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~~~~~Welcome to Meren's Apocalypse!~~~~~

Please note, this section is slowly being edited to include more

***Also please note that the deck is considerably more expensive due to the price jump in Shadowborns due to the popularity of the Athreos Shadowborn deck featured on The Command Zone. I imagine they will eventually go back down to normal price.

Welcome everyone! This deck has been my baby for over a year and a half now and has seen many changes over the course of its life (unlife?), each new iteration has made it stronger and more resilient. I hope you like it and enjoy it aaaaaaand let's jump right into it!

After Meren unleashed her vengeance on her former clan she set out to topple all of Jund, to silence its eternal drone and show it the beauty of destruction. Let us bring that destruction.

Hallo everyone!

So our strategy for this deck can be quite open ended as it is very flexible based on what we need or based on what our opening hands are. Our main strategies are: ramping to high hell, disrupting our opponents through discard and sacrifice, and finally through cheating out big creatures / amassing a massive zombie token army. Best part is you can flip to any of these on a dime. This deck thrives on it's flexibility and assortment of win conditions.

So, how do we do this? Well let's talk about the deck's synergies... (This is the part where you click the next section) Imagine this being said in Shrek's voice. Praise our Ogrelord.

Oh also, let's queue up some music!

The deck has very deep Synergy revolving around the Shadowborn Apostle . Since the Shadowborn is a 1 CMC card it gives us the ability to have lightning quick plays and very explosive turns.

Let's talk about some of the cards that work so well with these little dudes.

Cryptolith Rite allows all of our creatures to tap for mana, with so many Shadowborns this allows us to ramp into really large spells very quickly.

Skullclamp is a very effective sac and draw engine. The Shadowborns will always die and net us 2 card. If Grim Haruspex is on the field then it'll be 3 cards. Plus if this is combined with either Xathrid Necromancer , Rotlung Reanimator or Open the Graves then we will also receive a zombie for each one! If we have all three then 1 Shadowborn will net us 3 zombies.

Bloodbond March , Thrumming Stone , and Meren of Clan Nel Toth will ensure near endless recursion of these dudes whenever we need them.

With our Shadowborns we can start up sac engines using Viscera Seer , Skullclamp , Carrion Feeder and whatnot to control our opponent's boards using Grave Pact and Dictate of Erebos . This will ensure their board state is nonexistent while we keep getting ours back. This will also set us up nicely for a Rise of the Dark Realms , but more on this in a later section.

Constantly wiping their creatures while Overseer of the Damned is on the field will also net us zombies!

So, sometimes dealing with people's creatures isn't enough, especially if they are just slinging spells, so this is where our discarding comes into play. Shadowborn Apostle and any zombies we are generating are excellent fodder for Sadistic Hypnotist . Plus the Hypnotist is great when setting up for either Living Death or Rise of the Dark Realms . Additionally we have Liliana, Defiant Necromancer . She is great! Discard + Recursion. Yes please. Anyways, our opponents can't use their resources if we keep stripping them from their hands. Anything we toss to the grave mid to late game is just more fuel for the fire for us! With Meren the grave is essentially just an extension of our hand anyways.

So let's talk about artifacts and enchantments. We can do fine without using them, decks revolved around them are going to constantly suffer when we play our cute little Caustic Caterpillar or Bane of Progress .

Next up, ramp!

Mkay, so this section is actually going to be pretty straightforward. We having things like Kodama's and whatnot, but there are 2 cards I'd like to give particular attention to.

Cryptolith Rite is explosive in this deck. A turn 2 Cryptolith with a Shadowborn will become super explosive really quick. Plus with Skullclamp the Shadowborns can tap themselves so you can draw cards.

Second. Traverse the Outlands . This card is INSANE. Set up for a Demon of Death's Gate by saccing 3 Shadowborns and paying the life then play the outlands and get 9 basic lands!! I've had this as early as turn 3, but getting 9 lands at any time is great.

Sweet, okay let's move on to the win conditions :)

We've got numerous win conditions, so let's break it up a bit.

Combat Damage!?

Pathbreaker Ibex : This goat is metal as hell. With so many 9/9 demons in the deck this goat allows even our squishy shadowborns to become 10/10s.

Craterhoof Behemoth : So, if we get our zombie engine going we can have plenty creatures in no time. Oooor we can use Thrumming Stone to get all our Shadowborns, then it is goodnight!!

Tainted Strike : There are three 9 power demons in this deck. This card is for taking care of the troublesome lifegain player...or just troublesome player...yes infect sucks but it is necessary sometimes. Plus this is the deck's only source of infect that only works with 3 specific creatures.

All of the Demons are flying too so, yeah you can just swing with them and they can take care of the job too.

Alternate win conditions:

Gray Merchant of Asphodel : This undead potato is a bomb when he hits the field! It is easy to get high devotion in this deck. Dropping him will net a ton of life, but if we sac him and then bring him back with our commander it is sometimes enough to close out games. (Especially late game) Or we can drop him and then bring back Archfiend of Despair and it'll do the same thing.

Rise of the Dark Realms : It is time to get spooky!

Living Death : A board wipe and greatness from the graveyard! Slam dunk all your bad boys into the grave, drop this baby and let's get going!

and finally!

Torment of Hailfire : This deck can ramp hard if it needs, and if our other win conditions aren't feasible then this is amazing! Pair it with Cabal Coffers and Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth and you are freaking set! Bonus points if you empty everyone's hands with Sadistic Hypnotist first!

Graveyard plays, disruption and recursion will be nearly endless. The deck thrives on its resilience and win conditions.

My initial rendition of the deck has seen many changes over the last year, now it is definitely fine tuned and lethal if correctly piloted. If you're interested, the following article provides an alternate rendition of the deck and is an excellent read. The strategy for the deck in the article is more tailored for duel commander, however it is an excellent read regardless. EDHREC-Duel to the Death - http://articles.edhrec.com/edh-political-science-duel-to-the-death/

Thankyou for viewing my version of the deck, and thankyou for any comments ahead of time!

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Comments

Thank you for the reply!

July 22, 2018 7:59 a.m.

7/1/2013 Shadowborn Apostle’s first ability lets you ignore only the “four-of” rule. It doesn’t let you ignore format legality.

July 23, 2018 9:45 a.m.

It does! The EDH rules committee allows it!

July 23, 2018 9:50 a.m.

KumaLKS, that just means that if Shadowborn Apostle ever got banned in a format, the card text would not supersede the banning. It works exactly like Relentless Rats and Rat Colony.

July 23, 2018 10:16 a.m.

And Gooddaysir036, amazing deck. My only thought is that maybe you add Crucible of Worlds to take advantage of the synergy between Field of Ruin and Ob Nixilis, Unshackled.

All things considered though, the deck is phenomenal and definitely gets a +1 from me!

July 23, 2018 10:20 a.m.

devastated-heart, thankyou for the comment! And I have played Crucible in this deck, unfortunately it was one of the cards that I almost never wanted to draw into, since this version of Meren has no dredge it doesn't have to worry as much about land going to the grave. Retrieving Field of Ruin would be nice, but not enough to warrant its inclusion. Thankyou for the suggestion though! Any are absolutely worthwhile.

July 24, 2018 10:26 a.m.

I would greatly suggest upping the Shadowborn Apostle count up to ~25-28, this would allow Thrumming Stone to consistently draw out all of them. My normal line of play is Apostle into Rune-Scarred or Razaketh to fetch Thrumming Stone, then draw them all out, and sacrifice them to get a ton of giant Demons!

July 24, 2018 10:34 a.m.

SynergyBuild, so it is funny you mention this. One of the sections I'll be adding is "alternate/ previous iterations of the deck". I'll be doing this soonish? I actually used to use 30 Shadowborns for that reason, it is powerful, but very glass cannony and easier to disrupt. One bit of removal can be crippling without some tech to mitigate that (artifact recursion). This version is a more controlled but still has the explosive potential, just slightly more limited. With the current 20 Shadowborns I rarely pull less than 6 with Thrumming Stone. Usually I can pull them all out if my deck unless it is shuffled weird, but the magic number is 6 so it is almost never an issue :)! Thankyou for the comment! I'll be writing that next section once I get some extra time.

July 24, 2018 10:48 a.m.

I've made a few alterations to your formula due to budget constraints but I believe it's gonna be fun and interesting to see this deck play out. If this goes well and even if it doesn't thank you for the idea of this deck.

January 11, 2019 2:58 a.m.

TraneHeartnet, I definitely hope it works out for you! And thankyou! I'll try and write about a few variations I have done with the deck this weekend, perhaps one of them might interest you more than my current build here. Thanks again for the comment and view!

January 24, 2019 12:11 a.m.

I love running Meren as my commander as well. This is a clever build and one I've never seen before. +1 from me, keep up the good work.

November 26, 2017 3:43 p.m.

This is cute. I like it and wish I'd thought of it, so here's a +1 from me.

Pack Hunt and Secret Salvage can help find your Demon Cult. With as high as your devotion can go, Gray Merchant of Asphodel can be an outright win con and Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx will generate a ton of mana for the spells Razaketh, the Foulblooded finds for you.

Also, Ob Nixilis, Unshackled has some pretty funny interactions with Field of Ruin and to a slightly lesser extent Ghost Quarter. Especially if you run a way to recur them.

Lifeline is also pretty cute with a deck that sacrifices en masse, but its better if you can exile from your opponents graveyard on command.

December 21, 2017 6:03 a.m.

FancyLadies, thankyou for the support!! :D

t3hdarkness, holy crap your card suggestions are amazing! I especially love Fields of Ruin, been looking for something to interact with Ob Nixilis a bit more, so thankyou!! Lifeline is going into my side deck for sure.

December 23, 2017 6:08 a.m.

I just realized Shadowborn Apostle is a cleric. Try out a Rotlung Reanimator for some extra redundancy on top of Xathrid Necromancer

December 29, 2017 3:35 a.m.

This deck is screaming for Liliana's Contract.

July 17, 2018 10:28 a.m.

Bearmagus, The card is definitely a flavor win, but in the deck it was underperforming, couldn't reliably get it to proc a win since demons tend to get attention the moment they hit the field. Thankyou for the suggestion though!

July 17, 2018 8:48 p.m.

Pox would be a great card in this deck

July 19, 2018 6:10 p.m.

+1 for Golgari!

Thrashing Brontodon?

July 20, 2018 12:30 p.m.

golgariizzet, I've considered Pox and one of the new cards Fraying Omnipotence several times. I might have to test them out soon. They definitely seem like they'd work well. especially with Archfiend of Despair on the field.

SynergyBuild, I like the suggestion dude! Normally I opt for Caustic Caterpillar since he is only 1 CMC, however in a heavy enchantment meta I would absolutely grab that guy up. He will likely be in a sideboard.

Thankyou both for the support!

July 22, 2018 4:01 a.m.

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Created with Highcharts 9.3.3Card costs (outer) Land mana (inner)
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99% Casual

Competitive

Revision 1 See all

(6 years ago)

-1 Jungle Hollow main
-1 Reclaim main
+1 Torment of Hailfire main
+1 Twilight Mire main
Top Ranked
  • Achieved #2 position overall 7 years ago
Date added 7 years
Last updated 5 years
Legality

This deck is Commander / EDH legal.

Rarity (main - side)

10 - 0 Mythic Rares

27 - 0 Rares

12 - 0 Uncommons

27 - 0 Commons

Cards 100
Avg. CMC 3.17
Tokens Emblem Liliana, Defiant Necromancer, Energy Reserve, Experience Token, Human Cleric 1/1 BW, Morph 2/2 C, Zombie 2/2 B
Folders DEMONS ARE DANK, Commander, playtesters, Cool decks, bro, Commander Shiiiiiiieeeeeet, guest decks, Cool Commander, Interesting Commander Decks, decks, Considerable Decks
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