I highly recommend Trepanation Blade , may not be a Sword of Body and Mind but it gets the job done if your under a budget.

I also feel that having your creature get +x/+0 for each card you mill is incredible, first you will mill X cards, then if your zombie is able to deal damage to a player while Undead Alchemist is in play you will then mill base power+X. Then you will most likely have a sizable army of zombie tokens :D

I like the Trepanation Blade but I agree that Sword of Body and Mind is going to be more effective. I already have a SOBM so cost isn't the issue. I'm more concerned with whether or not I'm going to be able to maintain board control throughout the course of the match as well as my early game since I don't have many drops that cost less than 3.

Although I love Mindcrank it becomes moot once Undead Alchemist is on the field. You will already be filling their grave yard with other means, maybe some Surgical Extraction to thin their deck even more.

May no be the greatest one drop but there is always Diregraf Ghoul . Or Walking Corpse for a vanilla 2 cmc.

I was thinking the same thing but on the flip side of the coin if anything ever happens to Undead Alchemist the mindcrank provides a great way to finish off the assault. Maybe I can run less cranks for some surgicals. 2 and 2 maybe?

An ok set of mill cards are Dream Twist mills 3 with a cost effective flash back of 2. Curse of the Bloody Tome mills a player 2 on there upkeep every turn. jace is ok, the bad thing is that he costs 5 to cast. The two swords to work good. in a pure mill deck Trepanation Blade i believe is better since it mills no matter what and BaM has to do damage to a player.

Good feedback. =D

I couldn't find room for Dream Twist in the deck and I actually found Despise more beneficial because it helps me to eliminate creature or planeswalkers threats.

I also considered Curse of the Bloody Tome but when I weighed it against card:Jace's Erasure I felt that the latter pulled its weight more. Particularly with the archivist in play.

I've been thinking of the whole Sword of Body and Mind vs Trepanation Blade thing and haven't really been able to test either yet as they pretty much get naturalized/beasted/insert removal here the second they hit the board. My initial thought was that if I could control the board well enough I wouldn't have issues getting the sword through and it would be milling a lot more than the blade.

Finally I'm considering trying to fit card:Black Sun's Zenith into the deck since hexproof is such a highly played mechanic at the moment.

So I dropped the Stitched Drake cards out of the deck because I found they were nearly impossible to play since I usually don't have creatures in the graveyard. I'm debating between settling on Diregraf Ghoul or Walking Corpse as the early drop.

Next I'm weighing the viability of Grimgrin, Corpse-Born in the deck. I feel if the deck is working properly I'll have a lot of tokens to sacrifice at his disposal. It'll probably wind up as a trial and error test card I'm guessing.

As always comments, suggestions, and VOTES are greatly appreciated!

I'm working on a similar deck idea and I personally find the card:Jace's Erasure a little lacking unless you play a lot of draw card or manage to get all multiples in play.

Curse of the Bloody Tome is 1 colorless more a cast but is mandatory on opponents upkeep and is 2 cards a pop.

I'm still working on play testing with and without however. I just know the milling has suffered when I'm stuck with only 1 card:Jace's Erasure for an extended number of turns.

Xenograft , call zombies, Invisible Stalker is now a unblockable zombie with hexproof, equip invisible stalker with Trepanation Blade when you have undead alchemist out and Sword of Body and Mind when you don't have the alchemist BUT you have Mindcrank . Because Undead Alchemist cancels out the damage, you cant really deal damage to cause the body mind sword to do its 10 mill effect but you can still mill with the damage attained from the trepanation blade and the mill from its effect as well. Because invisible stalker is hexproof you wont have to worry about him. The worse your opponent can do is destroy you xenograft BUT WAIT, you still have sword of body and mind who cares if invisible stalker is a zombie or not, what if he destroys/counters your equipment? No worries, you still have xenograft and a really angry Mindshrieker that would love to eat up your opponents deck. By the early rate of milling your opponent might even lose all those artifact destruction and control cards. Surgical Extraction can make sure you wont ever have to see those mean old cards ever again. If you don't want to deal with counter spells and artifact destruction to ruin the deck, just expand your deck to as many win conditions as possible.

I didn't realize the Undead Alchemist cancelled out the Sword of Body and Mind ! thanks for pointing that out I'll have to get it changed to a Trepanation Blade right away.

Hi. Iam building similar deck and i found Nephalia Drownyard usefull especially in late game. Also Dream Twist work wonders against decks running liliana. 3 mana to mill 6 cards is not that bad. In my version i use Mana Leak and Gruesome Encore as some creatures tend to end in my opponents graveyard and its really annoying if you manage to Despise a titan turn 1 and cast him turn 3. hope that helps.

I was considering Nephalia Drownyard but I'm worried its going to screw me at the worst times for mana. In initial playtests I found myself dreading drawing that card early game.

I've been debating Dream Twist and Tome Scour but I feel that the slots can be used for more important cards that help to control the early game. If the way is cleared the Undead Alchemist and his buddies should do all the work I need.

I do like your suggestion to use Gruesome Encore though! I think it could be a good answer to milling some nasty creatures into the graveyard that may come back to haunt me. Obviously beating them mercilessly with that same creature is a huge plus. =P

I agree that Nephalia Drownyard sucks in early game but if u running 1 you only have 13% chance to see it in your opening hand and 23% by turn 7 so i think its worth a risk. Tome Scour has rotated out unfortunately. i was trying to use Undead Alchemist on fnm but he didnt survive for more than 2 turns even once:( ill try to use Swiftfoot Boots on him next time. It also made me want to splash white instead of black. much more defensive spells and u can still use Dismember and Surgical Extraction btw t1 island, dream twist, SE target -> any milled removal :)

I see your point about running 1 Nephalia Drownyard . Those ratios seem pretty favorable. I'm also intrigued with the white idea but I'm not convinced its going to answer the weenie rush as effectively as black will. I've honestly been considering splashing green for some counters protection to make my creatures immune to card:Black Sun's Zenith, possibly make Glissa, the Traitor a use, as well as open up some artifact destruction options. Problem is I don't feel like I have much room in the deck to play with. For the most part these cards in here feel needed.

New and improved deck is up with some new questions if any previous commentators would like to add some new wisdom.

I'd recommend running Snapcaster Mage as well as Skaab Ruinator. Cards like Armored Skaab and Deranged Alchemist work wonders with these two cards, feeding creatures for your ruinator, who's 5/6 zombie flier and snapcaster being fed with those removal cards. Opponents often play risky when they see you mill a kill card, so Snap+Flash can ruin their game, especially if you extract after.

I'd recommend Evil Twin as well, as it's a nice answer to some pain in the ass legendary, like the current Geist of Saint Traft, and alternatively a nice way to counter your opponents heavy hitter (block a token, remove with a Twin), or again to simply pump your own field (copy of a skaab ruinator or alchemist).

I'd recommend running Snapcaster Mage as well as Skaab Ruinator. Cards like Armored Skaab and Deranged Alchemist work wonders with these two cards, feeding creatures for your ruinator, who's 5/6 zombie flier and snapcaster being fed with those removal cards. Opponents often play risky when they see you mill a kill card, so Snap+Flash can ruin their game, especially if you extract after.

I'd recommend Evil Twin as well, as it's a nice answer to some pain in the ass legendary, like the current Geist of Saint Traft, and alternatively a nice way to counter your opponents heavy hitter (block a token, remove with a Twin), or again to simply pump your own field (copy of a skaab ruinator or alchemist).

Love the idea! +1 Good luck, looking forward to see the tournament history!

i like it, i think if you keep the nim deathmantle, get rid of phyrexian crusader,just because he's going to be doing infect damage, and add maybe a Phylactery Lich , he would be stronger and indestructible. add another Diregraf Ghoul , for early game. add 1 or 2 Curse of the Bloody Tome just to keep milling as each turn passes by. other then that i see what alkore is going with the idea. the problem is that you will need to have alot of mana if you have big spells in the graveyard, you kind of get a one chance deal with Snapcaster Mage (a.k.a. fogle from superbad)unless you bounce him back into your hand or if you get a Cackling Counterpart in there

Wow, I really like the self mill premise and you can even run Mirror-Mad Phantasm or Necrotic Ooze , heck both and infinite mill yourself for a win with Laboratory Maniac

The deck is more looking for a win by making 10 zombies from having undead alchemist on the field and using Jace or getting through with a couple zombies. Its an interesting variant on something I already have going though. I may have to check it out. Don't forget to +1 if you like the deck. =)

Wow I was completely unaware of Diregraf Captain. Shows how much time I've been spending on modern. Before DA came out I tried making a similar deck. You can look at it if you like.

As for cards I would recommend: Have you considered Grimoire of the Dead? It could add another win condition to your deck if for some reason you can't find your Alchemist.

There's also Sword of Body and Mind, but I think that card is starting to become overrated.

+1

Yeah I've been considering putting Liliana of the Veil back in over it but I'm just not completely sure. It could also be that final card I cut to run a solid 60. The problem in the past was having SOMETHING to address Mirran Crusader and other hexproof/pro creatures. Now that I have Evil Twin in the sideboard I think I'm addressing that particular issue in a much more fluent manner. I can probably afford to drop Call to the Grave at this point.

a Sword of Body and Mind really hurtsso yeah that ide sugest.

Sword of Body and Mind doesn't work with Undead Alchemist's replacement effect. Or else I would use it for sure.