It just depends a lot on which generals you play as well. I've had a Kemba, Kha Regent voltron deck for a while. Nobody is going to argue that Kemba breaks anything, yet people would still target her with Oblation, Chaos Warp or Spin into Myth despite the presence of generals that would become a bigger problem just because it renders the entire deck silent. If I were to rebuild it now, Kemba would still be slowed down tremendously by spot removal and wraths and nobody would blink an eye.
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My Commander decks:
Chandra, Torch of Defiance - Oops! All Chandras.
Prime Speaker Zegana - Draw for Power.
Pir & Toothy - Counterpalooza.
Arcades, the Strategist - Another Brick in the Wall.
Zacama, Primal Calamity - Calamity of Double Mana.
Edgar Markov - Vampires Don't Die.
Child of Alara - Dreamcrusher.
i think a major issue that a lot of peeps on this thread are touching on but don't actually explicitly mention is the notion of 'fairness' and 'balance'. EDH isn't a format known for those qualities and the RC is pretty explicit in that they aren't trying to 'balance' the format in any shape or form; they're primarily trying to weed out the unfun elements, especially aimed at enticing new blood onto the scene.
if your group enjoys the idea of their generals being tucked as a fun thing, then good on you guys, and im sure your group already houseruled it in. However, it would seem to me and at least the peeps at the local scene here that having your general tucked is one of the least fun things that can happen to them in a game. i can sort of understand why some people like tuck, but it would seem that for most people playing EDH, tuck is a general feel-bad.
if i got the wrong idea from the RC, my bad! i dont wanna be putting words in their mouth, but thats the impression i got anyways.
This is what they say. That the announcement explicitly refers to broken tutors and color balance kind of undermines this sentiment, though.
If your deck can entirely function without your commander, why do you have a commander? So you can jam the best cards in your favorite color combo and roll face?
I do my best to make most of my decks (and especially ones I plan to use in games where people want to play a bit more cutthroat) function both with and without the commander in play. My group runs a lot of removal, and I enjoy having a deck that functions after my general has been killed 4+ times and I may not have immediate access to it.
I liked tuck because it game me time to find an answer to some of the more difficult decks I play against. Even my mono red deck wasn't completely crippled by tuck, even though it made my game plan significantly harder.
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Personally, I'm still very pro-tuck. There are a lot of generals that are difficult to deal with long term, and tuck buys you time. That said, I also have just moved past it. Even without tuck, my group can keep people off of their generals with commander tax.
My feeling on the matter is likely influenced by the fact that I've never been a fan of decks that rely too much on their general. I guess I'll always think a deck falling to pieces w/out that ONE card is stupid.
It does highlight a problem with the way the rules committee handles things in my opinion. Fun to one person might be the complete opposite of fun for another. If they focused on balance instead of fun I think it would be a better way to run the format.
It does highlight a problem with the way the rules committee handles things in my opinion. Fun to one person might be the complete opposite of fun for another. If they focused on balance instead of fun I think it would be a better way to run the format.
They never said that they were catering to both sets of 'fun' though. Nor do they try. The format has a vision. If your vision is different, fine, but there's just going to be some friction with their decisions then.
I also continue to believe the loss of tuck enables lazy deckbuilding. This opinion is supported by some of the recent comments in this thread.
I don't disagree necessarily, but the loss of tuck also opened up quite a bit of space. For example, when it existed I always felt like Hinder and Spell Crumple were too good to not run in any blue deck. The option to counter a game-wrecking spell tied onto the option to maybe remove a commander from the game was too good to not have available. Without tuck those two spells suddenly felt a lot less auto-include, and I didn't necessarily feel the need to replace them with other counters. It just flat out opened up space in my blue decks. High Market was another card I felt was needed in almost every deck as a way to deal with tuck. Without tuck that was a slot that no longer felt like an auto-include.
I see tucking as a valid strategy in EDH. I also believe that a deck should be able to function without its general, at least that's how I build my deck. I'm willing to let my general be tucked if it gives my opponent an illusion that my deck is doomed without it.
On the personal side, I enjoy watching opponents' reaction when they realize that they can no longer cheat in their Derevi or expensive spells with Narset.
I'm glad tuck is just as proportionately useful as a removal strategy as destroy and exile. I don't like the idea of one means of removal getting a boost in utility because of a loophole. If the intent of the Commander format is an always available commander, it should be that way. The only way I would support reinstating tuck as a method of dealing with commanders is if destroy and exile were allowed to work as well, turning Commander into a format where the commander's only perks are commander damage and initial ease of access. Tuck was a loophole, and they should be fixed. Currently, only cards like Darksteel Mutation and Lignify, and to a lesser extent, Pacifism-style cards can deal with commanders on a lasting basis. I run Darksteel Mutation, but wouldn't be offended if the Rules Committee allowed your commander an out from auras as well.
I'm glad tuck is just as proportionately useful as a removal strategy as destroy and exile. I don't like the idea of one means of removal getting a boost in utility because of a loophole. If the intent of the Commander format is an always available commander, it should be that way. The only way I would support reinstating tuck as a method of dealing with commanders is if destroy and exile were allowed to work as well, turning Commander into a format where the commander's only perks are commander damage and initial ease of access. Tuck was a loophole, and they should be fixed. Currently, only cards like Darksteel Mutation and Lignify, and to a lesser extent, Pacifism-style cards can deal with commanders on a lasting basis. I run Darksteel Mutation, but wouldn't be offended if the Rules Committee allowed your commander an out from auras as well.
An out to auras would be too much, imo. What's next? Nevermore can't name commanders? Moat can't stop commanders?
I definitely think killing tuck on commanders is good for the format from a more casual angle. Most of the obnoxious more casual commanders will have a rough time with the commander tax after just 1 or 2 removal spells.
For the competitive side, the format is already a hot mess, anyway. Derevi not being tuck-able is not a problem with the format. Derevi is just a stupid card that basically abuses the rules of the format to the maximum (imo extremely poorly designed for the format). It's further reason that I don't even bother with making a single truly competitive deck in normal commander. The RC doesn't support it at all either, so it's really a lost cause.
I'm glad tuck is just as proportionately useful as a removal strategy as destroy and exile. I don't like the idea of one means of removal getting a boost in utility because of a loophole. If the intent of the Commander format is an always available commander, it should be that way. The only way I would support reinstating tuck as a method of dealing with commanders is if destroy and exile were allowed to work as well, turning Commander into a format where the commander's only perks are commander damage and initial ease of access. Tuck was a loophole, and they should be fixed. Currently, only cards like Darksteel Mutation and Lignify, and to a lesser extent, Pacifism-style cards can deal with commanders on a lasting basis. I run Darksteel Mutation, but wouldn't be offended if the Rules Committee allowed your commander an out from auras as well.
An out to auras would be too much, imo. What's next? Nevermore can't name commanders? Moat can't stop commanders?
I definitely think killing tuck on commanders is good for the format from a more casual angle. Most of the obnoxious more casual commanders will have a rough time with the commander tax after just 1 or 2 removal spells.
For the competitive side, the format is already a hot mess, anyway. Derevi not being tuck-able is not a problem with the format. Derevi is just a stupid card that basically abuses the rules of the format to the maximum (imo extremely poorly designed for the format). It's further reason that I don't even bother with making a single truly competitive deck in normal commander. The RC doesn't support it at all either, so it's really a lost cause.
yea, i think the commander 1v1/duel commander/french format rules are probably the best for 'competitive' balance even for multiplayer, and the EDH RC's rules are best for casual angle. but i think they removed tuck from their rules before the multiplayer format did.
is it possible for the OP to put up some sort of vote for the "1 tuck-free year experience" for this thread?
It does highlight a problem with the way the rules committee handles things in my opinion. Fun to one person might be the complete opposite of fun for another. If they focused on balance instead of fun I think it would be a better way to run the format.
People often do not agree as to what is balanced or not, so how is that an improvement?
If people are sick of reading about stuff just stop taking part. You have 100% control over what you read. Simic Ascendancy isn't going to get banned just because you didn't tell someone to shut up on the internet.
It definitely led to decks where the commander's abilities were only partially taken into account when building. I saw many competitive players using a bunch of sub-par commanders just for their colours. Mind you, this is before the second commander boxes came out where they printed a whole lot of BS commanders.
I'll definitely stick to duel commander for playing competitive. The format is a lot more cohesive and not having to punch through 3 other players means decks that want to attack with creatures are a lot more effective (the free double lava axe on everyone helps a lot as well).
My first main EDH deck (bounced around a bit before I finally got a copy) was Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter and I ran all the tuck spells (hallowed burial, terminus, condemn, banishing stroke). Vish kal could sac himself if I didn't want him to get tucked so it was very one-sided. Having your commander tucked just feels bad.
Pretty much what SAUS_9001 said. When tuck was at its most rampant I just ran a hardlock Derevi build. Couldn't be tucked so just locked down my opponents. Or I'd run Oloro with Ad Nauseam and never play my commander at all. Now that tuck is gone I can play my general and have more fun. It was a fine change.
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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.
Really, when I play top built commander decks, with demonic Tutor, Vampiric Tutor, Wordly.... Tuck is not a big deal, but everytime I did a budget deck, commander centric, I can see one card destroying your whole deck. I made a budget goblin storm Zada, Hedron Grinder deck, if she gets tucked, doesn't matter what turn it is, I just give up and go do something else. "Oh but you should have built some goodstuff deck!!" That is exactly why I am against tucking commanders, the game is for everyone, Commander is made for being a fun format, if you simply push casual players to having tutors (good tutors are expensive) then you are not being casual anymore.
Think like this, oh a blue deck, okay how to get your tucked commander back?
First you need to shuffle the deck, (fetch lands), then use cantrips, or just use something as cheap as Intuition... You need to know this is casual format, and thinking this way, only black colored decks can tutor your commander back, with pretty awful tutors... Diabolic Tutor and other cheap cards, everytime a rule pushes a deckbuild to competitive/goodstuff, I'm kind of against it, even if it does mean cutthroat decks like Derevi and Zur gets harder to stop, but yeah, they still can be stopped, if they can't, then they should be banned, but killing a bunch of commanders for 2-3 commanders to be more vulnerable, I don't think that is the way to make rules.
"Oh, but rules are made for competitive!", Duel commander is right there if the problem is competitive :D, and I really love it, no Zur, no Derevi, no Edric, so no need for tuck effects also.
Personally, I find tuck stupid. The entire point of having a general is to be able to create a deck that has synergy with the general at the helm. Its fine if you don't want too for personal reasons, but my thought is edh is more interesting if the decks revolve around the general.
I was thrilled to hear about the tuck rule change, and have enjoyed playing under the new rules since then. My 2nd game of commander I ever played resulted in my commander (Oloro) being tucked, and I never saw him for the rest of the game. My Narset deck would be horrible to play if the old tuck rule was in effect.
For me, there is a connection and perspective with your selected commander, and to know they are buried 75 cards deep in your library isnt anyway to play. Also, if I had to load up on tutors and counterspells to prevent my commander from being lost in my library, it weakens the rest of the cool stuff I want to do with my deck.
Here's a different perspective on tuck: I love my Maelstrom Wanderer deck. It doesn't combo, it's not just goodstuff, but it is built with the goal of always being able to do things and never spending turns going draw-go. However, I'm playing it less and less now because without more permanent answers to it, it is just overbearing to play against. Without changing the deck at all, it went from "powerful" to "groan-inducing" with the removal of more permanent answers. The deck wasn't even commander-centric, it just all worked together. So it leaves me in the awkward position of gutting one of my favorite decks, ruining the experience for my group, or simply not playing it. I've even suggested allowing tuck to still work in our group, but people would rather whine that they can't tuck MW than risk getting their commander tucked.
I would have rathered to see a rule that works like Command Beacon which allows you to pay some cost to move your commander to different zones. After all, for a lot of the commanders in question, simply racking up the commander tax can lock them out anyway.
Here's a different perspective on tuck: I love my Maelstrom Wanderer deck. It doesn't combo, it's not just goodstuff, but it is built with the goal of always being able to do things and never spending turns going draw-go. However, I'm playing it less and less now because without more permanent answers to it, it is just overbearing to play against. Without changing the deck at all, it went from "powerful" to "groan-inducing" with the removal of more permanent answers. The deck wasn't even commander-centric, it just all worked together. So it leaves me in the awkward position of gutting one of my favorite decks, ruining the experience for my group, or simply not playing it. I've even suggested allowing tuck to still work in our group, but people would rather whine that they can't tuck MW than risk getting their commander tucked.
I would have rathered to see a rule that works like Command Beacon which allows you to pay some cost to move your commander to different zones. After all, for a lot of the commanders in question, simply racking up the commander tax can lock them out anyway.
Maelstrom wanderer is one of the most broken commanders in the game. You don't even need to try to break him because he is that powerful. The only way to stop him is through being faster or using heavy disruption - like armageddon. Too many people do not want to play with that stuff, so the strongest ramp commander (maelstrom wanderer) becomes oppressive in casual groups. That's just how it is.
I personally would not want to put tuck cards into my deck for a house rule that I can't bank on being applied. I don't want to run cards that will not be as good in other games. That's just me, but it might be part of why people wouldn't want to put the cards in. Tuck is also just something I wouldn't want to house rule in.
I still disagree with your line of thinking, however I realize that we are representing very different gameplay expectations.
First, you seem to think that there is no place for "*****ty commanders like Phenax" in this format. That is not at all my opinion, but your logic makes much more sense when operating under this assumption.
Second, I don't play commander to win. I am a Timmy player in essence and thrive in the experience of awesome things happening in EDH. Being robbed, or robbing others, of the possibility to do so is something I can't enjoy.
Third, I play EDH with close friends only. There are no unfun cutthroat decks in my local meta, and we try hard to find a balance in powerlevel that does not rule out janky decks by default (my roommate loves his Phenax deck to death). We all had our commanders tucked at some point and decided it is nothing but a source of frustration. We don't play mass land destruction for the same reason, for example.
Also, I have never faced a Narset or Derevi deck that could not be kept in control, so I haven't experienced your pain and won't argue that point again.
I also continue to believe the loss of tuck enables lazy deckbuilding. This opinion is supported by some of the recent comments in this thread.
Others, too, have have voiced this opinion without providing arguments and I still fail to understand how no-tuck leads to lazy deckbuilding. Can you elaborate?
Tuck had too much collateral damage . When people could tuck 3 generals with a Hallowed Burial it just happened, even if only one was 'degenerate'. The player casting it just went 'I had to do SOMETHING about (General X)'. Now they can't just ruin fun built around commanders not doing broken stuff.
If people are sick of reading about stuff just stop taking part. You have 100% control over what you read. Simic Ascendancy isn't going to get banned just because you didn't tell someone to shut up on the internet.
I still disagree with your line of thinking, however I realize that we are representing very different gameplay expectations.
First, you seem to think that there is no place for "*****ty commanders like Phenax" in this format. That is not at all my opinion, but your logic makes much more sense when operating under this assumption.
I have no idea how you managed to interpret that from my words. "*****ty commanders generally don't get tucked before broken commanders" =/= "*****ty commanders have no place in this format"
Second, I don't play commander to win. I am a Timmy player in essence and thrive in the experience of awesome things happening in EDH. Being robbed, or robbing others, of the possibility to do so is something I can't enjoy.
There are many ways to prevent players from playing their general.
- Hyperfast combo. Kill the table before the player can play his general.
- Cutthroat stax. Prevent the player from playing his general or having his general do anything.
- Mass land destruction/mana denial. Prevent the player from having any mana to play his general.
- Simply killing the general multiple times so the commander tax is too high
- Stranding the general in play with pacifism, or perhaps stealing the commander with gilded drake (and the player just happened to not have a sac outlet in play at the time that happened, and/or doesn't draw into the right removal to save his general)
Why, then, do people get so sour over tuck? There are infinitely more things in EDH worse than getting your general tucked. At least green and black had extremely reasonable counters to tuck (they have the most tutors) while red/white/blue have the tuck effects to do it back at others (and blue has enough draw power to get the general back).
Granted, tuck was not often prevalent in hypercutthroat metas because most tuck spells are 3-mana (chaos warp, oblation, spell crumple, bant charm) which is a little slow. But even in just slightly more casual groups (where the tier 1 generals even if built slightly suboptimally are massive threats), it's nice to have an answer to someone's Arcum Daggson without having to rely on something like Stranglehold to try and stop him where those cards may not have a noticeable impact on the other players on the table.
Third, I play EDH with close friends only. There are no unfun cutthroat decks in my local meta, and we try hard to find a balance in powerlevel that does not rule out janky decks by default (my roommate loves his Phenax deck to death). We all had our commanders tucked at some point and decided it is nothing but a source of frustration. We don't play mass land destruction for the same reason, for example.
Also, I have never faced a Narset or Derevi deck that could not be kept in control, so I haven't experienced your pain and won't argue that point again.
When my general got tucked I knew it was just a part of the game so I sucked it up.
When I pointed my tuck at other generals I made sure that player knew that if his general stayed out for any longer he would have won the game or at least I would have lost the game. "You know I tucked your Zur for a reason, right?" "I tucked your Aurelia because she was coming in at me for a lethal attack, and I didn't tuck her last turn because she wasn't." etc. I played tuck properly and I didn't just throw it around because I could, because that would be playing it suboptimally.
I also continue to believe the loss of tuck enables lazy deckbuilding. This opinion is supported by some of the recent comments in this thread.
Others, too, have have voiced this opinion without providing arguments and I still fail to understand how no-tuck leads to lazy deckbuilding. Can you elaborate?
In EDH, many generals are repeatable sources of card advantage. This means that if you are 100% certain that your general will always be accessible to you, you can "cheat" your deckbuilding even more by focusing even harder on mana ramp. Extra mana ramp not only means that you will more reliably drop your general in play in the early turns, but you will be able to pay for the commander tax later in the game. With the threat of tuck and your general sometimes not being so easily accessible, that means you may need to play some redundant pieces to fill the holes that your general would.
For example, a Prossh deck will often use him to make the tokens, and the deck doesn't actually have a ton of other token makers. Before the tuck change, you needed a couple extra pieces of token makers in the event that Prossh gets tucked (jund has millions of creature tutors which help get Prossh back out, but sometimes you don't draw your tutors, so it helps to have redundant token makers). Without tuck, you can now reliably get Prossh to make the tokens, so now you can replace some of your weakest token makers with ramp to make the deck faster and more streamlined.
I also continue to believe the loss of tuck enables lazy deckbuilding. This opinion is supported by some of the recent comments in this thread.
Others, too, have have voiced this opinion without providing arguments and I still fail to understand how no-tuck leads to lazy deckbuilding. Can you elaborate?
The idea that the general will always be available to you, assuming you can continue to afford the casting cost, allows players to build decks around the general without worrying about having to protect the general, and without much concern about having to build in redundancies and/or other win conditions to be utilized if the general is not available. This allows people to build decks around unbalanced and overly powerful generals with, essentially, less fear of being shut down. This serves to reduce the checks-and-balances aspect of the game, which in my opinion is one of the essential components of healthy games of Magic. Essentially, it means players can freely worry less about how to make the deck function, and just stuff it with more "power" elements. This facilitates a less thoughtful, and thus lazier, approach to deck construction.
In addition, the demise of tuck has served to facilitate combo-oriented generals.
I continue to believe, as I have from the moment it was announced, that the change in tuck rules was a mistake. I am obviously in the minority in regard to this opinion, and it's not like I feel it destroys the format or anything like that, but I do nonetheless think it was a bad change, and that it does reward and encourage lazier deckbuilding and playing.
And again, I am not a competitive player, and I don't come at the topic from the POV of someone who is all about winning.
Essentially, it means players can freely worry less about how to make the deck function, and just stuff it with more "power" elements. This facilitates a less thoughtful, and thus lazier, approach to deck construction.
I'm pretty sure the change hasn't encouraged laziness at all. I think anyone who is lazy now was already lazy then. The people who now might say "well, my deck doesn't need to do anything on its own because I've always got my commander!" were almost certainly the ones saying "well, my commander might get tucked, so lets just jam a few extra sac outlets and tutors in here to keep that from happening." I'd hardly call that less lazy, and if anything, it's freed up their deck space to do more without their commander.
Anyone who was building decks that could function without leaning entirely on a powerful commander before the tuck change almost certainly still is now.
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Essentially, it means players can freely worry less about how to make the deck function, and just stuff it with more "power" elements. This facilitates a less thoughtful, and thus lazier, approach to deck construction.
I'm pretty sure the change hasn't encouraged laziness at all. I think anyone who is lazy now was already lazy then. The people who now might say "well, my deck doesn't need to do anything on its own because I've always got my commander!" were almost certainly the ones saying "well, my commander might get tucked, so lets just jam a few extra sac outlets and tutors in here to keep that from happening." I'd hardly call that less lazy, and if anything, it's freed up their deck space to do more without their commander.
Anyone who was building decks that could function without leaning entirely on a powerful commander before the tuck change almost certainly still is now.
In my meta, I have definitely seen more of what I describe. I am seeing more people who not only don't play sac outlets as much as they used to, but who also don't play much in the way of protection in general, unless they are going full-in voltron. I've heard people say things like "I can run more combo stuff now in place of things like Greaves 'cause I don't have to worry about (name of general) being tucked." I've not seen any decrease in tutors, either. If anything, I see as many tutors, they just aren't as often used to fetch the general.
I agree that the change to the tuck rule probably does encourage people to play some less-powerful generals because there is better pay-off to playing the sort of high-synergy decks some of those generals need if you don't have to worry about tuck, and I agree that is an overall positive change, but I'm still not sure it is outweighed by how difficult it is now to get rid of broken generals like Purphoros, Animar or Prossh for any length of time, and I am 100% certain all games involving Narset would be better if at least half of the time she got tucked before she could do anything.
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Chandra, Torch of Defiance - Oops! All Chandras.
Prime Speaker Zegana - Draw for Power.
Pir & Toothy - Counterpalooza.
Arcades, the Strategist - Another Brick in the Wall.
Zacama, Primal Calamity - Calamity of Double Mana.
Edgar Markov - Vampires Don't Die.
Child of Alara - Dreamcrusher.
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I liked tuck because it game me time to find an answer to some of the more difficult decks I play against. Even my mono red deck wasn't completely crippled by tuck, even though it made my game plan significantly harder.
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Personally, I'm still very pro-tuck. There are a lot of generals that are difficult to deal with long term, and tuck buys you time. That said, I also have just moved past it. Even without tuck, my group can keep people off of their generals with commander tax.
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It does highlight a problem with the way the rules committee handles things in my opinion. Fun to one person might be the complete opposite of fun for another. If they focused on balance instead of fun I think it would be a better way to run the format.
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I don't disagree necessarily, but the loss of tuck also opened up quite a bit of space. For example, when it existed I always felt like Hinder and Spell Crumple were too good to not run in any blue deck. The option to counter a game-wrecking spell tied onto the option to maybe remove a commander from the game was too good to not have available. Without tuck those two spells suddenly felt a lot less auto-include, and I didn't necessarily feel the need to replace them with other counters. It just flat out opened up space in my blue decks. High Market was another card I felt was needed in almost every deck as a way to deal with tuck. Without tuck that was a slot that no longer felt like an auto-include.
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On the personal side, I enjoy watching opponents' reaction when they realize that they can no longer cheat in their Derevi or expensive spells with Narset.
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I definitely think killing tuck on commanders is good for the format from a more casual angle. Most of the obnoxious more casual commanders will have a rough time with the commander tax after just 1 or 2 removal spells.
For the competitive side, the format is already a hot mess, anyway. Derevi not being tuck-able is not a problem with the format. Derevi is just a stupid card that basically abuses the rules of the format to the maximum (imo extremely poorly designed for the format). It's further reason that I don't even bother with making a single truly competitive deck in normal commander. The RC doesn't support it at all either, so it's really a lost cause.
yea, i think the commander 1v1/duel commander/french format rules are probably the best for 'competitive' balance even for multiplayer, and the EDH RC's rules are best for casual angle. but i think they removed tuck from their rules before the multiplayer format did.
is it possible for the OP to put up some sort of vote for the "1 tuck-free year experience" for this thread?
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"Non-Tribal" Tribal Generals, Eggs
I'll definitely stick to duel commander for playing competitive. The format is a lot more cohesive and not having to punch through 3 other players means decks that want to attack with creatures are a lot more effective (the free double lava axe on everyone helps a lot as well).
My first main EDH deck (bounced around a bit before I finally got a copy) was Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter and I ran all the tuck spells (hallowed burial, terminus, condemn, banishing stroke). Vish kal could sac himself if I didn't want him to get tucked so it was very one-sided. Having your commander tucked just feels bad.
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.
Really, when I play top built commander decks, with demonic Tutor, Vampiric Tutor, Wordly.... Tuck is not a big deal, but everytime I did a budget deck, commander centric, I can see one card destroying your whole deck. I made a budget goblin storm Zada, Hedron Grinder deck, if she gets tucked, doesn't matter what turn it is, I just give up and go do something else. "Oh but you should have built some goodstuff deck!!" That is exactly why I am against tucking commanders, the game is for everyone, Commander is made for being a fun format, if you simply push casual players to having tutors (good tutors are expensive) then you are not being casual anymore.
Think like this, oh a blue deck, okay how to get your tucked commander back?
First you need to shuffle the deck, (fetch lands), then use cantrips, or just use something as cheap as Intuition... You need to know this is casual format, and thinking this way, only black colored decks can tutor your commander back, with pretty awful tutors... Diabolic Tutor and other cheap cards, everytime a rule pushes a deckbuild to competitive/goodstuff, I'm kind of against it, even if it does mean cutthroat decks like Derevi and Zur gets harder to stop, but yeah, they still can be stopped, if they can't, then they should be banned, but killing a bunch of commanders for 2-3 commanders to be more vulnerable, I don't think that is the way to make rules.
"Oh, but rules are made for competitive!", Duel commander is right there if the problem is competitive :D, and I really love it, no Zur, no Derevi, no Edric, so no need for tuck effects also.
For me, there is a connection and perspective with your selected commander, and to know they are buried 75 cards deep in your library isnt anyway to play. Also, if I had to load up on tutors and counterspells to prevent my commander from being lost in my library, it weakens the rest of the cool stuff I want to do with my deck.
I would have rathered to see a rule that works like Command Beacon which allows you to pay some cost to move your commander to different zones. After all, for a lot of the commanders in question, simply racking up the commander tax can lock them out anyway.
I personally would not want to put tuck cards into my deck for a house rule that I can't bank on being applied. I don't want to run cards that will not be as good in other games. That's just me, but it might be part of why people wouldn't want to put the cards in. Tuck is also just something I wouldn't want to house rule in.
I still disagree with your line of thinking, however I realize that we are representing very different gameplay expectations.
First, you seem to think that there is no place for "*****ty commanders like Phenax" in this format. That is not at all my opinion, but your logic makes much more sense when operating under this assumption.
Second, I don't play commander to win. I am a Timmy player in essence and thrive in the experience of awesome things happening in EDH. Being robbed, or robbing others, of the possibility to do so is something I can't enjoy.
Third, I play EDH with close friends only. There are no unfun cutthroat decks in my local meta, and we try hard to find a balance in powerlevel that does not rule out janky decks by default (my roommate loves his Phenax deck to death). We all had our commanders tucked at some point and decided it is nothing but a source of frustration. We don't play mass land destruction for the same reason, for example.
Also, I have never faced a Narset or Derevi deck that could not be kept in control, so I haven't experienced your pain and won't argue that point again.
Others, too, have have voiced this opinion without providing arguments and I still fail to understand how no-tuck leads to lazy deckbuilding. Can you elaborate?
UR Mizzix of the Izmagnus ~~~ Build your own win-condition: Finite Spellslinging
UR Brudiclad, Telchor Engineer ~~~ We are the Borg. We will add your biological and technological distinctiveness to our own.
WUB Oloro, Ageless Ascetic ~~~ A Guide to dying slowly
UBR Marchesa, the Black Rose ~~~ Marchesa's undying Marionettes
RGW Mayael the Anima ~~~ All Hail the Big Chungus
GWU Chulane, Teller of Tales ~~~ Permanents Only ETB Shenanigans
BGU Sidisi, Brood Tyrant ~~~ Sidisi's Restless Servants
WUBRG The Ur-Dragon ~~~ Dragons eat your face
I have no idea how you managed to interpret that from my words. "*****ty commanders generally don't get tucked before broken commanders" =/= "*****ty commanders have no place in this format"
There are many ways to prevent players from playing their general.
- Hyperfast combo. Kill the table before the player can play his general.
- Cutthroat stax. Prevent the player from playing his general or having his general do anything.
- Mass land destruction/mana denial. Prevent the player from having any mana to play his general.
- Simply killing the general multiple times so the commander tax is too high
- Stranding the general in play with pacifism, or perhaps stealing the commander with gilded drake (and the player just happened to not have a sac outlet in play at the time that happened, and/or doesn't draw into the right removal to save his general)
Why, then, do people get so sour over tuck? There are infinitely more things in EDH worse than getting your general tucked. At least green and black had extremely reasonable counters to tuck (they have the most tutors) while red/white/blue have the tuck effects to do it back at others (and blue has enough draw power to get the general back).
Granted, tuck was not often prevalent in hypercutthroat metas because most tuck spells are 3-mana (chaos warp, oblation, spell crumple, bant charm) which is a little slow. But even in just slightly more casual groups (where the tier 1 generals even if built slightly suboptimally are massive threats), it's nice to have an answer to someone's Arcum Daggson without having to rely on something like Stranglehold to try and stop him where those cards may not have a noticeable impact on the other players on the table.
When my general got tucked I knew it was just a part of the game so I sucked it up.
When I pointed my tuck at other generals I made sure that player knew that if his general stayed out for any longer he would have won the game or at least I would have lost the game. "You know I tucked your Zur for a reason, right?" "I tucked your Aurelia because she was coming in at me for a lethal attack, and I didn't tuck her last turn because she wasn't." etc. I played tuck properly and I didn't just throw it around because I could, because that would be playing it suboptimally.
In EDH, many generals are repeatable sources of card advantage. This means that if you are 100% certain that your general will always be accessible to you, you can "cheat" your deckbuilding even more by focusing even harder on mana ramp. Extra mana ramp not only means that you will more reliably drop your general in play in the early turns, but you will be able to pay for the commander tax later in the game. With the threat of tuck and your general sometimes not being so easily accessible, that means you may need to play some redundant pieces to fill the holes that your general would.
For example, a Prossh deck will often use him to make the tokens, and the deck doesn't actually have a ton of other token makers. Before the tuck change, you needed a couple extra pieces of token makers in the event that Prossh gets tucked (jund has millions of creature tutors which help get Prossh back out, but sometimes you don't draw your tutors, so it helps to have redundant token makers). Without tuck, you can now reliably get Prossh to make the tokens, so now you can replace some of your weakest token makers with ramp to make the deck faster and more streamlined.
WUBRGProgenitus
URGMaelstrom Wanderer
WUBOloro, Ageless Ascetic
WURZedruu, the Greathearted
BRGProssh, Skyraider of Kher ($100)
GWUDerevi, Empyrial Tactician ($100)
UGKruphix, God of Horizons ($100)(retired)UTalrand, Sky Summoner (French 1v1, $100)
The idea that the general will always be available to you, assuming you can continue to afford the casting cost, allows players to build decks around the general without worrying about having to protect the general, and without much concern about having to build in redundancies and/or other win conditions to be utilized if the general is not available. This allows people to build decks around unbalanced and overly powerful generals with, essentially, less fear of being shut down. This serves to reduce the checks-and-balances aspect of the game, which in my opinion is one of the essential components of healthy games of Magic. Essentially, it means players can freely worry less about how to make the deck function, and just stuff it with more "power" elements. This facilitates a less thoughtful, and thus lazier, approach to deck construction.
In addition, the demise of tuck has served to facilitate combo-oriented generals.
I continue to believe, as I have from the moment it was announced, that the change in tuck rules was a mistake. I am obviously in the minority in regard to this opinion, and it's not like I feel it destroys the format or anything like that, but I do nonetheless think it was a bad change, and that it does reward and encourage lazier deckbuilding and playing.
And again, I am not a competitive player, and I don't come at the topic from the POV of someone who is all about winning.
I'm pretty sure the change hasn't encouraged laziness at all. I think anyone who is lazy now was already lazy then. The people who now might say "well, my deck doesn't need to do anything on its own because I've always got my commander!" were almost certainly the ones saying "well, my commander might get tucked, so lets just jam a few extra sac outlets and tutors in here to keep that from happening." I'd hardly call that less lazy, and if anything, it's freed up their deck space to do more without their commander.
Anyone who was building decks that could function without leaning entirely on a powerful commander before the tuck change almost certainly still is now.
In my meta, I have definitely seen more of what I describe. I am seeing more people who not only don't play sac outlets as much as they used to, but who also don't play much in the way of protection in general, unless they are going full-in voltron. I've heard people say things like "I can run more combo stuff now in place of things like Greaves 'cause I don't have to worry about (name of general) being tucked." I've not seen any decrease in tutors, either. If anything, I see as many tutors, they just aren't as often used to fetch the general.
I agree that the change to the tuck rule probably does encourage people to play some less-powerful generals because there is better pay-off to playing the sort of high-synergy decks some of those generals need if you don't have to worry about tuck, and I agree that is an overall positive change, but I'm still not sure it is outweighed by how difficult it is now to get rid of broken generals like Purphoros, Animar or Prossh for any length of time, and I am 100% certain all games involving Narset would be better if at least half of the time she got tucked before she could do anything.