Varina, Lich Queen

[WizardMN]

So, with the release of the new sets, here is what I am going to try out:

06/30/20

DecklistCMCManaPricesChartsDraw 7

CUTS

1 Liliana, the Last Hope

1 Corpse Harvester

1 Gravespawn Sovereign

ADDS

1 Teferi's Ageless Insight

1 Liliana's Standard Bearer

1 Peer into the Abyss

Approximate Total Cost:

I had mentioned Insight and Standard Bearer above and I still think they are very good includes for the deck. Since they are both card draw effects (more or less) it is possible I am going to end up with more than I really need. But, it is tough to go overboard on card draw

I did decide to try out Peer into the Abyss because @toctheyounger seemed excited by it Because I had added Twilight's Call, it seems like a really fun play to cast Peer, discard a ton of creatures, and then reanimate them at Instant Timing. A Zombie Army for the low, low price of 15 mana.

In any case, with the amount of mass reanimation I have here, it can work out pretty well and seems like a great top deck. Varina can get us back a lot of our life we lose anyway. So, I figured I would give it a try.

[toctheyounger]

So, with the release of the new sets, here is what I am going to try out:

06/30/20

DecklistCMCManaPricesChartsDraw 7

CUTS

1 Liliana, the Last Hope

1 Solemn Simulacrum

1 Gravespawn Sovereign

ADDS

1 Teferi's Ageless Insight

1 Liliana's Standard Bearer

1 Peer into the Abyss

Approximate Total Cost:

I had mentioned Insight and Standard Bearer above and I still think they are very good includes for the deck. Since they are both card draw effects (more or less) it is possible I am going to end up with more than I really need. But, it is tough to go overboard on card draw

I did decide to try out Peer into the Abyss because @toctheyounger seemed excited by it Because I had added Twilight's Call, it seems like a really fun play to cast Peer, discard a ton of creatures, and then reanimate them at Instant Timing. A Zombie Army for the low, low price of 13 mana.

In any case, with the amount of mass reanimation I have here, it can work out pretty well and seems like a great top deck. Varina can get us back a lot of our life we lose anyway. So, I figured I would give it a try.

Two of these are no-brainer obvious adds, and the third I'm very keen to hear about. Our stock has yet to come in so I'm waiting for arrivals before I make any Core Set 2021 changes.

I think Peer into the Abyss will probably work a touch better in my build with things like Archfiend of Ifnir and Zombie Infestation, but you do have Bone Miser and Tombstone Stairwell in here, so moving to cleanup step with that in play is going to be pretty devastating. I guess it's just going to be a case of being careful what you pitch as bb from Miser will almost not be usable (Varina's second ability perhaps?). It's also worth noting though that Peer can target any player, so it might well be usable in terms of getting someone within striking distance.

[WizardMN]

Because I am an idiot, I forgot I already cut Solemn before this round of changes. So, instead, I am going to cut Corpse Harvester. This one is hard to justify because it gets me zombies and land drops, but with Varina drawing me cards, and with it being 5 mana, I think I can do without it. I haven't seen it in many games anyway so I don't think I will miss it.

I am going to update my post above accordingly.

[WizardMN]

I played this deck last night against Ayara, First of Locthwain, God-Eternal Bontu, and Karona, False God.

I went Gravecrawler into Varina, Lich Queen and just worked on digging a little. I slowly built up my army with things like Undead Warchief and God-Eternal Oketra. I did need to get rid of Bontu's Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet but otherwise I was in a decent position to really start doing stuff.

However, I made a significant play mistake which cost us all the game. I sort of forgot about Liliana of the Dark Realms from Ayara and forgot she ultimated at 6. I should have attacked her but I was still trying to make sure my stuff didn't die when attacking. It was an issue of being too cautious with my board without paying enough attention to theirs.

So, of course, they ultimated, tutored for Razaketh, the Foulblooded and then tutored for a combo. I knew they were a combo deck so I am more mad that I wasn't more aggressive with trying to prevent Liliana from ult-ing. Just poor focus on my part.

Beyond that though, the deck actually performed really well. I had Kindred Discovery to draw cards, Oketra and Gravecrawler to give me an army (once I got a sac outlet), and Varina keeping my life total high and filtering cards. Havengul Lich and Grimgrin, Corpse-Born were sort of disappointing early as I didn't have a good way to cast them without them not doing much. They are super powerful cards in the right instances so the 5 CMC is justified. Just noticed I had both, along with Phyrexian Delver in hand so I wasn't really committing the board as well as I would have liked.

[Supersprite]

I just wanna know where the zombie ninja ninjitsu is? I still have varina sleeved somewhere and i tought it was a fun deck, not very competitive but it grt can do some aristocrat stuff.

I would focus on black and not too much uu and ww spells...

[WizardMN]

I am not sure about Fallen Shinobi. It actually looks like a really fun card to be fair. I might be willing to try to swing it if I had the room (or found something else that wasn't doing what I wanted). It is sort of an outlier in the deck and there isn't a lot I would want to bounce to hand, but the effect seems like it could do a lot.

As for the other comment: I have 41 spells that are black, 5 spells that are mono-U, and 5 spells that are mono-W. I am pretty sure I am already focused on black

[toctheyounger]

Yeah, for what it's worth I glanced at Fallen Shinobi too and thought the chances of it giving the deck what it needs is fairly slim. It needs to connect, where no other zombie really does, and it requires mana spent during combat, which isn't ideal for us - the ideal is curving creatures out pre-combat, or waiting for whatever we can dig up with our commander post-combat. As well as that, the possibility of turning up something valuable from someone else's deck that actually benefits us is not excellent.

I agree, the predominance of my deck is bb, very much so in the creature list. If it weren't there would be no reason to run Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx.

[WizardMN]

I played a couple games with this deck last night. One was pretty epic and I completely blame @toctheyounger for me losing The other was getting ganged up on for some reason.

The first game was against Karona, False God (God tribal), Zurgo Helmsmasher, and Tuvasa the Sunlit.

I got down a Cemetery Reaper, into a Corpse Knight into Varina. I swung a couple times to loot a little. I also got down Teferi's Ageless Insight to draw me more cards. Everyone else tried to figure out what to do against the Gods on Karona's board. Too many were on and they were tough to deal with. Luckily, Zurgo got Shadowspear (which they couldn't activate yet thanks to Suppression Field) and Tuvasa had a wrath. For some reason, Karona didn't kill Zurgo so they were able to wrath the board. I didn't lose a whole lot.

A turn or two later, I got Tombstone Stairwell on the field and got 6 tokens. When my turn came around again, after I figured out Stairwell was every Upkeep for every player, I dropped in Undead Augur. By that time, I had 9 zombies in the yard. So, I created 9 Zombies next turn. They were destroyed. I drew 18 cards. Next turn, same thing. Tuvasa then cast a wrath and I had 11 zombies that died including Varina and the Augur. So, in one turn cycle I drew 18 + 18 + 18 + 22 cards or 76 cards. I didn't have that many left.

I had already planned for this awesome play with discarding my hand to hand size, casting Twilight's Call to reanimate everything and win the game. But that was before I realized I hadn't applied the draw from Insight so once I realized that and went back to draw my cards, I found out I was 2 short of what I was supposed to draw and 3 short of being able to draw for turn. I literally drew too many cards thanks to Insight + Undead Augur + Stairwell.

If I ignore the fact that I died from it, I loved Stairwell. It is so good with Augur and to give me necessary blockers when I need them and then again to attack with Varina. I know now what toc has been saying about only needing for a couple turns at most

The second game was against Tuvasa the Sunlit and Aurelia, the Warleader.

I kept a 6 card hand with 5 lands and Kindred Discovery. I had no blue sources for it, but I had Unclaimed Territory to at least cast Varina. Which I did on turn 4 and in that time I drew two blue sources. I was able to cast Kindred Discovery on turn 5 and draw more cards to really set up my hand a little better.

I didn't get a lot of Zombies but I got a couple. Nothing too relevant. I did counter an Ugin, the Spirit Dragon with Mana Drain and got a couple zombie tokens with Varina's ability with the mana. I did mess up pretty terribly in that I cast Liliana, Untouched by Death and wanted to kill Aurelia. But Aurelia was a 4/5 thanks to Legion's Initiative. And I only had 4 Zombies. And I stupidly didn't make another zombie with Varina to just kill Aurelia.

At the time, I wasn't thinking much of it because Aurelia had Cage of Hands on her. But, unfortunately for me, Tuvasa conspired against me by agreeing to bounce the Cage if Aurelia swung at me. Which is what happened. Aurelia ended up getting a Sword equipped to make her a 6/7, they had True Conviction to give her double strike, and attacked me twice for 24 damage total. I was at 17 but commander damage is what did me in here.

Another game where I wish commander damage wasn't a thing

Overall, the deck performed exceptionally well. As mentioned, Stairwell was really fun. I just need to be more cognizant about pairing it with draw effects. I did have a Mikaeus, the Unhallowed get stuck in hand due to mana constraints and I have been finding I have not been activating Havengul Lich anymore. I even pitched it in the first game because it was the worst card in my hand. Phyrexian Delver isn't quite as bad, but it sort of fits into the same thing about single reanimation not being what the deck wants to do.

In the interest of lowering the curve I might think about cutting those 3 cards. I really like Mikaeus but with my draw and everything else, I am thinking mass reanimation is better than trying to work around making Undying work for me.

With the idea of lowering the curve, and toc's comments above, I doubt I will look too much into Fallen Shinobi either. He has some very good points about it and the deck wants to run on a slightly different axis than what Shinobi leans into.

[toctheyounger]

Not gonna lie, I totally expected to be tagged in a scathing indictment of Peer into the Abyss

Thing about Tombstone Stairwell is it's best when it's doing this sort of crazy stuff. It'll end the game, whether it's for you or against you. I guess the upside is you can always just not pay its upkeep and let it die, but you do need to make sure you've got your math right for the turn cycle ahead. It's seriously dangerous with draw triggers on the board, especially because all of the things included in either of our lists are mandatory, not 'may' clauses. There's also the fact that it could very well mean you ping yourself to death with Undead Augur before you deck yourself anyway. It might well be worth looking at instant speed sacrifice outlets if you find this happens regularly. Carrion Feeder is nice, there just isn't much else on tribe.

I've 100% done the same to myself for what it's worth - Kinderd Discovery and Tombstone Stairwell most definitely should not be in play together.

Personally I've been wondering about adding in God-Eternal Bontu to handle this sort of thing. Sometimes you just need a permanent you control to go away and he makes that easy. Could be worth it.

[WizardMN]

I haven't yet drawn it but I will certainly be writing about when I do

I actually had my entire next turn planned out with that stuff on the field. I wasn't going to pay the Upkeep cost (I only paid it once before this). I was going to have 40+ cards in hand and discard a bunch to hand size. I had Twilight's Call in hand to just reanimate everything and swing. I was at 7 life thanks to Augur but I was hoping to get Gray Merchant of Asphodel in hand/graveyard. The Insight just kind of ruined all that.

Yeah, I can see that being pretty dangerous too. It is actually kind of amazing how dangerous Stairwell is because of the possibility of draw effects. "Drawing too many cards" was not a complaint I was expecting to voice with Stairwell. And I had to have read Augur like 5 times to make absolutely sure I didn't miss a "may" in there

Yeah. We also have Nantuko Husk and Phyrexian Ghoul but those are not very good. I do like the idea of Bontu, which I already have in the deck. I wonder if one of the Instant "sac a creature; draw some cards" effects would be alright?

Things like Village Rites or Perilous Research or even Read the Runes. Read the Runes actually works really well with out draw doublers. We still need to discard the amount we draw (so no getting around it like Varina does) but it can sacrifice things and fill our graveyard for mass reanimation or Stairwell or something. And it lets us sac more than just creatures *and* can give us even more use out of those Zombies that are about to be destroyed anyway.

The issue with those is being one time use of course. But I have 3 slots I am thinking of above so there might be room to try out a few of these.

[toctheyounger]

I haven't yet drawn it but I will certainly be writing about when I do

I actually had my entire next turn planned out with that stuff on the field. I wasn't going to pay the Upkeep cost (I only paid it once before this). I was going to have 40+ cards in hand and discard a bunch to hand size. I had Twilight's Call in hand to just reanimate everything and swing. I was at 7 life thanks to Augur but I was hoping to get Gray Merchant of Asphodel in hand/graveyard. The Insight just kind of ruined all that.

Yeah, I can see that being pretty dangerous too. It is actually kind of amazing how dangerous Stairwell is because of the possibility of draw effects. "Drawing too many cards" was not a complaint I was expecting to voice with Stairwell. And I had to have read Augur like 5 times to make absolutely sure I didn't miss a "may" in there

Yeah. We also have Nantuko Husk and Phyrexian Ghoul but those are not very good. I do like the idea of Bontu, which I already have in the deck. I wonder if one of the Instant "sac a creature; draw some cards" effects would be alright?

Things like Village Rites or Perilous Research or even Read the Runes. Read the Runes actually works really well with out draw doublers. We still need to discard the amount we draw (so no getting around it like Varina does) but it can sacrifice things and fill our graveyard for mass reanimation or Stairwell or something. And it lets us sac more than just creatures *and* can give us even more use out of those Zombies that are about to be destroyed anyway.

The issue with those is being one time use of course. But I have 3 slots I am thinking of above so there might be room to try out a few of these.

Midnight Reaper is a similar clause, FYI, so watch that one too.

Yeah, I kind of like that idea to be honest. Read the Runes is actually quite flexible. It's instant speed, scales, plays nicely with discard and double draw synergies and can remove stuff we need gone from our side of the board. That's a good consideration and I think it might need to be tried. Even if you just pop it for one to tank your Teferi's Ageless Insight and keep yourself alive it's an easy way to stay a threat and turn the situation to your advantage. It doesn't really get cheaper than that either. The only other thing I can think of off the top of my head is Claws of Gix and there's really not any other reason to run it.

[WizardMN]

Midnight Reaper is a similar clause, FYI, so watch that one too.

Yep. That one is a little less relevant to the current "issue" since the tokens won't trigger it so it is less likely to do what Augur did.

Yeah, I kind of like that idea to be honest. Read the Runes is actually quite flexible. It's instant speed, scales, plays nicely with discard and double draw synergies and can remove stuff we need gone from our side of the board. That's a good consideration and I think it might need to be tried. Even if you just pop it for one to tank your Teferi's Ageless Insight and keep yourself alive it's an easy way to stay a threat and turn the situation to your advantage. It doesn't really get cheaper than that either. The only other thing I can think of off the top of my head is Claws of Gix and there's really not any other reason to run it.

I think I am going to add it in in the place of one of the cuts I am thinking about. You are right that Claws is very narrow in terms of what we want it for but Read the Runes allows for a number of different lines depending on the situation. And being an instant is pretty big.

[toctheyounger]

Oh, I'm an idiot, completely missed the 'nontoken' part of Midnight Reaper.

Yeah, I think I'll give Read the Runes a go myself; I currently have Tolarian Winds as my instant hand dump/refill, but there's a lot more flexibility to the former than the latter, and it plays significantly better into some of the other things we're trying to achieve.

[WizardMN]

So, with the talks of changes and trying a few things out, I decided to build this online and I got a game in today. I played against Sram, Senior Edificer, Okaun, Eye of Chaos & Zndrsplt, Eye of Wisdom partners, and Illuna, Apex of Wishes.

As a quick note: I should have lost this game twice. Once to a misplay (which happens so that isn't too relevant) and because of a misclick (which is not something that would happen in real life). So, the win was sort of tainted by those.

Anyway, I kept a 4 land hand with Teferi's Ageless Insight. I probably should have shipped it back to be honest, since I had no early plays. But, I kept it and just got down Varina on turn 4 with the intent of casting Insight on turn 5.

Sram started off with a turn one Sigarda's Aid which made things much easier for them overall.

Illuna ended up casting Curfew so Varina went back to my hand along with Sram which I think was the bigger issue. Sram did get an early Sword of Feast and Famine off Stoneforge Mystic so that made things *very* difficult for me since I had no creatures that could block him.

I ended up casting Varina, Lich Queen again the next turn. Sram got going again and just attacked me. Illuna Mutated onto their Vedalken Mastermind and got a free Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre. Luckily, Sram exiled it. I cast Insight the next turn and drew 2 cards and discarded one. One was a Signet so I cast that and passed, shields down.

Sram attacked Illuna and Illuna cast Snapback to return it to their hand so we had another Sram free turn. Okaun cast Mana Geyser for 15 mana followed byOkaun, Zndrsplt, Unwinding Clock, and Cyclonic Rift. Illuna cast the Mastermind again and mutated on top of it for an Avenger of Zendikar this time.

On my turn, I cast Noxious Ghoul to get rid of the tokens. Illuna bounced Avenger with the Mastermind's ability and tried to recast it but I countered it with Mana Drain. They scooped as they said they thought the game would go quicker than it had. That was only around 50 minutes in and we played for nearly an hour more.

With the mana from Mana Drain, I cast Agent of Erebos, Varina, Lich Queen, and Grimgrin, Corpse-Born which killed Okaun with the Ghoul triggers. Sram was under a Deep Freeze but they cast Flickering Ward on it to make it fall off. This was the moment of the misclick as they had a 13 power Sram, and I was at 9 commander damage already, and they accidentally clicked through combat so I stayed alive.

Okaun had Zndrplt and Okaun on board and they had a 48/48 Okaun thanks to winning a couple flips. But, he didn't have haste and couldn't attack so another bullet dodged.

On my turn I cast Insight again and attacked with 3 creatures. I drew 6 cards, one of which was a Swords to Plowshares. I also kept a Read the Runes in hand from those draws. I discarded most of my zombies since I had Zombie Apocalypse in hand also.

Sram cast Heavenly Blademaster and moved most equipment, other than the Sword to it. They swung at me with an 11/11 Sram which wasn't enough to kill me but it was a lot. I ended up removing the Blademaster since I would have died next turn to it and that got Sram down to 4/4.

They did get to untap so they put more equipment on Sram, cast Mother of Runes and cast Blackblade Reforged. They put the blade on Stoneforge Mystic making her a 9/10. Okaun attacked them and then cast Savage Beating. Sram saved their Mystic with Mother of Runes which then allowed Okaun to put Imprisoned in the Moon on Sram.

I ended up blocking with Grimgrin when they attacked me the next combat and then cast Read the Runes for 4. I drew 8, discarded 5, and sacrificed my 3 creatures.

Next turn I had a decision to make and it is possible I made the wrong decision. I had Zombie Apocalypse, Liliana, Death's Majesty, and Tombstone Stairwell. The "right" play was probably to cast Liliana and reanimate Noxious Ghoul. And then cast Stairwell to get free zombies (and a free wrath basically) every upkeep.

Even then though, Sram had Lightning Greaves and still had a big Mystic that could be equipped. So, what I did was cast Apocalypse. This gave everything -9/-9. I then activated Varina twice to kill the Mystic. I passed with a huge (tapped) board and 3 mana up.

Sram cast Foundry Inspector and equipped it up. The main ones were Golem-Skin Gauntlets, Lightning Greaves, Inquisitor's Flail, Surestrike Trident, and Sword of Feast and Famine. They swung into me for 10 (which would have been 20) while was at 22. I made a zombie with Varina to make it a 9 power and I went down to 4.

This was the misplay. If they gave it Vigilance with Accorder's Shield they could have attacked and then activated the ability to kill me.

I started my turn and lost my Mana Crypt flip to put me to 1. I also had to sac my Graveborn Muse before this turn started so as not to die to that.

I swung at Sram with 10 zombies so I gained 10 life and drew 20 cards. They were at 44 life and I did 55 damage to them thanks to Undead Warchief. I then had the ability to sac most of my board to ping Okaun and then cast Living Death to do it again. They scooped when I killed Sram though.

So, even though I should have lost earlier, it was a fun game. I think this highlights the mass reanimation stuff as being super good. I did have a problem against SoFaF but I think that is just bad luck for me. Not a whole lot I can do about it beyond maybe adding in a Mystical Tutor to get to my removal?

Read the Runes was pretty good too. Granted, that was mostly because I had the Apocalypse in hand so I could discard my Zombies but it did get me to a Swords to Plowshares (thanks to Insight's help). Agent of Erebos kept graveyards mostly empty so Living Death wouldn't have hurt me too much if I ended up casting it.

Maybe a bad keep to start with, but it worked out in the end. And the rest of the deck did a lot of what I wanted. Insight has been exceptional so far.

[WizardMN]

Got another game in. It was against 3 players as one conceded before the game even started. It was Mangara, the Diplomat and Zada, Hedron Grinder.

Mangara was playing a Tax build where they ended up with Drannith Magistrate, Tocatli Honor Guard, Hushwing Gryff, and Sphere of Safety.

Magistrate came down turn 2 so I was cut off from Varina. But, I cast Dreadhorde Invasion on turn 2 and then I had Sol Ring to accelerate me into Undead Warchief on turn 3. Diregraf Colossus came down turn 4 and this was a huge part of this game.

I did end up firing off a Read the Runes for 4 early on because Mangara cast Smothering Tithe and I didn't have much in hand as it was. I sacrificed a couple tokens and discarded 3 lands so now I had a better hand.

Mangara was staying alive pretty well thanks to their Felidar Sovereign but I ended up having pretty big tokens so I got through it reasonably well. Next turn I cast Withered Wretch (to help shut off their Emeria, the Sky Ruin) and Diregraf Captain. I got two more tokens.

I swung into Mangara with 3 creatures, paying 6 mana to do so and I got them down to 19 from 21 since they blocked 2 and Sovereign gained them life. Wretch exiled their target for Emeria. And then they scooped it up shortly after. They did it in response to an Extraplanar Lens from Zada but Zada had missed a lot of land drops and were in a very bad spot. I think they just saw the writing on the wall.

I am not a fan of the scoop there since it would have cost me a turn to kill Mangara (and they could have done some blocking) but scooping just left Zada in no man's land and they had no chance. I guess it feels worse here because they were playing a deck to actively do what it could to stop us from playing ours.

Anyway, I attacked Zada for 53 and they didn't bother blocking. This was the only trigger I got from Varina and it didn't matter.

So, another win for the deck and through a Magistrate which is really nice to see. While the deck is reliant on the commander to get some card draw and filtering, this shows it isn't overly reliant on her and can win without her if needed. Dreadhorde Invasion was nice in that it let me end the game at 90 life But Diregraf Colossus was probably the big one here as it gave me an army of zombies to be able to beat in with.

[WizardMN]

Oh, and since I forgot to detail it above, this is the change I made:

07/17/20

DecklistCMCManaPricesChartsDraw 7

CUTS

1 Mikaeus, the Unhallowed

ADDS

1 Read the Runes

Approximate Total Cost:

In the interest of lowering the curve, and because I am leaning more heavily into mass reanimation, I have decided to cut Mikeaus. The effect is tough to work with at 6 mana and I have other things that want cards in the graveyard or other ways I can make them work anyway.

[WizardMN]

I played this deck against Vaevictis Asmadi, the Dire and God-Eternal Bontu yesterday. Read the Runes and Bone Miser came out in full force.

I started with a 3 drop zombie into Varina into Bone Miser. I was able to build up a small army of zombies with this but not a whole lot. I did have to contend with Vaevictus and they ended up getting rid of Grimgrin, Corpse-Born during the first attack trigger which I think was a mistake with both Varina and Bone Miser on the field.

Bontu and I did what we could though It That Betrays was a problem. It stole a couple land Bontu sacrificed and got some creatures from my Fleshbag Marauder so they were in a very overwhelming position. They had It That Betrays, Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre, Vaevictis Asmadi, the Dire, and a couple other creatures.

In an attempt to find an answer, I cast Read the Runes for X=7. I ended up just discarding 7 cards which then triggered Bone Miser 7 times. I think I discarded mostly creatures so I just created tokens. Not bad, but still not great. It did give me a lot of fodder for the Annihilator triggers though.

Unfortunately, it wasn't quite enough. Vaevictus killed Bontu and set their sights on me. I ended up losing my board most of my board to blocking or because they just destroyed stuff and was left with 4 zombie tokens which were looking pretty pathetic. I passed the turn with 9 mana up.

They swung out at me in an attempt to kill me. I flashed in Twilight's Call and started looking through my graveyard. I hadn't paid much attention to what I had been binning since I had been so focused on finding an answer but this is what I returned (I put Varina in the yard knowing this play was coming next):

Varina, Lich Queen
Bone Miser
Agent of Erebos
Death Baron
Diregraf Captain
Diregraf Colossus (which had 15 counters on it after all this)
Fleshbag Marauder
Gravecrawler
Grimgrin, Corpse-Born
Lord of the Accursed
Plague Belcher
Relentless Dead
Undead Augur
Vengeful Dead
And, the coup de grâce:
Noxious Ghoul

That last card was so instrumental in this play that it completely turned the tide of the game. It completely wiped their board, and now I had a massive army. Everything I had was getting +3/+3 and any time a zombie died, my opponents lost 3 life. I was able to swing out next turn and kill Vaevictus even though they were above 40 life. I did still have to deal with the Annihilator 6 on the stack but that was pretty easy and caused them to lose 18 life in the process anyway

Twilight's Call turned this game into one where I was almost certain to lose into one where I would have had to try really hard not to win. It was amazing and one of my favorite plays with this deck so far. Fueled by Varina and Read the Runes. Obviously any mass reanimation would have worked but it made it even more satisfying when I was able to do it on my opponent's turn (for a measly 8 mana ).

I think the only real takeaway from this, beyond "Bone Miser is a good Magic card" is that Havengul Lich is losing a lot of its appeal. Phyrexian Delver is too but being an ETB trigger that then doesn't cost mana still saves it. Liliana, Death's Majesty might be another that I might cut. 5 mana is a lot even if her abilities are pretty good. I still like Liliana, Untouched by Death since I can cast any number of zombies the turn I activate her "ultimate". Though, that does bring up the question of why I am not running Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx. I should probably find a place to slot it in somewhere. Probably over High Market since I don't feel I really need sac lands in this deck.

[RedCheese]

Noxious Ghoul is my favourite card in the deck. He was the bane of the sliver deck in my group. Sutch a powerfull card in the zombie deck, specially when mass reanimating.

[toctheyounger]

That sounds like a blowout win and a great game all around.

How often have you found Twilight's Call pulling this sort of weight? I'm hesitant because it's not one-sided and expensive to cast, but instant speed is pretty great if you can swing it.

For what it's worth, too, I've been running Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx for a little while now, I feel like both of our lists are heavy enough in b to get good burst mana from it. To be honest though I haven't seen it come up with anywhere near enough regularity to feed back to you.

[WizardMN]

This is the first opportunity I had to cast Twilight's Call since adding it. Even online, I don't draw it often and the 8 mana for Instant timing is not cheap. So, I can't really say one way or the other on whether it is right for the deck due to not having it in hand very often; it just happened to work out well in this case. That can be said for any number of "bad" cards too though so it isn't quite enough to say it should be here.

It sounds like Nykthos is sort of the same for you. There is potential there and because I am swapping it in for a land that produces colorless, the risk is less that I will end up with a situation where it messes up my early plays. But without seeing it often enough, it is hard to say whether it is right for the deck.

[WizardMN]

Last night was a game that was really awkward. I played against a couple other people and started with 1 land, Sol Ring, and a Talisman. Luckily, I drew 2 lands as my first lands, but none were black which ended up being a problem. I got Varina down and she got removed immediately, I cast her again and she was then countered. I let her go to the graveyard.

Bane of Progress was cast and blew up my 2 rocks and left me with 5 mana, 2 of which was colorless and leaving me only 1 black source. This prevented me from casting Liliana, Dreadhorde General the next turn which would have cleared the board.

But, I stuck it out and was finally able to get to enough black to cast Liliana and she produced a token and died to a Hero's Downfall. The next turn I cast Patriarch's Bidding and Shepherd of Rot, with Phyrexian Delver, getting back a discarded Graveborn Muse the next turn.

I ended up with 7 zombies and another player had 1 so I was able to drain everyone for 8 killing the player with the other zombie. I then untapped and drained for 7 killing the other player and barely surviving at 11 life with the Muse trigger on the stack that would have drained me for another 7.

One thing worth noting is that, during this process, I had Hour of Revelation in my hand for a long time and never got to 3 white mana. Obviously, my loss of one rock that gave me white and having two colorless lands didn't help that, but it does show getting to 3 mana can be hard to achieve in a deck so devoted to black (and especially when not even getting that black mana).

[pokken]

Running all of these lands with a pair of tango lands is pretty greedy I think tbh. It'd obviously be better with the full fetch suite but I know you don't go that way

• bojuka bog
• cavern of souls
• high market
• phyrexian tower
• unclaimed territory
• unholy grotto
• vault of the archangel
• volrath's stronghold

I'd maybe shave a couple of those. The grotto, bog, and unclaimed territory are the ones I like the least, but there might be something great about Grotto I guess. I really am down on Bog lately it's usually not enough grave hate and entering tapped is a real cost, and only making black with a deck with 7 swamps.

I'd probably consider cutting 3-4 of these lands and adding stuff like Fetid Heath and maybe Fabled Passage and/or Prismatic Vista.

I think utility lands are probably the place you and I differ the most in deckbuilding though, so make of that what you will

edit: I think grotto is actually probably better than Volrath's Stronghold - I didn't realize you were basically 100% zombie. So Stronghold is my #1 cut.

[WizardMN]

So, that brings up a really good point on Grotto and Stronghold, but I want to comment on each of those lands you brought up because the discussion is worthwhile to have and after some thought, I think I might agree with you on most of them:

Bojuka Bog - There is a very real chance that outside of a green deck, this card is simply wrong. I am sometimes clouded by the effectiveness of cards in other decks (Karador in this case) and don't always look at the supporting cards allowing for that effectiveness. I would say that while my experience with the card hasn't always been bad, it has been middling at best due to needing to play it early and being "sorcery speed". I think there is a good argument for cutting this.

Cavern of Souls & Unclaimed Territory - I grouped these together since the argument for/against one likely fits the other. Since I am 100% zombie for creatures, these allow for very good color fixing for creature spells while making non-creature spells somewhat more awkward. But I think that tradeoff is worthwhile for them and being 3 color lands for creatures is a boon to the deck. Really, the only card I think they really mess with is Hour due to the intensive 3 White it needs but they do very well to get me off the ground.

High Market & Phyrexian Tower - I have had High Market on the chopping block already so there is definitely no argument from me on that one. Tower is another that is like Bog where it works splendidly in other decks but the different nature of this deck lends itself to not being as good. I like my sac outlets, no doubt, but trimming both of these for more color focused lands would likely make things better.

Unholy Grotto & Volrath's Stronghold - Interestingly, in the summary above, the 2 colorless sources I mentioned were these two cards. So, not only did they mess with my mana they also allowed me to evaluate their utility at the same time since I could have activated either one whenever I wanted. And it turned out that "whenever I wanted" was "never". I had a few creatures in the yard but nothing good enough to warrant costing me a draw for something else. To be fair, the lack of black mana likely did drive these decisions but the fact that I was in a predicament that these did not help with *and* I played the entire game without them being used even when I get my mana figured out probably lends weight to the argument of cutting them.

I would agree though that Grotto is better than Stronghold in this deck but I don't think I need both. And that assumes I even want one which might not be the case.

Vault of the Archangel - This one I would disagree on, just because I think the lifelink with an army of numerous sizes can be very useful. 5 mana is a lot to activate, though that matches Vito's ability, but if I am swinging for 20 and can gain 20 (while killing most blockers), it can get me out of a tight spot. I think of the utility lands being discussed this may arguably be one of the better ones since I might actually activate it. I did have a reason for adding it as well, somewhere in this thread, and I don't think I am ready to cut it quite yet.

With the Prismatic Vista "reprint" I am thinking of doing more with adding that and Fabled Passage to more decks. Even my 2 color decks, which I don't use fetches in because they only had 1 option for on color fetches, might be getting these 2 and the 1 on color fetch.

I definitely like the idea of Fetid Heath as well.

So, with that in mind, I think your suggestions are spot on. I tend to get a little in the weeds with utility lands and this is a deck that could benefit from trimming those for straight mana production/fixing. Which means that I am inclined to do the following:

10/09/20

DecklistCMCManaPricesChartsDraw 7

CUTS

1 Volrath's Stronghold

1 High Market

1 Bojuka Bog

1 Phyrexian Tower

ADDS

1 Fetid Heath

1 Fabled Passage

1 Prismatic Vista

1 Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx

Approximate Total Cost:

[pokken]

That looks pretty much perfect. I don't see many situations where tower is going to accelerate this deck all that much, and it makes things awkward sometimes.

I agree with your assessment of Vault of the Archangel and that's one of the reasons I did not put it on my hotter list of cuts, it's a huge swing with all your dudes and can get you out of do or die situations in a land slot. That's huge.

I do think that you want *one* of the recursion lands just as a potential out, but I think one is plenty.

I also do think you can support Nykthos on black and it'll almost always be better than tower.

Good stuff!

[toctheyounger]

That looks pretty much perfect. I don't see many situations where tower is going to accelerate this deck all that much, and it makes things awkward sometimes.

I agree with your assessment of Vault of the Archangel and that's one of the reasons I did not put it on my hotter list of cuts, it's a huge swing with all your dudes and can get you out of do or die situations in a land slot. That's huge.

I do think that you want *one* of the recursion lands just as a potential out, but I think one is plenty.

I also do think you can support Nykthos on black and it'll almost always be better than tower.

Good stuff!

Nykthos has been great in my build, should do just fine here too. The recursion lands are relatively niche, and Stronghold is more expensive, so Grotto makes more sense. Fairly corner case having to use them, but in a pinch you never know.

I'm interested to hear how the filter land turns out - eyes peeled for feedback.