Hello everyone, and welcome to the first installment of Modern Brews with logicknot here on Steemit! :)
The deck I will cover today is a homebrew of mine developed recently. I think this build in particular is one worth sharing, considering its simple yet effective play style, at an accessible price point of [$55.64, 14.72 TIX]
List: http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/a-human-burn-variant/
Creature (25)
3x Abbot of Keral Keep
3x Grim Lavamancer
4x Kessig Malcontents
4x Monastery Swiftspear
3x Priest of Urabrask
4x Prophetic Flamespeaker
4x Young Pyromancer
Instant (12)
4x Brute Force
4x Lightning Bolt
4x Titan's Strength
Sorcery (3)
3x Lava Spike
Land (20)
20x Mountain
As some of you may be aware, Five-Color Humans has taken the Modern format by storm lately in an SCG Modern Classic top finish (Philadelphia) and a Top 8 finish at Pro Tour Rivals of Ixalan. Upon further inspection of the list, I was curious about the consistency of Kessig Malcontents to warrant a red inclusion, even shying away from Noble Hierarch colors.
To my surprise, a lot of Modern staples in red shared the human subtype, yet nobody had fit them together into a deck utilizing their tribal benefits before.
The deck shown below will attempt to model an aggressive style of burn, whose balance favors creature spells contributing to our count, rather than the noncreature burn spells in mono-red inferior to Lightning Bolt.
Our one-drop creatures are limited to 4x Monastery Swiftspear and 4x Grim Lavamancer. Because instant spells are central to our deck, the relevance of these creatures should be obvious. The combination of haste and prowess on Swiftspear will be relevant in the early game as we seek to threaten swings which pump creatures, but with an option of casting additional creatures instead in the Second Main Phase. Although we do not run fetchlands in the budget version of the deck, I believe Grim Lavamancer is a fantastic inclusion of utility whose presence demands an answer from our opponent. Finally, although Abbot of Keral Keep can be awkward at times with the land drop, the deck seeks to refill the hand through those exile effects with conditional casting. In the worst-case scenario, the Abbot retains a solid 2/1 body with prowess poised against our opponent.
3x Lava Spike and x4 Lightning Bolt make up the extent of our noncreature burn here, as I believe other inclusions do not match the effectiveness of these two cards at a single red mana. Because we do not have any self-damage present in the deck, a Young Pyromancer and his tokens can extend the game out a few additional turns if need be. Although the tokens do not count as Humans, and instead are 1/1 Elementals, the Pyromancer does work in grinding out value if not dealt with swiftly.
Although these next cards may be nontraditional in modern, I believe they are undervalued and essential to our 3-drop plan in the deck. 3x Priest of Urabrask is here for our human count, and allows for dynamic chains of tempo in multiples. 4x Prophetic Flamespeaker is a card I believe may be the most underappreciated card in the deck for Modern play, and with the pumps accompanying below, the double effect of drawing damage is both a finisher and a value engine. Keep in mind that the first card exiled from the Flamespeaker can be cast in-between the first strike and regular combat damage steps, as well. 4x Kessig Malcontents is a 3/1 body in the deck which I’ve found to consistently do 2-4 damage with its enter-the-battlefield effect. The Kessig damage is as marvelous as the other burn in our deck, as it cannot be blocked or responded effectively to with removal.
Finally, the deck rounds out with some pump spells and a simple mana base. 4x Titan’s Strength is a card which produces heavy damage on the power of a creature and sets up a scry effect almost as valuable as a cantrip in the deck. While 4x Brute Force can be considered against 4x Mutagenic Growth, I’ve found that in mirror matches our burn takes advantage of other variants which start the game with their life total at 15. For this reason, a defensive-aggressive combination allows for cards like Brute Force to not only protect out creatures against a Lightning Bolt, but also to take 2 additional damage from other sources. Again, the manabase is simplified with just 20x Mountain in the budget mono-red deck, and I believe this number gives advantage over opponents in the face of mulligans and mana shortages. Often, our deck will be able to utilize any additional mana drawn in excess.
While I will not go into full detail about sideboards in this post, I can make some recommendations/favorites to consider in your meta (Anger of the Gods, Shattering Spree, Blood Moon, Vexing Shusher, Pithing Needle, Relic of Progenitus, etc.):
And that about wraps it up for the Budget Human RDW brew! Feel free to try this list out for yourself or make modifications seeking improvement. I have done well with the quantities shown here and put up a fight against competitive decks with a much higher cost. I hope you enjoyed my first installment of these deck reviews, and if you liked the blog be sure to upvote and comment down below! :)
Thanks, and Steem on~