This is a deck I brewed up about a month ago and I've been on the fence about posting it. The idea was to find a home for Pharagax Giant. He's too high on the curve for Burn since you should have already won by then and he's also not good for aggro. The only logical home I could think was a control deck. How about a Mono-Red control deck?
Inflame works great with my cheap low damage sweepers to help clear out some bigger guys. It also works well with the other spot removal to handle anything that would normally be out of hand for normal burn.
Wall of Fire can really stall the game, but maybe Frostburn Weird would be a better option as it's cheaper and can also help go for the win.
The sideboard can help add more burn when facing against decks that are lighter on the creature count and it also carries Pyroblast and friends to help control most control decks. Raze is also there to mess up any multicolored decks you might face. Admittedly Raze could probably be replaced with something more useful if anyone has a better sideboard option.
My best suggestion is the mana base. You should go for a playset of Deserts and maybe even Quicksands. Forgotten Cave will also help substantially. This might get in the way of Skreds' playability, but will be worth it in the end.
I'll take a look around and see if I missed anything.
My best suggestion is the mana base. You should go for a playset of Deserts and maybe even Quicksands. Forgotten Cave will also help substantially. This might get in the way of Skreds' playability, but will be worth it in the end.
I'll take a look around and see if I missed anything.
Arc Lightning is great, but I'm not sure what I could drop to fit it in. Any suggestions?
Kiln Fiend is one of my favorite cards of all time, but I feel it will come up short in this list. If my gameplan was to try and dump my hand every turn, then I could see him working, but for right now he'll be sidelined. He could be a pretty good SB choice to get a faster win against Combo or other decks that might have an empty board early in the game.
Desert will definitely be added to the list! With a couple of those in play the looming threat of Inflame can be even better. I think I'll stick to Desert and leave out Quicksands for the moment. I'll keep them in mind if I feel I need more removal.
I originally wanted to have mostly instants so I chose Shard Volley over Flame Slash and also since it could hit a player too. Now that I think about it though, at one mana it being a sorcery doesn't matter since I will surely have more open mana to work with.
How good is Dangerous Wager for you? I'd be tempted to take them out and add in 2x Faithless Looting instead. It doesn't net you cards, but discarding excess lands is just as good.
with a card saved by having only 2 Faithless Looting, I would also take out 1 Chandra's Fury for +2 Arc Lightning. You could possibly remove the last Chandras for a third copy of Arc.
Wouldn't you prefer Rolling Thunder over the Torch in the side? You can divide the damage as you want, which seems like a big plus to your deck!
I really like that Swirling Sandstorm, and wouldn't mind seeing a second copy. How easily do you get Thresh?
Oh! And I think you should switch the numbers of Giants and Weirds. You want to get as many weirds as possible, while the Giant is a game ender that you don't want to draw in your opener.
How good is Dangerous Wager for you? I'd be tempted to take them out and add in 2x Faithless Looting instead. It doesn't net you cards, but discarding excess lands is just as good.
with a card saved by having only 2 Faithless Looting, I would also take out 1 Chandra's Fury for +2 Arc Lightning. You could possibly remove the last Chandras for a third copy of Arc.
Wouldn't you prefer Rolling Thunder over the Torch in the side? You can divide the damage as you want, which seems like a big plus to your deck!
I really like that Swirling Sandstorm, and wouldn't mind seeing a second copy. How easily do you get Thresh?
Oh! And I think you should switch the numbers of Giants and Weirds. You want to get as many weirds as possible, while the Giant is a game ender that you don't want to draw in your opener.
Dangerous Wager is pretty good, but only if I'm down to no other cards in hand. Faithless Looting will probably dig for answers better while getting to Threshold faster and allowing for a bit more spell space if I run 2.
I'll take your advice, but drop the single Chandra's Fury for a second Swirling Sandstorm instead of an Arc Lightning. Getting to Threshold really depends on the matchup though. If there aren't a lot of targets for my spells then it's slow going, but if that's happening then I'm probably not needing to cast the Sandstorm anyway.
Rolling Thunder would be good, but I'm pack the torch mainly to hit players to close out certain matchups. I like it since it's harder to answer. I'm already able to hit creatures with a lot of damage so I'm sure I can go without Rolling Thunder. I'll keep it in mind as a future maybe depending on how things go with this list.
Overall this deck does a pretty good job. It can handle early threats and also deal with multiple threats. Sometimes it falls short, but with the changes I feel it's getting better. Perhaps it could even be competitive.
I think it's already looking a lot better! If you could play against some of the Tier1 decks and tell us how it goes, that would be great! I'm very interested in what comes out of it. I think those Deserts are going to be huge for the deck, like they were when I discovered them for my MUC.
Yeah, Desert was a great find! It fits into so many spots and doesn't take up space for other spells! So far it goes 50/50 against my Delver deck and that's without sideboarding. I'll definitely try it against some others.
Maybe a 1-of Flame Jab could be useful? I tend to want to put that card everywhere when I play Red. It's easy to include in small numbers and improves your draws late in the game by at least turning your useless lands into 1 damage.
I've been considering Flame Jab as well. I'll probably replace a Swirling Sandstorm for it.
As far as other matchups: This deck did really well against the Presence of Gond deck. All the burn plus Electrickery can put a stop to their plans. It also did well against Infect since there are a lot of answers to creatures packed in the deck.
Against MBC it puts up a good fight, but ultimately depends on being aggressive against their life total since a well timed Corrupt can put your opponent on top. The MBC list I played against uses Unearth to bring back ETB creatures so the creature burn falls a bit short sometimes.
White Weenie is a pretty tough matchup, especially with Standard Bearer and a board full of threats. Add in Benevolent Bodyguard and Guardian of the Guildpact and it gets worse. Fire at Will could be a replacement for Arc Lightning if the Guardian is expected in my meta or at least a sideboard option.
EDIT: It also did pretty well against a Hawks deck too!
I wonder if Fire at Will is really such useful card, since all it really does is counter a Guardian. It's such an inefficient card.
I took your deck for a spin and played a few games against a Delver deck. Based on that matchup, the deck seems to do very well. Also, I found that Inflame was pretty useless. This may not be the case for all matchups, but I get the feeling that in a lot of games, it won't be incredibly useful either. I would remove two and add two Flame Jabs I think. What kind of decks was Inflame doing well against?
Yeah, Fire at Will probably wouldn't be useful except against Guardian.
Inflame is a weird card sometimes. It doesn't help against anything specifically, but there has been times when it really came in handy and others when it didn't. Sometimes it was used as a Shock when I just needed the extra damage to take out something like Ulamog's Crusher and most times I only needed one point of damage to kill a threat and not 2. I'll add in the Flame Jabs and keep 2 Inflame and that should help a lot to add more pressure on the opponent.
Curse has won me a lot of matches and gets really good with multiples in play. A lot of times you can just answer their creatures and let them bleed out for the win.
Have you considered Crushing Pain? If you're using Inflame almost only to deal extra damage to a single creature, than Pain would be a lot better. It's too bad, because Electrickery+Inflame would be such a blowout, but I feel like it's a really rare occurrence.
I have considered Crushing Pain. It's just a preference of dealing a lot of damage to one creature or moderate damage to a few. As I test more or if I get a chance to try it competitively then I'll see which works better. Maybe I'll put Crushing Pain in my SB and see how it goes.
I have to say those 6 REBs are very welcome in the side. The list as it stands feels competitive now. I'm making tweaks on my end based on preference of burn spells, but other than that it's great.
I'd love to see your list once you've got it tweaked how you like.
Pharagax Giant is good, but it always seems to fall short since your opponent can find ways around it easily. He was the reason I wanted to put the deck together, but unfortunately I feel he needs to go.
Heirs are pretty good since they can be a growing threat, but starting as a 2/2 isn't that good.
Ill-tempered Cyclops looks great, especially with the Trample.
Gorehorn Minotaurs might be the best choice since the Bloodthirst is easy and they're efficiently priced.
After a quick look at other creatures I found Retromancer. He's not too powerful, but he might stick around for a while and even puts through damage if he'd be removed by a spell. I'll test around with other options and see what works.
I'm currently favoring the Cyclops just for the trample. After that, I'm not certain. The vampires are cool because they're basically unblockable (what red creatures do we see that can handle it? Only Nivix Cyclops). How easy would it be to get Bloodthirst, I'm not sure. The minotaur seems like the most powerful option, but I'm worried that we might have to make sub-optimal plays just to play him.
I like the look of your list. Good numbers and it looks like you can handle a lot of creatures. The SB looks great too! Fissure is a good addition to handle any creatures that might be troublesome or any lands. The name of your deck is awesome too!
Yeah, Searing Blaze is a card I have a hard time playing correctly, so I rather fill up slots on things like Skred and Flame Slash, even if they don't damage the opponent. I also went without Inflame or Crushing Pain entirely. Fissure is a card I haven't played since my first years playing magic, but I think it might be just what we need here. I can't imagine very many scenarios where you would destroy a land and not a creature around turn 5, but the option is there. There aren't too many straight up kill spells in Red, and this one is playable.
I've played against Mono-Green Stompy. Unfortunately, in two of the three games I played, I never drew into more lands and stayed stuck at two, so I feel the results weren't representative of the power of the deck. It should be a good matchup, I think!
Sounds like a good game plan! As long as you can keep having answers to creatures you'll eventually win with just Curse and Flame Jab and that's not even considering your creatures speeding it up.
I can see how Searing Blaze can be a little weird to play, especially since it requires a creature for it to be played. However, I feel it's a strong value card since you get to Bolt a creature and a player so it's definitely not wasted IMO. That's also why Arc Lightning is a great choice too, you don't waste any of the damage it deals. Searing Blaze is also an obvious choice to board out in certain matchups. If you fell like Searing Blaze isn't making the cut then Rolling Thunder might serve better since you can always use extra mana to deal damage to your opponent and take out multiple creatures.
I finally dropped Inflame from the list. I'd rather have the extra Skred and Flame Slash. It's unfortunate considering it's one of the reasons I thought about building this deck, but most times I'd use it with other burn spells just to kill one creature leading to a 1-for-2 situation and sometimes even a 1-for-3. That's just a disadvantage, especially since we're control!
I think my next step is to test this deck against decks that either don't use a lot of creatures or are completely creatureless. Burn seems like it'll be a tough matchup and combos could be troublesome.
Searing Blaze is a card that really wants to be plowed into the first viable target. At 23 lands, you shouldn't have too much trouble turning it on - the main weak point is being unable to fetch into it on the opposing turn.
Basically, it's like playing with Smash to Smithereens - it should be a 1-for-1 with bonus damage at the first available opportunity. If that's not where this deck wants to be, there are certainly other options...
EDIT: One thing people forget about Searing Blaze is that it targets both the creature and the player, so if they trade a Vines of Vastwood for it, the back end still hits them.
EDIT EDIT: I had a good feeling about Ill-Tempered Cyclops - 3/3 Trample for 3R is a good deal, and Monstrous mode is a solid beating. No idea what to do about burn, though.
Oh, you think the losers' bracket is your ally, but you merely adopted the scrub tier. I was born in it, molded by it. I didn’t 4-0 an FNM until I was already a man; by then, it was nothing to me but an extra pack to sell for store credit!
Funny how the cards that first prompted you to play this deck ended up getting cut to make the overall better. I think it's more of a compliment to the design of the deck rather than poor deck-building. Your idea was really good, and it's only getting better.
Burn is probably going to be a bad matchup, as we're basically a half-assed Burn deck in this scenario. Other creature-light strategies are actually not too bad. Other than TPPS, combo decks rely on some creatures in order to win, such as Nivix Cyclops or Sunscape Familiar. They will be punished for relying on specific cards to win and being too slow to recover.
Ill-Tempered Cyclops is actually really good. That Trample is super relevant. Not to mention that when he comes out, he often becomes monstrous the following turn.
We're outmatched against Burn. When throwing all our Burn at their face, we're an average of 2 turns slower on the clock compared to them. This gets better with the sideboarded Chain Lightnings and Fireblasts though. Don't forget to copy their Chain lightnings and use it against them, and to also use yours when they can't send it back! Creature are super important in this matchup. This goes particularly for Frostburn Weird which can deliver a beating and be immune to Bolts on their turn. I go -3 Electrickery, -2 Swirling Sandstorm, -1 Desert, +4 Chain Lightning, +2 Fireblast.
Against MBC, the matchup feels even worse. As soon as you start to feel in control, they kill their own creatures with Tendrils of Corruption in response to your burn spells and Corrupt you in the face until you're dead. Those life swings are just too much. I once had 2 Curses on the opponent and have them still win through their massive life gain. I also despise Chittering Rats now. So annoying.
That's some great advice against Burn. If I had Chain Lightnings I'd definitely use them but I don't have the budget for those ATM.
MBC has been tricky in my playtests. Corrupts, Gray Merchants and Tendrils are the worst! I'd say it would be best to play more of a burn strategy, but even then they can Ritual into the lifegain they need earlier and still stabilize. I'd say drop some of your creatures as they'll have the removal waiting and try and pack more direct damage. If only they'd reprint Sulfuric Vortex as a common...
That's some great advice against Burn. If I had Chain Lightnings I'd definitely use them but I don't have the budget for those ATM.
MBC has been tricky in my playtests. Corrupts, Gray Merchants and Tendrils are the worst! I'd say it would be best to play more of a burn strategy, but even then they can Ritual into the lifegain they need earlier and still stabilize. I'd say drop some of your creatures as they'll have the removal waiting and try and pack more direct damage. If only they'd reprint Sulfuric Vortex as a common...
lol, analyses is the word! A-nal-ee-seez!
Well against burn I suppose Lava Spike is just as good. You should definitely invest in Chain Lightnings, though. They're really good and useful in several decks. A friend of mine found them in the 15 cent commons piles in a store, once. Unfortunately, they've wised up since then.
Yeah, creatures are totally useless against MBC. More burn is just better, since it will blank much of their deck. I don't know, I guess this means we'd need to cut back on some of the six Pyroblast and devote more space to more burn spells. This would help against both Burn and MBC.
Against Burn there is pretty much nothing else you can do. Except there are too many cards in the main that you'd want to side out. You'll have to decide if you want to dedicate more SB Slots to that MU...
The problem against MBC is twofold:
1. Their lifegain.
Can't do anything against Corrupt, but against Gary and Tendrils your instant removal is key. So you shouldn't waste it on something unsubstantial.
Btw, that's why I love Skullcrack in Peasant RDW!
2. Supply.
Most of their cards are built-in two-for-ones, which is why the deck is so good. You have to somehow hold against that. Key cards here are Searing Blaze, Firebolt, Staggershock,...? Things that generate card advantage. Flame Jab doesn't really count though, as it doesn't kill anything.
Probably will have to change up the sideboard for this.
There's just nothing to do versus a Corrupt, and we can hardly kill them fast enough to prevent them from hitting 6 mana. I did catch on to the trick of removing creatures in response to a tendrils to prevent them from gaining life, so that helps a bit.
Every single one of their creatures must die, or else they start swinging with them and we're basically defenseless. And since many of them have high toughness, they all need flame slashes or Skreds.
None of those cards are really 2-for-1s. I see staggershock and Firebolt as 4-damage spells in a game versus MBC, unless they play two 2-toughness creatures.
Since we can't fight their life gain and their creatures create card advantage we can't really match, it seems like the only solution is to outrace them. Prevent them from playing too many spells by applying a crazy amount of pressure, like a classic Burn deck. Do we have another option?
3x Electrickery
4x Lightning Bolt
3x Searing Blaze
4x Skred
Creature
3x Retromancer
4x Frostburn Weird
Sorcery
2x Flame Jab
2x Faithless Looting
3x Arc Lightning
3x Flame Slash
2x Swirling Sandstorm
4x Curse of the Pierced Heart
Land
2x Forgotten Cave
4x Desert
17x Snow-Covered Mountain
3x Kaervek's Torch
3x Lava Spike
1x Fireblast
3x Pyroblast
2x Crushing Pain
3x Red Elemental Blast
Inflame works great with my cheap low damage sweepers to help clear out some bigger guys. It also works well with the other spot removal to handle anything that would normally be out of hand for normal burn.
Curse of the Pierced Heart can close out any games that you need to grind out.
Wall of Fire can really stall the game, but maybe Frostburn Weird would be a better option as it's cheaper and can also help go for the win.
The sideboard can help add more burn when facing against decks that are lighter on the creature count and it also carries Pyroblast and friends to help control most control decks. Raze is also there to mess up any multicolored decks you might face. Admittedly Raze could probably be replaced with something more useful if anyone has a better sideboard option.
Any big control cards that I'm missing?
Comments and suggestions are welcome!
Arc Lightning would be excellent here.
I would go for Flame Slash rather than Shard Volley.
My best suggestion is the mana base. You should go for a playset of Deserts and maybe even Quicksands. Forgotten Cave will also help substantially. This might get in the way of Skreds' playability, but will be worth it in the end.
I'll take a look around and see if I missed anything.
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Arc Lightning is great, but I'm not sure what I could drop to fit it in. Any suggestions?
Kiln Fiend is one of my favorite cards of all time, but I feel it will come up short in this list. If my gameplan was to try and dump my hand every turn, then I could see him working, but for right now he'll be sidelined. He could be a pretty good SB choice to get a faster win against Combo or other decks that might have an empty board early in the game.
Desert will definitely be added to the list! With a couple of those in play the looming threat of Inflame can be even better. I think I'll stick to Desert and leave out Quicksands for the moment. I'll keep them in mind if I feel I need more removal.
I originally wanted to have mostly instants so I chose Shard Volley over Flame Slash and also since it could hit a player too. Now that I think about it though, at one mana it being a sorcery doesn't matter since I will surely have more open mana to work with.
I'll make the updates on my OP.
with a card saved by having only 2 Faithless Looting, I would also take out 1 Chandra's Fury for +2 Arc Lightning. You could possibly remove the last Chandras for a third copy of Arc.
Wouldn't you prefer Rolling Thunder over the Torch in the side? You can divide the damage as you want, which seems like a big plus to your deck!
I really like that Swirling Sandstorm, and wouldn't mind seeing a second copy. How easily do you get Thresh?
Oh! And I think you should switch the numbers of Giants and Weirds. You want to get as many weirds as possible, while the Giant is a game ender that you don't want to draw in your opener.
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Dangerous Wager is pretty good, but only if I'm down to no other cards in hand. Faithless Looting will probably dig for answers better while getting to Threshold faster and allowing for a bit more spell space if I run 2.
I'll take your advice, but drop the single Chandra's Fury for a second Swirling Sandstorm instead of an Arc Lightning. Getting to Threshold really depends on the matchup though. If there aren't a lot of targets for my spells then it's slow going, but if that's happening then I'm probably not needing to cast the Sandstorm anyway.
Rolling Thunder would be good, but I'm pack the torch mainly to hit players to close out certain matchups. I like it since it's harder to answer. I'm already able to hit creatures with a lot of damage so I'm sure I can go without Rolling Thunder. I'll keep it in mind as a future maybe depending on how things go with this list.
Overall this deck does a pretty good job. It can handle early threats and also deal with multiple threats. Sometimes it falls short, but with the changes I feel it's getting better. Perhaps it could even be competitive.
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As far as other matchups: This deck did really well against the Presence of Gond deck. All the burn plus Electrickery can put a stop to their plans. It also did well against Infect since there are a lot of answers to creatures packed in the deck.
Against MBC it puts up a good fight, but ultimately depends on being aggressive against their life total since a well timed Corrupt can put your opponent on top. The MBC list I played against uses Unearth to bring back ETB creatures so the creature burn falls a bit short sometimes.
White Weenie is a pretty tough matchup, especially with Standard Bearer and a board full of threats. Add in Benevolent Bodyguard and Guardian of the Guildpact and it gets worse. Fire at Will could be a replacement for Arc Lightning if the Guardian is expected in my meta or at least a sideboard option.
EDIT: It also did pretty well against a Hawks deck too!
I took your deck for a spin and played a few games against a Delver deck. Based on that matchup, the deck seems to do very well. Also, I found that Inflame was pretty useless. This may not be the case for all matchups, but I get the feeling that in a lot of games, it won't be incredibly useful either. I would remove two and add two Flame Jabs I think. What kind of decks was Inflame doing well against?
Curse of the Pierced Heart is actually really awesome. Good find!
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Inflame is a weird card sometimes. It doesn't help against anything specifically, but there has been times when it really came in handy and others when it didn't. Sometimes it was used as a Shock when I just needed the extra damage to take out something like Ulamog's Crusher and most times I only needed one point of damage to kill a threat and not 2. I'll add in the Flame Jabs and keep 2 Inflame and that should help a lot to add more pressure on the opponent.
Curse has won me a lot of matches and gets really good with multiples in play. A lot of times you can just answer their creatures and let them bleed out for the win.
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I'm going to try playing another creature than Pharagax Giant. I'm thinking of trying either Gorehorn Minotaurs, Heirs of Stromkirk or Ill-tempered Cyclops. They cost less, and can get to be as big or bigger than the Giant.
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Pharagax Giant is good, but it always seems to fall short since your opponent can find ways around it easily. He was the reason I wanted to put the deck together, but unfortunately I feel he needs to go.
Heirs are pretty good since they can be a growing threat, but starting as a 2/2 isn't that good.
Ill-tempered Cyclops looks great, especially with the Trample.
Gorehorn Minotaurs might be the best choice since the Bloodthirst is easy and they're efficiently priced.
After a quick look at other creatures I found Retromancer. He's not too powerful, but he might stick around for a while and even puts through damage if he'd be removed by a spell. I'll test around with other options and see what works.
This is my list so far. It's feeling pretty good!
4 Frostburn Weird
3 Ill-Tempered Cyclops
Burn (19)
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Skred
4 Flame Slash
2 Flame Jab
2 Searing Blaze
3 Arc Lightning
3 Electrickery
2 Swirling Sandstorm
Other (6)
4 Curse of the Pierced Heart
2 Faithless Looting
Lands (23)
17 Snow-covered Mountain
2 Forgotten Cave
4 Desert
1 Electrickery
2 Fireblast
4 Chain Lightning
3 Pyroblast
3 Red Elemental Blast
2 Fissure
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What other decks have you tested it against?
I've played against Mono-Green Stompy. Unfortunately, in two of the three games I played, I never drew into more lands and stayed stuck at two, so I feel the results weren't representative of the power of the deck. It should be a good matchup, I think!
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I can see how Searing Blaze can be a little weird to play, especially since it requires a creature for it to be played. However, I feel it's a strong value card since you get to Bolt a creature and a player so it's definitely not wasted IMO. That's also why Arc Lightning is a great choice too, you don't waste any of the damage it deals. Searing Blaze is also an obvious choice to board out in certain matchups. If you fell like Searing Blaze isn't making the cut then Rolling Thunder might serve better since you can always use extra mana to deal damage to your opponent and take out multiple creatures.
I finally dropped Inflame from the list. I'd rather have the extra Skred and Flame Slash. It's unfortunate considering it's one of the reasons I thought about building this deck, but most times I'd use it with other burn spells just to kill one creature leading to a 1-for-2 situation and sometimes even a 1-for-3. That's just a disadvantage, especially since we're control!
I think my next step is to test this deck against decks that either don't use a lot of creatures or are completely creatureless. Burn seems like it'll be a tough matchup and combos could be troublesome.
Basically, it's like playing with Smash to Smithereens - it should be a 1-for-1 with bonus damage at the first available opportunity. If that's not where this deck wants to be, there are certainly other options...
EDIT: One thing people forget about Searing Blaze is that it targets both the creature and the player, so if they trade a Vines of Vastwood for it, the back end still hits them.
EDIT EDIT: I had a good feeling about Ill-Tempered Cyclops - 3/3 Trample for 3R is a good deal, and Monstrous mode is a solid beating. No idea what to do about burn, though.
Burn is probably going to be a bad matchup, as we're basically a half-assed Burn deck in this scenario. Other creature-light strategies are actually not too bad. Other than TPPS, combo decks rely on some creatures in order to win, such as Nivix Cyclops or Sunscape Familiar. They will be punished for relying on specific cards to win and being too slow to recover.
Ill-Tempered Cyclops is actually really good. That Trample is super relevant. Not to mention that when he comes out, he often becomes monstrous the following turn.
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We're outmatched against Burn. When throwing all our Burn at their face, we're an average of 2 turns slower on the clock compared to them. This gets better with the sideboarded Chain Lightnings and Fireblasts though. Don't forget to copy their Chain lightnings and use it against them, and to also use yours when they can't send it back! Creature are super important in this matchup. This goes particularly for Frostburn Weird which can deliver a beating and be immune to Bolts on their turn. I go -3 Electrickery, -2 Swirling Sandstorm, -1 Desert, +4 Chain Lightning, +2 Fireblast.
Against MBC, the matchup feels even worse. As soon as you start to feel in control, they kill their own creatures with Tendrils of Corruption in response to your burn spells and Corrupt you in the face until you're dead. Those life swings are just too much. I once had 2 Curses on the opponent and have them still win through their massive life gain. I also despise Chittering Rats now. So annoying.
UGTurboFogGU
BRSacrificial AggroBR
16The Paper Pauper Battle Bag16
EDH
BRRakdos, Lord of PingersBR
GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
UB Ramses OverdarkUB
Sig by Ace5301 of Ace of Spades Studio
That's some great advice against Burn. If I had Chain Lightnings I'd definitely use them but I don't have the budget for those ATM.
MBC has been tricky in my playtests. Corrupts, Gray Merchants and Tendrils are the worst! I'd say it would be best to play more of a burn strategy, but even then they can Ritual into the lifegain they need earlier and still stabilize. I'd say drop some of your creatures as they'll have the removal waiting and try and pack more direct damage. If only they'd reprint Sulfuric Vortex as a common...
lol, analyses is the word! A-nal-ee-seez!
Well against burn I suppose Lava Spike is just as good. You should definitely invest in Chain Lightnings, though. They're really good and useful in several decks. A friend of mine found them in the 15 cent commons piles in a store, once. Unfortunately, they've wised up since then.
Yeah, creatures are totally useless against MBC. More burn is just better, since it will blank much of their deck. I don't know, I guess this means we'd need to cut back on some of the six Pyroblast and devote more space to more burn spells. This would help against both Burn and MBC.
Probably will have to change up the sideboard for this.
There's just nothing to do versus a Corrupt, and we can hardly kill them fast enough to prevent them from hitting 6 mana. I did catch on to the trick of removing creatures in response to a tendrils to prevent them from gaining life, so that helps a bit.
Every single one of their creatures must die, or else they start swinging with them and we're basically defenseless. And since many of them have high toughness, they all need flame slashes or Skreds.
None of those cards are really 2-for-1s. I see staggershock and Firebolt as 4-damage spells in a game versus MBC, unless they play two 2-toughness creatures.
Since we can't fight their life gain and their creatures create card advantage we can't really match, it seems like the only solution is to outrace them. Prevent them from playing too many spells by applying a crazy amount of pressure, like a classic Burn deck. Do we have another option?
UGTurboFogGU
BRSacrificial AggroBR
16The Paper Pauper Battle Bag16
EDH
BRRakdos, Lord of PingersBR
GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
UB Ramses OverdarkUB
Sig by Ace5301 of Ace of Spades Studio
4 Lava Spike
3 Fireblast
4 Pyroblast
The Chain Lightnings can be Rift Bolts, if need be.
Against, MBC, I guess I would go -3 Electrickery, -4 Frostburn Weird, -3 Ill-Tempered Cyclops, -1 Desert, +1 Burn Package.
UGTurboFogGU
BRSacrificial AggroBR
16The Paper Pauper Battle Bag16
EDH
BRRakdos, Lord of PingersBR
GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
UB Ramses OverdarkUB
Sig by Ace5301 of Ace of Spades Studio