Look maybe i'm mistaken here but I don't remember them ever saying the ban things because they want to shake up the PT format. I recall it being that they save major bans for announcements before PT's to shake up the pt.
This is not inherently wrong. I mean yeah, it sucks we probably had to deal with AmuletBloom for longer than we probably should have, but by my understanding of it, it was going to be banned anyway, they just chose the timing of it to specifically improve the PT.
As for the splinter twin ban, I've also come to realize that frankly it wasn't to kill a "top deck" much like the GB/x Bloodbraid Elf ban was. The reality is, once upon a time we had Jeskai Control decks, and Temur Tempo decks, in addition to the Izzet Splinter Twin decks. However, as time went on, the aforementioned control and tempo decks fell off because they weren't as good as the splinter twin deck. I believe this also happened with the Grixis Midrange/Control deck we had which seems to have all but vanished in favor of the Grixis Twin deck. It's too easy and efficient to simply include Splinter Twin into any UR/x shell and if left unchecked DOES actually stifle format growth, as we've seen by pushing out most if not all non-twin versions of those decks.
We would in theory see a similar situation if SFM were to be unbanned in the wake of a twin ban. BG/x would lean more towards Abzan. Jeskai would add the package and virtually all esper control decks would do the same. 3-4 SFM 1 Batterskull and season with swords to taste. Now this isn't to say I think a SFM unban would be bad at all straight up power wise, but it WOULD be extremely present in any deck that can reasonably play 1W on turn 2.
And with that I'm back to my point. They didn't ban twin because the deck was too good, but because the card itself lead to anything in U gravitating to the UR/x twin package and that in itself is stifling growth. We wont exactly know what they expect the meta to look like, or what they have in the pipeline headed this way, but as far as this particular practitioner is concerned it does seem like a poor meta decision. I HATE tron with a passion because it really does stifle deck strategies that just want to play fair, and twin was kind of a secret ally in that fight. (The enemy of my enemy...) That said, not agreeing with this move does not somehow make the move into something it's not. Twin as an archtype wasn't hit because it was too good, or doing something it shouldn't in the meta, but the card Splinter Twin was banned because everything in blue over time eventually added it's package. And that IS stifling.
I am merely worried now that in the absence of twin more linear decks will spring to the top. Don't get me wrong I understand the reasons. You couldn't play U/x without first adding red for twin, which makes the card itself extremely limiting in diversity, and there was always the unnerving feeling of playing against a deck that could combo out at any time T3 forward. It was even worse game 2 and 3 because you NEVER knew how much of the combo was even left in the deck. That said, I hate tron and burn even more than I hated splinter twin.
As an individual card, the splinter twin ban makes sense.
As a card that worked itself into a strategy that helped the case of fair decks by being the linear deck to game against... not so much.
I've been saying bloom for a long time. No surprises there.
Skinning Tendrils (totally read sinking tendrils)... man with as much as I hate kitchen finks and voice of resurgence I can definitely see playing this over the other two versions. Not to mention catching random snapcaster mages helps alleviate some of the kolaghan's shenanigans. To me it's not a question of which infest is better, but if one is worth running at all.
If you're playing against SFM.dec as another fair deck, you're probably packing removal and discard. Maybe save the Thoughtseize for the turn after they SFM? Maybe all that removal you're playing to combat twin has a different target? How about just following it up with a kolaghan's command to kill the batterskull and shock the mystic? I would rather play against SFM.dec every round than <insert random linear deck> Hell, I would rather SFM come off the ban list than Sword of the Meek, which just adds another combo (albeit an incredibly slow one) for decks to focus around in the format.
Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet really reminds me more of a black Linvala, Keeper of Silence. Same cost and flying body. Linvala stops more things, which is more akin to the white color pie, but kalitas stops a lot of graveyard shenanigans and value creatures that can be hard for black based decks to contend with. Just being able to <insert doom blade variant> a wurmcoil engine, kitchen finks or Voice of Resurgence at parody is reason enough for me to test it. Getting the zombies when you kill something is just value. I mean if i cast him and he dies before hand, well the same can be said about tapping out to Linvala when she's good too, but should you untap with him? man, I'm likely to be killing your guys anyway, giving me bodies on top of that just seems great, which is something one can't say for the aforementioned linvala. Add in the lifelink and random ability to just keep getting bigger and I think we have a solid modern playable.
Blighted Fen does not target yourself (which sucks) and working from memory has proven to bite me in the ass more often than I would like. I concede this point
However as someone who's played MBC style decks since before odyssey block gave us cabal coffers, and someone who's been invested in the modern format since the originally rumored overextended format, I can tell you with confidence I don't think your deck as it currently stands really has much of a chance in a competitive environment. I have been looking for ways to attack the goal of getting a traditional MBC deck to work in modern since it's inception. Using resources like this, this thread, the mono black devotion thread, Smallpox theads, death cloud threads, potential legacy ports, and interesting legacy concepts like the gate to try and figure out a way to utilize the strengths minimize the weaknesses and attack specific meta games for modern. It's all but pointless as per the very nature of this threads lack of activity.
The format is too varied to offer a chance to meta game, the mana bases are too greedy to relegate yourself to a single color, and even having the best universal police card: Thoughtseize, is just not enough to make it work. Most control decks in the format have even gravitated more towards a tempo or midrange game plan. Grixis "Control" is little more than Jund except with blue instead of green. Jeskai control decks that see popularily lately seem to all want to pack resto angels and geists, which makes it very little surprise to me that the most effective mono black deck is probably the midrangey Mono Black Devotion.
It really doesn't help that people have come in here mostly just to post random lists that they came up with on their own and then they never want to accept anyone else's take on their deck. You can't expect people to throw together your list and test it for you. Instead let people who are not invested, or too close to your list give you some feed back, help push you into a direction or help you find a way to squeeze a few more consistency points out of the build.
Lateralus19, your deck doesn't look competitive in the slightest. Looks like a standard (the format) take on old mono black lists that want to just go over opponents, but it's got some elements that don't work with that outlook. Abyssal Persecutor lends himself more into the role of a finisher for efficient lists like the gate from legacy.
Which is why i suggested you try to move in that direction. Otherwise, spending 4 mana on most turns that does nothing if removed and doesn't really stop you from flat out losing to some of these combo decks just feels bad. Then you have a curve that goes all the way up to 6cmc with spells like Oona, wurmcoil and grave titan. With the exception of Oona, these guys are decent haymakers that can blow open a top deck war against grindy match ups like jund/junk/grixis but need more in the way of surviving or ramping to that point in the game. Your early game is almost entirely discard which can be good against some matches, but can actually be very bad against resolved threats. your removal has an average cmc of 2.9~ which means you are going to take a lot of punishment before you can reasonably answer aggressive threats, much less multiple aggressive threats.
not to mention your CA/tutor suite 2 phyrexian arenas, 1 LotDR, and 3 Beseech the queens is strongly lacking meaning you will have trouble finding the part of your deck you want reasonably. If you have to rely on Beseech the queen to find an answer to what could be a lethal inkmoth nexus is going to be extremely slow, eat up your entire t3, and leave you vulnerable. What worse about the card is, if you are playing against a deck like say scapeshift where resolving memoricide/cranial extraction would be game determining, beseech has no way to help you hit that on turn 4. Similar to the fact that there will be times when you absolutely need to hit that damnation/mutilate on 4, and you can't tutor for it on three. IF you are going to run a Beseech the Queen packages you definitely need to add Slaughter Pact and replace the extripates in your sideboard with Surgical Extraction so you have some options to look for and use on T3. However don't underestimate a transmute package
Choose One:
1BB - search for a card that costs 4 and put it into your hand. Can't be countered.
or
3B - put a 2/3 creature into play with Sacrifice a creature: Regenerate.
That's quite a flexible card. Especially running things like Damnation, night of souls' betrayal, Memoricide, your coveted LotDR, 1 of tendrils of corruption, and various threats of 4cmc.
I think a card like that is just better for someone running Persecutor than BBB, search for any card equal to the number of lands you have. If you just wanted a flexible tutor to search for various reactive cards to situations then I think Dark Petition is just better. BBB then wait until your next turn to cast what you searched for isn't much better/worse than waiting for 5 mana and casting demonic tutor into the card you searched up.
And since your curve is so much higher than most modern decks not named tron and you aren't trying to utilize Nykthos, shrine to nyx and devotion, maybe consider running Wayfarer's Bauble. Not as efficient as splashing green for rampant growth, but it's on color and can help you get to the mana you need to cast things.
As for your removal, pick one, Victim is just better than GftT, and you definitely need some earlier removal.. if you have to wait on drown in sorrow to answer a goblin guide... you aren't favored to win that game.
If you're deck worked so well why post looking for advice?
I don't understand how drown is good against zoo considering nacatl, Lord and loam are 3 toughness.
You're obviously underestimating dimir house guard. He's a 3 mana uncounterable rotor spell that lets you search for a 4cmc spell on turn three, and as a top deck is a 2/3 body should you need it that also just happens to let you sacrifice an abyssal persecutor. When your win con costs 4 and your most powerful spells cost 4, it's a fine card. In black red I used to curve it out into slaughter games to destroy scapeshift.
Dark confidant is amazing in low to the ground lists. I mean there is a reason jund plays him with 3-4 4cmc spells and a single tasigur 6cmc. If your argument is the deck still needs to be lowered that's reasonable, but it sounds more like you haven't played with him. 24 lands with 8-10 fetches, (jund) he still goes on tears without costing you a thing... T1 inquisition, t2 Bob can win games on its own.
Blighted fen isn't terrible... It's a land, that maybe saves you a game at, like zero cost to put in your deck. My list tops out at 4s, so extra land isn't always useful, and in the event of looking for outs to percy turns 1 land drop into a live draw. Its definitely better than your one nonbasic land because it comes in untapped, offers offensive utility and can kill a percy. Bojuko bog, is too slow to be effective gy hate in this format.
Grave titan, and wurm coil are fine cards, but oona is extremely low impact. And your original lists curve is way too high for only 24 lands.
But if you're seeing success, best of luck to you. Your meta comes off as more casual or slow. In my meta infect and affinity are rampant, as well as bloom, and playing a deck that will often give me 6 drops, and overcost or inefective removal is just signing me up for muliganing often, which isn't my cup of tea. If your meta hardens you should but your own spin on the efficient mbc list and try it
It's sad that one of the best black card draw spells can't even be played in the tradition MBC lists: Painful Truths
Lateralus19 - I would definitely bring down your curve. Most decks playing with Percy should probably top out at percy considering it's a low to the ground type of deck that wants to run on efficiency. I would also add 2 ish Blighted Fen as an uncounterable way to remove him. It's a bit costly but has some solid uses even if you don't have a persecutor out. I also find the beseech the queen plan to just fall flat most of the time. The only tutor's that i see as kind of playable right now are Dark Petition which wants to play in the devotion to black shell I think, and Dimir House Guard which is more limiting but at least operates as outs to persecutor at the very least. Not to mention he tutors for persecutor as well on curve to play him. Looking over your list i think you can refine it a bit more as well. Your discard suite looks bloated 5-7 is plenty, and even then sometimes can flood you out. Your removal is also in a bit of a disheveled state. Main deck 1 drown, 2 damnation, 3 lili, 1 lili of the dark realm, 1 heros downfall, 2 gftt, 3 victim and 1 tendrils. Kind of just feels all over the place. Let me just go ahead and say you need to pack up that liliana of the dark realm. I have a set collecting dust because of LotV. She has a home, if you wanted to try and go big with swamps matter theme, but here lotV is just superior. Drown is a sideboard card at best and not exactly a very good one. Personally I would recommend cutting the tendrils (though i think it's a fine card), LotDR, Drown and 1 damnation. LotDR, Drown and Tendrils all run the risk of not even being able to remove your own persecutor, and i think you would be better suited with some number of Disfigure to improve your game against infect, and affinity, as well as giving you a really nice way to answer an early jace. I would also like to second the Gatekeeper of malakir suggestion. It's almost always a 2 for 1, gives you a solid out to your own persecutor and when curved into a persecutor offers some liliana protection as well. The Hero's Downfall i'm just not sure about. We definitely need some protection against planeswalkers but 3 mana just feels like a lot to me. I've also considered Ruinous Path since it doubles as a late game win condition (Super Shriekmaw) but if i'm going to pay 3 mana for removal it probably needs to be instant to help me answer EoT Deceiver Exarch. Anyway I would just recommend you lower your deck to the ground since you're dead set on persecutor. Some of the legacy lists using Percy i've seen follow this design philosophy and they have so many outs to it, it's never going to cause them a loss.
Any thought on Vampiric Rites ?
B
Enchantment
1B, sac a creature: gain 1 life and draw 1 card.
It's not good enough for Modern. Maybe it will see play in graveyard based decks like zombies/vampires with Gravecrawler and Bloodghast but even there it won't have big impact.
I seem to recall people saying the same thing about Evolutionary Leap. It's very similar in that you replace a body for a card. In this case what you get is far less specific and you gain a life for each activation. That said though 1B per activation is much higher than G. Being in black and not chaining into creatures means you could pair it with cards like lingering Souls, and Bitterblossom.
Now I'm looking at this from a B/G Death Cloud standpoint. I understand that's like a T3-10 deck but it shares a few concepts with the standard BG/x shell. Etched Champion is quite difficult to handle for me even with the additonal sac effects inherent to death cloud and this card provides a solid way to push a board state while also potentially giving you mana bumps. We also just watched a naya chord deck run Pia and Kiran nalaar to go wide with, and i understand that flying thopters are probably more relevant in that shell, but if abzan company wanted a similar effect this could actually slide nicely into the shell as it's also Collected Company compatible. I may be a little high on this card at least for me it looks like it could be worth testing.
This is not inherently wrong. I mean yeah, it sucks we probably had to deal with AmuletBloom for longer than we probably should have, but by my understanding of it, it was going to be banned anyway, they just chose the timing of it to specifically improve the PT.
As for the splinter twin ban, I've also come to realize that frankly it wasn't to kill a "top deck" much like the GB/x Bloodbraid Elf ban was. The reality is, once upon a time we had Jeskai Control decks, and Temur Tempo decks, in addition to the Izzet Splinter Twin decks. However, as time went on, the aforementioned control and tempo decks fell off because they weren't as good as the splinter twin deck. I believe this also happened with the Grixis Midrange/Control deck we had which seems to have all but vanished in favor of the Grixis Twin deck. It's too easy and efficient to simply include Splinter Twin into any UR/x shell and if left unchecked DOES actually stifle format growth, as we've seen by pushing out most if not all non-twin versions of those decks.
We would in theory see a similar situation if SFM were to be unbanned in the wake of a twin ban. BG/x would lean more towards Abzan. Jeskai would add the package and virtually all esper control decks would do the same. 3-4 SFM 1 Batterskull and season with swords to taste. Now this isn't to say I think a SFM unban would be bad at all straight up power wise, but it WOULD be extremely present in any deck that can reasonably play 1W on turn 2.
And with that I'm back to my point. They didn't ban twin because the deck was too good, but because the card itself lead to anything in U gravitating to the UR/x twin package and that in itself is stifling growth. We wont exactly know what they expect the meta to look like, or what they have in the pipeline headed this way, but as far as this particular practitioner is concerned it does seem like a poor meta decision. I HATE tron with a passion because it really does stifle deck strategies that just want to play fair, and twin was kind of a secret ally in that fight. (The enemy of my enemy...) That said, not agreeing with this move does not somehow make the move into something it's not. Twin as an archtype wasn't hit because it was too good, or doing something it shouldn't in the meta, but the card Splinter Twin was banned because everything in blue over time eventually added it's package. And that IS stifling.
As an individual card, the splinter twin ban makes sense.
As a card that worked itself into a strategy that helped the case of fair decks by being the linear deck to game against... not so much.
I've been saying bloom for a long time. No surprises there.
However as someone who's played MBC style decks since before odyssey block gave us cabal coffers, and someone who's been invested in the modern format since the originally rumored overextended format, I can tell you with confidence I don't think your deck as it currently stands really has much of a chance in a competitive environment. I have been looking for ways to attack the goal of getting a traditional MBC deck to work in modern since it's inception. Using resources like this, this thread, the mono black devotion thread, Smallpox theads, death cloud threads, potential legacy ports, and interesting legacy concepts like the gate to try and figure out a way to utilize the strengths minimize the weaknesses and attack specific meta games for modern. It's all but pointless as per the very nature of this threads lack of activity.
The format is too varied to offer a chance to meta game, the mana bases are too greedy to relegate yourself to a single color, and even having the best universal police card: Thoughtseize, is just not enough to make it work. Most control decks in the format have even gravitated more towards a tempo or midrange game plan. Grixis "Control" is little more than Jund except with blue instead of green. Jeskai control decks that see popularily lately seem to all want to pack resto angels and geists, which makes it very little surprise to me that the most effective mono black deck is probably the midrangey Mono Black Devotion.
It really doesn't help that people have come in here mostly just to post random lists that they came up with on their own and then they never want to accept anyone else's take on their deck. You can't expect people to throw together your list and test it for you. Instead let people who are not invested, or too close to your list give you some feed back, help push you into a direction or help you find a way to squeeze a few more consistency points out of the build.
Lateralus19, your deck doesn't look competitive in the slightest. Looks like a standard (the format) take on old mono black lists that want to just go over opponents, but it's got some elements that don't work with that outlook. Abyssal Persecutor lends himself more into the role of a finisher for efficient lists like the gate from legacy.
3x Abyssal Persecutor
3x Bitterblossom
4x Dark Confidant
4x Gatekeeper Of Malakir
4x Vampire Nighthawk
Spells [17]
2x Cabal Therapy
2x Dismember
2x Go For The Throat
4x Hymn To Tourach
3x Innocent Blood
4x Thoughtseize
2x Liliana of the Veil
2x Umezawa's Jitte
land [21]
15x Swamp
4x Wasteland
2x Bojuka Bog
4x Leyline of the Void
3x Surgical Extraction
2x Pithing Needle
3x Dystopia
2x Null Rod
1x Duress
Which is why i suggested you try to move in that direction. Otherwise, spending 4 mana on most turns that does nothing if removed and doesn't really stop you from flat out losing to some of these combo decks just feels bad. Then you have a curve that goes all the way up to 6cmc with spells like Oona, wurmcoil and grave titan. With the exception of Oona, these guys are decent haymakers that can blow open a top deck war against grindy match ups like jund/junk/grixis but need more in the way of surviving or ramping to that point in the game. Your early game is almost entirely discard which can be good against some matches, but can actually be very bad against resolved threats. your removal has an average cmc of 2.9~ which means you are going to take a lot of punishment before you can reasonably answer aggressive threats, much less multiple aggressive threats.
not to mention your CA/tutor suite 2 phyrexian arenas, 1 LotDR, and 3 Beseech the queens is strongly lacking meaning you will have trouble finding the part of your deck you want reasonably. If you have to rely on Beseech the queen to find an answer to what could be a lethal inkmoth nexus is going to be extremely slow, eat up your entire t3, and leave you vulnerable. What worse about the card is, if you are playing against a deck like say scapeshift where resolving memoricide/cranial extraction would be game determining, beseech has no way to help you hit that on turn 4. Similar to the fact that there will be times when you absolutely need to hit that damnation/mutilate on 4, and you can't tutor for it on three. IF you are going to run a Beseech the Queen packages you definitely need to add Slaughter Pact and replace the extripates in your sideboard with Surgical Extraction so you have some options to look for and use on T3. However don't underestimate a transmute package
Choose One:
1BB - search for a card that costs 4 and put it into your hand. Can't be countered.
or
3B - put a 2/3 creature into play with Sacrifice a creature: Regenerate.
That's quite a flexible card. Especially running things like Damnation, night of souls' betrayal, Memoricide, your coveted LotDR, 1 of tendrils of corruption, and various threats of 4cmc.
I think a card like that is just better for someone running Persecutor than BBB, search for any card equal to the number of lands you have. If you just wanted a flexible tutor to search for various reactive cards to situations then I think Dark Petition is just better. BBB then wait until your next turn to cast what you searched for isn't much better/worse than waiting for 5 mana and casting demonic tutor into the card you searched up.
And since your curve is so much higher than most modern decks not named tron and you aren't trying to utilize Nykthos, shrine to nyx and devotion, maybe consider running Wayfarer's Bauble. Not as efficient as splashing green for rampant growth, but it's on color and can help you get to the mana you need to cast things.
As for your removal, pick one, Victim is just better than GftT, and you definitely need some earlier removal.. if you have to wait on drown in sorrow to answer a goblin guide... you aren't favored to win that game.
I don't understand how drown is good against zoo considering nacatl, Lord and loam are 3 toughness.
You're obviously underestimating dimir house guard. He's a 3 mana uncounterable rotor spell that lets you search for a 4cmc spell on turn three, and as a top deck is a 2/3 body should you need it that also just happens to let you sacrifice an abyssal persecutor. When your win con costs 4 and your most powerful spells cost 4, it's a fine card. In black red I used to curve it out into slaughter games to destroy scapeshift.
Dark confidant is amazing in low to the ground lists. I mean there is a reason jund plays him with 3-4 4cmc spells and a single tasigur 6cmc. If your argument is the deck still needs to be lowered that's reasonable, but it sounds more like you haven't played with him. 24 lands with 8-10 fetches, (jund) he still goes on tears without costing you a thing... T1 inquisition, t2 Bob can win games on its own.
Blighted fen isn't terrible... It's a land, that maybe saves you a game at, like zero cost to put in your deck. My list tops out at 4s, so extra land isn't always useful, and in the event of looking for outs to percy turns 1 land drop into a live draw. Its definitely better than your one nonbasic land because it comes in untapped, offers offensive utility and can kill a percy. Bojuko bog, is too slow to be effective gy hate in this format.
Grave titan, and wurm coil are fine cards, but oona is extremely low impact. And your original lists curve is way too high for only 24 lands.
But if you're seeing success, best of luck to you. Your meta comes off as more casual or slow. In my meta infect and affinity are rampant, as well as bloom, and playing a deck that will often give me 6 drops, and overcost or inefective removal is just signing me up for muliganing often, which isn't my cup of tea. If your meta hardens you should but your own spin on the efficient mbc list and try it
Lateralus19 - I would definitely bring down your curve. Most decks playing with Percy should probably top out at percy considering it's a low to the ground type of deck that wants to run on efficiency. I would also add 2 ish Blighted Fen as an uncounterable way to remove him. It's a bit costly but has some solid uses even if you don't have a persecutor out. I also find the beseech the queen plan to just fall flat most of the time. The only tutor's that i see as kind of playable right now are Dark Petition which wants to play in the devotion to black shell I think, and Dimir House Guard which is more limiting but at least operates as outs to persecutor at the very least. Not to mention he tutors for persecutor as well on curve to play him. Looking over your list i think you can refine it a bit more as well. Your discard suite looks bloated 5-7 is plenty, and even then sometimes can flood you out. Your removal is also in a bit of a disheveled state. Main deck 1 drown, 2 damnation, 3 lili, 1 lili of the dark realm, 1 heros downfall, 2 gftt, 3 victim and 1 tendrils. Kind of just feels all over the place. Let me just go ahead and say you need to pack up that liliana of the dark realm. I have a set collecting dust because of LotV. She has a home, if you wanted to try and go big with swamps matter theme, but here lotV is just superior. Drown is a sideboard card at best and not exactly a very good one. Personally I would recommend cutting the tendrils (though i think it's a fine card), LotDR, Drown and 1 damnation. LotDR, Drown and Tendrils all run the risk of not even being able to remove your own persecutor, and i think you would be better suited with some number of Disfigure to improve your game against infect, and affinity, as well as giving you a really nice way to answer an early jace. I would also like to second the Gatekeeper of malakir suggestion. It's almost always a 2 for 1, gives you a solid out to your own persecutor and when curved into a persecutor offers some liliana protection as well. The Hero's Downfall i'm just not sure about. We definitely need some protection against planeswalkers but 3 mana just feels like a lot to me. I've also considered Ruinous Path since it doubles as a late game win condition (Super Shriekmaw) but if i'm going to pay 3 mana for removal it probably needs to be instant to help me answer EoT Deceiver Exarch. Anyway I would just recommend you lower your deck to the ground since you're dead set on persecutor. Some of the legacy lists using Percy i've seen follow this design philosophy and they have so many outs to it, it's never going to cause them a loss.
20 Swamp
2 Blighted Fen
2 Ghost Quarter
Creatures 16
4 Dark Confidant
4 Gatekeeper of Malakir
3 Dimir House Guard
4 Abyssal Persecutor
Artifact 1
1 Batterskull
1 Whip of Erebos
3 Liliana of the Veil
Other 15
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Thoughtseize
3 Disfigure
2 Go for the Throat
3 Victim of Night
1 Damnation
1 Tendrils of Corruption
1 Memoricide
1 Night of Souls' betrayal
2 Duress
1 Disfigure
1 Go for the throat
1 Liliana of the veil
3 Leyline of the Void
3 Fulminator Mage
2 Spellskite
1 Damnation
A deck like this really wants Innocent Blood and Cabal Therapy but we work with what we have
I seem to recall people saying the same thing about Evolutionary Leap. It's very similar in that you replace a body for a card. In this case what you get is far less specific and you gain a life for each activation. That said though 1B per activation is much higher than G. Being in black and not chaining into creatures means you could pair it with cards like lingering Souls, and Bitterblossom.
yes... it's now very mediocre. Reading is key
Cons
Pros
Now I'm looking at this from a B/G Death Cloud standpoint. I understand that's like a T3-10 deck but it shares a few concepts with the standard BG/x shell. Etched Champion is quite difficult to handle for me even with the additonal sac effects inherent to death cloud and this card provides a solid way to push a board state while also potentially giving you mana bumps. We also just watched a naya chord deck run Pia and Kiran nalaar to go wide with, and i understand that flying thopters are probably more relevant in that shell, but if abzan company wanted a similar effect this could actually slide nicely into the shell as it's also Collected Company compatible. I may be a little high on this card at least for me it looks like it could be worth testing.
Or am i just crazy?