"The Waking Nightmares deck blurs the line between control and beatdown...
[Y]our Nightmares can take things away for good.
How? When you play a Nightmare, such as Faceless Butcher, it comes into play ability goes on the stack. In response, you sacrifice the Butcher... Then the Butcher's leaves-play ability resolves first, but the Butcher hasn't removed a creature from the game yet. The leaves-play effect does nothing. So the comes-into-play effect removes a creature from the game that can never be brought back!"
This deck is a remake of Torment's pre-built Waking Nightmare deck. It's built around the nightmare cast-sac stack mechanic to permanently exile cards/creatures/lands. Once the engine gets going, it provides near total lockdown of your opponent.
The ideal early combo is Carrion Feeder + Mesmeric Fiend + Oath of Ghouls
. Cast a nightmare, sac it as it enters the battlefield to permenantly exile an opponent card, and then recover the nightmare with Oath of Ghouls. Use Shred Memory to tutor for missing combo pieces, or ensure Oath of Ghouls continues to run in your favor.
Repeated sacs and nightmare card's ability to exile allows you to continue to win the graveyard count for Oath of Ghouls.
If you fall behind on in the early game, tutor for Pyroclasm to reset the board and get back in the game. Sometimes combos don't land, so Vampire Nighthawk, Skirsdag High Priest, and Underworld Cerberus carry enough punch to go for beatdown if that's what the gameboard dictates.
