"BOROS"
"Do Boros!"
"I really want to see Boros!"
"Do you think Boros is viable?"
"You're dumb!"
"Please I want to play Boros competitively"
I went through tons of commanders from Tajic, to Iroas, to Aureila.
I was almost ready to write up a post on Aureila control or aggro but it didn't quite fit. While Boros was ok in 1 v 1 I couldn't help but think it wouldn't work in multiplayer so I scrapped it and went back to the search.
I really wanted to go the easy route and do Boros eggs but let's be honest. Sharrum and Breya already do eggs miles better than any Boros general could so what would be the point?
That was until I found one decklist that really stood out.
http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/going-off-the-rails/
(Big thanks to reversemermaid for this decklist and putting my woes away)
That's right guys...Depala, Pilot Exemplar is the Boros general we're going with.
(Assuming you didn't read the title for whatever reason)
While the list hasn't been an update in a bit you can easily see how it works out. I made some tweaks to it myself so let's start with the basics.
Lands:
Mishra's Workshop
 |
| Eat your heart out Gisela |
Ancient tomb
Cavern of souls
Inventor's Fair
Rugged prairie
Sacred Foundry
Plateau
Clifftop Retreat
Battlefield Forge
Buried ruin
Flooded Strand
Bloodstained Mire
Wooded Foothills
Scalding Tarn
Arid Mesa
Marsh Flats
Windswept Heath
Strip Mine
Wasteland
8 Mountains
4 Plains
You can easily sub out Mishra's Workshop and Bazaar for other basics if budget is an issue. They're obviously not going to be as good but in a deck, with very little tutoring you can't expect them to land that often. And with that, we have our 32 lands ready. Once again we have a "low" amount of lands since we want the curve to be low, and we will have a shit ton of....
RAMP!!!
Boros Signet
Sol ring
Mana crypt
Mana vault
Mox diamond
Chrome Mox
Lion's Eye diamond
Mox Opal
Fellwar stone
Basalt Monolith
Krark-Clan Ironworks
Helm of awakening
Cloud key
| Foundry inspector |
SpringLeaf drum
Treasonous Ogre
Fifteen pieces of ramp here. A vast majority can be cast turn one or two so we can get Depala out early and use her ability. But we don't want to use her ability just willy nilly. Where we're going we need.
 |
| Nothing fair comes from this card |
COMBO!!!
Lion's Eye Diamond
Mox Opal
Basalt Monolith
Rings of Brighthearth
SpringLeaf Drum
Krark-Clan Ironworks
| Auriok Salvagers Myr Retriever Junk Diver |
With these guys, you can assemble either infinite colorless or infinite colored. With that, you tap Depala (preferably without attacking) using Springleaf drum or any vehicle to crew it.
Rings of Brightheart + Basalt Monolith = infinite colorless
Auriok Salvagers + Lion's Eye Diamond = infinite colored
Auriok Salvagers + Mox Opal + Krark-Clan Ironworks = infinite colorless
Myr Retriever + Junk Diver + Krark-Clan Ironworks + Helm of Awakening/Cloud Key/Foundry Inspector = infinite colorless
So cool, you have infinite mana and you crewed Delpala, let's take a look at what you can get
Vehicles to get:
Mirror Entity
Ovalchase Dragster
Fleetwheel cruiser
Cultivator's Caravan
Yup, Mirror Entity is a dwarf here.
Play the Cultivator's Caravan and tap it for white mana so you can cast Mirror Entity (You can skip this if you gained colored mana)
Play Mirror Entity, Ovalchase Dragster, and Fleetwheel Cruiser.
The Cruiser will become a creature with haste right away.
Crew the Ovalchase with entity and use his ability to make them infinite sized to kill off two players. As of right now unless you play a mass haste spell or give someone else haste if you want to kill off more than two players. We will get to that soon though
Plan B:
Let's say you have infinite mana but no access to Delpala for whatever reason
Impact Tremors
master Trinketeer
Purphrous, god of the forge
With infinite colored mana, you can kill all players with Trinketeer making infinite triggers for tremors or Purphrous. If you have haste for your little friends you don't even need Purphy or Tremors. Just go nuts with Trinketeer.
Now assembling a combo isn't easy when you don't have too much in the way of tutors. Let's look at what we have for card selection.
Tutors/Draw
Imperial Recruiter
Recruiter of the guard
Kuldotha Forgemaster
Memory Jar
Magmatic Insight
Wheel of fortune
Gamble
Enlightened tutor
Faithless looting
Tormenting voice
Wild guess
Cathartic Reunion
While a majority of these are simple draw two effects there is a good amount of redundancy in this deck to make sure you draw what you need when you need it.
Since we want Boros to be competitive (Right?) we need answers to make sure our combo goes off without a hitch. Here are a few answers
Magus of the moon
Blood Moon
Goblin Welder
Junk Diver
Myr Retriever
Scrap Trawler
Restoration Specialist
Ghirapur Aether Grid
PyroBlast
Red Elemental Blast
Mana tithe
Lapse of Certainty
Swords to plowshares
Path to Exile
Wear/Tear
Trash for Treasure
Silence
Armageddon
Ravages of war
Ruination
Vandalblast
Scrap Mastery
Chaos Warp
Daretti, Scrap Savant
As you can see we're running a massive amount of answers. With a plan that's this fragile, there need to be a ton of answers in case something goes wrong. I put in plenty of artifact retrieval, tons of mana base hate and a few just general answers to make sure that if there is something on the board that's a problem you can kill it. Sure we only have access to four counters but if you play right that should be just enough
That last of the goods:
Sensei's Divining top
Crucible of worlds
Anger
Smuggler's Copter
Thopter Engineer
That last few slots I went with these guys. Top and crucible work very well here since there are plenty of fetches and land destruction so you can make sure to not miss land drops and shuffle if your top three aren't to your liking.
Anger and Engineer give haste to your vehicles making it very possible to kill a whole table with your combo and copter is a card draw engine on top of something that can tap Depala.
And there you have it. That's the 99 I think would work best at making Boros viable in competitive groups. While this doesn't hold a candle to tier 1 decks it has been a nice surprise to see a deck that's both cheap to make and fairly decent.
With red gaining more looting effects in the years it's entirely possible that this can improve and maybe hit tier two one day with the right cards releasing. The main problem is the consistency. You very much so need to combo out to win with this deck and against a player with answers that will be very hard to do.
With that said I am happy to see a Boros deck that came out overall good. Nothing crazy but pretty good.
Here's a finalized decklist:
http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/spike-me-episode-2-depala-pilot-exemplar/
Well, what do you guys think of Depala? You think this is viable or another boring aggro commander? Let me know what you think and let's get a discussion going.
Decklist for Depala:
Until next time,
DoomBlade, Signing out
If you want to support the blog please visit my Patreon for more. Every little bit helps a ton and allows me to make more content for you guys in the future https://www.patreon.com/diestodoomblade
Auriok Salvagers + Lion's Eye Diamond = infinite colored
Auriok Salvagers + Mox Opal + Krark-Clan Ironworks = infinite colorless
Myr Retriever + Junk Diver + Krark-Clan Ironworks + Helm of Awakening/Cloud Key/Foundry Inspector = infinite colorless
So cool, you have infinite mana and you crewed Delpala, let's take a look at what you can get
Vehicles to get:
Mirror Entity
Ovalchase Dragster
Fleetwheel cruiser
Cultivator's Caravan
 |
| That's a big Dwarf |
Yup, Mirror Entity is a dwarf here.
Play the Cultivator's Caravan and tap it for white mana so you can cast Mirror Entity (You can skip this if you gained colored mana)
Play Mirror Entity, Ovalchase Dragster, and Fleetwheel Cruiser.
The Cruiser will become a creature with haste right away.
Crew the Ovalchase with entity and use his ability to make them infinite sized to kill off two players. As of right now unless you play a mass haste spell or give someone else haste if you want to kill off more than two players. We will get to that soon though
Plan B:
Let's say you have infinite mana but no access to Delpala for whatever reason
Impact Tremors
master Trinketeer
Purphrous, god of the forge
With infinite colored mana, you can kill all players with Trinketeer making infinite triggers for tremors or Purphrous. If you have haste for your little friends you don't even need Purphy or Tremors. Just go nuts with Trinketeer.
Now assembling a combo isn't easy when you don't have too much in the way of tutors. Let's look at what we have for card selection.
 |
| Draws cards and gets back artifacts. |
Tutors/Draw
Imperial Recruiter
Recruiter of the guard
Kuldotha Forgemaster
Memory Jar
Magmatic Insight
Wheel of fortune
Gamble
Enlightened tutor
Faithless looting
Tormenting voice
Wild guess
Cathartic Reunion
While a majority of these are simple draw two effects there is a good amount of redundancy in this deck to make sure you draw what you need when you need it.
Since we want Boros to be competitive (Right?) we need answers to make sure our combo goes off without a hitch. Here are a few answers
Magus of the moon
Blood Moon
 |
| Yeah, we need all the answers we can get |
Junk Diver
Myr Retriever
Scrap Trawler
Restoration Specialist
Ghirapur Aether Grid
PyroBlast
Red Elemental Blast
Mana tithe
Lapse of Certainty
Swords to plowshares
Path to Exile
Wear/Tear
Trash for Treasure
Silence
Armageddon
Ravages of war
Ruination
Vandalblast
Scrap Mastery
Chaos Warp
Daretti, Scrap Savant
As you can see we're running a massive amount of answers. With a plan that's this fragile, there need to be a ton of answers in case something goes wrong. I put in plenty of artifact retrieval, tons of mana base hate and a few just general answers to make sure that if there is something on the board that's a problem you can kill it. Sure we only have access to four counters but if you play right that should be just enough
That last of the goods:
Sensei's Divining top
Crucible of worlds
Anger
Smuggler's Copter
 |
| Plus you get sweet bling like this |
That last few slots I went with these guys. Top and crucible work very well here since there are plenty of fetches and land destruction so you can make sure to not miss land drops and shuffle if your top three aren't to your liking.
Anger and Engineer give haste to your vehicles making it very possible to kill a whole table with your combo and copter is a card draw engine on top of something that can tap Depala.
And there you have it. That's the 99 I think would work best at making Boros viable in competitive groups. While this doesn't hold a candle to tier 1 decks it has been a nice surprise to see a deck that's both cheap to make and fairly decent.
With red gaining more looting effects in the years it's entirely possible that this can improve and maybe hit tier two one day with the right cards releasing. The main problem is the consistency. You very much so need to combo out to win with this deck and against a player with answers that will be very hard to do.
With that said I am happy to see a Boros deck that came out overall good. Nothing crazy but pretty good.
Here's a finalized decklist:
http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/spike-me-episode-2-depala-pilot-exemplar/
Well, what do you guys think of Depala? You think this is viable or another boring aggro commander? Let me know what you think and let's get a discussion going.
Decklist for Depala:
Until next time,
DoomBlade, Signing out
If you want to support the blog please visit my Patreon for more. Every little bit helps a ton and allows me to make more content for you guys in the future https://www.patreon.com/diestodoomblade
Hi what does Ghirapur Aether Grid combo with?
ReplyDelete