Hello everyone, so what is Commander Unknown?
Commander Unknown is a variant of traditional commander that my playgroup developed sometime last year to combat a little of the repetitiveness that came from all of us playing the same decks over and over again. Naturally everyone has a deck that they have built, worked on, and simply just prefer to play, and while there is nothing wrong with having a "go to" deck if your playgroup is small enough like ours eventually there is no surprise, everyone knows what your deck wants to do and what cards are your combo pieces, etc. Eventually we found ourselves in a slump and we were seriously considering taking a break to rekindle our spark and passion for the game until one day my roommate decided to "roll" for his deck. Inspired by this random decision we all rolled dice to determine which decks we were playing. Everyone was playing something that they weren't familiar with and the games were immediately entertaining and varied.
Then another one of our friends said,"wouldn't it be great if we had twenty different decks? Then we could simply roll a D-20!" We ran with this idea putting a number value on every one of the decks in Rotation and growing the number of commander decks from 14 to 20. Finally the last thing we decided to add which has been done before is a point system very similar to what can be found on the Star City Games EDH series Commander VS. We have seasons that last 3 months with game night being every Sunday. So with the basic Description and backstory behind us if you are interested in this style of playing Commander here is a breakdown of our rules and how we have everything setup.
The Commander Decks:
Rafiq of the Many Completely Centralized Voltron strategy with a strong focus on the Exalted mechanic.
Oloro, Ageless Ascetic Good-stuff artifact deck with more of a focus on cheating out powerful artifacts than winning through lifegain
Rhys the Redeemed Big Selesnya tokens with a balanced construction both wide and tall.
Grenzo, Dungeon Warden Ganky Recursion deck with a focus on goblins and cheating them out into play.
The Point System
Rules:
Buy-in for total of $25.00, must be paid in advance in order to acquire points. (This Money Goes to Prizes and to new sleeves for the decks)
Only 20 Decks are allowed into the cube for League play at one time, decks can be rotated in and out as determined by group input.
Decks are randomly selected by rolling a 20 sided Dice.
Players can choose to reroll for a new deck at the cost of 1 point.
Once a deck has been played it cannot be played again until all of the remaining decks have been used.
Before decks are selected a player may choose a deck at the cost of 2 points.
Points are accumulated through participating in League Nights which are on every sunday unless otherwise stated.
Please help keep the cube organized by helping pick up at the end of the night.
Have fun and try not to get too salty! It’s a card game!
Points
First Blood : Be the first to deal combat damage to an opponent +1
Killing Blow : Be directly responsible for killing an opponent +1
Coupe De Grace : Kill all opponents on a single turn +1
Miner 69er : Destroy more than 3 lands in a single game +1
TimeCop : Take more than 3 extra turns in a single game +1
For the Horde : Control more than 20 creatures on the end of your turn +1
Fountain of Youth : Gain more than 30 life in a single turn +1
Boom Headshot! : Deal 50 or more damage to a single opponent on a single turn +1
Symphony of Destruction : Board wipe more than 3 times in a single game +1
Fun Police : Counter at least 4 different spells in a single game +1
Victor : Win the game. +2 with four or more opponents, +1 with three opponents
Destroyer of Knowledge : Eliminate an opponent through Mill +1
Lead by Example : Eliminate an opponent through commander damage +1
Undaunted : Cast your Commander 5 times in a single game +1
Overkill : Deal thirty damage over lethal to a single opponent +1
Denied : Be directly responsible for your own death +1
Friends with Benefits : every player in the game has over 10 lands +1
Exactsies : Deal the exact amount of combat damage to reduce an opponent's life to zero +1
Life Elevated : Win the game with over 100 life +2
Near Death Experience : Win the game with exactly one life +2
Guardian : Safe an opponent from lethal damage, this can be only obtained once in a game per player +2
Conclusion
Well there you have it guys,hope you all found this interesting. It is my favorite way to play commander now and it definitely has improved my play style by forcing me to step out of my comfort zone. I am waiting to rotate in a few of the new commanders from the 2017 precons but time will tell which one of them makes it into rotation. If you have any questions please do not hesitate to ask me or if you have any suggestions I am always open to new ideas on how to improve the experience for my playgroup. Enclosed are a few pictures of the our game setup.
Hello everyone, so what is Commander Unknown?
Commander Unknown is a variant of traditional commander that my playgroup developed sometime last year to combat a little of the repetitiveness that came from all of us playing the same decks over and over again. Naturally everyone has a deck that they have built, worked on, and simply just prefer to play, and while there is nothing wrong with having a "go to" deck if your playgroup is small enough like ours eventually there is no surprise, everyone knows what your deck wants to do and what cards are your combo pieces, etc. Eventually we found ourselves in a slump and we were seriously considering taking a break to rekindle our spark and passion for the game until one day my roommate decided to "roll" for his deck. Inspired by this random decision we all rolled dice to determine which decks we were playing. Everyone was playing something that they weren't familiar with and the games were immediately entertaining and varied.
Then another one of our friends said,"wouldn't it be great if we had twenty different decks? Then we could simply roll a D-20!" We ran with this idea putting a number value on every one of the decks in Rotation and growing the number of commander decks from 14 to 20. Finally the last thing we decided to add which has been done before is a point system very similar to what can be found on the Star City Games EDH series Commander VS. We have seasons that last 3 months with game night being every Sunday. So with the basic Description and backstory behind us if you are interested in this style of playing Commander here is a breakdown of our rules and how we have everything setup.
The Commander Decks:
The Point System
Rules:
Buy-in for total of $25.00, must be paid in advance in order to acquire points. (This Money Goes to Prizes and to new sleeves for the decks)
Only 20 Decks are allowed into the cube for League play at one time, decks can be rotated in and out as determined by group input.
Decks are randomly selected by rolling a 20 sided Dice.
Players can choose to reroll for a new deck at the cost of 1 point.
Once a deck has been played it cannot be played again until all of the remaining decks have been used.
Before decks are selected a player may choose a deck at the cost of 2 points.
Points are accumulated through participating in League Nights which are on every sunday unless otherwise stated.
Please help keep the cube organized by helping pick up at the end of the night.
Have fun and try not to get too salty! It’s a card game!
Points
First Blood : Be the first to deal combat damage to an opponent +1
Killing Blow : Be directly responsible for killing an opponent +1
Coupe De Grace : Kill all opponents on a single turn +1
Miner 69er : Destroy more than 3 lands in a single game +1
TimeCop : Take more than 3 extra turns in a single game +1
For the Horde : Control more than 20 creatures on the end of your turn +1
Fountain of Youth : Gain more than 30 life in a single turn +1
Boom Headshot! : Deal 50 or more damage to a single opponent on a single turn +1
Symphony of Destruction : Board wipe more than 3 times in a single game +1
Fun Police : Counter at least 4 different spells in a single game +1
Victor : Win the game. +2 with four or more opponents, +1 with three opponents
Destroyer of Knowledge : Eliminate an opponent through Mill +1
Lead by Example : Eliminate an opponent through commander damage +1
Undaunted : Cast your Commander 5 times in a single game +1
Overkill : Deal thirty damage over lethal to a single opponent +1
Denied : Be directly responsible for your own death +1
Friends with Benefits : every player in the game has over 10 lands +1
Exactsies : Deal the exact amount of combat damage to reduce an opponent's life to zero +1
Life Elevated : Win the game with over 100 life +2
Near Death Experience : Win the game with exactly one life +2
Guardian : Safe an opponent from lethal damage, this can be only obtained once in a game per player +2
Conclusion
Well there you have it guys,hope you all found this interesting. It is my favorite way to play commander now and it definitely has improved my play style by forcing me to step out of my comfort zone. I am waiting to rotate in a few of the new commanders from the 2017 precons but time will tell which one of them makes it into rotation. If you have any questions please do not hesitate to ask me or if you have any suggestions I am always open to new ideas on how to improve the experience for my playgroup. Enclosed are a few pictures of the our game setup.