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BW E&T Primer
DATE VALID
Please note this was written August 24th 2020 and is reflective of the legal cards and the meta during that time.
Introduction
So you've decided to play Black/White Eldrazi and Taxes (BW E&T). Welcome! This is a challenging but fun deck to play that heavily rewards player investment and practice. It's also a deck that never feels out of the meta with how diverse it is. Here I'll try to cover the basics of the deck, card choices, interactions, and tricks. Hopefully you'll find some insight here and maybe it'll guide you to some wins! Good Luck! Also there is a glossary at the end, so if there is some term or short form you are unsure of, give it a look over!
Strengths and Weaknesses
Strengths - Usually has game against any deck (Nothing feels unwinnable) - "Best Draws" are VERY good - Versatile Threats and Win Conditions - Complex interactions makes it harder for your opponent to be ready for every possible line - Versatile Side Board card options
Weaknesses - Mana base is VERY greedy (Weak to Bloodmoon and Land Destruction) - "Worst Draws" are VERY bad - Can sometimes "draw the wrong half of the deck" (Drawing wrong half of synergies or wrong lands) - Vulnerable to disruption (Discard Effects or being forced into top-deck mode without non-land permanents.)
How does this deck win?
Ah yes, how does the deck win. The name of the deck is derived from the legacy deck "Death and Taxes" due to similar cards and a similar game plan. The aim of the deck though is rather simple, play cheap creatures with effects that disrupt or slow down your opponents game plan long enough to allow you to play threats that eventually win the game before your opponent can recover. The deck does this through "taxing" effects where our cards increase the cost of our opponents spells and abilities, preventing them from play on-curve. While our opponent is trying to recover from our mana and resource denial, we play our threats, the "Death' part of the deck. We then aim to close out the game before our opponent can recover and do whatever it was their deck was trying to.
"Stock" List
The Deck List above is what I believe to be the BW E&T Stock List, the base and most streamlined version of the deck. Below I'll talk briefly about the card choices and possible flex spots but this is most certainly the purest form of the deck and should be the starting point before making adjustments
CARDS
Lands
We have 14 Colored sources (13 White, 12 Black) and 12 Colorless sources (with the overlap of Caves of Koilos serving as both Colored and Colorless mana sources) with no fetchlands in an essentially 3 color deck (Black, White, Colorless). On paper it looks sketchy and it is but the deck does curve out it's own mana quite well. 22 lands I would say is the minimum, some players prefer 23 due to running 4 Thought-Knot Seers but Eldrazi Temple does help with that. The mana base is pretty ridgid these days and you won't find much wiggle room but below is a rundown of each land and why it's in the deck.
Concealed Courtyard - Dual land than that comes in untapped as long as we have 2 or fewer other lands. Considering that Taxes is an archetype that tries to win during the early-mid game and how the deck operates quite well on few lands; these are basically Shock Lands without costing life. There will be games where your courtyard will enter tapped when you needed it to enter untapped, but those games are few and the upside in games where you need to avoid the 2 damage of shock lands is much higher. Great land overall, love to see one in the opening 7. Always play 4.
Caves of Koilos - Untapped TRI LAND. Yes I said tri land, that's because 2 of our creatures (Eldrazi Displacer and Thought-Knot Seer) specifically require colorless mana so producing Black, White and Colorless is just amazing for us. Might be the best land in the deck. Always play 4.
Eldrazi Temple - Makes the eldrazi creatures playable in the deck. Turns Eldrazi Displacer and Wasteland Strangler into 2 drops and turns Thought-Knot Seer into a 3 drop (or if you're lucky a 2 drop with double Eldrazi Temple). Also frees up mana to use Eldrazi Displacer's ability by only tapping 2 lands instead of 3. Probably tied for best land in the deck with Caves of Koilos. Always play 4.
Ghost Quarter - Land Destruction and synergy with Leonin Arbiter (which will be talked about under the Leonin Arbiter section). Otherwise still useful to punish greedy mana decks (Like Death's Shadow variants) and hit certain important lands with activated abilities (Man Lands, Tron Lands) or decks running land enchantments (On Thin Ice and Utopia Sprawl). Also adds a colorless source for those requirements. Always play 4.
Silent Clearing - Another untapped dual land with the upside of drawing cards down the road. Also not an awful top deck when empty handed as it gives you another shot. Great land that helps to keep the pressure up at the crucial late game moments. The number to play fluctuates between 3 and 2 + 1 Plains. Playing the additional plains is probably a meta call against a field with a high chance of Blood Moon and lots of "search for basic land" effects such as Path to Exile and Field of Ruin. Otherwise 3 is probably optimal.
Plains/Swamp - Basic lands as every deck should be running since cards like Field of Ruin and Blood Moon exist. Generally it's 2 Plains, 1 Swamp but some lists run 3 Plains as mentioned under the Silent Clearing section.
Creatures
The creatures of BW E&T can be broken up into 2 groups; Disruption and Pressure. Half the deck is meant to disrupt and slow down our opponent so they stumble on their first few turns, giving us time to play the Pressure half of the deck and defeat our opponent before they have a chance to recover. Now, some creatures can fit into both categories and that's what can make the deck so flexible, allowing you to adapt to whatever deck you're facing. Generally however our 1 and 2 CMC creatures are the Disruption and our 3 and 4 CMC Creatures are the pressure. Lets go into each of them now.
Giver of Runes - Not exactly a disruptive creature, but set's up to enable our disruptive creatures to pose the greatest impact on the game. Getting this out on T1 is very strong and if left unanswered, makes our 2 drops nearly untouchable. Often compared to Mother of Runes which is not surprising given their names and effects, Giver of Runes sometimes fills a different niche and has different strengths and weakness than its legacy counterpart. The 2 toughness (over Mother of Runes' 1 toughness) helps against Lava Dart, Gut Shot and sometimes Walking Ballista and the addition of 'protection from colorless' can really catch people off guard and blows out some rare interactions. Great card all around and a big boost to the deck. ALSO Please read the rulings on 'Protection(https://mtg.gamepedia.com/Protection)' as a mechanic. It can be confusing but knowing how and where it works and doesn't work will help you get the most out of it's effect. Giver is a good card that I like having 3-4 copies but it could be cut for something else if you really want. I've seen many lists cut Giver of Runes for Charming Prince but I really don't think that Prince is better than Giver at all so I'm opting for Giver as a 4 of in this spot. Mentioned before but you can trim 1 to make room for other cards.
Leonin Arbiter - The first half of our 'mana denial' plan. A card that preys on the landscape that is modern where the most powerful cards in the format are fetchlands. Leonin Arbiter really only works because of how modern just IS. The amount of decks playing greedy mana bases that love to play on curve require fetchlands to function, but when those fetches cost mana to activate it really can blow decks from under themselves and make it difficult to recover from. In addition, our own deck construction takes advantage of Leonin Arbiter itself in the form of Path to Exile and Ghost Quarter. Leonin Arbiter + Path to Exile creates the most powerful removal spell in modern if they do not have the mana required to search for a basic land. Ghost Quarter also becomes the best land destruction effect in the format. All of these together really hurt our opponents mana base and often slows them down by an entire turn or two just trying to deal with it. Just remember it also prevents ourselves from searching as well, and while our deck does the best to mitigate that effect it can still come up. Gotta have 4 in the deck. The effect stacks and it has the most impact early in the game where your opponent is strained for Mana.
Thalia, Guardian of Thraben - This is the second half of the 'mana denial' plan. Turning Opt or Lightning Bolt into a 2 mana spell, or Liliana of the Veil into a 4 mana spell is actually huge. A lot of veteren taxes players commonly refer to Thalia as a Time Walk from the effect it has on opponents often playing behind curve and essentially skipping a turn because their 2 mana spell on Turn 2 now costs 3 mana. Also single handedly makes combo decks cry as having a single spell cost more is annoying, but making 5 spells all cost more is in most cases unplayable. Also If you've noticed, our deck only runs 8 non-creature spells so Thalia's effect does very little against us and a much larger impact against most other decks. First strike is a relevant keyword as well giving it impact against creature decks as well. This deck runs 3, but mostly due to the Legendary rule and how tight the list already is. If you want you could easily go up to 4 and cut Tidehollow Sculler down to 3.
Tidehollow Sculler - Thoughtseize on a body; Sculler helps to tax your opponents resources, taking key cards or key removal from their hand improving an already established lock or a future situation you are about to set up. It's also the wording of Sculler that makes the card better than other similar cards like Brain Maggot and Kitesail Freebooter. Because of the line break in the effect of the card, it makes the Enter the Battlefield (Taking a Card) and the Leaving the Battlefield (Returning a Card) two distinct triggers. This means that if an opponent wants to remove Sculler, they will have to do it after we have already taken a card or risk losing another card forever. This will go more indepth in the "Tricks" portion down below. The most commonly cut card to make room for other includes. The mana cost feels clunky at times and often is just a 2/2 that took a card one time. Probably one of the easier cuts if you are needing space for other cards. 2-4 is good.
Flickerwisp - A swiss army knife of a card where it's power shines with Aether Vial. On the surface however it's a 3/1 that lets us re-use enter the battleifled abilities of other creatures, or allows up to untap a land, or removes blockers or other annoying permanents for the turn. Too much to go through here since the card really does do wonders when you pull off all the weird tricks and interactions it's capable of. At worst it's a 3/1 flyer that can end games. Super versatile card and has evasion to avoid ground stalls. I like 4, but some metas might not be as kind to Wisp as you could cut down to 3 or even 2. I always like 4 as there are very few cards that Flickerwisp can't mess with in some way.
Eldrazi Displacer - Similar vein as Flickerwisp, although only targeting creatures but also repeatable with the right amount of mana. It removes blockers, re-uses enter the battlefield effects, removes attackers on your opponents turn, and can protect other creatures from removal spells. It's also a 3/3 beater that can come down as early as turn 2 and makes your opponents brain hurt trying to think of all the things you can mess with. Amazing card and maybe our best 3 drop. See "Tricks" for more details. 4 of almost always. The card is actually stupidly powerful and you'd need a good reason to cut copies.
Wasteland Strangler - Strangler is removal + a body and hits a lot of targets and has the obvious synergy with Tidehollow Sculler to get rid of the card it took forever. Our deck also has other ways to fuel the strangler in the form of Path to Exile and Thought-Knot Seer not to mention more and more decks in modern are exiling their own cards for us so there really is no shortage of ammo for Strangler to throw at our opponents creatures. The wording for the effect on this card is a bit confusing but the it's straight forward once you learn it. The effect is as follows broken down: Strangler enters the battlefield, and it's ability will go on the stack. At this point you CHOOSE A TARGET CREATURE to give -3/-3. Nothing has happened yet, the ability has not resolved. The above will always happen regardless if there are cards in exile to use or not. If the ability resolves, you MAY now choose a card in exile (if their is one) that your OPPONENT owns and put it into that opponents graveyard. THEN the target creature gets -3/-3. There is no opportunity to respond to the card leaving exile. Simple really. Most decks play 3 due to requiring some light setup to get the effect off and that it doesn't kill every creature and does little against creature light decks like Control Decks.
Thought-Knot Seer - Huge beater in the form of 4/4 stats with a better Thoughtseize attached to it. Thought-Knot Seer is a monster of a card that can really slam the door shut on games where your opponent was leaning on one card to win. Being able to play this on Turn 3 or Turn 2 if you're lucky is amazing. not much else to say. Great card. Can run anywhere from 2-4 depending on your deck construction. Some people like to go 3 Thought-Knot Seer and go up to 23 lands (adding a Plains or Silent Clearing) in fear of it's demanding casting cost which is completely valid.
Other
Path to Exile - Great removal spell, the best white has to offer and synergies with Leonin Arbiter and Wasteland Strangler. It's also cheap making it cost at worst with Thalia, Guardian of Thraben out. 4 is most often correct but 3 isn't bad either if you want to jam some other cards in the deck.
Aether Vial - This card is what really makes the deck killer. In addition to effectively doubling our mana later in the game, the real power is the ability to play creatures uncounterable at instant speed. So many weird and new interactions are enabled by vial and really shows what this deck can do. Ideal hands always have one vial in them and there are very few if any other more powerful turn 1 plays. Real bad top deck though. Best card in the deck but also the worst. Generally you want vial on 2 or 3. 2 offers nice disruption with Tidehollow Sculler and Leonin Arbiter, but 3 offers some very powerful plays in Eldrazi Displacer with Mana up, Flickerwisp on endstep, and Wasteland Strangler in removal. Most games your vial will tick up to 3 however. Ticking up to 4 is possible, but only in bad situations since only Thought-Knot Seer is available at that point. That said, Instant Speed Uncounterable Thought-Knot Seer is terrifying.
Flex Cards
The following cards are some options you could run main deck, as for what you cut for them, that is entirely up to you. I've mentioned above what cards could be trimmed but I'm not sold on completely cutting anything. This is a chance to make the deck your own and spice it up how you like. The following cards can also be easily stored in the Sideboard for when you need them.
Kunoros, Hound of Athreos - Interesting beater with a LOT of text. Lifelink, Vigilance, Menace is a saucy combination especially Menace since we mess with combat so much already. Stapling on the anti-graveyard effect is icing on the cake. Could see play vs a graveyard heavy meta but it doesn't hit some important interactions such as Mystic Sanctuary or Delve which probably holds it back from being an absolute all-star.
Kaya, Orzhov Usurper - A versatile card that has game VS a variety of matchups. the +1 is great to gain life against aggro decks, burn decks, and decks that use the graveyard. The -1 hits a surprising amount of permanents such as Monastery Swiftspear, Death's Shadow, and Amulet of Vigor. And the -5 is great against Prison Decks and Grindy decks.
Charming Prince - I touched on this briefly when talking about Giver of Runes but we'll go more in depth here. Charming Prince is a pretty adaptable card. All 3 modes are relevant at some point in the game and the additional ability to have Aether Vial on 2 to have a Flickerwisp style save effect is nice, not to mention it's both a ETB re-user and an ETB value generator in itself. At first glance it seems great, but why it's not my first pick is that Turn 2 is very important for the deck. On turn 2 you NEED to be dropping some sort of disruption and Prince does nothing of the sort. And so you may say "Then play it on Turn 3" which in turn begs the question, is Prince better than any of our 3 drops? Probably not. It's a fine card, but I don't think it has a place in this deck. In addition to all this, if you're including Prince you have to cut something else, which is already hard. It just doesn't seem better than anything else the deck is already doing and for this case I would advise not adding Charming Prince. On the other side, decks have 5-0'd on MTGO with Prince main deck, so if it works, it works. I'm just not a fan.
Sideboard
Taxes decks are what you would call "Very Meta Dependant" and as such, there really isn't a concrete sideboard guide. You will need to learn the meta and adapt to changes in it, whether it's your local LGS or MTGO, your sideboard is up to you and what you feel like playing. So here I'll go over some obvious choices that are pretty diverse. Pick any of these and build the sideboard to your liking.
Fatal Push - Adds additional removal that doesn't give opponents a land. Useful against creature heavy decks.
Burrenton Forge-Tender - Great anti-red card. Infinite blocker vs Prowess and Burn. Blanks removal like Lightning Bolt and hard stops Anger of the Gods. Useful against many decks, especially red aggro decks.
Mirran Crusader - Almost specifically useful against Jund and Black heavy decks. This plus Giver of Runes make it very hard to kill and it makes both a killer attacker and blocker.
Rest in Peace - The signature Graveyard Hate card. Good against the usual suspect in Dredge but also useful against decks running Snapcaster Mage, Tarmogoyf, Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath, Mystic Sanctuary or Delve cards. Also has a side effect of giving Wasteland Strangler infinite exile ammo, since as soon as you move a card from exile to the graveyard, Rest in Peace will just move it back to exile immediately. So Strangle away!
Containment Priest - New kid on the block, good against any deck trying to cheat creatures in like Goryo's Vengeance decks, Neobrand, and Dredge. Also hits collected company and other Aether Vial decks (which also hits us, so be careful!). Has the additional advantage of turning Flickerwisp into ETB exile target creature forever and Eldrazi Displacer gets exile target creature forever. FUN!
Plague Engineer VS Orzhov Pontiff - Both very similar cards. Most of the time they will be doing the exact same thing, it's the edge cases where things change. Engineer has the upside of being a static effect. You can play it preemptively and you don't need to sink any other resources to have the effect. Stops Snapcaster Mage from blocking or Noble Hierarch from giving surprise Exalted triggers and keeps Humans and Merfolk in check. However, -1/-1 is all your ever going to get. You can't stack the effect and you have to devote to a single creature type. 2/2 and deathtouch is also not something to be ignored + the easier casting requirement. On the flip side, Pontiff offers either -1/-1 or +1/+1. The effect can also be repeated with Flickerwisp or Eldrazi Displacer and it effects the entire field instead of a single creature type. Haunt also comes up sometimes, but never for me. However you have to play it when creatures are already around and it's a 1/1 regular body so it's not swinging in for much. I personally like Pontiff over Engineer due to the ability to re-use the ETB but it's VERY close. There is still a lot of discussion on which is better, for now play whatever feels better for you.
Gideon, Ally of Zendikar - The OG Chad. Useful against control decks and decks trying to grind you out. Making 2/2s every turn and turning into a 5/5 indestructible sometimes is nothing to laugh at. Not to mention is gives a +1/+1 emblem sometimes. Super great card and has been in sideboards for forever.
Elspeth, Knight-Errant - Personal pet card of mine, and I play it in place of Gideon in most lists. Comes in the exact same matchups that you would bring Gideon in for, but offers a different set of loyalty abilities. If you're not liking Gideon, give Elspeth a try.
Kambal, Consul of Allocation - Very versatile card that shines most vs Combo Decks, making each spell hurt them and heal us. Also has game against Control decks and Burn Decks.
Stony Silence - The classic artifact hate card. Doesn't see as much play these days with the banning of Mox Opal but still finds itself some relevant matchups such as Hardened Scales, Tron and Eldrazi Tron.
Phyrexian Revoker - Bit of a catch-all card that rewards deck knowledge. Instant speed Aether Vial tricks are also nice, to respond to planeswalkers or Oblivion Stone on the stack.
PLAYING THE DECK
Mulligans - This deck mulligans A LOT. Be prepared to see 2 colorless lands 5 colored spells. This is okay, the decks raw power can sometimes beat going to 5 or 6 but it will happen. Ideally you're looking for a hand with two lands (At least one colored) one Aether Vial and 4 spells (ideally one or two 2 drops and a couple 3 drops). Mono 3-drop hands are usually too slow, even with temple, and high land hands generally hurt more than high spell hands. Don't be afraid to play without a Turn 1 Aether Vial hand, ideally being able to cast your spells is good enough.
Initial Turns - Ideal turns are T1: Aether Vial or Giver of Runes followed up by a T2: any 2 drop with priority normally being Thalia, Guardian of Thraben > Leonin Arbiter > Tidehollow Sculler.
The rest of the game - After that it's ideal to keep up pressure. If Leonin Arbiter is out and they are struggling on lands, it's mostly correct to Ghost Quarter them if you have the chance and can keep up the pressure, because they WILL draw into more lands.. you need to close things out before that happens. Remove problem creatures with Path to Exile and Wasteland Strangler. Protect your own creatures with Flickerwisp and Eldrazi Displacer. Honestly it's a hard deck to 'Goldfish' with, since so much of it depends on what your opponent is doing. The best is to just play it and get a feel for how it operates. Disrupt and slowdown your opponent, then go in for the kill while they are down. You can do it!
Tricks
Ah yes, where the deck really shows it's power. BW E&T is a deck that feels like it bends every rule in magic but not quite enough to break them. Make your opponents heads spin by pulling off this nonsense in games. Truly a blast and what makes the deck so fun to play. Also, since nearly all the tricks here involve Aether Vial in some way, it'll be broken up into creatures with a vial specific section.
Giver of Runes - The big thing here that people will forget is that Giver of Runes also gives protection from colorless. Some important colorless sources to know are Artifacts and some Planeswalkers but also Lands. For instance Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle triggers are colorless as well as some eldrazi or any spell/creature with the Devoid attribute. Not much else though, Giver of Runes is pretty straightforward.
Leonin Arbiter - Mentioned before but Path to Exile when your opponent does not have the mana open to pay for Arbiter is just "exile target creature" which is great. Ghost Quarter also becomes "Destroy target Land". Aether Vial however turns arbiter into a real threat. Remember you can activate vial in response to an opponents attempt to activate a fetchland to put Arbiter into play immediately and stopping the Fetchland effect from resolving. And no, your opponent cannot respond to "Arbiter entering the battlefield". If it came out of an Aether Vial then Cat Jesus has arrived and it's now too late. This works for any search effect such as Chord of Calling or Primeval Titan. Also note that if an opponent pays the to search, you can use Eldrazi Displacer's ability to 'blink' Arbiter. This now creates a 'new' Leonin Arbiter and your opponent will have to pay again if they wish to search. An edge case to remember is that Arbiter says "Players can't search libraries"... this includes YOUR library. So if your opponent plays Surgical Extraction or Unmoored Ego, they still have to pay the mana to search your library. The rules around arbiter are always a debate though when playing in paper, so I'd advise always talking to a head judge before an event to make sure you know what to do when your opponent attempts to search without paying the mana... which will happen. A LOT.
Thalia, Guardian of Thraben - Not many tricks here. Being able to put Thalia in at instant speed with vial is fun, but since it effects casting you have to do it preemptively. The closest thing I can think of is if your opponent has a multi-card combo, when you see them cast the first one you can vial in Thalia to throw a wrench in. It's possible they didn't account for the remaining spells costing extra now which may ruin the combo all together.
Tidehollow Sculler - First thing is the way Sculler is templated with the Enter effect and Leave effect being separate. This means that while the Enter effect is on the stack, if Sculler leaves the field for any reason (such as a removal spell from your opponent in response to the Enter trigger), the Leave effect will trigger. This means that whatever card you are about to exile will be gone forever since the effect that would return it is now resolving before having taken it. Confused yet? No worries, we'll go into the most complicated scenario here to break it down completely. One of the fun strategies is to put Tidehollow Sculler into play (with Aether Vial or cast) while you have an Eldrazi Displacer out and the mana to activate it. The stack goes as follows...
------TOP
In response, activate Displacer target Tidehollow Sculler.
Sculler ETB - (Take Card A)
------BOTTOM
At this point we let Displacer's ability resolve (assuming our opponent doesn't respond by killing sculler which will happen more often then not). Displacer resolves and now the stack looks like this...
-----TOP
Sculler Enter - (Take Card B)
Sculler Leave - (Return Card A)
Sculler Enter - (Take Card A)
-----BOTTOM
Eldrazi Displacer - the tricks here are more interactions with other creatures (as mentioned in the sculler tricks above). The common ones are being able to blink Tidehollow Sculler, Flickerwisp, Wasteland Strangler and Thought-Knot Seer to get a second use out of their Enter the Battlefield abilities. Secondary, you can use Displacer on your opponents creatures, either to tap them down allowing you to attack through or by stopping an attack, as blinking an attacking creature removes them from combat. Finally you can use Displacer to save your own creatures, since when a creature is the target of Lightning Bolt, if it gets 'Displaced' then the lightning bolt target is not longer valid. Nothing too complicated in itself, it's the interactions with the rest of our creatures that makes things interesting.
Flickerwisp - The swiss army knife of the deck. It's used offensively, defensively and everything in between. Casting normally, the uses are a little more limited. It's useful for removing something for the turn basically. Important targets could be a creature blocking you from hitting a planeswalker, Ensnaring Bridge preventing attacking all together, or anything else really. You can also use it on any of your ETB creatures to get another go out of it and at worst you can use it on your own land to 'untap it' at the end of the turn. It's also a 3/1 flyer which is quite respectable on it's own. With vial however, the possibilities open up. In addition to everything you could already do, you're now able to deploy it at instant speed allow you to use it in response to removal to save a creature, remove attackers at instant speed and get rid of anything at any time. The most powerful use however is at the end of the turn. Due to the wording on flickerwisp "Return that card to the battlefield under its owner's control at the beginning of the next end step." key word being here is 'beginning'. Meaning if Flickerwisp enters the battlefield during the end step (most commonly due to Aether Vial or Eldrazi Displacer's Ability) whatever it exiles won't return to the battlefield until the NEXT end step, essentially exiling it for an entire turn. This becomes useful against opponents Lands, as it removes the land for the turn cutting their mana short. Planeswalkers, preventing your opponent from activating them. And any other permanent with an ability you don't want your opponent using. It's also useful on your opponents end step to remove cards like Ensnaring Bridge, allowing you to attack on your turn, or another creature that is preventing you from attacking efficiently. Another way to get flickerwisp to enter on endstep is to simple fickerwisp another flickerwisp! One wisp exiles another till the end step, then that wisp comes in and you can do all the fun stuff described above.
Wasteland Strangler - We talked about this briefly before, and the effect is straight forward most of the time but there are situations where we can make the most of it. The best thing about Strangler though, is that it doesn't matter how a card is exiled, if it's in the exile zone it's free food to fling at your opponents creatures. All stars here are Suspended spells (Rift Bolt, Lotus Bloom, Greater Gargadon), Rebound spells (Ephemerate, Distortion Strike), Tidehollow Sculler's kidnapped card and any other effect that puts things into exile. Recently Adventure Cards from Elderaine are exiled and Light Up the Stage is another juicy one. The super spicy trick though are cards Exiled with Flickerwisp, even those are fair game. In a dream scenario you could Exile a card:Jace the Mindsculper with Flickerwisp, then use Wasteland Strangler to throw it at a Snapcaster Mage, awesome. Also don't be afraid to bait opponents to falling into a Strangler kill. Many games I've attacked into a Un-Flipped Thing in the Ice with Thalia or Arbiter or Sculler, opponent obviously blocks (cause why wouldn't they?) and then Strangler finishes it off with 2 damage on it. Awesome! You can get extra tricky with the card by casting it with no cards in Exile (maybe against a deck with counter spells) and most times your opponent will think it will do nothing, then you can Vial in a Flickerwisp, Sculler or Thought-Knot Seer to supply it with some juicy ammo and get full value without your opponent seeing it coming (this is all possible due to not having to pick an exile card until the ability resolves). For a SUPER clear explanation of how dumb this card can be, see: https://www.reddit.com/r/magicTCG/comments/64pahg/all_you_need_to_know_about_wasteland_strangler/
Thought-Knot Seer - Enters the battlefield, exiles a card, leaves the battlefield opponent draws a card. Not much else to it really. The tricks here are the same as mostly any other of our cards. You can build a soft lock with Eldrazi Displacer where you "Displace" Thought-Knot Seer on your opponents draw step. They draw a second card from Thought-Knot Seer leaving the battlefield and then out of their current hand you take their best card. Many decks can't recover from this, especially if you have additional protection for your two creatures but it's not a lights out by any means. Something else to note is that the 'Draw a Card' portion of Thought-Knot Seer still needs a target, so if your opponent becomes hexproof by some means, they will not draw a card from Thought-Knot Seer leaving the battlefield.
Aether Vial - Mostly everything has been covered at this point, but here's some general pointers when playing with vial. First, usually the best time to vial something into play is during your opponents end step. It leaves the the least time to react and it hides your board current power level for the most time, this also hedges better against boardwipes like Supreme Verdict. It will most likely drive opponents nuts, as sometimes an untapped vial is the scariest. Also remember to activate in response to Thoughtseize, Inquisition of Kozilek, or any other discard spell, removing your opponents options and possibly put into play the card your opponent wanted to take. Against decks with lots of counter spells, it may be wise to slow roll your threats, by only playing them out with vial. Making creatures un-counterable and unreactable is very strong, especially against control. Another thing you can try is faking out your opponent with Vial activation. A more common strategy when Vendilion Clique was common, activating vial when you have no intention to put a creature in or have nothing to vial in at all can be a great strategy since your opponent may want to respond before the vial ability resolves. Sometimes it's enough to just make your opponent question every vial activation if it's real or not.
Why not X?
Other Taxes Decks?
Another question you might be asking is "Why BW E&T over other variants of Taxes?" Well there are pros and cons of each variant so let's cover that now. (Disclaimer, while I have played these other versions, I am not as experienced as I am with BW. So take everything below with a grain of salt. This is only my interpretation.)
Something else to note that is similar about every other variant of Death and Taxes VS BW E&T is that BW has the "worst" or most inconsistent mana base of them all. It does however contain some of the best and most versatile sideboard cards. In light of that I won't bring it up these 2 points again as to avoid repeating myself over and over again.
Mono W E&T - Very similar, still runs Thought-Knot Seer and Eldrazi Displacer. In previous years, you'd be replacing your black cards with Blade Splicer or Restoration Angel but these have all but been forgotten by the un-banning of card:Stone Forge Mystic. The combination of Eldrazi + SFM Package really make this deck very strong, but as a half-way happy between traditional DnT and BW it doesn't see much love. While this deck is stronger against Bloodmoon than BW, it can still fall to the same inconsistencies as BW does with it's still demanding mana base. Not a bad deck by any means, Displacer and TKS combined with the equipment SFM brings can be very scary to stare down from the other side of the table. However being a middle child, it's just not very popular. Those looking for raw power will probably be drawn to BW and those afraid of the greedy mana base will drop Eldrazi all together.
Other Cards?
When it comes to changing the list, you have to be weary of the decks existing synergies. There are options for flex spots, as mentioned in the stock list breakdown, but remove too much and things start to fall apart. Below are a list of the clear 1 to 1 combos the deck has and how interconnected it all really is. Hopefully this will help to understand what can be trimmed and what can't, since trimming cards also trims those cards combos.
- Leonin Arbiter + Path to Exile + Ghost Quarter - Search Prevention
- Leonin Arbiter + Thalia, Guardian of Thraben + Ghost Quarter - Mana Denial
- Tidehollow Sculler + Wasteland Strangler - Clear 2 for 1 Combo
- Flickerwisp + Wasteland Strangler - Broken Combo
- Thought-Knot Seer + Tidehollow Sculler - Hand Disruption package
- Tidehollow Sculler + Flickerwisp OR Tidehollow Sculler + Eldrazi Displacer - Exile 2 cards (1 forever).
- Eldrazi Displacer + High ETB Creature Count - Multi-Use ETBs
- Eldrazi Temple + Thought-Knot Seer + Eldrazi Displacer + Wasteland Strangler - Cheaper Eldrazi Combo
- Aether Vial + High Creature Count - Maximum Vial usage
- Thalia, Guardian of Thraben + Low non-creature spell count - Minimal Negative Thalia Impact
Now, onto some cards that are frequently brought up when talking about possible includes into the deck that in my opinion, just don't fit.
Stoneforge Mystic - The new hotness. All the other taxes decks are running it, the new-old-kid UW control has become UW sharkblade. The card is GAS. Well the answer is... how? BW E&T is a very tight list with a lot of interconnecting synergies. SFM and it's package (Minimum of 4 Stoneforge Mystic 1 Batterskull 1 Sword of Fire and Ice) is just too many cards. If you cut Tidehollow Sculler and Wasteland Strangler why not cut Black and just go Mono White? Cutting Leonin Arbiter and Thalia, Guardian of Thraben just makes you into a bad WB Stoneblade. There just isn't room for the cards in this kind of deck. You can MAYBE fit it in the sideboard for a 'Transformation' game 2 but that's 6 sideboard slots for what? Other mid-range decks? The stock list already does well there so I don't think we need the help. SFM just isn't a card this deck can use, it's too many slots and it just won't fit. (Hit me up if you get a Yorion 80 card BW E&T SFM Deck to work).
Reality Smasher - Big beater. We have the temples, so why not? Because we don't have the mana for it. You'd need to go up to at least 24 if not 25 lands to reliably cast Smasher due to our deck wanting to Ghost Quarter aggressively and if you're cutting cards for Smasher, you're also cutting cards for more lands. Similar issue as Stoneforge Mystic, there just isn't enough room.
Wrap Up
Well, that's about it. I hope this has been informative for you! I'll try and keep this updated if anything crazy changes in the world of BW E&T. Thanks so much for reading and good luck out there!
Glossary
Here are some common terms or short form used usually when talking about Taxes decks. Some may appear in this primer.
- 'ETB' - stands for 'Enter the Battlefield' and usually refers to a creature's ability that is triggered by it entering the battlefield
- 'Giver' or 'Stepmom' - Giver of Runes
- 'Thalia' or 'Small Thalia' - Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
- 'Arbiter' or 'Cat Jesus' - Leonin Arbiter
- 'Vial' or 'Pokeball' - Aether Vial also see: 'Vial [creature here] in' which is the action of putting a creature into play with Aether Vial's activated ability (eg. Vial in Arbiter). also see: 'Tick up Vial' the act of adding a charge counter as part of Aether Vial's triggered ability on your upkeep. Also see: 'Vial on 2' meaning that Aether Vial currently as 2 charge counters on it.
- 'Path' - Path to Exile or the act of using Path to Exile to exile a creature (eg. Path your Goblin Guide)
- 'Sculler' - Tidehollow Sculler
- 'Wisp' - Flickerwisp or the action of targeting a permanent with Flickerwisp's ETB (eg. Wisp your opponents land)
- 'Displacer' - Eldrazi Displacer also see: 'Displacing' or 'Displace' is usually in reference to Eldrazi Displacer's activated ability
- 'Strangler' - Wasteland Strangler also see: 'Strangle your [creature name]' which refers to using Wasteland Strangler's ETB on another creature. Also see: 'Process/Processing [card name]' which refers to the resolution of Wasteland Strangler's ETB and which card you are moving from Exile to Graveyard (eg. Strangle your Dark Confidant processing Fatal Push).
- 'TKS' or 'Thought-Knot' - Thought-Knot Seer. Or used as a verb ('TKS / Thought-Knot' our opponent) to refer to Thought-Knot Seers ETB when used against an opponent.
- 'Strip Mine' - not to be confused with the legacy legal card Strip Mine, this usually refers to activating Ghost Quarter on an opponents land when you control Leonin Arbiter and they do not have the mana to pay to search their library. This is due to the replication of Strip Mine's activated ability by combining the effects of Ghost Quarter and Leonin Arbiter.
- 'Taxer' and 'Tax' 'Taxer' means any card or effect that increases the cost of other spells or abilities. Most often used when talking about Thalia or Arbiter. 'Tax' refers to the actual increased cost imposed by a 'Taxer'
- 'Flicker' - Derived from Flickerwisp's effect, this refers to the action of exiling a permanent till end of turn. An effect also seen on Charming Prince and Yorion, Sky Nomad
- 'Blink' - The action of exiling a permanent then returning to the battlefield immediately. See Eldrazi Displacer, Restoration Angel and Ephemerate.
- 'Temple' or 'E Temple' - Eldrazi Temple
- 'Caves' - Caves of Koilos
- 'Courtyard' - Concealed Courtyard
- 'Clearing' - Silent Clearing also see: 'Crack Clearing' or 'Cycle Clearing' which is the act of using Silent Clearing's second ability to draw a card.
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Casual
96% Competitive
| Date added | 4 years |
| Last updated | 4 years |
| Legality | This deck is Modern legal. |
| Rarity (main - side) | 41 - 0 Rares 16 - 0 Uncommons |
| Cards | 60 |
| Avg. CMC | 2.18 |
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