Card/Deck The Boros Legion (RW)

ravnic

ravnic

Boros is a difficult guild. if you want cards that do more than aggression, there isn't all that much to chose from. And even the aggressive cards aren't all that exiting imo, in all power level regions.

What are you running in your Boros sections? What themes/archetypes do you support? Did you have some surprising successes? What do you want the Boros Legion to do?


________

My current choices are:


- Sunhome Guildmage is like a red version of Selesnya Guildmage. It puts out bodys and pumps your team, while beeing an on-curve beater. Works well in Aggro decks, but better in midrange-y Token decks.
- Legionnaire has some nostalgia value for me, but is pretty boring and not exactly powerful too. I'd love to replace it with some interesting card, favorably a 3-drop, but there isn't much else offered.
- Goblin Trenches is exactly what I want from a gold card, good in different theaters/archetypes, an unique effect with much synergie potential. Super staple.
- Glory is an interesting anthem. Aggro and tokens are my main themes for {R}{W}, so this is perfect.


A combat-mindslaver effect, always has it's uses and makes for memorable fun. My favorite hybrid.



Line up in order, recruits, and tell me, which Boros cards you're running!
 
Onderzeeboot

Onderzeeboot

Ecstatic Orb
Always



Yeah, two :) This is, after all, one of the best one drops of all time. It scales well into the late game, is good as a 2/2 or 4/4, but also has an ultimate for when you mana flood.

Don't run



It looks cool, but just buries your opponent in an unfun way.

There are however some cool shenanigans to be achieved in the Boros guild.



A golden olden combo. If you want Boros to be a more controlling color pair, and your cube isn't cutthroat in power level, this is a nice option.



Good in aggro and control decks, the cow is a good on both offense and defense!



These cards may look boring, but they play well. Again, these are good in aggro and control decks.



And this one finds both!



One of the most fun planeswalkers around, I really dig this design. None of her abilities are backbreaking too, which is a big plus in a planeswalker.
 
ravnic

ravnic

I can comfirm that Assemble the Legion is super brutal and unfun, and you shouldn't run it. It's like four times as brutal Sprout Swarm.

I wish we could get this card:

Skyfires {5}{R}{W}
Sorcery (R)
Destroy all permanents.

Maybe even for {1} cheaper, but I would slam it as it is. And they will never print this, because someone has deemed mass LD unfun :rolleyes:
 
Onderzeeboot

Onderzeeboot

Ecstatic Orb
ravnic said:
I can comfirm that Assemble the Legion is super brutal and unfun, and you shouldn't run it. It's like four times as brutal Sprout Swarm.

I wish we could get this card:

Skyfires {5}{R}{W}
Sorcery (R)
Destroy all permanents.

Maybe even for {1} cheaper, but I would slam it as it is. And they will never print this, because someone has deemed mass LD unfun :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

With the power of Magic Set Editor and a printer, you can play this card in your cube if you want to ;)
 
Chris Taylor

Chris Taylor

Contributor
ravnic said:
I can comfirm that Assemble the Legion is super brutal and unfun, and you shouldn't run it. It's like four times as brutal Sprout Swarm.

I wish we could get this card:

Skyfires {5}{R}{W}
Sorcery (R)
Destroy all permanents.

Maybe even for {1} cheaper, but I would slam it as it is. And they will never print this, because someone has deemed mass LD unfun :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Huh I wonder why they deemed it as such.

What's even your plan with this? Greater Gargadon? Have your opponent concede out of misery because there aren't enough lands in their library to cast the spells in their hand?
 
ravnic

ravnic

It is a nice Wildfire variant, which is a very fun card to me. So is Destructive Force and Devastation and Upheaval. They are costy finishers you have to build around, it is okay when they makle winning almost impossible for your opponent.

The boros variant that came to my mind works with Gargadon and Stuff like Rukh Egg, as well as with floating mana like Upheaval.
 
ravnic

ravnic

Sweet card indeed.
My only problem with battalion is, that it feels so much like a win more mechanic. It only does something when you can attack with 3+ dudes.
 
ahadabans

ahadabans

Well, I think it's a token mechanic more than a win-more mechanic. You want lots of dudes so you can trigger it easily. Needing to commit 3 cards to the table (assuming single body threats) and swing with all of them makes it actually pretty fair mechanically, hard to trigger consistently, and not really worth building around in my experience. You really need cards that give you multiple bodies before this is a good card.

Flavor wise, I think Battalion is excellent in this guild. And mechanically, both colors have a plethora of token support so cubes aren't lacking for synergy options.

My only gripe is the body is lacking a bit in resilience. Angel gets removed and you are really hit with a big tempo loss. An extra point of toughness would have made this card so much more durable. Haste would have probably been overkill I think, but also clearly stellar on this card. Lightning Mauler with this as a follow-up is usually very bad news for your opponent.
 
Mondschwein

Mondschwein

I love Goblin Trenches and Lightning Helix. The third slot for Boros in my cube often changes. There was Firemane Avenger in my first iteration of it, then I added Warleader's Helix, but I found it to be awkward between Helix and Ribbons of Night. After that, I added Boros Reckoner, but it didn't help neither RWx Control nor Boros tokens (aggro/midrange), so I added Chained to the Rocks instead. As I'm constantly lowering the power level of my cube since the beginning of this year, I'm now at a point where I think about cutting CtR for being too efficiently costed for what it actually does, and am in search for an alternative.

Going back to the Avenger would fit the tokens theme perfectly, but outside of that there isn't much potential. Nahiri, the Harbinger doesn't look too bad, but maybe a bit strong? I already have Daretti, Scrap Savant in my cube as a 4-mana looting PW and I really like it, but could those two coexist in a list where there shouldn't be cards that are generally more powerful at the same cost? Being two colours is the reason why I'm still wondering.

Rally the Peasants is another card in my list that really fits the Boros lists, and I like it as a finisher, especially for midrange tokens.
 
ravnic

ravnic

Yeah, battalion is fine as a guilds mechanic, a much better fit than radiance was after all.

I like Rally the Peasants too, but it felt akward to run it AND Glory of Warfare in a 4-card section. And I think the enchantment is better. It is not instant speed and can't make for the swingy wins, but the constant bonus makes it much more appealing for slower decks, while still being a good anthem effect for aggro lists. And having all your Goblin and Spirit tokens as 3/1 attackers and 1/3 blockers is big game. This way it maximizes you damage output when your beating down and gives you super resilent blockers when you're behind.
 
sigh

sigh

I run Rally the Peasants in white, and have zero qualms about doing so. The front end of a white-shifted Trumpet Blast is perfectly decent on it's own, and the flashback is fine even with a very light splash of red. Rally is really great, and provides a really important effect for a format, in a color that can really capitalize on it too.

Glory of Warfare is ok, but I'd probably rather have Alpha Edition Orcish Orifamme, because it's half the cost and one color. In the RW section, I definitely prefer the lovely lady honored crop-captain
 
Rasmus Källqvist

Rasmus Källqvist

I love the flashback cards that I run several of them as mono colored. Not having both colors won't wreck you with them in the same way a gold card does. Same reason I decided to run kird ape as a red card. Will try to find room for Rally too I think.
 
Chris Taylor

Chris Taylor

Contributor
Rasmus Källqvist said:
I love the flashback cards that I run several of them as mono colored. Not having both colors won't wreck you with them in the same way a gold card does. Same reason I decided to run kird ape as a red card. Will try to find room for Rally too I think.
Click to expand...

Anyone actually playing kird ape like a red card is doing it wrong :p
That being said, you could run literally 10 more red cards than any other color and your drafters wouldn't notice, let alone an extra one.
 
Grillo_Parlante

Grillo_Parlante

Contributor
I would say Boros is probably one of the deeper guilds. Its a great candidiate to root an artifact sub-theme into, as part of a RWU artifact wedge, and most of its aggressive strategies scale very nicely up into aggressive midrange or midrange strategies. It can do micro-reanimator pretty easily, as well as prowess (which can also be nested into a RWU wedge), or artifact reanimator. Its aggro decks tend to be nuanced and deep, with ample disruption, control, and aggressive elements present. Great guild.
 
ahadabans

ahadabans

I find book keeping necessary to prevent analysis paralysis. I agree most of it is unnecessary design constraints with no purpose other than OCD placation. But I simply can't design a cube unless I set a bunch of artificial limiters. I may remove some of them over time, but to start without any is to basically have no cube. At least for me.
 
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