MTG Salvation

Ulamog is a superior Gaea's Blessing, fresh from the shenanigans I'm doing with Rakdos. Razaketh is comborific and the Scarab God looks like it can burn down the table. Avenging Druid helps with graveyard and lands so Ramunap replaces him, especially since I get the benefit without swinging. Hour is better than Tempt, or so goes the logic. Deathrite is much more versatile than Treespeaker. Really, the only regret cut is the Polluter just because I didn't want to cut any of the other 6 drops for my Birthing Pod chain. I wasn't ever really a fan of Undead Alchemist, as my plan is to kill with life loss and not mill.

Lol, I'm just glad you finally swapped out Avenging Druid.

The Sovereign required a lot of moving parts to get going. It suffers from the potential of being absolutely awesome but the setup was just too demanding. The amount of times I'd get the Sovereign and be sitting at 4 Zombies wondering what the hell I'm doing with this card. There were times it was awesome, granted; but as I move to improve my decks I want lower floors of functional rather than looking towards the absolute heights of efficacy. Enter the Hydra. It's big, which helps killing players but Reach also gives me defense from large flyer that might come my way. It also fetches any land, which is required for success with this deck. Lastly, I can feed it into my Birthing Pod without regrets for Sheoldred, Whispering One. After all, most of its value comes from the ETB trigger, not staying on the board durdling like the Sovereign.

I had a conversation on deckbuilding with a friend and he gave me pointers in that he says I build my decks to expect nothing to go wrong, he suggested more Spot Removal to handle cards that need to be interacted with. There have been so many times when my decks hit a brick wall because I was unprepared. With that in mind, I made cuts to add more spot removal in the deck: The amount of times I've seen a Grimgrin on the field and felt nervous made me want to use him. With a single swing, you can destroy the most troubling Creature or just send a Commander back chastened with additional tax. He gets pretty big, which helps in finishing out the game. Grimgrin is a Sac Outlet that I helps drain my opponents down with Zulaport Cutthroat or others. Furthermore, he does cute things with Embalmer's Tools and Mesmeric Orb. His drawback of not untapping was just praised as an advantage which should say loads about it. Furthermore, it's been a while since I was able to catch someone unawares ala "Morphling Untap".

Splendid Reclamation was added as an acknowledgement that it's probably the best ramp spell in Sultai/Golgari. The amount of times when I had easily 4+ lands in my Graveyard makes it better than a fully Tempted Tempting Offer, including all those special lands that I have so many dedicated slots to tutoring up. Plus it's handy against people who immediately Strip Mine my Cabal Coffers.

The rest of additions are the most flexible spot removal for its efficiency.

As for removal, it hurts me to get rid of Tombstone Stairwell. I built this deck originally around it but as I always strive to make my decks the best they can be within their power level and Sidisi being one of the most reputable of my "fair" decks, I needed a leg up. Yes, Stairwell ends games in my favour but considering how many hoops I have to jump through in addition to checking off various requirements, only to have them blow up in my face, made me decide to get rid of the Stairwell. Essentially, my recent changes to my decks have been less about looking at their power ceilings but examining their power floors. Stairwell was too damned costly to use and so it got the axe.

Vengeful Dead goes with it, as it was the optimal piece with Stairwell. I already have more mana efficient Creatures. Another high floor Creature was Nullmage Shepherd, I rather have a guaranteed answer in the removal I've added in, even though this is a Creature. I'm still fairly high on my Creature count, so I don't believe that's an issue. Diregraft Captain seemed more like a winmore, as it didn't gain me life from losing when I am in a tight spot like Zulaport or Blood Artist and it doesn't focus down the table like Plague Belcher.

Selfhoff Occultist isn't that impressive, I rarely cast it even with the opportunity, because I was too busy trying to do something else. One card mill is not worth as a one-of: Embalmer's Tools work because they keep happening even after board wipes and the like.

If you are running Tombstone Stairwell a favorite I have to pair with it is Dire Undercurrents which with the each upkeep trigger of stairwell can be very back breaking

That's neat tech Taleran but I don't think I'd run Dire Undercurrents because it is a 'win more' card that does nothing on its own and isn't even a Creature for Sidisi to mill. With the cut of Tombstone Stairwell, it's even more obsolete.

I did make the following change and it was a difficult decision to make:
I was trying to look at Creatures to cut but that's already difficult because they help Sidisi. Two that caught my eye for potential cuts are Nyx Weaver and Havengul Lich. Lich, because its dependence on useful cards in the graveyard and I having big mana to really abuse it. The Weaver because ever other 3 and 4 drop gets me mana or solves my problems. The thing is, the Weaver has Reach, mills me for Sidisi and in a pinch, can recur a card. I didn't like the idea of making any of those cuts, so I starting looking at the rest of the deck.

That's when I reevaluate if I really needed 40 Lands. Two of those Lands aren't Lands, Tolaria West is a tutor and Dakmor Salvage is a Dredge engine. That puts me at 38 Lands, which is more than most of my decks. I can cut a single land to bring back into line. At first, I looked at my Basics but I do not want to get any lower. I have a GB dominance and I don't want to remove any more of those sources. Three Islands is the lowest I'll comfortably go with my Basics. So, I had to take a look at my utility Lands. With the removal of Tombstone Stairwell and Gempalm Polluter, I really couldn't abuse Unholy Grotto to its fullest extent. I also am not cutting colored sources from my decks, so that's a win. What sealed the deal is that the Reclamation is effectively the same as the Grotto, better in that they directly to hand, but I'm fine with replacing like with like.

Made this change today: Hell's Caretaker has been slow and ponderous, rarely gaining me a benefit. I don't have time to cast him and when I do, I might not have another Creature to Sacrifice or my Graveyard might be shuffled away. Furthermore, because it is such a valuable creature I would be hesitant to sacrifice it to Birthing Pod or Ashnod's Altar (and it is a meagre sacrifice at that). Rot Farm Skeleton, on the other hand, does the same job as Caretaker in that it could be a body in my hand that I can discard to Survival of the Fittest or Fauna Shaman but I wouldn't care. It has a sizeable body, making Ashnod's possibility of milling good. If it ends up in my Graveyard, I can mill myself further and get a body. I also have very little 4 drops compared to 5, meaning that the Skeleton can be used to continually feed itself into my Birthing Pod. Lastly, it can still get in for four. If I have a lot of excess mana and 'nothing to do', I could always just recur the Skeleton repeatedly after feeding it a Sac outlet or another.

The upgrade of the Ixalan set: I like Solemn and I am concerned about my 4 drop slot for Birthing Pod but I believe my Rot Farm Skeleton should alleviate that choke point. I also find that Growing Rites is very similar to Solemn but in reverse. Solemn draws you a card at the end of its function while Rites lets you Impulse for a card with its ETB. Solemn grabs you a Land on its ETB but Rites transforms if you control 4 or more Creatures. It was the logical choice and is a way to lower my average CMC. On both points Rites does a better job than Solemn: Impulse over a Card and a Gaea's Cradle over a Rampant Growth.

My LGS was having a Buried Alive sale so I pulled the trigger on getting this. I feel like Nyx Weaver is the least contributory 3 drop and so it got the axe.

So what's the gameplan/how do you win? Just good stuff?

I usually overwhelm my opponents with Zombies. If the game goes on late enough, I can start sacrificing them to kill with Blood Artist and Zulaport Cutthroat. If I get a The Scarab God out, then I can keep the Zombies around to chunk the table down. If they let me assemble my big mana package, then I can do an absurd amount of plays to eventually overwhelm them. Plus I do have two Eldrazi Titans that usually make a mess if they are able to attack.

So yeah, I guess goodstuff is the answer.

I am a little dissatisfied with the deck. It's probably my most expensive deck dollarwise, but it is less competitive than my other decks. Sidisi does have a reputation in cEDH circle but I am not interested in taking her that way. Perhaps I should just downgrade her to midtier in my internal power level but I feel like I can improve her. Right now I think I need to lower my Creature count more, cut Birthing Pod because my creature mana curve can no longer support that and add in a lot more answers.

Was hoping to see Deadapult in this list based from the title. Ahh well...casual vs. efficient.

Considering how the deck has moved away from abusing Tombstone Stairwell's end of turn trigger combining with some sort of life loss upon Zombie death, the title should probably be changed too.

That and unless Sidisi gets a revamp, red won't really work that well for you. Some reason I was thinking Grixis...

I was feeling a little frustrated with my Sidisi. I didn't feel like I had a return on investment, as it is my most expensive deck and yet it could be wildly inconsistent. One of the factors I identified for inconsistency only really sprang out once I started piloting my Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord deck: my graveyard is inconsistent. Jarad makes a Graveyard and then benefits from it, Sidisi really only cares about milling. It brought to my attention the amount of times I would jump through hoops to setup a coup only to have an Eldrazi Titan ruin all of my effort. Feeling like I needed a second pair of eyes, I asked a friend to look the deck over and he remarked that I lacked some interaction, which is definitely a reason for the deck to be inconsistent but the thing that stood out to him is the lack of draw. Heeding his advice, I put in a bunch of draw engines. Silverglade will let me keep ramping turn-over-turn while Farhaven Elf was more one-and-done. Silverglade is also a choice addition to help me discard cards to Dredge.

I previously cut Evolutionary Leap because I didn't enjoy paying one. Previously, I felt like I tapped out quite a bit on my turn so I didn't have room for EOT Leaps. What I've learned from my Trostani, Selesnya's Voice deck is that if you leave mana open, people don't mess with you and the more mana you leave open the more the deck changes to operate at Instant Speed versus Sorcery. Liking the idea of switching to a more midrange control deck, I am open to having more permanents that will have me end my turns with mana open. Birthing Pod was a difficult cut as I enjoy the power and utility; however, my 4 drops consist of only Sidisi. Every other 4 drop doesn't come down on Turn 4, it appears later for some big benefit. Without 4 drops to Pod into 5s, the Pod was dead weight and it needed to go.

Zulaport Cutthroat is OK at draining down the table, but I prefer Blood Artist's ability to sap the table from all the random death. With that in mind, I don't feel like the card is worth placing redundancy in. The Cutthroat freed me up to put in spot removal that can handle Eldrazi and other obnoxious fattys: Reality Shift.

My friend talked about how I lose and I mentioned that if everyone has a 4/4 I get into trouble, he suggested Whispersilk Cloak and I did think of it because of its Shroud. I decided to go against it as I don't mind Sidisi randomly dying, it's when I can't swing in. I put Key to the City in to give Sidisi evasion, but it also gives me a draw engine. I am able to discard Dredge cards and then draw them off of the Key's draw trigger. This means I can make decisions whether to fish for lands or mill for zombies. Ashnod's Altar was a placeholder for Phyrexian Altar but that card got too expensive for me to shell out. Also, the 2 colorless wasn't that big of an advantage for this deck.

Without Phyrexian Altar or Zulaport Cutthroat, Gravecrawler became even more pointless. Instead, I can use Basalt Monolith with Sidisi and Mesmeric Orb to make infinite Zombies. I'm not too pleased with Basalt Monolith, I'm thinking it could probably be replaced by some sort of Creature that can untap itself. That means I could fetch it with Evolutionary Leap or it provides value when milled.

Arguel's Blood Fast won over consideration against Erebos, God of the Dead and Greed. I went with Arguel's because of its low CMC. Greed has an easier activation cost but I don't want to pay 4 to get it into play. I could perhaps move this to Erebos, as paying 4 is tied to an effect and he is a Creature which Sidisi likes for milling. I decided against Erebos due to cost and I don't want the table to get mad at Sidisi, she can handle a little hostility but not the entire table. Satyr Wayfinder gets cut due to its minimal effect.

Kefnet the Mindful is a neat Creature that draws me cards and is indestructible, letting him ignore Wraths. I also like Kefnet because his Land bounce means I can return Bojuka Bog or Tolaria West to my hand for further effects. I was saddened when I realized I would need to cut Sheoldred but she is high in the CMC chain and makes me play stupidly. Many of my attempts to setup a graveyard only to have an Eldrazi bust my efforts can be laid at Sheoldred's feet. I rather go with something more inconspicuous than a Creature that makes the whole table mad and rarely puts a Creature back into play.

As part of wanting more interaction, I added in Nimble Obstructionist whose Cycle ability can be really spicy vs certain triggered or activated abilities. The fact that it draws a card at Instant Speed also means I could surprise someone with a Dredge and Zombie. I cut Crypt of Agadeem because of its unreliability. I need untapped, available mana for my first few land drops and this landbase is questionable. I tried to compensate with more utility lands but I think I just need to add more colored sources.

Lastly, Rot Farm Skeleton was an attempt to keep Birthing Pod in the deck. Without the Pod, I don't need the Skeleton which is why I added Deathreap Ritual as a solid draw engine.

Made mana changes: With the massive upgrade to my draw suite, Grim Backwoods stood out more as a sore thumb than something that smoothed the deck over. I want to hit my colors more than any other utility. Forest gets the axe because of the increase of Blue cards plus a variety of effects that require Islands or Swamps.

I've been having some mana troubles, so this was an update but also a closer examination of cards that weren't fulfilling expectations. Kefnet has a lot of upsides but I was never able to keep him active, he also wanted blue mana which the deck has very little of relatively. This made him difficult to activate and so I cut him for the cheaper option of the Duskwatch Recruiter. It's in a main color, it is easier to activate and gives me card selection over just raw draw.

Basalt Monolith never really had me setup for the perfect combo, there's just too much hate for Mesmeric Orb. With that in mind, I added more countermagic to the deck. As I am shifting to a more reactive build, I am having mana open to make these plays.

I leant out the deck and someone was using the Plague Belcher to ping his opponent. The opponent then managed to swing in for the kill after realizing the Belcher doesn't gain life, just drains. That made me realize that I should probably have ways to gain life. The Belcher is relatively big, but his -2/-2 is inconvenient and he only drains on Zombies. Zulaport, on the other hand, drains from anything dying and gains me life. It's also cheaper, which is becoming more relavent as I'm slimming the deck down.

With the realization that I have so little blue and my dislike of ETBT Lands, I cut Lonely Sandbar for a better way to draw and discard with Geier Reach Sanitarium. It'll still give me Dredge draws but can do so over multiple turns.

I got a few Reflecting Pools that were on sale today. I've been having trouble getting all of my Green, so I decided to cut a Blue/Black Land instead of Opulent Palace. I haven't had trouble hitting my land types for Wonder, Filth, Taint or Check lands. With that in mind, I knew to cut Fetid Pools.

As I've been missing out on my Green, I changed out one Swamp to place in a Swamp.

This Sword is so good I feel like a PSA should be made for it: With the realization that Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord actually grows his Graveyard, I've been moving away from cards that care about my Graveyard as they're too swingy. Sword will help me ramp which helps with recasting Sidisi if I'm in a spot.

After a discussion with my playgroup and my avoidance of 'I win' buttons, I decided to add an Infinite to my deck so that I could close games out instead of a Goodstuff Zombie Swarm: DEN and Drake were an easy in, but I had a ***** of a time figuring out what to axe. I finally settled on Hydra and the Demon, the Demon was the first pick because as a 6+ drop, it didn't win me the game. Sure, it gave great value when I got the Sidisi train rolling, but otherwise it didn't flat out win me the game - which is something Razaketh, the Foulblooded could do by assembling enough value that I kill the table. I decided to axe the Hydra next because it also failed the 'win the game' yardstick of 6+ drops. I really, really like the Hydra as it protects my face from big flyers and helps get my mana out. In comparison, Drake and DEN give me Infinite mana and Zombies, which makes their pairing better than the Demon and Hydra.

I cut Stronghold because I couldn't guarantee I would have a card in my yard or that my yard would stay stable due to the two Titans. Instead, I replaced it with Alchemist's Refuge so that I could keep my mana open, threaten Counters or Activated Abilities and then do all of my plays on someone's end step.

Mana upgrade:

I'm curious as to why you added Duskwatch Recruiter. It puts creature cards in your hand and sends everything else to the bottom of the deck. Since you want to mill creatures or keep them on the top of the deck, shouldn't the filtering be the other way? Have you tested it? It feels a bit counterproductive to the overall strategy (in theory, at least).

I added the Recruiter as another way to draw cards. I'm finding that by adding a bit more of a 'draw, go' element to the deck, I'm looking for more ways to gain card advantage on an opponent's end step. Thinking about it some more, I realized I should probably add Thrasios, Triton Hero. The quest now is to replace Duskwatch Recruiter or Wood Elves. I also thought of adding Lotus Cobra to the deck as an accelerant, but I'm finding that I'm finding the deck has no room. I've been given thought to cutting Genesis because of my push to no longer be reliant on a graveyard, but it brings so much potential, especially returning my newly added combo pieces.

As of yet, I have not drawn Duskwatch Recruiter, but it is something to give me to do on an end step with the tons of mana this deck generates.

Hm, but by your own logic I would choose Thrasios, Triton Hero over Duskwatch Recruiter. You're not really drawing with the recruiter; you're adding creatures to your hand, which are better off on the top of the deck; anything else you'd "draw" goes to the bottom. So any noncreature cards aren't being drawn into. That's pretty much the exact opposite of what the deck should be doing. On the other hand Thrasios is an excellent mana sink and it actually draws you cards, which is what you're ultimately wanting to do at the end of an opponent's turn. Sure, you'd have to reveal the card but that's pretty irrelevant. It's also filtering whatever it is that you'd be drawing. And, if it's a land, you put it straight to play so you're not filling your hand with lands. So in any case, the best choice would be Thrasios over Duskwatch Recruiter.

You were right. I played a game and got Thrasios out and I immediately knew he was a better fit for me than Duskwatch. Being able to get more lands into play also means that my Cabal Coffers got more and more powerful. It definitely suited my desire to move the deck more towards responsive than continually playing at Sorcery speed.

Exsanguinate was added as another 'I win' button, though to be honest it is more 'I don't die' button. I've had a lot of games where I could comfortably tutor for one or two things but I couldn't figure a way out of a low-life bind. There's only so many bodies I could sacrifice to Razaketh, the Foulblooded before I am at too low life or the things I tutor for don't actually improve my odds. With the push of my deck to ignore more of my Graveyard, as the focus is milling do to how easily Titans make a mess anything I do plan with having a Graveyard, it made sense to cut Splendid Reclamation. I also found that there's a diminishing return on putting lots of land into play where it doesn't do that much more, even with a big mana deck.

Negate is a nice enough spell but it was the easiest cut to justify for Muddle the Mixture, which serves as either a tutor or Counterspell. There's a lot of powerful targets at two, so I see this more of a Tutor with Counterspell backup.

If you want more ways to up that life, you could add Whip of Erebos. Your creatures are going to get lifelink and you can reanimate a creature from your graveyard in a jam.