Teysa takes aim, Groups Slugs

Commander / EDH* Aristocrats Casual Group Slug Sacrifice WB (Orzhov)

pretendingtoalright

Creature (40)

• 1x Angel of Despair
• 1x Ashen Rider
• 1x Ayara, First of Locthwain
• 1x Blistergrub
• 1x Blood Artist
• 1x Carrion Feeder
• 1x Cruel Celebrant
• 1x Crypt Ghast
• 1x Dutiful Attendant
• 1x Endless Cockroaches
• 1x Falkenrath Noble
• 1x Filigree Familiar
• 1x Grim Haruspex
• 1x Gutterbones
• 1x Infectious Host
• 1x Lampad of Death's Vigil
• 1x Midnight Reaper
• 1x Murderous Rider
• 1x Myr Retriever
• 1x Night Incarnate
• 1x Nightmare Shepherd
• 1x Nocturnal Feeder
• 1x Oathsworn Vampire
• 1x Perilous Myr
• 1x Phyrexian Delver
• 1x Pitiless Plunderer
• 1x Priest of Forgotten Gods
• 1x Reassembling Skeleton
• 1x Reveillark
• 1x Serrated Scorpion
• 1x Soulcage Fiend
• 1x Spirit of Malevolence
• 1x Syr Konrad, the Grim
• 1x Tattered Mummy
• 1x Tenacious Dead
• 1x Teshar, Ancestor's Apostle
• 1x Teysa, Orzhov Scion
• 1x Vindictive Vampire
• 1x Whisper, Blood Liturgist
• 1x Zulaport Cutthroat

Land (34)

• 1x Bojuka Bog
• 1x Castle Ardenvale
• 1x Castle Locthwain
• 1x Caves of Koilos
• 1x Command Tower
• 1x Emergence Zone
• 1x Godless Shrine
• 1x Orzhov Guildgate
• 6x Plains
• 2x Plains
• 1x Reliquary Tower
• 1x Scoured Barrens
• 1x Silent Clearing
• 1x Snow-Covered Plains
• 2x Snow-Covered Swamp
• 9x Swamp
• 1x Swamp
• 1x Temple of Silence
• 1x Witch's Cottage

Artifact (7)

• 1x Arcane Signet
• 1x Ashnod's Altar
• 1x Mind Stone
• 1x Orzhov Signet
• 1x Sol Ring
• 1x Soul-Guide Lantern
• 1x Witch's Cauldron

Planeswalker (2)

• 1x Liliana, Dreadhorde General
• 1x Sorin, Vengeful Bloodlord

Commander (1)

Enchantment (8)

• 1x Bastion of Remembrance
• 1x Dark Prophecy
• 1x Dawn of Hope
• 1x Legion's Landing  ^Flip
• 1x Open the Graves
• 1x Phyrexian Reclamation
• 1x Revel in Riches
• 1x Smothering Tithe

Instant (6)

• 1x Altar's Reap
• 1x Anguished Unmaking
• 1x Costly Plunder
• 1x Mortify
• 1x Utter End
• 1x Village Rites

Sorcery (2)

• 1x Kaya's Wrath
• 1x Victimize

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Maybeboard

Creature (8)

• 1x Crashing Drawbridge
• 1x Gravecrawler
• 1x Kalastria Highborn
• 1x Krav, the Unredeemed
• 1x Ministrant of Obligation
• 1x Nezumi Graverobber  ^Flip
• 1x Ogre Slumlord
• 1x Solemn Simulacrum

Artifact (6)

• 1x Bontu's Monument
• 1x Desecrated Tomb
• 1x Phyrexian Altar
• 1x Skullclamp
• 1x Swiftfoot Boots
• 1x Talisman of Hierarchy

Enchantment (3)

• 1x Leyline of Sanctity
• 1x Oversold Cemetery
• 1x Vampiric Rites

Instant (3)

• 1x Flawless Maneuver
• 1x Generous Gift
• 1x Swords to Plowshares

Sorcery (3)

• 1x Akroma's Vengeance
• 1x Dusk / Dawn
• 1x Final Parting

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A teysa deck focused around things dying and doing the hurty. Anyways, Teysa Karlov was my first EDH deck that I built. It was a horrible mismatch of (W)(B) good standard cards (at the time) with some EDHREC rips thrown in.

Here's a more focused deck (with weak payouts lol) with budget includes and the shell of my old Teysa deck which is why there's such a disparity in the power/price of some of the cards.

Ramp

Typical Mana rocks like Arcane Signet, Mind Stone, Sol Ring and Orzhov Signet all can help get Teysa out earlier getting us in motion quicker. Revel in Riches and Pitiless Plunderer ramp up on creature deaths and double up with Teysa out. Smothering Tithe is an auto include in white decks lol. Priest of Forgotten Gods serves triple duty as slow ramp, card draw and removal.

Crypt Ghast doubles our swamps for explosive turns also.

Cannons and Fodder

The main crux of the deck is to have things die, and do damage. Tattered Mummy, Perilous Myr, Serrated Scorpion, Nocturnal Feeder, Soulcage Fiend, Spirit of Malevolence, and Infectious Host double on this by having die triggers on their own. And they're all relatively cheap cards which is important for some of the card in the deck included to support them.

Cards like Tenacious Dead, Reassembling Skeleton, Oathsworn Vampire, Gutterbones, and Endless Cockroaches are creature that recur themselves and can trigger other cards in our strategy.

The gunpowder of this analogy, the damage dealers are the typical suite of blood artist type effects. Blood Artist, Vindictive Vampire, Zulaport Cutthroat, Bastion of Remembrance, Cruel Celebrant, and Syr Konrad, the Grim. Ayara, First of Locthwain serves this in reverse, damaging on ETBs but that's fine I like the card.

The actual Cannons, the ones that trigger everything by letting things die. Whisper, Blood Liturgist, Ayara, First of Locthwain, Priest of Forgotten Gods, and Witch's Cauldron are sac outlets but limited in their once a turn use.

Carrion Feeder, Lampad of Death's Vigil, Ashnod's Altar are instant speed and repeatable (but Lampad is restricted by a mana cost). A few other spells have sacrifices as an additional cost as well which can help.

Reloading

In order to fuel the damage for this group slug there had to be ways to re-use the Fodder to take players out. Reveillark, Teshar, Ancestor's Apostle, and Sorin, Vengeful Bloodlord are great for specifically bringing back those cheap Fodder options.

Phyrexian Delver, Whisper, Blood Liturgist, Phyrexian Reclamation and Victimize can also pull those cards out of our graveyard but are probably better suited to hit our bigger creatures, that might carry some more utility.

Dutiful Attendant is another double duty card who we want to die to get its effect off, and doing so let's us return more ammo back to us. While Nightmare Shepherd can either squeeze out the extra damage we need from our fodder effects or let us scrounge some value from our more value oriented creatures, also pseudo-commander protection.

Scraping the bottom of the Barrel

Making sure we don't completely run out of steam, we have other payouts alongside our damage plan.

We can keep our hand topped off with persistent card draw like Dawn of Hope (also a mana sink for later in the game), Grim Haruspex, Midnight Reaper, Dark Prophecy and Liliana, Dreadhorde General which all double off Teysa's ability.

Or if we need to dig for answers/pieces, Filigree Familiar, Village Rites, Costly Plunder or Altar's Reap have immediate draw payouts.

Shrapnel Wounds

While how this deck works is pretty clear, how it stops other decks is always a good question. Anguished Unmaking, Utter End, Angel of Despair and Ashen Rider are solid removal pieces that can hit everything/almost anything

Liliana, Dreadhorde General, Priest of Forgotten Gods, Mortify, Murderous Rider and even Perilous Myr are more specific removal but are solid.

Night Incarnate and Kaya's Wrath simple board wipes. Might have to reset the board some time.

Support Fire

There's still a few pieces of the deck that aren't directly related to the game plan but synergize well enough with it. Namely Teysa, Orzhov Scion and Open the Graves which are just extra pay offs for things dying that help us keep board presence while we kill all of our own things.

On similar wavelengths, Castle Ardenvale, Dawn of Hope, and Adanto, the First Fort serve as solid mana sinks.

Trick Shots.

Lastly, there's a few loops in the deck that can win us the game. Nothing special and they're fairly easy to interact with or stop, but they deserve mentioning.

Teshar, Ancestor's Apostle + Ashnod's Altar + Perilous Myr + Myr Retriever. Goes like this, have this pieces out on the battlefield. Sac Perilous Myr to Ashnod's, then sac retriever. Return the Perilous Myr to hand with Retriever\s death trigger and cast with the from Ashnod's. This triggers Teshar and you can return the Retriever back to the battlefield. Repeat infinitely for infinite damage dealt by Perilous Myr or infinite death triggers, or infinite leave the graveyard triggers etc etc.

The next couple combos is just Pitiless Plunderer and Teysa being very synergistic. With Teysa Karlov, a free sac outlet, a death or etb payout and Pitiless Plunderer. Sacrifice Oathsworn Vampire or Reassembling Skeleton to the sac outlet. That generators two treasure tokens from the Plunderer thanks to Teysa, then you can just use that mana to replay either of those two. - Can recreate the loop without teysa if the sac outlet is Ashnod's Altar

Similar loop but with extra steps. Uses Teysa Karlov, Pitiless Plunderer, Phyrexian Reclamation,Ashnod's Altar and Serrated Scorpion(or Zulaport cutthroat, or Spirit of Malevolence). Sac the fodder to Ashnod's giving you floating and two treasure tokens. use with Phyrexian Reclamation to return the fodder to your hand and recast it with the remaining floating mana. Then repeat the loop. With Serrated Scorpion this also gives you infinite colourless mana, not that it really matters if you're allowed to complete the loop. (The healing from the Fodder means you either never drop below the life you started the loop at, or you net life using the scorpion)

Lastly, not a combo/loop but Revel in Riches is just another wincon to shoot for if all else fails.

"D'oh I missed"

While I think the main strategy of expendable fodder to turn into damage is well set. The deck feels lacking (I say feels since I've had no way to playtest it) in some general ways.

Some of the cards in the maybe board help with that.
Desecrated Tomb might just be a pet card of mine, but with all the recursion and Teysa having token synergies this card fits a similar role as Open the Graves

Final Parting would be fantastic for the sake of consistency. Get a card you need into your hand and a recursion target into your graveyard. Solid.

Crashing Drawbridge This is mostly a magical Christmas land potential include. But haste enabler when we have a few ways to generate lots of tokens and a few powerful creatures with tap abilities and the artifact creature speeds us up.

Leyline of Sanctity and Swiftfoot Boots offer protection that the deck lacks. The former protection your graveyard and the latter protecting your commander or combo pieces etc.

Cards that would be easy drops or have better (probably more expensive) replacements. Gutterbones: Relatively restrictive return mechanic makes it less flexible than other recursion pieces. - the self-recurring creature we do have are probably enough. Could replace this with any card in the maybe board with a positive outcome

Soulcage Fiend: Symmetric life loss effect isn't ideal, plus its a three cmc double card - would probably trade this card in for a recursion or ramp card, since I think the deck needs more of those.

Lampad of Death's Vigil: I like the card, I like the pay off for sacing something. But a mana cost to enable it means you're either leaving mana up just in case or using the mana and not having access to a sac outlet. - Could be exchanged for any free sac outlet, or a paid sac outlet with a bigger pay off (Krav)

Witch's Cauldron strictly worse Vampiric Rites with the two upsides of being recurable with Myr Retriever and triggering Teshar.

Soul-Guide Lantern is strictly a meta call. - No graveyard shenanigans in your playgroup? drop it for something else. I might personally trade it for Solemn Simulacrum to maintain a card slot that replaces itself

Filigree Familiar is a creature that synergizes well with the deck by having a relevant dies trigger, some nice incidental lifegain and being a target or trigger for teshar. - but it's also 3 cost 2/2. Skullclamp does the important parts of Filigree familiar but better.

Night Incarnate is a nice board wipe, especially when teysa's out, hitting things for -6/-6 which gets around indestructible. - But that's not always going to be the case. More consistent board wipes could easy take this slot. Like Dusk / Dawn

Dutiful Attendant is nice, offers us fodder with a payout that let's us keep going. - but it's a one time use 3 mana card. Oversold Cemetery is persistent, harder to remove, and cheaper.

Date added	3 years
Last updated	3 years
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	4 - 0 Mythic Rares 29 - 0 Rares 23 - 0 Uncommons 22 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	2.98
Tokens	Copy Clone, Human 1/1 W, Human Soldier 1/1 W, Morph 2/2 C, Soldier 1/1 W w/ Lifelink, Spirit 1/1 W, Treasure, Vampire 1/1 W, Zombie 2/2 B
Folders	Want to Play