Regarding on how EDH has separated the Magic Casual group severely to the point where the popular side is winning, it just seems like with Casual divided there's less people wanting to play Magic casually anymore.
I know it sounds like a silly question but think about it, the only reason
why Elder Dragon Highlander was created was to try to balance the Casual side of the TCG because Kitchen Table is too broken. There's so much power creep it's ridiculous but the irony of it is that it varies from meta to meta, no meta in both Casual formats are the same.
Nobody gives a crap about Johnny anymore, it's all about Spike and Timmy now. I loved playing Magic for the Johnny aspect of it and now with EDH it seems like it's sucking that idealism of deck design away from the game. Combo in EDH seems well not as good as in Kitchen Table, Johnny doesn't like too much jank and jank is what EDH is all about.
"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
Personally, I think that the internet has helped contribute to the 'death' of Kitchen Table magic. Thanks to the internet, people can read up on combos and strategies. I'm not saying they netdeck for casual, but they can post a decklist here and ask for help with combos or cards they should look out for, etc.
On top of that, it's easier for more people to buy cards online. There's no card shop in my town, or within 3 hours of it. So the only way for me to get cards in the past was to buy packs, or trade. So if nobody in the area had a card, it didn't exist. Now I can buy singles if I need a card nobody else has/someone has but won't trade.
Also, I just like EDH more. It helps keep things roughly on par, and it's just a fun format. You can try wacky crap and still win.
I know what you mean, here normal casual is dying as well but I dont mind since I am a collector and most of my decks can only consist of one card, AKA highlander, so adding a general isnt too painfull for my way of playing. Thats the upside of being a collector no need to worry about that playset of cards you will never get because you dont trade away your expensive rares for them in EDH ^^
No one I know plays EDH. For the longest time I assumed people just picked a random legend to put in their signature and pretended they had a deck.
But casual Magic isn't a supported format, you know. Nothing stops people from playing between FNM matches, during lunch, after school/work, or on someone's bed at 3am. I don't think it can die, or if it is possible, there wouldn't be any way to 'officially' tell.
In the group I play with, casual is alive and well. None of us have a FNM we can get to due to various obligations (work, parenthood, etc.), and so aren't necessarily in the Standard mindset. We occasionally play EDH, but the rest of the time it's anything-goes casual.
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There's one at the door, at the gate to damnation...
Is it thief, thug or whore? There's one at the door...
And there's room for one more till the end of creation. Neil Gaiman, Sandman #4 - A Hope in Hell
I sure hope kitchen table magic isn't dead.
I love it.
I only have one buddy who is willing to do it though.
If i want to play i have to go to tournies or play Arena League.
My friends are all going nuts over EDH, it irritates me. It's fun sure, but after awhile playing the same deck over and over again just gets sickening, I vastly prefer casual magic over EDH.
If casual were dead magic would soon follow. There are lots of casual players out there buying packs and weird rares. Its easy to loose sight of on a board like this but they're out there. They're just hard to find since they tend to play at homes, school, or where ever pick up games start. Personally I get together with a group of friends every tuesday for casual. Sometimes its legacy, sometimes type 2, star and 2HG crop up from time to time (only thing we really dont play is EDH =P)
That said I agree with the above points that access to information/turney results/deck lists/online shopping have changed the face even of the casual game but thats the world we live in (and Id rather have this then no one playing (anyone remember warlord ccg))
Interesting story actually. I'd ordered a pizza, and the delivery guy noticed the stacks of magic cards on my table and we started talking. Turns out they had a lunch-time gathering and I got invited! Sadly, it wasn't a good fit... When they said "bring whatever you can build" I don't think they understood my habit of never getting rid of cards, ever ("So you grandeured Korlash to get Overgrown Tomb to play Deed, regenerate Korlash, and then play Loxodon Warhammer and Phyrexian Relcamation. He's not small..."). Still, it was a group of 4 people, all having a good time, that had completely missed the M10 rules update! So many people like this aren't going to be on any boards or even frequent any shops. They're around, but damn near invisible.
Nobody gives a crap about Johnny anymore, it's all about Spike and Timmy now. I loved playing Magic for the Johnny aspect of it and now with EDH it seems like it's sucking that idealism of deck design away from the game. Combo in EDH seems well not as good as in Kitchen Table, Johnny doesn't like too much jank and jank is what EDH is all about.
I'm a Johnny(/Spike) and I love EDH. Combo in EDH can easily be made fairly brutal. Also, doesn't Johnny love making jank work? If by 'idealism of deck design' you mean optimization, than yes, the nature of Highlander lessens the benefits of optimization, sure, but it isn't even close to getting rid of it and EDH opens up so many ideas for deck design it's unreal.
My friends are all going nuts over EDH, it irritates me. It's fun sure, but after awhile playing the same deck over and over again just gets sickening, I vastly prefer casual magic over EDH.
Bolded part is fail. I've got 6 EDH decks and I regularly make changes to them or am making something new. In this regard, I don't see it being any different from other formats.
Bolded part is fail. I've got 6 EDH decks and I regularly make changes to them or am making something new. In this regard, I don't see it being any different from other formats.
good for you, but making a good edh deck costs money, and even if I wanted to spend it I couldn't. I trade for deck parts whenever I can but already my Wrexial EDH deck is leagues behind my Arcanis EDH deck, and I have to play with people who run sol ring, grim monolith, tutors, and generally lots of 10$ cards I just can't afford, I'm having a hard enough time getting the 5$ or less cost cards I want because everyone in the area plays freaking EDH.
You may have enough cards to make average power edh decks, but when the guy across the table is running original duals and a signed copy of The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale in addition to all the EDH staples for each color and a foil Rafiq of the Many as his general, it's sort of hard to keep up.
Dead? No. The only reason that it may seem dead is that you just haven't tried looking beyond the scope of your own group. Essentially, your area may have not many people interested in non-standard gameplay or you just haven't asked yet.
Also, it may seem this way because we don't speak much casual here at these forums, as most of us tend to at least talk about FNM builds. This shouldnt be any indication. If casual magic were dead, then Magic itself would be dead, as I would say that Casual magic is THE MOST important format to the sustaining of this game, primarily for the fact that it is truly the only format that can be claimed that nearly everyone plays. I know a good many people who have never played competitive magic and may never play it at all. Most people who quite competitive magic also tend to stick to casual, if not quit the game.
I think you should just explore the local game stores and find a group who you can play casual with. It would be a great help for you, as you learn new things and enjoy Magic and it helps spread the main point about any game: TO HAVE FUN!
It seems to me that EDH and kitchen table games appeal to different people. Really fun EDH decks require a sizable budget, and playing a good EDH games requires patience, time and a pretty good grasp of the rules (the last being dependant on how many group hug decks are at the table). At my LGS, since everyone I play with fits this demographic, we only play EDH (I recently dismantled all my normal casual decks because I simply wasn't ever using them). But I can't see EDH being for everyone. The person who spends a few dollars on MTG once in a while won't be able to support a decent EDH deck. EDH isn't playable drunk, or as a side event to something else that's going on. If this makes any sense, EDH strikes me as casual for serious players.
Thus: find some more players! There must be people about who don't like EDH, and would prefer just to player regular casual Magic.
Also, I don't know what you mean about combo decks not being possible in EDH. Most of the best multiplayer decks are combo decks.
Bolded part is fail. I've got 6 EDH decks and I regularly make changes to them or am making something new. In this regard, I don't see it being any different from other formats.
It seems to me that EDH and kitchen table games appeal to different people. Really fun EDH decks require a sizable budget, and playing a good EDH games requires patience, time and a pretty good grasp of the rules (the last being dependant on how many group hug decks are at the table). At my LGS, since everyone I play with fits this demographic, we only play EDH (I recently dismantled all my normal casual decks because I simply wasn't ever using them). But I can't see EDH being for everyone. The person who spends a few dollars on MTG once in a while won't be able to support a decent EDH deck. EDH isn't playable drunk, or as a side event to something else that's going on. If this makes any sense, EDH strikes me as casual for serious players.
Thus: find some more players! There must be people about who don't like EDH, and would prefer just to player regular casual Magic.
Also, I don't know what you mean about combo decks not being possible in EDH. Most of the best multiplayer decks are combo decks.
Agreed with Viperesque.
Things like EDH and Cube basically exist so that highly skilled, competitive players can have something akin to casual magic. It is more or less kitchen table magic for people who are the polar opposite of the kitchen table crowd.
Most EDH players love complex rules interactions, obscure card knowledge, broken decks, and high level play. Does that sound like a real kitchen table player to anyone?
That's ignoring the fact that to play EDH around here, you pretty much need to budget like you're building a legacy deck. Props if you own all the cards, but for most people it's like 600 bucks.
EDH is not a good replacement format for little Billy who shuffled together his best soldier cards to make a 71 card casual deck.
As long as there are playgroups that say things like "we don't do the stack here," casual magic will never die. 90% of players will never be invested enough to play EDH, cube, play T2, etc.
--
Good example of the difference between an EDH player and a casual player. The other day I explained the concept of oracle text to a friend who plays purely kitchen table magic. His response was, "that's stupid." Yeah, EDH =/= kitchen table magic.
when I still had friends who played paper magic we'd sit and play 5-color, which can be a very casual format though it got a little tired after awhile so we changed to singleton, and then we did EDH for awhile, then we'd pull out proxys from vintage and see who could get the sick broken combo off fastest, casual table magic is all about who you play with... if you play the same decks over and over then yea it dies off, but if you change it up all the time then theres no limit to fun, we'd draft Pick Your Own Packs and all kinds of things, granted RL got in the way of most so the move had to go to MTGO and still the same applies, if you play variety then you have more fun
Kitchen Table is not dead; it's just dormant most of the time. I probably speak for myself and my tiny little group but most of us have a casual deck lying around somewhere. We just don't bring it out often because most of the LGS (in my area, at least) would either be playing Standard (casual or competitive) or EDH.
I know of many of these players in the LGS who has nice casual decks to toss around but the problem is few people bother lugging them around so when a random casual deck appears in the LGS, that deck would probably have to find a Standard or EDH player willing to lock horn with the Casual EDH deck. In most of the cases, either the player feels bad that he wins / loses constantly due to differing power levels or no other players would want to play with him/her. Gradually, the Casual player either leaves or starts bringing a Standard deck just to have a decent Magic fix.
Therefore, I'd say that: -
The problem: getting a critical mass of players to "kick-off" the casual group.
My suggestion: get a group of friends to bring along some fun casual decks to your LGS. Play them openly and gradually, more people will join with the casual fun.
Now I'm an extremely competitive player and the fnm I go to has at least 25ppl and can hit 60ppl and most of the are ptq grinders, including myself.
But casual is by no means dead, but it is to depended on play group for most peoples liking.
Which means you can't always just bring a casual deck and have a fair game. Since there are no banned cards and casual players can spend a lot of cash or a little, the power levels are a lot different. There is a gaming club at my school and I brought a casual version of the old gb elves deck from standard for my first time going. The only rares were 4 oran rief the vastwood, 4 gilt leaf palace and 3 wilt leaf liege but their decks were just some starter decks and some random cards they had from the few packs they opened. Their decks were worse then most of the sealed/draft decks I have built. But say they were a more competitve group they might have decent standard/extended decks but don't play in tournaments, they might not have been so upset with me playing "such an overpowered" gb elf deck.
The reason people like edh so much more then casual is becasue there's no tournaments but there is that kind of free/fun aspect to it. And becasue there is outlined rules/banned lists people have more balanced decks, creating a better enviroment for play.
Power level in Casual is self limiting, based on the social milieu.
For example, I brought a UGu Spiritcraft/Reanimator deck to a casual game one time. I thought I was hot sh*t, with my dark rituals, chrome moxes, kokusho's, etc.
A few turns into the game I get steamrolled by a friend of mine playing a Faerie Rogue deck.
Just goes to show you that you gotta believe... in the heart of the cards.
And if you don't like EDH just don't play that format
(Or just a little once in a while to content your "EDH addict" friends)
so if I go to my CASUAL magic night and everyone else is playing EDH, I'm just supposed to sit there like a piece of furniture?
Even when I do play EDH the games take so long when I finally leave I could just go straight to Denny's to watch the drunks sober up for their 6 AM shift
I'm not saying EDH is a bad format, it's not, I'm just sick of three hour games with the same decks and the same strategies, it's nice every once in awhile but the reason for playing all night completely escapes me.
It's gotten to the point where my friend dissasembled all but one casual deck, and I can't really find a new playgroup because most others just don't have the same level of play. Cultivating a casual playgroup so that everyone's decks are fairly balanced against one another can take years of development and playing together.
Kitchen Table magic is certainly not dead, but it can require you to make the effort to find players. I have two playgroups and about a pool of 12-15 players that we'll sling cards with on a semi-regular basis. I host some events, and another guy hosts some as well.
It did take work finding people to play, responding to posts, ads, etc ... I didn't really find any casual players at FNM's.
EDH strikes me as a casual format for tournament/spike types. Sure, lots of casual players play EDH, but a lot of the spikeys around Vancouver love EDH as a diversion. It's a way for them to play casually in between more serious events.
I built an EDH deck and enjoy EDH. If you are a kitchen table player, you should have an EDH deck as part of your stock. EDH is a very fun format and can be easier to make decks around because you need only 1-ofs. I had lots of good G/W cards, and don't have a lot of G/W decks, so my EDH deck just took a lot of good and bulk rares that were otherwise sitting around doing nothing.
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Kitchen table magic is entirely dependent on your particular group of friends. I play fairly regularly with a few of my friends, some of whom have gotten back into the game around Zendikar. Most of them don't play EDH. There's a specific subset of that group, however, that plays mostly EDH. Unlike tournament Magic, it's really not possible to determine what's happening across the country/world in Casual magic just by extrapolating from your group.
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I know it sounds like a silly question but think about it, the only reason
why Elder Dragon Highlander was created was to try to balance the Casual side of the TCG because Kitchen Table is too broken. There's so much power creep it's ridiculous but the irony of it is that it varies from meta to meta, no meta in both Casual formats are the same.
Nobody gives a crap about Johnny anymore, it's all about Spike and Timmy now. I loved playing Magic for the Johnny aspect of it and now with EDH it seems like it's sucking that idealism of deck design away from the game. Combo in EDH seems well not as good as in Kitchen Table, Johnny doesn't like too much jank and jank is what EDH is all about.
See the problem? What do you guys think?
"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
On top of that, it's easier for more people to buy cards online. There's no card shop in my town, or within 3 hours of it. So the only way for me to get cards in the past was to buy packs, or trade. So if nobody in the area had a card, it didn't exist. Now I can buy singles if I need a card nobody else has/someone has but won't trade.
Also, I just like EDH more. It helps keep things roughly on par, and it's just a fun format. You can try wacky crap and still win.
The latest Comprehensive Rules are also good, and can be found here.
But casual Magic isn't a supported format, you know. Nothing stops people from playing between FNM matches, during lunch, after school/work, or on someone's bed at 3am. I don't think it can die, or if it is possible, there wouldn't be any way to 'officially' tell.
Is it thief, thug or whore? There's one at the door...
And there's room for one more till the end of creation.
Neil Gaiman, Sandman #4 - A Hope in Hell
I love it.
I only have one buddy who is willing to do it though.
If i want to play i have to go to tournies or play Arena League.
That said I agree with the above points that access to information/turney results/deck lists/online shopping have changed the face even of the casual game but thats the world we live in (and Id rather have this then no one playing (anyone remember warlord ccg))
Currently looking to buy miscut Homelands, (my wife thinks I'm crazy too).
Semper Gumby (Always Flexible)
I'm a Johnny(/Spike) and I love EDH. Combo in EDH can easily be made fairly brutal. Also, doesn't Johnny love making jank work? If by 'idealism of deck design' you mean optimization, than yes, the nature of Highlander lessens the benefits of optimization, sure, but it isn't even close to getting rid of it and EDH opens up so many ideas for deck design it's unreal.
Bolded part is fail. I've got 6 EDH decks and I regularly make changes to them or am making something new. In this regard, I don't see it being any different from other formats.
good for you, but making a good edh deck costs money, and even if I wanted to spend it I couldn't. I trade for deck parts whenever I can but already my Wrexial EDH deck is leagues behind my Arcanis EDH deck, and I have to play with people who run sol ring, grim monolith, tutors, and generally lots of 10$ cards I just can't afford, I'm having a hard enough time getting the 5$ or less cost cards I want because everyone in the area plays freaking EDH.
You may have enough cards to make average power edh decks, but when the guy across the table is running original duals and a signed copy of The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale in addition to all the EDH staples for each color and a foil Rafiq of the Many as his general, it's sort of hard to keep up.
Bingo, That sums it up perfectly =)
Currently looking to buy miscut Homelands, (my wife thinks I'm crazy too).
Semper Gumby (Always Flexible)
Also, it may seem this way because we don't speak much casual here at these forums, as most of us tend to at least talk about FNM builds. This shouldnt be any indication. If casual magic were dead, then Magic itself would be dead, as I would say that Casual magic is THE MOST important format to the sustaining of this game, primarily for the fact that it is truly the only format that can be claimed that nearly everyone plays. I know a good many people who have never played competitive magic and may never play it at all. Most people who quite competitive magic also tend to stick to casual, if not quit the game.
I think you should just explore the local game stores and find a group who you can play casual with. It would be a great help for you, as you learn new things and enjoy Magic and it helps spread the main point about any game: TO HAVE FUN!
Thus: find some more players! There must be people about who don't like EDH, and would prefer just to player regular casual Magic.
Also, I don't know what you mean about combo decks not being possible in EDH. Most of the best multiplayer decks are combo decks.
Agreed with Viperesque.
Things like EDH and Cube basically exist so that highly skilled, competitive players can have something akin to casual magic. It is more or less kitchen table magic for people who are the polar opposite of the kitchen table crowd.
Most EDH players love complex rules interactions, obscure card knowledge, broken decks, and high level play. Does that sound like a real kitchen table player to anyone?
That's ignoring the fact that to play EDH around here, you pretty much need to budget like you're building a legacy deck. Props if you own all the cards, but for most people it's like 600 bucks.
EDH is not a good replacement format for little Billy who shuffled together his best soldier cards to make a 71 card casual deck.
As long as there are playgroups that say things like "we don't do the stack here," casual magic will never die. 90% of players will never be invested enough to play EDH, cube, play T2, etc.
--
Good example of the difference between an EDH player and a casual player. The other day I explained the concept of oracle text to a friend who plays purely kitchen table magic. His response was, "that's stupid." Yeah, EDH =/= kitchen table magic.
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I know of many of these players in the LGS who has nice casual decks to toss around but the problem is few people bother lugging them around so when a random casual deck appears in the LGS, that deck would probably have to find a Standard or EDH player willing to lock horn with the Casual EDH deck. In most of the cases, either the player feels bad that he wins / loses constantly due to differing power levels or no other players would want to play with him/her. Gradually, the Casual player either leaves or starts bringing a Standard deck just to have a decent Magic fix.
Therefore, I'd say that: -
The problem: getting a critical mass of players to "kick-off" the casual group.
My suggestion: get a group of friends to bring along some fun casual decks to your LGS. Play them openly and gradually, more people will join with the casual fun.
But casual is by no means dead, but it is to depended on play group for most peoples liking.
Which means you can't always just bring a casual deck and have a fair game. Since there are no banned cards and casual players can spend a lot of cash or a little, the power levels are a lot different. There is a gaming club at my school and I brought a casual version of the old gb elves deck from standard for my first time going. The only rares were 4 oran rief the vastwood, 4 gilt leaf palace and 3 wilt leaf liege but their decks were just some starter decks and some random cards they had from the few packs they opened. Their decks were worse then most of the sealed/draft decks I have built. But say they were a more competitve group they might have decent standard/extended decks but don't play in tournaments, they might not have been so upset with me playing "such an overpowered" gb elf deck.
The reason people like edh so much more then casual is becasue there's no tournaments but there is that kind of free/fun aspect to it. And becasue there is outlined rules/banned lists people have more balanced decks, creating a better enviroment for play.
For example, I brought a UGu Spiritcraft/Reanimator deck to a casual game one time. I thought I was hot sh*t, with my dark rituals, chrome moxes, kokusho's, etc.
A few turns into the game I get steamrolled by a friend of mine playing a Faerie Rogue deck.
Just goes to show you that you gotta believe... in the heart of the cards.
so if I go to my CASUAL magic night and everyone else is playing EDH, I'm just supposed to sit there like a piece of furniture?
Even when I do play EDH the games take so long when I finally leave I could just go straight to Denny's to watch the drunks sober up for their 6 AM shift
I'm not saying EDH is a bad format, it's not, I'm just sick of three hour games with the same decks and the same strategies, it's nice every once in awhile but the reason for playing all night completely escapes me.
It's gotten to the point where my friend dissasembled all but one casual deck, and I can't really find a new playgroup because most others just don't have the same level of play. Cultivating a casual playgroup so that everyone's decks are fairly balanced against one another can take years of development and playing together.
It did take work finding people to play, responding to posts, ads, etc ... I didn't really find any casual players at FNM's.
EDH strikes me as a casual format for tournament/spike types. Sure, lots of casual players play EDH, but a lot of the spikeys around Vancouver love EDH as a diversion. It's a way for them to play casually in between more serious events.
I built an EDH deck and enjoy EDH. If you are a kitchen table player, you should have an EDH deck as part of your stock. EDH is a very fun format and can be easier to make decks around because you need only 1-ofs. I had lots of good G/W cards, and don't have a lot of G/W decks, so my EDH deck just took a lot of good and bulk rares that were otherwise sitting around doing nothing.
Looking for a casual playgroup in the Greater Vancouver area? Send me a PM. Our playgroup is always looking for more people to terrorize