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Mistress of Poisons

Commander / EDH BG (Golgari) Combo Counters Primer Tokens

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Negative-Counters (21)

Negative-Control (6)

Tokens (6)

Mana (38)

Reanimation (8)

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Commander (1)

Commander: Hapatra, Vizier of Poisons

Draw-Tutor (8)

Removal (7)

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Hapatra, Vizier of Poisons lends herself well to token strategies and stax strategies. Even if you want to avoid using stax as much as possible your deck will feel stax like to some degree simply due to the amount of -1/-1 counters flying around. She also has an easy time going infinite, which will be explained in that section. The infinite is easily avoided if that doesn't appeal to you.

So this may not be the deck for you if you don't like feeling in control and oppressive.

When Hapatra, Vizier of Poisons was spoiled there was some confusion about how she works. For clarity anytime a source you control makes a -1/-1 counter YOU PLACE THAT COUNTER. I'll show a few simple examples:

Witherscale Wurm gives wither to opponent's creatures so the opponent places the counters, hapatra doesn't give you snakes.

Corrosive Mentor gives your stuff wither. So when your black creatures do damage you place -1/-1 counters and hapatra gives you a snake.

Deity of Scars enters the battlefield with -1/-1 counters and hapatra gives you a snake.

From Wizards:

"Some effects care about which player puts counters on an object. Most spells and abilities instruct their controller to put those counters with an implied "you," such as the ability of Channeler Initiate does. For an object entering the battlefield with counters, its controller puts those counters on it." -https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/feature/amonkhet-release-notes-2017-04-14

"If a creature with wither or infect deals damage to a creature, the controller of the creature with wither or infect puts that many -1/-1 counters on the second creature." -http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=426901

Devoted Druid + Quillspike :

tap Devoted to add to your mana pool

untap Devoted placing a -1/-1 counter on her

if hapatra is present she will make a snake

pay and remove the -1/-1 counter from devoted with quillspike, quillspike gets bigger

repeat in that order

Hapatra, Vizier of Poisons + Blowfly Infestation + two 1/1s:

Get hapatra through to an opponent or use another source of making a -1/-1 counter

Place a -1/-1 counter on one of the 1/1s so it dies as a statebased effect

hapatra makes a snake

blowfly puts a -1/-1 counter on one of the 1/1s

hapatra makes a snake

blowfly puts a -1/-1 counter on one of the 1/1s

As you can see this second one needs a little help to actually do something. simply add any of the following: Parallel Lives , Zulaport Cutthroat , Blood Artist , Grave Pact , Ivy Lane Denizen , or any similar card you enjoy.

In all cases Hapatra, Vizier of Poisons can be replaced with or added to Nest of Scarabs or Flourishing Defenses

Obelisk Spider is another deadly critter for our arsenal of deadly critters and works with either of the above combos to win the game. Also just a strong card to have out on a creature heavy field during a Black Sun's Zenith or Carnifex Demon or similar.

The mana base is pretty simple. I find as few as 33 lands to work just fine and with only two colors you don't need more than basic lands to be able to be competitive. Golgari Guildgate and similar will add some consistency but can slow you down as they tend to come in tapped. If your opening hand has 2 forests and 1 swamp or vice versa you are generally good to go.

I have some utility lands that are worth considering:

High Market taps to sac a creature. This is a great response to when people try to steal hapatra, it also gives an instant speed way to activate Grave Pact .

Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx will give you a decent mana boost. Sadly tokens will not help you with this as it counts your devotion.

Opal Palace adds some +1/+1 counters for some more value when having to cast hapatra again. Also combats Harbinger of Night effects.

Oran-Rief, the Vastwood make a bunch of 1/1s and turn them into 2/2s, this is pretty good.

Reliquary Tower I have never been sad to see this card, if you have enough draw this card should save you from discarding at least a few times. If you do not have to discard cards at some point during a game add more draw.

Westvale Abbey   sac 5 tokens get a scary flier that attacks that turn? yes please.

Some mana acceleration worth considering:

Black Market this card is amazing, this deck makes it more awesome. Things will die a lot this will produce 10 mana easily.

Crypt Ghast and Nirkana Revenant double your swamps...

Joraga Treespeaker I like this with Flourishing Defenses for as much green mana as I want. There are also other elves in the deck so it just tends to be value.

This is really the meat of the deck. These are the cards that abuse Hapatra, Vizier of Poisons , Nest of Scarabs and Flourishing Defenses .

The strongest abuse: Black Sun's Zenith , Carnifex Demon , Contagion Engine , Harbinger of Night , and Midnight Banshee . All of these will hit a large amount of creatures which produces a large amount of snakes and most of these can be used multiple times.

Proliferate is extraordinarily powerful here, especially after one of the mass -1/-1 counter cards. Contagion Engine , Contagion Clasp , Grim Affliction , and Plaguemaw Beast will Torture creatures of your choice through hexproof and shroud if they have -1/-1 counters.

I feel Ammit Eternal is worthy of special mention short of cards which put out mass -1/-1 counters nothing is going to compete with the number of snakes this will give you as long as you can keep it alive. Worse case expect 5 snakes for 3 mana, it is like the inverse of Forgotten Ancient .

Wickerbough Elder is actually removal that comes with -1/-1 counters and wants us to feed it more counters.

Instant speed -1/-1 counters: Serrated Biskelion , Grim Poppet , Grim Affliction , Fevered Convulsions , Devoted Druid . These allow you to instantly weaken an opponents attacker and create a blocker if hapatra is present.

You will inevitably place -1/-1 counters on your own stuff. Some cards encourage you to do it like Wickerbough Elder . This section addresses ways to make sure you are not always wiping out your own stuff. The best way to do this is with +1/+1 counters, the ruling is that if a -1/-1 counter and a +1/+1 counter are on the same creature then you remove both types until only one type remains.

Example: Hapatra, Vizier of Poisons has 4 +1/+1 counters on her and you place 3 -1/-1 counters on her, you then as a statebased action remove +1/+1 counters and -1/-1 counters until only one type of counter is left. In this case remove 3 counters of both types. Also note the counters are still placed on her so you do get a snake for each -1/-1 counter even though you are now removing them.

Cards I'd recommend for keeping control of -1/-1 counters: Forgotten Ancient , Hex Parasite , Mikaeus, the Unhallowed , Nissa, Voice of Zendikar , Quillspike , Oran-Rief, the Vastwood , Ring of Xathrid .

Another method of dealing with negative counters which I'm still toying with is reanimation. Just let the -1/-1 counters run wild and bring the creatures back later. This method will get you back from field wipes quicker too. Though I think it is best to just run a combination of a good reanimation package and +1/+1 counters.

So I only have three cards which produce tokens: Hapatra, Vizier of Poisons , Nest of Scarabs , Flourishing Defenses and one card that doubles token production Parallel Lives . I don't think that it is important to have very many token producers since the commander fills that role and is a 2 drop. It is much more important that you have ways to turn these token generators on.

If you find you don't have enough token generating then here are a few suggestions: Awakening Zone , Creakwood Liege , From Beyond , Pharika, God of Affliction , Second Harvest .

If you build with Harbinger of Night and/or Midnight Banshee like I have you will likely want Concordant Crossroads or Akroma's Memorial as they will wipe out your tokens every turn and I like to use my tokens for stuff which includes maybe attacking.

Kamahl, Fist of Krosa , Beastmaster Ascension , Eldrazi Monument , and Seshiro the Anointed pump up your tokens. Seshiro is snake specific but added bonus of card draw.

Kamahl, Fist of Krosa is perhaps better in many ways than the others I mention here because the permanent bonus of most of them interferes with the combo of Hapatra, Vizier of Poisons + Blowfly Infestation and Kamahl, Fist of Krosa is a temporary bonus that also gives trample allowing your deathtouch snakes to really go to town. You can also change people's lands into creatures and then Black Sun's Zenith them to death to get hated out of your play group :P

Skullclamp , Fecundity , Blood Artist , Zulaport Cutthroat , Nullmage Shepherd take advantage of mass tokens, I chose to mostly take advantage of token death.

So infect is a thing. If you don't like the people you play against or if those people don't mind infect or if you don't mind feeling dirty you should run infect. It is powerful and almost guarantees that you will kill at least one person. It is also likely to make you the archenemy.

Here are infect cards that you could consider: Blightsteel Colossus , Core Prowler , Flesh-Eater Imp , Glistening Oil , Ichor Rats , Necropede , Phyrexian Crusader , Phyrexian Hydra , Phyrexian Swarmlord , Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon , Tainted Strike .

Glistening Oil and Phyrexian Hydra are probably some of the better ones for consistent snake generation. Something like Triumph of the Hordes or Tainted Strike are really more of a win conditions and I wouldn't expect to get snakes out of them just win the game.

Moving onto wither. You must use wither! Well you don't need to but I'd highly recommend it especially if you are not using infect. It is a great source of -1/-1 counters.

Some good wither cards: Corrosive Mentor , Blight Sickle , Lockjaw Snapper , Midnight Banshee , Necroskitter , Rendclaw Trow , Tower Above . You may notice there are fewer cards here and that is because we are missing red, so many nice options in red... I almost made this a black/red/green "hapatra" deck. I digress though. Corrosive Mentor is one that I'd recommend the most if you have some good combat creatures. Midnight Banshee can be bad as it will annihilate your green creatures, this includes hapatra's snakes, but she is powerful.

Should you run Doubling Season ? Most people probably instantly answered yes. I want to point out that this doubles the -1/-1 counters you place on your creatures and has no effect on your opponents creatures. I think you will find Doubling Season will hurt more than help. Consider that Hapatra, Vizier of Poisons your primary token production will give you one snake whether you place 10 -1/-1 counters on a creature or 1 -1/-1 counter on a creature. look instead at Parallel Lives and if you dont mind hugging Primal Vigor , personally I think Primal Vigor will be too nice to the opponents allowing them to easily remove your -1/-1 counters.

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Revision 5 See all

(4 years ago)

Top Ranked
Date added 7 years
Last updated 4 years
Exclude colors WUR
Legality

This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)

5 - 0 Mythic Rares

34 - 0 Rares

32 - 0 Uncommons

6 - 0 Commons
Cards 100
Avg. CMC 3.46
Tokens Clue, Elf Warrior 1/1 G, Experience Token, Human Cleric 1/1 BW, Insect 1/1 B, Plant 0/1 G, Snake 1/1 G, Snake 1/1 G w/ Deathtouch
Folders Commander/EDH, edh, Hapatra EDH, Decks I want, Cimmander, Favorite Decks by Others, Interesting Commander Decks, Proliferate, nb, Hapatra
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