Magic: The Gathering Drive to Work Podcast - #872: Zombies, Part 1

Episode Date: September 24, 2021

In this podcast, I look back at the history of Zombies and share some card-by-card design stories of some of the earliest Zombies.

I'm not pulling out of the driveway. We all know what that means. It's time for another drive to work. Coronavirus edition. Okay, so we, uh, Midnight Hunt's coming out. So I thought I would pick a theme that was very Midnight Hunt-ish. So I'm going to talk about zombies. One of my favorite creature types, for those that don't know. Um, I'm not sure what it is about zombies. I'm a big fan of zombies. I really like zombies. So you will see as I tell my story today, I had a lot of influence in early zombies of trying to make better zombies. But anyway, we'll get to that part of the story. Okay, so we start by going all the way back to Alpha.

So Alpha actually had, as printed on the card, only one card that was... Remember, summon at the time. So summon zombie. There was only one. In fact, it was summon zombies. It was plural. Now, there was a second card that referenced zombies.

So we'll talk about that. Now, there are... And there was another card that later got made into a zombie. So we'll talk about all that. Okay, so let me start with the first zombie in my mind, which is Scathade Zombies. Two and a black for a 2-2 creature, vanilla. That's what it did.

I think Richard in Alpha was really trying to help, like, communicate at Common that, like, green was better at creatures than other colors. And so green had a grizzly bear, you know, one and a green for a 2-2, and black and red both had a common 2-2, gave zombies for black and a gray ogre for red that were three mana for a 2-2, trying to communicate that green, you know, is better at creatures. And the other thing in alpha was zombie master.

One black, black, 2-3. I'm reading the alpha version of, black, two, three. I'm reading the Alpha version of the card, by the way. All zombies in play gain Swamp Walk and black regenerates for as long as this card remains in play. In contrast, the modern template is all zombies have Swamp Walk, other zombies have black regenerate this per minute. But anyway, so when Alpha first came out, remember the rules in Magic Revisionally

was the four of rules didn't exist yet. So the idea was if you wanted to play a zombie deck, well, play as many skee zombies as you wanted and then play whatever number of zombie masters you wanted and that was your zombie deck. There was Scavenging Ghoul was in the set, but it was not a zombie. It was a Summon Ghoul was in the set, but it was not a zombie. It was a summoned ghoul.

So you'll notice early on, there's a lot of creatures that we later went back and labeled as zombies, but at the time weren't labeled as zombies. Mostly what happened, and this is a good example of early magic kind of just named things whatever flavorfully they wanted to name it.

Creature types, I mean, zombie master existed, tribal existed in Alpha. So, I mean, there was some stuff, but it was more like, oh, let's just sort of name things. And there wasn't, like, zombies were very specifically, like, more traditional sort of raised from the dead zombies. In fact, if you ever look really closely, it's gay zombies on the Alpha version. In the background, there's a necromancer, but like you see his outline, um, mostly you're seeing the foreground and seeing the zombies. But anyway, um, so a lot of early zombies weren't labeled as zombies. Uh, we'll talk about them. Uh, but as far as like tribal zombies, when alpha got made, there was one zombie and one card that cared

about zombies. And that was it. And that was it for a while. Now, Scavenger Ghoul was in the set, but it was Summon Ghoul. In Arabian Nights, there was Cabal Ghoul, but that was Summon Ghoul, so that wasn't yet a zombie. In Legends,

there was Cyclopean Mummy and Headless Horseman, and even The Walking Dead. For some reason, The Walking Dead, which clearly, like you'd think, would be a zombie, is Summon Walking Dead. So, there's a lot of mismatch early on. And I guess

Boris Devilboon was in Legends as well. Back in the day, by the way, Legends were just Summon Legend. They had no other creature type. So, you know, he was flavored as a zombie, but he wasn't, or at least as a living dead. I think what happened later in Magic was, we sort of made

the decision, like, if you slice things too thinly, it's just hard to make tribes work. Like, okay, how about living dead things, you know, I mean, I guess vampires are vampires, but if you were dead and then raised from the dead, we're gonna call you a zombie. Yes, a mummy is a certain kind of zombie, but it's a zombie, so

we've started, we started saying, okay, we're gonna call these zombies. Okay, but the second zombie in Magic, the second zombie, like, literally the card said summon, and again it said summon zombies, by the way, uh, was the drowned, or just drowned, I think, not even the, drowned, um, in, um, the dark. And it was white Drowned, or just Drowned, I think. Not even the, Drowned, in the dark.

And it was white and blue for a 1-1, and it had Black Regenerate. So, by the way, so, Zombie Master exists, right? People are, like, desperately wanting to make a zombie deck. And, okay, finally, we gave you a second zombie. It's not in the same color, and it has the

ability, or one of the abilities, granted to you by the zombie master. Now, once again, I think, uh, you know, when, um, Jesper made it, he was just trying to make a cool card, and like, oh, it's a creature that's round, and, you know, it's water-based, so we'll make it blue, but it has, you know,

it's kind of a zombie, or it's a zombie, so we'll make it blue, but it has, you know, it's kind of a zombie, or it's a zombie, so we'll make it a black activation. Um, but anyway, it's just kind of funny, like, as somebody, I'm a zombie fan, and I remember early on wanting to make a zombie deck, and just not being able to make one, especially once the Four of Rules happened, because there was a point

in time where the Four of Rules happened, and there was, like, you couldn't even build, there weren't enough zombies to build a zombie deck, let alone good zombies. Okay. Also in the dark was Frankenstein's monster, but that was summon monster and not, uh, not a, we've now said, okay, look, you know,

Frankenstein, he was a zombie, you know. In fact, there's a whole range of Frankenstein-like zombies in Indusrides sets. Okay, then we get to... Oh, also in... Sorry, there's a few more in the dark. There is Murk Dwellers.

That was Summon Murk Dwellers. There's the Fallen. That's Summon Fallen. So once again, our zombies aren't labeled zombies. Okay, now we get to Ice Age. Ash and Ghoul, Summon Ghoul. Dread White, Summon White. Gangra Zombies, summon Ghoul. Dread White, summon White. Gangra Zombies, finally! Our third

zombies on Gangra Zombies. Now again, um, so Gangra Zombies were 1 blood, black, 2, 2. Tap Sacrifice Gangra Zombies to have it deal 1 damage to each creature and player. If you control any snow-covered swamps, Gangra Zombies instead deals 2 damage to each creature and player.

Um, and then also, there was Legion of Limdub Duel, that was also a zombie. One black black, two three, snow-covered swamp walk, which was a questionable thing. And there was Limb Duel's Cohorts. One black black, two three, summon zombies. Creatures blocking or blocked by Limb Duel's Cohort can't regenerate. Okay, so, finally, I think as of Ice Age, there were enough zombies that said zombie on them at the time that you could build a zombie deck. It wasn't good.

Like I said, 2B22, 1BB22, 1BB23, 1BB23. Now, given it's a mono black deck, you tend to not to play the Drowned, even though it existed. But with four zombies and zombie master, you could at first finally make a zombie deck. It was horrible. But you could finally make a zombie deck. Okay. And so comes along

Homeland's Reef Pirates once again, summon ships. It's not a zombie. So finally, the next zombie that's labeled a zombie at the time was Balduvian Dead in Alliances. And also Lord of Tressorhorn was Summoned Legend, so it later became a zombie.

But as far as an actual zombie, you're a zombie that can play. Balduvian Dead was three and a black, two, three. Once again, zombies are not very powerful. Two and a red, remove target summon card in your graveyard from the game to put a Graveborn token into play.

Treat this token as a 3-1 black and red creature that can attack the turn it comes into play. Bury Graveborn token at the end of turn. Okay, so we get another zombie, but it activates for red? Like, I don't have red in my... And in order to play the deck, I need mono black because everything is like one black black.

So Badoovin' Dead with... Anyway, things are not looking too great. Okay, finally, finally, things start looking up a little bit for the zombies in Mirage. Okay, so there's Cadaverous Knight that was Summoned Knight, so that wasn't a zombie

for purposes of your zombie deck. But there was Graveborn Zombie and Zombie Mob, which were both... In fact, I think Graveborn Zombie is the first zombie that says summon zombie and not zombies. A little trivia question there. In Mirage. Okay, so Graveborn Zombie was three in the black for a 3-2.

If Graveborn Zombie is put into the graveyard from play, put Graveborn Zombie on top of its owner's library. So basically, whenever it died, it went to the top of your library, and you would draw it next. Which, by the way, was for zombies, a step up. It's not that great a card, but for zombies,

it was a step up. And then we had Zombie Mob. Two black black, it's a two zero. Zombie Mob comes into play with one plus one plus counter for each summon card in your graveyard. Remove all those summon cards from the game. So Zombie Mob got bigger based on how many dead creatures you had.

Okay, okay! I mean, you had to have some dead creatures first, but it cost four mana. Anyway, so things still aren't looking too wonderful. Okay, so then we get to Visions. Necro Savant. Summon Necro Savant. Man!

They just wouldn't label zombies zombies back in the day. Okay, then we get into Portal. So the reason I'll bring up Portal is Portal introduces Gravedigger. Now, there were not creature types in Portal. So Bog Raiders, which was a 2-2 Swamp Walker, and Gravedigger, which was a... So Gravedigger is 3 and a black, 2-2. This is a Portal text.

When Graveyard comes into play from your hand, you may choose to return a summoned creature from your discard pile to your hand. So there's an interesting story in Gravedigger. So this is the first card. This is the first zombie that I think I made. I might have had a hand in Gravebrained Zombie or Zombie Mob,

because I was on the development team. But the first card I out and out just made from scratch was Gravedigger. And it has a really cool story. So I made it in Tempest. It was made in Tempest design, but what happened was Portal 3 Kingdoms came out before Tempest came out. So Gravedigger first shows up for the first time

in Portal, but it actually was first... It was made originally for Tempest. So here's how it got... it's actually a very interesting story how Great Dirt Direct got made. So, we had a mechanic in early Tempest that when you drew

the card, it would have an effect. And the idea was, I think we had, the plan at the time was, the back of the cards would be different. It's not a normal back. Because this is before sleeves. So when you draw it, you would see it as a different back. Everyone would know to look at it and say, ha ha, here's the effect so they'd draw triggers. Meaning

literally when you drew it, something would happen. And so I think we made a three black, a three to black two two that when you drew it, you raised dead. You got a creature card from your graveyard. And the idea was, oh, just putting this card in your deck, it generates

an effect. And then, we tried all sorts of things. We had a different pack and this and that, and in the end, there was no way to make it work. We tried a lot of versions of the draw triggers. Obviously, miracles years later would do it, but we couldn't quite find the solution that we wanted.

So, the solution I came up with was, well, instead of when you draw it, how about when you play it? Now, I should stress at the time when we were in Tempest Design, I had not seen visions yet. Like, the idea of a comes-into-play effect was just, I made it out of scratch. I had seen no one else do an enter the battlefield effect. I just was trying to mimic, well, I can't do it when I draw it, so when can I do it? And so the idea was, well, what if I just do it when you play it? And so, independent of seeing anybody else did it,

I made the first enter the play effect that I had ever seen. Now, independently, the vision design team had actually made some that I didn't know about. And probably they made it before I made mine, as far as chronologically. Because the Mirage and Visions go way back. But I was proud that I made an Enter the Battlefield effect before I saw anybody else make an Enter the Battlefield effect. I was very proud of that. And Gravedigger has obviously gone on to be a card that's gone on a lot of different sets.

It was in Portal, in Tempest. It was in a bunch of core sets. It was in Portal, in Tempest, it was in a bunch of core sets, it was in Odyssey, it's been definitely a card that's seen a lot of print. Okay, next place that we start getting some zombies is in Weatherlight. So Weatherlight

has a graveyard theme, so it actually, I think in Weatherlight we started saying, you know what, we should just label the zombies zombies and stop messing around and labeling everything but zombie. So now we haven't really got to the Great Creature update yet, where all the old things that I bypassed became zombies.

But we at least start labeling the zombies zombies. So we get Barrel Ghoul, one and a black, 4-4. During your upkeep, remove the top creature card in your graveyard from the game we get Barrel Ghoul, one and a black, 4-4. During your upkeep, remove the top creature card in your graveyard from the game, or bury Barrel Ghoul. I will note that this is one of the cards that cares about graveyard order. There's not a lot of them. This is one of them. And the idea is it eats

a card out of your graveyard. The funny thing is, it doesn't really matter if it's the top card. Like, it could just eat any card. But at the time, graveyard order could matter, so it did. And then there's Bone Dancer, 1-2-2-2, 0, put the top creature card of Defending Player's Graveyard into play

under your control. Bone Dancer deals no combat damage this turn, uses ability only if Bone Dancer is attacking and unblocked in only one each turn. Now let's see the common Oracle text for this. Whenever Bone Dancer attacks and isn't blocked, you may put the top creature card of the defending player's graveyard onto the battlefield under your control. If you do,

Bone Dagger assigns no combat damage this turn. Early days, a lot of our saboteur abilities were weirdly worded. And also, one of the things is, nowadays, usually when I hit you, we tend to do effects. In the early days, it was sort of like, well, if I hit you, then I can trade my damage instead for the effect. We don't tend

to do that much anymore. Finally, Zombie Scavengers was remove the top creature card in your graveyard from the game, regenerate. So that you, and once again, this also cares about the top card in your graveyard. I think because Weatherlight was a graveyard set, they had a bunch of cards that cared,

and there's some graveyard order cards in that that matter. But anyway, so we start getting some zombies. You can actually build a zombie deck. It's not very cohesive, but at least some of them care about the graveyard. There's some tension. Some want you to have cards in your graveyard. Some use cards in your graveyard.

But at least you start... Zombies are starting to get a little bit of a mechanical identity. Okay, so now we get to Tempest. We start getting to sets that I worked on. I mean, some of the sets I worked on, like, I worked on development for a lot of the sets. From everything from Tempest forward,

I'm sorry, not Tempest forward, from Weatherland, I'm sorry, no, from Antiquities. Not Antiquities. From Alliances. Okay, I had trouble remembering that. From Alliances forward, I joined as a developer. And from Alliances, for quite a while, for a couple years, I was on every development team. But Tempest was my first design team.

So I started designing things in Tempest. So Coffin Queen was made, but wasn't at the time a zombie. And Shrunk-Hole Assassin was an assassin, wasn't a zombie. But I did make Douthi Ghoul, which was pretty strong at the time. So it was one and a black for a 1-1 shadow. Whenever any creature with shadow is put into graveyard from play, put a plus one, plus one counter on Douthi Ghoul. So the idea was it was a two-drop 1-one, but as your Delthi Ghouls died,

it made them stronger. Still not a super pop, but we'll get to that in a second. I start making, actually, my first powerful zombie. So we get to Stronghold. And I... Oh, I actually did make... Sorry, in Tempest, I did make...

Sorry, I did make a zombie card. It's just not a summon type zombie. Let's see. What was the name of the card? It was... Sarcomancy, is that right? Sarcomancy, yes. Okay, so Sarcomancy was my first tournamentlevel zombie that I made.

So Sarcomancy is an enchantment. When Sarcomancy comes into play, this is the Tempest version, put a zombie token into play, treat this token as a 2-2 black creature. During your upkeep, if there are no zombies in play, Sarcomancy deals one to you. So what I wanted to do was I wanted to make,

originally it was a 2-2 zombie for one black mana that said if there's no zombies in play, it deals damage to you. But the problem was, well, in order for it to have text that worked, it had to be in play. And so the solution to this was to make a... It's an enchantment that makes a token.

I guess nowadays, maybe we make a zombie that has an ability in the graveyard. At the time, it was hard for us to do that, so the trick around it was we made this enchantment. And so the idea is it was a 2-2 creature for one black mana. Now, it had a drawback, obviously, but

hey, as long as you had zombies in play... So, it was me making a card for the zombie deck. I'm like, okay, you get a one-drop 2-2 zombie, and all you have to do is just have zombies. The drawback is nullified if you have zombies, which a zombie deck could probably pull off. So Sarcomancy was my first real nod to trying to make a very powerful zombie.

And then, in the next set, Stronghold, I made Carniphage. Carniphage was black for a 2-2. During your upkeep, pay one life or tap Carniphage. So that is a little bit more, not quite as good as Sarcomancy, but the

idea being, if you're going to make a sort of aggressive weenie deck, which is what the zombie deck was sort of designed to be, okay, I'm losing life, but hopefully I'm doing damage faster. I have a one mana tutu, so hopefully I'm doing two damage to them. I'm taking one damage. And you could tap it. So if attacking wasn't a good thing to do,

you tap and you didn't take the damage. But the idea is, as long as I can attack with it, okay, I'm doing two damage versus taking one damage. And Sarkomancy and Carnophage, along with Hatred, which is a card I think I was involved with. Hatred, for those that don't know the card,

what set was Hatred in? Hatred was in Exodus, was in the third set in the Tempest block. So Hatred is a three black black instant, pay X life, target creature gets plus X plus zero until end of turn. So it was a black deck that allowed you to be really aggro

because you could turn your, you could turn life into damage, right? And so those two zombies, those two zombies, plus Hatred, made an aggressive, for the first time ever, in Constructed, made an aggressive zombie deck. And I think, I think Hatred was mine. I was involved in Hatred

if I didn't just outmain Hatred. But anyway, I'm very proud that I put zombies on the map and finally made zombies something. Oh, there also was one other zombie I made in Exodus, by the way, Plaguebearer. So Plaguebearer was one black for 1-1,

XX black, destroy target non-black creature with total casting cost X equal to X. So nowadays I make Carnophage. But Plaguebearer also was something in your zombie deck that helped you kill things. And it killed it slowly. Needed a lot of mana, X, X. But still,

it was a two drop one one with the ability on board to kill things. So anyway, that is my... Okay, we can continue on. So the next zombies... I actually made the next two zombies as well. But these are from Unglued. So there's Deadhead, three and a black for a 3-3.

Put Deadhead into play. Use this ability only if an opponent loses contact with his or her hand of cards and only if Deadhead is in your graveyard. So the idea here is, it's the first time I was messing around with sort of physicality. Unglued, like normal magic, I mean, I guess Alpha had like Chaos Orb, where there was some physicality to that. Mostly that got moved out of sort of normal magic, and so Unglued picked up, you know, the mantle

of... So this idea here is that I have a three... So three mana five. Four mana, three, three zombie. And then, if my opponent ever puts down their hand, I can get it back out of the graveyard. And so it was fun to sort of make

a card that sort of, like, said to my opponent, like, okay, we kind of gotta hold your cards kind of got to hold your cards. Don't not hold your cards. Then the other zombie I made was Temp of the Damned, two and a black for a 3-3. When you play Temp of the Damned, roll a six-sided die. Temp of the Damned comes into play with a number of funk counters on it, equal to the die roll.

During your upkeep, remove a funk counter from Temp of the Damned or sacrilege Temp of the Damned. So the idea was this was kind of fading or vanishing. Actually, I guess technically it was more vanishing. But the idea is when it enters the battlefield, I get a three mana, I get a three mana 3-3, which I know this doesn't sound that good because we've made much better creatures.

But at the time, that was kind of aggressive. And the idea was you just didn't know how long you got to keep it around. The fun story of this card from a design standpoint was we have what we call, it's called slush. And what slush is, is whenever we get art and we pay for the art, and then it doesn't end up getting

used, it goes in our slush pile. The idea is it's art, we can use it, we have it, so if anybody can use the art, hey, here's art we already paid for. So one of the things I did in the unset, I normally do this in, well, I guess things I did, uh, uh, in, in the unset, I normally do this in, in, uh, well, I guess normally I'm not at the later part of the process where they're doing the

art, but in the unset I was. So I said to them, oh, is there anything in slush? And there were a couple of cards in slush. I think this and Gus were the two cards that I used from slush and I designed cards around them. I just said, okay, here's the art. What could I do with it? I made Temp the Damned to match the card.

Um, and so here's the art. What could I do with it? I may tempt the damned to match the card. And so I made another zombie. Okay, so now we get into Urza's saga. So Urza's saga, you'll note, we still have the problem of our zombies not always being labeled zombies. For example,

Eastern Paladin is Summon Knight. Hollow Dogs is Summon Hounds. Order of Yawgmoth is Summon Knight. Frexian Ghoul, sorry, that's Summon Zombie. Reclusive White is Summon Knight. Hollow Dogs is Summon Hounds. Order of Yawgmoth is Summon Knight. Frexian Ghoul, sorry, that's Summon Zombie. Reclusive White is Summon Minion. Sanguine Guard is Summon Knight. Western Paladin is Summon Knight. So, like, there are literally eight zombies in Urza's Saga,

only two of which are labeled zombies. So the two that actually were labeled zombies at the time were Cackling Fiend, 2 black, black, 2, 1. When Cackling Fiend comes into play, each of your opponents chooses and discards a card. And Frexing Ghoul, 2 and a black, sacrifices a creature. Frexing Ghoul gets plus 2, plus 2 until end of turn. So once again,

we are continuing on sort of making some zombies. I think, as you can see, once we get to sort of committing to like, look, all zombies are... Oh, here's the problem at the time. This is the real problem, by the way, is for a long time, we only would put one creature type on cards.

And so if, let's say you were a zombie knight. Well, if you were more a knight than a zombie, because the Eastern Paladin wanted to be a knight. Okay, well, knight's more important than zombie, so we put zombie on it. Hollow dogs, well, yeah, knight. Okay, well, knight's more important than zombie, so we put zombie on it. Hollow dogs, well, yeah, they're zombie dogs, but they're more dogs than zombies. And so a lot of times we'd have things that clearly were zombie. So it's not so much now.

Earlier on, we were just doing crazy labeling of stuff. Part of the problem right now is that we only had one creature type. So I was one of the people that really pushed to start getting multiple creature types on things. And it took me a surprising amount of time to do that. But that is kind of what's happening here. But you will notice, every time I'm on a set, I'm always looking for zombies.

I'm always trying to design zombies. And so there definitely is always push to do more zombies. So Urza's Legacy, Rank and File, which is a great name, two black and black for a 3-3. When Rank and File comes into play, all green creatures get a minus one, minus one until end of turn. I think that was part of a color hosing cycle. Okay, so now let's get into Urza's Destiny.

So Urza's Destiny, I know I did these cards because the sets was just me. So we get Apprentice Necromancer, one and a black, So Urza's Destiny, I know I did these cards because the sets was just me. So we get Apprentice Necromancer, one and a black. Wizard, one, one. Black and tap. Sacrifice Apprentice of Necromancer. Return target creature card from your graveyard to play.

This creature gains haste. At the end of turn, sacrifice it. So the idea behind this card was I really like the idea of getting utility out of your graveyard. And so it was cool to me, the idea that I got something, but I didn't get it forever. I just got it temporarily. So I thought it was a fun card, and then it played around with the idea of not that I'm doing permanent reanimation,

but sort of temporary reanimation. Interestingly, modern day, by the way, there's a big ongoing debate on the console colors of is black supposed to do that, or is red supposed to do that? And there's often debate back and forth of who is supposed to be doing that. We've done it a little bit in both colors. The other Urza's Legacy card is Plague Dogs. Four and a black for 3-3.

When Plague Dogs is put into a graveyard from play, all creatures get minus one, minus one until end of turn. Two, sacrifice Plague Dogs, draw a card. So one of the mechanical things I did in Urza's Destiny was I was trying to take cycling and do something cool with it. And so my idea at the time was to do what I called

cycling from play. And I wanted to actually call cycling from play, because I wanted to count it cycling, for purposes of things that cycled. But, actually, I guess it didn't matter yet because back then, yeah, when we first introduced cycling, there wasn't things that care about cycling. That didn't happen until Onslaught.

But anyway, we ended up not calling cycling from play. We just said to, the idea is to sacrifice this card, draw a card. So like, it's like, much like cycling is discard the card, here you can sacrifice the card, draw a card. So like, it's like, much like cycling is, discard the card, here you can sacrifice the card. And then, what I did on some of the cycling from play cards is I put a Death Trigger on them. One of the themes of Versus

Destiny was a lot of Death Triggers, because Death Triggers worked well with Echo, and Death Trigger worked well with cycling, which were the two named mechanics of the block. We're in the Urza-Saga block, obviously. And so this card's kind of fun because it's a 5-mana 3-3 creature and when it dies, it'll

do something, but you can also trade it in for a card and also trigger its ability. So I thought that was kind of fun. Okay, next is... what is this? Portal... Is this Portal Second Age? Hold on, let's see. This is... Oh, Starter 1999.

So that was a product we made to try to teach people how to play. And I think we made a few cards specifically for it. So Dakmar Ghoul is one of them. Two black, black, two, two. When Dakmar Ghoul comes into play, what we used to call Enter the Battlefield, a target opponent loses two life, you gain two life.

So he enters and drains somebody. I think that's the first time we did draining on a zombie. That's something we do a lot now. I think we do more draining on vampires because it's a little more flavorful on vampires, but we do occasionally do it on zombies. Okay, so now let's get into Portal Three Kingdoms. So Portal has the same problem where

of the eight cards that are now a zombie, five of which are mercenaries, because, uh, one of the mechanics in the set was mercenary. So, once again, we only had one creature type. If she's a mercenary, that mechanically mattered, so you had to be a mercenary. So, Phyrexian Driver, Phyrexian Prowler, Wrath of the Assassin, Spineless Thug, uh, Spiteful Bully were all cards that would later become zombies, but at the time weren't labeled as zombies. The three cards that were

labeled zombies, I'm sorry, Mercanian Mask only had one zombie. I'm jumping ahead. Those were all in Nemesis. So, there was only one zombie in Mercanian Masks. Deepwood Ghoul Zombie, 2 black, 2 1, Pay 2 Life, Regks. Deepwood Ghoul zombie, two black, two one. Pay two life, regenerate Deepwood Ghoul.

I remember the one thing that I think this was my card. I liked playing around with the idea. One of the things you'll see early on with Sarcomancy and stuff is I like the idea, and Hatred, I liked black being, I liked the zombie deck playing with life. I thought that was kind of fun. They were

undead. And so this is the idea of, okay, here I got a creature where, look, I can regenerate the creature, but it comes at a cost, and the cost is life rather than mana. And I was very fascinated by that. There's a lot of me experimenting with different life stuff you'll notice in zombies.

Okay, so finally we get to Nemesis. And all five Nemesis creatures that are zombies are creature-type mercenary. Because mercenary... So there were rebels and mercenaries in the Mercenary Mass Block. Rebels searched for things

that were mana cost higher than them. Mercenaries looked for things that were lower than them. Surprise, surprise, looking for higher things and tutoring things that made you go up the ramp were better than down. Rebels are very, very strong.

Mercenaries, not so strong. Okay, so I'm almost out of time here, but I will finish up with the last two zombies of Mercadian Mass Block, which were in Prophecy. And both were luckily creature-type zombie. Okay, so Coffin Puppets, 3 black, black, 3, 3. Sacrifice 2 lands. Return Coffin Puppets, 3 black black 3 3, sacrifice 2 lands return Coffin Puppets to play

play as a ability only during your upkeep, only if Coffin Puppets are in your graveyard, and only if you control a swamp so this set was the lead designer of the set was William Jockish who was a developer who really wanted to lead a design and he made a probably the most developer-y

slash play design-ery sets ever made in design. His theme was land as a resource, of sacking lands as resource, which is, if you understand magic really well, if you understand the resources

of magic really well, there's interesting decisions to be made, but for the average player who just doesn't want to sack their lands, it is just not fun. And Prophecy has a lot of mechanics where, like, if you're really interested in understanding the dynamics behind the scenes, there's

things you can do, but on the surface, it just makes for a very frustrating period. And Coffin Puppets is a good example where, okay, like, hey, maybe I do later in the game want to sacrifice lands to get back my creature and this did see some play in some zombie decks

because it's not a bad card but it was not particularly fun for people. The other zombie in Prophecy was Whip-Stitched Zombie one and a black for a 2-2 creature zombie so a 2-mana 2-2 at the beginning of your upkeep

sacrifice which with zombie unless you pay black so it had an upkeep of a black for a 2-2, creature zombie. So a two-mana 2-2. At the beginning of your upkeep, sacrifice which with zombie unless you pay black. So it had an upkeep of a black mana. But zombie decks back in the day were aggressive, and so stuff like this, sometimes, I mean, this wasn't a great zombie, and that zombie wants to keep spilling out other zombies, but

it was a two-mana 2-2, which it was, I mean, nice to see. A little bit too much of a drawback. Anyway, guys, I'm at my desk. And so while I love talking about zombies, and the plan is I will talk more about zombies. I'm planning to do one more of these soon and probably others down the road. But anyway, I'm at my desk.

So we all know what that means. It means it's the end of my drive to work. So instead of talking zombies, instead of talking zombies, instead of talking magic, it's time for me to be making magic and making zombies. Bye-bye, guys.