Raphael, the Nightwatcher

Gameplan

Raphael turns every attack into a death sentence by granting all your attacking creatures double strike, then snowballs aggression with the Sneak mechanic to redeploy attackers cheaply. Develop a fast mono-red board, swing wide or with big trampling threats, and let doubled combat damage close games quickly. Use cheap haste enablers and extra-combat effects to overwhelm before opponents stabilize.

Key Cards

• Fervor — Grants haste so attackers can swing the turn they hit play and benefit from double strike immediately.
• Combat Celebrant — Untaps your team for an extra combat step, doubling already-doubled damage for explosive turns.
• Hellkite Charger — Chains additional combats with double strike for potentially lethal multi-attack turns.
• Berserkers' Onslaught — Redundancy for the double strike effect that protects your gameplan if Raphael is removed.
• Purphoros, God of the Forge — Punishes opponents while you flood the board with attackers and tokens.
• Krenko, Mob Boss — Generates a wide goblin army that becomes lethal once everything has double strike.

Upgrade Path

Add more haste enablers (Hammer of Purphoros, Anger) and extra-combat payoffs (Aggravated Assault, Aurelia-style effects via red equivalents) to guarantee creatures attack and swing multiple times. Improve ramp with red rituals and mana rocks (Sol Ring, Dockside Extortionist) to deploy threats ahead of curve, and include evasion and trample sources so doubled damage actually connects. Prioritize redundancy for double strike and protection like Heroic Intervention's red analogs (Boros Charm-style indestructibility isn't available, so lean on recursion and resilience).