I tried Nissa, Vastwood seer in my Selvala deck, and it's pretty good. i'm thinking about making a chandra, fire of kaladesh deck too. IMO those planeswaler are great for that format, either as a commander or a deck card.
One of the things that I thought was a bit snooty is the "info" page on their blog site says that Tiny Leaders is for fans of EDH looking for a "deck building challenge", but it just seems to me that it is incredibly limited, especially at a 3 CMC cap. The real deck building challenge is still in making strong EDH decks I think, but Tiny Leaders does look entertaining mostly because it lets you play an EDH style format with a much faster tempo similar to legacy and modern.
Personally, I think that 4 CMC caps and a 60 card deck building limit would bring a whole lot more variety to what Tiny Leaders wants to accomplish, but the format has already gotten too big and I think that ship has sailed. It is designed for 1v1, however, so it is pretty much what I'd expect. You see maybe 5-7 top archetypes that consistently show up, which is typical of most competitive formats, especially when the card pool is reduced the way it is by the format's rules.
While lifting the format's restrictions would bring more variety, I was under the impression that a major appeal of the format was the limited card pool and tiny deck size - it offers more consistency and less variety. I suppose everyone prefers their own levels of these, and the current rules fit some better than others.
Personally, singleton Magic is so much more satisfying than x4 Magic that I'm happy any singleton format is getting attention.
Format is entirely dead in my area. Final tournament was seven players, with 3 Geist, 2 Ezuri, 1 Animar, and me (Liliana, Heretical Healer).
With the big five being so overwhelmingly powerful compared to everyone else, and certain colors not having commanders at all, it died a slow death around here.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Level 1 Judge
"I hope to have such a death... lying in triumph atop the broken bodies of those who slew me..."
You don't call "dying to removal" if the removal is more expensive in resources than the creature. If you have to spend BG (Abrupt Decay), or W + basic land (PtE) to remove a 1G, that is not "dying to removal". Strictly speaking Goyf dies to removal, but actually your removal is dying to Goyf.
Yep, TL is pretty much kaput in the PDX metro area. I disassembled both of my decks a long time ago to put the staples back in my EDH decks, where they belong. Kind of a shame, I guess--TL tourneys were sorta fun, as lacking in deck diversity as they ended up being.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
EDH: B Chainer, Dementia Master B | UG Edric, Spymaster of Trest UG | WRG Marath, Will of the Wild WRG | UBR Marchesa, the Black Rose UBR | UBG Tasigur, the Golden Fang UBG
Modern: WBG Abzan Company WBG | UBR Grixis Delver and/or Twin UBR | U Merfolk U
WBG Anafenza, the Foremost WBG WUR Shu Yun, the Silent Tempest WUR
WUBRG Horde of Notions WUBRG WUBRG Scion of the Ur-Dragon WUBRG URG Maelstrom Wanderer URG UBG Damia, Sage of Stone UBG WUG Roon of the Hidden Realm WUG WUG Rafiq of the Many WUG WUG Deveri, Empyrial Tactician WUG BRG Prossh, Skyraider of Kher BRG WBG Karador, Ghost Chieftain WBG UBR Nekusar, the Mind Razer UBR WBR Kaalia of the Vast WBR UG Prime Speaker Zegana UG UG Edric, Spymaster of Trest UG WB Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter WB WU Grand Arbiter Augustin IV WU
I know the format is mostly dead, but it's scheduled for fnm at my shop at the end of the month. I've been experiment with a Turbo Fog type deck in preparation. I decided Angus Mackenzie was too clunky, and two colours was enough. The deck lacks real removal but opens up to being a better control style deck. Vorel of the Hull Clade may seem odd, but I needed a U/G commander and he combos awesomely with Briber's Purse and Grindclock. Here's my list so far.
My mana base is kind of on a budget, I don't own any misty rainforest or breeding pool, etc. I obviously don't want to spend a lot of money on this deck, so if you have any suggestions, just remember I'm on a bit of a budget.
So this format is unexpectedly popular in my playgroup, and I've been looking into building something for a while. My first inclination is to go with GoST and a bunch of the counterspells and removal that I'm not playing in other decks. However, skimming through this thread, I see that there's a lot of hate on the old ghost, and a feeling that the format has become "solved" and boring.
Has any news of a possible banlist announcement surfaced? Wondering if it's worth my while to pick some of the tempo staples I'm missing or to invest my time and energy elsewhere.
They seem to update the banlist occasionally. They do a lot of testing before banning, and unfortunately I think it's a bunch of college dudes who more often than not have other things they need to focus their energy on. Last banlist update was July, which isn't really that long ago. Here's a link to the official blog: http://tinyleaders.blogspot.com/
URGImperial AnimarGRU BRGProssh, Tokenmaker of KherGRB WURNarset NostalgicRUW UBR"I like your deck better" JelevaRBU UBlue BraidsU GAzusa, Lost but RampingG
WUHanna, Pillowfort's NavigatorUW WBRAleshacratsBRW UBRGrixis Pew PewRBU URGYasova the ThreateningGRU BGGlissa the ArticiferGB WUSygg MerfolkUW RSquee, Value NabobR
By mostly dead I mean I haven't seen many tournaments lately, discussion of it online, etc. I could be wrong though. It seems like people "solved" the format a while ago and found Geist and Ezuri to be the best tiny leaders. I think people just stopped being creative though. There's also the fact that the people who created the format copyrighted the name, so I have a feeling that discouraged wizards from making any attempt to use the format.
My question at this point is: Is it possible to get an own sub-forum here only for the Tiny-Leaders Format. I dont like how its mixed up here with pauper and others and the big amount of TL threads demotes the "other variants" in a big way.
+1! it is very hard to find deckslist or active discussion or whatever. so the only way how to improve the deck is to discuss with buddies after the tournament. no way to prepare... nowhere to check for new strategies or tips.
Getting organised could breath new life into the intrest for Tiny leaders. Having it's own sub-forum would help.
I read people saying TL is dead or solved. Well I remember trying to introduce EDH to my playgroup before Commander was a thing, and it flopped because they did not understand the format. Now most of them have at least one Commander deck lying about.
Tiny leaders is new, different and needs to be "tasted" more than once before written off.
Does anybody else feel like the lack of updating and more regulation of the banlist and what cards can be commanders is the ultimate thing holding this format back? I mean the people who founded the format seemed to stop caring (or at least taking note of problem generals) a considerably short time after the format had its peak. I've seen people say it's because they were in on some plot to jack up card prices but I don't know enough to take a side on that.
I am curious though, does anyone think banning cards like ezuri and Geist would help the format, or do you think it would just spiral into other broken generals.
Also, from what I understand, the only method used for testing broken generals was if they just destroyed Esper control. Does anybody else think this was a poor method? What's your opinion on play testing problem generals against a diverse deck library to determine decisions?
I'm not sure how in depth this discussion has taken these topics so my apologies if anything here is mostly irrelevant.
Getting organised could breath new life into the intrest for Tiny leaders. Having it's own sub-forum would help.
I read people saying TL is dead or solved. Well I remember trying to introduce EDH to my playgroup before Commander was a thing, and it flopped because they did not understand the format. Now most of them have at least one Commander deck lying about.
Tiny leaders is new, different and needs to be "tasted" more than once before written off.
In general, the mods here (I used to be one) agree that a format needs to have somewhat of a large maintained traffic to really consider making a subforum for that format. Look at Pauper, a few years back it had a huge boom but it didnt really sustain. Tiny Leaders is sort of the same thing in that it had a big boom something like a year ago but we knew it was not going to be a sustained boom. Similar to pauper, Tiny Leaders uses a small portion of the card base and in a lot of ways that does mean that the format is solved quickly because of the fact that there is significantly less direction to pivot on.
I wont deny you that a lot of people did write off Tiny Leaders quickly. I for one played a good amount of pauper commander when it kind of had its boom. When tiny leaders popped up a little over a year ago I had some people in my meta ask me if I would play it and my counter argument was that I would try it if they would play Dual Commander with me because if the idea of Dual Commander freaked them out they probably were not going to like Tiny Leaders. In the end, nobody wanted to play Dual Commander so I refused to play Tiny Leaders. Since that time, I have seen Tiny Leaders become a lot less prevalent in discussion on the forums and have yet to actually see anyone play Tiny Leaders IRL.
Overall, it could get its own subforum but like I said, the following would have to stay strong for a maintained time. Look at the variant formats right now.... its kind of dead. A year ago we had Tiny Leaders decks being posted multiple new lists per day and now we see hardly any.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
Shame that Tiny Leader isn't very popualr nowadays here.Its still solid iny my lGS atleast and play it time to time.I actually prefer it over duel commander
I try to get it going in my area with basically no success. People brush it off as "not a real format" or "solved."
I find "solved" to be particularly obnoxious. So what if we know what the best decks are? Playing EDH is rarely about playing the BEST deck, it's about having fun. Why should we view Tiny Leaders any differently?
I've built all of my tiny leaders decks out of strategies that I love, but would struggle to make work in EDH. Where else could I possibly try to pull off Pinger tribal, ffs?
URGImperial AnimarGRU BRGProssh, Tokenmaker of KherGRB WURNarset NostalgicRUW UBR"I like your deck better" JelevaRBU UBlue BraidsU GAzusa, Lost but RampingG
WUHanna, Pillowfort's NavigatorUW WBRAleshacratsBRW UBRGrixis Pew PewRBU URGYasova the ThreateningGRU BGGlissa the ArticiferGB WUSygg MerfolkUW RSquee, Value NabobR
TL has been what my playgroup has played the most since it started to gain some publicity. Before that for me, it was just EDH every single time in a different playgroup. I moved (new playgroup from large to very small) and no one played EDH (WHAT!). Soon after, TL was brought into our life. I have seven TL decks now compared to my 8 sleeved up EDH decks. I have a few more EDH decks not sleeved and I could build all of the last few years precons back if I wanted. My EDH decks just collect dust while I throw down TL. The reason for this is that we are rarely in a group of more than 2 at a time. All my EDH decks but one are multiplayer and I don't enjoy playing them 1v1.
I currently run Soldiers with Brimaz, King of Oreskos, control with Sygg, River Cutthroat, value beats Marath, Will of the Wild, half goodstuffz Anafenza, the Foremost, huge mana Maga, Traitor to Mortals, Goblins with Grenzo, Dungeon Warden, and most recently ramp with Omnath, Locus of Mana. I am currently trying to put a contorl? list together with possibly Daxos of Meletis, also.
I can't remember them all, but the decks I see from my buddies the most are hydra types (protection of 3/4 of my deck) with Animar, Soul of Elements, burn control hell with Lyzolda, the Blood Witch, OHKO (not really, but it always does it to me...) Doran, the Siege Tower, a weird slivers Alesha, Who Smiles at Death, value dudes Athreos, God of Passage, and such.
Notice how none of these are Geist or Elves... Also, no one in our group is negative about the format. It is a great format. Would I rather play EDH? Not unless there are at least 4 people sitting down at the table... 4 people? Heck yes! Let's throw down. Even still, if two of us got knocked out early, TL would be the deck I would pull out to try to squeeze a game in real quick.
Note: We also play some casual modern/legacy/etc between our TL games so it isn't ONLY TL. Don't wanna get burned out and the change of pace is always nice. Those games are usually just as competitive as our TL games, too.
TL finally got its Sultai Commander, only 2 years too late.
Those of us who still play regularly, this has been awesome news! Something new for the format.
Along with Leovold, Emissary of Trest, I am also seeing a couple other possible playables already. Sanctum Prelate could be sideboard against some spell heavy decks. Doubt I will ever mainboard it. Daretti, Ingenious Iconoclast doesn't fit in any of my decks, but he may be useful. I will pick up one just in case. Anyone know who this would fit into? My Grenzo deck doesn't care much about artifacts or whiffing on a Walker. Repeatable removal at a price could be worthy in other decks, though. Recruiter of the Guard looks absolutely solid. Wish her body was a 2/2, but... Hits both Human and Soldier tribal synergies as well. Definitely getting a couple at least.
A lot of the multiplayer type cards won't work too well in our format since it is 1v1. Some of the reprints like IoK and Serum Visions is always dandy as well.
I tried Nissa, Vastwood seer in my Selvala deck, and it's pretty good. i'm thinking about making a chandra, fire of kaladesh deck too. IMO those planeswaler are great for that format, either as a commander or a deck card.
BUW Oloro, Ageless Ascetic
GUW Roon of the hidden realm
Tiny Leaders
GW Selvala, Explorer Returned
BU Sygg, River Cutthroat
While lifting the format's restrictions would bring more variety, I was under the impression that a major appeal of the format was the limited card pool and tiny deck size - it offers more consistency and less variety. I suppose everyone prefers their own levels of these, and the current rules fit some better than others.
Personally, singleton Magic is so much more satisfying than x4 Magic that I'm happy any singleton format is getting attention.
With the big five being so overwhelmingly powerful compared to everyone else, and certain colors not having commanders at all, it died a slow death around here.
"I hope to have such a death... lying in triumph atop the broken bodies of those who slew me..."
B Chainer, Dementia Master B | UG Edric, Spymaster of Trest UG | WRG Marath, Will of the Wild WRG | UBR Marchesa, the Black Rose UBR | UBG Tasigur, the Golden Fang UBG
Modern:
WBG Abzan Company WBG | UBR Grixis Delver and/or Twin UBR | U Merfolk U
WBG Anafenza, the Foremost WBG
WUR Shu Yun, the Silent Tempest WUR
WUBRG Horde of Notions WUBRG
WUBRG Scion of the Ur-Dragon WUBRG
URG Maelstrom Wanderer URG
UBG Damia, Sage of Stone UBG
WUG Roon of the Hidden Realm WUG
WUG Rafiq of the Many WUG
WUG Deveri, Empyrial Tactician WUG
BRG Prossh, Skyraider of Kher BRG
WBG Karador, Ghost Chieftain WBG
UBR Nekusar, the Mind Razer UBR
WBR Kaalia of the Vast WBR
UG Prime Speaker Zegana UG
UG Edric, Spymaster of Trest UG
WB Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter WB
WU Grand Arbiter Augustin IV WU
I think my favorite combo with Alesha would be Blind Zealot lol
1x Anticipate
1x Arcane Denial
1x Brainstorm
1x Counterspell
1x Cyclonic Rift
1x Fog
1x Moment's Peace
1x Prohibit
1x Repeal
1x Respite
1x Send to Sleep
1x Spore Cloud
1x Tangle
Sorcery
1x Compulsive Research
1x Ponder
1x Preordain
1x Dictate of Kruphix
1x Sphinx's Tutelage
Land
1x Command Tower
1x Evolving Wilds
4x Forest
1x Halimar Depths
5x Island
1x Simic Guildgate
1x Radiant Fountain
1x Temple of Mystery
1x Terramorphic Expanse
1x Thornwood Falls
1x Vivid Grove
1x Yavimaya Coast
1x Bounding Krasis
1x Coiling Oracle
1x Hangarback Walker
1x Snapcaster Mage
1x Trinket Mage
1x Wall of Frost
Artifact
1x Briber's Purse
1x Chalice of the Void
1x Elixir of Immortality
1x Grindclock
1x Howling Mine
Planeswalker
1x Jace Beleren
My mana base is kind of on a budget, I don't own any misty rainforest or breeding pool, etc. I obviously don't want to spend a lot of money on this deck, so if you have any suggestions, just remember I'm on a bit of a budget.
GW Death and Taxes WG
Has any news of a possible banlist announcement surfaced? Wondering if it's worth my while to pick some of the tempo staples I'm missing or to invest my time and energy elsewhere.
Avatar by Numotflame96 of Maelstrom Graphics
Sig banner thanks to DarkNightCavalier of Heroes of the Plane Studios!
Living End Contributor and Enthusiast
Come Pucatrade with me
Rules Advisor
Modern: BRGLiving EndGRB
Legacy: UBGShardless BUGGBU
BRGProssh, Tokenmaker of KherGRB
WURNarset NostalgicRUW
UBR"I like your deck better" JelevaRBU
UBlue BraidsU
GAzusa, Lost but RampingG
WBRAleshacratsBRW
UBRGrixis Pew PewRBU
URGYasova the ThreateningGRU
BGGlissa the ArticiferGB
WUSygg MerfolkUW
RSquee, Value NabobR
GW Death and Taxes WG
CardboardCreationism
ETSY COUNTERS
Getting organised could breath new life into the intrest for Tiny leaders. Having it's own sub-forum would help.
I read people saying TL is dead or solved. Well I remember trying to introduce EDH to my playgroup before Commander was a thing, and it flopped because they did not understand the format. Now most of them have at least one Commander deck lying about.
Tiny leaders is new, different and needs to be "tasted" more than once before written off.
I am curious though, does anyone think banning cards like ezuri and Geist would help the format, or do you think it would just spiral into other broken generals.
Also, from what I understand, the only method used for testing broken generals was if they just destroyed Esper control. Does anybody else think this was a poor method? What's your opinion on play testing problem generals against a diverse deck library to determine decisions?
I'm not sure how in depth this discussion has taken these topics so my apologies if anything here is mostly irrelevant.
In general, the mods here (I used to be one) agree that a format needs to have somewhat of a large maintained traffic to really consider making a subforum for that format. Look at Pauper, a few years back it had a huge boom but it didnt really sustain. Tiny Leaders is sort of the same thing in that it had a big boom something like a year ago but we knew it was not going to be a sustained boom. Similar to pauper, Tiny Leaders uses a small portion of the card base and in a lot of ways that does mean that the format is solved quickly because of the fact that there is significantly less direction to pivot on.
I wont deny you that a lot of people did write off Tiny Leaders quickly. I for one played a good amount of pauper commander when it kind of had its boom. When tiny leaders popped up a little over a year ago I had some people in my meta ask me if I would play it and my counter argument was that I would try it if they would play Dual Commander with me because if the idea of Dual Commander freaked them out they probably were not going to like Tiny Leaders. In the end, nobody wanted to play Dual Commander so I refused to play Tiny Leaders. Since that time, I have seen Tiny Leaders become a lot less prevalent in discussion on the forums and have yet to actually see anyone play Tiny Leaders IRL.
Overall, it could get its own subforum but like I said, the following would have to stay strong for a maintained time. Look at the variant formats right now.... its kind of dead. A year ago we had Tiny Leaders decks being posted multiple new lists per day and now we see hardly any.
Signature by Inkfox Aesthetics by Xen
[Modern] Allies
I find "solved" to be particularly obnoxious. So what if we know what the best decks are? Playing EDH is rarely about playing the BEST deck, it's about having fun. Why should we view Tiny Leaders any differently?
I've built all of my tiny leaders decks out of strategies that I love, but would struggle to make work in EDH. Where else could I possibly try to pull off Pinger tribal, ffs?
Living End Contributor and Enthusiast
Come Pucatrade with me
Rules Advisor
Modern: BRGLiving EndGRB
Legacy: UBGShardless BUGGBU
BRGProssh, Tokenmaker of KherGRB
WURNarset NostalgicRUW
UBR"I like your deck better" JelevaRBU
UBlue BraidsU
GAzusa, Lost but RampingG
WBRAleshacratsBRW
UBRGrixis Pew PewRBU
URGYasova the ThreateningGRU
BGGlissa the ArticiferGB
WUSygg MerfolkUW
RSquee, Value NabobR
I currently run Soldiers with Brimaz, King of Oreskos, control with Sygg, River Cutthroat, value beats Marath, Will of the Wild, half goodstuffz Anafenza, the Foremost, huge mana Maga, Traitor to Mortals, Goblins with Grenzo, Dungeon Warden, and most recently ramp with Omnath, Locus of Mana. I am currently trying to put a contorl? list together with possibly Daxos of Meletis, also.
I can't remember them all, but the decks I see from my buddies the most are hydra types (protection of 3/4 of my deck) with Animar, Soul of Elements, burn control hell with Lyzolda, the Blood Witch, OHKO (not really, but it always does it to me...) Doran, the Siege Tower, a weird slivers Alesha, Who Smiles at Death, value dudes Athreos, God of Passage, and such.
Notice how none of these are Geist or Elves... Also, no one in our group is negative about the format. It is a great format. Would I rather play EDH? Not unless there are at least 4 people sitting down at the table... 4 people? Heck yes! Let's throw down. Even still, if two of us got knocked out early, TL would be the deck I would pull out to try to squeeze a game in real quick.
Note: We also play some casual modern/legacy/etc between our TL games so it isn't ONLY TL. Don't wanna get burned out and the change of pace is always nice. Those games are usually just as competitive as our TL games, too.
http://www.cubetutor.com/cubeblog/36546
My Peasant Cube Forum
http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/the-cube-forum/cube-lists/682833-360-peasant-hasteds-cube
My Riviera Live Draft Cube
http://www.cubetutor.com/cubeblog/35647
Those of us who still play regularly, this has been awesome news! Something new for the format.
Along with Leovold, Emissary of Trest, I am also seeing a couple other possible playables already.
Sanctum Prelate could be sideboard against some spell heavy decks. Doubt I will ever mainboard it.
Daretti, Ingenious Iconoclast doesn't fit in any of my decks, but he may be useful. I will pick up one just in case. Anyone know who this would fit into? My Grenzo deck doesn't care much about artifacts or whiffing on a Walker. Repeatable removal at a price could be worthy in other decks, though.
Recruiter of the Guard looks absolutely solid. Wish her body was a 2/2, but... Hits both Human and Soldier tribal synergies as well. Definitely getting a couple at least.
A lot of the multiplayer type cards won't work too well in our format since it is 1v1. Some of the reprints like IoK and Serum Visions is always dandy as well.
http://www.cubetutor.com/cubeblog/36546
My Peasant Cube Forum
http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/the-cube-forum/cube-lists/682833-360-peasant-hasteds-cube
My Riviera Live Draft Cube
http://www.cubetutor.com/cubeblog/35647
PAUPER!!!
I have a Gelectrode deck with about 12 pingers, and it is quite fun.
Tiny leaders was always too restrictive for me at 3 cmc. But I am not a regular any more, so I am not part of the active playerbase.