I've always wanted to do a true "No Creature" deck. I'm still working on refining it, and hopefully soon, I'll be satisfied with it. I honestly haven't had a chance to put it together, but I'm looking forward to assembling it in a few weeks when I have the income to spare.
This is my first time using MTGvault.com, so I hope the community here doesn't burn me... Pun intended. I hope instead that the community will be willing to help me with any advice or ideas to improve what I have. Keep in mind, I want to keep it a mono red deck, I know it's not super munchkin tuned, but I can live with that. : )
I'm not really new to Magic, but I'm honestly still a novice. The only games I've played or will play is with a tight knit group of friends in a multiplayer setting of around four to six people. We have a gentlemen's agreement to not destroy lands, and the group generally doesn't have a lot of destroy artifact or destroy enchantment cards. For the exception of one friend who has a very challenging blue control deck, I rarely have to worry about counterspells, so the burn spells I do cast are usually accepted with a frown, but little else. We tend not to be cut throat, and play nice, going so far as spreading damage around instead of focusing, until a real threat has emerged. This gives me a huge psychological advantage however. When someone's declaring attackers and I'm holding a card, with my other hand on my mana ready to tap, more often then not, I'm passed over for an easier target even though I'm bluffing and holding a land, lol.
A "No Creature" deck can be a challenge, especially when you're hard headed and won't consider anything other then a mono colored deck, but not outside of the realm of possibility.
Now the challenges with a mono red "No Creature" deck in a multiplayer setting that I've found have included the need to try to achieve card advantage, a sustained mana ramp, decking yourself, and trying to out burn any life gains.
Without being able to actually play this deck yet, I'm going to have to speculate on how I hope it plays out. So I'm only going to be able to detail the combos that I hope come together to address some of the weakness that I see in running a mono red "No Creature" deck in a long multiplayer game. Thankfully most of these disadvantages can be overcome by the use of artifacts.
1. Card advantage will hopefully be achieved by the use of Howling Mine and an Isochron Scepter imprinted with Magma Jet. I had considered exchanging 4 mountains for 4 Reliquary Tower to be able to dispel my maximum hand size, but decided against it. This gives us more incentive to start slinging instants at people's faces, and gives us more opportunity to take advantage of Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle.
2. As for achieving a sustained mana ramp we're leaning on Gilded Lotus, and Extraplanar Lens to achieve our goals. With some luck on our opening hand, and the first 3 draws, turn 3 could involve playing Seething Song to pay for Gilded Lotus, then tapping Gilded Lotus to pay for the Extraplanar lens, that is of course if we're willing and able to be tapped out for a turn. This has the potential to provide us with 9 mana on turn 4 if we've played another land to replace the one imprinted to the Extraplanar Lens.
3. Playing a multiplayer game with only direct damage can be challenging. Not having big scary creatures to hide behind, we're going to have to split our damage between creature removal, and burning faces, and our source of damage dwindles with every card that goes into the graveyard. This is where Elixir of Immortality comes in to save our bacon. We'll use the Elixir to refresh our library, but since it's also shuffled back into the library don't be afraid to use one before getting Everlasting Torment onto the battlefield for a quick 5 life gain.
4. Everlasting Torment is an amazing card for what we're trying to accomplish. This prevents our opponent's from out healing our burns, and stops players from preventing our damage. What it also does is helps us with damage prevention. Since all damage happens as though it had Wither, even if we can't kill a creature, we can still reduce it's effectiveness. Being attacked by a 4/4? A one mana Lightning bolt just made it a 1/1, and since we don't have creatures of our own, we don't have to worry about our opponents taking advantage of Wither as well. Just be sure to use Elixir of Immortality before playing this if you need the life.
5. Reverberate. This pairs beautifully with the Isochron Scepter in my opinion. Not only can we use it to double our damage for just 2 more mana, it's also our anti-counterspell. When someone targets one of our spells, we'll just copy the counterspell, and counter the counterspell with our copy. I almost decided that Wild Ricochet would be better since it redirects, but Reverberate wins out for being 2 mana and capable of being used with the Isochron Scepter. It also has a psychological effect on opponents as well when imprinted. When our opponents see the Isochron Scepter untapped and ready to copy any instant or sorcery they try to cast, they may think twice.
Sideboard - In the multiplayer games that I play with friends, we don't use a sideboard, and to be honest, I wouldn't know what to put on one if I ever needed to use one. Instead I listed a few cards that I had considered for the deck, but ultimately bounced out to get down to 60 cards. I had considered using Blasphemous Act imprinted on Panoptic Mirror for 13 damage to all creatures every upkeep, but decided against it due to mana cost, and deck size.
Once I'm able to play test this deck, and see how it handles, I may adjust it.
Please leave a comment with what you think of the deck, or if you have any ideas to make it better, I'd appreciate the input!
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