0:00-1:40 Standard Intro 1:41-2:50 Card Kingdom 2:51-3:30 UltraPro 3:31-3:59 Game Knights promotion 4:00-4:30 Patreon 4:31-8:46 Commander Anthology WOTC doesn't financially compensate them for promoting their product so the actual time devoted to ads is only about 3 and 1/2 minutes. Context is important everyone.
+Vitor Dias all of those assume you have a board, which you might not. And also none of. Those really aren't board wipes in that they don't hit everyone but usually only one maybe 2 opponents
lightspeedasH monstrous onslaught has been one of my all time favorite green sorceries in commander. They can't even stop it by removing your biggest creature in response because it checks as it is cast.
I disagree with the Diabolic Tutor. I know it's 4 mana, but tutoring important or powerful cards on a budget is very difficult. A couple "Diabolic Tutors" (i.e. Sidisi, Rune Scar, etc) is a great, cheap way to make budget builds infinitely better and more consistent. I love Command Zone, but I do feel often that you guys live in an ecosystem divorced from the average commander player who can't afford things like Demonic and Vampiric Tutor. I agree with most the rest of the list, but bashing on a budget card by saying the more expensive versions are just better (like, duh) just feels kind of crummy.
Tyler Kaune It's like that with most of these mtg TH-camrs their 800 dollar decks are great if you have the money for it but for a budget player like me it just makes me groan. I sometimes hate playing commander because it sometimes needs very specific cards to work.
But what they were saying is that EVEN if you're on a budget you probably don't want this card. You might not even want tutors at all, there is probably something better you can do at that point.
Dennis Kroné im lucky and own dem tutor and pulled dark petition and diabolic i bought sidisi undead viser so i have plenty of tutors for my black decks . diabolic sits in my binder of edh cards lol
+Dennis Kroné I usually build on a budget and I can assure you that tutors are an excellent thing for budget decks because they allow you to acquire an expensive card or two or three and then instead of running all of the other expensive iterations of those cards you run really cheap tutors. Tutors are always awesome!
Far more important than a list like this is your rationale - explaining why you feel its overrated is so much more valuable than just a raw list. Thanks guys!
So as a new player to EDH I just watched the 25 must haves video you guys made, I then purchased a Gilded Lotus and a Scroll Rack then decided to watch this video...….. thanks for that.
good move for them if it makes more money for them. If I had to rank currently available sleeves I give "new/2ndseries" Dragonshields matte 8.5, UP Eclipses would be 9.0 for me, but it's true I buy Dragonshields for my standard decks which I single sleeve, whereas Modern/Commander staple decks are sleeved in UP eclipses.
I don't have any issue with the sleeves or ultrapro. It's more of a comment about how they are being shown on an EDH focused podcast and don't have enough for the format. Same thing with KMC's packing too. All about the memes fren.
To be fair even 100 sleeve packs don't have enough sleeves outside the theory. I usually need ~10/20 sleeves extra just to be sure if someting happens I can resleeve those damaged sleeves or just try out multiple extra cards, swap them in and out between games etc. and I just don't like resleeving things.
I've never purchased dragonshields that didn't have 4-7 extra sleeves. obvs not 10-20, but at least a few extra to account for random splits or wrinkles.
I mean, it makes sense to cater to players of 60 card deck formats, as those players make up the majority of the MTG community. Packs of 80 sleeves is the perfect amount for a 60 card deck with a 15 card sideboard, plus a couple sleeves extra in case of splits.
@@KrankkxGaming It's both. Apex Predator axes planeswalkers, which is a reference to the lore. JLK was indeed probably talking about Apex Predator, rather than Primal Hunter.
I'm very surprised by the inclusion of Scroll Rack, simply because I feel like it's a better version of Top, which wasn't included (and yet is equally popular in EDH). I agree that Top os very overrated, but confused why Scrollrack would be listed above it.
Reliquary Tower is on my overrated list. If I am ending my turn with more than 7 I either mulled poorly or drew cards from an effect outside of my control. There are enough ways to get cards back from your graveyard that it's only detrimental if there is gy hate directed toward you.
I genuinely agree with your card choices & like how you explained why they are all overrated whilst still being good cards in specific situations. Thank you as always for all the hard work that you both do for the show & the community.
18:28 You could do a episode of exemples of cards that you can use to force your opponents to do something. I acnt think of a 3 mana card that forces a board wipe
I run 3 of these in very specific commander decks; Jace and Rack in Narset (as they say, in that deck you just want ALL the top-deck manipulation you can get) and O Ring in my enchantress deck. I like O Ring because I have a couple of ways to sac enchantments in response to the trigger, to exile stuff forever, and it's also sometimes a handy political tool to stop enchantment wipes from certain players, if I'm holding another players powerful creature hostage. I also have a lot of recursion for my enchantments too, so I can usually get it back if they do deal with it. I should probably add a Cast Out to that deck too though, thinking about it, especially since I can cycle early and then recur it with other stuff. I agree with all their other points and I don't think I've run any of those others in any of my decks. I should probably consider Birds for my Animar though, getting him out on turn 2 occasionally would be pretty good.
I definitely agree with a lot of your points, except for the sword of light and shadow specifically. You guys kinda glanced over the protection clause which I believe is the best part about it. The fact that it gives protection against black and white negates so much removal. Sure the opponents can remove it but then they have to remove another card first.
To be fair, Maelstrom Wanderer has abnormal synergies with all of those cards. JTMS bouncing Maelstrom Wanderer is great, and brainstorming to set one up is also great. Avenger is much better when you have a haste outlet and Wanderer gives you that. Scroll Rack lets you stack your Cascade triggers as you want. Lotus is pushing you a full three turns closer to Wanderer. But if you were looking at a more generic Temur commander-- say, Surrak-- then these synergies wouldn't exist and the cards would get much worse. Incidentally props for the Pricia avatar. :D
Kestral287 haha yeah that was kinda my point since they talked about these picks being good in specific decks but not to jam in every deck. I was just surprised as to how many were key players in my pet deck. ^_^ Also cheers, this channel is actually dedicated to FoW :D
Damnation is not as good as verdict? verdict lets me regenerate and lets be honest most times the guy with the 3 counters in hand is not the one with the full board
How often does Regeneration actually make a difference? Or hell, how often is that effect even used in EDH? I'd rather draw a bunch of cards with Decree of Pain, or save mana and get around Indestructible with Toxic Deluge.
Decree of pain is 8 mana. In CEDH the average cmc is 2-3. I'm not saying every deck has to be competitive level, just that obviously mana cost matters a lot. I just revamped my decks and looked to remove anything expensive and clunky.Sure you cycle decree of pain - its -2/-2. Your meta is basically limited level EDH decks and a bunch of whinging when people play anything that hoses it. Really decree of pain is better than damnation? Lol. Not even close.
Wellllll. I live in Virginia and Star City is faster shipping for me but I do buy between them, Card Kingdom, and Channel Fireball. Edited: So I belong to three different metas, one is against Mimic Vat, Walking Atlas, and Trading Posts because they don't see a lot of value the other sees a lot of value from them. The LGS meta I'm at is against things like Howling Mine, Rites of Flourishing, ect. because there is a lot of tryhards there and they don't want to give them advantage.
Gotta say I'm pretty surprised to not see Solemn Simulacrum on either list. If you can't reliably sacrifice and reanimate it to abuse it's effects it's pretty underwhelming, but I see it all the time. Not a bad card, but I consider it the poster child for overrated "trap" cards.
I think it's good enough. It's never the best card in your 99, but it's almost always among the best 99 cards to fit into your deck. 4 mana is affordable, it usually replaces itself (if anyone at the table paths or swords a solemn, I'd be very happy). And the it ramps you and protects your life total or a planeswalker once or maybe even attacks into a planeswalker. That's just good value for 4 mana and the reason why solemn will always be among the first ramp spells I'd be looking at when building a deck.
The second best manarock with staying power ever printed is overrated in a format that is generally good for ramp? Witness is simply very solid value and is imo viewed as jsut that. It isn't some zomg broken card but solid value, which is wht it's rated at. Greaves is a zero equip haste and protection package. It's amazing for decks that like those things and usually fine otherwise. But is't that pretty much exactly how people view it? Titan is banned for a reason One of the best tutors ever printed is overrated in a format whose inherent ariance favours tutors? Okay
Who is casting turn 5 Gilded Lotus?!? This card takes you over the 4 CmC mark in a huge way if you cast it with any ramp played before turn 5. A single dork or signet gets it out on turn 4 tapping for 3 mana. 2 Ramp and it's out on turn 3. It does of course carry the target of being pricey and it sucks to get it countered if you tap out for it, but we all showed up to start fights anyway :)
I ordered each of the foil vivid lands and card kingdom messed up the order and sent me 2 vivid marshes. I emailed them told them its okay to just give me store credits because of the shipping but NOPE. They said they will mail me a 99c foil using the same shipping method i paid for. Mind you i live in Singapore and the shipping costed 14usd! After this incident i am converted.
I agree for the most part with your lists. Diabolic Tutor is the only one I strongly disagree with. I think 4 mana is a reasonable price to be able to search up anything you need. Granted Demonic Tutor and Vampiric Tutor are better, but Diabolic Tutor is a good budget option. You're in black so you have access to lots of ramp. Often you CAN cast Diabolic Tutor and the card you're searching for. Earlier in the video you mentioned Sidisi as a good tutor and it costs 1 more mana (i get that as a creature you can reanimate it so that's its selling point). I much prefer Diabolic Tutor to Beseech the Queen with its CMC restriction and it can be more difficult to cast if you're not in mono-black. A card I find is overrated: Panharmonicon. I was sooooo hyped on this card and I've been disappointed. It's obviously amazing in a flicker deck. However, I've found it durdles in other decks. You need to have a really high density of ETB creatures to make it worth including. Good card but not nearly as amazing as the initial hype.
You had me until The Swords. +2/+2 plus protection from 2 colours would be enough to have these swords in a lot of decks, the abilities on top of that are just gravy. I think the big problem is that Feast and Famine is so strong, that it makes the other swords look almost pedestrian. But I don't think the strength of one sword should devalue the others. I'd especially like to give props to SOBM, with Blue being so prevalent in EDH, having a body that can get passed blue blockers and abilities is key. On top of that, any creature with double strike becomes the most hilarious thing in the world. Milling for 20, creating 2 2/2's, maybe you've got parallel lives and Doubling season out. NUTS. I'd sooner have tried to throw shade at Umezawa's Jitte than any of The Swords, and I've got 6 in EDH decks as I write this, and I could probably find a home for it in a few other decks if I wanted. I don't really know what my top five or ten would be, I'd have to spend a fair amount of time considering it, I just know I wouldn't have put any of the swords on it, or Damnation, for that matter. But again, this is subjective, great episode, though a little heavy on the ads.
A large part of the swords being called overrated is that they each generate about the same amount of hate from the other players for less utility than Feast and Famine.
I'm still with you both 100% I think a good video/series could be what you think should be banned or un-banned. Also...@37:20. You nailed it. I'm an old school as it gets vet player, and I own many Scroll Racks. I've been warning people for years.
Just buy from tcg I always shop there sure it’s important to support lgs and everything else but why am going to pay $5 or $10 extra for a card when I could get it average price or lower on tcg I love supporting TH-cam magic content and local game shops but I’m not going to spend more for a card I can get cheaper just by waiting a couple days to a week
The best way to support is probably buying the ultra pro products off card kingdom! They're the same price over at TCGplayer, and you give twice the support!
40:55 I think Oblivion Ring is very good in decks that have Enchantment tutors. But else, it's just a 3 mana removal. That's "meh" at best, especially in white.
I'd love to try those sleeves but it's such a bummer they're only available in 80 packs. Real downer. I guess I'll stick with my Dragon Shields for now.
what a coincident, I was yesterday on Card Kingdom looking for some cool cards and found one that is highly underrated I think. Dissensions: ignorance bliss. 1r instant exile your hand face down and return it to your hand at the end turn draw a card....why underrated...well bottom floor is a cycle of 2 with more dodges in the mix in best, it lets red protect itself against discard and use its wheels draw card effect more fluently...yes its not like the best card ever but its dirt cheap and I can't see why when you think about how rare its effect is.
I've really been enjoying these videos. I haven't played Magic for about 15 years and my kids just got back into it. Hence, reigniting the fire for me as well. Just began playing commander with my wife about a week ago because of these guys. I can't wait to attempt to build my own commander deck vs the constructed ones.
its tons of fun, and i'm kinda in the same boat - returning MTG player doing his best to stand up to the high-power Modern/newer decks and Commander decks(which HEAVILY rely on Planeswalkers) meanwhile I'm sitting here with my Tempest and Ice Age cards and kicking a respectable amount of butt thanks to HEAVY control aspects
Good point. Now I just need to find the time. I might try and do my first draft this Saturday. Hopefully they are ready for me to ask a lot of questions. So many new abilities not enough time.
Two lists for two players- Birds of Paradise, Damnation, Gilded Lotus, Diabolic Tutor, Oblivion Ring Avenger of Zendikar, Jace the Mind Sculptor, Liliana Vess, Scroll Rack, all Sword of x and y Some of these feel like you're reaching guys. Though each of them has places where they can be used and abused here's my list: * Solemn Simulacrum (does everything ok, nothing great), * Ponder/Serum Vision/Preordain (takes a slot, smooths draws for combo, but feel like they do not do enough), * Decimate (amazing when it has 4 targets, sucks when it's stuck in your hand), * Krosan Grip (good if you play against plenty of infinite decks or tons of countermagic) * Phyrexian Arena (great when it stays around, but it paints a target on your head and is a pretty bit "kill be before I get value" target when it hits the board).
please DO NOT play the commander anthology on game knights. There can only be so much of the show produced and one of the best things about the show imo is seeing the decks that people build and the interesting cards I've never seen as well as the less mainstream commanders ._.
on a list of mainstream commanders where does "child of alara" sit in? Its my most functional deck and I never see 5 color commanders aside from when I completely dominate sliver players
I mean no offence and I'm sure you're a good player but if a sliver player is losing to child of Alara, they are simply not exploiting the true power of slivers. Also, what about Cromat? You never know what they are playing but it's cromat, how good can it be?
Well, i don't use cromat because all of his abilities seem lackluster to me. When it comes to 5 color commanders child and progenitous are the only commanders i would use. With child i get a board wipe ready to go because i usually have the mana for it, and progenitous is at the very least a world class beat stick. In regards to the part about slivers, i have had no problem with them because for the most part they don't stick around long enough to be a threat. My child deck uses a ton of grave recursion and is basically a 5 color golgari deck that functions better because of the extra three colors.
Fair enough on the sliver matchup, you have an amazing matchup with them. On Cromat, who cares about what cromat does. With a cromat deck, you never EVER play your commander. You only have cromat as your commander to confuse your opponents and steal a win out of nothing with a bonkers combo or blightsteel from nowhere. Cromat isn't a build around commander, it is a commander that draws no hate and gives you basically free set up time.
your analysis of Scroll Rack is very similar to what I see when I repeatedly activate Munda, Ambush Leader in my Ally deck. The filtering is great because I get a consistent stream of Ally cards but it also means I lose access to other utility cards.
tbh damnation and wrath of god are worse than things that tuck or return considering anyone can take advantage of the cards in the graveyards and in my experiance a lot of the decks I have played against have graveyard recursion
I think the graveyard recursion argument is overrated. they can get your card back eventually but Meren, alesha and karador need to play their general with commander taxes, then get one creature back that is summoning sick. It still buys you a lot of time.
LaMereACaniche to be Honest, No. its not true, IF You look through most powerful decks in the format...most of Them Will do stupid things with their Graveyard. i proved it in My playgroup now all of my opponents run Relic, crypt, spellbomb, ooze, bojuka bog n so forth. but then again, i dont play Casually, and neither does Josh and Jimmy (to an extent) seein that they play Riku, Cromat and just leave all sweet stuff.
Sure there's Golgari and a good amount of White/Black recurrsion in general but not to the point I wouldn't run Damnation. I can agree though that I probably wouldn't deck both it and Wrath in Orzhov because the sheer amount of options, only one, but that one could be either without it being overrated (and as stated, mono-black auto includes this).
People mash solemn into every deck because it's a coloress ramp creature that draws a card. You don't need to build around it, it's just a 2 for 1 card like acidic slime. He's just a very solid dude, and that's good enough to make it into a lot of decks. Burnished Hart, there's a solid window they can just kill it; Pilgrim's eye gets 1 card instead of 2, and it doesn't put the land into play; solemn, you can just set and forget, and you get to watch your opponents walk on eggshells not to kill it on accident. Nobody is claiming it to be this ridiculously powerful card that mows down entire armies, or can pump out tons of mana, it's perfectly rated. Honestly, even in green, I'm hard pressed to find a reason to not play it, like what's the next best ramp creature? Farhaven Elf, who doesn't draw you a card? Seed-Guide Ash, who doesn't do anything when it comes into play? Oracle Mul-Daya, is maybe quite a bit better long-term, but that's about it.
My top overrated card is Solemn Simulacrum. I see it a lot and it's one of the most played cards according to edhrec, but I rarely see it doing anything, and I've seen some players mashing it into pretty much all their decks.
It's just very efficient, it gives ramp for any deck, a chump blocker that rewards you for chump blocking with card draw. It's definitely just OK in your average deck, and MUCH better in decks with graveyard recursion, but that's why it's mashed mindlessly into a ton of decks. Because even in a deck that has no synergy with it, it's reliable, it always gives you a ramp and draws you a card and blocks some damage. Say drawing a card is worth one mana, ramping a land onto the battlefield is worth 2-3 mana, that means the 2/2 body you are getting at 1-2 mana, and it's all on one card. It's just reliable and efficient, even if it's not powerful. But yeah, I'd agree that it's a little bit overrated.
Yeah, I definitely agree that it's a decent value card. But I pretty much always feel like there's something better for the deck and it's almost always the first card I cut. It have a home in some decks but shouldn't be mashed into everything.
you're right that it is not he best, but its helpful in decks that do not have green for ramp and unlike a mana dork you don't lose value after a board wipe
I think that it belongs in many non-green decks because it is extremely good ramp comparative to the ramp available in most colors. If you are running green it is definitely wrong and if you are running a super aggressive deck it can be wrong but it is usually excellent in my meta because it has so many different effects.
How does Solemn rarely do anything? The card is crazy good. I only have three commander decks atm and that is one of the best cards that they each have.
Scroll Rack is incredibly powerful in the 2 decks I have it in. First is mono-blue draw all the cards. It lets me dig hard into my deck when I've got a hand full. The other is Yidris Storm. Allows me to dig further, faster, like in the blue deck, but it also lets me put cards in specific order to Cascade into in the order I want.
My 5, in no real order: 1. Mana dorks. If your commander is CMC 3, I'm on board with the Bird-- getting down Selvala on 2, sure. Or if you're in something like Ezuri where you can convert them to value down the line. But I see them get a lot of use for a deck where they're not actually helping your curve when compared to the far-less-vulnerable Nature's Lore or even a Signet. 2. Fetchlands. I see people trying to throw as many fetches as possible into two-color decks. Why? Your mana base is fine. Fetches are far more vulnerable to disruption than other lands (Stifle effects, anti-tutor effects, effects that force lands to come into play tapped). They're fine in three-color decks but not really needed, and shine in 4-5 color decks as well as decks that are going in on top deck manipulation or landfall synergies. But that's far fewer decks than I see them used in. 3. In Garruk's Wake/Insurrection/Rite of Replication: They cost 9 mana and don't actually win the game. Just go play Tooth and Nail or Expropriate more efficient cards. 4. Three-drop Lilianas: Not unlike what you said about JTMS, compounded by the fact that Last Hope has almost zero board impact and Veil's board impact is either limited to one player while restricting her to low loyalty or irritating the entire table. 5. Cultivate/Kodama's Reach: So in my experience, most of the commanders that people lean toward costs 3-4 mana. Cultivate actively is opposed to three-mana commanders and doesn't actually help you get to four-mana ones any faster. Meh. I'd rather play a two-mana ramp spell (of which there are billions) than that. It also makes you run basics, which unless you're in a Ruination or Blood Moon meta, is not great. One or two basics of each color should cover you in heavily multicolor decks. Meanwhile, Nature's Lore and Farseek almost never interfere with casting your commander and often get it down a turn sooner, can still find you multiple colors (via shocks, tangos, bicycles), and let you run a more consistent mana base. Signets cover two colors and can be used immediately for one less mana than Cultivate. Felwar Stone is usually just a five-color mana rock. Etc, etc. And to take my little shot at being 'that guy', I do actually think JTMS got much better when Atraxa happened. You can make people less scared of JTMS by using him to torture one player ("Hey ignore my Jace and Atraxa, I'm just going to poke this guy for four and bounce his commander every turn; his commander's scary so let me do this~"). Being four-color Atraxa actually wants fetchlands for topdeck manipulation, and can support this strategy with Top and Library. Also, the one time I did actually ult him, it was right after using Lily Vess' plus to strip the last card from his hand. Which, yes, super niche.
Kestral287 So I agree on a few of your points. However, cultivate and kodamas reach are still great. You may be right that they are possibly overrated and are just jammed in every green deck without thought. But it depends highly on your deck and meta. If you're in a meta with tons of board wipes, good luck keeping mana rocks around very long. Basic lands are just so safe on the battlefield. Also, if you run a deck where it's not necessary to get your commander out asap, they can be great, especially when paired with exploration or burgeoning. And generally if you're playing green, you're aiming to ramp fast. Also, rite of replication is pretty insane. I agree that it is expensive when kickedd, but in a deck with ramp that's not so bad. And it's versatile if you don't have all the mana for kicking . Definitely shouldn't go in every blue deck. But last night I casted kicked rite of replication on avenger of zendikar. Ended up with 50 6/7s after a land drop. It did in fact end the game. The great thing about the card is it can be a 4 drop of the best 8 drop out or it can be 5 of the best creature with the best ETB effect.
Kestral287 so the comment I have to make here is on your fetch lands. bacuase fetch is amazing in all decks period. reason being, is that they thin out your deck. you can essentially treat a fetch land, especially panorama style fetch as a play a land and draw. so in a singletons format style of play it makes those cards your really want to see show up that much faster. I will say I do agree mostly with your other choices on here they are pretty much situational at best. though I do love me a rite of rep at any point that I can get 5 copies of something fun. Even if it's something you had
Rund: Fair on Rite, but Rite is a very, very bad Clone. It's far easier to interact with on the stack, and that hurts the card badly. It is the best of the three I listed due to being semi-modal, but that's not why people use the card. As for the ramp cards, there's little real difference between Farhaven Elf and Cultivate when it comes down to it unless you can abuse the fact that it's a creature (reanimation, blinking, whatever). It's rare that the three points of damage Farhaven saves you actually swings a game in your favor, while swapping that Farhaven to Rampant Growth and getting your commander down a turn early actually can do that. Tom: All that your Reach/Cultivate argument points to is that ramp is good (of course) and that land ramp is usually safe (of course). But that doesn't mean that I should be using Reach over Nature's Lore. As for Rite, yes, Rite + Avenger + land + your opponents being on literally nothing won you that game. There's a lot of plus signs for something that can be abbreviated to "Tooth and Nail". Further, anecdotes don't actually mean much; the other day I won a game on the back of Liliana's Specter. Doesn't mean that card is good in EDH. Joseph: The difference between your deck being 99 and 98 cards is extremely narrow. You're arguing on a fraction of a basis point. It's most definitely not the equivalent of playing a land and drawing a card; drawing a card has a lot of real value on the game while decreasing the number of cards in your 99 card deck by exactly one does... well, not. You're getting a phantom scry at best. And if we're talking a scry + land, well, I don't see Temples crammed into every deck. Yeah, Temples come in tapped, but I've never won a game off Disallowing a Temple. The existence of fetches in your list creates a lot of small but notable vulnerabilities that add up to far more than the fraction of a basis point of consistency that you gain. There's also a converse argument that gets ignored far too often: EDH decks tend to go fatter on the curve, and pulling lands out of your deck can make it that much harder to cast your spells, and in particular to multi-spell. Four- and five- color decks still pretty much need fetches, and three-color decks can if they're deep on color dependencies--but then, I can T3 Animar with >90% consistency with no fetches other than Evolving Wilds/Terramorphic Expanse. And if you have /real/ synergies, sure. But the "I'm going to make my deck more consistent because over an EDH game I'll reduce the number of cards in my deck by two" argument is exactly the kind of overrated that I'm seeing.
I really like your point about Cultivate/ kodama's reach. I find that so few people who run green actually think about what their ramp spells do at different points in the game. They just see "this card ramps" and they throw it in to cover the ramp in their deck. I do, however, run both two and three mana ramp in my rafiq deck. There is a reason for that, though. The two mana ramp (nature's lore, farseek, rampant growth) either let me get a dual or just slot perfectly as a turn 2 play to get rafiq on turn 3. The 3 mana ramp (spoils of victory, cultivate) let me get duals or just let me get rafiq turn 3 if I can get a mana dork on turn 1. For those same reasons, I don't run my favorite ramp card (skyshroud claim). As fantastic of a card as that is, it doesn't work with what I really need the ramp for. I also completely agree with fetchlands. I think the percentage of difference they make in deck thinning is not significant enough to justify running them in a two or three color deck. If you own them already and just want to play them, I guess go ahead. I just don't see the point. A krosan verge is a tad slower but achieves statiscally more deck thinning (along with myriad landscape), while also ramping you. But this is just another case that I often call "top shelf syndrome". People know that cards are expensive and super good in other formats, so they think that automatically translates to edh. And it just doesn't.
Kestral287 I see your point, and I do agree that those cards can be overrated, but I just don't see nature's lore over reach or cultivate. Reach/cultivate ramp you as well as fix your mana better for only one more mana. There are decks that don't want to play those cards on turn 3, but that doesn't mean that the card isn't as good. It just means in decks that need their commander on turn 3 don't want reach/cultivate. Literally every other deck in green will probably want both unless you don't run a lot of basics, such as in a 4 or 5 color deck. I honestly think they see so much play just due to the cost of fetches and efficient 4 and 5 color mana bases. People often just spam mana rocks like chromatic lantern in decks that cost 3 and cultivate overall gives you much more value over the course of a game, unless you're in a 4 or 5 color deck.
You make some great points, especially in that these cards are great in perhaps a 1v1 vacuum, but lose a lot of their value in multiplayer EDH. Avenger of Zendikar is great in my Borborygmos Enraged deck, and I can see it in a Titania pretty easily, but it absolutely should not be in /every/ green deck. Like what is a Yisan going to do with it? Same with a BOP. As for Jace, I have a friend with an Atraxa superfriends and he was able to ult two players in one game due to pillow forting and a ton of proliferate, but that's a pretty specific circumstance and honestly the only one in EDH where I can see him actually being as broken as his legacy would suggest. Damnation is nice because it's cheap but yeah, there are scores better wipes, though few more iconic, I'd say, so there's a bit of a flavor win? Gilded Lotus is a lot better in monocolored decks than multi, but since the Paradox Engine ban it's lost a ton of value. I only run a Liliana Vess in my discard elves Nath deck, although you do kind of have to hope that your opponents have discarded some decent creatures to hope to get value out of the ult. She can tutor my Sadistic Hypnotist, though, which wipes all my opponents' hands, but like you said, my opponents, especially those who have played the deck a few times, can see that coming from a mile away. People really only run Diabolic Tutor because it's cheap, money-wise. Like I wish I could run Demonic Tutors in all my black decks, but money's a thing. Beseech the Queen's better, though, yeah, especially in monoblack. A little trickier to cast in multi. I agree with just about everything else, but my Ezuri, Claw of Progress loves Sword of Body and Mind because he gets an ability trigger from the wolf and ten cards is a LOT of cards to mill.
I like Sword of Light and Shadow in my meta because most of the decks only play black or white removal. You're always blanking a card in their hand, and recurring your creatures at the same time, but I play it in a deck that runs a lot of creatures and actually attacks, something a lot of my meta doesn't do. I also play scroll rack in my Maelstrom Wanderer deck, but like you said, that deck has a TON of shuffle effects, so those three 7 drops I put on top don't stay there.
I really do wish they would cover some of these topics in shorter videos. I don't have the time to watch an hour video to go over what could have been done in at least half the time.
N Kraus This. I generally devote the time to do both as I have an hour commute, one way, to work everyday. Listen on the way to as I prep for meetings and watch on the way home at night.
RainMasterXD You can also download the audio for it or just listen to the video on a car ride. There's plenty of ways to fit the podcast into some part of your day :D
I think Sensei's Divining Top is overrated in commander. It is in fact a great card, for some decks. But for the same reasons as scroll rack, it offers diminishing returns as you use your fetchlands. There are some decks that can abuse it, but mostly I believe there is a feeling that "Every commander deck needs sol ring and SDT", and that is a huge overstatement.I'd rather have any other draw engine card (sylvan library, arena, fecundity, etc) that is a bit more mana intensive in the SDT slot instead. Also, can you believe my playgroup overrates Praetor's Council to the point they wanted to ban it?? They see me using it for great effect, winning many games on a safe value strategy instead of their big risk/reward plays, and just think that it too offers too much inevitability to my control decks.
They pump out 1 a month after averaging it altogether. They take roughly 100 hours each to produce not to mention shooting them. They just released one; you're going to have to be patient for the next one.
I'm sure they would if they made more money from the channel. It's just so much work to make and edit Game Knights so they only come out once a month. Maybe once they make more from donations they will bring it out twice a month.
NivMizzetFiremind uh not really... the issue isn't cost so much as time. To double the amount in same time they'd have to hire people... that'd be a lot of extra money coming in to justify that. One a month is what it's at and what it likely will be at for a while if not ever. Good things come to those who wait.
Maybe 1 day, the production is very like table top and they put out a vid twice a month. I bet if the guys had the capital to hire more people and work on it more they would but it's a hard life being a YTer just now. I love the work they do and will keep supporting anyway I am able to. Once I have a better job i'll send them a nice chunk o cash each month too. I'm sure you agree they deserve it.
I can't really disagree with anything now because you've made some very valid points. The only two I, kind of, disagree with are Avenger of Zendikar and Diabolic Tutor, only because I make sure that, before I use it or throw it in a deck, I make sure I can get the most use out of them. For example, I like to play avenger of zendikar in a heavy mana ramp deck, so that I can drop him and still have enough mana to play Genesis wave immediately afterwards (My Freyalise deck loves to win this way) and I run diabolic tutor in my meren deck if I'm able to discard a card or two because, the way I build my meren, if it's in my graveyard, it's in play. Or I'll grab my Ashnod's altar with it and then drop birthing hulk next turn and infinite
Didn't you say turn 5 was an extremely important turn in the video? Then wouldn't a 4 mana tutor for a 5 mana play, answer to board state (I.E Damnation, Vandalbast etc.) be better than a 5 mana tutor for *possibly* a 3 mana play, depending on deck and opening?
but if you play ramp then its not four or five but three and four, which makes a big difference . if budget is not an issue then diabolic is not good enough because you already have demonic ,vampiric ,grim, cruel, diabolic intent etc. so many better options. If budget is the issue then still increasing ambition beseech the queen, dark pettion, sidisi, rune scarred are all still better. diabolic tutor is draft chaff. do not put it in your deck.
Yeah, in my play group, it's all about attack your opponents resources. The term, 'permanent,' is fairly misleading. Naming Birds of Paradise, is a certain no-no. A one drop chump blocker in the air, with the mana fixing early game, mid, or late is absolutely worth it, and helps you, 'get there.' I didn't hear you guys naming Sol Ring. I keep hearing about sad robot, Solemn Simulacrum. A four cost that might be good in artifact decks, but I was to draw more than a single card at four mana, and need lands (basics? really?) for no more than two mana. Costs too much mana for white utility to continuously dig it out, and there are better cards to blink. One time I put this card in my Atogatog deck for that fifth color of mana, but that was a budget build. Simulacrum does stuff yes, but is blows at doing that stuff due to the cost of the card, and I'd rather cheat something more effective into play.
They are literally saying you [or people] put cards in their decks which they think are subjectively strong or as you put it "work with their build", but in a fact underperform. The problem I have is that you make your choice of cards falseproof against criticism saying that my choice = objectivrly good when it is no always true. I personally put spells I LIKE into my decks sometimes even though I could put there better spells BUT I like flavour of entomb+reanimation so I put them into my golgari [and other] decks that have gy flavour.
You CAN technically pull of a diabolic tutor turn 2 if you have a dark ritual ;) But over all i agree with this list. The only time i play Avenger of Zendikar is with my Thromok Deck which luvs his tokens
You hit the nail on the head when you said that each of these cards are very good in certain decks. Many of these cards are best used as either combo pieces or to take advantage of very specific synergies in this format. I am super thrilled that you guys took a less arrogant approach to this video. To often you guys take a firm stance on a subject and talk down the listening audience even though many of those listeners have been playing longer and at a higher level than you have. That creates an adversarial relationship with those players and is probably a major factor in why you are subjected to so much criticism online. I can personally attest that I support many content creators but reconsidered doing so for your channel just based on the tone of how you speak to and about the community. Hopefully this is a sign that you will be more mindful of these things in the future.
I completely agree with Anvenger if Zendicar. I currently play it in a G/B deck, and most of the time it comes onto the field and draws hate at instant speed before a land can even come down that turn to pump the plants, and even though I play birthing pod and kukusho it seems like it should be a great target for that effect I'll general go grab sheoldred first or another black creature. I'm thinking of swapping it out for another creature, possible siege behemoth or sepulacar primordial.
I'd rate Oblivion Ring higher than Grasp of Fate. I mean, targetting every opponent is good in theory, but in the end is just making up X Oblivion Rings, with all the weaknesses and without the ability to politic around it. You can use the Oblivion Ring to work with other players to slow down a specific one, if you play it well you may even get them to wast resources to protect the Ring, wich is much harder to do with Grasp of Fate since you can't count on opponents having nonland permanents or tokens they'll ok getting rid of, so basically you will have all the opponents agreeing to take it out. Also, while extremely specific, you can use Oblivion Ring on yourself, essentially making on of your permanents impossible to remove and keeping it safe, particularly if you plan a wrath (like Planar Cleansing) or you know it's coming. It's still ridicolously specific, so it doesn't really make it a good card or the best plan, but it's still a possibility worth considering.
You can actually do politics with all 3 players and convince each of them that the permanents you pick were the ones they wanted so they all feel like you saved them from the other two
5. Blood moon, anytime an opponent has played it actually helped me 4. honestly even disregarding curve 5+ cmc better be game winning 3.sad robot, yavimaya elder really anyform of "imma get another land maybe" that isn't cultivate or another similar card 2. "you may play an additional land" 1. planeswalkers ...just all of them unless you can immediately do something powerful @ mana cost for a card that would do the same thing 0. tap lands without some sort of untapped clause
My main issue in justifying Diabolic Tutor, is that Diabolic Revelation and Increasing Ambition exist. Both are large, and unwieldy like the Diabolic, but when you build up that sort of excessive mana, you might as well bounce into multi-tutor range.
feast and famine is the ONLY sword that´s really strong without specifically abusing the abilities. fire and ice draws you a card which is nice, but 2 damage ? the circumstances to actually kill a real threat with that are ...welll.. too specific^^ other than that it´s nice to tear apart the opponents early game, but then again this demands you draw the sword within the first 4 to max 5 rounds. other than that it´s pretty much as useless as the other 3 swords. apart from that i completely agree with everything you said ^^ btw love your work, keep it up :)
Here's a question because of Damnation. Have you ever put in a card that you think of as strictly worse in a deck because it fits better flavor wise?The example is I run Damnation in a B/W religion/church/cleric themed deck instead of Toxic Deluge.
There is a debate over Birds of Paradise art story. Many say that it was actually not for Volcanic Island but Tropical Island, and right before they went to printing they saw the illustration and thought the bird in the foreground was too big. For proof, the template for Tropical Island in Alpha remained unchanged and the illustrator has been left as being Mark Poole while the real Tropicai Island's illustration was actually made by Jesper Myrfors. This has been corrected in Beta and further sets. As per what happened to Volcanic Island in Alpha, well, they apparently just forgot to print it (just like CoP: black). LIke I said, it's one theory that I have heard, the art from Birds of Paradise does seem to show a Volcanic Island to me too so we're not too sure about what's the real story here.
Im actually a little surprised that serra ascendant isnt on this list because if it isnt played within the first 4 turns then its just a 1/1 flyer, i mean if you get it out early its great, but if not its just not good.
I know a guy who plays Avenger of Zendikar in Omnath where he plays a ton of cramp and gets it back to him with plenty of power boost to the plant tokens, but... even then, I agree with you guys in that the avenger is something I'm usually able to answer, if not in board wipe form, then in the form of people copying it and usually to better effect than the player who played the Avenger in the first place.
I agree on all cards listed. Very excellent points about each card's strengths in certain deck types but being otherwise lackluster yet common auto-includes. My list: Burgeoning and Exploration are kinda useless without a draw engine online. Can't remember the last time my opening hand was 4 land, burgeoning + rhystic/remora. Solemn Simulacrum is an auto-include for red decks, white decks that can have trouble ramping and drawing. While decent in creature recursion/blink decks or slower ramp/control decks, it is otherwise kind of mediocre as a 4 drop. Auto-include in casuals but usually doesn't make the cut after the vintage/legacy power level stuff is added for competitive. Chromatic Lantern tends to be unnecessary outside of 4/5color decks if the mana base is built correctly. I have run it in tricolor decks that have a lot of cards with double mana costs like UU, BB, WW. A must-have if Blood Moon is common in your meta or you run Sen Triplets. Otherwise, meh... Still on the fence about: Eternal Witness, Propaganda/Ghostly Prison/Sphere of Safety pillow-fort stuff.
Eternal Witness is great because it's recursion outside of black. In a GR or GW deck it's basically mandatory. In GU it can be blinked quite easily to get more utility out of it. Propoganda and Ghostly Prison are great but need to be put in the right strategy and proper meta.
I play BOP in my Ezuri, COP deck. It ramps, triggers Ezuri, and it flies in late game if it gets a bunch of Ezuri counters. I play Avenger of Zendikar in my angry Omnath deck. The deck has sac outlets, maximizes landfall, and AoZ itself an elemental for Omnath. Both the right deck I guess. I don't have a Damnation, but I suppose I would put it into my Gisa and Geralf deck if I did. I don't have a Jace, Gilded Lotus, Scroll Rack, or any sword either. I don't think I have Diabolic Tutor in my Gisa and Geralf, but it is my worst EDH deck so I hardly play it. I only play limited and have four EDH decks. I don't spend money on the game anymore. I've not bought a box of boosters since '99.
Saw the top 5 lists in the description before they covered them, and they made a lot of sense. It's important to have cards that have multiple uses, are difficult to deal with, are cheap, or effect multiple opponents. Many of these cards simply do not do any of these things well, or not well enough as other options. I think you guys did a great job expressing the downsides of cards like these, and what would make good replacements!
I've always loved stasis snare more than oblivion ring. Oblivion ring is an unquestionable power play just for the sheer impact and flexibility, but no one sees stasis snare coming. One of the best times I've used the card has been after another player O-ringed something innocuous (by warranting an o-ring) and the next guy in line tried to steal the game by dropping Blightsteel. It didn't have haste, so it kinda sat there while I had it in hand. Everyone was getting pessimistic about the board while the o-ring player was digging for more removal. When it got back to the kill turn, it swung at me and I dropped the hammer. The sheer look of "wait, what?" was SUPER satisfying.
I'd agree with almost all of these. I don't think Gilded Lotus or Diabolic tutor makes my list, but I can see your point. My games tend to play a bit slower; my group likes big commanders and has less mana ramp. When you've got an 8 drop commander, and turn 4 is still early game, both the lotus and tutor make some good sense. Your games are a lot faster and have a lot more removal. It makes less sense for you guys.
for avenger of zendikar, I play it in my riku deck and someone in my playgroup plays sisay with night of souls betrayal. EVERY SINGLE TIME, when i play the first land to pump the tokens, he tutors it with his commander and all the tokens are gone...
i play mtgo, so here my feel.as follows baised on that. JOSH: 5. Birds of Paradise (in a critter ramp yea played. more for a cheap flyinf blocker.very rare) 4. Damnation (nice if you don't know about other options. mono black but very very very rare) 3. Gilded Lotus ( brilliant in a mono colour deck, or a deck that don't really want colourless. very rare) 2. Diabolic Tutor ( in a tool kit deck brill else. not used. i think i've onl yever seen it in black tutor decks. extramly rare) 1. Oblivion Ring (best used as a useful counter for mass removal. which is. situational. not seen and when i used it i scraped it due to how useless it is. expect i nthe manor also stated) so i use Gilded Lotus as i love mono decks. as for the reast yea don't use them much. JIMMY: 5. Avenger of Zendikar ( in a token deck or a land play deck there 3 such commander but other wise don't use. one game in 10 green really) 4. Jace the Mind Sculptor ( over priced and dies way to quick of be of use. mostly as its a kill on sight card, so its good for a hate magnet, mono blue only.) 3. Liliana Vess ( i like in a black deck with a card draw commander, else not seen) 2. Scroll Rack ( good if your quick and skilled in it use. else. not good seen only by one or two palyer who are skilled in it use and they play blue) 1. Sword of Light and Shadow / War and Peace / Body and Mind ( protection against abilities are very valid. else you don't see. mythicaly rare) all in all i only use liniana vess and that only because i need more tutors in my tool kit deck, never play it other wise. so i find my self in agreement with you both.
I run a Prossh deck and one time I had doubling season out and then I put Avenger of Zendikar out and then played a land to buff the plants. I thought that was cool and it works well in my deck because it gives me at least 7 things to sac to Prossh (with doubling season out, i had like I think 16 plants because i had an extra land) . I do agree though. Most of the time I do see people run it in any green commander deck thinking its so good and then they play it.. and.. then it sits there for maybe 1 or 2 turns and then dies.
I think the power of gilded lotus is not when you play it on turn 5. I find that on the turns on which I play gilded lotus, I look at my hand/board, count up the total mana cost of spells/abilities I want to activate/cast this turn, and come to a number that is 2 less than my available mana that turn. So, I shove gilded lotus in there, for mana efficiency. And on future turns, I just have more mana. That is not good in every deck, but I generally build my decks so that I never truly run out of ways to spend mana. So I always know that if the lotus survives, I will always be able to use the extra mana on the following turn(s). Definitely not an auto-include in every deck though.
I haven't seen a lot of your guys' videos so I don't know if this has been covered yet, but I have a question for you two. In a three color deck, would you rather have a Painful Truths @ X=3, or a Read the Bones? Would you rather have the extra card draw, or the ability to scry 2 before drawing those 2 cards?
So, after your opinion on Diabolic Tutor, I was wondering: What are your thoughts on Increasing Ambition? It's an expensive 3 for 1, but the cost is split apart and you can find random combo pieces you put in your deck, so I like it.
I find it way too slow an expensive. I'm just don't find myself in many games where I can tap out at sorcery speed after turn 5 and do nothing (and certainly never feel like I can do that twice in the same game).
Now I agree that many of the swords don't work in most decks, but sword of light and shadow works very well in decks that need a larger variety of creatures on the board. I have an Odric, Lunarch Marshal deck that hates board wipes that I don't have answers to and sword of light and shadow is huge for getting the pieces I need back to rebuild. Especially because I pretty much always have the flyers to get through.
I completely agree about JTMS. I personally only use him in my mono blue deck as a kill condition. I legitimately ultimate him 3-6 times in 1 turn when I use it to kill the table XD
Hmph, I've ran plenty of combo decks with Diabolic tutor and it's helped so much. Then again, I run 2-3 card combos at 2-3cmc each. So it's not like I'm paying 4 to tutor a 6-7cmc card. But, after this, I will consider finding something other than Diabolic tutor. I play a Breya combo deck. I actually had reshape in my hand and planned to sac a phyrexian metamorph and get sharuum to combo off with Marionette master, until I re-read reshape and realized you pay the cmc of the tutored card plus UU...I really wished I had something better(reshape still great, but i wished I had something that didn't require so much mana) or something else. If i had a demonic tutor in hand it would've been played turn 2 to get the sharuum, thus, problem avoided. So i might cut reshape as well. who knows.
I think what puts Oblivion Ring so high above its brethren like Grasp of Fate and even Cast Out, besides the fact that it was the first, is the whole "two triggers" clause thing which allows it to permanently remove things from the game if timed right. Not that all decks can abuse it, but flicker based decks can ruin games with the wording oversight in ways the fixed versions like Banishing Light can't. Also, white being the go-to color for enchantment strategies, loves even temporary removal that also counts towards its counts, like drawing for enchantresses and that extra mana for Serra's Sanctum. I completely agree that it's overrated, in the sense that I've seen it way too many times in decks with only splashes of white that can be running much better removal, but I also see how it would show up at the top of white's "top cards" lists on sites like EDHRec. Remember that Brago used to be the top deck on that site for the longest time, and almost all Brago decks included it because of how B.S. the interaction is.
I’ve had some killer Avenger of zendikar combos with scapeshift. Typically I’ll cast them both late game while I have around 10-12 mana and then have an overwhelming wall of plants lol
Josh just put Damnation on the list to lower the price.
0:00-1:40 Standard Intro
1:41-2:50 Card Kingdom
2:51-3:30 UltraPro
3:31-3:59 Game Knights promotion
4:00-4:30 Patreon
4:31-8:46 Commander Anthology
WOTC doesn't financially compensate them for promoting their product so the actual time devoted to ads is only about 3 and 1/2 minutes. Context is important everyone.
08:46
Kevin Troy i love u
thanks!
8 minutes of ads? That's gross.
Beat me to it.
ty man
I play damnation for style. I also went out of my way to buy a foil damnation from planar chaos for even more style.
Jason Tan my buddy got 1 pack from getting 3rd place in a tiny draft tournament at my LGS and drew foil damnation (modern masters)
....green has better boardwipes? ...green has board wipes?
The great aurora?
Overrun, Triumph of the Hordes, Craterhoof Behemoth, Ibex, Tooth and Nail... You're dead. All your permanents are wiped.
Bane of Progress is a game winning card.
+Vitor Dias all of those assume you have a board, which you might not. And also none of. Those really aren't board wipes in that they don't hit everyone but usually only one maybe 2 opponents
lightspeedasH monstrous onslaught has been one of my all time favorite green sorceries in commander. They can't even stop it by removing your biggest creature in response because it checks as it is cast.
I disagree with the Diabolic Tutor. I know it's 4 mana, but tutoring important or powerful cards on a budget is very difficult. A couple "Diabolic Tutors" (i.e. Sidisi, Rune Scar, etc) is a great, cheap way to make budget builds infinitely better and more consistent.
I love Command Zone, but I do feel often that you guys live in an ecosystem divorced from the average commander player who can't afford things like Demonic and Vampiric Tutor. I agree with most the rest of the list, but bashing on a budget card by saying the more expensive versions are just better (like, duh) just feels kind of crummy.
Tyler Kaune It's like that with most of these mtg TH-camrs their 800 dollar decks are great if you have the money for it but for a budget player like me it just makes me groan. I sometimes hate playing commander because it sometimes needs very specific cards to work.
Tyler Kaune its a good card but we have sidisi undead viser dark petition behold the beyond beseech the queen etc iv never liked diabolic tutor
But what they were saying is that EVEN if you're on a budget you probably don't want this card. You might not even want tutors at all, there is probably something better you can do at that point.
Dennis Kroné im lucky and own dem tutor and pulled dark petition and diabolic i bought sidisi undead viser so i have plenty of tutors for my black decks . diabolic sits in my binder of edh cards lol
+Dennis Kroné I usually build on a budget and I can assure you that tutors are an excellent thing for budget decks because they allow you to acquire an expensive card or two or three and then instead of running all of the other expensive iterations of those cards you run really cheap tutors. Tutors are always awesome!
1. Forest
2. Plains
3. Swamp
4. Island
5. Mountain
6. Blood moon
Underrated:wastes
Best: snow covered
Far more important than a list like this is your rationale - explaining why you feel its overrated is so much more valuable than just a raw list. Thanks guys!
Can't agree more!
So as a new player to EDH I just watched the 25 must haves video you guys made, I then purchased a Gilded Lotus and a Scroll Rack then decided to watch this video...….. thanks for that.
Protip: Oblivion Ring your own thing just before you board wipe for an unnecessarily clunky flicker
TFW ultra pro sleeves come in packs of 80
good move for them if it makes more money for them.
If I had to rank currently available sleeves I give "new/2ndseries" Dragonshields matte 8.5, UP Eclipses would be 9.0 for me, but it's true I buy Dragonshields for my standard decks which I single sleeve, whereas Modern/Commander staple decks are sleeved in UP eclipses.
I don't have any issue with the sleeves or ultrapro. It's more of a comment about how they are being shown on an EDH focused podcast and don't have enough for the format. Same thing with KMC's packing too. All about the memes fren.
To be fair even 100 sleeve packs don't have enough sleeves outside the theory. I usually need ~10/20 sleeves extra just to be sure if someting happens I can resleeve those damaged sleeves or just try out multiple extra cards, swap them in and out between games etc. and I just don't like resleeving things.
I've never purchased dragonshields that didn't have 4-7 extra sleeves. obvs not 10-20, but at least a few extra to account for random splits or wrinkles.
I mean, it makes sense to cater to players of 60 card deck formats, as those players make up the majority of the MTG community. Packs of 80 sleeves is the perfect amount for a 60 card deck with a 15 card sideboard, plus a couple sleeves extra in case of splits.
hey mr. editor, at around 25:00 i think he meant Garruk, Apex Predator - he said the Garruk that axes planeswalkers.
x505 oh no he meant Garruk that axes plainswalkers lmao it's a lore thing (Garruk went nuts and killed a bunch of walkers)
@@KrankkxGaming It's both. Apex Predator axes planeswalkers, which is a reference to the lore. JLK was indeed probably talking about Apex Predator, rather than Primal Hunter.
Am i the only one who always skips the first 10 minutes of this show?
they have so many ads that you kinda need to
Jace Ziegler no. And I listen at 2x speed. They’re so slow!
@@The_Murder_Party lb npgppbpppvpp0boppppppbppppp00opbppp000bpn0p0p0pnj0n0pmpb0knml
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5.solemn simalacrum
4.senseis divining top
3.vedalken orrey
2.command tower
1.sol ring
Do you agree with our Top 5s? What do you think are some of the more overrated cards in Commander?
The Command Zone game knights with commander anthology plz
Sensei's Divining Top. Not every deck needs to play the stacking game when card draw or tutor would serve you fine.
I agree with all of them, actually. Those are all fine choices.
I'm very surprised by the inclusion of Scroll Rack, simply because I feel like it's a better version of Top, which wasn't included (and yet is equally popular in EDH). I agree that Top os very overrated, but confused why Scrollrack would be listed above it.
Reliquary Tower is on my overrated list. If I am ending my turn with more than 7 I either mulled poorly or drew cards from an effect outside of my control. There are enough ways to get cards back from your graveyard that it's only detrimental if there is gy hate directed toward you.
Hmmm... title could have been, "Cards that don't belong in every deck."
That's basically just a definition of overrated.
"Cards that don't belong in every deck" -literally any card
isnt that literally every card tho
I genuinely agree with your card choices & like how you explained why they are all overrated whilst still being good cards in specific situations.
Thank you as always for all the hard work that you both do for the show & the community.
18:28 You could do a episode of exemples of cards that you can use to force your opponents to do something. I acnt think of a 3 mana card that forces a board wipe
Commander anthology better be a game knights
Great idea :-)
ArcGIS Is Fun Game knights: Constructed
ArcGIS Is Fun I hope so too I really want to see someone to play maren
same, 👌
I run 3 of these in very specific commander decks; Jace and Rack in Narset (as they say, in that deck you just want ALL the top-deck manipulation you can get) and O Ring in my enchantress deck. I like O Ring because I have a couple of ways to sac enchantments in response to the trigger, to exile stuff forever, and it's also sometimes a handy political tool to stop enchantment wipes from certain players, if I'm holding another players powerful creature hostage. I also have a lot of recursion for my enchantments too, so I can usually get it back if they do deal with it. I should probably add a Cast Out to that deck too though, thinking about it, especially since I can cycle early and then recur it with other stuff.
I agree with all their other points and I don't think I've run any of those others in any of my decks. I should probably consider Birds for my Animar though, getting him out on turn 2 occasionally would be pretty good.
"If you play platinum angel you can't lose"
I definitely agree with a lot of your points, except for the sword of light and shadow specifically. You guys kinda glanced over the protection clause which I believe is the best part about it. The fact that it gives protection against black and white negates so much removal. Sure the opponents can remove it but then they have to remove another card first.
There are so many of these cards that go in my Maelstrom Wanderer deck haha Avenger, JTMS, Gilded Lotus and Scroll Rack
To be fair, Maelstrom Wanderer has abnormal synergies with all of those cards. JTMS bouncing Maelstrom Wanderer is great, and brainstorming to set one up is also great. Avenger is much better when you have a haste outlet and Wanderer gives you that. Scroll Rack lets you stack your Cascade triggers as you want. Lotus is pushing you a full three turns closer to Wanderer.
But if you were looking at a more generic Temur commander-- say, Surrak-- then these synergies wouldn't exist and the cards would get much worse.
Incidentally props for the Pricia avatar. :D
Kestral287 haha yeah that was kinda my point since they talked about these picks being good in specific decks but not to jam in every deck. I was just surprised as to how many were key players in my pet deck. ^_^ Also cheers, this channel is actually dedicated to FoW :D
Red Zone Rogue i was watching thinking my maelstrom wanderer loves these lol. Glad I'm not alone
Damnation is not as good as verdict? verdict lets me regenerate and lets be honest most times the guy with the 3 counters in hand is not the one with the full board
How often does Regeneration actually make a difference? Or hell, how often is that effect even used in EDH? I'd rather draw a bunch of cards with Decree of Pain, or save mana and get around Indestructible with Toxic Deluge.
You guys hate budget players apparently.
video starts at 10:44, you can go to 10:00 to hear what the criteria/performance of the "type 5 overrated cards"
Enjoy the video :D
Topic begins 8:50
Decree of pain is 8 mana. In CEDH the average cmc is 2-3. I'm not saying every deck has to be competitive level, just that obviously mana cost matters a lot. I just revamped my decks and looked to remove anything expensive and clunky.Sure you cycle decree of pain - its -2/-2.
Your meta is basically limited level EDH decks and a bunch of whinging when people play anything that hoses it.
Really decree of pain is better than damnation? Lol. Not even close.
I'm legit hooked on watching your all's stuff, love the content and editing!!
Wellllll.
I live in Virginia and Star City is faster shipping for me but I do buy between them, Card Kingdom, and Channel Fireball.
Edited:
So I belong to three different metas, one is against Mimic Vat, Walking Atlas, and Trading Posts because they don't see a lot of value the other sees a lot of value from them. The LGS meta I'm at is against things like Howling Mine, Rites of Flourishing, ect. because there is a lot of tryhards there and they don't want to give them advantage.
Gotta say I'm pretty surprised to not see Solemn Simulacrum on either list. If you can't reliably sacrifice and reanimate it to abuse it's effects it's pretty underwhelming, but I see it all the time. Not a bad card, but I consider it the poster child for overrated "trap" cards.
I think it's good enough. It's never the best card in your 99, but it's almost always among the best 99 cards to fit into your deck. 4 mana is affordable, it usually replaces itself (if anyone at the table paths or swords a solemn, I'd be very happy). And the it ramps you and protects your life total or a planeswalker once or maybe even attacks into a planeswalker. That's just good value for 4 mana and the reason why solemn will always be among the first ramp spells I'd be looking at when building a deck.
TheNerindil iv always prefered pilgrims eye or burnished hart my gf loves sad robot im not a big fan of it but he is a good card
But noone would path a solemn...
I get behind burnished hart, but why pilgrims eye over robot?
Skuamato well i like getting the card in my hand and 3 mana is better for me then 4 and iv fell for pilgrim eye since trophy mage was printed
5. sol ring
4. Eternal witness
3. lightning greaves
2. Primeval titan
1. demonic tutor
The second best manarock with staying power ever printed is overrated in a format that is generally good for ramp?
Witness is simply very solid value and is imo viewed as jsut that. It isn't some zomg broken card but solid value, which is wht it's rated at.
Greaves is a zero equip haste and protection package. It's amazing for decks that like those things and usually fine otherwise. But is't that pretty much exactly how people view it?
Titan is banned for a reason
One of the best tutors ever printed is overrated in a format whose inherent ariance favours tutors? Okay
How fucking long does it take to just start the list
Who is casting turn 5 Gilded Lotus?!? This card takes you over the 4 CmC mark in a huge way if you cast it with any ramp played before turn 5. A single dork or signet gets it out on turn 4 tapping for 3 mana. 2 Ramp and it's out on turn 3. It does of course carry the target of being pricey and it sucks to get it countered if you tap out for it, but we all showed up to start fights anyway :)
I ordered each of the foil vivid lands and card kingdom messed up the order and sent me 2 vivid marshes. I emailed them told them its okay to just give me store credits because of the shipping but NOPE. They said they will mail me a 99c foil using the same shipping method i paid for. Mind you i live in Singapore and the shipping costed 14usd!
After this incident i am converted.
nicholas sia oh my!
I agree for the most part with your lists. Diabolic Tutor is the only one I strongly disagree with. I think 4 mana is a reasonable price to be able to search up anything you need. Granted Demonic Tutor and Vampiric Tutor are better, but Diabolic Tutor is a good budget option. You're in black so you have access to lots of ramp. Often you CAN cast Diabolic Tutor and the card you're searching for. Earlier in the video you mentioned Sidisi as a good tutor and it costs 1 more mana (i get that as a creature you can reanimate it so that's its selling point). I much prefer Diabolic Tutor to Beseech the Queen with its CMC restriction and it can be more difficult to cast if you're not in mono-black.
A card I find is overrated: Panharmonicon. I was sooooo hyped on this card and I've been disappointed. It's obviously amazing in a flicker deck. However, I've found it durdles in other decks. You need to have a really high density of ETB creatures to make it worth including. Good card but not nearly as amazing as the initial hype.
You had me until The Swords. +2/+2 plus protection from 2 colours would be enough to have these swords in a lot of decks, the abilities on top of that are just gravy.
I think the big problem is that Feast and Famine is so strong, that it makes the other swords look almost pedestrian. But I don't think the strength of one sword should devalue the others.
I'd especially like to give props to SOBM, with Blue being so prevalent in EDH, having a body that can get passed blue blockers and abilities is key. On top of that, any creature with double strike becomes the most hilarious thing in the world. Milling for 20, creating 2 2/2's, maybe you've got parallel lives and Doubling season out. NUTS.
I'd sooner have tried to throw shade at Umezawa's Jitte than any of The Swords, and I've got 6 in EDH decks as I write this, and I could probably find a home for it in a few other decks if I wanted.
I don't really know what my top five or ten would be, I'd have to spend a fair amount of time considering it, I just know I wouldn't have put any of the swords on it, or Damnation, for that matter.
But again, this is subjective, great episode, though a little heavy on the ads.
A large part of the swords being called overrated is that they each generate about the same amount of hate from the other players for less utility than Feast and Famine.
I'm still with you both 100% I think a good video/series could be what you think should be banned or un-banned. Also...@37:20. You nailed it. I'm an old school as it gets vet player, and I own many Scroll Racks. I've been warning people for years.
I want to shop on Card Kingdom but it seems like they intentionally overprice so I can't on principle.
Leonidas Spartan they are more expensive than my lgs. but they have most everything you may need.
Same here.
Just buy from tcg I always shop there sure it’s important to support lgs and everything else but why am going to pay $5 or $10 extra for a card when I could get it average price or lower on tcg I love supporting TH-cam magic content and local game shops but I’m not going to spend more for a card I can get cheaper just by waiting a couple days to a week
The best way to support is probably buying the ultra pro products off card kingdom! They're the same price over at TCGplayer, and you give twice the support!
Justin Anderson they are not the same price lmao
40:55 I think Oblivion Ring is very good in decks that have Enchantment tutors.
But else, it's just a 3 mana removal. That's "meh" at best, especially in white.
Um, I like the Progenitor Mimic and Avenger of Zendikar combo.
I'd love to try those sleeves but it's such a bummer they're only available in 80 packs. Real downer.
I guess I'll stick with my Dragon Shields for now.
nice!
Did they made a "top underrated cards" already?
They did #198
what a coincident, I was yesterday on Card Kingdom looking for some cool cards and found one that is highly underrated I think.
Dissensions: ignorance bliss. 1r instant exile your hand face down and return it to your hand at the end turn draw a card....why underrated...well bottom floor is a cycle of 2 with more dodges in the mix in best, it lets red protect itself against discard and use its wheels draw card effect more fluently...yes its not like the best card ever but its dirt cheap and I can't see why when you think about how rare its effect is.
You sold me on Game Knights, snap pre-order Archenemy on Card Kingdom today.
Nice! I found it to be super fun.
Dark Petition is a better alternative to Diabolic Tutor. Using it to get Necropotence, Toxic deluge, or Yawgmoth's will feels good.
I've really been enjoying these videos. I haven't played Magic for about 15 years and my kids just got back into it. Hence, reigniting the fire for me as well. Just began playing commander with my wife about a week ago because of these guys. I can't wait to attempt to build my own commander deck vs the constructed ones.
Great to hear! I'm glad we could help you get excited about Magic again. Let us know how it goes!
its tons of fun, and i'm kinda in the same boat - returning MTG player doing his best to stand up to the high-power Modern/newer decks and Commander decks(which HEAVILY rely on Planeswalkers)
meanwhile I'm sitting here with my Tempest and Ice Age cards and kicking a respectable amount of butt thanks to HEAVY control aspects
I haven't even attempted to play yet at my local store. Too much nerves.
Honestly just go in and start talking to people. I haven't seen many LGS crowds that weren't open to new players.
Good point. Now I just need to find the time. I might try and do my first draft this Saturday. Hopefully they are ready for me to ask a lot of questions. So many new abilities not enough time.
Two lists for two players-
Birds of Paradise, Damnation, Gilded Lotus, Diabolic Tutor, Oblivion Ring
Avenger of Zendikar, Jace the Mind Sculptor, Liliana Vess, Scroll Rack, all Sword of x and y
Some of these feel like you're reaching guys. Though each of them has places where they can be used and abused here's my list:
* Solemn Simulacrum (does everything ok, nothing great),
* Ponder/Serum Vision/Preordain (takes a slot, smooths draws for combo, but feel like they do not do enough),
* Decimate (amazing when it has 4 targets, sucks when it's stuck in your hand),
* Krosan Grip (good if you play against plenty of infinite decks or tons of countermagic)
* Phyrexian Arena (great when it stays around, but it paints a target on your head and is a pretty bit "kill be before I get value" target when it hits the board).
please DO NOT play the commander anthology on game knights. There can only be so much of the show produced and one of the best things about the show imo is seeing the decks that people build and the interesting cards I've never seen as well as the less mainstream commanders ._.
on a list of mainstream commanders where does "child of alara" sit in? Its my most functional deck and I never see 5 color commanders aside from when I completely dominate sliver players
I mean no offence and I'm sure you're a good player but if a sliver player is losing to child of Alara, they are simply not exploiting the true power of slivers. Also, what about Cromat? You never know what they are playing but it's cromat, how good can it be?
Well, i don't use cromat because all of his abilities seem lackluster to me. When it comes to 5 color commanders child and progenitous are the only commanders i would use. With child i get a board wipe ready to go because i usually have the mana for it, and progenitous is at the very least a world class beat stick. In regards to the part about slivers, i have had no problem with them because for the most part they don't stick around long enough to be a threat. My child deck uses a ton of grave recursion and is basically a 5 color golgari deck that functions better because of the extra three colors.
Fair enough on the sliver matchup, you have an amazing matchup with them. On Cromat, who cares about what cromat does. With a cromat deck, you never EVER play your commander. You only have cromat as your commander to confuse your opponents and steal a win out of nothing with a bonkers combo or blightsteel from nowhere. Cromat isn't a build around commander, it is a commander that draws no hate and gives you basically free set up time.
your analysis of Scroll Rack is very similar to what I see when I repeatedly activate Munda, Ambush Leader in my Ally deck. The filtering is great because I get a consistent stream of Ally cards but it also means I lose access to other utility cards.
Damnation? You're just trolling at this point Josh.
tbh damnation and wrath of god are worse than things that tuck or return considering anyone can take advantage of the cards in the graveyards and in my experiance a lot of the decks I have played against have graveyard recursion
So because some decks may have some graveyard options, damnation and wrath are overrated? Wtf kind of logic is that?
I think the graveyard recursion argument is overrated. they can get your card back eventually but Meren, alesha and karador need to play their general with commander taxes, then get one creature back that is summoning sick. It still buys you a lot of time.
LaMereACaniche
to be Honest, No. its not true, IF You look through most powerful decks in the format...most of Them Will do stupid things with their Graveyard.
i proved it in My playgroup
now all of my opponents run Relic, crypt, spellbomb, ooze, bojuka bog n so forth.
but then again, i dont play Casually, and neither does Josh and Jimmy (to an extent) seein that they play Riku, Cromat and just leave all sweet stuff.
Sure there's Golgari and a good amount of White/Black recurrsion in general but not to the point I wouldn't run Damnation. I can agree though that I probably wouldn't deck both it and Wrath in Orzhov because the sheer amount of options, only one, but that one could be either without it being overrated (and as stated, mono-black auto includes this).
People mash solemn into every deck because it's a coloress ramp creature that draws a card. You don't need to build around it, it's just a 2 for 1 card like acidic slime. He's just a very solid dude, and that's good enough to make it into a lot of decks. Burnished Hart, there's a solid window they can just kill it; Pilgrim's eye gets 1 card instead of 2, and it doesn't put the land into play; solemn, you can just set and forget, and you get to watch your opponents walk on eggshells not to kill it on accident. Nobody is claiming it to be this ridiculously powerful card that mows down entire armies, or can pump out tons of mana, it's perfectly rated. Honestly, even in green, I'm hard pressed to find a reason to not play it, like what's the next best ramp creature? Farhaven Elf, who doesn't draw you a card? Seed-Guide Ash, who doesn't do anything when it comes into play? Oracle Mul-Daya, is maybe quite a bit better long-term, but that's about it.
My top overrated card is Solemn Simulacrum. I see it a lot and it's one of the most played cards according to edhrec, but I rarely see it doing anything, and I've seen some players mashing it into pretty much all their decks.
It's just very efficient, it gives ramp for any deck, a chump blocker that rewards you for chump blocking with card draw.
It's definitely just OK in your average deck, and MUCH better in decks with graveyard recursion, but that's why it's mashed mindlessly into a ton of decks. Because even in a deck that has no synergy with it, it's reliable, it always gives you a ramp and draws you a card and blocks some damage.
Say drawing a card is worth one mana, ramping a land onto the battlefield is worth 2-3 mana, that means the 2/2 body you are getting at 1-2 mana, and it's all on one card. It's just reliable and efficient, even if it's not powerful.
But yeah, I'd agree that it's a little bit overrated.
Yeah, I definitely agree that it's a decent value card. But I pretty much always feel like there's something better for the deck and it's almost always the first card I cut. It have a home in some decks but shouldn't be mashed into everything.
you're right that it is not he best, but its helpful in decks that do not have green for ramp and unlike a mana dork you don't lose value after a board wipe
I think that it belongs in many non-green decks because it is extremely good ramp comparative to the ramp available in most colors. If you are running green it is definitely wrong and if you are running a super aggressive deck it can be wrong but it is usually excellent in my meta because it has so many different effects.
How does Solemn rarely do anything? The card is crazy good. I only have three commander decks atm and that is one of the best cards that they each have.
Scroll Rack is incredibly powerful in the 2 decks I have it in.
First is mono-blue draw all the cards. It lets me dig hard into my deck when I've got a hand full.
The other is Yidris Storm. Allows me to dig further, faster, like in the blue deck, but it also lets me put cards in specific order to Cascade into in the order I want.
My 5, in no real order:
1. Mana dorks. If your commander is CMC 3, I'm on board with the Bird-- getting down Selvala on 2, sure. Or if you're in something like Ezuri where you can convert them to value down the line. But I see them get a lot of use for a deck where they're not actually helping your curve when compared to the far-less-vulnerable Nature's Lore or even a Signet.
2. Fetchlands. I see people trying to throw as many fetches as possible into two-color decks. Why? Your mana base is fine. Fetches are far more vulnerable to disruption than other lands (Stifle effects, anti-tutor effects, effects that force lands to come into play tapped). They're fine in three-color decks but not really needed, and shine in 4-5 color decks as well as decks that are going in on top deck manipulation or landfall synergies. But that's far fewer decks than I see them used in.
3. In Garruk's Wake/Insurrection/Rite of Replication: They cost 9 mana and don't actually win the game. Just go play Tooth and Nail or Expropriate more efficient cards.
4. Three-drop Lilianas: Not unlike what you said about JTMS, compounded by the fact that Last Hope has almost zero board impact and Veil's board impact is either limited to one player while restricting her to low loyalty or irritating the entire table.
5. Cultivate/Kodama's Reach: So in my experience, most of the commanders that people lean toward costs 3-4 mana. Cultivate actively is opposed to three-mana commanders and doesn't actually help you get to four-mana ones any faster. Meh. I'd rather play a two-mana ramp spell (of which there are billions) than that. It also makes you run basics, which unless you're in a Ruination or Blood Moon meta, is not great. One or two basics of each color should cover you in heavily multicolor decks. Meanwhile, Nature's Lore and Farseek almost never interfere with casting your commander and often get it down a turn sooner, can still find you multiple colors (via shocks, tangos, bicycles), and let you run a more consistent mana base. Signets cover two colors and can be used immediately for one less mana than Cultivate. Felwar Stone is usually just a five-color mana rock. Etc, etc.
And to take my little shot at being 'that guy', I do actually think JTMS got much better when Atraxa happened. You can make people less scared of JTMS by using him to torture one player ("Hey ignore my Jace and Atraxa, I'm just going to poke this guy for four and bounce his commander every turn; his commander's scary so let me do this~"). Being four-color Atraxa actually wants fetchlands for topdeck manipulation, and can support this strategy with Top and Library. Also, the one time I did actually ult him, it was right after using Lily Vess' plus to strip the last card from his hand. Which, yes, super niche.
Kestral287 So I agree on a few of your points. However, cultivate and kodamas reach are still great. You may be right that they are possibly overrated and are just jammed in every green deck without thought. But it depends highly on your deck and meta. If you're in a meta with tons of board wipes, good luck keeping mana rocks around very long. Basic lands are just so safe on the battlefield. Also, if you run a deck where it's not necessary to get your commander out asap, they can be great, especially when paired with exploration or burgeoning. And generally if you're playing green, you're aiming to ramp fast. Also, rite of replication is pretty insane. I agree that it is expensive when kickedd, but in a deck with ramp that's not so bad. And it's versatile if you don't have all the mana for kicking . Definitely shouldn't go in every blue deck. But last night I casted kicked rite of replication on avenger of zendikar. Ended up with 50 6/7s after a land drop. It did in fact end the game. The great thing about the card is it can be a 4 drop of the best 8 drop out or it can be 5 of the best creature with the best ETB effect.
Kestral287 so the comment I have to make here is on your fetch lands. bacuase fetch is amazing in all decks period. reason being, is that they thin out your deck. you can essentially treat a fetch land, especially panorama style fetch as a play a land and draw. so in a singletons format style of play it makes those cards your really want to see show up that much faster. I will say I do agree mostly with your other choices on here they are pretty much situational at best. though I do love me a rite of rep at any point that I can get 5 copies of something fun. Even if it's something you had
Rund: Fair on Rite, but Rite is a very, very bad Clone. It's far easier to interact with on the stack, and that hurts the card badly. It is the best of the three I listed due to being semi-modal, but that's not why people use the card.
As for the ramp cards, there's little real difference between Farhaven Elf and Cultivate when it comes down to it unless you can abuse the fact that it's a creature (reanimation, blinking, whatever). It's rare that the three points of damage Farhaven saves you actually swings a game in your favor, while swapping that Farhaven to Rampant Growth and getting your commander down a turn early actually can do that.
Tom: All that your Reach/Cultivate argument points to is that ramp is good (of course) and that land ramp is usually safe (of course). But that doesn't mean that I should be using Reach over Nature's Lore.
As for Rite, yes, Rite + Avenger + land + your opponents being on literally nothing won you that game. There's a lot of plus signs for something that can be abbreviated to "Tooth and Nail". Further, anecdotes don't actually mean much; the other day I won a game on the back of Liliana's Specter. Doesn't mean that card is good in EDH.
Joseph: The difference between your deck being 99 and 98 cards is extremely narrow. You're arguing on a fraction of a basis point. It's most definitely not the equivalent of playing a land and drawing a card; drawing a card has a lot of real value on the game while decreasing the number of cards in your 99 card deck by exactly one does... well, not. You're getting a phantom scry at best. And if we're talking a scry + land, well, I don't see Temples crammed into every deck. Yeah, Temples come in tapped, but I've never won a game off Disallowing a Temple. The existence of fetches in your list creates a lot of small but notable vulnerabilities that add up to far more than the fraction of a basis point of consistency that you gain. There's also a converse argument that gets ignored far too often: EDH decks tend to go fatter on the curve, and pulling lands out of your deck can make it that much harder to cast your spells, and in particular to multi-spell.
Four- and five- color decks still pretty much need fetches, and three-color decks can if they're deep on color dependencies--but then, I can T3 Animar with >90% consistency with no fetches other than Evolving Wilds/Terramorphic Expanse. And if you have /real/ synergies, sure. But the "I'm going to make my deck more consistent because over an EDH game I'll reduce the number of cards in my deck by two" argument is exactly the kind of overrated that I'm seeing.
I really like your point about Cultivate/ kodama's reach. I find that so few people who run green actually think about what their ramp spells do at different points in the game. They just see "this card ramps" and they throw it in to cover the ramp in their deck. I do, however, run both two and three mana ramp in my rafiq deck. There is a reason for that, though. The two mana ramp (nature's lore, farseek, rampant growth) either let me get a dual or just slot perfectly as a turn 2 play to get rafiq on turn 3. The 3 mana ramp (spoils of victory, cultivate) let me get duals or just let me get rafiq turn 3 if I can get a mana dork on turn 1. For those same reasons, I don't run my favorite ramp card (skyshroud claim). As fantastic of a card as that is, it doesn't work with what I really need the ramp for.
I also completely agree with fetchlands. I think the percentage of difference they make in deck thinning is not significant enough to justify running them in a two or three color deck. If you own them already and just want to play them, I guess go ahead. I just don't see the point. A krosan verge is a tad slower but achieves statiscally more deck thinning (along with myriad landscape), while also ramping you. But this is just another case that I often call "top shelf syndrome". People know that cards are expensive and super good in other formats, so they think that automatically translates to edh. And it just doesn't.
Kestral287 I see your point, and I do agree that those cards can be overrated, but I just don't see nature's lore over reach or cultivate. Reach/cultivate ramp you as well as fix your mana better for only one more mana. There are decks that don't want to play those cards on turn 3, but that doesn't mean that the card isn't as good. It just means in decks that need their commander on turn 3 don't want reach/cultivate. Literally every other deck in green will probably want both unless you don't run a lot of basics, such as in a 4 or 5 color deck. I honestly think they see so much play just due to the cost of fetches and efficient 4 and 5 color mana bases. People often just spam mana rocks like chromatic lantern in decks that cost 3 and cultivate overall gives you much more value over the course of a game, unless you're in a 4 or 5 color deck.
You make some great points, especially in that these cards are great in perhaps a 1v1 vacuum, but lose a lot of their value in multiplayer EDH. Avenger of Zendikar is great in my Borborygmos Enraged deck, and I can see it in a Titania pretty easily, but it absolutely should not be in /every/ green deck. Like what is a Yisan going to do with it? Same with a BOP.
As for Jace, I have a friend with an Atraxa superfriends and he was able to ult two players in one game due to pillow forting and a ton of proliferate, but that's a pretty specific circumstance and honestly the only one in EDH where I can see him actually being as broken as his legacy would suggest.
Damnation is nice because it's cheap but yeah, there are scores better wipes, though few more iconic, I'd say, so there's a bit of a flavor win?
Gilded Lotus is a lot better in monocolored decks than multi, but since the Paradox Engine ban it's lost a ton of value.
I only run a Liliana Vess in my discard elves Nath deck, although you do kind of have to hope that your opponents have discarded some decent creatures to hope to get value out of the ult. She can tutor my Sadistic Hypnotist, though, which wipes all my opponents' hands, but like you said, my opponents, especially those who have played the deck a few times, can see that coming from a mile away.
People really only run Diabolic Tutor because it's cheap, money-wise. Like I wish I could run Demonic Tutors in all my black decks, but money's a thing. Beseech the Queen's better, though, yeah, especially in monoblack. A little trickier to cast in multi.
I agree with just about everything else, but my Ezuri, Claw of Progress loves Sword of Body and Mind because he gets an ability trigger from the wolf and ten cards is a LOT of cards to mill.
You what card people highly overrate? PRIMEVAL TITAN. #FREEPRIMETIME #FREEPRIMEVALTITAN #FREETHEBEAST
I still can't believe I can play flash/hulk again. I just keep winning with it. So just think if I could flash hulk into P.Titan. o.o
I'd be down for unbanning it, along with a dozen other cards. C'mon Sheldon, let's play some REAL Magic!
I can play most of the Legacy banlist in EDH, though.
I like Sword of Light and Shadow in my meta because most of the decks only play black or white removal. You're always blanking a card in their hand, and recurring your creatures at the same time, but I play it in a deck that runs a lot of creatures and actually attacks, something a lot of my meta doesn't do.
I also play scroll rack in my Maelstrom Wanderer deck, but like you said, that deck has a TON of shuffle effects, so those three 7 drops I put on top don't stay there.
I really do wish they would cover some of these topics in shorter videos. I don't have the time to watch an hour video to go over what could have been done in at least half the time.
RainMasterXD Then don't watch the video and listen to their audio while you're doing whatever makes you busy.
N Kraus This. I generally devote the time to do both as I have an hour commute, one way, to work everyday. Listen on the way to as I prep for meetings and watch on the way home at night.
RainMasterXD go find a top ten list from another channel then
you could try 1.5 or 1.25 speed. or watch half of it one day then half the next day
RainMasterXD You can also download the audio for it or just listen to the video on a car ride. There's plenty of ways to fit the podcast into some part of your day :D
I think Sensei's Divining Top is overrated in commander. It is in fact a great card, for some decks. But for the same reasons as scroll rack, it offers diminishing returns as you use your fetchlands. There are some decks that can abuse it, but mostly I believe there is a feeling that "Every commander deck needs sol ring and SDT", and that is a huge overstatement.I'd rather have any other draw engine card (sylvan library, arena, fecundity, etc) that is a bit more mana intensive in the SDT slot instead.
Also, can you believe my playgroup overrates Praetor's Council to the point they wanted to ban it?? They see me using it for great effect, winning many games on a safe value strategy instead of their big risk/reward plays, and just think that it too offers too much inevitability to my control decks.
Can you please make more commander gameplay videos pleaseeeeeee
They pump out 1 a month after averaging it altogether. They take roughly 100 hours each to produce not to mention shooting them. They just released one; you're going to have to be patient for the next one.
What Sysbit said.
I'm sure they would if they made more money from the channel. It's just so much work to make and edit Game Knights so they only come out once a month. Maybe once they make more from donations they will bring it out twice a month.
NivMizzetFiremind uh not really... the issue isn't cost so much as time. To double the amount in same time they'd have to hire people... that'd be a lot of extra money coming in to justify that. One a month is what it's at and what it likely will be at for a while if not ever. Good things come to those who wait.
Maybe 1 day, the production is very like table top and they put out a vid twice a month. I bet if the guys had the capital to hire more people and work on it more they would but it's a hard life being a YTer just now. I love the work they do and will keep supporting anyway I am able to. Once I have a better job i'll send them a nice chunk o cash each month too. I'm sure you agree they deserve it.
I can't really disagree with anything now because you've made some very valid points. The only two I, kind of, disagree with are Avenger of Zendikar and Diabolic Tutor, only because I make sure that, before I use it or throw it in a deck, I make sure I can get the most use out of them. For example, I like to play avenger of zendikar in a heavy mana ramp deck, so that I can drop him and still have enough mana to play Genesis wave immediately afterwards (My Freyalise deck loves to win this way) and I run diabolic tutor in my meren deck if I'm able to discard a card or two because, the way I build my meren, if it's in my graveyard, it's in play. Or I'll grab my Ashnod's altar with it and then drop birthing hulk next turn and infinite
I cant see Diabolic Tutor as overrated. Its the budget Demonic tutor, certainly for me. IF i had money id get Demonic/Vampiric instead but i dont.
I feel like Dark Petition is quite a bit better, which I failed to mention on the show. Maybe try that one instead?
I run both actually at least in one of my decks, i run a Dark Petition and a Demonic Tutor.
Didn't you say turn 5 was an extremely important turn in the video? Then wouldn't a 4 mana tutor for a 5 mana play, answer to board state (I.E Damnation, Vandalbast etc.) be better than a 5 mana tutor for *possibly* a 3 mana play, depending on deck and opening?
but if you play ramp then its not four or five but three and four, which makes a big difference . if budget is not an issue then diabolic is not good enough because you already have demonic ,vampiric ,grim, cruel, diabolic intent etc. so many better options. If budget is the issue then still increasing ambition beseech the queen, dark pettion, sidisi, rune scarred are all still better. diabolic tutor is draft chaff. do not put it in your deck.
Yeah, in my play group, it's all about attack your opponents resources. The term, 'permanent,' is fairly misleading.
Naming Birds of Paradise, is a certain no-no. A one drop chump blocker in the air, with the mana fixing early game, mid, or late is absolutely worth it, and helps you, 'get there.' I didn't hear you guys naming Sol Ring.
I keep hearing about sad robot, Solemn Simulacrum. A four cost that might be good in artifact decks, but I was to draw more than a single card at four mana, and need lands (basics? really?) for no more than two mana. Costs too much mana for white utility to continuously dig it out, and there are better cards to blink. One time I put this card in my Atogatog deck for that fifth color of mana, but that was a budget build. Simulacrum does stuff yes, but is blows at doing that stuff due to the cost of the card, and I'd rather cheat something more effective into play.
If your meta has a high amount of wraths, you need to find a new meta.
Nah you need to adapt by playing a lot of recursion and things that are hard to wrath.
Or just don't play creatures. Who needs those, anyway?
A deck with no creatures clearly has some plan to johnny all the fun out of the game.
Not really, some decks just don't need many creatures.
Is there a specific reason a Rafiq deck is running mill?
Having all those swords in a Kemba deck with Stonehewer Giant ends in tears.
I'll use any card that works with my build...I could care less what's overrated
They are literally saying you [or people] put cards in their decks which they think are subjectively strong or as you put it "work with their build", but in a fact underperform.
The problem I have is that you make your choice of cards falseproof against criticism saying that my choice = objectivrly good when it is no always true.
I personally put spells I LIKE into my decks sometimes even though I could put there better spells BUT I like flavour of entomb+reanimation so I put them into my golgari [and other] decks that have gy flavour.
that's essentially what they're saying.
Couldn't care less, surely?
You CAN technically pull of a diabolic tutor turn 2 if you have a dark ritual ;) But over all i agree with this list. The only time i play Avenger of Zendikar is with my Thromok Deck which luvs his tokens
parker cole also with turn 1 sol ring.
50% of your show is shameless comercial...
Shameless commercial what? The sentence doesn't even add up.
yeah, the show is only about 40 minutes of actual content now ._.
still good though
How do you expect them to make money?
You hit the nail on the head when you said that each of these cards are very good in certain decks. Many of these cards are best used as either combo pieces or to take advantage of very specific synergies in this format.
I am super thrilled that you guys took a less arrogant approach to this video. To often you guys take a firm stance on a subject and talk down the listening audience even though many of those listeners have been playing longer and at a higher level than you have. That creates an adversarial relationship with those players and is probably a major factor in why you are subjected to so much criticism online.
I can personally attest that I support many content creators but reconsidered doing so for your channel just based on the tone of how you speak to and about the community.
Hopefully this is a sign that you will be more mindful of these things in the future.
I completely agree with Anvenger if Zendicar. I currently play it in a G/B deck, and most of the time it comes onto the field and draws hate at instant speed before a land can even come down that turn to pump the plants, and even though I play birthing pod and kukusho it seems like it should be a great target for that effect I'll general go grab sheoldred first or another black creature. I'm thinking of swapping it out for another creature, possible siege behemoth or sepulacar primordial.
I'd rate Oblivion Ring higher than Grasp of Fate.
I mean, targetting every opponent is good in theory, but in the end is just making up X Oblivion Rings, with all the weaknesses and without the ability to politic around it. You can use the Oblivion Ring to work with other players to slow down a specific one, if you play it well you may even get them to wast resources to protect the Ring, wich is much harder to do with Grasp of Fate since you can't count on opponents having nonland permanents or tokens they'll ok getting rid of, so basically you will have all the opponents agreeing to take it out.
Also, while extremely specific, you can use Oblivion Ring on yourself, essentially making on of your permanents impossible to remove and keeping it safe, particularly if you plan a wrath (like Planar Cleansing) or you know it's coming. It's still ridicolously specific, so it doesn't really make it a good card or the best plan, but it's still a possibility worth considering.
You can actually do politics with all 3 players and convince each of them that the permanents you pick were the ones they wanted so they all feel like you saved them from the other two
I prefer cultivators caravan as ramp for that cost just cause it easily can become a creature to fight or block with
5. Blood moon, anytime an opponent has played it actually helped me
4. honestly even disregarding curve 5+ cmc better be game winning
3.sad robot, yavimaya elder really anyform of "imma get another land maybe" that isn't cultivate or another similar card
2. "you may play an additional land"
1. planeswalkers ...just all of them unless you can immediately do something powerful @ mana cost for a card that would do the same thing
0. tap lands without some sort of untapped clause
My main issue in justifying Diabolic Tutor, is that Diabolic Revelation and Increasing Ambition exist. Both are large, and unwieldy like the Diabolic, but when you build up that sort of excessive mana, you might as well bounce into multi-tutor range.
feast and famine is the ONLY sword that´s really strong without specifically abusing the abilities. fire and ice draws you a card which is nice, but 2 damage ? the circumstances to actually kill a real threat with that are ...welll.. too specific^^ other than that it´s nice to tear apart the opponents early game, but then again this demands you draw the sword within the first 4 to max 5 rounds. other than that it´s pretty much as useless as the other 3 swords. apart from that i completely agree with everything you said ^^ btw love your work, keep it up :)
I've recently made an abzan deck and I've been loving avenger of zendikar lately.
Here's a question because of Damnation. Have you ever put in a card that you think of as strictly worse in a deck because it fits better flavor wise?The example is I run Damnation in a B/W religion/church/cleric themed deck instead of Toxic Deluge.
There is a debate over Birds of Paradise art story. Many say that it was actually not for Volcanic Island but Tropical Island, and right before they went to printing they saw the illustration and thought the bird in the foreground was too big.
For proof, the template for Tropical Island in Alpha remained unchanged and the illustrator has been left as being Mark Poole while the real Tropicai Island's illustration was actually made by Jesper Myrfors. This has been corrected in Beta and further sets.
As per what happened to Volcanic Island in Alpha, well, they apparently just forgot to print it (just like CoP: black).
LIke I said, it's one theory that I have heard, the art from Birds of Paradise does seem to show a Volcanic Island to me too so we're not too sure about what's the real story here.
Im actually a little surprised that serra ascendant isnt on this list because if it isnt played within the first 4 turns then its just a 1/1 flyer, i mean if you get it out early its great, but if not its just not good.
I know a guy who plays Avenger of Zendikar in Omnath where he plays a ton of cramp and gets it back to him with plenty of power boost to the plant tokens, but... even then, I agree with you guys in that the avenger is something I'm usually able to answer, if not in board wipe form, then in the form of people copying it and usually to better effect than the player who played the Avenger in the first place.
I agree on all cards listed. Very excellent points about each card's strengths in certain deck types but being otherwise lackluster yet common auto-includes.
My list:
Burgeoning and Exploration are kinda useless without a draw engine online. Can't remember the last time my opening hand was 4 land, burgeoning + rhystic/remora.
Solemn Simulacrum is an auto-include for red decks, white decks that can have trouble ramping and drawing. While decent in creature recursion/blink decks or slower ramp/control decks, it is otherwise kind of mediocre as a 4 drop. Auto-include in casuals but usually doesn't make the cut after the vintage/legacy power level stuff is added for competitive.
Chromatic Lantern tends to be unnecessary outside of 4/5color decks if the mana base is built correctly. I have run it in tricolor decks that have a lot of cards with double mana costs like UU, BB, WW. A must-have if Blood Moon is common in your meta or you run Sen Triplets. Otherwise, meh...
Still on the fence about: Eternal Witness, Propaganda/Ghostly Prison/Sphere of Safety pillow-fort stuff.
Eternal Witness is great because it's recursion outside of black. In a GR or GW deck it's basically mandatory. In GU it can be blinked quite easily to get more utility out of it.
Propoganda and Ghostly Prison are great but need to be put in the right strategy and proper meta.
I play BOP in my Ezuri, COP deck. It ramps, triggers Ezuri, and it flies in late game if it gets a bunch of Ezuri counters. I play Avenger of Zendikar in my angry Omnath deck. The deck has sac outlets, maximizes landfall, and AoZ itself an elemental for Omnath. Both the right deck I guess. I don't have a Damnation, but I suppose I would put it into my Gisa and Geralf deck if I did. I don't have a Jace, Gilded Lotus, Scroll Rack, or any sword either. I don't think I have Diabolic Tutor in my Gisa and Geralf, but it is my worst EDH deck so I hardly play it. I only play limited and have four EDH decks. I don't spend money on the game anymore. I've not bought a box of boosters since '99.
Saw the top 5 lists in the description before they covered them, and they made a lot of sense. It's important to have cards that have multiple uses, are difficult to deal with, are cheap, or effect multiple opponents. Many of these cards simply do not do any of these things well, or not well enough as other options. I think you guys did a great job expressing the downsides of cards like these, and what would make good replacements!
Top 5 Underrated Cards:
5. Storm Crow
4. Storm Crow
3. Storm Crow
2. Storm Crow
1. Storm Crow
I've always loved stasis snare more than oblivion ring. Oblivion ring is an unquestionable power play just for the sheer impact and flexibility, but no one sees stasis snare coming. One of the best times I've used the card has been after another player O-ringed something innocuous (by warranting an o-ring) and the next guy in line tried to steal the game by dropping Blightsteel. It didn't have haste, so it kinda sat there while I had it in hand. Everyone was getting pessimistic about the board while the o-ring player was digging for more removal. When it got back to the kill turn, it swung at me and I dropped the hammer. The sheer look of "wait, what?" was SUPER satisfying.
I'd agree with almost all of these. I don't think Gilded Lotus or Diabolic tutor makes my list, but I can see your point. My games tend to play a bit slower; my group likes big commanders and has less mana ramp. When you've got an 8 drop commander, and turn 4 is still early game, both the lotus and tutor make some good sense. Your games are a lot faster and have a lot more removal. It makes less sense for you guys.
for avenger of zendikar, I play it in my riku deck and someone in my playgroup plays sisay with night of souls betrayal. EVERY SINGLE TIME, when i play the first land to pump the tokens, he tutors it with his commander and all the tokens are gone...
I need as many game knights episodes as there are podcast episodes.. I love watching those xD
You're wish has been granted.🧞♂️🧞♀️
I've seen those black eclipse sleeves at my local store. If you live around Frisco TX, go to Docs Comics and games, they have them there!
i play mtgo, so here my feel.as follows baised on that.
JOSH:
5. Birds of Paradise (in a critter ramp yea played. more for a cheap flyinf blocker.very rare)
4. Damnation (nice if you don't know about other options. mono black but very very very rare)
3. Gilded Lotus ( brilliant in a mono colour deck, or a deck that don't really want colourless. very rare)
2. Diabolic Tutor ( in a tool kit deck brill else. not used. i think i've onl yever seen it in black tutor decks. extramly rare)
1. Oblivion Ring (best used as a useful counter for mass removal. which is. situational. not seen and when i used it i scraped it due to how useless it is. expect i nthe manor also stated)
so i use Gilded Lotus as i love mono decks.
as for the reast yea don't use them much.
JIMMY:
5. Avenger of Zendikar ( in a token deck or a land play deck there 3 such commander but other wise don't use. one game in 10 green really)
4. Jace the Mind Sculptor ( over priced and dies way to quick of be of use. mostly as its a kill on sight card, so its good for a hate magnet, mono blue only.)
3. Liliana Vess ( i like in a black deck with a card draw commander, else not seen)
2. Scroll Rack ( good if your quick and skilled in it use. else. not good seen only by one or two palyer who are skilled in it use and they play blue)
1. Sword of Light and Shadow / War and Peace / Body and Mind ( protection against abilities are very valid. else you don't see. mythicaly rare)
all in all i only use liniana vess and that only because i need more tutors in my tool kit deck, never play it other wise.
so i find my self in agreement with you both.
I run a Prossh deck and one time I had doubling season out and then I put Avenger of Zendikar out and then played a land to buff the plants. I thought that was cool and it works well in my deck because it gives me at least 7 things to sac to Prossh (with doubling season out, i had like I think 16 plants because i had an extra land) . I do agree though. Most of the time I do see people run it in any green commander deck thinking its so good and then they play it.. and.. then it sits there for maybe 1 or 2 turns and then dies.
I think the power of gilded lotus is not when you play it on turn 5. I find that on the turns on which I play gilded lotus, I look at my hand/board, count up the total mana cost of spells/abilities I want to activate/cast this turn, and come to a number that is 2 less than my available mana that turn. So, I shove gilded lotus in there, for mana efficiency. And on future turns, I just have more mana. That is not good in every deck, but I generally build my decks so that I never truly run out of ways to spend mana. So I always know that if the lotus survives, I will always be able to use the extra mana on the following turn(s). Definitely not an auto-include in every deck though.
I haven't seen a lot of your guys' videos so I don't know if this has been covered yet, but I have a question for you two. In a three color deck, would you rather have a Painful Truths @ X=3, or a Read the Bones? Would you rather have the extra card draw, or the ability to scry 2 before drawing those 2 cards?
So, after your opinion on Diabolic Tutor, I was wondering: What are your thoughts on Increasing Ambition? It's an expensive 3 for 1, but the cost is split apart and you can find random combo pieces you put in your deck, so I like it.
I find it way too slow an expensive. I'm just don't find myself in many games where I can tap out at sorcery speed after turn 5 and do nothing (and certainly never feel like I can do that twice in the same game).
Okay, maybe it's just my deck that wants to combo off with Rooftop Storm and is otherwise pretty controlling.
Now I agree that many of the swords don't work in most decks, but sword of light and shadow works very well in decks that need a larger variety of creatures on the board. I have an Odric, Lunarch Marshal deck that hates board wipes that I don't have answers to and sword of light and shadow is huge for getting the pieces I need back to rebuild. Especially because I pretty much always have the flyers to get through.
I completely agree about JTMS. I personally only use him in my mono blue deck as a kill condition. I legitimately ultimate him 3-6 times in 1 turn when I use it to kill the table XD
Hmph, I've ran plenty of combo decks with Diabolic tutor and it's helped so much. Then again, I run 2-3 card combos at 2-3cmc each. So it's not like I'm paying 4 to tutor a 6-7cmc card.
But, after this, I will consider finding something other than Diabolic tutor.
I play a Breya combo deck. I actually had reshape in my hand and planned to sac a phyrexian metamorph and get sharuum to combo off with Marionette master, until I re-read reshape and realized you pay the cmc of the tutored card plus UU...I really wished I had something better(reshape still great, but i wished I had something that didn't require so much mana) or something else. If i had a demonic tutor in hand it would've been played turn 2 to get the sharuum, thus, problem avoided. So i might cut reshape as well. who knows.
I think what puts Oblivion Ring so high above its brethren like Grasp of Fate and even Cast Out, besides the fact that it was the first, is the whole "two triggers" clause thing which allows it to permanently remove things from the game if timed right. Not that all decks can abuse it, but flicker based decks can ruin games with the wording oversight in ways the fixed versions like Banishing Light can't. Also, white being the go-to color for enchantment strategies, loves even temporary removal that also counts towards its counts, like drawing for enchantresses and that extra mana for Serra's Sanctum.
I completely agree that it's overrated, in the sense that I've seen it way too many times in decks with only splashes of white that can be running much better removal, but I also see how it would show up at the top of white's "top cards" lists on sites like EDHRec. Remember that Brago used to be the top deck on that site for the longest time, and almost all Brago decks included it because of how B.S. the interaction is.
I’ve had some killer Avenger of zendikar combos with scapeshift. Typically I’ll cast them both late game while I have around 10-12 mana and then have an overwhelming wall of plants lol