This is almost entirely copied from "Run of the Mill" by user Illuminum with one exception. I have subbed out the
Vara, Fate-Touched x2 for
Direfang Spider x2. The reason for doing this is that drawing a very high cost card like Vara is only good late game and requires you to already have certain cards in hand. This deck can be played many different ways and Vara doesn't have synergy with all of them. Instead, I picked a 1-drop card that you can fetch with both
Crownwatch Press-Gang and
Shadowlands Guide. Sometimes you're fighting against a deck with big dudes or warcry and you don't have a way to make
Black Iron Manacles win the game yet, so fetching a 1/1 deadly instead of the
Fallen Oni can definitely help. It also gives you the benefit of drawing a card off of Shadowlands Guide or Crownwatch Press Gang if you normally wouldn't have one. More options in the library and in the void.
All around I love this deck as a huge mill fan and what Illuminum has put together is a very solid list. This small change has helped me get to silver 1 and almost gold (just won 9 in a row) pretty quickly using only mill in ranked.
Note: I first tried to sub Vara with Prickly Grenadin. Seems good on paper, but in practice it just doesn't work. If you can't afford Vara and don't have the spiders, but do have two prickly grenadin, it will get you there.
Happy milling! Make them cry
Dark Return
x4
1
Direfang Spider
x2
1
Fallen Oni
x4
1
Seek Power
x4
1
Torch
x4
2
Devour
x4
2
Dreamsnatcher
x4
3
Shadowlands Guide
x4
3
Slay
x4
4
Black Iron Manacles
x4
5
Crownwatch Press-Gang
x4
5
Harsh Rule
x4
6
Solitude
x4
Fire Sigil
x1
Justice Sigil
x2
Shadow Sigil
x3
Argenport Banner
x4
Seat of Chaos
x4
Seat of Glory
x4
Seat of Vengeance
x4
Stonescar Banner
x3
View Deck on Shiftstoned
Oni is a huge player in about 1/2 to 2/3 of all wins. With so many ways to draw the Oni in this deck you usually end up with at least one you can recycle.
One thing about this deck is that just because you have the creatures, it doesn't mean you should play them until you have the combo (with the exception of the spider and dreamsnatcher). Dreamsnatcher synergizes with just about everything. Having life gain and drawing out the game is very good in this deck. Bringing him back with +1/+1 with Dark Return is worth it even though dark return is so good for the main engine. You pretty much have to play the life gain/removal game until you draw enough of the main cards to mill then to death with solitude/BIM.
If you have a dreamsnatcher and an Oni in your hand, wait until you can use the combo. You will probably draw removal before you can do it, so you're safe.
Another way to run away with the game is dreamsnatcher and solitude. I once swung two different 22 power lifegain dreamsnatchers to end up winning with 80+ life. Solitude is not just a card to kill or do damage with BIM, it can also buff the hell out of dreamsnatcher.
There are a lot of different interactions and combos in this deck and it definitely takes about 20 or so games to get to know how to play it.
Oni is very good, but try to save them until you have BIM or dreamsnatcher out
This is what I have been playing, I originally had oni and prickly in it but it did not seem to work right. My biggest weakness when playing is wanting to play multiple overwinders for a quick win. It seems better to hold them back and play them one after another as they die.