Bontu's Monument

Legendary Artifact

Black creature spells you cast cost less to cast.

Whenever you cast a creature spell, each opponent loses 1 life and you gain 1 life.

Discussion (51)

DadHumanPraetor on Tuned Ayara

1 month ago

Nim Deathmantle+Ashnod's Altar goes infinite with any creature who makes 2 or more tokens on etb. You have several in your deck already but Grave Titan and Marsh Flitter are also options. Bontu's Monument turns your oathsworn vampire into a gravecrawler Phyrexian Altar is pricey but obviously a broken card Panharmonicon is ridiculous in Ayara if you have a meta that goes light on artifact removal-
Cast abhorrent overlord, trigger his etb twice so double tokens, then trigger ayara twice per token. Feels good lol. You can try Nightmare Shepherd with her too. So sweet to drop a Gray Merchant of Asphodel then sacrifice it and return it with Shepherd for another etb trigger. Sweet build man I like it. One mean card would be Sadistic Hypnotist it is the besssst lol

Raging_Squiggle on On the monument cards from …

1 month ago

Bontu's Monument, Tithe Drinker

The monument makes your creatures spells of the indicated color cost “one generic mana less”. It does NOT reduce the amount of colored mana required to pay. In this case, it well not affect Tithe Drinker’s casting cost at all since it does not contain any generic mana.

If you were to cast Butcher Ghoul, however, you would only have to pay since the monument reduces the generic mana cost by 1.

PaulMuadDib on Vito, Thorn of Dusk Rose

1 month ago

You are going to need more than 12 lands. Whenever I build a deck, I always start with 40 lands and then for every 3 pieces of ramp, which for a mono black deck would be a mana rock or swamp doubler or ritual spell like Dark Ritual, I remove a land.
Please retune the deck with 12 non-land mana sources and 36 swamps for starters and you can think of non-swamp lands you want to include later.
My suggestions for those sources are any 12 of the following, depending on your budget:
Sol Ring
Star Compass
Commander's Sphere
Crypt Ghast
Charcoal Diamond
Soldevi Adnate
Songs of the Damned
Worn Powerstone
Dark Ritual
Everflowing Chalice
Ashnod's Altar
Cathodion
Guardian Idol
Hedron Archive
Mind Stone
Magnifying Glass
Millikin
Prismatic Lens
Cabal Coffers <- could replace a swamp
Bubbling Muck
Pristine Talisman <- defiantly want that

After that you've got the commander, which takes up 1 card slot, so that leaves you with 51 cards to choose from.

I see the bare beginnings of either an aristocrats or a reanimator deck. In my opinion you should push more for aristocrats. It can draw you tons of cards and gain you quite a lot of life. There's no harm in keeping some reanimation spells in there though.

You want a good number of sacrifice outlets. I haven't heard of what a hard number should be so I'd shoot for at least 5. Here's a list of some that I remember off hand:
Witch's Cauldron
Vampiric Rites
Ashnod's Altar
Infernal Tribute <- has a funny synergy with Spine of Ish Sah
Gnawing Zombie
Altar of Dementia
Attrition
Blood Bairn
Bloodflow Connoisseur
Bloodsoaked Altar
Bloodthrone Vampire
Carnage Altar
Carrion Feeder
Corpse Blockade
Culling Dais
Dark Privilege
Diamond Valley
Disciple of Griselbrand
Gutless Ghoul
Lampad of Death's Vigil
Mind Slash
Spawning Pit
Phyrexian Plaguelord

For this strategy you'll need recurring creatures or token generators
Ghoulcaller Gisa
Reassembling Skeleton
Endless Cockroaches
Tenacious Dead
Nim Devourer
Bridge from Below
Open the Graves
Sanitarium Skeleton
Gravecrawler

value
Pitiless Plunderer
Bolas's Citadel

Lifegain
Blood Artist is a staple
Plunge into Darkness is something you might want for the pure lifegain of 3 per creature you sacrifice. Not sure that you want to use the "exile a bunch of your deck" too often.
Bontu's Monument
Corrupt
Drain Life
Shadows of the Past

reanimation
Living Death
No Rest for the Wicked
Sepulchral Primordial
Zombify
Rise from the Grave
Victimize
Apprentice Necromancer
Call of the Death-Dweller

spot removal/board wipes
Mutilate
Damnation
Defile
Hero's Downfall
Vona's Hunger

draw
Read the Bones
Sign in Blood
Damnable Pact
Smothering Abomination
Ransack the Lab
Minions' Murmurs
Harvester of Souls

and so forth. I'd look through some already built aristocrats decks to see exactly whether you want to take that strategy.

Oh yeah, for utility lands I'd choose any of the following within your price range:
Leechridden Swamp
Bojuka Bog
Reliquary Tower
Cabal Stronghold
Volrath's Stronghold
Phyrexian Tower
Myriad Landscape
Terrain Generator
Geier Reach Sanitarium

MrRyken on You Just Activated My Trap Card!

2 months ago

so Bontu's Monument can work with the combo too, and a +1 for the egyptian theme.

I'm not sure about this but how good can be Burgeoning ? I mean, drawing a lot of cards means a lot of lands waiting every round to be played. But with Burgeoning they can drop pretty fast, and with it more mana to activate our trap cards.

bushido_man96 on Spreading Rot

2 months ago

Karn's Bastion and Evolution Sage are solid inclusions for upping your spore counters.

You could improve your mana rock section, going with more 2 mana rocks. I rarely find Chromatic Lantern to be that useful in a two-color deck. Or, you could go in on land ramp with cards like Rampant Growth, a Wayfarer's Bauble, and even Summer Bloom can be useful. Since Slimefoot costs three to cast, I'd try to keep my ramp under 2 mana as much as possible, so I'd skip on cards like Cultivate and Kodama's Reach. Manalith and Darksteel Ingot are just not good.

I don't think Bontu's Monument is worth a slot here. You don't have many creatures to cast at all, and if it's not dead in your hand, it's going to be dead on your board. Lifecrafter's Bestiary will likewise not draw you many cards, and just having the scry isn't worth including it, in my opinion. Something like Vampiric Rites and Arguel's Blood Fast  ^Flip will help you draw cards more reliably in your current build. Harmonize would be a better draw spell for you, too.

Last thing I noticed is your lack of sacrifice outlets. Slimefoot does damage when saprolings die, and the most consistent way to kill saps is to do it yourself. If your budget allows, the altars are a good place to start: Ashnod's Altar, Phyrexian Altar, and Altar of Dementia. If your budget isn't that friendly, there are other options. Evolutionary Leap is a cheap sac outlet that lets you trade a sap for a creature in your library. Phyrexian Ghoul and Nantuko Husk are similar creatures that are free sac outlets, and Carrion Feeder is another decent one. Viscera Seer provides good value, too. Going all in on Slimefoot's abilities lets you get benefit out of enchanting it with cards like Keen Sense and Snake Umbra.

You've got a nice start. Hopefully this helps you focus it in a bit better.

TristanCVena on Demon Artist

2 months ago

This deck really would like some removal. I would recommend the obvious Fatal Push bumped into the mainboard, but I also think Dismember is neat cus ur mono black, and also should have a pretty healthy reserve of life to spend. Not sure if Bontu's Monument is really a big help here. I don't know if theres a lot of turns where you feel great just playing that, and it's a pretty dead draw a lot of the time. Also, Yawgmoth, Thran Physician might be a nice sacrifice outlet, and a way to get more gas, which this deck seems to be wanting a little bit. You could even toss in a couple Geralf's Messengers so that you have that combo potential on the top end, and also just because they're great creatures to have and sacrifice. Cool deck!

jakeelephant006 on its too late they are already under your bed

3 months ago

This deck performs very well with some decently large deficiencies. I think you need to cut some weaker cards (sorceries and creatures mostly) and add in more Ninjas and ninja synergies.

Cards to Cut: Creatures: Definite cuts are Jeskai Infiltrator, but I'd also heavily consider trimming Dark Impostor, Deathcult Rogue, Etrata, the Silencer, and Nezumi Cutthroat.

Sorceries: Definitely cut Hour of Eternity, Kefnet's Last Word, Paranoid Delusions and consider trimming Ghostform, Slip Through Space, or Stealth Mission.

Artifacts, Enchantments, Instants, Planeswalkers, and Lands: I would definitely cut Briber's Purse, Fatal Push, and Vraska, Scheming Gorgon while also giving thought to the merits of including Skygames, Bontu's Monument, Forge of Heroes, Unclaimed Territory, and of, or at least the Amonkhet, cycling lands.

The cards I have recommended are either slow, have low to zero synergy with the rest of the deck, or are typically weak in commander.

Cards to Add Creatures: Ninjas, ninjas, and more ninjas (plus some cheaper unblockables for good measure). There are 19 Ninjas in mtg history (excluding changelings). You have 11 in this deck. I think you ought to have more. The cheapest are Mistblade Shinobi, Okiba-Gang Shinobi, Skullsnatcher, Throat Slitter, and Walker of Secret Ways. Higure, the Still Wind and Ink-Eyes, Servant of Oni are both reasonable splurges in terms of powerful Ninjas to acquire. Now for other creatures to enable Ninjitsu. First off, I could have included Changeling Outcast in the last section since it is also a Ninja and you should absolutely be running it in here. Other small unblockables for you to Ninjitsu into are Gudul Lurker, Slither Blade, Tormented Soul, Faerie Seer, Mothdust Changeling, Gingerbrute, Dimir Infiltrator, Baleful Strix, Invisible Stalker, Augury Owl, Sage Owl, Spire Owl, and Cloud of Faeries. All of these cards are less than 3 cmc, and are either entirely unblockable or have good etb/ltb or dealing combat damage synergy (and are mostly pretty cheap too). I'd recommend adding at least 3 or 4 of them in addition to the above ninjas.

Other cards: This section is mostly for general things that you could do to make this deck more consistent and enjoyable to pilot, but there are a couple specific synergies I think you're missing out on. They're both pretty intertwined so I'll just address them together. I think you could be putting in a few more cards that are good to reveal off of Yuriko's trigger and ways to manipulate the top of your library so you get those card when they are most impactful. I am referring to cards like Treasure Cruise, Sibsig Muckdraggers, Temporal Trespass, Dig Through Time, Draco, Consign / Oblivion, Murderous Cut, Far / Away, Curtains' Call, Into the Story, Submerge, Commandeer, Commit / Memory, Discovery / Dispersal, Rags / Riches, In Garruk's Wake, and any other high cost card that has an alternate mana cost, mana reducing ability, split card, or is a high impact card. Then you could also throw in a few ways to manipulate the top of your library like Brainstorm, Ponder, Serum Visions, Tamiyo's Epiphany, and Crystal Ball. The only other synegystic thing you could put in here is making your other creatures Ninjas as well with Conspiracy, Xenograft, Arcane Adaptation, and Amorphous Axe.

Otherwise, you could probably add in some more ramp (Sol Ring, Mind Stone, Star Compass, etc.), card draw (see cantrips above and Last Thoughts), board wipes (could probably replace Bontu's Last Reckoning with some of the ones from the last section or just add those ones or some other good boardwipes) and spot removal or counterspells (I don't see a lot of good ways to deal w/ non-creature permanents in here).

multimedia on Scarab God Zombies (Budget)

3 months ago

Hey, there's two Zombie combos here. One is with Gravecrawler and the other is with Havengul Lich. Both use Rooftop Storm to free cast Zombies from my graveyard.

• Gravecrawler + Rooftop Storm + sac outlet + Diregraf Captain/Plague Belcher/Bontu's Monument

This combo can use any sac outlet as it's needed to get Gravecrawler into my graveyard to free cast him with Rooftop. Gravecrawler infinite dying triggering Captain is a win condition. Phyrexian Altar is the nonbuget expensive sac outlet that goes infinite with Gravecrawler. It's not in this deck, but is a good upgrade if looking to make upgrades. It would allow you to cut Rooftop completely from the combo.

• Havengul Lich + Rooftop Storm + Ashnod's Altar + Gray Merchant of Asphodel

Ashnod makes infinite colorless mana when I sac a Zombie and I use one colorless each time to activate Havengul. I can activate Havengul and then cast a Zombie in any graveyard for free. Merchant is the best win condition with his combo because I can infinite cast him and trigger his ETB infinite times. With Diregraf Captain or Plague Belcher in my graveyard and only one other Zombie in any graveyard I can use Captain/Belcher as a win condition by infinite sacing and casting that one another Zombie.

Bontu's Monument can also be a win condition since I'm casting a Zombie each time with Havengul. Mire Triton can be the only Zombie in my graveyard since she can assemble the rest of the Zombies for this combo. I can keep sacing/casting her from my graveyard to self-mill myself to get Zombies for the combo into my graveyard and then cast them with Havengul.

Other than the two combos the other strategy is attacking with a Zombie horde with Lords and Wonder as support. Accumulate Zombies and Zombie tokens which allows Scarab to make opponents lose a lot of life and also scry a lot which helps to find combo pieces. Flying is very powerful with attacking Zombies and Scarab. The combos are using my graveyard thus I want to get Zombies into my graveyard especially Gravecrawler. Wonder also wants to be in my graveyard therefore it's a great fit.