I do NOT think this is the case, but I find the idea hilarious and support it fully.
The writing of late has been getting better and better. Occasionally I trip over some of the dialogue that feels out of place, but the full sense of the characters is strong, and the story and setting are intriguing, this week especially.
Three are top of the line, consistently updated, and very, very good.
Another thirty or so are quite strong, able to compete with the best, but I don't update them much. The rest vary in power, ability, and goofiness from there, and are not currently being updated at all.
I started about a year ago with 20 decks, and I challenged myself to build one for each general. It's been pretty fun experimenting with what cards actually are and aren't playable as I have to dig deeper and deeper into my collection to put the decks together. Some of the decks have weird themes and it's been neat to try and play oddball cards that connect to those.
I used to have a blog updating my progress in building decks, but it came down to using that time to update or to actually build.
I agree with Mistform Ultimus, who is an absolute blast to play in a blue lord deck. Another less-used Voltron general is Volrath the Fallen, who I like using with Skeleton Shard and big artifact creatures (Why are the heck are you running Stratodon and Draco, especially in mono-B? :D:D)
[card]
Asmira, Holy Avenger[/card] is a perfect general to build a Melira-persist combo synergy deck around and very underused.
Someone else mentioned Hakim, Loreweaver, who can be solid (though I prefer not to infi-combo with him).
I disagree about Marton Stromgald being the next mono-red powerhouse, but only because I think Homura and Zirilan of the Claw already are powerhouses.
Give me time and I could probably give you another half-dozen or so "out-there" ideas. I've built so many by this point that I find myself stretching to new ideas all the time.
Another idea I have been mulling around is trying to make a deck around a favorite book or movie, I personally want to make a deck themed after the Bridge Burners from the Malazan Book of the Fallen series by Steven Erikson, or maybe Dune by Frank Herbert.
This can be pretty fun. I built a (really bad) Rashka the Slayer deck based around Buffy: The Vampire Slayer. It's full of crappy cards with thematic names and art, with sharpied quotes from the show all over them. I'm thinking of doing an A Song of Ice and Fire deck next, or perhaps two that will duel each other.
Another deck I'm trying to put together is a Blind Seer deck that is full of nothing but cards with Urza in their names or in their flavor text. This one is proving rough because I'm trying to make it semi-good. Basing around flavor text and / or card names can sometimes be tedious, but in the right playgroup makes for a fun time.
Bauble is just fine in non-green decks as decent ramp. In multicolor decks that don't run green, it's also a great fixer. There might be better cards for the slot if you're going all out, but being in the middle of a massive budget-building quest, I've found it to be a solid staple for a lot of decks.
That's where I always start with my black decks that need to search for things. Depending on what sort of things I want to search up, Dimir House Guard and Brainspoil are often next.
Update: Just passed the fifty deck mark! Now at 52 and counting; see the full list at the blog, as well as some thoughts on Voltron commanders and such.
My LGS has been great about selling me useful commons in bulk (go go Darksteel Ingot, Wayfarer's Bauble, and Whispersilk Cloak!), so I may have a decent shot at the decks being fairly okay for the next 50 or so. We'll see after that...
Thanks to all of those who have offered well wishes!
Thanks to everyone for the suggestions. Let me address a few things that have come up:
On sleeves, I will not sleeve every deck. Several of my decks were already unsleeved at the beginning (Johan, Baron Sengir), and now several quest decks that were determined cheap enough are as well (Rashka the Slayer, Oyobi, Yukora). I have talked to my LGS about possibly getting a deal on large amounts of sleeves, so hopefully I'll be able to get anything that really needs it sleeved up.
I will from time to time post decklists as I go, mostly of decks where I had some particular challenge in building it, either from theme or from having had to "make do" without particular cards that would make the deck better because they're down the line far enough that I just don't have the best options.
Later on, I may start taking up the suggestion to go by color, but I'm in the initial surge of creative ideas that came from starting this. When I've begun to run dry on those, I'll probably do something more methodical as you say.
As for doing this via an online method, well, where's the fun in that?
Just finished deck 47 (Circu) this afternoon and am going to spend an evening playing board games and watching movies with my wife:). I'll check back and answer any more questions tomorrow.
Yeah, as I mentioned, I may fail, but I figured, what the heck.
As far as money, well, I know I'll spend some, but I'm going to be doing a lot of trading down some of my higher money stuff to help out with that. If it starts looking like it will be too expensive, then I'll stop spending money on it.
As far as the bit about decks being sup-par, well that's okay. One of the things I want to experiment with is the traditional ideas of what makes a good EDH deck. I built and played a Taniwha deck that was filled with little but cheap artifact mana and bad blue creatures, with the only other rares being Evacuation and Sunder, and nearly won a three-way game against some solid competition. When I'm down to the dregs of my collection, I'll be forced to try out some of the worse stuff and I think some of it may turn out okay. Yes, a lot of those cards will have many more optimal replacements, but they will service fine.
At any rate, even if I don't succeed, I think documenting my attempt could lead to some interesting ideas to discuss.
So, I debated a while before deciding to post this thread here, or whether I should just keep this insanity local. But I decided, hey, why not.
With a deadline of two years from now-ish, I am attempting to acquire and then build an EDH/Commander deck for every commander in Magic.
Here's how it's going to work:
The first and most important rule of this quest is that every deck must be built in actuality with real cards, including no proxies and nothing that requires swapping cards between decks. Yeah, that last one may be the one that kills me.
Not all of these decks will be optimized! I am going to need more than 45000 cards for this quest. Making about 40% of that basic land may be the only thing that keeps this from breaking the bank. I am going to be doing the best I can with what I have, and when I run out of cards, I will use whatever I can get my grubby little hands on. I will, of course, be attempting themes and synergy wherever possible and will not be just throwing sixty-odd cards in a deck with forty lands or so.
I am separating this quest out into two year-long sections. Year one I will attempt to get all non-Portal: Three Kingdoms commanders, with the second year focusing solely on that set.
If I have counted correctly, there are 453 legends not in silver borders, plus 5 from Unglued / Unhinged. Since 5 more decks is nothing compared to the monumental task still in front of me, I might as well throw those in. Besides, I've already got a half-built Richard Garfield deck.
I am, of course, not including flip cards that become legends, as these are not legal generals.
I am not including currently banned generals, but I have spots for them in my organizational binder in case they become unbanned during this time.
I will be keeping up with current Magic releases and building decks for legends found in those sets. Here's hoping next year isn't a return to Kamigawa/other legendary block.
I will not be attempting to acquire and build a deck for the 1996 World Champion card. Obviously.
You may have questions: do you even own enough cards? No, not currently. I can get about halfway there with what I have now. After that, I'm going to go buying in bulk and seeing what I can get.
I've started a blog in order to keep people updated on how it's going. You can find it here: http://commanderquest.blogspot.com/
(please don't comment on site design... I suck at that sort of stuff)
At that site, I have an updated list of what's completed and what is under construction. I will try and keep it as up-to-date as possible, but if I have a choice of spending time deckbuilding or updating, well, I have to do the former as much as possible.
Oh yeah, and since I have a life outside of all this, I may go on long breaks. Since I am a teacher, this may mean that I have to do some serious catch-up work next summer, but there you are.
Before I started this, I already had about 20 decks. I started about two weeks ago, and am approaching 50 decks.
I know going into this that I may fail utterly. But hey, it should at least be fun!
I've been running my Tsabo Tavoc and Lord of Tresserhorn decks most often recently. I also rocked a pretty hilariously fun Taniwha deck at my LGS' last EDH night.
My favorite Magic card is Blinking Spirit! It was the first card that I really started thinking of all the different cool things I could do with it and got my Johnny senses tingling. There are thousands of cards I love, but that was the one that caught my attention in a big way first, and remains a sentimental favorite.
I do NOT think this is the case, but I find the idea hilarious and support it fully.
The writing of late has been getting better and better. Occasionally I trip over some of the dialogue that feels out of place, but the full sense of the characters is strong, and the story and setting are intriguing, this week especially.
Three are top of the line, consistently updated, and very, very good.
Another thirty or so are quite strong, able to compete with the best, but I don't update them much. The rest vary in power, ability, and goofiness from there, and are not currently being updated at all.
I started about a year ago with 20 decks, and I challenged myself to build one for each general. It's been pretty fun experimenting with what cards actually are and aren't playable as I have to dig deeper and deeper into my collection to put the decks together. Some of the decks have weird themes and it's been neat to try and play oddball cards that connect to those.
I used to have a blog updating my progress in building decks, but it came down to using that time to update or to actually build.
Not the banning, actually. I'm somewhat relieved to see Primeval Titan go.
It's just that I own only a single copy of it, and it is in one of my 160 or so decks, and I have no idea which one.
[card]
Asmira, Holy Avenger[/card] is a perfect general to build a Melira-persist combo synergy deck around and very underused.
Someone else mentioned Hakim, Loreweaver, who can be solid (though I prefer not to infi-combo with him).
Skeleton Ship proliferate
Taniwha is unexpectedly strong
Circu, Dimir Lobotomist will get you really funny looks (I prefer it over other mill generals because of the exiling)
Tsabo Tavoc is a personal favorite of mine
Homura, Human Ascendant turns even a few creatures into a real deadly force.
I disagree about Marton Stromgald being the next mono-red powerhouse, but only because I think Homura and Zirilan of the Claw already are powerhouses.
Give me time and I could probably give you another half-dozen or so "out-there" ideas. I've built so many by this point that I find myself stretching to new ideas all the time.
This can be pretty fun. I built a (really bad) Rashka the Slayer deck based around Buffy: The Vampire Slayer. It's full of crappy cards with thematic names and art, with sharpied quotes from the show all over them. I'm thinking of doing an A Song of Ice and Fire deck next, or perhaps two that will duel each other.
Another deck I'm trying to put together is a Blind Seer deck that is full of nothing but cards with Urza in their names or in their flavor text. This one is proving rough because I'm trying to make it semi-good. Basing around flavor text and / or card names can sometimes be tedious, but in the right playgroup makes for a fun time.
Others include Rune-Scarred Demon, Hoarding Dragon for artifacts, Insidious Dreams (though that's search to top of library), Mystical Teachings for instants, and a personal favorite: Night Dealings.
Oh, and there's always Grozoth!
That's where I always start with my black decks that need to search for things. Depending on what sort of things I want to search up, Dimir House Guard and Brainspoil are often next.
My LGS has been great about selling me useful commons in bulk (go go Darksteel Ingot, Wayfarer's Bauble, and Whispersilk Cloak!), so I may have a decent shot at the decks being fairly okay for the next 50 or so. We'll see after that...
Thanks to all of those who have offered well wishes!
And God of War, 9390? Where do you get that number? My count numbers just over 450.
On sleeves, I will not sleeve every deck. Several of my decks were already unsleeved at the beginning (Johan, Baron Sengir), and now several quest decks that were determined cheap enough are as well (Rashka the Slayer, Oyobi, Yukora). I have talked to my LGS about possibly getting a deal on large amounts of sleeves, so hopefully I'll be able to get anything that really needs it sleeved up.
I will from time to time post decklists as I go, mostly of decks where I had some particular challenge in building it, either from theme or from having had to "make do" without particular cards that would make the deck better because they're down the line far enough that I just don't have the best options.
Later on, I may start taking up the suggestion to go by color, but I'm in the initial surge of creative ideas that came from starting this. When I've begun to run dry on those, I'll probably do something more methodical as you say.
As for doing this via an online method, well, where's the fun in that?
Just finished deck 47 (Circu) this afternoon and am going to spend an evening playing board games and watching movies with my wife:). I'll check back and answer any more questions tomorrow.
As far as money, well, I know I'll spend some, but I'm going to be doing a lot of trading down some of my higher money stuff to help out with that. If it starts looking like it will be too expensive, then I'll stop spending money on it.
As far as the bit about decks being sup-par, well that's okay. One of the things I want to experiment with is the traditional ideas of what makes a good EDH deck. I built and played a Taniwha deck that was filled with little but cheap artifact mana and bad blue creatures, with the only other rares being Evacuation and Sunder, and nearly won a three-way game against some solid competition. When I'm down to the dregs of my collection, I'll be forced to try out some of the worse stuff and I think some of it may turn out okay. Yes, a lot of those cards will have many more optimal replacements, but they will service fine.
At any rate, even if I don't succeed, I think documenting my attempt could lead to some interesting ideas to discuss.
Those who offered support, thanks!
With a deadline of two years from now-ish, I am attempting to acquire and then build an EDH/Commander deck for every commander in Magic.
Here's how it's going to work:
- The first and most important rule of this quest is that every deck must be built in actuality with real cards, including no proxies and nothing that requires swapping cards between decks. Yeah, that last one may be the one that kills me.
- Not all of these decks will be optimized! I am going to need more than 45000 cards for this quest. Making about 40% of that basic land may be the only thing that keeps this from breaking the bank. I am going to be doing the best I can with what I have, and when I run out of cards, I will use whatever I can get my grubby little hands on. I will, of course, be attempting themes and synergy wherever possible and will not be just throwing sixty-odd cards in a deck with forty lands or so.
- I am separating this quest out into two year-long sections. Year one I will attempt to get all non-Portal: Three Kingdoms commanders, with the second year focusing solely on that set.
- If I have counted correctly, there are 453 legends not in silver borders, plus 5 from Unglued / Unhinged. Since 5 more decks is nothing compared to the monumental task still in front of me, I might as well throw those in. Besides, I've already got a half-built Richard Garfield deck.
- I am, of course, not including flip cards that become legends, as these are not legal generals.
- I am not including currently banned generals, but I have spots for them in my organizational binder in case they become unbanned during this time.
- I will be keeping up with current Magic releases and building decks for legends found in those sets. Here's hoping next year isn't a return to Kamigawa/other legendary block.
- I will not be attempting to acquire and build a deck for the 1996 World Champion card. Obviously.
You may have questions: do you even own enough cards? No, not currently. I can get about halfway there with what I have now. After that, I'm going to go buying in bulk and seeing what I can get.I've started a blog in order to keep people updated on how it's going. You can find it here:
http://commanderquest.blogspot.com/
(please don't comment on site design... I suck at that sort of stuff)
At that site, I have an updated list of what's completed and what is under construction. I will try and keep it as up-to-date as possible, but if I have a choice of spending time deckbuilding or updating, well, I have to do the former as much as possible.
Oh yeah, and since I have a life outside of all this, I may go on long breaks. Since I am a teacher, this may mean that I have to do some serious catch-up work next summer, but there you are.
Before I started this, I already had about 20 decks. I started about two weeks ago, and am approaching 50 decks.
I know going into this that I may fail utterly. But hey, it should at least be fun!
Main Decks:
Rasputin Dreamweaver
Balthor the Defiled
Less competitive meta decks:
Lord of Tresserhorn
Teysa, Orzhov Scion
Azusa, Lost but Seeking (totally untuned)
Isperia the Inscrutable
Phelddagrif (group hug)
Phelddagrif / Rafiq of the Many (voltron, group-hug fakeout)
Fun Weirdness Decks:
Tsabo Tavoc (Stuffy Doll / Pestilence)
Karona, False God (tribal walls)
Jasmine Boreal (vanilla creatures)
Numot, the Devastator (Tims)
Baron Sengir (old school - nothing with new card frame)
Johan (tribal spiders)
Complete but untested:
Sygg, River Guide (tribal merfolk, of course)
Animar, Soul of Elements (Aluren combo)
[card]Zedruu the Greathearted
[/card]
Under Construction:
Riku of Two Reflections
Wort, Boggart Auntie