Hey, saw your request for suggestions on how to get Ashnod's Altar and Vedalken Orrery into this deck. Looking at it, the things that seem weakest to me are the enchantment's that punish discard, Megrim, Liliana's Caress and Waste Not.

While they are all good cards, your deck doesn't strike me as being dedicated to discard, and I wonder how often you'll have them in play when you do force a discard... Not to say that incidental discard won't happen from other effects, but that's what I'd cut. Cutting those 3 will leave you room for both the Altar and Orrery, and I would also suggest adding Dictate of Erebos for redundancy and surprise. If you don't like Dictate, then try Gate to Phyrexia to deal with pesky artifacts.

I would also suggest (from same thread) cutting Kozilek, Butcher of Truth since the graveyard shuffle ability seems extremely anti-synergistic with the list. Also, Ashnod's Altar seems bad in the current list - I'm not sure what you're sacrificing for value. Where's the dispendable critter chain of Bloodghast, Nether Traitor, and/or Reassembling Skeleton? These guys would also help flip Lili more reliably

Ender666666 all three cards create a board presence that need to be answered. With lili makiking everyone discard the advantage is huge. Dictate got cut earlier. I'm super iffy about gate. It's very slow not the best, although I might test it out. I might cut Megrim for the orrery...

hubatish Kozilek's benefit outweighs his drawback. Shutting down mill and reusable POWERFUL card draw makes him worth it. The Ashnod's Altar is a free sac outlet, something that's borderline broken in edh, not to mention it adds mana. All those creatures are weak. I can reanimate good creatures so why bother with lower powerlevel ones?

So that you can sacrifice them to Skullclamp, Phyrexian Arena, Sadistic Hypnotist, and flip Lili, or discard them off of Lili for free value? Skullclamp + Bloodghast in particular is an amazing draw engine. Sacrificing a board of high power level creatures like Gray Merchant of Asphodel is only really good right before a Living Death (in which case it is amazing). Also, Bloodghast is certainly a tier above Reassembling Skeleton and Nether Traitor, and belongs in almost every black edh deck.

hubatishI used to have Bloodghast in here but it was lack luster.

Virlym puts it well: "its use was limited. It really just became sac fodder. It's a 2/1 body that can easily be blocked by almost anything, it can't block for you, and you really only want to draw it early game."

And saving creatures is not just for living death. It also stops people from stealing them, it enables them yo be reanimated for addition etb and dies effects.

Skullclamp works just as well equipped to a Rune-Scarred Demon sacced to an Ashnod's Altar as with Bloodghast and the demon actual creates large amounts of advantage.

Just wanted to add my 2 cents. First off, Rings of Brighthearth doesn't help you get the emblem quicker. Adding (or subtracting) loyalty is part of the cost for the planeswalkers. By using Rings of Brighthearth, you can double the effect (good for -X abilities), but you won't change the loyalty counters past the initial change of the first activation.

Second, why no Grave Betrayal? Liliana's emblem is basically a better version of it, but until you get her emblem it still gives you something fun.

I would also suggest Nim Deathmantle. It synergies with what you are doing, and you can also use it with an infinite combo (Ashnod's Altar + Wurmcoil Engine for infinite 3/3 LL/DT dudes, or infinite colorless mana to use with something like Exsanguinate).

It That Betrays also seems like a fun pick with all the sacrificing you can do. It will mostly get you creatures, but things like All Is Dust allow you to get more as well (you could also run Braids, Cabal Minion just to make it even more annoying). The downside, you paint a rather large target on your head.

Just some suggestions

I really like a couple of Virlyms suggestions. Nim Deathmantle has treated me very nicely in the past, being able to save your creatures from removal is a great asset.

Also just so you know, Braids, Cabal Minion is banned in EDH now.

I thought Braids, Cabal Minion was just banned as a commander like Kokusho, the Evening Star is, but you can still run them in your deck.

WotC Commander banned list

The banned list was updated a couple months ago, "banned as commander" is gone away with. Kokusjo is unbanned. and everything else is just outright banned.

I guess I'll play Deathmantle. What should I remove?

also Virlym I honestly don't like Grave Betrayal it's too expensive for it's use. I'd rather just use Rise of the Dark Realms and win. Plus my mana curve is a little too high for my linking already.

For the Deathmantle, I'd say to remove one of your 8, 9, or 10 drops. They are all powerful cards, but they are dead until the late game and only Ugin has the potential to win you the game. I personally would cut the Artisan of Kozilek, he is expensive for a reanimation spell.

Cards that could be chopped:
Artisan of Kozilek - ability only works when cast, not reanimated
Butcher of Malakir - too fragile and expensive for his ability, better off running Dictate of Erebos
Sadistic Hypnotist - fairly costly, and can only be used as a sorcery, there are better sac outlets
Strands of Night - sacrificing land is not something you really want to do with no way of returning them other than shuffling your graveyard back in
Crypt Incursion - granted, it's better than Shadowfeed, but there are better ways to gain life and better ways to have GY removal.
Toxic Deluge - I still don't like it, especially with the low amount of life gain in the deck. I would much rather run a Black Sun's Zenith

I suppose that's a starting point.

Artisan of Kozilek it is. And I was dubious of Strands of Night as well. But holy shit it's good.

If keeping Strands of Night with mana problems, you may either want to consider running more ramp (such as Liliana of the Dark Realms, or more mana rocks), running more things to shuffle cards back into your deck like Elixir of Immortality, running things like Crucible of Worlds, or running more ways to throw creatures into your grave to cheap them out better like Buried Alive.

I own buried alive. Removal ideas?

There are more, but this should be enough for you to start with. Agent of Erebos and Withered Wretch are probably your best bets tho.

Mass GY remval:
Agent of Erebos

Targeted GY removal:
Carrion Beetles - not very good tho
Chainer, Dementia Master - indirect and can get costly for a lot, but has more utility
Conversion Chamber - only for artifacts
Faerie Macabre
Famished Ghoul
Martyr of Bones
Phyrexian Furnace
Withered Wretch

I also just like Geth, Lord of the Vault, but he doesn't exile.

How does flipping Liliana, Heretical Healer to Liliana, Defiant Necromancer work? When she exiles herself to flip does she actually return as a planeswalker or does she return to the command zone?

I'm new so I have no idea but would be interested to hear why it would / wouldn't work.

THe rules for COmmanders is that whenever they exiled or sent to the graveyard you can choose to REPLACE the effect and send it to the command zone or to let the effect happen. So in this case you choose to let it get exiled so that it would come back as a Walker. OR you could choose to send it to the command zone.

Aah, I see. Cool, didn't know that. Thanks!

So if she is Trickbinded she's exiled forever

Actually, Trickbind would not exile her forever, it would merely stop her from exiling at all for that one trigger. She could then be triggered again, however if Trickbind is played on one of her planeswalker abilities you would have to replay her or be unable to activate any of her abilities.

Trickbind the return trigger and she's gone forever.

It's all 1 effect. there aren't 2 parts to it. Once she is exiled, she's coming back. You can't play something in the middle of it. There's no passing of priority once it starts resolving.

I'll check around. I was told trickbind was going to screw me over. I'd LOVE for it to work out in my favor.

I hope you're right Virlym

Something will die and Liliana will trigger. Priority will then pass. If no one utilizes that time, then the ability will start resolving. Priority won't be passed again until the ability is done resolving (meaning after she is on the field and you have your zombie).