I understand shifting away from Counterspell, but we're in the Voja era now, where countering a creature can come to the rescue of the table in a way that a lot of other removal struggles with.
@@Nex41354Exactly, the whole Voja uproar is kind of hilarious to me. She folds to board wipes just like every other elfball/token commander. Is she strong? Certainly, but no more than a lot of commanders that already exist. My guess is the folks who are complaining about her so much aren't running much interaction.
This is one of the most relatable comments I have seen. My pet card is Changeling Berserker and I always end up cutting it at some point after building the deck due to just how trash it is.
@@-8h- I have decks where I play them and keep the power level lower. Other decks I keep at around the power level of the playgroup in order to keep an even game even though they could probably be more fun. I keep a lot of the fun cards in still, don’t worry
@@-8h- indeed! Commander is THE format for janky, clunky, fun cards! Play whatever you like. Why should one optimise to the utmost without playing cEDH?
In general I think "good stuff" tends to clutter decks more than any other archetype of card. Very easy to just thumb right over that kind of card when you're updating a deck without considering that it might be the weakest card with all synergies considered.
There’s also the cost and hassle of changing out some cards that are outdated when they do 95% of what the latest and greatest hasbro crept version of it existing. It’s worth replacing if it provides new gameplay options but for building your engine and for keeping your pod balance stable, if it ain’t broke fixing it is optional.
100 percent agreed. It's nice trying out new cards but it's not ultimately necessary in most cases. I made it my goal this year to not even upgrade my decks but once a year in December.
@@cylonsteve2511 definitely group dependent. But I'd still argue someone doesn't necessarily need to upgrade their deck as frequently as one might think they do.
I get that. I don’t find myself “updating” decks to, unless the new add just makes a ton of sense. (And I’m actually excited to run it) eg. I swapped vandal blast with the new one from ixalan. I forget the name…has the angry god mole on it 😂
40:20 absolutely. If everyone can reliably get engines going, especially when cards like Rhystic Study are out and everyone is drawing off of everything, Smuggler’s Share can become a white Phyrexian Arena+ that sometimes give ramp off of the landfall deck or late game fetches. This is niche (pronounced neesh, not nitch, unless you want me to notch your nethers, Neanderthals), but when I sleeved it up I was the sole reason one of my lgs’s regulars stopped playing Mind’s Eye in their colorless deck and that makes me feel warm and fuzzy
I agree with you guys that regenerate isn't as common now a days, but it is funny you mentioned it because just last night I cast a fumigate to while the board and one of my opponents regenerated all his creatures and I passed the turn, he untapped and won because it became a one sided board while where only his stuff lived
I tend to run either Wrap in Vigor or Golgari Charm in decks that can include them. Doing so has saved my board on multiple occasions. Aesceticism can also be good
There's still a few key cards like The Blight Dragon that make me appreciate "They can't be regenerated", and I don't think Skittles The Blight Dragon is getting cut from lists any time soon.
Boardwipes that aren't wrath of god or damnation and also "destroy" (rather than -x/-x, exile or put on bottom of library) can also be cool if YOU are running regenerating creatures. I'm guessing that even was the original intend of the "they can't be regenerated" clause. Not to punish the opponent for playing regenerating creatures but to prevent the caster from abusing regenerating creatures, when they were still more prevalent. WotC really seemed to care about symmetry for global effects back then.
Smugglers share has performed super well for me for drawing cards, I run it in my gay kings commander deck (Kynaios and Tiro of Meletis) I can constantly make my opponents draw two cards per turn drawing at least 4 cards per round with it
I don't see Smuggler's share as a way to ramp in white; it is more of a card draw engine. With that card, I have drawn more cards in a game for its 3 CMC cost.
People that started know that the Invasion tapped duals were incredible for deck building. Guild gates became staple cards for deck-building. When the gain-lands came out in Tarkir, we BOUGHT UP all of them from chaff boxes because they were just a superior option. Nowadays gain-lands are relegated to budget decks. Back at the start, these were actually incredible as commons.
Regarding the “counterspell vs dispel” argument…I find it funny sometimes how Commander players as a community can never seem to agree on which is better…flexibility vs efficiency. One moment a modal spell is way better because it can handle multiple situations…the next moment it’s casting cost is “too restrictive” compared to a more narrow card that has a lower mana value. Maybe it’s an issue of established playgroup/meta vs LGS random players, but I see a massive variety of win cons. Sometime I need to deal with a Nyxbloom Ancient, sometimes it’s a Bolas’ Citadel, sometimes it’s an Aetherflux Resevoir, sometimes it’s a Tainted Strike, and sometimes the problem is a player’s commander itself. A counterspell being able to prevent so many problems hitting the field or prevent instant death vs having the wrong answer for the current problem just sucks. And generally it’s not some massive, unbearable burden to keep an Arcane signet and an Island open just in case. Unless I’m hoping to just pop off on my turn, I generally find it better to keep some cards in my hand so I can rebuild after a wipe or bluff that I have responses, so I generally don’t just dump my hand out every chance I get.
You're in a pod with two other players. Let them answer the problems. You don't have to build your deck in a way that answers every possible threat - in fact you can't.
They couldn't even decide which was better this episode, they went from talking about how Damnation being more efficient doesn't matter then went into the counterspell convo where efficiency is now the only thing that matters
Honestly I think if you’re playing counter spell and noticing that you exclusively counter things that kill your shit, instead of doubling down on that habit I think you need to reevaluate how you use counterspells in general
@@metricarea7546ok, that’s just a wrong mentality to have. If everyone has the mentality of “eh, leave the interaction to the next player”, everyone’s gonna be playing solitaire and have no dynamic gameplay. You don’t need to answer every threat, but fucking run interaction, don’t rely on other players to run it. However, using those counter spells and interaction is where you say “oh, this player is a blue deck with 7 cards in hand and goes before me, let’s see if he has interaction for this game ending threat”. You should always run interaction, but you can choose when to use it
Well I'll argue every time that sweepers are superior to spot removal. Keeo your 1-2 spot removals for the situation you'd die. And use sweepers against opponents value engines. @@archdruidman3493
I will forever defend treasure nabber, It does one of three things really well! 1.) Ramp you. Your opponents decide its worth it to just let you borrow the mana rocks. 2.) Slow down your opponents: they refuse to use their own mana to prevent you from borrowing it. 3.) Removal check the table: Better the annoying borrower than an important creature right? Its almost always 2 until 3 happens for me. Three mana to prevent people from using their own mana rocks? Pretty good. If by some miracle they use the mana rocks, then you get a temporary boost as well, great! They kill it outright or counter it? Better that than something more impactful right?
Magic is a strategy game that has some (all?) competition, therefore some kind of "confusing the player to make him/her play sub-optimally" is good from time to time
Yeah. I agree that Toxic Deluge is better, but Damnation is definitely the second best black board wipe. The same isn't true about Wrath of God. Most multicolored decks can find better options though.
Just in mono black I'd run Meathook Massacre, Blood Money, Plague Wind, Extinction Event, Massacre Girl, probably even In Garruk's Wake before Damnation. And that's not going into the niche board wipes that can be tailored to your deck like Kindred Dominance or Ritual of Soot.
I feel the same about Grave Pact and Dictate. I used to run both in my Edgar deck, and I vividly remember getting one out pretty early. I ran away with that game, but I felt bad about winning because one of the other guys just could not build his board. Now, I only run one of them.
Building off of the Terramorphic Expanse and evolving wilds discussion, the two color choose lands (the thriving and CLB gate cycle) are better options for mana fixing in 3+ color decks if you don't care the shuffle or landfall. Also the Gate cycle can be especially good with Circuitous Route, which is another strictly better explosive vegetation.
30:58 I don't have escape tunnel in any decks because I haven't bought any MkM. I also haven't bought any because I have so many terramorphic expanse and evolving wilds that I haven't needed to buy escape tunnel
Burnished hart and solemn sim for me was a sad realization they’ve been power crept out. 5-10 years ago the big impactful spells were 5-8 mana, now they are 3-6 mana, so they don’t accelerate your gameplay anymore, and if anything actively hinder it because you are casting ramp spells instead of impactful spells. I have like 10 of each piled up and play them in maybe 2 or 3 decks total. 90% of my ramp is 2 cmc or less now, if I’m paying 3 for a ramp card it’s got to do more than just find lands, and I’m not paying any more. I’m surprised solemn didn’t get mentioned in the video tbh, it’s probably one of the most iconic cards in the format.
I agree. I never loved Hart but I've run Solemn in so many decks over the years. Now, I basically only run Solemn if it supports the theme of the deck--artifacts, Golems, or blink strategies.
I play duplicant in a very specific deck, Meria, Scholar of Antiquity. Creature exile is hard in red green, and the duplicant is searchable with many of my spells as it is a creature, so it is a good fit, but I don't have it in any other deck. When they staple creature exile to a red or green creature for less, I'll probably make the switch.
I like a generalization you can make here and it's one I've had to painfully realize as well: Many cards do not do what they say on the tin, INSTEAD what they do is cause your opponents to play differently/carefully/slower to work around your potential advantage. And you have to evaluate those cards as having that effect rather than great card draw or great ramp or whatever.
53:23 I really like that adage too. I’ve found that my decks have toned down over time and are actually more fun now. They can still win, but it’s more fun for everyone now
I run Brainstorm in my Maelstrom Wanderer deck. being able to take a card from your hand and put it on top of your library to cascade into it is pretty strong.
yeah i love it in my yidris but for other decks brainstorm its still super useful think it less as just 1 card drawn but rather put back on top of the deck i dont want quite yet and grab cards that are more useful now
I actually cut brainstorm from my maelstrom wanderer deck because it's so awful to cascade into. I looked at the risk/reward and went the other direction. Kind of cool that even in the same decks there's good reasons for different players to make the opposite decision. I hope it keeps working out for you.
I totally agree with cutting brainstorm. I recently cut it in from my Heliod deck and didn’t realize what I’ve done!! Orcish bow master made it a little worse,too.
The thing about Brainstorm is it's "draw three" and not "look at three," and the cards you put back can be any cards in your hand, not just the ones you drew. If you have something like Teferi's Ageless Insight, you draw six and then put two back. If you've got card draw triggers, it triggers at least three of them. As an individual card, there are better cards for drawing 3 cards for one mana, but there's a lot of utility in Brainstorm that isn't immediately obvious on its own. That being said, it's a trap if you've got an opponent with a Smothering Tithe on the board, because you're giving that mfer 3+ treasures.
An observation/prognostication about Escape Tunnel: it may suffer from the (temporary) curse of Idol of Oblivion. The extra text (in the case of Escape Tunnel, the watered-down Rogue's Passage ability) might cause people--at least initially--to shy away from the card, only to rediscover it after some time passes. The card might experience a renaissance in the future when folks realize that it might be worth running just for the additional fetch/landfall trigger, as they discovered that decks that don't necessarily care about making a 10/10 token still might want Idol of Oblivion.
I recently replaced Evolving Wilds in my Aminatou deck for the same reason Dana championed but with a card that Joey brought up: Path of Ancestry. It's a tapped tri-land so is always better fixing than Evolving Wilds so worth it despite it having 0 chance to Scry.
21:10 feel this in my newbie heart. I do use it on creatures but I play wayyyy too many. I've cut down to 3-5 for the most part now and pair it with destroy spells and other ways to counter difficult cards.
I relate so much to what Dana said about his Athreos deck. I built an Arjun, the Shifting Flame deck because I thought it would be fun to weaponize card draw. And yeah, it was STRONG, but I played it literally once and took it apart because its play patterns didn’t seem fun for me or my opponents.
I left Emurakul Evangel in my Chatterfang deck for over 2 years after I realized it was the weakest card in the deck. It was winmore and only worked in magical christmas land but I really wanted to hit the big moment. The moment after it popped off for the only time, I finally took it out.
@@Jrizzle7426It's super fun, and I still have it in a 10 card package that I swap in sometimes. But Chatterfang is my cutthroat deck and while I love the Evangal it's too slow for what that deck is. I'm really hoping that it will fit in the Bloomburrow golgari deck.
I cut rhystic study from my jodah the unifier after a lot of time trying it. What i ultimately came to the conclusion of was that the deck had enough draw engines without rhystic study, and i never wanted to cast rhystic study over ramp or a temur ascendancy for haste and powerful card draw. I am happy for where my rhystic study ended up, but man i wish i pulled it out of jodah sooner.
You don't really need card draw since a good chunk of spells in that deck are two creatures in one. You are gonna be doing ok with the 2 for 1 value. If anything, Guardian Project would draw you more cards. Or Temur Ascendancy, as you've put it, or Garruk's Uprising-since Trample will be relevant for that deck.
@@Cephalopopo even smart opponents will not pay. The sentiment it is a stax piece feels wrong. And tbh it is back breaking moreso with cheap interaction backing it up and extra card draw on top of it.
@@iansinclair2028 then they are not smart opponents. Card effects that only depend on your opponent are weak. If you play rystic to slow down your opponent and get an occasional card it is well placed. If you play it as card engine it just means your opponents decks suck or they are really unlucky or they are stupid. Either way they don't remove it or let you draw well good for you if like getting the win handed to you. These Bartelcruiser cards only work so well in commander because no one ever runs interaction and mostly win more stuff. The only thing rystic does for sure is slow down a worthy opponent and as such is a good option against combo decks or to slow down for ur control deck Edit. For me rystic seems a bit like when ugin was in m21 standard. It was like an intelligence check for your opponent. Most of the time the card made opponents throw instead of actually win
I have recently started powering down decks, it feels bad when you play a game and nobody is on the same level. I have started by removing the fast mana and have never felt better about it. Additionally if there is a deck that has a win condition readily available in the command zone I wont play a single card in the deck that has the phrase "you win the game" on it. I feel it just leads to "feels bad" games or non games
The easiest answer to this is to communicate and decide unilaterally what power level the decks you’re playing are, this way you don’t need to depower decks to “fit with the rest of the table”
Yeah, but some friend groups really don’t have a cohesive understanding of “power level.” My best friends play very casually and are starting to figure things out (thankfully many of the precons they used as a starting point were on the powerful side - Prosper, Jared, Anikthea and Marneus Calgar). But their forays into homebrew have been a bit more haphazard. On the upside, my more powerful decks have become the “sometimes” decks while my goofy theme deck ideas get to go for a spin when everyone’s running a brew. Helps keep things interesting!
I do think Smuggler's Share is a good card, but I guess it depends on who you play with. I draw at least 1 card per round. The treasure part is a bit of flavor text as people tend to be done ramping. Trouble in Pairs (I have it, just never played it) appears to be the better one though.
I really love Blood on the Snow as a boardwipe. It forces me to play snow lands but the pay off it could be really good, a boardwipe that can reanimate a 6 mana value creature at best. You even can cast it with your commander on the field and reanimate it with his effect because it doesn't target. Or even you can choose to destroy all planeswalkers just to reanimate a creature.
No one plays Duplicant for whatever stats it happens to get... they play it for the EXILE effect. It ending up as a vanilla creature is essentially irrelevant.
In our play group, our friend's smuggler share has prefeormed amazingly well. It typically generates 1 treasure and 3 cards per turn cycle. It was certainly a meta call, but in our meta, it does work.
9:00 Joey killed me. I SWEAR I HAVE THOUGHT EXACTLY THE SAME LIKE 2 SEC BEFORE! That I should have made a Bingo with one of the fields being Dana's Night's Whisper. At this moment, I am writting down the two other: Joey - I don't like them touching my graveyards. Matt - I hate Monologue Tax.
Counterspell is one of the best counterspells in our format. You gotta ask yourself "Why run countermagic?" because countermagic is (after discard) the worst type of removal there is. You have to have it the moment they cast whatever you want to remove and you gotta keep mana open. Those are huge disadvantages. Also you can't wait and see if someone else wants to remove it more than you do. So you have to proactively react instead of waiting for the opportune moment. If you're scared of boardwipes play spells that counter noncreature spells or sorceries. If you're annoyed by all those "my creatures get indestructible and hexproof and phase out" cards.... run dispell. If you need to protect your combo and only have limited room in your deck for interaction... run counterspell. And mana drain and FoW. Because you need that flexibility to either answer a threat that kills you before you can win, to counter the combo of someone else or to protect your own stuff.
I’m not sure I agree with the challenge the stats on escape tunnel.. Almost every time I play it the whole pod usually sings “SECRET TUNNEL!!” “SECRET TUNNEL!” I’m almost always playing with different people btw..
I haven't cut it out yet, but I am debating taking In Search of Greatness out of my Sliver Overlord deck. It's great when it works, but it feels a bit bad when you essentially play a 2G scry 1 every turn enchantment especially in a WUBRG deck.
4-mana ramp in general feels questionable in a lot of decks now. Casting it on 4 means you're ramped to 6, maybe 7 mana on turn 5? It feels pretty slow for many decks. Of course, one can ramp into 4-mana ramp, but without a plentiful amount of 2-mana ramp to find reliably in order to cast 4-mana ramp on 3, this play pattern doesn't really work out. What I've found in deckbuilding is that by the time you build in all your land, card advantage, interaction, and some things that go on to win you the game it's pretty hard to find room for a full suite of both 2 & 4-mana ramp spells. This isn't to say it's totally unplayable, I've got a Kellan deck (Simic) that abuses the heck out of 4-mana ramp to play Big Dumb Green cards as fast as practically possible... but I think it only belongs in very specific decks. Salubrious Snail has an awesome video about his Radha (2-mana mana-dork version) deck that does the same: use the commander as ramp, cast 4-mana ramp, then yeehaw.
Because people have the wrong cards listed in their decks, it skews recommendations and high synergy listings. I say this because I learned about explosive veg from your site because its so popular. I bet there are some interesting tools and content you could do to improve recommendations on the site based on these inputs. Fantastic episode!!
I agree about Burnished Hart. Looks like such an op card and then you realize how expensive it is to get lands out of unless you're running decks that give discounts to abilities and artifacts and have those out first. Totally possible! But a Wayfarer's Bauble is so much better because you can play it turn 1 when you probably can't play anything else anyway, then on turn 2 after your land play, you can crack it for a third land, or do that whenever else if you have something better to play on turn 2. Something else about Burnished Hart that rarely comes up but could is that if you have like 6 mana to crack it immediately, you can't, because it's a creature with summoning sickness. It's way more niche than it looks.
Hard agree with the board wipe section. A 4-mana symmetrical wrath is efficient in that you can follow it up. But what's better, a wrath and a 3-drop from your hand, or a 7-mana wrath that keeps your entire board? I'd rather keep my board in 99% of cases.
Lil bro is down here still talking about his 7 mana plague wind 😂😂 "Let's look at Plague Wind. What's better, casting Damnation and a 3-drop, or casting Plague Wind? With Damnation you are left with a 3 drop, but with Plague Wind you're left with your entire board. That seems to me like it'll be better most of the time."
Interestingly, the extra mana to cast a Winds of Abandon instead of a Wrath of God is not relevant BUT the two blue pips of counterspell VS. An offer you can't refuse are?
No mention of Noxious Revival around the Regrowth effects? That card is damn strong when you are running a GY deck or even to replay an instant or sorcery on your draw step.
Smuggler's Share ended up being... right about where I expected. You end up getting an extra card or two per turn cycle from the 'draw two or more cards clause'.. and essentially nothing from the 'two or more lands entering' clause (The only things that will reliably trigger this are dedicated landfall decks and fetches... and there is a tendency to crack fetches ON the endstep).
I cut Sheoldred, Whispering One from a dimir wheel/reanimator deck. Locking folks out of creatures was awful, the 'reanimator' portion was very narrow. Sepulcher Primordial took the spot and is so much fun to pull out after a Breach the Multiverse.
The thing about eternal witness it’s great when the deck cares that it’s a creature which is most green decks lol. But it’s not necessarily an auto include in non creature decks
Ewit is one where if you ask yourself if you want it, odds are decent you do in fact want it. I just found myself not asking that with it for a long time.
Timeless Witness is more expensive but you can use it twice even without flicker. I also use it in my GW Mirri deck because Uncage the Menagerie is the star of that deck, and different mana values are relevant when tutoring!
About 2 color decks and mana fixing: You don't need any color fixing. Just tinker with the amount of basics and play all basics. Nothing else. It works. If budget isn't an issue, just play a real fetch.
My mom became opposed to Halloween because “all year long we tell our kids not to talk to strangers and not to accept candy from strangers and not to go to strangers houses, and then we take them to strangers houses to all for candy.”
After we got the removal spell ranking episode and now they again talked about boardwipes and how there are quite a few different versions, I would really love a boardwipe ranking or even tierlist episode. That would certainly be fun.
I play damnation MOSTLY because I traded for it with a friend. Its the OG Planar chaos version. And ofc its such a cool card! Gonna squeeze in Nuclear fallout into my zombie deck.
When talking about Damnation I was thinking exactly about counterspell and my inner monologue about it (wasn't fan because of efficiency and no benefits) however in the end you need just that in contrast in viggle room of boardwipes. In the end I play it and I play it defensively as well...however with creatures being also mighty spells on stick I don't want to lose that functionality of counterspell. That's reason I'll change sometimes mana castable force of negation for force of will. Also another debate is about arcane denial and how I started to value it more and more. Also expanse and wilds are garbage fetches even in budget landfall and only excuse for that number (and my hope for community) are precons. You got panoramas you got, promising veins and finaly you got landscapes. Wild expanse are amazing only in limited winth opening option for 2+ C decks. Witness I disagree because it represents one more copy for every function your deck needs be it removal, ramp, win condition or simple fetch to fix...not speaking about combo piece. Ever balancing the deck of "how many" well this card helps mightily. I agree that Bala ged MDFC free up the pressure however more likely than not I play both...not regrowth as I m weightedrd as way less of value.
Cheers Dana, you are the first person i have ever heard mention Public Enemy. Couldn't believe it never became popular, causes so much to happen. And what it causes is usually not achieved in blue.
The blue player ALSO has to attack... which is something blue decks don't generally want to be doing. It does work fairly well in Estrid and Tuvasa though (great colors for auras and you probably have ways to tap down anything you don't want attacking).
I run it in my Zur the Enchanter deck because it's tutorable and I have a tendency to become the table enemy, so it's kept me from losing more than once.
41:54 Unpopular Opinion, cards like this should be played as Stax pieces and not advantage engines. They are meant to make your oponents turns akward by forcing them to play around them giving you advantage for free while you set up your own things.
Having recently cut Burnished hart from my toggo & keskit deck, i feel this. The card had crazy synergy there but always felt like it took 2 or even 3 turns of me timewalking myself to pay me off.
About edhrec, what decks feed into the data? Is it just the once over the last year so newly made decks or all, that are put onto it since the beginning? 🤔
I had smugglers Share, deep gnome teramancer, and archivist of ogma, All in the same deck, after three or four games I realized I had drawn less cards than I had played so even when it seemed like they were "working" I wasn't actually gaining anything
I really liked Dana's final comment on this, having played most of these cards, and continuing to do so in some cases. Especially Duplicant is still a regular part of my toolbox, for decks that struggle with indestructible creatures while caring about artifacts or etbs themselves
20:05 The conversation about Damniation made me have to stop and reevaluate how much thought I was giving to this topic, I'm def still stuck on price memory here
Brainstorm is a card that generally gets better the more powerful the table is. If you're playing against decks that are looking to ramp out a bunch of big fatties and overrun, or pull off a janky seven card combo and the card pool generally avoids being too mean, then yes, Brainstorm is going to under perform. If you're playing decks with Wheels, tutors, fetches, rhystic/mystic, free spells, and the usual cEDH shenanigans, my experience is that Brainstorm excels in that kind of format.
My very slow Azorius Control List still runs Burnished Hart. It already includes wayfarer's Bauble, Mindstone etc, and it just needs yet another copy of this sort of effect. Yes it is clunky / expensive, but I couldn't find better options that I am not already running. The list runs several "wipe all permanents" effects, so most mana rocks are out.
I picked up like 10 Escape Tunnels to slot into various decks (I also play pauper) but honestly, if the second ability doesn't synergize, and I don't need yet another terramorphic expanse in my deck, I'm sticking with the titans
Sometimes the reason folks ain't cutting certain cards is because they are playing the cards they have rather than the cards they do not have, really it is simple as that because new cards cost money and once you have a certain amount of bulk when you go to build a new deck purchasing say 20 cards vs 40 cards because the newer cards are better because they are an instant instead of a sorcery but do the exact same thing.. most folks grab the sorcery and call it good simply to save money because all those little savings add up over time and you easily end up with 2 or maybe even 3 new decks to play vs the 1 deck you could have built instead when you buy all of the "better/best" cards for that one deck. I often will use less than the best cards when building a new deck to try it out and if it sticks around and I like it and want to keep it then I start to slowly upgrade the specific cards in it as finances allow.
I really liked the card Disallow in my first deck but ended up cutting from my list of go to cards. Unfortunately the gulf between 3 mana and 2 mana is huge.
If you're cutting counterspell then you better be playing a near CEDH level counter because the only thing better are free counters, mana drain and one mana counters, and how many of those counters hit creatures. E Wit is still really good in lower powered games because many decks don't have enough wincons and those that do usually have very fragile win conditions. E wit rarely underperforms, It gets back removal, key pieces that either got removed/countered before they could do their thing, it chump blocks, it sacrifices, it blinks etc. I may not want it in my opening hand but in my weaker decks its one of the first cards in and only worth cutting if you want to increase the decks powerlevel.
We had plenty of internal discussion on this one. You're not wrong at all, but on the other hand I personally know one person who works for BH and does good work, and a couple folks who have had good experiences there. Does that wash away the data harvesting or the hack therapists you can get? Probably not, but in the grand scheme of things we need some advertising, and being able to at least know there's some good to be done from them makes it more palatable for us than some of the ad alternatives.
One is a necessary evil the other isn't, this is why quite a few channels take strong stances against taking sponsorships that they do not actually believe in due to actually using them (and as such rarely have sponsors) @@solemnscrub
32:00 Especially these days, the quality of the taplands and especially the fetchable taplands has reached a point where there is never a point where a non-Landfall deck ever needs Evolving. Even if the best of them like the new Surveil lands aren't quite budget, you can have your choice of Scry 1, indestructible, artifact, or cycling.
I was with y’all till counterspell. Genuinely think the benefit of running An Offer over counterspell is so fractionally insignificant that I’d just run counterspell
I have a question. Why is Quick Study shown as "in 13704 decks, 2% of 705371 decks" and divination shown as "in 11444 deck, 1% of 1802207 decks". Shouldnt the number of eligible decks for Quick Study and Divination be the same?
Since Quick Study is a newer card, it hasn't had as much time to get into decks as Divination. It is compared against only decks that have been built or updated since that card was released, rather than the entire pool of decks, since those decks haven't had the chance to include or exclude it.
I disagree with the take on e-witness. It doesn't just get your wincon back from the yard. It gets whatever you need. Maybe you recur the swords to plowshares you played earlier to remove something that would otherwise kill you. If your graveyard is big enough it's more like a tutor
Me, putting duplicant in my new Science deck. Dr li can recur it which is nice and so its an exile spell that gets ok value for what it is, now I want a power crept version.
I understand shifting away from Counterspell, but we're in the Voja era now, where countering a creature can come to the rescue of the table in a way that a lot of other removal struggles with.
@Nex41354 None of the mentioned has Ward 3 ;)
So once Voja is on the board other targeted removal struggles a bit.
us boardwipe counter heavy blue players are the future
@@brighty-go6nnazorius gang
@@Nex41354Exactly, the whole Voja uproar is kind of hilarious to me. She folds to board wipes just like every other elfball/token commander. Is she strong? Certainly, but no more than a lot of commanders that already exist. My guess is the folks who are complaining about her so much aren't running much interaction.
That MF Voja is BBBBBBBBUUSTED
The worst feeling is cutting a fun card because it is too niche or simply much worse than the rest of the deck :/
This is one of the most relatable comments I have seen. My pet card is Changeling Berserker and I always end up cutting it at some point after building the deck due to just how trash it is.
Why play commander then? Just use it.
@@-8h-It does depend on the arms race of the group.
@@-8h- I have decks where I play them and keep the power level lower. Other decks I keep at around the power level of the playgroup in order to keep an even game even though they could probably be more fun. I keep a lot of the fun cards in still, don’t worry
@@-8h- indeed! Commander is THE format for janky, clunky, fun cards! Play whatever you like. Why should one optimise to the utmost without playing cEDH?
In general I think "good stuff" tends to clutter decks more than any other archetype of card. Very easy to just thumb right over that kind of card when you're updating a deck without considering that it might be the weakest card with all synergies considered.
20:23 Benjamin Wheeler has a story of flipping omniscience and then emrakul to a dark confidant. And dying. It's gold.
There’s also the cost and hassle of changing out some cards that are outdated when they do 95% of what the latest and greatest hasbro crept version of it existing. It’s worth replacing if it provides new gameplay options but for building your engine and for keeping your pod balance stable, if it ain’t broke fixing it is optional.
100 percent agreed. It's nice trying out new cards but it's not ultimately necessary in most cases. I made it my goal this year to not even upgrade my decks but once a year in December.
@@Blacklodge_WillyIt does depend on the arms race of the group.
@@cylonsteve2511 definitely group dependent. But I'd still argue someone doesn't necessarily need to upgrade their deck as frequently as one might think they do.
I get that. I don’t find myself “updating” decks to, unless the new add just makes a ton of sense. (And I’m actually excited to run it) eg. I swapped vandal blast with the new one from ixalan. I forget the name…has the angry god mole on it 😂
40:20 absolutely. If everyone can reliably get engines going, especially when cards like Rhystic Study are out and everyone is drawing off of everything, Smuggler’s Share can become a white Phyrexian Arena+ that sometimes give ramp off of the landfall deck or late game fetches.
This is niche (pronounced neesh, not nitch, unless you want me to notch your nethers, Neanderthals), but when I sleeved it up I was the sole reason one of my lgs’s regulars stopped playing Mind’s Eye in their colorless deck and that makes me feel warm and fuzzy
I agree with you guys that regenerate isn't as common now a days, but it is funny you mentioned it because just last night I cast a fumigate to while the board and one of my opponents regenerated all his creatures and I passed the turn, he untapped and won because it became a one sided board while where only his stuff lived
I was just looking at Wrap in Vigor yesterday and thinking maybe it's time had come since that clause is so rare now.
Yeah I still use regenerate in 3 of my most played decks
I tend to run either Wrap in Vigor or Golgari Charm in decks that can include them. Doing so has saved my board on multiple occasions. Aesceticism can also be good
There's still a few key cards like The Blight Dragon that make me appreciate "They can't be regenerated", and I don't think Skittles The Blight Dragon is getting cut from lists any time soon.
Boardwipes that aren't wrath of god or damnation and also "destroy" (rather than -x/-x, exile or put on bottom of library) can also be cool if YOU are running regenerating creatures. I'm guessing that even was the original intend of the "they can't be regenerated" clause. Not to punish the opponent for playing regenerating creatures but to prevent the caster from abusing regenerating creatures, when they were still more prevalent. WotC really seemed to care about symmetry for global effects back then.
Smugglers share has performed super well for me for drawing cards, I run it in my gay kings commander deck (Kynaios and Tiro of Meletis) I can constantly make my opponents draw two cards per turn drawing at least 4 cards per round with it
Thats a synergy it's like my flip heliod deck your forcing people to draw so many cards that it works really well.
@@mrTjstephens1 funny enough phyrexian Heliod is the best card of my deck
I don't see Smuggler's share as a way to ramp in white; it is more of a card draw engine. With that card, I have drawn more cards in a game for its 3 CMC cost.
if you can get it out early enough to get value out of it.
also having to depend on your opponents drawing cards for you to draw a card feels bad.
People that started know that the Invasion tapped duals were incredible for deck building. Guild gates became staple cards for deck-building. When the gain-lands came out in Tarkir, we BOUGHT UP all of them from chaff boxes because they were just a superior option.
Nowadays gain-lands are relegated to budget decks. Back at the start, these were actually incredible as commons.
Regarding the “counterspell vs dispel” argument…I find it funny sometimes how Commander players as a community can never seem to agree on which is better…flexibility vs efficiency.
One moment a modal spell is way better because it can handle multiple situations…the next moment it’s casting cost is “too restrictive” compared to a more narrow card that has a lower mana value.
Maybe it’s an issue of established playgroup/meta vs LGS random players, but I see a massive variety of win cons. Sometime I need to deal with a Nyxbloom Ancient, sometimes it’s a Bolas’ Citadel, sometimes it’s an Aetherflux Resevoir, sometimes it’s a Tainted Strike, and sometimes the problem is a player’s commander itself. A counterspell being able to prevent so many problems hitting the field or prevent instant death vs having the wrong answer for the current problem just sucks. And generally it’s not some massive, unbearable burden to keep an Arcane signet and an Island open just in case. Unless I’m hoping to just pop off on my turn, I generally find it better to keep some cards in my hand so I can rebuild after a wipe or bluff that I have responses, so I generally don’t just dump my hand out every chance I get.
You're in a pod with two other players. Let them answer the problems. You don't have to build your deck in a way that answers every possible threat - in fact you can't.
They couldn't even decide which was better this episode, they went from talking about how Damnation being more efficient doesn't matter then went into the counterspell convo where efficiency is now the only thing that matters
Honestly I think if you’re playing counter spell and noticing that you exclusively counter things that kill your shit, instead of doubling down on that habit I think you need to reevaluate how you use counterspells in general
@@metricarea7546ok, that’s just a wrong mentality to have. If everyone has the mentality of “eh, leave the interaction to the next player”, everyone’s gonna be playing solitaire and have no dynamic gameplay. You don’t need to answer every threat, but fucking run interaction, don’t rely on other players to run it. However, using those counter spells and interaction is where you say “oh, this player is a blue deck with 7 cards in hand and goes before me, let’s see if he has interaction for this game ending threat”. You should always run interaction, but you can choose when to use it
Well I'll argue every time that sweepers are superior to spot removal. Keeo your 1-2 spot removals for the situation you'd die. And use sweepers against opponents value engines. @@archdruidman3493
I will forever defend treasure nabber, It does one of three things really well!
1.) Ramp you. Your opponents decide its worth it to just let you borrow the mana rocks.
2.) Slow down your opponents: they refuse to use their own mana to prevent you from borrowing it.
3.) Removal check the table: Better the annoying borrower than an important creature right?
Its almost always 2 until 3 happens for me. Three mana to prevent people from using their own mana rocks? Pretty good. If by some miracle they use the mana rocks, then you get a temporary boost as well, great! They kill it outright or counter it? Better that than something more impactful right?
Magic is a strategy game that has some (all?) competition, therefore some kind of "confusing the player to make him/her play sub-optimally" is good from time to time
Notice how for damnatiion they mentioned only white wraths apart from toxic deluge 😂
Damnation is still my second Wrath after Toxic Deluge.
Yeah. I agree that Toxic Deluge is better, but Damnation is definitely the second best black board wipe. The same isn't true about Wrath of God. Most multicolored decks can find better options though.
@@nilsjonsson4446 that was my point
@@wafflehaxxx that was my point
Just in mono black I'd run Meathook Massacre, Blood Money, Plague Wind, Extinction Event, Massacre Girl, probably even In Garruk's Wake before Damnation. And that's not going into the niche board wipes that can be tailored to your deck like Kindred Dominance or Ritual of Soot.
I feel the same about Grave Pact and Dictate. I used to run both in my Edgar deck, and I vividly remember getting one out pretty early. I ran away with that game, but I felt bad about winning because one of the other guys just could not build his board. Now, I only run one of them.
I totally knew I was going to put Escape Tunnel in my Arcades deck as soon as I saw it spoiled. And I did and it rules.
Also consider Whalebone Glider! People don’t know this card exists and it is the funniest thing ever!
Building off of the Terramorphic Expanse and evolving wilds discussion, the two color choose lands (the thriving and CLB gate cycle) are better options for mana fixing in 3+ color decks if you don't care the shuffle or landfall. Also the Gate cycle can be especially good with Circuitous Route, which is another strictly better explosive vegetation.
30:58 I don't have escape tunnel in any decks because I haven't bought any MkM. I also haven't bought any because I have so many terramorphic expanse and evolving wilds that I haven't needed to buy escape tunnel
Burnished hart and solemn sim for me was a sad realization they’ve been power crept out. 5-10 years ago the big impactful spells were 5-8 mana, now they are 3-6 mana, so they don’t accelerate your gameplay anymore, and if anything actively hinder it because you are casting ramp spells instead of impactful spells. I have like 10 of each piled up and play them in maybe 2 or 3 decks total. 90% of my ramp is 2 cmc or less now, if I’m paying 3 for a ramp card it’s got to do more than just find lands, and I’m not paying any more. I’m surprised solemn didn’t get mentioned in the video tbh, it’s probably one of the most iconic cards in the format.
I agree. I never loved Hart but I've run Solemn in so many decks over the years. Now, I basically only run Solemn if it supports the theme of the deck--artifacts, Golems, or blink strategies.
I play duplicant in a very specific deck, Meria, Scholar of Antiquity. Creature exile is hard in red green, and the duplicant is searchable with many of my spells as it is a creature, so it is a good fit, but I don't have it in any other deck. When they staple creature exile to a red or green creature for less, I'll probably make the switch.
hopefully not, since exiling stuff is mainly white and often (not rarely D:) black
I like a generalization you can make here and it's one I've had to painfully realize as well: Many cards do not do what they say on the tin, INSTEAD what they do is cause your opponents to play differently/carefully/slower to work around your potential advantage. And you have to evaluate those cards as having that effect rather than great card draw or great ramp or whatever.
I cant let Explosive Vegetation go just because I love my Onslaught Foil copy so much D:
53:23 I really like that adage too. I’ve found that my decks have toned down over time and are actually more fun now. They can still win, but it’s more fun for everyone now
I run Brainstorm in my Maelstrom Wanderer deck. being able to take a card from your hand and put it on top of your library to cascade into it is pretty strong.
yeah i love it in my yidris but for other decks brainstorm its still super useful think it less as just 1 card drawn but rather put back on top of the deck i dont want quite yet and grab cards that are more useful now
I actually cut brainstorm from my maelstrom wanderer deck because it's so awful to cascade into. I looked at the risk/reward and went the other direction. Kind of cool that even in the same decks there's good reasons for different players to make the opposite decision. I hope it keeps working out for you.
I totally agree with cutting brainstorm. I recently cut it in from my Heliod deck and didn’t realize what I’ve done!! Orcish bow master made it a little worse,too.
The thing about Brainstorm is it's "draw three" and not "look at three," and the cards you put back can be any cards in your hand, not just the ones you drew. If you have something like Teferi's Ageless Insight, you draw six and then put two back. If you've got card draw triggers, it triggers at least three of them. As an individual card, there are better cards for drawing 3 cards for one mana, but there's a lot of utility in Brainstorm that isn't immediately obvious on its own. That being said, it's a trap if you've got an opponent with a Smothering Tithe on the board, because you're giving that mfer 3+ treasures.
An observation/prognostication about Escape Tunnel: it may suffer from the (temporary) curse of Idol of Oblivion. The extra text (in the case of Escape Tunnel, the watered-down Rogue's Passage ability) might cause people--at least initially--to shy away from the card, only to rediscover it after some time passes.
The card might experience a renaissance in the future when folks realize that it might be worth running just for the additional fetch/landfall trigger, as they discovered that decks that don't necessarily care about making a 10/10 token still might want Idol of Oblivion.
I recently replaced Evolving Wilds in my Aminatou deck for the same reason Dana championed but with a card that Joey brought up: Path of Ancestry. It's a tapped tri-land so is always better fixing than Evolving Wilds so worth it despite it having 0 chance to Scry.
It doesn't have 0 percent chance to scry, it will always scry off your commander.
@@nathand6467 Aminatou is a Planeswalker so doesn't trigger the scry unfortunately. So, it's 'just' a second copy of Arcane Sanctum.
21:10 feel this in my newbie heart. I do use it on creatures but I play wayyyy too many. I've cut down to 3-5 for the most part now and pair it with destroy spells and other ways to counter difficult cards.
I relate so much to what Dana said about his Athreos deck. I built an Arjun, the Shifting Flame deck because I thought it would be fun to weaponize card draw. And yeah, it was STRONG, but I played it literally once and took it apart because its play patterns didn’t seem fun for me or my opponents.
I left Emurakul Evangel in my Chatterfang deck for over 2 years after I realized it was the weakest card in the deck. It was winmore and only worked in magical christmas land but I really wanted to hit the big moment. The moment after it popped off for the only time, I finally took it out.
I pop off with that card all the time in my chatterfang build. It's a solid card imo.
@@Jrizzle7426It's super fun, and I still have it in a 10 card package that I swap in sometimes. But Chatterfang is my cutthroat deck and while I love the Evangal it's too slow for what that deck is. I'm really hoping that it will fit in the Bloomburrow golgari deck.
I cut rhystic study from my jodah the unifier after a lot of time trying it. What i ultimately came to the conclusion of was that the deck had enough draw engines without rhystic study, and i never wanted to cast rhystic study over ramp or a temur ascendancy for haste and powerful card draw. I am happy for where my rhystic study ended up, but man i wish i pulled it out of jodah sooner.
You don't really need card draw since a good chunk of spells in that deck are two creatures in one. You are gonna be doing ok with the 2 for 1 value. If anything, Guardian Project would draw you more cards. Or Temur Ascendancy, as you've put it, or Garruk's Uprising-since Trample will be relevant for that deck.
Really there was great henge, chulane, shanid, reki, jhoira, weatherlight captain, and that is just the immeadiate engines that come to mind
Rustic study is only a draw engine vs stupid opponents anyway. It's actually a stax piece, better put in guarantied card draw anyway.
@@Cephalopopo even smart opponents will not pay. The sentiment it is a stax piece feels wrong. And tbh it is back breaking moreso with cheap interaction backing it up and extra card draw on top of it.
@@iansinclair2028 then they are not smart opponents. Card effects that only depend on your opponent are weak. If you play rystic to slow down your opponent and get an occasional card it is well placed. If you play it as card engine it just means your opponents decks suck or they are really unlucky or they are stupid. Either way they don't remove it or let you draw well good for you if like getting the win handed to you. These Bartelcruiser cards only work so well in commander because no one ever runs interaction and mostly win more stuff. The only thing rystic does for sure is slow down a worthy opponent and as such is a good option against combo decks or to slow down for ur control deck
Edit. For me rystic seems a bit like when ugin was in m21 standard. It was like an intelligence check for your opponent. Most of the time the card made opponents throw instead of actually win
I have recently started powering down decks, it feels bad when you play a game and nobody is on the same level. I have started by removing the fast mana and have never felt better about it. Additionally if there is a deck that has a win condition readily available in the command zone I wont play a single card in the deck that has the phrase "you win the game" on it. I feel it just leads to "feels bad" games or non games
The easiest answer to this is to communicate and decide unilaterally what power level the decks you’re playing are, this way you don’t need to depower decks to “fit with the rest of the table”
Yeah, but some friend groups really don’t have a cohesive understanding of “power level.” My best friends play very casually and are starting to figure things out (thankfully many of the precons they used as a starting point were on the powerful side - Prosper, Jared, Anikthea and Marneus Calgar). But their forays into homebrew have been a bit more haphazard.
On the upside, my more powerful decks have become the “sometimes” decks while my goofy theme deck ideas get to go for a spin when everyone’s running a brew. Helps keep things interesting!
I do think Smuggler's Share is a good card, but I guess it depends on who you play with. I draw at least 1 card per round. The treasure part is a bit of flavor text as people tend to be done ramping. Trouble in Pairs (I have it, just never played it) appears to be the better one though.
With nelly borca you can draw 6 card with the commander and smuggler share in a turn cycle. The synergy is insane.
Duplicant still slaps in my Daretti deck.
I really love Blood on the Snow as a boardwipe. It forces me to play snow lands but the pay off it could be really good, a boardwipe that can reanimate a 6 mana value creature at best. You even can cast it with your commander on the field and reanimate it with his effect because it doesn't target. Or even you can choose to destroy all planeswalkers just to reanimate a creature.
No one plays Duplicant for whatever stats it happens to get... they play it for the EXILE effect. It ending up as a vanilla creature is essentially irrelevant.
It’s way better than meteor golem in that respect. No I don’t want to see butcher of Malakir recurred again.
In our play group, our friend's smuggler share has prefeormed amazingly well. It typically generates 1 treasure and 3 cards per turn cycle. It was certainly a meta call, but in our meta, it does work.
9:00 Joey killed me. I SWEAR I HAVE THOUGHT EXACTLY THE SAME LIKE 2 SEC BEFORE! That I should have made a Bingo with
one of the fields being Dana's Night's Whisper.
At this moment, I am writting down the two other:
Joey - I don't like them touching my graveyards.
Matt - I hate Monologue Tax.
OH SHIEW! I hit another one! Matt, thanks!
The worst feeling is buying a $10 card and realizing it doesn’t do what you want and cutting it feels rough
This is why you proxy cards before you buy them.
Counterspell is one of the best counterspells in our format. You gotta ask yourself "Why run countermagic?" because countermagic is (after discard) the worst type of removal there is. You have to have it the moment they cast whatever you want to remove and you gotta keep mana open. Those are huge disadvantages. Also you can't wait and see if someone else wants to remove it more than you do. So you have to proactively react instead of waiting for the opportune moment.
If you're scared of boardwipes play spells that counter noncreature spells or sorceries.
If you're annoyed by all those "my creatures get indestructible and hexproof and phase out" cards.... run dispell.
If you need to protect your combo and only have limited room in your deck for interaction... run counterspell. And mana drain and FoW. Because you need that flexibility to either answer a threat that kills you before you can win, to counter the combo of someone else or to protect your own stuff.
I’m not sure I agree with the challenge the stats on escape tunnel.. Almost every time I play it the whole pod usually sings “SECRET TUNNEL!!” “SECRET TUNNEL!” I’m almost always playing with different people btw..
I always love hearing you discuss your own decks and how you build them.
I haven't cut it out yet, but I am debating taking In Search of Greatness out of my Sliver Overlord deck. It's great when it works, but it feels a bit bad when you essentially play a 2G scry 1 every turn enchantment especially in a WUBRG deck.
...I used to play pickleball competitively :c
Is that possible? #shotsfired 😂
That's about as oxymoronic as competitive commander.
Migration Path only got that kick it needed because it was included in the Dinosaur deck.
4-mana ramp in general feels questionable in a lot of decks now. Casting it on 4 means you're ramped to 6, maybe 7 mana on turn 5? It feels pretty slow for many decks.
Of course, one can ramp into 4-mana ramp, but without a plentiful amount of 2-mana ramp to find reliably in order to cast 4-mana ramp on 3, this play pattern doesn't really work out. What I've found in deckbuilding is that by the time you build in all your land, card advantage, interaction, and some things that go on to win you the game it's pretty hard to find room for a full suite of both 2 & 4-mana ramp spells.
This isn't to say it's totally unplayable, I've got a Kellan deck (Simic) that abuses the heck out of 4-mana ramp to play Big Dumb Green cards as fast as practically possible... but I think it only belongs in very specific decks. Salubrious Snail has an awesome video about his Radha (2-mana mana-dork version) deck that does the same: use the commander as ramp, cast 4-mana ramp, then yeehaw.
Because people have the wrong cards listed in their decks, it skews recommendations and high synergy listings. I say this because I learned about explosive veg from your site because its so popular. I bet there are some interesting tools and content you could do to improve recommendations on the site based on these inputs. Fantastic episode!!
I agree about Burnished Hart. Looks like such an op card and then you realize how expensive it is to get lands out of unless you're running decks that give discounts to abilities and artifacts and have those out first. Totally possible! But a Wayfarer's Bauble is so much better because you can play it turn 1 when you probably can't play anything else anyway, then on turn 2 after your land play, you can crack it for a third land, or do that whenever else if you have something better to play on turn 2.
Something else about Burnished Hart that rarely comes up but could is that if you have like 6 mana to crack it immediately, you can't, because it's a creature with summoning sickness. It's way more niche than it looks.
Hard agree with the board wipe section. A 4-mana symmetrical wrath is efficient in that you can follow it up. But what's better, a wrath and a 3-drop from your hand, or a 7-mana wrath that keeps your entire board? I'd rather keep my board in 99% of cases.
Lil bro is down here still talking about his 7 mana plague wind 😂😂
"Let's look at Plague Wind. What's better, casting Damnation and a 3-drop, or casting Plague Wind? With Damnation you are left with a 3 drop, but with Plague Wind you're left with your entire board. That seems to me like it'll be better most of the time."
Interestingly, the extra mana to cast a Winds of Abandon instead of a Wrath of God is not relevant BUT the two blue pips of counterspell VS. An offer you can't refuse are?
For a reactive instant vs. a proactive sorcery? Yes.
33:41 Also I feel there is still the idea that deck thinning with fetch lands is impactful.
Great episode. I would really like to see the video cut into chapters!
The Burnished Hart remark felt personal.
No mention of Noxious Revival around the Regrowth effects? That card is damn strong when you are running a GY deck or even to replay an instant or sorcery on your draw step.
Smuggler's Share ended up being... right about where I expected.
You end up getting an extra card or two per turn cycle from the 'draw two or more cards clause'.. and essentially nothing from the 'two or more lands entering' clause (The only things that will reliably trigger this are dedicated landfall decks and fetches... and there is a tendency to crack fetches ON the endstep).
I cut Sheoldred, Whispering One from a dimir wheel/reanimator deck. Locking folks out of creatures was awful, the 'reanimator' portion was very narrow. Sepulcher Primordial took the spot and is so much fun to pull out after a Breach the Multiverse.
The thing about eternal witness it’s great when the deck cares that it’s a creature which is most green decks lol. But it’s not necessarily an auto include in non creature decks
Ewit is one where if you ask yourself if you want it, odds are decent you do in fact want it. I just found myself not asking that with it for a long time.
Timeless Witness is more expensive but you can use it twice even without flicker. I also use it in my GW Mirri deck because Uncage the Menagerie is the star of that deck, and different mana values are relevant when tutoring!
About 2 color decks and mana fixing:
You don't need any color fixing. Just tinker with the amount of basics and play all basics. Nothing else. It works.
If budget isn't an issue, just play a real fetch.
My mom became opposed to Halloween because “all year long we tell our kids not to talk to strangers and not to accept candy from strangers and not to go to strangers houses, and then we take them to strangers houses to all for candy.”
After we got the removal spell ranking episode and now they again talked about boardwipes and how there are quite a few different versions, I would really love a boardwipe ranking or even tierlist episode. That would certainly be fun.
I play damnation MOSTLY because I traded for it with a friend. Its the OG Planar chaos version. And ofc its such a cool card! Gonna squeeze in Nuclear fallout into my zombie deck.
When talking about Damnation I was thinking exactly about counterspell and my inner monologue about it (wasn't fan because of efficiency and no benefits) however in the end you need just that in contrast in viggle room of boardwipes. In the end I play it and I play it defensively as well...however with creatures being also mighty spells on stick I don't want to lose that functionality of counterspell. That's reason I'll change sometimes mana castable force of negation for force of will. Also another debate is about arcane denial and how I started to value it more and more.
Also expanse and wilds are garbage fetches even in budget landfall and only excuse for that number (and my hope for community) are precons. You got panoramas you got, promising veins and finaly you got landscapes. Wild expanse are amazing only in limited winth opening option for 2+ C decks.
Witness I disagree because it represents one more copy for every function your deck needs be it removal, ramp, win condition or simple fetch to fix...not speaking about combo piece. Ever balancing the deck of "how many" well this card helps mightily. I agree that Bala ged MDFC free up the pressure however more likely than not I play both...not regrowth as I m weightedrd as way less of value.
Cheers Dana, you are the first person i have ever heard mention Public Enemy. Couldn't believe it never became popular, causes so much to happen. And what it causes is usually not achieved in blue.
The blue player ALSO has to attack... which is something blue decks don't generally want to be doing.
It does work fairly well in Estrid and Tuvasa though (great colors for auras and you probably have ways to tap down anything you don't want attacking).
I run it in my Zur the Enchanter deck because it's tutorable and I have a tendency to become the table enemy, so it's kept me from losing more than once.
41:54 Unpopular Opinion, cards like this should be played as Stax pieces and not advantage engines. They are meant to make your oponents turns akward by forcing them to play around them giving you advantage for free while you set up your own things.
I use brainstorm in my Maelstorm wanderer deck, not as a draw spell but to setup cascades. Works decent there.
Oh boy, I hadn’t seen Public Enemy before, but you could be mean and throw Vanishing and Gaseous Form in with it to really twist the knife.
Public enemy and darksteel mutation on my opponent's commander is one of the saltiest plays I've pulled off.
Public Enemy in a Gwafa Hazid deck. Basically, goading the table against a Pacified creature 😈
Having recently cut Burnished hart from my toggo & keskit deck, i feel this. The card had crazy synergy there but always felt like it took 2 or even 3 turns of me timewalking myself to pay me off.
The scry 2 draw is likely better than brainstorm in most edh scenarios
About edhrec, what decks feed into the data? Is it just the once over the last year so newly made decks or all, that are put onto it since the beginning? 🤔
Always enjoy the content! Keep up the good work! Hopefully I'll get to see a Hakbal of the Surging Soul upping the average in the near future
I had smugglers Share, deep gnome teramancer, and archivist of ogma, All in the same deck, after three or four games I realized I had drawn less cards than I had played so even when it seemed like they were "working" I wasn't actually gaining anything
I really liked Dana's final comment on this, having played most of these cards, and continuing to do so in some cases. Especially Duplicant is still a regular part of my toolbox, for decks that struggle with indestructible creatures while caring about artifacts or etbs themselves
I'm throwin escape tunnel in my thalrog deck tonight. Just pulled a foil today. Ohhh the synergy with crucible effects!
20:05 The conversation about Damniation made me have to stop and reevaluate how much thought I was giving to this topic, I'm def still stuck on price memory here
Brainstorm is a card that generally gets better the more powerful the table is. If you're playing against decks that are looking to ramp out a bunch of big fatties and overrun, or pull off a janky seven card combo and the card pool generally avoids being too mean, then yes, Brainstorm is going to under perform. If you're playing decks with Wheels, tutors, fetches, rhystic/mystic, free spells, and the usual cEDH shenanigans, my experience is that Brainstorm excels in that kind of format.
Absolutely. Tutor to the top and then brainstorm is very good. Brainstorm plus fetches is very good too
@@falconlord7811 Also, Brainstorm in response to a Wheel can save your bacon if you've got the win in hand.
My very slow Azorius Control List still runs Burnished Hart.
It already includes wayfarer's Bauble, Mindstone etc, and it just needs yet another copy of this sort of effect.
Yes it is clunky / expensive, but I couldn't find better options that I am not already running.
The list runs several "wipe all permanents" effects, so most mana rocks are out.
Hedron Archive?
Okay, first I see an audition for Pickleball footware, THEN I get a magazine for it, NOW MATT'S SAYING IT. WHAT IS GOING ON WITH PICKLEBALL?!
I picked up like 10 Escape Tunnels to slot into various decks (I also play pauper) but honestly, if the second ability doesn't synergize, and I don't need yet another terramorphic expanse in my deck, I'm sticking with the titans
Sometimes the reason folks ain't cutting certain cards is because they are playing the cards they have rather than the cards they do not have, really it is simple as that because new cards cost money and once you have a certain amount of bulk when you go to build a new deck purchasing say 20 cards vs 40 cards because the newer cards are better because they are an instant instead of a sorcery but do the exact same thing.. most folks grab the sorcery and call it good simply to save money because all those little savings add up over time and you easily end up with 2 or maybe even 3 new decks to play vs the 1 deck you could have built instead when you buy all of the "better/best" cards for that one deck.
I often will use less than the best cards when building a new deck to try it out and if it sticks around and I like it and want to keep it then I start to slowly upgrade the specific cards in it as finances allow.
I play a thalirog landfall deck and I definetly found myself running seer's sundial for way too long, I can't remember a time I got value of it
I use Simic Asscendancy in a Hakbal deck. I only cast ot when I can 20 counters on the turn it it played.
I really liked the card Disallow in my first deck but ended up cutting from my list of go to cards. Unfortunately the gulf between 3 mana and 2 mana is huge.
LSV likes to say the ideal balanced Counterspell would be two and a half mana, so this makes a lot of sense.
If you're cutting counterspell then you better be playing a near CEDH level counter because the only thing better are free counters, mana drain and one mana counters, and how many of those counters hit creatures. E Wit is still really good in lower powered games because many decks don't have enough wincons and those that do usually have very fragile win conditions. E wit rarely underperforms, It gets back removal, key pieces that either got removed/countered before they could do their thing, it chump blocks, it sacrifices, it blinks etc. I may not want it in my opening hand but in my weaker decks its one of the first cards in and only worth cutting if you want to increase the decks powerlevel.
I realize better help pays the bills but the company is a total scam that does alot of data harvesting
As opposed to TH-cam and google? the platform you are currently on?
We had plenty of internal discussion on this one. You're not wrong at all, but on the other hand I personally know one person who works for BH and does good work, and a couple folks who have had good experiences there. Does that wash away the data harvesting or the hack therapists you can get? Probably not, but in the grand scheme of things we need some advertising, and being able to at least know there's some good to be done from them makes it more palatable for us than some of the ad alternatives.
One is a necessary evil the other isn't, this is why quite a few channels take strong stances against taking sponsorships that they do not actually believe in due to actually using them (and as such rarely have sponsors) @@solemnscrub
Divination is a great example of card used in limited CORE SET tournaments. Loved those, but they really felt weird...
32:00 Especially these days, the quality of the taplands and especially the fetchable taplands has reached a point where there is never a point where a non-Landfall deck ever needs Evolving. Even if the best of them like the new Surveil lands aren't quite budget, you can have your choice of Scry 1, indestructible, artifact, or cycling.
Dana giving a "isn't it weird" comment rather a dad joke in the beginning... honestly works.
I was with y’all till counterspell. Genuinely think the benefit of running An Offer over counterspell is so fractionally insignificant that I’d just run counterspell
Awesome group and discussions
Never have I heard of pickle ball till today, when I saw a sign after work. Then y’all bring it up and now I have to look it up.
Curious what y'alls opinion is on Supreme Verdict as a 4 mana boardwipe. Is the uncounterability worth it?
IMO yes because if I'm playing a boardwipe I'm behind on board and need it to go through in order to stabilize.
I have a question. Why is Quick Study shown as "in 13704 decks, 2% of 705371 decks" and divination shown as "in 11444 deck, 1% of 1802207 decks". Shouldnt the number of eligible decks for Quick Study and Divination be the same?
Since Quick Study is a newer card, it hasn't had as much time to get into decks as Divination. It is compared against only decks that have been built or updated since that card was released, rather than the entire pool of decks, since those decks haven't had the chance to include or exclude it.
@@EDHRECast Ah, that makes sense. Thank you for the prompt reply
I disagree with the take on e-witness. It doesn't just get your wincon back from the yard. It gets whatever you need. Maybe you recur the swords to plowshares you played earlier to remove something that would otherwise kill you. If your graveyard is big enough it's more like a tutor
Me, putting duplicant in my new Science deck. Dr li can recur it which is nice and so its an exile spell that gets ok value for what it is, now I want a power crept version.
Pickle ball? Nah man badminton is where it's at
Curious, may we get the link for Dana's Athreos deck?
I took a lot of Solemn Simulacrum out of my decks when I they introduced the initiative mechanic.
Swan song and an offer you can't refuse are the best counters in the format
“I’ll give you two Treasures to fk off” is the best description I’ve heard
I had Sylvan and Moriok Replica's in my Glissa the traitor deck for so long after they were just too much mana for what they do.