There are many benefits to third-party tournament series like the Star City Games Opens. Aside from exposing players and judges to more competitive play, they also help develop the next generation of Pro Tour “stars” and turn them into household names before they actually make it to the big time. Perhaps the biggest success in that regard is Brian Braun-Duin, who has gone from relative obscurity to a Grand Prix champion. And still people cannot pronounce his last name.

BBD has a number of valuable skills that make him an excellent Magic player, but the one that is most relevant to me and my articles is his brewing. With the exception of his tweaks to mono-black, a deck I have never had any desire to play, I have enjoyed the decks BBD comes up with. Because I’m me, I very rarely play them card-for-card, and his current Junk Reanimator list is no exception.

The Idea

I have always had a soft spot for dumping big things in the graveyard and bringing them back before I should be able to. One of my favourite cards of all time is [card]Recurring Nightmare[/card], and when that got banned from Standard in its heyday, I switched to [card]Oath of Ghouls[/card] and [card]Living Death[/card] decks. During Innistrad-RTR Standard I played Séance Reanimator, and in Modern I have messed around with multiple [card]Goryo’s Vengeance[/card] decks. The archetype is just fun for me.

With that in mind, it shouldn’t be a surprise that [card]Obzedat’s Aid[/card] was basically a dream card for me. Before M13 rotated out I really wanted to bring back [card]Omniscience[/card] or [card]Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker[/card] for optimum fun levels, but never got around to building such an unfair monstrosity. Sadly (and somewhat surprisingly, given the theme of the block) Theros and M14 provided us with precious few goodies to bring back with Aid, at least not ones that saved us mana.

BBD showed that the deck was viable, although he dipped into green for additional ways to fill the graveyard, some ramp and another fatty in [card]Sylvan Primordial[/card]. Far be it from me to call an established pro with multiple successes “wrong”, but I do not agree with the need for green. Sure, [card]Satyr Wayfinder[/card] and [card]Grisly Salvage[/card] are great at filling the yard up. Sure, it’s nice to be able to cast your fatties if you can’t draw the reanimation or the self-mill outlets. Know what else is nice? Having ways to fill your graveyard selectively that also help kill your opponent. I was fairly sure I could find enough ways to do that without dipping into green, while having a viable alternate plan if reanimation went awry. I also eliminated the awful late-game top deck draws of [card]Elvish Mystic[/card]s and [card]Sylvan Caryatid[/card]s, which is a reasonable trade-off for the early-game explosiveness.

The Deck

If we’re not running green, how are we filling our graveyard? Well let’s start with everyone’s favourite multi-format ruiner, [card]Pack Rat[/card]. When this card was initially spoiled I thought it would see some play in this sort of deck, and was dismissed as crazy. That used to bother me but I am so used to it now that I just ignore it. We’ve seen the power of [card]Pack Rat[/card] in Standard, but always before it’s been a case of “is the card in my hand better than another Rat?” Now in this deck we can discard our reanimation targets essentially for free, making ourselves more threats AND setting up a strong follow-up play in future turns.

One discard outlet just isn’t going to be good enough, no matter how powerful that outlet is. Here’s where I had to get a little janky, though not too much so: [card]Erebos’s Emissary[/card]. A 3/3 for 4 is barely limited playable, but that ability to discard creatures for a substantial buff is enough to warrant consideration. That I can bestow it on a [card]Pack Rat[/card] is an added benefit. I don’t know that I want four of them though, so we’ll run one [card]Trading Post[/card] as the last outlet. In addition to helping us get our beef in the graveyard and gaining us life in the process, we can also recur our [card]Whip of Erebos[/card] if necessary AND make Goats to be bestowed, pumped by an emblem, act as chump blockers or simply get sacrificed.

Just as one discard outlet wouldn’t cut it, one reanimation spell won’t either. We’re obviously playing 4 [card]Obzedat’s Aid[/card], and we need to supplement that with the very strong [card]Whip of Erebos[/card]. Initially I thought 3, but the fact it’s legendary combined with the ability to get it back if needed makes me want to cut that to 2. I also want to try a single [card]Rescue from the Underworld[/card] for instant-speed reanimation.

Our creature base is already partly built, with both [card]Pack Rat[/card] and [card]Erebos’s Emissary[/card] needing slots. Four Rats and 3 Emissary should do it. We’d be crazy not to play [card]Obzedat, Ghost Council[/card] in any BW deck, let alone one with [card]Whip of Erebos[/card]. So many decks just plain can’t answer Obzedaddy, let alone one that’s even harder to get rid of. Plus there’s a flavour win in bringing him back with [card]Obzedat’s Aid[/card]. [card]Ashen Rider[/card] is also begging for inclusion, doing what [card]Sylvan Primordial[/card] does only better. While we’re exiling, let’s get an [card]Angel of Serenity[/card] in here for value.

To round the deck out I wanted some utility cards to ensure I didn’t just die while waiting for something cool to happen. [card]Hero’s Downfall[/card], [card]Thoughtseize[/card] and [card]Underworld Connections[/card] are some of the most powerful cards in Standard right now and were basically auto-includes. Here’s what I ended up running:

[deck title=BW ReLansdellmator – Chris Lansdell]

[Lands]

7 Swamp

6 Plains

4 Godless Shrine

4 Temple of Silence

1 Blood Crypt

2 Temple of Malice

[/Lands]

[Creatures]

4 Pack Rat

3 Erebos’s Emissary

4 Obzedat, Ghost Council

4 Obzedat’s Aid

1 Angel of Serenity

3 Ashen Rider

[/Creatures]

[Other Spells]

4 Thoughtseize

4 Hero’s Downfall

2 Underworld Connections

2 Whip of Erebos

1 Trading Post

1 Rescue from the Underworld

3 Elspeth, Sun’s Champion

[/Other Spells]

[Sideboard]

1 Glare of Heresy

2 Lifebane Zombie

2 Blood Baron of Vizkopa

2 Revoke Existence

1 Angel of Serenity

2 Dark Betrayal

2 Gild

2 Sire of Insanity

1 Erebos, God of the Dead

[/Sideboard]

[/deck]

I really need to control my addiction to scry lands. [card]Blood Crypt[/card]s would just have been better here, no need to play the cute Temples on a deck that really needs to hit 5 mana on the turn it draws the fifth land. I do like Sire in the board, though I never had a chance to see how it worked I think it would have been solid against any control decks.

The Play

One problem with playing brews is that you never really know what your matchups will be like. I built the deck because I wanted to test my initial theory that [card]Pack Rat[/card] was good in Reanimator, but I had no idea if the deck would hold up against a relatively-tuned mono-black list. That would be my first-round opponent and, although I ended up on the losing end, the deck held its own in two of the three games. He had turn 2 [card]Pack Rat[/card] AND the [card]Dark Betrayal[/card] for my Rat on turn 3, leaving me with a do-nothing hand and Rats opposite.

The rest of the night would go significantly better as I would run the table, beating RW Burn, GW Auras, GW Aggro and a fourth deck I can’t for the life of me remember. The deck at all times felt very powerful, and although I occasionally was left needing one of the three things a reanimator deck needs (discard/mill, target, reanimation spell) I had enough powerful effects to keep me in the game while I waited. The sideboard [card]Gild[/card]s were key in a couple of places, ramping me into an Elspeth or fixing my mana for an Obzedat while also removing a threat. I never needed to try the Sires out of the board, which is a shame because I think the look on the face of the control players would have been worth capturing for posterity.

[card]Whip of Erebos[/card] continually did tons of work for me. The lifelink ability is so important against the aggressive decks I faced, especially with an army of rats on the board. Even when it got destroyed or Thoughtseized I was able to bring it back with [card]Obzedat’s Aid[/card], which more than one opponent had to read before shaking their head incredulously at the “target permanent card” line. On the other hand, [card]Rescue from the Underworld[/card] was a total blank. I think I cast it a grand total of once, and that was to sacrifice an Obzedat and avoid a [card]Selesnya Charm[/card]. Sure I got to bring back an [card]Ashen Rider[/card], but the game was over by that point anyway.

[card]Trading Post[/card] was fine. I think one is the correct number, but it’s probably a lot better if I include one card I completely forgot even existed: [card]Champion of Stray Souls[/card]. Sacrificing a couple of Goats to get back an [card]Ashen Rider[/card] and an Obzedat seems like a good deal and costs me no cards, at instant speed. The Champion himself is not super-efficient but he works well with Elspeth, [card]Trading Post[/card] and even [card]Pack Rat[/card] to some extent. Oh, and he’s resilient to removal, albeit for a fairly hefty price.

Although [card]Erebos’s Emissary[/card] seemed necessary when I built the deck, I think it might be a little too narrow. Replacing one with another [card]Trading Post[/card] and adding more beef, in the form of additional [card]Angel of Serenity[/card], or some utility, in the form of [card]Liliana of the Dark Realms[/card], could be an option. There might yet be something in Journey into Nyx or M15 that make this plan even more appealing.

All told I think this deck can do some work at FNM. Green definitely increases your speed while giving you more ways to fill your yard, but it also gives you more dead draws later in the game. It’s possible that new Ajani will help that issue with his first +1 ability, but I’m not in a hurry to try that. More on that in a future column.

With Journey into Nyx fully spoiled I’ll be spending next week deep in the brew tank, hopefully bringing you a couple of articles in the process. As always, thanks for stopping by. Brew on!