{"ops":[{"insert":"Sidisi's Zombo Combo"},{"attributes":{"header":1},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"\nThis Sidisi deck is a zombie tribal deck that focuses on getting as much value out of "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Sidisi, Brood Tyrant"}},{"insert":" herself. It started out as a deck focused on flooding the board with zombies, combined with about every lord Zombie tribal has to offer. As the deck got further optimized, it shifted more towards a deck with heavy self-mill that usually ends in loads of damage through "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Gray Merchant of Asphodel"}},{"insert":", "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Vengeful Dead"}},{"insert":" or similar effects combined with a huge board or a select number of zombies that recur each other infinitely.\n\nZombies are one of the most versatile tribes in commander, including creature removal, graveyard hate, reanimators, aristocrats, tutors, some serious card draw, and many others. Hell, we even have a ninja ("},{"insert":{"card-link":"Fallen Shinobi"}},{"insert":" ) and a mana dork ("},{"insert":{"card-link":"Llanowar Dead"}},{"insert":")!\n\nAs far as powerlevel goes, this deck is nowhere near cEDH (tribal decks don't get that far), but if piloted properly this deck can certainly mess around at a higher powered table.\n\nDo you like tribal decks, explosive turns and relentlessly reanimating through waves of mass removal? Then this might just be the deck for you!\n\nWhy Sidisi?"},{"attributes":{"header":2},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"\nSidisi is far from the most popular zombie commander according to EDHREC, with options such as "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Varina, Lich Queen"}},{"insert":", "},{"insert":{"card-link":"The Scarab God"}},{"insert":" and "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Gisa and Geralf"}},{"insert":". So why Sidisi then? Whereas most other options support the zombie tribe itself better, Sidisi decks tend to revolve a bit more around the fabulous naga lady herself. Just as with any zombie tribal commander, as long as our graveyard is left alone (which, admittedly, is quite often not the case), our board of zombies is quite resilient against boardwipes and such. However, Sidisi can also have exploding turns where we grind through most of our deck in a single turn using only 1 or 2 other cards.\n\nGrinding through our deck"},{"attributes":{"header":2},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"\nThe first objective of any Sidisi deck is always to grind through our deck ASAP. First off, this can lead to a swarm of tokens that can easily overwhelm your opponents. Secondly, our graveyard is like a second hand. The fuller it is, the easier it will be to pull off some kind of win by recurring loads of zombies.\nA very important note about Sidisi is that she generates a token when you mill one "},{"attributes":{"bold":true},"insert":"or more"},{"insert":" creatures. This means that a card like "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Traumatize"}},{"insert":" only nets you one token. We therefore want to mill through our deck one or two cards at a time where possible.\n\nHere I will list some of the cards that enable you to go through your deck quickly in approximate order from strongest to weakest enablers.\n\n"},{"insert":{"card-link":"Altar of Dementia"}},{"insert":": Al(ls)tar of dementia is known to be a powerhouse in general for any reanimator-focused deck. Sidisi + altar and our creature count of 42 means we burn through about 6 cards on average per zombie token. Give your zombies +1/+1 with any zombie lord and you're almost guaranteed to mill yourself out if you so desire. One important note is that Altar on its own never nets you any zombies, so in that sense other options might be favorable in some scenario's. That said, when you mill through your deck at once you can usually win the same turn."},{"attributes":{"list":"bullet"},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":{"card-link":"Embalmer's Tools"}},{"insert":": With Sidisi out, Embalmer's tools is basically a better "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Endless Ranks of the Dead"}},{"insert":" . Every zombie you have can now be tapped for about a 40% chance to produce a new one, netting you 1,4 times the zombies you originally had. However, since those zombies can also be tapped regardless of their summoning sickness, the new zombies "},{"attributes":{"bold":true},"insert":"also"},{"insert":" mills you. Zombies galore!"},{"attributes":{"list":"bullet"},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":{"card-link":"Path of Discovery"}},{"insert":": Definitely the most fun option. Every creature entering the battlefield gives you a new zombie token at best. At worst, you get some card advantage. It functions a bit like Embalmer's tools, but without having to tap your zombies. "},{"attributes":{"list":"bullet"},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":{"card-link":"Mesmeric Orb"}},{"insert":": Any experienced Sidisi player will know the power this card brings. Every permanent you untap during your untap step gives a separate trigger, meaning Sidisi creates zombie tokens for each creature put into your graveyard rather than 1 token for the whole bunch (as explained in the example with traumatize). The only real downside of this card is that there is less positive feedback between this card and Sidisi as the cards mentioned above. A combo worth mentioning is the orb plus "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Basalt Monolith"}},{"insert":" , which together can mill yourself infinitely. The reason I didn't include the monolith in this deck is because in this case, outside of this combo it is kind of a dead card."},{"attributes":{"list":"bullet"},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":{"card-link":"Archghoul of Thraben"}},{"insert":": Note how you have the option to put a card into your graveyard even if it's a zombie. Combining this with a sac outlet is another way to mill one card per token. While it is harder to mill your deck using only archghoul, it has a major upside of being a creature, meaning you can reanimate or tutor it more easily."},{"attributes":{"list":"bullet"},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":{"card-link":"Buried Alive"}},{"insert":", "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Corpse Connoisseur"}},{"insert":" and "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Vile Entomber"}},{"insert":": These won't dig deep into your deck, but sometimes, getting just a few of the right cards in your graveyard can be enough. The Connoisseur, a man of fine taste, even gives us value from the graveyard after being milled by some other card. Vile Entomber can even get non-creature cards, meaning it can also get a spell like "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Dread Return"}},{"insert":". Plus, with Sidisi out, these tutors still get you a zombie token as a bonus! "},{"attributes":{"list":"bullet"},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":" "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Underrealm Lich"}},{"insert":" , "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Stitcher's Supplier"}},{"insert":" , etc.: These are all good examples of cards that don't get you extremely deep into your deck, but that do get the ball rolling and are therefore still very useful. Additionally, the lich has some weird interaction with "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Sylvan Library"}},{"insert":" and also becomes a milling machine when combined with "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Undead Augur"}},{"insert":"."},{"attributes":{"list":"bullet"},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"\nThe real power with any of these enablers comes from combining them. For instance, Embalmers tools with Path of Discovery makes every token mill the top two cards of your deck separately, and you can still sacrifice the tokens to Altar of Dementia afterwards! An honorable mention goes out to "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Tombstone Stairwell"}},{"insert":", "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Cream of the Crop"}},{"insert":" and cards like "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Parallel Lives"}},{"insert":" (currently not in the list). They do not mill you by itself, but synergize very well with the other enablers in this list.\n\nZombo combo's & Flooding the board"},{"attributes":{"header":2},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"\nSo we've dumped a large chunk of our deck into our graveyard, now what? At this point we usually have either about 5 or 20 creatures on the board, depending on what mill engines we used to get through our deck. From here there are two main options:\n\nUse either "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Living Death"}},{"insert":", "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Patriarch's Bidding"}},{"insert":" or "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Zombie Apocalypse"}},{"insert":" to completely flood the board with about every zombie our deck has to offer. In case we don't have any of these in our hand, we can use "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Timeless Witness"}},{"insert":" (or "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Possessed Skaab"}},{"insert":" to stay on theme even more) to get it back from our graveyard. What, you also don't have those in your hand either? Well a final solution is to get one of "},{"attributes":{"italic":true},"insert":"those"},{"insert":" back using "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Dread Return"}},{"insert":". All in all, there are plenty of options for mass resurrection, like there should be in any zombie deck. Using the army we just gathered, you can either swarm down your opponent with the many lords of the deck buffing your army or you could just sacrifice about every zombie you have twice using "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Mikaeus, the Unhallowed"}},{"insert":" and a sac outlet such as "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Carrion Feeder"}},{"insert":", making your opponents lose life with Vengeful Dead, Plague Belcher and Diregraf Captain. You could even include the classic "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Zombie Master"}},{"insert":" + "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth"}},{"insert":" to make all your zombies unblockable!\n\nThe other option is to use the insanely potent "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Rot Hulk"}},{"insert":". This absolute unit heavily amplifies any single target reanimation effect. Moreover, we can often just sacrifice him and recur him again with the zombies he himself just retrieved from our graveyard. Here is an example of a loop that can be formed (assuming we have at least 2 opponents left) using the Hulk, "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Mikaeus, the Unhallowed"}},{"insert":", "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Phyrexian Delver"}},{"insert":", "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Carrion Feeder"}},{"insert":" and "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Gray Merchant of Asphodel"}},{"insert":":\nCast (or reanimate) Hulk, targeting Mikaeus and Carrion feeder"},{"attributes":{"list":"bullet"},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"Use carrion feeder to sac the Hulk, who returns because of Mikaeus"},{"attributes":{"list":"bullet"},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"With Rot Hulk, target Gary and Phyrexian Delver. Hold priority and sac the Rot hulk to carrion feeder again. (Mikaeus isn't scrictly neccessary anymore at this point, so to keep it simple we'll just sac him as well)."},{"attributes":{"list":"bullet"},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"Phyrexian Delvers' ETB now targets Rot Hulk. Let Gary's ETB resolve first to drain 5+ life from each opponent. Then hold priority with Carrion feeder's ETB still on the stack and sacrifice Gary and himself."},{"attributes":{"list":"bullet"},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"Repeat the last two steps until all opponents are dead."},{"attributes":{"list":"bullet"},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"\nA more recent addition to the zombie archetype, "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Necroduality"}},{"insert":", adds so many options that there's likely multiple combos I'm not even aware of, let alone writing them out here. Let me describe the most efficient one, requiring only 2 cards:\nHave Necroduality and any other creature on the board"},{"attributes":{"list":"bullet"},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"Cast "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Vile Entomber"}},{"insert":", getting a copy from duality and putting "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Rot Hulk"}},{"insert":" and "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Dread Return"}},{"insert":" in your graveyard"},{"attributes":{"list":"bullet"},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"Sacrifice the two entombers and the other creature to Dread Return's flashback, returning Rot Hulk"},{"attributes":{"list":"bullet"},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"Stack duality and hulk such that hulk reanimates first, grabbing the vile entomber. Entomber gets a Carrion Feeder and Phyrexian Delver"},{"attributes":{"list":"bullet"},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"Let the Duality copy of Hulk resolve, reanimating the Feeder and Delver. You can sac the Hulk to Feeder before the Duality copy of Delver resolves, letting you return Hulk."},{"attributes":{"list":"bullet"},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"At this point, Rot Hulk can be reanimated by its own copy, infinitely recurring other creatures in the process. For instance, saccing and recurring Entomber in the process means you can reanimate "},{"attributes":{"bold":true},"insert":"every zombie in your deck"},{"insert":"."},{"attributes":{"list":"bullet"},"insert":"\n"},{"attributes":{"header":2},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"A final option that doesn't require a lot of grinding through your deck is "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Liliana, Untouched by Death"}},{"insert":"'s -3 ability in combination with "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Rooftop Storm"}},{"insert":". This allows you to cast zombies from both your hand and graveyard for free. Combine this with a "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Sidisi, Undead Vizier"}},{"insert":" to be able to infinitely tutor cards from your deck, or just use a sac outlet to infinitely recast a zombie with an ETB or death trigger that can win you the game.\n\nHow many creatures?"},{"attributes":{"header":2},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"\nOne of the downsides of Sidisi is that she requires you to have a high number of creatures in your deck to ensure her second ability resolves whenever we mill ourself. Here's a chart I slapped together (it's not the prettiest, I know..) to show you the probability of hitting at least one creature when milling the top 1, 2 or 3 cards of our deck, based on the total number of creatures in the 99 (if you want to know how to do this, look up hypergeometric distributions).\n\n"},{"insert":{"image":"https://i.imgur.com/AkfKlUs.png"}},{"insert":"\nAs you can see, the curve is far from saturated at 42 creatures, which is the number of creatures I currently have in my version of the deck. The short answer to how many creatures you should run is therefore \"as many as possible!\". However, I feel that the probabilities are high enough (42, 67 and 81% for milling 1, 2 or 3 cards, respectively) to go through your deck quickly.\n\nHow to play the deck"},{"attributes":{"header":2},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"\nIn a successful game, Sidisi herself is cast twice. The first time is about a early as possible. She might stick around for a turn or two, filling up our graveyard and to creating some early tokens, before she gets removed. The second time is when we have some mill enabler and in this instance she usually only needs to stick around for one turn to be valuable.\n\nThe early game consists of getting some zombies and mana dorks from our hand onto the board until we hit one of our enablers or we can tutor for one. Needless to say, any tutors we run are most often used to find cards like Altar of Dementia, although on rare occasions you might want to get removal to get rid of graveyard removing permanents first.\nOnce you start milling yourself, its usually best to go all in. Sacrificing almost everything on your board to Altar usually pays off so don't be afraid to take some risks. Giving your opponents a full turn cycle to respond often leads to your graveyard being exiled.\nThe rest of the game often requires a bit of improvisation: most ways of milling are stochastic, where the amount of cards put into our graveyard after milling varies greatly. You can therefore never be sure what your graveyard (or board state) looks like at the end of your next turn. For me this is part of the fun of the deck, but it does mean you might fail to close out the game if you don't find the right line.\n\nThe biggest weakness of the deck is the limited amount of interaction. I usually save removal spells in case someone brings any form of graveyard hate. In case you don't have removal when facing "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Tormod's Crypt"}},{"insert":" like removal, you can sometimes bait someone into using it early by trying to reanimate some smaller targets in your graveyard. "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Krosan Grip"}},{"insert":" is especially helpful since its Split Second prevents the tormod's crypt from being activated in the first place. The real problem is permanent effects such as "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Rest in Peace"}},{"insert":". The only solution outside of removing it is to try and shut down the player controlling it, just by flooding the board every zombie you get your hands on and beating them down as fast as possible. Surprisingly enough, this actually works from time to time.\n\nIf a game ends up in an attrition heavy state, where people have little board presence and are out of cards, our utility heavy landbase comes in handy: "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Academy Ruins"}},{"insert":", "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Buried Ruin"}},{"insert":", "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Takenuma, Abandoned Mire"}},{"insert":" and "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Unholy Grotto"}},{"insert":" all help recur key cards such as mill enablers and reanimator creatures. All can be recurred by [[Life from the Loam]], a card that needs not introduction.\n\nOverall, our strategy is very proactive, trying to flood the board early and hoping to have creatures stick on the board. If that doesn't work out, we try and sneak in a win by assembling the right combination of cards for a single explosive turn where we have a combo or put a lot of zombies from out graveyard onto the battlefield. The deck can play out very different each game, so coming up with a game plan ahead of time is required for the deck to reach its full potential.\n\nNonbies worth mentioning"},{"attributes":{"header":2},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"\nI like to stick to a theme, which is why I stick to zombie - or at least zombie themed - creatures as much as possible. However, some things like ramp and removal are just required to make a deck run smoothly, and in Sidisi's case, creatures are always preferable. For this reason there are some mana dorks (i.e. "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Birds of Paradise"}},{"insert":") and "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Reclamation Sage"}},{"insert":" because most graveyard hate can be hit by it. Then there are some nonbies that are just too synergistic not to include: "},{"insert":{"card-link":"World Shaper"}},{"insert":" is an extremely efficient land reanimator while also being a repeated mill effect. Eternal Witness is too good to skip out on in decks like these, but "},{"insert":{"card-link":"Timeless Witness"}},{"insert":" working from your graveyard is a major upside and just happens to turn into a zombie, making her on theme. Win win!\n\nConclusion"},{"attributes":{"header":2},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"\nZombies might not be the strongest tribe in commander, but they are versatile and really fun to play. There are so many zombie cards that are not included in this deck that are still very much viable. The reason I wrote this short primer is not because I think the deck is incredibly strong, but because I think it is slightly unique in its combination of being focused on a tribe while still having a very specific other archetype that requires you to think deeply about what cards to include. I hope you've enjoyed this writeup and as always, suggestions or questions are always welcome.\n"}]}