[Article] Proactive vs. Reactive Sideboarding

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For an archetype that's pretty straight forward, and has IMO limited variance in deck choice (how fast do I want to kill them, how much burn, what's a good curve?) The sideboards from lists I've looked at have always varied GREATLY.

I don't know why, but I've had some sort of epiphany about how to organize these sideboard cards in a way I haven't done before. If this is an obvious topic, feel free to let this thread sink to the bottom.

Instead of thinking, what particular decks to I want SB cards for, what cards can't I deal with, etc. I was thinking of side-board plans based on style, thus minimizing the variance in post board games and letting your sideboard supplement your preferred play style rather than being a random bunch of tools to use.

The styles are Reactionary and Proactive. This article is not about judging which is more viable, it is more assuming you
know your own (or will look into) playstyle as a player. Do you make risky attacks? Do you try to end games as quickly as possible or wait for an opening to finish your opponent off?

Anyway, here are most of the tools for R/x aggro broken down:

Proactive
Proactive sideboard cards further the game plan of R/x aggro, to be as threat dense and inevitable as possible. To lean heavily on the philosophy of Virtual Card Advantage. If you bring in more resilient threats, different angles of attack (planeswalker, burn), you hope to overwhelm your opponent who might not have the right answers for you.

Volcanic Strength I still remember the day everyone laughed at this card. Then they tried to stabilize with their 4 reckoners and restoration angels, and ended up uselessy trying to race. Other red decks rarely have a way to remove something with 5 toughness or more as well.
Hound of Griselbrand A
threat that shrugs off board wipes and utilizes pump very efficiently. He is a great finisher against control or attrition decks, and can also be difficult for a mirror match to handle.
Pyreheart Wolf This hero keeps your creatures value artifically increased against midrange decks. Red creatures may be smaller and weaker, but if you have to spend two expensive big creatures just to stop one of them from getting through? Very powerful effect especially combined with hellrider.
Gruul War Chant Gruul's wolf on a stick. While not as flexible (it can't chump block, and is 4 cmc), its effect has haste and can screw up an unexpecting opponent's combat math. It also makes our creatures even stronger.
Threaten Effects This is another one up for debate. Zeman says its more proactive than skullcracks, which it is, but it still requires them to have a guy worth stealing and for you to be hopefully swinging for lethal. That said, stealing
their creature right when they are on the edge of stabilizing and bashing them with it and the rest of your force is indeed a powerful effect, especially when combined with a aggressive beating sac outlet in Dos Rakis.
Domri Rade He is a threat at the end of the day, just a bit too flimsy and not strong enough lately imo, but he will draw you cards against control and force them to answer him-or lose.
Olivia Voldaren You answer her or its game over. Period.
Rakdos' Return Burn and card advantage wrapped in one beautiful package. This card is pretty awesome


Reactive
Reactive sideboard plans seek to either create an exhausted board state in which your threat dense deck will eventually overwhelm your opponent. Either that or a "blowout" reactionary card that gets you very far ahead in actual card advantage, rather than seeking to make cards dead in your
opponent's hands, you seek to have his cards actually dead and answered. It requires your opponent to actually have the cards you seek to answer that game, so in my opinion it is more difficult to be successful at than proactive sideboarding. That said, being able to circumvent your opponent's own sideboard plan or "next level" them can be very powerful in taking control of a postboard game.

Examples:
Bonfire of the Damned Hopefully not much needs to be said about why this is a blowout card.
Mizzium Mortars-Stabilize with big creatures? Create a huge ground stall? Suit up a creature with Volcanic strength and race you? Mortars answers these, and is a very powerful effect when overloaded.
Dreadbore Unconditional sorcery speed removal. Great for any creature road block and sniping planeswalkers without wasting attack phases on them.
Ranger's Guile This card is up for debate, as it requires
your opponent to have spot removal and leave up manato be effective, but the card definitely encourages pro-active game play and "forcing" them to have it and punishing them when they do.
Skullcrack-Stabilize with a Rhox Faithmender into Thragtusk? Race me with unflinching courage? I don't think so. This definitely won't get you any CA, but it can keep a game in reach if you're about to run out of resources. Powerful when timed correctly
Elecktrickeries-Mana dorks, invisible stalker lingering souls, board wipe against naya blitz, the list goes on.
Blasphemous Act-A blowout card with Reckoner, or just a potential reset board. This can defintiely get you into an exhausted board state if you manage it well.
Pillar of Flame-Managing opposing aggro decks, voice of resurgences, mana dorks, and can be used as reach in a pinch, pillar is an excellent sideboard card and is often main boarded in R/x.
[
b]Fog[/b]-As reactionary as it gets, there is no doubt this is a blowout card in a mirror match or any deck that simply tries to race you down.
Tribute to Hunger-Requires them to only have one creature out worth removing, but the lifegain can make racing situations a breeze for R/b aggro decks.



All that said, there's no reason to limit yourself to only one type or the other in your SB plan. A good magic player knows when to play proactively (perhaps against someone you read as a reactive playing style) and when to play re-actively, so having a mix of options in your SB is probably a safe bet.

[zemanjaski]

Before I jump into deep analysis:
- Ranger's Guile is reactive
- Threatens are proactive

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I know you don't usually use a lot of words but to me the distinction is not so clear for those cards.

Threatens require them to have a creature to steal, it can just be sitting in your hand vs. jund for instance while they 1-1 remove your guys.

Do you mean reactive in terms of mana expenditure? That would make more sense.... because you can tap out for w/e each turn until a creature comes down then tap out for threaten effects, whereas with guile you usually need to leave a green open in order to utilize it.

[RedNihilist]

I guess the point is in the fact that a PROactive card forces the opponent to waste an answer, while a REactive card is potentially a dead card while you wait for your opponent to have an answerable answer.

[rcwraspy]

Pro-active = a question your opponent must answer
Re-active = your answer to your opponent's question

You could argue that a threaten effect is re-active because Thragtusk was the question and T-Blood was the answer. But in actual game-play, getting bashed with their own Thragtusk is your question which your opponent must answer. Especially since that could be any creature, not just Thragtusk.

Ranger's Guile is re-active because you only cast it to say "no" to something your opponent is trying to do. They've posed a question and your answer is no. It can be used in some corner cases as the last point of damage needed, but that's not the real value of the card.

[Link]

I also think their are rankings. Skullcrack is about as reactive as you can get, because it pretty much has to be played in reaction to a lifegain spell and the turn needs to be passed with 2 mana up to be useful.

If a spell forces you to hold something else back in your hand (aka you could've casted a creature, but decided to pass with 2 mana up because you smella tusk coming) its very reactive.

ranger's guile can be used as a relevant pump spell on the offensive, so its a bit more flexible. I'm pretty sure we consider Rampager a proactive card right? You also don't have to leave mana up for it at the end of your turn, since its normally cast at some point during combat. If you have another creature in hand, its always better to play it out then to not play it and save mana to save the one you have in play from a sorcery speed removal, amirite?

With this logic, I'll agree that threatens are pretty certainly
pro-active. I guess my issue with them is they are not strong enough on the draw as a card slot. I rather have a more permanent proactive card to push damage through, like pyreheart wolf or gruul war chant or something. On the draw its sometimes you that is stabilizing the battlefield rather than them stabilizing from your beat down, so a threaten is very useless here. You want to reach a point where you can push damage through their cards and they've run out of cards, and there's a pretty small window to do that on the draw before their lategame kicks in.

[RedNihilist]

I actually never considered the difference between playing TBlood while being on the draw rather than being on the play.

[rcwraspy]

With this logic, I'll agree that threatens are pretty certainly pro-active. I guess my issue with them is they are not strong enough on the draw as a card slot. I rather have a more permanent proactive card to push damage through, like pyreheart wolf or gruul war chant or something. On the draw its sometimes you that is stabilizing the battlefield rather than them stabilizing from your beat down, so a threaten is very useless here. You want to reach a point where you can push damage through their cards and they've run out of cards, and there's a pretty small window to do that on the draw before their lategame kicks in.

I think it completely depends on what deck you're against. Against another aggro deck and you're on the draw, absolutely you're
the one stabilizing. If you're facing Junk Rites, Jund, etc., those decks usually have a fairly clear board for the first couple of turns.

R/g BTE Aggro doesn't have a sacrifice outlet, but some aggro decks do. Like Dos Rakis. Threatens become better by a lot if you can sac the creature before the end of your turn.

[windstrider]

A threaten is proactive since you're using their best creature against them to deal damage or clear blockers, sometimes before they even get to use it. Now they have to answer your threats plus one that they were counting on to either protect or stabilize them.

Barrage of Expendables looks especially useful with threaten effects. Steal, attack for damage, sac, deal more damage. Easily splashable and abusable. With 5 mana, cast a threaten, steal, then cast Barrage and sac the creature after combat. Also can be used in reaction to board wipes. Might be worth exploring, might not.

[Link]

well I don't mean stabilize in the traditional stabilize sense (aka what decks try to do against US), I mean have the board state such where you can profitably attack each turn.

I know it seems strange to abuse the extra card when you're on the draw in aggro (usually you don't care about raw CA), but I've found its the key to winning (whereas some aggro players I speak to, there plan is to "steal g1, lose g2, win g3 on play") is to do such.

For example: Junk rites doesn't actually get CA without a proftiable salvage(and then you're losing that game no matter what tech you had ;P) so if you go around their creatures with pyreheart wolf for a turn or two you'll come out on top more often than if you just effectively pay are card for just damage (aka skullcrack, threaten) taht doesn't effect the board state.

A one-time steal doesn't usually do the job, at least in R/g. In Dos Rakis/sac its amazing post
board.

Barrage of the expendebles+threaten sounds really fun actually...

[windstrider]

Will it be good? Maybe. It's certainly a cheap sacrifice effect for mono-red or gruul if they want it.

[rcwraspy]

well I don't mean stabilize in the traditional stabilize sense (aka what decks try to do against US), I mean have the board state such where you can profitably attack each turn.

A one-time steal doesn't usually do the job, at least in R/g. In Dos Rakis/sac its amazing post board.

Barrage of the expendebles+threaten sounds really fun actually...

Barrage without a threaten best with undying? Fate, use your favorite Hound!