Lash of Thorns
Set Price Alerts

Combos Browse all Suggest

Legality

Format Legality
1v1 Commander Legal
Archenemy Legal
Arena Legal
Block Constructed Legal
Canadian Highlander Legal
Casual Legal
Commander / EDH Legal
Commander: Rule 0 Legal
Custom Legal
Duel Commander Legal
Gladiator Legal
Highlander Legal
Historic Legal
Legacy Legal
Leviathan Legal
Limited Legal
Modern Legal
Oathbreaker Legal
Pauper Legal
Pauper Duel Commander Legal
Pauper EDH Legal
Pioneer Legal
Planechase Legal
Quest Magic Legal
Tiny Leaders Legal
Vanguard Legal
Vintage Legal

Lash of Thorns

Instant

Target creature gets +2/+1 and gains deathtouch until end of turn.

ImaginitiveRascal on Deadly and Plotting

3 years ago

It looks very solid. The only things I'd suggest would be to cut Back for More because it is too pricy and add a few Agadeem's Awakening  Flip because it will probably have a larger impact bringing back more stuff. I would also suggest more one-drops because you only have 3 Duresss you can play turn 1 even though it looks like more because Village Rites, Alchemist's Gift, and Lash of Thorns need creatures.

Apollo_Paladin on Rat Attack!

3 years ago

For mono-black, Castle Locthwain is a fairly common one to toss a couple copies of. There's not much in the way of mono-black card draw, and at a glance that's what I see being the biggest constraint. Getting things out quickly can be nice, but against a control deck your creatures won't last long and then you'll be stuck Topdecking.

You might look at some early 1-mana Discard options to further play into your strategy/theme. Thoughtseize is by far the most common (and best) choice for this, but it can also be quite expensive to purchase singles of.

Other less costly options (albeit with more restrictions/conditions) for 1-mana discard spells are Duress or Specter's Shriek.

The newly released Mind Drain is vastly superior to Mind Rot, and is literally identical in its casting cost and card type; just an upgraded version.

I have a mono-black Hand Hate deck which I play regularly on MTGA online, and I've found Davriel, Rogue Shadowmage to be an excellent card to include. He serves beautifully as guaranteed damage per turn in longer games once the hands are cleared out, and he also provides a mana-free discard option for multiple turns while he's in play early so that you can keep the pressure on the opponent.

I have won numerous games on the back of Davriel, just by having enough creatures in play to act as stalemate blockers and then just keeping the opponent's hand empty and letting him tick each turn. Stalemate blockers can be amazing, and he's only a few cents to order singles of.

Drainpipe Vermin can be a useful 1-drop which would play into both your Rat and Discard mechanics, and it pairs very well when sacrificed to Nezumi Bone-Reader.

Ravenous Rats is an identical card functionally to Burglar Rat, in case you find this a useful card and wish to rebuild to include more than 4 of them by including both types.

Other neat suggestions you might want to try (depending on how this playtests) are Rancid Rats, Ratcatcher and/or Marrow-Gnawer

Beyond that, you mentioned Instants - I'd suggest control options even if they're cheap ones like Murder or Unmake (in case Indestructible is a thing you run into frequently) to handle things your Rats can't take care of straight away. There's also other permanents like Basilisk Collar which could make your weakling rats a real blocking threat, and it has a cheap enough Equip cost that you can attack with it on a creature, and typically afford to move it to an untapped Blocker immediately after. If the collar is too expensive or you don't like the Equip cost on it, you could go an Instant route with things like Deadly Allure, Lash of Thorns, Virulent Swipe, or Touch of Moonglove.

Even if none of these suggestions help, I like your build! +1

multimedia on Zagras and the Dethtouch Party

3 years ago

Hey, you're welcome.

There's 12 rogues here for the party, but only 5 clerics, 4 Warriors and 1 Wizard. These ratios of party members will make it difficult to have much mana cost reduction for Zagras especially Wizards. My advice is make these numbers more even to give you more chances to have different party members on the battlefield at once. Changeling Outcast is a budget one drop party member who can be any creature type you choose for party and it's unblockable which has good interaction with several tribal combat damage effects.

Budget Wizards to consider adding:

There's some party members who could be upgraded to better budget creatures especially the Warriors:

Blood Beckoning could be upgraded to Nullpriest of Oblivion who is a two drop Cleric or if you cast with kicker you can reanimate any creature in your graveyard. Beckoning doesn't reanimate it recurs the creature/creatures to your hand which is a big difference. Searing Barrage could be upgraded to any Wizard party member because this removal spell is not needed as it's the least good and costs the most mana for what it does.

Some cards to consider cutting:

Pump spells that only pump one creature one time such as Infuriate are subpar in Commander especially when you can only cast them once. If the spell pumped all creatures you control, protected the creature from removal or it made the creature have huge power with evasion then that's different, but the pump spells here don't do that. More draw is more impactful than pump.

Murphy77 on Lurrus Speaker

3 years ago

The problem with Lurrus is that, if you want to use multiples in the deck as a normal creature, then you can't use him as a companion. Having Lurrus on the field means that, each turn, you get to cast a permanent with a cmc of 1 or 2 from the grave. Kaya's Ghostform also returns creatures from the grave to the field.

Casting Archfiend's Vessel from the grave gives you a 5/5 demon (possibly from turn 3). Vampire of the Dire Moon is a very useful blocker that can be returned from the grave by Lurrus, Forever Young or Kaya's Ghostform. Having a 1/1 with deathtouch and lifegain on the field most of the time will effectively stop a large number of attacks against you. Use Lash of Thorns to give one of your others deathtouch (and some teeth), building on this sub-theme.

Behind this dark and dangerous front-end, is a basic life-gain deck. Once you get your life-gain running, Speaker of the Heavens should be pushing out 4/4 flying angels and Griffin Aerie should be generating 2/2 flying griffins each turn. Build up an army and simply swamp your opponent.

Snap157 on Death's Quick Touch [budget]

3 years ago

If you're running red in modern, you should have a playset of Lightning Bolt. They're great removal, as is Terminate. Additionally, I think that Rakish Heir or Assault Strobe would be a great combo with the amount of attacking you're doing. Lastly, while I love Olivia Voldaren as much as the next guy, she requires an immense amount of mana to get going, and I feel like if you take her out, you can also get rid of Lash of Thorns, which both streamlines the deck and allows you to add in other cards and some removal in the mainboard. Hope this helps!

Unha110w3d on

4 years ago

cool deck. Bladebrand , Lash of Thorns , for extra security when attacking, also it annoys many when they figure out that there confident massive creature there using to block will die as well. Yahenni, Undying Partisan is pretty awesome to have as well in a vampire tribal, his probably one of the best vampires.