Hello everybody,
Today i'm going to talk about my first modern archetype that I bought : Burn!
Burn could be seen as a mix between critical mass combo and aggro, usually you need to draw 6 burn spell to kill your opponent, but you can kill it with the creature plan. Usually you win the game between turn 3 to 5.
Let's talk about the cards!
Creature
These creatures are the best creature for modern burn because they deals some damage if they touch the board!
Let's start with Goblin Guide: 2/2 haste for a single mana it's absolutely great. the downside is that you give your opponent a land it there's one on top, but if there's another type of cards, you're getting a lot of information! Moreover,the card advantage provided from drawing land usually is not a big deal because you're going to close the game before that your opponent could capitalize the advantage.
Then we have Monastery Swiftspear, this card scales very well on turn 2/3, when she can beat your opponent for 3/4 damages! Moreover she doesn't give a land to your opponent, the only downside is that she's only a 1/2.
The last is Eidolon of the Great Revel. This card is really powerful because its ability is like getting virtual card advantage: your opponent will likely cast a removal on it taking 2, so you trade one card for one card of your opponent plus 2 damages. Obviously, if it's left unchecked, can win the game alone!
We're playing the cratures because they act as a virtual card advantage: with 1 attack of Goblin Guide you deal 2 damage, less than a bolt, that is our unit of measure so it's a virtual card disadvantage; with 2 attacks you deal 4 damages, more than a bolt, is a slightly virtual card advantage, then with 3 attacks you deal 6 damages, that means 2 bolt, a really great card advantage. The same could be said to the other creature, the more they stay on the board, more advantage the give to you!
4/4/4 it's MANDATORY!
Spells
The spells are pretty simple: 3 (or more damage) to your opponent! Some tips while using these cards:
1) If you have multiple Searing Blaze against Control, if they cast a Snapcaster Mage, you can cast first Searing Blaze, hold priority and cast second Searing Blaze! This will works because Searing Blaze needs to target to be casted, but won't fizzle if the creature is an invalid target during resolution of the spells!
2) You can use Boros Charm to give indestructible to all your permanent, for example you can use it against a mass removal as a counter, you can use it after block assignement to let your creature staying alive, you can use it against land denial and so on! Sometimes giving doublestrike to your swiftspear could be game winning, too! Dont think at it only as 4 damage to your opponent!
I play 4/4/4/4/4/4/4 of this, for a total
Lands
With the new canopy lands from Modern Horizons, this archetype get an incredible boost, because this deck usually die for this 2 reason:
1) Flooding;
2) Mulligan because you don't have lands
With the canopy lands you resolve all the 2 problems mentioned above, so it's great! After this, you've to play some red fetches to get online at instant speed Searing Blaze, a full set of RW Fastland, to reduce the amount of damage that you do to yourself and a split between basic Mountain and Sacred Foundry.
In my list I play: 4 Sunbaked Canyon, 2 Scalding Tarn, 2 Arid Mesa, 1 Wooded Foothills, 2 Bloodstained Mire, 4 Inspiring Vantage, 3 Sacred Foundry and 2 Mountains. You can play all type of red fectches, but sometimes you don't have a t1 play, so you play the land a pass the turn. If you play a Scalding Tarn, your opponent can't read that you're playing burn, so can do a suboptimal play. For example, if your opponent is playing Jund, can fetch a shockland and play a Thoughtseize because he expects a Jeskai deck!
Sideboard
The sideboard plans really depends on which type of deck you're going to expect to a tournament.
According to MTGGoldfish, you've to play:
Lifegain, Graveyard Hate, Artifact Hate, More Bolt Effects, Removals
This is the why of this sideboard:
2 Kor Firewalker against Burn and Monored
2 Rest in Peace against Jund, Grixis Death Shadow, Dredge
3 Smash to Smithereens against Eldratron, Tron, Stoneblade
3 Skullcrack against Stoneblade and Tron
3 Path to Exile against Jund, Grixis Death Shadow, Eldratron, Titanshift and Amulet Titan
2 Deflecting Palm against Eldratron, Titanshift and Amulet Titan
Final Thoughts
That's it, this is my build of Burn. Yeah, it's not very different from other lists, but I've tried to explain why you play these cards and I've tried to offer you some useful tips for using the deck!
Regards
Vito
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