I agree with Brian here 100% with regards to the steak vs. McD point. I remember when I used to get so excited about the yearly pre-cons, the quality of them and their design was so much more than it is now. As with the rest of magic, it has become over saturated
What do you want to see in the next Commander Legends set? "Better print quality." Truer words have never before been spoken. I laughed so hard at that response.
Ha, I laughed on that too, the commander legends quality with those very very very dark prints made me avoiding buying a full booster box. I bought 6 packs to play a sealed game with friends, and when I saw the cards: "OK, just some bad packs" - bought 3 or 4 more, opened and that was it for me. I like to collect a few cards from each set, but CL won't make to my binders.
@@lourencolimadacunha5493 the dark prints is nothing in comparison to the foil. For years, the From the Vault cards were greatly criticized for their tendency to curl, but low and behold the CL cards were curling in the packs themselves. Where buying a collectors booster, the only card that wasn't curled was the etched foil in the pack, and every other is just about unusable because of how curled the card came
@@lourencolimadacunha5493 - very DARK prints? Ha, you should have seen the collector booster foils, they were hot garbage. Ultra curled, and the black layer was like a 70% gray.
I literally ended Commander night last night by playing a game of pauper with a guy who brought some decks. 1 v 1 was the dessert! Is this the Professor or the Prophetic??
The best night of magic I had in the last two years was with a friend that built/proxied 6 premodern decks. We just rolled decks over and over and had a great time. Cool old cards we know and love, interactive, great variance of strategies and playstyles, quick games and drawn out games. It was heaven. We talked for days after it about making slight changes in sideboards.
It really makes so much sense. First two guys out of the pod? Grab another format deck and jam a 1v1 while the rest of the pod finishes the commander game.
@@Eckendenker This is the dream bro. I feel like many of the players who box themselves into EDH get burned out from its inherent casualness (variance + card pool) once they start being more competitive.
For me commander reflects the exact state of Magic: Power creep, a million products, everything has a hundred lines of text, simic, mana cheating. Whether it's better or worse than it was 5 years ago, depends on if you like these things.
5 years ago these problems were already ingrained in the format from Wizards printing the "made for commander" cards. I can think back to Meren and Ezuri dominating tables, and those decks are coming up on 7 years old now. 5 years ago we just had the biggest mistake many will say has ever been introduced into the format with the eminence mechanic.
@@enthusiasticnihilst1032 I would and do play that version of magic that you're outlining. Also same power level does not mean all card are the sames. It should be possible to make new cards without breaking certain rules. At least until you run out of ideas.
Our play group solves the casual-optimized issue by having ONE player bring ALL FOUR decks each week. The builder gives a briefing on the purpose of each deck. Everyone then picks a deck, with the builder picking last, or we just randomly assign them. The builder should win the majority of the games, right? But that's not what we've seen. Anyway, it works for us and we have fun with it. Thanks for your videos!
We have occasional deck swaps where you have to play someone else's deck. Lots of fun but, same as yours, does require a play group you trust your cards with
@@MattTorres Lately, we've discovered that a 60-70 card deck plays the same as a 100-card deck for most of the decks we'd play. Plus they don't take nearly as long to build, nor cost as much. Since we tend not to play decks more than twice, repetition is not an issue.
I’ve been battling depression for the last year and a half (since the start of Covid), and it’s been rough on me. I’ve gotten less and less enjoyment out of Magic, but I still keep playing it because of the great memories I have with the game. I still enjoy your content, and I really appreciate the dedication and quality entertainment from you. Thank you
Sometimes the game feels great, where everyone has done what their deck wanted to do, to a point that you no longer care who wins, since you enjoyed that hour of game.
@@Chagastom there are different types of decks. I have all kinds just for whatever experience the table wants. If you want the fastest game: Belbe, do you want Chaos Ikra & Ludevic Curse deck, want aggro wins: Saskia or Silvar & Trinn humans, Want to play against control without combo: Araumi, or control with combo: Taigam.
@@Chagastom the worst games are when I feel like im the only one trying to play a game and everyone else is just spending their first 5-6 turns are mana rocks, tutoring and shuffling their decks... and then the game just ends when someone explains to me that the cards they tutored for end the game, without anything actually happening, and I cant do anything about it.
100/10 Perfectly timed and executed Brexit joke 🤣 (I love the idea that Vince would use planeswalking to cheat on household chores but goes all the way to Ixalan for eggs)
What's interesting to me is a lot of the conversations are reflective of the old complaints about netdecking. The idea is you start with a natural chaotic messy format that is fun because of the chaos. But as cards are designed for the format, precons are made, and content creaters instruct the chaos dries up and the format because stable and a bit boring. It doesn't mean the format is bad, for one that is exactly why the format is easy to access. In the end it just comes down to the players and the pods taken the initiative on their own to talk about the deck and have fun. Personally the best move my playgroup has is 1. whoever won has to swap decks And 2. Everyone is honest about the tempo they want to play. Two simple rules that keep things balanced and ensures the games keep feeling different and hopefully fun.
I completely agree with this, your playgroup's rule about the winner swapping decks is really smart as well. My playgroup's problems have directly stemmed from a couple players taking content creators recommendations and sinking loads of money into their decks and swinging the power balance significantly in their favor compared to those of us that just grab some random stuff we own and throw things together. I'm not bashing content creators but I do think they've created a secondary formulaic form of Commander. That's not a bad thing but certainly an important talking point for playgroups.
@@Ixidora sorry but that rule of the winning player swaping his decks not only isn't smart but actually is very bad, how are they supossed to grow as players if they keep avoiding the powerfull decks instead of triying to beat them?
@@golem001px it isn't that they're trying to avoid the winning decks, it just ensures that there isn't one deck always at the table and that there is always a variety of competition. Also just because a deck won and was swapped doesn't mean they'll never play against that deck again.
Is swapping decks after winning not like, an unspoken rule of Casual? I've always felt like it would be boring and a bit of a dick move to play the same deck that I just won with, and that was the expectation.
I feel like what attracted me to the format in the beginning was that I finally had a place to explore my timmy tendencies with no worries of having a super optimized deck combo off in 5 turns; then slowly but surely that started to change, made worse when WotC started designing cards specifically for the format and printing 5x as many legends per set. you can even track the powercreep by looking at something like the history of content like the command zone podcast; when they first started you'd see cards like darksteel ingot and coalition relic in their builds, now the only "playable" 3 cmc mana rock is skyclave relic
That comment was mixed with his distaste with people's problems with specific experiences, however. If somebody doesn't like being armageddoned, do they just tell themselves they are having fun, when they clearly are not?
The discussion about sitting down and playing commander “to win or to play” sums up perfectly the frustration I have with some commander players at my LGS. I think the increased power of card design in recent years has caused some players to forget about the table experience and concentrate too much on winning. Commander at its core is a social multiplayer format and I think it’s lost some of that core value. To me commander is about playing big dumb plays and having longer games where everyone gets the opportunity to play their deck and do something before an eventual winner is decided. I adopt Vince’s attitude where I don’t play certain cards like cyclonic rift because it’s boring, predictable and makes the table groan. I avoid very high levels of counterspells and interaction because I want to see what people do with their decks. My objective is always just to not come last rather than win. I still win my fair share of games but I’m much happier knowing everyone at the table is having fun than pushing for the win every game.
"Made for commander" cards kinda take the fun out of the format imo. Commander for me is about finding a way to take advantage of having consistent access to a specific legendary creature. What kind of combos can I do with constant access to this affect? What kind of cards suddenly serve a different purpose when this effect is in the game? What fairly useless cards are now super broken because of a certain interaction with this creature? Stuff like that makes commander fun. Once you start including cards made for those kinds of interactions, it feels like it takes the fun out of it. Precon commanders nowadays are more like enchantments than creatures.
Beyond that, made for commander cards kinda take the fun out of searching for hidden gems in old sets, or looking through standard stuff to find good cards to add. The made for commander cards and sets just setting it down right in front of you spoils deckbuilding enjoyment sometimes too.
While I agree with your point, I'm glad to have arcane signet alongside cards that read "choose one. If you control a commander, choose any" or even [leadership vacuum] which makes target player return their commander(s) to the command zone
What I feel could help commander games: -Understanding other player's game experience *If you do a nasty turn and become threatening do not pretend that the rest of the table is on your level*
Most of the time I've seen that happen the player who's deck is better is very confused for the entire game about how the other players let them get to that point.
@@kingfuzzy2 Forsure. Agreed. The lower on the power level players go the more this happens. I've seen it happen numerous times but on accident. A player just plays good pieces if the table isn't removal heavy when that point of the game comes that 'little engine' takes over.
Five years ago, I was playing commander at my college game club on Fridays, and some of the optimization / power creep was already there. I've tracked the power of commander through the fall of a favorite and popular card, Sheoldred, and five years ago she was already seen as expensive and slow. I remember the more casual era of commander closer to seven or eight years ago.
I have an $80 Verazol deck that is one of my favorite decks to play. I also have a $700 Locust God deck but I find myself playing it less and less just because it's harder to find others who won't feel pubstomped by it I could put a Dockside or other "must have" staples in every deck but at that point why? I don't want to sit down to mirror matches in Commander. I like that all my decks play so differently and have their own personality.
Verazol is the most interesting simic commander. It plays differently from match to match thanks to kick, so it’s like having a 150 cards deck. Locust God always play the same. So maybe it’s not only the $$$ but the strategy itself you prefer.
Same, I have lots of different decks ranging from super low power £20-30 budget deck to a full on cEDH deck and everything inbetween. They are typically quite different though I do have a soft spot for tribal decks so I have like 4 of those but they are quite different. Selvala Eldrazi and Dimir Zombies are v different decks haha, and Tovolar werewolves is just Gruul face-smashy fun.
I have some above 500 usd decks but most of the cards are just overpriced RL's that are not even in Cedh level. Vesuvan doppelgangers, Forks etc are expensive cards but can just be used for casual decks. I call them "bomb cards" where most of my collections are just hard to find cards which are not even relevant before EDH era.
I have a very similar situation. My emmara soul of the accord deck $1000, but the deck I love playing more than that, Ayula. They play incredibly differently, and depending on the group and situation, I have either way.
Here's my take: Commander has different levels of play (how you want to define those levels is not the point here), and I make decks that can be strong within the level they play in. Even though my (for example) Wyleth voltron deck can be VERY strong at the level it plays against, if I try to move it up a level, I get crushed, and if I try to move it down a level, I'm pub stomping. It depends on the meta of the group you're playing in and it depends on the level everyone wants to play at. I try to keep decks on hand of many different power levels but I also try to make my decks as strong as they can be within the power level they are set in. Sometimes they get enough improvements to move up a level or sometimes I realize they're not as strong as I thought and I shift them down a level.
You know sometimes it is hard trying to make the strongest level 7 deck without accidently making it jump up to level 8 or 9 because consistency even with bad decks sometimes makes them too strong and able to compete with the level 10 decks while occasionally winning. But not all level 7's can do that as the legendary you have as your commander is mostly solely important on how strong your deck can be
@@JohnnyYeTaecanUktena I mean yes, there will always be anomalies, and that will happen no matter what you do. It's important to analyze your deck based on it's average gameplay. Every deck will have moments where it flops and moments where it shines, that's unavoidable. Regardless, it's up to the deck player to determine if their deck has moved up or down in power level and change when they play that deck accordingly. Personally, I build a deck as strong as I can (aka: as strong as my budget for any given deck will allow), and then I determine what level that deck has sat in. Usually I do this by putting a new deck in matchups that outrank it, and if I lose a bunch, move it down to a lower power level setting. If I still keep losing, keep moving it down until I find the point it can be competitive without being overpowering. TLDR: It's 100% up to each player to make sure their decks aren't overly powerful for the pod they're in. Simple as that.
@@NGPhotoVideo-TH-cam I have actually made a competitive deck at the cost of $20 USD before. These days the deck would probably cost around $100 to $200 USD due to some of the foils as foils do that
@@JohnnyYeTaecanUktena Oh I won't deny that competitive decks can be made on a budget. My comment about $ was just implying that some of the decks I have built could be even stronger if I had some more costly cards in them.
@@NGPhotoVideo-TH-cam Not necessarily, as cost does not quite equate to power even if you rule out foils as you would need cards that had synergy with your game plan tp raise the power or some mana rocks/mana fixing to make it more consistent. Like again synergistic cards are better than costly cards as not every Nekusar or Xyris deck would take Timetwister if the person had access to it and both benefits from opponents drawing cards and instead more mana would be better that way you can play the wheel cards more often getting more snakes or killing them with Nekusar burn
Having played Commander since it’s inception, I’ve found that every year brings a reduction in diversity. When I build a deck, there are fewer choices. Sure, there are always new spells, but you select 8 removal, draw, etc., and then the archetypal staples, which dominate slots, and he seems the reduction in choice. I love it, but it has become somewhat mechanical
Why are you choosing staples enough to dominate your slots though? I make new casual EDH decks all the time and I usually only pick the best card in slot if the entire point of the deck revolves around it or the deck has some crippling weakness that demands I make the remedy as potent as possible when I draw it.
Sorry to hear that. Are you using the precon commanders? I've tweaked my Estrid deck a lot and have recently decided to completely pivote my deck to include flash. I was themed around untapping my lands and pillow fortress. I'm adding vernal equinox, emergency zone, alchemists refuge, and leyline. (I didn't have any of these before), I'm also adding seed born muse, wilderness reclamation, and about 15-20 other newer cards since 2018. I'm into themed decks though. I've got a mono black big mana vampires deck, a strefan red/black vampire aristocrats deck, a Estrid enchantment deck, and a morph deck.
I am building currently a deck where one of my restrictions in deckbuilding is it can't contain any cards that were first printed in any of the commander decks or in Commander Legends. I'll be very interested to see how it stands up, but I do expect that other decks will easily stomp over it. I'll be willing to admit I'm wrong if it can be just as competitive as other decks out there, but I suspect that designing legends and cards to move product has created a scenario where the format is WAY more powerful now than it was before 2011.
Maybe try what Mitch is doing: aside from the commander, each card in the 99 is $1 or less. I've been able to build some interesting budget decks as a result.
it feels like most of this conversation revolves around playing with trusted friends and not the ever more powerful world of commander decks out there. Talk to someone who hasnt played in 5 years and they will most likely have a massively different concept on what low mid and high power is across the format.
@@roadrash2005 yeah... basically the casual social format at LGS pods is dead, nowadays it's pretty much singleton Legacy for tryharders that do not feel like playing the actual completitive formats. Of course, for those lucky enough to have a playgroup of friends, it is possible to agree on which kind of game people wants to play.
The ideal mentality for EDH is to play at a level the pod is looking for, while playing to win such that it could be fun for the rest to lose to. When losing can be fun, or at least not miserable, then you have found the right combination.
@@VexylObby Creating decks you would love to lose against doesn't work. For example, I hate losing to decks that are not 100% optimized. Not because I feel like they don't deserve to beat me but because I wish that the loss could have been given to me by the player and their deck at their best. If you told me to build a deck I would like to lose against, I would make some form of cEDH control deck because I can't get enough of the problem-solving part of fighting good control decks. But very few other players feel the same way. The second point, of finding like-minded players is really the only way to be happy.
"Commander's your only option" I'm old enough to remember when people would be willing to play casual Magic or multiplayer Magic in ways that weren't Commander. I love Commander but it's tiring and frustrating that it's become The Only Format in so many circles.
I mean there's draft, but that's a big buy in. other formats are available, but they require more overhead than commander. Commander, for time and interactivity reasons, really fills the "firday night poker" slot pretty well. (but i agree, i want to slamjam some canadian highlander, as homegames wouldn't care if i proxy the needed duals)
I miss those days so much. We just did giant games of 3-6 and it was a blast. Everyone had card that they always played and everyone would hate. The game was so fun and there wasn’t a million triggers every turn. There’s too much text now
I distinctly remember how back in the supposed Golden Age before the pre-cons, we were running into pretty similar problems. Yeah, it was just "throw together all the cool cards", but... Cradle is cool. Survival is cool. Swords of X and Y are cool... and thus those who had been playing for a decade (or had plenty of mana to spend) threw together their coolest cards and produced powerful decks. And the people who only had some Alara block draft chaff were mad that they couldn't compete. I don't think we ever really solved the problem. Other than that we stopped playing with the guy who insisted on de- and resleaving half his deck before every game to move all his power cards into whatever deck he was playing...
to be fair, during the golden age of EDH (not commander), there was much less preconstructed, people built their decks rather than using lists, there was more actual brewing and brainwork involved. Now commander is almost exclusively cEDH with the majority of commander cards having broken abilities that circumvent the original rules of the format...which is rather frustrating for those who lived through the time that edh was the format you played after FNM and such, just casual.
There are so many Commander pre-cons now that our group draft the decks and play them against each other. They are relatively balanced so no drama regarding power levels. Best way to play Commander, IMO.
Neat idea, I feel as if most pre cons can be very sluggish and unsynergistic, with awful mana bases and a very high curve, but maybe very slightly upgraded pre cons (just enough so you’re playing the game and not just going land pass) would be fun for my group
"You know what Dockside will be in? We've got 'triple masters' or 'double masters 2' and that's what they're saving it for, because they need those big expensive cards to justify their premiere sets." Prof hit that one on the nose!
Also I remember that Commander used to be that you could find a random odd uncommon and you'd be able to stick it in your 99 and be happy about it. Also Staples of today were dirt cheap. Aetherflux reservoir, Smothering Tithe, Anointed Procession... I traded and bought these for a few € when they came out since they were not played in modern or standard.
The best night of magic I had in the last two years was with a friend that built/proxied 6 premodern decks. We just rolled decks over and over and had a great time. Cool old cards we know and love, interactive, great variance of strategies and playstyles, quick games and drawn out games. It was heaven. We talked for days after it about making slight changes in sideboards.
This is seriously, one-hundred-percent my favorite content and discussion as it pertains to MTG (or any gaming really)! I really love the discussion you two bring to the table- even the webcam ones. @20:59 I don't really see much salt anymore actually. I would argue that the salt was real BEFORE the pandemic, and at least at my medium-sized LGS the rule 0 convo is alive and well. Like really good spirited. People share deck lists on moxfield and stuff to make sure that there aren't any surprises. However, to what you folks are saying about people getting upset about the existence of some cards is very real. People discuss a card within the decks' strategy, and folks will literally stand up and say, "Your deck sounds great, I just don't care for that/these cards. I think I'll find another pod." Lots of people hopping up and shuffling pods and stuff based on decks being played and perceived power levels based on rule 0 conversation. Conversations are amicable, but it SUCKS that people essentially (in my mind) say to us through those words, "I want to win. I don't think I can win through that card. I don't want to even try and play through it or around it, let alone remove it." THAT is the problem with Commander in my mind (if there was to be one that could paint every corner of the format while being painted with such a broad brush).
22:10 There's bannings in every format because Hasbro is pushing Wizards to continuously break every format and turn eternal formats into rotating formats. It's compromising game health for corporate greed.
8:00 : every once in a while, my friends and I do my jumpstart cube, which is more fun personally than the drafting portion of casual limited with friends. Can't wait for JS2
With all the Timmy and Johny players moving to commander as the main format, the Spikes had to move too - which means commander has become more competitive. I've played in casual commander tournaments with ridiculous ways to score points and the players that HAVE to win make the game miserable for everyone. I've also played in a cEDH tournament and it was a lot of fun as games were nicely balanced (comparatively).
@Phillip P. Once there is a price it's not a "casual round of magic, where everyone just wants to have fun" anymore. Once there is a price, people tend to "want" that price. And you get that price by optimizing 110%. If you want a casual game where noone tryhards for the win, you cannot have prices. Would you casually play a 2v2 on a fussball-table with the worst player around in your team, if there is 100$ on the line? No, you take the best teammate you can get if a price involved kick the noob out. (:
@@DevineAbyss I agree to a certain extent, but if the tourament is based on obscure tribal decks which 15/16 players adhere to the spirit of the stipulation but there's one player twisting it to a fast combo deck... Personally I'm sticking to cEDH for tournaments but there are plenty of players who want to scratch a competitive itch but try to remain in the confines of a regular commander game - unfortunately they're going to continue to be disappointed.
I find this a very interesting conversation from older pure magic players. I’m a yugioh player who has recently gotten into just commander. Commander really gives yugioh players that old school itch, and the optimization (staples) is few enough where it still feels like I’m creating a deck that is unique. Yugioh only has 40-60 cards, but 85% are non-archetype staples and every deck feels samey. Commander, as it is still feels unique enough. Perhaps my opinion will change down the road, but I find it very fun and refreshing.
I feel this hard. Whenever you start building a Yugioh deck, you start by adding 9-13 handtraps, red-eyes fusion and its pieces, foolish, ... until only 20 cards are still left for your actual deck engine (which are also all OTKs). Seeing Commander was such a revelation, the slow pace, the singletons, I genuinely love it. I love that it is casual. I love talking, playing cool cards, interacting with stuff my opponents do and have shifting alliances, so I love this format.
@@ByronAndOnAndOn the other thing is the staple engines for MTG have mostly been the same for years, but there’s enough budget alternatives to still keep it competitive and refreshing.
Yugioh is completely broken at this point. I had an old school deck that is designed to just keep recurring Red-Eyes over and over again. Phoenix Enforcer is a single card that does my entire deck better than my deck. Commander is broken by design. Its the problems with being a competitive game with so many legal cards, the best will always float to the top. The colors keep it a little more diverse. But for example Sol Ring is a staple. If you are not running Sol Ring, then you are doing it wrong. As they release more cards we'll end up with more staples.
@@josephcourtright8071 it’s true, it is inevitable, as MTG doesn’t utilize a ban list as effectively as Yugioh. But for now it’s still fun and varried enough.
I don't mind finding a group of people that won't play banned cards, just so others don't have to worry about bans or that discussion. But for cEDH, it makes a lot of sense that bans should exist.
Wizards keeps churning out heaps and heaps of cards, i mean its kinda understandable because they sell like hotcakes, why not keep making more? The ban list growing with the game is perfectly fine
One thing I’d like to mention, before I forget, cause I haven’t finished the section and you may have touched on it: I’ve only been playing magic since keledesh, and started playing commander in Dominaria, so I wasn’t as deep in when the commander decks were these hodge podges that had call backs or unique spins on even older sets and stuff like that, but this is my experience being on the board of execs for my college’s magic club: the commander decks bleeding into the set they come out with is absolutely amazing, both for getting new people into magic, and getting current drafters/standard players to play commander. The genius lies here: because the commander deck bleeds into the set, buying a precon can mean immediately upgrading it, because your date stamped card/lucky pull goes amazing in the deck. My go to example for this recent set is I bought the zombie deck from hunt, and pulled necroduality in my vow prerelease kit. While I do like the idea of commander decks being this deep dive into the lore and characters of old sets(one of my favorite past times is reading lore on MTG wiki) if we want to continue increasing and bringing in new players to commander, especially those that started in limited or 60 card magic, I feel having commander decks heavily tied to a recent set release is an amazing strategy. I’d just like them to also make sure they do print at least a commander deck to go with these more flavorful or lore filled supplemental sets, that what you can have the decks that are more reminiscent of how they once were, and continue on this honestly great plan
52:47 you have to keep in mind what the "new player" products used to be. new players weren't being pushed to get ur-dragon commander decks they were being marketed to get intro decks, planewalker decks, and the like. And we still get an annual commander decks! $20 commander decks dont in mean we don't get the more notable decks too. This year we had the cycle of very well received strixhaven themed commanders
The pregame talk 10yrs ago was, 'what's everyone playing?' 'alright everyone, kill Vivien's value deck first' Then whoever the Vivien is will think 'maybe i should play a deck people will actually let me play'
I think I enjoyed commander the most when it was some random new format my friend heard about called EDH. We wanted to play multiplayer and it sounded fun so we threw together piles of "good stuff". As we played more we made deck improvements and spent more money on various cards and eventually had to deal with a lot of the issues that have become "The Rule Zero Conversation". Most of the problems we encountered were solved with setting price limits on decks or individual cards. It isn't perfect as prices change wildly at times. But there is an expectation-or at least a perception-that a $500 deck is going to crush a $100 deck most of the time. This did a lot to prevent egos from getting bruised. To me it will always be a kitchen table format where sometimes you get blown out on turn 5 and sometimes it will be a 2 hour slug fest, with be best games being somewhere in the middle. Players and play groups need to learn to be okay with Conceding. It's a very clear indication that you aren't interested in continuing the current game. Sometimes just switching decks or getting a better starts is all the table needs to have a great time. Also, let people free mulligan a few times. No one is sitting down to play Magic because their favorite way to play is: Draw-Discard-End.
This was a very interesting video. Thank you both. And I love so much the intros and the timing of the very last cut for each and every single videos of DTR.
I feel that Commander was best placed as 'everyone's favourite second format' rather tha the premier format of MTG. Before it was fun and casual. Now it's the main thing to do, people have gotten competitive. Plus the made for commander stuff
Its not that people have gotten more competitive its more so that commander is the most balanced format while somehow being the least balanced at the same time so people have to do rule zero and talk about power levels of what they want to play
@@JohnnyYeTaecanUktena yeah, it could be. My original comment was half way through the video. Having watched the rest I was a little confused about the thoughts behind cedh and casual EDH being you need to have the right playgroup. I know that most formats are similarly fun to play if the decks are balanced against each other. Sure, Commander was started as a casual format specifically but it has competitive players and even vintage and legacy have casual players
@@jeef16 I didn't say it was impossible to find casual games, just that I think the format has suffered from being the premier format that people play and was better when it was something silly that people played between rounds or after a tournement.
@@christopherreay3242 I will say one thing a lot of competitive decks like power level 10 the top of the top re actually diverse to the point you can't really guess what someone is going to play as the meta is huge. Like there are also a lot of decks that are still 10's winning by turn 4 but they just don't see play because people want to play with newer stuff instead of going through Magics history. It is entierly possible to see a Phage the Untouchable as a commander at the table and it ends up killing everyone by turn 3 because no one expects fringe competitive There are also some good competitive cards that no one looks at especially if it is tribal such as Kaseto, Orochi Archmage as simic cedh
My ears are hearing a conversation between the Professor and Vince but my eyes are dream towards the bookshelf. Nice to see someone else appreciates Terry Brooks. You should do a bookshelf tour prof.
I work at an LGS , and the professor hit the nail on the head! The precons are only selling for the reprints, we have boxes of the Selesyna precons from Midnight hunt . Product fatigue makes things feel not as important, just my opinion
Excellent point when you say "Despite more and more cards coming out, you see less and less and variety in EDH decks." I'd say you even see less haymakers and pinch hitters. Now it's just value engines, combo pieces and "staples"
Fortunately I'm mainly seeing jank at my lgs because there's always a new player who everyone feels bad about bringing their more powerful decks to play against them.
There’s this core assumption to the “Rule 0”, “have to agree”, “Commander works by mutual consent” mindset that I think needs to be re-examined: “With some work and compromise, any four Commander players should be able to sit down and have a good time.” This idea is INSANITY. That isn’t a true statement for ANY group of people. You CANNOT FORCE COMPATIBILITY. And that’s okay! Players need to be willing to NOT play Magic with each other if it won’t lead to a good time, for any reason. You only get so much time on this Earth, don’t waste it on relationships you get nothing from. Now, some people might interpret this as “Don’t play except in pods where you have easy wins.” And I encourage people inclined to take it that way to take it that way, because it keeps you out of my pods! “Wah, no one wants to play with me now!” We never did!
"CANNOT FORCE COMPATIBILITY" rings true. I usually carry three or four decks with me to my LGS and always ask how casual the table is before entering and based on that I chose between like, gitrog cedh, hapatra go wide, bruna voltron or phoebe un-commander, adjusting decks if the table is more or less efficient then previously gauged, but it's impossible to do that with only one deck. My Circu doesn't have a fair wincon and can't win on a beatdown. If I were to hold my hand and avoid comboing, I wouldn't be able to do anything in a casual table. The inverse holds true for my Rakdos, I'll cast one or two big eldrazi for cheap and lose to a combo due to almost no interaction. Rule 0 pretends that there is a way to these decks play in the same table.
Very true, I've had a rotating 4th in our pod cause one guy is a cheese master while the rest us are playing casually. Not having him for a few weeks has made it alot more enjoyable and less salty.
Re: Precons. I like that They can expand on set themes more with set precons but they do feel less special. My chouce in a perfect but impossible world is that they drop the set precons back to 25 dollars then have a proper 4 or 5 deck premium, "set neutral" set of decks like in years past. But that is pie in the sky type thinking.
Simple answer: It has the potential to be better, since we have way more relevant options. It's also way easier to build powerful decks. Is more powerful decks good? - Depends. But if you don't like it, just don't.
While I think you're definitely right that powerful magic is even more accessible, I think the argument of if you don't like it don't build it just makes more problems when you look at an LGS. I've walked into stores where cedh was the game and had a great time, but ironically lower power stores seem more hostile to first timers when I walk in with powerful decks. Staples not being printed enough makes barriers and it's a simmering hostility that's building within the community in my opinion.
@@RyeFields When it comes to an LGS I think it comes down to how the community there handles power levels. My LGS has a pretty great community and most of the people there play at all power levels with multiple decks from precon-level to cEDH. The community is also proxy-friendly. New decks and players fitting in come down to the different power levels and playstyles they happen to enjoy so you really don't see any of the envy or hostility you describe, if that makes sense.
I'm learning magic. (Mostly Commander occasionally draft) I really like the pre-cons. They give a stable base, and I'm learning so much upgrading them.
I remember I used to buy every single commander product when it came in the early days. We used to get everyone together to play with the precons before we changed anything. Ever since they started making them more often, it lost its appeal because now it's so hard to keep up with all the cards coming out. Last one I bought was commander2017. I haven't had a desire to but a commander precon since.
I have to comment how good that opening skit was. The writing, timing, delivery; the screaming to planeswalk, "They evelolved" ... It's just so good. The Professor really has a gift with his skits, and Vince did his part perfectly.
These arguments are solid and applicable, yet I feel it's more achieveable in a playgroup. You consistently meet with particular individuals and apply a social contract with one another. Playing with strangers is the wild west of interaction, will they or won't they play some degenerate stuff. Were just going to have rip the band aid off until we're hopefully successful in finding a playgroup, that sticks.
I have a rule which works for me in terms of keeping my decks at a level where I have varied powerlevels. I have 16 commander decks currently, and apart from lands, and artifacts, i barely run more than one copy of any card across ALL of the decks. I have 1-2 competitive decks where anything goes, then beyond that across all the other decks, I only have 1 cyclonic rift, 1 tutor, 1 dockside extortionist etc etc. I found that not only does this help me from racing the decks to the top in terms of power level, but it keeps the creative juices going as well.
With rule zero in mind. When i play with players i never have played before, I ask people play there average deck, not thier most powerful, not the weakest. Then after the first game we can all decide to go who should power up and who should go down.
That’s all well and good but not everyone knows the power level of their own decks. A lot of my decks have the potential to do busted things, but I have that many decks I alternate between and am making so many more, that I never get enough games in with a single deck, to judge consistency. There is only so much free time at the weekend to play.
The issue here as well is depends on win condition. Commander is inherently more prone to draw chance than say, modern. It is totally plausible a deck could stomp lucky 1 in 10. Should this be downgraded to a 1 in 15 win? Sometimes the imbalance is clear, but not in every case.
@@beurtalvarez a multi-billion dollar corporation has the final authority on the game, yet somehow I can't play it the way I want to, that is opposite to the way the corporation promotes. You went a bit overboard on gaslighting to be taken seriously, I'm sorry
Commander used to be, mtg's magical Christmas land format, where you could play with the cards you had, throw in a bit of synergy, showcase your creativity and still compete. The mindset of the player base has changed, and its now about playing the most efficiently and is becoming a "competetive" format such as a multi-player modern or legacy. Obviously not everyone or all playgroups are like this, but as a whole it seems to be the direction the format is heading.
@@roguelitepentathalon agreed ppl have played high power for a very long time and there are pplwho still play low, but the format as a whole is shifting towards the faster higher power decks.
So glad to see you guys finally meeting in person! Hope you have/had a lot of fun playing. Personal thoughts on (my favourite) format: Rule 0 is really useful as long as it doesn't become a "you can't play that," kinda chat. I'd be happy with commander decks coming out more regularly for new players, (though I wish they were 20 quid not 40,) perhaps with a commander set like "Commander Legends" coming out once a year to introduce a bunch of weird new mythics to play around with. I've loved a lot of the new mythics they've made this year, from the bunny rabbit, to Slogurk, from Rograkh to Rionya, they've been super fun.
Prof describing the commander player asserting their happiness in the face of the absurdity of the format is what every absurdist philosopher used 500 pages to describe
Recently I've taken a new twist on my attempt to play magic without getting everything counter spelled, exiled, or mega killed. Cant Lose Tribal Every "you don't lose" effect, a bunch of things to make stuff and me have shroud and indestructible, but most importantly my lich's mastery and transcendence mix that I have come to adore. Bring only pain lands and suddenly when you get the combo up paying 2 life to play a land untapped makes you gain 4 life, exile 2 cards, and then draw 4. Gaze into the abyss before or afterwards to find everything in your deck. Add the 3 two red mana "extra turn, then lose" spells and the 3 mana red white one. Redirect damage from myself to indestructible creatures so I don't have to handle the downsides of lich's mastery. Force of will for a free counter you don't need to pay for. Add the couple instant cards that say "If you lose, don't and instead draw and change your life total" for extra chances to come online or if you face the exact counter that forces you to face a lose effect. Not to mention a chance to finally field the instant "end current turn then lose" card for ultimate flavor and spite Love it v much and felt I had to rant on it because I just made it. Pls give it a try if you read this
As a new player I LOVE the precons, I love how accessible they are, how they are on an equal power level, that they tend to have different cards and the same staples over and over again and so I can build a collection of cards and I can build some decks on my own, and I really enjoy the low power lever they are at. Its so hard for me not to not buy the latest precons :)))
Unpopular opinion: I've grown to like the product overload and the constant bombardment of new cards. As I start to show up at live commander nights again, I find myself going "ooo what's that card" more often. I've missed that "new player" experience and now realize how exhausted I was with knowing all the cards in the game. It just feels good to reach across the table, pick up an unknown card, and think "wow that's a cool card I didn't know about."
NGL I am stoked for spoilers always, regardless of how many we get. I totally understand the criticisms, though. I just have attention span issues and am always excited for the next batch of cards, especially for pauper.
I have to say though I started commander when Inalla came out. Bought it off the shelf and had of the best times in my life That kind of experience isn't possible without precons
My old play group from about 7 years ago had some simple rules for our Commander games: No infinite combos & no fetching for nonland cards. My current group plays Pauper EDH instead cause it's far cheaper and you don't have to deal with crazy powerful stuff outclassing the rest of the table as much.
I'm gonna agree with Vince, I think the setly precons are entry points for new players , but theyve moved the unique spectacle into commander legends and modern horizons are the actual commander yearly commander products now.
At the recent CFB Vegas 2021 event, me and my two friends walked into the Command zone. They asked us if we wanted a 4th player, who was a guy standing at the entrance looking for a game. We said "sure" and were seated at a table. During our Rule 0 conversation, we disclosed that we were playing casual decks which were level 6 or 7. He said "oh, cool" and wanted us to pick one of his two decks. We refused, and asked him to pick for himself. He went off on turn 4 and won the game, when the 3 of us had 3 lands and a single creature on the battlefield. We just said lets shuffle up and play again, but he said he didnt have time to, and left. Made for a great story, but I am not sure why every major event I go to, I experience something exactly like this. More and more, I am being invited to implement solution of simply skipping the Rule 0 conversation, but instead, to bust out my fully powered Atraxa Infect deck, and take the cunning player out when they demonstrate that they are obviously playing a cEDH deck, so we can actually play a decent game of commander. I can always play my deck down, but I cannot play my level 6 deck up to deal with stuff like this.
I did buy the midnight hunt pre-con decks on sale. as a way to introduce myself as well as my wife to commander. Had so much fun I had to get the crimson vow.
23:30 I think Vanguard’s choice restriction is a better system if you want to do something like that because if you don’t, you would have to assign an irresonable amount of points to either Leovold or Teferi’s Puzzle Box.
I think the days of horse tribal being able to win in commander are long gone. Commander has moved closer to what modern and these other competitive formats are and a lot of it is determined by the commander. Too many commanders just do too much now that old school ones cant compete even in very casual settings.
As someone who is just now getting into commander, I really like the precons. I got the Kaldheim elfball and it can kinda compete, I upgraded it for about $20 and it was all it took. When I talk to friends about commander, if they want to play, I consider grabbing them a precon. Vs trying to build Ghen, who is not an expensive commander, the deck gets pricey. Granted, I’m doing ghen with treasures, but when an alt win con deck is ~$200 to be okay and not great, precons that are cheap after a couple months are welcome entry points
The store that I play at has been doing a commander tournament instead of casual commander before standard and it's killed the consistent player base at the store. The house rules effectively banned infinite combos, so it isn't quite cedh but no one is encouraged to build unique decks, and you're frowned upon for not wanting to pay to play some casual commander before standard. It's a shame
I think at least part of what the Professor was struggling to convey near the end, about how impactful previous commanders were compared to recent ones, is that recent ones lack history. In recent sets, there are many legends that have a card but no visible impact on the world. They don't show up on other cards, they don't have a significant impact on the story, and this is the first time we're seeing them. I don't know who Eruth or Torens are (and I bet you have to look them up), and while their cards speak for them, that's all we get, vs the precons where we got things like Nahiri and Freyalise finally getting cards, callbacks to well loved planes, as well as things we just don't get any more. We don't get snake people like Kaseto or Phyrexians like Atraxa that often, meanwhile we already have this entire set (two in this case) dedicated to vampires and horror, we've had our fill, we don't need cherries on a cherry sundae with cherry whip cream. And because sets are crammed with so many legends, few are able to make an impact. When everyone's super, no one is and all that. While it's true supplementary sets pick up the slack, the point is before commander precons were special in that it gave us glimpses back into the worlds of yesteryear, bringing us things standard just couldn't provide, not just from power but from planes. Now precons are more like DLC for the main set, blurring in with it.
How about an expanded banlist that seeks to eliminate all of the auto includes in each color, as well as fast mana (including sol ring). It would encourage build diversity when those "auto include" card slots are freed up. I think it would create a healthy alternative "casual" commander. The other banlist could remain and all you would have to ask is "is this casual commander?"
There will just be other less optimal auto includes. Commander is a broken format there is no way to fix it that will have it remain Commander. It is a social game meant for a social experience not a competitive one. Everyone is playing to win as it is a game but playing to win and playing FOR the win are two different things. Having a strategy in your deck that can win you the game is not the same as only putting in the most optimal cards. The most optimal choice is the one that brings you closet to winning some people want to do a thing that brings you closer but in a fun or interesting way its still moving to the same end goal but its the path it takes. It really is what is more important having a fun social experience or winning if it is winning then it will inevitably result in exploiting the broken nature of the game. At every level there are broken cards that while not over powered are solely there because they are the best to get from shuffle up to win as opposed to oh my deck does x so this card would be fun and can help me win.
@@WillisPtheone That's the point of my suggestion. There will be different cards with different strengths/weaknesses amongst the less optimal versions of the "auto includes". It's just a suggestion. I see people asking the question "What is casual commander" quite a bit on various channels. Having a simple list of the most obvious "auto-includes" could help to define "Casual". Eliminating the boring staples doesn't make combos or big plays go away it just makes games more interesting.
my friends and I came up with some decks that follow these rules, excluding commander card, only 3 mythic, 5 rare, 12 uncommon cards allowed. You can do more rare if you use less mythic, and same with uncommon, but youll never have more than 20 asside from your commander(s). this means multi land will come into play tapped, and sol ring/mana crypt and the like arn't worth the high lvl slot. It can work out well, just forces you to use alot of more common cards.
Well yes, but actually no. More legends isn't a bad thing, at least not necessarily. Overpowered commanders have always been there, that's something you can't fix. If we think back exactly 5 years to 2016, that's when Atraxa and the 2 color Partner legends (Thrasios, etc.) came out. Up until Sharuum came in C13, Zur the Enchanter was the de-facto best Esper Commander (and arguably still is, but Alela and Sharuum can compete).
@@sephyrias883 the more legendaries they put out each set the less special they feel. It didn't use to be like this where I'm worried that I might regret building a new deck since in just a month or so a bunch of new legendaries will come out that might outshine the previous ones. Idk the format has just become too overwhelming to me to keep track of with so many products and legendaries and also so many new staples each year.
My friend and I are just entering content creation with this channel, but even before that I would maintain that the glut of precons is a good thing(McDonald's or nor) and here's why. Back when we got 1 commander product a year. They came, they sold out, that was it. Now there is always an option on the shelf for new players to pick up, and at my LGS specifically, we are seeing so many new people pick up precons and dive into the format. I think you, Vince and everyone else in content creation need to realize that magic is in a growth spurt right now, so that means we need products that help on ramp people into the game. Constantly giving players options to do that with commander precons is in my opinion the best and most effective way to do that. More new people are coming along now than I've seen in my 7 years playing. I(Dave) am a dyed in the wool commander player. I've given up playing modern after it being how I got into magic. Commander IS magic to me. I loved those early precons just as much as you did Brian, but I'd happily give up my once a year steak dinner for McDonald's ever single time if it means I can share a big mac with a new player.
I think it really comes down to WotC forcing "rotation" into eternal formats. People were playing eternal, non-rotating formats and weren't buying into new sets like standard and draft players were so WotC forced a power creep into these formats so people would feel forced to keep buying new sets.
I LOVE the discussion around the 21:00--about the success of the format kind of existing on a mutual belief that it works. I actually think that weird belief requirement is one of the coolest (or at least most intriguing) parts of the format
My perspective is mostly influenced by playing in a 10 person playgroup for over 5 years. A year ago we started playing cedh and those games feel exciting, interactive and are highly entertaining. we regularly agree with each other on our choice to go cedh. casual games can be a bit hit or miss though. we have one player who only runs cedh or high powered decks and who keeps undervaluing his decks. another player keeps forgetting in which casual decks he is running combos, which leads to alot of "oh I guess I won" moments. but everybody involved knows what they are getting into and I myself feel like I have alot of agency in chosing a deck that will be a good deck for a fun game, because I know the players, I know the commanders and the decks and most of the time a quick discussion like "does anybody run combos?" and me chosing my deck accordingly will suffice. it has been like that for five years. chase cards and auto includes have been a thing five years ago. the basic archetypes have been a thing five years ago. what did change though, is that the format feels alot more unforgiving for badly build decks, running not enough interaction or density of synergies. but that's my very subjective experience from playing in a focused playgroup that does include a new player every know and then, who fit in, if their personality fits our group, just nicely. so I do not think, that the format has a problem.
I was pretty evenly split between buying singles for what I needed and boosters to crack for fun as well as draft with, but I also was a weirdo that liked buying the supplemental intro decks and duel decks because I'd regularly find random jank from old sets in them that I'd be interested in building around or implementing in decks for my casual playgroup. Probably my favorite example of that was buying a couple of the Elspeth v. Kiora decks for the face cards but then I fell in love with Gustcloaks and built a pretty sweet monowhite aggro deck revolved around Gustcloaks and then another GW soldier token deck to ramp into back-to-back Captains of the Watch.
I actually really like the pioneer format, I can play my fravoute 60 card deck of all time there, Boros Cycling and this deck is unplayable anywhere else now sadly even as rogue.
Fantastic discussion - you summed up what i've been trying to convey to people that I play with so that we're all on the same wavelength and enjoying ourselves in our own ways, i'll be sure to share it around! Thank you!
It definitely feels like they release too many commander pre-cons and I've started to ignore them. This is unfortunate because from what I can see, they look like they are often getting more and more well constructed. The precons are a microcosm of the entire product release strategy from WOTC. There is so much to keep up with that I just don't care about most of it. Ultimately I just start targeting a few things a year that I really plan on getting into and assume the rest are just not for me - except perhaps some future day when I pick up some singles. But while this feels bad, I can't actually articulate why this is a problem. In the end, in a given year I'm still engaged with the same number of product releases. Other people may find things I don't care about interesting. But while think this rationalization is correct in some sense, I'm still a bit bummed that the commander products have often become one of those products that aren't for me.
I started with commander 2018 - bought the 4 decks to play with my brothers, it was blast - then I bought a few of the olds ones, like 1 every 3 months or so - got the 4 from 2019 - had a blast again - then when came 2020 with Ikoria they were still fine, but I thought they were a little off. Then Zendikar, commander legends, kaldheim - 11 decks in a 12 month span. When they released the "2021" Strixhaven, I had 0 interest, because I have barely played with those 11 decks. Then it kept going with 4 more from D&D, 4 more from Innistrad, now is 13 decks a year. For a casual "let's open and have fun" player, 13 decks seems too much. I can't remember the names from commander after Kaldheim (it's "azorius" and "elves" for me) - strixhaven I call the guild names "the simic one with tokens, izzet spells, boros artifacts, golgari life, orzhov counters". I'm definitely taking a break of regular sets and commander products for at least 2023.
To be fair to them, I don't think the precons have introduced a new power card in the past year or so, last one I can think of is Dockside Extortionist. Compared to some of the cards that have appeared in precons before, the commander-format cards they've been printing recently have been middling in power (and so redundant in the minds of most players).
@@lourencolimadacunha5493 This year I basically was into MH2 and Time Spiral Remastered. Everything else I just let pass. I honestly can't really tell you what most of the precons were about since Ikoria.
@14:10 I know, that's not the big thing to take away from this discussion, but Dockside Extortionist is not a color pie break. On the contrary, creating Treasure tokens is primary exclusively in red now.
A lot worst because every Sultai deck is either Muldortha or Yarok. Every Jeskai deck is Bird man Ky'kar or Alesha. Every Vampire Commander is...... Edgar Markov. Some of the made for Commander only cards are wayyy too strong that makes older cards useless. Power Creep is strong.
The bit at the beggining made me think about how awesome a silver bordered set about the content creators of Magic would be. Imagine our own universe as one of the planes, and the Prof and Vince as legendary creatures. So cool
Is It Better To Have Powerful But Broken Sets Or Weak But Balanced? Our thoughts: th-cam.com/video/NLmffj6NN1Y/w-d-xo.html
Wait he has a TH-cam channel now?!
WAIT, That British guy HAS A TH-cam CHANNEL ???
That Australian guy has a TH-cam channel?
Dear Professor, if I may set forth an argument, Rule
I agree with Brian here 100% with regards to the steak vs. McD point. I remember when I used to get so excited about the yearly pre-cons, the quality of them and their design was so much more than it is now. As with the rest of magic, it has become over saturated
“Brexit Brian! There’s no eggs in England!!” Absolutely killed me
Best gag in the video
Well, it's true lol
breggsit? All the eggs left!
I lost it there lol
I laughed pretty hard on that one.
What do you want to see in the next Commander Legends set?
"Better print quality."
Truer words have never before been spoken. I laughed so hard at that response.
Ha, I laughed on that too, the commander legends quality with those very very very dark prints made me avoiding buying a full booster box. I bought 6 packs to play a sealed game with friends, and when I saw the cards: "OK, just some bad packs" - bought 3 or 4 more, opened and that was it for me. I like to collect a few cards from each set, but CL won't make to my binders.
@@lourencolimadacunha5493 the dark prints is nothing in comparison to the foil. For years, the From the Vault cards were greatly criticized for their tendency to curl, but low and behold the CL cards were curling in the packs themselves. Where buying a collectors booster, the only card that wasn't curled was the etched foil in the pack, and every other is just about unusable because of how curled the card came
@@lourencolimadacunha5493 - very DARK prints? Ha, you should have seen the collector booster foils, they were hot garbage. Ultra curled, and the black layer was like a 70% gray.
I accidently bought a CMR foil and I just used my non-foil version of the card instead. The foil was a dark, ugly, pringle
Got a pack foil kamahl that's so cloudy you can barely read it
Even before watching, just the fact you get to sit in the same room together again is awesome and heartwarming.
To be fair, you could totally do that five years ago. 😉
@@joshuaanderson1852 great comment. I lol'd
they're not actually together it's editing
@@LukeFromNY Don’t blame them. They were told they would die if they went outside, so they didn’t. It’s the media’s fault, not theirs.
I literally ended Commander night last night by playing a game of pauper with a guy who brought some decks. 1 v 1 was the dessert! Is this the Professor or the Prophetic??
I have been known to...prophess
The best night of magic I had in the last two years was with a friend that built/proxied 6 premodern decks. We just rolled decks over and over and had a great time. Cool old cards we know and love, interactive, great variance of strategies and playstyles, quick games and drawn out games. It was heaven. We talked for days after it about making slight changes in sideboards.
It really makes so much sense. First two guys out of the pod? Grab another format deck and jam a 1v1 while the rest of the pod finishes the commander game.
@@Eckendenker This is the dream bro. I feel like many of the players who box themselves into EDH get burned out from its inherent casualness (variance + card pool) once they start being more competitive.
For me commander reflects the exact state of Magic: Power creep, a million products, everything has a hundred lines of text, simic, mana cheating. Whether it's better or worse than it was 5 years ago, depends on if you like these things.
Simic.
God that's so true...
I like Simic, but I like it better when it isn’t an immediate turn off for everyone else, so…
5 years ago these problems were already ingrained in the format from Wizards printing the "made for commander" cards. I can think back to Meren and Ezuri dominating tables, and those decks are coming up on 7 years old now. 5 years ago we just had the biggest mistake many will say has ever been introduced into the format with the eminence mechanic.
@@enthusiasticnihilst1032 I would and do play that version of magic that you're outlining. Also same power level does not mean all card are the sames. It should be possible to make new cards without breaking certain rules. At least until you run out of ideas.
no joke we need more miserable stax pieces. reprint winter orb
Our play group solves the casual-optimized issue by having ONE player bring ALL FOUR decks each week. The builder gives a briefing on the purpose of each deck. Everyone then picks a deck, with the builder picking last, or we just randomly assign them. The builder should win the majority of the games, right? But that's not what we've seen. Anyway, it works for us and we have fun with it. Thanks for your videos!
We have occasional deck swaps where you have to play someone else's deck. Lots of fun but, same as yours, does require a play group you trust your cards with
Brilliant idea!
That sounds really fun, if only I could afford to have that many decks lol
@@MattTorres Lately, we've discovered that a 60-70 card deck plays the same as a 100-card deck for most of the decks we'd play. Plus they don't take nearly as long to build, nor cost as much. Since we tend not to play decks more than twice, repetition is not an issue.
@@Phavahg we are also playing commander most of the time with 60 card decks
I’ve been battling depression for the last year and a half (since the start of Covid), and it’s been rough on me. I’ve gotten less and less enjoyment out of Magic, but I still keep playing it because of the great memories I have with the game. I still enjoy your content, and I really appreciate the dedication and quality entertainment from you. Thank you
Hey. You!
You're awesome. Keep on keeping on
@@vaultdweller1009 Thanks, I really appreciate that
Keep fighting. You're great and you are going to get through this. I am rooting for you and I am not the only one.
@@TolarianCommunityCollege Thank you, it means a lot
❤
Sometimes the game feels great, where everyone has done what their deck wanted to do, to a point that you no longer care who wins, since you enjoyed that hour of game.
the problem is that everybody just wants to go infinite and tutor for win cons
@@Chagastom there are different types of decks. I have all kinds just for whatever experience the table wants. If you want the fastest game: Belbe, do you want Chaos Ikra & Ludevic Curse deck, want aggro wins: Saskia or Silvar & Trinn humans, Want to play against control without combo: Araumi, or control with combo: Taigam.
@@Chagastom the worst games are when I feel like im the only one trying to play a game and everyone else is just spending their first 5-6 turns are mana rocks, tutoring and shuffling their decks... and then the game just ends when someone explains to me that the cards they tutored for end the game, without anything actually happening, and I cant do anything about it.
That's why cedh / power edh exsist. You can stop people doing such things if you allow all strategies to be played.
100/10 Perfectly timed and executed Brexit joke 🤣
(I love the idea that Vince would use planeswalking to cheat on household chores but goes all the way to Ixalan for eggs)
What's interesting to me is a lot of the conversations are reflective of the old complaints about netdecking.
The idea is you start with a natural chaotic messy format that is fun because of the chaos. But as cards are designed for the format, precons are made, and content creaters instruct the chaos dries up and the format because stable and a bit boring.
It doesn't mean the format is bad, for one that is exactly why the format is easy to access.
In the end it just comes down to the players and the pods taken the initiative on their own to talk about the deck and have fun.
Personally the best move my playgroup has is
1. whoever won has to swap decks
And 2. Everyone is honest about the tempo they want to play.
Two simple rules that keep things balanced and ensures the games keep feeling different and hopefully fun.
I completely agree with this, your playgroup's rule about the winner swapping decks is really smart as well.
My playgroup's problems have directly stemmed from a couple players taking content creators recommendations and sinking loads of money into their decks and swinging the power balance significantly in their favor compared to those of us that just grab some random stuff we own and throw things together.
I'm not bashing content creators but I do think they've created a secondary formulaic form of Commander. That's not a bad thing but certainly an important talking point for playgroups.
@@Ixidora sorry but that rule of the winning player swaping his decks not only isn't smart but actually is very bad, how are they supossed to grow as players if they keep avoiding the powerfull decks instead of triying to beat them?
@@golem001px it isn't that they're trying to avoid the winning decks, it just ensures that there isn't one deck always at the table and that there is always a variety of competition. Also just because a deck won and was swapped doesn't mean they'll never play against that deck again.
Is swapping decks after winning not like, an unspoken rule of Casual? I've always felt like it would be boring and a bit of a dick move to play the same deck that I just won with, and that was the expectation.
@@golem001px Playing Commander for most people isn't about "growing as a player", it's about having fun.
I feel like what attracted me to the format in the beginning was that I finally had a place to explore my timmy tendencies with no worries of having a super optimized deck combo off in 5 turns; then slowly but surely that started to change, made worse when WotC started designing cards specifically for the format and printing 5x as many legends per set. you can even track the powercreep by looking at something like the history of content like the command zone podcast; when they first started you'd see cards like darksteel ingot and coalition relic in their builds, now the only "playable" 3 cmc mana rock is skyclave relic
Is Basalt Monolith not playable these days?
@@TehSeksyManz it’s not really a mana rock
@@soren1803 So, it is considered to be more of a combo piece, I take it? I suppose that makes sense!
@@TehSeksyManz uh oh, wombo combooooooo
@@thestormtrooperwhocanaim496 Yaaa babyyyyyy
"Commander only works when everyone sits down at the table and pretends that it works."
Same thing with a society. Deep thoughts for a Tuesday.
Glad I'm watching this on Tuesday
That comment was mixed with his distaste with people's problems with specific experiences, however. If somebody doesn't like being armageddoned, do they just tell themselves they are having fun, when they clearly are not?
we play in a format
bottom text
@@wesleywyndam-pryce5305 Which includes not playing with people that will not adapt to players' tastes.
Money only works because we all agree it's worth something, but it's just pieces of paper.
That Planeswalker, bit 5 out of 5! I Loved it! Great job guys!👏👏👏👏
Vince screaming bloody murder to planeswalk was *chefkiss*
Give me my 2 tokens, Stephen.
The discussion about sitting down and playing commander “to win or to play” sums up perfectly the frustration I have with some commander players at my LGS. I think the increased power of card design in recent years has caused some players to forget about the table experience and concentrate too much on winning. Commander at its core is a social multiplayer format and I think it’s lost some of that core value.
To me commander is about playing big dumb plays and having longer games where everyone gets the opportunity to play their deck and do something before an eventual winner is decided. I adopt Vince’s attitude where I don’t play certain cards like cyclonic rift because it’s boring, predictable and makes the table groan. I avoid very high levels of counterspells and interaction because I want to see what people do with their decks.
My objective is always just to not come last rather than win. I still win my fair share of games but I’m much happier knowing everyone at the table is having fun than pushing for the win every game.
Absolutely casual play is about fun not winning
@@kingfuzzy2 In my group we call that "getting satisfied" hahah, one needn't win to get satisfied. Also, go pillow fort strategy!
"Made for commander" cards kinda take the fun out of the format imo. Commander for me is about finding a way to take advantage of having consistent access to a specific legendary creature. What kind of combos can I do with constant access to this affect? What kind of cards suddenly serve a different purpose when this effect is in the game? What fairly useless cards are now super broken because of a certain interaction with this creature? Stuff like that makes commander fun. Once you start including cards made for those kinds of interactions, it feels like it takes the fun out of it. Precon commanders nowadays are more like enchantments than creatures.
Beyond that, made for commander cards kinda take the fun out of searching for hidden gems in old sets, or looking through standard stuff to find good cards to add. The made for commander cards and sets just setting it down right in front of you spoils deckbuilding enjoyment sometimes too.
Gotta make money. You know, since everyone caught up on the swindling and rigging on Magic Arena and no one is playing online or IRL. I say fuck WotC
Every time I go to make a commander deck I want to make a Keranos one and then I remember he's just too bad as a commander anymore.
While I agree with your point, I'm glad to have arcane signet alongside cards that read "choose one. If you control a commander, choose any" or even [leadership vacuum] which makes target player return their commander(s) to the command zone
What I feel could help commander games:
-Understanding other player's game experience
*If you do a nasty turn and become threatening do not pretend that the rest of the table is on your level*
Most of the time I've seen that happen the player who's deck is better is very confused for the entire game about how the other players let them get to that point.
@@kingfuzzy2 Forsure. Agreed. The lower on the power level players go the more this happens. I've seen it happen numerous times but on accident. A player just plays good pieces if the table isn't removal heavy when that point of the game comes that 'little engine' takes over.
right on.
I look forward to this being uploaded to the podcast feed in August 2024
Optimistic.
What even is the issue with the podcast feed?
Five years ago, I was playing commander at my college game club on Fridays, and some of the optimization / power creep was already there. I've tracked the power of commander through the fall of a favorite and popular card, Sheoldred, and five years ago she was already seen as expensive and slow. I remember the more casual era of commander closer to seven or eight years ago.
sheoldred is still great in cube!
I have an $80 Verazol deck that is one of my favorite decks to play.
I also have a $700 Locust God deck but I find myself playing it less and less just because it's harder to find others who won't feel pubstomped by it
I could put a Dockside or other "must have" staples in every deck but at that point why? I don't want to sit down to mirror matches in Commander.
I like that all my decks play so differently and have their own personality.
Verazol is the most interesting simic commander. It plays differently from match to match thanks to kick, so it’s like having a 150 cards deck. Locust God always play the same. So maybe it’s not only the $$$ but the strategy itself you prefer.
Same. I have 46 decks as of now and all of them have different paths to victory. Didn't even put any combos on all of them.
Same, I have lots of different decks ranging from super low power £20-30 budget deck to a full on cEDH deck and everything inbetween. They are typically quite different though I do have a soft spot for tribal decks so I have like 4 of those but they are quite different. Selvala Eldrazi and Dimir Zombies are v different decks haha, and Tovolar werewolves is just Gruul face-smashy fun.
I have some above 500 usd decks but most of the cards are just overpriced RL's that are not even in Cedh level. Vesuvan doppelgangers, Forks etc are expensive cards but can just be used for casual decks. I call them "bomb cards" where most of my collections are just hard to find cards which are not even relevant before EDH era.
I have a very similar situation. My emmara soul of the accord deck $1000, but the deck I love playing more than that, Ayula. They play incredibly differently, and depending on the group and situation, I have either way.
Here's my take: Commander has different levels of play (how you want to define those levels is not the point here), and I make decks that can be strong within the level they play in. Even though my (for example) Wyleth voltron deck can be VERY strong at the level it plays against, if I try to move it up a level, I get crushed, and if I try to move it down a level, I'm pub stomping. It depends on the meta of the group you're playing in and it depends on the level everyone wants to play at.
I try to keep decks on hand of many different power levels but I also try to make my decks as strong as they can be within the power level they are set in. Sometimes they get enough improvements to move up a level or sometimes I realize they're not as strong as I thought and I shift them down a level.
You know sometimes it is hard trying to make the strongest level 7 deck without accidently making it jump up to level 8 or 9 because consistency even with bad decks sometimes makes them too strong and able to compete with the level 10 decks while occasionally winning. But not all level 7's can do that as the legendary you have as your commander is mostly solely important on how strong your deck can be
@@JohnnyYeTaecanUktena I mean yes, there will always be anomalies, and that will happen no matter what you do. It's important to analyze your deck based on it's average gameplay. Every deck will have moments where it flops and moments where it shines, that's unavoidable. Regardless, it's up to the deck player to determine if their deck has moved up or down in power level and change when they play that deck accordingly.
Personally, I build a deck as strong as I can (aka: as strong as my budget for any given deck will allow), and then I determine what level that deck has sat in. Usually I do this by putting a new deck in matchups that outrank it, and if I lose a bunch, move it down to a lower power level setting. If I still keep losing, keep moving it down until I find the point it can be competitive without being overpowering.
TLDR: It's 100% up to each player to make sure their decks aren't overly powerful for the pod they're in. Simple as that.
@@NGPhotoVideo-TH-cam I have actually made a competitive deck at the cost of $20 USD before. These days the deck would probably cost around $100 to $200 USD due to some of the foils as foils do that
@@JohnnyYeTaecanUktena Oh I won't deny that competitive decks can be made on a budget. My comment about $ was just implying that some of the decks I have built could be even stronger if I had some more costly cards in them.
@@NGPhotoVideo-TH-cam Not necessarily, as cost does not quite equate to power even if you rule out foils as you would need cards that had synergy with your game plan tp raise the power or some mana rocks/mana fixing to make it more consistent. Like again synergistic cards are better than costly cards as not every Nekusar or Xyris deck would take Timetwister if the person had access to it and both benefits from opponents drawing cards and instead more mana would be better that way you can play the wheel cards more often getting more snakes or killing them with Nekusar burn
Having played Commander since it’s inception, I’ve found that every year brings a reduction in diversity.
When I build a deck, there are fewer choices. Sure, there are always new spells, but you select 8 removal, draw, etc., and then the archetypal staples, which dominate slots, and he seems the reduction in choice.
I love it, but it has become somewhat mechanical
Honestly, this is why I build meme decks anymore.
Why are you choosing staples enough to dominate your slots though? I make new casual EDH decks all the time and I usually only pick the best card in slot if the entire point of the deck revolves around it or the deck has some crippling weakness that demands I make the remedy as potent as possible when I draw it.
Sorry to hear that. Are you using the precon commanders? I've tweaked my Estrid deck a lot and have recently decided to completely pivote my deck to include flash. I was themed around untapping my lands and pillow fortress. I'm adding vernal equinox, emergency zone, alchemists refuge, and leyline. (I didn't have any of these before), I'm also adding seed born muse, wilderness reclamation, and about 15-20 other newer cards since 2018.
I'm into themed decks though. I've got a mono black big mana vampires deck, a strefan red/black vampire aristocrats deck, a Estrid enchantment deck, and a morph deck.
I am building currently a deck where one of my restrictions in deckbuilding is it can't contain any cards that were first printed in any of the commander decks or in Commander Legends. I'll be very interested to see how it stands up, but I do expect that other decks will easily stomp over it. I'll be willing to admit I'm wrong if it can be just as competitive as other decks out there, but I suspect that designing legends and cards to move product has created a scenario where the format is WAY more powerful now than it was before 2011.
Maybe try what Mitch is doing: aside from the commander, each card in the 99 is $1 or less. I've been able to build some interesting budget decks as a result.
it feels like most of this conversation revolves around playing with trusted friends and not the ever more powerful world of commander decks out there. Talk to someone who hasnt played in 5 years and they will most likely have a massively different concept on what low mid and high power is across the format.
Lately whenever playing commander I’ve noticed players guaranteed to win by turn two. So I’ve had to drop the cmc to even keep up
@@roadrash2005 yeah... basically the casual social format at LGS pods is dead, nowadays it's pretty much singleton Legacy for tryharders that do not feel like playing the actual completitive formats.
Of course, for those lucky enough to have a playgroup of friends, it is possible to agree on which kind of game people wants to play.
"Terastodon is such a bomb" - Everyone, 5 years ago.
The ideal mentality for EDH is to play at a level the pod is looking for, while playing to win such that it could be fun for the rest to lose to. When losing can be fun, or at least not miserable, then you have found the right combination.
"Create decks you would love to lose against". But also, find like-minded people.
@@VexylObby Creating decks you would love to lose against doesn't work. For example, I hate losing to decks that are not 100% optimized. Not because I feel like they don't deserve to beat me but because I wish that the loss could have been given to me by the player and their deck at their best. If you told me to build a deck I would like to lose against, I would make some form of cEDH control deck because I can't get enough of the problem-solving part of fighting good control decks. But very few other players feel the same way. The second point, of finding like-minded players is really the only way to be happy.
"Commander's your only option"
I'm old enough to remember when people would be willing to play casual Magic or multiplayer Magic in ways that weren't Commander.
I love Commander but it's tiring and frustrating that it's become The Only Format in so many circles.
I mean there's draft, but that's a big buy in. other formats are available, but they require more overhead than commander. Commander, for time and interactivity reasons, really fills the "firday night poker" slot pretty well.
(but i agree, i want to slamjam some canadian highlander, as homegames wouldn't care if i proxy the needed duals)
We used to play attack left defend right with 60 card anything goes decks around the table, was a simpler time.
I still play "kitchen table Legacy" with my friends
Pack Wars, non-Prerelease Sealed, Wizard Tower, Highlander all are fun formats that I miss.
I miss those days so much. We just did giant games of 3-6 and it was a blast. Everyone had card that they always played and everyone would hate. The game was so fun and there wasn’t a million triggers every turn. There’s too much text now
I distinctly remember how back in the supposed Golden Age before the pre-cons, we were running into pretty similar problems. Yeah, it was just "throw together all the cool cards", but... Cradle is cool. Survival is cool. Swords of X and Y are cool... and thus those who had been playing for a decade (or had plenty of mana to spend) threw together their coolest cards and produced powerful decks. And the people who only had some Alara block draft chaff were mad that they couldn't compete. I don't think we ever really solved the problem. Other than that we stopped playing with the guy who insisted on de- and resleaving half his deck before every game to move all his power cards into whatever deck he was playing...
Sometimes it seems the Commander's problem is less about fixing the format and more about getting away from some certain people.
to be fair, during the golden age of EDH (not commander), there was much less preconstructed, people built their decks rather than using lists, there was more actual brewing and brainwork involved. Now commander is almost exclusively cEDH with the majority of commander cards having broken abilities that circumvent the original rules of the format...which is rather frustrating for those who lived through the time that edh was the format you played after FNM and such, just casual.
There are so many Commander pre-cons now that our group draft the decks and play them against each other. They are relatively balanced so no drama regarding power levels. Best way to play Commander, IMO.
Neat idea, I feel as if most pre cons can be very sluggish and unsynergistic, with awful mana bases and a very high curve, but maybe very slightly upgraded pre cons (just enough so you’re playing the game and not just going land pass) would be fun for my group
@@elipetrou9308 I'm with you. Not casting a single spell for 3 turns necause the curves being so high isn't my idea of fun.
sound absolutely solid!
what we do is get the pre cons and buy 1 display and upgrade the decks with that display then play
@@elipetrou9308 True. We usually just upgrade the lands with proxies if a deck is particularly slow. No other changes.
"You know what Dockside will be in? We've got 'triple masters' or 'double masters 2' and that's what they're saving it for, because they need those big expensive cards to justify their premiere sets." Prof hit that one on the nose!
Also I remember that Commander used to be that you could find a random odd uncommon and you'd be able to stick it in your 99 and be happy about it.
Also Staples of today were dirt cheap. Aetherflux reservoir, Smothering Tithe, Anointed Procession... I traded and bought these for a few € when they came out since they were not played in modern or standard.
The best night of magic I had in the last two years was with a friend that built/proxied 6 premodern decks. We just rolled decks over and over and had a great time. Cool old cards we know and love, interactive, great variance of strategies and playstyles, quick games and drawn out games. It was heaven. We talked for days after it about making slight changes in sideboards.
This is seriously, one-hundred-percent my favorite content and discussion as it pertains to MTG (or any gaming really)! I really love the discussion you two bring to the table- even the webcam ones.
@20:59 I don't really see much salt anymore actually. I would argue that the salt was real BEFORE the pandemic, and at least at my medium-sized LGS the rule 0 convo is alive and well. Like really good spirited. People share deck lists on moxfield and stuff to make sure that there aren't any surprises. However, to what you folks are saying about people getting upset about the existence of some cards is very real. People discuss a card within the decks' strategy, and folks will literally stand up and say, "Your deck sounds great, I just don't care for that/these cards. I think I'll find another pod." Lots of people hopping up and shuffling pods and stuff based on decks being played and perceived power levels based on rule 0 conversation. Conversations are amicable, but it SUCKS that people essentially (in my mind) say to us through those words,
"I want to win. I don't think I can win through that card. I don't want to even try and play through it or around it, let alone remove it."
THAT is the problem with Commander in my mind (if there was to be one that could paint every corner of the format while being painted with such a broad brush).
22:10 There's bannings in every format because Hasbro is pushing Wizards to continuously break every format and turn eternal formats into rotating formats. It's compromising game health for corporate greed.
When I think about it I'm blown away that we got 15 Commander decks this year. When a new deck comes out it's not as exciting.
8:00 : every once in a while, my friends and I do my jumpstart cube, which is more fun personally than the drafting portion of casual limited with friends. Can't wait for JS2
With all the Timmy and Johny players moving to commander as the main format, the Spikes had to move too - which means commander has become more competitive.
I've played in casual commander tournaments with ridiculous ways to score points and the players that HAVE to win make the game miserable for everyone.
I've also played in a cEDH tournament and it was a lot of fun as games were nicely balanced (comparatively).
Once there's a prize, the concept of "casual" disappears for many.
@Phillip P. Once there is a price it's not a "casual round of magic, where everyone just wants to have fun" anymore. Once there is a price, people tend to "want" that price. And you get that price by optimizing 110%. If you want a casual game where noone tryhards for the win, you cannot have prices.
Would you casually play a 2v2 on a fussball-table with the worst player around in your team, if there is 100$ on the line? No, you take the best teammate you can get if a price involved kick the noob out. (:
@@DevineAbyss I agree to a certain extent, but if the tourament is based on obscure tribal decks which 15/16 players adhere to the spirit of the stipulation but there's one player twisting it to a fast combo deck...
Personally I'm sticking to cEDH for tournaments but there are plenty of players who want to scratch a competitive itch but try to remain in the confines of a regular commander game - unfortunately they're going to continue to be disappointed.
At least in cEDH, we all have the same expectations
CEDH removes the primary difficulty that commander players run into, power level discrepancies.
I find this a very interesting conversation from older pure magic players. I’m a yugioh player who has recently gotten into just commander. Commander really gives yugioh players that old school itch, and the optimization (staples) is few enough where it still feels like I’m creating a deck that is unique. Yugioh only has 40-60 cards, but 85% are non-archetype staples and every deck feels samey. Commander, as it is still feels unique enough. Perhaps my opinion will change down the road, but I find it very fun and refreshing.
I feel this hard. Whenever you start building a Yugioh deck, you start by adding 9-13 handtraps, red-eyes fusion and its pieces, foolish, ... until only 20 cards are still left for your actual deck engine (which are also all OTKs). Seeing Commander was such a revelation, the slow pace, the singletons, I genuinely love it. I love that it is casual. I love talking, playing cool cards, interacting with stuff my opponents do and have shifting alliances, so I love this format.
@@ByronAndOnAndOn I feel this 100% I love the interaction, which is what yugioh has been missing for years now.
@@ByronAndOnAndOn the other thing is the staple engines for MTG have mostly been the same for years, but there’s enough budget alternatives to still keep it competitive and refreshing.
Yugioh is completely broken at this point. I had an old school deck that is designed to just keep recurring Red-Eyes over and over again. Phoenix Enforcer is a single card that does my entire deck better than my deck.
Commander is broken by design. Its the problems with being a competitive game with so many legal cards, the best will always float to the top. The colors keep it a little more diverse. But for example Sol Ring is a staple. If you are not running Sol Ring, then you are doing it wrong. As they release more cards we'll end up with more staples.
@@josephcourtright8071 it’s true, it is inevitable, as MTG doesn’t utilize a ban list as effectively as Yugioh. But for now it’s still fun and varried enough.
"I'm sorry, there's only a finite amount of fun at a table, and I'm having more of it if I can!" Words to live by! lmao
My motto.
@@PleasantKenobi Guess I better go build that Magda Stax deck I've been thinking about lately! >:)
I hate that attitude.
@@sailordaigurren8225 lol ok
Good point about the power level of pre-cons going up. I've noticed this as well and it feels like we're seeing a de facto rotation happening.
God Vince nailed the ban thing. We really as a community need to adjust our discussion around bans and expectations.
I don't mind finding a group of people that won't play banned cards, just so others don't have to worry about bans or that discussion. But for cEDH, it makes a lot of sense that bans should exist.
Wizards keeps churning out heaps and heaps of cards, i mean its kinda understandable because they sell like hotcakes, why not keep making more? The ban list growing with the game is perfectly fine
One thing I’d like to mention, before I forget, cause I haven’t finished the section and you may have touched on it: I’ve only been playing magic since keledesh, and started playing commander in Dominaria, so I wasn’t as deep in when the commander decks were these hodge podges that had call backs or unique spins on even older sets and stuff like that, but this is my experience being on the board of execs for my college’s magic club: the commander decks bleeding into the set they come out with is absolutely amazing, both for getting new people into magic, and getting current drafters/standard players to play commander. The genius lies here: because the commander deck bleeds into the set, buying a precon can mean immediately upgrading it, because your date stamped card/lucky pull goes amazing in the deck. My go to example for this recent set is I bought the zombie deck from hunt, and pulled necroduality in my vow prerelease kit. While I do like the idea of commander decks being this deep dive into the lore and characters of old sets(one of my favorite past times is reading lore on MTG wiki) if we want to continue increasing and bringing in new players to commander, especially those that started in limited or 60 card magic, I feel having commander decks heavily tied to a recent set release is an amazing strategy. I’d just like them to also make sure they do print at least a commander deck to go with these more flavorful or lore filled supplemental sets, that what you can have the decks that are more reminiscent of how they once were, and continue on this honestly great plan
It's a delight seeing you both in the same room again. What a wonderful reunion
＼ʕ •ᴥ•ʔ／
52:47 you have to keep in mind what the "new player" products used to be. new players weren't being pushed to get ur-dragon commander decks they were being marketed to get intro decks, planewalker decks, and the like. And we still get an annual commander decks! $20 commander decks dont in mean we don't get the more notable decks too. This year we had the cycle of very well received strixhaven themed commanders
The pregame talk 10yrs ago was,
'what's everyone playing?'
'alright everyone, kill Vivien's value deck first'
Then whoever the Vivien is will think 'maybe i should play a deck people will actually let me play'
that still happens in my group if someone playing a deck that we know is a problem we kill them first and they know it lol
I think I enjoyed commander the most when it was some random new format my friend heard about called EDH. We wanted to play multiplayer and it sounded fun so we threw together piles of "good stuff". As we played more we made deck improvements and spent more money on various cards and eventually had to deal with a lot of the issues that have become "The Rule Zero Conversation". Most of the problems we encountered were solved with setting price limits on decks or individual cards. It isn't perfect as prices change wildly at times. But there is an expectation-or at least a perception-that a $500 deck is going to crush a $100 deck most of the time. This did a lot to prevent egos from getting bruised. To me it will always be a kitchen table format where sometimes you get blown out on turn 5 and sometimes it will be a 2 hour slug fest, with be best games being somewhere in the middle. Players and play groups need to learn to be okay with Conceding. It's a very clear indication that you aren't interested in continuing the current game. Sometimes just switching decks or getting a better starts is all the table needs to have a great time. Also, let people free mulligan a few times. No one is sitting down to play Magic because their favorite way to play is: Draw-Discard-End.
I've had more fun now than when I started playing magic jank has never seen as much support and that makes me super happy.
9:52 "ram gang mother" what a disturbing yet hilarious awkward set of words for Vince to stumble upon, he tried to get away from with "whatever"
Whoopsie.
This was a very interesting video. Thank you both. And I love so much the intros and the timing of the very last cut for each and every single videos of DTR.
I feel that Commander was best placed as 'everyone's favourite second format' rather tha the premier format of MTG. Before it was fun and casual. Now it's the main thing to do, people have gotten competitive.
Plus the made for commander stuff
Its not that people have gotten more competitive its more so that commander is the most balanced format while somehow being the least balanced at the same time so people have to do rule zero and talk about power levels of what they want to play
so it's impossible for you to find casual games on spelltable? or a casual playgroup irl?
@@JohnnyYeTaecanUktena yeah, it could be.
My original comment was half way through the video. Having watched the rest I was a little confused about the thoughts behind cedh and casual EDH being you need to have the right playgroup. I know that most formats are similarly fun to play if the decks are balanced against each other. Sure, Commander was started as a casual format specifically but it has competitive players and even vintage and legacy have casual players
@@jeef16 I didn't say it was impossible to find casual games, just that I think the format has suffered from being the premier format that people play and was better when it was something silly that people played between rounds or after a tournement.
@@christopherreay3242 I will say one thing a lot of competitive decks like power level 10 the top of the top re actually diverse to the point you can't really guess what someone is going to play as the meta is huge. Like there are also a lot of decks that are still 10's winning by turn 4 but they just don't see play because people want to play with newer stuff instead of going through Magics history.
It is entierly possible to see a Phage the Untouchable as a commander at the table and it ends up killing everyone by turn 3 because no one expects fringe competitive
There are also some good competitive cards that no one looks at especially if it is tribal such as Kaseto, Orochi Archmage as simic cedh
My ears are hearing a conversation between the Professor and Vince but my eyes are dream towards the bookshelf. Nice to see someone else appreciates Terry Brooks. You should do a bookshelf tour prof.
I work at an LGS , and the professor hit the nail on the head! The precons are only selling for the reprints, we have boxes of the Selesyna precons from Midnight hunt . Product fatigue makes things feel not as important, just my opinion
I honestly just buy for the reprints it has been a very long time since a new commander has been Janky/unique Enough to appeal to me.
Excellent point when you say "Despite more and more cards coming out, you see less and less and variety in EDH decks."
I'd say you even see less haymakers and pinch hitters. Now it's just value engines, combo pieces and "staples"
Fortunately I'm mainly seeing jank at my lgs because there's always a new player who everyone feels bad about bringing their more powerful decks to play against them.
There’s this core assumption to the “Rule 0”, “have to agree”, “Commander works by mutual consent” mindset that I think needs to be re-examined: “With some work and compromise, any four Commander players should be able to sit down and have a good time.”
This idea is INSANITY. That isn’t a true statement for ANY group of people. You CANNOT FORCE COMPATIBILITY. And that’s okay! Players need to be willing to NOT play Magic with each other if it won’t lead to a good time, for any reason. You only get so much time on this Earth, don’t waste it on relationships you get nothing from.
Now, some people might interpret this as “Don’t play except in pods where you have easy wins.” And I encourage people inclined to take it that way to take it that way, because it keeps you out of my pods! “Wah, no one wants to play with me now!” We never did!
"CANNOT FORCE COMPATIBILITY" rings true.
I usually carry three or four decks with me to my LGS and always ask how casual the table is before entering and based on that I chose between like, gitrog cedh, hapatra go wide, bruna voltron or phoebe un-commander, adjusting decks if the table is more or less efficient then previously gauged, but it's impossible to do that with only one deck.
My Circu doesn't have a fair wincon and can't win on a beatdown. If I were to hold my hand and avoid comboing, I wouldn't be able to do anything in a casual table.
The inverse holds true for my Rakdos, I'll cast one or two big eldrazi for cheap and lose to a combo due to almost no interaction.
Rule 0 pretends that there is a way to these decks play in the same table.
YES THIS!
Very true, I've had a rotating 4th in our pod cause one guy is a cheese master while the rest us are playing casually. Not having him for a few weeks has made it alot more enjoyable and less salty.
Re: Precons. I like that They can expand on set themes more with set precons but they do feel less special. My chouce in a perfect but impossible world is that they drop the set precons back to 25 dollars then have a proper 4 or 5 deck premium, "set neutral" set of decks like in years past. But that is pie in the sky type thinking.
Simple answer: It has the potential to be better, since we have way more relevant options. It's also way easier to build powerful decks. Is more powerful decks good? - Depends. But if you don't like it, just don't.
While I think you're definitely right that powerful magic is even more accessible, I think the argument of if you don't like it don't build it just makes more problems when you look at an LGS. I've walked into stores where cedh was the game and had a great time, but ironically lower power stores seem more hostile to first timers when I walk in with powerful decks. Staples not being printed enough makes barriers and it's a simmering hostility that's building within the community in my opinion.
@@RyeFields When it comes to an LGS I think it comes down to how the community there handles power levels. My LGS has a pretty great community and most of the people there play at all power levels with multiple decks from precon-level to cEDH. The community is also proxy-friendly. New decks and players fitting in come down to the different power levels and playstyles they happen to enjoy so you really don't see any of the envy or hostility you describe, if that makes sense.
I'm learning magic. (Mostly Commander occasionally draft)
I really like the pre-cons. They give a stable base, and I'm learning so much upgrading them.
I remember I used to buy every single commander product when it came in the early days. We used to get everyone together to play with the precons before we changed anything. Ever since they started making them more often, it lost its appeal because now it's so hard to keep up with all the cards coming out. Last one I bought was commander2017. I haven't had a desire to but a commander precon since.
I have to comment how good that opening skit was. The writing, timing, delivery; the screaming to planeswalk, "They evelolved" ... It's just so good. The Professor really has a gift with his skits, and Vince did his part perfectly.
These arguments are solid and applicable, yet I feel it's more achieveable in a playgroup. You consistently meet with particular individuals and apply a social contract with one another. Playing with strangers is the wild west of interaction, will they or won't they play some degenerate stuff. Were just going to have rip the band aid off until we're hopefully successful in finding a playgroup, that sticks.
I have a rule which works for me in terms of keeping my decks at a level where I have varied powerlevels. I have 16 commander decks currently, and apart from lands, and artifacts, i barely run more than one copy of any card across ALL of the decks. I have 1-2 competitive decks where anything goes, then beyond that across all the other decks, I only have 1 cyclonic rift, 1 tutor, 1 dockside extortionist etc etc. I found that not only does this help me from racing the decks to the top in terms of power level, but it keeps the creative juices going as well.
With rule zero in mind. When i play with players i never have played before, I ask people play there average deck, not thier most powerful, not the weakest. Then after the first game we can all decide to go who should power up and who should go down.
That’s all well and good but not everyone knows the power level of their own decks. A lot of my decks have the potential to do busted things, but I have that many decks I alternate between and am making so many more, that I never get enough games in with a single deck, to judge consistency. There is only so much free time at the weekend to play.
The issue here as well is depends on win condition. Commander is inherently more prone to draw chance than say, modern. It is totally plausible a deck could stomp lucky 1 in 10. Should this be downgraded to a 1 in 15 win? Sometimes the imbalance is clear, but not in every case.
On the next episode of "Two old men shake their fists at the sky" we'll delve into the "good old days" when people played "real" magic!
Can't wait to see them play a game of Commander with no modern legal cards, mana burn, and damage on the stack
Drop the quotation marks and it's quite accurate
@@beurtalvarez a multi-billion dollar corporation has the final authority on the game, yet somehow I can't play it the way I want to, that is opposite to the way the corporation promotes. You went a bit overboard on gaslighting to be taken seriously, I'm sorry
Commander used to be, mtg's magical Christmas land format, where you could play with the cards you had, throw in a bit of synergy, showcase your creativity and still compete.
The mindset of the player base has changed, and its now about playing the most efficiently and is becoming a "competetive" format such as a multi-player modern or legacy.
Obviously not everyone or all playgroups are like this, but as a whole it seems to be the direction the format is heading.
EDH has had people playing high power decks for a very long time. It's really not a new thing at all.
@@roguelitepentathalon agreed ppl have played high power for a very long time and there are pplwho still play low, but the format as a whole is shifting towards the faster higher power decks.
So glad to see you guys finally meeting in person! Hope you have/had a lot of fun playing.
Personal thoughts on (my favourite) format: Rule 0 is really useful as long as it doesn't become a "you can't play that," kinda chat.
I'd be happy with commander decks coming out more regularly for new players, (though I wish they were 20 quid not 40,) perhaps with a commander set like "Commander Legends" coming out once a year to introduce a bunch of weird new mythics to play around with.
I've loved a lot of the new mythics they've made this year, from the bunny rabbit, to Slogurk, from Rograkh to Rionya, they've been super fun.
Prof describing the commander player asserting their happiness in the face of the absurdity of the format is what every absurdist philosopher used 500 pages to describe
Recently I've taken a new twist on my attempt to play magic without getting everything counter spelled, exiled, or mega killed.
Cant Lose Tribal
Every "you don't lose" effect, a bunch of things to make stuff and me have shroud and indestructible, but most importantly my lich's mastery and transcendence mix that I have come to adore. Bring only pain lands and suddenly when you get the combo up paying 2 life to play a land untapped makes you gain 4 life, exile 2 cards, and then draw 4. Gaze into the abyss before or afterwards to find everything in your deck. Add the 3 two red mana "extra turn, then lose" spells and the 3 mana red white one. Redirect damage from myself to indestructible creatures so I don't have to handle the downsides of lich's mastery. Force of will for a free counter you don't need to pay for. Add the couple instant cards that say "If you lose, don't and instead draw and change your life total" for extra chances to come online or if you face the exact counter that forces you to face a lose effect. Not to mention a chance to finally field the instant "end current turn then lose" card for ultimate flavor and spite
Love it v much and felt I had to rant on it because I just made it.
Pls give it a try if you read this
As a new player I LOVE the precons, I love how accessible they are, how they are on an equal power level, that they tend to have different cards and the same staples over and over again and so I can build a collection of cards and I can build some decks on my own, and I really enjoy the low power lever they are at. Its so hard for me not to not buy the latest precons :)))
Cooperative in match goals would be an interesting metric for large scale commander events. Each pod becomes a team.
Watching this made me realize getting rid of the ban list would do a great job of enforcing rule zero
We could eliminate the whole thing and nothing would change.
My group let's me run Karakas and it actually rarely ever affects games painfully
Yall killed it with this episode. Defining commander as illusory is perfect! Great video
Unpopular opinion: I've grown to like the product overload and the constant bombardment of new cards. As I start to show up at live commander nights again, I find myself going "ooo what's that card" more often. I've missed that "new player" experience and now realize how exhausted I was with knowing all the cards in the game. It just feels good to reach across the table, pick up an unknown card, and think "wow that's a cool card I didn't know about."
NGL I am stoked for spoilers always, regardless of how many we get. I totally understand the criticisms, though. I just have attention span issues and am always excited for the next batch of cards, especially for pauper.
I have to say though
I started commander when Inalla came out. Bought it off the shelf and had of the best times in my life
That kind of experience isn't possible without precons
My old play group from about 7 years ago had some simple rules for our Commander games: No infinite combos & no fetching for nonland cards. My current group plays Pauper EDH instead cause it's far cheaper and you don't have to deal with crazy powerful stuff outclassing the rest of the table as much.
pauper has a ton of crazy powerful cards. Dark ritual is a common.
I'm gonna agree with Vince, I think the setly precons are entry points for new players , but theyve moved the unique spectacle into commander legends and modern horizons are the actual commander yearly commander products now.
At the recent CFB Vegas 2021 event, me and my two friends walked into the Command zone. They asked us if we wanted a 4th player, who was a guy standing at the entrance looking for a game. We said "sure" and were seated at a table. During our Rule 0 conversation, we disclosed that we were playing casual decks which were level 6 or 7. He said "oh, cool" and wanted us to pick one of his two decks. We refused, and asked him to pick for himself. He went off on turn 4 and won the game, when the 3 of us had 3 lands and a single creature on the battlefield. We just said lets shuffle up and play again, but he said he didnt have time to, and left. Made for a great story, but I am not sure why every major event I go to, I experience something exactly like this. More and more, I am being invited to implement solution of simply skipping the Rule 0 conversation, but instead, to bust out my fully powered Atraxa Infect deck, and take the cunning player out when they demonstrate that they are obviously playing a cEDH deck, so we can actually play a decent game of commander. I can always play my deck down, but I cannot play my level 6 deck up to deal with stuff like this.
I did buy the midnight hunt pre-con decks on sale. as a way to introduce myself as well as my wife to commander. Had so much fun I had to get the crimson vow.
Yes, finally a new episode!
23:30 I think Vanguard’s choice restriction is a better system if you want to do something like that because if you don’t, you would have to assign an irresonable amount of points to either Leovold or Teferi’s Puzzle Box.
I think the days of horse tribal being able to win in commander are long gone. Commander has moved closer to what modern and these other competitive formats are and a lot of it is determined by the commander. Too many commanders just do too much now that old school ones cant compete even in very casual settings.
As someone who is just now getting into commander, I really like the precons. I got the Kaldheim elfball and it can kinda compete, I upgraded it for about $20 and it was all it took. When I talk to friends about commander, if they want to play, I consider grabbing them a precon. Vs trying to build Ghen, who is not an expensive commander, the deck gets pricey. Granted, I’m doing ghen with treasures, but when an alt win con deck is ~$200 to be okay and not great, precons that are cheap after a couple months are welcome entry points
The store that I play at has been doing a commander tournament instead of casual commander before standard and it's killed the consistent player base at the store. The house rules effectively banned infinite combos, so it isn't quite cedh but no one is encouraged to build unique decks, and you're frowned upon for not wanting to pay to play some casual commander before standard. It's a shame
I think at least part of what the Professor was struggling to convey near the end, about how impactful previous commanders were compared to recent ones, is that recent ones lack history. In recent sets, there are many legends that have a card but no visible impact on the world. They don't show up on other cards, they don't have a significant impact on the story, and this is the first time we're seeing them. I don't know who Eruth or Torens are (and I bet you have to look them up), and while their cards speak for them, that's all we get, vs the precons where we got things like Nahiri and Freyalise finally getting cards, callbacks to well loved planes, as well as things we just don't get any more. We don't get snake people like Kaseto or Phyrexians like Atraxa that often, meanwhile we already have this entire set (two in this case) dedicated to vampires and horror, we've had our fill, we don't need cherries on a cherry sundae with cherry whip cream. And because sets are crammed with so many legends, few are able to make an impact. When everyone's super, no one is and all that.
While it's true supplementary sets pick up the slack, the point is before commander precons were special in that it gave us glimpses back into the worlds of yesteryear, bringing us things standard just couldn't provide, not just from power but from planes. Now precons are more like DLC for the main set, blurring in with it.
Two headed giant is the most underrated format.
I really liked the chat. I always enjoy you both talking together. It seems you two are true friends. The Vince in the back was really quite.
How about an expanded banlist that seeks to eliminate all of the auto includes in each color, as well as fast mana (including sol ring).
It would encourage build diversity when those "auto include" card slots are freed up. I think it would create a healthy alternative "casual" commander.
The other banlist could remain and all you would have to ask is "is this casual commander?"
You mean how comp players have done with cedh, French edh, and/or dual edh? The last thing any of us want is another ban list to memorize.
There will just be other less optimal auto includes. Commander is a broken format there is no way to fix it that will have it remain Commander. It is a social game meant for a social experience not a competitive one. Everyone is playing to win as it is a game but playing to win and playing FOR the win are two different things. Having a strategy in your deck that can win you the game is not the same as only putting in the most optimal cards. The most optimal choice is the one that brings you closet to winning some people want to do a thing that brings you closer but in a fun or interesting way its still moving to the same end goal but its the path it takes. It really is what is more important having a fun social experience or winning if it is winning then it will inevitably result in exploiting the broken nature of the game. At every level there are broken cards that while not over powered are solely there because they are the best to get from shuffle up to win as opposed to oh my deck does x so this card would be fun and can help me win.
@@WillisPtheone That's the point of my suggestion. There will be different cards with different strengths/weaknesses amongst the less optimal versions of the "auto includes".
It's just a suggestion. I see people asking the question "What is casual commander" quite a bit on various channels. Having a simple list of the most obvious "auto-includes" could help to define "Casual". Eliminating the boring staples doesn't make combos or big plays go away it just makes games more interesting.
my friends and I came up with some decks that follow these rules, excluding commander card, only 3 mythic, 5 rare, 12 uncommon cards allowed. You can do more rare if you use less mythic, and same with uncommon, but youll never have more than 20 asside from your commander(s). this means multi land will come into play tapped, and sol ring/mana crypt and the like arn't worth the high lvl slot. It can work out well, just forces you to use alot of more common cards.
"Better print quality."
I don't know Professor, I think you might be asking for a bit much there.
"I thought you're only 21?"
"Yeah, but I have been for years."
Glad to be keeping the bit alive!
My big problem is too many legendaries and commander precons - a lot of interesting ones are outshined by the clearly pushed ones.
Well yes, but actually no. More legends isn't a bad thing, at least not necessarily.
Overpowered commanders have always been there, that's something you can't fix. If we think back exactly 5 years to 2016, that's when Atraxa and the 2 color Partner legends (Thrasios, etc.) came out. Up until Sharuum came in C13, Zur the Enchanter was the de-facto best Esper Commander (and arguably still is, but Alela and Sharuum can compete).
@@sephyrias883 the more legendaries they put out each set the less special they feel. It didn't use to be like this where I'm worried that I might regret building a new deck since in just a month or so a bunch of new legendaries will come out that might outshine the previous ones. Idk the format has just become too overwhelming to me to keep track of with so many products and legendaries and also so many new staples each year.
@@sephyrias883 Alela and Sharuum can not compete with zur.
My friend and I are just entering content creation with this channel, but even before that I would maintain that the glut of precons is a good thing(McDonald's or nor) and here's why.
Back when we got 1 commander product a year. They came, they sold out, that was it. Now there is always an option on the shelf for new players to pick up, and at my LGS specifically, we are seeing so many new people pick up precons and dive into the format.
I think you, Vince and everyone else in content creation need to realize that magic is in a growth spurt right now, so that means we need products that help on ramp people into the game. Constantly giving players options to do that with commander precons is in my opinion the best and most effective way to do that. More new people are coming along now than I've seen in my 7 years playing. I(Dave) am a dyed in the wool commander player. I've given up playing modern after it being how I got into magic. Commander IS magic to me. I loved those early precons just as much as you did Brian, but I'd happily give up my once a year steak dinner for McDonald's ever single time if it means I can share a big mac with a new player.
I think it really comes down to WotC forcing "rotation" into eternal formats. People were playing eternal, non-rotating formats and weren't buying into new sets like standard and draft players were so WotC forced a power creep into these formats so people would feel forced to keep buying new sets.
Lol one of these days they're gonna power creep sneak attack
Couldn't have said it better myself.
I LOVE the discussion around the 21:00--about the success of the format kind of existing on a mutual belief that it works. I actually think that weird belief requirement is one of the coolest (or at least most intriguing) parts of the format
My perspective is mostly influenced by playing in a 10 person playgroup for over 5 years. A year ago we started playing cedh and those games feel exciting, interactive and are highly entertaining. we regularly agree with each other on our choice to go cedh. casual games can be a bit hit or miss though. we have one player who only runs cedh or high powered decks and who keeps undervaluing his decks. another player keeps forgetting in which casual decks he is running combos, which leads to alot of "oh I guess I won" moments.
but everybody involved knows what they are getting into and I myself feel like I have alot of agency in chosing a deck that will be a good deck for a fun game, because I know the players, I know the commanders and the decks and most of the time a quick discussion like "does anybody run combos?" and me chosing my deck accordingly will suffice. it has been like that for five years. chase cards and auto includes have been a thing five years ago. the basic archetypes have been a thing five years ago.
what did change though, is that the format feels alot more unforgiving for badly build decks, running not enough interaction or density of synergies. but that's my very subjective experience from playing in a focused playgroup that does include a new player every know and then, who fit in, if their personality fits our group, just nicely. so I do not think, that the format has a problem.
I was pretty evenly split between buying singles for what I needed and boosters to crack for fun as well as draft with, but I also was a weirdo that liked buying the supplemental intro decks and duel decks because I'd regularly find random jank from old sets in them that I'd be interested in building around or implementing in decks for my casual playgroup. Probably my favorite example of that was buying a couple of the Elspeth v. Kiora decks for the face cards but then I fell in love with Gustcloaks and built a pretty sweet monowhite aggro deck revolved around Gustcloaks and then another GW soldier token deck to ramp into back-to-back Captains of the Watch.
I actually really like the pioneer format, I can play my fravoute 60 card deck of all time there, Boros Cycling and this deck is unplayable anywhere else now sadly even as rogue.
Fantastic discussion - you summed up what i've been trying to convey to people that I play with so that we're all on the same wavelength and enjoying ourselves in our own ways, i'll be sure to share it around!
Thank you!
It definitely feels like they release too many commander pre-cons and I've started to ignore them. This is unfortunate because from what I can see, they look like they are often getting more and more well constructed. The precons are a microcosm of the entire product release strategy from WOTC. There is so much to keep up with that I just don't care about most of it. Ultimately I just start targeting a few things a year that I really plan on getting into and assume the rest are just not for me - except perhaps some future day when I pick up some singles. But while this feels bad, I can't actually articulate why this is a problem. In the end, in a given year I'm still engaged with the same number of product releases. Other people may find things I don't care about interesting. But while think this rationalization is correct in some sense, I'm still a bit bummed that the commander products have often become one of those products that aren't for me.
I started with commander 2018 - bought the 4 decks to play with my brothers, it was blast - then I bought a few of the olds ones, like 1 every 3 months or so - got the 4 from 2019 - had a blast again - then when came 2020 with Ikoria they were still fine, but I thought they were a little off. Then Zendikar, commander legends, kaldheim - 11 decks in a 12 month span. When they released the "2021" Strixhaven, I had 0 interest, because I have barely played with those 11 decks. Then it kept going with 4 more from D&D, 4 more from Innistrad, now is 13 decks a year. For a casual "let's open and have fun" player, 13 decks seems too much. I can't remember the names from commander after Kaldheim (it's "azorius" and "elves" for me) - strixhaven I call the guild names "the simic one with tokens, izzet spells, boros artifacts, golgari life, orzhov counters". I'm definitely taking a break of regular sets and commander products for at least 2023.
To be fair to them, I don't think the precons have introduced a new power card in the past year or so, last one I can think of is Dockside Extortionist. Compared to some of the cards that have appeared in precons before, the commander-format cards they've been printing recently have been middling in power (and so redundant in the minds of most players).
@@Hedgemonkey5 I definitely think that is part of it. There are fewer and fewer reprints I'm interested in and the unique cards aren't must have.
@@lourencolimadacunha5493 This year I basically was into MH2 and Time Spiral Remastered. Everything else I just let pass. I honestly can't really tell you what most of the precons were about since Ikoria.
9:00 The Commander’s Quarters still make incredible budget decks
Yes, but power creep is very real. Also I mean, nostalgia blinds people more than anything, and we are all subject to that
But no one is forcing you to play these "pushed" cards. Play what you want to play.
@@wilfulbuckle13 yeah, we all know this. But that doesn’t change that they exist
@14:10 I know, that's not the big thing to take away from this discussion, but Dockside Extortionist is not a color pie break. On the contrary, creating Treasure tokens is primary exclusively in red now.
A lot worst because every Sultai deck is either Muldortha or Yarok. Every Jeskai deck is Bird man Ky'kar or Alesha. Every Vampire Commander is...... Edgar Markov. Some of the made for Commander only cards are wayyy too strong that makes older cards useless.
Power Creep is strong.
The bit at the beggining made me think about how awesome a silver bordered set about the content creators of Magic would be. Imagine our own universe as one of the planes, and the Prof and Vince as legendary creatures. So cool