[Decklist] Hotdogs!!

Well now.

I noticed I haven't posted anythng in November. So here it is! A post!  wonderfully empty (at the moment at least) post!

Hmmm. The idea was to post a Rakdos Blitz list. I have been putting off posting it as I have a bunch of thoughts to say about Dega blitz and Naya Blitz and Suicide Black and even Buried Alive....

But I am too lazy at the moment.

....

I guess I should touch up this post a little.

But here is the list:

Goldfishes for a turn 4 kill relatively consistently and I think you have about a 50% shot of winning. =)

The sideboard is a mess... but I think you can just borrow the standard sideboard used by Rabble Red and you should be fine.

Now why use this instead of Rabble Red. I mean, that deck is more streamlined and has a higher rate of damage output.

This deck is slower but is less of a glass cannon than Rabble Red. You know those times midgame when all you have are 1/1s. Yeah this deck tries to avoid that. Now I am not saying this is the next big piece of tech.

Hardly.

But it is an alternative and relatively cheap deck you can pick up and just brainlessly (for me at least :p) take your chances.

The aim of this deck is always to mow down that carytid or courser. Thats all =)

I might write more later but thats all for now...

oh yeah the decklist. For so amicably wasting the last few minutes of your life reading to this point... here it is: =P

Std_141003_degaaggro

Instant

4 x Lightning Strike

4 x Magma Jet

1 x Stoke the Flames

Enchantment

3 x Inferno Fist

Creature

4 x Mogis's Warhound

4 x War-Name Aspirant

4 x Goblin Rabblemaster

4 x Bloodsoaked Champion

4 x Gnarled Scarhide

4 x Monastery Swiftspear

3 x Firedrinker Satyr

Legend

1 x Purphoros, God of the Forge

Land

4 x Mana Confluence

4 x Bloodstained Mire

7 x Mountain

5 x Swamp

Later =)

[20141204 21:38]

So... first off the most important thing.

Why Hotdogs?

(Well feel free to disagree that a corny deckname is important but hey I am gonna write it anyways =D)

Well there is Mogis Warhound!! And the Scarhide is BEEF!!!

Fine.

Anyways this deck was kinda accidental. It began a long long time ago in a farm...

... wrong story.

It began back when innistrad rotated and Naya Blitz was gutted,  I  then tried to go Dega, but the parts just were'nt strong enough and the most damning development was the loss of the checklands.

Yes, did you know the checklands were essential for the Blitz deck? You see the pattern repeated with Zoo, Zoo survived in Legacy (for awhile anyways) before it died in Modern due to the lack of painless lands (it never took off in Modern, even with the release of the Wild Nacatl from the banlist). But I think I am confusing the issues here... A blitz deck needs fast mana firstly and if it comes painless better still. Fast mana with lots of pain (like Naya Blitz!!) is only viable if burn is inefficient. Well burn is alive and well in Modern... so theres that.

With the rotation of innistrad, fast mana was gone. We were left with the stupid scrye lands... which probably has its place, but that place is not blitz... or any aggro deck for that matter (which is why the current standard looks really dumb to me.... 8+ come into play tapped lands!!!! Is it a wonder decks these days die to random aggro?? - to understand how bad this is, imagine playing 8 or more guildlands. Thats bad right? Only a dedicated deck like Maze's End would even consider playing that many. But yet here we are..... where 8 "come into play tapped" lands are the norm)

During the last two blocks of Theros, we got the Hotdogs!!! ... But it always felt a little weird with the rest of the Dega team (Boros Elite, Ash Zealot and hmmm Frontline Medic?) But the mana in any case was still too slow. And the Dega blitz never did take off.

With M15, we got fast colour fixin' mana again in the form of Mana Confluence. This actually makes Dega Blitz extremely viable if the right cards were available. There are a few conditions that need to be met before such a deck becomes viable (and i mostly use the Naya Blitz structure as a guide) but that is a topic for another day. The reason I cannot answer if such a deck was possible is because I really can't. I did not put my mind to it to brew one... the reason being I was quite disgusted with how the retailers were handling Conspiracy, so I was in no mood to brew or play Magic. Which is a shame since as I mentioned in a past post, I actually saw some potential in M15. Now why even say all this if I did'nt build anything? I just wanted to point out that the fast mana is there! A crucial enabler is active!

Pain is an issue... and it is definitely worse than RTR/INN times but I think it is workable. Anyways long story short, by the time of Kahns of Tarkir, my pissiness with retailers is somewhat assuaged by the stuck inventories known as Conspiracy. Prices of boxes actually dropped. Not drastically mind you. But it says something that MM sells better. So the vindictive part of me is somewhat happier and I started fiddling with Kahns (it probably also had to do with Kahns having fetch reprints!!! Some good price lowering prints there means differences can be put aside temporarily).

What I like alot was:

4 x Bloodsoaked Champion

4 x Monastery Swiftspear

3 x Firedrinker Satyr

These guys (and gals) are all 1 cc and efficient. And the Champion is reminisent of the old Buried Alive decks where the black horde just kept coming back!! (Tho, the Champion would have be a nice bit more powerful if the Raid trigger only cost B). Swiftspear is really pretty with :

3 x Inferno Fist

4 x Mogis's Warhound

4 x Gnarled Scarhide

The synergy made me happy,  and it does a few things. Remember that in combat one either goes deep or wide? Mono Black devotion can do both, wide with Pack Rats and deep with Desecration Demon. Blitz is all in wide and Hexproof Auras was all in deep.

This?

Somewhere in between but not quite as strong as Mono Black devotion. Still it is pretty nice to build up a fatty and in lieu of exile effects, you can swarm when your voltron gets dismantled. I am absolutely serious when I say this is not very strong and is only a "nice" effect. Naya Blitz was bursty and fast. And it was resilent, with Frontline medic you got indestructible waves of attackers, Mayor of Avabruck made everything bigger, you got 5/5 Champion of the Parish, etc etc. The deck was stuffed to the brim with goodness. This deck does not come close. Still it is a nifty synergy with Bestow. (I always felt Bestow was really badly implemented, so having something workable  perhaps compelled me to do something with it)

Once the deck got started other candidates came in and fleshed out the deck:

4 x War-Name Aspirant

4 x Goblin Rabblemaster

2 mana for a 3/2 (most of the time) is pretty sweet and the Goblin Rabble master is a workable 3 cc dude as he helps with the swarm. Now the casting cost may seem high compared with the cards in Rabble Red, but still I would like to point out Naya Blitz curve is higher than Rabble Red's too. So the focus is a little different. I am not trying to be the most efficient on curve here, my main objective as mentioned above is to punch through carytids and coursers, again and again and again. Swarm and punch through when necessary, ebb and flow the toughness of the swarm as necessary. Thats the plan. All in four turns lol.

Why not more stoke the flames? The current burn darling in Rabble Red.

4 x Lightning Strike

4 x Magma Jet

1 x Stoke the Flames

3 x Inferno Fist

I am sure brewers know this. You use the best tool for the job. Stoke the Flames is tremendous with Rabble Master.... however you notice I regard Rabble Master as a workable 3 CC, he is not the core of my deck. I find that Stoke the Flames inhibits my attacks if I use the convoke, most times i want to keep hitting, while Stoke wants me to hold back the troops. So I did'nt really feel like it fit well in the deck. A 4cc to synergise with a 3 CC? No thanks. Remember, Rabble Red is build to abuse the Stoke by playing extremely efficient bodies (1 CC) and are goblins to boot! In my deck however I am happy that Inferno Fist plays well with Swiftspear. And together with the Hotdogs!, betstow makes the activating prowess of the swiftspear happen fairly regularly. And better still, the +2/+0 is permanent! And yet still better Inferno Fist is a stored value Shock. I like the synergy. Nuff Said.

The damage tends to come in drips and draps... which is fine since from experience (from Naya Blitz - yes I do likez it lots! lol) I frequently finish off my opponents by a few points. Sure it looks like I got lucky, but I like to think that the deck consistently has a few points of damage left in the tank to deal the finishing blow. Which is what I think this deck has... testing will confirm or refute this tho

Thats about it... other stuff? The fetches add a little for consistency in the mid to late game and Purphoros, God of the Forge is really nasty with Rabble Master and even if that does not happen, he is wont to apply the last drops of hurt to finish the game...oh the pump ability is nice too....

And that is that Hotdogs! explained.

Oh wait. It was supposed to be a Dega. Well the story behind that is that I really liked Kahns so I was hyped to build a Mardu (Dega's shiny new name!!) and you know, with the Speed and Cunning duel deck.... I really thought Mardu had speed... Unfortunately wedgies and the focus on expensive removal and midrange meant that ... Mardu aggro is kinda fat. And lumbering... not quite Blitzy.... So I just went.. "To hell with white!!" And you got Rakdos instead of Dega/Mardu =)

Have a good day ppl!


[20150501 01:58]

So recently got inspired to stuff a Tymaret in after seeing its synergy with the bloodsoaked Champion! Moreover, Hot Dogs was build with the premise that I will not fear losing my betstowed dudes, so Tymaret actually presents a very nice synergy with the betstow dudes as well!

this is the list:

Std_150425_degaaggrov2

Instant
4 x Magma Jet
1 x Stoke the Flames
4 x Lightning Strike

Enchantment
3 x Inferno Fist

Land
4 x Mana Confluence
5 x Swamp
7 x Mountain
4 x Bloodstained Mire

Creature
4 x Monastery Swiftspear
4 x Mogis's Warhound
4 x War-Name Aspirant
3 x Goblin Rabblemaster
4 x Gnarled Scarhide
2 x Firedrinker Satyr
4 x Bloodsoaked Champion

Legend
2 x Tymaret, the Murder King
1 x Purphoros, God of the Forge

Sideboard
4 x Banishing Light
2 x Dark Betrayal
1 x Goblin Rabblemaster
4 x Brain Maggot
1 x Firedrinker Satyr
3 x Destructive Revelry

I reduced the number of Rabblemasters and took out one Firedrinker. So I removed a 3cc and a 1cc for 2 2cc.

I guess my curve should not be too affected, and ditto for the speed. Why two Tymaret, why not 3 or 4? Well 2 Tymaret is enough for inevitability shenanigans and I really only want to see Tymaret mid to late game so I have found that 2 is a nice number for those kinds of situations. Moreover if I stuff more 2ccs I might lose my curve.

I also wanted to keep my interaction between the rabble masters and Purphoros so I wanted the rabble master density to stay high, hence it stays at 3 and no lower.

Why not switch all the Firedrinkers to little Zurgo? Well this is mostly a casual deck, so I am mostly not playing to win. This deck also does not really care for its own life points. Firedrinkers and grow and block. little Zurgo has blocking issues.... So I might switch to little Zurgo if I go for an actual FNM or something (unlikely at the moment :p) but otherwise... well burn has always been around, and if you play a little smarter with the Firedrinker you should'nt get burn too often. Sure when playing against Norm, Firedrinker got roasted alot, but not every deck runs burn so... I take my chances ;)

I noticed that this deck kinda has a warriors theme and I like Tymaret enough, so i ended up pushing a Heros Blade deck!


Have a good weekend ppl!