It’s been over a year since Sorin, Imperious Bloodlord was banned in Pioneer. Rakdos Vampires was one of the most brutal strategies to face down in its heyday due to its mix of speed, raw power, and resiliency. Unfortunately for Sorin fans, the potent Planeswalker hasn’t seen much play elsewhere outside of Historic and Timeless. It even received a nerf in Historic for being too strong alongside Saint Elenda.
Because of this, it’s exciting that a Mono-Black Vampires shell boasted an undefeated run in a Magic Online Modern League this past weekend. This deck attacks from multiple angles, making it tough to gameplan against.
Double Synergies for Double the Fun
Just like traditional Pioneer Vampires decklists prior to the Sorin ban, your strongest avenue to victory here involves pairing Sorin with Vein Ripper. Sorin’s -3 ability lets you cheat Vein Ripper into play as early as turn three. This gives you an incredibly powerful and resilient body that can easily overpower most early-game threats while dodging removal.
As strong as this combo is, though, you need to be prepared for games where you only draw one half of it. Fortunately, Vein Ripper isn’t the only Vampire to make an appearance. This decklist features a full playset of Vampire Hexmage, a cheap threat you can start dumping +1/+1 counters onto with Sorin. In some games, simply using Sorin to give Deathtouch and Lifelink to your non-Vampire creatures, such as Overlord of the Balemurk, will make it easier to win a race.
Of course, if you find both Vampire Hexmage and Overlord early, you unlock another powerful two-card synergy. After casting Overlord for its Impending cost, Vampire Hexmage can get rid of all of the time counters and enable a big attack. Overlord’s attack trigger then threatens to bring Vampire Hexmage back to your hand, or can start assembling your Sorin, Imperious Bloodlord and Vein Ripper combo.
While the Sorin combo elements of this list are similar to what we saw in Pioneer and Historic, the rest of this Modern list is rather unique. MTGO player Bokk has elected to combine the controversial Sorin package with the fallen Modern Necrodominance archetype, and it creates some really powerful synergies.
Necrodominance Package
Necrodominance is an elite source of card advantage, but it comes with numerous drawbacks. Between the life loss, reduced hand size, and being forced to skip your draw step, Necrodominance requires you to build around it to make it work. This deck accomplishes the task nicely.
Soul Spike, commonly found in dedicated Necrodominance decks, does a fantastic job mitigating Necrodominance’s downsides. The free removal spell acts as a life buffer that lets you take further advantage of Necrodominance in the future. Landing Sheoldred, the Apocalypse lets you go completely nuts with Necrodominance since you’ll gain two life back for every one life you pay.
While it may seem strange to blend the Necrodominance and Vampire themes together, they do a good job of complementing each other. Using Sorin as a life gain element makes Necrodominance more reliable. On the flip side, Necrodominance helps you dig for whichever piece of your Vampire combos you’re missing. Pitching copies of Vein Ripper to Soul Spike is also a totally fine option if you don’t have Sorin at the ready.
Strengths and Weaknesses
This unique archetype certainly has some things going in its favor in the current Modern metagame. Vein Ripper will often singlehandedly hold back Drone armies from Izzet Affinity, which has seen a popularity spike since Pinnacle Emissary burst onto the scene.
Against midrange matchups like Esper Midrange, Necrodominance excels as a grindy tool. By using discard spells to strip Esper Midrange players of Force of Negation and removal to keep opposing threats in check, you should have plenty of time to relish the card advantage. From there, the lack of a catch-up tool from this strategy can make it difficult to come back after they initially fall behind.
All of that said, there are bound to be weaknesses to be aware of. Perhaps your biggest weakness is that all of your biggest threats get tagged by Solitude. In the face of Vein Ripper, an Evoked copy of Solitude can still be sacrificed to pay the Ward tax.
Boros Energy can be a bit of a problematic matchup as well, given that Vein Ripper can’t stop a true go-wide army. The combination of Guide of Souls and Ocelot Pride can overwhelm you regardless of how strong Vein Ripper is. Your opponent may also be able to use Vein Ripper’s Ward ability as a sacrifice outlet to transform Ajani, Nacatl Pariah, making the matchup harder.
As if that weren’t bad enough, fast combo strategies like Ruby Storm and Belcher are also tough matchups due to your lack of early pressure. Ruby Storm can win the game as early as turn two, while Belcher has access to free counter magic to prevent you from sticking a threat.
Overall, Mono-Black Vampires doesn’t look like it will emerge as a top-tier archetype anytime soon. The good news is that this brew still showcases competitive potential. There’s a lot of room for innovation within the archetype, and we’re excited to see if Vampires continues to pop up in Modern down the line.
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