RUN AT THEM VERY FAST
Sounds simple enough, and sometimes, you just draw the , yoink them over to your side and the game is over pretty quickly after that, but most games they'll inevitably hit 5 mana, drop a big fatty, and stabilise. We don't want that to happen. The deck is comprised of two parts; ways to jam my fist into their face, and cards that make the first part easier. While others have opted for maximum density on Charge minions, I've opted for a slightly slower approach in favour of evasion, either in the form of Voidwalk or Airborne.
Most of the minions here either have Charge and start running, or have movement baked into them either via Voidwalk, Airborne, or forced movement abilities. Most of these are pretty straightforward as to how they synergise with , though I'd like to talk about why I'm not playing as many Charge minions as others. Sure, I could play and pair that with something like or dip into Air for , but I'm of the opinion that those cards are terrible topdecks in the mid-game and I'd rather have a more consistent spread of damage.
The baseline for my minions are that they all either pass the test of being better than a vanilla X/X for X by having some form of Genesis or utility to squeeze out extra damage and effectively be better than a single card, OR they're below rate on the power to mana cost ratio but offer tremendous utility in their effect. is a really, really underwhelming card, but when is a live draw, having a way to Strike them without being able to be intercepted is an effect that I am in very much in the market for.
and both offer the deck a new angle of attack compared to the previous iterations of Mono-Fire Druid aggro decks by forcing answers in the form of Magic-based removal or additional extra cards to answer the Airborne threats as opposed to being able to attack into them. Skull being a Fire Spellcaster means you get to keep the same suite of removal spells and interaction from those Druid lists, and still maintain Tawny's threat range while being slightly harder to kill. Both these new cards also mean that , a card that I've been cooler on in recent times, isn't as necessary as a top end flier.
I am now of the opinion that this package is near mandatory with the inclusion of two in the Atlas. does some real heavy lifting in getting Charge minions into their face ASAP and opens up so many avenues of attack that previously didn't exist. It being 4 power also means that it blocks very well, and can hold down the fort in an aggressive mirror.
In a "normal" game of Sorcery where site development ends up with both 8 and 13 covered in the first few turns, a lot of the early defensive sites like , , or essentially buys the opponent 2-3 turns of free defense. solves two problems, firstly, the defensive site gets shut down (and randomly screwing them on threshhold can be relevant), but also it means there's less of a need to play , another card I'm slowly coming down on.
I think very quickly the community will come to find that is an absurd card as it offers guaranteed kills when the opposing avatar hits Death's Door. I believe in that train of thought so much so that I'm splashing an entire element just for the extra reach. Oftentimes aggro decks will eventually lose out in the card advantage war and a well-timed board wipe like , , or can be the stabilisation the opponent needs to ensure we never have a shot at doing damage again. Getting them to door is easy, especially if they're choosing to lose 3 life each strike. So once they inevitably hit their 4-5-6 drops that are impossible to punch through, can come in for the W.
- The best finisher, 1 mana shoot them from anywhere, easily the cleanest answer to an opponent on Death's Door
- The finisher for the rare situations where they've suited up an or can't be targetted/damaged by magic somehow. Also clutch in the midgame to advance the board state.
- Answer for problematic auras like and other water-based lock cards.
- Admittedly not a "good" card, but still a funny one to answer a high-cost minion that would otherwise be inefficient to kill with burn spells.
- Cooks any of the water monsters that are a wall for our guys like and
, , - These cards suck in this deck. You can convince yourself that having them makes you more resilient against other aggressive decks, or let you skimp on drawing sites, but the reality is that drawing these anywhere past turn 2 is atrocious for your tempo, they all enable , and more importantly, you want to draw sites, so many of the sites are good for their utility rather than the literal mana production. These trinkets only serve to convince yourself it was a close game when you inevitably lose because you drew them late in a game.
The Third - You're not entirely starved of finishers, and can be viewed of as a dead card unless you're absolutely certain it can't get interacted with if ran out naked.
- Like , it's only really good if you're extremely behind or got them to Door. Otherwise there's a very high chance you're the one with more cards in hand and have the means to probably wipe all your own creatures when they take your turn for you.
, - Equally atrocious topdecks that convince you that you've a chance in a lost game, they're probably better in a Mono-Air variant of the deck, but I'm not exactly lacking for options to get in on them. is great because of the anthem effect it also provides, I don't need them to be entirely locked out, I rather them dead.