Devil's Play is just a terrible card when cast from the graveyard, so I did end up going with 3x Fling in that slot. Now if the deck gets disrupted, I can play a cheap Ghoultree and toss it for the win. It's also great in the second main phase after a Bloodrush attack.
This deck is very fun. I won a game last night with an 11/11 double-striking Splinterfright , my biggest turn 5 bash yet.
I read through a lot of threads of new (or more experienced) players with deck ideas that are hopelessly beyond any shred of redemption in a competitive environment. I saw this thread and assumed this deck was in the same category. There were some card choices I disagreed with but I built a version around the core idea and was impressed. The deck was much much better than I had anticipated. That said, I think all this double striking and faithless looting is a bad idea. This is an aggro deck. We want it to be as fast as possible.
This deck is like a burn deck. Bloodrush their face at every opportunity. It only runs 21 lands, but our curve tops out at 3 and we have 4x mulch. The major difference between this deck and some other versions is experiment one over faithless looting . Instead of card disadvantage, we are playing a creature that can quickly balloon in size. Vexing devil triggers evolve. My first match with this deck went experiment, experiment, vexing devil-> swing for 2. Less aggressive starts can be along the lines of experiment->skinbrand goblin-> slaughterhorn. By playing a powerful one drop, we get the option of bloodrushing on turn 2, which means we will almost always have the option of splinter/boneyard on turn 3. Playing the lower drop bloorush guys also dramatically improves fling. We hope to end the game with 4 mana in play, which means we probably wont have time to bloodrush-fling a zhur-taa swine. If we do have time, great, they are probably dead and we didnt need wrecking ogre. Fling really helps get around removal. Flinging ghoultree is also pretty scary.
EDIT: forgot about flinthoof boar . That guy should be main, over skinbrand goblin. Id like to fit 4x but what spots should be cuts Im not sure. Having experiment and flinthoof means we can reasonably transform into gruul aggro and dodge grave hate.
Thanks for the input mr.physics, I'm glad you liked the idea. I didn't consider bloodrushing on T2 as a more aggressive way to allow a T3 Splinterfright , that's actually pretty sweet. From my experience, Fling has been absolutely devastating in this deck, as has Ghor-Clan Rampager . I have swung with Ghoultree , bloodrushed with Ghor-Clan for 14/14 trample, and then thrown him at my opponent's face for another 14.
My build isn't fast like yours, but it only needs to connect twice to win, on average. If I get disrupted by removal, the Ghoultree/Fling combo usually costs 5 mana or less to close out the game.
I am going to give your aggressive version some testing, it looks good. I love my Wrecking Ogre , however. +4/+4 and double-strike on Splinty is downright cruel.
flinthoof boar was really the best thing from that list. Though I will admit that having more than three potential bombs does sound nice.
as far as looting being disadvantage I think that would depend on the deck. Refreshing a couple of cards to potentially draw into creatures that want you to have creatures in the grave sounds advantageous to me.
Further testing appears to indicate that my initial positive reaction may have been due to the overall power of Gruul Aggro. Slaughterhorn and rampager are simply pretty good cards due to versatility. Unfortunately, the deck has the speed of aggro but the consistency of combo and the weakness of combo. Part of the issue is that deathrite shaman is good enough to maindeck and just wrecks us, and there doesnt seem to be a reason to use this build
There's always Ground Seal for the SB in case of Deathrite Shaman . Anyway, it's a fun concept, and can produce some jaw-dropping wins if it gets a good draw.
Deathrite won't catch up in time to the amount of damage that will be dealt, unless they found a way to untap him. Also deathrite is so easily dealt with. Its a 1/2 creature, and there's room for burn/removal in the side. Pillar of Flame and he goes up in smoke.
