I think every color has cards that are just so strong/efficient on their own that you do yourself a disservice if you don't consider them every time you're building in that color. And then you must also ask yourself, is bolt better or worse than any other card i could potentially play in place of it? pretty frequently I think you'll find that powerful, efficient cards like become ubiquitous because the answer to the previous question is nearly always "no there is no card that's better than bolt". Exceptions being some of those mentioned - like storm, where your deck needs to be so finely tuned that bolt, while good, actually takes away from the efficiency of your deck achieving its goal.
Only downfall of this if that it's really easy to have pet cards, and if you favor them too much it can warp and limit your deck building. My biggest offender is Smallpox for example. I love the efficiency that it offers, and I love that I can build my deck to take advantage of the 'drawbacks'. By doing this though, I begin limiting my potential pool of cards that I might add to my black deck to 'cards that play well with smallpox' and suddenly every deck I make I'm building myself into a corner by adding BloodghastFlagstones of TrokairLingering Souls and eventually Liliana of the Veil. Then I figure well I may as well splash green for Abrupt Decay and Life from the Loam and suddenly I'm staring at my 28214720th iteration of BWg Loam Pox.
Bolt has much broader application than pox however, so it's going to be harder to find cards that truly are better for your deck. Similarly, if you were in blue and could play ancestral recall - how do you ever say no to that? How many cards out there let you do something better than drawing 3 cards at instant speed for a single mana? I think that's the type of rigor you have to apply when questioning whether certain staples belong in your deck or not.
"So every red aggro deck should play 4 bolts.*" - Izzetmage
*Some caviats do apply:
- Do not do it if the deck has some other synergi, like affinaty.
- If you have some other synergi, like enabeling delerium, do not play bolt.
- Have some reason to not play bolt because it does not fit with the gameplan, like dredge.
- If perhaps the deck has like a plan that hinges on cascade, obviusly you should not run bolt.
Sarcasemn aside, any 'rule' that needs this many exeption is not a rule.
'Bolt is a good card, that is all.' - Vidar Thorsby 2017
That's a pretty poorly view. Affinity plays bolt in Galvanic Blast. They have a bolt that deals 4, why would they play a bolt that deals 3? They only have 4 slots for bolt effects, so they play 'affinity bolt' (the better bolt). Also, this is not a red aggro deck, this is just an aggro deck that is capable of generating red mana, but it's colorless at heart. Your exception isn't an exception.
Enabling delirium has nothing to do with not playing bolt, but if you want to enable it by T2 because you want to fetch and play Death's Shadow, chances are you want your bolt slot to be Tarfire. Not because you don't want bolt, but because it's more efficient to your gameplan. Here you are playing a pseudo combo deck: go below 13 and enable 4 card types by turn 2. You're not pure aggro. Your exception is out of place.
Dredge is a combo deck, dredge wants to bin a dredger and get free creatures. Dredge doesn't play cards that aren't enablers. Your exception is out of place.
Cascade decks in modern are combo decks (Living End/Restore Balance), combo decks are not aggro decks. They are combo decks. Again, this is not an exception, but a misconception of yours.
Yes, every red based aggro deck should play bolt (and they do it). That will not change because that is the ceiling of aggro-red in modern: 3 damage at instant speed for 1 mana with no other constraints: no need to play any specific synergistic card, no reliance on graveyard, not demanding any card types in any zone. Three damage. 1 mana. Instant. That's as good as it gets.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
In Lorwyn's brief evenings, the sun pauses at the horizon long enough for a certain species of violet to bloom with the fragrance of mischief.
Also Eldrazi plays lots of dudes that don't die to bolt either.
It's a no-brainer
Only downfall of this if that it's really easy to have pet cards, and if you favor them too much it can warp and limit your deck building. My biggest offender is Smallpox for example. I love the efficiency that it offers, and I love that I can build my deck to take advantage of the 'drawbacks'. By doing this though, I begin limiting my potential pool of cards that I might add to my black deck to 'cards that play well with smallpox' and suddenly every deck I make I'm building myself into a corner by adding Bloodghast Flagstones of Trokair Lingering Souls and eventually Liliana of the Veil. Then I figure well I may as well splash green for Abrupt Decay and Life from the Loam and suddenly I'm staring at my 28214720th iteration of BWg Loam Pox.
Bolt has much broader application than pox however, so it's going to be harder to find cards that truly are better for your deck. Similarly, if you were in blue and could play ancestral recall - how do you ever say no to that? How many cards out there let you do something better than drawing 3 cards at instant speed for a single mana? I think that's the type of rigor you have to apply when questioning whether certain staples belong in your deck or not.
That's a pretty poorly view. Affinity plays bolt in Galvanic Blast. They have a bolt that deals 4, why would they play a bolt that deals 3? They only have 4 slots for bolt effects, so they play 'affinity bolt' (the better bolt). Also, this is not a red aggro deck, this is just an aggro deck that is capable of generating red mana, but it's colorless at heart. Your exception isn't an exception.
Enabling delirium has nothing to do with not playing bolt, but if you want to enable it by T2 because you want to fetch and play Death's Shadow, chances are you want your bolt slot to be Tarfire. Not because you don't want bolt, but because it's more efficient to your gameplan. Here you are playing a pseudo combo deck: go below 13 and enable 4 card types by turn 2. You're not pure aggro. Your exception is out of place.
Dredge is a combo deck, dredge wants to bin a dredger and get free creatures. Dredge doesn't play cards that aren't enablers. Your exception is out of place.
Cascade decks in modern are combo decks (Living End/Restore Balance), combo decks are not aggro decks. They are combo decks. Again, this is not an exception, but a misconception of yours.
Yes, every red based aggro deck should play bolt (and they do it). That will not change because that is the ceiling of aggro-red in modern: 3 damage at instant speed for 1 mana with no other constraints: no need to play any specific synergistic card, no reliance on graveyard, not demanding any card types in any zone. Three damage. 1 mana. Instant. That's as good as it gets.
This new topic is basically the same as this thread. So you can head over there to talk about bolt.