I've always liked tribal decks, but as the arms race between my brother's decks and my own increased I began to realize that I needed more synergy between my cards than just "Oh look, all my creatures are vampires, yippee." This realization became especially hard-hitting once my brother nearly perfected his elf tribal deck (which sucked for me since elf tribal decks have an insane amount of potential, imo).
This deck was the product of an uncountable number of losses to an elf tribal deck that I just couldn't surpass. It is designed to be aggressive, featuring mostly low cost spells and a couple of burn/removal abilities that can stymie your opponent in the early game, giving you an early advantage. At the same time, it doesn't run out of steam too fast, as the accumulation of +1/+1 counters help the deck deal with larger threats in the mid-to-late game.
If I had to name a weakness, it would probably be an inability to deal with enchantments and artifacts reliably, as well as board wipes, which tremendously set back the power scaling of the deck.
Sideboard contains cards I'm considering adding to the deck.
Comment if you'd like, I'm always open to suggestions!
The deck's play-style is rather straightforward; summon and power up your vampires, then hunt down the opponent. Most of the deck revolves around ways to either ensure that your vampires can deal direct damage, thereby growing in power/toughness, or ways to ramp that growth.
Blade of the Bloodchief, Curse of Stalked Prey, Indulgent Aristocrat, and Drana, Liberator of Malakir all work to boost the power of your vampires, the most important ones being Markov Blademaster, and Falkenrath Exterminator. Don't be afraid to sacrifice a couple of creatures to Indulgent Aristocrat's ability, as it's well worth the power boost your other creatures will receive, especially if there is a Blade of the Bloodchief out.
Markov Blademaster is the ace of this deck, as double striking an opponent directly nets double(+1) damage and two +1/+1 counters, and that's without accounting for the synergistic abilities of the other spells in the deck. Extra points if you combo Markov Blademaster with Inquisitor's Flail. If not, just make sure to have a Stromkirk Captain out so that your vampires can avoid the pesky double damage they would take for having Inquisitor's Flail equipped.
Use Lightning Bolt and Terminate to either eliminate blockers/remove potential threats,. Use them with extreme prejudice and impunity, as Falkenrath Exterminator can reliably take their place once powered up. I wouldn't recommend using Lightning Bolt to damage your opponent directly, it would be better to target a creature and remove a blocker to trigger Blade of the Bloodchief.
Cobbled Wings and Ruthless Invasion provide some maneuverability, allowing you to circumvent blockers and, in the case of Ruthless Invasion, swing out with all of your creatures to deal the final death blow.
Anowon, the Ruin Sage gives you one last trick up the sleeve, forcing players to sacrifice a creature each turn, which triggers Blade of the Bloodchief's ability and clears the field of blockers. It isn't too often that this card is necessary, the deck functions just fine without it, but when it does come into play, it can clutch the game out.