So this is BR Bob Bob Party. This is a take on an older deck I made around
Dreadhorde Arcanist
, RB Wizards - Snowmen1. This deck is not a burn deck, this deck is not an 8-rack deck, think of this deck as a lower to the ground, more tempo-esque midrange Jund deck in black and red.
This deck looks at
Dreadhorde Arcanist
as a
Dark Confidant
, and although it has differences in functionality, it gets you card advantage in a similar way in that both cards are ideally played on turn 2, and run away with the game by giving card advantage given that they live until your next turn. All
Dreadhorde Arcanist
needs to do is attack in order for there to be a card cast from the graveyard.
So why play with
Dreadhorde Arcanist
?
While it does function as a
Dark Confidant
for the purposes of this deck, it is still dissimilar in functionality in some ways. This has upsides and downsides. With this configuration can be very beneficial.
Dreadhorde Arcanist
is in a way a build-around-me card in a way, but it is in a way that allows you to play moderns most efficient interaction cards. In black and red,
Dreadhorde Arcanist
allows you to double the value of any of our efficient cards at converted mana-cost of one, which black and red have a lot of including but not limited to:
Thoughtseize
,
Inquisition of Kozilek
,
Lightning Bolt
,
Fatal Push
,
Surgical Extraction
(Which will literally disable decks when cast in multiples), and a new card to modern
Unearth
. on top of all of this, playing
Dreadhorde Arcanist
gives reason to play a much lower curve with a more streamlined game-plan that is low to the ground and consistent, Which also makes running
Dark Confidant
much less painful than it would be in other decks.
Why not play blue like in legacy or vintage?
If you want to, by all means slide
Dreadhorde Arcanist
into a UR Wizards list or a tempo list for more card advantage, but I dont see it worth playing blue for these reasons: in blue, there are great targets for
Dreadhorde Arcanist
, including
Opt
,
Serum Visions
, and maybe card:slight of hand, which translates more directly into card advantage than a discard spell when flashed back, but besides that, running
Dreadhorde Arcanist
in UR has fewer advantages than in Black Red. one of the bigger reasons to play in most decks blue is because of the availability of counterspells, which you would want in your deck, but conflict a lot with what
Dreadhorde Arcanist
does and how it works. Additionally, in UR Wizards for example, The deck thrives on being able to pivot and race with 3/x creatures, arcanist is rather slow, and would not be very helpful in this case either.
Card explanations for some of the key spells in the deck:
Spells:
Thoughtseize
: This is a cornerstone of the modern format.Very Very powerful card, nothing beats turn 1
Thoughtseize
in a midrange deck, it helps to disable combo decks, and can be used to dismantle your opponents hand. This also leads well into a common line of this deck, Turn 1 discard spell into turn 2
Dreadhorde Arcanist
or
Dark Confidant
. It allows you to clear the way for your card advantage cards to stick for more than a turn. Because of this this deck wants as many as possible. would be four-of, but you lose 2 life, and when you want to be casting this over and over again, you end up losing a lot of life.
Inquisition of Kozilek
: Also a cornerstone of the modern format. Everything said about
Thoughtseize
applies here, this is
Thoughtseize
4-7. This card is played as a four-of over
Thoughtseize
because you dont lose life from it!
Kolaghan's Command
: This is a very powerful card that is almost always a two-for-one. It also allows you to get back your dead creatures, which is important because there are few, and this deck needs one to stick. This is a one or two of in most midrange decks in the color, and has a number of advantages being a powerful card. one of these is the ability to time walk empty handed people in a way by making them discard a card instant speed at their draw step. This is also a way to deal with pesky cards that shut down this deck such as
Chalice of the Void
or
Ensnaring Bridge
. you can also play this twice off of
Dreadhorde Arcanist
by pumping him up. Very powerful card. it is a 3 drop, which hurts when hit with
Dark Confidant
, but this is a two of, making unlikely to flip with him, and this downside is barely worth excluding it from the list.
Funeral Charm
: this is a very powerful and versatile card for a few reasons that may not be immediately obvious. Like
Kolaghan's Command
, this card can be used to time walk opponents, but it also serves as a removal spell to x/1 creatures. on top of this it is another viable target for
Dreadhorde Arcanist
, allowing you to at the very least force your opponent to discard a card. On top of this, it can be used to pump
Dreadhorde Arcanist
, letting you get in extra damage, and equally as importantly, gets you in the range of being able to flashback
Kolaghan's Command
from the graveyard, as well as any other instant or sorcery cards with a converted mana-cost higher than 1 in the deck. Underrated card in this deck in my opinion.
Lightning Bolt
: One of the best card in modern. It kills creatures, can be used to kill your opponent or planeswalkers as well. Now imagine casting it twice. Very nice card.
Fatal Push
: This is one of modern's best removal spells. you get to cast it twice. Nice.
Surgical Extraction
(Sideboard): 4 of in the side. when its good its great. pairs well with discard spells, and can not only be used to dismantle decks with few win conditions or detrimental combos, but also acts as good graveyard hate. Evidently amazing when cast twice.
Pillar of Flame
: This is more of a flex slot card. Included as a hedge to Izzet Pheonix. This also incidentally deals with other creatures that may come back from the graveyard. At worst this card can hit a player or planeswalker.
Unearth
: This is a new card coming to modern. this solves a lot of the problems that this deck used to have. in R/B Wizards, the card
Claim / Fame
got play in the same number, but that card had several problems. Because of rulings, it was actually technically 3 mana, and cant be flashed back, and it really only got back
Dreadhorde Arcanist
and
Dark Confidant
. Now it can get back 3 drops like
Fulminator Mage
(Sidboard) and
Seasoned Pyromancer
. This card is amazing, can get back all of our creatures, which we absolutely need. Additionally it can be flashed back with
Dreadhorde Arcanist
. Imagine using
Fulminator Mage
3 times. with this card and
Dreadhorde Arcanist
, this can be done. oh wait, are we too far into the graveyard plan? nah its fine, we can cycle this one. Amazing when we have it, at its very least it can be a re-draw.
Shadowfeed
(Sideboard): This is additional Graveyard hate, but it is also so much more. I would like to make this a 3-of if I could fit it. (Update: I have 3 now, moved one surgical into the sideboard and added an additional in. makes it easy to sideboard
Thoughtseize
out now that there are 3 of each.) It is easy to see how the burn matchup can be hard, but this card gives a way to combat it in black at one mana. this card can also be flashed back with
Dreadhorde Arcanist
, meaning you can get 6 life from 1 card and 1 mana.
Liliana's Triumph
: new card, this is a way to interact if the opponent has a creature that we cant kill otherwise such as
Geist of Saint Traft
,
Slippery Bogle
, or even
Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
. Also gets stuff out of
Lightning Bolt
and FatalPush range.Can be flahsed back, though
Dreadhorde Arcanist
would need a pump, and it wont be instant speed.
Kaya's Guile
: This card is very good, and would take up the place of
Liliana's Triumph
. In this deck for this non-targeting edict effect, there is very little difference between 2 mana and 3 mana. Ideally you will be playing a
Dreadhorde Arcanist
or a
Dark Confidant
on turn 2, and this card is also just as possible to recast with
Dreadhorde Arcanist
as all of the pump in the deck brings up its power by 2. On top of doing what
Liliana's Triumph
does, this card allows for life gain, which is really good and saves you from losing the game at times, and this also allows for some mainboard graveyard hate. On top of all of this, you can cast this card with its intertwine cost off of draedhorde arcanist, which is just awesome. The only reason to not play this card over
Liliana's Triumph
should be your willingness to splash white.
Creatures:
Dark Confidant
: What gives this deck its name. This card says "Draw an additional card on your upkeep", and doubles the value of each of your turns when paired with the land count in this deck. You lose life with this, but a card is worth so much more than up to 3 life. Additionally, if you hit a land with
Dark Confidant
, you draw the card and don't lose any life. This card may not look good to new players, but It really is worth it. Worth it enough to build a deck with as many cards similar to it as possible.
Dreadhorde Arcanist
: This is
Dark Confidant
numbers 5-8. By simply having a one mana instant or sorcery card in your graveyard, you have value on turn 3, much like how
Dark Confidant
works. Additionally, having to attack in order to get value is not much of a problem. Being a 1/3, by turn 2 or 3 for your opponent, there really isn't much to compete with, and on top of that, this guy recasts removal for you, so you can just kill any blockers that would kill this guy. He basically hits everything in the deck and can occasionally recast 2 for one spells such as
Kolaghan's Command
. As a few advantages that this card has over
Dark Confidant
,
Dreadhorde Arcanist
does not cost you life, and it doubles any of your hoser cards, You can disable decks with double
Surgical Extraction
, screw over burn players with
Shadowfeed
and
sometimes
Kaya's Guile
, you can deal with artifact/enchantment strategies by casting double
Fragmentize
, and when paired with
Unearth
you can reoccur 2 creatures. Doubling your spells against certain decks can end games.
Seasoned Pyromancer
: This card is amazing. It filters out bad cards and churns through your deck for the cards you need. More often than not it is just a draw 2 cards on a 2/2 body. As an added bonus you get 2 1/1s on occasion, which is amazing. 4 power for 3 mana and filtering is very good. basically no matter what, this card gives options and immediate card advantage upon casting. As additional value, if this creature dies or gets countered you can either unearth it or pay 5 mana to make two tokens. Also, with
Dreadhorde Arcanist
you can discard cards that you want to use and still cast them. thats just straight up card advantage. Very good, low mana cost, rounds out the deck.
Grim Lavamancer
: This is an ok turn 1 play, since this deck doesn't use all of the cards that would go into the graveyard, we don't mind a potential clash with
Dreadhorde Arcanist
, On its own with a loaded graveyard, this guy alone can clear a battlefield over a few turns. Its good, but you don't want more than one or two.
Fulminator Mage
(Sideboard): Sideboard card Vs Tron, Valakut decks, and Control Decks. Takes out manlands, tron lands, and can strand people. Paired with
Surgical Extraction
, this card can end tron. Paired with
Unearth
, you can destroy 2 lands. If you get to reoccur unearth, you can destroy 3 lands. That is really good...
Other or odd picks:
Liliana, the Last Hope
: Great card, stalls the board, can empty the board and improves lightning bolt reach. Actually gets sided in Vs control because it can get creatures back from the graveyard and is almost always a 2 for 1 at worst on top of killing pesky Vendillion Cliques and
Snapcaster Mage
s. Ult never really happens, but I guess that would win you the game.
Sword of Light and Shadow
: This is a card that doesn't get much play in modern, but here, I think it has a home. +2/+2 is pretty good for improving our clock and gets some creatures out of bolt range, but protection from black and white allows for our creatures to stick by getting around opposing
Path to Exile
s and
Fatal Push
s. So cool, this card keeps our creatures from being hit by the three most used removal spells in modern, and then some, but there's test below that too that makes this card really good. Whenever the equipped creature deals combat damage to a player, you can gain 3 life and return a creature from the graveyard to your hand. This is huge. life may be a problem at times, and being able to gain 3 against burn every turn is amazing. Now all of that is good, but being able to return a creature from your graveyard to your hand is just what puts this card over the top here. In a deck that needs to stick a creature and which we only have 12 that we really want on the battlefield at any given moment, we run out of gas sometimes, this makes it so that never happens. We refuel off of this card, and it almost always is relevant. I have never been disappointed to have drawn this card in testing.
Mutavault
: Great card. This deck has problems closing out games, and this helps us with this and also helps us to use our turns as efficiently as possible. on top of this equipping a
Sword of Light and Shadow
Puts us back into the game when we have at least 4 lands, including
Mutavault
on the battlefield.
Ghitu Encampment
: This is
Mutavault
5-6, and maybe more, this card is actually very good. It is often overshadowed by manlands in other decks like treetop villiage and
Faerie Conclave
as well as most of the dual colored manlands, but here this card is absolutely needed because of the colors we are in. First strike is actually also relevant because lets say you have 3 or more lands and you are being attacked by a creature, at 2 toughness
Ghitu Encampment
can just kill it, and at 5, you can block, and then tap
Ghitu Encampment
for mana and bolt the creature, extending the range of lightning bolt and allowing you to keep your lands. On top of this, much like
Mutavault
, equipping a
Sword of Light and Shadow
Puts us back into the game when we have at least 5 lands, including
Ghitu Encampment
, on the battlefield.
Please Upvote and comment! I could use some help further developing this deck, so please leave suggestions. Also, please inform me of any technical, structural, or spelling errors as well as any rules on cards I may have gotten wrong I have made in typing this. I checked through it a few times, but that doesn't mean I got everything. Thanks!
