I didn't care for Banisher Priest in my W/B lifegain deck. With a lot of creatures like Missionaries, Child of Night, and Faithmenders, those creatures don't attract a lot of removal, meaning the removal your opponent does have is more likely going to kill BP before it really helps you. I'd recommend running a couple Reprisals in there, as the deck can struggle against larger creatures.

Sanguine Bond is a win condition, and just gets ridiculous with a Faithmender out. If anything I'd say bump it up to 2.

These were pretty much my thoughts exactly before I even read your reply. I was thinking Arrest instead of the Banisher Priest but Reprisal can't hurt either.

What a beautiful mana sink Vizkopa is turning out to be. I won a battle of attrition against an Azorius deck last night on his back basically.
I didn't start FRAPS for some reason until about 30 minutes into the game after the little bastard conceded. Ruined his ego, I'm sure, as I killed him while gaining life against his "lifegain" deck.
You could tell too as his pausing and not using his phases promptly more than likely meant he intended on me conceding a couple of times during the game and I wasn't about to.
Wish I had had the forethought to remember and press F9 earlier as it was one hell of a game!
I'll make sure the deck I listed is the cut I'm using presently when I get home this evening and if it isn't I'll update it.
Love Orzhov.

^ This
I'm running 2 and have had both out on more than one occasion and let me tell you...
They bring the pain.

Because apparently there weren't enough of these decks posted already (and so people don't have to go to my site to see my decklists)...

Life and Death

Creatures - 20
3 Ajani’s Pridemate
4 Child of Night
4 Lone Missionary
3 Vizkopa Guildmage
1 Brimaz, King of Oreskos
2 Mentor of the Meek
2 Rhox Faithmender
1 Baneslayer Angel

Other Spells - 16
2 Ulcerate
2 Ordeal of Heliod
2 Reprisal
3 Tribute to Hunger
3 Angelic Accord
1 Meditation Puzzle
2 Sanguine Bond
1 Covenant of Blood

Land - 24
9 Plains
7 Swamp
4 Orzhov Guildgate
4 Radiant Fountain

Inspired by wwBlackknightww, here is a WB Heroic aggro list that I just took for a spin to the tune of 5-0 in the ranked lobbies; I think that's my new official criterion for posting a list:

4 x Orzhov Guildgate
9 x Swamp
8 x Plains

4 x Gods Willing
4 x Swift Justice
3 x Tormented Hero
3 x Ulcerate
2 x Cruel Sadist

4 x Lone Missionary
4 x Child of Night
4 x Nimbus Wings
3 x Ajani's Pridemate
2 x Hero of Iroas
1 x Vizkopa Guildmage

2 x Agent of the Fates
2 x Mentor of the Meek
1 x Brimaz, King of Oreskos


Regarding the manabase:

I hate including gates in a deck like this but I feel it's necessary mainly because of Brimaz and Agent; I generally want to cast these cards ASAP if I draw them. I have also chosen to include more Swamps than Plains because my one-drop creatures are all black and I need a Swamp to cast them on T1. My deck has more white spells than black ones, but I can operate on a single white source in the early turns.

Regarding Creatures:

Tormented Hero has two power for one mana with Heroic upside.

Cruel Sadist requires only one activation to become a Bear (but can grow bigger if you need her to). You will probably never use her second ability, but hey, it's there in a pinch.

Lone Missionary is a Piker that triggers Pridemate, helps pay for Ulcerate, triggers Mentor, and helps you win damage races. Fine card here.

Child of Night is a Piker with basically the same benefits as the Missionary, except she has to get into combat to realize them. Still a fine card here.

Ajani's Pridemate is a Bear with a ton of value in this deck because of all the ways to gain life. I'd consider this a core card.

Hero of Iroas is a Bear that's amazing in any Heroic deck because he just wins games on his own if left unanswered.

Vizkopa Guildmage is the best remaining Bear that's on-color because it at least gives you the option to sink some mana into it; I wouldn't ever want more than one of these and it's not easy to cast on T2, so one copy is fine.

Mentor of the Meek turns all your Bears into cantrips. Enough said.

Agent of the Fates is a solid creature at the top-end of an aggressive deck, and with all the ways to trigger him he is a big part of the deck's removal package. Attacking with him and casting Swift Justice pre-blocks forces one sacrifice and the resulting first-strike plus deathtouch creature he becomes usually eats a second creature (if they have one).

Brimaz is Brimaz.

Regarding Spells:

Gods Willing protects your guys, triggers Heroic, and has the sweet delicious gravy of Scry on top.

Swift Justice is amazing in a combat-oriented deck because it triggers Heroic, triggers your Pridemates, and acts as removal in a lot of cases.

Ulcerate is an amazing removal spell in any deck that can afford the life payment and this one can.

Nimbus Wings provides evasion to push through damage, triggers Heroic, and brings your dudes outside the range of a lot of the common removal. We also have the synergy with Hero of Iroas, but that's just more delicious gravy.

I'm curious as to how this deck will function over a larger sample size. I have a feeling mine will end up looking more like this than not. Good looking deck.

Nice looking deck Hakeem. I liked the Tormented a lot but I found that I really needed some removal to keep the lifegain/deplete theme going so I swapped the three I had out for three Ulcerate last night. It's starting to smooth out nicely.

Just spit-balling here, I see there are lots of synergies with Lone Missionary but with so many other ways to trigger pridemate, would Leonin Snarecaster maybe be a better fit for this deck? Helps push more damage through, and still triggers everything everything Missionary does with the exception of Pridemate.

Just a thought. You've played it, I haven't.

Currently at 12-2, the deck runs really well. Making 3/3 fliers with Tormented Hero, Lone Missionary and Child of Night through Nimbus Wings is surprisingly effective and I usually don't have to worry about blocking against weenie/token decks because of all the lifegain; I suited up a Child of Night and just rode it to victory against a WR token build because I was gaining three life every turn and he couldn't block or Shock it. I also have curved Tormented Hero into Nimbus Wings swinging for three in the air on T2 plus the life loss from the Heroic trigger; it's a solid start.

The worst part of the deck is mulligans so far, you have to be a bit more aggressive than usual. Since it's a Heroic deck it plays a lot like an Aura deck in that you can sometimes just draw the wrong half of your deck.

Cruel Sadist isn't the hottest card, either, but I really don't see any other cheap creatures in these colors that I would like to replace it with. I suppose I could try subbing in some Banisher Priests to force through damage and I have the full set of Gods Willing to protect them from removal. I'm not going to make the swap, but I will ask myself whenever I draw the Sadist if the Banisher would be better. If anyone decides to test the deck with this swap, they should sub out a Swamp for a Plains to better support it.

It doesn't help pay for Ulcerate.

I'm really not a big fan of Snarecaster overall, though; if it were a Frost Lynx type of effect I'd be all over it, but just tapping something at sorcery-speed isn't worth as much as four life in this deck.

Hmm, fair enough. I guess I was looking at it as a Goblin Shortcutter type that most people seem to be running in RDW, but I suppose this deck is a little more control/little less aggro than that. Point taken.

Curving Tormented Hero into Hero of Iroas into Agent of the Fates with a handful of Heroic enablers is a thing of beauty!

I have the same curve in my deck, which is actually based off of your recently posted Boros deck, but with Black instead of Red. Just having Hero out there with Agent and multiple Enchants sometimes means spamming enchants on Agent and just eliminating everyone from the opponent's side. It's awesome.

Tormented Hero is an underrated card, from what I have seen on these forums.

At 21-4, I'm pretty satisfied with this pile. I did lose a game to a massive Rhox Faithmender that I had no way to deal with, and there were some other problematic creatures I fought along the way. I think my idea to cut the Cruel Sadists for some better removal was probably correct, so I'm going to sub in the Banisher Priests and make that minor change to the manabase so I have outs to those situations. I know Banisher isn't great, but this deck will probably win on the turn you cast it and you have the full set of Gods Willing to protect her otherwise.

Here's the final list, give it a shot if you want to play an aggressive deck featuring the Heroic mechanic:

4 x Orzhov Guildgate
8 x Swamp
9 x Plains

4 x Gods Willing
4 x Swift Justice
3 x Tormented Hero
3 x Ulcerate

4 x Lone Missionary
4 x Child of Night
4 x Nimbus Wings
3 x Ajani's Pridemate
2 x Hero of Iroas

2 x Agent of the Fates
2 x Mentor of the Meek
2 x Banisher Priest
1 x Brimaz, King of Oreskos

1 x Graveborn Muse


EDIT: The singleton Vizkopa Guildmage was getting on my nerves, so I added a singleton Graveborn Muse as another way to draw a few cards.

Looks like a solid list Hakeem and I haven't been all that impressed with the heal/hurts. This looks like a lot more fun. I'll have to take this out for a spin.

Here's my current Black/White deck:

4 x Orzhov Guildgate
12 x Plains
8 x Mountain

3 x Tormented Hero
3 x Gods Willing

3 x Vizkopa Guildmage
2 x Hero of Iroas
4 x Nimbus Wings
3 x Ordeal Of Heliod

3 x Banisher Priest
2 x Mentor of the Meek
2 x Graveborn Muse
2 x Phyrexian Rager
1 x Brimaz, King of Oreskos

2 x Agent of the Fates
3 x Armored Ascension

1 x Indulgent Tormentor
2 x Aegis Angel


Again, this is heavily inspired from Hakeem's Boros deck. Decent amount of draw, good protection of cards with God's Willing and Aegis Angel, and lots of Auras plus cards that benefit from them in an immediate fashion. This deck is a blast to play.

I'd love criticism on how to make that deck better, BTW. This is only the 2nd deck I have created, and I'm still very new to MTG.

Start with Orzhov Guildgates in place of the Boros.

Looks pretty solid, though, I'd have to play it to offer suggestions.

Ha! Fixed the post.

Let me know if you try it.