Hypnotic Specter is Hypnotic Specter ... none more needs to be said... except that the discard is random if u can't read.

I had kicked around the idea of possibly adding some specters to this deck, but I'm still not sure where I could work them in. Hypnotic Specter is a damn fine choice, since the casting cost is so cheap. I think I will try to swap the Blood Artist s for the specters and see what happens. Thanks!

Mono-black discard is a pretty awesome deck I have to say,I'd recommend ditching anything that costs over 3 mana though,not sure of your budget but here's a few considerations:

Thoughtseize - The holy grail of discard spells, pretty expensive though

Inquisition of Kozilek - Thoughtseize's little sister, still expensive but well worth it.

Wrench Mind - One of the most cost effective discard spells in the format, juts cross your fingers you're not up against affinity

Smallpox - This is great for a mono-black deck like this, dealing with a problem creature, keeping them off a land drop and emptying their hand, covers all the bases (one of the reasons I recommend dropping anything costing over 3 mana.)

Raven's Crime - castable from your grave, this guy helps make drawing lands late game suck much less.

Funeral Charm - double duty. removal, combat trick or a discard.

Liliana of the Veil - She should top your curve as a 4 of, She does everything you want your deck to do and she does it every turn.

Dark Confidant - (the other reason I recommend ditching anything over 3 mana) This guy will take your tier 3 deck and make it playable in tournaments. An extra draw each turn is just the kick in the pants a discard deck needs to keep up with about every matchup out there. letting you run through possible dead draws and keeping your hand full of discard is well worth a few life. Even if he flips lands Raven's Crime can do it's thing beautifully. and he certainly helps recover from Smallpox .

hope you find this helpful.

Very good advice! I will need some time to do some rearranging, but I really like the approach that you have presented. I really like the Raven's Crime and Dark Confidant combo; I had attempted to work Raven's Crime into the deck at one point and I couldn't think of how it would work well. I will update soon and let you know how I sculpt the deck from there. Thanks!

I think I may go with Phyrexian Arena instead of Dark Confidant , mostly because the card prices (yikes). But, I think that Phyrexian Arena will do the same thing at less of a threat to myself.

how useful do you find Gnat Miser really?

Early game he seems okay, but once your deck gets the ball rolling your opponent shouldn't get close to having 7 cards in their hand. Seems like something with more value could replace it in my opinion.

Yah, it's great for early game stuff, but I have noticed that he is only effective late game against blue draw decks. I had been kicking around the idea of replacing it with another creature that fits the theme, but I was hoping to add a different effect instead of just causing an opponent to discard. Any ideas?

I had thought about including more draw abilities, possibly with Blood Scrivener . I had even kicked around the idea of Wight of Precinct Six so I could have some heavy-hitters on the battlefield, considering the amount of creatures that could possibly be in my opponents' graveyards.

Ensnaring Bridge might be funny, otherwise Augur of Skulls is almost never a bad choice.

Not bad. I will put some of these cards on my maybe board and try them out. Thanks!

If you want a 1cmc discard spell, I would suggest Funeral Charm over Horrifying Revelation . At instant speed, you can do so much more with it. One trick: once you've emptied your opponent's hand, cast it on his draw step, after he draws a card, but before he can use it.

It also kills x/1 creatures for 1 mana. Far more useful than it might at first seem--there are a lot of very powerful creatures in Modern with one toughness.

I would also suggest Wrench Mind over Psychic Miasma . It was printed in an artifact block, when most people would have an artifact to toss. Now, in Modern, most decks don't have them so readily available in hand. So it will almost always hit them for two cards. Compare that to Psychic Miasma , which even if it hits two cards half the time, will cost four mana to do so.

Former long time discard player here. Used to play discard as main, until a pro guy explained me why you don't see discard at the Pro Tours.

Essentially, discarding as a core strategy constitutes a non retributive card superiority resource. What that means? You are slowing down (not neutralizing) your opponent's gameplay, without improving yours, and all that at the cost of your list spots. In a few words, you're sacrificing list slots you could assign to actual winning-aimed cards, and packing in sorceries that will ultimately fail at preventing your opponent from build his strategy. Look:

Turn 1: swamp, thoughtseize

Turn 2: swamp, wrench mind

Turn 3: swamp, liliana's caress, another thoughtseize.

Now let's analyze that opening. You have invested the entirety of your three first turns in discarding. Your opponent has had, and pretty much is going to for the rest of the game, free room to build on his strategy during every single turn, for all he's lost is 4 cards out of 11, and two life points. If he's got cards in his hand by turn 5, he's gonna be losing what, 2-4 points a turn, tbat if he hasn't buried the Liliana's Caress...

That said, discard is possible if you have some good side strategy, like a blue splash with cards that make your opponent draw massively... like Jace Beleren 's third skill. Plus some board control like Culling Scales .

tl,dr: against competitive, you're either dying or having your The Rack and Liliana's Caress handed to you long before they get to do anything special, say turn 6.

Good call on Funeral Charm . I didn't think to replace Horrifying Revelation with it, but I think you're correct. Wrench Mind could work as an alternative as well; the reason I liked Psychic Miasma was because of the possibiliy of getting to return it to my hand. However, since I have enough discard power in this deck I probably don't need any returns. Great advice qk1!

As for your advice, incredibruhahaha, I totally understand what you mean. This is why I needed some help on some additional win conditions. Before I scaled this deck down to what it is now, I had Painful Quandary which would play to the discard strategy as well as penalize opponents for casting, but it just was not fast enough. I have considered introducing a win condition that plays to my opponents' large graveyard, but I haven't quite been able to nail down a strategy yet.

Maybe something like Nyxathid as a beater?

That's a great idea! Something like that paired with Wight of Precinct Six could make for a good addition to this deck.

I will try this out with the current build and see what needs to be improved. Thanks!

Bloodchief Ascension and Mindcrank could make a nice way into the deck, the ascension alone with your discard can be pretty nice as well, as it deals damage and gives you life when ANY card goes to your opponent's graveyard from ANYWHERE.

It's cheap, it's black, it doesn't get any better~ c:

Nyxathid works really well here, but the problem is when you compare him to Phyrexian Obliterator , you realise that even at 7/7 he's not really worth it :D

oh... just noticed the Murder s and wondered 'wow, Go for the Throat or Doom Blade are almost definitely better options (depends on which you prefer to notbe able to kill). If you go up against affinity, jund etc. then you can side in the Murder s but they seem pretty weak for mainboard.