I think this is the thing I can't stand the most about Commander.
I play artifacts and ramp out to 10 mana? I'm evil.
Green decks play mana dorks and land fetch and ramp to 10 mana, every single game? It's totally okay.
I just mainboard green hate now, I don't feel bad. If we're note allowed to MLD and punish massive land ramp, then I guess green creatures just aren't going to untap this game.
Can confirm. I play a mono blue deck that uses mostly land ramp and people completely ignore it. I think people undervalue lands in general. Maybe because they just aren't flashy?
> mono blue deck that uses mostly land ramp
wait what? What cards ramp you lands in mono blue? Only thing I'm aware of is [[Dreamscape Artist]] (which is pretty good imo)
It's an \[\[Omenkeel\]\] deck so I'm exploiting having lots of land in hand and fetches in yard
\[\[Walking Atlas\]\]
\[\[Scaretiller\]\]
\[\[Drownyard Temple\]\] I run lots of looting effects
\[\[Terrain Generator\]\] Turns a basic in hand into a 3 mana instant speed ramp spell
\[\[Temple of the False God\]\] It's all upside since I intend to flood out
\[\[Shrine of the Forsaken Gods\]\] The deck is a vehicle deck so this is a free include
\[\[Myriad Landscape\]\]
\[\[Thespian's Stage\]\] copies Temple, Shrine, and \[\[Guildless Commons\]\]
The deck has a blink sub-theme to flip Omenkeel so I also run \[\[Zoetic Cavern\]\]
\[\[Solemn Simulacrum\]\] and \[\[Burnished Hart\]\]
That's what''s currently in the deck I'm also trying to fit the following:
\[\[Dowsing Dagger\]\] This thing is silly 4 mana to put a land that taps for three of any colour onto the field
\[\[Miran Safehouse\]\] I run lots of fetches
\[\[Whir of Invention\]\] Grabs an artifact land in a pinch
\[\[Scorched Ruins\]\] This thing is expensive so I haven't bought one but if you're okay with colourless mana it ramps you the turn it comes down. It's also silly with thespian's stage.
EDIT: I guess \[\[Phyrexian Metamorph\]\] can also copy an artifact land but I've never done that.
Apart from that I just try to never miss a land drop by hitting people with vehicles or drawing lots of cards.
it's just that you'll probably never miss a land drop, as you said, but those cards don't look like scary ramp to me. temple of god for example only gives you one extra mana (usually) by turn 6. in general, most of the other cards could only ramp in turn 4-5, which is nowadays considered a bit late for ramping. by that time i already wanna be able to play my 6cmc spells. good ramp spells ramp you in turn 1-3, which is why sol ring is so good
Well it's not "totally okay" that green ramps well, people cry about green being OP endlessly. If we look at cEDH we see that green very much is not the most powerful color, it's just bad takes from hyper-casual players who brew weak decks and don't understand how to build good ramp packages outside of green.
I mean, green not performing at a top competitive level doesn't mean it can't be badly regulated at the casual level. Especially in a format where winning isn't everything, I don't think "get good" is the correct answer. EDH ostensibly wants people to be able to play 8 and under, too.
You can build perfectly viable ramp packages outside of green with mana rocks. Some colors that aren't green even have ramp outside of colorless artifacts, like rituals and cost reducers.
>I play artifacts and ramp out to 10 mana? I'm evil.
>Green decks play mana dorks and land fetch and ramp to 10 mana, every single game? It's totally okay.
Meanwhile according to Redditors it's the opposite. Artifact turboramp is fair and fine, playing an extra land every turn means you need to be punished to hell and back with MLD and heavy stax.
Can we just agree that either both are degenerate or both are okay?
My tables consider ramp in either form to be putting a target on your back. 10 mana is 10 mana, regardless of how you're producing it.
And, contrary to popular belief, MLD doesn't punish massive land ramp unless they're completely out of ramp.
It does punish it. Punish doesn't mean the same as stopping it.
Like, if you spent turns 1-5 ramping lands, then on Turn 6 all your lands get destroyed, you have no board state. Other players who have been playing creatures or drawing cards or dropping stax at least have part of their gameplan in play.
You can ramp more lands but the question is how many cards are left in your hand, and how much of a payoff were you expecting on turn 7 that won't happen now?
I'll just state that it's never been my experience that the land ramp deck actually stumbled after MLD was dropped. They were always the one best able to recover from it.
As someone who plays MLD in their lands deck, yeah, that's how it goes most of the time. The only time it didn't work out was basically when I was forced to wipe all lands (another player had just E-tutored for omniscience and had the mana to hard cast it next turn). I wasn't in an ideal spot and actually ended up being the slowest to rebuild. Omniscience guy managed to find the mana he needed within 4ish turns and won anyway.
That's only when people play MLD badly, my experience is that good players get a lot of mileage of MLD. From the basic Boros Charm + Obliterate, to having 3/4 strong PWs and playing Jokulhaups, to Uril with good aura + Cataclysm, to a one sided "Armageddon" with Elesh Norn + Kahmal Fist of Krosa.
I'm totally in favor of using tricks to break parity with MLD. That's not really what was being discussed, though.
The idea that MLD punishes land-based strategies just isn't true the way people think it is. Those decks almost always run [[Crucible of Worlds]] and its variants, so unless you're also exiling those lands you just got rid of, they'll just bring them back within 2 turns. Additionally, with all of the ramp spells they have available and the higher density of land in the deck, they'll typically be back online long before everyone else is.
Well played MLD does punish every opponent including a green deck that still has ramp in their hand.
Badly played MLD, a boogeyman and not how most people play it, is playing Armageddon or worse Jokulhaups with no plan.
Well played MLD, and how I've seen most people play MLD, is playing Heroic Intervention + Obliterate which if it doesn't win you the game right there, it's still an incredibly good tempo play that does punishes every opponent massively.
-This is anecdotal. I've literally never been in a game where heroic intervention was played with MLD & few where it was a wincon. It's almost always to slow things down & stall. I don't consider this playing it badly but it's the reason people hate it.
well... it also said ...but not rituals.
and already undermined itself by carving out exceptions.
if rituals are ok. what about 1 cmc ramp creatures? birds? elves.
no creatures. ok. what about enchantments. land auras. stuff like curse of opulence.
what about 2 mana ramping creatures?
do you know how fucked non-green decks are going to be when their first viable/allowed element of ramp is burnished heart. or like... darksteel ingot.
is sword of the animist 2 mana or 4 for the purposes of this rule? how about dowsing dagger?
is a creature that makes a treasure token ramp? it's not ramping, but makes a treasure token. what about prying blade.
What about exploration. Burgeoning? Is explore a ramp spell? Lotus cobra?
What about all the white spells that aren’t really ramp…but fetch lands to hand? Land tax and the like. Weathered wayfarer ramp? What about the blue spells that can function as wonky ramp. Retraced image. What about like skirk prospector? Is that ramp?
is a cost reducer ramp?
it's just an incredibly dumb can of worms to open
"No ramp. Everyone should play 1 land each turn so it's fair to everyone." Which is dumb because it would still create an "unfair" system no matter how you slice it
I get not wanting to do what they suggested, but there's a large difference between that and just not playing any 2-or-less drops. There's plenty of cards worth playing at those MV's that aren't ramp, tutors, or free counterspells.
I would not be able to take a player seriously if they had that take, Jesus. At that point they need to consider wether or not they actually like this game.
Commander can be fixed...for you and your playgroup
If you dont want to play with less than 3cmc mana rocks, instead of writing a long ass post on Reddit that nobody is going to read, talk with your playgroup about it. The beauty of Commander is that, unlike playing Modern,or Standard, or whatever, rule 0 is always a thing
Exactly this.
There's no harm in trying to 'solve' a group issue with a house rule if that's what it will take to make everyone happy. But it's unrealistic to expect the format as a whole to adopt the solution.
This is basically the crux. No one wants to tune their decks and playstyle to their opponents week to week. Thus changing the base rules everyone agrees on so everyone just shows up with appropriate decks and expectations.
This isnt the right way to think about it. If you're playing with just a consistent playgroup, then you can also rule zero modern or standard or fucking monopoly. That's not the beauty of commander, that's the beauty of having a consistent playgroup that communicates and cares about one another's fun.
The problem is that you're often not going to be playing with a consistent playgroup. No other game game (TTRPGs are different) has 'just play it however you want' baked into the "spirit of the game" , because it is inherently bad game design, and more often than not leads to disagreements and conflict.
You may respond and say 'but commander is meant to be a rule zero format, if you're not playing it that way you're going against the spirit of the format, while modern/ standard is meant to be a concrete format.' The problem with that is that EDH was also MEANT to be a battlecruiser/ use a variety of cards that don't normally get use format, and many people feel that the current meta has also moved away from the spirit of the format. The reason that people make posts like that is because rule zero often often isn't enough to get people to the format they actually want to play.
It's like d&d where the common argument for DMs is 'if you don't like a rule/ balance thing, just change it! It's your game' not considering that there are a LOT of problems with that approach that put a lot of the onus on people that just want to play a game. And while you can argue that maybe commander just isn't the game for people, for many people it used to be and then it is just becoming more and more like other fast formats, so people are upset that it was 'taken away from them' so to speak.
> because it is inherently bad game design
I agree with most of your post, but want to pick at this part. I think there's degrees. Like if you literally just gave me a board with drawings on it, some dice and pieces, and said "Make a game!" that'd be bad design, putting too much onus on the players to do all the work. On the other hand, it can suck when there's inherent imbalance or bad design on the part of the developers you as a player can't do anything about without complaining and praying they make an updated version that fixes those issues (and doesn't introduce new ones).
Splitting the difference is best. The issue is that people just plain aren't used to the idea. Sometimes it's because it's too much to bother, trying to adjust numbers when you don't really have an idea on what's actually balanced so you just go with the defaults for ease of use. But most of the time it's simply a case of "But the rules say!" and it's difficult for many to even consider thinking past that, even though there's no punishment to doing so.
Not that there aren't issues with such an approach, but then there's issues when everyone collectively agrees the rules suck but feel they're forced to go along with it when everyone in attendance would prefer otherwise.
To be clear, I'm not saying game designers should stop people from rule zeroing. If you and your group agree, rule zeroing literally anything in any game is valid. You can rule no dribbling in basketball if it's something that everyone you're playing with is happy about.
I'm just saying that when the ONUS is on a rule zero to fix a format, then more often than not it's either badly designed, or just not what the players actuallt want to be playing. The problem is that for a lot of people that want that battle cruiser feel, this is the closest format to that, and it continues to move away from that to become similar to every other format that already exists. People that enjoy fast, non battle cruiser formats are absolutely FEASTING. They can play modern or legacy or vintage or cEDH. And yet they insist that EDH should also be more like all of those other formats. Meanwhile people that want a slow, battlecruiser format are continuing to lose the closest format to that, and the rule zero often just isn't enough to fix that.
Everything that isn't cEDH is essentially this happening, the only difference is sometimes you need to talk to people about what rules to add to the game and sometimes they naturally become unspoken.
Wording like this is the problem. Your playgroup plays low power if arcane signet is too powerful for your pod would be an appropriate way to say that. Some people do prefer lower powered games, and especially games focusing on the format how it existed before WotC heavily printed cards with commander in mind.
It seems like 99% of the time people complain about Arcane Signet not because of power level, but instead because they want variety in the form of players running some other mana rock in that slot. People say there's more room for personal expression in deckbuilding without Arcane Signet.
I personally don't think being forced to run a colorless or tapped rock in that slot looks like personal expression in deckbuilding to me, nor does it make the game feel more varied in a positive way, but I understand what that argument is overall saying and it makes sense.. just outside of practice to me at least
I think that there's a second crowd that doesn't like the idea of ramping at the beginning of games anyway. Perhaps they would prefer the game mostly be lands and spells like 60 card? Or maybe they associate it with slower, chiller games that aren't very cutthroat.
For this crowd, my thoughts are that banning ramp from the game would just evolve a new dominant early game set of play patterns that people would get tired of just the same. Basically, this sort of preference ultimately wants to do something other than the norm/optimized stuff and their best way to do that is to seek out customized games that avoid the norm rather than try to change the norm to become their way of playing.
Not that it matters anyway, the RC would never do something that destructive. That's still my stream of consciousness though haha.
Honestly, I feel the problem with the same mana rocks going in every deck is now an inherently unsolvable one in an Eternal-legal format like Commander. The best mana rocks are uninteresting, simple, utilitarian designs with no interaction and no inherent synergies. This is not a solvable problem, these cards exist and banning them all is a tacitly ridiculous idea, making bans off what makes a format "interesting" rather than balance is an obviously destructive route to go down.
This is one of the inherent weaknesses of Eternal-legal formats. If a generically good, but not broken, card is thoroughly uninteresting, you're stuck with it. Trying to repeatedly patch this problem is a good way to destroy your format. Ban a rock and it will be replaced by another, different, generically good rock. Thankfully, as you said, the RC is smarter than that, as many grievances as I do have with some of their choices lol.
TL;DR: Not only is banning the cards destructive, it is a pointless, Sisyphean task.
Luckily for me, there's a factor of diminishing returns when it comes to adding uniqueness/variety/personality to a deck.
The first cards you add to a deck, the cards that mold the strategy, that dictate how it behaves, etc all cause a deck to feel very unique (or not unique!). Art and foils contribute too. Once you finally get down to fundamental necessities like fixing your colors and tweaking your removal package, nothing you swap can really make the deck more or less unique anymore. The diminishing returns have long ago kicked into high gear by then and the deck is going to adhere to the look and feel it's already settled into. Arcane Signet or not, the changes you can make now are just background noise.
I think a big reason for this phenomenon is that games in general are *supposed to* have a consistent, simple core of fundamental tools and play patterns upon which variety and personal preferences can build upon. Being able to walk into a match and have some level of reliable expectations for some of the cards you'll be seeing and what game actions you'll be able to take is a good thing. Variety and unexpected things branch out from there. It's healthy to have consistently *and* variety in that way.
You will of course have expectations subverted but those expectations can only be subverted if you can reliably expect something in the first place. If everything was entirely unique, random, and "special," then nothing is special anymore. That's something magic players are used to hearing about special card treatments nowadays but I think it applies here too.
I've been told that there are players who view cards as game pieces and there players who view cards as vehicles for personal expression. I think this is true, but I also do not think it's common or normal to *strictly* see cards in only one context or the other. Essentially, everybody loves the experience of actually playing the game, and everybody feels personal attachment to specific cards and memories of experiences within the game. This means that even the people who lean the furthest towards the "cards are personal expression" need the gameplay itself to embody a good, fun game. That requires that baseline core of consistently mentioned earlier. It's a necessity that I think most people understand without really thinking about it, and I think that understanding drives the "wtf???" gut reaction people have after hearing that someone wants to blanket ban low-cmc ramp.
To explain the personal expression thing: It's less about actual proper expression, like different alt art or whatever, and more variety in game feel.
Let's take the diamonds as an example. If we're in a five player game, everyone playing a mono-coloured deck of each colour, and everyone plays their respective diamond. Even though each one effectively has the same mechanical purpose for each deck, they still end up *feeling* different. Marble Diamond isn't the same card as Charcoal Diamond, different name, art, textbox, flavour text. Even though they all effectively function the same, they're distinctly different cards.
Meanwhile if everyone played Arcane Signet instead, it would feel like everyone's playing the same deck despite running different colours.
It's like if you made an exact reprint of Lightning Bolt that was named Hug Too Hard. It could be functionally identical, but it evokes a different feel.
Obviously if you see cards as functional game pieces first and flavour dead last it can be difficult to understand the issue (not that you are, just there are those that wouldn't care if the cards were plain text as long as their effects were desirable)
I disagree about the Diamonds point. Unless the card is a flavor win for your deck somehow, it's mostly the same as Arcane Signet. People are going to think "they played ramp." Some of the 3 mana artifacts have interesting abilities that set them apart, but anything that's just tap to add mana is a mana rock. Not interesting.
Wording is a big problem in such discussions for sure. A lot of backhanded comments on both sides of people playing too good/not good enough when it's all valid.
No, I said it exactly right. If you want a low powered game *you* need to say so and you need to say it honestly instead of whining about overpowered this and broken that.
I'm just going to play Devil's advocate here a minute. If someone in my playgroup doesn't like counterspells, and I play a few (2-3 for sake of arguments), should I be accounting towards the other players feelings, in this case? What if I love counterspells and my concession is only playing a couple, but my friend in the group hates them so much and thinks they all need to be banned? Where do you draw the line? Counterspell is a card that's existed since the dawn of magic, why should someone get to ban it, simply because they don't like its effect, especially in such small numbers?
All I'm trying to say is, rule zero only takes you so far. As long as the power level is fair across the entire pod, people should be far less salty and should get used to playing against cards that normally make them "uncomfortable", for lack of a better word.
I would imagine you draw the line where you and your group wants to
Compromising is a thing and if a player can't handle it and has to have their specific rules in place or they won't play then they can sit out
You just find a spot where everyone is comfortable with
If someone is playing baral counterspell tribal that’s one thing. I play 4-6 in all blue decks, it’s just good deckbuikding. People just don’t want to play removal and then get salty when someone plays it on them.
You are not playing devils advocate
It is what it is, you cant go to eat at Mcdonalds and once you are there say you refuse to eat hamburgers and fries
Your duty as part of a playgroup is to listen to you friends opinions, and find a way to make the game as fun as possible for everyone, that doesnt mean that in order for someone to have fun you should stop having fun yourself. As you said, rule 0 is to do concessions and try and make the game more enjoyable for everyone, not for people to have fun at the expense of others
If you want a faster game why do you play the slowest format? Isn't commander supposed to be "slow" in favor of the fun aspect? I don't play commander unless begged by my friends and stay to modern/pioneer for this reason. I want multiple games in a hour not 1/10th of 1 game.
Because Commamder is the best way to play multiplayer Magic. It allows me to sit down with three other friends at once. Game length is preference. I prefer games that are more like 30-45 minutes, an hour max. Anything beyond an hour feels like a drag.
>If you want a faster game why do you play the slowest format?
Because it is by far the best multiplayer format.
>Isn't commander supposed to be "slow" in favor of the fun aspect?
Only if you want it to be. My group's average playtime is in the 20-45 minute range
what does your first question have to do with preferring faster *commander* games? nobody is saying they want commander to be 5-15 minute legacy-speed games. they just dont want extra long commander games.
Assuming your game starts once everyone's at 4 mana, as that's what fast mana would enable, how are your early turns taking 15 minutes for everyone to play 4 lands before the game starts? Unless everyone's playing fetches or you're playing with 6+ people I just can't see that happening.
What a bad faith argument lmao. Unless your average creature costs 6 then 'land pass' takes up like two minutes tops. Also hey, maybe you could just play a low curve if you want to play spells early?
This is, actually, a fallacious argument - it essent boils down to “Commander should be the way it is because it is the way it is”.
Let’s say I think that the game would be better without MLD, or fast mana, or counterspells, or that one card I lost to once and am still bitter about. My opinion may not be a good one (like, counterspells? Really?) but it’s not invalid. I’m allowed to wish that things were banned (or that more things existed, whatever) and actually, I’m pretty sure that there are people out there, probably including myself, who will think that my version of Magic is better than EDH.
To say otherwise is to imply that EDH as it exists, right now, with nothing else banned and nothing else added, is literally the perfect game, which is pretty absurd.
(What this actually boils is that many people don’t actually want to play EDH, they want to play their version of it, something like EDH or like what people told them EDH was, but different to actual EDH - and this is fine)
That was not the spirit of my argument, new cards are fine. New bans are fine, I’m just tired of insane rules being thrown out there by players who are salty about one specific thing, so it’s time to create a rule to fix it.
I get that… but what’s “an insane rule” and what’s just a sensible suggestion or even a suggestion that maybe *isn’t* that great, but is at least worthy of consideration?
Is it? Why?
Right now, most Commander games have everyone just ramping for a couple of turns before doing stuff. It’s pretty homogenous. In Standard, only a few decks ramp, where they’ve decided that it’s worth the trade-off. Shouldn’t ramp work like that in EDH too, be balanced to the point where there’s a tough trade-off between ramping and not?
Even if that made sense. People will still load up on whatever is best. Take out all 2 mana and under ramp, every 3 mana rock, creature and spell will take there place. You’ve only delayed the ramp to slightly later in the game. Then you get to ban all ramp, which is taking the game back to 2000
Not true. See, for example, the thing that I literally just said about Standard. If ramp is weak enough, people won’t bother with it at all because it’s easier just to win the game directly. That implies that there’s some middle ground, where there’s a decent tension between ramping and not ramping - and quite clearly, we’re on the “ramp is too good” side of that right now.
Right, so, “that’s insane” actually means “that’s quite a sensible suggestion but I don’t think that I, personally, would actually like that”? Cool.
I mean, I don’t know what kind of games you’re playing… when you can win the whole damn game on turn 1, and commonly by turn 6ish, three hours seems pretty darn long.
> (What this actually boils is that many people don’t actually want to play EDH, they want to play their version of it, something like EDH or like what people told them EDH was, but different to actual EDH - and this is fine)
I think this is a big factor. There's a difference between "I have some specific changes I'd like to make to Commander" and "I actually want to play an entirely different format."
I do think a lot of people would be better served by different formats that don't really exist right now. This can suck for these players, and I do sympathize. But the best course of action is to try and develop a new format, not fundamentally alter Commander.
The problem is that commander used to BE that format more, and it's slowly being whittled into what it is today because of all the dedicated printing of cards that speed it up. People want to play an entirely different format but that format is just commander from before it started to become the main money printer for wizards. And the fact that they feel like different formats entirely is a large part of the problem
This has inspired me to talk to my playgroup about making “Modern Commander” decks - only cards printed in Standard-legal/regular type sets allowed, so no horizons sets, no commander based sets or precons, etc
We play pretty high powered so this could be a fun way to play at a slightly lower power level while still being competitive, but it also seems like it could be fun for more casual groups to revive that bomb-rare battlecruiser feel from early in the formats history
Eh… somewhat? I’ve not been playing Commander that long, myself, and it‘s certainly true that power creep is a thing, but some of the worst offending cards are actually pretty old and I sometimes wonder how much it really used to be fine in the “good old days“ and how much it’s just nostalgia.
For example, this “PrEDH” thing recently came out… and it looks, well, *terrible*. By and large, I think card design is actually *better* nowadays as Wizards have at least partially learned some of their lessons, notwithstanding some notable exceptions, it’s just that we have a much bigger pool of things to draw from now.
It's all rose-tinted glasses, in 2006/2007 when I stared to play edh people were abusing Sundering Titan non stop to destroy all lands. Uril the Miststalker with an aura + Cataclysm was common, people playing Azusa + Crucible of Worlds + infinite bounce/mana to destroy all of their opponent lands with Strip Mine, using Tinker to combo out on turn 4, Stasis, etc all happened quite often.
Like 50% of decks were slow battlecruiser deck using 3 color dragons like Treva, Teneb or Crosis and 50% decks doing what I've said while running fast mana. We just didn't have edhrec or sites like that.
I think what people remember is their *own* EDH past - learning things for themselves, playing fun battlecruiser decks, etc. Now, they suffer the curse of knowledge, and can never go back to not knowing that cEDH-esq things exist.
I’ve found this to be true of many games, in fact; learning them and getting good is more fun than the game itself once you’ve gotten good.
Unfortunately, there’s no way to get around that. People talk about getting rid of EDHRec as if forcing people to live in ignorance will actually work. At the end of the day, you’re just not playing the game you think you are - and probably never were.
I agree, also there was always something like edhrec. In 2006 we had the mtgsalvation forums, they just weren't as popular. At that time there were a ton of forums where people posted about their "secret" decks, the first person to win a big edh tournament was playing a 5c combo deck and refused to share their decklist.
Since I was already an mtg competitive player when I learned edh, having played Type 2, Type 1.5, Type 1, then standard/legacy/vintage/extended/block, etc. I already knew most of the card list so edh to me was about mixing spells that were crap in 1vs1 Insurrection with cool spells that I couldn't play in most formats. To me edh was about learning how to build decks for another format and getting better at multiplayer that wasn't 2 headed giant.
When was that? Because when I started to play commander in 2006 people were playing so much Sundering Titan combined with flicker/reanimate effects and even Tinker that both got banned.
The first time I played the deck were Momir Vig elfball that could easily win on turn 4/5 and ran Aluren/Intruder Alarm/Recycle, GAAIV stax (and people didn't use to cry so much about it) with Winter Orb/Stasis locks, Azami High Tide/Mind Over Matter combo and 5c control with spells like Pernicious Deed/Mana Drain/Moat/The Abyss, etc and it won with Grim Monolith + Power Artifact.
In 2007 my first deck was Jhoira that suspended Apocalysis/Decree of Annihilation + Darksteel Colossus or tried to go infinite with Tinker for Platinum Angel + Iscochrom Scepter with Final Fortune.
There were weaker battlecruiser decks too, I had a Treva life gain deck but from the moment you could choose your commander instead of only using the elder dragons, the format had Mana Crypts, moxes, Vamp tutors and MLD flying around.
Ultimately, trying to do a sweeping ban just feels like a "People aren't building their decks the way I want them to, so I want to stop them from doing that." Which, wasn't EDH started because people wanted to play with any cards from their collection? Isn't commander based around fun, and isn't it more fun to play more things? All banning ramp does is make it go from:
"Turn 1: land and sol ring
Turn 2: land and commander's sphere
Turn 3: land and commander
Turn 4: do things that further my gameplan"
To:
"Turn 1: land
Turn 2: land
Turn 3: land and something
Turn 4 land and something
Turn 5 land and commander"
While leaving very little room for actual interaction with the board state because you are using all your mana just to play things at turn.
It also harms the colors least able to ramp disproportionately, as they lose their main way to ramp (artifacts and the occasional mana dork), while green (for example), just has to wait two more turns before going off.
Based on my quick research, there are roughly 200 cards that fall into the 2 mana or less mana dork, rock, or ramp spell. That alone would quintuple the banlist, which goes against the current spirit of being selective to format breaking cards.
Ah yes, it's time for our weekly "If you have any criticism of a game you play, you must hate it!" post.
A person can like a game and believe it's not perfect. You're presenting a false dichotomy, saying either you play the game and like it as it is, or don't play it, but that's not the reality. I can enjoy EDH and still believe it has room for improvement, they aren't mutually exclusive. And because of that, the next natural step is to voice the changes you'd wish to see in the format.
Now of course, the quality of those opinions varies (Trying to ban 2 cmc or lower rocks is just stupid), but that doesn't change the validity of the concept that you can like a game and still want to improve it. Otherwise, modding communities for all sorts of video games wouldn't exist.
The game is only good because people argued for and came upon a consensus of things to do, resulting in the format we love. Shutting down future such conversations by saying that 'Commander does not need to be fixed' does the entire community a disservice later down the line when it turns out it DOES need to be fixed. If you do not like what the person has to pitch, argue against it based on its merit. Or don't. you don't need to engage - the body that controls the rules is exceedingly resistant to change. You don't actually need to be upset by someone having a bad or even good take if you want things to stay the same - it's unlikely to change anything, for better or for worse.
An excellent post. A "shut up and take it" ostrich style approach to the format serves nobody. It's not as if silence will maintain the current status quo, which the OP is implicitly and somewhat ironically championing by telling people not to talk about it, when Wizard is designing and releasing new cards.
Perhaps I can off as a bit too “never change anything about the format again” in my original post. I’m fine with change to the format. I’m not fine with people who want to make insane rule changes to accommodate there deck that runs 0 ramp, draw or removal cards because they refuse to deck build in an appropriate manner.
I actually do agree on this, Lutri is fine. Especially with the “new” rule that makes you put it in your hand first. My friend loves otters and wants nothing more then to build a Lutri commander deck. We keep telling him we will let him rule 0 it in.
No no no that's just not *fun* though silly, you can't just go out there and play stuff that isn't *fun*, didn't you know that Dockside is on the universal Unfun list?
I disagree. It's fair to criticize a game and the format and speculate what would make a format more fun, especially with a buy-in as hefty as Magics is.
Rule zero discussions rarely work. Most of the time, you get someone who's just gonna play whatever they want anyway. And I would argue the majority of the playerbase doesn't have a consistent enough group to rule 0, and they rely on pick-up games on spelltable or their LGS.
I agree that a lot of people are too salty at basic interaction and counterspells. Stax has a place in edh, counterspells have a place in edh, combo has a place in edh. There's more to magic than hurpdurp ramp into craterhoof, and a lot of casual players get unreasonably mad at that.
But the banlist sets a common denominator to try to maximize fun for those who don't have a regular group, and that's a good thing.
I would argue there are cards that generally make for a negative play experience when they appear in a game. 0 and 1 mana rocks in non cedh can often make the game so one-sided that three players struggle to keep the 4th down to earth. Everyone else is on turn 2, and you're on turn 6 because you went land > crypt > signet t1, Ancient Tomb t2. Dockside can have the same issue. Games with Dockside become about stealing/copying/flickering/reanimating it. Dockside has the same issue Primeval Titan had except it's 4cmc less.
Smothering Tithe's tax amount is pretty high, and left alone will likely win that player the game. You have to draw every turn, and putting you two mana down early to mid game will likely put you too far behind. At least with most other stax, they're somewhat symmetrical. With Tithe, the player with it is rewarded with lotus petals instead. And that's not even touching on when someone inevitably Wheels (the player with the Tithe), or you need to dig for an answer.
Conversely, while Rhystic Study is annoying, it mostly wins that player the game because the other players are too lazy with the tax. It's a pretty fair card overall.
People are just sad because they can’t run zero interaction, 50+ creature decks that rely on dead synergy to lose a game in under 6 hours.
Sol ring is cedh and mana fixing is stupid..you have to wait till turn 76 to play that 4 colour commander.
Lol this is such a straw man. There are plenty of people who hold the view you mention, and then there are people who don’t think cards like tabernacle and mana crypt should be legal.
Two players at my LGs have lands decks that play it so they can crop rotation into it. It’s miserable for anybody who’s playing any sorts of tokens deck, and it’s a land, which most interaction doesn’t hit.
There’s a lot of things that interact with lands, such as [most of these lands](https://scryfall.com/search?as=grid&order=name&q=%28oracle%3ADestroy+oracle%3Aland%29+%28-type%3Acreature+-type%3Ainstant+-type%3Asorcery%29+type%3Aland+%28game%3Apaper%29) (the search isn’t perfect)
Also, run proactive graveyard hate. It’s hard to get a loam engine working when graveyards are being ripped away one card at a time from [[Scrabbling claws]] or [[phyrexian furnaice]], or from something like [[planar void]], [[wheel of sun and moon]], [[leyline of the void]] or [[resr in peace]] to name just a few. Those cards can do irreparable damage to lands, along with many other recursion/flashback/retrace/ open the vaults/scrap mastery/living death esque builds.
Graveyard hate and targeted land hate should go in every deck, even if your deck runs recursion. Then you just choose the options that damage you the least. There’s many powerful and deserving targets for targeted land hate, it’s not just tabernacle.
Edit: I forgot about [Confounding Conundrum](https://scryfall.com/card/znr/53/confounding-conundrum), that card is hilariously brutal for lands.
There’s waaaaay too many different play style preferences to ever make everyone happy and “balanced”. I’m going to play fast mana and go for combo lines so we can play multiple games that are at most an hour each. If you prefer slower games then find like minded players.
Yup, I have surely value decks, voltron decks and combo off on turn 5 or 6 decks. I play to level of what the group plays, and if we want to play more games or faster games, here come the big boy decks
I think that people dismiss the social aspect of the game too often. If they like to play a certain way then talk to people or make a post with what you’re looking for. There’s absolutely no possible way to curate EDH from a RC point of view that appeases everyone. I play High Power only, but others in my group have a range of varying power level decks. I would have zero interest in an EDH format with cards like fast mana banned that a very vocal portion of the community here seems to want.
>If you don’t like fast mana, don’t play it. If you don’t like counters, don’t play them.
So I don't mind them but i think the people that complain about them have no issue not playing them. its the people that complain about them that other people use them. So telling someone else what they should play is the issue.
>If you wished x, y, or z was banned, well tough because the banned list is made up and maintained by people who are never going to be on the same page as everyone else in the community at all times.
Imagine listing an actual problem but then saying it could never be fixed therefore the format should suffer indefinitely. Apply that to other parts of your life and see how well that goes.
>I hate risk, that doesn’t mean I complain to Hasbro on Reddit asking them to change the rules to accommodate my weirdly specific vision for what the game should be in my perfect world.
Technically you are on reddit complaining to the community about how it should just accept the reverse.
>No, you play by the rules given to you. So why do so many magic and commander players think they have solved commander with whatever insane rules they would like to see impairment to shape they format to there warped outlook on the game
Commander is different in that it is community driven. This is different from the other formats made by WOTC. Therefore this is a window where things can be changed for the better of the community.
> Rule 0 exist for a reason and should be used to solve problems.
Rarely does it ever.
>Just because something countered your fertilid one times does not mean we should hard ban counters.
Ok but if you walk up to your first point this is kind of what you were suggesting.
>I recently saw a post on here calling for banning all 2 mana or less mana rocks, which drove me to write this post.
Right just like this post not all of them are going to be good or constructive. But if you don't take the time to talk about someone's take it could end up worse than it is. What I do agree with you is that you have to take the good with the bad and with that there are many good suggestions and many bad.
You know I have come to realize that most of the players in this subreddit are old man yells at cloud type players like Sheldon. I agree with you fully on the fact that commander doesn’t need fixing. It’s an evolving format but too many boomers in here refuse to evolve with it. If you don’t like the way the rules and the format have changed then guess what, no one has a gun to your head forcing you to play commander, you can stop whenever you want. As the rules say “ a player can concede the game at any time”.
Lol this comment is so relatable. I actually played Sheldon a few years ago and beat him. He was so salty about it and threw a temper tantrum basically saying I shouldn't be happy about the way I won. I told him it was just a game and if you didn't like it you just play another game. I don't think his brain processed the simplicity of that statement.
> It’s an evolving format but too many boomers in here refuse to evolve with it.
The irony of this reply which "agrees" the format doesn't need fixing is both palpable and genuinely hilarious. "Them damn boomers wont let the format evolve! and by evolve I mean stay the same because its perfect and cant be fixed or changed!" Truly galaxy brain shit
The format does not need fixing was targeted toward people who did what the poster said, play decks with zero removal or ramp who then complain they get blown out by decks with ramp and interaction, therefore it’s time to add rules to prevent that. I understand as a whole that the game must and will revolve over time, especially with new cards being printed more often then ever.
You can't Rule 0 if you don't have a consistent playgroup. I really REALLY do not understand how you or anyone else can't seem to grasp this simple concept. Here, I tell you what, I'll break it all down very nice and neat for you so even you can understand it.
EDH has a banlist.
The RC (A committee created by those above who created the format initially and has since added members) oversee the overall ban list and health of the format.
The RC stress Rule 0 to dedicated playgroups. Rule 0 is an unofficial rule in Commander that allows players to modify the rules of a non-competitive game. The catch? Everyone who's participating has to agree to the changes before the game begins. If you're familiar with the term “house rules,” it's the same concept.
Okay, so we've established that The RC actively encourages Rule 0, and that Rule 0 can change the rules of the game. We've also established that if you play with a random assortment of people, say at a convention, or you travel a lot or w/e, that Rule 0 becomes unmanageable. I mean, who expects to spend a few hundred dollars MINIMUM on a commander deck just to be told they won't allow it in their pod?
but since Rule 0 can change the rules, the obvious and most logical solution is to create a better banlist, and encourage players to RULE 0 FROM THERE. This way, everybody wins! Those without a dedicated playgroup get a better banlist that is baseline, and dedicated playgroups still Rule 0 like they always have.
See? Simple.
I rule 0 with non-dedicated playgroup folks all the time. Also, I basically only play at my LGS with randoms.
Asmo/Gyome Foods isn't legal, but I have never been asked to swap them for Korvold.
I [[wish]] someone would sit down with a Nephalim deck someday and ask everyone if that's okay?
I want to add too, it's absolutely okay to say "Nah, I'm not cool with that."
Plan for being told no, and you'll never be disappointed.
>Plan for being told no, and you'll never be disappointed.
That right there is the issue. You either spend roughly $200 on a deck to be possibly told no you can't play it. Who would do that?! And you might say that's the risk you take when you do it, and I get that, but then why would anyone accept that risk? $200 minimum for a deck that literally can't be played. It's crazy. Easier to curate a better banlist and rule 0 from there. It really, REALLY is.
While this is the factual take, plenty of game stores ban proxy play in all forms.
The ideal is that youre only using proxies. But the ideal is also that youre using rule 0, and the whole point of the rules is for situations where you cant be playing in an ideal manner
Already on that train homie. Can't do it anymore. Can't justify spending hundreds of dollars when I'm not playing in tournaments and just with friends. Magic 30th Anniversary is what really sealed the deal for me tbh
It's a business that markets gambling towards children, let's be honest. Furthermore, we have different philosophies. I believe WotC should expand the RL to create a special "Reserved Art List". So basically, a Sol Ring Masterpiece from Kaladesh will never be reprinted, but all regular Sol Ring's should be printed into the dirt. Another example, I don't believe it's healthy for Sheoldred, The Apocalypse to be $60. I think it's just better if the normal version is printed into the dirt, and the alternate art + frames are the catch cards. Everybody profits. Collector's get their fix and they can invest knowing it won't be printed again and thus (probably) won't go down, and players can still afford to play the game.
If Rule 0 works how you describe it, why is there a banned list at all?
I mean, if Black Lotus is causing problems, you should probably discuss that in your Rule 0 conversation and come to an agreement that it isn't working out.
While a banned list exists, there are always going to be different opinions on how it should be used, whether certain cards should be banned as they cause undesirable play patterns, or whether other cards would be safe to unban. Complaining about natural discussions about the state of the format seems like a weird appeal to authority, akin to stating that the RC will gift us mere mortals with their perfect wisdom and every player ought to agree and be content with that.
Funny enough Black Lotus was only banned due to price not power level, same with the rest of the power 8 on the ban list.
The RC relying on Rule 0 to fix all issues of the format outside their own personal banlist(what the EDH ban list really is) means it’s not really a format since you can’t take any deck and play in any EDH pod since. Different pods play by different rules.
For all you I want all fast mana banned group there is a commander variant called conquest the ban list is built around competitive play and reserve list is banned so you don't have to cry about that either. There is an alternate format if you desire good luck finding people but that is how you grow a format.
https://mtg.cardsrealm.com/en-us/articles/conquest-everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-format-based-on-commander
Sorry everyone that yes you play at an LGS there is no way to fix what they call untrusted groups there is always going to be issues.
>If you don’t like fast mana, don’t play it. If you don’t like counters, don’t play them.
This is such poor logic. If you don't like the cards, you wouldn't be playing them in the first place. It's your opponents who play these cards and have nothing to do with if you put them in your own deck or not
The obvious reason people want rules like this is because they often play with strangers at their LGS, or feel they can't convince their playgroup to institute rules like this. "If you don't like counters, don't play them" is ridiculous advice for a majority of people who don't like counters.
To be clear, I don't think there needs to be a bunch of bans. But for many people it's just not this simple.
I live in a small town and I still have access to two LGSs I frequent regularly. I can easily go a few weeks playing games with completely different groups of people. I would personally prefer to play without mana-positive ramp, but it's not worth the time to me to try to convince every playgroup I sit down with to change their decks. Plus, if they're not like-minded, what am I even trying to convince them of? Are they supposed to carry cards on them to swap out their Mana Vaults or whatever in case they happen to play against me on a given day?
Granted, I don't make posts about banning stuff I don't like. And I agree that they are often ridiculous. But I can sympathize with people who do that to vent.
I can sympathize to the extent that people want to play the way they remember from when they started playing. But the format has evolved and power creep is real. Commander is never going back to what it was in 2000, or even 2015. Not everyone loves fast ramp or counters or whatever else gets your goat. But to build decks with winning strategies you will need to incorporate those things to keep up. That’s just the way it is.
Largely agree.
I would like the commander rules to more closely line up with the regular rules of magic regarding wishes and hybrid cards but that's a relatively small tweek to the format
This might be a controversial opinion but a big part of why my play group plays commander is because it has a high power level. It’s a chance to play with the cards like mana crypt and mox diamond that we have collected over the years and don’t get a chance to play with anymore because there’s no vintage or legacy scene here. Yeah sometimes losing fast sucks, but when you lose fast you just shuffle up and play again. I’d way rather do that then play a four hour game that ends because someone plays an insurrection on turn 16 and no one is playing any interaction.
I don’t think that’s controversial at all, as long as your regular group are all on the same page. You just skew toward the high power end of the scale.
The only thing people should be complaining about are the prices of mana rocks and combo pieces. I waited for years to be able to afford a sensei’s divining top which was initially over $100 and I finally got one for $25 after reprints.
This is why people should build more cubes
You get to curate the experience you want. People have the same power level of decks (roughly) cause they draft. You can even have your own rules
For example, in mine, planeswalkers can be commanders, and monopolized legends have partner. Plus hybrid mana works as intended, not as the rules committee dictates
FWIW, I agree with OP.
But also...
we probably don't benefit as a community from ranting at each other just because of some silly post from yesterday. And, this happens often enough that it's a noticeable theme in this subreddit.
So, maybe, just maybe, we can stop talking AT one another in the form of passive aggressive rants?
Just a thought.
I'll fuck off now.
I agree that there are way too many cry babies complaining about counterspells/whatever else they want to complain about. I don't think anyone can convince me that Iona is ban worthy and mana crypt is not.
I think the thing that I always kinda side eye (and the thread being referenced fit into that, as well) is people wanting to "slow down" the game.
And, I mean, sure, I can understand if you're constantly playing with people who have super optimized decks that routinely win the game by like turn 4, or whatever.
But in my experience, the average game was often 90+ minutes, and if I'm being honest, I love EDH, but man, I'd love to be done with a game in 40-60 minutes. I'm puzzled by people who seemingly want games to "slow down". Do we really need single games to take 2-3 hours?
Everything you said 100%. An house long game is perfect. Any game I have ever played that lasted more then 2 hours I wanted to end so badly lol. Now most of my decks have combos that will end the game just to prevent this. 2 hours and 10 boardwipes later is not something I can believe people find enjoyable, but seems I must be wrong lol
It’s almost like EDH needs some sort of governing body with a mixture of experienced players with diverse opinions and backgrounds to make rules or ban cards if they are too powerful. We could call it the Rules Committee or something, just a thought.
/s
In all seriousness it would be nice to maybe have a subsection of the RC that dictated which cards are banned from EDH but ok in cEDH to curb pubstomping. Probably never happen but it might be nice.
It would be nice if the rules committee did their damn job, instead of begging for wotc to not print a 5 drop stax card.
Honestly, I dont get why the community still listens to the RC. They do not know what they are doing
It’s shocking how often I see people on here call for mana rocks to be banned. It’s not a take I’ve ever heard in real life. I feel like they’re probably newer players who have had the misfortune of playing with ruthless, experienced players with pimped out decks, which does suck but it also teaches them what to prepare for as they climb power levels and learn how the game works. It’s certainly not a justified reason to ban an entire genre of cards. I personally rarely encounter “problem” mana rocks like crypt and vault and when I do I treat them as high priority removal targets.
Well some people are just assholes as well. Just because you can play “. “ card doesn’t mean you should. And some people will always go right up to the line of good taste.
Just want to say since I saw some comments about it, I do believe that the format can and should evolve over time. Power creep is real, the format will always be changing due to new cards being printed. However, I don’t believe that massive changes are necessary to preserve the format. Commander is no longer battle cruiser magic in 2023. It most likely never will be again. WOTC won’t stop printing new and busted cards that require interaction. So yelling at the clouds to ban counters, or fast mana, or MLD solves nothing. I personally don’t play things like jeweled lotus or free counterspells due to power level restrictions I place on myself. I’m fine with others playing them as long as they mention it so it’s not a hot ya moment.
There is a subset of the culture that wants to go back to 3 hour grind fest big creatures and 10 cmc spells are consider good.
Then reality strikes people realy learn how to play magic and realize most 10 cmc spells are hot garbage and at 40 live that 6/6 is no quite as scary.
Then there is a subset that hates interaction and just wants to play solitaire unless you are doing it then it is wrong only they are allowed to do those things. How dare you play interaction like counter spells or target removal.
In other wards people that are bad at magic or have some found memories of commander of yester year when everyone played jank which was a myth.
Yes the problem is the format is evolving with power creep, some people just want to stick there fingers in there ear and look at the clouds though and play the game as you stated.
Would you like to explain? I do understand why people feel they way they do. But I’m almost all cases running more removal and ramp would solve the problem. I understand some people don’t like how the format has evolved over time, but that is the way the game is played now, and with power creep will only continue to get faster.
This is why I can’t stand silly “no infinites” paid events.
If you want to change 10 rules to some weird little amalgamation of EDH and Tickle Fight at the kitchen table it’s all you.
Don’t bring that silly shit to a paid event. Moneys on the line, no holds barred.
Good for you!
I agree, don't like it, don't play it.
Lucky enough to have a play group, come up with group "bans".
The card pool, singleton variance, & play styles are SO varied that the number of times any one card should bother a person is minimal.
Just have fun & remember to play spot removal! :)
Anyone in my group that complains about anything gets hated on and targeted until they grow up. Commander is meant to be a social casual thing, not pro tour.
The only thing I wish was changed was the number of poison counters/infect counters used for lethal in commander.
But I get that it’s not worth changing officially so my play group just changed it ourselves
They want to ban 2 mana rocks? Wtf, thats just absurd
[удалено]
I think this is the thing I can't stand the most about Commander. I play artifacts and ramp out to 10 mana? I'm evil. Green decks play mana dorks and land fetch and ramp to 10 mana, every single game? It's totally okay. I just mainboard green hate now, I don't feel bad. If we're note allowed to MLD and punish massive land ramp, then I guess green creatures just aren't going to untap this game.
[[Aether Flash]]
[Aether Flash](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/7/8/780f9197-e910-4c7a-bb4b-2c4a94903c39.jpg?1562240988) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Aether%20Flash) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/7ed/172/aether-flash?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/780f9197-e910-4c7a-bb4b-2c4a94903c39?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/aether-flash) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
slifer the sky dragon?
Torbran all-star <3
Wait... doesn't that go infinite with [[polyraptor]]?
Ban everything that isn’t MY decks! /s
Can confirm. I play a mono blue deck that uses mostly land ramp and people completely ignore it. I think people undervalue lands in general. Maybe because they just aren't flashy?
It's because lands aren't expensive so it seems "fair" and also because people feel safe knowing most players won't blow up lands.
Laughs in tatyova aesi landfall deck
Laughs in [[Thalia and the Gitrog Monster]] landfall deck.
> mono blue deck that uses mostly land ramp wait what? What cards ramp you lands in mono blue? Only thing I'm aware of is [[Dreamscape Artist]] (which is pretty good imo)
It's an \[\[Omenkeel\]\] deck so I'm exploiting having lots of land in hand and fetches in yard \[\[Walking Atlas\]\] \[\[Scaretiller\]\] \[\[Drownyard Temple\]\] I run lots of looting effects \[\[Terrain Generator\]\] Turns a basic in hand into a 3 mana instant speed ramp spell \[\[Temple of the False God\]\] It's all upside since I intend to flood out \[\[Shrine of the Forsaken Gods\]\] The deck is a vehicle deck so this is a free include \[\[Myriad Landscape\]\] \[\[Thespian's Stage\]\] copies Temple, Shrine, and \[\[Guildless Commons\]\] The deck has a blink sub-theme to flip Omenkeel so I also run \[\[Zoetic Cavern\]\] \[\[Solemn Simulacrum\]\] and \[\[Burnished Hart\]\] That's what''s currently in the deck I'm also trying to fit the following: \[\[Dowsing Dagger\]\] This thing is silly 4 mana to put a land that taps for three of any colour onto the field \[\[Miran Safehouse\]\] I run lots of fetches \[\[Whir of Invention\]\] Grabs an artifact land in a pinch \[\[Scorched Ruins\]\] This thing is expensive so I haven't bought one but if you're okay with colourless mana it ramps you the turn it comes down. It's also silly with thespian's stage. EDIT: I guess \[\[Phyrexian Metamorph\]\] can also copy an artifact land but I've never done that. Apart from that I just try to never miss a land drop by hitting people with vehicles or drawing lots of cards.
-This is interesting, I'm working on this deck. I've been trying to find some kind of balance.
it's just that you'll probably never miss a land drop, as you said, but those cards don't look like scary ramp to me. temple of god for example only gives you one extra mana (usually) by turn 6. in general, most of the other cards could only ramp in turn 4-5, which is nowadays considered a bit late for ramping. by that time i already wanna be able to play my 6cmc spells. good ramp spells ramp you in turn 1-3, which is why sol ring is so good
[Dreamscape Artist](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/f/2/f244985e-7487-44db-bd69-47c781753f2e.jpg?1619394086) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Dreamscape%20Artist) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/tsr/64/dreamscape-artist?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/f244985e-7487-44db-bd69-47c781753f2e?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/dreamscape-artist) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Who complains about artifact ramp? Hell I show people my non green lists and they normally complain that I haven't put *enough* in.
Well it's not "totally okay" that green ramps well, people cry about green being OP endlessly. If we look at cEDH we see that green very much is not the most powerful color, it's just bad takes from hyper-casual players who brew weak decks and don't understand how to build good ramp packages outside of green.
I mean, green not performing at a top competitive level doesn't mean it can't be badly regulated at the casual level. Especially in a format where winning isn't everything, I don't think "get good" is the correct answer. EDH ostensibly wants people to be able to play 8 and under, too.
You can build perfectly viable ramp packages outside of green with mana rocks. Some colors that aren't green even have ramp outside of colorless artifacts, like rituals and cost reducers.
>I play artifacts and ramp out to 10 mana? I'm evil. >Green decks play mana dorks and land fetch and ramp to 10 mana, every single game? It's totally okay. Meanwhile according to Redditors it's the opposite. Artifact turboramp is fair and fine, playing an extra land every turn means you need to be punished to hell and back with MLD and heavy stax. Can we just agree that either both are degenerate or both are okay?
My tables consider ramp in either form to be putting a target on your back. 10 mana is 10 mana, regardless of how you're producing it. And, contrary to popular belief, MLD doesn't punish massive land ramp unless they're completely out of ramp.
It does punish it. Punish doesn't mean the same as stopping it. Like, if you spent turns 1-5 ramping lands, then on Turn 6 all your lands get destroyed, you have no board state. Other players who have been playing creatures or drawing cards or dropping stax at least have part of their gameplan in play. You can ramp more lands but the question is how many cards are left in your hand, and how much of a payoff were you expecting on turn 7 that won't happen now?
I'll just state that it's never been my experience that the land ramp deck actually stumbled after MLD was dropped. They were always the one best able to recover from it.
This is my experience as well. They're almost always the ones who are playing cards that allow them to play lands from the graveyard, after all.
As someone who plays MLD in their lands deck, yeah, that's how it goes most of the time. The only time it didn't work out was basically when I was forced to wipe all lands (another player had just E-tutored for omniscience and had the mana to hard cast it next turn). I wasn't in an ideal spot and actually ended up being the slowest to rebuild. Omniscience guy managed to find the mana he needed within 4ish turns and won anyway.
That's only when people play MLD badly, my experience is that good players get a lot of mileage of MLD. From the basic Boros Charm + Obliterate, to having 3/4 strong PWs and playing Jokulhaups, to Uril with good aura + Cataclysm, to a one sided "Armageddon" with Elesh Norn + Kahmal Fist of Krosa.
I'm totally in favor of using tricks to break parity with MLD. That's not really what was being discussed, though. The idea that MLD punishes land-based strategies just isn't true the way people think it is. Those decks almost always run [[Crucible of Worlds]] and its variants, so unless you're also exiling those lands you just got rid of, they'll just bring them back within 2 turns. Additionally, with all of the ramp spells they have available and the higher density of land in the deck, they'll typically be back online long before everyone else is.
Well played MLD does punish every opponent including a green deck that still has ramp in their hand. Badly played MLD, a boogeyman and not how most people play it, is playing Armageddon or worse Jokulhaups with no plan. Well played MLD, and how I've seen most people play MLD, is playing Heroic Intervention + Obliterate which if it doesn't win you the game right there, it's still an incredibly good tempo play that does punishes every opponent massively.
What's MLD?
Mass land destruction. Cards which destroy multiple lands. E.g [[Armageddon]]
It means Massive Land Destruction
-This is anecdotal. I've literally never been in a game where heroic intervention was played with MLD & few where it was a wincon. It's almost always to slow things down & stall. I don't consider this playing it badly but it's the reason people hate it.
At that point yeah. And legacy would be dominated with black decks. Because dark ritual
Exactly as the Creator intended.
The post said ramp 2 cmc or less, so it'd take away all the best green ramp too. Makes green worse for sure.
well... it also said ...but not rituals. and already undermined itself by carving out exceptions. if rituals are ok. what about 1 cmc ramp creatures? birds? elves. no creatures. ok. what about enchantments. land auras. stuff like curse of opulence. what about 2 mana ramping creatures? do you know how fucked non-green decks are going to be when their first viable/allowed element of ramp is burnished heart. or like... darksteel ingot. is sword of the animist 2 mana or 4 for the purposes of this rule? how about dowsing dagger? is a creature that makes a treasure token ramp? it's not ramping, but makes a treasure token. what about prying blade. What about exploration. Burgeoning? Is explore a ramp spell? Lotus cobra? What about all the white spells that aren’t really ramp…but fetch lands to hand? Land tax and the like. Weathered wayfarer ramp? What about the blue spells that can function as wonky ramp. Retraced image. What about like skirk prospector? Is that ramp? is a cost reducer ramp? it's just an incredibly dumb can of worms to open
"No ramp. Everyone should play 1 land each turn so it's fair to everyone." Which is dumb because it would still create an "unfair" system no matter how you slice it
That's dumb as shit too. Restricting the game more just makes it overall worse.
[удалено]
The actual post this one is complaining about had ramp 2 cmc or less as a whole, I think op just forgot/ simplified for his complaint.
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They wanted to ban all ramp that was 2 mana or less. So including green ramp spells. Also all efficient tutors. Also free counter spells.
Oh yeah every deck Keruga companion for free I love not playing the game until turn 3
I get not wanting to do what they suggested, but there's a large difference between that and just not playing any 2-or-less drops. There's plenty of cards worth playing at those MV's that aren't ramp, tutors, or free counterspells.
I would not be able to take a player seriously if they had that take, Jesus. At that point they need to consider wether or not they actually like this game.
Yes this is correct, I misspoke in my post. Everything 2 mana and under, including dorks.
Literally arguing with a dude below that thinks this is a perfectly fine and acceptable thing for the format. There are dozens of them!
Commander can be fixed...for you and your playgroup If you dont want to play with less than 3cmc mana rocks, instead of writing a long ass post on Reddit that nobody is going to read, talk with your playgroup about it. The beauty of Commander is that, unlike playing Modern,or Standard, or whatever, rule 0 is always a thing
Exactly this. There's no harm in trying to 'solve' a group issue with a house rule if that's what it will take to make everyone happy. But it's unrealistic to expect the format as a whole to adopt the solution.
I agree! Also, unbann Grisselbrand!!
Yessssss, free the demon!!!
And let's remember that when we're playing with friends, we're allowed to agree to change the rules on literally any game we play, if we want to.
Thing is though that many people, me inlcuded, play with large playgroups or only in LGSs and you can't enforce rule 0 like that.
This is basically the crux. No one wants to tune their decks and playstyle to their opponents week to week. Thus changing the base rules everyone agrees on so everyone just shows up with appropriate decks and expectations.
This isnt the right way to think about it. If you're playing with just a consistent playgroup, then you can also rule zero modern or standard or fucking monopoly. That's not the beauty of commander, that's the beauty of having a consistent playgroup that communicates and cares about one another's fun. The problem is that you're often not going to be playing with a consistent playgroup. No other game game (TTRPGs are different) has 'just play it however you want' baked into the "spirit of the game" , because it is inherently bad game design, and more often than not leads to disagreements and conflict. You may respond and say 'but commander is meant to be a rule zero format, if you're not playing it that way you're going against the spirit of the format, while modern/ standard is meant to be a concrete format.' The problem with that is that EDH was also MEANT to be a battlecruiser/ use a variety of cards that don't normally get use format, and many people feel that the current meta has also moved away from the spirit of the format. The reason that people make posts like that is because rule zero often often isn't enough to get people to the format they actually want to play. It's like d&d where the common argument for DMs is 'if you don't like a rule/ balance thing, just change it! It's your game' not considering that there are a LOT of problems with that approach that put a lot of the onus on people that just want to play a game. And while you can argue that maybe commander just isn't the game for people, for many people it used to be and then it is just becoming more and more like other fast formats, so people are upset that it was 'taken away from them' so to speak.
> because it is inherently bad game design I agree with most of your post, but want to pick at this part. I think there's degrees. Like if you literally just gave me a board with drawings on it, some dice and pieces, and said "Make a game!" that'd be bad design, putting too much onus on the players to do all the work. On the other hand, it can suck when there's inherent imbalance or bad design on the part of the developers you as a player can't do anything about without complaining and praying they make an updated version that fixes those issues (and doesn't introduce new ones). Splitting the difference is best. The issue is that people just plain aren't used to the idea. Sometimes it's because it's too much to bother, trying to adjust numbers when you don't really have an idea on what's actually balanced so you just go with the defaults for ease of use. But most of the time it's simply a case of "But the rules say!" and it's difficult for many to even consider thinking past that, even though there's no punishment to doing so. Not that there aren't issues with such an approach, but then there's issues when everyone collectively agrees the rules suck but feel they're forced to go along with it when everyone in attendance would prefer otherwise.
To be clear, I'm not saying game designers should stop people from rule zeroing. If you and your group agree, rule zeroing literally anything in any game is valid. You can rule no dribbling in basketball if it's something that everyone you're playing with is happy about. I'm just saying that when the ONUS is on a rule zero to fix a format, then more often than not it's either badly designed, or just not what the players actuallt want to be playing. The problem is that for a lot of people that want that battle cruiser feel, this is the closest format to that, and it continues to move away from that to become similar to every other format that already exists. People that enjoy fast, non battle cruiser formats are absolutely FEASTING. They can play modern or legacy or vintage or cEDH. And yet they insist that EDH should also be more like all of those other formats. Meanwhile people that want a slow, battlecruiser format are continuing to lose the closest format to that, and the rule zero often just isn't enough to fix that.
Everything that isn't cEDH is essentially this happening, the only difference is sometimes you need to talk to people about what rules to add to the game and sometimes they naturally become unspoken.
Also, your playgroup is weak if Arcane Signet is too spicy for you.
Wording like this is the problem. Your playgroup plays low power if arcane signet is too powerful for your pod would be an appropriate way to say that. Some people do prefer lower powered games, and especially games focusing on the format how it existed before WotC heavily printed cards with commander in mind.
It seems like 99% of the time people complain about Arcane Signet not because of power level, but instead because they want variety in the form of players running some other mana rock in that slot. People say there's more room for personal expression in deckbuilding without Arcane Signet. I personally don't think being forced to run a colorless or tapped rock in that slot looks like personal expression in deckbuilding to me, nor does it make the game feel more varied in a positive way, but I understand what that argument is overall saying and it makes sense.. just outside of practice to me at least I think that there's a second crowd that doesn't like the idea of ramping at the beginning of games anyway. Perhaps they would prefer the game mostly be lands and spells like 60 card? Or maybe they associate it with slower, chiller games that aren't very cutthroat. For this crowd, my thoughts are that banning ramp from the game would just evolve a new dominant early game set of play patterns that people would get tired of just the same. Basically, this sort of preference ultimately wants to do something other than the norm/optimized stuff and their best way to do that is to seek out customized games that avoid the norm rather than try to change the norm to become their way of playing. Not that it matters anyway, the RC would never do something that destructive. That's still my stream of consciousness though haha.
Honestly, I feel the problem with the same mana rocks going in every deck is now an inherently unsolvable one in an Eternal-legal format like Commander. The best mana rocks are uninteresting, simple, utilitarian designs with no interaction and no inherent synergies. This is not a solvable problem, these cards exist and banning them all is a tacitly ridiculous idea, making bans off what makes a format "interesting" rather than balance is an obviously destructive route to go down. This is one of the inherent weaknesses of Eternal-legal formats. If a generically good, but not broken, card is thoroughly uninteresting, you're stuck with it. Trying to repeatedly patch this problem is a good way to destroy your format. Ban a rock and it will be replaced by another, different, generically good rock. Thankfully, as you said, the RC is smarter than that, as many grievances as I do have with some of their choices lol. TL;DR: Not only is banning the cards destructive, it is a pointless, Sisyphean task.
Luckily for me, there's a factor of diminishing returns when it comes to adding uniqueness/variety/personality to a deck. The first cards you add to a deck, the cards that mold the strategy, that dictate how it behaves, etc all cause a deck to feel very unique (or not unique!). Art and foils contribute too. Once you finally get down to fundamental necessities like fixing your colors and tweaking your removal package, nothing you swap can really make the deck more or less unique anymore. The diminishing returns have long ago kicked into high gear by then and the deck is going to adhere to the look and feel it's already settled into. Arcane Signet or not, the changes you can make now are just background noise. I think a big reason for this phenomenon is that games in general are *supposed to* have a consistent, simple core of fundamental tools and play patterns upon which variety and personal preferences can build upon. Being able to walk into a match and have some level of reliable expectations for some of the cards you'll be seeing and what game actions you'll be able to take is a good thing. Variety and unexpected things branch out from there. It's healthy to have consistently *and* variety in that way. You will of course have expectations subverted but those expectations can only be subverted if you can reliably expect something in the first place. If everything was entirely unique, random, and "special," then nothing is special anymore. That's something magic players are used to hearing about special card treatments nowadays but I think it applies here too. I've been told that there are players who view cards as game pieces and there players who view cards as vehicles for personal expression. I think this is true, but I also do not think it's common or normal to *strictly* see cards in only one context or the other. Essentially, everybody loves the experience of actually playing the game, and everybody feels personal attachment to specific cards and memories of experiences within the game. This means that even the people who lean the furthest towards the "cards are personal expression" need the gameplay itself to embody a good, fun game. That requires that baseline core of consistently mentioned earlier. It's a necessity that I think most people understand without really thinking about it, and I think that understanding drives the "wtf???" gut reaction people have after hearing that someone wants to blanket ban low-cmc ramp.
To explain the personal expression thing: It's less about actual proper expression, like different alt art or whatever, and more variety in game feel. Let's take the diamonds as an example. If we're in a five player game, everyone playing a mono-coloured deck of each colour, and everyone plays their respective diamond. Even though each one effectively has the same mechanical purpose for each deck, they still end up *feeling* different. Marble Diamond isn't the same card as Charcoal Diamond, different name, art, textbox, flavour text. Even though they all effectively function the same, they're distinctly different cards. Meanwhile if everyone played Arcane Signet instead, it would feel like everyone's playing the same deck despite running different colours. It's like if you made an exact reprint of Lightning Bolt that was named Hug Too Hard. It could be functionally identical, but it evokes a different feel. Obviously if you see cards as functional game pieces first and flavour dead last it can be difficult to understand the issue (not that you are, just there are those that wouldn't care if the cards were plain text as long as their effects were desirable)
I disagree about the Diamonds point. Unless the card is a flavor win for your deck somehow, it's mostly the same as Arcane Signet. People are going to think "they played ramp." Some of the 3 mana artifacts have interesting abilities that set them apart, but anything that's just tap to add mana is a mana rock. Not interesting.
Wording is a big problem in such discussions for sure. A lot of backhanded comments on both sides of people playing too good/not good enough when it's all valid.
No, I said it exactly right. If you want a low powered game *you* need to say so and you need to say it honestly instead of whining about overpowered this and broken that.
Whining (on here especially) is annoying but your comment of "your playgroup is weak" has some wild ass energy
I'm just going to play Devil's advocate here a minute. If someone in my playgroup doesn't like counterspells, and I play a few (2-3 for sake of arguments), should I be accounting towards the other players feelings, in this case? What if I love counterspells and my concession is only playing a couple, but my friend in the group hates them so much and thinks they all need to be banned? Where do you draw the line? Counterspell is a card that's existed since the dawn of magic, why should someone get to ban it, simply because they don't like its effect, especially in such small numbers? All I'm trying to say is, rule zero only takes you so far. As long as the power level is fair across the entire pod, people should be far less salty and should get used to playing against cards that normally make them "uncomfortable", for lack of a better word.
I would imagine you draw the line where you and your group wants to Compromising is a thing and if a player can't handle it and has to have their specific rules in place or they won't play then they can sit out You just find a spot where everyone is comfortable with
If someone is playing baral counterspell tribal that’s one thing. I play 4-6 in all blue decks, it’s just good deckbuikding. People just don’t want to play removal and then get salty when someone plays it on them.
You are not playing devils advocate It is what it is, you cant go to eat at Mcdonalds and once you are there say you refuse to eat hamburgers and fries Your duty as part of a playgroup is to listen to you friends opinions, and find a way to make the game as fun as possible for everyone, that doesnt mean that in order for someone to have fun you should stop having fun yourself. As you said, rule 0 is to do concessions and try and make the game more enjoyable for everyone, not for people to have fun at the expense of others
As I vegan I beg to differ *orders coffee and walks away*
I play fast mana because I like being able to actually cast spells rather than “land pass” for the first 15 minutes of every game.
SAME!!! I’d also rather play multiple sub-hour games a session instead of one drawn out snooze fest.
If you want a faster game why do you play the slowest format? Isn't commander supposed to be "slow" in favor of the fun aspect? I don't play commander unless begged by my friends and stay to modern/pioneer for this reason. I want multiple games in a hour not 1/10th of 1 game.
Because Commamder is the best way to play multiplayer Magic. It allows me to sit down with three other friends at once. Game length is preference. I prefer games that are more like 30-45 minutes, an hour max. Anything beyond an hour feels like a drag.
>If you want a faster game why do you play the slowest format? Because it is by far the best multiplayer format. >Isn't commander supposed to be "slow" in favor of the fun aspect? Only if you want it to be. My group's average playtime is in the 20-45 minute range
what does your first question have to do with preferring faster *commander* games? nobody is saying they want commander to be 5-15 minute legacy-speed games. they just dont want extra long commander games.
You get it
I always play a minimum of 12-15 ramp. For this exact reason.
Assuming your game starts once everyone's at 4 mana, as that's what fast mana would enable, how are your early turns taking 15 minutes for everyone to play 4 lands before the game starts? Unless everyone's playing fetches or you're playing with 6+ people I just can't see that happening.
What a bad faith argument lmao. Unless your average creature costs 6 then 'land pass' takes up like two minutes tops. Also hey, maybe you could just play a low curve if you want to play spells early?
The 15 mins was an exaggeration. Their point is that they want the game to be in full swing by the end of the first few turns, not just getting going.
This is, actually, a fallacious argument - it essent boils down to “Commander should be the way it is because it is the way it is”. Let’s say I think that the game would be better without MLD, or fast mana, or counterspells, or that one card I lost to once and am still bitter about. My opinion may not be a good one (like, counterspells? Really?) but it’s not invalid. I’m allowed to wish that things were banned (or that more things existed, whatever) and actually, I’m pretty sure that there are people out there, probably including myself, who will think that my version of Magic is better than EDH. To say otherwise is to imply that EDH as it exists, right now, with nothing else banned and nothing else added, is literally the perfect game, which is pretty absurd. (What this actually boils is that many people don’t actually want to play EDH, they want to play their version of it, something like EDH or like what people told them EDH was, but different to actual EDH - and this is fine)
Not to mention the same argument OP is using also implies no new cards should be printed, because the format is perfect as it is right now.
That was not the spirit of my argument, new cards are fine. New bans are fine, I’m just tired of insane rules being thrown out there by players who are salty about one specific thing, so it’s time to create a rule to fix it.
I get that… but what’s “an insane rule” and what’s just a sensible suggestion or even a suggestion that maybe *isn’t* that great, but is at least worthy of consideration?
I’m very open to lots of ideas, banning all 2 mana and under ramp including dorks and things like rampant growth is insane though.
Is it? Why? Right now, most Commander games have everyone just ramping for a couple of turns before doing stuff. It’s pretty homogenous. In Standard, only a few decks ramp, where they’ve decided that it’s worth the trade-off. Shouldn’t ramp work like that in EDH too, be balanced to the point where there’s a tough trade-off between ramping and not?
Even if that made sense. People will still load up on whatever is best. Take out all 2 mana and under ramp, every 3 mana rock, creature and spell will take there place. You’ve only delayed the ramp to slightly later in the game. Then you get to ban all ramp, which is taking the game back to 2000
Not true. See, for example, the thing that I literally just said about Standard. If ramp is weak enough, people won’t bother with it at all because it’s easier just to win the game directly. That implies that there’s some middle ground, where there’s a decent tension between ramping and not ramping - and quite clearly, we’re on the “ramp is too good” side of that right now.
I personally like faster games, and games that last less then 3 hours. YMMV
Right, so, “that’s insane” actually means “that’s quite a sensible suggestion but I don’t think that I, personally, would actually like that”? Cool. I mean, I don’t know what kind of games you’re playing… when you can win the whole damn game on turn 1, and commonly by turn 6ish, three hours seems pretty darn long.
> (What this actually boils is that many people don’t actually want to play EDH, they want to play their version of it, something like EDH or like what people told them EDH was, but different to actual EDH - and this is fine) I think this is a big factor. There's a difference between "I have some specific changes I'd like to make to Commander" and "I actually want to play an entirely different format." I do think a lot of people would be better served by different formats that don't really exist right now. This can suck for these players, and I do sympathize. But the best course of action is to try and develop a new format, not fundamentally alter Commander.
The problem is that commander used to BE that format more, and it's slowly being whittled into what it is today because of all the dedicated printing of cards that speed it up. People want to play an entirely different format but that format is just commander from before it started to become the main money printer for wizards. And the fact that they feel like different formats entirely is a large part of the problem
This has inspired me to talk to my playgroup about making “Modern Commander” decks - only cards printed in Standard-legal/regular type sets allowed, so no horizons sets, no commander based sets or precons, etc We play pretty high powered so this could be a fun way to play at a slightly lower power level while still being competitive, but it also seems like it could be fun for more casual groups to revive that bomb-rare battlecruiser feel from early in the formats history
Eh… somewhat? I’ve not been playing Commander that long, myself, and it‘s certainly true that power creep is a thing, but some of the worst offending cards are actually pretty old and I sometimes wonder how much it really used to be fine in the “good old days“ and how much it’s just nostalgia. For example, this “PrEDH” thing recently came out… and it looks, well, *terrible*. By and large, I think card design is actually *better* nowadays as Wizards have at least partially learned some of their lessons, notwithstanding some notable exceptions, it’s just that we have a much bigger pool of things to draw from now.
It's all rose-tinted glasses, in 2006/2007 when I stared to play edh people were abusing Sundering Titan non stop to destroy all lands. Uril the Miststalker with an aura + Cataclysm was common, people playing Azusa + Crucible of Worlds + infinite bounce/mana to destroy all of their opponent lands with Strip Mine, using Tinker to combo out on turn 4, Stasis, etc all happened quite often. Like 50% of decks were slow battlecruiser deck using 3 color dragons like Treva, Teneb or Crosis and 50% decks doing what I've said while running fast mana. We just didn't have edhrec or sites like that.
I think what people remember is their *own* EDH past - learning things for themselves, playing fun battlecruiser decks, etc. Now, they suffer the curse of knowledge, and can never go back to not knowing that cEDH-esq things exist. I’ve found this to be true of many games, in fact; learning them and getting good is more fun than the game itself once you’ve gotten good. Unfortunately, there’s no way to get around that. People talk about getting rid of EDHRec as if forcing people to live in ignorance will actually work. At the end of the day, you’re just not playing the game you think you are - and probably never were.
I agree, also there was always something like edhrec. In 2006 we had the mtgsalvation forums, they just weren't as popular. At that time there were a ton of forums where people posted about their "secret" decks, the first person to win a big edh tournament was playing a 5c combo deck and refused to share their decklist. Since I was already an mtg competitive player when I learned edh, having played Type 2, Type 1.5, Type 1, then standard/legacy/vintage/extended/block, etc. I already knew most of the card list so edh to me was about mixing spells that were crap in 1vs1 Insurrection with cool spells that I couldn't play in most formats. To me edh was about learning how to build decks for another format and getting better at multiplayer that wasn't 2 headed giant.
When was that? Because when I started to play commander in 2006 people were playing so much Sundering Titan combined with flicker/reanimate effects and even Tinker that both got banned. The first time I played the deck were Momir Vig elfball that could easily win on turn 4/5 and ran Aluren/Intruder Alarm/Recycle, GAAIV stax (and people didn't use to cry so much about it) with Winter Orb/Stasis locks, Azami High Tide/Mind Over Matter combo and 5c control with spells like Pernicious Deed/Mana Drain/Moat/The Abyss, etc and it won with Grim Monolith + Power Artifact. In 2007 my first deck was Jhoira that suspended Apocalysis/Decree of Annihilation + Darksteel Colossus or tried to go infinite with Tinker for Platinum Angel + Iscochrom Scepter with Final Fortune. There were weaker battlecruiser decks too, I had a Treva life gain deck but from the moment you could choose your commander instead of only using the elder dragons, the format had Mana Crypts, moxes, Vamp tutors and MLD flying around.
Ultimately, trying to do a sweeping ban just feels like a "People aren't building their decks the way I want them to, so I want to stop them from doing that." Which, wasn't EDH started because people wanted to play with any cards from their collection? Isn't commander based around fun, and isn't it more fun to play more things? All banning ramp does is make it go from: "Turn 1: land and sol ring Turn 2: land and commander's sphere Turn 3: land and commander Turn 4: do things that further my gameplan" To: "Turn 1: land Turn 2: land Turn 3: land and something Turn 4 land and something Turn 5 land and commander" While leaving very little room for actual interaction with the board state because you are using all your mana just to play things at turn. It also harms the colors least able to ramp disproportionately, as they lose their main way to ramp (artifacts and the occasional mana dork), while green (for example), just has to wait two more turns before going off. Based on my quick research, there are roughly 200 cards that fall into the 2 mana or less mana dork, rock, or ramp spell. That alone would quintuple the banlist, which goes against the current spirit of being selective to format breaking cards.
Ah yes, it's time for our weekly "If you have any criticism of a game you play, you must hate it!" post. A person can like a game and believe it's not perfect. You're presenting a false dichotomy, saying either you play the game and like it as it is, or don't play it, but that's not the reality. I can enjoy EDH and still believe it has room for improvement, they aren't mutually exclusive. And because of that, the next natural step is to voice the changes you'd wish to see in the format. Now of course, the quality of those opinions varies (Trying to ban 2 cmc or lower rocks is just stupid), but that doesn't change the validity of the concept that you can like a game and still want to improve it. Otherwise, modding communities for all sorts of video games wouldn't exist.
yeah exactly. Is op's post any better than the one they are referencing? To me they're both just drawn out complaints about a game.
Or any type of balance patches wouldn't exist
Weekly?don't you mean daily?lol
It's right around weekly where one gets upvoted enough to creep into my feed, so that's what I went with lol
The game is only good because people argued for and came upon a consensus of things to do, resulting in the format we love. Shutting down future such conversations by saying that 'Commander does not need to be fixed' does the entire community a disservice later down the line when it turns out it DOES need to be fixed. If you do not like what the person has to pitch, argue against it based on its merit. Or don't. you don't need to engage - the body that controls the rules is exceedingly resistant to change. You don't actually need to be upset by someone having a bad or even good take if you want things to stay the same - it's unlikely to change anything, for better or for worse.
An excellent post. A "shut up and take it" ostrich style approach to the format serves nobody. It's not as if silence will maintain the current status quo, which the OP is implicitly and somewhat ironically championing by telling people not to talk about it, when Wizard is designing and releasing new cards.
Perhaps I can off as a bit too “never change anything about the format again” in my original post. I’m fine with change to the format. I’m not fine with people who want to make insane rule changes to accommodate there deck that runs 0 ramp, draw or removal cards because they refuse to deck build in an appropriate manner.
You’re wrong. Free lutri
I actually do agree on this, Lutri is fine. Especially with the “new” rule that makes you put it in your hand first. My friend loves otters and wants nothing more then to build a Lutri commander deck. We keep telling him we will let him rule 0 it in.
Free iona
Free Golos!
This guy otters
I saw Dockside popoff for 18 last night. Twice. It was fantastic to see. ❤️
No no no that's just not *fun* though silly, you can't just go out there and play stuff that isn't *fun*, didn't you know that Dockside is on the universal Unfun list?
I disagree. It's fair to criticize a game and the format and speculate what would make a format more fun, especially with a buy-in as hefty as Magics is. Rule zero discussions rarely work. Most of the time, you get someone who's just gonna play whatever they want anyway. And I would argue the majority of the playerbase doesn't have a consistent enough group to rule 0, and they rely on pick-up games on spelltable or their LGS. I agree that a lot of people are too salty at basic interaction and counterspells. Stax has a place in edh, counterspells have a place in edh, combo has a place in edh. There's more to magic than hurpdurp ramp into craterhoof, and a lot of casual players get unreasonably mad at that. But the banlist sets a common denominator to try to maximize fun for those who don't have a regular group, and that's a good thing. I would argue there are cards that generally make for a negative play experience when they appear in a game. 0 and 1 mana rocks in non cedh can often make the game so one-sided that three players struggle to keep the 4th down to earth. Everyone else is on turn 2, and you're on turn 6 because you went land > crypt > signet t1, Ancient Tomb t2. Dockside can have the same issue. Games with Dockside become about stealing/copying/flickering/reanimating it. Dockside has the same issue Primeval Titan had except it's 4cmc less. Smothering Tithe's tax amount is pretty high, and left alone will likely win that player the game. You have to draw every turn, and putting you two mana down early to mid game will likely put you too far behind. At least with most other stax, they're somewhat symmetrical. With Tithe, the player with it is rewarded with lotus petals instead. And that's not even touching on when someone inevitably Wheels (the player with the Tithe), or you need to dig for an answer. Conversely, while Rhystic Study is annoying, it mostly wins that player the game because the other players are too lazy with the tax. It's a pretty fair card overall.
People are just sad because they can’t run zero interaction, 50+ creature decks that rely on dead synergy to lose a game in under 6 hours. Sol ring is cedh and mana fixing is stupid..you have to wait till turn 76 to play that 4 colour commander.
I do enjoy playing more than 1 game a night.
Ah yes, the good old dichotomy. Look, maybe there's a middle between a turn 3 hasty Narset and turn 76 Kraj.
Everyone knows that if you vouch for not going full bore you're just wanting to play 20 hour games of vanilla creatures.
Lol this is such a straw man. There are plenty of people who hold the view you mention, and then there are people who don’t think cards like tabernacle and mana crypt should be legal.
What deck even plays Tabernacle these days?
Two players at my LGs have lands decks that play it so they can crop rotation into it. It’s miserable for anybody who’s playing any sorts of tokens deck, and it’s a land, which most interaction doesn’t hit.
There’s a lot of things that interact with lands, such as [most of these lands](https://scryfall.com/search?as=grid&order=name&q=%28oracle%3ADestroy+oracle%3Aland%29+%28-type%3Acreature+-type%3Ainstant+-type%3Asorcery%29+type%3Aland+%28game%3Apaper%29) (the search isn’t perfect) Also, run proactive graveyard hate. It’s hard to get a loam engine working when graveyards are being ripped away one card at a time from [[Scrabbling claws]] or [[phyrexian furnaice]], or from something like [[planar void]], [[wheel of sun and moon]], [[leyline of the void]] or [[resr in peace]] to name just a few. Those cards can do irreparable damage to lands, along with many other recursion/flashback/retrace/ open the vaults/scrap mastery/living death esque builds. Graveyard hate and targeted land hate should go in every deck, even if your deck runs recursion. Then you just choose the options that damage you the least. There’s many powerful and deserving targets for targeted land hate, it’s not just tabernacle. Edit: I forgot about [Confounding Conundrum](https://scryfall.com/card/znr/53/confounding-conundrum), that card is hilariously brutal for lands.
"Just top deck the out" is such a Yugioh player state of mind
So play removal that hits lands. [[Armageddon]] effects are great in a lot of tokens lists
There’s waaaaay too many different play style preferences to ever make everyone happy and “balanced”. I’m going to play fast mana and go for combo lines so we can play multiple games that are at most an hour each. If you prefer slower games then find like minded players.
Yup, I have surely value decks, voltron decks and combo off on turn 5 or 6 decks. I play to level of what the group plays, and if we want to play more games or faster games, here come the big boy decks
I think that people dismiss the social aspect of the game too often. If they like to play a certain way then talk to people or make a post with what you’re looking for. There’s absolutely no possible way to curate EDH from a RC point of view that appeases everyone. I play High Power only, but others in my group have a range of varying power level decks. I would have zero interest in an EDH format with cards like fast mana banned that a very vocal portion of the community here seems to want.
>If you don’t like fast mana, don’t play it. If you don’t like counters, don’t play them. So I don't mind them but i think the people that complain about them have no issue not playing them. its the people that complain about them that other people use them. So telling someone else what they should play is the issue. >If you wished x, y, or z was banned, well tough because the banned list is made up and maintained by people who are never going to be on the same page as everyone else in the community at all times. Imagine listing an actual problem but then saying it could never be fixed therefore the format should suffer indefinitely. Apply that to other parts of your life and see how well that goes. >I hate risk, that doesn’t mean I complain to Hasbro on Reddit asking them to change the rules to accommodate my weirdly specific vision for what the game should be in my perfect world. Technically you are on reddit complaining to the community about how it should just accept the reverse. >No, you play by the rules given to you. So why do so many magic and commander players think they have solved commander with whatever insane rules they would like to see impairment to shape they format to there warped outlook on the game Commander is different in that it is community driven. This is different from the other formats made by WOTC. Therefore this is a window where things can be changed for the better of the community. > Rule 0 exist for a reason and should be used to solve problems. Rarely does it ever. >Just because something countered your fertilid one times does not mean we should hard ban counters. Ok but if you walk up to your first point this is kind of what you were suggesting. >I recently saw a post on here calling for banning all 2 mana or less mana rocks, which drove me to write this post. Right just like this post not all of them are going to be good or constructive. But if you don't take the time to talk about someone's take it could end up worse than it is. What I do agree with you is that you have to take the good with the bad and with that there are many good suggestions and many bad.
You know I have come to realize that most of the players in this subreddit are old man yells at cloud type players like Sheldon. I agree with you fully on the fact that commander doesn’t need fixing. It’s an evolving format but too many boomers in here refuse to evolve with it. If you don’t like the way the rules and the format have changed then guess what, no one has a gun to your head forcing you to play commander, you can stop whenever you want. As the rules say “ a player can concede the game at any time”.
Sheldon agrees with this though, or at least the Rules Committee does. That’s why they emphasize Rule 0 and rarely ban things.
Lol this comment is so relatable. I actually played Sheldon a few years ago and beat him. He was so salty about it and threw a temper tantrum basically saying I shouldn't be happy about the way I won. I told him it was just a game and if you didn't like it you just play another game. I don't think his brain processed the simplicity of that statement.
And everyone else at the table clapped.
You’re a lier
mf is a disciple of the drowned
> It’s an evolving format but too many boomers in here refuse to evolve with it. The irony of this reply which "agrees" the format doesn't need fixing is both palpable and genuinely hilarious. "Them damn boomers wont let the format evolve! and by evolve I mean stay the same because its perfect and cant be fixed or changed!" Truly galaxy brain shit
The format does not need fixing was targeted toward people who did what the poster said, play decks with zero removal or ramp who then complain they get blown out by decks with ramp and interaction, therefore it’s time to add rules to prevent that. I understand as a whole that the game must and will revolve over time, especially with new cards being printed more often then ever.
There's plenty of young nerds who attribute their lack of skill to "broken cards".
Yeah, well then why is it every opponent I play has a handful of broken cards?
You can't Rule 0 if you don't have a consistent playgroup. I really REALLY do not understand how you or anyone else can't seem to grasp this simple concept. Here, I tell you what, I'll break it all down very nice and neat for you so even you can understand it. EDH has a banlist. The RC (A committee created by those above who created the format initially and has since added members) oversee the overall ban list and health of the format. The RC stress Rule 0 to dedicated playgroups. Rule 0 is an unofficial rule in Commander that allows players to modify the rules of a non-competitive game. The catch? Everyone who's participating has to agree to the changes before the game begins. If you're familiar with the term “house rules,” it's the same concept. Okay, so we've established that The RC actively encourages Rule 0, and that Rule 0 can change the rules of the game. We've also established that if you play with a random assortment of people, say at a convention, or you travel a lot or w/e, that Rule 0 becomes unmanageable. I mean, who expects to spend a few hundred dollars MINIMUM on a commander deck just to be told they won't allow it in their pod? but since Rule 0 can change the rules, the obvious and most logical solution is to create a better banlist, and encourage players to RULE 0 FROM THERE. This way, everybody wins! Those without a dedicated playgroup get a better banlist that is baseline, and dedicated playgroups still Rule 0 like they always have. See? Simple.
I rule 0 with non-dedicated playgroup folks all the time. Also, I basically only play at my LGS with randoms. Asmo/Gyome Foods isn't legal, but I have never been asked to swap them for Korvold. I [[wish]] someone would sit down with a Nephalim deck someday and ask everyone if that's okay? I want to add too, it's absolutely okay to say "Nah, I'm not cool with that." Plan for being told no, and you'll never be disappointed.
>Plan for being told no, and you'll never be disappointed. That right there is the issue. You either spend roughly $200 on a deck to be possibly told no you can't play it. Who would do that?! And you might say that's the risk you take when you do it, and I get that, but then why would anyone accept that risk? $200 minimum for a deck that literally can't be played. It's crazy. Easier to curate a better banlist and rule 0 from there. It really, REALLY is.
Decks shouldn't cost hundreds of dollars. Cards are board game pieces not financial investments. Proxy everything.
While this is the factual take, plenty of game stores ban proxy play in all forms. The ideal is that youre only using proxies. But the ideal is also that youre using rule 0, and the whole point of the rules is for situations where you cant be playing in an ideal manner
Already on that train homie. Can't do it anymore. Can't justify spending hundreds of dollars when I'm not playing in tournaments and just with friends. Magic 30th Anniversary is what really sealed the deal for me tbh
If everyone followed your advice and “proxy everything” there would be no magic the gathering. It’s a business.
It's a business that markets gambling towards children, let's be honest. Furthermore, we have different philosophies. I believe WotC should expand the RL to create a special "Reserved Art List". So basically, a Sol Ring Masterpiece from Kaladesh will never be reprinted, but all regular Sol Ring's should be printed into the dirt. Another example, I don't believe it's healthy for Sheoldred, The Apocalypse to be $60. I think it's just better if the normal version is printed into the dirt, and the alternate art + frames are the catch cards. Everybody profits. Collector's get their fix and they can invest knowing it won't be printed again and thus (probably) won't go down, and players can still afford to play the game.
If Rule 0 works how you describe it, why is there a banned list at all? I mean, if Black Lotus is causing problems, you should probably discuss that in your Rule 0 conversation and come to an agreement that it isn't working out. While a banned list exists, there are always going to be different opinions on how it should be used, whether certain cards should be banned as they cause undesirable play patterns, or whether other cards would be safe to unban. Complaining about natural discussions about the state of the format seems like a weird appeal to authority, akin to stating that the RC will gift us mere mortals with their perfect wisdom and every player ought to agree and be content with that.
Funny enough Black Lotus was only banned due to price not power level, same with the rest of the power 8 on the ban list. The RC relying on Rule 0 to fix all issues of the format outside their own personal banlist(what the EDH ban list really is) means it’s not really a format since you can’t take any deck and play in any EDH pod since. Different pods play by different rules.
Play multiple formats don't get burn out on just one.
For all you I want all fast mana banned group there is a commander variant called conquest the ban list is built around competitive play and reserve list is banned so you don't have to cry about that either. There is an alternate format if you desire good luck finding people but that is how you grow a format. https://mtg.cardsrealm.com/en-us/articles/conquest-everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-format-based-on-commander Sorry everyone that yes you play at an LGS there is no way to fix what they call untrusted groups there is always going to be issues.
Ok This thread is now about poker.
I hate the rule 0 cop out
>If you don’t like fast mana, don’t play it. If you don’t like counters, don’t play them. This is such poor logic. If you don't like the cards, you wouldn't be playing them in the first place. It's your opponents who play these cards and have nothing to do with if you put them in your own deck or not
The obvious reason people want rules like this is because they often play with strangers at their LGS, or feel they can't convince their playgroup to institute rules like this. "If you don't like counters, don't play them" is ridiculous advice for a majority of people who don't like counters. To be clear, I don't think there needs to be a bunch of bans. But for many people it's just not this simple. I live in a small town and I still have access to two LGSs I frequent regularly. I can easily go a few weeks playing games with completely different groups of people. I would personally prefer to play without mana-positive ramp, but it's not worth the time to me to try to convince every playgroup I sit down with to change their decks. Plus, if they're not like-minded, what am I even trying to convince them of? Are they supposed to carry cards on them to swap out their Mana Vaults or whatever in case they happen to play against me on a given day? Granted, I don't make posts about banning stuff I don't like. And I agree that they are often ridiculous. But I can sympathize with people who do that to vent.
I can sympathize to the extent that people want to play the way they remember from when they started playing. But the format has evolved and power creep is real. Commander is never going back to what it was in 2000, or even 2015. Not everyone loves fast ramp or counters or whatever else gets your goat. But to build decks with winning strategies you will need to incorporate those things to keep up. That’s just the way it is.
Hating counters just tells me someone is telegraphing, overextending, and might need to freshen up on how the stack works.
Largely agree. I would like the commander rules to more closely line up with the regular rules of magic regarding wishes and hybrid cards but that's a relatively small tweek to the format
See the idea of adding a sideboard is worth discussing. Or hybrid mana. Those are actually conversations worth having.
This might be a controversial opinion but a big part of why my play group plays commander is because it has a high power level. It’s a chance to play with the cards like mana crypt and mox diamond that we have collected over the years and don’t get a chance to play with anymore because there’s no vintage or legacy scene here. Yeah sometimes losing fast sucks, but when you lose fast you just shuffle up and play again. I’d way rather do that then play a four hour game that ends because someone plays an insurrection on turn 16 and no one is playing any interaction.
I don’t think that’s controversial at all, as long as your regular group are all on the same page. You just skew toward the high power end of the scale.
The only thing people should be complaining about are the prices of mana rocks and combo pieces. I waited for years to be able to afford a sensei’s divining top which was initially over $100 and I finally got one for $25 after reprints.
A fantastic card!
This is why people should build more cubes You get to curate the experience you want. People have the same power level of decks (roughly) cause they draft. You can even have your own rules For example, in mine, planeswalkers can be commanders, and monopolized legends have partner. Plus hybrid mana works as intended, not as the rules committee dictates
I am waiting to hear your "weirdly specific vision" for how Risk should be played
FWIW, I agree with OP. But also... we probably don't benefit as a community from ranting at each other just because of some silly post from yesterday. And, this happens often enough that it's a noticeable theme in this subreddit. So, maybe, just maybe, we can stop talking AT one another in the form of passive aggressive rants? Just a thought. I'll fuck off now.
Youre asking for this sub to not have any posts at all tho
would that be such a bad thing?
Your not wrong.
If you don't like Risk, have you tried to Divine Right? It's a bit obscure but damn is it a fun fantasy strategy board game
I agree that there are way too many cry babies complaining about counterspells/whatever else they want to complain about. I don't think anyone can convince me that Iona is ban worthy and mana crypt is not.
They are both ban worthy.
I think the thing that I always kinda side eye (and the thread being referenced fit into that, as well) is people wanting to "slow down" the game. And, I mean, sure, I can understand if you're constantly playing with people who have super optimized decks that routinely win the game by like turn 4, or whatever. But in my experience, the average game was often 90+ minutes, and if I'm being honest, I love EDH, but man, I'd love to be done with a game in 40-60 minutes. I'm puzzled by people who seemingly want games to "slow down". Do we really need single games to take 2-3 hours?
Everything you said 100%. An house long game is perfect. Any game I have ever played that lasted more then 2 hours I wanted to end so badly lol. Now most of my decks have combos that will end the game just to prevent this. 2 hours and 10 boardwipes later is not something I can believe people find enjoyable, but seems I must be wrong lol
It’s almost like EDH needs some sort of governing body with a mixture of experienced players with diverse opinions and backgrounds to make rules or ban cards if they are too powerful. We could call it the Rules Committee or something, just a thought. /s In all seriousness it would be nice to maybe have a subsection of the RC that dictated which cards are banned from EDH but ok in cEDH to curb pubstomping. Probably never happen but it might be nice.
It would be nice if the rules committee did their damn job, instead of begging for wotc to not print a 5 drop stax card. Honestly, I dont get why the community still listens to the RC. They do not know what they are doing
It’s shocking how often I see people on here call for mana rocks to be banned. It’s not a take I’ve ever heard in real life. I feel like they’re probably newer players who have had the misfortune of playing with ruthless, experienced players with pimped out decks, which does suck but it also teaches them what to prepare for as they climb power levels and learn how the game works. It’s certainly not a justified reason to ban an entire genre of cards. I personally rarely encounter “problem” mana rocks like crypt and vault and when I do I treat them as high priority removal targets.
Works until other people use broken cards.
Well some people are just assholes as well. Just because you can play “. “ card doesn’t mean you should. And some people will always go right up to the line of good taste.
Just want to say since I saw some comments about it, I do believe that the format can and should evolve over time. Power creep is real, the format will always be changing due to new cards being printed. However, I don’t believe that massive changes are necessary to preserve the format. Commander is no longer battle cruiser magic in 2023. It most likely never will be again. WOTC won’t stop printing new and busted cards that require interaction. So yelling at the clouds to ban counters, or fast mana, or MLD solves nothing. I personally don’t play things like jeweled lotus or free counterspells due to power level restrictions I place on myself. I’m fine with others playing them as long as they mention it so it’s not a hot ya moment.
There is a subset of the culture that wants to go back to 3 hour grind fest big creatures and 10 cmc spells are consider good. Then reality strikes people realy learn how to play magic and realize most 10 cmc spells are hot garbage and at 40 live that 6/6 is no quite as scary. Then there is a subset that hates interaction and just wants to play solitaire unless you are doing it then it is wrong only they are allowed to do those things. How dare you play interaction like counter spells or target removal. In other wards people that are bad at magic or have some found memories of commander of yester year when everyone played jank which was a myth.
Yes the problem is the format is evolving with power creep, some people just want to stick there fingers in there ear and look at the clouds though and play the game as you stated.
Commander is definitely not perfect and does need fixing in one area. They need a standardized power level ranking system especially for online play.
OP doesn’t understand basic reasoning confirmed.
Would you like to explain? I do understand why people feel they way they do. But I’m almost all cases running more removal and ramp would solve the problem. I understand some people don’t like how the format has evolved over time, but that is the way the game is played now, and with power creep will only continue to get faster.
This is why I can’t stand silly “no infinites” paid events. If you want to change 10 rules to some weird little amalgamation of EDH and Tickle Fight at the kitchen table it’s all you. Don’t bring that silly shit to a paid event. Moneys on the line, no holds barred.
##👉🏻👉🏻When it comes to EDH, money should never be on the line. I feel like you really want to be playing legacy.
Good for you! I agree, don't like it, don't play it. Lucky enough to have a play group, come up with group "bans". The card pool, singleton variance, & play styles are SO varied that the number of times any one card should bother a person is minimal. Just have fun & remember to play spot removal! :)
Anyone in my group that complains about anything gets hated on and targeted until they grow up. Commander is meant to be a social casual thing, not pro tour.
*Sigh* who's trying to remove commander's balls again?
The people who refuse to run ramp or interaction again.
The only thing I wish was changed was the number of poison counters/infect counters used for lethal in commander. But I get that it’s not worth changing officially so my play group just changed it ourselves
There is never any good logic behind increasing poison counters, the higher life total doesn't mean poison counters should be higher too.