4 - I like to run a couple tutors (I even run Sisay as a general), but I don't always tutor for the same thing. Usually, I'm trying to find an answer to something else - a permanent or a deck. Or I'm tutoring for utility. The problem I have for tutors is when people use them to search up the same combo pieces every time. I find that boring.
And I'm not even counting land fetch cards as tutoring. Those are just an important part of playing multi-color.
Argument: .... emphasize the singleton aspect of the format
This is what always gets me. What about the aspect of what a color is supposed to be able to do? The actual purpose of flavor behind what a color is capable of doing?
Gamble is utterly red. Vampiric Tutor is a perfect example of a black spell - paying life and hand-size reduction for a tutor. Cultivate is just what the color green offers the player. Typically the primary reason to include green is for ramp, which is either dorks, or land-tutor.
Arguments or debates over the inclusion of tutors in this format worry me. I really scares me that someone with rule-manipulating powers is going to interpret these debates as an actual serious issue with the format.
If you have an actual issue with the use of tutors in your local meta, then please talk to that local meta. We here at internet-land will each have our own opinion, completely derived from our own personal local meta. Some elements of these arguments will be similar for people. Most of the outlier opinions are based off of a few bad experiences that could be fixed just by talking to (or not playing with) someone specific.
Argument: .... emphasize the singleton aspect of the format
This is what always gets me. What about the aspect of what a color is supposed to be able to do? The actual purpose of flavor behind what a color is capable of doing?
Gamble is utterly red. Vampiric Tutor is a perfect example of a black spell - paying life and hand-size reduction for a tutor. Cultivate is just what the color green offers the player. Typically the primary reason to include green is for ramp, which is either dorks, or land-tutor.
Arguments or debates over the inclusion of tutors in this format worry me. I really scares me that someone with rule-manipulating powers is going to interpret these debates as an actual serious issue with the format.
If you have an actual issue with the use of tutors in your local meta, then please talk to that local meta. We here at internet-land will each have our own opinion, completely derived from our own personal local meta. Some elements of these arguments will be similar for people. Most of the outlier opinions are based off of a few bad experiences that could be fixed just by talking to (or not playing with) someone specific.
Red is supposed to be good at burn/direct damage. It is only of the only things in the color pie that Red does much better than any other color, but in EDH it's not a viable strategy. Perhaps the meta would be more diverse without tutors. Is it a coincidence that UBG are the best colors in the format and the best colors at tutoring?
No one is saying the EDH committee should ban tutors. The argument I presented says that playing with tutors is less fun and leads to games that are more consistent and monotonousness which is contrary to the point of having a singleton format.
People have different gripes with the format. There are various strategies that people find overpowered, broken, unfun, tedious to play against, etc. Playing without tutors makes nearly all of these things less problematic, or at least less frequent. If you hate Cyclonic Rift, you wouldn't have to play against it as much if your opponent didn't Merchant Scroll or Mystical Tutor for it every game. If you hate Palinchron infinite combos, you wouldn't have to encounter them as much if your opponent didn't Worldly Tutor or Demonic Tutor for it every game.
In terms of quantity of tutors of white vs blue, I won't bother mentioning the transmute Dimir mechanic, but I'll also skip over the entire concept of rebels and Lin Sivvi, Defiant Hero
In terms of quantity of tutors of white vs blue, I won't bother mentioning the transmute Dimir mechanic, but I'll also skip over the entire concept of rebels and Lin Sivvi, Defiant Hero
Often times the most hated strategies in the format occur and win so frequently because of tutors. Derevi, Empyrial TacticianStatis/Stax would be a much less oppressive deck if it couldn't tutor. Oloro Doomsday would be an alternate win condition rather than the entire deck if it couldn't tutor.
I don't find any specific cards more or less fun this includes tutors. I also think it is incredibly foolish to try and declare a BEST colors in the game when the games change so frequently by group by individual games and by decks.
I don't find any specific cards more or less fun this includes tutors. I also think it is incredibly foolish to try and declare a BEST colors in the game when the games change so frequently by group by individual games and by decks.
There are no cards that frustrate you when you play against them more than others? Not that I'm doubting you, but that's quite unusual for a seasoned EDH player.
I don't find any specific cards more or less fun this includes tutors. I also think it is incredibly foolish to try and declare a BEST colors in the game when the games change so frequently by group by individual games and by decks.
There are no cards that frustrate you when you play against them more than others? Not that I'm doubting you, but that's quite unusual for a seasoned EDH player.
Why would they frustrate me? It is a card game that I am having fun with friends, sure I didn't win because X thing happened but typically the games I am in are interactive in a way that numerous choices led to that spot and it all can not be laid on the feet of a single card.
I don't care about them in other folks decks per se, but for both myself and others I think it's relatively boring if they're always after the same targets, as opposed to providing access to a toolbox of varying answers.
So it has more to do with the deck they're in then the tutor effects themselves.
When it comes to this discussion, I'm at a 1 with the OP.
Saying tutoring leads to repetitive games...why stop there?
Consider the following:
1. Do free Mulligans lead to repetitive games? Why Should players be guaranteed playable good hands? Especially since the multiplayer aspect allows for comebacks ALL THE TIME. I'm always weary of that, I make sure and finish the job when someone's low because comebacks are a threat and awesome when they occur. They occur more often when mulligan rules are strict. Lax mulligan rules reward poor deck building. Or even worse, allow players to "game" the mulligan rule.
2. Ubiquitous ramp leads to repetitive games just the same. And I'm not talking about the explosive, broken ramp that too many people whine about-- personally, sol ring and mana crypt aren't bannable to me. Rampant growth, cultivate, explosive vegetation...allow players to cast all spells every game all the time. Let's be honest about the General meta at almost every group, aggro is absent. Players do nothing other than ramp for the first four turns. That's boring to me when all early game is about setting up to skip the mid-game and hop right into the end-game. Lack of aggro to punish this predictable play pattern.
3. Having a commander in the command zone kinda makes things repetitive also. Partner and all the commander tax abilities (e.g. Prossh) make it even worse. I hate two things in edh #1 people playing theft effects on my permanents and disrespecting my stuff and #2 commander set generals. they are absolutely the most annoying generals to play against.
4. And finally, if your opponent is tutoring for the same thing all the time...guess what? It means that you are doing the same thing all the time.
When it comes to this discussion, I'm at a 1 with the OP.
Saying tutoring leads to repetitive games...why stop there?
Consider the following:
1. Do free Mulligans lead to repetitive games? Why Should players be guaranteed playable good hands? Especially since the multiplayer aspect allows for comebacks ALL THE TIME. I'm always weary of that, I make sure and finish the job when someone's low because comebacks are a threat and awesome when they occur. They occur more often when mulligan rules are strict. Lax mulligan rules reward poor deck building. Or even worse, allow players to "game" the mulligan rule.
2. Ubiquitous ramp leads to repetitive games just the same. And I'm not talking about the explosive, broken ramp that too many people whine about-- personally, sol ring and mana crypt aren't bannable to me. Rampant growth, cultivate, explosive vegetation...allow players to cast all spells every game all the time. Let's be honest about the General meta at almost every group, aggro is absent. Players do nothing other than ramp for the first four turns. That's boring to me when all early game is about setting up to skip the mid-game and hop right into the end-game. Lack of aggro to punish this predictable play pattern.
3. Having a commander in the command zone kinda makes things repetitive also. Partner and all the commander tax abilities (e.g. Prossh) make it even worse. I hate two things in edh #1 people playing theft effects on my permanents and disrespecting my stuff and #2 commander set generals. they are absolutely the most annoying generals to play against.
4. And finally, if your opponent is tutoring for the same thing all the time...guess what? It means that you are doing the same thing all the time.
Not sure how much of this is sarcasm or rhetorical but I will bite.
1. Free mulligans are helpful because magic isn't fun if you don't get to play the game, even if it's just in the beginning of the game. If you draw a hand with no lands or one land, and have to pass 4 turns before you can cast any spells while you watch your friends play their decks, it isn't a fun experience. Casual mulligans ensure the consistency of everyone being able to play spells. However, even without casual free mulligans, players are virtually guaranteed a playable hand after one or two traditional mulligans (I personally like to play with 1 to 2 free mulligans).
2. Rampant Growth and Explosive Vegetation can be countered just like Birds of Paradise is susceptible to Swords To Plowshares. Preventing players from ramping can be a great tempo play. Players should not feel entitled to ramp, and often times one of the best ways to beat a mono green ramp deck is to stifle ramp or use land destruction towards the beginning of the game. Mana rocks like Sol Ring and Coldsteel Heart are also vulnerable to removal.
It also isn't true that players only ramp for the first 4 turns. I have a reanimator deck with a looter subtheme (see signature if you are curious) that frequently plays cards like Merfolk Looter, Jace, Vryn's Prodigy, Thought Courier and Careful Study in the beginning of the game. I have a Rhonas the Indomitable deck that runs zero land ramp effects (no shuffling) and while it does run a few mana dorks, the beginning of the game focuses on getting out creatures with a power of 4 of greater within the first 4 turns of the game (also see my signature) .
3. Having a commander in the command zone is the primary point of the format. You play a commander and 99 cards to go with that card (often these cards support the commander). Commander tax abilities or abilities that can't be interacted with (i.e. Oloro) are powerful and ensure some form of consistency, but they do not result in the same card being played every game or the same card winning a game consistently.
4. I don't understand this point. If I play a three different decks and none of them run tutors, but my opponent runs a mono black deck and tutors for Mike and Trike combo each game (suppose sometimes I am able to stop her and sometimes I am not), how does that mean that I'm doing the same thing all the time?
While I would say the general progression of the format has brought forward the obvious top-end problems of tutoring, there are many "fair" uses of tutoring in the format we cannot just dismiss the entire mechanic from the format.
I had this interesting thought experiment - what if in EDH all search effects are turned into filter effects? Instead of searching the library, you look at the top cards of your library until you hit the card type(s) the card filters for, then execute the rest of the card's effects.
I know there are a lot of erratas required (Demonic Tutor will require you to name a card type(s) first I assume) and cards that don't require to reveal the card (mainly Demonic Tutor though) will require some honesty, but assuming we do all the erratas, such a change will weaken the nature (and consistency) of all search effects without completely dismissing the mechanic.
Yes, the "fair" uses of tutoring will also get hit, but relatively speaking it's still better than a complete dismissal. The loss of consistency will hit the "top-end" usage a lot harder than the "fair" uses (although they'll get the occasional game-costing screw-up as well). Ramp will probably get hit the hardest (especially cards like Hour of Promise, which can screw up with 2 basics) among the "fair" use cards, but is that too heavy a price to pay as well (mainly because most people will say a complete removal of searching is definitely not the price to pay).
It's just a thought experiment, but it'll be good to see some opinions on it.
All depends on players, so 1. The person looking for card has to know what to look for and even if he found everything for a combo it's still open to disruption, especially if opponents play counterspells.
Besides, there are plenty of cards that get the cards you want without being Demonic Tutor, and in the right deck they might even function better than DT.
Don't tell me what I have or have not done. Your comment may have just been in jest, but it came off to me as very rude. I used to play a chaos-esque Zedruu deck about two years ago, so yes, I am well versed with Possibility Storm.
Resolving a single instance of Possibility Storm isn't that bad. Outside of situations where a player casts a card of a type they don't contain quite a lot of, a Storm trigger won't take that long to resolve. With tutors, a player might not know what card they need as they're casting it, only that they need to find something. In those instances, tutors can take some time to complete. In addition, even if a player knew exactly what card they wanted from the start, that card could just as easily be located in the bottom half or quarter of their library taking much more time to complete. If anything, replacing tutor effects with Storm triggers would speed up the game on average, not bring it to a frigid halt like Taleran is claiming.
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WUBRGMr. Bones' Wild RideGRBUW Trap your friends in an endless game with this 23-card combo!
I didn't really quite understand to put 10, or 1 because both answers have one answer for pro tutors and not having tutors. Confused. Anyways, I rate a 10 (feel strongly) about NOT having tutors.
I think tutors are the main problem any kind of "unfairness" or broken discussion in EDH. It would make the complaints go down so much if any card that says "search" in it's rules text was banned. Here is my post from a week back in another tutor discussion that I think I could not say any better about tutoring in EDH, read or just scroll down to the bottom for TL:RD synopsis.
From a personal standpoint of playing EDH for 8-9 years, I will never understand the appeal of tutors in EDH. There are so many cons to the pros for tutoring. After playing EDH for how long I have, I am absolutely tired with searching for a card in my deck. It gets so old having to look for a card that you generally don't know what you're going to look for, so you end up taking a good 30 seconds to a minute of time away from the game which bores your opponents and slows the game down. Then functionally, tutoring is a pain in the ass to shuffle your average 60-90 cards left in your deck beginning to mid game (after drawing your initial hand, drawing cards, getting milled etc. and how ever many turns later), especially if you are one of those people who double sleeve their cards in a perfect sleeve then in a Dragon sleeve. Now times doing that at least 5-10 times a game for the average EDH deck with fetchlands, etb tutors, etc. and it is just gets ridiculous. On top of that while you are searching you see all of the cards that are coming up in your deck, so if you don't pile shuffle for true maximum randomness, and you end up doing what I call a "lazy shuffle" where the player just simply puts cards in two piles and then mashes them together once (this happens ALL the time with at least one player in the group no matter where I play), then you will probably, and hopefully, unintentionally know what cards that are coming up. I am aware that all of this does not apply playing EDH online, but let's get real here, EDH sucks online and EDH is truly meant to be played for the social experience of interacting with human beings in front of you. EDH online is good for testing out cards you might like, and that is about it - it has been across the board a truly rotten experience trying to play with randoms online for me personally.
"Now Crumbcrispcoating", you might say, "tutoring is necessary for consistency in a 99 card singleton format to find what you need in certain situations". After playing EDH for so many years, I would say you are partially correct, you do at some points in the game wish you had that board wipe or combo piece or whatever; but my rebuttal is it really worth it for all of that fidgeting through all of your cards? Also strategically I have found that tutoring, even when it is a tutor that does not reveal what card you searches for, gives so much information away to the other 3 players in the game, and this is very true for a group you consistently meet with every week for EDH. For example, if Johnny combo player is playing with his known deck to combo off with his wacky combo, and then everyone knows Johnny tutors for that key piece, I can guarantee the other players are going to do everything they can to take him out or at least gang up on him the next game, or Johnny might even be "that guy" in the playgroup for every game following until the end of time. Players can be petty unfortunately. Now times this by a billion when someone reveals a tutor commander, I think we can all safely say we all gun for that player immediately off the bat. Think of Commanders like, Sisay, Arcum, Zur, hell - I can't think of any Commander that says "search" in it's rules text that I wouldn't want to destroy on sight (aside from Higure, the Still Wind because he has like 8 ninjas or something and no one plays him or Korlash, Heir to Blackblade, or Ob Nixilis, Unshackled, they're all cool. Especially Ob Nix because he is more anti-tutor which I approve.)
Finally I would also like to point out that tutoring is just simply lazy deck building. Sorry, but it is. It is truly the "easy mode" of EDH, and exploits the broken nature of the card pool that is legal, as well as ruining the variance factor which was designed for CASUAL play to get away from serious tourney Pro Tour play. Tutors do not promote creativity, personal self expression, or universal deck synergy with the 99 cards in front of you. I find that newer EDH players go tutor crazy, because they haven't had the chance to play these powerful over the top effects in Standard and they want POWERFUL CRAZY STUFF. After awhile though, it get's really old and you want to challenge yourself with improving your deck building and creativity skills in place of using easy powerful cards. After playing with these types of cards you will realize just how boring it gets and how easy cards these types of cards that do it all for you, such as tutors generally do. If you go tutor less, I can practically guarantee you that you will take the time and effort to find ways to improve your deck by replacing the slot the tutor is in with another card that has more synergy with the rest of the deck, so whatever you draw in your deck will almost always be a viable option no matter what point it is in the game. Tutors promote "good stuff", because aside from combo decks tutors will almost always search for generic answers that have no theme or creativity within your deck. So when you take your tutors out, your deck will cut down on the good stuff and will be possibly a little more interesting at the very least. Also, when the name of the game is 99 card singleton, there will be slight to medium variance regardless if you jammed 10 tutors in your deck - sure you will cut down a little on the variance, but it will still be there - so why not take them out and challenge yourself a little bit? Why not mix it up and just see what happens, you don't have to control randomness to the point where you are playing Standard, kick back and roll the dice sometimes. It's fun for those who can let go now and again and not be so serious with a game where you literally win nothing from your efforts aside from a high five maybe from the dude sitting next to you if you won in a funny cool fashion, or some kind of self validation you beat some kids at a card game. (And yes I realize there are 1v1 or *shudder* multiplayer competitive tourneys where you win cash, but I think we all know those are a load of nonsense). Who knows, maybe something wacky and zany and funny might happen, humor is a good thing last time I checked, not who can flex the biggest muscle for little to no gain. I wish the attitude towards EDH was more "trying to play to win, but so what if I lose - I had fun during the game" which I think would cut down a lot on the arguing and tryharding with what the OP was saying by jamming that many tutors in your deck. Finally, tutors can make combo decks win on turn 2-3, which unless your entire group is in agreement with this, I would say the majority of players that you will randomly play with will frown on this instawin non-interactive kind of game play. Doesn't really promote happy good times.
So in conclusion of my long winded essay I have just wrote, too long didn't read etc., tutors are really lame and make EDH even more broken than it already is and are easy and functionally annoying. I hope I just at least get an A+ for my thesis here.
so if you don't pile shuffle for true maximum randomness
This, on its own, is enough for me to dismiss half of what you say.
As I said in the first reply to this thread, you are taking various problems (most of them personal), and miss-attributing the cause to 'tutor' effects.
I'd rate myself a 7. Games where you tutor for the winning combo all the time are super boring. I've started cutting unconditional tutors and games have been a lot more swingy and fun.
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The "Crazy One", playing casual magic and occasionally dipping his toes into regular play since 1994.
Currently focusing on Pre-Modern (Mono-Black Discard Control) and Modern (Azorious Control, Temur Rhinos).
Find me at the Wizard's Tower in Ottawa every second Saturday afternoons.
Ive had a think about this over the past few days and revised my stance to a 1, tutors should basically always be allowed.
Discounting land tutors, what people seem to be saying is that they dislike peoples ability to tutor into a win and shut the game off early. This I agree can be frustrating however the tutor isnt the issue, its the decks ability to abuse it that is. Nobody would complain about Demonic tutor in a Relentless Rats deck.
TLDR: Tutors aren't the "problem", the deck is. If you don't like getting combo killed/ staxed or MLD'd play with other people who agree with you.
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EDH BRGKresh the BloodbraidedBRG, A box of lands and ideas.
Modern: RG Titanshift. A deck made of cards too stupid for EDH.
Retired: Lots. More than I feel you should suffer through or I should type out.
3. I personally don't try to run too many in my own builds, and I especially go easy on being able to tutor up combo pieces or having easily tutored combos, but I see their value and I wouldn't want to see them gone from my decks or my meta.
if you don't pile shuffle for true maximum randomness, and you end up doing what I call a "lazy shuffle" where the player just simply puts cards in two piles and then mashes them together once
Pile "shuffling" is not shuffling at all. It is only acceptable as a means of counting the cards in the deck.
A single mash shuffle is also insufficient, but repeated mash shuffles are. Under the Gilber-Shannon-Reeds model, a "perfect" riffle would need 9 repetitions to randomize a deck of 64-101 cards. A mash shuffle is very similar to a riffle shuffle. Note that "perfect" in this case is not a perfect interleave of the two halves of the deck, as that's not a shuffle either.
And I'm not even counting land fetch cards as tutoring. Those are just an important part of playing multi-color.
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This is what always gets me. What about the aspect of what a color is supposed to be able to do? The actual purpose of flavor behind what a color is capable of doing?
Gamble is utterly red. Vampiric Tutor is a perfect example of a black spell - paying life and hand-size reduction for a tutor. Cultivate is just what the color green offers the player. Typically the primary reason to include green is for ramp, which is either dorks, or land-tutor.
If the goal is to remove all tutors because demonic tutor makes for bad feelings, then that would cripple the color identity of black, unless everyone also decided to remove farseek and whir of invention and godo, bandit warlord and stoneforge mystic.
Arguments or debates over the inclusion of tutors in this format worry me. I really scares me that someone with rule-manipulating powers is going to interpret these debates as an actual serious issue with the format.
If you have an actual issue with the use of tutors in your local meta, then please talk to that local meta. We here at internet-land will each have our own opinion, completely derived from our own personal local meta. Some elements of these arguments will be similar for people. Most of the outlier opinions are based off of a few bad experiences that could be fixed just by talking to (or not playing with) someone specific.
Links to my most current deck lists;
Primary EDH; Rakka Mar Token Perfection, Crosis Mnemonic Betrayal, Cromat Villainous, Judith Gravestorm, Rakdos Empty Storm, Exava Artifacts, Bant Trash, & Fumiko Voltron!
EDH kept at home; Ruzzian Isset & Rakdos LoR!
EDH (nostalgic/pimp/retired) in storage;
Latulla Burns, Akroma Smash, Jeska Voltron, Rakdos Storm, Bladewing Darghans, Lyzolda Worldgorger, Xantcha Steals your Heart, Jori Storm, Wydwen Permission, Gwendlyn Paradox, Jeleva Warps, & Sigarda Brick!
Legacy Showanimator and High Tide!
Red is supposed to be good at burn/direct damage. It is only of the only things in the color pie that Red does much better than any other color, but in EDH it's not a viable strategy. Perhaps the meta would be more diverse without tutors. Is it a coincidence that UBG are the best colors in the format and the best colors at tutoring?
No one is saying the EDH committee should ban tutors. The argument I presented says that playing with tutors is less fun and leads to games that are more consistent and monotonousness which is contrary to the point of having a singleton format.
People have different gripes with the format. There are various strategies that people find overpowered, broken, unfun, tedious to play against, etc. Playing without tutors makes nearly all of these things less problematic, or at least less frequent. If you hate Cyclonic Rift, you wouldn't have to play against it as much if your opponent didn't Merchant Scroll or Mystical Tutor for it every game. If you hate Palinchron infinite combos, you wouldn't have to encounter them as much if your opponent didn't Worldly Tutor or Demonic Tutor for it every game.
UBRKess, Dissident MageUBR - Controlling Dissidents
GRhonas the IndomitableG - Indomitable Four Drops
WUBOloro, Ageless AsceticWUB - Loot & Renanimate
In terms of tutoring, blue has a few spell tutors (mystical tutor/personal tutor/merchant scroll), a few artifact tutors (fabricate/whir of invention/arcum dagsson), the very broken Intuition, and then the random long-term plans and Distant Memories (the latter being a joke of a card).
I'm not sure of the exact quantity, but it seems like white has a larger selection of tutor effects than blue with all of the aura/enchantment tutors. There are all of the enlightened tutor variants from Idyllic Tutor and Auratouched Mage to open the armory to stonehwere giant/stoneforge mystic. The scary Academy Rector, or planeswalker tutors like Call the Gatewatch and Djeru, With Eyes Open, and land tax/Gift of Estates/weathered wayfarer effects.
In terms of quantity of tutors of white vs blue, I won't bother mentioning the transmute Dimir mechanic, but I'll also skip over the entire concept of rebels and Lin Sivvi, Defiant Hero
Now blue does have a few inverse tutors in Thada Adel, Acquisitor/Denying Wind/acquire/bribery/knowledge exploitation. Are those considered tutors for this topic?
Is there any point in mentioning the commanders that tutor? Sidisi, Undead Vizier, Momir Vig, Simic Visionary, Arcum Dagsson and Zur the Enchanter seem like they may surface in the topic, but what of Djeru, With Eyes Open, Captain Sisay, General Tazri, Zirilan of the Claw and Godo, Bandit Warlord? These are typically entire decks built around the fact that the commander can tutor.
Links to my most current deck lists;
Primary EDH; Rakka Mar Token Perfection, Crosis Mnemonic Betrayal, Cromat Villainous, Judith Gravestorm, Rakdos Empty Storm, Exava Artifacts, Bant Trash, & Fumiko Voltron!
EDH kept at home; Ruzzian Isset & Rakdos LoR!
EDH (nostalgic/pimp/retired) in storage;
Latulla Burns, Akroma Smash, Jeska Voltron, Rakdos Storm, Bladewing Darghans, Lyzolda Worldgorger, Xantcha Steals your Heart, Jori Storm, Wydwen Permission, Gwendlyn Paradox, Jeleva Warps, & Sigarda Brick!
Legacy Showanimator and High Tide!
There is no viable tutoring general that does not have U, G or B.
White has terrible card advantage and only two really strong tutors, Enlightened Tutor and Stoneforge Mystic.
Often times the most hated strategies in the format occur and win so frequently because of tutors. Derevi, Empyrial Tactician Statis/Stax would be a much less oppressive deck if it couldn't tutor. Oloro Doomsday would be an alternate win condition rather than the entire deck if it couldn't tutor.
UBRKess, Dissident MageUBR - Controlling Dissidents
GRhonas the IndomitableG - Indomitable Four Drops
WUBOloro, Ageless AsceticWUB - Loot & Renanimate
There are no cards that frustrate you when you play against them more than others? Not that I'm doubting you, but that's quite unusual for a seasoned EDH player.
UBRKess, Dissident MageUBR - Controlling Dissidents
GRhonas the IndomitableG - Indomitable Four Drops
WUBOloro, Ageless AsceticWUB - Loot & Renanimate
Why would they frustrate me? It is a card game that I am having fun with friends, sure I didn't win because X thing happened but typically the games I am in are interactive in a way that numerous choices led to that spot and it all can not be laid on the feet of a single card.
So it has more to do with the deck they're in then the tutor effects themselves.
Saying tutoring leads to repetitive games...why stop there?
Consider the following:
1. Do free Mulligans lead to repetitive games? Why Should players be guaranteed playable good hands? Especially since the multiplayer aspect allows for comebacks ALL THE TIME. I'm always weary of that, I make sure and finish the job when someone's low because comebacks are a threat and awesome when they occur. They occur more often when mulligan rules are strict. Lax mulligan rules reward poor deck building. Or even worse, allow players to "game" the mulligan rule.
2. Ubiquitous ramp leads to repetitive games just the same. And I'm not talking about the explosive, broken ramp that too many people whine about-- personally, sol ring and mana crypt aren't bannable to me. Rampant growth, cultivate, explosive vegetation...allow players to cast all spells every game all the time. Let's be honest about the General meta at almost every group, aggro is absent. Players do nothing other than ramp for the first four turns. That's boring to me when all early game is about setting up to skip the mid-game and hop right into the end-game. Lack of aggro to punish this predictable play pattern.
3. Having a commander in the command zone kinda makes things repetitive also. Partner and all the commander tax abilities (e.g. Prossh) make it even worse. I hate two things in edh #1 people playing theft effects on my permanents and disrespecting my stuff and #2 commander set generals. they are absolutely the most annoying generals to play against.
4. And finally, if your opponent is tutoring for the same thing all the time...guess what? It means that you are doing the same thing all the time.
Not sure how much of this is sarcasm or rhetorical but I will bite.
1. Free mulligans are helpful because magic isn't fun if you don't get to play the game, even if it's just in the beginning of the game. If you draw a hand with no lands or one land, and have to pass 4 turns before you can cast any spells while you watch your friends play their decks, it isn't a fun experience. Casual mulligans ensure the consistency of everyone being able to play spells. However, even without casual free mulligans, players are virtually guaranteed a playable hand after one or two traditional mulligans (I personally like to play with 1 to 2 free mulligans).
2. Rampant Growth and Explosive Vegetation can be countered just like Birds of Paradise is susceptible to Swords To Plowshares. Preventing players from ramping can be a great tempo play. Players should not feel entitled to ramp, and often times one of the best ways to beat a mono green ramp deck is to stifle ramp or use land destruction towards the beginning of the game. Mana rocks like Sol Ring and Coldsteel Heart are also vulnerable to removal.
It also isn't true that players only ramp for the first 4 turns. I have a reanimator deck with a looter subtheme (see signature if you are curious) that frequently plays cards like Merfolk Looter, Jace, Vryn's Prodigy, Thought Courier and Careful Study in the beginning of the game. I have a Rhonas the Indomitable deck that runs zero land ramp effects (no shuffling) and while it does run a few mana dorks, the beginning of the game focuses on getting out creatures with a power of 4 of greater within the first 4 turns of the game (also see my signature) .
3. Having a commander in the command zone is the primary point of the format. You play a commander and 99 cards to go with that card (often these cards support the commander). Commander tax abilities or abilities that can't be interacted with (i.e. Oloro) are powerful and ensure some form of consistency, but they do not result in the same card being played every game or the same card winning a game consistently.
4. I don't understand this point. If I play a three different decks and none of them run tutors, but my opponent runs a mono black deck and tutors for Mike and Trike combo each game (suppose sometimes I am able to stop her and sometimes I am not), how does that mean that I'm doing the same thing all the time?
UBRKess, Dissident MageUBR - Controlling Dissidents
GRhonas the IndomitableG - Indomitable Four Drops
WUBOloro, Ageless AsceticWUB - Loot & Renanimate
I had this interesting thought experiment - what if in EDH all search effects are turned into filter effects? Instead of searching the library, you look at the top cards of your library until you hit the card type(s) the card filters for, then execute the rest of the card's effects.
I know there are a lot of erratas required (Demonic Tutor will require you to name a card type(s) first I assume) and cards that don't require to reveal the card (mainly Demonic Tutor though) will require some honesty, but assuming we do all the erratas, such a change will weaken the nature (and consistency) of all search effects without completely dismissing the mechanic.
Yes, the "fair" uses of tutoring will also get hit, but relatively speaking it's still better than a complete dismissal. The loss of consistency will hit the "top-end" usage a lot harder than the "fair" uses (although they'll get the occasional game-costing screw-up as well). Ramp will probably get hit the hardest (especially cards like Hour of Promise, which can screw up with 2 basics) among the "fair" use cards, but is that too heavy a price to pay as well (mainly because most people will say a complete removal of searching is definitely not the price to pay).
It's just a thought experiment, but it'll be good to see some opinions on it.
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A Dying Wish
To Rise Again
Chainer, Dementia Master
Muldrotha, the Gravetide
Atraxa, Praetors' Voice
Besides, there are plenty of cards that get the cards you want without being Demonic Tutor, and in the right deck they might even function better than DT.
Shu Yun, the Silent Tempest WUR Voltron Control
Temmet, Vizier of Naktamun WU Unblockable Mirror Trickery
Ra's al Ghul (Sidar Kondo) and Face-Down Ninjas
Brudiclad, Token Engineer
Vaevictis (VV2) the Dire Lantern
Rona, Disciple of Gix
Tiana the Auror
Hallar
Ulrich the Politician
Zur the Rebel
Scorpion, Locust, Scarab, Egyptian Gods
O-Kagachi, Mathas, Mairsil
"Non-Tribal" Tribal Generals, Eggs
Resolving a single instance of Possibility Storm isn't that bad. Outside of situations where a player casts a card of a type they don't contain quite a lot of, a Storm trigger won't take that long to resolve. With tutors, a player might not know what card they need as they're casting it, only that they need to find something. In those instances, tutors can take some time to complete. In addition, even if a player knew exactly what card they wanted from the start, that card could just as easily be located in the bottom half or quarter of their library taking much more time to complete. If anything, replacing tutor effects with Storm triggers would speed up the game on average, not bring it to a frigid halt like Taleran is claiming.
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- Godo, Bandit Warlord
- Lin Sivvi, Defiant Hero
- Zirilan of the Claw
I don't know how "viable" Djeru, With Eyes Open is, but he could be on the list, too.Two Score, Minus Two or: A Stargate Tail
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I think tutors are the main problem any kind of "unfairness" or broken discussion in EDH. It would make the complaints go down so much if any card that says "search" in it's rules text was banned. Here is my post from a week back in another tutor discussion that I think I could not say any better about tutoring in EDH, read or just scroll down to the bottom for TL:RD synopsis.
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From a personal standpoint of playing EDH for 8-9 years, I will never understand the appeal of tutors in EDH. There are so many cons to the pros for tutoring. After playing EDH for how long I have, I am absolutely tired with searching for a card in my deck. It gets so old having to look for a card that you generally don't know what you're going to look for, so you end up taking a good 30 seconds to a minute of time away from the game which bores your opponents and slows the game down. Then functionally, tutoring is a pain in the ass to shuffle your average 60-90 cards left in your deck beginning to mid game (after drawing your initial hand, drawing cards, getting milled etc. and how ever many turns later), especially if you are one of those people who double sleeve their cards in a perfect sleeve then in a Dragon sleeve. Now times doing that at least 5-10 times a game for the average EDH deck with fetchlands, etb tutors, etc. and it is just gets ridiculous. On top of that while you are searching you see all of the cards that are coming up in your deck, so if you don't pile shuffle for true maximum randomness, and you end up doing what I call a "lazy shuffle" where the player just simply puts cards in two piles and then mashes them together once (this happens ALL the time with at least one player in the group no matter where I play), then you will probably, and hopefully, unintentionally know what cards that are coming up. I am aware that all of this does not apply playing EDH online, but let's get real here, EDH sucks online and EDH is truly meant to be played for the social experience of interacting with human beings in front of you. EDH online is good for testing out cards you might like, and that is about it - it has been across the board a truly rotten experience trying to play with randoms online for me personally.
"Now Crumbcrispcoating", you might say, "tutoring is necessary for consistency in a 99 card singleton format to find what you need in certain situations". After playing EDH for so many years, I would say you are partially correct, you do at some points in the game wish you had that board wipe or combo piece or whatever; but my rebuttal is it really worth it for all of that fidgeting through all of your cards? Also strategically I have found that tutoring, even when it is a tutor that does not reveal what card you searches for, gives so much information away to the other 3 players in the game, and this is very true for a group you consistently meet with every week for EDH. For example, if Johnny combo player is playing with his known deck to combo off with his wacky combo, and then everyone knows Johnny tutors for that key piece, I can guarantee the other players are going to do everything they can to take him out or at least gang up on him the next game, or Johnny might even be "that guy" in the playgroup for every game following until the end of time. Players can be petty unfortunately. Now times this by a billion when someone reveals a tutor commander, I think we can all safely say we all gun for that player immediately off the bat. Think of Commanders like, Sisay, Arcum, Zur, hell - I can't think of any Commander that says "search" in it's rules text that I wouldn't want to destroy on sight (aside from Higure, the Still Wind because he has like 8 ninjas or something and no one plays him or Korlash, Heir to Blackblade, or Ob Nixilis, Unshackled, they're all cool. Especially Ob Nix because he is more anti-tutor which I approve.)
Finally I would also like to point out that tutoring is just simply lazy deck building. Sorry, but it is. It is truly the "easy mode" of EDH, and exploits the broken nature of the card pool that is legal, as well as ruining the variance factor which was designed for CASUAL play to get away from serious tourney Pro Tour play. Tutors do not promote creativity, personal self expression, or universal deck synergy with the 99 cards in front of you. I find that newer EDH players go tutor crazy, because they haven't had the chance to play these powerful over the top effects in Standard and they want POWERFUL CRAZY STUFF. After awhile though, it get's really old and you want to challenge yourself with improving your deck building and creativity skills in place of using easy powerful cards. After playing with these types of cards you will realize just how boring it gets and how easy cards these types of cards that do it all for you, such as tutors generally do. If you go tutor less, I can practically guarantee you that you will take the time and effort to find ways to improve your deck by replacing the slot the tutor is in with another card that has more synergy with the rest of the deck, so whatever you draw in your deck will almost always be a viable option no matter what point it is in the game. Tutors promote "good stuff", because aside from combo decks tutors will almost always search for generic answers that have no theme or creativity within your deck. So when you take your tutors out, your deck will cut down on the good stuff and will be possibly a little more interesting at the very least. Also, when the name of the game is 99 card singleton, there will be slight to medium variance regardless if you jammed 10 tutors in your deck - sure you will cut down a little on the variance, but it will still be there - so why not take them out and challenge yourself a little bit? Why not mix it up and just see what happens, you don't have to control randomness to the point where you are playing Standard, kick back and roll the dice sometimes. It's fun for those who can let go now and again and not be so serious with a game where you literally win nothing from your efforts aside from a high five maybe from the dude sitting next to you if you won in a funny cool fashion, or some kind of self validation you beat some kids at a card game. (And yes I realize there are 1v1 or *shudder* multiplayer competitive tourneys where you win cash, but I think we all know those are a load of nonsense). Who knows, maybe something wacky and zany and funny might happen, humor is a good thing last time I checked, not who can flex the biggest muscle for little to no gain. I wish the attitude towards EDH was more "trying to play to win, but so what if I lose - I had fun during the game" which I think would cut down a lot on the arguing and tryharding with what the OP was saying by jamming that many tutors in your deck. Finally, tutors can make combo decks win on turn 2-3, which unless your entire group is in agreement with this, I would say the majority of players that you will randomly play with will frown on this instawin non-interactive kind of game play. Doesn't really promote happy good times.
So in conclusion of my long winded essay I have just wrote, too long didn't read etc., tutors are really lame and make EDH even more broken than it already is and are easy and functionally annoying. I hope I just at least get an A+ for my thesis here.
That is putting it a lot nicer than I probably would have.
This, on its own, is enough for me to dismiss half of what you say.
As I said in the first reply to this thread, you are taking various problems (most of them personal), and miss-attributing the cause to 'tutor' effects.
A Dying Wish
To Rise Again
Chainer, Dementia Master
Muldrotha, the Gravetide
Atraxa, Praetors' Voice
Currently focusing on Pre-Modern (Mono-Black Discard Control) and Modern (Azorious Control, Temur Rhinos).
Find me at the Wizard's Tower in Ottawa every second Saturday afternoons.
Discounting land tutors, what people seem to be saying is that they dislike peoples ability to tutor into a win and shut the game off early. This I agree can be frustrating however the tutor isnt the issue, its the decks ability to abuse it that is. Nobody would complain about Demonic tutor in a Relentless Rats deck.
TLDR: Tutors aren't the "problem", the deck is. If you don't like getting combo killed/ staxed or MLD'd play with other people who agree with you.
BRGKresh the BloodbraidedBRG, A box of lands and ideas.
Modern:
RG Titanshift. A deck made of cards too stupid for EDH.
Retired: Lots. More than I feel you should suffer through or I should type out.
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A single mash shuffle is also insufficient, but repeated mash shuffles are. Under the Gilber-Shannon-Reeds model, a "perfect" riffle would need 9 repetitions to randomize a deck of 64-101 cards. A mash shuffle is very similar to a riffle shuffle. Note that "perfect" in this case is not a perfect interleave of the two halves of the deck, as that's not a shuffle either.
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