I might build this just to get use out of my two beautiful Chandra, Flamecallers. They have not had any use since goggles.

Just a note on Control.

They have a secondary win con which is to beat down with Wandering Fumarole.

A secondary backup plan, if they counter Dispossess, is Lay Bare the Heart.

Have you thought of replacing Dispossess with Lost Legacy? it seems that black mana difference is not that big of a deal and since you're running 3 By Force and usually when I play I have been seeing a lot of god's and you cant really hit them with Dispossess.

Just a thought. Like I would rather sit with the By Force to destroy it on the board than to just straight up get rid of it in the deck.

Would you consider adding one Geier Reach Sanitarium and if so, what would you cut? Other than a basic, Aether Hub seems the next best card to switch out.

Do you find the one Evolving Wilds to be helpful or would another slow land be better?

With all the discard would you run a third Fiery Temper?

Lay Bare the Heart or Faith of the Devoted in sideboard? I see the need for extra effects against Lost Legacy, however Lay Bare turn two can discard a Legacy on the play or draw.

Very nice deck, +1 from me.

Evolving Wilds and Aether Hubs are treated as 3 color lands for my fixing counts so I find them pretty helpful.

Geier Reach Sanitarium is definitely interesting... I may have to do some testing with one or two copies of it... I think the first replacement would be a Canyon Slough but if I go with 2 I'm not sure what the second one would be...

Despite all the discard effects I still wouldn't feel comfortable running a 3rd Fiery Temper without something more like the Sanitarium to be able to reliably get it off at instant speed. I've had to hard cast it too many times for me to run 3 atm.

I think I'm leaning towards Lay Bare the Heart currently but its definitely a tough call since Faith of the Devoted is also really good against durdley control decks.

I actually just pieced together a similar grixis cycling deck and I saw this on feature as I went to put the decklist up. I too am a big fan of the cycling aspect. A card that I'm pretty fond of that works well is Call the Bloodline. I'm a fan because it's a consistent discard outlet which you can use in tandem with Drake Haven to essentially pay 2 for both a drake and a 1/1 lifelink vampire. Have you considered running this card? If you have, what about it makes it not worth it to you?

By the way, +1'ed for the deck. Absolutely love it!

@like70bunnies:

Mostly it's the card disadvantage. I'd rather cycle than discard valuable cards. The only exception for that rule is Lightning Axe because of its efficiency in killing stuff. Playing with Call the Bloodline would mean restructuring a lot of the deck to include more madness cards so I don't constantly 2 for 1 myself.

The strength of this deck comes from the fact that I usually don't have to spend a card to do my things. The ideal boardstate (which I usually achieve), allows me to pay 2 mana to make a 2/2 Flying token, debuff my opponent's board, and Scry 1 and draw a card. Keeping cards in hand then becomes one of the most difficult things to achieve. So I have purposefully stayed away from the creature route with Olivia, Mobilized for War, madness spells like Murderous Compulsion because of the conditional nature of the madness card.

The last reason I don't like Call the Bloodline is because a 1/1 Lifelink vampire isn't going to win me the game. Drakes are really good because of a lack of big flyers to prey on them. Oftentimes, I can attack with one or two Drakes with impunity while I leave 3-4 more behind to block because everyone is playing non-flying creatures. If the vampires flew instead of gaining life then maybe, if they did both, then I'd probably run it but the card just falls short one too many counts. It doesn't replace the card, the tokens are non-evasive, and there's not enough good madness payoff which leads to 2 for 1s on myself.

Thanks for the insight! I can see what you're saying and it totally makes sense.

Is it consistent ? And can you play without drawing the Drake Haven ?

I have a "similar" deck, even if mine is way more aggro, and way more focused on discarding, the point is to not get more than 4 lands, and you can every rounds, discard 2 cards through Stitchwing Skaab, Haunted Dead, Cathartic Reunion, Tormenting Voice or Collective Brutality, and get 2 drakes, and if you never get you Drake Haven despite drawing tons of cards, i can still play the Prized Amalgam, Scrapheap Scrounger, Stitchwing Skaab, Haunted Dead never ending game.And i also always have a lot of cards in hand, and i feel like i do things with my mana, with a build more similar to yours, i felt like i always spend too much mana for not much result.

Grixis Discard

Standard* XorKoS

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Don't know if it interest you, but it seems more consistent.At least get an +1, for the deck and showing me Faith of the Devoted which i completely never saw lol.

Lay Bare the Heart is a nice inclusion you know I tried to get both faith and haven to work together but it always felt like drake was the correct play. Maybe try finding a spot for Fatal Push. I don't have any brutalities but if I can get a hold of some gonna add it to my deck.

XorKoS: If for some reason I can't find crab, the back up plan is control until Curator of Mysteries, Archfiend of Ifnir, or Chandra, Flamecaller can come clean up. Also, what is your source of never-ending draw you claim to have? I didn't see anything that keeps your hand full in that...

Adamram1985: That's because Drake Haven is almost always the correct play. Fatal Push is good, my problem with it lies in that there's very few things I need Push to kill that a Drake token can't. Lay Bare the Heart is also really good, I'm still toying with the sideboard and that is a definite contender.

I ran into a selensya walker deck at my lgs. Maybe remove the Faith of the Devoted for some walker hate. I get that it's in there for Lost Legacy but most people only run one in the side, with your counter package you should be safe. It might be worth a consideration but Disallow could be a huge addition

Never / Return, Lay Bare the Heart, and some others are high on the list. I won't do any serious updating til after I finish my Finals tomorrow. Making sure I pass my classes is more important than testing my deck atm.

Very true

I am trying to figure out why in a format with SO much creature recursion, all black decks aren't running at least 2-3 of Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet. It makes sense in a control match up especially because it is board control. No more death triggers. No more creatures for delirium. Board state. And a pump.

Because Scarab Feast is better, Scrapheap Scrounger is annoying, but other than zombies he's the only creature affected by it. Torrential Gearhulk is unaffected by Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet whereas Scarab Feast hits the gearhulk's targets as well.

Unless I start seeing a massive resurgence in Zombie lists, I think I'm going to stick with Scarab Feast as it hits more of the field and can't be stopped with a kill spell

Fatal Push is much better than Grasp of Darkness if you can get your hands on some. Then again I could be wrong so hey you tell me.

@ AngryBadgerthey are both good but each one does something better. Like for instance Grasp of Darkness can hit Avacyn, while push never can. Also, push might not be able to hit things above 2 cmc if you cannot trigger revolt. But on the other hand, a Thalia's Lieutenant that is a 5/5 can be hit by push but not grasp. So it's all depends on your meta and what you are going to play against, but in my opinion a good mix of both is needed.

Grasp of Darkness has been a better card for me more times than I can count. Revolt is so hard to trigger in standard so I'm forced to play with Push as if it only hits CMC 2... They both hit a lot of things so I'll look at what they hit that the other can't...

Relevant things Fatal Push hits that Grasp of Darkness can't:

• Awoken Horror  ^Flip

• Avacyn, the Purifier  ^Flip

Relevant things Grasp of Darkness hits that Fatal Push can't:

• Hazoret the Fervent

• Gideon of the Trials

• Glorybringer

• Pretty much any 3 drop because Revolt is super hard to trigger

• Bypasses Selfless Spirit/Make a Stand

As you can see, despite costing one more , the utility of Grasp of Darkness in what it hits is too big to ignore.

Zaueski Please tell me how Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet DOESN'T hit Torrential Gearhulk.

@adambomb786: Torrential Gearhulk decks don't recur the creature, they recur their spells with the Gearhulk. Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet doesn't exile their spells, ergo he doesn't effectively hit the gearhulk.

Yes, but he takes a body off the field that can't be recurred by another affect to cast him again and creates another body to blog or swing with..

What deck that plays torrential gearhulk plays recursion? Usually he's in either a blue something control deck as the finisher/flashback. None of those decks would use slots for recursion versus more removal/draw/counters

Zaueski sorry if I upset you by replying to you're comments, I shall now go back to lurking this deck's comments. Also gratz on how far this deck has come!

I'm trying to figure out why torrential even came up as a response to Kalitas. I was talking about creature recursion in the meta. Not spells.