Continuing our series on the best cards for commander coming out of Magic’s Murder Mystery themed set, Murders at Karlov Manor, we move on to black! Some of these cards made some waves when initially spoiled. Massacre Girl makes a return as a Known Killer and Case of the Stashed Skeleton in particular got some attention. Interestingly, there weren’t that many cards that fit strategies new to MKM – most of them were generally good for their own niche, making this an interesting set for players with a lot of black commander decks. Lots of cards that care about the graveyard or surveilling, reanimation effects, removal effects, and the closet skeleton’s even got a tutor effect to look at. Let’s browse through the best black cards in MKM!
Cream of the Crop
Massacre Girl, Known Killer
Our girl’s back, and she brings an old mechanic with her: Wither. Her build-around is getting our opponent’s creatures to die when they have toughness less than one. Wither’s an obvious choice, but Black has plenty of instants, sorceries and effects that reduce toughness, so you’re free to choose how you build. Black has one of the format’s best board wipes in Toxic Deluge, why not draw a ton of cards at the same time? MKM came with a few of these types of cards like Soul Enervation and Slice from the Shadows.
Looking to build a commander deck with her at the helm? Turn her into a mini Tergrid, God of Fright with Necroskitter. Consider Black Sun’s Zenith in your deck. You can run proliferate effects to increase the number of -1/-1 counters on anything that currently has them. Playing against a bunch of low toughness creatures? Get cheeky with Cauldron of Souls, letting your opponents creatures die twice for your benefit. Of course, the original Massacre Girl is a great addition, though keep in mind you stop drawing cards once your commander dies!
Persuasive Interrogators
I love this card. A clear finisher for a Clue deck, this Marionette Master lookalike lets you take an opponent out by sacrificing 5 clues. You can sacrifice them however you want – maybe you’re running a clue-themed Bartolomé del Presidio deck and can sacrifice all 5 clues for free. In these colors, you could run Ophiomancer and Homicide Investigator, sacrifice your snakes to Bartolomé del Presidio to get a clue each turn passively. That’s almost enough clues in one turn cycle to take out a player!
Eye of Duskmantle
Black loves paying life instead of mana and Eye of Duskmantle is a new way to do just that. Each turn you surveil cards, the Eye lets you play those cards that turn, paying life instead of mana if it’s a spell. A bit pricey at 7 mana value but if you have a strong surveil engine online you can cheat a lot of spells for an explosive turn. This card comes in the Revenant Recon precon helmed by Mirko, Obsessive Theorist but could find a home with your other surveil commanders like Eloise, Nephalia Sleuth.
Illicit Masquerade
This is an amazing card for a lot of reasons. It’s got flash. It’s not restricted to non-token creatures. It can trigger multiple times. It’s board wipe protection. It’s combo potential. What’s not to love? There’s some setup involved of course, your best-case scenario with this card is that you have a board full of tokens and a yard full of bomb creatures. You find a way to sacrifice your own creatures or flash this into play in response to a board wipe, come out bigger faster stronger. This does exile the creatures that die so it’s best not to use it on creatures you want to be getting back later, but sometimes you’re going to have to bite the bullet. Great card, can’t wait to throw it on my Savra, Queen of the Golgari or Old Rutstein decks!
Runners Up
While my list of ‘best’ black cards from this set are relatively limited, there are a number of other cards worth your consideration. Let’s dig in.
Vein Ripper
Gosh what an uncomfortable name. This guy caused some chatter when first spoiled, but I’m not that big on him. He’s strong but he’s double Blood Artist for 3x the cost. He’s got respectable stats but if I’m looking for some aristocrats ping finisher I’m not looking to pay 6 mana when there are so many 2-3 mana alternatives. Not a bad include for those types of strategies, just tough to justify for the mana cost – especially with !
Barbed Servitor
Stuffy Doll and Brash Taunter get a third addition to their damage-reflection creature squad. Barbed Servitor has the huge downside of coming into play suspected, making it unable to block until you find a way to prove its innocence. Nonetheless, these three cards all fit into Rakdos colors and make great additions to your new Judith, Carnage Connoisseur deck. Just cast a Blasphemous Act, gain ridiculous amounts of life and deal 39 damage to boot. Just don’t get hit by False Cure in the process!
Case of the Gorgon’s Kiss
I won’t tell you this card is amazing, but for only 1 black mana, you could get a lot of mileage out of it. Sorcery speed removal into a 4/4 deathtouch lifelink isn’t terrible. You could look to play this in decks where you deal incidental damage. Effects like Pestilence or Plague Spitter come to mind.
Case of the Stashed Skeleton
This card also caused some ruckus when spoiled but it’s just OK. If you’re strictly looking for budget black tutor options, this card is decent. It will take you at least two turns to get the tutor off, assuming you can unsuspect or remove your skeleton on the turn you play it to solve the case. Once solved, you can only tutor at sorcery speed, meaning you’ll have to wait until your next turn. I’d recommend Profane Tutor as an alternative – technically slower, but a bit safer and cheaper. If mana’s not an issue, Diabolic Tutor is about as fair and budget as black tutors get.
Homicide Investigator
Ah, a Morbid Opportunist for clues – one less mana, less generically good but can work well with Clue themed decks. Consider him with Persuasive Interrogators – a build up to your poisonous clue finisher. He’s a bit middling since he only triggers once a turn and only if your own creatures die.
Snarling Gorehound
Highlighting this card for its combo potential. Like many cards from this set, a Phyrexian Altar + Gravecrawler loop enables this card to do nutty things. Want to surveil your whole deck to win via Thassa’s Oracle the hard way? Gorehound’s got you covered.
Unshakeable Tail
A fun little Zombie Detective with an upkeep-triggered Surveil 1 ability and some graveyard synergies. Whenever a creature card hits your yard, you get a clue. This can be via self-mill like surveilling or just creatures being discarded or dying. He can imitate the world’s fairest dredge ability and have you pay 2 and sac a clue to come back to your hand. This can trigger things like Insidious Roots and Chalk Outline and of course can net you clues quickly to end the game with Persuasive Interrogators.
Macabre Reconstruction
This card is more limited by being sorcery speed, but worth mentioning for graveyard or self mill decks. You can easily get two creatures back to your hand for two mana, cheaper than even an Urborg Repossession. Worth mentioning in this set due to the number of cards that care about creatures leaving your graveyard.
Soul Enervation
This is a nifty removal spell on an enchantment that cares about creatures leaving your yard. The removal is in the form of -4/-4 which can synergize with the new Massacre Girl, Known Killer along with other cards from the set like Slice from the Shadows. It has another one of the newer ‘whenever a creature card leaves your graveyard’ triggers like Chalk Outline and Insidious Roots. This can replace a Blood Artist in a traditional Gravecrawler Phyrexian Altar combo, and has good synergy overall with decks that can get creatures out of their graveyard.
Outrageous Robbery
An interesting X-cost library theft spell similar to Villainous Wealth. The X cost means if you manage to find infinite mana you can just mill someone out. This isn’t new to black, cards like Damnable Pact already made that possible. Still though in decks that care about having permanents they control but don’t own, or about casting spells from exile, this card can make a natural fit. Don Andres, the Renegade, Prosper, Tome-Bound, as examples.
Charnel Serenade
This card joins the ranks of existing repeating suspended cards. Inspiring Refrain, Rousing Refrain, Venture Forth, Reality Strobe are all examples of existing repeated suspend cards. I like graveyard loops so I’m not a huge fan of Finality counters, but you could always run cards like Hex Parasite to remove those counters in a pinch. There aren’t a lot of black or colorless ways to manipulate time counters, so if you’re looking to accelerate your reanimation you’re going to need to run other colors.
Deadly Cover-Up
This blog is focused on Commander and Oathbreaker so I normally wouldn’t mention a card that tries to remove all copies of a specific card. However, this set does come with Slime Against Humanity, so I figured I’d mention a direct counter to that card in our black card review.
Extract a Confession
There aren’t a ton of options for cheap, instant-speed sacrifice effects that impact just your opponents. This card is very similar to Liliana’s Triumph but can turn into a discounted 4th mode on Gix’s Command if you collect the evidence requested. I’ll have to see if I can make room for this in my Glissa, the Traitor deck!
What do you think? Any favorites of yours that got left off this list? Any cool interactions or combos you’ve noticed worth highlighting? Comment below!