Adding more data: a maindecked Vilis decided a game last night.
The draw power is a very bonkers, and not just being able to pay B to do so (though, it helps that he can just kind of pay mana for cards). There's lots of ways to lose life, it turns out, and in great quantities as well.
Some tricks:
Reanimate draws 8 up front. You have mana to draw more.
Makeshift Mannequin is a surprise in combat when I attacked a player. He didn't block with Vilis, drew many, many cards.
Feldon of the Third Path (and
Apprentice Necromancer,
Doomed Necromancer, and
Coffin Queen) make attacks against a player with Vilis in the yard extremely not viable.
I wouldn't say that Vilis is as strong as Griselbrand, but, let's be fair: Griselbrand is a very high bar, and I think cards that are less broken/ubiquitous than Griselbrand should be considered for banning.
Less than the problematic draw, I dislike the idea that attacking the player is counterproductive. If you punch a Vilis player with some creatures, they're as likely to take the damage instead of blocking, and get free draw so they can do something catastrophic on their own turn. It creates a weirdly punishing calculus where you don't want to attack/push a player towards defeat because it paradoxically will move them closer to victory instead. It becomes a very all-or-nothing game where you need to be able to just kill the player using Vilis outright.
