I have been playing with my mono black zombie deck for about 6 months now. When me and my friends first started playing it would usually win almost every game, but as we have developed our decks more, it seems to be falling father and farther behind. So I have decided to tune the deck for the last time. Heres the final list.
I realize that there is a lot of creatures in the deck at 39. The only other kind of scorcery I would think of adding would be something along the lines of a Terror. At the moment the deck is sitting at 68 cards which is not too bad, but I would like to get it to 60. IF anyone has any suggestions about it please feel free
1) Zombie Master's abilities do not stack like the other zombie lords, so consider making him a 2-3 of instead of 4.
2) Try subbing out Yoke of the Damned for some Nameless Inversion to work with your Lord of the Undead for more consistent creature control.
3) Try adding some control via Duress/Distress and/or consider some card draw engines (i.e. Grave Defiler, Graveborn Muse) to better utilize Korlash, Noxious Ghoul, Warchief's etc.
4) Check out the sticky Zombie Primer at the top of the Casual page!
I went ahead and reduced the number of Zombie Master to 2 instead of 4.
I also went ahead and added 4 terror as well as still looking into the graveborn muse and distress. I think there both good cards however not sure how I would make room for them to fit
the curve is honestly not that big at all, the average mana cost per card is 2.5. I have 4 Dark ritual in the deck as well as the undead warchief which makes the curve very managable
I would take out Carnophage.... it looks like you aren't building a suicide deck, so he probably doesn't fit very well. If you still want to maintain the mana curve, may I suggest Carrion Feeder? I've had a lot of success with that card. Also, I'd bump up the Festering Goblins to 4, and bring Korlash down to 2.
Also, if you want to thin out your deck, its quite possible that you will have to remove some of the lords. Maybe stromgald crusader, though I understand how useful he is, being anti-flying and all.
Feel free to look at my deck, which seems similar to yours.
The point of the deck really is to buff zombies up using the lords etc while giving them all death touch with death baron. Attacking the opponent with creatures such as carnophage and korlash etc. Having a zombie master out and the Urborg legendary land will give all zombies swampwalk aswell.
I would take out Carnophage.... it looks like you aren't building a suicide deck, so he probably doesn't fit very well. If you still want to maintain the mana curve, may I suggest Carrion Feeder? I've had a lot of success with that card. Also, I'd bump up the Festering Goblins to 4, and bring Korlash down to 2.
Also, if you want to thin out your deck, its quite possible that you will have to remove some of the lords. Maybe stromgald crusader, though I understand how useful he is, being anti-flying and all.
Feel free to look at my deck, which seems similar to yours.
I am very reluctant to take out and of the Korlash, Heir To Blackblade simply for his grandeur ability, I am able to search for 2 swamps and put them into play? Thats pretty good and could really help with the mana curve I think, or am I wrong here?
How useful has grandeur been when you've played the deck? To me it seems that it would be unlikely that you would, all at the same time, have 4 mana, be droughting, and have two Korlash's. If that is the case, fine, but I know that all of the Lords are 3 mana, and normally when I get to 4 mana, I'm set unless I've got some Noxious Ghouls I can't play.
Call to the Grave might be an interesting add, I know that when I play it, just about everyone scrambles to kill it.
If you want to go the swampwalk route, I would put more Urborg in, and keep zombie master at 4. Maybe look at Zombie Trailblazer if you'd rather not have that many non-mana-producing lands. If I had either Zombie Trailblazer or Urborg, I would seriously consider that.
Also, Gempalm should be at 4. You have enough creatures that that shouldn't even be a question. It is an excellent card, and a game winner. Combo it with Lord of the Undead or Unholy Grotto, and you can devastate life totals each turn WHILE drawing cards.
in the past grandeur has been very useful, although I do see your point.
If I were to add 4 Zombie trailblazer which cards would you remove? And what is your thoughts on Yoke of the damned ? that paired with a terror can be quite devastating. I Would like to have the deck at about 60 cards but 65 or so will work I suppose,
I try to be at exactly 60, but that's just me. The philosophy behind that is that there are exactly 60 best cards for your deck, and anything else makes it less good. Also, you have less of a chance to get what you really want. I would throw out Yoke of the damned, because it is not reliable removal, and maybe bump terror up to 4.
That also puts you down to 62 cards, from 64. What to remove after that comes down to what your local decks look like. What do you face a lot of? I would be crazy to take out Stromgald Crusader (If I had any) because of the large amount of flying decks I face. If a lot of my games go pretty late, I value noxious ghoul for his ability to control. If I face a lot of aggro decks, I would value my low mana cost creatures, but just enough to let me survive until the zombie buffing takes effect and the control starts.
What would I do, in your position? I would take out two maggot carriers, and believe that 6 1-drops would be enough. That would put you to 60.
The point of the deck really is to buff zombies up using the lords etc while giving them all death touch with death baron. Attacking the opponent with creatures such as carnophage and korlash etc. Having a zombie master out and the Urborg legendary land will give all zombies swampwalk aswell.
That is not what i'm asking, i don't want a card list, what i want to know is, what you want to accomplish, what is your goal? If possible in a word.
1) Aggro: do damage the faster you can
2) Control: hold the board 'til you're able to drop off big stuff
3) Reanimate: revive creatures from your grave to beat
4) Combo: use some combination of cards that wins the game
In fact you said it, just didn't realized because you start to justify other cards inclusions, here is your true answer: "
The point of the deck really is to buff zombies up using the lords
". Everything else are comes from it.
Giving Deathtouch is not a strategy, the focus of your deck is not it, you're not trying to improve the deathtouch here, it is only a bonus. A strategy around it would be giving deathtouch to a creature and put a Lure over it to kill other creatures (for example), in this case, giving deathtouch will be the strategy, you'll be building your deck to reach that goal.
Attacking the opponent creatures with Carnophage and Korlash...attacking is a strategy, attacking with these specific creatures isn't. One is a 1cmc creature, the other is a 4cmc one with different abilities, so they are not related, this not a strategy. PS: you can't attack opponent's creatures, it's up to him decide to block or not, except if you play with creature with the provoke ability.
The same happens for swampwalk, its not your goal, if your creature happen to have it, better, if not, your deck will still fitting its real strategy, which is aggro (beating). Building a deck to give evasion to Bone Dancer and abuse it's ability would be an strategy around evasion.
Just to show you that everything you said after that phrase is not your deck strategy, just what some cards do (and that we all know)
One concern is, how do you deal with cards like enchantments or artifacts? In your deck you can't, and that's why you should improve your support cards, with cards like Duress/Distress
Let's try to fix your deck.
4 Noxious Ghoul: What is the deck strategy: Buffing up creatures with the lords, to improve damage. Does this card comes before the lords to get the pump? No. Does this card improves the damage of your deck? No. Not just that, with 17 lands, you won't get 4 lands out anything before 5-6 turn, so probably a stuck card in your hand.
4 Korlash, Heir to the Blackblade: this card won't effect the other cards, so no damage improvement, then or it produces a huge damage by itself or it doesn't deserve a spot. Let's see:
You're running 17 swamps, so probably you'll have 4 swamps out turn 6-7. By turn 5, if you got stuck into 3 lands, you'll be able to cast lord creatures every turn, so if you opponent manage to remove some of them, and you have only 5 creatures and 2 lords (you can start lords dropping from turn 3), you'll probably be able to deal 20 damage. So a 4 cmc card, that will drop turn 4-7, not effecting other creatures, and being at most a 4/4, when even the smallest creature you'll have by that time will be a 4/4 one, doesn't seems to deserve the spot. Guess we agree with his drop
2 Festering Goblin: What we want? getting fast damage producing pumped by lords. Does it comes before the Lords to ge the pump? YES. Is it the best option zombies can give? No. That is not a clear answer if you're not familiar with zombie cards, than looking for card options is the best way to find it. But right away i can tell you cards like Sarcomancy and Carrion Feeder that on 1 cmc: or do more damage, or gets bigger as the game goes, so doing more damage. So you can see that this card fits the theme, just is not the best option.
4 Duress: remember the card i've mentioned above (Propaganda)? So, to take care of it, there is only one way, taking it from your opponent's hand, and to make this dirty service, you use Duress. Distress is a budget version.
4 Carrion Feeder: i've listed alot of beater on this primer, and the best one for aggros are Sarcomancy, but since i don't know your budget, the second one is Feeder, that pump itself through the time.
4 Night's Whisper: you need to refuel your hand, or your deck will lose steam pretty fast, so this card is kind of needed. Phyrexian Arena is another option.
2 Unholy Grotto: retrieving wasted lords is really nice in a bump lord deck.
That still leave us with 68 cards we must drop 8.
Taking out the Support cards, and the faster drops to get the benefits, it leave us just with the lords to take out: Death Baron, Undead Warchief, Cemetery Reaper, Lord of the Undead and Zombie Master (people, packing all lords is not a strategy, specially if all are at the same cmc...:D)
I guess evasion and not having your creatures killed is kind off necessary in a beating deck (don't get blocked to do all damage), So Zombie Master is in (as a 3-of since multiples into play won't mean anything). Now let's look the other lords:
Undead Warchief (slower but really big pump +2, and makes your deck faster)
Lord of the Undead (+1 and retrieves other lords from grave, and take back wasted removal to clean the path)
Cemetery Reaper (+1 and create tokens)
Death Baron (+1 and deathtouch)
Death Baron: deathtouch is not relevant since destroying the creature won't mean that your creature won't be destroyed, so won't help on damage producing.
A 3/3 vs a 3/3 both will die, even if they don't have deathtouch.
Vs a smaller, won't help either since you'd already kill it.
Vs a bigger one it'd help, but since you have packed up removal, use it those random creatures.
As most of times you won't face bigger creatures, its a non-go.
Cemetery Reaper: amplifying the amount of beaters is always nice, so a maybe go, if there is nothing better.
Lord of the Undead: putting a lord into play is always better then a token, specially when this card can reuse the wasted removals to clean the path of your beaters, so for the same pump, this must stays.
Undead Warchief: +2 and a faster deck in a fast beating strategy is a must go.
I'd recommend: -4 Death Baron and -4 Cemetery Reaper. If you think Warchief is too slow, reap him off, and let the Reaper in, both will work.
That is not what i'm asking, i don't want a card list, what i want to know is, what you want to accomplish, what is your goal? If possible in a word.
1) Aggro: do damage the faster you can
2) Control: hold the board 'til you're able to drop off big stuff
3) Reanimate: revive creatures from your grave to beat
4) Combo: use some combination of cards that wins the game
In fact you said it, just didn't realized because you start to justify other cards inclusions, here is your true answer: "". Everything else are comes from it.
Giving Deathtouch is not a strategy, the focus of your deck is not it, you're not trying to improve the deathtouch here, it is only a bonus. A strategy around it would be giving deathtouch to a creature and put a Lure over it to kill other creatures (for example), in this case, giving deathtouch will be the strategy, you'll be building your deck to reach that goal.
Attacking the opponent creatures with Carnophage and Korlash...attacking is a strategy, attacking with these specific creatures isn't. One is a 1cmc creature, the other is a 4cmc one with different abilities, so they are not related, this not a strategy. PS: you can't attack opponent's creatures, it's up to him decide to block or not, except if you play with creature with the provoke ability.
The same happens for swampwalk, its not your goal, if your creature happen to have it, better, if not, your deck will still fitting its real strategy, which is aggro (beating). Building a deck to give evasion to Bone Dancer and abuse it's ability would be an strategy around evasion.
Just to show you that everything you said after that phrase is not your deck strategy, just what some cards do (and that we all know)
One concern is, how do you deal with cards like enchantments or artifacts? In your deck you can't, and that's why you should improve your support cards, with cards like Duress/Distress
Let's try to fix your deck.
4 Noxious Ghoul: What is the deck strategy: Buffing up creatures with the lords, to improve damage. Does this card comes before the lords to get the pump? No. Does this card improves the damage of your deck? No. Not just that, with 17 lands, you won't get 4 lands out anything before 5-6 turn, so probably a stuck card in your hand.
4 Korlash, Heir to the Blackblade: this card won't effect the other cards, so no damage improvement, then or it produces a huge damage by itself or it doesn't deserve a spot. Let's see:
You're running 17 swamps, so probably you'll have 4 swamps out turn 6-7. By turn 5, if you got stuck into 3 lands, you'll be able to cast lord creatures every turn, so if you opponent manage to remove some of them, and you have only 5 creatures and 2 lords (you can start lords dropping from turn 3), you'll probably be able to deal 20 damage. So a 4 cmc card, that will drop turn 4-7, not effecting other creatures, and being at most a 4/4, when even the smallest creature you'll have by that time will be a 4/4 one, doesn't seems to deserve the spot. Guess we agree with his drop
2 Festering Goblin: What we want? getting fast damage producing pumped by lords. Does it comes before the Lords to ge the pump? YES. Is it the best option zombies can give? No. That is not a clear answer if you're not familiar with zombie cards, than looking for card options is the best way to find it. But right away i can tell you cards like Sarcomancy and Carrion Feeder that on 1 cmc: or do more damage, or gets bigger as the game goes, so doing more damage. So you can see that this card fits the theme, just is not the best option.
4 Duress: remember the card i've mentioned above (Propaganda)? So, to take care of it, there is only one way, taking it from your opponent's hand, and to make this dirty service, you use Duress. Distress is a budget version.
4 Carrion Feeder: i've listed alot of beater on this primer, and the best one for aggros are Sarcomancy, but since i don't know your budget, the second one is Feeder, that pump itself through the time.
4 Night's Whisper: you need to refuel your hand, or your deck will lose steam pretty fast, so this card is kind of needed. Phyrexian Arena is another option.
2 Unholy Grotto: retrieving wasted lords is really nice in a bump lord deck.
That still leave us with 68 cards we must drop 8.
Taking out the Support cards, and the faster drops to get the benefits, it leave us just with the lords to take out: Death Baron, Undead Warchief, Cemetery Reaper, Lord of the Undead and Zombie Master (people, packing all lords is not a strategy, specially if all are at the same cmc...:D)
I guess evasion and not having your creatures killed is kind off necessary in a beating deck (don't get blocked to do all damage), So Zombie Master is in (as a 3-of since multiples into play won't mean anything). Now let's look the other lords:
Undead Warchief (slower but really big pump +2, and makes your deck faster)
Lord of the Undead (+1 and retrieves other lords from grave, and take back wasted removal to clean the path)
Cemetery Reaper (+1 and create tokens)
Death Baron (+1 and deathtouch)
Death Baron: deathtouch is not relevant since destroying the creature won't mean that your creature won't be destroyed, so won't help on damage producing.
A 3/3 vs a 3/3 both will die, even if they don't have deathtouch.
Vs a smaller, won't help either since you'd already kill it.
Vs a bigger one it'd help, but since you have packed up removal, use it those random creatures.
As most of times you won't face bigger creatures, its a non-go.
Cemetery Reaper: amplifying the amount of beaters is always nice, so a maybe go, if there is nothing better.
Lord of the Undead: putting a lord into play is always better then a token, specially when this card can reuse the wasted removals to clean the path of your beaters, so for the same pump, this must stays.
Undead Warchief: +2 and a faster deck in a fast beating strategy is a must go.
I'd recommend: -4 Death Baron and -4 Cemetery Reaper. If you think Warchief is too slow, reap him off, and let the Reaper in, both will work.
Hope being helpful, not just showing up a list, but explaining the reasons.
he could use sign in blood instead of the wisper. the ability to burn an opponent is definitely good in aggro. oh and tendrils? he looks like he's vulnerable to burn with his card advantage hurting him.
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Creatures 39
Scorcery 4
3 Yoke of the damned
4 terror
Lands 22
I realize that there is a lot of creatures in the deck at 39. The only other kind of scorcery I would think of adding would be something along the lines of a Terror. At the moment the deck is sitting at 68 cards which is not too bad, but I would like to get it to 60. IF anyone has any suggestions about it please feel free
1) Zombie Master's abilities do not stack like the other zombie lords, so consider making him a 2-3 of instead of 4.
2) Try subbing out Yoke of the Damned for some Nameless Inversion to work with your Lord of the Undead for more consistent creature control.
3) Try adding some control via Duress/Distress and/or consider some card draw engines (i.e. Grave Defiler, Graveborn Muse) to better utilize Korlash, Noxious Ghoul, Warchief's etc.
4) Check out the sticky Zombie Primer at the top of the Casual page!
Good luck!
I went ahead and reduced the number of Zombie Master to 2 instead of 4.
I also went ahead and added 4 terror as well as still looking into the graveborn muse and distress. I think there both good cards however not sure how I would make room for them to fit
Also, if you want to thin out your deck, its quite possible that you will have to remove some of the lords. Maybe stromgald crusader, though I understand how useful he is, being anti-flying and all.
Feel free to look at my deck, which seems similar to yours.
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=170566
The point of the deck really is to buff zombies up using the lords etc while giving them all death touch with death baron. Attacking the opponent with creatures such as carnophage and korlash etc. Having a zombie master out and the Urborg legendary land will give all zombies swampwalk aswell.
Scorcery 4
3 Yoke of the damned
3 terror
Lands 22
Heres a bit of an updated list, I took out the 4 Carnophage and bumped up the Festering Goblin count to 4. I also added 4 Maggot carrierand removed 1 terror and 1 Stromgald Crusader
I am very reluctant to take out and of the Korlash, Heir To Blackblade simply for his grandeur ability, I am able to search for 2 swamps and put them into play? Thats pretty good and could really help with the mana curve I think, or am I wrong here?
Call to the Grave might be an interesting add, I know that when I play it, just about everyone scrambles to kill it.
If you want to go the swampwalk route, I would put more Urborg in, and keep zombie master at 4. Maybe look at Zombie Trailblazer if you'd rather not have that many non-mana-producing lands. If I had either Zombie Trailblazer or Urborg, I would seriously consider that.
Also, Gempalm should be at 4. You have enough creatures that that shouldn't even be a question. It is an excellent card, and a game winner. Combo it with Lord of the Undead or Unholy Grotto, and you can devastate life totals each turn WHILE drawing cards.
If I were to add 4 Zombie trailblazer which cards would you remove? And what is your thoughts on Yoke of the damned ? that paired with a terror can be quite devastating. I Would like to have the deck at about 60 cards but 65 or so will work I suppose,
That also puts you down to 62 cards, from 64. What to remove after that comes down to what your local decks look like. What do you face a lot of? I would be crazy to take out Stromgald Crusader (If I had any) because of the large amount of flying decks I face. If a lot of my games go pretty late, I value noxious ghoul for his ability to control. If I face a lot of aggro decks, I would value my low mana cost creatures, but just enough to let me survive until the zombie buffing takes effect and the control starts.
What would I do, in your position? I would take out two maggot carriers, and believe that 6 1-drops would be enough. That would put you to 60.
That is not what i'm asking, i don't want a card list, what i want to know is, what you want to accomplish, what is your goal? If possible in a word.
1) Aggro: do damage the faster you can
2) Control: hold the board 'til you're able to drop off big stuff
3) Reanimate: revive creatures from your grave to beat
4) Combo: use some combination of cards that wins the game
In fact you said it, just didn't realized because you start to justify other cards inclusions, here is your true answer: " ". Everything else are comes from it.
Giving Deathtouch is not a strategy, the focus of your deck is not it, you're not trying to improve the deathtouch here, it is only a bonus. A strategy around it would be giving deathtouch to a creature and put a Lure over it to kill other creatures (for example), in this case, giving deathtouch will be the strategy, you'll be building your deck to reach that goal.
Attacking the opponent creatures with Carnophage and Korlash...attacking is a strategy, attacking with these specific creatures isn't. One is a 1cmc creature, the other is a 4cmc one with different abilities, so they are not related, this not a strategy. PS: you can't attack opponent's creatures, it's up to him decide to block or not, except if you play with creature with the provoke ability.
The same happens for swampwalk, its not your goal, if your creature happen to have it, better, if not, your deck will still fitting its real strategy, which is aggro (beating). Building a deck to give evasion to Bone Dancer and abuse it's ability would be an strategy around evasion.
Just to show you that everything you said after that phrase is not your deck strategy, just what some cards do (and that we all know)
One concern is, how do you deal with cards like enchantments or artifacts? In your deck you can't, and that's why you should improve your support cards, with cards like Duress/Distress
Let's try to fix your deck.
4 Noxious Ghoul: What is the deck strategy: Buffing up creatures with the lords, to improve damage. Does this card comes before the lords to get the pump? No. Does this card improves the damage of your deck? No. Not just that, with 17 lands, you won't get 4 lands out anything before 5-6 turn, so probably a stuck card in your hand.
4 Korlash, Heir to the Blackblade: this card won't effect the other cards, so no damage improvement, then or it produces a huge damage by itself or it doesn't deserve a spot. Let's see:
You're running 17 swamps, so probably you'll have 4 swamps out turn 6-7. By turn 5, if you got stuck into 3 lands, you'll be able to cast lord creatures every turn, so if you opponent manage to remove some of them, and you have only 5 creatures and 2 lords (you can start lords dropping from turn 3), you'll probably be able to deal 20 damage. So a 4 cmc card, that will drop turn 4-7, not effecting other creatures, and being at most a 4/4, when even the smallest creature you'll have by that time will be a 4/4 one, doesn't seems to deserve the spot. Guess we agree with his drop
2 Festering Goblin: What we want? getting fast damage producing pumped by lords. Does it comes before the Lords to ge the pump? YES. Is it the best option zombies can give? No. That is not a clear answer if you're not familiar with zombie cards, than looking for card options is the best way to find it. But right away i can tell you cards like Sarcomancy and Carrion Feeder that on 1 cmc: or do more damage, or gets bigger as the game goes, so doing more damage. So you can see that this card fits the theme, just is not the best option.
3 Yoke of the Damned: bad removal, there are tons of better ones: Smother, Snuff Out, Nameless Inversion, Doom Blade (M10 stuff), Last Gasp...just pick up any
1 Swamp: to add a cool land.
What to add?
4 Duress: remember the card i've mentioned above (Propaganda)? So, to take care of it, there is only one way, taking it from your opponent's hand, and to make this dirty service, you use Duress. Distress is a budget version.
4 Carrion Feeder: i've listed alot of beater on this primer, and the best one for aggros are Sarcomancy, but since i don't know your budget, the second one is Feeder, that pump itself through the time.
4 Night's Whisper: you need to refuel your hand, or your deck will lose steam pretty fast, so this card is kind of needed. Phyrexian Arena is another option.
2 Unholy Grotto: retrieving wasted lords is really nice in a bump lord deck.
That still leave us with 68 cards we must drop 8.
Taking out the Support cards, and the faster drops to get the benefits, it leave us just with the lords to take out: Death Baron, Undead Warchief, Cemetery Reaper, Lord of the Undead and Zombie Master (people, packing all lords is not a strategy, specially if all are at the same cmc...:D)
I guess evasion and not having your creatures killed is kind off necessary in a beating deck (don't get blocked to do all damage), So Zombie Master is in (as a 3-of since multiples into play won't mean anything). Now let's look the other lords:
Undead Warchief (slower but really big pump +2, and makes your deck faster)
Lord of the Undead (+1 and retrieves other lords from grave, and take back wasted removal to clean the path)
Cemetery Reaper (+1 and create tokens)
Death Baron (+1 and deathtouch)
Death Baron: deathtouch is not relevant since destroying the creature won't mean that your creature won't be destroyed, so won't help on damage producing.
A 3/3 vs a 3/3 both will die, even if they don't have deathtouch.
Vs a smaller, won't help either since you'd already kill it.
Vs a bigger one it'd help, but since you have packed up removal, use it those random creatures.
As most of times you won't face bigger creatures, its a non-go.
Cemetery Reaper: amplifying the amount of beaters is always nice, so a maybe go, if there is nothing better.
Lord of the Undead: putting a lord into play is always better then a token, specially when this card can reuse the wasted removals to clean the path of your beaters, so for the same pump, this must stays.
Undead Warchief: +2 and a faster deck in a fast beating strategy is a must go.
I'd recommend: -4 Death Baron and -4 Cemetery Reaper. If you think Warchief is too slow, reap him off, and let the Reaper in, both will work.
So your deck should be:
02 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
02 Unholy Grotto
14 Swamp
// CREATURES (26)
04 Carrion Feeder
04 Carnophage
04 Stromgald Crusader
04 Lord of the Undead
04 Undead Warchief
03 Zombie Master
03 Gempalm Polluter
04 Dark Ritual
04 Duress
04 Nameless Inversion
04 Night's Whisper
Hope being helpful, not just showing up a list, but explaining the reasons.
he could use sign in blood instead of the wisper. the ability to burn an opponent is definitely good in aggro. oh and tendrils? he looks like he's vulnerable to burn with his card advantage hurting him.