Kokusho, the Evening Star

Legendary Creature — Dragon Spirit

Flying

When Kokusho, the Evening Star is put into a graveyard from play, each opponent loses 5 life. You gain life equal to the life lost this way.

Discussion (48)

Last_Laugh on Marchesa, the Black Rose

2 weeks ago

Metallic Mimic deserves a spot. It either immediately protects Marchesa or it helps abuse etb/death triggers over and over. Just sac it to rename the creature type as needed. Kokusho, the Evening Star and Gray Merchant of Asphodel are two of my favorites to end games.

Last One Standing has a few things going for it. It costs less than Damnation and it gets under/around Gaddock Teeg/Void Winnower.

Feel free to check out my list for ideas. It's likewise etb/death abuse with no theft but it has over 100 comments and a pretty big maybeboard to sift through. Upvotes on any of my decks are appreciated. Got 99 Upvotes And A Bitch Ain't One - Marchesa

Last_Laugh on Killer Queen

3 weeks ago

You're missing a few important cards that allow you to abuse etb/death triggers on everyones turn instead of once per round. These cards also have the added bonus of immediately protecting Marchesa as she enters.

Metallic Mimic , Sage of Fables , and Vigean Graftmage . Mimic is probably the most powerful of the bunch just due to versatility... name zombies for Grey Merchant or Vindictive Lich , dragons for Kokusho, the Evening Star , Nicol Bolas, the Ravager  ^Flip, or Terror of the Peaks , or humans/wizards to protect Marchesa. Just sac as needed to reset the creature type.

I also run a synergistic etb/death trigger abuse Marchesa. Feel free to check out my list for other ideas. Upvotes on any of my decks are appreciated. Got 99 Upvotes And A Bitch Ain't One - Marchesa

Masterful on Necronomicon | Teysa Karlov | Primer

2 months ago

cfost827 I played Kokusho, the Evening Star for a while, and he was strong when he hit the board, just slow. I ended up taking him out cause I wanted a faster curve. Yosei, the Morning Star was always too stax-ey for my liking. He would slow down games a lot, and it didn't seem fun, but he's definitely powerful. For power level, I'd add Yosei, but for fun, I'd add Kokusho. However, I find that the deck runs much smoother when we don't have 6 mana creatures.

I like Carrion Feeder mostly because its a creature. It can be tutored for with Ranger of Eos and Recruiter of the Guard and can be recurred. Spawning Pit is a good sac oulet though. It's only 2 mana and can provide tokens as we sac things. Victimize is probably what I'd replace since its not a great sac outlet, and I recently put in more recursion in the form of Brought Back and Second Sunrise .

ijakobe on Meren's Secret Lair

2 months ago

If you want to make it more competitive, it might not be sexy, but the first and most important thing imo ist to lower the mana curve: For every card, ask yourself if a cheaper card exists that does about the same.

1-Mana Mana Dorks over more expensive stuff. they also fuel Meren really early, which really gets her going

Llanowar Elves

Elvish Mystic

Arbor Elf

Fyndhorn Elves

taking out

Burnished Hart

Rampant Growth

Primal Growth

Sifter of Skulls

I would take out Final Parting and maybe add Green Sun's Zenith , Tutor and mana dork along with Dryad Arbor .

A bit more card draw, for example Yawgmoth, Thran Physician , Dark Confidant , Village Rites , Oakhame Adversary

Out:

Golgari Findbroker - too expensive. Meren does, that already

Zulaport Cutthroat - the deck doesn't look like it wins via this, so you don't need it

Blood Artist - same

Syr Konrad, the Grim - same - maybe I underestimate the chip damage from these but I really dislike these Cards, because the don't do anything unless they stay araound for a long time. If you only deal 20 damage to the table with blood artist style cards, which seems generous, you still don't win.

I would rather have a more reliable win condition, a combo to end the game asap or a really powerful value engine, that gives you the staying power, paired with a bit of stax, Mindslicer comes to mind, while you get some kind of beatdown (I like Creakwood Liege , Craterhoof Behemoth with a bit of a board also kill one to two people quite quick) or stuff like a few Kokusho, the Evening Star or Gray Merchant of Asphodel triggers.

Random suggestions Some haymakers like Terastodon , Mikaeus, the Unhallowed or Protean Hulk to have some good Reanimation targets Cool Utility:

Puppeteer Clique

Bane of Progress

Collector Ouphe

Nature's Claim - my pet card

cfost827 on Necronomicon | Teysa Karlov | Primer

2 months ago

Awesome, thanks!

Lastly, have you ever tried running Kokusho, the Evening Star or Yosei, the Morning Star ? I feel like they are even better than Vilis, Broker of Blood in this deck (I know you just cut him already). With Teysa on the field and getting their death trigger, it makes these two quite powerful. Recurring them would also be great great. I'm thinking of testing adding in one of them. Which of the two would you add if you wanted to/could ?

Additionally, what are your thoughts on Spawning Pit as a sac outlet? I feel like it could actually do pretty well in this deck, maybe in place of Carrion Feeder ? Would like to hear your thoughts on this card as it could just make us more tokens.

cfost827 on Necronomicon | Teysa Karlov | Primer

2 months ago

Hey Masterful! Hope all is well and your play testing is continuing to be successful.

Just had a few thoughts on other cards to add/cut. Have you ever tried running Kokusho, the Evening Star or Yosei, the Morning Star ? I feel like they are even better than Vilis, Broker of Blood in this deck (I know you just cut him already). With Teysa on the field and getting their death trigger, it makes these two quite powerful. Recurring them would also be great great. I'm thinking of testing adding in one of them. Which of the two would you add if you wanted to/could ?

Additionally, what are your thoughts on Spawning Pit as a sac outlet? I feel like it could actually do pretty well in this deck, maybe in place of Carrion Feeder ? Would like to hear your thoughts on this card as it could just make us more tokens.

Thanks!

Tzefick on None

3 months ago

Fun concept.

Not sure if I believe her static ability is all that strong.

Granted in a shell that focuses on mass-producing saprolings, it can outright win the game. Although that same effect can be achieved through a Zulaport Cutthroat and any free sac outlet .

If we're talking Standard/Modern, I believe a 7 MV (feels weird to say instead of CMC) that requires a major setup for the pay off is too clunky to be competitive.

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What if you changed the static to a triggered ability instead of an active one? That means you can utilize the plants and saprolings as blocking fodder and still get the benefits of them dying.

Also I'm puzzled why the -4 (which is a very substantial amount of loyalty) only grants specific creature types either lifelink (on a zero power token) or wither (on a 1/1 body). That seems disproportionally bad. Especially for a 7 MV planeswalker.

The ultimate is just a double Kokusho, the Evening Star death trigger, which is quite nice.

I must comment on the use of hybrid mana as well, since green does not deal in making players lose life (well outside combat). I feel like you cannot justify the use of hybrid mana here. At the very least it should be in the mana cost to force both colors in there.

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I don't mean to take over, but I can't help but make a suggestion for a revised version.

One concept Show

Venenum, Apothemancer

Legendary Planeswalker - Venenum

Whenever a Plant dies, you may gain 1 life. Whenever a Saproling dies, you may have target opponent lose 1 life.

+2: Create a 0/1 green Plant creature token or a 1/1 green Saproling creature token. Then do it again.

-3: You may sacrifice X creatures you control. Distribute X +1/+1 counters among creatures you control. If you sacrificed both a Plant and a Saproling, distribute twice that many +1/+1 counters instead.

-9: Each opponent loses 10 life. You gain life equal to the amount of life lost this way.

4

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Changing the static ability from an active to a triggered ability means you cannot utilize it with death triggers - like Grave Pact . It also enables you to use the tokens as chump blockers and still get the life gain or loss triggered when the creature dies. This means you can more effectively defend the planeswalker itself while still getting some benefit out of it, even if it is slight.

I did not find a fitting use for the second active ability you made in the OP, as Plants don't have power and therefore don't benefit from lifelink (the card cannot be dependable on other cards buffing the Plants for this ability to make sense) and Saprolings gaining Wither until end of turn only means you can attack freely or reduce enemy critters if the opponent is low on life but still can survive getting saprolings flung in their face. If the enemy wants to avoid damage they cannot even block the Saprolings as they can just be sacrificed to secure the life loss. This ability just doesn't seem impactful at all and again it needs to work with itself and cannot be reliant on other cards enabling it.

Instead I put a sacrifice outlet here but as a single use on your own turn. I struggled a little with what exactly the benefit should be - outside triggering the static ability.

I considered making it a drain effect (in addition to the triggered ability on Saprolings), but figured it would make it too much of a finisher you drop when you have a large board of saprolings to sac and drain an opponent down.

I considered making the Plant + Saproling benefit a distribute X -1/-1 counters among any number of target creatures, so it doubles as removal. However that did seem a little too flexible and strong. It could just be a target creature that gets -X/-X until end of turn, so it can nuke a single creature. But it did seem stronger than what I else came up with, so I went with a less strong ability.

I considered making a surveil type effect (or similar to Mulch ), as green/black utilize the graveyard quite often, but figured it would be difficult to scale with Sacrifice X, so there would be no point in sacrificing many creatures for the sake of this ability. It could be considered to make the ability sacrifice a fixed amount of creatures for a fixed benefit, but I opted with the unlimited sacrifice ability, so you could use it as a finisher.

The second ability as it is here, is quite strong but is also slightly a trap. If you gather all your strength on a single creature, it is vulnerable to removal. If you keep multiple big threats, you're not sacrificing as many creatures and thus gets a lesser effect. And you do still need one of each creature type to get the doubling effect, which without makes the ability a lot less strong. This means you most likely will need to +2 her - which gives the opponents time to deal with her or your board.

Picture you slapped down an Avenger of Zendikar and created 10 Plants and you have a random Saproling from somewhere. Then next turn you play this planeswalker and -3 and sacrifice 8 Plants and 1 Saproling to distribute 18 +1/+1 counters. If you make the Avenger and two remaining Plants equal in strength you get two 8/8s and a 9/9. You gain 8 life from the plants and zap an opponent for 1.

Is this strong? It is. But it did require a setup beforehand - a powerful one at that. Is it too powerful? Not really when the alternative could have been a ramp spell to pump all the Plants with the Avenger or used Scapeshift to buff the Plants immensely. For this ability to be truly strong you do need a setup, which makes it fair to have a scaling ability.

You can opt to +2 her when played, to get the sacrifice fodder and then sac them both the next turn to distribute 4 counters. This is not really that strong, but it means you have to think about your sweet spots a lot more, balancing how much you sacrifice versus the effect you get from it.

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I did give her the +2 instead of just +1, as she is a 7 MV Planeswalker (and most 7+ MV planeswalkers have a +2 or higher ability) so it seems fair compared to cost.

Anyway, that's just my suggestion. The card is yours, so I would rather see what you come up with based on this feedback.

ThousandOaks on Elenda - Life After Death

4 months ago

iplayBANJO provides a lot of good feedback. In many instances, I agree with the feedback provided.

I see two main items that need to be improved. First, your deck is very unfocused. Second, you don't have much interaction.

*Adding Focus*

You have too many themes. It's unclear if you want to go Vampire Tribal, Aristocrats, Graveyard, Tokens, or Recursion. As a starting place for your first build, it's not a bad starting place, but we can definitely tighten up your direction. The best next step for you is to pick one theme and building around that. You can "splash" some other themes by adding utility cards like Priest of Forgotten Gods that contribute to your main theme, but dips into other themes consequentially.

ARISTOCRATS

I'm going to assume you're building aristocrats. For any build, it's very important to figure out your mana base. Some may disagree with me, but the utility of the mana base is one of the most important starting places when building any new deck. So for each build you make, identify at least your utility lands that support your build. Then use basic lands as place holders.

If you are running aristocrats, consider the following feedback.

Utility Lands: High Market and Phyrexian Tower . These are great sac outlets that can provide you added value. Command Beacon and Memorial to Folly are cheap utility lands that will help you avoid commander tax later in the game.

Value Engines: Take advantage of death triggers. (Death triggers are triggered abilities when a creature dies; e.g., hits the graveyard.) As the previous post discuss, you need to demand value from things dying. Ask your self the question "what value am I getting" when something dies. A few items I don't see above:

Grave Pact is great for you. With your aristocrats package out, you're generating value and removing your opponents board. It also gets around indestructible and hexproof.

Razaketh, the Foulblooded . This is an "I-Win" card in an aristocrats deck. It allows you to tutor and find answers as soon as it resolves.

Skullclamp will allow you to draw a metric butt-load of cards.

Teysa Karlov doubles the value of your death triggers.

Kokusho, the Evening Star is a great nuclear deterrent. It gives you a flyer, solid 5/5 body, and in a pinch, you can sacrifice it to get 15 life and deal out 15 damage.

*Interaction*

Interaction refers to your ability to respond to threats at instant speed. Currently, this is very crucial weak point in your build. This partially goes back to Focusing the deck. I would recommend first picking a single theme and rebuilding around that theme. Then, as you're rebuilding, as yourself the following questions for EVERY card you add:

Does this card do something when it resolves?

Identify what value the card gives you as it resolves. There's no right or wrong answer here, but we want to know what we're getting out of the mana we spend. Is it a 1/1 body I get? Or is it a 1/1 body with a trigger of some sort?

Keep in mind. Every time a card resolves (for example a combo piece), if it doesn't give you immediate value when it resolves, it's an opportunity for your opponents to remove it. How will you protect those combo pieces from removal? Teferi's Protection , Flawless Maneuver , Cosmic Intervention .

Does this card, by itself, have synergy with my theme or commander?

With Elenda at the helm, sometimes you're just putting fodder on the field for her. And that's perfectly okay, so long as you're playing at the broader synergy. Remember, with Aristocrats, you're probably not going to win by swinging a big beefy 50/50 Elenda, the Dusk Rose at someone's face. (She doesn't even have trample.) You're most likely going to win by all the triggers from Blood Artist , Cruel Celebrant , Falkenrath Noble , Zulaport Cutthroat , Bastion of Remembrance , Syr Konrad, the Grim , and Vindictive Vampire .

What value do I want out of this card, and how many other pieces do I need to get that value?

Again. No right or wrong answer here. Sometimes, it's just fun to play a card for the hell of it. Looking at you Choice of Damnations .

What is the range of the card? (Early/Opener, Mid-Range, Late Game/Close)

Have an idea of when you plan for a card to be most impactful. Is it a card that is strong early game, mid-game, or late game? How will it impact your state or the overall board when it resolves?

FINAL THOUGHTS

My immediate recommendation is to pick a single theme. I would move away from "perfect world" value situations. This refers to those situations where you're convincing yourself of value. For example, if you want to play Card X because you'll win if you also have Card Y on the field, and Card Z in your graveyard, then I wouldn't play Card X.

Next, I wouldn't run a single combo besides the following: Mikaeus, the Unhallowed + Triskelion or Mikaeus, the Unhallowed + Walking Ballista . Mikeaus by himself brings so much value to an aristocrats build. It essentially allows you to sacrifice each of your non-token creatures twice, including Elenda. With Triskelion or Walking Ballista, Mikaeus creates an infinite damage combo and wins you the game... also infinitely triggering your aristocrat triggers.

Finally, I would remove all the "lord" effects. Lord effects refer to effects that buff a certain creature type. Again, if you're running Aristocrats, you're not going to win because you have big creatures, you're going to win because you're forcing the most value from the death of your creatures.

All food for thought. Feel free to take or decline any suggestions. Happy brewing!