Diaochan, Artful Beauty is a very unique card. She exemplifies red's thinking side, and shows that there is more to the color than just smashing things. As a Commander, she offers you two things red traditionally has trouble with - the ability to destroy creatures outside of burn, and the ability to make allies.
This is not your typical mono red control deck. It has very little land destruction, no explosive game-ending plays, few non-permanents, few mana rocks, and lots of draw and tutoring. It is nonlinear and rewards good gameplay and foward-thinking. The entire deck, like Diaochan, offers a glimpse into some of the more subtile mechanics of red. I hope you like it.
This is a glacially slow deck with stax elements and lots of opportunity to gain incremental advantage the longer you can drag the game out.
Early on, use Diaochan to maintain a balance of power among players and keep people from attacking you. You should aim to tutor for Goblin Recruitor, and make a stack of Rummaging Goblin, Squee, and Goblin Welder, in that order. Rummaging Goblin + Squee draws you an extra card each turn, and Welder is a backup engine which feeds off of your huge number of artifacts. Once this is set up, focus on filling your graveyard with things you'll need later and finding more engines.
By the midgame, you should be abusing toys such as Smokestack, Crucible of Worlds, Rings of Brighthearth, and Salvaging Station. You should focus on locking the board down and denying your opponents resources.
Late game, protect Diaochan and use her for defense, then end the game with one of your finishers.
Your finishers will probably die a few times. You want to wait until people use up their removal before you deploy them, and hopefully you will have a recursion engine set up.
If that's not enough to kill them, you've still sculpted the perfect hand. Discard Kozilek, Butcher of Truth or Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre at the end of your turn so you don't die if something goes wrong. If you're blue, you can just keep casting Blue Sun instead.
Nice looking deck, Giodante. I think first off I would attempt to lower the curve some. You have a lot of 6+ drops, and in trimming the fat, I would consider removing a few of them.
Out of all your 6+ drops, Utvara Hellkite seems the weakest to me. I get it that he functions as a fun, powerful creature effect, but at 8 mana can you really reliably use him to upkeep smokestack or expect him to survive long enough to realistically get use from him?
If you removed a couple of these options, then I would consider adding in cards like Shivan Harvest, Price of Glory (Great in counter-heavy metas), Pyrohemia (this may be more of a meta choice, but I face a large amount of tokens in mine). Another card you might like that can be effective vs draw-go players is Tectonic Instability. I currently am testing all of the above, except Shivan Harvest, in my Diaochan list.
Overall a great list that is similar to the one I am working on, let me know how it plays out. I'm currently trying to get my curve down, but hopefully can get in some testing this week with it and get a list online soon.
Nice looking deck, Giodante. I think first off I would attempt to lower the curve some. You have a lot of 6+ drops, and in trimming the fat, I would consider removing a few of them.
Thanks. I think the curve looks deceptively high because of all of the cantrips and land-searching artifacts, combined with the political nature of the deck (it likes to do nothing early on). What would you cut to lower the curve?
Out of all your 6+ drops, Utvara Hellkite seems the weakest to me. I get it that he functions as a fun, powerful creature effect, but at 8 mana can you really reliably use him to upkeep smokestack or expect him to survive long enough to realistically get use from him?
I completely agree, and was torn between him, Akroma, or something else. I'm not sure if I need the extra finisher. I took him out for Duplicant, since Goblin Welder and Imperial Recruiter love it and it's always a good draw.
If you removed a couple of these options, then I would consider adding in cards like Shivan Harvest, Price of Glory (Great in counter-heavy metas), Pyrohemia (this may be more of a meta choice, but I face a large amount of tokens in mine). Another card you might like that can be effective vs draw-go players is Tectonic Instability. I currently am testing all of the above, except Shivan Harvest, in my Diaochan list.
Price of Glory is another of my favorite cards, along with Pyroblast and Red Elemental Blast, but it's definitely meta-dependent. I'll add it to the Other Good Options section for sure, though. It's definitely fine to run them blind into a metagame though, considering we tutor for Goblin Rummager early and have two Wheeleffects and a spellshaper.
Pyrohemia is a card I wish I could fit in, along with Chain Reaction and Oblivion Stone. I'll mention these as solutions to an aggressive metagame. One of my current build's issues is dealing with token swarms, after all. However, considering the nature of the build, Shard Phoenix might actually be the best solution.
Overall a great list that is similar to the one I am working on, let me know how it plays out. I'm currently trying to get my curve down, but hopefully can get in some testing this week with it and get a list online soon.
Thanks. I'll take a look at your list when you post it, and add a link to it here.
Ok so I tested my list out some last night. Steel Hellkite is a great finisher for the list, I hosed a token army, plus a couple of enchantments in the few turns I had him out. Actually won off stalling the game state into Koth of the Hammer's emblem.
Regarding Shard Phoenix, he is actually in my list atm. I've only drawn into him a handful of times however, and when I did he was used as recurring discard fodder for my card draw engines like Rummaging Goblin. I also worked Chandra Ablaze into my list. She actually is pretty solid overall, her spot removal ability is useful with our recurring creatures or just in general, and the wheel effect has proven useful as well. What do you think about Brittle Effigy? It's expensive removal, but if someone resolves Iona, it can be one of the few ways to deal with her. I'm testing it right now, but have only drawn into it once.
Ok so I tested my list out some last night. Steel Hellkite is a great finisher for the list, I hosed a token army, plus a couple of enchantments in the few turns I had him out. Actually won off stalling the game state into Koth of the Hammer's emblem.
I think you're 100% right about Steel Hellkite. The fact that it's an artifact is just great in here, and it does give amazing utility AND finishing power. In theory, it sounds better than All Is Dust, but I don't want to cut that. I'll have to think about what to cut. Any suggestions?
How has Koth been? I haven't tested him, since I didn't feel like his first two abilities are that useful for us. Have you found otherwise?
Regarding Shard Phoenix, he is actually in my list atm. I've only drawn into him a handful of times however, and when I did he was used as recurring discard fodder for my card draw engines like Rummaging Goblin.
I hadn't thought of that interaction. Nice. I'm wondering which phoenix I should use now. Kuldotha Phoenix is solid, but if I include Steel Hellkite, I free up a finisher slot and can include more control, and Shard Phoenix seems perfect since it's so versatile.
I also worked Chandra Ablaze into my list. She actually is pretty solid overall, her spot removal ability is useful with our recurring creatures or just in general, and the wheel effect has proven useful as well.
I usually like her in mono red, but since the printing of Rummaging Goblin and Staff of Nin, and the inclusion of Salvaging Station, I feel like we don't need her draw power as much. Heck, I'm not even running Mind's Eye! (Should I?) Her +1 ability is nice with Squee, but she costs 6 mana, and I think I'd rather just play Flametongue Kavu if that's her main use. How many relevant activations do you usually get out of her? If she costed 4 I'd be more inclined to run her.
What do you think about Brittle Effigy? It's expensive removal, but if someone resolves Iona, it can be one of the few ways to deal with her. I'm testing it right now, but have only drawn into it once.
I LOVE it and I think way more people should run it. I feel fine without it since I have All Is Dust, Duplicant, Chaos Warp, Karn Liberated, and Heat Shimmer to deal with her. In a pinch, I can always Imperial Recruiter for Duplicant or Gamble for anything. Still, it's VERY solid removal and I strongly recommend it if you feel you need the exile.
I think I like the Hellkite more than I do Spine of Ish Sah, while the Spine makes an immediate impact, I find there is so much anti-gy cards in my meta or exile effects that the Spine doesn't look like it would work too well overall. Hellkite, while still being suspectible to the same things, if I untap with him I usually just boardwipe an opponent.
I like that Koth functions on a variety of levels. On one hand his first ability is slightly like Garruk Wildspeaker's first one, but on the other hand Koth provides small dmg which can be useful if the board is stalled out. I wouldn't underestimate his second ability. There have been times where it proved very useful, such as when i had equipment already on the field, dropped koth, then dropped Diaochan off the ramp. If you see a chance where you can get koth out turn 2 with a sol ring, you will probably have the ultimate off fairly quick. Even later in the game if people don't have Beast Withins or Vindicates, if you have been controlling the board, you can probably pull his ultimate off. If you untap with the emblem you usually control the remaining part of the game in pure draw-go.
I'm not sure how I feel about the Kavu. I don't run any bounce engines atm to get a lot of uses out of him besides the first. Without anything to reuse him with, I think I like Chandra more. Her draw ability is great for our color too. She hasn't been the all-star that Koth has been, but I am rarely disappointed to see Chandra. Most of the time, I can get around 2-3 activations from her depending on when she is played. I like to keep her around until my hand gets low to wheel into a new one. In regards to Mind's Eye, I am currently running it. I attempt to play a sort of draw-go with my list if possible, so leaving the mana open hasn't been too much of an issue. I currently don't have the Station in my list, though have been considering it again. The colorless draw, plus recurring a lot of the artifacts we run could be really useful, just kind of hard to tutor out besides gamble.
Diaochan, Artful Beauty is a very unique card. She exemplifies red's thinking side, and shows that there is more to the color than just smashing things. As a Commander, she offers you two things red traditionally has trouble with - the ability to destroy creatures outside of burn, and the ability to make allies.
This is not your typical mono red control deck. It has very little land destruction, no explosive game-ending plays, few non-permanents, few mana rocks, and lots of draw and tutoring. It is nonlinear and rewards good gameplay and foward-thinking. The entire deck, like Diaochan, offers a glimpse into some of the more subtile mechanics of red. I hope you like it.
1 Diaochan, Artful Beauty
Artifacts
1 Armillary Sphere
1 Batterskull
1 Chromatic Star
1 Codex Shredder
1 Crucible of Worlds
1 Expedition Map
1 Ichor Wellspring
1 Lightning Greaves
1 Mana Crypt
1 Phyrexian Furnace
1 Puppet Strings
1 Pyrite Spellbomb
1 Rings of Brighthearth
1 Salvaging Station
1 Scrabbling Claws
1 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Skullclamp
1 Smokestack
1 Sol Ring
1 Spine of Ish Sah
1 Staff of Nin
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Sword of War and Peace
1 Tangle Wire
1 Thousand-Year Elixir
1 Trading Post
1 Traveler's Amulet
1 Wanderer's Twig
1 Wayfarer's Bauble
1 Duplicant
1 Flametongue Kavu
1 Goblin Matron
1 Goblin Recruiter
1 Goblin Welder
1 Godo, Bandit Warlord
1 Imperial Recruiter
1 Inferno Titan
1 Jaya Ballard, Task Mage
1 Kuldotha Phoenix
1 Magmatic Force
1 Magus of the Moon
1 Moggcatcher
1 Rakka Mar
1 Rummaging Goblin
1 Solemn Simulacrum
1 Spitebellows
1 Squee, Goblin Nabob
1 Wurmcoil Engine
Enchantments
1 Blood Moon
1 Stranglehold
Instants
1 Chaos Warp
Lands
15 Mountain
1 Ancient Tomb
1 Arid Mesa
1 Blasted Landscape
1 Bloodstained Mire
1 Buried Ruin
1 Evolving Wilds
1 Forgotten Cave
1 Haunted Fengraf
1 Inkmoth Nexus
1 Kher Keep
1 Petrified Field
1 Scalding Tarn
1 Smoldering Crater
1 Terramorphic Expanse
1 Thawing Glaciers
1 Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle
1 Wooded Foothills
1 Karn Liberated
Sorceries
1 Aftershock
1 All Is Dust
1 Blasphemous Act
1 Flame Slash
1 Gamble
1 Heat Shimmer
1 Mizzium Mortars
1 Reforge the Soul
1 Ruination
1 Shattering Spree
1 Vandalblast
1 Wheel of Fortune
1 Wild Guess
Strategy
This is a glacially slow deck with stax elements and lots of opportunity to gain incremental advantage the longer you can drag the game out.
Early on, use Diaochan to maintain a balance of power among players and keep people from attacking you. You should aim to tutor for Goblin Recruitor, and make a stack of Rummaging Goblin, Squee, and Goblin Welder, in that order. Rummaging Goblin + Squee draws you an extra card each turn, and Welder is a backup engine which feeds off of your huge number of artifacts. Once this is set up, focus on filling your graveyard with things you'll need later and finding more engines.
By the midgame, you should be abusing toys such as Smokestack, Crucible of Worlds, Rings of Brighthearth, and Salvaging Station. You should focus on locking the board down and denying your opponents resources.
Late game, protect Diaochan and use her for defense, then end the game with one of your finishers.
Synergies
Protect Diaochan
-Lightning Greaves
-Sword of Fire and Ice
-Sword of War and Peace
Turbo-Charge Your Tappers
-Rings of Brighthearth
-Thousand-Year Elixir
-Puppet Strings
Red Phyrexian Arena
-Find Goblin Recruiter
-Stack Rummaging Goblin, then Squee, Goblin Nabob
-Profit!
Goblin Welder's Favorite Ashtrays
-Chromatic Star
-Ichor Wellspring
-Mycosynth Wellspring
-Solemn Simulacrum
-Duplicant
-Wurmcoil Engine
-Spine of Ish Sah
Rings of Brighthearth Tricks
-Codex Shredder can recover itself and something else!
-Petrified Field can recover itself and a land!
-Sensei's Divining Top creates a draw engine!
-Karn Liberated gets out of control!
Squee's Toys
-Gamble finds Squee, no matter what.
-Skullclamp draws a ton of cards.
-Rummaging Goblin is your go-to draw combo.
-Jaya Ballard, Task Mage puts him to work.
-Trading Post makes him salvage for you.
-Wild Guess, Wheel of Fortune, and Reforge the Soul don't bother him.
-Goblin Matron, Goblin Recruiter, Moggcatcher, and Imperial Recruitor all have his phone number.
Grow Some Backbone!
-Spine of Ish Sah loves to be used and abused!
-Goblin Welder turns it into crazy advantage.
-Trading Post is a backup way to turn it into an engine.
-Shattering Spree gets you an extra use out of it.
-Smokestack adores it as fodder.
-Tangle Wire also appreciates it just for being there.
-Buried Ruin gets it for emergency situations.
Selection of Finishers
Your finishers will probably die a few times. You want to wait until people use up their removal before you deploy them, and hopefully you will have a recursion engine set up.
Batterskull - Easy to bounce or recur.
Sword of War and Peace - Dangerous under the right conditions.
Godo, Bandit Warlord - Deady with equipment.
Inferno Titan - Fast clock with enough mana.
Kuldotha Phoenix - Hasty, carries equipment, and recurs itself.
Magmatic Force - Damage, damage, everywhere!
Rakka Mar - Double her ability to build an instant army.
Wurmcoil Engine - The gift that keeps on giving.
Inkmoth Nexus - Wear them down with equipment and recursion.
Karn Liberated - The Hail Mary
Other Good Options
Akroma, Angel of Fury - A moderately fast, resilient finisher.
Utvara Hellkite - Very strong if you can get a few hits in.
Hellkite Igniter - Very aggressive option that requires some setup.
Magewright's Stone - If you want another untapper.
Vicious Shadows - Another way to end the game.
Shivan Harvest - If you have spare tokens, this is great.
Viashino Heretic - Good political tool.
Eye of Ugin+Kozilek, Butcher of Truth - Card advantage plus a finisher, but expensive.
Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker+Zealous Conscripts - You have plenty of Kiki tutors and recursion.
Solutions to Counter-Heavy Metagames
-Pyroblast
-Red Elemental Blast
-Price of Glory
-Tectonic Instability
-War's Toll
-Mana Web
-Defense Grid
-Akroma, Angel of Fury
Solutions to Token-Heavy Metagames
-Chain Reaction
-Pyrohemia
-Shard Phoenix
-Oblivion Stone
-Burning Sands
-Steel Hellkite
-Engineered Explosives
-Ratchet Bomb
The Combo
It's up to you if you want to include this combo. The pieces are all good and can go in any deck.
Rings of Brighthearth
Sensei's Divining Top
Basalt Monolith
At this point you draw your deck and have infinite colorless mana.
Then, depending on your deck, you play one of these:
Red - Comet Storm/Rolling Thunder
Green - Verdeloth the Ancient/Helix Pinnacle
White - Entreat the Angels/Decree of Justice/Martial Coup
Blue - Blue Sun's Zenith/Laboratory Maniac
Black - Exsanguinate
If that's not enough to kill them, you've still sculpted the perfect hand. Discard Kozilek, Butcher of Truth or Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre at the end of your turn so you don't die if something goes wrong. If you're blue, you can just keep casting Blue Sun instead.
Check out Dirkgently's list too: http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=458045
Mono Red's Strengths and Mono White's Strengths
Out of all your 6+ drops, Utvara Hellkite seems the weakest to me. I get it that he functions as a fun, powerful creature effect, but at 8 mana can you really reliably use him to upkeep smokestack or expect him to survive long enough to realistically get use from him?
If you removed a couple of these options, then I would consider adding in cards like Shivan Harvest, Price of Glory (Great in counter-heavy metas), Pyrohemia (this may be more of a meta choice, but I face a large amount of tokens in mine). Another card you might like that can be effective vs draw-go players is Tectonic Instability. I currently am testing all of the above, except Shivan Harvest, in my Diaochan list.
Overall a great list that is similar to the one I am working on, let me know how it plays out. I'm currently trying to get my curve down, but hopefully can get in some testing this week with it and get a list online soon.
[Primer] WUB Dromar, the Banisher Stax [SOON TO BE OLORO]
Thanks. I think the curve looks deceptively high because of all of the cantrips and land-searching artifacts, combined with the political nature of the deck (it likes to do nothing early on). What would you cut to lower the curve?
I completely agree, and was torn between him, Akroma, or something else. I'm not sure if I need the extra finisher. I took him out for Duplicant, since Goblin Welder and Imperial Recruiter love it and it's always a good draw.
I looove Shivan Harvest, but I'd want a few more token producers to feel comfortable running it. If I someday add in Siege-Gang Commander and Krenko, Mob Boss, it's probably going in.
Price of Glory is another of my favorite cards, along with Pyroblast and Red Elemental Blast, but it's definitely meta-dependent. I'll add it to the Other Good Options section for sure, though. It's definitely fine to run them blind into a metagame though, considering we tutor for Goblin Rummager early and have two Wheel effects and a spellshaper.
Pyrohemia is a card I wish I could fit in, along with Chain Reaction and Oblivion Stone. I'll mention these as solutions to an aggressive metagame. One of my current build's issues is dealing with token swarms, after all. However, considering the nature of the build, Shard Phoenix might actually be the best solution.
Tectonic Instability will be mentioned alongside Price of Glory.
Thanks. I'll take a look at your list when you post it, and add a link to it here.
Mono Red's Strengths and Mono White's Strengths
Regarding Shard Phoenix, he is actually in my list atm. I've only drawn into him a handful of times however, and when I did he was used as recurring discard fodder for my card draw engines like Rummaging Goblin. I also worked Chandra Ablaze into my list. She actually is pretty solid overall, her spot removal ability is useful with our recurring creatures or just in general, and the wheel effect has proven useful as well. What do you think about Brittle Effigy? It's expensive removal, but if someone resolves Iona, it can be one of the few ways to deal with her. I'm testing it right now, but have only drawn into it once.
[Primer] WUB Dromar, the Banisher Stax [SOON TO BE OLORO]
I think you're 100% right about Steel Hellkite. The fact that it's an artifact is just great in here, and it does give amazing utility AND finishing power. In theory, it sounds better than All Is Dust, but I don't want to cut that. I'll have to think about what to cut. Any suggestions?
How has Koth been? I haven't tested him, since I didn't feel like his first two abilities are that useful for us. Have you found otherwise?
I hadn't thought of that interaction. Nice. I'm wondering which phoenix I should use now. Kuldotha Phoenix is solid, but if I include Steel Hellkite, I free up a finisher slot and can include more control, and Shard Phoenix seems perfect since it's so versatile.
I usually like her in mono red, but since the printing of Rummaging Goblin and Staff of Nin, and the inclusion of Salvaging Station, I feel like we don't need her draw power as much. Heck, I'm not even running Mind's Eye! (Should I?) Her +1 ability is nice with Squee, but she costs 6 mana, and I think I'd rather just play Flametongue Kavu if that's her main use. How many relevant activations do you usually get out of her? If she costed 4 I'd be more inclined to run her.
I LOVE it and I think way more people should run it. I feel fine without it since I have All Is Dust, Duplicant, Chaos Warp, Karn Liberated, and Heat Shimmer to deal with her. In a pinch, I can always Imperial Recruiter for Duplicant or Gamble for anything. Still, it's VERY solid removal and I strongly recommend it if you feel you need the exile.
Mono Red's Strengths and Mono White's Strengths
I like that Koth functions on a variety of levels. On one hand his first ability is slightly like Garruk Wildspeaker's first one, but on the other hand Koth provides small dmg which can be useful if the board is stalled out. I wouldn't underestimate his second ability. There have been times where it proved very useful, such as when i had equipment already on the field, dropped koth, then dropped Diaochan off the ramp. If you see a chance where you can get koth out turn 2 with a sol ring, you will probably have the ultimate off fairly quick. Even later in the game if people don't have Beast Withins or Vindicates, if you have been controlling the board, you can probably pull his ultimate off. If you untap with the emblem you usually control the remaining part of the game in pure draw-go.
I'm not sure how I feel about the Kavu. I don't run any bounce engines atm to get a lot of uses out of him besides the first. Without anything to reuse him with, I think I like Chandra more. Her draw ability is great for our color too. She hasn't been the all-star that Koth has been, but I am rarely disappointed to see Chandra. Most of the time, I can get around 2-3 activations from her depending on when she is played. I like to keep her around until my hand gets low to wheel into a new one. In regards to Mind's Eye, I am currently running it. I attempt to play a sort of draw-go with my list if possible, so leaving the mana open hasn't been too much of an issue. I currently don't have the Station in my list, though have been considering it again. The colorless draw, plus recurring a lot of the artifacts we run could be really useful, just kind of hard to tutor out besides gamble.
[Primer] WUB Dromar, the Banisher Stax [SOON TO BE OLORO]