I'm curious what people's experiences with mono-colored decks have been.
When building a mono-shell, how much variety in deck building does each color provide?
I enjoy mono-red because I think there's a great variety of different play styles available to the color. You can go artificer, spellslinger/burn, goblin tokens with sac triggers, or red stompy - which I count both Lovisa Coldeyes and Zirilan of the Claw towards.
I feel like other mono builds have less options. When I go green I have the option to turn mana dorks sideways to make big mana to...cast big creatures. Or I can ramp to... cast big creatures. There's some tempo and control play available - Titania, Protector of Argoth has provided some new, interesting builds, and Mono-green enchantress is an option, but you probably want to include white for optimization.
Black is just black, and any combination of black cards doing what black does can probably win you the game. I don't see a deck being weak because it includes exsanguinate-spells, reanimator spells, and discard spells. There doesn't seem to be a need to narrow your focus in a black deck, there's such synergy in black that the deck seems to build itself, but over-all I'd say there's just one black goodstuff deck.
Blue is either too good, or too weak and lacks a win-con. The only interesting (read: "different") blue deck I've seen is mono-blue landfall with Patron of the Moon.
White just wants creatures. Maybe you can go mono-white enchantress, but you're still suffering from card draw, and become over dependent on artifacts.
In my signature, so currently: one black; one green; two white; two blue. No red, but that's primarily a budget constraint: I have a Feldon Of The Third Path red I want to build, but it'll set me back $600-$800 to build from scratch, so, it's an ongoing project for now.
In terms of power levels, I almost feel there are two groups: blue, green, and black, the power colors; and red and white, the weaker ones, with both in each category being fairly close in power level. In ranking them, it's also different in terms of mono color versus splash: I feel mono black is inherently more powerful than mono green, but green is typically a more powerful splash color, especially in creature-heavy builds. Overall I'd probably say U/B/G/w/r in mono color and U/G/B/r/w in terms of splashes.
That being said, you can totally build powerful white and red EDH decks, you'll just be leaning a bit heavily on artifacts for support.
I'm curious what people's experiences with mono-colored decks have been.
When building a mono-shell, how much variety in deck building does each color provide?
I enjoy mono-red because I think there's a great variety of different play styles available to the color. You can go artificer, spellslinger/burn, goblin tokens with sac triggers, or red stompy - which I count both Lovisa Coldeyes and Zirilan of the Claw towards.
I feel like other mono builds have less options. When I go green I have the option to turn mana dorks sideways to make big mana to...cast big creatures. Or I can ramp to... cast big creatures. There's some tempo and control play available - Titania, Protector of Argoth has provided some new, interesting builds, and Mono-green enchantress is an option, but you probably want to include white for optimization.
Black is just black, and any combination of black cards doing what black does can probably win you the game. I don't see a deck being weak because it includes exsanguinate-spells, reanimator spells, and discard spells. There doesn't seem to be a need to narrow your focus in a black deck, there's such synergy in black that the deck seems to build itself, but over-all I'd say there's just one black goodstuff deck.
Blue is either too good, or too weak and lacks a win-con. The only interesting (read: "different") blue deck I've seen is mono-blue landfall with Patron of the Moon.
White just wants creatures. Maybe you can go mono-white enchantress, but you're still suffering from card draw, and become over dependent on artifacts.
Green doesn't have to ramp into big creatures. As an example, my mono-green deck has two creatures with power greater than 4 (Krosan Tusker, which rarely hits the battlefield, and Terastodon, because who doesn't love some T-Don?). There are only 4 creatures with CMC greater than 4 (add to the list Genesis, who usually gets pitched to Survival/Shaman, and Duplicant, because everybody needs colorless removal). Granted, in this particular example I'm building wide rather than tall: there are 21 creatures in the deck (counting the general, Ezuri) which slip in under Aluren, plus token generation. It's not like I can't put the mana I ramp into to good use, either: Omnath, Locus of Mana, Joraga Warcaller, and Chameleon Colossus are all excellent funnels for any mana I happen to have lying around.
Mono-black doesn't have only one option, either. Suicide black is occasionally popular, my meta has an ANT deck with Sidisi at the helm, and my mono-black deck is a bit of a spellslinger build with Toshiro Umezawa.
I've seen controlling blue decks, as you might expect. I've also seen combo blue decks (these days, they usually combo into arbitrarily large card draw + Laboratory Maniac with counterspell backup), aggro blue decks (Sun Quan is pretty strong there, as is Talrand for a more spellslinger aggressive build). My own blue deck is designed without a wincon: I play my opponents' wincons instead, with 26 cards that either copy or appropriate my opponents' cards (and a number of others which take advantage of my opponents' plays or steal the card in a more metaphorical sense).
White does do well with weenies, but it's also got some of the best cards for controlling the board (as opposed to the stack, as blue usually does). Sweepers are what you see at first blush, but then you get to things like taxing (Aura of Silence, Suppression Field, Magus of the Tabernacle, Kataki, War's Wage, Thalia, Guardian of Thraben, Leonin Arbiter), tempo (Kismet, Loxodon Gatekeeper, Rule of Law, Eidolon of Rhetoric, Spirit of the Labyrinth), and some unique ways to say "no" (Hushwing Gryf, Stony Silence, Nevermore, Linvala, Keeper of Silence, Aven Mindcensor, Humility, Angel of Jubilation). I'll definitely agree that mono-white has to lean heavily on artifacts for card draw, though.
I'm curious what people's experiences with mono-colored decks have been.
Mine has been great.
My two mono-black decks are very different. Geth is a discard and reanimate deck. Discard is used both to control and to have things to steal/reanimate from others' graveyards. Marrow-Gnawer is a rat tribal deck with a disease subtheme. The two play very few cards in common. BTW, tribal and theme decks are one way to avoid sameness in making mono-color decks.
In Red, Rakka Mar is fast token blitz, pure and simple. It sometimes kills the whole table really early, but can also go for the long game, as it is quick to rebuild after board wipes. Kurkesh is an artifact deck, based strongly on the red Commander 2014 deck. I took out a couple of the more obvious combos and added more artifacts that benefit from Kurkesh's ability, plus some just plain solid stuff like Metalworker (which is insanely good in this deck). My Eron the Relentless deck represents an attempt to go very aggro without going full-tilt voltron. Red is actually good for a lot of things in EDH. It gets a bad rep because it doesn't do as many tricky things as some other colors, but if you care mostly about having fun, red actually has a lot to offer.
My white deck is Mageta the Lion "All wrath, all the time." It seeks to win via indestructible creatures, ample spot removal and at-will board wipes. It has done quite well. In my meta, there are a couple people with strong Nahiri decks that also do quite well. I have considered making a Nahiri deck, but the main archetypes are equipment aggro and tokens, and I already have other decks that do those things quite well.
My Heidar, Rimewind Master, is an unapologetic mono-blue control deck. It doesn't try to counterspell everything, but it makes it difficult for people to keep anything on the board for long, and is good at locking things down. It sometimes wins via Stasis lock. I don't play it often, but c'mon, it's mono-blue. I also like Jalira sea monster decks (my wife has one), but if you're going to have one mono-blue decks, it mights as well be of the type that makes people hate blue.
For mono-green, I went Mirri, Cat Warrior full-on voltron. Mirri seems so unassuming until you give your opponents some forests and Mirri is suddenly huge enough to two-shot people. It has done surprisingly well, and is a lot of fun to play.
I think the problem with trying to assess mono colored decks is that most of us identify, for the most part, as mages of a particular color. We gravitate towards our colors and use other colors far less frequently. So there's a bit of cognitive bias in trying to assess colors outside of one's "enjoyment zone."
In any case... In my mind, blue is the most flexibe color and can reasonably play the aggro, combo and control game equally well. Midrangy decks are a bad fit for blue, though, IMO.
Black has a similar feel to it. Where I could see it playing control, combo, aggro and midrange all equally well.
Green has incredible flexibility and plays aggro, combo and midrange(obviously) all well. (But not control, to my knowledge)
Red and white are where I'm not sure. For these colors, I just feel like there is little variety in how they approach playing. For example in white, you will always be using some kind of artifact package and in red, its pretty typical to have some kind of goblin package just as a form of utility.
White lends itself well to aggro and some midrange startegies, but obviously, there are very few combos in white, and again, there's the issue of drawing cards at the core of the control problem. Although, stax is something white CAN do quite well.
Red also can play the control, midrange, combo or aggro games effectively. But I think red's card pool has only recently received some of the tools to make this a reality. Before THS, I would have pretty much said red is pretty much exclusively for facebeating and occasional artifact shenanigans.
Good gracious. I used to have the whole all-colors-all-combinations 27 deck project, but I didn't always like the ones I built just to have the right deck combinations. So I pared down. To 30. Technically, one is still being built (my mono-U Jace flipwalker, which is currently being a mono-U control build with lots of Jaces), and another (my Liliana, Heretical Healer deck) is being led by another general right now.
B Ghoulcaller Gisa B Ob Nixilis (will be Liliana, Heretical Healer) U Vendilion Clique WUG Rubinia G Freyalise W Nahiri W Akroma R Kamahl GR Xenagos GB Jarad GRB Kresh BUG Tasigur RBU Garza Zol WUBRG Scion of the Ur-Dragon WUBRG Cromat GWB Teneb RWB Kaalia UWR Narset RB Lyzolda G Titania WR Anax and Cymede UR Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind UR Melek UR Tibor and Lumia UW Ephara GW Karametra (Angel tribal) WB Athreos GR Wort, the Raidmother GW Captain Sisay (tokens)
Plus the embryonic, work-in-progress U Jace deck.
I'm working on foiling out my favorites. Karametra, Kresh, Jarad, Xenagos, and Tasigur are complete. Vendilion Clique, Anax & Cymede, Melek, Athreos, Liliana, and Jace-to-be are in the foiling process.
I think the problem with trying to assess mono colored decks is that most of us identify, for the most part, as mages of a particular color. We gravitate towards our colors and use other colors far less frequently. So there's a bit of cognitive bias in trying to assess colors outside of one's "enjoyment zone."
I have a solution: All of my decks are blue, even the ones that don't have U in the color identity.
No, seriously, all of my decks either have blue, or play in some way that you might expect a blue deck to behave. (In a twist of irony, some of my decks that are actually blue don't behave as much like blue decks.)
So, it's pretty balanced. It makes sense to me that I've run W more (tied) than any other color, as I really value removal, particularly instant-speed spot effects like Swords to Plowshares. A high representation of G also makes sense, as it's just so good in EDH. I've pretty much decided to swear myself off of it, though. Going UG is just starting to feel too "easy-mode." I'm surprised that I've run R as much as other colors, though, as it really doesn't appeal to me much. I think it's always just been incidental (tagging along in Uril, the Miststalker and Kaalia of the Vast).
WUBRG - atogatog, all-the-cool-5c-things-that-got-colour-identity-screwed tribal WUBRG - karona "skip my own turn" tribal WUBRG - progenitus-hardcast/5c-control WUBRG - sliver tribal WUB - chromium pre-homelands french vanilla learn-to-play-edh WUB - oloro precon UBR - Mishra, Artificer Prodigy antiquities/brother's war theme UBR - jevala precon UBR - nicol bolas pre-homelands french vanilla learn-to-play-edh BRG - vaevictus asmadi pre-homelands french vanilla learn-to-play-edh BRG - prossh precon RGW - palladia-mors pre-homelands french vanilla learn-to-play-edh RWG - marath precon GWU - arcades sabboth pre-homelands french vanilla learn-to-play-edh GWU - derevi precon BGU - damia gorgon tribal WBR - kaalia precon WBG - ghave saproling tribal URG - riku copy stuff UWR - zedruu group hug UWR - zedruu police WU - banding tribal WU - gwafa hazid control UB - wrexial-the innsmouth-lovecraftian deck BR - rakdos the defiler metalpocalypse heavy metal brutality WG - tolsmir wolfblood lending deck UR - jhoira timey-wimey UR - tibor-lumia control WB - teysa voltron WR - agrus kos/aurelia/basandra/brion/gisela/iroas/razia/tajic "who-cares-who-leads-so-long-as-we-beat-face-boros" W - khemba U - teferi precon B - ob nixilis precon B - Ascendant Evincar beatdown B - phage living life close to the edge R - deretti precon R - norin the wary chaos R - ib nation (plus a few changes i made)
w-20
u-22
b-20
r-21
g-14
i think i have a couple of other decks that i probably forgot to mention, but thats the jist of it. seems quite even, though my disdain for green is slightly highlighted. another weird thing is that i think if it weren't for the precons and lending out decks, i think my dislike for green would be more pronounced (i have like 11 decks for lending out).
a bit surprised that w is high up there in the counts. ive always figured that i was a grixis player through and through, but there we have it; i'm a Yore-Tiller Nephilim player
My Sliver deck is my favorite. I got into Magic because a kid in middle school showed me his Victual Sliver and I thought the tribe concept was really cool. I don't play it much, but its one of those decks I'll always have around in one form or another.
The Vorel deck is more or less retired. It was my first attempt at a commander deck and its terribad. I'd take it apart, but there's not many cards in it I really care about using in another deck.
Maga is my first "successful" commander deck. I have a soft spot for mono black. I might switch up the theme a bit, but I'll probably always have at least one mono black deck.
I built the Karador deck because I'm also a Timmy at heart and I really wanted to play the high costed BW cards so I knew I needed green to ramp into them. It started out a revamp project of the Counterpunch precontructed deck I already owned but ended up replacing every card in the deck but the commander.
I picked up the Daretti deck because I eventually want to have a mono deck of each color, and none of the existing red commanders were really sticking out at me. Its been a pretty fun deck. I pick up upgrades for it now then, but I don't think the revamp will ever need to be as extensive as what I did to the Counterpunch deck.
The next deck I sleeve up with most likely be a Voltron deck since I don't really have anything like it yet. It'll probably be either WU, WU, or WUG and enchantment focused. I have a few decks I'm testing and they all preform reasonably well, but I haven't quite decided which one I like yet.
I'm running 3 sleeved decks, and Narset is still under construction as I find a strategy for it that isn't herp-derp goodstuff.dec.
Drana, Kalastria Bloodchief - Mono-Black Vampire Tribal B
Alesha, Who Smiles at Death - Equipment Beatdown WBR
Nicol Bolas - Bolas Themed Grixis Control BUR
Narset, Enlightened Master - Still working on that WUR
That breaks down as:
2W
2U
3B
3R
0G
I find green to be fairly boring. I love removal, so seeing my colors as mostly Mardu isn't shocking at all to me. If I end up building a fifth deck, it'll likely still be in Mardu colors in some shape or form. It's just my comfort zone and where I have the most fun. IF, and a BIG IF, they ever decide to print a werewolf or wolf legend, though, I could see myself splashing some green. Maybe even if I find a Jund deck I really like. I like removal, though, and I just find green to not have as much as I'd like. Turning dudes sideways and going "RAWR" just isn't my thing. I see the appeal, but I just prefer to have more interaction.
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Vorthos-player with way too much time on his hands and a love of thematic decks.
EDH - Yes, Each One is Named After a Song. I love tying music to my decks.
Yeah! I don't really have a preference. My green deck doesn't play a higher count of staples in the format, which is something I hate about the deck, but I still like how it plays out. I'm probably waiting for Origins to decide on a mono-W general, maybe the Gideon that's in here will be really good, who knows (might be building a nearly creature-less deck, I'll see). Also had some ideas about a full white-bordered mono-white deck but it's really hard to do.
My own rules when building a Commander deck:
1) Underrated general that I can build around but the deck must work without him/her too.
2) Every card must be legal in both banlists.
3) No infinite combo that could win (and ruin) instantly a multiplayer game.
4) Synergy at all costs; stay on theme, avoid goodstuff.
REPRESENTATION:
- 3 or 4
- 4 or 5
- 3 or 4
- 5 or 7
- 3 or 4
Contrary to my magic casual and standard days, I play a lot of black and blue. Which were up until a year ago, my least favorite colors. But of all my decks, the only one that doesn't have either or is my Aurelia deck, my first and still my favorite EDH deck
I'm curious what people's experiences with mono-colored decks have been.
When building a mono-shell, how much variety in deck building does each color provide?
I find that, with a few exceptions, mono-color decks actually encourage diversity. By this, I mean, EDH has its all-star cards in each color, and with two- and especially three-color decks, it can be easily end up as an all-stars goodstuff parade ( not that there's anything wrong with that, mind you ).
Mono color often forces you to look at weirder options. For example, in mono green you're kind of stuck on creature removal ( barring the uniformly excellent Beast Within ). So, you have to start running odder stuff like Lignify and Song Of The Dryads, or depending on the deck even Desert Twister ( grossly overcosted, yet ), etc. Your card pool needs to be creative given your color limitations.
The exception to this tends to be mana doublers. Caged Sun, Gauntlet Of Power, even the controversial Extraplanar Lens tend to pop up all the time in mono colored decks as they almost always tend to benefit the mono-player more.
monocoloured decks i think are awesome. because each colour's strengths and weaknesses are more exposed in monocolour, it makes deckbuilding a much more interesting process.
i think nearly any archetype is possible in any mono-colour build; there was someone here on MTGS that built a mono-green control build. if thats possible, anything else is probably just as possible. mono-blue sligh, mono-black group hug, mono-white pressure; its probably all possible (and i might even go for it if i could have been bothered).
mono-colour allows a higher percentage of good/underplayed non-basic lands like scorched ruins that wouldn't otherwise be possible.
So color counts come out to: W = 6 U = 5 B = 3 R = 3 G = 2 x = 1
Not too surprizing. I have always played WU, but as my wife and a friend started to shift towards more U and no one was playing W I shifted in that direction. We split a box for most expansions, so if I play the color that no one else does, I tend to get more of the cards that I want.
currently built decks are listed in signature, and colors are as follows: Wx2 U B R G WU WB WR WG UB UR BR BG RG WUB WUR WUG WBR WBG WRGx2 UBG URGx3 BRG WUBRG
totals
14xW
12xU
11xB
14xR
14xG
Mostly playing in Naya colors somewhat surprised me, as I tend to be one of the control players in the group. My first foray into MTG was in RG, so I suppose it's not that out of character.
[EDH] It's built to be a casual format and to a specific vision, and if you don't like the vision, there's nothing wrong with that, but it's not going to change to accommodate everyone. Big tent is not a goal.
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WG: Chorus of the Conclave
WG: Saffi
WGR: Ghitau
UB: Circu
B: He who hungers
BG: Glissa
BUR: Mishra
R: Eron
WB: Selenia
BR: Bladewing
W: 4
G: 4
U: 2
B: 5
R: 4
When building a mono-shell, how much variety in deck building does each color provide?
I enjoy mono-red because I think there's a great variety of different play styles available to the color. You can go artificer, spellslinger/burn, goblin tokens with sac triggers, or red stompy - which I count both Lovisa Coldeyes and Zirilan of the Claw towards.
I feel like other mono builds have less options. When I go green I have the option to turn mana dorks sideways to make big mana to...cast big creatures. Or I can ramp to... cast big creatures. There's some tempo and control play available - Titania, Protector of Argoth has provided some new, interesting builds, and Mono-green enchantress is an option, but you probably want to include white for optimization.
Black is just black, and any combination of black cards doing what black does can probably win you the game. I don't see a deck being weak because it includes exsanguinate-spells, reanimator spells, and discard spells. There doesn't seem to be a need to narrow your focus in a black deck, there's such synergy in black that the deck seems to build itself, but over-all I'd say there's just one black goodstuff deck.
Blue is either too good, or too weak and lacks a win-con. The only interesting (read: "different") blue deck I've seen is mono-blue landfall with Patron of the Moon.
White just wants creatures. Maybe you can go mono-white enchantress, but you're still suffering from card draw, and become over dependent on artifacts.
GWUBRDraft my Old Border Nostalgia Cube! and/or The Little Pauper Cube That Could!RBUWG
Modern:WDeath & TaxesW | RUGRUG DelverRUG
In my signature, so currently: one black; one green; two white; two blue. No red, but that's primarily a budget constraint: I have a Feldon Of The Third Path red I want to build, but it'll set me back $600-$800 to build from scratch, so, it's an ongoing project for now.
In terms of power levels, I almost feel there are two groups: blue, green, and black, the power colors; and red and white, the weaker ones, with both in each category being fairly close in power level. In ranking them, it's also different in terms of mono color versus splash: I feel mono black is inherently more powerful than mono green, but green is typically a more powerful splash color, especially in creature-heavy builds. Overall I'd probably say U/B/G/w/r in mono color and U/G/B/r/w in terms of splashes.
That being said, you can totally build powerful white and red EDH decks, you'll just be leaning a bit heavily on artifacts for support.
UTeferi, Temporal ArchmageU's prison: blue is the new orange is the new black.
Mizzix Of The Izmagnus : wheels on fire... rolling down the road...
BSidisi, Undead VizierB: Bis zum Erbrechen
GTitiania, Protector Of ArgothG: Protecting Argoth, by blowing it up!
GYisan, The Wanderer BardG: Gradus Ad Elfball.
Duel EDH: Yisan & Titania.
In Progress: Grand Arbiter Augustin IV duel; Grenzo, Dungeon Warden Doomsday.
Green doesn't have to ramp into big creatures. As an example, my mono-green deck has two creatures with power greater than 4 (Krosan Tusker, which rarely hits the battlefield, and Terastodon, because who doesn't love some T-Don?). There are only 4 creatures with CMC greater than 4 (add to the list Genesis, who usually gets pitched to Survival/Shaman, and Duplicant, because everybody needs colorless removal). Granted, in this particular example I'm building wide rather than tall: there are 21 creatures in the deck (counting the general, Ezuri) which slip in under Aluren, plus token generation. It's not like I can't put the mana I ramp into to good use, either: Omnath, Locus of Mana, Joraga Warcaller, and Chameleon Colossus are all excellent funnels for any mana I happen to have lying around.
Mono-black doesn't have only one option, either. Suicide black is occasionally popular, my meta has an ANT deck with Sidisi at the helm, and my mono-black deck is a bit of a spellslinger build with Toshiro Umezawa.
I've seen controlling blue decks, as you might expect. I've also seen combo blue decks (these days, they usually combo into arbitrarily large card draw + Laboratory Maniac with counterspell backup), aggro blue decks (Sun Quan is pretty strong there, as is Talrand for a more spellslinger aggressive build). My own blue deck is designed without a wincon: I play my opponents' wincons instead, with 26 cards that either copy or appropriate my opponents' cards (and a number of others which take advantage of my opponents' plays or steal the card in a more metaphorical sense).
White does do well with weenies, but it's also got some of the best cards for controlling the board (as opposed to the stack, as blue usually does). Sweepers are what you see at first blush, but then you get to things like taxing (Aura of Silence, Suppression Field, Magus of the Tabernacle, Kataki, War's Wage, Thalia, Guardian of Thraben, Leonin Arbiter), tempo (Kismet, Loxodon Gatekeeper, Rule of Law, Eidolon of Rhetoric, Spirit of the Labyrinth), and some unique ways to say "no" (Hushwing Gryf, Stony Silence, Nevermore, Linvala, Keeper of Silence, Aven Mindcensor, Humility, Angel of Jubilation). I'll definitely agree that mono-white has to lean heavily on artifacts for card draw, though.
Two Score, Minus Two or: A Stargate Tail
(Image by totallynotabrony)
Mine has been great.
My two mono-black decks are very different. Geth is a discard and reanimate deck. Discard is used both to control and to have things to steal/reanimate from others' graveyards. Marrow-Gnawer is a rat tribal deck with a disease subtheme. The two play very few cards in common. BTW, tribal and theme decks are one way to avoid sameness in making mono-color decks.
In Red, Rakka Mar is fast token blitz, pure and simple. It sometimes kills the whole table really early, but can also go for the long game, as it is quick to rebuild after board wipes. Kurkesh is an artifact deck, based strongly on the red Commander 2014 deck. I took out a couple of the more obvious combos and added more artifacts that benefit from Kurkesh's ability, plus some just plain solid stuff like Metalworker (which is insanely good in this deck). My Eron the Relentless deck represents an attempt to go very aggro without going full-tilt voltron. Red is actually good for a lot of things in EDH. It gets a bad rep because it doesn't do as many tricky things as some other colors, but if you care mostly about having fun, red actually has a lot to offer.
My white deck is Mageta the Lion "All wrath, all the time." It seeks to win via indestructible creatures, ample spot removal and at-will board wipes. It has done quite well. In my meta, there are a couple people with strong Nahiri decks that also do quite well. I have considered making a Nahiri deck, but the main archetypes are equipment aggro and tokens, and I already have other decks that do those things quite well.
My Heidar, Rimewind Master, is an unapologetic mono-blue control deck. It doesn't try to counterspell everything, but it makes it difficult for people to keep anything on the board for long, and is good at locking things down. It sometimes wins via Stasis lock. I don't play it often, but c'mon, it's mono-blue. I also like Jalira sea monster decks (my wife has one), but if you're going to have one mono-blue decks, it mights as well be of the type that makes people hate blue.
For mono-green, I went Mirri, Cat Warrior full-on voltron. Mirri seems so unassuming until you give your opponents some forests and Mirri is suddenly huge enough to two-shot people. It has done surprisingly well, and is a lot of fun to play.
I enjoy all of my mono-color decks quite a bit.
In any case... In my mind, blue is the most flexibe color and can reasonably play the aggro, combo and control game equally well. Midrangy decks are a bad fit for blue, though, IMO.
Black has a similar feel to it. Where I could see it playing control, combo, aggro and midrange all equally well.
Green has incredible flexibility and plays aggro, combo and midrange(obviously) all well. (But not control, to my knowledge)
Red and white are where I'm not sure. For these colors, I just feel like there is little variety in how they approach playing. For example in white, you will always be using some kind of artifact package and in red, its pretty typical to have some kind of goblin package just as a form of utility.
White lends itself well to aggro and some midrange startegies, but obviously, there are very few combos in white, and again, there's the issue of drawing cards at the core of the control problem. Although, stax is something white CAN do quite well.
Red also can play the control, midrange, combo or aggro games effectively. But I think red's card pool has only recently received some of the tools to make this a reality. Before THS, I would have pretty much said red is pretty much exclusively for facebeating and occasional artifact shenanigans.
G - Titania
RW - Aurelia (On Standby)
GW - Karametra (Building)
UBR - Marchesa (On Standby)
WBG - Ghave
URW - Narset
BGU - Tasigur
RWB - Zurgo
GUR - Intet
W - 5
U - 4
B - 4
R - 6
G - 5
Pretty accurate. I like red the most.
B Ghoulcaller Gisa
B Ob Nixilis (will be Liliana, Heretical Healer)
U Vendilion Clique
WUG Rubinia
G Freyalise
W Nahiri
W Akroma
R Kamahl
GR Xenagos
GB Jarad
GRB Kresh
BUG Tasigur
RBU Garza Zol
WUBRG Scion of the Ur-Dragon
WUBRG Cromat
GWB Teneb
RWB Kaalia
UWR Narset
RB Lyzolda
G Titania
WR Anax and Cymede
UR Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind
UR Melek
UR Tibor and Lumia
UW Ephara
GW Karametra (Angel tribal)
WB Athreos
GR Wort, the Raidmother
GW Captain Sisay (tokens)
Plus the embryonic, work-in-progress U Jace deck.
I'm working on foiling out my favorites. Karametra, Kresh, Jarad, Xenagos, and Tasigur are complete. Vendilion Clique, Anax & Cymede, Melek, Athreos, Liliana, and Jace-to-be are in the foiling process.
No, seriously, all of my decks either have blue, or play in some way that you might expect a blue deck to behave. (In a twist of irony, some of my decks that are actually blue don't behave as much like blue decks.)
Here's a list of every Goblin card and every Goblins-matter card in my mono-red deck:
Squee, Goblin Nabob
For an actual breakdown of creature types:
Two Score, Minus Two or: A Stargate Tail
(Image by totallynotabrony)
RGW
GWU
WBR
G
UB
So let's see, that's:
W: 3
U: 2
B: 2
R: 2
G: 3
So, it's pretty balanced. It makes sense to me that I've run W more (tied) than any other color, as I really value removal, particularly instant-speed spot effects like Swords to Plowshares. A high representation of G also makes sense, as it's just so good in EDH. I've pretty much decided to swear myself off of it, though. Going UG is just starting to feel too "easy-mode." I'm surprised that I've run R as much as other colors, though, as it really doesn't appeal to me much. I think it's always just been incidental (tagging along in Uril, the Miststalker and Kaalia of the Vast).
R.I.P. Sundering Titan (6/20/12) and Braids, Cabal Minion (9/12/14)
WBR: Kaalia of the Vast
GWU: Rafiq of the Many
WUB: Sydri, Galvanic Genius
URG: Riku of two Reflections
BRG: Kresh the Bloodbraided
WUBRG: Sliver Overlord
Breakdown:
W: 4
U: 4
B: 4
R: 4
G: 4
Yes, the color balance (and creature types) were intentional when I decided on the commanders.
Edit: I do not know how to math apparently.
WBR: Kaalia of the Vast
GWU: Rafiq of the Many
WUB: Sydri, Galvanic Genius
URG: Riku of Two Reflections
BRG: Kresh the Bloodbraided
WUBRG: Sliver Overlord
R Daretti, Scrap Savant artifact recursion
GW Karametra, God of Harvests ramp and stomp
WUB Oloro, Ageless Asetic pillowfort
GW Sigarda, Host of Herons enchantress
RG Borborygmos Enraged land throw
UBR Nekusar, the Mindrazer mill
RW Gisela, Blade of Goldnight soldier semi-tribal
R Purphoros, God of the Forge pop-goblins
GU Prime Speaker Zegana simic stomp
G Ezuri, Renegade Leader elf tribal
Breakdown:
W:4
U:3
B:3
R:5
G:5
Not sure what this says about my preferences...
UBGSidisi dredge.
BG Jarad dredge.
URGRiku.
URBMarchesa.
URBJeleva.
W: 0
U: 4
B: 5
R: 3
G: 3
Not surprising, Black is my favourite color.
WUBRG - karona "skip my own turn" tribal
WUBRG - progenitus-hardcast/5c-control
WUBRG - sliver tribal
WUB - chromium pre-homelands french vanilla learn-to-play-edh
WUB - oloro precon
UBR - Mishra, Artificer Prodigy antiquities/brother's war theme
UBR - jevala precon
UBR - nicol bolas pre-homelands french vanilla learn-to-play-edh
BRG - vaevictus asmadi pre-homelands french vanilla learn-to-play-edh
BRG - prossh precon
RGW - palladia-mors pre-homelands french vanilla learn-to-play-edh
RWG - marath precon
GWU - arcades sabboth pre-homelands french vanilla learn-to-play-edh
GWU - derevi precon
BGU - damia gorgon tribal
WBR - kaalia precon
WBG - ghave saproling tribal
URG - riku copy stuff
UWR - zedruu group hug
UWR - zedruu police
WU - banding tribal
WU - gwafa hazid control
UB - wrexial-the innsmouth-lovecraftian deck
BR - rakdos the defiler metalpocalypse heavy metal brutality
WG - tolsmir wolfblood lending deck
UR - jhoira timey-wimey
UR - tibor-lumia control
WB - teysa voltron
WR - agrus kos/aurelia/basandra/brion/gisela/iroas/razia/tajic "who-cares-who-leads-so-long-as-we-beat-face-boros"
W - khemba
U - teferi precon
B - ob nixilis precon
B - Ascendant Evincar beatdown
B - phage living life close to the edge
R - deretti precon
R - norin the wary chaos
R - ib nation (plus a few changes i made)
w-20
u-22
b-20
r-21
g-14
i think i have a couple of other decks that i probably forgot to mention, but thats the jist of it. seems quite even, though my disdain for green is slightly highlighted. another weird thing is that i think if it weren't for the precons and lending out decks, i think my dislike for green would be more pronounced (i have like 11 decks for lending out).
a bit surprised that w is high up there in the counts. ive always figured that i was a grixis player through and through, but there we have it; i'm a Yore-Tiller Nephilim player
Legacy - Solidarity - mono U aggro - burn - Imperial Painter - Strawberry Shortcake - Bluuzards - bom
B Maga, Traitor to Mortals Mono black good stuff
GBW Karador, Ghost Chieftain A bit of stax
GU Vorel of the Hull Clade +1/+1 counters
WUBRG Sliver Legion Tribal Aggro
R Daretti, Scrap Savant Modified preconstructed deck.
I think that adds up to:
W - 2
U - 2
B - 3
R - 2
G - 3
My Sliver deck is my favorite. I got into Magic because a kid in middle school showed me his Victual Sliver and I thought the tribe concept was really cool. I don't play it much, but its one of those decks I'll always have around in one form or another.
The Vorel deck is more or less retired. It was my first attempt at a commander deck and its terribad. I'd take it apart, but there's not many cards in it I really care about using in another deck.
Maga is my first "successful" commander deck. I have a soft spot for mono black. I might switch up the theme a bit, but I'll probably always have at least one mono black deck.
I built the Karador deck because I'm also a Timmy at heart and I really wanted to play the high costed BW cards so I knew I needed green to ramp into them. It started out a revamp project of the Counterpunch precontructed deck I already owned but ended up replacing every card in the deck but the commander.
I picked up the Daretti deck because I eventually want to have a mono deck of each color, and none of the existing red commanders were really sticking out at me. Its been a pretty fun deck. I pick up upgrades for it now then, but I don't think the revamp will ever need to be as extensive as what I did to the Counterpunch deck.
The next deck I sleeve up with most likely be a Voltron deck since I don't really have anything like it yet. It'll probably be either WU, WU, or WUG and enchantment focused. I have a few decks I'm testing and they all preform reasonably well, but I haven't quite decided which one I like yet.
Drana, Kalastria Bloodchief - Mono-Black Vampire Tribal B
Alesha, Who Smiles at Death - Equipment Beatdown WBR
Nicol Bolas - Bolas Themed Grixis Control BUR
Narset, Enlightened Master - Still working on that WUR
That breaks down as:
2W
2U
3B
3R
0G
I find green to be fairly boring. I love removal, so seeing my colors as mostly Mardu isn't shocking at all to me. If I end up building a fifth deck, it'll likely still be in Mardu colors in some shape or form. It's just my comfort zone and where I have the most fun. IF, and a BIG IF, they ever decide to print a werewolf or wolf legend, though, I could see myself splashing some green. Maybe even if I find a Jund deck I really like. I like removal, though, and I just find green to not have as much as I'd like. Turning dudes sideways and going "RAWR" just isn't my thing. I see the appeal, but I just prefer to have more interaction.
EDH - Yes, Each One is Named After a Song. I love tying music to my decks.
B Drana, Kalastria Bloodchief B - Fear of the Dark
WG Sigarda, Heron's Grace WG - Strength in Numbers
RG Xenagos, God of Revels RG - Fullmoon (It's werewolves)
RW Archangel Avacyn // Avacyn, the Purifier RW - The End is Nigh
60 Card Kitchen Table Decks
WUB Avacyn, Spirit Ferrier
RG Arlinn Kord's Howlpack
W: coming soon
U: 1
B: 1
R: 1
G: 1
Yeah! I don't really have a preference. My green deck doesn't play a higher count of staples in the format, which is something I hate about the deck, but I still like how it plays out. I'm probably waiting for Origins to decide on a mono-W general, maybe the Gideon that's in here will be really good, who knows (might be building a nearly creature-less deck, I'll see). Also had some ideas about a full white-bordered mono-white deck but it's really hard to do.
Rules Advisor
Pauper decks: Weenie Tokens — Zombies
My own rules when building a Commander deck:
1) Underrated general that I can build around but the deck must work without him/her too.
2) Every card must be legal in both banlists.
3) No infinite combo that could win (and ruin) instantly a multiplayer game.
4) Synergy at all costs; stay on theme, avoid goodstuff.
Intet, the Dreamer
Rith, the Awakener
Prossh, Skyraider of Kher
Jeleva, Nephalia's Scourge
Phelddagrif
Maelstrom Wanderer
W: 2
U: 4
B: 2
R: 5
G: 5
...That's kinda ironic given that my favorite color is black and my least favorite is green.
- Talrand, Sky Summoner Flying & Heavy Control
- Aurelia, the Warleader Voltron & Multiple Combat Phases
- Experiment Kraj/Vorel of the Hull Clade Simic Counter Abuse & Tomfoolery
- Sidisi, Brood Tyrant Self Mill/ Graveyard utility Zombie Swarm
- Crosis, the Purger Hand Abuse & Punishment
In the Works:
- Rakdos the Defiler Demons & Forced Sacrifice
- Obzedat, Ghost Council - Playing with life
- Treva, the Renewer - Tokens
Planned:
- Sen Triplets Big Brother Politics & Control
- Intet, the Dreamer or Surrak Dragonclaw Dragon Tribal, not sure which ability I like more.
REPRESENTATION:
- 3 or 4
- 4 or 5
- 3 or 4
- 5 or 7
- 3 or 4
Contrary to my magic casual and standard days, I play a lot of black and blue. Which were up until a year ago, my least favorite colors. But of all my decks, the only one that doesn't have either or is my Aurelia deck, my first and still my favorite EDH deck
I find that, with a few exceptions, mono-color decks actually encourage diversity. By this, I mean, EDH has its all-star cards in each color, and with two- and especially three-color decks, it can be easily end up as an all-stars goodstuff parade ( not that there's anything wrong with that, mind you ).
Mono color often forces you to look at weirder options. For example, in mono green you're kind of stuck on creature removal ( barring the uniformly excellent Beast Within ). So, you have to start running odder stuff like Lignify and Song Of The Dryads, or depending on the deck even Desert Twister ( grossly overcosted, yet ), etc. Your card pool needs to be creative given your color limitations.
The exception to this tends to be mana doublers. Caged Sun, Gauntlet Of Power, even the controversial Extraplanar Lens tend to pop up all the time in mono colored decks as they almost always tend to benefit the mono-player more.
UTeferi, Temporal ArchmageU's prison: blue is the new orange is the new black.
Mizzix Of The Izmagnus : wheels on fire... rolling down the road...
BSidisi, Undead VizierB: Bis zum Erbrechen
GTitiania, Protector Of ArgothG: Protecting Argoth, by blowing it up!
GYisan, The Wanderer BardG: Gradus Ad Elfball.
Duel EDH: Yisan & Titania.
In Progress: Grand Arbiter Augustin IV duel; Grenzo, Dungeon Warden Doomsday.
i think nearly any archetype is possible in any mono-colour build; there was someone here on MTGS that built a mono-green control build. if thats possible, anything else is probably just as possible. mono-blue sligh, mono-black group hug, mono-white pressure; its probably all possible (and i might even go for it if i could have been bothered).
mono-colour allows a higher percentage of good/underplayed non-basic lands like scorched ruins that wouldn't otherwise be possible.
Legacy - Solidarity - mono U aggro - burn - Imperial Painter - Strawberry Shortcake - Bluuzards - bom
W
WU
x
R
U
UBR
WUB
WBG
WG
WUR
So color counts come out to:
W = 6
U = 5
B = 3
R = 3
G = 2
x = 1
Not too surprizing. I have always played WU, but as my wife and a friend started to shift towards more U and no one was playing W I shifted in that direction. We split a box for most expansions, so if I play the color that no one else does, I tend to get more of the cards that I want.
EDH
WWWEight-and-a-Half-TailsWWW
Wx2
U
B
R
G
WU
WB
WR
WG
UB
UR
BR
BG
RG
WUB
WUR
WUG
WBR
WBG
WRGx2
UBG
URGx3
BRG
WUBRG
totals
14xW
12xU
11xB
14xR
14xG
Mostly playing in Naya colors somewhat surprised me, as I tend to be one of the control players in the group. My first foray into MTG was in RG, so I suppose it's not that out of character.
Kemba | Linvala | Talrand | Geth | Krenko | Zada | Patron of the Orochi | Medomai | Athreos | Gisela | Trostani | Nin | Silumgar | Kaervek | Jarad | Xenagos | Sydri | Narset | Roon | Zurgo | Ghave | Marath | Uril | Tasigur | Animar | Riku | Riku | Sek'Kuar | Cromat
B
B
R
R
G
UB
WU
WUBRG
W: 3
U: 3
B: 3
R: 3
G: 2
Hmm I didn't realize I have so many mono-colored decks :/ lol