Recently, I've found myself shifting my thought process for tutorings.
Namely, I've gone from 'no tutors at all besides basic land ramp' to an approach that allows me to fetch specific, secondary, kinda-building-the-deck-around-this-but-not-quite cards. This allows me to create some degree of subthemes and secondary win conditions for the decks, without tutoring becoming a catch-all answer to situations. Further limited by simply not having that many potential targets for the tutors that I included to get a particular 'theme' card; enough that the tutor is never a totally dead card, but not enough for it to be a generic 'find an answer' thing. I also don't play any black 'any card' tutors for this reason.
Those I think are the biggest 'package deals' I run.
What's your personal philosophy on including tutors, narrow or otherwise? What kind of 'packages' do you run in your decks? (Note: I'm not really looking for discussion on whether or not tutoring should be limited in some way, that's not the point of this topic.)
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X Hope of Ghirapur Swordpile W Ghosty Blinky Anafenza U Nezahal- Big, Blue and HERE! B Gonti Can Afford It R Etali, Primal 'Whatjusthappened?' G Polukranos Wants More Mana WU The Exalted Vizier Temmet WB Home, Athreos WR Basandra, Recursive Aggression WG Karametra, Momma of Lands UB Wrexial Eats Your Brains UR Arjun, the Mad Flame UG The Fable of Prime Speaker BR Hellbent, Malfegor Style BG Jarad, Death is Served RG Running Thromok WUB Varina and ALL the Zombies WUBYennett, the Odd Pain-Train WUR Zedruu the Furyhearted WUG Arcades' Strategy, Shmategy, Sausage and Spam WBR A Case of Mathas' Persistent F*ckery WBRLicia's League of Legendary Lifegain Layabouts WBG The Karador Advantage PackageWRG Gahiji Rattlesnake Collection UBR Jeleva... does... things UBG Damia's Just Deserts URG Yasova's Has More Power Than Sense BRG Wasitora, Bad Kitty WUBRBreya, Eggs, Breya'd Eggs WUBG Tymna and Kydele, Extended Borrowing WURG Kynaios and Tiro, Landfall Impersonations WBRG Saskia Pet Card EnchantressUBRG Yidris of the Chi-Ting Corporation WUBRG Tazri's Amazing Allies
As long as tutoring does exist...I run a treefolk package in my Multani group hug-permanents deck. They aren’t the best cards, but they still have a lot of synergy.
Any blue deck with an activated-ability general uses Dizzy Spell for Training Grounds...and probably Spellseeker, Merchant Scroll, and Mystical Tutor to grab DS, too.
My enchantress deck uses KotR and Crop Rotation mostly to find Serra’s Sanctum.
My main goal for a tutor is to be able to hit as many distinct card functions as possible, especially functions that are useful in different situations, like board wipe, ramp, and draw. Sometimes I'll even go so far as to include a slightly subpar card if it's hittable by a tutor that couldn't hit a better version of the same effect. That way my tutors are a good draw as often as possible.
I don't like tutors that are only used to be duplicates of a specific card, since my decks usually try to avoid being too dependent on anything besides the commander itself.
I run black tutors in creatureless Mogis since the deck is an A+B+C deck... I need to assemble ways to give tokens to my opponents, ways to kill those creatures, and way to punish my opponents for having creatures die. In my decks that are trying to assemble such crazy contraptions, I allow myself all the tutors.
So... my philosophy is that I maximize tutors for things I need for my deck to function, and otherwise play tutors that are restricted in function or heavily match the theme of the deck.
For example, the only tutors in my Marchesa, The Black Rose are Sidisi, Undead Vizier and Diabolic Intent. They are strong tutors, but they are there because they are sacrifice enablers too.
Looking through my decks now, I see I am running the following tutors (that are not just land tutors/ramp):
Vampiric Tutor - Only in Karador and mainly to get an Eldrazi on top of my library to then discard with Bazaar of Baghdad. It is unconditional so I can use it for other things as well, but beyond the Eldrazi, the things I tutor for are different each time. Mausoleum Secrets - This is exceptionally conditional and is only in a deck to try out. I am not sure if it will make the cut in the end. Recruiter of the Guard - A toolbox tutor that can get me a number of different things but is not (easily) repeatable. Enlightened Tutor - In the decks that run it, there are a number of different choices with Sword of the Animist usually being one of them so it allows me to ramp more successfully. There are other things each deck has that this gets but none are what I would consider to always be the "right" card. Invert // Invent - Invent is expensive but it lets me get to cards I might need at the time. Mystical Tutor - A staple for most of my blue decks as the choice for what to tutor for is almost always dependent on the game state. Protean Hulk - This allows for a few more play decisions and what to tutor for is based on the game state (ie, I run no infinite combos with it). Chord of Calling - Same as Hulk. Green Sun's Zenith - Same as Hulk and Chord while also being more restrictive. Natural Order - Same as Zenith for the most part. Sunforger - If I have enough Instants to make this work, I will often throw it in. Due to the cost and needing a creature to attach it to, I don't often feel that it is over the top even though it is repeatable. Spellseeker - This is really restrictive which means it often gets Rift or Mana Drain depending on the game state. This one actually does hit up against the issue of getting the same card most of the time (Rift is usually the card to get) but it has not been a major issue as Rift is not, on its own, game ending. It is usually just saving me from dying and I am fine with this being more defensive than offensive. Academy Rector - Very restrictive. To the point where the deck it is in (Karador) might be fine without it. I would likely put it into Teysa as it is much better there.
So, for the most part, I don't generally like unconditional tutors and will avoid putting them into most decks. This includes thigns like Demonic Tutor, Diabolic Tutor, and Vampiric Tutor (with the exception above). I try to ensure that my games, for the most part, play out differently each time and having tutors just creates games that are often too similar to previous games.
From there, whether I run a tutor depends on what I plan on getting with it. I had an Atraxa Superfriends deck built that purposely did not run Enlightened Tutor or Idyllic Tutor because I felt that the choice 99% of the time was just going to be Doubling Season. I also stopped running Survival of the Fittest in Karador as it just made the games boring. It wasn't that I was always getting the same thing; it was that I could get whatever I wanted at basically no cost. It took away some of the excitement of playing the deck when I knew I could always get the exact card(s) I needed. I have stayed away from Birthing Pod for the same reason.
As can be seen with the above examples, none of the tutors that I do run set up a game winning infinite combo or are only a second copy of something (though, as mentioned, Spellseeker kind of toes the line). I want my decks to work and sometimes adding a tutor can offer consistency to a deck. However, if I find that a deck really doesn't work at all without a bunch of tutors, I would just pull it apart and try something new.
Musing more, I do think that each of my above examples (or any decks where I have tutors for a reason), also stand to function well without the cards they tutor... it's just that some cards are pretty delicious and create new kinds of possibilities.
Ephara can function just fine without Astral Slide or Drake Haven - I've made sure that all the cards with cycling in the deck are workable even without them. But obviously putting cycling into override mode is fun.
Sunforger is a handy multitool for quick-playing cards I already had in the Zedruu deck, mostly counterspells and damage reflects.
The cards tutored for in Zegana are the few noncreatures I have in the deck that tend to put the creature spam over into the 'ridiculous' setting.
Also with this philosophy, I fully and completely agree that you should probably do your all to get rid of the thing I just specifically tutored for, hence why I want to avoid over-reliance on them.
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X Hope of Ghirapur Swordpile W Ghosty Blinky Anafenza U Nezahal- Big, Blue and HERE! B Gonti Can Afford It R Etali, Primal 'Whatjusthappened?' G Polukranos Wants More Mana WU The Exalted Vizier Temmet WB Home, Athreos WR Basandra, Recursive Aggression WG Karametra, Momma of Lands UB Wrexial Eats Your Brains UR Arjun, the Mad Flame UG The Fable of Prime Speaker BR Hellbent, Malfegor Style BG Jarad, Death is Served RG Running Thromok WUB Varina and ALL the Zombies WUBYennett, the Odd Pain-Train WUR Zedruu the Furyhearted WUG Arcades' Strategy, Shmategy, Sausage and Spam WBR A Case of Mathas' Persistent F*ckery WBRLicia's League of Legendary Lifegain Layabouts WBG The Karador Advantage PackageWRG Gahiji Rattlesnake Collection UBR Jeleva... does... things UBG Damia's Just Deserts URG Yasova's Has More Power Than Sense BRG Wasitora, Bad Kitty WUBRBreya, Eggs, Breya'd Eggs WUBG Tymna and Kydele, Extended Borrowing WURG Kynaios and Tiro, Landfall Impersonations WBRG Saskia Pet Card EnchantressUBRG Yidris of the Chi-Ting Corporation WUBRG Tazri's Amazing Allies
My two favorite tutors in EDH right now are Spellseeker and Recruiter of the Guard with Intuition as a close third. The I run the former two in Ephara and they are just exceptional - either one will really get the engine going while drawing a card with Ephara and being a body to help close the game if needed.
I usually will not play stuff like idyllic tutor because it's just too inefficient for me. I won't play Beseech the Queen.
*generally* I like to see in the vicinity of 4-ish generically powerful tutors in a deck and then a handful of situational or narrow ones to add some consistency, but not going crazy.
A few of my decks with tutor breakdowns:
Ephara
0 inventors' fair
1 mystical, enlightened, tithe (very narrow), land tax (very narrow)
2 stoneforge mystic
3 muddle the mixture, intuition, recruiter of the guard, spellseeker
5 thalia's lancers
You'll see a balance of stuff that can find engines (enchantments/artifacts), stuff that finds key creatures or spells, and stuff that fixes mana. 11 total tutors for my most tutor heavy deck, but they are mostly rather narrow.
So 11, but 13 if you count ramp spells (which I do not). I feel like this deck's tutor package is really well balanced after I cut down a couple land tutors. All efficient spells, mostly focused on assembling coffurborg.
What I like to do with this deck is use lands to solve problems, and you'll see a good balance of finding the right lands and finding things to recur/protect lands.
This is my lightest tutor deck, generally intends to just keep the cards flowing with Tuvasa and play the game that comes to it - I intentionally wanted to keep this deck quite simple so I can loan it out and also so I can have something that isn't very shuffly. I could see adding open the Armory potentially since finding the right aura to close the game is pretty valuable. But that's the only other tutor I think I'd want to play in this deck.
I designed this deck so that there is a higher quality of card than in most enchantress decks (fewer crappy enchantments to chain through the deck and more just straight up strong enchantments I want to play one a turn).
Namely, I've gone from 'no tutors at all besides basic land ramp' to an approach that allows me to fetch specific, secondary, kinda-building-the-deck-around-this-but-not-quite cards. This allows me to create some degree of subthemes and secondary win conditions for the decks, without tutoring becoming a catch-all answer to situations. Further limited by simply not having that many potential targets for the tutors that I included to get a particular 'theme' card; enough that the tutor is never a totally dead card, but not enough for it to be a generic 'find an answer' thing. I also don't play any black 'any card' tutors for this reason.
Allow me to illuminate:
Plea for Guidance, Idyllic Tutor and Drift of Phantasms in Ephara, God of the Polis spirit tribal with cycling theme, to grab Astral Slide and Drake Haven.
Plea for Guidance and Idyllic Tutor in Sunsong and Firespeaker, for Searing Meditation and Repercussion.
Ethereal Usher for Fable of Wolf and Owl, and Drift of Phantasms/Trophy Mage for Cloudstone Curio/Lifecrafter's Bestiary in Prime Speaker Zegana creature spam.
Open the Armory, Stonehewer Giant and Relic Seeker in Zedruu the Greathearted, for Sunforger. Also has Pteron Ghost, just because I find it amusing and randomly useful.
Shred Memory in Wrexial, the Risen Deep, for Mesmeric Orb and Doubling Cube. Also good for the occasional Eldrazi-in-graveyard situation a mill deck faces.
Those I think are the biggest 'package deals' I run.
What's your personal philosophy on including tutors, narrow or otherwise? What kind of 'packages' do you run in your decks?
(Note: I'm not really looking for discussion on whether or not tutoring should be limited in some way, that's not the point of this topic.)
Any blue deck with an activated-ability general uses Dizzy Spell for Training Grounds...and probably Spellseeker, Merchant Scroll, and Mystical Tutor to grab DS, too.
My enchantress deck uses KotR and Crop Rotation mostly to find Serra’s Sanctum.
(U/B)(U/B)(U/B) JUMP IN THE LINE, ROCK YOUR BODY IN TIME
(R/W)(R/W)(R/W) RISING FROM THE NEON GLOOM, SHINING LIKE A CRAZY MOON
(U/R)(R/G)(G/U) STEALIN' WHEN I SHOULD HAVE BEEN BUYIN'
I don't like tutors that are only used to be duplicates of a specific card, since my decks usually try to avoid being too dependent on anything besides the commander itself.
EDH Primers
Phelddagrif - Zirilan
EDH
Thrasios+Bruse - Pang - Sasaya - Wydwen - Feather - Rona - Toshiro - Sylvia+Khorvath - Geth - QMarchesa - Firesong - Athreos - Arixmethes - Isperia - Etali - Silas+Sidar - Saskia - Virtus+Gorm - Kynaios - Naban - Aryel - Mizzix - Kazuul - Tymna+Kraum - Sidar+Tymna - Ayli - Gwendlyn - Phelddagrif 4 - Liliana - Kaervek - Phelddagrif 3 - Mairsil - Scarab - Child - Phenax - Shirei - Thada - Depala - Circu - Kytheon - GrenzoHR - Phelddagrif - Reyhan+Kraum - Toshiro - Varolz - Nin - Ojutai - Tasigur - Zedruu - Uril - Edric - Wort - Zurgo - Nahiri - Grenzo - Kozilek - Yisan - Ink-Treader - Yisan - Brago - Sidisi - Toshiro - Alexi - Sygg - Brimaz - Sek'Kuar - Marchesa - Vish Kal - Iroas - Phelddagrif - Ephara - Derevi - Glissa - Wanderer - Saffi - Melek - Xiahou Dun - Lazav - Lin Sivvi - Zirilan - Glissa
PDH - Drake - Graverobber - Izzet GM - Tallowisp - Symbiote Brawl - Feather - Ugin - Jace - Scarab - Angrath - Vraska - Kumena Oathbreaker - Wrenn&6
I run artifact tutors in Shu Yun, the Silent Tempest so that I can get Swiftfoot Boots. The deck does nothing without the general.
If I have tutors that are specific to a specific archetype, I will play them.. Like Lifespinner in spirit tribal.
I have Trinket Mage and Dizzy Spell in my Kefnet deck to grab Amulet of Vigor.
So... my philosophy is that I maximize tutors for things I need for my deck to function, and otherwise play tutors that are restricted in function or heavily match the theme of the deck.
For example, the only tutors in my Marchesa, The Black Rose are Sidisi, Undead Vizier and Diabolic Intent. They are strong tutors, but they are there because they are sacrifice enablers too.
8.RG Green Devotion Ramp/Combo 9.UR Draw Triggers 10.WUR Group stalling 11.WUR Voltron Spellslinger 12.WB Sacrificial Shenanigans
13.BR Creatureless Panharmonicon 14.BR Pingers and Eldrazi 15.URG Untapped Cascading
16.Reyhan, last of the Abzan's WUBG +1/+1 Counter Craziness 17.WUBRG Dragons aka Why did I make this?
Building: The Gitrog Monster lands, Glissa the Traitor stax, Muldrotha, the Gravetide Planeswalker Combo, Kydele, Chosen of Kruphix + Sidar Kondo of Jamuraa Clues, and Tribal Scarecrow Planeswalkers
Vampiric Tutor - Only in Karador and mainly to get an Eldrazi on top of my library to then discard with Bazaar of Baghdad. It is unconditional so I can use it for other things as well, but beyond the Eldrazi, the things I tutor for are different each time.
Mausoleum Secrets - This is exceptionally conditional and is only in a deck to try out. I am not sure if it will make the cut in the end.
Recruiter of the Guard - A toolbox tutor that can get me a number of different things but is not (easily) repeatable.
Enlightened Tutor - In the decks that run it, there are a number of different choices with Sword of the Animist usually being one of them so it allows me to ramp more successfully. There are other things each deck has that this gets but none are what I would consider to always be the "right" card.
Invert // Invent - Invent is expensive but it lets me get to cards I might need at the time.
Mystical Tutor - A staple for most of my blue decks as the choice for what to tutor for is almost always dependent on the game state.
Protean Hulk - This allows for a few more play decisions and what to tutor for is based on the game state (ie, I run no infinite combos with it).
Chord of Calling - Same as Hulk.
Green Sun's Zenith - Same as Hulk and Chord while also being more restrictive.
Natural Order - Same as Zenith for the most part.
Sunforger - If I have enough Instants to make this work, I will often throw it in. Due to the cost and needing a creature to attach it to, I don't often feel that it is over the top even though it is repeatable.
Spellseeker - This is really restrictive which means it often gets Rift or Mana Drain depending on the game state. This one actually does hit up against the issue of getting the same card most of the time (Rift is usually the card to get) but it has not been a major issue as Rift is not, on its own, game ending. It is usually just saving me from dying and I am fine with this being more defensive than offensive.
Academy Rector - Very restrictive. To the point where the deck it is in (Karador) might be fine without it. I would likely put it into Teysa as it is much better there.
So, for the most part, I don't generally like unconditional tutors and will avoid putting them into most decks. This includes thigns like Demonic Tutor, Diabolic Tutor, and Vampiric Tutor (with the exception above). I try to ensure that my games, for the most part, play out differently each time and having tutors just creates games that are often too similar to previous games.
From there, whether I run a tutor depends on what I plan on getting with it. I had an Atraxa Superfriends deck built that purposely did not run Enlightened Tutor or Idyllic Tutor because I felt that the choice 99% of the time was just going to be Doubling Season. I also stopped running Survival of the Fittest in Karador as it just made the games boring. It wasn't that I was always getting the same thing; it was that I could get whatever I wanted at basically no cost. It took away some of the excitement of playing the deck when I knew I could always get the exact card(s) I needed. I have stayed away from Birthing Pod for the same reason.
As can be seen with the above examples, none of the tutors that I do run set up a game winning infinite combo or are only a second copy of something (though, as mentioned, Spellseeker kind of toes the line). I want my decks to work and sometimes adding a tutor can offer consistency to a deck. However, if I find that a deck really doesn't work at all without a bunch of tutors, I would just pull it apart and try something new.
Ephara can function just fine without Astral Slide or Drake Haven - I've made sure that all the cards with cycling in the deck are workable even without them. But obviously putting cycling into override mode is fun.
Sunforger is a handy multitool for quick-playing cards I already had in the Zedruu deck, mostly counterspells and damage reflects.
The cards tutored for in Zegana are the few noncreatures I have in the deck that tend to put the creature spam over into the 'ridiculous' setting.
Also with this philosophy, I fully and completely agree that you should probably do your all to get rid of the thing I just specifically tutored for, hence why I want to avoid over-reliance on them.
I tend to favor narrow but efficient tutors as opposed to bomb tutors like Plea for guidance that require large mana investments and telegraph plays.
More Entomb, Vampiric Tutor and Enlightened tutor and less Increasing Ambition.
My two favorite tutors in EDH right now are Spellseeker and Recruiter of the Guard with Intuition as a close third. The I run the former two in Ephara and they are just exceptional - either one will really get the engine going while drawing a card with Ephara and being a body to help close the game if needed.
I usually will not play stuff like idyllic tutor because it's just too inefficient for me. I won't play Beseech the Queen.
I typically will not play Imperial Seal or grim tutor because black has plenty of options.
*generally* I like to see in the vicinity of 4-ish generically powerful tutors in a deck and then a handful of situational or narrow ones to add some consistency, but not going crazy.
A few of my decks with tutor breakdowns:
Ephara
0 inventors' fair
1 mystical, enlightened, tithe (very narrow), land tax (very narrow)
2 stoneforge mystic
3 muddle the mixture, intuition, recruiter of the guard, spellseeker
5 thalia's lancers
You'll see a balance of stuff that can find engines (enchantments/artifacts), stuff that finds key creatures or spells, and stuff that fixes mana. 11 total tutors for my most tutor heavy deck, but they are mostly rather narrow.
Gitrog
0 eye of ugin
1 crop rotation, expedition map, vampiric tutor, entomb, green sun's zenith,
2 sylvan scrying, demonic tutor
3 realms uncharted, cultivate, kodama's reach
4 scapeshift, pir's whim
So 11, but 13 if you count ramp spells (which I do not). I feel like this deck's tutor package is really well balanced after I cut down a couple land tutors. All efficient spells, mostly focused on assembling coffurborg.
What I like to do with this deck is use lands to solve problems, and you'll see a good balance of finding the right lands and finding things to recur/protect lands.
Tuvasa
1 Enlightened tutor
3 kodama's reach, cultivate
This is my lightest tutor deck, generally intends to just keep the cards flowing with Tuvasa and play the game that comes to it - I intentionally wanted to keep this deck quite simple so I can loan it out and also so I can have something that isn't very shuffly. I could see adding open the Armory potentially since finding the right aura to close the game is pretty valuable. But that's the only other tutor I think I'd want to play in this deck.
I designed this deck so that there is a higher quality of card than in most enchantress decks (fewer crappy enchantments to chain through the deck and more just straight up strong enchantments I want to play one a turn).
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall