[Deck] Burn

[Wallace]

Wallace, I'm confused as to why you're such a big fan of Fork. IF you manage to use it with Fireblast, it's basically a Flame Rift without lifeloss. But you won't get that combo together most games (believe me, I played Fork when not so many great burn spells and cantrips were available). So what then. It's unplayable unless you draw 3 lands, and even then, the best you can hope for is to Fork a Bolt turning Fork into a far more conditional incinerate.

And yes, I have rarely if ever had a problem with Spark Elemental as a 2 of. There is no reason a player would leave a creature untapped to block against burn. So just time the Spark Elemental any time your opponent is tapped out (roughly 70% of the turns in my experience) and you have yourself a Bolt.

Brainstorm + Ponder doesn't work well in burn imho. So you spend one extra mana to draw a lightning bolt one turn faster. Why not just play Incinerate if that's you're after. Without a fetchland, you'll be drawing back the same cards that you put back.

Many of the newer builds don't bother with Incinerate, because it's just not good enough.

I used to think the same thing about fork until I ran it for a while. Yes you have to hit 3 mana and yes if you have no cards in hand it sucks as a top deck. I almost always hit 3 mana with this deck and Forking a Fireblast, PoP, or even flame rift is insane. Even better is using fork in response to counter magic or an opposing draw spell like FoF. You like Spark Elemental, I like fork...I think it's a matter of personal preference over a 2 of...

[Hanni]

You like Spark Elemental, I like fork

Fork is horrible. It's the price of Incinerate, it's going to do 3 damage on average most of the time, and it's reliant on playing another spell and it resolving. If you want to copy Flame Rift, that's 4 mana in 1 turn and you're only netting 1 additional point of damage over simply running Incinerate in that rare circumstance.

Spark Elemental is also bad. Now the opponent has targets for their dead removal. I suppose if you time it right, it can swing through without getting blocked... unless it gets nailed by a removal spell. Postboard, I'm sure it does exactly what a Bolt should do... but preboard, it's just another subpar burn spell because it is situational.

@ Hanni: Do you ever have trouble with not having a shuffle effect for your Brainstorm, given that you'll usually have to use your first fetchland to find a blue source to cast the Brainstorm with?

Not really... sometimes I don't necessarily want to get rid of anything, othertimes I do have another fetch (sometimes I do have an actual Volc in the starter). Magma Jet can also filter away cards after a Brainstorm.

Brainstorm + Ponder doesn't work well in burn imho. So you spend one extra mana to draw a lightning bolt one turn faster. Why not just play Incinerate if that's you're after. Without a fetchland, you'll be drawing back the same cards that you put back.

Well, there are other benefits to the cantrips... I was simply comparing Brainstorm + Lightning Bolt to Incinerate to show that it doesn't always affect the [mana] curve, which was a huge criticism for running cantrips. Aside from that, they increase consistency... I'm landscrewed less often and I'm land flooded less often. I've lost alot of games playing burn due to those 2 inconsistencies alone. Again, I'm drawing only the best burn spells and the cantrips prevent me from getting gassed quite often. 1 Brainstorm can often change the entire game around. There are quite a few positives for running them. I do agree that there are some negatives as well... however, I feel that the pros outweigh the cons.

And again, I'm not saying that the cantrip build is the evolution of burn or anything like that. However, I play around with burn every once in a while because the strategy of Burn is a nice break from things like Intuition Thresh and such. To date, with Burn, I've had the most success so far with the cantrip build.

[Clark Kant]

I'm skeptical but if you so sure, I'll try it out, I have all the cards from thresh anyways.

As for Spark Elemental, for the most part you don't need to time it for blocker. They attack with their creatures every turn anyways as they don't expect a creature from a pure burn deck.

You just time it so that their lands are tapped out whenever you play Sparky, which seems to be roughly 70% of the time since the games end so early on. And that's only preboard when you have some inkling of reason to suspect they play removal.

If you play it right, Spark Elemental is pretty much identical to Lava Spike. As a 2 of he's definately worth running imo. Keldon Marauders is also very solid, though you can't as easily ensure it deals 5 damage, it many times won't, it will always deal 2 damage atleast which is nice. Shard Volley could also work as the 2 of.

[Curby]

As for Spark Elemental, for the most part you don't need to time it for blocker. They attack with their creatures every turn anyways as they don't expect a creature from a pure burn deck.

You just time it so that their lands are tapped out whenever you play Sparky, which seems to be roughly 70% of the time since the games end so early on. And that's only preboard when you have some inkling of reason to suspect they play removal.

If you play it right, Spark Elemental is pretty much identical to Lava Spike. As a 2 of he's definately worth running imo. Keldon Marauders is also very solid, though you can't as easily ensure it deals 5 damage, it many times won't, it will always deal 2 damage atleast which is nice. Shard Volley could also work as the 2 of.

Right now I run 2 Volleys in place of your 2 Elementals, and for me this is the right choice. I must point out that some critters have vigilance, most have summoning sickness, and a few even have flash, so even aside from removal, getting across the red zone isn't guaranteed. You can time it, and I'm sure that your experience is valid, but I'd rather play a 2-of that truly guarantees damage (aside from countermagic).

Also, how much fast aggro do you have in your meta? Using Wraiths and Flame Rifts together is too dangerous for me, as my games with Burn are usually decided with just a few life on either side of the table. I can't let go of Flame Rift because it's just too good, but Wraith is currently unused.

When I get 6 more fetches, I'll be very interested in trying out a splashy burn. If nothing else, the increased consistency sounds great. Remember, burn is slow combo and combo is all about consistency. Any deck that draws a Fireblast, a Flame Rift, and 4 bolts can win in 3 turns, and pretty much all decks run those cards. The trick is to get those cards more often, and with the right amount of land and life at the end.

[Clark Kant]

I threw together the blue splash build on MWS breifly.

But it already seems to me that splashing blue to add consistency is counterproductive.

You can get colorscrewed out of blue pretty easily but with brainstorms in you rhand that you can't play.

You also open yourself up to both Stifle and Wasteland.

It also means you'll be taking self inflicted damage when you cast Price of Progress.

[Curby]

You also open yourself up to both Stifle and Wasteland.

It also means you'll be taking self inflicted damage when you cast Price of Progress.

This has always been the problem with splashing, but it seems like a bit of a light splash, in which you will want to cast maybe 3 blue spells in a game. Perhaps 1 Island, 2 Volcanics, and 8 Fetches (2-3 of which fetch blue) strike a decent balance. 11 blue sources should be plenty in what's ultimately a heavily red deck. (Manamorphose also helps.)

[Clark Kant]

I tried the same list that Hanni posted in the previous page (it doesn't run Manamorphose). That's a problem, say you run 11 blue sources, many games, you won't draw a blue source, at all.

Fairie Stompy runs 14 blue sources, and yet I frequently have to mulligan from not seeing a single blue source in the opening hand. 10 Land Stompy runs 14 sources counting the land grants, and same story of having to mulligan often from not seeing a green source.

So with a 11 sources, you will have opening hands with no blue source, but with a blue card. I encountered my share just in the short time I tried this deck out. Should you mulligan? What's the point, you have a dead card = the card you lose by mulliganing.

Don't forget, this is burn, the games are designed to end by turn 4, you have little chance of topdecking a blue source in those 4 turns.

You will have a blue card or two in your hand many games, and will be unable to cast them.

[Hanni]

I threw together the blue splash build on MWS breifly.

But it already seems to me that splashing blue to add consistency is counterproductive.

You can get colorscrewed out of blue pretty easily but with brainstorms in you rhand that you can't play.

You also open yourself up to both Stifle and Wasteland.

It also means you'll be taking self inflicted damage when you cast Price of Progress.

The deck doesn't get colorscrewed any worse than any of the other tons of decks out there that are 2c, 3c, 4c, etc.

I agree that you do open yourself up to Wasteland/Stifle, whereas you wouldn't if you stayed monocolor. However, I don't really see Wasteland being an issue... unless you get a bad draw, where all you have is a Volc starting, you shouldn't have a problem. The deck runs 6 basic mountains. I can see Stifle possibly screwing you... but no worse than any other deck with fetchlands.

The thing with PoP... you're really only taking 2 damage from it, since you should almost never have more than 1 Volc in play at a time AND you can sac them away to Fireblasts. Even if you take 4, it's still doing the exact same thing that Flame Rift does (considering you should almost never cast PoP when the opponent only has 1 nonbasic out).

I tried the same list that Hanni posted in the previous page (it doesn't run Manamorphose). That's a problem, say you run 11 blue sources, many games, you won't draw a blue source, at all.

Many games, you don't draw a blue spell at all. 11 blue sources for 8 blue spells. You also have 4 Street Wraith and 4 Magma Jet's to filter.

Fairie Stompy runs 14 blue sources, and yet I frequently have to mulligan from not seeing a single blue source in the opening hand. 10 Land Stompy runs 14 sources counting the land grants, and same story of having to mulligan often from not seeing a green source.

Faerie Stompy is a blue deck. This deck runs 8 blue spells, none of which are mandatory to play, all of which don't need to be played turn 1. The deck also has more filtering than Faerie Stompy. If you are mulliganing hands because you don't have a blue source in the opener, you should reconsider how you play the deck. In all of the testing I've done with the deck, the manabase has never been an issue. People run a green splash all the time for Krosan Grip and run considerably less draw/cantrip/filtering.

Don't forget, this is burn, the games are designed to end by turn 4, you have little chance of topdecking a blue source in those 4 turns.

Not always. The deck should goldfish turn 4 but that doesn't always happen. The ability to goldfish turn 4 isn't really any less of a factor in here anyway. Instead of running cards like Keldon Marauder (2cc for 2 dmg), Fanatic (1cc for 1 damage), etc, this deck just cantrips into better burn spells (especially Fireblast more consistently), thusly negating the loss in tempo immensely from casting the cantrip.

Many games, you can't win turn 4. Whether the deck screws you (too little land, too much lands), or the matchup is designed to where you need to play more of a control role (burn aggro), the gameplan isn't always a turn 4 win. The cantrips allow the deck to play the control role much, much better... that's how I won vs Faerie Stompy in the face of SoLS, Jitte, and even a few Chalices (digging for 2cc burn/EE in response). So on and so forth.

You will have a blue card or two in your hand many games, and will be unable to cast them.

About as often as having a green card in hand or two and being unable to cast them in Threshold or something, sure. The consistency of it happening? Rarely. The effect on the gamestate when it does occur? Usually minimal.

[Curby]

The deck doesn't get colorscrewed any worse than any of the other tons of decks out there that are 2c, 3c, 4c, etc.

I can see Stifle possibly screwing you... but no worse than any other deck with fetchlands.

What you say is true, but that doesn't mean it's a good argument. One of Burn's greatest strengths is its consistency, but it most often loses due to poor consistency (mana screw/flood) and poor resiliency.

Burn has good consistency because the spells are low-cost, and they have similar enough effects that many games play similarly. If a spell isn't discarded or countered, it's pretty much guaranteed to further your gameplan. That is also why it is resilient. It can ignore the hassles of creature combat, and it doesn't have any silver bullet spells that must resolve for the win (as with combo decks that end with a finisher spell).

However, we all know that in high level tournament play, it isn't enough. When we get mana-screwed, we get really screwed. When we get hated by Countertop and Chalices, that's nearly impossible to recover from. The question is how much splashing blue helps (1) consistency and (2) resilience.

If playtesting shows that colorscrew is unlikely, then the consistency is certainly improved by sculpting the topdeck and shuffling away chaff.

However, by opening yourself up to previously-dead hate such as Stifle, you're making yourself less resilient. Sure, it doesn't hurt you any more than another deck with fetches, but the point is to not be hurt at all by the changes we're making.

We have two clear weaknesses. Let's not make them worse.

That said, I'm still interested in trying it.

[technogeek5000]

Well, I dont play burn, although I do have a burn deck. If I was to bring it to a tournament, here is what I would play.

4 Bloodstained mire
4 Wooded Foothills
4 Taiga
2 barbarian ring
5 mountain

4 Lightning bolt
4 Chain lightning
4 Lava spike
4 Rift bolt
4 Price of progress
4 Mogg fanatic
4 Magma jet
4 Fireblast
4 Flame rift
3 Flamebreak
2 Keldon Marauders

4 Krosan Grip
4 Leyline of the void
4 Smash to smithereens
2 Pyroblast
1 REB

The way I see it is, if permanent disruption pieces are what kills this deck the most (mostly counterbalance) then why not have outs to it. The blasts really are not enough to stop CB (even thoguh they still help) so splashing for the best out seems simple. I have 12 sources of green and splashing green does nothing to disrupt the flow of the decks speed.

[Curby]

I've notice you often splash Leyline into decks that can't hardcast it. =) Do you think it's worth the dead topdeck?

Anyway, one problem I see is using a lot of suicide. Fetches, Barb Ring, PoP, Flamebreak, and Flame Rift could add up. Have you tested this build against fast aggro to see if it ends up killing itself more often than it should? Why not use only 2 Taigas and fetch them when you need them? It would reduce the chances of having to play one when you didn't need it, and opening yourself up to Wasteland, PoP damage, etc.

I run the Flamebreaks, Flame Rifts, and a couple Barb Rings. I'd love to use Street Wraith but it's just too risky... I often end up winning at just a couple of life as it is.

[technogeek5000]

Well, the way I see it is that Leyline is just as good of a topdeck in a deck that cant hardcast it compared to a deck that can hardcast it. The decks it gets sided in for (ichorid, aggro loam, GRAVEYARD etc..) really only care if its coming down on the first turn because A: Ichorid kills very early on and a turn 3-4 Leyline will have just as much effect on them as not playing it does B: you really only need to stall decks that use the graveyard for a few turns to allow you to win (aggro loam cant cast dreams against us in the first 3 turns without seriously harming themselves if they dont have loam). Yes I do think it is worth the dead topdeck because Leyline of the Void is extremely broken. Im glad you noticed, I havent left for a tournament without a playset of them in over a year.

No I havent tested that, but I will against goblins and whatnot.

[Valtrix]

Huh, I actually thought about having a burn deck with green in it as well, though I made mine somewhat different. I never really did much with it, but I really did like it. Sylvan library and manamorphose are just cool here, and grip is an obvious choice in the board. The board here isn't really that important besides that, I guess. I probably would swap guerilla tactics for REB or something, but I tend to run into somewhat decent amount of discard. Just a simple list, hurt it what you will:

// Lands
3 [OD] Barbarian Ring
9 [10E] Mountain (1)
4 [ON] Wooded Foothills
1 [R] Taiga

// Spells
3 [EX] Price of Progress
4 [FD] Magma Jet
4 [TSP] Rift Bolt
3 [DS] Flamebreak
4 [CHK] Lava Spike
4 [LG] Chain Lightning
4 [AT] Lightning Bolt
3 [LG] Sylvan Library
4 [JU] Browbeat
4 [SHM] Manamorphose
4 [10E] Incinerate
2 [FNM] Fireblast

// Sideboard
SB: 1 [EX] Price of Progress
SB: 4 [9E] Guerrilla Tactics
SB: 2 [JU] Breaking Point
SB: 4 [TSP] Krosan Grip
SB: 4 [TSB] Tormod's Crypt

[Curby]

Whoops, duh. Manamorphose is great for anyone who wants to splash (and even those who don't).

I'm not convinced that Sylvan Library does much though. I don't think paying 4 life per card would let you win any race, and if you're just sculpting topdecks, Mirri's Guile or Sensei's Divining Top is better.

I'd use more Flamebreaks and Cave-Ins rather than Breaking Point for the same reason that I'd use Flames of the Blood Hand rather than Browbeat. I don't want to give my opponent choices!

[electrolyze]

after some testing with burn i think i've came out on a really strong build:

1c:

4xlighting bolt
4xchain lightning
4xlava spike
4xmogg fanatic

2c:

4xmagma jet
4xkeldon marauders
4xincinerate
4xprice of progress

3c:

4xrift bolt
2xflame javelin

other:

4xfireblast

land:

16xmountain
2xbarbarian ring

side:

4xvexing shusher
4xshattering spree
4xsome anti combo thing, i run chalice for testing now.
3xblood moon

i think this build is really strong and fast, i dont run flamebreak main because there is not that many aggro in my meta that can race this build. and i dont run sulfuric vortex because i didnt like it when i was testing the deck, it feels like it was too slow for the deck.

the weird slots in the deck are flame javelin and incinerate i think.

i play incinerate because i wanted antother good 3 damage spell, so i think this card fits really wel in the deck, especially when playing against chalice decks(most of the time on 1).

flame javelin are my testing slots right now, i always have 2 slots open so thats why. maybe it could be flame rift, vortex or flamebreak.

what do you people think of the list?

[bigbear102]

If you are splashing a color I would definitely suggest using Manamorphose. I am not a proponent of running cards just because they cantrip, but MM lets you get around color screw without running into too much hate. For a green build running green in the board (sylvan library is ass), my mana base would be:

8x Fetch
2x Taiga
8x Mountain
4x Manamorphose

That would allow you to almost always see something to produce green by the time you want to be casting Grip, which is about the only reason to splash green.

[Wallace]

Burn really doesn't need to splash a color, the only card/cards that consistently cause problems for this deck are Counterbalance, Trinisphere and Chalice of the Void. By running Shattering Spree in the board, that takes care of 3sphere and CotV, most of the time. CB is a little harder to deal with, running Vexing Shusher should help a little bit. I think cards like Sulfuric Vortex, Rift Bolt and Flame Javelin and Fireblast will help even more. 3cc+ spells have been a problem for CB based decks for a while now. If you put all of those card together then you have a good combination to help deal with the dreaded spell.

Here is the list I have been testing for a Combo, counterbalance Meta:

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
4 Rift Bolt
4 Lava Spike
4 Fireblast

4 Magma Jet
4 Price of Progress
3 Shard Volley
3 Flame Javelin
3 Flamebreak
3 Sulfuric Vortex
1 Wheel of Fate

16 Mountain
3 Barbarian Ring

Sideboard:
4 Vexing Shusher
3 Pyrostatic Pillar
3 Shattering Spree
2 Tormod's Crypt
1 Sulfuric Vortex
1 Flamebreak
1 Gaea's Blessing

[bigbear102]

Wheel of Fate is horrible. I know you know that I'm gonna say it, so there it is. It costs 2 to suspend, which means it won't be active until turn 6. It is not reliable considering you have no way of finding it, and it will hardly ever actually do what you want it to, considering all of the decks that it might actually be decent against will just save a counter for it. Aggro/Combo decks will kill or be killed by then, and control/aggrocontrol will not care bacause they will counter it.

I would much rather see it being your 4th Vortex or Flamebreak MD. You may also want to consider adding 1-2 more 2 drops, considering ur curve jumps a bit.

[Curby]

Yeah, what he said re: Wheel and Library.

Plus, why Flame Javelin? It's new, but it's not shiny. Flames of the Blood Hand and Pulse of the Forge both have useful tricks and side effects. Sure you can hit a critter with Flame Javelin, but pretty much everything else in the deck can do that anyway. Personally I'd just use Flame Rift and end the game more quickly, but that's me. =)

[Wallace]

Yeah, what he said re: Wheel and Library.

Plus, why Flame Javelin? It's new, but it's not shiny. Flames of the Blood Hand and Pulse of the Forge both have useful tricks and side effects. Sure you can hit a critter with Flame Javelin, but pretty much everything else in the deck can do that anyway. Personally I'd just use Flame Rift and end the game more quickly, but that's me. =)

Yeah but Flames of the blood hand and Pulse of the Forge both say target player, I know, I know, this is burn and you shouldn't be targeting creatures. I have won so many games with Flame Javelin just because it kills the turn 2 or 3 Goyf that kicked my ass for 3 or 4 turns. There are so many games where Pulse/Flames just needed to say "target creature or Player" and I would have pulled it off.

I used to say the same thing about Wheel of Fate, then I saw the deck that finished 4th at the GP Indy side event. It was running 3 of them along with 4 Vortex and MB Pyrostatic Pillar. I tested it a few times and it was just what I thought it was, terrible. I started with 3 and then went down to 2, I almost cut it all together but wanted to try it as a 1 of. When I dropped it turn 2 or 3 it is/was amazing, yeah it got countered a bunch but when it resolved, o boy! The major disadvantage is that it's a shitty top deck and it has a cc of 0 so Counterbalance owns it, but counterbalance owns the whole deck so nbd. Just try it before you knock it...

I would much rather see it being your 4th Vortex or Flamebreak MD. You may also want to consider adding 1-2 more 2 drops, considering ur curve jumps a bit.

The curve does jump a little, but with 19 drops and 9 drops that gives the deck 28 spells that can be played for 2 mana or lees and 4 that are free (Sac 2 mountains to Fireblast). So the 6 spells that cost and 3 that cost thats only 9 3 cc spells, I almost always works out.