Kyren Toy is an odd little rock that I like running. Note that X can be zero, so it can always tap for 1.
With all the rocks, Paradox Engine is unsurprisingly brilliant, and can go infinite with Strionic Resonator, (which itself is a good card in the deck considering the cast and attack triggers many of the eldrazi have) or Sensei's Divining Top and Voltaic Key (both no-brainers to run).
Warping Wail is fun. Having a way to stop Vandalblast or Austere Command is a godsend. And on that note, Torpor Orb, a very strong card in general, is wonderful against Bane of Progress while not affecting many things you would be wanting to run. And on the subject of Orbs, why not Winter Orb? You're getting more mana from rocks than lands.
For a Kozilek deck in particular (as you have a reliable way to refill your hand), Null Brooch is another strong piece of interaction.
I've a Kozilek deck (I switch up which of the two), and the most important thing is to run pretty much every decently efficient mana rock you can get you hands on. Even otherwise mediocre cards like Sisay's Ring are very good when not only are you looking to play a 10 drop ASAP, but also said 10 drop will refill you hand to make up for playing all the rocks.
This latter point is why I would recommend one of the Kozileks as your general - of all the Eldrazi titan's abilities to have in the command zone, card draw is the most useful IMO as the typical gameplay of a big mana colourless deck will leave you very short on cards.
For me, a key point regarding Armageddon, Winter Orb and so on is moderation. While those are both cards I have no problem with someone playing, I would object if they came up every game, or even most games. Seeing how my decks can perform under those kind of effects and figuring out how best to solve the problems they pose can be very interesting and enjoyable. But it's not a problem I want to be solving all the time as it's also very fun to have full access to my resources and to play what I want to play. And to be honest, I feel this about pretty much any strategy in the game. Variety is the spice of life, and of EDH too.
So if someone wants to play a Boros deck that is using such effects to help overcome the colour combination's weaknesses, I'm fine with that. As long as they also have other decks they can play for when we want to mix things up.
Although, there is another factor that comes to mind regarding "unfun" strategies, and that's how the playgroup relates to each other. My group are mainly a bunch of friends who happen to play Magic while socialising with each other (although several of us only met through Magic). As such, if someone 'Geddons without a quick win to follow up, we're preferably happy to be sitting around and chatting with each other while the game gets back up to speed. I could see such plays being more problematic if you've not got that kind of relationship with the other players and you're only really there to play the game - thus having nothing to play means you have nothing to do.
This card is so good with Sliver Overlord... steal ALL the creatures!
Yeah, this is the only time I've seen it be used, but it's pretty darn good in that deck - 4: Control Magic is a strong effect.
Outside of Overlord, I can't see that many decks that want it - generally you care about your own creature's types, in which case Arcane Adaptation and co. are going to be better as, not only do they save on mana, but also you get any tribal cast/ETB triggers - and while there are cards that do go well with Unnatural Selection, the effects aren't generally strong enough to be worth building around the effect unless you have a commander who interacts well with this card.
As someone who plays and thoroughly enjoys both of these commanders, I'd say it really comes down to what you're looking for in terms of playstyle. Marchesa isn't really a reanimator general in the classic sense. You're not cheating things into play, you're not taking advantage of discard or Entomb, you're not using the graveyard as a resource in the way Chainer can. In fact, you don't really want to be interacting with the 'yard much at all - it's a place where your creatures will sit for a phase or two, nothing more. Marchesa generally tends towards aggression (with a correspondingly low curve), ETB/LTB abuse and an insane level of resilience.
In all honesty, my suggestion would be to have both. There's not that much in the way of overlap between what the two commanders want - a few good black ETB creatures and sacrifice outlets and that's it really - and they play very differently. If I had to keep one, it would probably be Chainer - the ability to abuse other people's graveyards means there's always some new things for me to do in a game - although Marchesa is the stronger commander.
I'd like to see more distinguishing between control deck types in your themes. Draw-Go (as ISBPathfinder suggested) is one way to do it, but control decks that usually tap out are also a thing. Compare a blue counter based control deck with a white based control deck based around things like Wrath of God. Very different ways of implementing a control gameplan.
Speaking as someone who has played Mind Sculptor in EDH in the past: It's a lot worse in multiplayer than in 1v1 where it can easily dominate games. Its reputation from 1v1 also carries over, so people tend to be overly-scared of it and will try to kill it often with even more prejudice than most planeswalkers.
Yeah, he doesn't quite live up to his 1v1 strength. JtMS suffers from one of the big consequences of the multiplayer aspect of EDH - there's 3 times as many opportunities to attack him. If he actually sticks around, he still provides a lot of value for his controller, but keeping him alive is much harder, especially with his reputation. The best 'walkers in EDH tend to be those that can have a decent impact on the game even with only one activation, and the ol' Wallet Sculptor doesn't work like that. Still, in a deck that's good at keeping creatures away, he's well worth running.
And I can certainly understand wanting one. It's the iconic planeswalker.
As for me, well, I'm going to be boring and say Timetwister. Sure, it's not as strong as the other 8, but it's still Power. And it's Power I could actually play in the only constructed format I care about. Not happening though....
Why are you having to track multiple people regularly enough that it's a problem? Commander damage is either irrelevant (I attack someone with Saffi Eriksdotter because they're open, I'm not going to care that they're on 2 commander damage), or you've only got 1 person to keep track of as you're only attacking one one person - that's how Voltron works, the entire archetype is about focusing people down one at a time.
It's a one drop mana dork. That means it's a very good card to start with. Add in the fact that it also helps fix mana at a pretty minor cost for this format, and we've got an excellent card. And yeah, using the Dark version is kinda obligatory.
It's a decent, if little clunky, option for creature removal - getting multiple uses out of a single card is always a good thing and in this format the oxen aren't that relevant, but sorcery speed really hurts for spot removal. Thing is, in this day and age, you can find good removal in all colours so it's a little awkward to see quite where it fits in. Maybe if you've some good artifact synergies or are looking to be very heavy on permanents in colours that can't get that much removal on them.
Oddly enough, I wouldn't really worry too much about getting more counters on it. It's nice to have, but if I just got three uses out of this, I'd be satisfied with my investment.
I'd generally prefer Dauthi Embrace for shadow granting shenanigans. It does cost to activate, but can be used multiple times per turn, and is much less fragile. Still, Dauthi Trapper certainly has its uses if you're in the market for a source of unblockable.
Tolaria West - Only if I have good (usually non-land) targets. Which generally means Mana Crypt and a couple of utility things like Tormod's Crypt. Maybe a Pact of Negation, but I don't have enough of those lying around. Basically, if I'm running a Trinket Mage package, this is a more restrictive second copy with an alternative mode as a tapland instead of a small body.
Vesuva - Only if I have very good non-legendary lands to copy. I'm not going to want to simply have this as some colour fixing, so I'm talking about Cabal Coffers and...well, mainly Cabal Coffers.
Utility deserts - Not so keep on the cycling ones unless I have a Life From the Loam package, as they ETB tapped, but the mono-colour ones are actually cards I feel I should consider more. A few points of damage over a game is not much (and they do still produce colourless), and even if the abilites aren't crazy, they're almost free to include.
Mikokoro, Center of the Sea - "Group hug" effects where you can control the timing are significantly less bad than other ones, so it's not a bad effect to have. There's really just the opportunity cost of it being a colourless land. It also hasn't been the cheapest card to buy, so I've never actually had one.
Soldevi Excavations - I often play it in mono-blue. I don't play is in multicolour decks. I've found it to be a nice little tool in a draw-go deck where I've often an extra bit of mana if I didn't need to use interaction.
Isloated Watchtower - I play it in some non-green mono-coloured decks, depends on how many other colourless lands I have and how colour heavy my spells are. Similar to the previous, the ability is certainly nice to have - it's not a huge impact, but there's not much cost to having the option - and there's usually at least one player who's ahead on lands.
Lucille McCoy, Tejas SheriffWR Legendary Creature - Human Gunslinger (MR)
Reach, vigilance
When ~ enters the battlefield or attacks, return target noncreature card in your graveyard with a convereted mana of 2 or less to your hand. 1, Discard a card: ~ gains grit until end of turn. 3/1
Grit(The next time this card would be destroyed by lethal damage this turn, prevent it instead.)
Why has this got red in its cost? Looks like a mono-white card to me.
Kyren Toy is an odd little rock that I like running. Note that X can be zero, so it can always tap for 1.
With all the rocks, Paradox Engine is unsurprisingly brilliant, and can go infinite with Strionic Resonator, (which itself is a good card in the deck considering the cast and attack triggers many of the eldrazi have) or Sensei's Divining Top and Voltaic Key (both no-brainers to run).
Warping Wail is fun. Having a way to stop Vandalblast or Austere Command is a godsend. And on that note, Torpor Orb, a very strong card in general, is wonderful against Bane of Progress while not affecting many things you would be wanting to run. And on the subject of Orbs, why not Winter Orb? You're getting more mana from rocks than lands.
For a Kozilek deck in particular (as you have a reliable way to refill your hand), Null Brooch is another strong piece of interaction.
This latter point is why I would recommend one of the Kozileks as your general - of all the Eldrazi titan's abilities to have in the command zone, card draw is the most useful IMO as the typical gameplay of a big mana colourless deck will leave you very short on cards.
So if someone wants to play a Boros deck that is using such effects to help overcome the colour combination's weaknesses, I'm fine with that. As long as they also have other decks they can play for when we want to mix things up.
Although, there is another factor that comes to mind regarding "unfun" strategies, and that's how the playgroup relates to each other. My group are mainly a bunch of friends who happen to play Magic while socialising with each other (although several of us only met through Magic). As such, if someone 'Geddons without a quick win to follow up, we're preferably happy to be sitting around and chatting with each other while the game gets back up to speed. I could see such plays being more problematic if you've not got that kind of relationship with the other players and you're only really there to play the game - thus having nothing to play means you have nothing to do.
Yeah, this is the only time I've seen it be used, but it's pretty darn good in that deck - 4: Control Magic is a strong effect.
Outside of Overlord, I can't see that many decks that want it - generally you care about your own creature's types, in which case Arcane Adaptation and co. are going to be better as, not only do they save on mana, but also you get any tribal cast/ETB triggers - and while there are cards that do go well with Unnatural Selection, the effects aren't generally strong enough to be worth building around the effect unless you have a commander who interacts well with this card.
In all honesty, my suggestion would be to have both. There's not that much in the way of overlap between what the two commanders want - a few good black ETB creatures and sacrifice outlets and that's it really - and they play very differently. If I had to keep one, it would probably be Chainer - the ability to abuse other people's graveyards means there's always some new things for me to do in a game - although Marchesa is the stronger commander.
Yeah, he doesn't quite live up to his 1v1 strength. JtMS suffers from one of the big consequences of the multiplayer aspect of EDH - there's 3 times as many opportunities to attack him. If he actually sticks around, he still provides a lot of value for his controller, but keeping him alive is much harder, especially with his reputation. The best 'walkers in EDH tend to be those that can have a decent impact on the game even with only one activation, and the ol' Wallet Sculptor doesn't work like that. Still, in a deck that's good at keeping creatures away, he's well worth running.
And I can certainly understand wanting one. It's the iconic planeswalker.
As for me, well, I'm going to be boring and say Timetwister. Sure, it's not as strong as the other 8, but it's still Power. And it's Power I could actually play in the only constructed format I care about. Not happening though....
Oddly enough, I wouldn't really worry too much about getting more counters on it. It's nice to have, but if I just got three uses out of this, I'd be satisfied with my investment.
Vesuva - Only if I have very good non-legendary lands to copy. I'm not going to want to simply have this as some colour fixing, so I'm talking about Cabal Coffers and...well, mainly Cabal Coffers.
Utility deserts - Not so keep on the cycling ones unless I have a Life From the Loam package, as they ETB tapped, but the mono-colour ones are actually cards I feel I should consider more. A few points of damage over a game is not much (and they do still produce colourless), and even if the abilites aren't crazy, they're almost free to include.
Mikokoro, Center of the Sea - "Group hug" effects where you can control the timing are significantly less bad than other ones, so it's not a bad effect to have. There's really just the opportunity cost of it being a colourless land. It also hasn't been the cheapest card to buy, so I've never actually had one.
Soldevi Excavations - I often play it in mono-blue. I don't play is in multicolour decks. I've found it to be a nice little tool in a draw-go deck where I've often an extra bit of mana if I didn't need to use interaction.
Isloated Watchtower - I play it in some non-green mono-coloured decks, depends on how many other colourless lands I have and how colour heavy my spells are. Similar to the previous, the ability is certainly nice to have - it's not a huge impact, but there's not much cost to having the option - and there's usually at least one player who's ahead on lands.
Why has this got red in its cost? Looks like a mono-white card to me.