[Deck] Burn

[Tao]

As for Standstill, someone told me years ago that you should always just break the Standstill asap, as you are gonna give them the cards anyways, so do it early and keep to your own game plan.

That is not true. If you have plenty of lands and they don't put pressure on you then there is no need to break the Standstill early. It prevents them from casting spells too and allows you to draw out of your flood.

The "break Standstill asap" is a rule for Aggro decks that play against Landstill because they lose the late game anyway. Especially new players often refuse to break Standstill when for example they play Goblins vs. Landstill and they can Waste and Port the first Factories.

[AlterEgo]

If you ask me, the best answer to Rhox Monks (and lifegain in general) is Sulfuric Vortex (always 4x)... no need to waste FOUR precious points of direct damage on a 3/4 vanilla

[Mikeleroi]

Here is what I see as the core of the deck:

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

4 Price of Progress (In a developed metagame, I have run 3 with the fourth sideboarded at times)
4 Magma Jet
4 Keldon Marauders

3-4 Flamebreak/Volcanic Fallout

4 Fireblast

I am playing EXACTLY the same core as you, with 2 flamebreaks and 3 volcanic fallouts. + 19 lands + 4 incinerate

From the list you have proposed I would take off ball lightning and flame rift. Flame rift because 4 damage for me at sorcery speed isn´t good enough. Maybe if it was an instant could be a possibility. And ball lightning... don´t know why, I just don´t feel confortable playing them.

The other options could be:

Creatures: elementals and fanatic. Don´t like them, they are not assured damage.

Sulfuric vortex... don´t like neither, maybe because it is a permanent.

Instant spells... for me they are overpriced: incinerate, flame javelin and shard volley just dont have a good relationship mana/damage. I have tried these days also needle drop and manamorphose but... they need "something more" to take these slots.

[Antonius]

I was wondering, does burn generally run blood moon in board or does it not even bother because mana-disruption is not part of its game plan?

cause I think i might have punted my match against burn by boarding in ray of revelations instead of geddons today (I was playing exploration stax, btw)

[uanlayen]

no you dont need bloodmoon price of progress is just funnier and ruder.

[Curby]

@mikeleroi: wait, 3 damage for 1 mana isn't good enough? With 19+ lands you'll generally have enough to support 4 Fireblasts and 2 Volleys; I wouldn't recommend running 4 Volleys. Needle Drop is horrible as it can't do anything alone (during the inevitable topdeck mode). I do rather like Manamorphose though.

@Antonius: who's the beatdown? If we can't be the aggro deck in the MU, we've already lost. If we can't kill them faster than they can disrupt us, we've already lost. To weaken our focus to try to be the control player is a mistake. Aiming too many spells at the creatures generally ends in a loss, because we're not control. We don't run cards like Ensnaring Bridge, because we're not control. We don't run cards like Wasteland and Blood Moon, because we're not control. (Though I guess "we" should actually be "they" as you were playing Stax. Blood Moon would have been a poor design choice for "them.")

Do you maindeck geddons or are they in the side (Stax usually runs Crucible so that would be weird). Geddons fuck up Burn pretty thoroughly. They can only afford to run cards like Fireblast and Shard Volley because of their relatively stable manabase. As they increase the number of 3-drops to increase resiliency against Chalice, to replace Flame Rift, and to increase the number of sweepers and Javelins (Rhox War Monk are a must-kill, and everyone sees some Merfolk, Elves, and/or Zoo nowadays), they normally keep the land count low. I would imagine that a Geddon destroying three Mountains should pretty much seal your victory, as you'll be granted plenty of turns to develop the lock as they desperately try to topdeck land. If you're lucky enough to draw 2 Geddons, you can even cast one after seeing their second land to slow them down to a crawl. Sure, Burn can be manaflooded, and a good player slow-playing land against you will add resilience, but the chances of them getting a land-heavy opener is probably slightly less than the chances of you opening with a 3-sphere, which would force them to overcommit right into your Geddon.

[Mikeleroi]

Well, I said that R+sacrifice a mountain for 3 damage is too much for me; but now I am trying with 2 Shard Volley and they are not so bad :) Still, I am running 2 incinerates that I don´t like.

For the discuss about Blood moon, as uanlayen said, Price of progress is funnier :D

[matamagos]

That is not true. If you have plenty of lands and they don't put pressure on you then there is no need to break the Standstill early. It prevents them from casting spells too and allows you to draw out of your flood.

The "break Standstill asap" is a rule for Aggro decks that play against Landstill because they lose the late game anyway. Especially new players often refuse to break Standstill when for example they play Goblins vs. Landstill and they can Waste and Port the first Factories.

That's true. I've played many times against landstill on the board and you should wait to refill your hand before breaking it. If the breaking point is very delayed, you will have 7 burn spells in hand, one of them probably a fireblast, and many of them with only 1 cmc. That means you can play A LOT of burn in only one turn. Would the control player have 7 counters in hand??? 7 counters that can be played in the same turn??? probably not

I think playing a landstill generally is not a good idea against burn

[Curby]

I thought Landstill decks still pretty regularly used Countertop, in which case countering a ton of 1-2drop burn spells is ridiculously easy.

[matamagos]

Yeah. But this is a completely different situation. If you have countertop on the board and some lives, do what you want with the landstill. You can order a whisky and put the card on the bottom of the glass. You are probably going to win anyway.

[mustanggt50conv]

Long time lurker, first time poster...

First, has anyone explored as to whether or not it would be advantageous for a burn player to always let the opponent play first; thus allowing you turn 1 card draw, which increases the probability of getting that last card you need (Fireblast) for a turn 3 kill?

I've gone over some scenarios with a core burn deck of 3 point damage spells with fireblast to finish and it turns out when you go first, by the end of turn 3 you've run out of cards and the opponent is still at 2 life; whereas if the opponent goes first, by the end of turn 3 you still have 1 card in hand (hopefully a fireblast) to cover the remaining 2 life of your opponent for the turn 3 kill.

Second, why doesn't anyone play Fireblast + Fork? I've been running burn for just over a year now and the combo has been clutch in many matches; especially in that the Fireblast + Fork combo allows you a turn 3 kill whether or not you play second on turn 1.

Any thoughts?

[Mikeleroi]

I have played with this deck some time, and haven´t seen many turn 3 kills... You need:
T1 -> Mana, bolt
T2 -> Mana, bolt, bolt
T3 -> Mana, bolt, bolt, bolt, Fireblast
-> 10 cards in your 3º turn, being on the draw and very lucky. Or, one less bolt and the player using a fetch.

If you draw first you can achieve a turn 3 kill; and if you play first you can stop his 3º turn attack with a volcanic fallout. Each play has its advantages.

About fork, I don´t like it because you would take its advantage only when combining with fireblast or price of progress. (I don´t want to fork a bolt or a volcanic fallout/flamebreak).

So, if you cast with PoP it will be turn 4º, and other player should be dead already: bolts on turns 1,2,3 and PoP on 4th. It is not necessary.

If you cast wit fireblast to achieve turn 3 kill you need:
T1-> Mana, bolt
T2-> Mana, bolt, bolt
T3-> Mana, bolt, fireblast, fork
-> 9 cards, very low probability.

So most of the time is a suboptimal card on the hand. (Well, that´s my opinion)

[Curby]

Yeah, don't run Fork. In general, people tend to remember matches in which a card was useful, not the matches when a card wasn't useful. If you topdeck a Fork you've just about given the opponent a Timewalk.

The 3-turn kill is a pleasant fantasy, and one that very rarely actually comes to pass (especially given the fact that the opponent will be disrupting your efforts). Speed is important, but make the deck so that it can reliably kill in 4-5 turns. Don't just concentrate on ways to get a 3-turn kill, as you'll reduce your overall consistency for slight gains in explosiveness. Compare Zoo and Goyf Sligh... Zoo's a bit slower but much more successful overall.

[Sevryn]

WWK burn:

Searing Blaze Instant

Searing Blaze deals 1 damage to target player and 1 damage to target creature that player controls.
Landfall - If you had a land enter the battlefield under your control this turn, Searing Blaze deals 3 damage to that player and 3 damage to that creature instead.


In such a creature-run format, this will almost always have a target turn 2 and let's us take out a critter while not neglecting the dome. Honestly, this looks like the best 2cc burn spell we could have reasonably asked for. It of course sucks against non-creature decks, but these are usually combo decks that we aren't going to race, or board control decks that will have 12+ dead cards against us.

[dal9ll]

But to be able to play it as an instant AND deal 3 to each target, you've got to have a land fall on your opponent's turn. We'll see about it tho. It may surprise me. Does this mean we have to start running fetchlands in this deck? Gone would be the days of Burn being a poor man's Legacy deck, haha!

I'd like to get some feedback on this deck, if I could:

4 Mogg Fanatic
4 Hellspark Elemental/Keldon Marauders

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
4 Lava Spike
4 Fireblast
4 Flame Rift
4 Rift Bolt
4 Flamebreak
4 Magma Jet
2 Cursed Scroll

15 Mountain
2 Barbarian Ring
1 Shivan Gorge

Sideboard:
4 Red Elemental Blast
3 Price of Progress
3 Sirocco
3 Ingot Chewer
2 Anarchy

[Sevryn]

But to be able to play it as an instant AND deal 3 to each target, you've got to have a land fall on your opponent's turn. We'll see about it tho. It may surprise me. Does this mean we have to start running fetchlands in this deck? Gone would be the days of Burn being a poor man's Legacy deck, haha!

I plan on sticking to zero fetchlands and just playing Searing Blaze as a sorcery. Two mana for 6 damage is sick, even if only 3 of it hits the opponent.

I'd like to get some feedback on this deck, if I could:

4 Mogg Fanatic
4 Hellspark Elemental/Keldon Marauders

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
4 Lava Spike
4 Fireblast
4 Flame Rift
4 Rift Bolt
4 Flamebreak
4 Magma Jet
2 Cursed Scroll

15 Mountain
2 Barbarian Ring
1 Shivan Gorge

Sideboard:
4 Red Elemental Blast
3 Price of Progress
3 Sirocco
3 Ingot Chewer
2 Anarchy

I'd go with Marauders over Hellspark, for the seemingly weird reason that Marauders can block.

Lifegain is the burn killer. Some number of Sulfuric Vortex is recommended, I would go with 4.

I'd drop Shivan Gorge for another mountain, because casting Flamebreak on turn 3 is often important. I also would up your land count to 19. I'm debating with my own deck whether 19 or 20 is right, but I'm fairly sure 18 is too low.

Flame Rift is a dangerous call if your meta has lots of agro.

I have not tested Cursed Scroll. If you like it, run it. If this was my deck, I would replace it with Price of Progress maindeck, and then have 2 more in the sideboard.

I run Shattering Spree in the place of Ingot Chewer. You can replicate to hit Chalice, but you can also invest more mana into it to wipe out Stax or Affinity, which I feel is worth it.

Basically, I told you the differences between your list and mine, so take all of this with a grain of salt. I would really like to run Flame Rift myself, but the self-damage is too much against decks like Zoo and Agro Elves. And Sulfuric Vortex will randomly win matches you would have lost to Jitte/Finks/Zuran Orb/etc.

[urdjur]

I don't think Searing Blaze will be a better solution to any problems than the ones we already have. As a top deck, it's almost as bad as Fork. We get inconsistency for some added creature removal that most often isn't needed since we can race aggro anyway.

For just one more mana, you get Flamebreak that does the same thing but better and without the landfall necessity. I could see this being a useful SB card against Zoo and tribal decks, but top decking it in a tight situation will still be a bitch. And running fetches to support it? DEFINETELY not worth it.

[Eksem]

How do people feel about reviving Ankh of Mishra? Or is it just too terrible a topdeck to consider?

I'm opposed to running creatures at all in a Burn-deck. An early Spark Elemental might be nice damage for it's cost, and Hellspark Elemental is nice card economy; but better card economy is making the opponents hand dead with useless removal. Mogg Fanatic was ok when it could get you an extra turn blocking and still get in that one point of damage, but now? It's worse than Shock, and you wouldn't run Shock, now would you?

Searing Blaze seems terrible in a deck that is trying to minimize the number of lands played.

[urdjur]

@Eksem: Ankh was tried before the new set of fetch lands and was then found lacking. No matter how much or little you build around it, you seem to end up with an inherently weaker burn deck with more dependencies. More fetches in the card pool makes it more attractive, but it still sucks mid-late game. As for creatures, I think Keldon Marauders is the only one that should be included at present.

I'm mostly active in the MTGS burn thread, where we've recently discussed the merits of Shard Volley. Those that run it usually only include 2 copies to not interefere with 4x Fireblast (and even so, 2 extra bolts go a long way), but we've recently found that you can run a full set if you simply cut a Fireblast copy. A full 20 3-for-1s is too good to pass up, even if it means running 3 fireblasts (this also reduces the risk of the troubling double fireblast of course). Running 7 spells that send at least 1 land to the grave also greatly helps with threshold for BRing. So recently, I've started to build burn decks with this 3/4 split and they run really smoothly. This is my present build:

18 Mountain
2 Barbarian Ring
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
4 Rift Bolt
4 Lava Spike
4 Shard Volley
4 Keldon Marauders
4 Magma Jet
3 Fireblast
3 Price of Progress
3 Sulfuric Vortex
3 Volcanic Fallout

//Sideboard
2 Powder Keg
2 Shattering Spree
2 Nevinyrral's Disk
2 Red Elemental Blast
2 Pithing Needle
2 Pyrostatic Pillar
2 Relic of Progenitus
1 Price of Progress

I'm very happy with the SB also. The first 10 cards are devoted to Stax (Keg/Spree/Disk) and CounterTop (Disk/REB/Needle), but of course they all have different uses too. Similarly, Pyrostatic Pillar can be combined with more narrow answers against combo (like adding Needle against Belcher, Relic against GY-based combos, REB against blue tutors etc.). This means you'll also have 4-6 relevant SB cards against most forms of combo.

So the SB is focused on ChaliceTrini, CounterTop and combo that can beat our clock. It largely ignores aggro decks, since the MD is already difficult for them to race. I do pack a vast arsenal of answers to Jitte however, and the variety in the SB is excellent against random shenanigans that aggro decks may pack in their sideboards (Burrenton Forge-Tender etc).

[matamagos]

This is an interesting list. However barbarian ring is not a mountain, and you can not feed fireblast and volleys with it. You have enough mountains (18), but you can only play one land each turn. So I don't know if in the final turn you will be able to play a barbarian ring or you will need only mountains to feed your many volleys and fireblasts.