Why does this exist? Seriously? Why is this some sort of argument in the first place? More specifically, why target EDHrec? They could have just as easily said MTGSalvation, Tapped Out, MTG Goldfish, or so many other sites. It's like saying that fast food is bad for you and blaming Arby's. Neither side of the argument is valid. Someone has an issue with people netdecking and one doesn't, but for some odd reason a guy decides "netdecking" isn't specific enough and throws his own argument out the window. EDHrec, and any similar site, ruins EDH about as much as a cheeseburger.
Not everyone has the time or the resources to go out and test every possibility for a deck archetype. If you want to play something that works and can't afford this, going through someone else's work and results is perfectly fine.
Isn't this where the U.S. sugar regulation started? Fear that kids would get too fat after eating cane sugar, so they use corn syrup instead, despite it has always been education and choice?
I use EDHrec as reference, always. In fact, I make my decks first, get my favorite cards and theme into it, before I look at other options. Consider most people don't have anything unique or flavorful to offer, EDHrec merely reflects that trend, not the best place to look for synergy and interactions.
Admittedly, their articles are usually a blast to read. I haven't used their card number section since last year.
I do value personalized EDH decks, so I see where JAMESD is coming from. At the same time, I support all tools available for building, including EDHRec. EDHRec doesn't prevent us from designing our decks as we choose.
While everyone is entitled to an opinion, that argument that EDHRec is ruining EDH was so terribly written it ruins any point the author was trying to make.
I really dont see why people are concerned/care about whether someone else utilizes a website to help them build a deck. Personally, between work, children, home life and an upcoming move, I have more important things to worry about and could give two ishes about how people build their EDH decks.
Hasn't Gatherer been a thing for some time now? It really doesn't that much effort to go to gatherer type in words you seen in your commander's text box and go from there.
Hasn't Gatherer been a thing for some time now? It really doesn't that much effort to go to gatherer type in words you seen in your commander's text box and go from there.
It actually can be. First, you have the "two meanings of counter" problem. (And Gatherer doesn't read the P/T modification properly.) Secondly, some commanders can be pretty open-ended.
Admittedly, if you're a Johnny, you're probably not going to use EDHrec, but if you're a Johnny, "search Gatherer for goblin" is not really an option either.
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Card advantage is not the same thing as card draw. Something for 2B cannot be strictly worse than something for BBB or 3BB. If you're taking out Swords to Plowshares for Plummet, you're a fool. Stop doing these things!
If you grind the hours on deck development that pros who post their list or apps like this do, you'll arrive at very similar conclusions.
EDHrec and other deckbuilding aids are only "ruining" it for abusive people who can't win without preying on the inexperienced.
Hasn't Gatherer been a thing for some time now? It really doesn't that much effort to go to gatherer type in words you seen in your commander's text box and go from there.
It's my go to. It can be quite a specific search engine. It has its weaknesses, but I'd rather search for what suits my needs than just for what everyone is using. That being said, if you want to put a deck together fast and don't want to get into the minutiae of what you need, EDHrec works fine too.
As far as I can tell EDH rec give you the most popular choices for commanders as built by others.
I don't find it very useful, personally, but for those with less experience it's a great tool.
They argument that more information stifles creativity is insane to me. There are so many other factors at play it's unlikely to be every deck is the same.
Personal preference, unique group dynamics, the dreaded "spirit of the game" type decisions. Even what kind of cards I own are more likely to be mitigating factors rather than a recommendation that 50% of people put card X into a deck headed by commander Y.
Sounds like someone lost one too many games and needs a scapegoat that avoids critical self examination of play pattern and deck construction.
The answer is no. On this very site, Scoeri has a thread that he has written a script for that does the same thing for all the multiplayer decks posted, and nobody has ever accused him of "ruining" EDH. It's all just useful statistical data that helps shortcut some of the time it takes to look up all the various cards that may work well with your commander.
I also find it super funny when people claim to be these super unique and creative deckbuilders like they're some sort of artist. Most of the time they end up producing utter trash that doesn't work and still needs loads of development, or decks that look a lot like netdecks.
I personally built both Karlov and Bruse+Reyhan from scratch. Just picked my theme, searched for the best cards for that theme, picked the best possible mana bases and removal suites, and played with the ammount of threats/answers until I arrived to something I liked goldfishing on tappedout to test my decks.
Yesterday I looked at the recently posted DTC top8 decklists. There's an 9 card difference between the Karlov that placed and my own, and a 6 card difference between my Bruyhan and one of the two that placed, and two of those cards I don't play because I don't own yet.
Complaining about netdecking is ridiculous when people try to optimize their decks. And if your problem is that others have optimal decks while you have funstuff, you don't have a problem with EDHrec or other card browsing websites, you have a people problem and need to talk to your playgroup about wanting to have brewer-friendly casual nights so that you can have fun experimenting.
I have always built my own decks, for every format. I enjoy exploring new space.
That being said, I have always looked at Standard and Modern results to see recent innovations, new interactions, etc, to get ideas on what to explore.
This has never been available for Commander. Until now, with EDHrec. It is finally a tool to see what other people are playing with. I"m not going to build a deck based on EDHrec, but if it helps me find cards I wouldn't have found otherwise, it's doing a good job.
We don't advertise or support any advertising at all - never have, since we started writing back in about 2011.
We're also just a bunch of friends and EDH enthusiasts writing and publishing on a pretty loose schedule. I'm not sure I even know how to track the clicks.
I do appreciate that y'all are reading - we all do. And that you're talking about the format in general. That's the whole point, after all.
I think it depends on how much a player bases their deck constructions by what the site suggests. I usually use it when I've tuned a deck to see if there are any obscure cards in Apocalypse that may prove to be helpful. I think it's generally based on use of the site and how mainstream it is.
Netdecking isnt really a problem unless you are looking for really high end decks. I really dont know anyone who netdecks directly. When I get an idea for a deck I start from scratch and I build my entire list. After I build my own list I will sometimes check other builds to see if there is any good tech I missed.
Because there is not really tournament results for multiplayer EDH there is not really a proven best and due to that most of the game is just building what you want. I am fine with players net decking because I feel that those who are not as familiar with deckbuilding / EDH need some help and even then they wont play it nearly as optimally as someone who built their own list (until they do a lot of testing). Its also a lot harder to justify changes in a list if you ask me when you net deck then when its your own list.
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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.
I've never even heard of EDHrec. I'll probably check it out, though I doubt I'll use it.
In general I dislike netdecking when it comes to commander. The creativity and diversity of the format has always been a big part of what set it apart from other constructed formats for me. That said, WotC has also done significant legwork to murder format diversity by printing powerful legends in precons, which consistently dominate the most-played commander lists. A win for marketing, I suppose, but a loss for those of us who prefer to sit down to a table with commanders from every era.
I doubt any particular website is responsible for a move towards homogenization. People who want to netdeck will find a way to netdeck. Maybe if we could time travel back to 1993 we could get rid of netdecking, but in the real world, some people are always going to do it.
Fwiw, even in the fairly competitive environment I play in, few people are netdecking. Mostly it's a bunch of goodstuff decks, which are also tedious to play against but for different reasons. I am honestly baffled by people that only have top-tier netdecks, though, and are then baffled when no one wants to play with them.
I think sites like EDHrec are fine. Some people like exploring all on their own and can ignore it, others need a little help deciding what to do and can find the one or two cards they need, and still others like jumping straight to the spoilers and can copy an entire deck if they want. If at the end of the day it gives you the kind of experience everyone you and everyone you play with can enjoy, it's all the same to me.
Hasn't Gatherer been a thing for some time now? It really doesn't that much effort to go to gatherer type in words you seen in your commander's text box and go from there.
It actually can be. First, you have the "two meanings of counter" problem. (And Gatherer doesn't read the P/T modification properly.)
To let you know Gatherer accepts regular expressions, which can be useful with some of the trickier search items. For example, a text search for m/counter\s(target|all)/ will give you counter spells while a text search for m/put.*\+.*counter/ will give you power and/or toughness modifying counters.
I enjoy seeing what other decks are playing, as well as sourcing new ideas. I can understand that netdecking can "ruin" a casual gaming meta, but also putting up impediments such as access to data could be equally bad. I know a lot of time I'll look at cards I already have and see which decks they'll fit in, not exactly how to build a deck from meta data
The genie is out of the bottle, and can't be put back in. We live in a world with EDHREC, maybe that's a bad thing - but the world it doesn't exist is gone.
I often use it to find tidbits I forgot about. Was refining a cleric deck and by looking at EDHrec I realized I completely forgot about Cabal Archon. The site is real handy for stuff like that.
I brew my own creations, and I do understand that newer players (or those that don't enjoy figuring out and crafting their own deck), need resources.
But being honest with myself - I'm not fond of having a resource that essentially builds a somewhat optimized deck. As someone that has been playing this game since Mirage, I can already typically guess as to what cards are included in a deck piloted by a common commander. That little bit of assumption leads to less variance when playing against others who pilot the same commander. The more common the commander, the more commonly occurring and same cards will be in the deck, leading to a less diverse series of games.
That is the part that agitates me. As the opponent, I play this format for unique games. I'm playing a 99-card singleton deck, and when playing, the best games are memorable, made by unique plays. Some of the spectacular plays that come out of this format are entirely due to the unique inclusions that people build in to their decks. Resources like edhrec help streamline, essentially "solve" commander decks. That takes away from the memorable experience.
Think of how exciting it is to reminisce on some elaborate janky combo win or interaction, vs "another tooth&nail/craterhoof" win. The elaborate janky wins are less common at tables played with more common commanders. There are just fewer stories, less interesting memories. But optimized common legendaries in the command zone makes for more common (and IMO more bland) wins, that are forgotten oh-so-quickly.
Again this is all just my opinion. My sentiments on this topic likely come from over-exposure to the game and this format. I understand that resources like edhrec are very useful, were around before, and will always be around. I just do not enjoy facing the same legendary commander and knowing what 80% of the deck is. My own knowledge and assumptions over deck inclusions used to be around 20%, but in recent years, as the format has grown more popular, more resources like that show up, and specific commanders are just.... everywhere, I can now typically guess 80% of a decks included cards based entirely off of knowing the players mtg-financial-ability.
edit; edhrec is not a problem. It just so happens to be one of the most capable resources of spitting out a deck with very little effort. The more popular this format becomes, the more prevalent the "issue" in this topic will appear. We can't stop it. We can't control what our opponents decide to build and play. If you don't like playing against net-decks and chose EDH as your format to escape from the solved/tier formats, and net-decking creeps up in your meta again, just find different people to play with.
Point: EDHrec is Ruining EDH
Counterpoint: EDHrec isn't Ruining EDH
What are your thoughts, inputs, ideas about this questioning?
WBG Karador, Ghost Chieftain
B Toshiro Umezawa
BG Pharika, God of Affliction - Necromancy and Politics
WWW The Church of Heliod
WBR Zurgo, Helmsmasher
RG Wort, the Raidmother
UBR Jeleva, Nephalia's Scourge
UG Vorel of the Hull Clade
Not everyone has the time or the resources to go out and test every possibility for a deck archetype. If you want to play something that works and can't afford this, going through someone else's work and results is perfectly fine.
The Unidentified Fantastic Flying Girl.
EDH
Xenagos, the God of Stompy
The Gitrog Monster: Oppressive Value.
Marchesa, Marionette Master - Undying Robots
Yuriko, the Hydra Omnivore
I make dolls as a hobby.
I use EDHrec as reference, always. In fact, I make my decks first, get my favorite cards and theme into it, before I look at other options. Consider most people don't have anything unique or flavorful to offer, EDHrec merely reflects that trend, not the best place to look for synergy and interactions.
Admittedly, their articles are usually a blast to read. I haven't used their card number section since last year.
Shu Yun, the Silent Tempest WUR Voltron Control
Temmet, Vizier of Naktamun WU Unblockable Mirror Trickery
Ra's al Ghul (Sidar Kondo) and Face-Down Ninjas
Brudiclad, Token Engineer
Vaevictis (VV2) the Dire Lantern
Rona, Disciple of Gix
Tiana the Auror
Hallar
Ulrich the Politician
Zur the Rebel
Scorpion, Locust, Scarab, Egyptian Gods
O-Kagachi, Mathas, Mairsil
"Non-Tribal" Tribal Generals, Eggs
I really dont see why people are concerned/care about whether someone else utilizes a website to help them build a deck. Personally, between work, children, home life and an upcoming move, I have more important things to worry about and could give two ishes about how people build their EDH decks.
The Mimeoplasm || Karador, Ghost Chieftain
Prossh, Skyraider of Kher || Vial Smasher/Tymna Group Slug
Drana, Kalastria Bloodchief || Talrand, Sky Summoner
Yidris - Unblockable Saboteurs || Kiki-Jiki, ETB breaker
Kess, Dissident Mage
It actually can be. First, you have the "two meanings of counter" problem. (And Gatherer doesn't read the P/T modification properly.) Secondly, some commanders can be pretty open-ended.
Admittedly, if you're a Johnny, you're probably not going to use EDHrec, but if you're a Johnny, "search Gatherer for goblin" is not really an option either.
On phasing:
EDHrec and other deckbuilding aids are only "ruining" it for abusive people who can't win without preying on the inexperienced.
It's my go to. It can be quite a specific search engine. It has its weaknesses, but I'd rather search for what suits my needs than just for what everyone is using. That being said, if you want to put a deck together fast and don't want to get into the minutiae of what you need, EDHrec works fine too.
I don't find it very useful, personally, but for those with less experience it's a great tool.
They argument that more information stifles creativity is insane to me. There are so many other factors at play it's unlikely to be every deck is the same.
Personal preference, unique group dynamics, the dreaded "spirit of the game" type decisions. Even what kind of cards I own are more likely to be mitigating factors rather than a recommendation that 50% of people put card X into a deck headed by commander Y.
Sounds like someone lost one too many games and needs a scapegoat that avoids critical self examination of play pattern and deck construction.
(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'
Tymna & Ishai, ie Esper Edric
Crosis Turbotrash
Indeed, one must wonder whether this was all posted just to drum up clicks and to get some backdoor advertising in...
I personally built both Karlov and Bruse+Reyhan from scratch. Just picked my theme, searched for the best cards for that theme, picked the best possible mana bases and removal suites, and played with the ammount of threats/answers until I arrived to something I liked goldfishing on tappedout to test my decks.
Yesterday I looked at the recently posted DTC top8 decklists. There's an 9 card difference between the Karlov that placed and my own, and a 6 card difference between my Bruyhan and one of the two that placed, and two of those cards I don't play because I don't own yet.
Complaining about netdecking is ridiculous when people try to optimize their decks. And if your problem is that others have optimal decks while you have funstuff, you don't have a problem with EDHrec or other card browsing websites, you have a people problem and need to talk to your playgroup about wanting to have brewer-friendly casual nights so that you can have fun experimenting.
That being said, I have always looked at Standard and Modern results to see recent innovations, new interactions, etc, to get ideas on what to explore.
This has never been available for Commander. Until now, with EDHrec. It is finally a tool to see what other people are playing with. I"m not going to build a deck based on EDHrec, but if it helps me find cards I wouldn't have found otherwise, it's doing a good job.
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
We're also just a bunch of friends and EDH enthusiasts writing and publishing on a pretty loose schedule. I'm not sure I even know how to track the clicks.
I do appreciate that y'all are reading - we all do. And that you're talking about the format in general. That's the whole point, after all.
--->GDCCommander
(W/U)(B/R)GForm of Progenitus, Shape of a Scrubland
BRGJund Tokens with Prossh, the Magic Dragon Foil
URGAnimar, the RUG CleanerFoil
RRRFeldon of the Third Path 2.0 Foil
BG(B/G)Not Another Meren DeckFoil
UR(U/R)Mizzix, Y Control and X Burn Spells
(W/U)(B/R)GHarold Ramos - The 35 Foot Long Twinkie (In +1/+1 counters)
UB(U/B)Dragonlord Silumgar
Because there is not really tournament results for multiplayer EDH there is not really a proven best and due to that most of the game is just building what you want. I am fine with players net decking because I feel that those who are not as familiar with deckbuilding / EDH need some help and even then they wont play it nearly as optimally as someone who built their own list (until they do a lot of testing). Its also a lot harder to justify changes in a list if you ask me when you net deck then when its your own list.
Signature by Inkfox Aesthetics by Xen
[Modern] Allies
In general I dislike netdecking when it comes to commander. The creativity and diversity of the format has always been a big part of what set it apart from other constructed formats for me. That said, WotC has also done significant legwork to murder format diversity by printing powerful legends in precons, which consistently dominate the most-played commander lists. A win for marketing, I suppose, but a loss for those of us who prefer to sit down to a table with commanders from every era.
I doubt any particular website is responsible for a move towards homogenization. People who want to netdeck will find a way to netdeck. Maybe if we could time travel back to 1993 we could get rid of netdecking, but in the real world, some people are always going to do it.
Fwiw, even in the fairly competitive environment I play in, few people are netdecking. Mostly it's a bunch of goodstuff decks, which are also tedious to play against but for different reasons. I am honestly baffled by people that only have top-tier netdecks, though, and are then baffled when no one wants to play with them.
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
To let you know Gatherer accepts regular expressions, which can be useful with some of the trickier search items. For example, a text search for m/counter\s(target|all)/ will give you counter spells while a text search for m/put.*\+.*counter/ will give you power and/or toughness modifying counters.
The genie is out of the bottle, and can't be put back in. We live in a world with EDHREC, maybe that's a bad thing - but the world it doesn't exist is gone.
But being honest with myself - I'm not fond of having a resource that essentially builds a somewhat optimized deck. As someone that has been playing this game since Mirage, I can already typically guess as to what cards are included in a deck piloted by a common commander. That little bit of assumption leads to less variance when playing against others who pilot the same commander. The more common the commander, the more commonly occurring and same cards will be in the deck, leading to a less diverse series of games.
That is the part that agitates me. As the opponent, I play this format for unique games. I'm playing a 99-card singleton deck, and when playing, the best games are memorable, made by unique plays. Some of the spectacular plays that come out of this format are entirely due to the unique inclusions that people build in to their decks. Resources like edhrec help streamline, essentially "solve" commander decks. That takes away from the memorable experience.
Think of how exciting it is to reminisce on some elaborate janky combo win or interaction, vs "another tooth&nail/craterhoof" win. The elaborate janky wins are less common at tables played with more common commanders. There are just fewer stories, less interesting memories. But optimized common legendaries in the command zone makes for more common (and IMO more bland) wins, that are forgotten oh-so-quickly.
Again this is all just my opinion. My sentiments on this topic likely come from over-exposure to the game and this format. I understand that resources like edhrec are very useful, were around before, and will always be around. I just do not enjoy facing the same legendary commander and knowing what 80% of the deck is. My own knowledge and assumptions over deck inclusions used to be around 20%, but in recent years, as the format has grown more popular, more resources like that show up, and specific commanders are just.... everywhere, I can now typically guess 80% of a decks included cards based entirely off of knowing the players mtg-financial-ability.
edit; edhrec is not a problem. It just so happens to be one of the most capable resources of spitting out a deck with very little effort. The more popular this format becomes, the more prevalent the "issue" in this topic will appear. We can't stop it. We can't control what our opponents decide to build and play. If you don't like playing against net-decks and chose EDH as your format to escape from the solved/tier formats, and net-decking creeps up in your meta again, just find different people to play with.
Links to my most current deck lists;
Primary EDH; Rakka Mar Token Perfection, Crosis Mnemonic Betrayal, Cromat Villainous, Judith Gravestorm, Rakdos Empty Storm, Exava Artifacts, Bant Trash, & Fumiko Voltron!
EDH kept at home; Ruzzian Isset & Rakdos LoR!
EDH (nostalgic/pimp/retired) in storage;
Latulla Burns, Akroma Smash, Jeska Voltron, Rakdos Storm, Bladewing Darghans, Lyzolda Worldgorger, Xantcha Steals your Heart, Jori Storm, Wydwen Permission, Gwendlyn Paradox, Jeleva Warps, & Sigarda Brick!
Legacy Showanimator and High Tide!