Relentless Dead

Creature — Zombie

Menace (This creature can't be blocked except by two or more creatures.)

When Relentless Dead dies, you may pay . If you do, return it to its owner's hand.

When Relentless Dead dies, you may pay . If you do, return another target Zombie creature card with converted mana cost X from your graveyard to the battlefield.

Discussion (49)

Balaam__ on Ontogeny Recapitulates Phylogeny

1 week ago

Thanks for the insight, DeVerbalen. The Aether Vial situation you described was always a concern as I was building this. I went with it reasoning that with 4 copies of this cheap artifact, I would probably draw at least 2 relatively early and that I would leave them sitting at 1 counter and 2 counters respectively. That would ensure a free Gravecrawler and Relentless Dead on any given turn, if available. With these two zombies coupled with access to the Pyre, I can field all my creatures as soon as they’re drawn. Not to mention that once Grimgrin, Corpse-Born is in play I can buff him infinitely with the Aether Vial -> Gravecrawler interaction.

That being said, I do see merit in your comment and I’ll keep it in mind. I haven’t yet extensively playtested this build, so you may well be right. Zombies are my favorite creature type and I usually always have a new deck being worked on in the background, so I might take your suggestions and apply them to another build. Thanks again!

Blackgate on Phantom Menace (God-Eternal Bontu menace/aggro)

3 weeks ago

Hello droslag, thanks for the feedback! They are both great menace cards thank you! I think both those cards would be great in a zombie menace deck to make the most use of their special abilities. Combine them with Graf Harvest and that would be a good foundation! That being said adding Plague Belcher and Relentless Dead is something I will play test!

I am also considering swapping out Hunted Nightmare for 3 copies of Dreamstealer and swapping out Josu Vess, Lich Knight for Tergrid, God of Fright  ^Flip to include a discard strategy to the main deck.

droslag on Phantom Menace (God-Eternal Bontu menace/aggro)

3 weeks ago

Plague Belcher and Relentless Dead are good menace creatures. Relentless Dead has the potential to reanimate the other zombies you are already boarding, and is pretty hard to get rid of.

TheVectornaut on There's a Quake In My Boot!

4 weeks ago

I don't know what your budget is, but this seems like an ideal deck to be running some sort of fetchlands, even the common variants. They let you recur Bloodghast an additional time and even grant extra damage from Mayhem Devil . Hofri Ghostforge and Rekindling Phoenix feel quite slow relative to the power of their effect. It also seems a shame not to have as many black creatures available to sacrifice as possible for the sake of Teysa, Orzhov Scion , although I could also see Pawn of Ulamog fulfilling a similar role. Maybe something like Gutterbones , Reassembling Skeleton , or a combo of Relentless Dead and Gravecrawler could prove useful. There's also Grim Haruspex as another way to refuel or Gate to the Afterlife if pitching cards is important.

kellpiece on Golgari Aristocrats

1 month ago

Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord one of my fav golgari sac creatures, might make a good finisher since all your cards are such low cmc Abrupt Decay super clutch G/B control card. Lotleth Troll and Relentless Dead make for great sacrifice cratures Viscera Seer and Carrion Feeder can be pretty clutch Rancor is nice as well to keep those lowbies swingin.

ClockworkSwordfish on Fast Zombies Everywhere!

3 months ago

Rancid Rats seems like kind of a weak point in the deck! Skulk seems kind of wasted on a creature with Deathtouch - you're more than happy to have him blocked by one of your opponent's big fellas - and it will only get worse if you're trying to stack lords. If you really want the Deathtouch on a cheap body, I think Foulmire Knight would serve your purposes much better. He's one mana for the same 1/1 Deathtouch body, and can also score you an extra card if you draw him later in the game. Seeing as you already have eight one-drops, however, I can understand if you wanted a solid two-mana creature. Relentless Dead , Stromgald Crusader and Graveyard Marshal all would fit the bill.

By the way, Ghoulcaller's Chant is also directly superior to Return from Extinction in a zombie deck!

Jonesbond49 on Zombie Tribal

4 months ago

I've decided to make more than one list but each one should be helpful to you in the future. Also, you don't need to put in all these cards. There are too many here for you to fit in the deck.

Liliana cards:

Liliana, Death's Majesty (can be a board wipe but don't count on it), Liliana, Dreadhorde General (also doubles as amazing card draw), Liliana, Heretical Healer  ^Flip, Liliana, the Last Hope, and Liliana, Untouched By Death (has a removal ability).

Zombie tribal cards:

Shepherd of Rot, Lord of the Accursed, Risen Executioner, Relentless Dead, Field of the Dead, Undead Augur (also card advantage), Havengul Runebinder, Stitcher Geralf, Gleaming Overseer, Call to the Grave (rude card), Endless Ranks of the Dead (my favorite zombie tribal card), Graf Harvest, Graveborn Muse (also card advantage), and Josu Vess, Lich Knight.

Never/Return is zombie themed removal.

Necromantic Selection is a zombie themed board wipe.

Ramp cards:

Dimir Signet, Talisman of Dominance, Charcoal Diamond, Sky Diamond, and Fellwar Stone.

I hope this helps!

HalbrechtHalbrecht on BLACK ZOMBIE

6 months ago

I love Zombies! Probably one of the first tribes that got me interested in tribal decks, after I saw the power of my friend's Zombie deck. +1 from me just for Zombies!

Question 0: Before we can offer any meaningful help, we need to know if you truly mean this to be a deck for the Modern format? Or will it be casual and you won't care about format that much?

(As an aside, when I first started Magic and joined T/O, I didn't really understand that Modern was a competitive format and I just labeled any deck that could be legal in Modern as Modern. LoL. Pretty sure some of my decks on T/O still mistakenly have Modern set when really they should be Casual!)

I'm going to offer my advice assuming you want it to be Modern, but if you're going more for a casual build, then feel free to ignore some of this.

Game Plan

First, the deck is trying to do too many things — zombie tribal, self-mill, graveyard recursion, graveyard exiling, "swamps matter", tokens, devotion — some of which don't really complement each other. If you want to streamline it for Modern, you'll have to choose a more focused direction.

I would remove the "swamps matter" subtheme, as you don't really have ways to dump extra swamps onto the battlefield nor do you take full advantage of it (where is Defile for example?). Korlash might be worth keeping, since he's a zombie, but get rid of both Nightmare and Squelching Leeches, as they're not even zombies and they're on the higher end of CMC. Personally, I'd get rid of Lashwrithe as well, but if you really love the card and want to keep it, at least you can equip that to a zombie.

Then I would choose between full-on zombie tribal including tokens, or devotion and recursion. Neither of the latter play nicely with tokens, which don't have mana costs for devotion or stay in the graveyard for recursion. A few incidental tokens are fine, but cards like Moan of the Unhallowed and Shamble Back are not synergistic at all with devotion/recursion.

Next, are you more interested in recurring your graveyard or exiling it for tokens? I.e. do you want to do Ghoulraiser, Gravecrawler, Lord of the Undead, etc., or do you want to do Cemetery Reaper, Graveyard Marshal, Tymaret, etc.? You can't do both. Personally, I'd go the recursion route, add more ways to sac your zombies for value, and cycle them in and out of the graveyard at will.

So in summary, I would go with 1) zombie aggro including tokens, or 2) zombie recursion, with a subtheme of devotion for Gray Merchant. Going either route, I'd cut Nightmare, Leeches, Lashwrithe, and Tymaret (he's not a zombie, and provides only inefficient graveyard hate). If you go route 2, I'd also cut the sorceries Moan and Shamble. That's at minimum 8 cards out. What you add depends on which game plan you choose.

Other Zombies

You're missing some other great zombie lords: Death Baron, Lord of the Accursed, Undead Warchief, and even Risen Executioner. While not a creature, Graf Harvest gives them all menace.

Relentless Dead and Unbreathing Horde are difficult to get rid of, the former because it can easily come back to hand (and bring a friend), the latter because of his damage prevention clause.

Graveborn Muse can provide some serious card advantage. Geralf's Messenger is amazing for devotion, he drains a little himself, and he's hard to get rid of.

If you go the route of cycling your zombies in and out of your graveyard, consider Undead Augur, Plague Belcher, and Quest for the Gravelord.

Misc. Comments

In place of Cemetery Recruitment, I'd run Ghoulcaller's Chant or Unearth. The latter is particularly good if you cut all your 4+ CMC creatures except for Gray Merchant (so aside from the cards I said to cut under "Game Plan", you'd also cut Korlash and Sidisi, which I think are good cuts anyways).

You didn't label this deck as "budget", so if you can afford it, Cavern of Souls is a must-include land in any tribal deck.

I don't like Sands of Delirium. It's only function is self-mill and there's more efficient ways to do self-mill. You also currently don't take full advantage of self-mill, with things like Dredge or Flashback-style effects. If you go full force into graveyard synergies, then self-mill is important, but even then, I'd play Stitcher's Supplier over Sands. For 1 mana, you can easily get 6 cards into your graveyard, and you can easily recur him, and he's a zombie that can attack. That would take 9 mana with Sands, which is just a dead artifact.

Lastly, some sacrifice options: Gnawing Zombie isn't amazing, but the effect is relevant. I would replace Sign in Blood with Village Rites — same card draw, but one less mana, instant speed, and no life loss. You also have cards that like to die, like Festering Mummy, Black Cat, Tattered Mummy, and the above-mentioned Stitcher's Supplier.

Sorry for the wall of text. I just love zombies! So I hope at least something in there was useful.