Zombie Deck

There are a few main concepts for Zombie Deck. One focuses on swarming the field with Zombies, usually from the Graveyard. Other Zombie Decks, however, focus on milling your opponent's Deck out. Star cards commonly used in these decks include "Il Blud", "Mezuki", "Goblin Zombie", "Plaguespreader Zombie", "Pyramid Turtle", "Kasha", "Spirit Reaper and "Zombie Master".

Zombie Burn Deck
The Zombie Burn Deck can be played different ways. Combinations such as "Malevolent Mech - Goku En" or "Zombie Mammoth" with "Vengeful Servant" and "Creature Swap" are effective ways to do massive amounts of damage easily, but cards that reverse any damage taken like "Prime Material Dragon" and "Rainbow Life" or cards that negate the activation of Trap or Spell Cards like "Dark Bribe", "Solemn Judgment" etc, can stop these effects all too easily. In addition, if you are facing another Zombie Deck or a Deck with Zombies in it, the strategy won't work.

Another Zombie Burn strategy involves inflicting damage when "Burning Skull Head" is Special Summoned from the hand with the effect of "Skull Flame" and "Skull Conductor", coupled with "Everliving Underworld Cannon" and "Dark Room of Nightmare" for additional damage. They might not do as much damage in a single hit, but they are more effective because there are fewer card effects to stop the combination, and "Skull Flame" is easily summoned using "Call of the Mummy" or "Pyramid Turtle", with the added advantage of having 2600 ATK.

"Shutendoji" and "Burial from a Different Dimension" can help to bring back a banished "Skull Flame" and "Burning Skull Head". "Supersonic Skull Flame" can also unleash additional damage simply by having "Burning Skull Head"s in your Graveyard, and searchers such as "Goblin Zombie" could be used to add "Burning Skull Head" to your hand.

Zombie Sworn/Chaos Zombie Deck
Zombiesworn Decks use the "Lightsworn" engine to send Zombie monsters to the Graveyard for "Mezuki" to revive. "Chaos Sorcerer" and "Black Luster Soldier - Envoy of the Beginning" are also used because of the abundance of LIGHT and DARK monsters.

Zombie World Deck
Also known as The Army Of Darkness, this Deck type, as the name suggests, is based around the Field Spell, "Zombie World". This Deck is very versatile, as almost any of the Zombie staples can be splashed in. This Deck can be brutally effective against many other Decks, as "Zombie World", as well as changing all your opponents monsters on the field and in the Graveyard into Zombies, also stops your opponent from Tribute Summoning anything other than a Zombie-Type monster. This negatively affects many commonly used Decks, such as Disaster Dragon, Monarchs and Plants. Many cards are designed specifically to work with the Field Spell, such as "Doomkaiser Dragon" or "Trap of the Imperial Tomb" or even "Sacred Crane" or "Molten Zombie" for draw power. These cards have very good effects, but are sometimes better to avoid, as they are useless without the Field Spell. Other cards have indirect merit, such as "Getsu Fuhma", "Marionette Mite", or even "Tutan Mask" when used on your opponents to stop pesky Spells or Traps. This Deck has many Zombie staples such as "Pyramid Turtle", "Zombie Master", "Goblin Zombie", or even "Plaguespreader Zombie" if you want to Synchro Summon. The key player in this Deck is without a doubt "Il Blud". "Getsu Fuhma" can be used to destroy most monsters with higher ATK than your Zombies if need be. "Kasha" can also be included, but remember that monsters treated as Zombies by the effect of "Zombie World" that are returned to the Deck are not counted towards its ATK. "Immortal Ruler" can also be used to recycle "Zombie World". Another excellent card to use is "Red-Eyes Zombie Dragon", which allows you to Summon any Zombie which it destroys by battle.

Zombie Beat Down/D.D. Deck
This Deck involves using "Shutendoji" and "Necroface" to banish multiple cards, followed by recycling "Necroface" with the effect of "Shutendoji" and Normal Summoning it as a massive beatstick.

With this technique, you can recycle your Deck, and use "Soul Absorption" to gain Life Points quickly. However, you might Deck out quickly because of the speed you can banish from the top of your Deck with the draw power you get with "Shutendoji", but you can still recycle your Deck with the effect of "Necroface". By doing this, you can greatly harass your opponent.

Diva Zombie Deck
This Deck uses the revival effects of Zombie monsters with the effect of "Deep Sea Diva" to Special Summon other Sea Serpents (most notably another "Deep Sea Diva") to quickly Synchro Summon. This Deck type is heavily reliant on "Mezuki" and its effect to quickly Special Summon Zombie monsters in the Graveyard, along with "Burial from a Different Dimension" to recycle it.

This Deck was severely slowed by the Limiting of "Burial from a Different Dimension" in March 2010.

Z-HEROes/Absolute Zombies
This Deck uses the "Destiny HERO" engine for extra draw power, as well as using "Destiny HERO - Malicious" to Synchro Summon quickly. It is also known to include the aforementioned "Diva Engine", as they work with "Miracle Fusion" to Fusion Summon "Elemental HERO Absolute Zero". This Deck is also less reliant on "Divas" for Synchro Summoning.

BludVise Synchro Deck
This Deck works by using the Equip Spell "Supervise" on "Il Blud" to Special Summon Zombies from your hand or Graveyard and use them for Synchro Summoning. It works like a Gigavise Deck but is admittedly slower. Shadow Specter introduces "Natural Bone Saurus", a Level 4 Zombie Gemini, another target for "Supervise" and also usable with "Gemini Spark".

Since this is a Zombie Deck, "Il Blud" greatly benefits from Zombie revival cards such as "Book of Life". Also, "Pyramid Turtle" can quickly Special Summon "Il Blud" from the Deck. Once the effect of "Il Blud" has been activated, simply Special Summon Zombies to swarm the field and then use Tuner monsters to Tune with them. "Plaguespreader Zombie" is the ideal Tuner in this Deck, but "Krebons", "Blackwing - Gale the Whirlwind", and "Dark Resonator" all have good synergy with this Deck since they are all DARK monsters.

To speed this Deck up, "Hidden Armory" is useful to search "Supervise" and cards such as "Goblin Zombie" can help bring "Plaguespreader Zombie" from the Deck to your hand. Cards such as "Mezuki" can also help Summon "Il Blud" from the Graveyard in case it is destroyed, and cards like "Shutendoji" can help recycle the effect of "Mezuki". With all the Tribute fodder available because of "Il Blud", it is not a bad idea to add a few "Caius the Shadow Monarchs" to the Deck for field removal.

Zombie Synchro Deck
This Deck is used to Summon monsters quickly from the Deck with either "Pyramid Turtle" and/or "Mystic Tomato" and using "Creature Swap" on one of them wile either you or your opponent have a stronger monster can Special Summon a stronger monster to give you the edge you need. You can also add monsters to your hand with the "Goblin Zombie" or Special Summon from the Graveyard with "Zombie Master", "Il Blud", "Mezuki" and "Book of Life". "Dark Armed Dragon" is in this Deck for the purpose of being a massive beatstick and its effect will have your opponent on the edge of their seat. "Zombie World" is here for the purpose of abusing the effects of "Il Blud, "Zombie Master" and "Red-Eyes Zombie Dragon" and punish your opponent with their own monsters. "Beast of the Pharaoh" can Special Summon another Zombie from your Graveyard when it's used as a Synchro Material, while also being Level 3, which helps with getting Synchro Monsters with odd Levels, like "Black Rose Dragon" or "Ally of Justice Catastor". "Gorz the Emissary of Darkness" and "Tragoedia" are here for either helping you Synchro Summon or to take your opponent out with high ATK power. "Blackwing - Gale the Whirlwind", "Krebons" and "Emergency Teleport" are in this Deck to help with the instant Synchro Summon, they also supplement the Deck by negating attacks and weakening the opponent's monsters.

Zombie Xyz Deck
With the new cards "Blue-Blooded Oni", "Yellow-Bellied Oni" and "Red-Headed Oni", Zombies now have the option to swarm the field with Xyz Monsters. Since both (and most of the best Zombie-Type monsters) are Level 4, is best to use Rank 4 Xyz monsters (like "Gem-Knight Pearl", that works very well with the effects of the "Onis"), but "Pain Painter" can also be used to summon Rank 2 Xyz monsters. The "Xyz" archetype is also used as support.

Endless Decay Deck
This Zombie Burn Deck mainly focuses on Summoning "Endless Decay" which can be easily sent to the Graveyard by "Foolish Burial" or "Lavalval Chain" and then be Special Summoned from Graveyard by "Book of Life", "Il Blud" or even a "Mezuki" in the Graveyard. Another good method to Special Summon it directly is by using the core of this Deck, "Pyramid Turtle" to get destroyed by battle and Special Summon it from the Deck. Since "Decay" has high ATK, usually your opponent will focus on getting rid of it by card effects so be sure of having at least 2 "Pyramid of Wonders" in this Deck so it protect it from cards such as "Mirror Force" or "Dark Hole", and "Solemn Warning" for protection from monster effects. Another good addition to this Deck is "Imperial Iron Wall" to protect "Decay" from being banished.

Vampire Deck
A "Vampire" Deck combines a Mill Deck and the ability to summon Level 5 and higher Zombies for Synchro/Xyz Summons.

Main article: Vampire.

Wights
A "Wight" Deck combines a self milling strategy to send multiple "Wights" ("Skull Servant", "King of the Skull Servants", "The Lady in Wight", and "Wightmare") from your hand and Deck to the Graveyard in order to power up "King of the Skull Servants". Typical milling engines can be used to run this Deck, such as the fast milling from "Magical Merchant" or the power of destroying opponents cards while milling with "Lightsworns" such as "Ryko" and "Lyla".

Main article: Wight.

[Weakness]

Monarchs
Monarchs can be very deadly to any deck but can be especially deadly to a zombie deck. Once "Zombie World" is gone you can get "Treeborn Frog" back and keep destroying anything they put down. Just have some MST's (or anything to get rid of field spell cards) on standby to knock out the zombie world. From there it's merely, tribute, destroy, tribute destroy, tribute, destroy. Then bring out "Oblisk The Tormentor" and the game is practically yours. Main fallback is having Zombie World on the field. Once that is gone it opens up a lot of doors for you to attack and dismember your opponent.