Yeah, this is working. The deck's weaker than it was previously, but it's got more interesting stuff going on in terms of gameplay dynamics. I'm of the opinion that partner decks can be some of the cooler, more varied, yet still consistent performers - you've got two potential things to synergise with out of the command zone, so you can go modular to support it and still have the requisite enabler at the ready. In this case, it's the combination of Gilanra's desire for big spells and Eligeth's natural gravitating towards low-cost scries. They actually work well together, as you drop in the 6+CMC bomb for Gilanra to draw off of, and then spend the remaining mana on whatever, such as cheap Eligeth scry stuff.
Delver Factory has quite liked seeing the various cheapo spells, and has also liked eating a
Spitting Image (or three). This power of cloning is not something that needs to be
Clone Legion size to be cool, as it turns out. The secret to being able to run a clone-rich deck in 2021 is to have some stuff of your own you wouldn't mind copying. And there's plenty of that here -
Ulvenwald Hydra, the
mini-game sphinxes, Delver Factory, what have you.
Avenger of Zendikar was earmarked as a potential cut in the last update, I drew him, he didn't spark joy. This frees me up from all landfall win conditions, which is a good thing. This puts more pressure on the
Sun Quans in the deck to help provide whatever mediocrestuff wide with evasion prowess, and that makes games more interesting as that's another piece of the puzzle I sometimes need to find.
Clone Legion is the last of the problematic high-end haymakers, as it can single-handedly undo an opponent's advantage and flip gears on the game. In its last appearance, I had the power to repeatedly recur and cast it 10+ times in one turn, and it managed to yield a board state that was unreasonably powerful and took over an opponent that had no business being caught up with.
Marit Lage's Slumber may be the least obnoxious
Tatyova, but it is still a Tatyova.
Migration Path does not need to draw two on top of ramping two.
Nezahal is a sad one to cut, as he's the original "whenever opponent" card in here, but he is also the most boring of the lot, in fairness. He did not spark joy and sat in hand more often than not recently.
Rishkar's Expertise makes me feel guilty more than anything - it's not that insane a draw spell, even with Eligeth out, but it just feels like a big boy tryhard card and I'm trying to avoid running those that aren't necessary in here.
Most of the new includes are various flavours of clones, as those make for interesting, interactive gameplay. As mentioned, I've got some decent targets for it myself, so I've got a decent fail case if nobody else has anything worth copying.
Followed Footsteps is like a garbage tier
Progenitor Mimic, and is pretty fun because of the badness.
Saheeli's Artistry is the
Clone Legion replacement on account of being less ludicrous. In the interest of thoroughness, I should note that it nominally enables an infinite - given enough mana and a
Doubling Cube, it can be mana positive when cast. Needs appropriate recursion to keep this up, most easily in the form of a recursive body like
Eternal Witness to copy. This is yet to come up in gameplay, and I've put quite a few games on the thing recently, so it's unlikely to need addressing.
Stolen Identity is pretty neat as it can go live on Eligeth. In its debut appearance I kept making
Gilded Lotuses until I had a flipped Delver Factory to start copying instead. In terms of non-clone includes, there's the Eligeth-minded
Crystal Ball. Repeatable scry-draw stuff is quite nice, and this is another piece of that.
Kiora's Follower is the strongest include in a while, as it checks a lot of high power boxes. It's a two-mana ramp spell, helping power out Gilanra haymakers from turn four onward. It actually untaps Gilanra, so said haymaker will draw two cards rather than one. It also untaps various renowned big mana things like Doubling Cube. It's seriously no slouch. But it is also a creature, so it's pretty easy to deal with in the grand scheme of things. It's come out a few times by now, it's quite good, but it's not game-wrecking. And it synergises nicely with what the deck is after, so it stays.
It's unfortunate that all forms of multi-
Regrowth get rid of themselves in some capacity.
Reap has been nothing short of amazing, and once the mana comes together it can be used in intense recursion setups. Remember that mention of 10+
Clone Legions in a turn? That was thanks to Reap (and a secondary Regrowth to pick the Reap up). Seeing how the cast angle makes good use of
Sharknado variants, I'm considering
Mirage Mirror as a way to try to get more of those online.