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Teysa & Her Teeny Tiny Murder Buddies

Commander / EDH* Control Stax Tokens WB (Orzhov)

LordMithos

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Creature (21)

Sorcery (10)

Land (36)

Enchantment (11)

Commander (1)

Commander: Teysa, Orzhov Scion

Instant (12)

Artifact (6)

Planeswalker (3)

So you've found my deck! I built this as my second commander deck back when I had just started fooling around with the format and quickly fell in love with the playstyle of this versus the voltron Daxos I started with. Years later Teysa still is my go to girl when there are butts that need kicking. Without further ado....

Prime Time

Simple really! I love having nice things and not letting other people have nice things. For realsies though, black and white lends itself to strategies that I love. It offers some surprisingly nice things; for example it has some very potent card draw, the ability to play both proactively and reactively, and some power to back it up. You will like this deck if you enjoy:

  • The political game. If you aren't willing to sometimes be the bad guy, be making deals, or appear as the underdog you will not like this deck
  • Treating everything as a resource. Lands are resources, cards are resources, your life is a resource, especially your creatures are resources, and your opponents creatures are resources
  • Options! This deck can and has won by going wide, going tall, or combo
  • Resiliency. The benefit of how tokens and especially some of the combos/synergies in here work means that recovering after something like a board wipe isn't as crippling for us as it is for some
If you like those things then please read on! If not, read on anyway and you may learn a thing or see something that makes you go wait, that's a dumb choice. If the latter happens let me know. I am going to go over most of the cards I put in and/or a few that I didn't or ended up cutting so strap in.
I've found that right around 36 lands seems to be the sweet spot for this deck, more and we get flooded like nuts and although we could get away with fewer, as it stands right now this seems like reasonably good spot. If a person were to have access to better mana rocks than I do you could almost certainly cut down to probably as low as 32-33.

    • Ancient Tomb: Life is cheap, sell that stuff off for mana. Gets you to the fun stuff faster.
    • Arcane Lighthouse: Given that our commander is removal on a stick we want to be able to get rid of problem creatures without worrying about hexproof/shroud. Pesky Narset or Sigarda getting you down? No more! Works well against voltron and combo commanders given that players obviously are going to protect them as soon as possible
    • Bojuka Bog: The one answer I have to graveyard strategies, probably should add something else to the sideboard but I'm rarely unhappy to see this come up. Better in the mid to late game once they're thinking of comboing off
    • Brightclimb Pathway  : New lands that offer an upgrade to just a regular old Plains or Swamp. Not too shabby
    • Evolving Wilds/Terramorphic Expanse: Poor man's fetches but they work. When I win the lottery I will replace them with the other fetchlands
    • Fetid Heath: Early game filtering is super helpful, especially if you're missing one colour or the other. Less stellar in the late game but it is never bad
    • Godless Shrine: Great land, most notably because you can fetch it with that good ol' Marsh Flats but be careful with the shock. We do end up spending life so it can add up. Good early if you need it untapped and it's not a big deal if it comes in tapped mid to late game
    • Isolated Chapel: The only reason I don't like this more than Godless Shrine is that I can't fetch it. I've never had it come in tapped and it's good all the time
    • Kjeldoran Outpost: This guy is a double edged sword. He fuels our token needs so we can go to town but if you're going to join the Night's Watch you want to have lived a fulfilling life already. Meaning you don't want it early game because your resources will be tied up casting spells and sacrificing a plains sucks. That said, if you're going to play it in the early game make sure you tap the plains you're going to sacrifice first to get the most bang for your buck. In the late game though it makes all the difference when it comes to breaking parity and when we're hungry for creatures to sacrifice. One other downside of this is you should run a few more plains to make up for the fact you have to sac one. Something to be aware of
    • Kor Haven: This one honestly should almost be a sideboard card. Super duper against voltron decks especially once you introduce it to Arcane Lighthouse meaning nothing and no one is safe. It also means you can make safe blocks if you need to as your critters will deal damage but buddy's creature is now a big hug monster dealing no damage while you can perhaps kill something important. I keep it in because I hate Brago, King Eternal and people who go tall
    • Marsh Flats: The day I bought this was the day I became a Magic man. If you can afford it, every EDH deck should have them. If not, that's ok, they're not mandatory. Nice because it thins out your deck of lands which means you get to draw the fun stuff later! Also can fetch dat Godless Shrine. A note on the timing of this, I find that unlike a lot of things this generally does not reward you for waiting until the end of your opponents turn. Especially if they are playing blue you will want to try to minimize any chances of a Stifle effect. That said, waiting until you see what a person is doing can be nice if you think you might need one of a couple different lands
    • Orzhov Basilica: People really hate on these, but if you make your play right they're pretty great. Just make sure you use the land you plan to bounce to cast your spell before actually playing this land and all is wel as you won't have lost anything that turn. Only downside of this is that if someone hits you with a Strip Mine effect it really hurts because now you're down 2 land drops. I think it's worth it though. Good in early game but in the late game that bounce hurts less
    • Phyrexian Tower: Now this is a land that this deck absolutely loves. Gives us one of those sometimes all important sac outlet that is a little harder to get rid of than our artifacts or creatures and gives us acceleration for the measly cost of a token. That's a price I'm willing to pay. Only quibble is I think this should have given 3 black as that would line up better with Dark Ritual but I'm admittedly a little biased. Good all the time
    • Temple of Silence: Again, another land that people love to hate. I love me some scrying as you'll no doubt notice later on and I'll take that effect on a dual land. Best in the early game but good in the late game too
    • Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth: My version of colour fixing. In running this I can run a few more plains than swamps because if I get it out it doesn't matter. As an expansion to that thought, it also makes all those colourless utility lands I'm running a little more practical as they can become swamps. Usually a good target for Wandering Wayfarer to help smooth out mana. Good all the time but really helps in that early game
    • Westvale Abbey  : I put it in because I thought ooooohhhhh pretty. I keep it in because it hasn't hurt me yet and it has the potential to be super rewarding. If I have to make a token I can, albeit the most expensive 1/1 ever, and the one time I managed to flip it to the demon life was pretty sweet. Really good in the event of a sweeper or board wipe as you're losing all those tokens anyway and you'll get a big indestructible creature out of it while the other guy is trying to reset the board. Best in the mid/late game when you have tokens already and can afford to lose a few to make an angry beat face that will recover some life and really put a clock on things

    Almost shockingly a black white creature deck does not run a ton of creatures! I didn't want to go the reanimator road because I think that's lame and if you look at just about anyone else's Teysa deck they have a reanimator combo path and I am my own man dang it. That just means though that the creatures I run have to be giving me value in the form of giving me tokens, letting me use my tokens, or taking away options from our opponents. Anyway, here they are:

    • Academy Rector: It's always a good idea to have a strong female mentor in your life. So that you can kill her and get one of your fancy enchantments. She comes out a little later than ideal so if it's possible to ramp into her go for it! My usual targets are Grave Pact, Darkest Hour, Anointed Procession, or Contamination. Gives us some tactical flexibility for whatever the situation is which is always welcome. I'd caution against playing her unless you can sacrifice her right away as she is an immediate target for exile or counterspells.
    • Blood Artist: Great guy, really brings some creativity to the murdering. Works great when we are sacrificing other creatures to do other things and the small life gain he brings helps offset the life we're spending. Has a game ending combo but I will mention that in the combo section! Good whenever you can drop him but often gets nuked
    • Bloodline Keeper  : Makes good sized tokens with evasion and then after a while makes it so they will hurt when they connect. A little slow, I often find it hurts that I can't make a token the turn I bring him in but if you have the other vampire makers out then it's much faster. The Ixalan stuff definitely helped. If you can get him out with Sorin, Lord of Innistrad or Legion's Landing   you're well on your way to a good time. The earlier you can drop him the better so he can start making vampire bros sooner. Often he'll eat removal but hey, that's one less bullet coming for our super creatures
    • Brimaz, King of Oreskos: Mufasa is dope, an early bomb that if you afford to be aggressive will quickly make a board state for you. Be wary though, if you manage to get him out around the time you want, turn 2-4, you will look like the scary guy even though he's not that effective
    • Geist-Honored Monk: This lady does it all; she makes us some tokens, scales with our board, and makes a great attacker/blocker because of that vigilance. When she comes out the game often starts to shift toward our favour but you want to play her once you're ready to steamroll or combo with something like Grave Pact to clear the board
    • Grave Titan: We want this big bad giant out as soon as possible, if you have the ramp drop him ASAP. We want those zombie tokens and we want them yesterday. I've also heard he's big too and apparently it hurts when you hit with him
    • Hanweir Militia Captain  : This is a cool card! Kind of like our Geist-Honored Monk except she comes out earlier and keeps making us tokens. And these tokens are easily the most valuable to us in terms of combo, so long as we have Teysa out, that we can sacrifice them for her ability **and** get our spirit token out of it. Meaning we have Teysa's utility of a white creature and the self replacement of a black creature. Now that's value. I like to drop her once I have 3 other creatures in order to get that flip as soon as possible while minimizing the amount of time people have to deal with her before she is a problem
    • Hero of Bladehold: Another guy kind of like Brimaz that we want out and attacking as soon as we can to get that board state growing. Packs a punch too in the late game when you're boosting your hordes. Again though, makes you look like a powerhouse
    • Hushwing Gryff: This one is mostly a meta call, I play with quite a few people who do unkind things with ETB effects (looking at you turn 5 Terastodon attached to Deadeye Navigator). That said, he's a white creature that lets us sacrifice him to Teysa if we are desperate and flying is always welcome. As he has flash I recommend holding onto him in your hand to surprise hose the guy trying to pull the above mentioned BS. It's important to note that it doesn't really cause us an issue, the only cards we play that are affected are Grave Titan and Geist-Honored Monk. The rest of are triggers tend to be on death which this does nothing against. If ETB effects are not as prevalent for your meta put in him your sideboard
    • Mentor of the Meek: This guy rocks! Get him out as soon as you are actually making tokens because this will refill your hand fast, and there's nothing like having options to really put the pressure on your opponents. Even if you are only drawing one extra card a turn, that's fuel. Don't expect him to live for very long though and definitely don't play him before you are actually making tokens. There is a combo with this guy that can draw our deck so check out that wombo combo section
    • Ophiomancer: Oh buddy, Snek Lady is super secret tech. Most of the other token producers in this make you at most 1-2 tokens on your turn. This guy will make you 1 on everyone's turn if you manage her properly! If you have something to sacrifice the snek token to, make sure you do as you want to maximize your returns. Generally if you have options try to kill the snake first but they do make good blockers if you're in a position that needs a defensive presence. Works really well with Mentor of the Meek as you can draw as many cards as there are players in a round if you have mana open. Good whenever you can play it
    • Razaketh, the Foulblooded: This fellow is literally a demonic tutor. Attached to an 8/8 body with flying and trample.I think that this is the perfect high end finisher and is perfect for finding solutions and is effectively a free sac outlet which sometimes makes all the difference.
    • Reassembling Skeleton: Of all the things in this deck in my playgroup this is the one that gives them nightmares. Ok, maybe not but I really like him. Sacrifice fodder and a reoccurable blocker/combo fodder. What's not to love?
    • Requiem Angel: Despairing angel why do you weep? I understand why you make everyone else cry as all those tokens that we just killed are now coming back. Seriously, as long as the tokens are not already spirits this lady effectively doubles our board presence giving us way more fuel for our degeneracy. Also makes us super resilient to board wipes too. Decent power and toughness make this lady nothing to dismiss as well
    • Sadistic Hypnotist: A creature we can use to make someone give up their options? All day every day. Get him out as quickly as possible and so long as you can maintain him people will be forced to play what they draw on their turns if it's something that they want to keep. This deck is about resource denial and this guy is just one other method to attack resources. Another important thing to note, he also is a free sac outlet which I hear is a good thing
    • Sublime Archangel: This lady completely changes how this plays. It can change a situation from a stalemate to making you able to attack very safely. Drop her and then attack with your 1/1 white spirit. Your opponent had better pray he also has a flyer. You can play a lot more defensively as when you attack it suddenly behooves you to only to it with one creature leaving you with lots of blockers. Drop her as soon as you have 3-4 tokens out
    • Teysa Karlov: Trying this lady out for now, I think that she's going to be a good fit. The doubling effect of death triggers is a huge deal and affects an awful lot of our stuff. See the Wombo Combo section for the major interactions
    • Thoughtpicker Witch: Remember how we're denying our opponents resources? More of the same. This works really well with the Snek Lady; get token on upkeep, sac token to control their draw. Personally I use this to feed them lands. Can't cast spells if you have no spells (insert meme here) but obviously situational as to what they should be given. Note that you can do this as often as you have creatures and mana open. The earlier you can get this nastiness happening the better but it seems especially effective late game once hands are low and people are looking for those all important top decks to get their engine moving again
    • Twilight Drover: It's always nice to get this guy out, like our Requiem Angel he gives us the ability to recover use from our already dead tokens and he sometimes can get absolutely stupid big. One of those creatures that gives us those sweet sweet options we're taking away from other people. Good whenever you can drop him
    • Weathered Wayfarer: A recent addition. Also, a frickin' allstar. He gives us whatever mana fixing we need, grabs us our utility lands if and when we need them, and all that for 1 white. If we really need it we can sac him to Teysa. A note of use, if you get him in your opening hand and you have the option take the draw. That means you should get to activate him every turn without comprising your land play
    • Yawgmoth, Thran Physician: This dude is kinda neat. Leaves us with a sacrifice outlet for free (other than life) that lets us draw and work on removal. The proliferate option could come up especially with the -1/-1 counters or any of the other weird things that happen in Commander games. Don't really see the benefit of the protection from humans but could pop up

    I don't run lots of artifacts in here but overall the ones I have are important and make our game plan run much more smoothly.

    • Ashnod's Altar: The second most important one I run in here, the altar allows me to generate mana quickly and dump threats out much faster than the resources Black and White normally have available to them. And again very important, a free sac outlet. Please see combos section to see how important this card is.
    • Blasting Station: Look at that! Another combo piece that I'll describe in the combo section. Try not to drop it until you're ready to go off though so it's not sitting vulnerable. I'd say this is the most important one I run because used properly it will end the game
    • Orzhov Signet: Pretty simple, play card, get mana, profit. The sooner the better for that sweet mana fixing
    • Phyrexian Altar: Finally managed to track one down! This card is great and enables a few combos. A free sacrifice outlet that not only is free! But wait, there's more! Not only do we get to sacrifice a critter for free but we actually profit from it which really works nicely to let us play out our deck once we have accomplished a combo
    • Skullclamp: Another allstar, ever wanted to draw cards like there was no tomorrow? You found the right card. It is beyond question the best way to draw cards in this deck. Take advantage of Wizard's broken mistake, we don't get to do it very often
    • Torpor Orb: See Hushwing Gryff. Just a little harder to kill than a creature but we lose out on the Flash effect. Sideboard it if you're not seeing many or powerful EtB effects
    Again, I don't run lots of enchantments but unlike my artifacts these are critical to the deck. We can still win by the combat damage route but here is where things really come together.

    • Anointed Procession: When the Amonkhet block came out there was literally one thing from it that I wanted and this was it. Not having access to green really hurt in terms of being able to just spit tokens out and this colour shifted version of Parallel Lives is awesome. This card is pretty self explanatory but can go infinite with a combo that I will mention in the combo section. Drop it ASAP but expect to see it vanish in a puff of sadness fairly quickly
    • Bitterblossom: I would describe this as the most elegant card in the deck, seriously, look at that art. And having a stable token producer on turn 2 (or turn 1!) is a great sign. Just be aware that the loss of life will add up
    • Contamination: When it comes to games I'm a bad person. And this card shows it. Play this as early as you can to shut down people not playing black but make sure you'll be able to make creatures to keep it out. At that point their only hope is to respond right away or count on having mana rocks to get some colours. Just be aware that this will slow us down too so play accordingly
    • Darkest Hour: This is honestly the most important card I have in the deck. Why? It makes creatures black. See the combo section for why this is kind of a big deal
    • Dictate of Erebos: One of my favourite interactions with this deck is that concept of if I can't have nice things then you can't either. That flash makes it so you can swing out or block like crazy and wreck everyone else's day. Just be aware that 100% of the time this is out you are the villain and people will be coming for you
    • Dreadhorde Invasion: It's like another Bitterblossom! Although it encourages going tall rather than wide it works for our purposes, especially if we can be sacrificing the token each turn. That said, it wouldn't hurt my feelings to have a good sized zombie token to throw at someone's face. Lifelink isn't a bad thing either
    • Grave Pact: See above, minus flash but can come out a turn sooner. The dream is to have them both out
    • Legion's Landing  : Very similar to Kjeldoran Outpost but without the part where I have to lose a Plains to get it out. The trigger to get it to flip is really pretty easy and I'd be willing to lose 3 tokens to have it flip. Otherwise it's at worst a 1/1 white vampire with lifelink for 1 and I'm ok with that
    • Rite of Belzenlok:I haven't actually had this come up in a game yet but getting a total of 5 tokens, one of which is a 6/6 flyer for 4 mana seems worthwhile to me. Will update this as time goes.
    • Shadows of the Past: I don't care what anyone says, I love this enchantment. Everytime a creature dies? I have very easily had this be Scry 1 15 times inside a single turn. The second ability I think I have used once, because we don't run many creatures it won't come up often and it's expensive. Definitely only worth it for that mad scryin' we'll be doing
    • Smothering Tithe: A mana enchantment! Formerly was running Black Market but I think that Smothering Tithe is going to fly under the radar a little better. The other advantage this has over Black Market is that this effectively gives us resources of any colour as opposed to only black. Will scale with however many opponents you have which is very very nice
    Let's take a look at the slow spells a person can do. Not much that's special here but they are the support stuff we need.

    • Armageddon: This is a great way to seal the deal once we're ahead. If we can accomplish a board state where we have a consistent token generating system and some way to keep generating mana like Phyrexian Altar then our game is running smoothly while everyone is set to zero
    • Beseech the Queen: I like my tutors and this is a decent one. At it's best it's a 3 cost tutor that can fetch pretty much anything we can cast. Great for whatever spell we need at the time
    • Demonic Tutor: The best tutor I have. Unconditionally gets you what you need at sorcery speed for 2. I'm always happy with that
    • Diabolic Tutor: Sac outlet and more tutoring! Who could complain? 2 mana for that is pretty good stuff too.
    • Gather the Townsfolk: Makes tokens when you need them. Again, that fateful hour will never trigger but the making 2 white tokens is worthwhile
    • Lingering Souls: One of the best white token sorceries there are. Get flying spirits for 3 and then do it again for 2? Aw yeah
    • March of Souls: The only board wipe I'm currently running and it's because it largely should leave my side of the board untouched. It is good stuff if a little expensive
    • Revoke Existence: Good for being rid forever of artifacts and enchantments that need to be gone. Sadly not at instant speed though
    • Soul Exchange: Yeah I know I said I wasn't doing reanimator but once in while an important thing dies and this is a super efficient way to get it back. Oddly enough, thrulls are one of the few token types I don't make so we will never see that incredibly rare +2/+2 token
    • Vindicate: Aside from being a beautiful bit of artwork by Karla Ortiz the ability to hit anything be it a troublesome land, a nasty artifact, or a bothersome enchantment is pretty worthwhile. Unfortunately it doesn't exile so it's not as complete as some removal but you're still looking at a solid option. I'd not use it on a creature unless you have to given that we have so many other good options for killing them and not many for being rid of the stuff mentioned before.
    • Abzan Advantage: I had chosen this because I was worried about being unable to target enchantments or indestructible shenanigans but neither of those have come up and it's always better to remove choice from an opponent if possible so I will likely replace this with Erase, Deicide, Abolish, Aura Blast, or Fragmentize. Not great if an opponent has more than 1 enchantment out and the bolster is not worth mentioning
    • Altar's Reap: An instant speed Skulltap, another one off Skull Clamp but this time at instant speed! Nice if you swing and you have a creature that will die because of a block or something. Why not sacrifice it anyway?
    • Anguished Unmaking: That's a nice game breaking bomb you have there. It would be a shame if someone....exiled it. 3 life is something to be aware of, can hurt in the late game
    • Culling the Weak: Now this is black ramp, spend a token we probably got for free in order to cast a bomb? I'll take 4. Or 1 because this is EDH. It's more black than Dank Ritual! I usually use this to drop a mid game threat in the early game or a late game bomb in the mid game
    • Dark Ritual: Ironically the less black Dark Ritual. See above
    • Dismember: I started running this to deal with people playing the indestructible gods, and it does a very good job. Anything indestructible is no longer out of our reach, not that anything without hexproof/shroud is ever but you get my meaning. It also is a super sneaky thing; no one expects a kill spell when you only have one colourless mana source open
    • Enlightened Tutor: Great tool for tracking down a lot of our winning kit. Try and save it for the end of an opponents turn so you get that card immediately
    • Path to Exile: Oh the things we do for ramp. I hit my own tokens with this as often as I nuke someone else's creature. Flexible in that way and cheap to cast
    • Raise the Alarm: Cast Gather the Townsfolk on someone else's turn. Or, if you need some creatures for Teysa to use to exile now here is your answer
    • Secure the Wastes: Pretty sweet stuff, it's a Raise the Alarm that scales. Cast on the end of someone else's turn or on demand
    • Swords to Plowshares: Objectively the better between it and Path as life is easier to chip away at than giving your opponents resources but it's less flexible in terms of utility. By that, I mean that I don't care for the one off life gain to hit one of my own tokens as opposed to the land with Path
    • Vampiric Tutor: Best tutor in this deck. Find anything at for only 2 life and a black. Again, cast it at the end of an opponents turn so you get it right away
    • Elspeth, Sun's Champion: It's like they designed a Planeswalker for this deck. Her +1 is basically exile a creature with Teysa out. Her -3 is going to wipe out all those nasty fatties looking to get rid of our munchkins, and her -7 will end the game. Always worth getting out ASAP
    • Sorin, Grim Nemesis: Angry Sorin is here and he's here to draw me cards. Realistically the -9 is not going to happen often but the card draw from the +1 is always welcome and the life loss that everyone gets to enjoy can and has made the difference in close games. His -X I haven't made use of often but when I need something dead it does the job
    • Sorin, Lord of Innistrad: This Sorin is really great! He will make us those sweet tokens, boost our armies, and smash through stalemates. Just don't bother hitting their commander with his ultimate unless you must as you won't get the dead commander typically. Dumping those emblems out is often a good idea, they can't go away and if you have two of them out your 1/1 chumps suddenly look a little more concerning. I will often try to get him out as soon as I can, if Dank Ritual is in hand Sorin is a common cast as he really puts that pressure on
    In this section I'll talk about some synergies and the combos that this deck has. I'm going to claim they're all deliberate but truthfully some of them are sheer dumb luck interactions that I discovered as I played it. Without further ado...
    1. Darkest Hour: The most important combo piece in the deck, this combines with several things to do some nastiness so long as we have Teysa, Orzhov Scion out. The downside to this is that it means we no longer can use Teysa's first ability so make sure when you drop this you are in a position to win. This card combos out with:
    2. Grave Pact/Dictate of Erebos: These ones have some reasonably simple synergies but one or two worth noting:
      • Anything where we lose a creature to gain advantage now gains us creature parity and whatever advantage we were getting anyway, ie. Ashnod's Altar, Skullclamp,Blasting Station, Teysa, Orzhov Scion, Culling the Weak, etc.
      • Black Market will quickly get out of hand
      • And perhaps the least intuitive one, but my personal favourite of all these, is March of Souls. We blow up everyone's creatures, putting Grave Pact on the stack afterward, and then everyone else has to sacrifice as many creatures as you had before you cast the spell. This often makes this a one sided board wipe which otherwise you don't get for less than 7 mana
    3. Contamination: Depending on what we're up against this can give us a hard lock on the board by making it nearly impossible for anyone who isn't playing black to cast spells. This works really tidily with:
      • Orzhov Signet: Just because our lands aren't giving us white doesn't mean we have no way to get it. If you can get this out at the same time as Contamination then we should still be able to cast some of the white spells that come up.
      • Bitterblossom: This reads, pay one life, get a death trigger, and all lands tap for one black. Can be any one of our things that produce at least one token a turn. Ophiomancer is an even better option in terms of not losing life and efficiency. The difference between the other token producers and Bitterblossom is that this fits the curve super nicely. In a perfect hand we play this turn 2 and have the lock set by turn 3.
      • Revoke Existence: The next step to maintaining this lock is to remove any mana rocks the other players have. There are other pieces to accomplish but this gives you the idea.
    4. Teysa Karlov: So this nice lady helps out a lot of our toolkit, specifically
        5. Requiem Angel will give us 2 spirits when any of our stuff that's not a spirit dies
          Twilight Drover will get 2 +1/+1 counters whenever a token dies. With any luck will get out of hand real quick
    This deck is pretty resilient but there are a few things that it has trouble dealing with.

    • Depending on how the other deck does it I have had trouble interrupting combo that doesn't rely on having creatures as most of our deck is geared toward establishing board control and our own combo rather than being able to interrupt someone dropping instants. For example, our deck would not fare well against storm at all.
    • Another thing I often run into that stalls me hard is mass bounce. Oddly enough I have more trouble with it than mass destruction as a lot of my combo pieces would survive a board wipe but mass bounce sets us back a long ways. If I never see another Cyclonic Rift again it will be too soon.
    • Other Stax strategies can either cripple us or make our day. If they set up the lock after we have token producers out we will be good to go as we have a very strong chance of being able to out value them in terms of resource production. If not, we are stuck.
    • Rest in Peace would cause us a real problem as most of the combos I run depend on death triggers. Leyline of the Void isn't as big a deal as it's only cards that it stops and most of our death triggers are tokens.
    • The last thing I think I should mention is that the main combo of this deck is dead in the water if we lost Darkest Hour. We can still win through other means but that card is our most effective key to victory. Protect it at all costs and unless playing against a counterspell or discard deck do not cast it until you are in a position to start comboing off.
    So there are some things that I've been toying with putting in, replacing, or have just been kind of unhappy with.

    As time has passed some things have proven to not be what I'd hoped and as such here are the things that got the axe.

    • Sheoldred, Whispering One - Power card but by the time this bad boy comes out it's often just a little too late for the effects I need. I've particularly noticed this as I've moved from a combat damage direction toward combo.
    • Thraben Doomsayer - Makes us those precious white tokens but it's just unfortunately too slow and I'm almost always finding a better play on turn 3. His secondary ability has literally never happened for me so he's been dropped.
    • Tragic Slip - Still on the fence with this one but had a few things that I wanted to put in and this was my weakest piece of removal so out it went.
    • Black Market - Well this is a neat thing here it just is too slow. Recently I opened a copy of Smothering Tithe and as such I'm pretty sure that's a superior choice as it's cheaper and I think ultimately going to score me more mana at times when it's more helpful. Comparing the two, Black Market can definitely be more explosive and get absurd amount of mana going but I think that Smothering Tithe will fly under the radar for longer.
    • Vona, Butcher of Magan - Just wasn't feeling as strong as I needed a top end drop to be. 7 life is a pricey cost for the ability and that I can't do it on opponents turn feels limiting.
    • Sword of Fire and Ice - The sword is unbelievably good for sure, however it wasn't performing as well as it needed to in order to keep a slot in this deck. Moved it to my Jhoira, Weatherlight Captain deck.
    • Idyllic Tutor - It was tied with Beseech the Queen as the most expensive tutor in here without the ability to search for whatever I want and at sorcery speed. Cut for better tutors
    • Utter End - Too expensive. Super good in terms of being able to hit whatever I want but ultimately having to keep 4 mana open to respond is not practical. Cut it for less flexible but cheaper removal.
    • Elspeth, Knight-Errant - Just was finding she wasn't quite generating enough value and consistently getting to an ultimate of course is not a good plan.
    • Thespian's Stage - Just found that it was better to have a Plains or Swamp to keep the value train going
    • Captain's Claws - Found more and more that the need to attack to get a token was not a great situation. Cut in favour of other token generators
    • Kaya's Wrath - Too mana specific
    • Revival / Revenge - Just wasn't performing. Not enough of the creatures I wanted to recur and when I have 6 mana I'd rather spend it elsewhere

    So it turns out that when you tweak a deck for years and put your heart, soul, and way too much money into said deck sometimes it does reasonably well. It recently won a EDH tournament at our LGS alongside a disgusting number of combo decks trying to go off on turn 3 or 4 and has defeated a few opponents including the following:

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    Nov. 15, 2017
    Edit

    After playing, tweaking, and very gradual progress with this deck for years I think I am going to try and write a primer for it. For anyone who looks at this stay tuned!

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    Date added 9 years
    Last updated 3 years
    Legality

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

    13 - 0 Mythic Rares

    40 - 0 Rares

    15 - 0 Uncommons

    13 - 0 Commons
    Cards 100
    Avg. CMC 3.00
    Tokens Cat Soldier 1/1 W, Cleric 0/1 B, Demon 6/6 B, Emblem Elspeth, Sun's Champion, Emblem Sorin, Lord of Innistrad, Faerie Rogue 1/1 B, Human 1/1 W, Human Cleric 1/1 BW, Snake 1/1 B, Soldier 1/1 W, Spirit 1/1 W, Treasure, Vampire 1/1 B w/ Lifelink, Vampire 1/1 W, Vampire 2/2 B, Vampire Knight 1/1 B, Warrior 1/1 W, Zombie 2/2 B, Zombie Army 0/0 B
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