House of Cards
Commander / EDH
SCORE: 62 | 122 COMMENTS | 6801 VIEWS | IN 28 FOLDERS
V5 Friday Night Magic Game Report —Sept. 9, 2016
Played this in a five man casual pod. Other decks were Surrak Dragonclaw, a tokens and lifegain Trostani, Selesnya's Voice running Sigarda, Heron's Grace, a Mayael the Anima deck running Vigor, Giant Adephage, Omnath, Locus of Rage etc. and a Kalemne, Disciple of Iroas deck running Victory's Herald and Warchief Giant.
I was first on the play leading with Maze of Ith, then missing a land drop but drawing Chrome Mox and using Vampiric Tutor to draw Phyrexian Arena.
The Surrak player was mana screwed. Kalemne player ramped, and got Kalemne, Warchief Giant and Victory's Herald out and started attacking people. Trostani player gained some life and got Whispersilk Cloak out which eventually got attached to Sigarda, Heron's Grace. Mayael player triggered her ability but kept missing creatures.
Maze of Ith ran good defense. I hit the Kalemne player with a 1:2 punch of Do or Die and Malicious Affliction to remove all their threats. Syphon Mind re-filled my hand and I played Rune-Scarred Demon to tutor Touch of Darkness and combined it with Horobi to clear the board apart from Sigarda, and a Wolfbriar Elemental. Surrak player folded.
Mayael player played Arbor Colossus as a monstrosity, killing Horobi, then got Hunting Grounds up and running after skipping a turn to get rid of Lethal Vapors. Annoyingly, the Kalemne player folded after paying off Temporal Extortion.
Giant Adephage crashed into Havoc Demon knocking out Sigarda and a bunch of wolf tokens only for the Trostani player to drop new Emrakul, the Promised End targeting me and was able to kill me with midnight bargain.
So all in all a pretty good showing and a lot of fun with huge political power.
Maze of Ith was a defensive Allstar.
Temporal Extortion was fun, but not sure if we should run something nastier like MImic Vat to take advantage of the death.
Havoc Demon was a really useful wipe.
Not sure if we have too many mana rocks? Maybe replace one with Scuttlemutt?
Not sure if we're running too few creatures for Grave Pact/Dictate of Erebos although the ability to regulate the board state is really useful.
Also feels like we want another big threat we can drop after the politics. Maybe an eldrazi. Or another demon.
NotaNetDeck says... #4
Cool idea Draw_Wurm, black definitely does have some political cards.
I'm not sure why Rise of the Dark Realms and Cauldron of Souls are in the maybeboard, though. Cauldron has huge synergy with Horobi, Death's Wail, allowing you to kill any number of creatures once a turn cycle for free! Rise is a super strong finisher, especially in a deck that focuses on killing creatures.
September 5, 2016 6:42 p.m.
Hey NotaNetDeck. Thanks!
Tweaking cards at the moment so moved Rise of the Dark Realms to the side, although it was originally in. What would you drop for it?
Power Matrix currently has the Cauldron of Souls slot, mainly because it has less obvious Horobi synergy (so people will see it as less of a threat) and you can boost opponents creatures and then kill them when Horobi is out to play politics.
The other strong option was Mimic Vat or Arena of the Ancients to run defense and shut down opposing commanders.
September 6, 2016 4:02 a.m.
Draw_Wurm since your commander kills creatures you should add Rise of the Dark Realms back and Remove Innocent Blood, since you have Dictate of Erebos and Grave Pact.
September 6, 2016 4:49 a.m.
Hey Alondith. Done!
Ruffigan. Good question! The meta I play in doesn't go infinite. Head Games is anti combo tech.
Without Horobi we can switch to being aggressive with some of our creatures supported by Dauthi Embrace, Tower of the Magistrate etc.
Polluted Bonds, Wound Reflection Gray Merchant of Asphodel and Exsanguinate all offer direct damage routes. Drana, Kokusho and Dread are all evasive threats.
Open to suggestions though!
September 6, 2016 3:43 p.m.
One of the lesser used but excellent rares Shambling Swarm might fit well in this type of deck. Great for devotion strategies as well.
September 7, 2016 12:42 a.m.
Hey dlamars. Yeah I keep swapping Shambling Swarm in and out with Mogis's Marauder. At the minute running the marauder because it can be used offensively without Horobi and is an ETB wrath with Horobi out.
September 7, 2016 5:22 a.m.
Ah yeah sorry missed where you mentioned that, I could see how the marauder might work a little better. Also I saw Mimic Vat but not Soul Foundry on your maybe list, I like the forge a little more for long term devotion gains. One more mana and you can play a more effective marauder every turn and set up gray merchant.
September 7, 2016 11:07 a.m.
Love-in-Theory says... #12
Nice Deck +1
i like the idea of a political mono-black, sounds like a lot of fun!
(Check out my voltron R/W Aurelia, the Not-As-Consistent-As-Sir-Lancelot deck if you have a chance)
September 8, 2016 12:31 p.m.
Shakespeare314 says... #13
It seems like this deck could really abuse some of the relatively bad etb creatures out there. With your commander out, a lot of those boring "When this enters the battle field, target creature gets +1/+0 until end of turn." effects seem a lot more powerful. This would increase reliance on having Horbi out though.
bartolowen says... #1
Heavy deck !
September 5, 2016 7:35 a.m.