Not to "win out right" but... In my playgroup a bestmaster ascension wount last a turn and trust me, the decks in my playgroup 10% of those decks, we dont have gaias cradle nor the fast mana rocks or legacy duals , So, you actually think they play that way because is good for the show
How heavily tuned and how competitive a group is isn't just a function of card cost.
Anyway, in my own group a card like beastmaster's ascension might get countered on cast, might get killed in a turn, or might remain in play for quite a while, especially if the caster can't immediately capitalize on it and there are other targets. How long such a card remains in play depends entirely on the style of decks you play and the kind of meta your local group uses. You state that in your group, such a card would get removed immediately. In mine, that'd only happen if it was a must-answer threat the moment it got played, and fi someone actually had an answer in their hand.
What I'm trying to say here is: "Don't confuse 'playing to a different meta' with 'misplays'."
It seems like you're expecting a different level and style of play from them than others do. For example, the 'misplays' you describe here would be fairly common plays in my own fairly casual group. If you've got the mana, and nothing else to play, why not drop one of these cards for future use if they don't get removed? Don't answer that, I understand why it'd be considered sub-optimal, I just can't be bothered to hold onto cards I could play for turn after turn without doing anything until I've got enough mana to do all the things at once.
Now, there might still be some aspect of keeping the show in mind here. A game where everyone is only playing lands and ramps and then passing until they've got enough mana to win outright would be pretty boring, even if it might be optimal, but I think that the considerations here is to have fun and exciting games by not playing a 100% tuned competitive playstyle, and the fact that this makes for better youtube is a secondary concern.
The ability does not state any exception to the standard planeswalker rules, so you can't activate it on your opponent's turns unless something else does allow you to do so.
306.5d Each planeswalker has a number of loyalty abilities, which are activated abilities with loyalty symbols in their costs. Loyalty abilities follow special rules: A player may activate a loyalty ability of a permanent they control any time they have priority and the stack is empty during a main phase of their turn, but only if none of that permanent’s loyalty abilities have been activated that turn. See rule 606, “Loyalty Abilities.”
You're lacking a bit in the boardwipe department, and I don't think you can assume to be fast enough to never need one. I'd at the very last play kindred dominance, but something like pernicious deed or gaze of granite should give you something to hit a wide variety of targets.
edit: also, you'll want to play beast within as it's spot removal that can hit anything.
I was playing a Breya deck focused on making treasures and thopters. I found myself holding a Mechanized Production but with none of my usual targets to put it on.
<snip>
One player destroys the Tithe before my next turn, but I have 8 treasures due to people drawing cards.
So, this happened at the table next to mine when I was playing at a fairly casual EDH tournament this weekend. One mill-based deck had been steadily grinding down all decks in the game, to the point that most graveyards had 70 cards or more in them, and most decks where down tho the last 5 cards or so. The tournament judge walks by and casually quips that that would be a great moment to play a living death. He moves on to the next table, the turn gets passed, and the next player promptly complies with the judge's suggestion.
And then another player promptly reverberates the living death for even more chaos. The judge hurries back to the table, as even a pod of experienced players would need some help resolving that board state. What follows is a massive cluster of creatures entering the battlefield, triggering all kinds of effects, including for two players 'must draw' effects that take them out (this includes the player of the living death before it een gets to resolve, simplifying things).
Then, while the stack for the remaining two players is still in the process of resolving, the goblin player sacrifices some goblins for mana to get off a massive raid to finish off the last player.
The whole thing was absolutely glorious, and required about 10 minutes to resolve.
You're making a lot of assumptions about what you 'need' to do to keep up with the rest of the table. If your meta is indeed hyper-competitive, with everyone building the absolute best deck possible then you're right, but that's what magic is like, as most eternal formats congregate to a limited number of best decks.
However, not all meta's are like that. For example, in my local meta I wouldn't need to ru anywhere near that amount of mana acceleration, and 6 mass removal spells is decidedly overkill. We barely run any tutors in my Meta and I in particularly avoid playing tutors unless it does something particularly interesting (such as congregation at dawn in Gishath, or some non-basic land tutors in sisters of stone death because that deck really needs the massive amounts of mana to function).
All of this is to say that interesting deck building does not have to be dead. If your group values that aspect of EDH, all they have to do is agree on some global limits to their meta to avoid playing cEDH.
One thing that should help this ability at least somewhat is to not have the power boost be permanent, but instead be until end of turn, and to have the requirement that the target creature for the duel is untapped, so there is some counterplay possible if someone doesn't want a particular creature to be forced into a duel (No dueling against mana-dorks, for example). Your highway scoundrels would then be something like:
Highway Scoundrels2BB
Duel 1 (When ~ attacks, you may choose an untapped creature the defending player controls. If you do, ~ gains +1/+1 untill end of turn. It is now blocked by that creature. Block restrictions do not apply with this effect.)
Whenever this creature duels, its controller draws a card.
2/2
Being indestructible only relates to being destroyed, and does not directly relate to dying:
702.12. Indestructible
702.12a Indestructible is a static ability.
702.12b A permanent with indestructible can’t be destroyed. Such permanents aren’t destroyed by lethal damage, and they ignore the state-based action that checks for lethal damage (see rule 704.5g).
702.12c Multiple instances of indestructible on the same permanent are redundant.
and
700.4. The term dies means “is put into a graveyard from the battlefield.”
Ninjas might be another possibility? Yuriko, the tiger's shadow makes for a very agressive commander if you build around getting her ability to trigger. she can hit the field as early as turn 2 if you get a 1-drop creature, and this deck wants to run a bunch of cheap, hard to block creatures anyway to get your ninjas in.
I second the pre-con suggestion. However, if your group out-grows the pre-cons and want to build something from scratch, I think commanders with a very clear build-path are a good start. Creature tribal commanders would often fall in this category, as would, for example, omnath, locus of rage. Such cards he;lp in that they put further constraints on the cards you could be using by making it clear what they need to win. Creature tribal commanders want their tribe to be represented, while omnath wants you to play a whole bunch of ramp to enable him, for example.
Sounds like you might want to build an actual group-hug deck? Something based around the new king, for example.
Alternatively, you could build a stompy tribal deck, like Dinos with Gishath or Dragons with the Ur-dragon or something like that. That way you've got a deck more focused on building your own thing than on stopping your opponents from doing their thing.
Edit: you could also build something with a theme of stealing creatures, like yasova dragonclaw, sisters of stone death or dragonlord silumgar. Such decks tend to automatically scale up or down depending on the power of your opponent's decks, but it is a tactic that's inherently more disruptive to their strategies.
So, let's see. Saga's are back. 'Escape' is a new mechanic that allows for the casting of spells from the graveyard. I suspect most of them will have an 'exile X cards from the graveyard' cost to reduce the possibility for eternally recurring stuff. "heroes of the revel" and "hero of the nyxborn" basically have heroic, but because it's not keyworded, its probably only on a couple of cards. Lastly, the "omens" are probably a 5 card cycle.
That's about all I can figure from a quick glance at these cards so far.
edit: oops, I completely missed the mention of devotion
How heavily tuned and how competitive a group is isn't just a function of card cost.
Anyway, in my own group a card like beastmaster's ascension might get countered on cast, might get killed in a turn, or might remain in play for quite a while, especially if the caster can't immediately capitalize on it and there are other targets. How long such a card remains in play depends entirely on the style of decks you play and the kind of meta your local group uses. You state that in your group, such a card would get removed immediately. In mine, that'd only happen if it was a must-answer threat the moment it got played, and fi someone actually had an answer in their hand.
What I'm trying to say here is: "Don't confuse 'playing to a different meta' with 'misplays'."
Now, there might still be some aspect of keeping the show in mind here. A game where everyone is only playing lands and ramps and then passing until they've got enough mana to win outright would be pretty boring, even if it might be optimal, but I think that the considerations here is to have fun and exciting games by not playing a 100% tuned competitive playstyle, and the fact that this makes for better youtube is a secondary concern.
edit: also, you'll want to play beast within as it's spot removal that can hit anything.
Rolling a d3 is probably as easier, as most players already have d6's for counters.
Wouldn't you have won right there though?
And then another player promptly reverberates the living death for even more chaos. The judge hurries back to the table, as even a pod of experienced players would need some help resolving that board state. What follows is a massive cluster of creatures entering the battlefield, triggering all kinds of effects, including for two players 'must draw' effects that take them out (this includes the player of the living death before it een gets to resolve, simplifying things).
Then, while the stack for the remaining two players is still in the process of resolving, the goblin player sacrifices some goblins for mana to get off a massive raid to finish off the last player.
The whole thing was absolutely glorious, and required about 10 minutes to resolve.
However, not all meta's are like that. For example, in my local meta I wouldn't need to ru anywhere near that amount of mana acceleration, and 6 mass removal spells is decidedly overkill. We barely run any tutors in my Meta and I in particularly avoid playing tutors unless it does something particularly interesting (such as congregation at dawn in Gishath, or some non-basic land tutors in sisters of stone death because that deck really needs the massive amounts of mana to function).
All of this is to say that interesting deck building does not have to be dead. If your group values that aspect of EDH, all they have to do is agree on some global limits to their meta to avoid playing cEDH.
Highway Scoundrels2BB
Duel 1 (When ~ attacks, you may choose an untapped creature the defending player controls. If you do, ~ gains +1/+1 untill end of turn. It is now blocked by that creature. Block restrictions do not apply with this effect.)
Whenever this creature duels, its controller draws a card.
2/2
and
Alternatively, you could build a stompy tribal deck, like Dinos with Gishath or Dragons with the Ur-dragon or something like that. That way you've got a deck more focused on building your own thing than on stopping your opponents from doing their thing.
Edit: you could also build something with a theme of stealing creatures, like yasova dragonclaw, sisters of stone death or dragonlord silumgar. Such decks tend to automatically scale up or down depending on the power of your opponent's decks, but it is a tactic that's inherently more disruptive to their strategies.
That's about all I can figure from a quick glance at these cards so far.
edit: oops, I completely missed the mention of devotion