Varina, Lich Queen - Esper Zombie Midrange

[pzbw7z]

Off topic but did anyone notice that the Haakon package is in the March of Machines Knight's Charge Commander deck? Well, at least Haakon, Corpse Knight and Foulmire Knight are. Buried Alive and Phyrexian Altar are glaringly absent.

[toctheyounger]

Buried Alive and Phyrexian Altar are glaringly absent.

Lol glaring in that those cards are worth most of the MSRP of the precon on their own! If they were glaringly present, I'd be picking up a copy myself.

[pzbw7z]

Buried Alive and Phyrexian Altar are glaringly absent.

Lol glaring in that those cards are worth most of the MSRP of the precon on their own! If they were glaringly present, I'd be picking up a copy myself.

Fair point, but the value of those cards would tank if they were printed in a precon.

But it is cool that someone at least saw the value of Haakon with Sidar Jabari of Zhalfir.

[pzbw7z]

Anything from March of the Machines strike your fancy? No, nothing really speaks to me either. There two don't seem to suck, buy I'm not excited about trying either; Corrupted Conviction and Moment of Truth.

A number of Battle cards could be used, but none of them call to me, particularly.

[RedCheese]

Yeah nothing for my fancy either.

[pokken]

I think the battle that tutors for an instant/sorcery is the strongest consideration.

[yeti1069]

I think the battle that tutors for an instant/sorcery is the strongest consideration.

Do you expect to be getting a lot of value out of the backside?

[pzbw7z]

I think the battle that tutors for an instant/sorcery is the strongest consideration.

Invasion of Arcavios is five mana, then seven toughness/loyalty/???, so it's a tough sell for me. I'd want a Battle's front to be worthwhile on its own and this one doesn't meet that standard. Maybe it's worth it, but we aren't exactly a spell slinger deck.

[pokken]

I think the battle that tutors for an instant/sorcery is the strongest consideration.

Do you expect to be getting a lot of value out of the backside?

Yeah, I mean, if you tutor for Demonic Tutor and then flip it, you have won the game probably 99% of the time. Same with Intuition. It's a big mana play but the plan would be to play it, crash, win.

Invasion of Arcavios is five mana, then seven toughness/loyalty/???, so it's a tough sell for me. I'd want a Battle's front to be worthwhile on its own and this one doesn't meet that standard. Maybe it's worth it, but we aren't exactly a spell slinger deck.

We aren't a spell slinger edck but I have 23 instants/sorceries and they are among the most impactful cards in the deck-- other tutors, Intuition, Living Death, etc.

I think just running Mystical Tutor would likely be better most of the time, but the mode of also being Mystic Retrieval and being card neutral (and eventually positive) is nice.

My general rule of thumb is that anything that is a 1 card win condition deserves some thought, and this has some serious advantages over other 1-card wincons like Final Parting in that it's resilient to graveyard hate and generates value as well.

I think it's a hair inefficient for me but in a casual build, especially one looking to go heavier on Living Death effects, I think it is a strong consideration. You can go absolutely bananas doubling a Living Death with a sac outlet here.

If you go:
Invasion of Arcavios get Living Death
swing out, flip it
cast Living Death
sac your entire board
resolve the copy of living death
sac your entire board
resolve your Living Death

Everybody's dead!

The failure mode of Diabolic Tutor / Mystic Retrieval split card is also really not that bad for 5 mana.

[yeti1069]

I think that's asking a lot.

How many sac outlets is everyone running these days? I don't have all that many in my list.
I've also noted that most of the players here have seemed to drift away from combat-focused strategies, instead preferring aristocrats, so getting 7 damage through to an obviously strong battle doesn't seem like a guarantee unless you're casting this on an open opponent.

You're also looking for a 10 mana play (5 to search, 5 to cast Living Death).
You also will want a pretty substantial board/graveyard presence, which we can set up for sure, but this card isn't doing much if you aren't already chugging along.
Then doubling any of the mass reanimation spells is going to require an aristocrat piece or two, in addition to the sac outlet to even be worthwhile.

I have a fair number of instants and sorceries in my deck, but not enough, and not impactful enough ones to feel like a 5 mana spell that requires some hoops to get to the spell doubling is worth including. We can tutor for a spell for 1, 2, or 3 mana if thats' what we need, and there are 4 and 5 mana enchantments that can double our spells if that's what we care about. Stapling them both together is nice, but I just don't see this as the deck for this card.

[pokken]

I think that's asking a lot.

How many sac outlets is everyone running these days? I don't have all that many in my list.
I've also noted that most of the players here have seemed to drift away from combat-focused strategies, instead preferring aristocrats, so getting 7 damage through to an obviously strong battle doesn't seem like a guarantee unless you're casting this on an open opponent.

You're also looking for a 10 mana play (5 to search, 5 to cast Living Death).
You also will want a pretty substantial board/graveyard presence, which we can set up for sure, but this card isn't doing much if you aren't already chugging along.
Then doubling any of the mass reanimation spells is going to require an aristocrat piece or two, in addition to the sac outlet to even be worthwhile.

I have a fair number of instants and sorceries in my deck, but not enough, and not impactful enough ones to feel like a 5 mana spell that requires some hoops to get to the spell doubling is worth including. We can tutor for a spell for 1, 2, or 3 mana if thats' what we need, and there are 4 and 5 mana enchantments that can double our spells if that's what we care about. Stapling them both together is nice, but I just don't see this as the deck for this card.

Varina, Lich Queen hits for 4, so 7 is not that much to ask most of the time.

Anyway, I thnk it varies a lot by deck construction for sure.

[Rframpt]

For me adding battles is a very low priority as I have enough figuring out what goes into my version of Varina in the cards we already have. Sieges to me seem to be a fun addition to Magic, but I don't think I can run them in my deck as every slot is already contented with other cards I want to play. Are they perhaps the most optimal? Certainly not. But I want to make a deck which I think is appropriate for my Meta's power level. Currently, I am adding Liliana, Untouched by Death, Shambling Ghast, the Haakon Package minus Intuition, as that is too over budget for me, and I have a bunch of other pet cards I either want or need to play.

[Rframpt]

One card I think is very underplayed in Varina deck is Ashiok, Dream Render. Likely you mill yourself, exiling all opponent's graveyards, and it also is 3 mana which means Sevinne's Reclamation gets it back should you discard it to Varina's ability

[pzbw7z]

I don't want to give anyone any ideas, so I won't play Ashiok. It's the last card I want to see on the battlefield.

[yeti1069]

I think that's asking a lot.

How many sac outlets is everyone running these days? I don't have all that many in my list.
I've also noted that most of the players here have seemed to drift away from combat-focused strategies, instead preferring aristocrats, so getting 7 damage through to an obviously strong battle doesn't seem like a guarantee unless you're casting this on an open opponent.

You're also looking for a 10 mana play (5 to search, 5 to cast Living Death).
You also will want a pretty substantial board/graveyard presence, which we can set up for sure, but this card isn't doing much if you aren't already chugging along.
Then doubling any of the mass reanimation spells is going to require an aristocrat piece or two, in addition to the sac outlet to even be worthwhile.

I have a fair number of instants and sorceries in my deck, but not enough, and not impactful enough ones to feel like a 5 mana spell that requires some hoops to get to the spell doubling is worth including. We can tutor for a spell for 1, 2, or 3 mana if thats' what we need, and there are 4 and 5 mana enchantments that can double our spells if that's what we care about. Stapling them both together is nice, but I just don't see this as the deck for this card.

Varina, Lich Queen hits for 4, so 7 is not that much to ask most of the time.

Anyway, I thnk it varies a lot by deck construction for sure.

Sure, but Varina has to get through. You can set it up to make that more likely, but it just looks like a lot of hoops to jump through to get to something the deck doesn't even do a great job taking advantage of. Also, you're spending 5 mana to tutor for the spell and telegraphing your next move somewhat. How likely are you to also have another 5 or 6 mana to cast the spell on same turn?

For me adding battles is a very low priority as I have enough figuring out what goes into my version of Varina in the cards we already have. Sieges to me seem to be a fun addition to Magic, but I don't think I can run them in my deck as every slot is already contented with other cards I want to play. Are they perhaps the most optimal? Certainly not. But I want to make a deck which I think is appropriate for my Meta's power level. Currently, I am adding Liliana, Untouched by Death, Shambling Ghast, the Haakon Package minus Intuition, as that is too over budget for me, and I have a bunch of other pet cards I either want or need to play.

I found Liliana to be underwhelming. As a deck that wants to be attacking every turn, it's not great at holding back blockers to defend a Planeswalker, and 4 mana to cast her and ult in the same turn is going to severely limit your ability to reanimate anything.

One card I think is very underplayed in Varina deck is Ashiok, Dream Render. Likely you mill yourself, exiling all opponent's graveyards, and it also is 3 mana which means Sevinne's Reclamation gets it back should you discard it to Varina's ability

Ashiok has the same problem as I mentioned above as a PW, and then isn't necessarily doing anything we need. Exiling other yards is great, but I'm rarely concerned with what other people have in their bins, and I don't think Varina needs, or even necessarily benefits, from a bunch of self mill with few ways to recur the important mass reanimate spells.

[pzbw7z]

If anyone wants a copy of Invasion of Arcavios, hit me up. I pulled two at the prerelease tonight including a foil. I don't plan to try it out.

Complete the Circuit seems almost crazy enough to try, but there's only a card or two that would be worth while. Still, it would be epic to fire off Living Death three times with the proper setup. Magic Christmas, I know, but still. . . EPIC!

Corrupted Conviction has almost talked me into giving it a try. It's not Plumb the Forbidden, but it seems playable.

[pzbw7z]

For me adding battles is a very low priority as I have enough figuring out what goes into my version of Varina in the cards we already have. Sieges to me seem to be a fun addition to Magic, but I don't think I can run them in my deck as every slot is already contented with other cards I want to play. Are they perhaps the most optimal? Certainly not. But I want to make a deck which I think is appropriate for my Meta's power level. Currently, I am adding Liliana, Untouched by Death, Shambling Ghast, the Haakon Package minus Intuition, as that is too over budget for me, and I have a bunch of other pet cards I either want or need to play.

I found Liliana to be underwhelming. As a deck that wants to be attacking every turn, it's not great at holding back blockers to defend a Planeswalker, and 4 mana to cast her and ult in the same turn is going to severely limit your ability to reanimate anything.

Liliana, Untouched by Death is awesome. She might not be quite as good without Rooftop Storm, but there's still shenanigans to be had with her.

Haakon and Co. are quite content with Buried Alive, as, yes, Intuition is beyond my budget as well.

[toctheyounger]

Yeah I think I need to try the battles before I weigh in on them myself. It's just such an unknown. That said we're essentially a farm deck. We want to swing so there's no real reason we can't knock them down to some extent. Of them I'm really only interested in New Capenna, I think the all round costs of Arcavios are going to be too hard to leverage most of the time.

I'll also second Lili being pretty strong. We can use all of her abilities off the jump and there's a couple of really simple and easy ways to just go right for the win with her too. She makes Shambling Ghast a self contained loop that just needs a pinger and plays so nicely with the altars.

[pokken]

Liliana is very important as a backup gravecrawler right now. The "let you repeatedly cast things from the yard" is one of the main combo bottlenecks. and letting shambling ghast act as both gravecrawler and half of an altar opens up a lot of other avenues (using a carrion feeder that you can cast from the yard for example).

You can go from sac outlet zombie, ghast, and drain zombie in the bin to winning the game in just one Lilliana so that's pretty clutch.

If you're not looking to combo it's less exciting but you can still do ashnods altar Gary dances pretty seriously sometimes. Or even just crypt if agadeem to get 2-3 garies.

Would be very very low on my cut list personally.

[Falkenbach]

Anyone gonna try Invasion of Amonkhet ?

[pokken]

Anyone gonna try Invasion of Amonkhet ?

I think I might if I ever build another version of the deck that's more controlly and less creature zombie heavy. It's kind of a cool way to bank a zombie for after a sweeper, if your goal is to curve a sweeper into Varina or something maybe.

[pzbw7z]

Anyone gonna try Invasion of Amonkhet ?

It doesn't excite me, but it's reasonably costed. If one falls into my lap, I'll give it some consideration.

I wound up with an Invasion of Innistrad, which I want to like, but the front seems overpriced by at least 1 and the ability on the back does too.

[pzbw7z]

Has anyone given Pact of the Serpent a thought?

[pokken]

If you have a bunch of zombies you're in a good spot. Imho your draw spells should be good topdecks (epiphany, kindred, ponder, fof) or be reactive to being about to be in a bad spot (plumb, liliana standard bearer).

Deck doesn't need too many winmore cards. If so teferis ageless insight and Alham archive are the first to add.

[toctheyounger]

Small, and slightly overdue, update:

In

• Enlightened Tutor
• Phyrexian Ghoul
• Liliana's Standard Bearer

Out

• Ad Nauseam
• Putrid Goblin
• Crucible of Worlds

I had thought LSB was already in here if I'm honest, but it's wild that I took it out. Generally I think it's going to be easy enough to draw buttloads with, and it's cheaper than Ad Naus. The tutor is an obvious one; now I have a dedicated way to get altars when I need them, or Land Tax, Skullclamp, whatever. Phyrexian Ghoul I'm going out on a limb for on pokken's recommendation. I can see the lines, I guess I'm just gonna play around with it and see what it can do outside of a vacuum. Weirdly, Nantuko Husk is hard to find.

Ad Nauseam I'm not too sad to lose. To really sequence it well it needs a whole lot of expensive rocks or rituals to meet your mana requirements, or an EoT cast which means holding up 5. Not the easiest. Putrid Goblin is I guess a little less utility than the Ghoul, easy switch, and I've already talked about Crucible. It just doesn't feel useful to me here.

As an aside, I grabbed an Invasion of New Capenna to try out here. Let's call that the set review for me. As a primer, there's an obligation to cover some of the new stuff, but this one just didn't have a lot for us. Now that phyrexians are a tribe in their own right there's just less zombies around. I think the set was good, but I just don't think it was good for this deck. I guess that's part and parcel of just having meaningful discourse to the point that we know pretty specifically what's going to work or not, and there just wasn't much that fits what we need.