At a glance
- Format: Brawl (100-card)
- Commander: Zoyowa Lava-Tongue
- Colors: Black / Red (BR)
- Archetype: Rakdos blight-aristocrats / descend (budget)
- Power tier: competitive
- Competitive Brawl: ✅ Legal
Strategy
Zoyowa taxes opponents every time a nontoken permanent of yours hits the graveyard, so the plan is to guarantee a descend each turn with cheap fodder and recursion. Blight enablers (Chaos Spewer, Gutsplitter Gang, Shadow Urchin, Broodrage Mycoid) spend your own creatures’ toughness for value, killing small bodies that feed free sac outlets (Goblin Bombardment, Skullport Merchant, Ruthless Knave, Vampiric Rites) and recur from the yard (Reassembling Skeleton, Bloodghast, Persistent Specimen). Aristocrat drains (Zulaport Cutthroat, A-Blood Artist, Bastion of Remembrance, Vengeful Bloodwitch, Falkenrath Noble) turn every death into life swing, while lifegain payoffs (Marauding Blight-Priest) convert that gain back into opponent life loss. Golden Demise and premium single-target removal keep boards honest, and Bringer of the Last Gift is the recursive haymaker finisher. Every Treasure, sac land, and creature death chains into Zoyowa’s edict-or-burn tax.
Upgrade path
PLAYABLE-NOW budget build: 0 rare/mythic crafts required (commander Zoyowa is owned; the only rare here, Bringer of the Last Gift, is already owned). The ideal power-ceiling version at data/decks_json/brawl-blight.json is the upgrade target - craft Priest of Forgotten Gods, Dark-Dweller Oracle, Bloodletter of Aclazotz, Yawgmoth Thran Physician, The Meathook Massacre, and Sheoldred to level up. Budget in-role swaps: Skullport Merchant + Ruthless Knave for Priest/Dark-Dweller (sac-outlet card advantage + Treasure ramp), Fell Stinger for extra draw, Marauding Blight-Priest for Bloodletter’s lifegain-to-drain doubling, Falkenrath Noble as an extra Blood Artist, Golden Demise for the wrath, Bringer of the Last Gift as the finisher.
Cards
Decklist
Paste straight into MTG Arena (or Moxfield/Archidekt):
Commander
1 Zoyowa Lava-Tongue
Deck
1 Arcane Signet
1 Mind Stone
1 Scuzzback Scrounger
1 Pitiless Plunderer
1 Big Score
1 Seize the Spoils
1 Goblin Bombardment
1 Village Rites
1 Deadly Dispute
1 Corrupted Conviction
1 Vampiric Rites
1 Phyrexian Arena
1 Preacher of the Schism
1 Midnight Reaper
1 Dream Seizer
1 Gix, Yawgmoth Praetor
1 Gristle Glutton
1 Reassembling Skeleton
1 Persistent Specimen
1 Bloodghast
1 Tenacious Underdog
1 Undead Butler
1 Shambling Ghast
1 Zulaport Cutthroat
1 A-Blood Artist
1 Bastion of Remembrance
1 Mayhem Devil
1 Vengeful Bloodwitch
1 Judith, the Scourge Diva
1 Sanguine Syphoner
1 Boggart Mischief
1 Shadow Urchin
1 Gutsplitter Gang
1 Chaos Spewer
1 Sting-Slinger
1 Sourbread Auntie
1 Nest of Scarabs
1 Canonized in Blood
1 Broodrage Mycoid
1 Kardur, Doomscourge
1 Fatal Push
1 Go for the Throat
1 Bitter Triumph
1 Infernal Grasp
1 Heartless Act
1 Abrade
1 Feed the Swarm
1 Hero's Downfall
1 Bogslither's Embrace
1 Blight Rot
1 Bake into a Pie
1 Massacre Wurm
1 Arbiter of Woe
1 Vein Ripper
1 Perforating Artist
1 Skullport Merchant
1 Fell Stinger
1 Marauding Blight-Priest
1 Falkenrath Noble
1 Golden Demise
1 Bringer of the Last Gift
1 Ruthless Knave
1 Command Tower
1 The Dross Pits
1 The Autonomous Furnace
1 Boiling Rock Prison
1 Blood Crypt
1 Blazemire Verge
25 Swamp
6 Mountain
Ideal build (upgrade target)
The power-ceiling build (multi-agent workflow output) — every premium payoff and the full combo/synergy package. The current list is the playable-now budget version; craft toward this as your wildcards come in.
Crafts to reach the ideal: 7 (4 mythic, 2 rare, 1 other)
- Mythic: Bloodletter of Aclazotz, Sheoldred, the Apocalypse, The Meathook Massacre, Yawgmoth, Thran Physician
- Rare: Dark-Dweller Oracle, Priest of Forgotten Gods
- Other: Rakdos Signet
Full ideal list (paste into Arena):
Commander
1 Zoyowa Lava-Tongue
Deck
1 Arcane Signet
1 Mind Stone
1 Rakdos Signet
1 Scuzzback Scrounger
1 Pitiless Plunderer
1 Big Score
1 Seize the Spoils
1 Goblin Bombardment
1 Priest of Forgotten Gods
1 Village Rites
1 Deadly Dispute
1 Corrupted Conviction
1 Vampiric Rites
1 Dark-Dweller Oracle
1 Phyrexian Arena
1 Preacher of the Schism
1 Midnight Reaper
1 Dream Seizer
1 Gix, Yawgmoth Praetor
1 Gristle Glutton
1 Reassembling Skeleton
1 Persistent Specimen
1 Bloodghast
1 Tenacious Underdog
1 Undead Butler
1 Shambling Ghast
1 Zulaport Cutthroat
1 A-Blood Artist
1 Bastion of Remembrance
1 Mayhem Devil
1 Vengeful Bloodwitch
1 Judith, the Scourge Diva
1 Bloodletter of Aclazotz
1 Sanguine Syphoner
1 Boggart Mischief
1 Shadow Urchin
1 Gutsplitter Gang
1 Chaos Spewer
1 Sting-Slinger
1 Sourbread Auntie
1 Nest of Scarabs
1 Yawgmoth, Thran Physician
1 Canonized in Blood
1 Broodrage Mycoid
1 Kardur, Doomscourge
1 Fatal Push
1 Go for the Throat
1 Bitter Triumph
1 Infernal Grasp
1 Heartless Act
1 Abrade
1 Feed the Swarm
1 Hero's Downfall
1 Bogslither's Embrace
1 Blight Rot
1 Bake into a Pie
1 Massacre Wurm
1 The Meathook Massacre
1 Arbiter of Woe
1 Vein Ripper
1 Sheoldred, the Apocalypse
1 Perforating Artist
1 Command Tower
1 Boiling Rock Prison
1 Tramway Station
1 The Dross Pits
1 The Autonomous Furnace
1 Blood Crypt
1 Blazemire Verge
24 Swamp
6 Mountain
Card images & data via Scryfall.