[Deck] Red Death (B/R Aggro Control)

[4eak]

B/x aggro control variants have been pretty decent for me. Discard is solid disruption in this format. Black also has Bob and good 2-for-1's. Red adds both spot removal and Moon effects.

Here is a decklist:

// Lands - 22
3 Swamp
1 Mountain
4 Blood Crypt
4 Marsh Flats
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Blackcleave Cliffs
2 Dragonskull Summit

// Creatures - 20
4 Grim Lavamancer
4 Dark Confidant
3 Phyrexian Revoker
4 Gatekeeper of Malakir
4 Vampire Nighthawk
1 Batterskull

// Removal - 9
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Terminate
1 Basilisk Collar

// Discard - 9
4 Thoughtseize
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Raven's Crime

// Sideboard
SB: 1 Phyrexian Revoker
SB: 4 Ratchet Bomb
SB: 2 Liliana of the Veil
SB: 2 Consuming Vapors
SB: 4 Magus of the Moon
SB: 2 Blood Moon



The deck has surprising amount of life-gain (which is great against Zoo, imho) for a B/R deck.
It is packed with removal.
I'm liking the 1-of effects (all of which have severe diminishing returns in multiples).
Collar + Mancer is excellent.
Batterskull is an underrated card by itself, and it continues to impress me. The card is exceptionally hard to permanently answer, it stabilizes boards for you, and produces plenty of card advantage.
Raven's Crime is also a card that doesn't get enough credit; even without loam, that card can put tremendous amounts of pressure on opponents at many stages of the game. Converting nearly useless land (which is essentially virtual card disadvantage for you) into raw card advantage by forcing your opponent to discard is nice.



peace,
4eak

[tsabo_tavoc]

I like the list a lot. It does seem to be light on finisher (1 Batterskull), so how about bringing in a pair of Obliterators?


Raven's Crime is also a card that doesn't get enough credit; even without loam, that card can put tremendous amounts of pressure on opponents at many stages of the game. Converting nearly useless land (which is essentially virtual card disadvantage for you) into raw card advantage by forcing your opponent to discard is nice.

Isn't it worse than Liliana, as you never want to cast it early.

[perm]

Could you please explain the 8 fetches? seems gratuitous when most lands aren't fetchable.

I am liking the overwhelming CA and ability to deal with just about everything. I am curious as to how well you handle decks like splinter twin

[264505]

I'm wondering if you really need that many red sources. You could add some mana base disruption with Tech Edge and add an Urborg in there as well.

[4eak]

I like the list a lot. It does seem to be light on finisher (1 Batterskull), so how about bringing in a pair of Obliterators?

I originally had gone for more finishers. I'm not convinced it is the correct way to go with the deck though. Winning-small also gives me greater versatility in the first few turns. I could be wrong though. If I added more, Batterskull and Obliterator are my goto finishers. Mirran Crusader, while not a big guy, is also an interesting choice (pretty sweet against removal too). My main worry behind Obliterator is the mana coloration, which post-board, with Moon effects, is very difficult to achieve.


Could you please explain the 8 fetches? seems gratuitous when most lands aren't fetchable.

8 Fetches for three reasons:

Grim Lavamancer activations
Getting Swamps on command, which is important for when I'm playing Moon on T3.
I want to maximize my ability to get both colors on turn 1.

After 5 lands, more can be unnecessary. If you've seen Raven's Crime, you'll often hold back just to pressure your opponent's hand.


I'm wondering if you really need that many red sources. You could add some mana base disruption with Tech Edge and add an Urborg in there as well.

I use the George-Baxter analysis as a starting place for building the coloration of my mana-bases in all my decks. I then adjust it according to the actual deck's needs and abilities (and some testing). With a lack of card filtering or additional mana smoothing, I find B/x decks, which often wants access to both colors on turn 1, must build more conservative mana bases than usual. Also, for a deck that actually is directly seeking card advantage, mulligans are very painful, and you don't want to mull because you lack the coloration required. Hence, the mana base.

I originally had Urborg in there, I may cut a Dragonskull Summit for it still. That mountain is beginning to look weak again to me as well (originally a swamp). Tech Edge may be correct, man-lands might deserve consideration too.


I am liking the overwhelming CA and ability to deal with just about everything. I am curious as to how well you handle decks like splinter twin

Discard and removal are both relevant to stopping them from comboing out. B/x Aggro control decks rarely have matchups that are extremely favorable for them, but they tend to perform decently against most everything, including combo.



peace,
4eak

[Madak17]

I like your list a lot, nice job! Have you had much chance to test Liliana of the Veil? Seems to me like it might deserve a main deck spot.

[Mr. Safety]

@4eak: I agree, Collar + Grim is hot tech. I'm actually using 4x Grim and 2x Collar in my zoo deck. It can really rape the mirror match.

[Maveric78f]

That may seem stupid but Go For The Throat is better than Terminate when a lot of Spellskite are all over the place (and they are the only artifact creatures you'll find out of lightning bolt reach).

[4eak]

If you face a lot of Spellskite, then sure, that makes sense. I face enough Affinity that G4tT does not work for me. Spellskite is not the only artifact creature which is out of Bolt range. Ravager and MoE are consistently able to play around Bolt.


peace,
4eak

[hi-val]

I feel like the reason to run RB in the first place is to run Rise/Fall. What a juicy card! It deals 4 from Dark Confidant, but I don't see that as a big downside. The thing is lethal to resolve.

[alpaca]

Is it possible that a deck like this could be proposed in the nowadays meta?

Inviato dal mio Nexus 4 utilizzando Tapatalk