MTG Salvation

Sidisi has gotten some pretty mixed reviews, but I'm firmly in the camp that she's a strong commander that will not only be competitive, but also differentiate herself from the Mimeoplasm and other graveyard-based commanders.

Here's the deck.



This deck's got a lot of interlocking parts.

-Combos. There are 3 infinite combos within the deck.

The first is Mesmeric orb + seeker of skybreak/aphetto alchemist + sidisi, brood tyrant. mill your deck as many times as you like with kozilek, butcher of truth to reshuffle to get infinite zombies, dread return gravespawn sovereign, use him to return diregraf captain and dimir house guard, sac zombies, win. Alchemist even morphs, for flavor/surprise, and with mana dorks and inspired dudes to untap and mesmeric orb being nuts with sidisi already, there are no dead cards here.

The second infinite combo is greater good + some zombie lord + sidisi + some dredge card, ideally 2 although you have a good chance of hitting more once you get going. Sac token to draw 3, dredging as many as possible, then discard the dredge cards. assuming you don't have bad luck and whiff, keep doing it and accumulating zombies as you go. Extractor demon unearthed can help if things are going badly. Once you're dredging all 3 you're bound to get tons of zombies, so proceed as with combo 1.

The third infinite combo is altar of dementia + zombie lords + Sidisi (+ extractor demon). If you have a bunch of lords, but no demon, you might be able to mill into him, especially if you have a bunch of zombies already. Your odds get a lot better with more lords. Anyway keep sacking zombies you mill yourself, with extractor unless you have bad luck you should be making 1-2 zombies each time. once you have infinite zombies, proceed as with combo 1.

-dredge + sidisi is just ridiculous. You get an almost-guaranteed creature just for dredging! with lftl you can even dredge repeatedly using cycling lands, netting a zombie (probably) and CA for 3 mana each time!

-creatures. There's a lot of them. This deck is about 50% creatures. That means sidisi is a pretty reliable source of zombies - each attack/etb trigger has a 7/8 chance of netting a free zombie.

-zombie tribal. Lots of cool lords to play around with and ways to make those 2/2s a little more relevant, especially when it's time to go infinite. If you wanted to make this deck more casual (i.e. drop the infinite combos, wuss) then I would play up the zombie tribal angle. Seems fun.

-deranged assistant and millikin ramp out sidisi turn 3, and then have a +50% chance of making a zombie every time they tap. That's pretty cool.

-minor untap theme. There's a few cute inspired guys, and 3 dudes who can untap them as instants. neat.

-carrionette loves getting milled into the grave. Cool removal, Plus it's a cute way to tap people out before you go infinite.

Now, let's see that loser Surrak make a deck that cool.

Corpse Connoisseur is triply good with Sidrisi: it has value if milled, it puts a creature card directly from the library into the grave for a Zombie token, and it serves as another Entomb. And it's even a Zombie.

Also, Forbidden Alchemy as another search option that mills and is useful even if milled.

Maybe there is space for Phenax? Tap Zombies to make more zombies? You might not even need his loyal servant Eater of the Dead.

Also Kozilek reshuffles your whole graveyard, which can be a problem if you have goodies in there (unearth, flashback, Genesis, etc.) Perhaps to enable combo #1 you could use something like Dread instead?

Quote from PochetteRecharge »

Corpse Connoisseur is triply good with Sidrisi: it has value if milled, it puts a creature card directly from the library into the grave for a Zombie token, and it serves as another Entomb. And it's even a Zombie.

Also, Forbidden Alchemy as another search option that mills and is useful even if milled.

Maybe there is space for Phenax? Tap Zombies to make more zombies? You might not even need his loyal servant Eater of the Dead.

Also Kozilek reshuffles your whole graveyard, which can be a problem if you have goodies in there (unearth, flashback, Genesis, etc.) Perhaps to enable combo #1 you could use something like Dread instead?

connoisseur is a solid option, I would say that it's a bit slow for what I want, though, and the deck frequently goes infinite pretty quickly, and there aren't many times when getting a specific creature into my grave is what I really need. I don't think the cost is worth it for something like genesis. From playtesting I've rarely felt like I needed it very badly. As far as tutors go, hitting mesmeric orb/altar of dementia/greater good is usually the sticking point.

the flashback cost on forbidden alchemy is so high i feel like it's kind of irrelevant for this deck. Goldfishing it usually goes infinite around turn 6-7 without interference. I really tried to keep the creature count high, and while alchemy has some decent synergy I think I'd be more tempted to run something like grim tutor or imperial seal if I were going to use more noncreatures.

Phenax is cute, I may try to find room for him. He doesn't go infinite with anything but he's a decent backup plan. Definitely something I'd recommend for the more tribally-focused deck, although the play of this deck tends to be pretty combo-y and I'm not sure he's worth it in that game plan.

kozilek is a necessary evil I think. Without him neither of the other 2 combos go infinite unless I included a ton of dread-like cards, and I don't want to waste the slots. Generally speaking I want the deck to avoid being overly reliant on what's in the grave anyway, I think only a few cards really care.

They can untap themself

I'm running a rather more casual version of Sidisi myself, so not sure if this'd work for you, but have you given Parralel Lives/Doubling Season a look? Sure, they're not creatures, but when every creature hit with Sidisi provides you with 2 zombies instead of one, they effectively act as 2 lords for the combo with Altar of Dementia.

Hey guys, relatively new to the thread and magic. I've got me a nice shiny promo Sidisi, and I want to build an edh deck around her.


I'm with the other guy. I don't understand the infinite combos you've laid out very well. Could you give a more comprehensive, detailed walkthrough of them? Thanks so much


EDIT: And I'm dumb. So you swing with one and then just tap one to untap the other? It sounds dangerous to have to attack to make this work.

Quote from biofall »

Hey guys, relatively new to the thread and magic. I've got me a nice shiny promo Sidisi, and I want to build an edh deck around her.


I'm with the other guy. I don't understand the infinite combos you've laid out very well. Could you give a more comprehensive, detailed walkthrough of them? Thanks so much


EDIT: And I'm dumb. So you swing with one and then just tap one to untap the other? It sounds dangerous to have to attack to make this work.

both seeker of skybreak and aphetto alchemist can target themselves with their untap ability. Basically this does nothing (the seeker/alchemist just taps and then untaps when the ability resolves) but mesmeric orb triggers each time you perform this cycle and causes you to mill. So it lets you mill as much as you want to.

You don't need both of them, you don't need to attack, you just need 1 of them on the field with mesmeric orb (and sidisi to profit from the milling).

I've been playtesting Sidisi myself with a similar build as yours except for the Skybreaker/Alchemist interactions with the Orb (Seriously, I can't believe I missed those. That just blows my mind.) My build focuses less on Zombie Tribal stuff and more on using the graveyard as a secondary resource with a few Flashback cards, Haakon, Stromgald Scourge + Nameless Inversion and the like.

The only cards I really suggest from my shell that you need to put in yours is Opposition and Worm Harvest. Seriously, these two are amazing alone, and fantastic together. The fact that you can get cards in your graveyard so easily with Sidisi is the reason why I think these two shine brightly in this deck type.

I'm debating making this for a friend, do you think you have enough creatures to maximise Sidisi? More mana elves over some of your lands may assist in increasing the likelihood of hitting. Would Dryad Arbor also fit do you think? It is a hand that can be fetched with Green Sun's Zenith (if you decide to run it) and triggers Sidisi if accidentally hit.

How does this deck not have Blood Artist? It's a second Diregraf Captain.

I wonder about some of the creature choices. Some could be better.

Basalt Monolith

There hasn't been a response to recent posts, but I am interested in performance of Soul of Innistrad, it's cost is quite high, has it justified its place?

This deck is sweet, got some nice ideas here.

Good deck for Sylvan Library, no? Also with all the control magics it might be nice to have some sac outlets like possibly Phyrexian Altar, Carrion Feeder or Viscera Seer. Helm of Possession does both those things. I may be way off base though

What about Vengeful Dead? It's better than Diregraf Captain cause it hits all opponents.

I guess that's true. Also, there's the Lightning Greaves + Cephalid Illusionist combo. For additional milling support.

Basalt Monolith + Mesmeric Orb is a good infinite combo to make your zombies

Phenax, God of Deception + Eater of the Dead = mill your opponent out

Phenax, God of Deception + Grimgrin, Corpse-born + Sidisi, Brood Tyrant = infinite self-mill for infinite zombies for infinite untap Grimgrin for one big mill out on all opponents

Just a couple of things I use for my Sidisi deck that have performed very well.