"My red deck is so fast I cut Koth!" "Oh yeah?! My red deck is so fast I cut Goblin Guide! OH SNAP!!"

YEAH! WHAT'S UP?!?! I cut GOBLIN GUIDE from my red deck! You know I'm good!

Maybe you haven't had this pleasure:
Sitting down in the last round of an FNM where you're X-1 and a win here gets you a prize. You're pumped because you have a home made brew in your hands that all of your friends made fun of you for building. "Oh yeah guys? I'll just go win FNM with it!" you told them. But hey, you didn't win, but 4-1 isn't bad, and maybe the deck needs tuning. You can recall that one awkward moment against UB control where you realized you didn't play around Spell Pierce, but besides that you think you played fine all day. Roll the dice: 5, he gets a 9. Ok, not great, but I won all my die rolls today so losing once isn't the end of the world. Hand is slightly slow, but i'm on the draw, so maybe I can get a little more early action... HOLY CRAP I JUST GOT HIT FOR 5 ON TURN 1!! Draw for turn, Comes into play tapped land, pass. Take a punch of 10 damage to the face, draw for turn, enter scoop phase. Looks like I don't price.

If this has happened to you, you know it's an experience you never want to have again. Mark just wrote a piece on the Kuldotha Red deck over on Deckmaster Central. He has Goblin Guide in his list, but does note that the worst openings with the deck are those that include the Guide. Now let me put this out there: I don't want to play this deck. This is a deck I will probably have on hand in some form simply to grind games against. However, this is a powerful deck and no matter how narrow a deck may seem (puke your entire hand on the table, hope it gets there), there is still plenty of room for innovation.

One thing of note is how this deck curves out at 1, maybe 2 for Goblin Wardriver. However, many decks play 4 Mox Opals and has access to 2 mana on turn 1, so having 3 drops isn't out of question. Note in Mark's sideboard there are 3 Tuk Tuk, the Explorers and 2 Goblin Chieftans. Theres a guy at my store who made his own rendition that runs Raid Bombardment. What do these cards add? A TON!

If Tuk Tuk had a facebook, he could post the same status after every FNM: "The Day of Judgement came, but I returned to pwn face!"

Goblin Chieftan is very dependant on your list, and in Mark's case (running Guide) it is a good choice because there are a ton of Goblins to pump.

Quick Aside
{
You know why Battle Cry is so good? Every creature you have with Battle Cry is a lord. When you're attacking having the extra toughness is less important than the extra power. That's why Contested Warzone is so good. Would you play a land that didn't produce mana, but has Glorious Anthem attached? Would you play Maze of Ith? ($26)
}
End Aside

How many Battle Cry-Esque effects can we get?
Goblin Chieftan
Signal Pest
Goblin Wardriver
Raid Bombardment
Goblin Bushwacker

How can we make the most of our Battle Cry-Esque effect? We need tons of creatures!
Kuldotha Rebirth: 3 creatures
Devastating Summons: 2 creatures

Guess what? You don't need to Devastating Summons for more than 1 land to get value!

So because of all this, our clear strategy is to overwhelm the board full of tiny tokens that hit for 3-4 each when they actually attack.

So that's why Goblin Guide can considered the slowest card in the deck! We don't want to win on turn 1, we want to win on turns 2-3!

Now we're talking about a nutty deck to try and deal with. How can you possibly deal with such an expansive army on turn 1 or 2? Slagstorm is far better than Pyroclasm in terms of what it does for its mana, because for an additional R, we can hit the landfall creatures (Steppe Lynx, Plated Geopede) to blow up Jace. However, it may just be a turn too slow for Kuldotha Red.

Remember when I said we could have a couple of 3's to mix it up? What if we also were too cool to stick it just to red? Read this nice and slow:

Beastmaster Ascension

Dark Tutalege

^^Read that again^^

As if having your creatures bash for 3-4 a piece isn't enough, what if we just tack on another +5/+5? One quick note: If you want Beastmaster Ascension, cut Raid Bombardment. They don't play nice with eachother. But hey, Beastmaster Ascension is a beating! It had its moment of glory in the Zvi deck back in block contructed, but this is the perfect kind of deck that can bring it back. This is a swarm deck, so was Zvi's.

Maybe you don't want to go for the raw power approach. After all, if you don't get your Ascension off, you can still auto-lose to Pyroclasm/Slagstorm. Maybe you want to play Phyrexian Arena, but usually better. Then go for Dark Tutalege. Drawing 2 cards a turn WHILE being the hardcore beatdown deck that makes your opponent gasping for even a single extra life point is brutal.

The splash is easy: we currently have 2 dual lands that can conditionally come into play untapped: Blackcleave Cliffs/Copperline Gorge and Dragonskull Summit/Rootbound Crag. Just play 4 of each, mountains, and a couple Contested Warzone, and we have an instant mana base.

I feel like this is the best version of red deck right now because it doesn't give control decks a moment to make a mistake. Of those 2 splash cards, I would opt for Dark Tutalege simply because the deck already provides good beats, and Dark Tutalege is a far better card to draw after they Day of Judgement. Here is my list:

4x Memnite
4x Ornithopter
4x Goblin Bushwacker
4x Signal Pest
2x Goblin Wardriver

4x Kuldotha Rebirth
3x Devastating Summons
2x Dark Tutalege
3x Raid Bombardment
4x Lightning Bolt
2x Chimeric Mass
2x Jinxed Idol
1x Flayer Husk

4x Mox Opal
3x Dragonskull Summit
4x Blackcleave Cliffs
2x Contested Warzone
8x Mountain

If you are like me, you probably didn't read that list. So let me pull out a couple cards I think I will get crap for from those who do read this: Jinxed Idol and Flayer Husk. This is the swarmiest of swarm decks, so we should always win the Jinxed Idol war, and I can tell you first hand that Jinxed Idol basically halves your life total. Flayer Husk is another atypical card, but a 1/1 for 1 is right on curve, and he acts as another anti-sweeper card by effectively staying alive post wrath.

In the sideboard, I would suggest running Flame Slash. Perimeter Captain is VERY good at stopping this deck. I know because I was able to turn off 3 attackers with a single one in practicing against it with my UW Shape Anew deck. Also, losing the option of hitting the opponent is much less important than losing the option of making profitable attacks. Forked Bolt is also the tech of choice for the Mirror by being able to kill 2 creatures for R.

So, how do we beat this deck? If you don't have a plan, you will get chewed up and spat out in the first 10 minutes. My weapon of choice as a UW control player would be Perimeter Captain, Spell Pierce, and Oust. Yes, Oust is a card I didn't mention before, but it is fantastic if I'm killing with poison, and is even good against RUG (just hit Cobra, and they lose their explosive opening).

He who is not prepared shall be crushed!

Until next time, stay classy!