With a sacrifice outlet of which the deck has many. I commonly have at the very least, two Graveborn tokens when I cast this. And sometimes more. Between Sek'kuar, tokens and the Elemental itself. This can wrath an opponent's board and make him sac lands, severely neutering him. It's been a blow out every time i've played it.
I think that the Werewolf Legend might not yet be spoiled yet if it exists. So far Zombies, Humans and Vampires have a Legend. But not Werewolves. Also many Werewolves mention Tolovar their leader. Since Avacyn will have no DFC cards, and there are no more DFC Werewolves in Dark Ascension, you can assume 1 of two things. There is no Werewolf legend (Tolovar), or the Werewolf legend (Tolovar) is permanently stuck in Werewolf form.
Also if he does exist I don't see how he can top Everwolf. He has to be either crazy awesome. Or meh.
I didn't realize the necessity to pay the casting cost (and colors). That definitely hampers the ability a bit. Geth is obviously stronger by a mile, but the Lich still has real power. Flavorwise, as MrDTE said, it is perfect. He can easily pay one mana plus a low casting cost of (presumably) one of your Zombies (or Shriekmaw), or, at a stretch, steal an opponent's creature with a serious mana exertion. He's strong. He's a Lich.
Did you really think he could zombify any creature, in any graveyard without tapping for 1, and was that aggressively costed, AND he got their activated abilities?
Damper isn't the word, that would be the best creature ever printed.
I'm seeing something with self mill Mimeoplasm of course, but I'm sure there HAS to be a loop somewhere. Buried Alive targeting Lich, Necrotic Ooze, ? + a reanimate spell???
Your doing it wrong.
It's a really good card that lets you recur creatures out of graveyards. It's actually a lot like Geth, Lord of the Vault in that respect. It doesn't need a combo to be amazing, and it seems superfluous if there was.
I think that's kind of the point though, to be useful, it's no transform ability needed to be on the legend more so than this for any werewolf based deck to appear. Otherwise, they are just too unpredictable.
Unless the Legend manually flips Werewolves as his activated ability.
Forgive this messy list as it was exported from MTGO, I made this deck with some budgetary stuff, and so it's missing a few things like Mystical Tutor, Clones, etc.
But it's proven pretty powerful nonetheless. Recently I had a game that went something like
Turn 1-3 everyone lays land, My opening hand was something like
Cultivate, Eternal Dominion, Grand Coliseum, Mountain, Island, Pongify, Nostalgic Dreams
Turn 3, Cultivate
Turn 4, Riku
Turn 5, Nostalgic Dreams for Cultivate, Sol Ring, Cultivate and forked.
Turn 6, Drew Terastodon last turn, I play Terastodon and fork him.
Turn 7, Eternal Dominion forked, grab Lightning Greaves from one guy, Plate from another and put them both on Riku
Turn 8, One guy's only removal spell is Decree of Pain which he casts just to get rid of Terastodon, other guy's Animar and a few dudes
Turn 9, Two Eternal Dominions go off, I grab Blightsteel Collossus from Animar, fork him, then grab Terastodon from him and fork him.
Alternatively, use Strands of Night .The land sacrifice and life gain won't matter if you can just kill everyone right there and then.
Kokusho may have been very broken with Recurring Nightmare, but the fact is this: people willseek to abuse him. People will recur Kokunuts in cycles. Kokusho may be best in sac+recur decks, and a solid addition to black-splashing decks a la Primeval Titan, but he isn't too overpowered. However, although it's true that he's not quite as good without sacrifice engines, but he will still be powerful, if not only in the right decks.
However, I still think that banlists should be up to playgroups. Is there any benefit to following the official banlist in casual play, instead of making up one?
The point is not that people will try, is that will it even be effective?
Kokusho isn't even that good now. There are much better ways to win. And how can something be degenerate if there are easier ways to win? I thought degenerate meant that it was too easy to win.
Lets see, this does come down to whether the context is Multiplayer or 1v1.
In multiplayer Kokusho is by far the best of the 3 IMO, with Sphinx being the worst. Simply because sphinx needs to have an opponent draw before any benefit is gained from in. In Multiplayer it's unlikely this will happen until you are already winning. Kokusho's ability is best in Multiplayer with the more players the better, with Primevil being in the middle, as he is going to get you to 8 mana at least.
In 1v1 the tables turn. Kokusho is the worst of the 3, having only one opponent to leech from. Now depending on the point in the game is whether the titan or the sphinx tops the 1v1 category. Titan gives a massive boost at the start of the game, not so much during the later stages if you already have a ton of mana out. Sphinx in the early game could still be killed before any benefits, but this gets less likely as the game progresses, since by then there would be counter magic to back him up.
So I went with none.
Lolno
Sphinx is several orders of magnitude the strongest 6drop in the format. Kokusho is not even a blip on the radar anymore without Recurring Nightmare. Sphinx will replace itself the moment you pass your turn, as Primeval Titan will when he ETB. But unlike Sphinx, you don't need to attack with the Sphinx to get advanced mileage out of him. He threatens people to not get greedy to draw too much, He draws you cards simply by your opponents having turns. And if two Sphinx are on the battlefield at the same time, you pretty much draw your deck.
Even if you used Titan to grab Coffers/Urborg, i've never seen more games one than off the back of the Sphinx. Kokusho can't even compare, the card never should have been printed.
Of course. I don't even think Koko can be 'abused' without Recurring Nightmare!
I just like following the 'official' list is all. Keeps things from becoming overly complicated.
Here's the skinny.
With Recurring Nightmare for 2B you could sac and recur Kokusho, draining the table for 5, and putting Kokusho in play and Nightmare in your hand. Because you'd always end the chain with Kokusho in play, and Nightmare in hand. Especially if you had any number of sac lands. The combo was very hard to disrupt, right?
The closest I have ever come to duplicating what Kokusho could do, was by using Nim Deathmantle
Since you need 8 cycles to kill everyone, assuming no one gained any life. Recurring Nightmare could end the game for 16BBBBBBBB or 24 CMC. Nim Deathmantle has to stay in play, and you need a sacrifice outlet to get it to work. 3 cards compared to just 2 needed in the Nightmare combo. Not only that but you need 32 just to end the game. And Nim Deathmantle has to stay on the board the entire time. Or you'd have to do it all in one turn. But if you can dump 32 in a single turn, then Exsanguinate is just better and harder to disrupt. Since one is vulnerable to graveyard hate and any artifact kill. The other is only vulnerable to counterspells. And the hand is one of the safest zones to keep your kill cards.
Kokusho isn't even that good anymore. I loved Kokusho because I had fond memories of using him in my casual decks when I started around Mirrodin/Kamigawa. Compared to Primeval Titan, Consecrated Sphinx, even Grave Titan, he just isn't that good.
I'm looking for more of a Jund goodstuff type deck... I saw how amazing Gravepact was in my monoblack deck, and thought I'd expound upon that with Sek'kuar, but now I'm more interested in throwing in awesome Jund stuff and throwing around sweet spells like Violent Ultimatum.
I know I can just use the general for colors, but which one fits better with that strategy as opposed to being built around. So far the vote seems to be for Karrthas...
Nothing says you can't use those too.
My Sek'kuar deck uses Grave Pact, Violent Ultimatum, Decimate and Maelstrom Pulse. along with some really awesome tech in a Sek'kuar deck.
Sek'kuar himself can pump this spell up to absurd levels and clear someone's entire board. It's the only spell of it's kind that is capable of nuking one person's lands and creatures. Making it awesome for Politics. "Hey, I took care of the bad guy, now all that's left of him is a smoking crater"
I've heard recently that when you cast Living Death while you control a creature such as Savra, Queen of the Golgari, "the triggers activate after the spell resolves", meaning that your opponent sacrifices the creatures they resurrect.
Just one question, EDH players : Is this really true? I don't like cards with the word ' then ' in their text box because they confuse me when it comes to triggers
If so, does it work with cards like Grave Pact, and how does it look like.
A good thing to remember about things like that. Is no spell or ability can go on the stack while a spell is still resolving.
Sacrificing all creatures in play, Exiling all creatures in GYs, and returning all exiled creatures exiled to the battlefield are all done, by the game's perspective, at the exact same time. Then once Living Death finishes resolving, all abilities that trigger, such as Sacrifice, Dies, or ETB abilities go on the stack.
So if you theoretically had enough black creatures to cover every creature in each opponent's GY, their abilities would still go on the stack, but they would then have to sacrifice them.
Grabbing one ASAP, that's just too good not to be played.
With a sacrifice outlet of which the deck has many. I commonly have at the very least, two Graveborn tokens when I cast this. And sometimes more. Between Sek'kuar, tokens and the Elemental itself. This can wrath an opponent's board and make him sac lands, severely neutering him. It's been a blow out every time i've played it.
Also if he does exist I don't see how he can top Everwolf. He has to be either crazy awesome. Or meh.
Uhhhhhh...
Grand Arbiter Augustin IV
Also I don't think she's even that good of a Commander. Gaddock Teeg does her job but better.
Did you really think he could zombify any creature, in any graveyard without tapping for 1, and was that aggressively costed, AND he got their activated abilities?
Damper isn't the word, that would be the best creature ever printed.
Your doing it wrong.
It's a really good card that lets you recur creatures out of graveyards. It's actually a lot like Geth, Lord of the Vault in that respect. It doesn't need a combo to be amazing, and it seems superfluous if there was.
Unless the Legend manually flips Werewolves as his activated ability.
But it's proven pretty powerful nonetheless. Recently I had a game that went something like
Turn 1-3 everyone lays land, My opening hand was something like
Cultivate, Eternal Dominion, Grand Coliseum, Mountain, Island, Pongify, Nostalgic Dreams
Turn 3, Cultivate
Turn 4, Riku
Turn 5, Nostalgic Dreams for Cultivate, Sol Ring, Cultivate and forked.
Turn 6, Drew Terastodon last turn, I play Terastodon and fork him.
Turn 7, Eternal Dominion forked, grab Lightning Greaves from one guy, Plate from another and put them both on Riku
Turn 8, One guy's only removal spell is Decree of Pain which he casts just to get rid of Terastodon, other guy's Animar and a few dudes
Turn 9, Two Eternal Dominions go off, I grab Blightsteel Collossus from Animar, fork him, then grab Terastodon from him and fork him.
1 Kazandu Refuge
1 Decimate
4 Island
1 Into the Roil
1 Elixir of Immortality
1 Island
1 Pongify
1 Voidslime
1 Radiate
1 Vivid Crag
1 Vivid Creek
1 Vivid Grove
1 Ghost Quarter
1 Darksteel Ingot
1 Crystal Ball
1 Reliquary Tower
1 Sol Ring
1 Tolaria West
1 Blasphemous Act
1 Cultivate
1 Thawing Glaciers
1 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Sphinx of Uthuun
1 Hull Breach
1 Oracle of Mul Daya
1 Tectonic Edge
1 Eternal Dominion
1 Mana Geyser
1 Fierce Empath
1 Diamond Valley
1 Acidic Slime
1 Rootbound Crag
1 Fault Line
1 Terastodon
1 Mulldrifter
1 Mimic Vat
1 Eternal Witness
1 Explosive Vegetation
1 Charmbreaker Devils
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Grand Coliseum
1 Arcane Denial
1 Praetor's Counsel
1 Comet Storm
1 Coiling Oracle
1 Brainstorm
1 Rite of Replication
1 Preordain
1 Minamo, School at Water's Edge
1 Turnabout
1 Mosswort Bridge
1 Darksteel Plate
1 Spell Crumple
1 Kodama's Reach
1 Reap and Sow
1 Duplicant
1 Wild Ricochet
1 Fire-Lit Thicket
1 Leyline of Anticipation
1 Tooth and Nail
1 Ponder
1 Temple of the False God
1 Seedborn Muse
1 Nostalgic Dreams
1 Primeval Titan
1 Nature's Lore
1 Mana Reflection
1 Simic Growth Chamber
1 Blatant Thievery
1 Recurring Insight
1 Solemn Simulacrum
4 Mountain
1 Gruul Turf
1 Izzet Boilerworks
1 Blue Sun's Zenith
7 Forest
1 Krosan Grip
1 Beast Within
1 Sakura-Tribe Elder
1 Lightning Greaves
1 Reins of Power
1 Reiterate
1 Guided Passage
2 Island
1 Riku of Two Reflections
The point is not that people will try, is that will it even be effective?
Kokusho isn't even that good now. There are much better ways to win. And how can something be degenerate if there are easier ways to win? I thought degenerate meant that it was too easy to win.
Lolno
Sphinx is several orders of magnitude the strongest 6drop in the format. Kokusho is not even a blip on the radar anymore without Recurring Nightmare. Sphinx will replace itself the moment you pass your turn, as Primeval Titan will when he ETB. But unlike Sphinx, you don't need to attack with the Sphinx to get advanced mileage out of him. He threatens people to not get greedy to draw too much, He draws you cards simply by your opponents having turns. And if two Sphinx are on the battlefield at the same time, you pretty much draw your deck.
Even if you used Titan to grab Coffers/Urborg, i've never seen more games one than off the back of the Sphinx. Kokusho can't even compare, the card never should have been printed.
Here's the skinny.
With Recurring Nightmare for 2B you could sac and recur Kokusho, draining the table for 5, and putting Kokusho in play and Nightmare in your hand. Because you'd always end the chain with Kokusho in play, and Nightmare in hand. Especially if you had any number of sac lands. The combo was very hard to disrupt, right?
The closest I have ever come to duplicating what Kokusho could do, was by using Nim Deathmantle
Since you need 8 cycles to kill everyone, assuming no one gained any life. Recurring Nightmare could end the game for 16BBBBBBBB or 24 CMC. Nim Deathmantle has to stay in play, and you need a sacrifice outlet to get it to work. 3 cards compared to just 2 needed in the Nightmare combo. Not only that but you need 32 just to end the game. And Nim Deathmantle has to stay on the board the entire time. Or you'd have to do it all in one turn. But if you can dump 32 in a single turn, then Exsanguinate is just better and harder to disrupt. Since one is vulnerable to graveyard hate and any artifact kill. The other is only vulnerable to counterspells. And the hand is one of the safest zones to keep your kill cards.
Kokusho isn't even that good anymore. I loved Kokusho because I had fond memories of using him in my casual decks when I started around Mirrodin/Kamigawa. Compared to Primeval Titan, Consecrated Sphinx, even Grave Titan, he just isn't that good.
Nothing says you can't use those too.
My Sek'kuar deck uses Grave Pact, Violent Ultimatum, Decimate and Maelstrom Pulse. along with some really awesome tech in a Sek'kuar deck.
Din of the Fireherd
Sek'kuar himself can pump this spell up to absurd levels and clear someone's entire board. It's the only spell of it's kind that is capable of nuking one person's lands and creatures. Making it awesome for Politics. "Hey, I took care of the bad guy, now all that's left of him is a smoking crater"
A good thing to remember about things like that. Is no spell or ability can go on the stack while a spell is still resolving.
Sacrificing all creatures in play, Exiling all creatures in GYs, and returning all exiled creatures exiled to the battlefield are all done, by the game's perspective, at the exact same time. Then once Living Death finishes resolving, all abilities that trigger, such as Sacrifice, Dies, or ETB abilities go on the stack.
So if you theoretically had enough black creatures to cover every creature in each opponent's GY, their abilities would still go on the stack, but they would then have to sacrifice them.