Why is This Deck?
Golgari midrange has been a stable force in the metagame for months now, and some very powerful Golgari cards were introduced with Outlaws of Thunder Junction, so I wanted to take a crack at adding them and finding out what new cards offered genuine upgrades rather than simply changes for change’s sake.
The Core Gameplan
Midrange decks vary in how controlling versus how aggressive they are. This particular one is very aggressive with cards like Mosswood Dreadknight and Gix, Yawgmoth Praetor offering card advantage on efficiently priced aggressive bodies. In fact, that will be a theme as we break down the other threats of the deck because we’ve prioritized cards that give us additional cards while also applying pressure.
If all of our threats need to be answered, but they all replace themselves in hand, we end up with card advantage over the course of the game. As a result, play out threats that you don’t mind losing first, and also keep in mind the kinds of removal you expect to see. Mosswood Dreadknight is an excellent threat to play as a creature on turn two against black or red opponents whose kill spells will likely not exile and let you recur it, whereas other threats might be preferable against white opponents who will likely exile whatever they see.
The New Early Game
Tinybones is an amazing one-drop that can trade up in combat while also provide card advantage by stealing permanents out of the opponent’s graveyard. In the mid and late game, it’s often best to either keep Tinybones back to block or attack with mana open and take your opponent’s graveyard apart. Keep in mind that every spell cast out of your opponent’s graveyard is one you didn’t have to cast out of your hand, again, generating card advantage.
Card advantage is not only achieved by drawing cards yourself, but also by eliminating resources from your opponent. Hopeless Nightmare was already a card that saw play in some versions of this deck previously, and Tinybones Joins Up can do effectively the same thing with additional damage potential given the sheer number of legendary creatures included in our list.
Tinybones isn’t the only member of the squad who gets a card immortalizing their “You son of a bitch, I’m in” moment. Vraska Joins Up gives deathtouch counters that can supercharge our Mosswood Dreadknight or The Gitrog, Ravenous Ride, but it also provides a sort of Coastal Piracy type effect to give us redundancy with Gix, Yawgmoth Praetor and ultimately massive card advantage.
Card advantage is also the reason for 4x Caustic Bronco. This two-drop can draw cards on every attack and even gives you a way to get damage out of non-hasty creatures that can’t attack right away. If you play Caustic Bronco on two into Gix, Yawgmoth Praetor on three, Gix can immediately saddle the horse and your opponent will lose life equal to the top of the deck. In this deck, that’s not likely to be a lot of damage unless The Gitrog, Ravenous Ride, or Virtue of Persistence show up, but even getting an additional two or three life loss can add up.
The New Late Game
Vraska, the Silencer is an interesting card because it lines up nicely against midrange decks with heavy creatures. As you apply pressure to your opponent, their creatures will likely die in combat. Leaving mana open to steal them as treasures from your opponent’s graveyard can allow for some very powerful scenarios. Imagine a Terror of the Peaks or Sheoldred, the Apocalypse incidentally dying to Glissa Sunslayer or Tinybones, the Pickpocket only to become a treasure on your board. These kind of static effects become even more valuable because they’re now on an artifact that can’t be targeted with creature removal, just be careful not to crack the clue if the Arena autotapper suggests it unless you’re willing to lose the effect. Also, the treasure is the actual card from your opponent’s graveyard, so you’re denying any reanimation loops as well.
The Gitrog, Ravenous Ride provides a massive closer that provides huge swings with both its hasty damage output but also the number of cards and lands it can provide. Don’t hesitate to sacrifice creatures, even very good ones like Gix or Glissa, to this trigger. This deck is drawing cards constantly, so ramping even late into the game will still be valuable. If you can get one trigger off of this, it will usually represent an advantage swing your opponent simply can’t come back from outside of a High Noon/Farewell type of arrangement.
Notable Omissions
Deep-Cavern Bat has been a mainstay in many, many black decks since it came out in Lost Caverns of Ixalan. Its ability to gain you some life while disrupting your opponent’s hand is nice, but it basically always strips removal because it gives the card back to the opponent. In decks leveraging Raffine and other tempo strategies, this can fit perfectly, but this deck is far more interested in generating ongoing card advantage rather than a temporary tempo advantage. As a result, I didn’t include it and instead opted for two copies of Duress in the main board with two more in the side. Duress also fits better on our curve.
If I’m honest, I didn’t include Preacher of the Schism in this deck originally because I simply forgot about it when I made my first draft. Practically, though, it doesn’t saddle the Caustic Bronco like all of our other three drops, so you can make an argument that its omission makes sense. In future versions of this deck, I will likely drop the number of Caustic Broncos to three and add in a few copies of Preacher. The card advantage combined with a resilient and competitive body does make the card very powerful.
In Conclusion
I like to brew what many would call “jank.” I’m confident that this deck does not qualify by anyone’s definition. Instead, it’s a powerful take on a known meta commodity that is powerful and very capable of winning games in best-of-three and even open deck list environments. It turns out, attacking your opponent while drawing cards is a powerful strategy and Outlaws of Thunder Junction has played right into that strategy in Golgari.
I’ll continue tuning this 75 and I look forward to showing off future builds over on my Twitch channel. I hope to see you there. Happy brewing!
