Mortician Beetle

Creature — Insect

Whenever a player sacrifices a creature, you may put a +1/+1 counter on Mortician Beetle.

Legality

Format	Legality
1v1 Commander	Legal
Archenemy	Legal
Block Constructed	Legal
Canadian Highlander	Legal
Casual	Legal
Commander / EDH	Legal
Commander: Rule 0	Legal
Custom	Legal
Duel Commander	Legal
Freeform	Legal
Highlander	Legal
Legacy	Legal
Leviathan	Legal
Limited	Legal
Modern	Legal
Modern Beyond Horizons	Legal
Oathbreaker	Legal
Pauper	Legal
Pauper Duel Commander	Legal
Pauper EDH	Legal
Planar Constructed	Legal
Planechase	Legal
PreDH	Legal
Quest Magic	Legal
Tiny Leaders	Legal
Vanguard	Legal
Vintage	Legal

Discussion (50)

legendofa on legendofa

3 months ago

Crow_Umbra Color pie to pizza pie. Beautiful. And shout out to Mortician Beetle--one of my first "real" decks was mono-black sac. Getting the deep lore on everyone is a good early episode.

I took that color test in the episode notes. It pretty much got what I expected for me, and it sounded like it matched what everyone there expected from each other. So I think it's a pretty good one.

So now I want to throw out another episode idea. Of course, feel free to say no if it doesn't work. But I'd like to see an episode where the three of you work together to build a deck from scratch. Pick a commander that nobody in the group runs and design a decklist around it. Make the official Mages of Magic podcast deck.

zachz on Orcus, Lord of Revival

1 year ago

I like the deck. You asked for suggestions in early game, so I'm looking at your goals and seeing how to best reach them.

The mana curve leans a bit high for your goal, and I think you could use more mana ramping. The cards creating treasure tokens are a solid option. You might look for lower CMC cost creatures, as many of yours are better in mid game but aren't affordable with 2 or 3 mana. Barrier of Bones is a cheap drop that can hold ground decently, and gives you a brief surveil. Manaforge Cinder could be helpful if you are are struggling with mana color. If you had more zombies (you currently have 4), then Gravecrawler could be very fun to add. Jadar, Ghoulcaller of Nephalia would provide a steady stream of zombies at pretty early game. Also in general, having low CMC early game drops means you can also bounce a creature using Unearth. If you lean on sacrifice, you can also benefit from Mortician Beetle early on.

Best of luck!

wallisface on budget token sac

3 years ago

Some thoughts:

• Bone Shards is better than Eaten Alive

• Carrion Feeder is better than Bloodthrone Vampire, and you prolly want a playset.

• I’m not a fan of either Mortician Beetle or Reassembling Skeleton. The Beetle just feels like it’ll be hard to get value from, and the Skeleton just feels waay too slow/clumsy. I’d suggest using Blisterpod and Shambling Ghast instead, as these both have stronger death triggers, and can chump-block in the early game to help ramp you into the spells that matter.

• Tap lands are almost always a terrible idea. You’re only running 2 colours so running just basics should be fine, and trip you up less often, than running stuff like Evolving Wilds. I’d suggest just playing 11x Swamp, 11x Forest, 2x Golgari Rot Farm

DeinoStinkus on Creepy Crawlers - Halloween 2022

3 years ago

Befoul, Brain Maggot, Dig Up, Mausoleum Secrets, and Mortician Beetle also might be worth looking into.

Fenrixx on Endless Hunger

3 years ago

wallisfaceThanks a lot for that detailed comment ...youre absolutly right about the Mortician Beetle but my thounght behind Scute Swarm was to have a 1 drop that has a good potential to get stronger so its not useless in later stages of the game. (i'm not playing competitive so eventhough moder tends to be over at turn 3-4 thats mostly not the case in my games.) and Hex Parasite is useful in a lot of matchups and at the very least i get to take my -1/-1 counter from Persist ;P Yes Giant Adephage,Hornet Queen and Living Hive are cards that normally need a lot of ramp but my plan here was actually to get the to the graveyard and reanimate them with Persist and also i love the idea to reanimate Grist, the Hunger Tide with Unearth since she is a 3 Mana insect creature when shes in the graveyrad.

wallisface on Endless Hunger

3 years ago

I think the big issue here is that you’ve built around Grist to an extreme, where most of your other cards become terrible on their own. Giant Adephage, Hornet Queen, Scute Mob and Scute Swarm all need to live in a deck able to dump a LOT of lands into play quickly to be useful, with only 22 lands and no ramp, these cards are either uncastable or nigh-on-useless. There’s alao ny synergy in your deck to make use of any of Hex Parasite, Hornet Nest, or Mortician Beetle.

It feels like you’ve focused your deck too heavily around the assumption that Grist will be in play, which puts you in a really terrible spot when you don’t draw it. Furthermore, Grist doesn’t need it’s +1 to trigger multiple times in a turn to be good - what Grist wants is a deck that can support her by providing other strong threats and distractions while she slowly out-values the board. That’s something you’re not providing her here.

legendofa on Memento Mori

3 years ago

Could Mortician Beetle find a place in here as another sacrifice reward?

wallisface on Demonic Sacrifice

3 years ago

Some thoughts:

• your mana curve is very high, and your land count is very low. I would suggest limiting yourself to only 4 cards that cost 4-or-more mana, and going up to 23 lands.

• a bunch of your creatures aren’t helping you control the board. Deathgreeter only gains you life, and Mortician Beetle only gets bigger. I would focus on better payoffs for things dying. For example, Mayhem Devil would thrive in a deck like this.

• I’d suggest ditching both of Virulent Swipe and Murder. Black has enough awesome killspells that you should never need to spend 3 mana for one. And Swipe feels redundant here with your existing amount of killspells.