Burn Spells other than Bolt
Modern Deck Help forum
Posted on March 9, 2017, 8:08 p.m. by Pieguy396
So I have a Jeskai Delver of Secrets Flip deck (Delving into America), and I'm looking to add 3 or 4 more 1-mana burn spells. It's not a burn deck in the traditional sense, so I want my burn spells to at least be able to hit creatures. I already have 4 Lightning Bolt and 2 Forked Bolt, and as I see it, my options are Burst Lightning, Flame Slash, Pillar of Flame, Magma Spray, and more Forked Bolt. Each have their own advantages and disadvantages.
Flame Slash is sorcery speed and can only hit creatures, but deals 4 damage.
Burst Lightning is generally just 2-damage Lightning Bolt, but with more lategame relevance.
Magma Spray can only hit creatures, but exiles things it kills.
Pillar of Flame is sorcery speed, but exiles things it kills.
Finally, Forked Bolt is sorcery speed, but allows me to divide damage, especially useful against Lingering Souls tokens and the like.
Which one(s), and how many, would you suggest I add? Thanks in advance!
EDIT: added Burst Lightning instead of Shock
the.beanpole says... #4
Also, Burst Lightning is another strictly better Shock. Electrickery is solid against Lingering Souls.
March 9, 2017 8:27 p.m.
MindAblaze says... #6
Arc Trail is one of my pet cards. Divides damage and passes out three.
March 9, 2017 8:38 p.m.
Thanks for the suggestions, guys! I totally forgot about Burst Lightning, as well as Wild Slash, Electrickery, and Tarfire. I'm really only looking for 1-mana cards, as my 2-slot is pretty full, but thanks for the other suggestions like Arc Trail and Searing Blaze. Which cards mentioned above do you guys think are the best?
March 9, 2017 8:49 p.m.
ToolmasterOfBrainerd says... #8
Any 2 damage card is almost always NOT worth playing. Rift Bolt and Lava Spike are the only things I would seriously consider. If there's a lot of Lingering Souls in your meta I'd strongly recommend Electrolyze instead of Forked Bolt. Electrolyze can be thrown at your opponent EOT their turn if you don't have a target just to cantrip.
March 9, 2017 10:04 p.m.
tbh I have played delver in the past and I think you're already probably playing a little too much burn, and if not you certainly have enough. I'd recommend more threats, possibly mana leak.
March 9, 2017 11:02 p.m.
Wizard_of_the_Broke says... #10
I just came back after not playing for 2 years. When I left, I was running budget Delver tempo builds most of the time. One of the cards that I'm personally pretty happy about is Dual Shot. I don't know the current meta inside and out, but it seems to me that Dual Shot is almost worthwhile (over Forked Bolt) just for taking out Snapcasters at instant speed - and mind you Forked Bolt is one of my favorite tempo cards. But it's a tough call.
Looking at you deck, I'm not sure how important it is that Dual Shot doesn't hit face, because you're not aggro, so board state is more important than trying to race. You could probably say the same for Magma Spray and Flame Slash. It looks like the exile effects are really only that big of a deal for Kitchen Finks, which are trouble for a tempo deck to be fair, but I'm not sure they're worth more than 1 slot, if that (Lingering Souls is way more common).
But, taking a quick glance at creatures in the meta link, I think Flame Slash isn't very good at the moment. For most of the stuff that Bolt misses, you'd want Roast. Same story for Wild Slash and probably Burst Lightning. Although, Spellskite is a fairly important card to deal with.
And Electrickery is really, really good against any token-producing effects.
Nice budget build by the way. I can't wait to add Thing in the Ice Flip to my older builds.
March 10, 2017 12:37 a.m.
Wizard of the broke being able to go to the face is by far the most important part of a burn spell within a tempo deck. Also, there are so many more cards that see play with 2 toughness that dual shot basically does nothing the entire time.
March 10, 2017 9:05 a.m.
JerichoDarkstar says... #12
I don't know how useful it would be to you, but there is Fall of the Titans.
Funny enough, I've already talked about this card once already today. I think it's a really underrated card. If you can pull off the Surge costs (with Lightning Bolt and other cheap burn spells running around, it shouldn't be an issue), you can really deal some damage.
You can pay 6 Total ( + for X) to do 10 damage to the face. Or 5 damage to a creature and 5 damage to a planeswalker.
Now, this card is very specialized and only works well in certain decks. But, I thought I'd throw it out there just because I think it deserves more attention.
March 10, 2017 11:50 a.m.
the.beanpole says... #13
JerichoDarkstar, you can't choose the same targets for Fall of the Titans. It specifies "up to 2 target creatures and/or players", implying that it must be 2 different targets. In your example, you could only deal 5 to a single player. You can't even choose a player and a planeswalker that player controls because of the way damage redirection works between players and planeswalkers. Source.
March 10, 2017 12:14 p.m.
JerichoDarkstar says... #14
@the.beanpole Derp. I actually knew that, but forgot it.
When I was playing at the OGW PreRelease (was still kinda new to some finer points of the rules), I played it just like I suggested. No one corrected me I guess because other people just didn't catch it. I actually made it to 2nd Place with my partner with just Fall of the Titans.
It wasn't until Draft when I was talking about how awesome the card was that someone corrected me. It's been so long, I had completely forgotten it said "up to two"
I sincerely apologize for my mistake.
March 10, 2017 12:24 p.m.
JerichoDarkstar says... #15
Wait, I remember why this confused me, now.
It wasn't that no one was correcting me. It was because we were playing Two-Headed Giant. I could target two players, but because they shared one health, I kept telling myself it counted for Double when I was making my calculations.
Now I feel even double derp.
March 10, 2017 12:35 p.m.
Wizard_of_the_Broke says... #16
Murpy I'm not saying you don't want to hit someone in the face sometimes, but I also think it's okay to have 2 slots for spells that don't hit face, especially when we're talking about stuff like Electrolyze and Forked Bolt, where we're probably doing 1 damage to the face. But that's a minor point.
That said, I totally mis-read Dual Shot as an instant Forked Bolt that only hits creatures. You are correct, Dual Shot is unplayable.
Ryjo says... #2
What about Lava Spike, Lightning Bolt's Sorcery speed, only player targeting brother?
March 9, 2017 8:12 p.m.