[Primer/Deck] Burn

Go creatureless and put some Glacial chasms.
aggro can't beat it, Merfolk is wasteland or die, elves can't get trough nor can dredge, it prevents the damage you cause on yourself (sulfuric vortex, flame rift and your own Price of progress) and you can sacrifice your glacial chasm to another chasm, never letting the upkeep costs be to high.
Using creatures in burn is too risky, goblin guide and lavamancer are (at least to me) the only creatures that can make the cut (even tough I love Kiln Fiend), most of the time it's just food for your opponent's DR shaman to get some life back

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Originally Posted by Vlad Teppes

Go creatureless and put some Glacial chasms.
aggro can't beat it, Merfolk is wasteland or die, elves can't get trough nor can dredge, it prevents the damage you cause on yourself (sulfuric vortex, flame rift and your own Price of progress) and you can sacrifice your glacial chasm to another chasm, never letting the upkeep costs be to high.
Using creatures in burn is too risky, goblin guide and lavamancer are (at least to me) the only creatures that can make the cut (even tough I love Kiln Fiend), most of the time it's just food for your opponent's DR shaman to get some life back

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I can not imagine playing Glacial Chasm mainboard, because every wasteland is blow out against you, I can only imagine to sideboard it (exchange with maybe goblin guide?) in some wastelandless aggro matchups from budget reasons (but still prefer ensnaring bridge), imho it worth too much sb space against specific matchups, if aggro is problem for you, try to play searing bloods in sb and blazes main, what do you think about this sb:

3x ensnaring bridge (aggro, rug delver, show and tell)
2x vexing shusher (miracles, uwr, merfolk) or 3x pyroblast (if show and tell is played in your meta)
2x searing blood (elves, goblins, ur delver, death and taxes, deathrite, stoneforge...) in lagecy now there is no */3 toughness creature we are afraid of
2x smash to smithereens (stoneforge decks, chalice of the void)
3x pyrostatic pillar (storm) not sure if help enought vs ANT, maybe cut this for something more usefull (needle, null rod, flame rift)
3x gv hate? (want leyline of the void or leyline of sanctity, because slows down ANT)

I want try to play aintrazi's maindeck from my last post with 21 lands (12/9 higher land count due to sb shushers) and 3x vortex main (or 4x vortex and cut 1x lava spike?)

plan against uwr delver or blue aggro is to play control role with bloods, blazes and lavamancers, when reach six mana drop shusher and bridge in the same turn,
against miracles sculp your hand, reach a lot of mana, drop shusher and kill him from the spot or drop vortex in the same turn

imho null rod is now interesting sb choice against miracles, it stops top/counterbalance shenanigans, explosives, also slows down ANT, invalides vial and jitte, sword of fire and ice, kills afinity etc., good against other random fast decks like painter, metalworker...

maverick is almost dead, so no more artefact/enchantment hate (in form of quasaly pridemage) preboard is good call for us

I think metagame is really good for well builded burn right now,

Could you all please write down your sideboard choices and sb plan in your meta, thanks.

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Originally Posted by Lyle Hopkins

I don't really like Mindbreak Trap, primarily for the reason you've given. I can see the card being strong in a meta-game with a decent amount of Belcher or All Spells, but for me, I rather play Pyrostatic Pillar.

Concerning Elves, I don't really like bringing Pyrostatic Pillar in against them because Elves can sometimes combo off before you stick it (if you're on the draw) and they always have the ability to simply beat you down too. I've been struggling with this match-up, but having Grafdigger's Cage in the sideboard helps. Sometimes keeping a hand with a bunch of creature removal and a Grim Lavamancer can get there, if you're able to keep them off creatures.

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Thanks, Your point with pillar and grafdiggers cage seems valid.

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Originally Posted by datanaga

imho null rod is now interesting sb choice against miracles, it stops top/counterbalance shenanigans, explosives, also slows down ANT, invalides vial and jitte, sword of fire and ice, kills afinity etc., good against other random fast decks like painter, metalworker...

...Could you all please write down your sideboard choices and sb plan in your meta, thanks.

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I've been toying with the idea of running Null Rod for a little while now, but I've never considered using it against the U/W Control match-up. I'm going to have to test this one out myself.

Currently my sideboard looks something like this:

3 Smash to Smithereens
3 Pyroblast
3 Ensnaring Bridge
3 Pyrostatic Pillar
3 Grafdigger's Cage

Grafdigger's Cage and Pyrostatic Pillar are the two spots that fluctuate the most. If I don't think I'll be seeing any Elves or Dredge at a tournament I'll usually bring Surgical Extraction instead. I've also been testing Vexing Shusher in the place of Pyrostatic Pillar. I like five three-ofs at the moment because I feel like each card is important and I want to see them as much as possible when I bring them in. Maybe I'll eventually tweak some numbers, but this is where I'm at right now.

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Originally Posted by datanaga

I can not imagine playing Glacial Chasm mainboard, because every wasteland is blow out against you, I can only imagine to sideboard it (exchange with maybe goblin guide?) in some wastelandless aggro matchups from budget reasons (but still prefer ensnaring bridge), imho it worth too much sb space against specific matchups, if aggro is problem for you, try to play searing bloods in sb and blazes main, what do you think about this sb:

3x ensnaring bridge (aggro, rug delver, show and tell)
2x vexing shusher (miracles, uwr, merfolk) or 3x pyroblast (if show and tell is played in your meta)
2x searing blood (elves, goblins, ur delver, death and taxes, deathrite, stoneforge...) in lagecy now there is no */3 toughness creature we are afraid of
2x smash to smithereens (stoneforge decks, chalice of the void)
3x pyrostatic pillar (storm) not sure if help enought vs ANT, maybe cut this for something more usefull (needle, null rod, flame rift)
3x gv hate? (want leyline of the void or leyline of sanctity, because slows down ANT)

I want try to play aintrazi's maindeck from my last post with 21 lands (12/9 higher land count due to sb shushers) and 3x vortex main (or 4x vortex and cut 1x lava spike?)

plan against uwr delver or blue aggro is to play control role with bloods, blazes and lavamancers, when reach six mana drop shusher and bridge in the same turn,
against miracles sculp your hand, reach a lot of mana, drop shusher and kill him from the spot or drop vortex in the same turn

imho null rod is now interesting sb choice against miracles, it stops top/counterbalance shenanigans, explosives, also slows down ANT, invalides vial and jitte, sword of fire and ice, kills afinity etc., good against other random fast decks like painter, metalworker...

maverick is almost dead, so no more artefact/enchantment hate (in form of quasaly pridemage) preboard is good call for us

I think metagame is really good for well builded burn right now,

Could you all please write down your sideboard choices and sb plan in your meta, thanks.

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And how exactly Is wasteland a blowout against us? I like to run some protection main deck, it can at the very least buy us a turn (if they don't have wasteland) , and even if they do waste it you have more food to lavamancer.
Sideboarding with burn is actually not that hard '-'

my sideboard looks like this:

2- Ensaring bridge (I run 1 main deck)
2- Pyroblast
3- Surgical extraction
1- Red elemental blast
1- Tormod's Crypt (The dredge players I face are not using Pithing needle anymore)
3- Smash to smithereens
3- Pyrostatic Pillar

then again, my meta is heavy on creature aggro and tribal, so I'm used to face creature removal and constant pressure, that's why I run 4 glacial chasms and 1 ensaring bridge main deck (and 4 lavamancers as my only creatures)

the good thing in burn right now, is that most cards the opponent uses are downright useless:

Wasteland is only usefull in blowing their own lands to reduce the damage of POP
Counterspells are not that good against us, most of our spells do the same thing (but counterbalance is GG most of the time)
Removal? please, at most burn runs 12 creatures, or even 0, so yeah good luck with that.
Fetchlands, BOB? they make our clock even faster
Not to mention the greedy manabases of legacy, they make our POP downright lethal, doing 8+ damage easily.

the only downside is that we suck against combo decks (pyrostatic pillar can make a difference here, but most combo decks run disruption and/or counterspells)

Check out Eidolon of the Great Revel !

Bye bye pyrostatic pillar, now you have legs and a 2/2 body!

ATM, burn seems like the best place for him.

I'd like to know everyone's opinion on Eidolon of the Great Revel. I've been mulling it over a bit and it may end up taking the place of Pyrostatic Pillar in my sideboard. Eidolon serves the exact same purpose as Pillar but with the added benefit of potentially dealing some combat damage. It also can't be targeted by Spell Pierce (not sure how important this is). The only downside I can currently think of is Eidolon's susceptibility to creature removal, but ultimately I don't believe this will be much of a hindrance. Most of the match-ups I bring Pillar in against (e.g. Storm, Show & Tell, etc.) don't have your typical creature removal.

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Originally Posted by Lyle Hopkins

I'd like to know everyone's opinion on Eidolon of the Great Revel. I've been mulling it over a bit and it may end up taking the place of Pyrostatic Pillar in my sideboard. Eidolon serves the exact same purpose as Pillar but with the added benefit of potentially dealing some combat damage. It also can't be targeted by Spell Pierce (not sure how important this is). The only downside I can currently think of is Eidolon's susceptibility to creature removal, but ultimately I don't believe this will be much of a hindrance. Most of the match-ups I bring Pillar in against (e.g. Storm, Show & Tell, etc.) don't have your typical creature removal.

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He's an enchantment, so any removal they have for enchantments will still be live.

If you already run pillar in the board, this just seems like a no-brainer to me.

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Originally Posted by d0nkey

He's an enchantment, so any removal they have for enchantments will still be live.

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Doesn't really matter, since bounce/Decay hits both anyway. Slaughter Pact could matter, Eidolon can't be Duressed though.

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Originally Posted by H3llsp4wn

Doesn't really matter, since bounce/Decay hits both anyway. Slaughter Pact could matter, Eidolon can't be Duressed though.

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I didn't think about Duress. Good point!

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Originally Posted by Lyle Hopkins

I'd like to know everyone's opinion on Eidolon of the Great Revel. I've been mulling it over a bit and it may end up taking the place of Pyrostatic Pillar in my sideboard. Eidolon serves the exact same purpose as Pillar but with the added benefit of potentially dealing some combat damage. It also can't be targeted by Spell Pierce (not sure how important this is). The only downside I can currently think of is Eidolon's susceptibility to creature removal, but ultimately I don't believe this will be much of a hindrance. Most of the match-ups I bring Pillar in against (e.g. Storm, Show & Tell, etc.) don't have your typical creature removal.

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Definitely throwing away all my Pyrostatic Pillars for this guy. Gotta keep attacking rather than playing do-nothing-sometimes enchantments.

I think that Eidolon goes in the main deck for Burn. Over 90% of the spells cast in Legacy are 3 cc or less. You are essentially doing two damage to your opponent almost everytime he casts a spell, plus you have a 2/2 body that can get in for more damage. The opponent will even take two damage by aiming a removal spell at him.

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Originally Posted by Justin

I think that Eidolon goes in the main deck for Burn. Over 90% of the spells cast in Legacy are 3 cc or less. You are essentially doing two damage to your opponent almost everytime he casts a spell, plus you have a 2/2 body that can get in for more damage. The opponent will even take two damage by aiming a removal spell at him.

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yeah I'm pretty sure nobody played Pillar maindeck. Ever. You do remember you get hit for EACH of your Burn spells from Eidolon, besides blank 2/2 for RR is rubbish anyway.

only good things about this would be - protection from Duress and Spell Pierce and building devotion (standard only). Might want to replace your sideboard Pillars in ANT and Storm matchups but thats about it.

Right, nobody played Pillar maindeck because it didn't have legs and couldn't beat in for an additional two damage a turn. A 2/2 for 2 is only rubbish if it's a vanilla bear. You need to test Eidolon and see how much damage you get out of this card over the course of a game. You will almost always do at least two damage with it and usually a lot more. It's not even much of a drawback that Eidolon hurts the Burn player, because Burn is set up to win damage races. He will be bad in some matchups, but the drawback won't matter the majority of the time against most of the best decks in this format.

I've been considering the versatility of each card and how often it will be useful even when drawn in multiples. This just seems like a no-brainer to me...

4 Goblin Guide
4 Vexing Devil

3 Grim Lavamancer
3 Eidolon of the Great Revel
3 Flame Rift
3 Fireblast

4 Rift Bolt
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
4 Lava Spike
4 Price of Progress

8 Mountains
12 Fetches

I think time will show if Eidolon is suited for the main deck or not.
It does indeed it's work against decks like Delver wich are mostly >= CMC 3 as we are, but it eventually opens a window where they can like win the race by double bolting us or something.

I am more interested in a comparison in terms Sideboard applications.
They both get Wiped Away etc, die to Abrupt Decay, Enchantment Removal and have the same effect. Also the manacosts don't make a difference for us.
What makes Eidolon different is for me (Plus and Minus):
- Get's removed by creature removal, most commonly i guess is Swords to Plowshares and Lightning Bolt.
+ Has the potential of delivering additional damage by attacking (tho it doesn't have haste, it's mostly 0 or 2 damage one game)
+ Doesn't get caught by Duress.
I think the combo matchups we like to bring in either of these don't Run Swords or Bolts so that negates Eidolons main downside. But Storm most likely run's Duress somewhere. It think this alone makes Eidolon worth considering.
(If i missed something please tell me)

(I still think you should run a split between a Pillar effect and Mindbreak Trap, to create situations, where they have the wrong protection, meaning they have Duress against Pillar/Eidolon or Wipe Away against Trap.)

...........................

Another thing.
I have gone over my recent sideboards and seen that there are like 5 packages it'd like to run.

• The Pyroblast/ Red Elemental Blast Package (4 Cards)
• The Show and Tell Package (4 Cards out of Ashen Rider/ Confusion in the Ranks)
• The Artifact Hate Package (3 Cards in Smash to Smithereens)
• The Strom Hate Package (4 (or 5) Cards: 2 Mindbreak Trap, 2 Pyrostatic Pillar)
• The Graveyard Hate Package (4 Cards out of Fairie Marcabre or Surcial Extraction)

It is apparent that it's only possible to run 4 out of 5 of these.
I'd love to get advice on your suggestions for a completely onknown meta.
edit: (and if you say the first 4 i'd like to know wich one to cut to 3 cards ... problably blast)
(If i know what to expect i of course adjust accordingly)

I think the Show and Tell package is just too narrow. First, the hate is too narrow. Both cards are only good against one deck, and even then they're only good against Show and Tell (the card) not even Sneak Attack. Secondly, your Blasts function as Show and Tell hate anyway (you weren't beating a Sneak attack in any case, I suppose). Plus, cards like Vortex are usually main deck and easily Show-able.

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Originally Posted by HammerAndSickled

I think the Show and Tell package is just too narrow. First, the hate is too narrow. Both cards are only good against one deck, and even then they're only good against Show and Tell (the card) not even Sneak Attack. Secondly, your Blasts function as Show and Tell hate anyway (you weren't beating a Sneak attack in any case, I suppose). Plus, cards like Vortex are usually main deck and easily Show-able.

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That's indeed a good point.
We won't win a counter war against Sneak and Show, but Pyroblast's are probalby disruptive enough to buy us the time we need.
(I think burn has in general not many outs to a resolved Sneak Attack, but we try to be faster i guess.)
Thanks.

If you speak about Sulfuric Vortex (wich only affects Griselbrand against SnT) i have them in the main anyway.

Considering your advice i am testing this for now:

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
4 Rift Bolt
4 Lava Spike
4 Goblin Guide
4 Hellspark Elemental
4 Sulfuric Vortex
4 Fireblast
4 Price of Progress
4 Flame Rift
2 Barbarian Ring
17 Mountain
1 Skullcrack

Sideboard:
3 Smash to Smithereens
2 Mindbreak Trap
4 Pyroblast
2 Pyrostatic Pillar
4 Surgical Extraction

Wish i had room for 5 designated Storm hate cards, but i guess you can easily bring in Pyroblasts as well.

edit: I guess against Counterbalance we hope it get's cast into our Pyroblast without counterbackup...

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Originally Posted by Nina

That's indeed a good point.
We won't win a counter war against Sneak and Show, but Pyroblast's are probalby disruptive enough to buy us the time we need.
(I think burn has in general not many outs to a resolved Sneak Attack, but we try to be faster i guess.)
Thanks.

If you speak about Sulfuric Vortex (wich only affects Griselbrand against SnT) i have them in the main anyway.

Considering your advice i am testing this for now:

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
4 Rift Bolt
4 Lava Spike
4 Goblin Guide
4 Hellspark Elemental
4 Sulfuric Vortex
4 Fireblast
4 Price of Progress
4 Flame Rift
2 Barbarian Ring
17 Mountain
1 Skullcrack

Sideboard:
3 Smash to Smithereens
2 Mindbreak Trap
4 Pyroblast
2 Pyrostatic Pillar
4 Surgical Extraction

Wish i had room for 5 designated Storm hate cards, but i guess you can easily bring in Pyroblasts as well.

edit: I guess against Counterbalance we hope it get's cast into our Pyroblast without counterbackup...

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Against Storm I would bring in some amount of Surgical Extraction as well. I typically bring in 3 Pyroblast, 3 Pyrostatic Pillar, and 3 Surgical Extraction. The ability to disrupt a storm opponent's cantrips can be quite important in a match-up where every little bit helps.