Over the last couple of weeks, we’ve seen hints of an awesome Zombie deck in Standard. Haunted Dead and Prized Amalgam is an awesome engine, particularly in conjunction with Cryptbreaker to get the graveyard interactions started early. The problem for this strategy has been that it is more than capable of grinding out most decks in the format, but not before getting crushed by Emrakul, the Promised End. Given that you can’t really play a late-game deck unless you have a real plan against Emrakul, the Promised End, the strategy has sort of fallen by the wayside. BradPitKeeper is looking to change that:

Black-Blue Zombies ? Eldritch Moon Standard | BradPitKeeper, 5-0 Standard League

• Creatures (26)
• 4 Cryptbreaker
• 4 Haunted Dead
• 4 Prized Amalgam
• 4 Relentless Dead
• 3 Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
• 3 Voldaren Pariah
• 2 Diregraf Colossus
• 1 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
• 1 Nantuko Husk

• Planeswalkers (3)
• 3 Liliana, the Last Hope

• Spells (7)
• 4 Dark Salvation
• 3 Grasp of Darkness

• Lands (24)
• 14 Swamp
• 4 Choked Estuary
• 4 Sunken Hollow
• 1 Submerged Boneyard
• 1 Westvale Abbey

• Sideboard (15)
• 1 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
• 1 Voldaren Pariah
• 1 Grasp of Darkness
• 2 Collective Brutality
• 2 Distended Mindbender
• 2 Infinite Obliteration
• 1 Negate
• 1 Ob Nixilis Reignited
• 2 Ruinous Path
• 2 Transgress the Mind

Buy This Deck

The core of this deck should look familiar. Haunted Dead, Cryptbreaker, and Prized Amalgam are a dream team we’ll be seeing plenty of during their tenure in Standard. Add to the mix Jace, Vryn's Prodigy to further fuel the graveyard interactions, and you’ve got a powerful and reasonably consistent engine that’s difficult to break apart.

The key difference between this deck and previous iterations is that this one has multiple ways to go big and beat Emrakul, the Promised End. Diregraf Colossus is a great way to go wide, particularly in conjunction with Liliana, the Last Hope to ensure that you never run out of Zombies to cast. As you churn through your deck, it becomes easier to find copies of Voldaren Pariah, which is a good insurance policy against Emrakul, the Promised End or against miscellaneous creature decks. Being able to Madness the Voldaren Pariah into play is absolutely absurd, especially when you can flip it mid—combat to absolutely demolish your opponent’s attacks, or just flip it after your opponent puts an Emrakul, the Promised End into play to protect yourself from getting completely blown out.

It’s also worth noting that Nantuko Husk is a big deal against Emrakul, the Promised End decks. This is a card that lets you convert all of your random Spirit and Zombie tokens into substantial chunks of damage, especially given that you have Grasp of Darkness and Dark Salvation to keep the board clear of Pilgrim's Eye and Sylvan Advocate. Even outside of Emrakul, the Promised End matchups, the ability to attack without fear into Sylvan Advocate is very real, and having access to Nantuko Husk and Westvale Abbey as stallbreakers is important.

If you’re looking for a Zombie deck that crushes Bant without giving up too much in the Emrakul, the Promised End matchup, this may just be the deck for you.