Hey everyone. I have my fair share of combo decks, aggro decks and control decks under my belt, but I am now interested in something a little different. I know I probably shouldn't admit this, but I am an EDH Dave. You're probably wondering "What the heck is a Dave?" And "How is this related to the topic?" Well, to put it bluntly; a Dave is the unofficial term some people have used to describe a fourth MTG psychodynamic, whereby the player loves ruining people's plans/options and doesn't care whether they win or lose, as long as the opponent(s) had a hard, annoying time trying to win.
The main difference between an EDH griefer and an EDH Dave is a griefer is deliberately going out of his way to troll and ruin the game, where as a Dave plays his actual playstyle and griefs by accident, just enough to watch the opponent scramble without completely ruining it. You know that guy that plays back to basics in a mono-blue EDH deck filled with counterspells? Yeah, thats a Dave.
Since reading Daniel Rezendes' 2007 article on the psychodynamic, I have always been fascinated with cards that make people uncomfortable and make them squirm a little. Cards like stranglehold, Ruination, Quicksilver fountain, obsidian fireheart, painful quandary, telepathy, nature's wrath and aura of silence all make me giggle like a little girl, but I digress. I have come to the conclusion that mono-red would be best to create a Dave deck for. This psychodynamic heavily interests me and I would like to implement it into a mono-red edh deck.
So, now here is the dilemma; I can't decide which commander to use for this new deck as they are each good/bad in their own way. I have narrowed it down to these five commanders:
Purphoros, God of the forge: I admittedly haven't seen much of him in action, but from what I hear... he is a house. I think the only downside to him is the deck must be very much built around him to be effective. One obvious pro is he is quite hard to remove/tuck. Does he attract much hate?
Akroma, angel of fury: Being uncounterable, mostly unstealable and mostly untuckable she is a very good option for my meta. I also love her mana sink OHKO abilities. What do you guys think of her? How much hate will she attract?
Jaya Ballard, task mage: My favourite mono-red commander. Its just scary how much my girlfriend looks like her and vice-versa. Even before her though, I've always loved Jaya. Theres just something so cool about having a planeswalker-commander that can kill sharuum, niv-mizzet or azami with just one red mana. I was wondering what you guys thought of Jaya and how effective she can be? Would she attract less hate then the other general options I have suggested? Is her discard a serious hindrance? There is heaps of tuck in my meta; should i be worried if I don't buy a imperial recruiter to tutor for her, I am screwed?
Norin the wary: Pretty much the troll of EDH AFAIK. Apparently he's very hard to remove from the board. I haven't seen any Norin decks in my area and I was wondering if I could get some insight into how hated/effective/fun he actually is. He sounds like a super-ultra-mega troll, but I'm scared that after spending all the money on his deck, he will be a one-time-show-pony and everyone will not play him again.
Kiki-jiki, mirror breaker: Everyone knows the mirror breaker. Does he get seriously hated out like everyone says he does? I love me some kiki-jiki but im worried i'll get insta-hated-out and won't get to Dave around.
TL;DR: I can't choose between the 5 commanders listed above for a mono-red Dave EDH deck. What are your opinions/experiences on each. Thanks in advance guys.
Hummm griefer based mono red, I would look at Norin or Jaya probably for a griefer build. Norin has a lot of dirty tricks and Jaya's ability to sort of blow things up at will can work nicely for that strategy.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
redthirst is redthirst, fifth Horseman of the Apocalypse. He was the leader of the Fires of Salvation, the only clan I'm aware of to get modded off the forums so hard they made their own forums.
Degenerate? Sure. Loudmouth? You bet. Law abiding? No ****ing way.
Without question, Norin is your guy. My playgroup refuses to come to the table if I play Norin. This is all after just >>>1<<< game with my Norin deck. He is king of the fun at any game.
While Purphoros is cool and lets you play some cool cards like Hellion Eruption and Firecat Blitz, he is just a worse deck than Krenko IMO.
Akroma just isn't that powerful.
Norin is getting to be a bit overdone.
Kiki-Jiki draws so much hate I wouldn't be comfortable playing him. He doesn't have people start targeting you, but you'll have a hard time keeping him on board.
I disagree. Akroma is very powerful because she's a great mana sink for big mana red and is pro the best colors to be pro. Use an Akroma's Memorial and it gets better. If you want to troll hard, float a ton of mana (Mana Geyser), Obliterate, and slam Akroma down. It's even better if you have Chandra Ablaze.
Also, Ashling is fantastic. My favorite. Very easy to troll with because she's so independent.
My mono red deck is Adamaro, first to desire. Not sure if that fits your style, but it's basically MLD + stuff like howling mine and wheel effects. It also runs a ton of "free" spells so that I can get around the lack of mana while make use of the excess hand size I have - cards like fury of the horde and blazing shoal are quite good. I think I may be a bit Dave since I am usually happy as long as everyone knows I was in the game.
In my mono red I use Lovisa Coldeyes. She gives a bonus to barbarian, warriors and berzerkers of which I run NONE of. So fun discussing to new players my general of choice. A few have gotten frusturated and tried giving me red legend cards out of their confusion lol. Fun fun.
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EDH builds:
Sliver Queen
Progenitus
Teysa, Envoy of ghosts
Rubinia, Removalchaser
Xenagos, God of sweatiness
Jaya Ballard, task mage: My favourite mono-red commander. Its just scary how much my girlfriend looks like her and vice-versa. Even before her though, I've always loved Jaya. Theres just something so cool about having a planeswalker-commander that can kill sharuum, niv-mizzet or azami with just one red mana. I was wondering what you guys thought of Jaya and how effective she can be? Would she attract less hate then the other general options I have suggested? Is her discard a serious hindrance? There is heaps of tuck in my meta; should i be worried if I don't buy a imperial recruiter to tutor for her, I am screwed?
you might try purpheros, one of his best friends is norin, and kikki is his goblin cousin. kikki's great for copying all the army in a box shenanigans for a boatload of damage, and norin makes people hurt for doing anything at all. having norin and purpheros out and casting jokulhops seems like giggles for a dave. solid mountains for a mana base lets you ruination/blood moon at will.
in my experience, running him does draw some hate, but it can make little difference as cards like norin, krenko, siege gang, goblin warrens (innocuous kill card there right?) end the game quickly.
Purphoros is more of a combo deck than anything, and that doesn't seem to be what you're going for. Same goes for Kiki. Akroma can be good, but again, her playstyle is (from what I've gathered) big mana > wipe board > Akroma. I mean, some would consider Jokulhaups griefing, but it doesn't make people squirm so much as groan.
I think you'd have good luck with either Jaya or Norin. They both have their own little engines which make them powerful commanders. I play Norin and have no experience with Jaya, so he's my vote, but enough good players swear by her that I think you can pick either one. There are good resources on this board to build either.
I also play Weiss Schwarz, Chaos, Vanguard and Wixoss.
Weiss Schwarz Sets
Accel World, Angel Beats, Familiar of Zero, Gargantia on the Verdurous Planet, Guilty Crown, Kill La Kill, Robotics;Notes, Sword Art Online.
Chaos Partners
Arpeggio of Blue Steel: Iona, Kirishima, Kongou.
Dangan Ronpa: Asahina, Togami.
Freezing: Vibration: Chiffon, Satelizer.
Vanguard Clans Favoured
Angel Feather, Dark Irregulars, Genesis, Neonecter, Pale Moon, Shadow Paladins, Tachikaze.
Also, on Imperial Recruiter: Every mono-:symr: wants it. Not just Jaya. Check out the Jaya primer in the multiplayer section for more information about how that deck tends to go. I don't think Weebo even plays Recruiter.
Purphoros - You will be hated, you will be linear, you will be quick. With purphoros at the helm you need to either get your kill in quickly or you'll be targeted down universally. It's pretty obvious what the goal of the game is when you use him, and unfortunately he's pretty bad against Torpor Orb, so pack in lots of non-creature artifact destruction.
That being said, if you can get a little horde of critters out, his activated ability does scary, scary things. Nevermind the fact that his ETb is just as likely to kill everyone.
Akroma - Seemingly only good in Wildfire-type decks, or 1v1 Kaalia decks (pro blue is good). Your deck will either be really good, and you'll die after the first game, or it'll suck, and you'll die after the first turn.
Jaya Ballard - My first general when I began my foray into mono red. You can build around her discard really easily, and in fact make it a theme to the deck. Jaya loves Squee, long walks on the beach, and seahorses. They don't light on fire as easily as regular horses do, you see.
Kiki-Jiki - Again, a commander that will be either really good or really bad, and also shut down by Torpor Orb. At five mana, with three red, he's really awkwardly placed in terms of cost. You want to be spewing out colorless mana to get more value out of your ETB abuse, but you want colors in order to actually cast him.
He goes infinite by himself with Zealous Conscripts, and can be a really fine goodstuff red general. I think he's better in the 99.
If you're very worried about tuck, Gamble can fetch your general easily for the price of either discarding another card, or increasing her command zone count by 1.
Often overlooked for mono-color are the hybrid mana legends from Shadowmoor/eventide. I have a big mana mono-B deck with Oona, Queen of the Fae at the helm and it's nice. It even lets you run other hybrid cards like Memory Plunder without losing the strengths of a mono-color mana base.
In that spirit, I would submit Wort, the Raidmother. Doubling up on Wildfire, Thoughts of Ruin, and similar resource denial can be quite painful, additionally, you can run Vexing Shusher to deal with permission decks; plus, being a goblin makes him easily tutorable in R.
Tahngarth (defensive) and Godo (offensive) are pretty good voltron commanders. Dong Zhou, the Tyrant covers a lot of red's bases. One of your biggest weaknesses will be the "titanic creature of doom." Dong Zhou is a deterrent for that and makes a great general for a deck that wants to just deal damage and have things like Furnace of Rath out. Kazuul, Tyrant of the Cliffs is a unique mono-red general that can play a sort of political deterrence game, and is nice if you want to be the aloof barbarian. Maraxus of Keld has no master. He is chaos.
The main difference between an EDH griefer and an EDH Dave is a griefer is deliberately going out of his way to troll and ruin the game, where as a Dave plays his actual playstyle and griefs by accident, just enough to watch the opponent scramble without completely ruining it. You know that guy that plays back to basics in a mono-blue EDH deck filled with counterspells? Yeah, thats a Dave.
Since reading Daniel Rezendes' 2007 article on the psychodynamic, I have always been fascinated with cards that make people uncomfortable and make them squirm a little. Cards like stranglehold, Ruination, Quicksilver fountain, obsidian fireheart, painful quandary, telepathy, nature's wrath and aura of silence all make me giggle like a little girl, but I digress. I have come to the conclusion that mono-red would be best to create a Dave deck for. This psychodynamic heavily interests me and I would like to implement it into a mono-red edh deck.
So, now here is the dilemma; I can't decide which commander to use for this new deck as they are each good/bad in their own way. I have narrowed it down to these five commanders:
Purphoros, God of the forge: I admittedly haven't seen much of him in action, but from what I hear... he is a house. I think the only downside to him is the deck must be very much built around him to be effective. One obvious pro is he is quite hard to remove/tuck. Does he attract much hate?
Akroma, angel of fury: Being uncounterable, mostly unstealable and mostly untuckable she is a very good option for my meta. I also love her mana sink OHKO abilities. What do you guys think of her? How much hate will she attract?
Jaya Ballard, task mage: My favourite mono-red commander. Its just scary how much my girlfriend looks like her and vice-versa. Even before her though, I've always loved Jaya. Theres just something so cool about having a planeswalker-commander that can kill sharuum, niv-mizzet or azami with just one red mana. I was wondering what you guys thought of Jaya and how effective she can be? Would she attract less hate then the other general options I have suggested? Is her discard a serious hindrance? There is heaps of tuck in my meta; should i be worried if I don't buy a imperial recruiter to tutor for her, I am screwed?
Norin the wary: Pretty much the troll of EDH AFAIK. Apparently he's very hard to remove from the board. I haven't seen any Norin decks in my area and I was wondering if I could get some insight into how hated/effective/fun he actually is. He sounds like a super-ultra-mega troll, but I'm scared that after spending all the money on his deck, he will be a one-time-show-pony and everyone will not play him again.
Kiki-jiki, mirror breaker: Everyone knows the mirror breaker. Does he get seriously hated out like everyone says he does? I love me some kiki-jiki but im worried i'll get insta-hated-out and won't get to Dave around.
Oh, and here is the article incase everyone is wondering where my reference was about this fourth Psychodynamic: [PHP]http://www.mtgsalvation.com/660-the-fourth-psycho.html[/PHP]
TL;DR: I can't choose between the 5 commanders listed above for a mono-red Dave EDH deck. What are your opinions/experiences on each. Thanks in advance guys.
Signature by Inkfox Aesthetics by Xen
[Modern] Allies
—Jaya Ballard, task mage
While Purphoros is cool and lets you play some cool cards like Hellion Eruption and Firecat Blitz, he is just a worse deck than Krenko IMO.
Akroma just isn't that powerful.
Norin is getting to be a bit overdone.
Kiki-Jiki draws so much hate I wouldn't be comfortable playing him. He doesn't have people start targeting you, but you'll have a hard time keeping him on board.
There is the Vashino dragon commander as an option
Well what about Ashling the pilgrim?... you blow her up in reponse to things
Pioneer:UR Pheonix
Modern:U Mono U Tron
EDH
GB Glissa, the traitor: Army of Cans
UW Dragonlord Ojutai: Dragonlord NOjutai
UWGDerevi, Empyrial Tactician "you cannot fight the storm"
R Zirilan of the claw. The solution to every problem is dragons
UB Etrata, the Silencer Cloning assassination
Peasant cube: Cards I own
I disagree. Akroma is very powerful because she's a great mana sink for big mana red and is pro the best colors to be pro. Use an Akroma's Memorial and it gets better. If you want to troll hard, float a ton of mana (Mana Geyser), Obliterate, and slam Akroma down. It's even better if you have Chandra Ablaze.
Also, Ashling is fantastic. My favorite. Very easy to troll with because she's so independent.
RRRAshling, the PilgrimRRR
UUUThadda Adel, AcquisitorUUU
BBB Two Hundred Zombies BBB
Duel Commander
WR Tajic, Wrath of the Manlands RW
BGW Doran Destruction WGB
Commander
GUB Mimeoplasm, Screw Politics BUG
BR Mogis, God of Slaughter RB
RGW Marath, Ramp and Removal WGR
WUBRG Karona, Jank God GRBUW
I buy HP and Damaged cards!
Only EDH:
Sigarda, Host of Herons: Enchantress' Enchantments
Jenara, Asura of War: ETB Value Town
Purphoros, God of the Forge: Global Punishment
Xenagos, God of Revels: Ramp, Sneak, & Heavy Hitters
Ghave, Guru of Spores: Dies_to_Doom_Blade's stax list
Edric, Spymaster of Trest: Donald's list
Sliver Queen
Progenitus
Teysa, Envoy of ghosts
Rubinia, Removalchaser
Xenagos, God of sweatiness
Do you mean Zo-Zu the Punisher?
I think we have a winner!
in my experience, running him does draw some hate, but it can make little difference as cards like norin, krenko, siege gang, goblin warrens (innocuous kill card there right?) end the game quickly.
yes, so sorry.
I buy HP and Damaged cards!
Only EDH:
Sigarda, Host of Herons: Enchantress' Enchantments
Jenara, Asura of War: ETB Value Town
Purphoros, God of the Forge: Global Punishment
Xenagos, God of Revels: Ramp, Sneak, & Heavy Hitters
Ghave, Guru of Spores: Dies_to_Doom_Blade's stax list
Edric, Spymaster of Trest: Donald's list
I think you'd have good luck with either Jaya or Norin. They both have their own little engines which make them powerful commanders. I play Norin and have no experience with Jaya, so he's my vote, but enough good players swear by her that I think you can pick either one. There are good resources on this board to build either.
Draft my Peasant Cube.
EDIT: Diaochan, Artful Beauty is good, but very build around. I have her as my mono-red control.
Main Decks
Diaochan, Iroas, God of Victory, Kaalia, Marton, Ulasht, Volrath,
Kaervek, Prossh, Titania
Amusing or Themed
Progenitus
Pauper Guildmages
Azorius Boros Dimir Golgari Gruul Izzet Korozda
Orzhov Rakdos Rix Maadi Selesyna Simic Skarrg Zameck
I also play Weiss Schwarz, Chaos, Vanguard and Wixoss.
Accel World, Angel Beats, Familiar of Zero, Gargantia on the Verdurous Planet, Guilty Crown, Kill La Kill, Robotics;Notes, Sword Art Online.
Chaos Partners
Arpeggio of Blue Steel: Iona, Kirishima, Kongou.
Dangan Ronpa: Asahina, Togami.
Freezing: Vibration: Chiffon, Satelizer.
Vanguard Clans Favoured
Angel Feather, Dark Irregulars, Genesis, Neonecter, Pale Moon, Shadow Paladins, Tachikaze.
Wixoss - Just trial decks for now!
The deck can win out of nowhere with about 18 different combinations of cards, and it makes Obliterate asymmetrical.
Horde of Notions
Yosei | Talrand | Geth | Slobad | Polukranos
Medomai | Grimgrin | Tymaret | Borborygmos | Saffi | Obzedat | Edric | Glissa | Jhoira | Aurelia
Sydri | Shattergang | Thraximundar | Derevi | Karador | Wanderer | Zedruu | Mimeoplasm
Considering both how many lists I've seen of him and how new he is, it's pretty damn popular. I wouldn't call it overdone, but it's definitely done.
Of the five in the OP, Jaya seems the best.
Cheers!
Krichaiushii on PucaTrade.
Creator of Nyxathid Goes To Town, the M:tG blog responsible for the most LoLs
http://nyxathidgoestotown.wordpress.com/
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But... on the five you listed:
Purphoros - You will be hated, you will be linear, you will be quick. With purphoros at the helm you need to either get your kill in quickly or you'll be targeted down universally. It's pretty obvious what the goal of the game is when you use him, and unfortunately he's pretty bad against Torpor Orb, so pack in lots of non-creature artifact destruction.
That being said, if you can get a little horde of critters out, his activated ability does scary, scary things. Nevermind the fact that his ETb is just as likely to kill everyone.
Beusapu's Multiplayer and Kwiznek's 1v1 are good places to start.
Akroma - Seemingly only good in Wildfire-type decks, or 1v1 Kaalia decks (pro blue is good). Your deck will either be really good, and you'll die after the first game, or it'll suck, and you'll die after the first turn.
mutedequilibrium's 1v1 is the place to go for this gal.
Jaya Ballard - My first general when I began my foray into mono red. You can build around her discard really easily, and in fact make it a theme to the deck. Jaya loves Squee, long walks on the beach, and seahorses. They don't light on fire as easily as regular horses do, you see.
Check out Weebo's Jaya and d0su's Squee for ideas.
Kiki-Jiki - Again, a commander that will be either really good or really bad, and also shut down by Torpor Orb. At five mana, with three red, he's really awkwardly placed in terms of cost. You want to be spewing out colorless mana to get more value out of your ETB abuse, but you want colors in order to actually cast him.
He goes infinite by himself with Zealous Conscripts, and can be a really fine goodstuff red general. I think he's better in the 99.
Fire Fist had a potent Kiki-Jiki back in the day.
Norin - I think I'll just link my primer and call it a vote.
EDH:
RNorin the WaryR <-Link! (Primer - Mono Red Control)
GUEdric, Spymaster of TrestUG <- Link! (Mini-Primer - Dredge)
Duel Commander:
WUGeist of Saint TraftUW <- Link! (Aggro-Control)
BGSkullbriar, the Walking GraveGB <- Link! (Aggro)
BUGDamia, Sage of StoneGUB <- Link! (Extinction Control)
Church of the Wary
Often overlooked for mono-color are the hybrid mana legends from Shadowmoor/eventide. I have a big mana mono-B deck with Oona, Queen of the Fae at the helm and it's nice. It even lets you run other hybrid cards like Memory Plunder without losing the strengths of a mono-color mana base.
In that spirit, I would submit Wort, the Raidmother. Doubling up on Wildfire, Thoughts of Ruin, and similar resource denial can be quite painful, additionally, you can run Vexing Shusher to deal with permission decks; plus, being a goblin makes him easily tutorable in R.
Dong Zhou, the Tyrant covers a lot of red's bases. One of your biggest weaknesses will be the "titanic creature of doom." Dong Zhou is a deterrent for that and makes a great general for a deck that wants to just deal damage and have things like Furnace of Rath out.
Kazuul, Tyrant of the Cliffs is a unique mono-red general that can play a sort of political deterrence game, and is nice if you want to be the aloof barbarian.
Maraxus of Keld has no master. He is chaos.