Mono Black

[Fred The Ev]

I have played magic since the beginning of the Masques block, and quit right around when onslaught came out. I came back about a month before Guildpact. I have mainly tested this deck against B/W landstill, U/G madness and White weenie. The Chalices tend to take care of the white weenie, but unless i get a 2 ritual, 1 specter, 1 hymn hand, or something of the likes, i lose fairly consistently. I think a large portion of this could be my sloppy play after a 2-3 year break. But i still think this deck could use some help. (Obviously, the two power nine cards are proxied) 

Land
10 Swamp
4 Bloodstained Mire
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine

Instants/Sorceries
4 Duress
4 Unmask
4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Dark Ritual
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Demonic Consultation
3 Diabolic Edict

Enchantments/Artifacts
1 Necropotence
1 Mox Jet
1 Black Lotus
4 Chalice of the Void

Creatures
4 Nantuko Shade
4 Hypnotic Specter
4 Phyrexian Negator

Sideboard
4 Tormod's Crypt
4 Engineered Plague
3 Darkblast
1 Diabolic Edict
3 Spinning Darkness

[warble]

Well I will reply even though I believe you just posted a decklist and thus this thread will succumb to the lock gnomes from the village of lock lock.

1) Screw LD (that would be land destruction) with black.  If you can't win, you lose.  Stalling the game only helps your opponent by costing you valuable early game turns.

2) Put a win condition in the deck.  Seriously, this is vintage.  Creatures don't fight, unless they're named darksteel colossus or goblin <insert name here>.  Or sometimes weird blue/green creatures but that's fish and you're running black.  Yes, win condition = good in vintage.  You won't get 5 turns against CS, you won't get 4 against fcg, but with duress unmask and hymn you can possibly wreck combo.  However, wrecking means you can win the game.  WIN the game.  Not beat him for a while and lose.  On that note, let's introduce your black deck to the card Tendrils of Agony. 

Hope you enjoy my random posting from work.  If you like beatdown, without auto-scooping when you go 2nd or when your opponent sideboards, fish and bird $h|t have great early game.

Also, if you're going to play against those decks I'll wager you're playing extended or legacy, not vintage, so you might consider posting for suggestions there and not in vintage, where stax cs and oath make any mono-black deck cry.

[pyr0ma5ta]

Actually, this is one of the better mono-black lists I've seen in a while.  It's actually got a coherent game plan, unlike some of the piles that are posted on this site.

That said, your control-aggro plan isn't really all that good in Vintage.  You can't afford to wait to turn 3 to drop a negator that gets drained into a gifts.  If you're going to go with creatures that attack, try looking at something more aggressive, like Carnophage and Sarcomancy.  And please, cut the Edicts.  You'll either get a Welder or Shaman, which you don't really care about anyway, and if you try it against 11/11, you'll just run into a drain.  It's not even good against Goblins.  Terrible.

The other way that this deck can go is -creatures, +Cabal Ritual, +ancestral recall, + brainstorm, + yawg bargain, + tendrils of agony, + yawgmoth's will.  Look at a TPS or GrimLong list on SCG for reference.  You can always bring in the dudes in the side if you want to have that board strategy for fun.  Incidentally, Yawgwill should be in this deck even if you try and keep it black beatdown-ish.

Good luck!

[Fubar]

1) Screw LD (that would be land destruction) with black. If you can't win, you lose. Stalling the game only helps your opponent by costing you valuable early game turns.

Actually, strip mine might be one of the best lands printed.  And a deck like this lives on it's disruption.  I don't know what decks you face, but mana deniel is your friend, find some null rods. 

[swooop]

Land
9 Swamp
4 Bloodstained Mire
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine
18 land

Instants/Sorceries
4 Duress
2 Unmask
2 Cabal Therapy
4 Dark Ritual
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Demonic Consultation
2 Diabolic Edict
2 Dark blast
1 Death Wish
1 Yawgmoths Will
22 spells

Enchantments/Artifacts
1 Necropotence
1 Mox Jet
1 Black Lotus
4 Chalice of the Void
1 Lotus Petal
8 Enchantments/Artifacts

Creatures
2 Nantuko Shade
4 Dark confidant
4 Phyrexian Negator
2 Withered Wretch
12 Creatures

Sideboard
2 Nantuko shade
1 Withered Wretch
4 Null Rod
2 Engineered Plague
1 Tendrils of agony
1 Diabolic Edict
4 Leyline of the void


These are the changes i would make to the deck (in bold) although i haven't played this style of deck in at least 2 years.
I find the land destruction route to be ineffective in most match ups nowadays my plan would be to land some early beats then to bust into a tendrils of a will mid game, I don't believe this deck has a long game or ever can

[Guli]

please play with withered wretch for 20 games and you will be the one calling yourself ceazy not to play with them

[Harlequin]

Swoops decklist looks pretty good, and I would have to agree with Guli on thw wretches.  I would say from Swoop's list anywhere you see that Skittering Guy, replace him with Withered wretch.  You miss out on 1 dmg per turn, but you gain a ton more disruption.   Also where is your mindtwist? 

You might aslo think about the black leyline on the side as a 4 of.  So from Scoops list I would say
--- Main Deck-----------
-2 Skittering Skirge
-1 Chalice of the void (moved to SB)

+2 Withered Wretch
+1 Mind Twist

---- Sideboard----------
-3 Planarvoid
-2 Skitting Skirge

+4 Leyline of the Void
+1 Chalice of the void (from MD)

[swooop]

Good call on the leylines they also function better against instant speed effects(necromancy), I'm not a fan of the wretches they feel to much like control to me but that is a personal viewpoint. The economics of mindtwist don't feel like it should work early ritual mana should be used to drop beaters not randomly luckshot for the win. I think your right about the skirge's though just can't bring myself to recommend flesh reaver in the same deck as dark confidant will change the decklist to accommodate the recommended changes.

[Draven]

Swoops decklist looks pretty good, and I would have to agree with Guli on thw wretches.  I would say from Swoop's list anywhere you see that Skittering Guy, replace him with Withered wretch.  You miss out on 1 dmg per turn, but you gain a ton more disruption.   Also where is your mindtwist? 

You might aslo think about the black leyline on the side as a 4 of.  So from Scoops list I would say
--- Main Deck-----------
-2 Skittering Skirge
-1 Chalice of the void (moved to SB)

+2 Withered Wretch
+1 Mind Twist

---- Sideboard----------
-3 Planarvoid
-2 Skitting Skirge

+4 Leyline of the Void
+1 Chalice of the void (from MD)

I don't think you need the Leylines with 4 Wretches. The Wretches are just as good, plus, they come with a 2/2 body. Other wise, it looks good...

[swooop]

I played this deck against workshop.dec (stax and aggro) and it just can't cut it absolutely terrible in fact the disruption was useless in the matches I played as is it might be another two years of set releases before i play this again, wasn't actually that bad versus a gifts deck leyline after boarding usually wins the match with little fuss. Back to the drawing board it seems .

[thatguynextdoor]

What I don't like about this deck is the fact that you are not casting a creature until turn 2 or 3 unless you have Dark Ritual (assuming if you had it that it wasn't Duressed away). This now means you will not be attacking until turn 3 or 4...by which you will probably be dead or in a lock nearing your ultimate demise.

If you decide you want to stick with mono black, In my opinion, you will need quicker creatures-its that simple. You put your opponents on no type of clock at all with this build (as far as creatures go). I mean smaller quicker creatures don't really put a Tier 1 deck on a clock either, but its a heck of a lot better off for you. Also, you may want to consider Mishras Factories too, I know that the only successful mono black decks Ive seen (mono black aggro's that is) ran which seemed to improve matchups just a wee bit.

[ArthurKing]

Is Nether Void not played anymore?
Is that a stupid question? I havent played Magic since they changed the look of the cards...

[Fred The Ev]

I have changed some things as per pyr0ma5ta's suggestions

Lands(19)
5 Swamp
4 Underground Sea
4 Polluted Delta
1 Bloodstained Mire
4 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine

Creatures(4)
4 Hypnotic Specter

Enchantments/Artifacts(5)
1 Black Lotus
1 Mox Jet
2 Chalice of the Void
1 Yawgmoth's Bargain

Instants/Sorceries(32)
4 Dark Ritual
4 Duress
1 Vampiric Tutor
4 Cabal Ritual
1 Demonic Tutor
4 Tendrils of Agony
4 Hymn to Tourach
1 Yawgmoth's Will
4 Unmask
1 Ancestral Recall
4 Brainstorm

Sideboard(15)
2 Chalice of the Void
2 Nantuko Shade
4 Engineered Plague
3 Diabolic Edict
4 Tormod's Crypt

Yes Yes Yes the swoops deck looks very nice, but i would really rather play control. I'm mainly not sure about the SB and land. I figure that the ratio of Mana-Producing to Fetch should be 2:1 but then well then i started really overthinking it, I only have 9 lands that can give me blue mana, and though i just need one, it still seems a little low, especially when dark ritual cant produce blue and there is no chance in hell of Black Lotus getting sacked for blue. Is 9 to low, You tell me. I also have my doubts about the sideboard.....

[thatguynextdoor]

I would HIGHLY reccomend maybe playing Planar Void over Crypt since
1. its unaffected by Pithing Needle and Powder Keg, and all the anti-artifact hate
2. Most decks run key spells at 1 (ie Goblin Welder, Brainstorm, etc) making them more hesitant to play Chalice at it