I'm getting back into Standard after sometime. It seems that creature-less burn decks are dead...
I'm curious if anyone runs this nowadays with so many decks with creatures that can be pumped up so fast.
I know WOTC on podcast and blogs said that creatures are better for game play, but I miss the old days where creatures were for the most part optional and burns decks could rely on goblin generators to have decent blockers.
The meta isn't in a great place for them. It might not be in a place for them again, soon, either, because WoTC is really pushing creature-based strategies.
What you want for that kind of deck to be strong is a format that runs lots of creature removal, but is otherwise minimally interactive. Ideally, the format will also feature risky strategies involving a sketchy manabase and minimal control elements, and no incidental lifegain.
Your plan with MRB is predicated on speed and consistency. You plan to win faster than your opponent can, but don't cope well with disruption or anything that slows you down. The best way to do that against a well-tuned deck piloted well is usually for something to go wrong in their tempo, and you need that to be a regular occurance (like combo decks that go off on turn 4-5-6, or decks that hit all their colors by turn 3-4; hyphenated turn count is a tip-off that fast consistency can pick up free wins).
R/W Burn has done well post-BNG, it's just not entirely creatureless. Most Burn decks from older formats/seasons aren't creatureless either, just veeeery creature light. Personally, I'd be happy as a Burn player that such a deck is even able to make it to T1 in these creature-heavy days. We're that much closer to the creatureless deck you're looking for.
Well... Get reprints of 3 different lightning bolts plus volcanic fallout in M15 and maybe there will be but why would it have to be creatureless? I mean, if you had grim lavamancer, you'd play that. Chandra's phoenix is fine in standard burn. If there's good creatures for it, why not play them? I guess you could do it without them but it is standard, not an eternal format with a large enough card pool to have all the duplicates to take them straight to 0 with burn by racing.
Yeah creatureless burn is an unnecessary restraint on your ability to play magic. R/W burn is certainly a viable deck at the moment, being in 8 of the past ten top 16 open rosters, and taking I believe, the entire tournament twice. They only really need 2 creatures in the maindeck, chandra's phoenix and eidolon of the great revel with boros reckoner and satyr firedrinker in the sideboard.
Creaturless burn has basically never existed. It did before the 4 of nonbasic land rule. But since then you at least had ball lightning or spark elemental.
R/W burn with 4 chandra's pheonix and nothing else is a perfectly fine deck that is still doing well. It all depends on how much you are hung up on being completely creatureless.. its more like almost creatureless.
I'm curious if anyone runs this nowadays with so many decks with creatures that can be pumped up so fast.
I know WOTC on podcast and blogs said that creatures are better for game play, but I miss the old days where creatures were for the most part optional and burns decks could rely on goblin generators to have decent blockers.
Times have changed.
What you want for that kind of deck to be strong is a format that runs lots of creature removal, but is otherwise minimally interactive. Ideally, the format will also feature risky strategies involving a sketchy manabase and minimal control elements, and no incidental lifegain.
Your plan with MRB is predicated on speed and consistency. You plan to win faster than your opponent can, but don't cope well with disruption or anything that slows you down. The best way to do that against a well-tuned deck piloted well is usually for something to go wrong in their tempo, and you need that to be a regular occurance (like combo decks that go off on turn 4-5-6, or decks that hit all their colors by turn 3-4; hyphenated turn count is a tip-off that fast consistency can pick up free wins).
This might happen again, we'll see.
BEEEES!
Rabble Red
Modern
Burn
Infect
Pioneer:UR Pheonix
Modern:U Mono U Tron
EDH
GB Glissa, the traitor: Army of Cans
UW Dragonlord Ojutai: Dragonlord NOjutai
UWGDerevi, Empyrial Tactician "you cannot fight the storm"
R Zirilan of the claw. The solution to every problem is dragons
UB Etrata, the Silencer Cloning assassination
Peasant cube: Cards I own