Is there a Place in EDH for Kalitas, Bloodchief of Ghet?
Commander Deck Help forum
Posted on April 18, 2018, 11:02 a.m. by Arcaneful
Hello!
So I recently acquired a copy of Kalitas, Bloodchief of Ghet from my LGS. I thought the art looked very cool, and I never got a chance to play with the original zendikar block so I thought maybe I should try him out in EDH. Problem is, I have no idea where to use him. I'd like to lean away from Vampire Tribal so Edgar is out, and I can't decide if I should use him as a commander. I'm in a tier 2.5-3 meta and even though we're casual, he seems pretty slow. Anyone have any experience with him as the commander? Anyone have him in a deck at all?
I think he is better in the 99. Geth, Lord of the Vault just does his ability better, since it allows you to trigger etbs as well as and have the relevent static abilities, but kalitas' activation is much cheaper, so it is a good addtion to the 99 of a Geth deck.
April 18, 2018 11:49 a.m.
You could potentially run him as a commander in any mono-B strategy provided that your opponents run a lot of of high-value creatures. Still, decks that do that tend to pack a ton of protection and mono-B struggles to get past that.
Honestly, he's pretty bad because he's so slow.
April 18, 2018 12:05 p.m.
griffstick says... #5
Yes I've built it several times. It's fun. But you need lots of mana for it to be fun. It's a tier 3 CMDR at best. You'll need lots of good ramp. Like mana doublers. Caged Sun, and Extraplanar Lens. You need to focus on what black does best when considering mana ramp. Cabal Coffers, Magus of the Coffers, Nirkana Revenant, and Crypt Ghast. utilize the fact that you'll be mono black so cards like. Nightmare Lash, Lashwrithe, and Strata Scythe. You need big finishers that use big mana. Exsanguinate, and Torment of Hailfire. You'll want to try to have a few ways to stay in control early. Royal Assassin creatures, and some deathtouch creatures. You'll be killing selected creatures so Mimic Vat it good here. You want to make your CMDR more effective, so you'll want Illusionist's Bracers, and Rings of Brighthearth to copy Kalitas's effect throw in Basalt Monolith to make infinite colorless mana when paired up with the Rings of Brighthearth. You'll want to have Grave Betrayal as well this pairs up well with Kalitas. You are gonna need Command Beacon because if and when Kalitas dies. It will be hard recasting her after she dies 1 or 2 times. And you can do a reanimation theme as well where you can pick from graves at will with cards like Animate Dead, Rise from the Grave, Rise of the Dark Realms, and Fated Return. You'll need your basic edh packages. The Worn Powerstone, Sol Ring, Thran Dynamo, Burnished Hart, Gilded Lotus ramp package. About 4 board wipes. Decree of Pain, Archfiend of Depravity, Black Sun's Zenith, Mutilate. You'll need some other targeted removal and control. Withering Boon to stop etb effects that might threaten you, Imp's Mischief to redirect targeted spells. Sadistic Sacrament for the combo decks. And Praetor's Grasp for the same, or use it to grab a mana rock. Then throw in some strong combos that mono black does well. Mindcrank + Bloodchief Ascension or Exquisite Blood + Sanguine Bond. Along with a few other good ones. And some one shot heavy hitters. Like Sorin Markov, Tree of Perdition, and Blood Tribute. Follow the guidelines and you'll have a solid deck.
April 18, 2018 12:07 p.m.
There are a few ways to do this. Either speed up your mana accelerants, or slow down the rest of the table. Black has a lot of good access to both, but especially the second.
The Abyss and Magus of the Abyss will slow their board presence, but leave those bigger monsters for you to pick off with Kalitas. Creeping Dread, Cunning Lethemancer, and Mindslicer (if you're feeling mean) will give you hand advantage and slow their tempos.
If you're set on playing this card, it could be a good addition to a Chainer, Dementia Master deck, as you wouldn't have to really cast it at all.
lilgiantrobot says... #2
Kalitas can work pretty well as the lead of a big mana black control deck. While certainly not the best choice, he kills things and steals them so there's certainly worse options. If you don't want to give him as much focus, any deck that ramps well can use his abilities since they're very independent of the rest of a build.
April 18, 2018 11:46 a.m.