Dies to Removal

I picked up my old mono-red mana sink deck to play casually against Khaospawn and enjoyed it. When I brewed it up months ago, Modern was mostly Twin combo, Affinity and Pod. Twin seems to have fallen off the map, leaving RDW, Pod and Affinity to fill the void.

I played it some more this morning against a field of T1 stuff and found that it could still hang. Without the threat of T3 instant wins hanging over me, I found that this deck performs better and can still grind out wins against even the likes of Jund/Rock.

Plus, it's gotten some new toys from Theros block!




Apparently, the journey into Nyx was to find me some sweet stuff to cast with my mountains.

[deck]Modern Mana Sink Deck Wins v. 1.0[/deck]

A notable synergy here is Stonewright + Prophetic Flamespeaker which should remind old-school Standard Sledgehammer Red (the inspiration for this deck) players of pairing up a Stonewright to a Hound of Griselbrand and attacking for a billion.

The tendency for the early game to consist of building board presence while sitting on removal lends itself to Stoke the Flames. Pumping mana into a FoD or KDL and then turning them into a mana source for Convoke inspires a certain sense of anarchic glee inside me.

I'm not sure whether Magus of the Moon is better than Fulminator Mage, will test.

The Spikeshot
Elders may be worse than fetches and Grim Lavamancer, too. Will test!

Mogg Fanatic might be better than Forked Bolt because it can carry a sword and deal with man-lands.

Keldon Megaliths?

Like, as a singleton

Indeed, will put 1 in! Haven't tried them yet, but I know you were impressed with them in Heal's list.

I liked it a lot

Forgot to include my SB in the OP, will edit.

Morning testing:

2-0 vs. Rock
2-0 vs. Mono U Tron
2-1 vs. UWR Control
2-1 vs. RG Tron
2-0 vs. Affinity
Instant concede vs. Soul Sisters, didn't want to waste an hour

Been thinking about a 1/1 split between Stonewright and Pyrewild Shaman. The +3/+1 Bloodrush plays nicely with Flamespeaker, but it's all theory at this point.

Why Sword of Light & Shadow over Feast & Famine?

Playing around to see if the creature re-buy effect on L&S is better than the untap discard ability on F&F. I can be looser with my creatures and run more sacrifice effects (Fulminator Mage, Mogg Fanatic) if I can play them again from the GY.

Pro white/black is also my favorite combo since every relevant creature survives a Bolt with a sword attached already.

I switched Magus of the Moon to Fulminator Mage and I think I like it more. I made the swap after I resolved a Magus against Pod, then he casually podded a Finks into a Murderous Redcap and went about his business. If I'd had a Fulminator on board instead, I could have responded to the trigger and blown up a land, or main-phased it to set my opponent back a turn.

There's also an obscure win-more condition where I can attack with a sworded up dude, pop Mage for a land, then get it back for another shot.

I guess that's pretty ok

i would love to own some fulminator mages but their price is ridiculous in paper magic

Definitely, I don't think they're actually as good as their price. When the great MTGO Kibler fiasco went down, and Deathrite got banned, prices dropped across the board. I picked up a set of Lilianas and Fulminator Mages.

Played for a few hours last night and this morning to get a feel for the deck after a small change.

Here's what I jammed -

[deck]Modern Mana Sink Deck Wins v. 1.2[/deck]

I found that Nykthos does almost good of a job as Koth, but it's not a win-con on an empty board. Koth is sometimes win-more, so I'm playing with the Devotion mechanic in his place, which gives 2 more card slots.

I put Basilisk Collar in to test and was very happy
with it. I have enough creatures that deal damage that a Basilisk Collar can control the board in grindy games.

Collar also has synergy with Flamespeaker, since 1 first strike damage with deathtouch is enough to kill any blocker, leaving the normal damage to trample through.

I had a funny game where I killed a Burn player with an Eidolon of the Great Revel equipped with a Collar, since all he had were Lava Spikes and Skullcracks. Thanks for the 2 life!

Stonewright is great, but only when Flamespeaker is on the board. He might get cut to 1, but not sure what else to play in that spot instead. Perhaps a Koth or a Chandra?

Affinity is laughably easy, so I've removed the SB Shattering Blows and left 1 Shattering Spree.

Tron is annoying, but Fulminator Mages help keep them playing fair.

The Vexing Shushers are great vs control and come in against any creatureless matchup.

The Stoke the Flames are fantastic. 10/10 would Convoke again.

Glad to hear Stoke is putting in work. Maybe test Magma Jet for its scry if Stonewright isn't working out?

I may up the burn count a bit. Either a 2-of Bonfire or Flame Javelin to round out the removal package

Probably Javelin, 22 land may not support Bonfire.

Go with Javelin. Bonfire gets you a shock from Eidolon. Since you deck is running a lower curve, might Act on Impulse work in this build? Normally I would say use Chandra's 0 for card advantage, but here you should be able to cast whatever is revealed via Act.

I'm not sure that's true. Act costs 3, so unless I have a sworded up dude for the untap trigger, the best I can usually do is cast a Bolt or a Fanatic off the flip.

Generally, instead of playing cards that draw me into better cards, I like to play more copies of the better cards.

If I wanted a filtering spell, I'd go with Faithless Looting first, because it fills the GY for Lavamancer, and it's cheap.

[deck]Modern Mana Sink Deck Wins v. 1.3[/deck]

Will be playing this tomorrow morning on stream. Excellent results in testing.

And I'll be at work tomorrow until 5. Hope Goblin Guide works out.

I liked Goblin Guide, but missed having the extra burn. I think it's a matter of preference, but GG suffered from diminishing returns where a Flame Javelin was always welcome. I'm a sucker for 4 damage burn spells.

I also learned that I was disappointed with Stonewright because I was never drawing him as a 1-of. I tried him as a 4-of for shits and giggles, learned that he's actually very good if I see him a lot.

Still playing with the numbers, but 20 land has been on the money. The deck mulligans quite well, but largely falls on its ass if I keep 1-landers or get screwed for too many turns.