This is not your usual zombie deck. This is a combo deck that abuses Gisa and Geralf as a means to find and play the pieces of the combo. There are three important features of G&G that drive the deck's focus:
- They have an ETB effect
- They put cards in the bin
- They let you get a free zombie from the bin each turn
Our aim is to assemble a combo that can generate infinite mana (any color). We have two main ways of doing this.
The first way is very simple: have Palinchron and Deadeye Navigator in play at the same time. The combo here is quite plain, and is capable of generating infinite mana without having to cast any spells, which can be useful if an opponent has something like Kambal, Consul of Allocation in play. The downside to this method is that both pieces are expensive and neither are zombies, which means that getting them into play typically requires either hard-casting them, which can be difficult, or reanimating them, which depends on having the right cards in hand.
The second way requires more pieces: you must have Palinchron and Archaeomancer in play, and cast Ghostly Flicker targeting both. Archaeomancer will fetch back the Ghostly Flicker, while Palinchron will give you back the mana you spent casting it, plus up to four extra. The downside to this method is that it requires an extra card.
It is worth noting that all the pieces in each combo (except for Deadeye Navigator) have redundancy to get around exile effects.
- Archaeomancer can be replaced by Possessed Skaab, which has the added benefit of being a zombie, and thus playable from the bin with G&G in play
- Palinchron can be replaced by Peregrine Drake, which is generally worse but will still enable both combos
- Ghostly Flicker can be replaced by either Displace or Illusionist's Stratagem, though the latter should be used to find one of the other two since you will deck yourself otherwise
Once you generate infinite mana, the victory flowchart looks something like this:
- Do you have Exsanguinate in hand? If yes, cast it for an arbitrarily large number.
- Do you have Gray Merchant of Asphodel in play or in your hand? If yes, use Ghostly Flicker and Archaeomancer to recur it an arbitrary number of times.
- Do you have Gray Merchant of Asphodel in your graveyard? If yes, then play G&G, cast the gray merchant out of the bin.
- Do you have Exsanguinate in your graveyard and Archaeomancer in play? If yes, then flicker Archaeomancer to retrieve Exsanguinate.
- Do you not have either Gray Merchant of Asphodel or Exsanguinate in your hand or graveyard? If yes, then play G&G, and flicker repeatedly until one or both is in the bin.
In general, once you have infinite mana you should be able to abuse the ETB trigger from G&G to put your entire deck in your bin and have virtually all the resources in the deck at your disposal, since Phyrexian Delver can bring back any creature and Possessed Skaab can bring back any instant or sorcery.
Since the deck aims to win by combo and not by swarming opponents with zombie tokens, most of the zombies in the deck serve as either fetch-pieces, control, or value. Each one has a specific reason to be in the deck:
- Apprentice Necromancer: Serves as instant-speed reanimation that can be played from the bin, though since there is no haste in the deck it has to be played in advance. Flickering reanimation targets will give the additional value of dodging the sacrifice trigger. In addition, the necromancer can enable combos at instant speed.
- Coffin Queen: Similar to Apprentice Necromancer, the queen allows for faster reanimation shenanigans. The exile trigger makes this high-risk high-reward, but the additional upside is that she can reanimate from any graveyard, not just your own (and yes, she has been errata'd to have the zombie subtype even though it doesn't show that on the paper copies of the card).
- Fleshbag Marauder: Already a good card in most decks on its own, the marauder becomes an even stronger control piece with G&G in play, as it can be recurred from the graveyard repeatedly.
- Forgotten Creation: An excellent means for quickly going through the deck. Since most cards can be recurred, you will almost always be using its ability.
- Gray Merchant of Asphodel: Win-con, or just a way to stabilize your life total in the mid-game.
- Karfell Harbinger: A mana dork that can be played out of the graveyard. The deck runs enough instants and sorceries to generally always have use for the harbinger.
- Nightscape Familiar: Often even better than a simple mana rock. Playing the familiar on turn two leads into G&G on turn three, and it can significantly speed up the deck's route to comboing off.
- Orvar, the All-Form: As a changeling, Orvar is all types and so is seen as a zombie by G&G. Orvar makes all flicker spells in the deck twice as good, and can also be used with Pyre of Heroes to find combo pieces.
- Phyrexian Delver: Reanimation that can be played from the graveyard, and can be recurred with flicker spells, is very strong in this deck.
- Possessed Skaab: Combo piece, but can also provide value in the mid-game.
- Sedraxis Alchemist: Rather flexible control piece that can cheaply stave off almost all threats, one of two ways in the deck of dealing with enchantments w/o access to white or green.
- Sidisi, Undead Vizier: Much like Fleshbag Marauder, Sidisi goes from good to great with G&G providing recursion.
- Stitcher's Supplier: A cheap card that is playable from the bin and provides a little bit of value from turn one all the way to the late game.
- Tomebound Lich: Repeatable value on a stick, both draws and puts more zombies into the bin.
- Vile Entomber: Finds combo pieces in the late game or good reanimation targets and zombies in the mid-game, puts them in your bin.
The deck also plays a reanimation package that can either bring in the more expensive zombies for less, or more often hit one of the other big reanimation targets in the deck, such as Meteor Golem, Sphinx of Uthuun, Rune-Scarred Demon or Agent of Treachery.
Because these cards (and also many of the zombies) have ETB triggers, the deck runs a sizable amount of flicker effects. This includes not just Ghostly Flicker and its substitutes for the combo, but also Essence Flux, Siren's Ruse, and Thassa, Deep-Dwelling. These flicker effects provide both repeated value off the ETB creatures, but also a way to dodge exile effects like Swords to Plowshares that threaten to permanently remove your combo pieces.
