Super value budget deck featuring our special guests: Hidetsugu and his merry band of burn spells.
Heartless Hidetsugu Has a pretty nasty ability by himself, especially if you can make it happen as early as possible. Dealing all opponents damage equal to half their life total can seriously swing a game to your advantage. Where Hidetsugu really shines however, is as a fast combo deck. The key combos are listed below.
Dictate of the Twin Gods + Heartless Hidetsugu
Dictate of the twin gods has flash, which means that as long as you have left yourself 5 mana open, you can play it at the end of your opponent's turn, and immediately turn around and play Hidetsugu on your turn, and as long as has haste from a card like Generator Servant, Lightning Mauler, Bloodlust Inciter, Ashling's Prerogative, Expedite or Hammer of Purphoros, he can immediately deal all opponents damage equal to their half their life totals twice, and as long as all life totals are even numbers (hidetsugu rounds down) you win. If an opponent has an odd life total, they will be left with 1 life, which is where cards like Geistflame and Goblin Fireslinger come in handy for clean up.
Other similar combos in this deck include Angrath's Marauders + Heartless Hidetsugu
, Gratuitous Violence + Heartless Hidetsugu
, Heartless Hidetsugu + Insult / Injury
, Heartless Hidetsugu + Quest for Pure Flame
, Heartless Hidetsugu + Overblaze
and Heartless Hidetsugu + Quest for Pure Flame
.
Another great combo is Heartless Hidetsugu + War Elemental
. Hidetsugu deals half of each opponent's life total in damage while War elemental racks up an insane amount of counters. Ideally Hidetsugu will be hitting for between 15 and 20 life per opponent, and therefore war elemental could become as modest a creature as 16/16 or as crazy as 60/60 in a 4 player game at full health totals. Add Loxodon Warhammer to this combo, and you have a pretty intense threat. the more players in the game and the more lifegain decks in the game, the better this combo becomes.
Aside from the main strategy, this deck seeks to take potshots at opponents using cheap burn instants and sorceries, while benefiting doubly from them with cards like Guttersnipe, Charmbreaker Devils and Thermo-Alchemist.
Of course, this deck is very vulnerable to creature removal and board wipe. for this reason, this deck is geared toward moving quickly and giving our commander haste. I have also included Swiftfoot Boots to help with both of these problems, and if I decide to graduate this deck out of "budget status" and spend some more money on it, I will add more protection and pillowfort, as catalogued in the sideboard.
Also: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGTG41a4xhI
