Sideboard


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What's in your head, in your head?

Zombie, Zombie, Zombie-ie-ie, oh

This deck is based around abusing recursive creatures and spells while using hand disruption in order to take apart our opponent's gameplan and get ahead. Originally was a Zombie tribal list, but as the meta shifted the deck became too slow. However, since zombies are my favorite creature type, I wanted to keep them as the core part of the creature base.

The Creatures

  • Gravecrawler great one drop, its recursive, 2 power aggressive body, has zombie synergy with Cryptbreaker, and a great card to discard into the grave.

  • Cryptbreaker adds so much in the form of utility to the deck, it creates tokens by discarding unneeded spells or recursive creatures into the yard and serves as a draw engine.

  • Bloodghast basically a Gravecrawler that gains haste when we have the opponent on the ropes and is easier to recur. However, It loses out on Zombie synergy.

  • Tidehollow Sculler hand hate on a stick that also is a zombie, will often be crewing since we don't want it to die through combat.

  • Smuggler's Copter 3/3 flier that can be crewed by any creature, yum. Its looting effect works wonders with all the recursive cards we can discard, so it's basically like drawing a free card.

The Spells

  • Collective Brutality great two-drop spell with many modes of application. Its hand disruption, a kill spell, and life drain all in one. Plus, with its escalate being: discard a card, it is a quick way to fill the grave.

Lands

  • Mutavault adds to the aggression of the deck, can crew, swing in, and is a zombie as well so it can recur both Gravecrawler and Bloodghast

  • Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth ensures we hit multiple black mana sources more consistently and makes the utility lands less of a liability.

  • Vault of the Archangel gives our small creatures the ability to trade with much larger threats while giving us some life gain.

The Sideboard

  • Surgical Extraction great tool against combo, coupled with the hand hate in the mainboard, it allows us to make sure an opponent's threats are dealt with permanently. Also hates on Graveyard heavy decks, such as Dredge or Hollow One, by picking off certain key pieces.

  • Drown in Sorrow helps against decks that can swarm around us, or hit threats that can't be targeted. the scry is also useful.

  • Bontu's Last Reckoning is a cheap and effective sweeper, after testing Damnation and Wrath of God were too slow for the deck, often it would get stuc on three mana. So, Bontus is here to wipe the board against heavily agressive decks such as Humans.

  • Damping Sphere hate for Tron, Storm, and KCI.

  • Disenchant destroys Rest in Peace which is the most common hate card against this deck, as well as destroying other forms of graveyard hate. Hurts Boggles, Affinity, and Hollow One as well

  • Stony Silence Hates on Affinity, Tron, Lantern, KCI, and shuts off Aether Vial.

  • Anguished Unmaking more removal that can hit more than just creatures, mostly here for planeswalkers, looking at you Karn and Ugin.

  • Nihil Spellbomb here to counter other graveyard decks, which are a few thanks to Hollow One, Vengevine, and Living End being around. also takes away targets for flashback against control.

  • Tocatli Honor Guard and Torpor Orb do the same thing and are here to help with the Humans matchup since it has heavily infested the local meta. They work by shutting off the multiple ETBs that give Human creatures their value.

Upgrades

Looking into making room for Liliana, the Last Hope or Liliana of the Veil, if the funds allow for it. Looking into adding sweepers into the sideboard for Humans and other similar matchups, since with our recursion wiping our field isn't much of a big deal. Also looking into adding in more fetch lands. With Death Barron's reprinting and my use of him in standard, I've been thinking of adding him into the sideboard to help against decks that play larger threats than ours.

Previous Write Up

The Zombies

I've loved zombies since I first started playing magic, so I decided that my modern deck should use them as the core creature base. The Zombie Base is nice since they are mostly low cost creatures that are resilient to opponent interaction and have tribal synergy.

Gravecrawler: great one drop that is resilient to removal, its a 2 power creature on turn one which is nice. It also has some nice interactions with the other pieces in the deck

Cryptbreaker: Also a great one drop that adds a lot of utility, you can dump bad draws into making a 2/2 zombie, and it gives card draw as well to give an advantage when matches become grindy or stall.

Tidehollow Sculler: Hand disruption on a stick that has some cute interactions with its trigger, if you kill this creature with its ability on the stack the targeted card is exiled indefinitely. Also forces opponents to waste removal on it instead of on deadlier threats if they want the exiled card back.

Relentless Dead: A 2/2 zombie with menace is nice especially when it has recursion and can trade with 2 blockers and then come back. It also has the added benefit of being able to recur another zombie from the grave. Overall great value.

Diregraf Colossus: Great card on curve, in the mid-game, or as a top deck. While being a three mana 2/2 isn't that great, it gains value on the curve by creating a swarm of zombies on subsequent turns. Later on in the game, it can come down as a giant body that can swing in for lethal.

Plague Belcher: A 5/4 body with Menace that comes down on turn three is amazing, and its ETB trigger synergizes well with all of the recursive creatures. Also when the zombies crash with defenders or die to attackers, Belcher can chip through with its anthem effect. The anthem effect in combination with zombie's recursion dissuades opponents from wiping board. It is also a nice clock especially with the chip it can provide.

Geralf's Messenger: Geralf's Messenger is kinda like a really big Gravecrawler, except its recursion is limited, but in exchange it pings for 2 when it enters the field. Undying makes trading and sacrificing this creature that much more appealing, and less appealing to remove. It also supplies this deack with some much needed reach, as it has no burn.

Death Baron: The only lord in the deck, mostly because this deck isn't trying to race and go wide with beefed up tokens. Instead, the reason for this lord is the Deathtouch that enables favorable trades with the addition of zombie's recursion, which allows this deck to rebuild more quickly than the opposition.

The Spells

The spells in this deck give it adequate interaction with the enemy's creatures, but also interact heavily with their hands. The aim is to take apart their game plan by discarding their on curve plays, or eliminating their win conditions.

Fatal Push: Removal, what more can I say.

Path to Exile: Removal for what Push can't hit. Both of these together make an excelent removal package.

Surgical Extraction: a vital spell in certain matchups, like Tron and Storm, since it can completely destroy an opponent's game plan. Thoughtseize or an Inquisition of Kozilek help Surgical Extraction greatly as they allow problem cards to be dumped into the grave yard for easy extraction.

Thoughtseize: Best hand disruption we have.

Inquisition of Kozilek: Rounds out the hand disruption, best played after a Tidehollow Sculler or a Thoughtseize to make sure it doesn't go to waste.

Liliana, the Last Hope: The only Planeswalker in the deck, all her abilities are relevant. She adds removal, can sac off a Gravecrawler to enable some interactions, can add in more recursion, or dump zombies into the grave for Diregraf Colossus, and her last ability wins the game with a swarm of tokens.

The Lands

I'll go over the zesty lands, the rest are there for a consistent mana base even with the sideboard options. Also 22 lands to hit 3 lands consistently enough and to not flood our hands with lands.

Westvale Abbey  : this is in just to flip it and swing in with Ormendahl for the win. Works well with all the zombies the deck can produce and is another sac outlet for Plague Belcher's effect.

Vault of the Archangel: this gives life gain and more Deathtouch, which helps break through board stalls and gives the deck more value when it trades. Great against go wide decks, aggro and burn.

Mutavault: when all else is gone Mutavault can still swing in for the win, also its a tribal deck so why not.

Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth: there are quite a few double black, and triple black cards so this helps the deck run more smoothly.

The Sideboard

The sideboard is mostly hate board for the current meta at the shop I play at.

Nihil Spellbomb: Counters other graveyard heavy decks, but its mostly here to shut down Storm. It also gives some card draw.

Stony Silence: for Affinity, Lantern Control, and to stop certain Tron variants from cracking prisms. Also stops Relic of Progenitus and other pesky artifacts.

Disenchant: for Boggles and Blood Moon, Chalice of the Void, Grafdigger's Cage, Rest in Peace, Aether Vial, Ensnaring Bridge and other artifacts and enchantments that screw us.

Hero's Downfall : more removal doesn't hurt especially when it kills off Karn Liberated, Ugin, the Spirit Dragon, or Liliana of the Veil.

Wrath of God: Mostly for go wide decks or aggro decks that can't rebuild fast enough. Also a cute kill move with Plague Belcher on the field. Will change with more testing, as it is very rarely sideboarded in.

Ghost Quarter: destroying value lands is nice, especially against Jund's duals, Tron lands, utility lands, and man lands like Inkmoth Nexus. Will be replaced with Fulminator Mage when the funds arrive.

Suggestions

Updates Add

Took out Blood Scriveners in order to add in the removal and hand disruption in from the sideboard. Scrivener was nice when it worked and gave a lot of advantage, but was often a dead card in hand or unnecessary to get the win. still testing so I may bring them back in as a two of.

Bontu's Last Reckoning is added in as a cheap sweeper, whose downside is mitigated by the deck's natural recursion. Still unsure if I should run as a two of and take out the Drown in Sorrow. Tocatli Honor Gaurd and Torpor Orb are added in tho help against humans, by taking away the deck's numerous ETBs.

Comments

Casual

94% Competitive

Top Ranked
  • Achieved #64 position overall 6 years ago
Date added 6 years
Last updated 6 years
Exclude colors URG
Legality

This deck is Modern legal.

Rarity (main - side)

3 - 1 Mythic Rares

34 - 8 Rares

19 - 3 Uncommons

0 - 3 Commons

Cards 60
Avg. CMC 1.56
Tokens Spirit 1/1 W, Zombie 2/2 B
Folders Modern Decks, Modern Things, MODERN ZOMBIE, zombies
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