(Long Goodbye | Art by Jarel Threat)

Greatness, at Any Cost

Hey everyone! After my first article for EDHREC on the most played cards from Karlov Manor in Commander, I couldn't wait to share more listy goodness with you. Today, I'm beginning a series on commonly played cards in the format for each color, starting with the most played mono-black cards in Commander!

EDH is constantly evolving, with new cards being printed every few months. While I'm not one to complain about exciting card previews, I also think it's helpful for players—new and experienced alike—to have access to a list of cards through EDHREC that have been safe, solid, and powerful inclusions in decks over the years and through many iterations of the format. As you'll see from this list, the most played mono-black cards in Commander tend to be the cheapest, most streamlined version of common effects in the color, like tutoring or removal in the case of black. Even if you don't plan on playing these cards, this list should give you a good idea of how the average EDH deck playing black might look like, or it may serve as inspiration for your next deckbuilding adventure. 

Honorable Mentions - New Hotness from Murders at Karlov Manor

Given how recently Karlov Manor released on paper, it might be difficult to decide which cards are powerful or unique enough to merit inclusion in your decks. Thankfully, we have EDHREC data to give us insight into what people have already started playing so early on in the format.

No mono-black cards made it to the top 10 most played cards from the set as presented in my last article. But that doesn't mean the set gave us a bunch of weak, uninteresting black cards. Just beyond the top 10, you'll find two absolute bangers.

Vein Ripper is like a Blood Artist on steroids for decks that want to sacrifice a lot of creatures or control the board with removal. Costing six mana is certainly a downside when you have access to Artist or Zulaport Cutthroat. But Ripper tries to make up for it with huge stats and a Ward ability that threatens to get drain trigger party started.

Meanwhile, Massacre Girl, Known Killer is an aggressive legend that literally changes the rules of engagement and offers you card draw to boot. Even if you don't try that hard to take advantage of her second ability by playing a bunch of removal that reduces creatures' toughness, just playing a deck that wants to get into combat often should pay you off or make her a lightning rod for removal.

10.Zulaport Cutthroat

Speaking of Blood Artist, the 10th most played mono-black card in Commander is a lookalike with the Human type, Zulaport Cutthroat. This 2-drop also drains opponents when creatures die, but instead of making you choose one opponent to punish, you get to be like Oprah and say, "you get a drain, and you get a drain!" (are my readers old enough for this reference?) Slowly bleeding opponents to death by sacrificing your creatures, targeting enemy pawns with removal, and sweeping the board has to be one of the most classic ways a black mage can win a match of EDH!

Sure enough, there are a ton of commanders with black in their color identities that love having a Cutthroat in play. Broadly speaking, the most popular commanders paired with the 1/1 based on EDHREC data tend to fall into three camps: legends that pay you off for things dying or getting drain triggers, like Teysa Karlov and Shirei, Shizo's Caretaker, ones that give you a lot of fodder for other cards to sacrifice, like Endrek Sahr, Master Breeder and Elenda, the Dusk Rose, or commanders that have sacrifice abilities themselves to help get your started on the road to a dead table, such as Yawgmoth, Thran Physician.

Cutthroat and similar cards also enable many infinite combos. Check out the card's Commander's Spellbook page for inspiration on how to build a instant kill machine.

9.Victimize

Victimize is the kind of card that looks pretty powerful at face value. For the moderate set-up cost of a board presence and legal targets, you get to reanimate two creatures. Maybe you want to reuse busted enters-the-battlefield effects like Sun Titan or Etali, Primal Conqueror. Or maybe, you want to get the sacrifice train going for effects like Grave Pact. It's a good deal either way.

Aside from the potent promise of value, Victimize also makes this list because it's a pretty great combo card as well! Check this example out below:

There are a lot of ways to go infinite with Victimize as long as you're playing blue, green, and sometimes red as well. Most of these combos need a way to use all the death triggers, like Zulaport Cutthroat, but putting a million +1/+1 counters on Carrion Feeder or making infinite tokens work as well. Players tend to run it in decks featuring commanders like Henzie "Toolbox" Torre, Sefris of the Hidden Ways, and Syrix, Carrier of the Flame, among others.

8.Blood Artist

Decks playing Zulaport Cutthroat also tend to play Artist for consistency's sake. They do have different types, however. this means Vampires-matters decks can squeeze extra value out of it, while Human-centric decks might play the Cutthroat only. Even when the Artist isn't contributing anything to combat as an 0/1 and when you have yet to build up your sacrifice engine, certain commanders will still appreciate having more Vampires in play to power up their synergies.

Type line aside, I do think Zulaport Cutthroat is the better card in the format, as you don't need to target an opponent like Blood Artist makes you. They're in roughly the same amount of decks, so I think we can chalk the 0/1's increased presence to its relative longevity in the format.

7.Reanimate

I wrote in my introduction that the most played cards in each color tend to be the cheapest and most efficient versions of a certain effect. This couldn't be more true than for Reanimate. At a measly one mana, this classic card is one of the most powerful spells in Commander. I struggle to think of an EDH deck playing black cards that wouldn't at least consider Reanimate, especially since it can also target creature cards in your opponents' graveyards.

Its simple, unobtrusive potency is attested to by the variety and flexibility of cards that are paired with it the most in EDHREC user-submitted decks. Players tend to play Reanimate alongside extra mana sources like Ignoble Hierarch and Birds of Paradise, control effects like Rhystic Study and Swords to Plowshares, and format powerhouses like Dockside Extortionist and Cyclonic Rift.

And what are we reanimating? That depends on the colors decks play besides black, but some of the most popular targets include Etali, Gisela, Blade of Goldnight, and Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite.

6.Phyrexian Arena

Another one of black's classic effects dating back to Magic's early days is card advantage in exchange for life. Even in today's world of wall-of-text value creatures and game-winning haymaker spells, iconic card draw staple Phyrexian Arena continues to feature in decks playing black.

Unless you're running a streamlined, creature-focused or aggressive deck that may find Arena too clunky or slow, you can probably throw this enchantment into your 99 and feel pretty good about it. Of course, you're on EDHREC reading this, so you undoubtedly want more bang for you buck than a few extra cards and a slightly depressed life total. Thankfully, there are both powerful and synergistic options in black and beyond that might make you ecstatic to run this three-mana enchantment rather than just pretty good.

Sheoldred, the Apocalypse and Starscream, Power Hungry don't need much help running a table, but having them in play alongside Arena does make the one-extra-card-per-turn effect snowball even more as the game progresses. Meanwhile, Daxos the Returned is happy to have more enchantments. Treacherous Blessing is one of my favorite cards out of Theros: Beyond Death, and it pairs perfectly with Arena as another enchantment that digs you towards sweepers or your win condition.

If you're looking to build around enchantments, Blessing isn't the only permanent that you might run in a deck that makes good use of Arena. Pillowfort- or taxes-style decks love having this in play while feeling safe behind Ghostly Prison, Propaganda, and Blind Obedience.

5.Toxic Deluge

Many if not most black decks want to run some number of sweepers. While there are a ton of options available, none of them do the job quite like Toxic Deluge.

Most other sweepers start at four mana or have some sort of drawback tacked on. And although paying life is technically a drawback, it's a bargain for the flexibility and effectiveness this sorcery offers you. Deluge does a lot of things uniquely well, coming in at three mana and dealing with indestructible creatures. The modality of the card is also a big advantage. You can wipe the board of small creatures while keeping your precious commander alive, or you can inject some politics into the decision of how much life to pay.

It also makes for a hilariously sweet combo with Massacre Girl, Known Killer, letting you draw a card for each of your opponents' fallen creatures.

4.Feed the Swarm

We used to live in a world where the color black had no way to answer enchantments. Today, with cards like Feed the Swarm and to a much lesser extent Pharika's Libation and Extract the Truth, mono-black mages are no longer completely cold to this card type.

Depending on who you ask, Wizards of the Coast's shift in design philosophy is either an unforgivable color pie violation or a clever way to strengthen black in various formats. Either way, many players have slotted this card into their black decks since its printing in Zendikar Rising, making it one of the most played mono-black cards in Commander.

While you really don't need to go to great lengths to justify Feed the Swarm's inclusion in your deck, there are some cool ways to make it pop. Deckbuilders have ingeniously incorporated its drawback into their decks featuring commanders like Mortarion, Daemon Primarch and Vilis, Broker of Blood.

3.Vampiric Tutor

The first of two iconic "tutor" effects on this list is Vampiric Tutor. The instant presents casters with two drawbacks—costing an extra two life to cast and making you wait a turn for the card you searched up—but it's still an incredible powerful card especially in a singleton format like Commander. Having access to an additional copy of the best card for the current board state is an incredible boon, and that's essentially what Vampiric Tutor is. It can fetch a Cyclonic Rift when it would be the most devastating or it can find the last card you need for your one-hit-KO combo. It helps protect your commander in tandem with cards like Fierce Guardianship. Vamp's ceiling is as high as all the cards in your deck. It's one of the best black cards in the format!

2.Dark Ritual

Speaking of cards that are as powerful as the best plays in your deck, we have Dark Ritual. Even without additional fast mana, casting a three-cost card on turn one or a four-cost card on turn two makes for a broken start. Looking through the EDHREC data, players have been using this card in decks where powering out your commander threatens to control the game.

Of course, fast mana cards tend to play well together. That's why we see so many decks also playing mana creatures like the two Hierarchs, Birds of Paradise, and Deathrite Shaman (these are also just some of the most played cards in Commander, period). When I look at a decklist featuring Dark Ritual, I immediately try to find the game ending combo. Going the instant kill route also makes sense considering some of the card's associated commanders.

It's technically card disadvantage, however, so maybe that makes it less broken?

1.Demonic Tutor

Personally, I wouldn't have it any other way than for Demonic Tutor to top the list of most-played mono-blacks card in Commander. As I wrote in my ode to Vampiric Tutor above, being able to fetch the best card in your deck for a given situation is one of black's most iconic sections of the color pie. Getting to play Demonic Tutor is a pretty compelling reason to play a black deck, choice of commander aside, and a powerful combo enabler that helps keep this format we love diverse.

It might seem obvious, but getting to put a card directly into your hand from your library makes Demonic Tutor better than Vamp in many spots, even if it does cost an extra mana and only happens at sorcery-speed. There are enough catch-all "cant-touch-this" spells like Teferi's Protection and Heroic Intervention that make Tutor worthwhile to cast while you set up your combo turn or right before your opponent threatens to snatch victory away from you.

The Stairs Lead Down in Both Directions

This was a fun article to write! I'm sure format veterans wouldn't have much difficulty predicting which cards would make it to this list, but it's still wonderful to see so many of the game's iconic older cards beating newer effects to this list. On the other hand, you really don't need to play the strongest or most efficient version of a spell when this isn't your deckbuilding goal. It truly is a strength of Magic: the Gathering that we've seen seemingly a million black sweeper cards each with different drawbacks and advantages, and with different compelling reasons to pair with different commanders. Take a look at more mono-black staples here on EDHREC.

I hope you enjoyed this review, and I look forward to sharing the most played cards in the other colors. Until next time!

Read more:

Wombo Combo - Mono-Black Edition

Brew For Your Buck - Build a Budget Mono-Black Deck

Nick Price