I have championed to unban Library for a few years now, but the impression I got was that the few cards that are banned under PBtE are cemented on that list, and that this criteria is basically dead which won't apply to any additional cards. Personally, I think that you are opening a can of worms if you take price into consideration for future bannings.
No one has mentioned this at all in our discussions, so I have no reason to believe that it's off the table when it comes to discussions about bannings and unbannings going forward.
2) It has been my understanding that how their decisions affect prices is not a concern for the RC, at least not one that they wish to address. Are you speaking for yourself or individual members, or the collective?
I'm speaking for myself, but there's a part of the philosophy document that says that the format is to be steered to avoid significant barriers to entry. This has come into play in discussions of unbanning some cards that are likely innocuous for the format at this time but whose price makes them unobtainable for all but a few players.
Lets lay some ground rules:
1) Fractured Powerstone and Paliano, the High City are nonequivalent examples that have no weight in the discussion.
2) Concerns about price are a non-issue.
3) If a player would hypothetically misbehave with using wishes, they are obviously violating the social contract / gentleman's agreement.
4) The arguments against wishes that are "do we really need them?" and "but the RC made this rule years ago so..." are nonarguments.
5) The reason this discussion came about recently is because of misunderstanding and confusion, which rule 13 already creates for the masses who don't know about it, ergo clarity and strict rules are more desirable than murkiness and house rules.
1) Agreed.
2) Except that it is. Cards cost money and making cards more desirable suddenly is something that has to be taken into account by the RC and the CAG. We're not WotC and we're allowed to acknowledge the existence of the secondary market.
3) This is true for anything in Commander, not just wishes. What makes Wishes special is the degree to which a bad or ignorant actor can abuse them to the detriment of everyone else in the game.
4) You are literally arguing that a rule of the format should be changed. The onus is on the side asking for change to prove that change is better than the status quo. Inertia is a powerful force.
5) Rule 13 was clarified for exactly this reason. Should ignorance of any given rule by some percentage of the playerbase be a valid reason to argue for removal of that rule? I don't think so.
A question for everyone complaining about Rule 13 re: Wishes, etc.:
Nothing functionally changed in the rule with this update, so why is everyone getting all argumentative about it now?
My two cents: Coming from a judge/tournament Magic background, it goes against most of my instincts to insist on anything other than being able to concede at any time for any reason. I understand that there are strategic and political implications to concession in multiplayer games, but those are things that the playgroup can work out among themselves.
At the same time, I'm not a fan of conceding to deny someone triggers or resources. In my mind, a concession shortly before you would lose anyway is just shortcutting to that point and none of the benefits of the kill should be lost to the aggressor.
Finally, I'll note that if snap concessions are a problem in your play group, then feel free to invoke Rule 0 and make a house rule preventing them.
Whirlpool Warrior - why this card?
I think there are too many coin-flip cards. I think you need a bit more ramp. Like... 3-4 more ramp cards at least. You have two 5-drop commanders and you really want both out.
I'm thinking Mind Stone, Worn Powerstone, Izzet Locket and Thought Vessel.
Whirlpool Warrior is a reasonable bit of card churn for the deck. It can also mess up other players after they've tutored, etc. Additionally, it's a warrior and has synergy with Lovisa if I get her out. The biggest reason for its inclusion here, though, is that the deck needed more bodies and I like the card and think it's fine.
I agree that there might be too many coin flip cards, but I haven't played the deck enough yet to know which ones I don't like yet. I did do a quick once through the deck, though, and replaced Tide of War with Worn Powerstone.
I'm still curious to know if you ever tried running some of the Changelings for the Sphinx slots. It's not like they are all-stars on their own, but I would think that some of the same principals that apply to Edgar Markov Vampires would apply here; that almost any cheap Sphinx becomes instantly playable due to the trigger. Amoeboid Changeling and Shapesharer seem like they could be good.
I haven't tried them, but honestly, I'm just not interested in them. The upside of my creatures being Sphinxes is that they all have reasonable flying bodies, and with Unesh out, 4 CMC Sphinxes only cost 2 anyway, so the value of a naturally cheap changeling isn't really worth it. The deck really isn't that interested in more 1-cost sphinxes.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, another coin flip deck with the Eyes from Battlebond, I know.
I've done my best to make this deck different from the typical decks I've seen others build around these two, though, so I hope you'll enjoy my take on it.
Anyway, here's the list:
So what's going on here? Well, first of all, I didn't want to tilt the deck toward chaos or tokens like I've seen others do, so I took a good hard look at my commanders and realized that Okaun has a lot of good face-punching potential, so I've tried to build around making him as effective as possible since I won't get to cast him too many times in the average game. To do this, the deck has an abundance of ways to give Okaun haste, as well as plenty of other effects to pump him up and give him trample and other fun combat abilities. To top off this strategy, I have a few extra combat effects to allow me to take advantage of turns where I win several flips off of Okaun and he gets nice and beefy.
In searching for effects to both pump Okaun and give him haste, I was reminded of the fact that he's a Berserker, and that allowed me to include Lovisa Coldeyes, a long time pet card, in the deck. Once Lovisa is in the mix, there's very little downside to skewing other creatures towards being Warriors, as several of them can also help Okaun get bigger. This is a minor sub-theme of the deck, but one that I expect to add value over the course of many games.
What's a good coin flipping deck without Krark's Thumb, though? Obviously the deck is just better when we have our lucky digit in play, so there are also a number of cards in the deck to help find and recur the Thumb for maximum coin flipping shenanigans. Also, since we're putting in a small artifact theme, it allowed me to finally find a home for Vedalken Humiliator, which is a hell of a card when put into an aggressive shell. (It's also a fun combo with Winter Sky, and yes, I have pulled that off. It was great.)
The deck is still early in its life, and so I don't know if some of the coin flip cards will keep their slots for the long term, but I'm at least going to give them a chance to test their luck. Before I finish up, though, I want to give a shoutout to Risky Move, which is a crazy fun card that really belongs in decks that just want to throw a wrench into a game and mess up people's plans. Give it a look and try it out if you have a deck that it might be fun in. You won't be disappointed.
The list hasn't been updated with WAR cards yet because I don't change my lists until I have cards in hand to make the physical change as well, but about the only change that's going to happen is that Goblinslide will swap out for the new Saheeli, and I'll find a way to slot in a Spark Double as well.
As always, feedback and suggestions are welcome. Thanks for reading.
What was the thought process for the RC and CAG on planeswalkers?
It basically boiled down to the fact that there was no real upside beyond flavor and letting people play their favourite walkers as commanders. This was offset with a lot of downside, including the fact that we would have to ban at least six or more cards to implement this change without breaking the format. Additionally, planeswalker commanders slow down games a lot and allowing for blanket PW commanders would dilute a lot of the identity of the commander format.
I'm definitely in favor of giving the official rules more importance. Until today, the Commander vibe always seemed to be that house rules were the ideal state, and that the official rules were just suggestions for those unlucky enough to play against strangers. The new, "These are the rules, and you're not entitled to change them" vibe sits better with me.
We still want established play groups to be able to tailor the format to their own tastes, but we accept that an ever-increasing volume of Commander play is happening outside of these sorts of groups and so we want to make it clear what the status quo is for these sort of pick-up game scenarios as well.
EDH has plenty of its own rules that make it unique among formats. Why not one more? .
Simple rules:
1. You own the tutored card.
2. The card is outside of the game.
3. The card is within the color identity of your deck.
4. The card is legal in Commander (or allowed by your play group).
5. The card is (or will be) sleeved to match your deck’s sleeves, if any.
Not's not ONE more that's FIVE more
And why does it have to match my commander's CI? It says any card......
EDIT II: Maybe this hsould be moved into it's own thread?
This is exactly why we left the rule as it was. Everyone has their own idea of what's a "reasonable interpretation" of the cards for Commander. People would be unhappy with any set of restrictions or allowances we gave, so it's best to let playgroups hash out these issues within themselves.
I know you make good use of clones in your deck, have you considered the new Spark Double? Seems great to copy your sphinx, even your general, to help with the storm count.
Oh it's absolutely on the list for cards to go in the deck. I don't change my lists until I have the cards in hand, though, so it's not there yet.
For now.
You never know, the opinions can change with time.
If not now, then when? I feel like this was the best shot that PW commanders had.
The moment has passed, and things only go down from here. If you want PW commanders, then make an exception with your playgroup or play Oathbreaker or the like.
"Sideboards don't exist in commander, therefore the card does not function."
End of the conversation, there isn't a "no, but" required.
Except the card is legal to play. Why?
It's not even mentioned on the ban list page on the "Official Commander Rules" site. Add a section for cards that reference "outside the game" and list them out real quick. That's all that needs to be done.
Of the 12 cards that can get cards from outside of the game, eight serve no other function than doing so, but the other four have uses beyond that effect: Spawnsire is still an annihilator eldrazi that can make tokens, Development can be used normally, Karn's static and + abilities still work, and Mastermind's Acquisition is another copy of Diabolic Tutor. To me, that doesn't sound like a useless set of cards or cards that should be banned for being useless.
Low key I've been waiting for this deck to come up in the feed ever since the (I'm assuming gender here) her thread about it. Happy it finally happened.
- I see a lot of cards that care about Islands, and not to mention the suggestion here from @ForgottenOne for High Tide, but a lot of nonbasics that you could easily do without.
Rogue's Passage (you have evasion already).
Reliquary Tower (why do you need to horde cards in hand? An ability is only as good as your ability to use it, and this deck doesn't appear to have a need to horde cards)
Deserted Temple (you combo with Nykthos, once/turn cycle, and if you're doing that you're probably trying to storm already. I think you'd be better served by an Island, or a Candelabra of Tawnos in this slot, if I'm being brutally honest here).
Halimar Depths appears fine on the surface but do you really need 1/3 of a ponder in exchange for an EBT land? Again I suspect an island is superior here.
Myriad is OK, I suspect a Thawing Glaciers would go further for you though (and it still functions under B2B ).
Skerry is fine, probably better than Tomb in 80% of games. Path of Ancestry and Cavern of Souls are self-explanatory.
Since you could be playing so many more basic Islands, I imagine Back to Basics becomes an easy sell here, as does Engulf the Shore. Similarly Daze remains an incredible blowout that no one expects. Submerge is a great removal spell (how many games do you see where someone isn't playing "ramp to a million mono-G"?)
I bet instead of those shuffles, you'd be better served by a Time Spiral/Time Reversal if you don't have a Timetwister lying around. I don't see any cantrips. Those are the reason to play U imo, is there a reason to not include Brainstorm/Ponder/Preordain and their ilk?
High Tide is already in the deck. (I play the IDW/Dack version, fwiw.)
I agree that the deck could use some more islands. Rogue's Passage and Halimar Depths always seem to underperform, so they're likely due for a cut.
Reliquary Tower is needed in the deck because there's often a turn or two of setup before the storm turn, and you don't want to have to ditch any cards before then, especially if you know you'll be operating on the Mind over Matter plan.
I'm not interested in effects like Daze/Force of Will/Pact of Negation because I'm generally not a fan of them in Commander in general and I also don't want to make my decks too hard to interact with. I would rather have my combo disrupted once in a while in the name of more interactive Magic than play a truly tightly tuned build with no room for escape. It's just a philosophy thing for me.
As for Submerge/Engulf the Shore, I just don't have room for these sorts of effects in the deck and would rather just play similar effects on Sphinxes (Riddlemaster / Dream Eater). The same goes for cheap cantrips, which I just don't have the space for. I would much rather have a slower start with a better combo turn than to be drawing these cards late game. Besides, sphinxes give me all the card draw I could want.
Walk the Aeons is the extra turn spell of choice because I want to be able to buy it back once or twice. The reason I play an extra turn spell at all is because often I can storm off, fill the board with sphinxes, but not kill anyone, so i need the extra turn to turn the air force sideways and occasionally I'll need a second extra turn to get the last opponent dead as well.
No one has mentioned this at all in our discussions, so I have no reason to believe that it's off the table when it comes to discussions about bannings and unbannings going forward.
I'm speaking for myself, but there's a part of the philosophy document that says that the format is to be steered to avoid significant barriers to entry. This has come into play in discussions of unbanning some cards that are likely innocuous for the format at this time but whose price makes them unobtainable for all but a few players.
1) Agreed.
2) Except that it is. Cards cost money and making cards more desirable suddenly is something that has to be taken into account by the RC and the CAG. We're not WotC and we're allowed to acknowledge the existence of the secondary market.
3) This is true for anything in Commander, not just wishes. What makes Wishes special is the degree to which a bad or ignorant actor can abuse them to the detriment of everyone else in the game.
4) You are literally arguing that a rule of the format should be changed. The onus is on the side asking for change to prove that change is better than the status quo. Inertia is a powerful force.
5) Rule 13 was clarified for exactly this reason. Should ignorance of any given rule by some percentage of the playerbase be a valid reason to argue for removal of that rule? I don't think so.
Nothing functionally changed in the rule with this update, so why is everyone getting all argumentative about it now?
At the same time, I'm not a fan of conceding to deny someone triggers or resources. In my mind, a concession shortly before you would lose anyway is just shortcutting to that point and none of the benefits of the kill should be lost to the aggressor.
Finally, I'll note that if snap concessions are a problem in your play group, then feel free to invoke Rule 0 and make a house rule preventing them.
Whirlpool Warrior is a reasonable bit of card churn for the deck. It can also mess up other players after they've tutored, etc. Additionally, it's a warrior and has synergy with Lovisa if I get her out. The biggest reason for its inclusion here, though, is that the deck needed more bodies and I like the card and think it's fine.
I agree that there might be too many coin flip cards, but I haven't played the deck enough yet to know which ones I don't like yet. I did do a quick once through the deck, though, and replaced Tide of War with Worn Powerstone.
I haven't tried them, but honestly, I'm just not interested in them. The upside of my creatures being Sphinxes is that they all have reasonable flying bodies, and with Unesh out, 4 CMC Sphinxes only cost 2 anyway, so the value of a naturally cheap changeling isn't really worth it. The deck really isn't that interested in more 1-cost sphinxes.
I've done my best to make this deck different from the typical decks I've seen others build around these two, though, so I hope you'll enjoy my take on it.
Anyway, here's the list:
1x Okaun, Eye of Chaos
1x Zndrsplt, Eye of Wisdom
Planeswalker (4)
1x Saheeli, Sublime Artificer
1x Daretti, Scrap Savant
1x Ral Zarek
1x Tezzeret the Seeker
Artifact (16)
1x Mana Crypt
1x Sol Ring
1x Wayfarer's Bauble
1x Coldsteel Heart
1x Izzet Signet
1x Krark's Thumb
1x Ring of Valkas
1x Ruby Medallion
1x Strionic Resonator
1x Swiftfoot Boots
1x Chariot of Victory
1x Commander's Sphere
1x Loxodon Warhammer
1x Worn Powerstone
1x Boompile
1x Crooked Scales
Instant (10)
1x Desperate Gambit
1x Fighting Chance
1x Aleatory
1x Arcane Denial
1x Chaotic Strike
1x Izzet Charm
1x Counterflux
1x Puppet's Verdict
1x Soul's Fire
1x Expansion // Explosion
1x Goblin Bomb
1x Goblin Festival
1x Aggravated Assault
1x Planar Chaos
1x Chance Encounter
1x Impulsive Maneuvers
1x Risky Move
Creature (16)
1x Archetype of Aggression
1x Frenetic Efreet
1x Mijae Djinn
1x Taurean Mauler
1x Whirlpool Warrior
1x Bloodsworn Steward
1x Chaotic Goo
1x Karplusan Minotaur
1x Paragon of Fierce Defiance
1x Spark Double
1x Vedalken Humiliator
1x Volatile Rig
1x Kazuul, Tyrant of the Cliffs
1x Lovisa Coldeyes
1x Skyclaw Thrash
1x Scourge of the Throne
Sorcery (10)
1x Gamble
1x Vandalblast
1x Winter Sky
1x Fiery Gambit
1x Game of Chaos
1x Molten Birth
1x Squee's Revenge
1x Stitch in Time
1x Relentless Assault
1x Seize the Day
1x Academy Ruins
1x Ancient Tomb
1x Buried Ruin
1x Command Tower
1x Darksteel Citadel
1x Desolate Lighthouse
1x Evolving Wilds
1x Forgotten Cave
1x Ghitu Encampment
1x Great Furnace
1x Inventors' Fair
2x Island
1x Izzet Boilerworks
1x Lonely Sandbar
7x Mountain
1x Myriad Landscape
1x Opal Palace
1x Reliquary Tower
1x Scalding Tarn
1x Seat of the Synod
1x Shivan Reef
1x Spirebluff Canal
1x Steam Vents
1x Sulfur Falls
1x Temple of Epiphany
1x Terramorphic Expanse
1x Volcanic Island
1x Wandering Fumarole
So what's going on here? Well, first of all, I didn't want to tilt the deck toward chaos or tokens like I've seen others do, so I took a good hard look at my commanders and realized that Okaun has a lot of good face-punching potential, so I've tried to build around making him as effective as possible since I won't get to cast him too many times in the average game. To do this, the deck has an abundance of ways to give Okaun haste, as well as plenty of other effects to pump him up and give him trample and other fun combat abilities. To top off this strategy, I have a few extra combat effects to allow me to take advantage of turns where I win several flips off of Okaun and he gets nice and beefy.
In searching for effects to both pump Okaun and give him haste, I was reminded of the fact that he's a Berserker, and that allowed me to include Lovisa Coldeyes, a long time pet card, in the deck. Once Lovisa is in the mix, there's very little downside to skewing other creatures towards being Warriors, as several of them can also help Okaun get bigger. This is a minor sub-theme of the deck, but one that I expect to add value over the course of many games.
What's a good coin flipping deck without Krark's Thumb, though? Obviously the deck is just better when we have our lucky digit in play, so there are also a number of cards in the deck to help find and recur the Thumb for maximum coin flipping shenanigans. Also, since we're putting in a small artifact theme, it allowed me to finally find a home for Vedalken Humiliator, which is a hell of a card when put into an aggressive shell. (It's also a fun combo with Winter Sky, and yes, I have pulled that off. It was great.)
The deck is still early in its life, and so I don't know if some of the coin flip cards will keep their slots for the long term, but I'm at least going to give them a chance to test their luck. Before I finish up, though, I want to give a shoutout to Risky Move, which is a crazy fun card that really belongs in decks that just want to throw a wrench into a game and mess up people's plans. Give it a look and try it out if you have a deck that it might be fun in. You won't be disappointed.
The list hasn't been updated with WAR cards yet because I don't change my lists until I have cards in hand to make the physical change as well, but about the only change that's going to happen is that Goblinslide will swap out for the new Saheeli, and I'll find a way to slot in a Spark Double as well.
As always, feedback and suggestions are welcome. Thanks for reading.
We still want established play groups to be able to tailor the format to their own tastes, but we accept that an ever-increasing volume of Commander play is happening outside of these sorts of groups and so we want to make it clear what the status quo is for these sort of pick-up game scenarios as well.
This is exactly why we left the rule as it was. Everyone has their own idea of what's a "reasonable interpretation" of the cards for Commander. People would be unhappy with any set of restrictions or allowances we gave, so it's best to let playgroups hash out these issues within themselves.
Oh it's absolutely on the list for cards to go in the deck. I don't change my lists until I have the cards in hand, though, so it's not there yet.
If not now, then when? I feel like this was the best shot that PW commanders had.
The moment has passed, and things only go down from here. If you want PW commanders, then make an exception with your playgroup or play Oathbreaker or the like.
Of the 12 cards that can get cards from outside of the game, eight serve no other function than doing so, but the other four have uses beyond that effect: Spawnsire is still an annihilator eldrazi that can make tokens, Development can be used normally, Karn's static and + abilities still work, and Mastermind's Acquisition is another copy of Diabolic Tutor. To me, that doesn't sound like a useless set of cards or cards that should be banned for being useless.
High Tide is already in the deck. (I play the IDW/Dack version, fwiw.)
I agree that the deck could use some more islands. Rogue's Passage and Halimar Depths always seem to underperform, so they're likely due for a cut.
Reliquary Tower is needed in the deck because there's often a turn or two of setup before the storm turn, and you don't want to have to ditch any cards before then, especially if you know you'll be operating on the Mind over Matter plan.
I'm not interested in effects like Daze/Force of Will/Pact of Negation because I'm generally not a fan of them in Commander in general and I also don't want to make my decks too hard to interact with. I would rather have my combo disrupted once in a while in the name of more interactive Magic than play a truly tightly tuned build with no room for escape. It's just a philosophy thing for me.
As for Submerge/Engulf the Shore, I just don't have room for these sorts of effects in the deck and would rather just play similar effects on Sphinxes (Riddlemaster / Dream Eater). The same goes for cheap cantrips, which I just don't have the space for. I would much rather have a slower start with a better combo turn than to be drawing these cards late game. Besides, sphinxes give me all the card draw I could want.
Walk the Aeons is the extra turn spell of choice because I want to be able to buy it back once or twice. The reason I play an extra turn spell at all is because often I can storm off, fill the board with sphinxes, but not kill anyone, so i need the extra turn to turn the air force sideways and occasionally I'll need a second extra turn to get the last opponent dead as well.
Thanks for the feedback so far, everyone!