It might be useful in some aggro matchups, but ultimately I don't think it does anything where I'd prefer Ghostly Prison more. I guess it shuts down Kiki-Jiki combo, if you have a lot of that going on. (Then again, so does Ghostly Prison, more or less.)
I'm going to be playing with my lovely new Death and Taxes builds for a while for FNMs (my meta isn't always running tier decks anyway, as history has shown for me), but I may be doing some Soul Sisters testing on XMage now and then.
(EDIT: I don't remember if we've discussed this or not, but why *don't* we run Thalia in this deck? We don't run that many noncreature spells.)
Hallowed Moonlight is a good, versatile card, yes. If it's needed in your meta, it can't hurt to run it. That said, Rest in Peace covers the most difficult situations and is unconditional-- they can't reanimate anything if there was never anything to reanimate, so there's no guesswork involved. Meanwhile, the other cards that cheat in a huge creature can be mitigated with a well-placed Path to Exile (or in Emrakul's case, Blessed Alliance for the edict effect).
Hallowed Moonlight does work very well against token generators and Collected Company-- it's a common SB card in Standard for that reason. For now, at least.
It's hard to be particularly helpful when your main complaint is "I hate control decks" and then just named a bunch of cards you use without even explaining why you chose them. I'd think it would be wise to look back at your original statement before pointing fingers. I said exactly what I meant-- the idea is to prevent Nahiri from ulting here-- and for control decks in general, you can beat them down with boosted tokens since they're harder to remove. I don't really know what else you'd want aside from going into painfully overanalytical detail.
But if you want excruciating detail, here you go, I guess.
It is exactly how I said: the choices I think are best against Nahiri decks are Pithing Needle and Celestial Purge. The Pithing Needle is great against any Planeswalker, but when the deck's main wincon revolves around it, it more or less debilitates them. It's not narrow at all when it's the single easiest thing to throw in to jam their whole system-- a colorless one-drop that literally any deck in Magic can play to stop Planeswalkers? It's fantastic.
After that, you can hold on to the Celestial Purge as a safeguard against the Nahiri if they have a way to destroy the Pithing Needle, or you can use it to remove threats like Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet (if they're running Mardu Nahiri) or Izzet Staticaster (which is in the Jeskai Nahiri sideboard and is devastating against us, especially in the early game).
Also, if you're not running Ghost Quarters, you should be. Jeskai Nahiri (and a LOT of control decks in general) run Celestial Colonnade, and it's incredibly troublesome.
Another decent choice against any red deck is Mark of Asylum. Keeps your creatures safe from burn removal.
As for the cards you named off: Rest in Peace - Decent but wouldn't be my first choice unless I knew they were doing something with significant graveyard interaction. Snapcaster Mage is a pretty good reason to board it in, though, as would be Kalitas or Emrakul. But I think we have better answers in running Pithing Needle to stop Emrakul from coming out to begin with, and Celestial Purge to kill things like Kalitas off. Blessed Alliance is also good, as it can stop Emrakul after she's out, and it can also stop Kalitas too.
Defense Grid - This is a terrible card for this deck. Control decks keep their mana open to counter spells and kill creatures, while meanwhile we're trying to drop a bunch of one-drop cards-- and try to keep one or two open to play Path to Exile, Blessed Alliance, Celestial Purge, or Dismember. This turns those 1 and 2-drop spells into 4 and 5-drop spells. No good at all.
Grand Abolisher - Again, this is one of those cards that only look good on paper. Sure, it's nice to think "yeah, now I can do stuff without being countered or killed!", but in practice, you're spending 2 mana on a creature that they will either counter on the way down or allow, and kill the next turn. You'll rarely, if ever, get any actual use out of it.
Celestial Purge - Good, for reasons we've already discussed.
Secure the Wastes - Also good, but I personally prefer Spectral Procession for being the most efficient mana-to-token ratio card we have available to us-- and they're evasive tokens too, which can get some unblockable beats in. They're hard for control decks with single-target removal to get rid of.
Suppression Field - Not a bad card, but it can backfire. Even if it takes longer, they can still activate those abilities-- and it makes using Martyr of Sands on our end feel incredibly bad, especially if we need emergency lifegain and can't afford to pay it because it costs 3 instead of 1. Some people like it. I prefer Pithing Needle.
Mana Tithe - A white Force Spike is pretty nice, but once they know you have it, it's really nothing more than something for them to play around by being sure to make sure they have one more mana open to cast their spells. It's just like running Judge's Familiar-- sure, it's nice when it works, but in most cases it's possible to just play around.
Surgical Extraction - Not worth it. Even if you can use it and name their Mana Leaks, their Remands, their Terminates, their Cryptic Commands, their Snapcaster Mages, their Doom Blades, their Pyroclasms, their Lightning Bolts, what have you, I guarantee that they'll have something else that works just as well for them. Most good control decks have a variety of counter/kill spells anyway, so you'll maybe get 1 or 2 other cards out of their deck.
when i saw it i could feel all the nostalgia coming back and i thought this will replace felidar sovereign and now i just cant wait for kaladesh to come out so i can retouch my old soul sisters deck that i didnt play with for years!
after all it was my first ''competitive deck'' and i played it way too much back in the days.
You can't believe it? We were talking about it literally last page.
I don't think it works too well in a Soul Sisters deck. Something running that would want far more card advantage and cards played per turn-- it's not very common for us to have over 50 life unless we're already undeniably winning. I think it'd work much nicer in a deck that gets lots of card draw and plays lots of one-drops every turn (or just builds up and goes off like Storm or Jeskai Ascendancy), or a deck that gets more lifegain in general, like Martyr Proc.
That said, it's a potential way out vs. Lantern Control, I guess? Not worth much if they Pithing Needle it, though.
Overall it's janky and I don't think it fits here. It's a neat card and a fun wincon, but I don't think it's one we can use unless we build around it (and honestly, if we're going to do a lifegain wincon, you may as well do Felidar Sovereign).
And I still think it's not really a good fit for a Soul Sisters deck-- that is to say, the very aggressive variant that this archetype is built around. I'm sure you could tweak the deck to be all about the lifegain all of the time, but you may find that to be a much more slow, control-based style of play, more suited to the Martyr Proc archetype, whose style of play revolves around "soft-locking" opponents out of the game by gaining life far faster than they can reduce it by recurring Martyr of Sands over and over again every turn with Proclamation of Rebirth, while laying down beats with Serra Ascendant.
I haven't been playing with SS much recently due to all the Nahiri decks online. I absoluteely HATE playing against 'control decks'. Do any of you share my feelings on this or is there a better way lol? I've read about choosing when to play your spells to bait out their counters etc, i've run 4 cavern of souls mainboard (prob the most success i've had in tournaments). I've tried SB cards like rest in peace (snapcaster mage), defense grid, grand abolisher, celestial purge, ,secure the wastes, suppression field, mana tithe, surgical extraction. What advice/ experiences can you give me to help improve my play/decisions against these type of decks?
Rest in Peace is a good card against decks that use Snapcaster Mage and Nahiri (because they can't re-use Emrakul after one use since she doesn't get shuffled back into the deck) But obviously, even one hit with Emrakul is devastating, so it's not THAT good (but if any deck can survive a turn against an Emrakul, it's a lifegain deck). Defense Grid hurts us more than them, I feel. Grand Abolisher is cool on paper, but not in practice. Celestial Purge is a common SB piece against Nahiri. Suppression Field is all right-- I personally prefer Pithing Needle as SB tech in ANY deck vs. Planeswalkers. Mana Tithe is interesting; I don't know how well it works for us. Surgical Extraction doesn't really seem all that necessary.
Ultimately, if your meta is overrun by Nahiri, I'd say board in Pithing Needles and Celestial Purges for sure.
Control decks are just as much a part of Magic as Aggro or Combo decks; you may as well get used to them or play something else. I know a lot of control decks really don't like dealing with our Spirit tokens, especially when pumped with Honor of the Pure. It's harder for them to get rid of them all.
... On a side note, I'm in the process of collecting AEther Vials to build Death & Taxes/Merfolk/Spirits. Do you think they have a place in Soul Sisters too?...
I don't think that we need Æther Vials in Soul Sisters. Vial allows merfolk to play arround sorcery speed mass-removal and to make combat ackward for your opponent, because you can flash in a lord. The Taxes decks play creatures that can creat card adventage when flashed in in response to spells or abilitys from your opponent (Flickerwisp, Leonin Arbiter, Selfless Spirit, Aven Mindcensor, ...). The only thing I would like to flash in is Archangel of Thune but taking vial up to 5 seems not good and Windbrisk Heights lets us allready play Archangel for free when we attack with your spirit tokens.
Fair enough. I just thought it could be interesting.
In my personal experience, mainboarding Spellskite is awful and never comes when I need it. It's nice in the sideboard for those bad matchups though-- it's another choice that completely debilitates Infect, too.
Hey guys!
That Abzan player who quit: It was late game, I was at a very low life total. For the next couple of turns, I managed to play Ranger twice, fetch some Sisters/Serra to eventually go above 30 and win the game with Ascendants. Oh, he was very mad. I forgot the exact words but it was something like: Oh, that's when you know your deck is terrible when you had nothing going on until you drew the Rangers. Your deck is not good, blablabla. I starting laughing, lmfao.
How you know when your deck is bad: when you're running Abzan of all things and cannot beat a white weenie lifegain deck at low health for multiple turns and allow a complete recovery, leading to your defeat.
I think you would greatly benefit from some more onedrops to make Ranger of Eos worth it. Since you seem to be going for a human-tribal-ish thing, I'd suggest dropping some stuff to fit in Champion of the Parish, Thraben Inspector, or Doomed Traveler, to name a few cheap options. I think you'd also benefit from some spirits/fliers in general, since they're kind of our secondary win condition. I know you want human synergy, but Spectral Procession + Honor of the Pure can be a pretty scary clock for the opponent. I don't like Gather the Townsfolk; the odds of you making value of its secondary ability are slim and it doesn't have the advantage of being instant speed like Raise the Alarm. I don't think it would hurt your plan much to make it Spectral Procession instead. If you really want human tokens, play more Secure the Wastes.
I'd also suggest demoting Ghostly Prison to the sideboard unless you know for sure your meta is heavily creature-based. It does little of value in decks that run few creatures and it'd suck to draw it when you don't need it.
I used to run that in a budget version of the deck! It was hilarious. I'd get all of this unwarranted criticism that it was a bad card while they were losing to it.
I don't think it works too well in a Soul Sisters deck. Something running that would want far more card advantage and cards played per turn-- it's not very common for us to have over 50 life unless we're already undeniably winning. I think it'd work much nicer in a deck that gets lots of card draw and plays lots of one-drops every turn (or just builds up and goes off like Storm or Jeskai Ascendancy), or a deck that gets more lifegain in general, like Martyr Proc.
That said, it's a potential way out vs. Lantern Control, I guess? Not worth much if they Pithing Needle it, though.
Overall it's janky and I don't think it fits here. It's a neat card and a fun wincon, but I don't think it's one we can use unless we build around it (and honestly, if we're going to do a lifegain wincon, you may as well do Felidar Sovereign).
Martyr is good. It's not a card you want to see in the later game, but it is the key to our earliest wins, which is the T1 Ascendant + T2 Martyr (or vice-versa, if you need the Ascendant to reach 30+ life, it just sets you back a turn), swing for 6 flying lifelink. It puts you so far ahead of your opponent that even if they kill it on their next turn, you still have an enormous advantage to ease you into mid-late game.
And that's fine, because we have cards to supply the Martyr later in the game. Squadron Hawk fills your hand with up to three white cards while giving you an evasive beater on the board, and Ranger of Eos gives you two white cards in your hand-- which can be 2 Sisters if you have Pridemate/Thune out, 2 Martyrs if you're really far behind (especially if you have an 1/1 Ascendant out), or a Martyr and Ascendant to get you going again.
I've tried playing without Martyr before and the deck just doesn't feel right-- especially if you're running Ascendants. If you drop her, you may as well drop the Ascendants and the Hawks as well and lose your best wincon. Pridemate is great and all, but he has no evasion and gives you no life advantage, so he can be chump blocked for days and easily removed on top of that-- and Thune is just really expensive.
There is something to be said for a more focused Sister build though-- drop Martyr/Ascendant/Hawks and bring in stuff like Auriok Champion, Hero of Bladehold, Brimaz, King of Oreskos, and a couple more Archangel of Thune (maybe some Secure the Wastes?). That way you have a ton more bodies making it onto the board and more lifegain for each one-- and running multiple Thunes raises your odds of turning everything into a Pridemate. It's just a much slower, midrange-y build.
WB Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim | WBR Queen Marchesa | WUBR Breya, Etherium Shaper
Modern:
/ Death and Taxes | W/ Soul Sisters | Spirits | U Faeries | Tempered Steel Affinity
(EDIT: I don't remember if we've discussed this or not, but why *don't* we run Thalia in this deck? We don't run that many noncreature spells.)
WB Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim | WBR Queen Marchesa | WUBR Breya, Etherium Shaper
Modern:
/ Death and Taxes | W/ Soul Sisters | Spirits | U Faeries | Tempered Steel Affinity
Hallowed Moonlight does work very well against token generators and Collected Company-- it's a common SB card in Standard for that reason. For now, at least.
WB Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim | WBR Queen Marchesa | WUBR Breya, Etherium Shaper
Modern:
/ Death and Taxes | W/ Soul Sisters | Spirits | U Faeries | Tempered Steel Affinity
But if you want excruciating detail, here you go, I guess.
It is exactly how I said: the choices I think are best against Nahiri decks are Pithing Needle and Celestial Purge. The Pithing Needle is great against any Planeswalker, but when the deck's main wincon revolves around it, it more or less debilitates them. It's not narrow at all when it's the single easiest thing to throw in to jam their whole system-- a colorless one-drop that literally any deck in Magic can play to stop Planeswalkers? It's fantastic.
After that, you can hold on to the Celestial Purge as a safeguard against the Nahiri if they have a way to destroy the Pithing Needle, or you can use it to remove threats like Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet (if they're running Mardu Nahiri) or Izzet Staticaster (which is in the Jeskai Nahiri sideboard and is devastating against us, especially in the early game).
Another useful card for either version of Nahiri deck is Leyline of Sanctity. It stops you from being targeted by any Burn spell, and keeps you safe from Vendilion Clique, Thoughtseize, Inquisition of Kozilek, and so on.
Also, if you're not running Ghost Quarters, you should be. Jeskai Nahiri (and a LOT of control decks in general) run Celestial Colonnade, and it's incredibly troublesome.
Another decent choice against any red deck is Mark of Asylum. Keeps your creatures safe from burn removal.
As for the cards you named off:
Rest in Peace - Decent but wouldn't be my first choice unless I knew they were doing something with significant graveyard interaction. Snapcaster Mage is a pretty good reason to board it in, though, as would be Kalitas or Emrakul. But I think we have better answers in running Pithing Needle to stop Emrakul from coming out to begin with, and Celestial Purge to kill things like Kalitas off. Blessed Alliance is also good, as it can stop Emrakul after she's out, and it can also stop Kalitas too.
Defense Grid - This is a terrible card for this deck. Control decks keep their mana open to counter spells and kill creatures, while meanwhile we're trying to drop a bunch of one-drop cards-- and try to keep one or two open to play Path to Exile, Blessed Alliance, Celestial Purge, or Dismember. This turns those 1 and 2-drop spells into 4 and 5-drop spells. No good at all.
Grand Abolisher - Again, this is one of those cards that only look good on paper. Sure, it's nice to think "yeah, now I can do stuff without being countered or killed!", but in practice, you're spending 2 mana on a creature that they will either counter on the way down or allow, and kill the next turn. You'll rarely, if ever, get any actual use out of it.
Celestial Purge - Good, for reasons we've already discussed.
Secure the Wastes - Also good, but I personally prefer Spectral Procession for being the most efficient mana-to-token ratio card we have available to us-- and they're evasive tokens too, which can get some unblockable beats in. They're hard for control decks with single-target removal to get rid of.
Suppression Field - Not a bad card, but it can backfire. Even if it takes longer, they can still activate those abilities-- and it makes using Martyr of Sands on our end feel incredibly bad, especially if we need emergency lifegain and can't afford to pay it because it costs 3 instead of 1. Some people like it. I prefer Pithing Needle.
Mana Tithe - A white Force Spike is pretty nice, but once they know you have it, it's really nothing more than something for them to play around by being sure to make sure they have one more mana open to cast their spells. It's just like running Judge's Familiar-- sure, it's nice when it works, but in most cases it's possible to just play around.
Surgical Extraction - Not worth it. Even if you can use it and name their Mana Leaks, their Remands, their Terminates, their Cryptic Commands, their Snapcaster Mages, their Doom Blades, their Pyroclasms, their Lightning Bolts, what have you, I guarantee that they'll have something else that works just as well for them. Most good control decks have a variety of counter/kill spells anyway, so you'll maybe get 1 or 2 other cards out of their deck.
WB Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim | WBR Queen Marchesa | WUBR Breya, Etherium Shaper
Modern:
/ Death and Taxes | W/ Soul Sisters | Spirits | U Faeries | Tempered Steel Affinity
You can't believe it? We were talking about it literally last page.
And I still think it's not really a good fit for a Soul Sisters deck-- that is to say, the very aggressive variant that this archetype is built around. I'm sure you could tweak the deck to be all about the lifegain all of the time, but you may find that to be a much more slow, control-based style of play, more suited to the Martyr Proc archetype, whose style of play revolves around "soft-locking" opponents out of the game by gaining life far faster than they can reduce it by recurring Martyr of Sands over and over again every turn with Proclamation of Rebirth, while laying down beats with Serra Ascendant.
Rest in Peace is a good card against decks that use Snapcaster Mage and Nahiri (because they can't re-use Emrakul after one use since she doesn't get shuffled back into the deck) But obviously, even one hit with Emrakul is devastating, so it's not THAT good (but if any deck can survive a turn against an Emrakul, it's a lifegain deck). Defense Grid hurts us more than them, I feel. Grand Abolisher is cool on paper, but not in practice. Celestial Purge is a common SB piece against Nahiri. Suppression Field is all right-- I personally prefer Pithing Needle as SB tech in ANY deck vs. Planeswalkers. Mana Tithe is interesting; I don't know how well it works for us. Surgical Extraction doesn't really seem all that necessary.
Ultimately, if your meta is overrun by Nahiri, I'd say board in Pithing Needles and Celestial Purges for sure.
Control decks are just as much a part of Magic as Aggro or Combo decks; you may as well get used to them or play something else. I know a lot of control decks really don't like dealing with our Spirit tokens, especially when pumped with Honor of the Pure. It's harder for them to get rid of them all.
WB Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim | WBR Queen Marchesa | WUBR Breya, Etherium Shaper
Modern:
/ Death and Taxes | W/ Soul Sisters | Spirits | U Faeries | Tempered Steel Affinity
From a few days ago:
WB Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim | WBR Queen Marchesa | WUBR Breya, Etherium Shaper
Modern:
/ Death and Taxes | W/ Soul Sisters | Spirits | U Faeries | Tempered Steel Affinity
WB Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim | WBR Queen Marchesa | WUBR Breya, Etherium Shaper
Modern:
/ Death and Taxes | W/ Soul Sisters | Spirits | U Faeries | Tempered Steel Affinity
WB Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim | WBR Queen Marchesa | WUBR Breya, Etherium Shaper
Modern:
/ Death and Taxes | W/ Soul Sisters | Spirits | U Faeries | Tempered Steel Affinity
WB Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim | WBR Queen Marchesa | WUBR Breya, Etherium Shaper
Modern:
/ Death and Taxes | W/ Soul Sisters | Spirits | U Faeries | Tempered Steel Affinity
W
Sorcery
Destroy target artifact or enchantment with converted mana cost of 4 or less.
Seems potentially decent. Maybe not as versatile as Sundering Growth, but cheaper.
Then there's also "Aerobatic Maneuver" (unofficial translation)
2W Instant
Flicker a creature you control and draw a card.
Could potentially work to abuse an ETB effect and get some card draw going?
WB Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim | WBR Queen Marchesa | WUBR Breya, Etherium Shaper
Modern:
/ Death and Taxes | W/ Soul Sisters | Spirits | U Faeries | Tempered Steel Affinity
How you know when your deck is bad: when you're running Abzan of all things and cannot beat a white weenie lifegain deck at low health for multiple turns and allow a complete recovery, leading to your defeat.
WB Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim | WBR Queen Marchesa | WUBR Breya, Etherium Shaper
Modern:
/ Death and Taxes | W/ Soul Sisters | Spirits | U Faeries | Tempered Steel Affinity
I'd also suggest demoting Ghostly Prison to the sideboard unless you know for sure your meta is heavily creature-based. It does little of value in decks that run few creatures and it'd suck to draw it when you don't need it.
WB Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim | WBR Queen Marchesa | WUBR Breya, Etherium Shaper
Modern:
/ Death and Taxes | W/ Soul Sisters | Spirits | U Faeries | Tempered Steel Affinity
WB Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim | WBR Queen Marchesa | WUBR Breya, Etherium Shaper
Modern:
/ Death and Taxes | W/ Soul Sisters | Spirits | U Faeries | Tempered Steel Affinity
That said, it's a potential way out vs. Lantern Control, I guess? Not worth much if they Pithing Needle it, though.
Overall it's janky and I don't think it fits here. It's a neat card and a fun wincon, but I don't think it's one we can use unless we build around it (and honestly, if we're going to do a lifegain wincon, you may as well do Felidar Sovereign).
WB Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim | WBR Queen Marchesa | WUBR Breya, Etherium Shaper
Modern:
/ Death and Taxes | W/ Soul Sisters | Spirits | U Faeries | Tempered Steel Affinity
And that's fine, because we have cards to supply the Martyr later in the game. Squadron Hawk fills your hand with up to three white cards while giving you an evasive beater on the board, and Ranger of Eos gives you two white cards in your hand-- which can be 2 Sisters if you have Pridemate/Thune out, 2 Martyrs if you're really far behind (especially if you have an 1/1 Ascendant out), or a Martyr and Ascendant to get you going again.
I've tried playing without Martyr before and the deck just doesn't feel right-- especially if you're running Ascendants. If you drop her, you may as well drop the Ascendants and the Hawks as well and lose your best wincon. Pridemate is great and all, but he has no evasion and gives you no life advantage, so he can be chump blocked for days and easily removed on top of that-- and Thune is just really expensive.
There is something to be said for a more focused Sister build though-- drop Martyr/Ascendant/Hawks and bring in stuff like Auriok Champion, Hero of Bladehold, Brimaz, King of Oreskos, and a couple more Archangel of Thune (maybe some Secure the Wastes?). That way you have a ton more bodies making it onto the board and more lifegain for each one-- and running multiple Thunes raises your odds of turning everything into a Pridemate. It's just a much slower, midrange-y build.
WB Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim | WBR Queen Marchesa | WUBR Breya, Etherium Shaper
Modern:
/ Death and Taxes | W/ Soul Sisters | Spirits | U Faeries | Tempered Steel Affinity