How do you guys feel about Hungry Flames and Shock compare to the previously available burn spells in RB-Copter-less decks? Collective Defiance is sometimes guite lovely but the double-R and the Sorcery. . . oh, the Sorcery. . .
Anyway, I think I may try some number of both in my RB-Vampire-Madness deck and put some or all of the CD into the side-board.
My gut feeling is that splashing blue for Tezzeret's Touch is what's going to make this deck great again. We can do it pretty easily as well between Aether Hub and Spire of Industry. I've already noticed a pretty disgusting combo here vs. control/combo/slow decks. Put Tezzeret's Touch onto Hope of Girapur, swing in for 5 in the air on turn 3 or 4. Sacrifice Girapur before our opponent starts their turn 4, now opponent can't play Aetherworks Marvel (or use a kill spell on Girapur which we get back.) We still have the copter back on our turn 4/5, hit them again, sac. it again, we can prevent Marvel being played until their turn 6! By then we should have them in kill range. Note we can also use this to prevent Saheeli Rai from being played.
I'm liking the looks of the all artifact creature deck with Metallic Mimic boosting constructs. I do think Improvise spells will make it playable. Also, 4 copies of Weldfast Engineer makes a lot of sense to me in that deck.
I seriously think running Heart of Kiran in a deck devoid of walkers is a bad idea. Unfortunately, there isn't much to really replace copter with strait up, but Aethersphere Harvester is fairly good at 3 cmc.
Not sure I agree with this. We have Scrounger, Syndicate Trafficker in 2 drop slot that have 3 power to activate Heart of Kiran on their own. If you add Weldfast Engineer, we could be using Bomat Couriers to crew the Heart of Kiran. Also, we can play Chandra, possibly Tezzeret the Schemer in the deck if we want. We shouldn't discount it so off hand just cause we don't have an abundance of walker's we want to play.
Here's a silly Consulate Dreadnought idea I'm toying around with. I like that we can crew it pretty easily on turn 3 even without Siege Modification. Problems I see are too many legendary cards in the deck. (It has too many cards in it right now as well.) I like that Siege Modification has another good target on Hope of Girapur if we can't find Dreadnought or Heart of Kiran.
Response to leve89's deck: I'm pretty sure you don't need 4 key to the city in the deck. I would go down to 2 of those and have 4 Heir to Falkenrath and 4 Bloodhall Priest. I could see Lathnu Hellion being a good option for this deck, or Pia Nalaar. You are pretty light on artifacts to be running Inventor's Apprentice in my opinion. Remember, you can't rely on drawing just one artifact throughout the game for Apprentice, as they may kill your artifact! I would make the mana base look more like this:
Spire of Industry isn't needed if we aren't playing 3 colors plus you'll lose consistency in your mana base, plus take damage. Aether Hub is really only needed if playing 3 colors or have a good amount of energy themed cards. Go up to 23 lands.
that is an interesting build. are there any other playable constructs that can replace Walking Ballista, though? seems to be the slowest card in the deck.
I've taken a closer look at this construct idea, I think there's something to it!
Here's a deck list. There are a lot of constructs out there that haven't been mentioned yet. Also, Stonforge Masterwork can add synergy and a wincon to the deck.
This deck is begging to play 3 colors with Spire of Industry just being released.
Here's a rough idea with a few oddball cards thrown in for you to consider:
Treasure Keeper is also a construct. 4 mana is a lot, but perhaps as a sideboard card against boardwipes? I was really impressed with it in pre-release. I took first out of 50 and this card helped me do it (without any kind of synergy like we have going on here.)
Tezzeret the Schemer was in here until I saw stoneforge Masterwork. He could be maindeckable in this kind of build. At least a sideboard card against aggro decks. We should be able to give something +3/-3 by turn 4 really easily, and he's still at 3 loyalty with them down a creature.
We may have to find room for built to smash I'm afraid. Perhaps we drop tezzeret's touch for built to smash mainboard and have transformational blue splash sideboard to beat control players.
There are a lot of ideas out there for r/b/x artifacts with this new set release!
Edit: I'm looking at resourceful return again. We can actually get back a Freejam Regent with it, or at least give us one more chance at drawing our synergy pieces. I'm going to look at blue draw spells for this deck next. Slip through Space
I think the hyper aggro version of this deck with a madness subtheme is still quite strong (and potentially gained more from others losing copter than Smuggler's offered it directly) so here is my take on B/R Aggro. This is still in testing but so far it's rather successful.
Overall Pia is seeming more like a SB card but that will be meta-dependent. I'm liking Olivia but not sure how good she really is. Insolent is fine but potentially replaceable. Bomat and Bloodhall are both all-stars. Heart has been pretty strong in testing and is a great answer to Liliana and other planeswalkers oftentimes.
"What kind of ability would say "counters black spells" on it? "If a Rigger you control would assemble a Contraption, it counters black spells instead"? "
-Mark Gottlieb
I like your list. The main thing I would worry about is the amount of discard outlets to enable your madness cards now that we cannot count on Copter loots. Key, Lightning Axe, Heir of Falkenrath, and Neonate seem like the best options. I'd probably want around 8 outlets at least, given you have Priest, Temper, and Alms. Olivia might be better without Copter around, but she is a bit slow. Courier helps as well, but is very awkward to pop early.
I like your list. The main thing I would worry about is the amount of discard outlets to enable your madness cards now that we cannot count on Copter loots. Key, Lightning Axe, Heir of Falkenrath, and Neonate seem like the best options. I'd probably want around 8 outlets at least, given you have Priest, Temper, and Alms. Olivia might be better without Copter around, but she is a bit slow. Courier helps as well, but is very awkward to pop early.
I've thought similar to this. But ultimately I have the following:
Things I want to discard: 12-13
4 Scrapheap Scrounger
2-3 Bloodhall Priest
4 Fiery Temper
2-3 Alms of the Vein
Things that discard: 10
2 Key to the City
4 Bomat Courier
2 Insolent Neonate
2 Olivia, Mobilized for War
So altogether about 60% of the deck works with the madness subtheme and I've never felt lacking in that regard in testing so far.
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"What kind of ability would say "counters black spells" on it? "If a Rigger you control would assemble a Contraption, it counters black spells instead"? "
-Mark Gottlieb
Well, I'd be interesting in how that works out in testing. My experience with Courier is that you cannot really pop him until around T5-6 and very often gets killed before you can get value. That doesn't really help when you want to use Tempers as a way to gain tempo early. Olivia is somewhat similar, given she has to hit the board T3 and then you have both untap with her and have the extra mana to both cast the creature and the madness spell (not to mention she's somewhat awkward with Priest).
In reality, I look at that your list of outlets and only count 4x reliable discard outlets, and another 6 late game conditional ones. The previous build had 2-3 Keys, 4 Copter, 3 Lightning Axe mainboard, for only 4x Priest and 4x Temper. That's not including the 4x Couriers for later game conditional discard.
Key and Neonate are excellent, and I think you will want more of that type of early game discard. Both work well with the curve of the deck, letting it double spell around T3. I like Hier for a similar reasons, since the curve of 1-drop, into Heir, into Priest is pretty good. Otherwise, casting Heir on T3 and immediately getting value with a Temper or Alms is also good. I'd be inclined to have 2-3 Keys, 4 Neonate, and 2 Heir in the list. I'd likely cut 2x Pia, 1 Heart, and 2x Forerunner to make space. If you needed more, Lightning Axe would be the next goto.
that is an interesting build. are there any other playable constructs that can replace Walking Ballista, though? seems to be the slowest card in the deck.
I've taken a closer look at this construct idea, I think there's something to it!
Here's a deck list. There are a lot of constructs out there that haven't been mentioned yet. Also, Stonforge Masterwork can add synergy and a wincon to the deck.
This deck is begging to play 3 colors with Spire of Industry just being released.
Here's a rough idea with a few oddball cards thrown in for you to consider:
Treasure Keeper is also a construct. 4 mana is a lot, but perhaps as a sideboard card against boardwipes? I was really impressed with it in pre-release. I took first out of 50 and this card helped me do it (without any kind of synergy like we have going on here.)
Tezzeret the Schemer was in here until I saw stoneforge Masterwork. He could be maindeckable in this kind of build. At least a sideboard card against aggro decks. We should be able to give something +3/-3 by turn 4 really easily, and he's still at 3 loyalty with them down a creature.
We may have to find room for built to smash I'm afraid. Perhaps we drop tezzeret's touch for built to smash mainboard and have transformational blue splash sideboard to beat control players.
There are a lot of ideas out there for r/b/x artifacts with this new set release!
Edit: I'm looking at resourceful return again. We can actually get back a Freejam Regent with it, or at least give us one more chance at drawing our synergy pieces. I'm going to look at blue draw spells for this deck next. Slip through Space
Shock seems like a necessity with Copycat and aggro decks around so I've moved it to the main board. Hope has been really surprisingly good in testing so far too. Pia I'm still not sure on, as some matches she is dead weight and some she excels so we'll have to see the meta first.
Trawler has been rather meh so far so I'm probably not going to keep it in.
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"What kind of ability would say "counters black spells" on it? "If a Rigger you control would assemble a Contraption, it counters black spells instead"? "
-Mark Gottlieb
"What kind of ability would say "counters black spells" on it? "If a Rigger you control would assemble a Contraption, it counters black spells instead"? "
-Mark Gottlieb
Heir seems to be the closest replacement for Copter. It's an early evasive threat that enables Madness. It was almost playable in the old lists. T2 Heir into T3 Priest is pretty sweet.
This list gives us 10x early game discard outlets and 15x overall. It has 11x T2 artifacts for Apprentice (maybe a little low, but decent), and 14x overall for Disintegration. I wonder about a list with 3x Heart and mainboard Chandra.
What I like about this style of deck is how good it is at beating CopyCat combo. Early pressure backed up with 11x spells that break up the combo at instant speed. They are forced to jam and we have plenty of tools to stop it when they do.
After just a little bit goldfishing with Metallic Mimic in the construct deck, disappointment set in. Mimic is just a bit too clunky with constructs. The curve of the deck was too high for my liking, and the deck could easily get stalled out on the ground since the creatures are so small. Metallic Mimic and stoneforge masterwork may be better suited for thopters however.
This deck goes all in on thopters with multiple ways to pump them. The two above mentioned cards plus Weldfast Engineer, Pia Nalaar and Tezzeret's Touch. The basic idea is hit the opponent fast and hard in the air with lots of thopters. Maverick Thopterist is one of the build around me cards in the deck.
[Rules question: If Tezzeret's Touch is on a thopter, the artifact creature it becomes still has flying correct?]
We are running 3 colors, which could change to just r/u. I just want access to Unlicensed Disintegration, Transgress the Mind and Metallic Rebuke!
This deck is a weird aggro/control amalgamation, but I think it could work! Metallic Mimic should be much more useful in this deck as we can play thopters for 0 and get two thopters for Maverick Thopterist, which could come out on turn 3 quite easily. Plus pumping evasion>>pumping ground creatures
Tezzeret's Touch simply gives any artifact p/t = 5 so everything else carries over, so yes Orni is a 5/5 flier on Turn 3 with no summoning sickness if you played it T1 or T2.
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How can we truly be free, if we are held in the bondage of clothing?
"What kind of ability would say "counters black spells" on it? "If a Rigger you control would assemble a Contraption, it counters black spells instead"? "
-Mark Gottlieb
Heir seems to be the closest replacement for Copter. It's an early evasive threat that enables Madness. It was almost playable in the old lists. T2 Heir into T3 Priest is pretty sweet.
This list gives us 10x early game discard outlets and 15x overall. It has 11x T2 artifacts for Apprentice (maybe a little low, but decent), and 14x overall for Disintegration. I wonder about a list with 3x Heart and mainboard Chandra.
What I like about this style of deck is how good it is at beating CopyCat combo. Early pressure backed up with 11x spells that break up the combo at instant speed. They are forced to jam and we have plenty of tools to stop it when they do.
Scrapheap Scrounger gets a bit better with Heir of Falkenrath instead of Copter.
"What kind of ability would say "counters black spells" on it? "If a Rigger you control would assemble a Contraption, it counters black spells instead"? "
-Mark Gottlieb
If you want more Burn, consider replacing Unlicensed Disintegration with more Burn. I like everything main-deck to go to the dome. I have targeted removal side-board but not main-deck. It may not be your cup of tea, but it's a option for accelerating the kill.
I really like the flow of this deck and the consistency too.
matches included U/R Control, G/W tokens, Mono Red Aggro, U/W Midrange, etc. no Marvel deck or Saheeli combo.
the deck still can grind and finish off the opponent when it's time.
my loss was against U/W midrange. the use of Rattlechains to replace Copter seems to mirror my own use of Heir of Falkenrath to replace Copter. i stupidly named "Gisela, the Broken Blade" when i cast Lost Legacy and when i looked at his hand he got 2 Spell Queller. that was a grave mistake because i did have 2 removal in hand and should have named Spell Queller to make sure they do not get exiled.
as for Pia Nalaar... i am undecided. still seems like her ability to pump an artifact creature is relevant, as well as putting 2 bodies on the board when cast. and of course, her thopter powers up Unlicensed Disintegration.
Heir of Falkenrath was an OK card. not as good as Copter, but she does the job of damage racing and is a one time Madness enabler.
will the deck still be competitive once Tier 1 decks emerge? that i do not know. but it seems that playing smart with hand disruption as well as removing opponent's key bomb cards from his or her deck are good enough for now.
playtested with a friend. i used the B/R madness deck while he used W/U midrange with Rattlechains, Selfless Spirit and Spell Queller as his spirits. absolutely back breaking. need to Lost Legacy Spell Queller ASAP.
I keep playing around with non-madness more artifact decks, and I'm not coming up with anything that seems as consistent as madness decks. The value of essentially having a lightning bolt in the deck is incredibly good! We shouldn't loose heart though, there's probably some new deck waiting to be discovered among all of the artifact synergy just released. BTW, with no smuggler's copter around, could Quicksmith Genius be worth looking at?
Yes, Lathnu Hellion is worth considering if your deck is fast enough.
I do have a new idea for Metallic Mimic. Play it with human Artificer's, and Inventor's Goggles. I'm more excited for this deck idea than anything else I've come up with so far.
This incarnation finally has some good and simple synergy going on. It should retain the aggro speed of the madness deck too! I'm looking at plays like turn 1 Hope, turn 2 Artificer's Goggles+Apprentice. I also like turn 2 Metallic Mimic turn 3 Apprentice+Aether Chaser.
Aether Chaser is a card I'd considered before, but without googles I don't think he's good enough. With goggles and mimic in the deck, we stand a good chance of making him a 3/2 first strike which I like quite a bit.
Note that Goggles can buff a metallic mimic if we choose artificer as it's creature type. This is huge, because mimic is pretty fragile on it's own. It's bad synergy to play a 2 drop creature that you can't effectively attack with in an aggro deck. Turn 1 goggles makes our turn 2 Mimi a 3/3! Now that's a creature we can be proud of and attack profitably with.
2 copies of resourceful return in the deck. With no scrounger's exiling our creatures, resourceful return becomes pretty great. We want to get our mimic's back from the graveyard and dig to find them. Also note the awesome synergy with Hope of Ghirapur! We can stop someone from casting Marvel for two turns with these two cards. This play could be good turns 3-6 against control players.
another opposing card to keep in mind is Aethersphere Harvester. yesterday, that card verily stopped my offense and turned the game around. so if you're building a deck, keep that card in mind. if you have Lathnu Hellion and the opponent has the Harvester, Hellion will be wasted. better have a means to deal with Harvester.
not saying Hellion's bad, but Harvester's too good against it.
So based upon the SCG open, it looks like this deck is poised to do rather well. Copycat combo is pretty easy to deal with in this deck. Control is draw dependent but as long as we can land some early threats we should win that matchup. G/B is gonna be hard to beat, because their creatures are beefier than ours. Also, Aethersphere Harvester is a huge problem that we have to have an answer to. I've been testing the list I listed earlier which is aggro with burn elements and in testing it just wins most matchups. Key to the City is definitely super important right now too.
I also stand by that Hope of Ghirapur is extremely strong right now. The ability to make an opponent unable to board wipe, play their planeswalkers, etc is just so strong right now. I've moved it up to 4 main and I am not disappointed. Considering it's going for like $2 right now, I recommend to grab a set because I think the card is going to shoot up once people realize what it offers.
Do you guys think this deck could possibly run the Walking Ballista at all? I think it's too slow but it seems like it could work in some matchups for us potentially.
I honestly am considering Destructive Tampering for the sb. It's not a strong card but it actually answers most of the issues in that it deals with the Harvester (plus the random artifact combo decks like Reservoir) and allows us to get through clogged boards. There may be better options but I think it has potential.
I'm having a lot of trouble working up a sb. What do you guys think are the essentials for the side?
Edit: I also just realized that Tears of Valakut just became so much better.
"What kind of ability would say "counters black spells" on it? "If a Rigger you control would assemble a Contraption, it counters black spells instead"? "
-Mark Gottlieb
What do you guys think of the lists in the MTGO leagues that went 5-0?
Looks pretty streamlined to me especially to beat splinter cat, and a little sideboard for midrange strategies. Gonna give it a try this week at a local tournament.
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Anyway, I think I may try some number of both in my RB-Vampire-Madness deck and put some or all of the CD into the side-board.
Frenzy-Affinity-Ghost Quarter-Rock-Tokens- RGWPhyrexian Zoo- WVial KnightsStandard:
BW Knights(Rotated)Pioneer: RW Knights - BW Rally Zombies - UW Heroes
Commander:WUG
Jenara, Asura of War- WGSigarda, Host of HeronsCasualties of economicsLegacy: Good-night, sweet prince. Mono-R Burn
I'm liking the looks of the all artifact creature deck with Metallic Mimic boosting constructs. I do think Improvise spells will make it playable. Also, 4 copies of Weldfast Engineer makes a lot of sense to me in that deck.
Not sure I agree with this. We have Scrounger, Syndicate Trafficker in 2 drop slot that have 3 power to activate Heart of Kiran on their own. If you add Weldfast Engineer, we could be using Bomat Couriers to crew the Heart of Kiran. Also, we can play Chandra, possibly Tezzeret the Schemer in the deck if we want. We shouldn't discount it so off hand just cause we don't have an abundance of walker's we want to play.
Here's a silly Consulate Dreadnought idea I'm toying around with. I like that we can crew it pretty easily on turn 3 even without Siege Modification. Problems I see are too many legendary cards in the deck. (It has too many cards in it right now as well.) I like that Siege Modification has another good target on Hope of Girapur if we can't find Dreadnought or Heart of Kiran.
4x Inventor's Apprentice
4x Scrapheap Scrounger
4x Weldfast Engineer
4x Pia Nalaar
4x Consulate Dreadnought
4x Siege Modification
4x Built to Smash
4x Unlicensed Disintegration
Response to leve89's deck: I'm pretty sure you don't need 4 key to the city in the deck. I would go down to 2 of those and have 4 Heir to Falkenrath and 4 Bloodhall Priest. I could see Lathnu Hellion being a good option for this deck, or Pia Nalaar. You are pretty light on artifacts to be running Inventor's Apprentice in my opinion. Remember, you can't rely on drawing just one artifact throughout the game for Apprentice, as they may kill your artifact! I would make the mana base look more like this:
Spire of Industry isn't needed if we aren't playing 3 colors plus you'll lose consistency in your mana base, plus take damage. Aether Hub is really only needed if playing 3 colors or have a good amount of energy themed cards. Go up to 23 lands.
Here's a deck list. There are a lot of constructs out there that haven't been mentioned yet. Also, Stonforge Masterwork can add synergy and a wincon to the deck.
This deck is begging to play 3 colors with Spire of Industry just being released.
Here's a rough idea with a few oddball cards thrown in for you to consider:
4x Metallic Mimic
2x Eager Construct
4x Scrapheap Scrounger
2x Scrap Trawler
4x Chief of the Foundry
4x Freejam Regent
3x Stoneforge Masterwork
4x Tezzeret's Touch
2x Grasp of Darkness
4x Unlicensed Disintegration
4x Spire of Industry
4x Spirebluff Canal
2x Aether Hub
4x Forboding Ruins
8x swamp
8x Mountain
4x Hope of Girapur
4x Metallic Rebuke
3x Lost Legacy
2x Transgress the Mind
2x Negate
Treasure Keeper is also a construct. 4 mana is a lot, but perhaps as a sideboard card against boardwipes? I was really impressed with it in pre-release. I took first out of 50 and this card helped me do it (without any kind of synergy like we have going on here.)
Tezzeret the Schemer was in here until I saw stoneforge Masterwork. He could be maindeckable in this kind of build. At least a sideboard card against aggro decks. We should be able to give something +3/-3 by turn 4 really easily, and he's still at 3 loyalty with them down a creature.
Counterspells in the sideboard because screw Aetherworks Marvel! We might be able to outgrind a control player with Scrap Trawler, Treasure Keeper, perhaps Resourceful Return or an ambitious Reverse Engineer?
We may have to find room for built to smash I'm afraid. Perhaps we drop tezzeret's touch for built to smash mainboard and have transformational blue splash sideboard to beat control players.
There are a lot of ideas out there for r/b/x artifacts with this new set release!
Edit: I'm looking at resourceful return again. We can actually get back a Freejam Regent with it, or at least give us one more chance at drawing our synergy pieces. I'm going to look at blue draw spells for this deck next. Slip through Space
2 Key to the City
3 Heart of Kiran
Creatures
4 Scrapheap Scrounger
4 Forerunner of Slaughter
4 Bomat Courier
2 Insolent Neonate
2 Pia Nalaar
2 Bloodhall Priest
2 Olivia, Mobilized for War
4 Unlicensed Disintegration
4 Fiery Temper
3 Alms of the Vein
Planeswalkers
1 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
Lands
4 Smoldering Marsh
4 Foreboding Ruins
8 Mountain
7 Swamp
Overall Pia is seeming more like a SB card but that will be meta-dependent. I'm liking Olivia but not sure how good she really is. Insolent is fine but potentially replaceable. Bomat and Bloodhall are both all-stars. Heart has been pretty strong in testing and is a great answer to Liliana and other planeswalkers oftentimes.
Some cards I plan to test are Metallic Mimic, Shock, Hungry Flames, and Lightning Axe. I kinda want to see if Midnight Oil could have a place in this deck/sb too but it might be too clunky even against control matches.
Current Decks
Standard / Type 2
BRMidrange
"What kind of ability would say "counters black spells" on it? "If a Rigger you control would assemble a Contraption, it counters black spells instead"? "
-Mark Gottlieb
Modern: R Skred -- WBG Melira Co -- URW Nahiri Control
Legacy: R Mono Red Burn -- UWB Stoneblade
Commander: R Krenko, Mob Boss -- WUBRG Scion of the Ur-Dragon -- WUBRG Maze’s End
Other: R No Rares Red (Standard) -- URC Izzet Tron (Pauper)
I've thought similar to this. But ultimately I have the following:
Things I want to discard: 12-13
4 Scrapheap Scrounger
2-3 Bloodhall Priest
4 Fiery Temper
2-3 Alms of the Vein
Things that discard: 10
2 Key to the City
4 Bomat Courier
2 Insolent Neonate
2 Olivia, Mobilized for War
So altogether about 60% of the deck works with the madness subtheme and I've never felt lacking in that regard in testing so far.
Current Decks
Standard / Type 2
BRMidrange
"What kind of ability would say "counters black spells" on it? "If a Rigger you control would assemble a Contraption, it counters black spells instead"? "
-Mark Gottlieb
In reality, I look at that your list of outlets and only count 4x reliable discard outlets, and another 6 late game conditional ones. The previous build had 2-3 Keys, 4 Copter, 3 Lightning Axe mainboard, for only 4x Priest and 4x Temper. That's not including the 4x Couriers for later game conditional discard.
Key and Neonate are excellent, and I think you will want more of that type of early game discard. Both work well with the curve of the deck, letting it double spell around T3. I like Hier for a similar reasons, since the curve of 1-drop, into Heir, into Priest is pretty good. Otherwise, casting Heir on T3 and immediately getting value with a Temper or Alms is also good. I'd be inclined to have 2-3 Keys, 4 Neonate, and 2 Heir in the list. I'd likely cut 2x Pia, 1 Heart, and 2x Forerunner to make space. If you needed more, Lightning Axe would be the next goto.
Modern: R Skred -- WBG Melira Co -- URW Nahiri Control
Legacy: R Mono Red Burn -- UWB Stoneblade
Commander: R Krenko, Mob Boss -- WUBRG Scion of the Ur-Dragon -- WUBRG Maze’s End
Other: R No Rares Red (Standard) -- URC Izzet Tron (Pauper)
i like that build. Stoneforge Masterwork could be the new Ghostfire Blade in that deck.
3 Key to the City
2 Heart of Kiran
Creatures
4 Scrapheap Scrounger
4 Forerunner of Slaughter
4 Bomat Courier
3 Bloodhall Priest
2 Scrap Trawler
2 Hope of Ghirapur
3 Unlicensed Disintegration
4 Fiery Temper
4 Shock
Planeswalkers
1 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
Lands
4 Smoldering Marsh
4 Foreboding Ruins
8 Mountain
7 Swamp
Here is my updated testing list.
Shock seems like a necessity with Copycat and aggro decks around so I've moved it to the main board. Hope has been really surprisingly good in testing so far too. Pia I'm still not sure on, as some matches she is dead weight and some she excels so we'll have to see the meta first.
Trawler has been rather meh so far so I'm probably not going to keep it in.
Current Decks
Standard / Type 2
BRMidrange
"What kind of ability would say "counters black spells" on it? "If a Rigger you control would assemble a Contraption, it counters black spells instead"? "
-Mark Gottlieb
Modern: R Skred -- WBG Melira Co -- URW Nahiri Control
Legacy: R Mono Red Burn -- UWB Stoneblade
Commander: R Krenko, Mob Boss -- WUBRG Scion of the Ur-Dragon -- WUBRG Maze’s End
Other: R No Rares Red (Standard) -- URC Izzet Tron (Pauper)
Imo, way too slow for an aggro version. Midrange could use it though, sure.
Current Decks
Standard / Type 2
BRMidrange
"What kind of ability would say "counters black spells" on it? "If a Rigger you control would assemble a Contraption, it counters black spells instead"? "
-Mark Gottlieb
Anyway, this is what I would play for RB going forward.
4 Bomat Courier
4 Inventor's Apprentice
4 Heir of Falkenrath
4 Scrapheap Scrounger
3 Pia Nalaar
4 Bloodhall Priest
Spells:14
3 Lightning Axe
3 Key to the City
4 Fiery Temper
4 Unlicensed Disintegration
4 Foreboding Ruins
1 Geier Reach Sanitarium
9 Mountain
4 Smoldering Marsh
5 Swamp
2 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
1 Lightning Axe
4 Shock
2 Collective Brutality
4 Transgress the Mind
2 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
Heir seems to be the closest replacement for Copter. It's an early evasive threat that enables Madness. It was almost playable in the old lists. T2 Heir into T3 Priest is pretty sweet.
This list gives us 10x early game discard outlets and 15x overall. It has 11x T2 artifacts for Apprentice (maybe a little low, but decent), and 14x overall for Disintegration. I wonder about a list with 3x Heart and mainboard Chandra.
What I like about this style of deck is how good it is at beating CopyCat combo. Early pressure backed up with 11x spells that break up the combo at instant speed. They are forced to jam and we have plenty of tools to stop it when they do.
Modern: R Skred -- WBG Melira Co -- URW Nahiri Control
Legacy: R Mono Red Burn -- UWB Stoneblade
Commander: R Krenko, Mob Boss -- WUBRG Scion of the Ur-Dragon -- WUBRG Maze’s End
Other: R No Rares Red (Standard) -- URC Izzet Tron (Pauper)
This deck goes all in on thopters with multiple ways to pump them. The two above mentioned cards plus Weldfast Engineer, Pia Nalaar and Tezzeret's Touch. The basic idea is hit the opponent fast and hard in the air with lots of thopters. Maverick Thopterist is one of the build around me cards in the deck.
[Rules question: If Tezzeret's Touch is on a thopter, the artifact creature it becomes still has flying correct?]
We are running 3 colors, which could change to just r/u. I just want access to Unlicensed Disintegration, Transgress the Mind and Metallic Rebuke!
This deck is a weird aggro/control amalgamation, but I think it could work! Metallic Mimic should be much more useful in this deck as we can play thopters for 0 and get two thopters for Maverick Thopterist, which could come out on turn 3 quite easily. Plus pumping evasion>>pumping ground creatures
4x Hope of Girapur
4x Metallic Mimic
3x Pia Nalaar
1x Whirler Virtuoso
4x Weldfast Engineer
4x Maverick Thopterist
2x Metallic Rebuke
4x Tezzeret's Touch
3x Unlicensed Disintegration
4x Spire of Industry
4x Spirebluff Canal
2x Choked Estuary
3x Foreboding Ruins
3x Island
4x Mountain
3x Swamp
Current Decks
Standard / Type 2
BRMidrange
"What kind of ability would say "counters black spells" on it? "If a Rigger you control would assemble a Contraption, it counters black spells instead"? "
-Mark Gottlieb
Scrapheap Scrounger gets a bit better with Heir of Falkenrath instead of Copter.
3 Key to the City
2 Heart of Kiran
Creature
4 Scrapheap Scrounger
4 Bomat Courier
3 Hope of Ghirapur
4 Insolent Neonate
4 Forerunner of Slaughter
3 Unlicensed Disintegration
4 Fiery Temper
3 Shock
Sorcery
4 Alms of the Vein
Land
4 Smoldering Marsh
4 Foreboding Ruins
8 Mountain
6 Swamp
I really like the flow of this deck and the consistency too.
Current Decks
Standard / Type 2
BRMidrange
"What kind of ability would say "counters black spells" on it? "If a Rigger you control would assemble a Contraption, it counters black spells instead"? "
-Mark Gottlieb
Frenzy-Affinity-Ghost Quarter-Rock-Tokens- RGWPhyrexian Zoo- WVial KnightsStandard:
BW Knights(Rotated)Pioneer: RW Knights - BW Rally Zombies - UW Heroes
Commander:WUG
Jenara, Asura of War- WGSigarda, Host of HeronsCasualties of economicsLegacy: Good-night, sweet prince. Mono-R Burn
4 Bomat Courier
4 Inventor's Apprentice
4 Heir of Falkenrath
4 Scrapheap Scrounger
3 Pia Nalaar
4 Bloodhall Priest
Spells:14
3 Lightning Axe
3 Key to the City
4 Fiery Temper
4 Unlicensed Disintegration
4 Foreboding Ruins
1 Geier Reach Sanitarium
9 Mountain
4 Smoldering Marsh
5 Swamp
2 Lost Legacy
1 Lightning Axe
4 Shock
2 Release the Gremlins
4 Transgress the Mind
2 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
ended up 2nd place, which is not bad at all.
matches included U/R Control, G/W tokens, Mono Red Aggro, U/W Midrange, etc. no Marvel deck or Saheeli combo.
the deck still can grind and finish off the opponent when it's time.
my loss was against U/W midrange. the use of Rattlechains to replace Copter seems to mirror my own use of Heir of Falkenrath to replace Copter. i stupidly named "Gisela, the Broken Blade" when i cast Lost Legacy and when i looked at his hand he got 2 Spell Queller. that was a grave mistake because i did have 2 removal in hand and should have named Spell Queller to make sure they do not get exiled.
as for Pia Nalaar... i am undecided. still seems like her ability to pump an artifact creature is relevant, as well as putting 2 bodies on the board when cast. and of course, her thopter powers up Unlicensed Disintegration.
Heir of Falkenrath was an OK card. not as good as Copter, but she does the job of damage racing and is a one time Madness enabler.
will the deck still be competitive once Tier 1 decks emerge? that i do not know. but it seems that playing smart with hand disruption as well as removing opponent's key bomb cards from his or her deck are good enough for now.
Yes, Lathnu Hellion is worth considering if your deck is fast enough.
I do have a new idea for Metallic Mimic. Play it with human Artificer's, and Inventor's Goggles. I'm more excited for this deck idea than anything else I've come up with so far.
2x Bomat Courier
4x Inventor's Apprentice
4x Metallic Mimic
4x Aether Chaser
3x Weldfast Engineer
3x Pia Nalaar
4x Inventor's Goggles
2x Resourceful Return
2x Shock
4x Unlicensed Disintegration
4x Foreboding Ruins
8x Swamp
9x Mountain
This incarnation finally has some good and simple synergy going on. It should retain the aggro speed of the madness deck too! I'm looking at plays like turn 1 Hope, turn 2 Artificer's Goggles+Apprentice. I also like turn 2 Metallic Mimic turn 3 Apprentice+Aether Chaser.
Aether Chaser is a card I'd considered before, but without googles I don't think he's good enough. With goggles and mimic in the deck, we stand a good chance of making him a 3/2 first strike which I like quite a bit.
Note that Goggles can buff a metallic mimic if we choose artificer as it's creature type. This is huge, because mimic is pretty fragile on it's own. It's bad synergy to play a 2 drop creature that you can't effectively attack with in an aggro deck. Turn 1 goggles makes our turn 2 Mimi a 3/3! Now that's a creature we can be proud of and attack profitably with.
2 copies of resourceful return in the deck. With no scrounger's exiling our creatures, resourceful return becomes pretty great. We want to get our mimic's back from the graveyard and dig to find them. Also note the awesome synergy with Hope of Ghirapur! We can stop someone from casting Marvel for two turns with these two cards. This play could be good turns 3-6 against control players.
What do you think?
another opposing card to keep in mind is Aethersphere Harvester. yesterday, that card verily stopped my offense and turned the game around. so if you're building a deck, keep that card in mind. if you have Lathnu Hellion and the opponent has the Harvester, Hellion will be wasted. better have a means to deal with Harvester.
not saying Hellion's bad, but Harvester's too good against it.
I also stand by that Hope of Ghirapur is extremely strong right now. The ability to make an opponent unable to board wipe, play their planeswalkers, etc is just so strong right now. I've moved it up to 4 main and I am not disappointed. Considering it's going for like $2 right now, I recommend to grab a set because I think the card is going to shoot up once people realize what it offers.
Do you guys think this deck could possibly run the Walking Ballista at all? I think it's too slow but it seems like it could work in some matchups for us potentially.
I honestly am considering Destructive Tampering for the sb. It's not a strong card but it actually answers most of the issues in that it deals with the Harvester (plus the random artifact combo decks like Reservoir) and allows us to get through clogged boards. There may be better options but I think it has potential.
I'm having a lot of trouble working up a sb. What do you guys think are the essentials for the side?
Edit: I also just realized that Tears of Valakut just became so much better.
Current Decks
Standard / Type 2
BRMidrange
"What kind of ability would say "counters black spells" on it? "If a Rigger you control would assemble a Contraption, it counters black spells instead"? "
-Mark Gottlieb
Modern: R Skred -- WBG Melira Co -- URW Nahiri Control
Legacy: R Mono Red Burn -- UWB Stoneblade
Commander: R Krenko, Mob Boss -- WUBRG Scion of the Ur-Dragon -- WUBRG Maze’s End
Other: R No Rares Red (Standard) -- URC Izzet Tron (Pauper)
Looks pretty streamlined to me especially to beat splinter cat, and a little sideboard for midrange strategies. Gonna give it a try this week at a local tournament.