As for sweepers, the best one imo Dead of Winter. You use edict effects to counter cheated creatures anyway.
I like Illness in the Ranks as it castrates Monastery Mentor, Young Pyromancer and Empty the Warrens, all 3 are in top tier decks. Against delver night of souls' betrayal is the ultimate, but also nearly impossible to resolve. For the mana I want The Abyss. I think these are all the options:
Dread of night
the abyss
illness in the ranks
Night of Souls' Betrayal
Engineered Plague
Plague Engineer
Toxic Deluge is likely a little more reliable than Dead of Winter, unless you are dedicated to Astrolabe and a higher than normal SC-Swamp count. I also like Marsh Casualties and Darkblast for sweepers/repeatable removal.
Honestly, Plague Engineer is good enough to be a maindeck card in Pox. It does everything you want, it just doesn't play well with Smallpox/Innocent Blood if he's you're only creature on board. I would want to go deep with it though, with something like Unearth to provide some card draw and combos with Plague Engineer post-Smallpox/blocking.
As for PW's, it's one of the few ways that Pox really can't interact outside of combat (which is usually not enough with anemic threats like Bloodghast, Factory.) Bitterblossom is really good at pressuring planeswalkers, but I wouldn't leave home without some number of Pithing Needle in my sideboard, likely 3.
Brainstorm Realist
I close my eyes and sink within myself, relive the gift of precious memories, in need of a fix called innocence. - Chuck Shuldiner
Black has a lot of stuff against planeswalkers. Murderous Rider does a lot, but you can also sideboard Noxious Grasp to deal with Oko/Teferi. Pithing Needle often catches Abrupt Decay, or in bant match ups, Teferi can clear the way for Oko, and Oko can clear the way for Teferi.
I have 3 copies of The Elderspell split in my 75 which is pretty clean.
Having 8 Planeswalkers of my own helps make it complete as an effect.
All cards acquired for the top8 deck I'll be running tonight. I REALLY want to change a few things but out of respect for the pilot and their finish I'll run their list for now. I got a few reps out of it vs a gruul aggro deck last night and the bitterblossoms got my life count scary low (first time main decking these), but i don't expect to be taking multiple ball lightnings on the chin tonight so that should be a huge issue. It was fun hiding behind the bridge when I was able to stick it.
Early thoughts are the deck needs more lands/B mana sources, but we'll see how it really plays out against the field. I'll take as good of notes as I can and get the write up in tomorrow most likely.
Write up from tonight, using the exact decklist, Tl;dr at the bottom:
22 LANDS
1 Blast Zone
1 Bojuka Bog
2 Castle Locthwain
2 Maze of Ith
9 Swamp
3 Verdant Catacombs
4 Wasteland
3 CREATURES
3 Murderous Rider
22 INSTANTS and SORC.
4 Dark Ritual
2 Fatal Push
3 Hymn to Tourach
1 Innocent Blood
2 Inquisition of Kozilek
4 Liliana's Triumph
1 Mastermind's Acquisition
1 Noxious Revival
4 Thoughtseize
13 OTHER SPELLS
4 Ashiok, Dream Render
3 Bitterblossom
1 Dreadhorde Invasion
3 Liliana of the Veil
2 Liliana, the Last Hope
SIDEBOARD
2 Ensnaring Bridge
1 Extirpate
4 Leyline of the Void
1 Null Rod
2 Pithing Needle
2 Plague Engineer
2 Ratchet Bomb
1 Surgical Extraction
Round 1, Joshua on Punishing Dack (4 color).
R1G1: On the draw, no mulligans. Opening hand: Wasteland, Castle Lockthwain, 2 ashiok, hymn, lili triump, bitterblossom.
He opens with a U Sea and ponders. I waste his sea.
He follows up with a trop and pass.
I IoK, see Trop, Snappy, P fire, Thoughtseize, and Jace. I take the snappy.
He drops a tarn, brainstorms, then thoughtseizes me and takes my bitterblossom. I draw another swamp and hymn him, getting trop and a ponder. He thoughtseizes again and gets my lili last hope. I get ashiok out and start milling. He drops a leo and a Goyf. I get LiliOtv and get his creature with -2 and then use lili's triumph to get the other and force a discard.
He lands an oko next which meats a swift end (murderous rider).
He gets a dack and starts looting but I follow up with another ashiok and mill for the win.
1-0.
I believe i sided out 2 maze of ith for a surgical and extirpate. I elected not to bring in needles for fear of dack stealing them, which as I am typing now realize that is stupid because they'd still work.
R1G2: On the draw. No mulligans. Opening hand: Swamp, Blast zone, bitter blossom, hymn, lili OTV, surgical, fatal push.
My t2 hmyn is met with a veil of summer. He follows up with dack and starts looting and discarding 2 punishing fires. I attempt to surgical them but it gets forced.
I land a t4 bitterblossom which doesn't stick long (Abrupt decay or ass trophy, can't recall). He eventually ultimates dack and pfires my liliOTV at 3 loyalty and steals her. I have to use up a swift end (murderous rider) on it to kill it.
He lands a plague engineer on fairies and eventually just P. fires me to death. I must not have done much this game as I don't have many notes.
1-1. No changes to SB.
R1G3: On the play. we both mull to 6. I get Swamp, innocent blood, bitterblossom, lili LH, ashiok, lili triumpb, caslte lockthwain (bottomed innocent blood).
He starts on a fetch. I go for the turn 2 bitterblossom which gets met with a cracked fetch, a brainstorm, and an assassins trophy before it can get going.
I follow up by wasting his trop and landing an ashiok and begin milling.
Next up is a lili LH which sticks after a brainstorm. He follows up with a dack and starts looting.
Critical play... I IOK and see snappy, grove of burn willows, drown in the lock, and notion thief. I didn't mark what I picked but I think it was snappy. Here is where the big mistake came in. I had him down to 2 cards in hand (one was a notion thief, which I forgot had flash). I had ash, lili LH, and lili OTV. I cast a discard spell to get him with one card left (Notion thief). I uptick lili last hope to 6 ON AN EMPTY BOARD, then Plus 1 on lili OTV which he naturally responds with flashing Notion thief. I don't quite have details on how it happened next but the notion thief ends up killing one lili and I think he bounced the last hope on the next draw (I don't quite remember, but it wound up I lost both walkers in the process).
He lands a jace and starts upticking/fate sealing. With his notion thief and dack, he is having me (him) draw the 2 and me discarding 2. Spicy. But, between the looting and ashiok his library is running light. I force him to draw extra cards from my castle lockthwain through his notion thief. He eventially P Fires his own guy to stop that. I start saving cards as his jace ultimate is coming. He draws his last card the turn he ults jace. I have 3 cards from my hand in my new "library" at this point. And he he has dack loot me for 2, then drops a fresh dack from his hand to have me loot once more for the win.
1-2
Had I sequenced my lili activation better, I'd have been able to keep my walkers on an empty board. He did have a p fires but didn't have the grove to bring it back.
R2 - Jeffrey on mono red prison.
R2G1: on the draw. Opening hand: 2 swamp, 1 castle, hymn, ashiok, lili LH, fatal push.
He mountain and passes. I rip a dark rit off the top and t1 ritual into lili last hope. He comes back with a chrome mox and a 3 ball (not a big deal for this deck, fortunately)
I tick up a few turns until he gets his war boss out. I elect to -2/-1 the war boss to avoid mentor triggers but it didn't really matter.
I hymn but he comes back next turn with a rabblemaster and I'm basically done. I can't do anything useful with the push in my hand without fetches as his dudes had cmc of 3. I was dead pretty quick. which is ok because in g2...
1-3
R2:g2 on the play: opening hand, swampx2, dark rit x2, lili OTV, lili LH, IoK. I keep, obviously, and try to contain the erection growing in my pants. He mulls to 5 after seeing no lands in his first 2. I IoK his chalice (karn tGC, mountain, chalice, rabble master, ancient tomb). He lands a mountain and passes. I dump my hand full of rituals and lilis and he scoops.
2-3
R2:G3. On the draw. Opening hand: swamp, fetch, dark rit, IoK, rider, lil triumph, BB.
He mulls to 6 and i pray for no chalice. Fortunately, he doesn't have it. He opens with tomb, chrome mox for a T1 rabble master. I swiftly end it with swamp + dark rit. He gets out a chalice on 1, which is fine at this point.
I cast the rider from adventure which was good timing as he landed a scab-clan berserker next but couldn't get it to connect to make it renown. I land a bitterblossom.
He lands chalice on 2 (I respond with lili triumph on his goblin token).
I ride BB to victory with rider protection from the scab clan berserker. Last turn had 5 tokens.
3-3.
I believe I sided in bridges and ratchet bombs, siding out ashioks. Never saw em either game.
R3 vs Andrew on 5c snow control.
R3G1: on the draw. opening hand: wasteland, swamp, 2x bitterblossom, hymn, lili OTV.
He fetches for a U Sea and IoKs me, taking 1 bitterblossom. I draw another wasteland so I waste his sea and pass back.
He fetches up a trop and probably ponders. I play my second wasteland and land a BB.
He does nothing so I waste his top and hymn him, getting StP and something else. Unfortunately, I only got 1 token before BB meets an abrupt decay. That being said, I rip another off the top and get up to 3 tokens before he lands an okko and a 3feri and starts bouncing things. Rider takes out his oko, he gets a jace and bounces some more while eventually ultimating jace for the win.
3-4
out 2 maze of ith, 2 innocent blood. In 2 needles, 1 surgical, 1 extirpate.
mull to 6 on the play. Opening hand: swamp, castle, wasteland, fetch, thought seize, lili LH, extirpate (I bottom the fetch).
I TS and see veil, BS, ponder, plague engineer, abrupt decay, vol, and snow island. I chose veil.
I go for my lili LH. he brainstorms, doesn't find a force so I keep it and start ticking up. He fetches a tundra for 3feri and starts upticking as well. I decide kind of randomly to extirpate a BS from his yard (he had BS, ponder, and veil). He had one in his hand as well, lucky me. also had a veil so that could have been good too.
get lots of planewalker support (both lilis) that deals with a couple of plague engineers. I am able to uptick liliLH to 7, but he finds and abrupt decay on his turn at the last possible moment.
eventually jace and oko take over and I die. I don't see a BB until its too late in the game. I will note I did get stuck on 2 lands this game after lots of wastelanding, with riders/PWs in my hand. this was the only game i felt the light land count.
3-5 (1-2)
In summary:
Went 1-2 in rounds, probably should have gone 2-1. Went 3-5 in games, probably should have gone 4-4. But my opponents made mistakes too so perhaps it evened out.
dark rits into early PWs were usually very strong plays.
castle is good mid/late game
i didn't have issues with life loss from my deck like i thought.
The deck kind of hinges on getting a BB to stick and stay. without it, you are reliant on lili LH but the deck, according to my R1 opponent is "nothing but bombs and disruption." He isn't wrong lol.
5 lilis seems to work well for lili's triumph to pull double duty.
Decks in the field were the above plus snow aluren and a green based deck with nissa who shakes the world (I think, didn't get to watch much of that game). There were just 6 of us as the other two just join/dropped so we could start with 8.
Land count seemed fine. That being said, I didn't get hit by a wasteland either and used mine offensively most of the time.
Ash only stopped one fetch activation but it was later in the game so I'm not sure that it would have mattered. He shuffled after a brainstorm anyway so it probably achieved its primary purpose anyway.
I'll clean up the grammar and formatting later but at least those who can't sleep or live on the other side of the world can get their fix.
I think i got my recaps correct but if not, its at least close enough. I'm open for questions as well.
and that is the difference between good player playing a winning deck and a bad one...
bad choices and bad sequencing
and complaining about land count while happy trigger wastelanding is stupid
Brainstorm Realist
I close my eyes and sink within myself, relive the gift of precious memories, in need of a fix called innocence. - Chuck Shuldiner
write up formatted slightly better with a couple new comments:
Land count seemed fine. That being said, I didn't get hit by a wasteland either and used mine offensively most of the time.
Ash only stopped one fetch activation but it was later in the game so I'm not sure that it would have mattered. He shuffled after a brainstorm anyway so it probably achieved its primary purpose anyway.
No problem. I enjoyed playing it and helping the forum.
Hi. You must be new here:
Well, I should be, as I'm the one who topped that tourney. Mana base was just right without being mana screwed or mana flooded.
Acquisition was awkward and so were the bb's. I had to side them out against anything that wasnt control or big fat Marit Lage. Hymn wasnt great either against VoS. Ashioks, Riders and Engineers on the other hand outperformed.
Since then there have been made some positive changes to the list with the help of my friends.
P.S. It's easy to bash something you don't understand.
I don't think anyone bashed the deck, we (or at least I) just hadn't seen one like it and had questions. Based on where we (some of us) had been with smallpox decks having a much higher land count, switching to a poxless MBC type deck was new to us. Was there too much life loss with the riders being only the life gain? We didn't know, we've never played this deck. What about the noxious revival? Initially I thought it was a flexible grave hate but it got back dead walkers or other utility disruptions/removal in testing but I don't know if that is the best use or its intention. Are the fetches to shuffle bottomed riders back into the deck? Seems like it could put the deck at a risk to blood moon otherwise, or is it to avoid getting stuck under a fate sealing Jace? Are the BBs used offensively or defensively to protect the walkers, or is it just matchup dependent? As you said, we (who were posting) didn't have experience with it so we were asking questions and giving thoughts but I don't think anyone bashed it. And I took your exact list as you saw and just above that I said I wanted to make changes but:
I don't have the audacity to take a winning deck and say it sucks and make changes that aren't personal style/lack of access to cards. I'll be the first to admit i'm not a great player as the play lines above indicate. But I'd be happy to hear about the matchups you had (good and bad) and how you approached the tougher ones, and your thoughts on particular card choices. Especially if there are lines that aren't necessarily obvious. the meta in that tournament seemed quite diverse so it lends strength to your showing.
I think any sort of innovation that performs well is welcomed here. Perhaps you got the feeling your deck was being bashed because we said N=1 and Smallpox is still good, but if that's the case I don't think anyone intentionally bashed anything. Pretty convinced your list would be better with an Urborg.
What was the rationale behind Dreadhorde Invasion? Did you ever get any beefy armies or lifelinking armies?
Based on conversation on the FB thread, urborg is a no because it "turns on" opponents fetch lands with ash out. So if you are going to lean on ash to do work I can see why urborg would be skipped.
I was unable to live the dream of stopping fetches in my event so I cant comment on this from experience. Only got to stop one fetch but he cracked it just to shuffle off a brainstorm anyway.
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No offense to the creator but I think the deck is in the wrong thread. By sheer definition, Poxless decks aren't Pox decks. Mono-black control is MBC. That's not a bad thing but I'm not dropping Smallpox for innovation... If I wanted only to develop a winning deck, I'd abandon Pox and just play Temur Delver. I'd find a way to squeeze in Smallpox and Sinkholes in that list. Especially with no Urborgs, Mishra's Factory and includes Ashiok, Dream Renders. The foundation is great
Just for laughs, you could call it a trans-Pox deck?
Three Lilianas to rule them all. One Pox to find them. Smallpox to bring them all and in the Sinkhole bind them!
How about one with 2 Smallpoxes? Just saw this posted; another interesting maybe sort of Pox probably MBC list, top 8 in an 89-player tournament in Italy last week
// 24 Lands
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Castle Locthwain
3 Mutavault
3 Polluted Delta
10 Swamp
3 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
3 Wasteland
// 13 Creatures
3 Asylum Visitor
4 Bloodghast
4 Gatekeeper of Malakir
2 Murderous Rider
// 8 Instants
4 Dark Ritual
4 Liliana's Triumph
// 8 Sorceries
2 Inquisition of Kozilek
2 Smallpox
4 Thoughtseize
// 7 Planeswalkers
3 Liliana of the Veil
4 Sorin, Imperious Bloodlord
// Sideboard
SB: 1 Extirpate
SB: 2 Helm of Obedience
SB: 4 Leyline of the Void
SB: 2 Liliana, the Last Hope
SB: 2 Pithing Needle
SB: 2 Plague Engineer
SB: 2 Ratchet Bomb
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