FNM FUN - FIRE & ICE
With Robert Blum
Welcome back for article number 3. This week I took a pretty successful deck in mono red devotion and tweaked it to add a splash of blue. My shop is pretty notorious for esper builds and guys running blood baron so I wanted to have an answer. This deck proved to be way more fun then I ever imagined and did some really crazy things in game. Well without further ado lets check out the list.
UR Devotion - By Yours Truly
Creatures
4 - Ash Zealot
4 - Ash Zealot
4 - Frostburn Weird
4 - Boros Reckoner
4 - Fanatic of Mogis
2 - Keranos, God of Storms
Spells
2 - Cyclonic Rift
2 - Turn//Burn
2 - Ral Zarek
2 - Hammer of Purphoros
Lands
4 - Temple of Epiphany
4 - Steam vents
3 - Island
4 - Nykthos Shrine to Nyx
As you can see the blue splash is mainly for a few control pieces. I felt with the amount of mana produced in this deck by Nykthos overloading a rift against an army of x/2's would prove to be deadly! I was correct. The deck went 4-1 good enough for 2nd place with my only loss coming to esper control and it took 3 games and a billion removal spells for it to get there.
Match 1 - Mono Blue Devotion
Game 1
This matchup just seemed really unfair for the devotion player. Turn one I played Firedrinker - turn 2 ash zealot swing 4 - not wanting to lose his raptor no blocks. next turn i dropped reckoner then burned out his nightveil. he eventually had to block with Cloudfin just to live and then down came fanatic for the win.
Game 2
This was a very special game. I have a buddy who refuses to play standard (Hey Joe) he swears the format just isn't fun. He strictly plays modern, edh and draft. He happened to be at this particular FNM night when my UR deck went off for the first time, as he was playing conspiracy draft.
With that interlude here we go. Turn 1 mountain Satyr, Turn 2 Mountain Ash Zealot - swing 4, Turn 3 Steam Vents, Reckoner, Turn 4 Steam Vents into Frostburn burning tree, finally we hit nykthos i was able to tap nykthos for 10 I used 5 of it to cast storm breath four to cast fanatic. my opponent took 12 damage and then we swung for game as he just didn't have the blockers to get there.
My buddy came over and said wait what just happened I explained it to him and his face was priceless - his response was your standard deck just did 20+ damage on one turn. My answer was yes. He literally kept watching standard matches all night lol.
Matches 1-0 Games 2-0
Match 2 - Green/Red Midrange
This was a matchup that i felt really good about nothing in my opponents deck other than an mana dork cost less than 4 and that gave me 4 turns to set up a win.
Game 1 - on the play
Satyr pass, frostburn pass, zealot, burn elf pass at this point he's taken (7) - next turn drop nykthos (tap for 5) dragon and rift his blocker - swing 10 more, next turn fanatic good game.
Game 2
This game was disgusting Iquickly hit some damage then built up a board state where it was creature heavy on both sides - I finally found a shrine tapped it for about 16 mana rifted his board played a dragon and fanatic on my side and then with a hammer in play from a few turns earlier i swung for like 26
Matches 2-0 Games 4-0
Match 3 - UB mill card draw something lol
I am still not exactly sure what to call this deck it was supposed to be some kind of engine with prophet of kruphix, master of feasts and notion thief I can't really say what it was supposed to do as both games I played against it my opponent was mana screwed and couldn't cast anything that mattered or that I could tap down with Ral Zarek to attack through.
I can say one of his friends played the exact same deck to 4-1 and 3rd place the same night and it seemed cool of what I could see of it. Maybe next weeks fun FNM deck.
Matches 3-0 Games 6-0
Match 4 - Mono Red Devotion no Shrines.
This wasn't anywhere near as close as I thought it would be his deck wasn't running frostburn or burning tree in it's place were chandra's phoenix and firefist striker. I found that having the devotion is what really makes this deck hum and I was correct as dropping nykthos with 6-8 devotion is just back breaking if I draw rift or dragon. Twice in this game i drew dragon and was able to play and monstrous him in the same turn with devotion mana.
Matches 4-0 Games 8-0
Match 5 - Esper Control
First let me be clear ----> I HATE CONTROL DECKS!! & I HATE SPHINX'S REV!! Ok now that I got that out of my system.
Game 1 - On play
I completely crushed him he found no answers, no verdicts or rev's and one kill spell. I was just too fast.
Game 2
I had him down to 4 when he wiped the board away at this point it was all about finding dragon or ash zealots to win. I found 3 dragons and 2 ash zealots in turns but he drew a kill spell every single turn (top deck magic baby) and managed to kill my threat on attack I did get him down to 2 before he stabilized with a rev. after that it was just too late.
Game 3
I was hoping for a similar game to game 2 and that he would draw a kill spell every time he needed it. I got a different game but still one that wasn't good for me. he went turn one thoughtseize rip zealot, turn 2 i get seized again ripping reckoner, and turn three he had dissolve for my threat after that it was basically over on turn 5 he dropped obzedat and i cried. this match was over as he had a solid clutch of cards and I knew it was all removal or counter magic.
Matches 4-1 Games 9-2
All in all I was really happy with the deck however I would definitely make some changes. Personally I feel the deck needs 3 rifts main and 4 turn and burn. The keranos can come down to one and the ral zareks are just horrible. Yes, I had a game where Ral was an all star but more often then not I would board him out for my extra turn and burns and cyclonic rifts.
The board had a 4th dragon which came in against the control player but for the most part the deck didn't change much between games.
I completely crushed him he found no answers, no verdicts or rev's and one kill spell. I was just too fast.
Game 2
I had him down to 4 when he wiped the board away at this point it was all about finding dragon or ash zealots to win. I found 3 dragons and 2 ash zealots in turns but he drew a kill spell every single turn (top deck magic baby) and managed to kill my threat on attack I did get him down to 2 before he stabilized with a rev. after that it was just too late.
Game 3
I was hoping for a similar game to game 2 and that he would draw a kill spell every time he needed it. I got a different game but still one that wasn't good for me. he went turn one thoughtseize rip zealot, turn 2 i get seized again ripping reckoner, and turn three he had dissolve for my threat after that it was basically over on turn 5 he dropped obzedat and i cried. this match was over as he had a solid clutch of cards and I knew it was all removal or counter magic.
Matches 4-1 Games 9-2
All in all I was really happy with the deck however I would definitely make some changes. Personally I feel the deck needs 3 rifts main and 4 turn and burn. The keranos can come down to one and the ral zareks are just horrible. Yes, I had a game where Ral was an all star but more often then not I would board him out for my extra turn and burns and cyclonic rifts.
The board had a 4th dragon which came in against the control player but for the most part the deck didn't change much between games.
I am going to tweak this deck and probably run it again this week as I really love the fact that it can do 20+ damage on turn 4 pretty consistently!
Well that's all for this week, thanks for reading as always and feel free to share your input.
Rob
Well that's all for this week, thanks for reading as always and feel free to share your input.
Rob
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