The Three Shades of Red in Pauper: Rally, Red Madness, and Rakdos Madness

Today, I want to examine Mono Red Rally, Mono Red Madness, and Rakdos Madness by looking at their differences and similarities. They are all Lightning Bolt decks, but sometimes this is where the commonalities end. For each deck, I will provide a sample decklist, so we can all keep track of the cards mentioned.

And without further ado, let's get it!

Mono Red Rally

This is the most creature-centric of all the variants. It can remind us of Kuldotha Rebirth decks from before - mainly because they are both Goblin Bushwhacker decks. 

The best openers involve Golin Tomb Raider, accompanied by an artifact, turning it into a drawback-less Goblin Guide. The best version of it is turn one Great Furnace into Tomb Raider - putting insane pressure on the opponent from the very first turn.

Another very powerful part of the deck is Burning-Tree Emissary lines, which allow you to play out numerous creatures very early on, making it hard for the opponent to come back as soon as turn two. Combined with the previously mentioned Goblin Bushwhacker, we're looking at a ton of damage turn three, especially if more than one Emissary was deployed. 

The name of the deck comes from Rally at the Hornburg - a card that can be played off Emissary mana and, conveniently, grants haste to Emissary itself. A popular line is turn one creature, turn two Emissary + Rally - attack all.

In addition, there is a small artifact subtheme that goes beyond just Goblin Tomb Raider, as we play Galvanic Blast in addition to Lightning Bolt and Chain Lightning for the burn suite. We enable it thanks to Great Furnace but also Experimental Synthesiser, Clockwork Percussionist, and Voldaren Epicure Blood Token.

Last but not least, we can generate proper card advantage thanks to Wrenn's Resolve, which in this case is basically two mana Divination. Between it and Synthesiser, we can have a properly steady card flow. We're not only fast but stable and can play a longer game.

If you're looking to engage in combat and have those dopaminergic early turns with Emissary, look no further!

Mono Red Madness

This is much closer to what you might call a burn deck, but it's not strictly so. While we could argue taxonomy, I like to think of Madness as something on the Control-Combo spectrum. Your games will often be determined by a resolved Guttersnipe and a flurry of spells targeted at the opponent, especially the free ones like Lava Dart or Fireblast. This might be as simple as turn three Guttersnipe and turn four win, or in a more roundabout way, where you play a control role, targeting the burn spells not at the opponent's face but rather their threats to stay alive - and at some point you deploy Guttersnipe and play out the rest of the hand. A resolved Guttersnipe will frequently spell disaster, as you can always play more spells in response to a removal spell - so as long as it hits the battlefield, you're golden.

There is a sub-plan that involves Sneaky Snacker. Depending on the matchup and a particular game, Snackers might be your way to get chip damage in, outgrind removal, or your recurring blockers. It is, however, a key part of the deck and something that the opponent always has to take into account for longer games.

In order to enable Snacker, we play discard-draw effects in Faithless Looting, Highway Robbery, and Grab the Prize. They aren't there only to discard Snacker and get some new fresh cards. They also synergise with Fiery Temper, and allow you to discard a Lava Dart, so it can wait in the bin for its moment to be played for free later. They are also excellent at filtering your hand when you're flooded in the late game.

All in all, it's not an aggressive 'go face' type of burn deck, so it's definitely for more patient red mages.

Rakdos Madness

What happens if we splash black? How different is Rakdos from Mono Red if both are Madness decks? Well - VERY.

While I called Mono Red Madness a Combo-Control strategy, Rakdos I'd call something like Midrange Burn. The name is shared, but the decks do play out quite a bit differently.

First, there are 12 madness payoffs, contrary to Mono Red's just 4. Here, we add the black ones - Kitchen Imp and Alms of the Vein. Imp allows us to get into combat more eagerly, and in tandem with Snacker, we get a solid flying fleet. Alms and Vampire's Kiss, another madness enabler, give the deck lifegain, which isn't to be found in other red strategies. It, at least in principle, should help when facing off against other aggressive decks. 

The sideboard also benefits from another colour, highlighting cards like Duress, Extract a Confession, or yet another madness payoff Dark Withering.

The downside is pretty clear - we're considerably slower. Compared to the clean 18 Mountain manabases, here we run as many as 8 tap lands.

One could say that this version is better at playing long between its lifegain and so many ways to generate value with madness, but I'd just say it plays out the late game differently than Mono Red. This deck gains a gradual advantage and wins at the end, having accrued more resources, while Mono Red is waiting for a moment to 'combo kill' with Guttersnipe in one fell swoop - it doesn't need a gradual advantage when it can just finish the opponent off.

Conclusion

As you can see, you can put Mountains into your deck and play completely differently, depending on the rest of the shell. I reckon it's a great upside of the format where you can have preferences, but still choose a strategy that speaks to you the most. There isn't just one red or one blue deck in the format - on the contrary!