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Asbestos Patrol

Casual* Burn Control RGW (Naya) RW (Boros)

Epicurus

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Creature (16)

Planeswalker (5)

Land (20)

Enchantment (6)

Sorcery (7)

Instant (6)

Maybeboard

Creature (2)

Instant (1)

Enchantment (1)

Artifact (1)

(Pssst... asbestos is fireproof)

Here's a Pyrohemia deck; burn + control. A planeshifted version of a Pestilence deck. Abusing the enchantments ability to both boardwipe and burn the opponent to death at the same time.

Based around protection, with a little help from a few hatebears. This deck is obviously best against creature decks, but can handle any type of creature deck, and is just as stifling in multiplayer, perhaps even better. And it holds its own against control, albeit not as well. That's where I will plead for help from y'all. But first, read ahead.

For Pyrohemia to be effective, you must be able to keep at least one creature in play. The easiest way to do that, of course, is to use creatures that can't be damaged by it. 3 solid, cheap pro-red creatures in Silver Knight, Vulshok Refugee and Kor Firewalker accomplish that goal fairly easily. 2 of them cost 2cmc, the other only 3, and the Firewalker also gains you back life lost to the Pyrohemia whenever you cast a red spell. Which might come in handy if you don't control The Wanderer. At any point, if you have enough mana and more life than your opponent, you win. The only other creature is Torbran, thane of redfell. He's susceptible to your Pyrohemia, but he's still good for the deck. Pyrohemia activates each instance of damage separately, so the Thane adds 2 damage for every red mana you pump into it. Sure, you could only pump 3 red into it before you kill him, but that 3 red will deal 9 damage to your opponents and every creature they control. Not a bad ceiling. Plus, with The Wanderer in play, he's pretty much a win condition.

You may start to see a recurring dynamic here, because The Wanderer is going to show up in many of these categories. Her main advantage is synergy is with Pyrohemia. However, it also serves as burn hate in general, providing protection against other players' burn spells as well. She also stops a tall creature, which can come in handy. Next, Collective Effort is mostly in there for enchantment hate, but has the added benefit of its other two modes. It can pop a creature that might be too big for your Pyrohemia to handle, and also pump your own creatures in the process. It's a very versatile fruit. To round it all off, Aurelia's Fury doubles as both burn and spellslinger hate.

I already covered the pro-red creatures, but a couple other spells fall into this category as well. Obviously, again, The Wanderer. In this aspect, she keeps you from damaging yourself with Pyrohemia, and as I already mentioned, also keeps Torbran alive. And finally, Worship to protect yourself from your own Pyrohemia, as well as against infinite damage loops. Worship is an excellent plan B if your Wanderer draws hate and gets nuked.

Two mana ramp cards in Seething Song and Koth of the Hammer. The song because the deck is 2 color and you need red for Pyrohemia's activation. This is also why the mana base is weighted red, even though the color cost distribution is mostly equal. Koth is a solid mana ramp engine as well, even given that you could only use him for that once before requiring a refill. Once may be all you end up needing. And besides, if you have to create a land creature on his second turn in play, chances are your opponents don't have anything to block it with. Furthermore, his ult can be helpful if you have trouble getting or keeping your Pyrohemia. The only fetch is Idyllic Tutor, but that's really all of it I think this deck needs. The final card to mention is Deafening Clarion which is mostly there just for the life gain potential, but also can boardwipe, especially against wide token decks, without killing any of your creatures (even Torbran). Its life gain potential is necessary if you don't get The Wanderer early enough, as mentioned earlier with Kor Firewalker.
  • The first big maybe for this deck would be Stuffy Doll, for many applicable reasons. Besides the obvious, it would allow you to add Guilty Conscience to the deck, and the inevitable infinite combo that ensues. However, this deck is not Modern legal, and not the most efficient Guilty Doll deck one could make in Legacy. Not by a longshot. And, in fact, Stuffy Doll is a dead draw in this deck when you control The Wanderer. Adding Stuffy Doll would make this a completely different deck; a deck in which almost none of the spells that are in it make any sense being there.
  • Next, in the shuffle of deciding which pro-red creatures to choose, I many times had 4x Disciple of Law in place of the Vulshok Refugee. Costs one less, and cycleable, which is awesome because you only really need to control one creature when Pyrohemia gets rolling, perhaps two in case of nonred removal. However, I decided on the Refugee over the Disciple because it is red, which fules the Kor Firewalker and deals 2 extra damage with Torbran, thane of redfell, and because all of the lands produce red mana but only 10 produce white. I'm open to arguments about this decision, and for other pro-red or otherwise protected creatures I may have overlooked.
  • Next, I don't know if Chaos Moon might be better for the deck than Koth of the Hammer. Koth's most useful addition to this deck is his mana ability, and while one use of it might be all you get, it might be all you need. Chaos Moon should be easy to control with this deck, hypothetically, but if not it would become a liability. A similar issue would arise from Mana Flare, because it would make spellslinger decks more difficult to control. Is there better mana ramp for this deck than Koth? Some other kind of High Tide level stuff for red that I'm overlooking?
  • Sun Droplet is a mainstay in my Hurriquake deck. Not including it in this deck is less about how useful Sun Droplet would be, and more about the space to put it. It seems like the deck covers life gain sufficiently between Kor Firewalker and Deafening Clarion. However, with a quasi-suicide control deck like this, you have to make sure that you don't set yourself up for a quick win for your opponent, by bringing your own life too low. The Wanderer obviously helps with that also, but do you think this deck needs more life gain?
  • Finally, Idyllic Tutor vs Enlightened Tutor. I chose the new model, even though it costs two more, because (a) I don't need it to search for artifacts, and (b) I feel like putting the Pyrohemia I use it to search for into my hand gives enough advantage to make it be the proper choice. Feel free to tell me I'm wrong.

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