Pauper: Kuldotha Burn Deck Tech & Sideboard Guide

I'm Tiago Fuguete and while you were reading the intro, Monastery Swiftspear has already come into play and hit you for 1. In today's deck, we are going to elaborate on the change that Mono Red Burn underwent and became a Mono Red Aggro, a change for the better.

Before talking about today's Burn Aggro, let's talk about how Burn used to be, with Thermo-Alchemist, plenty of spells that dealt damage to the opponent like Lightning Bolt, Rift Bolt, Chain Lightning and Fireblast. The deck played well in the format, but usually ran out of gas if it didn't kill the opponent fast enough.

It was a deck with few creatures, lots of spells and no means to replenish itself, so if the opponent gained some life, things would get complicated. Even when Reckless Impulse was released, it was still tested and almost no one liked to use it, but today's strategy is different.

Swiftspear was a really cool addition to Pauper, and a wonderful card to Burn, giving retirement to Thermo-Alchemist and changed its play style.

The deck started to use more creatures (as I count Kuldotha Rebirth as 3 creatures each), Reckless Impulse started to see a more play, and now we have artifacts that generate a lot of value and all these cards serve to trigger Monastery Swiftspear.

Nowadays, there are several lists playing, and they are all very similar, with only each player using changing that card they think they can do better. Our list has some really cool ones that I would like to mention.

The first is the Kessig Flamebreather. I've heard several players saying that it doesn't go well in the deck, but for me, it's excellent because it triggers the same turn it enters the battlefield, and it also triggers when we play an artifact.

A second creature I relly dig is the 1 copy of Goblin Bushwhacker. I've seen many games end when we combine Goblin Bushwhacker with Kuldotha Rebirth with 8 damage for 3 mana.

When we need to mulligan with this deck, it's much better than with the old Burn because as I said here, we have several draw spells, and we can still have the same consistency.

Another detail is that in the old Burn, each mulligan meant 3 less damage. Now with more creatures and especially Monastery Swiftspear, the damage is constant on the board and for each artifact, or spell we play the damage increases, so it ends up supplying the mulligan.

Our stance is mostly the beatdown, play a creature and attack and on the next turn again. The difference here is that in this aggro we also have direct damage and small creatures in quantity, always bothering our opponent while we try to draw more cards.

vs. Dimir Terror

We will start by talking about a tricky matchup.

Playing Mono Red against Ux is always tense, but Dimir Terror doesn't run faeries and therefore has fewer counterspells, which is great for us. However, some lists are running maindeck Unexpected Fangs and Suffocating Fumes.

On the sideboard, the game improves for both sides because both have good sides like Pyroblast and Hydroblast. An essential card for us is Relic of Progenitus, since the longer we can delay the 5/5 creatures coming into play, the more chances to win we have.

Side in:

Side out:

vs. Grixis Affinity

Even though Affinity is no longer omnipresent as it once was, the deck is still good and this game has everything to be good for us. But don't think it's easy, as our opponent has 2 cards that can delay our strategy: Reckoner's Bargain and Metallic Rebuke.

It is important to know how to play around these two cards, as they are already present in Game 1, and we cannot forget and spend all our resources at once, and then take one of them as an answer.

Side in:

Side out:

vs. Caw Gates

Here we have one of the worst matchups, our opponent's deck looks like it was made just to beat us. It has counterspells, damage prevention and lifelink creatures, which is everything we don't want to face.

Caw Gates today is one of the best decks in the format and has been appearing a lot in tournaments, so you have to be prepared to face it and that's why we run maindeck End the Festivities and Lava Dart.

End the Festivities is in the deck thinking about playing the mirror match too, but it will be very useful against Squadron Hawk. Lava Dart is great for triggering Monastery Swiftspear since it's two spells on one card, but actually, it's good for killing Sacred Cat which is also two creatures in just one card, so we'll try to have a fairer trade.

Side in:

Side out:

vs. Gruul LD

This match has everything to be good for us, as losing one land or another may not make much difference.

The biggest care we have to take is with Weather the Storm, especially since lists are running it on maindeck, but just be careful and play around.

Side in:

Side out:

vs. Mono Red Aggro

Our mirror today is a tricky match. The deck is very fast and whoever starts with the best hand and mainly with two cards, Monastery Swiftspear and some removal, will have the advantage.

Having the Monastery Swiftspear is pretty strong at first as it forces your opponent to spend a Bolt on it and that's why you need to have removal too if your opponent has that start.

And on the sideboard, I don't change anything, not that there isn't anything good for us to add, but I think they end up worsening our game instead of improving it.

Ending another article, this is a deck that I highly recommend you to play, as it is excellent, fast and will bring you results.

Any questions or suggestions, just leave it here in the comments, and I'll come back to talk about it!

Thank you very much, and I hope you enjoyed the reading.