One cool aspect of Duskmourn is that there are some neat throwbacks to older designs in the set. Of course, there are some sweet reprints, such as Ethereal Armor and Pyroclasm that are getting their chance to shine in Standard once again. On top of that, though, we have cards like the Overlords that clearly draw from previous ideas (in this case, the Titan cycle from over a decade ago.)
Among the cards that reference designs from many years ago, Doomsday Excruciator is one of the hardest to make work. Doomsday is an unbelievably powerful card. However, the new creature’s mana cost makes it significantly harder to set up. Maximizing it is very difficult, and it didn’t seem like the juice was worth the squeeze.
As it turns out, Magic Online user Nictophobia has set out to prove us wrong. They made it all the way to top eight of a Magic Online Pioneer Challenge abusing the power of Doomsday Excruciator’s enters-the-battlefield trigger. While they made it clear this deck is a work in progress, there’s plenty of room to explore within the archetype. The result is nothing to scoff at, and there could very well be some potential here.
Doomsday Gameplan
- Mana Value: BBBBBB
- Rarity: Rare
- Stats: 6/6
- MTG Sets: Duskmourn
- Card Text: Flying. When Doomsday Excruciator enters, if it was cast, each player exiles all but the bottom six cards of their library face down. At the beginning of your upkeep, draw a card.
The main idea behind the Doomsday Excruciator Pioneer strategy is that it functions like a Dimir control deck with a combo finish. This is far from new territory, as this is exactly how the Dimir Inverter of Truth decks used to operate prior to Inverter’s ban.
Similar to Dimir Inverter’s endgame, this Dimir Doomsday Excruciator shell looks to close the game with Thassa’s Oracle after resolving the namesake card. Jace, Wielder of Mysteries also accomplishes the same task. Winning the game from there is fairly trivial, as Doomsday Excruciator leaves you with only six cards in deck. So, once you’ve found Oracle or Jace, you can cast Doomsday Excruciator with the intention of casting some cantrips on the following turn and reducing your library size enough to win guaranteed.
As you might expect, setting up Doomsday Excruciator is tougher than Inverter of Truth. Not only do you have to get to six mana in the first place, but you have to have six black mana specifically. Furthermore, you still need to resolve a card with multiple blue pips in its mana cost afterwards to end the game. This isn’t easy, but the way Nictophobia constructed the manabase does a lot to help the cause.
First of all, there are a lot of Dimir dual lands present. Gloomlake Verge is a fantastic new addition as an untapped land that reliably produces both blue and black mana. From there, you’ll find three copies of Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth. It can be a bit awkward playing three copies of a legendary land in a control deck, but Nictophobia pointed out that the land can be crucial to ensuring that Doomsday Excruciator is castable on curve. As we will see, this deck has a lot of cantrips to dig for Urborg as well as ways to loot away excess copies of the land.
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Combo Meets Control
- Mana Vlue: 1B
- Rarity: Rare
- MTG Sets: Duskmourn
- Card Text: Search your library for a Demon card, reveal it, put it into your hand, then shuffle. Delirium– If there are four or more card types among cards in your graveyard, instead search your library for any card, put it into your hand, then shuffle.
To help buy time until you can cast Doomsday Excruciator, this deck makes use of some cheap interaction. Most notably, Fatal Push and Thoughtseize both do a solid job keeping the opponent off-balance.
You’ll also find a lot of cantrips present. Consider and Sleight of Hand help you find whatever missing pieces of the combo you need as well or disruption to stay alive. A playset of Ledger Shredder does a solid job letting you churn through your library and pitch excess copies of Doomsday Excruciator or Urborg.
On top of that, Ledger Shredder and these cantrips can enable Delirium rather quickly. This is incredibly useful, considering this deck plays a full four copies of Demonic Counsel. Demonic Counsel is a cool card. At minimum, you can always go tutor up Doomsday Excruciator. Once you have Delirium, though, there are some neat options to go search for.
Against Azorius control, you’ll often want to find Cavern of Souls so you can resolve your win condition through Counterspells. Against go-wide creature decks, Extinction Event can work wonders. Demonic Counsel doubling as a way to make your combo more consistent and a method of finding your best cards in any given matchup is quite strong.
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A Unique Option
- Mana Value: 2BB
- Rarity: Mythic Rare
- Stats: 4/5
- MTG Sets: Dominaria United
- Card Text: Deathtouch. Whenever you draw a card, you gain 2 life. Whenever an opponent draws a card, they lose 2 life.
At the end of the day, while this deck is clearly leagues below Dimir Inverter from a brokenness perspective, that doesn’t mean the deck can’t have success. As long as you can stall the game long enough, Doomsday Excruciator+Thassa’s Oracle should be able to end the game in your favor. Demonic Counsel offers a lot of flexibility, too.
The main issue this deck can run into is in matchups where getting to this point is difficult. Against Rakdos aggro, for instance, if you don’t have Fatal Push in your opening hand, you risk getting run over. On the flip side, it can be tough setting up a spot where you can resolve Doomsday Excruciator in a sea of counter magic or discard spells from Azorius control or mono-black midrange.
The nice thing is that in post-sideboard games, if you know your combo is unreliable or too slow, you can pivot to a complete Dimir control role. There are four copies of Sheoldred, the Apocalypse in the sideboard for a reason. This train of thought was often used by Dimir Inverter players, too, abusing the power of cards like Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet at the time.
There is definitely a lot of room left for innovation within the Doomsday Pioneer archetype. While it’s unlikely that the deck will surge to the top tier of decks anytime soon, there’s still hope for it to make a push. Make sure to be on the lookout for any notable changes in the deck’s structure moving forward. Dimir Doomsday Demon combo is one hell of a strategy!
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