[Standard] B/R Aggro-Control

[Hellsing293]

Hello, I am new to Type 2.  I have played many formats from vintage, to limited, to competitive peasant (lol), but I have never played a game of standard.  I'm trying to make a standard deck to compete at my local card shop.  I hope that I'm going about this deck critique correctly.  If not, I apologize.

To preface the decklist, I would like to describe the local metagame.  I have friends who go to the tournaments so I was able to scope out some expected decks and opponents.  Most of the standard decks aren't exactly "tier 1."  There are a lot of decks with ridiculously high mana curves and unstable mana bases.  However, I've heard that there are experienced players piloting Elves, Vampires, and Burn lurking around.

So, the deck that I have come up with is the following:

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Creatures: 20
4 Guul Draz Assassin
4 Gatekeeper of Malakir
4 Slavering Nulls
4 Hypnotic Specter
4 Vampire Nighthawk

Instants: 4
4 Lightning Bolt

Sorceries: 15
4 Blightning
4 Slave of Bolas
2 Duress
2 Marsh Casualties
3 Sign in Blood

Lands: 21
15 Swamp
6 Mountain

Sideboard: 15
4 Deathmark
4 Suffer the Past
2 Duress
1 Sign in Blood
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Mana Curve:
1 Mana: 10 Spells (25.6%)
2 Mana: 13 Spells (33.3%)
3 Mana: 12 Spells (30.8%)
4 Mana: 0 Spells (0%)
5 Mana: 4 Spells (10.3%)
*Kicker costs unaccounted for*

Color Distribution:
Black Spells: 23 (59.0%)
Red Spells: 8 (20.5%)
Gold Spells: 8 (20.5%)

Deck's Goal:
The goal of this deck is to take early control of the board while gaining card advantage via discard.  The deck is supposed to be quick, but not in the burn deck sense where the main goal is the opponent's life total.  I imagined that the goal of the deck would be to get so far ahead by mid-game that the game is virtually over.

Card Explanations:
Creatures[/U]

Guul Draz Assassin : A quick one-drop that can take early control of the board.
Gatekeeper of Malakir : A solid body with a built-in Diabolic Edict.  It seems like good card advantage, and it enables early board control.
Slavering Nulls : He's not as good as Hypnotic Specter, but he is still an early attacker that disrupts the opponent.
Hypnotic Specter : I consider this card a foundation of the deck.  Its powerful random discard coupled with its evasion makes it a perfect aggro-control creature.
Vampire Nighthawk : This card seems seriously under-costed to me.  It gives me an evasive beater who can hold off fatties (via deathtouch).  The lifelink works nicely to minimize [CARD]Sign in Blood[/CARD]'s cost.

Instants[/U]

Lightning Bolt : An under-costed burn that doubles as board control.  It belongs in any red deck.

Sorceries[/U]

Blightning : A ridiculously powerful spell that takes a chunk of life while gaining card advantage via making the opponent discard.
Slave of Bolas : Nets me one more attacker and the opponent one less blocker for a turn.  I predict that it will also work excellently against all of the fatties running around.
Duress : The deck is very susceptible to board sweepers and lacks enchantment removal.  I figure that duress is an early spells that can get rid of anything threatening.
Marsh Casualties : A powerful, one-sided board sweeper against opposing aggro decks.
Sign in Blood : I felt that the deck needed some form of draw, and after using the Gatherer this seemed to be the best available option.

Comments:
I realize that there are many   costs in the deck.  After adding these cards to the deck, I decided that the best route to take would be to create a black deck with a touch of essential red spells.  For this reason, I am cautious to add any   costs except very significant red spells to the deck.

Regarding the use of only basic lands, I figured that since the deck wants to come out quick that lands that came into play tapped would hinder my game plan.  Is this correct thinking?  Or am I really missing out on some good plays with other lands?

Are there too many 4of's?  Should I try to diversify the deck more?

What archtypes are the biggest threat to such an aggro-control deck?  What cards should I worry about?

I really wanted to play Bituminous Blast, but I couldn't find room for it.  I'm still willing to play it if anyone has suggestions of what I should cut for it.

My sideboard is very much an approximation since I've never actually played the decks at the local tournaments.  I've scouted other sideboards for black and red decks, but am I missing something essential.

Thank you in advance for your suggestions!

[CorwinB]

You should really run a couple Terminates in this deck. This is non-conditional, ridiculously undercosted removal. You may want to remove a couple Slave of Bolas (way too expensive, in a deck with only 21 lands) for Terminates. Speaking of which your land count is really low. Your curve may not be too high, but the leveling creatures mean a recurring investment of mana. Regarding mana, you may want a couple Lavaclaw Reaches : while other manlands are more powerful, this one allows you to fireball your opponent if the board is clear, which is always nice.

Slavering Nulls is not a bad card, far from it, but it lacks evasion which makes it a hard sell in Standard. Great if you can keep the opponent's board clear.

Regarding the threats to your deck :

• Jund has so much built-in CA and removal that it makes it hard to stick a threat on board. Your best hope is that they have often slow starts
• UW : I'm afraid your deck folds to the tap-out version, which has so much draw and threat density that it will become hard to stick a threat and win from there. Your matchup is probably a bit better against Chapin-style, Permission UW, but I wouldn't say it's great either
• RDW is another hard matchup, as by the time you get your discard online you have probably lost a lot of life already. The new Devastating Summons deck can kill extremely fast
• Mythic has a combination of fatties and small mana producers, which makes it hard to rely on Edict effects against them. Deathmark in the SB helps this matchup tremendously, though.
  
• I'm not sure how you would fare against the new "American Gladiators" deck, featuring a UW base, a splash of Red, and an absurd amount of powerful Planeswalkers (Ajani Vengeant, Jace the Mindsculptor, Elspeth and Gideon). The deck has a slow start so your discard may sting a lot, but they have absolutely incredible turns once they get a couple Walkers online. You may want Pithing Needle or Vampire Hexmage as a SB answer to Planeswalkers.

[serracollector]

Terminate is an obv addition.  Also,  I have seen a lot of Bloodghast + Sarkhan, the Mad,  for lots of fatty tokens real fast.

I would suggest:
- 4 Slave of Bolas + 2 Sarkhan +2 bloodghast
- 4  Gull Assasin, +3 Terminate + 1 Sign in Blood (draw is good).

Sarkhan acts as a kill engine, card drawer (since most things in ur deck are 3 CC or less he should live a turn), and is amazing with bloodghasts.

3 terminate + Blightning + bolt +  Sign in blood should keep your threat count plenty high enough.

Other cards u might wanna consider

Consuming vapors - 2 creatures dead for 1 card, life gain, and even stops eldrazi fatties.
Abyssal Persecutor - 6/6 flying tramplers are good.  With Vapors/Terminate/Sarkhan, very easy to get rid of once you don't need him anymore.

Not sure how you would fit those in (if you want to), but they are great as well.

[Hellsing293]

Do you thinking Lightning Bolt and Blightning can be sufficient to prevent any planeswalker nuisances?

Regarding the changes you suggested, how about:
-4 Slave of Bolas
+2 Terminate
+2 Lavaclaw Reaches

How about Prophetic Prism as a cantripping mana-fixer, or would it be slow and junky?  Do you think I can squeeze Bituminous Blast into this deck?

EDIT: Would Sarkhan fit or do you think that it would be too expensive/slow?

[CorwinB]

Do you thinking Lightning Bolt and Blightning can be sufficient to prevent any planeswalker nuisances?

Regarding the changes you suggested, how about:
-4 Slave of Bolas
+2 Terminate
+2 Lavaclaw Reaches

How about Prophetic Prism as a cantripping mana-fixer, or would it be slow and junky?  Do you think I can squeeze Bituminous Blast into this deck?

EDIT: Would Sarkhan fit or do you think that it would be too expensive/slow?

I don't think Prophetic Prism is a good fit in your deck. As a cantrip they are never a dead draw, but you can't afford spending 2 manas on fixing. More dual lands would probably be a better fit.

Sarkhan the Mad as a one or two-off would probably be great in this deck.

[Russian Alara]

Do you thinking Lightning Bolt and Blightning can be sufficient to prevent any planeswalker nuisances?

Regarding the changes you suggested, how about:
-4 Slave of Bolas
+2 Terminate
+2 Lavaclaw Reaches

How about Prophetic Prism as a cantripping mana-fixer, or would it be slow and junky?  Do you think I can squeeze Bituminous Blast into this deck?

EDIT: Would Sarkhan fit or do you think that it would be too expensive/slow?

I don't think Prophetic Prism is a good fit in your deck. As a cantrip they are never a dead draw, but you can't afford spending 2 manas on fixing. More dual lands would probably be a better fit.

Sarkhan the Mad as a one or two-off would probably be great in this deck.

Agree with CorwinB on Sarkhan at two..

[serracollector]

As I suggested above, 2 srakhan, and maybe 2 Bloodghst.  Bloodghast is too good to not be in about any black aggro deck.  He doesn't die.