[Primer] PyroRed

[stephan]

I started with zemanjaski latest PyroBoros list on paid events, sadly misscalculated time differences and couldnt join an DE, but i made my own with 2mans.
didn't make specific match notes, but maybe i remember something useful.

Match 1. Master-o'-Waves 2:0
Match 2. Master-o'-Waves 1:2
Match 4. Master-o'-Waves/Black 1:2
Two different player on mono-U, both maybe on the exact PT decklists. The aggro draw supplied by few removals to kill Tidebinder/Omenspeaker is pretty hard for them. Phoenix was an Allstar in these matches. Chained to the Rocks was a livesaver, and could be the best card in these matches if there werent Ratchet Bomb and Cyclonic Rift in those decks. Exiling an active Thassa feals great. T4 MoW into T5 MoW is mostly unbeatable, but every deck had its nutdraw?
The Black splash gives the deck some
kind of control and Nightveil Specter. If i didnt have problems to find the correct line of play (had some trouble to identicate when to play which land, but the access to mutas and scry lands is powerful when done safely) both losses could have been close.

Match 3. BW 2:0
R2 He is at 6 and had a Desecration Demon in play and all mana up. i had Cackler, Muta and 4 Mountains on board and drew into my second "Spear". so had 6 dmg in hand nothing else, what would you do?
I decided they should burn the face, Spear one resolves, Spear Two.. in response Pharika's Cure. Killed Cackler and get 2 Life. He has no outs, i draw an hasty guy to finish him im combination with muta. Chained to the Rocks is very nice here to keep off that freaking demon...

Match 5. Jund
1. Round he ramps, i punched his face wich Cackler, Ash, Phoenix. He get the control with burn and chandra, wich i -probably
wrong- tried to kill. He was at 2 Life and dropped Sire of Insanity,i draw a Shock for the win. R2 was definitly won due to the white spalsh and the addition of Peak Erruption. T5 he dropped Polukranos to get chained to the rocks and the Peak Erruption kills a Shockland and Chandra. Was an easy win from there.
Thanks zemanjaski for your comment to aggressive Magma Jet digg for Peak Erruption, could easely had lost without doing that.

In these Matchups i could see the differences between playing RDW and this type of deck. Going into round 10 or more doesnt feel so bad, especially after boarding out 1drops and chandra "drawing" cards.

[zemanjaski]

[LaZerBurn]

I just went 3-1 with the latest PyroBoros build in the 2 mans. The deck is a joy to play and slowly but surely I'm getting better with it. Thanks to Z for not only building it but writing up match up and boarding guides too

Match 1 Vs B/R 2-0
G1 I'm pleased with myself as I kill my own Phoenix in response to Anger two turns in a row then return it with Chandra and carrying on beating
G2 T3 Peak Eruption gets me ahead and I end up winning past two Demons.

Match 2 Vs Mono U 1-2
G1 I kill everything he plays, keep him off devotion and win
G2 I don't kill everything and die to Thassa and 2 MoW
G3 I mull to 6 and a Satyr and Ashley swiftly get him to 4. I then draw land for 4 turns while he makes 13 tokens from 2 MoW. I pray for Mortars but don't
get it so I die

Match 3 Vs Mono B 2-1
G1 I only see a Lifebane Zombie, which I kill, and a Doomblade so I win
G2 I keep a borderline hand and Xathrid Necromancers and Merchants beat me up.
G3 I get a nice start - T1 Cackler, T2 Ashley, T3 Phoenix and he can't catch up.

Match 4 Vs BUG 2-0 This was a home brew I think? Cloudfin, Cacklers, Ooze, Experiment One
G1 I killed his Ooze in response and run over him.
G2 I played well, blocking correctly and thinking ahead and the deck was n full flow this game with Chandra, her Phoenix and YP all online and purring

I have to say, it's great to be here at DtR

[Jack]

Yo, would anyone be willing to take over this "primer"? I just created the thread so we had somewhere to discuss this specific red variant, and then the mods slapped "primer" onto the title. Now that I see just how many of you have taken up this glorious creation of zemanjaski, I feel like the deck deserves something more.

[Khaospawn]

Not the hero it needs. But the one it deserves.


SWEAR TO ME!

[Yarpus]

I wrote a Primer some time ago, currently updating it to match the overall idea of PyroRed now. Still, I am not sure if I should post it as it's still waiting for Zem's agreement as it's his deck and his idea.

[zemanjaski]

I don't really mind who runs it. I'm too busy with the full RDW primer / articles / playing to add this as well I'm afraid.

[Khaospawn]

Actually, I do not want to run this one. I haven't represented this deck enough to assume leadership of the thread.

However, I am planning doing a write-up, somewhat of a primer, in the very near future ..

[Yarpus]

I actually don't like the whole "Go-White" movement in here. There are some other colours to splash that are reasonable as long as you accept the fact that you don't get the access to Scrylands. I personally do love me some Scrylands, but the options you get from splashing something else are far more powerfull.

Splashing Blue:
- Turn // Burn: flexxible removal/burn
- Izzet Charm: huh, skeleton key
- Counterspells: to say "no"

Splashing Black:
- Doom Blade/Dreadbore: "please go die"
- Thoughtseize: if you want to go ham
- Exava, Rakdos Blood Witch: as potential finisher
- Rakdos' Return: if all you want to do is lick off the tears of control/midrange players

Splashing... Green:
- Destructive Revelry: kills artifacts/enchantments? Yes. Generates token with YP? Yes. Returns Chandra's Phoenix? Yes.
- Ground Assault: not the best removal you could imagine but it does it'
s job
- Gruul Charm: killing all the 3/3 fliers slowly becomes more and more relevant. Especially if you also can just push damage through the ground creatures.
- Clan Defiance: maybe that's a bit too stretchy, but hey, this card is awesome!

If anyone decides to write a Primer, he can use some of the scraps of this: http://www.sendspace.com/file/ne9j9h . Decklist is fairly outdated, but well, maybe some parts of it could be ok.

[Jack]

I don't think that there needs to be anyone to "run" the primer, I just think that there should be a few more words in the first post. Z, you've already done a lot for the deck. Would you mind if I pasted some of your words in there (giving you full credit, of course)?

[Yarpus]

BTW. Why in the hell those WizardFuckars don't give us 16 slots in SB. I hate running non-geminate number of cards. So I'm really tempted to use 14-cards SB and some kind of singleton shitty card for lulz.

[zemanjaski]

Yeah go for it freedom, just throw it in quotes and it's fine by me. It's really hard for me to motivate myself to write "complete" documents, I tend to work in bursts, so just throwing something up now and then and letting others take and use what they want suits me.

RE: splash; I think white is best and it's not particularly close. Why? Boros Reckoner. You can get him in the other variants but you're mana starts to get really awkward. I think Reckoner is just where you want to be post board too often to not have easy access to him.

[Yarpus]

I think we are mostly talking about very delicate splashing of the off-color. For mostly SB stuff (like in case of Gruul - you can have no maindeck Green cards, just variety of SB stuff). So you could actually consider running only 8 sources of Green mana (for 2 Destructive Revelry? Or for 4 Ground Assault?) Doesn't sound that bad.
Maybe I'm just clinging to the synergies of the deck too hard. I dislike playing Reckoner as both:
a) I can't afford him
b) He's non-synergistic with the rest of the deck
c) He doesn't deal with Chandra's Phoenix and Chandra, Pyromaster at all.
Generally, with him coming up in the 70% of the decks - people will start packing lots of responses to him.

[F.I.A]

@Yarpus: One great thing about splashing White is having access to Boros Charm as anti-verdict tech. But still, to answer most of your suggestions.

- [card]Turn // Burn[/card] : I like how this work on Fiendslayer Paladin with the Turn side, but Chained to the Rocks does it for measle 1 mana. It's still better when used against Obzedat, though.
- Izzet Charm : Still cannot kill Master of Waves or Fiendslayer Paladin. The counter part has awkward interaction with Chandra.
- Counterspells : See the end portion of above

- Doomblade, Dreadbore - The former cannot hit many target (Black & blue devo sporting Nightveil Specter,
usual red aggro sporting Rakdos Cackler) compared to Chained to the Rocks. Dreadbore is actually a weaker option compared to Chained (Sometimes, you want the creature exiled instead of dead).
- Thoughtseize - Didn't own one just yet, but I suppose it is good to nip out problems before they bloom.
- Exava, Rakdos Blood Witch - Zero synergy with most of your creatures.
- [card]Rakdos's Return[/card] - I suppose it works if we manage to flood ourselves, since our mana base is usually tight with all the scrying.

- Destructive Revelry - White still has [card]Wear // Tear[/card].
- Ground Assault - See Rakdos' Return
- Gruul Charm - I haven't been seeing fliers very often these days. The age of getting blocked by 3/4s
long gone.
- Clan Defiance - See Rakdos' Return

Not that it's not a good idea to try other splash, but right now, White has the most suitable options at the moment. Like, if Black started to get some good cards in the future, I'd splash it for Slaughter Games and [card]Toil // Trouble[/card].

[zemanjaski]

a) not a real reason
b) he really ties together the SB strategy and the 1 drops are just as un-synergistic
c) white can deal with Phoenix (very relevant), black can deal with Chandra ~ though I'm not even sure if that's relevant? What other deck is Chandra a key piece in? Reckoner at least can threaten Chandra.

I'm not sure what answers people can bring in for my Reckoners that are realistic. What's GR ramp bring in? Is GW going to board pacifism? They don't come in against Doom Blade decks anyway. Sure, Big Boros can chain them; but I will have Peak Eruption there.

[zemanjaski]

Black is a distant second but has some decent possibilities. Tymaret is good here. The others aren't even remotely good enough.

[Yarpus]

- Turn // Burn : I like how this work on Fiendslayer Paladin with the Turn side, but Chained to the Rocks does it for measle 1 mana. It's still better when used against Obzedat, though.

Yes - but what you get is the millage of flexxibility. It's a burn card. It's also an answer to every single creature card in the format except of Kalonian Hydra <laugh>. It returns Phoenix, it kills Obzedat and Blood Baron of Vizkopa, it generates the token.

- Izzet Charm : Still cannot kill Master of Waves or Fiendslayer Paladin. The counter part has awkward interaction with Chandra.

Yes, and Shock doesn't kill Obzedat. The awkwardness stops in the moment when you have access to 2 additional modes.

- Doomblade, Dreadbore - The former cannot hit many target (Black & blue devo sporting Nightveil Specter, usual red aggro sporting Rakdos
Cackler) compared to Chained to the Rocks. Dreadbore is actually a weaker option compared to Chained (Sometimes, you want the creature exiled instead of dead).

Having access to both burn and removal gives you the possibility of dealing with both the drops you mentioned and big fattys.

- Exava, Rakdos Blood Witch - Zero synergy with most of your creatures.

4/4 First Strike Haste needs no synergies to work.

- Destructive Revelry - White still has Wear // Tear.

And Revelry is a bit cooler 90% of time.

- Gruul Charm - I haven't been seeing fliers very often these days. The age of getting blocked by 3/4s long gone.

*cough* Nightveil Specter *cough* ultimate'd Elspeth *cough* Mono Blue Fliers in the format *cough* having 2nd mode which is Seismic Stomp.

[zemanjaski]

How can you promote Exava (no synergy) then write-off Reckoner? Hypocrisy.

[Yarpus]

One is mostly strong in defense/grinding against Aggro.
Exava is aggresive finisher/beater who serves the similiar role as Hellrider did in Inn-RtR.
No offense - but there's a bit of difference here and there.

[Mage of hot stuff]

Match 5. Jund
1. Round he ramps, i punched his face wich Cackler, Ash, Phoenix. He get the control with burn and chandra, wich i -probably wrong- tried to kill. He was at 2 Life and dropped Sire of Insanity,i draw a Shock for the win. R2 was definitly won due to the white spalsh and the addition of Peak Erruption. T5 he dropped Polukranos to get chained to the rocks and the Peak Erruption kills a Shockland and Chandra. Was an easy win from there.
Thanks zemanjaski for your comment to aggressive Magma Jet digg for Peak Erruption, could easely had lost without doing that.

In these Matchups i could see the differences between playing RDW and this type of deck. Going into round 10 or more doesnt feel so bad, especially after boarding out 1drops and
chandra "drawing" cards.

Can peak eruption kill a planeswalker? i was under the assumption it had to do damage to the player whom land you detroyed? If not thats reaally awesome.

[Yarpus]

You deal the damage to the player. And then you have the choice - either it lowers his life count or lower the loyality counters on Planeswalker he controls. That's how it works in terms of burn spells. In case of declaring the attackers - you need to say out loud whom you are attacking.

[zemanjaski]

One is mostly strong in defense/grinding against Aggro.
Exava is aggresive finisher/beater who serves the similiar role as Hellrider did in Inn-RtR.
No offense - but there's a bit of difference here and there.

And no offence, it's hypocritical to argue that the text of one card is sufficient to be worth mentioning and dismissing another card that sees inclusion for the same reason. It seems trite to tell me that the text of the cards are actually different though.

@ Magus. Yes, you can kill PWs with it.

[Helios]

If Z gives his blessing, I don't mind doing the Primer. I intend to play this deck all season.

RE: Reckoner- So I hear you can swing into x/5s with impunity, and trade with x/6s (or kill with LS in hand). Yea, Reckoner totally cannot be aggressive. This deck is all about options, and Reckoner gives you more of those than Exava.

[zemanjaski]

^ granted.

[Helios]

*swoons*

[Mage of hot stuff]

You deal the damage to the player. And then you have the choice - either it lowers his life count or lower the loyality counters on Planeswalker he controls. That's how it works in terms of burn spells. In case of declaring the attackers - you need to say out loud whom you are attacking.

oooooo thats very good info to know. thanks for that yarpus!

[Yarpus]

And no offence, it's hypocritical to argue that the text of one card is sufficient to be worth mentioning and dismissing another card that sees inclusion for the same reason. It seems trite to tell me that the text of the cards are actually different though.

The reasons to include those cards are completely different. At least for me, Exava is more all-around card. It's hard-to-deal-with threat against Aggro. It's not as defensive against them (as you'll most often want to play it as 4/4) while it also offers some serious beating against Control. Reckoner is better for grindy matchups.
Not sure how Exava is effective against Gx decks, while Reckoner IS effective against these. Still, with format getting more and more infested with variety of removal that deals with Reckoner I think Exava might be a viable option as she can provide some hasty-beating-value. Most probably she belongs in
the other deck though.
Hey, just don't go all "you're useless piece of shit Yarpus". I'm here to help - at least I'm trying to. Sorry if I fail to do so.

Reckoner is better against creatures.
Exava is better against removal.
After ProTour people will be all about removal.

[Jack]

I was thinking of actually just keeping it up myself (I just edited the first post to match the current (mono red) version of the deck), but it's probably better if someone who'd be willing to dedicate a bit more time to keeping it up would take it over. Have at it, Helios!

[Jack]

How exactly did you go about handing the Dos Rakis thread over to Nuwen? Would Z be able to do it as a standard mod, or would we have to get admin to do it?

[zemanjaski]

Why will removal matter to Reckoner? I already asked for you to explain what removal the decks Reckoner comes in against will use to obsolete him:
- mono red
- green-red ramp
- mono green
- green-white

Naya has access to Chained, which is a clean answer, but you're bringing in Peak Eruption...

[F.I.A]

Wait, how is Exava good against removals here?

And Yarpus, you're pulling my legs here when you can afford Thoughtseize but not em' Red Bulls.

[zemanjaski]

She's good against Doom Blade and most red removal.

[NerdBoyWonder]

A PyroRakdos build with YP$ & Murder King gots me intrigued.

[zemanjaski]

Yeah me to. Fitting in all the cards isn't easy, but it's a pretty exciting deck. Tymaret is just really good.

[deck]PyroRak[/deck]

[NerdBoyWonder]

Between Phoenix, YP$ and Murder King you have this constant recursion ass whooping potential. Going out on a limb here and say a sideboard would look something like this?

[deck]Sideboard
2 Rakdos Returns
4 Boros Reckoner
2 Dreadbore
2 Hammer of Purphoros
2 Mizzium Mortars
3 Peak Eruption[/deck]

[zemanjaski]

You definitely can't run Reckoner. Rest seems OK. In my experience Duress > Rakdos Returns because it's just faster and you only care about a couple of cards.

[Jack]

Purge the Profane>>>>>>>Duress>Rakdos's Return.

[NerdBoyWonder]

If you run Duress why not thoughtseize? I would assume the problem cards worth taking out are things that aren't creatures? Wondering if Slaughter Games is too slow also.

[zemanjaski]

Well, you'll usually oy want that effect vs. control and duress does exactly the same thing there (you're not ever taking Aetherling). I suppose if you want discard against midrange (I don't know) then Thoughtseize is preferable.

[NerdBoyWonder]

Looking over the PyroRak & PyroBoros builds and even though PyroRak has potential the PyroBoros build has much more solid burn plan to keep the phoenixes live. Damn you Z & Khaos. Don't know what to pilot this friday and for FNM, PyroBoros or Mogis Red.