Varina, Lich Queen - Esper Zombie Midrange

[yeti1069]

I know everyone is on the "LOWER THE CURVE" bandwagon, but there are too many fun zombies to play.

On that front, Ratadrabik of Urborg is SO DUMB alongside Mikaeus and/or Sidisi!

Just had a game where I swung with the team, pitched the 3 of them to Varina triggers, and then after combat cast Rot Hulk to reanimate them. Sacrificed Sidisi to itself, which made a token copy AND brought back the original with Undying. They sacrificed themselves to themselves again, which brought in one more token copy, making a total of 4 tutors. On my next turn, I swung and pitched Overcharged Amalgam, and Apprentice Necromancer, among other cards, and played a Carrion Feeder. In order for anyone to really impact my board, they had to remove Ratadrabik (that's hard to say!) twice (thanks Mikaeus!), and then still had to deal with Mikaeus to get anything else off the board, but ALSO had to get through 2 counter spells, thanks to Rot Hulk and Overcharged Amalgam.

This was definitely a case of some stars aligning, but it made for a brutally oppressive board state. Thankfully for everyone, I drew into and discarded Gary, so when they made the attempts at removing my stuff, he was one of the 3 cards I reanimated with Hulk, with 15 devotion, and the ability to recur once with undying.

I'll note that, aside from the layers of protection for my board, just the vigilance was useful alongside Cryptbreaker, as that allowed me to attack and still tap for draws.

[pokken]

I know everyone is on the "LOWER THE CURVE" bandwagon, but there are too many fun zombies to play.

On that front, Ratadrabik of Urborg is SO DUMB alongside Mikaeus and/or Sidisi!

Just had a game where I swung with the team, pitched the 3 of them to Varina triggers, and then after combat cast Rot Hulk to reanimate them. Sacrificed Sidisi to itself, which made a token copy AND brought back the original with Undying. They sacrificed themselves to themselves again, which brought in one more token copy, making a total of 4 tutors. On my next turn, I swung and pitched Overcharged Amalgam, and Apprentice Necromancer, among other cards, and played a Carrion Feeder. In order for anyone to really impact my board, they had to remove Ratadrabik (that's hard to say!) twice (thanks Mikaeus!), and then still had to deal with Mikaeus to get anything else off the board, but ALSO had to get through 2 counter spells, thanks to Rot Hulk and Overcharged Amalgam.

This was definitely a case of some stars aligning, but it made for a brutally oppressive board state. Thankfully for everyone, I drew into and discarded Gary, so when they made the attempts at removing my stuff, he was one of the 3 cards I reanimated with Hulk, with 15 devotion, and the ability to recur once with undying.

I'll note that, aside from the layers of protection for my board, just the vigilance was useful alongside Cryptbreaker, as that allowed me to attack and still tap for draws.

Says get on the train!

I don't know if I have had a game go long enough to do something like this forever, everyone plays so fast these days

[yeti1069]

Think Rot Hulk was turn 5 or 6.

[ChocoDude]

I've got another question for you @pokken . Do you run Dictate of Erebos over Grave Pact to get the element of surprise, just before you sac a bunch of your creatures? I've got a spare Grave Pact, but only one Dictate and that's committed to my Ayara deck.

The real reason is that I like the art better on dictate and don't want to run two of the effect, but it's also more fun to get people and doesn't take 3 black pips.

Thumbs up on the art! Yeah it definitely seems more fun to surprise your victims. Maybe I'll look into getting a second one.

[ChocoDude]

Hey All,

It's been a while since I've written. I'm still following the thread and have been lowering my curve (currently 2.43 non-land CMC/MV) like a few of you have to capitalize on Varina-triggers sooner. I'm curious what folks would tweak with my current decklist. You can click on the mana symbols next to Varina in my signature to see it. Caveat: I can't afford Intuition, so I don't plan to go full on aristocrats-combo. I also don't really want to fork out the cash for Entomb, or Misty Rainforest or Scalding Tarn. My mana-base works fairly well as is. Also, I've been quite happy with Buried Alive which is a recent add, so it's going to stay. I noticed a few of you have eschewed Wonder and I had removed it for a while as well, but something felt missing for me. I played several games where Varina just didn't perform very well, so I made a few changes adding Wonder back in, Buried Alive, and Stitcher's Supplier. Since then, I have literally won the last three games I've played with Varina. In two of those three, Wonder and Toxic Deluge were the all-stars allowing me to freely swing for Varina-triggers and I won mostly via combat. I did mass reanimate in both those games, but it wasn't enough to clear the table. Overall, I like that the deck can win via looping mass reanimation (like it did in the third game) or combat (like the other two wins). For a while, I was so bummed that the deck wasn't playing well that I thought of bumping my CMC back up some and adding in Mikaeus, the Unhallowed, Vengeful Dead, Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver, and Empty the Laboratory as I previously had great success with them. But, the simple changes I recently made have worked wonders and kept the curve lower, so yay!! Honorable mention to Buried Alive and Master of Death in two of my three recent wins as well.

I've thought about adding in the Haakon package, but I'm not sure what I'd swap, so it's just a thought for now. What are your thoughts on having all three of Anguished Unmaking, Void Rend, and Generous Gift in there? I like that Generous Gift can take out a troublesome land if needed. I was thinking of pulling my sole Fierce Guardianship from my Nekusar pile and putting it in Varina for either Arcane Denial...or...I could swap it out for Generous Gift and forego the potential land removal. However, I could potentially remove GG for another sac outlet in the form of Phyrexian Ghoul, which I have, and also swap Arcane Denial for Fierce Guardianship. What are your perspectives on these?

One last question, without Mikaeus in the deck, is there functionally any real difference between Putrid Goblin and Butcher Ghoul? I have a Ghoul, but not the Goblin.

Good to see you back again, friend! Hope you're keeping well.

Your list looks honestly pretty solid. You might have a little space around the lords package, I've always felt they're not great.

I remembered what my ulterior motive for Goblin was; sac fodder for altars to push mana acceleration. Quite often it'll be great for early Reclamation or reanimation. Its quite nice. But either Ghoul or Goblin would suffice.

As an aside for readers at large, Ad Naus has been super good for me in goldfishing. Almost guaranteed to see a quarter of my deck each cast without any major fear of bleeding out. Its been pretty amazing to have.

Thanks Toc! I've been lurking for many months and trying out some of the ideas that were talked about as you can tell by my lower curve. Yeah I may drop Death Baron and Bladestitched Skaab for maybe Butcher Ghoul and Phyrexian Ghoul. That may happen sometime over the weekend. Suddenly became a busy Thursday/Friday.

[RedCheese]

I'm keeping Baron and Bladestich in my list because they are altenative win cons by going to mass token generation. So many ways this deck can go. One match won with Mass reanimating with Gary, the other match i had a bunch of tokens pumped by lords and flying with Wonder in the graveyard. Like to keep the versatile with options this way, even sometimes at the cost of the curve.

[toctheyounger]

Yeah, to be honest I've found having a single big beater like Champion or Diregraf is often enough to dominate combat. If we can get Urborg in pkay with Zombie Master we can slap face too, so its easy enough to pivot with those. Champion gets enormous massively quick.

[ChocoDude]

@yeti1069 Yeah I'm occasionally tempted to go back to a higher mana curve. Ratadrabik seems fun and I picked up a copy. I was thinking of making a deck around him, but I already have an Orzhov deck in Liesa, Shroud of Dusk and I don't have another full set of lands and goodstuff support cards to have two Orzhov commander decks. If I tire of the lower curve, maybe I'll try Ratadrattat out in a higher curve variant.

@RedCheese Yeah, I currently have Baron and Skaab in there to assist with "combat wins" as well, but I'm going to try without them. I would still have Lord of the Undead in there, as well as Wonder and Zombie Master for evasion. I'll try to remember to report back how my impending changes play out. Although that might be a month or two from now. Would you care to share your current list? Can I infer that you're running a lower curve now?

[RedCheese]

Need to update my list. Been a while and im been too lazy atm XD. But im sure to do it at some point. But i can understand droping them. Varinna is that versatile of a commander.

[pokken]

I think Bladestitched Skaab is the last lord I'd take out, as small as it is costing 2 cmc is a lot less than 3 (even with deathtouch and more text). But I did wind up cutting it; most of the time I'm willing to trade a zombie for loot 1, since my plan is to get it back later with a mass reanimation.

[plaganegra]

Hey everyone, it's been a while.

I still play and have great fun with the same zombie deck I have been playing with since last I stopped by this thread. Very cool to see a couple new "auto-reanimators" being printed and cannot wait to try them out.

Just spent some time reading all of the legal attractions to use with "Lifetime" Pass Holder - I think this has a lot of potential. The amount of potential value upside on a 1cmc zombie is pretty crazy, and the floor is similar to other 1cmc zombies outside of the main staples. Not sure I fully understand all the inner workings of the new card type, but based on what I know it seems to me that this has virtually no cost to include in a Varina deck. It almost seems too good to be true to me... The attractions have some very powerful effects - like extra combat steps, horsemanship, blinking, drawing, treasures, etc. The whole thing feels quite powerful and overlooked. I'll be finding room in my deck for this zombie guest personally. Flavor-wise I don't have a problem with a space zombie bringing my other zombies onto some haunted rides haha. Not even par for the course anymore considering the silly things happening with IP crossovers

An attraction deck needs to have a minimum of 10 (probably competitively all you would want)

• Swinging Ship
• Tunnel Of Love
• Trash Bin
• Roller Coaster
• Pick-a-Beeble
• Kiddie Coaster
• Information Booth
• Ferris Wheel
• Hall of Mirrors
• Haunted House
• Merry-Go-Round

(some of these are not linking correctly, no clue why - sorry)

Seems like a pretty big upgrade to something like Diregraf Ghoul haha.

Also, Poxwalkers - this is sweet. I am not sure I can use it yet, but it opens up a ton of new lines in a deck focused on recursive value. I see it as an alternative to Prized Amalgam, probably not in addition to, but I am not able to see all the possibilities right now to fully rule that out. It is much better than amalgam when you have gravecrawler or haakon package because the zombie comes back right away which opens up a lot of options. I almost always have gravecrawler because of how focused my deck is which gives me a lot to consider... For now it'll warm the bench, but cool to see it printed and happy to think about it!

Edit - reading back a bunch of pages to see what I have missed. Pass Holder seems like it would be a great inclusion in a build focused on curving out with zombies that add value and trigger Varina. Glad to see more people using entomb, buried alive, amalgam, wonder, master of death, etc.

[devilcatz]

Phantasmal Image as an option? Cheap and good to copy other player's commander for use!

I have been using Mirror Entity with great success.
Pay X as zero to get everything dead. Case Living Death etc., or just as a big buff for an attack or Defense.

[devilcatz]

By the way, this is a great site. I've read all 98 pages of post!

[pzbw7z]

Phantasmal Image as an option? Cheap and good to copy other player's commander for use!

I have been using Mirror Entity with great success.
Pay X as zero to get everything dead. Case Living Death etc., or just as a big buff for an attack or Defense.

Phantasmal Image is a fine card and may work well just as you describe, but I'd probably not include it unless I had several of my own targets that had good EtB effects.

Mirror Entity is another solid card and I can see some circumstances where it could do work. But the 3-drop slot is very crowded for us, it must be said.

[pokken]

image has some sequencing problems but it's got a huge upside. Definitely worth thinking about. It has some combo value as well (iirc it goes infinite with persist guy and undying guy and a sac outlet?).

I don't think I'd run it because you usually have to assume it's a 3 drop and I have too many of those as is. Not being castable from the yard is a problem.

If you have lots of big etb zombies it's pretty bananas though.

[devilcatz]

So many good 3 drops…. What are the 3 drops everyone is running?

[pokken]

So many good 3 drops…. What are the 3 drops everyone is running?

Good question, this is probably the hardest set of decisions to make I think. Many Varina decks get glutted at the 3 because it's the traditional cost for most lords.

I only run 8 three drops, and they are made up of:
-- sac outlets (nantuko husk/phyrexian ghoul)
-- aristocrat outlets (plague belcher)
-- combo pieces (Haakon, Stromgald Scourge, Liliana's standard bearer)
-- Recurring value engine (Master of Death, Diregraf Colossus )
-- removal - Murderous Rider // Swift End

As I reflect on those, I find basically all of them are expendable, except Plague Belcher. I could find different ways to draw cards, different combos, or deal without as many sac outlets.

In my deck if you swapped most of those cards out for lords you would be on a more aggro plan than a combo plan, which would be a pretty interesting lowish power plan I think.

It's interesting I think that my deck is somewhat glutted at 3 and I run *zero* lords.

[pzbw7z]

• Death Baron
• Diregraf Colossus
• Fleshbag Marauder
• Haakon, Stromgald Scourge
• Headless Rider
• Liliana's Standard Bearer
• Lord of the Undead
• Midnight Reaper
• Plague Belcher
• Zombie Master

Most of these have at times accomplished something significant enough to make me want to keep them, with the exception of Headless Rider. That guy hasn't done anything for me yet. I probably wouldn't cut Haakon for love or money, but otherwise, they are all cut-able except perhaps Plague Belcher.

Come to think of it, Diregraf Colossus hasn't really pulled his weight for me either. Both it and Headless Rider look good on paper, but they will be the first to go if I ever have a look at my pile again.

[RedCheese]

Diregraf Captain
Diregraf Colossus
Death Baron
Plague Belcher
Master of Death

Not a lot of 3 drops in my list surprisinglly. Cut alot of lords over time for cheaper zombies.

Death Baron's abiltiy too powerfull to cut, for me personally. My decks makes a decent amount of tokens and pumping them was too relevant.
Diregraf Colossus wasn't that impressive for me so far. I usually pitch him to Varinna's ability.
Diregraf Captain and plague Belcher are aristocrats so im happy with them
Master of Death is a new inclusion so yet to see its performance

[pokken]

I've been thinking a lot about using Varina's discard outlet ability more aggressively, and I think there's a room for a pretty well tailored deck design that focuses on opposite ends of the curve;

Basically, play a mix of 1 and 2 drops and ramp/fixing spells with the aim of gettin varina and a critical mass out early, and then a ton of very expensive cards to chuck to the bun -- probably 10+ very high drop creatures. You might even be able to play exclusively 1-drops with this strat, you'd need about 20 of them.

The nice part about that approach is if you're just gonna win the game when you stick a Sire of Stagnation or Razaketh, the Foulblooded, it doesn't matter that much if they're zombies. The bad side is you can run into the wrong half of your deck.

Still, seems like a pretty fun way to play to use Varina as a Breakthrough type card in the commandzone that has incremental lifegain.

[RedCheese]

Love Varinna's versatily. My first version with her was more spell and token generation based. I probably should try making it again because it was neat.

[pokken]

Love Varinna's versatily. My first version with her was more spell and token generation based. I probably should try making it again because it was neat.

Man if there were critical mass of Raise the Alarm type effects in zombies, that'd be really farking fun

[toctheyounger]

Come to think of it, Diregraf Colossus hasn't really pulled his weight for me either. Both it and Headless Rider look good on paper, but they will be the first to go if I ever have a look at my pile again.

I agree with Colossus, but Rider has been an amazing add for me. It just keeps so much board presence in play for you, and with an altar in play it just gets you that much closer to enough resource to go off. I've been very happy with it myself.

[toctheyounger]

I've been thinking a lot about using Varina's discard outlet ability more aggressively, and I think there's a room for a pretty well tailored deck design that focuses on opposite ends of the curve;

Basically, play a mix of 1 and 2 drops and ramp/fixing spells with the aim of gettin varina and a critical mass out early, and then a ton of very expensive cards to chuck to the bun -- probably 10+ very high drop creatures. You might even be able to play exclusively 1-drops with this strat, you'd need about 20 of them.

The nice part about that approach is if you're just gonna win the game when you stick a Sire of Stagnation or Razaketh, the Foulblooded, it doesn't matter that much if they're zombies. The bad side is you can run into the wrong half of your deck.

Still, seems like a pretty fun way to play to use Varina as a Breakthrough type card in the commandzone that has incremental lifegain.

That feels pretty possible to me. With some aggressive topdecking you could get a really nice reanimation suite going. Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite, Toxrill, the Corrosive, Razaketh, the Foulblooded and such could be kinda brutal. Norn would be the best of the bunch right away to me, but I am a midrangey stax player at heart, so Razaketh is a little out of my wheelhouse.

Stuff like vamp tutor, Insidious Dreams, Top and Rack would help you get there nicely i would say.

[RedCheese]

Love Varinna's versatily. My first version with her was more spell and token generation based. I probably should try making it again because it was neat.

Man if there were critical mass of Raise the Alarm type effects in zombies, that'd be really farking fun

Rise from the Tides is a card