MTG Salvation

I was looking into maybe an edh deck for Karlov of the Ghost Council, but I might instead prefer a 65 card Emperor's support deck. What's below is the first draft, was looking for feedback outside of my meta. Tear it apart if you wish, I'm not married to any card, but did still want to rock with Karlov firing off exiles like crazy.

Karlov works best in multiplayer with repeatable lifegain such as Soul Warden & Soul's Attendant. You want turn 1 repeatable lifegain (Authority of the Consuls is good too), turn 2 Karlov, turn 3 swing for a bunch and/or remove the biggest threat on the board. I have 2 Karlov decks that share a lot of cards but do different things. One has red & us a Norin the Wary, Impact Tremors, Purphoros, God of the Forge deck where Karlov gets ridiculously gigantic if you get Norin & a Soul Sister out, and the other is more a straight up life gain deck that also uses Ajani's Pridemate & wins with Felidar Sovereign if it doesn't just push combat damage through. If you're going to use extort, I'd go with Thrull Parasite over Knight of Obligation because you want to be extorting early & often, if the extort guys ever swing that's just a bonus.

A mate of mine plays a Karlov deck that's Black-White-Green for Forgotten Ancient as well as all the typical white weenies.
HE seems to enjoy it, but to be honest I can't remember what else from green is in there.

Quote from chiefdrana »

Karlov works best in multiplayer with repeatable lifegain such as Soul Warden & Soul's Attendant. You want turn 1 repeatable lifegain (Authority of the Consuls is good too), turn 2 Karlov, turn 3 swing for a bunch and/or remove the biggest threat on the board. I have 2 Karlov decks that share a lot of cards but do different things. One has red & us a Norin the Wary, Impact Tremors, Purphoros, God of the Forge deck where Karlov gets ridiculously gigantic if you get Norin & a Soul Sister out, and the other is more a straight up life gain deck that also uses Ajani's Pridemate & wins with Felidar Sovereign if it doesn't just push combat damage through. If you're going to use extort, I'd go with Thrull Parasite over Knight of Obligation because you want to be extorting early & often, if the extort guys ever swing that's just a bonus.

Maybe:
+4 Thrull Parasite
+4 Tithe Drinker
-4 Knight of Obligation
-4 Vampire Nighthawk

Ups count to twelve extort sources, and drops curve. Is Blood Baron good here, as a late game ender? Since I have wing meatshields as the Emperor, I really don't need to worry about combat. I could up the extort to 16. Even so, Blood Baron might be good as a beater. On the fence about him.

Quote from slave »

HE seems to enjoy it, but to be honest I can't remember what else from green is in there.

Uh oh, is Karlov by himself oppressive to play against? With prison effects, I could see it being heavy-handed.

This my my current Karlov build:


It does quite well draining the table and having a massive life total. Karlov can one shot people if he lives long enough. He is mostly kill on sight though. If I were to build it differently I would splash red for things like Purphoros, god of the forge and Alesha, Who Smiles at Death. Kambal, Consul of Allocation would be good here too.

Thanks to everyone's input, the decklist looks like this below, with 16 sources of extort and even a couple ways to bring back the little guys along with Karlov. The pontiffs should really supercharge the extortion, too. NOW I'M EXCITED.



Edited 11/21/17 to show latest list.

Unless your meta is just a bunch of creatures, I would definitely play Kambal if you are going the drain route. Some decks instantly fold to him if someone can't get rid of him, and if they do, it's almost always still a minimum 4 life swing in your favor. You are probably getting 2 counters for Karlov per each opponents turn until that happens though, and that's better than extorting once (especially for no mana investment).
Pontiff doesn't help you because there's only 6 creatures that don't already have extort. Extort is adding a mana to the cost of each spell, and this isn't a big mana black deck. Crypt Ghast would be much better if you want another extorter because it gives you some mana to play w/, but then you at least want 4 Godless Shrine, and it can get expensive. Even Basilica Screecher is much better than Pontiff though because he comes out quickly.

Actually, my meta does have a lot creatures, and if my Emperor Wings were getting too pummeled, I would send the little extorters out to the wings and let them die in combat before dropping Merciless Eviction to then Return to the Ranks. If I go Basilica Shrieker over the pontiffs, I will then swap out Obzedat for two more Return to the Ranks.

The main point in favor of the pontiffs is their size and they give extorters extra extort triggers (if I'm understanding it right with creatures with multiple instances of extort triggering separately). If so, two pontiffs out late game with one other creature would allow six extort triggers per spell. I would only want to cast a single spell per turn and then drain as much as the mana allows.

I see merits to both and I like both options. Your insights have been very good. I'll run some sims and see which is going to work best for the meta.

It's true multiple extorts trigger separately, but without an Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth, Cabal Coffers, Crypt Ghast build I don't see how you are generating enough mana to be casting 6 mana spells & extorting them multiple times. If you were generating that kind of mana, you might as well be playing Debt to the Deathless &/or Exsanguinate and ending the game.
You might consider Well of Lost Dreams or Yawgmoth's Bargain if running another Necropotence isn't an option because you don't want to miss any land drops.

A fair point, I haven't playtested anything. I may actually buy and try both options to see what works. Thanks for the feedback.

Well, I finally got my last two Karlovs. Goldfishing has revealed that Basilica Screecher is a better fit as Chiefdrana suggested. I'm also thinking that Concealed Courtyard is better than Desert. I've seen times that I don't have enough of a given color and those types of lands have always worked well for me. That would increase extort fuel.

An earlier poster ran Vault of the Archangel and Rogue's Passages over the deserts, I think that would help.
Plus I wonder if one or two Phyrexian Arenas would be a good addition.

Apart from those the deck looks a blast...!

Made a late change more for my meta than anything. Took out the Basilica Screechers and instead played Blood Baron of Vizkopa to transfer out to wings as support and a third possible wincon. In the Emperor's game we played, Karlov came out, exiled two creatures and stabilized my wing's elf deck that was gettin out-steamed by a rogues tribal. Gradually got to enough life to have a 10/10 Karlov, flip two Chalice of Life to the death side to kill the other wing, and start casting Blood Barons. I was slow on mana all game, so I couldn't get heavier extort triggers going, and Karlov had to siphon mana for triggers to instead pop creatures, but he did his thing to kill about four creatures and a player while I worked on the 2nd and 3rd wincons before the enemy Emperor resigned.

Thanks for your interest and feedback on this deck, it helped form a fun deck that had a good showing today.

Quote from Xyx »

Blood Baron of Vizkopa sounds awkward in Emperor. You transfer your 10/10 and it becomes a 4/4.

Oops, forgot to reply that our group has played by modified rules for some time. Under those changes, players keep control of their creatures when they march and attack during their turn instead of the player the marched creatures reside in. Were it strict Emperor rules, I wouldn't use the Blood Barons.

A 1x Triskaidekaphobia in a deck like this will create some wonderful memories, trust me..

"Hey friend...what'd you say your life was at, again?" "Oh. 13, you say?"



We have an L2 in our group and he has gotten every one of us at some point with this.. It's pretty good. You're playing against an Extort deck and it can really sneak up on you. I mean, it's way easier to get someone to 13 than to get them to zero with Extort, right?