I played a game online against
Hamza, Guardian of Arashin,
Izoni, Thousand-Eyed, and another
Varina, Lich Queen deck.
I started off with
Search for Azcanta // Azcanta, the Sunken Ruin on turn 2 into
Varina, Lich Queen on turn 4. I didn't have a turn 3 play (well, I did but didn't realize Izoni played an
Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth so I didn't cast my
Withered Wretch). Which worked out just fine since I cast
Mana Drain countering Varina's
Graveborn Muse. They had 3 cards in hand so I figured this was a smart play to keep them under control.
Search was able to bin
Mission Briefing to get me to a land so I was able to cast Varina off the Mana Drain mana and exile two cards to get a token. I was still struggling on mana a little since I missed the next turns land drop. I cast
Rhystic Study to try to draw a few cards and Hamza cast
Primal Vigor which worked out probably best for me and the other Varina player. Or, it would have worked out for me if I had enough mana to start exiling cards from my yard.
But Study drew me 2 nonland cards and Search made sure I got to a land (it was already on top) so I could hit my land drop. Izoni had cast
Oubliette on my Varina so I just cast
Wayward Servant and
Withered Wretch with one mana open to exile something from Varina if needed. They ended up casting
Winds of Abandon which got me 3 lands (super important at this time) and I didn't really lose a lot. I ate their
Graveborn Muse I countered earlier.
Izoni then blew up Rhystic Study with
Assassin's Trophy which was fine with me since I really just wanted lands anyway. On my turn, I played a land and cast
Midnight Reaper and
Graveborn Muse and passed with 3 mana up and
Plumb the Forbidden in hand. Varina then attacked me with their general and I just double blocked and they killed Midnight Reaper which I was fine with. I still drew a card and Varina was gone so they couldn't make 2 zombies at a time with her (Primal Vigor was really a risky play for Hamza in this game).
Izoni then tried to destroy Varina's
Plague Belcher which Varina "countered" with
Lazotep Plating. Izoni, inexplicably, scooped to this. I had drawn a
Tithe off Midnight Reaper dying so I cast that for Scrubland. On my turn I drew
Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx though so I just swung with Varina and Graveborn Muse (since Izoni scooped, Varina phased back in) and discarded both lands I had in hand. I was going to cast
Toxic Deluge for X=2 since my board wouldn't die and Varina's would. However, since I drew
Mana Crypt I just decided to cast
Lord of the Undead, create a token with Varina (the other Varina got rid of Primal Vigor by this point), and cast
Fleshbag Marauder. I chose to sac the token so I would have a blocker. I realize the Lord was a risky play here since it pumped up *all* zombies but Varina only had 5 so I wasn't too concerned and I wanted my Nykthos to tap for a bit more.
I left up 6 mana total: 2 for Plumb and 3 (+the Azcanta) to dig with Azcanta. Varina then cast
Ondu Inversion // Ondu Skyruins so I just cast Plumb to draw 4 cards. One of those cards was
Fact or Fiction so I just used the 4 remaining mana for that. I had Hamza sort the piles and I had 3 zombies,
Living Death, and
Twilight's Call. They put the Zombies in one pile and the reanimation in the other. Which I think was right, but I obviously just took the 2 reanimation spells. The other Varina had cast
Rise of the Dread Marn to get 5 zombie tokens as well.
So, on my turn I just cast
Living Death to get rid of their tokens and get all my stuff back.
Gray Merchant of Asphodel was in the yard as one of the first things I discarded early on so I drained both players for 16 each. I then activated Nykthos for a bunch of mana, cast
Grimgrin, Corpse-Born, sacrificed Gray Merchant, and cast the other reanimation spell to get Gray Merchant back to win the game.
Search was good here. I don't think it was stellar by any stretch but it did its job, filtered through some junk, and filled the yard with a couple zombies and fodder for Varina. And, it "ramped" me to get me another land later in the game. So, while this is the first game with it, I do like it.
None of the other three changes above made an appearance until much later in the game where they were not relevant. And none of them were cast or otherwise made it onto the field. Again, I don't really think I like those cards anyway (except Corpse Augur; I think that is still reasonable), so I wasn't expecting much out of them anyway.
I do want to call out Epiphany though. I had it in hand at the end, and Nykthos would have let me cast it from quite a bit. While I didn't actually need it, I did find a few lines I was contemplating with it (until newer draws change my plans). I think this is one of the more underrated additions to the deck. Again, I won't go as far as to say it absolutely needs to be in this deck, but with the mana the deck has been able to generate lately, even without having access to
Archaeomancer's Map, I think this card is pretty good in general and I have been impressed with it in nearly every scenario I wanted/needed to cast it.