I've been in talks with a few friends for awhile and we've been wanting to test Modern EDH with a new card pool: All Modern, Conspiracy, and Commander prints allowed (Modern banned cards are now unbanned). The idea is to create a more approachable format for newer players who don't have Legacy card pools and don't want to devote huge amounts of cash to compete with the potential of Spike metas. It's also to even the power levels out of casual to competitive build by hoping to reduce some of the more broken interactions and slow the format down. We feel this would be favorable to a major demographic of players who like EDH, but are deterred by the prior issues.
We're pretty ambitious about the idea, so I'm making this thread for anyone willing to test and give feedback or any input on banned lists. That said, it's a new format and that means other changes can be talked about: Mulligan rules, Commander Tax, etc... Naturally cards will have to be monitored, but we feel that modern legal cards and combos that are already powerful in EDH will be fine and more acceptable. Infinites and other combos will still be a part of the game, but with this new card pool, the things that enable those strategies will be leaving, while answers will be staying for the most part. The biggest things leaving will be tutors, artifact combos, and many 2 card insta-win combos.
This is not to replace EDH obviously, so please don't compare it to the needs of people that feel current EDH is perfect as is. This is to be a new thing to coincide along with it for others or simply to expand. There's no current plan on how to promote this if it works great, right now we're in the concepting phase. Ultimately it'd be great to get a site going or ask if preestablished groups would simply host the rule set of the variant.
Like the idea? How can you help?
Test the format in your play groups
Post feedback on balance and feel
Encourage others to join in on the discussion to give it attention
Current Rules
Cards printed in Modern, Conspiracy, Commander sets are all legal (alt rule to test "only unique cards in Commander are legal")
Cards banned in Modern and EDH are unbanned
All other EDH rules are in place. Multiplayer rules.
So 8th edition-current are legal. What about commander sets? Many cards not from that time frame are in those sets, notably Sol Ring and the commanders themselves.
So 8th edition-current are legal. What about commander sets? Many cards not from that time frame are in those sets, notably Sol Ring and the commanders themselves.
He mentioned commander sets as being included. It seems to be everything with a Modern card banner. So yes, Sol Ring and Propaganda are included. The question becomes whether or not to include Demonic Tutor from the duel decks.
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One of these day I have to get myself organizized.
With the Commander Sets, reprints like Sol Ring are the biggest concern and the rules may be altered to "Only unique cards from the Commander Set", but we want to test things first. We may just have to cherry pick a few, most notably the Legacy mana rock reprints. The Commanders are fine. A lot of them will be losing key cards that make them over powered (EX: Prossh will lose Food Chain).
Now, some of these things could maybe come off. Painter's Servant, for example. Most of the old color-hate lockdown pieces aren't legal, and neither is Grindstone. You may consider banning Iona, Shield of Emeria in its place.
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Currently Playing:
Legacy: Something U/W Controlish EDH Cube
Hypercube! A New EDH Deck Every Week(ish)!
This isn't the first time this idea has surfaced. And every time, I keep wondering to myself why a Modern-based card pool would be tried before a Legacy-based card pool gets a fair shake in the first place. Just implementing Legacy rules would go most of the way in meeting the stated goal:
The idea is to create a more approachable format for newer players who don't have Legacy card pools and don't want to devote huge amounts of cash to compete with the potential of Spike metas. It's also to even the power levels out of casual to competitive build by hoping to reduce some of the more broken interactions and slow the format down. We feel this would be favorable to a major demographic of players who like EDH, but are deterred by the prior issues.
Can we name a card printed before 8th edition, not currently banned in Legacy or EDH, that is routinely causing these problems in EDH? You stated Food Chain, but I'd argue that doesn't qualify because it is one deck, and that deck is generally considered worse than all the other Turn 4-5 combo decks that have Blue. I can't think of a single card that's not already banned in either EDH or Legacy.
For a first run of testing we would not include Duel Decks, Planechase, FTV, and Archenemy. Seems it would not really do anything beneficial for what this is attempting.
I think a few cards could come off the current ban list and this is what testing is for. It's probably best to unban all cards on the current list and see what it devolves too. We need to see what those cards lost and evaluate if their interactions are reasonable. Some might go right back to the banlist, others might be awesome new cards we can put back in the wild.
I think Iona would be fine, once again the format will be slowing down. We're not trying to stop what happens with EDH, we simply want a format that gives people more room to breath and have time to answer things so we'll be looking more at enabling effects rather than single powerful spells. We are actually competitive tournament EDH players looking for a format where the Spike decks can be played, but don't completely dominate casual decks with consistent t1-5 wins as we see now.
Can we name a card printed before 8th edition, not currently banned in Legacy or EDH, that is routinely causing these problems in EDH? You stated Food Chain, but I'd argue that doesn't qualify because it is one deck, and that deck is generally considered worse than all the other Turn 4-5 combo decks that have Blue. I can't think of a single card that's not already banned in either EDH or Legacy.
There's still a few such as Winter Orb or Gaea's Cradle. But keep in mind this isn't just about balance, it is also to encourage players with non-legacy card pools to enjoy the EDH style format. New players don't have a stepping stone into EDH if their play group becomes Spike-oriented. A $100-200 isn't going to compete with $1,500-3,000 of legacy combo and utility. It would be a great idea for new players who want to use their Standard/Modern cards that often get rotated out.
With very few cards that can do an Armageddon impersonation, what will keep Gx ramp decks in check?
Well that's what we need to test. This reopens the meta and we need to see if preexisting strategies will be untouched and become stronger with the nerfing to others. We may also find that the loss of some of the best tutors, draw, and redundant effects leads to those strategies being too hard to make a stable deck around.
A good example is my Derevi loses Winter Orb and Tangle Wire, but not Hokori, Dust Drinker. Along with a few missing tutors, this makes that strategy a bit harder to push. It may have to be cut since it's now only 1 card.
I would love to support this format. How should I go about doing so?
Keep the thread alive, test the format yourself. This idea is in its early phases of execution and will undergo testing soon on my end. I'm gauging enthusiasm of the idea in our meta and hopefully we see something like Tiny Leaders make a new format (Tiny Leaders was the basis of doing this, seeing how people misleading wanted to play it to avoid the stated issues of current EDH)
Short of the reserved list going the way of the dodo, the rising prices of reserved list staples will probably make this EDH variant necessary within the next ten years.
I would actually be fine with "non-reserved list" legal, but there do seem to be some non-reserved cards like Force Of Will that Wizards does not seem to be in a hurry to reprint, so perhaps Modern / plus sets released since Modern's start date is a good idea.
When I ran the Cmdr events on MODO (via www.gatherling.com), I tried a Modern event for one of our last events (that, oddly enough, struggled to garner interest to fire). The card pool I designated was Modern plus the Commander sets (because why play Commander without cards designed specific for Commander?!) only. Here's what I banned; (We played 1v1, so just an fyi)
As I was limited to the confines of MODO, there were some concessions that had to be made that I otherwise do not feel like I'd ban had it been paper; for example without the "cheat elements" and fast mana, Emrakul, the Aeons Torn would be more than safe to be legal. Likewise Painter's Servant & Sundering Titan may be safe. Dread Return, Living Death/End, & Sword of the Meek were "safety" bans that I feared for the format otherwise. Mindslaver is a relic from our past events where, it's ban hurt no single deck, but by not being legal it made for a healthier format overall; YMMV (it forced GAAIV to play an actual win-con instead of opponents scooping out of boredom lol). Griselbrand is OKish in a format that plays Jin Gitaxias, Core Augur (without access to Entomb and similar ludicricies) and I wanted to test Sway of the Stars as I believe it's "fair"-ish (by this format's standards) but again because of the limitations of the client we used...
I suspect Primeval Titan and Sylvan Primordial could come off, if you're playing 1v1 (in multiplayer I would unban Titan but keep Primordial locked away).
Really, my goal with a ban list was simple - cull any way to repeatedly draw cards asymmetrically at a low cost (Edric), repeatedly tutour for low mana (Zur...if you want to repeatedly tutour, then Planar Portal and Ring of Three Wishes are both legal), or that inherently break the format by circumventing basic rules (Derevi). Other than that, I tried to keep as many deck archetypes legal.
This will be aimed at multiplayer first, so cards like Derevi and Edric will be unbanned. But a 1v1 list could also be formed as well later on. Good to hear some of those cards felt good in modern.
I'll be attempting to run this with some of the top EDH players in my meta with the intent to be as busted as possible, as well as trying our current decks, modded for the changes. We want to see how it operates in a cutthroat environment first, then test it with casual players and see if this helps lessen the gap in take power.
If new players lack older cards then they simply don't play with the cards they don't have. If they are getting beaten by older cards then maybe the people they are playing with can build differently. But hey, why discuss within playgroups when you can attempt to design worse formats. How can you have EDH when you get rid of all the legends of magic's past?
Also, Modern is awful not exactly relevant but it's not exactly EDh friendly in the way that draws people to the format.
If new players lack older cards then they simply don't play with the cards they don't have. If they are getting beaten by older cards then maybe the people they are playing with can build differently. But hey, why discuss within playgroups when you can attempt to design worse formats.
Also, Modern is awful.
"This is not to replace EDH obviously, so please don't compare it to the needs of people that feel current EDH is perfect as is. This is to be a new thing to coincide along with it for others or simply to expand."
If new players lack older cards then they simply don't play with the cards they don't have. If they are getting beaten by older cards then maybe the people they are playing with can build differently. But hey, why discuss within playgroups when you can attempt to design worse formats.
Also, Modern is awful.
"This is not to replace EDH obviously, so please don't compare it to the needs of people that feel current EDH is perfect as is. This is to be a new thing to coincide along with it for others or simply to expand."
Seems silly that the legacy legal commander product cards are legal. Consistency should exist in your rulings. At least when looking at power levels for your "competitive" areas.
This will be aimed at multiplayer first, so cards like Derevi and Edric will be unbanned. But a 1v1 list could also be formed as well later on. Good to hear some of those cards felt good in modern.
I'll be attempting to run this with some of the top EDH players in my meta with the intent to be as busted as possible, as well as trying our current decks, modded for the changes. We want to see how it operates in a cutthroat environment first, then test it with casual players and see if this helps lessen the gap in take power.
Even still...I can't recommend enough to keep Zur the Enchanter on the banlist. For everyone's sake.
My deck follows a guideline similar to this, but allows any cards printed with the modern or new modern border. So FTV, judge / fnm promos, commander products, duel decks, ect. are allowed in the deck.
It's good fun, and still competes with the other decks pretty well.
That said, I don't think this is a thing that needs to exist. If you want to play an edh variant that's easy and cheap to build around, you might as well just play pauper/peasant. Most pickup games will have players that neither have nor want to build around these rules, so they'll either be left out or you'll still need to have normal EDH decks.
This will be aimed at multiplayer first, so cards like Derevi and Edric will be unbanned. But a 1v1 list could also be formed as well later on. Good to hear some of those cards felt good in modern.
I'll be attempting to run this with some of the top EDH players in my meta with the intent to be as busted as possible, as well as trying our current decks, modded for the changes. We want to see how it operates in a cutthroat environment first, then test it with casual players and see if this helps lessen the gap in take power.
Even still...I can't recommend enough to keep Zur the Enchanter on the banlist. For everyone's sake.
We'll keep it in mind. Our play group is 50+ players, most of which are intensely competitive top tier decks that play several tournaments a week. Currently Zur has never won a tournament, so he's not the first on my list of concerns.
Seems silly that the legacy legal commander product cards are legal. Consistency should exist in your rulings. At least when looking at power levels for your "competitive" areas.
Agreed. That said, most of the reprints don't seem broken, so I need to take some time an evaluate the cards this would offer. Being a new format in test, it's worth seeing if it's still balanced as these cards are fairly cheap and I wouldn't want to write a rule that will be a growing ban list every time a commander set is printed with legacy cards. New players may confuse a reprint with something new and feel it is legal, and it'd be better to avoid that.
But yeah, this is totally in the back of my mind. Sol Ring and Basalt Monolith are the biggest cards I'm worried about. It may be better just to ban those and let the others be. Testing will decide.
That said, I don't think this is a thing that needs to exist. If you want to play an edh variant that's easy and cheap to build around, you might as well just play pauper/peasant. Most pickup games will have players that neither have nor want to build around these rules, so they'll either be left out or you'll still need to have normal EDH decks.
Well the benefit of having an established format means others are building with the same restrictions in mind. There's no implied 75% decks or guessing power levels. It makes it easier to walk up to a group and go "Modern EDH?" versus guessing which deck you need to play to not piss off a new group of players. The power level gap is more reasonable with that declaration, but has the appeal of cards people want to play unlike pauper.
I'm actually getting a lot of positive feedback here and other places.
That's kind of my point though, walking up to a group and asking for "modern edh" is silly in and of itself. And your assumption that a deck won't piss of the entire table is pure conjecture, there's still going to be decks that are more obnoxious that others. If a Kalia deck walks up to the table, it's still going to be bonkers; almost all of the good demons, dragons, and angels were printed after 8th.
You might as well just play pauper, most people won't build modern edh because most of the legacy cards that are a problem are already banned, and most of the cards that are still a problem are modern. You're cutting a lot of the answers to some pretty big problems to keep out the cost of certain cards (true duals, mana crypt, ect.) without also banning those problem cards.
The fact that you unbanned Zur is a pretty big indicator that you guys didn't really look at the card pool very hard, hence my earlier statement that you may as well play a preestablished format that already does exactly what you're looking to do.
We're pretty ambitious about the idea, so I'm making this thread for anyone willing to test and give feedback or any input on banned lists. That said, it's a new format and that means other changes can be talked about: Mulligan rules, Commander Tax, etc... Naturally cards will have to be monitored, but we feel that modern legal cards and combos that are already powerful in EDH will be fine and more acceptable. Infinites and other combos will still be a part of the game, but with this new card pool, the things that enable those strategies will be leaving, while answers will be staying for the most part. The biggest things leaving will be tutors, artifact combos, and many 2 card insta-win combos.
This is not to replace EDH obviously, so please don't compare it to the needs of people that feel current EDH is perfect as is. This is to be a new thing to coincide along with it for others or simply to expand. There's no current plan on how to promote this if it works great, right now we're in the concepting phase. Ultimately it'd be great to get a site going or ask if preestablished groups would simply host the rule set of the variant.
Like the idea? How can you help?
Current Rules
He mentioned commander sets as being included. It seems to be everything with a Modern card banner. So yes, Sol Ring and Propaganda are included. The question becomes whether or not to include Demonic Tutor from the duel decks.
Current Decks
GTitania midrange
RGThromok tokens/goodstuff | UB Grimgrin zombie tribal
GW Sigarda enchantress | R Godo voltron
U Braids aggro | WR Kalemne punisher
RU Mizzix storm | BUG Mimeoplasm competitive reanimator | UG Ezuri infect
What about other stuff that's been printed new-frame, like Duel Decks, Planechase, FTV, and Archenemy?
As far as the banlist goes, I'd start with anything on the current list in a Modern frame:
Primeval Titan
Sylvan Primordial
Griselbrand
Sundering Titan
Trade Secrets
Biorhythm
Channel (if FTV is legal)
Gifts Ungiven
Painter's Servant
Panoptic Mirror
Protean Hulk
Recurring Nightmare
Sway of the Stars
Upheaval (again if FTV is legal)
Worldfire
Now, some of these things could maybe come off. Painter's Servant, for example. Most of the old color-hate lockdown pieces aren't legal, and neither is Grindstone. You may consider banning Iona, Shield of Emeria in its place.
Currently Playing:
Legacy: Something U/W Controlish
EDH Cube
Hypercube! A New EDH Deck Every Week(ish)!
Can we name a card printed before 8th edition, not currently banned in Legacy or EDH, that is routinely causing these problems in EDH? You stated Food Chain, but I'd argue that doesn't qualify because it is one deck, and that deck is generally considered worse than all the other Turn 4-5 combo decks that have Blue. I can't think of a single card that's not already banned in either EDH or Legacy.
Current Decks
GTitania midrange
RGThromok tokens/goodstuff | UB Grimgrin zombie tribal
GW Sigarda enchantress | R Godo voltron
U Braids aggro | WR Kalemne punisher
RU Mizzix storm | BUG Mimeoplasm competitive reanimator | UG Ezuri infect
I think a few cards could come off the current ban list and this is what testing is for. It's probably best to unban all cards on the current list and see what it devolves too. We need to see what those cards lost and evaluate if their interactions are reasonable. Some might go right back to the banlist, others might be awesome new cards we can put back in the wild.
I think Iona would be fine, once again the format will be slowing down. We're not trying to stop what happens with EDH, we simply want a format that gives people more room to breath and have time to answer things so we'll be looking more at enabling effects rather than single powerful spells. We are actually competitive tournament EDH players looking for a format where the Spike decks can be played, but don't completely dominate casual decks with consistent t1-5 wins as we see now.
Trap your friends in an endless game with this 23-card combo!
So not Erayo, got it.
Current Decks
GTitania midrange
RGThromok tokens/goodstuff | UB Grimgrin zombie tribal
GW Sigarda enchantress | R Godo voltron
U Braids aggro | WR Kalemne punisher
RU Mizzix storm | BUG Mimeoplasm competitive reanimator | UG Ezuri infect
There's still a few such as Winter Orb or Gaea's Cradle. But keep in mind this isn't just about balance, it is also to encourage players with non-legacy card pools to enjoy the EDH style format. New players don't have a stepping stone into EDH if their play group becomes Spike-oriented. A $100-200 isn't going to compete with $1,500-3,000 of legacy combo and utility. It would be a great idea for new players who want to use their Standard/Modern cards that often get rotated out.
Well that's what we need to test. This reopens the meta and we need to see if preexisting strategies will be untouched and become stronger with the nerfing to others. We may also find that the loss of some of the best tutors, draw, and redundant effects leads to those strategies being too hard to make a stable deck around.
A good example is my Derevi loses Winter Orb and Tangle Wire, but not Hokori, Dust Drinker. Along with a few missing tutors, this makes that strategy a bit harder to push. It may have to be cut since it's now only 1 card.
Keep the thread alive, test the format yourself. This idea is in its early phases of execution and will undergo testing soon on my end. I'm gauging enthusiasm of the idea in our meta and hopefully we see something like Tiny Leaders make a new format (Tiny Leaders was the basis of doing this, seeing how people misleading wanted to play it to avoid the stated issues of current EDH)
Short of the reserved list going the way of the dodo, the rising prices of reserved list staples will probably make this EDH variant necessary within the next ten years.
I would actually be fine with "non-reserved list" legal, but there do seem to be some non-reserved cards like Force Of Will that Wizards does not seem to be in a hurry to reprint, so perhaps Modern / plus sets released since Modern's start date is a good idea.
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.
1 Coalition Victory
1 Dark Depths
1 Derevi, Empyrial Tactician
1 Dread Return
1 Edric, Spymaster of Trest
1 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
1 Gifts Ungiven
1 Golgari Grave-Troll
1 Griselbrand
1 Hive Mind
1 Living Death
1 Living End
1 Mindslaver
1 Painter's Servant
1 Panoptic Mirror
1 Primeval Titan
1 Protean Hulk
1 Serra Ascendant
1 Sol Ring
1 Sundering Titan
1 Sway of the Stars
1 Sword of the Meek
1 Sylvan Primordial
1 Trade Secrets
1 Worldfire
1 Zur the Enchanter
As I was limited to the confines of MODO, there were some concessions that had to be made that I otherwise do not feel like I'd ban had it been paper; for example without the "cheat elements" and fast mana, Emrakul, the Aeons Torn would be more than safe to be legal. Likewise Painter's Servant & Sundering Titan may be safe. Dread Return, Living Death/End, & Sword of the Meek were "safety" bans that I feared for the format otherwise. Mindslaver is a relic from our past events where, it's ban hurt no single deck, but by not being legal it made for a healthier format overall; YMMV (it forced GAAIV to play an actual win-con instead of opponents scooping out of boredom lol). Griselbrand is OKish in a format that plays Jin Gitaxias, Core Augur (without access to Entomb and similar ludicricies) and I wanted to test Sway of the Stars as I believe it's "fair"-ish (by this format's standards) but again because of the limitations of the client we used...
I suspect Primeval Titan and Sylvan Primordial could come off, if you're playing 1v1 (in multiplayer I would unban Titan but keep Primordial locked away).
Really, my goal with a ban list was simple - cull any way to repeatedly draw cards asymmetrically at a low cost (Edric), repeatedly tutour for low mana (Zur...if you want to repeatedly tutour, then Planar Portal and Ring of Three Wishes are both legal), or that inherently break the format by circumventing basic rules (Derevi). Other than that, I tried to keep as many deck archetypes legal.
Steel Sabotage'ng Orbs of Mellowness since 2011.
I'll be attempting to run this with some of the top EDH players in my meta with the intent to be as busted as possible, as well as trying our current decks, modded for the changes. We want to see how it operates in a cutthroat environment first, then test it with casual players and see if this helps lessen the gap in take power.
Also, Modern is awful not exactly relevant but it's not exactly EDh friendly in the way that draws people to the format.
"This is not to replace EDH obviously, so please don't compare it to the needs of people that feel current EDH is perfect as is. This is to be a new thing to coincide along with it for others or simply to expand."
Seems silly that the legacy legal commander product cards are legal. Consistency should exist in your rulings. At least when looking at power levels for your "competitive" areas.
Even still...I can't recommend enough to keep Zur the Enchanter on the banlist. For everyone's sake.
Steel Sabotage'ng Orbs of Mellowness since 2011.
You and I both.
All I ever wanted to do with him is Entwine Tooth and Nail for he and Realm Razer...
Steel Sabotage'ng Orbs of Mellowness since 2011.
It's good fun, and still competes with the other decks pretty well.
That said, I don't think this is a thing that needs to exist. If you want to play an edh variant that's easy and cheap to build around, you might as well just play pauper/peasant. Most pickup games will have players that neither have nor want to build around these rules, so they'll either be left out or you'll still need to have normal EDH decks.
WWWAvacyn: We Can Make The World StopWWW
We'll keep it in mind. Our play group is 50+ players, most of which are intensely competitive top tier decks that play several tournaments a week. Currently Zur has never won a tournament, so he's not the first on my list of concerns.
Agreed. That said, most of the reprints don't seem broken, so I need to take some time an evaluate the cards this would offer. Being a new format in test, it's worth seeing if it's still balanced as these cards are fairly cheap and I wouldn't want to write a rule that will be a growing ban list every time a commander set is printed with legacy cards. New players may confuse a reprint with something new and feel it is legal, and it'd be better to avoid that.
But yeah, this is totally in the back of my mind. Sol Ring and Basalt Monolith are the biggest cards I'm worried about. It may be better just to ban those and let the others be. Testing will decide.
Well the benefit of having an established format means others are building with the same restrictions in mind. There's no implied 75% decks or guessing power levels. It makes it easier to walk up to a group and go "Modern EDH?" versus guessing which deck you need to play to not piss off a new group of players. The power level gap is more reasonable with that declaration, but has the appeal of cards people want to play unlike pauper.
I'm actually getting a lot of positive feedback here and other places.
You might as well just play pauper, most people won't build modern edh because most of the legacy cards that are a problem are already banned, and most of the cards that are still a problem are modern. You're cutting a lot of the answers to some pretty big problems to keep out the cost of certain cards (true duals, mana crypt, ect.) without also banning those problem cards.
The fact that you unbanned Zur is a pretty big indicator that you guys didn't really look at the card pool very hard, hence my earlier statement that you may as well play a preestablished format that already does exactly what you're looking to do.
WWWAvacyn: We Can Make The World StopWWW