Deadly_Walrus: What I would recommend would be to organize the deck-list by Price, then cut all of the $20 and over cards, and most of the $5-$20 cards. I plan on posting a budget list sometime soon, but that would be a good place to start! More the 60% of the value of my list is in the 10 most expensive cards. The beauty of this deck is that there really are no "Auto-include" expensive card.

Ok thanks!

Hi, I happened to build a similar Scarab deck and I can offer few tips from my experience with my playgroup.

First of all, as you mentioned, mana acceleration is very important as dimir doesnt have many natural ways to ramp. Aside from mana rocks, I found Solemn Simulacrum and Burnished Hart surprisingly effective. They are great targets for eternelizing later. I prefer them to some lesser mana rocks as those can be destroyed.

I also agree that counterspells can be the key, you are missing two very important ones: Stubborn Denial is basically one-mana Negate in the deck. Muddle the Mixture can be 2-mana Swan Song but it can find your Rings, Mindcrank or Cyclonic Rift. You really want cheap counterspells as you want to spell most of your mana eternelizing. Psychic Strike might seem sweet (ran it initially) but it can be very underwhelming.

Shriekmaw and Mulldrifter the effect is too strong to ignore, they generate great value early and can be used in the lategame with our general.

Fleshbag Marauder should be autoinclude. It's a zombie and it puts creatures in opponents' graveyards which is what we really want here. Same goes for Sheoldred, Whispering One. I also like Stronghold Assassin especially when paired with Relentless Dead. Siren of the Silent Song is also surprisingly fun. Vengeful Pharaoh is worth considering too. Its pseudo prison card and you can kill their best attacker and convert it to your side. Lastly, Evil Twin is also nice value, kills the cloned creature, you reanimate it, then reanimate Twin, kill another creature next turn, reanimate. Pure value.

As for other spells, I kinda like Memory Plunder since you mill your opponents quite a lot. Imagine resolving say Cruel Ultimatum or In Garruk's Wake at instant speed for 4 mana. I also value Pull from Tomorrow highly.

So those are my two cents, hope it helps with the deck.

As for the cards you already play, I would have some candidates for a cut. Rooftop Storm is pretty weak card, especially since you play under 20 zombies. Not worth 7 mana to play 3-4 cmc zombie for free. Paradox Haze seems nice but usually you dont have that much Zombies in play for it to matter (and if you do your opponents are doing something wrong :-)) Endless Ranks of Dead seems also sweet but for it to be relevant you would really have to overextend which usually results in boardwipe.

With such low zombie count I really don't think Gisa and Geralf are that great in the deck, I would rather play Havengul Lich which can cast any creature from ANY graveyard and its also a zombie. Honestly I cut all 4-mana lords, leaving ony 3-mana ones. But it really depends how deep you want to invest into the tribal theme. Right now I am experimenting with Liliana's Reaver and Evil Twin in that slot.

@mikeintosh your Endless Ranks of the Dead link leads to a deck instead of the card itself. This isn't important in this situation since the card is in his deck, but in the future, instead of just putting endless ranks of the dead in brackets, use card:endless ranks of the dead in brackets to lead 100% to the card itself

mikeintosh: Fantastic Suggestions! I kind of want to make a list of cards that would go great in this deck, because it really is crazy! I always get 10 or so suggestions to add, but only like 2 or 3 cards that I could cut. I think I could make my list a bit more competitive by stepping back from the zombie lords, but I think they add I very viable wincon to the deck. Solemn Simulacrum and Burnished Hart do make very interesting suggestions. Sheoldred, Whispering One, and all the great cards with ETB abilities are very interesting... it is very tempting to lose some of my zombie flavor and go deeper into the control side with this deck... It just proves my past point, that there are so many different ways to build this deck! I have not played my list enough yet to see how much I need to tweak it. (I finish my bachelor's degree in 10 weeks... then I will have MUCH more free time!!!)

I have a Fleshbag Marauder on the way, I like getting the earliest print of a card, if not to extensive. I like the rustic feel it gives to this deck, even if they have newer reprints.

I REALLY REALLY like Memory Plunder!!! It is very situational of course, but is SO dang funny! Pull from Tomorrow might be going in too!

The problem I see here is that most of the cards I am thinking about taking out are my creatures, and I am not to sure if I am ready to step away from a zombie tribal. I will just have to play it out more and see how it goes!

Card that I am thinking about cutting (Potentially):

• Chromatic Lantern
• Nim Deathmantle
• Rooftop Storm
• Dictate of Erebos
• Risen Executioner
• Psychic Strike
• Overseer of the Damned??? (His cmc pains me every time...)
• One Land

I would keep Overseer, it has both power and flavor :)

But I agree with all other mentioned cards. Also maybe Vedalken Orrery (you can at least play Layline for free), Rite of Replication and both Entomb and Buried Alive (they are combo enablers rather than value cards) Also Paradox Haze is a candidate for a cut, in your deck it is very non-political card and it paints target on you. And finally, Endless Ranks of Dead as I mentioned in my last post.

As for card type counts, I wouldn't go below 37 lands, you really want to hit them consistently, mana screw is your worst enemy. Concerning creatures, I play around 30 (32 in my current build). I don't want to rely on my opponents' graveyards so I like to have good portion of my own threats. Hope it helps

Please correct me: Paradox Haze means double life Lost for everybody by Scarab God? I think thats not a great idea for a cut?

@man1ac Dont get me wrong, its not a bad card per say. It looks great on paper, but there are few troubles with that:

1) You have to overextend for the drain to be significant. Which usually forces a boardwipe.

2) Does nothing when you dont have your commander out. And yes, your opponents will hate a lot on your general.

3) If you have enough zombies and this in play, you are playing alone against the whole table. Its the same problem as with Doubling Season. Sweet card but terrible card politically. And Commander is a lot about politics.

4) It can backfire, say theres Sheoldred in play.

But sure, it can work for you, it all depends on your meta but I made the cut early on and honestly there never was a moment where I wished for a second upkeep. Just my two cents.

I only made it through about half the comments so sorry if its been mentioned but would a card like Misthollow Griffin be fun here?

When you use the gods ability on it you get a 4/4 flier for four and can then cast the card again from exile.... nearly never ending 4/4 and 3/3 fliers doesn't seem too bad?

I do agree with a good bunch of your cut considerations

Chromatic Lantern: I agree on this cut, it is a very nice and good card, but is better used in decks with 3-5 colours for it to really have value. How often do you begin a game with a hand that isn't able to produce both blue or/and black mana in this deck, you have lots of dual coloured lands so my guess is not that often :)

Risen Executioner: Its not really the best zombie lord, the +1/+1 is nice, but it cant block and the ability to play it from the graveyard is too big of a mana cost since your grave will have a good amount of creatures, especially from board wipes, it is commander after all. So yeah, propably the first thing to cut. Maybe add Patriarch's Bidding as it cost 1 more mana but return all your zombies which might be better when you have 5 mana available.

Nim Deathmantle: Its abilities is pretty expensive, 6 mana to even use an equipment is quite a lot if not the equiment is game changing, and it does not really seem that gamechanging, its a nice effect and nice to have reanimation, but there is already a good amount of reanimation and your commander benefits from your graveyard as well as the other players graveyard, and it makes them zombies and might buff them up to a 4/4 for only 4 mana and is on a stick, so it is a fine pick to cut. If you put in Noxious Ghoul in the deck at some point, it might be worth since it will protect your commander or one of the other 5 non-zombies you have.

Rooftop Storm: I am a little against cutting this one, i have not playtested this deck so have not seen how it performs. I understand that it has a high CMC, and you will rarely have that many zombies in your hand for this to have an strong effect. But if you end cutting a little more non-creatures and add some more zombies, it might be good to keep in. You do only have 17/18 zombies so i see the reason of maybe cutting it, but maybe it just the fact of free zombies that makes one want to keep it.

Dictate of Erebos: Same effect as Grave Pact but with flash and 1 more in CMC, depends on how useful Grave Pact is, and for me 5 mana and a flash card seem a bit expensive, even though you probably have a good amount of lands untapped. But Leyline of Anticipation and Vedalken Orrery will give Grave Pact flash. It really comes down to if the effect is worth having 2 card slot taking the up the same affect to make sure you get it.

Psychic Strike: Its nice for a counterspell to mill an opponent since it ups your commanders target for eternalize effect, but for a counterspell it seems a bit weak, and other cards might have a bigger impact.

Overseer of the Damned: Too expensive, completely agree. Combos well with Grave Pact, but tapping out 7 mana for this effect is saddening since it will likely be a big target the second it comes out. And if you draw it early game it feels like a set back, even though you will scry away from it very quickly.

One Land: How is your experience with you mana availibilty? You have a 3.08 Average CMC which is a bit but nicely low for a zombie deck, might be another reason to cut Rooftop Storm. The most common and spread mana base for a commander deck is 46 mana sources (38 lands and 8 accelerants) You have 36 lands and 7 accelerants, so a bit less. It might work but for me it seems like it should rather have an extra land instead of cutting one :) But if yuo want to cut one, i have a hard time seeing how good Winding Canyons is in this deck.

But these are all my considerations on your possible cuts.

Been playtesting a lot and made already some changes which were suggested here:

Dreamborn Muse : Awesome card, even lategame just awesome. The mill is exactly what you need and even with a lot of GY hate there will always be stuff to exile an get back.

Illusionist's Bracers: Dropped Rings for this one cause it comes for free and often is forgotten because its just an Equipment. For me the cheaper and suprisinigly stronger card.

Shepherd of Rot: Had him online but he only puts a clock on the game cause I will drain myself with. Lost 2 games because of him because of some crazy Creature Pump on the other side with added up with my Shepherd. Went for Noxious Ghoul instead.

Bloodchief Ascension: In combination with Dreamborn Muse brutal card, ou will need a Counterspell for both to keep them alive a little bit. Can win games a little bit dirty but for the fun for it I will play it as long is I am allowed in my playgroup :D

Grave Pact and Dictate of Erebos : Really like both, they make the game quite fun because having a sac outlet means some sort of removal.

And totally agree on Fleshbag Marauder - but I only like him at max turn 5. Otherwise they will be stuff there that people won't mind sacing (Tokens)

In my opinion the deck needs at least 2-3 cards of direct card removal to get little more control over the overall board situation. Mutilate / Go for the Throat // Barter in Blood may be worth a shot?

@man1ac Nice observations. I came mostly to same concluisons. I have been tuning my deck yesterday based on some games we had with our playgroup recently.

Totally agree on targeted removal. Myself, I prefer Pongify, Snuff Out (free removal so more mana to use the God) and Curtains' Call (as it takes out two creatures unconditionaly. Some other observations I had:

1) You may end up playing against spell decks, had a hard time playing against Glissa and combo Hanna, Ship's Navigator. both reccuring artifacts and enchantments from the graveyard. So you need a beatdown plan and also gravehate for other than creatures. Therefore I added Withered Wretch

2) Vengeful Pharaoh is better than Propaganda, let people know you have it in your graveyard, they will likely attack elsewhere

3) Muddle the Mixture is just perfect card. And if you transmute, go for Cyclonic Rift

4) Crypt Ghast seems to underperform. you almost never wanna to play him T4 and its instant target once its out. Rather settle for Cabal Coffers, replaced with Notion Thief

5) Dont forget Bloodchief Ascension plus Mindcrank is an infinite combo. Had to take it out due to our playgroups tier rules

6) Memory Plunder continues to impress. Played Toxic Deluge in opponents combat phase or Krosan Grip to take out a combo piece I wouldnt be otherwise able to ged rid of. This card is an all-star in the deck.

I builded a black zombie a while ago but I justed openned The Scarab God so I was thinking to build a deck around it.

Chromatic Lantern is kinda useless in a two color deck. For the same mana cost, I would go for Phyrexian Altar instead.

If you look closely, Phyrexian Altar + Diregraf Colossus + Gravecrawler = Infini token or Infini mana, add a Skullclamp and draw your deck or Bitter Ordeal to exile opponent library... you get so many possibility with Phyrexian Altar and Gravecrawler.

I am VERY impressed with all of the suggestions! The problem that I am facing with this deck is how many ways there is to build and play it!!! Although you can easily cut most/all zombie lords and just focus everything on The Scarab God's ability, that is not what I am trying to do in this build quite yet. This list can win without him in play, with a horde of zombies. However, this does not mean other versions of this deck are not viable! I am just giving this tribal thing a try before I make any crazy changes.

mikeintosh: I ended up cutting Overseer of the Damned... it is pretty cool card, but 7cmc was often to much. There is better removal for less. It is a really cool card though.

Paradox Haze just wins, hands down. After much playtest, it is here to stay.I am almost never upset with drawing it, and a card that says "remove me now, or I win" is a dang good card if you ask me!

LittleBlueHero - Thank you for the comment and the upvote! Misthollow Griffin is great in this deck, but falls under that category of non-tribal cards that this list is not quite ready to play.

Odysseus_97, mikeintosh and man1ac: Thank you SO much for the well throughout comments to my update! I weighed them heavily as I did this update! You guys are truly amazing for taking the time out to write so much on this list! What are your thoughts on my final changes???

TDK: You are totally right about Phyrexian Altar. Once I get a copy, and find room for it, it will be in here!

Like all the changes. Your average CMC is very efficient now. It's inspiring me to consider some changes to my deck.

I agree that burnished hart and Solemn would be great in here. For potential cuts: how effective is Gisa and Geralf in here? Also, maybe talisman of dominance if you're looking to swap one ramp card for another.

Congrats on being the highest Zombie EDH deck! :)

MegaMatt13: My Avg CMC is even better then you might think, because Curtains' Call and Gempalm Polluter are not really 6cmc when you think about it, which leave only Grave Titan, Mikaeus, the Unhallowed and Rooftop Storm at 6cmc in the deck. I top off with Army of the Damned of course, but that is way to good to remove!

There has been some discussion about removing Rooftop Storm, but it has done VERY good in my experience. My hand is OFTEN full because of all my draw, as well as my opting to use The Scarab God's reanimate instead of casting spells. Rooftop Storm allows me to save many for that ability, which really is a big deal in this deck! I am running 20 zombies, which seems like enough to keep it in.

Daedalus19876: Thanks man! The Scarab God has really allowed for tribal zombies to really be a power-house in commander. Both Grimgrin, Corpse-Born and Gisa and Geralf are good, but they have nothing on the power level of The Scarab God!!!

TDK: OMG, i know its stupid but had to comment on how great of a suggestion cutting Chromatic Lantern for Phyrexian Altar is, just wow. Opens up combos and still serves the mana purpose, just thumbs up man.

VexenX : First of all, congratulations on the best zombie EDH deck on tappedout, you deserve it for putting this much work into it :) And i am also going to build one zombie deck with scarab god, it might be an exact copy of this deck, why mess with the formula ;). Love the amount of zombies, not to many but not to few, great token abilities, not only clean 2/2 zombies but zombie token with abilities :D And can win without its commander which is so nice to be able to do either through draining life, milling or just smash them in the face with zombies.

Now on your recent update.

First of all Phyrexian Altar, im glad to see you adding it soon, it goes so well with Gravecrawler and unlocks so many combos, most have already been posted but my list is over 20 combos with the two of them, crazy. And with The Scarab God Scry ability, you will find those two so freaking fast.

Chromatic Lantern out for Damnation: Agree, Not that useful in 2 colours, you will rarely start with mono coloured mana in your hand. Damnation is a great boardwipe, and there should always be included board wipes in EDH decks, and as you mention it fills the grave. There is still the Zombie friendly board wipe with Noxious Ghoul you could consider if you think about replacing a zombie.

Overseer of the Damned out for Fleshbag Marauder: Sad to see Overseer of the Damned go, it such a good card, but because of the CMC it just doesn't work. It is very expensive and not a zombie which also takes it a bit down. Fleshbag Marauder on the other hand is a zombie, removes more than Overseer of the Damned on the enter the battlefield effect, even though you dont get to choose, but playing it early will not often give other players a choice :)

Risen Executioner out for Undead Alchemist: Great swap. Risen Executioner as you say is the most expensive and worst lord. Completely agree on the arguments about Undead Alchemist, if only the exile had just let them stay in the graveyeard it would have been nuts. But it is still powering up your commanders triggered ability which seem more mana friendly than the activated ability, and a bit more healthy for you being one step ahead in both life total and knowing what you will be getting from your topdeck the next several turns. And if somebody removes it for the life drain effect, oh no what will i do with my 20 zombie tokens...swing.

Nim Deathmantle out for Gempalm Polluter: Yeah, the mana needed for Nim Deathmantle always seemed to high for me, awesome effect but for 6 mana there are better things to use the mana on. Gempalm Polluter seems really good, if only for its cycling its still amazing it can be a instant target player dies :)

Psychic Strike out for Rewind: I would say strictly better counterspell, great swap. Nice having four mana open, and it will also be able to generate an extra mana with Dimir Aqueduct or if you included Temple of the False God could in a rare instance generate 2 more mana :)

Dictate of Erebos out for Curtains' Call: Seems like a fine swap, more removal is always good, and Dictate of Erebos always seems like a little to expensive and you already have the same effect with Grave Pact.

Rings of Brighthearth out for Illusionist's Bracers: Seems like a good budget cut too. Buy yeah, keeping mana open, which is nice, and actually cheaper than the rings if you want 4 triggers :)

Rings:

4 mana for the ability = 1 trigger (4 mana total)

+2 additional trigger = 2 triggers (6 mana total)

+2 additional trigger = 3 triggers (8 mana total)

+2 additional trigger = 4 triggers (10 mana total)

+2 additional trigger = 5 triggers (12 mana total)

+2 additional trigger = 6 triggers (14 mana total)

Bracers:

4 mana for ability + extra trigger = 2 triggers (4 mana total)

4 mana for ability + extra trigger = 4 triggers (8 mana total)

4 mana for ability + extra trigger = 6 triggers (12 mana total

But yeah, great swaps :)

My last considerations is Noxious Ghoul for the zombie friendly board wipe.

Phyrexian Altar which you are going to include, which is good :D

Yeah, thats all i got, great deck, thanks for the appreciation of the suggestions, really nice to see one appreciating them :)

VexenX Thanks! Always happy to help. I really liked your idead and I wanted to build him anyway so I kinda tagged along and play the deck 90% similar to yours. In my playgroup you have to be very careful with infinite win Combos so I will pass Phyrexian Altar. Since my Plagroup ist mostly 3 guys I will skip Curtains' Call as well. For 4cmc I think there is better removal.

I kinda dislike the Undead Alchemist cause as long as he is on the field you contradict The Scarab Gods Ability. That I dont like. I think 1-2 specific Token are way more valuable than just a massive 2/2 Zombie Horde. (If you hit a Wrath ALL Cards will be gone and Scarab God is nearly a 5/5 Beatstick and nothing more.)

I already tried Noxious Ghoul and I am undecided cause removing 1/1 Tokens is his main thing. Its hart to get >1 Zombies per turn into game without Gravecrawler.

Regarding the direct Removal Dismember and/or Murderous Cut may be worth something. Especially the Cut may come quite cheap...

Hey guys, played some more games with my playgroup and came with some more observations:

1) non-black-claused removal sucks. Black is very popular color in Commander so you have to have non-conditinal removal. Out - Snuff Out, In - Rapid Hybridization

2) Enchanments can be bane of this deck. Our playgroup play a lot of nasty enchantments like No Mercy, Bloodchief Ascension, Painful Quandary and other stax and prison spells. Having a way to get rid of those is essential. In - Nevinyrral's Disk and Aura Thief. Cant wait to steal those nasty enchantments

3) Vengeful Pharaoh keeps impressing me. An prison effect that is hard to deal with.

4) With more games I find gravehate more and more essential. Scarab provides some hate but you need to have a way to get rid of cards other than creatures. Withered Wretch is great for that.

5) Lords that dont do anything besides +1/+1 underperforms. Axed Cemetery Reaper. (clashes with our commander).

@man1ac I really dont like dismember, misses a lot of targets. Murderous Cut seems good but before considering it I would go with Pongify and Rapid Hybridization first.

Question: Why run Bojuka Bog Isn't it a nonbo with your commander and the deck?