On Theme: Golgari Swarm (Guilds of Ravnica Part 1 of 10)

Nature's most raw beauty is the circle: perfect in its continuance, with no break between death and life.

So this week we are starting a series of articles about decks based on the ten guilds from the original Ravnica block. I think I am not alone in having Ravnica on the brain recently, since we are heading back for the next block and since there are at least 10 new Legendary Creatures for us to build with coming out.

So picking a place to start I ended up picking Golgari since we have seen some of the new Golgari Legendary and I wanted to play with the guild colors. Plus they are two of my favorite colors for magic, and my second favorite of the guilds following behind Dimir. So starting with Golgari I will run through the guilds that will be in Return to Ravnica, then the ones slated for Gatecrash.

So enough of the busy work, lets get down to the deck. So who are are using to run the deck? Well if you can’t tell from her lovely picture up top I decided that Savra, Queen of the Golgari fit the bill the best. But the Sisters of Stone Death made the deck as well, so you could easily switch them out.

For those that don’t know Savra has the following abilities:

Whenever you sacrifice a black creature, you may pay 2 life. If you do, each other player sacrifices a creature.

So she works as a Gravepact effect, but only on sacrifices and cost life. Well that isn’t to bad, just need to get some black creatures and some sac outlets.

Her other ability is:

Whenever you sacrifice a green creature, you may gain 2 life.

Ok so that takes care of the life lose, now we just need lots of Black and Green Creatures.

Building around our general has come up with a couple of strategies. Lots of B/G Creatures, lots of sac outlets, and lots of ways to bring those creatures back so we can kill them again.

So lets start with the a few of the Creature All Stars:

Cranker Abomination - This guy is pretty neat. He is a cheap 6/6 and when played in multiplayer there is a greater chance of having an opponent with no creatures.

Creakwood Liege - I know we talked about this cycle before, and the pump ability is nice for beating people down, but his other ability is why he shines in this deck, he makes B/G Tokens for us to sac for Profits.

Doomgape - A 10/10 for 7, who also works as a sac outlet and gains us life. Yeah that seems good.

Drooling Groodion - He is from Rav, has the Golgari water mark, works as removal of sorts, a pump and a sac outlet. He fits right in.
Gleancrawler - We need ways to bring creature back from the graveyard and this guy does that.

Lord of Extinction & Vulturous Zombie - Both of these guys get fed by all our graveyard shenanigans so they give us big creatures to sac to Doomgape or to bash in some faces.

Sac Outlets:

Attrition - What can I say, this card is just good. Reapeatable instant speed removal, which in this deck gets multiple creatures...good times.

Dark Privilege - Not the best card but helping to keep some creatures on the field that are needed is good.

Ashnod's Altar & Phyrexian Altar - Mana and Sac at instant speed.

Birthing Pod - Now I haven't set up chains for this card, but I am sure there are some in there and getting a creature for sacing a creature seemed like a good idea in the deck.

Mortarpod - Once again not the most powerful card but another sac outlet that does some damage.

Darkheart Sliver - Sac for a bit of life and is cheap to recur over and over.

Golgari Guildmage - Sac and Recur, and on theme for the Guild.

Now for a look at the rest of the deck.

Commander:

1x Savra, Queen of the Golgari

Creature (23)

1x Canker Abomination
1x Creakwood Liege
1x Darkheart Sliver
1x Deity of Scars
1x Desecrator Hag
1x Doomgape
1x Drooling Groodion
1x Gleancrawler
1x Golgari Guildmage
1x Golgari Rotwurm
1x Grave-Shell Scarab
1x Hag Hedge-Mage
1x Lord of Extinction
1x Noxious Hatchling
1x Rendclaw Trow
1x Shambling Shell
1x Sisters of Stone Death
1x Skullbriar, the Walking Grave
1x Spiritmonger
1x Stalker Hag
1x Vulturous Zombie
1x Woodlurker Mimic
1x Woodwraith Corrupter

Artifact (10)

1x Ashnod's Altar
1x Birthing Pod
1x Darksteel Ingot
1x Expedition Map
1x Lightning Greaves
1x Mimic Vat
1x Mortarpod
1x Nim Deathmantle
1x Phyrexian Altar
1x Sol Ring
Sorcery (7)

1x Damnation
1x Demonic Tutor
1x Green Sun's Zenith
1x Harmonize
1x Increasing Ambition
1x Maelstrom Pulse
1x Praetor's Grasp

Enchantment (170
1x Animate Dead1x Attrition
1x Awakening
1x Awakening Zone
1x Baneful Omen
1x Black Market
1x Dark Privilege
1x Doubling Season
1x Gift of the Deity
1x Golgari Germination
1x Grave Pact
1x Grim Feast
1x Necrogenesis
1x Parallel Lives
1x Pernicious Deed
1x Phyrexian Arena
1x Squandered Resources
Instant (3)

1x Beast Within
1x Chord of Calling
1x Putrefy
Land (39)

1x Cabal Coffers
1x Command Tower1x Crypt of Agadeem
1x Evolving Wilds
7x Forest
1x Gaea's Cradle
1x Gilt-Leaf Palace
1x Grim Backwoods
1x High Market
1x Inkmoth Nexus
1x Jund Panorama
1x Khalni Garden
1x Mosswort Bridge1x Oran-Rief, the Vastwood
1x Overgrown Tomb
1x Phyrexian Tower
7x Swamp
1x Tainted Wood
1x Terramorphic Expanse
1x Twilight Mire
1x Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1x Verdant Catacombs
1x Vivid Grove
1x Vivid Marsh
1x Volrath's Stronghold
1x Woodland Cemetery
1x Yavimaya Hollow

So that is my take on the Golgari Swarm. It was alot of fun to try and build around this guild leader and make it feel needed in the deck. Next week we will take a swing at the Cult of Rakdos and its Demonic Members.
As always, if you got any ideas for the deck or any other strange themes you would like to see built, shoot me an email at jmfelber@gmail.com, or hit my twitter @RealFelber.  I am also on the Salvation boards as HatterofMad all the time, and if you wanna check out my experiment in MTG Trading check out
The One Red Mountain Project, it is starting to get exciting up to about 20 bucks from trading starting with a single foil mountain.


Jon Felber