Theros Beyond Death is already here, but you don’t need a single card from it to keep performing great in Arena with this amazing budget Throne of Eldraine deck.
Introduction
“Red Deck Wins” is a concept as old as Magic itself. While others are brewing complex combo decks and worrying about fixing their mana and drawing their pieces on time, you can perform just as great and win a mind-blowing amount of games. Destroy your opponents by simply playing red burn spells amplified with the right support.
Decklist and strategy
Meet Torbran, Thane of Red Fell, also known in the meme world as Torbjorn or Gimli. This 2/4 for 4 has an Oracle text that reads:
“If a red source you control would deal damage to an opponent or a permanent an opponent controls, it deals that much damage plus 2 instead.”
This is huge. Note that it works for all sources of damage and isn’t limited to once per turn or anything like that. So the deck builds itself, really. Take all the cheap effects that deal 1 damage (often called “pings”) and have them deal 3 damage instead! Without further ado, let’s jump straight to the decklist.
- 4x Fervent Champion
- 4x Scorch Spitter
- 4x Shock
- 4x Cavalcade of Calamity
- 4x Light Up the Stage
- 4x Risk Factor
- 4x Skewer the Critics
- 4x Chandra, Acolyte of Flame
- 4x Torbran, Thane of Red Fell
- 4x Dwarven Mine
- 20x Mountain
That’s a lot of four-ofs, but there’s a reason for that. With this deck, consistency is key. You want to be able to play all the spells that you draw and get the maximum value out of every card. We don’t go fancy, we go face.
For one-drops, we’ve got Fervent Champion and Scorch Spitter. We want to play these immediately. The Champions have a very useful First Strike and synergize well with each other, providing +1/+0 if you have two of them on the battlefield. The Spitter is pure value.
Cavalcade of Calamity is our win condition. Since all our creatures except Torbran have 1 Power, we’ll deal insane amounts of damage with this ping, especially after the King himself is on the battlefield. If we have 2 or 3 of these online, it is very hard not to win.
Light Up the Stage, Risk Factor and Skewer the Critics are our utilities. We draw cards and remove threats with those. Use them wisely and time them correctly. It’s always a good idea to sacrifice a Mountain to Jump-start a Risk Factor in the late game.
Chandra, Acolyte of Flame is here only for her second ability, giving us 2 Elemental tokens to trigger our Cavalcades of Calamity.
When it comes to mana, there’s nothing to see here – 4x Dwarven Mine to provide us with more 1/1 creatures and 20 Mountains. Full art, of course!
Budget
This is one of the cheapest decks you can assemble and you will get some serious mileage out of your investment. We’ve got only a handful of Rares here, and while we do need them in sets of four, it is still relatively easy to get those, and they are all useable in other Red decks as well.
With that in mind, we can cut down the deck even more. The Fervent Champions are nice, but not essential for victory. Feel free to swap them for Raging Goblins or Goblin Bannerets instead. Now that’s some amazing value!
Personalize
This is Magic, so what works for every single player will vary. Feel free to tweak the list to your personal style and preference. Here’s a Maybe list of cards that also work with the concept for your consideration:
- Tibalt, Rakish Instigator – those Devils are really useful Calamity triggers.
- Electrostatic Field – if you’re into Izzet, this will slow the deck down a bit but can work.
- Wrap in Flames, Underworld Fires, Purphoros’s Intervention – flashy new cards that work well with Torbran. Extremely useful to clear busy so your own tiny creatures can attack. As for the Intervention – the flexibility of the X-cost makes it a great removal tool if you need to get rid of a pesky Teferi, Time Raveler.
So, go ahead, assemble this easy deck, learn to time its spells correctly and enjoy your shiny new rank increase. Good luck and have fun!
