It doesn't require a strategy article to show that Necropotence can nearly turn Drain Life into a Braingeyser. Building and playing a winning Necrodeck, however, is not simply a matter of throwing Necropotence and a bunch of other cards together. As with all decks, building a deck around this card is a process of careful card choices guided by a thoughtful design philosophy, a philosophy that incorporates an understanding of the key cards in the deck and the strategies they engender. This article, therefore, looks at the role of the Necropotence deck in Type II by exploring not just the card combinations that define the Necrodeck but also the strategic principles on which this deck type is based.
The Faustian Bargain
Let us begin with the reason people play with Necropotence: its power. The card reads: "Skip your draw phase. If you discard a card from your hand, remove that card from the game. {0} : Pay 1 life to set aside the top card of your library. At the beginning of your next discard phase, put that card into your hand. Effects that prevent or redirect damage cannot be used to counter this loss of life." Once in play, this enchantment grants the ability to draw a card without any expenditure of mana, limited only by the amount of life its controller has. Often it can supply the controller with several cards per turn. (In contrast, Ancestral Recall can only be used once and yields only three cards.)
What are the costs of this power? The first cost of any card is the amount and color of mana required to put it in play. At BBB, Necropotence imposes a significant color burden. In Type II, playing Necropotence almost always means playing an all-black deck to ensure a consistent supply of black mana. Second, Necropotence forces its controller to skip his or her draw phase. The only way to get new cards into play is by paying life; in the worst case, if the controller only has one life left, he or she cannot afford to draw. Third, the cards obtained through Necropotence come into the hand at the beginning of the controller's discard phase, essentially giving the opponent another full turn to act.
Necropotence, therefore, presents a Faustian bargain: the immediate rush of power in exchange for a steady decline towards utter helplessness. Anyone desiring to make such a bargain must take these properties into account in deck building and in strategy.
The Best Offense...
All successful decks must have an offense (some way to win) and a defense (some way not to lose). Almost all tournament decks win by reducing the opponent's life to 0, with a minority attempting to run the opponent out of cards. Defensive strategies also can be divided into two broad categories: disruption and threat neutralization. Disruption means preventing the opponent from playing his or her game unimpeded; no matter how good your offense may be, if your opponents can do everything they want to do, their strategy will ultimately overcome yours. Threat neutralization means dealing with offensive threats (cards that will kill you) or defensive threats (cards that will prevent you from killing your opponent). These threats usually come in three categories: creatures, artifacts, and enchantments. Without the ability to deal with all three classes of threats, a deck simply cannot consistently win.
In fact, most good tournament decks are built around defense; if you can neutralize all of your opponent's offensive threats, you win. On the other hand, if you cannot defend, you lose. That Scryb Sprites may only do 1 damage when it attacks, but it will kill you in twenty turns. The successful Necrodeck, therefore, must have a solid defensive foundation that incorporates both disruption and threat-neutralization cards capable of taking care of creatures, artifacts, and enchantments. However, Necropotence requires playing black, and black is notoriously weak in threat neutralization. It has few real global anticreature measures like white's Wrath of God; its anti-artifact measures (Warp Artifact, Haunting Wind, etc.) are extremely weak; and color hosers like Gloom are pretty much the only way it can handle enchantments. In addition, Necropotence itself makes it difficult to stay alive, leeching away its controller's life with every card drawn using its ability.
...Is A Good Defense
One way around these drawbacks is a fast offense that can overwhelm
the opponent before the Necropotence begins to turn into a liability.
This all-out speed-offense mindset is, in fact, the dominating
philosophy behind most Necrodecks. Most Necrodeck players rely on
weenie hordes, direct damage, or some other form of extremely fast
offense to empty their hand so they can refill it using Necropotence.
The problem with this is that the Necrodeck's offense can be stopped
cold by a defensive global effect, at which point it quickly becomes
too costly for the Necropotence player to recover by drawing
additional cards. For example, CoP: Black can halt a black-weenie
Necrodeck in its tracks, and the Necrodeck player simply cannot draw
many more cards without some way of gaining life.
In addition, a Necropotence deck's offensive elements must be
structured around its use of the Disk. The typical strategy of putting
out three or four small creatures is not advisable since the Disk will
destroy them all. The alternatives are to use regenerating creatures,
easily replaced creatures, or no permanents at all. Since black lacks
good offensive regenerators and has few good direct-damage spells,
all-black Necro-decks (which make up the majority of Necrodecks) use
dangerous creatures that can be easily replaced. Order of the Ebon
Hand from Fallen Empires and Knights of Stromgald from Ice Age fit
this description perfectly; they have protection from white, so they
cannot be Plowshared or Spirit Linked, or blocked by the ubiquitous
Serra Angel; they can be given first strike or pumped up for more
damage-dealing power; and at a cheap BB, those that are
destroyed by the Disk can easily be replaced. A Type II Necrodeck can
have eight of these lethal creatures. Or, since Order of the Ebon Hand
is easier prey for Serrated Arrows, you might choose to substitute a
few Black Knights.
Finally, since each point of life potentially equals an extra card,
gaining and preserving life is extremely important. In combination
with the Disk, permanent life-gainers are of questionable utility;
while Ivory Tower and Zuran Orb pass the test because of their immense
power, cards like El-Hajjaj, Spirit Link (which requires playing
white), and Fountain of Youth are probably better replaced with Drain
Life, which is unaffected by the Disk and additionally serves both a
defensive (anticreature) and an offensive (direct-damage) purpose.
These, then, are the usual elements of the Necrodeck: early
disruption, fast-yet-powerful offense, mid- to late-game threat
neutralization, and life gain that doesn't rely on many permanents.
But how do you play the deck effectively?
Playing with Death
The most important principle to remember when playing a Necrodeck is
what L. A.'s Mark Chalice calls the "parity situation." A parity
situation is achieved when neither side has an advantage in terms of
cards in hand and cards in play, and you are at an equal but not
dangerously low point in life. You and your opponent have traded card
for card-you put out a Specter, he Plowshares it; you cast a Hymn and
he counters it; you get out a creature, he gets out a creature; and so
on. It is at this point that casting Necropotence can be so powerful.
By taking advantage of the initial rush of anywhere between three and
seven cards that Necropotence offers, you can achieve instant card
superiority. Even if Necropotence is countered, you are not at a
disadvantage, since you traded Necropotence for a counterspell and you
continue to draw normally.
Being able to identify when you've reached this parity situation is
the most important strategic element of the Necrodeck. Parity against
a passive, blue/white deck is different from parity against an
aggressive, red/green deck, and experience is the key to knowing when
you've reached parity and when you haven't.
The defenses on which a Necrodeck rely work to support this parity
situation. The discard effects force the opponent to get cards into
play or risk losing them to a Hymn. Land destruction also puts
pressure on the opponent since there is no guarantee that he or she
will have the mana needed to cast his or her important spells. Once
your opponent has been pressured into casting the creatures,
artifacts, enchantments, or other destruction effects that are
important to his or her strategy, you can use the Disk to wipe all of
them from the board and start over, usually with a huge card advantage
that Necropotence has given you.
The parity principle can be illustrated by this not atypical example:
The Necrodeck player has carefully traded card for card against her
red/green opponent (one of the toughest foes of the Necrodeck). A
Specter was just Bolted, land count is about even, an Erhnam Djinn has
been Terrored, and so on. When both players are at about three cards
in hand and the red/green player has been forced to put Zuran Orb,
Llanowar Elves, and perhaps Stormbind and other important items into
play, the Necrodeck player drops Necropotence and refills her hand to
seven cards. Next turn, the red/green player draws one card and plays
it-let's say it's an Erhnam Djinn. The Necrodeck player's next move is
to play an Order and the Disk, then refill her hand again. The
red/green player uses Stormbind on the Order (going deeper into card
disadvantage to do so) and attacks for substantial damage. The
Necrodeck player uses the Disk, wiping the board clean, gets her draw
back with a five- or six-card advantage, and the game resumes with the
red/green player having few or perhaps no useful cards in hand while
the Necrodeck player has many options. Once the game reaches this
stage it is difficult, if not impossible, for the red/green player to
come back.
The mistake frequently made by less-experienced players of the
Necrodeck is to use Necropotence to constantly replenish the supply of
offense, going for offensive overkill rather than trying to achieve a
parity position. The problem with this approach is that a single,
defensive global effect by the opponent completely reverses the tide
of the game. The most common example of this is when, having achieved
card advantage, a Necrodeck player puts out three or four creatures in
the midgame in an effort to kill the opponent in the next turn.
Suddenly, the opponent casts Pyroclasm or Wrath of God; the Necrodeck
player has lost all of his offense and cannot draw normally. While the
Necrodeck player is spending his quickly dwindling life in an effort
to get the Disk or some way to restore his advantage, his opponent is
drawing without penalty-and killing the Necrodeck player with a single
Savannah Lions or Llanowar Elves.
Now let's suppose that the Necrodeck player puts a Disk in play as
insurance and then goes for massive overkill. When the opponent puts
out some defense, say CoP: Black or Whirling Dervish, the Necro player
is faced with a no-win situation: If he uses the Disk, he loses his
entire offensive force and any serious advantage he might have had,
and goes back to drawing one card per turn. Alternatively, if he sets
aside cards prior to triggering the Disk, he may lose a significant
chunk of his remaining life.
If, instead, the Necrodeck player had put out a Disk with the single
Order, holding the other creatures in reserve, the opponent would have
had to use the Wrath or Pyroclasm to kill one creature. The result is
a one-for-one exchange, maintaining the advantage of the Necrodeck
player. Or, in the second scenario, he can use the Disk, eliminating
only one of his creatures, and then play the offensive threats in
reserve without threatening his own card advantage.
Life And Liberty
What role does life gain have in a Necrodeck? Again, the parity
principle is involved. The ideal parity situation is when both players
are about equal in terms of cards in hand, cards in play, and amount
of life. We've seen how a discard defense and careful play help
achieve the first level of parity: cards in hand. We've also seen how
Nevinyrral's Disk, if properly used, can achieve the second level of
parity: cards in play. Similarly, life-gainers support the third level
of parity: life. Although parity of life is subordinate to the other
two-winning with one life is still winning-it supports the use of the
Necropotence to achieve and maintain the all-important cards-in-hand
advantage over your opponent. Using Necropotence pretty much
guarantees that when you gain advantage in cards in hand, you lose
advantage in life. Life-gainers are necessary not so much to gain
advantage in life but to restore parity in life.
It is important to view life gain in a Necrodeck in terms of restoring
parity after card advantage is gained (and life advantage is lost).
The deck-building and game-play strategies change if this is clearly
understood. For example, instead of using a Drain Life early,
reasoning that taking 3 life now equals three cards later, the
Necrodeck player will wait until he or she has taken the three cards
with Necropotence and then use Drain Life to pay for them. This way,
whatever life parity existed before the Necropotence is restored,
while card advantage should swing to the side of the Necro player.
It's a subtle difference, but the change in game play is substantial.
A Necrodeck without Necropotence?
The parity principle makes it clear that while a Necrodeck can win and
does quite often without Necropotence, it cannot win with any degree
of consistency without Nevinyrral's Disk. The game play revolves
around the Disk as much as it does around Necropotence. One telling
sign is that an experienced player using a Jester's Cap on the
Necrodeck will leave Necropotence alone and go directly for the Disks.
In fact, one of the most important decisions to make when playing a
Necrodeck is when not to use Necropotence at all. This has become
especially important now that just about every tournament player is
aware of the Necrodeck and prepared for it in one way or another. So
when do you decide not to use Necropotence?
The first and most obvious instance is when you're up against a strong
burn deck. It would be suicidal to drop a Necropotence and take
yourself down to where a Lightning Bolt or a medium-sized Fireball
could end your ability to draw more cards. If you must use the
Necropotence against a deck with a heavy direct-damage element, use it
in a parity situation to refill your hand and then Disk it away,
preserving your ability to draw without spending life (which becomes
quite a concern against burn decks). The card advantage you acquire
during that one turn, supplemented by the cards drawn normally, should
be adequate to carry you to victory. The same analysis should apply to
other fast-attack decks, whether white weenies with
protection-from-black creatures, or fast green decks packing Whirling
Dervish. Unless you can deal with these creatures, it is inadvisable
to use Necropotence at all; rely on your normal draw to pull you out.
(Of course, if there is a Dervish on the board, you might have to use
Necropotence to try to find a solution as quickly as possible.)
The second instance in which not using Necropotence may be preferable
often arises in sideboarding. For example, if you're playing against a
green deck that typically starts Whirling Dervishes, you might expect
your opponent to be well aware of the Necrodeck and prepared with
Storm Seekers in the sideboard. In this case you might decide to pull
Necropotence from the deck altogether and rely on additional defensive
measures (Serrated Arrows or non-black blockers for the Dervish, Dark
Banishing or Terror for the big green creatures). Against the strong
burn deck above, you might suspect that your opponent, aware of the
Necrodeck's preference for Orders and Knights, has sideboarded
Earthquake or Pyroclasm. You might pull the Necropotence, which you
probably would not want to use anyway, for additional offensive
measures (large, flying creatures like Sengir Vampires, or perhaps
Racks to punish your opponent for using the direct damage).
Taking your own Necropotence out with Nevinyrral's Disk, a move to
which I have referred a few times, is also fraught with decisions
about when and how to do so. The most obvious opportunity arises when
you are getting too low on life to continue using Necropotence to
obtain cards. But in a situation where you have achieved a massive
card advantage and your opponent is relatively helpless, you may also
want to Disk your own Necropotence away so you can draw normally.
Timing becomes important here as you play strategic mind-games with
your opponent. She may try to lure you into using the Disk so that
your permanent-based offense is also wiped out, hoping to then play
permanents of her own. In the majority of cases, it is best to wait to
use the Disk until the end phase of your opponent's turn. If you use
the Disk then, you can draw normally during your turn since
Necropotence will then be gone (after setting aside a few cards before
it disappears for an even greater card advantage), and your opponent
cannot then play the Autumn Willow she's been holding. Alternatively,
you can wait until your upkeep to use the Disk to take advantage of
Ivory Tower and other life-gaining effects.
The strategy of the Necrodeck, then, revolves around the parity
position. The early part of the game is spent trying to reach parity
in cards in hand, while the middle part of the game is spent trying to
reach parity in cards in play. The developed late game, if the
opponent manages to survive that long, then involves maintaining the
advantage and restoring parity in life as much as possible. The
Necropotence deck is one of the most effective and consistent decks in
Type II play today, and yet few players can win consistently with it
because they do not fully understand the principles that drive it. By
understanding the key strategic principle of parity and by carefully
managing the resources of cards in hand, cards in play, and amount of
life, the Necrodeck player can pose a grave threat to any opponent.
And, for those who run up against a Necrodeck in their next
tournament, remember that understanding the Necrodeck is the first
step toward beating it.
The Lindback Necrodeck
[Note: The Duelist printed the deck below in its article. I'm sure
better versions existed long before the article saw print. But
nonetheless, it does illustrate much of what I wrote, and it has pedigree
since it took Lindback to the semifinals of Pro Tour 1.]
This mono black Necrodeck took Stockholm's Leon Lindback to the
semifinals at the New York Professional Tournament in February.
* 1 Dance of the Dead (IA)
* 1 Dark Banishing (IA)
* 1 Ivory Tower (4E)
* 1 Jalum Tome (CH)
* 1 Soul Burn (IA)
* 1 Zuran Orb (IA)
* 2 Ebon Stronghold (FE)
* 2 Nevinyrral's Disk (4E)
* 2 Serrated Arrow (HM)
* 3 Knight of Stromgald (IA)
* 4 Dark Ritual (4E/IA)
* 4 Drain Life (4E)
* 4 Hymn to Tourach (FE)
* 4 Hypnotic Specter (4E)
* 4 Necropotence (IA)
* 4 Order of the Ebon Hand (FE)
* 4 Strip Mine (4E)
* 17 Swamp
Sideboard (15 Cards)
* 1 Apocalypse Chime (HM)
* 1 Ashes to Ashes (4E)
* 1 City of Brass (CH)
* 1 Feldon's Cane (CH)
* 1 Jalum Tome (CH)
* 1 Meekstone (4E)
* 1 Safe Haven (CH)
* 1 Serrated Arrows (HM)
* 1 Stromgald Cabal (IA)
* 1 Torture (HM)
* 2 Nevinyrral's Disk (4E)
* 3 The Rack (4E)
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Last modified Mon Oct 30 1995