Introduction

This is a mono red aggro deck with the Nahiri's Warcrafting and Invasion of Tarkir // Defiant Thundermaw combo. The deck also has 4 Shivan Devastators which increase the damage of Invasion of Tarkir // Defiant Thundermaw and trigger the attack ability of Defiant Thundermaw. Especially when you have 1 or more dragons alongside Defiant Thundermaw, it's true dragon mayhem!

Format

• The deck is for the Standard format, as of September 2023, with March of the Machine being last legal set.
• The deck should perform well in both Bo1 and Bo3 matches.
• The deck can win games on turn 4 or 5, which means that it is suitable for quickly grinding a large number of wins in the Arena ladder.

Source

The deck is based on a 5–0 mono red deck by geleroff: https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/5829760#paper

Main Deck

60 Cards

The card with the highest fixed mana cost in the deck is Nahiri's Warcrafting, which requires 3 mana to cast. Everything else is castable with 2 mana. This is most helpful, when you draw only 2 or 3 lands in an entire game, and it allows you to pretty much play all your spells. If, on the other hand, you are mana flooded, you can use the extra mana to create bigger Shivan Devastators, cast free spells with Bloodthirsty Adversary, activate Mishra's Foundry, and play the channel ability Sokenzan, Crucible of Defiance. Nahiri's Warcrafting also works better when there is more mana available to cast the potential extra spell.

1 Mana Spells

14 Cards

• 4 Kumano Faces Kakkazan // Etching of Kumano — The best 1 mana spell in red. It's even unnerfed in Standard.
• 4 Monastery Swiftspear — A creature with haste and prowess. Excellent in aggro decks.
• 2 Phoenix Chick — A 1 mana flying creature that can come back from the grave.
• 4 Play with Fire — An excellent 1 mana red removal spell that can also deal direct damage to the opponent.

2 Mana Spells

15 Cards

• 4 Bloodthirsty Adversary — An excellent aggro creature with haste that can also cast instant and sorcery spells for free, if you have lots of mana available.
• 3 Feldon, Ronom Excavator — Another excellent aggro creature, which gives you a card, when it has been dealt damage.
• 4 Invasion of Tarkir // Defiant Thundermaw — A battle that can deal damage to any target except itself. It boosts up with dragons in your hand and its back side is pretty strong. It combos well with Nahiri's Warcrafting and Shivan Devastator.
• 4 Lightning Strike — A good removal spell that can also deal direct damage to the opponent.

3 Mana Spells

4 Cards

• 4 Nahiri's Warcrafting — A good removal spell against Sheoldred, the Apocalypse. It can also be used to flip Invasion of Tarkir // Defiant Thundermaw.

Spells with X in Mana Cost

4 Cards

• 4 Shivan Devastator — A flexible flying creature with haste. It combos well with Invasion of Tarkir // Defiant Thundermaw.

Lands

23 Cards

• 18 Mountain
• 3 Mishra's Foundry — A good man-land. Lands are not destroyed by sweepers, such as Sunfall and Farewell, which makes man-lands useful against control decks.
• 2 Sokenzan, Crucible of Defiance — A legendary channel land that creates two 1/1 creatures with haste. The effect is uncounterable, which makes Sokenzan useful against control decks.

Strategy

The deck is a bit more complicated to play than a traditional mono red aggro deck, because you need decide whether you want to flip Invasion of Tarkir // Defiant Thundermaw or not. If you have Nahiri's Warcrafting in your hand, you can usually use it to flip Invasion of Tarkir // Defiant Thundermaw, unless you need it for Sheoldred, the Apocalypse or another creature. Flipping the Invasion may also be effective, if you have an additional dragon in your hand. Since flipping the Invasion requires 5 damage, it is usually a question whether you want to deal this damage to the opponent or to the battle. As a rule of thumb, I would say that if you have a really good board state that probably wins you the game, do not flip the Invasion. However, if your board state is weak and is probably not enough to win you the game, it is better to flip the Invasion first and thus get a better board state before you try to go for killing the opponent. Since Nahiri's Warcrafting cannot deal damage to the player, it is often useful to use it to flip the Invasion, which saves your other damage spells and combat damage for the opponent. But of course, you can use Warcrafting to kill a creature to make a way to deal combat damage to the Invasion and flip it.

Overall, I feel that the deck is a bit better than a traditional mono red aggro deck in terms of resilience, because you can decide whether you want to flip the Invasion or not. If you have a bad board state, you can go for the Invasion and get a powerful dragon to help your army. You can also play the deck like a traditional mono red aggro deck by trying to deal 20 damage in 4 or 5 turns and completely forego the flipping of the Invasion. The deck also has Nahiri's Warcrafting that helps a lot against Sheoldred, the Apocalypse and it is not a dead card vs. control, because you can use it to flip Invasion of Tarkir // Defiant Thundermaw. All in all, there are no dead cards in deck, since all other damage spells can deal damage to the opponent. The deck has a total of 10 flying creatures (if you count Defiant Thundermaws), which makes it pretty dangerous against decks that rely on ground blockers.

Weaknesses

The deck is slower than a mono red deck that does not employ so many flying creatures. Therefore, a traditional mono red deck may not be a good matchup for the deck.