I agree with the OP's sentiment. Instead of printing a decent suite of cards with madness, they decided to take the easy route and print a legendary like Anje. There is still room to use Anje in something other than the all madness card deck. In a potential cycling/discard deck, Anje can definitely enable things like Drake Haven.
This is going to happen every year with every CMDR set release. Almost every print for CMDR set spawns something completely ridiculous (tax dodgers like Derevi and Yuriko, Proosh, Oloro, Eminence, Partner). EDH is a great format because it happened organically around reasonably designed sets. It's like if R&D went to the cube forum and actually decided it was a good idea to crowd source card design from there.
Sure, the card looks clunky and its sorcery-speed makes it look far more fair than a Coalition Victory on cursory examination.
However if you manage to flash this in (Vedalken Orrery, Leyline of Anticipation, Vernal Equinox, etc, etc) at the end of an opponents turn that conveniently rolls over to your turn and your upkeep trigger happens, that nobody has an answer that is instant speed, it creates a win out of nowhere that nobody could respond to.
And for those that say its more fragile, you may want to reexamine the card's type, enchantment. A card type that actually has fairly strong reanimation and recovery abilities through enchantress-centric decks.
And for those saying you just destroy their board like with Coalition Victory before the trigger happens, that is not necessarily a fool proof way. As you need to also exile their graveyard as HEA, if still on the board, still counts the card types in it's controller's graveyard.
And because the safest option is to spring this at the end of a turn that would go to yours, combat is out of the option unless an opponent suspects you of having HEA in hand.
The other safe alternative is lock the other players in the game so they don't have mana or creatures to fight back. Which means some combination of stax and/or pillowfort which are also fairly enchantress-centric strategies and only opens itself really to sorcery speed removal if an opponent has a means to do so.
Then there is the next part [life total greater than starting]. It doesn't state how much it needs to be, just that it is, which means 41+ life meets the requirements. Which is also 9 less life than Test of Endurance and Aetherflux Reservoir. 1 life more than Felidar Sovereign, but trades lifelink and body for a harder to remove card type and 2W less cost, which also makes it W cheaper than Test and Reservoir.
The other requirement [five colors among permanents you control], well we do have Scuttlemutt, Scrapbasket, Planewide Celebration, Sphinx of the Guildpact, and Transguild Courier. It really becomes a question of which to run and how many of them just for that category. Plus since they are mostly artifacts, this benefits even an enchantress deck because a lot of their cards also interact with artifacts as well.
Plus being artifact creatures ticks off 2/6 of the boxes required to fulfill the win condition. Yes, even Planewide Celebration ticks off 2/6 of the boxes, it creates a creature and is a sorcery in your graveyard which gets counted by HEA and even gains the controller 4 life per time chosen which neatly works back into the life requirement from earlier, and can even recover a HEA in your graveyard.
EDIT: Also one more thing, the win-condition card is mono- in its identity, which means it has more flexibility in its cost and less restriction to what deck it can go into which is a pretty powerful thing.
SECOND EDIT: The reason I feel also warrants attention: Coalition Victory (sorcery) used things like Scrapbasket (artifact creature), lands of every type (Prismatic Omen (enchantment) or Gaea's Balance [sorcery]) and basic [lands], and maybe an instant. Which is 5-6 card types along with 5 colors.
Coalition Victory and Happily Ever After are both sorcery-speed win conditions that desire to be flashed in when your opponents have already spent their mana and their sorcery speed answers can't touch it, leaving only instant-speed answers. That aside from the life requirement, HEA is 5 mana cheaper than Coalition.
Man, that's a whole lot of "what-if's."
+
A lot of bad cards you have to play to enable the whole thing.
You explained why each one of the stipulations is easily achievable. But that's the easy part. Of course, each individual part is easy. The hard part is doing it all at once and having it all while opponent's can be gunning for you.
1.) Happily Ever After is worse than just being sorcery speed. It's also a permanent that can be removed unlike Coaltion Victory.
2.) The life requirement shouldn't be brushed aside. Coalition Victory can win at the end of the game when you're low. This enchantment cannot. At the end of the game, being above 40 might not actually be attainable.
3.) Sure a sorcery-speed answer can't touch Happily Ever After or Coalition Victory. But embarrassingly, an onboard answers like Tormod's Crypt or Wasteland can. In that case, I think Happily Ever After is even more vulnerable because Seal of Cleansing can knock it out.
4.) You even have to give your opponent a card.
but...
5.) If I played against you often and you won with Happily Ever After very often, I'd just congratulate you each time. Go for it.
I am going to assume that you have never played Vintage. Every tutor is a copy of your best cards.
I have played in tournaments in 2008 where I have cast:
Dark ritual - Dark Ritual - Dark ritual - demonic tutor for YawgWill - Cast YawgWill - do it again from the graveyard to then find and cast Tendrills of Agony as the 10th spell and win.
Demonic Tutor for Lotus or Time Vaul or Flash or Gifts Ungiven - which ends up being a Demonic Tutor for 6 cards because one pile is to get YawgWill + Recoup + Lotus + Dark Ritual. No matter what they give you, you win.
I played and won a mox ruby in a 30 man event with mono black null rod agro. Leyline of the void, duress, Hymn to tourach, hypnotic spector, phyrexian negator, dark confidant, wasteland, stripmine, sink hole, amd a suite of Demonic Tutor, Vampiric, Imperial Seal, YawgWill, one tendrils, 4 rituals, Mox Jet and a pile of swamps. The main plan was to play resource denial and finish hard. Open the game with leyline, Turn 1 ritual into duress and Demonic tutor for null rod, then win through attrition.
The lists and examples go on and on.
That colorless and a black makes a difference when you can fetch an underground sea, cast a mana crypt or off color mox (red/green/white) and tutor up a combo card or force of will or whatever is strong.
But in Commander? Ome reason why I am "burnt out" on the format is how leniar my decks become with tutors.
Personal tutor for merchant scroll, maybe cast a can trip to draw it; merchant scroll for Intuition; Intuition into a game winning pile, of which there are many.
I was thinking to myself: How good or useless is any given commander if it is not trying to combo?
I love Breya and how we got an esper commander with red which can use Goblin Welder, Deretti, Scrap Mastry, Shaali and all of those fun cards. I live the idea of looting and rummaging through my deck on the cheap and then reanimating artifacts. However, I must explain each time I play with new people that it is a red esper artifact goodstuff deck and not a fast 4 color combo with cheap tutors.
If I play Mizzix, only combo is viable. I do not buy into the Earthquake game plan and relying on X spells and Mizzix surviving. Without tutors, it is trash. With it, it is versitile and strong. Not cEDH strong, but it can defend itself and has many play lines to end games with different synergystic combos... but strugles without a boat load of obvious tutors.
The list goes on and on as well. I found many decks I love leaned on tutors to carry tye deck to victory in games it would have otherwise had no business winning if tutors were cut from the deck. That is why I began to question if the concepts were even good, or if I was just leaning on a powerful game mechanic - tutors - in a game and format designed around variance and the mistery of the draw.
Vintage is really different now. 2008 is a long time ago in MTG time. Demonic Tutor is definitely played in non-combo decks. While it's a copy of your best card, the "best" card changes from turn to turn and game to game. I play my Lands.dec (link) with a heavy tutor suite. And even with a heavy-hitter like Ad Nauseam in my 99, I tutor for answers or engine pieces just as often.
You sound burnt out but it's not because of tutors. I suspect there are several other culprits, especially if you're going to look at every single deck based on it's combo potential or theoretical power-level (i.e. "tier). When you do that, of course, there is no reason to play certain decks or build certain ways. After all, very few things are worth doing when you get to play Black Lotus or Ancestral Recall. Same things happen in EDH also. And you know what, bans don't really fix anything. Restrict Ancestral, and there's still Treasure Cruise and enough facsimiles to make Blue the best color.
In your ISBpathfinder Edgar deck, forget any discussion about tutors->Necro...aren't you glossing over the fact that Edgar Markov is just a stupidly designed magic card? I can't imagine a worse deck to play if you feel "jaded." There is basically no other way to build Edgar than to jam vampires. Only difference is that the good deck builders found out way earlier that crappy, cheap vampires were best. Even the bad deck builders have found that by now since they've been thoroughly creamed by enough good Edgar players by now (Edgar is ridiculously popular according to EDHrec). Yeah, Markov and most CMDR-set legendaries are garbage for the format. Just don't play Edgar Markov.
If combo and infinite loops are the only way to reliably win in your meta, that's not a problem tutor-bans will fix. Like I said in another thread, if Joe's mono black deck wins by DT into Exsanguinate/Torment of Hailfire or Tim's etb Bant deck always goes for Craterhoof, what good does a tutor ban do? Isn't he still going to win with the same card in every game that goes long?
I think for some Breya players, it's only fun because it's Esper + Red. Some players don't really care to infinite loop everyone else out each game. But since it's the only option, they run it. I know vintage players long for a place where Goblin Welder can dominate once more. You mentioned all of the fun cards. Well, aren't tutors just access to your fun cards? I say tutors just enable fun. Fun isn't necessarily game ending. The corollary of course is that being able to actually play your spells is fun and that mana enables fun. I believe both. Get that notion of tutors bans out of here.
If you propose that tutors enable a weak/poor strategy but otherwise potentially fun strategy (e.g. Mizzix) to exist, how exactly is that a negative? Especially since you're also saying that a tutor-enabled "has many play lines" and "different synergistic combos?" I'd say that my lands.dec deck is otherwise extremely weak besides its tutors. I don't play any fast mana, have no stack interaction/instant speed removal (since it's completely lands based), and doesn't play enough permanents/card draw that I can ever snowball value. But that I play 5 colors and can tutor for lands that act as spells or engines that allow me to use lands is what makes my deck good.
If a tutor for a single card, can turn a game around where you are otherwise dead-to-rights, maybe that card and the tutor should be discussed together?
I say that match-ups and the multiple odd-interactions and truly-unique board states possible in EDH are what really drive variance in commander games. I mean, the card that people most build their decks around is already tutor'd out each and every single game. A blanket tutor-ban isn't going to make games more fun just because.
I know that a thoughtful, reflective deck builder can put together something to get them out of a funk. Blaming certain cards is just too easy. But if someone or group is stuck playing the infinite loop/instant win game or won't let go over always playing the same high power'd cards, then games can seem same-ish.
Yeah, Macabre's Demonic Tutor = Rampant Growth shouldn't be taken seriously. Both power-level and effect are massively different. No green ramp spell approaches DT's power. And Rampant Growth isn't good for much besides loot fodder in the late game (but this can be said of other good cards as well), whereas DT is someone I'm happy to draw at any time in any game (but this can be said of other good cards as well). However, I must bring up that green land ramp = consistency. And that can mean repetitive as well. I mean, some of the same people who complain about tutors being repetitive for some reason refuse to acknowledge that T2 ramp, T3 ramp, T4 ramp, T5 Maelstrom Wanderer, T6 Maelstrom Wanderer, T7 Maelstrom Wanderer is also repetitive and enabled with green land ramp.
It's pointless to have a singleton restriction if your deck can contain some wildcards (great analogy)that for 1-2 mana can be everything else. If you need to tutor that bad, you still have diabolic tutor
I don't think tutors violate the singleton nature of the format because it's not as if you can tutor for another copy of the same card.
About the "singleton restriction" of the format, do you feel the same about Relentless Rats?
Do not put tutors that search for spells and tutors that search for basic lands together in the same group.
If you want to complain about ramp, complain about ramp, but they are separate discussions.
I agree that those are two separate things.
However, one of the complaints about tutors is that they make the game more consistently the same. So other than power-level, some people complain about tutors making games feel the same. It's an easy parallel for people to make since ramping lands consistently also makes games feel the same and land ramp is literally searching your deck for specific cards. So I guess that's why it's brought up so often together.
But I'm sure the OP meant to just discuss Demonic Tutor and the like.
Tutors are just basically wild cards which I find unfun in all games not just Magic. It seems they've been printing more tutor hate of late. I just hope they continue to print more playable tutor hate, then the problem will fix itself as tutoring will not be a sure thing.
I suppose that split cards are kinda like wildcards too...so I don't necessarily agree that tutors are exactly wildcards, but I understand.
100% there definitely does need to be more search-hate.
Green ramp spells have minimal impact on the game, at least in comparison to other tutors. You aren’t tutoring up a game winning/saving answer with Rampant Growth.
Green land ramp/tutoring is one of the biggest parts of EDH though.
Great experiment. Now, instead of banning tutors, try banning the cards that player in your group tutor for over and over again. And then have fun.
If you have a solid play group, doing both of these on separate occasions would be worth your while. See which games are actually more varied.
I find breaking up people from playing the same win-conditions over and over again leads to much more varied games. Take away tutors for Craterhoof Behemoth and guess what? Craterhoof still ends up winning the same amount of games.
Show me a deck that doesn't want Sol Ring and I'll show you a deck that's been built wrong.
I don't have a decklist for my Edric, Spymaster of Trest deck because I retired it a while back before I started putting stuff online, but I didn't play Sol Ring there because it doesn't produce G or U and I'm very low to the ground. I also have Null Rod and would put the new Collector Ouphe in the deck.
Here are two decks that I already have put on tappedout:
I do like input on deck lists, so if you can justify Sol Ring in either of those decks, lmk. I don't have Sol Ring in Sram because I'm trying to cantrip with Wauras. I also don't play Sol Ring in Child, because I'm actively planning to trigger Child of Alara.
No... it's pretty clearly the tutors. I don't care how good Doubling Season is in your deck; when you can't easily tutor for it every game there is less repetition. This feels pretty self-explanatory.
Well, if Doubling Season wasn't that good, then the super friends player wouldn't tutor for it every time. And then your argument against tutors repetitively tutoring for the same thing each game wouldn't hold. Unless, of course, you still feel like the game is repetitive when a player tutors for different things each game.
I don't know if you're actually going to look through my deck lists and prove me wrong about Sol Ring. But if you do, you'll notice that my Land.dec is heavy in tutors. Rarely do I get the same card again and again so I know tutoring in and of itself doesn't lead to repetitive games. Tutors themselves are not the root causes of repetitiveness. In my lands.dec, having a Planar Cleansing as a commander leads to the repetitive games.
Your argument also doesn't hold because tutoring isn't the only way to end up with the same card each game. What if you see the same card dominate or end multiple games, but it was not tutored for? Even when the card(s) isn't tutored for, you're still going to say that the game was a repeat of the previous, right? For instance, in any game that lasts long enough versus a deck with Black, I can reasonably expect an eventual huge Exsanguinate and/or Torment of Hailfire to end the game. And thus, I play (e.g. plan whom I attack) with that possibility in mind. That isn't caused by tutoring, that's just caused by the card being in the 99.
Even if you play in a game where a player tutored for the same card over and over again, what about all of the actions prior to the tutor being cast? Wouldn't that also mean that the game was essentially the same each time before the tutor as well? How come the game state was the same each time such that the player could/would get the same thing again and again and play the same line again and again? Maybe your games are boring/repetitive because your pod is growing stale or lacks interaction? Maybe the tutor target is so powerful that it doesn't matter what the board state is? I don't think those are issues addressed with the ban of Demonic Tutor, Vampiric Tutor, or Imperial Seal.
Essentially, your only argument that tutoring causes repetitive games is that a player can tutor for the same card each game. And you and Carthage refuse to consider that other things can lead to repetitiveness, despite the glaringly obvious counter-argument that the same player who can tutor for the same card each time can also tutor for something else. When someone brings up other reasons why a game can be repetitive, you just repeat, "no, it's the tutors."
I don't really need/want to change your mind, I just want my opinion out there as much as anyone else. But if someone is going to complain about Bribery or list Mastermind's Acquisition just to make a point about the perils of tutors, those people should stay far away from any decisions about the banlist.
If anything, please look through my deck lists and if you feel Sol Ring can actually be justified, let me know.
Competitive decks run a small number of game winning cards, and then a lot of ways to get those game winning cards. Your example of doubling season is actually not a particularly strong competitive play, because for the same mana cost someone might cast ad nauseum or final parting for worldgorger + reanimate and win the game immediately.
And while it is possible for optimal lists to not include sol ring, that list is VERY small, and those decks are extremely optimized. I would wager that all three of the decks you think are optimal without sol ring should actually be running sol ring.
But all of this is separate from the actual topic at hand, which is why ban tutors.
The main reason continues to be that tutors have best targets in most situations, and time and time again people will keep going for the same lines of play instead of adapting to new sets of cards in their hand.
How come your arguments/posts center around cEDH or competitive? Let's not discuss the banlist exclusively under the umbrella of cEDH. First, cEDH is a nebulous term. Second, cEDH doesn't have a separate banlist apart from actual EDH. If you're going to dismiss every 5 cmc card, just because it's not good enough to stack up again Ad Naus, then what's the point of complaining about Bribery?
Your main complaint against tutors (repetitiveness) happens have with or without tutors. Because the root causes of repetitiveness aren't tutors.
For instance, let's consider Doubling Season. If someone tutors for that card every single game in their super friend deck, is the tutor the issue or is Doubling Season? Maybe the repetitive search for Doubling Season is because that card is so far and above every other card in the deck.
Doubling Season and PW decks are also interesting in the consideration of repetitiveness because many would argue that it's a very repetitive archetype. Even non-green PW decks play out essentially the same. They're all stacks of removal, wrath's, and fogs. So redundant effects are why they're repetitive, not the Demonic Tutor for Doubling Season.
And let's face it, people actually want their decks to function/play out the same each game. That's why people play redundant effects, consistent mana, and build around their generals. You don't want repetitiveness, but you fail to address the elephant in the room, generals and building around them make decks play out very consistently.
If you have ever play tested competitively, you'll no doubt realize that many match-ups are predictable. That's just what happens when you run the same 75 vs the other same 75. Games being fun and non-repetitive in EDH owe a lot to how decks interact in unpredictable ways in multiplayer pods. I can build a Brago deck to be consistent and do the same things, but when I bring it to a different pod, the games will play out differently whether I tutor or not (and I do use Recruiter of the Guard to get many different creatures each game). That should be primary source of games being fresh and new. Games don't just become fresh and new because you are ban happy.
Here are some factors that play into repetitiveness more so than tutors:
1.) The strength of new threats they print is very high and many players will gravitate towards those same threats. I wished WOTC would stop printing for EDH.
2.) Many of those new strong cards are legendary creatures. I personally don't like playing against 3-4 Merens at every store, but it seems like other people do. Once again, players will flock to strong threats and when they are commanders, its effect is even more potent on you seeing the same stuff each game.
3.) With the release of each set, more redundant effects are available and find their ways into decks.
4.) EDHREC and commander content means a lot of people hear/see/become influenced the same things.
5.) Generous mulligan rules. You'll see this has had a huge impact in sanctioned magic as well. This is literally a rule that makes games play out more the same each time.
6.) It has become socially unacceptable to impact the game such that players have anything other than their ideal board-state. You even have huge cry-babies that whine when you remove their Consecrated Sphinx. Apparently, it's even frowned upon to play Torpor Orb because it's "stax." Players actively expect all of their resources to remain intact for an entire game. Well, if you can always plan to have all of your colors and play ahead on curve, then of course games will play out the same each time.
This is not out of place at all for more competitive decks.
Your point is that tutors hurt deck diversity but that's not the case.
Look at the tutors that you listed. Examples like Reshape and Transmute Artifact are very theme specific. In order to run those, you have to skew your deck heavily towards artifacts. I don't see all cEDH being heavily artifact themed. So in a way, those tutors let many types of decks exist. Just like how enchantment tutors can encourage people to build around enchantments and those land tutors encourage people to build lands matter decks.
And many of the cards you mentioned aren't pure tutors. They are only even run because they can function multiple roles in the deck at the same time. +10 tutors in a deck is a lot of air. And like I said, if you want to build a good deck, it's tough to play that much air. You might start every decklist as 1 Sol Ring and 10 tutors, but that is lazy deck building.
I have 3 decks without Sol Ring and I'm sure that I built them in optimal ways. In the same way, I never felt compelled to include tutors just to have them. I feel much move compelled to include things like Doubling Season, you know, cards that actually do things.
Depending on the colors and how much disposable income one has access to (I see you, Imperial Seal), it's pretty easy to end up running maybe a dozen tutors. Even if one tries to avoid the "broken" tutors, there are still the "not-good-enough-for-cEDH-but-still-pretty-powerful" tutors like T&N and Diabolic Revelation that can end up warping more casual metas when every game ends with double-tutoring for a combo or something.
You listed many, many options. And some aren't even worth playing. I love Diabolic Revelation. Honestly, why would anyone bring that up as a problem?
And, if someone wants to play Wild Pair or Thalia's Lancers? What do you have against them?
I'm also sure that my question was facetious. I can count to ten and use gatherer as well + not many or any good decks will waste 10 slots on a pure tutors. Using gatherer or edhrec to stuff your deck full of tutors will not build a good deck.
Also, many of the tutors you list also support weaker decks. There's also a case to be made that tutoring allows weaker decks to compete with stronger decks. and once again, where you might see T&N as a problem card in casual, I see T&N as the epitome of being a Timmy in EDH. Doing powerful things is fun.
When you allow tutors, it greatly hurts deck variety.
Why go deeper into the card pool when you have 10 slots devoted to the best tutors available?
They also encourage combos, which are innately overpowered by the format, especially multi-tutors.
It hurts variety in a casual format which makes decks and games go stale earlier than they should.
People "don't like" tutoring. When in all actuality, they do. In EDH, the card you want to play with the most is always available in every game in the command zone. They don't actually want randomness (i.e. see "mana-screw" and "color-screw").
This is rarely true. Even in my commander focused decks, at every mana cost there is a spell I'd rather have than my commander.
I guess it's "rarely true" just because you say so. "10 tutors" is really pushing it. Can you name all ten of them?
I find that powerful legendary creatures from Commander sets has done more to damage deck variety than tutor cards by far. Demonic Tutor goes into all decks that have black and that has never limited the variety of decks that I see. But Meren merely existing means I see Meren everywhere.
Every now and then when I peek into this subforum, I see posts about tutors being banned (either as an actual topic or more commonly a post on a thread.
Personally I have no issue with tutors, but every now and then I am in a game where the one tutoring has no clue what they want to look for. This is the only time I have a problem. As they (the player) slow down the game. I run all 10 fetches in my deck, and I may end up taking a few seconds deciding which land I want to fetch (based on what I have on board and in hand.) I also run vampiric tutor, demonic tutor and tooth and nail in my deck. Every game I know what I am looking for when I cast these spells.
But still I see "ban tutors" Soni want to know why people wish to ban tutors so often. I want to hear the justifications to ban and not ban tutors.
I can't answer your question, but I'll echo your sentiment. People taking too long is the real problem.
People "don't like" extra-turns. When in all actuality, they do. Taking an extra-turn is one of the most viscerally enjoyable things in MTG.
People "don't like" tutoring. When in all actuality, they do. In EDH, the card you want to play with the most is always available in every game in the command zone. They don't actually want randomness (i.e. see "mana-screw" and "color-screw").
Had another Yarok game yesterday and it was miserable. Nobody had removal the instant the Yarok player cast his commander, so he proceeded to ramp for free with Lotus Cobra, making it pointless to kill Yarok as he had so much mana it wouldn't even matter if he had to cast it again. I eventually scooped in frustration and left the store. I was playing Surrak Dragonclaw all creatures, so no way to deal with Yarok without giving him four ETB triggers. Another player was playing Simic, no board wipes there, even if he overloaded Cyclonic Rift the Yarok player had so much mana he'd just recast his hand giving him even more value with the double ETBs. The Yarok player takes two turns for every turn their opponents get, Yarok doubles every card in the deck.
I have a personal vendetta against Yarok now, and will go after anyone playing him until one of us is dead or he is banned.
At least now you know how to deal with Yarok.
fwiw, It's still worth it to remove Yarok even when the player has a lot of mana because it makes it tougher to have mana to cast Yarok + something else on the same turn.
If you don't play removal for creatures, don't be surprised when a commander-centric deck takes over. In EDH, you always have +1 card available due to command zone. If you play blue at all, you can always steal opposing commanders. For commander-centric decks, it can be crippling. So trade for a Gilded Drake.
Since you have a personal vendetta against Yarok, will you finally play Torpor Orb now? Say what you want against "stax" effects...but here's a solution...
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This is going to happen every year with every CMDR set release. Almost every print for CMDR set spawns something completely ridiculous (tax dodgers like Derevi and Yuriko, Proosh, Oloro, Eminence, Partner). EDH is a great format because it happened organically around reasonably designed sets. It's like if R&D went to the cube forum and actually decided it was a good idea to crowd source card design from there.
Man, that's a whole lot of "what-if's."
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A lot of bad cards you have to play to enable the whole thing.
You explained why each one of the stipulations is easily achievable. But that's the easy part. Of course, each individual part is easy. The hard part is doing it all at once and having it all while opponent's can be gunning for you.
1.) Happily Ever After is worse than just being sorcery speed. It's also a permanent that can be removed unlike Coaltion Victory.
2.) The life requirement shouldn't be brushed aside. Coalition Victory can win at the end of the game when you're low. This enchantment cannot. At the end of the game, being above 40 might not actually be attainable.
3.) Sure a sorcery-speed answer can't touch Happily Ever After or Coalition Victory. But embarrassingly, an onboard answers like Tormod's Crypt or Wasteland can. In that case, I think Happily Ever After is even more vulnerable because Seal of Cleansing can knock it out.
4.) You even have to give your opponent a card.
but...
5.) If I played against you often and you won with Happily Ever After very often, I'd just congratulate you each time. Go for it.
Vintage is really different now. 2008 is a long time ago in MTG time. Demonic Tutor is definitely played in non-combo decks. While it's a copy of your best card, the "best" card changes from turn to turn and game to game. I play my Lands.dec (link) with a heavy tutor suite. And even with a heavy-hitter like Ad Nauseam in my 99, I tutor for answers or engine pieces just as often.
You sound burnt out but it's not because of tutors. I suspect there are several other culprits, especially if you're going to look at every single deck based on it's combo potential or theoretical power-level (i.e. "tier). When you do that, of course, there is no reason to play certain decks or build certain ways. After all, very few things are worth doing when you get to play Black Lotus or Ancestral Recall. Same things happen in EDH also. And you know what, bans don't really fix anything. Restrict Ancestral, and there's still Treasure Cruise and enough facsimiles to make Blue the best color.
In your ISBpathfinder Edgar deck, forget any discussion about tutors->Necro...aren't you glossing over the fact that Edgar Markov is just a stupidly designed magic card? I can't imagine a worse deck to play if you feel "jaded." There is basically no other way to build Edgar than to jam vampires. Only difference is that the good deck builders found out way earlier that crappy, cheap vampires were best. Even the bad deck builders have found that by now since they've been thoroughly creamed by enough good Edgar players by now (Edgar is ridiculously popular according to EDHrec). Yeah, Markov and most CMDR-set legendaries are garbage for the format. Just don't play Edgar Markov.
If combo and infinite loops are the only way to reliably win in your meta, that's not a problem tutor-bans will fix. Like I said in another thread, if Joe's mono black deck wins by DT into Exsanguinate/Torment of Hailfire or Tim's etb Bant deck always goes for Craterhoof, what good does a tutor ban do? Isn't he still going to win with the same card in every game that goes long?
I think for some Breya players, it's only fun because it's Esper + Red. Some players don't really care to infinite loop everyone else out each game. But since it's the only option, they run it. I know vintage players long for a place where Goblin Welder can dominate once more. You mentioned all of the fun cards. Well, aren't tutors just access to your fun cards? I say tutors just enable fun. Fun isn't necessarily game ending. The corollary of course is that being able to actually play your spells is fun and that mana enables fun. I believe both. Get that notion of tutors bans out of here.
If you propose that tutors enable a weak/poor strategy but otherwise potentially fun strategy (e.g. Mizzix) to exist, how exactly is that a negative? Especially since you're also saying that a tutor-enabled "has many play lines" and "different synergistic combos?" I'd say that my lands.dec deck is otherwise extremely weak besides its tutors. I don't play any fast mana, have no stack interaction/instant speed removal (since it's completely lands based), and doesn't play enough permanents/card draw that I can ever snowball value. But that I play 5 colors and can tutor for lands that act as spells or engines that allow me to use lands is what makes my deck good.
If a tutor for a single card, can turn a game around where you are otherwise dead-to-rights, maybe that card and the tutor should be discussed together?
I say that match-ups and the multiple odd-interactions and truly-unique board states possible in EDH are what really drive variance in commander games. I mean, the card that people most build their decks around is already tutor'd out each and every single game. A blanket tutor-ban isn't going to make games more fun just because.
I know that a thoughtful, reflective deck builder can put together something to get them out of a funk. Blaming certain cards is just too easy. But if someone or group is stuck playing the infinite loop/instant win game or won't let go over always playing the same high power'd cards, then games can seem same-ish.
Yeah, Macabre's Demonic Tutor = Rampant Growth shouldn't be taken seriously. Both power-level and effect are massively different. No green ramp spell approaches DT's power. And Rampant Growth isn't good for much besides loot fodder in the late game (but this can be said of other good cards as well), whereas DT is someone I'm happy to draw at any time in any game (but this can be said of other good cards as well). However, I must bring up that green land ramp = consistency. And that can mean repetitive as well. I mean, some of the same people who complain about tutors being repetitive for some reason refuse to acknowledge that T2 ramp, T3 ramp, T4 ramp, T5 Maelstrom Wanderer, T6 Maelstrom Wanderer, T7 Maelstrom Wanderer is also repetitive and enabled with green land ramp.
I don't think tutors violate the singleton nature of the format because it's not as if you can tutor for another copy of the same card.
About the "singleton restriction" of the format, do you feel the same about Relentless Rats?
I agree that those are two separate things.
However, one of the complaints about tutors is that they make the game more consistently the same. So other than power-level, some people complain about tutors making games feel the same. It's an easy parallel for people to make since ramping lands consistently also makes games feel the same and land ramp is literally searching your deck for specific cards. So I guess that's why it's brought up so often together.
But I'm sure the OP meant to just discuss Demonic Tutor and the like.
I suppose that split cards are kinda like wildcards too...so I don't necessarily agree that tutors are exactly wildcards, but I understand.
100% there definitely does need to be more search-hate.
Green land ramp/tutoring is one of the biggest parts of EDH though.
Great experiment. Now, instead of banning tutors, try banning the cards that player in your group tutor for over and over again. And then have fun.
If you have a solid play group, doing both of these on separate occasions would be worth your while. See which games are actually more varied.
I find breaking up people from playing the same win-conditions over and over again leads to much more varied games. Take away tutors for Craterhoof Behemoth and guess what? Craterhoof still ends up winning the same amount of games.
I also never like Cataracts because it's essentially a colorless land. And you probably don't have to be playing Unclaimed Territory.
I don't have a decklist for my Edric, Spymaster of Trest deck because I retired it a while back before I started putting stuff online, but I didn't play Sol Ring there because it doesn't produce G or U and I'm very low to the ground. I also have Null Rod and would put the new Collector Ouphe in the deck.
Here are two decks that I already have put on tappedout:
I do like input on deck lists, so if you can justify Sol Ring in either of those decks, lmk. I don't have Sol Ring in Sram because I'm trying to cantrip with Wauras. I also don't play Sol Ring in Child, because I'm actively planning to trigger Child of Alara.
Well, if Doubling Season wasn't that good, then the super friends player wouldn't tutor for it every time. And then your argument against tutors repetitively tutoring for the same thing each game wouldn't hold. Unless, of course, you still feel like the game is repetitive when a player tutors for different things each game.
I don't know if you're actually going to look through my deck lists and prove me wrong about Sol Ring. But if you do, you'll notice that my Land.dec is heavy in tutors. Rarely do I get the same card again and again so I know tutoring in and of itself doesn't lead to repetitive games. Tutors themselves are not the root causes of repetitiveness. In my lands.dec, having a Planar Cleansing as a commander leads to the repetitive games.
Your argument also doesn't hold because tutoring isn't the only way to end up with the same card each game. What if you see the same card dominate or end multiple games, but it was not tutored for? Even when the card(s) isn't tutored for, you're still going to say that the game was a repeat of the previous, right? For instance, in any game that lasts long enough versus a deck with Black, I can reasonably expect an eventual huge Exsanguinate and/or Torment of Hailfire to end the game. And thus, I play (e.g. plan whom I attack) with that possibility in mind. That isn't caused by tutoring, that's just caused by the card being in the 99.
Even if you play in a game where a player tutored for the same card over and over again, what about all of the actions prior to the tutor being cast? Wouldn't that also mean that the game was essentially the same each time before the tutor as well? How come the game state was the same each time such that the player could/would get the same thing again and again and play the same line again and again? Maybe your games are boring/repetitive because your pod is growing stale or lacks interaction? Maybe the tutor target is so powerful that it doesn't matter what the board state is? I don't think those are issues addressed with the ban of Demonic Tutor, Vampiric Tutor, or Imperial Seal.
Essentially, your only argument that tutoring causes repetitive games is that a player can tutor for the same card each game. And you and Carthage refuse to consider that other things can lead to repetitiveness, despite the glaringly obvious counter-argument that the same player who can tutor for the same card each time can also tutor for something else. When someone brings up other reasons why a game can be repetitive, you just repeat, "no, it's the tutors."
I don't really need/want to change your mind, I just want my opinion out there as much as anyone else. But if someone is going to complain about Bribery or list Mastermind's Acquisition just to make a point about the perils of tutors, those people should stay far away from any decisions about the banlist.
If anything, please look through my deck lists and if you feel Sol Ring can actually be justified, let me know.
How come your arguments/posts center around cEDH or competitive? Let's not discuss the banlist exclusively under the umbrella of cEDH. First, cEDH is a nebulous term. Second, cEDH doesn't have a separate banlist apart from actual EDH. If you're going to dismiss every 5 cmc card, just because it's not good enough to stack up again Ad Naus, then what's the point of complaining about Bribery?
Your main complaint against tutors (repetitiveness) happens have with or without tutors. Because the root causes of repetitiveness aren't tutors.
For instance, let's consider Doubling Season. If someone tutors for that card every single game in their super friend deck, is the tutor the issue or is Doubling Season? Maybe the repetitive search for Doubling Season is because that card is so far and above every other card in the deck.
Doubling Season and PW decks are also interesting in the consideration of repetitiveness because many would argue that it's a very repetitive archetype. Even non-green PW decks play out essentially the same. They're all stacks of removal, wrath's, and fogs. So redundant effects are why they're repetitive, not the Demonic Tutor for Doubling Season.
And let's face it, people actually want their decks to function/play out the same each game. That's why people play redundant effects, consistent mana, and build around their generals. You don't want repetitiveness, but you fail to address the elephant in the room, generals and building around them make decks play out very consistently.
If you have ever play tested competitively, you'll no doubt realize that many match-ups are predictable. That's just what happens when you run the same 75 vs the other same 75. Games being fun and non-repetitive in EDH owe a lot to how decks interact in unpredictable ways in multiplayer pods. I can build a Brago deck to be consistent and do the same things, but when I bring it to a different pod, the games will play out differently whether I tutor or not (and I do use Recruiter of the Guard to get many different creatures each game). That should be primary source of games being fresh and new. Games don't just become fresh and new because you are ban happy.
Here are some factors that play into repetitiveness more so than tutors:
1.) The strength of new threats they print is very high and many players will gravitate towards those same threats. I wished WOTC would stop printing for EDH.
2.) Many of those new strong cards are legendary creatures. I personally don't like playing against 3-4 Merens at every store, but it seems like other people do. Once again, players will flock to strong threats and when they are commanders, its effect is even more potent on you seeing the same stuff each game.
3.) With the release of each set, more redundant effects are available and find their ways into decks.
4.) EDHREC and commander content means a lot of people hear/see/become influenced the same things.
5.) Generous mulligan rules. You'll see this has had a huge impact in sanctioned magic as well. This is literally a rule that makes games play out more the same each time.
6.) It has become socially unacceptable to impact the game such that players have anything other than their ideal board-state. You even have huge cry-babies that whine when you remove their Consecrated Sphinx. Apparently, it's even frowned upon to play Torpor Orb because it's "stax." Players actively expect all of their resources to remain intact for an entire game. Well, if you can always plan to have all of your colors and play ahead on curve, then of course games will play out the same each time.
Your point is that tutors hurt deck diversity but that's not the case.
Look at the tutors that you listed. Examples like Reshape and Transmute Artifact are very theme specific. In order to run those, you have to skew your deck heavily towards artifacts. I don't see all cEDH being heavily artifact themed. So in a way, those tutors let many types of decks exist. Just like how enchantment tutors can encourage people to build around enchantments and those land tutors encourage people to build lands matter decks.
And many of the cards you mentioned aren't pure tutors. They are only even run because they can function multiple roles in the deck at the same time. +10 tutors in a deck is a lot of air. And like I said, if you want to build a good deck, it's tough to play that much air. You might start every decklist as 1 Sol Ring and 10 tutors, but that is lazy deck building.
I have 3 decks without Sol Ring and I'm sure that I built them in optimal ways. In the same way, I never felt compelled to include tutors just to have them. I feel much move compelled to include things like Doubling Season, you know, cards that actually do things.
You listed many, many options. And some aren't even worth playing. I love Diabolic Revelation. Honestly, why would anyone bring that up as a problem?
And, if someone wants to play Wild Pair or Thalia's Lancers? What do you have against them?
I'm also sure that my question was facetious. I can count to ten and use gatherer as well + not many or any good decks will waste 10 slots on a pure tutors. Using gatherer or edhrec to stuff your deck full of tutors will not build a good deck.
Also, many of the tutors you list also support weaker decks. There's also a case to be made that tutoring allows weaker decks to compete with stronger decks. and once again, where you might see T&N as a problem card in casual, I see T&N as the epitome of being a Timmy in EDH. Doing powerful things is fun.
I guess it's "rarely true" just because you say so. "10 tutors" is really pushing it. Can you name all ten of them?
I find that powerful legendary creatures from Commander sets has done more to damage deck variety than tutor cards by far. Demonic Tutor goes into all decks that have black and that has never limited the variety of decks that I see. But Meren merely existing means I see Meren everywhere.
I think the effect is too difficult to trigger.
But they are printing a lot of candidates lately with their "lands matter" push. For example, Elvish Reclaimer from 2020 seems ridiculous.
I can't answer your question, but I'll echo your sentiment. People taking too long is the real problem.
People "don't like" extra-turns. When in all actuality, they do. Taking an extra-turn is one of the most viscerally enjoyable things in MTG.
People "don't like" tutoring. When in all actuality, they do. In EDH, the card you want to play with the most is always available in every game in the command zone. They don't actually want randomness (i.e. see "mana-screw" and "color-screw").
At least now you know how to deal with Yarok.
fwiw, It's still worth it to remove Yarok even when the player has a lot of mana because it makes it tougher to have mana to cast Yarok + something else on the same turn.
If you don't play removal for creatures, don't be surprised when a commander-centric deck takes over. In EDH, you always have +1 card available due to command zone. If you play blue at all, you can always steal opposing commanders. For commander-centric decks, it can be crippling. So trade for a Gilded Drake.
Since you have a personal vendetta against Yarok, will you finally play Torpor Orb now? Say what you want against "stax" effects...but here's a solution...