Vandalblast to blow up everyone's rocks? They use their lands to cast more rocks and other stuff and keep playing.
Assuming they have more in hand, actively tutor them, recover their prior rocks, or luckily draw into them. Can result in "draw-go" if it stops a deck from progressing further as the pilot hopes to find more to put them back into the game. Which can result in the game stalling out based on the impact except for the person who did it.
Wrath effects to zap all the creatures? Players use lands to cast more creatures and other stuff, the game moves on.
See points on rocks.
Blow up all the lands? Most of the players, save those (including, non-coincidentally, the one who played the MLD) who are prepared for this, draw cards hoping to draw into something that might put them back into the game. Most of the time they draw and go. Even if they draw a land, they mostly draw and go until they do that a couple of times. The game crawls to the stall, unless the MLD guy can pull off a win pretty much immediately.
See points on rocks.
People who don't see the difference in these conditions either should play only with people who like the same thing, or maybe just stick to playing competitive formats. Or playing with themselves, I suppose.
Same could be same about basic destruction/disruption.
Vandalblast to blow up everyone's rocks? They use their lands to cast more rocks and other stuff and keep playing.
Assuming they have more in hand, actively tutor them, recover their prior rocks, or luckily draw into them. Can result in "draw-go" if it stops a deck from progressing further as the pilot hopes to find more to put them back into the game. Which can result in the game stalling out based on the impact except for the person who did it.
Wrath effects to zap all the creatures? Players use lands to cast more creatures and other stuff, the game moves on.
See points on rocks.
Blow up all the lands? Most of the players, save those (including, non-coincidentally, the one who played the MLD) who are prepared for this, draw cards hoping to draw into something that might put them back into the game. Most of the time they draw and go. Even if they draw a land, they mostly draw and go until they do that a couple of times. The game crawls to the stall, unless the MLD guy can pull off a win pretty much immediately.
See points on rocks.
People who don't see the difference in these conditions either should play only with people who like the same thing, or maybe just stick to playing competitive formats. Or playing with themselves, I suppose.
Same could be same about basic destruction/disruption.
You are clearly one of the guys the lost point was aimed at.
The point is, if you still have your lands, unless you have built your deck really badly (or strangely, reflecting a few fringe cases), you can rebuild a lot more easily than is usually the case when you don't have lands. Even if you are a dedicated rock-user, you will probably not have the as your only mana sources; you will initially use lands to fuel your playing rocks. If you still have lands after your rocks go kablooie, you can draw into more rocks and cast them, or do something else (presumably your deck has more in it than just rocks). Same with creatures. Blow up someone's critters, they're still behind, but they can cast something else with that land (and maybe other mana) they have available. Everyone being able to do something, even if some of their stuff is blown up, lets people play and maybe continue to have a good time. Blow up the lands, this slows things down a lot more. This is important if your primary goal is to win. If your goal is for everyone to have an enjoyable, social game, not so much, especially if your win doesn't come immediately after (or perhaps as a result of) the MLD.
Vandalblast to blow up everyone's rocks? They use their lands to cast more rocks and other stuff and keep playing.
Assuming they have more in hand, actively tutor them, recover their prior rocks, or luckily draw into them. Can result in "draw-go" if it stops a deck from progressing further as the pilot hopes to find more to put them back into the game. Which can result in the game stalling out based on the impact except for the person who did it.
Wrath effects to zap all the creatures? Players use lands to cast more creatures and other stuff, the game moves on.
See points on rocks.
Blow up all the lands? Most of the players, save those (including, non-coincidentally, the one who played the MLD) who are prepared for this, draw cards hoping to draw into something that might put them back into the game. Most of the time they draw and go. Even if they draw a land, they mostly draw and go until they do that a couple of times. The game crawls to the stall, unless the MLD guy can pull off a win pretty much immediately.
See points on rocks.
People who don't see the difference in these conditions either should play only with people who like the same thing, or maybe just stick to playing competitive formats. Or playing with themselves, I suppose.
Same could be same about basic destruction/disruption.
You are clearly one of the guys the lost point was aimed at.
The point is, if you still have your lands, unless you have built your deck really badly (or strangely, reflecting a few fringe cases), you can rebuild a lot more easily than is usually the case when you don't have lands. Even if you are a dedicated rock-user, you will probably not have the as your only mana sources; you will initially use lands to fuel your playing rocks. If you still have lands after your rocks go kablooie, you can draw into more rocks and cast them, or do something else (presumably your deck has more in it than just rocks). Same with creatures. Blow up someone's critters, they're still behind, but they can cast something else with that land (and maybe other mana) they have available. Everyone being able to do something, even if some of their stuff is blown up, lets people play and maybe continue to have a good time. Blow up the lands, this slows things down a lot more. This is important if your primary goal is to win. If your goal is for everyone to have an enjoyable, social game, not so much, especially if your win doesn't come immediately after (or perhaps as a result of) the MLD.
I think you missed my point actually. I personally believe you are misrepresenting land destruction VS other forms of disruption which can stall out a player.
Also social aspect is already inherent within MTG, its called interacting with the person or people who are your opponent(s) with words, emotions, body language, facial expressions, and physical contact (Example: Handshake for a good game).
You are also doing that thing I personally despise about these types of arguments: You are conflating different aspects of the game as if they meant the same thing. These aspects in this case are: social interaction, personal enjoyment, and gameplay. These aspects can be in conjunction but are also are distinct from each other and are never always all together.
I think you missed my point actually. I personally believe you are misrepresenting land destruction VS other forms of disruption which can stall out a player
Count me in, then, because I don’t understand your point at all.
Assuming they have more in hand, actively tutor them, recover their prior rocks, or luckily draw into them. Can result in "draw-go" if it stops a deck from progressing further as the pilot hopes to find more to put them back into the game. Which can result in the game stalling out based on the impact except for the person who did it.
To me, this reads like your saying blowing up rocks/dorks screeches the game to a halt much like MLD does. I can’t really wrap my head around your point.
Vandalblast to blow up everyone's rocks? They use their lands to cast more rocks and other stuff and keep playing.
Assuming they have more in hand, actively tutor them, recover their prior rocks, or luckily draw into them. Can result in "draw-go" if it stops a deck from progressing further as the pilot hopes to find more to put them back into the game. Which can result in the game stalling out based on the impact except for the person who did it.
Wrath effects to zap all the creatures? Players use lands to cast more creatures and other stuff, the game moves on.
See points on rocks.
Blow up all the lands? Most of the players, save those (including, non-coincidentally, the one who played the MLD) who are prepared for this, draw cards hoping to draw into something that might put them back into the game. Most of the time they draw and go. Even if they draw a land, they mostly draw and go until they do that a couple of times. The game crawls to the stall, unless the MLD guy can pull off a win pretty much immediately.
See points on rocks.
People who don't see the difference in these conditions either should play only with people who like the same thing, or maybe just stick to playing competitive formats. Or playing with themselves, I suppose.
Same could be same about basic destruction/disruption.
You are clearly one of the guys the lost point was aimed at.
The point is, if you still have your lands, unless you have built your deck really badly (or strangely, reflecting a few fringe cases), you can rebuild a lot more easily than is usually the case when you don't have lands. Even if you are a dedicated rock-user, you will probably not have the as your only mana sources; you will initially use lands to fuel your playing rocks. If you still have lands after your rocks go kablooie, you can draw into more rocks and cast them, or do something else (presumably your deck has more in it than just rocks). Same with creatures. Blow up someone's critters, they're still behind, but they can cast something else with that land (and maybe other mana) they have available. Everyone being able to do something, even if some of their stuff is blown up, lets people play and maybe continue to have a good time. Blow up the lands, this slows things down a lot more. This is important if your primary goal is to win. If your goal is for everyone to have an enjoyable, social game, not so much, especially if your win doesn't come immediately after (or perhaps as a result of) the MLD.
I think you missed my point actually. I personally believe you are misrepresenting land destruction VS other forms of disruption which can stall out a player.
Also social aspect is already inherent within MTG, its called interacting with the person or people who are your opponent(s) with words, emotions, body language, facial expressions, and physical contact (Example: Handshake for a good game).
You are also doing that thing I personally despise about these types of arguments: You are conflating different aspects of the game as if they meant the same thing. These aspects in this case are: social interaction, personal enjoyment, and gameplay. These aspects can be in conjunction but are also are distinct from each other and are never always all together.
Yeah, no. Giving someone the finger is a social interaction. Calling someone an ******** and pissing on their cards is also a social interaction, albeit not a very appropriate one. The social aspect of EDH is about more than socially interacting, which is indeed inherent to the game. EDH/Commander was designed as a social format, with "social" in this context referring to "creating a mutually enjoyable social experience." If everyone in a play group enjoys MLD, then cool, but the majority of players of this format are not cool with that, and for good reason: Because it is much harder to recover from MLD than from other, more acceptable forms of disruption. Other forms of disruption will rarely, if ever, disrupt the whole game the way MLD will, and if it does, people will almost always recover more slowly.
You can despise that reasoning all you want, but that reaction on your part doesn't change the facts about the social contract and its place in the format, or make your insistence that the game should be played a certain way regardless of whether people are having a good time any less wrong-headed when applied to this specific format of Magic.
If you just care about winning, play with other competitive players, or at least ones who are cool with the same thing, or play other competitive formats. This one was designed to be different, in that it specifically takes things like everyone's enjoyment into account (something that is irrelevant to, say, Legacy or Modern), and is about more than winning. People can choose to play it with the primary concern being competition, and that is cool, but that is not the default, and certainly not the one right way to play it.
I think you missed my point actually. I personally believe you are misrepresenting land destruction VS other forms of disruption which can stall out a player.
Also social aspect is already inherent within MTG, its called interacting with the person or people who are your opponent(s) with words, emotions, body language, facial expressions, and physical contact (Example: Handshake for a good game).
You are also doing that thing I personally despise about these types of arguments: You are conflating different aspects of the game as if they meant the same thing. These aspects in this case are: social interaction, personal enjoyment, and gameplay. These aspects can be in conjunction but are also are distinct from each other and are never always all together.
When a large enough number of people say that having an enjoyable game is dependent on being able to cast their cards, then something that prevents gameplay from happening will necessarily prevent fun from happening too, and for most people (especially angry nerds) someone stopping them from having fun will also probably make them less social. Some people don't mind that sort of thing, so of course in a like-minded group you should do whatever you like, but conflating those things for the majority of EDH players isn't without cause.
Anyway, MLD is imo completely different from other forms of wipe because other forms of wipe can be played around relatively easily. If you know your opponent runs creature wipes, avoid having significantly more value in creatures than they do at a given time to restrict the value they can get, same for artifacts and enchantments. Land wipes are not the same - sandbag lands all you want, if they can establish a dominant position for a single turn and then wipe lands, no amount of preparation will save you or help you reload faster than 1 land per turn (barring exploration or what-have-you).
Vandalblast to blow up everyone's rocks? They use their lands to cast more rocks and other stuff and keep playing.
Assuming they have more in hand, actively tutor them, recover their prior rocks, or luckily draw into them. Can result in "draw-go" if it stops a deck from progressing further as the pilot hopes to find more to put them back into the game. Which can result in the game stalling out based on the impact except for the person who did it.
Wrath effects to zap all the creatures? Players use lands to cast more creatures and other stuff, the game moves on.
See points on rocks.
Blow up all the lands? Most of the players, save those (including, non-coincidentally, the one who played the MLD) who are prepared for this, draw cards hoping to draw into something that might put them back into the game. Most of the time they draw and go. Even if they draw a land, they mostly draw and go until they do that a couple of times. The game crawls to the stall, unless the MLD guy can pull off a win pretty much immediately.
See points on rocks.
People who don't see the difference in these conditions either should play only with people who like the same thing, or maybe just stick to playing competitive formats. Or playing with themselves, I suppose.
Same could be same about basic destruction/disruption.
You are clearly one of the guys the lost point was aimed at.
The point is, if you still have your lands, unless you have built your deck really badly (or strangely, reflecting a few fringe cases), you can rebuild a lot more easily than is usually the case when you don't have lands. Even if you are a dedicated rock-user, you will probably not have the as your only mana sources; you will initially use lands to fuel your playing rocks. If you still have lands after your rocks go kablooie, you can draw into more rocks and cast them, or do something else (presumably your deck has more in it than just rocks). Same with creatures. Blow up someone's critters, they're still behind, but they can cast something else with that land (and maybe other mana) they have available. Everyone being able to do something, even if some of their stuff is blown up, lets people play and maybe continue to have a good time. Blow up the lands, this slows things down a lot more. This is important if your primary goal is to win. If your goal is for everyone to have an enjoyable, social game, not so much, especially if your win doesn't come immediately after (or perhaps as a result of) the MLD.
I think you missed my point actually. I personally believe you are misrepresenting land destruction VS other forms of disruption which can stall out a player.
Also social aspect is already inherent within MTG, its called interacting with the person or people who are your opponent(s) with words, emotions, body language, facial expressions, and physical contact (Example: Handshake for a good game).
You are also doing that thing I personally despise about these types of arguments: You are conflating different aspects of the game as if they meant the same thing. These aspects in this case are: social interaction, personal enjoyment, and gameplay. These aspects can be in conjunction but are also are distinct from each other and are never always all together.
Yeah, no. Giving someone the finger is a social interaction. Calling someone an ******** and pissing on their cards is also a social interaction, albeit not a very appropriate one. The social aspect of EDH is about more than socially interacting, which is indeed inherent to the game. EDH/Commander was designed as a social format, with "social" in this context referring to "creating a mutually enjoyable social experience." If everyone in a play group enjoys MLD, then cool, but the majority of players of this format are not cool with that, and for good reason: Because it is much harder to recover from MLD than from other, more acceptable forms of disruption. Other forms of disruption will rarely, if ever, disrupt the whole game the way MLD will, and if it does, people will almost always recover more slowly.
You can despise that reasoning all you want, but that reaction on your part doesn't change the facts about the social contract and its place in the format, or make your insistence that the game should be played a certain way regardless of whether people are having a good time any less wrong-headed when applied to this specific format of Magic.
If you just care about winning, play with other competitive players, or at least ones who are cool with the same thing, or play other competitive formats. This one was designed to be different, in that it specifically takes things like everyone's enjoyment into account (something that is irrelevant to, say, Legacy or Modern), and is about more than winning. People can choose to play it with the primary concern being competition, and that is cool, but that is not the default, and certainly not the one right way to play it.
Because the topic is about one gameplay aspect and how to deal with another gameplay aspect. Not one about to deal with a gameplay aspect with social contract or its effects on personal enjoyment of others. That you are muddying the thread about gameplay with your social-politics is what irritates me.
Well, to be fair, I thinks it’s been pretty clearly established that MLD does not Combat Ramp in the slightest. Muddying the thread aside(and who are you to make this claim) MLD isn’t the answer anyways, so again, what’s your point?
You can be irritated all you want, but in the context of this format, the social aspect of the game and whether everyone is having a good time are just as important a component of game play as are strategic aspects. Stating this fact isn't muddying the thread at all. The social contract and politics are factors which were intentionally designed into this format. Also, as Buffsam89 notes, and as I and others have noted repeatedly throughout this thread, MLD does not actually do a good job of combatting ramp, and to the (poor) extent to which it does so, it does so in a manner which is indiscriminate, negatively impacting all of the opponents' ability to make meaningful decisions within the game, not just the player who is heavily ramping. This makes for a poor social play experience in addition to not generally working well against dedicated land ramp players. So, this makes your point doubly wrong.
At its core, MLD is a control strategy focusing on eliminating as much of each opponent's resources at possible. It is actually much more effective in controlling the table in a multiplayer game than are more conventional control strategies such as counterspells, bouncing permanents and hand destruction. As such, considered from purely a strategic point of view, MLD is a strong option to consider, especially in certain colors, if all you care about is winning the game. And if competition is the primary focus of whomever you are playing with, that's fine. But since that isn't what the majority of Commander players are looking for, pursuing that strategy is largely going to be an asocial (if not antisocial) route to go. MLD is not unique in this regard. Most of the people playing in this format are also not interested in playing against hard stax/lockdown decks, either.
Well, to be fair, I thinks it’s been pretty clearly established that MLD does not Combat Ramp in the slightest. Muddying the thread aside(and who are you to make this claim) MLD isn’t the answer anyways, so again, what’s your point?
Buffsam makes a good point. Can we focus less on the social aspect of playing MLD and get back to the original intent of the thread, please?
Buffsam makes a good point. Can we focus less on the social aspect of playing MLD and get back to the original intent of the thread, please?
Everytime someone tries the pro MLD players still talk about the social aspect.
I have yet to hear:
- why MLD is better than single-target land destruction against lands like cradle/coffers
- how can MLD help against other forms of ramp. Mana crypt + Mana vault surely is a lot worse than farseek + cultivate
- how can limited MLD (like wildfire) stop the ramp player
- why harming the other players is better than all together ganging on the ramp player
- why you can't use removal or theft effects against the ramp player.
i'd really like to hear the answers, but i bet the only thing i will get is "you are too entitled because you think land are sacred, they are resources like everything else" or something like that.
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How i feel about competitive players and casual players in EDH: The competitive are german tourists, the casual are italian tourists, both in a italian beach. The italians asking themselves "why are the germans here?" make a legitimate question, the answer is because the beach is beautiful, no matter the country you came from. The italians wanting to ban the germans are dumb, because if the germans pay for their stay and follow the rules like everyone else, they have the right to be in the beach. Hovewer, if the germans started to ask themselves "why are the italians here?"... they would be dumb as hell.
This discussion so far have been pretty much destroy this and destroy that, but why not try to help out the person with the fewest lands with something like Oath of Lieges? The only downside is that enchantment don't take into account all non-land based ramp, but any destruction of non-lands is generally more accepted.
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EDH BGU Sidisi, Brood Tyrant - Lurking Zombies. GBG Sapling of Colfenor - Forest Growth and Destruction. RWU Zedruu the Greathearted - Blinking and trading. GWB Teneb the Harvester - Enchantments, you lose life I gain life. RRR Neheb the Eternal - Ping people for mana burn.
Buffsam makes a good point. Can we focus less on the social aspect of playing MLD and get back to the original intent of the thread, please?
Everytime someone tries the pro MLD players still talk about the social aspect.
I have yet to hear:
- why MLD is better than single-target land destruction against lands like cradle/coffers
- how can MLD help against other forms of ramp. Mana crypt + Mana vault surely is a lot worse than farseek + cultivate
- how can limited MLD (like wildfire) stop the ramp player
- why harming the other players is better than all together ganging on the ramp player
- why you can't use removal or theft effects against the ramp player.
i'd really like to hear the answers, but i bet the only thing i will get is "you are too entitled because you think land are sacred, they are resources like everything else" or something like that.
- MLD is better than targeted in some situations because many ramp decks are fetching basics. Taking out an Omnath or Maelstrom Wanderer deck’s whole mana base in one fell swoop prior to the commander coming down is better than removing that Stomping Ground and delaying the general one turn. Again, it is better in SOME cases.
- MLD does help against Mana Vault, as the vault becomes much less likely to be untapped. But the question here is more of a red herring. No one is arguing that you run MLD in lieu of answers to artifacts. The argument is to run them in tandem. There are a myriad of targeted and mass artifact removal effects that everyone agrees is fine to play.
- Wildfire can deal with multiple types of ramp. It wipes Ramunap Excavator, Oracle of Mul Daya, and a whole host of mana dorks. I play it in my deck where my commander has 5 toughness, so she survives and slowing down the game is beneficial to me. Just yesterday, I used it to slow down a ramp player, while also wiping 13 Zombies cast off a Jeleyva trigger, wiped Jeleyva and made it so she could not be cast again that game. I left myself with Coffers/Urborg and a Mountain, plus Herron Archive and Rakdos Signet. In SOME situations, it’s a great tool. If you can’t see that, then you’ve probably never had it in your hand.
- You can certainly gang up on the ramp player. Just because I have MLD in hand doesn’t mean I can’t try politics first. However, there is no guarantee that the other players will play along. Have you never sat at a table where you think the whole table needs a threat assessment recalibration? I prefer the ability to take matters into my own hands if necessary.
- You are assuming theft and removal just always work. How about an Entwined Tooth and Nail for Avenger of Zendikar and Purphorous? Or a hard cast Emrakul the Promised End? Or any of the other hundreds of things a player can do with tons of mana that removal and cloning fails to solve?
I think the problem you are having is that you think the argument is binary. Either MLD is good or it is bad. My stance is that it can be bad and also it can be good. It’s a spectrum. It is up to the player to assess situations and deploy it or hold it.
I think the problem you are having is that you think the argument is binary. Either MLD is good or it is bad. My stance is that it can be bad and also it can be good. It’s a spectrum. It is up to the player to assess situations and deploy it or hold it.
I have yet to see a situation where MLD good sides outweight its bad sides.
I think the problem you are having is that you think only about your perspective and not about other players also. "Yeah i stopped the ramp player with my armageddon, he was going to win""But i had two counterspells in my hand, i could have stopped him too, no i have to sit down for several turns doing nothing".
Using a wildfire just to kill a ramunap or a mul daya for example will get you o much hate from the table... and for the right reason. The ramp player will still have more land and the others won't be able to do anything.
I agree it's a great a tool, in fact you were able to keep coffers/urborg and become the ramp player yourself. So it wasn't actually a move made for greater justice or to make everything fair, it was just to make you win. Don't complain if other people want to stop you from winning, so they want to stop wildfire.
All the situations you are pointing out feels a lot like magical christmas land. Yeah a player was able to ramp until 9 just with cultivate and rampant growth variants (while the other players have what? 6 lands? 5 lands? 4 lands?), cast tooth and nail, assemble a combo and win without any other player having counterspell or removals?
Many safepoint where you can stop the player without needing MLD and restarting the game.
The only convincing argument you made is about Omnath and similar decks. MLD can really be the best strategy against them.
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How i feel about competitive players and casual players in EDH: The competitive are german tourists, the casual are italian tourists, both in a italian beach. The italians asking themselves "why are the germans here?" make a legitimate question, the answer is because the beach is beautiful, no matter the country you came from. The italians wanting to ban the germans are dumb, because if the germans pay for their stay and follow the rules like everyone else, they have the right to be in the beach. Hovewer, if the germans started to ask themselves "why are the italians here?"... they would be dumb as hell.
I think the problem you are having is that you think only about your perspective and not about other players also. "Yeah i stopped the ramp player with my armageddon, he was going to win""But i had two counterspells in my hand, i could have stopped him too, no i have to sit down for several turns doing nothing".
If you're going to have a huge problem with MLD, then why not counter the MLD? I agree with you about MLD not being the answer vs Ramp. But you can't make arguments like that.
Just play more counters, people. I guarantee you that UU is going to make people think twice about spending an entire turn on one spell.
Encouraging a diversity of strategies in the games you play makes games more fun. Ramp on ramp games are not very back and forth in any format (e.g. R/G Prime-Time mirror-match in a PT Final). If there are aggro decks that can punish a player for doing nothing meaningful for turns 2-5 and decks with some blue that can help police craziness, games will be play out differently more often.
Been following this conversation for a bit, and I am just rather saddened by the lack of 'cut everyone down to certain amount of lands and/or artifacts' style effects. I do realize Balance is not exactly fair (and is rightly banned), but would more five-or-more mana cards that cut everyone down to six lands and two artifacts (or variants thereof) be that bad?
Though I did do a bit of a bulk order of 30-ish Ghost Quarter/Tectonic Edge/Encroaching Wastes to spread across my decks, since this did remind that I could certainly do with more of that in my games.
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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
I think the problem you are having is that you think the argument is binary. Either MLD is good or it is bad. My stance is that it can be bad and also it can be good. It’s a spectrum. It is up to the player to assess situations and deploy it or hold it.
I have yet to see a situation where MLD good sides outweight its bad sides.
I think the problem you are having is that you think only about your perspective and not about other players also. "Yeah i stopped the ramp player with my armageddon, he was going to win""But i had two counterspells in my hand, i could have stopped him too, no i have to sit down for several turns doing nothing".
Using a wildfire just to kill a ramunap or a mul daya for example will get you o much hate from the table... and for the right reason. The ramp player will still have more land and the others won't be able to do anything.
I agree it's a great a tool, in fact you were able to keep coffers/urborg and become the ramp player yourself. So it wasn't actually a move made for greater justice or to make everything fair, it was just to make you win. Don't complain if other people want to stop you from winning, so they want to stop wildfire.
All the situations you are pointing out feels a lot like magical christmas land. Yeah a player was able to ramp until 9 just with cultivate and rampant growth variants (while the other players have what? 6 lands? 5 lands? 4 lands?), cast tooth and nail, assemble a combo and win without any other player having counterspell or removals?
Many safepoint where you can stop the player without needing MLD and restarting the game.
The only convincing argument you made is about Omnath and similar decks. MLD can really be the best strategy against them.
As for you "never seeing the good outweigh the bad," I wrote an instance that happened to me yesterday where it killed 14 creatures and made my opponents' commanders uncastable for several turns while leaving mine on the battlefield with no blockers in the post you quoted. Trust me, it was good.
I also never would play a Wildfire just to kill an Oracle of Mul Daya or an Excavator. I was asked to give a reason why to play a smaller version of MLD like Wildfire and used those creatures as examples of things that are good to sweep away when blowing up lands.
And yeah, I never said I play MLD for "greater justice," so not sure where you got that. The goal is to win the game. I don't run out LD as a panic move. It's a way to combat my opponents (plural) and put myself in the best position to win the game.
- MLD is better than targeted in some situations because many ramp decks are fetching basics. Taking out an Omnath or Maelstrom Wanderer deck’s whole mana base in one fell swoop prior to the commander coming down is better than removing that Stomping Ground and delaying the general one turn. Again, it is better in SOME cases.
If you skip over the fact it hits all 4 players, sure. And who is going to be best equipped to recover? Oh yea the ramp deck.
I think the problem you are having is that you think the argument is binary. Either MLD is good or it is bad. My stance is that it can be bad and also it can be good. It’s a spectrum. It is up to the player to assess situations and deploy it or hold it.
The issue isnt that it is binary, it is that when its bad, it is TERRIBLE. And not for one person, for the table.
If people are sick of reading about stuff just stop taking part. You have 100% control over what you read. Simic Ascendancy isn't going to get banned just because you didn't tell someone to shut up on the internet.
I mean, obviously you have your mind made up on the topic, so it’s probably best we agree to disagree.
I think most people should be able to agree that MLD can be an effective answer to ramp in some situations. The problem, besides all the social contract stuff, is that there are many situations in which it isn't - if they're primarily ramping with artifacts or creatures it's weak. If they already have powerful nonland stuff out it's weak. If you don't have a good recovery plan or a good board, it's weak. If the ramper has a good recovery plan, it's weak. A counterspell, mind twist, etc will practically always at least be a step in the right direction to controlling the player, or at least they definitely won't make things worse.
In the right meta I could see MLD being a reliable counter to certain ramp-based decks and could earn a slot for only that reason, but if I were putting it in a deck without specific meta knowledge it would be primarily as a way to seal a win, and if once in a blue moon it was a good answer to ramp then that would just be a bonus.
If you're going to have a huge problem with MLD, then why not counter the MLD? I agree with you about MLD not being the answer vs Ramp. But you can't make arguments like that.
Hey, i wasted one of my counterspell for your MLD, now i have only one for the dangerous ramp player! Well the alternative was stopping playing for 2-3 turns, so i guess i'll take it!
... so yeah, another situation were MLD just made things worse
As for you "never seeing the good outweigh the bad," I wrote an instance that happened to me yesterday where it killed 14 creatures and made my opponents' commanders uncastable for several turns while leaving mine on the battlefield with no blockers in the post you quoted. Trust me, it was good.
I meant the good for the whole table, not jut for yourself. Of course MLD is good for yourself. The problem is that it's not going to be good for the table in almost any situation, so the table is right to discourage it or KOS.
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How i feel about competitive players and casual players in EDH: The competitive are german tourists, the casual are italian tourists, both in a italian beach. The italians asking themselves "why are the germans here?" make a legitimate question, the answer is because the beach is beautiful, no matter the country you came from. The italians wanting to ban the germans are dumb, because if the germans pay for their stay and follow the rules like everyone else, they have the right to be in the beach. Hovewer, if the germans started to ask themselves "why are the italians here?"... they would be dumb as hell.
I don’t understand what you mean by “good for the table.” When is any kind of board wipe symmetrically good for every in the game?
Usually good for the table means recovering from a lopsided situation where one player is far ahead. Generally symmetrically good for everyone except the person who was ahead.
I don’t understand what you mean by “good for the table.” When is any kind of board wipe symmetrically good for every in the game?
Usually good for the table means recovering from a lopsided situation where one player is far ahead. Generally symmetrically good for everyone except the person who was ahead.
This
If i have 50-100 tokens that are gonna wipe out almost everyone the next turn and you wrath, you did something good for the table. Even if the other players lost some creatures, veryone is still in the game, the disaster was averted and the match can continue.
It wasn't a situation that could be handled in another way, even with the cooperation of all the other players.
And it's not like wraths are sacred too. If used "at random" they can make extremely long and boring.
One of my most terrible game was with a jund deck full of wraths. The guy piloting it was like "you have one more creature than me! wrath!" and made the game last forever.
So yeah the "reset button" cards should be using accordingly when the table need it. And MLD is the most tricky and the most "restting" of all the reset buttons. If you use reset button just to put yourself at advantage or, even worse, at random, expect other players to act accordingly. That means targeting you (at best) or not liking to play with you (at worst).
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How i feel about competitive players and casual players in EDH: The competitive are german tourists, the casual are italian tourists, both in a italian beach. The italians asking themselves "why are the germans here?" make a legitimate question, the answer is because the beach is beautiful, no matter the country you came from. The italians wanting to ban the germans are dumb, because if the germans pay for their stay and follow the rules like everyone else, they have the right to be in the beach. Hovewer, if the germans started to ask themselves "why are the italians here?"... they would be dumb as hell.
Apocalypse is not banned. Madness is now a thing, discarding in red is actually helpful when you build your deck around it. Throwing down some madness creatures after wiping the board seems to bee a good idea.
I feel like Wake of Destruction and other selected MLD like Boil has not been mentioned as an option here.
A Boil matters nothing to the nonblue player, just as a Ruination matters little to nothing to a monocolored deck.
Heck, Living Plane+Pestilence+Parapet makes MLD onesided, and you don't see people rushing to ban In Garruk's Wake.
The thing I think this thread needs to take under consideration is each person's meta. My meta runs a lot of black, so protection from black on a creature is a great idea in my deck, just like if Sir Rampy MonoGreenton McRamperson esq. wins 50% of the time, maybe an Acid Rain or a Wake of Destructionshould be going into your deck.
Maybe you should play reanimator and bring Herald of Leshrac in early to steal their advantage (and run a Claw of Gix to liquidate what would otherwise be returned).
Targeted MLD just takes some planning.
Getting back to Combatting Ramp, not all color combinations are good at it, but red looks to be the boss.
I am not just talking land destruction, Acidic Soil will punish the person with the most resources and Anathemancer lets you target. There are definitely cards that deal damage to a player for each artifact they control or gives them an upkeep cost.
There are many (older) cards created to punish people for having too many resources.
Heck you want to watch someone squirm? Mindslaver them, then on their turn you control, user Bazaar Trader to give them Claw of Gix or just Zuran Orb and take everything from them.
Lastly, and this is heavily meta dependent, what are they doing with all that ramp?
Casting an expensive spell? - Spelljack
Loads of tokens? - Æther Snap (Aether Snap)
Swing wide? - Fog/Constant Mists/Dawnstrider
Storm? - Timestop
After any of these plays stopped, you turn to the other players and say something to the effect of "Did you see what I just stopped? If we don't take this person out by their next turn, I might not have drawn another card that can do something similar. We need to take this person out NOW." Then you have the other players to the brunt of the work ganging up on the player that just tried to go off. If that is your sort of thing. You can keep them in the match if that is how you go about things, its your playgroup after all.
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See points on rocks.
See points on rocks.
Same could be same about basic destruction/disruption.
You are clearly one of the guys the lost point was aimed at.
The point is, if you still have your lands, unless you have built your deck really badly (or strangely, reflecting a few fringe cases), you can rebuild a lot more easily than is usually the case when you don't have lands. Even if you are a dedicated rock-user, you will probably not have the as your only mana sources; you will initially use lands to fuel your playing rocks. If you still have lands after your rocks go kablooie, you can draw into more rocks and cast them, or do something else (presumably your deck has more in it than just rocks). Same with creatures. Blow up someone's critters, they're still behind, but they can cast something else with that land (and maybe other mana) they have available. Everyone being able to do something, even if some of their stuff is blown up, lets people play and maybe continue to have a good time. Blow up the lands, this slows things down a lot more. This is important if your primary goal is to win. If your goal is for everyone to have an enjoyable, social game, not so much, especially if your win doesn't come immediately after (or perhaps as a result of) the MLD.
Also social aspect is already inherent within MTG, its called interacting with the person or people who are your opponent(s) with words, emotions, body language, facial expressions, and physical contact (Example: Handshake for a good game).
You are also doing that thing I personally despise about these types of arguments: You are conflating different aspects of the game as if they meant the same thing. These aspects in this case are: social interaction, personal enjoyment, and gameplay. These aspects can be in conjunction but are also are distinct from each other and are never always all together.
Count me in, then, because I don’t understand your point at all.
To me, this reads like your saying blowing up rocks/dorks screeches the game to a halt much like MLD does. I can’t really wrap my head around your point.
Yeah, no. Giving someone the finger is a social interaction. Calling someone an ******** and pissing on their cards is also a social interaction, albeit not a very appropriate one. The social aspect of EDH is about more than socially interacting, which is indeed inherent to the game. EDH/Commander was designed as a social format, with "social" in this context referring to "creating a mutually enjoyable social experience." If everyone in a play group enjoys MLD, then cool, but the majority of players of this format are not cool with that, and for good reason: Because it is much harder to recover from MLD than from other, more acceptable forms of disruption. Other forms of disruption will rarely, if ever, disrupt the whole game the way MLD will, and if it does, people will almost always recover more slowly.
You can despise that reasoning all you want, but that reaction on your part doesn't change the facts about the social contract and its place in the format, or make your insistence that the game should be played a certain way regardless of whether people are having a good time any less wrong-headed when applied to this specific format of Magic.
If you just care about winning, play with other competitive players, or at least ones who are cool with the same thing, or play other competitive formats. This one was designed to be different, in that it specifically takes things like everyone's enjoyment into account (something that is irrelevant to, say, Legacy or Modern), and is about more than winning. People can choose to play it with the primary concern being competition, and that is cool, but that is not the default, and certainly not the one right way to play it.
Anyway, MLD is imo completely different from other forms of wipe because other forms of wipe can be played around relatively easily. If you know your opponent runs creature wipes, avoid having significantly more value in creatures than they do at a given time to restrict the value they can get, same for artifacts and enchantments. Land wipes are not the same - sandbag lands all you want, if they can establish a dominant position for a single turn and then wipe lands, no amount of preparation will save you or help you reload faster than 1 land per turn (barring exploration or what-have-you).
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
At its core, MLD is a control strategy focusing on eliminating as much of each opponent's resources at possible. It is actually much more effective in controlling the table in a multiplayer game than are more conventional control strategies such as counterspells, bouncing permanents and hand destruction. As such, considered from purely a strategic point of view, MLD is a strong option to consider, especially in certain colors, if all you care about is winning the game. And if competition is the primary focus of whomever you are playing with, that's fine. But since that isn't what the majority of Commander players are looking for, pursuing that strategy is largely going to be an asocial (if not antisocial) route to go. MLD is not unique in this regard. Most of the people playing in this format are also not interested in playing against hard stax/lockdown decks, either.
Buffsam makes a good point. Can we focus less on the social aspect of playing MLD and get back to the original intent of the thread, please?
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Everytime someone tries the pro MLD players still talk about the social aspect.
I have yet to hear:
- why MLD is better than single-target land destruction against lands like cradle/coffers
- how can MLD help against other forms of ramp. Mana crypt + Mana vault surely is a lot worse than farseek + cultivate
- how can limited MLD (like wildfire) stop the ramp player
- why harming the other players is better than all together ganging on the ramp player
- why you can't use removal or theft effects against the ramp player.
i'd really like to hear the answers, but i bet the only thing i will get is "you are too entitled because you think land are sacred, they are resources like everything else" or something like that.
BGU Sidisi, Brood Tyrant - Lurking Zombies.
GBG Sapling of Colfenor - Forest Growth and Destruction.
RWU Zedruu the Greathearted - Blinking and trading.
GWB Teneb the Harvester - Enchantments, you lose life I gain life.
RRR Neheb the Eternal - Ping people for mana burn.
- MLD is better than targeted in some situations because many ramp decks are fetching basics. Taking out an Omnath or Maelstrom Wanderer deck’s whole mana base in one fell swoop prior to the commander coming down is better than removing that Stomping Ground and delaying the general one turn. Again, it is better in SOME cases.
- MLD does help against Mana Vault, as the vault becomes much less likely to be untapped. But the question here is more of a red herring. No one is arguing that you run MLD in lieu of answers to artifacts. The argument is to run them in tandem. There are a myriad of targeted and mass artifact removal effects that everyone agrees is fine to play.
- Wildfire can deal with multiple types of ramp. It wipes Ramunap Excavator, Oracle of Mul Daya, and a whole host of mana dorks. I play it in my deck where my commander has 5 toughness, so she survives and slowing down the game is beneficial to me. Just yesterday, I used it to slow down a ramp player, while also wiping 13 Zombies cast off a Jeleyva trigger, wiped Jeleyva and made it so she could not be cast again that game. I left myself with Coffers/Urborg and a Mountain, plus Herron Archive and Rakdos Signet. In SOME situations, it’s a great tool. If you can’t see that, then you’ve probably never had it in your hand.
- You can certainly gang up on the ramp player. Just because I have MLD in hand doesn’t mean I can’t try politics first. However, there is no guarantee that the other players will play along. Have you never sat at a table where you think the whole table needs a threat assessment recalibration? I prefer the ability to take matters into my own hands if necessary.
- You are assuming theft and removal just always work. How about an Entwined Tooth and Nail for Avenger of Zendikar and Purphorous? Or a hard cast Emrakul the Promised End? Or any of the other hundreds of things a player can do with tons of mana that removal and cloning fails to solve?
I think the problem you are having is that you think the argument is binary. Either MLD is good or it is bad. My stance is that it can be bad and also it can be good. It’s a spectrum. It is up to the player to assess situations and deploy it or hold it.
RBGLiving EndRBG
EDH
UFblthpU
BRXantchaRB
BGVarolzGB
URWZedruuWRU
I have yet to see a situation where MLD good sides outweight its bad sides.
I think the problem you are having is that you think only about your perspective and not about other players also. "Yeah i stopped the ramp player with my armageddon, he was going to win""But i had two counterspells in my hand, i could have stopped him too, no i have to sit down for several turns doing nothing".
Using a wildfire just to kill a ramunap or a mul daya for example will get you o much hate from the table... and for the right reason. The ramp player will still have more land and the others won't be able to do anything.
I agree it's a great a tool, in fact you were able to keep coffers/urborg and become the ramp player yourself. So it wasn't actually a move made for greater justice or to make everything fair, it was just to make you win. Don't complain if other people want to stop you from winning, so they want to stop wildfire.
All the situations you are pointing out feels a lot like magical christmas land. Yeah a player was able to ramp until 9 just with cultivate and rampant growth variants (while the other players have what? 6 lands? 5 lands? 4 lands?), cast tooth and nail, assemble a combo and win without any other player having counterspell or removals?
Many safepoint where you can stop the player without needing MLD and restarting the game.
The only convincing argument you made is about Omnath and similar decks. MLD can really be the best strategy against them.
If you're going to have a huge problem with MLD, then why not counter the MLD? I agree with you about MLD not being the answer vs Ramp. But you can't make arguments like that.
Just play more counters, people. I guarantee you that UU is going to make people think twice about spending an entire turn on one spell.
Encouraging a diversity of strategies in the games you play makes games more fun. Ramp on ramp games are not very back and forth in any format (e.g. R/G Prime-Time mirror-match in a PT Final). If there are aggro decks that can punish a player for doing nothing meaningful for turns 2-5 and decks with some blue that can help police craziness, games will be play out differently more often.
Though I did do a bit of a bulk order of 30-ish Ghost Quarter/Tectonic Edge/Encroaching Wastes to spread across my decks, since this did remind that I could certainly do with more of that in my games.
As for you "never seeing the good outweigh the bad," I wrote an instance that happened to me yesterday where it killed 14 creatures and made my opponents' commanders uncastable for several turns while leaving mine on the battlefield with no blockers in the post you quoted. Trust me, it was good.
I also never would play a Wildfire just to kill an Oracle of Mul Daya or an Excavator. I was asked to give a reason why to play a smaller version of MLD like Wildfire and used those creatures as examples of things that are good to sweep away when blowing up lands.
And yeah, I never said I play MLD for "greater justice," so not sure where you got that. The goal is to win the game. I don't run out LD as a panic move. It's a way to combat my opponents (plural) and put myself in the best position to win the game.
RBGLiving EndRBG
EDH
UFblthpU
BRXantchaRB
BGVarolzGB
URWZedruuWRU
The issue isnt that it is binary, it is that when its bad, it is TERRIBLE. And not for one person, for the table.
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EDH
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BGVarolzGB
URWZedruuWRU
In the right meta I could see MLD being a reliable counter to certain ramp-based decks and could earn a slot for only that reason, but if I were putting it in a deck without specific meta knowledge it would be primarily as a way to seal a win, and if once in a blue moon it was a good answer to ramp then that would just be a bonus.
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
Hey, i wasted one of my counterspell for your MLD, now i have only one for the dangerous ramp player! Well the alternative was stopping playing for 2-3 turns, so i guess i'll take it!
... so yeah, another situation were MLD just made things worse
I meant the good for the whole table, not jut for yourself. Of course MLD is good for yourself. The problem is that it's not going to be good for the table in almost any situation, so the table is right to discourage it or KOS.
RBGLiving EndRBG
EDH
UFblthpU
BRXantchaRB
BGVarolzGB
URWZedruuWRU
Usually good for the table means recovering from a lopsided situation where one player is far ahead. Generally symmetrically good for everyone except the person who was ahead.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
This
If i have 50-100 tokens that are gonna wipe out almost everyone the next turn and you wrath, you did something good for the table. Even if the other players lost some creatures, veryone is still in the game, the disaster was averted and the match can continue.
It wasn't a situation that could be handled in another way, even with the cooperation of all the other players.
And it's not like wraths are sacred too. If used "at random" they can make extremely long and boring.
One of my most terrible game was with a jund deck full of wraths. The guy piloting it was like "you have one more creature than me! wrath!" and made the game last forever.
So yeah the "reset button" cards should be using accordingly when the table need it. And MLD is the most tricky and the most "restting" of all the reset buttons. If you use reset button just to put yourself at advantage or, even worse, at random, expect other players to act accordingly. That means targeting you (at best) or not liking to play with you (at worst).
I feel like Wake of Destruction and other selected MLD like Boil has not been mentioned as an option here.
A Boil matters nothing to the nonblue player, just as a Ruination matters little to nothing to a monocolored deck.
Heck, Living Plane+Pestilence+Parapet makes MLD onesided, and you don't see people rushing to ban In Garruk's Wake.
The thing I think this thread needs to take under consideration is each person's meta. My meta runs a lot of black, so protection from black on a creature is a great idea in my deck, just like if Sir Rampy MonoGreenton McRamperson esq. wins 50% of the time, maybe an Acid Rain or a Wake of Destructionshould be going into your deck.
Maybe you should play reanimator and bring Herald of Leshrac in early to steal their advantage (and run a Claw of Gix to liquidate what would otherwise be returned).
Targeted MLD just takes some planning.
Getting back to Combatting Ramp, not all color combinations are good at it, but red looks to be the boss.
I am not just talking land destruction, Acidic Soil will punish the person with the most resources and Anathemancer lets you target. There are definitely cards that deal damage to a player for each artifact they control or gives them an upkeep cost.
There are many (older) cards created to punish people for having too many resources.
Heck you want to watch someone squirm? Mindslaver them, then on their turn you control, user Bazaar Trader to give them Claw of Gix or just Zuran Orb and take everything from them.
Lastly, and this is heavily meta dependent, what are they doing with all that ramp?
Casting an expensive spell? - Spelljack
Loads of tokens? - Æther Snap (Aether Snap)
Swing wide? - Fog/Constant Mists/Dawnstrider
Storm? - Timestop
After any of these plays stopped, you turn to the other players and say something to the effect of "Did you see what I just stopped? If we don't take this person out by their next turn, I might not have drawn another card that can do something similar. We need to take this person out NOW." Then you have the other players to the brunt of the work ganging up on the player that just tried to go off. If that is your sort of thing. You can keep them in the match if that is how you go about things, its your playgroup after all.