Optimizing Ghoulish Procession Sideboards Across Formats

Ghoulish Procession card art from Innistrad Remastered

Image courtesy of Scryfall.com

Optimizing Ghoulish Procession Sideboards Across Formats

There’s something deliciously grim and satisfying about a small enchantment turning a tense late game into a zombie procession 🧙‍♂️🔥. Ghoulish Procession, a color-identity puzzle piece from Innistrad Remastered (INR), is a perfect example of how a modest mana investment can snowball into a resilient, repeatable engine. For the uninitiated, this uncommon two-mana enchantment says: when one or more nontoken creatures die, you create a 2/2 black Zombie creature token with decayed, and this triggers only once per turn. The flavor text—“It was a family reunion to die for”—knows exactly the mood you’re chasing: a board twitch that compounds value as the game evolves. In sideboard contexts across formats, Ghoulish Procession shines when you want incremental pressure after sweepers, or when you’re leveraging sacrifice-made value to outgrind a control shell. And yes, that decayed zombie has its quirks—can’t block, must be sacrificed when it attacks—so you’re balancing tempo with inevitability ⚔️🎲.

Why this enchantment fits neatly in sideboards

Ghoulish Procession is not a one-turn wonder; it’s a long-game accelerator. The trigger is conditioned on non-token deaths, which means you’re not incented to dump generic removal into your own ranks (you’ll want to avoid wrecking your own board). Instead, you lean into board stalls, creature-combos, and sacrifice outlets that turn the dying into incremental advantage. The created 2/2 Zombies with decayed can pressure opposing life totals while you rebuild, then recur or respecify a different angle with that single-turn trigger limit. In sideboards, the card serves as both a trap for aggro and a clutch engine for attrition matchups, especially when paired with other sacrifice outlets and anthem-like effects. The deck-building math becomes about “how many times can I trigger this across the game” rather than “how big a single swing can I assemble in one go” 🧙‍♂️💎.

Format-by-format strategy and practical lines

Here’s how Ghoulish Procession tends to behave across common competitive formats, and how you can tune the sideboard to maximize its upside:

Modern — In Modern, the best homes for this card are aristocrats- or sacrifice-backed midrange builds that can weather sweepers and still press for value. You’ll want to protect the Procession with selective graveyard hate and resiliency. Use it as a one-turn engine after a sweeper or mass removal, letting a single trigger balloon into a legion of decayed zombies over the next two turns. Pair it with sacrifice outlets and care about not over-extending into creatures that would be wiped away in a follow-up board wipe—your aim is a slow trickle that becomes a torrent after the dust settles 🔥.
Pioneer — In Pioneer, where longer games are common, Ghoulish Procession can create a surprising backstop after a well-timed removal spell. The once-per-turn trigger means you’ll want a board that allows at least two or three creature deaths across turns to keep generating value. It slots into midrange shells that lean on disruption and resilient threats, turning each creature death into a foothold for a zombie echo that keeps pressing pressure as you stabilize 🚀.
Legacy — Legacy players can leverage Ghoulish Procession as a value engine in slower metas, particularly where abuse of sacrifice outlets can outgrind combo decks. The card’s flavor of “the dead walk again” is DJ-friendly in archetypes that already lean on wedge-colored control with some sacrifice synergies. Expect it to shine in niche shadow-aristocrat combinations where a few sacrificed creatures across multiple turns add up to a meaningful board presence.
Vintage — Vintage dynamics are a touch more fringe, but a calculated Ghoulish Procession can still act as a disruptive engine in certain black-dominated strategies. The key is knowing when to anchor the board with a decayed zombie that forces opponents to respect a long-game path you’re building toward. Don’t expect a big one-turn swing here; think of it as a cheap, persistent value engine to swing inevitability your way 🕯️.
Commander (EDH) considerations — Sideboards in EDH are less formal, since it’s a 100-card singleton format, but you’ll still encounter sideboard-esque adjustments in tournaments and cube-like environments. Ghoulish Procession can slot into aristocrat or zombie tribal shells, where repeated creature deaths are common across turns, and you can set up boards that snowball with a handful of sacrifice outlets and token producers. It’s a flavorful, thematic choice that rewards planning and patience, especially in multiplayer environments where every extra zombie compounds pressure 🎭.

From a design perspective, the card’s masterstroke is that it combines simple, recurring value with a risk-reward twist: your decayed zombies can’t block, but they can accelerate your clock while occupying the opponent’s resources. The encoded flavor—zombie hospitality gone wrong—lands nicely with the “family reunion to die for” line, providing an in-game hook for players to lean into. If you’re a deckbuilder who loves heard-it-before, seen-it-before archetypes with a twist, Ghoulish Procession offers a compact engine that rewards careful sequencing and patience 🧙‍♂️💎.

As you tune your sideboard, think about sequencing, not just raw density. Include a few low-cost removal spells, some graveyard hate for predictable graveyard strategies, and a couple of sacrifice outlets that ensure every death event can be channeled into value across multiple turns. The result is a lean, resilient plan that doesn’t rely on a single big swing, but rather a steady trickle that becomes a flood as the game unfolds 🎨.

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