Grave Titan is great, but he costs waaaaaaaay too much (financially) haha

However, players can tweak it to their liking. Even I have tweaked it a little from this since I played it last. But this is definitely the foundation which the deck should be built upon.

Welcome! Glad you enjoyed the site.

Great overview of your deck Looks solid. I would play 1-2 more lands but that’s because I hate losing to mana screw hehe.

I like Grave Titan versus Jund if you can fit it somehow in the sb.

Also, in the sideboard, you could take out both inquisitions and 1 gatekeeper, and put in 3x Consume the Meek for white weenie or ally decks. Very, very useful.

These would improve the deck overall, but it does work well either way.

This is a fantastic site, and I enjoy reading through the various decks and comments.

Anyway, I ran into this deck on your site one day, and decided to build my own variation of it. It got to the final at FNM, but still could not beat Jund. I think with the right draw, however, it could have potential at beating Jund.

Here is my full decklist.

Land: (23)
20x Swamp
3x Bojuka Bog

Creatures: (17)
4x Hexmage
4x Black Knight
4x Nighthawk
4x Banshee
1x Bloodwitch (I basically count her as a 5th Banshee)

Other Spells: (20)
4x Bloodchief
4x Consuming Vapors (or if you prefer, hideous end)
3x Sign in blood
3x Mind Sludge
3x Corrupt
2x Sorin Markov
1x Liliana Vess

As far as the main deck goes, I have found corrupt to be much better than tendrils, and it does more damage than consume spirit ever could. Though it costs 2 more mana, you can target the player as well, often ending the game outright by the point you can cast it. Consuming Vapors and vampire nighthawk will keep you alive until it comes out.

The 3 Bojuka Bogs rarely hinder your mind sludge and corrupt, but are so very useful. So many decks use their graveyard, and it’s wonderful to get rid of them with the drop of a land. I’ve also replaced 1 Sorin from the original deck with 1 Liliana. She comes out a turn earlier, and if the ascension is active, she is worth 2 life drain per turn, as well as providing a tutor for those difficult moments. Also, she keeps the pressure on them if she comes out the turn after mind sludging them. They have to top deck and play whatever they draw or lose it immediately.

Black knights are infinitely more useful than Bloodghasts or Highborns, as their first strike ability and pro-white-ness is unmatchable early game. With highborns, you have to rely on your creatures to die, and there aren’t enough vampires in the deck for her ability to be useful anyway. Bloodghasts are woeful defensively, and you need early game blockers, especially with the damage you will do to yourself with Banshee and sign in blood. And having two first-strikers out is absolutely amazing defensively.

Hexmage stays in no matter what, as her first-strike and sac ability is unmatched. She can be gotten rid of easier than black knight, but you can always sac her in response, making her immune to mind control-like effects, and anything blue plays, simply by sacking her. She takes out anything with counters when she dies, as well, which is a nice little bonus. Planeswalkers, levelers, allies, quests all fall before the Hexmage. Her and black knight are a great team, not just for this deck, but any mono black deck.

I feel this is a good combination of attack and defense, which is why I have found that this deck works well, even if you *don’t* draw the ascension.

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Sideboard: (15)
3x Sadistic Sacrament
3x Duress
2x Inquisition of Kozilek
4x Gatekeeper of Malakir
3x Contaminated Ground

The sideboard is actually the strongest part of this deck. It can combat against almost any archetype, I have found.

Sadistic sacrament comes in against control or combo decks to remove the cards they need, or cards that you won’t be able to easily deal with, before they can even come out.

Duress also comes in against control to remove any pesky counterspells.

Inquisition can go either way… Bring it in against control for counterspells as well, or against aggro to remove fast, low-cost creatures. (Goblin Guide, I’m looking at you)

Gatekeepers are wonderful against aggro decks, or black decks (if you are playing hideous end and not consuming vapors main deck.)

Contaminated ground is the most underrated card ever. It combos directly with the ascension to give you counters, and slows down dual colour decks, as well as stopping manlands, such as that dreaded celestial colonnade. Also goes great against Valakut ramp. I’ve used it to great effect many times against such decks. Bring it in anytime a deck has a shaky mana base.

As I said, this deck can also, (surprisingly enough), hold its own and is tough to beat even if you don’t draw the ascension. It only has trouble against one deck, Jund, but since that is rotating out soon, and I’ve built this deck with no cards that rotate out this October, it will outlast Jund, and I see a very promising future for it in the next year of standard.

It is a lot of fun to play and I recommend it to anyone.

Thanks for the inspiration!

Good point on the fetchlands. In that case, Bloodghast is not as good and I wouldn’t play them in the deck.

For sb, you could go with a combination of Duress, Mind Rot, Doomblade, Pithing Needle, and Tendrils.