ComradeJim270, I found another Daretti deck for you to critique.

@SmokeyBear15, my friend will be the guy to tell you all about this deck and what you should or shouldn't change. I personally am less qualified when it comes to red EDH decks.

I have been summoned!

It looks like you started with the pre-con, which isn't a bad place to begin by any means. There is room for improvement here, but before I offer suggestions I'd like to know a bit about your EDH meta and what you would like to do with the deck.

Daretti is best when he's at the forefront of a control deck, and also thrives in a deck built for combo. But some groups don't like decks that win through combos, and mono-red's brand of "control" can be considered very un-fun because instead of countering things it just makes people's stuff explode or burst into flames.

It's also important to know your budget. Because they can go in any deck, powerful EDH artifacts like Metalworker, Staff of Domination (which are a game-ending combo together) and Mycosynth Lattice can be pricy. I'm guessing you don't want to spend more than a few dollars a card based on what you said about Darksteel Forge, but I'd strongly consider saving up to pick that one up at least.

My deck is Not Quite From Scratch. If you see a combo or win condition in the description I'd be happy to explain how it works!

@ComradeJim270: I think my 'meta' is that I want to be able to survive any blows and take hits until I'm ready to start making big swings. That's why things like tokens or little things that I can block with, etc, are great until I can get my emblem out. I know there's a lot more that Daretti, Scrap Savant is useful for than just producing his emblem (and I've learned to really appreciate his +2 ability), but damn do I want that emblem out quick.

If you want the emblem out quick, possibly invest in The Chain Veil?

I'm thinking about the following swaps...

Armillary Sphere -> Burnished Hart, because its a creature, and gives the lands directly to battlefield instead of to my hand.

Swiftfoot Boots -> Predator, Flagship, because I feel like the deck as a whole is weak against flying, and who doesn't want to give flying to their big hitters? That, and spot removal for enemy fliers is nice too. I really like having the hexproof and haste as a cheap equipment, though. Thoughts?

Ruby Medallion -> Caged Sun, because the +1/+1 for red creatures plus double mana on all my mountains, 4 special lands, and my Pyromancer's Goggles would be more useful than just one less for red spells. It's a 6 cmc rather than just 2, but the benefits are nice.

A Mountain -> Goblin Welder, because someone pointed out to me that it's pretty much Daretti's -2 ability for cheap. Good way for getting artifacts deposited in my graveyard straight to the battlefield, rather than back to my hand (where I'd still have to pay their cost). I think I have enough artifacts that tap for mana or let me fetch lands to justify removing a single basic land.

Swiftfoot Boots are an EDH staple for a reason. If something you play isn't likely to survive a turn without them, you will wish you had them.

I fully agree with your other ideas. I'm actually not sold on the goggles being in a mostly colorless deck at all, though. I'd rather have Reiterate, which has greater utility and goes infinite with Mana Geyser.

If you want to protect Daretti long enough to get his emblem you will have to run control or else build up combos with proliferate artifacts like Contagion Engine... and in the latter case you're better off just comboing to win the whole thing. He draws a ton of hate, and even when people aren't trying to kill him, they will occasionally poke Daretti to keep him off that ultimate. Unfortunately mono-red control tends to lose friends.

I would consider using Daretti to set up combos rather than attempting to consistently ult him. I have found that a much more reliable strategy.

You mentioned Eye of Ugin on my list. I think it's better if you have a huge dude you want to grab like Colossus of Akros or Blightsteel Colossus.

Also, definitely put Faithless Looting in here, it's a very good card. Take out Trepanation Blade. Your deck wants to be milled, not do the milling! I'd also take out Dormant Volcano, because the only good thing about the card is the lovely art. Chandra, Fire of Kaladesh  ^Flip isn't very helpful in here either, her effect is much to small. If you want a planeswalker, run Chandra, Pyromaster instead. But I'd take a Krark-Clan Ironworks over either of those; sac outlets are awesome, especially when they make mana.

Are infinite combos something you're interested in? I can suggest a few.

Fine, fine, I'll keep Swiftfoot Boots, twist my arm why don't ya. ;)

I would love a Reiterate. I'll look into it.

I don't think hoping for something with proliferate is the way to go. I think you're right that not leaning on the emblem and having other ways of getting my toys out would be better.

I like Faithless Looting and see it's worth, but it might not be next on my "fit this in" list. Trepanation Blade was my way of getting maybe a big boost and maybe getting rid of their nice cards, but you're right that it doesn't necessarily fit in with the rest of the deck. I'm indifferent on Dormant Volcano, and if I had another Chandra I'd put it in. I like Chandra, Fire of Kaladesh  ^Flip more as a distraction. I feel that people are gonna really want to get rid of her, when that's likely fine by me if they do. But if I do happen to get her transformed, that's even better.

I'm interested in hearing your ideas for infinite combos here, but I don't think I'd enjoy winning that way. But that does bring up a point; I don't have a lot of abilities etc that I could pour a ton of mana into. Not that I've ever run out of things to spend it on, but it's just an observation....

Other changes:

Mountain -> Buried Ruin, because artifact retrieval

Dormant Volcano -> Smoldering Crater, because cycling

Sadly, Chandra in general tends to be crappy in EDH. Pyromaster is the only one I'd consider playable at all. In particular, Fire of Kaladesh basically does nothing; I don't know if I'd even bother attacking one in an EDH game, I'd be inclined to just let someone ult her because 3 life a turn is a nuisance at best. If you want a planeswalker to draw heat from Daretti I think Pyromaster or Koth of the Hammer are probably better options. I do want to clarify I'm not saying any of this to be mean, I am just trying to clarify why I believe the card is not suitable for the deck.

But neither is as funny as blocking stuff with Pentavites and then sticking them back on Pentavus before damage. That's actually a very helpful way to protect Daretti. So is Crawlspace. I'd recommend Silent Arbiter but it really pisses people off.

Some other things I'd recommend highly:

• Unwinding Clock and Clock of Omens, because untapping your stuff all the time is awesome. Especially if you're untapping Tower of Fortunes and especially if you're doing that with the card that made every Daretti player excited about Magic Origins: Alhammarret's Archive! Drawing four off Daretti's +2 is amazingly good. Drawing eight cards at the end of everyone's turn is just gravy.
• Nevinyrral's Disk is a straight-up boardwipe. It hits enchantments, which is great. Normally, in mono-red your answer to troublesome enchantments is to make a sad puppy face and plead with other players to destroy them. Having an alternative to that is nice. I'm actually considering Scour from Existence for this reason. It's also why Unstable Obelisk is a really good card in mono-red, mono-black and Rakdos decks.
• Orbs of Warding or Witchbane Orb shut off targeted yard hate like Tormod's Crypt, which is also worth considering!
• Ring of Three Wishes is a great tutor in a color starved for them. Normally it's more fair because you can use it three times. Daretti can just get it back and use it some more.
• Colossus of Akros is a huge dude to cheat out. Doesn't even cost much money. Getting him out on turn three or four is fun and will make people leave Daretti alone for a while.
• This thing won't let me make more suggestions through the comment. Crap! You'd have to add them to your maybeboard manually.
• Thran Dynamo and Worn Powerstone are excellent mana rocks.
• All Is Dust is a fantastic boardwipe that dropped in cost with its MM2 reprint.
• Insurrection has probably won more EDH games than any other mono-red card. You don't even have to swing if you don't want to, you can just sac all their dudes to Ashnod's Altar and grin as you abuse all the mana.
• Kuldotha Forgemaster is a must, allowing you to grab something from your deck and put it directly onto the field while blue players sigh and wish they had Stifle in hand.
• Vedalken Orrery. Flash is good. Like... really good.
• Tomb of the Spirit Dragon: for those pesky aggro or burn decks.
• Red Sun's Zenith: burn spells that exile are nice, especially when they keep showing up.
• Soul of New Phyrexia: "I'm going to destroy your-" "No." "Ok, what about your-" "No."
• Kurkesh, Onakke Ancient: Copying artifact abilities is great!

Anyway, since you asked here are some of the combos I run:

• Make my stuff indestructible with Darksteel Forge, then "destroy" it with Hoard-Smelter Dragon so it hits hard. You can actually just target the Forge itself since it has a high CMC. Probably the closest thing I have to a "fair" win condition.
• Metalworker and Staff of Domination with three or more artifacts in hand means I get infinite mana, infinite life, infinite tap/untap for creatures and infinite draw. Since I have infinite colorless mana I can draw Comet Storm and burn everyone to death for .
• Infinite mana can also be achieved with Reiterate and Mana Geyser. But my preferred method is Basalt Monolith and Rings of Brighthearth. You need only to more colorless to set this off: tap the Monolith for mana, then copy the untap trigger with the Rings. You'll end up with a surplus of untap triggers that let you keep tapping the Monolith an infinite number of times.
• With Mimic Vat, Dross Scorpion and either Ashnod's Altar or Krark-Clan Ironworks on-board I can play Myr Battlesphere. This gives me four myr tokens. I sac the Battlesphere and a token and imprint Battlesphere onto the Mimic Vat. Then I can make a token of Battlesphere, get four more myr tokens and sac those, getting and a Dross Scorpion trigger to let me untap the Vat and do this again as many times as I like. I end up with an arbitrarily large number of hasty Battlespheres (and uncountably large amounts of mana) and even more myr tokens. The Battlespheres swing, I use their ability... my opponents all die.
• If I have infinite mana and Krark-Clan Ironworks I can play Spine of Ish Sah, sac it, and play it again until my opponents have no permanents. With Vedalken Orrery I can do this at instant speed to get a hard lock on the game.
• Mycosynth Lattice means that Vandalblast destroys everyone else's permanents. With Hellkite Tyrant you can take every single one of someone's permanents and probably win your next upkeep unless it dies. The latter option is probably less likely to make people defenestrate you since at least it's quick. Some people might even find it funny.
• Another rather mean thing you can do with the Lattice is to have Darksteel Forge, Unwinding Clock and Nevinyrral's Disk. Every turn the disk will untap and you can immediately use it to destroy everyone else's stuff. This is also a lock and is quite hard to break once it starts. With Clock of Omens you can do it all in one turn... which I've done in response to what would have been a lethal Bruna, Light of Alabaster swing before.
• If you have Daretti's emblem, Mycosynth Lattice and Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle you can go for a late-game win by saccing all your mountains to Krark-Clan Ironworks each turn and letting Valakut burn people to a crisp when they come back in. Fairly easy to get lots of mountains by popping Burnished Hart each turn.
• Daretti's emblem with Unwinding Clock and some mana rocks lets you get a Mindslaver lock. It's not nice, but it will generally win the game for you.

You'll notice some things appear multiple times. It's my belief that a combo piece should be useful outside of the combo (which is why I don't run Blasting Station) and ideally should be part of multiple combos so you have redundancy. Many of these things will be useful even if you don't combo with them.

Sorry for the long post, please ask if you'd like any clarifications and let me know if some of this appeals to you so we can work on what to cut to make room.

Note for the Mimic Vat combo above: you only need to sac two myr tokens each time once you imprint the Battlesphere. That gives you enough mana to keep going and still have extras.

Your deck is really different from most daretti lists. You're playing many creatures and less combo and control stuff. How about playing Karn, Silver Golem, Darksteel Forge, Mycosynth Lattice + Vandalblast , Mana Vault, Basalt Monolith and Rings of Brighthearth?

Mostly because the five cards you mentioned that I don't have yet cost over $50 together. Trust me, I see the value in them, but I'm slow to fork out the money. I tend to prefer cheaper decks in general. And I like my creature heavy theme too, but I'm looking into other cards like Mirrorworks, Alhammarret's Archive, and Crawlspace.

Any input on how to improve a creature focused Daretti? One question I always struggle with is what to pitch when looting with his +2. If only we could have more Goblin Welder effects!

I would play Trash for Treasure, Faithless Looting and at least Darksteel Forge to cheat your creatures out from the graveyard and make them indestructible. Molten Primordial also seems to be very strong in your deck.

You should always pitch big artifactcreatures, to cheat them into play with the -2 ability or with Trash for Treasure. If you can get your hands on it, Scarecrone could be a second Goblin Welder for your deck.

I like Trash for Treasure. I've found some other ways to cheat things out from the graveyard that I can re-use, such as Clone Shell and Deathrender, and sorta Feldon of the Third Path too. Hoarding Dragon lets me tutor for things (so long as it doesn't get exiled, etc). I don't think I'd noticed Scarecrone's second ability before, so I'll be sure to make a note of that. And I need to find a spot for Faithless Looting.

I'm actually thinking of taking some of ComradeJim270's advice above, and getting myself a Mimic Vat and Krark-Clan Ironworks. I can work those in with an Ashnod's Altar.Then, I can potentially get infinite mana and tokens out of those if I have out either Clock of Omens or Dross Scorpion and anything that makes tokens when it ETB's (such as Myr Battlesphere, Precursor Golem, Wurmcoil Engine, and even Myr Sire would work).

Having the sac outlets also makes a lot of my stuff work better: Hoarding Dragon, Clone Shell, Junk Diver, Myr Retriever, Ichor Wellspring, Scrap Mastery and so on. I have stuff that wants to die, especially when I have my emblem out, and this lets me make sure that happens whether Darksteel Forge is out or not.

I would cut Dualcaster Mage for Faithless Looting

Made the changes I mentioned above. I'm really digging it now. Both Ashnod's Altar and Krark-Clan Ironworks are nice. I normally (or, well, used to) say that I don't like infinite combos, but this deck requires 3 or 4 pieces before I get there. So that's not that bad, right? Does that still count as casual? ;) I'm adding these combos into the description.

abzanforever: I'm still looking to fit in Faithless Looting and/or Tormenting Voice (would you believe that I pulled my first one from a pack today?). I'm really torn on what to take out though, especially after my changes. But I did take your advice on giving Dualcaster Mage the axe.

I want to put in Skullclamp too. And I like Phyrexian Revoker a lot. Things I'm considering taking out are:

-Impact Tremors, which can win the game if I assemble an infinite token combo. But... I guess infinite hasty tokens via Mimic Vat is already a pretty solid win-con....

-Mirrorworks, which I like, but every time I've drawn it, I just pitch it and never really go back for it, usually preferring something better. That's a sign that maybe it should go.

-Voltaic Construct, because he's... kinda... nice? It would be nice to have psuedo-vigilance as needed on any of my big creatures. It doesn't help with any combos though, but Mage-Ring Responder sure likes it. I guess.

Voltaic Construct can go Infinite with Karn, Silver Golem and a three Mana rock or with Metalworker and two cards in hand but you don't play either, so you should really cut Voltaic Construct

You could also take a look at my Daretti Commander: Daretti, the Lord of Artifacts

I'm sorry it took me a very very long time to comment on your deck. Looking at it, one thing that stood out to me immediately was that you're running Platinum Emperion. I would highly suggest that you use Platinum Angel instead.

The main reasons are that you have a few cards that gain you life, and their effectiveness is nerfed if your life total cannot change.

The other reason is that in Commander, there are so many other ways to die, other than having your life reduced to Zero. You can die from Poison, another player can Win through things like Felidar Sovereign or Test of Endurance. Heck, someone can deck you out and beat you that way.

With Platinum Angel your could have -26000 life, 92 poison counters, have an opponent at 75 life with Felidar Sovereign in play, and still be alive and fighting. Just about a month ago, I survived a Kiki-Jiki Pestermite combo and won the game due to Platinum Angel alone.

I like Platinum Angel a lot. I'm considering trading for one, for this and another deck. Platinum Emperion has served me well though, often keeping me from untimely deaths. Both of them are susceptible to removal, and the downside of the Angel is that if I'm at less-than-zero life, I lose immediately when someone casts Naturalize or Path to Exile. The Emperion doesn't have that problem; if he came into play while I had 18 life, I still have 18 life when he leaves. I've witnessed both of these situations in person.

I've 97% decided that I want to swap out Hoard-Smelter Dragon for Kuldotha Forgemaster as soon as I can get one. The dragon just isn't on-theme enough, although the artifact spot-removal is nice. Thoughts on this swap?

I've also found another infinite combo here: Mycosynth Golem + Myr Retriever + Junk Diver + Krark-Clan Ironworks/Ashnod's Altar. This alone produces infinite colorless mana. If I had a Impact Tremors that would be an instant win, but I took that out. What I do have though is Dross Scorpion, which would now give me infinite untap as well.

Some fun things I've recently done in one turn that I wanna brag on:

-Played Hoarding Dragon, tutored for Darksteel Forge, sacrificed the dragon to Ashnod's Altar, discarded the forge with Geier Reach Sanitarium, put the forge into play with Daretti, Scrap Savant's -2.

-On the previous turn, I played Clone Shell, and copied it with Mirrorworks. One of them exiled Kuldotha Forgemaster. Let it die as a chump blocker, and got the forgemaster out. On my next turn, I sacrificed 'n tutored with it to get Blightsteel Colossus, copied it with Mirrorworks. Cast Lightning Greaves and copied it as well. Killed both of my opponents with 'em.

I'm really happy with this deck. I'm thinking of making a couple changes though. Bosh, Iron Golem is rarely something I actively want. I may replace it with Platinum Angel that I just acquired. And if I can get my hands on a Scarecrone, I'd replace Feldon of the Third Path with it.

Rings of Brighthearth copies your commander's abilities for added benefits.

It's a wonderful effect for a not-so-wonderful price of $20, haha! I really really want one, but I'm a cheap ass. The expensive cards I have in this deck were all generous gifts from good friends. I just got a Duplicant for $2... that's how cheap I am. Thanks though, I'm keeping my eye out for one!

Added a Foundry Inspector and a Workshop Assistant in place of Lodestone Golem and Deathrender. Both new additions are combo-y goodness.

Don't forget about Alhammarret's Archive! Doubling the card draw from Daretti's +2 is so good. And any other card draw opportunity also.