Efficient way for black to amass large stack of mana?
Modern forum
Posted on Oct. 26, 2021, 9:17 p.m. by mortalman
Heya guys, I wish to make a mono-black knight deck revolving around Josu Vess, Lich Knight and Haakon, Stromgald Scourge. I think I can get Haakon into my graveyard easily enough with some self-milling, but how could I pull off Josu's kicker ability? 10 mana seams like a lot to be able to play consistently. Are there any relatively budget (<$5) cards that will allow me to build a sizeable black mana pool to be able to pull this maneuver off? Thanks :)
Grubbernaut says... #3
The closest thing (which is not in your budget) is Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx, maybe - but 10 mana in modern should basically win you the game on the spot, if you want to be on-curve. By comparison, you could be paying full-price for Omniscience, almost any tron payoff, etc.
As for budget, I can't think of anything outside of tron for colorless.
October 26, 2021 9:40 p.m.
Not sure this would work with whatever your deck currently consists of, but if you run a life gain build you could use the second ability of Accomplished Alchemist. But now you’re practically locked into /, splashing for the two cards you mentioned—which isn’t the easiest to do with in the casting cost.
October 26, 2021 9:50 p.m.
Cabal Coffers, Liliana of the Dark Realms, and Nirkana Revenant can all accelerate in mono-black, but they all require a high mana and time investment, and they're not budget. Undead Warchief, Bontu's Monument, and Gravebreaker Lamia give you a discount. Outside of these, the most efficient and budget-friendly ramp is in green, if you're willing to splash another color.
October 26, 2021 10:44 p.m.
I think Crypt Ghast is the card FormOverFunction was talking about.
October 26, 2021 11:28 p.m.
wallisface says... #8
Careful about some of the above suggestions, as not everything people have posted is modern legal. Also, a bunch might look good at a glance, but are actually traps (for example, Cabal Stronghold might look appealing, but to get 10 black mana, you need 7 swamps and the Stronghold in play, which is just not viable).
In modern these are the only cards that come to mind for me:
-
Tron lands. But this would require, at a minimum, having the three Tronlands in play, as well as 3 swamps. That means having to revolve most of your deck around assembling the right lands. And Tron decks can typically have the game won a lot easier than this, so this feels like a whole lot of effort for almost no gain.
-
Skirge Familiar. But this just answers one question with another question. And, at the point where you have a card-drawing engine for this card, to get mana for your Josu Vess, Lich Knight, you've made far too complicated a combo, for again, minimal payoff.
-
Crypt Ghast. This would mean you can do what you want with only 5 swamps, potentially casting your zombie-horde on turn 5 with a high-land-density deck. I personally think this is the most viable option you have to get Josu out, but keep in mind there's still an issue here, namely, it's $12, so above your budget. And beyond that, it's a 4cmc creature that's super-easy to kill before you can do anything with it.
I think your best bet is to either go down the Crypt Ghast route, or add Green to the deck so you can run mana dorks. Anything else will probably be too slow (i'm considering any plan that takes more than 5 turns to execute non-viable)
October 27, 2021 3:06 a.m.
TypicalTimmy says... #9
Just so everyone knows, OP technically only needs ; The rest is generic, aka any color works :D
Might I suggest Golgari? You get plenty of dorks to ramp with, and one of my favorites - Satyr Hedonist. Also Generator Servant. I've split so many boardstates in half with these two...
FUN FACT!! The from Generator Servant doesn't need to be spent on a single creature! If you spend on one creature and on another creature, they BOTH get haste! :D
Sorry for derailing the thread :3
October 27, 2021 3:24 a.m.
TriusMalarky says... #10
I don't think those cards can go in the same deck. Josu is best as a mildly janky Tron payoff(but let's be real, most of Tron's payoffs are super janky in everything except Tron or other big mana decks), and B Tron isn't necessarily a bad deck.
Haakon is just a bad card. The deck it would go in would be something like Dredge, I guess, but dredge has a ton of better recursive critters. Also, Black knights also has far better 3 mana creatures as well.
Now, if you're just playing kitchen table, then it doesn't matter too much that Haakon sucks -- you just have the problems of a) that's two incredibly different strategies, neither of which are knight focused and b) modern has two ways to big mana, and neither of them achieve 10 with triple black included before like turn 6 at the earliest.
October 28, 2021 11:48 a.m.
TriusMalarky Hey thanks for the response! What would you suggest I use for my flagship(s) in my mono-black knight deck if Haakon and Josu are kind of bunk?
November 3, 2021 8:04 p.m.
TriusMalarky says... #12
Knight of the Ebon Legion, Murderous Rider, Smitten Swordmaster then fill it in with stuff from this list
FormOverFunction says... #2
There are some lands that can get you a little bit of headway, like Ebon Stronghold and some storage lands that could help as well... heck, even Black Mana Battery. I like having one or two things like that ticking in the background, just to make my opponents worry a little. Lastly there is Nykthos and Cabal Coffers for super speed. Also that Orzhov guy that doubles black mana production.... whose name I can’t remember. I think it’s its a spirit.
October 26, 2021 9:37 p.m.