INTRODUCTION:  LIFE AND DEATH

We now have the Golgari deck to build.  Green and Black are traditionally the colors of life and death.  Green loves nature and big beasts.  Black loves power and big scary monsters.  With both colors bringing the beats, I'm guessing the combination should do fairly well in creature combat.  Sounds like they should go together like peanut butter and jelly to me.

Another Green Lantern, but no White this time. 

There are actually a few popular commanders out there in this color combination.  I built a Nath of the Gilt-Leaf deck when he first came out, and it was pretty fun.  For me, at least.  However, I definitely did not make any friends with this deck, as random discard pleases no one on the receiving end.  Another popular commander is Savra, Queen of the Golgari.  Savra is definitely a "build around me" general, with a lot of sacrificing and Grave Pact effects.  However, I wanted to work with something a little less played.  Vhati il-Dal isn't overly popular, but I'd rather attack with my general and it seem like he would be held back most of the time.  You guys already know who I picked, so I guess I will just shut up now.
 

THE DECK:  BRING ON THE BEATS!

Let's take a look at our Commander:

Sapling has a couple of good things going for her.  First, she's indestructible.  That's pretty sweet, actually.  You don't have to worry about Wrath of God, Oblivion Stone or Damnation destroying your general.  Just keep in mind that this won't prevent her from being tucked by Condemn.  Second, she has the ability to draw you cards, just by attacking!  So you can send her into the storm with impunity, not worrying about whether she will survive, to see what's on the top of your deck.  Keep in mind, however, that you will only draw the card if it is a creature.  That obviously means that we are going to focus on a creature heavy/centric deck.  Finally, you have the ability to gain life with Sapling.  This is minor, but can be useful.

What are her drawbacks?  Well, she costs a lot.  At 5 mana, she probably won't be coming out extremely quickly.  But on top of that, she only has 2 power.  That's just sad.  However, we don't need for her to be a powerhouse, as we are going to have our other creatures in the deck do the dirty work for us.  She only needs to draw cards and be indestructible.  She's also a good roadblock against big scary monsters as well.

Before I show you the deck, I'm going to show you a card that seems to be popular in Sapling decks, but that I did not include.  Here it is:

If you equip Sapling with Worldslayer and there is an open opponent, you pretty much have the game sealed up.  Of course, it's not a foregone conclusion that you will win, as someone can draw a random Path to Exile.  But then it's just everyone starting over.  Meanwhile, all you've been doing is attacking for 2 the entire time.  That's just annoying.  I guess you could pack your deck full of Darksteel creatures and stuff as well, so that they would stick around after Worldslayer hits, but I didn't go this route.  If you like this idea, feel free to add it to the deck.  I would probably also include a couple of larger indestructible creatures, like Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre, so that you can at least beatdown quicker.  But it wasn't for me.  With that out of the way, here is the deck:

Sapling of Colfenor

A Commander Deck

Creatures 1 Acidic Slime 1 Avatar of Woe 1 Avenger of Zendikar 1 Deadwood Treefolk 1 Dread 1 Duplicant 1 Fauna Shaman 1 Genesis 1 Geth, Lord of the Vault 1 Grave Titan 1 Grave-Shell Scarab 1 Graveborn Muse 1 Ink-Eyes, Servant of Oni 1 Lord of Extinction 1 Mephidross Vampire 1 Multani, Maro-Sorcerer 1 Nezumi Graverobber 1 Oracle of Mul Daya 1 Pelakka Wurm 1 Pestilence Demon 1 Primeval Titan 1 Puppeteer Clique 1 Rampaging Baloths 1 Sapling of Colfenor 1 Shriekmaw 1 Silklash Spider 1 Solemn Simulacrum 1 Spiritmonger 1 Terastodon 1 Tornado Elemental 1 Triskelion 1 Vigor 1 Vulturous Zombie 1 Wickerbough Elder 1 Woodfall Primus 1 Xathrid Demon 1 Yavimaya Dryad 1 Yavimaya Elder 38 cards Other Spells [Artifacts] 1 Loxodon Warhammer 1 Oblivion Stone 1 Well of Lost Dreams [Enchantments] 1 Defense of the Heart 1 Gift of the Deity 1 Lurking Predators 1 Mirri's Guile 1 Phyrexian Arena 1 Phyrexian Reclamation 1 Storm Front 1 Sylvan Library 1 The Abyss 1 Wild Pair [Instants] 1 Putrefy 1 Rootgrapple [Sorceries] 1 Beacon of Unrest 1 Damnation 1 Maelstrom Pulse 1 Natural Order 1 Primal Command 1 Profane Command 1 Scapeshift 1 Sylvan Scrying 1 Tooth and Nail 24 cards

Lands 1 Bojuka Bog 1 Cabal Coffers 1 Crypt of Agadeem 1 Gaea's Cradle 1 Ghost Quarter 1 Golgari Rot Farm 1 Llanowar Wastes 1 Mikokoro, Center of the Sea 1 Miren, the Moaning Well 1 Mosswort Bridge 1 Mouth of Ronom 1 Overgrown Tomb 1 Phyrexian Tower 1 Reliquary Tower 1 Shizo, Death's Storehouse  9 Snow-Covered Forest 7 Snow-Covered Swamp 1 Treetop Village 1 Twilight Mire 1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth 1 Verdant Catacombs 1 Vivid Grove 1 Vivid Marsh 1 Volrath's Stronghold 38 cards

The deck actually has less creatures than I was originally going for, but I just couldn't cut some of my non-creature spells.  Oh well.  Anyway, here's a breakdown of the card categories:

Recursion

Deadwood Treefolk, Genesis, Geth, Lord of the Vault, Ink-Eyes, Servant of Oni, Nezumi Graverobber, Puppeteer Clique, Volrath's Stronghold, Phyrexian Reclamation, Beacon of Unrest, Profane Command:  You are going to be playing with a bunch of big scary dudes, and there are times when you are going to want them back.  In addition, you may also want to play with the creatures in your opponents' graveyards as well.  Well, here you go.  I've been waiting to draw Geth, but he hasn't come up yet.  I'm sure he will rock though.

Targeted Removal

Acidic Slime, Avatar of Woe, Duplicant, Shriekmaw, Terastodon, Wickerbough Elder, Woodfall Primus, Putrefy, Rootgrapple, Maelstrom Pulse, Profane Command, Mouth of Ronom:  You have a variety of ways of getting rid of various problems.  And if you use creatures for your dirty work and they die, you can usually get them back with your recursion.  Snow lands are in there specifically for use with Mouth of Ronom.  And you should usually have a treefolk out for drawing your extra card with Rootgrapple.

Tutoring

Fauna Shaman, Defense of the Heart, Wild Pair, Natural Order, Tooth and Nail, Primal Command:  Occasionally you are going to need an answer, and you are going to want that answer right now.  Use these tutors to get what you want. In addition, you may have noticed the 2 creature combos in the deck.  The first is the traditional Mephidross Vampire/Triskelion combo.  The second is Pestilence Demon/Vigor.  I don't feel bad about playing either of these combos, as they are both pretty easy to disrupt.  But if you don't want answers to enchantments or artifacts, these are probably the creatures you want to search up with Defense of the Heart and Tooth and Nail.

Creature Control

Dread, Pestilence Demon, Damnation, Gift of the Deity, The Abyss:  You have a couple of good methods of creature control in the deck.  If you have Sapling out, The Abyss has practically no effect on you.  Just choose to target Sapling, which cannot be destroyed, and then go about your business.  Good times! Gift of the Deity is pretty cool.  It pumps Sapling and gives her Lure and deathtouch.  Since she's indestructible, she will stick around so that you can attack someone else again next turn.  I like it a lot.

Flying Defense

Silklash Spider, Tornado Elemental, Storm Front:  When I made this deck, I was fairly concerned about Skithiryx.  Therefore, I added a few methods of dealing with him.  As long as Skittles doesn't have shroud, you should be able to tap him down with Storm Front.  The Spider can oftentimes have enough mana to destroy him if you are prepared. In addition, there are a couple of flyers in the deck itself, so you can oftentimes have a blocker anyways.

Now there probably isn't as much mass removal in the deck as you may expect.  With only Damnation and Oblivion Stone, you may be in trouble sometimes.  But I didn't often find it to be an issues.  If you want more, feel free to include Decree of Pain and Nevinyrral's Disk.

Since the draw depends on having a creature on the top of your deck, it is nice to stack it.  Deck stacking is performed here by Mirri's Guile and Sylvan Library.  These are good for making sure that you do draw a creature when Sapling attacks.  You can also use Sensei's Divining Top if you want, I just didn't want to have to deal with activating it all the time.  Since you actually gain life every time you draw a card with Sapling, Well of Lost Dreams can allow you to draw more.

Scapeshift and Primeval Titan are great at searching up Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth and Cabal Coffers together.  In addition, I really wanted Xathrid Demon to work.  He is a pretty big beater on his own, and if you have out a decent sized Lord of Extinction or Multani, Maro-Sorcerer, that can really hurt your opponents.  Plus, who doesn't like a big hungry demon on their team?

So basically this is a creature beat down deck.  Play your critters and stomp on people.  There aren't a whole lot of tricks, and with only 2 Instants in the deck, it reminds me of the decks that I used to play with.  So you will get beat by combo, but there are plenty of times you are going to just squish people.  Good times.  So let's see how the deck does.
 

THE GAME:  FIGHT!

Here are my opponents:

Avatar of Woe, Snow-Covered Swamp, Vulturous Zombie, Pelakka Wurm, Snow-Covered Forest, Snow-Covered Forest, Xathrid Demon

 

CONCLUSION

The MVP of the game for my opponents was this card:

This card is great at reusing cards in the graveyard, and also exiling something you are worried about having to see again.  And when facing off against a couple of green decks, you can be sure that there will be at least a few utility creatures in the graveyard.  It's a pretty good card that you should consider using in almost all of your decks that use Black.

So the deck is pretty much straight beat down, which is a fun change of pace if you are used to playing control.  With a couple of little synergies and combos in the deck, you should be able to clear the way for your large beasts to mash face.  There isn't a whole lot of defense in the deck against combo and graveyard hate, so if you want, feel free to add Relic of Progenitus.

You can check out the deck for download or purchase HERE.  The deck comes out to around 215 tickets, which is sort of pricey.  Avenger of Zendikar, Primeval Titan and Natural Order are the 3 most expensive cards in the deck.  The Order can be replaced with something like Worldly Tutor but the other two are tough.  I guess Journeyer's Kite is repeatable land search.  Keep in mind that Survival of the Fittest is a great card that you should add if you own one.  I just noticed that Survival is now over 60 tix, and I'm glad I picked up my copy a while ago.  Another card that would be useful is Pernicious Deed, which is a lot cheaper than it used to be.

Hope you liked the deck.  Until next week!

Leviathan, aka Tarasco on MTGO
mrmorale32 at yahoo dot com

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