Get Bent

They say drawing cards is the best feeling in the game of Magic. Drawing is a very powerful tool in the game. It's really a necessity. Too many cards in hand can be a problem though. You're physical maximum hand size is probably less than 100 cards. Joking aside, there are some real drawbacks to having access to almost every card in your deck at once. Choosing the right spell and right sequence that way an really stretch out the length of a game. Even if you draw your deck you want to optimize your play patterns. I can't imagine how much worse it would be if you had access to every card all at once and then lost anyway. It would look bad on you, for sure.

I took that idea, that drawing cards is the best feeling, as a challenge. What if I had no cards? I would have to rely on the permanents I have on the battlefield and protect it heavily. I imagined a very straightforward deck with fewer surprises, fewer tricks. A deck like that would have to have a sense of inevitability, like nothing an opponent does matters. My deck will just wash over the table. That's quite a lofty goal, but it would face strong competition and without tricks, it would be exceedingly difficult. More likely than not a deck that straightforward would become stale to play after a while. I'm going to add some depth. If only there was an ability that rewarded me for not drawing cards.

Great news, there is. Sort of. Hellbent rewards me for not having cards in hand. It's almost better if I didn't draw the card in the first place. There's already a trap here. If I go into combat or start taking most actions my opponents are left in a conundrum. The situation they're facing could get worse, in two ways, if I respond to their action. I'll get the benefit of whatever spell I cast but if it happens to be the last card in my hand I'll also get the benefit of being Hellbent.

Before we go any further I want to thank Bear Lord Cards for sponsoring this article. He's been a great resource for finding cards and doing great live streams and giveaways. Ask him about the saga of his 10/10 Chrome Mox (or me). When I told him about doing a deck around Hellbent he got excited since it's a mechanic from when he started playing. He wanted to share that excitement with you, and jumped at sponsoring this article. Go check out his shop. Let's get back to the article.

So what are the Hellbent options? I hope you like Rakdos colors because that's where this ability lives. There's a little bit of everything here, creatures, removal, even a tutor. Most people seem to be familiar with Rakdos Pit Dragon. People of a certain age anyway. The dragon has Firebreathing and even has the opportunity to fly if I pay for it. The Hellbent doubles the potential of the Firebreathing by granting the dragon Double Strike. Don't sleep on those two abilities put together, especially with some evasion in the mix. A couple of late game hits like that will knock out most players. Older players know the dragon, but newer players know Tragic Fall in one form or another. This Modern Horizons 2 card is a riff on Tragic Slip. It's good targeted removal and a great way to get around indestructible. That tutor I mentioned, Infernal Tutor, is only good to find a land on its own until I'm Hellbent. If so it's unrestricted and can get the best thing out there.

Nihilistic Glee has been great for the strategy. It lets me get rid of dead cards in hand and drain a life. It even enables itself by letting me draw cards under the right conditions. It works great with Gibbering Descent. I never mind pitching Descent away with Nihilistic Glee since it has Madness. After that, Gibbering Descent just sits out there making opponents mad. That's also why I like Hollowborn Barghest here. It's pricey at 7 mana, but it has decent stats but more important is its ability. Opponents are hurt if they're caught without cards in hand and they're punished if I have no cards in hand. Every time someone passes turn there lies the potential for extra damage to get thrown around the table. I think opponents have spared this from their targetted removal to allow it to hit the next player in turn order. Would you let it Shock the next player and delay casting targeted removal on it?

Anthem of Rakdos is a very high-risk high-reward type of effect. I don't love the self damage it does, especially not doubled for each attacking creature, but there's no denying the power it lets me project through the course of a game. Jagged Poppet is equally risky. If it gets hit I discard cards. That's not great, but I ultimately want to be Hellbent. If I am when the Poppet hits an opponent, that player discards. Opponents are less likely to attack me with this out, certainly with smaller tokens over the fear I'll block and get closer to 0 cards in hand. I'm staying aggressively positioned by playing Price of Knowledge. Some decks try to draw cards at a steady pace while others look to do it in a big burst. Either way, I'm looking to drop life totals with this enchantment. It's easy to catch players off guard.

A number of the cards I've highlighted so far deal with discarding. That's a reliable way to get to 1 or 0 cards in hand. I wanted to capitalize on this and immediately thought of some well explored mechanics to help me do so. The first was Flashback and its derivatives like Aftermath. I can let the cards sit in the graveyard until I'm ready to use them effectively. The next best way I thought to capitalize on discarding was Madness. The effect is powerful if I can time it right. This really helped shape the identity of the deck. Flashback and similar effects are plentiful in all colors, even Red and Black that I've talked about so far. Madness is well represented in those 2 as well, but so is Blue. I wouldn't be adding it for its card draw potential but rather for its flexibility in casting spells. I also needed to tackle a Grixis deck for my Make EDH Weird Again color combination challenge. It was a win-win.

Let's explore some of those mechanics. Sever the Bloodline is a great way to mow through a bunch of token creatures. It's pricey to do the second time, but it beats getting overrun by thopters. Siphon Insight does something interesting, exiling a card from an opponent expands what my deck has access to. Since that card remains exiled it doesn't count towards the cards in my hand, like impulse draw. Indulge doubles my attackers but more importantly, Excess ramps me, often very early in the game. Never is fine removal, but coupling it with Return puts it over the top, even though the effect is very narrow. There are some great options for removal with madness like Big Game Hunter, Just the Wind, and Shadowgrange Archfiend. Stromkirk Occultist, when it hits, provides me with impulse draw. This is great for enabling me to cast more cards without losing my Hellbent bonuses like Siphon Insight. More on that later. I think the card that best represents the deck is Bloodhall Priest. I can save a mana casting it for Madness and Shock something when it enters the battlefield or attacks if I'm Hellbent.

I promised you more on impulse draw effects, so here we go. Invasion of Kaldheim offers a hand's worth of cards to exile, even though it's on a timeline. Once the battle takes 4 damage it flips to Pyre of the World Tree. At a certain point pitching a land isn't much of a downside. The damage is ok but getting to exile an additional card to play is where it's at. Jhoira of the Ghitu lets me tuck away cards on a timeline. 4 turns is a lot but once I exile a mass of cards it creates this inevitability around the table. It's fun to see. Chainer, Nightmare Adept allows me to cast creatures from my graveyard. All I have to do is discard, which gets me closer to Hellbent anyway. The second ability is what makes him so explosive. He doesn't care if I cast the creature from my graveyard or from exile, all those creatures get haste to mess up opponents' life totals. He happens to work well with Sin Prodder. That devil throws some damage around and fills my yard. Some people let me draw the cards to avoid the damage but not really in the early game.

Not all of the cards I cast from exile need to be mine. Dream-Thief's Bandana and Gonti, Lord of Luxury all open up your cards for my gain. Nightveil Spectre is really what opened up this archetype up for me years ago, so I wanted to find a home for it here as well. Fiend of Shadows works the same way. I like to keep the pressure up and hit people with high value evasive creatures. My deck only has 100 cards in it and Grixis as a color combination has problems with removing certain card types. I'm looking at you, enchantments.

The first draft of this deck struggled a bit. Being Hellbent was powerful if I had the right cards out. It wasn't uncommon to get overtaken in the latter turns. Players with more options and who exercise those options are likely to beat a player with no options. I found the best way to capitalize on my strategy was to extend it to my opponents. My deck is designed to take advantage of and plan for not having cards in hand. Yours isn't. A Sire of Insanity always upends what's going on in a game, in the best way. Players wait often wait for the perfect moment to deploy something or try to set up the perfect turn 4 turns from now. For a shard all about death, Grixis is all about living in the moment.

I'm not running a ton of these effects, but I wanted to make sure the ones I am are interesting. Like Mindslicer. Opponents do not want to kill this thing. It's not uncommon for this Horror to get in for damage 3 or 4 turns in a row because no one wants to risk being the reason everyone resets their hand to 0. Bandit's Talent is a smaller version of the effect but with more upside. If I have a reliable way to discard cards I'll even kick it up to Level 3. My most controversial pick for this part of the strategy has to be Narset, Parter of Veils. We all know why this is hated. I'm never surprised when this draws a lot of hate from the table.

Who would I choose to champion such a strategy? I wanted Crosis, the Purger to do the job. This dragon is rather unassuming. 6 mana is a lot for a commander these days. I feel like a subset of players write off expensive commanders because they never expect them to get played. I've also noticed people playing more colors in their deck are more likely to let this go once it hits the field. They think the opponents playing fewer colors will be more of a target for me since I'll make them discard more cards. I don't let that fly. Everyone is fair game. What I don't do though is get someone with only 1 card in hand. If that is a mana rock or a land I've just wasted 3 mana to see something useless. I speak from experience. What I have not experienced though is a colorless deck. That would shut me down big time.

6 power is good but not great since Crosis needs to connect 4 times to knock someone out. Either way, I need to connect with Crosis so I can make that opponent discard. This is another way to move opponents toward being Hellbent like me. It's all fun and games until Crosis purges those cards from your hand. I really like the dragon with Arm-Mounted Anchor. Flying and menace mean I'll be getting damage in reliably. It also pushes the damage high enough to make Crosis a 3 hit kill against an opponent rather than a 4 hit kill.

I don't usually give much space to talking about lands in my decks. This time I want to spotlight a couple of standouts. Sea Gate Wreckage has been an important lifesaver. That sounds very opposite of a hellbent deck, but it's important to have options. My first thought was to be empty handed at all costs and at all times. That was very aggressive and unnecessary. I only need to be Hellbent when it matters. Once I'm Hellbent there's no surprise left for opponents. However, if I have a card in hand opponents are worried about me becoming Hellbent right after casting a mysterious spell I have in hand. It's a double whammy. Opponents prefer to attack a known quantity over 2 sets of variables. So I use Sea Gate Wreckage to draw a card at key times. Especially on the end step before my turn. Plus there are cards that are similar to Hellbent but work even if I only have 1 card in hand. My second land to talk about is The Biblioplex. I'm rarely at 7 cards in hand, but zero works too. It's a little more limited than Sea Gate Wreckage but does provide flexibility.

I mentioned cards that work with 1 card in hand rather than 0. Carnage Interpreter gets a decent stat boost if I have 0 or 1 card in hand. He also helps get cards out of hand quickly by forcing me to discard. When it enters I get to make some clue tokens to draw cards when it's not a detriment to my plan. If I'm already hellbent it's no big deal. If there's nothing to get rid of but the upside is still there. Hazoret the Fervent can't attack of block if I have many cards in hand. If I'm stuck I can activate her ability and just get rid of those extra cards in my hand.

Let's see where the deck stands now

Crosis, the Purger

Tragic Fall	Dream-Thief Bandana	Opposition Agent
Slithering Shade	Viscious Shadow	Sin Prodder
Slaughterhouse Bouncer	Arm-Mounted Anchor	Price of Knowledge
Ragamuffyn	Chainer, Nightmare Adept	Jhoira of the Ghitu
Rakdos Pit Dragon	Sire of Insanity	Kotose, The Silent Spider
Plan the Heist	Awaken the Erstwhile	Gonti, Lord of Luxury
Nihilistic Glee	Bandit's Talent	Fiend of Shadows
Necromancer's Familiar	Mindslicer	Nightveil Spectre
Jagged Poppet	Invasion of Kaldheim	Heartless Conscription
Infernal Tutor	Spellscorn Coven	Brainstealer Dragon
Hazoret the Fervent	Tarrian's Journal	Elder Brain
Gibbering Descent	Obelisk of Grixis	Decadent Dragon
Dread Wanderer	Commander's Sphere	Embereth Shieldbreaker
Demonfire	Consign/Oblivion	Murderous Rider
Carnage Interpreter	Kolaghan's Command	Hypnotic Sprite
Bloodhall Priest	Rakdos Charm	Narset, Parter of Veils
Anthem of Rakdos	Geistflame Reservoir	Indulge/Excess
Big Game Hunter	Siphon Insight	Never/Return
Just the Wind	Sever the Bloodline	Deep Analysis
Shadowgrange Wrchfiend	Necrogoyf	Stromkirk Occultist
Sea Gate Wreckage	The Biblioplex	Keldon Megalyths
Ghost Quarter	Volatile Fault	Bojuka Bog
Scavenger Grounds	Temple of Deceit	Temple of Malice
Temple of Epiphany	Mountain x8	Swam x9
Island x9
Kaya's Ghostform	Toxic Deluge	Blasphemous Act

I like the way the deck plays. Some games feel like feast or famine, where you're drawing your best Hellbent stuff and it stacks together, and in others, you're waiting for that reward that might never come. Either way, I'm playing an involved and thoughtful game.

I wanted to give another shout out to Bearlord Cards for making this deck and article possible. Go check them out here and use my TCGPlayer link to check out their shop here.

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