@Hakeem

He mad.

Nice win. What turn was that on?

I've drawn five cards but I don't know if it was draw or play for me.

Turn 5 or it sucks! : )

Okay, so I've been testing this deck a bunch lately and I have to say, it's really strong. Here's is the final decklist with notes on the card choices:



Tormented Hero - Two-power one-drops are great in an aggro strategy and this guy gives you a little bit of reach with his Heroic ability.

Coordinated Assault - The deck is playing a bunch of weenies, so a power boost plus first strike acts as removal and lets you swing into a lot of boards that you otherwise couldn't.

Shock - An excellent removal spell in this metagame and a bit of reach to close out games all for just one mana.

Ulcerate - Combined with Shock, this gives us seven one-mana removal spells to clear the way for our little dudes. The life loss rarely matters because this deck is almost always the beatdown.

Bloodghast - The ability to recur this guy helps against a lot of decks, and with Devouring Swarm we can sacrifice him to deal damage and get him back on the same turn.

Goblin Shortcutter - An absolute workhorse in this deck, he allows us to swing right through problematic blockers while adding a Piker to the board. All for just two mana.

Krenko's Command - Two creatures on one card lets us go wide and the tokens can also provide a bit of reach because we can sacrifice them to Devouring Swarm.

Hellspark Elemental - This guy is insane because no one wants to spend removal on him or block him, and you get to bring him back for a second round if you have no cards or just have some excess mana to spend.

Devouring Swarm - Some much-needed evasion and the sacrifice ability lets you force through damage by sacrificing those otherwise-useless goblin tokens. It also protects your guys from opposing threats like Act of Treason or Switcheroo as a bonus. Free sacrifice outlets are always good.

Goblin Rabblemaster - Probably the best three-drop for any aggro deck, this guy is insane.

Agent of the Fates - I'm not playing this guy for his Heroic trigger, but just for the body. There are five spells in the deck that can trigger him (twelve if you count Shock and Ulcerate), though, so you can get some marginal upside from time to time.

Act of Treason - Basically, this is the fifth Shortcutter that also acts as a pseudo-burn spell. I would never want more than one, though, because it can be a dead draw. There is upside considering you can sacrifice stolen creatures through Devouring Swarm, but that's just gravy.

Graveborn Muse - This type of deck can run itself out of cards quickly and also tax the opponent's removal. In that type of game, this gal refills your hand and gives you the gas to finish where you otherwise couldn't.

Banefire - An extra piece of removal if needed, and a mana sink in case you flood out. This can close a lot of games.

Here it is, Auunj.

Inspired by Hakeem I liked the idea of a aggro Rakdos deck with lots of pump and removal. I especially like the multiple ways of clearing the way for my attackers and the syngergy between Deviant Glee and Goblin Rabblemaster.



I'm sure the deck could be polished a bit. I'm not sure about Blister Beetle and Phyrexian Rager. I've tested Liliana's Specter and Bloodcrazed Neonate but wasn't really sure if it's the best way to go. Neonate was nice vs control decks as it can get easily out of hand, especially when pumped with Furor of the Bitten or Deviant Glee with trample.

I didn't think I'd have that much success and fun with a Rakdos aggro deck, but it's working! It's very aggresive and plays very similar to Monk's RDW and is theoretically capable of a t3 win. I myself got a t4 win twice.

Here's the updated list:

How good is Deviant Glee? I feel like you need more creatures, perhaps Goblin Arsonist or Goblin Shortcutter?

Deviant Glee is MVP. Great with stacked Furor of the Bitten on a Satyr Hoplite (7/6 on t2) or Goblin Rabblemaster as it let's me push damager through.

Goblin Arsonist is on the list. I did consider Goblin Shortcutter but I have enough removal usually. I'm still testing the deck, but having a blast so far.

Deviant Glee is such an underrated card it is stupid. Especially if it works anything like it does in my Mardu Heroic deck (which I surmise that it does).

I can confidently say that in my Mardu Heroic list, Deviant Glee is tied with Gods Willing as the "best spell in the deck"

+2/+1 and triggering Heroic for is pretty huge.

The Trample is the real kicker though.

Having to pay for pseudo-evasion is annoying, but is pretty cheap and easy to come by.

It completely and totally wrecks any deck that is looking to chump until it can set up/stabilize, which is HUGE in this meta.

If you get a Deviant Glee on something, there is a good chance you are going to be able to attack in every turn and deal damage while potentially taking a creature as well.

Compare this with say Ordeal of Heliod in or Furor of the Bitten in and you will see the difference, attacking into chump blocks during a lot of your early turns.

Deviant Glee pretty much completely invalidates a good portion of the defenses in a lot of decks.

Hope you aren't relying on chumping with X/1 and X/2 creatures to survive the early turns, otherwise Deviant Glee is likely going to eat you alive.

Not to mention that it works extremely well with Rabblemaster, allowing him to make attacks your normally wouldn't. As an X/2 with no evasion there are a lot of times when you don't want to attack with Rabblemaster because best case scenario you are doing 0 damage to your opponent and trading creatures (usually with a loss of value on your end).

With Deviant Glee those suicide attacks become more favorable to you. Losing your Rabblemaster isn't quite as bad when doing so means trading with a creature AND potentially doing a ton of damage that turn as well.

I would literally cut every single copy of Furor of the Bitten before I would cut a single copy of Deviant Glee.

This was meant to be only a first draft, but I actually went 8-2 with it very quickly, so I decided to throw it out here so you guys can help me improve it.



The lone Elemental feels super random, but I don't know what to put there. Maniacal Rage feels like a worse Glee (and Glee is spetacular, I have to say) with a marginal upside (another Shortcutter effect), which doesn't see worth it. Maybe Rabblemaster is the solution, but he feels a little slow for the deck (I know this sounds crazy, but so is the Neonate). I'm thinking Brain Maggot. I really like the card in aggressive decks.

Also, I would appreciate opinions on the mana base, both in amount and in ratio. Bear in mind that the deck is basically mono 2-drops, so think about that before suggesting something like Monk's RDW mana.

Thoughts?

Ulcerate is an option. Also, Banefire, Suffer the Past or Skullcrack can help you reduce their life (into <10hp territory).

Damn you people and your DLC, I want to try the Rakdos Vampire deck! But seriously fel, where are Tormented Hero and Goblin Rabblemaster? I'm not sold on Deviant Glee and Child of Night, and I was thinking about playing Devouring Swarm alongside Kalastria Highborn for a bit of reach. Sacrifice Bloodghast, drain them, play a land, then do it again is an eight-point life swing for no mana investment. Or you could get them down low and just sacrifice the team to finish. I like Swarm over Connoisseur because it has evasion.

I would start here:



The mana is my main concern, so it's possible that I have to add Savage Lands to make it a bit better. Playing a tapped land on T2 should be possible most of the time with seven one-drops, but it would need a bit of testing.

I could be convinced to spin it.....

I'm working on an elf deck at the moment which is currently mono green but; after some testing, seems like it's headed to Selesnya (I just really didn't want another deck to end up in that color though - it's just too rampant in this DotP version). Once I iron out the kinks, I'll be happy to give this some spins (I could always use your input on the elf deck too. It'd make the process go faster).


elk

I don't have the cards yet.

Fair enough. Your theory craft is strong though so that's something!


elk

Don't think I'm too great at deck building but it's fun and I decided to go for a higher end vampire deck with the new additions, though Sheoldred has yet to show up in any of my games which is a shame.

Personally I had a real blast playing this deck yesterday night, thanks for posting this. Haven't played it enough to suggest any major changes, but it seems already great as is to me.

The only change I made while playing was removing the Elemental for a third guildgate. I think your deck needs more red mana somehow, despite the predominance of black creatures, all your options that help breaking through while attacking are red. I had one match when I had only 1 red mana and still won, but it was slower because I wasn't able to use more than one red mana spell or ability in the same turn to pass through my opponent's blockers.

You have Shock, Coordinated Assault, Goblin Shortcutter and the trample ability of Deviant Glee (that you'll potentially need to activate every turn) that cost 1 red mana and all help getting through your enemy's creatures.

I'd say that optimally you need to have at least 2 red manas in play most of the time to be able to use a combination of two of the above spells in the same turn when necessary. So I would definitely add at least another land as I did (if the guildgate is too slow, at least a Mountain) and maybe remove one Swamp in favor of one more Mountain but I haven't played enough yet to know if this would be optimal.

Anyway, very fun and powerful deck, just need to keep in mind that Undying Evil won't work on your pumped vampires like the Neonates. I felt so stupid forgetting about this during one game...

So I mentioned I would test this and here are my current impressions:

Guul Draz Vampire is surprising a good little card and synergizes with Bloodghast for the 10hp trigger. They both become such problems then and folks end up having to use removal.

Tormented Hero is just another Elite Vanguard for the most part and generally not too exciting. It just has the same limitations you run into with any 2/1 and works best if you can get a nice wide board. I'd almost think a Pharika's Chosen would create more pressure/ trade up considering how little you trigger the heroic condition.

Bloodcrazed Neonate just needs more build around. Unless it's out on T2 and you've got Goblin Shortcutter, Coordinated Assault, Shock (etc) to support it, it just gets wrecked. You need to focus on growing it to make it worth while and it gets much worse the later you play it (if it's got no size and it attacks into mid/late boards, it just a throw away). If there were more combat tricks or ways to force this through, then it can become a problem (maybe things like Brain Maggot for the removal/swing? If not, some other removal/tricks would be worth while like Ulcerate, Dead Weight, Undying Evil even Deviant Glee could be a thing)

Kalastria Highborn is another surprisingly good card and was easy enough to trigger. Made a difference in quite a few games taking my life total out of danger and even winning a couple games. This with Devouring Swarm worked well. In fact there were quite a few times I wish I had more vampires on the board to trigger the effect (swing with a ton and capitalize on their blocks).

Not sure what to suggest at the moment but the deck just feels like it needs more 'oomph'. With aggro, I want to be ahead a fair amount when I'm hitting T4 and T5 so the opponent feels like they are on their back foot (or at least have to be defensive) and this deck usually wasn't far enough ahead to create that pressure. I also was looking for some more 'big finishers' that I think the deck is lacking (you know when you're sitting there thinking, "what can I top deck to win/blow out this game?"). I get the low cost/low curve limits so take this comment with a grain of salt. As an after thought, would Raid Bombardment increase the pressure here?

I'm surprised not to see something like Rakish Heir in the mix. It would inflate the threat level for a lot of the deck (even with the 'sac' consideration built into the deck).

I'll keep spinning it and see if there are any other suggestions I can make.

elk

I'm not sure about Rakish Heir, I don't think it's good enough for three mana. I'd rather just play Bloodflow Connoisseur if we're playing three mana Vampires because she can eat the outdated Heroes/Neonates/Goblins for a permanent boost. I like Devouring Swarm because it has flying but do you think Bloodflow would be better?

I feel like all the best cards for this deck are in the three mana spot but we can only play so many of them because of the curve.

I need these cards.