Yeah, for this deck, mill is very seldom an actual wincon.

A small defense for some of my includes versus what others use.

Reins of power is basically a fog when I need one in dire circumstances, and it helps protect against voltron players by stealing their big unblockable commander, and sometimes killing them with it. Again, the early game (as you mentioned) is the weakest portion of the game for this deck. Even knowing that my deck runs a fog (Darkness) is enough to sway some players from attacking me. And if they don't know they may over extend right into a counter attack. For 1 black mana, i can make some good deals. Like I said in the description, quid pro quo is a big portion of how this deck plays out. I can offer to save another player if they help me out for a turn or two.

Many cards you mention (Spiral, Incursion, Plunder) have all been really useful in past builds. I even like Crypt incursion enough for the reasons you mentioned that I kind of miss it. The issue is that so far, I've faced very few reanimator decks that make Incursion worth it, and I'm not really sure what to remove to put it back in. Everything else here offers much more utility. I could see maybe removing Underworld Connections, but the name is so perfect for this deck.

The same kind of goes for why I took out Plunder. I like that plunder can be anything I've milled. Removal, Draw, Reanimation, etc. But the cost is a bit off-putting, and I'd rather just have a reliable piece of removal inplace of Plunder (a conditional one). Mill, as fun as it is, is just not reliable enough to make Plunder a safe bet a lot of the time. But again, Sometimes i do miss it in this deck.

Lord of the Void, on the other hand, has always been solid for me. If I can get a creature for free after swinging with Lord of the Void, I really don't care much that the cards are exiled rather than sitting around in the graveyard pile. He's one of my few flying creatures - a glaring weakness in this deck.

Also, all of my exile effects are used because Dissipate can counter Eldrazi. Undead Alchemist is great token generation.

No Mercy, on the other hand, requires that I get hit before the creature gets destroyed. The token swarms that I've come across don't care if they lose a few tokens because I will be out of the game. No mercy won't help me against infect, either. I'd rather just prevent the attacks altogether.

As for Psychic Spiral, I usually felt like The Spiral was a dead draw a lot of the time. Sometimes it gave me a reshuffle, and only milled a single player for about 30-40 cards. The mill part of my deck is fairly weak these days, for one. Also, it cost 5 mana for that effect, which generally didn't count for much on the board unless Lazav was out and I got lucky. I'm usually not that worried about the self mill effects because I am never at risk of fully milling myself out. Maybe I go through half my library in a game, but games don't last long enough for that to be a concern.

Overwhelming Intellect, no offense, but I pretty much don't care what the upside is. I don't want to hold up 6 mana for a counterspell.

Thanks a lot for your suggestions and comments. I guess of all of them, I'd be most interested in putting back Crypt Incursion and Memory Plunder, but space is tight. So, I don't know.

Hey I am in the process of piecing this deck together and had a few questions about card substitutes. Being mainly a collector for the past 20 years I have some older and more expensive cards that I was wondering if they could be subbed in and if so how?Cards I had in mind whereVendillion cliquemana drainforce of willdark confidantwastelandrishadan port

I have these cards in other decks and could sub them in for this one?

Hmm. Interesting question. Although the formatting is a bit difficult to read, I'll try and respond with whether I'd use the listed cards, why, and what I'd replace to fit them.

Vendilion Clique could be useful if you wanted to include the popular Tunnel Vision combo package, but with access to black I'd often rather have regular discard as a trigger for Lazav, rather than tucking something random. I would personally not use Clique in this list.

Mana Drain is awesome, thematic, and expensive. It steals mana, which is something this deck will never say 'no' to. If I had access to a copy, I'd probably swap it for Swan Song, and avoid giving them a flying token, not to mention being a less restrictive counter.

Force of Will is in a similar boat as Mana Drain. It's a wider-reaching counter with a decent alt-cost, though I'd only use it if you play in a very fast or combo oriented meta because two-for-oneing yourself at a table of four is a bad feeling. And the alternative cost is the only thing I'd basically ever pay. 5 mana is excessive for a counter (excepting Pact of Negation), and this deck rarely wants to reserve that much mana. To support casting Force, I guess I'd like to have a bit more draw in the deck to ensure that I didn't have to toss an otherwise important card to cast it. I could see dropping Dimir Charm or Darkness if the theme is less important than keeping counters around.

Dark Confidant I actually have a copy of, and his omission is just due to his synergy with the deck. While uncharacteristically low for an EDH mana curve at 3.2, I still think that old Bob is just too taxing on my life total. I have basically no lifegain in this deck to speak of, and it always hurts to pay 4, 5, or 6 life for a spell, when you're already running Arena, Erebos, and VoB. I would not recommend running this.

Wasteland could easily be subbed in replacing either Thespian's Stage or Wasteland's weaker cousin Ghost Quarter. I would have to have Wasteland or Rishadan Port (though it seems useless in EDH unless you play in a very fast/ cutthroat meta) come in as one of my few colorless producing lands because it is vital in this deck to hit UUBB on turn 3-5 (5 is late) so you can start stacking triggers for Lazav. He is a very color intensive commander and colorless, utility, or taplands do him no favor in the early game. I always mull those away.

Hope that helps!

Sorry to clog up your thread with comments, forgot to also add Jace, the Mind Sculptor to the list of subs.

In my experience, Planewsalkers are usually hard to defend and the decision to include one in my EDH decks comes down to whether even a single activation is worth the mana cost. This is why I'm not running 'Mill Jace' (Jace, Memory Adept), or Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver, despite the fact that they are incessantly recommended.

JTMS is okay at best in this deck. He's good utility, and his somewhat aggressive cost could push him over the edge if you wanted to drop either a clone or Reins of Power. The first turn he comes out you can bounce a troublesome creature, Brainstorm, or Fateseal a card. I run enough protection (Propaganda, Pestilence, Crawlspace, etc) in this deck to keep him alive for a couple turns, but for some reason other players seemed to focus me when I had a walker out. They must just seem like easy targets. 2UU for a Fateseal is kind of a bad bargain in my opinion, but if you want to ult you've gotta do it. 5 times which is a long time to keep a walker alive in EDH.

Usually you'd use him for a bounce or two over three turns, or just a Brainstorm every turn until someone pops him. FOr 2UU, that's a pretty good deal. I'd never even bother attempting to Ult JTMS in EDH. If not only for the fact that you basically single out one player by exiling their library and now they're out of the game while the rest finish.

Just had my first game playing this deck today, it's SO much fun. Thanks again for building this great creation!

Glad you liked it! Thanks for the kind words!

The deck looks great! I'm actually in the process of trying to build a Lazav deck myself. I want it to be control with lots of counters, bounces and murder spells. With creature copying and stealing. Possibly some mill, but I don't want that to be a focus. Do you have any suggestions I could use for it? Also need to know a good number of bounces, counters and murders.

The thing I love most about this deck is whenever I get into a situation where I think it's game over for me I draw something that completely turns the tables and goes for the win.

Hey I just wanted to know your opinion of Wrexial, the Risen Deep, if you think he would fit into this deck? Also now that I have Sensei's Divining Top and Glimpse the Unthinkable can I please get your recommendations of how to get them into this deck?

I personally would drop Darkness for Top and add a Maze of Ith. That's just at a glance though, I'd have to take a more in depth look after work.

Hey jjarmst, I really appreciate your interest. I would also appreciate it if in the future you could comment on my user page instead of cluttering up this page, and sending notifications to other followers of this deck.

It would be useful to me to see what version of this list you are running, since I believe you have made several additions of your own. That will help me see what the balance of effects you have currently is, which makes it easier to suggest alterations.

As I mention in my description, Glimpse is pretty terrible in multiplayer EDH so I would never add it to this deck, even if I had a copy. Spending a card to mill maybe 10% of a person's deck at a 4-player table is not where you wanna be. It's so not worth it that I actually boil with rage at its mention, for as often as it's suggested here.

Wrexial was in here for a while. What i didn't like was that 1) he comes in for a cost of 6 mana, and 2) I always depended on supplying him with evasion, and he seldom gave me useful stuff to cast. I eventually cut him for either a board wipe or more card draw, which the deck was lacking at the time. Card draw gives me effects that I definitely want to cast, and at 6 mana in this deck you want to offer up something extra good. So far I haven't missed him that much.

As for the Top, as S1lverfish mentioned, Darkness could safely go. It's kind of a pet card, but it has earned its place in the past. The black fog has saved my life a couple of times in the past, and offers up opportunities for deadly counter attacks. Top gives consistency of draw, so you could run it if you like. Remember that it is better to run Top with many shuffle effects to maximize the scry. Soothsaying is pretty cool too if you'd rather have more powerful scrying, at additional cost.

Love it, it would also seem you've been doing this awhile, so as a fellow albeit younger lazav player, any advice or criticism you would post on Jace's Vengeance by Immortalized would be much appreciated, as well as a +1 if you like. +1

I couldn't help but notice that you had Sword of Body and Mind in both evasion and mill. Is there supposed to be another sword for protection or is there another card missing; if the sword is to only be in there once; it would put you at 99(including commander)

Actually several cards fill diverse roles, if you notice (Lord of the Void, etc.) That is by design. And there are actually 100 unique entries. If you add up the categories, it is greater than 100. =)

BRAVO. Lazav, Dimir Mastermind is my favorite commander. I use a more mill-focused build (General Mills Cereal) to run my friend's Omnath deck down until I hit Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre so I can beat face, but this deck is a thing of beauty.

If you are up to it, i've recently responded to your post on my deck, and further refined suggestions would be much appreciated, feel no obligation however. Thanks again.

I realize this might not be the right place, but I was hoping you could take a look at my Lazav deck when you have a chance. It's primarily based on this deck, but I've made some choices (mostly for budget reasons and some neat ideas) that I would greatly appreciate your insight on. The deck is The King in Yellow.

Pox is always fun to put out there.

I love this deck! It has crazy good synergy, would you mind if I used it for a base for the deck I'm building?

Sure, feel free!