MTG Salvation

INTRODUCTION:

So, like many people who have approached Edgar Markov I started out with a build that utilized a lot of vampires that were fairly good standalone (such as Olivia Voldaren). My original build was more about how many bodies I could move through play and it played off of some token generators that were not at all vampire. This first build did have some success but in this first build I kept noticing how good the cheap 1-2 mana vampires felt because of the efficiency they gave me in the amount of bodies for the mana given Edgar Markov's free token.

After having played my original version for a few weeks, I decided I wanted to investigate what a low curve would look like given how good those cheap vampires kept feeling. As I was feeling this concept out I realized that there was a lot of tempo draw that I could use for such a build for refilling my hand and keeping my deck active. With that, my current version took off.

STRATEGY:

Edgar Markov's free tokens generates sooooo much free value when you look at cheap vampires and getting 2 for 1 bodies on top of the natural abilities of the creatures. When I first built a list like most people I had some expensive vampires and I found that all of my cheap vampires just felt SOOOO much better because of the added value of the vampire token. I have built this list with a super low curve to try to take advantage of those free bodies.

The idea of this build is to curve in with very cheap bodies and utilize the power of the anthems. Edgar Markov himself also cares a lot more about having a swarm of creatures. When I first built Edgar I really never cast him because I wasnt swarming with enough creatures for it to really be a good move. Since moving to more of a low curve swarm deck anthems have picked up a TON of value that they did not have for me in my previous build because I was trying to play standalone good vampires. The move has made the deck work so much better I cant even express how much better it feels now.

The other element of running a low curve is that some cards like Dark Confidant and Ad Nauseam care specifically about what the cost to cast cards are. I run a lot of tempo draw as well such as Wheel of Fortune and Null Profusion that play off of being able to curve the hand in and then refill. Skullclamp and Tymna the Weaver are more examples of repeat draw that I run in here and being able to draw those cards cheaply and then move them really keeps the action of a deck like this high.



CONSIDERATIONS:

• Luminarch Ascension - it seems like a card that could potentially explode with a lot of action. I like that its cheap and could be dropped very early on as well. Its kind of a mana hog if it goes live but if it goes live I don't care its good. The concerns being that you need to probably draw it early and it could possibly suck to topdeck it later. This deck is not really a big mana deck and it generally has a lot of use for its mana so stopping the vamp gameplan to make angels seems questionable.
• Attrition - its a good effect and I have the bodies to fuel it, its just kind of expensive at BB to cast and another B to activate immediately. The restriction of nonblack creatures sometimes does not matter and sometimes it feels like you cant ever hit what you want.
• Gate to Phyrexia - its a little slow but its repeatable and I have the fodder to feed it.
• Raging River - the evasion is alright. I guess its sort of like Menace assuming I am not staring down a bunch of flyers.
• Rune-Tail, Kitsune Ascendant - potentially it lets me attack without fear of blockers / chump block without losing tokens. The life total restriction is a little concerning though as sometimes my life fluctuates depending on how suicidal I get with Necropotence and other suicide draw like Dark Prophecy.

I see your discussion on Skullclamp, but if you are worried about your draw imo the best thing are the equipment tutors for it. The good ol' clamp is well worth the mana difference. If you are worried about them being dead later, you can also add Sword of the Animist and/or the new Dowsing Dagger to help with ramp.

Quote from Jusstice »

I see your discussion on Skullclamp, but if you are worried about your draw imo the best thing are the equipment tutors for it. The good ol' clamp is well worth the mana difference. If you are worried about them being dead later, you can also add Sword of the Animist and/or the new Dowsing Dagger to help with ramp.

Yea.... I could see doing that but I feel like Animist / Dagger are still not things I would prioritize over clamp in this deck. It might also be an option to just run a few more tutors like Enlightened Tutor / Beseech the Queen and just accept that I kind of always want skullclamp here. My issue with adding more equipment to justify adding equipment tutors but then still mostly being unsatisfied with my secondary tutor targets. To add 2 more equipment and then 2 equipment tutors eats up a lot of space when I still mostly wont be interested in tutoring for the others. I do really like Sword of the Animist in general but I think it may be more important to have lands to play from hand for the turn as well since most of my creatures are kind of frail attacking every turn can be costly on having to equip things as well as the land coming in tapped. I did kind of forget to add any white land retrieval so I guess perhaps I should do that now.

DECK CHANGE:

• New Blood -> Enlightened Tutor I like that New Blood fits the theme of the deck but realistically.... I just don't think I need to be stealing creatures. As removal its kind of specific in what it can do for a deck that is not going to be a control based deck. Enlightened has a lot of solid targets it can get me and its cheap to cast. Early on I can see keeping it for draw and later on it can turn into wincons.
• Mizzium Mortars -> Land Tax I like mortars but its more of a swarm vs swarm or defense vs swarm. I need some draw and ensuring that I have land drops is a good way to do that. I totally forgot about land tax when I was building it lol. I only have 10 basics but I think that is fine.

I think that adding more equipment is an option but again part of my concern is that a lot of these creatures are a little frail and I am more focusing on swarming rather than having a few good attackers. Skullclamp totally fits given the tokens but I am going to be harder pressed to want some of those other equipment over skullclamp and the other equipment don't appeal to me as much if I have already gotten skullclamp. I think for now the better solution might just be the adding another tutor for redundancy and not trying to make a full package out of it.

Quote from DrakeZ »

Hello. I will be throwing several suggestions here, as there are many threads with Edgar Markov as commander already going on and I am one of those who plan on playing him.

You have mentioned card draw and ramp. I am one of the (it seems) few people who HATE playing mana rocks in my decks. I see your land base, Weathered Wayfarer is unfortunately not a vampire, but I still think it is a very good choice if you want to "ramp". Other similar effects in these colors are Tithe or Gift of Estates where you can tutor up dual or shock lands. Or even Curse of Opulence might be good if you really want more mana.

Card draw: one card I absolutely love here is Dark Prophecy. It might get dangerous, but in this deck it goes from good to straight broken.

Other suggestions that I might have: I like Indulgent Aristocrat here. It is cheap, has lifelink, is a sacrifice outlet and boosts your vampires. Another card that I have seen mentioned a lot is Reconnaissance - seriously, this card basically means that your dudes have vigilance (at worst), are protected when they become blocked, or even straight up allows you to untap them after combat damage to tap them for Captivating Vampire. It really IS an amazing piece of tech.

For me personally, I am trying to go wide and fast with this deck. I am going to include Authority of the Consuls and Blind Obedience to slow my opponents while I try to quickly kill them with army of vampires.

Another piece of tech that I have seen in another post is Falkenrath Gorger + Tortured Existence. Both 1CMC cards that together allow you to reanimate your vampires at instant speed, which I find to be very good.

All of my suggestions are very low CMC, as I try to really push the deck in terms of how fast it can be.

Weathered Wayfarer / Tithe / Gift of Estates - I was and am interested in including Wayfarer but my issue is sort of that he is slow to activate and this deck is going wide. I felt like if I got him in the early turns it would be no problem and I will probably get tons of value from it but then I was thinking what if I draw him on like turn 8? In general a go wide strategy is already a little weak to sweepers and I felt that outside of drawing him early he felt underwhelming to me. If I get to use him mutliple times still at that point its fine but in general I thought he felt a little slow outside of the early game for a swarm style of deck. I think Tithe and Gift of Estates are still like.... options but I think in the same regards cards like Sign in Blood (and the other version for 1B) are also kind of in direct competition with them and I do like just draw over land search when I can for the most part. I kind of gave in for Land Tax in part because of how many lands it can get me for the mana but while I do like Tithe it more lines up with Sign in Blood for value

Curse of Opulence thats kind of amusing. I normally dont care for the curses but this is one I will try to keep in mind.

Dark Prophecy yea thats a good call. I think I know of a spot I can work it in at.

Indulgent Aristocrat I had a fear that I would need to be swarming kind of huge before it pays off. I will give it some thought. In some regards though I might just consider like Mirror Entity though as for the counters to actually matter its going to take several turns of it sticking or for me to have good stated minions (vamps dont tend to do). Some of how I was trying to build was to try not to be soley focused on combat damage and a wide swing which is part of why I tried building with so much emphasis in some of the out of combat damage. I could add more emphasis into combat capabilities but I felt in some ways it was slower and more dependent on a more predictable rate of creature growth. Essentially what I am saying that the go wide and anthem hard build is more susceptible to spot removal on its anthems and sweepers where the build of ETB / Death effects kind of split things and force opponents to try to gain some life as well as sweep me. I do think that Indulgent Aristocrat is a respectable card and I will add it to my considerations because I don't think its that different from like Stromkirk Captain for instance but it has a bigger capability if you have a bigger swarm and it feels like it has less capability if you have less in play.

Reconnaissance its a good card and a good suggestion for a swarm of under powered creatures. I didn't include it in part because I am not going as focused on going wide + anthem attacking. I think it fits better into that style of deck. It can unfortunately be a low impact card though too if you get swept and then you draw it. It itself just makes a good board better and it lets you get in for chip damage without exposing your creatures to dying. I think that its a great card but I plan to mostly attack those with few creatures in play.

Authority of the Consuls / Blind Obedience if you want to aim for being a fast aggro deck I can see this. My problem is that they are not good topdeck draws later on so later in the game they fall off in how good they are. I am more aiming for a midrange lifetotal pressure strategy deck as well rather than going for early game aggro.

Falkenrath Gorger I am just not really running cards that give synergy to this card. I dont think that it has enough value to try to justify the cards to make it better either.

Tortured Existence this card is good when you have a big discrepancy between how good creatures are or when a deck has silver bullets that you need to recover. Most of the vamps feel about equivalent to me offhand. I considered Sword of Light and Shadow to recover some vamps but in the end I felt it would be a bit slow and the fragile nature of individual vamps discouraged me from equipment in a lot of ways.

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Ultimately, I think I probably should try to make room for Dark Prophecy. I will put Indulgent Aristocrat and Reconnaissance on my consideration list but I think both are still a little questionable for how I am trying to play. I will probably see how the deck plays a bit first and decide later how I feel about them.

DECK CHANGES:

Athreos, God of Passage -> Dark Prophecy if I actually thought I would get my vamps back from Athreos I think I probably would keep him in. My issue is that he doesn't do anything with the tokens that die and its putting some choices into the hands of my enemies. I like that Athreos is a black based devotion god because I think I can actually hit the devotion to animate and swing with him (its both an upside and a downside) but ultimately I think the capability to draw from my token deaths is probably more relevant than a single opponent losing 3 life on a creature death of mine.

EDIT: reading through some of the other Edgar lists and I saw someone suggest Iroas, God of Victory. I actually like the suggestion quite a bit because to me it feels like an even more powerful Reconnaissance (less defensive but more offensive). I added it to my considerations list but its something that's caught my interest now.

Hi there ISB!


I would like to suggest Settle the Wreckage as a ramp/potential wrath piece. Early-to-mid-game, you can ramp absurdly with it by attacking in with tokens, then using Settle at the end of combat step, after damage has been dealt. Similarly to Reconnaissance actually, and it works quite well with Recon too, in that you can then use it on a turn where you swing out as per usual, then Recon your more prized Vamps out in response. Really, I suggest both quite highly.

As for lategame, when the opponent really doesn't need the ramp, it's a fantastic and potentially devastating combat trick.

Try them out! It's worth your while, I believe.

~Lil Kalki

Quote from kalkris »

Hi there ISB!


I would like to suggest Settle the Wreckage as a ramp/potential wrath piece. Early-to-mid-game, you can ramp absurdly with it by attacking in with tokens, then using Settle at the end of combat step, after damage has been dealt. Similarly to Reconnaissance actually, and it works quite well with Recon too, in that you can then use it on a turn where you swing out as per usual, then Recon your more prized Vamps out in response. Really, I suggest both quite highly.

As for lategame, when the opponent really doesn't need the ramp, it's a fantastic and potentially devastating combat trick.

Try them out! It's worth your while, I believe.

~Lil Kalki

kalkris

Thanks for the suggestion. Right now I need to get more games in with the deck before I really make much for changes. I have only managed to play one game and that one game ended rather early (I did win but it was a lot of king making at the last turn. I do have some concerns as well that this card might be a little late for when I want to push ramp even for myself. If I could get it to fire like on curve then I think it would be good but I think there are a lot of challanges for that.

I'm going for a 'syphon build' as well as I want a kind of casual deck. Here's the list.

A few cards that have been good for the syphon plan: Blood Seeker, Kheru Bloodsucker, Drana's Emissary, Cliffhaven Vampire and Bontu's Monument. Monument's cost reduction is nice, especially since my deck has a black bias but it's drain fits the theme. The Kheru Bloodsucker is also quite dangerous, as between Markov, Rakish Heir and Indulgent Aristocrat plus any other lords, it is easy to punish anyone for Wrathing you.

Also, with all of these +1/+1 Counters, it means Cauldron of Souls does a good job of keeping your entire board alive.

Quote from Tev »

I'm going for a 'syphon build' as well as I want a kind of casual deck. Here's the list.

A few cards that have been good for the syphon plan: Blood Seeker, Kheru Bloodsucker, Drana's Emissary, Cliffhaven Vampire and Bontu's Monument. Monument's cost reduction is nice, especially since my deck has a black bias but it's drain fits the theme. The Kheru Bloodsucker is also quite dangerous, as between Markov, Rakish Heir and Indulgent Aristocrat plus any other lords, it is easy to punish anyone for Wrathing you.

Also, with all of these +1/+1 Counters, it means Cauldron of Souls does a good job of keeping your entire board alive.

Blood Seeker It was originally in my list like right up until when I made my list 100 cards (one of the last few cuts). I like the concept of it and it fits the flavor I was going for but my issue is that its impact is entirely dictated by the design of my opponents decks. While some cards like Blood Artist can also benefit based on what my opponents deck composition is its not a card I felt that I had any real direct impact on how it played out. I ended up cutting it and including the off tribe Zulaport Cutthroat because instead of looking at how my opponent designed their deck it looks at how I built my deck. Its unfortunate that its not part of the tribe but I think as far as what the two cards do, I am going to see a lot more impact from Zulaport Cutthroat than I would Blood Seeker. I can totally see the situation of playing Blood Seeker vs a token deck but I can also see the situation of playing it against a voltron and or creature light deck. Whenever I can I like to put the control of a card like this in my own hands than gamble on the style of play of my opponents.

Kheru Bloodsucker My issue is how small vampires are from the get go. Its possible if I am swarming or have a big buff up that I could have a lot that would meet that requirement but I feel like I need to test more before I can assume I can buff my vamps. I have not put in enough play testing to really get a feel of what a normal game is for this deck so its hard for me to say. The one game I played so far I never saw any anthems so this would have been able to affect like 7 creatures in my list is all.

Drana's Emissary Its too slow and not enough impact if you ask me. I would probably play Tithe Drinker over it for the extort and I don't really value it very highly either. I am not a fan of slow value effects that trigger on my next turn's upkeep as I feel they are slow to act and too dependent on curving them into play.

Cliffhaven Vampire hummmmmmm I do really like the idea of comboing him with Blood Artist / Zulaport Cutthroat / Falkenrath Noble / Sanctum Seeker as that sounds SUPER SPICY. My issue is that its a little bit winmore in that I really don't care for him much outside of that kind of a situation and the cards that make him good are already really good if I can get them to work. I think it still might be good enough given those situations and it itself is probably not going to bring down a ton of hate on me until I set something like that up. I wish it was like.... a little better statted but its ability is possibly busted and possibly nothing.

Bontu's Monument Its not a bad thought especially given how much of the vamps are black. I could see that working. I will give it some more thought.

Rakish Heir I don't much care for slow over time growth like this because its no immediate impact and it relies on you still having a board for subsequent turns.

Indulgent Aristocrat I am waiting to test the deck more before I make a decision if I want this card. I see potential for it but it takes a fairly large swarm of creatures and a good bit of mana before I like it. Its cool that its a sac outlet but 2 mana activation sac effects are not exactly cheap.

Cauldron of Souls I like the concept of the card but I don't think I have ever seen the card like.... do anything. Nobody walks into wrathing you with this card up so it feels like it just pulls removal for days it itself and then you get wrathed. That is at least my experience seeing others play the card and with that I have never run it myself as it just doesn't accomplish much in my experience.

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Really what I need right now is to playtest more. I think several of your suggestions are solid. Right now though I really need to test more so I can identify more of the cards I might have issues with as well as come up with more of a feel of how the deck plays and what is / isn't working.

Hi ISB, Haven't been on in a while, RL issues. Studied/used your Riku/Kiki-Jiki builds in the past, and I really respect your insight and knowledge regarding this "mildly" complex game we play. I purchased this vampire EDH precon recently, so I'm here perusing your thread, and I've got a card that nobody has mentioned, on any of the threads, which I think might be very good here. And that's Cauldron of Souls. The -1/-1 counters from the cauldron would be cancelled out by the repeatedly obtained +1/+1 counters from various ways, which in turn would allow any/all of your creatures repeated use of the cauldron, right? This also would allow any etb/etg effects that we are already utilizing. Also, how about Cloudstone Curio? Your feedback please.

Quote from MtG_Maniac »

Hi ISB, Haven't been on in a while, RL issues. Studied/used your Riku/Kiki-Jiki builds in the past, and I really respect your insight and knowledge regarding this "mildly" complex game we play. I purchased this vampire EDH precon recently, so I'm here perusing your thread, and I've got a card that nobody has mentioned, on any of the threads, which I think might be very good here. And that's Cauldron of Souls. The -1/-1 counters from the cauldron would be cancelled out by the repeatedly obtained +1/+1 counters from various ways, which in turn would allow any/all of your creatures repeated use of the cauldron, right? This also would allow any etb/etg effects that we are already utilizing. Also, how about Cloudstone Curio? Your feedback please.

Welcome back. Sorry if my explanation gets a little long winded but I figured I would do my best to explain why my thoughts are what they are.

Cauldron of Souls Tev did actually just ask me about it. I will give a little more in dept of an explanation about why I don't like it though.

• Its a 5 mana card that has no immediate impact.
• Its protections are limited in what it can protect against. AKA Terminus / Merciless Eviction go through it)
• Its protection is not friendly with tokens.
• It has to be played before being wrathed but at a point that your board is maybe worth wrathing.
• If someone casts a Wrath of God effect into an untapped Cauldron of Souls its because they are completely not paying attention. My experience is usually that Cauldron of Souls usually dies quickly and the wrath follows after it or someone executes a wrath that it will not protect against (tuck / exile / grave hate added).

I think that when looking at Cauldron of Souls the closest example to me is really a poor man's Mikaeus, the Unhallowed. You really should almost never consider running Cauldron of Souls over Mikaeus, the Unhallowed (exception being maybe if you are like trying to rez humans). Mikaeus in comparison can be resurrected much easier, gives a buff to your creatures, can attack with evasion, and brings creatures back stronger instead of weaker. Their mana cost is very similar as well so really the reasons to not run Mikaeus, the Unhallowed assuming you own / can buy either one of them is that either your landbase cannot support BBB casting cost (a budget reason) or the price tag of Mikaeus, the Unhallowed is too high (also budget). So really.... the reason to not run Cauldron of Souls is because there is almost no reason to run it over Mikaeus, the Unhallowed which does about the same thing but acts as an anthem and its rez effect is stronger.

As to why I am not running Mikaeus, the Unhallowed in this deck... well it really circles back to several of the same points from Cauldron of Souls really.

• The protection does not work well for tokens.
• It is a protection effect that needs to be dropped ahead of time.
• The amount of anthem for the mana is just sort of ok.

Mikaeus, the Unhallowed can somewhat closely be compared to Eldrazi Monument for example in terms of how much pump I get and the mana costs. The protection that Eldrazi Monument gives for tokens is more friendly and the sacrifice / turn is not that concerning to me. The mass flying tagged on gives me an evasion to connect to opponents immediately considering its evasion and pump its nice. It also helps me on defense quite a bit. The wraths that get past Eldrazi Monument often would also screw with Mikaeus, the Unhallowed as well. Mikaeus is a little more robust being its a creature in black but I am also not running that much rez. In this comparison both of them give a little bit of an anthem and protection but while Eldrazi Monument slowly kills some of them it gives a much stronger buff for tokens.

So, in a nutshell... Cauldron of Souls < Mikaeus, the Unhallowed < Eldrazi Monument in this specific setup. There are times where I do prefer Mikaeus over Monument but it tends to be times where creatures have ETB / Death triggers. Mikaeus can also be stronger if you are using a creature tactic (not tokens) to do aggro things. Usually when you start introducing token tactics into the mess Eldrazi Monument picks up more momentum. The amount of rez you run also can make Mikaeus stronger too. You could also bring into consideration a number of spot protection effects such as Boros Charm and Teferi's Protection as other potential protection card considerations. Sometimes its better to have the surprise protection than to put it out there and see if people have removal for you. There is a third option yet as well which is to rely on mass resurrection rather than trying to put up defenses beforehand. Pre-emptive defenses are really rough because it means you need to take a turn to set up a defensive measure rather than furthering your attempt to kill people now. In that sense I think that a cheaper one shot protection or a follow up resurrect can be more efficient in that if someone does not have that answer you are investing less upfront. Preventive measures also tend to have situational natures in what they protect against as well so there is that too.

Cloudstone Curio - its true that this card "could" make running a bunch of one mana vampires like say Pulse Tracker to be useful. My issue is that so few of the cheap drop vampires are naturally good when drawn past the first few turns. I dont want to be topdecking on turn 6+ and find a one drop vampire that does nothing but attack. Vampires have a very hard time with the fact that they are a tribal deck so you need support cards, draw, ramp, answers all packed in as well as their tribal package. The last thing I want to do is to be topdeck drawing and find a vanilla 1/1 for 1 vampire mid to late game. Because so few vampires have ETB effects I feel the other direction this card pushes is for cheap vampires that you just flip flop in which I dont think is a good idea. In my opinion, its probably stronger to run more draw instead of this card that "might" function as ETB abuse / cheap vampire token abuse in the right situations because I think there are not sufficient cheap vampires that would really make this worthwhile.

Great explanation. I'm currently using Eldrazi Monument, and Boros Charm. I agree, the surprise protection IS mainly better, especially if the board wipe takes out other players, and NOT you. These vamps do need a bit of help to be a viable EDH deck. It's gonna be interesting to see how people come up with different strategies to do it. Hmmm... I wonder if Warp World might work...

Quote from MtG_Maniac »

Great explanation. I'm currently using Eldrazi Monument, and Boros Charm. I agree, the surprise protection IS mainly better, especially if the board wipe takes out other players, and NOT you. These vamps do need a bit of help to be a viable EDH deck. It's gonna be interesting to see how people come up with different strategies to do it. Hmmm... I wonder if Warp World might work...

Warp World - it could work my issues are a few with the card still:

1. It costs a ton of mana and you need to cast it when you kind of are doing well. If you are doing well and have a bunch of vamps and tokens in play why not just push a wincon instead?
2. Its expensive to cast.
3. Its situational.
4. We dont really have much for ETB effects. Its possible with this type of build to flip into Purpheros / Impact Tremmors but generally speaking it does better when your creatures are also doing ETB things.

I have played a few decks in the past with Warp World tactics and sometimes I use it because my ways forward are blocked (as an answer) and sometimes I use it with ETB based creature tactics. It seems awkward to play in a big board of non token creatures into non ETB creatures.

Quote from ErosAtArms »

Throne of the God-Pharaoh could be worthwhile if you're into attacking.

It could but I have also seen some issues attacking en mass at times too. There is the question of if you need to defend yourself still and a question of what they have for blockers. I think a build using heavier Reconnaissance (yes I realize the nonbo of untapping but I'm referring to this style of card that preserves attackers) tactics may get more value from something like this. I have built my list right now in such a way that I don't necessarily get to attack as much with mine. I will have to see how much attacking I get to do on average really before I put more thought into this one.

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I ended up playing two more games last night, the first of which I lost to like a 60+ health Debt to the Deathless on like turn 10 from a deck that would have died to me but the player before me knee capped me with an Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite the turn before he did it. The second game I ended up winning off the back of a combination of Viscera Seer, Blood Artist, Ophiomancer, and Sanctum Seeker. Really both games I wanted lower curves, sac outlets, and more draw so that is going to be a little bit of my focus right now. I felt like I was constantly struggling with the feeling of running out of cards to play so draw is going to be one of my biggest focuses right now which I am primarily going to do through increasing my tutors for Skullclamp.

DECK CHANGES:

• Butcher of Malakir -> Vampire Warlord I felt like I was always struggling to get my sac outlets for one reason or another. I always feel like I am doing better with one of my sac outlets on hand so I am trying to make a move that cuts the mana curve and adds me another sac outlet. I like that the warlord has alright stats, stays on tribe, and lowers my curve.
• Vicious Shadows -> Iroas, God of Victory I want to make some room for Iroas. I got shadows once and the mana to cast it plus needing a sac was a little much for me. I think its incredibly powerful but its also tricky to get it into play at the right time. Its also probably one of the lamest cards ever to lose to so I feel like making combat a little more viable is useful to me.
• Phyrexian Reclamation -> Stoneforge Mystic I needed to be a little more proactive. I always felt like Reclamation was a little awkward given the extra two mana per attempt to rez. I just felt like it was slow and reactive and that the mana efficiency of it was a little slow for a deck not running much for ramp.
• Utter End -> Aura of Silence I felt that Utter End was a little awkward to try to keep mana up for. It just felt a little heavy for spot removal I guess. I like the idea of slowing people down on their artifacts / enchantments as it buys me more time to put pressure on with creatures and its still removal as needed.
• Syphon Mind -> Steelshaper's Gift I felt that Syphon was just ok. I had a hard time justifying the time to cast it. I always felt like I would have rather had some other draw when I would get it so I think a tutor for clamp is a good move.
• Twilight's Call -> Rise of the Dark Realms I realized that in a lot of cases I just need bodies coming in and dying for me. So this move is an attempt to just get more bodies as a whole for myself.
• Bloodlord of Vaasgoth -> Sword of the Animist With Bloodlord of Vaasgoth I realized that its just going to be too slow. Its essentially an anthem that does not affect my board but kind of requires board to achieve it. I had high hopes for it but I think I am fine just letting it go. There are too many conditions to it and its too slow so I feel like I will just get blown out by a sweep before I can set up the vamps that would be behind him. Being a 5 mana vamp also I have a problem that I often play the early vamps to get set up and get chip damage already so my hand after a 5 drop is not usually full of vamps. I wanted a second equipment in deck to justify the tutors I am adding.

I have to run for now so I will update these changes later. Let me know what you think of these changes if you want. I still need to put in a lot of testing as honestly there are a lot of directions this tribe can go and I am not convinced that I have much sorted out yet. I do know that I like my sac outlets and I feel like I can never draw enough lol.

Quote from ErosAtArms »

Both Coat of Arms and Eldrazi Monument seem rather clunky and high on the curve. With the addition of the equipment tutors you should consider Umezawas Jitte, as you play a deck focused on combat and board presence. Painful Truth and Night's Whisper are also worthwhile additions in the struggle for card advantage. Sunforger could be a potent late-game plan.

Sorry for the delay, I was putting a lot of thought into a few changes and it delayed my response a bit.

Coat of Arms / Eldrazi Monument I had the opportunity to tutor for one of them last night and I constantly felt a little underwhelmed by Coat of Arms due in part to the higher chances of being blocked as well as one situation where someone else was also tribal and had more creatures than I. Even with being tribal, really like any token deck can also be a big problem for Coat of Arms. I felt like I was ok with Eldrazi Monument due to it adding stickiness to my minions but the lack of evasion or stickiness as well as helping opponents is really making me feel that Coat of Arms might not be worth it. I was going to test it a little longer but I think you are right that both of them might be a little heavy.

Umezawa's Jitte it could work... its a little situational though. I tend to like it more in a voltron deck that needs to worry about utility and token swarm tactics to be honest. I don't really foresee myself using many of the modes except for the -/- pokes. I tend to like it more in voltron decks because the +/+ effect of Jitte matters a LOT more when pushing for commander damage. I feel like since I am not a voltron deck it actually takes a fairly large hit. Green based voltron really do get a lot from it though as I used to play it in my Thrun deck. When I looked at equipment there are still a few that I have in mind such as Dowsing Dagger (the ramp is welcome blockers are so so), Blade of Selves (bodies entering and could be saced), Deathrender (could be fun for tricks), Heirloom Blade (kind of draw), Sword of the Paruns (another anthem option), Sword of Fire and Ice (Draw / removal). Really in a lot of cases I have issues with several equipment that a lot of my vampires are kind of fragile and in a lot of cases lack evasion. Its a question of what the role of the equipment is and where it is at in terms of priorities it retrieving. For the most part I have accepted that my vampires are fragile and lack evasion and so I currently have two equipment in the deck that do not rely on connecting to generate value. I really bumped the equipment count in part to justify the fact that I have tutors for equipment but my plan is mostly to go get Skullclamp. Of the few equipment I mentioned, I think its likely that Blade of Selves or Heirloom Blade would likely be among some of the ones I might consider if I did actually add any of them. Blade of Selves draws removal like nobody's business though and considering most of my creatures do not ETB its harder to justify but what if you were to jam it on an anthem vamp for instance and suddenly you are buffing +4/+4 for instance off of that. It does also make for some interesting consideration with Purphoros / Blood Artist tactics. Heirloom Blade I kind of value as a worse Skullclamp since it only draws me more vamps where as I would rather draw 2 cards than specifically draw more vamps but I think there really is some viability behind Heirloom Blade as another concept card that could be used to make like a heavy 1 drop vamps deck work in that you play a one drop, equip Heirloom Blade / Skullclamp to draw into a new 1 drop and just use the super cheap vamps + free tokens to make a deck flow. It would fit into a similar concept as Cloudstone Curio but I think that build looks quite a bit different than what I have right now so for now I will just kind of lock that idea away but I think it could be something worth testing at some point. Right now, I will probably let it ride and see how much of an issue I have with having only 2 equipment with 2 equipment tutors.

Painful Truths - Honestly..... I forgot that this was a thing lol. I build soooo many 1-2 color decks that going for a three color deck is kind of rare for me. Yea I think that seems good. I will try to make room for it. I have some concerns with one shot draw that unless you draw into more draw its a temporary fix. I am kind of working on cutting some of the lower perfoming cards and trying to bring up my draw to make it flow a little better.

Night's Whisper - Its a good card, I had been working on trying to get more continuous draw but I like the card as a whole.

Sunforger - Its one of those cards that some swear by it. I honestly don't love the card as its a ton of mana upfront and if it doesn't live long its just a lot of work for not much reward. My expected lifetime for Sunforger tends to be that it will die before the next turn. Given the amount of mana it takes to push this card around and that its somewhat of a value over time card it comes down to how much you can use it before it dies as how useful it is.

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I was talking with a friend of mine and I wanted to try to perhaps take a look at the vampires I am running and in some cases cut the ones I don't feel are performing as well for me. As of right now I assessed Kalastria Highborn, Mavren Fein, Dusk Apostle, and Stromkirk Captain as some under performing vampires as of right now. With Kalastria Highborn I was finding that the mana per vampire is too high for me to really be able to activate it much. It also only targets a single player which is really unfortunate as I am finding it to be a really sub par Blood Artist. The irony is that I have not even drawn it yet but I played my vampires with another player also playing vamps in the same game and I really saw this issue on his board. Mavren Fein, Dusk Apostle I feel like it might work in a deck with more focus on attacking especially if utilizing effects like Reconnaissance. I just found it too awkward to be forced to attack with a non token vampire too often as often I am dooming a utility vampire so that I can get a token vampire. Stromkirk Captain is awkward to me because I just never seem to hit a critical mass for vamps where an anthem makes a difference.

DECK CHANGES:

• Kalastria Highborn -> Bloodthrone Vampire I am swapping out a 2 mana vamp for another 2 mana vamp. I don't think I can really realistically get the best from Kalastria Highborn as I cant think of many situations I would be willing to keep up a ton of black mana and pass turn or sac all my guys just to activate her. She just feels too expensive to use, she only hits one opponent and she takes a ton of mana to really get anywhere. I have been really enjoying when I have free sac outlets so I will give this one a shot too.
• Mavren Fein, Dusk Apostle -> Night's Whisper There have been a few situations where I have noticed that Mavren Fein is a little awkward to trigger since I have to attack with a non token vampire to trigger her. Sometimes I can do that and sometimes I cant so well. In the end, I felt like it was a little more work than it was worth and I am working on my draw so in goes some cheap draw.
• Stromkirk Captain -> Recruiter of the Guard I have had a hard time getting up to the critical mass of vampires where a one shot anthem matters. Instead I think I would rather be able to toolbox into a better and more appropriate creature. White recruiter gets access to a few more of my vampires than red recruiter but if things go well with this one I might consider both.
• Coat of Arms -> Painful Truths I wanted to add some additional draw to the deck to just try to smooth things out a little more. I like the efficiency of the three cards for thee mana and three life. The anthem effects have been harder to mass creatures to make them work and Coat of Arms can backfire vs tokens kind of poorly.

Akroma's Memorial mayhap? I mean I have not gone through the deck to see all the interactions that being pro black and red may change, and if its not optimal do you have enough token production for Cathars' Crusade?

Quote from EonAon »

Akroma's Memorial mayhap? I mean I have not gone through the deck to see all the interactions that being pro black and red may change, and if its not optimal do you have enough token production for Cathars' Crusade?

Akroma's Memorial is awkward in a lot of ways. For the most part I would be using it to gain evasion to attack plus vigilance to defend. Its just a lot of mana to pay for something like that. It gets more awkward if anyone were to ever steal it or copy it from me because most of my creatures and removal do fall into black. It also does not really boost my output as an anthem or anything. You really need noncreature buffs at the 5+ mana range in a deck like this to be really powerful. In my deck currently it probably closest measures up to Homura, Human Ascendant or Eldrazi Monument. The big difference is that both of those effects give me flying and an anthem where as Akroma's gives a defensive buff rather than a stat buff. Being that I am a swarm style of token deck the anthems tend to be stronger here where as if you are using just a few stronger creatures thats when I tend to like
Akroma's Memorial more. The fact that I am heavily in the colors of black as well is another slight blow to Akroma's Memorial because it also can backfire a little harder on me if stolen or cloned.

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I did some additional thinking on some of my recent changes and I think two of them are still a little questionable. I will make one change now because I think its good and the other I am kind of just thinking on for now so if anyone wants to weigh in I am open.

DECK CHANGE:

• Vampire Warlord -> Imperial Recruiter I kept feeling like vampire warlord cost was 1-2 more than I really wanted to pay for it. I like the stats and I like its ability but really I wanted what it was giving me for like 3-4 mana instead. I got to realizing that a very large portion of the creature base that I always want falls into the range of what the recruiters can get. Beyond that though they give me a creature who enters and can die cheaply while getting me access to the important creatures. I could Imperial Recruiter for Viscera Seer as an example and pull off my sac outlet for less mana than the Warlord while getting an extra body from it. Beyond that though I think that sac outlets lose some value when being redundant and there are a ton of tutor targets that these guys can hit that I think really make the deck run well. Academy Rector for instance get fetch out my gods, draw, or attrition if need be. Blood Artist / Zulaport Cutthroat make for great targets if I have a board that could sac well. Ophiomancer gives me the bodies to churn through sac and ETB. Captivating Vampire gives me theft potential. This recruiter can also get me Gray Merchant of Asphodel which can be a strong punch to everyone.

Aura of Silence - I have my eye on it. Honestly I felt that Utter End was a little clunky but that was also before I added a lot of draw and toolboxing to the deck. Its possible that Utter End is just fine and I just need to keep it in hand until ***** hits the wall. I ran into an Elesh Norn one game and it kind of literally killed me so there is the want to have something that is flexible in what it can handle but can dig me out of problems. Aura of Silence can be huge when drawn early but I also have a good number of early game moves so it can be awkward to get in from that perspective. I do like that it gives me an answer target for Academy Rector which I just added two recruiters whom can get it. I also did consider some other ideas like Merciless Eviction, Unexpectedly Absent, Swords to Plowshares, Elspeth, Sun's Champion, Return to Dust, and even just adding another tutor like Beseech the Queen as a tutor for one of my current answers. I guess for now I am just saying that I am considering several cards for this slot but I cant really come up with the logic to say that any one of them are the correct answer.

I am just going to make a small change. I was going to jam some vamps last night but it ended up that people wanted to play some Massive Darkness so we played that instead. I think that I still have a lot to test and learn with the list so I'm a little bummed I didn't get to test my newest changes. I have been trying to piece some of my considerations together vs the current list and I have a small change to make for now.

DECK CHANGE:

• Rise of the Dark Realms -> Insurrection both of these cards are expensive to cast and can be huge impact. What I like though is that the Insurrection gives me somewhat of a psudo wrath in combination with some of my sac outlets as well as giving me potential to push for damage. I like the idea of Rise of the Dark Realms but it is a dead card longer into the game and its kind of reliant on someone kill wrathing (not tuck or exile) and then also not grave hating before I can pull it off. Ultimately in this change, I think I am giving somewhat of an answer in Insurrection and I feel it is less situational in some ways than Rise of the Dark Realms.

I also added a few more cards to my consideration of late. Goblin Sharpshooter seems like it could be a lot of fun with chain gun sacrificing some of my tokens. The fact that it is off tribe, could be a problem if stolen, and needs to tap for its value are my concerns offhand. Emeria Angel has always been one of my favorite token makers and I think it makes fairly good tokens given the fetchlands and continuous token generating value it could do.

Do you really need steelshapers gift? With the amount of tutors and the only 2 bits of equipment it seems even for a cheap search not that efficient. Maybe add dowsing dagger considering that the 2 tokens don't mean as much since many of your creatures have flying or some other type of evasion? If you object to that maybe sign in blood as extra card draw plus if they are at 2 life it can be used to kill if need be.

I was going to suggest Legion's Landing but on consideration its initial drop isn't that great later on and I'm unsure you would always have 3 creatures that you wanted to attack with at any given time to transform it. Admittedly I haven't made/tried this deck out.

Quote from EonAon »

Do you really need steelshapers gift? With the amount of tutors and the only 2 bits of equipment it seems even for a cheap search not that efficient. Maybe add dowsing dagger considering that the 2 tokens don't mean as much since many of your creatures have flying or some other type of evasion? If you object to that maybe sign in blood as extra card draw plus if they are at 2 life it can be used to kill if need be.

I was going to suggest Legion's Landing but on consideration its initial drop isn't that great later on and I'm unsure you would always have 3 creatures that you wanted to attack with at any given time to transform it. Admittedly I haven't made/tried this deck out.

• Steelshaper's Gift - Honestly, I really cant back it up right now or really say that its not worth having. Necropotence, Skullclamp, and Dark Prophecy are probably the three biggest draw sources in my deck so my logic is that a tutor for one of the strongest draw in my deck is probably better than a one shot draw. I was leery to bring it in but I definitely noticed a wish to have more draw in the deck which pushed me to try to add consistency on this end of things. I was even a little leery to add Sword of the Animist to the deck because it forces me to do some attacking when I might not be ready to do that.
• Dowsing Dagger - I was a little worried from the perspective that I don't have that much evasion to my creatures. Most of my creatures are kind of fragile and small and so when it came to Sword of the Animist I understood that I might be sending a token to its death but the trigger of it attacking I felt was still strong enough. Right now, I want to just run the deck and see how my changes went as I made a lot of changes and honestly I don't know how the deck is sitting as I lost my opportunity to play this week to a board game that someone brought.
• Sign in Blood - So, really I do have a few problems with small and cheap one shot draw effects especially in a deck like this. You have to give up time and mana to short term draw a few cards. Their effects are good but honestly short term drawing is far better in a control shell than it is in an aggro style of deck. I need to be doing a lot of things with my mana and ideally I want to do it early. This deck is also heavily black so the BB cost of Sign in Blood can actually cut you off from other actions given how black intensive a lot of this deck is. I do like these effects and I did add Night's Whisper and Painful Truths recently but I also think that they are dangerous in the tempo loss that they cause. My ultimate goal is to flood the board with dudes and have their entering / leaving play matter. I need to set up a lot of cards to make that happen and if I end up giving up turns to draw it just leaves me with my ass hanging out. This isn't to say that I think that adding these is the wrong move but to some degree I need to test things out and see where I sit now with draw and consistencies.
• Legion's Landing - The ETB effect is underwhelming, the token making option of it is underwhelming, and the ability to flip it looks challenging. It does ramp which is kind of cool but when do you get that ramp? The cost per token is just a little too high mana wise to the point that it feels hard to slide into a turn in addition to doing things. I just don't like the feel of it as a whole. Its probably better to try to ramp or try to make tokens and I feel this card is just kind of bad at both.

Right now, I really need to do more testing and unfortunately I have to wait another week before I can hope to do that as it stands.

How about Behind the Scenes for more evasion ? I considering it for my build cause odds are most of our opponents creatures will be to big to block our tokens and if you have extra mana laying around you can pump the tokens, plus I will get the Sanctum Seeker trigger w/o hopefully losing a vamp token. I'm also considering Hidden Stockpile as another sac outlet as we only have to sac a Vamp token to get the trigger then after that the servo can be sac keep our vampires still flowing.

So this is a completely different deck idea/approach with Edgar. A buddy has a different sort of "syphon" build, where he is running Edgar as more of a combo build with paradox engine. He is using cloudstone curio to make infinite tokens by spam'ing a pair of vamps. You already have Purphoros, God of the Forge and Goblin Bombardment, you could just increase the volume of mana-rocks and plug the engine.

If you like that idea, then I would suggest adding brush with death. I've been trying to get my buddy to include brush with death for flavor, since it is far more vamp-theme'ed than making infinite spawn.


Dega/Mardu is a very good color combination for paradox engine. Sure no blue means no whir of invention or fabricate, but red gives trash for trasure/daretti, scrap savant/scrap mastery, white gives enlightened tutor/argivian find/sun titan (to recur blown up mana-rocks), and black has all the tutors. You could tune the deck to be entirely focused around the paradox engine combo, or since the majority of the parts are just good-stuff and mana-rocks, you could just add the essential parts and sometimes happen upon it.

Quote from bt67 »

How about Behind the Scenes for more evasion ? I considering it for my build cause odds are most of our opponents creatures will be to big to block our tokens and if you have extra mana laying around you can pump the tokens, plus I will get the Sanctum Seeker trigger w/o hopefully losing a vamp token. I'm also considering Hidden Stockpile as another sac outlet as we only have to sac a Vamp token to get the trigger then after that the servo can be sac keep our vampires still flowing.

Honestly, I am still having some issues really getting an assessment of evasion mechanics so far with this commander. I do have a few things to say about evasion in general for Edgar Markov though.

Pros:

• Great when you have lots of damage in play on board already.
• Good for chip damage (repeated small attacks)
• Good vs creature based decks (especially tokens)

Cons:

• Evasion only matters if you have threats.
• Bad vs control decks.
• Bad vs decks that don't intend to use defenders to block.
• It adds no damage to your clock.
• Adds to your board complexity (bad vs sweepers).
• You draw them instead of gas.

My issue with relying on cards that the purpose is to get you in and do damage is numerous to be honest. Most forms of evasion are situational on your opponents not having specific things that counter them. Most any of them run the problem of being poor vs sweepers and fort effects. In a lot of cases you make assumptions that your opponents are running creature based tactics and plan to block you instead of using control effects to deflect or remove your attackers. Most of these cards also have an opportunity cost as well in that you have to draw them instead of more threats / draw / answers and that they are often very situational if they will work.

Reconnaissance / Iroas, God of Victory / Cover of Darkness / Ankle Shanker are among some of these type of evasion enablers for instance. They all run some issues with them which is that they cost cards and are situational in if they help. I did recently add Iroas, God of Victory because he gives me the ability to swing knowing I will not be removed in blocking as well as the evasion he grants. He is also the most robust of the ones I am mentioning right now which is useful vs sweeper effects.

Circling back though, one of my biggest issues with a lot of these evasion only buffs is that they dont really add to my clock other than hopefully let me connect and even then, it seems very conditional as a lot of these have conditions behind them such as Cover of Darkness being against non black creatures, Reconnaissance requires opponents to not have a bunch of blockers, and Behind the Scenes requires them to not have a bunch of tokens. Because of how conditional a lot of evasion effects are I prefer the evasion + buff effects over the effects that only give one or the other. Eldrazi Monument and Homura, Human Ascendant are two of my very few non vampire based anthems because they give me evasion as well as good stat buffs.

TLDR: Sorry that went long but I don't like evasion only mechanics because they rely too much on how your opponent deckbuilds to make them useful.

Hidden Stockpile - Its kind of cool but I would honestly probably want it to check every turn rather than our own end step only for producing the token. The sac effect is only ok given that it costs mana to activate.

Quote from Macabre »

So this is a completely different deck idea/approach with Edgar. A buddy has a different sort of "syphon" build, where he is running Edgar as more of a combo build with paradox engine. He is using cloudstone curio to make infinite tokens by spam'ing a pair of vamps. You already have Purphoros, God of the Forge and Goblin Bombardment, you could just increase the volume of mana-rocks and plug the engine.

If you like that idea, then I would suggest adding brush with death. I've been trying to get my buddy to include brush with death for flavor, since it is far more vamp-theme'ed than making infinite spawn.


Dega/Mardu is a very good color combination for paradox engine. Sure no blue means no whir of invention or fabricate, but red gives trash for trasure/daretti, scrap savant/scrap mastery, white gives enlightened tutor/argivian find/sun titan (to recur blown up mana-rocks), and black has all the tutors. You could tune the deck to be entirely focused around the paradox engine combo, or since the majority of the parts are just good-stuff and mana-rocks, you could just add the essential parts and sometimes happen upon it.

Thanks, I did consider some options with cheap vampires and cloudstone curio. I do not personally run infinite combo as something I prefer to play as though so I dont intend to do the combo you outlined.

I do have to question the reason to try to take a tribal deck though and make an overly complicated combo out of it though. It makes sense in a deck like Azami, Lady of Scrolls where the commander is part of the combo and it utilizes so few cards but in my opinion the complexity of the Edgar Markov combos has been too intricate. If you are looking to play a combo deck it is my advice to play a better deck. Mikaeus, the Unhallowed + Triskelion is an example of a very easy to pull off two card combo that utilizes 2 creatures which makes it even easier to execute utilizing reanimation tactics and or things like Tooth and Nail.

I understand that some players just love to win via combo but if the combo is too complicated it is my opinion that the deck actually operates better by utilizing "fair" tactics and just slimming itself down rather than trying to assemble this massive hulk of cards together. What you just described would require something like 2 specific artifacts, 1+ colored mana mana rock, 2 cheap vampires. This really only achieves an infinite loop as well and you would have to add another card into that to finish the game right then and there. Zervintz has an Edgar list that does utilize a few infinite combos utilizing some tactics often focusing on Haakon, Stromgald Scourge. I still think he has a bit of an uphill fight to make his work but he has it down to 1 artifact and two creatures which is probably a little more friendly for a black deck. He has a few alternative ways to execute it but it seems to be mostly a Haakon, Stromgald Scourge & Phyrexian Altar combo. If you or your friend have interest in vampire combo I suggest you swing by his list some time as he is putting some effort into how to make vamps a combo deck.

In regards to your question on my thread

"It seems a bit odd to me that you like Reconnaissance but cut Iroas, God of Victory. I was wondering if I could get some insight into that change you made."

I prefer Reconnaissance because it's both offensive and defensive due to the pseudo vigilance rather than only helping on offense like Iroas.

With Iroas, yeah you swung with the team safely, but they're still tapped.

With Reconnaissance you swung with the whole team but are able to untap each creature at the most opportune time like after first strike damage is dealt for +1+1 counters from Drana to your whole team (amazing with Stromkirk Captain).

Ok, so I played my deck again and I constantly felt like I wanted my curve to be lowered and push harder on cycling cards. Given this thought and feeling I wanted to try out some new concepts with a lower curve higher turn over style of a list. I have been working on this list since last week and I like the direction it is going so I thought for the time being I would move to this new build and archive my old list to just see how I felt between the two builds. This new build has a VERY heavy focus on low costs and turning cards over.

I still have a lot of things to square away but I really like the idea of a list that plays a lower curve and has a heavier focus on turn over. I constantly had a struggle in my old list between trying to play as some odd aggro list and having answers. I thought it might be fun to just hit the gas a little harder this time and see how flooding my list with cheap efficient bodies would do.



There were some interesting cards I definately put some thought into as well but ultimately did not make my list:

Larceny - I like the effect and I felt like I was swarming fairly well but ultimately I had the question of if I were to cast this why not try to do something to kill players instead of just screw with hands? If it had cost less mana I could probably see it but I felt ultimately that the cost of the card as well as how situational it is felt like it was more of an odd control effect than for a deck trying to aggro people down.
Gideon, Ally of Zendikar - I like how sticky it is but honestly, its too much mana for what it does. Its redeeming factor is how sticky the anthem is. I am moving fast and trying to murder people, I need mana efficiency more than I do a sticky anthem. I am trying to keep my anthems on creatures especially on vampire creatures when I can as they make the deck work a little smoother even if they are more fragile.
Sorin, Lord of Innistrad - Same issue with Gideon. I feel like I am trying to move faster than these cards allow me to do.
Sword of Light and Shadow - I like the idea of the sword, I just think its a little too much mana to move it arround and so it felt too slow to me.
Austere Command - Its a good wrath, I just wanted to move faster than that or focus on recovery with my wraths.
Night's Whisper / Painful Truths / Read the Bones - With the cost of my cards being so cheap, one shot draw like this actually becomes a little less effective. I decided to really pull like all of my one shot draw I was using in my previous version out for repeatable draw. Dark Confidant for example is going to hurt less with the lower cost curve and its also giving me a creature to trigger all my creature abuse or attack with evasion with.
Vampire Nocturnus - Soooooo if I could actually trigger his ability regularly I would love this guy. I just don't like the fact that even in a black heavy deck my chances of the top card being black is roughly 1/3 chance. I think that this buff is incredible especially given how swarm based I am kind of going, I just didnt like how unreliable he is without something like Sensei's Divining Top or Scroll Rack.
Brutal Hordechief - I like his activated and triggered abilities, I am just running out of room for stuff.
Sanctum Seeker is mostly an improvement on him as well but I still think that Brutal Hordechief is decent. I just dont want to overload my 4 costs so I opted to go a little lighter considering he is not a vampire.
Nihil Spellbomb - Its an effect I like but I opted to try to push faster to the point that grave yard hate might not really matter. We will see I guess given time but generally grave abuse becomes more of a thing as games go on rather than early on. I felt that the mana to cycle this card was a little unfortunate given how action jammed I am early on.
Ophiomancer - I like the bodies / turn of the card. I think its a good possibility I just think for now I have a lot going on and I want to see how things go as is. This card takes a few cards set up for it to really do much which is why for now I am opting to pass on it.
Grenzo, Dungeon Warden - I like that I could drop him in for cheap and still he probably can flip into most of my creatures. Ultimately though still it probably takes 6 mana to flip a creature and I am not a big mana deck.
Grenzo, Havoc Raiser - I like what he gives my creatures but RR is harder to pull off when the deck is so black focused. I felt like it was perhaps too much to ask to land him have a board connect with my board and then continue to do so.

One Equipment and Steelshaper's Gift? I chalk that up to ballsy. I think a Sword of Light and Shadow would be a great second addition to give you some sustain. Plus if you return those cheap Vampires to hand, you play them out for more bodies. As for a cut, I don't know, the list looks tight.

Edit: Didn't see Skullclamp which is pretty derp of me. In which case, perhaps no need for SoLaS.

Quote from Tev »

One Equipment and Steelshaper's Gift? I chalk that up to ballsy. I think a Sword of Light and Shadow would be a great second addition to give you some sustain. Plus if you return those cheap Vampires to hand, you play them out for more bodies. As for a cut, I don't know, the list looks tight.

Edit: Didn't see Skullclamp which is pretty derp of me. In which case, perhaps no need for SoLaS.

I played with my equipment count a bit and I was always a bit conflicted on what to run. Skullclamp is still my primary and Heirloom Blade is my secondary. I am still a little hesitant on Heirloom Blade but the total cost of my vampires in my list is 50 mana over 24 bodies so like 2.08 mana / vampire is the average. When you get an additional vampire token every vampire you cast its sort of like an average of 3 mana, go get another vampire (at the cost of the token). This tactic gets more viable as you move the cost of the curve down. I considered several equipment options as a potential for a third equipment and in the end I didn't like any of them enough to include a third. Mask of Memory and Sword of Light and Shadow were somewhat of the next considerations I had in mind with Umezawa's Jitte also kind of in consideration. For now I will just run the two and see how I feel about that.

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I went home last night and did some work on putting the new list together. I had a handful of changes I decided to go through with as I worked on putting it together last night.

DECK CHANGES:

• Signal Pest -> Serra Ascendant - I like the Signal Pest but the amount of board I have to have for it to equate to Serra Ascendant is just a little crazy. Serra Ascendant sticks to the low curve ideals but it just packs a lot of punch on its own without needing the synergy really.
• Dusk // Dawn -> Yawgmoth's Will - I still like Dusk // Dawn but I primarily want to cast Dawn so it takes time to get to doing that part of the card. Its possible I end up removing my own threats due to anthems or larger creatures with Dusk as well. Yawgmoth's Will looks really really good with this low curve and I think it will make a great recovery tool.
• Hero of Bladehold -> Tymna the Weaver - I still like Hero of Bladehold but I felt it was a little slow for being one of my curve toppers. It looks like a great recovery tool post wrath but while I am still doing well it feels too slow to play to the board. Tymna the Weaver looks great with all this early game aggression and evasion and I just kind of forgot to put her in when I was building earlier. She represents a continuous draw outlet that still fits my curve decently.
• Bitterblossom -> Mardu Ascendancy - Honestly, I still think Bitterblossom is decent but when I was building this list I kept circling back to Militia's Pride and thinking to myself that the only reason I didn't like that card was the mana cost per token. Mardu Ascendancy takes that cost per token out and all of the evasion I run will make the tokens I make also evasive. Tie in the ETB / Death / sac potential of all these tokens I can make off of it and I think it makes for a strong burst of output. Where I was fairly consistantly going to get one token per turn off Bitterblossom I think Mardu Ascendancy takes my build into consideration a LOT better and its going to just bust out some output.
• Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx -> Gemstone Caverns - I have to really watch colorless mana. I think that there is a chance to generate some great mana with Nykhtos but it just backfires on the front end of the game when I need my mana and I need it faster and in color. Gemstone Caverns helps towards providing colored mana in the opener as well as a tempo ramp and if I draw it later, that is probably fine.
• High Market -> Graven Cairns - I am trying to remove some of the colorless mana in the deck. I have fewer cards in the deck now that I need a sac outlet for as I think its mostly Academy Rector for the single sac effects I want otherwise I am more interested in repeat sac effects which High Market does not provide all that well. So, colorless land out for fix.
• 1 Plains -> Fetid Heath - Increasing my mana fix.
• 1 Swamp -> Rugged Prairie - Increasing my mana fix.

I like this wave of changes. I still need to test things as well as work out what is going to work and what isn't (hopefully tonight). I put some thought into Dragonmaster Outcast as well but I didnt see anything I actively wanted to cut for it for now. I am trying to keep my vamp count high so I can test some of these things a bit more so I might consider Dragonmaster Outcast still but further in the future if something isnt working out. I like that it has the low curve thing down but plays out a little stronger later in the game. I considered Ranger of Eos / Recruiters but ultimately they felt slow to me in this build for mostly just being some draw.