got me thinking.. is it possible to build a mono black standard Zombie deck? How about a vamp deck?
j
It should be possible, not sure if it will be as effective as the B/R or B/G versions. If I was going to play mono-black in standard, I would not stick only with zombies, since Vampire Nighthawk is too powerful to not include in mono-black (if you are a bit on a budget). The only problem is the price of the deck, since you need to spit in some cash if you want it to be effective. Gravecrawler and Geralf's Messenger are pretty much a must, if you are going to play mono-black zombies in standard. So it pretty much depends on how much you are willing to spend to create a standard-legal deck to determine what sort of deck you should be playing. Even though it might not be optimal (in a tournament setting)creating a mono-black control deck that is standard-legal should be possible while still making it relatively cheap if money is an issue.
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Decks I play:
Legacy:
Pox
Demon Stompy
Black Knights
Modern:
Tainted Shadow
MBC
8 Rack
Casual:
Suicide Black
Old-school Nightmare Effect
EDH:
Anowon, the Ruin Sage
"God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him."
-Friedrich Nietzsche
Well, I do have this. Currently in my Rasputin deck.
It's the only piece of power I care to own because it's the only one that's legal in EDH.
The cube will not be powered because I don't think I'd like playing with a powered cube. Same reason I'm not including the (much more accessible) fast mana like Sol Ring, Mana Crypt, and Mana Vault. They polarize the game state too much (i.e. lead to blowouts within the first few turns of the game) and make for extremely obvious first picks which cheapens the draft portion of cubing. Wouldn't mind a second Timetwister though, as it's not nearly on the level of the rest. Hell, at this point Power 9 should probably just be -Timetwister +Library of Alexandria.
I can see where you're coming from, though I can assure you that you'd have fun with a powered cube. Ours is powered with proxies for like 15 cards but ours does include a mox ruby, jet, ancestral, and a timeswister. (this isn't my personal cube, just the one I play with). We did cut sol ring and mana crypt for the reason you mentioned, mana vault I've found to be fine though.
I agree with you that timetwister isn't really power 9 but I'd probably pick vault over library, though their power level is pretty equally nuts
EDIT: obligatory comment about awesome black border P9 and how I'm not worthy
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Ready for the apocalypses? The dark side is always open
I can see where you're coming from, though I can assure you that you'd have fun with a powered cube. Ours is powered with proxies for like 15 cards but ours does include a mox ruby, jet, ancestral, and a timeswister. (this isn't my personal cube, just the one I play with). We did cut sol ring and mana crypt for the reason you mentioned, mana vault I've found to be fine though.
See, you've only gone like a third of the way in on power, and even then you cut back some of it. I'd think when discussing a [Powered] cube that's a list that unabashedly starts with Black Lotus, Time Walk, and Sol Ring.
got me thinking.. is it possible to build a mono black standard Zombie deck? How about a vamp deck?
j
As I said mono anything while we are in ravnica will be a challenge, not impossible but a bit of a stretch. Reason why is most of the good cards are multi colored. If you wanna make vamps you will want to run Falkenrath Aristocrat and Dreadbore. Mono black zombies is a bit low because we have no amazing mono black kill spell. You may say murder but I am so used to paying 1B for doom blade I just can't accept murder yet. If we had the removal I would say mono zombies was doable but as stands I am leaning toward red for support in a zombie/vampire aggro deck.
I did play mono black zombies last season to a bit of luck. Didn't win as much as I normally do but delver was a stupid deck then just be lucky you didn't have to play against it. The difference was that we had Doom Blade, Geth's Verdict, Dismember, and Go For the Throat in last standard. It was a pretty awesome removal suite. now the best cards are multi colored.
Edit: though on a budget thrill-kill assassin is a good creature that can work as a removal spell for creatures that don't have flying.
And to the point of Modern being expensive that is true but they are trying really hard on that format. Modern Masters set and the reprints of the shocks point to a cheaper modern than we have seen since it started.
As I said mono anything while we are in ravnica will be a challenge, not impossible but a bit of a stretch. Reason why is most of the good cards are multi colored. If you wanna make vamps you will want to run Falkenrath Aristocrat and Dreadbore. Mono black zombies is a bit low because we have no amazing mono black kill spell. You may say murder but I am so used to paying 1B for doom blade I just can't accept murder yet. If we had the removal I would say mono zombies was doable but as stands I am leaning toward red for support in a zombie/vampire aggro deck.
...
And to the point of Modern being expensive that is true but they are trying really hard on that format. Modern Masters set and the reprints of the shocks point to a cheaper modern than we have seen since it started.
When talking about optimal decks in Ravnica, you're never going to be in mono-color but that's largely because of how easy the color fixing is. You can make a solid 60 card deck without going outside of one color and that'll be fine for FNM. As to kill spells, don't forget about Tragic Slip and Sever the Bloodline.
The supply of shocklands has greatly increased, but from what can recall of the prices they really haven't gone down, presumably on account of the drastically increased demand for them in T2. This'll probably change more over the next few months as it continues to get drafted though. Could probably wait on getting those if you're wanting to be budget-conscious.
When talking about optimal decks in Ravnica, you're never going to be in mono-color but that's largely because of how easy the color fixing is. You can make a solid 60 card deck without going outside of one color and that'll be fine for FNM. As to kill spells, don't forget about Tragic Slip and Sever the Bloodline.
The supply of shocklands has greatly increased, but from what can recall of the prices they really haven't gone down, presumably on account of the drastically increased demand for them in T2. This'll probably change more over the next few months as it continues to get drafted though. Could probably wait on getting those if you're wanting to be budget-conscious.
The shocks will go down when they rotate but they are modern lands that you can pull out of packs of the current set so that alone is amazing for the cost of modern as a format. Don't forget that we got the gates for fixing on a budget.
Can't believe I forgot slip and sever. They are actually in my zombie deck. i do however think slip is a bit worse without a instant speed sac to set it up. The bloodthrone will do fine for that.
Every time i have tried Alter's Reap i would draw it at the wrong time. Either i had a guy that I didn't want to sac or i was winning already and didn't need more cards. In a pinch it was o.k. but i would rather just loose the two life to Sign in Blood. This is especially true if he isn't using shocks and doesn't have to worry about the damage from them.
I forgot that had been reprinted actually. Was just thinking back to cards that were in that old Skirsdag High Priest deck. But yes, Sign in Blood is a fine card.
If we are talking about cheap efficient removal in standard, we actually got Dead Weight at sorcery speed, it takes out delvers and a lot of the other problematic creatures in the format, even falkenrath aristocrat. Tragic Slip which has been mentioned is nice as well. The problem with black is the fact that it has a hard time dealing with a resolved pw, but we got Duress for that.
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Decks I play:
Legacy:
Pox
Demon Stompy
Black Knights
Modern:
Tainted Shadow
MBC
8 Rack
Casual:
Suicide Black
Old-school Nightmare Effect
EDH:
Anowon, the Ruin Sage
"God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him."
-Friedrich Nietzsche
I would still pick duress over appetite for brains, simply because duress can hit liliana as well (just in case) or maybe run a 3/3 split of the two cards, then the chance of actually having one of those discard spells by turn 3 is pretty large, appetite for brains hits Thragtusk though, which is why I can see it being favoured by you. Thragtusk is indeed a problem, but depending on my creature base I am unsure if I like crippling blight more than dead weight. If I were to run a more controlling shell and have all my creatures to be flying, I favour dead weight, but if I was storming through on the ground I would chose crippling blight.
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Decks I play:
Legacy:
Pox
Demon Stompy
Black Knights
Modern:
Tainted Shadow
MBC
8 Rack
Casual:
Suicide Black
Old-school Nightmare Effect
EDH:
Anowon, the Ruin Sage
"God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him."
-Friedrich Nietzsche
My favorite of the 1 mana discard spells is Cabal Therapy (and not because Cabal is in the name). Then again, I think you're only talking about standard. I've come into this discussion a bit late. In that case, Duress gets my vote.
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"[Screw] you and the green you ramped in on." - My EDH battle cry. If I had one. Which I don't.
You getting all this Stabby? That is what I shall call you from now on, stabby.
As for my pick I would say appetite main and druess side. neither one hits cheap creatures but only appetite hits most planeswalkers and thragtusk. Since thragtusk is a major player I would rather have answers for him. The only deck we would want duress in for is control and appetite will hit some of controls stuff like jace and tamiyo.
As a zombie player I wouldn't mind discarding a gravecrawler or a dreg mangler to lili anyway.
You getting all this Stabby? That is what I shall call you from now on, stabby.
As for my pick I would say appetite main and druess side. neither one hits cheap creatures but only appetite hits most planeswalkers and thragtusk. Since thragtusk is a major player I would rather have answers for him. The only deck we would want duress in for is control and appetite will hit some of controls stuff like jace and tamiyo.
As a zombie player I wouldn't mind discarding a gravecrawler or a dreg mangler to lili anyway.
I am. I've been analyzing everyones input. Cant thank you all enough!
Thanks everyone. I ordered some of the cards I needed to put the rest of this deck together. I tried to use what a lot of you all suggested to get it just the way I want it.
Off of ebay - I got 4 Geralf's Messenger, 4 Gravecrawler, 1 Vampire Nighthawk to fill in some spots. I took out a bunch of the 1of's I had on the creature roster.
So here's what it looks like now -
See, you've only gone like a third of the way in on power, and even then you cut back some of it. I'd think when discussing a [Powered] cube that's a list that unabashedly starts with Black Lotus, Time Walk, and Sol Ring.
nonono, the ones I listed were just the ones that we have actual cardboard for. The others are in, just proxied.
And we cut time vault too, forgot about that one
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Ready for the apocalypses? The dark side is always open
still on the fence about highborn ghoul. he's still in there because he actually came in really handy the last 2 games I played. I was able to get him out and both of my tormented souls to do quick (albeit cheap) damage.
Again, I'm new to all of this and still trying to learn some strategy and other things. I know the deck still needs some tweaking.
Highborn was in my first run at zombies. Then I went up against R/B control. And he dies to everything. Searing spear, Tragic slip, pillar of flames, dead weight... he even dies to geistflame... twice. If you want a 2 power 2 drop use rakdos shred-freak. He comes with the power you want and haste. he can get a very explosive start and hits before they untap into their sorcery speed removal.
k check this start it has happened to me with my zombies.
Turn 1 play gravecrawler (or diregraf or crackler either way they are 2 power two drops.)
Turn two attack with guy then play 2 Bump in the nights he was at 12 on turn 2. Bump in the night should be 4 of in most black standard decks right now even if you can't flashback.
Turn two attack with guy then play 2 Bump in the nights he was at 12 on turn 2. Bump in the night should be 4 of in most black standard decks right now even if you can't flashback.
He may have been at 12, but that's a lot of cards out of your hand to do so and you had hardly any pressure on the board. The amount of life they can recoup from Centaur Healer, Thragtusk, or Huntmaster is huge.
If you can't flash it back, it's a Lava Spike (which isn't great). If you can flash it back, that means you're in red and should be playing sets of Searing Spear and Brimstone Volley first.
He may have been at 12, but that's a lot of cards out of your hand to do so and you had hardly any pressure on the board. The amount of life they can recoup from Centaur Healer, Thragtusk, or Huntmaster is huge.
If you can't flash it back, it's a Lava Spike (which isn't great). If you can flash it back, that means you're in red and should be playing sets of Searing Spear and Brimstone Volley first.
With this deck i have found that following up with a messenger and an aristocrat is enough pressure. More often you play only one bump on turn two and another 2 power 1 drop and bring them to 15 with 2 guys down.my aim with the deck is to win game 1 as fast as possible then switch up to a more grindy zombies with the sideboard adding in more burn. Bonfire sucks here or so it seems.
Lets get a vote going here. Everyone can pick up to 3 and we will run the tally at the end. The one with the most is the format. If there is a tie, we will do a vote among the top 3. I'll do my vote later.
Standard
Extended
Modern
Legacy
Vintage
Block*
Commander
Build Your Own Standard
Pauper
Peasant
Other (specify)
*If block is decided, we will vote shortly after we end this vote to determine the block.
Extended Modern Build your own standard(not quit sure on the rules of this but what I did read sounds interesting.)
@Chilli
I wanna try a pox deck and I was wondering what your list is? I have never played any type of pox deck so I would need a walk through on how to play it as well if you wouldn't mind.
Also to SirAuron and the clan as a whole, was the Bible written by anyone linked to this site or this clan? If not it may be worthwhile to attempt to write our own. Put our own take on what we would want to do. I read that the copy write states we may not alter it in any way. It would be fun to write our own to leave to future members.
Extended
Modern
Build your own standard(not quit sure on the rules of this but what I did read sounds interesting.)
Build your own standard entails you picking two blocks and one core set and building a deck from those.
Also, for future note, could everyone bold their vote so as I scan and tally them up, it will be easier to spot.
Also to SirAuron and the clan as a whole, was the Bible written by anyone linked to this site or this clan? If not it may be worthwhile to attempt to write our own. Put our own take on what we would want to do. I read that the copy write states we may not alter it in any way. It would be fun to write our own to leave to future members.
No but I linked to it anyways because it was so fitting. We can try, but we can barely get a wiki project off the ground
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It should be possible, not sure if it will be as effective as the B/R or B/G versions. If I was going to play mono-black in standard, I would not stick only with zombies, since Vampire Nighthawk is too powerful to not include in mono-black (if you are a bit on a budget). The only problem is the price of the deck, since you need to spit in some cash if you want it to be effective. Gravecrawler and Geralf's Messenger are pretty much a must, if you are going to play mono-black zombies in standard. So it pretty much depends on how much you are willing to spend to create a standard-legal deck to determine what sort of deck you should be playing. Even though it might not be optimal (in a tournament setting)creating a mono-black control deck that is standard-legal should be possible while still making it relatively cheap if money is an issue.
Decks I play:
-Friedrich Nietzsche
I can see where you're coming from, though I can assure you that you'd have fun with a powered cube. Ours is powered with proxies for like 15 cards but ours does include a mox ruby, jet, ancestral, and a timeswister. (this isn't my personal cube, just the one I play with). We did cut sol ring and mana crypt for the reason you mentioned, mana vault I've found to be fine though.
I agree with you that timetwister isn't really power 9 but I'd probably pick vault over library, though their power level is pretty equally nuts
EDIT: obligatory comment about awesome black border P9 and how I'm not worthy
Ready for the apocalypses? The dark side is always open
See, you've only gone like a third of the way in on power, and even then you cut back some of it. I'd think when discussing a [Powered] cube that's a list that unabashedly starts with Black Lotus, Time Walk, and Sol Ring.
*has piece of beta power*
"Yeah, but it probably shouldn't even be on the list for power and the edges are little rough."
#Daveworldproblems
As I said mono anything while we are in ravnica will be a challenge, not impossible but a bit of a stretch. Reason why is most of the good cards are multi colored. If you wanna make vamps you will want to run Falkenrath Aristocrat and Dreadbore. Mono black zombies is a bit low because we have no amazing mono black kill spell. You may say murder but I am so used to paying 1B for doom blade I just can't accept murder yet. If we had the removal I would say mono zombies was doable but as stands I am leaning toward red for support in a zombie/vampire aggro deck.
I did play mono black zombies last season to a bit of luck. Didn't win as much as I normally do but delver was a stupid deck then just be lucky you didn't have to play against it. The difference was that we had Doom Blade, Geth's Verdict, Dismember, and Go For the Throat in last standard. It was a pretty awesome removal suite. now the best cards are multi colored.
Edit: though on a budget thrill-kill assassin is a good creature that can work as a removal spell for creatures that don't have flying.
And to the point of Modern being expensive that is true but they are trying really hard on that format. Modern Masters set and the reprints of the shocks point to a cheaper modern than we have seen since it started.
I'd like another Timetwister for the cube, but having just looked it up the price that is not gonna happen. It's doubled since I got that one.
When talking about optimal decks in Ravnica, you're never going to be in mono-color but that's largely because of how easy the color fixing is. You can make a solid 60 card deck without going outside of one color and that'll be fine for FNM. As to kill spells, don't forget about Tragic Slip and Sever the Bloodline.
The supply of shocklands has greatly increased, but from what can recall of the prices they really haven't gone down, presumably on account of the drastically increased demand for them in T2. This'll probably change more over the next few months as it continues to get drafted though. Could probably wait on getting those if you're wanting to be budget-conscious.
The shocks will go down when they rotate but they are modern lands that you can pull out of packs of the current set so that alone is amazing for the cost of modern as a format. Don't forget that we got the gates for fixing on a budget.
Can't believe I forgot slip and sever. They are actually in my zombie deck. i do however think slip is a bit worse without a instant speed sac to set it up. The bloodthrone will do fine for that.
Every time i have tried Alter's Reap i would draw it at the wrong time. Either i had a guy that I didn't want to sac or i was winning already and didn't need more cards. In a pinch it was o.k. but i would rather just loose the two life to Sign in Blood. This is especially true if he isn't using shocks and doesn't have to worry about the damage from them.
Decks I play:
-Friedrich Nietzsche
Planeswalkers can be rough to deal with, but I'd 100% be on Appetite for Brains over Duress.
Decks I play:
-Friedrich Nietzsche
Pristaxcontrombmodruu!
As for my pick I would say appetite main and druess side. neither one hits cheap creatures but only appetite hits most planeswalkers and thragtusk. Since thragtusk is a major player I would rather have answers for him. The only deck we would want duress in for is control and appetite will hit some of controls stuff like jace and tamiyo.
As a zombie player I wouldn't mind discarding a gravecrawler or a dreg mangler to lili anyway.
I feel obligated to (re)post a particular bit from the last thread:
Day[9] on Stab Wound (Warning: There's a bit of swearing. Because Stab Wound )
It's the clip for about 2m following the link, after which you should just go back to part 1 and watch the whole thing!
I am. I've been analyzing everyones input. Cant thank you all enough!
Thanks everyone. I ordered some of the cards I needed to put the rest of this deck together. I tried to use what a lot of you all suggested to get it just the way I want it.
Off of ebay - I got 4 Geralf's Messenger, 4 Gravecrawler, 1 Vampire Nighthawk to fill in some spots. I took out a bunch of the 1of's I had on the creature roster.
So here's what it looks like now -
4x Gravecrawler
4x Highborn Ghoul
4x Geralf's Messenger
4x Vampire Nighthawk
2x Liliana's Shade
1x Liliana of the Dark Realm
2x Vengeful Vampire
1x Vampire Nocturnus
1x Mikaeus, the Unhallowed
2x Tragic Step
4x Murder
2x Reap the Seagraf
1x Sorin's Thirst
1x Endless Ranks of the Dead
1x Army of the Damned
looking forward to any more input. I really want to stick with both zombies and vampires for this one deck.
thanks!
J
nonono, the ones I listed were just the ones that we have actual cardboard for. The others are in, just proxied.
And we cut time vault too, forgot about that one
Ready for the apocalypses? The dark side is always open
Highborn was in my first run at zombies. Then I went up against R/B control. And he dies to everything. Searing spear, Tragic slip, pillar of flames, dead weight... he even dies to geistflame... twice. If you want a 2 power 2 drop use rakdos shred-freak. He comes with the power you want and haste. he can get a very explosive start and hits before they untap into their sorcery speed removal.
k check this start it has happened to me with my zombies.
Turn 1 play gravecrawler (or diregraf or crackler either way they are 2 power two drops.)
Turn two attack with guy then play 2 Bump in the nights he was at 12 on turn 2. Bump in the night should be 4 of in most black standard decks right now even if you can't flashback.
Ah, got it. I still do not think I'd want to go that route. Curious, how often does playing power lead to an early blowout?
He may have been at 12, but that's a lot of cards out of your hand to do so and you had hardly any pressure on the board. The amount of life they can recoup from Centaur Healer, Thragtusk, or Huntmaster is huge.
If you can't flash it back, it's a Lava Spike (which isn't great). If you can flash it back, that means you're in red and should be playing sets of Searing Spear and Brimstone Volley first.
True for reference this is my zombies:
4x Lotleth troll
2x Blood Artist
2x Dreg Mangler
4x Geralf's Messenger
2x Falkenrath Aristcrat
2x Hellrider
3x Sign in Blood
2x Dreadbore
3x Brimstone volley
1x Abrupt Decay
1x Bonfire of the Damned
4x Bump in the Night
2x Cavern of Souls
4x Blood Crypt
3x Dragonskull Summit
4x Overgrown Tomb
4x Woodland Cemetery
5x Swamp
With this deck i have found that following up with a messenger and an aristocrat is enough pressure. More often you play only one bump on turn two and another 2 power 1 drop and bring them to 15 with 2 guys down.my aim with the deck is to win game 1 as fast as possible then switch up to a more grindy zombies with the sideboard adding in more burn. Bonfire sucks here or so it seems.
Lets get a vote going here. Everyone can pick up to 3 and we will run the tally at the end. The one with the most is the format. If there is a tie, we will do a vote among the top 3. I'll do my vote later.
Standard
Extended
Modern
Legacy
Vintage
Block*
Commander
Build Your Own Standard
Pauper
Peasant
Other (specify)
*If block is decided, we will vote shortly after we end this vote to determine the block.
Extended
Modern
Build your own standard(not quit sure on the rules of this but what I did read sounds interesting.)
@Chilli
I wanna try a pox deck and I was wondering what your list is? I have never played any type of pox deck so I would need a walk through on how to play it as well if you wouldn't mind.
Also to SirAuron and the clan as a whole, was the Bible written by anyone linked to this site or this clan? If not it may be worthwhile to attempt to write our own. Put our own take on what we would want to do. I read that the copy write states we may not alter it in any way. It would be fun to write our own to leave to future members.
Build your own standard entails you picking two blocks and one core set and building a deck from those.
Also, for future note, could everyone bold their vote so as I scan and tally them up, it will be easier to spot.
No but I linked to it anyways because it was so fitting. We can try, but we can barely get a wiki project off the ground