Greetings! Enter if you dare. Inside awaits the final round of our precon guides for Duskmourn: House of Horror. We’ve saved the most demonic and cruel deck for last. So prepare yourself, for Endless Punishment, starring Valgavoth, Harrower of Souls.

Who Are the Commanders of Endless Punishment?

Valgavoth is a 4/4 Elder Demon for four mana () with flying and ward - pay 2 life. And whenever an opponent loses life for the first time on their turn, you put a +1/+1 counter on Valgavoth and draw a card.

This is a hell of a lot of commander for just four mana. We’ll expect to see lots of damage effects in the deck, particularly effects that most often hit players on their turns. 

Our backup commander is The Lord of Pain, possibly the most metal card name ever. This is a 5/5 Human Assassin with menace for five mana () that prevents your opponents from gaining life. And whenever a player casts their first spell in a turn, you choose another target player to hit with damage equal to that spell’s mana value.

A few important things to note here. The Lord of Pain won’t often trigger Valgavoth, since players cast most spells on their own turns, and you deal the damage to a player other than the caster.

Also it includes you as well, so if Lord was your commander, you’d definitely want to cast as many spells on other players’ turns as possible.

Keep in mind that The Lord of Pain can become a problem if two opponents get knocked out of the game. When it's 1v1, whenever you opponent casts a spell, you have to choose yourself to receive the damage. Be warned.

Here’s the full deck list:

What Are the New Cards in Endless Punishment?

Let’s start with the Room, shall we? No, I don’t mean the cult classic film by Tommy Wiseau, I’m talking about Spiked Corridor // Torture Pit. The Corridor side makes you three Devil tokens that all deal out one damage when they die.

Torture Pit is much more relevant to the deck, though, as it tacks on an extra two damage whenever you deal noncombat damage to an opponent. Seeing as that’s a large percentage of the deck, it’s a really good fit.

We have one new artifact in this deck, and that’s Séance Board. This very strange mana rock has morbid and puts a soul counter on the Board at the end of any turn that a creature dies. Then you can tap it to make an amount of mana of any one color equal to the number of soul counters, with one pretty big caveat.

That mana can only be used to cast instant, sorcery, Demon, and Spirit spells. Here’s the problem: there are only 16 cards in the deck that this can be used on.

Granted, one of them is Valgavoth, but I'm not sure recasting your commander makes this worth the slot. Of course, we want to evaluate new cards for their uses beyond the decks they come in, and I’d expect there are many deck that will want this, particularly spellslinger decks and, obviously, Demon and Spirit decks. But here, it’s gonna be the easiest card to cut for my upgrades.

Let’s look at some creatures next. First up is Star Athlete, a 3/2 with menace and blitz . When he attacks, you choose a nonland permanent, which doesn’t have to be controlled by the defending player. The permanent’s controller chooses to either sacrifice it or take five damage.

As a repeatable effect, I think this is just okay. First, a 3/2 won’t be able to attack forever until it gets blocked to death. Second, if it’s early game, they’ll probably take the five. But if it gets blocked and dies, then you basically paid three mana to deal five damage.

Not a huge ROI. However, there are political possibilities here. You can certainly ask opponents to not block in order to target something owned by another player if it’s troubling the board. But again, its controller will probably just take the five.

Next is Barbflare Gremlin, another 3/2 that has to attack to do anything. Well, not technically attack, but it has to be tapped. In a deck without convoke effects, that usually means attacking.

While it’s tapped it has a sort of “Manabarbs and Mana Flare had a baby” effect - whenever a player taps a land for mana, they add an additional mana and take one damage. This doesn’t have the benefit of evasion that Star Athlete has, so it’s even more difficult to safely send into battle.

First strike is nice, but it won’t keep it safe past the mid-game most of the time. Now if you were to run this in a dedicated convoke deck, like Kasla, the Broken Halo, you'd have an all-star.

Then we’ve got Persistent Constrictor, a 5/3 Zombie Snake with persist. On each opponent’s upkeep that player loses a life and you put a -1/-1 counter on a creature they control.

The life loss works beautifully with Valgavoth, and the counters are a nice way, albeit a slow way, to deal with indestructible creatures. I mean, it takes out Brash Taunter in one turn. But don't do that, cuz I love he.

Our last new creature is Gleeful Arsonist, a Human Wizard with undying that deals damage to opponents equal to her power when they cast noncreature spells.

There aren’t a ton of ways in the deck to pump this outside of its own undying ability. But it’s gonna find a home in a lot of +1/+1 counter decks. Could you just run Ruric Thar, the Unbowed? Sure, as long as you’re in green. But Ruric also deals damage to you, so this definitely has a one-up there.

Our new sorcery is Sadistic Shell Game, a five-mana spell that can kill up to four creatures, none of which will be yours. Also, it doesn’t target, so you can use it to kill creatures with hexproof and shroud. I love this card. And not just because the art is grotesque and that’s sort of my thing.

Card designs that get all the players involved, and in some cases working together for a common good, is right up my alley. Possibly my favorite new card from the set.

Our last card is an instant that gets cast over and over again. It’s Suspended Sentence, a four-mana spell that destroys a creature and takes three life from the creature’s controller.

Then it suspends itself for three turns, after which you cast it again. We’ve seen these repeatable suspend effects before in cards like Rousing Refrain and Reality Strobe.

The only other black card that has this effect is Charnel Serenade, which is currently only played in 5,215 decks. However, this card is much better, and I think it’ll see a bit more play. 

What Are the Themes and Strategies of the Deck?

Damage and life loss. That’s the themes and strategies of this deck. More specifically we’re trying to do all we can to make sure each opponent is losing life on their own turn so that Valgavoth gets massive and draws all the cards.

There are a few cards in the deck that ping opponents on each turn very easily. Fate Unraveler, Spiteful Visions, and Kederekt Parasite hit them whenever they draw a card.

We also have effects that will happen often, if not every turn, with Rampaging Ferocidon and Blood Seeker hitting opponents when they have creatures enter, Nightshade Harvester when they have lands enter, Kaervek the Merciless whenever they cast spells, and Harsh Mentor whenever they activate non-mana abilities.

There’s even Mogis, God of Slaughter, who deals two damage to opponents on their upkeep if they don’t sacrifice a creature. And Theater of Horrors can be activated for four mana to deal a damage to each opponent any time.

For draining life any old time, we’ll look to Syr Konrad, the Grim, Bastion of Remembrance, Blood Artist, and Falkenrath Noble to trigger off of creature deaths. We also have damage effects on our turn. Although they won’t trigger Valgavoth, damage is damage, and damage ends games.

We’ve got Vial Smasher the Fierce who fires off damage to a random opponent or planeswalker when we cast our first spell each turn, which will only hit opponents on their turns if we're casting instants.

Tectonic Giant can deal three damage to each opponent when it attacks. Mayhem Devil deals one damage to any target whenever a player sacrifices a permanent (hello Treasure tokens).

And we can’t forget one of my all-time favorite creatures, Brash Taunter. This guy works beautifully as a blocker, since he soaks up all damage dealt to him and deals it back out to any opponent.

He also has an activated ability which allows him to fight a target creature. This will come in handy when Valgavoth has a dozen +1/+1 counters on him.

How Do You Play Endless Punishment?

Valgavoth is immensely powerful. And several cards in the deck allow you to reap his benefits on each opponent’s turn, every turn. In every playtest I did for this deck, if Valgavoth was on the board, my hand was full.

In addition to the massive amount of card draw he provides (possibly even better than Tatyova, Benthic Druid, or similar Simic value commanders), he gets bigger. And fast. So not only are you dishing out extra damage constantly, you’re also highly likely to get within range of killing people with commander damage. 

With this much value in the command zone, and a deck full of ways to keep him popping off, you’re more than likely to be the archenemy in the pod when you play this deck. The ward ability to get rid of Valgavoth is easy enough to pay, and he will get removed often. So be prepared for that.

Thankfully, Valgavoth isn’t required to win the game with this deck. I mean, he makes it a lot better, but there is so much damage and life drain in this deck that you’re gonna be plenty strong without him.

This is especially true because of the life gain effects that will keep you healthy, like Basilisk Collar and Mask of Griselbrand. We also have one of the most popular black creatures ever printed in the deck: Gray Merchant of Asphodel.

“Gary,” as we lovingly call him, has ended more Commander games than just about any format staple you can name, outside of Craterhoof Behemoth and Cyclonic Rift (although that one stalls games as often as it ends them).

But one thing the deck is sorely lacking is graveyard recursion. There’s none to be found here, which means you’re unlikely to abuse Gary as so many black Commander decks have.

However, with as full as your hand is gonna be, you’ll likely have an easy time recovering from board wipes. You just have to learn to say “goodbye forever” to your favorite creatures when they die.

Is Endless Punishment Worth Buying?

Here’s my final grade:

B

Valgavoth is the epitome of an “easy value” commander. It doesn’t take much to get him cooking. Just drop a Kederekt Parasite and you’re off to the races.

But is he too good? I think so. Too much value in the command zone leads to boring games, and I think Valgavoth fits that bill. The Lord of Pain, on the other hand, has a lot more nuance, and a much more fun effect on the game.

The deck plays beautifully, doing everything it wants to as soon as you have your commander on the board. Your opponents will have to use up all of their removal spells on you to keep you from winning.

Where the grade takes a hit the most here is the new cards. Generally speaking, I’m not a fan of this selection. As I mentioned, Séance Board will find a suitable home somewhere, but it’s abysmally bad in this deck.

Star Athlete and Barbflare Gremlin are both 3/2 that require you to attack to get a benefit, even though they won’t survive combat past turn five or six. And Spiked Corridor // Torture Pit is just boring and unoriginal. That said, there are still a few solid cards among the new class. Sadistic Shell Game stands out as a potential casual Commander staple, with its ability to kill of four creatures for just five mana, including creatures with hexproof and shroud.

Gleeful Arsonist, although small, is also likely to get picked up in a lot of decks for the massive amounts of damage it can create, especially in decks with +1/+1 counters or other pump effects.

Our reprint selection for this precon is just as good as the other Duskmourn decks have been. I gotta say, WOTC did a great job of adding reprint value to this set of decks. Included here we have Kederekt Parasite, Vial Smasher the Fierce, Graven Cairns, and Witch’s Clinic as the standouts.

Can I make this deck better? Find out in my Upgrade Guide here. And make sure to check out my guides for the rest of the Duskmourn decks as well, right here on EDHREC.

More Duskmourn Precons:

Death Toll Precon Review

Miracle Worker Precon Review

Jump Scare! Precon Review

Andy Zupke

Andy's been playing Magic on and off since Fallen Empires. He loves to travel, drink, eat, and spend time with family and friends.