Rakdos Pit Dragon

[Aricanius]

Rakdos Pit Dragon - :2: :r: :r:
Creature - Dragon {R}

:r: :r: : Rakdos Pit Dragon gains flying until end of turn.

:r: : Rakdos Pit Dragon +1/+0 until end of turn.

Hellbent - Rakdos Pit Dragon has double strike as long as you have no cards in hand.

3/3

[Aricanius]

Ladies and gentlemen, the card that broke the format.

This card loves Blazing Shoal, since it enables hellbent quicker and pumps the damage up, and let's not forget a card names Umezawa's Jitte, but who cares about the Jitte if you're killing on turn 4?

[Kird_Ape]

hmmm seems okay....RR might be hard to get though...if u ask me hellbent is kinda....dumb

[RedDragon1]

Link? Somefing?

[Aricanius]

Link? Somefing?

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=mtgcom/daily/mf89

[Aricanius]

hmmm seems okay....RR might be hard to get though...if u ask me hellbent is kinda....dumb

RR isn't hard if you're playing mono-red.

Hellbent is supposed to be a risky thing to get, but on the other hand, if you're playing mono-red with burn then you typically run out of steam... and when that happens, your creatures get wicked abilities.

This guy enables a turn 4 kill quite easily.

[Flaming ninja]

With so many 1cc or 2 cc burn spells like Shock, Volcanic hammer, Glacial Ray, Lava spike, Hellbent is quite achieveable with red apparently. With this dragon, it is really freaking wicked after it gets Hellbent.

Too bad Chrome Mox is rotated out or it will even be easier to get this out early. About the turn 4 kill, you will have to playtest it in order to find out.

But yes, the revival of mono-red deck has come again. Blood moon will also shine again.

[Risky]

So you're saying that Last Gasp and Lighting Helix are going to be very important for the next year between this and Batman.

[Aricanius]

So you're saying that Last Gasp and Lighting Helix are going to be very important for the next year between this and Batman.
Rakdos mostly revolves around 3 toughness. I'd like to post another spoiler, but it's not an official preview. Could always just head over to Wizard's board to check it out, they seem to allow non-official ones.

[Galvatron]

sweet tim to star hording mor kagemaros lol an devouring lights
oh wel from this stand pin it's better than rkdos himself

[Riplak1]

sweet tim to star hording mor kagemaros lol an devouring lights
oh wel from this stand pin it's better than rkdos himself

What did he just say?

[Haemoglobin]

This card is worse than a lot of people think. It's very mana consuming, which aggressive decks don't like, Hellbent is still very hard to enable even with lots of cheap burn you still have to dump your whole hand. Plus this card comes out turn 4. Against extremely aggressive decks they could have taken a large chunk out of your life total by then, plus this dies to most pieces of removal, Mortify, Putrefy, Fetters, Helix, Hammer all come to mind.
Highly resembles Furnace Whelp, which wasn't fantastic.

[DeathDuel]

Yes, this is a good card, im just worried about the 3 points of toughness.

[DeathDuel]

he said,

Sweet, Time to start holding more Kagemoros,lol, holding devouring light, from a standard point, this card is better than Radkos himself.

[clustro]

why play mono in this format people need to stop suggesting it please...just no...

[nix-ice-]

OMFG this guy is a house and just for the record i hate the "oh it dies to volcanic hammer mortify putrefy....etc" argument because face it kid so does EVERY other creature in this format ok i mean seriously your mentioning pointless things. This guy is so good, that your opponent must find a way to deal with it right away or lose the game, thats just how good he is, r/g control of some sort, turn one forest birds, turn 2 land stone rain, turn 3 land, this guy turn 4 land another one maybe or stonerain/wreak havoc/demolish. turn 5 land shock shock, Beat face. gg

[Kird_Ape]

Hellbent is still very hard to enable even with lots of cheap burn you still have to dump your whole handactually its easy to happen with one with nothing crappy? yes card dumping? yes worst card that will never see play? proablly not....

[8thjunkie]

Well.... absolutly bad idea comparing a red dragon that requires NO hand to be good to the man, the myth, THE MORPHLING.

[kdevore]

Seems like he could be okay with enablers in extended such as chrome mox as someone else has mentioned. Hellbent seems like it will be pretty solid. Looking forward to extended season and trying to abuse it in conjunction with Zombie Infestation and Dr. Teeth. There are soooo many enablers in that format, but then again it may not be viable due to people already trying to hate out/beat ichorid and tog.

[Mishra-]

this card is ok.Competes with solifuge in the 4 casting cost slot tho.not sure it its good enough for type 2 at the moment.

[NineTwoFeeva]

maybe you will see it used with that aethermages touch ? hmmmm

[Aricanius]

maybe you will see it used with that aethermages touch ? hmmmm

What advantage would Touch give this card? You wouldn't have the right mana to use any of its abilities.

[Skaldenbach]

I like the idea of Tempo Burn/LD before this guy starts hurting. If we try to build for the immediate kill on turn 4, we will be disappointed by a single Last Gasp, Lightning Helix, Volcanic Hammer, Putrefy, Mortify, Boomerang, etc. Build around that... Deny them mana to cast thier "outs", THEN pummel them when you have more than enough to get him pumped up.

Sample Idea:

4x Rakdos Pit Dragon
4x STE
4x Birds (or Farseek)
4x Stoneshaker Shaman (finally a use for him!! Holding mana for an out? Dont think so!)
2-3x Ankh of Mishra Goblin (cant think of his name)

4x Stone Rain
4x Demolish
4x Wreak Havoc
4x Lava Spike
3x Sensei's Top (so the Shaman doesn't ruin you)
Xx Burn of some sort (Shock, etc)

4x Gruul Guild land (+1/+1 land)
4x Stomping Grounds
4x Karplusan Forest
Xx Mix of Basics

Now, dont hold me to the numbers. Just some random ideas. It may need some board sweepers, like Pyroclasm, to keep things in your favor. Not entirely sure yet... Again, just some ideas.

Other possible inclusions:
-Rumbling Slum
-Giant Solifuge
-Flames of the Blood Hand (for the annoying Hierarch)
-Red Rusalka (for the extra ping for the win)

-=Skald=-

[Aricanius]

Zo-Zu the Punisher

My deck idea looks like:

4x Scorched Rusalka
4x Frenzied Goblin
4x Rakdos Guildmage
4x *************
4x Rakdos Pit Dragon

4x *************
4x Seal of Fire
4x Char
4x Rakdos Signet
4x O-Naginata

20x Mountain

Those *'s clarify a few things, but they haven't been shown here The Guildmage might be replaced by something else if its ability isn't useful, and if the black ability is useful then some dual lands get inserted. Might change the Rakdos Guildmage to a Gruul Guildmage for the reusable Shock.

[Haemoglobin]

Firstly, you shouldn't go giving away cards which haven't been officially previewed, you might get banned, you know which card I'm talking about. This card seems very good on the surface, but it is very slow, and people who suggest One With Nothing, just no. The only deck this should see play in is mono red and I don't think that will have a huge impact on the metagame, as BR is just far superior, Lyzolda the Blood Witch is just stupidly good. I can't see this seeing a large amount of play in T2, it's too slow for Rakdos, and Azorius and Simic builds will be able to beat this card, if you don't believe me look at the spoiler and see what I'm talking about.

[buddelicious]

Did I hear someone say they were gonna team this up with Zombie Infestation and Psychatog? If you do get Rakados Pit Dragon, Tog and ZI out on me im just gonna quit life... or cast Wrath of God.

BTW its Gods son jesus' birthday, in a way... Go celebrate and play those control decks with Wrath of God. Not really and Jesus cards yet...

[wyatt290]

i would like to know hoe he easily kills turn four fellas with cards like char and helix and counters....well even if theyre not there tell me the turn for kill easily please because he has not broken the format yes hes awesome i know i want 8 of them but just tell me how you think he broke the format and the turn four kill

[Risky]

For the record, I was not saying that this card is bad because it dies to Gasp and Helix. Quite the opposite, I was saying those two spells will be better because they can kill this, along with Skeletal Vampire.

[Kird_Ape]

id like to see some one try to beat sum1 with a deck based around this guy lol...

[Aricanius]

i would like to know hoe he easily kills turn four fellas with cards like char and helix and counters....well even if theyre not there tell me the turn for kill easily please because he has not broken the format yes hes awesome i know i want 8 of them but just tell me how you think he broke the format and the turn four kill

With a signet he can come out turn 3, and if you pitch a shoal to him to activate hellbent and activate jump and firebreathing twice, you can easily deal 16 or so damage on turn 4. That's a shock land and shock away from turn 4 kill.

[kryogen]

So first turn Stomping Ground, Kird Ape. (5 cards in hand)
Second turn Draw; Mountain, Birds of Paradise, swing for 2 (18). End of Opp turn Shock them (16). (3 cards in hand)
Third turn Draw; (Land), Pit Dragon, swing for 2 (16).
Fourth turn Draw (4); Land (3), Pitch other pit dragon spell to Shoal to give active one +4/+0 until EOT (1), cast your Seething Song (0) which gives Rakdos hellbent/double strike and use the remaining mana (1 land, 1 bird, 5 red) to give him +7 more, for a total of 14 double strike damage. Swing for 28. (-12)

Thats about all I can think of, I'm sure its possible to do it faster.

1: Stomping Ground (6), Birds (5 in Hand)
2: Draw(6); Mountain(5), Seething Song(4), Pit Dragon (3 in Hand)
3: Draw(4); Mountain(3), Seething Song(2), tap open mountain, pump RRRR into +1/+0 and RR into Flying (7/3), pitch any red card 3cc or higher to Shoal (0 in Hand) to give the dragon 1x/3 and do 20-26 points of damage on turn 3.

[GenericKen]

Or you could throw two blazing shoals onto him (or three blazing shoals onto the birds).

He's not a combo card. He's a very solid card with only 3 toughness and a very shaky mechanic to sit on.

Bottom line, because of the 3 toughness you can't build around him (char kills just as well as gasp, helix, mortify, putrify, etc). At least, not just around him. Hellbent is going to need three or four other very solid and cheap hellbent cards to make a real deck.

Suprisingly, without the jump ability, he becomes much, much less playable. And the feature article was quite mistaken about meloku: Meloku *hates* doublestrike and bouncing 6-10 lands to kill this guy.

[Kird_Ape]

yeah but they need to empty their whole hand for him to be good, turn 4 i verry highly doubt you will empty your whole hand by turn 4, they take their turn 5 and play meloku, if u can empty your hand at turn 5 maybe with one with nothing or discard cards or stuff like that, then hes good against meloku, meloku can just ignore him and block with 1 1/1 and ignore him and proceed to beat you, unless you wait and wait and wait for meloku to attack, then theres no real point cause the player will probally proceed to beat you if you just stall out for meloku to attack so you can use jump and pump twice [doubt you will be able to jump AND pump twice RRRR hard to get] then thats dumb meloku is alot better than this...if it had flying to start with than MAYBE

[wyatt290]

i see what you mean hes pretty good i know but i just cant see a consistant turn 4 kill iwth this guy and defintly blazing shoal wont be used it is soooooooooo bad it would be kool though to blazing shoal pitcha bts swing for 12+it could happen i guess i just cant see it.

and where do you think he'll fit in in grull beats does anyone think he'll fit into heezy street build?
and kyrogen your not ever gonna get a god draw like that a turn 3 kill iwth the dragon if you can do that consistantly good for you but i just dont have those kinda mad skills

[Pilloku]

FINALLY!!!! This makes mono red in standard playable, ooooeee..... I am going to play the hell out of this card. s

[Haemoglobin]

Yes it makes it playable, but it doesn't make it good.

[the Starter]

this dragon is good as a nice little finisher in mono-red builds when the ground gets stuck and your solifuges can't get through, but a deck around him, not a good idea.

and yeah the 3 toughness is a drawback bot can be ignored sometimes... just imagine how broken he would be with Moldervine Cloak...

[arcane]

actually its easy to happen with one with nothing crappy? yes card dumping? yes worst card that will never see play? proablly not....
omg, someone is actually thinking to play one with nothing, u r a brave man.... using a crappy card.
i personally think OWN should never be used. not even for hellbent purposes, it has been showed u can get the hellbent condition other ways.

[the Starter]

omg, someone is actually thinking to play one with nothing, u r a brave man.... using a crappy card.
i personally think OWN should never be used. not even for hellbent purposes, it has been showed u can get the hellbent condition other ways.

:eek: hey! how can you say such things? OWN is the best card from the Kami Block. OWN, well, owns. it's the best card ever, it's 50% like Lion's Diamond Eye wich is 50% like Black Lotus. :rolleyes: :cool: :D :p ;)

[Kird_Ape]

lol, dont be hatin on it, ill play it in a standard game turn 1 and beat you with madness ability :D

[arcane]

.....interesting, people now like OWN, i'll stop selling mine at 50 cents.
ok, but turn 1: swamp, OWN, mox, rootwalla, rootwalla, rootwalla, some card seems unlikely to me.
but t say it OWNs, the starter? it OWNS?
a quarter of the black lotus?
whatever. :) :) :)

[the Starter]

Hey I was defending OWN wich I think is one of the most fun cards in Kami Block, at least it's better than Mudhole :D

[Isaaku]

umm... i would say that in vintage OWN could be ok... maybe... i guess... (who am i kidding? oh right no one) but i don't really play vintage so what do i know?

for standard on the other hand i think this card has possible potentiall, i realize as things stand at this point the card is a little shaky, esspecially since it's not hasty and thus gives your oppoenent 3 turns to decide the most advantageous way to kill it, but the deck strategy that is implied by "hellbent" is an interesting throwback to cursed scroll in rdw, if the format matches rakdos w/ other complimentary hellbent permanents (13 besides rakdos, i ran the word through the oracle) it could make an effective archtype on it's own, besides that i still like the idea of combining it w/ a shoal

[arcane]

the days of mudhole! man, OWN makes u think about those mighty rares like mudhole, OWN, gangrenous goliath, reckless assault, some of my favorites

[Dommo]

This card is simply awesome in mono-red with any form of acceleration. I.E. seething songs/desperate rituals, as they clean out your hand and give the mana for pumpage(I mean seriously, desperate ritual, run out of cards, and you have a 4/4 flying double strike! This could be on turn 4 consistently!).

[the Starter]

and when Time Spiral rolls in this dragon is going to be HUGE for one reason only, Unluckyman's Paradise, Tsuyoshi Fujita's invitational card, this is what I read somewhere the card is looking like so far:

Unluckyman's Paradise
Legendary Land
if you're going second you may begin with this card in play and if you do you may remove a nonland card from your hand, if you do ~this~ comes into play with a luck(?) counter.
:t: : add :1: to your mana pool.
:t: : add one mana of any color to your mana pool. play this ability only if ~this~ has a counter on it.
:D

[Aricanius]

That land is alright, but I don't see it breaking anything. The situation of going second -and- having it in your opening hand when you're only going to be running 2 of them max due to the legend rule is too remote to call game breaking.

[Champloo]

nah...totally jank....for its hell ebtn ability...control decks can target them with draw.

[Aricanius]

nah...totally jank....for its hell ebtn ability...control decks can target them with draw.
If control has let this hit the table at all and their best play is to make you draw cards, they've already lost. Rakdos Augermage wrecks control.

[NeCrOMyStIc]

Yeah, isn't it funny wizards allows those spoilers after the lawsuit w/ rancored elf over @ mtgsalvation lol. This dragon will be played quite a bit w/ rakdos forming up to be a powerhouse

[NeCrOMyStIc]

Oh yeah as far as haste..look to the boros guildmage