Dies to Removal

While the original PyroRed could transition from aggro to control if the game goes long, do you feel like PyroRakdos doesn't have the same fluid flexibility with the loss of Chandra, Pyromaster?

Well, the decks I was previously bringing Chandra in for was aggro and control. Now that we have Searing Blood we can afford to continue with our aggro plan. It's literally a two for one against them and often times a three for one with a Phoenix in the yard. That's the same thing Chandra did against them except in some cases where you just stuck her late and let her go ultimate uncontested. Against control we're just so fast we don't miss Chandra at all.

Still loving this deck, that sideboard looks pretty good. Is 4 Toil/Trouble too many? I feel like you can't bring it in vs anything besides UW.

I next level mono black by bringing it in. I just take out 8 creatures and turn into a burn deck.

While the original PyroRed could transition from aggro to control if the game goes long, do you feel like PyroRakdos doesn't have the same fluid flexibility with the loss of Chandra, Pyromaster?

Wait why does PyroRakis have to lose Pyromaster?

If you're mana is playing phoenix it sure as fuck can (and should) play Chandra

I very much like the idea of siding into a burn deck vs. Mono black. Nice drown in sorrows you got there huh?

Dreadbore your demon, leave up 2 mana
Skullcrack your merchant, return phoenix.

huehuehuehuehuheuheuheuhue

Monoblack was a cake walk before rotation.


Finally traded in a bunch of cards to complete nuwen's temple of malice set so she's running the deck now. She likes shock better than searing blood for one, so if you're looking to cut something to make room for searing blood it probably has to be some number of magma jet =/ (running a 2-2 split atm).

Curving out at 2 Chandra and 2 Exava at the 4-drop. Running 24 land just because its important to curve out, and extra scry to hopefully prevent flood.

Hm this is the wrong thread for Rakdos, stop confusing me Xanatos....

Hm this is the wrong thread for Rakdos, stop confusing me Xanatos....

Congratulations

I went 1-4 (worst result in months) with my list yesterday so I don't think this is the deck for me, unfortunately

At least there is someone else who mirrored my results with this build, lol. As much as I want YP$ to work, he just does literally nothing every game for me.

In totally unrelated news, I want to combine Boros Reckoner, YP$, Guttersnipe, and Goblin Electromancer for maximum huehue.

There was another IQ on Saturday, I finished 5-2, which was good only for 11th place. I would be upset about this, but I lost to some really silly shit that I probably couldn't have ever beat anyway, so oh well.

Round 1
I played against BG graveyard shit. Lotleth Trolls, Jarad, Nighthowlers, Nemesis of Mortals... I had no play against this deck whatsoever. It ended up in the top 8, probably due to the fact that nobody else was playing graveyard hate either. I'm not even going to sum up games 1 and 2 because they both consisted of Lotleth Troll being played similar to Aetherling and me being unable to do anything about it. I brought in Reckoners and Slaughter Games in hopes that I could get the Lotleth Trolls before they became a problem, but I was unsuccessful.


Round 2
Was against RG Monsters. Game 1 I roflstomped him by killing everything he played and
slamming a dragon. He didn't find the solution and I just cracked him to death with the dragon repeatedly. In this matchup I brought out the 1drops and brought in Ultimate Price and Reckoners.

Game 2 he kept trying to planeswalker me to death. At one point he had Xenagos out with a Polykranos on board, but I had Young Pyromancer live and enough tokens to chump him until I found the Dreadbore. By the time he had played his Domri, we were a few turns deep and I found a Phoenix, which he had no answer to, and I proceeded to chip away at his life total like this, completely ignoring Domri since even if he made an emblem he had no relevant creatures anyway.

Round 3
Played against Chris Van-Meter on Esper. I think most of the SCG guys were playing the deck. Neither of our games went very long, as I got excellent hands against Esper that consisted of "Kill you with these 2/2s." Game 1 I got him with Mutavaults.

Game 2 was Cackler and an unanswered pair of Phoenix.
I didn't sideboard at all for this matchup, the mainboard matchup is already very good against Esper.

Round 4
My second loss came here after my opponent shuffled my deck so violently that he broke two of my sleeves and actually destroyed one of my Zendikar mountains in the process. I was pretty fucking irritated. It was WB midrange. Game 1 I beat the shit out of him with a slew of Phoenix, and it was funny because Bile Blight hit them quite a few times and they just kept coming back. I brought out the 1drops to bring in Ultimate Price and Skullcracks.

Game 2 he played Blood Barons for 4 consecutive turns. Really?

Game 3 was pretty similar, except it consisted of Obzedat into Blood Baron when I had him at 4. Seems good. Honestly I could have probably won but I was put on tilt pretty hard by my opponent literally destroying my deck that I wasn't playing my best.

Round 5
I played against GW aggro again. This matchup is pretty easy for
me since I know all the cards in the deck. You don't get caught off guard very often if you know the list, which is what the deck is trying to do, so it was a pretty simple 2-0. (Although we did have a life discrepancy at one point. It ended up not mattering in the end since I obliterated him and he got super salty about it.)

Game 1 consisted of me removing every creature he played and killing him with Stormbreath and Chandra. It was some of the least exciting Magic I've played in a while. I boarded out my 1drops and a single Shock to bring in Reckoners, Ultimate Price and Flames of the Firebrand.

Game 2 started out with him stumbling a little bit, and me beating him down with Mutavaults. At one point we had a discrepancy which involved 2 life difference, the judge ruled it in his favor, but then I topdecked two Stormbreaths in a row and my opponent proceeded to mumble about how I was bad at Magic and my deck took no skill. Salty much? I lost to this guy at the last IQ so I don't know what
his problem is.

Round 6
I played against mono black devotion, which is another particularly easy matchup. I ended up losing game 1 to double Grey Merchant, but I then boarded out my 1drops, bringing in Skullcracks and Ultimate Price.

Game 2 was a lot different, and it involved us killing each creature in play for the first 6 turns. He ran out of threats before I did since Phoenix is OP. I managed to whittle him down with nothing but small burn (which recurred my Phoenix) and the Phoenix itself.

Game 3 was also pretty unexciting. He played Pack Rats too early, I had the Ultimate Price while he was playing around the 3 damage removal spell with Mutavault. From there it was basically him trying to resolve anything that would give him enough devotion to play a meaningful Grey Merchant. He did eventually Merchant me for 6, but I had the Skullcrack and just killed him on the swingback.

[
b]Round 7[/b]
Played against a guy I played in the final round of swiss last IQ. "Mono white" humans. This time he didn't get so lucky, because I 2-0'd him with enough time on the clock to go outside and charge my phone to 50% in the car. He never got Battalion going, I killed most of the things he played. Turns out Daring Skyjek is super bad as the only creature on board.

Game 2 was exactly the same. Last IQ, this guy got me pretty upset because we were having a close game and and at the very end he flips over the top card and goes "Oh, I guess I win." He flips an Ajani for game. Well, I got to exact sweet, sweet vengeance when I did the same thing with Stormbreath Dragon for exactly lethal. Granted, this game wasn't as close since in both games he never even hit me for a single point of damage...




I was pretty disappointed when I didn't make top 8. The guy I lost to in round 1 was 5-2 and he made it, as was another gentleman, but I ended up in
11th from tiebreakers. :\

I bubbled my first and only IQ after going 5-2 so I know how it feels.

Hey guys. I post here occasionally but it's been awhile, just made top 4 of a PTQ playing PyroBlack. There were 190 people so it was 8 rounds plus top 8. I've written a more in depth tournament report here http://www.htnorth.com/wordpress/?p=4394 for the store I work at.

Here's my list though

PyroBlack
[deck]4x Firedrinker Satyr
2x Rakdos Cackler
4x Ash Zealot
4x Young Pyromancer
4x Chandra’s Phoenix
3x Chandra, Pyromaster
2x Shock
4x Lightning Strike
4x Magma Jet
2x Mizzium Mortars
4x Dreadbore
4x Blood Crypt
4x Temple of Malice
2x Rakdos Guildgate
2x Mutavault
11x Mountain

Sideboard
3x Toil / Trouble
3x Thoughtseize
2x Doom Blade
2x Mizzium Mortars
2x Stormbreath Dragon
1x Mutavault
1x Ultimate Price
1x Fated Conflagration[/deck]

I went 7-1 in swiss after losing my first round to UW. I beat Naya
Control, Mono Black, Esper Midrange, BW Midrange, Two Mono-Black aggro decks, and finally beating Mono Blue Devotion splashing white in round 8 as my win and in match.

In top eight I beat GR monsters in the quarter finals and then lost to BW in the semis. I ended the day with an overall match record of 8-2.

Couple of thoughts. Thoughtseize was kinda meh. I only brought it in against mono blue and UW/x it was fairly subpar each time, although it's much better against mono blue. I didn't like toil/trouble, I feel like having an extra couple of one drops would have been more useful in combating UW/x and Black Devo/midrange decks. Stormbreaths in the board were fantastic, I don't like them in most matchups but against GR/Mono Blue bringing in the extra land and win conditions was really great. The UW control player I lost to boarded in extra counterspells which are very good against this deck as it plays like a slower aggressive deck some of the time. Sphinx's Revelation is almost impossible to beat, I
almost want to run Slaughter Games. This is not to say however that I think UW/x is an unwinnable matchup, just that it is difficult to overcome the card advantage of a lategame revelation.

Your deck is pretty similar to mine, and I think you are trying to play too many black sources and not enough Mutavaults. I've had very little trouble with only 8 black sources in the deck, specially considering there are only four spells in the maindeck that require black at all.

I play four Mutavaults for the express reason of being able to absolutely, without fail beat control decks every single time. I would suggest dropping those Guildgates and trying out the Mutavaults, they're very good.

Also Mouthbreather Dragon is very good.

I've found from personal experience that 4x mutavault is too many in a 23 land deck. Keep in mind that post board I'm bringing in up to 6 black spells which need the additional black sources. That said as far as luck goes I tend not to run particularly well and would not condemn anyone else for running a playset of mutavault.

I've found from personal experience that 4x mutavault is too many in a 23 land deck. Keep in mind that post board I'm bringing in up to 6 black spells which need the additional black sources. That said as far as luck goes I tend not to run particularly well and would not condemn anyone else for running a playset of mutavault.

Congrats on the results! I myself and kind of favoring aggro with burn/removal support instead of vice versa. Can you talk a little bit about your sideboard against certain match ups? you have an interesting fated conflagration as a single, and 2 sbds. Im just really curious how you go about sideboarding against the current "tier 1" of standard.

I've been playing the deck for just shy of six months now in both iterations. (White and black) That being said, I probably have something like 250+ games on it. The mana with 8 sources has never once been a problem I've run into, since the splash is so light. I've never run guildgates, although I did run a single Plains in the white version since my splash was a little heavier out of the board. Lands coming in tapped is pretty bad for the deck unless there is a purpose for it. You need to make maximum use of your mana each turn. I consider Scry 1 to be an acceptable use of 1 mana, which is why I have no problem with playing the scrylands, but Guildgates are just not good.

8 black sources is plenty. You never want to have more than one at any given time, and the math is in your favor that you see at least one within the first 4 turns of the game. (You're more likely to see a black source than you are to see
Dreadbore.) You don't generally need to cast a black spell sooner than that. Ultimate Price is the only one I could conceivably see needing that soon. I actually play one more black spell in the board than you do (2 Erebos, 3 Ultimate Price, 3 Slaughter Games) and even then, the second black source is usually bad. I like seeing at least one Temple of Malice, but any more beyond that, especially Blood Crypt, is basically a 100% dead card.

Clearly I'm not going to convince you, but I do have a LOT of experience with this deck and I just figured I would make my experience readily available to you and anybody else who might be interested.

I considered writing a full-on article about the deck, but I can only assume James will eventually do one of his own and mine will be quickly discarded.

The Fated Conflagration basically functions as a fifth Dreadbore with a higher mana cost and some slight upside. It kills basically every relevant threat outside of Master of Waves and Desecration Demon, which it can sometime kill when combined with a chandra ping or the first strike from an ash zealot. I'd definitely consider playing a second one in the 75.

I don't really use a precise sideboarding structure but here are some general guidelines. The sideboard contains the most important

RG Monsters
Against RG we're playing as a tempo deck post board trying to keep them off balance while applying pressure. Alternatively we can just play as a control deck and gain keep the board clear until we can resolve a dragon or phoenix
Key Dynamics and interactions: Ash Zealot's First Strike and Burn Spells, Trading low cost removal spells for high cost creatures and gaining tempo in the process
Out: 2x Shock, 4x Magma Jet,
2x Rakdos Cackler, 1x Lightning Strike
In: 2x Doom Blade, 2x Mizzium Mortars, 2x Stormbreath Dragon, 1x Fated Conflagration, 1x Ultimate Price, 1x Mutavault

BW Midrange
Against this deck we're forced to board into a more effective sligh deck as opposed to a more effective control/tempo deck.
Key Interaction/Dynamics: Scry the BW deck has a multitude of threats that are all very difficult to answer, using magma jet to sculpt the perfect hand of answers is very very important in this matchup. This matchup is very skill intensive and will most likely be lost on the back of a single misstep.
Out: 2x Shock, 4x Lightning Strike, 1x Rakdos Cackler
In: 3x Toil, 2x Mizzium Mortars, 1x Ultimate Price, 1x Fated Conflagration

Mono Black Devotion
This matchup is similar to BW in that every threat will just end the game if unchecked.
Key interactions: Burn Spells and Chandra's Phoenix
Out: 2x Shock, 4x Magma Jet
In: 3x Toil, 2x Mizzium Mortars, 1x Ultimate Price

UW/x Control
Key interactions: Phoenix
and Burn spells
Out: 2x Shock, 2x Lightning Strike 2x Mortars 1x Guildgate
In: 3x Thoughtseize 3x Toil, 1x Mutavault

Esper
Out: 2x Shock, 4x Lightning Strike 1x Guildgate, 1x Dreadbore, 1x YP$
In: 3x Thoughtseize 3x Toil, 1x Mutavault, 2x Mutavault
Against esper postboard is awkward because we have to hedge against them bringing blood baron in and just running away with the game.

MonoBlue Devotion
This matchup is bad. We have to board into being the control deck and attempt to grind them out.
Key interactions: Removal spells, Card advantage from Chandra's 0 ability
Out: 2x Rakdos Cackler, 4x Firedrinker Satyr, 4x Ash Zealot, 2x Magma Jet
In: 3x Thoughtseize 2x Doom Blade 2x Mizzium Mortars 2x Stormbreath Dragon 1x Mutavault 1x Ultimate Price 1x Fated Conflagration

Aggressive Matchups
Key interactions: Young Pyromancer and removal spells
Out: 4x Firedrinker Satyr, 2x Rakdos Cackler
In: 2x Mizzium Mortars, 2x Doom Blade, 1x Ultimate Price, 1x Fated Conflagration
If the opponent is on a
black based aggressive deck I leave in two firedrinker satyrs to function as one mana removal spells

I considered writing a full-on article about the deck, but I can only assume James will eventually do one of his own and mine will be quickly discarded.

You're safe, all my time is taken up learning to count to 20.

There are almost no matchups where I would keep in my 1drops, especially not against RG Monsters.

You only keep them in against control decks because they allow you to apply early pressure and sometimes even force Detention Spheres out of them. They come out in practically every other matchup. ESPECIALLY Satyrs. Why would you leave Satyr in against RG Monsters? It is the actual worst card to have.

Satyr is a great card against RG monsters if you're on the tempo plan. Your life total is a resource, one which isn't being particularly pressured in that matchup. Using your satyrs to trade up for larger, more expensive creatures is very important in the resource war. They also attack through Sylvan Caryatid which can be quite the roadblock for other small creatures.

Post-Board we're playing as a disruption aggro deck in most matchups. We can't play that role without early pressure in a turn one or two play.

The Fated Conflagration basically functions as a fifth Dreadbore with a higher mana cost and some slight upside. It kills basically every relevant threat outside of Master of Waves and Desecration Demon, which it can sometime kill when combined with a chandra ping or the first strike from an ash zealot. I'd definitely consider playing a second one in the 75.

I don't really use a precise sideboarding structure but here are some general guidelines. The sideboard contains the most important

RG Monsters
Against RG we're playing as a tempo deck post board trying to keep them off balance while applying pressure. Alternatively we can just play as a control deck and gain keep the board clear until we can resolve a dragon or phoenix
Key Dynamics and interactions: Ash
Zealot's First Strike and Burn Spells, Trading low cost removal spells for high cost creatures and gaining tempo in the process
Out: 2x Shock, 4x Magma Jet, 2x Rakdos Cackler, 1x Lightning Strike
In: 2x Doom Blade, 2x Mizzium Mortars, 2x Stormbreath Dragon, 1x Fated Conflagration, 1x Ultimate Price, 1x Mutavault

BW Midrange
Against this deck we're forced to board into a more effective sligh deck as opposed to a more effective control/tempo deck.
Key Interaction/Dynamics: Scry the BW deck has a multitude of threats that are all very difficult to answer, using magma jet to sculpt the perfect hand of answers is very very important in this matchup. This matchup is very skill intensive and will most likely be lost on the back of a single misstep.
Out: 2x Shock, 4x Lightning Strike, 1x Rakdos Cackler
In: 3x Toil, 2x Mizzium Mortars, 1x Ultimate Price, 1x Fated Conflagration

Mono Black Devotion
This matchup is similar to BW in that every threat will just end the game if unchecked.
Key interactions:
Burn Spells and Chandra's Phoenix
Out: 2x Shock, 4x Magma Jet
In: 3x Toil, 2x Mizzium Mortars, 1x Ultimate Price

UW/x Control
Key interactions: Phoenix and Burn spells
Out: 2x Shock, 2x Lightning Strike 2x Mortars 1x Guildgate
In: 3x Thoughtseize 3x Toil, 1x Mutavault

Esper
Out: 2x Shock, 4x Lightning Strike 1x Guildgate, 1x Dreadbore, 1x YP$
In: 3x Thoughtseize 3x Toil, 1x Mutavault, 2x Mutavault
Against esper postboard is awkward because we have to hedge against them bringing blood baron in and just running away with the game.

MonoBlue Devotion
This matchup is bad. We have to board into being the control deck and attempt to grind them out.
Key interactions: Removal spells, Card advantage from Chandra's 0 ability
Out: 2x Rakdos Cackler, 4x Firedrinker Satyr, 4x Ash Zealot, 2x Magma Jet
In: 3x Thoughtseize 2x Doom Blade 2x Mizzium Mortars 2x Stormbreath Dragon 1x Mutavault 1x Ultimate Price 1x Fated Conflagration

Aggressive Matchups
Key interactions: Young Pyromancer and removal
spells
Out: 4x Firedrinker Satyr, 2x Rakdos Cackler
In: 2x Mizzium Mortars, 2x Doom Blade, 1x Ultimate Price, 1x Fated Conflagration
If the opponent is on a black based aggressive deck I leave in two firedrinker satyrs to function as one mana removal spells

Soo.....I'm not taking Alex's side. However, I'm going to point out a few things based on my experience using a similar deck. I've been playing Walter White (basically Walter Black but with white spells, the red stuff is almost exactly the same 1-for-1).

I don't think the guildgates are needed. With the black spells, at least in the deck he runs and the equivalent for my white version, you aren't trying to turn-2 a spell needing a black source. Turn 1 mana dork? Swing for 1 and burn it. Turn 2 pack rat? Swing for 1 and burn it. Turn 2 Caryatid? Get pissed and set up for a phoenix.Turn 4 demon/polukranos? Okay, now we would like a black source. Basically at the turn 4 spot, that is where we want ONE black source. Nothing in
the deck needs 2x black mana to cast (don't even try to run a whip.) That means you are going through a large chunk of the deck to find a black source based on drawing 7 cards and going first and the math is on your side. Obviously it won't always work (statistically, even a mono colored deck will be screwed with 4x mutavaults in some games) but it works enough to be worthwhile.

You seem to have a lot of cards for the control matchup. Do you find it difficult or is it just like 80% of your meta? On that note, why are you going for the toil//trouble? If you want card advantage and do well against decks running a lot of lifegain, why not try erebos instead? There isn't any skillcrack in the SB, which is great for the MBD, BW, UW, and Esper matchups. Punt their Gary, Revelation, or BBoV? Basically, lifegain sucks, so why not use cards that punt the lifegain?

Why are you using doom blade instead of ultimate price? Is there just very little MBD in the area? I feel UP right now is a strict upgrade since
most of the problematic cards that are multicolored have some black in them (BBoV, Obzedat, Reaper of the Wilds, etc.)

Can you explain to me in the RG matchup why you are boarding out the burn spells (which kill their smaller mana dorks and recur the phoenix, one of your ace cards since they have only one flyer) but are keeping in SOME OF the 1 drops that get blanked by basically every card in their deck? A turn 2 caryatid basically means your satyr is bad, or a turn 3 courser. And the ones you leave in are the satyrs, which literally are the worst card in your deck against RG monsters, you could at least put the cackler out with a lead on it to block...

Not trying to beat up on you but these are just questions I have. Maybe I'm missing something in the logic here?

RG Monsters is a deck that plays up to four Mizzium Mortars in the mainboard, and can play 5/5s on turn 3. The absolute last card that I want to have in my deck against a deck like that is Satyr Firedancer. Life is only a resource until it isn't. I would much rather have six removal spells than six 2/2s.

Alex, I'd love to read that article if you do decide to write it.

The Fated Conflagration basically functions as a fifth Dreadbore with a higher mana cost and some slight upside. It kills basically every relevant threat outside of Master of Waves and Desecration Demon, which it can sometime kill when combined with a chandra ping or the first strike from an ash zealot. I'd definitely consider playing a second one in the 75.

I don't really use a precise sideboarding structure but here are some general guidelines. The sideboard contains the most important

RG Monsters
Against RG we're playing as a tempo deck post board trying to keep them off balance while applying
pressure. Alternatively we can just play as a control deck and gain keep the board clear until we can resolve a dragon or phoenix
Key Dynamics and interactions: Ash Zealot's First Strike and Burn Spells, Trading low cost removal spells for high cost creatures and gaining tempo in the process
Out: 2x Shock, 4x Magma Jet, 2x Rakdos Cackler, 1x Lightning Strike
In: 2x Doom Blade, 2x Mizzium Mortars, 2x Stormbreath Dragon, 1x Fated Conflagration, 1x Ultimate Price, 1x Mutavault

BW Midrange
Against this deck we're forced to board into a more effective sligh deck as opposed to a more effective control/tempo deck.
Key Interaction/Dynamics: Scry the BW deck has a multitude of threats that are all very difficult to answer, using magma jet to sculpt the perfect hand of answers is very very important in this matchup. This matchup is very skill intensive and will most likely be lost on the back of a single misstep.
Out: 2x Shock, 4x Lightning Strike, 1x Rakdos Cackler
In: 3x Toil, 2x Mizzium Mortars, 1x
Ultimate Price, 1x Fated Conflagration

Mono Black Devotion
This matchup is similar to BW in that every threat will just end the game if unchecked.
Key interactions: Burn Spells and Chandra's Phoenix
Out: 2x Shock, 4x Magma Jet
In: 3x Toil, 2x Mizzium Mortars, 1x Ultimate Price

UW/x Control
Key interactions: Phoenix and Burn spells
Out: 2x Shock, 2x Lightning Strike 2x Mortars 1x Guildgate
In: 3x Thoughtseize 3x Toil, 1x Mutavault

Esper
Out: 2x Shock, 4x Lightning Strike 1x Guildgate, 1x Dreadbore, 1x YP$
In: 3x Thoughtseize 3x Toil, 1x Mutavault, 2x Mutavault
Against esper postboard is awkward because we have to hedge against them bringing blood baron in and just running away with the game.

MonoBlue Devotion
This matchup is bad. We have to board into being the control deck and attempt to grind them out.
Key interactions: Removal spells, Card advantage from Chandra's 0 ability
Out: 2x Rakdos Cackler, 4x Firedrinker Satyr, 4x Ash Zealot, 2x Magma Jet
In: 3x Thoughtseize 2x Doom
Blade 2x Mizzium Mortars 2x Stormbreath Dragon 1x Mutavault 1x Ultimate Price 1x Fated Conflagration

Aggressive Matchups
Key interactions: Young Pyromancer and removal spells
Out: 4x Firedrinker Satyr, 2x Rakdos Cackler
In: 2x Mizzium Mortars, 2x Doom Blade, 1x Ultimate Price, 1x Fated Conflagration
If the opponent is on a black based aggressive deck I leave in two firedrinker satyrs to function as one mana removal spells

Soo.....I'm not taking Alex's side. However, I'm going to point out a few things based on my experience using a similar deck. I've been playing Walter White (basically Walter Black but with white spells, the red stuff is almost exactly the same 1-for-1).

I don't think the guildgates are needed. With the black spells, at least in the deck he runs and the equivalent for my white version, you aren't trying to turn-2 a spell needing a black source. Turn 1 mana dork? Swing for 1 and burn it. Turn 2 pack rat? Swing for 1 and burn it. Turn 2 Caryatid? Get pissed
and set up for a phoenix.Turn 4 demon/polukranos? Okay, now we would like a black source. Basically at the turn 4 spot, that is where we want ONE black source. Nothing in the deck needs 2x black mana to cast (don't even try to run a whip.) That means you are going through a large chunk of the deck to find a black source based on drawing 7 cards and going first and the math is on your side. Obviously it won't always work (statistically, even a mono colored deck will be screwed with 4x mutavaults in some games) but it works enough to be worthwhile.

You seem to have a lot of cards for the control matchup. Do you find it difficult or is it just like 80% of your meta? On that note, why are you going for the toil//trouble? If you want card advantage and do well against decks running a lot of lifegain, why not try erebos instead? There isn't any skillcrack in the SB, which is great for the MBD, BW, UW, and Esper matchups. Punt their Gary, Revelation, or BBoV? Basically, lifegain sucks, so why not use cards
that punt the lifegain?

Why are you using doom blade instead of ultimate price? Is there just very little MBD in the area? I feel UP right now is a strict upgrade since most of the problematic cards that are multicolored have some black in them (BBoV, Obzedat, Reaper of the Wilds, etc.)

Can you explain to me in the RG matchup why you are boarding out the burn spells (which kill their smaller mana dorks and recur the phoenix, one of your ace cards since they have only one flyer) but are keeping in SOME OF the 1 drops that get blanked by basically every card in their deck? A turn 2 caryatid basically means your satyr is bad, or a turn 3 courser. And the ones you leave in are the satyrs, which literally are the worst card in your deck against RG monsters, you could at least put the cackler out with a lead on it to block...

Not trying to beat up on you but these are just questions I have. Maybe I'm missing something in the logic here?

I think going forward it may be worth going
down a Gate and going up a mutavault now that I've thought about it although I have had difficulty drawing black sources in the past.

The comment about the number of sideboard cards for the control matchup is actually kinda funny because I was thinking the same of most of the Pyroblack decks in the thread right now. I'm not running any sideboard cards that are dedicated for the UW/x matchups. Thoughtseize and toil/trouble both underperformed for me at the PTQ. I've never been a fan of Thoughtseize outside of it's ability to disrupt fast combo decks but my testing partner convinced me to run it. As for Toil/Trouble over Skullcrack, Toil is proactive whereas Skullcrack is reactive. Toil will cause a six point life swing in games where your opponent never gets to resolve a spell that would gain them life because they're already dead. That said I wasn't happy with either and will probably replace both

The sideboard I had for the deck at the PTQ was specifically tuned for BW/RG, with a playset of
mortars and dreadbore along with the conflagration is enough removal for BW so the doom blades were a hedge against RG. Doom Blade also has the upside of killing more things than Price against Mono Blue devotion and RW Devotion.

The reason that Satyr is good in the RG Monsters Matchup is because most of they time your opponent won't block your satyr with their caryatid when you attack with mana open or if they do block then you get to kill their caryatid for the measly cost of 2 mana and a lifepoint.

Here's an example of an average curve for RG against this deck post board.

Turn one: Temple, or forest, or even forest into elf
RB turn one: red source into Satyr

Turn Two: land into Sylvan Caryatid
RB turn two: Land into attack with satyr into caryatid, either they block and lose their caryatid or they let it through and then you still have mana up to play cards post combat.

Applying pressure is important in the matchup because of the tempo style gameplan we're on. Having a turn one play
that isn't just blanked by caryatid is very important. The curve example I gave was of Pyro on the draw. Because of how expensive their actual threats are we'll almost always be ahead on mana.

An exception to this is when RG has a draw which consists of a lot of mana dorks at which point their threat density has been very diluted and we can play as the control deck killing their large creatures until we can land a finisher.

You can always play the control deck against RG monsters, all of their threats die to your premium removal suite. Dreadbore hits EVERYTHING, Ultimate Price hits all of the relevant creatures, and Mizzium Mortars kills everything short of Polykranos. There is absolutely no incentive to playing a tempo game against them when instead you can simply kill every creature that you could lose to and resolve a recurrable threat via Phoenix. Flying creatures are INCREDIBLY good against them, as the only creature in their mainboard that can stop it is Stormbreath Dragon. Some decks aren't even playing Arbor Colossus in the board anymore.

Jund monsters is a little trickier to beat, and requires more finesse, but at the end of the day you can still beat them as well. Beating a resolved and protected Reaper of the Wilds is difficult, but it can also be pretty easily controlled with Pyromancer tokens, Phoenix, and various other
blockers.

I agree entirely. The reason that I'm on the gameplan of playing tempo first is that sometimes when playing as the control deck against a deck with such high impact threats as RG a patch of flooding out can cost you the game. If you were on the tempo plan in that game then you might have already won that game. Keeping them on the defensive also keeps the pressure off you in the long game and can help deal with planeswalker xenagos which would otherwise cost you two cards to deal with.

The Fated Conflagration basically functions as a fifth Dreadbore with a higher mana cost and some slight upside. It kills basically every relevant threat outside of Master of Waves and Desecration Demon, which it can sometime kill when combined with a chandra ping or the first strike from an ash zealot. I'd definitely consider playing a second one in the 75.

I don't really use a precise sideboarding structure but here are some general guidelines. The
sideboard contains the most important

RG Monsters
Against RG we're playing as a tempo deck post board trying to keep them off balance while applying pressure. Alternatively we can just play as a control deck and gain keep the board clear until we can resolve a dragon or phoenix
Key Dynamics and interactions: Ash Zealot's First Strike and Burn Spells, Trading low cost removal spells for high cost creatures and gaining tempo in the process
Out: 2x Shock, 4x Magma Jet, 2x Rakdos Cackler, 1x Lightning Strike
In: 2x Doom Blade, 2x Mizzium Mortars, 2x Stormbreath Dragon, 1x Fated Conflagration, 1x Ultimate Price, 1x Mutavault

BW Midrange
Against this deck we're forced to board into a more effective sligh deck as opposed to a more effective control/tempo deck.
Key Interaction/Dynamics: Scry the BW deck has a multitude of threats that are all very difficult to answer, using magma jet to sculpt the perfect hand of answers is very very important in this matchup. This matchup is very skill intensive and
will most likely be lost on the back of a single misstep.
Out: 2x Shock, 4x Lightning Strike, 1x Rakdos Cackler
In: 3x Toil, 2x Mizzium Mortars, 1x Ultimate Price, 1x Fated Conflagration

Mono Black Devotion
This matchup is similar to BW in that every threat will just end the game if unchecked.
Key interactions: Burn Spells and Chandra's Phoenix
Out: 2x Shock, 4x Magma Jet
In: 3x Toil, 2x Mizzium Mortars, 1x Ultimate Price

UW/x Control
Key interactions: Phoenix and Burn spells
Out: 2x Shock, 2x Lightning Strike 2x Mortars 1x Guildgate
In: 3x Thoughtseize 3x Toil, 1x Mutavault

Esper
Out: 2x Shock, 4x Lightning Strike 1x Guildgate, 1x Dreadbore, 1x YP$
In: 3x Thoughtseize 3x Toil, 1x Mutavault, 2x Mutavault
Against esper postboard is awkward because we have to hedge against them bringing blood baron in and just running away with the game.

MonoBlue Devotion
This matchup is bad. We have to board into being the control deck and attempt to grind them out.
Key interactions: Removal spells,
Card advantage from Chandra's 0 ability
Out: 2x Rakdos Cackler, 4x Firedrinker Satyr, 4x Ash Zealot, 2x Magma Jet
In: 3x Thoughtseize 2x Doom Blade 2x Mizzium Mortars 2x Stormbreath Dragon 1x Mutavault 1x Ultimate Price 1x Fated Conflagration

Aggressive Matchups
Key interactions: Young Pyromancer and removal spells
Out: 4x Firedrinker Satyr, 2x Rakdos Cackler
In: 2x Mizzium Mortars, 2x Doom Blade, 1x Ultimate Price, 1x Fated Conflagration
If the opponent is on a black based aggressive deck I leave in two firedrinker satyrs to function as one mana removal spells

Soo.....I'm not taking Alex's side. However, I'm going to point out a few things based on my experience using a similar deck. I've been playing Walter White (basically Walter Black but with white spells, the red stuff is almost exactly the same 1-for-1).

I don't think the guildgates are needed. With the black spells, at least in the deck he runs and the equivalent for my white version, you aren't trying to turn-
2 a spell needing a black source. Turn 1 mana dork? Swing for 1 and burn it. Turn 2 pack rat? Swing for 1 and burn it. Turn 2 Caryatid? Get pissed and set up for a phoenix.Turn 4 demon/polukranos? Okay, now we would like a black source. Basically at the turn 4 spot, that is where we want ONE black source. Nothing in the deck needs 2x black mana to cast (don't even try to run a whip.) That means you are going through a large chunk of the deck to find a black source based on drawing 7 cards and going first and the math is on your side. Obviously it won't always work (statistically, even a mono colored deck will be screwed with 4x mutavaults in some games) but it works enough to be worthwhile.

You seem to have a lot of cards for the control matchup. Do you find it difficult or is it just like 80% of your meta? On that note, why are you going for the toil//trouble? If you want card advantage and do well against decks running a lot of lifegain, why not try erebos instead? There isn't any skillcrack in the
SB, which is great for the MBD, BW, UW, and Esper matchups. Punt their Gary, Revelation, or BBoV? Basically, lifegain sucks, so why not use cards that punt the lifegain?

Why are you using doom blade instead of ultimate price? Is there just very little MBD in the area? I feel UP right now is a strict upgrade since most of the problematic cards that are multicolored have some black in them (BBoV, Obzedat, Reaper of the Wilds, etc.)

Can you explain to me in the RG matchup why you are boarding out the burn spells (which kill their smaller mana dorks and recur the phoenix, one of your ace cards since they have only one flyer) but are keeping in SOME OF the 1 drops that get blanked by basically every card in their deck? A turn 2 caryatid basically means your satyr is bad, or a turn 3 courser. And the ones you leave in are the satyrs, which literally are the worst card in your deck against RG monsters, you could at least put the cackler out with a lead on it to block...

Not trying to beat up on you but
these are just questions I have. Maybe I'm missing something in the logic here?

I think going forward it may be worth going down a Gate and going up a mutavault now that I've thought about it although I have had difficulty drawing black sources in the past.

The comment about the number of sideboard cards for the control matchup is actually kinda funny because I was thinking the same of most of the Pyroblack decks in the thread right now. I'm not running any sideboard cards that are dedicated for the UW/x matchups. Thoughtseize and toil/trouble both underperformed for me at the PTQ. I've never been a fan of Thoughtseize outside of it's ability to disrupt fast combo decks but my testing partner convinced me to run it. As for Toil/Trouble over Skullcrack, Toil is proactive whereas Skullcrack is reactive. Toil will cause a six point life swing in games where your opponent never gets to resolve a spell that would gain them life because they're already dead. That said I wasn't happy
with either and will probably replace both

The sideboard I had for the deck at the PTQ was specifically tuned for BW/RG, with a playset of mortars and dreadbore along with the conflagration is enough removal for BW so the doom blades were a hedge against RG. Doom Blade also has the upside of killing more things than Price against Mono Blue devotion and RW Devotion.

The reason that Satyr is good in the RG Monsters Matchup is because most of they time your opponent won't block your satyr with their caryatid when you attack with mana open or if they do block then you get to kill their caryatid for the measly cost of 2 mana and a lifepoint.

Here's an example of an average curve for RG against this deck post board.

Turn one: Temple, or forest, or even forest into elf
RB turn one: red source into Satyr

Turn Two: land into Sylvan Caryatid
RB turn two: Land into attack with satyr into caryatid, either they block and lose their caryatid or they let it through and then you still have mana up to
play cards post combat.

Applying pressure is important in the matchup because of the tempo style gameplan we're on. Having a turn one play that isn't just blanked by caryatid is very important. The curve example I gave was of Pyro on the draw. Because of how expensive their actual threats are we'll almost always be ahead on mana.

An exception to this is when RG has a draw which consists of a lot of mana dorks at which point their threat density has been very diluted and we can play as the control deck killing their large creatures until we can land a finisher.

I think a difference comes into play with whom is the aggressive player in the RG matchup. I see it as a more midrange fight whereas you are trying to go the aggro route. While I see the logic in the SFD I believe that it will be a nuisance drawing it later whereas other spells will be more beneficial after turn 3-4. A burn spell will always recur the phoenix or smack a domri that is getting too big, for example, or help
you trade a phoenix for a polukranos.

People say Skullcrack is reactive like it's a bad thing. One of the benefits of being a reactive card is getting people to over-commit on resources. If a MBD has the choice of spells and drops a gary because they are low on life, and you Skullcrack, they now took a worse option on a gamble. And if the opponent is low on cards then toil//trouble isn't very useful. I'm not hitting on this hard since you already said it is coming out.

I guess the doomblade is a meta call- I see a SHIT TON of black but almost no RW or MUD around here.

Who is the beatdown is probably the only useful bit of information Mike Flores ever uttered. I tend to take it to heart.

His weekly column on tcgplayer is actually pretty good. Very refreshing compared to the other articles we are used to seeing these days.

Im trying out Pyroblack for the first time in the practice room with your list Valdarith from post 3636. Just beat BW agro 2-0 game one was me nut drawing him not much there game 2 was were it really got fun boarded in tons of extra removal kept hand of spike jester and a million removal spells. Went on to kill everything he played and got there with my single jester. Man this deck is fun

Also one of the most proactive cards you can play against control is Erebos, and you aren't playing any. It draws more cards that Toil // Trouble, prevents the lifegain from Sphinx's Revelation, and is very hard to remove unless they have exactly Detention Sphere, which can be Slaughter Games'd away.

Toil // Trouble is just not a good card and I wouldn't consider playing a single copy. You keep talking about being proactive, but you're playing a deck jammed full of reactive cards already, and you're trying to go against the grain in the sideboard for seemingly no reason at all. Either embrace that idea or don't, but I wouldn't use that to justify playing subpar cards like Toil // Trouble.

With RW burn becoming more popular online it may be best to swap Toil / Trouble to Duress since it can be used in both the control and burn match.

Im trying out Pyroblack for the first time in the practice room with your list Valdarith from post 3636. Just beat BW agro 2-0 game one was me nut drawing him not much there game 2 was were it really got fun boarded in tons of extra removal kept hand of spike jester and a million removal spells. Went on to kill everything he played and got there with my single jester. Man this deck is fun

Glad you like it! This deck preys on a lot of the other aggro decks so I'm not surprised by your result.

Valdarith,

How has the 4 Devour Flesh in the board been for you? Which match ups besides Naya Hexproof do you board this in? It seems like a counterintuitive card in your deck with the life gain aspect.

I'm actually running Glaring Spotlight instead now. It was only for Hexproof.

I'm in the DE currently. Just lost 1-2 to Esper after some bad luck. Opponent throws down Fiendslayer Paladin g2 and I simply cannot deal with that card. Zem can say all he wants about how bad it is but he has the right to be wrong. Lost g3 on a mull to five and spiked lands off the top of my deck the next three turns. The one time I wish I kept my one-land hand.

I also never saw one Phoenix through all three games, and one of them went 16 turns. Hooray variance.

Just easily 2-0d Esper control in second match so at least I redeemed myself. Still haven't seen a Phoenix lol.

I'm actually running Glaring Spotlight instead now. It was only for Hexproof.

I'm in the DE currently. Just lost 1-2 to Esper after some bad luck. Opponent throws down Fiendslayer Paladin g2 and I simply cannot deal with that card. Zem can say all he wants about how bad it is but he has the right to be wrong. Lost g3 on a mull to five and spiked lands off the top of my deck the next three turns. The one time I wish I kept my one-land hand.

I actually think that we may be seeing more of Uther Lightbringer in controls, since it is rather "easy" solution to Burn as Mortars deal with Archangel. Still don't think it's a good card, but hey, an Esper walled
me yesterday with boarded Specters. Threw me off guard.