My favorite commander card is Descent into Avernus. You could build around it. You could break parity. But I just cram it into my red decks regardless of synergy, slam it every time I draw it and crank the game up to 11. Every game it doesn't get destroyed has a clock on it, and it enables more people to make their plays before the game ends, neatly excising two of commander's most frustrating elements.
One of the best EDH videos ever. This kind of content NEED views and absorption. Literally got me to sub Patreon, which I should have done long ago but I am lazy.
Casual commander players are the most competitive people I've ever met. They whine and bitch when they lose. They declare everything other than their specific bullshit is unfair. It's maddening.
I genuinely enjoy scouring through new cards coming out and seeing a card and going 'oh that'll be perfect in this one deck i own'. Like when Rip, Spawn Hunter was spoiled I jumped for joy because it's another addition to my 5 color vehicles deck. Those moments are very enjoyable. However, I made a Dungeons & Dragons themed deck with the Stranger Things characters, the D&D movie characters, and the Baldur's Gate 3 characters all in the deck, and the rest is all D&D cards. It's perfectly terrible, very unsynergistic, but, I love it for the theme. And that deck is 100% complete, and I will never touch it (Unless they make new D&D cards). So I do like the feeling of having a deck be 100%'d.
I am tired of sitting down to some competitive commander that I point out is strong and someone tells me its a casual build then they proceed to play it sub optimally, I sort of ignore them, and then the Heliod Walking Ballista combo me behind a Heroic Intervention when I try responding. Those people, make me want to just play blue control every game.
If I DO upgrade a deck, I tend to lean away from cards that make the deck "better". I seek cards that will improve the experience for the table instead of looking to increase my own win rate.
Video isn't even out yet, and I wholeheartedly agree with the premise. To me, it fundamentally removes the fun/casual aspect of commander. Every time you upgrade your deck you're systematically inching closer to a competitive mindset. If that's what you want, that's fine. I believe that most people don't actually want that and just fall into that trap.
The problem though is that the power creep is real. And I'm not talking about splashy mythics here. Just check how run-of-the-mill effects over the years either become cheaper, or get an upside attached to them, and after a while both. That's most of the upgrades I do: commons and uncommons. Because that is the baseline at which new decks are built. Fall behind there, and you'll simply be outpaced by faster decks.
I actually almost always keep my decks identical or near identical to their original forms once created and tested for a goldfish or ten. I really like keeping my decks that way because it's nice to see these little snapshots into my own personal history. Remembering what cards really inspired me 5, 10 years ago. Remembering the fun moments I've experienced with the deck is a big reason I keep playing commander.
My philosophy for any (casual) EDH deck is to build it towards a goal. The goal is never to win, but rather to answer "does it do a thing?" and "how well does it do that thing?" Once that goal is reached, other than a few old cards uncovered over the years, the deck is done.
Most of my decks are so tuned to my playgroup and the specific way I want to pilot them that I think I've unintentionally put them in amber. It's great to chill out and play with the goofy nostalgic cards that are specific to you. Recently I also stopped actively looking for upgrade cards in previews. Sometimes I'll find out about a card months after it released because someone else in my pod plays it or I stumble across it on scryfall. But the rush to get the hot new thing right when it releases and show it off right away is so exhausting, and I finally realized that, especially when I'm buying singles, there's no real rush. Less energy spent on hype is great.
Most of my decks are so finely tuned down to the mana value that I don't really need to upgrade. And not finely tuned in a competitive power sense, just that every card has a good reason to be there in its mana value slot. Replacing them with new cards would just be redundant. I only upgrade a deck because I was never really satisfied with some cards and they're only there until something more synergistic comes along. So whenever I upgrade, it's usually like a 10+ card sweep of stuff that wasn't working which I replace. The last time I upgraded, it was to put a bunch of MH3 MDFC lands and Demolition Fields in each of my 18 Commander decks because MDFCs and targeted land destruction are great for any deck.
For a lot of people, it is not about playing the latest and greatest, but rather it’s just remaining competitive. No one likes to sit down at a table and get curb stomped by a new deck made from the latest and greatest. An average commander deck from 10 years ago is nowhere near as competitive as average commander decks at this day in age. Look at Slivers as an example. They were the threat 10+ years ago, but with all the new stuff they are just average at this day in age. Keeping a decks in amber is a good idea if the play groups do a lot of the same, but this game isn’t known for its’ player base to not buy product.
What I’ve really liked doing is making $50 budget decks on older unplayed commanders because it forces you to use some really interesting cards or have a very unique gameplan. Also consequentially any upgrades are super cheap to keep the deck within budget.
I'm glad to see a video on this! At poitns too I'm super into upgrading decks, other times I jsut want to put my money towards other things and upgrading just isn't needed. Typically I have a small number of decks which get upgrades/tweaks whenever a new card looks cool. Though recently I've been working on making my Zinnia deck all animals, because I like the theme, which is a fun & silly challenge.
I very rarely upgrade decks and instead just build new ones. it has turned into me owning about 20 finished complete decks. some of my friends don't understand how I have that many but they keep spending money on upgrades. I like the more design aspect of doing weird things with my decks and playing the cards that are never seen. Psychic Surgery will forever be one of my favorite blue cards in commander.
I have a couple of 60 card decks that I've amberized. I built my first creatureless deck, in 2000 and made minor upgrades (mostly lands) between 2000 and 2010. I've left it alone since. If I ever sell my collection, it's the only MtG related thing I'll keep. I love leaving it alone, it feels like it has history with me. I have a Kamahl, Fist of Krosa commander deck that I treat the same way. One thing that I love about it, is the hidden mode of Kahahl's first ability. Inevitably, someone doesn't read it when I offer it to them, then goes on to Wrath the board. I absolutely love turning all of their lands, and just their lands, into 1/1s and watch them realize that not only did they annoy everyone else at the table, but they Armageddoned themselves.
I have 60 card decks from the 90s that I have never taken apart. Some got raided over the years because some of those old cards are absurdly powerful but quite a few remain intact.
Outside of a couple of pet decks, I usually don't upgrade my decks very often. Sometimes I'll pull a cool elf and go "hey I should put this in Lathril".. but trying to keep 30+ and growing decks optimized constantly would be an expensive endeavor. Usually I will see a precon or legendary creature I like say Ooh shiny and upgrade it to the point I am happy with how it plays and play with it until the next shiny crosses my eye. My bag for game nights usually contains 1 of my pet decks I am in the mood to play, and a random mix of other decks of varying builds and power levels.. (I usually carry six decks with me 5 of which have been often selected by random number generator). If there is a theme I'm going for that week I may be a little more selective (spooky season is upon us let me play my zombies and vampires) but otherwise I am there to have fun.
It’s a very refreshing video . Normally people push the new hotness and it’s really obvious but just don’t get obsessed with the new , just enjoy what you have!!!!
Completely agree with the point to the video. However, if you are going to play the format or game with this mind set then be okay with losing more often. MTG is a game about winning and or losing. Even if you play for fun, you should be playing with the intent to win or the intent to lose. Regardless try to have fun with it. Losing only sucks if you are actively trying not to lose.
I tend to theme my decks, and I'll just build with the cards I have. Sometimes the point is to just build something kicking around in my brain even though I know I'll never play it. I have one of each Khan, as an example. Also, one of each 2-color Elder Dragon (the DTK 5 and the Strixhaven 5) as well as one of each mono-colored Elder Dinosaur. I've never played the Elder Dinosaur decks. They just sit there as a reminder of the exercise in creativity that was building a mono-colored deck. I also like building decks that use only the card pool from a single plane. It can be fun to build an Innistrad-only deck, even if you never play it.
I've played against someone who had questioned why I even ran certain cards and told me after the last game what cards he thought I should be putting in my deck, and did so for my other opponent as well. For reference, I build theme decks. I was criticized by my card choice in a themed deck I had just built and was first testing against a sheoldred player.
That's how I keep the urge to upgrade everything at bay. I also like to maintain a theme and flavour for a deck. Sometimes a powerful new card also is thematic and it's great to upgrade.
I decided to do this to Sythis a while back. The deck is fun to play, has a number of win cons, and she SLAPS! I haven't upgraded her build in about two years and shes got no problem keeping up with different tables.
Another thing I'll do if I need to strip an old deck of staples is keep the deck skelly on a shelf. This can be very easy to do when those pieces won't fit elsewhere.
I was gifted an Otrimi Commander precon when Ikoria came out. I made upgrades with the cards I had and made the restriction that I cannot buy any singles/packs for it. I still trade cards for it, but only with cards I already had on hand. It’s my favorite deck I have not intentionally spent any money on myself.
I usually only upgrade my underrepresented tribal decks, when the tribe gets one-in-ten sets creature. Usually to replace shapeshifter that is there only to fill in the quota.
Man that was close... I was almost feeling called out when you were referring to people picking up 3 copies of Trouble in Pairs when it came out. I just picked up 2 of course. I am definitely not one of those 3-copy weirdos that ruin everyone elses fun by playing generically good cards that require no deck synergy at all.
Personally I love updating my decks when new sets come out. Not all my decks do get new cards but often a couple of them either geta strick upgrade or sidegrade card. I do it because it keeps it from becoming stale to play the deck. But at same time i also find old magic cards all the time i add to decks as either upgrades or sidegrades of cards but still keep the overall same power level in total for the deck.
I set a rule for myself Most of my decks I never updgrade, but the two decks that I do more actively maintain, I only make changes if those changes result in the deck having a higher total number of retro frame cards. Right now they're both at about 80% retro frame cards. Once they're at 100% retro frame cards I'll probably never touch them again.
I agree with this. I wish I could just play without having to upgrade. But half my commander group upgrades and the power creep in recent years has been huge. At a certain point, I was no longer having fun because some people were wrecking me, because I wasn't upgrading my decks and they were. I try to keep it reasonable, but I just have to cave in and get some cards to keep up. The power creep adds up over the course of a year.
Yeah, that's definitely a thing. There are approaches that make it less relevant though. Having a deck whose purpose isn't to win, as one example. If you just have one weird thing you're trying to pull off, and once you've done it, you're mission complete even if you lose can let you play with scaled up decks. Introduce the first player to punch you to the Door to Nothingness. Make an opponent resurrect your Leveler. Assemble the entire Justice League on the board at once.
A friend who shares your view about the direction the game has gone recently took his 2015-era Naya Burn Modern deck to a local event and went undefeated, and said it's the most fun he's had with Magic in a while.
The funny thing about hyper competitive meta decks, is that they often make choices to balance power vs cost beat very specific metas. It's hilarious when some 10 year old meta drops in and wrecks all the new meta deck that aren't tooled specifically to counter it.
I like to drop in cards from when I first took up magic, the look on other players faces when the realise the card I just played id nearly older than them
So, what I like to do, is take a fun idea, and see how good I make it. it's not about being hyper competitive, for ME, but to just make a dumb idea work. so if it loses, I gotta upgrade, tweak, over and over and over and over and over again.
How I decide if I should put a card in my deck: 1) Does it look like it will make my deck more fun than whatever card has been sitting festering in my hand every time i play the deck because it turns out it wasn't actually as fun as it looked? That's it. FFS I put a whole bunch of Rats in my Asmoranomardicadaistinaculdacar deck for the Pixar memes. I cannot think of a single reason other than "Is it more fun?" to put a card in your deck. Sometimes that will mean better at winning, sometimes it will just be theme, and sometimes it will be that new card from foundations the with the massive fuck off Squirrels on it, because massive fuck off Squirrels and I should not need to elaborate on that point. That said, I feel the need to spank a walrus.
Usually I try to keep at least 10 flavor spots. One mana +/- wont make or break a deck. Having suboptimal interaction from the set the commander was printed in isnt the end of the world. However it is rough out there playing with random people at an LGS.
I have an ulterior motive for keeping some type2/standard decks as only the way they were back then so they don't get to powerful and are more likely to be fairly playable against people that played 2 or 3 years and quite but kept their decks. If I play those decks upgraded, they may blow people out of the water and then they decide to never ever play again.
Thing 1) trying to start a war out here with the ASD watchers about Dinos is gonna backfire GL!. Thing 2) Ambering an eternal format should be called Junding...
Yes! Dad is right here. Most of the product fatigue comments feel like they’re forced to upgrade their decks. Like yeah that will burn you out but you don’t have to. I do prerelease and then get back to commander. Very rarely do I upgrade decks with the latest. Like why?
I make too many decks to upgrade them. Instead I just occasionally revisit them and rebuild them with the new card set in the option pile. Avoids new product hype as well as helping me stay sane.
I upgrade decks until I get them to a point I'm satisfied with them. My Krenko deck hasn't seen upgrades in about 5 years, and only recently did I add a card to it. On the other side, I have a mono-green lands matters decks (most creatures have P/T = lands I have), and I have swapped the commander of the deck numerous times, as well as swapping out chunks of cards from the deck because I just can't get it to feel right.
for the most part, if a deck is well built to start with, it'll be fine without constant upgrades. sure, eventually that deck just won't be able to keep up as Wizards keeps power creeping the format... a typical land base from 2013 wouldn't be able to keep up with a land base from today. but your deck won't be immediately terrible if you didn't change out your putrefy with assassin's trophy back when that card came out, you can let things sit a while between updates
Everytime i try to sell some friends on edh they say if you made a format explicitly to run them off it would be edh. The biggest thing is no rotation. Deck upgrading and meta refresh is what drives them in tcgs. I think that highlights some tension with this era of edh and how wotc supports it. Players with that standard cycle mentality or habit looking at decks and wotc just going churn baby churn.
I use to have around 15 decks and update them all every set and it was really exhausting to do so. I’ve now stopped downing so and rarely upgrade them outside of a few cards when I open them in packs, but I now have 54 commanders deck and might be doing all this wrong…
I am now building a new deck which is a bit the opposite of this fucking trend... I want it to be bling and shling, so it's a 5 colour Cromat deck where every single fucking card in it is original old border foil. There's no way I can upgrade that. Only change cards as I start getting more of the old border foil ones (so only any set between Urza's Legacy and Scourge). And surprise suprise... it fucking works! There's multicolor lands, there's mana rocks, removal, creatures... heck even combos
I def thing it depends on what the upgrades are, I like making my decks stronger but I usually try to avoid generically good stuff (the smuggling tithes/Rhystic Study type cards) if there is a card that comes out that fits the deck and is an upgrade I might go for it as long as it isn't too pricey
I like the mario party analogy. I've been saying Commander is like a game of Smash brothers with 4 players, any stage, with most items on. Why are we trying to make 4 player smash competitive? Even if it was comp ruleset with 4 players, no one would would take that seriously.
Good video I like the sentiment and agree. But also I build something new each week and my oldest deck is 3-4 months old probably. Totally agree with going off the beaten path though.
And this is why those of us who don't play a ton of commander laugh so hard when people are like "It's a casual, non-competitive format!". Sure, maybe at kitchen tables it is. At almost every LGS I've been to? No, it's not. People say it a lot but if you actually go observe what's happening in random pods at most LGS's it's not very casual, and people absolutely hate losing. All the "it's casuaaaaalllll" thing has done is give people an excuse to complain when people play styles of cards they don't like (e.g. interaction or counter spells).
Honestly I don't mind upgrading my decks. I can add more fun cards that work better into my decks and then recycle the cards I take out into new decks.
Ive cut my collection down to 2 legit decks and a few that are full proxies that i printed. Maybe once a year ill buy a new card for the 2, and its usually just some power crept uncommon.
I've got more than 70 decks. I only upgrade a few at a time, but I really need to go through and fix mana bases but for the most part most of the decks don't get new cards outside of me fixing lands.
*_"Stop upgrading your decks"_* ... to make the strong cards cheaper and to have less strong opponent decks so that i am one of the few who is stronger than all the others. Actually a good idea...for everyone else except me.
Honestly. I only upgrade a few decks of mine. My dimir horror precon 10 card swap budget. Always looking to find new powercrept horrors or pay 3 mana to draw 2/3 cards. My chun li deck. It is my pub stomp the known pub stomper at an lgs deck. Some other decks when I see a new card previewed or played against I go. Oh I want that for a specific deck and forget about it.
The only deck I "upgrade" is Maelstrom Wanderer, and those aren't even upgrades. I like switching out creatures when new sets come out so it constantly feels fresh, even if the new creatures going in are technically a downgrade.
Guess I have two dads now, though I don't think I'll call you daddy pk, just a bit too parasocial and weird. I agree with everything you said, like I've stopped upgrading decks, if anything they just get taken apart because resources are finite and I've a half dozen la based commander game shows each with 4 charismatic hosts in my house now, like yeah I could upgrade many decks to be better more efficient, but I don't want to commander shouldn't be an arms race even though every time I dare bring something new to the table Steve will bring out his nuclear arsenal >.> luv ya but ya a tryhard. Like my Zedru deck is far from perfect, or good, in fact it's incredibly slow and it's win condition none existent, but that's not the point, I don't want it to be this perfect machine, I play it because it's a derpy mess that can be interesting and funny.
yea this is me, i gave up paying attention to new cards a long while ago. I'm relying on edhrecast to say a random card and be like, that would be good in bababa deck
It's not fomo that makes me obsessively tweak and upgrade my commander decks. I just have a problem. My (Currently) Savra deck, formely known as the Meren deck, formely known as the Sidisi deck, formely known as the Muldrotha deck, formely known as the Sidisi deck (The same one) might as well be a living ode to the Ship of Theseus. A corner cut here, some tech there, new additions keep shifting the focus every which way, warping and ultimately mutating the deck's identity, that commander changes and the need for massive rebuilds have become routine. Sacrifice and graveyard decks are the worst for this, because you'll seldom see a set come and go with nothing fun to add to it. It's a problem I have recognised for a while now, yet it's good to be told outright. As I plan to make the changes needed to change the Meren deck into a Savra one, maybe it's time I looked at encasing it in amber. Get the deck to a satisfactory condition, trying my best to ignore any new sets that come from hereon and then finally letting it stop eating all my investments into the game.
Are you okay buddy? Do you need some help? Please take care of yourself we don't want to lose you. Remember you matter. You make a difference in people's lives. Please be careful with that shotgun.
I’m so sick of people telling me that I didn’t build my deck right just because I didn’t make it as powerful as possible.
"Why don't you play OptimalCard in this???"
@ “you should be playing this commander for that deck instead”
im so sick of people telling me i didnt build my deck right because i made it as powerful as possible
Oh you should not meet my friend then. He hyper-optimizes and always "suggests" what I should put into my janky tribal
I’m so sick of people explaining to me
Why I won with more inexpensive cards than I could have.
My favorite commander card is Descent into Avernus. You could build around it. You could break parity. But I just cram it into my red decks regardless of synergy, slam it every time I draw it and crank the game up to 11.
Every game it doesn't get destroyed has a clock on it, and it enables more people to make their plays before the game ends, neatly excising two of commander's most frustrating elements.
Agreed. Great card design
veteran explorer
My Vihaan commander loves Descent into Avernus!!
One of the best EDH videos ever. This kind of content NEED views and absorption. Literally got me to sub Patreon, which I should have done long ago but I am lazy.
Casual commander players are the most competitive people I've ever met. They whine and bitch when they lose. They declare everything other than their specific bullshit is unfair. It's maddening.
okay okay okay.... hear me out....
everything, though, IS bullshit. unless I do it
I genuinely enjoy scouring through new cards coming out and seeing a card and going 'oh that'll be perfect in this one deck i own'. Like when Rip, Spawn Hunter was spoiled I jumped for joy because it's another addition to my 5 color vehicles deck. Those moments are very enjoyable. However, I made a Dungeons & Dragons themed deck with the Stranger Things characters, the D&D movie characters, and the Baldur's Gate 3 characters all in the deck, and the rest is all D&D cards. It's perfectly terrible, very unsynergistic, but, I love it for the theme. And that deck is 100% complete, and I will never touch it (Unless they make new D&D cards). So I do like the feeling of having a deck be 100%'d.
As an editor, i really apreciate the edit's this video
10/10 ad read.. would listen again
I wasn't expecting to get called out today by Kenobi, but hey, that's dad's for ya.
Yo some of the stills in this video are insanity. Lol PK's always out there, but damn.
New editor? High production value video! 😮
I've been editing for PK for a little while now, but glad you enjoyed it!
I am tired of sitting down to some competitive commander that I point out is strong and someone tells me its a casual build then they proceed to play it sub optimally, I sort of ignore them, and then the Heliod Walking Ballista combo me behind a Heroic Intervention when I try responding. Those people, make me want to just play blue control every game.
If I DO upgrade a deck, I tend to lean away from cards that make the deck "better". I seek cards that will improve the experience for the table instead of looking to increase my own win rate.
Unless I'm having consistency issues or my deck feels too weak, I only make changes for theme and fun 100%
Video isn't even out yet, and I wholeheartedly agree with the premise. To me, it fundamentally removes the fun/casual aspect of commander. Every time you upgrade your deck you're systematically inching closer to a competitive mindset. If that's what you want, that's fine. I believe that most people don't actually want that and just fall into that trap.
The problem though is that the power creep is real. And I'm not talking about splashy mythics here. Just check how run-of-the-mill effects over the years either become cheaper, or get an upside attached to them, and after a while both. That's most of the upgrades I do: commons and uncommons. Because that is the baseline at which new decks are built. Fall behind there, and you'll simply be outpaced by faster decks.
@Volkbrecht I played one of my oldest decks last week and it won handedly. It's a mikaeus the lunarch artifacts deck. Just find a chill pod
I actually almost always keep my decks identical or near identical to their original forms once created and tested for a goldfish or ten. I really like keeping my decks that way because it's nice to see these little snapshots into my own personal history. Remembering what cards really inspired me 5, 10 years ago. Remembering the fun moments I've experienced with the deck is a big reason I keep playing commander.
My philosophy for any (casual) EDH deck is to build it towards a goal. The goal is never to win, but rather to answer "does it do a thing?" and "how well does it do that thing?" Once that goal is reached, other than a few old cards uncovered over the years, the deck is done.
Most of my decks are so tuned to my playgroup and the specific way I want to pilot them that I think I've unintentionally put them in amber. It's great to chill out and play with the goofy nostalgic cards that are specific to you.
Recently I also stopped actively looking for upgrade cards in previews. Sometimes I'll find out about a card months after it released because someone else in my pod plays it or I stumble across it on scryfall. But the rush to get the hot new thing right when it releases and show it off right away is so exhausting, and I finally realized that, especially when I'm buying singles, there's no real rush. Less energy spent on hype is great.
Most of my decks are so finely tuned down to the mana value that I don't really need to upgrade. And not finely tuned in a competitive power sense, just that every card has a good reason to be there in its mana value slot. Replacing them with new cards would just be redundant. I only upgrade a deck because I was never really satisfied with some cards and they're only there until something more synergistic comes along. So whenever I upgrade, it's usually like a 10+ card sweep of stuff that wasn't working which I replace. The last time I upgraded, it was to put a bunch of MH3 MDFC lands and Demolition Fields in each of my 18 Commander decks because MDFCs and targeted land destruction are great for any deck.
Holy shit the amount of WORK done on this single video is im-freaking-mense! Great job!
For a lot of people, it is not about playing the latest and greatest, but rather it’s just remaining competitive. No one likes to sit down at a table and get curb stomped by a new deck made from the latest and greatest. An average commander deck from 10 years ago is nowhere near as competitive as average commander decks at this day in age. Look at Slivers as an example. They were the threat 10+ years ago, but with all the new stuff they are just average at this day in age. Keeping a decks in amber is a good idea if the play groups do a lot of the same, but this game isn’t known for its’ player base to not buy product.
What I’ve really liked doing is making $50 budget decks on older unplayed commanders because it forces you to use some really interesting cards or have a very unique gameplan. Also consequentially any upgrades are super cheap to keep the deck within budget.
Same! Live for the jank!
I'm glad to see a video on this! At poitns too I'm super into upgrading decks, other times I jsut want to put my money towards other things and upgrading just isn't needed.
Typically I have a small number of decks which get upgrades/tweaks whenever a new card looks cool.
Though recently I've been working on making my Zinnia deck all animals, because I like the theme, which is a fun & silly challenge.
Idk man, if a new, cool dragon comes out, I will definitely give it several looks at the very least.
I very rarely upgrade decks and instead just build new ones. it has turned into me owning about 20 finished complete decks. some of my friends don't understand how I have that many but they keep spending money on upgrades. I like the more design aspect of doing weird things with my decks and playing the cards that are never seen. Psychic Surgery will forever be one of my favorite blue cards in commander.
I've downgraded from 50 decks last year lol if they all function and are fun, why mess with them? 😂
I have a couple of 60 card decks that I've amberized. I built my first creatureless deck, in 2000 and made minor upgrades (mostly lands) between 2000 and 2010. I've left it alone since. If I ever sell my collection, it's the only MtG related thing I'll keep. I love leaving it alone, it feels like it has history with me.
I have a Kamahl, Fist of Krosa commander deck that I treat the same way. One thing that I love about it, is the hidden mode of Kahahl's first ability. Inevitably, someone doesn't read it when I offer it to them, then goes on to Wrath the board. I absolutely love turning all of their lands, and just their lands, into 1/1s and watch them realize that not only did they annoy everyone else at the table, but they Armageddoned themselves.
This is how I feel with my lord of the Nazgul commander deck. Labor of love lol
I have 60 card decks from the 90s that I have never taken apart. Some got raided over the years because some of those old cards are absurdly powerful but quite a few remain intact.
Outside of a couple of pet decks, I usually don't upgrade my decks very often. Sometimes I'll pull a cool elf and go "hey I should put this in Lathril".. but trying to keep 30+ and growing decks optimized constantly would be an expensive endeavor. Usually I will see a precon or legendary creature I like say Ooh shiny and upgrade it to the point I am happy with how it plays and play with it until the next shiny crosses my eye. My bag for game nights usually contains 1 of my pet decks I am in the mood to play, and a random mix of other decks of varying builds and power levels.. (I usually carry six decks with me 5 of which have been often selected by random number generator). If there is a theme I'm going for that week I may be a little more selective (spooky season is upon us let me play my zombies and vampires) but otherwise I am there to have fun.
I m glad you never stop glazing the fraying line, it's such a great card
I play a lot of tribal decks, so I usually only update decks if a new card for a tribe is printed that goes well in one.
My issue : my tribal deck is human tribal
It’s a very refreshing video . Normally people push the new hotness and it’s really obvious but just don’t get obsessed with the new , just enjoy what you have!!!!
Completely agree with the point to the video. However, if you are going to play the format or game with this mind set then be okay with losing more often. MTG is a game about winning and or losing. Even if you play for fun, you should be playing with the intent to win or the intent to lose. Regardless try to have fun with it. Losing only sucks if you are actively trying not to lose.
I appreciate the music choice during the "ad" read.
Fuck, now I want to reinstall BattleBlock Theater.
Theres a spiky way to play Fraying Line - flash it in before your turn with like Liberator or goblin welder
I tend to theme my decks, and I'll just build with the cards I have. Sometimes the point is to just build something kicking around in my brain even though I know I'll never play it. I have one of each Khan, as an example. Also, one of each 2-color Elder Dragon (the DTK 5 and the Strixhaven 5) as well as one of each mono-colored Elder Dinosaur. I've never played the Elder Dinosaur decks. They just sit there as a reminder of the exercise in creativity that was building a mono-colored deck. I also like building decks that use only the card pool from a single plane. It can be fun to build an Innistrad-only deck, even if you never play it.
I've played against someone who had questioned why I even ran certain cards and told me after the last game what cards he thought I should be putting in my deck, and did so for my other opponent as well.
For reference, I build theme decks. I was criticized by my card choice in a themed deck I had just built and was first testing against a sheoldred player.
I got asked the other day why I had Inspiring Cleric in my Blink/Lifegain deck. Apparantly ETBing for 4 life wasn't something they considered.
That's how I keep the urge to upgrade everything at bay. I also like to maintain a theme and flavour for a deck. Sometimes a powerful new card also is thematic and it's great to upgrade.
Gilmore girl UB! 😂 you joke, but my ex-wife would play her second game ever, if it was a Laurelie-Luke partner deck
I decided to do this to Sythis a while back. The deck is fun to play, has a number of win cons, and she SLAPS!
I haven't upgraded her build in about two years and shes got no problem keeping up with different tables.
Bro, you're on fire in the first 5 mins here!
Another thing I'll do if I need to strip an old deck of staples is keep the deck skelly on a shelf. This can be very easy to do when those pieces won't fit elsewhere.
Ngl I didnt realize we were doing an ad read until you said it was over
I was gifted an Otrimi Commander precon when Ikoria came out. I made upgrades with the cards I had and made the restriction that I cannot buy any singles/packs for it. I still trade cards for it, but only with cards I already had on hand. It’s my favorite deck I have not intentionally spent any money on myself.
I usually only upgrade my underrepresented tribal decks, when the tribe gets one-in-ten sets creature. Usually to replace shapeshifter that is there only to fill in the quota.
Man that was close... I was almost feeling called out when you were referring to people picking up 3 copies of Trouble in Pairs when it came out. I just picked up 2 of course. I am definitely not one of those 3-copy weirdos that ruin everyone elses fun by playing generically good cards that require no deck synergy at all.
Personally I love updating my decks when new sets come out. Not all my decks do get new cards but often a couple of them either geta strick upgrade or sidegrade card. I do it because it keeps it from becoming stale to play the deck. But at same time i also find old magic cards all the time i add to decks as either upgrades or sidegrades of cards but still keep the overall same power level in total for the deck.
I set a rule for myself
Most of my decks I never updgrade, but the two decks that I do more actively maintain, I only make changes if those changes result in the deck having a higher total number of retro frame cards.
Right now they're both at about 80% retro frame cards. Once they're at 100% retro frame cards I'll probably never touch them again.
I agree do the same thing have a couple decks that upgrade often to keep competitive and then a half full that are frozen.
I agree with this. I wish I could just play without having to upgrade. But half my commander group upgrades and the power creep in recent years has been huge. At a certain point, I was no longer having fun because some people were wrecking me, because I wasn't upgrading my decks and they were. I try to keep it reasonable, but I just have to cave in and get some cards to keep up. The power creep adds up over the course of a year.
Yeah, that's definitely a thing. There are approaches that make it less relevant though. Having a deck whose purpose isn't to win, as one example. If you just have one weird thing you're trying to pull off, and once you've done it, you're mission complete even if you lose can let you play with scaled up decks.
Introduce the first player to punch you to the Door to Nothingness. Make an opponent resurrect your Leveler. Assemble the entire Justice League on the board at once.
A friend who shares your view about the direction the game has gone recently took his 2015-era Naya Burn Modern deck to a local event and went undefeated, and said it's the most fun he's had with Magic in a while.
The funny thing about hyper competitive meta decks, is that they often make choices to balance power vs cost beat very specific metas.
It's hilarious when some 10 year old meta drops in and wrecks all the new meta deck that aren't tooled specifically to counter it.
I like to drop in cards from when I first took up magic, the look on other players faces when the realise the card I just played id nearly older than them
This is the first time I’ve heard of Commander compared to Mario Party and I freaking love it. Please be my dad.
I have my full power decks and my decks with all the leftovers. Those leftover decks are freaking awesome.
i have taken it upon me to build decks for my playgroup i manage the power level, and we agree to keep the theme > power :D
So, what I like to do, is take a fun idea, and see how good I make it. it's not about being hyper competitive, for ME, but to just make a dumb idea work. so if it loses, I gotta upgrade, tweak, over and over and over and over and over again.
How I decide if I should put a card in my deck: 1) Does it look like it will make my deck more fun than whatever card has been sitting festering in my hand every time i play the deck because it turns out it wasn't actually as fun as it looked? That's it. FFS I put a whole bunch of Rats in my Asmoranomardicadaistinaculdacar deck for the Pixar memes. I cannot think of a single reason other than "Is it more fun?" to put a card in your deck. Sometimes that will mean better at winning, sometimes it will just be theme, and sometimes it will be that new card from foundations the with the massive fuck off Squirrels on it, because massive fuck off Squirrels and I should not need to elaborate on that point. That said, I feel the need to spank a walrus.
Usually I try to keep at least 10 flavor spots. One mana +/- wont make or break a deck. Having suboptimal interaction from the set the commander was printed in isnt the end of the world. However it is rough out there playing with random people at an LGS.
I have an ulterior motive for keeping some type2/standard decks as only the way they were back then so they don't get to powerful and are more likely to be fairly playable against people that played 2 or 3 years and quite but kept their decks. If I play those decks upgraded, they may blow people out of the water and then they decide to never ever play again.
I like making decks with only retro bordered cards, that’s pretty fun
Commander has become Yu-Gi-Oh.
I have an elfball deck i haven't changed since origins, its just a deck i know how it plans, it plays well, and is mega fun
And yet when I play a Chaos deck, everybody groans.
Thing 1) trying to start a war out here with the ASD watchers about Dinos is gonna backfire GL!.
Thing 2) Ambering an eternal format should be called Junding...
Yes! Dad is right here.
Most of the product fatigue comments feel like they’re forced to upgrade their decks. Like yeah that will burn you out but you don’t have to.
I do prerelease and then get back to commander. Very rarely do I upgrade decks with the latest. Like why?
Wow. Fraying Line is a great concept. Maybe it just needs a bit of polishing.
I make too many decks to upgrade them. Instead I just occasionally revisit them and rebuild them with the new card set in the option pile. Avoids new product hype as well as helping me stay sane.
I upgrade decks until I get them to a point I'm satisfied with them. My Krenko deck hasn't seen upgrades in about 5 years, and only recently did I add a card to it. On the other side, I have a mono-green lands matters decks (most creatures have P/T = lands I have), and I have swapped the commander of the deck numerous times, as well as swapping out chunks of cards from the deck because I just can't get it to feel right.
Phillip K Dick's less successful sequel: Do Vinces dream of ontological shotguns?
This is the deck upgrade version of edging. I'm in
for the most part, if a deck is well built to start with, it'll be fine without constant upgrades.
sure, eventually that deck just won't be able to keep up as Wizards keeps power creeping the format... a typical land base from 2013 wouldn't be able to keep up with a land base from today. but your deck won't be immediately terrible if you didn't change out your putrefy with assassin's trophy back when that card came out, you can let things sit a while between updates
been living in a preDH mindset for this reason. only so many cards exist
I just like using the cards you get. Ordering is cool but you go down a rabbit hole in that you want to order all the greatest stuff.
Everytime i try to sell some friends on edh they say if you made a format explicitly to run them off it would be edh. The biggest thing is no rotation. Deck upgrading and meta refresh is what drives them in tcgs. I think that highlights some tension with this era of edh and how wotc supports it. Players with that standard cycle mentality or habit looking at decks and wotc just going churn baby churn.
Years ahead of you. When MTG bloated to 20+ releases a year I said F it.
What are we at now 100+?
I only upgrade my monogreen hydra trible wars. I love it so much. I add like 1 card a year
I use to have around 15 decks and update them all every set and it was really exhausting to do so. I’ve now stopped downing so and rarely upgrade them outside of a few cards when I open them in packs, but I now have 54 commanders deck and might be doing all this wrong…
I am now building a new deck which is a bit the opposite of this fucking trend... I want it to be bling and shling, so it's a 5 colour Cromat deck where every single fucking card in it is original old border foil. There's no way I can upgrade that. Only change cards as I start getting more of the old border foil ones (so only any set between Urza's Legacy and Scourge).
And surprise suprise... it fucking works! There's multicolor lands, there's mana rocks, removal, creatures... heck even combos
I def thing it depends on what the upgrades are, I like making my decks stronger but I usually try to avoid generically good stuff (the smuggling tithes/Rhystic Study type cards) if there is a card that comes out that fits the deck and is an upgrade I might go for it as long as it isn't too pricey
I just stopped upgrading. no one have time and money to keep up with is insanity.
My LGS gives out prizes randomly to everyone at commander night. So prizes for commander, kind of
I like the mario party analogy. I've been saying Commander is like a game of Smash brothers with 4 players, any stage, with most items on. Why are we trying to make 4 player smash competitive? Even if it was comp ruleset with 4 players, no one would would take that seriously.
I'm just more picky about what I choose to upgrade with. so my decks change less often because of that
Good video I like the sentiment and agree. But also I build something new each week and my oldest deck is 3-4 months old probably. Totally agree with going off the beaten path though.
I have 35 decks. I only make changes if I'm unhappy with them or a fun card comes out. So maybe 1 card a year each
And this is why those of us who don't play a ton of commander laugh so hard when people are like "It's a casual, non-competitive format!". Sure, maybe at kitchen tables it is. At almost every LGS I've been to? No, it's not. People say it a lot but if you actually go observe what's happening in random pods at most LGS's it's not very casual, and people absolutely hate losing. All the "it's casuaaaaalllll" thing has done is give people an excuse to complain when people play styles of cards they don't like (e.g. interaction or counter spells).
Honestly I don't mind upgrading my decks. I can add more fun cards that work better into my decks and then recycle the cards I take out into new decks.
Build new decks and then after a year or so look back at your old one and either upgrade it or rebuild it completely.
Ive cut my collection down to 2 legit decks and a few that are full proxies that i printed. Maybe once a year ill buy a new card for the 2, and its usually just some power crept uncommon.
I've got more than 70 decks. I only upgrade a few at a time, but I really need to go through and fix mana bases but for the most part most of the decks don't get new cards outside of me fixing lands.
You can be my stepfather, but only if you promise to buy me every Secret Lair...👀
*_"Stop upgrading your decks"_* ... to make the strong cards cheaper and to have less strong opponent decks so that i am one of the few who is stronger than all the others. Actually a good idea...for everyone else except me.
Honestly. I only upgrade a few decks of mine. My dimir horror precon 10 card swap budget. Always looking to find new powercrept horrors or pay 3 mana to draw 2/3 cards.
My chun li deck. It is my pub stomp the known pub stomper at an lgs deck.
Some other decks when I see a new card previewed or played against I go. Oh I want that for a specific deck and forget about it.
I like to play gimmicks, so more than upgrading, I'm into weird sinergies~
You're not just my dad, Vince - you're my Daddy ❤
The only deck I "upgrade" is Maelstrom Wanderer, and those aren't even upgrades. I like switching out creatures when new sets come out so it constantly feels fresh, even if the new creatures going in are technically a downgrade.
Guess I have two dads now, though I don't think I'll call you daddy pk, just a bit too parasocial and weird.
I agree with everything you said, like I've stopped upgrading decks, if anything they just get taken apart because resources are finite and I've a half dozen la based commander game shows each with 4 charismatic hosts in my house now, like yeah I could upgrade many decks to be better more efficient, but I don't want to commander shouldn't be an arms race even though every time I dare bring something new to the table Steve will bring out his nuclear arsenal >.> luv ya but ya a tryhard.
Like my Zedru deck is far from perfect, or good, in fact it's incredibly slow and it's win condition none existent, but that's not the point, I don't want it to be this perfect machine, I play it because it's a derpy mess that can be interesting and funny.
yea this is me, i gave up paying attention to new cards a long while ago. I'm relying on edhrecast to say a random card and be like, that would be good in bababa deck
Most of my knowledge of new sets comes from the chaff bin at my lgs.
Tusk it a phenomenal movie.
Brave of you asking the internet "do you want me to be your Dad"
I play merin the tutor commander. And it's great fun. Idc if I win. I want to watch the chaos. I want to watch the table burn.
Good man.
This is me letting you know I agree in the comments below.
It's not fomo that makes me obsessively tweak and upgrade my commander decks. I just have a problem. My (Currently) Savra deck, formely known as the Meren deck, formely known as the Sidisi deck, formely known as the Muldrotha deck, formely known as the Sidisi deck (The same one) might as well be a living ode to the Ship of Theseus. A corner cut here, some tech there, new additions keep shifting the focus every which way, warping and ultimately mutating the deck's identity, that commander changes and the need for massive rebuilds have become routine. Sacrifice and graveyard decks are the worst for this, because you'll seldom see a set come and go with nothing fun to add to it. It's a problem I have recognised for a while now, yet it's good to be told outright. As I plan to make the changes needed to change the Meren deck into a Savra one, maybe it's time I looked at encasing it in amber. Get the deck to a satisfactory condition, trying my best to ignore any new sets that come from hereon and then finally letting it stop eating all my investments into the game.
Are you okay buddy? Do you need some help? Please take care of yourself we don't want to lose you. Remember you matter. You make a difference in people's lives. Please be careful with that shotgun.