When I discussed red in multiplayer, I made mention of how difficult red-black can be in group play. Today, I’ll use that as a starting point for discussing black.
Red’s trade-offs usually feel pretty chaotic -“I can get a powerful effect, but I’m likely to get burned in the process (either by actually getting burned, or losing random cards, etc.).” Black’s trade-offs are a bit more cold and calculating -“I lose this predictable resource to make X happen to everyone else.” It’s not an absolute distinction (witness Death Match or Last-Ditch Effort), but normally black can dictate what it loses in a way that red cannot.
Taken separately, either can combine with another color effectively. Green and blue replenish resources, while white defends well and protects against universal damage. But put them together, and these two colors will see you out of cards and creatures within six to eight rounds of a typical game.
There’s only one style of red-black deck that’s likely to consistently win in multiplayer, and it nearly demands two cards: Flametongue Kavu and Haunted Crossroads. You’d start it something like this…
4 Shivan Zombie
4 Bone Shredder
2 Viashino Heretic
4 Flametongue Kavu
4 Haunted Crossroads
…and then you add whatever else you like and cross your fingers that no one’s playing a difficult enchantment. (Story Circle alone can bust you.)
But do you notice something about the cards I picked? They’re not typical red or black, since no resource is automatically being given up.
To do more than peg a single creature at a time, black needs to give something up. Fortunately, an experienced Magic player can find ways to make sacrifice work to her advantage, and these are the cards to do it with:
# | BLACK | RS | GO | SP | PG | PL | CK | COM |
35 | 1 | 2 | 6 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 2.51 | |
34 | 1 | 2 | 8 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 2.77 | |
33 | 2 | 6 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 2.78 | |
32 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 4 | 2 | 2 | 2.80 | |
31 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 4 | 3 | 4 | 2.82 | |
30 | 2 | 4 | 5 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2.82 | |
29 | 5 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 2.97 | |
28 | 2 | 4 | 3 | 4 | 2 | 3 | 3.00 | |
27 | 4 | 6 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 3.05 | |
26 | 1 | 3 | 2 | 7 | 2 | 4 | 3.07 | |
25 | 2 | 6 | 4 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 3.08 | |
24 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 3 | 2 | 5 | 3.20 | |
23 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 3 | 2 | 5 | 3.20 | |
22 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 4 | 1 | 5 | 3.21 | |
21 | 3 | 4 | 3 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3.36 | |
20 | 7 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 3.39 | |
19 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 6 | 2 | 3 | 3.40 | |
18 | 2 | 7 | 5 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 3.42 | |
17 | 2 | 5 | 3 | 5 | 1 | 5 | 3.49 | |
16 | 2 | 5 | 2 | 5 | 2 | 5 | 3.50 | |
15 | 3 | 2 | 4 | 7 | 2 | 4 | 3.57 | |
14 | 5 | 3 | 3 | 4 | 2 | 4 | 3.57 | |
13 | 5 | 5 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 5 | 3.66 | |
12 | 3 | 4 | 1 | 5 | 5 | 4 | 3.68 | |
11 | 5 | 3 | 2 | 6 | 2 | 4 | 3.75 | |
10 | 7 | 4 | 3 | 5 | 1 | 3 | 4.06 | |
9 | 2 | 5 | 3 | 6 | 7 | 2 | 4.13 | |
8 | 2 | 8 | 5 | 3 | 7 | 2 | 4.53 | |
7 | 5 | 5 | 2 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 4.58 | |
6 | 5 | 5 | 3 | 8 | 2 | 4 | 4.61 | |
5 | 6 | 5 | 3 | 5 | 2 | 6 | 4.62 | |
4 | 6 | 5 | 1 | 3 | 8 | 4 | 4.64 | |
3 | 7 | 6 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 8 | 4.69 | |
2 | 7 | 6 | 2 | 4 | 2 | 6 | 4.73 | |
1 | 8 | 4 | 1 | 7 | 2 | 5 | 4.74 |
# | BLACK | |
35 | Conditional, but highly effective. | |
34 | Breaks last few opponents’ backs | |
33 | Stats assume you paid kicker. | |
32 | Great early, often pathetic late. | |
31 | Sim: Takklemaggot | |
30 | This, Extinction rule vs. Onslaught. | |
29 | Sim: Plague Dogs, Festering Goblin | |
28 | Like Innocent Blood, better earlier | |
27 | GO=7, PL=0 if sole black mage. | |
26 | Sim: Syphon Soul | |
25 | Sim: Massacre, Infest, Forced March | |
24 | Depends on how good clerics get. | |
23 | Classic staple in discard decks. | |
22 | Reeks of old-school goodness. | |
21 | What infinite 1/1 squirrel tokens? | |
20 | Of course, you still take damage! | |
19 | Stellar after mass destruction. | |
18 | Extreme, but gets the job done. | |
17 | This/Megrim make group discard playable. | |
16 | Untargetables are immune. | |
15 | Sim: Unnerve, Mind Swords | |
14 | Great Spy Kids quote doesn’t fit. | |
13 | Sim: Fatal Blow | |
12 | Feared combo card. | |
11 | Sim: Reanimate | |
10 | Group discard needs good beef. | |
9 | Sim: Twilight’s Call, Exhume, etc. | |
8 | Still way more fun than Mutilate. | |
7 | Illusion/Reality was never better. | |
6 | Build a better Lhurgoyf! | |
5 | Sim: Visara the Dreadful | |
4 | Less risky than Pandemonium | |
3 | Sim: Pestilence, Crypt Rats, etc. | |
2 | An interactive Pestilence. | |
1 | The card that started this tradition. |
If you compare the number of new Judgment/Onslaught cards on this list compared to red and green, you’ll see far fewer. Only three worthwhile cards stood out as significantly different from past black cards – Death Match, Syphon Mind, and Rotlung Reanimator. (Patriarch’s Bidding is an uber-Exhume, and I don’t know if False Cure shouldn’t really be bumped by five or ten other worthwhile cards readers could suggest.)
We’re #1…I Mean, We’re #22!
Of all the colors, I have made the most changes over time to the black Hall. From version to version, the top choice never seems to stay the same. At the top has been, from versions one through six: Grave Pact, Subversion, Plague Wind, Underworld Dreams, Living Death… And now Grave Pact again. What the heck is my problem?
I’m apparently very fickle, but give me a moment to defend myself. Black is incredibly tough to rate. In fact, I’d say black, while my favorite color overall, is probably the most difficult to play in group – not just because of the resource trade-offs I mentioned earlier, but also because of the obvious power level of so many of its cards and the way it doesn’t really try to help a damn soul other than yourself. While green is pleasing the board with Awakening and Dual Nature, black is trying to kill everything off with Thrashing Wumpus and Spreading Plague.
This puts black in some unusual positions – its pigeon rating is the highest of all the colors, because it sucks resources away from players, and the more players there are, the better that sort of thing works. Its rattlesnake and gorilla ratings are pulled up by the way it whacks creatures, but then yanked down by the way the cards often aren’t affecting the board at all (e.g., discard, life drain). It can repeat effects well – but often requires a sacrifice to do so each time. And naturally, its plankton rating is abysmal.
In the midst of all this back and forth, I trust readers can understand that my feelings about many cards have shifted over time as I try to get a bead on what makes them work – and what makes them fail. While I hope the refreshed numeric rating system will keep things stable in the future, there are no guarantees!
Symphonic Syphons
How neat is it that Syphon Soul saw reprint? Tournament players must be so annoyed at all of us, for the things we ask for from Wizards. What a great pigeon card! And then on top of that, they give us Syphon Mind – which, in my opinion, surpasses Bottomless Pit in its multiplayer effectiveness. Discard decks always suffered from an inability to keep pressure on and/or defend themselves from retaliation. Both problems stem from depleting your own hand. (Bottomless Pit has always been seen as a necessary path, which means you operate with no cards either, and just hope to topdeck that Corrupt or other win condition.)
But now, while everyone discards the way you want them to, you actually add to your hand. Even in decks that don’t focus on discard, Syphon Mind should be amazing – spend four mana to draw upwards of five or six cards in most conventional games. Who cares what your opponents ditch?
Should You Contaminate A Game?
Every color other than green has at least one signature card that punishes or prevents the use of mana. In red, it’s Acidic Soil. In white, it’s Limited Resources (and yes, Armageddon). In blue, it’s Stasis. Here in black, the card guaranteed to annoy the entire table (with one or two happy exceptions here and there) is Contamination.
A card that attacks mana like this starts at 0 for plankton. Then I give it the tiniest of boosts, since it doesn’t shut down the entire board – just most of it. (Artifact and black mages are still fine, and in fact probably thrive now.) The rattlesnake on a card like this is weird to rate – there’s upward pressure in the same way that white cards like Ivory Mask straight-out prevent retaliation. But there’s also definite downward pressure, in that whatever exists on the board is coming right for you – I could easily entertain arguments that a good deal of the time, Contamination has zero rattlesnake impact. In the end, I don’t think this card can ever do better than average for that aspect… And, in fact, future Halls may rate it lower, depending on what sort of feedback I get from readers.
Cards like this are tricky in multiplayer. It’s not just because people will come at you – that idea never bothers me – but more that you’re keeping the game from following a natural flow. “Natural flow” for a multiplayer game is not the same as”natural flow” for a competitive duel. In duel, it’s about winning the game in whatever fashion works most efficiently. Contaminate away!
In group, it’s about seeing each player develop their strategy – and then proving yours most worthy. Worthy of laughs, worthy of the win, worthy of the best single play, or whatever is up to you. But how can you compare your deck to anyone else’s, if you won’t even let them get a spell off after turn 3?
I’ve played Contamination. (It was in the first version of my still-strong Grave Pact deck.) I’ve played Stasis and Limited Resources, too. And here’s my bottom line – like combo decks or random color hosers, they’re interesting maybe once. But after that, you haven’t really learned anything… And you’re not going to. Neither is your group (other than the fact that you’d probably be happier playing in tournaments). Set the mana denial aside, and find another aspect of the deck you can tweak. It may feel painful, but motivate yourself to make the deck work without the annoyance. Think of it as tying a hand behind your back. You’ll still kick everyone’s ass, right?
Eyeballs Vs. Hard Numbers
Fastidious readers may notice, as they compare ratings across colors, that Death Match would rate higher on my Top 10 Onslaught lists than it has elsewhere. To this, I can only say: Sharp eyes, and let’s see how well you can eyeball an entire list of 350 cards in the space of a week or two! My Top 10 are still pretty much my Top 10, but the order has shifted somewhat, and Death Match sits around #2 instead of #5 now. The card’s just good, open, repeatable fun for everyone. Now how often does black do that?
Staples Don’t Dissolve Like Stitches
Zombies are one of the casual community’s favorite creature types, and small wonder why – they just keep coming back for more. I expect Onslaught to revitalize interest in this creature type, and for many players who have never tried zombies, or even black, to give it a whirl. Here are some black staple cards to consider as you dip your toe back into the murky swampwater:
- Wall of Souls, a card I’ve often included in the Hall,
- Expunge, the most efficient version of Terror given cycling,
- Fog of Gnats, or any cheap black regenerating flyer like Will o Wisp,
- Haunted Crossroads, one of the best recursion cards black has,
- Abyssal Gatekeeper, when you want to tell the board that you just don’t give a damn,
- Exhume, which was set aside to honor Patriarch’s Bidding, but the cheapest word in multiplayer recursion,
- Hidden Horror, an excellent first-turn Dark Ritual play (which would be Hypnotic Specter, but I’m trying to stay away from rares, remember),
- Syphon Soul, now reprinted in Onslaught for your convenience,
- Hymn to Tourach, because discard will never be better, and
- (the rare) Phyrexian Plaguelord, which really ought to be known as the defining black creature in any environment given its stats, abilities, casting cost, efficiency, and flavor.
There are many signature rare black creatures (Hypnotic Specter, Sengir Vampire, Lord of the Pit, and so on), but I’ll stick with the Plaguelord, which will fit into most black multiplayer decks better than half of the cards I’d hear about, and persists longer than the other half. I would also highly recommend Corpse Dance to anyone who enjoys recursion. It’s a heck of a card.
Quick story about Exhume – a while back, our group played a”Big Happy Deck” format where everyone pulled off of the same, massive three-hundred card deck and then ditched into the same, massive graveyard. (Black and green are proud in that format, because both colors draw and recur pretty well.) Let me tell you, Exhume is pretty funny in that format. Resolve it active player first, going to the left:
ACTIVE PLAYER: I’ll take the Phyrexian Plaguelord.
NEXT PLAYER: I’ll take the Sengir Vampire.
PLAYER AFTER THAT: Oooh, I’d better take the Phantom Centaur.
PLAYER AFTER THAT ONE: Hmmm…well, a Spike Feeder will still get me four life.
NEXT TO LAST PLAYER: A Fog of Gnats is better than nothing.
LAST PLAYER: Ummmm…Blood Pet?
Big Happy Deck a great format, by the way, and with all the Odyssey cards using threshold and flashback, you ought to consider it again if you haven’t done it in a while.
Next up is blue. Time to roll out the instants!
Peace,
Anthony Alongi
[email protected]