. . . And Paul Levitin

With so many duelists taking inspiration from Lazaro Bellido’s performance in Toronto last weekend, it’s no surprise that his closest teammates are all running the latest version of his deck. Say what you will about the potentially inconsistent opening hands of Zombies with Card of Safe Return: three out of four Superfriends running the deck are undefeated.

Let me rephrase that. Dale Bellido, Matt Peddle, and Paul Levitin (not a Superfriend) are undefeated. I still can’t figure out how Levitin wriggled his way into getting the team’s decklist:

If you haven’t seen the deck, here’s how it works. It opens really strong thanks to Giant Rat and Pyramid Turtle, and it plays to a slow pace early in the duel in order to accomplish two things. First, playing passively for several turns lets the deck build up a few Zombies in the graveyard, enabling big mid-game plays with Book of Life and Zombie Master. From there, it works to draw into one or more copies of Card of Safe Return. The deck can play aggressively before it hits Safe Return, but the longer you can ride it out, the bigger the payoff, because all the deck’s key plays get better with Return on the table.

Once Return hits, the deck can either explode for a win, or simply go about its business slowly turning the tide of battle. It’s that grinding pace that’s terrifying, and it’ll often be worthwhile to play stupid early on in order to draw out Heavy Storm. Once the opponent’s used it, the early game may be a bit rough, but the mid and late game become a lot easier, since Card of Safe Return can be used in conjunction with face down cards without a worry of losing major card presence to removal. Mobius the Frost Monarch isn’t a popular pick here today, so multiple copies of Card of Safe Return can exist on the field for a long time.

At least, until the Zombie duelist wins.

Card Trooper is integral, providing another target for the Ratbox recruiter engine and giving the deck another way to get Zombies into the graveyard. It allows for the usual range of over-the-top plays with Torrential Tribute, and it can run over Elemental Hero Stratos or trade with Breaker the Magical Warrior. It’s just as good as it was last format, and even though it may no longer be an OTK on its own, it certainly helps establish one-turn wins regardless. Because of the low level of field commitment this deck usually wants to make in the first few turns, Card Trooper is ideal for early pushes, allowing the elimination of an on-field threat while not losing card presence or simplifying the Zombie player’s field.

Creature Swap is the other signature combo this deck possesses. The use of Swap in conjunction with Pyramid Turtle or Giant Rat is easy to see; trade your opponent a recruiter, run it over, pull something huge, and you’ll get to keep the opponent’s monster. But there are some subtle uses for it as well. Swapping for a monster and then tributing it will place it in your opponent’s graveyard, bringing Book of Life online in situations where attacks would be rebuked. It can also be used to shunt an attack mode Spirit Reaper to the opponent’s side of the field, so that it can be attacked repeatedly to press through damage. These are examples of situations that pop up only rarely, but this deck generates these little situations all the time. It literally has dozens of ways to defeat you.

Three Book of Life, three Zombie Master, two Il Blud, Premature Burial, and Call of the Haunted means this deck has ten effects that special summon monsters for Card of Safe Return. Half of those can do it repeatedly if they’re left on the field long enough, and one fourth of the total card count special summons from the graveyard. That gives this build the consistency it needs to justify the three copies of Card of Safe Return, and I think so far the biggest hand I’ve seen a Zombie player wield today was 27 cards. That match was over pretty quick.

One inclusion here that does defy the norm is the choice of Dust Tornado over Royal Decree. A lot of the Zombie builds proposed in online communities over the past weeks ran Decree for its ability to encourage the Zombie deck’s tendency to attack over a course of several turns, but Dust Tornado is superior in several ways. First, it doesn’t prevent the deck from running Call of the Haunted, which is integral in using Il Blud efficiently (while also giving another special summon for Card of Safe Return). It even helps Call of the Haunted, since Dust can be used to set that important trap card. Second, Dust does about as much to enable offensive initiatives as Decree does. Few duelists are actually setting more than one defensive spell or trap card at this tournament; large back fields are rare, so Tornado is often all that’s needed to create an opening. Skill and Snipe Hunter compensate for exceptional cases.

Zombies are officially competitive and, to me, the best part is that the Superfriends build represents only one of several ways they can be played. Despite the general skepticism, higher utility versions without Card of Safe Return and Creature Swap can be highly competitive. No one here has even touched the idea of an Instant Fusion build centered on Reaper On The Nightmare, and Lazaro’s dabbling with sided options like Vampire Lord is showing surprising promise. It’s difficult to predict where this deck may go in the future, and that’s pretty cool.

With Round 5 wrapping up, about half a dozen competitors appear to be undefeated with Zombies. We may very well see several in Day 2.