The Future of the Dead
Zombie Creature Type in Tenth Edition

By Darkblessing



The highly anticipated Lord of the Undead has been brought to Tenth Edition, and will provide you with your endless horde. Be sure to run a heavy amount of these in any zombie deck you create to assure that you can play out of your graveyard well into the game. The Lord of the Undead is so effective because irregardless of how your opponent sends your zombie cards to the graveyard (via discard, sacrifice or destroy), you can always bring them back with this card. This not only puts card advantage in your favor, but adds huge pressure onto your opponent to destroy Lord of the Undead before you return your zombie hordes to play.



Phyrexian Arena has left standard and now travels to extended, leaving many black color players without a way to increase card draw per turn. However, you can expect the addition of Graveborn Muse to help you get your cards at the cost of life. In Onslaught she was introduced with a number of other zombies and what I consider to be the "prime time" for all zombie players. She now comes back to us and depending on how many zombies you have in play, you are going to be drawing a lot more cards. Watch that health though, as the loss can be severe with many zombies on the play field. Counter this loss by throwing your opponent these key Tenth Edition cards: Consume Spirit and Essence Drain.



Festering Goblin makes his reappearance yet again as a first turn wonder. There are few first turn creature cards compared to festering goblin that can put so much pressure on other players. If they are tempted to destroy festering goblin, then they have to expect a -1/-1 coming their way and that can mean certain death for other playable first turn and second turn creatures. You are going to want to run four of these in your zombie deck without a doubt, just make sure to be cautious when using two at the same time with no other creatures in play - if one of them dies unexpectedly, then the other goblin is going to die as well from the -1/-1.



Other zombies included in Tenth Edition are: Dross Crocodile (your damage swinger), Mass of Ghouls (your heavy artillery), Scathe Zombies (normal attacker and blocker), Spineless Thug (normal attacker but cannot block) and Severed Legion (your unblockable damage). Also, if you need to damage your opponent and you have no way at the moment to bring back your undead horde from the graveyard with Lord of the Undead, make sure to go on a quick offensive with the newly standardized Midnight Ritual. If the game drags on and your opponent is sending a lot of things to your graveyard, be sure to add at least one Mortal Combat to your deck to guarantee your win when that creature count hits twenty.

Be sure to add these important cards from time spiral while they are in standard as well: Withered Wretch and Yixlid Jailer for protection against dredge decks, Undead Warchief to buff up your legions while lowering the cost and finally Korlash, Heir to Blackblade to introduce a new kind of pain to your opponent. Surprise your enemy with Fallen Ideal on your favorite zombie, sacrifice other low cost zombies, and then use the newly standardized enchantment No Rest for the Wicked for a deadly blow and quick renewal of your legions. The new additions to Tenth Edition will provide you endless hours of tweaking your new zombie legion!

Not only are zombies one of the most powerful creature types at the moment in standard, whether they are in the graveyard or in play they have everything to gain nothing to lose. So go ahead, pick yourself up some booster packs with confidence and get started right away to ensure your win with your favorite undead legions - I know I will.

~Darkblessing