Decree of Pain

Sorcery

Destroy all creatures. They can't be regenerated. Draw a card for each creature destroyed this way.

Cycling (, Discard this card:Draw a Card.)

When you cycle Decree of Pain, all creatures get -2/-2 until end of turn.

Discussion (51)

Osbert on Dame Drain

1 week ago

Ayara doesn't seem like a good fit since you only have 7 black creatures including herself and your commander.

Selvala also seems out of place here since you arent playing many large power power creatures. I think I would cut her because on average she won't make more than 3 mana (so 2 because you pay G for the ability) and you'll be handing most of the card draw to opponents. Similarly Hunter's Insight, Life's Legacy, Garruk Primal Hunter face the same problems. These cards feel terrible when they draw you 2-3 cards. Instead I suggest drawing cards or creature casts like Guardian Project, Zendikar Resurgent, Lifecrafter's Bestiary, etc.

If you like storming off with creatures maybe consider Tangleroot. Sure it helps opponents but it makes elf decks vomit their hands and with a creature draw engine on board it might as well be a Primal Surge.

Your deck currently has 1 piece of grave recursion which would make a lot of black mana lovers sad. Some good options are Patriarch's Bidding, Rise of the Dark Realms, Finale of Eternity, & Oversold Cemetery.

Your deck also has a very few ways to disrupt opponents which can be problematic. Reclamation Sage, Attrition, gravepact, Toxic Deluge, Decree of Pain, Viridian Corrupter, and Viridian Zealot are good options to consider.

You seem to have abundant ways to produce mana but not a lot of ways to use it. I suggest the classic Staff of Domination as a combo piece and maybe some X spells like Torment of Hailfire. Other mana sinks like Temur Sabertooth can help you dig with draw engines while abusing EtBs.

Heliogabale on Haha tutors go brrrrrr

1 month ago

OK, I don't know how I missed this in the first place, but Cycling discards the card as well! This opens a whole pool of cards that essentially turn into self-recurring card advantage with DePietro on the board.

Barren Moor and Lonely Sandbar become great cantrips, while Nimble Obstructionist and Decree of Pain grant effects that can be replayed every turn.

Truly this thread is leading to some great ideas!

Nemesis on Belbe Come Back

1 month ago

Myr Battlesphere

Horizon Stone

Ugin, the Ineffable

Colossus of Akros

Darksteel Colossus

Desolation Twin

Decree of Pain

Finale of Eternity

Animist's Awakening

Boundless Realms

Lurking Predators

Conduit of Ruin

Optimator on Giant's Deck

2 months ago

The amount of utility cards that facilitates for a large-creature/stompy deck (like giant tribal) is completely unparalleled and unrivaled. There are things--both budget and expensive--like Garruk's Uprising, Soul's Majesty, Hunter's Insight, Snake Umbra, Triumph of Ferocity, Lead the Stampede, Garruk, Primal Hunter, Return of the Wildspeaker, Abundance, Rhythm of the Wild, Selvala's Stampede, Shamanic Revelation, Elemental Bond, Colossal Majesty, Guardian Project, Rancor, Primal Rage, Heroic Intervention, Wrap in Vigor, Golgari Charm, Lifecrafter's Bestiary, Canopy Cover, Aspect of Mongoose, Alpha Authority, Asceticism, Defense of the Heart, Lignify, Lurking Predators, Bow of Nylea, The Great Henge, Eerie Ultimatum, Reap, Creeping Renaissance, Seasons Past, Reap the Past, Genesis Ultimatum, Beastmaster Ascension, Overwhelming Stampede...

The list is huge, and it grows every year.

This is on top of the superior ramping ability of Green and it's above-average removal options. One big advantage of Green's land-based ramp is things like Planar Cleansing, Hour of Revelation, Play of the Game, Bane of Progress, Creeping Corrosion, and Merciless Eviction can't send you back to the stone age by destroying all your mana rocks.

Everything you will want to be doing with Giant Tribal, Green supports and supports well. I cannot stress this enough. Not to mention the good green giants that keep getting printed.

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Black doesn't provide too much in the way of utility specific to giant tribal or stompy decks other than recursion and good card draw like Greed, Phyrexian Arena, and Erebos, God of the Dead. Personally I like cards like Damnable Pact, Read the Bones, Ancient Craving and Ambition's Cost but if you're running Green and/or Blue you shouldn't need to lose life to draw cards. Painful Truths might still be useful due to it's great rate (three cards for three mana is good). Syphon Mind is a great rate and has the upside of making your opponents discard.

Obviously Black specializes in removal (but so does White!) so you could run things like Mortify, Despark, Utter End, Vindicate, Anguished Unmaking, Dreadbore, Terminate, Bedevil and Ruinous Ultimatum. In Garruk's Wake and Decree of Pain are probably good in your giant deck since you're ramping so hard. Since you're running White you shouldn't need Black's wraths, but those two stood out.

Things like Phyrexian Reclamation, Animate Dead, and Reanimate are great for creature decks. Palace Siege is all right on a budget. So is Twilight's Call. It's no Oversold Cemetery or Meren of Clan Nel Toth or Rise of the Dark Realms but those are pricey. Recovering from boardwipes will be important.

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Blue has some interesting removal options like Curse of the Swine, Pongify, Rapid Hybridization, and Reality Shift. You have some Cyclonic Rifts in your trade binder, right? That alone is a great reason to run Blue in your deck (it's literally one of the best cards in EDH straight-up). Do it!

Blue also has all the card-draw--from per-turn stuff like Kumena's Awakening and Mind Unbound; chunks of cards like Concentrate, Treasure Cruise, Fact or Fiction, Fathom Trawl, and Tidings; huge hand-refillers like Overflowing Insight, Mind Spring, Stroke of Genius, and Pull from Tomorrow; and some sneaky stuff like Windfall, Keep Watch, Drawn from Dreams, Verity Circle, and Insight. Green has some amazing card-draw already but it wouldn't be a terrible idea to supplement it with Blue cards. Rush of Knowledge would be REALLY good in a giant-tribal deck--especially with Morophon, the Boundless at the helm.

Counterspells are very much not Giant/Stompy but I have a few aggro decks that run a silver-bullet copy of Negate or Swan Song just as anti-boardwipe tech. Not necessary though. Boros Charm, Golgari Charm, and Wrap in Vigor work well in that capacity. There are lots of 3-cmc options too but the mana difference between 2 and 3 is huge.

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You could even run some interesting charms like Abzan Charm or Esper Charm. There are some surprisingly potent options. Some are stinkers of course.

Temur Ascendancy would be reason alone to run five colors and be utterly fantastic in this deck.

Garruk's Uprising alone is reason to run at least Green.

Merciless Eviction is one of the best removal spells in the game. Four or five colors would allow you to run that.

Urban Evolution would be good in a big-mana deck like this. Inspired Ultimatum, while not amazing, is playable.

You get the idea.

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As you can see, there is a myriad of reasons to run more colors. Honestly, I really can't recommend it enough if true Giant-Tribal is the goal--whether Naya giants or five-color giants.

One extremely important thing for large-creature decks is to consider how you're going to recover from board wipes. Superior card-draw from Green, Black, and Blue cards will help immensely. Card advantage like Phyrexian Reclamation, Palace Siege, Seasons Past, All Suns' Dawn, Reap the Past, Reap, Creeping Renaissance, Eerie Ultimatum, and abilities like Mayael the Anima's, Golos, Tireless Pilgrim's, and Kenrith, the Returned King's reanimate ability will help you recover. These are things that Red and White simply can't do well. Sure there's Resurrection and Reya Dawnbringer, but they aren't great.

Brion Stoutarm is a legitimately good general--he really is!--but not for giant tribal. He brings nothing to the table for giant tribal other than being a decently-statted Giant himself and pigeonholes you into the worst color pair in EDH for essentially no benefit. As I mentioned, Iroas, God of Victory and, to a lesser extent, Kalemne, Disciple of Iroas would make better commanders if you are dead-set on Boros colors (which I do not recommend if you want to play maximum giants). If you were building around Brion's ability and had some giants around as support that would be one thing, but it seems that's not the goal. As such, please consider switching commanders :) I think that if you want Brion Stoutarm as the commander, you should make a Brion deck.

I really do think you'll be happier in the long run with a different commander It doesn't have to be expensive. Most of what you would need I can trade to you, including Morophon, the Boundless, and most supplemental cards I don't have are in the 25-cent to $1 range (Realm-Cloaked Giant, Mayael the Anima, etc). I actually have a shitload of this utility stuff on-hand, and you have some great staples like Cyclonic Rift on-hand--and probably more! I want you to be satisfied with your deck! It doesn't have to be competitive to be fun, but it doesn't have to be expensive to work better and smoother and be more competitive.

VastBadger on Gonti’s 5 finger discounts

2 months ago

Update to the last post. When I get the cards, I'll be switching a few things around.

Replacing Cauldron of Souls with Manascape Refractor. Replacing Nyx Lotus with Jet Medallion. Replacing Unstable Obelisk with Expedition Map. Replacing Decree of Pain with Toxic Deluge. Replacing Puppeteer Clique with Massacre Wurm. Replacing Kheru Mind-Eater with Opposition Agent. Replacing Ancient Craving with Vampiric Tutor.

RNR_Gaming on The Scarab God - zombie tribal

3 months ago

I always thought a control shell with wraths and forced sacrifice stuff would be neat Languish, Damnation, Yahenni's Expertise, gravepact, Dictate of Erebos and Decree of Pain

Juuluk on Deathkeeper, shaman spellcaster- looking for …

3 months ago

MagicMarc thanks for the advice, I appreciate it. I’m getting closer to a final version now. I decided to scale back on Finale of Promise + Shaman's Trance and only include a Decree of Pain and a Decree of Savagery so I’ll have two good targets in my own grave, plus anything good in the opponents. On top of that, Mindclaw Shaman is added value.

Juuluk on Deathkeeper, shaman spellcaster- looking for …

4 months ago

Thanks for the suggestion MagicMarc I'll do that. I saw that the rats and dwarves wouldn't work with succession. That's too bad about the thrumming stone, but I see what you're saying. I thought about using it with mortuary and something like Plaguecrafter, but I don't know if that would work either now.

Could I also get your opinion on the Finale of Promise and Shaman's Trance combination? I decided that I really can't deny the flavor of th trance, even though it's hot garbage. I don't want to only be using it as an interrupt though, or having to rely on my opponent having flashback or escape cards i can play that turn, that's why I made that jank. It's not optimal, but it's basically throwing cards into my grave with an Underrealm Lich or cycling a Decree of Pain, then just making things explode. I thought it would be cool if it worked with Sins of the Past too, but I feel like I should bring that to a rules board.