I like the deck DarkShock, though I'd change a few cards personally, as I'm the reverse in terms of quantities. I have to have the max possible of each card or my brain itches!

I make exceptions for the occasional card such as Guul Draz and Elixir of Immortality though.

I also like Sheoldred. Unfortunately, it seems she's like the Black Baneslayer in that she improves any deck that can run her, except at least here she makes sure you'll always have a vampire for the Sanguine combo, and can take advantage of the Highborn ability every turn if need be.

Sheoldred was one of my last cuts.. but she also requires 24 land IMO, so she's really 2 cards.

I'm not gonna pay 5 mana for Flesh to Dust. If this were a mana intense control/ramp deck.. maybe. If it was an Exile like Angelic Edict, maybe.. but for what it is.. no. This deck wants to tap out except for leaving open 1-2 mana for an unforseen vamp kill so I can punish with Highborn.. and the 1 mana combat tricks. Assassinate has been pretty good actually. It's not perfect.. but it kills bombs. It has been significantly better than Tribute to Hunger, which was often just a token/weenie killer.

I'd like to find a place for Guul Draz but don't know what I'd cut. I'm not cutting a single vampire other than maybe -1 Bloodflow Connoisseur, Ulcerate stays for sure, Paragons ALL stay, Hall stays, all the draw cards stay (Rager is a wonderfully disposable body and he blocks well) Muse is one of the 3 best cards in the deck. So.. what's left? Assassinates, Bond/Blood Tribute (not cutting those), Undying Evil and Dead Weight. I'm open to ideas about them.

I've been messing with the deck and because I wanted to squish in Guul and Vicious Hunger, I cut Dead Weight and Rager.

so:

-2 Dead Weight
-4 Phyrexian Rager
+3 Guul Draz Vampire
+3 Vicious Hunger

Guul for Rager is wrong but I just want this card in a deck and this version seems to have a good fit. Vicious seems right though for Weight (unless you were finding a lot of value enchanting creatures that it didn't kill).

I did run into a few headaches though over Radiant Fountain. Normally I'm not opposed to a mono deck using it but you've got a lot of double costs and a minor mana sink. There were a few times it was an issue and the upside wasn't worth it so I'd suggest you try it without them and see how it goes.


elk

I think Dead Weight is far superior to Vicious Hunger because it's cheaper and shrinks big dudes. I was playing Orzhov Heroic earlier today and hung three of them on a Griselbrand to make it a 1/1, which was awesome. My opponent was playing ramp into bombs so I was just stockpiling them and they came in handy.

I think in monoblack, the pecking order is Dead Weight > Ulcerate > Vicious Hunger, unless you're playing a bigger top end and can't afford the life payment from Ulcerate. Assassinate isn't terrible, but it's slow and you have to take a hit from the bomb before you can kill it so I'm not sold on it.

I think the problem I have is that you want to play aggro but you also want to include the combo, which is full of expensive cards. Perhaps you could build a control deck to build and assemble the combo rather than the aggro plan?

Just spitballing here.

@elk: The Fountain thing came up a few times.. not gonna lie. It never crippled me though.. it hurt when I would go T2 Fountain into Child of Night, T3 Highborn, Child would die and I wouldn't be able to activate Highborn's ability or play a combat trick. After that though.. T4+ not a problem. I don't think the deck NEEDS them.. but they provide a nice cushion.

I can't get behind Vicious Hunger. I like Dead Weight shrinking unanswerable dudes so I can race or draw an answer.

I want Guul in here. I think after a kicked Blood Tribute, with a few lord effects or counters.. he could be GG alone. I feel there is another combo win like Bond/Tribute with Guul Draz/Tribute. It's typically Tribute then alpha strike.. Guul Draz makes that plan a match ender much more consistently. I could maybe do -1 Assassinate -1 Bloodflow, +2 Guul Draz. I might play with that later.

@Hakeem: It's not just an aggro plan.. its an aggro plan with a healthy dose of uncounterable reach.. and Blood Tribute, which helps aggro, reach and can be a GG with bond. But the reach plan goes with the aggro plan or its not enough reach. Bond and Tribute combo with almost the entire deck not just each other.

Also.. if anyone can find an answer for a resolved Baneslayer Angel, Stormbreath, etc. where the opponent has a boardand you can't use Tribute to Hunger.. I'm all ears. Resolved flying bombs are this deck's biggest weaknesses. Ground bombs are fine.. I've already killed 3 Kozileks with this deck with Paragon of Open Graves and a chump blocker.. and countless Pelakka Wurms, Inferno Titans, etc. You can attack into those boards with Bloodghast too. I can't use Devouring Swarm for this job bc of its 1 toughness.. I'd have to sac 4-5 guys to beat Baneslayer.. that's not good enough.

So.. its Assassinate or Flesh to Dust. You pick. With Assassinate, you can advance your board on the same turn.. or leave open mana for combat tricks. FTD is pretty much gonna eat all your mana for that turn.. and you really want to be able to keep mana up to protect your T4 drops.. especially Muse. Its also worth noting, Assassinate gets hosed by Vigilance. Its a minor negative.. but its there.

Splash blue for Tidehollow Strix? Or are you totally sold on monoblack?

It still can't beat Baneslayer bc of First Strike.. otherwise I could run Swarm and use Paragon's ability.

Slayer is Slayer, but you said "Resolved flying bombs are this deck's biggest weaknesses". Strix is great against all but one of them!

That's true.. and I agree. But I can't be proud of a deck that just scoops to Baneslayer. I see her ALL THE TIME! Like.. every 4-5 games seriously. I must have an answer or the deck could never be really considered good. She hoses the reach plan too with her lifelink. A resolved Blood Tribute/Bond combo is the only way I have out besides Assassinate.

You could bite the Bullet and play your favorite Flesh to Dust. The card is pretty bad, but one copy probably wouldn't be terrible.

I've been down that road.. its been considered, but I didn't and here's why: Being able to advance my board and play my 1 mana spells is crucial IMO. Protecting Muse and Paragon with Undying Evil is often the difference between winning and losing, especially Muse. I can take the hits.. I can recoup 5-6 damage a lot of ways in this deck, so I feel, after everything considered, Assassinate is the best of the options. If I were going to go with another color it would be 2x Reprisal. I can deal with Stormbreath well enough bc I can outrace him. If he blocks I can use Ulcerate or Paragon.. but 5 mana God angel just hoses me.

What do you guys think about a single Suffer The Past in here?

With Bond out.. its double damage.

If the opponent is near dead and you can't reach other ways, it finishes.

You can Blood Tribute, attack, untap and finish with Suffer.

I think it could be really, really good here.. like Corrupt in the old games.. but with even more upside bc of Bond.

This is what I was after. If you're primarily including it to shrink mid/late game versus early turn removal then I get it. Thing is, you're only packing 2 of them so you limit how much you can mess with a fatty. I'll have to test it more to see how much it effects the clock.




I lean towards Ulcerate over Weight personally (well my deck builds do) but agree both are better than Hunger. Hunger was just a suggestion dependent on why Beast was including Weight in the build. He's got a pain gain aspect going on and he was willing to toss in Radiant fountains for additional triggers which is why I figured Vicious Hunger was a reasonable consideration. He made mention in a post about feeling the hp hurt due to the loss of Tribute to Hunger and thought this suggestion was another marginal gain he could add to his removal.

It makes me think if he's using Weight for removal/shrinking then he should be running more than just 2 to increase frequency of draw and allow him to shrink targets farther. Undying Evil is great for Muse and Paragon (and the odd combat trick) but very little else. I'd start cutting there to add in additional Weights.



elk

Splashing white for Reprisal (and Vizkopa) seems viable too.

In monoblack decks that aren't balls-to-the-wall-aggro, I prefer Vicious Hunger over Ulcerate.

Beast - So I've been playing the deck some more and I have to say that Vicious Hunger is starting to seem like the better option (or as it's been eluded to, splash some white for Vizkopa etc).

There is a lot of self plink in the deck with a fair amount of conditional heal. Child of Night has to live and then swing/block which is often a single activation unless you get out some anthem/lord effects. Both Kalastria Highborn and Blood Tribute require vampires (yes Highborn triggers off itself but it does have a mana requirement too) and there's only 11 in the deck. I'm not saying the deck doesn't get the heals but it can be clunky too. I found that any game that went long had me on the back foot often holding cards because I couldn't afford the risk to play them. Normally with an aggro theme, you're not usually concerned with your life total but the deck isn't quite aggressive enough to ignore the self plink and the damage your opponent is doing. It just feels like you need to consider some more offsetting hp gains (conditional or not).

Surprisingly enough I'm understanding why you want to keep Fountain. It's clunky due to the double costs but the hp is needed (this should be the red flag - also why losing tribute to hunger hurt). Having said that, there has to be better ways to introduce hp gain than disrupting your mana curve (again I'm normally fine with Fountain in a mono deck but here it's actually messing with game play and that's a problem).

elk

Elk: Thanks for the feedback! You don't feel this deck has good long game? I think the reach plan and the combo win are great solutions to stalled boards. Bloodghasts with Deathtouch pumped up with lord effects put the opponent in really unfavorable situations unless they have disposable forces like Tokens. Deathtouch on any chump keeps the big nasties at bay too. While the board stalls I just start focusing on the reach combos. I've whooped many a spider deck with it.


You're 100% right about Child of Night.. I play it on T2 and it just sits there until I buff it with a lord or get it to trade in combat, then use Undying Evil to make it tougher. It makes sense why mjack wanted to play Walking Corpse or whatever bear it was in his mono black.. bc the 2 toughness matters a lot.

I put in a single Suffer the Past and played 5 games but never drew it. I think it could be needed lifegain or a total knockout blow with Sanguine Bond out. Hosing spider decks could be great too.

Long game - not in the traditional sense. I'm generally thinking of a lot of the mid range style decks floating around when I consider a long game plan. A lot of those decks carry sweeper effects and excess removal that minimize your whole deck. They are typically built to have better staying power than this type of deck because they need to get to a game where they will excel. Keep in mind that you get 1 shot with your undying evil to save your paragon/muse and then it's open season. You've only got 2 Dead Weights to shrink targets and decks like those tend to have more than just 2 problems. Your reach combo; which I found to be Highborn/Sanguine Bond and then Bloodghast/Connoisseur; can be tough to assemble especially in the face of removal. Now I had intermittent parts assembled here and there but never all of them at once (and with no way to tutor, it's left to draw) so I never got the full effect but it should be an indication to how often it comes up too (I didn't keep track but I'd say I'm into the 30 games range). Blood Tribute/Sanguine is just fine but even that comes up as either one or the other more often than they do together (just because of qty restriction). Not to mention that with a semi-aggro shell going on, it continues to make Tribute worse as the game goes on (there were a few games where I didn't have Bond and was only casting tribute for 3-5hp).

Don't get me wrong, there are a lot of nice synergies and ways to play this build but a deck with a primarily 1-4 mana CMC curve is generally not a great late game player. This could speak to the competition you're facing (or the way they're building) but I'm more inclined to think it speaks volumes to the quality of player that you are. I refer to Hakeem's youtube channel where he consistently mows over the cattle and only when he's facing someone competent does it make a difference in the deck archtypes and the deck make up. Same goes for top level play. They generally don't refer to the person piloting the deck because it's assumed they are going to be making optimal plays and have sufficient testing in with the deck. They are generally referring to the match ups they are built for/excel against and the ones they don't.

Regarding Suffer, it's another conditional one. You don't have ways to forcibly fill their grave so it has to be due to trades/deathtouch and them using sorcery/instants (or happen to be a grave recursion deck). It absolutely can be a game finisher but it will typically need a late game to be effective which again I don't think is your focus. I'd keep an eye on this one.




elk

After some testing.. Suffer was bad. It was a dead card in 2 out of 3 times it showed up.

Another thing happened... I got my faced wrecked by turn 3 Brimaz bc of his vigilance. So.. Assassinate is back on the chopping block. The only way I could've dealt with him was chumping my board.

A friend of mine suggested putting in Cruel Sadist.. and so far it has been really good here. By herself she beats Raise the Alarm and Krenko's Command (block, tap, lose 1 life, become a 2/2, eat a token, and the other one won't attack). The card grows as the match wears on.. as much as I need it to. This extra health cost has increased the need for more lifegain though.. so Dead Weight got cut in favor of Elk's Vicious Hunger. I don't like it as much as Dead Weight.. but its health gain is needed. But.. the real reason to add Cruel Sadist is synergy with Paragon of Open Graves. For 6 mana, I can get reusable Flesh to Dusts. This combo is awesome for wrecking bombs.. but it's mana intensive. In fact.. the whole deck is becoming mana intensive, so I cut something else and put in a 24th land. I'm not sure that's the right call bc I started flooding out.

Thoughts on Cruel Sadist?

We are also trying out Indulgent Tormentor. With all the lord effects.. his 3 toughness is less of an issue. If he sticks.. he is a massive boon for this deck, unless I'm against token spam. I really want Sheoldred in here.. but.. dat cost!

I think giving cruel sadist death touch actually makes it playable. I can agree with the swap over suffer the past