Looks fine to start off with. I used to play Mono-Black Devotion some years ago (I even have the highest rated 'Devotion' deck on T/O). A couple of tips though.

1. You can drop all of your non-basic lands for basic Swamps, and bring your land count to 23-24 (this streamlines your mana for casting & spells on-curve, and neuters things like Ghost Quarter & Blood Moon, etc.).

2. The speed of the format has to be considered. That being said, Erebos & Ayara come down a little late to be really impactful. I would cut them, 1-2 Phyrexian Arena, and 1-2 Garys (this will make your mana curve less steep)

3. You wanted Mono-Black Aggro? Well, to me at least, nothing screams Mono-Black like a Phyrexian Obliterator equipped with a Lashwrithe!

Metroid_Hybrid already mentioned everything you should consider, but other than that, yeah this looks great. Also looks fun and interesting to play (or play against). Nice job!

Metroid_Hybrid, Balaam__

I appreciate the feedback, guys. It's good to be going Black again. I took your advice land-wise into consideration and compromised a bit on it. I like the pressure that the Leechridden Swamp allows me to put on people and they are still Swamps, so I'm not hurting for black mana. I actually haven't minded them coming in tapped because I usually seem to be playing one-drops on turn two and, to be honest, their pinging nature as a potential mana-sink have often been the difference between that Gary finishing a foe off or letting them linger. I did drop Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth as superfluous (and expensive), removed one Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx and added three additional Swamps. I personally don't love the ratio of 23 lands in a 60 card mono-colored deck but I split the difference by increasing the deck size to 61. 61-card decks have always seemed lucky for me for some reason, don't know why.

I dropped 1x Ayara, First of Locthwain, 1x Erebos, God of the Dead and 1x Gray Merchant of Asphodel, replacing them with an additional Phyrexian Obliterator, Geralf's Messenger and added in 1x Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet. Collectively this increased my Devotion and smoothed out my mana curve to a greater degree.

At the moment I'm pretty happy with the deck, I just have concerns about non-creature removal, particularly artifacts and enchantments that could potentially wreck me - but then, that kinda comes with the Black territory, doesn't it.

Metroid_Hybrid,

Also, the ONLY thing that kept me from finding a place for Lashwrithe was the fact that I don't currently have any artifacts and I like that hate being dead draws in their hand. Still haven't ruled it out completely though.

I think you can find better cards than a 1/1 deathtouch creature for . Maybe even Deadeye Tracker but it might not be worth it.

If you like that slot though there are at least three strictly better cards I can think of right now, Vampire of the Dire Moon, Foulmire Knight, and Ruthless Ripper.

Raven's Crime is middling, Leechridden Swamp is bad, and Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx dosen't have anything to ramp into.

You don't have much maindeck creature removal (for dorks, creatures relevant to combos etc.), I would reccomend Bloodchief's Thirst as it can also answer planeswalkers and is only 1 mana without kicker.

Your sideboard could use some work too, while I understand that you want to build devotion, Contaminated Ground and Withered Wretch aren't amazing at what they do. I guess I never have seen contaminated ground and its pretty cheap so you could test it and see how it does, but I would reccomend playing cards like Relic of Progenitus or Grafdigger's Cage over wretch in every case but maybe tribal zombies.

Flooremoji,

Thanks for stopping by and taking the time to respond. I hadn't been aware of Vampire of the Dire Moon, I consider that an immediate upgrade!

Raven's Crime has proven very effective for me in the mid-game at times, catching opponents off-guard when I double or triple-cast it to empty their hand (especially in the second or third game of a match when they've boarded out all their graveyard hate). It's worth a one-of imo. I detailed my reasons for Leechridden Swamp above, but I'm open to dropping it. Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx ramps into a hand full of cards from a Phyrexian Arena or two.

I'll definitely try Bloodchief's Thirst in the sideboard over Victim of Night for its value against Planeswalkers but I really like the instant speed of the latter. Contaminated Ground is intended to interfere with land strategies like Tron while Withered Wretch allows me to cycle multiple cards out of a graveyard AND gives me a body that increases my Devotion.

Cranial Plating is the one that counts artifacts.. Lashwrithe counts your Swamps, AND is a Living Weapon to boot..

I think the only point to playing mono black devotion in modern is winning the standoffs where Leechridden Swamp would be making a difference, so unless it's a one-of and you have fetchlands to find it I think having a tapped land is too big a downside to justify it in a deck thats already happy to be in a board stall.

Metroid_Hybrid, no I just meant that with no other artifacts in my deck that Lashwrithe would draw every bit of artifact hate they had. What, exactly, are the benefits of a 'living weapon'? I read the card but I don't get it.

Btw, been looking for Tymaret, Chosen from Death and finally found it. Trying to decide if I want one or two, but it helps my turn two options.

Flooremoji, not just board stalls, the card serves as a nice mana-sink any time you're caught with a couple of extra unused lands. It's only real downsides is its vulnerability to 'non-basic land' effects and the issue of it coming in tapped. From my experience it works out to a coinflip, so I don't feel any special passion about it... just don't want to dismiss its potential usefulness out of hand. It's been a good card for me in the past.

TS/IoK package is the absolute best t1 in black. I'd personally run Fatal Push as my 9th-12th 1-mana spells, and Knight of the Ebon Legion to round out the bottom of the deck.

The best interaction in modern plus a creature that can do quite a lot.

Then you have 2-drops. I'd run Gifted Aetherborn and Yarok's Fenlurker. Your 1x Tymaret is solid as well.

For bigger stuff, you have a variety of choices. IMO, your big stuff is all pretty good. Obliterator, Gatekeeper, Messenger, Kalitas are awesome. Nighthawk is reasonable. If you want card draw, though, just use Sign in Blood and Night's Whisper.

Some thoughts:

• I think you need to be playing 24 lands... 22 is just waaay too low with the amount of 4-and-5 drops you’re playing.

• even with 24 lands, your mana curve doesn’t look great. You have a bunch of “cute” cards like Ayara, First of Locthwain and Erebos, God of the Dead, which don’t actually help you much, and would be better served as killspells. I would suggest dropping these cuter cards to get Bloodchief's Thirst into the mainboard.

• 3 Phyrexian Arena seems a bit much, i don’t think you want to be running more than 2 (drawing a second copy is effectively pretty close to a dead draw)

• Killing Wave doesn’t seem like a good card, your opponent can always choose the option that suits them best.

• the sideboard needs a lot of work. I’m not sure what you’re trying to hose with these cards, but i think your current setup needs a major rethink

Rejoice! Lithoform Blight is the new, better Contaminated Ground. replace right away:). In other news, I think more main deck removal is def a must, cards like erebos and vamp of the dire moon are cute, but probably bad, adding main deck pushes or thirsts would be ideal, but if u want to stick on the devotion route then Murderous Rider is a great one. as others have said nykthos is pretty bad here, especially if ur trying to curve into into a quad black card. in the board, Leyline of the Void is miles better than wretch

Hey StoryArcher, I like your list. It reminds me of my old Mono-Black devotion deck. Over the years I played many, many games with it, and I learned some tips I would like to share with you. I don’t see the budget tag, so I’m going to give my recommendations regardless of price.

First of all, your mana base needs fetchlands. I run at least 6. This will thin the deck, and in the long run this makes a statistically significant difference on your card draws. You should also run at least 2 Castle Locthwain for additional card draw. A single Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth will help when you don’t want to pop a fetchland to save life. Once you add fetchlands, this raises the question, why not run a Black/X dual land like Godless Shrine that you can fetch if you need? But I’ll get to that later.

Next, the Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx serves no real purpose and you should cut it. It will slow you down when you need the black mana, trust me. In a competitive modern setting, you want to hit every land drop with this deck so you can hit a turn 4 Obliterator or Kalitas. The Shrine slows you down and only helps during the late game.

Next, your mana curve is too high, and all the 3-drops will only slow you down when you need early game plays. 4 Riders are excessive, I would drop 3-4. You could run Gatekeeper of Malakir instead for indirect removal, and Fatal Push or Bloodchief's Thirst for targeted removal. You really need at least 4x 1-drop removal spells mainboard. Erebos is also not as useful as a 4th Obliterator, which should be viewed as the staple of the deck. The Messengers are slow because they enter play tapped. I would prefer the 4th Vampire Nighthawk, or consider Nighthawk Scavenger instead or in addition to the other Nighthawks. Ayara is interesting but ultimately doesn’t further your goal of aggro.

Another option is running 4 Dark Confidants instead of Arena for more card draw, if you reduce the number of high-mana cost cards. This may seem risky, but with all of your life gain, it will balance out and you will gain tremendous card advantage. Arena is too slow for Modern. You might as well run Sign in Blood or Night's Whisper instead for instant draw.

I know it seems counter-intuitive, but the focus on devotion should be secondary. That’s where Gary comes in all on his own. You don’t need Tymaret or Nykthos, which ultimately do not further your goal of aggro.

Like I said earlier, if you run fetchlands, a couple of Godless Shrine, and maybe even Silent Clearing for more draw, you can have access to critical removal like Path to Exile, Rest in Peace, Disenchant\Revoke Existence, etc, without compromising the feel of playing Mono-Black. I came to this point after realizing that I needed support that only White could offer. My version is more control oriented with Liliana of the Veil and takes advantage of the White mana for Lingering Souls. Check it out if you like:

TWIN LILIANA CONTROL (Ultimate Black Devotion)

If you’re a Mono-Black purist, consider Feed the Swarm on your sideboard to help with enchantments. You’ll need some other way to deal with artifacts like Ratchet Bomb.

Hope this helps! :)

Your sideboard is typically meta-dependant, as you can't have answers to everything.

You should probably have multiple cards you can swap in and out for your sideboard and sometimes your main since sideboards are meta dependant.

Damping Sphere is a really good counter against Storm decks and big-mana decks like Tron and Amulet Titan which place down lands that can sometimes generate 2 or even 3 mana.

You should have some forms of mass graveyard hate. Withered Wretch might be decent or slightly better than Surgical Extraction , but there are other cards that at a tap of a card can make a graveyard vanish. Or maybe just move a die around. Ashiok, Dream Render is an example.

Cry of the Carnarium is a suggestion over Drown in Sorrow . However, this is mostly "what do you value: Scry or Exile creatures"

Feed the Swarm might be a decent suggestion if you want to go after enchantments, or if there are too many problematic enchantments in your meta. Blood Moon is not something you should be too careful about since you're in mono-colors with 2 non-basics. You should be fine without enchantment removal, but this is something that's meta-dependant.

Murderous Rider is a pretty decent removal card, granting you both a chump-blocker/attacker and getting you removal as long as you have enough mana. However, modern is a turn-4 format, and it values having 3 or fewer CMC/MV cards. A 4 mana card had better win the game, and anything that's at 5 or above will either be placed into a commander/standard deck or a control deck. I recommend Fatal Push as a better piece of removal, but you can keep Murderous Rider in it since it's basically a Hero's Downfall .

certainly looks fun and would love to play this deck... id say making room for some mainboard spot removal in the form of Feed the Swarm/Tragic Slip or any of the other previously suggested removal cards would be good in this.

Icbrgr - Do you think additional creature removal is really necessary with the sets of Murderous Rider, Thoughtseize and Inquisition of Kozilek along with the various Deathtouch creatures? Obviously some additional means of dealing with Enchantments, Lands and Artifacts would be helpful, but I've been going the discard + Surgical Extraction route so far... if I were to add additional removal, what would you suggest taking out?

In my opinion the utility of your creatures having adventure/deathtouch is certainly great value and I think are great picks; however I personally would like to have access to cheap instant speed spot removal... just for an example I'd try to cut 2 copies of Gray Merchant of Asphodel and a single copy of Geralf's Messenger in favor of 3xTragic Slip (or some other ratio of creatures)... Whether they or you swing with a deathtouch creature and when they chump block you can pay to take out an additional creature of value... Vendetta/Disfigure also have there place for consideration depending on your meta.

Just my thoughts on the matter; i really do like your deck good luck and happy brewing!

Some thoughts:

• while you have hand disruption and some removal, I think you need much, much more removal in the deck (4-8 cards). Your current creature count is crazy high, and your comparative removal options are very low, and very slow (3cmc is A LOT of mana to kill a thing). Look to include at least a playset of Fatal Push, and additionally 2-3 copies of another efficient killspell (the upcoming one “Infernal Grasp” from Midnight Hunt looks ideal).

• 22 lands feels low for realistically/fairly casting all those 4-and-5 cmc cards. The abovementioned removal should help buy you time, but personally i’d suggest cutting down the quantity of these cards you’re running. 3 Obliterators and 2 Garys feels more on-curve and reasonable. Even adjusting for this, i’d recommend going to 23 lands to help cater for your numerous 3-drops.

• Sign in Blood is imo a bad card here (and bad in general). You’re looking to build up your board state and tear your opponents board state apart. This card does neither of those - leaving your board bare while letting your opponent stabilise.

• Your sideboard needs to be able to cater for all the various unfair decks. This will vary highly dependant on your local meta, but generally you’ll want ways to mess with lands, ways to mess with artifacts, ways to hate on the graveyard, answers for burn, and other cards to shore up your weakpoints. It may be worth having a single Godless Shrine and some fetches in your mainboard, so that you can sideboard Vindicate, as well as Deafening Silence, Rest in Peace, and other hate pieces that white is strong in. Other useful cards could include Damping Sphere, Sun Droplet, Torpor Orb, Void Mirror - but will depend on what you’re up against.

Hey StoryArcher, I have a lot of experience with black devotion - I’d like to share my thoughts with you (I am making suggestions regardless of budget considerations, since I don’t see the budget tag):

I concur with the other users above - you need to seriously consider mainboarding more cheap removal. Rider is good, but it’s expensive at 3 mana and also costs 2 life. It’s ok to run 1-2, but there’s a reason why Fatal Push is a mainstay in black decks. Especially if you run a few fetch lands to thin the deck and trigger revolt. Another good option is Dismember, which kills the germ created by Kaldra Compleat and other pesky indestructible creatures for as low as 1 mana. The new Infernal Grasp looks good too.

You are running too many Gray Merchant of Asphodel - 2 is enough. You don’t want them to clog up your hand, and your land count is lean at 22 lands.

Additional lifegain is also important. Consider a couple Collective Brutality to gain life and as backup removal/discard. Cling to Dust on the sideboard is very useful for lifegain and card drawing.

Sign in Blood is a weak card because it doesn’t further your board state. Phyrexian Arena is slower, but it draws you a card every turn and adds to devotion. Also Liliana, the Last Hope helps fish for creatures from your deck/graveyard. She is complimented well by Liliana of the Veil, which discards your own cards but her ultimate is game-ending. Geralf's Messenger is good but slow. I would cut them in favor of the Lilianas.

I don’t see the usefulness of Knight of the Ebon Legion. You aren’t running a tribal vampire deck, and it seems out of place. Consider Dauthi Voidwalker to add to your devotion and for built-in graveyard hate. There are more graveyard based decks than ever in today’s meta.

Other good choices are Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet for lifegain and zombie generation, and Tourach, Dread Cantor for discard and protection from white.

I concur with wallisface - splashing a little white for better removal on the sideboard is a big help in today’s meta. Lingering Souls is very useful to generate pressure in the early game and can be discarded by Liliana and Collective Brutality. Also Silent Clearing is a great way to draw additional cards. If you run 1-2 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth, you can turn your fetches and Silent Clearings into swamps and save life.

Here is a link to my list, for your reference:

TWIN LILIANA CONTROL - Black Devotion [Primer MH2]

Hope this helps! :)

Your mana curve makes me think you need a lot more than 21 lands (24 feels more reasonable considering your 4-and-5 drops)

I’m also surprised to see you playing Sign in Blood, as it’s a pretty universally-bad card in modern, but also in a devotion deck wastes a turn on not increasing your devotion.

I know 61 cards isn’t much above 60, but there has to be some card you can cut here to reach that optimal number.

wallisface

Thanks for the comments. It sounds like your recommendation would be to drop the 3x Sign in Blood and add two lands in their place. Based on past experience that sticks me with two problems: The first is that I don't know of any other black cards that let me draw like Sign in Blood (immediately) and with so many 1 and 2-drops I find I can often cast it and then cast at least one of the cards I drew as well. It also helps me get that 4th or 5th land right around the time I need it. The second is that whenever I've tried playing with more lands it never seems to work out. I inevitably get land clumps that stall me out for that crucial round or two.

FWIW 61 cards in my deck is something I've done all the way back since Ice Age. It's just a personal thing, kind of a signature. I understand that it's technically not optimal, but the variance is so minor and at this point it's tradition.

wallisface

Any thoughts about the various quandaries I'm entertaining above? Does Phyrexian Crusader warrant inclusion in the sideboard? Is Cry of the Carnarium the best use of that lone card slot? Is Bad Moon worthy of serious consideration? How much will a lack of land destruction ultimately hurt me? Is Withered Wretch a better option than Relic of Progenitus om this particular deck?

StoryArcher to answer your specific questions:

• Phyrexian Crusader would be a very odd sideboard choice. I think your sideboard in general needs a lot of work, over half of it is just graveyard hate which feels really excessive. I think you need to diversify your sideboard to better cope with devotions numerous bad matchups. Specifically, you have no answer for Torpor Orb, and very little to do versus control decks. Combo decks are also likely to give you grief. And you probably want some cards to help you versus burn. At the moment the sideboard feels really lacking.

• Cry of the Carnarium is a fine card, but really it should only exist in the sideboard. Its only real purpose will be to cope with Mirran Crusader when you’re playing against taxes.

• Bad Moon doesn’t offer you anything particularly special (trying to race aggro feels like a bad plan?), but Blood Moon should defo be an auto-include as 2-of in the sideboard - all the more established black-devotion decks i’ve seen seem to be including these to have a fighting chance versus a lot of the greedier meta.

• Withered Wretch is probably a fine alternate to Relic, though might be a bit slow. Most of the time shutting down a graveyard deck equals an easy win anyway, so i think you just want Relic as its faster. In any case, as mentioned before, 8 grave-hate cards in the sideboard is overkill, unless your meta is entirely dredge.

On the Sign in Blood topic, the issue with it is that it often consumes valuable devotion points. Playing it turn-2 gives you nothing (board-state-wise), and nobody wants to be playing a single 1cmc creature on turn-3. Playing it will almost always put your opponent ahead in board state, and as you’re effectively a sorcery-speed-creature-deck, having a full hand isn’t particularly helpful for securing a win.

Also just did some math on the land scenario, specifically on how many cards need to be drawn to reach the golden 5th land.

With 21 lands, you'll on average reach your 5th land after drawing 14.29 cards. So, somewhere between turns 7-9 depending on whether you're on the play or draw.

With 24 lands, you'll on average reach your 5th land after drawing 12.5 cards. So, somewhere between turns 5-7 depending on whether you're on the play or draw.

Now, yes, having a spell that draws 2 cards does catch the 21-land-deck up to the 24-landers land-drop-rate. BUT, that relies on the 21-land-deck getting that drawspell just to keep-up, and it also means that the 21-land-deck has had to invest time in catching-up their land-drops, where as the 24-lander is able to just keep establishing their board presence.

Anyway - i'll drop the land/Sign in Blood debate now, because by now i've either already sold the concept, or not. It's also worth noting that Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx can skew these results pretty heavily, if drawn.