I usually run 3 wraths per deck (plus a couple tutors if reasonably possible). I prefer one sided ones. I always run farewell in every white deck. It answers practically anything. It answers things nothing else will (like hexproof + indestructible). It answers enchantress, reanimator, and artifact decks. It can be a one sided board wipe under the right conditions. Fairly often the pod will reach a point where one player is in a strong position and we're all like "Well, hope somebody draws farewell". I love farewell.
I started playing edh with 5 other friends and just to troll they’d play wraths every other turn. So i used to cut all mine in favor of protection. Fast forward to now, i play with tons of other people and know I NEED wraths but I only have access to a few hours a week to play. So my time being valuable, I only play one-sided wraths or flexible wraths in my decks. Leaving me a little anemic in terms of wraths. But i just make up for it with other forms of interaction or card draw. So far im doing fine. Certain decks, especially those in white do exceptionally well, no doubt in part bc there’s so many more wraths to choose from. Either way I think that’s the balance. Having removal that doesn’t slow down YOUR gameplan and hinders opponents. That’s my answer to how many wraths.
The greatest analysis you made and should be considered is how a wrath is a great card economy-wise, trading 1 card for way more than 1 card. This is true for the "each opponent discards a card" as well.
The more and more I play, the less I enjoy wraths. They tend to just make games drag on forever. If you’re using asymmetric wipes then that’s fine to break parity or finish the game but I am not a fan of wrathing the board, I’d rather just have the person ahead just win and move to the next game.
I've actually been cutting down to just 1-2 wraths in my deck. May be a meta thing, but it feels like everyone else is running at least 4 wraths. Too many, and it feels like games last too long without meaningful progress (as I saw in a pod against a gonti deck that proceeded to snag the whole table's wraths for a 3+ hour game that ended when everyone agreed to just move on).
The amount of wraths i'm running depends solely on the archetype. For a while, I played an Esper control/superfriends deck with Chromium, the Mutable as the commander. In that deck I ran 10 wraths (Cyc Rift, Supreme Verdict, Wrath of God, Austere Command, Merciless Eviction, Cataclysm, Farewell, Terminus, All is Dust, Damnation) with Ugin and Elspeth, Sun's Champion as pseudo-wraths. In my playtime with it, the other stax-like pieces drew much more ire than the wraths. That deck is an exception though, I ran a lot of wraths there because it was the best way to protect my 17 walkers. In a normal deck I'll run somewhere from 3-6 depending on my creature count.
@@V2ULTRAKill at the time Toxic Deluge was like a 35-40 USD card. I did not feel like buying that after getting the fetches and shocks were mad expensive too and I prioritized those. The majority of things in that list i already owned
Your wraths should depend on your strategy. I only play 3 or maybe 4 in my storm deck, but the tempo that it wins and its density of tutors and draw means i consistantly get access to them or can defeat my opponants before they can solidify a board to need them. A good way to check is to play test your deck in different playgroups and play your strategy normally, but keep an eye on your opponents boards and how often during the game you feel overwhelmed by them vs not
One 5 player game with Mono-Red Hidetsugu I drew into 2 creature wipes and an artifact wipe. After casting the second creature wipe 2 players immediately quit the game. I was only running about 3 creature wipes (including Earthquake) and 2 artifact wipes in the deck plus a lot of burn. Worth mentioning the other 2 players took me out next. Hidetsugu scares people but the deck has a low win rate due to hurting me too. I think the real source of salt is playing Hidetsugu plus the wipes. The wraths are certainly fair as my things die too but a lucky draw meant drawing a few early. I'm trying the deck with a different commander to see if it paints less of a target on my back when I sweep the board. Casual commander really doesn't like control strategies in general. I only tend to pull out the UW control deck (pillow fort, no tax cards but lots of counters and wraths) for a game when power levels are higher than anticipated or with Hidetsugu if people actually want a fast game. I think people are less salty when it is a high cost sweeper like dropping an Oblivion Stone and popping it right away. One-sided wrathers if you don't have the board to end the game fast annoy people too. Problem is sweepers are usually best when you are behind.
8 wraths is always a good amount, each wrath having diferent unique effects. like dealing with every nonland. making draw to me. reanimating one of my stuff. making spirits to everyone. stuffs like that.
I normally only play one-sided wraths or wipes in most colors you cab at least find 2/3 or depending you're strat you can find even more I've begun putting in more one-sided wraths and win rate has gone up a good amount.
I also prefer board whipes over single target removal. At the end of the day it surely is metadependent to what is the right choice. In my experience single target removal is more effective, when people play combos, while board whipes are better against critical mass. For example a Sword to plowshare is great when removing the Blood Artist, that is a key combopiece for an infinite, but when played against a critical mass aristocrat deck, the player will just play another version of the effect like Zulaport Cutthroat. Against powerfull engine-like-decks single target removal just doesnt remove enough pieces, they just get replaced. But be picky indeed with your selection of whipes, cause decks are so heavily optimized (in terms of ramp and carddraw) these days that the wipes just set you back if other players on the table have a good manabase and a full hand (the typical simic playpattern). Thats why I only play one-sided or really cheap (like blas. act) or flexible (like damn) wipes.
What I’ve noticed, is since my friends got me to play magic again, and specifically commander, the adults who play that format, are literally whiny children that couldn’t handle playing a cutthroat competitive game of any kind. The point of the game isn’t to be social or have fun, the point is to win. Games are social yes. But we aren’t playing co operative game. We are playing a competitive game, and if they can’t have fun when other people are playing to win, maybe they should play games that are co op, not competitive.
I end up fairly wrath-heavy with cards that (mostly) wipe the board and provide a creature so that I’m ahead before opponents who would otherwise rebuild first. Stuff like Massacre Girl, Sunfall, Phyrexian Rebirth, Necromantic Selection, and Ugin, the Spirit Dragon. Not only do I go from being behind or in a stalemate with opponents to a slight advantage, but can deal with opponents otherwise running unchecked.
What's your Henzie list? As a fellow Henzie enjoyer, you've peaked my interest. I used to run 4 wipes ( currently down to 3, but really reconsidering )
I think running like 7 is ideal. Like 2-3 universal “clean the board” wipes and 4-5 asymmetric wipes that either don’t hurt your board or progress your game plan.
the issue with 7 wraths is if you're in certain colors and strategies you physically cannot run 4-5 asymmetric wipes to accomplish that. Take minthara merciless soul. a list which in my case is a power matters sacrifice list with recursion the only asymmetric wipes i can run is citywide bust and even that hits key creatures like yawgmoth or ghoulcaller gisa all the others either get rid of all the stuff that i want to make an engine out of (The enternal wanderer) care about low power not low toughness or are just too expensive
i run creature heavy decks so im probably biased, but i really dont like symmetric board wipes you use 4-6 mana on your turn, clear the board (and the other 3 players can have some form of protection or recursion). ALL 3 of the other players will get to play before you do, rebuild and/or target you for wiping the board... if you go down with your own wipe it feels extremely pointless, even if you managed to sweep the Voja player's board.
The reason Wraiths are good is it’s card advantage. If I doomblade a creature I have gone 1 for 1 for 2 kinda. While me at the person getting doom bladed are down one card the other two opponents are up one each.
I've been working on a deck that has no removal. To make up for this it has hexproof, unblockable and indestructible with some of the biggest power boosters in the game. I also wanted creatures that naturally have triggered abilities every turn and the rest of the slots went into stuff that protects them. The social contract is dead.
running too much wraths means you are presenting a lot of answers but you are not presenting questions. i try to run either wraths in which i can break parity or are modal (damn), so if i am ahead they are never dead cards in my hand. for instance if you are playing a creature deck that can't risk its creature for blocking because they are value pieces play settle the wreckage. personally i have seen that running a lot more threats, a lot more live draws. i don't run wraths in some decks. i run cards that create board states that without a wrath don't become unmanageable they win. it always depends on the kind of game the table wants though. what i described is a playstyle that works with decks that deploy there engines and ramp early and need too few resources to pull the trigger to win. or with other decks that may take longer to win because the are combat centric but create a lot or pressure in life totals really early. pako and haldan is the most notable example in my playgroup. i would argue that there are decks you don't run wraths or the wraths you run are not creature based. mono green is such deck. i don't care about your creatures. most likely mine are scarier any way. it really depends on the speed of the deck and the local meta. if you don't have a stable play group i recommend increasing efficient spells wraths and tutors so your decks can answer most deck and how aggressive you go is not up to the draw but a reaction to what the table is doing.
Brah since when is wrath a problem? So many color have protection spell like heroic intervention. I think people should try to play around it more and have mana up for their protection spell. Also if the player who wraith did nothing the previous turn, they are taking a risk in tempo as they are not casting any spell
Play one-sided wraths, the symmetrical wraths are less and less useful because nowadays decks have enough gas to keep pushing threats non-stop making card advantage not a thing and there's spells like TefPro and Heroic Intervention that makes you lose the game if they cast it in response.
I'm very focused in my deck building. Not a fan of "I need an answer to everything in the deck". I've built a wrath themed deck, with 25, got the most win rate of any of my other decks. Not a great experience for the other players, winning or not, it was not worth it. But then if I had just 4 wraths in the deck, and played 2, the experience would be the same. If players make board states that end the game in a anti-climax fashion, or make the game not enjoyable for others, thats them building poorly for casual as well. But sure, if you wanna win, you will solve most things being a boardstate police like I was.
I usually run 3 wraths per deck (plus a couple tutors if reasonably possible). I prefer one sided ones. I always run farewell in every white deck. It answers practically anything. It answers things nothing else will (like hexproof + indestructible). It answers enchantress, reanimator, and artifact decks. It can be a one sided board wipe under the right conditions. Fairly often the pod will reach a point where one player is in a strong position and we're all like "Well, hope somebody draws farewell". I love farewell.
I started playing edh with 5 other friends and just to troll they’d play wraths every other turn. So i used to cut all mine in favor of protection. Fast forward to now, i play with tons of other people and know I NEED wraths but I only have access to a few hours a week to play. So my time being valuable, I only play one-sided wraths or flexible wraths in my decks. Leaving me a little anemic in terms of wraths. But i just make up for it with other forms of interaction or card draw. So far im doing fine. Certain decks, especially those in white do exceptionally well, no doubt in part bc there’s so many more wraths to choose from. Either way I think that’s the balance. Having removal that doesn’t slow down YOUR gameplan and hinders opponents. That’s my answer to how many wraths.
Aka cyclonic rift (really busted wipe). I be holding up 2 mana on ur turn 7
I run about 4-5 wraths myself. But in also EXTREMELY removal heavy anyways.
You sir have so many tabs, great discussion tho. I used to play 2-3 Boardwipes, but also been considering adding more as of recently.
Looks like someone needs to board wipe his chrome...
@@billykann7725 💀
The greatest analysis you made and should be considered is how a wrath is a great card economy-wise, trading 1 card for way more than 1 card. This is true for the "each opponent discards a card" as well.
The more and more I play, the less I enjoy wraths. They tend to just make games drag on forever. If you’re using asymmetric wipes then that’s fine to break parity or finish the game but I am not a fan of wrathing the board, I’d rather just have the person ahead just win and move to the next game.
I've actually been cutting down to just 1-2 wraths in my deck. May be a meta thing, but it feels like everyone else is running at least 4 wraths. Too many, and it feels like games last too long without meaningful progress (as I saw in a pod against a gonti deck that proceeded to snag the whole table's wraths for a 3+ hour game that ended when everyone agreed to just move on).
Go ahead and run your wraths. You aint stopping me when i got my phase cards
The amount of wraths i'm running depends solely on the archetype. For a while, I played an Esper control/superfriends deck with Chromium, the Mutable as the commander. In that deck I ran 10 wraths (Cyc Rift, Supreme Verdict, Wrath of God, Austere Command, Merciless Eviction, Cataclysm, Farewell, Terminus, All is Dust, Damnation) with Ugin and Elspeth, Sun's Champion as pseudo-wraths. In my playtime with it, the other stax-like pieces drew much more ire than the wraths.
That deck is an exception though, I ran a lot of wraths there because it was the best way to protect my 17 walkers. In a normal deck I'll run somewhere from 3-6 depending on my creature count.
Imma be real
How tf were you running that many wipes and it DIDNT cross your mind to run deluge
The best creature boardwipe in the game
@@V2ULTRAKill at the time Toxic Deluge was like a 35-40 USD card. I did not feel like buying that after getting the fetches and shocks were mad expensive too and I prioritized those. The majority of things in that list i already owned
Your wraths should depend on your strategy. I only play 3 or maybe 4 in my storm deck, but the tempo that it wins and its density of tutors and draw means i consistantly get access to them or can defeat my opponants before they can solidify a board to need them. A good way to check is to play test your deck in different playgroups and play your strategy normally, but keep an eye on your opponents boards and how often during the game you feel overwhelmed by them vs not
One 5 player game with Mono-Red Hidetsugu I drew into 2 creature wipes and an artifact wipe. After casting the second creature wipe 2 players immediately quit the game. I was only running about 3 creature wipes (including Earthquake) and 2 artifact wipes in the deck plus a lot of burn. Worth mentioning the other 2 players took me out next. Hidetsugu scares people but the deck has a low win rate due to hurting me too. I think the real source of salt is playing Hidetsugu plus the wipes. The wraths are certainly fair as my things die too but a lucky draw meant drawing a few early. I'm trying the deck with a different commander to see if it paints less of a target on my back when I sweep the board.
Casual commander really doesn't like control strategies in general. I only tend to pull out the UW control deck (pillow fort, no tax cards but lots of counters and wraths) for a game when power levels are higher than anticipated or with Hidetsugu if people actually want a fast game.
I think people are less salty when it is a high cost sweeper like dropping an Oblivion Stone and popping it right away. One-sided wrathers if you don't have the board to end the game fast annoy people too. Problem is sweepers are usually best when you are behind.
I run 1: cyclonic, and thats enough
-cEDH
8 wraths is always a good amount, each wrath having diferent unique effects.
like dealing with every nonland.
making draw to me.
reanimating one of my stuff.
making spirits to everyone.
stuffs like that.
I normally only play one-sided wraths or wipes in most colors you cab at least find 2/3 or depending you're strat you can find even more I've begun putting in more one-sided wraths and win rate has gone up a good amount.
I also prefer board whipes over single target removal. At the end of the day it surely is metadependent to what is the right choice. In my experience single target removal is more effective, when people play combos, while board whipes are better against critical mass. For example a Sword to plowshare is great when removing the Blood Artist, that is a key combopiece for an infinite, but when played against a critical mass aristocrat deck, the player will just play another version of the effect like Zulaport Cutthroat. Against powerfull engine-like-decks single target removal just doesnt remove enough pieces, they just get replaced. But be picky indeed with your selection of whipes, cause decks are so heavily optimized (in terms of ramp and carddraw) these days that the wipes just set you back if other players on the table have a good manabase and a full hand (the typical simic playpattern). Thats why I only play one-sided or really cheap (like blas. act) or flexible (like damn) wipes.
I have an Oloro deck with over 20 board wipes. That's the only deck I'm certain has enough.
What I’ve noticed, is since my friends got me to play magic again, and specifically commander, the adults who play that format, are literally whiny children that couldn’t handle playing a cutthroat competitive game of any kind. The point of the game isn’t to be social or have fun, the point is to win. Games are social yes. But we aren’t playing co operative game. We are playing a competitive game, and if they can’t have fun when other people are playing to win, maybe they should play games that are co op, not competitive.
I end up fairly wrath-heavy with cards that (mostly) wipe the board and provide a creature so that I’m ahead before opponents who would otherwise rebuild first. Stuff like Massacre Girl, Sunfall, Phyrexian Rebirth, Necromantic Selection, and Ugin, the Spirit Dragon. Not only do I go from being behind or in a stalemate with opponents to a slight advantage, but can deal with opponents otherwise running unchecked.
What's your Henzie list? As a fellow Henzie enjoyer, you've peaked my interest.
I used to run 4 wipes ( currently down to 3, but really reconsidering )
I think running like 7 is ideal. Like 2-3 universal “clean the board” wipes and 4-5 asymmetric wipes that either don’t hurt your board or progress your game plan.
the issue with 7 wraths is if you're in certain colors and strategies you physically cannot run 4-5 asymmetric wipes to accomplish that. Take minthara merciless soul. a list which in my case is a power matters sacrifice list with recursion the only asymmetric wipes i can run is citywide bust and even that hits key creatures like yawgmoth or ghoulcaller gisa all the others either get rid of all the stuff that i want to make an engine out of (The enternal wanderer) care about low power not low toughness or are just too expensive
@@jmanwild87 yeah it can be difficult to fit such a high number.
i run creature heavy decks so im probably biased, but i really dont like symmetric board wipes
you use 4-6 mana on your turn, clear the board (and the other 3 players can have some form of protection or recursion). ALL 3 of the other players will get to play before you do, rebuild and/or target you for wiping the board... if you go down with your own wipe it feels extremely pointless, even if you managed to sweep the Voja player's board.
The reason Wraiths are good is it’s card advantage. If I doomblade a creature I have gone 1 for 1 for 2 kinda. While me at the person getting doom bladed are down one card the other two opponents are up one each.
I've been working on a deck that has no removal. To make up for this it has hexproof, unblockable and indestructible with some of the biggest power boosters in the game.
I also wanted creatures that naturally have triggered abilities every turn and the rest of the slots went into stuff that protects them.
The social contract is dead.
running too much wraths means you are presenting a lot of answers but you are not presenting questions. i try to run either wraths in which i can break parity or are modal (damn), so if i am ahead they are never dead cards in my hand. for instance if you are playing a creature deck that can't risk its creature for blocking because they are value pieces play settle the wreckage.
personally i have seen that running a lot more threats, a lot more live draws. i don't run wraths in some decks. i run cards that create board states that without a wrath don't become unmanageable they win.
it always depends on the kind of game the table wants though. what i described is a playstyle that works with decks that deploy there engines and ramp early and need too few resources to pull the trigger to win. or with other decks that may take longer to win because the are combat centric but create a lot or pressure in life totals really early. pako and haldan is the most notable example in my playgroup.
i would argue that there are decks you don't run wraths or the wraths you run are not creature based. mono green is such deck. i don't care about your creatures. most likely mine are scarier any way. it really depends on the speed of the deck and the local meta. if you don't have a stable play group i recommend increasing efficient spells wraths and tutors so your decks can answer most deck and how aggressive you go is not up to the draw but a reaction to what the table is doing.
I run 4 as a minimum
Brah since when is wrath a problem? So many color have protection spell like heroic intervention. I think people should try to play around it more and have mana up for their protection spell. Also if the player who wraith did nothing the previous turn, they are taking a risk in tempo as they are not casting any spell
My Breya deck is up to 9 wraths
Having to disclose your build and includes is just so... god...
In my wrath tribal avacyn i run 12 spot removals and 12 wraths
Play one-sided wraths, the symmetrical wraths are less and less useful because nowadays decks have enough gas to keep pushing threats non-stop making card advantage not a thing and there's spells like TefPro and Heroic Intervention that makes you lose the game if they cast it in response.
I'm very focused in my deck building. Not a fan of "I need an answer to everything in the deck". I've built a wrath themed deck, with 25, got the most win rate of any of my other decks. Not a great experience for the other players, winning or not, it was not worth it. But then if I had just 4 wraths in the deck, and played 2, the experience would be the same. If players make board states that end the game in a anti-climax fashion, or make the game not enjoyable for others, thats them building poorly for casual as well. But sure, if you wanna win, you will solve most things being a boardstate police like I was.
25 wraths is WILD. I love it 😆