Hi, my (user)name is Hell Noire, my real name I won't provide, but those who know me, tend to find I use the same style username all over the place. I have played this wonderful game for quite some time, originally starting in Mirrodin block (yes, the first one) with a casual 60 card Zombie deck. I left shortly after Unhinged released, returning on the tail end of New Phyrexia, and have been playing off and on since then. I am not a super competitive person, and while I build decent enough decks, I try not to have decks that 'untap and win' decks, though there are times that that is exactly what my decks do. I pride myself on not being too mean, too degenerate, and completely stoppable - if not harder than most, due to how I structure my decks. I have attempted some Legacy, some Vintage, and the only format I do not enjoy playing as a rule is Standard - ironically, for the reason that I enjoy limited - that it is too constrained to build interesting decks with.
Since this is so long of a writeup (took me nearly 3 hours to write up, haha), I'm breaking it up into spoiler tags for convenience sake. Pop open each one to see what they say, then close afterwards - otherwise, you're in for a long read!
Jarad is an interesting Commander to me, as when the Golgari vs Izzet spoilers started coming out, I think I about had a dance or three over how excited I was for what Jarad could do. I had never seen a creature that good before (in my opinion). At the time I was newer to EDH, and wasn't particularly combo savvy. A lot of my friends at the time were happy to see Niv-Mizzet's new foil art, while I was drooling at the thought of all the stupid stuff I could do with Jarad. At the time, I had was just starting into Legacy, so I thought that an efficient mana build with Jarad at the helm, and big monsters to throw would be the best idea. Cards like Phyrexian Dreadnought and Force of Savagery with any anthem effects would be wonderful. It didn't take long to get a first revision of Jarad out the door - and while I didn't always win, I had an interesting deck.
Then came the faster combo decks, the ones that would go off at the table and win before I could blink. My meta at the time were all guys making much more money then me, and I learned very quickly that big stompy usually got stomped by combo decks. During this time, I had run across Dredge in Legacy, and was amazed at how effective it was - even without Bazaar of Baghdad, it constantly made a top showing in my Legacy meta, leaving poor Charbelcher playing me in the dust. Suffice to say, I had a brainfart - I couldn't afford Dredge in Legacy, nor could I win in EDH. But what if I went and made a Dredge deck in EDH? I wouldn't need to buy 4 of anything expensive, I wouldn't be spending a ton of money on the deck, (HA! Suck it past me...) and I could stand a chance against the combo decks!
Let's look at the competition, shall we:
Glissa, the Traitor - Doesn't benefit from Dredge creatures hitting the yard. Also plays more with artifacts then this deck does.
Iname as One - Seems more suited for Tribal Spirits - and this deck doesn't run a lot of spirits... if any at all.
Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest - an interesting general, but seems more oriented to take advantage of Grave Pact effects. While we could benefit from them occasionally, we don't run any in the deck because the deck doesn't need them.
Meren of Clan Nel Toth - a very common suggestion for this deck, as when your creatures die, your reanimation\return to hand is free. Not bad - but we don't often have things dying on our field. If we do, it's because we're comboing out and winning then, or just running some silly stuff to delay our opponents. Overall, a decent card, but not right for this deck, especially when stuff doesn't 'die' as much as it gets discarded.
Nath of the Gilt-Leaf - We're not Elf tribal. The discard is nice... but not really that useful in this deck. Especially since we can never be the target of the discard.
Pharika, God of Affliction - Exiling cards from our yard to get a small snake that doesn't do anything to help us seems bad. We're comboing from our yard, and not trying to exile it all!
Sapling of Colfenor - putting cards into our hand isn't where we want them. We want them in the yard, where we can reanimate them for cheap, and bring them effectively into play before someone else attempts something silly.
Savra, Queen of the Golgari - much like Meren, the sister to Jarad expects creatures to enter the graveyard from the battlefield. As we play as much as we can out of the yard, it's not the ability we can abuse.
Sisters of Stone Death - I feel bad talking smack about a Gorgon, but when she doesn't do anything for the deck, she might as well remain on the sidelines and never see the light of day. She's also 8 mana and never impacts our game plan.
Skullbriar, the Walking Grave - doesn't take advantage of graveyards, and only rewards counter strategies that this deck doesn't do.
Varolz, the Scar-Striped - While a good sac outlet and can use the yard to break in counters, he seems to want to exile from your yard to be useful. Otherwise, I could see him as a secondary commander/replacement commander. However, reworking the toolbox of creatures would be required.
Vhati il-Dal - While a traitor to Greven, he doesn't really do much of anything for this deck either.
which leaves...
Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord - To start off, he costs four mana. Four coloured mana, but four mana none the less. Already he's possible to cast within a decent amount of time. His first ability gets him big backed by a deck designed to play out of the yard. His secondary ability gives us reach to kill opponents if we start losing our way. And his final ability means that he can always be a commander to reliably enjoy at a decent amount of mana. Until they give us the Legendary that grants Dredge X to all cards in your graveyard, (which will likely never happen), Jarad remains the best choice for this deck.
But what if we added a colour?
The only colour that would want to be added would be Blue, for Intuition and for Tasigur. While it would add possible further redundancy, it's overall more streamlined in Golgari colours. White could allow Karador, but overall, white doesn't add anything we really need either - perhaps Iona, but even then, not really required for the deck's already redundant process. It would add Blazing Archon though which would help against a Maelstrom/Primal Surge deck my meta has - but not worth it enough to consider it, truth be told.
Confused? Not to worry, read on and I'll explain everything as much as I can.
Despite how most decks in any format play, Dredge always plays differently then them. It wants cards in it's graveyard, and this specific build of Jarad abuses it to no end. Not only do we want cards in our graveyard, we want them in there so bad, we'll skip draw steps to actually fuel our graveyard. How? The answer comes from a powerful keyword, called Dredge. Every time you would draw a card, Dredge puts an optional trigger on the stack - you can mill yourself that number of cards and skip that draw, and get that card back to your hand. Seems useless in a vacuum sure, and worse still in a singleton format. However, that's where the Recursion and Reanimation spells come in - we're trying to mill ourselves until we get to one of our wincons or powerful Draw/Protection cards, then bring them back and start using them to interact with our opponents. Jarad also benefits greatly from this style of play, as he gets stronger for each creature in our graveyard, so if you have to visit people with Jarad, you most certainly can - and he will bring serious beats with him.
Ideally, in our opening hands, we want Bazaar of Baghdad, Hermit Druid, or a tutor spell to hit one of those. Failing that, we can fall back on our Dredge keyworded cards or Mesmeric Orb, though they are not as good as the previous suggestion. Because of the surplus of enablers this deck has, we have a bunch of hands that we can keep. Just remember a good rule of thumb - three lands are going to nearly assure you a win. If you need more than that, I'd be slightly concerned, though it's been known to be that way before.
On top of that, you will want either removal, or recursion in hand. Both is better then not, as gravehate has been known to be packed into the most unsuspecting of decks. I once saw a Bruna, Light of Alabaster run Rest in Peace to give an example - so it's not unheard of to have other decks that love the yard attempt to keep us from it. It's okay though, if they focus on hating the graveyard, no doubt someone will break it, because it doesn't seem to be EDH without someone playing with their graveyard. And if you're unlucky enough to be stuck with three decks that hate your graveyard ways, while much slower, we can still plan out our own wins by playing fairly.
So Hell, what does this deck do well?
Fills the graveyard up at a decent speed
Reanimates spells that are terrifying and shouldn't be coming back for any reason?
Comboing out from flooding the yard full of silly creatures
What are the shortcomings of this deck?
Clearly, gravehate is a serious problem this deck will face. In my meta, we've got a handful of decks that hate on graveyards, though they are nowhere near competitive ready, even on a causal level. However, I will say that on more than one occasion, I wish I could bring myself to run Witchbane Orb, but I can't justify it due to how infrequent people exile graveyards in my meta. On top of that, when it does come down, there's usually the mad shuffle of getting it off the board before the person gets any value out of it. Otherwise, minus gravehate, this deck is decently difficult to beat.
------------------
Bayou, City of Brass, Command Tower, Llanowar Wastes, Mana Confluence, Overgrown Tomb, Tainted Wood, Tarnished Citadel, Twilight Mire - we are a two colour deck, that needs access to both colours at any time. It is ill advised to cut any of them, though I'm sure if you're on a budget that cutting Bayou would be my first suggestion. We run five basic lands due to Hermit Druid, and while not usually recommended to up that amount, I can understand if you're on a budget, that it completely stinks to drop $140 on a single card. If you decide not to run Bayou, run a Swamp in it's place - this deck is black heavy and needs the black mana more than the green.
Bloodstained Mire, Marsh Flats, Polluted Delta, Windswept Heath, Verdant Catacombs - Primarily used to remove the basic lands first, then going back and getting the non-basics out of the deck. Oddly enough, for a Golgari deck, it relies much heavier on the Black side, which reflects the Fetch selection. I am planning on running all of them one day, but at the same time, I am buying the cards slowly - piece by piece, so my list on TappedOut is an accurate list of what's presently in the deck.
Crypt of Agadeem, Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth - Crypt's power is that even that if we drop it turn one to work around the ETB tapped, it powers up the further along we get towards our winning states. Urborg allows us to lose less life to our painlands\Citadel, and since we rely so much on Black mana to set this ship up, it makes more sense to run Urborg, Tomb as it helps us stabilize our life loss quickly once played.
Dakmor Salvage - a slower land that usually wouldn't be warranted for inclusion in a deck, but one that assures us that we hit our Black mana as we chainsaw though our deck either by Druid, by Bazaar, or by Dredge. Life is never certain - but it's certainly going to need some Black mana if we expect to win.
Ancient Tomb - because more times than not, Sol Ring will be sitting in our yard or in our deck, and even taking a shock a turn to activate it is the right play if we're still above 2 life.
High Market, Phyrexian Tower - Sac outlet lands. Sacrificing a Dredge card to either regain a life/gain two mana is always relevant. It's also on the off chance your opponent is saving that Path/Swords for your Lord of Extinction too.
Golgari Rot Farm - But Hell!, I hear you shout, Rot Farm ETBs tapped, and bounces a land! When is it ever good? Two words: Crop Rotation. Saving a Bazaar from Strip Mine, saving a Crypt of Agadeem from Sowing Salt/Caustic Rain, it's value through and through. Even so, being set back one turn to untap with two more mana than normal is still pretty good when your meta doesn't run anywhere near enough land destruction to make you worried. And if they do, it's all the better!
Mortuary Mire - recent addition from the new Zendikar block, it allows us to throw around some recursion at instant speed if needed, but otherwise, helps us. (see description of Golgari Rot Farm for more info on the instant speed trick) When combined with some of the other silly lands this deck runs, it can easily be used as another Regrowth effect for the cost of a land drop and a black or green mana (cycle the Cycle lands!)
Deathrite Shaman - the one mana planeswalker from Ravnica may be banned from Modern, but in EDH, he is still a boss. Dropping him turn one with net us mana from Fetches, life gain from creatures used against us, or cause some loss of life by eating that counterspell Azami had waiting for us... Not bad for one mana.
------------------
Big Game Hunter, Dismember, Slaughter Pact, Toxic Deluge, Damnation, Fleshbag Marauder, Merciless Executioner - all great cards to deal with threats opponents try to slip by us. Big Game Hunter's Madness makes him on par with Tragic Slip as a powerful removal piece, Dismember is a real answer to most creature based combos, Toxic and Damnation are still some of the best board wipes in Black, and Fleshbag/Executioner are not only sac outlets, but a good way to deal with Voltron decks.
Bojuka Bog, Maze of Ith - Since our opponents have scary graveyards sometimes, even without being graveplay decks, there's no reason not to run it. Granted, usually it sits in the yard doing nothing - but the option is there if we need it. Instant speed too, if required. Maze can stop some Voltron decks, as well as keeping us alive a few more turns so we can combo out in a decent amount of time.
Deglamer, Krosan Grip, Unravel the Aether, Woodfall Primus, Void Winnower - Unlike a lot of metas I've seen in my area, mine seems to run a lot of Blightsteel or other indestructible artifact effects. Maybe it's common overall, I can't say. There's some instant speed exile artifacts in Green, but it doesn't mean that we want to pay that much mana when two mana deals with it just fine. Krosan Grip is a staple in all green decks or green splashing decks for a very good reason. Woodfall combos with any sac outlet and Mikaeus to decimate opponents - and can net us a decent chunk of hate. For good reason, mind you. Void Winnower is just good - forces our opponents to be odd, and enforces a lot of gravehate will stay in hands until Winnower is dealt with. Yes, there's still some odd cmc gravehate - but not as much as you might think. Winnower is also a good all-around beat stick if we need to swing at people or hold back an army.
Song of the Dryads - Alarmingly powerful enchantment in green to remove anything - but seems a bit too expensive for my blood. Will be one of the first pieces removed if I can find something better.
------------------
Hermit Druid - The gold standard if you want to mill yourself out. Stops only when you hit a basic land - and we're trying to remove as many of them as we can.
Bazaar of Baghdad - A simple land... that with the right backing, is completely busted. Reanimation decks dream of Bazaar, Dredge decks dream of Bazaar. And everyone else shudders in horror. There really is no replacement card for Bazaar in our colours, sadly - anything similar is either banned, or just not as good. If you're on a budget, I would suggest filling this in with Grim Backwoods, as it's a sac outlet and a card draw - but even so, it's nowhere near as powerful.
Dakmor Salvage, Golgari Grave-Troll, Golgari Thug, Life from the Loam, Stinkweed Imp - With Bazaar and natural card draw, Dredge will fill your yard extremely fast. They also can be useful on the field as well. On more than one occasion, the deck gets a Golgari Grave-Troll into play, and it's at least a 18/18 to throw around with Jarad if we have to.
Altar of Dementia, Mesmeric Orb - the weakest in our lineup of mill cards, they do have the advantage of hitting other players too. While this isn't so good if we're not the only ones playing out of the yard, it does mean that we get some free mill for ourselves after the initial two mana investment. Altar also serves you well with Woodfall Primus - blow up one thing, mill that opponent some, then blow something else up. With Mikeaus in the mix though - good luck to your opponents...
Mindslicer - Deceptively powerful for this deck. We don't usually care about our hands, and as he affects our opponents too, means they'll be trying to avoid the Mindslicer if they want to keep their hands available to them. Nice little political rattlesnake.
------------------
Reanimation is pretty apparent - most of the selections are standard fair from any Reanimator deck. However, do not doubt the use of Stitch Together or Wake the Dead - both are very strong cards, and Threshold is extremely easy to hit in this deck if you play it right. Liliana, Heretical Healer is super easy to flip in this deck, and her abilities to discard Dredge cards, reanimate non-Legendary pieces of hate\destruction, or to give us a bouncy Emblem is stupid good for three mana.
------------------
Recursion is also pretty straight forward - Riftsweeper to pull exiled cards back, Regrowth (and it's cousin, Noxious Revival) to get any cards back, etc, etc. Shouldn't be any questions needed there.
Tutors, for the most part are pretty standard fare - minus Sylvan Scrying and Crop Rotation. Crop Rotation allows us to use our lands as forms of 'counters' or 'answers' to other people's decks, something I found extremely interesting that no one in my meta had ever done before. While occasionally not used because it's in the yard, it does enable some silly stuff. It's also, oddly, a way we can use Dakmor Scavenge again for a Dredge if needed. Sylvan Scrying is our Sorcery clone of it - while not as powerful, it doesn't require land sacrificed for the increased speed - can still fetch any land we want out of our deck to hand, to be played later, or now, if needed.
------------------
Barren Moor, Tranquil Thicket - while they only "draw" one card, they still trigger Dredge - which is the entire point of the deck. So for one mana, you could theoretically Dredge up to six cards. Not bad at all.
Baleful Force, Phyrexian Arena, Greater Good - Usually reanimated early to enable Dredge on everyone else's turn, then for our turn, we decide to actually draw. Also gets beaty if you need to. A much more powerful Phyrexian Arena effect being easier to cast. (But also easier to remove!) Arena and Greater Good are on here for standard reasons - more card draw, the better. Greater Good also has the upside of discarding Dredge cards back to the yard if needed.
Phyrexian Devourer + Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord = Death. Best done midgame, before you Dredge over half your deck into the yard. Keep exiling cards off the top until you hit the highest life total, then fling Devourer.
Necrotic Ooze + Phyrexian Devourer + Triskelion = Death. Best done early, as you'll be exiling the cards off the top of your deck, then removing the counters to deal damage to opponents. The deck has exactly enough to do 3 opponents at 40 life apiece - so if you have Buried Alive and Reanimate in hand, you can do it with more than enough to spare.
So yeah, I'm looking for any suggestions or any comments about this deck. It is a tad unorthadox, and I apologize for that. However, when piloted correctly, can cause a world of hurt. It doesn't hurt to goldfish the deck a few times to see the options you have open, and while the deck usually plays during it's own turn, it has been known to do silly thing on opponent's turns as an option too.
So for those of you not watching spoilers, you should always watch them, though this early... well, let's just say some of my group are anticipating it's fake but as we haven't gotten confirmation yet...
If that new Kozilek is real, it is completely broken for this deck! I can't wait to discard my Dredge cards back to the graveyard to counter grave-hate. Wizards, you are TOO KIND! Only think I can think of cutting at this point is Greater Good, likely because it hasn't been cast in some time - now that the deck is much more Dredge aligned rather than Midrange aligned (sorry razzliox), fishing cards out of my yard is the name of the game. On top of that, it makes the Necrotic Ooze combo much more potent in the deck too.
Official list has been updated to reflect some successful testing - I am now running a few more non-basics (Tainted Wood and Tarnished Citadel) as well as Exploration as a second Manabond effect. Granted, it doesn't discard the rest of our hand, but playing two land a turn catches us up quicker with the faster decks in my current meta. Any suggestions are welcome!
Yeah, I'm super excited for that too. It's something I can abuse a lot since I have a diverse curve with lots of fatties to counter would-be game-winning spells. On the other hand, depending on what <> means, hardcasting him is either impossible or unlikely - my curve currently tops out at 9 with Void Winnower (and Tooth and Nail, kinda).
Yeah, I'm super excited for that too. It's something I can abuse a lot since I have a diverse curve with lots of fatties to counter would-be game-winning spells. On the other hand, depending on what <> means, hardcasting him is either impossible or unlikely - my curve currently tops out at 9 with Void Winnower (and Tooth and Nail, kinda).
And there lies the biggest problem for you, I feel - he's a great reanimator target, but can you hard cast him? Because I know you want to be able to hardcast your fatties if needed. Assuming it means colourless, and not generic mana, I don't think your deck can take the hit to hardcast it as it means you have to run the new Wastes land or something else that makes colourless mana... it would either come in off Tooth and Nail or Reanimation effects. Granted, if not, we both can still reanimate it - so it's a thing that doesn't slow me too much.
I was originally going to post my comments over on your primer before I remembered my own topic - and I appreciate you coming over to concur, haha. Though, I was curious how long though it was going to be until I saw you commenting on my cEDH post. Figured I wasn't getting much of an answer here until your comment, so expanding to cEDH was the next best thing.
On a side note, unrelated to this list, played some two-headed EDH competition today with my current Azami list in my signature. It was singleton with the combined heads, so had to drop Sol Ring and Time Reversal since my partner was Nekusar and added Rite of Rep + Dig. Thanks to the wheels we both ran, took first place.
Back on topic - Tarnished Citadel has been hurting me something fierce with all the other painlands, and it royally sucks. I've had to bring in Woodland Cemetery, which isn't too bad overall. Running the shock, the ABU dual, and the basics/fetches that I do, I can usually assure it's coming in untapped. Only once has it ETB tapped - as it was the first land I played for the game, turn two into City, turn 3 into Druid thanks to Vampiric Tutor. I do wish there was a way I could give him haste though without bouncing into Jund Dredge [and even then - there is no generals that benefit from the Dredge mechanic that I'm aware of].
I've received the following recommendations via Reddit: Necromancy, Exhume, and Dance of the Dead - out of all of them, I don't like Dance still. The other two for sure need to come in. I'm thinking Treasured Find and Sewer Nemesis will be the likely cuts - Sewer relies too much solely upon one person's yard, and Treasured Find, while powerful, is much better suited as another reanimate effect. I am debating about cutting Noxious Revial to readd Find, but the instant speed grabbing something to the top of the deck for free does allow responses to exile of yard seems a bit better.
Since this is so long of a writeup (took me nearly 3 hours to write up, haha), I'm breaking it up into spoiler tags for convenience sake. Pop open each one to see what they say, then close afterwards - otherwise, you're in for a long read!
Then came the faster combo decks, the ones that would go off at the table and win before I could blink. My meta at the time were all guys making much more money then me, and I learned very quickly that big stompy usually got stomped by combo decks. During this time, I had run across Dredge in Legacy, and was amazed at how effective it was - even without Bazaar of Baghdad, it constantly made a top showing in my Legacy meta, leaving poor Charbelcher playing me in the dust. Suffice to say, I had a brainfart - I couldn't afford Dredge in Legacy, nor could I win in EDH. But what if I went and made a Dredge deck in EDH? I wouldn't need to buy 4 of anything expensive, I wouldn't be spending a ton of money on the deck, (HA! Suck it past me...) and I could stand a chance against the combo decks!
Glissa, the Traitor - Doesn't benefit from Dredge creatures hitting the yard. Also plays more with artifacts then this deck does.
Iname as One - Seems more suited for Tribal Spirits - and this deck doesn't run a lot of spirits... if any at all.
Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest - an interesting general, but seems more oriented to take advantage of Grave Pact effects. While we could benefit from them occasionally, we don't run any in the deck because the deck doesn't need them.
Meren of Clan Nel Toth - a very common suggestion for this deck, as when your creatures die, your reanimation\return to hand is free. Not bad - but we don't often have things dying on our field. If we do, it's because we're comboing out and winning then, or just running some silly stuff to delay our opponents. Overall, a decent card, but not right for this deck, especially when stuff doesn't 'die' as much as it gets discarded.
Nath of the Gilt-Leaf - We're not Elf tribal. The discard is nice... but not really that useful in this deck. Especially since we can never be the target of the discard.
Pharika, God of Affliction - Exiling cards from our yard to get a small snake that doesn't do anything to help us seems bad. We're comboing from our yard, and not trying to exile it all!
Sapling of Colfenor - putting cards into our hand isn't where we want them. We want them in the yard, where we can reanimate them for cheap, and bring them effectively into play before someone else attempts something silly.
Savra, Queen of the Golgari - much like Meren, the sister to Jarad expects creatures to enter the graveyard from the battlefield. As we play as much as we can out of the yard, it's not the ability we can abuse.
Sisters of Stone Death - I feel bad talking smack about a Gorgon, but when she doesn't do anything for the deck, she might as well remain on the sidelines and never see the light of day. She's also 8 mana and never impacts our game plan.
Skullbriar, the Walking Grave - doesn't take advantage of graveyards, and only rewards counter strategies that this deck doesn't do.
Varolz, the Scar-Striped - While a good sac outlet and can use the yard to break in counters, he seems to want to exile from your yard to be useful. Otherwise, I could see him as a secondary commander/replacement commander. However, reworking the toolbox of creatures would be required.
Vhati il-Dal - While a traitor to Greven, he doesn't really do much of anything for this deck either.
which leaves...
Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord - To start off, he costs four mana. Four coloured mana, but four mana none the less. Already he's possible to cast within a decent amount of time. His first ability gets him big backed by a deck designed to play out of the yard. His secondary ability gives us reach to kill opponents if we start losing our way. And his final ability means that he can always be a commander to reliably enjoy at a decent amount of mana. Until they give us the Legendary that grants Dredge X to all cards in your graveyard, (which will likely never happen), Jarad remains the best choice for this deck.
But what if we added a colour?
The only colour that would want to be added would be Blue, for Intuition and for Tasigur. While it would add possible further redundancy, it's overall more streamlined in Golgari colours. White could allow Karador, but overall, white doesn't add anything we really need either - perhaps Iona, but even then, not really required for the deck's already redundant process. It would add Blazing Archon though which would help against a Maelstrom/Primal Surge deck my meta has - but not worth it enough to consider it, truth be told.
1x Ancient Tomb
1x Animate Dead
1x Baleful Force
1x Barren Moor
1x Bayou
1x Bazaar of Baghdad
1x Big Game Hunter
1x Bloodstained Mire
1x Bojuka Bog
1x Buried Alive
1x Buried Ruin
1x City of Brass
1x Command Tower
1x Crop Rotation
1x Crypt of Agadeem
1x Dakmor Salvage
1x Damnation
1x Deathrite Shaman
1x Deglamer
1x Demonic Tutor
1x Dismember
1x Entomb
1x Exhume
1x Eternal Witness
1x Exploration
1x Fauna Shaman
1x Fleshbag Marauder
2x Forest
1x Genesis
1x Golgari Grave-Troll
1x Golgari Rot Farm
1x Golgari Thug
1x Greater Good
1x Hermit Druid
1x High Market
1x Krosan Grip
1x Life from the Loam
1x Life/Death
1x Liliana, Heretical Healer
1x Living Death
1x Llanowar Wastes
1x Lord of Extinction
1x Mana Confluence
1x Manabond
1x Marsh Flats
1x Maze of Ith
1x Merciless Executioner
1x Mesmeric Orb
1x Mikaeus, the Unhallowed
1x Mindslicer
1x Mortuary Mire
1x Necromancy
1x Necrotic Ooze
1x Nighthowler
1x Noxious Revival
1x Overgrown Tomb
1x Phyrexian Arena
1x Phyrexian Delver
1x Phyrexian Devourer
1x Phyrexian Tower
1x Polluted Delta
1x Reanimate
1x Regrowth
1x Riftsweeper
1x Rune-Scarred Demon
1x Sakura-Tribe Elder
1x Skullclamp
1x Slaughter Pact
1x Sol Ring
1x Stinkweed Imp
1x Stitch Together
1x Strip Mine
1x Survival of the Fittest
3x Swamp
1x Sylvan Library
1x Sylvan Scrying
1x Tainted Wood
1x Tarnished Citadel
1x Toxic Deluge
1x Tranquil Thicket
1x Triskelion
1x Twilight Mire
1x Unravel the Aether
1x Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1x Vampiric Tutor
1x Verdant Catacombs
1x Victimize
1x Void Winnower
1x Volrath's Stronghold
1x Wake the Dead
1x Wall of Blood
1x Windswept Heath
1x Woodfall Primus
1x Worldly Tutor
1x Yawgmoth's Will
1x Bayou
1x Bloodstained Mire
1x City of Brass
1x Command Tower
1x Crypt of Agadeem
1x Dakmor Salvage
1x Deathrite Shaman
1x Exploration
2x Forest
1x Golgari Rot Farm
1x Llanowar Wastes
1x Manabond
1x Mana Confluence
1x Marsh Flats
1x Mortuary Mire
1x Overgrown Tomb
1x Phyrexian Tower
1x Polluted Delta
1x Sol Ring
3x Swamp
1x Tainted Wood
1x Tarnished Citadel
1x Twilight Mire
1x Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1x Verdant Catacombs
1x Windswept Heath
WinCons (7)
1x Lord of Extinction
1x Mikaeus, the Unhallowed
1x Necrotic Ooze
1x Nighthowler
1x Phyrexian Devourer
1x Triskelion
1x Wall of Blood
1x Big Game Hunter
1x Bojuka Bog
1x Damnation
1x Deathrite Shaman
1x Deglamer
1x Dismember
1x Fleshbag Marauder
1x Krosan Grip
1x Maze of Ith
1x Merciless Executioner
1x Slaughter Pact
1x Strip Mine
1x Toxic Deluge
1x Unravel the Aether
1x Void Winnower
1x Woodfall Primus
Enablers (11)
1x Altar of Dementia
1x Bazaar of Baghdad
1x Dakmor Salvage
1x Golgari Grave-Troll
1x Golgari Thug
1x Hermit Druid
1x Life from the Loam
1x Manabond
1x Mesmeric Orb
1x Mindslicer
1x Stinkweed Imp
Reanimation (11)
1x Animate Dead
1x Exhume
1x Life/Death
1x Liliana, Heretical Healer
1x Necromancy
1x Phyrexian Delver
1x Reanimate
1x Stitch Together
1x Victimize
1x Wake the Dead
1x Living Death
1x Altar of Dementia
1x High Market
1x Phyrexian Tower
Recursion (8)
1x Eternal Witness
1x Genesis
1x Life from the Loam
1x Mortuary Mire
1x Regrowth
1x Riftsweeper
1x Volrath's Stronghold
1x Yawgmoth's Will
Tutors (11)
1x Buried Alive
1x Crop Rotation
1x Demonic Tutor
1x Entomb
1x Fauna Shaman
1x Rune-Scarred Demon
1x Sakura-Tribe Elder
1x Survival of the Fittest
1x Sylvan Scrying
1x Vampiric Tutor
1x Worldly Tutor
Draw (7)
1x Baleful Force
1x Barren Moor
1x Greater Good
1x Phyrexian Arena
1x Skullclamp
1x Sylvan Library
1x Tranquil Thicket
Despite how most decks in any format play, Dredge always plays differently then them. It wants cards in it's graveyard, and this specific build of Jarad abuses it to no end. Not only do we want cards in our graveyard, we want them in there so bad, we'll skip draw steps to actually fuel our graveyard. How? The answer comes from a powerful keyword, called Dredge. Every time you would draw a card, Dredge puts an optional trigger on the stack - you can mill yourself that number of cards and skip that draw, and get that card back to your hand. Seems useless in a vacuum sure, and worse still in a singleton format. However, that's where the Recursion and Reanimation spells come in - we're trying to mill ourselves until we get to one of our wincons or powerful Draw/Protection cards, then bring them back and start using them to interact with our opponents. Jarad also benefits greatly from this style of play, as he gets stronger for each creature in our graveyard, so if you have to visit people with Jarad, you most certainly can - and he will bring serious beats with him.
Ideally, in our opening hands, we want Bazaar of Baghdad, Hermit Druid, or a tutor spell to hit one of those. Failing that, we can fall back on our Dredge keyworded cards or Mesmeric Orb, though they are not as good as the previous suggestion. Because of the surplus of enablers this deck has, we have a bunch of hands that we can keep. Just remember a good rule of thumb - three lands are going to nearly assure you a win. If you need more than that, I'd be slightly concerned, though it's been known to be that way before.
On top of that, you will want either removal, or recursion in hand. Both is better then not, as gravehate has been known to be packed into the most unsuspecting of decks. I once saw a Bruna, Light of Alabaster run Rest in Peace to give an example - so it's not unheard of to have other decks that love the yard attempt to keep us from it. It's okay though, if they focus on hating the graveyard, no doubt someone will break it, because it doesn't seem to be EDH without someone playing with their graveyard. And if you're unlucky enough to be stuck with three decks that hate your graveyard ways, while much slower, we can still plan out our own wins by playing fairly.
Clearly, gravehate is a serious problem this deck will face. In my meta, we've got a handful of decks that hate on graveyards, though they are nowhere near competitive ready, even on a causal level. However, I will say that on more than one occasion, I wish I could bring myself to run Witchbane Orb, but I can't justify it due to how infrequent people exile graveyards in my meta. On top of that, when it does come down, there's usually the mad shuffle of getting it off the board before the person gets any value out of it. Otherwise, minus gravehate, this deck is decently difficult to beat.
Bloodstained Mire, Marsh Flats, Polluted Delta, Windswept Heath, Verdant Catacombs - Primarily used to remove the basic lands first, then going back and getting the non-basics out of the deck. Oddly enough, for a Golgari deck, it relies much heavier on the Black side, which reflects the Fetch selection. I am planning on running all of them one day, but at the same time, I am buying the cards slowly - piece by piece, so my list on TappedOut is an accurate list of what's presently in the deck.
Crypt of Agadeem, Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth - Crypt's power is that even that if we drop it turn one to work around the ETB tapped, it powers up the further along we get towards our winning states. Urborg allows us to lose less life to our painlands\Citadel, and since we rely so much on Black mana to set this ship up, it makes more sense to run Urborg, Tomb as it helps us stabilize our life loss quickly once played.
Dakmor Salvage - a slower land that usually wouldn't be warranted for inclusion in a deck, but one that assures us that we hit our Black mana as we chainsaw though our deck either by Druid, by Bazaar, or by Dredge. Life is never certain - but it's certainly going to need some Black mana if we expect to win.
Ancient Tomb - because more times than not, Sol Ring will be sitting in our yard or in our deck, and even taking a shock a turn to activate it is the right play if we're still above 2 life.
High Market, Phyrexian Tower - Sac outlet lands. Sacrificing a Dredge card to either regain a life/gain two mana is always relevant. It's also on the off chance your opponent is saving that Path/Swords for your Lord of Extinction too.
Golgari Rot Farm - But Hell!, I hear you shout, Rot Farm ETBs tapped, and bounces a land! When is it ever good? Two words: Crop Rotation. Saving a Bazaar from Strip Mine, saving a Crypt of Agadeem from Sowing Salt/Caustic Rain, it's value through and through. Even so, being set back one turn to untap with two more mana than normal is still pretty good when your meta doesn't run anywhere near enough land destruction to make you worried. And if they do, it's all the better!
Mortuary Mire - recent addition from the new Zendikar block, it allows us to throw around some recursion at instant speed if needed, but otherwise, helps us. (see description of Golgari Rot Farm for more info on the instant speed trick) When combined with some of the other silly lands this deck runs, it can easily be used as another Regrowth effect for the cost of a land drop and a black or green mana (cycle the Cycle lands!)
Deathrite Shaman - the one mana planeswalker from Ravnica may be banned from Modern, but in EDH, he is still a boss. Dropping him turn one with net us mana from Fetches, life gain from creatures used against us, or cause some loss of life by eating that counterspell Azami had waiting for us... Not bad for one mana.
Bojuka Bog, Maze of Ith - Since our opponents have scary graveyards sometimes, even without being graveplay decks, there's no reason not to run it. Granted, usually it sits in the yard doing nothing - but the option is there if we need it. Instant speed too, if required. Maze can stop some Voltron decks, as well as keeping us alive a few more turns so we can combo out in a decent amount of time.
Deglamer, Krosan Grip, Unravel the Aether, Woodfall Primus, Void Winnower - Unlike a lot of metas I've seen in my area, mine seems to run a lot of Blightsteel or other indestructible artifact effects. Maybe it's common overall, I can't say. There's some instant speed exile artifacts in Green, but it doesn't mean that we want to pay that much mana when two mana deals with it just fine. Krosan Grip is a staple in all green decks or green splashing decks for a very good reason. Woodfall combos with any sac outlet and Mikaeus to decimate opponents - and can net us a decent chunk of hate. For good reason, mind you. Void Winnower is just good - forces our opponents to be odd, and enforces a lot of gravehate will stay in hands until Winnower is dealt with. Yes, there's still some odd cmc gravehate - but not as much as you might think. Winnower is also a good all-around beat stick if we need to swing at people or hold back an army.
Song of the Dryads - Alarmingly powerful enchantment in green to remove anything - but seems a bit too expensive for my blood. Will be one of the first pieces removed if I can find something better.
Bazaar of Baghdad - A simple land... that with the right backing, is completely busted. Reanimation decks dream of Bazaar, Dredge decks dream of Bazaar. And everyone else shudders in horror. There really is no replacement card for Bazaar in our colours, sadly - anything similar is either banned, or just not as good. If you're on a budget, I would suggest filling this in with Grim Backwoods, as it's a sac outlet and a card draw - but even so, it's nowhere near as powerful.
Dakmor Salvage, Golgari Grave-Troll, Golgari Thug, Life from the Loam, Stinkweed Imp - With Bazaar and natural card draw, Dredge will fill your yard extremely fast. They also can be useful on the field as well. On more than one occasion, the deck gets a Golgari Grave-Troll into play, and it's at least a 18/18 to throw around with Jarad if we have to.
Altar of Dementia, Mesmeric Orb - the weakest in our lineup of mill cards, they do have the advantage of hitting other players too. While this isn't so good if we're not the only ones playing out of the yard, it does mean that we get some free mill for ourselves after the initial two mana investment. Altar also serves you well with Woodfall Primus - blow up one thing, mill that opponent some, then blow something else up. With Mikeaus in the mix though - good luck to your opponents...
Mindslicer - Deceptively powerful for this deck. We don't usually care about our hands, and as he affects our opponents too, means they'll be trying to avoid the Mindslicer if they want to keep their hands available to them. Nice little political rattlesnake.
Tutors, for the most part are pretty standard fare - minus Sylvan Scrying and Crop Rotation. Crop Rotation allows us to use our lands as forms of 'counters' or 'answers' to other people's decks, something I found extremely interesting that no one in my meta had ever done before. While occasionally not used because it's in the yard, it does enable some silly stuff. It's also, oddly, a way we can use Dakmor Scavenge again for a Dredge if needed. Sylvan Scrying is our Sorcery clone of it - while not as powerful, it doesn't require land sacrificed for the increased speed - can still fetch any land we want out of our deck to hand, to be played later, or now, if needed.
Baleful Force, Phyrexian Arena, Greater Good - Usually reanimated early to enable Dredge on everyone else's turn, then for our turn, we decide to actually draw. Also gets beaty if you need to. A much more powerful Phyrexian Arena effect being easier to cast. (But also easier to remove!) Arena and Greater Good are on here for standard reasons - more card draw, the better. Greater Good also has the upside of discarding Dredge cards back to the yard if needed.
Phyrexian Devourer + Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord = Death. Best done midgame, before you Dredge over half your deck into the yard. Keep exiling cards off the top until you hit the highest life total, then fling Devourer.
Necrotic Ooze + Phyrexian Devourer + Triskelion = Death. Best done early, as you'll be exiling the cards off the top of your deck, then removing the counters to deal damage to opponents. The deck has exactly enough to do 3 opponents at 40 life apiece - so if you have Buried Alive and Reanimate in hand, you can do it with more than enough to spare.
Mikaeus, the Unhallowed + Triskelion = Death. Best done anytime. If you have Victimize, you just win on the spot if it resolves.
So yeah, I'm looking for any suggestions or any comments about this deck. It is a tad unorthadox, and I apologize for that. However, when piloted correctly, can cause a world of hurt. It doesn't hurt to goldfish the deck a few times to see the options you have open, and while the deck usually plays during it's own turn, it has been known to do silly thing on opponent's turns as an option too.
UU Azami, Lady of Experiments and Control UU
BG Jarad - Toolbox Reanimator GB
Trying to figure out what to build next!
Official list has been updated to reflect some successful testing - I am now running a few more non-basics (Tainted Wood and Tarnished Citadel) as well as Exploration as a second Manabond effect. Granted, it doesn't discard the rest of our hand, but playing two land a turn catches us up quicker with the faster decks in my current meta. Any suggestions are welcome!
UU Azami, Lady of Experiments and Control UU
BG Jarad - Toolbox Reanimator GB
Trying to figure out what to build next!
Jarad Graveyard Combo[Primer]!
Sidisi ANT!
Playing Commander to Win - A guide on Competitive, 4-player EDH
LandDestruction.com - An EDH blog
I was originally going to post my comments over on your primer before I remembered my own topic - and I appreciate you coming over to concur, haha. Though, I was curious how long though it was going to be until I saw you commenting on my cEDH post. Figured I wasn't getting much of an answer here until your comment, so expanding to cEDH was the next best thing.
On a side note, unrelated to this list, played some two-headed EDH competition today with my current Azami list in my signature. It was singleton with the combined heads, so had to drop Sol Ring and Time Reversal since my partner was Nekusar and added Rite of Rep + Dig. Thanks to the wheels we both ran, took first place.
Back on topic - Tarnished Citadel has been hurting me something fierce with all the other painlands, and it royally sucks. I've had to bring in Woodland Cemetery, which isn't too bad overall. Running the shock, the ABU dual, and the basics/fetches that I do, I can usually assure it's coming in untapped. Only once has it ETB tapped - as it was the first land I played for the game, turn two into City, turn 3 into Druid thanks to Vampiric Tutor. I do wish there was a way I could give him haste though without bouncing into Jund Dredge [and even then - there is no generals that benefit from the Dredge mechanic that I'm aware of].
I've received the following recommendations via Reddit: Necromancy, Exhume, and Dance of the Dead - out of all of them, I don't like Dance still. The other two for sure need to come in. I'm thinking Treasured Find and Sewer Nemesis will be the likely cuts - Sewer relies too much solely upon one person's yard, and Treasured Find, while powerful, is much better suited as another reanimate effect. I am debating about cutting Noxious Revial to readd Find, but the instant speed grabbing something to the top of the deck for free does allow responses to exile of yard seems a bit better.
UU Azami, Lady of Experiments and Control UU
BG Jarad - Toolbox Reanimator GB
Trying to figure out what to build next!