In a way, each new MTG set release is like a new season of Game of Thrones. Each of the major players in the meta gets a chance to scheme with the new cards and vie for a bigger piece of the playability pie. Mono-Black Midrange has been skulking around on the fringes of Standard viability for a while now. Thanks to some of the terrifying new black cards in Duskmourn, however, it may well be ready to stage its meta coup at long last. Enjoy decks with two-card insta-kill combos? Well, this is about to become a deck with three.
Sudden Death
All of these combos center around Bloodletter of Aclazotz, a terrifying Vampire Demon from back in The Lost Caverns of Ixalan. The passive effect on this card doubles all life loss your opponent experiences on your turn. This results in an instant kill when paired with cards that wipe out half of your opponent’s life in one go, such as Rush of Dread. This combo was hyped up when Thunder Junction was released, but ultimately it never made much of an impact in Standard.
Duskmourn, however, may be about to change that. Combo as an archetype relies on consistency more than any other deck in Magic. In Duskmourn, two more cards that can fill in the role of Rush of Dread are coming: Unstoppable Slasher and Grievous Wound. Slasher halves your opponent’s life if it gets through for damage, while Wound does the same once it’s attached to your opponent. These two cards add a lot of redundancy to the Bloodletter deck, giving you more ways to end the game out of nowhere.
Both of them are, handily, on-curve too. You can play Slasher on three into Bloodletter on four and win right away if Slasher goes unblocked. You can also go Bloodletter on four into Wound on five, and swing in the air to do the same thing. Rush of Dread is still a viable option too, and slots into the same spot on the curve as Wound. With all of these viable pieces, as well as tutors to grab them in Demonic Counsel and Insatiable Avarice, Mono-Black Midrange with a Combo twist could well be a viable deck in new Standard.
Mono-Black Midrange In Current Standard
Of course, this would require some fairly significant alterations to the existing Mono-Black decks in the format. At the moment, Mono-Black plays more of a grindy, value-based game. Early drops like Tinybones, the Pickpocket and Caustic Bronco generate early card advantage, then Preacher of the Schism and Kaervek take over later on. These cards can draw you into your powerful disruption and removal suite, which includes Deep-Cavern Bat, Go for the Throat, and Cut Down. In terms of finishers, the packages vary from deck to deck. Popular choices include Sheoldred, the Apocalypse, Archfiend of the Dross, and Aclazotz, Deepest Betrayal.
This build is solid, but it has trouble dealing with much of the current metagame. According to MTGDecks, the deck only commands a 1.68% meta share. Hardly the stuff of tournament victory. A new direction built around Bloodletter combos could be just what it needs to pull ahead. Bloodletter can easily sub in for either Archfiend or Sheoldred as a four-of, and you can consolidate the scattered Kaervek/Gix packages into copies of Unstoppable Slasher. Grievous Wound is a bit harder to fit in, but Gix’s Command also sees regular play in the deck, so you can swap in a couple of Wounds instead.
With the core combo pieces in place, you’ll want to toss in some consistency boosters like Demonic Counsel and Insatiable Avarice. It’s a crying shame that Shadow of Mortality rotated out, since that would’ve added a fourth combo line to the deck. Funeral Room/Awakening Hall is a possible alternative, but hitting for 11 rather than 15 is a notable downside. It does probably offer more value to the deck than Shadow did in the past, however.
Trials And Tribulations
A deck with so many combo lines is certainly exciting in theory. That said, it’s important to consider the current meta carefully before committing to any new list, and make sure you have a plan for dealing with the big players.
At the moment, Aggro holds the lion’s share of the format. Gruul Prowess and Rakdos Lizards in particular, with Boros Convoke and Mono-Red coming up behind. These are the biggest obstacles to any new deck seeing success in Standard, Mono-Black Midrange included. Sideboarding is tricky for a combo deck like this, since so many pieces are essential, but you definitely need some early interaction for these matchups. Fear of Lost Teeth is a decent option, trading easily with most Aggro creatures and gaining you some life in the process. You really need instant speed options for Slickshot Show-Off, however, so consider throwing in Anoint with Affliction and Long Goodbye too.
Outside of Aggro, this deck should actually have relatively few problems. The rest of the meta consists largely of Domain Ramp and Midrange lists, all of which you can go over the top of via one of your combo lines. This didn’t pan out for Bloodletter in the past, but with the new pieces from Duskmourn I think it’s much more likely. You have time to work with in these matchups, so just don’t overextend into a Sunfall and you should be fine.
Overall, this new Combo variant of Mono-Black Midrange has serious Standard potential. The prevalence of Aggro in the format is a very real hurdle to overcome, but if things slow down even a bit then players may find themselves being insta-killed more often than not.
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