Talrand was weak, and niv obviously wouldn't fit in a much faster deck, but outside of that, the deck performs reasonably well. It needs to be a little faster, but gutternsipe+electromancer+think twice is painful to play, its just so much value. The same is true for sniper/mancer/ravings.
Tangentially, I'm campaigning for guttersnipe's official nickname to be the sniper.
I suspect that you are running to many counterspell effects here. And if you're going to run counterspells, then syncopate is a must.
I think (I'm not sure) that pillar of flames is going to be better than eletrickery much of the time. I would also avoid blustersquall ('cause it isn't that great of a card) and niv (really out of place here).
Some notes:
-Stonewright, Hellion Crucible and Wild Guess as ways to get through flood / scale into the lategame. Stonewright and the Crucibles have been particularly impressive. Wild Guess is OK - I tried Faithless Looting a lot before rotation - it was amazing with Grim Lavamancer but I have much less incentive to run it now.
-The manabase is OK. I could probably get by on 21 land, but the extra just gives me a little more reliability. I am at the point where I just want to play my cards and not have my deck beat me itself
-the curve feels really good. Turn 3 is often brimstone volley OR another 2 drop OR put a counter on hellion crucible, so it plays better than it looks.
- the burn package has been very solid so far. Sideboard choice shore up what could be weaknesses.
-hellrider is an absurd card.
The sideboard is pretty general and will undergo a lot of work once the meta settles a little more. Obviously some cards for zombies. Nothing for control, but I am not sure what I would want - we lost shrine, Koth and manabarbs, so there is no go to card (without splashing black).
Frostburn weird are tech for the aggro mirror when you want to become the control deck - they block most creatures and trade favourably with everything from the zombie deck (obviously you do need to manage the messengers) allowing you to go big with sideboarded mizzium mortars and electrickery
Utterly from my gut: I dislike chainwalker and stonewright. I've not really tested either, but a 3/2 for two doesn't really sound like much of a deal and the conditionality of the firebreathing clause on stonewright seems undesirable. I can see running either, but I don't like it (again, completely untested ATM though).
I will also be very surprised if wild guess pans out--I don't have much faith in that card anymore.
No vexing devil? I still can't for the life of me understand why people don't play him. If he is good enough to fit into legacy decks.....though I guess its not exactly teh same thing.
I just know from my testing and experience I haven't regreted seeing a vexing devil unless ist turn 5+. but if it IS turn 5+ I can't really think of anything i WOULD want to see.
The more creature-oriented and less burn-oriented these lists become, the less they want devil. Devil is a contentious card, he's not bad exactly, but not all red lists want him.
None of these lists would be able to ignore the downsides of devil well enough to warrant his inclusion.
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Don't know if I'll like Stonewright, but I didn't really like the Rakdos Shred-Freak it's replacing either, so whatever.
I'd really like to be able to go RB for Deathrite Shaman and Hellhole Flailer, but the mana looks tricky - 8 sources of playable RB mana and only 4 of them come into play untapped first turn. That seems like it'd lead to a significantly more inconsistent deck.
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"Of course you should fight fire with fire. You should fight everything with fire."
—Jaya Ballard, task mage
redthirst is redthirst, fifth Horseman of the Apocalypse. He was the leader of the Fires of Salvation, the only clan I'm aware of to get modded off the forums so hard they made their own forums.
Degenerate? Sure. Loudmouth? You bet. Law abiding? No ****ing way.
After testing it out, Nivmagus Elemental works best with Bonfire of the Damned. Bonfire is a good sweeper, which I think will be important due to Selesnya. If you draw it in your opening hand, or can't put its Miracle cost to good use (ie not enough lands), cast it for as little as possible and feed it to Nivmagus.
Would cards like Furor of the Bitten and Deviant Glee work here? While they would be terrible top decks, they also help protect our 1-drops from chump blockers.
Pretty sure we stole it from somewhere, but it tested well. I wouldn't try to get cute with it.
Been testing this one. I'm thinking Talrand himself might work better in the 4 slot than Talrand's Invocation. Also, all the sorcery-speed removal works against stuff like Desperate Ravings and Cyclonic Rift.
But again I may be wrong. I haven't taken him to a PTQ yet(but I will mid october). If he underplays for me then I"ll take him out and put him in my legacy burn. I just don't think its excusable to play thunderous wrath but then say Vexing devil is to janky for current standard. (not saying that to anyone in this forum but have gotten that answer before)
Thunderous wrath wins you the game as a topdeck. Devil never will.
Also that answer was like 3 hours old when you posted this.
I guess OP wants it to be 'keyworded' like "dies" was. What word would you replace ETB with though?
When Aegis Angel is born?
When Huntmaster of the Fells arrives?
When Kitchen Sphinx lands?
When Faerie Imposter busts in?
When Dread Cacodemon pops in?
When Malfegor shows up?
Utterly from my gut: I dislike chainwalker and stonewright. I've not really tested either, but a 3/2 for two doesn't really sound like much of a deal and the conditionality of the firebreathing clause on stonewright seems undesirable. I can see running either, but I don't like it (again, completely untested ATM though).
Gore-House Chainwalker is indeed a pretty bad card but the two drop options past Ash Zealot are all fairly suspect. Looking at the other main candidates (Mogg Flunkies, Shred-Freak, Lightning Mauler) none of them really do a much better job than Chainwalker.
As for Stonewright, you should definitely test him out. He's a really useful manasink for this deck and effectively has haste provided you have another creature in play. Being able to dump all of your excess red mana into extra damage is a huge boost for this deck, and it also can also force your opponent into making trades they really don't want to be making (like your random Rakdos Cackler for their Restoration Angel for example). Also when paired with any first strike creature he basically turns that creature into the abyss which is rarely a bad thing.
And I found that no Pithing Needle is included in any sideboard at all. Why?
A couple of things:
1. Your deck is 61 cards - you have 25 creatures listed, not 24.
2. Vexing Devil is hot garbage in anything but BURN! - that isn't even theory at this point. It's been tested for months. It's not good here.
3. Thunderous Wrath is great if you top deck it, but worthless in your opening hand - since RDW usually wins in 6 turns or less, that means you will have 5 chances for it to be great (when you draw and have R) in an average game, but 7-8 chances for it to be useless (7 card opening hand + your first draw if you're on the draw). It will be useless more often than it will be great.
4. Pithing Needle is a totally reactive card that doesn't further Aggro's plan - it may become necessary if a card's activated ability completely hoses the deck and we have no other way to deal with it, but otherwise it's a bad choice.
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"Of course you should fight fire with fire. You should fight everything with fire."
—Jaya Ballard, task mage
redthirst is redthirst, fifth Horseman of the Apocalypse. He was the leader of the Fires of Salvation, the only clan I'm aware of to get modded off the forums so hard they made their own forums.
Degenerate? Sure. Loudmouth? You bet. Law abiding? No ****ing way.
Hooray for a new thread and standard season! Lovely primer Zem.
I guess I´ll stand in defense of the Rakdos Sligh and/or Burn variant(s) as that is my pet brew. I believe that there is much merit in splashing black because of a number of cards:
Dreadbore - can and most often will replace Searing Spear in Sligh as a MD card that saves sideboard space plus is an iron clad answer to the various fatties in GW and Naya builds that will be even more common (aswell as being a bonus vs control in answering PWs). Translation: Wolfir Silverheart.
Hellhole Flailer - is the main reason for a black splash in Sligh. There´s a lack of good 3 drops and this guy also adds 'more value' in a way that is very rare in aggro creatures; the built in Burn is reach on the table.
Rakdos Charm - this is a SB card, but a very good one. It eats graveyards (anti-Izzet, Golgari), it punishes token strategies (Selesnya) and saves a slot for the obligatory artifact answer.
Slaughter Games - also a SB card, yet powerful. This is what neuters Thragtusk. Keep the manadorks off the board and this will go off before they can deploy it.
Deathrite Shaman - is Grim Lavamancers big brother and a suprising ally from the Golgari camp. It´s basically 4 times as effective as ol' Grim with a better body. Even works in duplicates. This is the reason for splashing black in the Burn variant.
That's the skeleton crew and there's more cards, but this is the skint of my reasoning.
I really like the Burn miracle while others don't. As Burn wants to filter more than Sligh I find the trade off acceptable. A related issue is the lack of decent Burn spells.
I really like splashing black - I think it gives you access to the most powerful sideboard cards (look at your sideboards compared to mine...). Dreadbore in particular is a great SB card. I am just a little skeptical on the mana - colour me undecided.
Do you mind if I add those lists to the primer? It gives others a good place to start. Thanks for the contribution!
@ DeluxeTea - thanks for the quote repost Much appreciated!
Quote from Yorutenchi »
I think his answer is outdated now that RDW has become more viable due to Rakdos. I may be wrong but I've been testing with him and without him and so far he is a "win more" card. Not a key player but always a good addition to the deck for me. I may have biased testing or something that makes him far from the norm but so far he is working for me. I hope people re-test him in the new RDW or Rakdos/burn of the up and comming season.......or on second thought I hope they don't and I keep the secret all to myself. lol
What I wrote was based on playing with VD in every match since AVR was released - more than 100
The problem is that in a creature based deck, you need your burn spells to either
a) remove blockers
b) be a good enough topdeck late in the game to burn them out
VD cannot do either of those, so he isnt burn. He isnt a creature early either - so he can really only be included if the times you will have him in your opener (dealing 4 damage) or draw him in the first few turns are worth more than what another 1 drop would do in that slot - I submit that 4 damage for 1 card (with card disadvantage) is less valuable than the expected return on any of the other 1 drops, which will deal damage then trade (maintaining card parity).
VD shines in burn (especially legacy burn) because you're not trying to "deal damage" in a conventional sense - you're a 7 card combo deck, with 40 copies of your key card In that context, card advantage is completely irrelevant - you can kill someone with a grip full of 7 cards very easily.
We no longer have that luxury in standard - we're having to fight a more honest creature battle, and I suspect that in that environment, VD holds up worse.
Quote from Aesnath »
Utterly from my gut: I dislike chainwalker and stonewright. I've not really tested either, but a 3/2 for two doesn't really sound like much of a deal and the conditionality of the firebreathing clause on stonewright seems undesirable. I can see running either, but I don't like it (again, completely untested ATM though).
I will also be very surprised if wild guess pans out--I don't have much faith in that card anymore.
Hi Aesnath! Looking forward to hearing about your early experiences with the decks.
I think the weakest card in the 75 I posted is Chainwalker. But I do believe him to be the most viable of the non-As Zealot 2 drops. Chainwalker is the first card I want to replace when GTC hits - but until then, he at least hits very hard, and is only slightly worse than stormblood beserker in power level, but requires no enablers - so is a much better topdeck.
I was doubtful on stonewright as well, but he has consistently exceeded my expectations. I am going to have a 4th main or in the board, depending how the meta shakes out - he is amazing against the GW decks and the Ux control decks - against GW because he lets your crappy guys trade up for their good ones (negating their acceleration advantage and stranding their support cards) and againt Ux control because he is basically "R: x/1 haste, where x = number of mountains you control -1". If they cannot kill him immediately, I have dealt 10 damage in two turns just off the firebreathing. I am a big fan, but if GTC brings something better, I will reconsider my position.
Basically, my wishlist is a better 2 drop and 1-2 better burn spells, and some sideboard cards.
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Don't know if I'll like Stonewright, but I didn't really like the Rakdos Shred-Freak it's replacing either, so whatever.
I'd really like to be able to go RB for Deathrite Shaman and Hellhole Flailer, but the mana looks tricky - 8 sources of playable RB mana and only 4 of them come into play untapped first turn. That seems like it'd lead to a significantly more inconsistent deck.
Looks really solid to me. I found ShredFreak to me just OK - I have found stonewright to be backbreaking. I think it is a good trade, and the games where you start with a 1 drop are a LOT different to the games where you don't. Let us know how it goes!
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Would cards like Furor of the Bitten and Deviant Glee work here? While they would be terrible top decks, they also help protect our 1-drops from chump blockers.
Little too risky I think. I would rather just have another creature at the moment - though I can see Furor being potentially playable - it was VERY good in block constructed, so there might be something there.
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Would cards like Furor of the Bitten and Deviant Glee work here? While they would be terrible top decks, they also help protect our 1-drops from chump blockers.
Little too risky I think. I would rather just have another creature at the moment - though I can see Furor being potentially playable - it was VERY good in block constructed, so there might be something there.
Dave Price used Giant Strengths in his Tempest Block Constructed PT Deadguy Red. This was a format rife with removal, and he won the entire tournament. With removal today being weaker than it once was, I believe Furor could work.
Regarding the deck, I find that having 8 one-drops just isn't cutting it for me. Stonewright isn't that good when dropped T1 and Vexing Devil is a no go. I'll try dropping the Shred-Freaks for Reckless Waifs and see where it gets me. With Wizards trying to make the game more midrange-y, she just might flip more often. Forge Devil could also be of some use, pinging mana dorks and other utility creatures.
Furor is by far the closest to constructed play I think - +2/+2 for R is very, very good. It is effectively a R 2/2 haste creature. Incredible on Stromkirk Noble. In Block Constructed, not many decks could beat Stromkirk Noble into Furor - on the play that was typically game. However, with Ultimate Price, Azorius Charm and Abrupt Decay likely to be very popular, I am somewhat skeptical. It is worth testing.
Reckless Waif is pretty incredible against control decks. Beyond that it has always let me down. My biggest issue with Forge Devil is that you cannot play it onto an empty board.
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If you run furor make sure you have guys with forms of evasion. Even dropping a furor on a hellhole flailer to make it deal 6 then sacced deal 6 again is much better then just putting it on your early drop with no evasion that can't block if they can somehow interact with that, azorius charm, cyclonic rift, just a bunch of little token blockers etc etc. Furor on ash looks interesting as a turn 3 play that can push through almost anything. Furor also on stromkirk if humans are prevalent again early turns could prove worthwhile, since all i was getting out of a first turn stromkirk on average was 3 damage which was severely underwhelming in the end.
All im getting as is be careful with furor, i imagine its maindeckable going in blind but will easily get sb'ed out in a fair amount of matches. And can cause a bit too many blowouts if you use it too aggressively.
Im not fond of stonewright if you argue that keyrunes are bad your essentially saying this guy is a easier to deal with shock since you won't really be having more then 2 mana untapped most turns and if you do you could probably end up rebuilding your deck to make it less common occurrence. It just feels like your trying to fill a slot with him and hes most likely a win more card. I am almost positive there is better mana sinks then this guy is all.
Im very fond of the black splash and i can't see how running 8 dual lands and probably 2 swamps is going to be bad on your mana base as long as you stay away from mana intensive black cards.
It might even be worth having Furor as a sideboard card? All I know is that the return on it, even if you only hit once is basically a shock, so you're getting most of a card anyway - two hits and the value has become really good. So there is something there, I just don't know if it is enough.
My only issue with the Rakdos manabase is that I have played around with pretty much that mana base before (22 land w/ 10 black sources) and found it very underwhelming. Bloodcrypt does make it a bit better of course. I am more than happy for everyone else to try it, find out it is amazing then tell me I am wrong of course
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If you run furor make sure you have guys with forms of evasion. Even dropping a furor on a hellhole flailer to make it deal 6 then sacced deal 6 again is much better then just putting it on your early drop with no evasion that can't block if they can somehow interact with that, azorius charm, cyclonic rift, just a bunch of little token blockers etc etc. Furor on ash looks interesting as a turn 3 play that can push through almost anything. Furor also on stromkirk if humans are prevalent again early turns could prove worthwhile, since all i was getting out of a first turn stromkirk on average was 3 damage which was severely underwhelming in the end.
All im getting as is be careful with furor, i imagine its maindeckable going in blind but will easily get sb'ed out in a fair amount of matches. And can cause a bit too many blowouts if you use it too aggressively.
Im not fond of stonewright if you argue that keyrunes are bad your essentially saying this guy is a easier to deal with shock since you won't really be having more then 2 mana untapped most turns and if you do you could probably end up rebuilding your deck to make it less common occurrence. It just feels like your trying to fill a slot with him and hes most likely a win more card. I am almost positive there is better mana sinks then this guy is all.
Im very fond of the black splash and i can't see how running 8 dual lands and probably 2 swamps is going to be bad on your mana base as long as you stay away from mana intensive black cards.
Stonewright is hardly win more at all. You WILL flood at some point, it's not a question if but when it will happen, and when you do it's important to have something to do with your mana. Stonewright can push through a lot of damage with your excess mana and even if it's just one or two points per attack those points are still very relevant to this deck. He also pairs very well with Ash Zealot which is another good reason to run him. If you think there are better mana sinks then feel free to suggest them though and people will take a look at them. The only others I can think of in Mono Red are Hellion Crucible (which doesn't compete with Stonewright for deck slots anyways) and Dragon Hatchling (which seems to be mostly just a bad Stonewright).
If you want to splash black you get Stensia Bloodhall which is ok I guess but you really have to flood to make use of it. Splashing green for Kessig Wolf Run could be something you could do after Gatecrash comes out and we have access to Stomping Grounds but until then I don't think only 4 Rootbound Crags is reliable enough for that to work. Desolate Lighthouse is also a potential option and Slayer's Stronghold could be once we get Sacred Foundry. Again though those cards are lands and wouldn't compete with Stonewright for slots either.
The reason why the mana is bad with a black splash is because Dragonskull Summit can enter play tapped, and Swamps make it difficult to cast any non-Rakdos Cackler 1-drops. Swamps also make Ash Zealot more difficult to cast Compare these two opening hands:
With the first hand you can curve out your 1 and 2 drops with ease and then spend your 3rd turn burning something, playing another creature or putting a counter on Hellion Crucible depending on what's going on.
With the second hand you have to play a tapped Dragonskull Summit on turn 1, play Stomkirk Noble and a Swamp on turn 2 (or Ash Zealot if you get lucky and draw an untapped Red source), and then do something else turn 3.
The point of that example is to show that with Swamps and Dragonskull Summits in the deck you can lose a lot of tempo. While the two hands are functionally similar (3 lands, 4 spells), the R/B hand is basically playing a turn behind the Mono-Red hand in this example and that's a really big difference for a deck like this one.
All that being said, splashing a second color can be good because it gives your deck more options (for example a B/R list could run Falkenrath Aristocrat as its 4 drop which is quite possibly better than Hellrider in this deck and could also have Dreadbores as a catch-all answer to troublesome PWs or creatures). You basically have to determine whether the loss of consistency is worth the increased versatility splashing a color gives you.
Stonewright is hardly win more at all. You WILL flood at some point, it's not a question if but when it will happen, and when you do it's important to have something to do with your mana. Stonewright can push through a lot of damage with your excess mana and even if it's just one or two points per attack those points are still very relevant to this deck. He also pairs very well with Ash Zealot which is another good reason to run him. If you think there are better mana sinks then feel free to suggest them though and people will take a look at them. The only others I can think of in Mono Red are Hellion Crucible (which doesn't compete with Stonewright for deck slots anyways) and Dragon Hatchling (which seems to be mostly just a bad Stonewright).
If you want to splash black you get Stensia Bloodhall which is ok I guess but you really have to flood to make use of it. Splashing green for Kessig Wolf Run could be something you could do after Gatecrash comes out and we have access to Stomping Grounds but until then I don't think only 4 Rootbound Crags is reliable enough for that to work. Desolate Lighthouse is also a potential option and Slayer's Stronghold could be once we get Sacred Foundry. Again though those cards are lands and wouldn't compete with Stonewright for slots either.
The reason why the mana is bad with a black splash is because Dragonskull Summit can enter play tapped, and Swamps make it difficult to cast any non-Rakdos Cackler 1-drops. Swamps also make Ash Zealot more difficult to cast Compare these two opening hands:
With the first hand you can curve out your 1 and 2 drops with ease and then spend your 3rd turn burning something, playing another creature or putting a counter on Hellion Crucible depending on what's going on.
With the second hand you have to play a tapped Dragonskull Summit on turn 1, play Stomkirk Noble and a Swamp on turn 2 (or Ash Zealot if you get lucky and draw an untapped Red source), and then do something else turn 3.
The point of that example is to show that with Swamps and Dragonskull Summits in the deck you can lose a lot of tempo. While the two hands are functionally similar (3 lands, 4 spells), the R/B hand is basically playing a turn behind the Mono-Red hand in this example and that's a really big difference for a deck like this one.
All that being said, splashing a second color can be good because it gives your deck more options (for example a B/R list could run Falkenrath Aristocrat as its 4 drop which is quite possibly better than Hellrider in this deck and could also have Dreadbores as a catch-all answer to troublesome PWs or creatures). You basically have to determine whether the loss of consistency is worth the increased versatility splashing a color gives you.
I think we're at basically the same place. To be fair, I am running 3 Hellion Crucible, which is probably just as problematic as interaction of 2 swamps + 4 dragonskull summit. I think what we do agree on is that some amount of risk is necessary to increase the power of the deck.
I cannot encourage players enough to try Stonewright and form their own opinion. It has been fantasic for me, and would have been so prior to rotation, if not for gut shot. That has haste-light when it comes into play, as well as the ability to turn every land into damage is very powerful as the game goes on - like Dromar said, eventually you're going to flood and Stonewright is insanely powerful in those situations - especially against the Bant and GW decks (all their pumps look pretty bad when you're firebreathing; their lifegain can be worked through by you dumping mana - it isn't great, but it is a LOT better than relying on burn).
Finished Part 2 of the Primer - just the card guide, strategy guide, matchup guide and minor parts to go!
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Stonewright is hardly win more at all. You WILL flood at some point, it's not a question if but when it will happen, and when you do it's important to have something to do with your mana. Stonewright can push through a lot of damage with your excess mana and even if it's just one or two points per attack those points are still very relevant to this deck. He also pairs very well with Ash Zealot which is another good reason to run him. If you think there are better mana sinks then feel free to suggest them though and people will take a look at them. The only others I can think of in Mono Red are Hellion Crucible (which doesn't compete with Stonewright for deck slots anyways) and Dragon Hatchling (which seems to be mostly just a bad Stonewright).
If you want to splash black you get Stensia Bloodhall which is ok I guess but you really have to flood to make use of it. Splashing green for Kessig Wolf Run could be something you could do after Gatecrash comes out and we have access to Stomping Grounds but until then I don't think only 4 Rootbound Crags is reliable enough for that to work. Desolate Lighthouse is also a potential option and Slayer's Stronghold could be once we get Sacred Foundry. Again though those cards are lands and wouldn't compete with Stonewright for slots either.
The reason why the mana is bad with a black splash is because Dragonskull Summit can enter play tapped, and Swamps make it difficult to cast any non-Rakdos Cackler 1-drops. Swamps also make Ash Zealot more difficult to cast Compare these two opening hands:
With the first hand you can curve out your 1 and 2 drops with ease and then spend your 3rd turn burning something, playing another creature or putting a counter on Hellion Crucible depending on what's going on.
With the second hand you have to play a tapped Dragonskull Summit on turn 1, play Stomkirk Noble and a Swamp on turn 2 (or Ash Zealot if you get lucky and draw an untapped Red source), and then do something else turn 3.
The point of that example is to show that with Swamps and Dragonskull Summits in the deck you can lose a lot of tempo. While the two hands are functionally similar (3 lands, 4 spells), the R/B hand is basically playing a turn behind the Mono-Red hand in this example and that's a really big difference for a deck like this one.
All that being said, splashing a second color can be good because it gives your deck more options (for example a B/R list could run Falkenrath Aristocrat as its 4 drop which is quite possibly better than Hellrider in this deck and could also have Dreadbores as a catch-all answer to troublesome PWs or creatures). You basically have to determine whether the loss of consistency is worth the increased versatility splashing a color gives you.
So i want to get this straight because the corner case where RB gets mana screwed, as you demonstrated, will happen is almost as likely as being completely mana screwed in a mono colored deck....Idk if you really just using theory or actual testing at all for what your getting at. To begin with there is only 1 turn dragonskull summit should/will enter the battlefield tapped and that is almost always turn 1 which means you kept no other lands in hand or more dragonskull summits(which is still a oddity), so your hand better be f'ing beautiful or you need to start learning when to mulligan. Great you realize it will happen you also realize you will have to mulligan with a mono colored deck as well, where is the problem in getting a deck that has more overall power/potential for a very reasonable mana base coming from. How is 8 duals bad? What you pointed at is a more likely then not a very small percentage of hands you will receive if you actually play the deck extensively, and if its a big enough of a problem you can fix the mana for it but might have to exchange overall speed of the deck, but you can't however have them print mono red cards because your missing one to do something until next release.
Secondly, stonewright is a much easier to disrupt mana sink, i could even go as far as saying bonfires would easily be around 25% better then stone in the course of a day at a large event. Which im not seeing any deck post, what have we learned about bonfire in creature verse creature mirrors, sorry this is a deck that has all its dudes turn sideways for damage, bonfire is amazing. Stonewright is probably worse then a furor in a lot of ways. I think your all too stuck up on the marginal uses of stonewright for control matches which is fine why not just sb him them since that is really all he will be proving to be doing something for more then 1 turn against. I don't know how to tell you this but stonewright is ok i haven't been tempted to run firebreathing in a aggro/burn/sligh deck in a long long time for various reasons. I get your trying to use him to create a need to answer board presence with exhausting little resources/swing a aggro mirror with 1 attack. But most of the aggro mirrors are easily decided in the first few turns that he will never be relevant and i will always board him out, Hellrider i would rather have for control matches as well. He is just not the card you want for whatever you want him for. If your running him for any reason outside of those i would love to know why because i can't quite frankly come up with one.
I mean if you want to actually talk about card choices im glad but if your just going to keep coming up with small corner cases of why having 8 dual lands which only 4 have a mandatory ETB tapped clause and other semantics i will gladly be done with this, i can easily bring up the cases of you play hellion crucible play a slow hand tick it up then unleash it they then drop unsummon/cyclonic rift, or you drop a stonewright and pair your turn 3 they then drop a wolfir silverheart turn 4 paired to another creature because you tapped out to deal that extra 2 damage...wtf now.
Secondly, stonewright is a much easier to disrupt mana sink, i could even go as far as saying bonfires would easily be around 25% better then stone in the course of a day at a large event.
Easier to disrupt than what? A spell-land? A filter spell like Faithless Looting? Well - of course! Grim Lavamancer is very easy to disrupt as well. For a 1 drop that will trade with pretty much anything, and can let you do huge damage if you're unfortunate enough to flood, he is pretty good. He is the exact opposite of a win-more; when everything goes well, he is probably no better than a 2/1 for R, but when things are going badly and you flood - then he is great. He is also easily the best 1 drop to topdeck.
I am unsure how it is possible to claim than bonfire is expected to be 25% better across an event.
Quote from Drowning »
Which im not seeing any deck post, what have we learned about bonfire in creature verse creature mirrors, sorry this is a deck that has all its dudes turn sideways for damage, bonfire is amazing.
Sure, but we cannot really run Bonfire effectively without running more land. Stonewright and Bonfire don't really compete for the same deck space anyway - at least for me I want at least 10 x 1 drops; the games where you have a good 1 drop is so much better than the games where you don't.
Quote from Drowning »
Stonewright is probably worse then a furor in a lot of ways. I think your all too stuck up on the marginal uses of stonewright for control matches which is fine why not just sb him them since that is really all he will be proving to be doing something for more then 1 turn against. I don't know how to tell you this but stonewright is ok i haven't been tempted to run firebreathing in a aggro/burn/sligh deck in a long long time for various reasons.
I would rather have the body and not be vulnerable to 2-for-1s. I don't doubt that furor isnt a good card, but Stonewright should be both more consistent and a better topdeck.
Quote from Drowning »
I get your trying to use him to create a need to answer board presence with exhausting little resources/swing a aggro mirror with 1 attack. But most of the aggro mirrors are easily decided in the first few turns that he will never be relevant and i will always board him out, Hellrider i would rather have for control matches as well. He is just not the card you want for whatever you want him for. If your running him for any reason outside of those i would love to know why because i can't quite frankly come up with one.
I just like him because he:
- lets your creatures trade up OR makes any frist strikers you have crazy scary
- lets you turn any unused mana into damage. It might only be 1 damage every 3 turns, but it is still something. And there will be times where he generates 3+ damage a turn, which is the same as drawing a card for us.
- he is the best topdeck of any 1 drop we have. He has pseudo-haste later on. Sure, he is weaker than Stromkirk Noble or Rakdos Cackler on turn 1, but as the game goes on I really do believe that he is a lot better.
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This list looks very mean. How have the invocations worked here? I'm not sure I like them as much conceptually.
I suspect that you are running to many counterspell effects here. And if you're going to run counterspells, then syncopate is a must.
I think (I'm not sure) that pillar of flames is going to be better than eletrickery much of the time. I would also avoid blustersquall ('cause it isn't that great of a card) and niv (really out of place here).
Utterly from my gut: I dislike chainwalker and stonewright. I've not really tested either, but a 3/2 for two doesn't really sound like much of a deal and the conditionality of the firebreathing clause on stonewright seems undesirable. I can see running either, but I don't like it (again, completely untested ATM though).
I will also be very surprised if wild guess pans out--I don't have much faith in that card anymore.
The more creature-oriented and less burn-oriented these lists become, the less they want devil. Devil is a contentious card, he's not bad exactly, but not all red lists want him.
None of these lists would be able to ignore the downsides of devil well enough to warrant his inclusion.
In order of what you want to see late game:
1. Burn
2. Hellrider
Here's what I'll be playing around with:
4 Stromkirk Noble
4 Rakdos Cackler
2 Stonewright
4 Ash Zealot
4 Gore-House Chainwalker
4 Hellrider
4 Pillar of Flame
4 Searing Spear
4 Thunderbolt
4 Brimstone Volley
20 Mountain
2 Hellion Crucible
Don't know if I'll like Stonewright, but I didn't really like the Rakdos Shred-Freak it's replacing either, so whatever.
I'd really like to be able to go RB for Deathrite Shaman and Hellhole Flailer, but the mana looks tricky - 8 sources of playable RB mana and only 4 of them come into play untapped first turn. That seems like it'd lead to a significantly more inconsistent deck.
—Jaya Ballard, task mage
Been testing this one. I'm thinking Talrand himself might work better in the 4 slot than Talrand's Invocation. Also, all the sorcery-speed removal works against stuff like Desperate Ravings and Cyclonic Rift.
Thunderous wrath wins you the game as a topdeck. Devil never will.
Also that answer was like 3 hours old when you posted this.
Gore-House Chainwalker is indeed a pretty bad card but the two drop options past Ash Zealot are all fairly suspect. Looking at the other main candidates (Mogg Flunkies, Shred-Freak, Lightning Mauler) none of them really do a much better job than Chainwalker.
As for Stonewright, you should definitely test him out. He's a really useful manasink for this deck and effectively has haste provided you have another creature in play. Being able to dump all of your excess red mana into extra damage is a huge boost for this deck, and it also can also force your opponent into making trades they really don't want to be making (like your random Rakdos Cackler for their Restoration Angel for example). Also when paired with any first strike creature he basically turns that creature into the abyss which is rarely a bad thing.
20 Mountain
2 Hellion's Crucible
Creatures: 24
4 Stromkirk Noble
4 Rakdos Cackler
4 Vexing Devil
4 Ash Zealot
4 Gore-House Chainwalker
3 Rakdos Shred-Freak
2 Hellrider
4 Brimstone Volley
4 Searing Spear
2 Thunderous Wrath
4 Pillar of Flame
I've posted this on another retired thread. Notable absentees include Stonewright, Thunderbolt, Wild Guess. Not sold on those...yet. But Thunderbolt can easily replace Searing Spear if I want to.
And I found that no Pithing Needle is included in any sideboard at all. Why?
A couple of things:
1. Your deck is 61 cards - you have 25 creatures listed, not 24.
2. Vexing Devil is hot garbage in anything but BURN! - that isn't even theory at this point. It's been tested for months. It's not good here.
3. Thunderous Wrath is great if you top deck it, but worthless in your opening hand - since RDW usually wins in 6 turns or less, that means you will have 5 chances for it to be great (when you draw and have R) in an average game, but 7-8 chances for it to be useless (7 card opening hand + your first draw if you're on the draw). It will be useless more often than it will be great.
4. Pithing Needle is a totally reactive card that doesn't further Aggro's plan - it may become necessary if a card's activated ability completely hoses the deck and we have no other way to deal with it, but otherwise it's a bad choice.
—Jaya Ballard, task mage
I really like splashing black - I think it gives you access to the most powerful sideboard cards (look at your sideboards compared to mine...). Dreadbore in particular is a great SB card. I am just a little skeptical on the mana - colour me undecided.
Do you mind if I add those lists to the primer? It gives others a good place to start. Thanks for the contribution!
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What I wrote was based on playing with VD in every match since AVR was released - more than 100
The problem is that in a creature based deck, you need your burn spells to either
a) remove blockers
b) be a good enough topdeck late in the game to burn them out
VD cannot do either of those, so he isnt burn. He isnt a creature early either - so he can really only be included if the times you will have him in your opener (dealing 4 damage) or draw him in the first few turns are worth more than what another 1 drop would do in that slot - I submit that 4 damage for 1 card (with card disadvantage) is less valuable than the expected return on any of the other 1 drops, which will deal damage then trade (maintaining card parity).
VD shines in burn (especially legacy burn) because you're not trying to "deal damage" in a conventional sense - you're a 7 card combo deck, with 40 copies of your key card In that context, card advantage is completely irrelevant - you can kill someone with a grip full of 7 cards very easily.
We no longer have that luxury in standard - we're having to fight a more honest creature battle, and I suspect that in that environment, VD holds up worse.
Hi Aesnath! Looking forward to hearing about your early experiences with the decks.
I think the weakest card in the 75 I posted is Chainwalker. But I do believe him to be the most viable of the non-As Zealot 2 drops. Chainwalker is the first card I want to replace when GTC hits - but until then, he at least hits very hard, and is only slightly worse than stormblood beserker in power level, but requires no enablers - so is a much better topdeck.
I was doubtful on stonewright as well, but he has consistently exceeded my expectations. I am going to have a 4th main or in the board, depending how the meta shakes out - he is amazing against the GW decks and the Ux control decks - against GW because he lets your crappy guys trade up for their good ones (negating their acceleration advantage and stranding their support cards) and againt Ux control because he is basically "R: x/1 haste, where x = number of mountains you control -1". If they cannot kill him immediately, I have dealt 10 damage in two turns just off the firebreathing. I am a big fan, but if GTC brings something better, I will reconsider my position.
Basically, my wishlist is a better 2 drop and 1-2 better burn spells, and some sideboard cards.
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Looks really solid to me. I found ShredFreak to me just OK - I have found stonewright to be backbreaking. I think it is a good trade, and the games where you start with a 1 drop are a LOT different to the games where you don't. Let us know how it goes!
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Little too risky I think. I would rather just have another creature at the moment - though I can see Furor being potentially playable - it was VERY good in block constructed, so there might be something there.
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Done and done!
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Dave Price used Giant Strengths in his Tempest Block Constructed PT Deadguy Red. This was a format rife with removal, and he won the entire tournament. With removal today being weaker than it once was, I believe Furor could work.
Regarding the deck, I find that having 8 one-drops just isn't cutting it for me. Stonewright isn't that good when dropped T1 and Vexing Devil is a no go. I'll try dropping the Shred-Freaks for Reckless Waifs and see where it gets me. With Wizards trying to make the game more midrange-y, she just might flip more often. Forge Devil could also be of some use, pinging mana dorks and other utility creatures.
Reckless Waif is pretty incredible against control decks. Beyond that it has always let me down. My biggest issue with Forge Devil is that you cannot play it onto an empty board.
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All im getting as is be careful with furor, i imagine its maindeckable going in blind but will easily get sb'ed out in a fair amount of matches. And can cause a bit too many blowouts if you use it too aggressively.
Im not fond of stonewright if you argue that keyrunes are bad your essentially saying this guy is a easier to deal with shock since you won't really be having more then 2 mana untapped most turns and if you do you could probably end up rebuilding your deck to make it less common occurrence. It just feels like your trying to fill a slot with him and hes most likely a win more card. I am almost positive there is better mana sinks then this guy is all.
Im very fond of the black splash and i can't see how running 8 dual lands and probably 2 swamps is going to be bad on your mana base as long as you stay away from mana intensive black cards.
My only issue with the Rakdos manabase is that I have played around with pretty much that mana base before (22 land w/ 10 black sources) and found it very underwhelming. Bloodcrypt does make it a bit better of course. I am more than happy for everyone else to try it, find out it is amazing then tell me I am wrong of course
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Stonewright is hardly win more at all. You WILL flood at some point, it's not a question if but when it will happen, and when you do it's important to have something to do with your mana. Stonewright can push through a lot of damage with your excess mana and even if it's just one or two points per attack those points are still very relevant to this deck. He also pairs very well with Ash Zealot which is another good reason to run him. If you think there are better mana sinks then feel free to suggest them though and people will take a look at them. The only others I can think of in Mono Red are Hellion Crucible (which doesn't compete with Stonewright for deck slots anyways) and Dragon Hatchling (which seems to be mostly just a bad Stonewright).
If you want to splash black you get Stensia Bloodhall which is ok I guess but you really have to flood to make use of it. Splashing green for Kessig Wolf Run could be something you could do after Gatecrash comes out and we have access to Stomping Grounds but until then I don't think only 4 Rootbound Crags is reliable enough for that to work. Desolate Lighthouse is also a potential option and Slayer's Stronghold could be once we get Sacred Foundry. Again though those cards are lands and wouldn't compete with Stonewright for slots either.
The reason why the mana is bad with a black splash is because Dragonskull Summit can enter play tapped, and Swamps make it difficult to cast any non-Rakdos Cackler 1-drops. Swamps also make Ash Zealot more difficult to cast Compare these two opening hands:
Mono-Red: Mountain, Mountain, Hellion Crucible, Stromkirk Noble, Ash Zealot, Pillar of Flame, Brimstone Volley
R/B: Swamp, Dragonskull Summit, Stensia Bloodhall, Stromkirk Noble, Ash Zealot, Pillar of Flame, Brimstone Volley
With the first hand you can curve out your 1 and 2 drops with ease and then spend your 3rd turn burning something, playing another creature or putting a counter on Hellion Crucible depending on what's going on.
With the second hand you have to play a tapped Dragonskull Summit on turn 1, play Stomkirk Noble and a Swamp on turn 2 (or Ash Zealot if you get lucky and draw an untapped Red source), and then do something else turn 3.
The point of that example is to show that with Swamps and Dragonskull Summits in the deck you can lose a lot of tempo. While the two hands are functionally similar (3 lands, 4 spells), the R/B hand is basically playing a turn behind the Mono-Red hand in this example and that's a really big difference for a deck like this one.
All that being said, splashing a second color can be good because it gives your deck more options (for example a B/R list could run Falkenrath Aristocrat as its 4 drop which is quite possibly better than Hellrider in this deck and could also have Dreadbores as a catch-all answer to troublesome PWs or creatures). You basically have to determine whether the loss of consistency is worth the increased versatility splashing a color gives you.
I think we're at basically the same place. To be fair, I am running 3 Hellion Crucible, which is probably just as problematic as interaction of 2 swamps + 4 dragonskull summit. I think what we do agree on is that some amount of risk is necessary to increase the power of the deck.
I cannot encourage players enough to try Stonewright and form their own opinion. It has been fantasic for me, and would have been so prior to rotation, if not for gut shot. That has haste-light when it comes into play, as well as the ability to turn every land into damage is very powerful as the game goes on - like Dromar said, eventually you're going to flood and Stonewright is insanely powerful in those situations - especially against the Bant and GW decks (all their pumps look pretty bad when you're firebreathing; their lifegain can be worked through by you dumping mana - it isn't great, but it is a LOT better than relying on burn).
Finished Part 2 of the Primer - just the card guide, strategy guide, matchup guide and minor parts to go!
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So i want to get this straight because the corner case where RB gets mana screwed, as you demonstrated, will happen is almost as likely as being completely mana screwed in a mono colored deck....Idk if you really just using theory or actual testing at all for what your getting at. To begin with there is only 1 turn dragonskull summit should/will enter the battlefield tapped and that is almost always turn 1 which means you kept no other lands in hand or more dragonskull summits(which is still a oddity), so your hand better be f'ing beautiful or you need to start learning when to mulligan. Great you realize it will happen you also realize you will have to mulligan with a mono colored deck as well, where is the problem in getting a deck that has more overall power/potential for a very reasonable mana base coming from. How is 8 duals bad? What you pointed at is a more likely then not a very small percentage of hands you will receive if you actually play the deck extensively, and if its a big enough of a problem you can fix the mana for it but might have to exchange overall speed of the deck, but you can't however have them print mono red cards because your missing one to do something until next release.
Secondly, stonewright is a much easier to disrupt mana sink, i could even go as far as saying bonfires would easily be around 25% better then stone in the course of a day at a large event. Which im not seeing any deck post, what have we learned about bonfire in creature verse creature mirrors, sorry this is a deck that has all its dudes turn sideways for damage, bonfire is amazing. Stonewright is probably worse then a furor in a lot of ways. I think your all too stuck up on the marginal uses of stonewright for control matches which is fine why not just sb him them since that is really all he will be proving to be doing something for more then 1 turn against. I don't know how to tell you this but stonewright is ok i haven't been tempted to run firebreathing in a aggro/burn/sligh deck in a long long time for various reasons. I get your trying to use him to create a need to answer board presence with exhausting little resources/swing a aggro mirror with 1 attack. But most of the aggro mirrors are easily decided in the first few turns that he will never be relevant and i will always board him out, Hellrider i would rather have for control matches as well. He is just not the card you want for whatever you want him for. If your running him for any reason outside of those i would love to know why because i can't quite frankly come up with one.
I mean if you want to actually talk about card choices im glad but if your just going to keep coming up with small corner cases of why having 8 dual lands which only 4 have a mandatory ETB tapped clause and other semantics i will gladly be done with this, i can easily bring up the cases of you play hellion crucible play a slow hand tick it up then unleash it they then drop unsummon/cyclonic rift, or you drop a stonewright and pair your turn 3 they then drop a wolfir silverheart turn 4 paired to another creature because you tapped out to deal that extra 2 damage...wtf now.
Easier to disrupt than what? A spell-land? A filter spell like Faithless Looting? Well - of course! Grim Lavamancer is very easy to disrupt as well. For a 1 drop that will trade with pretty much anything, and can let you do huge damage if you're unfortunate enough to flood, he is pretty good. He is the exact opposite of a win-more; when everything goes well, he is probably no better than a 2/1 for R, but when things are going badly and you flood - then he is great. He is also easily the best 1 drop to topdeck.
I am unsure how it is possible to claim than bonfire is expected to be 25% better across an event.
Sure, but we cannot really run Bonfire effectively without running more land. Stonewright and Bonfire don't really compete for the same deck space anyway - at least for me I want at least 10 x 1 drops; the games where you have a good 1 drop is so much better than the games where you don't.
I would rather have the body and not be vulnerable to 2-for-1s. I don't doubt that furor isnt a good card, but Stonewright should be both more consistent and a better topdeck.
I just like him because he:
- lets your creatures trade up OR makes any frist strikers you have crazy scary
- lets you turn any unused mana into damage. It might only be 1 damage every 3 turns, but it is still something. And there will be times where he generates 3+ damage a turn, which is the same as drawing a card for us.
- he is the best topdeck of any 1 drop we have. He has pseudo-haste later on. Sure, he is weaker than Stromkirk Noble or Rakdos Cackler on turn 1, but as the game goes on I really do believe that he is a lot better.
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GR Ramp Happy Valakut GR
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