Why This Deck Exists
Somewhere between a Princess Bride crossover and a poison counter fever dream, this deck decided it wanted to be both. Westley leads a Golgari-leaning, mostly-Green infect shell that wants to proliferate you into oblivion while everyone else is still figuring out what their commander does. It is mean, it is fast, and it is the kind of deck that makes your whole playgroup start counting poison counters out loud, nervously.
Commander
- Westley, Dread Pirate Roberts — Your general and the reason this whole poison plan holds together, ready to swing the game your way the moment the table stops paying attention.
Planeswalkers
- Garruk, Unleashed — Makes wolves and grows your board, giving you a reason to attack with everyone at once.
Creatures
- Ankle Biter — Cheap infect creature that starts poisoning people before turn three if you’re unlucky enough to sit across from it.
- Axebane Ferox — A sticky bear that fights back and keeps growing the longer combat drags on.
- Blightsteel Colossus — A single connection with this thing ends the game, infect or not, thanks to its absurd power.
- Bloodroot Apothecary — Cheap body that feeds your proliferate shenanigans and quietly pulls weight every turn.
- Contaminant Grafter — Infect creature that hands out a poison counter just for showing up.
- Dragon Sniper — A reach creature that can pick off small attackers or flyers before they become a problem.
- Evolution Sage — Every land you play doubles as a free proliferate trigger, exactly the kind of value this deck loves.
- Fang of Shigeki — Snake creature that grows the more counters are floating around the board.
- Gnarlwood Dryad — A one-mana deathtouch blocker that trades up with almost anything.
- Gran Pulse Ochu — Big ramp payoff creature that gets bigger the more mana you’ve poured into the board.
- Heralds of the Shredder — Token generator that keeps handing you extra bodies to attack with or throw at removal.
- Hit-Monkey — Scrappy attacker that punishes anyone who blocks it carelessly.
- Hornet Queen — Instantly gives you a swarm of deathtouch flyers, a great answer to basically anything big.
- Mirkwood Spider — Reach blocker that keeps flyers from ruining your day for cheap.
- Moss Viper — Infect creature with deathtouch, so it trades with anything and poisons whoever it hits.
- Narnam Renegade — Cheap infect deathtouch body that’s annoying to block for one measly mana.
- Nightshade Dryad — Deathtouch creature that discourages combat math against your whole board.
- Questing Beast — Big vigilant threat that dodges most removal and fights back hard if blocked.
- Saryth, the Viper’s Fang — Gives your creatures deathtouch and vigilance, turning your whole team into scary attackers and blockers at once.
- Sedge Scorpion — One-mana deathtouch blocker that stops early aggression cold.
- Tajuru Blightblade — Cheap counter-synergy creature that grows as counters pile up around the table.
- Tyrranax Rex — Massive dinosaur beater that just wants to smash face repeatedly.
- Venerated Rotpriest — Gives your team toxic and proliferate triggers, basically the deck’s thesis statement in creature form.
- Virulent Emissary — Infect creature that grows the longer the game goes, exactly when you want it swinging.
- Vorinclex, Monstrous Raider — Doubles every counter you put on things, turning a slow poison plan into an instant nightmare for opponents.
- Wasteland Viper — Cheap infect deathtouch creature that trades with big things while quietly poisoning someone.
Sorceries
- Cultivate — Classic ramp spell that fixes your mana and sets up bigger turns ahead.
- Explore — Cheap card draw and land drop smoothing, nothing flashy but always useful.
- Green Sun’s Zenith — Tutors up exactly the creature you need, scaling with however much mana you have to spend.
- Harmonize — Draws you three cards in one shot to refill your hand after a rough turn.
- Natural Order — Sacrifices a creature to grab a huge green threat straight out of your deck.
- Noxious Assault — Adds poison counters to opponents based on how many creatures you control, and this deck has plenty.
- Planewide Celebration — Ramps you hard and refills your hand at the same time, a great top-end payoff.
- Predatory Focus — Buffs your attackers for the turn, turning a decent swing into a lethal one.
- Smell Fear — Cheap removal that clears small blockers so your attackers connect.
- Thirsting Roots — Grows your board and pumps everyone, rewarding you for going wide.
- Triumph of the Hordes — Gives your whole team infect and trample for the turn, basically a one-card kill button in this deck.
- Unnatural Restoration — Brings back a creature or land from your graveyard when you need a rebuy.
Instants
- Blessed Respite — Protects a creature or fogs damage in a pinch, buying you the turn you need.
- Crop Rotation — Swaps a basic land for any land in your deck, great for grabbing a utility land fast.
- Fog — Prevents all combat damage this turn, the classic get-out-of-jail card.
- Force of Vigor — Blows up two artifacts or enchantments for free if you pitch a green card, huge against combo pieces.
- Heroic Intervention — Gives your whole board hexproof and indestructible, dodging board wipes at instant speed.
- Infectious Bite — Fight spell that also slaps a poison counter on your opponent for extra rudeness.
- Legolas’s Quick Reflexes — Combat trick that pumps and protects one of your attackers when it matters most.
- Obscuring Haze — Prevents damage from a chosen number of attackers, a cheaper cousin of Fog.
- Pistus Strike — Deathtouch fight spell that trades your creature favorably in almost any combat.
- Worldly Tutor — Finds any creature in your deck and puts it on top, so you draw exactly what you need next turn.
Artifacts
- Bow of Nylea — Flexible utility artifact that gives lifegain, deathtouch, or a fight ability depending on what the board needs.
- Brotherhood Regalia — Buffs your creatures based on how many counters are on the board, which this deck has in spades.
- Decimator Web — Shrinks and taps down opposing creatures, quietly neutering the scariest thing on the table.
- Dolmen Gate — Lets your attacking creatures block afterward, so you never have to choose between offense and defense.
- Lightning Greaves — Gives haste and shroud, letting your commander swing the turn it hits the field and dodge removal.
- Silver Shroud Costume — Equipment that boosts stats and adds a keyword, cheap value for whoever wears it.
- Sol Ring — The best mana rock in the format, period, and it belongs in every single deck you own.
- The Great Henge — Massive mana and card advantage engine that gets easier to cast the bigger your creatures are.
- The One Ring — Draws you a huge handful of cards and makes you nearly unkillable for a turn cycle.
- Trailblazer’s Boots — Equipment that lets its wearer walk right past blockers, great on your infect threats.
- Whispersilk Cloak — Gives shroud and unblockable, perfect on your commander or your scariest infect creature.
Enchantments
- Asceticism — Gives your whole team hexproof or regenerate depending on what threat you’re dodging that turn.
- Exploration — Lets you play extra lands each turn, speeding up your whole gameplan.
- Sylvan Library — Lets you look at extra cards on top of your deck and keep the best one, one of the best card advantage engines in Green.
Lands
- Access Tunnel — Utility land that lets a creature sneak past blockers when you need it most.
- Castle Garenbrig — Taps for extra mana specifically for big creature spells, which this deck has plenty of.
- Escape Tunnel — Another sneaky land that helps a creature get in unblocked.
- 30 Forest — Your bread and butter, tapping for the green mana that makes this whole deck run.
- Karn’s Bastion — Utility land that proliferates, quietly pushing your poison counters up turn after turn.
- Rogue’s Passage — Makes any creature unblockable for a turn, perfect for pushing through lethal infect damage.
- Shifting Woodland — Flexible land that can turn into a huge threat or recur creatures from your graveyard.
Game Plan
This deck has one job and it does it with a grin: get ten poison counters into an opponent as fast and as quietly as possible. Early turns are about ramping with things like Cultivate and Explore while your cheap deathtouch and infect creatures hold the fort. Once Venerated Rotpriest, Saryth, or Vorinclex hit the table, every combat step starts mattering a lot more, because now your whole team is threatening poison instead of just one or two guys. The real dagger is Triumph of the Hordes. Cast it after combat has already started and watch the table do math they really did not want to do. If that resolves and you have any kind of board, someone is very likely dead on the spot.
Strengths
The deck is resilient in a way infect decks usually aren’t, thanks to protection pieces like Heroic Intervention, Asceticism, and Dolmen Gate letting you keep swinging through removal-heavy tables. It also has real card advantage from Sylvan Library, The One Ring, and The Great Henge, so you’re rarely starving for gas the way a lot of one-note aggro decks are. And because poison counters don’t care about lifegain, this deck laughs at the one player who insists on jamming a lifegain commander every single game.
Weaknesses
Ten poison counters is a low number, and everyone at the table knows it. That means this deck draws a huge target the moment Westley or a proliferate engine sticks around for more than a turn or two. Board wipes hurt in a very literal sense since your threats are also your clock, and losing your infect creatures often means starting the poison count back at zero. The deck also leans on a handful of key pieces like Triumph of the Hordes and Vorinclex to close games quickly, so getting those countered or removed can stall you out longer than you’d like.
Upgrades
If you want to push this further, look at cheap proliferate enablers and more protection for your key threats, since keeping Venerated Rotpriest or Saryth alive for even one extra turn usually wins the game outright. Adding more tutors alongside Green Sun’s Zenith and Worldly Tutor to consistently find Triumph of the Hordes would tighten up the deck’s most explosive line. And if your table runs a lot of interaction, a few more instant-speed answers for artifacts and enchantments beyond Force of Vigor would help you fight through the hate that a poison deck inevitably attracts.


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