This has been one of my most effective decks over the past week or two, so I wanted to share it. It's basically a midrange zombie list, but GUdecks is now calling it "Tempo Zombies," which is fine. In my gameplay vid, though, you'll see me take a decidedly control stance against aggro nature.
This is the current deck I'm playing with. Thanks to Artudent, I recently swapped out my Skeletal Hoplites for Netherborn Binders. My gameplay vid will showcase how that has paid off.
Deck Code:
GU_1_1_CCcCCcBEpBEpHAFHAFKCBKCBIBZIBZCDSCDSPAaIADIADIAJIAJIACIACPAePAeIAKIAKCCeCCeCAgCAgPAfIBPIBP
Overall, my record with this and the previous deck is fantastic:
I'm sure it won't keep that insane win rate with repeated play, but clearly it has some power. It's great into Aggro War thanks to Perseverance. It has a strong early game thanks to the zombie package, but it also packs a punch in the 6-7 mana range.
Price-wise, if you take Hortuk out you're left with a decidedly budget-friendly deck.
Also note that (like a good zombie deck should), this deck has almost no singletons. In other words, I'm running 2x of every card except my leggies. This is to improve my draw odds of finding obelisk/scepter in the mulligan. A deck running 2x of every card has a roughly 40% of finding one or the other in the mulligan. Each singleton you add brings this down, so they have to be worth it. In our case, they most certainly are:
Both of these are amazing cards and well worth the hit to my mulligan odds.
It's zombies! It's easy! Make a bunch of zombies and kill them! 馃ぃ
Actually, this deck plays a bit different. Against aggro you play more like a control deck. I take Blood Ritual god power to help kill creatures and heal. Once they close decklists and you can't know for sure what you're playing against, I think you have to take Blood Ritual all the time. Against something like control magic, Soul Burn is better, though.
We are running a ton of removal in the deck, so managing aggro early usually feels pretty easy.
So into aggro, you're mainly trying to either:
If you go first and can get your board full of zombies, you win the game. If you can make it to 7 mana, your opponent has run out of cards (usually) and you win the game. Decided which of these paths to proceed is important. Taking big risks to get your zombies going will result in losing more games. The safe route is to just keep their board as clear as possible. If (while doing that), you get zombies on board, that's great. Going first, though, you can often establish zombies early (before they steal board from you). In which case, that's another win.
Against control opponents, you are forced into the aggro role. Often, our early removal like Blight Bomb and Curse of Greed aren't good for much. Instead, we want early cheap creatures and our Obelisk/Scepter. Finding Rhinos on curve is awesome, and at 6 mana, getting a Skull + Obelisk on board has always been good. Ramp magic will often just Unbound Flames you, but you have to try for it anyway. Sometimes they won't have it.
At 7, with almost any board presence at all, Overseer of Vitality can win the game for you:
When all else fails, Hortuk will drop 22 stats on board and give you a shot to win with raw damage. Remember when you drew out Magic's Unbound Flames with Vampiric Skull? Hortuk is the payoff.
I've got a few games recorded, but wanted to share this one. It's one of my recent games with Netherborne Binders, so when they show up, imagine how much worse Skeletal Hoplites would have been!
Going first? Check.
Obelisk/Scepter in Mulligan? Check.
Good supporting cards? Also yes.
Turn 1 I'm feeling very confident. I don't have a 1 drop, though, so I have to pass. I can't burn my pip so early. This deck has a lot of high-mana cards so bricking is a concern. Also, the plan is to play Fae on 2 into Obelisk on 3 and use the pip to blightbomb a Jag or some other early drop.
Voracious Fiend feels better than Fae here. Part of Fae's strength is killing a 1 HP minion.
Dagan is a game-winning play from our opponent. Unfortunately for them, we started the game with all the answers we need. Note that I don't force the Obelisk here. Dagan will spiral out of control, of course, so clearing board is priority #1. Drawing Hortuk also reminds us why we don't use our pip early unless it will win the game. Can't play this guy for a long time.
Obelisk and Binder feels good here. However, I take a risk and decide to go for a full board. This will protect my obelisk.
Punished by Blade! Ouch. Using that pip doesn't feel so great now, but at least we have some board presence to work with.
Axewoman is a huge top deck and allows us to clear the board. Without it, I would have cleared Blade but left Boar alive hoping for confused to work in our advantage.
All in all, things aren't looking great. After playing Binder I have a Hortuk I can't play for 4 more turns while our opponent has a hand full of cards.
Binder's time to shine! I can trade into Jag and GP. Imagine how much worse Hoplite would have been in this situation! I grab relic hate from the sanctum. I probably should have played it, but Krosta had a Moonlight Charm in his deck, so I decided to hold it.
Never lucky. We get Vampiric Skull exactly on curve. When choosing what to bring back, I'm again faced with a choice: take a big risk and bring back obelisk or use Axewoman to control our opponent. This time, cooler heads prevail, and I take a big threat off the board.
Now that we're guaranteed to make it to 7 mana, I'm feeling confident again. Clear board and wait for next turn.
Despite their best efforts, it's pretty clear that our opponent is out of gas. Two turns playing single creatures and they can't even GP out a badger. I'd bet they had their Moonlight Charm in hand too and knew they couldn't play it. Hortuk seals the game.
I've posted decks similar to this before, and I've run just about ever flavor of zombie deck under the sun. This by far feels the best. Chira and Perseverance have greatly increased the power of this deck against both aggro and control decks. This deck doesn't include 1x Corpse Explosion, which is the only negative I can think of. That single card gives you an out against hard control decks and also forces them to the threat (when they are deck peeking). I could see running 1x Binder and fitting Explosion in. You take another hit to your mulligan odds, but it might be worth it. On the other hand, Corspse Explosion is just a dead card when behind.
Definitely give this deck a try. You can take out Hortuk for a Fickle Cambion or just about any 1-2 mana drop you feel like. Alternatively, consider replacing him with a Bifurcating Curse, which just so happens to be the perfect answer to enemy Hortuks!
