Why So Shirei-ous?

Commander / EDH Control Discard Mono-Black Multiplayer Reanimator Stax

TheFanatic

Creature (30)

• 1x Abyssal Gatekeeper
• 1x Apprentice Necromancer
• 1x Big Game Hunter
• 1x Blood Artist
• 1x Bone Shredder
• 1x Bottle Gnomes
• 1x Cadaver Imp
• 1x Coffin Queen
• 1x Fume Spitter
• 1x Harvester of Souls
• 1x Heap Doll
• 1x Hell's Caretaker
• 1x Junk Diver
• 1x Liliana's Shade
• 1x Marsh Flitter
• 1x Mindless Automaton
• 1x Myr Retriever
• 1x Myr Sire
• 1x Nezumi Bone-Reader
• 1x Noxious Toad
• 1x Pawn of Ulamog
• 1x Perilous Myr
• 1x Pilgrim's Eye
• 1x Reassembling Skeleton
• 1x Sadistic Hypnotist
• 1x Scarecrone
• 1x Sultai Emissary
• 1x Thoughtpicker Witch
• 1x Triskelion
• 1x Viscera Seer

Planeswalker (3)

• 1x Liliana of the Dark Realms
• 1x Liliana Vess
• 1x Sorin Markov

Land (36)

• 1x Ancient Tomb
• 1x Bojuka Bog
• 1x Cabal Coffers
• 1x Deserted Temple
• 1x High Market
• 1x Myriad Landscape
• 1x Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
• 1x Shizo, Death's Storehouse
• 1x Strip Mine
• 24x Swamp
• 1x Tectonic Edge
• 1x Temple of the False God
• 1x Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth

Enchantment (8)

• 1x Attrition
• 1x Black Market
• 1x Contamination
• 1x Dictate of Erebos
• 1x Gate to Phyrexia
• 1x Grave Pact
• 1x Necropotence
• 1x Phyrexian Arena

Artifact (13)

• 1x Ashnod's Altar
• 1x Darksteel Plate
• 1x Expedition Map
• 1x Helm of Possession
• 1x Jet Medallion
• 1x Lightning Greaves
• 1x Meekstone
• 1x Skullclamp
• 1x Smokestack
• 1x Sol Ring
• 1x Spawning Pit *list*
• 1x Swiftfoot Boots
• 1x Unstable Obelisk

Instant (3)

• 1x Malicious Affliction
• 1x Tragic Slip
• 1x Vampiric Tutor

Sorcery (6)

• 1x Damnation
• 1x Demonic Tutor
• 1x Diabolic Intent
• 1x Diabolic Revelation
• 1x Exsanguinate
• 1x Yawgmoth's Will

Commander (1)

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Maybeboard

Creature (2)

• 1x Crypt Rats
• 1x Sorceress Queen

Instant (1)

• 1x Wake the Dead

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This is my Shirei, Shizo's Caretaker list. The deck is, like most Shirei lists, built around using the commander as a recursion engine in order to slowly grind out game-winning value. My playgroup plays mostly free-for-all multiplayer games, and it's somewhat competitive.

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Why Shirei?

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Black has always been my favorite color in Magic, and I have a soft spot for graveyard abuse. I just love recursion. For evidence of this, see my standard deck: deck:dredge-in-standard-yes-please

When I first saw Shirei, I was super interested to see how his ability could be abused in a Commander deck to create the ultimate graveyard-based deck, and here we are now!

This list turned out to be stax-based, focused on denying resources to the opponents while simultaneously creating huge amounts of resources for the pilot. Read on to find out some of the key cards in the deck's strategy.

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No, You May Not -- Resource Denial

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• Bojuka Bog - Helps shut out other graveyard decks.
• Strip Mine - Can be used to keep the opponent off one color of mana, or simply to destroy a utility land.
• Tectonic Edge - Strictly worse than Strip Mine, but still great at killing utility lands.
• Heap Doll - More selective graveyard hate than Bojuka Bog. Prevents the opponent from using targeted recursion.
• Meekstone - Shuts down a ton of EDH decks, particularly green creature builds. Also great against voltron decks.
• Thoughtpicker Witch - Lets us screw over the opponents' draws and prevent anything useful from hitting their hand.
• Nezumi Bone-Reader - Cheap discard engine that will easily get rid of an opponent's entire hand.
• Contamination - Great at mana-screwing opponents. It's also a nice sacrifice outlet. This effect is very mean, and I may take it out if it's too annoying for my playgroup.
• Noxious Toad - Sacrifice target that causes each opponent to discard.
• Grave Pact - Keeps the opponent's board clear without any extra effort.
• Smokestack - Classic stax piece. We can basically ignore this card entirely, while the opponent is left with no board.
• Dictate of Erebos - See Grave Pact.
• Liliana Vess - A slow discard engine, but has enough utility otherwise to make it worth the slot.
• Sadistic Hypnotist - The deck's best discard engine. Makes it almost too easy to keep the opponent's hand empty, with no further mana investment required after he hits the field.

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Keeping It Coming -- Card Draw

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• Skullclamp - Although this card is a nonbo with Shirei, there are enough token producers in the deck to make it viable.
• Necropotence - The best black card draw in the format, period. Stick this thing and your hand will always be full.
• Phyrexian Arena - A staple in any black EDH deck.
• Pilgrim's Eye - Helps find land drops and acts as sacrifice fodder.
• Scarecrone - While the one mana investment per turn isn't ideal, this is still a valuable card draw engine with Shirei out.
• Liliana of the Dark Realms - Never miss a land drop again.
• Liliana's Shade - See Pilgrim's Eye.
• Mindless Automaton - Requires no mana investment to sacrifice, and draws a card on every turn with Shierei out. An excellent card in the deck.
• Harvester of Souls - A 5/5 deathtouch beater for 6 that doubles as an insane draw engine with how often this deck sacrifices creatures. Note that you also get to draw whenever an opponent's creature dies. Awesome!

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Finishing the Game -- Win Conditions

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• Blood Artist - The classic "drain and brain". It's the slowest way to win, but it happens more thank you would think.
• Exsanguinate - This deck can produce a surprising amount of mana through Pawn of Ulamog, Ashnod's Altar, Liliana of the Dark Realms, Black Market, Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx, and Cabal Coffers. It's not uncommon for this card to take out the entire table.
• Liliana Vess - After a long game, her ultimate is essentially GG.
• Sorin Markov - Setting an opponent's life from 40 to 10 usually does the trick.
• Triskelion - Yes, it's slow. Yes, it requires Shirei to be out. Yes, it gets the job done.

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Please comment and +1 if you like the deck!

This deck is retired as of 3/21/15

Date added	10 years
Last updated	8 years
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	7 - 0 Mythic Rares 28 - 0 Rares 26 - 0 Uncommons 15 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	2.88
Tokens	2/2 C Artifact Creature Spawn, Eldrazi Spawn 0/1 C, Emblem Liliana of the Dark Realms, Goblin Rogue 1/1 B, Manifest 2/2 C, Phyrexian Myr 1/1 C
Folders	Standard, EDH Black, commander, EDH, Decks to Consider, Deck Ideas, Other people's decks, reference Decks, EDH funny, z. EDH: Shirei