Tuesday, November 5, 2019

Red Alert

Red has been an issue for WotC for a while; the color was either too narrow at what it did (direct damage), or unfun (land destruction, randomized cards).

One way they appear to be looking to solve Red's place in Magic is by having players get effects 'blind'. That is: sure, you can draw three cards if you're willing to discard two, but you won't know what you're going to get. Want to play the top card of your library? Fine-but we're not going to help you figure out if that's a good thing before you do it.

It is out of this concept, Red Alert was created, named after the Transformer.
3 Guttersnipe
4 Dire Fleet Daredevil
3 Bedlam Reveler
4 Abbot of Keral Keep
1 Kari Zev, Skyship Raider

3 Samut's Sprint
3 Searing Spear
2 Burst Lightning
3 Chandra's Pyrohelix

19 Mountain
4 Smoldering Crater

4 Chandra, Torch of Defiance

1 Kari Zev's Expertise
2 Chain Lightning
4 Light Up the Stage
I've been pretty excited about this concept! Trying to play free things off the top of the deck to gain card advantage may not seem like much but the randomization of the effect interests me, plus it's a chance to use Bedlam Reveler and who can resist that?

After that, there's a suite of cheap burn spells to help me use Light Up The Stage's Spectacle ability, with the bonus of possibly being able to play them off of a Chandra, Torch of Defiance activation or Abbot of Keral Keep's enter the battlefield trigger. The Prowess on Bedlam Reveler and Abbot encourage me to play my spells, so my hand might empty pretty fast. Getting to use the top of my library as an added "card in hand" could be powerful.

Guttersnipe is just a solid card in a deck with eighteen instants and sorceries and should steal wins for me.

Dire Fleet Daredevil might look weird and it does only fit the theme in a roundabout way. I am getting to play with the instants and sorceries my opponent has used! But who knows what they'll play? I think it's a powerful card and an opportunity to use my opponent's resources against them. I expect Path to Exile, Brainstorm, and Fatal Push, cards Red generally does not have access to. So why not take my opponent's? Still, it's a risk.

I'm looking forward to where this one takes me; I don't know that this part of Red's color pie has been explored much.

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