First a quick little disclaimer, this is my first primer so my formatting and all might not be top tier, but with that being said I hope you guys enjoy the deck

The Commander

Marton Stromgald is in my opinion a highly underrated card, not only as a commander but even just as a card in the 99 of many different go wide agro decks that contain red. His ability to buff all your attacking creatures can lead to some surprising amounts of damage and some unique interactions. I chose to build around Marton over others due to his uniqueness and uncommon appearances as a commander, he's essentially a red variant of Craterhoof Behemoth as your commander, hence the title of the deck. So if you have any decks that could maybe run Marton I definitely recommend you go through your list and see if he would fit into the deck.

The Battle Plan

The strategy of this deck is pretty straightforward, you want to pump out as many creatures as you can and then swing in for a lot of damage. I've decided to go with a focus on tokens with a goblin sub-theme as they have pretty good synergy when it comes to tokens with cards such as Krenko or the other Krenko and of course there is Chancellor of the Forge , but you can also find some elementals and thopters in here as well.

But without wasting much more time, let's dive into the guts of the deck

Now we all know that Mono red isn't really known for being the best when it comes to ramp. Artifacts and rituals are pretty much the go-to and this deck isn't much different.

Artifacts

There is of course to nobody's surprise Sol Ring being the overpowered card that it is, and then I have put in Mind Stone which can also draw you a card later in the game, Worn Powerstone , Wayfarer's Bauble , and Iron Myr which doubles as a creature.

Rituals

I have put in three rituals in this deck Mana Geyser , Battle Hymn and Brightstone Ritual . All of these can help you dump your hand and fill the board with creatures or cast either of the two X spells. additionally the hymn / ritual can be cast at instant speed which can be useful for activating the ability of Tilonalli's Summoner

Other

Surprisingly one of the best pieces of ramp isn't Sol Ring , although that is a ridiculously good card I believe the winner here would be Braid of Fire which just nets you more and more and more mana the longer it sticks around, additionally it keeps you on track with mana if you start missing land drops because of the additional mana it adds each turn. It will likely be a big target for removal but it almost always gets to at minimum pay for itself before it goes down. Ill put Ruby Medallion in this category as well even though it technically isn't ramp it is mana reduction, it reduces all your red spells by one colorless mana and that qualifies as ramp in my eyes.

Just like ramp, red also struggles with decent card draw. Finding red card draw without the whole "discard" clause attached is next to impossible, I understand that its all part of reds flavor being the go quick color that it is... but having to discard cards is one of my least favorite things to do in magic. So I've come up with card draw that makes me discard the least amount possible.

While I unfortunately can't entirely get a way from discard I have decided to go with Faithless Looting , Thrill of Possibility , Subira, Tulzidi Caravanner , and Valakut Awakening  . These are all pretty decent low cost options for drawing that have minimum discarding (minus Subira ). The two cards that don't make me discard would be Light Up the Stage which isn't technically discarding anything, and Humble Defector who triples as a creature to attack with and get another trigger off of marton and a political piece to bargain with your opponents.

now of course you can (and probably should) switch out cards here for wheels like Wheel of Misfortune or Reforge the Soul if discarding doesn't really bother you like it does me but these cards I have are just based on personal preference.

Alright, we've gotten to what the deck is actually trying to do and how it goes about doing that.
You will find that a lot of the token generation here is similar to what you would find in a Krenko, Mob Boss deck, you have all the of your basic cards listed below

you see where this is going, the token generation as stated above is mostly just taken straight from a krenko deck, however this isn't just goblins so there are still some other ways to get all your creatures on the battlefield. First off there is the two X spells Tempt with Vengeance and Firecat Blitz which generate a bunch of elemental tokens with haste which can really catch your opponents off guard as you go from having nothing on the board to having an army. Next you have Tilonalli's Summoner which pumps out even more elementals to swing in with, and Loyal Apprentice who can get you some flying thopter tokens that can be really hard for your opponents to block and apprentice is also part of an infinite combo that i'll talk about later. Finally in this section I wanted to mention Kher Keep which is just a land that can pump out some 0/1 bodies that can be clamped to draw cards, get a few extra Purphoros triggers or just simply add to the body count of your board.

There is one major issue with Marton himself which is keeping him alive when he goes to swing in. As he unfortunately doesn't buff himself when triggers we need to find other ways to help this 1/1 survive.

First off there is Dolmen Gate which prevents all damage to Marton and all your other creatures during combat on your turn, it would be neat if it worked for blocking too because then you can utilize Marton's blocking trigger efficiently as well. Next you have Subira, Tulzidi Caravanner and Rogue's Passage both of which make Marton unblock-able until end of turn. And lastly Goblin Chirurgeon who can be activated to regenerate Marton in response to him being dealt damage.

Also in a way Fumiko the Lowblood protects him by keeping all your opponents creatures tapped from attacking which means generally nobody to block Marton and kill him

so one thing that works quite well with Marton is extra combats, why? because his trigger lasts until the end of turn meaning it stacks each combat. So I've decided to put in two cards that trigger extra combats, one being Moraug, Fury of Akoum and the other being Breath of Fury which goes infinite with Loyal Apprentice providing unlimited combats

Next there is of course Purphoros, God of the Forge / Impact Tremors who can just ping down all your opponents with all the creatures entering the battlefield, they do especially well if you have either of the Krenkos out on the field which leads into the next neat little synergy. when you swing in and you have Krenko, Tin Street Kingpin out, if you layer Marton's trigger first then Krenko's you'll get a whole bunch of extra little goblins that can block on the trackback after your attack in case someone is still a threat.

Now this isn't really a synergistic thing, but if you manage to Reverberate one of the X spells then that can make a heck of a lot of hasty elementals out of nowhere and totally surprise your opponents, it works super well even if you can't reverberate it

Finally there is rings of bright hearth which can get you multiple triggers off of Marton or even Krenko, Mob Boss if you have him out

Some Tips

  • Generally try to ramp only during turns one and two and three, after turn three you want to be beginning to set up your board presence

  • Play important cards like Legion Loyalist or Purphoros right before you want to use them as to not attract attention to them / yourself and get maximum usage out of them

  • Discarding cards is okay, although I don't like to do that its probably a decent idea to add some wheels into the deck

  • Best time to play Fumiko is the turn before your big attack to give you a clear board to attack into

  • don't wait on casting Empty the Warrens for too long just to get one additional storm trigger, just getting one trigger is fine

  • Goblin Bombardment is a great insurance plan if you get board wiped

So that's the deck, if you like it give it a +1 and maybe leave a comment if you have any suggestions, So with that being said goodbye and happy deck building

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91% Casual

Competitive

Top Ranked
Date added 4 years
Last updated 3 years
Legality

This deck is Commander / EDH legal.

Rarity (main - side)

2 - 0 Mythic Rares

31 - 0 Rares

19 - 0 Uncommons

17 - 0 Commons

Cards 100
Avg. CMC 2.88
Tokens 1/1 R Token Creature Elemental Cat, City's Blessing, Dwarf 1/1 R, Elemental 1/1 R, Elemental 1/1 R w/ Haste, Enchantment Golem 3/3 C, Goblin 1/1 R, Kobold 0/1 R, Thopter 1/1 C
Folders Awesome Decks I've Seen, EDH, Cool, cool decks
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