Brewing with rakdos

[James Mills]

Hello, I have decided to brew a rakdos control deck and I want to know what people think.

Ok here it is:

2 murder
3 rakdos returns
4 sign in blood
3 ultimate price
4 duress
4 liliana of the veil
4 mutilate
4 vampire nighthawk
4 dreadbore
2 underworld connections
3 desecration demon

4 blood crypt
4 dragon skull summit
2 rakdos guildgate
13 swamp

The metagame here is simple. Thragtusk, mainly selesnya or jund so I wanted a deck that was good against creature decks. What do people think.

[Thomas David Baker]

My experience of running Barter in Blood in the previous Standard is that it is unimpressive (Undying, Lingering Souls, just having three guys).

Pillar of Fire should probably be in the main (Geralf's Messenger, Strangleroot Geist, mana dorks).

Tribute to Hunger is not bad and offsets life loss from the card draw and helps against Geist of Saint Traft.

Sign in Blood seems key in this deck.  Almost any hand with two lands and a Sign in Blood is a keep.

Sideboard should possibly include Sever the Bloodline or some other way to deal with Entreat the Angels?

Not sure about your win-cons.  Olivia Voldaren is in your colors and is a pretty scary t4.

[Philip Dickinson]

Rakdos Keyrune feels like it might be surprisingly good in a deck like this. i also feel as though the newer liliana is probably much better than it seems in a grindy black deck

[Dan Barrett]

I like the keyrune suggestion, blocks thragtusks all day, and can conveniently not be a creature when you wanmt to play a sweeper.

[Jason Savage]

See Millsy, I am not the only one to say Rakdos Keyrune!

[James Mills]

I had it in my earlier incarnation of the deck but I thought it was a tad too clunky but this was probably to do with some of the other cards I had in the deck too. I will try it again. What do I take out though?

[James Mills]

Barter probably isn't as good I will probably o for some number of tributes instead. I have quite a bit of card advantage in my deck so against undying guys I don't really care about killing them twice. That being said pillar does seem like a necessity in this format for all the reasons you mentioned.

Olivia does seem ok, I might try one in the main an see how that works out. Sign in blood and underworld connections are both key in this deck especially if you have an active liliana because there isn't any other way to take advantage of the symmetrical discard apart from having more cards than your opponent.

Entreat gets taken by slaughter games from the board or mutilated so it doesn't really worry me. I will look into having a few copies in the board though.

Thomas David Baker said:

My experience of running Barter in Blood in the previous Standard is that it is unimpressive (Undying, Lingering Souls, just having three guys).

Pillar of Fire should probably be in the main (Geralf's Messenger, Strangleroot Geist, mana dorks).

Tribute to Hunger is not bad and offsets life loss from the card draw and helps against Geist of Saint Traft.

Sign in Blood seems key in this deck.  Almost any hand with two lands and a Sign in Blood is a keep.

Sideboard should possibly include Sever the Bloodline or some other way to deal with Entreat the Angels?

Not sure about your win-cons.  Olivia Voldaren is in your colors and is a pretty scary t4.

[Dan Barrett]

Is there an instant speed answer to Entreat? Just thinking, in case you play against a smart/lucky player who miracles it during your end step.

[James Mills]

Well I can kill one with a murder or ultimate price but I don't really see this being much of a problem. I can only really plan for so many scenarios, some fringe scenarios like this will happen from time to time but not often enough to have a specific plan against it.

Dan Barrett said:

Is there an instant speed answer to Entreat? Just thinking, in case you play against a smart/lucky player who miracles it during your end step.

[Peter Dun]

3 points:

1) evolving wilds is almost strictly better than guildgate in this deck due to synegy with dragonskull summit

2) this deck lacks a late game trump, you could be attempting to just get them with rakdos' return, but at least consider army of the damned

3) m13 liliana is VERY VERY good in a deck like this. test it

[James Mills]

Are you saying to replace one liliana with the other or have a combination of the two. Yes I was looking at army an grislebrand for the late game. I decided against army because people are playing rakdos charm and that just kills me. Of course since I haven't actually tested against any decks yet.

I have replaced the guild gates with mountains anyway so ignore that.

Peter Dun said:

3 points:

1) evolving wilds is almost strictly better than guildgate in this deck due to synegy with dragonskull summit

2) this deck lacks a late game trump, you could be attempting to just get them with rakdos' return, but at least consider army of the damned

3) m13 liliana is VERY VERY good in a deck like this. test it

[Thomas David Baker]

I was playing 1 Sorin Markov, 1 Grave Titan, 1 Griselbrand, 1 Karn Liberated as late game trumps in the previous standard.  Is Army of the Damned better than Griselbrand?

Griselbrand was probably the worst of those four just because he costs so much.  Also I had the lifegaining ramp artifact.

If you want to be that deck you probably play yet more answers and don't maindeck the Nighthawks.

[James Mills]

Tom, I would kill to have grave Titan back in standard. None of the others though.

What other options do I have for late game trumps?