Erebos vs Chainer vs Gonti vs Marrow-Gnawer EDH / CMDR game play for Magic: The Gathering

Deck Strategies

• 

  Erebos, God of the Dead

  Utilizes heavy black mana ramp with Cabal Coffers and Lake of the Dead to cast powerful spells and maintain card advantage, focusing on life loss mechanics and resource denial.

• 

  Chainer, Dementia Master

  Employs stax elements and reanimation, leveraging discard effects and board control with cards like Smokestack and Phyrexian Arena to disrupt opponents while bringing back threats from the graveyard.

• 

  Gonti, Lord of Luxury

  Focuses on stealing opponents’ cards and permanents to gain advantage, combined with ramp and removal spells to control the board and pressure opponents.

• 

  Marrow-Gnawer

  Swarm strategy centered on generating rat tokens and leveraging synergy cards like Rat Colony and Willbreaker to overwhelm opponents and create board dominance through rat tribal synergies.

Gameplay Insights

• 1

  Kevin’s aggressive use of Cabal Coffers allowed him to generate massive amounts of black mana quickly, enabling him to cast huge threats and multiple spells in a single turn.

• 2

  The interaction between Marrow-Gnawer’s rat tokens and Kevin’s board wipes like Damnation created a dynamic where board clears reset the battlefield but rat synergies kept regenerating pressure.

• 3

  Armand’s use of Smokestack and bottomless pit created a stax lock environment, slowly grinding opponents down and limiting their ability to establish a board presence.

• 4

  The repeated use of tutors and card draw spells like Phyrexian Arena and Necropotence ensured players could maintain options and combo pieces despite heavy disruption.

• 5

  The synergy between token generation and card advantage spells like Increasing Ambition and Beseech the Queen was critical in maintaining momentum and finding key threats.

• 6

  Strategic land destruction (Ghost Quarter, Strip Mine) played a pivotal role in disrupting ramp strategies, especially targeting Cabal Coffers to reduce mana production.

Notable Cards

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  Cabal Coffers

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  Shriekmaw

• 

  Damnation

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  Smokestack

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  Willbreaker

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  Rat Colony

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  Lake of the Dead

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  Profane Command

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  Beseech the Queen

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  Ghost Quarter

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  Strip Mine

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  Increasing Ambition

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  Necropotence

• 

  Rise of the Dark Realms

Summary

The game features a four-player mono-black Commander match with Erebos, Chainer, Gonti, and Marrow-Gnawer as the commanders. Early turns focus on ramping black mana through lands like Cabal Coffers and utility lands such as Ghost Quarter and Strip Mine to disrupt opponents' mana bases. Kevin, playing Gonti, leverages Cabal Coffers and strong creatures like Kozilek, Butcher of Truths and Shriekmaw to exert early pressure, stealing key permanents and maintaining board control with spells like Damnation. Eric, on Marrow-Gnawer, builds a rat swarm strategy, continually creating rat tokens and using Rat Colony synergies alongside cards like Willbreaker to manipulate board state and opponents' resources. Armand, on Chainer, focuses on stax elements, using cards like Smokestack and Phyrexian Arena to control the game pace and generate card advantage.