Zombie Horde

Standard Drac07

SCORE: 3 | 13 COMMENTS | 2475 VIEWS

Dark Ascension and The Quickening, pt. 2 —Feb. 3, 2012

So I'm still at sea, but I wanted to see what I could cook up with the release of DKA. I want to maintain the theme of the deck as a neverending wave of Zombies. That having been said, I'm not too happy with the proportion of cards I feel best contribute to that end, but I don't want to go much higher than 60 cards (I'm at 62 at the moment). Cards I wish I could have more of: Endless Ranks of the Dead, Moan of the Unhallowed, Ghoulcaller's Chant, and Undying Evil. As much as I want to increase their count, I would have to start cutting away from things like spot removal and these awesome creatures. There will probably be tweaking after playtesting. Mikaeus, the Unhallowed and Havengul Lich would be great, but realistically, it's going to be a long time before I can get my hands on them.

As previously stated, this incarnation of the deck will rely on Heartless Summoning to get my creatures out faster. I put three of them in to increase the chance of drawing them quickly, but I wouldn't really want to have more than one on the field at a time. With the advent of Diregraf Captain, I feel that the ability to pair it up with Cemetery Reaper more than makes up for the -1/-1.

Reduced numbers of Grave Titans and Vengeful Pharaohs. These are great cards, but they're late-game and my major focus here is to speed things up without sacrificing too much power. I also removed Call to the Grave, as awesome as it is with a Zombie deck, because I didn't want to have to lose the Titans. Added a Grimgrin, Corpse-Born because he'll work very well with the Gravecrawlers.

Toward the end of endless waves of Zombies, I've added in Geralf's Messengers and Undying Evil to take advantage of the new mechanic. Mid-game should see things like Moan of the Unhallowed and Endless Ranks of the Undead to keep the Zombies coming.

Win conditions: Diregraf Captains should make my opponent think twice about striking down the Zombies I hope to be generating. Grave Titans bringing in two each as they come out. Vengeful Pharaohs that work from the graveyard and Gravecrawlers, neither of which ever really go away. With mana freed up by Heartless Summoning, I can use Cemetery Reapers' activated ability. As those stack up, I can get out one-drop Unbreathing Hordes as powerhouses that refuse to go down. Not to mention the Titans and Pharaohs are powerful deathtouchers, and everything that's out being buffed by Lords.

In its finished form, with Mikaeus and Havenguls, I envision sacrificing undying, cheaper Grave Titans to Grimgrin multiple times. If the engine is up and running very well, with plenty of Lords and perhaps two Heartless Summoning out, that's only two black mana per Titan per Havengul cast. Two more Zombie tokens per Titan per battlefield entrance and Grimgrin growing like crazy.

Anticipated weaknesses: Counterspells from blue. Direct damage and pure speed from red. Board wipes from any number of sources. I would love to splash in some counterspells of my own, perhaps in place of spot removal currently in place. Zombie Apocalypse would handily take care of a board wipe, so that may find a home in here later. In the meantime, there's Ghoulcaller's Chant.

As always, any and all feedback is much appreciated!