Is a mono-black suicide money ball control deck viable in Premodern?

[SeekerOfTruth007]

4 Dark Ritual

4 Phyrexian Arena

4 Hypnotic Specter

4 Nantuko Shade

4 Bone Shredder

4 Royal Assassin

4 Icy Manipulator

4 Powder Keg

4 Hymn to Tourach

4 Gerrard's Verdict

8 Plains

16 Swamps

Sideboard:

4 Engineered Plague

4 Ring of Gix

3 Tormod's Crypt

4 Ravenous Rats

==

Bone Shredder comes out against Dreadnought and Ravenous Rats go in.

Engineered Plague goes in vs Goblins or Elves.

Ring of Gix can go in vs Dreadnought or Rock to make sure the fatty never gets to attack.

Updates

4 mo

Okay, so I splashed white for Gerrard's Verdict due to 2 for 1 Card Advantage. There are other ways to build an Arena deck. See below.

Updates

4 mo

4 Dark Ritual
4 Phyrexian Arena
4 Hypnotic Specter
4 Nantuko Shade
4 Royal Assassin
4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Flametongue Kavu
4 Terminate
4 Grim Lavamancer
4 Fire // Ice
8 Mountains
16 Swamp

SB:
4 Powder Keg
4 Engineered Plague
4 Icy Manipulator
3 Tormod's Crypt

[Cyfris]

I like it but I am not sure the reliability of splashed white for one card won't come back to bite you in the ass. I have 60/40 rule myself if 40% of my deck isn't the other color I will find ways to go mono or other of the addition color to add for balance and consistancy. I am also the most unlucky person and will get skunked with double white mana hands and not be able to cast anything..

[SeekerOfTruth007]

I've figured out I've got way more land in the deck than I need. If I stick to mono-black, I can get away with 18 lands and a total card count of 62, like this:

4 Dark Ritual
4 Phyrexian Arena
4 Hypnotic Specter
4 Nantuko Shade
4 Bone Shredder
4 Royal Assassin
4 Icy Manipulator
4 Powder Keg
4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Duress
4 Diabolic Edict
18 Swamps

SB:
4 Ravenous Rats
4 Engineered Plague
4 Ring of Gix
3 Tormod's Crypt

I've identified a problem creature for Green and Green/Black decks: Blastoderm. My only way to deal with it once it hits the table is to trade a Nantuko Shade with it, since the Green player will likely have one or more Elves in play, making Diabolic Edict not that good vs Blastoderm. I can always hope Hypnotic Specter or Hymn to Tourach kills it from their hand though.

I traded in Diabolic Edict for instant speed instead of Chainer's Edict, because the Flashback on Chainer's Edict is so expensive that 2-for-1 card advantage is not realistic in this format.

By using a very low land count, we maximize the power of Phyrexian Arena to draw more spells every turn.

[SeekerOfTruth007]

Check this out. A deck similar to this beat the vaunted 'dreadnought" deck 3-1 in a best of 5, and he wasn't even optimized.

https://youtu.be/79OUXkcFtLM?si=7jOPDX2oxKafrFXB

$50 deck beats a $1400 deck 3-1.

I thought that's how that worked. Hypnotic Specter is one of the most powerful cards ever printed.

The dreadnought deck has ZERO answers for the carnage of random discard.