Hopelessly Devoted to Vito

• Commander: Vito, Thorn of the Dusk Rose
• Deck Themes: Mono, Devotion, Life-drain, Combo
• Rotation: Zendikar Rising

Introduction

This deck uses Vito’s static ability to convert life points we gain, into life points we drain from our opponents. It can make sudden, dramatic assaults, even eliminating multiple players in the same turn. It’s all very Black.

Whenever you gain life, target opponent loses that much life.

{3}{B}{B}: Creatures you control gain lifelink until end of turn

Handily, Vito’s own activated ability grants lifelink to all your creatures and can fuel the lifegain half of the equations. But he’s not going to be attacking, so you should look to casting it and use the ability on the same turn.

This is very strong, but true black-heartedness calls for despair-inducing combos, and there are a couple of cards that work really nicely with Vito.

Gary’s Back

The first is Gray Merchant of Asphodel, which was originally printed in 2013’s Theros – notable for its well-developed gods and heroes theme.

At the time, the card’s drain/gain effect was strong that it catapaulted Mono Black from obscurity to domination in Pro Tour Standard. Now reprinted in Theros: Beyond Death, it’s completely bonkers for multiplayer Brawl, where multiple players multiplies the effect.

If Vito’s on the battlefield when ‘Merchant resolves you can easily gain more than 20 life, putting yourself out of reach of the others, and if another player is faltering, it can be enough to knock them out of the match.

The key is Devotion and timing is everything.

Each {B} in the mana costs of permanents you control counts toward your devotion to black.

You really want maximum Devotion to increase the effect, and maximum opponents to multiply the effect. So ideally, Merchant is played on to a battlefield late enough that it has Vito and other creatures, but also early enough that you still have maximum opponents.

It usually works best around early to mid-game before your creatures get whittled down, but if in doubt, and even if Vito’s not there to add to do the direct damage, play it early and take what you can get.

Plus, depending on how you build this deck, you might be able to bring him back later when the effect can be lethal.

Interventionist

The other big combo card in this deck is Erebos’s Intervention, which in the right situation can take out two opponents for the price of one.

You want to dump as much mana as possible into the additional X cost to destroy a big blocking creature with overkill, then convert the X expended to life gain, which Vito in turn converts to direct damage.

If removing a big blocker lets your creatures through the gap, then you can get a double-kill for a properly evil Just As Planned moment.

This might all sound a bit tortured, but torture’s on-theme, and rather than wishing they were dead, your opponents will actually be dead, which is just how we like them.

Mana and Artifacts

Black lacks fast mana, so mana rocks – artifacts that create mana, are essential. ‘Signet is auto-included; Altar works with your Devotion, and Nyx Lotus is sensational.

If you’re ahead, it will let you dump insane quantities of mana into Erebos’ Intervention for the combo above. When you’re behind, it can help you rebuild board state quickly.

However, Nyx Lotus is very strong and your opponents are going to want to nuke it as soon as they can. Since artifact removal is unfortunately cheap, its life expectancy is correspondingly short.

Skyclave Relic meanwhile is a more modest mana source, but with Indestructible also considerably more robust. You really want this card with Kicker for the extra copies, and if its not in hand by that 6th turn, we want to search it up.

Plan B

Evil geniuses are usually thwarted by their own desire to be wicked above all else, and since our Evil Combos are quite easily foiled, we need a more mundane Plan B.

This is to use smaller, defensive creatures to run interference while we develop our ‘field, and have several larger creatures to provide their own threat as backup, with both maximising Devotion.

The Henchmen

We want Grimdancer’s Deathtouch, plus Menace when we’re ahead, and Lifelink when we’re behind. If in doubt, take the Menace.

Hunted Nightmare is also great in a 4 player game when the Deathtouch counters can often be given to an opponent with no creatures – mocking is also nicely on-theme.

The Villains

Massacre Wurm has a triple-black cost, can protect against tokens, and if someone’s gone wide with Scute Swarm or Phylath, the triggered ability can really hurt them.

Demon of Loathing is very strong, and can swing a game that’s gone stagnant, forcing them to sacrifice their creatures. Bloodchief works the other way around, bringing back your own.

Card Draw

In my experience of multi-Brawl in the last couple of years, it’s card-draw that you need to get right with every deck. The games are too long for any sort of traditional aggro game, and if you don’t have several cards in hand, you’re losing.

Clackbridge Troll is the must-have card here, and you’ll be perfectly happy to see it tapped down any number of turns for the card draw. I’ve very often used Grim Tutor to fetch it and get in to the game.

Silversmote Ghoul is easily recycled turn-to-turn, Lost Legion’s scry is surprisingly good, and Mazemind Tome is always solid.

Erebos’ usually survives (destroy-type) board sweeps, when you can activate his ability, or flash in Liliana’s Standard Bearer to compensate serious losses with commensurate card draw.

Note that if your evil crew is exiled, you’re as screwed as everyone else, so play cautiously and hold something back in anticipation of Ugin and Extinction Event. They are both going to happen.

Removal

Removal is Black’s signature move, and we’re spoiled for choice. My preferred suite includes Eat to Extinction, Drag to the Underworld, Extinction Event, Murderous Rider and Soul Shatter.

Threat, and All That

There’s a whole article worth writing about so-called ‘casual’ EDH players getting agitated about supposed threat, and another about whether ‘threat’ means clear and present danger, or merely potential for that danger.

In which respect it’s worth mentioning Lithoform Engine, a card that would be fabulous if your opponents couldn’t foresee the ludicrous potential of doubling and retargeting your combo damage.

In lieu of all those articles then, I can tell you that at least in our locale (Tokyo), ‘Engine is considered a clear and present danger, lasts about 1 turn, and has consistently proved unplayable.

Final Thoughts

Multiplayer Brawl needs resilience, and mono-coloured decks usually aren’t. The big weakness here is that it’s quite easy for your opponents to reduce your Devotion and counter your combos, so its effectiveness depends a lot on how much interaction there is in your match.

That said however, I really enjoy playing this deck and the bleak-hearted fun of trying to suck the life out of my opponents anyway. There’s also aesthetic pleasure in the the beauty of the cards’ shared colour-way, and I get satisfaction simply putting these cards on the ‘field together.

Your soul is lost, so you might as well enjoy the darkness.

Combos	Minions	Villains	Mana/Ramp	Card Draw	Removal	Land	Other
Erebos’s Intervention	Grimdancer	Demon of Loathing	Altar of the Pantheon	Clackbridge Troll	Drag to the Underworld	Crawling Barrens	Demonic Embrace
Gray Merchant of Asphodel	Hunted Nightmare	Drana, the Last Bloodchief	Arcane Signet	Erebos, Bleak-Hearted	Eat to Extinction	21 Swamp	Ayara, First of Locthwain
Vito, Thorn of the Dusk Rose	Nighthawk Scavenger	Massacre Wurm	Nyx Lotus	Mazemind Tome	Extinction Event	Castle Locthwain	Gravebreaker Lamia
			Skyclave Relic	Liliana’s Standard Bearer	Murderous Rider	Agadeem’s Awakening	Grim Tutor
			Solemn Simulacrum	Lost Legion	Soul Shatter	Hagra Mauling	Nightmare Shepherd
				Silversmote Ghoul	Ugin, the Spirit Dragon	Malakir Rebirth	The Cauldron of Eternity
							Tymaret, Chosen from Death
							Shadowspear