It's been a long time since I posted on this thread, but I recently took some time to update my list from a few years back, so I thought I'd post it again and get some feedback. It's also listed in the OP.
Note that sideboard and maybeboard cards are just cards that I at one point thought about and added to the site just for the sake of reference.
This is a bit optimistic, since you still need a lot of mana and need to have sisay and your mindslaver both resolve, but you're right that that makes the combo better. It's possible that this is the sort of inevitability that Sisay needs to move it one step beyond midrange, and I'll probably try this out when I get a chance. Good suggestion :-).
I've actually never played the deck with Mindslaver, but it could be interesting. The only concern is that mistveil plains is kind of bad, and both combos only really work/are capable of going off if you have an active Sisay in turn and a way to tutor up land, which usually means you have any number of other ways of winning. I'd try them though, and return back with some thoughts once you see how they are. Definitely a powerful enough combo to merit consideration.
It's been a long time since I posted on the Sisay forum. Part of it was that I moved, and a lot of the people I knew who played 1v1 suddenly became very far away, but another, more shameful part of it is that I spent some time playing Geist. As fun as that was (and it was quite fun), I do believe that Sisay is more my style. As has been true in the past, and seems to remain true today based on Riley's build, Riley and I disagree quite a bit on how to build Sisay. I think this is great, and shows that Sisay is a versatile general that can fit into many shells. As before, my list is a "biggest zoo" build, but I've cut a lot of the chaff for sleeker cards. Awkward cards have been removed (Arbor Elf + Cavern = combo?), and fundamental problems I had with the deck have been updated. This is a work in progress, and hopefully will see more updates going forward, but thoughts are always appreciated.
Ignore the maybeboard, that's just a random list of ideas, mostly from a while back.
Overview of changes:
1. Cut cards that were needed to beat Edric. I find cards like Last Breath depressing, and hope that I don't need them. With Edric around, it was useful, but at this point I think you can outclass most other small creature based decks with your card quality. Since those smaller zoo decks should be good matchups and Edric is no longer legal, cards like this that are not general like Swords, Journey, Path, Oust, etc. don't need to be played.
2. PLAY MORE LANDS! This was something that always bugged me about Sisay. Missing land drops is often fatal for the deck, and I found myself wondering often why I didn't just play more land. I started on 37, then moved to 38, and now am at the full 40. Why? Because the lands are awesome! Many of the lands have useful effects that complement the game plan, give more tutor targets for Knight, Wayfarer, etc., and MOST IMPORTANTLY make it less likely that you start whiffing on t3. What's the point of playing marginal cards like Last Breath when you could be hitting your land drops and playing better cards? One could argue that instead of 2 lands I should be playing Three Visits and the other functional equivalent (which is a real argument), but I personally don't see the point. Lands are some of the best cards in Sisay, and by playing more with more tutors (Crop Rotation now in the main as well) and more abusability (Life From the Loam back in, along with the good cycling lands and Mox Diamond), the extra lands seem unlikely to do harm. Plus, something like 5 of them are manlands anyway.
3. Some new cards (at least for me): Angel of Serenity, Glowrider, Garruk PH. Notable exclusion: Selesnya Charm - I'm not clear on why this would be good, or why Riley plays it, but it seems like none of the modes (except the exile, which is narrow) are all that good in EDH, and I don't think the versatility really makes up for it. The best think I can think of is getting a sworded guy through? But that doesn't even work with SOFAF.
Overall, some minor updates, but a list I'm much happier with. I'll get back to all of you on how it performs.
I did indeed mean windbrisk heights :-). I mix those up more than I probably should.
Kor haven I definitely want to cut, since it has done next to nothing despite seeming quite good on paper. Deserted temple has actually been okay, since generating double mana with stuff like cradle is occasionally useful, but you're right that it's probably not worth the abnormal mana that the colorless tap costs me.
I've also made a few changes that are reflected in my list (see the OP).
I can't say I agree with everything Riley has done, but I'm glad it seems to be working well. Thalia has been great for me, and I wouldn't cut it.
Trinisphere seems very, very out of place. I suspect that will end up being WAY too awkward and get cut, but we'll see.
My biggest issue with my list right now is the mana base. I'm currently running 39 lands (since missing a land drop with this deck is pretty devastating in the first 4-5 turns), but have found that i have a few too many colorless sources. I'm probably going to cut out a lot of the cards that are only useful in weird, fringe circumstances and play all the dual lands. Even cards like Windswept Heath haven't been testing particularly well.
I agree with Dauntless Escort. It's a card that fell in and out of my builds a while back, but I hadn't really reconsidered him until Riley mentioned him again. Definitely a good answer to some of Sisay's problems in the metagame.
As it is I still feel far more comfortable with my decklist's more creature-based approach (we now differ by 10+ on our creature count!), and it has worked well for me so far, but I'd love to her how your testing goes. I saw you were 2-0 in the tournament a while back. How did that end up going?
I think a lot of the difference in opinion between Riley and I comes from our different perspectives. I play a lot of regular tournament magic, and that is where I tend to focus my time (and my metagame knowledge). These days, this means Modern and Standard in particular. Playing in major constructed events has taught me that, if you don't know the format as well as you might like to (as is certainly the case for me in 1v1 EDH), you should play the best, most proactive deck you can. A lot of people take this to mean burn, but really it means you just need to play a deck with a plan. Going into a modern event knowing nothing about the metagame playing Faeries or Gifts Control is asking to get smashed. As a result, my EDH deck tends to be as proactive as I can make it. Obviously as an uber spike I try to keep it as tuned as I can, but when offered a choice between a more defensive and a more proactive card, I'll always pick the latter. My defensive cards I prefer to be cheap and high utility (Nature's Claim is my favorite example, a card that has been such a highlight of this deck since I started playing it despite being so seemingly innocuous) while my aggressive cards need to be dangerous and force responses from my opponents. At the very least, I think a build like that will force your opponent to "have it" multiple times in a match. With a more fine tuned understanding of the meta, it is likely possible to play a game of percentages and try to eke out small advantages with finely tuned card choices, but I'd argue that this requires an extremely good understanding of the deck you're facing and of how to play your own deck near flawlessly. It will be better in the end (generally) than the proactive approach, but usually only narrowly because you never risks in your gameplay if you can avoid it. There is also the potential (and I did this back when I played Next Level Bant - shudder) to over-metagame, and play a deck that is so good against the format that it's just bad.
So in the end, if you're going to play 1v1 EDH a lot and very competitively, listening to Riley is probably a good idea. If you're not, and want a competitive Sisay deck that you can probably just pick up and play pretty well in 1v1 against the vast majority of good, serious players that may not be flawless for winning a 1v1 tourney, I think my list is a good choice (though Riley's is probably also fine for this).
That being said, World Queller? I hope that's a joke.
People playing creature removal isn't a good justification for not playing creatures. I played against a Lyzolda deck the other day on Cockatrice, and part of what won was the fact that they just cannot possibly have enough removal for everything. Fiend Hunter is the kind of card where, yes, they may be able to kill it, but it will either waste a good amount of their time or a premier removal spell (like a bolt). If you play Journey, yeah you killed the dude, but they still have the bolt. Fiend Hunter MADE them have it, and made it not nearly as frustrating for later creatures that you may play. Fiend Hunter also synergizes with Sun Titan and Reveillark (which I immediately regretted cutting a couple weeks back) and allows you to achieve parity faster on board. No, it's not the best card in the deck, but as always the argument of "dies to infinite removal" isn't a strong pushback. If removal is literally going to kill every creature you play, why are we playing Sisay? Play Thrun as a general. Or Geist of Saint Traft. Or Sigurda.
In other words, by assuming that they always have the removal, and building your deck under that assumption, you not only make your deck worse, but you make the removal they do have better. For every Fiend Hunter that doesnt die, a Sisay will.
As always, I disagree. Journey has been mediocre for me, and I've found myself tutoring Fiend Hunter up a lot with Worldly Tutor and the like. It's very useful to have creature-based removal in the deck since it's much easier to find your creatures than anything else. Also, Fiend Hunter rarely needs to stick around to really do it's job. I'd happily play both if I were you, or at the very least test both and see which is better for you. Not sure why Riley mentioned shroud, since neither of these cards is good against shroud... (and Fiend Hunter is arguably better against it because at least you get a dude..). I'd say that if you're looking for hard removal, go with journey, but I think Fiend Hunter is a better card in the deck. I've found that it's often more relevant to eat a guy for a couple turns and then do something way more busted, and Fiend Hunter can buy you a lot of time with a good defensive body. Also, if they want their card back, they have to target the fiend hunter, which is pretty optimal for you (them wasting time/removal on a random 1/3 sounds good)
So I know I'm probably not speaking for everyone here, but I actually really stongly dislike Survival in the deck. It has always been hard for me to make it useful, and even though theoretically it should do a lot of work with Sisay (allowing you to tutor up any creature every turn) in practice it's just been a bit too clunky. I don't think the deck would be hurt much by the banning of Survival. In fact, I think Riley and I have both moved away from some of the Survival-based combos that are available (I have, for example, cut Karmic Guide and Yosei).
I don't play Retainers (and have never really wanted to) so I can't say much on that front
Jitte, on the other hand, is critical. The biggest fear for the deck is that they may ban Jitte and Gaea's Cradle, both of which are very very important for Sisay to be at her best. Of the two, I think the deck could be fine without Jitte, but I think that if Cradle gets banned it'd be worth rethinking the deck from the ground up. At that point it may actually be worthwhile to consider the enchantment version, if only to abuse the possibility of tutoring Serra's Sanctum.
As far as tutoring for non-legendaries goes, there are the following cards:
Green Sun's Zenith
Fauna Shaman
Eladamri's Call
Wordly Tutor
Birthing Pod
and...
CHORD OF CALLING - This is a card I thought about a couple days ago and actually could not believe I am not playing already. It seems SUPER INSANE and will definitely find a place in my list. If only for the possibility of forcing blue opponents to counter it on their turn so you can resolve a threat on your own.
There are also bad tutors like Congregation at Dawn that I probably would not recommend
I really still just disagree with Riley's new direction here. I've been playing explore for a while now, and while it's cool to have, I can't imagine playing many other cards like it. Putting more creatures into play has always been relevant for this deck, and I'm almost universally happier to have a mana dork in my opener. Maybe this is less of a problem for me because I play 39 land, but I don't honestly care if they bolt a birds or something. You can get past them killing one or even 2 mana dorks, and the fact that they absolutely HAVE to otherwise they get steamrolled is a fantastic thing. Cards like Explore put no pressure on your opponent to do anything. They just sit on their removal and wait for our threats (which are NOT on par with threats from decks like Azusa or Jhoira or other dedicated Fatties decks) which they can then kill. Essentially, this isn't a ramp deck. We can't pretend to be a ramp deck, and we can't wait to play slower ramp spells to get ahead. Yeah, you'll lose a few games to opponents having infinite removal or (god forbid) Goblin Sharpshooter, but the premise of the deck as a deck that threatens t 2-3 sisay against an opponent with a dearth of answers is critical, and having other creatures in play before you play Sisay is also extremely useful (how else do you get value out of Jitte? Norn? Cradle?).
I stick by my conclusion a few weeks ago that Sisay wants literally all the 1 drop accelerants it can play: they remain the absolute best card to see in your opening hand, and the best way to get ahead. Sisay by nature is VERY good at staying ahead once you have an advantage, and the dorks are what give you that position.
Playing some more games tonight, so we'll see how I feel about my list after that.
I have to disagree quite a bit with the cutting of Arbor Elf, Bloom Tender, and Harmonic Sliver. I'm not sure how you justify those, but by doing so you're just slowing the deck down. If you're having trouble against faster decks with burn, it makes more sense to add more hate cards (Firewalker? Forge Tender? Refraction Trap? Harm's Way? These are random ideas, but these cards are all playable) rather than cutting some of the best accelerants from the deck. Harmonic Sliver has always been better than Revoke in this deck because he is tutorable in a bunch of ways, and having more creatures to chump/attack with is always better than not. There is no way the 1 mana difference is enough to change him to a revoke..
great, good to know there's a place i'll be able to play some EDH in NYC. Is there a big 1v1 competitive scene, or not really?
I'm actually on 39 lands right now. I sort of realized that the games you're most likely to lose are the ones where you miss your first couple land drops (and of the first 3-4 really), and playing more spell-lands gives the deck less of a chance to just loose the game while retaining a sufficiently high spell-density. Don't really like mutavault, since I'm not really sure that a 2/2 justifies the colorless cost. I actually think Nantuko Monestary is strictly better in our deck (how often would you activate mutavault pre-threshold?).
It's been a long time since I posted on this thread, but I recently took some time to update my list from a few years back, so I thought I'd post it again and get some feedback. It's also listed in the OP.
Note that sideboard and maybeboard cards are just cards that I at one point thought about and added to the site just for the sake of reference.
http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/sisay-edh-3/
It's been a long time since I posted on the Sisay forum. Part of it was that I moved, and a lot of the people I knew who played 1v1 suddenly became very far away, but another, more shameful part of it is that I spent some time playing Geist. As fun as that was (and it was quite fun), I do believe that Sisay is more my style. As has been true in the past, and seems to remain true today based on Riley's build, Riley and I disagree quite a bit on how to build Sisay. I think this is great, and shows that Sisay is a versatile general that can fit into many shells. As before, my list is a "biggest zoo" build, but I've cut a lot of the chaff for sleeker cards. Awkward cards have been removed (Arbor Elf + Cavern = combo?), and fundamental problems I had with the deck have been updated. This is a work in progress, and hopefully will see more updates going forward, but thoughts are always appreciated.
Here's the list (which I believe is also linked on the front page): http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/sisay-edh-3/
Ignore the maybeboard, that's just a random list of ideas, mostly from a while back.
Overview of changes:
1. Cut cards that were needed to beat Edric. I find cards like Last Breath depressing, and hope that I don't need them. With Edric around, it was useful, but at this point I think you can outclass most other small creature based decks with your card quality. Since those smaller zoo decks should be good matchups and Edric is no longer legal, cards like this that are not general like Swords, Journey, Path, Oust, etc. don't need to be played.
2. PLAY MORE LANDS! This was something that always bugged me about Sisay. Missing land drops is often fatal for the deck, and I found myself wondering often why I didn't just play more land. I started on 37, then moved to 38, and now am at the full 40. Why? Because the lands are awesome! Many of the lands have useful effects that complement the game plan, give more tutor targets for Knight, Wayfarer, etc., and MOST IMPORTANTLY make it less likely that you start whiffing on t3. What's the point of playing marginal cards like Last Breath when you could be hitting your land drops and playing better cards? One could argue that instead of 2 lands I should be playing Three Visits and the other functional equivalent (which is a real argument), but I personally don't see the point. Lands are some of the best cards in Sisay, and by playing more with more tutors (Crop Rotation now in the main as well) and more abusability (Life From the Loam back in, along with the good cycling lands and Mox Diamond), the extra lands seem unlikely to do harm. Plus, something like 5 of them are manlands anyway.
3. Some new cards (at least for me): Angel of Serenity, Glowrider, Garruk PH. Notable exclusion: Selesnya Charm - I'm not clear on why this would be good, or why Riley plays it, but it seems like none of the modes (except the exile, which is narrow) are all that good in EDH, and I don't think the versatility really makes up for it. The best think I can think of is getting a sworded guy through? But that doesn't even work with SOFAF.
Overall, some minor updates, but a list I'm much happier with. I'll get back to all of you on how it performs.
Kor haven I definitely want to cut, since it has done next to nothing despite seeming quite good on paper. Deserted temple has actually been okay, since generating double mana with stuff like cradle is occasionally useful, but you're right that it's probably not worth the abnormal mana that the colorless tap costs me.
Oust is awesome! Why did you cut that?!
I can't say I agree with everything Riley has done, but I'm glad it seems to be working well. Thalia has been great for me, and I wouldn't cut it.
Trinisphere seems very, very out of place. I suspect that will end up being WAY too awkward and get cut, but we'll see.
My biggest issue with my list right now is the mana base. I'm currently running 39 lands (since missing a land drop with this deck is pretty devastating in the first 4-5 turns), but have found that i have a few too many colorless sources. I'm probably going to cut out a lot of the cards that are only useful in weird, fringe circumstances and play all the dual lands. Even cards like Windswept Heath haven't been testing particularly well.
I agree with Dauntless Escort. It's a card that fell in and out of my builds a while back, but I hadn't really reconsidered him until Riley mentioned him again. Definitely a good answer to some of Sisay's problems in the metagame.
As it is I still feel far more comfortable with my decklist's more creature-based approach (we now differ by 10+ on our creature count!), and it has worked well for me so far, but I'd love to her how your testing goes. I saw you were 2-0 in the tournament a while back. How did that end up going?
So in the end, if you're going to play 1v1 EDH a lot and very competitively, listening to Riley is probably a good idea. If you're not, and want a competitive Sisay deck that you can probably just pick up and play pretty well in 1v1 against the vast majority of good, serious players that may not be flawless for winning a 1v1 tourney, I think my list is a good choice (though Riley's is probably also fine for this).
That being said, World Queller? I hope that's a joke.
In other words, by assuming that they always have the removal, and building your deck under that assumption, you not only make your deck worse, but you make the removal they do have better. For every Fiend Hunter that doesnt die, a Sisay will.
http://media-dominaria.cursecdn.com/attachments/96/666/635032497111428072.jpg
http://media-dominaria.cursecdn.com/attachments/96/564/635032497086311428.jpg
http://media-dominaria.cursecdn.com/attachments/96/668/635032497112052088.jpg
I don't play Retainers (and have never really wanted to) so I can't say much on that front
Jitte, on the other hand, is critical. The biggest fear for the deck is that they may ban Jitte and Gaea's Cradle, both of which are very very important for Sisay to be at her best. Of the two, I think the deck could be fine without Jitte, but I think that if Cradle gets banned it'd be worth rethinking the deck from the ground up. At that point it may actually be worthwhile to consider the enchantment version, if only to abuse the possibility of tutoring Serra's Sanctum.
As far as tutoring for non-legendaries goes, there are the following cards:
Green Sun's Zenith
Fauna Shaman
Eladamri's Call
Wordly Tutor
Birthing Pod
and...
CHORD OF CALLING - This is a card I thought about a couple days ago and actually could not believe I am not playing already. It seems SUPER INSANE and will definitely find a place in my list. If only for the possibility of forcing blue opponents to counter it on their turn so you can resolve a threat on your own.
There are also bad tutors like Congregation at Dawn that I probably would not recommend
I stick by my conclusion a few weeks ago that Sisay wants literally all the 1 drop accelerants it can play: they remain the absolute best card to see in your opening hand, and the best way to get ahead. Sisay by nature is VERY good at staying ahead once you have an advantage, and the dorks are what give you that position.
Playing some more games tonight, so we'll see how I feel about my list after that.
I'm actually on 39 lands right now. I sort of realized that the games you're most likely to lose are the ones where you miss your first couple land drops (and of the first 3-4 really), and playing more spell-lands gives the deck less of a chance to just loose the game while retaining a sufficiently high spell-density. Don't really like mutavault, since I'm not really sure that a 2/2 justifies the colorless cost. I actually think Nantuko Monestary is strictly better in our deck (how often would you activate mutavault pre-threshold?).
I have never GSZed for Safekeeper :-P