MTG Salvation

Captain Sisay was my first attempt at an EDH deck and it's still my most solid, I think. Unless I'm up against a completely broken deck like some Sliver monstrosity (or a finely-tuned Zur machine) this deck has the capacity to hold its own against almost all comers. The theme is obvious ... Sisay tutors for a legend (or legendary permanent) every turn! This allows for some righteous toolbox action (she can even mana-fix!) and also guarantees me serious power in the way of brick houses like Akroma, Silvos, and Multani.

Here's the list as it currently stands:
There are a few cards that are obvious inclusions but that I don't own (Savannah, Gaea's Cradle, Jitte) but aside from that I can't think off the top of my head of very many changes I want to make.

The toolbox capacity of this deck can get pretty absurd. I can get removal (Mangara), mass removal (Mageta), control hate (Dosan, Teeg), stall (Hokori), creature defense (Kor Haven), artifact hate (Glissa), flyer hate (Arashi), and of course any of my large scary legends (Multani, Akroma, Silvos, Kodama, Jugan, Tolsimir, Molimo, Radiant). I can mana-fix or just get extra mana (Cloud Keeper). I can even tutor up a random Mindslaver! And with the 2 mana-doubling enchantments, the 5 mana rocks, and the 5 land ramp spells, I can pretty reliably get my fat out a turn or two before mana costs would suggest. Sisay hitting the board, active and shrouded, on turn 2 isn't even out of the question (all I need is Lightning Greaves and Sol Ring in the opening hand).

I'm open to thoughts!

UPDATE:
-2 Plains
-Call of the Herd
-Tigereye Cameo
-Mirari
-Candles of Leng
-Time of Need
+Mistveil Plains
+Garruk Wildspeaker
+Selesnya Sanctuary
+Selesnya Signet
+Rings of Brighthearth
+Thousand-Year Elixer
+Enlightened Tutor

Patron of the Orochi brings this over the top. That and Winding Canyons, and your opponents are going to have to deal with something soon.

Have you tried out the Hondens? Chump blockers and extra life can't be bad. Plus the spirits are Pendlehaven targets.
Day of Destiny seems like a good fit with your legend creatures.
Konda, Lord of Eiganjo might be good... I'm basing that entirely on his indestructible-ness. Actually if indestructibility is fun for you, think about That Which Was Taken instead.
Candles of Leng has always been underwhelming to me...

The Patron is definitely a good choice. Id swap it in, taking out balstoderm or forgotten ancient-they don't seem to help the theme as much.

Look up legendary lands on Gatherer- there are a few that I think could be pretty useful in one way or another.

yeah joe, patron looks good. and with the mana you have, why arent you playing canyons? EOT tutor AND play the guy? pretty awesome......

I've thought about Patron but I only run 8 forests in the whole 100 cards, and with the exception of Glissa, none of my green creatures really have relevant tapping abilities (OK, I guess if Rhys starts going off, Patron gets insane ...), so the 8 mana has never seemed really worth it to me ... but I haven't tried it yet, so it's worth a shot. What would you recommend I cut for it? The curve's already pretty high, so my first thought is probably Reya Dawnbringer. (Forgotten Ancient is completely nutty, but I think I can afford to lose Blastoderm.)

Winding Canyons goes in as soon as I find one. Good looks.

The only legendary lands left are either colorless with an ability that doesn't really warrant losing mana consistency (Rath's Edge, God's Eye, Mikokoro, Boseiju, Miren) or completely insane (Gaea's Cradle, Karakas ... isn't that banned anyway?). Serra Sanctum doesn't have enough support, so aside from Cradle (and Miren, which I'm still on the fence about) I think the land base is pretty set as far as legendary lands go.

reya is a good choice, also consider blastoderm or molimo. they arent gamebreaking really. youre forgetting that parton untaps YOUR GENERAL. two tutors a turn man, c'mon.

lands: riftstone portal?

Touche, sir.

I would replace a lot of your colorless, fixing, and weaker utility nonbasics (those that come into play tapped should be first on the chopping block) with search lands (the ones from Mirage, and the three Shards panoramas, for instance) to begin with, while shifting your basic count more towards the foresty end. Doing this also makes Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary a viable accelerant, who can then speed up getting out Patron of the Orochi.

Also, Kodama's Reach would be better than rampant growth; early plays are not as valuable as cards that give you more bang for your buck.
Other accelrants that work well (especially with the patron untapping things):
overgrowth
utopia sprawl
wild growth
mana reflection-type effects
and along those lines,
garruk wildspeaker


edit-- I don't know how common milling is with your group, but if there is a deck or two that likes to mill you to death, mistveil plains deserves a spot too.

You're very artifact-light, so Kataki, War's Wage could be good if your meta is artifact-heavy and it's tutorable.

OK, notes to self:

-Reya Dawnbringer +Patron of the Orochi
-Rampant Growth +Kodama's Reach
-Plains +Mistveil Plains (can return dead legends w/Sisay!)
-Centaur Garden +Winding Canyons
-Tigereye Cameo +Selesnya Signet or Talisman of Unity
-Call of the Herd +Day of Destiny
-Blastoderm +Garruk Wildspeaker
-Candles of Leng +Kataki, War's Wage
-Loxodon Hierarch +Yosei, the Morning Star (that was a duh moment)
-Basalt Monolith +Grim Monolith
-Mirri, Cat Warrior +Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary
-Ghost Quarter +Grasslands

And of course Savannah, Gaea's Cradle, Windswept Heath, and Umezawa's Jitte are all on the list. My only CIPT lands are Krosan Verge, Treetop Village, and duals, so I'm not sure if I want to cut them for Panoramas.

I'm not too happy about the idea of enchanting lands because just about every EDH deck I've ever encountered has run a Strip Mine and/or a Ghost Quarter.

Man I wish they'd errata Karakas so it could only hit your own legends, maybe then it'd be unbanned and I could play it. Karakas would be freakin' awesome in this deck even if it couldn't hit opponents' generals.

I like this deck a lot. One question: Why no Yosei, the Morning Star?

Cheers,
rant

Rofellos is banned.

Quote from tumultuous

Rofellos is banned.

As a general. He's all good when it comes to playing inside a deck. Maybe too good.

I'd run the Kaldra pieces to tutor up.

Quote from CursedMortivore

As a general. He's all good when it comes to playing inside a deck. Maybe too good.

Interesting. Didn't know that; thanks!

good subs man. looking forward to playing a better sisay next time!

Quote from Yarg

I'd run the Kaldra pieces to tutor up.

This. It's pretty invigorating when you assemble Voltron...

A few more notes from my own Sisay experience:

- I like lots of 2-drop accelerators (Signet, Steward of Valeron, etc). It's so clutch to have Sisay searching your library on turn 4.
- Scroll Rack and Sylvan Library work really well here too, seeing as how you're shuffling every turn
- Thousand-Year Elixir. Busted!

Your milage may vary.

I definitely want an artifact in here to double up with Sisay's ability, but with a choice between Thousand-Year Elixer and Rings of Brighthearth, I think I'm inclined to put in the Rings. Thousand-Year Elixer costs one less mana to activate and enables haste for Sisay (and Mangara and Glissa), but Rings allows for some absolutely broke-to-bits interactions with non-creature cards in this deck (like Mindslaver (wow), Krosan Verge, Strip Mine, and Kor Haven), and makes a difference with smaller abilities like Mind Stone and Horizon Canopy's card draws and the token-producing lands.

-Mirari +Rings of Brighthearth, I think.

Making 3 cuts just for the Kaldra set doesn't seem worth it for me. Just about everything else in here has enough merit on its own that making 3 cuts for what is essentially only one addition just doesn't seem smart.

Quote from onewheelwizzard

I definitely want an artifact in here to double up with Sisay's ability, but with a choice between Thousand-Year Elixer and Rings of Brighthearth, I think I'm inclined to put in the Rings.

I found room for both, but I'm always happier to see Elixir in my hand. Rings is great and all (even without Mindslaver), but I think Eilixir has better synergy with Sisay, who is the whole point of the deck. The way I see it, both cards get me two activations, but Elixir gives Sisay pseudo-haste, which I find much more important, since she attracts a lot of hate and can get quite expensive to play. If I'm going to pay 6+ mana for her, I want to make sure I squeeze at least one activation out of her. Rings may work with more cards overall in the deck, but Elixir works better with the card we *always* have access to; Sisay.

Making 3 cuts just for the Kaldra set doesn't seem worth it for me. Just about everything else in here has enough merit on its own that making 3 cuts for what is essentially only one addition just doesn't seem smart.

It seems to me that

-1 Basalt Monolith
-1 Call of Herd
-1 Time of Need
+3 Kaldra pieces

looks a lot better (at least on paper). Your opinion is that each Kaldra piece by itself doesn't do enough. You're telling me that a 3/3 vanilla from Call of the Herd is more relevant than making any of your guys indestructible? Or using a card to tutor up a legendary creature (something your general already does) is better than first strike, haste, and trample for any of your fatties? I don't know dude, I'd give that hardware a shot before you dismiss it...

i highly endorse the Kaldratron.

Mikokoro, Center of the Sea?

OK guys I'm'a resurrect my thread to ask a question.

So I just realized that my deck has a couple random infinite-mana combos, and these combos only require two cards each. The cards in specific are Basalt Monolith, Mana Reflection, and Rings of Brighthearth. (Since Basalt Monolith combos with Rings and Grim Monolith doesn't, I figure that's a good enough reason to keep that slot the way it is.)

But the problem is that I have no way of actually using infinite mana in any appropriately game-breaking way! The only way I have of actually using infinite mana is using Sensei's Divining Top with Rings of Brighthearth to draw my deck (that works, right?), and even then, my win condition is still attacking (so it's not a guaranteed win, the only attacker that would win the game in one turn, Multani, can't get Lightning Greaves attached to it).

So I'm looking for a card, optimally tutorable with Sisay, that can turn infinite mana into a game win, optimally an immediate one. So far I've come up with Helix Pinnacle and Staff of Domination (which aren't legendary) and Verdeloth the Ancient (which doesn't win immediately). Tutoring up Mindslaver and using Rings on its ability is basically a game win in all but the biggest multiplayer games, I guess, but I'm leaving my options open and waiting for a sure thing ...

(A way to filter colorless mana into colored mana indefinitely is also something I'd welcome into the deck now!)

Oh, one other thing, if anyone can think of a reliable sacrifice outlet or bounce engine that can allow me to recur Mangara of Corondor, I'd appreciate it. I'd use Erratic Portal but it seems kinda underpowered in this deck aside from that one usage.

Myojin of Life's Web and Serra's Sanctum.

Day of Destiny

Eight-and-a-Half-Tails

Honden of Life's Web and Honden of Cleansing Fire

Sword of the Chosen.

I like all of these and have lost to the green Myojin on several occasions. 8-and a half tails is the Reed Richards to my Dr. Doom. And the others are just good and tutorable.

So it's just infinite colorless mana? Eh.....

I guess if you're really hard up for something that will win that turn, you could play Magma Mine, but that card is terrible outside of your combo. I mean, how often do you plan on having all four pieces out at once anyway? Nemata is good with lots of colorless, and as long as you have a Cradle out, he gets out of hand VERY quickly. In fact, I just added Knight of the Reliquary for even more ways to find it!

As for Mangara...there's Stonecloaker? I run that guy to give me some way to deal with opponent's recursion, but I love that it bounces a guy. Our playgroup still allows Karakas, so... Erratic Portal is more than good, give it a shot. Being able to save your guys from board sweep is always good, and it messes with your opponent's math sometimes.

uh... jitte... (legendary)

The nastiest combo in my Sisay deck is Kamahl, Fist of Krosa and Crovax, Ascendant Hero. If you get them both in play then Kamahl reads "G: Destroy target land".

The best part about it is that you can dig them up with Sisay, Worldly Tutor, or Eladimri's Call. And they can both come in at once with Tooth and Nail or Defense of the Heart.