When I got the Rookie Red deck from CardKingdom last year I was taken aback with it’s speed and how fun it was. It offered great value also. But I wanted to do my take on the deck. How would I do a red aggro deck?

From Saturdays post you know I spent sometime testing this deck with Justin, and a little bit more time on Sunday as well (before swapping over to play with other decks). In the games Saturday my initial version of the deck was just getting it’s butt handed to it by Justin’s Vampire/Zombie token deck. I needed a solution. Ok I needed a legal version of Scalding Salamander (it’s legal in Commander/Legacy and Vintage, but not Modern). I didn’t have a creature like it, but I did come across Pyroclasm. So I ordered a play set of the card. I thought in the meantime seeing as this was a casual game, I’d play 3 copies of the Scalding Salamander for fun. They worked like a charm against those tokens. After I had finished playing with the deck, before moving on I thought “you know what? I’ll see what cards CardKingdom put in their sideboard pack for red”. Guess what was in there? Yep 2 copies of the Pyroclasm. I could have been testing with those!

So what is this deck all about? Speed. Hit them hard and fast.

What am I looking for in the opening hand? 3 or 4 mana, Bloodlust Inciter, a 2 drop and 3 drop, possibly one of the removal cards as well. I like Mutiny and Hijack. Using the opponents creatures against them is fun. And could be with Hijack that little extra bit of damage to push you over the finish line. I think in the initial version I had the 2 cost Lightning Strike because that is the card I layed my hands on first, but I do like the 1 cost Lightning Bolt more, so I dug that out for this deck to use instead.

The sideboard is more of the same, if anything I could add in something to get rid of enchantments. Which I am missing. But there is artefact removal, one or two more big creatures to swing in with if needed. Plus cards to remove those nasty tokens.

So let’s look at those lovely graphics and stats that the Decked app gives me for a deck.

Not surprisingly the AMC is under 2. Which is what I want, and allows for that hit them fast and hard.

22 lands seems about right

Creatures:26

4 Bloodlust Inciter
4 Fanatical Firebrand
4 Goblin Trailblazer
2 Nest Robber
3 Raptor Hatchling
2 Swab Goblin
2 Wily Goblin
1 Combat Celebrant
3 Frilled Deathspitter
1 Charging Tuskodon

Spells:12

2 Blazing Volley
3 Lightning Bolt
3 Mutiny
1 Bombard
3 Hijack

Lands:22

22 Mountain

Sideboard:15

1 Weaver of Lightning
1 Charging Monstrosaur
1 Sun-Crowned Hunters
2 Dual Shot
1 Earthquake
1 Lightning Bolt
3 Smelt
1 Abrade
2 Fling
2 Pyroclasm

So that is my take on the CardKingdom Rookie Red deck. What do you think? What would you change?