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PrimerMulligansSideboardMatchups

Aggro Matchups

  1. Black Sacrifice
  2. Bogles
  3. Elves
  4. Madness Burn
  5. Mono Red Madness
  6. Mono Red Rally
  7. White Aggro

Aggro-Control Matchups

  1. Blue Terror
  2. Dimir Faeries
  3. Dimir Terror
  4. Mono Blue Faeries

Combo Matchups

  1. Altar Tron
  2. Ruby Storm
  3. Spy Combo

Combo-Control Matchups

  1. Familiars

Control Matchups

  1. Dimir Control
  2. Golgari Gardens
  3. Jeskai Ephemerate

Midrange Matchups

  1. Esper Affinity
  2. Grixis Affinity
  3. Jund Wildfire

Ramp Matchups

  1. Flicker Tron
  2. Gruul Ponza
  3. Gruul Ramp
  4. Monster Tron

Black Sacrifice

Carrion Feeder - emblematic card for this matchup
Read the Black Sacrifice full guide →

Matchup - Favored

We are the control deck here, and they have to force the game. Every damage source they play except Rite of Consumption is combat damage, which Moment's Peace, Tangle and Fog blank, so despite a far faster clock their whole game comes down to building one creature big enough for a lethal Rite of Consumption and resolving it through Arcane Denial, Muddle the Mixture and Weather the Storm before Stream of Thought mills them out. Their removal, Snuff Out and Tragic Slip in the lists that run them, has no creature of ours to hit, and nothing else in their maindeck slows the mill. We hold inevitability and never need to speed up; we only need a counter or Weather the Storm ready for that one card.

Speed is theirs, and that matters more than it looks. Their one-drops attack almost from the start, and every point that connects before we can hold green mana open each turn lowers the bar a single Rite of Consumption has to clear. Let the first one-power attacks through while making land drops and drawing cards, but start fogging once the attackers have grown. Save Tangle for the turn they attack with everything, so the whole board stays tapped through their next untap step; tapped creatures can still be sacrificed to Bloodthrone Vampire, Carrion Feeder and Rite of Consumption, so Tangle saves us a fog, not a counter.

Once their board can threaten a lethal drain, keep Arcane Denial or Muddle the Mixture up every turn and let creature spells resolve. The sacrifice is part of Rite of Consumption's cost and is not refunded, so countering it after they have fed the board to Bloodthrone Vampire also costs them the Vampire and everything sacrificed into it. With no counter available, cast Weather the Storm in response: storm counts every spell cast before it that turn, so the creatures, Village Rites, Supernatural Stamina and the Rite itself all add copies, and the life arrives before the damage. Pay Stream of Thought's replicate cost only with the mana left after keeping a fog and a counter open for their turn, because the turn we tap low is the turn they can cast Rite of Consumption safely. Their late draws only matter if they are the Rite or grow the creature it will sacrifice, while our draw spells keep finding fogs and counters.

Key Threats

Rite of Consumption is the only card they play that damages us outside combat, and it is near-universal in their lists. They sacrifice their biggest creature, usually a Bloodthrone Vampire pumped by the rest of the board or a Carrion Feeder loaded with counters, and the damage walks past every fog, so this is the card our counters and Weather the Storm are held for. Do not tap low on our own turn and do not spend the last counterspell on a creature: either one lets them sacrifice the board into the Vampire and drain us for lethal.

Bloodthrone Vampire turns a board our fogs have blanked for turns into one huge Rite of Consumption at once, growing with every creature fed to it, and the Squirrels, Insects and Mercenaries left behind by Nested Shambler, Infestation Sage and Nezumi Linkbreaker are more fuel. Letting their board go wide while we have no counter ready means every extra body is two more points of drain on the same turn.

Carrion Feeder can't block and its attacks run into our fogs, which makes it easy to write off, but every creature fed to it adds a permanent +1/+1 counter and we play no creature removal. It keeps growing across turns until the counters it has banked turn one Rite of Consumption into lethal damage, so track its power as the number the Rite will deal.

Mesmeric Fiend only shows up after sideboarding, where almost every list brings it in. It sees our hand and exiles the counterspell we hold for Rite of Consumption or a Stream of Thought, and with Carrion Feeder or Bloodthrone Vampire on the board they sacrifice it in response to its own trigger so the card never comes back. Letting it resolve while we hold our only counter or a lone Stream of Thought either clears the way for the Rite or cuts off the mill.

Sideboard Plan

In:

  • 2 Dispel

Out:

  • 2 Heritage Reclamation

Dispel comes in to counter Rotten Reunion, from hand or by flashback, before it exiles a Stream of Thought or Moment's Peace from our graveyard, and to counter Supernatural Stamina before they sacrifice the pumped creature to Rite of Consumption, all for one blue mana that leaves fog mana open. Two copies rather than three because it can't counter Rite of Consumption (a sorcery) or Mesmeric Fiend (a creature), so a third would have to replace a fog, a counter that does hit the Rite, or a draw spell.

Heritage Reclamation goes out. Their maindeck has no artifact cards (Shambling Ghast's Treasure tokens are the only artifacts it makes) and Sadistic Glee is its only enchantment, while the graveyard mode only stops Unearth or a Supernatural Stamina return from adding one more body. None of it answers Rite of Consumption, even as a plain cantrip it competes for the green mana we hold for fogs, and after sideboarding the artifact mode can't catch Nihil Spellbomb, which they activate in response. Bojuka Bog stays as our graveyard hate because it still counts as a land drop and costs no spell slot.

Sideboarding shifts this pairing moderately in their favor: they swap removal that had no targets for hand and graveyard disruption aimed at the exact cards our plan depends on, while we only add a pair of Dispel. The matchup stays favored, but the post-board games are tighter than Game 1.

Post-board Strategy

Expect them to trade the creature removal that had no targets in Game 1 for Mesmeric Fiend, Rotten Reunion and, in many lists, Nihil Spellbomb, so for the first time our hand and graveyard come under attack: the counter we hold for Rite of Consumption, the Moment's Peace flashbacks and the Stream of Thought loop. Flash back a Moment's Peace from the graveyard before casting a fresh one from hand, and when Stream of Thought's copies shuffle cards back, put the previously cast Stream of Thought into the library first so the kill isn't sitting in the graveyard for Nihil Spellbomb to exile. If they point Rotten Reunion at a Moment's Peace in our graveyard during their own turn, flash it back in response: it still prevents that turn's combat damage, and Rotten Reunion has no legal target left, so it does nothing, not even the Zombie.

Mesmeric Fiend is the card to plan around. With Carrion Feeder or Bloodthrone Vampire on the board they sacrifice it in response to its own trigger, and whatever it takes is gone for good. Arcane Denial is the only card in our post-board deck that counters the Fiend itself, so spend it there only when another answer to Rite of Consumption is already in hand. Otherwise, respond to the trigger with Brainstorm and put the counter held for the Rite and a Stream of Thought on top of the library, where the Fiend can't see them, and cast any instant we would have used that turn anyway.

Dispel's main target is Rotten Reunion, from hand or by flashback, when it targets a Stream of Thought, or when it targets a Moment's Peace on our own turn, where flashing the fog back in response would waste it. Otherwise it counters Supernatural Stamina before they sacrifice the pumped creature to Rite of Consumption. Dispel can't counter a sorcery, so Arcane Denial and Muddle the Mixture stay reserved for the Rite itself. The race itself does not change: they still have to resolve one big drain before the mill finishes, they just have more ways to clear the counter out of the way first.

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