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cloudstrife7
12-23-2008, 04:59 PM
Not sure if this is the right place, but I'll post in the deck thread later if this is wrong.

Say you are too poor for Thoughtseize and Sinkhole in MBA, what are the best replacements?
I get that duress works for Thoughtseize, but I'm pretty convinced that 8 discard spells is not enough against the majority of decks. Also, there doesn't seem to be a logical replacement for sinkhole.

Is it best to use blackmail and icequake/rancid earth if you're short on cash, or should you concentrate on keeping as high a concentration of good cards as possible?

Arsenal
12-23-2008, 05:03 PM
Duress + Hymn is an effective discard package. I would definitely stick with good spells instead of mediocre ones.

Like, if you can't afford Sinkholes, don't play Icequake. Play more discard (good spells) instead. Or use that open slot for additional removal (again, good removal spells).

Also, how "budget" are you looking to go? Because while a playset of Thoughtseize are expensive, a playset of Confidant + Specter + Negator + Shade + Jitte/Sword of can become quite expensive too.

cloudstrife7
12-23-2008, 05:36 PM
Anything $4.00 or less per copy is fair game, anything between $4.00 and $7.00 is alright if it states an ironclad case.

I opened swords in packs a while back, and as for the creature list, quality black creatures are a dime a dozen. I've got 4 tombstalker and 4 plague sliver to serve as wincons... nevermind, here's the list as of right now.

4 Dark Ritual
4 Duress
4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Snuff Out
1 SoFI
1 SoLS

4 Carnophage
4 Tombstalker
4 Plague Sliver
21 Swamps

9 Empty spots, currently filled by 1 diabolic edict 2 blackmail 3 withered wretch and 3 hand of honor, which often disappoint.

4th edition hippies are within my price range, I just don't have them yet.

Citrus-God
12-23-2008, 05:44 PM
// Lands 26
4 Dark Ritual
4 Mishra's Factory
18 Swamp


// Creatures 18
4 Carnophage
4 Sarcomancy
4 Hypnotic Specter
2 Plague Sliver
4 Phyrexian Scuta


// Spells 16
4 Duress
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Snuff Out


// Sideboard 15
4 Engineered Plague
4 Relic of Progenitus
4 Perish
3 Diabolic Edict


IMO, stay away from Tombstalkers. You don't have fetchlands to power them out aggressively. I'd say stick to 12 disruption spells and a ton of fatties. Phyrexian Scuta are probably better than Plague Sliver, but you should run both anyway.

The Sideboard is a little jankity, but don't run the board I provided. You might have a better SB than I do.

You should try and find a way to get Umezawa's Jitte. It is much better than Sword of Fire and Ice. Much better.

Shabbaman
01-02-2009, 05:18 AM
9 Empty spots, currently filled by 1 diabolic edict 2 blackmail 3 withered wretch and 3 hand of honor, which often disappoint.

Instead of Blackmail you can expand your discard suite with Unmask.

Captain Hammer
01-02-2009, 01:51 PM
Run a standard sui black list with Snuff Out but subbing out Thoughtseize and Sinkhole.

Duress replaces Thoughtseize.

Additional removal/discard replaces sinkhole. Options include Smother, Edict, Jitte and even Augur of Skulls.

If you don't have fetchlands to power Tombstalkers, play Dark Confidants instead (they're $5 per card on ebay). But if you're playing Confidant, you should cut the Snuff Outs too, for Smother/Edict.

Don't play crap like Phyrexian Scuta/Plague Sliver, play Ashenmoor Gouger, it's very good for the cc.

I don't think the 2 power zombies are worth playing nowadays but I could be wrong.

Citrus-God
01-03-2009, 05:20 AM
If you don't have fetchlands to power Tombstalkers, play Dark Confidants instead (they're $5 per card on ebay). But if you're playing Confidant, you should cut the Snuff Outs too, for Smother/Edict.

That could work too, but the inclusion of Confidant can make the post-Counterbalance very hard to play properly, especially with Smothers/Edicts instead of Snuff Out.


Don't play crap like Phyrexian Scuta/Plague Sliver, play Ashenmoor Gouger, it's very good for the cc.



Who says you cant play both Scuta/Plague Sliver and Ashenmoor Gouger? I think he should play more of these cards mainly because of the fact that Sui Black relies so much on opening hands that it'd be nice to run cards like Scuta as well. But now that I think about it, you should be running both Ashenmoor Gouger and Phyrexian Negator. Flesh Reaver is also really good.

DalkonCledwin
01-03-2009, 09:07 AM
now that I am starting to get away from the budget aspect of my deck I don't mind sharing some of my secrets for budget cards:

Okay here it goes:

Wasteland >>> Ghost Quarter
Sinkhole >>> Rain of Tears /// Icequake
Thoughtseize >>> Duress
Fetch Lands >>> Ordinary Swamps

Basically the list I had been running looks something like the following:

//Creatures:
4 Tombstalker
4 Hypnotic Specter
1 Ashenmoor Gouger
4 Stromgald Crusader
3 Carnophage

//Instants:
3 Rend Flesh
2 Diabolic Edict
2 Smother
4 Dark Ritual

//Sorceries:
4 Rain of Tears
4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Duress

//Lands:
4 Ghost Quarter
17 Swamp

As soon as I was able to, I managed to upgrade the Quarters to Wastelands, then I worked on improving the creature base. I also improved the disruption base as well. I also improved the Land Base in general. So yeah budget decks are nice, but they only get you so far.

@ Tombstalker: I have never had a problem getting him out even without fetch lands. So I see no reason not to run him in a Suicide Black list even without the fetch lands. He really is the best creature (with minimal drawbacks) that the color has to offer. As such I highly recommend running him regardless of if you have fetch lands or not.

Captain Hammer
01-03-2009, 10:23 AM
Okay here it goes:

Wasteland >>> Ghost Quarter
Sinkhole >>> Rain of Tears /// Icequake
Thoughtseize >>> Duress
Fetch Lands >>> Ordinary Swamps

With the exception of Swamp and Duress, all the other alternatives are crap.

Do NOT play crappy cards because they are similar to but worse than the staples.

Play other good cards instead.

For example.

Wasteland > Mishra's Factory
Sinkhole > Edict/Augur of Skulls
Thoughtseize > Duress

DalkonCledwin
01-03-2009, 11:21 AM
With the exception of Swamp and Duress, all the other alternatives are crap.

Do NOT play crappy cards because they are similar to but worse than the staples.

Play other good cards instead.

For example.

Wasteland > Mishra's Factory
Sinkhole > Edict/Augur of Skulls
Thoughtseize > Duress

The problem with your suggestion, is that Suicide Black basically thrives on its land destruction capabilities. Part of the entire strategy is to deny the opponent its mana. As such, Mishra's Factory, while it is a good card, and a cheap alternative to Wasteland, really has no place in the deck. Likewise Rain of Tears really is the only cheap alternative to sinkhole that you can run, as it is the only card that accomplishes the job of destroying land (unless you want to run Blight or Smallpox instead?). Suffice to say, I have done plenty of testing with my budget deck (the example I provided) and it plays incredibly well. So I would highly recommend that over anything you suggested.

Especially if the person in question can afford some of the more expensive cards at some point (even if they can't get Sinkholes maybe at somepoint they can upgrade to Wastelands and Thoughtseizes). I already provided this person an example of what my deck looks like now that I have upgraded it a bit, and it is far better than the example I posted here. And no, I will not be posting that list on these forums.

Captain Hammer
01-03-2009, 09:46 PM
Are you seriously arguing that Ghost Quarter is NOT garbage!

90% of the decks in the format play atleast 2 basics.

So 90% of the time, the only person you're mana screwing with Ghost Quarter is yourself.

Rain of Tears and Icequake are not comparable to Sinkhole. There is a world of difference between blowing up thier land turn two and playing a threat turn 3, and blowing up their land turn three and playing out your threat on turn 4 instead. Turn 2 Sinkhole sticks them at one mana. Odds are, they already played out the one casting card in their hand, so you essentially time walked yourself.

Turn 3 Icequake sticks them at 2 mana. They will have several options to choose from when deciding what to play. You didn't time walk them. And yet, you spent more mana to do it. At that point, you're better off attemping a higher creature kill count instead of land destruction.

Valtrix
01-03-2009, 11:38 PM
Indeed. Three cost land destruction is not what this deck needs. Especially without wasteland there's just no point in running land destruction at all. Committing only halfway to a strategy is bad. Likewise, I don't think mishra's factory is the way to replace wasteland. It's only a threat, but at that job it's mediocre. It really can't help you play cards in your deck because you need black mana for almost everything. In addition, you're going to want to be pumping out creatures instead of using a mana to attack with a measly 2/2. I wish there was a good manland in black...But there's not. Also, ghost quarter will not help you at all. Simply don't play it.

I'm not sure how well the swords would work in this. They seem clunky, and the three mana cost seems like too much when you want to aggro them to death. That said, I think they are probably reasonable. You lose in speed, but it lets you make a creature able to compete with larger creatures. The biggest thing you need to worry about are large creatures of your opponent's, and being able to take away things they start with that can X for 1 you. That's way bad for you.

DalkonCledwin
01-04-2009, 12:51 AM
Are you seriously arguing that Ghost Quarter is NOT garbage!....

Turn 3 Icequake sticks them at 2 mana. They will have several options to choose from when deciding what to play. You didn't time walk them. And yet, you spent more mana to do it. At that point, you're better off attemping a higher creature kill count instead of land destruction.

I think you fail to realize the full potential of land destruction in a suicide deck. The purpose of it is not necessarily to keep an opponent at 1 mana or whatever you think it is. Rather the better goal to achieve with Land Destruction in a Suicide Deck is to color screw your opponent, so that they are unable to play whatever spells of the color that you screw them of happens to be.

For which job it little matters if you are playing 2 or 3 casting cost Land Destruction or even Ghost Quarter. But on one point I will agree with you. Ghost Quarter is garbage, and should be replaced with Wastelands ASAP.

Captain Hammer
01-04-2009, 08:44 AM
Forget about replacing Ghost Quarter in a budget list with Wastelands asap.

Ghost Quarter shouldn't be played at all, period, in a budget list or otherwise.

And no, color screw is not the main purpose of LD in sui black. And even if it were, Ghost Quarter can only colorscrew probably 15% of the decks in the format, and even then only for a turn or two even under ideal circumstances.

In my thresh list for instance, I play 2 Island, 1 Forest, and 1 Plains. I couldn't care less about Ghost Quarter.

As others pointed out, without Wastelands, the whole LD strategy is pointless. Don't bother with 3cc LD spells, just play more removal instead. Assuming that you already play 4x Snuff Out, both Edict and Smother work well.

DalkonCledwin
01-04-2009, 02:27 PM
you seem to be forgetting that this is both the casual and budget forum. In any case, I have been running 3cc Land Destruction spells for weeks, and been able to top 4 with them regularly. So yeah, the cards are not as bad as you seem to think they are.

Valtrix
01-04-2009, 02:35 PM
Just because you top 8 with a deck doesn't mean that it's good/optimal. Just because this is a budget question doesn't mean you have to play a bad deck.

3cc land destruction is pointless. The only reason that the LD in the deck is so good is because of how cheap sinkhole + wasteland (+ hymn) is. LD is one of those things that you can't do half-heartedly. In order to make it worthwhile playing at all you need both those parts. Using a more expensive sinkhole and no wasteland just doesn't help at that point. And since you can't get them off of lands fast enough, it makes more sense to play more removal for the cards that they manage to get out and so that your guys can get through. At three mana I'd rather play unmake than LD, and unmake isn't even very good. Especially since there's no thoughtseize in a budget build it becomes even more important to get rid of creatures.

Arsenal
01-04-2009, 05:59 PM
The problem with your suggestion, is that Suicide Black basically thrives on its land destruction capabilities.

This is not true at all. Suicide Black is not dependant on land destruction, but rather discard. In ALL Suicide Black decks, there is a strong presence of discard (Duress, Thoughtseize, Hymn, Hippy), but land destruction may or may not be present. A quick glance at deckcheck.net proves my point; land destruction may be able to get worked into the deck, but it is nowhere near as vital as discard spells.

If I were looking into a budget version of Suicide Black, it makes a lot more sense to run cheap discard + cheap removal + cheap threats instead of watered down land destruction elements that aren't even necessary. The ONLY build of Suicide Black that I've seen effectively running Sinkhole + Wasteland is the tempo-based Tombstalker builds, and even then, those builds run a minimum of 8 discard (4 Thoughtseize + 4 Hymn) and Hippy.

In summary, discard is the backbone of the disruptive elements in Suicide Black, not land destruction.

DalkonCledwin
01-04-2009, 08:17 PM
This is not true at all. Suicide Black is not dependant on land destruction, but rather discard. In ALL Suicide Black decks, there is a strong presence of discard (Duress, Thoughtseize, Hymn, Hippy), but land destruction may or may not be present. A quick glance at deckcheck.net proves my point; land destruction may be able to get worked into the deck, but it is nowhere near as vital as discard spells.

You bring up a fair point. I will concede this. However if you aren't going to be running Land Destruction in a Suicide Black deck, then I would automatically be running Dark Meekstone, or some similar variation on the Suicide Black list. At least that is my personal preference.

overseer1234
01-05-2009, 06:01 AM
You bring up a fair point. I will concede this. However if you aren't going to be running Land Destruction in a Suicide Black deck, then I would automatically be running Dark Meekstone, or some similar variation on the Suicide Black list. At least that is my personal preference.

Yeah, but that would require BBlossom's and well... they're not going to be budget until they rotate out of standard.

DalkonCledwin
01-05-2009, 12:07 PM
Yeah, but that would require BBlossom's and well... they're not going to be budget until they rotate out of standard.

that isn't necessarily true... take goyf for example...

in any case, I don't think you can honestly build a competitive sui black without some form of moderate investment into the deck.

throst54
01-05-2009, 03:59 PM
The pro white knights are generally a great option for budget mbc, as they dodge most of the popular removal in the format.
I usually just go with Black Knight, but thats because im already running Nantuko Shade.

Another card I've always liked in mbc is Funeral Charm. It adds to your discard suite, and allows for combat tricks.
It'll never be the MVP of the deck, but its always good.

ryaneriggs
04-27-2011, 03:28 PM
Why not run Smallpox? It hurts you too, but it will still get them to 1 land by turn 2...also wipes out a creature and rids them of 1 life...not too horrible for BB.

Doomhed
06-06-2011, 01:34 AM
if you can't afford sinkholes, use Blight. sure they get an activation out of the land, but that is all they get.

Also, I recommend Drinker of sorrow over negator, as lightning bolt is everywhere lately, as is lavamancer, and we all know how much negator hates burn.

evanmartyr
06-07-2011, 01:03 AM
if you can't afford sinkholes, use Blight. sure they get an activation out of the land, but that is all they get.

Also, I recommend Drinker of sorrow over negator, as lightning bolt is everywhere lately, as is lavamancer, and we all know how much negator hates burn.

Blight is a half-decent budget replacement for Sinkhole, but Rancid Earth may be better, since it gives them as many extra uses out of their land while having additional functionality.

If Lightning Bolt is everywhere, I'd suggest any random 4 toughness thing, not Drinker of Sorrow. Dross Harvester is a good option.

vikram
06-07-2011, 02:44 AM
Don't bother with Sinkhole. It only works on occasion, and is useless just as often. The only reason to play it is if you're playing a full playset of Wasteland to supplement it. And the ld strategy is still not consistent enough to be worth it imo.

If you want to play budget sui black, play this list...
21 Swamp
4 Dark Ritual

2 Inquisition of Kozilek
2 Duress
2 Cabal Therapy
3(2) Rite of Consumption
4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Go for the Throat

4 Dark Confidant
4 Gatekeeper of Malakir
3(4) Nyxathid
3 Abyssal Persecutor
4 Phyrexian Obliterator


It's actually a very competitive list. And the only expensive cards in it are Confidant and Obliterator. A playset of either card will cost you less than the cost of just one dual.

Gui
06-08-2011, 02:08 PM
Phyrexian Revoker
Nantuko Shade
Arrogant Bloodlord
Knight of Stromgald
Order of the Ebon Hand
Gatekeeper of Malakir
Vampire Nighthawk

Inquisition of Kozilek
Duress
Hymn to Tourach

Bojuka Bog
Faerie Macabre

Doom Blade
Go for the Throat
Vendetta
Diabolic Edict
Cursed Scroll

There are so, sooo many good options in Black Budget Builds... as long as you have 4x Bob, any of these can make the cut.
I'd start with Nantuko, Revoker and Bloodlord as kills, Duress + Inquisition + Hymn as discard, and Go for the Throat + Diabolic + Malakir as removal, with a lot of Swamps.

DragoFireheart
06-11-2011, 06:49 PM
Sui Black is easily one of the best budget decks you could make. I know he's expensive now, but Phyrexian Obliterator may become cheaper at some point. It's worth watching his price to see if he falls in price.

Iare
06-21-2011, 12:39 PM
I put this together for loaning out to someone, its budget but it top 8'd a local tournament of 14 people. (Yea big tournament whatever)

Creatures- 19
4x Hippies
4x Dauthi Slayer
4x Big Game Hunter
3x Nantuko shade
4x Gatekeeper of Malikar

Spells- 22
4x Dark Ritual
4x Inquisition of Kozilek
4x Hymn to Tourach
4x Sign in blood
4x Go for the throat
2x Darksteel axe

Lands- 19
17x Swamps
2x Cabal Coffers

Sideboard
4x Engineered plague
4x Nullrod
4x Tormod's crypt
3x Duress


If anyone is looking for a cheap tier 1.5 deck that can roll with the big boys I would suggest trying this out. You have potential card advantage in Sign in blood, hippies, gatekeeper, hymn, and big game hunter.

Your worst matchup is Goblins, your only hope is to lucksack game 1 or Engineered plague games two and three. Otherwise this deck maintains pretty neutral matchups across the board, you really aren't overly favored in any match ups or behind in any (Except goblins and combo can be rough at times but is winnable). This deck is especially good against other aggro control decks, since it runs a full 12 removal spells (4 go for the throat 4 Gatekeeper and 4 Big game hunter) and a whole bunch of card advantage.