Devotion to Red

[hamfactorial]

[deck]Devotion to Red v. 1.0[/deck]

After playing a few games with LP's RW devotion list at the GP, I started turning the Modern card pool over in my head with devotion in mind.

The primary questions with devotion decks hoping to abuse Nykthos are:

1. How do I generate lots of devotion?
2. What do I spend the mana from Nykthos on?

The first question is easy to answer since red's best creatures typically have highly red mana costs.

The second question is helped somewhat by the presence of some great and cheap mana
sinks.

In order to establish a board state that can provide high devotion, I've opted for a high creature count as well as a way to consistently draw into them in Domri Rade. That he survives a bolt and provides devotion himself is just a bonus. Being able to fight through board stall with an Ashenmoor Gouger has proven useful to say the least.

With a mostly creature deck, it is difficult to respond at instant speed unless your creatures have ways of dealing damage. I selected Grim Lavamancer and Ember Hauler for that reason. Ember Hauler can be activated with colorless mana as upside, so opening hands with Hauler and Nykthos needn't depress you.

Spellskite provides no devotion, but it allows some degree of non-interaction with combo decks like Twin and Pod, and Hexproof. Casting one off of a BTE chain also feels quite nice.

The Hammer and 2 Swords provide a way to get value out of multiple copies of Nykthos, late game land and provide CA,
provided that the creature can get through.

Other cards I considered:
Shrine of Burning Rage for the ultimate in "play lots of red spells"
Seal of Fire over Grimmy
Sword of Feast and Famine over F&I
Dismember as a 2/3-of to deal with troublesome creatures.

[LP, of the Fires]

Shoutouts to Demigod of Revenge.

[hamfactorial]

Indeed

I'm not sure if Fanatic is any good in the land of instant speed sweepers and Torpor Orb, so he might get the cut for Demigod.

Also, Boartusk Liege?

[hamfactorial]

Yup, Boartusk Liege.

[deck]Devotion to Red v. 1.1[/deck]

I'll be playing with the numbers (4 Spellskite and 4 KDL is too many, 2 Grim Lavamancer is too few, I think), but I like the creature selection. I tried Demigod, but he was impossible to cast on 23 land if I didn't already have a dominant board state. Boartusk Liege is reasonable to cast with an empty board, is always possible if I'm making land drops. He also drops off of a BTE chain for value.

Morning testing before downtime:
1-0 vs. bad RB vampire homebrew
1-0 vs. Tempo Twin
1-0 vs. Valakut
0-1 vs. Pyromaster Ascension Storm

I'm inexperienced with green, so the sideboard is a mess. I'm thinking that Vines of Vastwood may be valuable here, but I'll look at the common Gruul Zoo sideboards to see what they're packing.

Cards that come to mind -
[cards]Ancient Grudge
Ghor-Clan Rampager
Scavenging Ooze
Rancor[/cards]

[redthirst]

I think I like Boggart Ram-Gang over Ashenmoor Gouger - especially if you're running BTE and Liege.

[hamfactorial]

I like Boggart Ram-Gang a lot, too. I picked Gouger over the Ram-Gang because the 4/4 body can't be bolted, which is very relevant in Modern. Hard to argue with haste, though.

Both the Gouger and the Ram-Gang are 5/5s with a Boartusk Liege on the field, but the Gouger is much worse on defense.

Will certainly test to see which performs better.

[rcwraspy]

if you're playing with a lot of hybrid red/green creatures for devotion, it seems that Fracturing Gust would be a perfect SB card since you can still get a good amount of green off Nykthos.

[rcwraspy]

for some reason this thread made me think of the new Xenagos, God of Revels + Mage Slayer + fatty. Has Mage Slayer ever seen play in anything other than EDH?

[hamfactorial]

I love the Fracturing Gust idea. I could easily up the RG dual count to be able to cast it without a nutty board presence.

[redthirst]

I like Boggart Ram-Gang a lot, too. I picked Gouger over the Ram-Gang because the 4/4 body can't be bolted, which is very relevant in Modern. Hard to argue with haste, though.

Both the Gouger and the Ram-Gang are 5/5s with a Boartusk Liege on the field, but the Gouger is much worse on defense.

Will certainly test to see which performs better.

Also, you can chain BTE into Ram-Gang, which you can't do with Gouger or most of your 2-drops.

[Jack]

I think, in an earlier discussion, we came to the conclusion that Flinthoof Boar was a better card than Ram-Gang. Then devotion became a thing.

[hamfactorial]

I think you're right, red. BRG is probably the better 3 drop for this deck.

[redthirst]

I'll also point out that, in a pinch, with BRG out Nykthos can produce the colored mana needed for Fracturing Gust... if that's a thing.

[hamfactorial]

It couldn't hurt to get more on-color devotion. Also, why the hell is Fracturing Gust $5 on MTGO? Holy crap.

[Toddington]

In modern, you actually have RR 2-drops you can cast off Burning-Tree Emissary, could you play Gruul Guildmage and Vexing Shusher? Guildmage is sort of a mana sink, and Shusher might be good in some matchups?

I've been thinking about porting R-Devotion to Modern, and I was wondering if you even need a big finisher like Stormbreath Dragon. I just wanna cast huge Bonfire of the Damneds, but that's probably too cute. Koth of the Hammer seems good, as a psuedo-accelerant / non-creature devotion source / beater.

EDIT: Didn't see Shusher in SB.

[hamfactorial]

I have Shusher in the SB, it's pretty great. I don't think Gruul Guildmage does a lot for me in this deck.

With more green in the mix, I could run Chord of Calling and a few toolbox creatures to hate on the combo decks.

Like Burning-Tree Shaman against Twin.

There are probably more worth considering.

[rcwraspy]

you could also run something like Sylvan Scrying to guarantee you see Nykthos. Chains off BTE too. Maybe a 1-of Scrying and a 1-of some utility land, like a wasteland variant.

[hamfactorial]

Sylvan Scrying lets me run fewer Nykthos and some other interesting lands in their place. Raging Ravine and Kessig Wolf Run, for example.

[hamfactorial]

On to the great dilemma of removal, do I splash black for Abrupt Decay or just go full #yolo and run Beast Within?

[hamfactorial]

Going Abrupt Decay. The black lets me abuse Olivia Voldaren (if ever needed).

[hamfactorial]

Spoiler alert: the deck isn't very consistent, the removal in Modern is too good to establish a giant board presence.

[Pedros]

After playing around with both red devo in standard and testing white prison (with nykthos and huge revelation / white sun's zenith) Did we arrive with something?

[hamfactorial]

The creature devotion builds I tried were OK. They won in fair fights, but I got shit on repeatedly by combo decks like Twin, Scapeshift and Storm.

A prison devotion deck is probably the better plan.

[Pedros]

Yeah I am mitivated now that Patric Chapin wrote article about it that they even thought about it for pro tour but some decided UW control was better.