People should know all the cards in their deck. People should have a plan before they start with Gifts, but they very frequently do not. And thats what sucks games into EDH purgatory.
I also know that you used tidings as a somewhat tongue in cheek example, but its 100% true. There are people that take forever to cast tidings, and they take 5-10 minutes to cast gifts. I was trying to avoid using new players as a primary argument, but it is a contributing factor.
If you think you can use gifts fairly, in a way that does not drag the game to EDH purgatory, just house rule it back into your area. If people in your group really love pile splitting that much then i'm sure you won't have problems with it. In most groups it is going to end a lot of games with EOT gifts, untap combo out with counterspell back up. Or some person durdling away trying to cast it 1-2 times every single turn. Or it is going to stall out with someone trying to find 4 cards and wheeling and dealing with someone else to give them the cards they actually want to stay alive, while sticking 2 flash back cards in the GY, ect.
FOF effects don't routinely flip over cards that help you recast them. Gifts can always find things to recur gifts, they are very different effects.
It wasn't just super competative players that were taking forever agonizing over how to resolve gifts. It was the newer players that would be overwhelmed by the number of decisions. Or the people who have 10 decks, and can't remember what all is in any one deck to plan ahead of time and want to find 4 good cards, but don't want to throw away their 2 best cards, ect. (and also to a degree super competitive players)
My experience was that people routinely took forever to cast gifts. Because if you aren't abusing it with recursion, you are throwing away your 2 best cards.
When you try to abuse gifts, its SUPER broken and ends the game. When you put it in a random deck it can slow down the game to a crawl, even without being heavily built around.
I think it would be an interesting list to try and compile.
I would argue that the only cards that should go on a list like that are any 2 card combo that will win a multiplayer game that turn. Or any 3 card combo that will win the game in a single turn that is not disruptable with creature removal.
But if you can try to compile the list based a couple of criteria, you can also just tell people to consider those criteria instead of compiling the list to begin with. So it might be interesting to compile as a thought experiment type of thing, and if you were able to complete it, people might reference it, but I wouldn't really expect people to be bound by it. Also, not going to lie, I would probably reference it when making decks to see if I was missing more powerful combo.
The group debate that it always spawned for us, was should we scoop instead of waiting for the person to keep searching.
In our experience, it was even WORSE in battle cruiser/good stuff EDH games than in decks with dedicated combo decks, because the person would be searching their deck forever, getting yelled at (but it's not like we could give them a warning for slow play like you can in a tournament, ect). When you are going for a combo, at least there is a dedicated stack to go for. but in attle cruiser magic, you can go for something like regrowth, recollect, eternal witness, genesis, with the intent of obnoxiously casting gifts repeatedly.
Our games would devolve into one person casting multiple gifts ungiven for recursion spells, and then for various threats.
I would argue that it creates an unfavorable game state, by the amount of time that it can take to resolve, which I would argue is even more time than even someone with a senseis top on turn 1 takes throughout the course of a game, all boiled into 1 long debate over how to play one part of one turn.
I think people are focusing too much on using the card in a single 4 card go to stack, but there is so much more to the card than that, and the number of decision trees trees and running the different game theory situations of what is my opponent going to actually give me, ect can take forever. And then the opponenet needs to figure out how they are going to split the piles. For example, if you already have a recursion effect in your hand, or already have a combo peice in hand, you can try and get more protection, ect.
Those are some of the decision points that an experienced player needs to make with the card. When someone relatively new throws it in their deck and casts it without a plan ahead of time, it was pure torture. And when people realize that instead of regrowing one of the gifts targets, they can regrow the gifts itself, resolving the turn can take 10 minutes easy, and it doesn't even necessarily end the game after that.
If the only problem was when you tutored for a 4 card pile that wins the game with X mana, I think you could make the argument the philosophy of EDH would keep that in check enough to not warrant a solo ban. but I really hated playing against this card more for the length of time that it took to resolve in non default mode than a quick standard combo win.
I think my mono red godo deck is linked in my signature, it has a ton of mono red ramp, and most of the best red card draw/filtering.
One of the things that I realized with it is that is is very important to have mana rocks that produce more than 1x mana, so I would never use something like heart of ramos or even something like fellowar stone because it doesn't have enough impact. With reds lack of card draw/card advantage, if you are paying mana for something, it should do for more than just be faster land, because top decking a mana source late game seems even worse in mono red for some reason.
Would there be anyway to make a list of strict 2 card win a multiplayer game combos.
It seems like the list got very long over the years with all the 3+ card combos, when the combos that you would really consider building around are the strict 2 card combos.
I was looking to do a couple different things:
1) Optimize this deck list to be as competitive and brutal as possible for multiplayer.
2) Come up with a set of cards that I can switch out to be less combo oriented for more casual metagames.
Right now it kinda feels like it is maybe a little too powerful for a more casual meta, but not powerful enough for a super competitive meta.
I like the idea of mono blue, but people are complaining mostly about the knowledge pool combo, especially since it is pretty easy to set up by turn 6 without much hope for interaction.
I think some of the weaker cards in the deck are:
Serum Visions
Preordain
Impulse
Time Warp
Temporal Manipulation
Gravitational Shift
Propaganda
Crawlspace
I like the early search of cantrips so I'm not really sure I want to cut them, since finding something to deal with multiple attacking creatures very early can be pretty crucial in a lot of games. The Time walks don't seem like things I can really abuse to badly and could probably be something better, but they are also decent place holders since they always cycle for free at worse.
Then some of the board control cards seem anti-synergistic with each other.
If anyone has a way of converting the deck to be less combo kill oriented I would be interested in seeing ways to do that as well. It seems like mono blues powerful cards just aren't quite good enough to close out a multiplayer game, without completely retooling the deck.
I think people are discounting the fact that it only finds forests. With Primeval Titan, you could be untapping with insane amounts of mana (coffers/urborg 5+ min), with sylvan it will likely be 3 or less. Titan could also find any of several utility lands like Eye of Ugin to find even more threats to spend the massive amount of mana that he had generated. If not dealt with, it would end the game by itself if built around.
When comparing him to sundering titan, Sylvan only destroys one land from each player when it ETB. Sundering Titan could kill 3 lands from a single player when it ETB and again when he LTB. Sundering Titan completely wrecks a single player, essentially knocking them out of the game. Sylvan kinda griefs everyone a little, but doesn't single handedly knock people out of the game. It's not even as obnoxious as Terastadon, which can knock someone out early game targeting 3 lands.
Sylvan Primordial is certainly playable, but it doesn't ramp or warp the game around itself as much as PT does, and it does not wreck a single player the way Titan does. It's just solid utility on a big body.
I would like to see Lion's eye diamond unrestricted.
It seems like storm combo is just too mediocre now to compete with 13 sphere effects.
Without brainstorm, I still wonder if long would be good enough. Maybe thats asking too much though. I don't think Infernal tutor was ever legal with LED, which would essentially turn long into a 2 color deck, unless it wanted to splash for a few off color bombs or utility spells. Also needing to fight through missteps and flusterstorms might prove much more difficult.
I'm not sure about thirst, brainstorm, ponder, merchant scroll. I liked the format so much more when those cards were legal, but it might be too much power for combo decks if we just gave them everything back :P. I could see leaving gifts, since it was a pretty broken engine.
I think Library would be safe as well. It think it's usefulness is questionable against workshop and dredge. I'm not sure you can afford to not play out artifact mana in the early turns against shops, not to mention trying to find space. I think it would potentially be a SB card to bring in against the more grindy control match ups.
I dislike the mana rocks that tap for less than 2 because in the late game they are often worse than lands.
Those are good points on Coalition relic, but i'm not sure i'm sold on it. To me, Manalith is unplayable, so that worst case scenario seems pretty bad to me.
I love All is Dust. All is Dust and Chaos Warp are probably the 2 removal spells that will never leave the deck. There are so many enchantments and things like Iona that can't be answered by red otherwise, they are uncuttable. The fact that I keep my mana base is huge too since I usually try to jam godo as often as possible.
I was looking through the decklist database for other Godo decks, since I have been tuning mine for the last year or so as well, and it looks like we have come to some pretty similar conclusions.
I was wondering if you had ever tried out Ur-Golem's eye or Sissay's Ring over some of the mana sources that only produce 1 mana like Mox Opal or Mind Stone? We have pretty similar mana bases I think the only differences are:
- Mind Stone
- Mox Opal
- Dreamstone Hedron
- Coalition Relic
- Expedition Map
+ Wayfayers Bauble
+ Gauntlet of Might
+ Mana Crypt
+ Sissays Ring
+ Ur-Golems Eye
And then I have a few more non basic lands than you do.
I'm taking a second look at the coalition relic though, since every other turn it can tap for RR.
How has Trading post worked out for you? I have been using goblin welder, but trading post seems like it could work in my build as well.
Have you ever found that Oblivion Stone and Nevs Disk are too destructive to your own mana? I have never really liked them, especially considering All is Dust leaves your mana alone, while taking care of most other non artifacts.
The problem with big creature decks, is that it is usually worse than voltron.
Kaalia can be extremely effective, but I think you would see similar problems to Mayael, in that it is very dependant on getting Kaalia out, and then also finding the big creatures, but MAyael generates card advantage, where Kaalia uses your draw step.
I also know that you used tidings as a somewhat tongue in cheek example, but its 100% true. There are people that take forever to cast tidings, and they take 5-10 minutes to cast gifts. I was trying to avoid using new players as a primary argument, but it is a contributing factor.
If you think you can use gifts fairly, in a way that does not drag the game to EDH purgatory, just house rule it back into your area. If people in your group really love pile splitting that much then i'm sure you won't have problems with it. In most groups it is going to end a lot of games with EOT gifts, untap combo out with counterspell back up. Or some person durdling away trying to cast it 1-2 times every single turn. Or it is going to stall out with someone trying to find 4 cards and wheeling and dealing with someone else to give them the cards they actually want to stay alive, while sticking 2 flash back cards in the GY, ect.
It wasn't just super competative players that were taking forever agonizing over how to resolve gifts. It was the newer players that would be overwhelmed by the number of decisions. Or the people who have 10 decks, and can't remember what all is in any one deck to plan ahead of time and want to find 4 good cards, but don't want to throw away their 2 best cards, ect. (and also to a degree super competitive players)
My experience was that people routinely took forever to cast gifts. Because if you aren't abusing it with recursion, you are throwing away your 2 best cards.
When you try to abuse gifts, its SUPER broken and ends the game. When you put it in a random deck it can slow down the game to a crawl, even without being heavily built around.
I would argue that the only cards that should go on a list like that are any 2 card combo that will win a multiplayer game that turn. Or any 3 card combo that will win the game in a single turn that is not disruptable with creature removal.
But if you can try to compile the list based a couple of criteria, you can also just tell people to consider those criteria instead of compiling the list to begin with. So it might be interesting to compile as a thought experiment type of thing, and if you were able to complete it, people might reference it, but I wouldn't really expect people to be bound by it. Also, not going to lie, I would probably reference it when making decks to see if I was missing more powerful combo.
In our experience, it was even WORSE in battle cruiser/good stuff EDH games than in decks with dedicated combo decks, because the person would be searching their deck forever, getting yelled at (but it's not like we could give them a warning for slow play like you can in a tournament, ect). When you are going for a combo, at least there is a dedicated stack to go for. but in attle cruiser magic, you can go for something like regrowth, recollect, eternal witness, genesis, with the intent of obnoxiously casting gifts repeatedly.
Our games would devolve into one person casting multiple gifts ungiven for recursion spells, and then for various threats.
I think people are focusing too much on using the card in a single 4 card go to stack, but there is so much more to the card than that, and the number of decision trees trees and running the different game theory situations of what is my opponent going to actually give me, ect can take forever. And then the opponenet needs to figure out how they are going to split the piles. For example, if you already have a recursion effect in your hand, or already have a combo peice in hand, you can try and get more protection, ect.
Those are some of the decision points that an experienced player needs to make with the card. When someone relatively new throws it in their deck and casts it without a plan ahead of time, it was pure torture. And when people realize that instead of regrowing one of the gifts targets, they can regrow the gifts itself, resolving the turn can take 10 minutes easy, and it doesn't even necessarily end the game after that.
If the only problem was when you tutored for a 4 card pile that wins the game with X mana, I think you could make the argument the philosophy of EDH would keep that in check enough to not warrant a solo ban. but I really hated playing against this card more for the length of time that it took to resolve in non default mode than a quick standard combo win.
One of the things that I realized with it is that is is very important to have mana rocks that produce more than 1x mana, so I would never use something like heart of ramos or even something like fellowar stone because it doesn't have enough impact. With reds lack of card draw/card advantage, if you are paying mana for something, it should do for more than just be faster land, because top decking a mana source late game seems even worse in mono red for some reason.
It seems like the list got very long over the years with all the 3+ card combos, when the combos that you would really consider building around are the strict 2 card combos.
1) Optimize this deck list to be as competitive and brutal as possible for multiplayer.
2) Come up with a set of cards that I can switch out to be less combo oriented for more casual metagames.
Right now it kinda feels like it is maybe a little too powerful for a more casual meta, but not powerful enough for a super competitive meta.
1 Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir
Combo/Other (11)
1 Knowledge Pool
1 Palinchron
1 Great Whale
1 Deadeye Navigator
1 Blue Sun's Zenith
1 Stroke of Genius
1 Fact or Fiction
1 Treasure Cruise
1 Dig Through Time
1 Time Warp
1 Temporal Manipulation
Search (11)
1 Brainstorm
1 Ponder
1 Preordain
1 Serum Visions
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Merchant Scroll
1 Impulse
1 Fabricate
1 Transmute Artifact
1 Treasure Mage
1 Long-term Plans
Counterspells (8)
1 Counterspell
1 Mana Drain
1 Negate
1 Remove Soul
1 essence scatter
1 Swan Song
1 Dispel
1 Cryptic Command
1 Ætherize
1 Ætherspouts
1 Evacuation
1 Cyclonic Rift
1 Time Stop
1 Engulf the shore
1 Illusionist's Gambit
1 Reins of Power
1 Rapid Hybridization
1 Pongify
1 Reality Shift
1 All is Dust
1 Oblivion Stone
1 Meishin, the Mind Cage
1 Forcefield
1 Ensnaring Bridge
1 Energy Field
1 Gravitational Shift
1 Propaganda
1 Crawlspace
1 Fog bank
1 Guard Gomazoa
1 Silent Arbiter
1 Maze of Ith
1 Mana Crypt
1 Sol Ring
1 Sapphire Medallion
1 Mind stone
1 Thought Vessel
1 Sky diamond
1 Fellwar Stone
1 Thran Dynamo
1 Gilded Lotus
1 Gauntlet of Power
1 Caged Sun
Lands (34)
1 Academy Ruins
1 Tolaria West
1 Riptide Laboratory
1 Strip Mine
1 Wasteland
29 Island
I like the idea of mono blue, but people are complaining mostly about the knowledge pool combo, especially since it is pretty easy to set up by turn 6 without much hope for interaction.
I think some of the weaker cards in the deck are:
Serum Visions
Preordain
Impulse
Time Warp
Temporal Manipulation
Gravitational Shift
Propaganda
Crawlspace
I like the early search of cantrips so I'm not really sure I want to cut them, since finding something to deal with multiple attacking creatures very early can be pretty crucial in a lot of games. The Time walks don't seem like things I can really abuse to badly and could probably be something better, but they are also decent place holders since they always cycle for free at worse.
Then some of the board control cards seem anti-synergistic with each other.
If anyone has a way of converting the deck to be less combo kill oriented I would be interested in seeing ways to do that as well. It seems like mono blues powerful cards just aren't quite good enough to close out a multiplayer game, without completely retooling the deck.
Thanks in advance.
When comparing him to sundering titan, Sylvan only destroys one land from each player when it ETB. Sundering Titan could kill 3 lands from a single player when it ETB and again when he LTB. Sundering Titan completely wrecks a single player, essentially knocking them out of the game. Sylvan kinda griefs everyone a little, but doesn't single handedly knock people out of the game. It's not even as obnoxious as Terastadon, which can knock someone out early game targeting 3 lands.
Sylvan Primordial is certainly playable, but it doesn't ramp or warp the game around itself as much as PT does, and it does not wreck a single player the way Titan does. It's just solid utility on a big body.
It seems like storm combo is just too mediocre now to compete with 13 sphere effects.
Without brainstorm, I still wonder if long would be good enough. Maybe thats asking too much though. I don't think Infernal tutor was ever legal with LED, which would essentially turn long into a 2 color deck, unless it wanted to splash for a few off color bombs or utility spells. Also needing to fight through missteps and flusterstorms might prove much more difficult.
I'm not sure about thirst, brainstorm, ponder, merchant scroll. I liked the format so much more when those cards were legal, but it might be too much power for combo decks if we just gave them everything back :P. I could see leaving gifts, since it was a pretty broken engine.
I think Library would be safe as well. It think it's usefulness is questionable against workshop and dredge. I'm not sure you can afford to not play out artifact mana in the early turns against shops, not to mention trying to find space. I think it would potentially be a SB card to bring in against the more grindy control match ups.
I think by far the 2 most powerful strategies in Commander are Voltron and combo. I would love to see more Edric's and Kaalias.
Maybe a more aggressively costed mono white general.
It speeds up to a 2 turn clock with fairly minimal mana
He can then ramp up to 1 hit KO the rest of the table pretty quick after his first kill too.
Those are good points on Coalition relic, but i'm not sure i'm sold on it. To me, Manalith is unplayable, so that worst case scenario seems pretty bad to me.
I love All is Dust. All is Dust and Chaos Warp are probably the 2 removal spells that will never leave the deck. There are so many enchantments and things like Iona that can't be answered by red otherwise, they are uncuttable. The fact that I keep my mana base is huge too since I usually try to jam godo as often as possible.
I was wondering if you had ever tried out Ur-Golem's eye or Sissay's Ring over some of the mana sources that only produce 1 mana like Mox Opal or Mind Stone? We have pretty similar mana bases I think the only differences are:
- Mind Stone
- Mox Opal
- Dreamstone Hedron
- Coalition Relic
- Expedition Map
+ Wayfayers Bauble
+ Gauntlet of Might
+ Mana Crypt
+ Sissays Ring
+ Ur-Golems Eye
And then I have a few more non basic lands than you do.
I'm taking a second look at the coalition relic though, since every other turn it can tap for RR.
How has Trading post worked out for you? I have been using goblin welder, but trading post seems like it could work in my build as well.
Have you ever found that Oblivion Stone and Nevs Disk are too destructive to your own mana? I have never really liked them, especially considering All is Dust leaves your mana alone, while taking care of most other non artifacts.
Kaalia can be extremely effective, but I think you would see similar problems to Mayael, in that it is very dependant on getting Kaalia out, and then also finding the big creatures, but MAyael generates card advantage, where Kaalia uses your draw step.