I totally appreciate the amount of time and thought you put into this. Meren is one of my favorite commanders and you gave me a few ideas so I thank you for that. You deserve more upvotes (or comments for that matter). +1 for you! :)

Wanna trade brains for a bit? Meren, Who Tutors Golgari-Style

Some great ideas here. I'll be trying Repopulate and Polluted Dead

Please take a look at mine, would appreciate the feedback Obligatory Meren Deck

Imperial Seal? Bazaar of Baghdad?

@SynergyBuild:

Imperial Seal may eventually come in. I find myself happy with my tutor package right now and my wallet is also happy Im not trying to buy one.

Bazaar just does nothing for me. I have absolutely no need to be discarding that many cards period, and Putrid Imp does just fine for me when I do need to discard. The only deck I actually see this card being viable in is Gitrog Monster. Also, the price tag on Bazaar is ungodly.

Thanks for the suggestions!

Elvish Mystic, Fyndhorn Elves, Llanowar Elves, Chrome Mox, Mox Diamond, Mana Vault, Mana Crypt are some of the fast ramp, and

Llanowar Mentor... is jank af

@SynergyBuild: I cut the mana dorks that dont color fix because they arent as useful. Fast mana rocks/aggressive ramping isnt really my goal. The list isnt supposed to be super competitive because I gave up on cEDH a few months back. Also, Fyndhorn Elves in foil is hideous (to me).

Llanowar Mentor seems really cool, but better in an elf tribal or really ramp-heavy strategy.

Thanks for the additional suggestions!

Concerning the win combo: For Demon to bring back World Shaper it needs 3 mana, and 4 Energy counters. How are you getting those counters? Build up through the game?

@Arnir: I guess I left that bit out somehow; Ill update it right now, but Ill explain it here also. When you sacrifice Dryad Arbor and World Shaper with Pawn of Ulamog in play you get two spawn tokens and two energy. You sacrifice those for the two colorless mana of Demons ability and two more energy and this produces exactly four energy every time you loop it. All you then have to supply is the black mana, which we do through coffers, etc. before we start sacrificing our lands.

Thanks for the comment and pointing out the flaw in the primer!

fantastic. I'll be tossing this in my folders to check out later. Definitely gives me inspiration from the premise alone however. Toss an Abrupt Decay in here though. Card is literally too good not to play.

@Enivid thanks for the upvote! Im glad you liked the deck. I would love to run Abrupt Decay, but no one plays control in my meta and it doesnt hit enough targets for me to justify it at this point. I mean it hits a lot of good targets in Commander, just not enough that I see regularly.

what a great deck +1! I just ordered a bunch of cards for a meren deck similar to this one. Do you ever have trouble executing the bitter ordeal win condition? It seems like alot of cards to be able to get out on the board and keep there and take awhile to ramp up.

@cicely24 - Thanks for the upvote! Typically I don’t, as I just play control until I essentially just slam a win. I’ll keep the board clear where necessary and then once I’ve accrued significant advantage over my opponents, then I start setting up the win. Usually doesn’t take long as not many of the combo pieces are especially threatening on their own and the deck has plenty of built in protection. Also, I can get everything I need to win off of two Protean Hulk death triggers, so it’s not hard at all to win out of nowhere (and that’s assuming I have nothing I need on board).

for real i am confused why people choose Blood Artist over Zulaport Cutthroat. is it because it has more life-gain potential through draining each person individually? Is it because Artist can target self? Don't they garner retaliation from one opponent but zulport is neutral. plz help. is plus 1 attack and no targeting and deal more damage not strictly better?

@Teeracer - yes, Cutthroat is strictly better 99% of the time because you’re draining each opponent for one life per death rather than one opponent for one life per death

Also slightly confused on where this question came from as I’m not running either creature

Control_Train yeah sorry I’ve just been spamming it on meren decks because I don’t understand the forum system....

It’s all good man I’m happy to help and answer questions anytime. The difference in power isn’t really that relevant in EDH but the extra damage is. You can kill a whole table with the same amount of triggers as it would take you to kill just one opponent using Cutthroat vs Blood Artist

Hi,

Just wanted to comment in appreciation. This deck seems super fun and I'm looking forward to try out the gravestorm combo! Been waiting to build a Meren deck that suits my playstyle and this one is definitely something I'd love to play!

+1!

Thanks for the upvote! I'm glad you enjoyed the deck. Have fun testing it out! :)

How do you execute the win if you've been getting hated on all game? Say for example you don't have enough life to pay 3 with Chainer multiple times for gravestorm count. I normally play with 2-3 others in my pod -- just seems like it would be hard to wipe all of their decks.

That would be my only concern. Or maybe I'm just missing something..

Either way, superb deck! Long time Meren player here and I want to give this build a shot.

Thanks for the comment! I'm glad you like the deck. :)

Savra and Izoni can put in real work together cushioning your life total. It initially seems like three hundred is a lot of Gravestorm to accumulate, but I'm never afraid to use Bitter Ordeal to kill just one person who can hurt me the most or who's about to win. Izoni can also generate a massive amount of tokens to rack up the Gravestorm count.

Most of the time I don't even have to pull the trigger with Bitter Ordeal, just grinding my opponents resources out is usually enough to get a concession if the engine is online.

As far as getting hated on a lot, if you just mean targeted then board wipes are usually enough, especially with Eternal Witness to bring them back. If you mean dealing with graveyard hate, I'm currently testing some hand disruption creatures to be able to pick apart my opponent's answers to my shenanigans. G/B doesn't have a ton of ways to deal with graveyard hate, and Bojuka Bog is almost unbeatable, but something I've learned to do is not over extend into it.

I saw that you added the cycling lands, but then removed Life from the Loam. That is a mistake. You can return the cycle lands and have draw two on a stick. I can understand the other dredgers since you aren’t going for a fast kill, but the loam package seems to fit the speed you are playing at. With Underrealm Lich ,for two mana, you are looking at six cards and doing this on other players turns. It also makes it easy to return Cabal Coffers and Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth, which make your win a lot easier. Also, if you are going to play Razaketh, the Foulblooded you should partner him up with his buddy Life / Death. It fits into exactly what you are doing. It allows you to return razaketh, setup the winning turn, and even gives you a mini Bitter Ordeal bomb. Interesting deck. Had a similar idea, except it was a bit more expensive because it required Gaea's Cradle Yawgmoth's Will and Earthcraft. If you want to take the razaketh line further Songs of the Damned might allow you to combo the turn you assembled razaketh and Life / Death.

I did add the cycling lands and cut Life from the Loam. I added the cycling lands to mitigate some flooding issues late game, and I cut all the dredge cards because they are not an effective route to self mill anymore. They don't work with Underrealm Lich at all, as Lich stops the draw completely so you can't dredge, plus Lich is better than a dredge for three because I get one of the cards to hand. Loam always felt like a durdle play, and I have ways to recur my lands with World Shaper and Eternal Witness, or Glowspore Shaman if need be. They also serve no purpose in the deck (Loam aside) other than milling me. I swapped most of the dredge cards out for the card draw engines, which have felt significantly better. It's also a reason I'm going to be cutting Doom Whisperer soon. It's ineffective and serves no real purpose other than to fill my graveyard. My argument for the cheaper creatures like Satyr Wayfinder is they come down early, help me hit land drops, and fill the graveyard a little without overextending or shutting me off of drawing cards, like dredge does.

I would run Reanimate over Life / Death because it's one mana cheaper and the Life side has no function for this deck, but I don't need to aggressively reanimate creatures that badly in my experience. Meren does that well enough on her own, and Chainer fills the gaps. I like songs of the damned, but I don't need that much mana. Urborg and Coffers do more than enough work, which is why I recently cut Deserted Temple; the excess mana just wasn't necessary for kills.

Hey, just wanted to clarify that dredge and underrealm lich's ability are both replacement effects, so you get to choose which replacement effect to apply. Also, thoughts on Stitcher's Supplier over Glowspore Shaman?

When you have two replacement effects, you get to choose which one is the replacement effect. An example of what I am talking about. Rest in Peace Blightsteel Colossus. They both use the word “if”. So, when the colossus goes to graveyard, you get it put back into your deck, not exiled. It is the same with dredge and Underrealm Lichs ability. They are both replacement effects replacing your draw. If Underrealm Lich is out, and Life from the Loam is in graveyard, and you cycle Barren Moor you can choose to dredge 3 or use Underrealm Lichs ability. When it comes to draw step you get to choose which effect to resolve. They work in tandem by one doing its thing when convenient, not excluding each other. This is how all replacement effects work. If there is two effects trying to replace the same thing, you get to choose. Another example. One opponent controls one Notion Thief, and another controls another Notion Thief, and you control Life from the Loam in graveyard. You draw an extra card outside draw step. You can choose opponent A to draw that card, or opponent B, or you can dredge three. Now you draw another card, but can’t dredge. You now choose either opponent A or opponent B to draw a card. The key thing here is replacement effects don’t use the stack, so no matter what turn order opponents are in, you choose which to resolve. Also, you can choose not to dredge. You don’t have to do it if you don’t want to. As for Life / Death, you only use it with Razaketh, the Foulblooded. You cast Life / Deaths both halves targeting the demon. Now, you can use your lands as tutors to setup your winning turn, or win on the spot if you have almost everything but needed a few more things. The reanimation aspect is nice because it allows the card to always be useful, but the life half is only useful with the demon. It would allow your deck more resiliency, while always giving you a path to victory if you have the demon on board, as this is usually the first thing you tutor for. It also helps when you get boardwiped, as now you have no other creatures to sacrifice to the demon. And then finally Songs of the Damned is only useful with the demon, because as you tutor, you still need a lot of mana to cast what you tutor. So, instead of waiting for a turn after tutoring ten times, you can win on the spot by just casting Songs of the Damned a bunch of times. Here is an example of the line. You use Life / Death to bring back Razaketh, the Foulblooded, while at the same time casting life. You activate the demon, getting Songs of the Damned. You cast it and get back 10. You the sac another creature, getting worldshaper. You then sac another creature, getting Cabal Coffers you play coffers, activate, get mana. You sac another land creature, getting Bitter Ordeal. Then you sac another land creature getting Eternal Witness, casting it and getting back Songs of the Damned, recasting it with your floating mana, and getting the same mana. Then you proceed with the win that you wanted, because at this point you should have all the mana you need to cast out the rest of the combo. And this all started at three mana bringing back the demon.

So you are technically correct in that I can choose which to use. My whole point is, I can't get both at the same time, and Lich is better than dredge. Period. Until they ban Underrealm Lich in this format, I'll not be putting dredge back into this deck.

Secondly, you are wrong on Life / Death. It is not a Fuse card, and therefore both halves can never be cast simultaneously. This is why I said I would run Reanimate over it.

Songs of the Damned is a wasted slot in my deck. I have all the mana in the world I could ever need with Pitiless Plunderer, Cabal Coffers, and Urborg. A dead slot that functions only on the turn I want to win (and only before I start going off) is bad. Izoni and Pitiless Plunderer together make more mana in a turn typically than Coffers does. I cut Deserted Temple specifically because it was a pointless slot dedicated to making more mana in a deck that didn't need it.

Here's some math to prove to you I don't need all this extra mana. Say for instance I have 25 lands in play, including Urborg and Coffers. I can float a total of forty eight black mana with these lands in play. This gives me sixteen Chainer activations, minus one to get Bitter Ordeal out of the graveyard with Eternal Witness if necessary. This gives me fifteen loops of sacrificing all my lands and putting them back in play with World Shaper. So 25 Gravestorm per loop multiplied by 15 Chainer activations is 375 gravestorm count. This is enough to cleanly kill three players with all 99 cards still in their library. In a five man pod, 375 gravestorm still allows me to cleanly kill all four other players assuming that at least twenty five cards are missing from their libraries (take note that if four players draw seven card opening hands, this already eliminates 28 cards). Unless someone is casting Worldpurge, I'm fine.

And all that math assumes I ONLY have 25 lands in play. 90% of the time, I've got every land in my deck in play when I win.