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R/B Burn and life drain deck advice

Built this deck originally for the heck of it but it turned out to not be that bad. I've rebuilt it a couple times but am not sure where to go from here. I want to focus on burn and life drain, mostly through spells and then creature abilities. It stands as this currently:

Land:
-12 swamps
-11 mountains
-1 blood crypt

Creatures:
-1 rakdos ragemutt
-2 guttersnipe
-3 mortis dogs
-4 child of night
-3 falconrath nobles
-3 carnage gladiators

Spells:
-2 rise from the grave
-3 corrupt
-1 essence drain
-1 crypt incursion
-4 doom blade
-1 toil/trouble
-3 lava axe
-2 showstopper
-1 triggon of corruption
-1 staff of the death mages
-1 rakdos keyrune

My sideboard consists of the following but I do not really substitute out much:

-2 Blind zealot
-1 Vault skirge
-2 corpse hauler
-1 rakdos shred-freak
-4 pitchburn devils
-1 geth's verdict
-1 yolk of the damned
-1 stab wound
-1 pyromancer's gauntlet
-1 havoc festival


Any and all advice is greatly appreciated,
MrBillieBob

P.S. What sets are legal to play in standard format? I have some very old cards but do not know if I'm actually allowed to use them.
Posted 27 July 2013 at 08:31

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2 replies

Standard legal sets are innistrad, dark ascension, avacyn restored, m13, return to ravnica, gatecrash, dragons maze, and m14. However, innistrad, dka, avr, and m13 are cycling out in september when theros is released.

For a burn oriented strategy in current standard you want shock, pillar of flame, searing spear, brimstone volley, and maybe bump in the night. These are all commons and uncommons so they shouldn't be too hard to get. Cards from your list that I'd consider dropping are gladiator, showstopper, ragemutt, staff of the death magus, and lava axe. Unfortunately these are all either too slow or not what this deck wants. For a life drain approach blood artist is a good idea as well, and dying wish is very fun when you can get it on a decent sized creature. If you're willing to shell out some cash, rakdos' s return isn the best possible card for this deck imo. Let me know what you come up with when you edit without nonstandard stuff and ill see if I can think of anything else :)
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Posted 01 August 2013 at 02:03

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Basically what is legal in standard format is that set list you posted. But you can use an older version of a card if there is a reprint in one of the current legal sets.
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Posted 07 August 2013 at 07:53

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