A Look At The Boros Aggro Deck

Hello everyone.  Welcome to Standard Weekly!

This week’s article looks at Boros Aggro, one of the newer decks from Streets of New Capenna season, because of its place as a top best-of-one deck on Arena that has shifted into a very competitive best-of-three deck in tournaments.

What has made Boros Aggro so popular among best-of-one players on Arena is the deck’s consistent speed. 

When Boros Aggro has a good starting hand, it can quickly flood the board with creatures and still have removal spells to take out the early creatures your opponent plays.  This makes Boros Aggro a deck to play against, now, or after rotation.

Given that you have a good curve to your opening hand, on turn one you play either Kumano Faces Kakkazan or Hopeful Initiate. 

Kumano Faces Kakkazan is a saga that deals one point of damage to your opponent and any planeswalkers he controls the turn it enters play.  On chapter 2, Kumano Faces Kakkazan gives the first creature you play a +1/+1 counter.  When it gets its third lore counter, Kumano Faces Kakkazan is exiled and then returns to the battlefield as Etching of Kumano. 

This 2/2 creature has haste and when any creature your opponent controls dies, it is sent to exile.  This ability plays an important role against decks that can bring back creatures from the graveyard by preventing them from casting cards that bring creatures back from the graveyard or from casting creatures from the graveyard.  Both Innistrad sets had creatures designed to be cast from the graveyard and several reanimation spells that see standard play.  Etching of Kumano offers a lot of value for only one red mana.

Hopeful Initiate is the little engine that could in the deck. 

For one white mana, you get a 1/ 2 human with training.  When another creature attacks with Hopeful Initiate that has a higher power it trains.  When it trains it gets a +1/+1 counter.  Typically, Hopeful Initiate trains several times in a game making it a larger and larger threat as the game advances.  Hopeful Initiate has a second ability.  For two mana and a white mana you can remove two counters from among creatures you control to destroy an artifact or an enchantment.  

Given the option of casting either card on turn one, my preference is Kumano Faces Kakkazan. 

The value that Kumano Faces Kakkazan brings to the board is too much to wait on for a later turn.  The only situation where I choose Hopeful Initiate as my turn one play is when I have Bloodthirsty Adversary to play on turn two.  This will train Hopeful Initiate on turn two and lead to dealing 4 damage to an opponent who does not have a creature to block with this turn.

On turn two, the deck has Bloodthirsty Adversary and Luminarch Aspirant. 

Bloodthirsty Adversary pairs well with Hopeful Initiate.  For two mana, you get a 2/2 vampire with haste that can grow itself when cast late in the game.  When Bloodthirsty Adversary enters the battlefield you have the ability to spend an additional three mana for a +1/+1 counter and you get to cast an instant or sorcery that costs three mana or less from your graveyard.  You have the ability to do this as many times as you want, so you can cast multiple burn spells from your graveyard if you have the extra mana. 

In a previous article, I noted the power of Luminarch Aspirant.  Nothing has changed.  Getting to put a +1/+1 counter on a creature at the beginning of your attack step grows your team and can lead to lethal damage from attacking creatures as early as turn four.

On turn three, Brutal Cathar and Sunrise Cavalier give you quality options that allow you to continue the beat down of your opponent or the ability to remove from play a creature on your opponent’s side. 

Sunrise Cavalier gives you a 3/3 creature with haste and trample with the ability to turn on the day night cycle.  Like Bloodthirsty Adversary, Sunrise Cavalier pairs well with Hopeful Initiate.  The ability to get through trample damage is important to the deck because typically when you lose a game your opponent has a low life total.  The extra point or two of damage from Sunrise Cavalier can be the difference in a game.  When day becomes night or night becomes day, Sunrise Cavalier gets a +1/+1 counter you may put on any of your creatures.

Brutal Cathar is a 2/2 human soldier werewolf with the ability to exile a creature your opponent controls when it enters play. 

The creature remains exiled until Brutal Cathar leaves the battlefield.  Most of the time, I wait to deploy Brutal Cathar until I get to a turn where I need to remove my opponent’s best creature to continue attacking or on a turn where I can exile a token with the ability. 

Brutal Cathar also starts the day-night cycle.  When day becomes night, Brutal Cathar transforms into Moonrage Brute. 

This 3/3 werewolf has first strike and ward of pay three life.  This makes Moonrage Brute a quality attacker that defends itself with the ward ability.  Then when night becomes day, Moonrage Brute transforms into Brutal Cathar.  This transformation activates Brutal Cathar ability to exile a target creature making it a powerful creature that your opponent must deal with or it can repeatedly exile your opponent’s creatures.

On turn four, you want to play Thundering Raiju. 

For two colorless and two red mana, you get a 3/3 spirit that has haste and a powerful ability.  When Thundering Raiju attacks, it puts a +1/+1 counter on target creature you control.  Then Thundering Raiju deals X damage to each opponent, where X is the number of modified creatures you control other than Thundering Raiju.  The ability to deal direct damage to your opponent by doing what the deck is designed to do makes Thundering Raiju a very important part of the deck.  When your opponent cannot deal with Thundering Raiju it takes over the game and ends the game on the turn it enters play or in a few turns.

Now that we have looked at the creatures in the deck, it is time to discuss the decks removal and burn spells.  Play With Fire and Roil Eruption give you the ability to strike any target. 

For one red mana, Play With Fire deals two damage to any target and if that damage was to a player you get to scry one.  While Roil Eruption deals three damage to any target for a colorless and a red mana.  The drawback to Roil Eruption is that it is sorcery, so you cannot use it at instant speed to respond to your opponent’s decisions.  Roil Eruption will rotate out of standard, but we already have its replacement from Dominaria United in Lightning Strike.  Red decks have suffered over the past few years because they lacked an instant speed removal spell for only two mana.  Lightning Strikes return solves that problem.

The final removal piece in the deck is Valorous Stance. 

For two mana, you get an instant that either makes a creature indestructible or kills a creature with toughness four or greater.  Most of the time, you will use Valorous Stance to remove a large creature your opponent has, but there will be time you will use it to protect one of your creatures.

Now that Dominaria United spoiler season has started, we have the chance to see what new cards might find their way into Boros Aggro.  One Card for sure is Lightning Strike. 

The other card that might be a good replacement for Luminarch Aspirant is Guardian of New Benalia. 

This two-mana white human soldier has three abilities that make it ideal for the deck. 

First, it has the new keyword enlist.  When Guardian of New Benalia attacks, you can enlist the aid of another creature by tapping it.  Guardian of New Benalia adds the power of the tapped creature to its own making it a bigger threat.  Whenever Guardian of New Benalia activates this ability, you also get to scry two.  This gives you card filtering that should help you advance your game plan by moving unneeded cards to the bottom of your library. Guardian’s final ability allows you to discard a card to give it indestructible until the end of the turn.  This means that you can constantly protect Guardian no matter which creature your opponent choices to block with when you attack.

Designing the deck’s mana base post rotation presents a challenge because Boros did not get a pain land from Dominaria United, so you will have to use a slow lands from Kamagawa: Neon Dynasty, Wind-Scarred Crag, or from Streets of New Capenna, Cabaretti Courtyard and Jetmir’s Garden.  Each of these lands comes into play tapped, so you cannot use the mana on the turn you play it.  Jetmir’s Garden does allow you to cycle the land, so it can have value late in a game.

Here is my first take on a post-rotation version of the deck.  The sideboard still needs to replace 2 Elite Spellbinders, but I expect we will get a good option from Dominaria United or we could use a creature from the Innistrad sets.

Boros Aggro: Scott Trepanier

That’s it for this week.  I’ll see you next time.