Dies to Removal

Hi, I'm new here, but have been lurking on and off here since Theros. I've been playing the Rw devotion variant throughout JOU with some amount of success in my local meta laden with Courser of Kruphix control/midrange/enchantress decks (won JOU game-day and 4 FNMs in a row, losing eventually to UW control).

[deck]
Creature (27)
2x Ash Zealot
2x Eidolon of the Great Revel
4x Burning-Tree Emissary
4x Frostburn Weird
4x Boros Reckoner
3x Fanatic of Mogis
2x Iroas, God of Victory
2x Purphoros, God of the Forge
4x Stormbreath Dragon

Land (24)
4x Sacred Foundry
4x Temple of Triumph
1x Battlefield Forge
11x Mountain
4x Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx

Sorcery (2)
2x Mizzium Mortars

Enchantment (5)
2x Hammer of Purphoros
3x Chained to the Rocks

Instant (2)
2x Magma Jet

Sideboard (15)
2x Assemble the Legion
2x Mizzium
Mortars
1x Chained to the Rocks
2x Banishing Light
2x Rest in Peace
3x Boros Charm
2x Wear / Tear
1x Glare of Heresy
[/deck]

I have found 2 Eidolons sufficient or else too damaging to me. Magma Jet smooths out 24 lands, working as intended. I am contemplating changing them to Boros Charm though, due to the relatively high prevalence of removal spells in my local meta. I also tend to board out my Iroas after game 1 for a more board control (Banishing Light and so on), but find he continually takes many slower decks by surprise with the combo T2 2 drop --> T3 Hammer -->T4 Iroas --> T5 play any devotion enabler and swing with everything for 10+ damage. I have Rest in Peace in sideboard due to a few local reanimator/Athreos decks.

M15 has piqued my interest in a RU devotion build utilising Aggressive Mining. The idea is having Jace, the Living Guildpact on the battlefield, playing Aggressive Mining to draw extra cards, and then using Jace's -3 ability to return
Aggressive Mining to your hand to play any new land draws. RU also opens up a live Keranos, which is pretty tempting itself.

I also wonder how prevalent Hushwing Gryff will be in sideboards against us. If it is used, Fanatic of Mogis may turn out to be a weaker 4-drop than the currently neglected Flame-Wreathed Phoenix. I also quite like the idea of a singleton Haunted Plate Mail to turn any of our creatures into a big threat.

Cute name!

The Mining + Jace thing is a bit too cute for my tastes.

Iroas seems like a decent card against midrange decks but I would consider moving him to the board.

I feel like anything less than four Ash Zealot in Red Devotion is wrong.

Hushwing Gryff seems relatively low impact here. Turns off Fanatic, BTE, and the Purphoros trigger. I wouldn't worry about it.

Need opinions of people that specialized in this deck (Looking at you LP and Jasper )



[deck]
Creatures (34)
1 Scuttling Doom Engine
1 Soul of New Phyrexia
4 Ash Zealot
4 Boros Reckoner
4 Fanatic of Mogis
4 Frostburn Weird
4 Generator Servant
3 Hoarding Dragon
4 Soul of Shandalar
4 Stormbreath Dragon
1 Purphoros, God of the Forge
Lands (24)

16 Mountain
4 Temple of Malice
4 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
Spells (2)

1 Hammer of Purphoros
1 Mizzium Mortars[/deck]

What I found interesting is a choice of 2 drops available now for this deck:

Frostborn Weird
Ash Zealot
Eidolon of the Great Revel
Burning Tree Emissary
Generator Servant

I think Generator
servant can act as Nykthos 5-8, allowing casting Dragon on turn 3. It is also great BTE followup.

Hoarding Dragon Toolbox is interesting, it is huge flying beater or 2 for 1 engine tuttoring: Hammer, Soul of the New Phyrexia and Scuttling Doom Engine. I like this idea.
Someone would have to tweek this deck thou, as I dont think having only 1 removal preboard is ideal.

Thoughts? LP / Jasper?

I somewhat like Generator Servant as a card, but I don't like him in Devotion. Hoarding Dragon without Generator Servant just seems kind of weak. I'm not all that interested in Soul of Shandalar. Scuttling Doom Engine just seems plain awesome, but it might not fit here. Obviously it's a great creature, and giving it haste with Hammer should basically win you the game, but it's also not a Devotion enabler. Same goes for Soul of New Phyrexia, although it has a relevant ability.

I will say this though. I've never considered myself to be very good at new card speculation. I just kind of test
things, and find out what works and why.

More on Generator Servant:
When we are generating extra mana to put stuff into play early, we are creating a large board presence. I don't mean just a large creature, we are getting a large creature along with all the little guys making it happen. This taxes 1-for-1 removal, as if they remove the big bad Dragon, we still have all these little guys. When you use Generator Servant, yes, you are getting a turn 3 hasted 4/4, but that's all you have at the end of your turn 3. If it's removed, you've spent 2 turns and 2 cards to deal 4 damage. Nevermind the possibility of your hasted beater getting instantly blown up or countered. The risk of getting 2-for-1'ed is too real for me to advocate it.


I'll be keeping a close eye on this thread for ideas this week though. Let me us know if you test this deck out, and let us know how it goes. I love reading tournament reports and stuff like that.

4th place in the SCG Super Invitational Qualifier today. Not going to be a very good report, since I'm tired, don't take notes during or after games, and have a generally poor memory of how matches go unless it's significant.

R1: Junk. Won in 2. Game 1 was Archangel vs Stormbreath Dragon, and we all know how that goes. Game 2 I had a BTE and a Firedrinker on the board at the end of turn 2. Turn 3 draw another BTE. Cast BTE, play Nykthos, activate Nykthos for 5 mana, cast Twinflame strived targetting both BTE's, use the 4 mana from the BTE ETB's to pump Firedrinker twice. Attack for 10.

R2: Boss Sligh. Won in 3. Won the die roll, won game 1. Game 2 and 3 I just basically played as the control deck and removed stuff until he ran out of steam.

R3: Selesnya Aggro. Won in 2, easy games tbh.

R4: Selesnya Aggro. Won in 2 again, still easy.

R5: RW Burn. Won in 2. Didn't seem to be all that difficult of a
matchup, although my opponent was severely hurt by his mana base in game 2. He had a Temple of Silence, a Mutavault, and a Mountain, and never hit a 4th land. Apparently this guy reads the RW Burn thread on here a lot, and his deck was an ideal clone of a Zemanjaski style burn deck.

R6: Intentional draw.

R7: Intentional draw.

Top 8: The same Selesnya Aggro from R3. Won in 2 again. I don't know exactly who these Selesnya decks are preying on to make it so far, but it's certainly not a threat to me.

Top 4: Mono black devotion. Lost in 3. Game 1 was me on the warpath, laying down the beats with this opening hand. Firedrinker, Ash Zealot, Rakdos Cackler, Magma Jet, Mountain, Mountain, Nykthos. Game 2 involves me getting 11 lands into play, and him being stuck on 2 for a long time. Extreme flood vs extreme screw, except he eventually hit a 3rd land, and played Pack Rats. Game 3 I kept a hand that I probably shouldn't have, and I just couldn't win fast enough before he resolved a Gary. Hand was
Firedrinker, Skullcrack, Skullcrack, Stoke the Flames, 3 lands. I kind of just didn't draw any large threats to close the game out. We'll notch this loss up to variance.

Prizes: $100 cash, 18 packs of M15. Pulled a Nissa and a Garruk.

And now for the list, which wasn't too much different than the one I've been posting:

[deck]Creatures 29
4 Rakdos Cackler
4 Firedrinker Satyr
4 Ash Zealot
4 Burning-Tree Emmisary
3 Boros Reckoner
4 Chandra's Phoenix
4 Fanatic of Mogis
2 Stormbreath Dragon

Other Spells 8
1 Chandra, Pyromaster
4 Magma Jet
1 Twinflame
2 Stoke the Flames

Lands 23
4 Nykthos
19 Mountains

Sideboard:
3 Skullcrack
3 Eidolon of the Great Revel
3 Searing Blood
2 Anger of the Gods
2 Stormbreath Dragon
1 Boros Reckoner
1 Mutavault
[/deck]


Moving forward, I'm going to suggest Ratchet Bomb as a 2-of replacement for Anger of the Gods. Why? Because Ratchet Bomb does pretty much all the same stuff
that Anger does, besides exiling. It is an effective sweeper, with the upside of blowing out Rats, Krakens, and other tokens, with the immunity to Brave the Elements. I remember a time where Devotion decks actually ran this thing, and I can't remember why they stopped, because in theory, it should be pretty solid from the board to stop the things that hurt us.

Also, I want 4 Stoke the Flames main deck. This thing is great, seriously. Besides killing most things, or just dealing 4 to the face, it actually lets our 1-drops have a purpose in the late game, when they are too weak to be attacking/trading up. I cannot say what to remove though. Obvious first choice would be the 1 remaining Chandra, and perhaps the Twinflame/1 Phoenix/1 Cackler. The problem being that Chandra put in a lot of work today, and the Twinflame not only provided me the occasional free win, but ended up being the only topdeck able to win me the game a few times. I 100%
endorse it as a 1-of, but YMMMV.

Testing Circle of Flame now.

I went 4-1-1 split T8 for $30 at FNM. Drew with buddy on Esper round 1 but beat him 2-1. 2-0 against Esper, 2-0 against Wb Devotion, 2-0 against burn, 1-2 against BW Midrange, 2-1 against Esper.

Stock Rw list with 4 Cackler, 2 mm, 2 chain, 1 Chandra, 1 hammer, 1 Purph main then 2 chain, 2 mm, 2 Electrickery, 1 Iroas, 4 Charm, 4 Firedrinker. 12 white sources.

[deck= Newest brew I'm testing]
4 Burning-Tree Emissary
4 Frostburn Weird
4 Eidolon of the Great Revel
2 Ash Zealot
4 Goblin Rabblemaster
4 Fanatic of Mogis
4 Stormbreath Dragon

2 Chandra, Pyromaster
4 Stoke the Flames
2 Magma Jet

2 Hammer of Purphoros

4 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
20 Mountain
[/deck]


I've found the Eidolon to be pretty solid in lists without a bunch of 1-drops, so I've been testing it and liking it. Frostburn is here to help us stabilize against other creature based aggro decks, and is also pretty good against UWx Control variants. Ash Zealot is just kind of there, since sometimes she can really put in work.

Jammed some games against 2 different MBD devotion players the other day. Overall record from my notes was 16-9, in my favor. Goblin Rabblemaster is the real MVP in this matchup. Aside from representing tons of damage if left alone, he also
generates a lot of fodder tokens that you can sack to Demon every turn. He doesn't do a whole lot for our devotion plan, but I think the card is solid enough in this and other matchups to shine here. Boros Reckoner would normally be in this slot, and that card just isn't good enough to maindeck any more, in my opinion. Too slow, useless against Control and MBD, and that's really all it comes down to for me.


Gonna go with this for FNM, barring any last minute changes. Depending on how that goes, I'll most likely be using this at an IQ on Saturday. The only thing I really see myself doing is adding 2 copies of Twinflame somewhere, possibly in place of the Jets. Twinflame's value goes up in this list simply by adding another good target for it. Twinflame on a Rabblemaster is a pretty big blowout, and it still has all the oldies but goldies in Fanatic, BTE, and Dragon.

Edit: It's also worth mentioning that [card]Stoke the
Flames[/card] works beautifully with both Burning-Tree Emissary and Goblin Rabblemaster. BTE lets you Stoke on 3 after it ETB's, and you can use Stoke with Goblin Rabblemaster to save the goblin tokens by Convoking them.

Now that the full set has been spoiled, what does everyone think about Red Devotions place?

I think it could be a thing. Here's a list I just kind of threw together by looking at what's available:

[deck]MRD v.1
Artifacts (3)
3 Hammer of Purphoros

Creatures (21)
3 Archetype of Aggression
3 Ember Swallower
4 Fanatic of Mogis
4 Generator Servant
3 Goblin Rabblemaster
2 Purphoros, God of the Forge
2 Stormbreath Dragon

Instants (8)
4 Magma Jet
4 Lightning Strike
4 Stoke the Flames

Planeswalkers (2)
Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker

Land (22)
19 Mountain
3 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
[/deck]

It seems a little top heavy. At first I had 4 Eidolon of the Great Revel instead of 4 Stoke the Flames. I don't know if Stoke is the right answer. Haven't really started working on a sideboard yet.

Thoughts?

(Sorry if this is the wrong section.)

I think it will end up running 3 Sarkhan, 2/3 Chandra, possibly more Stormbreath, and have more going on with the lower CC spells with all 4 Rablemasters. The new Phoenix may be a 1 or 2 of as well. RW for sideboard options may be the play and an Elspeth or two main. I'm not sure about any of this but I'll be testing a Devotion-ish deck and a more burn heavy deck post rotation.

Cool, look forward to your results.

Dragon Mantle was ran in Block Constructed Red Devotion, so I think it's worth looking at. The problem is the set, and how everything is low on the devotion count. The curve is currently all over the place if you are trying to make Red Devotion work. I think Big Red just has better tools, since Red Devo lost all it's explosiveness.(Bye bye Burning-Tree Emissary, you will be missed always)

I'm not too hip on the lingo, so I must ask what the difference is between Big Red and Devotion? Does big red allow other colors to be splashed?

[deck]4 Eidolon of the Great Revel
4 Generator Servant
2 Prophetic Flamespeaker
4 Goblin Rabblemaster
4 Ashcloud Phoenix
2 Purphoros, God of the Forge
3 Stormbreath Dragon

3 Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker
1 Chandra, Pyromaster

4 Chained to the Rocks
2 Hammer of Purphoros

11 Mountian
4 Temple of Triumph
4 Battlefield Forge
2 Wind-Scarred Crag
3 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
1 Mana Confluence

SB:
2 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
1 Wind-Scarred Crag
1 Banishing Light
1 Deicide
1 Glare of Heresey
2 Reprisal
2 Magma Spray
3 Arc-Lightning
1 Chanrda, Pyromaster
1 Harness by Force[/deck]

Deck I'm likely to play post rotation. Ashcloud phoenix is better then fanatic with the loss of all the RR spells and the need for a better blocker in the absence of reckoner and FB weird.

The other way I could see going is a much more aggressive variant with 4 Firedrinkery satyrs, Archetype of aggression, Fantic, and Stoke
the Flames. that decks probably mono-red and lower curve, but I'm currently not interested in testing it as I like my current build a lot.