Victory or Seppuku

Commander / EDH Mono-Black Spellslinger Theme/Gimmick

Tarzunga

Instant (29)

• 1x Assassin's Ink
• 1x Black Sun's Twilight
• 1x Cremate
• 1x Dark Bargain
• 1x Dark Dabbling
• 1x Dark Ritual
• 1x Eat to Extinction
• 1x Erebos's Intervention
• 1x Extinguish the Light
• 1x Grim Return
• 1x Hatred
• 1x Hero's Demise
• 1x Hero's Downfall
• 1x Imp's Mischief
• 1x Infernal Grasp
• 1x Moonlight Bargain
• 1x Poison the Cup
• 1x Price of Fame
• 1x Scour from Existence
• 1x Sheoldred's Edict
• 1x Slaughter Pact
• 1x Sudden Death
• 1x Sudden Spoiling
• 1x Tainted Strike
• 1x Thrilling Encore
• 1x Tragic Slip
• 1x Vona's Hunger
• 1x Withering Boon
• 1x Wretched Confluence

Planeswalker (1)

• 1x Professor Onyx

Creature (13)

• 1x Activated Sleeper
• 1x Ascendant Evincar
• 1x Chainer, Dementia Master
• 1x Crypt Ghast
• 1x Doom Whisperer
• 1x Dread Presence
• 1x Drivnod, Carnage Dominus
• 1x Harvester of Souls
• 1x Kamber, the Plunderer
• 1x Oriq Loremage
• 1x Overseer of the Damned
• 1x Sangromancer
• 1x Sedgemoor Witch

Artifact (10)

• 1x Aetherflux Reservoir
• 1x Arcane Signet
• 1x Bolas's Citadel
• 1x Fireshrieker
• 1x Jet Medallion
• 1x Lightning Greaves
• 1x Primal Amulet  ^Flip
• 1x Ring of Xathrid
• 1x Sol Ring
• 1x Vorpal Sword

Enchantment (6)

• 1x Black Market
• 1x Eternal Thirst
• 1x Grave Betrayal
• 1x Illness in the Ranks
• 1x Phyrexian Arena
• 1x Revel in Riches

Commander (1)

Land (36)

• 1x Access Tunnel
• 1x Arcane Lighthouse
• 1x Barren Moor
• 1x Bojuka Bog
• 1x Cabal Stronghold
• 1x Castle Locthwain
• 1x Deserted Temple
• 1x Forbidden Orchard
• 1x Reliquary Tower
• 1x Rogue's Passage
• 1x Shizo, Death's Storehouse
• 24x Swamp
• 1x Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth

Sorcery (4)

• 1x Bontu's Last Reckoning
• 1x Diabolic Tutor
• 1x Final Parting
• 1x Torment of Hailfire

---

Maybeboard

Instant (26)

• 1x Aphotic Wisps
• 1x Baleful Mastery
• 1x Blood Pact
• 1x Curtains' Call
• 1x Darkness
• 1x Deadly Rollick
• 1x Defile
• 1x Demon's Due
• 1x Devour in Shadow
• 1x Dismember
• 1x Drag to the Underworld
• 1x Entomb
• 1x Force of Despair
• 1x Hellish Rebuke
• 1x Insidious Dreams
• 1x Lethal Scheme
• 1x March of Wretched Sorrow
• 1x Nurgle's Conscription
• 1x Plumb the Forbidden
• 1x Rise of the Dread Marn
• 1x Shred Memory
• 1x Sickening Shoal
• 1x Snuff Out
• 1x Tendrils of Corruption
• 1x Vampiric Tutor
• 1x Withering Torment

Creature (8)

• 1x Gravebreaker Lamia
• 1x Kothophed, Soul Hoarder
• 1x Lorcan, Warlock Collector
• 1x Lord of the Forsaken
• 1x Massacre Wurm
• 1x Syr Konrad, the Grim
• 1x Tormod, the Desecrator
• 1x Vilis, Broker of Blood

Artifact (8)

• 1x Blade of the Bloodchief
• 1x Commander's Plate
• 1x Expedition Map
• 1x Glaring Spotlight
• 1x Sceptre of Eternal Glory
• 1x Seance Board
• 1x Sensei's Divining Top
• 1x Shadowspear

Land (8)

• 1x Barad-dur
• 1x Boseiju, Who Shelters All
• 1x Cabal Coffers
• 1x Emergence Zone
• 1x Fell Mire  ^Flip
• 1x Hagra Broodpit  ^Flip
• 1x Plaza of Heroes
• 1x Takenuma, Abandoned Mire

Enchantment (4)

• 1x Cunning Rhetoric
• 1x Meathook Massacre 2
• 1x Sadistic Glee
• 1x Scion of Halaster

Sorcery (4)

• 1x Bitter Ordeal
• 1x Damnation
• 1x Feed the Swarm
• 1x Temporal Extortion

---

"Generally speaking, the way of the warrior is resolute acceptance of death." - Miyamoto Musashi

One day I was searching for a legendary samurai that could be good to build a commander deck around. Toshiro Umezawa really caught my attention. While I tried to think about what to do exactly, I decided to read some lore on him and he quickly became one of my favourite MtG characters. As a result I decided to go ahead with the deck.

I tried several things since I first built it, however this is the version I think works better with him. Plus, I'm really glad that the last few sets actually brought some new goodies that work pretty well with Toshiro, and the new rule in which commanders now go to the grave on death before going to the command zone really helped Toshiro gain some more strenght.

The deck is mainly spellslinger with plenty of removal and some utility plus some other permanents that also trigger on creature's deaths. However the main win-con of the deck is Hatred.

The main combo of the deck is Forbidden Orchard + Illness in the Ranks , which is meant to trigger Toshiro's ability by simply tapping the land for mana while at the same time gifting an opponent a token that will instantly die, allowing me to play an instant from the grave right away.

Win-cons available:

• Commander damage, mainly with a sneaky Hatred and/or Eternal Thirst/Ring of Xathrid. Fireshrieker helps with that strategy aswell;

• Infect with Tainted Strike, plus the help of the aura/equips mentioned before;

• Regular combat damage by simply having more creatures than the opponents due to the removal, token generation and reanimation;

• Torment of Hailfire if the game takes too long and/or I can generate a ton of mana, Imp's Mischief helps prevent a possible counterspell;

• Aetherflux Reservoir + Bolas's Citadel + Doom Whisperer combo allows me to essentially play my whole deck and just shoot the whole table;

• Vorpal Sword seems like a fun card I wanted to try out, not sure if it will stay. Gotta test it to decide;

Other decks with a mono-color samurai commander:

• Mono-Green - Musashi used 2 swords? Hold my sake!

• Mono-Red - Chaos of War

• Mono-White - The Art of Self-defense

Any suggestions to improve the deck are welcome.

Top Ranked	Achieved #39 position overall 6 years ago Achieved #35 position in Commander / EDH 1 year ago Achieved #1 position in Commander / EDH Mono-Black 1 year ago Achieved #1 position in Commander / EDH Spellslinger 1 year ago
Date added	6 years
Last updated	1 day
Exclude colors	WURG
Key combos	Forbidden Orchard + Illness in the Ranks Aetherflux Reservoir + Bolas's Citadel + Doom Whisperer
Legality	This deck is Commander / EDH legal.
Rarity (main - side)	4 - 0 Mythic Rares 41 - 0 Rares 18 - 0 Uncommons 13 - 0 Commons
Cards	100
Avg. CMC	3.39
Tokens	Blood, City's Blessing, Foretell, Pest 1/1 BG, Spirit 1/1 C, Treasure, Zombie 2/2 B
Folders	EDH ideas, Tickles my fancy, Interesting Commander Decks, Cool decks, bro, EDH, Owned Decks, Intresting commander decks, cool decks, Cool decks, Black