P.S. Elspeth, Sun's Champion's +1 that puts three 1/1 soldier token onto the battlefield is broken (that should be a minus ability). I need more Bile Blight or something to deal with that crap.
Well, she IS a 6-mana, double white walker. That's not terribly broken compared to that cost (look at Sorin Markov or Garruk's abilities for similarly powerful ones).
The first round was against a W/U Elspeth soldier token deck. I destroyed it in the first game but then they sideboarded in tons of exile and removal for the next two games. Second round was against a red deck running dragons, burn, and goblin rabblemaster. I had terrible draws and lost twice in a row to flying dragons. The 3rd-5th rounds I was up against W/U Heroic decks running things like Hero of Iroas with tons of pumps/protection instants to trigger heroic. I cleaned out the 3rd and 4th rounds, but then lost twice to a flyer in round 5.
What options do we have against flyers? I was hoping to rely on Felhide Petrifier and Fall of the Hammer to take care of them, but it just isn't consistent or fast enough. I didn't feel horribly outclassed in any of my matches (except the last two games of the first round), but things just didn't go quite right to win.
P.S. Elspeth, Sun's Champion's +1 that puts three 1/1 soldier token onto the battlefield is broken (that should be a minus ability). I need more Bile Blight or something to deal with that crap.
I think you should have circle of flame in your sideboard. It seems like the problems that you had dealt with tokens. That takes care of them. This deck should do well in standard now that the format has slowed down since khans arrived. I think stab wound is too slow actually. It's not that great. You should just use magma jet. That way you can scry to cards you need.
I'm not top sure what to do about flyers actually. I came to this thread to learn and give some feedback of my own. Anyone else have thoughts?
Dragons and other flyers are going to popular Once FRF hits. My deck used to have a lot of buffs, but now I think disruption and removal is more appropriate. Kolagan is a personal choice, I'm interested to see if his dash ability makes him a good finisher.
Dragons and other flyers are going to popular Once FRF hits. My deck used to have a lot of buffs, but now I think disruption and removal is more appropriate. Kolagan is a personal choice, I'm interested to see if his dash ability makes him a good finisher.
As far as Kolaghan, the Storm's Fury is concerned, for 5 cmc I'd rather go with a full playset of Kragma Warcaller and some Twinflame or Felhide Spiritbinder's Inspired ability. Kragma alone is better than Kalaghan (+2 vs +1 when attacking), but a Twinflame or Spiritbinder can double Kragma's effects for 2 mana. With a Ragemonger out, you can get +4/+0 for 5 cmc total versus the dragon's +1/+0. That can turn a modest board of Ragemonger and 2 other minotaurs into a 30 damage swing out of nowhere. I will admit though, having a flyer could be useful (I experienced that need last FNM).
I have mixed feeling about the addition of Arcbond too. You certainly would never want to cast it when you have a Felhide Petrifier out since that's an instant Wrath of God (unless you're board presence has been dwarfed to a single Petrifier I guess). The minotaurs can swing for so much too, that Arcbond could certainly only ever work as a finisher if the opponent is going to be left with a couple points of life. It could shave off a brutal last turn where an aggro deck would otherwise stabilize. It's definitely worth testing to see how it plays out.
Arcbond is an interesting card. If my opponent stabilizes behind a wall of Giant monsters it can be used as a mini-wrath, and reset the board. Problem is though Minotaurs don't recover fast enough on their own, hence my inclusion of Kolaghan. I like the idea of including Twinflame though, It might be worth it to drop Kolaghan and Arcbond altogether and replace with another Warcaller and a playset of Twinflame
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CCL Winner- July '08, Aug '08 Sept '08, Oct '08 Survivor- CCS: Lost in Takenuma, CCS: Stranded In Tolaria
I don't always play Jank, but when I do, I play Saffronolive.
I think a card not being released yet is a pretty good reason for why no one is using it yet : )
At any rate, she is an interesting addition, but Whip of Erebos serves the same purpose and more (lifelink). Having played minotaurs a lot lately, you either win by turn 6 or 7, or lose. You are looking for alpha strikes. It's alright in the early turns to swing in uncontested with a Gnarled Scarhide or Deathbellow Raider, but during turns 4-6 you would generally rather not attack with 3 minotaurs and have 1 get sent to the graveyard by blockers. Instead it is much better to wait until you have enough minotaurs out to make an alpha strike and end it right there. If a minotaur or two falls before that, the Whip is enough to pull it back out for one turn and strike (works best with Kragma Warcaller)
Best case scenario is to throw down 2-3 minotaurs in one turn with one of them being the Warcaller and then swing. Alesha just takes up crucial mana that could be spent on 1 to 3 minotaurs. She looks good on paper, but in practice she is kind of ...meh.
Now I could see Alesha being useful with something like Rakshasa's Secret which gives us card advantage and throws some minotaurs into the graveyard to pull back out. Alesha, Who Smiles at Death would shine nicely with any other card that helps you throw things into the graveyard for free.
Besides the fact that she isn't released yet, do note that the Standard Minotaur Deck is pretty much clogged at the 3-cmc spot already. Whip of Erebos is a better option.
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Not to be rude, but have you even tried Whip of Erebos in this deck? The lifelink is game changing. Earlier in the thread people were having the same discussion I remember.
That's not to say you couldn't use both Alesha and Whip, but I probably wouldn't.
I threw it in last second against a control deck. My thought process was that my deck had a ton of permanents, but their deck didn't. The cost of 7 mana to sacrifice it is pretty much at a point in the game where if I haven't won yet, then things must be looking pretty bad. And that's exactly how it looked when I sacrificed the Pyxis and went from 1 Rageblood Shaman on the board to 6 minotaurs including 2 Kragma Warcallers to swing in for 40 damage out of nowhere. (oh, and by the way, they didn't have anything to put in except a couple of lands)
It's not the greatest card ever, but it does sort of act as a last resort grenade to throw out onto the battlefield for very little investment. Against decks with very few permanents (control, removal, tokens, etc...) this is a decent sideboard option.
Besides the fact that she isn't released yet, do note that the Standard Minotaur Deck is pretty much clogged at the 3-cmc spot already. Whip of Erebos is a better option.
Who said you need to cast her on turn 3 to be effective? She is a 5-6 turn drop, that does what the Whip does - reanimates a dude a turn after it comes it (her reanim has both ups and downs as you get your cows back pernamently but you don't trigger Warcaller in the same turn). Would you rather have a 3/2 First Striker or static lifelink for your guys in an aggro deck?
It was indeed never said you will cast her at turn 3. What is just being said is that the deck is already having lots of 3-cmc spells. As for the whip, it is not really a win more card. I used to disagree having the whip in this deck (you can see my previous posts regarding this), but when I tried it, it really is a game changer.
Minotaurs lacks enough 1-drops and 2-drops, (we only have Gnarled Scarhide, Deathbellow Raider and Felhide Brawler) which at times you really can't go full aggro on the early turns but sometimes fall back at Midrange. I've been playing Minotaurs since RTR-Theros blocks (when Reckoner was still legal) and 50% of the time, you play at midrange when you can't draw your early beaters.
Well, this doesn't mean you can't use Alesha though, feel free to test it.
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Hey guys. Been reading this thread ever since I first started brewing and playing my own minotaurs deck way back when in RTR. Really cool ideas have been bouncing back and forth it looks like. I wanted to offer my most recent iteration of the deck to see what other people thought.
Sometimes I feel like it's a little light on minotaurs for early game pressure, but the power of the gods is undeniable. Especially erebos, what with all this life gain going around, drawing cards is relevant too. Considering sliding in a third one of those. I finally broke down and downloaded MTGO to test this list out (BTW, MTGO is god awful. If paper magic didn't exist I wouldn't play the game)
Hand disruption has been pretty stellar, though I don't always see it when I need it, which makes getting dudes through or casting gods/warcaller tough sometimes, but at the very least whip has been pretty helpful in that endeavor. All in all, I've played 10-15 matches thus far, with about 50/50 win to loss rate. The toughest cards to deal with are anger of the gods, end hostilities, really just removal heavy decks that can gain card advantage later on via cruise, jaces ingenuity, dig through time etc. I can usually outrace any aggro or midrange deck. So for that reason I have worked up this side board
4 drown in sorrow - aggro, tokens, etc. - if I had boarded this in more often I think my win percentage would have gone up
4 bloodsoaked champion - an attempt to "go under" control - yet to be tested
after this I'm kind of stuck......
Sign in blood might be right, but certainly not 4. The others I don't really care for
in my house, i'm sitting on a pair of chandra, pyromaster and a sarkhan,dragon speaker
but outside of that nothing really comes to mind. I'd like to try out these cards in my side online, but I've already spent like 80 bucks -_-
Any thoughts you guys?
Okay, I am not quite ready to give up on Minotaurs just yet. I think with the release of Fate Reforged, and the current meta, we need to be faster and more resilient. Because of that I think the addition of the following cards benefits this deck greatly:
I am deliberately leaving Rageblood Shaman out of the mix, because it wrecks Break Through the Line. After testing, Break Through the Line is much more useful, and becomes very awesome with a Whip of Erebos out.
Enchantments, Instants, Sorceries, and Artifacts package (in order or usefulness):
Whip of Erebos – Almost essential. Lifelink helps us stay in the game. Break Through the Line – Unblockable, hasted damage is good. Unblockable, hasted damage with lifelink is even better. Add in Kragma Warcaller to increase that damage and this becomes a game winner. Despise / Duress / Thoughtseize – As useful as ever. Pick whichever one fits your budget. Palace Siege – Minotaurs can be powerful out of nowhere, but they are also easily killed. The Khans choice here, like Alesha, allows us to swing with the minotaurs without fear of losing them forever. When combined with lifelink, we have a viable option to gain life each turn with little repercussion. The Dragons option isn’t that great admittedly, but it can be helpful in some games. Rakshasa’s Secret – Hand disruption is very valuable. What’s nice about Secret though is that it potentially throws targets for Alesha/Whip/Palace into our graveyard. Outpost Siege – Khans give us card advantage. Most things here are under 4 mana, so once we can play Outpost, we can always play whatever it exiles, AND then draw a card on top of that. The Dragons option isn’t stellar though. Twinflame – Copying a Kragma Warcaller is the best play here. Springleaf Drum – We can’t wait around until turn 3-4 to be doing something meaningful. The drum allows us to get a Whip out earlier before it can be countered.
One nice thing about these additions is that the current meta is not running a whole lot of enchantment/artifact removal. White has Erase, but that’s about it.
I believe the real breakthrough here is Alesha. I never thought of the fact that minotaurs all have power 2 and trigger with her!
Palace siege is also a nice addition for bringing them back. I'm sold, I'm going to sleeve up this deck again!
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Huey, Dewey and Louie are always dressed in RUG. it is CLEARLY going to be the wedges block Pioneer: WURFaerie fires BRGDragons ModernBGElves WRBurn UR Fires Turns URGift Storm UG Twiddle Storm
So I hit top eight in Tennessee's SCG state championship with this list. I'm sure it was fairly sub-optimal: I honestly don't know Standard that well, and mostly tuned my removal and SB around some stuff friends said.
My matchups were:
One UB control, which I kind of just devoured by pulling back dudes with Kolaghan's Command and Chandra's CA
One traditional Abzan Midrange, which I lost due to keeping poor hands like an idiot (I'm on the draw and have a Temple of Malice with a Ragemonger, I can pull enough lands to get there!)
One Abzan combo thing with Rhino, Gary, a bunch of self-mill, and Rally the Ancestors, which resulted in a game one win after we both gained mountains of life, me from whip, him from reviving Rhino and Gary's multiple times. I legitimately survived four of the bastards being brought back simultaneously. Twice. But then game two I just dropped a t4 Kragma on a mostly empty board and won.
Three small red aggro decks, all of which I beat. Against two of them I lost game one, because lolThoughtseize against fast dudes and burn. Postboard, cheaper removal and Drown gave me a pretty easy time. Kolaghan's Command was strong here, letting me kill a dude and cut a card from their hand, forcing them to run out of resources much more swiftly.
No idea what the guy I was up against in the seventh round was playing, we drew into T8 and I went to get some Taco Bell.
And then my last matchup, in the first round of the T8. My opponent gets a game loss for leaving other cards in his deck box. I beat him (And, in fact, four other individuals in the top eight. My opponent win percentage was like 75%) previously in the event. I'm feeling good: I'm pretty certain I'll move on to the next match.
Game one/two, I mulligan a one-lander into another one-lander, but decide to keep because I know he's on red aggro and I don't think I can win through that much disadvantage. I don't luck into lands. I really need to stop keeping one landers, even when I think I have a good reason for it.
Game two, I keep a hand full of Commands and Ultimate Prices, with two lands. I proceed to not draw more lands for far too long, and just can't really stabilize against the three token producing spells he drops over the next few turns, despite topdecking a Drown in Sorrow at nine life and killing all his dudes. He just burns me out before I can get enough gas or pull a Whip.
The biggest changes I think I'd make would be to run less Thoughtseize mainboard, as shocking yourself isn't that great an idea just right now, and probably fit a third Whip and fourth Drown in somewhere. Some Circle of Flame, which I didn't even realize was Standard legal until looking upthread, would have helped, too. But then, again, I don't really know Standard, so maybe my luck was just weird running into so much small red.
Regardless, though, I'm exceptionally happy. This is the best I've done at an event with more than thirty or so people, and, really, since it's one of two I've ever gotten to go to, I can't call my percentages that bad.
Oh, and I won FNM the night before with roughly the same list.
Been wanting to to get into standard for a while and I also wanted to make Minotaurs since I played a prerelease of Theros where I played R/B Goodstuff and fell in love with the silly little minotaurs that I pulled.
I've taken alot of inspiration from just about everywhere, mostly when it comes to siding. But after reading a bit into the thread it changed quite a bit. I might end up cutting the fetch lands, downfall and thoughtsieze because of pricing and could use some help with replacing them.
Haven't had the chance to test it too much and I want to have a solid build before I start buying stuff. Any and all help is needed/wanted/appreciated
It's worth a try, but I'm already getting creature-lite draws at times. Plus, the Ragemonger makes the Shaman a bargain.
What this deck really needs is a source of cheap card advantage. Sometimes you get going, then hit a couple of lands in a row and run out of steam against 1-for-1 removal. It seems like Sign in Blood is tough on the mana of a deck that's mostly red (though I do like the potential to burn out someone with it), Tormenting Voice is too weak, and Outpost Siege is too slow.
Curve is a little high. Warchanter is not good--it's too expensive, gives you no devotion, hurts your mana, and brings no abilities. Cut the 2 Warchanters and add another Deathbellow and another Rageblood. Also, Kragma Warcaller is seriously one of the strongest cards in the deck--wins games out of nowhere--and I'd probably cut the Butchers and replace with Warcallers.
Flurry of Horns seems like it would be good, but Twinflame is better in this deck. You can cast it for just 1R or you can strive it and get the same number of dudes as Flurry. Upside is that the minotaurs you make with Flurry can come in with upside, a la Fanatic/Warcaller/Rageblood.
All of the changes I'm suggesting are quite budget friendly. Obviously upgrading your lands would help as well if you can do it. Regarding lands, if you had any Temple of Malices, you could probably go to 23 lands and replace one with a Tormenting Voice or some other card advantage. Had your lands been better (Temple of Malice, Bloodstained Mire, Mana Confluence), I would have suggested dropping the Mogis (kind of a pet card for a lot of people, so I see why you'd keep it) and the Skullcleavers for some number of Felhide Brawlers and Gnarled Scarhides. You can see my list above for my preferred creature configuration, though I'll admit that going the Mardu route was bad because the lands weren't good for an aggro deck and the upside of Crackling Doom in a fast game is minimal.
Well, she IS a 6-mana, double white walker. That's not terribly broken compared to that cost (look at Sorin Markov or Garruk's abilities for similarly powerful ones).
URW Control
WBG Abzan
GRW Burn
EDH
GR Rosheen Meanderer
I think you should have circle of flame in your sideboard. It seems like the problems that you had dealt with tokens. That takes care of them. This deck should do well in standard now that the format has slowed down since khans arrived. I think stab wound is too slow actually. It's not that great. You should just use magma jet. That way you can scry to cards you need.
I'm not top sure what to do about flyers actually. I came to this thread to learn and give some feedback of my own. Anyone else have thoughts?
4 Gnarled Scarhide
4 Deathbellow Raiders
4 Ragemonger
3 Rageblood Shaman
3 Kragma Warcaller
3 Kolaghan, the Storm's Fury
4 Thoughtsieze
3 Fated Conflagration
3 Hero's Downfall
3 Whip of Erebos
2 Arcbond
4 Temple of Malice
3 Bloodstained Mire
9 Swamp
8 Mountain
CCL Winner- July '08, Aug '08 Sept '08, Oct '08
Survivor- CCS: Lost in Takenuma, CCS: Stranded In Tolaria
As far as Kolaghan, the Storm's Fury is concerned, for 5 cmc I'd rather go with a full playset of Kragma Warcaller and some Twinflame or Felhide Spiritbinder's Inspired ability. Kragma alone is better than Kalaghan (+2 vs +1 when attacking), but a Twinflame or Spiritbinder can double Kragma's effects for 2 mana. With a Ragemonger out, you can get +4/+0 for 5 cmc total versus the dragon's +1/+0. That can turn a modest board of Ragemonger and 2 other minotaurs into a 30 damage swing out of nowhere. I will admit though, having a flyer could be useful (I experienced that need last FNM).
I have mixed feeling about the addition of Arcbond too. You certainly would never want to cast it when you have a Felhide Petrifier out since that's an instant Wrath of God (unless you're board presence has been dwarfed to a single Petrifier I guess). The minotaurs can swing for so much too, that Arcbond could certainly only ever work as a finisher if the opponent is going to be left with a couple points of life. It could shave off a brutal last turn where an aggro deck would otherwise stabilize. It's definitely worth testing to see how it plays out.
CCL Winner- July '08, Aug '08 Sept '08, Oct '08
Survivor- CCS: Lost in Takenuma, CCS: Stranded In Tolaria
I think a card not being released yet is a pretty good reason for why no one is using it yet : )
At any rate, she is an interesting addition, but Whip of Erebos serves the same purpose and more (lifelink). Having played minotaurs a lot lately, you either win by turn 6 or 7, or lose. You are looking for alpha strikes. It's alright in the early turns to swing in uncontested with a Gnarled Scarhide or Deathbellow Raider, but during turns 4-6 you would generally rather not attack with 3 minotaurs and have 1 get sent to the graveyard by blockers. Instead it is much better to wait until you have enough minotaurs out to make an alpha strike and end it right there. If a minotaur or two falls before that, the Whip is enough to pull it back out for one turn and strike (works best with Kragma Warcaller)
Best case scenario is to throw down 2-3 minotaurs in one turn with one of them being the Warcaller and then swing. Alesha just takes up crucial mana that could be spent on 1 to 3 minotaurs. She looks good on paper, but in practice she is kind of ...meh.
Now I could see Alesha being useful with something like Rakshasa's Secret which gives us card advantage and throws some minotaurs into the graveyard to pull back out. Alesha, Who Smiles at Death would shine nicely with any other card that helps you throw things into the graveyard for free.
Besides the fact that she isn't released yet, do note that the Standard Minotaur Deck is pretty much clogged at the 3-cmc spot already. Whip of Erebos is a better option.
That's not to say you couldn't use both Alesha and Whip, but I probably wouldn't.
Pyxis of Pandemonium
I threw it in last second against a control deck. My thought process was that my deck had a ton of permanents, but their deck didn't. The cost of 7 mana to sacrifice it is pretty much at a point in the game where if I haven't won yet, then things must be looking pretty bad. And that's exactly how it looked when I sacrificed the Pyxis and went from 1 Rageblood Shaman on the board to 6 minotaurs including 2 Kragma Warcallers to swing in for 40 damage out of nowhere. (oh, and by the way, they didn't have anything to put in except a couple of lands)
It's not the greatest card ever, but it does sort of act as a last resort grenade to throw out onto the battlefield for very little investment. Against decks with very few permanents (control, removal, tokens, etc...) this is a decent sideboard option.
It was indeed never said you will cast her at turn 3. What is just being said is that the deck is already having lots of 3-cmc spells. As for the whip, it is not really a win more card. I used to disagree having the whip in this deck (you can see my previous posts regarding this), but when I tried it, it really is a game changer.
Minotaurs lacks enough 1-drops and 2-drops, (we only have Gnarled Scarhide, Deathbellow Raider and Felhide Brawler) which at times you really can't go full aggro on the early turns but sometimes fall back at Midrange. I've been playing Minotaurs since RTR-Theros blocks (when Reckoner was still legal) and 50% of the time, you play at midrange when you can't draw your early beaters.
Well, this doesn't mean you can't use Alesha though, feel free to test it.
4 deathbellow raider
3 rageblood shaman
4 ragemonger
4 kragma warcaller
3 whip of erebos
3 mogis, god of slaughter
2 erebos, god of the dead
4 magma jet
4 thoughtseize
2 despise
Sometimes I feel like it's a little light on minotaurs for early game pressure, but the power of the gods is undeniable. Especially erebos, what with all this life gain going around, drawing cards is relevant too. Considering sliding in a third one of those. I finally broke down and downloaded MTGO to test this list out (BTW, MTGO is god awful. If paper magic didn't exist I wouldn't play the game)
Hand disruption has been pretty stellar, though I don't always see it when I need it, which makes getting dudes through or casting gods/warcaller tough sometimes, but at the very least whip has been pretty helpful in that endeavor. All in all, I've played 10-15 matches thus far, with about 50/50 win to loss rate. The toughest cards to deal with are anger of the gods, end hostilities, really just removal heavy decks that can gain card advantage later on via cruise, jaces ingenuity, dig through time etc. I can usually outrace any aggro or midrange deck. So for that reason I have worked up this side board
4 drown in sorrow - aggro, tokens, etc. - if I had boarded this in more often I think my win percentage would have gone up
4 bloodsoaked champion - an attempt to "go under" control - yet to be tested
after this I'm kind of stuck......
I've been using these cards as filler mostly in my side online:
4 sign in blood
1 twinflame
2 despise
Sign in blood might be right, but certainly not 4. The others I don't really care for
in my house, i'm sitting on a pair of chandra, pyromaster and a sarkhan,dragon speaker
but outside of that nothing really comes to mind. I'd like to try out these cards in my side online, but I've already spent like 80 bucks -_-
Any thoughts you guys?
HOW DO WE TAKE DOWN CONTROL???
- Break Through the Line
- Palace Siege
- Outpost Siege
- Rakshasa’s Secret
- Springleaf Drum
- Alesha, Who Smiles at Death
(after some testing, I go back on what I said earlier, she isn’t too bad)So the creature package becomes:
I am deliberately leaving Rageblood Shaman out of the mix, because it wrecks Break Through the Line. After testing, Break Through the Line is much more useful, and becomes very awesome with a Whip of Erebos out.
Enchantments, Instants, Sorceries, and Artifacts package (in order or usefulness):
Whip of Erebos – Almost essential. Lifelink helps us stay in the game.
Break Through the Line – Unblockable, hasted damage is good. Unblockable, hasted damage with lifelink is even better. Add in Kragma Warcaller to increase that damage and this becomes a game winner.
Despise / Duress / Thoughtseize – As useful as ever. Pick whichever one fits your budget.
Palace Siege – Minotaurs can be powerful out of nowhere, but they are also easily killed. The Khans choice here, like Alesha, allows us to swing with the minotaurs without fear of losing them forever. When combined with lifelink, we have a viable option to gain life each turn with little repercussion. The Dragons option isn’t that great admittedly, but it can be helpful in some games.
Rakshasa’s Secret – Hand disruption is very valuable. What’s nice about Secret though is that it potentially throws targets for Alesha/Whip/Palace into our graveyard.
Outpost Siege – Khans give us card advantage. Most things here are under 4 mana, so once we can play Outpost, we can always play whatever it exiles, AND then draw a card on top of that. The Dragons option isn’t stellar though.
Twinflame – Copying a Kragma Warcaller is the best play here.
Springleaf Drum – We can’t wait around until turn 3-4 to be doing something meaningful. The drum allows us to get a Whip out earlier before it can be countered.
One nice thing about these additions is that the current meta is not running a whole lot of enchantment/artifact removal. White has Erase, but that’s about it.
Palace siege is also a nice addition for bringing them back. I'm sold, I'm going to sleeve up this deck again!
Pioneer: WURFaerie fires BRGDragons
ModernBGElves WRBurn UR Fires Turns URGift Storm UG Twiddle Storm
We can't have Duress. It rotated out of Standard.
...
This thread is dead it seems. Later Tier 2 Minotaurs!
4 Deathbellow Raider
4 Rageblood Shaman
4 Ragemonger
4 Kragma Warcaller
4 Thoughtseize
3 Kolaghan's Command
3 Hero's Downfall
2 Ultimate Price
1 Murderous Cut
1 Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker
1 Whip of Erebos
7 Mountain
6 Swamp
4 Temple of Malice
4 Bloodstained Mire
2 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
3 Drown in Sorrow
2 Ultimate Price
2 Dark Betrayal
2 Felhide Petrifier
2 Self-Inflicted Wound
1 Crux of Fate
1 Silence the Believers
1 Whip of Erebos
1 Kolaghan's Command
So I hit top eight in Tennessee's SCG state championship with this list. I'm sure it was fairly sub-optimal: I honestly don't know Standard that well, and mostly tuned my removal and SB around some stuff friends said.
My matchups were:
One UB control, which I kind of just devoured by pulling back dudes with Kolaghan's Command and Chandra's CA
One traditional Abzan Midrange, which I lost due to keeping poor hands like an idiot (I'm on the draw and have a Temple of Malice with a Ragemonger, I can pull enough lands to get there!)
One Abzan combo thing with Rhino, Gary, a bunch of self-mill, and Rally the Ancestors, which resulted in a game one win after we both gained mountains of life, me from whip, him from reviving Rhino and Gary's multiple times. I legitimately survived four of the bastards being brought back simultaneously. Twice. But then game two I just dropped a t4 Kragma on a mostly empty board and won.
Three small red aggro decks, all of which I beat. Against two of them I lost game one, because lolThoughtseize against fast dudes and burn. Postboard, cheaper removal and Drown gave me a pretty easy time. Kolaghan's Command was strong here, letting me kill a dude and cut a card from their hand, forcing them to run out of resources much more swiftly.
No idea what the guy I was up against in the seventh round was playing, we drew into T8 and I went to get some Taco Bell.
And then my last matchup, in the first round of the T8. My opponent gets a game loss for leaving other cards in his deck box. I beat him (And, in fact, four other individuals in the top eight. My opponent win percentage was like 75%) previously in the event. I'm feeling good: I'm pretty certain I'll move on to the next match.
Game one/two, I mulligan a one-lander into another one-lander, but decide to keep because I know he's on red aggro and I don't think I can win through that much disadvantage. I don't luck into lands. I really need to stop keeping one landers, even when I think I have a good reason for it.
Game two, I keep a hand full of Commands and Ultimate Prices, with two lands. I proceed to not draw more lands for far too long, and just can't really stabilize against the three token producing spells he drops over the next few turns, despite topdecking a Drown in Sorrow at nine life and killing all his dudes. He just burns me out before I can get enough gas or pull a Whip.
The biggest changes I think I'd make would be to run less Thoughtseize mainboard, as shocking yourself isn't that great an idea just right now, and probably fit a third Whip and fourth Drown in somewhere. Some Circle of Flame, which I didn't even realize was Standard legal until looking upthread, would have helped, too. But then, again, I don't really know Standard, so maybe my luck was just weird running into so much small red.
Regardless, though, I'm exceptionally happy. This is the best I've done at an event with more than thirty or so people, and, really, since it's one of two I've ever gotten to go to, I can't call my percentages that bad.
Oh, and I won FNM the night before with roughly the same list.
4 Bloodfell Caves
4 Swamp
6 Mountain
4 Temple of Malice
4 Bloodstained Mire
Creatures:
4 Gnarled Scarhide
4 Deathbellow Raider
4 Rageblood Shaman
4 Ragemonger
4 Kragma Warcaller
2 Alesha, Who Smiles at Death
3 Lightning Strike
3 Kolaghan's Command
2 Hero's Downfall
Planeswalker
2 Chandra, Pyromaster
Enchantment:
1 Whip of Erebos
Sorceries:
2 Twinflame
3 Thoughtseize
2 Virulent Plague
2 Hero's Downfall
1 Crux of Fate
2 Ultimate Price
2 Felhide Petrifier
3 Rakshasa's Secret
1 Thoughtseize
1 Lightning Strike
1 Whip of Erebos
Been wanting to to get into standard for a while and I also wanted to make Minotaurs since I played a prerelease of Theros where I played R/B Goodstuff and fell in love with the silly little minotaurs that I pulled.
I've taken alot of inspiration from just about everywhere, mostly when it comes to siding. But after reading a bit into the thread it changed quite a bit. I might end up cutting the fetch lands, downfall and thoughtsieze because of pricing and could use some help with replacing them.
Haven't had the chance to test it too much and I want to have a solid build before I start buying stuff. Any and all help is needed/wanted/appreciated
// Creatures
4 Deathbellow Raider
2 Fanatic of Mogis
3 Felhide Petrifier
4 Gnarled Scarhide
4 Kragma Warcaller
4 Rageblood Shaman
4 Ragemonger
4 Crackling Doom
2 Kolaghan's Command
4 Lightning Strike
2 Twinflame
Drop the rageblood shaman,s and put in Break Through the Line if you activate it before attacks your minitors still get the buff from kragma warcaller
What this deck really needs is a source of cheap card advantage. Sometimes you get going, then hit a couple of lands in a row and run out of steam against 1-for-1 removal. It seems like Sign in Blood is tough on the mana of a deck that's mostly red (though I do like the potential to burn out someone with it), Tormenting Voice is too weak, and Outpost Siege is too slow.
3 Deathbellow Raider
3 Felhide Petrifier
2 Kragma Butcher
4 Minotaur Skullcleaver
3 Rageblood Shaman
4 Ragemonger
2 Fanatic of Mogis
1 Mogis, God of Slaughter
2 Kragma Warcaller
2 Warchanter of Mogis
4 Lightning Strike
2 Searing Blood
2 Ultimate Price
2 Flurry of Horns
Lands:24
4 Bloodfell Caves
14 Mountain
6 Swamp
2 Dark Betrayal
3 Duress
2 Searing Blood
2 Barrage of Boulders
2 Virulent Plague
2 Fanatic of Mogis
2 Flurry of Horns
Built with Decked Builder
Flurry of Horns seems like it would be good, but Twinflame is better in this deck. You can cast it for just 1R or you can strive it and get the same number of dudes as Flurry. Upside is that the minotaurs you make with Flurry can come in with upside, a la Fanatic/Warcaller/Rageblood.
All of the changes I'm suggesting are quite budget friendly. Obviously upgrading your lands would help as well if you can do it. Regarding lands, if you had any Temple of Malices, you could probably go to 23 lands and replace one with a Tormenting Voice or some other card advantage. Had your lands been better (Temple of Malice, Bloodstained Mire, Mana Confluence), I would have suggested dropping the Mogis (kind of a pet card for a lot of people, so I see why you'd keep it) and the Skullcleavers for some number of Felhide Brawlers and Gnarled Scarhides. You can see my list above for my preferred creature configuration, though I'll admit that going the Mardu route was bad because the lands weren't good for an aggro deck and the upside of Crackling Doom in a fast game is minimal.
4 Deathbellow Raider
3 Felhide Petrifier
2 Kragma Butcher
4 Minotaur Skullcleaver
3 Rageblood Shaman
4 Ragemonger
2 Fanatic of Mogis
1 Mogis, God of Slaughter
4 Kragma Warcaller
4 Lightning Strike
2 Searing Blood
2 Ultimate Price
2 Flurry of Horns
Lands:23
4 Bloodfell Caves
1 Evolving Wilds
10 Mountain
4 Swamp
4 Temple of Malice
2 Dark Betrayal
3 Duress
2 Searing Blood
2 Shatter
2 Barrage of Boulders
2 Virulent Plague
2 Flurry of Horns
Built with Decked Builder