X Gon Give It To Ya (Xiahou-Dun Stax Primer) (Commander / EDH MTG Deck)

X Gon Give It To Ya (Xiahou-Dun Stax Primer)

Commander / EDH* Combo Competitive Control Mono-Black Multiplayer

Sicohippy

Sorcery (25)

Instant (5)

Creature (2)

Artifact (23)

Enchantment (8)

Commander (1)

Land (35)

Planeswalker (1)

1x Karn Liberated

Sideboard

Land (2)

Instant (2)

Enchantment (1)

1x The Meathook Massacre

Maybeboard

Artifact (6)

Planeswalker (1)

1x Liliana, Dreadhorde General

Creature (4)

Enchantment (3)

Sorcery (4)

Instant (1)

1x Hero's Downfall

Combo off early game to destroy an entire table in the late game with one anticipated turn.

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This is an original deck by myself, though heavily influenced by the user olbuddyolpal, whom I appreciate greatly on his original Tier 1: Xiahou Dun deck. This deck at its heart is similar in terms of brutality, and contains many of the same combos, however, I've taken the liberty of editing the deck and updating it myself to what is a more versatile EDH deck in the modern development of the format. I've spent a lot of time researching and editing it until it’s been as perfect as it is now. Regardless of how happy I am with the deck as it is, I am always open to suggestions, because no deck it perfect right? Right???

Some of the following combos are combos I discovered from olbuddyolpal, and one of them is even an original combo by himself from his deck as mentioned before. I have them organized a little neater and have documented all of my changes from his deck to this one. I hope you guys enjoy it and appreciate how absolutely disgusting this deck is from the reverse side of the table.

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Why and how I play this deck. Show

Mono is my absolute favorite archetype in EDH, and probably the entire game. I find it to be ludicrously fun, and this deck is a mono players wet dream. Its chock full of crazy combos, it’s got an absurd amount of versatility for a monocolored deck, and it can be highly effective in (just about) any meta. It really causes you to think things through 9 times before making a move, because there are so many options available on how to respond to a situation. This deck in itself has made me a far better magic player, as well as deck builder.

The reason it has made me better at playing the game itself is because it allows you to see the vast range of options you have in terms of responses. It forces you to be extremely creative. It pushes you to understand the entire situation of the board’s layout, and allows you to see the potential you have with such limited resources and combos. I cannot tell you how many times I have used pieces of a combo on the board for a completely different purpose. The wide array of plays in this deck are difficult to explain, so I have taken the liberty to carefully word all of them as thoroughly as I can. I almost always win games with this deck at a total of under 10 life. Mono 's ability to use life and creatures as a resource has always fascinated me and proven to be extremely effective. The flavor of the archetype is fantastic, with an underlying theme of "anything standing in my way will be eliminated". The reason I often end games with such little resources is because the deck forces you to figure out ways to keep afloat until you are able to fully combo off and win. You usually struggle to stay in the game until- well until you don't. Once you combo off its usually game over that turn. This deck has so many utilities and tutors to access whatever you need that it can sincerely be difficult to run out of responses. If you do run out of responses and you can’t tutor them, just recur the ones you have used before with Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed.

Why would you play this deck? Show

Why wouldn't you play this deck? Show

Because every deck has its weakness, and this deck’s biggest fault happens to be that our commander, Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed, only recurs cards from our graveyard. That being said, there isn’t much that a person can do when playing this deck if they are playing against mass artifact removal. This is why I have taken some small measures to prevent this from happening, by adding in cards like:

It would go without saying, however, that our ability to recur artifacts is extraordinarily limited in mono , and this deck will do poorly against mass artifact removal and artifact hate.

The second reason you wouldn't play this deck should be obvious, but _sigh_ I'll say it anyway... If your playgroup hasn't got the stones to endure a puzzling game that denies them of resources and staxes them into oblivion, well... This deck may be for you, but maybe not your candy land playgroup of Phelddagrif Timmy group hugs and Angus Mackenzie feel-good collector's decks.

Artifact Recursion Show

Other measures you can take in order to bring artifacts back to the table that you have lost include, but are not limited to:

Use Thespian's Stage to copy Buried Ruin before sacrificing it.
Use Crucible of Worlds to recur Buried Ruin and gain an artifact back each turn.

If Crucible of Worlds does happen to get popped, it is wise to keep a copy of Buried Ruin on the battlefield using Thespian's Stage. This way, you can recur Crucible of Worlds using Thespian's Stage’s copied ability of Buried Ruin, and then you may continue to recur artifacts from your graveyard.

You can use Rings of Brighthearth to copy the abilities of Buried Ruin, Arcbound Reclaimer, Trading Post, or even Thespian's Stage.

There are probably many other ways to recur artifacts in this deck that I haven’t found yet, even after 8 months of development, I still am finding new things to do in this deck, and strange combos and plays still keep coming up, depending on the situation I find myself in.

The biggest flaw with all of these artifact recursion abilities is that almost all of them are dependent on other artifacts. You can keep trying and trying to recur artifacts as much as you want to, but often times it can be a wiser move to just ignore the combo that you had failed to put in place and move on to the next. No matter how much you feel like you need the combo that rests in your graveyard, sometimes you’re only hurting yourself further by destroying all of your recursion techniques early on before you even play or consider other combos. So, once again, artifact hate is one of the strongest responses to this deck, and it doesn’t function as well in meta’s that focus on keeping the board void of them.

Another reason you wouldn’t want to play this deck is because it’s just plain old evil. EDH is a format where everybody can casually socialize, become friends, and observe the totally wicked plays that can potentially take place in a multiplayer 40 life format. If you happen to lock everybody out of doing anything in the game early on (which is very possible in this deck), the only thing you’ll do is dominate and spread hate into your meta.

How to play this deck strategically in a multiplayer setting. Show

Let it be noted that although this deck does do well in 1v1 games, 4+ player games are where its true element is revealed. People often don’t see the combos coming, and they are all too often caught up in the strangeness of this boards development to see the pieces of a combo sneaking up on them. For this reason, it is often times better to play certain halves of combos before playing their second half. This way nobody will know what you are up to in a multi-player game. Remember, multiplayer Magic is a game that relies heavily on psychologically bluffing your opponents into believing that you’re the smallest threat on the board. If somebody happens to see you play a Contamination, they’ll be able to assume that you might play Reassembling Skeleton or Bitterblossom next. Because of this raise in awareness that your opponents might be subject to, the best way to play a combo like this is by playing Bitterblossom first. Why? Let me just give this answer a context:

-You play Bitterblossom at the beginning of your Main Phase.

Any player playing mono will take this as FAR less threatening than they would Contamination. Bitterblossom gives you a 1/1 faerie token at the beginning of each combat, where as Contamination locks every single player on the board who isn't playing mono out of their decks.

So, let's just say that the person playing decides to use a Counterspell on Bitterblossom. Because of this counter, nobody knows that your true intentions were to lock every player on the board out of using their lands to tap for mana. Nobody is suspicious. The play did not resolve and nobody takes you for as large of a threat as a person who can recur Contamination from their graveyard using Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed. They don’t even know that Contamination is in your hand!

With Bitterblossom already on the field, half of your combo is in place, so even considering that Contamination does get countered or destroyed immediately by a Krosan Grip, there is less effort involved in setting the combo back up when we only have to recur a single card and play it again. Remember, the ideology here is conservatism until we're able to lock the game out of interfering with our plans.

So, in short, you (almost) always want to play the less threatening piece of the combo first, or you might want to play the piece of the combo to strategically bait a Counterspell. This way, you can spend next turn to recur that card into your hand, and cast it next turn. At this point, whoever did happen to counter the spell you played last turn will be less likely to do so again this turn, because last turn they used one of the counters that was in their hand.

An original combo by olbuddyolpal Show

Unlimited (or ) Mana, Plus a Win Con. Show

Basalt Monolith + Rings of Brighthearth

Tap Basalt Monolith to add to your mana pool.
Spend that to untap Basalt Monolith
Upon untapping Basalt Monolith, tap to use Rings of Brighthearth’s ability to copy the untap ability of Basalt Monolith.
In response to spending to copy Basalt Monolith’s untap ability, tap Basalt Monolith again to add to your mana pool, and then allow Basalt Monolith to be untapped by Rings of Brighthearth. This will leave you with a total of mana left in your mana pool, which you can use of to copy the ability of untapping Basalt Monolith. The result of this is that you can add to your mana pool, and only have to spend to do it again. This will net you mana each time you repeat, giving you literally, INFINITE colorless mana.
Combine this combo with Exsanguinate or Sensei's Divining Top to win the game.

Infinite mana, with a catch... Show

Why Mycosynth Lattice then? Show

Mycosynth Lattice is a very useful card in terms of control, not only does it give us the potential to acquire infinite mana, but it also gives us the potential to deny triggered/activated abilites from occuring that are activated/triggered from playing coloured spells. Momir Vig, Simic Visionary is a great example. Momir Vig, Simic Visionary is a VERY powerful Tier 2 general, and with absoloute reason to be feared. I have sat across the table many times from him as a commander, and I can say that if his ability is exploited, he quickly becomes a pest, as infinite combos are not hard to achieve in his color range of , and tutoring out creatures and responding by drawing them is definitely fodder to pull out combos quickly.

Mycosynth Lattice would make essentially make all spells colorless, making Momir Vig, Simic Visionary's ability flop, and it would make him essentially useless. I can also verify that Momir Vig, Simic Visionary is only ONE of MANY examples where activated abilities like this would become useless.

Another valid reason for having Mycosynth Lattice in this deck is if you DO happen to activate this method of infinite mana, you will often times end up tapping yourself out. Now, if you happen to have Mycosynth Lattice in your hand, you will have access to the mana that you NEED to combo off and win the game. It's usually best to do this when a player is tapped out as well during your turn, but sometimes, it may just be a final resource or stretch of desperation that can VERY OFTEN times win you games sitting at large tables. If you happen to have an Exsanguinate and a Demonic TutorGC in your hand, but only 1 Swamp untapped, you'll be SO close to having won this game on this turn. Using that mana to cast Demonic TutorGC and search out Mycosynth Lattice and cast it for free will allow you to have the mana you need to potentially win 1 turn sooner, which VERY often decides games in this deck. Mycosynth Lattice is here to stay in this deck for me, because of the ability it has to often times narrowly win games. It can completely change the nature of the board as a whole, and is an enchantment that truly changes every player's perspective. Including our own.

True Infinite Mana Show

Deserted Temple+Cabal Coffers+Rings of Brighthearth

This combo was wisely reccomended to me by Profet93 after pointing out to me that Mycosynth Lattice can not be used to infinitely recur cards using our general, Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed.

It's actually quite simple, really, you only need to begin the combo with a minimum of 6 Swamps, which can easily be achieved considering you have Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth on the field.

Heres how it works:

to Cabal Coffers, this will add to your mana pool.
Spend to Deserted Temple, using its ability to Cabal Coffers. This will leave you with a total of , a Cabal Coffers and a Deserted Temple
spend to copy Deserted Temple's ability using Rings of Brighthearth, this will leave you with a total of , and both Cabal Coffers and Deserted Temple will be .
spend of your to Cabal Coffers, this will restart the entire process, only this time, you will net at the beginning of the process. Everytime you rinse and repeat you will net , repeat infinite times to recieve infinite mana. No strings attached!

Infinite recursion Show

Another True Infinite Mana Combo Show

Draw your whole deck Show

Infinite Tutoring/Draw your whole deck Show

Lock your opponents out of drawing cards Show

Mana Denial Show

Contamination + Bitterblossom OR Reassembling Skeleton

Contamination allows us to block all of our opponents out of spending their mana freely (unless they are playing , obviously) and because we need to pay with 1 creature each upkeep, we can easily use either Bitterblossom or Reassembling Skeleton.

I’ve added both Bitterblossom and Reassembling Skeleton for a number of reasons…

The first being that there are times when Reassembling Skeleton is a better option for this combo than Bitterblossom. This deck often times forces you to play at VERY dangerously low levels of life (as in 10 or less), in which case, considering we have other cards like Mana Crypt, Mana VaultGC, Phyrexian Arena, or any other permanents that force us to lose life each turn, losing 1 life each turn can decide the game entirely. It might just take us surviving one extra upkeep to finally combo off and take the win, even if our opponents happen to have infinite life or creatures, we can still combo off and win a game with just one extra turn. In this case, where life is a very precious resource, Reassembling Skeleton is a better choice to recur the cost of a creature each upkeep as per Contamination.

Sometimes, however, an extra can be a deciding factor in the game as well, and we might be short of being able to play our Vampire Hexmage to bring out our 20/20 Marit Lage token with Dark Depths. We may be mana short of playing Karn Liberated which could be used to exile an opponent’s Craterhoof Behemoth that is hanging over our heads, waiting to swing for game next turn. You get the idea that sometimes we just need mana more than life to win the game as quickly as possible.

Another reason would be that Bitterblossom might be the only protection we are able to use against a nasty flying creature. We could essentially spend 1 life each turn to block ourselves from 20 flying damage each turn. The same goes for Reassembling Skeleton, with the exception that he doesn’t exactly fly… The point is, because we have such a gross lack of creatures in this deck, we may need to build a small wall of defense in order to block us from taking monumental damage from opponent’s creatures until we can tutor for or draw out a board wipe/kill spell like Damnation or Hero's Downfall.

Creature Denial Show

Lock your opponents out of attacking you. Show

Handling Combo Decks Show

Sunstone Show

Another Win Con Show

Ahhh Zombies!! Show

No maximum hand size + massive card advantage Show

Destroy all creatures each turn Show

Dealing with permanents Show

Recurring Our General Every Turn for Show

Double your Fetchland’s and Planeswalker's abilities Show

Death and fetches Show

Maybe Board Show

Changes Show

-Removed The Abyss, Grim Tutor, and Imperial Seal. They are all WAY too expensive.

-Added Increasing Ambition

-Added Dark Petition and Ring of Three Wishes

-AddedGlacial ChasmGC

-Removed 1 Snow-Covered Swamp for Thespian's Stage. It'll help me copy Cabal Coffers and Dark Depths if I decide on putting it in.

-Removed Trading Post for Dark Depths

-removed 4x Snow-Covered Swamps for

Bloodstained Mire

Marsh Flats

Polluted Delta and Verdant Catacombs

-Added The Abyss

-Added Trading Post. I realize now after having played many games that are multi-way, that I need to have the ability to recur artifacts, this deck relies SO heavily on graveyard recursion, but Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed only allows me to recur cards. I need the ability to recur cards from the grave that are artifacts, because there is too much artifact hate in some metas, and I feel like Arcbound Reclaimer simply isn't enough alone to protect me from this. I am sorry I broke the 100 card limit with this card, but it’s just too important, and I can’t afford to take anything out right now, I feel like my mana base is strong enough to allow me to put one single extra drop into this deck and make an exception this time.

-Removed Ring of Three Wishes for Demonic Collusion, as per @metalevolence's reccomendation. I truthfully feel like Ring of Three Wishes is a very useful artefact, as it can be used on multiple turns, works well with my infinite colorless mana combo, and can be easily copied by Ring of Three Wishes but for a total cost of across a timeframe of 2 turns, I might as well just spend the on Demonic Collusion to end the game faster by getting my combos out ASAP. I can also recurr it by itself if need be, and that can compensate for Ring of Three Wishes reuse ability.

-added Painter's Servant This is only a temporary addition for now, in order for me to play test an infinite recursion combo

-Removed Painter's Servant, it's illegal...

-Added Deserted Temple For the infinite mana combo that it offers with card:Rings of britghthearth and Cabal Coffers

Removed Demonic Collusion for Grim Tutor I think the collusion is a good tutor, so it'll stay on my maybe board, but its time to move on to bigger and better things. I am in love with this deck, I've had it long enough for me to say I want this to be the strongest it can be, and I think Demonic Collusion is my weakest tutor, so I'm tossing in the Grim Tutor at long last.

Removed Increasing Ambition for Imperial SealGC I can't ignore the seals drop in price, I have to take advantage of it becuase its just way too good for me to ignore at this point. Increasing Ambition is another one of my weakest tutors, I'd say 2nd weakest to Demonic Collusion. Imperial seal for the price is worth it to me in this deck. It'll remain on my maybeboard regardless, becuase its still a good tutor as far as tutors go, I suppose.

4/26/17

Removed Dark Petition

Also removed Dark Depths. This is a permanent removal, as the combo with Vampire Hexmage is simply too weak to hold its own in multi-player. It is definitely a combo that is better suited for 1v1 magic rather than group play, as this deck's intentions are.

Removed 2x Snow-Covered Swamps for Command Beacon and Boseiju, Who Shelters All

Removed Night's Whisper for Skullclamp

Removed Glacial ChasmGC for Sunstone

Removed Ugin, the Spirit Dragon for Lux Cannon

Removed Read the Bones for Null Brooch

12/25/2020

Removed Mycosynth Lattice for Chromatic Orrery

Mycosynth Lattice has a huge, and undeniable drawback of making all of our cards artifacts in the graveyard. It disallows us the ability to respond when we are going infinite, which is the only time that Mycosynth Lattice would be cast anyway. The added benefit of tapping for makes Chromatic Orrery well worth the CMC.

Removed Worn Powerstone for Grim MonolithGC. Monolith just gives me more immediate value and can be used the turn it's cast. I may revert this change, but I feel as though Worn Powerstone is a weak link that needs to be handled, and the same goes for Thran Dynamo. They simply aren't efficient enough.

Changes I may Make Show

Notes Show

Suggestions

Updates Add

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Revision 64 See all

(1 week ago)

-2	All is Dust	main
+2	All is Dust	main

Top Ranked	Achieved #31 position overall 8 years ago
Date added	9 years
Last updated	1 week
Exclude colors	WURG
Legality	This deck is not Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	14 - 1 Mythic Rares 45 - 3 Rares 18 - 1 Uncommons 5 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	3.42
Tokens	Faerie Rogue 1/1 B, Goat 0/1 W, Zombie 2/2 B
Folders	New Commander, Mono-Black, Decks I Like, Commander, Refferences, Liked Decks, Decks that I like and I want to look at again sometime, Fun Decks, Cool.decks, EDH
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