MTG Salvation

You could not pay me to remove Kambal from my 75. I used to be a skeptic, then had a night where I boarded it in for every match (Burn x2, Lantern, Mardu). I'm a believer.

#KambalForPresident #MakeOrzhovGreatAgain

My two cents... Typically, I personally view the discard as a turn 1-2 play in this deck. You're either stalling their game plan or hitting their removal to protect your threats. Later in the game, usually the only discard I want to see if Thoughtseize since it's better than Inquisition at that point. That leaves you more likely to have your hand full of 2 drops (peezy, brutality) or 3 drops (k command, souls). Manamorphose doesn't really impress me all that much - sure there's the chance you'll draw into another manamorphose but it ends up being really bad if you're hell/heckbent and you draw into a land. Also, drawing into a Reveler or Pyromancer doesn't help you with Phoenix.

Also, with the Dredge menance getting more and more popular, I don't think it's wise for us to be over-reliant on the GY. Bedlam Reveler becomes a brick if they hit Spellbomb/Leyline/RIP. Lingering Souls + Looting get exiled away. Arclight is another one that falls into this rut.

I do think Arclight has potential to be good in burn oriented decks. Gutshot/Spike/Bolt/Looting/Fiery Temper (off of looting) all can accelerate it out better and use it to close the game faster than a midrange shell can.

If you remove discard and add arclight, you might as well change the entire deck to be like the Runaway Red lists that have popped up lately.

The discard suite is a large part of what makes Mardu Pyro what it is - the grindiest of the Black midrange decks. Without that, our disruptive strategy goes away so you need to retool the overall deck.

Probably not enough more basics to matter to us, but more and more Blood Moon is less of a freebie than it used to be.

UW control can/does fetch basics pretty aggressively, so it mostly shuts down Colonnade until they land Teferi or Cryptic bounce it (plus, if they run EE it gives them a 3rd color to pop BM with). Burn doesn't really care that much about it - an experienced Burn pilot will dump their RW spells first and save their R/RR spells if they suspect Blood Moon. It slows down Tron, but slowing Tron down isn't enough without board pressure. Spirits and Humans have Hierarch/Vial, so it really hasn't helped me much in those match ups either.

The match-ups I've personally seen Blood Moon still shine are GDS for the greedy mana base and Affinity for the man lands, but I've encountered fewer of these (paper) over the last few months.

Quote from PedroBorgas »

Is Hoogland a reference to us?

It was not. It was in reference to the poster. I was just applying a similar logic to our deck, since BM serves a similar purpose in our list.

Quote from Jake_MG »

Has anyone seen this? https://www.reddit.com/r/ModernMagic/comments/9oa0w8/so_i_just_50d_a_competitive_league_with_this_hot/

Obviously our deck is a different one, but has anyone felt MD blood moon being lacking in this meta?

I personally have, yes. Hoogland makes a great point in the comments that sums it up: cards like FoR, GQ, and now Assassin's Trophy are pushing decks to run more basics. This mitigates the "Gotchya" factor of Blood Moon. Even if they don't, decks are packing more flexible options that deal with it. It feels really bad when you land a Blood Moon, just to have your opponent Natural State(SB) or even Assassin's Trophy (MB) it. I hate time-walking myself.

Personally, I think Land Destruction (esp. the kind that doesn't replace) may be a the better solution for the current format. I've been eyeing the W/B Denial decks lately b/c they MD Fulminator mages to double down on their resource denial game. This can hurt UWx control, which is stalling to turn 4 for Cryptic, and Tron, where we want to slow them down and apply pressure simultaneously. The downside of FM is that it doesn't fuel our Revelers, but it is easier on our mana than Molten Rain can be.

Speaking from playing Ponza, people tend to keep hands with just enough lands. If we can punish them for that along with our Discard game, it could be a good way forward.

Pyro also has the benefits of being very consistent. This can be huge, as it can poach other decks' based on variance. This (combined with experience level of both pilots with their respective decks) probably shouldn't be discounted.

I personally kept the Brutalities in. I have them in place of the flex spots like Manamorphose.

Quote from SpellHeart »

Helixes are cool. With this build I feel myself less reactive and more agressive in games.

I'm more and more of a fan of it myself. Plus, with Burn seeing more and more play in-response to UWx Control on the rise, the incidental life gain helps with this match up.

Quote from Shaggy »

If decks are going to run more basics does that give mardu more of a reason to run molten rain in the board to complement blood moon? Go for the basics and play blood moon?

I think I might try it out with replacing the Blood Moon entirely with Molten Rains. Blood Moon is becoming less of a "gotchya" card in my local meta due to speed and higher basic land counts. At least MR ends up being a tempo play that feeds Reveler.

Seth Manfield posted an article about Mardu Pyromancer with some tweaks he made:
http://magic.tcgplayer.com/db/article.asp?ID=14864&writer=Seth Manfield&articledate=9-19-2018.

Pretty standard looking list, save for some changes to the sideboard and 1x Night's Whisper MB and another 1x SB, which seems like interesting tech for grindy match-ups. Helps solve a problem I often have where I quickly run out of steam when I don't see one of my Faithless Lootings.

I may test a small number of Flame of the Keld in my list. We get to hell-bent quickly anyway, plus zerging with a bunch of elementals +2 dmg each seems fun.

Will probably be too slow for many match ups but still could be a way to speed up the clock.

I've been somewhat intrigued by the BR prowess lists on MTGO lately. Takes a more aggressive slant with swiftspear and kiln fiend while keeping the core disruptive package. I'm still not sure if it's really a thing or just working bc it's caught folks off guard.

I don't like ditching white though. Loosing kambal, souls, and wear/tear seems risky.

I'm considering moving Blood Moon and LoTV (list as it currently stands below) to SB in favor of adding a bit more punch to the deck G1. In practice, I keep encountering opening hands clogged with 3 CMC spells (like these) that I have to mulligan to have more early game plays.Possibly another option is to drop KCommand down from 3x to 2x, move LoTV, and keep Blood Moon to maintain some % of free wins off of that.

What do you guys think? Not sure what I'd put in their place - perhaps a 3rd Brutality and/or Lightning Helixes for more reach?

Best piece of advice I've been given for Infect is to use removal on your turn and not theirs, especially Bolt. Failed attempts at removal on their turn plays right into Blossoming Defense or another pump spell, thereby beefing up their creature for combat and killing us faster. Otherwise, use your discard wisely and I've not had too many issues with that match up.