Thanks Khaos
I value your input, your experience of playing the deck and insights into the match ups are invaluable. It also means we get to work on the same deck too which I like
What's your current 75? I've checked the thread and your last one is pre-ban. Wat have you replaced DRS with?
I really
the Dancer (largely based on how pleasing it is to CRUSH MonoU Devo with St Burn) but I'm thinking he may be too slow and
vulnerable here? Against Zoo for example T2 would you rather dome them for 6 (setting up a T3 Bridge or Anger which they can't interact with) or just kill 2 of their guys (effectively gaining 4-6 life) or play the Dancer? Potentially he's awesome but if you do play him and they just kill him and keep attacking you're fucked
You can't hide behind him like a Bridge either
Thoughts guys?
This is worth a look - I faced the GR Zoo list, (and a variant with Lightning Mauler and Keldon Marauders) it wasn't very pleasant and BTE totally wrecked me. I didn't see Anger though
I had to rebuild the deck just last week and, for
the life of me, I couldn't remember my original 75 before I took the deck apart. Sometime over the summer, I realized that playing Burn in a competitive environment was pointless due to DRS being in the format, the fact that a single well-timed Lightning Helix against you could put you so far out of reach that winning was impossible, and that to do somewhat reasonable well you had to mish-mash your deck to include DRS AND Lightning Helix, which put you in 3-4 colors. This was all just bad. I switched over to Mono Red Goblins for a long while before developing other decks, like Merfolk, Storm, a Goblin-Burn variant, and U/R Delver.I am very happy that not only does Burn stand a better chance now than before RTR released, but that Vexing Devil is somewhat playable. Somewhat.
Anyways, here is what I'm currently working with:
[deck]
Creatures 12
4 Goblin Guide
4 Grim Lavamancer
4 Vexing Devil
Burn 28
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Rift Bolt
4 Lava Spike
4 Bump in the Night
4 Skullcrack
4 Searing Blaze
n1 Shard Volley
3 Flame Javelin
Land 20
4 Arid Mesa
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Blackcleave CLiffs
4 Mountain
2 Blood Crypt
2 Stomping Ground
Sideboard 15
4 Satyr Firedancer
3 Rakdos Charm
3 Destructive Revelry
2 Combust
3 ***
[/deck]
The last 4 spells in the list, the 3/1 split of Javelin and Shard Volley, is more or less my flex spots. I like Shard Volley, since it's Lavamancer fuel and it allows you to strategically make Blackcleave Cliffs less shitty after turn 3, but I really hate holding multiples and being stuck on 1-2 land. As a finisher, it's great - no doubt about that. And as for Flame Javelin, well, I've lost too many Game Ones against Twin to just want it [Javelin] over Flames of the Bloodhand. Granted, if you have to board into "creature removal mode" by using the Satyr Firedancer, the Bloodhands will essentially function as a Javelin, but I digress. I've run across too many decks maindecking Spellskite to just know what suits me.
Other cards I've considered are [
card]Molten Rain[/card],
Pillar of Flame,
Volcanic Fallout, and
Burst Lightning. Burst Lightning is especially tempting since it does hit that "sweet spot" of 4 damage, but kicking it can't come soon enough to potentially stop a turn 4 Splinter Twin/Exarch combo. But, having access to more 1 CMC instant speed removal is very valuable when on the Firedancer plan. (Firedancer is almost like YP$ in that you don't want to play him and then be tapped out. You want to get some value from him even if he's killed.)
I play the full 4 Lavamancer and Searing Blazes since my meta is starting to become more aggressive. The last Modern event I played in had B/W tokens (very good, too), Small Tribal Zoo (like, turn 4 kill scary), Affinity, Merfolk, and Goblins. With these decks in my metagame, Lavamancer and Blaze are rarely dead cards. Against certain control decks, those 8 cards can just come
right out for the 2x Combust, 3x Rakdos Charm, and 3x Destructive Revelry. I find all of those cards helpful in fighting graveyard flashback shenanigans, Spellskites, Leylines, Colonnades, Exarchs, Resto Angels, Chalice of the Void set at 1, Swords or Batterskull, etc. Basically, the usual suspects in the faces of Control.
