BlackLegendary Creature — Human WarlockTivash, Gloom Summoner
Mana value5Rank#10,441
The Commander
At the beginning of your end step, if you gained life this turn, you may pay X life, where X is the amount of life you gained this turn. If you do, create an X/X black Demon creature token with flying.
Guide
Gameplan
Tivash is a mono-black lifegain payoff: lean on lifelink and other lifegain triggers to bank life each turn, then convert that life into a flying Demon at your end step. You grind value with incremental lifegain, build a board of evasive demons, and close games by either swinging through the air or draining tables out. Turn to turn you deploy lifegain enablers, attack or block with the lifelinking commander, and keep paying life for bigger and bigger demons.
Strengths
- Generates large evasive bodies repeatedly with no extra cards required
- Lifelink and lifegain synergies fuel a near-bottomless life buffer
- Mono-black gives access to the best tutors and recursion in the format
- Tokens dodge sorcery-speed removal and pressure life totals quickly
- Self-sufficient engine that snowballs if left unchecked
Weaknesses
- Relies on actually gaining life each turn to function—lifegain hate shuts it off
- Paying life for tokens makes you vulnerable to burn and life-loss strategies
- Mono-black struggles with enchantments and stuck artifacts
- A single board wipe erases your demon investment
- No card advantage built into the commander beyond bodies
Key Cards
- Whip of Erebos — Grants your whole team lifelink, turning every attack into fuel for end-step Demons.
- Authority of the Consuls — Cheap repeatable lifegain on top of slowing opponents' creatures.
- Aetherflux Reservoir — Stacks lifegain into a one-card kill while also feeding Tivash's token engine.
- Sanguine Bond — Pairs with lifegain to drain opponents while you build demons.
- Exsanguinate — A lifegain-fueled X-spell that both pads your total and acts as a finisher.
- Vito, Thorn of the Dusk Rose — Converts your constant lifegain into direct damage for an alternate win.
- Bolas's Citadel — Lets you spend life as a resource for cards while gaining it back from Tivash's lifelink.
Upgrade Path
Add more reliable per-turn lifegain (Soul Warden effects, Children of Korlis, lifelink granters) so Tivash always triggers, and include drain payoffs like Sanguine Bond and Vito to punish your high life total. Tighten the mana with fast rocks and add black's premium tutors (Demonic Tutor, Vampiric Tutor) to assemble Aetherflux Reservoir combos. Finally, protect the engine with cards like Heroic Intervention substitutes (Tainted Strike isn't it—use Imp's Mischief, Deflecting Swat) and recursion such as Reanimate to rebuild after wipes.
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
- ▸Beating down with a swarm of large flying Demon tokens
- ▸Draining the table with Sanguine Bond/Vito plus heavy lifegain
- ▸Aetherflux Reservoir burst kill off accumulated life
- ▸Exsanguinate or Torment of Hailfire as a life-fueled finisher
Archetypes
- Lifegain/Aristocrats — Tivash rewards stacking lifegain triggers and converting them into board presence and drain.
- Tokens/Go-Wide — End-step Demons build an evasive army that scales with how much life you gain.
- Combo — Aetherflux Reservoir and Sanguine Bond turn lifegain loops into deterministic kills.
- Midrange Value — Mono-black tutors and recursion let you grind incremental advantage behind a self-sustaining engine.
Combos
No combos found for this commander on Commander Spellbook.
Related Commanders
Same color identity (B), by popularity.
