Spider-Man Saves the City | Art by Dan Dos Santos

Spider-Man isn't a franchise I ever would've expected Magic: the Gathering to do a crossover with. And, while I'm trying to maintain my typical skepticism of these Universes Beyond sets, this one is definitely cracking my resolve. I'm champing at the bit to find out how the Magic design team has chosen to tackle the Spider-Man cannon and to see how deep into the lore they're going to take us.

The first wave of previews left me feeling a little underwhelmed, but there is one standout card from the bunch I'm excited to take a look at in this deck tech: Venom, Deadly DevourerVenom, Deadly Devourer.

What Does Venom, Deadly Devourer Do?

Venom, Deadly DevourerVenom, Deadly Devourer is, put simply, a really buff Scavenging OozeScavenging Ooze. Venom is a four mana 4/4 with vigilance, menace, and a very versatile activated ability: For three mana, Venom can exile a creature from any graveyard and put a number +1/+1 counters equal to the exiled creature's toughness on himself.

Most importantly, this ability can be activated at instant speed, meaning opponents often won't know how much damage they're on the hook for when deciding whether or not they want to block Venom.

This deck will fall somewhere under the Voltron umbrella, using +1/+1 counters rather than Auras or Equipment to deal lethal commander damage. My goal for this deck is to use Venom as the ambush predator that he is.

The primary play pattern will be swinging with Venom while holding up a bunch of open mana, letting opponents make their blocking decisions, then tossing a creature into exile at instant speed, eating it with Venom and either tearing through the creatures that blocked him or dealing lethal commander damage if an opponent ever makes the mistake of leaving Venom unblocked.

Key Cards for Venom, Deadly Devourer

In order for Venom to really do anything, he needs creatures in the graveyard to eat! Thankfully, there are a lot of ways to do that while keeping opponents in the dark until it's too late.

EntombEntomb is the signature card of graveyard strategies like this. For only one mana, it sends any card straight from the library to the graveyard at instant speed. Survival of the FittestSurvival of the Fittest serves the same function, alongside its cousin Fauna ShamanFauna Shaman, while also serving as a discard outlet to dispose of large creatures that get stuck in the hand.

Bitter TriumphBitter Triumph is often a two-for-one deal, destroying an opposing creature and discarding one from the hand, giving Venom two creatures to exile for just two mana.

Unfortunately, Venom won't get enough +1/+1 counters to one-shot an unsuspecting opponent in just one activation without a little help. Even exiling a creature as large as Impervious GreatwurmImpervious Greatwurm is just shy of allowing Venom to deal the necessary 21 points of commander damage.

To get the rest of the way there, Venom will need a little help from cards that can double the counters on him. I love Bristly Bill, Spine SowerBristly Bill, Spine Sower as yet another instant speed activated ability that can be held over the defending player's head during combat.

Alongside the instant speed methods of sending creatures to the graveyard, I've included some self-mill and recursion engines to provide the deck with some much needed card velocity.

SixSix and Life from the LoamLife from the Loam work together to create an engine that I severely underestimated until I got to play with it. Life from the LoamLife from the Loam picks up lands to discard as part of the retrace cost to cast permanents from the graveyard with SixSix's ability and fills the graveyard as it gets dredged back each draw step.

I've included some permanents to bolster this synergy, like Seal of PrimordiumSeal of Primordium and Haywire MiteHaywire Mite instead of more conventional artifact and enchantment removal. Life from the LoamLife from the Loam is also fantastic on its own as a way to recur lands, like Strip MineStrip Mine, Boseiju, Who EnduresBoseiju, Who Endures, and Fetchlands.

How Does this Venom, Deadly Devourer Deck Win?

This deck wins like any other Voltron deck: Venom, Deadly DevourerVenom, Deadly Devourer will get into the red zone and kill all three opponents all by himself.

Tainted StrikeTainted Strike can speed up this process, drastically reducing the amount of +1/+1 counters Venom will need to one-shot at least one opponent. Often, this card comes in handy in the longer games where Venom dies a couple of times and the deck's resources are being stretched thin to string together one last combat step to end the game.

I've included one alternative to the normal combat damage plan. Jarad, Golgari Lich LordJarad, Golgari Lich Lord can sacrifice a large Venom, Deadly DevourerVenom, Deadly Devourer and burn the whole table out. Venom isn't even the only reasonable creature that can be used to burn out the table in this way. Lord of ExtinctionLord of Extinction will often be more than large enough in the later stages of the game. Even better, Jarad recurs himself and provides a very enticing ReanimateReanimate target.

Executing this plan is more high-investment than simply attacking with Venom, but the resources that go into it are very much worth the reward.

The biggest barrier to winning the game with Venom, Deadly DevourerVenom, Deadly Devourer is opposing graveyard hate. Cards like Rest in PeaceRest in Peace render the game entirely unplayable for this otherwise unstoppable Symbiote.

I've tried to protect against this with a lot of generic non-land permanent removal. However, a well timed piece of graveyard hate can still render this deck inert despite Venom's best efforts to subvert it. I think it can be fun for decks to have fatal flaws like this, and I find it very funny that Magic's version of Venom is more vulnerable to Bojuka BogBojuka Bog than he is church bells or fire.

Venom, Deadly Devourer Commander Deck List

Conclusion

This build of Venom should easily fit into Bracket 3 (Upgraded) tables. The slightly high count of tutors, particularly Survival of the FittestSurvival of the Fittest, and the "ambush predator" strategy are definitely worth bringing up in pre-game discussions to prevent opponents from feeling completely blindsided by a 36/36 Venom killing them on turn five, however.

I'd recommend this deck to players that enjoy commander damage strategies, graveyard decks, or fellow Spider-Man fans that just appreciate the flavor of Venom, Deadly DevourerVenom, Deadly Devourer and the strategies he lends himself to. I definitely fall into all three categories.

The only con of this deck I anticipate is that the strategy is very streamlined. The games this deck wins will all look very similar to one another and the games the deck loses likely will as well. This might limit replayability a good bit. But for all I know there will be cards in Marvel's Spider-Man that have yet to be revealed that could add some more mechanical depth to Venom's strategy.

I'm a little sad that there won't be Commander precon decks for Marvel's Spider-Man, as when the set was originally announced I was really hoping for a precon with either Eddie Brock and Venom or Cletus Kasady and Carnage as partner commanders. I'm holding onto some hope that those characters might get printed on dual faced cards that transform like the Innistrad werewolves.

But in the unlikely event that Venom, Deadly DevourerVenom, Deadly Devourer is the only Symbiote that gets printed, it's cool enough on its own that I could live with that.