Red Death 2018

[Poron]

Hi All,

Tired of casting Brainstorm, I went back to the most straight-forward strategy ever born: burn with some result on MTGO. I went to points in almost every challenge I played with it and I have realized its potential and overall its weaknesses.

We are totally helpless against every possible kind of combo, be it Lands, Show and Tell, Reanimator (into Iona) or just straight BR reanimator into turn 0 Sire of Insanity and so on.

The color which can help the deck to reach its goal without too many distractions is, imho, definitely the good old black. Overall it can compensate to an historic problem of Burn: card advantage. Dark Confidant and Hymn to Tourach can totally help us, even though in the first draft I am much more oriented to keep it as a SB card against control and combo.

So, the black cards I am adding to the regular burn would be:

4 Dark Confidant (fixes card advantage and provide gas from turn 4 onwards for a much more consistent kill)
4 Thoughtseize. Not to bye every G1 against combo
4 Duress (SB) because SnT is still a card
4 Hymn to Tourach (SB) because with Dark Confidant going on, you just lack the mana to play everything.
3 Diabolic Edict. The only thing that helps against Marit Lage Emrakul and Griselbrand
2 Gurmag Angler. Because it makes no sense to be filling the graveyard faster than the mafia and not use it.

Current list

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Lava Spike
4 Monastery Swiftspear
4 Goblin Guide
4 Eidolon of the Great Reveal
4 Chain Lightning
2 Price of Progress
2 Gurmag Angler
2 Sulfuric Vortex
4 Thoughtseize
4 Dark Confidant
3 Fireblast

19 lands

SB
4 Pyrostatic Pillar (with Eidolon it’s the A plan against Storm)
4 Duress
4 Diabolic Edict
3 Smash to Smithreens

Between Blood Crypt, Thoughtseize, Dark Confidant (with Fireblast and Gurmag), Price of Progress, Sulfuric Vortex and Eidolon I was seriously thinking to add a couple of Death’s Shadow.

Opinions? Cool cards I don’t know?
Thanks

[JackaBo]

Sounds great

[EpicLevelCommoner]

I'm suprised you aren't considering Bump in the Night in place of Lava Spike. Not to mention Tyrant's choice for 1B 4 life loss spell

I am concerned about Dark Confidant while running Gurmag and Fireblast, but not sure what would be useful in that spot.

Speaking of Gurmag Angler, there is probably something better for abusing a fast graveyard fill ... again not sure though (I'd say Soulflayer if you can get BB reliably as a hasty fatty seems pretty crucial).

[Poron]

Those are good ones!! Overall the -4 life that dodges both Solitary Confinement and Energy Field is great. Time to sleeve 4 of them with 4 Flame Rift you have a massive non targeting strength.

What cheap haste creature can black give us?

[Poron]

After some test it became clear that Young Pyromancer and Cabal Therapy were natural inclusions.

Guys, this shit is flying! Haha

4 Thoughtseize
3 Cabal Therapy

Are good against combo and against everything else we just burn and burn and burn

Oh right we are also able to play Slaughter Games and Lost Legacy in case

[CabalTherapy]

Ah, I remember a dude playing this deck back in 2008 or 2009 at the LGS with Confidants and Tombstalkers. Good times.

[Poron]

After some test I have changed a lot of things and I have realized that this deck totally needs draws.

Be it Bedlam Reveler or Night’s Whisper or whatever else.

[Eldariel]

There are many ways to take the deck but take heart of the trade-offs you're making. Remember that strengthening one aspect is necessarily weakening another and you need to maintain the reasons to play the deck while tinkering to improve it. It's not reasonable to expect it to do everything. You might be well-advised to post your latest list as it is hard to make suggestions with incomplete information on your data but as it stands, a couple of things I'd like to point out:
- Every non-damage non-creature spell makes the kill plan take more cards on average and thus you more reliant on repeating sources of damage like creatures over one-shot sources of damage (burn spells). Mind the balance and plan the rest of your deck accordingly.
- Your list is rather creature-heavy. To that end, do you feel like Lava Spike still pulls its weight? It seems to me like it might be worth more to get something that can optionally hit creatures as well such as Rift Bolt.
- If you add draw you inevitably make the deck slower. Do you feel the deck is fast enough that it's worth sacrificing speed for midgame power? This seems like it'll improve grindy match-ups (that seem hard anyways) but weaken the races.
- If you go the route of Pyromancer, you're very close to Grixis Delver already. Is what you have enough to make up for not having blue cards? I can certainly see Price of Progress and mana resiliency as arguments that do vindicate a two-colour build or at least make it not strictly worse.
- What are your experiences against the big blue decks of the format? RUG, Grixis, UR Delver, Miracles, Pile? How do the games usually go? How do you win? How do you lose? Combo match-ups seem pretty self-evident (race with a bit of disruption) and Stompy-decks look challenging (Chalice seems like a house), so I'm mostly interested in the less obvious ones.
- I don't think such a deck can afford cards that don't impact the board. Thus I'd recommend draw á la Abbot of Keral Keep, Bedlam Reveler, or Dark Confidant (though needing it to live to get anything may be too much of a drawback) over stuff like Night's Whispers, Painful Truths, or whatever. Things that leave a threat while drawing stuff.

[Mr. Safety]

I'm pretty sure that Flame Rift and Death Shadow could be good here, maybe better than gurmags.

[Poron]

Current list

4 Chain Lightning
4 Bump in the night
4 Rift Bolt
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Monastery Swiftspear
4 Flame Rift
4 Tyrant’s Choice
3 Price of Progress
2 Sulfuric Vortex
4 Exquisite Firecraft
4 Fireblast

1 swamp
2 mountains
16 red duals and fetches

SB:
3 Duress
4 Thoughtseize
4 Pyrostatic Pillar
4 Smash to Smithreens

Yesterday I lived the dream to win against SnT with burn

[KærvekTheMerciless]

This has basically been my wheelhouse since I started in Legacy in 08.

Draw is inherently a weakness, as such I've found that sources of residual damage are of key importance.

Given the ban on DRS, I have had to cut the green from my build (I used to run BRG), and subsequently have gone back to this.

I don't particularly care for black-splashed Burn, that's somewhat of a copout to what Red Death actually is.

Here is what I'm working with so far.

4 Harsh Mentor
3 Scab-Clan Berserker
2 Mindsparker
2 Vampire Nighthawk
2 Abyssal Persecutor
2 Dark Confidant
2 Liliana of the Veil
2 Daretti, Ingenious Iconoclast
2 Pithing Needle
3 Duress
3 Cabal Therapy
2 Hymn to Tourach
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Terminate
2 Diabolic Edict
2 Kolaghan's Command
3 Wasteland
2 Ghost Quarter
4 Bloodstained Mire
3 Badlands
3 Mountain
3 Swamp
2 Wooded Foothills
1 Verdant Catacombs

SB:

3 Leyline of the Void
2 Ashen Rider
2 Stromgald Cabal
2 Amulet of Safekeeping
2 Pyroblast
2 Pyroclasm
1 Blood Moon
1 Ensnaring Bridge

Lmk.

[Hanni]

The problem is that so many things that you're trying to do just work better with cantrips. Both Young Pyromancer and Gurmag Angler get better when you splash blue for Brainstorm and Ponder.

With that said, that doesn't mean that you would need to go heavy into blue to include Force of Will. The proactive nature of the discard plan seems sufficient as a disruption package. However, you could easily trim subpar cards like Lava Spike and Sulfuric Vortex to fit 8 cantrips in, and the deck would be much better for it.

Blue also gives you access to the most aggressive creature in the format with Delver of Secrets...

[Ronald Deuce]

This thread has piqued my interest. A couple of years back, I'd considered running Deathrite Shaman and Bump in the Night along with a couple of Badlands.

If the primary concern with a monored list is stopping combo, is black strictly speaking the best color to splash? I feel like white has a lot of tools for handling pretty much any kind of combo.

[Poron]

What white cards would you play to stop combo?

[Qweerios]

This thread has piqued my interest. A couple of years back, I'd considered running Deathrite Shaman and Bump in the Night along with a couple of Badlands.

If the primary concern with a monored list is stopping combo, is black strictly speaking the best color to splash? I feel like white has a lot of tools for handling pretty much any kind of combo.

It is well known that the best color to complement burn if you want to disrupt combo is blue. UR Delver is essentially a burn deck with counterspells and all of the best fast creatures. I mean, you can literally shove fetches, volcanics, 4 brainstorms and 4 delvers in your burn deck and it immediately becomes a better burn deck at no cost (besides money)...

[Poron]

Ok

SB
Spell Pierce
Daze
FoW

MD
Delver
Brainstorm
Ponder
Preordain
Stormchaser

Let’s give it a try

[Mr. Safety]

What white cards would you play to stop combo?

Ethersworn Canonist
Containment Priest


This is in no way better (IMHO) than splashing blue for Spell Pierce, etc. If you splash both black and white, then you have targeted discard plus permanent based hate. Then the question becomes: how do you maintain an aggressive burn-based strategy after splashing both?

[Poron]

Canonist is good against Storm but not better then 4 Eidolon MD and 4 Pilllar SB. Sure, white give access to Silence / Orim’s Chant.

Priest is useless against turn 0 reanimator combo or SnT into Omniscience

[Hanni]

Canonist is good against Storm but not better then 4 Eidolon MD and 4 Pilllar SB. Sure, white give access to Silence / Orim’s Chant.

Priest is useless against turn 0 reanimator combo or SnT into Omniscience

Eidolon is great vs Storm, but mediocre against other combo decks. That's the reason for running more versatile disruption options like discard or countermagic.

Canonist is better against other combo decks because it can at least slow the opponent down. Not that I'd want Canonist either, but still.

This thread has piqued my interest. A couple of years back, I'd considered running Deathrite Shaman and Bump in the Night along with a couple of Badlands.

If the primary concern with a monored list is stopping combo, is black strictly speaking the best color to splash? I feel like white has a lot of tools for handling pretty much any kind of combo.

I think discard + hatebears is a fine plan, ala Deadguy Ale, but I don't get the point of splashing red into that deck. It already has fantastic removal options, and it's not aggressive enough to want burn spells.

I think Red Death as a strategy is perfectly legitimate. Aggressive creatures, burn, and discard is a solid plan. I just think splashing blue for Brainstorm, Ponder, and Delver is going to be way better than sticking to just red and black.

It is well known that the best color to complement burn if you want to disrupt combo is blue. UR Delver is essentially a burn deck with counterspells and all of the best fast creatures. I mean, you can literally shove fetches, volcanics, 4 brainstorms and 4 delvers in your burn deck and it immediately becomes a better burn deck at no cost (besides money)...

Which is basically what my R/u Sligh list is doing.