Rules; This thread isn't for you to argue over red's effectiveness or competitiveness. This thread isn't for you to argue over mass LD. I don't play it because I'm a softy and win without it. This thread is just to help those that want to explore mono red or pick up tips on how to improve their red game in multicolor decks.
Let's start with reds biggest problem and most commonly asked about part of it's game.
I'm going to be really specific here because this is the most important part.
Wheel of Fortune and Reforge the Soul are great. Their downside of refilling your opponents hand in an aggressive meta is moot because you can't play without cards and aside from mono white, your opponents are already outdrawing you. Some players like to run lots of 'no maximum handsize' effects and tons of draw so that you forcing them to discard their hand and draw seven can often be a decrease for them. They also help with lots of tutors. Rite of Replication kicked on Rune-Scarred Demon? New hand bro.
Chandra Ablaze is not a planeswalker. It is a draw engine that occasionally removes stuff. The fact that it is slightly less than half a wheel effect isn't a big deal. I have never used her ultimate. I'm sure some decks can benefit from it but I have had her up to 9+ counters before with other draw engines on board and not bothered using her ultimate.
Knollspine Dragon can be amazing and I've drawn 20+ cards off of it before. Especially amazing in Kiki-Jiki. That being said, it doesn't go in every deck. One upside is it's still a 7 mana 7 power flyer with a MAY ability. But it is quite honestly win more when it works.
Dragon Mage needs haste effects. I can't remember if I have ever cast it and had it live a whole turn to attack with or not which should say something. It also gives your opponents who didn't have answers, the ability to draw into them. As a seven mana wheel effect, you need to always have haste, always be able to get to the mana to cast it, and generally have one of the strongest decks at the table for it to be good. Honestly this dragon gets no love from me.
Here is a pretty comprehensive thread for colorless card draw. Unfortunately it hasn't been updated since May of last year. I have run a TON of these. So far the ones I am most in love with that can slot into any mono red deck (not equipment based) are;
Mikokoro, Center of the Sea is in every red deck I have even though I rarely use it but in bad situations (avenger army and me without a wrath) it helps me dig for answers. It also helps your opponents dig for those answers too. Also great post Myojin of Night's Reach so the player that pulled the trigger doesn't quite as easily run away with the game. As a land it doesn't take up a spell slot so it's never a dead draw and it can sit and do nothing until that one game it shines.
Mind's Eye is great. It scales up for multiplayer and gets better if your opponents have out draw engines. Huge target on it's head so don't run it out without mana to use it assuming it makes it to your opponents draw step. Combine with Wheel effects to dig for days.
Memory Jar is a late game card. If your meta ends on turn 4-6, don't run this. But given enough mana (we'll get to that), it can be amazing for you. Discarding what you don't cast can hurt but we have options for recursion we will get to later.
Staff of Nin is Phyrexian Arena for twice as much mana in any color. If you're getting to 8+ mana routinely and playing big mutliplayer games. Jam this in there.
Sensei's Divining Top is the amazing card it always has been. Something to remember is that you can activate to rearange the top three and respond to that activation with the draw effect so you get to put it on top and make it the second or third card down if the situation is needed. This benefits from shuffle effects but it's good enough without them 90% of the time. Combine with Rings of Brighthearth or Voltaic Key to turn it into an expensive draw engine if your deck already benefits from those.
Now for those of you running creatures (don't laugh, you can rock a creatureless red deck pretty easily) I suggest;
Skullclamp pairs with Kher Keep and can sit on anything that your opponents must answer. Great card is great. Squee loves this card.
Mask of Memory is great in lists that run lots of support dudes or can force through attackers. Especially good if you run utility dorks that can get in early before people get blockers out. I LOVE this card, really.
Infiltration Lens is great in Voltron lists or lists that attack with one big dude as opposed to several little dudes. I've found it lackluster because I want my guys connecting but it still resides in some voltron decks of mine where the opponents will be blocking if they can. Looking at you Adamaro.
Culling Dais is for Voltron lists to help prevent your suited up general from getting tucked. It also slots into fattie dragons lists or anything with must answer threats. Always keep one mana up once this thing has a counter on it. Squee also loves this card.
Ultimately the link above to all the colorless draw spells prior to may 2011 is a great link to read through one good time. Some things will work better for you then they do for me because we all have different play styles.
Recoup and Past in Flames are extremely effective. Unless you are pure creature aggro or voltron I would suggest running both of these in the majority of mono red lists. They effectively let you buy something back twice, you don't mind discarding them or wheeling them away, and they have been consistantly amazing for me as wheel effects number 3-4.
Card selection;
Mindmoil is my new favorite red card. Once you get used to how it functions it can be amazing for you. Recognize that you get one shot at the hand you have and pick the card you need the most. Then get ready for the rest. Faithless Looting, Recoup, Past in Flames, and your general are great ways to dump a worthless hand on the bottom and get some new options. Shuffle effects are great here at getting you back to something you just put on the bottom last turn. It also lets you chain together artifact ramp and get way out ahead if you have a free turn to durdle with.
Faithless Looting is a great tool to dig for stuff. It also offers you a slightly higher value for taking mediocre opening hands if mulliganing down is strictly enforced. While technically card disadvantage, it allows for some great card selection in that you can dig 4 cards deep for 4 mana and the cost of a card. Some of the things you discard can be recurred later but we'll get to that. Don't forget it's in your graveyard. It gets better on the second activation. Considering red has a hard time interacting with it's grave yard this card is best used when your hand is full of lands or when you want to dig for something and not as a generic first turn play without thought.
Mad Prophet and Rummaging Goblin are what they are. My red decks don't have room for these cards but if you're running a very linear strategy that must cast x cards to win or run a ton of equipment to turn them into beaters they are there for you. I do run Rummaging Goblin in Krenko but usually feel bad about it.
The last thing I want to stress is that you should occasionally see if there is a card that does what you're looking for that has 'draw a card' tacked on the back of it. The more of these you run, even if they're a turn slower or slightly worse, the less likely you are to end up in top deck mode. If you can't build a red deck that doesn't end up in top deck mode then you're doing it wrong. It's not the colors fault, trust me.
These are the utility lands that I often use.
I have one red deck that doesn't care about lots of mana. Adamaro, First to Desire is packed with 'everybody draws' effects like Howling Mine and Temple Bell but ultimately its highest costing card is 5 mana and because it has sooo much built in draw it plays a land every single turn. (Dear Box from MTGO. You shared your list with me over a year a go and I've just started playing around with it. I'm more voltron and you were more combo but it is still SUPER fun man, great job.) Every other red deck I have wants lots of mana. Extraplanar Lens, Guantlet of Power, Caged Sun, and Doubling Cube are great tools along side traditional colorless acceleration. On MTGO Guantlet of Might is cheap but IRL I do fine without it. You also can not skimp on land count. Run 38 lands AND mana accelerants. I don't care if all the rest of your non green decks do fine with 35 lands and 10 colorless mana rocks. You want to play a land every turn. That being said, play smart and drop the doublers when you can benefit from the extra mana on that same turn. If you are playing with mana in mind, jam in Devil's Play just for kicks. At worst it will kill two creatures you need dead and at best it will kill two players. Fireballs for 30 are not uncommon late game. A fun little psyche out online is a few turns after I have a doubler out I'll just tap all of my mana at once so it's all in my pool and mention who's life total I'm tapping for. Freaks people out.
If you don't run a single x cost spell, you still want to have enough mana to take multiple actions a turn so it is very important that you run at minimum 38 lands. My Ashling deck requires tons of red mana to be able to use her ability at will and I've found that a simple mountain has a ton more value then a lot of the other cards I could run so there I run 46 lands. This doesn't even touch on the mana producing artifacts. To keep this from being another 5 paragraphs, let me just focus on the lands. You will notice some routinely used utility lands missing from this list and that is because they don't tap for mana. If they do, let us all know because I am forgetful. These are also all deck dependent. For Ashling and Akroma I need lots of red mana sources so I skimp on the utility lands but Godo doesn't care and he runs the guantlet of utility lands. Here are the ones that I routinely use;
Ancient Tomb is purely play style. I like it in some of my red decks because it gets my utility artifacts out faster and is a back up Sol Ring and Mana Crypt but it's not in everything because one mana doubler and it's a mountain that costs two life to use.
Boseiju, Who Shelters All doesn't have a place outside of a heavy control meta. The life cost isn't worth it if you're not in a blue on blue on blue play group.
Buried Ruin goes in every red deck that uses artifacts. Sometimes it rebuys Expedition Map to fetch out another Land Destruction land (strip mine) to answer something and sometimes it gets back Memory Jar to draw you into more gas. With the wheel effects and the fact that you will probably be running a plethora of utility artifacts, it is always useful.
Forgotten Cave, Blasted Landscape, and Smoldering Crater are just great extra utility. They prevent flooding and mana screw. I've gone back and forth on when and how to play them but I'm just about settled on playing them turn 1 if I have only 3 lands in my opening hand and stalling a bit to see what I draw if I have 4 lands in hand. You never want to cycle it as soon as you can, you want to wait till you are sure you're drawing enough lands and mana sources to hit your average CMC first. I can't tell you how many times I've cycled them away only to be stuck at 5 lands for three turns.
Hall of the Bandit Lord is great if your goal is voltron. I wouldn't run it in a deck that doesn't rely on its general having haste beause the three life cost adds up quick if you have to use it for mana on something that isn't a creature. Red has such an easy access to haste that it's arguable you shouldn't even run it in voltron but it's worth its weight if your goal is to kill with 21 general damage as fast as possible. It is free and doesn't take up a spot.
Haunted Fengraf is an interesting new land that I have had some success with. You have to give up your Solemn Simulacrums and other utility dorks because paying three to rebuy them sucks but if your deck is 10 fattie must answer threats and a ton of non creature stuff, try it out. I've liked it in Akroma where all of my bodys generate card advantage by existing or are 1-2 turn clocks.
Kher Keep provides blockers against early aggro decks, skullclamp fodder, with a doubler they swing for 1, and they provide something to sacrifice to your opponents Fleshbag Marauder or Sheoldred when you've got the one beater out.
Mikokoro, Center of the Sea is in every red deck I have even though I rarely use it but in bad situations (avenger army and me without a wrath) it helps me dig for answers. It also helps your opponents dig for those answers too. Also great post Myojin of Night's Reach so the player that pulled the trigger doesn't quite as easily run away with the game. As a land it doesn't take up a spell slot so it's never a dead draw and it can sit and do nothing until that one game it shines.
Reliquary Tower doesn't deserve a spot. You will very very rarely find yourself with a full hand. Red isn't the color for this land and for the 1 game it pulls its weight it isn't tapping for RR the other ten games you had it sitting on board for no reason.
Snow-Covered Mountain is an expensive upgrade but allows you to run Scrying Sheets and Mouth of Ronom, both of which are great utility. Combine Scrying Sheets with Sensei's Divining Top to dig faster. It also opens up the door to the powerhouse that is Skred. Later on when you want to next level it you also have bought access to Glacial Crevasses and Rimescale Dragon in your control decks, Goblin Rimerunner in Krenko or voltron lists, and you get a hasty Thermopod in your token swarm combo lists that want to finish with burn or sac a couple 1/1s for an extra combat step you couldn't afford. For you casual gamers, ask your buddys if you can sharpie SNOW on your mountains so everyone knows they are your dedicated snow mountains. Please don't tell me about proxys, I play on MTGO.
Tectonic Edge and Ghost Quarter need to be in all your edh decks. Your red 'destroy target creature' spells mostly come with 'destroy target land' attached to them but there are a TON of abusive utility lands that need to be answered and even more creatures. I lucked into a cheap promo Strip Mine but if you're ballin run Wasteland too. I must say that I like Ghost Quarter because it can actually accelerate you once you have a doubler out. I've blown up my own tapped mountain to get an untapped one for eot tricks or to have enough mana to kill something several times. If money is no object, I would run Strip Mine, Wasteland, and still be rocking Ghost Quarter. Maybe someone can chime in on Dust Bowl because I've always wanted to get one.
Temple of the False God doesn't have a place in mono red if you run the mana doublers. By the time you have 5 lands to turn it on you should be pretty close to dropping a doubler and having your mountains tap for 2 anyway. I've always found it lackluster. Your mileage may vary.
Terrain Generator isn't good enough. Without consistant draw you shouldn't have a hand full of lands and with consistant draw you want to spend your mana casting threats instead.
Thawing Glaciers + Deserted Temple is a great package in groups that play longer games. I've cut Glaciers from decks that were proactive and I've used it as a Kodama's Reach every other turn till I litterally didn't have any mountains left to fetch in decks that like to keep the board clean and play the control game. If you drop the roughly 10 dollars on Thawing Glaciers go ahead and spend the extra 5 for Deserted Temple. You can always put Temple with Coffers when you go back to the dark side.
Urza's Factory is a really expensive consistant token spell. I got to live the dream using Deserted Temple to plop out two a turn and won games but I don't specifically like it because of how expensive it is.
Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle should go in any mono red deck that routinely expects to reach its cost. My view is that it is NOT amazing but it is free damage. When you start running 6+ utility lands and aren't turning it on but once in a while, take it out. The utility lands are more important then the free bolts. But if you don't have most of these lands, grab a Valakut and rejoice when you get to ping the poo out of people for free.
Vesuva is great. You can copy your opponents Coffers when they have Urborg out to get a ton of extra colorless mana. You can kill Academy Ruins and Volrath's Stronghold with the legend rule. You can clone Thawing Glaciers and be able to pick it back up. Just remember that Kher Keep is legendary. Yeah, that sucks. Two valakuts for six damage per mountain, clone their strip mine for assurance they won't kill your.
Tutors are a big part of EDH online. Personally I enjoy the fun of playing different games with the same deck but considering the formats available tutors I'll try and give you a run down on red.
Gamble is the most important card you can buy if you want to be competitive in red. The random discard is rarely an issue unless it's late game and there are ways to negate that. Once in a while I'll blow it early on Koth of the Hammer if the decks my opponents are playing don't strike me as being early game decks. Koth really is that good. This greatly depends on the number of mountains you run in the deck and if you have a mountain heavy hand or a utility land heavy hand. But I don't run Koth in every deck. A great trick is if you need removal and have used a removal spell, you can use it to get Recoup or Past in Flames so it doesn't matter what you discard because you'll get to use it on recurring that removal. There are also a few creatures in red that can come out of the graveyard should you be on the wrong end of discard spell and need a blocker bad.
Flamekin Harbinger is a bad card. But it can be used to get a plethora of good creatures in red. Including the red evoke creatures that can answer creatures, artifacts, and lands. It also gets Ashling if she gets tucked.
Imperial Recruiter is insanely expensive in paper but cheap online. I wouldn't bother with spending the money outside of Kiki-Jiki but I would probably suggest getting it for Kiki-Jiki if you really want to build a proper Kiki-Jiki deck. Could not begin to list all the 2 power creatures worth getting. If you happen to be lucky enough to get to play with Imperial Recruiter be careful you don't end up with a weenie deck.
Goblin Matron, Goblin Recruiter, and Moggcatcher are amazing for all the good utility goblins. Even outside of a goblin tribal deck, there are some really amazing goblins that fit into plenty of other decks and having more common access to those cards is strong.
Godo, Bandit Warlord is a great general and a great part of the 99 if you run a few pieces of equipment. For those of you with swords (I don't own any) he can get the one that actually protects your stuff from the majority of your opponents cards.
Hoarding Dragon is risky without a sacrifice outlet if you're in a white or blue heavy meta game. Remember that if it doesn't die and is exiled or bounced instead, what you tutored for is gone forever. But the fact that it is a reasonably costed 4/4 flyer isn't lost on me.
Zirilan of the Claw, Dragonstorm, and Imperial Hellkite exist for all the dragon timmys out there. Which really isn't a bad deck if you build it to generate enough mana and draw enough cards to consistantly drop dragons early and often but it needs a meta that isn't fast or super developed.
In the interest of giving you a head start here are the generals I have played and things I used to enable them or the primers I'm aware of for generals I maybe haven't built. If someone has an in depth thread on a mono red general reguardless of if it's covered or not please feel free to post the link somewhere in this thread for others to find.
Ashling the Pilgrim was my first mono red deck before I ever even had an MTGO account. She can be built in several different styles including control, burn, and voltron. My first version really wanted to use ashling as a back up wrath effect and I'd rarely cast her until the mid game. Lots of removal and 'control' oriented cards. The second focused more on popping her multiple times trying to bring the life totals of the table low enough for direct burn. With stupid amounts of mana generation if I didn't have her casting cost plus six mana to blow her up if needed, she didn't come out. The last time I got more aggressive and tried going the distance with general damage with equipment that could make her huge like Strata Scythe, Argentum Armor and even Tatsumasa, the Dragon's Fang. One thing you can't build Ashling without is Scythe of the Wretched.
Rakka Mar is also very good if you like aggro/tempo builds. Thousand-Year Elixir, Magewright's Stone, Puppet Strings, and Rings of Brighthearth helped pump out the army. Bedlam and Heat Stroke made sure that I continually apply pressure despite an opposing army of larger creatures. Breath of Fury is a two card combo with her if you happen to get them both out on an empty table. While the deck does rely on the general quite a bit it had several other creatures with tap abilities and an assortment of win conditions outside of token swarm. The argument could be made that Krenko is better but I really enjoyed Rakka Mars under the radar status and ability to churn out 3-6-9 power a turn that was swinging right then without a haste enabler.
Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker is very much a combo general. That being said it's a very Timmy combo and can make amazing come backs. My version focuses on value creatures with a few finishers and only has one actualy way to go infinite in the deck in Zealous Conscripts. Despite this, just casting and using Kiki to copy Chancellor of the Forge in response to the ETB trigger puts 14 haste power on the board. Also, most of the things that Kiki is good with aren't bad on their own so if Kiki gets tucked you're not up the creek. Fire Fist has a great thread here with a lot of info on how to play KIki.
Tahngarth, Talruum Hero is very much a voltron general that doubles as repeatable removal. Using pump equipment to keep him from trading and the ability to attack the open player and stay upright to stop the swing back is great. A case could be made that he carrys Tenza, Godo's Maul just as well as Godo does. Not as fast as Godo at assembling a lethal set of equipment but much more handy in a game that goes longer and I didn't personally build the deck to be all in so I could stand longer games. Lifelink on him too made it nearly impossible to outrace him unless it was an opposing voltron strategy. He isn't quite as hot at a table full of tokens or decks that are comboing off without creatures. Thankfully he doesn't need a ton of support to be good.
Adamaro, First to Desire seems like a horrible general at first glance. Hes only powerful if your opponents hands are full. A user on MTGO by the name of Box sent me his list over a year a go that was very much combo oriented behind casting lots of wheel effects and finishing with Molten Psyche to kill the table. He also backed it up originally with land destruction but the last time I saw him online (been a long time) he had taken it out. While he mostly used Adamaro as a place holder as a cheap early threat that could carry the game home by itself, I have recently tried my own Adamaro deck. Mine focuses a ton on Howling Mine effects and being able to force the other players to draw on my own turn. It is surprisingly effective and with 8+ permanent based draw every turn cards I can easily get to wraths and answers and 'long' games end with me having less then 50 cards left in my deck. I still run the Molten Psyche placeholders and my record is over 30 damage to each player with it and that's without building with the intent to combo. The biggest game changer in the deck is Mindmoil with it's ability to litterally dig 15+ cards deep in a turn and allows me to be a little heavy handed on redundancy with voltron pieces and combat tricks. Thanks to Assault Strobe and Savage Beating it's easy to kill the players who haven't yet taken any general damage.
Akroma, Angel of Fury is a terrible thing for a deck relying on white and or blue primarily. Most decks that include white with black use whites targetted removal since it is more efficient. Even in a situation where her protection doesn't do anything it's still very easy to turn her into a two turn clock. I'll never forgive WOTC for not giving her haste. Also, she does have morph and she interacts with the command zone by costing two more when cast with morph. You need to know that for when people ask because you should never cast her for her morph cost. Ever. If you are losing and have the option of casting her for morph and blocking on their turn or just dieing. Choose dieing. Don't give the control player the satisfaction of finally having a relevant card against her. The deck I stuck her with is using all of the instants and sorcerys I rarely ever play and none of the 'good' cards outside of mana doublers because I wanted to see if I was missing something and she still just has a way of dominating games. Certainly if you're in a heavy control group and want to surprise your friends, Akroma with a heavy disruption/removal package and a plethora of wheel effects and ways to reuse them will turn their game plans upside down.
Jaya Ballard is also a very strong control meta general but of a different speed entirely from Akroma. I love Weebo's primer for her and it can be found here.
Marton Stromgald is an amazingly underplayed red creature. He is a HUGE part of my Rakka Mar deck above and is often the only thing I will use Imperial Recruiter to get. Honestly he even deserves a spot in a tribal Krenko build as an overrun effect with honorary goblin status. To really understand him, I direct you to ISBPathfinders thread.
Norin the Wary is a horrible general that you should never play. If you agree, go tell Gaka here. If you dissagree then I have no idea what I'm talking about and I apologize ahead of time.
Krenko, Mob Boss can be built many different ways. Combo, swarm, aggro, tribal, the list goes on. The unfortunate thing about him is he is SO freakin strong if given a turn or three that people will hate on you from the get go. It also doesn't tend to be a back and forth deck with great play quality because you're either way out in front and winning or doing nothing. That being said, I love krenko in my Wort, Boggart Auntie deck and honestly don't think that he's been explored to his fullest potential. I did stumble upon a list here with lots of great tips and card suggestions. Sticking to tribal also severly diminishes Krenko's power.
Slobad, Goblin Tinkerer is for those of you that love brown. I know that a lot of people play him with Obliterate but I've been crushed by his shenanigans without Obliterate. A former friend of mine on MTGO had a deck that never tried to touch lands and it was stupidly powerful and explosive. Doing a quick search I found a primer here by trees.
Now that that is out of the way. Lets talk about combatting specific meta games. Strait up Apocalypse into general won't be discussed here as that's pretty obvious.
Being an MTGO player I can pretty much assume that someone will be playing something I am not prepared for. While this doesn't let me tune to a meta game it does allow me to run lots of wild answers for different strategys and get to see how often they perform.
The big bad meanie against red has always been blue. If you run in combo/control heavy metas then you can interact in several ways. My favorite is Mage's Contest. Despite having fallen in love with red I am still very much a black player. When you cast it and they have the option of beating your opening bid of 1 damage they will always come back with 5. Top it by another 5. Make them PAY for that Boundless Realms because the only point of life that matters is the last one. Seriously though, Overmaster, Pyroblast and Red Elemental Blast are great at ensuring your stuff resolves. The second two also can counter some of the strongest/fastest generals in the format and typically 70% of the spells in their deck. Because you can't be a control deck, don't run them out of your hand at the first opportunity. Pick your spots and play smart. Red can kill artifacts like black can kill creatures and it's not terribly bad at killing creatures either. Unfortunately those enchantments only get answered by Chaos Warp, Spine of Ish Sah, Oblivion Stone, and Nevinyrral's Disk. Most of reds directcreaturedestruction doubles as land destruction and traditionally accepted 'strong' decks run multiple colors. If your group is competitive and runs lots of colorless utility lands, jump on their mana base and take a color away from them. You'd be surprised how often this works. Especially true with non green decks but after you've seen two ramp spells and they still only have one source of red mana for their general, kill that dual land. The wheel effects also play a double roll here at disrupting your opponents who are scultping their hand for their combo pieces and refilling your hand full of gas. You can build a really nasty anti control/combo list that can sit till it gets out Akroma and then just kill people but you can also run army in a can generals like Rakka Mar that are cheap to cast and easy to support. Jaya Ballard would also like a word with you if it truely is blue on blue on blue.
Aggro heavy metas are easy to deal with for red. Between Blasphemous Act, Chain Reaction, Earthquake, Rolling Earthquake, Fire Tempest, Inferno, Mizzium Mortars, and Starstorm you should be fine with creature armys. Tokens are even easier with a pethora of smaller Volcanic Fallout style spells. Insurrection and Twist Allegiance can turn their armys into your armys for a turn. You also have the benefit of a plethora of extra combat spells if you just want to out aggro the aggro table. Most of reds big fat beaters fly and there are plenty of them that come with extra benefits. You also benefit from being able to easily just burn face and close out games a turn early that an aggro deck might not have the reach for. Honestly, red thrives on aggro tables. Balefire Dragon, Bogardan Hellkite, Flameblast Dragon, Ryusei, the Falling Star, and Scourge of Kher Ridges at the top of your curve and teach them what for. Ashling, Jaya Ballard, or Tahngarth for removal on a stick generals or Rakka Mar, Krenko, Kiki-Jiki for army in a can generals.
Recursion heavy meta games with lots of graveyard shenanigans and creature theft are a little harder to deal with if you don't pack the answers you need. WOTC has given us a vast number of ways to clean out graveyards. You can also go really deep on it with a number of sacrifice outlets and some threaten effects to really abuse their cheap fattys. Token generators and Helm of Possession. I especially like creatureless decks here. Give them nothing to steal out of your yard and kill them with fire. Most heavy graveyard based decks run lots of 'each player sacrifices' effects so if you don't rely on creatures they're not disrupting you. Run a couple of shuffle effects so your business doesn't get exiled with your own grave hate. Remember that every time they have reanimation in hand and you've exiled the graveyards that they effectively are now sitting on dead cards in hand. Dong Zhou, the Tyrant should be a beast in this type of deck but honestly that's some arm chair racing. Pretty much any strategy works here since red isn't always in it's graveyard. Just run more hate.
The last things I want to talk about is playing smart.
A big part of the strategy is playing smart. If you're used to playing whatever you want whenever you want then no worries, this is no different. On the other hand, if you're in a meta that runs targetted removal, counter spells, and ways to screw with your plans, PAY ATTENTION. Black can run a body out and if it immediately gets answered, reanimate it next turn. Green can get so far out ahead that nothing it casts matters because there is another must answer threat coming next turn. Blue can protect it's threats. White has some really nasty things that are super hard to deal with. You're not playing those colors. You want to step up your play and next level to play some mono red. I can't tell you how much my game improved in the last year of playing almost entirely mono red because I can't remember how BAD I was before. Even online, if someone has a full grip of cards and lots of mana open but hasn't done anything at instant speed all game, go for it. If someone has been answering things left and right but is down to two cards and didn't respond to the person to your right's nasty spell, go for it. Take a couple swings before playing that Inferno so you can net a greater advantage and everything that has been played since the first time someone attacked you would be attacking you now reguardless. When your turn four Koth of the Hammer gets countered by a table full of players with mana up, you're a sucker and you deserve to lose.
The last part of this rodeo is card quality. I just mentioned Koth and I want to hammer home how important it is to run things that can win the game on their own. If you get Koth to 5 loyalty, ultimate him. Mountains tapping for damage can carry a game home easily. Dragonmaster Outcast at one single mana can walk away with a game if he goes unanswered and for seven more mana Utvara Hellkite will crush games in three turns (play with haste so you get at least one dragon for your money). This is also meta dependent. Shattering Spree is really hard to counter unless you only target the thing you need gone once. Vandalblast is better but more people want to prevent it from resolving. Smash is instant speed and replaces itself so you can wait for the blue player to tap out eot and you're not down a card. But if you're rocking a voltron deck then run Batterhorn and Oxidda Scrapmelter so they can carry swords around. Hateflayer bashes for 10, can swing into Avacyn, Angel of Hope or Ulamog and kill them thanks to wither, and is all around a bad ass despite being slow and expensive. There is no room in this format for red to run narrow answers or generic beaters. I'm timmy enough that I can get down on some Minotaur Aggressor. Big, haste, first strike, nice power numbers, what's not to love? I will not run it in mono red for the same reason that you won't run Craw Wurm in mono green. On the other side of that coin I absolutely love Spitebellows because he can answer any of the really problematic generals on the turns they come out or be a beater for his full price since outside of someone wasting path to exile on him he's killing two things. You would never have assumed that at first glance he is either 1 for 1 removal or a 2 for 1 beater/blocker. With red it is all about card quality. Build around your general because you will have access to it more then any other card in your deck but don't run 20 pump effects, 10 haste effects, 10 pieces of card draw and 20 sources of removal hoping Godo will get there. He won't, he'll get tucked, and then I'll get to read your next post about how mono red sucks.
I think a section on commander selection and what some of the more capable commanders can do would be a nice addition to this.
A rundown on some of red's hate effects could be nice as well. Using things like Grip of Chaos, Blood Moon, War's Toll, and Stranglehold can cut people out of entire games without dabbling into mass LD.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
Mono red is something I've been wanting to get into more and more. It's underused and challenging. The power is there but the consistency always worries me. Good to see more and more people breaking it open. I have seen almost everey variety of decks but besdies Cockatrice never a mono red one.
Thank you for this! Had to stop lurking to thank you for so eloquently explaining why you enjoy playing red. I've been on the fence for a while now, my mind jumping from stax / control with GAAIV or mono green ramp with Omnath. I've always liked casually playing around with red however and this thread sealed the deal. How do you like Jaya Ballard as a general?
Thank you for this! Had to stop lurking to thank you for so eloquently explaining why you enjoy playing red. I've been on the fence for a while now, my mind jumping from stax / control with GAAIV or mono green ramp with Omnath. I've always liked casually playing around with red however and this thread sealed the deal. How do you like Jaya Ballard as a general?
I would go send Weebo a PM or check out his primer in the MP section. He has in my opinion the best experience / knowledge on her. You would probably find his primer on her informative to say the least. Overally I think she is cool and packs a lot of utility. She becomes stronger too the more blue you see which is unusual for most commanders.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
I gotcha, that makes sense. Who would you suggest? I'd rather not go the voltron route but I'm not entirely opposed to it.
Edit: Just saw your post Pathfinder, I've seen his primer a few times now, which is where I got the commander choice to be honest. I was curious as to others thoughts of Jaya, or any mono red for that matter. I'll go re read his though, its been a while.
Well, in my own opinion some of the stronger mono red commanders are:
Akroma, Angel of Fury lots of control decks have problems with her. She is really hard to tuck as well since blue and white have most of those effects. She can kill quickly thanks to her firebreathing and can be combined with mass LD effects decently if chosen or simply big mana / red control tactics.
Ashling the Pilgrim versatile commander in the fact that she doesnt push you into any one direction for your deck. She can work with mass LD as she comes in quickly or even voltron / control styles of play. She is versatile in what direction to take her. Thanks to her ability to self buff she scales into the game very nicely as well.
Godo, Bandit Warlord toolbox equipment. One of his downsides is that he is a bit predictable. He can kill quickly though and brings some consistancy that red often lacks to the table.
Homura, Human Ascendant Use some sac outlets to flip him. His buff is useful for both token or simply agro tactics. His mana cost is sort of high though considering he also needs a sac outlet plus other creatures to become useful though.
Ib Halfheart, Goblin Tactician the all in mass LD deck. Pop all of your lands into tokens then blow up all lands and hope nobody has a counterspell. This is the sort of deck for you if you like going all in plus blowing up lands.
Jaya Ballard, Task Mage versatile control. She is better if you see blue decks in your meta though. I once tried her out but it was against no blue decks and with Mayael the Anima vomiting indestructables out so.... probably not the best meta choice for me then lol. She has good versatility though.
Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker probably the hands down most competitive mono red commander out there. He is completely combo oriented and I wouldn't even bother touching him unless you are ok with running combo. He is very powerful but he does receive a lot more hate than other mono red commanders as a whole.
Krenko, Mob Boss the goblin wave. I haven't actually seen one of these decks yet myself but it is essentially a linear token production machine. The downside is that its easy to see coming, the upside is that hes easy to recast and gets out of hand very quickly.
Marton Stromgald the I swing for lethal at everyone commander. His pump is one of the biggest pump effects in the game and the only pump of even close to that size on a legend. I use him myself and have found him very enjoyable and he wins a lot My own list in my sig if you want to check him out.
Norin the Wary usually sort of a troll style of deck involving a lot of ETB creature support and chaos. Check out Gaka's list for more info.
Urabrask the Hidden sort of a chaotic ability that screws with blockers a lot. I haven't seen a ton of him around lately but he is hard to block and does a lot of damage racing.
Zirilan of the Claw dragon tribal style of deck. I haven't seen one in a while but it functions off of big mana quite well. Give it time and mana and it will assemble a ton of damage quickly.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
Their downside of refilling your opponents hand in an aggressive meta is mute because you can't play without cards and aside from mono white, your opponents are already outdrawing you.
Outside of that, and as a mono-red player myself, I agree with most of what you've said. In particular, I find the wheel effects doing more harm to my opponents than good. Red is an absolute blast.
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"[Screw] you and the green you ramped in on." - My EDH battle cry. If I had one. Which I don't.
ISBPathfinder;
Ok, tonight after work I'll update the Op with what I know and give links to the ones I like. Huge raging fan of Smoke. Also dissapointed that Rakka Mar and Tahngarth weren't on your list of good red commanders. They're both easy to turn into monsters.
Kralc;
Thank for the kind words. Red likes artifacts too and stax is super easy to rock in red with Slobad, Goblin Tinkerer to protect what's important. I really like Jaya from having been on the receiving end of her. I haven't actually built her myself since I went with Akroma to hate on blue decks since she hates on white as well but the link to Weebo's thread earlier up the page should do you wonders.
Knautschke;
Lots of commanders in all colors are fragile and easy to deal with. Thankfully, your opponents die to fireballs just as fast as your general dies to removal.
Thank you for the thread. One point to make is that you "Card Draw" section has some card draw, but also a lot of card filter. Perhaps seperating those out may be helpful (i.e. fiathles looking, rumaging goblin, etc are filter).
Thank you for the thread. One point to make is that you "Card Draw" section has some card draw, but also a lot of card filter. Perhaps seperating those out may be helpful (i.e. fiathles looking, rumaging goblin, etc are filter).
Thanks again.
They're under card selection actually. I just didn't make a new tab for it because I didn't want to gum the thing up with tons of spoilers. But I fixed it for you.
I think that the mono red mana base deserves its own section or at least more emphasis, and you did a pretty good job in the few sentences that you did devote to it, but I think it is probably one of the most important points, and one of the least obvious.
One of the first things that I realized with Godo was to make mono red work, you need massive amounts of mana. I run 36-38 lands and 16-18 mana doublers/mana rocks that produce 2+ mana. Red is extremely efficient which it comes to answering small things with 2-3 toughness (lightning bolt/pyroclasm/whipflare), but once you need to answer 4+ toughness, or non land non artifact permanents, the costs start to balloon to 6-7+ mana to deal with them through earthquake effects or 7cc colorless answers like Karn or Spine of Ish Sah.
I found that to remain competitive, you need consistent access to acceleration and lands, which means running a ton of lands, and a ton of accelerants to be able to play your expensive answers in a timely manner.
In general, I have found that I just want to be pretty aggressive with most hands, but when you need an answer, you need an answer and you need to be able to play it.
ISBPathfinder;
Ok, tonight after work I'll update the Op with what I know and give links to the ones I like. Huge raging fan of Smoke. Also dissapointed that Rakka Mar and Tahngarth weren't on your list of good red commanders. They're both easy to turn into monsters.
I mostly picked out those that I had seen myself moreso. There are other commanders that you can push to work. I just haven't seen those commanders actually work out so much in my own past experience for multiplayer but I suppose they could become more viable in 1v1 or with a strategy I haven't seen or thought about yet.
Plus... I wrote that up at like 5:00 AM so I was sort of tired lol.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
SELVAXRI! King of Misfortune & Master of Rocket Launchers "Do ya feel lucky? Because you'd better start runnin' while you still can." 375 Misfortune {+3 signed AP's} & 104 Rocket Launcher (41 AQ/ 63 Rev) Edgar Rice Burroughs, forgotten legend of the word.
Mind if I ask why Latulla? As someone who has a deck built around her, I don't see what the point is of making a weenie tribal deck and then tacking her on as commander.
I've come to really like Diaochan, Artful Beauty. She kills those large creatures red traditionally has problems with, and is great at allowing you to play control.
I want to see someone make a Mannichi, the Fevered Dream deck if it's possible without it being completely terrible.
What do you think of Slobad, goblin tinkerer? I like him since red likes artifacts and he can protect half of them if need be. He really loves Obliterate.
Mind if I ask why Latulla? As someone who has a deck built around her, I don't see what the point is of making a weenie tribal deck and then tacking her on as commander.
i like that aspect. using my commander as the cannon, rather than trying to build around her. she's not exactly the best General to build around (despite herself being a Keldon general in the Prophecy story).
I may actually never build the deck, i just think it'd be fun.
I can assume there are better Commanders, but being a legacy player at heart- she'd be the most interesting.
if possible, i'd try to find a way to make Starke of Rath a general.
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SELVAXRI! King of Misfortune & Master of Rocket Launchers "Do ya feel lucky? Because you'd better start runnin' while you still can." 375 Misfortune {+3 signed AP's} & 104 Rocket Launcher (41 AQ/ 63 Rev) Edgar Rice Burroughs, forgotten legend of the word.
i like that aspect. using my commander as the cannon, rather than trying to build around her. she's not exactly the best General to build around (despite herself being a Keldon general in the Prophecy story).
I may actually never build the deck, i just think it'd be fun.
I can assume there are better Commanders, but being a legacy player at heart- she'd be the most interesting.
if possible, i'd try to find a way to make Starke of Rath a general.
I think Starke of Rath can be an absolute beast. Land a Homeward Path with him and he's bonkers.
Heartless can be an absolute beast, and I really like Kumano (moreso as one of 100 cards in a Big Red deck, rather than the general, but he's strong nonetheless).
Ok. I updated the op with utility lands. Added a little more on how important mana is to red decks. Gave a list of the tutors I have used but I need to elaborate a bit more. I'll try and get a crack at the generals I have played and played against tomorrow.
that0neguy; I completely agree that mana is important but not to every deck. It's pretty easy to be undercosted in red and still be strong. Not that I disagree that a lot of mono red strategys require a ton of colorless ramp.
Completely disagree with the aggressive part though when it comes to multiplayer. Your play style is just different from mine. I enjoy waiting in the weeds and then stomping people to death. I don't like being the big early game threat that takes all the stray attacks mid game. Unless the deck is truely designed to kill before they stabalize which I am proud to to say red can do it.
ISBPathfinder; I have a Rakka Mar deck that was infamous with the folks that I would routinely see on MTGO multiplayer games. It was pretty disgusting before stumbling on and stealing a few cards from your Marton Stromgald deck (including Marton himself). Thanks for all your hard work. =p
Selvaxri; build a Latulla, Keldon Overseer deck. The worst that could happen is you build a great deck that needs a better general and the best would be that I end up stealing all your secrets and trying it out for myself. Maybe that's just best for me...
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Super excited that people have as much interest in red as I do.
Red can efficiently deal with some permanents, especially a ton of small creatures or artifacts, but enchantments and larger toughness can be tough to deal with (especially when you compare it to what other colors have to deal with them).
The reason I say that you sometimes just need to be aggressive, is that there are some strategies that you will often just lose to if the game goes long, usually some type of prison strategy revolving around enchantments or recurring instants/sorceries.
There are answers to any board state, All is Dust usually being my catch all, but if they start to back up those board states with counterspells and a little pressure, the game slips away the longer a game goes.
I think this might be something that is more of a problem for a smaller metagame than a larger one though. I play in a pretty small metagame so I see cards like Stoney Silence, Aura Shards, Iona along with a lot of artifact hate directed pretty speficially at me. (And I maindeck things like Anarchy in response).
Not that Aggression is always Plan A, but its also important to recognize the situations where it might be your only out.
Let's start with reds biggest problem and most commonly asked about part of it's game.
I'm going to be really specific here because this is the most important part.
Wheel of Fortune and Reforge the Soul are great. Their downside of refilling your opponents hand in an aggressive meta is moot because you can't play without cards and aside from mono white, your opponents are already outdrawing you. Some players like to run lots of 'no maximum handsize' effects and tons of draw so that you forcing them to discard their hand and draw seven can often be a decrease for them. They also help with lots of tutors. Rite of Replication kicked on Rune-Scarred Demon? New hand bro.
Chandra Ablaze is not a planeswalker. It is a draw engine that occasionally removes stuff. The fact that it is slightly less than half a wheel effect isn't a big deal. I have never used her ultimate. I'm sure some decks can benefit from it but I have had her up to 9+ counters before with other draw engines on board and not bothered using her ultimate.
Knollspine Dragon can be amazing and I've drawn 20+ cards off of it before. Especially amazing in Kiki-Jiki. That being said, it doesn't go in every deck. One upside is it's still a 7 mana 7 power flyer with a MAY ability. But it is quite honestly win more when it works.
Dragon Mage needs haste effects. I can't remember if I have ever cast it and had it live a whole turn to attack with or not which should say something. It also gives your opponents who didn't have answers, the ability to draw into them. As a seven mana wheel effect, you need to always have haste, always be able to get to the mana to cast it, and generally have one of the strongest decks at the table for it to be good. Honestly this dragon gets no love from me.
Here is a pretty comprehensive thread for colorless card draw. Unfortunately it hasn't been updated since May of last year. I have run a TON of these. So far the ones I am most in love with that can slot into any mono red deck (not equipment based) are;
Mikokoro, Center of the Sea is in every red deck I have even though I rarely use it but in bad situations (avenger army and me without a wrath) it helps me dig for answers. It also helps your opponents dig for those answers too. Also great post Myojin of Night's Reach so the player that pulled the trigger doesn't quite as easily run away with the game. As a land it doesn't take up a spell slot so it's never a dead draw and it can sit and do nothing until that one game it shines.
Mind's Eye is great. It scales up for multiplayer and gets better if your opponents have out draw engines. Huge target on it's head so don't run it out without mana to use it assuming it makes it to your opponents draw step. Combine with Wheel effects to dig for days.
Memory Jar is a late game card. If your meta ends on turn 4-6, don't run this. But given enough mana (we'll get to that), it can be amazing for you. Discarding what you don't cast can hurt but we have options for recursion we will get to later.
Staff of Nin is Phyrexian Arena for twice as much mana in any color. If you're getting to 8+ mana routinely and playing big mutliplayer games. Jam this in there.
Sensei's Divining Top is the amazing card it always has been. Something to remember is that you can activate to rearange the top three and respond to that activation with the draw effect so you get to put it on top and make it the second or third card down if the situation is needed. This benefits from shuffle effects but it's good enough without them 90% of the time. Combine with Rings of Brighthearth or Voltaic Key to turn it into an expensive draw engine if your deck already benefits from those.
Now for those of you running creatures (don't laugh, you can rock a creatureless red deck pretty easily) I suggest;
Skullclamp pairs with Kher Keep and can sit on anything that your opponents must answer. Great card is great. Squee loves this card.
Mask of Memory is great in lists that run lots of support dudes or can force through attackers. Especially good if you run utility dorks that can get in early before people get blockers out. I LOVE this card, really.
Infiltration Lens is great in Voltron lists or lists that attack with one big dude as opposed to several little dudes. I've found it lackluster because I want my guys connecting but it still resides in some voltron decks of mine where the opponents will be blocking if they can. Looking at you Adamaro.
Culling Dais is for Voltron lists to help prevent your suited up general from getting tucked. It also slots into fattie dragons lists or anything with must answer threats. Always keep one mana up once this thing has a counter on it. Squee also loves this card.
Ultimately the link above to all the colorless draw spells prior to may 2011 is a great link to read through one good time. Some things will work better for you then they do for me because we all have different play styles.
Recoup and Past in Flames are extremely effective. Unless you are pure creature aggro or voltron I would suggest running both of these in the majority of mono red lists. They effectively let you buy something back twice, you don't mind discarding them or wheeling them away, and they have been consistantly amazing for me as wheel effects number 3-4.
Card selection;
Mindmoil is my new favorite red card. Once you get used to how it functions it can be amazing for you. Recognize that you get one shot at the hand you have and pick the card you need the most. Then get ready for the rest. Faithless Looting, Recoup, Past in Flames, and your general are great ways to dump a worthless hand on the bottom and get some new options. Shuffle effects are great here at getting you back to something you just put on the bottom last turn. It also lets you chain together artifact ramp and get way out ahead if you have a free turn to durdle with.
Faithless Looting is a great tool to dig for stuff. It also offers you a slightly higher value for taking mediocre opening hands if mulliganing down is strictly enforced. While technically card disadvantage, it allows for some great card selection in that you can dig 4 cards deep for 4 mana and the cost of a card. Some of the things you discard can be recurred later but we'll get to that. Don't forget it's in your graveyard. It gets better on the second activation. Considering red has a hard time interacting with it's grave yard this card is best used when your hand is full of lands or when you want to dig for something and not as a generic first turn play without thought.
Scroll Rack really needs shuffle effects. Besides fetch lands, slotting in Traveler's Amulet, Wanderer's Twig, Wayfarer's Bauble in place of lands, and Expedition Map (you should be running anyway) can really enable it.
Mad Prophet and Rummaging Goblin are what they are. My red decks don't have room for these cards but if you're running a very linear strategy that must cast x cards to win or run a ton of equipment to turn them into beaters they are there for you. I do run Rummaging Goblin in Krenko but usually feel bad about it.
The last thing I want to stress is that you should occasionally see if there is a card that does what you're looking for that has 'draw a card' tacked on the back of it. The more of these you run, even if they're a turn slower or slightly worse, the less likely you are to end up in top deck mode. If you can't build a red deck that doesn't end up in top deck mode then you're doing it wrong. It's not the colors fault, trust me.
If you don't run a single x cost spell, you still want to have enough mana to take multiple actions a turn so it is very important that you run at minimum 38 lands. My Ashling deck requires tons of red mana to be able to use her ability at will and I've found that a simple mountain has a ton more value then a lot of the other cards I could run so there I run 46 lands. This doesn't even touch on the mana producing artifacts. To keep this from being another 5 paragraphs, let me just focus on the lands. You will notice some routinely used utility lands missing from this list and that is because they don't tap for mana. If they do, let us all know because I am forgetful. These are also all deck dependent. For Ashling and Akroma I need lots of red mana sources so I skimp on the utility lands but Godo doesn't care and he runs the guantlet of utility lands. Here are the ones that I routinely use;
Ancient Tomb is purely play style. I like it in some of my red decks because it gets my utility artifacts out faster and is a back up Sol Ring and Mana Crypt but it's not in everything because one mana doubler and it's a mountain that costs two life to use.
Boseiju, Who Shelters All doesn't have a place outside of a heavy control meta. The life cost isn't worth it if you're not in a blue on blue on blue play group.
Buried Ruin goes in every red deck that uses artifacts. Sometimes it rebuys Expedition Map to fetch out another Land Destruction land (strip mine) to answer something and sometimes it gets back Memory Jar to draw you into more gas. With the wheel effects and the fact that you will probably be running a plethora of utility artifacts, it is always useful.
Forgotten Cave, Blasted Landscape, and Smoldering Crater are just great extra utility. They prevent flooding and mana screw. I've gone back and forth on when and how to play them but I'm just about settled on playing them turn 1 if I have only 3 lands in my opening hand and stalling a bit to see what I draw if I have 4 lands in hand. You never want to cycle it as soon as you can, you want to wait till you are sure you're drawing enough lands and mana sources to hit your average CMC first. I can't tell you how many times I've cycled them away only to be stuck at 5 lands for three turns.
Hall of the Bandit Lord is great if your goal is voltron. I wouldn't run it in a deck that doesn't rely on its general having haste beause the three life cost adds up quick if you have to use it for mana on something that isn't a creature. Red has such an easy access to haste that it's arguable you shouldn't even run it in voltron but it's worth its weight if your goal is to kill with 21 general damage as fast as possible. It is free and doesn't take up a spot.
Haunted Fengraf is an interesting new land that I have had some success with. You have to give up your Solemn Simulacrums and other utility dorks because paying three to rebuy them sucks but if your deck is 10 fattie must answer threats and a ton of non creature stuff, try it out. I've liked it in Akroma where all of my bodys generate card advantage by existing or are 1-2 turn clocks.
Kher Keep provides blockers against early aggro decks, skullclamp fodder, with a doubler they swing for 1, and they provide something to sacrifice to your opponents Fleshbag Marauder or Sheoldred when you've got the one beater out.
Mikokoro, Center of the Sea is in every red deck I have even though I rarely use it but in bad situations (avenger army and me without a wrath) it helps me dig for answers. It also helps your opponents dig for those answers too. Also great post Myojin of Night's Reach so the player that pulled the trigger doesn't quite as easily run away with the game. As a land it doesn't take up a spell slot so it's never a dead draw and it can sit and do nothing until that one game it shines.
Reliquary Tower doesn't deserve a spot. You will very very rarely find yourself with a full hand. Red isn't the color for this land and for the 1 game it pulls its weight it isn't tapping for RR the other ten games you had it sitting on board for no reason.
Snow-Covered Mountain is an expensive upgrade but allows you to run Scrying Sheets and Mouth of Ronom, both of which are great utility. Combine Scrying Sheets with Sensei's Divining Top to dig faster. It also opens up the door to the powerhouse that is Skred. Later on when you want to next level it you also have bought access to Glacial Crevasses and Rimescale Dragon in your control decks, Goblin Rimerunner in Krenko or voltron lists, and you get a hasty Thermopod in your token swarm combo lists that want to finish with burn or sac a couple 1/1s for an extra combat step you couldn't afford. For you casual gamers, ask your buddys if you can sharpie SNOW on your mountains so everyone knows they are your dedicated snow mountains. Please don't tell me about proxys, I play on MTGO.
Tectonic Edge and Ghost Quarter need to be in all your edh decks. Your red 'destroy target creature' spells mostly come with 'destroy target land' attached to them but there are a TON of abusive utility lands that need to be answered and even more creatures. I lucked into a cheap promo Strip Mine but if you're ballin run Wasteland too. I must say that I like Ghost Quarter because it can actually accelerate you once you have a doubler out. I've blown up my own tapped mountain to get an untapped one for eot tricks or to have enough mana to kill something several times. If money is no object, I would run Strip Mine, Wasteland, and still be rocking Ghost Quarter. Maybe someone can chime in on Dust Bowl because I've always wanted to get one.
Temple of the False God doesn't have a place in mono red if you run the mana doublers. By the time you have 5 lands to turn it on you should be pretty close to dropping a doubler and having your mountains tap for 2 anyway. I've always found it lackluster. Your mileage may vary.
Terrain Generator isn't good enough. Without consistant draw you shouldn't have a hand full of lands and with consistant draw you want to spend your mana casting threats instead.
Thawing Glaciers + Deserted Temple is a great package in groups that play longer games. I've cut Glaciers from decks that were proactive and I've used it as a Kodama's Reach every other turn till I litterally didn't have any mountains left to fetch in decks that like to keep the board clean and play the control game. If you drop the roughly 10 dollars on Thawing Glaciers go ahead and spend the extra 5 for Deserted Temple. You can always put Temple with Coffers when you go back to the dark side.
Urza's Factory is a really expensive consistant token spell. I got to live the dream using Deserted Temple to plop out two a turn and won games but I don't specifically like it because of how expensive it is.
Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle should go in any mono red deck that routinely expects to reach its cost. My view is that it is NOT amazing but it is free damage. When you start running 6+ utility lands and aren't turning it on but once in a while, take it out. The utility lands are more important then the free bolts. But if you don't have most of these lands, grab a Valakut and rejoice when you get to ping the poo out of people for free.
Vesuva is great. You can copy your opponents Coffers when they have Urborg out to get a ton of extra colorless mana. You can kill Academy Ruins and Volrath's Stronghold with the legend rule. You can clone Thawing Glaciers and be able to pick it back up. Just remember that Kher Keep is legendary. Yeah, that sucks. Two valakuts for six damage per mountain, clone their strip mine for assurance they won't kill your.
Flamekin Harbinger is a bad card. But it can be used to get a plethora of good creatures in red. Including the red evoke creatures that can answer creatures, artifacts, and lands. It also gets Ashling if she gets tucked.
Imperial Recruiter is insanely expensive in paper but cheap online. I wouldn't bother with spending the money outside of Kiki-Jiki but I would probably suggest getting it for Kiki-Jiki if you really want to build a proper Kiki-Jiki deck. Could not begin to list all the 2 power creatures worth getting. If you happen to be lucky enough to get to play with Imperial Recruiter be careful you don't end up with a weenie deck.
Goblin Matron, Goblin Recruiter, and Moggcatcher are amazing for all the good utility goblins. Even outside of a goblin tribal deck, there are some really amazing goblins that fit into plenty of other decks and having more common access to those cards is strong.
Godo, Bandit Warlord is a great general and a great part of the 99 if you run a few pieces of equipment. For those of you with swords (I don't own any) he can get the one that actually protects your stuff from the majority of your opponents cards.
Hoarding Dragon is risky without a sacrifice outlet if you're in a white or blue heavy meta game. Remember that if it doesn't die and is exiled or bounced instead, what you tutored for is gone forever. But the fact that it is a reasonably costed 4/4 flyer isn't lost on me.
Zirilan of the Claw, Dragonstorm, and Imperial Hellkite exist for all the dragon timmys out there. Which really isn't a bad deck if you build it to generate enough mana and draw enough cards to consistantly drop dragons early and often but it needs a meta that isn't fast or super developed.
Ashling the Pilgrim was my first mono red deck before I ever even had an MTGO account. She can be built in several different styles including control, burn, and voltron. My first version really wanted to use ashling as a back up wrath effect and I'd rarely cast her until the mid game. Lots of removal and 'control' oriented cards. The second focused more on popping her multiple times trying to bring the life totals of the table low enough for direct burn. With stupid amounts of mana generation if I didn't have her casting cost plus six mana to blow her up if needed, she didn't come out. The last time I got more aggressive and tried going the distance with general damage with equipment that could make her huge like Strata Scythe, Argentum Armor and even Tatsumasa, the Dragon's Fang. One thing you can't build Ashling without is Scythe of the Wretched.
Rakka Mar is also very good if you like aggro/tempo builds. Thousand-Year Elixir, Magewright's Stone, Puppet Strings, and Rings of Brighthearth helped pump out the army. Bedlam and Heat Stroke made sure that I continually apply pressure despite an opposing army of larger creatures. Breath of Fury is a two card combo with her if you happen to get them both out on an empty table. While the deck does rely on the general quite a bit it had several other creatures with tap abilities and an assortment of win conditions outside of token swarm. The argument could be made that Krenko is better but I really enjoyed Rakka Mars under the radar status and ability to churn out 3-6-9 power a turn that was swinging right then without a haste enabler.
Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker is very much a combo general. That being said it's a very Timmy combo and can make amazing come backs. My version focuses on value creatures with a few finishers and only has one actualy way to go infinite in the deck in Zealous Conscripts. Despite this, just casting and using Kiki to copy Chancellor of the Forge in response to the ETB trigger puts 14 haste power on the board. Also, most of the things that Kiki is good with aren't bad on their own so if Kiki gets tucked you're not up the creek. Fire Fist has a great thread here with a lot of info on how to play KIki.
Tahngarth, Talruum Hero is very much a voltron general that doubles as repeatable removal. Using pump equipment to keep him from trading and the ability to attack the open player and stay upright to stop the swing back is great. A case could be made that he carrys Tenza, Godo's Maul just as well as Godo does. Not as fast as Godo at assembling a lethal set of equipment but much more handy in a game that goes longer and I didn't personally build the deck to be all in so I could stand longer games. Lifelink on him too made it nearly impossible to outrace him unless it was an opposing voltron strategy. He isn't quite as hot at a table full of tokens or decks that are comboing off without creatures. Thankfully he doesn't need a ton of support to be good.
Adamaro, First to Desire seems like a horrible general at first glance. Hes only powerful if your opponents hands are full. A user on MTGO by the name of Box sent me his list over a year a go that was very much combo oriented behind casting lots of wheel effects and finishing with Molten Psyche to kill the table. He also backed it up originally with land destruction but the last time I saw him online (been a long time) he had taken it out. While he mostly used Adamaro as a place holder as a cheap early threat that could carry the game home by itself, I have recently tried my own Adamaro deck. Mine focuses a ton on Howling Mine effects and being able to force the other players to draw on my own turn. It is surprisingly effective and with 8+ permanent based draw every turn cards I can easily get to wraths and answers and 'long' games end with me having less then 50 cards left in my deck. I still run the Molten Psyche placeholders and my record is over 30 damage to each player with it and that's without building with the intent to combo. The biggest game changer in the deck is Mindmoil with it's ability to litterally dig 15+ cards deep in a turn and allows me to be a little heavy handed on redundancy with voltron pieces and combat tricks. Thanks to Assault Strobe and Savage Beating it's easy to kill the players who haven't yet taken any general damage.
Akroma, Angel of Fury is a terrible thing for a deck relying on white and or blue primarily. Most decks that include white with black use whites targetted removal since it is more efficient. Even in a situation where her protection doesn't do anything it's still very easy to turn her into a two turn clock. I'll never forgive WOTC for not giving her haste. Also, she does have morph and she interacts with the command zone by costing two more when cast with morph. You need to know that for when people ask because you should never cast her for her morph cost. Ever. If you are losing and have the option of casting her for morph and blocking on their turn or just dieing. Choose dieing. Don't give the control player the satisfaction of finally having a relevant card against her. The deck I stuck her with is using all of the instants and sorcerys I rarely ever play and none of the 'good' cards outside of mana doublers because I wanted to see if I was missing something and she still just has a way of dominating games. Certainly if you're in a heavy control group and want to surprise your friends, Akroma with a heavy disruption/removal package and a plethora of wheel effects and ways to reuse them will turn their game plans upside down.
Jaya Ballard is also a very strong control meta general but of a different speed entirely from Akroma. I love Weebo's primer for her and it can be found here.
Marton Stromgald is an amazingly underplayed red creature. He is a HUGE part of my Rakka Mar deck above and is often the only thing I will use Imperial Recruiter to get. Honestly he even deserves a spot in a tribal Krenko build as an overrun effect with honorary goblin status. To really understand him, I direct you to ISBPathfinders thread.
Norin the Wary is a horrible general that you should never play. If you agree, go tell Gaka here. If you dissagree then I have no idea what I'm talking about and I apologize ahead of time.
Krenko, Mob Boss can be built many different ways. Combo, swarm, aggro, tribal, the list goes on. The unfortunate thing about him is he is SO freakin strong if given a turn or three that people will hate on you from the get go. It also doesn't tend to be a back and forth deck with great play quality because you're either way out in front and winning or doing nothing. That being said, I love krenko in my Wort, Boggart Auntie deck and honestly don't think that he's been explored to his fullest potential. I did stumble upon a list here with lots of great tips and card suggestions. Sticking to tribal also severly diminishes Krenko's power.
Slobad, Goblin Tinkerer is for those of you that love brown. I know that a lot of people play him with Obliterate but I've been crushed by his shenanigans without Obliterate. A former friend of mine on MTGO had a deck that never tried to touch lands and it was stupidly powerful and explosive. Doing a quick search I found a primer here by trees.
The big bad meanie against red has always been blue. If you run in combo/control heavy metas then you can interact in several ways. My favorite is Mage's Contest. Despite having fallen in love with red I am still very much a black player. When you cast it and they have the option of beating your opening bid of 1 damage they will always come back with 5. Top it by another 5. Make them PAY for that Boundless Realms because the only point of life that matters is the last one. Seriously though, Overmaster, Pyroblast and Red Elemental Blast are great at ensuring your stuff resolves. The second two also can counter some of the strongest/fastest generals in the format and typically 70% of the spells in their deck. Because you can't be a control deck, don't run them out of your hand at the first opportunity. Pick your spots and play smart. Red can kill artifacts like black can kill creatures and it's not terribly bad at killing creatures either. Unfortunately those enchantments only get answered by Chaos Warp, Spine of Ish Sah, Oblivion Stone, and Nevinyrral's Disk. Most of reds direct creature destruction doubles as land destruction and traditionally accepted 'strong' decks run multiple colors. If your group is competitive and runs lots of colorless utility lands, jump on their mana base and take a color away from them. You'd be surprised how often this works. Especially true with non green decks but after you've seen two ramp spells and they still only have one source of red mana for their general, kill that dual land. The wheel effects also play a double roll here at disrupting your opponents who are scultping their hand for their combo pieces and refilling your hand full of gas. You can build a really nasty anti control/combo list that can sit till it gets out Akroma and then just kill people but you can also run army in a can generals like Rakka Mar that are cheap to cast and easy to support. Jaya Ballard would also like a word with you if it truely is blue on blue on blue.
Aggro heavy metas are easy to deal with for red. Between Blasphemous Act, Chain Reaction, Earthquake, Rolling Earthquake, Fire Tempest, Inferno, Mizzium Mortars, and Starstorm you should be fine with creature armys. Tokens are even easier with a pethora of smaller Volcanic Fallout style spells. Insurrection and Twist Allegiance can turn their armys into your armys for a turn. You also have the benefit of a plethora of extra combat spells if you just want to out aggro the aggro table. Most of reds big fat beaters fly and there are plenty of them that come with extra benefits. You also benefit from being able to easily just burn face and close out games a turn early that an aggro deck might not have the reach for. Honestly, red thrives on aggro tables. Balefire Dragon, Bogardan Hellkite, Flameblast Dragon, Ryusei, the Falling Star, and Scourge of Kher Ridges at the top of your curve and teach them what for. Ashling, Jaya Ballard, or Tahngarth for removal on a stick generals or Rakka Mar, Krenko, Kiki-Jiki for army in a can generals.
Recursion heavy meta games with lots of graveyard shenanigans and creature theft are a little harder to deal with if you don't pack the answers you need. WOTC has given us a vast number of ways to clean out graveyards. You can also go really deep on it with a number of sacrifice outlets and some threaten effects to really abuse their cheap fattys. Token generators and Helm of Possession. I especially like creatureless decks here. Give them nothing to steal out of your yard and kill them with fire. Most heavy graveyard based decks run lots of 'each player sacrifices' effects so if you don't rely on creatures they're not disrupting you. Run a couple of shuffle effects so your business doesn't get exiled with your own grave hate. Remember that every time they have reanimation in hand and you've exiled the graveyards that they effectively are now sitting on dead cards in hand. Dong Zhou, the Tyrant should be a beast in this type of deck but honestly that's some arm chair racing. Pretty much any strategy works here since red isn't always in it's graveyard. Just run more hate.
The last part of this rodeo is card quality. I just mentioned Koth and I want to hammer home how important it is to run things that can win the game on their own. If you get Koth to 5 loyalty, ultimate him. Mountains tapping for damage can carry a game home easily. Dragonmaster Outcast at one single mana can walk away with a game if he goes unanswered and for seven more mana Utvara Hellkite will crush games in three turns (play with haste so you get at least one dragon for your money). This is also meta dependent. Shattering Spree is really hard to counter unless you only target the thing you need gone once. Vandalblast is better but more people want to prevent it from resolving. Smash is instant speed and replaces itself so you can wait for the blue player to tap out eot and you're not down a card. But if you're rocking a voltron deck then run Batterhorn and Oxidda Scrapmelter so they can carry swords around. Hateflayer bashes for 10, can swing into Avacyn, Angel of Hope or Ulamog and kill them thanks to wither, and is all around a bad ass despite being slow and expensive. There is no room in this format for red to run narrow answers or generic beaters. I'm timmy enough that I can get down on some Minotaur Aggressor. Big, haste, first strike, nice power numbers, what's not to love? I will not run it in mono red for the same reason that you won't run Craw Wurm in mono green. On the other side of that coin I absolutely love Spitebellows because he can answer any of the really problematic generals on the turns they come out or be a beater for his full price since outside of someone wasting path to exile on him he's killing two things. You would never have assumed that at first glance he is either 1 for 1 removal or a 2 for 1 beater/blocker. With red it is all about card quality. Build around your general because you will have access to it more then any other card in your deck but don't run 20 pump effects, 10 haste effects, 10 pieces of card draw and 20 sources of removal hoping Godo will get there. He won't, he'll get tucked, and then I'll get to read your next post about how mono red sucks.
A link was posted later on in here to a post from Giodante for some more great tips to playing mono red.
Good luck, have fun, may your enemys die in a fire.
A rundown on some of red's hate effects could be nice as well. Using things like Grip of Chaos, Blood Moon, War's Toll, and Stranglehold can cut people out of entire games without dabbling into mass LD.
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[Modern] Allies
I would go send Weebo a PM or check out his primer in the MP section. He has in my opinion the best experience / knowledge on her. You would probably find his primer on her informative to say the least. Overally I think she is cool and packs a lot of utility. She becomes stronger too the more blue you see which is unusual for most commanders.
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[Modern] Allies
Edit: Just saw your post Pathfinder, I've seen his primer a few times now, which is where I got the commander choice to be honest. I was curious as to others thoughts of Jaya, or any mono red for that matter. I'll go re read his though, its been a while.
Akroma, Angel of Fury lots of control decks have problems with her. She is really hard to tuck as well since blue and white have most of those effects. She can kill quickly thanks to her firebreathing and can be combined with mass LD effects decently if chosen or simply big mana / red control tactics.
Ashling the Pilgrim versatile commander in the fact that she doesnt push you into any one direction for your deck. She can work with mass LD as she comes in quickly or even voltron / control styles of play. She is versatile in what direction to take her. Thanks to her ability to self buff she scales into the game very nicely as well.
Godo, Bandit Warlord toolbox equipment. One of his downsides is that he is a bit predictable. He can kill quickly though and brings some consistancy that red often lacks to the table.
Homura, Human Ascendant Use some sac outlets to flip him. His buff is useful for both token or simply agro tactics. His mana cost is sort of high though considering he also needs a sac outlet plus other creatures to become useful though.
Ib Halfheart, Goblin Tactician the all in mass LD deck. Pop all of your lands into tokens then blow up all lands and hope nobody has a counterspell. This is the sort of deck for you if you like going all in plus blowing up lands.
Jaya Ballard, Task Mage versatile control. She is better if you see blue decks in your meta though. I once tried her out but it was against no blue decks and with Mayael the Anima vomiting indestructables out so.... probably not the best meta choice for me then lol. She has good versatility though.
Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker probably the hands down most competitive mono red commander out there. He is completely combo oriented and I wouldn't even bother touching him unless you are ok with running combo. He is very powerful but he does receive a lot more hate than other mono red commanders as a whole.
Krenko, Mob Boss the goblin wave. I haven't actually seen one of these decks yet myself but it is essentially a linear token production machine. The downside is that its easy to see coming, the upside is that hes easy to recast and gets out of hand very quickly.
Marton Stromgald the I swing for lethal at everyone commander. His pump is one of the biggest pump effects in the game and the only pump of even close to that size on a legend. I use him myself and have found him very enjoyable and he wins a lot My own list in my sig if you want to check him out.
Norin the Wary usually sort of a troll style of deck involving a lot of ETB creature support and chaos. Check out Gaka's list for more info.
Urabrask the Hidden sort of a chaotic ability that screws with blockers a lot. I haven't seen a ton of him around lately but he is hard to block and does a lot of damage racing.
Zirilan of the Claw dragon tribal style of deck. I haven't seen one in a while but it functions off of big mana quite well. Give it time and mana and it will assemble a ton of damage quickly.
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[Modern] Allies
The word you're looking for here is "moot."
Outside of that, and as a mono-red player myself, I agree with most of what you've said. In particular, I find the wheel effects doing more harm to my opponents than good. Red is an absolute blast.
Pristaxcontrombmodruu!
i think i know what im gonna do this afternoon...
put back my Tahngarth, Talruum Hero deck together again, and go smash some pretty face...
Hakim, Loreweaver
Autumn Willow
Yomiji, Who Bars the Way
Hanna, Ship's Navigator
Chromium
Skyfire Kirin
Ok, tonight after work I'll update the Op with what I know and give links to the ones I like. Huge raging fan of Smoke. Also dissapointed that Rakka Mar and Tahngarth weren't on your list of good red commanders. They're both easy to turn into monsters.
Kralc;
Thank for the kind words. Red likes artifacts too and stax is super easy to rock in red with Slobad, Goblin Tinkerer to protect what's important. I really like Jaya from having been on the receiving end of her. I haven't actually built her myself since I went with Akroma to hate on blue decks since she hates on white as well but the link to Weebo's thread earlier up the page should do you wonders.
Knautschke;
Lots of commanders in all colors are fragile and easy to deal with. Thankfully, your opponents die to fireballs just as fast as your general dies to removal.
Thanks again.
They're under card selection actually. I just didn't make a new tab for it because I didn't want to gum the thing up with tons of spoilers. But I fixed it for you.
One of the first things that I realized with Godo was to make mono red work, you need massive amounts of mana. I run 36-38 lands and 16-18 mana doublers/mana rocks that produce 2+ mana. Red is extremely efficient which it comes to answering small things with 2-3 toughness (lightning bolt/pyroclasm/whipflare), but once you need to answer 4+ toughness, or non land non artifact permanents, the costs start to balloon to 6-7+ mana to deal with them through earthquake effects or 7cc colorless answers like Karn or Spine of Ish Sah.
I found that to remain competitive, you need consistent access to acceleration and lands, which means running a ton of lands, and a ton of accelerants to be able to play your expensive answers in a timely manner.
In general, I have found that I just want to be pretty aggressive with most hands, but when you need an answer, you need an answer and you need to be able to play it.
I mostly picked out those that I had seen myself moreso. There are other commanders that you can push to work. I just haven't seen those commanders actually work out so much in my own past experience for multiplayer but I suppose they could become more viable in 1v1 or with a strategy I haven't seen or thought about yet.
Plus... I wrote that up at like 5:00 AM so I was sort of tired lol.
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[Modern] Allies
King of Misfortune & Master of Rocket Launchers
"Do ya feel lucky? Because you'd better start runnin' while you still can."
375 Misfortune {+3 signed AP's} & 104 Rocket Launcher (41 AQ/ 63 Rev)
Edgar Rice Burroughs, forgotten legend of the word.
Jalira, Master Polymorphist | Endrek Sahr, Master Breeder | Bosh, Iron Golem | Ezuri, Renegade Leader
Brago, King Eternal | Oona, Queen of the Fae | Wort, Boggart Auntie | Wort, the Raidmother
Captain Sisay | Rhys, the Redeemed | Trostani, Selesnya's Voice | Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord
Gisela, Blade of Goldnight | Obzedat, Ghost Council | Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind | Vorel of the Hull Clade
Uril, the Miststalker | Prossh, Skyraider of Kher | Nicol Bolas | Progenitus
Ghave, Guru of Spores | Zedruu the Greathearted | Damia, Sage of Stone | Riku of Two Reflections
Mind if I ask why Latulla? As someone who has a deck built around her, I don't see what the point is of making a weenie tribal deck and then tacking her on as commander.
Reckless Waif; It's the red Delver of Secrets.
Mono Red's Strengths and Mono White's Strengths
What do you think of Slobad, goblin tinkerer? I like him since red likes artifacts and he can protect half of them if need be. He really loves Obliterate.
My Saffi deck
as a rogue player, i just like the aspect of using her to try to one-shot my opponent when i ramp up my mana using Mana Echoes with Goblin Warrens [and Brightflame Ritual]. Sure, i'd also have Mogg Infestation to kick things off...
i like that aspect. using my commander as the cannon, rather than trying to build around her. she's not exactly the best General to build around (despite herself being a Keldon general in the Prophecy story).
I may actually never build the deck, i just think it'd be fun.
I can assume there are better Commanders, but being a legacy player at heart- she'd be the most interesting.
if possible, i'd try to find a way to make Starke of Rath a general.
King of Misfortune & Master of Rocket Launchers
"Do ya feel lucky? Because you'd better start runnin' while you still can."
375 Misfortune {+3 signed AP's} & 104 Rocket Launcher (41 AQ/ 63 Rev)
Edgar Rice Burroughs, forgotten legend of the word.
I think Starke of Rath can be an absolute beast. Land a Homeward Path with him and he's bonkers.
Heartless can be an absolute beast, and I really like Kumano (moreso as one of 100 cards in a Big Red deck, rather than the general, but he's strong nonetheless).
that0neguy; I completely agree that mana is important but not to every deck. It's pretty easy to be undercosted in red and still be strong. Not that I disagree that a lot of mono red strategys require a ton of colorless ramp.
Completely disagree with the aggressive part though when it comes to multiplayer. Your play style is just different from mine. I enjoy waiting in the weeds and then stomping people to death. I don't like being the big early game threat that takes all the stray attacks mid game. Unless the deck is truely designed to kill before they stabalize which I am proud to to say red can do it.
ISBPathfinder; I have a Rakka Mar deck that was infamous with the folks that I would routinely see on MTGO multiplayer games. It was pretty disgusting before stumbling on and stealing a few cards from your Marton Stromgald deck (including Marton himself). Thanks for all your hard work. =p
Selvaxri; build a Latulla, Keldon Overseer deck. The worst that could happen is you build a great deck that needs a better general and the best would be that I end up stealing all your secrets and trying it out for myself. Maybe that's just best for me...
--
Super excited that people have as much interest in red as I do.
The reason I say that you sometimes just need to be aggressive, is that there are some strategies that you will often just lose to if the game goes long, usually some type of prison strategy revolving around enchantments or recurring instants/sorceries.
There are answers to any board state, All is Dust usually being my catch all, but if they start to back up those board states with counterspells and a little pressure, the game slips away the longer a game goes.
I think this might be something that is more of a problem for a smaller metagame than a larger one though. I play in a pretty small metagame so I see cards like Stoney Silence, Aura Shards, Iona along with a lot of artifact hate directed pretty speficially at me. (And I maindeck things like Anarchy in response).
Not that Aggression is always Plan A, but its also important to recognize the situations where it might be your only out.