I like to think each one of them is on a sine wave of good and bad takes, but they're all slightly off-phase from each other which is what makes this podcast great to watch
@@zackkelley2940 They’re not saying it’s not a board wipe because it has a targeted mode, they’re saying it’s not a board wipe because it bounces things, which isn’t a permanent solution. They had the same take on Unsummon. I agree that single-target bounce spells aren’t good enough to be considered removal, because the opponent can replay that one thing on their next turn and then they’re back to normal. But mass bounce spells are definitely board wipes, because they reset the board, and opponents won’t be able to get everything you bounced back down in one turn. And maybe they’ll even have to discard some of it to hand size. It buys time, which is what board wipes are supposed to do.
I get that it's goldfish and all, but every time I hear someone call Richard the fish father, I can't help but think the cod father would sound amazing
It’s more that’s it’s one sided removal too as most blue decks aren’t board heavy and your opponents also loses lose all there tokens which in commander is often a lot.
Thank you! Adding the letter ranks made things either very cluttered or very small, but adding just the symbols felt like the sweet spot :) EDIT: Only now did I realize I should've put the category titles at the top of the screen and not have them disappear, oops :(
The strongest part of ramp is that it has a guaranteed/reliable payoff in the command zone. Ramp's weakness in 60 card formats is not having the payoff at the right time. Having a 3 cmc commander makes playing 6-7 1 cmc mana dorks a much more powerful inclusion in the deck. Or having a 4 cmc commander out on turn 3 because of 2 cmc mana rocks. Having that guaranteed playoff takes so much risk away when committing to mana ramp (in any form)
I loved that part. Also, he got Seth to say artifact removal was less important and then got him to say green is very good because it has artifact removal.
“Bounce spells don’t count as removal because they can just play the creature again” is a weird line of logic. Wouldn’t that make exile effects the only real form of removal?
I feel like bounce counts as removal because you can counter it when they try and send it back down. It also clears off counters, equipment, and enchantments. Tell people who play against my Inalla deck that bounce doesn't count when I have like eight plus wizards that etb bounce and you never get to do anything.
@@SilverAlex92 problem is blue has 99 different 3 mana or less bounce (non-land) permanent spells. In a blue deck you can remove something every single turn. Blues actual weakness is having very limited draw engines that dont cost mana.
@@anthonymcclellan6256 I didn't check steal cards assuming there were too expensive mana wise for my deck, ty for the tip off. thats amazing. theres a white one that destroys an enchantment and then every other enchantment with that name for if you're the one player st the group without the money for them or haven't proxied them, also a 2 drop.
@@matthewdevey8878 is that the one where you can exile stuff when you draw? if so I just have a hard time seeing that being allowed to stick around if you can even resolve it. I considered adding it to my value engine deck but it seemed like it would pull ALL of the aggro. edit: idk why I chose to Google after and confirm I was talking about a different card.
This episode is basically an excuse for us to talk about the strengths and weaknesses of each color. Our rankings are meant to be generalized and based on our experienced power level (mid-power). Obviously there's far more factors, most notably the actual commander choice; if someone ranks Blue lower than Green that doesn't mean they think a Blue deck led by Urza is weaker than a Green deck led by Autumn Willow. CEDH is its own beast and the weight of each category would be totally different -- countermagic would be more important for example -- and not reflected in our rankings.
Blue being the worst makes sense for lower powered combat based metas where combo is frowned upon, but at tables where people jam the best staples of each color blue may be the best. I only play against randoms in LGSs and am always way more worried about the mono blue deck than the mono green deck. There is a wide range of power levels between the average Commander Clash deck and CEDH, which I don’t play, and saying blue is the worst color broadly in EDH is bizarre.
What color is the best in a vacuum like this vs what color you're scared of at the table is a completely different question, though. Most of what they were looking at in this video was interaction, which outside of counterspells blue has a hard time with and counterspells are generally inefficient in multiplayer formats. Green has arguably the best noncreature removal and can shore up the creature removal with fights which are often quite cheap. The reason you're often scared of the mono blue deck has to do with the way they win rather than the strength of the deck. Mono green decks will pump out creatures and smack you with them and at any time you can wrath or murder a key creature and the deck will usually fall flat on it's face. Blue will pull some uninteractable combo and unless you have a counterspell ready you just lose. Wincons weren't really talked about at all this video, just generic cards like interaction so they don't factor into the ratings. Also most people I see running mono-blue decks are running decks that are much higher power than most of the rest of the table; borderline cedh with tons of fast mana and undercosted/free counterspells.
@@robertweavill2072 there were also issues with how they defined categories. For example; while blue ramp does rely heavily on artifacts, it is also the color that can take the best advantage of those artifacts. I’m sure we’ve all seen blue decks copy and/or untap their Thran dynamos and sol rings loads of times, which is a uniquely blue form of ramp that went totally unappreciated. Board wipes is another spot where as a mono blue player it’s much easier to keep the board clear of lethal threats with cards like cyclonic rift, evacuation, scourge of fleets, etc. while setting up a kill than if I’m the red or green player. Yes it’s largely a tempo play as they can recast their cards, but honestly a hard wrath can be making life easier for the reanimator deck to recover faster too, so there are comparable trade offs. A lot of the arguments made against blue in this video seemed to almost purposefully look past how blue decks actually operate in the wild. It is laughable to think red should be ranked higher than blue in single target removal just because chaos warp exists when blue has a huge catalogue of single target answers to pretty much anything from bouncing (too many to list) to destroying (pongify and rapid hybridization ) to transforming (imprisoned in the moon and frogify) to freezing (Frost Titan like effects) to exiling (Raven form and resculpt). If we’re exclusively talking metas where attacking with creatures is the only real path to victory, then sure blue is lacking in this category, but I’ve personally been killed much more by blue sun’s zenith x=100000 than by a craterhoof in random lgs games. It’s not just randomly vomiting out a combo that wins blue games, it wins because of it’s all around strength in the format.
@@robertweavill2072 yup, I also play with random rotating tables at my lgs and the blue and green decks are always afraid of the other in my experience. Creature players are worried about getting countered or combod and control/combo players are worried about dying before they can set up
@@frosty980 even in metas where attacking is the only path to victory, blue can be absolutely terrifying. Blue has the most flyers, and the most straight up unblockable creatures. Sure, they are usually low to the ground, but they also usually have payoffs for actually hitting. I've killed more people with Tetsuko than I have with Feather.
(Replying to the original comment) But the point is, blue decks have to go for a combo finish because they don't have other options that are as strong as the other colours. So if you're looking at what the colours have to offer in a vacuum, blue does very poorly on many metrics. That's what the commander clash crew identified here. What WotC could do is give blue more means to push towards a win then decks would exist that aren't combo and have a proper chance of fitting into low-mid power games.
I feel like blues interaction is a bit undervalued here, and black is a bit overvalued in that sense. Pongify is strictly better removal cost wise than most of blacks removal, raven form hits artifacts and creatures, bounce spells hit almost anything and can end up timewalking someone, etc... still think blue is lacking a bit in regards to diverse playstyles and options for "fair decks", but I dont think its nearly as bad as people seem to make it out to be either.
I am definitely most scared of mono blue player at the table, because they're either Storm, an artifact combo deck, or a Laboratory Maniac/Thassa's Oracle combo deck lol I'm beginning to realize just how influenced the CC Crew are by how infrequently they play two-card or even three-card combos as a primary win condition. I think that, more than anything, is the driver of ideas like "mono blue is weak" and "spot removal is overrated." When you don't have to worry about your opponents comboing off at all, it definitely skews the metagame and what cards are worth playing or not worth playing
@@MasterDoctorBenji Debatable. I personally run a good bit of removal depending on the deck I play. But I definitely agree there is such thing as too much targeted removal
@@NoNo-qt4ov when you run more removal and keep playing with the same playgroup, eventually they stop running removal and rely on you. Richard would rather run 6 birds and dousing dagger and lose than be the "police". After all he is playing with Seth, and he is never paying the 1.
Honestly, Tomer is schooling them all on Blue's removal ranking. I commented on the last podcast that if I'm building a Dimir or U/B/x deck, I'm putting in Blue's spot removal over black's. It's just more efficient, and can kill artifacts. Seriously underrated.
Agreed, though black has creatures with removal etbs it can make use of. But instant/sorcery wise, Black has one S (Deadly Rolick) and a bunch of B/Cs, while U has like 4 As and a B. And you only want so much spot removal.
@@NoNo-qt4ov I think most people are playing spot removal in Commander wrong. If they're using it to kill a Bird or something, than yeah, it's bad. But you can't do those 1-for-1's in Commander. You have to save it for game-ending threats.
@@brningpyre definitely agree. I have a Mizzix deck and it was vital that I save my Spot removal and Counterspells towards the end. Most people I see use them pretty quickly and on things that are technically strong but not worth wasting a spot removal at
Blue’s transformation removal is severely underrated. Frogifying a commander is great. Killing a commander with spot removal is card disadvantage. You lose a card in hand and they can still recast the commander. But if you frogify the commander, then they spend a removal on the enchantment, that was one-one interaction.
What blue removal is enchantment based? Pongify, kills and leaves an extra body behind. Turn to frog, only causes the creature to become a 1/1 and, lose abilities until the next turn.
@@thomasjacobs4919 there is an card called “Frogify” from throne of Eldraine. Turn to Frog is from magic origins and yeah I think that is a really bad card
Only problem with those effects is that they are sorcery speed. They do not protect you from combos and some commanders gain so much advantage even if they have them for one turn like the korvolds and chulanes that if you don't counter them or instant speed remove them it will be a minor inconvenience to them at worst.
The more i listen to this podcast the more i belive this guys don't play enough islands and manarocks. Bouncing may not be a permanent solution but the fact that you get very cheap ones, instant speed ones and creatures attached ones. Makes blue amazing at keeping the board clean. The only real problem blue has in casual is closing out games, cause u want to stay away from combos so you are left with few, subpar, options. Also you are severely underrating mono black powerlevel.
Exactly. Blue had amazing interaction, but has limited win cons outside of comboing out. Blue is probably the best secondary color. It protects your stuff, slows down opponents, and has great cantrips for digging.
The other guys are massively underrating bouncing creatures. Tempo is as important as card advantage, especially in a multiplayer game like this. Having even one big blocker bounced back to your hand often means becoming vulnerable to 3 rounds of attacks before you can recast it.
@@andyspendlove1019 blue has the best reactionary removal. Its just not permanent. But pongifying chulane after its cast breaks the loops and sets them behind. Dispersing smothering tithe before the opponent draws removes 4 or more (7 on average)mana and invalidates turns. Unsummoning an urdragon removes eminence even if it was brought out by hellkite courser. Blue is above average. At everything.
Blue is the single best color at dealing with literally all threats. It has the game's best board wipe, the largest number of spot removal spells, the hardest removal to avoid, and the most aggressively costed removal. These guys created the categories to manufacture a ranking that seems legit if you don't actually pay attention. They separated all of the categories into "blue" and then "this card type, except when it's blue those don't count".
Plus bounce synergizes with countermagic to be a permanent solution. Often you don't need to permanently remove something anyways. If you bounce something extremely threatening they're forced to recast it on their next turn. You can often effectively take away an entire turn since recasting most big threats is expensive, *and* it keeps a target on their back distracting the rest of the table. Also many threats are assembled. If you bounce a creature that has accrued a threatening number of +1/+1 counters, auras, or non-repeatable until end of effects, it often does not return as anything similar.
@@timbombadil4046 If you’re bouncing a creature, you’re usually taking _two_ turns away from them, because they’ll have to recast it next turn, and then wait another whole turn to be able to attack with it.
Richard arguing that Red has better spot removal than Black is wild, LOL. I feel like their group in general really underplays Indestructible creatures. Every other table I've played at ALWAYS has at least one ind. creature or other permanent on the table.
There's just also a ton of cards that are good exile based removal for black, like deadly rollick and baleful mastery and sacrifice effects also are very effective.
Ah the clickbait, as for the actual answer. I actually think Red will be the weakest color if not already in the near future The biggest thing holding White back was card draw/card advantage and Wotc so far has been exploring different ways to do so.
Weird to me Richard and Seth don't consider Cyclonic Rift as mass removal. Is literally removes everything on the board. Especially if you do it before someone's end step and then they have to discard to hand size. Its insane
@@joshuasnyder4101 They definitely have the chance to replay. But I mean as long as you do it on someone's end step and your turn is next, I assume you're going to hit them from anywhere to half their health or all of it since they have nothing. Plus I mean unless their deck is all ETBs they're going to have to spend another turn replaying everything which I think gives you plenty of time to win. Plus again, if you do it at the main threats end step they will most likely half to discard a lot of their stuff
@@joshuasnyder4101 but you're forcing them to spend mana on that thing again. Bounce is a tempo hit, and in alot of cases it is removal. Snap is one of the best removal cards that people aren't playing enough
Richard is 100% wrong about extra turns. There is not a single mid powered deck in the game that would not be improved by adding a Time Warp to it. You don't need to be an extra turn deck to make use of what is essentially a free spell that draws you a card and gives you extra main/combat phases. There just will be incidental synergy no matter what deck you are playing.
I have a collection of the entire mystical archive, made a volo deck, stuck time warp in for the hell of it and that card is busted. I have had 2 accidental infinite combos happen with it, and it just wins games “fairly”
to be fair choas warp can lead toward your opponent doesn't get anything valuble if the top card of there library is a land or a non permament spell. Meanwhile Tibalt will always hit a spell for your opponent to be able to cast.
This has been a super interesting exploration of each color by itself, though I'd be curious how your answers would have shaped out if you'd ranked each color pair and wedge as well. I'll bet you'd find that a lot of color combinations that include blue end up on higher on that list.
Crim: Edict effects are not "spot" removal--they don't deal with specific threats, all else being equal. Tomer's right on Blue, it has multiple, efficient, instant speed creature removal. I'd say it's above Red--which just has chaos warp+good artifact removal--and maybe even Black. Seth is too hung up on permanently removing. Yes exile>destroy>bounce, but Rift still resets everyone else's tempo, and gets rid of tokens and counters as a bonus. Everyone has to rebuild using their mana and hand. Sounds like a boardwipe to me. Richard: ...3-4 removal spells?
But Crim's examples are Edicts that deal with the *strongest* Threat. Make an example in particular always hit the exact card you want it to, at the very least.
Lightning Bolt is so underrated in commander. The format has gotten smaller and faster these days. Archon of Emeria, Hushbringer, Drannith Magistrate... so many problematic creatures can be delt with with a bolt.
Ok I'm gonna need these guys to not put black and green in the same tier for counter spells. On top of imps mischief they also forgot withering boon 2 mana pay 3 life counter a creature spell. I'm pretty sure there is a black enchantment that counters things too but I may be misremembering on that one.
@@P3rs3cutr0ll Niche in the sense that it has narrower targets than generic counterspells that hit everything. This is why a card like Essence Scatter, also niche, does not generally see play. Also, I'd argue that the "best counterspell" for the format would hit more targets i.e. Counterspell/FoW/Counterspell. Not bad for non-blue though. It'd likely see more play if people knew about it.
I consider bounce removal. With how easy it is to get anything back from the yard I dont see it as a whole lot worse than destroying creatures. Don't get me wrong, it is worse but destroying a creature is not even close to permanent.
In my opinion, counter magic is spot removal, and because of this blue is an S in spot removal. I know y’all had a separate category for counter magic, but I wouldn’t separate that from spot removal.
Yeah, have come to see it as temporally rather than categorically limited removal. Shatter can only destroy artifacts, counterspell can only remove a threat while it's on the stack.
Isn’t it kinda bad removal because it requires you to respond first? Like opponent A casts a blightsteel and I have a path to exile in hand. You counter it, and I still have my path in hand. In a way, when you use them for removal instead of saving the game, you’re priority bullying yourself in a way, since you are responding at the first possible second instead of the last possible. That’s why i personally don’t like counterspells as removal, I like them for saving my board/the game
They should definitely remove the top card for each category per color from their consideration, as good as some of them are, one card can’t carry mono colored deck and I think it would give a better representation of a colors power.
I agree. Especially since the top card for most things is very expensive and your average casual player won’t have it. Like last week, they said Black has good ramp because of Coffers+Urborg
dedicaded mono red player here. I play each and every enchantment removal I can grab. played the 7 mana Scour from existence, played 5 mana sorcery Introduction to Annihilation and draws your opponent a card, extremly excited for the new 2 mana one in Baldur's gate. In commander you can't be picky about spot removal
Yea, I don't think blue is better than red in mass removal. Like yea I agree kind of that Cyclonic Rift is one of the best board wipes. But other than that I agree with Richard, if I have blue/red deck I will rather run chain reaction, Blasphemous Act etc over evacuation, flood gate or Fade Away. And no I will never play Fade Away. Just having one good board wipe doesn't in my opinion make it better than red with multiple choices. Even with like less seen options such as star storm, Volcanic Torrent or Magmaquake.
the discussion about what a counterspell is was very weird. how could you possibly consider veil of summer a counterspell? a counter spell has to say "counter" and "spell" on it.
Blue isn't a low tier for spot removal any more, it's got lots of exile vs creatures, cheap destroy vs creatures, and can even deal with artifacts reasonably well, all this ignoring it's access to bounce, so I feel like I'd order things thusly: W is S tier again for removal due to how many good options they have to deal with essentially any card type now, Sultai is at A Tier, with each having shortfalls in it's package, Red is probably C tier as it can remove creatures, planeswalkers, artifacts and even players with it's spells/effects, but most of them require a lot of resources to work effectively. Remember, Red can generate a ton of mana and use that to burn pretty big stuff, it's issue is that it can't readily exile creatures, so Red is hardly a slouch in this area, but it's not really above what you'd call 'average'. Black technically can remove artifacts, enchantments, creatures (it's 2nd best at this, White is just better except Deadly Rollick), planeswalkers and sometimes a player, which is honestly pretty good if you've got a high enough budget to afford the good removal. It's also worth noting that Blue's best 'spot removal' is actually just Counterspell, so it's not like Blue can't deal with almost every card for UU, a big part of why Blue is not a bad colour, but apparently we're putting that elsewhere. Green has tons of naturalize effects, lots of fight effects for creatures and planeswalkers, and it has some damage based wipes vs flyers (and rarely vs other targets technically)/targeted removal for flyers, as well as having various 'destroy literally any permanent' stuff, Desert Twister is probably playable in budget mono-green, and Beast Within is a top tier card. I would say creatures and planeswalkers are the weakest area of Green's removal, but it's naturalize stuff is actually better than what you get in White generally, Green also has cheap wipes for Artifacts and Enchantments. Huh, now Tomer brings up card theft as removal, I'm actually liking that point and I've listed it thusly, stealing stuff is making it 'not a problem anymore' usually, and often turns it into an asset for you. Blue also has some pretty big 'spot removal' effects, Mental Manipulation and Curse of the Swine can be a late game spell to swing a game, either can just devastate a board, especially in a Simic deck. Counter magic is clearly just 'Blue Removal', but okay, I'd tier is U at S, Boros at C, and Golgari at D. In other formats, you've got weird counters that can matter, but you don't run Meren in cEDH because of her sick interaction package IMHO, you'd run a Jeskai deck for that. Stack fiddling is biggest in U, but it's also present in Boros in some cases, part of why Jeskai spells decks are pretty solid inherently at very high levels, they can just interact with everything and control the board. I guess Green has stuff like Avoid Fate? Does that matter? Black has essentially nothing. I think I might agree with Richard that White has slightly better stack interaction, look at all those W Silence effects, along with various 'bad' mono-white counters like Memory Lapse, along with Rebuff the Wicked, it's not like W can't do stuff. You could even use Teferi's Protection as a sort of counter, more or less dodging an annoying (or worse) effect, and there is also Angel's Grace. Red has less, but it does have some. Maybe I'd say W is C+ and R is C-? I guess R does have stuff like Fork, and Pyroblast? Green is good at wiping flyers, artifacts and enchantments. Ezuri's Predation is hilarious, but I use Monstrous Onslaught to good effect in OG Multani, where I can play it and deal +20 damage as I see fit, which should result in a dead player due to them having no blockers left. If you remember that Green can easily Naturalize wipe, Green is probably a bit better than you're rating it. Anyways, W is S for wipes, R is A, Golgari is B, U is C. None of the colours are helpless here, but R is arguably the least narrow colour after W, which can just wipe anything period. U is the hardest to work with, but it's mass bounce isn't bad, and it also has big spot removal like Curse and Manipulation, but Green's numerous naturalize wipes along with it's bad solutions to creatures/planeswalkers are solidly better, but not generally more relevant in a Commander game than Black's access to several very good Wrath effects. Black does suffer a ton from versatility issues, but it can also force mass sacrifice potentially, which can win the game while dealing with some problem permanents, I think Black might be worse than Green if your meta actually cares about naturalize. Red is actively good at wiping artifacts, and it's not bad at clearing the board of most creatures, and it can also blow up lands, especially non-basics, but it also has Flashfire, Boil/Boiling Seas and Omen of Fire if you really hate Azorius. Red has damage wipes galore, both big, small and versatile, so Red can be very good at controlling a board with wipes. For uniqueness, I feel like it should be Grixis on top, Grixis gets access to all of the cards that are just ridiculous that aren't Shahrazad, they've since taken away some of the uniqueness of these colours, but White is not known for crazy/chaotic effects (it does have them I know, like mass removal that trickles permanents back into play), but chaotic effects are a viable strategy to actually win games in Grixis, you don't even need wincons, you can just steal theirs. Anyways, I'll rate as follows: R is probably A, Dimir is B, W is C and G is D. White has some unique stuff, but it's biggest features are just removing things (either one at a time or a bunch at a time) and hitting people with creatures, I guess Silence is pretty unique? Protection stuff in general I guess, but I think you should break Protection off into it's own area. Green is low on the uniqueness totem, with very few cards doing especially interesting things, often the Green card in a creature cycle's perk is being big and having Trample (more true historically I guess), with other colours getting actual abilities that are interesting, like First Strike or Flying or non-keyword stuff even, Green is super-boring but super-powerful. I don't think any of the colours are really S tier at this point, too much colour pie bleed has occurred, perhaps as I see more of the new sets (which seem pretty interesting, and offer more unique cards arguably) I'll bump one of them up. 'Can't lose the game' is 100% Protection. Black's unique stuff is literally just cards that are ridiculous, especially the crazy old enchantments from back in the day, Chains of Mephistopheles for example, effects that are not really part of the colour pie, and this is where Grixis in general shines, it's got lots of effects that aren't really 'on the colour pie' because they are so weird, and Red gets the most of these crazy Chaos effects. Land destruction is under Removal and Wipes btw, and yeah Red is probably the best at this, especially hosing the living shit out of the poor Blue players with Boil. I think if you didn't count it as removal, Blue has tons of theft effects for all manner of stuff, so that's crazy unique, other decks might get stuff out of the graveyard, but Blue can just take stuff. I think Dimir is pretty much 'you can do anything you want as long as it'll help you win', while Izzet is 'you can pretty much do anything, even cost yourself the game!', put them together to create crazy and memorable games. White is openly the least unique colour for the record, it's supposed to be the 'support' colour that helps fill gaps in your deck, being 'stand out' at few things.
For the strongest colour, it goes like this: U is S, being able to counter almost anything/bounce anything and remove lots of stuff make it an extremely strong colour, it also has various extremely weird stuff like Mana Vortex and 'bounce a thing if you do a thing' effects that can be much better than most White Stax in non-cEDH games, Blue also has access to flyers/evasive creatures and has the best payoffs arguably for hitting people, it's really rough taking on an entire pod if everyone is 'out to get you', Blue does require the most skill to play though, other than maybe White. White has the highest budget generally to compete, it is never especially easy to play do to it's numerous weaknesses. Black is a very viable mono-colour, and isn't as hard to master as Blue or White, Green and Red are both very easy to play and both are quite solid with other colours to support them. I wouldn't want to play mono-Green or Red especially, but both are viable at high levels and low alike, mono-Red can be pretty skill testing in some builds at higher levels though. So, I'd go U at S, B is A, Naya is probably about equal in terms of overall power at C, quite a bit below the crazy shenanigans that Dimir can pull off. Naya is just full of Casual beaters/playable but not great cards, and if you wanted to build a powerful deck you'd build around Dimir first and foremost. I'd put W down a tier lower, but good players consistently do fine with White, so it's viable apparently. Green has ramp, but you can just run Storage Lands in other colours so who cares (I'm only semi-serious, but those are not bad cards secretly), right? Red has 2 really good fast mana cards that see consistent high level play, but you don't often run a ton of other R in a 5 colour deck, you've got a handful of staples, I just checked and Kenrith Storm on the database has 10% Red Symbols, even less than it's 11% for White and 14% Green, and this is a STORM deck, designed to storm off, at the highest level tables, and in 5 colours, and it runs very little Red. Red has big flashy staples now, but it doesn't have the guts to build with, you still want tons of Dimir. Blue in Casual as a mono-colour deck suffers mostly from having a weak board, but you can end up with a pretty wide board, and Blue is remarkably good at pulling off an upset vs an overconfident opponent, stupid stuff like Polymorphist's Jest or Mass Diminish (which is worse yet better at the same time). Blue needs it's card draw and tutors to find it's solutions in it's toolbox, but it's toolbox is very good. As far as ramp goes, Blue does have some ramp, it's also about the best colour at just hitting consistent land drops over time due to it's draw. I mean, you probably have to use a strong Blue Commander to go Mono, like Talrand or Orvar, but they do exist. I guess Talrand is just way worse Kykar, but those 2/2s coupled with various 'screw up people's swings' cards will win games if your power level isn't too high.
I kind of think they are undervaluing a lot of the things blue can do, especially artifact synergies essentially giving it ramp and recursion rivaling green.
For board wipes it's WBU(R/G tied) White is amazing. Black is good but only hits creatures. Blue has full board bounce (can redeploy but that's a whole turn wasted to end up less than where they were) Red and Green have good removal but it's limited in the number of cards that are worth playing to wipe.
It pains me that no one brought up withering boon, a legitimate 2 mana black counter spell. I have gotten so many people by holding up counter magic in mono black
For removal: White S Black A Blue B Red C Green D White is unquestionably best while black has so many great effects and even cards like attrition, blue has good spot removal that is somewhat versatile, red has great artifact removal lots of damage dealing and chaos warp, and green hits mainly artifact and enchants and only has 2 cards that deal with any permanent.
Tomer had them all 3 nodding hard when he couldn't stop naming good blue removal until he said something dumb about bounce.. lmao EDIT: I love how they were so about to agree on the mass removal section until they began debating the foundation of the very argument itself ahhahaah classic
Click bait tile is, well, just that, there is no argument for blue being the worst color. Having access counter spells, artifacts synergies, some of the best instant speed interaction, and the absolute best card advantage. There is no way that blue is the worst color in Commander, this is a meme.
Go with a casual mono-blue deck and try to win anything. Mono-green and mono-white will destroy you. Mono-black is pretty much the same. Mono-red can be kind of equal, since all the burn is so inefficient, but that’s it.
I think blues color identity is unique in that it lets blue "bend the core rules of magic". So it interacts on the stack, it messes with extra upkeeps, extra turns, it mills cards, it has alterante winconditions based on number of cards in hand (artemsis, omniscience in some sense) or in library (jace, thassa's oracle, labman). It also has cool alternate wincons related to its mastery over artefacts (mechanical production, phyrexian vs mirrodin enchantment thingy). I think expanding this, and possibly the sphinxes as blues core multiplayer identity could be a good way of 'pushing' blue for commander, without breaking it in other formats and maybe even without making i obnoxious. I think adding more counterspells is not the way to buff blue for casual, and giving it ramp would indeed make it very unfun in casual, and break the pie which is not good imo. Give me more cards that give me weird extra phases (extra untap steps, extra end steps, extra end of combat step, whatever, bend those rules, skip steps of opponent turns, phase things in/out; interact with exile if you really want, more knowledge is power themed alternate wincons, for example if you have more cards in hand then all your opponents combined, you win)
Touts Gilded Drake as a creature removal option in Blue despite the $260 price tag, yet claims Gate to Phyrexia is too much for a black option to remove artifacts because of the $60 price tag. This does not compute.^^
White is so much better than black. You guys forgot about fateful absence, cribswap, despatch in an artifact deck and the white auras that pacify/mutate a creature to a do nothing creature. They synergize with enchantress decks too. Sure black has more quantity of kill spells but white has better overall removal spells.
That Blue board wipe discussion was hilarious. But seriously Cyclonic Rift is definitely a board wipe. Its commenly said the graveyard is your second hand, so how is destroy that much better than bounce?
I personally consider bounce as removal, that being said, this view only stems from the amount of graveyard recursion that every color has now. Eerie Ultimatum works when you do get board-wiped, but not if you get bounced.
"Green is really low on uniqueness" gee that can't possibly be a function of Wizards just taking things from other colors and giving them to green could it?
I personally think Green ruined Magic a bit. It became so ubiquitous at 'good stuff' that it is the reason for the most color pie breaks and design changes we are seeing in modern day design (such as white now getting card draw).
I think red is better spot removal in cedh than casual. you don't see 9/9 in cedh and lightning bolt is actually played also red elemental blast, pyroblast
Is the threat on the board now? No? Then the threat has been removed. Whether it's been removed temporarily or permanently is a question of quality, not nature.
Well, unless your opponents have a reliquary tower or similar effect granting no maximum hand size, a cyclonic rift will be getting rid of most of the permanents bounced with it, since they won't have the mana to replay everything on their next turn and will have to discard down to 7 cards in hand.
I feel like you guys left out a pretty big area- how easy can a color play “unfair” Magic. The ability to cheat costs on cards, use life as a resource etc. never really came up. I think those factors probably push Black ahead of White in mono color decks. But great conversation and really enjoyed these episodes.
People are gunna think im sweaty showing up with my abzan decks. Even though hypothetically abzan would be the best colour trio, theres really no good commanders in that identity. abzan good stuff would be so much fun though Also, for blue ramp, I think they should have more "copy target permanent" so you could copy a land and it would count as ramp
Rift has to be considered a wipe. Being able to redeploy doesn't mean it isn't. You're clearing the board. Plus you're almost always putting your opponents back a couple turns. The only common best case on the receiving end of Rift is you get to FULLY redeploy in 1 turn. Which usually isn't the case. Graveyards are so relevant in Commander that I feel like people can often redeploy from the grave anyways. So if people replay stuff from their grave, did you wipe the board or not? Yes. Yes you did.
a very helpful category would be: best ways to win the game/ best threats. that would help to explain why green is the best color. best ramp and best threats just make it the best color. also the insane amount of card draw green got in the near past. thats why blue is the worst color. bad ramp, bad threats, okay card draw and too interactive. "oh blue player, you have only a few creatures? guess I attack you". blue lacks so many things in the midgame.
I’d really like to see a ranking of the best two colour pairings. I think it would be a really interesting podcast that has a lot of connections to this one.
Despite white being my favorite color, and being mostly a monowhite and selesnya player, I wouldn't rank white above B on the overall ranking since... White isn't good at WINNING the game. And that has been a serious problem over my magic the gathering years. White plays to stall, to not lose, not to win.
Yes! They need a category for each color’s unique WIN CONDITIONS (outside of regular combat). For example historically white generally attacks, but it is getting more niche “win the game” cards. Blue has mill, self mill, combos, etc. red and black also have great combos.
@@drmskipper and white's creatures for combat aren't that good either. Sure they usually have keywords, but we need to assess the fact that white's aggression is only good on limited. They have kept designing that for more than 20 years, as if limited was the only thing there was to design combat for, and it shows.
You can really see their playstyles from these rankings. Specially richard. The targeted removal is just the 2 or 3 best that count. Counterspells are super lategame cards, them costing 3 mana is no big deal, he'll hpld it till the end of the game on turn 15 and if he cast it it's either by absolutely not having a choice or he's winning the game because of it.
I would appreciate it if you guys leaned more into budget considerations. If you rank a color based entirely on one single card that’s expensive, you probably won’t see it in casual play. Especially pickup casual games. For example, Green is good at ramp no matter what your budget is. Black is ok at ramp with Coffers+Urborg, but without those two costly lands it doesn’t have much
yes. if blue can't play rift or all is dust, what is it playing? There is whelming wave, but even this card is extremely avarege as a wrath, but white has so many choices for wraths that,at minimun they destroy all creatures and in all budgets too that you can say it has better wraths than blue
I think Best Support Color would be a good category to add in the future. Like at 57:11 Crim said White has so much that makes it the best support color. Where as for me, Red needs a high volume of it's burst effects and lacks ramp and card advantage which makes it the worst support For me Support looks like WG UB R
Blue also has Imprisoned in the Moon, feels good to hit a commander with it. If they got no enchantment removal, their commander is out of commission for the rest of the game lol
Im so annoyed that they seem to severely underestimate Black Ramp. Like there is so much good sac ramp in black, from thrulls, to somdevi adnate, pitiless plunderer, black market not to mention being best known for Dark Ritual and having Overeager Apprentice which turns other card into Dark Ritual.
It’s a shame that the new 2 mana chaos warp (wild magic surge) wasn’t revealed before this podcast because I would be curious to see how it affected opinions
@@brningpyre you make some good points! The efficiency has certainly come with a lot of downsides (destroy, finds a permanent with the same type, 2 red pips) to balance it out, which I like that it’s not just unconditionally better. I also meant how it affected opinions of red as a color in relation to other colors since it now has 2 really flexible removal spells that go in every red deck
it's fascinating that blue is so low, but I think it's entirely because of what it does and what non Cedh is like. Because it does only do a few things really well, drawing cards, stack interaction, and enabling broken combos. And that third part is basically never in casual, the second isn't as important when you're not protecting the third, and every colour draws cards now. I mean it also does broken things like taking extra turns, but that's also frowned upon.
great pod! way late obvs, but for unique/strengths of each color i like: White - lifegain, auras/equips, enchantment focus, stax, protection, go wide, flying, blink, small creatures Blue - copying stuff, storm, flying, extra turns, artifact focus, blink, stax, mill Black - sacrifice, graveyard focus, discard Red - storm, copying stuff, artifact focus, burn, go wide, combat focus/extra combats, land destruction, stax, discard Green - +1/+1 counters, enchantment focus, go wide, protection, graveyard focus
In CEDH it's blue all the way. Red is still meh in cedh. Card draw, interaction, win cons are most imortant. Mass removal is irrelevant. Land ramp is irrelevant. 1.Blue thassa/lab man/jace. rhystic/mystic/ledger/cantrips. pongify/rapid/reality/cyclonic. Actual counterspells !! 2.Black Thassa, Ad naus/peer/necro. Real tutors that get anything !! All the Reanimate effects. Ritual mana for black card draw spells. 3.Green/Red (Mana dorks, anti blue counterspells, Dockside, Underworld breach, extra combat, green recursion) 5. White (The best stax, land destruction) Other colors have good stax anyways- Dauthi, Endurance, Grafdigger's, Thorn of amethyst, collector ouphe, Magus of the moon, opposition agent etc
Cyclonic Rift is 100% absolutely categorically a board wipe.
See also Damn. Just because the single target mode gets used once in a blue moon doesn't make it not a board wipe.
@@zackkelley2940 damn is orzhov not mono black, that white pip makes it not legal in mono black.
@@atk9989 My mistake, but the point still stands. It is very much still a board wipe.
I like to think each one of them is on a sine wave of good and bad takes, but they're all slightly off-phase from each other which is what makes this podcast great to watch
@@zackkelley2940 They’re not saying it’s not a board wipe because it has a targeted mode, they’re saying it’s not a board wipe because it bounces things, which isn’t a permanent solution. They had the same take on Unsummon.
I agree that single-target bounce spells aren’t good enough to be considered removal, because the opponent can replay that one thing on their next turn and then they’re back to normal. But mass bounce spells are definitely board wipes, because they reset the board, and opponents won’t be able to get everything you bounced back down in one turn. And maybe they’ll even have to discard some of it to hand size. It buys time, which is what board wipes are supposed to do.
I get that it's goldfish and all, but every time I hear someone call Richard the fish father, I can't help but think the cod father would sound amazing
Codfather is 100% better
Mass bounce is absolutely removal, most boards can't rebuild in just one turn after a rift
It’s more that’s it’s one sided removal too as most blue decks aren’t board heavy and your opponents also loses lose all there tokens which in commander is often a lot.
Alot of blue board wipe affects blue too
I don't know how they can argue it isn't removal. I mean by definition a bounce effect is removing a permanent from the battlefield
It definitely counts as removal for token decks
Love the way u figured out a way to present the individual tiering :) good job !
Thank you! Adding the letter ranks made things either very cluttered or very small, but adding just the symbols felt like the sweet spot :) EDIT: Only now did I realize I should've put the category titles at the top of the screen and not have them disappear, oops :(
I really like it
@@MTGGoldfishCommander incremental improvements. Thank you for the hours of entertainment. Really appreciate u guys!
The strongest part of ramp is that it has a guaranteed/reliable payoff in the command zone. Ramp's weakness in 60 card formats is not having the payoff at the right time. Having a 3 cmc commander makes playing 6-7 1 cmc mana dorks a much more powerful inclusion in the deck. Or having a 4 cmc commander out on turn 3 because of 2 cmc mana rocks. Having that guaranteed playoff takes so much risk away when committing to mana ramp (in any form)
That's a great point. Having a guaranteed spell to spend your mana on minimizes the biggest risk of ramp.
Richard is such a contrarian that he really had Seth defending green spot removal when he actually ranked green higher than Seth 😂
Yep everybody knows a guy like this you can't tell him nothing yet he will bark in your ear all day about the right way to do things.
I loved that part. Also, he got Seth to say artifact removal was less important and then got him to say green is very good because it has artifact removal.
@@isaacsmith3998 just proved seth doesn't know his own opinion. Seth is also never paying the 1.
Also rating red's spot removal A lmao
Cyclonic Rift bounces 7+ turns of work that *will not* be redeployed in one single turn. It's absolutely a wipe.
Especially rewarding if you don't have a maximum hand size, which isn't uncommon in blue. It's not uncommon to see salty discard after Rift, hehe.
Also all tokens, including the increasingly common treasures, are actually whiped, hehe.
“Bounce spells don’t count as removal because they can just play the creature again” is a weird line of logic. Wouldn’t that make exile effects the only real form of removal?
I feel like bounce counts as removal because you can counter it when they try and send it back down. It also clears off counters, equipment, and enchantments. Tell people who play against my Inalla deck that bounce doesn't count when I have like eight plus wizards that etb bounce and you never get to do anything.
@@SilverAlex92 problem is blue has 99 different 3 mana or less bounce (non-land) permanent spells. In a blue deck you can remove something every single turn. Blues actual weakness is having very limited draw engines that dont cost mana.
I agreed with Tomer that theft spells are removal. Blue spot removal very solid.
Steal Enchantment is so underplayed. 2 mana to steal a tithe or rhystic study.
Blue also has Imprisoned in the moon which can remove a commander from the game (even a planeswalker commander) almost indefinitely for some decks.
@@anthonymcclellan6256 I didn't check steal cards assuming there were too expensive mana wise for my deck, ty for the tip off. thats amazing. theres a white one that destroys an enchantment and then every other enchantment with that name for if you're the one player st the group without the money for them or haven't proxied them, also a 2 drop.
@@matthewdevey8878 is that the one where you can exile stuff when you draw? if so I just have a hard time seeing that being allowed to stick around if you can even resolve it.
I considered adding it to my value engine deck but it seemed like it would pull ALL of the aggro.
edit: idk why I chose to Google after and confirm I was talking about a different card.
This episode is basically an excuse for us to talk about the strengths and weaknesses of each color. Our rankings are meant to be generalized and based on our experienced power level (mid-power). Obviously there's far more factors, most notably the actual commander choice; if someone ranks Blue lower than Green that doesn't mean they think a Blue deck led by Urza is weaker than a Green deck led by Autumn Willow. CEDH is its own beast and the weight of each category would be totally different -- countermagic would be more important for example -- and not reflected in our rankings.
You could bounce something then counter it when they play it again
@@darthanakinII that's two cards and anywhere from 3 to 5 mana to remove something.
saw this title and my internal reaction was "i'm not even going to dignify this with a click" ........ but here we are
henlo my fellow clickbaited Blue players
got'em
I bet they even asked to hear your thoughts down in the comments.
@@Dawsenconway like and subscribe
Blue being the worst makes sense for lower powered combat based metas where combo is frowned upon, but at tables where people jam the best staples of each color blue may be the best. I only play against randoms in LGSs and am always way more worried about the mono blue deck than the mono green deck. There is a wide range of power levels between the average Commander Clash deck and CEDH, which I don’t play, and saying blue is the worst color broadly in EDH is bizarre.
What color is the best in a vacuum like this vs what color you're scared of at the table is a completely different question, though. Most of what they were looking at in this video was interaction, which outside of counterspells blue has a hard time with and counterspells are generally inefficient in multiplayer formats. Green has arguably the best noncreature removal and can shore up the creature removal with fights which are often quite cheap.
The reason you're often scared of the mono blue deck has to do with the way they win rather than the strength of the deck. Mono green decks will pump out creatures and smack you with them and at any time you can wrath or murder a key creature and the deck will usually fall flat on it's face. Blue will pull some uninteractable combo and unless you have a counterspell ready you just lose. Wincons weren't really talked about at all this video, just generic cards like interaction so they don't factor into the ratings. Also most people I see running mono-blue decks are running decks that are much higher power than most of the rest of the table; borderline cedh with tons of fast mana and undercosted/free counterspells.
@@robertweavill2072 there were also issues with how they defined categories. For example; while blue ramp does rely heavily on artifacts, it is also the color that can take the best advantage of those artifacts. I’m sure we’ve all seen blue decks copy and/or untap their Thran dynamos and sol rings loads of times, which is a uniquely blue form of ramp that went totally unappreciated. Board wipes is another spot where as a mono blue player it’s much easier to keep the board clear of lethal threats with cards like cyclonic rift, evacuation, scourge of fleets, etc. while setting up a kill than if I’m the red or green player. Yes it’s largely a tempo play as they can recast their cards, but honestly a hard wrath can be making life easier for the reanimator deck to recover faster too, so there are comparable trade offs. A lot of the arguments made against blue in this video seemed to almost purposefully look past how blue decks actually operate in the wild. It is laughable to think red should be ranked higher than blue in single target removal just because chaos warp exists when blue has a huge catalogue of single target answers to pretty much anything from bouncing (too many to list) to destroying (pongify and rapid hybridization ) to transforming (imprisoned in the moon and frogify) to freezing (Frost Titan like effects) to exiling (Raven form and resculpt). If we’re exclusively talking metas where attacking with creatures is the only real path to victory, then sure blue is lacking in this category, but I’ve personally been killed much more by blue sun’s zenith x=100000 than by a craterhoof in random lgs games. It’s not just randomly vomiting out a combo that wins blue games, it wins because of it’s all around strength in the format.
@@robertweavill2072 yup, I also play with random rotating tables at my lgs and the blue and green decks are always afraid of the other in my experience. Creature players are worried about getting countered or combod and control/combo players are worried about dying before they can set up
@@frosty980 even in metas where attacking is the only path to victory, blue can be absolutely terrifying. Blue has the most flyers, and the most straight up unblockable creatures. Sure, they are usually low to the ground, but they also usually have payoffs for actually hitting. I've killed more people with Tetsuko than I have with Feather.
(Replying to the original comment) But the point is, blue decks have to go for a combo finish because they don't have other options that are as strong as the other colours. So if you're looking at what the colours have to offer in a vacuum, blue does very poorly on many metrics. That's what the commander clash crew identified here. What WotC could do is give blue more means to push towards a win then decks would exist that aren't combo and have a proper chance of fitting into low-mid power games.
I feel like blues interaction is a bit undervalued here, and black is a bit overvalued in that sense. Pongify is strictly better removal cost wise than most of blacks removal, raven form hits artifacts and creatures, bounce spells hit almost anything and can end up timewalking someone, etc...
still think blue is lacking a bit in regards to diverse playstyles and options for "fair decks", but I dont think its nearly as bad as people seem to make it out to be either.
My problem with blue is it lacks win cons. As a secondary color,blue might just be the best for its interaction.
@@joshholmes1372 I would 100% agree on that. It does not win well, especially in "fair" "casual" games where combos are frowned upon.
Also the speed the table turns on you the second you counter something. People hate being told no.
I am definitely most scared of mono blue player at the table, because they're either Storm, an artifact combo deck, or a Laboratory Maniac/Thassa's Oracle combo deck lol
I'm beginning to realize just how influenced the CC Crew are by how infrequently they play two-card or even three-card combos as a primary win condition. I think that, more than anything, is the driver of ideas like "mono blue is weak" and "spot removal is overrated."
When you don't have to worry about your opponents comboing off at all, it definitely skews the metagame and what cards are worth playing or not worth playing
@@swirlingtoilets this is why I love blue decks like Tetsuko. It's a unique avenue to win in blue, and most people underestimate the deck.
Richard's targeted removal tier list is just the best 2 removals of each color, he doesn't play more then that in any given deck
thats lazy ...
Seriously. But I mean like he said, he only runs like 2 spot removal in a deck so it'd made sense he'd run the top two in the colors he's using
Which makes sense, outside of a controller/politics deck you don't want that many more.
@@MasterDoctorBenji Debatable. I personally run a good bit of removal depending on the deck I play. But I definitely agree there is such thing as too much targeted removal
@@NoNo-qt4ov when you run more removal and keep playing with the same playgroup, eventually they stop running removal and rely on you. Richard would rather run 6 birds and dousing dagger and lose than be the "police". After all he is playing with Seth, and he is never paying the 1.
Honestly, Tomer is schooling them all on Blue's removal ranking. I commented on the last podcast that if I'm building a Dimir or U/B/x deck, I'm putting in Blue's spot removal over black's. It's just more efficient, and can kill artifacts. Seriously underrated.
Agreed, though black has creatures with removal etbs it can make use of.
But instant/sorcery wise, Black has one S (Deadly Rolick) and a bunch of B/Cs, while U has like 4 As and a B.
And you only want so much spot removal.
Absolutely.
Ravenform, Pongify, etc. are all excellent. Not to mention scaleable spot removal like Cyclonic Rift and Curse of the Swine.
Agree. Not sure why everyone sleeps on Pongify. Just feel like most people think is okay or bad
@@NoNo-qt4ov I think most people are playing spot removal in Commander wrong. If they're using it to kill a Bird or something, than yeah, it's bad. But you can't do those 1-for-1's in Commander. You have to save it for game-ending threats.
@@brningpyre definitely agree. I have a Mizzix deck and it was vital that I save my Spot removal and Counterspells towards the end. Most people I see use them pretty quickly and on things that are technically strong but not worth wasting a spot removal at
Blue’s transformation removal is severely underrated. Frogifying a commander is great. Killing a commander with spot removal is card disadvantage. You lose a card in hand and they can still recast the commander. But if you frogify the commander, then they spend a removal on the enchantment, that was one-one interaction.
What blue removal is enchantment based? Pongify, kills and leaves an extra body behind. Turn to frog, only causes the creature to become a 1/1 and, lose abilities until the next turn.
@@thomasjacobs4919 Imprison in the Moon
@@thomasjacobs4919 Kasmina's transmutation, witness protection, and mystic subdual are all cheap blue auras that make a creature lose its abilities
@@thomasjacobs4919 there is an card called “Frogify” from throne of Eldraine. Turn to Frog is from magic origins and yeah I think that is a really bad card
Only problem with those effects is that they are sorcery speed. They do not protect you from combos and some commanders gain so much advantage even if they have them for one turn like the korvolds and chulanes that if you don't counter them or instant speed remove them it will be a minor inconvenience to them at worst.
The more i listen to this podcast the more i belive this guys don't play enough islands and manarocks.
Bouncing may not be a permanent solution but the fact that you get very cheap ones, instant speed ones and creatures attached ones. Makes blue amazing at keeping the board clean. The only real problem blue has in casual is closing out games, cause u want to stay away from combos so you are left with few, subpar, options. Also you are severely underrating mono black powerlevel.
Exactly. Blue had amazing interaction, but has limited win cons outside of comboing out. Blue is probably the best secondary color. It protects your stuff, slows down opponents, and has great cantrips for digging.
15 mins in: "Man, Tomer getting beaten up on Blue removal." I'm with Tomer here; Blue has enough ways to get rid of creatures. At least a B.
The other guys are massively underrating bouncing creatures. Tempo is as important as card advantage, especially in a multiplayer game like this. Having even one big blocker bounced back to your hand often means becoming vulnerable to 3 rounds of attacks before you can recast it.
@@andyspendlove1019 blue has the best reactionary removal. Its just not permanent. But pongifying chulane after its cast breaks the loops and sets them behind. Dispersing smothering tithe before the opponent draws removes 4 or more (7 on average)mana and invalidates turns. Unsummoning an urdragon removes eminence even if it was brought out by hellkite courser.
Blue is above average. At everything.
Blue is the single best color at dealing with literally all threats. It has the game's best board wipe, the largest number of spot removal spells, the hardest removal to avoid, and the most aggressively costed removal. These guys created the categories to manufacture a ranking that seems legit if you don't actually pay attention. They separated all of the categories into "blue" and then "this card type, except when it's blue those don't count".
I have to say, completely agree with Tomer as a mono blue player. Bounce is also severely unrated
Plus bounce synergizes with countermagic to be a permanent solution.
Often you don't need to permanently remove something anyways. If you bounce something extremely threatening they're forced to recast it on their next turn. You can often effectively take away an entire turn since recasting most big threats is expensive, *and* it keeps a target on their back distracting the rest of the table.
Also many threats are assembled. If you bounce a creature that has accrued a threatening number of +1/+1 counters, auras, or non-repeatable until end of effects, it often does not return as anything similar.
@@timbombadil4046 If you’re bouncing a creature, you’re usually taking _two_ turns away from them, because they’ll have to recast it next turn, and then wait another whole turn to be able to attack with it.
Richard arguing that Red has better spot removal than Black is wild, LOL.
I feel like their group in general really underplays Indestructible creatures. Every other table I've played at ALWAYS has at least one ind. creature or other permanent on the table.
There's just also a ton of cards that are good exile based removal for black, like deadly rollick and baleful mastery and sacrifice effects also are very effective.
Probably because there's so much exile in their meta due to people playing indestructible creatures and graveyard recursion in the past.
Richard is the most unhinged person on this podcast. Idk if he a contrarian or just insane.
@@NinjaPicnicers I think that's a bit much. He just has a different perspective based on his style of play.
Their group overplays removal in general, which in turn leads them to undervalue permanents of all kinds.
Ah the clickbait, as for the actual answer. I actually think Red will be the weakest color if not already in the near future The biggest thing holding White back was card draw/card advantage and Wotc so far has been exploring different ways to do so.
Weird to me Richard and Seth don't consider Cyclonic Rift as mass removal. Is literally removes everything on the board. Especially if you do it before someone's end step and then they have to discard to hand size. Its insane
Bounce isn’t removal is the take which I get. They can replay those things
As if they’re getting another turn when you Rift on the end step before your turn lol, not to mention this assumes infinite mana
@@joshuasnyder4101 They definitely have the chance to replay. But I mean as long as you do it on someone's end step and your turn is next, I assume you're going to hit them from anywhere to half their health or all of it since they have nothing. Plus I mean unless their deck is all ETBs they're going to have to spend another turn replaying everything which I think gives you plenty of time to win. Plus again, if you do it at the main threats end step they will most likely half to discard a lot of their stuff
@@NoNo-qt4ov I use cyclonic as a defensive card unless I know I win the next turn
@@joshuasnyder4101 but you're forcing them to spend mana on that thing again. Bounce is a tempo hit, and in alot of cases it is removal. Snap is one of the best removal cards that people aren't playing enough
In a format where the graveyard is considered a second hand I would say that bounce spells are close, though not equal, to destruction based removal.
Bounce gets so underrated. It’s very strong to hit “non-land permanent” for 2 and slow them down.
i had this same thought... like if it goes to their graveyard it is even cheaper to get back than if it goes to their hand.
Wouldn't that mean bounce spells are BETTER than destruction?
Richard is 100% wrong about extra turns. There is not a single mid powered deck in the game that would not be improved by adding a Time Warp to it. You don't need to be an extra turn deck to make use of what is essentially a free spell that draws you a card and gives you extra main/combat phases. There just will be incidental synergy no matter what deck you are playing.
I have a collection of the entire mystical archive, made a volo deck, stuck time warp in for the hell of it and that card is busted. I have had 2 accidental infinite combos happen with it, and it just wins games “fairly”
Big fan of the rankings showing up over the individual cameras, appreciate the constant improvements on this podcast!
Richard with spot removal: random with chaos warp is good
Richard with counterspells: random with tibalt’s trickery is bad
Richard is a contrarian...
to be fair choas warp can lead toward your opponent doesn't get anything valuble if the top card of there library is a land or a non permament spell. Meanwhile Tibalt will always hit a spell for your opponent to be able to cast.
This has been a super interesting exploration of each color by itself, though I'd be curious how your answers would have shaped out if you'd ranked each color pair and wedge as well. I'll bet you'd find that a lot of color combinations that include blue end up on higher on that list.
Crim: Edict effects are not "spot" removal--they don't deal with specific threats, all else being equal.
Tomer's right on Blue, it has multiple, efficient, instant speed creature removal. I'd say it's above Red--which just has chaos warp+good artifact removal--and maybe even Black.
Seth is too hung up on permanently removing. Yes exile>destroy>bounce, but Rift still resets everyone else's tempo, and gets rid of tokens and counters as a bonus. Everyone has to rebuild using their mana and hand. Sounds like a boardwipe to me.
Richard: ...3-4 removal spells?
But Crim's examples are Edicts that deal with the *strongest* Threat. Make an example in particular always hit the exact card you want it to, at the very least.
Lightning Bolt is so underrated in commander. The format has gotten smaller and faster these days. Archon of Emeria, Hushbringer, Drannith Magistrate... so many problematic creatures can be delt with with a bolt.
Ok I'm gonna need these guys to not put black and green in the same tier for counter spells. On top of imps mischief they also forgot withering boon 2 mana pay 3 life counter a creature spell. I'm pretty sure there is a black enchantment that counters things too but I may be misremembering on that one.
Green is getting counterspells in baldurs gate tho
Cool black counter I did not hear mentioned - Withering Boon. It's a color-shifted Essence Capture they never see coming. Niche but not bad at all.
not really that niche, in a format with a creature on the command zone (most of the time), it's like the best counterspell for the format.
@@P3rs3cutr0ll Niche in the sense that it has narrower targets than generic counterspells that hit everything. This is why a card like Essence Scatter, also niche, does not generally see play. Also, I'd argue that the "best counterspell" for the format would hit more targets i.e. Counterspell/FoW/Counterspell. Not bad for non-blue though. It'd likely see more play if people knew about it.
Black in bottom tier for counter magic:
Can't belive y'all sleeping on Withering Boon.
Dashed Hopes in Shambles
I consider bounce removal. With how easy it is to get anything back from the yard I dont see it as a whole lot worse than destroying creatures. Don't get me wrong, it is worse but destroying a creature is not even close to permanent.
In my opinion, counter magic is spot removal, and because of this blue is an S in spot removal. I know y’all had a separate category for counter magic, but I wouldn’t separate that from spot removal.
Yeah, have come to see it as temporally rather than categorically limited removal. Shatter can only destroy artifacts, counterspell can only remove a threat while it's on the stack.
It kills something. If I doom blade something as soon as it etbs, that’s removal, so why does it not count if I kill it before it etbs?
Isn’t it kinda bad removal because it requires you to respond first? Like opponent A casts a blightsteel and I have a path to exile in hand. You counter it, and I still have my path in hand.
In a way, when you use them for removal instead of saving the game, you’re priority bullying yourself in a way, since you are responding at the first possible second instead of the last possible.
That’s why i personally don’t like counterspells as removal, I like them for saving my board/the game
@@Spirited_skiing alternatively isn't it better removal? Your opponent plays Dockside Extortionist, do you want StP or Counterspell?
@@Spirited_skiing you say that til a thoracle or dockside or protein hulk lands.
They should definitely remove the top card for each category per color from their consideration, as good as some of them are, one card can’t carry mono colored deck and I think it would give a better representation of a colors power.
I agree. Especially since the top card for most things is very expensive and your average casual player won’t have it. Like last week, they said Black has good ramp because of Coffers+Urborg
dedicaded mono red player here. I play each and every enchantment removal I can grab. played the 7 mana Scour from existence, played 5 mana sorcery Introduction to Annihilation and draws your opponent a card, extremly excited for the new 2 mana one in Baldur's gate. In commander you can't be picky about spot removal
@@fernandotanigushi8310 sounds like you have a high amount of…. Devotion to Red
@@TransformersBoss I guess you can call Fernando Devoted Druid
Seth called resculpt not a great card :(. I really think resculpt is still incredibly underrated. I consider the best spot removal in blue.
I personally find black the least interesting or fun colour to play.
Yea, I don't think blue is better than red in mass removal. Like yea I agree kind of that Cyclonic Rift is one of the best board wipes. But other than that I agree with Richard, if I have blue/red deck I will rather run chain reaction, Blasphemous Act etc over evacuation, flood gate or Fade Away. And no I will never play Fade Away. Just having one good board wipe doesn't in my opinion make it better than red with multiple choices. Even with like less seen options such as star storm, Volcanic Torrent or Magmaquake.
the discussion about what a counterspell is was very weird. how could you possibly consider veil of summer a counterspell? a counter spell has to say "counter" and "spell" on it.
Black green blue white red for me. Black can do so much and can combo off so much with just cheap cards
I would place green above black but agree with the rest
@@Marocax I can understand that
Blue isn't a low tier for spot removal any more, it's got lots of exile vs creatures, cheap destroy vs creatures, and can even deal with artifacts reasonably well, all this ignoring it's access to bounce, so I feel like I'd order things thusly: W is S tier again for removal due to how many good options they have to deal with essentially any card type now, Sultai is at A Tier, with each having shortfalls in it's package, Red is probably C tier as it can remove creatures, planeswalkers, artifacts and even players with it's spells/effects, but most of them require a lot of resources to work effectively. Remember, Red can generate a ton of mana and use that to burn pretty big stuff, it's issue is that it can't readily exile creatures, so Red is hardly a slouch in this area, but it's not really above what you'd call 'average'. Black technically can remove artifacts, enchantments, creatures (it's 2nd best at this, White is just better except Deadly Rollick), planeswalkers and sometimes a player, which is honestly pretty good if you've got a high enough budget to afford the good removal. It's also worth noting that Blue's best 'spot removal' is actually just Counterspell, so it's not like Blue can't deal with almost every card for UU, a big part of why Blue is not a bad colour, but apparently we're putting that elsewhere. Green has tons of naturalize effects, lots of fight effects for creatures and planeswalkers, and it has some damage based wipes vs flyers (and rarely vs other targets technically)/targeted removal for flyers, as well as having various 'destroy literally any permanent' stuff, Desert Twister is probably playable in budget mono-green, and Beast Within is a top tier card. I would say creatures and planeswalkers are the weakest area of Green's removal, but it's naturalize stuff is actually better than what you get in White generally, Green also has cheap wipes for Artifacts and Enchantments. Huh, now Tomer brings up card theft as removal, I'm actually liking that point and I've listed it thusly, stealing stuff is making it 'not a problem anymore' usually, and often turns it into an asset for you. Blue also has some pretty big 'spot removal' effects, Mental Manipulation and Curse of the Swine can be a late game spell to swing a game, either can just devastate a board, especially in a Simic deck.
Counter magic is clearly just 'Blue Removal', but okay, I'd tier is U at S, Boros at C, and Golgari at D. In other formats, you've got weird counters that can matter, but you don't run Meren in cEDH because of her sick interaction package IMHO, you'd run a Jeskai deck for that. Stack fiddling is biggest in U, but it's also present in Boros in some cases, part of why Jeskai spells decks are pretty solid inherently at very high levels, they can just interact with everything and control the board. I guess Green has stuff like Avoid Fate? Does that matter? Black has essentially nothing. I think I might agree with Richard that White has slightly better stack interaction, look at all those W Silence effects, along with various 'bad' mono-white counters like Memory Lapse, along with Rebuff the Wicked, it's not like W can't do stuff. You could even use Teferi's Protection as a sort of counter, more or less dodging an annoying (or worse) effect, and there is also Angel's Grace. Red has less, but it does have some. Maybe I'd say W is C+ and R is C-? I guess R does have stuff like Fork, and Pyroblast?
Green is good at wiping flyers, artifacts and enchantments. Ezuri's Predation is hilarious, but I use Monstrous Onslaught to good effect in OG Multani, where I can play it and deal +20 damage as I see fit, which should result in a dead player due to them having no blockers left. If you remember that Green can easily Naturalize wipe, Green is probably a bit better than you're rating it. Anyways, W is S for wipes, R is A, Golgari is B, U is C. None of the colours are helpless here, but R is arguably the least narrow colour after W, which can just wipe anything period. U is the hardest to work with, but it's mass bounce isn't bad, and it also has big spot removal like Curse and Manipulation, but Green's numerous naturalize wipes along with it's bad solutions to creatures/planeswalkers are solidly better, but not generally more relevant in a Commander game than Black's access to several very good Wrath effects. Black does suffer a ton from versatility issues, but it can also force mass sacrifice potentially, which can win the game while dealing with some problem permanents, I think Black might be worse than Green if your meta actually cares about naturalize. Red is actively good at wiping artifacts, and it's not bad at clearing the board of most creatures, and it can also blow up lands, especially non-basics, but it also has Flashfire, Boil/Boiling Seas and Omen of Fire if you really hate Azorius. Red has damage wipes galore, both big, small and versatile, so Red can be very good at controlling a board with wipes.
For uniqueness, I feel like it should be Grixis on top, Grixis gets access to all of the cards that are just ridiculous that aren't Shahrazad, they've since taken away some of the uniqueness of these colours, but White is not known for crazy/chaotic effects (it does have them I know, like mass removal that trickles permanents back into play), but chaotic effects are a viable strategy to actually win games in Grixis, you don't even need wincons, you can just steal theirs. Anyways, I'll rate as follows: R is probably A, Dimir is B, W is C and G is D. White has some unique stuff, but it's biggest features are just removing things (either one at a time or a bunch at a time) and hitting people with creatures, I guess Silence is pretty unique? Protection stuff in general I guess, but I think you should break Protection off into it's own area. Green is low on the uniqueness totem, with very few cards doing especially interesting things, often the Green card in a creature cycle's perk is being big and having Trample (more true historically I guess), with other colours getting actual abilities that are interesting, like First Strike or Flying or non-keyword stuff even, Green is super-boring but super-powerful. I don't think any of the colours are really S tier at this point, too much colour pie bleed has occurred, perhaps as I see more of the new sets (which seem pretty interesting, and offer more unique cards arguably) I'll bump one of them up. 'Can't lose the game' is 100% Protection. Black's unique stuff is literally just cards that are ridiculous, especially the crazy old enchantments from back in the day, Chains of Mephistopheles for example, effects that are not really part of the colour pie, and this is where Grixis in general shines, it's got lots of effects that aren't really 'on the colour pie' because they are so weird, and Red gets the most of these crazy Chaos effects. Land destruction is under Removal and Wipes btw, and yeah Red is probably the best at this, especially hosing the living shit out of the poor Blue players with Boil. I think if you didn't count it as removal, Blue has tons of theft effects for all manner of stuff, so that's crazy unique, other decks might get stuff out of the graveyard, but Blue can just take stuff. I think Dimir is pretty much 'you can do anything you want as long as it'll help you win', while Izzet is 'you can pretty much do anything, even cost yourself the game!', put them together to create crazy and memorable games. White is openly the least unique colour for the record, it's supposed to be the 'support' colour that helps fill gaps in your deck, being 'stand out' at few things.
For the strongest colour, it goes like this: U is S, being able to counter almost anything/bounce anything and remove lots of stuff make it an extremely strong colour, it also has various extremely weird stuff like Mana Vortex and 'bounce a thing if you do a thing' effects that can be much better than most White Stax in non-cEDH games, Blue also has access to flyers/evasive creatures and has the best payoffs arguably for hitting people, it's really rough taking on an entire pod if everyone is 'out to get you', Blue does require the most skill to play though, other than maybe White. White has the highest budget generally to compete, it is never especially easy to play do to it's numerous weaknesses. Black is a very viable mono-colour, and isn't as hard to master as Blue or White, Green and Red are both very easy to play and both are quite solid with other colours to support them. I wouldn't want to play mono-Green or Red especially, but both are viable at high levels and low alike, mono-Red can be pretty skill testing in some builds at higher levels though. So, I'd go U at S, B is A, Naya is probably about equal in terms of overall power at C, quite a bit below the crazy shenanigans that Dimir can pull off. Naya is just full of Casual beaters/playable but not great cards, and if you wanted to build a powerful deck you'd build around Dimir first and foremost. I'd put W down a tier lower, but good players consistently do fine with White, so it's viable apparently. Green has ramp, but you can just run Storage Lands in other colours so who cares (I'm only semi-serious, but those are not bad cards secretly), right? Red has 2 really good fast mana cards that see consistent high level play, but you don't often run a ton of other R in a 5 colour deck, you've got a handful of staples, I just checked and Kenrith Storm on the database has 10% Red Symbols, even less than it's 11% for White and 14% Green, and this is a STORM deck, designed to storm off, at the highest level tables, and in 5 colours, and it runs very little Red. Red has big flashy staples now, but it doesn't have the guts to build with, you still want tons of Dimir. Blue in Casual as a mono-colour deck suffers mostly from having a weak board, but you can end up with a pretty wide board, and Blue is remarkably good at pulling off an upset vs an overconfident opponent, stupid stuff like Polymorphist's Jest or Mass Diminish (which is worse yet better at the same time). Blue needs it's card draw and tutors to find it's solutions in it's toolbox, but it's toolbox is very good. As far as ramp goes, Blue does have some ramp, it's also about the best colour at just hitting consistent land drops over time due to it's draw. I mean, you probably have to use a strong Blue Commander to go Mono, like Talrand or Orvar, but they do exist. I guess Talrand is just way worse Kykar, but those 2/2s coupled with various 'screw up people's swings' cards will win games if your power level isn't too high.
I kind of think they are undervaluing a lot of the things blue can do, especially artifact synergies essentially giving it ramp and recursion rivaling green.
For board wipes it's WBU(R/G tied)
White is amazing. Black is good but only hits creatures. Blue has full board bounce (can redeploy but that's a whole turn wasted to end up less than where they were) Red and Green have good removal but it's limited in the number of cards that are worth playing to wipe.
You're only playing 2-4 board wipes in a deck, so the best 2 cards are really all that matters.
It pains me that no one brought up withering boon, a legitimate 2 mana black counter spell. I have gotten so many people by holding up counter magic in mono black
I’ve always wanted that card
For removal:
White S
Black A
Blue B
Red C
Green D
White is unquestionably best while black has so many great effects and even cards like attrition, blue has good spot removal that is somewhat versatile, red has great artifact removal lots of damage dealing and chaos warp, and green hits mainly artifact and enchants and only has 2 cards that deal with any permanent.
Tomer had them all 3 nodding hard when he couldn't stop naming good blue removal until he said something dumb about bounce.. lmao
EDIT: I love how they were so about to agree on the mass removal section until they began debating the foundation of the very argument itself ahhahaah classic
Click bait tile is, well, just that, there is no argument for blue being the worst color. Having access counter spells, artifacts synergies, some of the best instant speed interaction, and the absolute best card advantage. There is no way that blue is the worst color in Commander, this is a meme.
Go with a casual mono-blue deck and try to win anything. Mono-green and mono-white will destroy you. Mono-black is pretty much the same. Mono-red can be kind of equal, since all the burn is so inefficient, but that’s it.
@@asmodean7239 I run a mono blue deck. That isn't true.
I think blues color identity is unique in that it lets blue "bend the core rules of magic". So it interacts on the stack, it messes with extra upkeeps, extra turns, it mills cards, it has alterante winconditions based on number of cards in hand (artemsis, omniscience in some sense) or in library (jace, thassa's oracle, labman). It also has cool alternate wincons related to its mastery over artefacts (mechanical production, phyrexian vs mirrodin enchantment thingy). I think expanding this, and possibly the sphinxes as blues core multiplayer identity could be a good way of 'pushing' blue for commander, without breaking it in other formats and maybe even without making i obnoxious. I think adding more counterspells is not the way to buff blue for casual, and giving it ramp would indeed make it very unfun in casual, and break the pie which is not good imo. Give me more cards that give me weird extra phases (extra untap steps, extra end steps, extra end of combat step, whatever, bend those rules, skip steps of opponent turns, phase things in/out; interact with exile if you really want, more knowledge is power themed alternate wincons, for example if you have more cards in hand then all your opponents combined, you win)
Crim's pup is the goodest doggo.
YOU CAN ABSOLUTELY SLOT IN A LIGHTNING BOLT IN A DECK AND CALL IT A DAY!
sorry for shouting, my love for bolt is too much
I love Richard but I would never follow his advice lol. I'm glad people like him exist, but good god his advice/rankings are usually pretty terrible.
Touts Gilded Drake as a creature removal option in Blue despite the $260 price tag, yet claims Gate to Phyrexia is too much for a black option to remove artifacts because of the $60 price tag.
This does not compute.^^
White is so much better than black. You guys forgot about fateful absence, cribswap, despatch in an artifact deck and the white auras that pacify/mutate a creature to a do nothing creature. They synergize with enchantress decks too.
Sure black has more quantity of kill spells but white has better overall removal spells.
That Blue board wipe discussion was hilarious. But seriously Cyclonic Rift is definitely a board wipe. Its commenly said the graveyard is your second hand, so how is destroy that much better than bounce?
I personally consider bounce as removal, that being said, this view only stems from the amount of graveyard recursion that every color has now. Eerie Ultimatum works when you do get board-wiped, but not if you get bounced.
"Green is really low on uniqueness" gee that can't possibly be a function of Wizards just taking things from other colors and giving them to green could it?
I personally think Green ruined Magic a bit.
It became so ubiquitous at 'good stuff' that it is the reason for the most color pie breaks and design changes we are seeing in modern day design (such as white now getting card draw).
Unsummon I see as a fine blue removal spell, it’s not the best removal but it’s legit
I think red is better spot removal in cedh than casual. you don't see 9/9 in cedh and lightning bolt is actually played also red elemental blast, pyroblast
Is the threat on the board now?
No?
Then the threat has been removed. Whether it's been removed temporarily or permanently is a question of quality, not nature.
I mean, if you don't play combo and discount all the best blue stuff, yeah, maybe it is the worst...
Well, unless your opponents have a reliquary tower or similar effect granting no maximum hand size, a cyclonic rift will be getting rid of most of the permanents bounced with it, since they won't have the mana to replay everything on their next turn and will have to discard down to 7 cards in hand.
blue is also the most expensive to play with a decent blue deck needing the crazy expensive counters.
I feel like you guys left out a pretty big area- how easy can a color play “unfair” Magic. The ability to cheat costs on cards, use life as a resource etc. never really came up. I think those factors probably push Black ahead of White in mono color decks. But great conversation and really enjoyed these episodes.
The Cyc Rift debate had me dying XD
People are gunna think im sweaty showing up with my abzan decks.
Even though hypothetically abzan would be the best colour trio, theres really no good commanders in that identity. abzan good stuff would be so much fun though
Also, for blue ramp, I think they should have more "copy target permanent" so you could copy a land and it would count as ramp
Y'all are just playing blue wrong. It's definitely S tier.
Rift has to be considered a wipe. Being able to redeploy doesn't mean it isn't. You're clearing the board. Plus you're almost always putting your opponents back a couple turns. The only common best case on the receiving end of Rift is you get to FULLY redeploy in 1 turn. Which usually isn't the case. Graveyards are so relevant in Commander that I feel like people can often redeploy from the grave anyways. So if people replay stuff from their grave, did you wipe the board or not? Yes. Yes you did.
Got some word choice errors in there but y'all should get the point
Entertaining but some of the most ludicrously inconsistent ranking.
Glad to see Crim covering for Rotwolf's absence, hope to see him again
They totally need to play only mono blue one week. And see how it feels then they need to play all mono colored decks the next week
White can also just permanently remove a commander from the game(Out of Time and Opulescence combo). It really can just yeet stuff out of existence.
bolt is way better then estimated. I catch people all the time with bolt.
a very helpful category would be: best ways to win the game/ best threats. that would help to explain why green is the best color. best ramp and best threats just make it the best color. also the insane amount of card draw green got in the near past. thats why blue is the worst color. bad ramp, bad threats, okay card draw and too interactive. "oh blue player, you have only a few creatures? guess I attack you". blue lacks so many things in the midgame.
I’d really like to see a ranking of the best two colour pairings. I think it would be a really interesting podcast that has a lot of connections to this one.
Your meta is generally pretty low removal I’d say
Despite white being my favorite color, and being mostly a monowhite and selesnya player, I wouldn't rank white above B on the overall ranking since... White isn't good at WINNING the game. And that has been a serious problem over my magic the gathering years. White plays to stall, to not lose, not to win.
Yes! They need a category for each color’s unique WIN CONDITIONS (outside of regular combat). For example historically white generally attacks, but it is getting more niche “win the game” cards. Blue has mill, self mill, combos, etc. red and black also have great combos.
@@drmskipper and white's creatures for combat aren't that good either. Sure they usually have keywords, but we need to assess the fact that white's aggression is only good on limited. They have kept designing that for more than 20 years, as if limited was the only thing there was to design combat for, and it shows.
Because the card "Seal Of Removal" exists, I consider bounce removal.
You can really see their playstyles from these rankings. Specially richard. The targeted removal is just the 2 or 3 best that count. Counterspells are super lategame cards, them costing 3 mana is no big deal, he'll hpld it till the end of the game on turn 15 and if he cast it it's either by absolutely not having a choice or he's winning the game because of it.
I consider counter magic as spot removal.
I would appreciate it if you guys leaned more into budget considerations. If you rank a color based entirely on one single card that’s expensive, you probably won’t see it in casual play. Especially pickup casual games. For example, Green is good at ramp no matter what your budget is. Black is ok at ramp with Coffers+Urborg, but without those two costly lands it doesn’t have much
yes. if blue can't play rift or all is dust, what is it playing? There is whelming wave, but even this card is extremely avarege as a wrath, but white has so many choices for wraths that,at minimun they destroy all creatures and in all budgets too that you can say it has better wraths than blue
14:57 It turns out bounce is the opposite of suicide.
Skred, Lightning Bolt, Abrad,
I loved this podcast so much. Don't ever change, guys. So many awesome disputes.
I think Best Support Color would be a good category to add in the future. Like at 57:11 Crim said White has so much that makes it the best support color. Where as for me, Red needs a high volume of it's burst effects and lacks ramp and card advantage which makes it the worst support
For me Support looks like
WG
UB
R
Why has nobody claimed the "GoldFather"??
The number of notable creatures Lightning Bolt kills in EDH goes up every time somebody asks "who would play that?"
Yea. Abrade is such an all star for this reason.
I'm shocked Crim and Tomer didn't mention Hibernation when listing the best blue wipes
Blue also has Imprisoned in the Moon, feels good to hit a commander with it. If they got no enchantment removal, their commander is out of commission for the rest of the game lol
Im so annoyed that they seem to severely underestimate Black Ramp. Like there is so much good sac ramp in black, from thrulls, to somdevi adnate, pitiless plunderer, black market not to mention being best known for Dark Ritual and having Overeager Apprentice which turns other card into Dark Ritual.
Seth comparing unsummon to swords has me cracking up 😂😂
Archivist of Oghma + Deep Gnome Terramancer say hello from the 3rd best color in magic ::: OKETRA REJOICE!
It’s a shame that the new 2 mana chaos warp (wild magic surge) wasn’t revealed before this podcast because I would be curious to see how it affected opinions
It's an important distinction that it destroys, so it's tough to compare it to Chaos Warp. It also guarantees they get something, unlike Chaos Warp.
@@brningpyre you make some good points! The efficiency has certainly come with a lot of downsides (destroy, finds a permanent with the same type, 2 red pips) to balance it out, which I like that it’s not just unconditionally better.
I also meant how it affected opinions of red as a color in relation to other colors since it now has 2 really flexible removal spells that go in every red deck
it's fascinating that blue is so low, but I think it's entirely because of what it does and what non Cedh is like. Because it does only do a few things really well, drawing cards, stack interaction, and enabling broken combos. And that third part is basically never in casual, the second isn't as important when you're not protecting the third, and every colour draws cards now. I mean it also does broken things like taking extra turns, but that's also frowned upon.
I think overall for all formats and including competitive play it goes
Blue
Black
White
Green
Red
Green or red can be swapped.
White also has like unique "Grand Abolisher" type effects or "Silence" which are key in CEDH.
Richard is fucking insane
great pod!
way late obvs, but for unique/strengths of each color i like:
White - lifegain, auras/equips, enchantment focus, stax, protection, go wide, flying, blink, small creatures
Blue - copying stuff, storm, flying, extra turns, artifact focus, blink, stax, mill
Black - sacrifice, graveyard focus, discard
Red - storm, copying stuff, artifact focus, burn, go wide, combat focus/extra combats, land destruction, stax, discard
Green - +1/+1 counters, enchantment focus, go wide, protection, graveyard focus
In CEDH it's blue all the way.
Red is still meh in cedh.
Card draw, interaction, win cons are most imortant.
Mass removal is irrelevant.
Land ramp is irrelevant.
1.Blue
thassa/lab man/jace.
rhystic/mystic/ledger/cantrips.
pongify/rapid/reality/cyclonic.
Actual counterspells !!
2.Black
Thassa, Ad naus/peer/necro.
Real tutors that get anything !!
All the Reanimate effects.
Ritual mana for black card draw spells.
3.Green/Red
(Mana dorks, anti blue counterspells, Dockside, Underworld breach, extra combat, green recursion)
5. White
(The best stax, land destruction)
Other colors have good stax anyways-
Dauthi, Endurance, Grafdigger's,
Thorn of amethyst, collector ouphe,
Magus of the moon, opposition agent etc
SUNDER… vs Armageddon… sunder isn’t land destruction?? Sweeper not sweeper