Green/Black Disciple of Bolas Deck for New Standard

September 27, 2012 | Posted by Dee

One of the best ways to build more powerful decks than other players is to figure out the best combos.

For example, if you realized that Snapcaster, Ponder, and Delver worked very well together, you could’ve done really well last year in post-Innistrad Standard.

Other combos that worked well during that time include Sun Titan + Phantasmal Image and Primeval Titan + Kessig Wolf Run + Inkmoth Nexus.

In post-Return to Ravnica Standard, I think the Disciple of Bolas and Thragtusk interaction could be one of the top combos.

I built a deck with Disciple in mind to see how powerful the card was. The deck did well in playtesting. Here’s the decklist.

GB Disciple
Creatures (25)
Spells (11)
Lands (24)
Sideboard (15)

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You can’t rely on just Thragtusk to sac to Disciple because there will be games when you don’t draw the green creature. Therefore, I added a bunch of other cards that play well with Disciple.

Strangleroot Geist is a good creature to sac because it has undying. Rancor also works well with Disciple because it boosts power and it goes back to your hand after you sac the enchanted creature.

Dreg Mangler has some utility after you sac it. You can buff a creature by activating Dreg Mangler’s scavenge ability while it is in the graveyard.

Wolfir Silverheart is pretty insane with Disciple because it gives other creatures a big buff of +4/+4. For example, when you soulbond with Thragtusk and then sac it to Disciple, you draw nine cards and gain nine life!

Garruk Relentless gives you 2/2 Wolf creature tokens, which are good sacrifice fodder for Disciple.

Tragic Slip is the removal spell of choice because it interacts well with Disciple. The black creature turns on morbid with his ability. Plus, when you draw cards, you can draw Tragic Slip if you don’t already have it in hand.

In one game, my opponent tapped out for Niv-Mizzet, Dracogenius. I sacrificed Thragtusk to Disciple to draw five cards. One of those five cards was Tragic Slip. I cast it in the same turn to kill the big Dragon.

I started with 3 Disciple because I thought there would be situations where you didn’t want to sacrifice a creature or you didn’t have a good creature to sacrifice. I’ve been happy with that number.

However, four copies might be correct since the card is pretty good. If you play this deck, I would test 4 Disciple. I’m not sure which card to take out though. My best guess is Rancor.

Disciple is an important card but the deck can win without it. The deck can do a good impression of an aggro deck with Rancor and the cheap haste creatures, Strangleroot Geist and Dreg Mangler.

You will win games without Disciple of Bolas by just establishing an early offense and killing your opponent before he has a chance to setup his defense.

For example, with a turn one Arbor Elf, you can have aggressive starts like turn two Dreg Mangler, swing for three and turn two Strangleroot Geist, enchant it with Rancor, and attack for four.

Note that Arbor Elf can untap Overgrown Tomb since it’s a Forest. This helps you cast the double black cards, Vampire Nighthawk and Liliana of the Veil.

Wolfir Silverheart is a nice finisher when you combine it with the flying of Vampire Nighthawk and the trample of Rancor.

Filed Under Standard 

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23 Responses to “Green/Black Disciple of Bolas Deck for New Standard”

  1. Lasyala on September 30th, 2012 3:01 pm

    What about deadbrigde goliath as turn 3 or 4 drop?:)

  2. Pigari on October 2nd, 2012 7:24 am

    Doesn’t Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord deserves a place at this deck?

  3. Dee on October 2nd, 2012 9:06 pm

    @ Lasyala

    I like the Garruk better unless you don’t have a lot of control decks in your metagame. But if you don’t have any Garruks, Deadbridge Goliath is a good budget alternative.

    @ Pigari

    I think Garruk, Thragtusk, and Wolfir Silverheart are better cards than Jarad.

    I don’t like Jarad in this deck because it doesn’t have ways to fill up the graveyard quickly. Jarad is much better in a deck with Splinterfright, Mulch, and Grisly Salvage.

  4. Pigari on October 3rd, 2012 1:10 pm

    But Jarad’s ability use the pumped criatures to do damage, like Disciple use them to gain life and draw cards…
    He can be a good finisher.

  5. Dee on October 3rd, 2012 11:18 pm

    @ Pigari

    The problem with Jarad is he’s much slower than Disciple. You have to spend mana to use his ability. With Disciple, you don’t have to.

    Also, the casting cost of Jarad requires much more than Disciple.

    You’re not using Jarad fully at all if you just want to use his sac ability. There will be times when Jarad just dies right away to a Searing Spear or even worse, gets exiled by Pillar of Flame because you don’t have cards like Grisly Salvage to fill up your graveyard.

    I could be wrong but I think Garruk, Thragtusk, and Wolfir Silverheart are better cards than Jarad. Do you think any of these cards are worse than Jarad in this deck?

  6. Golgari Thug on October 6th, 2012 4:58 pm

    can you explain what match ups the planeswalkers in the sideboard come in, they seem terrible for what the main deck does? I guess we need more permanent removal

  7. Gideon Browne on October 7th, 2012 1:29 pm

    could you please explain what you base you sideboard on. Is it based on the metta at your store. What do you board in and out against what?

  8. Dee on October 7th, 2012 9:09 pm

    @ Golgari Thug

    Liliana comes in against control decks. With Disciple of Bolas, you should have extra cards to discard to Liliana’s first ability.

    If Liliana is not effective enough, you can try Duress in her place.

    Vraska the Unseen has been great for me to kill problem permanents especially planeswalkers, Jace and Tamiyo.

    @ Gideon Browne

    I mostly play online with Cockatrice so that’s the metagame I’m targeting with the sideboard. This metagame is pretty diverse with many different decks.

    The planeswalkers come in against control. You can cut Tragic Slip and Vampire Nighthawk.

    Abrupt Decay is good against fast decks, Detention Sphere, and Oblivion Ring. Dead Weight is there to fight decks with a lot of small cheap creatures like Diregraf Ghoul and Rakdos Cackler.

    Against aggro, you can take out the Wolfir Silverhearts and one Rancor.

    Vile Rebirth is there to fight Gravecrawler, Geralf’s Messenger, and reanimator decks. You can cut the rest of the Rancors against Zombies to make room for Vile Rebirth.

    Ground Seal is good against reanimator decks. Versus these decks, I would remove Abrupt Decay, Tragic Slip, and 1 Nighthawk.

  9. Gideon Browne on October 8th, 2012 2:14 pm

    What about deathrite shaman iinstead of vile rebirth?

  10. Dee on October 8th, 2012 2:29 pm

    @ Gideon Browne

    That seems fine. I’m not sure which card is better.

  11. Sean Reed on October 13th, 2012 9:33 am

    Maybe even geralfs messenger would be a nice sack. If he’s not countered you are effectively dealing six dmg and drawing 3 cards gaining three life. Arbor elf is your fix with your duel lands for your colors so is double black shouldn’t be an issue.

  12. Sean Reed on October 13th, 2012 9:38 am

    Disregard my last it’s only 4 life lose. And he’s triple black so maybe or maybe not worth the effort for him.

  13. Dee on October 15th, 2012 5:00 am

    @ Sean Reed

    Yeah, triple black is too steep of a casting cost. I want at least 20 black sources for Geralf’s Messenger.

  14. Strife on October 31st, 2012 5:39 am

    You know, have you considered desecretion demon? Since you are an aggro deck, it comes into play, immediately applies pressure because even though they sacrifice their creatures to tap him, the pump him up, making him an even better target for disciple. Just my two cents. :)

  15. Dee on October 31st, 2012 1:24 pm

    @ Strife

    I didn’t consider it but Desecration Demon could be good for the reasons you mentioned. Also, it helps with morbid for Tragic Slip.

    Just make sure not to cut cards that cost less than it so that your mana curve doesn’t become too expensive.

  16. azathoth on November 10th, 2012 7:42 pm

    I play at a store where every body seems to have unlimited budget and the decks are well tuned… wondering what kind of chance I would have with a deck like this…

    I often play against 2 reanimator… with tragtusk serinity shenanigans

    A token deck

    A Jund control

    A uwr geist counter spell burn

    Bant control ramp

    …I d like to try the deck without the walkers… maybe add 3 far seek instead (I know a bit odd)… cut a mangler and a troll and add a 3rd silver heart and 4th rancor to try to trample those damn spirit token and those thragtusk

    Any thoughts and advise… should I even try this? I m just looking for fun but winning against them once in a while could be fun

  17. Dee on November 10th, 2012 8:33 pm

    @ azathoth

    I’m not sure how well this deck fares against the ones you mentioned because I haven’t played it in a while.

    If you want a low cost deck that can win against the top decks, I would play Mono Red Aggro.

    Check out some decklists on this page:
    http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Digital/MagicOnlineTourn.aspx?x=mtg/digital/magiconline/tourn/4557170

  18. Azathoth on November 11th, 2012 7:18 am

    Thanks

    RDW is just not my style… I did a bit of research and found only one similar deck that did well at states… the golgari summoning list this guy use is playing tricks with my mind… I’m not sure if it’s good or not… I’m missing card to try it and i’m too chicken to buy them… cause the deck could be great or garbage.. not sure. Anyway… might be worth toying around

    http://www.mtgdecks.net/decks/view/39817

  19. Alasdair on November 12th, 2012 3:43 pm

    Nice list man, thank you. Your site obviously takes a lot of work, so thanks for putting the time in.

    I have just played a relatively similar list at my local shop and did pretty well- didn’t lose a game for the first three rounds against 2x red black zombies and 1 x blue white tempo with guest of saint traft. I split the prizes with the guy I was tied with for first, and then was promptly crushed in the match we played for fun by his unburial rites deck.

    I wanted to ask what you thought of bloodline keeper as a garruk replacement, as its another constant source of tokens and potentially crushing late game?

    Also, budget constraints have me running bramblecrush in the sideboard to deal with planeswalker, golgari charm to deal with tokens/board wipes/detention spheres and ghost quarters to.mess with complex mana bases. Any suggestions for other budget sideboard options?

  20. Dee on November 14th, 2012 11:50 pm

    @ Azathoth

    Just from a quick glance, I don’t like the deck. Heartless Summoning does not combo well with Disciple of Bolas and Arbor Elf. There is only one Elf for Elvish Archdruid.

    @ Alasdair

    Thanks and congrats on your performance.

    I like Bloodline Keeper as a Garruk replacement.

    Regarding your sideboard, what decks are you looking to beat?

  21. Azathoth on November 15th, 2012 12:22 pm

    The question was not directed to me… but you said you were crushed by an unburial deck… so 3-4 ground seal could be a nice addition for your sideboard… the card replace itself and is annoying for unburial deck (in addition of the charm you already have) the unburial deck would most likelly have to play the ramp game rather than the unburial game… anyway just a suggestion

  22. Alasdair on November 22nd, 2012 7:12 am

    Thanks Azathoth – I’ll look into try Ground Seal out, sounds like a good option.

    Dee, It’s reanimator that I’ve had problems with so far, but I think that U/W flash and also planeswalker based control could be problematic too. I’m thinking Bramblecrush and Appetite for Brains could be good options in those matchups?

    I’m trying out a new version this Friday so fingers crossed.

  23. Dee on November 24th, 2012 9:07 am

    Actually, I think Appetite for Brains is not that good against UW Flash. They only have a few cards that cost four or more.

    Appetite for Brains does seem good against planeswalker control.

    I like Ground Seal, Cavern of Souls, and Crushing Vines versus UW Flash.