I tend to take those kind of decks apart, learn from them and make more "table-friendly" decks in the future.
One of my earliest EDH decks was a Darigaaz deck with a relatively simple plan: make everyone draw, ramp myself like nuts, symmetrically destroy lands (leaving me often the only able to cast stuff for real), punish people based on handsize (Price of Knowledge and every Sudden Impact variant...)... profit?
But it was unfun to the extreme to play against if it worked - and if it didn't, I just accelerated everyone and got routed if anyone knew my gameplan. I have not made that idea(or similar) again since scrapping the deck, although there's been the occasional deck idea I've left on the drawing board as I've realized the 'fun factor' might not be there.
Well, I have completed said challenge... and a couple of extras. I have the names (and loosely speaking, main ideas) in my signature, but I am happy to expand on any of them if any get you curious. They range from aggro to midrange to big dumb battlecruiser, casual to pseudo-competitive, and cover pretty much every playstyle except hard control or stax (just not my cup of tea I've found out).
As for general finding a theme or commander to build around... well, these days I am definitely looking at 'what haven't I done yet in this color combo or a combo that shares colors with this?'. Usually sparked by a new legendary thing being spoiled these days too, as there's very few themes I haven't at least tried out in a deck before, by this point.
A good starting point is picking a commander you like, mull about what themes or mechanics would support said commander and deviate from there. Currently building a Temmet, Vizier of Naktamun deck centering on odd things that make tokens + exalted, with the goal of attacking with just with the one big-dumb token that's also unblockable thanks to Temmet. Silly? You bet. Might get the occasional game where a well-time wrath ruins me? Oh yeah. Still probably fun to pilot and rather very far from your typical Azorius controld deck? Mmmhm.
Some of the art are pretty darn spiffy, I'll give em that...
But I absolutely loathe playing cards I can't read the abilities of. It tends to lead people misremembering what the cards' effects are more often than not, unless the card is something along the lines of Lightning Bolt in simplicity.
Well that, and I have 34 decks. If I started pimping them I'd go broke real fast.
I plan on playing it in my Karador deck which basically consists of token makers and ways to gain life/draw cards off of those tokens. I reckon the card will be strong there without an obvious way to 'combo off' - although granted the curve of the deck combined with life gain can potentially still end up with a turn where I play a third of my deck, my life total doesn't noticeably change, and have a pretty ridiclous Overrun-able board if should I get my next turn - or kill people with Blood Artist effects should someone wrath.
Curiously, a lot of the 'fairness' of the concede can be linked to the amount of salt visible on the conceding player's face/the table in general.
If the player is conceding because the game is down to two and it's obvious they can't win, there's very rarely any sour blood. (*looks at the top card of library at start of turn, shrugs* "Yep, you got it.")
...but if the concede is done out of spite or in response to that Bribery, it's generally pretty obvious there's lemons involved in the game already.
Personally, I don't mind if anyone concedes, although doing it just because you can does sour my opinion of you a touch if you're just doing it 'because I am not winning'. Last I personally checked, winning is not the sole goal of the format.
On my own side of things I tend to be waaaaay more on the 'let's see this to the end' side, even if I am obviously on the losing side. Granted, my love of Fogs, Batwing Brumes and Mirror Strikes of every variety might have something to do with this too...
In the end, I have about 70 cards I am going to try, spread across 34 decks.
Probably won't end up even putting all of those in, but I am still very positively surprised about the quality of this set, commons and uncommons in particular have a lot of pretty usable stuff compared to earlier sets.
As usual, the spread is pretty uneven; got a couple of decks that got nothing from the set (Damia land/discard, Tazri ally etb combo) and a couple of decks that are getting 6 cards (Karametra land animator, Licia legendary lifegain).
A lot of cards are just 'that looks fun' more than actually 'this is exactly what my deck does' though, so I'll see how much of the cards actually stick once I have to figure out what to take out to put them in...
This set has definitely gotten a lot better than I presumed from the initial premise. For the first time I am actually also interested in the story. I am happy to have been proven wrong.
Yep, except I now have a dilemma: so far, I've kept the Varina deck so that every nonland card either is a zombie or references zombies in its' rules text... and that the only kind of token the deck makes is the standard 2/2 black zombie.
Oketra makes better zombies, which oddly slightly breaks the themage. Nyyerf.
A very solid wincon in Thromok the Insatiable, for all the same reasons it is in Prossh - though at least Thromok has to first have the tokens to devour as he doesn't come with them
Oooh, I like this approach to her. Tokens, destroy/exile them for benefit, build a board, then use the same removal cards to clear the way once you have an army.
Divergent Transformations should probably also be there, and could potentially be real scary if you get to cast it on repeated turns on your tokens and get big expensive stuff instead.
One of my earliest EDH decks was a Darigaaz deck with a relatively simple plan: make everyone draw, ramp myself like nuts, symmetrically destroy lands (leaving me often the only able to cast stuff for real), punish people based on handsize (Price of Knowledge and every Sudden Impact variant...)... profit?
But it was unfun to the extreme to play against if it worked - and if it didn't, I just accelerated everyone and got routed if anyone knew my gameplan. I have not made that idea(or similar) again since scrapping the deck, although there's been the occasional deck idea I've left on the drawing board as I've realized the 'fun factor' might not be there.
As for general finding a theme or commander to build around... well, these days I am definitely looking at 'what haven't I done yet in this color combo or a combo that shares colors with this?'. Usually sparked by a new legendary thing being spoiled these days too, as there's very few themes I haven't at least tried out in a deck before, by this point.
A good starting point is picking a commander you like, mull about what themes or mechanics would support said commander and deviate from there. Currently building a Temmet, Vizier of Naktamun deck centering on odd things that make tokens + exalted, with the goal of attacking with just with the one big-dumb token that's also unblockable thanks to Temmet. Silly? You bet. Might get the occasional game where a well-time wrath ruins me? Oh yeah. Still probably fun to pilot and rather very far from your typical Azorius controld deck? Mmmhm.
But I absolutely loathe playing cards I can't read the abilities of. It tends to lead people misremembering what the cards' effects are more often than not, unless the card is something along the lines of Lightning Bolt in simplicity.
Well that, and I have 34 decks. If I started pimping them I'd go broke real fast.
If the player is conceding because the game is down to two and it's obvious they can't win, there's very rarely any sour blood. (*looks at the top card of library at start of turn, shrugs* "Yep, you got it.")
...but if the concede is done out of spite or in response to that Bribery, it's generally pretty obvious there's lemons involved in the game already.
Personally, I don't mind if anyone concedes, although doing it just because you can does sour my opinion of you a touch if you're just doing it 'because I am not winning'. Last I personally checked, winning is not the sole goal of the format.
On my own side of things I tend to be waaaaay more on the 'let's see this to the end' side, even if I am obviously on the losing side. Granted, my love of Fogs, Batwing Brumes and Mirror Strikes of every variety might have something to do with this too...
Probably won't end up even putting all of those in, but I am still very positively surprised about the quality of this set, commons and uncommons in particular have a lot of pretty usable stuff compared to earlier sets.
As usual, the spread is pretty uneven; got a couple of decks that got nothing from the set (Damia land/discard, Tazri ally etb combo) and a couple of decks that are getting 6 cards (Karametra land animator, Licia legendary lifegain).
A lot of cards are just 'that looks fun' more than actually 'this is exactly what my deck does' though, so I'll see how much of the cards actually stick once I have to figure out what to take out to put them in...
...the deck didn't last long. <.<
Yep, that it does, but I am a slave to a theme.
'Missing out' is subjective anyway, though I did indeed (mildly) miss on not having those two cards in. Now Oketra joins them.
Also, how about that Casualties of War? New staple much?
This set has definitely gotten a lot better than I presumed from the initial premise. For the first time I am actually also interested in the story. I am happy to have been proven wrong.
...what?
Yep, except I now have a dilemma: so far, I've kept the Varina deck so that every nonland card either is a zombie or references zombies in its' rules text... and that the only kind of token the deck makes is the standard 2/2 black zombie.
Oketra makes better zombies, which oddly slightly breaks the themage. Nyyerf.
Oooh, I like this approach to her. Tokens, destroy/exile them for benefit, build a board, then use the same removal cards to clear the way once you have an army.
Divergent Transformations should probably also be there, and could potentially be real scary if you get to cast it on repeated turns on your tokens and get big expensive stuff instead.