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Hello, everyone! If you've ever read any of my previous articles, it should come as no surprise that I'm a Boros Legionnaire at heart. The combination of Red and White offer fast attacks, fliers, removal, direct damage, and answers for nearly anything my opponent can throw at me. If you're a fan of playing control, I'm sorry, but this article won't have much to offer you other than an inside look into the mind of a Boros mage. This week I'll be taking a look at a few different Boros builds so you can decide which one is the best fit for you.
Boros Angels
The first deck I have attacks the opponent on two fronts, the ground and the air, simultaneously. Let's take a look at the deck:
Boros Angels | WAR Standard | Tops420, aetherhub.com user
- Creatures (19)
- 1 Lyra Dawnbringer
- 2 Dreadhorde Arcanist
- 2 Krenko, Tin Street Kingpin
- 3 Aurelia, Exemplar of Justice
- 3 Feather, the Redeemed
- 4 Legion Warboss
- 4 Resplendent Angel
- Instants (16)
- 2 Risk Factor
- 3 Defiant Strike
- 3 Justice Strike
- 4 Reckless Rage
- 4 Sheltering Light
- Sorceries (3)
- 3 Gird for Battle
- Enchantments (3)
- 3 Legion's Landing
- Lands (21)
- 5 Mountain
- 8 Plains
- 4 Clifftop Retreat
- 4 Sacred Foundry
Resplendent Angel also plays nicely with the angelic members of this team. Lyra Dawnbringer gives all other Angels you control +1/+1 and lifelink, which gets Resplendent Angel very close to being able to create a 4/4 Angel token all by herself (without activating her activated ability). With Feather, the Redeemed, you're able to reuse Gird for Battle turn after turn building up your team. Aurelia, Exemplar of Justice can also help her get bigger by targeting her with the +2/+0 bonus and granting her vigilance.
One other important member of this team is Dreadhorde Arcanist. With this Zombie Wizard, you're able to reuse Instant and Sorcery cards from your graveyard. If you happen to also have Feather, the Redeemed in play, the card you cast with Dreadhorde Arcanist's attack trigger will get returned to your hand instead of being exiled, which makes Dreadhorde Arcanist and Feather, the Redeemed quite the power couple.
Boros Bugler
The next deck I have for you Features Militia Bugler doing what he does best. Let's take a look at it:
Boros Bugler | WAR Standard | lenny872, deckstats.net user
- Creatures (27)
- 1 Dismissive Pyromancer
- 1 Tomik, Distinguished Advokist
- 3 Aurelia, Exemplar of Justice
- 3 Krenko, Tin Street Kingpin
- 3 Siege-Gang Commander
- 4 Adanto Vanguard
- 4 Boros Challenger
- 4 Legion Warboss
- 4 Militia Bugler
- Sorceries (2)
- 2 Lava Coil
- Enchantments (7)
- 3 Conclave Tribunal
- 4 History of Benalia
- Lands (24)
- 5 Mountain
- 8 Plains
- 1 Field of Ruin
- 2 Boros Guildgate
- 4 Clifftop Retreat
- 4 Sacred Foundry
- Sideboard (15)
- 3 Baffling End
- 3 Banefire
- 1 Deafening Clarion
- 2 Goblin Cratermaker
- 3 Integrity // Intervention
- 2 Lava Coil
- 1 Solar Blaze
This deck also features a small Mentor theme as well, which helps the smaller creature tokens you're able to create become larger threats. Aurelia, Exemplar of Justice is especially good at mentoring others, as she can target herself with her beginning of combat trigger, making it so that any other creature on your team can be mentored a time or two. Use that ability as often as you can to keep your token generators alive as long as possible.
I like the single copy of Dismissive Pyromancer in this deck as a means of drawing additional cards. While you won't always be able to use this ability, having it available to you can mean the world if there's a specific card you're looking for. Even though there is only one copy of it in the deck, finding it when you need it is made easier by the amount of cards that playing Militia Bugler allows you to see.
Boros Dinosaurs
The final deck I have for you this week uses creatures from a land before time in an attempt to make your opponent extinct. Let's take a look at it:
Boros Dinosaurs | WAR Standard | ukryan243, deckstats.net user
- Creatures (18)
- 1 Burning Sun's Avatar
- 1 Charging Tuskodon
- 1 Goring Ceratops
- 1 Huatli's Snubhorn
- 1 Majestic Heliopterus
- 1 Otepec Huntmaster
- 1 Stampeding Horncrest
- 2 Pterodon Knight
- 2 Sun-Blessed Mount
- 2 Territorial Hammerskull
- 2 Tilonalli's Knight
- 3 Kinjalli's Caller
- Planeswalkers (1)
- 1 Huatli, Dinosaur Knight
- Instants (8)
- 1 Electrodominance
- 1 Settle the Wreckage
- 2 Desperate Lunge
- 2 Lightning Strike
- 2 Shock
- Sorceries (4)
- 2 Hijack
- 2 Warlord's Fury
- Enchantments (5)
- 1 Sarkhan's Unsealing
- 2 On Serra's Wings
- 2 Seal Away
- Lands (24)
- 11 Mountain
- 9 Plains
- 4 Stone Quarry
If you manage to play the single copy of Sarkhan's Unsealing in the deck, you'll gain a big advantage. It's a very powerful card that provides additional damage either for creature or planeswalker removal or for aiming it directly at the opponent's life total. The problem is that it costs 4 mana and doesn't do anything until you cast a creature spell. That's the importance of only including one copy in the deck. One nice thing is that it triggers from casting a creature spell, so you get the damage whether the creature is countered or not.
Wrapping Up
For me, hands down, Boros is the Guild I love playing the most. These decks all feature only Red and White cards, but they all play differently. You can play tiny creatures and outnumber your opponent, or play huge Dinosaurs. You can use flying creatures to attack, or hold back and attack the opponent with direct damage spells. Boros offers a lot of flexibility, which allows for a variety of ways to play, making it never boring to play a Boros deck.
What do you think of these decks? Do you have any suggestions for improvements? Let me know by leaving a comment below or you can reply to me directly on Twitter (@mikelikesmtg), or email me directly at mikelikesmtg@gmail.com. Also, feel free to share this article with your friends anywhere on social media. And be sure to join me here again next week as I continue my search for innovative decks in Standard. I'll see you then!
-Mike Likes
