Kamahl's Falcon Punch

[ISBPathfinder]

Kamahl, Pit Fighter

The idea behind this deck is sort of a question of how many lightning bolts can I throw at a time if I try real hard. This is a big mana red build featuring Kamahl, Pit Fighter|Odyssey as the commander. You will see in this list there is a lot of mana sinks as well as creatures that take untapping well.

This is a bit rough as of right now but it looks interesting. My biggest concern offhand is how much panic he might induce. If I have to defend myself from everyone and have everyone aiming removal at Kamahl this might be tough.

Kamahl, Pit Fighter

DecklistCMCManaPricesChartsDraw 7

COMMANDER (1)

1 Kamahl, Pit Fighter|Odyssey

CREATURES (15)

1 Dragonmaster Outcast

1 Dragon Whisperer

1 Burnished Hart

1 Rekindling Phoenix

1 Skyfire Phoenix

1 Solemn Simulacrum

1 Creepy Doll

1 Darksteel Sentinel

1 Endbringer

1 Godo, Bandit Warlord

1 Soul of Shandalar

1 Angrath's Marauders

1 Darksteel Gargoyle

1 Knollspine Dragon

1 Kozilek, the Great Distortion

ARTIFACT (29)

1 Everflowing Chalice

1 Basilisk Collar

1 Expedition Map

1 Relic of Progenitus

1 Sol Ring

1 Wayfarer's Bauble

1 Azor's Gateway

1 Endless Atlas

1 Grim Monolith

1 Illusionist's Bracers

1 Magewright's Stone

1 Mind Stone

1 Thaumatic Compass

1 Thornbite Staff

1 Crucible of Worlds

1 Darksteel Plate

1 Puppet Strings

1 Rings of Brighthearth

1 Staff of Domination

1 Sword of Vengeance

1 Thousand-Year Elixir

1 Umbral Mantle

1 Worn Powerstone

1 Gauntlet of Might

1 Hedron Archive

1 Thran Dynamo

1 Batterskull

1 Mind's Eye

1 Akroma's Memorial

ENCHANTMENT (3)

1 Experimental Frenzy

1 Outpost Siege

1 Gratuitous Violence

INSTANT (7)

1 Street Spasm

1 Abrade

1 Comet Storm

1 Shattering Pulse

1 Starstorm

1 Chaos Warp

1 Smash

SORCERY (5)

1 Shattering Spree

1 Mizzium Mortars

1 Ignite the Future

1 Chandra's Ignition

1 Blasphemous Act

PLANESWALKER (1)

1 Ugin, the Spirit Dragon

LAND (39)

1 Arid Mesa

1 Blast Zone

1 Bloodstained Mire

1 Homeward Path

19 Mountain

1 Myriad Landscape

1 Prismatic Vista

1 Sanctum of Eternity

1 Scalding Tarn

1 Scavenger Grounds

1 Shinka, the Bloodsoaked Keep

1 Spinerock Knoll

1 Strip Mine

1 Tectonic Edge

1 Temple of the False God

1 Thawing Glaciers

1 The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale

1 Tower of the Magistrate

1 Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle

1 Winding Canyons

1 Wooded Foothills

Approximate Total Cost:

[weltkrieg]

Rings of brighthearth and illusionist's bracers seem like automatic includes given what you're trying to do. You're already running gratuitous violence, so maybe angrath's marauders too?

[benjameenbear]

Super Smash reference ftw! Awesome.

I imagine that Kamahl will die a lot as people get terrified of him punching them out of the arena, so maybe the addition of some more mana rocks could be welcome? Fire Diamond, Coldsteel Heart, etc. would all ensure that Kamahl can keep coming out and smashing things.

[ISBPathfinder]

Rings of brighthearth and illusionist's bracers seem like automatic includes given what you're trying to do. You're already running gratuitous violence, so maybe angrath's marauders too?

Rings of brighthearth - Originally I held off questioning if it was better than an untap but...... I suppose its better than Jandor's Saddlebags though so I guess I should make that swap.

Illusionist's Bracers - Yea it looks great. The only concern with a lot of this stuff to make Kamahl better is the question of how hard it is going to be to keep him in play.

Angrath's Marauders - OOooooooooo yea that sounds great. I kind of completely glazed over that that is a thing.

Super Smash reference ftw! Awesome.

I imagine that Kamahl will die a lot as people get terrified of him punching them out of the arena, so maybe the addition of some more mana rocks could be welcome? Fire Diamond, Coldsteel Heart, etc. would all ensure that Kamahl can keep coming out and smashing things.

I agree there is a big question of if I can keep Kamahl in play. Two mana ramp is ok but I think I want to focus a bit more on 2+ mana ramp. That said I probably should take a look and see if I can include Everflowing Chalice due to its scaling nature.

DECK CHANGES:

• Fanning the Flames → Angrath's Marauders I have a lot of things to dump mana to so I think ultimately Fanning the Flames probably is lower priority than several others. Double damage is a really nice pickup as it works with a lot of the effects and plays well towards the fact that Kamahl has haste.
• Commune with Lava → Knollspine Dragon I want to try out Knollspine and Commune was ultimately what I considered the low hanging fruit to cut to try to bring in for it. I like that Knollspine gives me a blocker as well on a turn that I spend a bunch of mana on draw.
• Jandor's Saddlebags → Rings of Brighthearth Rings seems stronger in retrospect. I think it also has more potential in the deck and combines with other untap effects a little better. The hard part is it brings into question if I run fetchlands now lol.
• Street Spasm → Endbringer Spasm helps against tokens but I think endbringer can help on that front as well as serve as card draw. I like that a lot of the abilities of it look sort of appealing to copy.
• Thespian's Stage → Winding Canyons Flash and or haste seem relevant for a few of the creatures. Its not enough that I would want to commit to Vedalken Orrery though.
• 1 Mountain → Hanweir Battlements I want a little access to haste. I considered Flamekin Village but I think I value the land entering untapped more than I do it producing red for this deck given its mono colored and the commander is more expensive to cast.

I will try to find some room for Everflowing Chalice. I was having some difficulty making all the room I had so far though so I guess its on my short list of things to add. Its a bit concerning to bring in so many 6+ cost cards but replacing X mana spells for them is probably fine as many would take up at least as much mana when cast ideally.

[ISBPathfinder]

I ordered some sweet cards for this deck and I had a few more thoughts and things I wanted to change. In general I wanted to shore up my defenses a bit more, add some more ramp, and draw. I felt like I had a bit too many 6+ drops and I wanted to keep the number of mana hungry things down a bit more and shore up defenses. Putting up defenses and continuing to live is currently my objective with this deck for now so I can do testing deeper into the duration of games. That might change after playing it some but ultimately my goal for this deck right now is a bit more of a big mana control style of deck.

DECK CHANGES:

• Drakuseth, Maw of Flames → Everflowing Chalice I do actually really like Drakuseth, I am playing him in a Neheb deck and he seems good. That said, I want to be a little more defensive as of right now and I think that Drakuseth plays better towards an aggressive deck or a deck with dragon synergy and or more haste enabling effects. Everflowing is very versatile and I can see myself casting it as a 4 mana ramp for two early on or later on using it to fuel some really big mana turns.
• Inferno Titan → Thaumatic Compass Inferno tends to be a little more aggressive than I am trying to be right now. It is good at cutting down utility creatures and tokens but I think Kamahl can hit on important utility creatures for me. I think its a little too heavy of an overlap and pushes me towards being more aggressive where as I think I want to be a bit more reactive with this deck. The compass can give good defenses when it flips and card advantage in land drops until then.
• Kumano, Master Yamabushi → Skyfire Phoenix I am trying to push on having big mana in this deck but I think ultimately Kumano might compete a bit much with Kamahl as far as using my mana on things. I might come back to this later but I like this Phoenix from the standpoint that I can use it + Kamhl to shoot down titans. I like this Phoenix from the standpoint that I think if a game is going poorly its because Kamahl is dying a lot and or I am taking a lot of attacks. Having some free chump blockers when that is happening sounds potentially useful.
• Gilded Lotus → Worn Powerstone I think I value the option of curving my mana a bit sooner and curving into my commander potentially. Gilded is better when drawn later as it enters untapped and gives mana back immediately but from the standpoint of early game the powerstone curves into Kamahl in a good way.
• Sword of the Paruns → Endless Atlas I gave the sword more consideration and its like.... a billion mana to get it going. It is 7 mana to just get it set up and that mostly doesn't do anything getting it on Kamahl. In contrast Umbral Mantle gets cast, equipped, and payed to untap for less mana to cast and equip this sword. I think a lot of the cost of the sword comes from the static buffs it gives out which play a lot better into a swarm tactic deck. I ABSOLUTELY LOVE Endless Atlas in mono red / mono white decks and I totally had a derp moment when I didn't put it in my list to start. I needed more draw and its totally making my list.
• Buried Ruin → Spinerock Knoll To be honest, I have had a very hard time justifying cracking Buried Ruin in recent years because it puts me behind a land. Sure, there are good artifacts to recover but its something I just find I do very sparingly because of putting me behind a land. It also is a colorless land that doesn't do anything else until I sac it. I like that Spinerock is a red producing land that can get me some card advantage later.
• 1 Mountain → Shinka, the Bloodsoaked Keep So, first strike seems kind of amazing in retrospect given that my commander is a 6/1. This really opens up the option to block with him without taking up much space. It does make my Valakut / Gauntlets worse cutting a basic for it but I think its worth having and my basic count still seems acceptable.
• 1 Mountain → Temple of the False God Given that the temple naturally gives me mana like I have a gauntlet its probably fine to swap a basic out for it. I should have had it in there starting probably but I didn't think abut it until later. I think I still have plenty of basics in here.

My hope is to be able to sleeve this up for next week assuming I get my card order fast enough. With the commander products coming out today though its possible that my order might be delayed since I just ordered it yesterday.

[Tryno]

Jeska, Warrior Adept and Rakka Mar seem like flavor wins, but I don't know if I like them more than Chandra, Fire Aritsan and Outpost Siege. Chandra gives more draw, and also shoots people when they punch her.
Outpost Siege is stickier and less inclined for people to murder your for having a planeswalker.

I also am not a huge fan of Mana Geyser in this, Skyscanner sounds cool for flying defense

[ISBPathfinder]

I have been talking to Tryno via chat a bit about this deck and objectives of it. I think in a nutshell it just needs to put up defenses, draw cards, and enable Kamahl. That said, I am adjusting a few of the cards in here because I think I was trying to make my alternate threats more of a thing than I really need to. My goal I guess is to play more into the late game and just make myself not a nice target for attackers.

DECK CHANGES:

• Spikeshot Elder → Expedition Map Spikeshot seemed like it would be cool with the equipment and gauntlets in the deck. That said, I think there is a very big portion of time where its not actually a good drop. If I went deeper into the goblin package idea and picked up like Goblin Matron I think I would have liked it more but I was facing a point where I felt like I wanted to go away from some goblins and some of the gauntlets and at that point the elder seemed like it was losing a lot. I think there are board states I would still like the elder but it seemed like it was getting worse with some of the changes I am making here and so I also included it in the cuts. The map is a bit versatile in general and it can ramp Kamahl out or give access to some good utility.
• Goblin Sharpshooter → The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale I have seen some games where Shaprshooter is AMAZING and I have seen games where it is very lackluster. Some of my decision to make this move is that I was moving away from the idea of a goblin package, not increasing my haste relivance, and increasing my lands package. It really seemed to make sense to make the move as Tabernacle often feels more robust and really doesn't hurt this type of deck much.
• Imperial Recruiter → Azor's Gateway I decided that the toolbox of recruiter wasn't good enough with where I wanted to be at. The card filtering of gateway feels really good given I really don't recur much of anything here and assuming it would ever flip it still seems like a good card but I really just like it as a nice little filter option for now.
• Jeska, Warrior Adept → Outpost Siege I think Jeska is really cool and it's a cool flavor win. That said, I think I want something that gives me a bit better card quality. The siege gives reasonable draw for a deck that isn't heavily responsive. I considered if I wanted Vance's Blasting Cannons instead but the fact that Outpost Siege can play lands seem good. I can definately see room to argue that maybe I want both and maybe with some testing I might be able to try that out.
• Rakka Mar → Rekindling Phoenix Trying to get something that is a bit better without help. Rakka looks fun and amusing but I think if I don't have Kamahl my solution is getting him back out rather than trying to have this weird backup use for untappers. The Phoenix is reasonable as sort of a Maze of Ith type card that takes grave hate or exile removal to get past and it works alongside Kamahl to kill big fatties or allows me to be aggressive if I want. As a plus, the phoenix recently plumited to being like a $3 card which in my opinion is GREAT! At one point it was like $30 lol.
• Neheb, the Eternal → Creepy Doll Neheb was another idea to go big mana but I think the issue is I don't really want to be tapping Kamahl on my turn if I can help it and it lends itself more to an aggro strategy than I really want to be right now.
• Gauntlet of Power → Crucible of Worlds gauntlets seem maybe a little winmore in that they don't really ramp into Kamahl and they seem heavily geared towards the mana dumps. I still think I want the mana dumps but maybe a few less of them. If I had more mana dumps then I might like the gauntlets more but it just started looking like I wouldn't be all that happy with them and like they might take too many cards to set up. I was hesitant to go into crucible / fetchlands mostly because its expensive but I own the stuff and I would like to at least start off strong so lets try it for now and if I really like this deck then they will stay in.
• Caged Sun → Grim Monolith Similar to above. Grim is nice in that it can ramp into Kamahl and still a lot of big turns can come off the back of having that three extra mana. I think it just fits a bit better with what I am doing and a T3 Kamahl would be sweet.
• Dreamstone Hedron → Kozilek, the Great Distortion I wanted to move my ramp to being faster and include more draw. I think Kozilek fits the things I want to do in this deck quite well. Obviously some of the bigger ramp would be good going into Kozilek but I think as a whole I am happier pushing the ramp sooner and the draw number up.
• Mana Geyser → Abrade Trying to shift a bit away from big mana and Geyser is a big one shot effect that I don't know if I can make the most use of. I like the versatility of Abrade and I think it can be fired off effectively on its own or alongside Kamahl in a lot of cases.
• Fetchlands in for basics to enable both Rings of Brighthearth and Crucible of Worlds.
• Hanweir Battlements → Blast Zone I realized I cut most of the creatures who would care about haste at this point. I still potentially like the flash on canyons as a few of the creatuers in here could be REALLY good with flash still. Blast Zone gives me removal in the lands though which is something I think I want.

[ISBPathfinder]

I got a little bit of playtest in this last week. I managed to play a 5 player FFA and a 1v1 game later. The 5 player FFA game was a 3 hour slog so its hard to outline that one but it was interesting. I shifted to being more rattlesnake rather than proactively hitting threats. I focused more on the 1-2 players I felt were in the lead and keeping them from getting further ahead which actually was fairly good but it probably did also contribute to the game going longer. In the end, I managed to get out of a Faith's Fetters with Blast Zone while having Gratuitous Violence and a few untap effects. From there I lowered opponents hp to the range which I could kill them and left Kamahl up with all my mana to respond. From there they were doomed and I managed to end the game. By the end of that game I think I counted the ability to shoot for 36 damage a turn thanks to untappers (Staff of Domination being the repeat option).

DECK CHANGE

• Viashino Heretic → Street Spasm I just went far enough away from haste focuses for my own liking for Viashino. I still kind of want a bit more artifact answers but for now swarms seem like a problem and I like that Street Spasm is instant speed and doesn't kill Kamahl.
• Savage Beating → Akroma's Memorial I like the idea of one shotting someone with Kamahl but realistically, I am not really worried about someone with no blockers. The person I would want to use this on would probably be doing decently given that it will take time to spin that up. In the end, I felt like Akroma's allows me to poke at people and defend better than usual. There is some amount of concern about if it would be stolen or copied but ultimately my wincon isn't really using combat so I figured I want to test it out.
• Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx → Homeward Path I realized that my devotion to red is likely not really ever going to be a thing. Assuming someone hijacks my commander, I think the utility of homeward trumps the maybe chance of a little extra mana. I think with some utility lands, its fine to rarely find them necessary but having access to something to make you not lose games is important.
• Kher Keep → Sanctum of Eternity similarly with Homeward, I think a big way I lose is not having access to Kamahl. There are times I do use the Keep but I felt like it hasn't been as relevant in this deck given I don't really have any token or much to make them better.

I need to play the list more because its such an odd kind of deck. I could see based on opponents there could be a chance everyone would just get pissed with me and run me down. As of right now with multiplayer I think I play re-actively and try to keep the person who is in first from being SUPER far in first. I need to test a bunch more though before I really know how things are and how this type of deck works lol. I have a hard time really judging how a deck like this is doing overall lol.