When I first got into Pioneer, I wanted my deck to be reminiscent of my Standard Sultai Whip deck from 2014. I was determined to fit Whip of Erebos into a pioneer deck, and one of my attempts was to whip back Gray Merchant of Asphodel (Gary) for a minimum of four damage. Ultimately, Whip felt too slow, and there were much better cards. I have always loved Gary, but a new favorite card emerged during The Brother’s War: Phyrexian Fleshgorger. Prototyping Fleshgorger adds to your devotion; thus, this deck was made.
The strategy is to play aggressive devoted creatures such as Evolved Sleeper and Gifted Aetherborn, followed by a Phyrexian Fleshgorger to ramp up to five devotion. With Nykthos and Meathook Massacre, we can wipe our opponent’s creatures while maintaining our own creatures and increasing our devotion even further. When new threats come into play, we have Murderous Rider to handle them, and then it adds two devotion as well. If you haven’t won from the aggressive start, playing Gray Merchant of Asphodel will drain your opponent for a fair amount of damage and recoup some of the damage we paid for Murderous Rider and Thoughtseize.
I have only played the deck for about a month or so, but I have easily climbed the ranks in Explorer to the top of gold with it. Some of the decks I encountered in the lower ranks aren’t quite in the meta, but the mix of aggressiveness and removal has been working really well against many strategies. Thoughtseize can remove their best card, and both Bloodchief’s Thirst and Murderous Rider can handle other threats early in the game. Both Castle Locthwain and Evolved Sleeper fuel your card advantage which can also take away the game.
Against graveyard decks, there are main board cards such as Tymaret, Chosen by Death, which can handle threats as well as add to your devotion, as well as aggressive cards like Misery’s Shadow and Hive of the Eye Tyrant. Graveyard Trespasser is tricky, as it has ward and is graveyard hate, but it also hurts devotion which can be problematic in the early game. Against most creature decks and aggro decks, this deck performs well. So far, the most challenging matchups are angels and control.
Against control, if they handle your early creatures via removal or countermagic, we are pretty much stuck attempting to play any creature with minimal value, as devotion won’t be obtained, removal won’t be resolved, and attacking is unlikely. When sideboarding, we can bring in Invoke Despair, Duress, and Liliana of the Veil, which feels much better than some removal for their non-existent creatures. If we can resolve Lily and use her ultimate, the game is won. This has been my prime strategy against this matchup.
Against angels, the trick is using your removal at the right time before everything gets +2/+2 from Righteous Valkyrie. Once your opponent has Righteous Valkyrie, it slows down when we can play Meathook, and our opponent has gained so much life that the game might be over. This deck runs a lot of three-mana creatures which can be clunky and is not ideal for our suite of removal spells. With a lot of four toughness creatures, Meathook is tougher to play when we have to wipe our own board as well, which reduces the ability to play a Meathook later if needed.
I have a lot of fun playing this deck and as of right now, it’s the only reason I am playing on Arena. Games never take too long, and many creatures are just enjoyable to play, Evolved Sleeper being the surprise game-changer I didn’t know I would love. I believe the deck can stand on its own and is viable for any casual FNM. Now that Phyrexian Obliterator is being re-printed, I can’t wait to see how much damage Gary can do! It will be interesting to modify the deck and see what cuts I make once Phyrexia: All Will Be One comes out.
You can find the decklist here!
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