This deck isn't for the faint of heart, as it is storm in its rawest form. With Zada at the helm of this pile, she'll show you one hell of a journey.
You will like this deck if:
- You like storm
- You like the challenge of mono red
- You don't have a lot of time to fit a game in
- You like achieving ludicrous things while your opponents stare at you
- You like cheapish EDH decks
You will not like this deck if:
- You hate combos
- You hate non-interaction
- You hate losing spectacularly when you fizzle
Mulligans
You need to aggressively mulligan hands. With the elimination of the partial paris mulligan the deck took a bit of a hit, but can still function properly if you mulligan aggressively. You have to take each opening hand differently, but the key pieces are as follows:
1: Cantrip (Crimson Wisps, Expedite)
2: Token Producer (Krenko's Command, Young Pyromancer)
3: Ramp (One-Two Mountain and/or fast mana)
You snap keep a hand if it has these three categories of cards. You do not need pump spells/expensive spells until you can start chaining them together for the win, so why have them in your opener? Sometimes you'll just have to keep shipping hands, but this list has gotten pretty lean and can mulligan nicely.
Zada is the lynch pin of this pile. Do not cast this chick until you can guarantee resolving at least one cantrip like Crimson Wisps with a slew of tokens out. Mana Vault and Grim Monolith are in the deck to specifically act as a ritual to get Zada out for only one red. Cast Ruby Medallion whenever you like, but try to cast Helm of Awakening the turn you plan to go off, or at least the turn before. Don't let opponents get to abuse the free ramp.
To be able to safely "go off" you're going to need around 5-6 tokens. This should allow you to dig deep enough to find another cantrip and ritual to keep going. The more tokens the better, but be wary of decking yourself. A wanton Twinflame into Expedite can easily deck you.
Sometime you just lose Zada to commander tax or a Darksteel Mutation, Imprisoned in the Moon, etc. and there's nothing you can do about it. That's why we have included Mirrorwing Dragon as a second commander to keep the deck alive.
Cantrips
Once Zada resolves, these cantrips gain Radiate. Zada makes them the best cards in the deck since even when your opponent ties to kill Zada or counter the cantrip, the remaining copies will resolve and refill your hand. There are tiers to the cantrips in this deck:
These are the 1-2 mana instant speed cantrips that aren't limited in casting requirements and give haste. Crimson Wisps, Accelerate, and Expedite are your best friends and best cards in the deck.
These are the 2-3 mana cantrips that are still insanely good. They still draw cards, but don't give haste or are conditional. Stun, Boiling Blood, Rile, Renegade Tactics, Spark of Creativity or is limited to casting in combat Chaotic Strike. These guys are just as key as the tier 1 cantrips in order to storm off.
These have been eliminated from the deck, as Zada has gotten good enough tools from the latest sets that they are no longer necessary. Since they don't draw until the next upkeep, they just aren't that great.
These are the 1-2 mana cantrips that are limited to casting in combat. This means that Zada has to survive moving to combat in order for you to have a chance at drawing cards. This means any main phase rituals will also fizzle. They also do not draw you cards until the next upkeep, so there is no way to continue "going off" with these. Aleatory, Panic, Balduvian Rage, Gorilla War Cry. In the end they aren't great, and crossing your fingers that you get to untap with a few tokens isn't good enough.
Expedite: Haste enabler, instant, and cheap
Crimson Wisps: Haste enabler, instant, and cheap
Accelerate: Haste enabler, instant
Renegade Tactics: Cheap, sorcery
Stun: Instant
Boiling Blood: Instant
Spark of Creativity: Cheap, interactive, versatile
Rile: Nukes your board, but draws cards
Crash Through: Here's to not reading the card before throwing it in my deck. Doesn't target. :(
Since these are the most important cards in the deck, you'll need every other card draw and filtering tool at your disposal in order to find them. This is the reason for the inclusion of the following:
Skullclamp
Cathartic Reunion
Faithless Looting
Magmatic Insight
Tormenting Voice
Wheel of Fate
Wheel of Fortune
Wild Guess
Winds of Change
Bedlam Reveler
Tokens
The tokens producers are the most mana efficient available, even if it means card disadvantage. The upside of having more tokens far outweighs the card loss once Zada hits the field. The token factories rank as follows:
Young Pyromancer: The most mana efficient and synergistic card with the deck. As you go off he adds more tokens without any additional mana investment
Goblinslide: While way more mana intensive than Young Pyromancer, this card is protected against creature hate. It flies under the radar and will continue to deliver post board wipe.
Krenko, Mob Boss: He costs a little more, but can win games on his own. Haste enablers + Kari Zev's Expertise can win games on its own.
Kher Keep: It's a free card slot in the lands that can makes tokens in a pinch.
Springjack Pasture: More intensive Kher Keep, but redundant token production.
The remaining cards are one off effects that have varying degrees of efficiency/versatility:
Kuldotha Rebirth
Devastating Summons
Dragon Fodder
Krenko's Command
Mogg War Marshal
Twinflame
Mogg Alarm
Release the Gremlins
Hordeling Outburst
Empty the Warrens
Tempt with Vengeance
Molten Birth
Win Cons
This deck wants to win through combat damage in a spectacular fashion. Here are the best go-tos for this deck:
Non-Combat Win Cons
You'll need to dedicate at least one slot to winning without combat, since there are a ton of cards that just make it impossible through attacking. Here are your best options:
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Ignite Memories or Fiery Gambit can be used for a random and fun finisher. Opponents can get into rolling a dice a bunch of times to see if they're dead or not. This is about as interactive as you can make a storm win con. I think they're too expensive, and I'm not a fan of random.
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Volcanic Awakening is a more serious storm card. This is the most expensive cmc, and also doesn't actually win you the game. Most of the time you can assume that you will have enough turns to kill everybody by attacking. But if someone has a hard lock on combat, then all you did was reset lands. The whole point of a non-combat win con was to not use combat at all, so this doesn't make the cut for me.
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Arcbond is my favorite option. This plus Blasphemous Act doesn't require a massive amount of tokens unless you're trying to make Blasphemous Act cheaper. In fact, With Zada and only 2 tokens you can deal 39 damage to each opponent. It's easy enough to deal one damage through their fetch lands, or smacking them with a token. The more obvious flaw to this plan is that this doesn't actually net you a win. Arcbond also deals damage to you so this causes a draw by killing everyone at the same time (but by playing mono red in EDH, that's a win in my books). This is my personal non-combat win-con of choice, since if I can't win through combat damage then everyone is going down with me. Currently cut, since it's too situational.
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Purphoros, God of the Forge: This guy combos well with the token makers, but can get shut down by Torpor Orb effects. The main detractor is that he requires an initial 4 mana investment BEFORE making more tokens. He draws a metric butt-load of hate, and if you've gone off and drawn your whole deck to find him you still don't just win by casting the card.
-Guttersnipe: It's really easy to storm off and kill everybody. It's one mana less than Aetherflux Reservoir, and is an extra body to draw off of Zada's trigger, and tutorable with Imperial Recruiter if that guy ever becomes affordable. Everything you could ask for really.
Card Choices for Value
Here's where the rest of the cards that don't fall into a specific category fall, as well as some other that have some corner cases that are worth mentioning:
- Arcbond: This does an insane amount of damage with Zada out and can steal draws (wins in my book) out of nowhere. Currently cut, since it's too situational.
- Blood Moon: An excellent hate card against greedier mana bases. Can outright win the game, but typically slows opponents down enough to grind through the clunkier Zada hands. Is one mana cheaper than Ruination, and can be played early with greater effect.
- Dualcaster Mage: A very versatile card. Can act as a counterspell, double a ritual, or outright win with Twinflame by making infinite Mages. Just remember that copying a cantrip targeting Zada will not cause Zada to trigger a second time since you are not casting the copy.
- Kari Zev's Expertise: Holy crap this card is sweet. While not the most mana efficient, the versatility is insane. The real benefit is the second line of text where it becomes an insane ritual and you'll be able to cast the rest of your hand for free including Wheel of Fate and Lotus Bloom.
- Magus of the Moon: This is Blood Moon number two, but has the added benefit of enabling an additional cantrip.
- Recoup: I picked this over Shreds of Sanity since it has the ability to be cast from the graveyard. It ultimately costs less upfront and provides more card advantage in the long run.
- Release the Gremlins: This isn't the most efficient spell, but adding to the board while taking out problem artifacts can buy you enough time to win.
Hosers
This deck doesn't interact too well, so there are a number of cards that just completely and utterly dominate this deck. If there are a lot of these guys you won't be having the best time.
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Leovold, Emissary of Trest: Just scoop if he's the commander. This guy just craps all over our strategy and often comes down turn two. You just have to develop your board and hope for someone to kill him without using a board wipe.
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Grand Arbiter Augustin IV: An awesome hand can beat him as you just win before he can come down. A slower hand means you really have to get on the board fast and then direct all other players hate towards the Arbiter player until the commander is off the table.
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Thalia, Guardian of Thraben, Eidolon of Rhetoric, Ethersworn Canonist: With the addition of Spark of Creativity and Blasphemous Act we actually have some removal spells that can deal with them. Release the Gremlins can also hit Canonist.
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Spellskite: This card isn't too bad, since our cantrips still allow us to draw the card regardless of the target. Our pump spell copies will tax their life total pretty hard, and we've always got Haze of Rage. Release the Gremlins can nab it with one of the targets, and then they can't redirect the rest.
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Nekusar, the Mindrazer: This guy really isn't bad because you love the card draw the whole deck plays, but you'll need to play politics to get someone to kill him if you plan on going off at any point. The amount of cards you will draw will definitely kill you first. Blasphemous Act can kill him, and a big enough Spark of Creativity can exile enough gas to just kill the table without drawing any cards.
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Ghostly Prison + Propaganda
: These cards aren't complete hosers, but they do throw a big wrench in the mix when you plan on killing them. Luckily, some of the rituals are instant speed so you can get some mana in combat to pay for the attacks. You will still have to do double the work to get them dead as red can't interact with enchantments at all. Otherwise, just throw Guttersnipe down and kill them that way.
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Rest in Peace, Grafdigger's Cage, Relic of Progenitus, Scavenging Ooze etc: We are a Past in Flames deck so graveyard hate does hit us. It's easy enough to fight through these cards, but they make things extra difficult.
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Torpor Orb, tanglewire, Smokestack aren't too bad of effects as we can dump out an insane amount of tokens relatively quickly.
Notable Exclusions
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Scroll Rack: While I'd appreciate the extra card selection in a non-blue deck as well as the extra artifact for Mox Opal and Kuldotha Rebirth, there just aren't enough shuffle effect to support this card. I currently only have four red fetches and Gamble. Even if I found an Imperial Recruiter to add, six shuffle effects would too often lead to the "brainstorm lock". We'd have to wheel into the cards we put on top anyways, so this card will be excluded until additional free shuffle effects are provided.
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Memory Jar: This card will require more testing, but the initial 5 mana investment is a little too much for my liking. We're playing Zada so our draw spells are 1 mana. This may find its way back in at some point, but for now it's cut.
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Chandra, Torch of Defiance: This card was great to cast on turn 2/3, but any other time I drew her I was wishing she was Koth of the Hammer since I needed a bigger ritual and not a 2 mana planeswalker. She does add some longevity to the deck with the included "card draw", but the inability to play lands and cast until end of turn really limit that ability. Too often did I just discard her to a Tormenting Voice. She may make her way back in at some point since she can kill most of the hoser creature cards, but for now she's out.
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Siege-Gang Commander: This card is great, but just has too much upfront mana cost to be able to include. Beetleback Chief, Pia and Kiran Nalaar, etc. all fall into this category.
