12 Bolts

Modern Budget Burn Competitive Mono-Red Red Deck Wins

jomnepo

Creature (18)

• 4x Bomat Courier
• 4x Ghitu Lavarunner
• 4x Monastery Swiftspear
• 4x Soul-Scar Mage
• 2x Viashino Pyromancer

Land (18)

• 18x Mountain

Instant (15)

• 4x Fiery Temper
• 3x Gut Shot
• 4x Lightning Bolt
• 4x Wizard's Lightning

Enchantment (5)

• 1x Experimental Frenzy
• 4x The Flame of Keld

Sorcery (4)

• 4x Faithless Looting

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Sideboard

Instant (4)

• 2x Skullcrack
• 2x Smash to Smithereens

Creature (3)

• 3x Goblin Chainwhirler

Artifact (5)

• 2x Smuggler's Copter
• 3x Tormod's Crypt

Enchantment (3)

• 3x Alpine Moon

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Welcome to the Modern 12 Bolt Primer!

Primer Announcement!

Partially done with the Primer. -jomnepo

Deck Results

I'll be posting here deck results that I've had with the current list soon.

Deck Introduction

This is a deck for the players who want to burn the opponent out and close the game out really fast. This is focused on what does best. To burn the opponent out. Having 12 Bolts will surely enough to burn out the opponent and having The Flame of Keld at its third lore counter means that our bolts would be 5 damage each.

Deck Enablers - Bolts

1. THE REAL LIGHTNING BOLT
Lightning Bolt
• No need for explaining. Run 4 Copies. Easy.
2. THE DISCARD BOLT

Fiery Temper

• This card is very strong in my testing since our deck has a lot of discard outlets such as Faithless Looting, Dismissive Pyromancer, and The Flame of Keld. Effectively turning every discard/looting effects into discard/loot + 3 damage or possibly 5 damage. Run 4 Copies, no doubt.
3. THE WIZARD BOLT
Wizard's Lightning
• This card can be good or bad. Based on my testing I can say that around 70% you'll be paying only for this card if we're against decks with low removal count. Having 10 Wizards in our deck really help turn this card into a Lightning Bolt. Still, run 4 copies.

Deck Enablers - Aggro Creatures

1. Monastery Swiftspear
• We start with probably the best 1-drop haste in the modern format. She is really good from T1 to T4-5. Her prowess ability is best suited for this deck since we can chain a lot of non-creature spells in 1 turn. Run 4 copies.
2. Bomat Courier
• 1-drop haste with a lot of card advantage if it can get a lot of free attacks to the opponent. This is also good in a discard heavy match-ups like BGx decks where in you can get a lot of value with it's ability. Plus, it's another discard outlet to enable Fiery Temper to be cast with its madness cost. Run 4 copies.
3. Soul-Scar Mage
   • The only 1 drop in our deck that doesn't have haste but its ability is really good in a match-up where in the opponent's creature outsizes ours by a mile. And he also has prowess which I've mentioned before, a really good fit in our deck. Enables Wizard's Lightning to be a one mana spell. Run 4 copies.
4. Ghitu Lavarunner
   • Pseudo-Goblin Guide creature that can easily be enabled with a lot of loot effects and free spell like Gut Shot in our deck. And it enables Wizard's Lightning to be a one mana spell. Run 4 copies.
5. Viashino Pyromancer (previously Dismissive Pyromancer)
   • Also under my playtesting, I've realized that Dismissive Pyromancer is just too slow for this deck. Viashino Pyromancer has far more value than Dismissive Pyromancer since it's an unconditional shock for the opponent, plus it's 4 damage to the opponent on the last chapter of The Flame of Keld.

Deck Enablers - Looting Effects

Note

Looting effects only improves card quality in your hand. It doesn't provide card advantage. And for this occasion, looting effects completely enables our deck to run at full speed. Enabling Fiery Temper and can fuel our graveyard for Ghitu Lavarunner to be a Goblin Guide most of the time.

1. Faithless Looting
• This is one of our major looting effects, too much value for 1 card. Combining with Fiery Temper, it's a draw two, discard two, deal 3 damage for . Run 4 copies, no questions asked.
2. Experimental Frenzy (Previously Hazoret the Fervent)
   • After a couple weeks of playtesting, I've decided to replace Hazoret the Fervent with Experimental Frenzy. Both cards are in the flex spot of the deck but it seems that Experimental Frenzy tends to draw you more cards that beating down with Hazoret. Especially if you're mana flooded, this enchantment really impresses me and it can turn around games by out value-ing the opponent. Plus, if you can't cast the card you may just discard it with the discard outlets of your deck. Faithless Looting is a card that can modify the top card of you're library if you don't like the top card (either can be played from top of your library of flashbacked from your graveyard.).

Sideboards

Note Sideboards is strongly dependent in the meta in your local game store. The sideboard list I provided is a budgeted one. Some sideboard choices might not be suitable for your meta. I'll be giving a budget and non-budget sideboard cards in this run down.

1. Tormod's Crypt
• This is against graveyard-centric decks such as Storm, Dredge, Snapcaster Mage decks, and Scavenging Ooze/Tarmogoyf decks. Non-budget replacement: Relic of Progenitus.
2. Alpine Moon
• This is against UrzaTron, Valakut, and other land based decks. Can also be used against man lands that are hard to answer such as Celestial Colonnade. Non-budget replacement: Blood Moon.
3. Skullcrack
• This is against life gain decks and for extra reach for burn. This covers damage prevention effects as well. Budget replacement: Insult
4. Smash to Smithereens
• This is against artifact based decks such as Affinity, KCI, and the like. This is also a work around Chalice of the Void since the opponent is mainly focused to chalice the deck for 1 and 3. This might actually work. Non-budget replacement: Shattering Spree
5. Smuggler's Copter
• This is for additional looting effect and is very useful if you can't pass the ground defense of the opponent. This card is hard to answer because it is not a creature most of the time and it flies over the ground defense. Can be replaced by: Young Pyromancer for go-wide metas.
6. Goblin Chainwhirler
• This is against token based decks and it is a huge body and it also has first strike which is really good in some occasions. Having the final lore counter of The Flame of Keld would make this a 3/3 first striking body bringing Anger of the Gods and Lightning Bolt to the battlefield. Budget replacement: Electrickery

TLDR

The deck is easy to understand, it may feel janky at your first few games since it feels like you're doing too much just to bolt the opponent. But after a while, you'll find more loops with the deck and facing a lot of decision making. Just bolt the opponent whenever there's an opportunity, but make sure that you got the ground covered as well. Bolting mana creatures eg: Birds of Paradise, and the like.

Top Ranked	Achieved #56 position overall 5 years ago
Date added	5 years
Last updated	5 years
Exclude colors	WUBG
Legality	This deck is not Modern legal.
Rarity (main - side)	9 - 11 Rares 15 - 2 Uncommons 18 - 2 Commons
Cards	60
Avg. CMC	1.60
Folders	Modern, Deck I'd Like to Playtest, Decks I Like, Gamma, Modern