[[Standard Development]] Once You Go Black...

[justinhering]

I realized recently, playing my tri-color toolbox deck, that my favorite part was playing Grave Titan. So, I made a deck with Grave Titan.

Suck it!

He's the best finisher in standard right now. Disagree if you want, but I feel I can always win the game if he is on the field. In fact, some of you bore witness to me almost winning a game with Grave Titan on the field after JTMS popped his ultimate. He's insane.

Anyway, here's the list.

[Creatures] 16
3 Grave Titan
4 Liliana's Specter
1 Massacre Wurm
4 Vampire Hexmage

[Spells and Artifacts]] 20
4 Doom Blade
2 Duress
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Liliana Vess
3 Mimic Vat
3 Mind Sludge
4 Sign in Blood
4 Skinrender

[Lands] 24
4 Marsh Flats
20 Swamp

Its a midrange deck, that takes advantage of Mimic Vat. Once I get one more Grave Titan, I probably drop Liliana Vess for one more mainboard.

And here's the sideboard...

Sideboard:
2 Duress
4 Go for the Throat
1 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Massacre Wurm
3 Memoricide
4 Vampire Nighthawk

[fearthefearless]

i like it but i think that 4 inqusitioins and 1 durress will be better in this meta. 3 mind sludges might be a little much id go 2 mind sludge and 2 black sun zenith also dropping one mimic vat. i think you should keep the one of liliana and stick to 3 grave titans. and 2 go for the throats 2 doomblades works best incase u do infact run into the treacherous grave titan lol and skinrender is a creature lol

i also like the hexmages but 4 main board might be much... try to main 2 side and run a contagion clasp maybe for some extra removal and proliferating lilianna and your -1/-1 counters.


solid idea though i wanna see how it plays

[aaren]

I would drop the liliana's specter for 2 durress and an additional inquisition in a heart beat, she is ok but too slow, there are other things that you could be doing I feel like.

I personally think a 4th grave titan would be nice too . I tend to disagree with Josh in the Mimic Vat thing. I would run a 4th and even more removal and drop mind sludge. Your controlling their hand so much as it is... no reason to spend 5 mana to make them discard like 2 cards.... Also you might wanna add like another couple removal spells like disfigure and go for the throat main board.

My final suggestion would be Sadistic Sacrement over Memoricide in the side board. The main thing that would hurt your deck are the equipments cause you have very little amount of ways to get ride of it. If they play different swords this can get ride of them all. Im not sure though to be hoenst with you, cawgo has been mainboarding 2 feast and famine and no body and mind in Atlanta.

[justinhering]

If I drop Liliana's Specter it will be in favor of Vampire Nighthawk. I want this to be midrange, not straight control, so I am trying to keep the creature count at around 16.

I could also play Nantuko Shade as an alternative to Vampire Hexmage...maybe 2 Mages and 2 Shades and then board in the other 2 mages against control?

I like Contagion Clasp a lot, and an updated list actually has me playing 4 Inquisitions and dropping one land. In playtests, I felt like 24 lands was 1 too much.

I will post an updated list shortly with said suggestions taken into account.

Btw, Duress and Inquisition get rid of swords. I thought about playing Brittle Effigy to handle equipped hawks as well.

[justinhering]

Updated decklist...

2 Black Sun's Zenith
2 Contagion Clasp
2 Doom Blade
1 Duress
2 Go for the Throat
3 Grave Titan
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Liliana Vess
4 Marsh Flats
1 Massacre Wurm
3 Mimic Vat
2 Nantuko Shade
4 Sign in Blood
4 Skinrender
19 Swamp
2 Vampire Hexmage
4 Vampire Nighthawk

Sideboard:
1 Black Sun's Zenith
2 Duress
2 Go for the Throat
2 Malakir Bloodwitch
1 Massacre Wurm
3 Memoricide
2 Sadistic Sacrament
2 Vampire Hexmage

[deo]

Have you thought about gatekeeper of malakir?

[ddoonan]

Add blue lol

[justinhering]

gatekeeper does not work with Mimic Vat...Although I am tempted to cut the vat and add Gatekeeper.

I won't add blue...it goes against everything I stand for.

After playing a LOT of games against CawGo tonight, I made some adjustments. This deck has no way of dealing with the swords, especially Feast and Famine. Hence, the Tumble Magnets. Some other observations...Sadistic Sacrament is too slow and so is Doom Blade, even.

I am going with Disfigure over Doom Blade mainboard to deal with the most popular decks. In fact, I think Disfigure is the better card right now. Yeah, you heard right. Think about it. It kills hawks, mystics, lotus cobras, Crusaders, Goblin Guides, geopedes, lynxs, etc., and all for one little mana. To me, that one mana is huge. Not to mention it wrecks B/R Vampires.

Some cards I considered...Marsh Casualties, Consume The Meek, Consuming Vapors, Gatekeeper of Malakir. Like I said, I may drop the Mimic Vat and go with the Gatekeeper. Then this becomes Vampire Control.

Here's the list:

2 Black Sun's Zenith
4 Disfigure
1 Doom Blade
1 Duress
2 Grave Titan
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
4 Marsh Flats
2 Massacre Wurm
2 Mimic Vat
2 Mind Sludge
4 Sign in Blood
3 Skinrender
18 Swamp
2 Tectonic Edge
4 Tumble Magnet
2 Vampire Hexmage
3 Vampire Nighthawk

Sideboard:
1 Black Sun's Zenith
3 Doom Blade
1 Duress
2 Go for the Throat
2 Hammer of Ruin
2 Malakir Bloodwitch
2 Memoricide
2 Vampire Hexmage

Hammer of Ruin makes an appearance in the sideboard against Boros and CawGo.

[ddoonan]

How about nantuko shade and persecutor?