The Commander
Flying, trample, haste, protection from black
Spirit of the Night has first strike as long as it's attacking.
Guide
Gameplan
Cast a 9-mana 6/5 with flying, trample, haste, first strike (when attacking) and protection from black, then beat in for chunky evasive damage while leaning on mono-black ramp, tutors and reanimation to deploy it early and repeatedly. You play a midrange/Voltron-aristocrats hybrid: ramp into the body, suit it up or back it with removal and recursion, and grind the table down.
Strengths
- Hard-to-block evasive threat with flying, trample, and haste that hits the turn it arrives
- Protection from black dodges removal, blockers, and damage from the most common EDH color
- First strike when attacking makes it survive most combat and brawl through blockers
- Mono-black gives access to the best tutors, ramp, and recursion in the format
Weaknesses
- 9 mana is brutally expensive without ramp or cheat effects
- Single colorless makes it weak to artifact ramp/fixing disruption and color-screw is irrelevant but ramp is mandatory
- No card advantage or protection beyond pro-black; vulnerable to white/blue/red removal and exile
- Only a 6/5, so it dies to chump-stacking, edicts, and bounce despite the keywords
Key Cards
- Cabal Coffers — Turns Swamps into explosive mana to hard-cast a 9-drop ahead of curve.
- Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx — Devotion-fueled ramp lets mono-black generate the huge mana this commander demands.
- Reanimate — Cheats Spirit of the Night into play for one mana, sidestepping the cost entirely.
- Whip of Erebos — Grants lifelink to the evasive body and enables recursion if it dies.
- Imp's Mischief — Protects your big swing or steals removal targeting since black struggles to counter.
- Demonic Tutor — Finds your ramp, reanimation, or a finisher to assemble the gameplan consistently.
Upgrade Path
Add fast mana and rituals (Dark Ritual, Cabal Ritual, Sol Ring, plus Bubbling Muck/Crypt Ghast) so you can deploy turn 3-5, and lean on reanimation (Animate Dead, Necromancy) to ignore the cost. Round out with protection (Imp's Mischief, Sheltered by Ghosts-style hexproof from equipment) and stax/recursion like Phyrexian Reclamation, then close with a drain finisher (Torment of Hailfire, Exsanguinate) so removal doesn't strand you. Strong tutor and ramp density is what raises this deck from casual to focused.
Core Cards
The most-played cards for this commander, built from aggregated deck data (the Mythic Graph). Build public decks to seed it.
Win Conditions
- ▸Commander damage and evasive beatdown stacked with equipment/auras
- ▸Reanimate a board of big black threats and overwhelm
- ▸Drain and life-loss engines like Gray Merchant of Asphodel and Exsanguinate
- ▸Combat damage through flying/trample after clearing blockers
Archetypes
- Voltron — An evasive, pro-black, first-striking body is an ideal carrier for equipment and auras to one-shot opponents.
- Reanimator — Black's premier reanimation spells cheat past the prohibitive 9 mana cost again and again.
- Mono-Black Ramp/Midrange — Cabal Coffers, Nykthos, and rituals let you hard-cast the demon and other fatties while grinding with removal.
- Aristocrats — Black's sacrifice and drain engines provide a backup win and recursion fodder around the commander.
Combos
No combos found for this commander on Commander Spellbook.
Related Commanders
Same color identity (B), by popularity.
