I have a deck-building problem. Having played the Magic for twenty-plus years, I’ve amassed quite a collection of cards. Even as I go through the dregs, readying them for their next lives, I occasionally find a card that starts the gears turning in my brain. “Go ahead,” some dark passenger whispers. “Build a deck around me.”

Then I wake up, surrounded by piles of cardboard.

Oh no, not again.

It was after one such fit that I found myself the proud owner of a Marrow-Gnawer. I remember thinking that Rat tribal would be a fun change of pace from my normal, graveyard-based strategies. Having a commander that required a sacrifice, however, pushed me toward some death synergy. I resisted the urge and ended up with a deck that pulled in multiple directions.

I have found this to be a problem when building Commander decks. My natural inclination is to construct stacks around what I love in Magic, which, as I’ve mentioned previously, is using the graveyard as a significant resource. When I try to go against my own personal grain, I find that the decks just don’t come out as cohesive. Heck, even my Muzzio, Visionary Architect deck has a number of cards based on sacrifice and Raise Dead effects (albeit focused on artifacts).

With Marrow-Gnawer, I wanted to do something different. Except I didn’t, and now the deck is a little bit of a mess.

Marrow-Gnawer ? Commander | Alex Ullman

• Commander (0)

• Creatures (42)
• 1 Abhorrent Overlord
• 1 Avatar of Woe
• 1 Basilica Screecher
• 1 Big Game Hunter
• 1 Bone Shredder
• 1 Butcher of Malakir
• 1 Cadaver Imp
• 1 Chittering Rats
• 1 Corrosive Mentor
• 1 Crypt Ghast
• 1 Crypt Rats
• 1 Deathgreeter
• 1 Diseased Vermin
• 1 Fume Spitter
• 1 Gray Merchant of Asphodel
• 1 Infected Vermin
• 1 Liliana's Specter
• 1 Mortician Beetle
• 1 Nezumi Graverobber
• 1 Ogre Slumlord
• 1 Okiba-Gang Shinobi
• 1 Pack Rat
• 1 Paragon of Open Graves
• 1 Pestilence Demon
• 1 Phyrexian Plaguelord
• 1 Pontiff of Blight
• 1 Ratcatcher
• 1 Rats of Rath
• 1 Ravenous Rats
• 1 Rotting Rats
• 1 Skirsdag High Priest
• 1 Skullsnatcher
• 1 Stinkweed Imp
• 1 Stronghold Rats
• 1 Throat Slitter
• 1 Thrull Parasite
• 1 Typhoid Rats
• 1 Solemn Simulacrum
• 1 Ascendant Evincar
• 1 Erebos, God of the Dead
• 1 Ink-Eyes, Servant of Oni
• 1 Shirei, Shizo's Caretaker

• Spells (23)
• 1 Grim Harvest
• 1 Life's Finale
• 1 Read the Bones
• 1 Grave Pact
• 1 Nihilistic Glee
• 1 Underworld Connections
• 1 Armillary Sphere
• 1 Citanul Flute
• 1 Cloudstone Curio
• 1 Coat of Arms
• 1 Eldrazi Monument
• 1 Erratic Portal
• 1 Expedition Map
• 1 Lashwrithe
• 1 Lightning Greaves
• 1 Nevinyrral's Disk
• 1 Nihil Spellbomb
• 1 Nim Deathmantle
• 1 Ring of Xathrid
• 1 Skullclamp
• 1 Sol Ring
• 1 Swiftfoot Boots
• 1 Akroma's Memorial

• Lands (34)
• 25 Swamp
• 1 Barren Moor
• 1 Blasted Landscape
• 1 Bojuka Bog
• 1 Cabal Coffers
• 1 Evolving Wilds
• 1 Swarmyard
• 1 Temple of the False God
• 1 Terramorphic Expanse
• 1 Thawing Glaciers

Buy This Deck

This deck reminds me of a Rube Goldberg machine, but one he left on the cutting room floor. Pulled in more directions than a Stretch Armstrong, my Marrow-Gnawer deck went from tribal deck to bad black good stuff.

Rats

Often, these suites of cards will flood the board with an exponential number of Rats. Then, when the time is right, I slam an Anthem effect and ride it to victory. Sadly, this does not happen very often, as this deck takes quite a while to set up. But when it does, there is nothing like slaying a table with a swarm of rather large rodents.

Devotion

While this theme was partially present before the advent of Theros block, it took off in earnest when I added Gray Merchant of Asphodel, Erebos, God of the Dead, and Abhorrent Overlord. Calling it devotion is a bit of misnomer, as it just really liked black mana. Cabal Coffers, Crypt Ghast, and Pontiff of Blight gave this deck another angle of attack. I call this devotion since it plays along a similar axis as the mana-symbols-count vector.

Lashwrithe was a recent addition to this pocket, as was Pestilence Demon. The Pontiff of Blight has cross-area synergy, as it works very well with all the tokens available from Marrow-Gnawer’s minions.

Quirky

Many of the Rats fall on the border of this category as well. The Rats themselves are cards that are left of center and are not what I would call standard Commander options. The tribal nature of Marrow-Gnawer gives me an excuse to run some odd cards like Stronghold Rats, Rotting Rats, and Diseased Vermin.

Somehow, even though these three areas overlap, I still feel that this deck is pulled in multiple directions. Unlike the Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord deck linked to earlier, Marrow-Gnawer has no unifying focus to its multiple plans other than that they all require black mana. Instead, each plan is only partially complete, and that results in a deck that can never really close. I rarely pull it out of the deck box because it’s not as fun to play as some of my other creations.

This is where you, my readers, come in. I want to revise my mono-black deck, and I want your help. I am willing to focus on any of these ideas or to try to find something new. First up, though, will be thinking about the creature in charge.

Here are some current candidates:

Erebos, God of the Dead also lives in this junkyard. If I wanted to push this deck more toward a devotion engine, I could see it taking the reins. However, Erebos is a card that would be a departure from the somewhat off-kilter nature of the deck. Therefore, if I want Swamps to matter, I have pulled two options to the front, each with its own subtheme.

• Drana, Kalastria Bloodchief would turn the deck into a board-control machine that would try to win through damage.
• Volrath the Fallen would take the deck back to my roots and give a space for a reanimation strategy.

These cards would totally dismantle the Rats theme, but I would be excited to see how these commanders would direct their armies.

Finally, there is Ashling, the Extinguisher. I am enamored with this card and its saboteur nature, but also with the fact that I haven’t seen it on battlefields very often. Running the dark side of Ashling could push the deck more toward the Voltron style: trying to win with a suited-up commander. Ashling would also push the odd inclusions up more, as I think I would have fun with some black Auras that enhance creatures and perhaps some of the loner cards from Avacyn Restored.

Those are four options and four very different directions. I want to take Marrow-Gnawer from a deck about which I always say, “Maybe I’ll play you next time,” and turn it into, “I’m playing this tonight.” Vote in the poll below, and let me know which path to take!

[poll id="459"]

When you vote, sound off below on some cards in the comments to get the conversation started. Think Volrath needs the Whip of Erebos? Let me know. Want Ashling to carry the Sword of Light and Shadow? Write it down. I won’t be writing about Marrow-Gnawer’s journey every week, but I’ll update you on progress periodically as the deck evolves.

Let the voice in the back of my head speak to yours. I’m excited for this experiment, and I hope y’all are as well!