Given that you've been retiring other decks, I hope you're not planning to also retire Toshiro...
I agree with your assessment of the Pontiff.
I dont have any intentions of putting away Tohsiro any time soon. I find him too interesting still. I had like a year in which it was my main deck I would run. I really like the deck as a whole and dont have any intentions of it going anywhere. That said, I have been distracted by Modern and Standard lately not to mention a few new decks have been taking some of my attention away from my existing decks.
Jenara - It was a case of for the last several years probably bordering three years at the time I really had not played the deck more than 5-10 times a year. It would come out for like a game every 4 months it felt like and that was just because I felt like I owed myself to play it. I really enjoyed the commander but for like two years before that I played the deck sometimes exclusively every week. It was a great deck but it was hard to really change it anymore after you test it that extensively for that long. People also over reacted when they saw me playing it based on some bad experiences my playgroups had had with it lol.
Marton - It was a similar case to Jenara. When I first started playing Marton the meta was a lot younger and they were not accustomed to a deck as focused on just mashing the win button. I liked it but it was a deck that relied somewhat on it being a bit of everyone focusing each other equally but the more people knew me and my Marton deck the harder it was to get through random removal. The deck still played quite well but its harder when you get multiple people beating you up all game. It was a combination of elements I guess that got me to put Marton away which included me playing a few other red decks at the time as at one point I had Lovisa Coldeyes and Daretti, Scrap Savant also together with Marton.
Thrun - I didnt like the tactics that I needed to use to really make him feel viable. Green also doesn't have the best access to stax / LD tactics so it made it a bit challenging. I dont mind hexproof commanders but he is probably the most challenging of the playable hexproof commanders.
As a whole, I often have other objectives which usually include similar feeling or colored commanders when I retire a deck or it has to be a long time of me not really playing a commander. Toshiro doesn't really have any competition for his spot as most black legends I find boring and he is so flavorful that I think it would be challenging for me to really replace him. Lin Sivvi will never get axed either regardless of how much / little I play her because of my sweet alters not to mention the fact that so few of the cards in her deck are all that playable elsewhere. Toshiro plans to stay as well more because he has proved himself and I just freaking love the deck.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
It is an interesting card. I really don't do a lot of attacking though as if I am attacking its because I have a creature under Corpse Dance, the board is essentially empty, or I possibly have like a Wurmcoil Engine or a Titan. In most cases I am not worried about gaining unblockable but its possible to combine it with Hatred if you want to run both for an amusing potential commander kill out of nowhere.
When it comes to defending yourself with it, I would rather have Darkness.
I ended up playing a 5 player game Tuesday night. It was... not a good game lol.
Starting somewhere arround turn 3-4 someone dropped a Grafdigger's Cage. The turn after that went away we got a Relic of Progenitus into play by another player who slow rolled it hard. I ate a Bojuka Bog and a Withered Wretch also that game. The other black deck and I staired each other down with Erebos, God of the Dead in play essentially the whole game and I had milled my Karn Liberated who got exiled. I milled through my Gary and he got exiled as well as right after my Kokusho died he also got exiled. It was a really really bad setup of heavy grave hate and hate on lifegain. Cabal Coffers got played by both black decks and answered the following turn by Strip Mine effects.
The game ended by the other black deck casting an Exsanguinate for like 30 and one of the mono blue players played a Commandeer hijacking it and winning instead. It was.... a bad experience lol. I was constantly drawing and not finding the things I wanted. I ended the game with a full hand of creature hate but outside of a single voltron deck nobody was really pushing creatures. I cast Toshiro at 11 mana which is an indication of how little I was doing. I was sort of casting him to be able to block with my Erebos, God of the Dead if need be lol.
Just thought I would reflect on a painful game lol. The opposing Erebos, God of the Dead was probably the worst of everything as it cut me off from gaining the life that would have kept me in the game. It also kept me from drawing as hard as I would have otherwise wanted to. Lifegain hate + grave hate is a mean mixture for this deck.
Just sort of doing a first glance at BFZ. At this point spoilers for the set have just started but there is enough interesting things I felt I might do a partial review.
Oblivion Sower it has a wonky sort of on cast ability. It on average should ramp a single land off its own ability assuming nobody has anything in exile. Its sort of amusing but it doesnt reanimate nicely in that its trigger does not happen again on rez. Its interesting but I don't think its strong.
Hedron Archive its an artifact stone. Mashing two Mind Stones together does not make it as good as Mind Stone. Its at least more reasonable than Dreamstone Hedron for most decks but it doesnt really interact with much for this deck.
Defiant Bloodlord its Sanguine Bond with legs. This deck can work with creatures but not really with enchantments. This deck also gains sort of a lot of life so.... its interesting. The idea of taking Crypt Incursion or Gray Merchant and turning them into a kill effect seems sort of amusing.
Blight Herder its sort of an amusing effect but the fact that its an on cast effect and that it requires returning things from exile sort of makes it really situational.
Ruinous Path its like a bad Hero's Downfall. Its an interesting option but being sorcery speed really sort of kills it.
Titan's Presence wow I love the effect but sadly its requirement is something that I really cannot achieve reliably enough to run it. Its a great effect but the required reveal is just not going to happen.
Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger wait... he doesn't shuffle on hitting grave???? He exiles two things on cast???? This guy could compete with an effect like Karn Liberated potentially for a spot in the deck. The fact that he is a creature who does not shuffle means that I can reanimate him (not for as good of value as his ability is on cast) but still, he has an impressive set of stats on him. It is an interesting rendition.
Just sort of doing a first glance at BFZ. At this point spoilers for the set have just started but there is enough interesting things I felt I might do a partial review.
Oblivion Sower it has a wonky sort of on cast ability. It on average should ramp a single land off its own ability assuming nobody has anything in exile. Its sort of amusing but it doesnt reanimate nicely in that its trigger does not happen again on rez. Its interesting but I don't think its strong.
Hedron Archive its an artifact stone. Mashing two Mind Stones together does not make it as good as Mind Stone. Its at least more reasonable than Dreamstone Hedron for most decks but it doesnt really interact with much for this deck.
Defiant Bloodlord its Sanguine Bond with legs. This deck can work with creatures but not really with enchantments. This deck also gains sort of a lot of life so.... its interesting. The idea of taking Crypt Incursion or Gray Merchant and turning them into a kill effect seems sort of amusing.
Blight Herder its sort of an amusing effect but the fact that its an on cast effect and that it requires returning things from exile sort of makes it really situational.
Ruinous Path its like a bad Hero's Downfall. Its an interesting option but being sorcery speed really sort of kills it.
Titan's Presence wow I love the effect but sadly its requirement is something that I really cannot achieve reliably enough to run it. Its a great effect but the required reveal is just not going to happen.
Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger wait... he doesn't shuffle on hitting grave???? He exiles two things on cast???? This guy could compete with an effect like Karn Liberated potentially for a spot in the deck. The fact that he is a creature who does not shuffle means that I can reanimate him (not for as good of value as his ability is on cast) but still, he has an impressive set of stats on him. It is an interesting rendition.
Ok.... I can get hyped on that. I play Karn Liberated accepting that 90% of the time he just dies to random beats after playing him and using him once. This allows us to use this at instant speed and hit lands or whatever we want. I.... am excited for this.
Looking at some of the other random stuff from this set:
Breaker of Armies an ok budget sort of a creature. Its nice that he has a natural lure effect on him and he is big so he can mash into defenses and kill utility creatures. It also makes people attack out with utility creatures potentially to keep them alive which amuses me. It seems... not ideal though.
Void Winnower it stops half of all spells from being cast and it keeps people from defending with tokens which is decent. It can be reanimated just fine as well so its... interesting. It also stops a lot of answers from being cast so... interesting. Like... every clone that sees play is also even mana so its hard to copy.
Ob Nixilis Reignited his abilities.... are just sort of ok. I like that he has a kill effect on him as it has synergy with the deck but I honestly dont want a vulnerable Phyrexian Arena as a walker. I wouldn't buy one for commander and if you open one, I would sell it assuming you dont intend to use it in standard.
Mortuary Mire budget friendly land. Its not amazing but if you have a budget landbase its a nice effect since you probably will be running mostly basics already anyways.
Overall, I am excited for Scour from Existence and I think that Void Winnower is a strong reanimation target. Most decks wont care for Scour from Existence but seeing that we care about instants I think it makes it really good here. I almost never get Karn to last a whole turn anyways.
Ok, looks like we have some fairly sweet last second cards to consider for Toshiro. Random rogue instants are always cool by me.
Grave Birthing - this card is a somewhat cheap cantrip that also gives us a blocker or a means of ramp. The exile clause can be used when someone else is trying to reanimate outside of their own graveyard as well as many people will agree to exile the rez target. I think its a fantastic card as it doesnt strictly need to be saved for in response to something. Getting another card plus a one time ramp or blocker sounds good to me.
Grip of Desolation - exiles a LAND!!! It also exiles a creature and is colorless so it gets past protection from black. Its a little spendy to do but the two effects both seem very interesting. I am less sold on it than I am with Grave Birthing but I still think this is a great effect as its normally outside of our color scheme to exile, dodges protection, land destruction, and it fits the theme of being an instant. Something else to note but you can use this card through an Iona, Shield of Emeria choice of black which is cool.
I think Grave Birthing sounds fantastic. I think the grip is probably worth testing but due to its mana cost I am less certain of it. I will try to do a full set review later.
Alright, time to get my Battle for Zendikar set review out of the way.
Defiant Bloodlord Its sort of half of a combo. When you pair it with an effect like Gray Merchant of Asphodel, Kokusho, the Evening Star, Crypt Incursion or so many other lifegain effects in deck. The problem is that if I dont have a good source of life gain its a very expensive flyer with not great stats. I am generally not very fond of effects that require a second specific type of mechanic in order to function. If my commander was a source of lifegain it might be a different story.
Drana, Liberator of Malakir I love the flavor and feel of this card. If it is worth running though, it would be in some sort of a token based build which this deck is not. Her pump is slow and not very large so I feel like for black it would probably need to be a deck built arround her and it would be a snowball style of token deck which would probably not recover well from wraths. Still, I really enjoy the flavor here but I dont see her as being very playable in the 99.
Grave Birthing I get to draw a card, poke at someone's graveyard, get a token that can be used for ramp, and possibly deny someone their rez effect all for 3 mana at instant speed? Sign me up. This is like a really odd Cremate effect with a little extra tagged on fun. I love cremate effects and I love the design here as its just really cool and still fairly affordable for all the things it does. This is probably one of the cards I am most looking froward to from this set which seems really odd to say but its a really cool utility effect that covers a lot of bases for little mana at instant speed.
Grip of Desolation it chews through indestructible creatures as well as serving as land destruction. Its also devoid so it can get through protection from black as well as Iona, Shield of Emeria for black. The only real concern for me is that its a 6 mana instant. Six mana for a spot removal is really a lot to pay but the fact that it gets a land too is sort of hard to evaluate. I really love everything except for the casting cost on this. I feel like this spell sort of wobbled between five and seven mana and they picked six for it. I love and sort of hate it at the same time.
Guul Draz Overseer this card is sort of another swarm based tactic. This deck does not swarm attack so its designed more for a token build which is tough since it has more synergy being mono black but mono black is tough to do for tokens.
Ob Nixilis Reignited I love the idea of more Phyrexian Arena effects but walkers need to have fast impact and Phyrexian Arena as an effect tends to be very slow to get its value as it usually takes 2-3 triggers to get your value back out of the three mana enchantment I would say you would need 3-5 triggers from Ob Nix to really have him pay for the 5 mana sorcery cost he has. Walkers are weak in this format and usually die quickly. He also builds up to his ult before the time I would be satisfied with the work he has done so a lot of people will want to keep him from ulting as its essentially game over for whoever you target with his ult. I also do not like his -3 ability as its something I have enough access to already in black.
Smothering Abomination its not a terrible effect but it belongs more in a creature sac build which this is not.
Vampiric Rites it reminds me of Infernal Tribute to be honest. I dont run Infernal Tribute so I am still sort of indifferent on this effect which resembles it quite a bit. Its nice that its cheaper to drop but it also cannot sacrifice as many things and it costs 1B instead of 2. The small lifegain seems a bit minor as well. I think both have their own merrits but I havent run either really in here because I usually prefer a free sac outlet or better draw. These sort of effects tend to need tokens and or lots more creatures built into the lists in my opinion.
Zulaport Cutthroat it is bad Blood Artist which means its still decent but not in this build. You really need to be pushing tokens and sac heavy to make this sort of thing add up. I ran a lot of these sort of effects back when I ran Balthor the Defiled as a commander and it would have great synergy there where you are mass rezing and rotating creatures in general.
Hedron Archive its a slight improvement on Sisay's Ring. The real issue is that a lot of my big mana stuff really relies on the number of lands I have / number of swamps so this isnt really ramping me into my game all that well and its not giving me big mana. I feel like I am more likely to run earlier ramp or move to Gauntlet of Might / Caged Sun / Nirkana Revenant for more mana generation.
Breaker of Armies he forces creatures to die in combat which is sort of nice. He is also a reanimation target and makes people panic about creatures they leave to defend themselves with. I keep looking at this guy and thinking to myself that he is sort of cool but I also feel like he isn't quite good enough.
Oblivion Sower its land ramp which I like but he is expensive to cast and I cant abuse his on cast effect with most of my renamation as I primarily rez into play instead of to hand.
Scour from Existence ohhh boy this is nice. I have always sort of hated Karn Liberated because 95% of the time I cast him as a sorcery speed version of this. Karn never lives for me and his timing sucks as well as his lack of interaction with the deck. I can also abuse this with Toshiro which is just great.
Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger there are a lot of things going for this guy. 1) he doesn't shuffle my graveyard if he dies which means we can rez him easier and he isn't just throwing my graveyard away 2) he has twin exile effects on cast which means we can deal with artifacts, enchantments, lands, and indestructible things with him. His ability on attack isn't huge but it screws with a lot of toolbox decks and if left alone he will add up. He does also still have good protection with indestructibility plus we run some sac outlets to dodge Swords to Plowshares if we want.
Void Winnower it stops opponents from casting half of all spells which is sort of nice. It can be reanimated just fine as well. My concern is if someone steals it I dont know what my answer is as I feel like most of my answers are even mana cost cards. Depending on how much of this I start seeing I might have to add Murderous Cut to the deck.
Blighted Fen man, that sacrifice effect is expensive to cast. I dont know where I stand on this right now but I can see its uses. I think its a great budget effect for anyone trying to build up a Toshiro deck as it will be very cheap and most budget decks probably wont have a lot of non swamp lands to interfere with Cabal Coffers. I feel like if I want to add utility lands at this point I have to replace utility effects to add them because I dont like hurting my Cabal Coffers further than I have with my utility lands already.
Mortuary Mire another seeming good option for a cheap budget land to run in a budget Toshiro list. Its essentially a one time Volrath's Stronghold. I wouldn't run it outside of a budget list that doesn't have a lot of utility lands.
I feel like I got away with an unusual amount of interesting cards for Toshiro. Most of my other decks just sort of wave their hands at the additions from this set but I think there is a lot of promise with the cards from this set for this deck. Currently from the new cards the ones I am really considering right now seem to be: Grave Birthing, Grip of Desolation, Scour from Existence, and Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger.
While I am at it, I feel like I want to move on some of these cards. For now, I opted not to add Grip of Desolation to my list but its on the radar as an interesting effect for me still.
DECK CHANGES:
Insidious Dreams -> Grave Birthing I have honestly had some issues with Insidious Dreams in that it is card disadvantage. Its still sort of an expensive to cast tutor and it seems more useful for setting up infinite combos. I love all of the things that Grave Birthing does and its positive card advantage instead of negative.
Karn Liberated -> Scour from Existence I have had a lot of issues with Karn and he doesn't interact with the deck that well. Scour gives me the same effect but gives me better timing and the ability to flash it back off of Toshiro.
Wurmcoil Engine -> Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger so far, I haven't been too impressed with the Wurmcoil Engine. Too often I find it to not really deal with issues that come up. Eldrazi, flyers, Erebos, and so many other things can really be a pain while playing this deck so it feels like its been a bit of a situation where the Wurmcoil Engine is decent but not really amazing. Ulamog on the other hand gives me more reach to removing problem threats that black often has a hard time with.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
Played a fairly good game last night. I didn't see any of the new cards really as I saw Scour from Existence in my opener but it went back in the deck to try to get more lands.
The red deck ended up ramping hard into nothing so he played a T3 Planar Chaos which lasted three turns. The other mono black deck ended up having played a Bitterblossom just before this and we mostly just twiddled our thumbs through the Chaos. I ended up doing not much the first few turns but I played a Memory Jar on curve which was the third turn of the Planar Chaos as I still had a lot of good draw in hand otherwise. On the third turn the Planar Chaos popped and the red player played his Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker that he fetched up off of his Goblin Matron. I could tell he was going to abuse the heck out of a goblin army. I cracked the Memory Jar on my turn and put The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale and Phyrexian Arena into play. The Tabernacle really cut the red deck off from its token plan and it cut through the bitterblossom tokens quickly. I took a few little pokes for it but it slowed my opponents down a lot.
I played a Crypt Ghast to get up some mana and lifegain. The next turn the other black player tried to rotate some tokens with Hell's Caretaker and I used an extorted Crypt Incursion to cut him off and gain 15 HP. The mono blue player was slowly playing some beater creatures and the mono red deck was scowling at my Tabernacle as he didn't have much to do thanks to it.
I played a Kothophed, Soul Hoarder and he started drawing me some cards as The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale does its thing to bitterblossom tokens. I draw some cards and push some things around for about a turn. The mono black deck starts to sort of put a lot of things into play though which seems a little concerning to me. The red player plays a Chandra Ablaze and wheels thinking he is hurting me. I still have Phyrexian Arena + Kothophed, Soul Hoarder so I think its sort of amusing. I drop an Oblivion Stone and pass turn. The black player attacks me with something sort of minor but I dont really care so I pop the Oblivion Stone and draw 9 cards from Kothophed, Soul Hoarder.
My opponents are slow to recover being that they got Chandra wheeled so they have small hands. The blue player has some big random unblockable beater come out of suspend. I dont really care and he swings it somewhere else. I play a Solemn Simulacrum + Necromancy a Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker and copy my simulacrum.
My opponents are slow to play. The red player had a lot of artifact mana and not much for lands so he is slow coming back. The black player is mostly defending himself and the blue player just dropping random fatty creatures. I play a Rune-Scarred Demon with Kiki ready to make another. I do it at the end of my opponents turns and get Gray Merchant of Asphodel + Kiki a copy with the ability on the stack. I end up pulling like 20+ life off of everyone. I also happen to have an Altar of Dementia + Wake the Dead so I end up doming my opponents for another 25 or so with a follow up Gray Merchant + Kokusho.
Corpse Augur its a creature that potentially draws us a good number of cards. Keep in mind that he is best when you consider having sacrifice outlets ans using creature rez. I like that his mana cost and power are both reasonable together so he can play as a blocker for us especially when backed with a sac outlet on demand. If you dont have sac outlets up just keep in mind that theft and exile removal will be a bit of a concern. Overall I think this is a very solid consideration for a creature with draw in toshiro. It fits a lot of the themes we want as a whole.
Deadly Tempest its nothing to really write home about. It potentially hurts token decks more but its an expensive to cast wrath at sorcery speed so its nothing I am really excited about. Its.... ok if you are building a budget Toshiro deck but I think even then there are wraths I prefer over this. When playing budget sometimes you just have to play with what you have though.
Dread Summons Its a cool effect. The downside being that its a sorcery. I dont think I would really run this to be totally honest.
Scourge of Nel Toth its a decent creature but it doesn't really fit the playstyle that Toshiro normally uses. Its more of something that fits the tactics that a grave pact token / reanimator deck would use.
Thief of Blood so probably the biggest thing to note on this guy is that he outright kills all planeswalkers in play when he enters. I think as it is though he is really sort of a meta call. I think there are times he could to tons of work and times where he does absolutely nothing. I think the normal experience with him would be closer to doing little to nothing. I like the flavor of the card but its definitely situational.
Wretched Confluence ohhhhhh wow. I can draw 3 at instant speed for 5 (which I will mention that Ambition's Cost / Ancient Craving only cost one less at sorcery speed). The versatility of this card is just like hitting the jackpot for Toshiro. The -2/-2 will often kill utility commanders and enable flashback of other spells and recovering creatures to hand can mean dodging graveyard hate or just being a nice pickup instead of drawing a card. I really think this is probably the best card we have gotten possibly since Gray Merchant for this deck. It fits what we want to be doing in a lot of angles as I think all three of the modes are very very good.
Blade of Selves I think its a good effect but remember that you really need to be pushing your creature count high enough to make it something you can use. I am always hesitant to use equipment without a consistent creature plan. This equipment is also primarily useful on ETB / Dies creatures so some creatures like Stinkweed Imp and just a ton of good creatures I am running dont use this well. I think I counted like 8 creatures in my list I would actually want to put this on. So while I think this is a really good equipment, keep in mind the number of creatures you would want to put it on as I think you really need to be shooting for 15-20+ targets for this to be good enough to run.
Sandstone Oracle its a cool little draw effect and its on legs. Unfortunately, its not very good draw from the perspective of playing black.
Thought Vessel its an ok mana stone that has a nice little tagged on perc. I generally dont worry too much about discarding surplus cards as I always get to pick them so I dont value no max hand size that much unless I intend to Necropotence for 20 or something silly.
Command Beacon its sort of wonky in general. I think its designed for commanders that you normally cant cast from command zones. I dont really see much of a reason to run it outside of those commanders and even then its sort of gimmicky.
So...... what does that really leave us with. Wretched Confluence is by far my favorite card from the commander 2015 set for Toshiro and I think Corpse Augur is very respectable. I plan to try to work both of them into my deck for testing with high hopes for both. I welcome discussion of these cards and or the list if anyone has suggestions for changes or wants to add anything to other card options here.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
So I had a decent game last night which I ended with a combination of Gray Merchant of Asphodel (10 devotion) + Crypt Rat. The real MVP of the night was a Coffin Queen though that hit play on like turn 5 and never died though lol.
One thing I really wanted to mention is that if you can hijack a Oracle of Mul Daya and pair it with Necropotence its super silly. I was exiling one card off my library at a time until I would hit lands. Its like.... way better than Sylvan Library with it lol.
Coffin Queen not dying + Attrition was really good. I was rezing creatures and shooting them off every turn. I was even cycling Oracle of Mul Daya as removal. It was great when I dropped a Grim Return on a Atarka, World Render that I had just killed with Attrition and then forced that player to use spot removal on his own dragon instead of my Coffin Queen because of how much I was doing to him each turn.
My opponent almost came back in the end with a Warstorm Surge but I killed him in response to some triggers he needed with Crypt Rats. It was a good game and it goes to show what a Coffin Queen can do if it goes unanswered.
Ok, I have been sort of lazy about outlining this change but I guess I will do it now. I did this one early on but I have yet to ever see the card in like 5 games so its hard to really say how I feel about the change so far.
DECK CHANGES:
Null Profusion -> Wretched Confluence Null Profusion is a great card but it has a number of issues which is that it forces you to stop being reactive and just cycle your hand. It also leaves you in a bit of an odd spot if it gets answered quickly or if you get it with other card draw as its a good one for if you haven't been drawing but less good if you are seeing your draw. I like essentially all of the modes on this instant and it fits the theme of the deck. The idea of flashing it back or enabling other flashbacks with it just sounds so good. I have had it in deck for a while now I just cant ever seem to find it unfortunately. In the end, I felt that the confluence was more on theme with the instants side of toshiro and had more versatility. It in a vacuum is a weaker draw mechanic but its not only draw and its more synergistic with the commander.
Doing a partial review of Oath of the Gatewatch. I have enough things that I am excited enough about that I wanted to sort of run through what we have so far and what is on my radar.
Endbringer - so, the abilities on this are a little interesting. It untaps itself every turn though and stat for the mana wise its not bad. What I like though is just the random Toshiro support that it could lend in randomly killing things no command to enable flashing back. I have 11 lands in my list as it stands that can provide colorless mana to use his other abilities and disabling a big attacker form coming at me or drawing cards all seems totally playable. I like that it can play offense + defense as well because of the extra untapping. It seems like a good creature who has the potential to feed well into Toshiro's abilities as well.
Kozilek, the Great Distortion Draw, huge beater, counterspells, and it doesn't shuffle into my deck super randomly??? It seems like it could be really strong potentially.
Warping Wail hard sorcery counter / chump block as needed / ramp option. It seems like something I wont ignore. I wish the spot removal was a little stronger but even then, it seems like a strong optional spell for being a colorless instant.
Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet so, I love everything that he does other than the fact that he turns off Toshiro's flashback ability. He works well with the removal in deck though and his abilities / stats all seem fairly solid. I like that its grave hate as well. I am interested by him even if he is kind of anonbo with Toshiro because honestly I dont always push Toshiro and he is more of a proactive value instead of reactive. He seems cool at least. I wouldnt dismiss him even if he is bad combined with Toshiro.
Sifter of Skulls its sort of a sac based creature heavy style of creature. It reminds me a lot of Pawn of Ulamog but it makes better tokens and has better stats. Its not for this deck but I think its a decent card.
So.... what am I actually looking at right now as it stands as possibles? I would say all of the ones I listed other than Sifter of Skulls are cards I will be looking at right now as it stands.
So, all of Oath of the Gatewatch has been spoiled now. I will do a full set review now. Unofrtunately not a lot has changed since my partial review.
Oath of the Gatewatch Set Review:
Endbringer he enables toshiro with his ping removal, he can swing in essentially with vigilance, draw cards, deter attackers, and tap flyers / evasives. Really I feel like he does just tons of freaking work for a responsive deck like this. I am really kind of excited to try him out for myself as his potential seems great to me. He seems like a really good reanimation target as he is just a good value over time creature for this sort of deck.
Kozilek, the Great Distortion draw, counterspells, huge backside, and he does not make me shuffle my graveyard away when he dies. He seems good overall but his mana cost is still a concern. I feel like he falls a little bit into the same consideration as some other effects like Ulamog and or Ugin where they are expensive to drop. Kozilek's cast trigger is probably slightly inferior to Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger's cast trigger for this deck since we have access to good draw but I think Kozilek makes up for that by having a much better in play ability. He is a little more fragile though as he lacks the indestructibility. Its a tough call to be honest as it would come down to how long you expect either one to stay in play.
Matter Reshaper its amusing. Its almost always still a card draw but I dont really have much for value generation in my own creatures dying, I am a spellslinger deck as well. It seems kind of cool but not quite the right fit for this deck.
Reality Smasher its a random beater card. Its stats / cost / haste + trample seem decent. Strict beaters are rarely good in this format though and it does not fit the playstyle of this deck.
Spatial Contortion its bad removal. Its colorless though which is cool but for a black deck its nothing new.
Thought-Knot Seer its kind of cool hand hate as the opponent does not get that card back. Even then though, it only hits one opponent so its sort of similar to a Vendilion Clique in some ways in its effect which I have never much liked for this format.
Warping Wail an option of one shot ramp in the eldrazi token / chump blocker / sorcery counter. I really like the feel of this card but I dont know if sorcery countering is too narrow or not. I mean, countering a Tooth and Nail with it in a mono black deck would feel super amazing. On the other hand that is really kind of narrow. It might be something I would have to sit on for a while to really use and it seems a bit challenging to flash it back well as it would require me to have a spot removal plus the mana to cast both at the right time. I like the idea of it I just dont know if it quite does what I need it to.
Bearer of Silence - all around its a bad Fleshbag Marauder. The ability is on cast, it costs extra to trigger, and it only hits one opponent. It has flying but it cant block so its really designed more for standard / limited purposes more than commander. Its design makes it an aggressive black aggro style of creature for 60 card formats.
Corpse Churn its self mill + a Disentomb effect at instant speed. Its... really not that bad when you look at the option of flashing it back later. You would want to try to get a heavier creature count to really support this style of tactic though. Milling yourself alone isn't a very good effect but a mill + recovery of a creature in one cheap effect, it could be ok to be honest. The toshiro synergy is good and it has good synergy with creatures as well so it seems like it could be a consideration that wouldn't be terrible potentially.
Dread Defiler - Its expensive to drop and the ability is target opponent instead of each opponent. I would probably consider it if it was each opponent but between the cost of it, the cost to activate, and being single target, it all adds up to what I feel is not such a great card.
Grasp of Darkness - its nothing new. It doesnt hit hard enough in general considering we can usually kill most anything for 2 mana I wouldnt want a two mana non scaling spot removal. Its ok limited fodder.
Inverter of Truth its a cool effect but its very all in for what is ultimately just an efficient beater. Its a trap.
Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet - its got some bad synergy with Toshiro as while they are both in play, he will disable Toshiro from ever triggering but the upside is that his value is quite good. I think he has some real potential to the point I think he could be worth testing.
Kozilek's Translator thats an amusing ability. Unfortunately its got bad stats for the mana as well as a limitation of once a turn. Its still possible to run it as between your turn and opponents turns it should give 1-2 mana a turn but since it only drops on turn 5 and isn't a very good body, its kind of a lot of work for what you get. I feel like its kind of a cheap budget Crypt Ghast but still not very good.
Oblivion Strike ahhhhhh sorcery speed 4 mana removal. If it was an instant I would at least look at it for the devoid exile but overall its just bad because its slow and expensive.
Unnatural Endurance I love these effects but I never get arround to playing them. Its a cool effect and it can result in some cool Toshiro blocks as well as being cheap removal that can push you through a wrath or spot removal potentially. When it comes to using these sort of tricks the problem is that anyone who has another trick usually trumps this effect.
Mirrorpool it seems like it could be playable for the either clone effect or spell twinning. I think its a cool effect and in general I run enough colorless lands to pull the colorless end of it off.
So, I guess I was a little grumpy when we got the last commons / uncommons and there wasnt really much of anything else I was interested in. Last set I was pleasantly surprised by some of the chaff they dropped in last second where this set was less of that. I will say though there seem to be quite a few cards I would consider this set though so thats a good indicator. Endbringer, Kozilek, the Great Distortion, Warping Wail, Corpse Churn, Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet, and Mirrorpool are all things I would consider to be worth considerations in a Toshiro list.
Well that concludes my set review. I will see what I can do about getting some of those cards for testing. Feel free to let me know if anyone gets any experience with the new stuff.
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I apologize for it being so long since I dropped a review or update. I have had a lot of new decks and updates and toshiro has not had much to work with in recent sets since BFZ.
Eldritch Moon Review:
Collective Brutality - its a sorcery and to be honest I am not overly fond of any of the modes for commander. The -2/-2 to a creature is probably the strongest of them for commander but it cant be repeated without being flashed back. In the end its a sorcery and its power seems a little low for commander.
Liliana, the Last Hope I do like the -2 ability but honestly she doesn't have much loyalty and I would want this ability to be something I could maintain or at least do it more from the get go. It is cool that she is cheap to drop but I would want to be able to use her -2 ability more than once in a row because her +1 ability is a bit lackluster.
Oath of Liliana the ETB is nice, but honestly we have no way to abuse it making something like Fleshbag Marauder who is a creature and thus leaves us with options to abuse it. I think this is potentially a cool enchantment themed deck card but it doesnt fit this build.
Succumb to Temptation instant speed 3 mana Sign in Blood? Seems good to me. It might cost one more but the potential to flash it back makes it all worthwhile to me.
Tree of Perdition its kind of like a slower Sorin Markov effect but its a creature who can defend you and or be rezed. Its interesting but its not the kind of effect I really want.
Voldaren Pariah / Abolisher of Bloodlines I really like the transformation trigger effect but sacrificing three creatures sounds difficult to manage. I dont think it quite fits here but I think its a good solid card for decks that might have sacrifice or token strategies in black. Cool add, it just doesn't quite fit here.
Geier Reach Sanitarium its sort of like a cheaper Bazaar of Baghdad that helps opponents a little bit but also allows you to fill your graveyard or cycle off redundant effects or set up a graveyard for a rez or throw out a situational card that is not going to be useful anytime soon. What I like about it is that it still taps for mana and that you can use it at instant speed as needed.
So, what is worth considering here? In my mind, Succumb to Temptation and Geier Reach Sanitarium are worth testing potentially. Both of these effects have some promise in this sort of deck.
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First off I want to say this one of my favorite primers and one of the most up to date one, so thank you. Also I was wonder your thoughts on these cards are, just curious.
Hatred - so my biggest problem with hatred is sort of a two fold thing. 1) if you are not in the lead then it means someone is doing lots of value / in the lead. Generally speaking when someone else is winning hard they have answers and or blockers which means you are talking about overcoming defenses plus casting hatred which is challanging to do. If you are in the lead, you are talking about half killing yourself to kill one player and even then it means getting past any defenses they have. Toshiro has no evasion so by default other than if they have utility creatures to defend themselves with its not hard to chump or block / kill toshiro when he is attacking. I tend to use him as a blocker for trash creatures rather than trying to attack with him because its not that hard to deal with him when he attacks. I think he "can" get there but at the same time I feel like Hatred is a cool little trick that might work once or twice but overall it seems like for the most part its very situational leaning towards not being that functional. I would personally rather see the Lashwrithe / Nightmare Lash for the continuous power / toughness buff. I like that hatred fits the whole "on theme" of toshiro but honestly I have had a hard time justifying half killing myself to cast it. Our commander on average will not connect for any real damage. I just dont see much room to consider it without evasion and size by default with our commander.
MirrorPool it seems ok. I have it in my Kozilek deck and I have tried it in a few other decks. I just honestly very rarely find it to be an effect that I use to be honest. Its a nice effect but especially in a deck like this every swamp has value with Cabal Coffers which is a high tutor target for me. I try to really put consideration into my non basic lands and limit which ones I justify and make sure its an effect that I often find myself needing. I think its fine to run but there are a lot of considerations to be had in non basic lands in a deck like this.
Grave Betrayal I dont like big expensive sorcery speed effects that do not have immediate interaction / value. Its a cool effect but I just see myself casting this and it immediately blowing up. I avoid effects that involve me tapping out for no effect when I can. Enchantments are also tricky because we dont have much of a way to interact with in a deck like this.
Jet Medallion Its in my list. I like it a lot. In my mind these medallions are ideal in a deck that plans to multi cast a lot of spells that would be cost reduced in a turn. I often find it generating 1-3 mana in a turn.
Tainted Strike I am not convinced on this effect. Its very rare to get 9 damage in a hit so you are realistically saying you need to get in with two 4+ powered guys and be able to cast + flashback this effect in the same time to kill someone. I dont like it because its all or nothing on if it does anything. If you put any poison counters on someone but do not kill them with it you are wasting damage. I dont like this effect because of that. To be totally honest, I kill a lot of people with Gray Merchant of Asphodel, Kokusho, the Evening Star, and Crypt Rats.
Do you have the most up to date list at all? Seems you last updated the OP back in Dec 15 Thanks
Its more or less the list still. There are a few small adjustments as I think I am running Endbringer and the new Succumb to Temptation. Its always been a little tricky to maintain the OP for me because my meta allows hybrid spells that you can pay either side of so my IRL list runs things like Oona, Queen of the Fae / Memory Plunder / Shadow of Doubt. Due to the fact that most players cannot play these in their meta I opted to exclude them from the primer but it also makes it a much harder time to organize the OP because my own list is not quite what it is.
For the most part though, there have not been a lot of adjustments from that. Most of this return to Innistrad block has been bad for this deck so most of the last things to consider were including some eldrazi and colorless spells.
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Newer to EDH and this guy looks awesome.
Is your deck still pretty up to date? I'd hate to outright net deck (and I don't have the money to) but, this seems to be the most up to date primer. Is there anything more recent you'd add?
Newer to EDH and this guy looks awesome.
Is your deck still pretty up to date? I'd hate to outright net deck (and I don't have the money to) but, this seems to be the most up to date primer. Is there anything more recent you'd add?
I probably would have gotten Succumb to Temptation into the list. I did a review for it but never got it into the OP it looks like. Other than that there hasnt been much for newer than that that I really would have considered. Its possible to consider some of the eldrazi that came out in the recent blocks too if thats your thing. The new eldrazi have the advantage of not shuffling away your graveyard so they work a little better with this strategy than the original ones who mostly shuffled your bin away.
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Hi, I am trying to build an extremely budget Toshiro deck (like $50), and I want to thank you for making this great resource about him. I have a few questions I'd like to ask before finalizing the deck.
Hi, I am trying to build an extremely budget Toshiro deck (like $50), and I want to thank you for making this great resource about him. I have a few questions I'd like to ask before finalizing the deck.
I am glad it has been of some help to you. I have not played the list myself in 2-3 years now so I am a little out of touch but I did play the list a LOT back when I had it together so I will do my best to comment based on my own experience.
Lethal Vapors - In general, I think its a card that has to be timed incredibly well. Every meta is also going to be very different on how they play against it so its a card that is hard to really weigh in against. This card is absolute trash if it does not live for more than a turn rotation is I guess where I am at. In blue you can pay 5 mana and take an extra turn which is worth an average of three of this card if one opponent blows it up in the first turn with its own ability. Overall, I think this card is trash to be honest but again, it comes back to how your opponents play around this. If nobody opts to take the turn loss then its great. My experience though is some noob player blows out their turn and its literally the worst thing I could possibly consider doing. There is also the chance that someone just plays something like a Reclimation Sage on it too still.
Primal Amulet - If I was still playing this deck this is likely something I would either be running or have at least put in and tested for myself.
Abhorrent Overlord - it costs a ton of mana is the reason I didn't run it. It isn't something I really thing I would have put resources into rezzing it as the tokens are slow and need time to work. Gray Merchant is such an upgrade over this card even if they cost the same mana it wouldn't even be close in comparison. In a budget list I guess its ok but I don't like it.
Pestilence Demon / Pestilence / Thrashing Wumpus - the best solution in my mind is to run snow lands and then Withering Wisps but going along the lines of budget I would say its a close match between Thrashing and Pestilence mostly because at least in my list I had a lot of rez which does make thrashing slightly stronger.
How much instant speed draw is too much? In general its hard to have too much draw. I guess the best answer I can give you is when you stop having time to cast the draw you might have too much but its also one of those things that if you are pushing good draw into more draw effects then things are going well. The worst situation is when you have no draw so I tend to prefer over drawing into more draw and discarding it to the option of not having enough and not getting to draw enough cards.
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Thanks for the feedback! What I meant by the draw question I was thinking more along the lines of instant draw spells that are only good if you get the trigger off of Toshiro (e.g. Aphotic Wisps). Basically my question boils down to whether or not you normally end up with enough extra Toshiro triggers to get value from them?
Also on that note would you run any sorcery-speed draw effects. I know that Promise of Power is powerful enough card draw to warrant a slot in many lists, but aside from that would you consider running effects like Night's Whisper and Read the Bones, or do you normally end up with enough extra triggers to reliably recur cantrips into think twices?
Thanks for the feedback! What I meant by the draw question I was thinking more along the lines of instant draw spells that are only good if you get the trigger off of Toshiro (e.g. Aphotic Wisps). Basically my question boils down to whether or not you normally end up with enough extra Toshiro triggers to get value from them?
Also on that note would you run any sorcery-speed draw effects. I know that Promise of Power is powerful enough card draw to warrant a slot in many lists, but aside from that would you consider running effects like Night's Whisper and Read the Bones, or do you normally end up with enough extra triggers to reliably recur cantrips into think twices?
If you are swimming in triggers then adding more do nothing cantrip instants can work but I found that often the number of triggers I would get would vary a lot based upon my opponents playstyles as well as what decks they would play. For instance, you can play against a commander centric deck and you might see a lot less procs but then the next player might be ETB / Sac based and you get a bunch. I guess I would say that in general I would play with some and see how they go for you. If you seem to have a lot of wasted triggers then its not bad but I tended to see a lot of time where I would not get many triggers by just being in play with Toshiro and then out of nowhere a wrath would trigger a BUNCH of them which would also make it hard to have the mana to throw into little do nothing cantrips. I did run some like Cremate and Headstone but in a lot of cases the graveyard hate was more important to me and the fact that they draw was just the gravy on top to make them feel less situational as to when I wanted to see them.
When it comes to sorcery speed one shot draw I would rather the two mana ones over 4-5 mana ones in part because this deck really is a draw / go style of deck and keeping mana up from turn to turn was important. Its better to pay less on your turn to keep more options up for later.
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If you are swimming in triggers then adding more do nothing cantrip instants can work but I found that often the number of triggers I would get would vary a lot based upon my opponents playstyles as well as what decks they would play. For instance, you can play against a commander centric deck and you might see a lot less procs but then the next player might be ETB / Sac based and you get a bunch. I guess I would say that in general I would play with some and see how they go for you. If you seem to have a lot of wasted triggers then its not bad but I tended to see a lot of time where I would not get many triggers by just being in play with Toshiro and then out of nowhere a wrath would trigger a BUNCH of them which would also make it hard to have the mana to throw into little do nothing cantrips. I did run some like Cremate and Headstone but in a lot of cases the graveyard hate was more important to me and the fact that they draw was just the gravy on top to make them feel less situational as to when I wanted to see them.
When it comes to sorcery speed one shot draw I would rather the two mana ones over 4-5 mana ones in part because this deck really is a draw / go style of deck and keeping mana up from turn to turn was important. Its better to pay less on your turn to keep more options up for later.
I'd like to second this. When I ran a Toshiro list, I found that his triggers tended to happen in bursts, so mana is usually his biggest constraint, not cards. With that in mind, it's often better to cast one or two high-impact instants than it is to make sure you use every last trigger. Cheap sorcery-speed card draw will help you hit your land drops early so you have the mana to spend later once creatures start dying. Sign In Blood will net you the same number of cards as casting Aphotic Wisps twice, except you won't ever need to wait for a creature to die or spend a removal spell to get the second card off of Sign In Blood. You're going to want your non-removal instants for refilling your hand/GY, not as a DIY Think Twice.
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I dont have any intentions of putting away Tohsiro any time soon. I find him too interesting still. I had like a year in which it was my main deck I would run. I really like the deck as a whole and dont have any intentions of it going anywhere. That said, I have been distracted by Modern and Standard lately not to mention a few new decks have been taking some of my attention away from my existing decks.
Jenara - It was a case of for the last several years probably bordering three years at the time I really had not played the deck more than 5-10 times a year. It would come out for like a game every 4 months it felt like and that was just because I felt like I owed myself to play it. I really enjoyed the commander but for like two years before that I played the deck sometimes exclusively every week. It was a great deck but it was hard to really change it anymore after you test it that extensively for that long. People also over reacted when they saw me playing it based on some bad experiences my playgroups had had with it lol.
Marton - It was a similar case to Jenara. When I first started playing Marton the meta was a lot younger and they were not accustomed to a deck as focused on just mashing the win button. I liked it but it was a deck that relied somewhat on it being a bit of everyone focusing each other equally but the more people knew me and my Marton deck the harder it was to get through random removal. The deck still played quite well but its harder when you get multiple people beating you up all game. It was a combination of elements I guess that got me to put Marton away which included me playing a few other red decks at the time as at one point I had Lovisa Coldeyes and Daretti, Scrap Savant also together with Marton.
Thrun - I didnt like the tactics that I needed to use to really make him feel viable. Green also doesn't have the best access to stax / LD tactics so it made it a bit challenging. I dont mind hexproof commanders but he is probably the most challenging of the playable hexproof commanders.
As a whole, I often have other objectives which usually include similar feeling or colored commanders when I retire a deck or it has to be a long time of me not really playing a commander. Toshiro doesn't really have any competition for his spot as most black legends I find boring and he is so flavorful that I think it would be challenging for me to really replace him. Lin Sivvi will never get axed either regardless of how much / little I play her because of my sweet alters not to mention the fact that so few of the cards in her deck are all that playable elsewhere. Toshiro plans to stay as well more because he has proved himself and I just freaking love the deck.
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It is an interesting card. I really don't do a lot of attacking though as if I am attacking its because I have a creature under Corpse Dance, the board is essentially empty, or I possibly have like a Wurmcoil Engine or a Titan. In most cases I am not worried about gaining unblockable but its possible to combine it with Hatred if you want to run both for an amusing potential commander kill out of nowhere.
When it comes to defending yourself with it, I would rather have Darkness.
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[Modern] Allies
Starting somewhere arround turn 3-4 someone dropped a Grafdigger's Cage. The turn after that went away we got a Relic of Progenitus into play by another player who slow rolled it hard. I ate a Bojuka Bog and a Withered Wretch also that game. The other black deck and I staired each other down with Erebos, God of the Dead in play essentially the whole game and I had milled my Karn Liberated who got exiled. I milled through my Gary and he got exiled as well as right after my Kokusho died he also got exiled. It was a really really bad setup of heavy grave hate and hate on lifegain. Cabal Coffers got played by both black decks and answered the following turn by Strip Mine effects.
The game ended by the other black deck casting an Exsanguinate for like 30 and one of the mono blue players played a Commandeer hijacking it and winning instead. It was.... a bad experience lol. I was constantly drawing and not finding the things I wanted. I ended the game with a full hand of creature hate but outside of a single voltron deck nobody was really pushing creatures. I cast Toshiro at 11 mana which is an indication of how little I was doing. I was sort of casting him to be able to block with my Erebos, God of the Dead if need be lol.
Just thought I would reflect on a painful game lol. The opposing Erebos, God of the Dead was probably the worst of everything as it cut me off from gaining the life that would have kept me in the game. It also kept me from drawing as hard as I would have otherwise wanted to. Lifegain hate + grave hate is a mean mixture for this deck.
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Oblivion Sower it has a wonky sort of on cast ability. It on average should ramp a single land off its own ability assuming nobody has anything in exile. Its sort of amusing but it doesnt reanimate nicely in that its trigger does not happen again on rez. Its interesting but I don't think its strong.
Hedron Archive its an artifact stone. Mashing two Mind Stones together does not make it as good as Mind Stone. Its at least more reasonable than Dreamstone Hedron for most decks but it doesnt really interact with much for this deck.
Defiant Bloodlord its Sanguine Bond with legs. This deck can work with creatures but not really with enchantments. This deck also gains sort of a lot of life so.... its interesting. The idea of taking Crypt Incursion or Gray Merchant and turning them into a kill effect seems sort of amusing.
Blight Herder its sort of an amusing effect but the fact that its an on cast effect and that it requires returning things from exile sort of makes it really situational.
Ruinous Path its like a bad Hero's Downfall. Its an interesting option but being sorcery speed really sort of kills it.
Titan's Presence wow I love the effect but sadly its requirement is something that I really cannot achieve reliably enough to run it. Its a great effect but the required reveal is just not going to happen.
Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger wait... he doesn't shuffle on hitting grave???? He exiles two things on cast???? This guy could compete with an effect like Karn Liberated potentially for a spot in the deck. The fact that he is a creature who does not shuffle means that I can reanimate him (not for as good of value as his ability is on cast) but still, he has an impressive set of stats on him. It is an interesting rendition.
Defiant Bloodlord and Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger have me at least interested so far. Both of them are big mana creatures though which I am not as fond of.
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Yeah, I'm even considering Ulamog as a reanimation target, despite his cost...
Ok.... I can get hyped on that. I play Karn Liberated accepting that 90% of the time he just dies to random beats after playing him and using him once. This allows us to use this at instant speed and hit lands or whatever we want. I.... am excited for this.
Looking at some of the other random stuff from this set:
Breaker of Armies an ok budget sort of a creature. Its nice that he has a natural lure effect on him and he is big so he can mash into defenses and kill utility creatures. It also makes people attack out with utility creatures potentially to keep them alive which amuses me. It seems... not ideal though.
Void Winnower it stops half of all spells from being cast and it keeps people from defending with tokens which is decent. It can be reanimated just fine as well so its... interesting. It also stops a lot of answers from being cast so... interesting. Like... every clone that sees play is also even mana so its hard to copy.
Ob Nixilis Reignited his abilities.... are just sort of ok. I like that he has a kill effect on him as it has synergy with the deck but I honestly dont want a vulnerable Phyrexian Arena as a walker. I wouldn't buy one for commander and if you open one, I would sell it assuming you dont intend to use it in standard.
Painful Truths its a miss in like every direction.
Mortuary Mire budget friendly land. Its not amazing but if you have a budget landbase its a nice effect since you probably will be running mostly basics already anyways.
Overall, I am excited for Scour from Existence and I think that Void Winnower is a strong reanimation target. Most decks wont care for Scour from Existence but seeing that we care about instants I think it makes it really good here. I almost never get Karn to last a whole turn anyways.
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Grave Birthing - this card is a somewhat cheap cantrip that also gives us a blocker or a means of ramp. The exile clause can be used when someone else is trying to reanimate outside of their own graveyard as well as many people will agree to exile the rez target. I think its a fantastic card as it doesnt strictly need to be saved for in response to something. Getting another card plus a one time ramp or blocker sounds good to me.
Grip of Desolation - exiles a LAND!!! It also exiles a creature and is colorless so it gets past protection from black. Its a little spendy to do but the two effects both seem very interesting. I am less sold on it than I am with Grave Birthing but I still think this is a great effect as its normally outside of our color scheme to exile, dodges protection, land destruction, and it fits the theme of being an instant. Something else to note but you can use this card through an Iona, Shield of Emeria choice of black which is cool.
I think Grave Birthing sounds fantastic. I think the grip is probably worth testing but due to its mana cost I am less certain of it. I will try to do a full set review later.
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Defiant Bloodlord Its sort of half of a combo. When you pair it with an effect like Gray Merchant of Asphodel, Kokusho, the Evening Star, Crypt Incursion or so many other lifegain effects in deck. The problem is that if I dont have a good source of life gain its a very expensive flyer with not great stats. I am generally not very fond of effects that require a second specific type of mechanic in order to function. If my commander was a source of lifegain it might be a different story.
Drana, Liberator of Malakir I love the flavor and feel of this card. If it is worth running though, it would be in some sort of a token based build which this deck is not. Her pump is slow and not very large so I feel like for black it would probably need to be a deck built arround her and it would be a snowball style of token deck which would probably not recover well from wraths. Still, I really enjoy the flavor here but I dont see her as being very playable in the 99.
Grave Birthing I get to draw a card, poke at someone's graveyard, get a token that can be used for ramp, and possibly deny someone their rez effect all for 3 mana at instant speed? Sign me up. This is like a really odd Cremate effect with a little extra tagged on fun. I love cremate effects and I love the design here as its just really cool and still fairly affordable for all the things it does. This is probably one of the cards I am most looking froward to from this set which seems really odd to say but its a really cool utility effect that covers a lot of bases for little mana at instant speed.
Grip of Desolation it chews through indestructible creatures as well as serving as land destruction. Its also devoid so it can get through protection from black as well as Iona, Shield of Emeria for black. The only real concern for me is that its a 6 mana instant. Six mana for a spot removal is really a lot to pay but the fact that it gets a land too is sort of hard to evaluate. I really love everything except for the casting cost on this. I feel like this spell sort of wobbled between five and seven mana and they picked six for it. I love and sort of hate it at the same time.
Guul Draz Overseer this card is sort of another swarm based tactic. This deck does not swarm attack so its designed more for a token build which is tough since it has more synergy being mono black but mono black is tough to do for tokens.
Ob Nixilis Reignited I love the idea of more Phyrexian Arena effects but walkers need to have fast impact and Phyrexian Arena as an effect tends to be very slow to get its value as it usually takes 2-3 triggers to get your value back out of the three mana enchantment I would say you would need 3-5 triggers from Ob Nix to really have him pay for the 5 mana sorcery cost he has. Walkers are weak in this format and usually die quickly. He also builds up to his ult before the time I would be satisfied with the work he has done so a lot of people will want to keep him from ulting as its essentially game over for whoever you target with his ult. I also do not like his -3 ability as its something I have enough access to already in black.
Smothering Abomination its not a terrible effect but it belongs more in a creature sac build which this is not.
Vampiric Rites it reminds me of Infernal Tribute to be honest. I dont run Infernal Tribute so I am still sort of indifferent on this effect which resembles it quite a bit. Its nice that its cheaper to drop but it also cannot sacrifice as many things and it costs 1B instead of 2. The small lifegain seems a bit minor as well. I think both have their own merrits but I havent run either really in here because I usually prefer a free sac outlet or better draw. These sort of effects tend to need tokens and or lots more creatures built into the lists in my opinion.
Zulaport Cutthroat it is bad Blood Artist which means its still decent but not in this build. You really need to be pushing tokens and sac heavy to make this sort of thing add up. I ran a lot of these sort of effects back when I ran Balthor the Defiled as a commander and it would have great synergy there where you are mass rezing and rotating creatures in general.
Hedron Archive its a slight improvement on Sisay's Ring. The real issue is that a lot of my big mana stuff really relies on the number of lands I have / number of swamps so this isnt really ramping me into my game all that well and its not giving me big mana. I feel like I am more likely to run earlier ramp or move to Gauntlet of Might / Caged Sun / Nirkana Revenant for more mana generation.
Breaker of Armies he forces creatures to die in combat which is sort of nice. He is also a reanimation target and makes people panic about creatures they leave to defend themselves with. I keep looking at this guy and thinking to myself that he is sort of cool but I also feel like he isn't quite good enough.
Oblivion Sower its land ramp which I like but he is expensive to cast and I cant abuse his on cast effect with most of my renamation as I primarily rez into play instead of to hand.
Scour from Existence ohhh boy this is nice. I have always sort of hated Karn Liberated because 95% of the time I cast him as a sorcery speed version of this. Karn never lives for me and his timing sucks as well as his lack of interaction with the deck. I can also abuse this with Toshiro which is just great.
Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger there are a lot of things going for this guy. 1) he doesn't shuffle my graveyard if he dies which means we can rez him easier and he isn't just throwing my graveyard away 2) he has twin exile effects on cast which means we can deal with artifacts, enchantments, lands, and indestructible things with him. His ability on attack isn't huge but it screws with a lot of toolbox decks and if left alone he will add up. He does also still have good protection with indestructibility plus we run some sac outlets to dodge Swords to Plowshares if we want.
Void Winnower it stops opponents from casting half of all spells which is sort of nice. It can be reanimated just fine as well. My concern is if someone steals it I dont know what my answer is as I feel like most of my answers are even mana cost cards. Depending on how much of this I start seeing I might have to add Murderous Cut to the deck.
Blighted Fen man, that sacrifice effect is expensive to cast. I dont know where I stand on this right now but I can see its uses. I think its a great budget effect for anyone trying to build up a Toshiro deck as it will be very cheap and most budget decks probably wont have a lot of non swamp lands to interfere with Cabal Coffers. I feel like if I want to add utility lands at this point I have to replace utility effects to add them because I dont like hurting my Cabal Coffers further than I have with my utility lands already.
Mortuary Mire another seeming good option for a cheap budget land to run in a budget Toshiro list. Its essentially a one time Volrath's Stronghold. I wouldn't run it outside of a budget list that doesn't have a lot of utility lands.
I feel like I got away with an unusual amount of interesting cards for Toshiro. Most of my other decks just sort of wave their hands at the additions from this set but I think there is a lot of promise with the cards from this set for this deck. Currently from the new cards the ones I am really considering right now seem to be: Grave Birthing, Grip of Desolation, Scour from Existence, and Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger.
While I am at it, I feel like I want to move on some of these cards. For now, I opted not to add Grip of Desolation to my list but its on the radar as an interesting effect for me still.
DECK CHANGES:
Insidious Dreams -> Grave Birthing I have honestly had some issues with Insidious Dreams in that it is card disadvantage. Its still sort of an expensive to cast tutor and it seems more useful for setting up infinite combos. I love all of the things that Grave Birthing does and its positive card advantage instead of negative.
Karn Liberated -> Scour from Existence I have had a lot of issues with Karn and he doesn't interact with the deck that well. Scour gives me the same effect but gives me better timing and the ability to flash it back off of Toshiro.
Wurmcoil Engine -> Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger so far, I haven't been too impressed with the Wurmcoil Engine. Too often I find it to not really deal with issues that come up. Eldrazi, flyers, Erebos, and so many other things can really be a pain while playing this deck so it feels like its been a bit of a situation where the Wurmcoil Engine is decent but not really amazing. Ulamog on the other hand gives me more reach to removing problem threats that black often has a hard time with.
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[Modern] Allies
The red deck ended up ramping hard into nothing so he played a T3 Planar Chaos which lasted three turns. The other mono black deck ended up having played a Bitterblossom just before this and we mostly just twiddled our thumbs through the Chaos. I ended up doing not much the first few turns but I played a Memory Jar on curve which was the third turn of the Planar Chaos as I still had a lot of good draw in hand otherwise. On the third turn the Planar Chaos popped and the red player played his Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker that he fetched up off of his Goblin Matron. I could tell he was going to abuse the heck out of a goblin army. I cracked the Memory Jar on my turn and put The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale and Phyrexian Arena into play. The Tabernacle really cut the red deck off from its token plan and it cut through the bitterblossom tokens quickly. I took a few little pokes for it but it slowed my opponents down a lot.
I played a Crypt Ghast to get up some mana and lifegain. The next turn the other black player tried to rotate some tokens with Hell's Caretaker and I used an extorted Crypt Incursion to cut him off and gain 15 HP. The mono blue player was slowly playing some beater creatures and the mono red deck was scowling at my Tabernacle as he didn't have much to do thanks to it.
I played a Kothophed, Soul Hoarder and he started drawing me some cards as The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale does its thing to bitterblossom tokens. I draw some cards and push some things around for about a turn. The mono black deck starts to sort of put a lot of things into play though which seems a little concerning to me. The red player plays a Chandra Ablaze and wheels thinking he is hurting me. I still have Phyrexian Arena + Kothophed, Soul Hoarder so I think its sort of amusing. I drop an Oblivion Stone and pass turn. The black player attacks me with something sort of minor but I dont really care so I pop the Oblivion Stone and draw 9 cards from Kothophed, Soul Hoarder.
My opponents are slow to recover being that they got Chandra wheeled so they have small hands. The blue player has some big random unblockable beater come out of suspend. I dont really care and he swings it somewhere else. I play a Solemn Simulacrum + Necromancy a Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker and copy my simulacrum.
My opponents are slow to play. The red player had a lot of artifact mana and not much for lands so he is slow coming back. The black player is mostly defending himself and the blue player just dropping random fatty creatures. I play a Rune-Scarred Demon with Kiki ready to make another. I do it at the end of my opponents turns and get Gray Merchant of Asphodel + Kiki a copy with the ability on the stack. I end up pulling like 20+ life off of everyone. I also happen to have an Altar of Dementia + Wake the Dead so I end up doming my opponents for another 25 or so with a follow up Gray Merchant + Kokusho.
So... I guess it was a combination of things but Kothophed, Soul Hoarder and The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale are really the ones that shined through as the cards that got work done.
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[Modern] Allies
Corpse Augur its a creature that potentially draws us a good number of cards. Keep in mind that he is best when you consider having sacrifice outlets ans using creature rez. I like that his mana cost and power are both reasonable together so he can play as a blocker for us especially when backed with a sac outlet on demand. If you dont have sac outlets up just keep in mind that theft and exile removal will be a bit of a concern. Overall I think this is a very solid consideration for a creature with draw in toshiro. It fits a lot of the themes we want as a whole.
Deadly Tempest its nothing to really write home about. It potentially hurts token decks more but its an expensive to cast wrath at sorcery speed so its nothing I am really excited about. Its.... ok if you are building a budget Toshiro deck but I think even then there are wraths I prefer over this. When playing budget sometimes you just have to play with what you have though.
Dread Summons Its a cool effect. The downside being that its a sorcery. I dont think I would really run this to be totally honest.
Scourge of Nel Toth its a decent creature but it doesn't really fit the playstyle that Toshiro normally uses. Its more of something that fits the tactics that a grave pact token / reanimator deck would use.
Thief of Blood so probably the biggest thing to note on this guy is that he outright kills all planeswalkers in play when he enters. I think as it is though he is really sort of a meta call. I think there are times he could to tons of work and times where he does absolutely nothing. I think the normal experience with him would be closer to doing little to nothing. I like the flavor of the card but its definitely situational.
Wretched Confluence ohhhhhh wow. I can draw 3 at instant speed for 5 (which I will mention that Ambition's Cost / Ancient Craving only cost one less at sorcery speed). The versatility of this card is just like hitting the jackpot for Toshiro. The -2/-2 will often kill utility commanders and enable flashback of other spells and recovering creatures to hand can mean dodging graveyard hate or just being a nice pickup instead of drawing a card. I really think this is probably the best card we have gotten possibly since Gray Merchant for this deck. It fits what we want to be doing in a lot of angles as I think all three of the modes are very very good.
Blade of Selves I think its a good effect but remember that you really need to be pushing your creature count high enough to make it something you can use. I am always hesitant to use equipment without a consistent creature plan. This equipment is also primarily useful on ETB / Dies creatures so some creatures like Stinkweed Imp and just a ton of good creatures I am running dont use this well. I think I counted like 8 creatures in my list I would actually want to put this on. So while I think this is a really good equipment, keep in mind the number of creatures you would want to put it on as I think you really need to be shooting for 15-20+ targets for this to be good enough to run.
Sandstone Oracle its a cool little draw effect and its on legs. Unfortunately, its not very good draw from the perspective of playing black.
Thought Vessel its an ok mana stone that has a nice little tagged on perc. I generally dont worry too much about discarding surplus cards as I always get to pick them so I dont value no max hand size that much unless I intend to Necropotence for 20 or something silly.
Command Beacon its sort of wonky in general. I think its designed for commanders that you normally cant cast from command zones. I dont really see much of a reason to run it outside of those commanders and even then its sort of gimmicky.
So...... what does that really leave us with. Wretched Confluence is by far my favorite card from the commander 2015 set for Toshiro and I think Corpse Augur is very respectable. I plan to try to work both of them into my deck for testing with high hopes for both. I welcome discussion of these cards and or the list if anyone has suggestions for changes or wants to add anything to other card options here.
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[Modern] Allies
One thing I really wanted to mention is that if you can hijack a Oracle of Mul Daya and pair it with Necropotence its super silly. I was exiling one card off my library at a time until I would hit lands. Its like.... way better than Sylvan Library with it lol.
Coffin Queen not dying + Attrition was really good. I was rezing creatures and shooting them off every turn. I was even cycling Oracle of Mul Daya as removal. It was great when I dropped a Grim Return on a Atarka, World Render that I had just killed with Attrition and then forced that player to use spot removal on his own dragon instead of my Coffin Queen because of how much I was doing to him each turn.
My opponent almost came back in the end with a Warstorm Surge but I killed him in response to some triggers he needed with Crypt Rats. It was a good game and it goes to show what a Coffin Queen can do if it goes unanswered.
Ok, I have been sort of lazy about outlining this change but I guess I will do it now. I did this one early on but I have yet to ever see the card in like 5 games so its hard to really say how I feel about the change so far.
DECK CHANGES:
Null Profusion -> Wretched Confluence Null Profusion is a great card but it has a number of issues which is that it forces you to stop being reactive and just cycle your hand. It also leaves you in a bit of an odd spot if it gets answered quickly or if you get it with other card draw as its a good one for if you haven't been drawing but less good if you are seeing your draw. I like essentially all of the modes on this instant and it fits the theme of the deck. The idea of flashing it back or enabling other flashbacks with it just sounds so good. I have had it in deck for a while now I just cant ever seem to find it unfortunately. In the end, I felt that the confluence was more on theme with the instants side of toshiro and had more versatility. It in a vacuum is a weaker draw mechanic but its not only draw and its more synergistic with the commander.
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[Modern] Allies
Endbringer - so, the abilities on this are a little interesting. It untaps itself every turn though and stat for the mana wise its not bad. What I like though is just the random Toshiro support that it could lend in randomly killing things no command to enable flashing back. I have 11 lands in my list as it stands that can provide colorless mana to use his other abilities and disabling a big attacker form coming at me or drawing cards all seems totally playable. I like that it can play offense + defense as well because of the extra untapping. It seems like a good creature who has the potential to feed well into Toshiro's abilities as well.
Kozilek, the Great Distortion Draw, huge beater, counterspells, and it doesn't shuffle into my deck super randomly??? It seems like it could be really strong potentially.
Warping Wail hard sorcery counter / chump block as needed / ramp option. It seems like something I wont ignore. I wish the spot removal was a little stronger but even then, it seems like a strong optional spell for being a colorless instant.
Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet so, I love everything that he does other than the fact that he turns off Toshiro's flashback ability. He works well with the removal in deck though and his abilities / stats all seem fairly solid. I like that its grave hate as well. I am interested by him even if he is kind of anonbo with Toshiro because honestly I dont always push Toshiro and he is more of a proactive value instead of reactive. He seems cool at least. I wouldnt dismiss him even if he is bad combined with Toshiro.
Sifter of Skulls its sort of a sac based creature heavy style of creature. It reminds me a lot of Pawn of Ulamog but it makes better tokens and has better stats. Its not for this deck but I think its a decent card.
So.... what am I actually looking at right now as it stands as possibles? I would say all of the ones I listed other than Sifter of Skulls are cards I will be looking at right now as it stands.
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[Modern] Allies
Oath of the Gatewatch Set Review:
Endbringer he enables toshiro with his ping removal, he can swing in essentially with vigilance, draw cards, deter attackers, and tap flyers / evasives. Really I feel like he does just tons of freaking work for a responsive deck like this. I am really kind of excited to try him out for myself as his potential seems great to me. He seems like a really good reanimation target as he is just a good value over time creature for this sort of deck.
Kozilek, the Great Distortion draw, counterspells, huge backside, and he does not make me shuffle my graveyard away when he dies. He seems good overall but his mana cost is still a concern. I feel like he falls a little bit into the same consideration as some other effects like Ulamog and or Ugin where they are expensive to drop. Kozilek's cast trigger is probably slightly inferior to Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger's cast trigger for this deck since we have access to good draw but I think Kozilek makes up for that by having a much better in play ability. He is a little more fragile though as he lacks the indestructibility. Its a tough call to be honest as it would come down to how long you expect either one to stay in play.
Matter Reshaper its amusing. Its almost always still a card draw but I dont really have much for value generation in my own creatures dying, I am a spellslinger deck as well. It seems kind of cool but not quite the right fit for this deck.
Reality Smasher its a random beater card. Its stats / cost / haste + trample seem decent. Strict beaters are rarely good in this format though and it does not fit the playstyle of this deck.
Spatial Contortion its bad removal. Its colorless though which is cool but for a black deck its nothing new.
Thought-Knot Seer its kind of cool hand hate as the opponent does not get that card back. Even then though, it only hits one opponent so its sort of similar to a Vendilion Clique in some ways in its effect which I have never much liked for this format.
Warping Wail an option of one shot ramp in the eldrazi token / chump blocker / sorcery counter. I really like the feel of this card but I dont know if sorcery countering is too narrow or not. I mean, countering a Tooth and Nail with it in a mono black deck would feel super amazing. On the other hand that is really kind of narrow. It might be something I would have to sit on for a while to really use and it seems a bit challenging to flash it back well as it would require me to have a spot removal plus the mana to cast both at the right time. I like the idea of it I just dont know if it quite does what I need it to.
Bearer of Silence - all around its a bad Fleshbag Marauder. The ability is on cast, it costs extra to trigger, and it only hits one opponent. It has flying but it cant block so its really designed more for standard / limited purposes more than commander. Its design makes it an aggressive black aggro style of creature for 60 card formats.
Corpse Churn its self mill + a Disentomb effect at instant speed. Its... really not that bad when you look at the option of flashing it back later. You would want to try to get a heavier creature count to really support this style of tactic though. Milling yourself alone isn't a very good effect but a mill + recovery of a creature in one cheap effect, it could be ok to be honest. The toshiro synergy is good and it has good synergy with creatures as well so it seems like it could be a consideration that wouldn't be terrible potentially.
Drana's Chosen - Cohort is a bad ability.
Dread Defiler - Its expensive to drop and the ability is target opponent instead of each opponent. I would probably consider it if it was each opponent but between the cost of it, the cost to activate, and being single target, it all adds up to what I feel is not such a great card.
Flaying Tendrils bleh infest. Its not an instant and its kind of narrow. Next.
Grasp of Darkness - its nothing new. It doesnt hit hard enough in general considering we can usually kill most anything for 2 mana I wouldnt want a two mana non scaling spot removal. Its ok limited fodder.
Inverter of Truth its a cool effect but its very all in for what is ultimately just an efficient beater. Its a trap.
Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet - its got some bad synergy with Toshiro as while they are both in play, he will disable Toshiro from ever triggering but the upside is that his value is quite good. I think he has some real potential to the point I think he could be worth testing.
Kozilek's Translator thats an amusing ability. Unfortunately its got bad stats for the mana as well as a limitation of once a turn. Its still possible to run it as between your turn and opponents turns it should give 1-2 mana a turn but since it only drops on turn 5 and isn't a very good body, its kind of a lot of work for what you get. I feel like its kind of a cheap budget Crypt Ghast but still not very good.
Oblivion Strike ahhhhhh sorcery speed 4 mana removal. If it was an instant I would at least look at it for the devoid exile but overall its just bad because its slow and expensive.
Sifter of Skulls its a cool card in a gravepact style of deck.
Unnatural Endurance I love these effects but I never get arround to playing them. Its a cool effect and it can result in some cool Toshiro blocks as well as being cheap removal that can push you through a wrath or spot removal potentially. When it comes to using these sort of tricks the problem is that anyone who has another trick usually trumps this effect.
Mirrorpool it seems like it could be playable for the either clone effect or spell twinning. I think its a cool effect and in general I run enough colorless lands to pull the colorless end of it off.
So, I guess I was a little grumpy when we got the last commons / uncommons and there wasnt really much of anything else I was interested in. Last set I was pleasantly surprised by some of the chaff they dropped in last second where this set was less of that. I will say though there seem to be quite a few cards I would consider this set though so thats a good indicator. Endbringer, Kozilek, the Great Distortion, Warping Wail, Corpse Churn, Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet, and Mirrorpool are all things I would consider to be worth considerations in a Toshiro list.
Off the top of my head, Endbringer, Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet, and Mirrorpool are probably the three that I have the most interest in right now but I also see potential in Corpse Churn and Warping Wail which might be worth looking into further. Kozilek, the Great Distortion seems like a fine card but I have a feeling that I need it to be Kozilek or Ulamog and not both in list.
Well that concludes my set review. I will see what I can do about getting some of those cards for testing. Feel free to let me know if anyone gets any experience with the new stuff.
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[Modern] Allies
Eldritch Moon Review:
Collective Brutality - its a sorcery and to be honest I am not overly fond of any of the modes for commander. The -2/-2 to a creature is probably the strongest of them for commander but it cant be repeated without being flashed back. In the end its a sorcery and its power seems a little low for commander.
Liliana, the Last Hope I do like the -2 ability but honestly she doesn't have much loyalty and I would want this ability to be something I could maintain or at least do it more from the get go. It is cool that she is cheap to drop but I would want to be able to use her -2 ability more than once in a row because her +1 ability is a bit lackluster.
Oath of Liliana the ETB is nice, but honestly we have no way to abuse it making something like Fleshbag Marauder who is a creature and thus leaves us with options to abuse it. I think this is potentially a cool enchantment themed deck card but it doesnt fit this build.
Succumb to Temptation instant speed 3 mana Sign in Blood? Seems good to me. It might cost one more but the potential to flash it back makes it all worthwhile to me.
Tree of Perdition its kind of like a slower Sorin Markov effect but its a creature who can defend you and or be rezed. Its interesting but its not the kind of effect I really want.
Voldaren Pariah / Abolisher of Bloodlines I really like the transformation trigger effect but sacrificing three creatures sounds difficult to manage. I dont think it quite fits here but I think its a good solid card for decks that might have sacrifice or token strategies in black. Cool add, it just doesn't quite fit here.
Geier Reach Sanitarium its sort of like a cheaper Bazaar of Baghdad that helps opponents a little bit but also allows you to fill your graveyard or cycle off redundant effects or set up a graveyard for a rez or throw out a situational card that is not going to be useful anytime soon. What I like about it is that it still taps for mana and that you can use it at instant speed as needed.
So, what is worth considering here? In my mind, Succumb to Temptation and Geier Reach Sanitarium are worth testing potentially. Both of these effects have some promise in this sort of deck.
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[Modern] Allies
1 MirrorPool
1 Grave Betrayal
1 Jet Medallion
I admit that Hatred is really just an alternate Tainted Strike but has done wonders for me.
MirrorPool it seems ok. I have it in my Kozilek deck and I have tried it in a few other decks. I just honestly very rarely find it to be an effect that I use to be honest. Its a nice effect but especially in a deck like this every swamp has value with Cabal Coffers which is a high tutor target for me. I try to really put consideration into my non basic lands and limit which ones I justify and make sure its an effect that I often find myself needing. I think its fine to run but there are a lot of considerations to be had in non basic lands in a deck like this.
Grave Betrayal I dont like big expensive sorcery speed effects that do not have immediate interaction / value. Its a cool effect but I just see myself casting this and it immediately blowing up. I avoid effects that involve me tapping out for no effect when I can. Enchantments are also tricky because we dont have much of a way to interact with in a deck like this.
Jet Medallion Its in my list. I like it a lot. In my mind these medallions are ideal in a deck that plans to multi cast a lot of spells that would be cost reduced in a turn. I often find it generating 1-3 mana in a turn.
Tainted Strike I am not convinced on this effect. Its very rare to get 9 damage in a hit so you are realistically saying you need to get in with two 4+ powered guys and be able to cast + flashback this effect in the same time to kill someone. I dont like it because its all or nothing on if it does anything. If you put any poison counters on someone but do not kill them with it you are wasting damage. I dont like this effect because of that. To be totally honest, I kill a lot of people with Gray Merchant of Asphodel, Kokusho, the Evening Star, and Crypt Rats.
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[Modern] Allies
Its more or less the list still. There are a few small adjustments as I think I am running Endbringer and the new Succumb to Temptation. Its always been a little tricky to maintain the OP for me because my meta allows hybrid spells that you can pay either side of so my IRL list runs things like Oona, Queen of the Fae / Memory Plunder / Shadow of Doubt. Due to the fact that most players cannot play these in their meta I opted to exclude them from the primer but it also makes it a much harder time to organize the OP because my own list is not quite what it is.
For the most part though, there have not been a lot of adjustments from that. Most of this return to Innistrad block has been bad for this deck so most of the last things to consider were including some eldrazi and colorless spells.
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[Modern] Allies
Newer to EDH and this guy looks awesome.
Is your deck still pretty up to date? I'd hate to outright net deck (and I don't have the money to) but, this seems to be the most up to date primer. Is there anything more recent you'd add?
I probably would have gotten Succumb to Temptation into the list. I did a review for it but never got it into the OP it looks like. Other than that there hasnt been much for newer than that that I really would have considered. Its possible to consider some of the eldrazi that came out in the recent blocks too if thats your thing. The new eldrazi have the advantage of not shuffling away your graveyard so they work a little better with this strategy than the original ones who mostly shuffled your bin away.
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[Modern] Allies
What are your thoughts on: Lethal Vapors, Primal Amulet, and Abhorrent Overlord?
Which do you feel are the best out of Pestilence Demon, Pestilence, and Thrashing Wumpus?
How much instant speed draw is too much?
BChainer Sac-Based ControlB
UWOjutai Control/VoltronWU
I am glad it has been of some help to you. I have not played the list myself in 2-3 years now so I am a little out of touch but I did play the list a LOT back when I had it together so I will do my best to comment based on my own experience.
How much instant speed draw is too much? In general its hard to have too much draw. I guess the best answer I can give you is when you stop having time to cast the draw you might have too much but its also one of those things that if you are pushing good draw into more draw effects then things are going well. The worst situation is when you have no draw so I tend to prefer over drawing into more draw and discarding it to the option of not having enough and not getting to draw enough cards.
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[Modern] Allies
Also on that note would you run any sorcery-speed draw effects. I know that Promise of Power is powerful enough card draw to warrant a slot in many lists, but aside from that would you consider running effects like Night's Whisper and Read the Bones, or do you normally end up with enough extra triggers to reliably recur cantrips into think twices?
BChainer Sac-Based ControlB
UWOjutai Control/VoltronWU
If you are swimming in triggers then adding more do nothing cantrip instants can work but I found that often the number of triggers I would get would vary a lot based upon my opponents playstyles as well as what decks they would play. For instance, you can play against a commander centric deck and you might see a lot less procs but then the next player might be ETB / Sac based and you get a bunch. I guess I would say that in general I would play with some and see how they go for you. If you seem to have a lot of wasted triggers then its not bad but I tended to see a lot of time where I would not get many triggers by just being in play with Toshiro and then out of nowhere a wrath would trigger a BUNCH of them which would also make it hard to have the mana to throw into little do nothing cantrips. I did run some like Cremate and Headstone but in a lot of cases the graveyard hate was more important to me and the fact that they draw was just the gravy on top to make them feel less situational as to when I wanted to see them.
When it comes to sorcery speed one shot draw I would rather the two mana ones over 4-5 mana ones in part because this deck really is a draw / go style of deck and keeping mana up from turn to turn was important. Its better to pay less on your turn to keep more options up for later.
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[Modern] Allies
I'd like to second this. When I ran a Toshiro list, I found that his triggers tended to happen in bursts, so mana is usually his biggest constraint, not cards. With that in mind, it's often better to cast one or two high-impact instants than it is to make sure you use every last trigger. Cheap sorcery-speed card draw will help you hit your land drops early so you have the mana to spend later once creatures start dying. Sign In Blood will net you the same number of cards as casting Aphotic Wisps twice, except you won't ever need to wait for a creature to die or spend a removal spell to get the second card off of Sign In Blood. You're going to want your non-removal instants for refilling your hand/GY, not as a DIY Think Twice.