. I play a very aggressive, 3-for-R heavy deck with maindecked Flame Rifts and last time I did a battery of goldfishing, I was looking at a 4.5 turn goldfish kill average. I didn't get a 3 turn kill in 30 games. If your friend is winning games against opponents a full turn earlier on average, either he's cheating, playing totally inept opponents, discovered some totally awesome new strategy that we'd all love to hear about, or some combination of the above.
Against Counterbalance, Chalice, discard, life gain, chill, Sinkhole, and our topdeck giving us what we don't want, a 3.5-turn average kill becomes a pleasant dream but nothing more. I challenge you and your friend to present us with a decklist that proves me wrong.
"Loss" or even the slightly incorrect "lose" but definitely not "loose." You're a writer!
That said, total agreement. Flame Rift was fine in a control-heavy meta but with a lot of Zoo running around, it's definitely not recommended.
As I said before elsewhere, that's technically true but I wouldn't count on it being applicable in many cases, as you admitted. I just wanted to reiterate that this is a dangerous way of thinking, and that while their fetches, Horizon Canopies, and Bobs may make our job easier, every deck has a disruptive component that will make our job harder.
If you're going to goldfish against an imaginary 19-life opponent, I'd start with 5 cards in hand, to simulate the spells and lands that you're going to lose or have invalidated. At this point, you're no longer goldfishing but actually trying to simulate an active opponent.
2) Use the right number of each card.
3) Know your probabilities.
4) Print your deck lists; make yourself and your judges happier.
I'm only going to do this Fireblast part but your statistics are incorrect.
4/60 != ~0.49
4/60 == ~0.067 (~7%) for one Fireblast.
Even drawing 10 cards total will give you only an 8% chance of getting one (4/50 == 0.08).
You only get 45% - 50% chance of drawing one with only 8-9 cards left in the deck.
Unless you cheat.
2) Use the right number of each card.
3) Know your probabilities.
4) Print your deck lists; make yourself and your judges happier.
I hang my head in shame.
Seriously, some words are more difficult for us non-natives (though I tend to check them up more when writing articles). Like loose/lose, pour/poor, if it's "ie" or "ei" on words like perceive and achieve. I also hate the verbs lie/lie - some conjugations always seem to get confused or even worse express an alcalic detergent (lye). And don't get me started with parking in drive ways and driving in park ways, when to hyphen "meta" with other words (infact, I never met-a-hyphen I liked) and so on.
Exactly. These are not estimates, nor calculations that you can do by hand (unless you have a serious fetish for Riemann sums). AFAIK, there are two options: Hypergeometric distributions, or monte carlo simulations.
I don't have a program to do monte carlo simulations (which could tell exactly how likely you are to get a t3 win hand, for instance), but anyone can do hypgeomdists in Excel or using a free on-line calculator. I believe I've linked to this one before: http://www.adsciengineering.com/hpdcalc/
To ask the "at least 1 fireblast" question by cards 1-9, simply input from top to bottom:
60
4
(blank)
9
0
0
The last numbers (0 and 0) means it will calculate from exactly 0 cards to exactly 0 cards, which will yield a result of 51% total for exactly 0 fireblasts in the first 9 cards. That means more than zero (or at least 1) fireblast has a 49% chance of happening. The odds of exactly one fireblast is 38%. Two fireblasts in the first 9 cards will happen fully 9% of the time, whereas 3-4 fireblasts happens less than once in a hundred games.
Those running 3 fireblasts have a 34% chance of seeing exactly 1, and a 5% chance of exactly 2 in the first 9 cards. This tells us there is some merit to running 3x Fireblast, because you halve the number of games where you'll see 2, while only reducing the chances of seeing one with 4%. OTOH, you'll still see double fireblasts 5% of the time, and it isn't necessarily a bad thing either, plus Magma Jet helps you tweak the land-to-fireblast ratio (something that doesn't come across in these simulations). So in short, I think it's better to run the full playset to increase the chances of seeing at least one every game.
To get the "at least four bolts" data, just input 60/16/(blank)/9/0/3 and add up the probabilities. 1 minus that sum is the probability that you'll get 4+ bolts.
There are a number of such calculations you can do to help tweak your burn deck without getting fooled by random playtesting results. Like how much land to run. Playtesting is good for the stuff that statistics and common sense can't decide on.
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"At least for those who can play cards, their present incarnation is not quite wasted."
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2) Use the right number of each card.
3) Know your probabilities.
4) Print your deck lists; make yourself and your judges happier.
Then its my bad on that, and I apologize to urdjur for the post. Please post more references on where you get your numbers (as a writer, you should know this too as it helps keep away posts like mine).
(U/B)(U/B)(U/B) JUMP IN THE LINE, ROCK YOUR BODY IN TIME
(R/W)(R/W)(R/W) RISING FROM THE NEON GLOOM, SHINING LIKE A CRAZY MOON
(U/R)(R/G)(G/U) STEALIN' WHEN I SHOULD HAVE BEEN BUYIN'
For example, take DreadStill. Against versions packing 4x Dreadnought, I happily boarded 3x Shattering Spree, since the nought was a quicker way to loose against them than being stuck in a CounterTop lock. But I had to board against the CounterTop part too, so in the end I was forced to take out quite a lot of burn. Then I ran into a goyf version running only two noughts but 4 goyfs. This makes boarding artifact hate less attractive, but the risk of loosing to an early nought is still there.
The advantage with Disk is that it handles everything at once, if it gets through. Counterbalance and any threats go away simultaneously. In addition, it handles ALL the problem enchantments and artifacts that can prevent burn from winning.
The downside is of course its slowness. There are faster answers, but they are much more narrow. Thus, I think 2-3 Disks could effectively round out and diversify a SB, if backed up with some faster answers as well. Specifically, I think they should replace the Vexing Shusher spot, as they are especially useful against Chalice/Trinisphere and CounterTop, without being vulnerable to StP, burn or BEB.
A series of seven articles using Magic to explore the very stuff of the Universe!
"At least for those who can play cards, their present incarnation is not quite wasted."
[Click here for the articles!]
Another issue is the increased popularity of Pridemage, which can be dropped and activated during the Disk's vulnerable turn. Would Zoo take out Pridemage when facing Burn?
I take it that you don't run Sulfuric Vortex? That works well against control but it gets whacked by the Disk.
2) Use the right number of each card.
3) Know your probabilities.
4) Print your deck lists; make yourself and your judges happier.