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| Krenko, Mob Boss | Art by Karl Kopinsky |
The General
The general of this deck is Krenko, Mob Boss. When I first saw the card I fell in love with it's effect and felt a strong urge to build an EDH deck around him. His ability doubles the amount of goblins you have on the field and is very easy to abuse with the right cards.
The Lands
First I'll get the land portion of the deck out of the way. Being a mono-colour deck the land base was incredibly easy and very cheap. It consists of 33 Mountains, Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle and Vesuva. The land base was kept simple to improve the consistency of the deck and to maximise on Valakut's effect to get free lightning bolts where possible.
The Enchantments
This deck contains five enchantments Blood Moon, Fervor, Leyline of Punishment and Shared Animosity. Blood Moon provides no real downside to Krenko while potentially crippling an opponent's mana base and as such is a no brainer to include. Fervor is a simple haste enabler that allows Krenko's ability to be abused sooner and allows you to swarm your unsuspecting opponent sooner. Leyline of Punishment is simply there to stop life gain and fog effects. Lastly Shared Animosity is there to work as a sort of Battle Cry on crack, allowing you to overwhelm your opponent's with much fewer goblin's.
The Instants
The deck only runs four instants; Battle Hymn, Brightstone Ritual, Increasing Vengeance and Reverberate. Battle Hymn and Brightstone Ritual serve to produce large amounts of mana to be abused however you see fit. Increasing vengeance and Reverberate are included so if need be you can copy any of your, or your opponent's spells as much as needed and can win games.
The Planeswalker
The deck only runs one planeswalker, Koth of the Hammer. Koth can be situational but has won me games in the past where me and my opponent were at a stalemate and Koth's emblem was what decided the match. He's is also useful to produce a little extra mana or even as a meat shield to buy you more time.
The Sorceries
The deck runs eleven sorceries that fit into three general categories; removal/burn, token generation and disruption.
The removal and burn consists of Blasphemous Act, Burn at the Stake and Devil's Play. Blasphemous Act gets rid of most threats and should always be cheap to cast. Burn at the Stake can decide games by itself and should always be able to remove a player from the game. Devil's play can often remove two players from the game with the amounts of mana this deck can produce and has come to my rescue in several games.
The token generation is fairly straight forward and consists of Dragon Fodder, Krenko's Command, Kuldotha Rebirth and Mogg Alarm. All do practically the same and and do it cheaply.
The disruption consists of Burning Inquiry, Warp World and Wheel of Fortune. Burning Inquiry can sometimes backfire but tends to hurt opponent's more, especially combo players. Warp World can be used in emergency as a gamble to reset the board or with enough tokens can get almost every permanent in the deck on the field giving you 33 lightning bolts and a massive board presence while crippling your opponent.
Wheel of Fortune can be used to reload you hand or to empty the hand of an opponent who has been drawing a little too many cards.
Relentless assault is included in case it's needed for that extra push.
The Artifacts
The artifacts make up a large portion of this deck and fall into four general categories; mana rocks, staples, buffs and abuse.
The mana rocks consist of Coalition Relic, Sol Ring, Thran Dynamo and Worn Powerstone. These mana rocks are pretty standard and serve to accelerate mana slightly.
The staples of the deck are Expedition Map, Lightning Greaves, Memory Jar, Mimic Vat, Ring of Valkas, Sensei's Divining Top, Skullclamp, Swiftfoot Boots and Tormod's Crypt. Expedition map, Mimic Vat and Ring of Valkas aren't really staples but I like to put them in most decks and they often come in handy. Lightning Greaves and Swiftfoot boots give haste and protect Krenko which is very important. Memory Jar works almost like a second Wheel of Fortune. Sensei's Divining Top greatly improves consistency and should be put in almost every EDH deck. Skullclamp is amazing in any token deck and provides ungodly draw power which is something that red generally shouldn't have. Tormod's Crypt is the needed graveyard hate, my meta is full of graveyard abuse so all graveyard hate possible is needed in every deck.
The buffs consist of Coat of Arms and Door of Destinies. Both are straight forward and give massive buffs to the tokens made by Krenko.
The abuse category is where all the artifacts that abuse Krenko's ability belong. They consist of Magewright's Stone, Phyrexian Altar, Puppet Strings, Rings of Brighthearth, Slate of Ancestry, Sword of the Paruns, Thornbite Staff, Thousand-Year Elixir and Umbral Mantle. These artifacts allow Krenko's effect to be activated several times a turn and the potential to "go infinite". Phyrexian Altar can be used to produce near infinite amounts of mana and has good synergy with Thornbite Staff. Slate of Ancestry is just included as a back up draw outlet and generally isn't needed.
The Creatures
The various creatures in the deck serve to either generate tokens, increase damage, enable haste or provide utility. The token generators are Beetleback Chief, Chancellor of the Forge, Mogg War Marshal and Siege-Gang Commander. The creatures to increase damage are Akki Lavarunner, Furystoke Giant, Goblin Bushwhacker, Goblin Chieftain, Goblin Wardriver, Hellrider and Marton Stromgald. The haste enablers are Goblin Bushwhacker, Goblin Chieftain and Goblin Warchief.
The utility creatures are Goblin Recruiter and Moggcatcher who tutor. Goblin Ringleader and Sensation Gorger who combine with Recruiter to get the goblins you want. Goblin Ruinblaster as spot land destruction. Siege-Gang Commander and Skirk Fire Marshal to provide burn if needed. Lastly there's Skirk Prospector who acts as another Phyrexian Altar.
The Strategy
There's three things in EDH that make you a target; playing combo, playing blue and playing aggressively. This deck is designed to be an aggressive combo deck and as such can get a lot of hate in multiplayer games. The key to reducing the hate is to hold back on getting too much of a board presence until you can make your alpha strike and cripple your opponent. Win or lose this is one of my favourite EDH decks and is always fun to play.
The full deck list can be found here. All feedback is welcome. Have your own Krenko EDH deck? Post what you do differently in the comments.
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