Black Sabbath and Red Green Agrro

Way back in the annuals of time during the Tempest block I used to play a deck I nicknamed “Mob Rule”.   This was partially because it played the card Mob Justice to kill you after spamming the board with a host of tokens and little critters. 

Oh look I have a bunch of guys - this is gonna hurt...

The other reason for this name drew it’s inspiration from the title track of the Black Sabbath album and I had the words of the song going round my head every time I would play the card with Ronnie James Dio belting out:

“If you listen to fools”

“The Mob Rules, the Mob Rules!”

This album cover just looks like it should be a Magic card.

Now you have a slight inkling of how my mind works, and this influenced my thinking when I first looked at the deck list and began plans to mod it for use at FNM Relax.  Here is the original deck list from the starter:

Mob Rule M13 Intro Pack –

1  Evolving Wilds

8  Forest

15  Mountain

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24 lands

1  Arms Dealer

1  Bladetusk Boar

2  Dragon Hatchling

2  Fire Elemental

2  Flinthoof Boar

2  Furnace Whelp

3  Goblin Arsonist

1  Goblin Battle Jester

1  Krenko, Mob Boss

2  Mogg Flunkies

2  Reckless Brute

1  Rummaging Goblin

1  Torch Fiend

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21 creatures

1  Chandra's Fury

1  Cleaver Riot

1  Fervor

2  Flames of the Firebrand

1  Kindled Fury

2  Krenko's Command

1  Ring of Valkas

1  Serpent's Gift

2  Titanic Growth

1  Trumpet Blast

2  Volcanic Geyser

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15 other spells

On seeing this I instantly started to make plans for using mass swarms of Goblins to come screaming across the board to overwhelm my opponent; Goblin Chieftain, Goblin Gaveleer (amazing with the red ring on it), Kuldotha Rebirth, Spikeshot Elder, Goblin Grenade etc.  Mono red goblins in standard again – it’s been a while due to the total lack of goblins in Innistrad but I figured I could build a tribal deck no problem, and then I got to the manabase and stopped.  This deck is not mono red, there are a few green spells in it so it has some forests.  Wolf run ramp and red/green agro have been major forces during recent times so it seemed that using elements of this deck would be a far better way to go and sent me in a totally different direction with the deck.  Red/green has a really good mana base which allows me to use the following:

4 Copperline Gorge

4 Rootbound Crag

3 Kessig Wolf run

2 Evolving Wilds

5 Forests

6 Mountains

24 lands

Block or Die!  No wait, block and still die!

Keeping with my rules of only changing 10 cards in the main deck I decided to remove the following:

1  Serpent's Gift

2  Titanic Growth

1  Trumpet Blast

1  Kindled Fury

2  Dragon Hatchling

2  Reckless Brute

1  Rummaging Goblin

My four mythic slots were easily filled with 2 Primeval Titans and 2 Hunt Masters of the Fells.

Say hello to my little friends!

Being able to go and get these creatures is very handy and Green Sun's Zenith does just that so I added 3 of those.

 Another copy of Krenko, Mob Boss seemed like a good idea as he helps to produce large numbers of goblin tokens and there are still enough goblins to support this. 

What a handsome chap he is.

I also decided to go full in with the creature agro and added 2 cpoies of Strangleroot Geist as my last 2 cards.  Which gives me the following Deck list:

1  Arms Dealer

1  Bladetusk Boar

2  Hunt Master of the Fells

2  Fire Elemental

2  Flinthoof Boar

2  Furnace Whelp

3  Goblin Arsonist

1  Goblin Battle Jester

2  Krenko, Mob Boss

2  Mogg Flunkies

2  Primeval Titans

2  Strangleroot Geist.

1  Torch Fiend

23 creatures

1  Chandra's Fury

1  Cleaver Riot

1  Fervor

2  Flames of the Firebrand

2  Krenko's Command

1  Ring of Valkas

3 Green Sun's Zenith

2  Volcanic Geyser

13 other spells

The only thing I now needed to do was make a sideboard.

2 Acidic Slime

2 Daybreak Ranger

1 Viridian Corrupter

2 Brimstone Volley

1 Beast Within

3 Pillar of Flame

1 Incinerate

3 Cavern of Souls

Red/green aggro/wolf run with a twist.  The Acid Slime is there for those pesky moorland haunts/swords and even birthing pods.  Day Break Ranger is really good at shooting delver.  Viridian Corrupter is a cheaper acidic slime for artefacts. 

Viridian Corrupter/Kessig Wolf Run is a win condition on its own.

Brimstone volley is there to kill things like restoration angel, Beast Within deals with everything but Mirrodin Crusader.  Pillar of flames for those nasty undying guys that wont lay down and a bit of extra burn in the form of Incinerate.  Finally 3 Cavern of Souls come in to make my men counter proof against blue.

This whole thing seems pretty strong and is the closest thing to a top tier deck I have played at FNM Relax.  Don't forget that this Friday 10^th August 2012 is extended, so rummage through those Alara and Zendikar block cards and see what you can find.  Look forward to seeing you there.