Creature (23)
Land (23)
Sorcery (7)
Instant (7)
Sideboard
Instant (4)
Artifact (3)
Enchantment (3)
This is my Mono-Black Midrange deck. It generally tries to wear down the opponent through an attrition game long enough to start getting two for ones and to make plays the opponent can no longer handle as the game progresses. The sideboard is meant to be a "catch all" sideboard, and is not necessarily tailored to my specific meta.
If there is anything in this description you think should be added or removed to improve depth or understanding of the deck, please don't hesitate to tell me. If you like the deck or have something to say, upvotes and comments are greatly appreciated!
Play some discard spells to pick apart your opponent's hand
Play some efficient creatures
Try to get a few 2 for 1's and maintain a large board presence
Play a Gary or two
Drop your opponent's life to 0.
This deck takes that mentality, but instead of focusing in on Gray Merchant of Asphodel (although it has that line of play), it instead tries to lay a few efficient creatures on the board to bait removal, and later play Phyrexian Obliterator to sweep in and win the game (or just go with the tempo/beatdown plan if your opponent couldn't manage to compete with your early game). I have decided not to include several cards that some might consider staples to Mono-Black Devotion (I'm looking at you Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx) because I felt like they usually interfered with consistency and that this particular build didn't take full advantage of them like other builds might.
Grim Flayer: This dude puts in work. We get a 2/2 trampler that quickly becomes a 4/4 trampler, that as an added bonus helps us find what we want and puts things in our graveyard for us. He grows out of range of Lightning Bolt once we establish delirium, again encouraging our opponent to use up their hard removal dealing with him, clearing the way for an Obliterator that will stick around. A strong proactive 2 drop that helps set up our future plays while becoming a large threat himself. We'll take 4.
Vampire Nighthawk: He fills in a lot of holes in the deck. His lifelink helps us recover from damaging ourselves from shocklands, fetches, Thoughtseizeing, and Dismembering. He gives us a way to deal with flyers and deathtouch makes him a fantastic blocker to drag out the game. A good stall card that can be aggressive when needed and can help keep us alive. Sounds like a solid 3 of.
Liliana, Heretical Healer
: Solid card, giving us a lifelink to get back into the game against aggro. When it flips, that token is more relevant than you might think at first, as it can protect her once she flips. If we can protect her for a turn or two, it becomes easy to win the attrition war with her +2. A good card that can keep us alive, and when flipped can add another blocker and get back value from the graveyard and act as a wincon in the attrition game. We'll take 2 due to her being legendary.
Geralf's Messenger: While it effectively comes in a turn late, it makes up for it by allowing us to apply extra pressure to our opponent while providing us with a sticky creatures on the field. It also fuels Relentless Dead and is excellent in setting up a large play with Gary. He is also another creature that tempts our opponent to use exile-based removal before we play Phyrexian Obliterator. Can be pretty solid, but we'll take 2 as it can also be too slow against hyper aggressive decks.
Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet: He acts as some mainboard graveyard hate, as well as giving us an army to stall with in the attrition war. As many know, the lifelink can be super relevant, especially when you can sacrifice some of your vampires or zombies to make him huge. Because he doesn't instantly die to Lightning Bolt, he can be a real long-term threat. 2 sounds about right, as it competes with the Obliterator's slot and it's legendary.
Phyrexian Obliterator: The right play turn 4 nearly every time. He can win a lot of games on his own, almost always reading unblockable to opponents and stonewalling attackers. His discouragement to damage based removal is incredible. Nothing like your opponent having nothing on board. He also curves perfectly into Gary, providing insane value that can end the game quickly. Automatic 4 of, as the value is incredible.
Gray Merchant of Asphodel: Gary can help you recover or pulls surprise wins from nowhere. Usually you will have at least 4 devotion to black to at least get back into the game. Gary can be the turning point in a lot of games, and can be incredible with Relentless Dead. We'll keep this as a two of because, although it has a lot of potential, it can also fail us hard, especially if we don't already have the tools to deal with early aggression and draw multiple.
Deadly Allure: This may seem like a strange card to include, but trust me, it definitely works (Thanks KaiserChronic). It acts as a removal spell that you can use twice, and it is great to pitch to the graveyard with the Flayer or Lily's abilities, or Collective Brutality. Because the way deathtouch works, you can get easy 2 for 1's when giving it to Relentless Dead (with a potential for essentially a 4 for 1), and trample creatures like Grim Flayer and Phyrexian Obliterator basically swing for free besides -1 damage for each blocking minion. Especially with Phyrexian Obliterator, this can lead to crazy plays. Another thing to note is forcing a problematic flyer to blocker Vampire Nighthawk can be the turning point of the game. And all it costs is 1 mana. This is a 1 of, as we don't typically want to see 2 of these in our hand simply because they are redundant and useless without board presence.
Inquisition of Kozilek: A great hand attack spell in modern. This is great for not only getting rid of the most threatening card in an opponent's hand (3 or less), but it also can help get rid of hate cards (especially grave hate) brought from the opponent's sideboard in games 2 and 3. In this build in particular, it is good to make taking hard removal as a strong priority so that your Phyrexian Obliterators can go unchallenged. A 4 of seems like a good idea so that we can get to the late game.
Thoughtseize: This is mostly to interrupt combo decks, and can be used to get rid of other troublesome cards that Inquisition cant hit, such as Collected Company or Tron's threats. Against aggro, this is usually what you'd like to discard when possible, unless you are in the driver's seat. Well put this in as a 1 of, although you can go with a 3/2 split between Inquisition of Kozilek and Thoughtseize if you have a combo or control heavy meta.
Collective Brutality: A great toolbox of maim, pain and drain. Cripple your opponent's hand, kill or cripple a creature, or get a little extra life while putting pressure on or finishing off your opponent's life total. Not only this, but allowing us to get multiple effects? Priceless, and with good tempo. This can set us up for delirium as well. We'll go with 1 for lack of room, but I could potentially see a 2 of.
Abrupt Decay: Easily one of the best, if not the best removal spells in modern. This is the main reason to splash green, as green is able to cover black's weaknesses in dealing with artifacts and enchantments efficiently. Icing on the cake is that this can't be countered. We're running it as a 4 of in order to keep up with aggro decks, but can be brought to 3 in favor of other cards if you are in a combo or control heavy meta.
Dismember: This is a solid removal spell, and can deal with a variety of decks. It can kill the decks running Tasigur, the Golden Fang and Siege Rhino while also acting as extra cheap (although semi-risky) removal against Infect and Affinity. Luckily, we have a fair amount of lifelink in the deck to come back in case we need to damage ourselves somewhere down the line. We'll put in 2 of these.
Become Immense: After a lot of debating with myself, this has come in. It has some anti-synergy with Relentless Dead, Grim Flayer, and Lily, but at the same time it is supported by Grim Flayer, Lily, and our fetches. It also has so many good targets in this deck that it is really impossible to pass up. Allowing a Grim Flayer suddenly swing in for 10 damage (or at least 8 if we need to get rid of delirium) can be crazy. Relentless Dead's menace can make this insane, and the grand play, Phyrexian Obliterator can be just as good. Giving this to any of our creatures with lifelink can put a damage race well in our favor. We'll put in 1 as we'd definitely like to see it, but never in multiples.
Bloodstained Mire & Polluted Delta: These are in here for a few reasons, the chief among them to fetch us an Overgrown Tomb. The other reason that I have included 7 fetches is because they help achieve delirium, and they have the minor benefit of a little deck thinning (yes, I know it has been argued whether they do enough thinning for it to be worth it, but in this build there are additional reasons to run them than just deck thinning). I'm still looking for a good way to incorporate either landfall (without Bloodghast, as it can't block and I'm not sure if I could afford to run a creature that can't block) or a use for shuffle effects. But for now they get my colors when I need them, and fuel both delirium and delve, and so to get delirium more consistently and to better fuel delve, we'll take playsets of both. The reason that Verdant Catacombs isn't in here is that the price was unnecessary for what I needed the fetches for.
Overgrown Tomb: Get these with your fetches. We have two in here in case we need to pitch one with Grim Flayer (shouldn't happen often) or if another effect such as a Ghost Quarter destroys one.
Twilight Mire: A weird land that can help us fix in case we need double green, like when we are running our Creeping Corrosion from the sideboard against Affinity. We only run 1 in here because getting two in the early game could easily lead to mana screw fairly easily, or could just put us behind by a turn. To be put simply, the benefits of Twilight Mire don't warrant the risk of a second.
Blooming Marsh: Finally, there is a GB fastland. These are great opening plays, but lose their value mid to late game. In order limit their impact in the late game, we have reduced the number from a playset to 3 in order to reduce the number of them that we draw in the late game at the cost of the number of them that we get in the early game.
Shizo, Death's Storehouse: This is simply a swamp with upside No reason to not include one, right? Besides getting punished for Blood Moon, this can be really sweet. It can only help 4 cards in our deck, Lily and Kalitas, 2 copies each. While Lily may not be an ideal target, a buffed up Kalitas can be invaluable when given fear. Also, even Lily can make an impact if buffed by Become Immense. One of the craziest plays is using this to help single out a creature with Deadly Allure. Saying to Jund Youre Kalitas dies to my Kalitas, you dont get to block with Scooze is a really cool play.
Swamp: Mostly where we get our zombies, and generally the home of all things dark and vile. We need a good number of basic swamps when playing against Blood Moon.
Spellskite: Mostly here for Infect and Bogles, and is very helpful when trying to achieve delirium. Besides that, it can be helpful to put in against decks that run more removal than we can get rid of, giving us a way to protect Phyrexian Obliterator. We can give 2 sideboard slots to this.
Fulminator Mage: These guys come in against Tron and greedy manabases. They can really give us the win, and as a bonus they give us extra devotion. Don't forget that sacrificing these guys triggers Lily, so use that to your advantage when you can. We'll take 2 of these.
Pithing Needle: The catch all for abilities. Hits lands, planeswalkers, creatures, artifacts, enchantments It covers anything and everything. If you need to shut off Affinity's infect damage, play this, and they need to change their strategy. Don't want Nahiri, the Harbinger to be a thing? Name it with this. Can't let Scavenging Ooze take away your graveyard? This works there too. It also helps fuel delirium if it goes to the grave. We'll take 1, because even in matchups where we want to see it, we don't usually want to see multiple or we won't have enough fuel to win an attrition war.
Phyrexian Arena: When you get into the grindy matchups and need more card draw, who you gonna call? Phyrexian Arena! This is a solid card that turns life into draw each turn, and can quickly lead to card advantage over your opponent. This also is good for delirium. We'll add 1, but 2 would be acceptable depending on your meta. I simply couldn't find space for another.
Night of Souls' Betrayal: This is great at stopping tokens and aggro decks like Infect and Affinity in their tracks. Note that this reduces your creatures' toughness as well, so remember that during combat. Again, if put into the grave this helps delirium. We'll take 1, as it is legendary and a second in hand would be dead.
Thoughtseize: When your opponent is playing combo or has a linear win condition, this can be excellent. Extra hand discard can be important, especially to get your opponent's troublesome sideboard cards, but remember that you likely don't want this against an aggressive deck. We'll have one in the sideboard as back up.
Maelstrom Pulse: This is a catch all answer to troublesome permanents. If your opponent's Goyf looks at you the wrong way, Pulse it. If an opposing Lily is bothering you, Pulse it. It also shines against token decks, potentially taking away a large board of tokens away from your opponent. We only have room in the sideboard for 1, but if you have a meta where this shines, I'd recommend trying to find space for a 2nd.
Damnation: When your opponent's board gets out of hand, there is a fallback plan: blow it up. This is easily the most expensive card, so if you need a budget option, feel free to try Languish. When using your board wipe, try to set up a play to trade multiple cards for it with minimal damage to yourself. We'll add this as a 1 of.
Creeping Corrosion: The decimator of Affinity, and one of the only decks you'll run this against. Surviving long enough to land this usually spells out a win for you, but getting there may prove difficult. We'll take a 1 of.
Shadow of Doubt: Besides being a hilarious play, this gives us a large advantage when used correctly. It can interrupt an opponent's plans like crazy, especially combo decks or greedy manabases (using this on a needed fetch land is pretty mean). Letting us draw a card afterwards like nothing ever happened should put us far ahead. One thing to look out for is your own fetches. Dont forget to play around it yourself. We'll take a 2 of.
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| Top Ranked |
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| Date added | 7 years |
| Last updated | 6 years |
| Exclude colors | WUR |
| Splash colors | G |
| Legality | This deck is Modern legal. |
| Rarity (main - side) | 16 - 0 Mythic Rares 27 - 12 Rares 7 - 1 Uncommons 2 - 2 Commons |
| Cards | 60 |
| Avg. CMC | 2.57 |
| Tokens | Emblem Liliana, Defiant Necromancer, Zombie 2/2 B |
| Folders | Cool Decks, Modern Reference, Modern interesting, Obliterator! |
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