There is no rotation in commander. All cards ever printed, save for a small banned list, are legal.
Commander ranges from incredibly casual to brutally cutthroat. It all depends on the specific play group, though it's generally considered to be more casual. You will want to check your LGS to see how they play before you build a deck.
To answer your title question: Yes, it is worth it to play Commander but the enjoyment you get out of it is dependant on your meta and your playgroup.
To start with, decks don't rotate out. Decks are built with the entirety of Magic's card pool at hand with a few exceptions. So, once you build a deck, that deck is good forever. You will most likely work on changing the deck over time and tweak it to perform better but you can build a deck today and it will always be legal (unless something gets banned out of it which happens rarely).
The idea behind Commander is it is supposed to be more of a Social format, rather than Casual (though these lines are blurred and everyone has their own idea). In essence, it is meant to be a way to build a deck that is not just meant to win, but one that you can use to play against, and with, other people. One that allows everyone to have fun, entertaining games of Magic without the pressure of tournament Magic.
In regards to deck building, some people want to focus on a certain color combination so they just build the deck and then afterwards they choose a Commander based on the colors and pick the most powerful one. Others do the opposite and find a Commander they want to build around and then choose cards to include based on the Commander. And some so something in between. 1v1 formats often have a optimized decklist for a certain archetype whereas you will see 20 different decklists, of varying power and focus, for a single Commander.
Basically, Commander ends up being what you and your group make of it. Some groups are hyper competitive and seek to win on turn 3. Others are extremely casual and ban combos or have a distaste for Wraths in general. And again, there are plenty of groups in between.
Do you have a playgroup in mind? Is there a store you plan on going to? Do you know anything about their meta or playstyles? Do you have any ideas on how you want to build your first deck or what you want to focus on to start with?
Commander is a very fun format where just about everything is legal, and all the cards you were told were too expensive to be playable are now playable and good.
Pick up a preconstructed commander deck to get a good start and work from there.
Do you have a playgroup in mind? Is there a store you plan on going to? Do you know anything about their meta or playstyles? Do you have any ideas on how you want to build your first deck or what you want to focus on to start with?
I was planning on going to a store called Comic Quest but my mom doesn't like the area. I don't know anything about the local meta, and I honestly have no idea what kind of deck I want to build. I'd rather not spend too much into a deck as of right now because I don't know if I'll like the playstyle.
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I'm new to Magic and have a lot of stupid questions. Thanks to everyone in advance who help answer these stupid questions.
Just remember Commander isn't played in a tournament setting, so you may or may not find people with these decks at stores. They tend to form groups and play in their own time, and sometimes the hardest part is to find a group to play with. These games can last for a LONG time, so it's also not recommended if you're looking to play quick games.
But as someone mentioned, it's more of a social game than anything. If you've ever played Mario Party it's pretty similar in a sense that alliances can be made and broken with everyone planning a target to go after.
Do you have a playgroup in mind? Is there a store you plan on going to? Do you know anything about their meta or playstyles? Do you have any ideas on how you want to build your first deck or what you want to focus on to start with?
I was planning on going to a store called Comic Quest but my mom doesn't like the area. I don't know anything about the local meta, and I honestly have no idea what kind of deck I want to build. I'd rather not spend too much into a deck as of right now because I don't know if I'll like the playstyle.
Then I would just go with FourDogsInAHorseSuit's suggestion picking up a precon (the new Tribal ones are pretty fun) and going down there with that. I wouldn't expect it to outperform any decks you play against, but it will give you a feel for the players, the meta, and the format in general without sinking a bunch of money into it. Beyond that, if you choose to stick with it, you can tweak that deck if you like it or work on something different. Or, you find the format isn't for you and you can back out easily.
Do you have a playgroup in mind? Is there a store you plan on going to? Do you know anything about their meta or playstyles? Do you have any ideas on how you want to build your first deck or what you want to focus on to start with?
I was planning on going to a store called Comic Quest but my mom doesn't like the area. I don't know anything about the local meta, and I honestly have no idea what kind of deck I want to build. I'd rather not spend too much into a deck as of right now because I don't know if I'll like the playstyle.
Play something disruptive. I recommend helping hands. All decks have a plan, and when you drop a Bolderwyr Heavyweights, or a Wild Evocation things don't go according to plan. And best of all you won't be a threat, and people will have to deal with all the other more immediate threats before they can deal with you.
If this happens to be a competitive setting (Yuck) simply surviving will help your record.
I think it's worth noting that Commander/EDH is a format designed for multi-player free-for-all play, so it adds something of a political element that is largely missing from the duel-cenric formats.
I tended to favor decks that laid down solid defense with lots of Walls and cards like Propaganda, War Tax, Ghostly Prison etc. and played cards that helped everybody, like Howling Mine, Kami of the Crescent Moon, Walking Archive, Gate to the Aether, Braids, Conjurer Adept, Font of Mythos etc; Then use Rolling Stones and Assault Formation to go on offense or use Reminisce, Feldon's Cane, etc to mill to victory. It's been a while since i've played in that format, we still called it Elder Dragon Highlander, but i hope i've given you an example of how the political aspects can be used to a player's advantage. It can even be an advantage to play an underpowered deck because the others will be more worried about each other which can give you time to build up a well-timed surprise.
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They just couldn't put 7th edition into Modern because of the card borders? Seriously? Count me out.
EDH is great if you like to brew deck ideas. 100-card singleton allows for loooots of creativity compared to 60-card formats. Also, EDH isn't as rife with copy-paste deck building as competitive formats; you'll generally have more room to have fun, with a less competitive deck.
I started playing EDH over 10 years ago and I never play any other form of Magic anymore. This is of course, purely subjective but if you want a more rational argument: it is much cheaper too. A lot of cards that are really good in EDH are not that good in tournaments so they are dirt cheap.
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The secret to enjoyable Commander games is not winning first, but losing last.
If my post has no tags, then i posted from my phone.
Build a good deck, wanna know why? Because it is going to save you a lot of trouble of building a gazillion decks, disliking most of them, rip them apart, rebuild, spend more money etc routine.
If you want to start playing commander I actually recommend not building your own deck first and picking up one that sounds like it would be fun to play, or at the very least look at some gameplay videos of some existing archetypes to see how they role with you. I got into commander pre-cons when 2014 was released and have moved from buying just one of the decks to just getting the entire set of them on pre-order as they are that good (your mileage may vary depending on what wizards does next year. ).
Once you find a deck that plays the way you want to play, then look into various cards that fit that theme online that work with it. EDH rec is a great place to start looking at how to build the deck or even rebuild the deck to work the way you want it. Just keep in mind that politics play more a role in EDH than in 1 vs 1 magic, so going super spikey can actually be bad in this format. Well, unless you are the guy that is playing Canadian Highlander and happens to just throw a commander in to play. In that case start working out the table alliance because you might have a game of Arch Enemy on your hands.
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1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
I have played nothing except Commander & Cube since 2011 and loved every second of it, until the 2015 release of the XP counter commanders. That's when my playgroup started shifting from casual-minded aggro towards combo. Things completely degenerated in 2016, when infinite combo decks made aggro decks unviable. Commander is now dead to me. And I have the impression a lot of other groups have also degenerated from a casual into a combo environment.
Hopefully something happens to fix this issue; Either a 'fork' in the format's ban lists, allowing a non-combo environment to co-exist separately from a combo-heavy environment or some new casual format. But I personally no longer enjoy commander and I would no longer tell new players to join the format.
The problem isn't the commander decks, the problem is the ban list. They shouldn't have the one mana and two mana tutors legal in commander as those make decks way too consistent.
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1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
I have played nothing except Commander & Cube since 2011 and loved every second of it, until the 2015 release of the XP counter commanders. That's when my playgroup started shifting from casual-minded aggro towards combo. Things completely degenerated in 2016, when infinite combo decks made aggro decks unviable. Commander is now dead to me. And I have the impression a lot of other groups have also degenerated from a casual into a combo environment.
Hopefully something happens to fix this issue; Either a 'fork' in the format's ban lists, allowing a non-combo environment to co-exist separately from a combo-heavy environment or some new casual format. But I personally no longer enjoy commander and I would no longer tell new players to join the format.
Umm Agro is MENT to lose to combo. Just like Agro is ment to beat control. If combo is consistently beating agro that means things are where their ment to be. Its if combo in consistantly beating CONTROL THEN you have the problem.
Umm Agro is MENT to lose to combo. Just like Agro is ment to beat control. If combo is consistently beating agro that means things are where their ment to be. Its if combo in consistantly beating CONTROL THEN you have the problem.
Well thats not really how it works.
Aggro decks are fast, combo decks are just as fast, but they use a different approach to win.
Spell-based combo decks use no creatures and so removal becomes blank against them.
While creature based aggro decks play a lot of creatures, so removal , especially mass removal becomes much stronger against them.
Control-decks have flavors too. Either they are packed with lots of removal and/or use counterspells and play not much creatures to use mass removal in their favor.
Its really not as simplistic to say aggro wins against control, as control decks are build to win against aggro decks, if thats what they want to prepare against.
Midrange goes bigger than aggro decks, so if that is enough to stop them, you win the games.
In formats like modern that becomes quite a stretch, as decks like Deathshadow can play almost like a aggro, combo, control deck, as it has elements of all types, depending on the draw and some card choices.
With green you might play more creatures and it turns into a aggro deck.
If all that counts is getting a deathshadow lethal with something like doublestrike, than its like a combo deck.
If you play a threat and protect it with discard and counterspells, thats pretty much what a control deck would want to do.
The archetypes blur easily here and by archetype alone you cannot really say what is "supposed" to win, as often enough decks are beaten by single specific cards and hate.
----
For combo the clock matters and the power of the hate against them.
If a single card spells death for a combo deck, its in trouble (thats the case for pure graveyard based decks, or spell based decks that cannot beat the white leyline, or decks that cannot beat a chalice on 1 etc. etc.).
Aggro decks with Burn will have a much easier time against a control deck full of removal.
Aggro decks full of creatures will have a easier time against control decks full of counterspells.
But it still depends a lot on specifics, archetype alone doesnt have any big meaning here.
Build a good deck, wanna know why? Because it is going to save you a lot of trouble of building a gazillion decks, disliking most of them, rip them apart, rebuild, spend more money etc routine.
That may work for some, but other people enjoy building multiple decks. I agree that when getting started, you should focus on one deck. But what's wrong with enjoying a variety of play styles and strategies?
I have played nothing except Commander & Cube since 2011 and loved every second of it, until the 2015 release of the XP counter commanders. That's when my playgroup started shifting from casual-minded aggro towards combo. Things completely degenerated in 2016, when infinite combo decks made aggro decks unviable. Commander is now dead to me. And I have the impression a lot of other groups have also degenerated from a casual into a combo environment.
That's not a problem with the format - it's a group mentality. Your group allowed themselves to escalate an arms race, which typically ends in mutually assured destruction. Considering the popularity of Commander, I guarantee more groups are still playing with a healthy mixture of agro, combo, and control than have gone to infinite combo only.
I've heard that Commander is a casual format, so if that is true, I'd probably be interested in it, as a new player.
What is Commander all about? And how frequently do decks rotate out?
EDH is a format where terrible things can and will happen. You will get boardwiped. You will get ganged up on 3-1. You will lose to an infinite combo after you have established a lead in board position. Accepting that these things can happen and enjoying the flow of the game is the best way to play.
All that being said, I wouldn't stop playing EDH for anything.
It is the most fun I have had since I started the game back in 2000.
I've heard that Commander is a casual format, so if that is true, I'd probably be interested in it, as a new player.
What is Commander all about? And how frequently do decks rotate out?
EDH is a format where terrible things can and will happen. You will get boardwiped. You will get ganged up on 3-1. You will lose to an infinite combo after you have established a lead in board position. Accepting that these things can happen and enjoying the flow of the game is the best way to play.
All that being said, I wouldn't stop playing EDH for anything.
It is the most fun I have had since I started the game back in 2000.
It's also one of the safest formats in Magic as far as knowing what you buy isn't going to become worthless later. Competitive formats can be a tumultuous ride even in formats like Modern. Commander, if you end up buying a Doubling Season, it's never going to rotate out, get banned, or become worthless due to a meta shift making the deck it slots into ineffective.
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1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Actually, Why doesn't commander have a points list? Canadian Highlander basically stays playable because of the points list, which limits the number of high powered cards that can exist in any given deck. (Points List for Canadian Highlander found here).
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1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
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What is Commander all about? And how frequently do decks rotate out?
Commander ranges from incredibly casual to brutally cutthroat. It all depends on the specific play group, though it's generally considered to be more casual. You will want to check your LGS to see how they play before you build a deck.
To start with, decks don't rotate out. Decks are built with the entirety of Magic's card pool at hand with a few exceptions. So, once you build a deck, that deck is good forever. You will most likely work on changing the deck over time and tweak it to perform better but you can build a deck today and it will always be legal (unless something gets banned out of it which happens rarely).
The idea behind Commander is it is supposed to be more of a Social format, rather than Casual (though these lines are blurred and everyone has their own idea). In essence, it is meant to be a way to build a deck that is not just meant to win, but one that you can use to play against, and with, other people. One that allows everyone to have fun, entertaining games of Magic without the pressure of tournament Magic.
In regards to deck building, some people want to focus on a certain color combination so they just build the deck and then afterwards they choose a Commander based on the colors and pick the most powerful one. Others do the opposite and find a Commander they want to build around and then choose cards to include based on the Commander. And some so something in between. 1v1 formats often have a optimized decklist for a certain archetype whereas you will see 20 different decklists, of varying power and focus, for a single Commander.
Basically, Commander ends up being what you and your group make of it. Some groups are hyper competitive and seek to win on turn 3. Others are extremely casual and ban combos or have a distaste for Wraths in general. And again, there are plenty of groups in between.
Do you have a playgroup in mind? Is there a store you plan on going to? Do you know anything about their meta or playstyles? Do you have any ideas on how you want to build your first deck or what you want to focus on to start with?
Pick up a preconstructed commander deck to get a good start and work from there.
I was planning on going to a store called Comic Quest but my mom doesn't like the area. I don't know anything about the local meta, and I honestly have no idea what kind of deck I want to build. I'd rather not spend too much into a deck as of right now because I don't know if I'll like the playstyle.
But as someone mentioned, it's more of a social game than anything. If you've ever played Mario Party it's pretty similar in a sense that alliances can be made and broken with everyone planning a target to go after.
Standard: BG Golgari Midrange
Modern: U Merfolk GWUBR 5 Color Humans UBW Esper Gifts GW Bogles
Play something disruptive. I recommend helping hands. All decks have a plan, and when you drop a Bolderwyr Heavyweights, or a Wild Evocation things don't go according to plan. And best of all you won't be a threat, and people will have to deal with all the other more immediate threats before they can deal with you.
If this happens to be a competitive setting (Yuck) simply surviving will help your record.
I tended to favor decks that laid down solid defense with lots of Walls and cards like Propaganda, War Tax, Ghostly Prison etc. and played cards that helped everybody, like Howling Mine, Kami of the Crescent Moon, Walking Archive, Gate to the Aether, Braids, Conjurer Adept, Font of Mythos etc; Then use Rolling Stones and Assault Formation to go on offense or use Reminisce, Feldon's Cane, etc to mill to victory. It's been a while since i've played in that format, we still called it Elder Dragon Highlander, but i hope i've given you an example of how the political aspects can be used to a player's advantage. It can even be an advantage to play an underpowered deck because the others will be more worried about each other which can give you time to build up a well-timed surprise.
**Legacy**
Grixis Delver
16post
**Standard**
I'll let you know if/when i go back to Standard. I hate pulling cards i can't use.
Two Score, Minus Two or: A Stargate Tail
(Image by totallynotabrony)
Depends really. I've known a lot of stores where people don't even bother with the format.
Standard: BG Golgari Midrange
Modern: U Merfolk GWUBR 5 Color Humans UBW Esper Gifts GW Bogles
http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/magic-fundamentals/magic-general/334931-what-is-the-most-pimp-card-deck-youve-seen-or?comment=5361
Commander
RGOmnath, Locus of Rage Grenades! EDHGR
UWSygg's Defense, EDH - Voltron & ControlWU
BUGMimeoplasm EDH ft. Ifnir Cycling-discard comboBUG
WBTeysa, Connoisseur of CullingBW
BWSelenia & Recruiter of the Guard suicice combo EDHWB
UBRWGO-Kagachi - 5 Color Enchantments - EDHUBRWG
If my post has no tags, then i posted from my phone.
But other than that it is a pretty fun and cheap format.
EDH: Xenagos, God of Revels.
Once you find a deck that plays the way you want to play, then look into various cards that fit that theme online that work with it. EDH rec is a great place to start looking at how to build the deck or even rebuild the deck to work the way you want it. Just keep in mind that politics play more a role in EDH than in 1 vs 1 magic, so going super spikey can actually be bad in this format. Well, unless you are the guy that is playing Canadian Highlander and happens to just throw a commander in to play. In that case start working out the table alliance because you might have a game of Arch Enemy on your hands.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
The problem isn't the commander decks, the problem is the ban list. They shouldn't have the one mana and two mana tutors legal in commander as those make decks way too consistent.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Umm Agro is MENT to lose to combo. Just like Agro is ment to beat control. If combo is consistently beating agro that means things are where their ment to be. Its if combo in consistantly beating CONTROL THEN you have the problem.
Well thats not really how it works.
Aggro decks are fast, combo decks are just as fast, but they use a different approach to win.
Spell-based combo decks use no creatures and so removal becomes blank against them.
While creature based aggro decks play a lot of creatures, so removal , especially mass removal becomes much stronger against them.
Control-decks have flavors too. Either they are packed with lots of removal and/or use counterspells and play not much creatures to use mass removal in their favor.
Its really not as simplistic to say aggro wins against control, as control decks are build to win against aggro decks, if thats what they want to prepare against.
Midrange goes bigger than aggro decks, so if that is enough to stop them, you win the games.
In formats like modern that becomes quite a stretch, as decks like Deathshadow can play almost like a aggro, combo, control deck, as it has elements of all types, depending on the draw and some card choices.
With green you might play more creatures and it turns into a aggro deck.
If all that counts is getting a deathshadow lethal with something like doublestrike, than its like a combo deck.
If you play a threat and protect it with discard and counterspells, thats pretty much what a control deck would want to do.
The archetypes blur easily here and by archetype alone you cannot really say what is "supposed" to win, as often enough decks are beaten by single specific cards and hate.
----
For combo the clock matters and the power of the hate against them.
If a single card spells death for a combo deck, its in trouble (thats the case for pure graveyard based decks, or spell based decks that cannot beat the white leyline, or decks that cannot beat a chalice on 1 etc. etc.).
Aggro decks with Burn will have a much easier time against a control deck full of removal.
Aggro decks full of creatures will have a easier time against control decks full of counterspells.
But it still depends a lot on specifics, archetype alone doesnt have any big meaning here.
WUBRG#BlackLotusMatterWUBRG
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2023 Average Peasant Cube|and Discussion
Because I have more decks than fit in a signature
Useful Resources:
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EDHREC
ManabaseCrafter
EDH is a format where terrible things can and will happen. You will get boardwiped. You will get ganged up on 3-1. You will lose to an infinite combo after you have established a lead in board position. Accepting that these things can happen and enjoying the flow of the game is the best way to play.
All that being said, I wouldn't stop playing EDH for anything.
It is the most fun I have had since I started the game back in 2000.
It's also one of the safest formats in Magic as far as knowing what you buy isn't going to become worthless later. Competitive formats can be a tumultuous ride even in formats like Modern. Commander, if you end up buying a Doubling Season, it's never going to rotate out, get banned, or become worthless due to a meta shift making the deck it slots into ineffective.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!