Phyrexian Totem
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Legality

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

Phyrexian Totem

Artifact

: Add to your mana pool.

: Phyrexian Totem becomes a 5/5 black Phyrexian Horror artifact creature with trample until end of turn.

Whenever Phyrexian Totem is dealt damage, if it's a creature, sacrifice that many permanents.

DreadKhan on "The High Priestess of Helgrind"

7 months ago

Well, I had a bit of time so I took another look!

I feel like Bond of Revival isn't enough value for 5 mana, and the effect probably doesn't scale especially well. Disentomb seems small, I would usually prefer to have a more impactful card, and a 1 drop that you can't play early is often annoying in my experience. I'm not sure why you're using Expanded Anatomy, I doubt you'd miss it. Introduction to Prophecy is really bad if you have access to Black spells, paying a few life to get more cards in hand is a good deal. Do you have big enough creatures to justify Thud in here? If you don't expect to have a huge creature (power high enough to kill a player with a decent life total) I'd cut it. Ebony Charm seems like a strange choice, the evasion isn't the best and the exile effect feels very small for Commander, where you usually want effects that deal with an entire Graveyard (if not everyones). Effects like Enthusiastic Study aren't usually very good, and Learn doesn't work so you just loot IIRC, which isn't enough added value. If you're going to run Get the Point I think you should look at stuff like Ravenous Chupacabra, Nekrataal, either kills something but each leaves a body you can sacrifice, and both cost less mana. Same with Reach of Shadows, there are wildly better cards you could use that are still cheap. If you're going to sacrifice a creature for Rescue From the Underworld I think you could just run Victimize, it's bigger and less mana.

I'm looking through here and I've noticed you have a relatively large number of single target single card discard effects, in my experience these scale very poorly in multiplayer. I think you could keep the best one or two, but you don't need so many of them I feel.

Another potential issue here is that you have a LOT of redundant sacrifice outlets, I'm not sure you really need that many when you have your Commander, I think I would look for cards that offer a payoff for sacrifices, there are lots of cards in Rakdos that care about death triggers, any of them is probably better than something like Voracious Null when your Commander offers a great sac outlet.

I'm not sure if you'll really have problems or not, but if you find you are short of mana you could probably add a few mana rocks, Rakdos Keyrune is pretty versatile, Phyrexian Totem is potentially a creature as well. There are Charcoal Diamond and Fire Diamond, there is Mind Stone, and many more that are 2 or 3 mana. I find decks that have enough lands are probably better in most situations, but having a few mana rocks can be good sometimes.

RockIV on Power Word Death

8 months ago

DreadKhan ty very much! I'm always looking for ways yo improbe this deck. I Will consider it.I'm always searching for the perfect creatures for it. I never added Phyrexian Totem to the deck because i i'm afraid of ending sacrificing every permanent because of it. Murderous Rider is a creature that i always wanted, but i never find it anywhere where i live.

I have to think more about the 1 drops. They might be a good add but i don't know if they Will end up being usefull

Any creature recomandation Will be extremy appreciated. :D

DreadKhan on Power Word Death

8 months ago

I'm pretty sure you want to run Dark Ritual x4 in here, it's a really good card in Legacy mono-Black and you're very light on 1 drops. It's higher budget, but you might want to replace some of your removal spells with Liliana of the Veils, these can do more than just kill a creature, potentially helping vs other decks.

Since you have so many 4 drops, have you considered Phyrexian Totem? This is very good with a heavier removal package and if a Black deck wants to cast some 4 drops. It's really sweet to play a Dark Ritual on turn one to cheat out a Phyrexian Totem, and you can still use the B mana the Totem can make, so if you added more 1 drops, such as Vampire of the Dire Moon or Vampire Cutthroat.

You might also look into replacing some of your removal with Murderous Riders, these offer both a removal spell and a body in one card, and it can hit a PW in a pinch.

DreadKhan on Brian Stacks' Pyromancy (E)

9 months ago

You don't have a sideboard, but if you ever think about it I bet Meekstone would be handy as backup copies of Smoke vs fast aggro decks. Technically they 'stack', if you have both they can only untap 1 creature that satisfies Meekstone.

Also, I absolutely love creature lands/artifacts that become creatures, some even do double duty as a mana rock. If you added Black you could try something like Phyrexian Totem or Rakdos Keyrune, but mono-Red does have Foriysian Totem, 1 or 2 copies of this might be a nice way to close out games, it's especially useful if your opponent can't safely play blockers, or if they've snuck out a few weenies early since the Totem makes a great blocker. There is also Guardian Idol, which might be more useful than Mind Stone vs some decks, maybe Haunted Plate Mail or Levitating Statue could do work, Xanthic Statue is only 5 for an 8/8 Trample. For Man-lands there flashy Den of the Bugbear, each time you pay it's 3R you get to make another 1/1 fwiw. If people play lots of weenies then Ghitu Encampment is very good at dealing with them with it's First Strike. These cards that become lands might be even better in a sideboard as well, where you play game 1 with zero creature presence and once you're sure people have pulled all their creature hate you can sneak some situational creatures in.

Interesting solution to the 'how do I kill my opponent?' question, creatureless decks are always cool!

DreadKhan on Mono Black Pox Control

9 months ago

I'm not sure if you have enough removal here to make them work, but I absolutely loved Phyrexian Totem in my Pox deck, it's an incredibly fast clock if people have an empty board. If you used Shrieking Affliction over The Rack you might try out Leechridden Swamp, these seem too small to matter, but in longer/slower games they are a nice surprise. Leechridden Swamp also likes Davriel, Rogue Shadowmage, which combines a Rack effect with the option of a discard effect, he's also a very good Rack, even at 3 mana.

I don't know what else you should run in their place, but is Fatal Push really a good fit in here? I usually see it run in decks that use Fetchlands. I think I'd just run x4 Sudden Edict and try to keep the board clear, is the targeting that key? There is also Liliana's Triumph and Geth's Verdict that each relevant have upsides and can hit big/durable stuff.

If you don't mind raising your budget a bit (and stay on The Rack) Urza's Saga can find a Rack for you, that's a lot better than paying 4 mana for a Wasteland I'd argue, and that ignores the supply of constructs you can get if you've got nothing better going on.

Have you ever tried out Necrogen Mists? It doesn't work well with stuff like Quest for the Nihil Stone, but it's great with The Rack, once you get one out the opponent no longer can sit on their cards, they only go down without serious card draw.

Really like what you've built, it's always nice to see different takes on the archetypes of Discard and Pox!

DreadKhan on 12 Rack Diesel

11 months ago

Jayc_ider yes, I'm happy to hear what people think, it's very easy to have blind spots in one's deckbuilding that are obvious to others, thanks for your input! This deck in part grew out of my frustrations with stuff like Hymn to Tourach, getting a 2 for 1 is a solid play most of the time, but the fact that it's a single use effect cost me plenty of games, it's almost impossible for my opponent to regrow their hand if I have one of those enchantments out, meaning that if I have 2 or 3 Racks out, the game ends surprisingly quickly because there is no way to slow down my clock. Hymn is a good card I agree, but I found this to be more consistent because people could just sit on cards and I have no other clocks. I use Thoughtseize less because it shrinks my opponent's hand, and more because it can get rid of problem cards on turn 1, the discard enchantments are very thorough I find.

Technically this isn't a Megrim deck, so it actually doesn't mind having 'dead' discard spells, as long as the opponent has no cards I'm probably killing them due to the various Rack effects the deck runs. There is the obvious problem of me not having a Rack out, but I don't think it's really necessary to run more than 12 copies. I have had very good luck using Phyrexian Totem in decks that are good at clearing the board of bodies, perhaps x2 of that would help finish games a bit more consistently?

Card advantage is interesting, it's intrinsically a good thing but there is the corollary that card quality can be more important in some decks, this deck can win using a relatively small number of cards so I usually find I don't care about drawing more. TBH I find Castle is usually a bad card in this deck (I can't store cards, meaning I need to use the card the turn I draw it, Castle uses 4 lands to draw), but Phyrexian Arena might work a bit better, it's still a solid card in Pox decks for example. I'm not sure what I'd trim for x2 Arena, I'll have to think about it! I like the idea of having better odds of hitting more removal when I need it, and this deck tends to win quickly enough that it can afford the life.

At this point I've also thought about switching out 2 of my Enchantments for 2 more Liliana of the Veil to have more creature hate. They're all 3 drops so it should be fine (this deck desperately wants to Dark Ritual into a 'discard every turn' effect turn 1), even more creature hate is always a good thing in a creatureless deck. Honestly, the biggest reason to run x2 over x4 was the extreme price point of the LotV.

Again, thanks for taking the time to check out my deck, it's always nice to hear some new ideas!

eliakimras on The Horrarrr

11 months ago

Hey! Joey from EDHRECast commented on upgrades for Captain N'ghathrod here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=obGhfxKWkk4. He focus more on the mill side of things, so he has more targets for reanimation.

Doing my research on topics he didn't touch on, you might want to consider:

Lands:

Just like what I did with Menacing Aura, it might be wise to stuff some utility into your lands, so you have more options when playing your matches.

In:

DreadKhan on Fuck you

1 year ago

I'm just happy to see you running x4 Hymn, it's a very 'go to hell and get fucked' kinda card, it can and does just win games. If you're playing casual you could consider a Mind Twist, which is banned for some reason while Hymn is fine. I playtested with Mind Twist for awhile, and I found that while it was sometimes a worse Hymn, it was also sometimes a game ender when I can hit an opponent for 4 or more cards.

When I see you running Spawning Pool, I feel like you should probably run Phyrexian Totem if you want a creature that can actually attack. It's very good with Edict effects, like Innocent Blood, but it's especially juicy with Smallpox, it's type is ignored and it can easily make up for losing a land. If you want Spawning Pool as a blocker then I'd run Mishra's Factory, which can block as a 3/3 for 1 mana, and can swing as a 2/2.

I wonder if you shouldn't toss in a Reliquary Tower to go with your Necropotence/Ivory Tower, it's one thing to gain 3 life at your upkeep, but gaining 10 or more sounds pretty tempting.

In my Pox deck, I found I preferred running No Mercy over Damnation, it's vulnerable to interaction but is a bigger effect over the course of a game if it doesn't go away. I played it with Mishra's Factory and Phyrexian Totem, so there was a good reason to not throw away your blockers if you can't deal with those annoying non-creatures. Damnation would clear the board once, but No Mercy makes small swings usually not worth it, making it a card I can just throw down when I have the mana, I don't need to manage the board like a wipe will require. All that said, there are definitely situations where you'll want Damnation and No Mercy is dead cardboard, but I feel like you've got space for some of each in your sideboard.

I'm not sure if it'll go up or down over time since it's in Standard I gather, but Liliana of the Veil is a heck of a card in a deck like this. She's good enough that you could consider The Rack as a clock.

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