Best One Mana Spells in Ixalan Standard - RED

[DelverMage]

Red has 7 one mana cards that I thought worthy of this list, although a few of them have asterisks signifying that they are situational.  Some of the better reprinted staple cards in the set are red.  Most of the situational cards are worth working towards when designing and playing this deck, which is interesting because many times strong red staples are good all by themselves.

Creatures

Flameblade Adept – Here we have a 1/2 red creature with menace for one mana.  Early evasion and improved toughness is a real bargain for that price.  If you happen to be cycling, or discarding cards (by choice or not), Flameblade’s power grows.  This is convenient to take advantage of circumstances, but not strong enough to actually try to build around.  If you are looking to create an Abandoned Sarcophagus cycling deck that has red, the Flameblade Adept would be a shoe in.

*Inventor’s Apprentice – 1/2 red creature for one mana.  Slightly above average, but as soon as you have an artifact in play the Inventor’s Apprentice becomes a 2/3.  Now you have a good deal, as the special circumstance is easy to do.  This is the same idea as Toolcraft Examplar, not as powerful, but it remains consistent.  Inventor’s Apprentice really enjoys a nice pair of Inventor’s Goggles, FYI. 

*Rigging Runner – A 1/1 first strike for one red is good.  If you can wait until your second main phase to cast the Rigging Runner after you have a creature attack it will be a 2/2 first strike as it will get a +1/+1 counter.  That does start to push Rigging Runner to the far edge of a good starting card, but casting it on the second main phase of Turn 2 is about as fast as it can get and be the best value.

Soul-Scar Mage – 1/2 human wizard with Prowess for one red mana is a very nice card.  The Soul-Scar Mage also turns your non-combat damage in to -1/-1 tokens for creatures.  This is an excellent way to deal with the various Gods from Amonkhet, as they are indestructible.  That does tend to make the Soul-Scar Mage a strong target for removal.  This effect is triggered though, not activated, so you can follow up the successful summoning of a Soul-Scar Mage with a Lightning Strike and get your negative tokens.  This card gets an Honorable Mention towards the Top 5.

Spells

Magma Spray – One of the core cards in recent Standard formats, it was first introduced with Shards of Alara.  Although Magma Spray can only target creatures, if they die, they are exiled.  This is an extremely useful result in the Ixalan Standard format.  There are many powerful staple cards that deserve every Magma Spray they get.  Don’t forget that Magma Spray’s effect still works even if it was not the only card to do damage to the creature.  So a chump block followed with a Magma Spray can keep those pesky Scorpion and Scarab gods from going back into your opponent’s hand.

Shock – Another red staple reprint that was originally introduced in the set Stronghold.  Shock is an instant that is good for 2 damage, and it can target creatures or players.  It is very vanilla, and very useful.
 
Sideboard

Chandra's Defeat – Because this card is so razor focused, it just does not make any sense to play it in your main board.  But many top tier decks utilize legitimate targets as a part of their path to victory.  With its ability to provide 5 damage to a red creature or planeswalker, Chandra’s Defeat has become a staple card in just about any Standard deck that can cast it.  Not only does it help keep Chandra herself off the battlefield, but it takes out many game finishing cards like Glorybringer and a number of Dinosaurs.  Now if we could only get it to work on Hazoret the Fervent.  (Hmmm.  Chandra’s Defeat while Soul-Scar Mage is in play would do the trick.)