Madam Sisay's Illustrious House of Degeneracy
Commander / EDH*
SCORE: 8 | 999 VIEWS | IN 1 FOLDER
Maybe It's Maralen? —June 3, 2023
So, I was thinking while I was looking at a Maralen deck, whey am I not running Maralen of the Mornsong in here? Sisay can dig her out on my opponent's end step, meaning I can just tutor up Opposition Agent, thus dodging the big annoyance of Maralen, that it's hard to get her out at the right time so that people can't just tutor up answers to your plan. I like that Maralen is only 3 mana, so Sisay can find her once I've got 2 MV worth of Legendary permanent, which then makes me wonder about Asmo, which would allow me to do something really dirty pretty quickly if I want, I can sometimes use Sisay turn 3 or 4, which would be early enough for the lock to be harsh. I'm not sure what I'd dig out next, maybe an infinite mana combo? Anyways, this 'combo' would be used vs stronger pods that threaten early wins, Sisay is a fairly rugged win con tutor/advantage engine that works through lots of Stax. I think this might be a great choice for a deck I could play anywhere since I can dig out jank Shrines, or go straight for a brutal lock.
I'm also thinking about Esika, God of the Tree Flip, there's always Sword of the Chosen to consider.
Edit: Is Descent into Avernus a fit in a deck like this? If I can get it out turn 3 I am in very good shape when I get the 4 Treasures, hopefully good enough to go off? Later game I do have some life gain kicking around, so it's a very bad clock in conjunction with my Shrines I guess.
So, Selvala, Heart of the Wilds would be great in here, as would Derevi, Empyrial Tactician.
Edit: So, looking at this list, I wonder if I need quite this many ramp effects with this sheer land count? I run a lot of Basics I know, which forces me to run ways to help fix my mana, which is a major purpose of the land ramp spells. I suspect this deck wants another Haste enabler (which would have to be Legendary), so I'm thinking old Naya Samut? I also want more early card draw effects, as is this deck can easily get stuck with no real draw effects other than Sisay, and if you are forced to start without any other Legendaries it takes awhile to get anywhere. I'm not sure what is really good enough, but I'm thinking either some 'bad' White draw spells and/or good Black draw spells that aren't too Black intensive, neither list is especially long. This is the kind of deck that can afford to run some Group Hug elements I'd argue, it's pretty good at generating pretty impressive value with WUBRGs worth of mana for example, so if I use one of my big weird Ramp spells to find one or two WUBRGs worth of Basics, most people won't have as many (or if they do won't derive as much power since they'll end to run out of cards). it's risky, but it's also a lot of fun, and it's part of why this deck is able to hang with almost any pod imaginable. I guess Mardu Dihada works well in Sisay? Maybe I should look at that?
Edit: Well, in goes Progenitus and Samut, Voice of Dissent go in, Samut offers a 2nd Haste source, but more importantly combos off with Emiel potentially if your untap souce can pay for Emiel infinitely, which in this deck is a few of my mana dorks. I threw in Progenitus as a big derpy top end card for Casual play, vs stronger decks it can still be worth bringing out if a 10/10 Protection is a problem. I also threw in some fancy lands, hopefully they'll make the deck go faster (that's how better art works, right?).
Edit: So I was wondering if something like this was out there, then I was like 'whoa, Uber-Counter!'. While the idea of paying WUBRG to counter something sounds terrible, once he's out you just need Emiel and you can counter anything for {3}, which is definitely worth the hassles. Also the real beauty is that unless you need the WUBRG to chain off and win, you can usually hold up the last WUBRG until your last opponent's end step, and if nobody was about to win (and Ertai stops a LOT of win cons technically) then I just find my Zur or whatever. I think I'd pull the Samut PW, the ability is fine and the Haste is a thing, but I have serious redundancy in Gruul Legends, but I have a paucity of Dimir, so this even has niche advantages. We'll see if that seems like a safe trade, but I think having an incredibly hard to deal with counter that can stop nearly anything is enough upside to lose my spare Haste source (there is Tyvar, Jubilant Brawler fwiw, but you can't swing with his Haste, not sure if that ever matters).
Edit: I think if I put Ertai in I might switch out Vito and Heartless for Maralen and Opposition Agent, the only issue is if I draw into Maralen, because she has to come out via Sisay, but on the other hand Maralen would be used exclusively for competitive games, as a relatively fast/consistent lock that provides me with resources to either win quickly or protect my lock, Maralen would see no play vs lower power decks. In contrast, Progenitus is a useful card in the list to deal with lower power metas, Progenitus is a very slow clock, but it's able to recycle itself, meaning I just need to recast Sisay and WUBRG it back out once I have Raised by Giants (those are enough to find Progenitus) as a closer, I can always use subsequent WUBRGs to find Shrines or stuff that doesn't synergize well, ideally stuff to help keep me alive. I feel like a table full of 5s would be the perfect place to try to set up Progenitus and Spirit of Resistance (which means I have an unblockable 10/10 and take no damage myself). Is Ertai and a Maralen trick going to be good enough to qualify as a fairly parasitic cEDH list? I mean, people have been known to bring Golgari, and my single U counterspell is more than they come with. I'm not trying to argue it'd be a 'good' cEDH deck, but one that you could technically sit down at a table with and maybe steal a win or two over the course of a night, it's not like you can be optimal at both beating 5s with 'fair Magic', yet also able to threaten much stronger decks with stuff fit for their level.
Edit: So, I'm thinking (when I get them) Ertai Resurrected > PW Samut, Opposition Agent > Vito, Maralen > Hidetsugu, Descent Into Avernus > Mythos of Brokkos. None of the cards I'd be pulling are bad cards (the deck has synergies for each of those, with the least for Samut), but Samut is redundant (and not especially good, and in over-represented colours), Vito is too slow with Hidetsugu for higher power games (you generally can kill 2 players that turn, and if you can't kill everyone you're better off using Legacy Weapon to exile everything with your infinite mana), and Mythos just doesn't come up enough/isn't a findable tool in a tutor-driven deck. In contrast Ertai offers removal or the most versatile counter ever printed, it almost wouldn't matter what the downside was in this deck (though 4 MV is unpleasant), Maralen's Lock is a really low to the ground thing to cheat out if you want to lock the board down, and Descent speeds up my deck more than others I'd wager, giving me an extra WUBRG is a VERY bad idea.