Victory really has no place on the ban list. It's incomparably weak to many of the combos present in the format, requiring a minimum of nine mana and five cards to pull off. Its continuing presence on the banlist along with several cards is one of the primary reasons I feel the current rules committee is inadequate.
It's shocking to see someone feel this way. I believe Coalition Victory is the posterchild for what a banned card should look like.
Coalition Victory ends the game instantly when it resolves. That's probably the least satisfying way to end a game of Commander. Why would someone want this card running around in the format? It just completely invalidates every decision made before it was cast. Plus, it's trivially easy to assemble the conditions needed to cast it. Between fetches, shocks, and a slew of Cultivate effects, all a player needs is eight mana and their Commander. Lands can hardly be considered combo pieces. Not to mention there's almost no way to interact with it. Players can counter it or try to destroy creatures/lands in response to it, but that's it. It isn't like other alternate win condition cards such as Helix Pinnacle that trigger only during the upkeep, allowing other players a chance to use sorcery speed cards in an attempt to stop it. Coalition Victory literally just ends the game.
EDIT: A word
If you're able to assemble Coalition Victory, you deserve to invalidate every decision made before it (which also isn't true. You need to both get three highyl specific lands into play, cast an extremely high color investment creature, AND somehow put an 8-CMC card which in turn has an insane color cost, all without anyone playing a single answer against you. It in no way invalidates previous decisions, as the combo is weak to nearly every form of removal or stax under the sun. You can delay hard-casting it indefinitely just by keeping a Gaddock Teeg around. It's a win condition, and just like every other win condition in all of EDH, it's entirely dependent on decisions made by you and your opponents). Meanwhile you can just cast Ad Nauseam on someone else's turn and storm out on your next mainphase with protection and multiple lines of victory. It's the same thing, only with most combos, you get to watch your opponent play with himself for several minutes while he goes off. Coalition Victory is at least a clean win, which is more than most combos can say. And it's certainly not unique in being a win the game on the spot card. laboratory maniac is one of the most ubiquitous win conditions in EDH. He's only put into play when his controller's victory is guaranteed. He's far, far better than Coalition Victory, yet there's hardly a peep about him being banworthy. Any way you slice it, Victory's card's place on the banlist just doesn't make sense.
Victory really has no place on the ban list. It's incomparably weak to many of the combos present in the format, requiring a minimum of nine mana and five cards to pull off. Its continuing presence on the banlist along with several cards is one of the primary reasons I feel the current rules committee is inadequate.
The majority of the cards currently on the banlist could be safely removed without damaging the format. You'd have cards like Gifts Ungiven and recurring Nightmare, which are playable without being terribly strong. You'd even get a few totally unplayable cards like Coalition Victory and Worldfire. However, there are a few cards that the format simply couldn't handle. Things like Tolarian Academy and Tinker: cards that turn games into coin flips. or the Moxen, which heavily punish anything less than 5C decks.
Derevi USED TO be one of the strongest commanders in EDH thanks mainly to her tap/untap ability (though her other effects did contribute). However, she was severely weakened over a year ago due to the Partial Paris rule change. It took away her consistency and much of her speed, knocking her out of the top rankings. Currently, she's a fairly strong stax (Prison) commander.
I try to build all of my decks as competitively as possible. While not all reach '10' due to the natural limitations of the color identity and/or commander, I would like to think all of them are at the upper end of the spectrum. For example, Ad Nauseam Zur is obviously a 10, but my midrange Marath build is probably closer to an 8 or 8.5.
I'll do a quit breakdown of some of my person favorites. Links can be found to all of them in my signature for those interested.
Ad Nuaseam Zur: 10. Essentially the strongest deck in the format after the Vancouver mulligan change. Multiple lines of victory and consistent turn 4 wins put the deck right at the top of the list.
Boonweaver Karador: 10. Another wickedly powerful deck. It utilizes slowing elements of stax and hatebears to control the game, though it's signature combo can be assembled as early as turn 1 with a decent starting hand.
Derevi Prison: 9.5. Derevi suffered a lot from the mulligan change, having to drop many glass-cannon lokpieces in favor of more midrange tools. However, she's still undeniably one of the commanders decks in the format.
Food Chain Prossh: 9.5. Speedy wins and several lines of victory make Prossh both powerful and resilient.
Mimeoplasm Midrange: 9.5. Arguably the best devoted reanimator deck in the format, Mimeoplasm excels at comboing off quickly and consistently. Being in the best tri-color combination in the format, it has the tools to deal with nearly any situation and the explosiveness to outrace nearly any deck.
Brago Stax: 9.5. A powerful stax deck that excels at locking the board quickly and assembling its main win condition: Strionic Resonator combo.
Imperial Animar: 9.5. An extremely fast deck that can combo out by turn 4, or simply win via massive attrition. It's essentially 'creature storm', able to play through large chunks of the deck in a single turn until an infinite combo is hit.
Arcum Dagsson Stax: 9. A powerful mono-blue stax deck that can either lock down the board, or win quickly via an infinite artifact combo. Both can be accomplished simultaneously thanks to the deck's extremely low reliance on mana.
Teferi Stax: 9. Another powerful mono blue stax deck.
Yisan Midrange: 9. A quickly rising all-star in competitive metas. He gets shut down by a multitude of things, but his insane consistency and multiple paths to victory make Yisan a deck to be reckoned with.
Glass Cannon Narset: 9. Fallen pretty far since the Mulligan change.
If you're looking to climb up the totem pole of power, zur the enchanter is the obvious upgrade from Oloro. He's even more painful to play against, though. Either you're building a back-breaking stax deck that allows zero interaction and drags up the same boring enchantment strings, or you're building Esper storm and playing solitaire until you win on turn 3/4.
If you're looking to play something more fun in Esper colors, I would advise Esper Artifacts with Sharuum at the helm. She's also an upgrade from Oloro, but she's quite fun to play and play against most of the time.
The deck typically has enough many dorks and other alternate mana sources that it gets hit less hard by MLD than most decks. If it's super prevalent in your meta, Crucible of Worlds might be worth sticking in. cryptolith rite also helps.
The deck runs over most common forms of stax, and even plays several stax pieces itself. Not an issue usually.
Lili, Bishop, and Reshaper all don't do enough for the deck to justify inclusion.
Have you heard about our lord and savior, Dankchantress yet? The One True Deck.
In all seriousness, there are several ways to build Derevi. However, one archetype stands head and shoulders above the others: Stax. Derevi's ability has a somewhat unique and utterly broken interaction with winter orb and all its many friends. Combine that with with the best slew of hate bears in the game (with the possible exception of Naya), and you have a recipe for one of the strongest decks in the entire format. Decklist For Reference
Hmmmm, is it possible to send a link to your lists of Meren?
It would be interesting to argue about an actual list, if possible.
All the arguments here seem solid; considering a meta with counterspells in which combos are, at best, a dream, what is the status fo Meren?
I have a link to my build in my signature. Here's a fresher one though. Link
Meren, and midrange in general, naturally has a favorable matchup against both traditional control and stax. Meren herself more or less poops on hard control, since any countered creatures not exiled can be recurred without casting. Assuming hard combos are out of reach, winning via stax loops and raw value is quite feasible.
Stax is undeniably the strongest build for Brago competitively. Indeed, it's one of the strongest decks in the format. Consistently locking opponents out of the game in the first few turns and comboing off with Strionic Resonator as early as turn 2 > anything other iterations of Brago can accomplish, especially Voltron based strategies.
If you're doing a 2HG event, edric, spymaster of trest is the way to go. He does indeed play control, though it comes across as more of tempo due to the way he plays out. He's disgustingly strong in matches where he only has to worry about one opponent (he's banned in French Commander with good reason). He's excellent when paired with any deck that likes to go wide. Elfball, Animar, Krenko goblins, etc. The most disgusting, evil, unholy thing you could do is have your friend play Edric as well. Double Edric is truly a nightmare to behold. The deck can be built on a budget of $50 and still perform exceedingly well.
Artifact-heavy commanders that I've personally had positive experiences with:
1. brago, king eternal. His ability allows him to exile (untap) all nonland permanents he controls every turn. This makes mana rocks a key component of the deck, allowing him to break stax parity and use entirely one-sided cards like [[static orb]] and [[embargo]]. He's wickedly strong-- easily Tier 1 when built correctly.
5. sydri, galvanic genius. While not as strong as the four previously listed commanders, Sydri has great artifact synergies. She can win by blowing up everyone's lands with mycosynth lattice, assembling an infinite combo, or simply beating face with an army of artifacts.
6. daretti, scrap savant. Yet another stax commander. Daretti wins by coming down quickly and getting his ult online, allowing him to create one-sided destruction. All of his abilities are extremely relevant.
If you only use it in your group, and they're fine with it, then sure. Just know that if you ever try to take the deck to any kind of official event, you'll be DQ'd almost immediately, as it's considered cheating.
I've done this a few times, only we played on Cockatrice, and only used Skype for the voice chat to make the game feel realer and more friendly. Using Skype by itself is rough, because often the camera is too grainy or oddly angled to even see what your opponent is doing. It's far better when paired with a MtG media like Cockatrice, Untap, Tabbletop, or MtGO.
If you're able to assemble Coalition Victory, you deserve to invalidate every decision made before it (which also isn't true. You need to both get three highyl specific lands into play, cast an extremely high color investment creature, AND somehow put an 8-CMC card which in turn has an insane color cost, all without anyone playing a single answer against you. It in no way invalidates previous decisions, as the combo is weak to nearly every form of removal or stax under the sun. You can delay hard-casting it indefinitely just by keeping a Gaddock Teeg around. It's a win condition, and just like every other win condition in all of EDH, it's entirely dependent on decisions made by you and your opponents). Meanwhile you can just cast Ad Nauseam on someone else's turn and storm out on your next mainphase with protection and multiple lines of victory. It's the same thing, only with most combos, you get to watch your opponent play with himself for several minutes while he goes off. Coalition Victory is at least a clean win, which is more than most combos can say. And it's certainly not unique in being a win the game on the spot card. laboratory maniac is one of the most ubiquitous win conditions in EDH. He's only put into play when his controller's victory is guaranteed. He's far, far better than Coalition Victory, yet there's hardly a peep about him being banworthy. Any way you slice it, Victory's card's place on the banlist just doesn't make sense.
I'll do a quit breakdown of some of my person favorites. Links can be found to all of them in my signature for those interested.
Ad Nuaseam Zur: 10. Essentially the strongest deck in the format after the Vancouver mulligan change. Multiple lines of victory and consistent turn 4 wins put the deck right at the top of the list.
Boonweaver Karador: 10. Another wickedly powerful deck. It utilizes slowing elements of stax and hatebears to control the game, though it's signature combo can be assembled as early as turn 1 with a decent starting hand.
Derevi Prison: 9.5. Derevi suffered a lot from the mulligan change, having to drop many glass-cannon lokpieces in favor of more midrange tools. However, she's still undeniably one of the commanders decks in the format.
Food Chain Prossh: 9.5. Speedy wins and several lines of victory make Prossh both powerful and resilient.
Mimeoplasm Midrange: 9.5. Arguably the best devoted reanimator deck in the format, Mimeoplasm excels at comboing off quickly and consistently. Being in the best tri-color combination in the format, it has the tools to deal with nearly any situation and the explosiveness to outrace nearly any deck.
Brago Stax: 9.5. A powerful stax deck that excels at locking the board quickly and assembling its main win condition: Strionic Resonator combo.
Imperial Animar: 9.5. An extremely fast deck that can combo out by turn 4, or simply win via massive attrition. It's essentially 'creature storm', able to play through large chunks of the deck in a single turn until an infinite combo is hit.
Arcum Dagsson Stax: 9. A powerful mono-blue stax deck that can either lock down the board, or win quickly via an infinite artifact combo. Both can be accomplished simultaneously thanks to the deck's extremely low reliance on mana.
Teferi Stax: 9. Another powerful mono blue stax deck.
Yisan Midrange: 9. A quickly rising all-star in competitive metas. He gets shut down by a multitude of things, but his insane consistency and multiple paths to victory make Yisan a deck to be reckoned with.
Glass Cannon Narset: 9. Fallen pretty far since the Mulligan change.
Sisay Stax: 8.5
Meren Midrange: 8.5
Marath Midrange: 8
Kaalia Stax: 7.5
Shattergang Stax: 7.5
Splinter Twin Sedris: 7.5
Grenzo Doomsday: 7.5
If you're looking to play something more fun in Esper colors, I would advise Esper Artifacts with Sharuum at the helm. She's also an upgrade from Oloro, but she's quite fun to play and play against most of the time.
The deck runs over most common forms of stax, and even plays several stax pieces itself. Not an issue usually.
Lili, Bishop, and Reshaper all don't do enough for the deck to justify inclusion.
In all seriousness, there are several ways to build Derevi. However, one archetype stands head and shoulders above the others: Stax. Derevi's ability has a somewhat unique and utterly broken interaction with winter orb and all its many friends. Combine that with with the best slew of hate bears in the game (with the possible exception of Naya), and you have a recipe for one of the strongest decks in the entire format. Decklist For Reference
I have a link to my build in my signature. Here's a fresher one though. Link
Meren, and midrange in general, naturally has a favorable matchup against both traditional control and stax. Meren herself more or less poops on hard control, since any countered creatures not exiled can be recurred without casting. Assuming hard combos are out of reach, winning via stax loops and raw value is quite feasible.
1. brago, king eternal. His ability allows him to exile (untap) all nonland permanents he controls every turn. This makes mana rocks a key component of the deck, allowing him to break stax parity and use entirely one-sided cards like [[static orb]] and [[embargo]]. He's wickedly strong-- easily Tier 1 when built correctly.
2. teferi, temporal archmage. Another stax commander, he too heavily abuses artifact mana, and has several artifact-based win conditions like the chain veil and ward of bones.
3. sharuum the hedgemon. Most of her win conditions are assembled through artifacts.
4. arcum dagsson. No introduction needed.
5. sydri, galvanic genius. While not as strong as the four previously listed commanders, Sydri has great artifact synergies. She can win by blowing up everyone's lands with mycosynth lattice, assembling an infinite combo, or simply beating face with an army of artifacts.
6. daretti, scrap savant. Yet another stax commander. Daretti wins by coming down quickly and getting his ult online, allowing him to create one-sided destruction. All of his abilities are extremely relevant.