Lilbrudder: I DARE ALL THINGS A MAN MAY DARE! HE WHO DARES MORE IS NONE!

Dark Ritual is an interesting idea here that I had not considered. Especially since I have a 3-mana commander with haste that can hit for 2 on T1 :D

Vampiric Tutor and Demonic Tutor were more expensive (in terms of money) than I'd intended to use on this deck. But I'll definitely consider them if this deck becomes more tuned! :)

And thank you for the compliments! :3 I aspire to be half as clever with my decks as you are with yours.

pet_snake: I merely summoned people I already knew to be good deckbuilders - thank you for joining the party of your own volition. Your insights into this deck are brilliant: mind if I tag you next time that I'm brewing a deck? :)

Now, on to my actual responses to your comment!

You mentioned Bloodline Keeper  ^Flip, Hangarback Walker, Ogre Slumlord, Overseer of the Damned, Pawn of Ulamog and Sifter of Skulls as potential cuts.

Based on the limited testing I've done so far, I like how Hangarback Walker and Bloodline Keeper  ^Flip work in the deck. For the former, a T2 Walker for X=1 followed by T3 Yahenni is a strong start (giving me a guaranteed two indestructible triggers, and allowing me to slowly amass an army "inside" the Walker). Same with the T3 Yahenni, T4 Keeper pairing (Keeper also gives me flying blockers, which can be a big deal). The back side of Keeper is pretty handy, too, since it spits out flying 4/4s every turn and boosts Yahenni herself.

I think you may be right about several of the others. I'm still on the fence about Pawn of Ulamog, but the others are strong cuts. Thanks for pointing those out!

I really like Harvester of Souls in general. He turns my many board wipes asymmetrical - we both have no field, but I end up with significantly more cards in hand (in addition to my commander who sticks around). I haven't drawn Blood Artist in my testing yet, so let me get back to you on his inclusion.

Mimic Vat is an amazing idea and I'm embarrassed that I neglected to include it. I generally find Epochrasite to be a bit too slow - it sticks around, sure, but only comes back every 3 turns. Nether Traitor is a good idea, but I'd play Bloodghast before I'd include Traitor. And I honestly just don't like Demon of Dark Schemes (aka Slim Shady) much - I find energy to be parasitic, and having Massacre Wurm in here is usually better.

Bane of the Living is pretty great, and I can sac it to make Yahenni indestructible after I unmorph it. That has to go in here...

Tombstone Stairwell is something of a pet card. I acknowledge that occasionally it will kill me, but each of those tokens dies at EOT and they're generated every turn for every player. If I cast it in the late game, Yahenni will grow so large that it isn't even funny. Maybe I should include Disciple of Bolas to "recycle" a large Yahenni...

I am also thinking about cutting Hellfire, but more because of the $20 price tag and because I need the slots. I think for now it'll stick, though, because one-sided board wipes are hard to come by. And if the board is empty, I'll be able to swing for enough damage to make up for my life loss. I don't play in extremely token heavy metas currently, so I don't expect to kill myself off of it.

Rogue's Passage is very neat, and 100% immediately deserves a slot. I'm again miffed that I forgot to include it myself, lol. I'm iffy on Mirrorpool, though, since I can't generate colorless mana reliably enough.

Thank you, very very VERY much, for your comment. Mind if I tag you in the future to get your thoughts on other decks? :)

ceji3: The only reason Damnation isn't in here yet is that I don't want to pay $40 for it :(

I'm kicking myself that I forgot Ophiomancer. 100% going in, thank you.

Fatal Push is neat, but in this deck I'd rather go with Tragic Slip. I might add both, though.

Thanks for the comment! :)

IgnisMachina: I think I'll avoid the combo for now, no offense intended. Partly because I'm avoiding infinite combos in this deck, and partly because I'm playing insufficient tutors to pull it off.

But thanks for the comment anyway! :)

Enral: Ooh, I like how you think! I'll playtest it - I don't want to give them blockers, but those extra counters DO look tasty...

Casey4321: Toxic Deluge (and the rest of the -X/-X sweepers) do require a bit of setup, admittedly. But if I set X as less than Yahenni's toughness (hopefully still a large number), she'll get a lot bigger and I'll have cleared the field of everything (even opposing indestructible creatures). You may be right about Black Sun's Zenith, though. It doesn't "wear off" at EOT so Yahenni ends up being much smaller :(

pet_snake covered this topic well already :)

AND THAT'S THE END OF MY BACKLOG OF COMMENTS

good god, that was a lot of typing, lol

Thank you all, so much, for your interest in the deck! :)

Anyone think I should add anything in particular from my sideboard?

If you want to mention me next time you can. I'm not entirely active here but I use this as a place to catalog decks as I rotate them in and out so I'll be around.

As for stuff from your maybeboard? Dismember, Necromantic Selection and Trailblazer's Boots stand out most to me. Solid Removal, Sorta one-sided (Make Yahenni indes. then return one of your dudes) wipe and solid evasion all seem decent.

Last thing I'd look at is squaring up your mana base. Include some utility cards like Strip Mine, Tectonic Edge and Reliquary Tower to act as silver bullets against stuff like Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle and the like.

Sidisi, Undead Vizier might be a good fit.

Is Bloodsoaked Champion a nice addition, because of the recursion?

Yes, because it's basically an instant speed "pay : Yahenni is indestructible until end of turn." As long as you attack with her, which why wouldn't you.

Okay, from what you told me about your playgroup versus your Avacyn deck, you need flying. you probably should also utilize snow covered swamps instead of normal ones if you're using Extraplanar Lens but beyond that I'll need to know how much board control you'd want versus being the aggro player of the group yourself (ie having the big fatties/mass wave of tokens)(which may or may not involve tribal vampire/zombie stuff).

pet_snake: Will do! And you're right, those would be good inclusions...

n0bunga: Out of your suggestions, I am most intrigued by Temporal Extortion, Westvale Abbey  ^Flip, and Archfiend of Depravity. They'll all have to find a slot here :)

Midn8: In most cases, without reanimation, I'd prefer to play something like Demonic Tutor. Thanks, though - I'll consider her! :)

Koffiemelk: He could be good, yeah. There's a whole set of those self-recurring creatures (Nether Traitor, Reassembling Skeleton, etc). I need to find a place for several in here, but slots are tight :(

TheRedGoat: Most of the decks in my meta are playing mostly nonbasics, so I'm not TOO worried about acquiring Snow-Covered Swamps (also, they have terrible art). I'm honestly not sure about that balance either - I'll have to get back to you. The original goal was to usually leave Yahenni as the biggest and last threat on the battlefield.

Thank you all for your comments! :)

Just got here, sorry I'm late Daedalus19876.

Wait, I'm one of the "trustworthy deckbuilders"?

:D

As for the deck, give me a while to look at it, I'll be back when I have ideas.

dude, how do you get this level of exposure, upvotes, and comments in a single day on a new deck?

These sure many comments in a short time...

Yahenni is just awesome. My suggestion woould as well have been Avatar of Woe.

You definitely get my +1 already for adressing your commander with the correct pronoun ;)

That was the fastest rise to #1 ever.

EternalBrewmaster: Honestly, it's a bit hit or miss.

I try to do a sort of promotion for each of my new decks (featuring them, deckcycling them frequently, asking for help/advice on other websites), but they rarely take off this quickly.

My two highest-rated decks (my Sidisi and my Avacyn) both floated around 10-20 for months before they took off. Overall, crowd dynamics are weird and hard to predict. But once something gets some exposure, it tends to snowball because it rises to higher rank and gets more attention, etc.

In this case, I suspect this one was successful for several reasons.

First, the strategy is relatively simple and easy to understand - it doesn't require a huge description.

Second, Yahenni is a newly-spoiled commander and this was the first deck on this website around them, as far as I know - so the deck gets the benefit of originality.

Third, they are a fan favorite character already, so everyone is excited about their flavor and lore.

But honestly this has surprised me as much as it's surprised you, LOL.

AwezomePozzum: I eagerly await your comments! :)

seshiro_of_the_orochi: Thank you for your comment and upvote! Honestly, I keep trying to correct myself, because I keep calling them "her". Force of habit I suppose - almost all of my commanders are female.

Lilbrudder: Thank you, sir! Your decks deserve the recognition more than mine, though. And as I said above, this deck got a lot of recognition due to a confluence of fortuitous factors :)

I'm kind of in love with this... Well done!

for life.

Daedalus19876 thanks for the self-examination response dude. It's always good talking to you and I'm happy for your success. This idea is really cool and I'm happy to see you are not doing the same old black thing with Mike and Trike like another commentor mentioned. I really enjoy Lifeline personally in my black decks and idk if it would be ideal in this deck but maybe consider it as your guys would always return since your general should always stick around. Your opponents' will too, but if you have creature parity, since your general is a free sac outlet, you can kill everyone's creatures every turn with Grave Pact effects so they never have guys that can attack and Yaheni would get ridiculously big.

Also, I can't recommend Nether Traitor and Bloodghast enough. They're both less mana intensive than Reassembling Skeleton and Nether Traitor can come back every time one of your guys dies, even tokens.

Also, Plague of Vermin is my new favorite tech, great with Blood Artist if you need to recoup the life, but you can bait your opponents into getting a bunch of dudes and then hit them with Massacre Wurm :)

Another couple pet cards from me, but I really like Demon of Dark Schemes, and Skirsdag High Priest.

Zulaport Cutthroat, Falkenrath Noble, and Butcher of Malakir are all versions of cards you already have, so they might make for good consistency.

Hey there,

Won't lie I am mostly commenting so I can be notified if anyone else comments. I built Yahenni right after he was spoiled too. We run a lot of the same cards and a lot of different ones. Since I rarely get commenters but am always looking for suggestions and Ideas I tend to syphon off of other peoples deck's comments.

The one card I had a blast playtesting yesterday was Infernal Genesis. Its a card I forgot about until I found it in my bulk rare box while building. Its kind of group huggy but it helps to get you sac fodder and makes sure your opponents have crap out to kill (a lot like forbidden orchard). I always like running cards that make me less juicy of a target, I also run Crawlspace for the same reason.

If any of you want to take a look it would be much appreciated!

Yahenni Beats

Sudden Spoiling

Massacre Wurm

Kothophed, Soul Hoarder

illumfolly why would you suggest cards he already has in the list?