Ultimate MTG Mono Black Deck Guide for Thunder Junction

Making the Best New Mono Black Deck for Thunder Junction

Elevate your game with our Thunder Junction mono black deck guide for Magic the Gathering. Discover key cards, combos, and strategies to crash the meta.

It wouldn't be a real MTG set release if we didn't make a new mono black deck that showcases all of the new and awesome black cards, so I am here to do that for you today! We are going to be using the new bomb from Thunder Junction in a one turn kill combo {If you haven't heard about this card yet, you are going to very shortly). If that isn't enough, we will also include plenty of other ways to dwindle the life total of our opponent. This one will be a lot more low to the ground than normal, as the deck is centered around pulling off a combo, not necessarily grinding it out, or hoping to get to the late game for a win. We will have a well-rounded sideboard to be able to handle most of the threats that I foresee us facing, and if we need to, we can play that control game until it is time to pull off our flashy victory. The new set really is opening up a lot of doorways for many decks. Mono black undoubtedly will get better, but we do have to let things play out to also see how much better other archetypes get. I would definitely expect the sideboard to be dynamic, and changed frequently.

Total Cards:

Relevant New Cards

Magic the Gathering Card - Rush of Dread - MTG Circle

This is the card that is expected to be the bomb for us in the new set. It is a board wipe, one-turn-kill combo piece, and hefty discard spell all in one. The card is effectively the swiss army knife for the essence of mono black. It is perfect. What we will be doing with the deck is using a couple of different standard-legal tutors to find it when we don't have it in our hand, or to find Bloodletter of Aclazotz if that happens to be the missing piece. Casting Dread with the mode that makes the opponent lose half their life rounded up while Aclazotz is out is a one-turn-kill, no matter what their life total is. They could have over one million life and it would not matter. It is the perfect finisher, and we can even use it as a combo with Archfiend of the Dross as well, as making the opponent sacrifice creatures can also cause significant life loss.

Magic the Gathering Card - Insatiable Avarice - MTG Circle

This card is also effective in the deck because it acts as a tutor, and we can draw three cards from it. It is helpful for setting up our combo also. We can cast the spree on the first mode for three mana - making it a turn three combo set up to get our Bloodletter on the board on turn four. If we have that card in hand, then we put Dread on top of our deck, or vice versa if Dread is in hand and we haven't found Bloodletter yet. We want to ensure Bloodletter is on the board on turn four or sooner, then cast Dread to end the game. This card is pivotal in helping us set up that combo.

Magic the Gathering Card - Binding Negotiation - MTG Circle

This card is another one that I believe will be relevant and see a bunch of play in the new set. Being able to take a card out of plot should be a very powerful ability. We just want to ensure that the coast is clear to pull off our combo. We can make the opponent discard a counter spell, removal, or anything that might halt our big move. This on turn two, Avarice on turn three, Bloodletter on turn four, and Dread on turn five is our ideal setup for winning the game by the fifth turn!

Magic the Gathering Card - Caustic Bronco - MTG Circle

Caustic Bronco is likely a card that could have it's own deck built around it. The reason for including it here, is we just wanted to either get extra cards in our hand, or pressure the life total of the opponent early, or both! This card and Preacher of the Schism should draw out early removal to clear the path for Bloodletter. If you really wanted to get cheeky, you could throw in a couple Breach The Multiverse with this deck and then make the opponent lose seven life when it's on top if you saddled the Bronco (you can directly put any card on top of your deck with Avarice).

Relevant Cards from Previous Sets

Magic the Gathering Card - Beseech the Mirror - MTG Circle

This card is really helpful because it acts as another tutor, but also allows us to cast one piece of our combo by using the bargain mechanic. (Note that at least one additional spree cost must be paid if you cast Rush of Dread with this card). This is the reason for using cards like Hopeless Nightmare and another reason that Preacher of the Schism is so good!

Magic the Gathering Card - Bloodletter of Aclazotz - MTG Circle Magic the Gathering Card - Braids, Arisen Nightmare - MTG Circle

Braids is just a nice piece to the deck that once again will demand removal out of our opponent. She can cause early pressure to the opponent's life total, and she can draw us some cards. It is important to have some type of early game, and not just hope to cast cards on turn four and five and simply win. We will likely have to do something else before that due to the fast-paced Standard Meta that we currently have.

I know that I've mentioned this card probably five times or so already in the article, but it is indeed the second piece of our combo to kill the opponent on turn five. You have likely seen me run this card if you have looked at any other list that I've put on here, so we won't dwell too much on what it does. Just know that we need it on the board when we cast Dread for victory.

There are other cards as well such as Preacher of the Schism that will be important for us to set up our combo. It can draw us cards, and makes tokens that we can use to cast Beseech with the bargain cost. Hopeless Nightmare also helps out with that.

I hope you are somewhere close to as excited as I am to see this deck in action! It should be a good time no matter how it goes. Every MTG Player loves a good combo!

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I am a Magic The Gathering competitive player, and streamer. I specialize in homebrew decks. My favorite formats are: Standard, Pioneer (Explorer on Arena), and EDH. I first started playing MTG in 2001, and have played on and off since then.

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Explore the new Aetherdrift mechanics in Magic: The Gathering, rated for Limited and Constructed play. Discover which mechanics excel in Standard format.

Examining the Aetherdrift Mechanics, and Rating them for Limited or Constructed

Every time a new set comes out, there always seems to be a mechanic we are excited for, but maybe it doesn't pan out to be as powerful as we thought. Sometimes we think it will be good in constructed, and it ends up only being good in draft. There are other times when it is a sleeper, and we may have overlooked it when we were predicting what might be good. When we examine set design, sometimes we can also see the clear intent for the mechanics to be good in both the limited and constructed environments, and there are cards with power levels for each different environment. One might be watered down a bit to be more limited-friendly, and another might be that overpowered card that you need to be a bomb in constructed. There are a few ways to go about it, and we do what we can to identify which mechanics we should be mindful of in constructed, particularly in Standard, where the new cards affect the format more than other constructed formats. What we will do today is look at the mechanics that are prevalent with the new cards. There are some that are familiar mechanics, and I will still go over those. There are a couple of new ones that I think are quite interesting, and I have opinions on. Let's check out these mechanics, and give them some ratings! Exhaust You guys can tell that I am pretty excited about this one. The deck that I made for exhaust seems like it will run pretty smoothly. I believe that Exhaust is a mechanic that has cards that are intended for limited, and cards that are intended for constructed, and that the mechanic will be useful in both environments. One of the reasons that I believe it can be so good in draft is that you can almost consider the ability to act as another card later on in the game. You could have no cards in hand, but if you have two exhaust creatures, it is almost like you have two cards in hand that can make something happen. I'm excited for the mechanic, and I'm excited to draft the set and see if I can get a good bit of Exhaust cards going. I think it will be relevant in constructed because of the crazy value that you can get from some of the rares, and because there is one that allows for graveyard recursion.

Zombies are Coming back from the Dead with Aetherdrift

Whenever I see the word "Zombie" in a new set, I always like to revisit the archetype a bit in order to see if anything could be good. I decided to raise these zombies from the dead due to some cards that I saw from Aetherdrift, and I thought that we could at least make a deck that is fun, and who knows, it may be competitive too. We have received decent support lately with cards like Gisa, The Hellraiser. Although she isn't a zombie herself, she creates them every turn, and acts as a lord for them. Not to mention, the ward cost on her makes it so that she adequately fills out the top end of our list. She will help us immensely with swarming the board with skeletons, and efficiently rebuilding after board wipes. There are also going to be some ways to play our zombies from the graveyard, whether it be re-casting or embalming. Since we have the opportunity to raise our dead, we have to give it a shot. There is too much flavor that entices me. This will be my mono black list for the new set, as I think this is the best mono black deck to showcase as many new cards as possible. Any other mono black deck would likely just be adding one or two cards into an already good mono black deck, so I wanted to give you as much as I can with the new cards showcase. Without further ado, let's check out the deck! As you can see, we have plenty of lords in the deck. We are going to make these vanilla zombies huge, both to use as infinite blockers, and to have a threatening attack. We also brought back Unstoppable Slasher for some extra fun, and to guarantee that we have alternate win conditions when needed. In typical zombie fashion, we also don't mind getting rid of some of our creatures if it produces extra value for us. We can get rid of one of our zombies to deal with any problematic creature with Final Vengeance. I chose this over Eaten Alive because it allows us to sacrifice enchantments too, and there are some useful enchantments that support our zombies, so that could prove useful too. There are new cards in the deck, so let's take a look at those. Aetherdrift Zombie Support Cards

This Deck is Sure to be EXHAUSTING to Play Against

Gruul is an archetype that is usually reserved for the aggro decks in Standard. I'm sure that you guys have had enough of that, so I will spare you another Gruul Aggro list that you only play because the deck is good. We are trying something new with this one, and we are taking advantage of the Exhaust mechanic from the new set. It is something that remains to be seen if it is a constructed-playable mechanic, or something that is better suited for limited. I believe that I am pushing the limits of its capabilities here, and that we can do some pretty cool stuff with the deck. One thing that I am excited about is that the deck features a TON of new cards. It will be really difficult for anyone in Early Access to say that this deck didn't showcase any new cards - the creatures and vehicles are almost all exclusively new! We are looking to reduce the activated costs of abilities within the deck, and then get crazy value from it that overwhelms the board. If we play our cards right, we can do some activated abilities for next to nothing, and gain a strong advantage from it. We can possibly also have a Fireball finish if we play our cards right. This deck does a little bit of everything, and I am excited to try it out. Allow me to present to you: Gruul Exhaust! There are some staple cards that we include when we have activated abilities of creatures. One card that forces its way into the deck is Agatha's Soul Cauldron. It is too powerful not to include. We have a couple of ways to mill our cards, and the meta is pretty removal-heavy. We should have enough ways to get things into our graveyard, and if we don't we simply add one or two more Hedge Shredders to mill more cards. With the Exhaust ability, you sadly can only activate it once, BUT we are going to put multiple instances of said abilities on one creature, thus making it much more palatable. We also will reduce the cost of all exhaust abilities with one of the new cards to be shown later, and with Agatha of the Vile Cauldron. I was surprised to see this card - I did not know that it came out with the Soul Cauldron itself. We have seen the Cauldron so much, but we haven't seen a ton of the actual Agatha Creature. The deck has a few removal spells, but some of our vehicles also have a way to do direct damage, so we don't need to include as many as we normally would. We kept it pretty simple on the lands due to the demanding mana values in some of our cards, and because the deck is a little faster. There are multiple cards that have two pips of each of the colors represented, so we do not want to stall when it comes to having the right mana. Although I have a bunch of new cards from the set in this deck, I will showcase to you five of the ones I think are the most impactful. Relevant New Cards

These Aetherdrift Aristocrats are Racing to Victory!

We are coming to the end of spoiler season, and we are ramping up for early access for Aetherdrift. Almost all of the cards have been revealed, so Magic players are dashing to find the new deck that will work for them. This is an exciting time for creators as well, because it is our chance to make predictions on what the most impactful cards will be. We can straight up make a prediction, we can come out with a top 5 or 10, or we can theory craft new decks. I'm going to be dropping a few decks over the next couple of days that I think will be really fun to play in Standard, and that I will be playing in early access for Aetherdrift! Here is a look at the first deck I made that is an Orzhov Sacrifice Combo Deck! This new Orzhov Creation looks to take advantage of a lot of low-mana high-value creatures. We have multiple different sacrifice outlets, and a couple of different ways to interact with our graveyard. Most of the creatures are two mana value or lower, so we can even use a card from Foundations to bring them all back at once! We will draw a ton of cards, drain our opponent's life total, and have tons of blockers for the various aggro decks that we may come across. We can even punish the opponent for killing our creatures. The deck also features 23 lands due to the fact that our curve is pretty low, and we can operate pretty well with two or three mana. You might be wondering: "OK, so what is actually new about the deck?" We are looking to take advantage of the Start Your Engines mechanic that has been brought to us in this set. If you are unfamiliar with how that works, you can read my most recent article for a deep dive! For now, let's take a look at some relevant new cards from the set! Relevant New Cards

This New Mechanic in Aetherdrift WILL Have BIG Implications!

Aetherdrift is upon us, and everyone is ready for a refresh to the current Standard format. It's not particularly bad, but it could use a bit of a shake up. Foundations beefed up some of the archetypes that were already good, and it did so to the point that it is impossible to play a few matches in the format without seeing some type of Dimir. There are so many good different artchetypes of it currently that it is difficult to decide against playing it. Aetherdrift is bringing us a ton of vehicles, and it appears that this card type will force it's way into relevancy in the format. These new vehicles are announcing themselves with a little bit of flavor, however. There is a new mechanic that is coming to MTG that is called Start Your Engines. Initially, this mechanic didn't stand out to me too much. I had to take a bit of a deep dive into how it worked, and how to get to what is called "Max Speed" before I realized that we can do some broken stuff with this. Before I did my research, I went from thinking that it would be a draft-only mechanic, to thinking this might be the most powerful mechanic in the entire set. Let's take a look at how exactly Start Your Engines works, and then we will look over some examples of cards in Standard that should allow it to be ridiculous in all of the best ways. How Does Start Your Engines Work? This is an interesting one, and it fits in perfectly with the flavor of the set. We will have the Start Your Engines mechanic on a few of the cards, and it's ability instantly starts when the permanent enters the battlefield. If it is the FIRST Start Your Engines card played, it will instantly give you a Speed of 1. This is something that automatically happens as the permanent enters, and it is not a trigger that can be stifled, or fizzled by removing the permanent giving the Speed. Now, what I initially thought for this mechanic was that you got more speed by playing cards that had the Start Your Engines ability, but that isn't how it works, and I'm glad it's not that way. So how do we gain speed? In order to increase our speed past 1, we will have a trigger of an increase in speed once per our turn when an opponent loses life. What is pretty fun about this is that we do not need the permanent to stay on the board in order for the speed to increase. This means that the mechanic is comparable to The Ring Temps You from LOTR.

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: Recapping MTG in 2024

2024 was a huge year for MTG. It was a lot of things. Controversial, exciting, frustrating, promising, and refreshed. We saw some formats get ruined, then fixed, then ruined again. We saw some great changes to Standard that not everyone was fans of at first, but they seemed to quickly warm up to them. We saw Wizards effectively abandon a format in favor of propelling Standard into a more prominent position. We saw some great cards printed for Standard, and some promising things to come in the next year that were announced. Along with that, a fair amount of people were still bothered by the new trajectory of the format. Some are calling into question the longevity of MTG now with the heavy lean into Universes Beyond. A little bit of everything happened this year in the MTG world, and it was interesting if nothing else. On a personal level, it was also a hell of a year for me, as I took down two different events and grew a lot as a player. We are going to look at The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly from this year! The Good I have to admit, I'm pretty excited that we have an infinite gain and drain combo in Standard right now. With Enduring Tenacity and Bloodthirsty Conqueror having made a lot of my dreams come true in my favorite format. Although the deck isn't the most viable in the format, it is incredibly fun to play, and I'm just happy that we had such exciting cards printed in the format. It leads to good card design going forward, and gives us promise for what's to come in the next year.

Examining the Aetherdrift Mechanics, and Rating them for Limited or Constructed