Modern Horizons 2 reinforces that Wheels are the unhealthiest thing in Commander, with cards like Dauthi Voidwalker and Sanctifier en-Vec (and Gaea’s Will, I suppose). This is of deep concern to me, and is going to undergo a great deal of thought. Banning an entire class of cards is awkward at best, potentially politically suicidal at its worst. I know that folks love Wheels, so it gets even more difficult. There seem like no good answers at the moment, but I’d really like to look for them. Hey, you asked for more transparency, so there’s a good window into my head (note that the rest of the RC may not share my views on this particular subject).
The way I see this is that Wheel effects aren't necessarily bad when it's mainly cards that leave players with no resources available while the guy running Hullbreacher or Notion Thief nets 20+ Treasure tokens or 20+ cards in hand. Of course there's also the argument that because Wheel effects exist in our format that we'll never see an interesting Commander that cares about drawing cards simply because it's always about "How many Wheel effects can I cram into the 99 because it's the most efficient way to draw lots of cards and get lots of triggers?" You want to know what makes Wheel effects back breaking? Stax pieces that don't allow everyone to "Wheel" equally, also looking at you Smothering Tithe and Narset, Parter of Veils. Only time I've seen Smothering Tithe being oppressive is in conjunction with Anointed Procession and Armageddon abilities.
Bottom line is that Stax and Wheel effects don't mix. It's why Leovold, Emissary of Trest was banned within weeks of his printing because he was too oppressive as a 3 CMC Commander that stops extra card draw and gives the controller other value to abuse in Sultai colors. The issue with Wheel effects here ARE Stax abilities not the fact that Wheel effects should refresh hands. The Wheel effects can't refresh when a card just says no to any additional card draw. If the EDH / Commander Rules Committee were to make a logical solution to this problem, it would be to ban Hullbreacher and Narset, Parter of Veils instead of going after cards that generate Wheel effects but then it also begs the question of how much card advantage is too much? Mono Red NEEDS Wheel effects as much as other colors in the game do including Rakdos builds built around Madness like Anje Falkenrath.
"Restriction breeds creativity." - Sheldon Menery on EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering
"Cancel Culture is the real reason why everyone's not allowed to have nice things anymore." - Anonymous
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" - Mark 8:36
"Most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Every life decision is always a risk / reward proposition." - Sanjay Gupta
Obviously they aren't getting banned and the article is clear that this is just Sheldon musing on wheels being bad. Which, to some extent is true, but don't come in here with a clickbaity title because you want to stir up drama. They aren't getting banned and nothing suggests that the rest of the RC feels they are bad. Sheldon even goes out of his way to say that the rest of the RC may not share his viewpoint. Take this article for what it is: an insight into some of his personal thoughts and nothing more. His is allowed to have a personal opinion on something and the format doesn't have to change to suit those opinions (unless they are shared by enough of the RC/CAG).
Obviously they aren't getting banned and the article is clear that this is just Sheldon musing on wheels being bad. Which, to some extent is true, but don't come in here with a clickbaity title because you want to stir up drama. They aren't getting banned and nothing suggests that the rest of the RC feels they are bad. Sheldon even goes out of his way to say that the rest of the RC may not share his viewpoint. Take this article for what it is: an insight into some of his personal thoughts and nothing more. His is allowed to have a personal opinion on something and the format doesn't have to change to suit those opinions (unless they are shared by enough of the RC/CAG).
Well I wasn't sure how I was going to be able to title this thread regarding the subject matter without it sounding all "clickbaity" so If you're going to blame someone blame Mitch from Commander's Quarters on YouTube since he's the one who brought this to my attention first. I thought that what Sheldon said on his Star City Games Article was very important information regarding the health of the Commander format and wanted to bring that attention here on MTG Salvation to see what others felt about it.
It is a sigh of relief that this is nothing more than his own personal thoughts of where he thinks the format should go and not an actual official ban announcement coming down the pipeline. Either way If worse comes to worse, we'll just adapt and adjust to the changes like we've always done. I always enjoy having a good challenge when it comes to deck building in Commander as "restriction breeds creativity" after all. But If we're being serious about banning an entire class of cards, why not Mass Land Destruction instead of Wheel effects? It's less politically suicidal than banning Wheel effects anyway.
"Restriction breeds creativity." - Sheldon Menery on EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering
"Cancel Culture is the real reason why everyone's not allowed to have nice things anymore." - Anonymous
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" - Mark 8:36
"Most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Every life decision is always a risk / reward proposition." - Sanjay Gupta
Oh even if this happened There would be something wrong with the RC if Wheels get banned before the Mass Land Destruction cards, as a matter of fact we just got one in MH2 with all the colorless producing lands (vast majory of played cards in command can tap for colorless besides the dual lands and basics)
so If you're going to blame someone blame Mitch from Commander's Quarters on YouTube since he's the one who brought this to my attention first.
This feels a little like a cop-out given you repeated his clickbait, but you also have a point. I was an early subscriber to Commander's Quarters because I loved his deck techs; I used to watch every video when they came out. These days... not so much. In his drive to generate tons of content and to be the first, he has resorted to spamming us with multiple videos per day during spoilers (rather than a summary video) and making clickbait videos where he tries to yank people's emotions rather than have a reasoned, thoughtful approach.
the article is clear that this is just Sheldon musing on wheels being bad... They aren't getting banned and nothing suggests that the rest of the RC feels they are bad. Sheldon even goes out of his way to say that the rest of the RC may not share his viewpoint.
So, yeah, Mitch from Commander's Quarters and anyone else who repeats "the sky is falling" need to have less of a knee-jerk reaction to half a sentence and actually contextualize Sheldon's entire quote:
Banning an entire class of cards is awkward at best, potentially politically suicidal at its worst. I know that folks love Wheels, so it gets even more difficult. There seem like no good answers at the moment, but I’d really like to look for them. Hey, you asked for more transparency, so there’s a good window into my head (note that the rest of the RC may not share my views on this particular subject).
It's really Hullbreacher and Narset, Parter of Veils that need to be banned in Commander for how oppressive they are with Wheel effects. Most of the other cards Ryperior74 mentioned earlier aren't nearly as broken with Wheel effects especially Smothering Tithe since it doesn't really deny your opponents card draw off a Wheel effect. All it does is pressure them to pay mana in order to prevent you from mana accelerating. As for Tergrid, God of Fright I literally had to tech Library of Leng and Brand to deal with her. Notion Thief MIGHT be a problem with Wheel effects, MIGHT.
This episode of Game Knights from the Command Zone on YouTube is arguably one of the best case examples of why Wheel effects are problematic in Commander:
Now imagine a hypothetical scenario in which Cassius had Void Mirror on the battlefield when Josh was forced to cast Deflecting Swat for free since all his lands were tapped to redirect Swan Song to counter Timetwister with Narset, Parter of Veils on the battlefield to prevent everyone else other than Cassius from not being able to draw off of Timetwister. What would Josh had been able to do If he knew Void Mirror would counter his Deflecting Swat unless he had something already on the battlefield to blow up the Void Mirror so he could resolve the Deflecting Swat while it was still on the stack?
If Josh didn't have any options available would he had scooped or continue grinding? MTG particularly in Commander has always had a history of one player at the table snowballing to a point where nobody can really respond to it since we as players always have a terrible habit of not conserving our mana when it comes to lands and mana rocks. Blue is most often times prone to keeping their lands untapped to deal with potential threats on board while I think it probably would help If the format had more cards like Seedborn Muse to deal with this but not on the same power level as Prophet of Kruphix.
"Restriction breeds creativity." - Sheldon Menery on EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering
"Cancel Culture is the real reason why everyone's not allowed to have nice things anymore." - Anonymous
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" - Mark 8:36
"Most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Every life decision is always a risk / reward proposition." - Sanjay Gupta
so If you're going to blame someone blame Mitch from Commander's Quarters on YouTube since he's the one who brought this to my attention first.
This feels a little like a cop-out given you repeated his clickbait, but you also have a point. I was an early subscriber to Commander's Quarters because I loved his deck techs; I used to watch every video when they came out. These days... not so much. In his drive to generate tons of content and to be the first, he has resorted to spamming us with multiple videos per day during spoilers (rather than a summary video) and making clickbait videos where he tries to yank people's emotions rather than have a reasoned, thoughtful approach.
the article is clear that this is just Sheldon musing on wheels being bad... They aren't getting banned and nothing suggests that the rest of the RC feels they are bad. Sheldon even goes out of his way to say that the rest of the RC may not share his viewpoint.
So, yeah, Mitch from Commander's Quarters and anyone else who repeats "the sky is falling" need to have less of a knee-jerk reaction to half a sentence and actually contextualize Sheldon's entire quote:
Banning an entire class of cards is awkward at best, potentially politically suicidal at its worst. I know that folks love Wheels, so it gets even more difficult. There seem like no good answers at the moment, but I’d really like to look for them. Hey, you asked for more transparency, so there’s a good window into my head (note that the rest of the RC may not share my views on this particular subject).
I know mitch went off the deep rails a little bit with his videos and episode 2 of his gameplay should have happened a while ago but the editor was too expensive
its all Walking dead secret lairs fault for that happening because it was defiantly after that video is when all this started
This is also a guy who doesnt like tutors, denial strategies, or land destruction... so its not likely to happen
I think he should actually step back from being on the rules committee at this point because a lot of his views clash with what the format has actually become.
Edit: and because thatll rankle someones ass let me clarify: when you arent a fan of so many legitimate strategies, when they dont fit your concept of what the format is or should be, despite what that format has become, it calls into question your ability to identify and deal with legitimately problematic cards.
This is also a guy who doesnt like tutors, denial strategies, or land destruction... so its not likely to happen
I think he should actually step back from being on the rules committee at this point because a lot of his views clash with what the format has actually become.
Edit: and because thatll rankle someones ass let me clarify: when you arent a fan of so many legitimate strategies, when they dont fit your concept of what the format is or should be, despite what that format has become, it calls into question your ability to identify and deal with legitimately problematic cards.
Last I checked Sheldon DID get Iona, Shield of Emeria banned and that took how long for the Rules Committee to ban compared to the preemptive ban in Ikoria with Lutri, the Spellchaser? If he has a real problem with Wheel effects in Commander then just cut to the chase and ban Hullbreacher and Narset, Parter of Veils already, problem solved. Honestly I think the real problem is when you combine Wheel effects with Stax pieces or asymmetrical abilities that create too much of a one-sided advantage akin to Overloading Cyclonic Rift or Vandalblast with Mycosynth Lattice on board. Wheel effects are perfectly fine as long as everyone is drawing an equal amount of cards or close to it at least.
How often does someone combo off of a fresh new hand from a Wheel effect unless they aren't being forced to discard cards in hand? I don't see it happen often in Commander tables at least based on my experience with the format thus far. What If draw replacement effects aren't as one-sided? How one-sided is TOO one-sided? Like I said earlier the Overload mechanic definitely pushed the boundaries of how far it was able to go. Winds of Abandon is a very criminally underrated Overload card printed in Modern Horizons 1 but because it only affects creatures it's less powerful than Cyclonic Rift in that regard which is fine. Still doesn't diminish it's usefulness and playability especially in Mono White builds for Commander.
"Restriction breeds creativity." - Sheldon Menery on EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering
"Cancel Culture is the real reason why everyone's not allowed to have nice things anymore." - Anonymous
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" - Mark 8:36
"Most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Every life decision is always a risk / reward proposition." - Sanjay Gupta
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The way I see this is that Wheel effects aren't necessarily bad when it's mainly cards that leave players with no resources available while the guy running Hullbreacher or Notion Thief nets 20+ Treasure tokens or 20+ cards in hand. Of course there's also the argument that because Wheel effects exist in our format that we'll never see an interesting Commander that cares about drawing cards simply because it's always about "How many Wheel effects can I cram into the 99 because it's the most efficient way to draw lots of cards and get lots of triggers?" You want to know what makes Wheel effects back breaking? Stax pieces that don't allow everyone to "Wheel" equally, also looking at you Smothering Tithe and Narset, Parter of Veils. Only time I've seen Smothering Tithe being oppressive is in conjunction with Anointed Procession and Armageddon abilities.
Bottom line is that Stax and Wheel effects don't mix. It's why Leovold, Emissary of Trest was banned within weeks of his printing because he was too oppressive as a 3 CMC Commander that stops extra card draw and gives the controller other value to abuse in Sultai colors. The issue with Wheel effects here ARE Stax abilities not the fact that Wheel effects should refresh hands. The Wheel effects can't refresh when a card just says no to any additional card draw. If the EDH / Commander Rules Committee were to make a logical solution to this problem, it would be to ban Hullbreacher and Narset, Parter of Veils instead of going after cards that generate Wheel effects but then it also begs the question of how much card advantage is too much? Mono Red NEEDS Wheel effects as much as other colors in the game do including Rakdos builds built around Madness like Anje Falkenrath.
"Restriction breeds creativity." - Sheldon Menery on EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering
"Cancel Culture is the real reason why everyone's not allowed to have nice things anymore." - Anonymous
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" - Mark 8:36
"Most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Every life decision is always a risk / reward proposition." - Sanjay Gupta
Obviously they aren't getting banned and the article is clear that this is just Sheldon musing on wheels being bad. Which, to some extent is true, but don't come in here with a clickbaity title because you want to stir up drama. They aren't getting banned and nothing suggests that the rest of the RC feels they are bad. Sheldon even goes out of his way to say that the rest of the RC may not share his viewpoint. Take this article for what it is: an insight into some of his personal thoughts and nothing more. His is allowed to have a personal opinion on something and the format doesn't have to change to suit those opinions (unless they are shared by enough of the RC/CAG).
It is a sigh of relief that this is nothing more than his own personal thoughts of where he thinks the format should go and not an actual official ban announcement coming down the pipeline. Either way If worse comes to worse, we'll just adapt and adjust to the changes like we've always done. I always enjoy having a good challenge when it comes to deck building in Commander as "restriction breeds creativity" after all. But If we're being serious about banning an entire class of cards, why not Mass Land Destruction instead of Wheel effects? It's less politically suicidal than banning Wheel effects anyway.
"Restriction breeds creativity." - Sheldon Menery on EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering
"Cancel Culture is the real reason why everyone's not allowed to have nice things anymore." - Anonymous
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" - Mark 8:36
"Most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Every life decision is always a risk / reward proposition." - Sanjay Gupta
besdies if theres more likely bans to fix the wheels it would be the following
Cyclonic Rift (after bouncing you wheel)
(few others forgot the names though)
Oh even if this happened There would be something wrong with the RC if Wheels get banned before the Mass Land Destruction cards, as a matter of fact we just got one in MH2 with all the colorless producing lands (vast majory of played cards in command can tap for colorless besides the dual lands and basics)
As WizardMN pointed out: So, yeah, Mitch from Commander's Quarters and anyone else who repeats "the sky is falling" need to have less of a knee-jerk reaction to half a sentence and actually contextualize Sheldon's entire quote:
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This episode of Game Knights from the Command Zone on YouTube is arguably one of the best case examples of why Wheel effects are problematic in Commander:
Now imagine a hypothetical scenario in which Cassius had Void Mirror on the battlefield when Josh was forced to cast Deflecting Swat for free since all his lands were tapped to redirect Swan Song to counter Timetwister with Narset, Parter of Veils on the battlefield to prevent everyone else other than Cassius from not being able to draw off of Timetwister. What would Josh had been able to do If he knew Void Mirror would counter his Deflecting Swat unless he had something already on the battlefield to blow up the Void Mirror so he could resolve the Deflecting Swat while it was still on the stack?
If Josh didn't have any options available would he had scooped or continue grinding? MTG particularly in Commander has always had a history of one player at the table snowballing to a point where nobody can really respond to it since we as players always have a terrible habit of not conserving our mana when it comes to lands and mana rocks. Blue is most often times prone to keeping their lands untapped to deal with potential threats on board while I think it probably would help If the format had more cards like Seedborn Muse to deal with this but not on the same power level as Prophet of Kruphix.
"Restriction breeds creativity." - Sheldon Menery on EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering
"Cancel Culture is the real reason why everyone's not allowed to have nice things anymore." - Anonymous
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" - Mark 8:36
"Most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Every life decision is always a risk / reward proposition." - Sanjay Gupta
I know mitch went off the deep rails a little bit with his videos and episode 2 of his gameplay should have happened a while ago but the editor was too expensive
its all Walking dead secret lairs fault for that happening because it was defiantly after that video is when all this started
I think he should actually step back from being on the rules committee at this point because a lot of his views clash with what the format has actually become.
Edit: and because thatll rankle someones ass let me clarify: when you arent a fan of so many legitimate strategies, when they dont fit your concept of what the format is or should be, despite what that format has become, it calls into question your ability to identify and deal with legitimately problematic cards.
How often does someone combo off of a fresh new hand from a Wheel effect unless they aren't being forced to discard cards in hand? I don't see it happen often in Commander tables at least based on my experience with the format thus far. What If draw replacement effects aren't as one-sided? How one-sided is TOO one-sided? Like I said earlier the Overload mechanic definitely pushed the boundaries of how far it was able to go. Winds of Abandon is a very criminally underrated Overload card printed in Modern Horizons 1 but because it only affects creatures it's less powerful than Cyclonic Rift in that regard which is fine. Still doesn't diminish it's usefulness and playability especially in Mono White builds for Commander.
"Restriction breeds creativity." - Sheldon Menery on EDH / Commander in Magic: The Gathering
"Cancel Culture is the real reason why everyone's not allowed to have nice things anymore." - Anonymous
"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" - Mark 8:36
"Most men and women will grow up to love their servitude and will never dream of revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
"Every life decision is always a risk / reward proposition." - Sanjay Gupta