Mono Black Control in Modern: Necrodominance Deck Guide

I remember my excitement when I first saw this card on the spoiler page: Necropotence is one of the most iconic and strong cards in the history of MTG, so having a “slightly power crept” version of it in modern felt sweet. 
People discovered early on that the card couldn’t be played as a value tool, but instead has to be the centre piece of a deck where you can optimize the life loss and the draw engine. 
Some cards remained in the “core” of the deck from the beginning - I am mostly talking about.

Soul Spike: the card is really good at converting dead black cards into lifegain (and eventually a wincon); 
March of Wretched Sorrow: it’s a really strong interaction, that can also be a huge lifegain boost after drawing a ton with Necro
Sheoldred, the Apocalypse: "combos" with Necro, doubling your life total and allowing you to draw deep in your deck to find Soul Spikes and eventually win the game. 
Force of Despair: zero mana Damnation, often unpredictable, that can flip games. 

Since the deck requires a lot of black cards to function, and swamps are close to bricks once you draw a lot with Necro, it’s optimal to play a number of MDFC black cards. Luckily, most of them are avg/good. Boggart Trawler for example is huge against Goryo and Broodscale, and it’s a 3/1 that can pressure opponents in inevitability games. Fell the Profane is weaker, but sometimes a cmc4 murder might turn into a relevant spell.

The rest of the deck is composed by the best 8-one mana black interaction in Thoughtseize and Fatal Push, and a mixture of the best interactive spells for a certain metagame. Necro is a control deck, so any card that helps to stabilize before deploying Necro is welcomed. I am mostly looking at Orcish Bowmaster, Wrath effects, and strong spot removals like Sheoldred’s Edict.

Nowadays the best builds of Necrodominance are playing with Black + Green, and funny enough the deck received a really big upgrade with Strixhaven.

Professor Dellian Fel

This card does everything for the deck, and provides “extra copies of Necro” plus an alternative wincon once you start piling Soul Spikes and Marches. The professor is also in strong synergy with Sorin of House Markov, creating a subgame where lifegain matters and can be quickly turned into huge damage.

The second huge boost provided by Strixhaven is Witherbloom Command.

This powerful two mana instant fits the deck perfectly and it seems designed to be played in Necro. 
Sacrificing a permanent to draw two is really strong, also considering you can sacrifice Necrodominance in Upkeep if you’re stuck, or in the end step to have a full grip of 7. 
Destroying a 2 or less mana permanent is great to remove whatever Push can’t touch, usually like Weapons Manufacturing, Amulet of Vigor, Blade of the Blood Chief or other annoying permanents. It’s also really strong against Vexing Bauble, since the card might be annoying against Soul Spike and it’s usually a side in.
Gaining life is the less relevant mode, but, as I stated before, this effect can be relevant combined with Delian Fel’s ultimate or Sorin. It’s also a +5 card if you have Necro in play.

Tips and tricks

Your life matters a lot in this deck (more than most decks). With this in mind, don’t waste Thoughtseize unless you’re looking for something specific, as the card can protect your combo too, and you can eventually pitch it to Soul Spike or March.

Against Blood Moon, avoid fetching Tombs. Swamps are your best friends, as your goal is always to play Necrodominance. You can even decide to not crack your fetch until a green spell shows up, to keep both doors open.

Understanding how many cards to draw with Necro can be tricky, and remember your hand size is shrinked to 5. With this in mind, I usually like to draw to have 5 + 3/4 cards to discard. This means if I hit Soul Spike, I can play that and discard only one card (that’s usually a redundant land). This is my simplified rule of thumb, but there are a lot of factors in the mix. 

If you have a Sheoldred in play, you should always draw a lot trying to end the game on spot; same is true if you have still 3 March in the deck/hand, a target on board, and at least one mana up. Or if you still have a lot of Soul Spike in the deck with less than 30ish cards.

Sideboard ideas

I really enjoy having alternative sideboard plans when I run Necro; this is because Necro itself is often vulnerable (Boseiju/Force of Vigor), doesn’t do enough (if your opponent is playing a one turn combo deck), or the engine is weak (Sheoldred/Removals do poor).

My two sideboard plans are:
4x Dauthi Voidwalker. The card is just really good in this meta, and I can see playing some copies in the maindeck too. A house vs Goryo and Broodscale, while it’s also a disruptive tool against Druid and other decks. 
Your goal postboard is to match Dauthi with a discard spell, hopefully finding an Emrakul or Atraxa to win on spot; but you can also keep up doing 3 damage per turn.

2x Ashiok, Dream Render. I am unsure why Ashiok is so overlooked right now, since it’s one of the best planeswalker you can run on your sideboard. It’s just really strong against Mychospawn/Saga decks, and can keep the graveyard in check against Emrakul. Vs Devoted, it stops all the tutoring, forcing the opponent to have the clean combo in hand. 
And of course it is still a house against Neobrand and Amulet, despite those two are a bit on decline right now.

I am currently playing three Chalice of the Void: the card is great against Prowess, if you can X=1 (mostly because postboard you’re supposed to side out thoughtsize, having just 4 Push as CMC1 cards), but can also be relevant against Affinity as pseudo vexing bauble.

The rest is a bit up to you: I like to run a number of Wraths in the form of Damnation, Culling Ritual and Meathook Massacre; and a couple of extra GY cards like Nihil Spellbomb.

My decklist and sideboard guide

Broodscale:
+2 Ashiok
+2 Dauthi Voidwalker
+2 Break the Ice
-4 Orcish Bowmaster
-1 Sorin
-1 Soul Spike

Druid:
+2 Ashiok
+2 Culling Ritual
+1 Damnation
-2 Dauthi Voidwalker
-1 Sorin
-1 Sheoldred, the Apocalypse
-1 Sheoldred’s Edict

Goryo:
+1 Surgical
+2 Dauthi Voidwalker
-3 March of Wretched Sorrow

Prowess:
+3 Chalice of the Void
+2 Culling Ritual
+1 Damnation
-2 Dauthi Voidwalker
-4 Thoughtseize

Affinity:
+3 Chalice of the Void
+2 Culling Ritual
+1 Damnation
-2 Dauthi Voidwalker
-4 Orcish Bowmaster

Storm:
+2 Damping Sphere
+2 Dauthi Voidwalker
-3 Force of Despair
-1 Professor Delian Fel

Boros Energy:
+2 Culling Ritual
+1 Damnation
-3 Thoughtseize