Previously, for a period of about 2 years, Kokusho, the Evening Star had been banned in Commander. The original ban reason was that Kokusho warped gameplay around herself and was over-centralizing the game. She was banned at the same time as Recurring Nightmare, an incredibly strong combo piece that was used to loop Kokusho with very little available disruption. As time went on, and stronger creatures and graveyard hate were printed, a larger and larger vocal group took part on the internet. This eventually lead to a re-evaluation of Kokusho on the banlist. This deck was first conceived and built during a unique opportunity to test play Kokusho in a current environment prior to her unbanning. Many of my original thoughts and considerations for the deck stem from the testing mindset, many cards were added to support the core theme I'd decided on (influenced by what value Kokusho would bring to the deck), and many cards were forced to rotate rather quickly to try different ideas and angles in a short time frame. Many of the earlier write-ups are also very focused on how Kokusho did and did not impact the game. Here is my original opening statement of this deck:
I thought that was banned?
Armada Games, the Brick and Mortar store which is Sheldon Menery's local playgroup, play league games running for 2 months. For the duration of the league, some twist to the rules is given. For example, a previous one was to disallow Primeval Titan. For Armada League 15, Sheldon Menery and Armada Games have implemented a very interesting twist: unbanning Kokusho, the Evening Star.
Now, I have never played when Kokusho was legally viable. I joined EDH after that point (I think). For the most part, I actually have no interest with what's on the banlist and why. It's pretty self-evident to me, for the most part. Kokusho, however, has always been a sore-spot on the internet. Much as a train wreck, World of Warcraft guild drama, or Judge Judy, it held a strange fascination for me. I knew it was bad, but I couldn't stop staring at it. Not one to turn down potential drama, I decided: "why should those Armada people get all the fun?"
So I talked with my playgroup, at length, and despite a heated and explosive start, we agreed to try the same thing at our local area! When I pitched the idea initially, I was hoping more people would join in (one player has, though we've never seen Kokusho from him, yet), but it's been an interesting and unusual treat to us thus far.
When I knew that I wanted to play test Kokusho, I knew that I also should not build a super-combo-abuse deck, for three reasons:
Once you set up any combo, it doesn't matter what the combo is. You aren't testing the cards anymore, but rather the combo. I will grant that this is only partially true: how easily a combo can be set up, and how hard it can be to be disrupted is also a factor. But in this case, we have an obvious mirror: Mikeaus, the unhallowed and Triskellion. Two cards, one a 6-cost general, in mono-black with all of mono-blacks tutors, that's dependent on the graveyard.
Once you set up an infinite recursion loop with Kokusho, it could be anything else at all, and it wouldn't make a difference. It could be Highway Robber, and infinite recursions will net you the same exact result, you'd just have to do more of it. If you really want to gripe on the "target," Malakir Bloodwitch can step in its place. There are a ton of other options. If the loop is non-infinite, then it makes a large difference in investment.
When considering Griselbrand, the RC (or at least, Sheldon) have stated that they don't really care about how the hyper-aggressive combo turn 4 decks work. That's not something you bring to a casual table. If you want to be a competitive turn-4 vintage 100-card singleton player, good for you! But that's not Commander. The importance is to look at the impact across the board of 'any' game (I may have paraphrased this a little bit. This is my general understanding of their philosophy; I could be wrong).
So, what kind of deck does want Kokusho? Obviously something that reanimates, but that's like saying air+lungs=combo. So I got to looking at what Kokusho does:
It's big, it flies: This means she can block like a champ, threaten people like a boss, turn sideways if needed, and ward off small attackers.
Threat on death: Her ability goes off when she dies, this gives us a few points:
It means she's something opponents may not want to remove if she's not directly threatening them. She's potential energy, rather than being kinetic energy.
It also means she's an even greater deterrent as a blocker.
Makes other players more wary of clearing the board. Even if you extend a bit more, it's just a tiny bit of extra weight on the "Don't blow everything up" side of the scale.
Finally, she drains life. Life is typically viewed as a useless resource. You're not dead until you have 0 of it, so no life matters except for the last one. This viewpoint is even more true in EDH, where life-gain is given a natural counter in the form of Commander Damage. For this reason, most people focus more on the damage dealt half of the drain, but I think that's wrong. There are a few reasons why the lifegain is equally important, if not more so. After all, if the ability were only a 5 pt earthquak to players, it would be nothing special.
First, a lot of people do die over the course of the game to damage. Life still is one of the factors that determines if and when you lose. Getting more of it makes your opponents work that much harder to actually win the game.
Incidental damage, from utility creatures, random equipment, other hate cards, still occurs. Having an extra buffer against such effects may not be such a terrible idea.
Making one avenue of you losing harder to handle (killing you with regular damage), forces your opponents to instead use a different option to win the game. Forcing your opponents more towards a different path is disadvantageous to them, after all, they may not be geared as well to that path, but it's even more directly advantageous to you: by closing off one path (or making it harder) to victory, you can plan and include more narrow answers to the other paths. It buys you deck construction space.
The next big point is that in order to play Kokusho, we need to incorporate black. Black is the single best color in converting life into a resource, from mana (Vesper Ghoul) to card draw (Necropotence), black can absorb the strengths of other colors at a cost of a resource most of them can't even tap into. Kokusho refills this resource, allowing for some serious extra power.
So where does that leave us? Kokusho, the Evening Star blocks like a champ, deters attacks, lends some counter-weight to removal and wraths, and gains us life which means more resources, closes off an avenue to victory, and gives us more time.
My general conclusions on my analysis of Kokusho eventually led me to building a Mono-Black Control deck, with a very heavy reanimation focus, and a large theme of abusing the color's capabilities to gain life through theft, and converting life into another resource, usually cards, which also takes advantage of Commander's higher starting life total.
Once I had my deck style solidly determined, I had to decide on a Commander. Two factors led to my choices of potential Commanders: One, was that I wanted to be able to run Kokusho as a Commander. While most of the banlist thread was willing to compromise as 1 of the 99, I figured if I was going to test this thing, I was going to test it. After all, if Mikeaus, the Unhallowed can be a Commander, maybe Kokusho could too. This led to needing a Mono-black shell. Since Kokusho needs two pieces to work, herself and a reanimation method (sac outlet is an enabler, you can get her to simply die normally, so is not technically "needed," only helpful in terms of combo ability), it made sense that her companion Commander should serve as the mirror role.
I settled on the choice of Chainer, Dementia Master, but kept considerations open for other potential Commanders.
My initial choice to run this deck, Chainer, Dementia Master gives us instant speed targeted revival. Chainer also lets us use enemy creatures, and has a built in exile mechanic, which is not to be underestimated. He also has a built in pump, which can help in creature trades. I have found that Chainer's precision resurrection makes him play very different from other Commanders. It allows you to play more reactively, and causes you to consider each option in depth, and the lasting advantages of many situations.
You might like Chainer if...
You like playing control. Chainer lends himself better to a drawn out game. You're reviving one target at a time, so it's all about utility, maintaining a board position, and keeping that life coming in.
You enjoy drawing out a game, winning through attrition and bleeding opponent's resources.
You might not like Chainer if...
You dislike Stax strategies. While not necessary to running Chainer, it is some of the best removal black has access to, and the slow chain of dying corpses is one of the best way to fuel some of the lifegain abilities to offset his pain.
You dislike Suicide Black. Chainer hurts you. 3 life doesn't seem like much, but when you repeatedly start using the ability, it adds up very quickly.
You dislike reliance on lifegain. Lifegain holds Chainer together.
Considerations:
Lifegain is highly important, not just to stall, but to provide additional resources. Protect your lifegain engines.
Be ready to use Chainer as graveyard hate. Chainer himself adds strong anti-creature graveyard abuse, as you can simply steal their stuff in response.
Sacrifice Outlets are needed in order to control and offset Chainer's exiling effect.
You can also look at jmdt's retired Chainer primer for more ideas. jmdt has a different style to Chainer, though we've stolen quite a few ideas from each other.
Balthor the Defiled is another Commander I have been very pleased with. Balthor provides more immediate advantage, though he instead has a heavier tax on use, making his use far more limited as the game goes on. He can also provide excellent value out of mass creature resurrection and death with the vampire drainers like Blood Artist. He loans himself well to a combo synergy, making for essentially half of a Living Death loop. Pair him with Phyrexian Altar, and you can kill a table.
Mikaeus, the Unhallowed comes with a bit of baggage. He's a two card combo with Tsikellion, so people treat him as a single tutor away from winning the game. Aside from that, he’s plenty potent with sac-loops, ETB/LTB abilities, and +1 counter abuse, as he gives you a free second use on everything.
Geth, Lord of the Vault is another extremely strong reanimator General. His limitation of only playing with your opponent’s stuff is mitigated by the capability of returning artifacts. Geth lists typically go straight up heavy mana play, and then play out of opponents graveyards. People may hard target Geth if they think you might be packing an infinite mana combo as you'll be able to mill out the table on a single turn, similar to Oona.
Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed allows for recursion of any black card, allowing for powerful interactions: for example, XHD can return Living Death, and by letting your Commander go to the graveyard, Living Death will then return XHD to play, allowing for a loop of carnage and death. Also see:
XeroxedFool's retired Xiahou Dun primer, which is still an excellent in-depth look into this unique Commander.
The poster-girl of the deck, and the reason I finally built a mono-black deck to begin with. Kokusho, the Evening Star brings the lifegain and stall to the forefront. Furthermore, you are rewarded for buying time by simultaneously killing your opponents. All you have to do is stall enough, and they'll all die eventually. Now that Kokusho is fully unbanned, she could play a much larger role in Commander, and warrants a second look.
During the Unbanning Testing event, I theorized some changes to make the deck more focused on Kokusho in the Commander slot, and she plays far differently than any other commander. Kokusho is much safer from graveyard hate, as she herself can always return to the Command Zone, and every time she dies she allows for a good target for your reanimation spells. You can also focus more purely on control with Kokusho at the helm, since Kokusho will eventually win the game for you just by dying.
The deck has come a long way since its inception. While I had previously attempted to rigorously avoid infinite combos, I have recently decided to allow some of them back in, though it is still not a focus of the deck. Chainer has progressed through many phases of changes, alternating between being powered up, and powered down due in part to responding to changes in my playgroup. The majority of my stable playgroup prefers less powerful, more relaxed games, and so generally dislike my Chainer deck on general principles. Sometimes though, a few players join who tend to prefer more powered games. Chainer changed accordingly, being one of my more powered (yet not competitive) decks. Despite not focusing on infinite combos, I now classify it as Combo-Control deck. While I still Identify with the Control aspect most strongly, it does move into dies/sac loops for a combo win.
The deck still breaks down into specific sections:
Card advantage to keep a full grip and maintain threats in the field and in the yard.
Life Recovery to fuel the various costs the deck incurs.
Reanimation: the core interaction that makes the deck tick.
Answers to specific problems, usually in creature form to be easily recurred.
Finally, the mana needed to progress the deck throughout.
Card Draw:
The card draw this deck utilizes focus on two aspects: The first lies in converting life as a resource, such as Bloodgift Demon variants, and the second lies in converting dying creatures into future resources, such as Skullclamp and Grim Haruspex. Recursion can also fit into this category, and honorable mentions go to Oversold Cemetery and Sword of Light and Shadow. The Recursion from the commander, and other cards in the deck helps strengthen the Card advantage package. For one, recursion itself is a form of card advantage, resulting in increased board presence and less need to replace removed pieces. Secondly, it can help keep the advantage engines online. Black's high volume of tutors can help get them going in the first place.
Life Recovery:
Life recuperation serves different roles depending on the Commanders I have played with; despite this, I'm happy with similar selections for all of them so far. With Chainer, the life recovery is there to keep you afloat, and to use as a resource. It counteracts the suicidal nature that Chainer brings to the table. With Kokusho, it closes off an avenue of attack. With Balthor, it buys the time the deck needs to gain the advantage on the field, and in the yard, to win the war of attrition.
While the cards may stay similar, different ones stood out a bit more per Commander. Chainer enjoyed Dross Harvester a lot, as specific individual creatures would die and return often, over a period of time. With Balthor, the Blood Artist and Falkenrath Noble are able to do a lot more damage, as masses of creatures return and die together. Kokusho benefits the most from Kokusho herself.
Reanimation:
Whether you're running Balthor or Chainer, you have reanimation immediately available to you, but other sources are helpful: It is never wise to rely on specific resource. Whether you lose your Commander somehow, or they get too expensive to cast, backup plans are always useful. Likewise, alternative means may cost less (Hell's Caretaker), or it may be needed to avoid the life-payment of Chainer, or you only need to resurect one target with Balthor. Kokusho obviously also needs her own fair share of reanimation, as she'll be counting on you drawing into them. The star players here are Hell's Caretaker which can upgrade a creature of yours for free on the upkeep, Nezumi Graverobber who can also act as graveyard hate, Corpse Dance which is instant speed, and remains a surprise until needed, and Dread return which can be used twice. Beacon of Unrest also brings extra utility to the field in artifact recursion. Living Death likewise can also serve as a wrath option while also a resurrection spell. Certain Colorless options bring the possibility of recurring artifacts as well, which helps mitigate some of Black’s weaknesses. Trading Post has been especially powerful, and Geth, Lord of the Vault allows you to pick up your opponent’s utility artifacts. A Salvaging Station mini-package could also be very powerful alongside trading post, as the deck can certainly power out the dies triggers. There are already a few useful 1 cost artifacts in the deck.
Answers:
As I've run into problems, this is where the deck has changed the most.
Artifacts and Enchantments:
Currently I am watching the need to answer artifacts and enchantments, as that is what black has the largest difficulty removing. Answers to these problems lie mostly in colorless solutions, like Oblivion Stone and Steel Hellkite. Karn liberated, Spine of Ish Sah and All is dust are all also good answers, though you'll note they tend to be expensive. Artifact specific answers also include Gate to Phyrexia and Phyrexian Tribute. As you can see, these problems have very narrow answers.
Protection from black is another strong problem to resolve, especially if you are playing Chainer, Dementia Master as your commander. Many people forget that when Chainer reanimates, he makes the creature black as well, which means that you can't reanimate an artifact to toss in front. Making colorless token creatures can help a bit, but in terms of removal, the colorless solutions above are strong.
Stax:
Named after the popular card Smokestack, stax derives itself from a style of deck that seeks to deny opponents' resources and increase their costs with cards like thorn of amethyst. Stax cards usually refer to the cards that continuously cause an opponent to sacrifice a resource, like Smokestack or Braids, Cabal Minion. This strategy is very powerful in this kind of deck, as Chainer and Balthor both return resources to you to negate the symmetrical effect, and Kokusho can likewise mitigate a cost while providing a faster clock to the lock. The deck initially ran Braids, cabal minion, Smokestack, Magus of the abyss, and Sheoldred, whispering one. They were removed to test other strategies, but it remains one of the best methods to answer problems in the deck. Removal of these forced me to find other answers to common creature problems. Other stax effects can also include Anowon, the ruin sage to join the vampire package the deck could run. Pact effects (named after Grave pact), like Butcher of Malakir can also fit in this style of answers. Since the deck currently is built to stall and survive, adding the last bit in the tax effects can make this deck easily turn into a controlling Stax deck as well. Today, the deck focuses more on reactive reanimation of Fleshbag Marauder variants.
Targeted Removal:
Targeted removal can help remove pinpoint answers. There are creature-based answers, such as Skinrender, which is aggressively costed, and differs itself from other black answers in that it does not have a non-black clause; Shriekmaw, which can evoke for a quick terror, though is more limited in its scope of targets; and Duplicant, which answers the most problems of the three, hitting even protection from black creatures, though not if resurrected by Chainer. Other options I considered were Nekrataal, which lost to shriekmaw's evoke cost; Nightshade Assassin, which lost due to requiring cards in hand, telegraphing information to the enemy, and a lack of a reliable way to madness it.
Spell based options can also be potent, and black has a number of excellent options: Tragic Slip is very easy to ‘turn on,’ and Go for the Throat is applicable among a large set of threats. Murder is simply the case to judge all others by, as it's the general catch-all. On top of those options, I particularly like Sudden Death, Sudden Spoiling, and Nameless Inversion, in differing situations.
Mass Removal:
When I removed the Stax effects, two problems increased immediately: The first was board positions became larger, as nothing was weeding out the chaff, and the second came in the form of indestructible creatures, most notably in the form of Avacyn, Angel of Hope. That game I really was unhappy at having removed my Stax effects. I looked into mass removals that would deal with both problems. Mutilate and Black Sun's Zenith both showed as potential answers, and All is dust got another point in that direction. Eventually, I decided on two creature based options that would do the job well enough, and could be recurred. The first was Massacre Wurm, which leaves me untouched, can be brought back multiple times if needed, and also serves as an alternate win condition. The second was Kagemaro, First to Suffer. Though he does need cards in hand, he's aggressively costed, is easy to sac and recur multiple times, and does not require that I share my information with my opponents.
Mana:
The last piece of the puzzle, and a large one, is the mana to do everything that is needed. Despite having an aggressive curve, both Commanders, and the various sac effects, are very mana-intensive. It is rare to not be able to use all your mana if need be. This is compounded by blacks typical weakness in its inability to ramp. To sate the massive mana demands of the deck, we have to turn to colorless sources, and also to some trickery. The most obvious at first are the mana rocks. I run 9 artifacts that cost 3 or less that tap for mana (or, in the case of the Wayfarer's bauble, get a land), that can take the early turn out of our equation, and push us to a reasonable amount to act. Cheap is important, as it is the early turns we need to skip past. While Gilded Lotus is impressive, it doesn't help us if we have a low land count, and arrives on turns we'd rather be dropping Chainer, Bloodgift Demon, or many other things. The next obvious inclusion are the 4 mana doublers, and Cabal Coffers. Since the coffers need a large number of swamps anyways, Extraplanar Lens, Gauntlet of Power, and Caged Sun help increase the value of our mana sources. Nirkana Revenant adds a recurrable option to the lineup. Crypt Ghast is the latest all star to the party, being a recurable creature, cheaply costed, and having built in lifegain. He’s practically built for this deck.
The next pieces are in the lands: Never underestimate the power of simply making land drops on time. While we're low on lands to consistently draw into them (it should average one in three cards) our card-draw helps some, and thawing glaciers helps, as does Crucible of Worlds. With a sac land, like Marsh Flats, the crucible turns life into consistent land drops and deck thinning. Paired with a Rings of Brighthearth, and you turn it into ramp, which pays itself back in two turns. Faster with a Coffers out. Thawing Glaciers is a land that allows you to make a land drop every other turn. With a 35% chance to draw a land, this means you should be able to make land drops 2 of every third turn, though every land in hand extends this even further out. With Vesuva, you can make a land drop every turn, until you're ready to return the Vesuva to hand to copy something else. Again, Rings of Brighthearth or Deserted Temple turn the glaciers into ramp as well. The final land is Terrain Generator. This land helps increase the land drops you can make, considering that 2/3 of our lands are basic swamps, this can help immensely in the early game, or once you have a powerful card advantage machine online.
Creatures - 25
Since we are running a reanimator strategy, many of our permanents have been converted to creature-based equivalents. This helps make our utility packages reusable with the reanimation we run.
Blood Artist - This guy is Falkenrath Noble's little brother. Same effect, on a cheaper cost. Recovers life as a buffer, and for all the reasons I built for Kokusho in the lifegain section. See post #43 (link below) for some fun.
Bloodghast - Recurrable threat, sacrifice target, and just great with skullclamp. Less useful without the Stax effects, but still a good slot. Would also be good if I added more equipment.
Disciple of Griselbrand - Though not a free sac outlet, he also doubles as a life gain option.
Nether Traitor - Recurable body on the cheap again. Fits in the bloodghast package, though he also carries Sword of Light and Shadow like a champ as well.
Fleshbag Marauder - A kill switch to get rid of opposing creatures. He can kill himself, allowing him to be reused multiple times in a single turn.
Pawn of Ulamog - A combo piece. This allows you to gain mana from killing off creatures, allowing for further resources to be used. He can fuel dies/sac loops, especially with Living Death. His spawns can also be used as further sacrifice fodder for Skullclamp or other effects.
Crypt Ghast - A mana doubler, at a cheap cost, that comes stapled with a lifegain ability.
Dimir House Guard - This guy is both a tutor option, as there are many applicable 4 drops in the deck, and later can be reanimated as a sac outlet.
Disciple of Bolas - An incredibly powerful draw option, with some very relevant lifegain attached.
Falkenrath Noble - See blood artist. These two are used both as lifegain engines, and as a kill con once you get a sac loop going.
FleshWrither - Another repeatable tutor option. As with Dimir House Guard, there are a lot of relevant 4 drops, high on the list being Crypt Ghast. He can also get removal if needed, card draw, and lifegain.
Graveborn Muse - Phyrexian Arena on a body. She can be brought back easily, and turns life into cards.
Mindslicer - Make no mistake, Mindslicer will not make you any friends. His full board discard can be used to abruptly end games or take control of an opportunistic situation. Recuring him can be brutal, especially in the opponent’s draw steps for a soft lock.
Sangromancer - Recuperates life. 3 is a magic number for Chainer. As with many things, was far more potent with the Stax package forcing death from the opponents. Still works beautifully with Attrition, or reanimated in response to a board wipe.
Slum Reaper - Fleshbag Marauder’s big brother. While typically one would assume that the cheaper Felshbag would be the better overall option, Fleshbag would be more likely to be cut (should it come to it) for two reasons: The 4 cost is useful for tutoring up with Dimir House Guard or Fleshwrither; also, the two toughness has been useful to me once, when an opponent had a Niv Mizzet on the field, and would have been able to shoot Fleshbag twice in response to the trigger, which would have killed my Chainer, that one extra toughness actually came in handy. Once dead the cost to reanimate either is the same, so the 1 extra initial cost is a very minor price to pay.
Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed - Since the Judge Foil dropped his price to an acceptable range, I picked him up as his utility is simply otherwise unmatched in black. He can recur tutors, return powerful enchantments, and combos in a death loop with Living Death.
Duplicant - Colorless removal. Good for those obnoxious protection from black things.
Harvester of Souls - An excellent source of card draw. Resurrect him in response to a wrath to have a sizable grip of cards.
Kokusho, the Evening Star - Our champion test target, joins the ranks of other life-gaining pieces that keep us alive, and combo pieces that make our opponents dead.
Massacre Wurm - Another creature-based wrath variant, that also serves as an excellent threat.
Nirkana Revenant - Mana doubling option that can be reanimated, and is an immense threat.
Wurmcoil Engine - A powerful lifelinker to help keep us alive.
Scrabbling Claws - Free slot of grave hate. See post #43 (link below) for some fun.
Skullclamp - Card draw that works well with our sacrificed targets, with the tokens, or with the self-recuring bodies. Just great card draw in any creature-based deck.
Altar of Dementia - A powerful free cost sac outlet that can mill more targets for reanimation. I have used it on myself perhaps almost as much, or more, than my opponents.
Illusionist’s Bracers - Doubling up Chainer’s (or Balthor’s, or Geth’s) ability for free is a great way to get ahead in resource acquisition. Helps lower the life cost of Chainer’s ability as well.
Spawning Pit - Great sac-outlet that also provides more bodies back. Was also very strong in conjunction with the Summoning Station that was run in the initial deck. Also excellent to provide fodder for Salvaging Station.
Crucible of Worlds - Helps get back Coffers (which will die, often), as well as serving for making land drops with sac-lands.
Oblivion Stone - Another piece that can also remove artifacts and enchantments. Extra wrath effect.
Rings of Brighthearth - Great way to double up on Chainer's ability, sac lands, glaciers, and many other things for incremental advantage.
at instant speed also makes them true instant-speed revivals, which is exceptionally strong.
Staff of Domination - Now that it has been unbanned, the Staff is an excellent source of card advantage, defensive positioning, and yes, even emergency lifegain.
Trading Post - Giving us another manner to recur our powerful artifacts, the other abilities on the post are all useful to this deck.
Bitterblossom - Was better when Stax was in the deck, but is still very strong. At worst, you get a chump blocker that soaks at least 1 damage (off a trampler), which is conveniently the life you put into it anyways; every scenario from there simply gets better. Since we have a lot of life recovery, turning that resource into bodies is great value. Works well with skullclamp, hell's caretaker, and Sword of Light and Shadow.
Dark Prophecy - A new addition from m14, this card is a cheaper Harvester of Souls for yourself, and is essentially skullclamp #2 for use with our self reanimating friends like Reassembling Skeletons. While not as powerful as clamp, it has the benefit of not requiring additional equip mana to be paid, and also works well with Pawn of Ulamogs eldrazi tokens. I have been highly pleased with this card every time I've seen it. It's a cross between Harvester of Souls and Necropotence.
Necropotence - An extremely powerful draw engine, this card is near to being broken on the power scale. Do note that you return the cards on your end step, which means if you pay to go over 7 cards, you’ll need to discard down. It also exiles any card you discard, so beware of that with Memory Jar, and if you pay extra life, though do note that the exile effect is a triggered ability and you can respond to it with Chainer (or Balthor).
Yawgmoth's Will - Nick-named "Yawg-Win," the will is the ultimate rescursion tool for black, allowing you to bring anything back at all. Great second or third tutor target, as you can then re-use all of your tutors. You can also re-play a land, so if you're going to be using the will, be sure to play a land from the grave, not your hand. Note that the exile applies until the end of the turn, so be wary of people aiming their removal the turn this is played, as it can moderately back fire.
Living Death - Simultaneously a board wipe, and a reanimation spell. Use Grave Hate to help make it more powerful. Combos with Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed, as he can return it, then it will return him, etc.
Tutors - 3
The tutoring package allowed me to slot less answers, and more versatile answers. The tutors were chosen as they are the easiest to cast.
Vampiric Tutor - Instant speed helps offset the card dis-advantage this generates.
Demonic Tutor - 2 cost, most generic self-replacing tutor.
Beseech the Queen - 3 cost, requires you to reveal your chosen object.
Mana Rocks - 8
Since black has no existing ramp, artifact mana is important in order to have a fair amount of acceleration. Not much is actually needed, even one piece puts you into comfortable territory with the mana curve. They all cost 3 or less so that they are easily played early game, and work as real acceleration. Most also tap for black, rather than colorless.
Mana Crypt - While typically painful over longer games, and thereby better in a more aggressive deck, the amount of lifegain this deck runs can mitigate the negative effect of it, while it helps reachthat explosive amount of mana you want to optimally run[/c]
Sol Ring - Quite possibly the best mana rock for the format.
Wayfarer's Bauble - Can't be as easily wiped, and gets a swamp for coffers.
Thran Dynamo - It’s practically a cheaper Guilded Lotus.
Planeswalkers - 2
Liliana of the Dark Realms - Every Liliana has powerful interactions, but as the deck is highly starved for mana, Dark Realms’ land tutoring is enough for inclusion. The final emblem is icing on the cake, and the deck has enough control to pull it off. The middle ability is useful in emergencies.
Karn Liberated - Karn is another of our sources of removal for targets that Black would otherwise have problems with.
Vesuva - Clone, for lands. Usually copies Coffers, but is also great with Glaciers to thin the deck and to make land drops every single turn.
Winding Canyons - Follows the lines of Vedalken orrery. Keeping information in surprise is always good, and also gives you a turn of protection from sorcery-speed removal. This also allows Chainer and Balthor as Commanders to truly be instant speed GY reanimation, protecting you even more against exile effects.
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Swamp - Need these for coffers and end up getting doubled to high production.
3 sac lands - These are the 'good' sac lands. Which 3 you run really doesn't matter. It comes down to life being a resource, and having that land come in untapped. These are used to get consistent land drops with Crucible, and to actually ramp with the Rings.
Mikeasus, the unhallowed - Mike is a star player in this type of deck. Doubling your value out of sacrifices, and rendering pact/stax effects to a much higher value. He was removed due to power level interfering with Kokusho Testing. Further, when you have you sac-loop set up, he is simply win more, and his undying can actually interfere with theft of opposing creatures.
Braids, Cabal Minion - (and friends) Initially, Stax was proving a bit unfun for my group, so Braids and friends got cut after a short while. Also, she was stealing the show from Kokusho. Why get a creature to buy myself more time to win, when I can just get one to win? Since then, stax effects have entered and left depending on what answers I wanted to run. Braids not only answers problematic creatures and keeps the board clean, she can also answer artifacts, and serves as a free sacrifice effect on your own turn, which for us is a resource.
Solemn Simulacrum - Absolutely beast to abuse with Chainer, the Sad Robot was cut when I noticed I could just as easily abuse other people's ramp creatures. He costs a bit more than I want to spend, he was competing with a lot of other guys for the 4 drop slot.
Griselbrand - Hah! He's GriselBANNED now! (It had to be done, somewhere in here...)
Wishlist
Imperial Seal - Price tag aside, the sorcery speed limitation on top of waiting for a turn to get your tutor target (assuming no interference from the opponents), is quite problematic. It's offset some by card draw, but the slowness of it remains a large problem for me. It could replace the Diabolic Tutor, due to mana cost alone, but the speed issue still bothers me.
The deck is very much in a control-oriented seat. The early game is dedicated to setting up your mana base, with lands and mana-rocks. The next step is to begin developing the board position, with draw engines, and whatever creatures you have around.
It's difficult to give terribly more than that, as the deck is largely reactive for much of the game. A large resource also involves the use of the General considering what's in opponents' grave yards, and what's in yours, and this is something that is dependent largely on the game. The deck wins primarily through attrition. While the rest of the table loses creatures, life and resources, as the game progresses your reanimation and life recovery keeps you even, or increases as other positions diminish. Eventually you can simply walk over everything that's left.
Since I had built this deck for testing, I have written up some brief play descriptions. This will show how I pilot the deck and react to various problems. Initially I largely relied on my memory, as I wanted to emphasize what key events stood out the most in games, but in several I took better notes, such as post #43, where I kept detailed notes throughout the game. Not quite to the level of a play-by-play, but pretty darn close.
Throughout this thread I have copied over my replies to the various Kokusho unbanning updates. If some are quoted, they are copied from a Kokusho discussion thread. Clicking the arrow next to my name in the quote will link you to the Kokusho armada report threads, which had more discussion and replies to my tests. You can find my play reports in the following posts:
post #7: The first game played with the Deck. Chainer leads the team. I made a few mistakes, with both Chainer and Dark Mike, forgetting small facets of their abilities, but nothing game changing. Post #26: Two short recounts. A mistaken win, and a loss due to stigma lasher. Post #27: Where I continue with Chainer for 3 more games. Post #35: Post #29 had some initial confusion, I'd played rather late and had merged the two later games together. It took some time through emails with my playgroup, but managed to get those correctly sorted out with an extra tidbit from my brother, which I then posted into post #35. I had 3 Chainer games, including a 1v1, and 2 games with Kokusho at the helm. Post #41: I skipped a week of testing (I had seriously overplayed the deck), so my initial planning for Balthor was delayed. I played 2 games on two different days, one of which was uninspiring, but the second surprised me by the versatility Balthor offers. Not slapping yourself every time you use the ability also helps. Post #43: A second game heading up with Balthor shows some unique strengths of several under-appreciated cards. Post #48: A few changes to a more beefed up version, but it's Blood Artist who takes the spotlight in these two games with an amazing performance.
The most important thing in a game is to have fun. We relaxed the rules to run the unbanning test to begin with, so why not relax the rules for some fun and a good laugh at the end?
The deck has evolved quite a bit during testing, faster even than many others, due to extra conditions on the testing process. For example, while some cards would typically be left in, due to working extremely well, in this deck they were forced to be cut due to detracting attention from the Kokusho testing. Some examples would be Mikaeus, the Unhallowed, and the Stax package of Braids, Cabal Minion and Magus of the Abyss.
You'll find the changes throughout the tread, but here's the basic gist of what's happened:
-1 Swamp
+1 High Market - just need to move it from the decaying corpse of my Skullbriar deck.
-1 Desolation - With Chainer out, I use more mana on other turns than other people do.
+1 Sangromancer - with stax/attrition, etc, fuels my Chainer, and that is good.
Some changes for this upcoming week. The biggest is that Kokusho will be taking the helm. I am actually quite unhappy about this, I feel Chainer is far stronger, but perhaps I'll be proved wrong. The next is the removal of Stax elements. These were unfun for my group, and while they would stay if Chainer remained my general (they do help close out games), I want to test Kokusho. Stax is running too big of a competition next to Special K. Mikeaus has also been removed for stealing the show.
Coming in are Shriekmaw and Skinrender to take care of removal option, Hell's Caretaker as an additional resurrection effect (I need more without being able to depend on Chainer), Malakir Bloodwitch as another Special K effect.
Sorry for the lack of details on this one. I kept bad notes. It also seriously messed me up when I went to actually change the deck.
General:
-Kokusho
+Balthor, the defiled
Deck
-5 Malakir Bloodwitch
+6 Kokusho
-8 Decree of Pain
+5 Kagemaro, First to suffer - Recureable wrath. Also kills things like Avacyn (was a problem one game).
-4 Solemn Simulacrum
+6 Massacre Wurm - Recureable wrath.
-8 Griselbrand (steals the show) (He will return, as a commander.) I lied. Blame Sheldon.
+5 Living Death - Wrath AND Removal. Does it get any better?
General:
-Balthor, the defiled
+Chainer
This actually happened about 3 months after the last recorded change.
Deck
[indent]Due to the length of time since the last update to the change log, and the fact that the decklist in the thread had a different date from the changelog, I can’t do a card per card swap. Instead, I will explain some general philosophy changes:
My meta is currently a bit split between two demographics. Some players have more powerful decks, and are now embracing, if not infinite combos, some very strong synergies. Some infinite combos as well have shown up. The other side still prefers a more relaxed, heavy board-presence, high-interaction games. Chainer was generally disliked by the second group, initially I tried powering him down a bit, but I feel that was the wrong reaction: sawing off the corners of the square peg. I have now moved to making Chainer higher on the side of power of the decks I own, and if there are a few inifinite combos, I’m not going to cry. It’s not the goal, but it may happen.
Increased tutoring. While I have not re-introduced Diabolic, at 4 cost, and have actually removed Rune-Scarred, at 7 cost, I have embraced some other tutor options, such as Dimir House Guard, who doubles as a sac outlet, and Fleshwrither and Corpse Connoisseur as repeatable agents.
Power options, such as Necropotence have re-entered.
This happened a few weeks ago, right after m14 came out, but I only remembered to fix it now. Pretty minor change, but loving it so far:
-Memory Jar
+Dark Prophecy
I loved Dark Prophecy the minute I saw it spoiled, and knew it had to go in the deck. Shortly prior to the spol of Dark Prophecy, I had been goldfishing and enjoying a cute engine of Reassembling Skeleton and Harvester of Souls, and had been wishing that Harvester was cheaper. Wish Granted!
Memory Jar got the cut, as I wanted to keep my number of draw engines constant, and every time I drew it, I wasn't particularly happy to see it. Even those times in which I was happy to see it, for example, no cards in hand, and a Rings of Brighthearth on the field, it still didn't impress me much, and felt clunky and slow for what I wanted to be doing.
Once I realized where the deck was actually going, I started to create the mono black shell that I would be playing for the next 2 months and change (and potentially longer). The initial drafts of the deck have not been kept, but the first final version is found below:
After I built the initial Chainer version, I theorized what changes would be made to tailor the deck t be more Commander Centric with Kokusho at the helm. While I did not run this exact version of the deck during the Kokusho testing, I did switch out a number of cards to make the deck very similar to this list:
Tailoring the deck to Kokusho required a little bit more work. Much of the base remains the same, but most of the other lifegain engines have been replaced by card advantage, reanimation and sac outlets.
Dross Harvester - Lifegain/recovery. While the 4 life back hurts, he can be sacced if needed until that's past, and brought back when needed. I have had excellent results from this guy.
Bloodline Keeper - Threat/token sac fodder. This guy replaced the Summoning Station. While the station worked exceptionally well with the Stax options, the Keeper is better with the current Vampire package, both counting as a Vampire himself, as well as providing a threat as a massive Lord when he transforms.
Hell's Caretaker - Great for use with the self-recuring bodies, tokens, or to simply upgrade what's currently out. An excellent reanimation piece. If need be can act as a simple resurrection spell and replace himself.
Skinrender - Removal option. He's important as he can hit black targets, something Shriekmaw or the old-school Nekrataal cannot do.
Chainer, Dementia Master - Currently in the 99, interchangeable with Balthor as the leader. Two legendary creatures which can Reanimate large amounts of bodies.
Steel Hellkite - Black has issues dealing with resolved artifacts and enchantments. The Hellkite attempts to alleviate these problems.
Rune-Scarred Demon - I typically have issues justifying his cost, but when we can repeatedly bring him back, there's really no reason not to run him.
Mimic Vat - Things are dying. Was even stronger when the deck ran Stax effects, but remains a great card overall. Can also keep a problem card in limbo for a while to prevent opponents use, until you can bring real grave-hate to bear.
Sword of Light and Shadow - A great equipment to get great extra value from your creatures. I maintain that it might be the single best piece of equipment in EDH. It also has the two most relevant colors of protection.
Vedalken Orrery - An unusual pick, the ability to draw-go and delay decisions is very powerful, and often misunderstood and incorrectly under-valued. The ability to also play the commanders
Oversold Cemetery - Conveniently, we run a lot of creatures, and tend to have several die over the course of the game. While Phyrexian Arena gives you 1 card advantage equal to the average value of your deck, this gives you one card equal in value to the best creature in your graveyard. Very strong.
Attrition - The second best sac outlet in the deck. The ability to turn our bodies into death is a strong asset in a sac outlet. The biggest problem is that it requires a target to act as a sacrifice outlet; this can come back to bite you.
Infernal Tribute - The best sac outlet in the deck. This allows us to turn bodies into cards. Since we turn life into bodies, this essentially turns life into cards as well.
Grave pact - The last remaining stax/pact effect, grave pact is an excellent source of removal that gets around shroud, hexproof, and protection from black. Can use our bodies to keep the board clean.
Strands of Night - an excellent instant speed reanimation engine. The loss of a swamp is surprisingly painful, especially in black which doesn't have much available ramp, so use intelligently. Crucible of Worlds helps offset this.
Corpse Dance - Instant speed reanimation. Be careful with the exile clause, I have had my sac-outlet destroyed in response before.
Dread Return - A powerful recursion spell, that can be flashed back for minimal cost.
Beacon of Unrest - A powerful recursion spell that can also return key artifacts, like Oblivion Stone.
Exsanguinate - Life buffer on an insane non-targeted global drain life.
Memory Jar - A powerful draw option, that can be used to drop extra creatures in the graveyard. Recurable with Trading Post, and highly synergistic with Rings of Brighthearth.
When you activate Memory Jar, and then copy it with Rings of Brightheart, you will have two abilities on the stack:
[indent]Memory Jar (copy) -will be on top, and
Memory Jar (original) on the bottom[/indent]
This means that the copy ability will exile your initial hand, and give you 7 new cards, and then the original ability will exile the copy hand, and give you 7 new cards.
Both abilities create a delayed trigger for the end of turn.
At the end of turn, you can stack the return triggers in the same order, that way first you discard the Memory Jar (original) hand, and return your initial hand.
Then you discard your initial hand, and return the Memory Jar copy hand, leaving you (and admittedly, everyone else) with a new hand of 7 cards.
It took me as long to cut the last two cards as to make the deck, and now you're adding more!? You're killing me!
j/k
Let's see:
Faithless: Strong possibility, but I don't think it's needed. While I have a strong reanimator theme, I should have enough cheapskates and tokens to handle early game well. I'm not just looking to cast guys out of my grave. To that end, I do need to look at my curve though. I don't want to be stuck with useless fat in the main hand.
Leyline/Orrery/canyons: Needed? No. The option to delay your actions is very strong though. It's something I'm starting to incorporate into more decks. I'm going to run with it a bit before I remove it. It may simply not be for every deck, this deck already has a lot of things to do on opponents' turns. This just opens more options.
Counters: I started with 4, and then cut down. Are counters needed? Again, no, most of my playgroup runs none, but black has a bit of an issue with enchantments... and so does red, and blue. Not only that, but there may be other times where a key 'NO' comes in handy. It's not there for permissions style, I expect to hold them for multiple turns, until it really changes the outcome of the game.
Reanimate/Animate Dead: Oversight, though the lack of recursion for them makes me overall less giddy about them... Off through the list again... In a way though, I almost would rather have Cauldron Dance back...
===
EDIT
===
Creature curve seems high. Is Kuro worthwhile as Removal?
Odd choice, but he was next on my list of things to comment on. On the reanimation: They are cheap, instead of being reusable. No jin? What made you chose that?
Jin: Lack of one made him slip my mind. That's not much of an issue for this deck idea though, I guess I can cut... Rune-Scarred, Mike, or Duplicant for him... If I cut Duplicant, I can cut one of the cheaper guys for a Shriekmaw.
-or-
I can make room in the counterspells... hm.
Oh, frick. I forgot Exsanguinate. No wonder my lifegain seemed weak.
=====
Hmmmm, with that half hour break, looking at the list again, it's more than 80% black, and looks almost exactly like the Koku/Chainer mono-black deck I was going to build as deck#2 for this. Funny that.
I lose like... 9 cards... and a Conjurer's closet? That last one makes me sad a bit
We are Casual. While we do not hard ban anything, we encourage that certain startegies not played, or certain cards be refained from being included. To that end, we discourage mass land destruction, though one player won't be parted from his cataclysm. We discourage infinite combos, though one player still includes curiosity in his Niv-Mizzet deck, and we see the occasional combo appearance now and again. We discourage Sundering Titan, Primeval Titan, and I no longer play Seedborn Muse, among other cards.
To that end, looking through the decklist, it is obvious that this deck violates a few casual policies, but does not commit to a hard stax/denial theme. It is mostly fat reanimator. One point of interest to me was to see if there was a differentiation between the DECK being disgusting, compared to KOKUSHO being disgusting.
My opening decision was to ride the Harvestor draw long as I could, and reanimate him with chainer if need be.
I got even luckier, My first draw was Cabal Coffers.
The game starts as expected, I open with a turn 2 compass, turn 3 orrery, and then I can just react. Cho Manno starts early weenie aggression, but it's directed elsewhere, and I have a Dross Harvester to drop if need be as a blocker. I drop the Harvester of Souls early, and get an Attrition on the field fast, which in conjuction with the Kaervek player takes care of the white weenie army. I drop black Mikeaus, for some real fun with Nether Traitor + Attrition, but Teysa takes offense at that, and tries to path my Mike, with a False prophet on the field. I sac my Mike to attrition to kill the prophet, and in response sac the Harvester to a Phyrexian tower for some mana, with the board clear, I drop Barids, Cabal Minion to take a free shot at people's lands and artifacts (there's been a font of mythos for a turn or two). Teysa drops a second Font.
Kaervek tries to reanimate his Flayer of the Hatebound so I flash out Chainer, and steal it instead. I have a Summoner's Station out for fodder for my own braids, so on my turn I pair out a Magus of the abyss to put some real lock down on the table. I also draw Kokusho.
At this point, Everyone has lands, 1 creature, and maybe an artifact. I have an active Magus/Braids. My dross Harvestor is gaining me more life than dealing to me, and my Mikeaus is on the field, doing stupid damage with my stolen Flayer. My Harvestor of Souls is back, drawing me easily 2+ cards a turn, especially with the skullclamp/nether traitor out, and all Fonts of Mythos are dead, having been sacrificed to Braids. Someone tried to strip my Coffers, but I'd been holding a Crucible for a long time, just for that occurrence.
My hand is now 3 land, Diabolic Tutor, Beseech the Queen, Gravepact, and now Kokusho, the Evening Star as well. To top it off, Kaervek has a Rune-Scarred Demon in his Graveyard I am eying. I was already tempted when starting that turn to tutor for Kokusho, as the whole point of the deck was to try him, and honestly, I felt like I had already won, and that I could afford to waste a tutor to just be able to have him out. That was my mindset.
Kokusho ends the game. The game was already over in my mind though; there was very little anyone could do to remove the board position/cards I had. Between Chainer/Rune-scarred, with Dross Harvestor cutting out the life loss, I had unlimited tutoring available to me (well, still limited by my mana, but at least 6-7 there, plus two in my hand).
That said, Kokusho is very disgusting with Chainer, due to being able to refuel the life to keep bringing him back.
====
All three players agreed that Kokusho ended the game. One agreed that the game was over before then. One claimed he had an answer to Chainer, to which I pointed out I would sac chainer, who would then return because of Mikeaus, rendering his removal useless. He claimed my Kokusho, who was a Nitemare, would then be exiled. I pointed out that Kokusho had been sacrificed, and returned by Mikeaus, and was no longer a Nitemare. He agreed then that the game was over before then.
The biggest dirty look I got that game, was when I played Magus of the Abyss next to Braids, foiling a dastardly plan by removing sacrifical fodder for Braids.
The second biggest dirty look, was when I stole the Hateflayer with a Flashed Chainer.
The third most dirty look was when I started using Kokusho/Hateflayer/Mikeaus/Sac outlet to end the game. There was one sigh of relief that the game was now officially over. I ended the game at 90 life.
Also, I was generating about 20 mana/turn, with the two tutors I could have gotten a Deserted Temple and Exsanguinate and ended it that way for a close to 40 point exsanguinate.
Well, I have to admit, it proves nothin other than this is a good deck. Koko may have finished it off, but really that could of been anything. I do like the mono black look.
Well, I have to admit, it proves nothin other than this is a good deck. Koko may have finished it off, but really that could of been anything. I do like the mono black look.
That was the conclusion I came to from that game as well, however, there was a lot of good luck in my draws. I did find myself a bit mana-flooded as well, but I'll refrain from changes there for a bit, until I get a few more games in.
Kokusho had a memorable impression that game, but an unnecessary one. Nothing more was needed really to win. They had to deal with too many different things, simultaneously, to damage my position. Also, the Braids/Magus drew a lot more negative emotion. I may try a stax-less version, just to compare the negative emotions generated by both.
Removing Kokusho from the deck does not harm it in any noticeable manner, I believe.
He did make it go a lot smoother though. Black may not need that kind of life greasing.
I am tempted to add Sangromancer in place of something, as Chainer's ability can be painful used often.
I haven't thought about it too much yet. Probably some other form of removal... Dark Imposter/Carrionette/Shriekmaw? Maybe a couple extra sac outlets, I felt as if a few more wouldn't be unwelcome. More ETB abilities maybe? Possibly a Rings of Brighthearth. I was wanting one at one point when I had crucible/sac land in hand.
I also figured out what my Sedris build was missing: Warstorm Surge and Flayer of the Hatebound. Serious Sedris tech there. I may try it (yet) again in a few weeks, and see how it compares as a more casual deck.
Also, Victimize? You do have a ton of ETB effects that it can be abused with.
I think the trouble with removing the staxs, is the fact that they honestly are a sac outlet, and removal balled into one. Not many cards can boast that.
Also, Victimize? You do have a ton of ETB effects that it can be abused with.
I think the trouble with removing the staxs, is the fact that they honestly are a sac outlet, and removal balled into one. Not many cards can boast that.
I know, that's why they're in there. They're good, but if I want a comparison of the negative emotion compared to Kokusho without them... I may have to try and make it play "nice" at some point.
Victimize will be nice in here, I was actually wanting another rez tonight too. I'll look over what I can replace it for tomorrow.
"to which I pointed out I would sac chainer, who would then return because of Mikeaus, rendering his removal useless."
Bear in mind Mikaeus, the Unhallowed only returns non-human creatures. Still, I'm of the opinion that the game would have been over regardless, though.
Yes, this deck clearly needs to have more cards in it ;).
Why do you play the warehouse and leech ridden swamp? I mean they are okay, just a bit iffy.
Leech Ridden was just a toss-in, I don't much care about it either way, but it is a swamp, so a fetch can get it, and you never know, that 1 life could matter. Essentially, small loss, for small potential gain.
Shizo... I am currently running 6 Legendary creatures, I think I had one or two others in a bit earlier too, especially when I was building with Sedris in mind. It kind of bled over from Sedris, where I was also running Shinka, but again, seems like a decent potential upside compared to a very small potential loss. Some of the Legendaries already have an evasion, so the benefit isn't that great, but it also comes in untapped, so if someone really wants to use theirs to strip me, or use a vesuva... sure.
"to which I pointed out I would sac chainer, who would then return because of Mikeaus, rendering his removal useless."
Bear in mind Mikaeus, the Unhallowed only returns non-human creatures. Still, I'm of the opinion that the game would have been over regardless, though.
Yeah, this was brought up in the other thread, I had overlooked that, but boardwise it made no difference that game. It's something I'll need to pay special attention to in future games, as it also affects the Magus (who you can see with a counter in the photo) and Braids.
As it is, I had plenty of sac fodder, and even forgot to return my Nether Traitor as even more sac bait, so...
Why are you recommending Faithless Looting? I just legitimately don't understand, it's outside of Chainer's/Kokusho's color identity.
And Leyline of Anticipation is blue... I'm so confused...
EDIT: Nevermind, I just saw the Sedris deck, it all makes sense now.
Why are you recommending Faithless Looting? I just legitimately don't understand, it's outside of Chainer's/Kokusho's color identity.
And Leyline of Anticipation is blue... I'm so confused...
EDIT: Nevermind, I just saw the Sedris deck, it all makes sense now.
Yeah, this was my fault. I wanted to build Sedris first, as I figured that would be the more 'casual' deck, but as you can see from the list in the spoiler, it was 90% mono-black-legal, and it looked a lot like the mono-black deck I wanted to build. So I switched it over. I've gotten a few more ideas on fixing the Sedris list now, but I'll take my time with that one.
===
Since the deck has both Kokusho and Chainer designated as potential Generals (though several other legendaries in the deck can step up to play), I started considering the advantanges of both.
Namely, the part where Kokusho is much harder to remove when he is a General.
However, Chainer gives you built in Card Advantage in a general, not something to be dismissed lightly. Further, his instant speed resurrection is also not to be taken lightly, as it can protect your valued resources in the graveyard very well.
I think that even if Kokusho were fully unbanned, I would still prefer Chainer at the helm, though further playing the deck/testing is waranted before I commit to that decision, especially as I have not played with Kokusho at the helm yet.
I eventually also plan to put Sheoldred, Mikaeus, and Griselbrand at the helm of this deck, though it was not specifically designed with any of them in mind.
Yeah, this was my fault. I wanted to build Sedris first, as I figured that would be the more 'casual' deck, but as you can see from the list in the spoiler, it was 90% mono-black-legal, and it looked a lot like the mono-black deck I wanted to build. So I switched it over. I've gotten a few more ideas on fixing the Sedris list now, but I'll take my time with that one.
===
Since the deck has both Kokusho and Chainer designated as potential Generals (though several other legendaries in the deck can step up to play), I started considering the advantanges of both.
Namely, the part where Kokusho is much harder to remove when he is a General.
However, Chainer gives you built in Card Advantage in a general, not something to be dismissed lightly. Further, his instant speed resurrection is also not to be taken lightly, as it can protect your valued resources in the graveyard very well.
I think that even if Kokusho were fully unbanned, I would still prefer Chainer at the helm, though further playing the deck/testing is waranted before I commit to that decision, especially as I have not played with Kokusho at the helm yet.
I eventually also plan to put Sheoldred, Mikaeus, and Griselbrand at the helm of this deck, though it was not specifically designed with any of them in mind.
Ah, that makes sense. It would be kinda cool to use a differnt Legend every game so that the deck always felt new and different.
Ah, that makes sense. It would be kinda cool to use a differnt Legend every game so that the deck always felt new and different.
Kind of why I want to try it with these other guys, especially since a number of them are powerful in their own right. I do want some consistent feel though with Kokusho/Chainer, and then use the others to compare how the deck feels different (If it does).
It's kind of cool for me, since this is the first time I've built a deck with so many potential changeable Generals.
-1 Swamp
+1 High Market - just need to move it from the decaying corpse of my Skullbriar deck.
-1 Desolation - With Chainer out, I use more mana on other turns than other people do.
+1 Sangromancer - with stax/attrition, etc, fuels my Chainer, and that is good.
Kind of why I want to try it with these other guys, especially since a number of them are powerful in their own right. I do want some consistent feel though with Kokusho/Chainer, and then use the others to compare how the deck feels different (If it does).
It's kind of cool for me, since this is the first time I've built a deck with so many potential changeable Generals.
This almost makes want to build a monocolored EDH deck with a huge amount of Legends in it.
Maybe I'll do that with the Baru, Fist of Krosa deck I want to build.
Essentially add in a bit more of the vampire life-steal package, and more to more creature based for synergy with resurrections and with Winding Canyons
Dread might not be as useful. I liked him as a threat to reanimate if attacked en masse, but I think I could just reanimate a juicier target at that point.
Bloodgift Demon may also be overkill on the card draw. At that mana cost the Harvestor of souls and Griselbrand make better reanimation targets.
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StaffI thought that was banned?
Armada Games, the Brick and Mortar store which is Sheldon Menery's local playgroup, play league games running for 2 months. For the duration of the league, some twist to the rules is given. For example, a previous one was to disallow Primeval Titan. For Armada League 15, Sheldon Menery and Armada Games have implemented a very interesting twist: unbanning Kokusho, the Evening Star.
Now, I have never played when Kokusho was legally viable. I joined EDH after that point (I think). For the most part, I actually have no interest with what's on the banlist and why. It's pretty self-evident to me, for the most part. Kokusho, however, has always been a sore-spot on the internet. Much as a train wreck, World of Warcraft guild drama, or Judge Judy, it held a strange fascination for me. I knew it was bad, but I couldn't stop staring at it. Not one to turn down potential drama, I decided: "why should those Armada people get all the fun?"
So I talked with my playgroup, at length, and despite a heated and explosive start, we agreed to try the same thing at our local area! When I pitched the idea initially, I was hoping more people would join in (one player has, though we've never seen Kokusho from him, yet), but it's been an interesting and unusual treat to us thus far.
When I knew that I wanted to play test Kokusho, I knew that I also should not build a super-combo-abuse deck, for three reasons:
So, what kind of deck does want Kokusho? Obviously something that reanimates, but that's like saying air+lungs=combo. So I got to looking at what Kokusho does:
So where does that leave us? Kokusho, the Evening Star blocks like a champ, deters attacks, lends some counter-weight to removal and wraths, and gains us life which means more resources, closes off an avenue to victory, and gives us more time.
Oh my goodness, Kokusho, the Evening star buys us TIME. We've uncovered a control deck's dream.
My general conclusions on my analysis of Kokusho eventually led me to building a Mono-Black Control deck, with a very heavy reanimation focus, and a large theme of abusing the color's capabilities to gain life through theft, and converting life into another resource, usually cards, which also takes advantage of Commander's higher starting life total.
Once I had my deck style solidly determined, I had to decide on a Commander. Two factors led to my choices of potential Commanders: One, was that I wanted to be able to run Kokusho as a Commander. While most of the banlist thread was willing to compromise as 1 of the 99, I figured if I was going to test this thing, I was going to test it. After all, if Mikeaus, the Unhallowed can be a Commander, maybe Kokusho could too. This led to needing a Mono-black shell. Since Kokusho needs two pieces to work, herself and a reanimation method (sac outlet is an enabler, you can get her to simply die normally, so is not technically "needed," only helpful in terms of combo ability), it made sense that her companion Commander should serve as the mirror role.
I settled on the choice of Chainer, Dementia Master, but kept considerations open for other potential Commanders.
You might like Chainer if...
- You like playing control. Chainer lends himself better to a drawn out game. You're reviving one target at a time, so it's all about utility, maintaining a board position, and keeping that life coming in.
- You enjoy drawing out a game, winning through attrition and bleeding opponent's resources.
You might not like Chainer if...- You dislike Stax strategies. While not necessary to running Chainer, it is some of the best removal black has access to, and the slow chain of dying corpses is one of the best way to fuel some of the lifegain abilities to offset his pain.
- You dislike Suicide Black. Chainer hurts you. 3 life doesn't seem like much, but when you repeatedly start using the ability, it adds up very quickly.
- You dislike reliance on lifegain. Lifegain holds Chainer together.
Considerations:- Lifegain is highly important, not just to stall, but to provide additional resources. Protect your lifegain engines.
- Be ready to use Chainer as graveyard hate. Chainer himself adds strong anti-creature graveyard abuse, as you can simply steal their stuff in response.
- Sacrifice Outlets are needed in order to control and offset Chainer's exiling effect.
You can also look at jmdt's retired Chainer primer for more ideas. jmdt has a different style to Chainer, though we've stolen quite a few ideas from each other.Also see:
During the Unbanning Testing event, I theorized some changes to make the deck more focused on Kokusho in the Commander slot, and she plays far differently than any other commander. Kokusho is much safer from graveyard hate, as she herself can always return to the Command Zone, and every time she dies she allows for a good target for your reanimation spells. You can also focus more purely on control with Kokusho at the helm, since Kokusho will eventually win the game for you just by dying.
5 Chainer, Dementia Master
Creatures - 29
1 Bloodsoaked Champion
2 Blood Artist
2 Bloodghast
2 Disciple of Griselbrand
2 Reassembling Skeletons
2 Zulaport Cutthroat
3 Burnished Hart
3 Fleshbag Marauder
3 Grim Haruspex
3 Merciless Executioner
3 Pawn of Ulamog
4 Agent of Erebos
4 Corpse Augur
4 Crypt Ghast
4 Dimir House Guard
4 Disciple of Bolas
4 Falkenrath Noble
4 Fleshwrither
4 Mindslicer
4 Sangromancer
4 Slum Reaper
4 Smothering Abomination
4 Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed
5 Gray Merchant of Asphodel
5 Kagemaro, First to suffer
5 Sidisi, Undead Vizier
6 Duplicant
6 Kokusho, the Evening Star
6 Massacre Wurm
2 Bitterblossom
3 Dark Prophecy
3 Necropotence
3 Phyrexian Arena
Instant - 2
1 Vampiric Tutor
7 Scour From Existence
Sorcery - 3
2 Demonic Tutor
3 Yawgmoth's will
5 Living Death
Artifact - 12
1 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Skullclamp
2 Altar of Dementia
2 Spawning Pit
2 Sword of the Animist
3 Crucible of Worlds
3 Oblivion Stone
3 Phyrexian Altar
3 Rings of Brighthearth
3 Sword of Feast and Famine
5 Gauntlet of Power
6 Caged Sun
Artifact - Mana Rocks - 9
0 Mana crypt
1 Sol Ring
1 Wayfarer's Bauble
2 Charcoal Diamond
2 Thought Vessel
3 Darksteel Ingot
3 Unstable Obelisk
3 Worn Powerstone
4 Thran Dynamo
4 Liliana of the Dark Realms
7 Karn Liberated
LAND - 38
1 Bloodstained Mire
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Buried Ruin
1 Cabal Coffers
1 Deserted Temple
1 High Market
1 Marsh Flats
1 Mirrorpool
1 Myriad Landscape
1 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
1 Petrified Field
1 Phyrexian Tower
1 Polluted Delta
1 Terrain Generator
1 Thawing Glaciers
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Verdant Catacmbs
1 Vesuva
1 Winding Canyons
19 swamp
The deck has come a long way since its inception. While I had previously attempted to rigorously avoid infinite combos, I have recently decided to allow some of them back in, though it is still not a focus of the deck. Chainer has progressed through many phases of changes, alternating between being powered up, and powered down due in part to responding to changes in my playgroup. The majority of my stable playgroup prefers less powerful, more relaxed games, and so generally dislike my Chainer deck on general principles. Sometimes though, a few players join who tend to prefer more powered games. Chainer changed accordingly, being one of my more powered (yet not competitive) decks. Despite not focusing on infinite combos, I now classify it as Combo-Control deck. While I still Identify with the Control aspect most strongly, it does move into dies/sac loops for a combo win.
Currently Running: the detailed list
The deck still breaks down into specific sections:
While the cards may stay similar, different ones stood out a bit more per Commander. Chainer enjoyed Dross Harvester a lot, as specific individual creatures would die and return often, over a period of time. With Balthor, the Blood Artist and Falkenrath Noble are able to do a lot more damage, as masses of creatures return and die together. Kokusho benefits the most from Kokusho herself.
Protection from black is another strong problem to resolve, especially if you are playing Chainer, Dementia Master as your commander. Many people forget that when Chainer reanimates, he makes the creature black as well, which means that you can't reanimate an artifact to toss in front. Making colorless token creatures can help a bit, but in terms of removal, the colorless solutions above are strong.
Spell based options can also be potent, and black has a number of excellent options: Tragic Slip is very easy to ‘turn on,’ and Go for the Throat is applicable among a large set of threats. Murder is simply the case to judge all others by, as it's the general catch-all. On top of those options, I particularly like Sudden Death, Sudden Spoiling, and Nameless Inversion, in differing situations.
The next pieces are in the lands: Never underestimate the power of simply making land drops on time. While we're low on lands to consistently draw into them (it should average one in three cards) our card-draw helps some, and thawing glaciers helps, as does Crucible of Worlds. With a sac land, like Marsh Flats, the crucible turns life into consistent land drops and deck thinning. Paired with a Rings of Brighthearth, and you turn it into ramp, which pays itself back in two turns. Faster with a Coffers out. Thawing Glaciers is a land that allows you to make a land drop every other turn. With a 35% chance to draw a land, this means you should be able to make land drops 2 of every third turn, though every land in hand extends this even further out. With Vesuva, you can make a land drop every turn, until you're ready to return the Vesuva to hand to copy something else. Again, Rings of Brighthearth or Deserted Temple turn the glaciers into ramp as well. The final land is Terrain Generator. This land helps increase the land drops you can make, considering that 2/3 of our lands are basic swamps, this can help immensely in the early game, or once you have a powerful card advantage machine online.
Creatures - 25
Since we are running a reanimator strategy, many of our permanents have been converted to creature-based equivalents. This helps make our utility packages reusable with the reanimation we run.
Artifacts - 16
Enchantments - 7
Spells -5
General - 2
- Yawgmoth's Will - Nick-named "Yawg-Win," the will is the ultimate rescursion tool for black, allowing you to bring anything back at all. Great second or third tutor target, as you can then re-use all of your tutors. You can also re-play a land, so if you're going to be using the will, be sure to play a land from the grave, not your hand. Note that the exile applies until the end of the turn, so be wary of people aiming their removal the turn this is played, as it can moderately back fire.
- Living Death - Simultaneously a board wipe, and a reanimation spell. Use Grave Hate to help make it more powerful. Combos with Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed, as he can return it, then it will return him, etc.
Tutors - 3The tutoring package allowed me to slot less answers, and more versatile answers. The tutors were chosen as they are the easiest to cast.
Mana Rocks - 8
Since black has no existing ramp, artifact mana is important in order to have a fair amount of acceleration. Not much is actually needed, even one piece puts you into comfortable territory with the mana curve. They all cost 3 or less so that they are easily played early game, and work as real acceleration. Most also tap for black, rather than colorless.
Planeswalkers - 2
Land - 38
Wishlist
The short answer: very well, thank you.
The deck is very much in a control-oriented seat. The early game is dedicated to setting up your mana base, with lands and mana-rocks. The next step is to begin developing the board position, with draw engines, and whatever creatures you have around.
It's difficult to give terribly more than that, as the deck is largely reactive for much of the game. A large resource also involves the use of the General considering what's in opponents' grave yards, and what's in yours, and this is something that is dependent largely on the game. The deck wins primarily through attrition. While the rest of the table loses creatures, life and resources, as the game progresses your reanimation and life recovery keeps you even, or increases as other positions diminish. Eventually you can simply walk over everything that's left.
Since I had built this deck for testing, I have written up some brief play descriptions. This will show how I pilot the deck and react to various problems. Initially I largely relied on my memory, as I wanted to emphasize what key events stood out the most in games, but in several I took better notes, such as post #43, where I kept detailed notes throughout the game. Not quite to the level of a play-by-play, but pretty darn close.
Throughout this thread I have copied over my replies to the various Kokusho unbanning updates. If some are quoted, they are copied from a Kokusho discussion thread. Clicking the arrow next to my name in the quote will link you to the Kokusho armada report threads, which had more discussion and replies to my tests. You can find my play reports in the following posts:
post #7: The first game played with the Deck. Chainer leads the team. I made a few mistakes, with both Chainer and Dark Mike, forgetting small facets of their abilities, but nothing game changing.
Post #26: Two short recounts. A mistaken win, and a loss due to stigma lasher.
Post #27: Where I continue with Chainer for 3 more games.
Post #35: Post #29 had some initial confusion, I'd played rather late and had merged the two later games together. It took some time through emails with my playgroup, but managed to get those correctly sorted out with an extra tidbit from my brother, which I then posted into post #35. I had 3 Chainer games, including a 1v1, and 2 games with Kokusho at the helm.
Post #41: I skipped a week of testing (I had seriously overplayed the deck), so my initial planning for Balthor was delayed. I played 2 games on two different days, one of which was uninspiring, but the second surprised me by the versatility Balthor offers. Not slapping yourself every time you use the ability also helps.
Post #43: A second game heading up with Balthor shows some unique strengths of several under-appreciated cards.
Post #48: A few changes to a more beefed up version, but it's Blood Artist who takes the spotlight in these two games with an amazing performance.
Only the most awesome thing EVER!
Read about the The Super Extravagent Rainbow KOKUSHOPALOOZA (the first).
The most important thing in a game is to have fun. We relaxed the rules to run the unbanning test to begin with, so why not relax the rules for some fun and a good laugh at the end?
Retired EDH - Tibor and Lumia | [PR]Nemata |Ramirez dePietro | [C]Edric | Riku | Jenara | Lazav | Heliod | Daxos | Roon | Kozilek
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StaffThe deck has evolved quite a bit during testing, faster even than many others, due to extra conditions on the testing process. For example, while some cards would typically be left in, due to working extremely well, in this deck they were forced to be cut due to detracting attention from the Kokusho testing. Some examples would be Mikaeus, the Unhallowed, and the Stax package of Braids, Cabal Minion and Magus of the Abyss.
You'll find the changes throughout the tread, but here's the basic gist of what's happened:
+1 High Market - just need to move it from the decaying corpse of my Skullbriar deck.
-1 Desolation - With Chainer out, I use more mana on other turns than other people do.
+1 Sangromancer - with stax/attrition, etc, fuels my Chainer, and that is good.
-1 Leechridden swamp - eh.
+1 Petrified Field - Yeah, coffers love.
Coming in are Shriekmaw and Skinrender to take care of removal option, Hell's Caretaker as an additional resurrection effect (I need more without being able to depend on Chainer), Malakir Bloodwitch as another Special K effect.
Summoning Station -> Bloodline Keeper.
Loxodon Hammer -> Malakir Bloodwitch
[something] -> Kalastria highborn
[something] -> Falkenrath Noble
Braids, Cabal Minion -> Shriekmaw
Magus of the Abyss -> Skinrender
[something] -> Hell's Caretaker
Sorry for the lack of details on this one. I kept bad notes. It also seriously messed me up when I went to actually change the deck.
-Kokusho
+Balthor, the defiled
Deck
-5 Malakir Bloodwitch
+6 Kokusho
-8 Decree of Pain
+5 Kagemaro, First to suffer - Recureable wrath. Also kills things like Avacyn (was a problem one game).
-4 Solemn Simulacrum
+6 Massacre Wurm - Recureable wrath.
-8 Griselbrand (steals the show) (He will return, as a commander.) I lied. Blame Sheldon.
+5 Living Death - Wrath AND Removal. Does it get any better?
-Balthor, the defiled
+Chainer
This actually happened about 3 months after the last recorded change.
Deck
[indent]Due to the length of time since the last update to the change log, and the fact that the decklist in the thread had a different date from the changelog, I can’t do a card per card swap. Instead, I will explain some general philosophy changes:
My meta is currently a bit split between two demographics. Some players have more powerful decks, and are now embracing, if not infinite combos, some very strong synergies. Some infinite combos as well have shown up. The other side still prefers a more relaxed, heavy board-presence, high-interaction games. Chainer was generally disliked by the second group, initially I tried powering him down a bit, but I feel that was the wrong reaction: sawing off the corners of the square peg. I have now moved to making Chainer higher on the side of power of the decks I own, and if there are a few inifinite combos, I’m not going to cry. It’s not the goal, but it may happen.
Some key changes are:
This happened a few weeks ago, right after m14 came out, but I only remembered to fix it now. Pretty minor change, but loving it so far:
-Memory Jar
+Dark Prophecy
I loved Dark Prophecy the minute I saw it spoiled, and knew it had to go in the deck. Shortly prior to the spol of Dark Prophecy, I had been goldfishing and enjoying a cute engine of Reassembling Skeleton and Harvester of Souls, and had been wishing that Harvester was cheaper. Wish Granted!
Memory Jar got the cut, as I wanted to keep my number of draw engines constant, and every time I drew it, I wasn't particularly happy to see it. Even those times in which I was happy to see it, for example, no cards in hand, and a Rings of Brighthearth on the field, it still didn't impress me much, and felt clunky and slow for what I wanted to be doing.
6 Sedris, the Traitor King
Creatures - 19
2 Bloodghast
2 Nether Traitor
2 Nezumi Graverobber
2 Reassembling Skeleton
3 Stinkweed Imp
3 Trinket Mage
4 Braids, Cabal Minion
4 Graveborn Muse
4 Solemn Simulacrum
5 Bloodgift Demon
5 Chainer, Dementia Master
5 River Kelpie
5 Steel Hellkite
6 Deadeye Navigator
6 Duplicant
6 Kokusho, the Evening Star
6 Mikaeus, the Unhallowed
7 Rune-Scarred Demon
7 Sheoldred, Whispering One
Artifacts - 13
1 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Scrabbling Claws
1 Skullclamp
2 Spawning Pit
3 Crucible of Worlds
3 Loxodon Warhammer
3 Mimic Vat
3 Oblivion Stone
3 Sword of Light and Shadow
4 Smokestack
4 Vedalken Orrery
5 Conjurer's Closet
7 Summoning Station
Enchantments - 11
2 Bitterblossom
2 Oversold Cemetery
3 Attrition
3 Infernal Tribute
3 Necropotence
3 Phyrexian Arena
4 Grave pact
4 Leyline of anticipation
4 Sneak Attack
4 Strands of Night
5 Dire Undercurrents
General - 5
3 Corpse Dance
3 Yawgmoth's Will
4 Dread Return
5 Beacon of Unrest
8 Decree of Pain
1 Vampiric Tutor
2 Demonic Tutor
3 Beseech the Queen
4 Diabolic Tutor
2 Arcane Denial
2 Countersquall
3 Undermine
------
Mana Rocks - 9
1 Everflowing Chalice
1 Wayfarer's Bauble
1 Sol Ring
2 Charcoal Diamond
2 Sky Diamond
2 Star Compass
3 Coalition Relic
3 Darksteel Ingot
3 Pristine Talisman
Land - 35
1 Academy Ruins
1 Badlands
1 Bloodstained Mire
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Buried Ruin
1 Cabal Coffers
1 Command Tower
1 Deserted temple
1 Evolving Wilds
1 Phyrexian Tower
1 Polluted Delta
1 Shinka, the Bloodsoaked Keep
1 Shizo, Death's Storehouse
1 Temple of the false god
1 Terramorphic Expanse
1 Thawing Glaciers
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Vesuva
1 Winding Canyons
7 Swamp
6 Island
3 Mountain
1 Wormfang Drake
1 Harvester of souls
1 Dread
1 exsanginate
Once I realized where the deck was actually going, I started to create the mono black shell that I would be playing for the next 2 months and change (and potentially longer). The initial drafts of the deck have not been kept, but the first final version is found below:
5 Chainer, Dementia Master - or Kokusho
Creatures - 22
2 Blood Artist
2 Bloodghast
2 Nether Traitor
2 Nezumi Graverobber
2 Reassembling Skeleton
3 Dross Harvester
4 Braids, Cabal Minion
4 Graveborn Muse
4 Magus of the Abyss
4 Sangromancer
4 Solemn Simulacrum
5 Bloodgift Demon
5 Chainer, Dementia Master - or Kokusho
5 Steel Hellkite
6 Dread
6 Duplicant
6 Harvester of Souls
6 Mikaeus, the Unhallowed
6 Nirkana Revenant
7 Rune-Scarred Demon
7 Sheoldred, Whispering One
8 Griselbrand
Artifacts - 15
1 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Scrabbling Claws
1 Skullclamp
2 Spawning Pit
3 Crucible of Worlds
3 Loxodon Warhammer
3 Mimic Vat
3 Oblivion Stone
3 Sword of Light and Shadow
4 Smokestack
4 Vedalken Orrery
7 Summoning Station
3 Extraplanar Lens
5 Gauntlet of Power
6 Caged Sun
2 Bitterblossom
2 Oversold Cemetery
3 Attrition
3 Infernal Tribute
3 Necropotence
3 Phyrexian Arena
4 Grave pact
4 Strands of Night
Spells - 10
General - 6
3 Corpse Dance
3 Yawgmoth's Will
4 Dread Return
5 Beacon of Unrest
8 Decree of Pain
2x Exsanguinate
1 Vampiric Tutor
2 Demonic Tutor
3 Beseech the Queen
4 Diabolic Tutor
Mana Rocks - 9
1 Everflowing Chalice
1 Wayfarer's Bauble
1 Sol Ring
2 Charcoal Diamond
2 Star Compass
3 Coalition Relic
3 Darksteel Ingot
3 Pristine Talisman
3 Skull of Ramos
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Buried Ruin
1 Cabal Coffers
1 Deserted temple
1 High Market
1 Petrified Field
1 Phyrexian Tower
1 Shizo, Death's Storehouse
1 Temple of the false god
1 Thawing Glaciers
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Vesuva
1 Winding Canyons
20 Swamp
3 sac lands - for crucible use
1 Balthor the Defiled
Creatures - 26
2 Blood Artist
2 Bloodghast
2 Disciple of Griselbrand
2 Nether Traitor
2 Nezumi Graverobber
2 Reassembling Skeletons
3 Dross Harvester
3 Fleshbag Marauder
3 Pawn of Ulamog
4 Bloodline Keeper
4 Disciple of Bolas
4 Falkenrath Noble
4 Graveborn Muse
4 Mindslicer
4 Skinrender
4 Xiahou Dun, the one-eyed
5 Bloodgift Demon
5 Chainer, Dementia Master
5 Kagemaro, First to Suffer
6 Dread
6 Duplicant
6 Massacre Wurm
6 Mikaeus the Unhallowed
6 Nirkana Revenant
7 Butcher of Malakir
7 Rune-Scarred Demon
2 Bitterblossom
2 Oversold Cemetary
3 Infernal Tribute
3 Mind Slash
3 Phyrexian Arena
4 Grave pact
4 Strands of Night
Instants - 2
1 Vampiric Tutor
4 Slaughter
Sorceries - 7
2 Demonic Tutor
3 Yawgmoth's Will
4 Diabolic Tutor
4 Dread Return
5 Beacon of Unrest
5 Living Death
6 Beseech the Queen
Aritfacts - 11
1 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Scrabbling CLaws
1 Skullclamp
3 Crucible of Worlds
3 Oblivion Stone
3 Rings of Brighthearth
3 Sword of Light and Shadow
4 Vedalken Orrery
3 Extraplanar Lens
5 Gauntlet of Power
6 Caged Sun
0 Everflowing Chalice
1 Sol Ring
1 Wayfarer's Bauble
2 Charcoal Diamond
2 Star Compass
3 Coalition Relic
3 Darkstee Ingot
3 Pristine Talisman
3 Skull of Ramos
Planeswalkers - 1
7 Karn Liberated
Land - 36
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Buried Ruin
1 Cabal Coffers
1 Deserted Temple
1 High Market
1 Marsh Flats
1 Petrified Field
1 Phyrexian Tower
1 Polluted Delta
1 Shizo, Death's Storehouse
1 Temple of the False god
1 Terrain Generator
1 Thawing Glaciers
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Verdant Catacmbs
1 Vesuva
1 Volrath's Stronghold
1 Winding Canyons
18 swamp
This deck won through attrition, primarily through mass resurrection and wipes, abusing blood artist and Falkenrath Noble triggers.
Theorized Deck List
After I built the initial Chainer version, I theorized what changes would be made to tailor the deck t be more Commander Centric with Kokusho at the helm. While I did not run this exact version of the deck during the Kokusho testing, I did switch out a number of cards to make the deck very similar to this list:
Tailoring the deck to Kokusho required a little bit more work. Much of the base remains the same, but most of the other lifegain engines have been replaced by card advantage, reanimation and sac outlets.
6 Kokusho, the Evening Star
Creatures - 19
2 Bloodghast
2 Disciple of Griselbrand
2 Nether Traitor
2 Nezumi Graverobber
2 Reassembling Skeleton
4 Braids, Cabal Minion
4 Graveborn Muse
4 Hell's Caretaker
4 Skinrender
4 Xiahou dun, the one-eyed
5 Bloodgift Demon
5 Chainer, Dementia Master
5 Kagemaro, First to suffer
6 Duplicant
6 Harvester of Souls
6 Massacre Wurm
6 Mikaeus, the Unhallowed
6 Nirkana Revenant
7 Rune-Scarred Demon
Artifacts - 17
1 Relic of Progenitus
1 Scrabbling Claws
1 Skullclamp
2 Carnage Altar
2 Spawning Pit
3 Crucible of Worlds
3 Oblivion Stone
3 Phyrexian Altar
3 Phyrexian Vault
3 Sword of Light and Shadow
4 Smokestack
4 Vedalken Orrery
4 Well of Lost Dreams
7 Spine of Ish Sah
3 Extraplanar Lens
5 Gauntlet of Power
6 Caged Sun
1 Phyrexian Reclamation
2 Bitterblossom
2 Oversold Cemetery
3 Attrition
3 Infernal Tribute
3 Phyrexian Arena
4 Gravepact
4 Strands of Night
5 Dawn of the Dead
Spells - 10
General - 7
3 Corpse Dance
3 Victimize
3 Yawgmoth's Will
4 Dread Return
5 Beacon of Unrest
5 Living Death
1 Vampiric Tutor
2 Demonic Tutor
3 Beseech the Queen
4 Diabolic Tutor
Mana Rocks - 9
1 Everflowing Chalice
1 Wayfarer's Bauble
1 Sol Ring
2 Charcoal Diamond
2 Star Compass
3 Coalition Relic
3 Darksteel Ingot
3 Pristine Talisman
3 Skull of Ramos
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Buried Ruin
1 Cabal Coffers
1 Deserted temple
1 High Market
1 Petrified Field
1 Phyrexian Tower
1 Shizo, Death's Storehouse
1 Temple of the false god
1 Terrain Generator
1 Thawing Glaciers
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Vesuva
1 Volrath's Stronghold
1 Winding Canyons
18 Swamp
3 sac lands - for crucible use
I never actually ran this version, but you can see my general thought process with it.
Placeholder, until I figure out what to do with these card descriptions that used to be in the deck:
When you activate Memory Jar, and then copy it with Rings of Brightheart, you will have two abilities on the stack:
[indent]Memory Jar (copy) -will be on top, and
Memory Jar (original) on the bottom[/indent]
This means that the copy ability will exile your initial hand, and give you 7 new cards, and then the original ability will exile the copy hand, and give you 7 new cards.
Both abilities create a delayed trigger for the end of turn.
At the end of turn, you can stack the return triggers in the same order, that way first you discard the Memory Jar (original) hand, and return your initial hand.
Then you discard your initial hand, and return the Memory Jar copy hand, leaving you (and admittedly, everyone else) with a new hand of 7 cards.
Retired EDH - Tibor and Lumia | [PR]Nemata |Ramirez dePietro | [C]Edric | Riku | Jenara | Lazav | Heliod | Daxos | Roon | Kozilek
Also, maybe faithless looting is a good idea?
Counterspell suite needed? It seems sub par.
Also, no reanimate or Animate Dead?
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StaffIt took me as long to cut the last two cards as to make the deck, and now you're adding more!? You're killing me!
j/k
Let's see:
Faithless: Strong possibility, but I don't think it's needed. While I have a strong reanimator theme, I should have enough cheapskates and tokens to handle early game well. I'm not just looking to cast guys out of my grave. To that end, I do need to look at my curve though. I don't want to be stuck with useless fat in the main hand.
Leyline/Orrery/canyons: Needed? No. The option to delay your actions is very strong though. It's something I'm starting to incorporate into more decks. I'm going to run with it a bit before I remove it. It may simply not be for every deck, this deck already has a lot of things to do on opponents' turns. This just opens more options.
Counters: I started with 4, and then cut down. Are counters needed? Again, no, most of my playgroup runs none, but black has a bit of an issue with enchantments... and so does red, and blue. Not only that, but there may be other times where a key 'NO' comes in handy. It's not there for permissions style, I expect to hold them for multiple turns, until it really changes the outcome of the game.
Reanimate/Animate Dead: Oversight, though the lack of recursion for them makes me overall less giddy about them... Off through the list again... In a way though, I almost would rather have Cauldron Dance back...
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EDIT
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Creature curve seems high. Is Kuro worthwhile as Removal?
Life seems to go fast. Add loxodon Warhammer?
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Edit 2
===
Cut Kuro, Pitlord for Lox Hammer.
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StaffJin: Lack of one made him slip my mind. That's not much of an issue for this deck idea though, I guess I can cut... Rune-Scarred, Mike, or Duplicant for him... If I cut Duplicant, I can cut one of the cheaper guys for a Shriekmaw.
-or-
I can make room in the counterspells... hm.
Oh, frick. I forgot Exsanguinate. No wonder my lifegain seemed weak.
=====
Hmmmm, with that half hour break, looking at the list again, it's more than 80% black, and looks almost exactly like the Koku/Chainer mono-black deck I was going to build as deck#2 for this. Funny that.
I lose like... 9 cards... and a Conjurer's closet? That last one makes me sad a bit
1 Chainer, Dementia Master - or Kokusho
Creatures - 20
2 Blood Artist
2 Bloodghast
2 Nether Traitor
2 Nezumi Graverobber
2 Reassembling Skeleton
3 Dross Harvester
4 Braids, Cabal Minion
4 Graveborn Muse
4 Magus of the Abyss
4 Solemn Simulacrum
5 Bloodgift Demon
5 Chainer, Dementia Master - or Kokusho
5 Steel Hellkite
6 Dread
6 Duplicant
6 Harvester of Souls
6 Mikaeus, the Unhallowed
6 Nirkana Revenant
7 Rune-Scarred Demon
7 Sheoldred, Whispering One
8 Griselbrand
Artifacts - 15
1 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Scrabbling Claws
1 Skullclamp
2 Spawning Pit
3 Crucible of Worlds
3 Loxodon Warhammer
3 Mimic Vat
3 Oblivion Stone
3 Sword of Light and Shadow
4 Smokestack
4 Vedalken Orrery
7 Summoning Station
3 Extraplanar Lens
5 Gauntlet of Power
6 Caged Sun
2 Bitterblossom
2 Oversold Cemetery
3 Attrition
3 Desolation
3 Infernal Tribute
3 Necropotence
3 Phyrexian Arena
4 Grave pact
4 Strands of Night
Spells - 10
General - 5
3 Corpse Dance
3 Yawgmoth's Will
4 Dread Return
5 Beacon of Unrest
8 Decree of Pain
2x Exsanguinate
1 Vampiric Tutor
2 Demonic Tutor
3 Beseech the Queen
4 Diabolic Tutor
------
Mana Rocks - 9
1 Everflowing Chalice
1 Wayfarer's Bauble
1 Sol Ring
2 Charcoal Diamond
2 Star Compass
3 Coalition Relic
3 Darksteel Ingot
3 Pristine Talisman
3 Skull of Ramos
Land - 35
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Cabal Coffers
1 Winding Canyons
1 Buried Ruin
1 Shizo, Death's Storehouse
1 Temple of the false god
1 Deserted temple
1 Thawing Glaciers
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Phyrexian Tower
1 Vesuva
1 Leech-ridden swamp
21 Swamp
3 sac lands - for crucible use
huh how's that look?
I think it wants some Blood Artist and Falkenrath Noble.
WHOOPS. River Kelpie was still in... =P Blood artist found a spot.
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StaffRetired EDH - Tibor and Lumia | [PR]Nemata |Ramirez dePietro | [C]Edric | Riku | Jenara | Lazav | Heliod | Daxos | Roon | Kozilek
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StaffThat was the conclusion I came to from that game as well, however, there was a lot of good luck in my draws. I did find myself a bit mana-flooded as well, but I'll refrain from changes there for a bit, until I get a few more games in.
Kokusho had a memorable impression that game, but an unnecessary one. Nothing more was needed really to win. They had to deal with too many different things, simultaneously, to damage my position. Also, the Braids/Magus drew a lot more negative emotion. I may try a stax-less version, just to compare the negative emotions generated by both.
Removing Kokusho from the deck does not harm it in any noticeable manner, I believe.
He did make it go a lot smoother though. Black may not need that kind of life greasing.
I am tempted to add Sangromancer in place of something, as Chainer's ability can be painful used often.
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StaffI also figured out what my Sedris build was missing: Warstorm Surge and Flayer of the Hatebound. Serious Sedris tech there. I may try it (yet) again in a few weeks, and see how it compares as a more casual deck.
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I think the trouble with removing the staxs, is the fact that they honestly are a sac outlet, and removal balled into one. Not many cards can boast that.
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StaffI know, that's why they're in there. They're good, but if I want a comparison of the negative emotion compared to Kokusho without them... I may have to try and make it play "nice" at some point.
Victimize will be nice in here, I was actually wanting another rez tonight too. I'll look over what I can replace it for tomorrow.
Seems like I wanted more of everything =P
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Why do you play the warehouse and leech ridden swamp? I mean they are okay, just a bit iffy.
Bear in mind Mikaeus, the Unhallowed only returns non-human creatures. Still, I'm of the opinion that the game would have been over regardless, though.
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StaffLeech Ridden was just a toss-in, I don't much care about it either way, but it is a swamp, so a fetch can get it, and you never know, that 1 life could matter. Essentially, small loss, for small potential gain.
Shizo... I am currently running 6 Legendary creatures, I think I had one or two others in a bit earlier too, especially when I was building with Sedris in mind. It kind of bled over from Sedris, where I was also running Shinka, but again, seems like a decent potential upside compared to a very small potential loss. Some of the Legendaries already have an evasion, so the benefit isn't that great, but it also comes in untapped, so if someone really wants to use theirs to strip me, or use a vesuva... sure.
Yeah, this was brought up in the other thread, I had overlooked that, but boardwise it made no difference that game. It's something I'll need to pay special attention to in future games, as it also affects the Magus (who you can see with a counter in the photo) and Braids.
As it is, I had plenty of sac fodder, and even forgot to return my Nether Traitor as even more sac bait, so...
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Btw, is Magus of the Abyss a substitute for The Abyss or you just prefer the body?
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StaffIn this particular case, since my General is Chainer, it's all about the body. It makes him easier to bring back. =P
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Why are you recommending Faithless Looting? I just legitimately don't understand, it's outside of Chainer's/Kokusho's color identity.
And Leyline of Anticipation is blue... I'm so confused...
EDIT: Nevermind, I just saw the Sedris deck, it all makes sense now.
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StaffYeah, this was my fault. I wanted to build Sedris first, as I figured that would be the more 'casual' deck, but as you can see from the list in the spoiler, it was 90% mono-black-legal, and it looked a lot like the mono-black deck I wanted to build. So I switched it over. I've gotten a few more ideas on fixing the Sedris list now, but I'll take my time with that one.
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Since the deck has both Kokusho and Chainer designated as potential Generals (though several other legendaries in the deck can step up to play), I started considering the advantanges of both.
Namely, the part where Kokusho is much harder to remove when he is a General.
However, Chainer gives you built in Card Advantage in a general, not something to be dismissed lightly. Further, his instant speed resurrection is also not to be taken lightly, as it can protect your valued resources in the graveyard very well.
I think that even if Kokusho were fully unbanned, I would still prefer Chainer at the helm, though further playing the deck/testing is waranted before I commit to that decision, especially as I have not played with Kokusho at the helm yet.
I eventually also plan to put Sheoldred, Mikaeus, and Griselbrand at the helm of this deck, though it was not specifically designed with any of them in mind.
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Ah, that makes sense. It would be kinda cool to use a differnt Legend every game so that the deck always felt new and different.
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StaffKind of why I want to try it with these other guys, especially since a number of them are powerful in their own right. I do want some consistent feel though with Kokusho/Chainer, and then use the others to compare how the deck feels different (If it does).
It's kind of cool for me, since this is the first time I've built a deck with so many potential changeable Generals.
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Staff+1 High Market - just need to move it from the decaying corpse of my Skullbriar deck.
-1 Desolation - With Chainer out, I use more mana on other turns than other people do.
+1 Sangromancer - with stax/attrition, etc, fuels my Chainer, and that is good.
-1 Leechridden swamp - eh.
+1 Petrified Field - Yeah, coffers love.
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This almost makes want to build a monocolored EDH deck with a huge amount of Legends in it.
Maybe I'll do that with the Baru, Fist of Krosa deck I want to build.
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StaffSummoning Station -> Bloodline Keeper.
Gravepact -> Butcher of Malakir (mana cost bothers me)
Loxodon Hammer -> Malakir Bloodwitch
Mimic Vat -> Kalastria highborn
[something] -> Falkenrath Noble
Essentially add in a bit more of the vampire life-steal package, and more to more creature based for synergy with resurrections and with Winding Canyons
Other possible inclusions:
I already have a few vampires (4) in blood artist, bloodghast, sangromancer, and the revenant.
Addung in the first 5 bumps me up to 9, which should be enough to make the Bloodwitch into a mini second Kokusho.
Also, the highborn and Noble would help out a fair amount on my life drain side, especially with the bloodghast shenanigans.
I also definitely need a slot Rings of Brighthearth and Victimize. I'm having problems selecting things to cut.
Dread might not be as useful. I liked him as a threat to reanimate if attacked en masse, but I think I could just reanimate a juicier target at that point.
Bloodgift Demon may also be overkill on the card draw. At that mana cost the Harvestor of souls and Griselbrand make better reanimation targets.
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