Varina, Lich Queen - Esper Zombie Midrange

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toctheyounger
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Post by toctheyounger » 1 year ago

Id have sworn I out a copy aside to add in to my list, but it isn't in there.
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plaganegra
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Post by plaganegra » 1 year ago

@Reya

Good point - Above when I say +1 I mean to say it replaces itself by drawing a card. Saying "net +1" was not correct so I edited my post and fixed that thank you! ponder and brainstorm are neutral on card advantage since there is no net change. The important distinction by pokken is that brainstorm and ponder draw you a card that turn whereas gaze does not. It does give you access to a lot of cards in the GY though which is a form of card advantage.

I agree that brainstorm is unique with a fetch because it is swapping the cards. Crazy good stuff there without a doubt
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Post by pokken » 1 year ago

Think your analysis seems pretty sound @plaganegra

My perspective is definitely colored by my fetch heavy build.

The one missing piece is connects to @Reyas point which is gaze is actual card disadvantage which is not thaaat big of a deal but worth noting.

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Post by Reya » 1 year ago

What do you think of simply cutting Zombie Apocalypse for Cosmic Intervention ? It's 6 mana, heavy black cost and everything enter tapped. (Well, destroying all humans is a relevant upside in EDH).

It's our worst mass reanimation spell. Cosmic allows more powerful lines and powerful interactions with fetches. I can see maybe one downside of Cosmic. On an empty board it's a terrible draw and you can't do infinites loops with it (you always need to wait EOT).

Other point, I see we all don't play a lot of interactions like spot removals. Do you feel the need of playing more than 1 or 2 cards of that kind ? I kept 2 spot removals in my Varina list for more than two years. But now, with a lot of discussion here and a lot of testing, I feel that only one Chain of Vapor could be enough (again, thanks pokken!). But it feels still strange to not run Anguished Unmaking anymore. This card can solve so many issues. Problem is 3 mana.

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Post by toctheyounger » 1 year ago

Reya wrote:
1 year ago
What do you think of simply cutting Zombie Apocalypse for Cosmic Intervention ? It's 6 mana, heavy black cost and everything enter tapped. (Well, destroying all humans is a relevant upside in EDH).

It's our worst mass reanimation spell. Cosmic allows more powerful lines and powerful interactions with fetches. I can see maybe one downside of Cosmic. On an empty board it's a terrible draw and you can't do infinites loops with it (you always need to wait EOT).

Other point, I see we all don't play a lot of interactions like spot removals. Do you feel the need of playing more than 1 or 2 cards of that kind ? I kept 2 spot removals in my Varina list for more than two years. But now, with a lot of discussion here and a lot of testing, I feel that only one Chain of Vapor could be enough (again, thanks pokken!). But it feels still strange to not run Anguished Unmaking anymore. This card can solve so many issues. Problem is 3 mana.
Personally I think its better than Bidding. ETB tapped doesn't matter really, unless your meta is combat heavy. Bidding having the chance of being symmetric rather than asymmetric is a bit rough to me. Your opponents will always choose something. Besides, Apocalypse can sometimes be a wipe too; it's not that common, but I know there's a ton of hatebears in humans, so taking the chance to get them gone every now and then seems worth it to me.

Personally I think we're generally all on a plan to have better interaction on the stack than in play, and personally I'm comfortable with just having a couple of options for problematic permanents. Chain of Vapor solves a couple issues for me, stuff in play and Kindred Discovery, and it's as cheap as you can get. I often struggle to hold up the mana for Unmaking, and while I haven't seen it in play yet presumably the same could be said for Void Rend. I don't have a Chain yet, so they'll stay in the list for now, but if I can track down a Chain, one will be off for sure.
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Post by pokken » 1 year ago

I think chain of vapor and cyclonic rift is enough general purpose spot removal. If rift ever gets a reprint I'll probably add it over one of my counterspells or murderous rider.

I'd play a swords to plowshares before unmaking or void rend. I just don't want to be removing things. It's not what this deck wants to do.

Mostly we want very cheap handful of stack interaction everything 2cmc or less because we want to almost tap out for zombies every turn

Swan song or offer are decent options too.

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Post by toctheyounger » 1 year ago

pokken wrote:
1 year ago
I think chain of vapor and cyclonic rift is enough general purpose spot removal. If rift ever gets a reprint I'll probably add it over one of my counterspells or murderous rider.

I'd play a swords to plowshares before unmaking or void rend. I just don't want to be removing things. It's not what this deck wants to do.

Mostly we want very cheap handful of stack interaction everything 2cmc or less because we want to almost tap out for zombies every turn

Swan song or offer are decent options too.
Swan Song has always been pretty great for me, I could see running Offer instead; Treasures can't block your zombies. But, y'know, it's not that critical, either is fine.

I run Unmaking and Rend purely for things like Rhystics, Smothering Tithes, stuff that I can't pick up any other way. There's other bounce and remove stuff about at a really cheap rate, and I think given that we're not really playing the long game I'd be just as happy with something like Fragmentize to cover that off. Even Alchemist's Retrieval isn't terrible. I really just want something to make sure that I'm not feeding someone else's win or what have you. As is, Unmaking and Rend are a bit costly, but I've already convinced myself that they're placeholders.
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Post by pzbw7z » 1 year ago

I like having something to deal with obnoxious things such as Ashiok, Dream Render, Leyline of the Void, or Rest in Peace. So I like the cards that can deal with any non-land permanent. I don't mind anything so much as permanent or repeatable grave-hate.

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Post by toctheyounger » 1 year ago

Agreed, although in all honesty I actually don't see a ton of grave hate. Lucky me, I guess.
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Post by Rframpt » 1 year ago

I think I am a possible outlier in terms of the amount of removal I am packing in my Varina deck. Though my playgroup is also very interactive and you need ways to deal with their threats before they skate on you. Currently my list contains:
Despark
Anguished unmaking
Void rend
Lethal scheme
Vanishing verse
Damn
Rite of oblivion.
The good thing about it I feel like I am never that far away from dealing with any sort of permanent on the field. This also on top of having six boardwipes in the deck

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Post by RedCheese » 1 year ago

Varinna is very flexible so no worries adding removal for those sort of situations

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Post by pokken » 1 year ago

Rframpt wrote:
1 year ago
I think I am a possible outlier in terms of the amount of removal I am packing in my Varina deck. Though my playgroup is also very interactive and you need ways to deal with their threats before they skate on you. Currently my list contains:
Despark
Anguished unmaking
Void rend
Lethal scheme
Vanishing verse
Damn
Rite of oblivion.
The good thing about it I feel like I am never that far away from dealing with any sort of permanent on the field. This also on top of having six boardwipes in the deck
Wow that feels like an over the top amount of removal to me. Remind me what your game plan is?

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Post by Rframpt » 1 year ago

pokken wrote:
1 year ago
Rframpt wrote:
1 year ago
I think I am a possible outlier in terms of the amount of removal I am packing in my Varina deck. Though my playgroup is also very interactive and you need ways to deal with their threats before they skate on you. Currently my list contains:
Despark
Anguished unmaking
Void rend
Lethal scheme
Vanishing verse
Damn
Rite of oblivion.
The good thing about it I feel like I am never that far away from dealing with any sort of permanent on the field. This also on top of having six boardwipes in the deck
Wow that feels like an over the top amount of removal to me. Remind me what your game plan is?
It may seem like that but in my meta everyone packs a good amount of removal. The plan of the deck is like many we have seen here swing with zombies to loot zombies into the yard then mass reanimate with the combination of gray merchant, corpse knight, wayward servant, vengeful dead & plague belcher to finish off anybody left alive

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Post by pokken » 1 year ago

Rframpt wrote:
1 year ago
It may seem like that but in my meta everyone packs a good amount of removal. The plan of the deck is like many we have seen here swing with zombies to loot zombies into the yard then mass reanimate with the combination of gray merchant, corpse knight, wayward servant, vengeful dead & plague belcher to finish off anybody left alive
Hmm. That's interesting. What I have found playing in metas like that is you can kinda attack them with this deck which is aggro-combo, by shaving down to the bare minimum interaction and being more able to establish your early game with things that are undesirable to remove (e.g. cheap zombies).

If I were you I would consider *at minimum* replacing all the "bad" removal with countermagic; things I consider bad are:
1) anything sorcery speed
2) anything with 3 cmc or higher cost
3) anything 2 cmc or higher that only hits creatures or is narrow somehow (e.g. Vanishing Verse)

If you're already loaded up on countermagic consider more card draw/selection in those slots. And definitely run Chain of Vapor if you can.

re: countermagic suite
I consider the hierarchy for Varina to be, in order (although price is a factor ofc)
Obviously ymmv, and I think it's possible to build a Varina deck that can support Force of Will if you really try.

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Post by Rframpt » 1 year ago

pokken wrote:
1 year ago
Rframpt wrote:
1 year ago
It may seem like that but in my meta everyone packs a good amount of removal. The plan of the deck is like many we have seen here swing with zombies to loot zombies into the yard then mass reanimate with the combination of gray merchant, corpse knight, wayward servant, vengeful dead & plague belcher to finish off anybody left alive
Hmm. That's interesting. What I have found playing in metas like that is you can kinda attack them with this deck which is aggro-combo, by shaving down to the bare minimum interaction and being more able to establish your early game with things that are undesirable to remove (e.g. cheap zombies).

If I were you I would consider *at minimum* replacing all the "bad" removal with countermagic; things I consider bad are:
1) anything sorcery speed
2) anything with 3 cmc or higher cost
3) anything 2 cmc or higher that only hits creatures or is narrow somehow (e.g. Vanishing Verse)

If you're already loaded up on countermagic consider more card draw/selection in those slots. And definitely run Chain of Vapor if you can.

re: countermagic suite
I consider the hierarchy for Varina to be, in order (although price is a factor ofc)
Obviously ymmv, and I think it's possible to build a Varina deck that can support Force of Will if you really try.
While I appreciate your thinking on optimizing the deck I like where the level my deck is currently.

Decklist right here: https://www.archidekt.com/partial-compa ... alQuantity

I have found that going full in on the combo line with Haakon isn't where I want to be with the deck. Counters can go in some of my other control decks. I do plan on adding creatures so I can start playing Tormod again

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Post by pokken » 1 year ago

Rframpt wrote:
1 year ago
While I appreciate your thinking on optimizing the deck I like where the level my deck is currently.

Decklist right here: https://www.archidekt.com/partial-compa ... alQuantity

I have found that going full in on the combo line with Haakon isn't where I want to be with the deck. Counters can go in some of my other control decks. I do plan on adding creatures so I can start playing Tormod again
It looks solid all in all, bit hefty on the curve side but that pays off with mass reanimation sometimes. I think my favorite bit of spice is Ashiok, Dream Render -- milling yourself 4 and grave hating everyone else is pretty nice :)

I think playing sweeper heavy is reasonable to do with Varina, it's basically saying "I'm gonna sweep the board *then* play Varina" which is legitimate.

Even outside of pure optimization I think you could improve your overall experience by adjusting some of the removal package, but it's your deck :)

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Post by plaganegra » 1 year ago

pokken wrote:
1 year ago
re: countermagic suite
I consider the hierarchy for Varina to be, in order (although price is a factor ofc)
I think it's possible to build a Varina deck that can support Force of Will if you really try.
I like your hierarchy.
Personally I value the 1cmc counterspells >> 2cmc counterspells though because of how much I tap out.

Intersting idea here. How many blue cards do you think would support FoW? I have thought about it and just assumed this build was impossible.

I actually don't have any counterspells that cost more than 1 mana currently which is actually the primary reason I am interested in FoW and have never tried mana drain. I have never included mana drain in my list because of the double blue cost and the 2cmc. Do you think I should run Mana Drain? If I were to add any 2cmc counters it would probably be that
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Post by pokken » 1 year ago

plaganegra wrote:
1 year ago
I like your hierarchy.
Personally I value the 1cmc counterspells >> 2cmc counterspells though because of how much I tap out.

Intersting idea here. How many blue cards do you think would support FoW? I have thought about it and just assumed this build was impossible.

I actually don't have any counterspells that cost more than 1 mana currently which is actually the primary reason I am interested in FoW and have never tried mana drain. I have never included mana drain in my list because of the double blue cost and the 2cmc. Do you think I should run Mana Drain? If I were to add any 2cmc counters it would probably be that
I can't really get myself on Swan Song train because I just find I care too much about creatures; I can't let someone resolve something like an Agent of Treachery or Gilded Drake, so I prioritize generic spells and free ones. Also just so many crazy ass bombs now.

In general I think you need around 20-25 blue spells to support Force of Will; I have I think ~12.

The way I would apprach trying to get that is:
1) add a bunch of blue looting spells in place of black zombies (Fact or Fiction Otherworldly Gaze Frantic Search
2) add a few of the good blue zombies like Grimgrin, Corpse-Born and Stitchwing Skaab
3) add a few more counterspells and maybe a Flood of Tears or something like that. this is probably the deck for Swan Song :)
4) add Teferi's Ageless Insight

I think the blue focused varina is going to be more controlling, and more into using Varina, Lich Queen's ability to make zombies and using blue to fill the yard.

re: Mana Drain
yes you should play mana drain. The sequence of pass turn with mana up, mana drain something big, use the mana to power a combo turn, happens often enough that I consider it to be a core capability.

I have had games where my plan was to mana drain on 3 into varina + make 2 zombies on turn 4 (usually off Stitcher's Supplier).

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Post by Rframpt » 1 year ago

pokken wrote:
1 year ago
Rframpt wrote:
1 year ago
While I appreciate your thinking on optimizing the deck I like where the level my deck is currently.

Decklist right here: https://www.archidekt.com/partial-compa ... alQuantity

I have found that going full in on the combo line with Haakon isn't where I want to be with the deck. Counters can go in some of my other control decks. I do plan on adding creatures so I can start playing Tormod again
It looks solid all in all, bit hefty on the curve side but that pays off with mass reanimation sometimes. I think my favorite bit of spice is Ashiok, Dream Render -- milling yourself 4 and grave hating everyone else is pretty nice :)

I think playing sweeper heavy is reasonable to do with Varina, it's basically saying "I'm gonna sweep the board *then* play Varina" which is legitimate.

Even outside of pure optimization I think you could improve your overall experience by adjusting some of the removal package, but it's your deck :)
That is what I like about playing Varina. It feels like I am always adjusting the knobs and bolts of the deck. I can see that I am very much on the heavy side of removal and could go down so I have a few more early drops, which surely would help curve out better.
Still it feels nice knowing the likelihood of finding an answer to problem permanents isn't far if you have the board to back it up

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Post by plaganegra » 1 year ago

pokken wrote:
1 year ago
I can't really get myself on Swan Song train because I just find I care too much about creatures; I can't let someone resolve something like an Agent of Treachery or Gilded Drake, so I prioritize generic spells and free ones. Also just so many crazy ass bombs now.
I haven't really felt the need to counter many creatures in my meta personally. Most of the big threats to my gameplan specifically come in the form of non-creature spells. The two cards you mentioned as examples wouldn't really bother me too much since they don't really end the game. They are definitely power swings, but nothing I cannot overpower. I want counterspell backup for my own game-ending turns and also outs for cards that really end the game like Expropriate and other combos. Most combos I encounter use at least one spell to go off (I know not all do though).

I think using another counterspell that hits anything is solid though so I will try to find room for mana drain.

That's just my current take on countering creatures vs non-creature spells though based on my recent play experiences (which are sadly not as recent as I would like).

Was supposed to play tonight - got the newly revamped deck all sleeved up and ready to go. My copy bladewhip transmogrant even came in today! Had to reschedule for the 3rd time in a month with the playgroup because two of the dudes decided to do something else. Ugh. Probably need another playgroup.
Zombies ate my brains.
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Also: Yawgmoth, Tinybones, Blim, Krenko, Kaalia, Beckett Brass, Chatterfang, Evelyn, Kodama-East, Kozilek, Breya, Morophon, U-Braids, Ashcoat.
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Post by pzbw7z » 1 year ago

Recently, I swapped in Tormod, the Desecrator for Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver, and, I must say, I've really been digging Tormod. He really gets on well with Varina and Gravecrawler and just a bunch of other cards.

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Post by devilcatz » 1 year ago

pzbw7z wrote:
1 year ago
Recently, I swapped in Tormod, the Desecrator for Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver, and, I must say, I've really been digging Tormod. He really gets on well with Varina and Gravecrawler and just a bunch of other cards.
Keep both? Both are awesome.

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Post by Rframpt » 1 year ago

devilcatz wrote:
1 year ago
pzbw7z wrote:
1 year ago
Recently, I swapped in Tormod, the Desecrator for Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver, and, I must say, I've really been digging Tormod. He really gets on well with Varina and Gravecrawler and just a bunch of other cards.
Keep both? Both are awesome.
I agree on getting both in the deck. As wilhelt can make use of the tokens Tormod generates to draw some cards

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Post by plaganegra » 1 year ago

Tormod works much better with the cards that come back and needs very little to operate (Just Varina or a zombie that comes back). Wilhelt relies heavily on the rest of your board and gives you half-zombies. I couldn't fit both so I had to cut Wilhelt personally. I did not enjoy the cut though. He is awesome. Wish I could fit both, but both are probably unnecessary.
Zombies ate my brains.
My Varina Decklist
Also: Yawgmoth, Tinybones, Blim, Krenko, Kaalia, Beckett Brass, Chatterfang, Evelyn, Kodama-East, Kozilek, Breya, Morophon, U-Braids, Ashcoat.
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Post by RedCheese » 1 year ago

I can't believe i never tested Tormod in Varinna... I guess ahd so many chungus zombies in my lsit in the past that forgot about it. Going to try him out

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