Ash Zealot is very good. I want to meet the genius who argues against it in a deck so sorely lacking in card quality and in such dire need of batallion enablers.
Please, I'm listening.
it's not a bad card by any measure, it just isn't good in this shell. In essence it's 2/2 firststrike with haste (it's anti-flashback ability is obviously awesome but much less relevant for AIR than RDW). It's problem is partially that it's casting cost is hard to handle off BTE but also it doesn't actually do much.
All of the two-drops so far do something besides beat down for 2, ash zealot doesn't. With six first strike enablers the first strike is pretty mediocre, infact it can be a hindrance as much as a benefit becaues it makes our weapon surges less effective. The haste is nice but it's cost pretty much ensures that if we have a BTE in hand it's coming down on turn three and we're likely to be casting a Foundry-street Denizen or stromkirk noble in its place. Which is far from ideal.
Now assuming that we don't have a BTE in hand we still want to cast it after any of our other two drops so it's still coming down turn three which is, in most games our crucial turn in emptying our hand for the Dynacharge/ Weapon surge. Ash Zealot puts a spanner in that, she really is too slow .
Realisticly we want to go
Turn 1: 1 drop
Turn 2 : 2 drop, hopefully Two 2 drop's off BTE.
Turn 3: 2 or 3 1 drops
Turn 4: Dyncharge- opponent is dead or Weapn Surge- opponent's board is cleared (usually scoop).
With Ash zealot we can't cast two 1 drops turn 3 so we lose a body for dynacharge/battalion, gain no extra power over two one drops and gain arbitary card advantage. We also cast less bodies and therefore less batallion enablers, whic can be brutal.
I had Ash Zealot in my list for quite a while but it just wasn't stelar, I found myself wishing it was a 1 drop 1/1 more often than not. Her biggest advantage is she lives through eletrickery but seeing as naya blitz isn't a big part of the meta we hardly see electrickery anyway.
That list has very obvious flaws, he even said so himself. Certainly not something you want in the OP of your primer.
The curent primer list is pretty bad, it has a terrible manabase, running expensive burn and has a sideboard which looks cut and pasted from an RDW deck. My list does have flaws but the list in the OP has a lot more, I don't think that my list should be in the primer, it's still being refined but we should have it updated with *someones* list.
Edit: I should add I'm currently assessing the viability of running a set of Gore-House Chainwalker's in place of the goblin arsonists in the sidebord. Ideally I'd lik tt cut the reckless waifs all together and not have to have sidebord slots dedicated to taking her out in bad matchups but we really dont have any other options.
Ive been running AIR for a while now, I originally started about a month and a half ago and since then I've taken it to a handful of FNM's and been playimg with it almost exclusively amongst my playgroup.
some things I've discovered in my testing:
Ash Zealot isn't too crash hot in AIR, really anything you cant cast off a BTE can burn a hole in your hand and with 6 first-strike enablers I found it being a rakdos shread-freak most of the time
Vexing Devil seems to suffer from all its flaws that it has had in standard since print, really that choice for our opponent is brutal for us, it often results in control/midrange decks stabilizing at 1-2 life and stealing the game from us. Don't get me wrong, it represents awesome effeciency but it is just so bad after about T2 and is a horrible topdeck after we've emptied our hands. I run reckless waif in its origional place and I think just about any one drop 1/1 would do better than vexing devil but I guess it might deserve a little more testing.
3 cmc cards just dont seem to work, I run a singleton Fervant Cathar in the sideboard ATM and only because I dont really have too much to cut it for, with 18 lands (often sideboarding dow to 17) we just dont have the manabase to support them.
This deck really needs another all-star 1 drop, at the moment I'm running reckless waif and ive tested literally every 1cmc red card but really we suffer with what we have. Goblin Arsonist is probably the strongest candidate but ao far reckless waif has proved to be more punishing for control.
weapon surge is an allstar, it seems bad and sometimes it is just half of a dynacharge but in so many games an overloaded weapon surge clears our opponents board and ends in a scoop. I dont think its worth maindecking more than two though.
I did manage to take out an FNM, im on my phone atm (so please excuse the typos) but you can find my report in the mono-red thread.
Junk-something:
This was my first match of the night, also the quickest, the poor guy didn't play a non-land card, I also didn't end up figuring out what he was playing. Game 1 I opened with a Foundry Street Denizen, turn 2 I played a Burning-Tree Emissary into Krenko's Command swung for 4, turn 3 I swung and overloaded a dynacharge and my opponent scooped. Game 2 was much like game one, I didn't bother sideboard or to take notes but it was another turn 3 scoop. The entire match was over in under 5 minutes.
UWR-Control: Game 1 was an outright race, my opponent wasn't sure what to make of my turn 1 Foundry Street Denizen and just let me empty my hand and beat him down for the win, I didn't see a single spell.
I assumed he was playing UWR midrange and expected to see a t3 reckoner, I boarded in Mugging, Firefist Striker, the Dynacharge and Rubblebelt Maaka's and took out the Stromkirk Noble's and Weapon Surge's.
Game 2: After a mulll to 5 I emptied my hand onto the battlefield and by turn five I had him at 2 life, he top-decked a supreme verdict, stabilized and beat me down with an AEtherling, burning any creature that I actually managed to resolve.
After seeing him playing control I took the Firefist Striker's out for the Stromkirk Noble's and kept the Mugging's for his aetherling, even though I hoped to never see it.
Game 3: a turn 1 and two Reckless Waif kept him main-phasing his ample removal and cantrips/cyclers and I was able to just keep beating him down till a T6 aetherling at 10 life started to kill my board presence, luckily the following turn he top-decked a land and transformed both my Reckless Waif's and I topdecked a mugging which I used to push through my attackers and beat him down to 0
Junk-Aristocrats: the toughest matchup of the night, swinging into a wall of tokens is never good especially when they have access to so many combat tricks. Luckily Weapon Surge appears to be a bit of a trump card here. I didn't see a single Legion Loyalist but I imagine he'd be an allstar in this matchup.
Game 1: got off to a solid start with denizen into burning tree+ lightning mauler, my opponent dropped a sorin and lingering souls to answer and we entered a stalemate where we both were amassing a similarly sized board state, I managed to top deck two Krenko's Command but she had eventuality, I ended up swining hoping a Weapon Surge would trump her combat tricks after a long sequence of double-blocks and sacrificing I droped an overloaded Weapon Surge and she scooped.
Game 2: I didn't appear to take notes on game two or three but I do remember getting a land heavy hand and a few unfortunate land draws put her too far ahead and I just couldn't compete
Game 3: I don't remember much, it was a solid start for both of us and we stalled for quite a while, until she Tragic Sliped her own Voice of Resurgence to start to beat down, a crucial Weapon Surge ensued and my opponent was left with a sorin a 1/1 elemental and no cards in hand. I beat down for the win.
Junk-Reanimator/midrange Friendliest opponent of the night, we had an awesome chat, sadly his deck was just too slow to withstand the onslaught. In both games he managed to ramp into a thragtusk (once on turn 3) but Legion Loyalist was a champ here and along with dynacharge removed the 'tusk and made the token irrelevant.
not much more to say really, I did board in Electrickery and the Firefist Striker but didn't see either. Probably one of our best matchups.
Jund Midrange, splashing blue
This guy had a terrible manabase often getting screwed, This is deffinetly our worst matchup by far, I discovered that a pair of Gloom Surgeons is probably one of the worst board states for us to see, theres just no way around the suckers.
Game 1: A typical start for us, I was just too quick. Turn 1 : Reckless Waif, Turn 2 threeBurning-Tree Emissary's into Krenko's Command and a turn three Weapon Surge with the other in hand meant he had no hope
Game 2: His start went like this: T1 land duress (picking my Weapon Surge), T2 land into gloom surgeon, T3 land into gloom surgeon into pillar of flame, then a T6 overloaded mizzium mortars and a T8 miracle bonfire meant there was no coming back from his gloom surgeon beatdown.
Game 3: We both played pretty much nothing for the first 4 turns, this was a risk on my part, My opening hand consisted of two Krenko's Command a Burning-Tree Emissary and 4 land, I figured if I could drop everything but land T5 he would read a Dynacharge or Weapon Surge and either drop a Sire of Insanity to deal with it or hold a counter up for them, this also would mean he wouln't miracle a bonfire seeing as there was an empty board. In hindsight this was a mistake as an overloaded mizzium mortars would end me. Luckily he had syncopate and dissipate in hand and held them waiting for the Dynacharge, by the time he figured I was bluffing it was too late and I bloodrushed a Rubblebelt Maaka for the win.
I also think this deck probably needs a seperate thread, it is built completely different to RDW and plays accoringly, I don't have the time to do/update a primer though.
I've held back on weapon surge because I've felt like it's redundant with Legion Loyalist . Is the +1/+0 worth it? I could see it being pretty good...
The +1/+0 is a perfectly fine effect on it's own, even with Legion Loyalist it represents ~3-5 damage for 2 cmc. Where it really shines is when you dont have a Legion Loyalist on board then it becomes a pseudo-boardwipe for 2. There was even a few games where I wished I didn't have a Legion Loyalist on the board so that my opponent would block without accounting for the first strike.
It is also much easier to overload than dynacharge, which is incredibly relevant running 17-18 lands.
Although it isn't the finnisher that dynacharge is, most games that you actually overload a dynacharge it is pretty much lethal.
Over the last few weeks I've been trying to brew a FNM-competitive standard deck that comes in at under $30, it started with an argument among friends as to the cost of playing competitive magic. Last night I went 5-0 at a ~30 man FNM with my $27 Mono-red weenies deck.
It's very similar to Argetlam's All in Red deck, my final list was:
I'll do a match-by-match analysis if anyone wants but here are my notes for the night:
Weapon Surge- Worth it's weight in gold, this allowed me to profitably trade or outright remove my opponents creatures in blocking. Easily won me a few games on its own. I would have lost both games to Junk Aristocrats (Who got 2nd place) if it wasn't for this card. Obviously not as good a finisher as dynacharge, but much better in combat.
Reckless Waif- Surprisingly awesome, this was a last minute change from goblin arsonist, it forces control to Think twice (and tap out) on their own turn, and often flips to midrange deck which don't run enough 1-3 drops to stop her. In two games she flipped because I ran out of gas and was just enough to put my opponent at 0
Dynacharge- Obviously the enabler for this deck, often a T3/4 overloaded Dynacharge ends in a scoop however it's not that great when you are stuck on 2 lands, I am considering going 3 weapon surges and 2 dynacharge maindeck, my only concern is not being able to close out game one quick enough against control. In the aggro matchups I often brought in both Weapon Surges and took out a Dynacharge and a mountain to let me race through their burn/counter aggro.
A small note on this deck, it seems to suffer badly from game 2 syndrome and so far the best way I've found to pilot it is to go balls-to-the-walls aggro game 1 but game two and three be a little more conservative be sure to only attack into blockers if you have the ability to either bring your opponent to 0 or come out with a commanding board position. I won one game by holding a krenko's command and droping it T7 after we both cleared the board with trades and I ended up beating him down from 6 with a 1/1 token.
I don't think many people are goldfishing it tbh. And if you can't win earlier you can usually find some way to defend yourself.
I have a 20$ faith's reward version and it's also pretty good, for its price at least.
I was goldfishing around with it for a while today and although it seemed fun I couldnt help that it'd fold to a simple counter on a Fabricate or tezzeret. How does this do in practice? have you had a chance to test this against any established archetypes?
Also could Thoughtcast have a home here?
Most of the time it'd be a draw two for 1U and this deck seems to suffer if it cant assemble the combo or make the first 3-4 land drops by about t5 and we already have a lot of win conditions.
I was updating the OP and ran up against the character limit, hit the wrong button, and lost not only my changes, but a lot of the old formatting. Just put in over an hour fixing it, and still have a lot to do.
If it helps, the link to the budget decklist is gone:
A fun, and fairly competitive version of any Orzhov build is completely manageable on a budget. I've created several decklists that weigh in at under $100 and even managed to get one under $60.
A full description of how to do it, as well as a sample $66 decklist is available HERE.
it's not a bad card by any measure, it just isn't good in this shell. In essence it's 2/2 firststrike with haste (it's anti-flashback ability is obviously awesome but much less relevant for AIR than RDW). It's problem is partially that it's casting cost is hard to handle off BTE but also it doesn't actually do much.
All of the two-drops so far do something besides beat down for 2, ash zealot doesn't. With six first strike enablers the first strike is pretty mediocre, infact it can be a hindrance as much as a benefit becaues it makes our weapon surges less effective. The haste is nice but it's cost pretty much ensures that if we have a BTE in hand it's coming down on turn three and we're likely to be casting a Foundry-street Denizen or stromkirk noble in its place. Which is far from ideal.
Now assuming that we don't have a BTE in hand we still want to cast it after any of our other two drops so it's still coming down turn three which is, in most games our crucial turn in emptying our hand for the Dynacharge/ Weapon surge. Ash Zealot puts a spanner in that, she really is too slow .
Realisticly we want to go
Turn 1: 1 drop
Turn 2 : 2 drop, hopefully Two 2 drop's off BTE.
Turn 3: 2 or 3 1 drops
Turn 4: Dyncharge- opponent is dead or Weapn Surge- opponent's board is cleared (usually scoop).
With Ash zealot we can't cast two 1 drops turn 3 so we lose a body for dynacharge/battalion, gain no extra power over two one drops and gain arbitary card advantage. We also cast less bodies and therefore less batallion enablers, whic can be brutal.
I had Ash Zealot in my list for quite a while but it just wasn't stelar, I found myself wishing it was a 1 drop 1/1 more often than not. Her biggest advantage is she lives through eletrickery but seeing as naya blitz isn't a big part of the meta we hardly see electrickery anyway.
The curent primer list is pretty bad, it has a terrible manabase, running expensive burn and has a sideboard which looks cut and pasted from an RDW deck. My list does have flaws but the list in the OP has a lot more, I don't think that my list should be in the primer, it's still being refined but we should have it updated with *someones* list.
4 Foundry Street Denizen
4 Legion Loyalist
4 Rakdos Cackler
4 Reckless Waif
4 Stromkirk Noble
4 Burning-Tree Emissary
3 Firefist Striker
4 Lightning Mauler
2 Rubblebelt Maaka
3 Dynacharge
2 Weapon Surge
4 Krenko's Command
Land:
18 Mountain
1 Dynacharge
4 Goblin Arsonist
2 Mugging
2 Weapon Surge
1 Firefist Striker
2 Volcanic Strength
2 Rubblebelt Maaka
And my 5-0 FNM report can be found here
Edit: I should add I'm currently assessing the viability of running a set of Gore-House Chainwalker's in place of the goblin arsonists in the sidebord. Ideally I'd lik tt cut the reckless waifs all together and not have to have sidebord slots dedicated to taking her out in bad matchups but we really dont have any other options.
some things I've discovered in my testing:
Ash Zealot isn't too crash hot in AIR, really anything you cant cast off a BTE can burn a hole in your hand and with 6 first-strike enablers I found it being a rakdos shread-freak most of the time
Vexing Devil seems to suffer from all its flaws that it has had in standard since print, really that choice for our opponent is brutal for us, it often results in control/midrange decks stabilizing at 1-2 life and stealing the game from us. Don't get me wrong, it represents awesome effeciency but it is just so bad after about T2 and is a horrible topdeck after we've emptied our hands. I run reckless waif in its origional place and I think just about any one drop 1/1 would do better than vexing devil but I guess it might deserve a little more testing.
3 cmc cards just dont seem to work, I run a singleton Fervant Cathar in the sideboard ATM and only because I dont really have too much to cut it for, with 18 lands (often sideboarding dow to 17) we just dont have the manabase to support them.
This deck really needs another all-star 1 drop, at the moment I'm running reckless waif and ive tested literally every 1cmc red card but really we suffer with what we have. Goblin Arsonist is probably the strongest candidate but ao far reckless waif has proved to be more punishing for control.
weapon surge is an allstar, it seems bad and sometimes it is just half of a dynacharge but in so many games an overloaded weapon surge clears our opponents board and ends in a scoop. I dont think its worth maindecking more than two though.
I did manage to take out an FNM, im on my phone atm (so please excuse the typos) but you can find my report in the mono-red thread.
any progress on the primer? Need any help?
in my experiance so long as I have ~3 1 drops 1 land hands are completely keepable with AIR
Junk-something:
This was my first match of the night, also the quickest, the poor guy didn't play a non-land card, I also didn't end up figuring out what he was playing. Game 1 I opened with a Foundry Street Denizen, turn 2 I played a Burning-Tree Emissary into Krenko's Command swung for 4, turn 3 I swung and overloaded a dynacharge and my opponent scooped. Game 2 was much like game one, I didn't bother sideboard or to take notes but it was another turn 3 scoop. The entire match was over in under 5 minutes.
UWR-Control:
Game 1 was an outright race, my opponent wasn't sure what to make of my turn 1 Foundry Street Denizen and just let me empty my hand and beat him down for the win, I didn't see a single spell.
I assumed he was playing UWR midrange and expected to see a t3 reckoner, I boarded in Mugging, Firefist Striker, the Dynacharge and Rubblebelt Maaka's and took out the Stromkirk Noble's and Weapon Surge's.
Game 2: After a mulll to 5 I emptied my hand onto the battlefield and by turn five I had him at 2 life, he top-decked a supreme verdict, stabilized and beat me down with an AEtherling, burning any creature that I actually managed to resolve.
After seeing him playing control I took the Firefist Striker's out for the Stromkirk Noble's and kept the Mugging's for his aetherling, even though I hoped to never see it.
Game 3: a turn 1 and two Reckless Waif kept him main-phasing his ample removal and cantrips/cyclers and I was able to just keep beating him down till a T6 aetherling at 10 life started to kill my board presence, luckily the following turn he top-decked a land and transformed both my Reckless Waif's and I topdecked a mugging which I used to push through my attackers and beat him down to 0
Junk-Aristocrats: the toughest matchup of the night, swinging into a wall of tokens is never good especially when they have access to so many combat tricks. Luckily Weapon Surge appears to be a bit of a trump card here. I didn't see a single Legion Loyalist but I imagine he'd be an allstar in this matchup.
Game 1: got off to a solid start with denizen into burning tree+ lightning mauler, my opponent dropped a sorin and lingering souls to answer and we entered a stalemate where we both were amassing a similarly sized board state, I managed to top deck two Krenko's Command but she had eventuality, I ended up swining hoping a Weapon Surge would trump her combat tricks after a long sequence of double-blocks and sacrificing I droped an overloaded Weapon Surge and she scooped.
Game 2: I didn't appear to take notes on game two or three but I do remember getting a land heavy hand and a few unfortunate land draws put her too far ahead and I just couldn't compete
Game 3: I don't remember much, it was a solid start for both of us and we stalled for quite a while, until she Tragic Sliped her own Voice of Resurgence to start to beat down, a crucial Weapon Surge ensued and my opponent was left with a sorin a 1/1 elemental and no cards in hand. I beat down for the win.
Junk-Reanimator/midrange Friendliest opponent of the night, we had an awesome chat, sadly his deck was just too slow to withstand the onslaught. In both games he managed to ramp into a thragtusk (once on turn 3) but Legion Loyalist was a champ here and along with dynacharge removed the 'tusk and made the token irrelevant.
not much more to say really, I did board in Electrickery and the Firefist Striker but didn't see either. Probably one of our best matchups.
Jund Midrange, splashing blue
This guy had a terrible manabase often getting screwed, This is deffinetly our worst matchup by far, I discovered that a pair of Gloom Surgeons is probably one of the worst board states for us to see, theres just no way around the suckers.
Game 1: A typical start for us, I was just too quick. Turn 1 : Reckless Waif, Turn 2 three Burning-Tree Emissary's into Krenko's Command and a turn three Weapon Surge with the other in hand meant he had no hope
Game 2: His start went like this: T1 land duress (picking my Weapon Surge), T2 land into gloom surgeon, T3 land into gloom surgeon into pillar of flame, then a T6 overloaded mizzium mortars and a T8 miracle bonfire meant there was no coming back from his gloom surgeon beatdown.
Game 3: We both played pretty much nothing for the first 4 turns, this was a risk on my part, My opening hand consisted of two Krenko's Command a Burning-Tree Emissary and 4 land, I figured if I could drop everything but land T5 he would read a Dynacharge or Weapon Surge and either drop a Sire of Insanity to deal with it or hold a counter up for them, this also would mean he wouln't miracle a bonfire seeing as there was an empty board. In hindsight this was a mistake as an overloaded mizzium mortars would end me. Luckily he had syncopate and dissipate in hand and held them waiting for the Dynacharge, by the time he figured I was bluffing it was too late and I bloodrushed a Rubblebelt Maaka for the win.
I also think this deck probably needs a seperate thread, it is built completely different to RDW and plays accoringly, I don't have the time to do/update a primer though.
EDIT: Just some phrasing/typos.
Thankyou, I kept notes on most of my matches so I'll post a more detailed anlysis of how the deck went when I get home
The +1/+0 is a perfectly fine effect on it's own, even with Legion Loyalist it represents ~3-5 damage for 2 cmc. Where it really shines is when you dont have a Legion Loyalist on board then it becomes a pseudo-boardwipe for 2. There was even a few games where I wished I didn't have a Legion Loyalist on the board so that my opponent would block without accounting for the first strike.
It is also much easier to overload than dynacharge, which is incredibly relevant running 17-18 lands.
Although it isn't the finnisher that dynacharge is, most games that you actually overload a dynacharge it is pretty much lethal.
It's very similar to Argetlam's All in Red deck, my final list was:
4 Foundry Street Denizen
4 Legion Loyalist
4 Rakdos Cackler
4 Reckless Waif
4 Stromkirk Noble
4 Burning-Tree Emissary
3 Firefist Striker
4 Lightning Mauler
2 Rubblebelt Maaka
3 Dynacharge
2 Weapon Surge
4 Krenko's Command
Land:
18 Mountain
1 Dynacharge
2 Electrickery
3 Mugging
2 Weapon Surge
1 Firefist Striker
4 Volcanic Strength
2 Rubblebelt Maaka
I'll do a match-by-match analysis if anyone wants but here are my notes for the night:
Weapon Surge- Worth it's weight in gold, this allowed me to profitably trade or outright remove my opponents creatures in blocking. Easily won me a few games on its own. I would have lost both games to Junk Aristocrats (Who got 2nd place) if it wasn't for this card. Obviously not as good a finisher as dynacharge, but much better in combat.
Reckless Waif- Surprisingly awesome, this was a last minute change from goblin arsonist, it forces control to Think twice (and tap out) on their own turn, and often flips to midrange deck which don't run enough 1-3 drops to stop her. In two games she flipped because I ran out of gas and was just enough to put my opponent at 0
Dynacharge- Obviously the enabler for this deck, often a T3/4 overloaded Dynacharge ends in a scoop however it's not that great when you are stuck on 2 lands, I am considering going 3 weapon surges and 2 dynacharge maindeck, my only concern is not being able to close out game one quick enough against control. In the aggro matchups I often brought in both Weapon Surges and took out a Dynacharge and a mountain to let me race through their burn/counter aggro.
A small note on this deck, it seems to suffer badly from game 2 syndrome and so far the best way I've found to pilot it is to go balls-to-the-walls aggro game 1 but game two and three be a little more conservative be sure to only attack into blockers if you have the ability to either bring your opponent to 0 or come out with a commanding board position. I won one game by holding a krenko's command and droping it T7 after we both cleared the board with trades and I ended up beating him down from 6 with a 1/1 token.
Yes, but innistrad is also the name of the first set in the block.
The innistrad block consists of Innistrad, Dark Ascention and Avacyn Restored.
I was goldfishing around with it for a while today and although it seemed fun I couldnt help that it'd fold to a simple counter on a Fabricate or tezzeret. How does this do in practice? have you had a chance to test this against any established archetypes?
Also could Thoughtcast have a home here?
Most of the time it'd be a draw two for 1U and this deck seems to suffer if it cant assemble the combo or make the first 3-4 land drops by about t5 and we already have a lot of win conditions.
If it helps, the link to the budget decklist is gone: