Oy vey, I’ve been a testing machine as of late. I can’t remember when I’ve been playing so much Magic. Me and my playtesting group, the renowned (work with me) High Plains Drifters, have gone through at least thirty decks – and we’ll probably go through thirty more before the next two weeks are through. It’s getting to the point where I’m seeing Braids in my sleep…And she’s starting to look pretty darn good. Hey, baby, why don’t we come back to my place and sacrifice some permanents together? I can show you my extensive archive of Star City articles, too.
This must be the Magic version of beer goggles. Help me before I start making passes at Empress Galina!
But on to the business at hand – which is Regionals, not my predilection for female art on Magic cards. As you can probably surmise from the title, we’re going to look at control black today. I forget who introduced me to this build – I think it was Gambit’s prince of pessimism, Grey Anderson – but I’ve rather enjoyed playing with it. Clearly, it’s the progeny of the control black decks from PT: Osaka, improved with a few additions from Invasion block and 7th Edition.
4 Duress
4 Addle
4 Innocent Blood
4 Chainer’s Edict
3 Mutilate
4 Phyrexian Arena
4 Corrupt
2 Soul Burn
3 Diabolic Tutor
1 Haunting Echoes
1 Mind Sludge
1 Yawgmoth’s Agenda
21 Swamp
2 Cabal Coffers
2 Terminal Moraine
Sideboard:
4 Nantuko Shade
3 Shambling Swarm
3 Millstone
1 Haunting Echoes
2 Caustic Tar
Creature kill, this deck has in spades. Innocent Blood and Chainer’s Edict may be overkill, and Mutilate takes it completely over the top. Oddly enough, all of the kill spells are non-targeted – so let’s be happy Ivory Mask is out of the environment. Counting flashback, the deck has nineteen kill spells. Nineteen!
The downside of all this creature removal is that it’s all at sorcery speed – there’s no instant speed removal, like Afflict or Dark Banishing. This can be a downside when your opponent brings in a Skizzik or something hasty that you need to deal with right now… But that’s a negative you simply have to deal with.
Discard is represented by Duress and Addle. Obviously, being creatureless, Ravenous Rats and Mesmeric Fiends are no-nos. Unhinge? No.
Diabolic Tutor allows you to run single copies of”silver bullet” cards, much like the old”Napster” deck. In my case, I chose to go with Mind Sludge (usually a guaranteed Mind Twist), Haunting Echoes, and Yawgmoth’s Agenda. Other possibilities of singles include Persecute, Mirari, or even a lone Nantuko Shade. I find you have to resist the”sexiness” of Haunting Echoes when tutoring for it – although it will win you a lot of games – in favor of what’s needed then, like the less sexy Corrupt or Phyrexian Arena. The Agenda is also a game winner in a long, drawn-out affair when you’ve filled your graveyard with half your deck.
Phyrexian Arena fills the need for card drawing. The life loss generally isn’t an issue, since the deck’s kill mechanism – Corrupts and really, really big Soul Burns – help to replenish what’s lost.
Terminal Moraine is a somewhat janky addition, and you may be wondering what you need this Thawing-Glaciers-wannabe in the deck. Primarily, it’s a deck thinner, getting one less swamp out of your deck and into play. Yeah, Rampant Growth it’s not quite, but it’s something worth playing around with.
The other non-basic land, Cabal Coffers, can simply be insane in this deck. Get two in play with about eight or so swamps and it’s game over with a Soul Burn. Two seems to be the right number, with twenty-five lands overall.
The deck, like anything else, has strengths and weaknesses. Anything depending upon a single-creature strategy – Psychatog, Enforcer-Go and Balancing Tings – is dead meat against this deck. Upheaval? Balancing Act? Whatever. Swamp, Innocent Blood, scoop.
“Fast Beats” R/G, using Flametongue Kavus, Skizziks, and Calls of the Herd usually isn’t that much of a threat, provided you can deal with the early mana creatures until you can start dropping powerful bombs like Mutilate and Corrupt in the midgame. Frog, however, being not only faster than Fast Beats but also possessing anti-discard cards like Fiery Temper and Violent Eruption, can be problematic. Shambling Swarms from the sideboard help the matchup considerably.
But the zombies are stumbling across the landscape now, lowing”Braids…Braids…” There are apparently three flavors of Braids-flavored black decks coming to the fore – including”Noir,” the B/W version using Vindicates and Spectral Lynx (although Brad would like it pointed out that he’s been playing that deck for over two months now, and, while he thinks Alex’s name is stupid, I think it’s quite evocative and apropos), the Kibler B/R version, and a variant from Neutral Ground that uses blue.
Of these, B/W is the most problematic. Vindicate can take out the Arena and the deck combines enough early disruption with small beatdown creatures – and of course, most decks will scoop to a turn 3 Vindicate followed by a turn 4 Braids. The B/R and B/U-based versions of Braids decks are considerably weaker, especially B/R, with four Flametongues and no targets.
The biggest problem that mono-black control has, however, is that every deck archetype has some kind of defense against it after sideboarding. This deck will win the first game over 80% of the time… But in games two and three, once cards like Compost, CoP: Black and Aegis of Honor come in from the sideboard, the percentages fall considerably. Then you depend upon either decking them with Haunting Echoes or hoping they never draw or play their hosers. A transformational sideboard, perhaps, using multiple copies of Millstones and Haunting Echoes, may have merit.
But remember those janky Terminal Moraines? The Moraine becomes a better choice when you toy around with the idea of adding a forest or two and Pernicious Deed, either main or sideboard. Before you scoff, consider this: Deed deals with all the sideboard cards that neuter this deck. Deed is also a global kill spell. With three tutors, two Moraines, and four Arenas, getting that green source of mana isn’t hard, and one or two forests doesn’t water the mana base down to the point that Cabal Coffers or Corrupt become sub-optimal.
Also, splashing green gives you access to Compost for the mirror match.
The trouble with the Deed is that unlike Mutilate, you often have to wait a turn to have the mana to wipe the board clean. Here, you’re making a tradeoff of guaranteed kill for something a bit more versatile.
If you want to play around with it, this is my version:
3 Duress
4 Addle
4 Innocent Blood
3 Chainer’s Edict
3 Mutilate
3 Pernicious Deed
4 Corrupt
2 Soul Burn
4 Phyrexian Arena
3 Diabolic Tutor
1 Haunting Echoes
1 Mind Sludge
2 Forest
2 Terminal Moraine
2 Cabal Coffers
You may want to add Tainted Wood, but that can dilute the mana base a little too much in my own opinion. Take it for what it’s worth.
Now, back to sleep, and the Braids of my dreams.
Dave Meddish
[email protected]
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