Why Gisa?
As far as monoblack generals go, there are a number of popular choices. Without going into too much detail about the 54 other generals available to monoblack, simply put I believe that Gisa is the best general to build a zombie swarm shell around. Marrow-Gnawer is very similar, but I don’t like rats as much as a tribe and there is more support for zombies. Mikaeus works very well, but I have already abused him enough and I wanted to do something I had not branched into before.
At the end of the day, you should choose Gisa because she is a fun commander to challenge yourself with. She can be extremely explosive and has some fun combos, and there are not many things more fun than exponentially flooding your field with zombies every turn. She can quickly overwhelm opponents with field advantage both on the board and in hand. There are better swarm commanders, but none are in a monoblack shell where you can also abuse all the many offerings of being a single color, particularly black.
My Meta
My meta is comprised of a casual friend group that has been getting increasingly competitive recently. Commanders include Prossh, Sharuum Combo, Omnath, Marath, Nahiri, Teferi, and Uril. I have other decks including Karador, Aurelia Aggro, Animar, Kruphix, and Norin the Wary. All of the above decks usually have heavy ramp out the gate, and those who do not have it are left behind. The general trend is for these decks to have sped up significantly because of this, forcing this build of Gisa to be a more aggressive one in order to keep pace with all the green and artifact ramp.
This version of Gisa is designed such that ideally, by turn 7 or 8, we should be doing something degenerate. Early ramp is valued highly because if we fall behind there is not a lot of room for us to catch up, outside of certain key spells. A lot of draw spells are also included because for us, life does not matter, but fast pacing and consistent gas does. The more we do sooner the more likely we are to close the game. This deck can go the distance over a longer game, but it is rarer. Anthems are also very highly valued in this deck, as each one not only allows us to make more zombies, but each zombie that is made is also stronger.
You'll like Gisa if...
You enjoy the idea of huge swarms of creatures to overwhelm opponents outside of a green shell.
You enjoy a synergistic deck where most cards have multiple reasons for being included.
You think tap abilities are merely another tool to be abused, and that sacrificing rarely has to be a drawback.
You enjoy ridiculous situations that get out of hand quickly... like 40 zombies from a 2 creature board state.
You like being able to win from nowhere, even when behind on board position.
Gisa might not be for you if...
Sacrificing creatures for profit bothers you.
You want to win through infinite combos.
You can go infinite with Gisa, but it's pretty difficult and not all her combo pieces are worth it on their own. There are better commanders for this purpose.
You don't like decks that are "all-in" all the time.
Gisa goes hard or she goes home. She if constantly trying to outpace more flexible decks by creating enough pressure each game where they have to stop whatever they are doing in order to contend with her. She is a very black commander in the sense that her life total is completely a resource that we abuse, be it from getting gas, recursion, or gaining power.
(This is my first time using a [deck] tag, and I was not sure how to properly format it by card purpose. I'd appreciate some help from someone who knows!)
Cards Explained:
Grave Titan
Strictly value creature. Does what we want to do with the deck on ETB and swing, and has a nice body to sac to Gisa when we want. Great beater.
Carrion Feeder
1 Drop zombie that gains value off of other anthems and doubles as a sac outlet and huge body for Gisa when needed? Sign me up!
Phyrexian Dreadnought
Testing this currently. In theory, reads: 1B Tap: Put 12 2/2 Zombies on the battlefield. Essentially a 2 mana Rise of the Dark Realms.
Lightning Greaves
Gisa + Haste isn’t always necessary, but it’s a great thing to have in our pocket. At the very worst it provides protection for the main engine of the deck.
Thornbite Staff
Was previously Thousand-Year Elixir. I made the swap after realizing how good this card can be even in non-combo value with Gisa. However, there is also now combo support in the form of Phyrexian Altar, which combined with this and Gisa make for infinite zombies and infinite mana.
Zombie Master
Zombie to profit off our anthems, and makes our horde unblockable if an opponent controls swamps. If only there was a land that made everything on the field a swamp...
Phyrexian Crusader
Zombie. Plus, incredible value beater that really puts pressure on opponents early on. It is in as both an alternate win condition (it gets very big very fast with our anthems) and can combo with Hatred for the surprise kill. Protection is a very key part of this card, as well, even just to threaten to allow us to setup more.
Lord of the Undead
Zombie. Anthem. Recursion. All in one nice little package. Allows an engine with a sac outlet and a card like Gary.
Death Baron
Zombie. Anthem. Deathtouch?! Coincidentally also boosts Dimir House Guard, although we don’t use it for that purpose.
Cemetery Reaper
Zombie. Anthem. Oh, and grow your army at the expense of opponents' graveyards, too.
Drana, Liberator of Malakir
Currently testing. In theory, it is a permanent anthem every turn to our horde, as the first strike damage goes through and then immediately adds value to every single one of our zombies before they connect. The evasion helps ensure he will consistently provide value, and it’s always nice to have a flier.
Phyrexian Altar
Previously Risen Executioner. This card allows ramp, is a sac outlet (always useful), and enables infinite combos with both Mikaeus and Thornbite Staff. I have been looking for an excuse to put this card in for a while and the deck finally has the support for it that it has needed.
Undead Warchief
Zombie. Better anthem. Ramp?! The best of the best when it comes to our lords package. Another incentive to be playing lots of zombies in this deck.
Lashwrithe
What if I told you that there was a creature that has the same power as all of our swamps, and then could attach itself after being sacked for free to another creature to add its power to them? This card is bonkers value. Has nice synergies with cards that care about power, such as Disciple of Bolas.
Hatred
The central combo piece of this deck. Once this gets played, if you have played it smartly, the game should end very quickly in your favor. For one v one, just swing and kill for the win with your horde, as you can pay the difference between yours and your opponents life. If that won’t work, wait until EOT, then pump and sac the creature with Gisa, creating an average of 30-35 zombies that can then swing on untap, depending on how low you can make your life total go. Multiple players or you can’t kill everyone at once with your horde? Make sure you have Whip of Erebos or Disciple of Bolas to regain all the life you just paid into this (and with Disciple draw your deck). Have your cake and eat it, too! One of the main reasons to include Dimir House Guard as an extra tutor for the Whip/Disciple. Hatred should kill someone the turn it is dropped around 75% of the time. Those huge zombie swarms get even crazier if we can them put Akroma’s Memorial out (rare but not unfeasible – we get a lot of mana in this deck).
Coat of Arms
Another central combo piece. A little more dangerous to play than Hatred, as it can buff your opponents’ creatures as well if you are not careful. Best played into a board where you can immediately either swing for the win or sac a newly buffed zombie with Gisa. If you’re allowed to have this and tap with Gisa, then your army will grow exponentially every turn in power and size. Playing this after a swarm created with Hatred should thoroughly overkill your opponents.
Vampiric Tutor
Classic. One of the best. Staple for any black deck.
Expedition Map
Lands are very important to us in this deck, as they enable some very broken ramping due to our mono black nature. This card usually reads "3: Search your library for Urborg or Cabal Coffers and bring it to your hand."
Demonic Tutor
The other staple for any black deck.
Diabolic Intent
Demonic Tutor with a negligible downside? The sacrifice is a boon to us more often than not mattering to us. Great card.
Dimir House Guard
Because this deck is designed to be more explosive in nature than a traditional aggro or midrange build, it needs to find its clutch combo or utility pieces when needed. This card is a sac outlet when we want it, and a tutor for multiple sources of draw power, life gain, recursion, and creature power when we need it.
Nantoku Husk
Zombie. Previously Corpse Harvester. Nantoku Husk enables us to double our field power with Gisa the turn we go active with it, and we have plenty of ways to return it to the battlefield after we have sacrificed it. This is a great hidden tech card that allows some mean combos as we also required another sac outlet in this deck.
Skullclamp
Just a little good in a deck where we are regularly killing off our things.
Phyrexian Arena
This deck needs its gas all the time. This card provides it.
Necropotence
See: Phyrexian Arena.
Erebos, God of the Dead
Cute anti-lifegain clause, but also an indestructible way for us to consistently draw cards. Can also be a nice beater more often than not. Often better than Phyrexian Arena due to our huge pools of mana.
Disciple of Bolas
Allows us to sacrifice a huge zombie or other creature, and draw cards and gain life off of it. Plays very nicely with this deck.
Graveborn Muse
Zombie. Also, I know, this may seem to scream "kill ourselves." However, our commander is a sac outlet. This allows us to control exactly how much we want to pay with this card. Just play smart, and this allows us some huge card advantage swings out of nowhere.
Bloodgift Demon
Previously Corpse Augur. A Phyrexian Arena on a large flying beatstick is just plain good. Especially when this deck is hungry for draw power all the time.
Gravecrawler
Zombie. Gisa and him go way back. Again, and again, and again...
Bloodghast
Often better than gravecrawler due to the free recursion. Plays nicely with all the sacrifice effects in this deck.
Yawgmoth's Will
When we need that card in our graveyard, we really, really need it. Because this deck is built more to explode and relies on certain pieces, this can be central to allowing us to win.
Geralf's Messenger
Zombie. Drains opponent's life. Efficient body for sacking. Recurs itself. Provides tons of devotion when that is relevant. What's not to love?
Coffin Queen
Zombie. Nice recursion package and can steal opponents' creatures. I think this is a highly underrated card, it can easily be brutal. Note that with Gisa it can recur and sac once a turn.
Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed
Black's ancient, limited Eternal Witness. Still works pretty well, and can provide its own engine with Volrath's Stronghold. Great for many reasons.
Whip of Erebos
We are never sad to see this card. Not only can it give us extra value off of things in our graveyard, it allows our zombie horde to swing much more freely because we can now profitably trade blows with opponents. Key combo piece with Hatred in a multiplayer setting.
Puppeteer Clique
Previously Phyrexian Delver. This guy is a flier, has persist to combo out with Mikaeus/provide extra sacrifice value, and grabs a creature from our opponents' graveyard, which actually is often much more valuable than what we can grab from ours. We can infinitely recur their same creature if we have this guy plus Mikaeus and a sac outlet.
Mikaeus, the Unhallowed
Zombie!! One of the best. Evasive, destroys humans, anthems our dudes, nice body, and gives undying to most of our 32 real creatures (even though unfortunately Gisa and him do not play well). It may be strange to see this in a zombie token deck, but this guy does everything we want. Thanks to Puppeteer Clique he now doubles as a combo piece, too!
Volrath's Stronghold
Black recursion engine for creatures. Really nasty with all the sacrifice effects and ETB effects we can reuse and abuse. Adds Resiliency.
Unholy Grotto
Volrath's Stronghold for zombies! Still testing, has provided value most of the time when I have used it. Nice to have redundancy. Recurs key pieces like Sidisi, Gray Merchant, Crusader, lords, and Carrion Feeder.
Wayfarer's Bauble
Cheap, early ramp that gives us a swamp. More useful than other ramps because we value swamps themselves very highly for a number of broken effects.
Sol Ring
It is very rare that a deck does not want this card.
Dark Ritual
Sol Ring #2. Allows for some very explosive early plays to allow us to get our field rolling much faster. Late game it can provide that little bit of extra mana to get the better play, but obviously its value diminishes if we are already swimming in mana. Still, the amount of value it provides early on has always outweighed its potential lacklusterness late game whenever I have used it.
Bubbling Muck
A little slower than Dark Ritual, but allows us to break from a stalled board state into some explosive plays to ruin our opponents' day.
Jet Medallion
Early game it is just a rock. Late game it gains extra value by reducing the cost of our spells by a net of more than one each turn.
Burnished Hart
A necessary evil in case we are short on swamps. Slows us down, but allows us to play instead of being completely stalled when we need those lands.
Solemn Simulacrum
Slower land ramp, considering it usually comes down turn 4. However, it also nets us card advantage, loves to be sacrificed, and we have ways of reusing him. Also provides a swamp, which as discussed earlier is much more valuable than normal to us.
Crypt Ghast
The Crypt G is one mean dude. Ramp into him and explode while your opponents are still playing their mana dorks and setup cards. He is a Nirkana Revenant for two less. The extort trigger is very rarely a thing we actually would want to use. He lets us do huge plays. For those unaware, he is still able to be used in a mono black deck because the color symbol on extort
Caged Sun
With the amount of ways we have to ramp into this early, Caged Sun quickly goes from being an expensive rock to being invaluable. Its anthem effect is very relevant, and once it drops we are set on mana.
Phyrexian Tower
Another sacrifice effect to abuse. Additionally, it allows us to ramp at the small cost of removing one of our creatures. Great land.
Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
We have tons of devotion sources in this deck, making Nykthos oftentimes more explosive (even if less consistent) than Cabal Coffers. Basically COffers 2.0
Cabal Coffers
The one. The only. Monoblack's best friend. Great card - taps for normal mana if you have 3 swamps (note - easy to do), and once it is rolling essentially lets each of your swamps each turn tap for an additional mana. We often tutor for this land. Gets bonkers with doubling effects and Urborg.
Gate to Phyrexia
Black's only colored way to remove artifacts. It just so happens that we love sacrificing creatures in this deck, so that is not such a bad drawback. There is a very artifact heavy presence in my meta, so I have found this card a necessity.
Stronghold Assassin
Zombie! Also a sac outlet that lets us destroy pesky creatures that ruin our day.
Fleshbag Marauder
Zombie. As in most decks he appears in, we love to abuse him. We can even play him, immediately sac him with Gisa, and then sac one of the 3 zombies he makes to his effect. This nets us 2 zombies (minimum, often more) and makes our opponents sacrifice a creature for 4 mana.
Oblivion Stone
The best semi-selective colorless boardwipe that this deck can abuse reliably and on the same turn it is played. Requires a ton of mana to do so, but we usually have that available. Can really be clutch in tight spots where our opponents have gone off before us.
Contamination
I was not sold on this card until I tried playing with it. Sacrificing a creature each turn is pitifully easy for us, and should we not want the effect anymore, we just don't! Meanwhile our opponents are usually dead in the water. Also fun to note, most of our mana doubling effects add the mana themselves (not the lands), and so we still get our same bonkers mana production while everyone else suffers. This is not usually an early game, on curve play unless we have gotten an especially explosive start.
Grave Pact
We sacrifice so much in this deck, we may as well get some extra value off of it! Really helps us lock down the board very quickly.
Mutilate
Because I don't want to spend $50 on Damnation. Also, Mutilate usually gets the job done, and has some niche times where it can be better than Damnation. Good cad that can often save us in a pinch.
Black Market
Previously Dictate of Erebos. Black Market is in testing, although I have high hopes for it as it is an insanely powerful ramp spell.
Steel Hellkite
Oblivion Stone and this are our only ways of removing enchantments in this deck. The Hellkite comes on a nice body that is a flier, which sometimes is all we need. It also helps us remove everything pesky that we hate on our opponents fields. I have not been disappointed with him yet.
Decree of Pain
This is a great card - mana is not usually a problem for us, and while we don't like board wipes, this one left us have massive profit by insane card draw. Often negates all of the pain of wiping the board in the first place.
Strip Mine
An auto include in every deck I can find space for it. Too good to pass up - often times walks the combo deck by keeping their winning combo at bay for one more turn until they get the right amount of mana. This deck appreciates this effect especially because it is less versatile in its normal removal options than multi colored decks.
Bojuka Bog
Taps for black and gives us a great effect. A shame that it comes in tapped, but it is still almost always worthwhile.
Shepherd of Rot
Zombie. Cheap Creature. Useful and abuse-able effect! Often we will be able to utilize him as we see fit. Either an anthemed body to sacrifice to the Zombiecaller herself, or a great way to drain opponents' life quickly in a board stall environment. Often allows us to push through the last bit of damage we need to close the game.
Gray Merchant of Asphodel
Zombieeee. Gar is wily in this deck, and would be good even without a zombie tribal theme. We get extra value off of sacrificing him due to his typing, and his ETB is brutal as always. Usually lands for around 10 devotion.
Exsanguinate
I am still testing this card. Can provide that late game reach when it is needed, and for that reason has remained. Having an extra win con out of nowhere can be invaluable. I would be open to replacing it though.
Vesuva
We ahve so many valuable lands, why not have another of them? Testing this and Thespian's Stage. Having this come in tapped can be a large drawback in certain situations.
Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
Big daddy. We love seeing this land, as it makes all our lands tap for all colors (that we care about). Best land in the deck.
Thespian's Stage
See Vesuva. Does not come in tapped, which is nice, and can tap for colorless on its own.
Swamps
The more the merrier! Second best land in the deck. Between Crypt Ghast, Caged Sun, Lashwrithe, Mutilate, and Cabal Coffers, we really love our swamps.
I'm a big fan of synergy, so that's why I decided to go with the Zombie Tribal theme (instead of monoblack good stuff) to this deck. I saw ti as the most synergistic and effective way to build a Gisa deck without compromising on key pieces. That being said, I am very open to suggestions. This is the first deck I have really created from the ground up, as there was very little research I could for her relative to more popular commanders. It is my hope that this list is helpful to promote ideas of your own. Please let me know what you think!
I realized that Nantoku Husk provided some amazing hidden synnergy with Gisa - basically allows us to double our board power on the turn we sac things to him with Gisa, as most of our zombies are already a 2/2. Also adds nice resiliency and redundancy in the form of a sac outlet, and he's a zombie! I added Puppeteer Clique to enable the infinite combo with Mikaeus now that we have 3 unconditional sac outlets in the deck. The substitution over Phyrexian Delver also works very well because often our graveyard will only have a few things in it and not much worth grabbing, and Clique is a flier that grabs us more sac fodder for Gisa.
EDIT: 12/2/2015
OUT: Risen Executioner, Corpse Harvester, Dictate of Erebos
IN: Phyrexian Altar, Thornbite Staff, Black Market
After the previous edit, I realized that I should diversify my win conditions, and that I had been grievously overlooking both Phyrexian Altar and Thornbite Staff's non-combo value. Coincidentally, they also go infinite with Gisa, for both infinite Mana and infinite zombies.
Black Market is a spell I've always wanted to include but never have. However after some analysis I decided it was worth testing over Dictate of Erebos.
My OUTs are because they are slow, expensive, and have relatively smaller impact to my game plan than my INs. I am still looking for a slot for Phyrexian Ghoul, Zombie Trailblazer, and I would love to get Vampire Nighthawk in as an extra combo with Hatred.
Why Gisa?
As far as monoblack generals go, there are a number of popular choices. Without going into too much detail about the 54 other generals available to monoblack, simply put I believe that Gisa is the best general to build a zombie swarm shell around. Marrow-Gnawer is very similar, but I don’t like rats as much as a tribe and there is more support for zombies. Mikaeus works very well, but I have already abused him enough and I wanted to do something I had not branched into before.
At the end of the day, you should choose Gisa because she is a fun commander to challenge yourself with. She can be extremely explosive and has some fun combos, and there are not many things more fun than exponentially flooding your field with zombies every turn. She can quickly overwhelm opponents with field advantage both on the board and in hand. There are better swarm commanders, but none are in a monoblack shell where you can also abuse all the many offerings of being a single color, particularly black.
My Meta
My meta is comprised of a casual friend group that has been getting increasingly competitive recently. Commanders include Prossh, Sharuum Combo, Omnath, Marath, Nahiri, Teferi, and Uril. I have other decks including Karador, Aurelia Aggro, Animar, Kruphix, and Norin the Wary. All of the above decks usually have heavy ramp out the gate, and those who do not have it are left behind. The general trend is for these decks to have sped up significantly because of this, forcing this build of Gisa to be a more aggressive one in order to keep pace with all the green and artifact ramp.
This version of Gisa is designed such that ideally, by turn 7 or 8, we should be doing something degenerate. Early ramp is valued highly because if we fall behind there is not a lot of room for us to catch up, outside of certain key spells. A lot of draw spells are also included because for us, life does not matter, but fast pacing and consistent gas does. The more we do sooner the more likely we are to close the game. This deck can go the distance over a longer game, but it is rarer. Anthems are also very highly valued in this deck, as each one not only allows us to make more zombies, but each zombie that is made is also stronger.
You'll like Gisa if...
Gisa might not be for you if...
1 Carrion Feeder
1 Phyrexian Dreadnought
2 Lightning Greaves
2 Thornbite Staff
3 Zombie Master
3 Phyrexian Crusader
3 Lord of the Undead
3 Cemetery Reaper
3 Death Baron
3 Drana, Liberator of Malakir
3 Phyrexian Altar
3 Nantoku Husk
4 Lashwrithe
4 Undead Warchief
5 Coat of Arms
5 Hatred
7 Akroma's Memorial
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Expedition Map
2 Demonic Tutor
2 Diabolic Intent
4 Dimir House Guard
5 Sidisi, Undead Vizier
1 Skullclamp
3 Phyrexian Arena
3 Necropotence
4 Erebos, God of the Dead
4 Disciple of Bolas
4 Graveborn Muse
4 Corpse Augur (new)
1 Gravecrawler
2 Bloodghast
3 Yawgmoth's Will
3 Geralf's Messenger
3 Coffin Queen
4 Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed
4 Whip of Erebos
6 Mikaeus, the Unhallowed
1 Wayfarer's Bauble
1 Sol Ring
1 Dark Ritual
1 Bubbling Muck
2 Jet Medallion
3 Burnished Hart
4 Solemn Simulacrum
4 Crypt Ghast
2 Gate to Phyrexia
3 Stronghold Assassin
3 Fleshbag Marauder
3 Oblivion Stone
3 Contamination
4 Grave Pact
4 Mutilate
5 Thornbite Staff
5 Black Market
6 Steel Hellkite
8 Decree of Pain
2 Shepherd of Rot
5 Gray Merchant of Asphodel
2 Exsanguinate
0 Volrath's Stronghold
0 Unholy Grotto
0 Phyrexian Tower
0 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
0 Cabal Coffers
0 Strip Mine
0 Bojuka Bog
0 Vesuva
0 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
0 Thespian's Stage
27 Swamp
(This is my first time using a [deck] tag, and I was not sure how to properly format it by card purpose. I'd appreciate some help from someone who knows!)
Cards Explained:
Grave Titan
Strictly value creature. Does what we want to do with the deck on ETB and swing, and has a nice body to sac to Gisa when we want. Great beater.
Carrion Feeder
1 Drop zombie that gains value off of other anthems and doubles as a sac outlet and huge body for Gisa when needed? Sign me up!
Phyrexian Dreadnought
Testing this currently. In theory, reads: 1B Tap: Put 12 2/2 Zombies on the battlefield. Essentially a 2 mana Rise of the Dark Realms.
Lightning Greaves
Gisa + Haste isn’t always necessary, but it’s a great thing to have in our pocket. At the very worst it provides protection for the main engine of the deck.
Thornbite Staff
Was previously Thousand-Year Elixir. I made the swap after realizing how good this card can be even in non-combo value with Gisa. However, there is also now combo support in the form of Phyrexian Altar, which combined with this and Gisa make for infinite zombies and infinite mana.
Zombie Master
Zombie to profit off our anthems, and makes our horde unblockable if an opponent controls swamps. If only there was a land that made everything on the field a swamp...
Phyrexian Crusader
Zombie. Plus, incredible value beater that really puts pressure on opponents early on. It is in as both an alternate win condition (it gets very big very fast with our anthems) and can combo with Hatred for the surprise kill. Protection is a very key part of this card, as well, even just to threaten to allow us to setup more.
Lord of the Undead
Zombie. Anthem. Recursion. All in one nice little package. Allows an engine with a sac outlet and a card like Gary.
Death Baron
Zombie. Anthem. Deathtouch?! Coincidentally also boosts Dimir House Guard, although we don’t use it for that purpose.
Cemetery Reaper
Zombie. Anthem. Oh, and grow your army at the expense of opponents' graveyards, too.
Drana, Liberator of Malakir
Currently testing. In theory, it is a permanent anthem every turn to our horde, as the first strike damage goes through and then immediately adds value to every single one of our zombies before they connect. The evasion helps ensure he will consistently provide value, and it’s always nice to have a flier.
Phyrexian Altar
Previously Risen Executioner. This card allows ramp, is a sac outlet (always useful), and enables infinite combos with both Mikaeus and Thornbite Staff. I have been looking for an excuse to put this card in for a while and the deck finally has the support for it that it has needed.
Undead Warchief
Zombie. Better anthem. Ramp?! The best of the best when it comes to our lords package. Another incentive to be playing lots of zombies in this deck.
Lashwrithe
What if I told you that there was a creature that has the same power as all of our swamps, and then could attach itself after being sacked for free to another creature to add its power to them? This card is bonkers value. Has nice synergies with cards that care about power, such as Disciple of Bolas.
Hatred
The central combo piece of this deck. Once this gets played, if you have played it smartly, the game should end very quickly in your favor. For one v one, just swing and kill for the win with your horde, as you can pay the difference between yours and your opponents life. If that won’t work, wait until EOT, then pump and sac the creature with Gisa, creating an average of 30-35 zombies that can then swing on untap, depending on how low you can make your life total go. Multiple players or you can’t kill everyone at once with your horde? Make sure you have Whip of Erebos or Disciple of Bolas to regain all the life you just paid into this (and with Disciple draw your deck). Have your cake and eat it, too! One of the main reasons to include Dimir House Guard as an extra tutor for the Whip/Disciple. Hatred should kill someone the turn it is dropped around 75% of the time. Those huge zombie swarms get even crazier if we can them put Akroma’s Memorial out (rare but not unfeasible – we get a lot of mana in this deck).
Coat of Arms
Another central combo piece. A little more dangerous to play than Hatred, as it can buff your opponents’ creatures as well if you are not careful. Best played into a board where you can immediately either swing for the win or sac a newly buffed zombie with Gisa. If you’re allowed to have this and tap with Gisa, then your army will grow exponentially every turn in power and size. Playing this after a swarm created with Hatred should thoroughly overkill your opponents.
Vampiric Tutor
Classic. One of the best. Staple for any black deck.
Expedition Map
Lands are very important to us in this deck, as they enable some very broken ramping due to our mono black nature. This card usually reads "3: Search your library for Urborg or Cabal Coffers and bring it to your hand."
Demonic Tutor
The other staple for any black deck.
Diabolic Intent
Demonic Tutor with a negligible downside? The sacrifice is a boon to us more often than not mattering to us. Great card.
Dimir House Guard
Because this deck is designed to be more explosive in nature than a traditional aggro or midrange build, it needs to find its clutch combo or utility pieces when needed. This card is a sac outlet when we want it, and a tutor for multiple sources of draw power, life gain, recursion, and creature power when we need it.
Sidisi, Undead Vizier
Zombie. See: Diabolic Intent. Also, nice fat sackable body.
Nantoku Husk
Zombie. Previously Corpse Harvester. Nantoku Husk enables us to double our field power with Gisa the turn we go active with it, and we have plenty of ways to return it to the battlefield after we have sacrificed it. This is a great hidden tech card that allows some mean combos as we also required another sac outlet in this deck.
Skullclamp
Just a little good in a deck where we are regularly killing off our things.
Phyrexian Arena
This deck needs its gas all the time. This card provides it.
Necropotence
See: Phyrexian Arena.
Erebos, God of the Dead
Cute anti-lifegain clause, but also an indestructible way for us to consistently draw cards. Can also be a nice beater more often than not. Often better than Phyrexian Arena due to our huge pools of mana.
Disciple of Bolas
Allows us to sacrifice a huge zombie or other creature, and draw cards and gain life off of it. Plays very nicely with this deck.
Graveborn Muse
Zombie. Also, I know, this may seem to scream "kill ourselves." However, our commander is a sac outlet. This allows us to control exactly how much we want to pay with this card. Just play smart, and this allows us some huge card advantage swings out of nowhere.
Bloodgift Demon
Previously Corpse Augur. A Phyrexian Arena on a large flying beatstick is just plain good. Especially when this deck is hungry for draw power all the time.
Gravecrawler
Zombie. Gisa and him go way back. Again, and again, and again...
Bloodghast
Often better than gravecrawler due to the free recursion. Plays nicely with all the sacrifice effects in this deck.
Yawgmoth's Will
When we need that card in our graveyard, we really, really need it. Because this deck is built more to explode and relies on certain pieces, this can be central to allowing us to win.
Geralf's Messenger
Zombie. Drains opponent's life. Efficient body for sacking. Recurs itself. Provides tons of devotion when that is relevant. What's not to love?
Coffin Queen
Zombie. Nice recursion package and can steal opponents' creatures. I think this is a highly underrated card, it can easily be brutal. Note that with Gisa it can recur and sac once a turn.
Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed
Black's ancient, limited Eternal Witness. Still works pretty well, and can provide its own engine with Volrath's Stronghold. Great for many reasons.
Whip of Erebos
We are never sad to see this card. Not only can it give us extra value off of things in our graveyard, it allows our zombie horde to swing much more freely because we can now profitably trade blows with opponents. Key combo piece with Hatred in a multiplayer setting.
Puppeteer Clique
Previously Phyrexian Delver. This guy is a flier, has persist to combo out with Mikaeus/provide extra sacrifice value, and grabs a creature from our opponents' graveyard, which actually is often much more valuable than what we can grab from ours. We can infinitely recur their same creature if we have this guy plus Mikaeus and a sac outlet.
Mikaeus, the Unhallowed
Zombie!! One of the best. Evasive, destroys humans, anthems our dudes, nice body, and gives undying to most of our 32 real creatures (even though unfortunately Gisa and him do not play well). It may be strange to see this in a zombie token deck, but this guy does everything we want. Thanks to Puppeteer Clique he now doubles as a combo piece, too!
Volrath's Stronghold
Black recursion engine for creatures. Really nasty with all the sacrifice effects and ETB effects we can reuse and abuse. Adds Resiliency.
Unholy Grotto
Volrath's Stronghold for zombies! Still testing, has provided value most of the time when I have used it. Nice to have redundancy. Recurs key pieces like Sidisi, Gray Merchant, Crusader, lords, and Carrion Feeder.
Wayfarer's Bauble
Cheap, early ramp that gives us a swamp. More useful than other ramps because we value swamps themselves very highly for a number of broken effects.
Sol Ring
It is very rare that a deck does not want this card.
Dark Ritual
Sol Ring #2. Allows for some very explosive early plays to allow us to get our field rolling much faster. Late game it can provide that little bit of extra mana to get the better play, but obviously its value diminishes if we are already swimming in mana. Still, the amount of value it provides early on has always outweighed its potential lacklusterness late game whenever I have used it.
Bubbling Muck
A little slower than Dark Ritual, but allows us to break from a stalled board state into some explosive plays to ruin our opponents' day.
Jet Medallion
Early game it is just a rock. Late game it gains extra value by reducing the cost of our spells by a net of more than one each turn.
Burnished Hart
A necessary evil in case we are short on swamps. Slows us down, but allows us to play instead of being completely stalled when we need those lands.
Solemn Simulacrum
Slower land ramp, considering it usually comes down turn 4. However, it also nets us card advantage, loves to be sacrificed, and we have ways of reusing him. Also provides a swamp, which as discussed earlier is much more valuable than normal to us.
Crypt Ghast
The Crypt G is one mean dude. Ramp into him and explode while your opponents are still playing their mana dorks and setup cards. He is a Nirkana Revenant for two less. The extort trigger is very rarely a thing we actually would want to use. He lets us do huge plays. For those unaware, he is still able to be used in a mono black deck because the color symbol on extort
Caged Sun
With the amount of ways we have to ramp into this early, Caged Sun quickly goes from being an expensive rock to being invaluable. Its anthem effect is very relevant, and once it drops we are set on mana.
Phyrexian Tower
Another sacrifice effect to abuse. Additionally, it allows us to ramp at the small cost of removing one of our creatures. Great land.
Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
We have tons of devotion sources in this deck, making Nykthos oftentimes more explosive (even if less consistent) than Cabal Coffers. Basically COffers 2.0
Cabal Coffers
The one. The only. Monoblack's best friend. Great card - taps for normal mana if you have 3 swamps (note - easy to do), and once it is rolling essentially lets each of your swamps each turn tap for an additional mana. We often tutor for this land. Gets bonkers with doubling effects and Urborg.
Gate to Phyrexia
Black's only colored way to remove artifacts. It just so happens that we love sacrificing creatures in this deck, so that is not such a bad drawback. There is a very artifact heavy presence in my meta, so I have found this card a necessity.
Stronghold Assassin
Zombie! Also a sac outlet that lets us destroy pesky creatures that ruin our day.
Fleshbag Marauder
Zombie. As in most decks he appears in, we love to abuse him. We can even play him, immediately sac him with Gisa, and then sac one of the 3 zombies he makes to his effect. This nets us 2 zombies (minimum, often more) and makes our opponents sacrifice a creature for 4 mana.
Oblivion Stone
The best semi-selective colorless boardwipe that this deck can abuse reliably and on the same turn it is played. Requires a ton of mana to do so, but we usually have that available. Can really be clutch in tight spots where our opponents have gone off before us.
Contamination
I was not sold on this card until I tried playing with it. Sacrificing a creature each turn is pitifully easy for us, and should we not want the effect anymore, we just don't! Meanwhile our opponents are usually dead in the water. Also fun to note, most of our mana doubling effects add the mana themselves (not the lands), and so we still get our same bonkers mana production while everyone else suffers. This is not usually an early game, on curve play unless we have gotten an especially explosive start.
Grave Pact
We sacrifice so much in this deck, we may as well get some extra value off of it! Really helps us lock down the board very quickly.
Mutilate
Because I don't want to spend $50 on Damnation. Also, Mutilate usually gets the job done, and has some niche times where it can be better than Damnation. Good cad that can often save us in a pinch.
Black Market
Previously Dictate of Erebos. Black Market is in testing, although I have high hopes for it as it is an insanely powerful ramp spell.
Steel Hellkite
Oblivion Stone and this are our only ways of removing enchantments in this deck. The Hellkite comes on a nice body that is a flier, which sometimes is all we need. It also helps us remove everything pesky that we hate on our opponents fields. I have not been disappointed with him yet.
Decree of Pain
This is a great card - mana is not usually a problem for us, and while we don't like board wipes, this one left us have massive profit by insane card draw. Often negates all of the pain of wiping the board in the first place.
Strip Mine
An auto include in every deck I can find space for it. Too good to pass up - often times walks the combo deck by keeping their winning combo at bay for one more turn until they get the right amount of mana. This deck appreciates this effect especially because it is less versatile in its normal removal options than multi colored decks.
Bojuka Bog
Taps for black and gives us a great effect. A shame that it comes in tapped, but it is still almost always worthwhile.
Shepherd of Rot
Zombie. Cheap Creature. Useful and abuse-able effect! Often we will be able to utilize him as we see fit. Either an anthemed body to sacrifice to the Zombiecaller herself, or a great way to drain opponents' life quickly in a board stall environment. Often allows us to push through the last bit of damage we need to close the game.
Gray Merchant of Asphodel
Zombieeee. Gar is wily in this deck, and would be good even without a zombie tribal theme. We get extra value off of sacrificing him due to his typing, and his ETB is brutal as always. Usually lands for around 10 devotion.
Exsanguinate
I am still testing this card. Can provide that late game reach when it is needed, and for that reason has remained. Having an extra win con out of nowhere can be invaluable. I would be open to replacing it though.
Vesuva
We ahve so many valuable lands, why not have another of them? Testing this and Thespian's Stage. Having this come in tapped can be a large drawback in certain situations.
Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
Big daddy. We love seeing this land, as it makes all our lands tap for all colors (that we care about). Best land in the deck.
Thespian's Stage
See Vesuva. Does not come in tapped, which is nice, and can tap for colorless on its own.
Swamps
The more the merrier! Second best land in the deck. Between Crypt Ghast, Caged Sun, Lashwrithe, Mutilate, and Cabal Coffers, we really love our swamps.
I'm a big fan of synergy, so that's why I decided to go with the Zombie Tribal theme (instead of monoblack good stuff) to this deck. I saw ti as the most synergistic and effective way to build a Gisa deck without compromising on key pieces. That being said, I am very open to suggestions. This is the first deck I have really created from the ground up, as there was very little research I could for her relative to more popular commanders. It is my hope that this list is helpful to promote ideas of your own. Please let me know what you think!
EDIT:
12/1/15
Out: Phyrexian Delver, Thousand-Year Elixir
In: Nantoku Husk, Puppeteer Clique
I realized that Nantoku Husk provided some amazing hidden synnergy with Gisa - basically allows us to double our board power on the turn we sac things to him with Gisa, as most of our zombies are already a 2/2. Also adds nice resiliency and redundancy in the form of a sac outlet, and he's a zombie! I added Puppeteer Clique to enable the infinite combo with Mikaeus now that we have 3 unconditional sac outlets in the deck. The substitution over Phyrexian Delver also works very well because often our graveyard will only have a few things in it and not much worth grabbing, and Clique is a flier that grabs us more sac fodder for Gisa.
EDIT: 12/2/2015
OUT: Risen Executioner, Corpse Harvester, Dictate of Erebos
IN: Phyrexian Altar, Thornbite Staff, Black Market
After the previous edit, I realized that I should diversify my win conditions, and that I had been grievously overlooking both Phyrexian Altar and Thornbite Staff's non-combo value. Coincidentally, they also go infinite with Gisa, for both infinite Mana and infinite zombies.
Black Market is a spell I've always wanted to include but never have. However after some analysis I decided it was worth testing over Dictate of Erebos.
My OUTs are because they are slow, expensive, and have relatively smaller impact to my game plan than my INs. I am still looking for a slot for Phyrexian Ghoul, Zombie Trailblazer, and I would love to get Vampire Nighthawk in as an extra combo with Hatred.