In a mono black deck I would highly recommend Silence the Believers.

Oooh, good call. I've added it to the acquire list!

Umezawa's Jitte would help give you a little bit of an edge, and would be a flavor win. It is kind of expenseive, but it's gotten a cheaper version in FTV: Lore. I was going to suggest counterspells, but you've already got the useful ones in here. This is already a pretty good deck. Keep it up!

Thanks much! Yeah, even if nothing else, the potential lifegain offsets a lot of my card draw mechanics, and the extra flexibility could come in handy. Also, I can't resist some good flavor.

Annihilate is listed twice

I suggest running Unstable Obelisk for pro-black, Sphinx-Bone Wand for value, and Corrupt for a huge life swing

Thawing Glaciers good for control decks

Deserted Temple Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx Thespian's Stage Vesuva

Death Wind seems expensive

no Sol Ring?

maybe Fatal Push?

Dash Hopes is very situational, try looking at the worst case scenerio's. your combo opponent casts the final piece and pays 5 life to win the game. I'd do that everytime

Chill to the Bone for Victim of Night?

is Archfiend of Depravity doing enough? Maybe a board wipe?

Phyrexia's Core for synergy with Spine of Ish Sah

Expedition Map for finding Cabal Coffers and Thawing Glaciers

For primer advice, I recommend analyzing the bad match-ups and ways to improve those match-ups. I also highly love Snuff Out, the card can come out of nowhere and lets you tap out occasionally and still pull surprises.

Thanks for the suggestions!

hoardofnotions: I like most of those land suggestions, particularly the copy-target-Cabal Coffers ones. Not sure Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx works here due to the low number of permanents, but it's certainly something that could work in an alternative build!

Death Wind IS expensive, but it gets around indestructible, and we usually have the mana to make it effective, so it's generally worth having.

I actually consciously didn't put Sol Ring in here. It's fantastic early game, but we don't really ramp into anything in the first few turns, and late game with a coffers out, I'd actually rather draw a swamp than a ring.

Dash hopes is more frequently a finisher than one might expect. Sure, it doesn't stop the combo player who's still got 30 life, but for anyone at/around 10, it can be lethal. Also, paying 10 life (because we usually immediately try to flash it back) to resolve one spell can be a big deal. It's certainly not a black Counterspell, but it does its work nonetheless.

Archfiend of Depravity actually tends to be better than a board wipe, since each sacrifice my opponents makes feeds Toshiro Umezawa or Ogre Slumlord or Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet or Harvester of Souls. Meanwhile, I get to keep all my creatures! Plus, the clamp it puts on reanimator decks, that a board wipe doesn't, is huge.

I do like Expedition Map and Phyrexia's Core. I'll try to find slots for them in my own build, and then report back with effectiveness later!

Jreluctance: Thanks for the input! I've added matchup sections, and I'll keep adding to them as I face more decks!

You call it a Primer without even including Oathkeeper, Takeno's Daisho or Umezawa's Jitte?

Umezawa decks need their commander alive to actually trigger so throw in a Fated Return or a Darksteel Plate.

You can get more flexible plays out of Nim Deathmantle and Mimic Vat.

If you're already in monoblack and going for an Exanguinate you can get away with Geth, Lord of the Vault before you realistically kill anyone with only the Crypt Ghast and Cabal Coffers for big mana and no tutors. Maybe you can add Black Market with a pile of rituals in the graveyard like Dark Ritual, Cabal Ritual, Culling the Weak, and that might be reasonable.

This also could really use a Toxic Deluge, Mutilate a Necropotence, Grave Betrayal, Bitterblossom, Bloodchief Ascension, Hatred, Black Sun's Zenith, Overseer of the Damned, or a Rune-Scarred Demon.

Also some of the basics are missing like Sol Ring, Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth and Reliquary Tower.

Oh and a Skullclamp.

Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx: Any other black permanent + your commander means that its mana neutral. Black cards tend to have heavy color weight, so it's easy to get positive mana value out of this. Even at neutral, it can still act as filtering.

Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth: A customary include in any deck that has Cabal Coffers (or black at all). It's a swamp on the field.

Forbidden Orchard: Helps spellslinger matchups, or just gives already staxed players a permanent to sacrifice to your edict effects. Should be an auto include in this as much as it is in Glissa.

Tombstone Stairwell: Kind of a slower card, but it gives you repeated triggers of your commander's ability. Kind of a pet card of mine, admittedly.

Tutors: Demonic, Vampiric, or otherwise. With your commander these will generally let you shape your hand however you like.

Gonti Lord of Luxury would be a nice implement here.

Vraska's Contempt

Revel in Riches

Boneyard Parley

gdm1989: Boneyard Parley is probably a little too much for too little in this deck, but I'm definitely looking at adding it to my G/B recursion deck. The other two will almost certainly find homes here. Thanks for the suggestions!

think Dire Fleet Ravager would be useful too?

Karn Liberated and Ugin, the Spirit Dragon

Dire Fleet Ravager in this deck would be a worse Gray Merchant of Asphodel, and even if it were better/the same, that's not really an effect I need more of. I can't reliably win with him, since I have to have more life than all my opponents for him to not be lethal to me, and I'm usually paying a lot of life to draw cards. Even if I'm able to reliably kill/reanimate him (probably via Chainer, Dementia Master) he's less effective than Gray Merchant, needing 8 ETB's to kill a player at 40, where Gray Merchant needs only 7 (making a not-unreasonable assumption that I have 6 devotion). As a player's life total gets lower, Gray Merchant kills even faster, while Ravager doesn't. For example, if I have six devotion, Gray Merchant kills a player at five life when it ETBs, where Ravager takes FOUR triggers to kill that player (5->3->2->1->0).

Karn Liberated is... unnecessary. Sure, he's a reusable Scour from Existence, but the target he paints on himself and on me by extension really isn't worth the trouble. He's a great card, but the politics of how this deck needs to operate really wants to keep planeswalkers to a minimum. I make exceptions for Ob Nixilis and Liliana because they facilitate card draw and mana ramp, which are the two main necessities in this deck.

Ugin, the Spirit Dragon doesn't really fit here. I don't need his damage dealing ability, and I have relatively few permanents to put into play with his ult. His -X is fine, but it exiles, which means I can't reanimate those things later for my own use, and it's a board clear, which this deck should make unnecessary if spot removal is used properly.

Yeah I reason I karn would be good is there will be decks that have enchantments same with a few planeswalkers. I been thinking of ways to be more well rounded in a multiplayer game against these cards. Plus also trying to steal the cards onto your battlefield.

Gonti, Lord of Luxury we can abuse via reanimation triggers

Kozilek, the Great Distortion for us to discard instants to counter cards and set up our spells

Bane of Bala Ged to keep exiling lands, enchantments, and other problematic things

Sheoldred, Whispering One can keep on triggering toshiro's ability

Primal Amulet to reduce our instants cost and also copy the spells

Sorin Markov I've seen a video with someone using him in a toshiro edh deck and won 4 times. While he may not be able to kill things he can take care of annoying life gain decks

Phyrexian Obliterator for defense and another way of dealing with permaments

Kor Dirge to redirect damage

Lim-Dul the Necromancer to steal your opponents creatures

Boseiju, Who Shelters All your instants cant be countered

Focusing on creatures such as Bane of Bala Ged, Sheoldred, Whispering One, and Kozilek, the Great Distortion, would turn this deck in a different direction than it currently goes, becoming more reanimator than control. Putting those creatures onto the battlefield makes me a target, and that's the opposite of what I want to do when I'm playing this deck. The idea is to discourage people from trying to interact with me by promising that they will lose more than I do. If I slam Sheoldred, suddenly A) they are losing value if they DON'T interact with me, and B) I have something important to lose, so the interaction's no longer one-sided in my favor.

Lim-Dul the Necromancer is certainly an option, though I tend to find him too expensive for his effect. I'd recommend trying out Geth, Lord of the Vault over Lim-Dul, since he not only can res creatures without waiting for a death trigger, but can grab artifacts too, all while doubling as another win-con should we get enough mana.

Phyrexian Obliterator is... interesting. My gut instinct is to say that it falls into the same category as Kozilek, the Great Distortion, in that it paints too much of a target on me. That said, if I were to use it properly (that is, mainly on defense), it could certainly be quite effective as a deterrent. I'll play around with it and let you know how it performs.

Gonti, Lord of Luxury is an odd one for sure. The variance on him seems really high - for every time I rip someone's eldrazi titan off the top of their library, there are going to be moments I hit three lands and an Emerald Medallion. If I were killing/reanimating him consistently, he'd be pretty sweet, but I don't know how frequently I'd end up doing that over reanimating Gray Merchant or things from my opponent's graveyards.

Boseiju, Who Shelters All seems like a good addition, and so does Primal Amulet - I'll test them and see how they do.

Kor Dirge is cute, but I dunno how effective it would be. If someone's actually attacking me, they're likely going for the kill, expecting that I'll interact by removing a lot of their attacking creatures. Dirge doesn't seem any better than any particular kill spell in that instance, and would be weaker in moments when I need a kill, but am not being actively targeted.

Sorin Markov runs afoul of the same limitations as Karn. As a terrifying planeswalker, he's going to draw more attention than he's worth. In addition, it's rare that I'm attacking with small enough amounts of damage that setting someone's life to 10 will be relevant. Either I'm swinging with a huge board courtesy of Rise of the Dark Realms, or I'm not usually swinging at all. Similarly, when casting the game-ending X-cost spells, it doesn't usually matter what life someone's at - either I have loads more mana than I could ever need, or I'm not likely going for the kill. Thus, life-gain strategies tend not to be an issue for me (doubly so since most of them rely on lifelinking creatures, which are easy for me to remove).

You make some valid points on avoiding putting a bullseye on your head obliterator will still make a good defense. As for the others they were more of a last resort just in case toshiro have problems coming to the field. I'll do some more testing and see if there is a better alternative :)

I dont know if these other cards will help you out in terms of defense

Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed

Urborg Justice

Isochron Scepter

Spellbinder

Dingus Staff

Temporal Extortion

Arguel's Blood Fast

Ad Nausem

Ad Nauseam is a card that should not be cast unless a player intends to win the game on the spot with it - I frequently see people cast it as a source of card advantage, but that's really not what it's useful for. I'd rather stick to the guaranteed 1 life = 1 card from Phyrexian Arena and similar sources than risk 6 life for a Harvester of Souls that doesn't win me the game. In short, that's a card that fits in low-to-the-ground combo decks, not so much low-to-the-ground control decks. Remember, if all is going as planned, the number of turns it takes me to win is irrelevant. I've got control of the game, and eventually I will find my win-con. Ad Nauseam is far more likely to lose me the game than win it.

Arguel's Blood Fast is fine. Greed is better, and Erebos, God of the Dead is better than both. The only advantage Blood Fast has is that it comes down earlier, but in the early stages of the game I don't usually want to tap out for card advantage - I've still got 5-7 cards in hand!

Temporal Extortion runs into a similar problem as Ad Nauseam. How often will one extra turn win me the game? Not frequently. Either I've got the cards to kill a player, or I've got the cards to control a player, or I don't, and one extra draw step isn't likely to save me. Meanwhile, showing the table that card, and NOT winning, demonstrates to everyone that winning is in my immediate interests, and therefore that they should be trying to kill me as quickly as possible.

Dingus Staff encourages people to kill me, since they know I'll be killing their creatures, and if they swing at other players and lose creatures, they're still losing life, so they may as well dedicate resources to stop me from pinging them. Meanwhile, again, if I'm ready to go for the win, the Staff doesn't get me there - either I've got Exsanguinate for lethal, or I don't. Small amounts of damage here and there aren't likely to help.

Isochron Scepter shows people what I'm working with. If I put Doom Blade on it, suddenly instead of threatening "I probably have removal if you attack me," I'm promising "I'm going to kill every non-black creature I see." It's a very powerful card, and I wouldn't fault someone at all for putting it in their list (hence its inclusion on my "Maybeboard"), but I don't like it myself.

Spellbinder runs into the same problems, with the additional issue that I'm not running many creatures, and that if an opponent is making a decision on whether or not to block, seeing the card I'm going to cast should they let me connect better helps them make an informed decision. Where Scepter could be good in the right hands, I don't think Spellbinder's good in this archetype.

Similarly, without many creatures of our own, Urborg Justice won't really do a whole lot.

Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed brings back the question of how much I want to be a target. That's a card that traditionally represents very quick combo kills, and could easily begin drawing a lot of hate from the table. Meanwhile, most of what he's going to do... Toshiro Umezawa already does. With the exception of Exsanguinate, Torment of Hailfire, and Rise of the Dark Realms, I don't really see myself using his ability at all, and even if all three are in my grave, Empty the Pits is still a viable wincon that Toshiro can recollect.

I didnt know that about Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed I rarely see him in my play groups

Atm I'm still tweaking my version of toshiro umezawa but I was thinking along with Primal Amulet

Mirari and Mirrorpool would be useful if you're looking to copy spells I'm still looking for more cards similar to those 2.I don't know if these others cards would fit your play style but thought of running Lord of the Void, Corrupt, Maze of Ith, or Fleshbag Marauder?

Yeah, Xiahou Dun, the One-Eyed isn't a very common card to see, mostly because he's a Portal Three Kingdoms card, and that whole set's basically impossible to find (hence his nearly 90$ price tag). The trick with him, is that in black, he's really easy to reanimate, so a super-popular strategy with him is cast Demonic Tutor, grab Dread Return, then sac him to get DT back, then reanimate him Dread Return, then DT again, sac him again to get DT back, DT again, flashback Dread Return to reanimate him again, sac him again, get back DT again, DT again, and hey look, you've now got the three pieces of your combo in hand and you win. He's just very abusable - like if Eternal Witness were in blue/white where flickering to keep getting extra ETB's was a thing, PLUS having access to the best tutors in the game.

I'd be more inclined to run Mirari than Mirrorpool, since MP requires colorless mana to activate, and I don't want to weaken the manabase by adding too many non-black producers. If your list already has a number of ways to produce colorless mana, then sure, go for it. Mirari seems pretty cool, though I'd caution against using it to copy your killspells (most of the time) since the spells will frequently be cheaper than the price to copy.

Corrupt is a great spell - the only reason I'm not running it is because it's not an instant, so I can't get it back with Toshiro. Notice that it's effectively a slower, more costly Tendrils of Corruption, unless I'm aiming it at a player - in which case, I want them dead, not just stung for a bit. Still, running it as a possible way to finish out a game, or just to pick off that one problem player isn't a mistake.

Maze of Ith and Fleshbag Marauder both seem like solid additions. I'm shying away from Marauder (and his twin, Merciless Executioner), just because I like my removal instant-speed, but particularly if you're looking to go in a more creature-based direction, he's a solid card that triggers Toshiro usually more than once.

From these cards, Lord of the Void is the only one I don't really think belongs. Again, this is a really strong card that you can use to devastating effect... but everyone at the table will know it. Also, people tend to be very incentivized to remove things like Lord that steal cards out of their library. In my superfriends list, I specifically run Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver not because it's that great in EDH, but because people will swing at them again and again and again even to the point of ignoring my much more dangerous planeswalkers, because it's actively ripping resources away from them, and the other walkers are ticking up much more subtly - towards much more devastating ults.

In short, run Lord if you like, but be prepared to have him removed, and to draw the ire of the table if he sticks around.