Mono Red Sideboard/Last few slots.

Okay, so we have our main theme, and we have a fairly good fill-out of the last few slots.

To bring everyone up to speed:
Creatures: (13)
4x Stromkirk Noble
1x Grim Lavamancer
1x Spikeshot Elder
4x Stormblood Berserker
3x Phyrexian Metamorph

Non-Creature Permanents:  (10)
4x Shrine of Burning Rage
1x Ratchet Bomb
4x Koth of the Hammer
1x Batterskull

Spells: (12)
1x Faithless Looting3x Tezzeret's Gambit
4x Volt Charge 2x Devil's Play
2x Red Sun's Zenith

Lands: (24)

24x Mountain

+1 something.

So, I've been a horrifically bad side-boarder in the past, which is something we're looking to fix this time.  With Pyromancer Ascension the strategy was a bit easier, with Mono Red it seems like it matters alot more, so we need to think through each category of thing and see what we can do to improve our match-ups there.

Big (repeatable, game-ending) effects:

I really like the idea of having a sideboard card that doesn't necessarily answer a threat that the opponent's deck presents, but rather just murders their whole strategy.   Whether it be a recurring damage source, or a card that blanks their strategy, cards like this in sideboards can swing match-ups entirely, which is what we're looking for out of a sideboard card.  Sure, a card like Incinerate or Combust is a relatively efficient removal spell, but it's just a 1:1.  This category goes a lot bigger in general.

 I love me a red enchantment, and Mana Barbs is a potential game-ending threat against Ramp and Control.  If we had a Sulfuric Vortex, I'd be playing that, but Mana Barbs isn't too far off.  It's not a creature, it's hard to remove, it comes down relatively quick, and it just turns off a whole lot of cards.  You can't really Wolf Run, or Forbidden Alchemy, or even really Think Twice, Drownyard, or Snapcaster with this in play.  I need some testing against ramp, to see if this card lives up to my expectations in that matchup, but I am certain that this will be all I need against control.  (2-3 copies at most).  Control is already a pretty good mat-up, but if I can get double duty out of this guy against Ramp, it'll be a solid inclusion.  Against ramp, it needs to be accompanied by some sort of steal-effect, or a card like Inferno Titan, or Wurmcoil could just kill me.

Moltensteel Dragon seems like an awesome card against ramp.
1) It flies, which pretty much nothing they have does. (Inkmoth, sure, but we are red, right?)
2) It's a 4-drop, which is fast enough to matter.
3) It has four toughness, which avoids alot of their damage-based removal. (Slagstorm, Whipflare, Inferno Titan, non-metalcraft Galvanic Blast)
4) It potentially kills them on turn 5, which is just fast enough to matter, and combos pretty well with early aggression.  If they're even in the teens, this guy could get the job done in one swing.

4 (base) + 4 (normal firebreathing) + 1 (land drop) = attacking for 9 damage on turn 5, before I get around to spending any more life.  Now, realistically, I won't be higher than 16 when this guy comes out, and paying down to 2 is unlikely to be a strong plan unless they are tapped out.  This leaves 12 more life to spend, which is 15 "safe" damage just from this guy on turn 5.  This guy feels super-solid against ramp.

Some of the other cards in other sections hard-answer other strategies.  Ratchet bomb is a one-sided wrath against tokens, a deck that can block you all day long.  Inferno Titan ends games against aggro.  But we'll talk about those in a minute...

1 damage effects:

The first category of thing that red side-boarding offers is small (one damage) effects.  They are quite plentiful, and they have some good options with the rest of the deck.

The things we'll be looking to kill with this sort of effect are often (always) on turn one, and include the following cards:

The enemy:

These cards are the pinnacles of one-drops, and the ones we need to be reacting to turn one, or they quickly get out of control.  All of these quickly turn into (or enable) some very dangerous starts for your opponent .  We can't just drop our own Noble, and ignore this sort of effect from our opponent, like we might with, say other one-drops like Doomed Traveler, a spirit token on Turn 3, or a random dork like Young Wolf.

Your effect has to happen on your turn one (on the draw), or perhaps your turn two (on the play).  On the play, we get some help from our 4 x-spells that are not coming out in these match-ups.  This strongly influences what type of card we can use to deal with these cards.

Cards like Grim Lavamancer, or Spikeshot Elder, for example, are not going to cut it to deal with these cards in the early game.  The same goes for Inferno Titan, or Chandra, which naturally prey upon these type of cards in a vacuum.

General contenders for the "do one damage" category that handle these cards (aka on turn one)

The answers:

I think it is quite interesting to look at these cards for the purpose of dealing with opposing one-drops, since they directly compete for slots dealing with this specific problem.  They don't come in in match-ups where these problem cards above are not present.

Goblin Arsonist is the "best" one-drop for enabling a powered-up T2 Berserker.
Gut Shot can deal with the problem, while still allowing you to drop a Noble.

However, I think the best of these options is actually Forge Devil(!).
Forge Devil kills all of these creatures, and leaves behind the same 1/1 as Noble, that enables your Berserker quite nicely, without even needing to draw the Noble.  It seems like a perfect mix of all three cards.  It kills the threat, it stays around as a threat to power up Berserker, or eat removal, or apply pressure.  The damage is front-loaded, so it is not hurt as much by Vapor Snag, etc etc.

It isn't an amazing main-deck option, because it can't be cast T1 on the play, but you wouldn't play Gut Shot T1 on the play, you'd just play the Noble you always have in your hand.  Forge Devil even does less damage to you than Gut Shot, in the scenario where it matters...  It chumps to save Koth, it does almost everything in the scenario where it's good.  And in the scenario where it's bad?  Well, it's a sideboard card, you don't bring it in against Ramp or Control...

It's worst against killing things in response to equips, but equipment is seeing a downswing due to the amount of removal people are playing, and we're Red FFS, if we can't deal with an artifact, noone can....

The other one-damage answers:

These two are fine main-deck answers, and repeatable "free"-ish damage is pretty good against creature decks.   However, we can't overdo it with either of these as answers, because we don't have a ton of free "fuel" for Lavamancer, and Elder is quite spendy.  Both are somewhat lacking in multiples, so I'd set the limit on each of these as 1x Main, 1x Side. (4x total)

These last two consist of a kill condition in one card, and a card that sort of works with the deck's theme, and is often dead even in it's good matchup.

Inferno Titan is a serious house.  He represents 18 damage on an open board the turn after you cast him, and he clears up a battlefield quite well.  He's pretty reasonable against Vapor Snag (as all Titans), but he would be the most expensive spell in the deck.  24 lands is quite a bit for an aggro deck, and I do have 4 card draw spells, but I could still have a hard time getting him down, especially since one of my card draw spells encourages me to dump lands.  I like this guy in all the situations where Berserker and Noble are perhaps not the best.

Chandra, oh Chandra.  I really want this version of Chandra to be good, but she is just so... slow, and ineffective.  I'd play Liliana in a Heartbeat if she was red, because she solves a lot of problems the deck has.  But Chandra is a 4-mana Gut shot, with the benefit of being able to cast a Gut Shot every turn!  Her ultimate is similarly lackluster, and 1 damage effects are very hard to be relevant in that stage of the game.  White decks have Anthem effects by this time, Green have their big guys down, Blue's are 2/2s, Black's are x/2's, and Red guys are barreling down on you, killing her through the air.  I wish there was a good match-up for her, or that her effect was strong.  Without anthems, I think she might see play, but...

Among these options, I'd want at MOST
1x Inferno Titan (side)
1x Grim Lavamancer Main/1x Side
1x Spikeshot Elder Main/1x Side
1-3x Forge Devil (Side)

Sweepers:

White and Black get a lot of credit for having sweepers, but Red is the color people turn too quite often for sweep effects.  For our deck, this is somewhat of a double-edged sword.  We have a fair number of low-drops we'd want to cast early, and following that up with a sweeping creature-kill spell seems like not the best plan in the world.

However, if you look at our plan vs the creature match-ups, some of our creatures are not that amazing there.  Noble is terrible against non-human blockers, and Berserker isn't great if they have one-drops (because you can't get in for damage to pump him up).   Elder and Lavamancer aren't exactly strong turn one plays, and we're the one with the sweeper, so we can know whether we need to play slow or fast.  So let's look at what we have available, and see what kind of trouble we can get ourselves into...

Ratchet Bomb is an amazing card in this format.  It is very good against Tokens (while ignoring virtually everything in our deck), it is reasonable against white removal (which tends to be 3cc Exile perminants), and okay against Anthems (which are all 2cc).  We could play as many as three of this spell, and not look too silly, in the right match-up.

Contagion Engine is something that works pretty well with the deck (one-turn ultimate koth on 8 mana), but alot of our proliferate effects would in theory be coming out when these come in.

Whipflare and Slagstorm are both interesting.  Slagstorm seems like it "does the job" a bit better, because it deals with multiple anthems against tokens, single anthems against humans, double lords in UW/UB, and can go to the head in a pinch.  Whipflare is something our creatures are more likely to live through, and does kill unaugmented creatures quite well (Geist, Captain, etc)

Blasphemous Act is the best spell to T4 Koth into.  It potentially costs 1 if we're in the right situation (8 creature on board, including ours), and it sets up a clear ultimate the next turn.  This would be the spell I'd want to bring in if I was keeping the majority of my low-drops in.  It near-guarantees ultimate the next turn, which an aggro deck is unlikely to beat.

I'm really not sure which way to lean in this category.  There are just too many upsides to each option here for me to make a clear decision.  It's also possible that any of the pure sweepers (the red cards) are "too cute" for this application.

Artifact == Boom!

Manic Vandal is the standard, but I'm pretty sure Torch Fiend is just better.  It is the only instant speed one, and it beats down while you wait for them to have an artifact worth killing.  It can be killed before they play their artifact but you can always hold it if you suspect this, so it seems like it is just better than Manic Vandal, unless it's very likely that they will have an artifact to destroy by the time you're ready to cast your spell.  So, there you go.

Lifegain

I don't have a ton of creatures, so though sword might be the worst option here, strangely.  It is the fastest possible option, potentially being active on turn four.  It also gives some relevant protections (from my own sweepers?), and blocking avoidance.  Other swords might compete on this removal-protection and blocker avoidance, but sword certainly hits the hardest of the sword options.  However, I'm also more of a grindy deck, than a super-aggressive one....

Wurmcoil is one of the better options that exists, and it and Batterskull fight it out for which is the worst against Vapor Snag.  When in doubt, I'd say go with the cheaper one, and that is Batterskull.  Besides, equip my one-of Elder with my one-of Batterskull?  Good game?

I'd say either Batterskull or Wurmcoil are the competition for this slot, as a 1-3 of total between main and side.  They are also competing with some of the sweepers (Contagion Engine), or other random expensive cards (Inferno Titan).  It's possible that Titan is just the best "Life Gain" option, because it kills them in 1 turn, and does something immediately when it comes into play.  All three of these are excellent to copy with a Metamorph, and stand on their own, which is critical for this type of card.  A sword is great, but "what is it, compared to the arm that wields it".  If they wrath you, and you have a sword, your Metamorph is looking pretty sad.

Graveyard Hate:

For this category, we have an atomic bomb, and a tactical nuke:

 I think Surgical wins this fight for our deck, because against the decks where this matters (Reanimator), being able to "Time walk" their Unburial Rites, and get one more swing in is what we'd be looking to do.  These decks don't have sweepers, so we'd be keeping with the creature plan, and just buying a turn free of Elesh/Wurmcoil to seal the victory.  I don't think it would be reasonable to go over ~3 of this type of effect, and you'd have to believe that the deck was quite popular to go that high.  It does work fairly well against some of the undying creatures as well, so you might get some double-duty there.

If I had more artifacts, (to enable Mox Opal), I'd love to have some spellbombs, but we just can't get there without giving up a bit much.

Theft:

Instant speed, vs Trample.  Ray of Command is a serious beating, but Traitorous blood actually costs 3, which can set up some insane T6 plays with Metamorph.  (Take your Titan, Shoot itself, deal 9, copy your Titan, kill your titan).  Traitorous blooding a deathtouch creature (like Titan) is a big game as well.  But instant-speeding it against Elesh Norn turns their one-sided Wrath into a more palatable

This sort of effect could compliment a card like Mana Barbs to "finish them" with their own spells.

Random:

 Refugee is one of the best cards you can have for the red mirror, but it did not work out at all against match-ups with "red removal", like ramp.  Since MR is claimed to be dead in tournaments these days, this guy is probably taking a back seat to cards for other match-ups.

I played against quite a bit of blue control, and those guys really liked to bring Negate in against me, or leave in other counterspells.  Waif is probably the best guy to punish such a strategy.  However, he fights into the commonly paired black color, who has cheap creature removal, and sweepers, neither of which this guy is very good against.  He's also pretty abysmal against "deck with a one-drop", which comprises something like 60+% of the metagame right now.  If you add in one-drop removal, it's more like 100%.  Mons Goblin Raiders is not what we want.

Besides, we have some other cards that murder UB control, and avoid the creature problem.  Mua ha ha...

Mid-Stage Summary:

The best cards, with the maxes I'd want are:
3x Mana Barbs
3x Moltensteel Dragon
3x Traitorous Blood
3x Forge Devil
2x Gut Shot
1x Spikeshot Elder (+1x Main)
1x Grim Lavamancer (+1x Main)
2x Inferno Titan
2x Ratchet Bomb (+1x Main)
2x Slagstorm/2x Blasphemous Act
3x (Manic Vandal/Torch Fiend)
1x Wurmcoil Engine (+1x Batterskull Main)
2x Surgical Extraction

So, that's 26\8 cards.
If we group these by matchup:
Ramp:
3x Mana Barbs (?)
3x Moltensteel Dragon
3x Traitorous Blood
Against Ramp, I can take out the Shrines (4), Lavamancer/Elder (2), Fireballs (4).  So 10 is the max I'd want here.  If I could "double up" on the mana barbs here, and not need the traitorous blood because of Moltensteel, I could leave in some of these cards, because they are not horrific.  If I bring in the Mana Barbs, would I rather have Traitorous Blood, or Moltensteel?  If I bring in Mana Barbs, is Shrine, a normally bad card, suddenly a good card?  so -4 Fireball, +3 Shrine, +2 Moltensteel -1 Elder?

I need some test-time against ramp with this strategy, and we'll see how it works...  Maybe just Mana Barbs is enough, and I go up to a full 4 against Control and Ramp, enough said...

Control:
3x Mana Barbs
(Ratchet Bomb against O-Ring)
Against Control, I can take out the Fireballs (4), or the Elder/Lavamancer (2) + Berserker (4).  It really depends on how they want to play against me.  Elder/Lava are pretty terrible against Curse of DH, which most people will bring in or keep in, and Berserkers are rarely powered in this match-up (but if they are, they're game-ending).  I need must-answer threats though, to make them tap out, so I can resolve my game-ending threats (Shrine, Koth, Barbs, etc, etc)

Aggro:
3x Forge Devil
1x Spikeshot
1x Lavamancer
2x Inferno Titan
2x Ratchet Bomb
1x Wurmcoil
2x Slagstorm/2x Blasphemous Act.
I have trouble against (white) aggro, because my creatures don't connect, which causes a chain reaction of suck.  Flyers also get through against my Koth, making it a worse win condition.

Noble's okay in this matchup, because he's still hard to block, but Berserker gets alot worse.

The big question is what do I take out?  Do I fight the creature battle, trying to come out on top, or do I play sweepers, and if so, which ones?  Is Ratchet Bomb my sweeper, against their 3's of O Ring and Fiend Hunter?  (and Crusader, but that shouldn't be in?)  Do I bring in the life gain aggro trumps?  They combo well with the sweepers...

So really this is:
3x Forge Devil
1x Spikeshot
1x Lavamancer
1x Inferno Titan
(Taking out card draw?  Shrine?)

OR
2-4x Sweeper
2x Inferno Titan
1x Wurmcoil
0-1x Mimic Vat
(Taking out Berserker)

Tokens:
2x Ratchet Bomb
2x Inferno Titan
2x Slagstorm/2x Blasphemous Act
1x Wurmcoil

Random:
2x Surgical

Ratchet bomb, and splash hate for whichever plan I choose above, should be good.

Conclusion

3x Mana Bars (4x if good against Ramp)
2-3x Moltensteel or Traitorous blood, depending on testing results against ramp
2x Ratchet Bomb
1x Inferno Titan
5x other sideboard cards against Aggro (depending on plan/test results)
2-3x Random (Surgical, Mimic Vat, etc)

Mono Red - Modifications before the "real thing" (shudder)

1) Tezzeret's Gambit is best against control, which I'm already winning.  It costs a bit too much life against aggro, which I'm losing.
Conclusion -> Move one copy to the sideboard.

2) Phyrexian Metamorph is awesome.
Conclusion -> Move the third copy to the maindeck.

3) Arc Trail is terrible.
Conclusion -> Move Devil's Play, Geistflame main.  Remove AT from main and board.

4) Mutagenic Growth is only good vs Red removal, and some creature combats.  Life loss is also limiting vs tempo/aggro decks, which are omnipresent.
Conclusion -> Move at least one copy to the board.

5) Chandra is actually good against some of the decks I have trouble with
Conclusion -> Consider moving one copy back to the main.  Have one copy in the side.  (I bought them, might as well use them)

6) Need some lifegain against aggro.
Conclusion -> Buy 1x Batterskull, or 1x Sword of W&P for the main.  (copyable with Phyrexian Metamorph)

7) Need a sideboard against white.
Conclusion -> Buy 2-3 Slagstorm and/or the 2-damage version for the sideboard/main. (replacing Arc Trail)

8) Need an answer to Hero of Bladehold.
Conclusion -> Include 1-3 Combust in the side.

9) Tokens are everywhere
Conclusion -> Suppliment (7) with 1-3 ratchet bombs, consider having one main, since it combos strongly with proliferate effects to take down bigger fish.

10) Dark Ascension is released
Conclusion -> Include 1-3 copies of Faithless Looting in the main/side.  Should translate roughly to "draw four cards" late game, and "find land/discard flashback" early.

Notes to self

Ideas from watching PT coverage:

1) Combust
Should be good against blue/white, which is everywhere.  Kills Hero even with an Honor of the Pure, which is good stuff.  Also kills Hero for 5 mana after I copy it.

2) Galvanic Blast
With the rise of Metamorph, Metalcraft becomes more plausible.  Galvanic blast does 2 damage (which is an important number?), or 4 damage metalcrafted, which is more aggressive than Geistflame. or faster than Arc Trail.

3) Arc Trail
Terrible.  Put in almost anything else.  (Devil's Play).  Whipflare or Slagstorm would be superior?  Slagstorm is probably better, but it is awkward with Berserker...)

4) Ratchet bomb
Stock seems on the rise, with all the tokens.

5) Inferno Titan
Vs aggro?  Having a top end could be reasonable, but pushes the deck in a different direction for creature matchups =/

6) Mana Flare
Kills control, but am I already winning those?  No aspect of Koth triggers this, which is quite good.

7) Devil's Play + Geistflame >> Arc Trail
Both behave similarly to Arc Trail.  If I need more, RSZ is a possibility.

8) Splash one island of 4x Evolving, 1x Island?

Testing Mono Red - Results

Maindeck changes:
2 mutagenic growth, 2 devil's play, 2 arc trail, 2 geistflame, 2 phyrexian metamorph, 1 reckless waif
Sideboard changes: 1 devil's play, 3 manic vandal, 1 phyrexian metamorph, 2 ratchet bomb, 2 reckless waf, 1 red sun's zenith, 2 vulshok refugee, 2 arc trail

 ==========================================
Summary:
Archtype: MatchWin-MatchLoss, GameWin-GameLoss
Subarchetype, game1win-game1loss, game2win-game2loss, ...

Overall: 27-17, 63-45
+ some game that I didn't figure out (45 rounds, only 44 games)

Ramp: 3-1, 7-4
Jund: 2-1, 2-1
GBW: 2-0
GR: 1-2


Ramp in general seemed like it turned out okay.  Losing my only game against the "pure" GR ramp was not awesome.  Being able to prey on artifact acceleration randomly was good.  Did not need Arc Trail for these matchups, Geistflame + Devil's Play was fine.  Metamorph excelled.

U(W) Aggro: 3-10, 12-21
General: 2-1
Delver: 0-1, 1-2, 1-2
Bant: 1-2
Puresteel: 1-2
Humans: 0-2, 1-2, 2-1, 0-2, 0-2
GW Tokens: 2-0, 1-2
Clearly my worst archtype matchup.  I think I sideboarded poorly against UW.  Berserker is terrible in that matchup, and I did take out Shrines, which were probably my best way to actually win.  (Kill all their creatures and wait for them to die).  Little fliers do a good job at killing Koth, which sucks.  Sideboard cards here that could help would be the red sweepers, Slagstorm, etc.  Metamorph, and the blue cards in general, made me feel a bit of the pain here.
Ratchet bomb, and some sort of life gain, would be awesome here, to deal with:
Anthems
Hero of Bladehold
1/1 Flyers

Control: 7-2, 15-6
Mono Blue: 1-2
UB: 2-0, 2-1, 2-0, 1-2
Esper: 2-0, 1-0, 2-1
RWU Vengance: 2-0
Yeah.  I lost to the mono blue guy with Darksteel Sentinal (can't beat that card), but control just can't beat Koth, even the more aggressive control variations like Esper/Solar Flare.  The little guys are critical, to get them on the back foot, and the Shrine + Koth + Metamorph combo finishes them off.

"Combo": 2-1, 4-3
Grixis Graveyard: 2-0
UB Architect/summon: 0-2, 2-1
I lose to the nut draws from UB, but metamorph isn't bad there, etc.

Random Aggro: 10-3, 21-11
Random: 2-0, 2-1, 2-1, 2-1, 2-1, 2-0, 2-0, 1-0, 2-0, 2-1
Mono Red: 1-2, 0-2
MBPoison: 1-2
Whoda thunkit, Phyrexian Crusader sucks for mono red.  And mono red that doesn't hurt itself beats mono red that does hurt itself.  One thing my deck does is really destroy random decks.  If you're slow off the draw, or just messing around, you lose pretty hard to this deck, which I like.  (It forces the opponent to be as fast as me, or die, and I might not even keep a fast draw)

Midrange: 2-0, 4-0
Jund: 2-0
Black: 2-0
I can beat midrange, because my late game (Koth Ultimate) is better, and my early game (Waif + Berserker) is better.  Metamorph is also great in these matchups.

===========================================
Match by match breakdown:

Match 1:Jund ramp 2-1
Game 1: Copying primeval was good.  Leading with berserkers would have been better.
Game 2: played terribly.  Not used to the new cards, interactions?  Not taking it seriously?
Game 3: Noble into vandal into Metamorph(vandal) into berserker was good, with relevant targets for the vandals.

Match 2: UW delver L 0-1
Game 1: Tempoed out with aether adept.  Made plenty of mistakes in this game that caused the loss.  Lose and learn!

Match 3: Jund Ramp 2-1
Lost game 2.  He had a ton of removal, but not alot of threats/ramp.

Match 4: Mono Red 1-2
Won game two.  Made some bad plays in G3.  I pay alot of life, so some game-changer like Sword or Batterskull would really swing things back my way.  I also only have two pro-red guys for the mirror.

Match 5: Green-x Werewolves 2-0
Metamorphing a flipped Mayor of Avabruk is bonkers. (You get a wolf immediately, and can cast at will, and you can kill the original Mayor fairly easily with Volt Charge, etc.  I should have taken a screenshot in this game, it got out of hand very quickly.

Match 6: MB Poison 1-2
Won game one.  He drew multiple Crusaders into me not having any Shrines.  Lame.

Match 7: Some terrible deck, 2-1

Match 8: UB Control 1-2
Game 1: Copied a wurmcoil with Koth in play, but he gained enough life and dropped enough high-toughness threats that I couldn't kill him before he decked me with Blue Suns Zenith.  I feel like I made several mistakes in this game, I should have just Kothed the dome, but I only had 4 land vs 36 life, and tried to draw more with my spells, etc.
Game 2: Steamrolled him
Game 3: Lost to Wurmcoil

Match 9: Bant random stuff 1-2
Game 1: Attacked with a noble, instead of blocking a Geist.  Not a great play when you're at 12 life.
Game 2: Won
Game 3: Mental Mistep and Gut Shot drawn against my 1 drops.  Was not swording....

Match 10: UW Puresteel 1-2
Game 1: Lost.  Mulled to 3 land + 3 spell, drew 4 land vs a double paladin draw.
Game 2: Won
Game 3: Lost.  Copied a sword of war and peace, I feel like I could have won this game.

Match 11: Mono blue control
Game 1: Lost to darksteel sentinal (yeah, look that one up)
Game 2: Won, steamrolled.
Game 3: Lost to sentinal again.  Can't be RSZ'ed.  My copy was bounced and countered.  Gah.

Match 12: GBW Ramp 2-0
He never really got started in either game, vs my good draws.

Match 13: UW Delver 1-2
Game 1: Gut shot, lord of the unreal, and phantasmal image were not enough.
Game 2: Lost, timely + snag + tempo.
Game 3: Lost, same reason.

Match 14: UB Control 2-0
Game 1: Wring flesh, not a great player.
Game 2: Noble to berserker to gambit to koth, vs dissipation field.  Dissipation field!

Match 15: UB Control 2-1
Game 1: Lost.  He had alot of life gain, BSZ.  Got milled to death a turn before I could kill him.
Game 2: Won, Steamrolled.
Game 3: Shrine, Metamorph a shrine, metamorph a batterskull.  Eventually killed with double shrine.

Match 16: Rg aggro artifacts?  2-1
Game 1: Signal pest, Spikeshot elder, furor of the bitten (??!).  Won with a removal spell.
Game 2: Lost to a swarm of goblins
Game 3: Won.  His deck just had alot of random stuff in it.

Match 17: Mono red 0-2
Game 1: Arc Trail was not great.  You can't let a creature hit you t2 for fear of berserker.
Game 2: He drew more pro red, I could still topdeck a burn spell for the win (him at 1), but did not.

Match 18: WU sword 2-1
Game 1: Lost.  Bad keep, Noble, Shrine, 5x land.  (It's good against everything!).  Learned how dangerous Geist is.
Game 2: He did nothing, I failed with Koth but won anyway.
Game 3: He brought in Negates.  I have creatures.

Match 19: Grixis Delver, Ruinator, Masticore.  2-0

Match 20: Jund Kessig + Mortarpod + green midrange.  2-0

Match 21: Esper control.  2-0
Game 1: Reckless Waif beatdown.
Game 2: He played a Wurmcoil, then I played two Wurmcoils.  I had 16 land in play when I won.

Match 22, 23: GW Tokens 2-0, 1-2
Game 1: Win, AT vs 2 mana guys on their mull to 5.
Game 2: Win, He draws all land.
Game 3: Loss, Ton of mistakes.
Game 4: Won
Game 5: Loss

Match 24, 25: UW Humans 0-2, 1-2
Game 1: Lost, He had a ton of one-drops.  Champion got out of range fast.
Game 2: Lost, Honor + R/W sword.  Swords are stupidly good.
Game 3: Lost, Fiend Hunter, O Ring vs my "big guys"
Game 4: Noble, Noble, Berserker off a one-land mulligan.
Game 5: Lost.  Hero's hard, exile effects are hard.

Match 26: Solar Flare 1-0
He abandoned after G1

Match 27: UB Architect/Summon 0-2
Game 1: Lost.  My notes say "UG"
Game 2: Lost.  Grand Arbiter into Trinket Mage into Wurmcoil into Spellskite and Tezzeret.

Match 28: Some kind of mayor deck 2-1
Game 1: Won
Game 2: Lost, Mulled to 5, never drew a 2nd land.  Probably should have mulled to 4.
Game 3: Mulled to 6 and won.  Copying flipped mayors is good.  Not a very good player.

Match 29: GBU Poison (a pretty good draft deck). 2-1
Game 1: Lost to untamed might.
Game 2-3: I drew removal for his 16 2-mana 1/1s

Match 30: UW Delver
Game 1: We both mulled, I won.
Game 2-3: He won.
I need to learn from these delver experiences.

Match 31: UW Humans 2-1
G3: He discar4ded T3, I won.

Match 32: Mono black non-poison 2-0
Game 1: He mulled twice, didn't really know what he was.
Game 2: He cast an obliterator T4, I killed it with damage, and won two turns later.  (Kept a Chandra and a Shrine with n counters, with no land)

Match 33: UW Humans 0-2
Match 1?: Mulled, stuck on no action + all blue.
Game 2: Hero + Honor beats me copying their hero.  Copying their hero isn't all that great, because you can't attack anyway.   I need some better SB cards against honor.  Slagstorm?

Match 34, 35, 36: Puresteel + terrible terrible cards, 2-0, 2-0, 1-0
Game 5: Won a mull to 4

Match 37: UB Control 2-0
Game 1: No answer to early aggro
Game 2: No answer to Shrine

Match 38: GR Ramp, 1-2
Game 1: Lost, Dungrove + Sword.
Game 2: Won, Not a great player
Game 3: Lost, bad keep.  Dungrove + 1drop + Titan

Match 39: UW Humans: 0-2

Match 40: Some draft deck 2-0

Match 41: RB Aggro/Control Burn (Bump) 1-2
Game 1: Mulled and lost
Game 2: Won
Game 3: He went on the draw, and he lost.

Match 42: UB Control 2-0
Game 1: He drops Liliana, I drop Koth, guess who won
Game 2: Shrine -> SHrine -> Koth -> Koth into 3x counters.

Match 43: Solar Flare 2-1
Not an amazing player.  Brought in negate for G3, which I won.

Match 44: URW Burning Vengance with Wrath 2-0
Wrath continues to be non-amazing vs my deck.

Match 45: Heartless summoning
G1: He played Multiple Wurmcoils T4, and more stuff T5.
G2: Waif -> Bomb -> Concede
G3: Win.

==============================
Concluding thoughts:
Kristina suggested I write the results as I do them, and that I get started actually playing some tourneys, which I was a bit scared of, but agreed to.  So maybe we'll see some "real" results soon!

Testing Mono Red - Round 2

I can provide data from the 20 or so matches I played, but I am not going to post specific match results.  I have root concerns about the testing for a number of reasons:

1) I beat some terrible decks.  Some of them seemed like draft decks, and probably half the decks I played were not on anyone's tier list for being reasonable decks to play.

2) Many times my out was my opponent being terrible, and they did indeed take that out on a number of occasions.

Overall findings:
Metamorph was pretty reasonable against control, and pretty bad against aggro.  I copied several Heroes of Bladehold, but against decks with Hero of Bladehold in them, having a Hero of Bladehold on defense is not great at all.  Especially when they have Honor of the Pure and you don't.  Especially when they have 3 guys out.

Arc Trail was not a blowout in any situation.  I was used to Arc Trail saving me from my times playing Pyromancer Ascension, but it just really wasn't very good this time around.  Honor of the pure, or just having two (or three) toughness guys was rough to deal with.  I probably need Slagstorm for these matchups, or Whipflare, or something else in these slots.  (Ratchet bomb?).  Geistflame was "just as good" (aka "just as bad") in the matchups were neither was dead.

W/u Humans was my worst matchup.  Their Feind Hunters, O Rings, Journeys did wonders against my "big creature" threats.  They could also fly over to kill Koth, or just Hero + attack. 

I lost to delver a couple times.  You are really on the back foot in this matchup.  You think you can be aggro, but Geist is so much damage, and Vapor Snag wreaks havok on Berserker/Noble.

Control matchups were wins.  They have a hard time with Koth + Shrine + Metamorph + the rest of my deck randomly showing up with T5 kills.  I need a better solution for those aggro matchups though.

I'm somewhat demotivated at this point, but I'll do some more testing this weekend, and see if I can find some real opponents, and figure out how to win those games.

Mini testing results - Red with Phrexian Metamorph

I did some testing with Phyrexian Metamorph this weekend, and I was pretty impressed.  I played two main, and three side, and in most matchups, I was reaching for the third in my sideboard as the first thing I put in.  Now, maybe this was just a gut reaction from trying the card, but it seemed quite powerful, and I was often in the scenario were I just wanted to draw a metamorph off the top, for the win.

I brought it in against control decks, especially Blue/Black and Esper, because you can copy Shrine, which is probably your best card against them. (Copying Grave, Sphynx, Wurmcoil, Batterskull out of their deck are all good as well)

I brought it in in the mirror, because copying the protection from red guy, when it can't be shattered (or blocked, etc) is pretty good.

I brought it in against ramp, because it was a way to kill Thrun (I killed a Thrun in most every game with this), as well as copying Primeval (then taking their swing, then swinging in for the win)

I brought it in against the random combo decks, because they are trying to cheat something out, and you just copy it. (but bigger, often).

I brought it in against a Mayor of Avabruk human deck.  Let me tell you, letting their mayor flip, then copying it, and IMMEDIATELY GENERATING A TOKEN to block their Mayor is good times.  That game was almost over on T3, but it did last another 4 or so turns, since he kept playing guys that I'd either kill, or that would have to chump block my army of wolves.  (The copied flipped mayor won't flip back, it just keeps pumping out tokens for you)

The one matchup where it didn't seem phenominal was UW Delver.  I'm not sure I can play any of the life payment cards (except Gut Shot, and probably Growth), because if they counter them, or bounce the Metamorph, you're probably just dead, and that deck is all about redundancy in bounce/counter/attack.

===================================

Other problems:
It doesn't combo all that well with Koth, and copying a (1/1) Vampire isn't that hot, but I was never in the scenario of having a Metamorph in hand I couldn't or didn't want to cast (except against delver perhaps, and even then I probably should have run it out w/o fear to copy a delver or snapcaster).  I did run into one scenario against mono red where I couldn't afford to cast all my phyrexian mana stuff, but I think what I should be cutting in that scenario is the Gambits, not the Metamorphs. 

If I had played more games, I might have run into more situations where my only metamorph target was destroyed in response, but that only happened once (UB opponent virulent wounded his own Snapcaster in response, which was fine by me)

My first day of testing I was making mistake after mistake.  Post-combat Koths, Koth +1ing a summoning sick mountain.  Getting distracted and not winning with a ultimate Koth.  (Just don't do anything against U/B but kill them, eventually I'll learn this.  Don't turn on their dead cards in hand!)  I was racing in scenarios I was clearly losing in.  (Block Geist with 3/3 Vampire?  Nah, attack!  3 turns later, I'm dead)  I'm pretty sure my mulligan decisions were pretty bad too.

On the second day, I didn't feel like I was making nearly as many mistakes.  I was mulliganing a bit more, but I was also winning perhaps twice as much.  So maybe taking a month off actually playing the deck didn't do all that much for my ability to play the deck =)

I do need to play the delver matchup more.  Their tempo/aggro is no joke, and simply siding up to 4 arc trails and 3 1-damage spells isn't doing the trick.   Snapcaster -> Vapor Snag was brutal every time, so I need to make sure I'm winning the race if I try to get aggressive.  I've watched alot of SCG live games where the delver opponent thought they could race, and just lost, with more (and less) aggressive decks than mine.  I found I was using my arc Trails on T2 to kill their one threat, and in this respect, Geistflame is probably a better answer.  (I have 4 AT 2 GF now)

Anyway, it felt good to play the deck again, and the metamorphs really seemed sold.

P.S.:
I made alot of terrible plays (and alot of terrible keeps, and sideboard decisions), but one that I liked was when I had 5 mana, a shrine, and a Berserker.  You can cast the Berserker, get the counter on the shrine, and also use it to deal damage to your opponent, and get the Bloodthirst on the Berserker.  I'm not sure if it actually won the game for me, but it was nifty.

Red - Tweaks before Dark Ascension

The red deck has performed pretty well in the TPR, but had some troubles with the ramp decks, which may become more popular going forward.  We have the tools to deal with one-toughness dorks en masse from the ever-popular illusions deck, and can deal with Geist by blocking (hopefully).

On top of this, I have been keeping up with the tournament reports, and statements such as "I have a bad mono Red Matchup", or "the only thing this is bad against is mono red", or "I have timely for Mono Red" (this deck largely ignores timely, because it does damage in huge chunks, and deals primarily in hard to block threats, or going over the top with Koth)

So, we seem fairly well positioned in the metagame.  We have access to the right removal for the aggro decks, and we have huge threats on the control decks, that they have to answer mostly individually, or die.

Our early threats (Noble, Waif) will have taken somewhat of a hit from the metagame being anti-little-dudes, but our little guys just set up our main plan (ultimate Koth), which decks still don't have a good generalized answer to.

===================

So, what are the steps going forward?

Well, we probably need to get some time spent in some real games online.  There's no substitute for real playtime, and we'll work out the kinks this way one way or the other.  I've been fairly busy lately, so I haven't been able to put time

We also need to lock down our last few slots, and figure out a sideboard plan for ramp that actually does something to tilt the matchup in our favor.

I am still sold on the core of the deck. 
4x:  (24 cards)
Noble, Berserker, Volt Charge, Koth, Tezz's Gambit, Shrine of Burning Rage
Scattered Removal: (6-9 cards)
Some combination of Geistflame, Gut Shot, Arc Trail, Devil's Play
Mana Base:
24 mountains.
Koth ultimate really wants you to hit 6 mountains, and though we'd like to play something like 4x of the new UR "dual", I don't know that we can afford it, just to ease a bit of pain from Koth, or other blue splashes.  We could go up to 25, but I wouldn't want to go below 23.

This leaves us between 3 and 6 more slots for random other stuff.

Previously, we played 7 removal spells, leaving us 5 "other" slots.

We played 3x Reckless Waif, which was a real beating against the do-nothing blue decks, but it got sideboarded out against anything with early creatures, because it never flips there, and it trades far too easily.  The strongest argument for this is that it is another way to enable Berserkers.

We also had 2 Chandra, the Firebrand.  This was meant as another must-answer counter-capable effect, but in the end it ended up being something like a 4-mana curse of the Pierced Heart that they could attack and kill.  Chandra's ultimate is very lackluster, and you can't play the game of "defend her for a turn and win" like you can with Koth.  Drawing 4 is sweet, doubling Devil's Plays is sweet, but she was just glacially slow.  Perhaps in the new all-moorland-haunt metagame, she'd get better, but these are definately slots that can be "adjusted"

One spell that has been catching my eye lately to replace Chandra is Phyrexian Metamorph.  PM has alot of advantages in this metagame, including:
1) Has synergy with all the things the deck is trying to do already.  It's a 5-6th Noble, Berserker, Shrine, etc, whichever is the best in the particular matchup.
2) It magnifies the power of sideboard cards, which tend to be creatures or artifacts (Sword, Ratchet Bomb, Manic Vandal)  (Similar to what Snapcaster does for blue decks with instants and sorceries)
3) It Kills the Heck out of Thrun (a card we can't beat), Geist, and any other stupid legend that people play these days, on often the same turn our enemies play them.
4) It copies Titans, and doesn't die to them.  (on 6 mana, we can even kill a Inferno with this guy + Volt Charge (which has no other targets anyway)
5) It overloads artifact hate, which people are playing a criminally low amount of these days anyway.
6) It's a house against Heartless Summoning/Pod, because it's bigger than their version.
7) Copy a Grave Titan, and they can't Go for the Throat, Doom Blade, OR Tribute it...  Copy a Sphynx, and it really seems like we'll be able to do more by stacking our deck than our control opponent. (aka kill them)

It really seems like Metamorph has +'s in all the matchups. 
\The downside of it is that it's the 5th and 6th phyrexian blue mana we have in the deck, which could be somewhat painful against the most aggroeist of aggro decks.  Good thing we're packing Geistflames and Arc Trails to take the momentum back from those decks!  But this is a concern, so we should probably include some way to mitigate all this life loss.

Going through the list, we see a ton of bad options, and:

Batterskull is a bit slower than sword, but is a game-changer in aggro matchups.

Sword of War and Peace does a great job of getting our guys in for damage past the various white tokens we're seeing these days, and protects our guys from some of the more played removal (red).

Having one or two of either of these main, and one or two side seems like it would be a solid plan to prevent us from killing ourselves in aggro matchups.  They happen to combo fairly well with Metamorph, and our overall aggressive strategy.  The sword is the most aggressive, so that's what I'd start with, and see where it goes from there.

If we presume that represents 3-4 maindeck slots, we still have a couple left over after 2x Devil's Play, 2x Geistflame, 1x Gut Shot, 2x Arc Trail.

One piece of technology that has been rearing it's head (again through the abomination that is Phyrexian Mana) is Mutagenic Growth.  The removal spell of choice nowadays is Gut Shot, which Mutagenic Growth is fabulous against on the swing-in.  It saves your guys from Whipflare, Slagstorm, Galv Blast, and the like.  It causes a T3 Thrun to unexpectedly die to a Berserker or Noble as well, which is always good.

I'd want to play at least one of these, since it's never dead, and could very likely win games against the kind of removal that is being played nowadays to deal with the delver threat.  If I played two, with two metamorph, and 4 Gambit, I almost certainly need some sort of way to mitigate that damage in a longer game, so I'd almost have to include two of the life-gain options.

Mutagenic comes at the cost of Reckless Waif, but I can't imagine any deck that exists in the new Mono-Delver metagame being weak to a 1/1 on 1.  It makes me sad to remove these, because they did so much damage, but keeping a Noble alive to swing in for a counter and 3 damage is probably worth the hit here.  Maybe.

Definately worth testing.  It's possible that we'll just have to include some Sulfur Vents, especially if Metamorph proves their worth up to a 4-of...  That'd be good times.

==============

I do like that the deckbuilding requirements on this deck are quite a bit looser than on Pyromancer Ascension.  I can include any number of one-ofs, and things work out just fine.  Wish me luck in the queues...