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'The flesh of the dead obey my whims'

Commander / EDH Budget Mono-Black Sacrifice Zombie

SniperFrog


Maybeboard


Zombie Tribal on a budget.

With a necromantic horde at your fingertips, take control of the game with bodies that can continuously garner value over time. Key pieces like Gray Merchant of Asphodel, Gravecrawler, Graveborn Muse, Cryptbreaker, Diregraf Colossus, Tomb Tyrant, Warren Soultrader and Undead Augur keep us in the game or combo into overwhelming advantage, ensuring victory in more fair ways. While soultrader is here with gravecrawler, there are no drain effects in the list, so it's hardly infinite. Still very powerful, though.

Liliana, Heretical Healer   is an excellent commander for the list, granting a repeatable reanimation spell from the zone. Alternately, Tormod, the Desecrator is also an excellent option if you want a more tribal based commander, though I would personally cut the Lily from the 99 seeing as she isn't a zombie.

Removal is pretty robust, though we miss out on the low price Toxic Deluge after it's recent reprint. Bontu's Last Reckoning is a fair replacement, though obviously worse. Noxious Ghoul, Accursed Marauder and Fleshbag Marauder provide some removal attached to putrid flesh, so they find places here as well. I'm currently considering bringing in another sweeper, but I haven't decided which ones I really like yet.

Reanimation is a major engine for our value train. Altar of Bhaal, Victimize, Unearth, Dread Return, Patriarch's Bidding and Chthonian Nightmare all do excellent work for us here. Chthonian Nightmare and Altar of Bhaal specifically have been outstanding engines.

Ramping is easy with a bunch of rocks, though I might add one or two more.

Typical games go one of two ways:

Cast unassuming creatures until you mill over something like Bridge from Below.

Win the game.

Or:

Cast a bunch of spells, garnering value and advantage via filling the graveyard.

Lose to graveyard hate. lol.

This deck is weak to static graveyard removal a la Rest in Peace, Planar Void, etc. With only a single Feed the Swarm in our arsenal to answer these sorts of spells, we will struggle to win those sorts of matchups. That's the nature of this sort of graveyard based strategy, which is something I rather enjoy.

Thanks for taking the time to look at the list. Let me know if you have any suggestions, though most cards over four or five bucks probably won't be considered unless they're cracked.

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95% Casual

Competitive

Revision 31 See all

(49 minutes ago)

+1 Crypt of Agadeem main
+1 Dread Summons maybe
+1 Embalmer's Tools main
+1 Into the Pit maybe
+1 Returned Reveler main
+1 Wailing Ghoul main
Top Ranked
Date added 2 years
Last updated 13 minutes
Legality

This deck is Commander / EDH legal.

Rarity (main - side)

20 - 0 Rares

25 - 0 Uncommons

28 - 0 Commons

Cards 100
Avg. CMC 2.41
Tokens 1/1 B Token Creature Zombie Goblin, Clue, Energy Reserve, Squirrel 1/1 G, Treasure, Zombie 2/2 B, Zombie Army 0/0 B
Folders Decks to try, Mono Black Decks, Budget Decks, Commander/EDH
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