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Rakdos (black/red) Midrange is one of the strongest decks available in 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Magic: The Gathering's ✃Standard format. The deck has access to some of the best cards in the entire format whi꧃le being a consistent threat.
Midrange decks are the style in between Aggro and Control. They thrive off of🉐 one-for-one trades with other permanents, often with removal spells while slowly out-resourcing your opponent. Rakdos Midrange in particular tends to put down low-mana threats onto the battlefield to chip in for quick damage. At the same time, it lets you win by casting its explosive spells to deal the last bit of damage you need to close the gameജ out.
Updated June 8th, 2023 by Johnny Garcia: Standard players received the news that the usual rotation would not be happening in 2023, and sets would be legal in the format for three years as opposed to two. Due to this change, a banlist was released to remove cards that had caused the meta to stagnate and not be a part of this new Standard. These bans were aimed primarily at Rakdos Midrange, with Fable Of The Mirror-Breaker, Invoke Despair, and Reckoner Bankbuster all no longer allowed in the format. Despite these bans, Rakdos Midrange is still a solid deck thanks to the plethora of options the color pairing has access to.
Sample Decklist
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Main Deck |
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2 Chandra, Hope's Beacon |
4 Bloodtithe Harvester |
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2 Etali, Primal Conqueror |
4 Graveyard Trespasser |
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2 Sheoldred, the Apocalypse |
4 Tenacious Underdog |
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1 Light Up The Night |
2 Abrade |
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2 Cut Down |
4 Go For The Throat |
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2 Sheoldred |
2 Invasion Of Azgol |
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2 Liliana Of The Veil |
4 Haunted Ridge |
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1 Gix, Yawgmoth Praetor |
4 Blackcleave Cliffs |
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5 Mountain |
1 Sokenzan, Crucible of Defiance |
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4 Sulfurous Springs |
7 Swamp |
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1 Takenuma, Abandoned Mire |
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Sideboard |
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3 Brotherhood's End |
2 Dreams of Steel and Oil |
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3 Duress |
3 Lithomantic Barrage |
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2 Razorlash Transmogrant |
2 Unlicensed Hearse |
Key Cards
Bloodtithe Harvester
Bloodtithe Harvester is one of the few cards that are a must-run at the maximum of four copies. For just two mana, you get a creature with solid stats that can deal three damage, access to discarding a dead card in your hand for a better one with the Blood token, and a removal spell thanks to Bloodtithe Harvester's sacrifice effect.
Its three power is very relevant as many popular creatures have three or less toughness. It often dies in combat due to its lower toughness, but Bloodtithe Har🐭vester is a strong utili🏅ty card that is incredibly easy to cast. If you get multiple Blood tokens onto the battlefield, Bloodtithe Harvester can be used as fantastic removal that gets around indestructible.
Tenacious Underdog
Rakdos Midrange can suffer with card draw, but Tenacious Underdog is a way to get around this weakness. This comes in the form of its blitz ability. It gives you a constant source of card draw when it dies iಞf you pay the blitz cost, and unlike other blitz cards it can be used from the graveyard.
This allows you to continuously use its effect to put pressure on your opponent. It has decent stats that lead to it being able to destroy most creatures in combat. It's a solid card to discard as well as you can replay it from the graveyard so you can push your card advantage even further.
Liliana Of The Veil
Liliana Of The Veil is a phenomenal planeswalker that slowly but surely destroys your opponent's hand with its +1 ability. Often, it acts as removal as well with its -2 ability which also gets around protection such as ward or hexproof. It is best used in combination with removal spells so you get rid of the creature your opponent would want to sacrifice and force them to sacrifice a stronger one.
Though the -6 ability seldom comes up, if it does you can win the game off of it by forcing awkward decisions to have to be made. Liliana Of The Veil is easy to cast to allow you to start using it righ🏅t away. The discard ability is where it shines and if the opponent does not have a way to draw cards it leads to them having little to play.
Tenacious Underdog is an excellent choice to discard for Liliana's +1 effect as you can use its blitz ability from the graveyard.
Sheoldred, The Apocalypse
While Sheoldred, the Apocalypse generally should not be run at the max four copies, it's best to include at least two in your Rakdos Midrange deck. The biggest downside to Rakdos Midrange is it often doesn't have much of a comeback factor.
Sheoldred, the Apocalypse is one of the main ways Rakdos Midrange can get back in the game from a deficient. It will give you life when you draw cards, and since you have multiple ways to draw cards, you can take advantage of this effect quite easily. It also often forces your opponent to use their removal on it as the two damage burn it does can slow them down drastically, especially if they're also playing a Midrange deck.
Chandra, Hope's Beacon
The main way to close out games, Chandra, Hope's Beacon is the top-end Rakdos Midrange decks look for in order to deal the last amount of damage needed. Its -X ability helps to act as removal and direct damage to the opponent while the other effect꧒s help to cast any ♕other spells.
If Chandra, Hope's Beacon stays on the battlefield for a whole turn, it often leads to a win, especially if you're able to copy powerful spells with Chandra's passive effect. The loyalty Chandra has combos with Light Up the Night in the graveyard to help pay for 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:its flashback cost (which is also a great choi🌱ce of spell to copy to deal a massive outburst of b🍎urn damage).
How To Play Rakdos Midrange
Rakdos Midrange is all about answering your opponent's threats while slowly building up a board presence. You'll have multiple instant removal spells, with Cut Down able to take care of low-stat creatures and Go For The Throat able to handle any nonartifact creature (though they are hardly played in Standard). For the few artifact creatures common in Standard like Phyrexian Fleshgorger, you have Abrade to take care of those (or creatures wit🍸h three or less toughness).
You do not always want to immediately use your removal spells. It's best to save them to deal with creatures preventing you from getting in for damage.
Rakdos Midrange plays a small number of creatures, but all of them provide some kind of value when played. Don't be afraid to commit to creature trades in combat as the higher-mana spells are capable of helping you stay in the game even if you don't have many creatures on your side of the battlefield. Creature trades are especially strong with Tenacious Underdog as you can b൲ring it back later when you want t🔥o get aggressive with blitz.
Games while playing Rakdos Midrange can often last for a long time with how much is being removed (be it with spells or😼 through comba🔯t), so you will often have a lot of mana sources on the battlefield. This is where the big mana spells come into play.
Etali, Primal Conqueror can be a game-winner if it's not removed and you're able to transform it. Casting Etali gets you two extra spells for free that can be your other game-winning spells (or your opponent's). Chandra, Hope's Beacon is the best endgame card as it lets you dig through your deck for removal, which youꦗ can copy to clear the battlefi🏅eld and burn for lethal damage.
The -X ability lets you target up to two targets, which can deal direct burn damage and remove a creature, or remove two creatures so the creatures on your s🌞ide of the b🌸attlefield can attack without having to worry about blockers.