Play a zombie (or multiple) every turn with Aether Vial and Nykthos. Draw into a Graveborn Muse to fill your hand and draw a Gray Merchant with her effect. Drain your opponent for an obscene amount and win. Similar to the OG Mono-black Devotion lists, but with moar zombos and a white splash.
THE BREAKDOWN:
Cryptbreaker is a mini Deathrite Shaman in this deck. It can draw us cards to find a finisher, or create tokens to add to our zombie count. The discard ability also combos well with Gravecrawler.
Gravecrawler is a one-drop beater with recursion and 2 power. We can discard it with Cryptbreaker, or sac it to Fleshbag Marauder for value. As an added bonus, every time it is cast from the graveyard it will trigger Wayward Servant's life drain.
Wayward Servant helps combat our life loss from Graveborn Muse or Thoughtseize early on and passively extorts our opponents life. It basically counts as 2 black devotion for Gray Merchant of Asphodel's ability, and adds to our zombie count.
Tidehollow Sculler is a Thoughtseize with a body to add to our black/zombie devotion count.
Relentless Dead gives 2 black devotion, can be sac'd for value or to reanimate one of our other creatures with Fleshbag Marauder and ofcourse, is a zombie. Menace is relevant too, making him get in evasive damage early game.
Geralf's Messenger represents atleast 4 damage to your enemies face as long as it resolves and often does more. It also adds a whopping 3 black devotion by itself and is a zombie to boot. He combos well with Wayward Servant adding a point of damage each time he enters the battlefield, and he can also be sac'd with Fleshbag Marauder for value or to inflict 2 more points of damage. Highly underrated card.
Fleshbag Marauder does a pretty good imitation of Gatekeeper of Malakir providing an edict effect with a body. He lacks the double black, and can't be played turn 2 but is a zombie.
Graveborn Muse is the main reason to run so many zombies. She's a Dark Confidant on steroids which is risky, but also highly rewarding. It's not uncommon to be drawing 7 cards a turn with her first activation.
Gray Merchant of Asphodel is the payout card your most often going to want to be drawing with Graveborn Muse. Not only does it off-put the life cost from Muse, it is a win-con in of itself, often draining for 9 or more damage when he hits the board.
Sorin Markov will help you set up a Gray Merchant kill against resilient decks like Soul Sisters, and adds quite a bit of devotion. His ultimate is pretty sweet too.
Aether Vial helps us cheat on mana, play around counters and flood the board quickly for our devotion counts. Has great synergy with Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx, allowing us to have pseudo-ramp in our BW deck.
Elixir of Immortality is there to help with Graveborn Muse's life loss and to restock our library if we're running out of gas.
The goal of this deck isn't to be the most efficent Mono-black devotion deck, but to be a flavorful and still playable Zombie deck. It's alot of fun to play, with many synergy's, and requires keen attention to not kill yourself. Any suggestions are welcome, and thanks for reading!
