Varina, Lich Queen

[WizardMN]

The next game was against Xyris, the Writhing Storm, Zedruu the Greathearted, and Keranos, God of Storms.

I started off with decent lands and some early drops. Expedition Map got me Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx early though I did wait a couple turns to play it since it didn't do anything. Xyris was filling our yards with Psychic Corrosion and I was just holding onto 2 mass reanimation spells.

During this time there was a bit of back and forth with the board where we all just tried to keep Xyris in check and Noxious Ghoul came through in spades for that. Keranos was slowly eating my board though and did eventually kill the Ghoul since I had cast Tombstone Stairwell and was wrathing every turn.

I was able to build up a decent board presence, expecially considering Ghoul wrathed the board twice before being removed. And of course I was getting a ton of zombies off Stairwell. 17 was what I got for the first trigger. However, Keranos cast Echo of Eons which was then doubled from Double Vision so my yard went away. Luckily, Xyis refilled it a little bit so I got 4 zombies the next upkeep. I ended up paying the upkeep cost once and then Keranos tried to shuffle it in with Chaos Warp. I had Nykthos, 6 devotion to black, and 4 other lands untapped so I activated Nykthos and cast Twilight's Call in response. I got Gray Merchant of Asphodel, Carrion Feeder, and Vengeful Dead (among others) back. I let Chaos Warp resolve so I could try to kill the rest of the table depending on what I got off of it. I got a land.

However, and I did forget this in the moment, the Zombies it created are destroyed immediately when it leaves and Vengeful Dead cares about *any* zombie dying so the tokens my opponents had was enough for me to kill the rest of the table.

One interesting situation at the end of the game was that Zedruu gave me Nine Lives so I was trying to play around that all game and really was trying to play around them conceding which would have killed me too. So I held up Twilight's Call far longer than I probably should have in case they did concede out of nowhere or in response to me reanimating everything. Otherwise I would have reanimated in response to the Echo of Eons.

At the end, Nine Lives did trigger since Zedruu lost second but with Carrion Feeder I was able to sac zombies in response to the trigger to ensure I killed Xyris first.

Of note, I finally got Silversmote Ghoul on the field almost immediately at the start of the game. I even had a line set up where I would attack with it, Varina, and Gravecrawler and then sac it to draw and get it back at the end step. It felt kind of cool to do that but I ended up not being able to swing due to a few things and I never got another chance since I needed to keep up blockers so I didn't lose to Nine Lives. So, while I could have made use of it, and was in a reasonable position to do so at one point, it never came to fruition. My opinion on the card is still the same: it is very synergistic but the effect isn't worth it. Any zombie would have done the same thing there. While that won't apply in every situation I am pretty confident that I have given the card the chances it needs and I remain unimpressed.

Nothing else really stood out (good or bad). The deck functioned as I like it to though I am starting to get more into the idea of Balthor the Defiled as an option. And I did have Vault of the Archangel pretty much the entire game again. And, again, I never had enough mana to activate it. This too is another card that has shown that it just isn't going to work the way I thought it would.

[Falkenbach]

I think you were also very unlucky to have both opponents have their graveyard hate out since these are online matchups right? I feel like most people (in my local gamestore) either run no graveyardhate or only 1-2 pieces. How has that been for you online with random people?

Lord of the Accursed is indeed most of the time a buffing lord and nothing more.. i think of replacing him with Bladestitched Skaab [/card] to lower curve have another earlier drop. Aldo it might soon seem the skaab is also pretty weak.. will you replace lord of the accursed and so for what? (Any midnight hunt cards?)

[WizardMN]

I think you were also very unlucky to have both opponents have their graveyard hate out since these are online matchups right? I feel like most people (in my local gamestore) either run no graveyardhate or only 1-2 pieces. How has that been for you online with random people?

Grave hate in general is hit or miss with opponents. Not many people run it to begin with and even fewer run permanents that sit around. I don't think it comes up often enough to be worried about and, as mentioned, I think I was still able to play around them reasonably well even though they did affect me.

Lord of the Accursed is indeed most of the time a buffing lord and nothing more.. i think of replacing him with Bladestitched Skaab to lower curve have another earlier drop. Aldo it might soon seem the skaab is also pretty weak.. will you replace lord of the accursed and so for what? (Any midnight hunt cards?)

Yeah, I still think Lord of the Accursed is better than Skaab since it pumps the toughness at least. But I also don't think Skaab is good enough at all, even with being a 2 drop. I have a bunch of cards I am thinking of cutting so I can't say for sure that Lord will be cut specifically for a Midnight Hunt card since the only Zombie I could see adding at all is Falcon Abomination and even that is questionable. Realistically, I likely hope for more from the Commander decks and/or Crimson Vow. I know Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver is definitely going to make it in.

I think of the cuts I have, Lord of the Accursed is on the list, but lower. I think there are 4 or 5 other cards I want to cut first. So, with the slow movement on playable zombies in new sets, it might be a while depending on what we actually get in the next few sets.

[WizardMN]

I never did make an update on the Midnight Hunt Commander cards and most decks I have don't really care about any of the new cards, but this deck sort of does. There are a lot of zombies I don't want to try so I am just going to skip over them for now. Here are my thoughts on the cards that I either want to try or that might be on the edge. I will probably try to come up with some cuts for these cards as well as others that have been discussed above so I can start trying things out:

Blue Cards

Empty the Laboratory - This seems like a reasonable way to refill the board and the graveyard for later on. If we take some of our cheaper zombies (or even the tokens Varina creates) and sac them to get a new army, we can then reanimate the nontokens we sacrificed with one of our reanimation spells. It isn't perfect as the mana cost can get high but I think it is worth a try.

Multicolor Cards

Wilhelt the Rotcleaver - This is one of the few zombies in recent sets that is basically a shoo-in for the deck. It does a lot of what we want and while he sits on the curve at the same spot as Varina, his abilities are just too good to pass up. I don't really like Decayed but it is serviceable when it is just a "free" zombie. And it works with the tokens from Tombstone Stairwell and Varina which can provide pretty good value.

[WizardMN]

With all of the discussions above and wanting to continue to try to tune this deck, here is the next round of changes I am going to try:

10/02/2021

DecklistCMCManaPricesChartsDraw 7

CUTS

1 Vault of the Archangel

1 Mana Drain

1 Phyrexian Delver

1 Lord of the Accursed

1 Silvermote Ghoul

1 Dihada's Ploy

1 Teferi's Ageless Insight

1 Search for Azcanta

1 Master of Death

ADDS

1 Wilhelt the Rotcleaver

1 Empty the Laboratory

1 Balthor the Defiled

1 Apprentice Necromancer

1 Arcane Denial

1 Swan Song

1 Vanquish the Horde

1 Memory Deluge

1 Dread Return

Approximate Total Cost:

This is a pretty big change so I will try to go over everything. First, the cuts:

Vault has never been used so I am just going to cut it for a Swamp. The few times it could be useful are not worth the times it messes up my mana. Mana drain is just being cut for Arcane Denial in the interests of getting rid of the double blue requirement. It is also not often that the mana truly does a lot since our zombies require a lot of colored mana. Phyrexian Delver is a straight swap for Balthor as discussed earlier.

Silversmote Ghoul I figured I have a chance. I never like it to begin with (so there was an obvious bias right away) and there was never a situation that suggested I should change my mind on it. Dihada's Ploy isn't bad but I want to go a little bigger with Memory Deluge. Ultimately, Deluge likely isn't right either but then I might shift into something like Deep Analysis.

Teferi's Ageless Insight is another I have gone back and forth on and I figured I would cut it again. Search for Azcanta was nice but not largely impactful. Master of Death ended up being pretty mediocre as expected.

Wilhelt, Empty, and Balthor have been discussed earlier. Necromancer is a replacement for Delver (sort of) that can be done at instant timing. I like the idea and got close to adding Unburial Rites as well, but decided to just go with this and Dread Return for now. I think it might have a place but I am not sure how much I want to go down that road.

Arcane Denial is a swap for Mana Drain and Swan Song is just adding a little depth to the counter suite. I don't think it is fantastic by any means, but 1 mana can really help get our mass reanimation spells through. Vanquish the Horde is a wrath that often ends up costing 2 mana. I don't know if we need it but it could be helpful when we are really far behind. Deluge was talked about earlier and Swamp is the land for Vault. Dread Return is another testing card based on discussions in @toctheyounger's thread. I am not sold on it but I like the potential. Notably, not replacing Vault with another land leaves me at 37 lands. Others have talked about going lower and I am not really comfortable doing that but I figured I could try it seeing as I do have a fair bit of filtering.

[WizardMN]

Of note, Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver is not online so I just decided to slot in Deep Analysis to try out.

I played a game online with the aforementioned changes and it went pretty well. The opponents' commanders were Merieke Ri Berit, Kaalia of the Vast, Xenagos, God of Revels. I will admit that a lot of what happened is due to Merieke's Oath of Lieges though so it is hard to say the deck worked entirely on its own.

Anyway, I started off with a 4 land hand, Akroma's Will, Carrion Feeder, and Apprentice Necromancer. I played Feeder and Necromancer on curve and then cast Varina on turn 4. Varina let me dig a bit and I mostly attacked Merieke since they just had a 0/5 blocker. I did go after Kaalia with Varina a couple times and Merieke put an aura onto Kaalia to give her Phasing which helped out. I just kept trying to put more zombies out and did discard a couple to Varina because I had to; I wasn't trying to set much up from the yard yet. But, I got Graveborn Muse down which helped out a lot.

This kept my hand full and kept my yard full since it gave me a lot more to discard too. Kaalia had Linvala, Keeper of Silence preventing me from activating Varina, Feeder, and Necromancer but it wasn't too big a deal. They did get Avacyn, Angel of Hope on the field but I had Noxious Ghoul in hand. I did wait a little bit so I could sequence it better and eventually I drew into Twilight's Call I ended up discarding a bunch of zombies, including Ghoul, to Varina and hand size and then left up exactly 8 mana to flash in Call.

Merieke didn't do much on their turn and Kaalia ended up getting Mirrorwing Dragon out but didn't have anything to cast targeting it. Xenagos flashed in Xenagos thanks to Yeva, Nature's Herald and I ended up taking this opportunity to flash in Call. Merieke was empty handed, Kaalia had 2 mana open and Xenagos was tapped out. So, it seemed like the best time to go for it. I didn't bother doing the math but I did have Corpse Knight, Wayward Servant, and Gray Merchant of Asphodel in the yard. Xenagos was at 35 life, Merieke was at 19, and Kaalia was at 43.

After all the triggers resolved, Xenagos was at -2, Kaalia was at 6, and Merieke was at -18. I was then able to use Carrion Feeder to sac creatures (now that Linvala was gone thanks to Noxious Ghoul) and get Vengeful Dead to trigger 6 times to win the game.

This was on turn 8 as well which really shows how much Oath helped things out. I also had Cyclonic Rift in hand that I had been keeping up just in case.

Overall, the deck worked spectacularly. The only card I ended up seeing that I didn't want to see was Fleshbag Marauder since it didn't do anything at the time. Akroma's Will never did anything either but I did have a number of sequences that I was trying to get to make it work. I never needed it so I am not sure if this is an anomaly or maybe an indicator of how unnecessary the card might be in the deck. It is tough to totally discount it though since we are still a creature centric deck so we want to give us ourselves some way to win through combat. With some of the lesser reliance on lords, Will gives us a way to win out of nowhere or even just gain a bunch of life.

[WizardMN]

Had a pretty good game online just now against Anje Falkenrath, Volo, Guide to Monsters, and Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn.

I started off with Corpse Knight and Wayward Servant into Varina, Lich Queen and Zombie Master. This let me get in a few hits unimpeded since I drew Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth on the turn I cast Master. This did let Anje swing at me a couple of times with their zombies but Varina kept my life total up at first.

Volo was doing Volo things but not super impactful. They copied Kiora's Follower, Man-o'-War, Acidic Slime (which blew up Urborg), and something else. I ended up using Expedition Map to get Phyrexian Tower since I wanted the mana and then I blew the board with Vanquish the Horde for 2 mana and recast Varina which had been bounced by Man-o'-War.

Next turn I cast Fleshbag Marauder after Anje and Volo cast their commanders and Lathiel cast a single creature. Volo was down to around 15 at this point because they were a pretty big target for most of the game. I did start dividing damage between them and Lathiel though. While just gunning for them was the "right" play most likely, it still felt bad and it is tough to just go after them when the others are at above 30 life. And Lathiel did have 5 cards in hand. Anje had none so they weren't much of a threat.

I did keep whittling Volo down until I got them to 6 which is when I cast Noxious Ghoul and Gray Merchant of Asphodel in one turn thanks to Phyrexian Tower and Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx (which I luckily drew into). This killed Lathiel's commander which they had cast in the mean time and I could have killed Anje's commander but I wanted to leave up the 2 mana for Delay just in case. Gray Merchant did kill the Volo player outright.

Soon after, Lathiel scooped it up as they were on 13 life and apparently weren't doing much. So it came down to just Anje and me and since they hadn't had much for cards in hand, they were struggling. They made a good show of it to discard a Madness card or 2 and cast them but I was able to fire off a pretty big Epiphany at the Drownyard (for 11 I think?) which actually got me very little. It did ensure I had a mass reanimation in hand since I saw two and got me Mission Briefing just in case. I didn't really need it in this case. But I didn't see many zombies. I ended up getting most to hand which I then discarded to Varina next turn.

I then cast and activated Balthor the Defiled which I had in hand for about 4 turns just waiting to set it up. This got me 10 or so triggers each from Wayward Servant and Corpse Knight and returned Gray Merchant which I had sacrificed to Phyrexian Tower to cast Epiphany. That was more than enough to end the game on the spot as Anje was now down to 15-20 life or something.

Expedition Map for Nykthos and Tower has been a pretty good inclusion. This game it got me Tower which I think was the right call in the moment and drawing into Nykthos later just propelled me forward by quite a bit. Balthor was awesome and since only one deck was running Red and/or Black, I didn't have to worry much about reanimating everything. And Withered Wretch helped control that further anyway.

Empty the Laboratory sat in my hand for about 5 turns without me ever really wanting to cast it. I had a couple situations where I could have but I would have sacrificed 3 zombies to get 3 random ones and it never quite felt right to fire it off for that little of a payoff since I liked the Zombies I had. I ended up discarding it to Varina.

Nothing else really stood out as a problem though. Mission Briefing wasn't all that helpful and there might be an argument for cutting it due to the 2 blue mana and because there is enough redundancy in the deck without it anyway. I did draw into Heliod's Intervention which, as usual, didn't do anything so it was another that I just discarded to Varina.

There might be a few other cards that are sort of close to being on the chopping block: Land Tax, Vile Entomber, Mission Briefing, Fleshbag Marauder (maybe; this has been hit or miss so far), Memory Deluge (this was questionable to start with), Empty the Laboratory, and Heliod's Intervention are the list of cards where I could see making cuts depending on new cards being added or just tweaking other elements of the deck.

But, for the most part, the deck is functioning the way I want and I have been enjoying it quite a bit. It has hit a pretty good stride after all the tweaks and testing over the past few months when I was trying out different ideas and different inclusions.

[pokken]

Expedition Map for Nykthos and Tower has been a pretty good inclusion. This game it got me Tower which I think was the right call in the moment and drawing into Nykthos later just propelled me forward by quite a bit.

I'm glad to see this working out; it felt when I suggested that that going from 5 to 10 mana was a lot more where this deck wanted to be than from 2 to 4. It's a really unusual deck that has so many great 1-3 mana spells that really conflict with wanting to ramp on 2 -- and having Varina before bodies on board is not all that helpful.

[WizardMN]

I agree and I think that is why traditional ramp isn't quite as effective here. We really want to be ramping later which then means our ramp needs to be more explosive. I have said it before but taking an early turn off to ramp really puts us behind where we want to be with board presence.

[toctheyounger]

Good to hear it's working well for you. I'm quite interested in trying the Map myself, I just don't have a spare copy.

How has adding Vanquish been for you? Presumably a really nice add, my LGSes are out at the minute so ill end up having to wait on it i think.

Any sign of Wilhelt so far? I'm quite excited to see how far he pushes the deck ahead.

[WizardMN]

Vanquish worked out well the one time I cast it. I think it fits in a good spot as it allows for a wrath and commitment to the board in the same turn. I have had more luck with it in Karador which I am honestly thinking should just be Hour of Revelation so I might swap that out. But I like Vanquish and have been happy with it so far.

Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver is not online so I can't test it out

[toctheyounger]

Ah yes I remember you mentioning that. Bummer.

I'm making a big swathe of upgrades myself in the next few days so hopefully I'll get some gameplay in with it.

[WizardMN]

Game Summary

Had a pretty solid game online just now. Played against Saheeli, the Gifted, Juri, Master of the Revue, and Farideh, Devil's Chosen.

I started with 5 lands, Withered Wretch, and Epiphany at the Drownyard. I didn't really get much else at first but I used Wretch to keep graveyards clean and then attacked with it when Varina, Lich Queen was on the field to start the looting.

I was able to use Brainstorm and Ponder to ensure I got cards I needed and a couple fetches allowed me to shuffle away "bad" cards with Brainstorm. I ended up discarding Shepherd of Rot and Memory Deluge early on with Varina. Varina also did a bit to create some tokens with her ability.

While I was doing this, Juri and Farideh weren't doing much. Farideh was getting stuck on lands and I think Juri just didn't have a lot. But Saheeli was going off. In one turn, they cast Saheeli and plussed her. This let them cast Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre and swung at me after equipping it with Lightning Greaves. I sacrificed 3 zombie tokens and Wretch and then blocked with Varina.

I could have countered Saheeli with Delay but I honestly felt that we could do a bit more with what was on the board and it would have been premature. I am not sure if I should have or not (I never did cast Delay) but the end result worked out fine for me so I not too broken up about letting her resolve. At the time, we didn't know they were on Eldrazi and, to be fair, we never saw any others.

Anyway, with my board cleared, I cast Living Death to get rid of Ulamog. When everything returned for me (nobody else had anything) I used my last mana to exile Ulamog with Wretch before he shuffled in to ensure they couldn't get him back. Now I had 4 creatures and my opponents had none. However, Saheeli rebuilt reasonably well and ended up with Metalwork Colossus so I couldn't attack them. Instead, I attacked the other two so I could loot. This got me Expedition Map. I used it to get to Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx and after playing Nykthos, I had 4 lands untapped (the other 3 were tapped from Map).

I passed the turn and Saheeli ended up trying to go off again. They copied Colossus and swung at me for 20. I decided now would be a good time to cast Cyclonic Rift. I had exactly 7 mana thanks to Nykthos and they could not counter it. So, everything went away. I then attacked them next turn and cast Tombstone Stairwell and Gray Merchant of Asphodel. I went to 77, Juri went to 16, Farideh went to 18, and Saheeli went to 13. With Stairwell triggering, there were a total of 12 zombies on the field each turn so not quite enough to activate Shepherd to kill Saheeli (or anyone else). I had hoped the other two players would attack someone but they didn't. Well, Farideh attacked me since I couldn't block but that didn't do anything.

Saheeli started their turn and cast Blasphemous Act. I made a zombie with Varina and activated Shepherd in response. So, they died and B Act did not resolve.

I started my turn and just activated Shepherd again to kill the other two players.

End of Summary

The deck worked out fantastically. I did stumble on lands a little after shuffling one away thinking I had enough but my card draw was more than enough to get me back on track. Map for Nykthos is again working out way better than I expected. I never did cast Epiphany but I had a couple times I thought about it but went with more zombies with Varina instead. And, of course, Tombstone Stairwell was huge in this game allowing Shepherd to drain for the last life from everyone. I never even got to attack with them!

All in all, I have no real concerns about the deck. This might show Memory Deluge is not good enough and perhaps Deep Analysis isn't too bad in that slot. Though, it is currently in the Wilhelt slot online. But that might allow for some testing to see if it can be good enough as a real include. Fleshbag Marauder almost showed up but I ended up milling it or discarding it or something. That might be the biggest "what if" change I am thinking of. When he works, he works great. But he doesn't always work. In this game, there were too many tokens on the side of the person I actually cared about.

[pokken]

The number of times I have passed turn with Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx for Cyclonic Rift up is...a lot. Like a really common play pattern. It is deceptive, people forget you have 7 mana open on 3 lands or whatever.

[WizardMN]

I have gotten behind in set updates again but this set did have a bit for quite a few of my decks. Here are my thoughts for this deck:

White Cards

Storm of Souls - Another mass reanimation spell deserves a second look and this one has a lot going for it. It only reanimates our stuff (which not many of our mass reanimation spells do) and it gives them flying. It does make them 1/1s which isn't ideal but our lords can potentially buff them a little more beyond that. The exile clause is mostly irrelevant. While we have some ways to get things back (and a new one from this set even) it isn't enough to call it a dud. Unfortunately, with the options we currently have, this one just misses the mark. Living Death acts as a pseudo wrath; Zombie Apocalypse does the same as this and potentially destroys things; Twilight's Call can be an Instant. Balthor can be an Instant as well. And since he is a creature it allows for better loops of one Reanimate into him for another. I could see it competing with Patriarch's Bidding though. One mana more and no one gets anything besides us? That seems pretty relevant. 5 mana over 6 mana isn't a huge difference but it might be enough. Arguably, the bigger issue is the white mana over black mana thanks to Nykthos and (potentially) Crypt of Agadeem. 2 White isn't that hard to make but it is far easier to make 2 black.

Blue Cards

Necroduality - I think I am in the minority here but.....I don't like this card. I mean, it seems great (and probably is great) but there are plenty of other great cards that don't make the cut in my list just based on not being needed. I sort of feel like Herb Brooks with this deck and how my choices differ from some in Toc's thread: I am not trying to find the best cards; I am trying to find the *right* cards lol

And this is one that sort of epitomizes that philosophy. I believe this would make a good addition to the deck. I believe that this would lead to unwinnable board states for my opponents. But I also believe it is massive overkill and is more of a "win-more" card than is needed. Part of this is based on my own playstyle of prioritizing control over basically everything else, but I feel that this just isn't needed. It might make games easier to win, and might make them go faster, but ultimately isn't needed to win. I doubt I put it in my deck but I also think others will have exceptional success with it. It is basically tailor made for our deck. It just isn't for me.

Overcharged Amalgam - Now, with that complaint about Necroduality out of the way, this is a Zombie I do like. Flash is always good and a Stifle on a stick is good too. I don't really have a counterspell to just straight up replace with this but I do think it belongs in the deck.

Repository Skaab - I think this gets me to the point of removing Mission Briefing. This is more expensive but being stapled to a zombie makes it fit the deck more and has a bit more synergy with the deck overall. Twilight's Call, and Apprentice Necromancer give me ways to get it back at instant timing (though Call is massively expensive if I am expecting to also cast a spell I get off Skaab).

Selhoff Entomber - This fuels our mass reanimation but it just a much slower way of doing what Varina already does. It isn't a bad 2 drop zombie, but it isn't exactly a great one either.

Black Cards

Archghoul of Thraben - This is a pretty good card that can either fuel the yard or give us cards in hand. It works great with Tombstone Stairwell and can keep feeding it as the turns go on. But I am not sure whether I want to use it. I still have a couple flex slots so I might throw him him to see what happens.

Dying to Serve - One extra token per turn just isn't going to cut it. It works well with the deck. Just not well enough.

Graf Reaver - A 2 drop zombie is something we are always on the lookout for. And one that also can blow up planeswalkers isn't bad either. I am usually cautious of things like this though as the ability seems good on the surface but ultimately ends up being a trap. It isn't often we need to blow up a planeswalker and we definitely don't want to be holding onto it in our hand waiting for the right time to use it. Which means that it, more often than not, just ends up being a worse Carnophage.

Headless Rider - This seems like a better use out of creatures dying than the Archghoul. While this doesn't work with tokens, it does let us sac our board to get more things to sac or attack with. This is an easier one to say I will be definitely trying out.

[toctheyounger]

Definitely get the Necro thing. Its how I feel about Rooftop Storm. But, I can't not at least try it out myself. I can definitely see it being winmore in some places, backfiring in others and maybe sometimes being just right. In one way its another way to accelerate Varina's filter and that it itself is quite good. At the same time though I think it'll be a lightning rod quite often too. Being that it, as a permanent is not the primary threat we bring to the table, I'm ok with that.

Honestly though the biggest standout for me is Repository Skaab. Its everything I've wanted for the last 2 years. It gives us redundancy in non-permanent retrieval, removal and permission spells, and quite significantly with either mana producing altar just allows us to keep reanimation spells rolling until the table is done for. All for 40 cents. As good as some of the other cards are for us (and there really are some great ones) I think this one is going to be the best.

[WizardMN]

I agree 100% on the Skaab likely being one of the best cards from this set (and from the last bunch of sets). And I understand the idea of wanting to try out Necroduality. I was going to buy one in paper but decided to wait for now since I don't plan on actually running it. I did get one Online, where they are a bit cheaper, so I will have it if I ever cave and decide to try it out. At least Online gives me the avenue to test it out. And it is a fair assessment of the threat it brings. We know it isn't the biggest threat, but our opponents don't so taking a little heat off Varina might be enough to push it over the edge.

I will keep watching updates in your thread to see what people's experiences with it are. I have seen a couple standout games summarized already so it will be interesting to see other's experiences as well.

[Nimbaway]

Necroduality is definitely a card which can feel like win more or do little, I've opted to give it a go in my Varina list for the very reason that graveyard removal has become more prevalent in my meta. There are times where a mass reanimation feels not good enough because too little is in the yard, Necro might help mitigate this issue a bit since you can double up with it.

I'm on the fence with Archghoul of Thraben as well, it seems like a nice engine but it's not a may ability and thus its likely to mill a lot of our non-creature cards. Something which the deck doesn't exactly recur too well, even with the new Skaab in the deck.

[Falkenbach]

Necroduality is definitely a card which can feel like win more or do little, I've opted to give it a go in my Varina list for the very reason that graveyard removal has become more prevalent in my meta. There are times where a mass reanimation feels not good enough because too little is in the yard, Necro might help mitigate this issue a bit since you can double up with it.

I'm on the fence with Archghoul of Thraben as well, it seems like a nice engine but it's not a may ability and thus its likely to mill a lot of our non-creature cards. Something which the deck doesn't exactly recur too well, even with the new Skaab in the deck.

I think Archghoul of Thraben is still a may ability on non zombies aswell you just leave it on top then?

Balthor the Defiled is great but with the skaab and amalgam being blue creatures and i myself run oketra and binding mummy being white its annoying but still 95% of the zombies are black.
I do also run sometimes in the issue that filling the grave is rather slow.
I use to run Search for Azcanta // Azcanta, the Sunken Ruin but its to slow imo.

[Nimbaway]

I think Archghoul of Thraben is still a may ability on non zombies aswell you just leave it on top then?

You're right, I missed out on the may in the last part.

[pokken]

The interaction between Archghoul of Thraben and Tombstone Stairwell is really brutal and one that I missed, but the more I think on it...basically if Tombstone Stairwell sticks, I am winning anyway?

I think you're right that Headless Rider is probably the second best card of the set for us, and one I will probably find room for at some point.

[WizardMN]

Necroduality is definitely a card which can feel like win more or do little, I've opted to give it a go in my Varina list for the very reason that graveyard removal has become more prevalent in my meta. There are times where a mass reanimation feels not good enough because too little is in the yard, Necro might help mitigate this issue a bit since you can double up with it.

I think that is a fair point about graveyard removal. I have yet to encounter a ton of it online so I can still get the mass reanimation plan to work most of the time. Those situations may come up more than I give them credit for to be honest so it is possible Necroduality ends up more in the middle of the spectrum more often.

Balthor the Defiled is great but with the skaab and amalgam being blue creatures and i myself run oketra and binding mummy being white its annoying but still 95% of the zombies are black.
I do also run sometimes in the issue that filling the grave is rather slow.
I use to run Search for Azcanta // Azcanta, the Sunken Ruin but its to slow imo.

I honestly already forget Balthor only hit Black (and Red) creatures so his (non)interaction with the non-black zombies it something to keep in mind. I do agree that missing a couple cards isn't that big a deal but we also don't want to be relying on Skaab coming back or something when he doesn't.

I too have found that sometimes filling the yard is a little slow but I think that is where the control aspects and the reliance on Varina come in. We don't necessarily need to be speeding towards a situation where we are dumping a ton of cards in the yard right away (that is where grave hate blows us out). I generally prefer a slower approach anyway where we have some incidental mill or zombies dying as we interact with the rest of the table and then just slam a mass reanimation when the time is right. I think there are likely some instances where filling the yard faster is better but I think the deck can generally handle the slower approach just fine.

As for Search, I agree. It looks like it does a lot of what we want, but I found that it didn't do enough in general. Mill is slow (if we even want to mill at all), the "ramp" is nice but not the best, and even its activated ability is hit or miss since we aren't going to hit a noncreature nonland that we want too often. It is good so I wouldn't fault anyone for running it. I just feels it sort of toes the line between playable and unplayable for me.

The interaction between Archghoul of Thraben and Tombstone Stairwell is really brutal and one that I missed, but the more I think on it...basically if Tombstone Stairwell sticks, I am winning anyway?

That is a fair point on Stairwell too. There is very little we need to make that card better

[ChocoDude]

I agree with most of the sentiment here regarding the new cards. I myself am running Headless Rider and Repository Skaab. I tried out Necroduality (proxy) and got it in two games, but based on my board state I ended up pitching it to the yard both times as I got it through Varina triggers and needed other cards more in those moments. For now, I've taken it out and put in an Ashnod's Altar as I want another sac outlet. I'm going to wait and see how others fair with it. I think it'll come down more in price too.

[WizardMN]

I have been on sort of a hiatus recently (mostly playing ESO) and am still really on a hiatus. But I figured I should at least try to keep up to date with the deck. Here are the next round of changes I am going to try:

12/15/2021

DecklistCMCManaPricesChartsDraw 7

CUTS

1 Mission Briefing

1 Heliod's Intervention

1 Vanquish the Horde

1 Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver

1 Vile Entomber

ADDS

1 Overcharged Amalgam

1 Repository Skaab

1 Headless Rider

1 Archghoul of Thraben

1 Devastating Mastery

Approximate Total Cost:

Skaab and Briefing are straight swaps so not much to say there. I decided to try both Headless Rider and Archghoul. I think Rider fits well and the Archghoul is more "testing" it out as I am not completely sold on it.

Vanquish is being cut for Mastery. I think there is an argument to stick with Horde but I just feel like this deck really wants to reset everything when it can and destroying more than creatures basically doesn't affect us at all. Mastery does have a steep color requirement if I want to cast it for 6 but being able to cast it for 4 is reasonable.

Amalgam seems to just make sense in the deck as works out pretty well with a couple of different things.

Intervention is being cut since I never cast it and adding back in Mastery basically handles the same stuff anyway. Wilhelt is being cut because it isn't online and I have seen others get sort of down on it anyway. Vile Entomber was a tougher cut but I needed something and with Archghoul helping to fill the yard (though much less precisely) it seems like a reasonable swap.

I am not sure when I will get a chance to test all these but I am excited for a couple of the new cards and don't really think I am losing out on much with the cuts so they are likely the right cuts. As mentioned above, I have still decided against Necroduality for now

[yeti1069]

Not having Wilhelt online kinda sucks. I've liked him so far in my list. Very similar to Headless Rider, with the bonus of drawing a card at EOT, and being able to make tokens off of other (non-decayed) tokens. I've had the effects all be relevant, including the sacrifice cost. I think some of the negativity toward him in the other Varina threads is due to their reconfiguring their lists to be lower to the ground and a little faster (and more focused on combo).