If You HAD to Ban or Unban a Card...? | EDHRECast 301
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- Опубліковано 1 лют 2024
- Commander's in a very healthy place! But if you were FORCED to make a change, what would it be?
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Smothering Tithe should probably not trigger off the first card your draw each turn. If it punished people for drawing extra, and left more room for casual decks, it would regulate itself better.
It shouldn't exist or it should cost about 6 mana.
Yes! The fact it punishes your first draw is the major factor why i think it is a bad card, feels like youre being punished for just playing the game
Sheolderd shouldn't count the first card each player draws too
Smothering tithe on turn two in casual lobbies ... Is dumb ... And solrings exist ....
Smothering tithe has proven itself as a cedh playable. As well as rhystic study. If casuals have a problem with the card, leave it to those tables. I do not build my casual decks with expensive cedh cards. I oftentimes play powerful, cheap interaction. Soul partition, for instance.
And I oft jam simian spirit guide and elvish spirit guide in everything because they're so cheap.
But cards like smothering tithe, rhystic study, and these other super powered value cards that scale even harder in casual are just softbanned for me.
Cards like orcish bowmasters though I think is fine in casual. It doesn't do that much and boardwipes are more prominant
Personally, i really think that the "self regulation" arguments really conflict with who the ban list is for. If the ban list is truly for random people at an LGS, then why take the chance that the one person might not have self regulated and built a MLD deck, or put drannith in, or iona etc. Its immensely easier to have the play groups allow these self regulation cards with a rule 0, than to expect people to willfully choose not to run them against random strangers. People dont tend to have self control. Id rather see an extensive ban list that the play groups who know each other can selectively take cards off of, then let the LGS experience be thrown to the wolves.
I tend to agree with this sentiment, but I think unfortunately it has more problems when put into practice. I manage a small local play group and we are constantly bringing in new players (either to our group, the game or both) and one of the reasons we decided not to have a special house ban list is that it has two major downsides. 1st, you have to have an onboarding phase with any new person, regardless of skill level/veterancy (we have players who started less than a month ago and former pro tour regulars all in the same group). We don't want to try to bring a new person in and say "hey your favorite card is banned here cause it annoys us" or even "sorry infect player, we hate poison so we arbitrarily made it 20 counters for you to win" because it negatively impacts inclusivity. In a game as complicated and intimidating as MTG can be, we don't want to put up even more roadblocks to people learning the game that might make them decide it's not worth the effort just for a night or two of fun a month. 2nd, managing that ban list requires lots of discussion and thought, and while it's fun to watch an hour or so of thought experiments with my favorite MTG content creators, being REQUIRED do have those conversations (arguments) regularly just to keep the gaming group going sounds like the second biggest group killer behind the demon of scheduling.
If not for those big headaches, I would probably support the "ban first, rule zero later" philosophy.
Personally I think that self regulation is a necessity of the format, it doesn't function without it. It's a social format not a competitive one. There's endless permutations of an EDH banlist because everyone has a different perspective of what *needs* to be banned and that's just way too much onus to put on what is effectively a boardgame with thousands of pieces. What you think is a downside of the format, where most of the banlist are signpost bans is exactly why it's so popular because it's format that wags it's finger at certain types of play but doesn't outright tell anyone not to.
@@steadfastideal well note, i was talking about random strangers at an lgs, not a play group. And in not suggesting having a "new banlist" for your play group, but individual case by case basis as a part of rule 0 conversations. Its much more beneficial to the new player experience to, for example, not be allowed to play tergrid at an lgs, but be allowed to play it against willing friends. That doesnt require coming up with a new banlist for your pod, just having rule 0 conversations.
@@zbaschtian so you resort to attacking me and my deck building, instead of arguing against my points? You're not even correct. Im the player at my pod who runs the most interaction.
@@robertmonroe7930 a fair point. It still requires a conversation that in some ways goes against the spirit of the "play the cards you own" nature of EDH's kitchen table origins. The same issue I described can happen in reverse too ("Wait you guys allow Tegrid? But that cards banned?"). And for better or worse many players use the "official" nature of banlists as justification for problematic behavior. Interacting with it as little as possible sidesteps it for our group, and just ganging up on the guy who won't stop bringing Gaia's Cradle to FNM fixes the rest for my meta. Really just drives home that there's no one perfect solution to the issue.
As an unban Primtime player, Dana's argument actually convinced me why it would be a problem. Petition to add a votable"WEEEEEEEE" tag to cards on EDHRec alongside their salt score.
My reaction to their arguments was, “Soooooo?” The shuffling thing can be annoying, but unless you’re going to draw cards, you can wait to shuffle. Like say you search with Prime Time and then you Cultivate and then fetch… just shuffle when your deck needs to be randomized.
@@crawdaddy2004 yeah, this completely negates the argument. Even with fetchlands, just say youre gonna search, cast your spell and whatever else then shuffle afterwards.
if Prime Time says basic lands, it wouldnt have been banned
@@bamby3144if it said basic lands noone would care. who would have guessed that if you remove the good bit from a card it suddenly looks worse??? (sorry if it came out as rude, i didn't mean it. But come on)
@@Dragostorm21 you could just agree instead of being rude lmao. 2 basics on ETB and attack is still very good
I don’t think Dockside is banning itself, at least not in my LGS. People are playing and flickering that in all their “casual” decks.
That's what I want the banlist to reflect. Hard bans but also a list of soft bans to avoid explosive non-games at the lgs
The EDHREC cast is in terminal denial about 95% of commander players playing proxies now. The entire attitude towards proxies has GREATLY shifted in the past few years, hilariously thanks to wizards.
@@bobby45825 It does bother me that they only ever talk about the price of cards when it comes to availability (for more reasons than 1).
I think the people at my LGS are mostly playing real cards because they brag about the cost of their decks, but that's beside the point because I agree that many people proxy now, myself included. I just don't proxy cards that I don't personally want to see across the table.
@@seanedgar164 Yeah, it's rough. I don't like the idea of banning anything, but it super sucks when you sit down to play a casual game, tell everyone you don't play any tutors, fast mana, free counters, Dockside, stax, etc. And they all sit down and play a bunch of those cards.
I want people to have the option to play whatever they want, but the people at my LGS don't seem to have much restraint or ability/interesting in appropriately matching power level. Fortunately, I've found a lot better matches on Spelltable. I just wish I could find people to play in person that knew how to properly represent their decks.
And, thus, the ban list starts to feel like a reasonable solution for a lot of these excessively powerful cards.
@@maxleveladventures When I was playing with my guy friends, I used to get them proxies as well to make it perfectly clear that I'm not trying to literally muscle anyone off the tables just because I'm playing with cards they can't "afford". Our group also played with a restricted ruleset against infinite combos and turns as well so everyone could build balls to the wall and nobody could claim something unexpected or "unfair" (for the most part) was the reason why somebody won. Usually it was better politics or fear mongering or king making but not "it's cause you have omniscience".
Primetime was banned in the goodstuff era. It took advantage of the social contract by putting you so far ahead on lands, which was hard for your opponent to interact with. Now the format has sped up and I feel like the decks are so synergistic it is less of a problem. I think EDHRECast episode 251 pretty much makes the case for a lot of cards from this era to be unbanned :D
Dockside is the modern day prime time.... once ine hits playt, if it did not just win on the spot,the entire game becomes about the Dockside... all this from a 2 yes that is TWO mana spell!
They didn't mention other cards like Etali, Primal Conqueror and I'm like "guys, there's insanely better blink targets over prime time. Sorry but that's not good enough anymore."
Etali is good but what you get from it is random, with a lot of variance depending on the decks of your opponents.
Meanwhile, Primeval Titan grabs multiple combo pieces from your own deck and vomits them out, and he does that not only when they ETB but also when they attack, making it easier to abuse
@jinxed7915 it's better to have a discussion on whether Gaea's cradle and Cabal coffers should be legal or not. Outside of those lands, what's the most insane thing prime time is grabbing? Everything beyond that point is just good or ok but not game breaking by any stretch
Maybe in cEDH where they play a minimum of a dozen pieces of fast mana and the entire meta is built around turbo-ing out spells?
@@jinxed7915 Etali cannot miss, you get 4 spells on etb. PrimeTime is more efficient (it gets 2 things you can choose) but saying Etali has a lot of variance is kind of disingenous. 4 spells + 7/7 trample and it's an ETB does push it into PrimeTime category. I had to cut it because even if it hits 4 mana rocks, it's absurd.
Banning Sol Ring sure would be a bold move for the reason you mentioned, but at the same time, I feel like the issue you listed with Manacrypt are so much more present with the Ring, because of its ubiquity. And it's just that it's also part of lower power pods too, it even feels like a bigger problem there aswell.
Banning Sol Ring would just let Mana Crypt and Vault be even more busted. Casuals would cry rivers of tears.
Rightly so, because leaving the Crypt unbanned at that point would be pure pandering to the enfranchised players.
I mean, if you *want* to drive a huge swathe of players into the arms of the Indistinguishable-Without-a-Jeweler’s Loupe proxy-makers, go ahead with a ban like that.
Just don’t be surprised when every single person who *was* playing Sol Ring shows up with a 4$ Mana Crypt you can’t tell from the original without a loupe.
I get the arguments against Sol Ring. Were it up to me, *all* the cheesy 0-1 cost artifact mana would go. It’s just not going to happen that way, so no one would end up happy with a this-or-that ban.
That would make banning it a net positive
My own personal "challenge the stats" that I discovered is Arterial Alchemy in Chishiro, The Shattered Blade, which isn't even on his EDHREC page. It's an enchantment that creates a blood token for each opponent when it enters the battlefield and it makes all blood tokens you control equipments, so 3 equipment blood tokens means 3 spirit tokens from Chishiro, or more if you already have Doubling Season or Parallel Lives on board.
Definitely gonna try this out!
The thing about restraint in EDH is that people don't have it when it comes to value. Many of the cards that are slam dunked into places they probably shouldn't be are ones that give more resources. Thats why people don't jam Protean Hulk like they would Prime Time, Hulk is a wincon, and in EDH people like to win in particular ways. The road to get to their weird wincon, people aren't so picky about, despite ramp and card draw being two of the strongest things in a game of Magic. I've seen so many Docksides at casual tables, and thats not even a card people like. Prime Time would actually be everywhere, in every green deck.
Companion just needs to not function in Commander. It's the only "from outside of the game" mechanic allowed from some reason, and I hate that inconsistency. If Companion is gonna be allowed to have a "Companion Zone", why wouldn't "wish" cards be allowed a "Wish Zone"? Just ditch both fully and remove the headache.
Funny enough that's a rule I never had to play with a decade ago. We were playing a casual multiplayer format to wind down after the FNM. If the card says "from outside the game" it just means something you own and have nearby. Otherwise fun, splashy, inefficient things like paying 20 to activate Spawnsire of Ulamog have literally nowhere to be played in full spirit of the card as written. I understand not wanting to have a sideboard specifically because there is no "sideboarding" in a best of one multiplayer format but also it's not sanctioned play, so when it really gets down to it, the unique rules for EDH are not set in stone.
Just let "outside the game" work as intended: Whatever cards you have on you. Sideboards aren't necessary, they're just the restriction for 60 card tournament play.
The RC gave their reasoning on why the 8 legal companions were allowed to function. The fact they require deck building costs and hoops to go through, and mostly they only play themselves, no wishing for anything that's a silver bullet for the particular scenario
15 minutes of buildup only for Matt's first point to be "Dockside isn't banned, Demonic Tutor allows you to tutor, and Apex Devastator is splashy so I don't know why this card that jams all three of these effects into a single card that's also harder to interact with is banned." 😂
Great episode, guys. I love how you kept it respectful and saw each other's points of view.
Mirror Entity is also funny on Delney decks because if you really need a good generic creature with a triggered ability that isn't necessarily 2 or less power, you can make it a 2/2 so you get a double trigger on it
So long as it's not an ETB trigger, as by the time you could make it a 2/2 with entity, the window for it to trigger and Delney to see it would have already passed.
I would honestly love to see a return of banned as commander and unban all the cards that are just problematic as a commander
I've heard the reason they cut this was literally just them being afraid that MTGO couldn't handle a separate banlist for just that. Lutri shouldn't be banned in all zones, just companion and maybe as commander, same for braids and the like. Really just absurd.
@@TrogdorbadLuttri absolutely doesn't need to be banned as commander. It's such a mediocre card compared to all the possible Izzet legendaries
I see a lot of Drannith Magistrate in casual metas.
Regarding Dana's point on Prime Time - he is SPOT on. Why is Rhystic Study acceptable in casual games? There is no reason. No deck "needs" Rhystic, but it shows up in so many decks
To be honest, what makes Rhystic Study so powerful is that people play poorly. You should almost always pay the 1. As soon as someone regularly stops paying it though, then everyone stops paying it and that’s when the RS player gets to run away with the game.
I find that my stax deck needs it, because a card that reads "spells your opponents cast cost 1 more" is great, but I don't think that deck is in a position to complain about it, being stax 😂
Yeah. I Just had one of "those guys" play Koma into a pretty mid Power table and drop rhystic and j-lotus and argue he "needed it" because his Commander was so expensive
@@Dragon_Fyre Sure the cards gets so much more problematic, the worse people play against it, but my issue with the card is how crazy it is, even when your opponents play it perfectly. For the absolute bottom you get 3 mana: "Spells your opponents cast cost 1 more to cast" and that's quite strong still, so I never exactly got this point.
@@Krunschy Grand Arbiter Augustin IV makes all your opponents spells cost 1 more AND your spells cost 1-2 less. That’s even better an effect than Rhystic Study if people would just pay the tax.
Super hyped for your takes on this. Looking forward to seeing how we agree and/or disagree. Always an interesting topic.
Iona would probably self regulate now, yes. I also faced it before the ban as a new player, and that part was so un fun. If an experienced player at that playgroup didn't house ban it, I dont think I would have continued to play commander. So, I could argue either way these days. Essentially, that house ban was technically self-regulating.
Seems like i agree with literally everything else in the episode 😅
I think Dana actually hit a hidden point that the RC uses to ban cards (or not ban) about the "Weeeeee" factor. Prophet of Kruphix was banned because people couldn't regulate themselves. Its also probably a big reason why some of the more egregious offenders people want banned is because out in the wild it is regulated. Which mean that your playgroup is letting problems thrive.
As a game designer, I'm always intrigued in the creation of counterplay options for example, what would you do if there was a 4 CMC colourless mana rock that while it was on the battlefield no mana abilities on any artifact with 2 CMC or lower could be activated? Treasures, frozen. Mana Crypt and Sol Ring, paused. Your Worn Powerstone would still work and the land focussed players would be fine. The dockside player still has vandal blast to stop you but it would force a little more back and forth. Adding more tools is always the healthiest IMO but this has mostly just been a shower thought I felt posting.
It wouldn't be played because its 4 CMC, it won't function as a mana rock at that curve and people won't just play it because they rather ramp at 2 than screw opponents. I mean, Vandal Blast, Stony Silence and Culling Ritual always existed. If people wanted to counter play, they would do it. But nobody likes to hinder themselves or play such ruthless cards in order to fix bad design.
Sometimes the best way to solve problematic things in games, it's to get rid of them (Ban). You should be critical, step back and ask yourself 'Is this card/element really adding something to the experience/game? Is it worth it the frustration/trouble?' Sometimes yes, sometimes no. Sometimes is not about balance, but about fun and feel.
@@patonnight This is EDH. 4 mana is nothing. Also the other examples you listed are symmetrical, and there's a big difference between screwing over just your opponents vs needing to bend your deck around it. Symmetrical is a better design I think because of that, but there's a reason folks play Cyclonic Rift over something like Evacuation even though it costs 3 more mana.
Isn't it a bad Karn?
I would like to ask why your cutoff is cmc "2 or less" and not 1. 2 hits signets and talismans, which are the go-to artifact ramp cards, and I don't think I've ever seen people complain about those.
as for the "isn't that just a bad Karn"... a "bad Karn" that isn't vulnerable to being attacked by creatures and makes mana sounds like an extremely powerful hate piece.
The only card I would consider banning is Gaea's cradle, for the sake of consistency. Both Tolarian Academy and Serra's Sanctum being banned but GC not feels like it sends mixed messages. In terms of power even, I'd argue that Serra's Sanctum is the less powerful of the three. Why should it be banned if GC isn't ?
Moreover, Library of Alexandria's reason for being banned is it's price, and I don't see why that wouldn't apply to the cradle too.
Serra's Sanctum isn't banned.
My bad, I misremembered.
Mirror entity is even crazier in that Delney deck. You can play your super big creatures with cool effects and set their power to 2, swing, then pump them back up!
Regarding Sway of the Stars - if it hadn't been banned when i started playing EDH back in 2009, my first deck would have been Jhoira of the Ghitu. I had a 60 card deck that ran four of her, and I'd suspend a few beaters (Greater Gargadon, Deep-Sea Kraken, etc.) plus Sway of the Stars. Then I'd stack the suspend so the game was wiped/reset to 7 life before letting a beater enter with haste. However, it was banned, so I started with teysa, Orzhov Scion instead.
I would never accept a Mana Crypt ban without also banning Sol Ring.
I think you got it backwards. A solring ban would be ridiculous as long as mana crypts are allowed. One is clearly better than the other, and less accessible for most.
I think the lower power levels should be defined, not by bans, but rather by broad general philosophies.
I'd prefer something like "one piece of fast mana per deck, no mana denial, nor any taxing/punishing of necessary game actions (drawing, casting spells, tapping lands).
Thoughts?
My point is if one goes, they both should go. Mana Crypt is not clearly better than Sol Ring (after turn one; they are essentially the same). If accesability is to be a criteria for banning, then ban the entire reserved list. Define "fast mana" in a way that doesn't make playing anything other than green viable. Define taxing of "necessary game actions" in a way that doesn't send white back into the dumpster of commander colors. @@drew-id
Ah, the old “Commander players can’t tell the difference between 1 and zero”
It’s funny how everyone intuitively understands the power difference between Counterspell and Cancel, but remove the two blue pips and leave 1 generic vs. zero and suddenly people are like “NO WAY ZERO IS BETTER”
The other issue is banning sol ring would make pretty much every precon unplayable out of the box. For me that’s the strongest argument for not banning sol ring. Mana crypt isn’t in precons
apples to oranges. can't compare a counterspell with a mana rock. Sol Ring and Mana Crypt are both mana rocks that provide two mana. Turn one Mana Crypt is marginally better than turn one Sol Ring. After turn one; the power difference fades. @@mkill572
My friend and I 3-0'ed our WAR two-headed sealed in great part thanks to Bond of Discipline. It instantly became a card I love and keep an eye on!
Was wondering if someone would say Iona 😂 I genuinely do not think there’s a single positive for taking it off the ban list
The rules committee recently updated the ban list with official reasons for each card's banning. Interesting that the power 9 were banned, not because of power, but because of how expensive they were.
It would be both. They were OP staples for CEDH and unaffordable by the majority of players.
Odd considering Timetwister is still legal, and it will set you back $4k on the low end.
Terrible reasoning as the secondary market constantly shifts and most players proxy now.
This is not the stated reason. 8 of the power 9 were banned so people wouldn't look at (what was then) a new format and think they needed to build a Vintage deck to play it.
Part of that was the perception of cost, but the other part of it was creating a distinct identity for EDH as a unique format.
@TheSpikeFeeders which is hilarious that they would be cEDH staples, and if commander were ever implemented on arena, suddenly the "price" argument would be out the window.
I still don’t know why the rules committee has not banned storm crow!
Tergrid is my answer to a CEDH table. i would not play that deck against normal ppl, unless they did break a deal!
I stopped playing mono coloured decks at my lgs untill Iona was banned. I can came across it 3 times. each time, i was playing mono decks and my colour was chosen each time. It left a bad taste in my mouth. 25:58
The reason Dockside Extortionist won't get banned is that, like Opposition Agent and Hullbreacher, the RC/CAG thought it would be used to curb high power decks without affecting lower power strategies. Any time you talk about the problem, you'll be told "but that's cEDH, that's different". The only solution is to wreck them with it or have the cards escape into the wilds of casual play.
Notice how Hullbreacher's ban emphasized the offensive wheeling.
i actually look forward to hearing the dad jokes for the upcoming episode, i appreciate the humor from the edhrec crew
Coalition Victory being banned while Thoracle exists in the format is absurd.
For my choices, I'd unban Library of Alexandria (if Timetwister and Tabernacle are still legal, I don't see why price is really a concern here). Keeping at or near 7 isn't as easy as it used to be, and draw spells have become much more powerful over the years. Which leads into my ban: Rhystic Study. Rhystic is just too good for the cost, and introduces unfun tax play patterns where you know you're all losing, but you keep struggling against it anyway.
When I've seen worldfire, it's been pretty wild, and I love the sudden race the game becomes. But I love chaos plays.
Smothering Tithe and Rhystic Study and anything like them.
Edit - And Sol Ring.
Coalition Victory being banned because it can “win out of nowhere” is a weird hill for the committee to die on. It’s not like it’s the only card that wins out of nowhere, just the only one that’s banned
*Stares at thassa's oracle*
They probably wouldnt ban it if it was printed now but now the question is is would it add anything positive if it was unbanned and probably not since it probably wouldnt see much play
I've bever been prouder to be from Boston.
I now need a Sol Ring Fenway Park alter.
So I guess we're not even going to acknowledge Thassa's Oracle?
I’d rather see demonic consultation banned. That card has zero use cases aside from naming a card that doesn’t exist in your deck.
@@andrewpeli9019 Ultimately it doesn't deal with the problem at hand. While Thassa's Oracle is not a problem by itself the analysis changes when entire metas form around it homogenizing gameplay and deck building. If i run Thoracle combo in EDH I'm filling so many slots just to tutor the combo when those could've been filled with more creative and diverse card selection. If I sit down and the table expects a Thoracle combo it slows down gameplay cuz we need to leave mana up to disrupt the combo otherwise the person plays 2 spells and the games over. If you ban Demonic Consultation there's still Tainted Pact. Ultimately, the reason I'm for Thassa's Oracle ban is not because it's particularly broken or busted but it's just not fun to me as a wielder or an opponent. It checks alot of the boxes the guys mention in this video from the Commander Rules Committee about what makes a card ban-worthy.
@@andrewpeli9019 Tainted Pact still exists though. And there's even more 3rd tier options to remove the library behind that. Rather deal with the problem card.
Are people winning with it in casual? Not really, I've certainly never seen that. It's cedh exclusive
I still haven't seen a Thassa's oracle in the wild. I guess not something people play at my lgs
I didn't even know Iona was banned! I don't play her because she's too ... oppressive in a targetted way.
I think if we're willing to suffer Kinnan, Bonder Prodigy to exist in the format, it's probably fine to unban Rofellos.
To be honest rofellos never should’ve been banned in the first place. It was just banned as a general (which it should be for sure), but when they consolidated the lists (which I think shouldn’t have happened anyways) it “had” to be banned. My playgroup still played with it in the 99 for years
I also strongly think Roffellos doesn't do nearly as much as he once could.
However because he's on the RL I think he's stuck on the ban list forever
I think they should bring back the Banned as Commander list.
Roffellos is no worse than a lot of big mana options in Mono Green, if you can’t just keep recasting him.
I was thinking last night about the ban list, and did come to the conclusion that while there's a lot of stuff about it that should change, they do occasionally nail it, like with banning Golos, which for my money is the worst card ever printed for EDH.
Karakas is probably worse, but it was technically printed before EDH existed
Honestly I think Golos died for Kenrith's sins, he does every commander staple effect on loop. Golos is at least random though still strong
What a horrible take.
I am a little surprised that Tirgrid lasted long enough to self regulate. As much as i loathe that card it did regulate. At least near me, one person has a competitive tirgrid and then everyone else played it once or twice got their jollies and moved on
I think if you banned iona itd still be put in angel decks. With the cost people would see it as a finisher to kill at least one player, which isnt as good as winning a game, but it also stalls for you a bit if youre waiting for like an akromas will or something.
Damn the self control on not mentioning Rhystic once.
In terms of unbanning, I’m of the mind that the way Commander is structured doesn’t lend well to a banlist, but if I’m only unbanning one thing, I’d say Flash. CEDH has moved past some of the stuff Flash Hulk was doing since the ban, and otherwise it’s not very harmful in casual. In terms of what to ban, Farewell. It has all the downsides of things like Sway of the Stars or Cyclonic Rift without the benefits they have of opening up a line to win.
"It's not Arena, we can't just buff or nerf cards willy-nilly like that"
You say that, but that's exactly what they did to Training Grounds with its Aftermath reprint. They clearly didn't feel like programming Arena to retain the card's original functionality (discounting creatures' activated abilities by "up to" 2 mana - now we don't have a choice and it's always 2) so they just changed how it functions in paper - and you know it's for Arena functionality because none of the other "up to" discounters have been changed, plus one of the reasons Suspend was changed to a May cast was for Arena programming.
Sure, it's technically a barely relevant change, but they literally just printed Dynaheir within the year before that change, and she cares a lot about that "up to" clause. The old promise of "we'll never make functional erratas" has been broken, so who knows what changes we'll see down the road.
I have learned how to play commander (and kinda magic in general) in my LGS against the cashier who played a very high power Tergrid deck (he claimed it was cedh). I lost like 50+ games and won once. In a duel with a creature with a creature recon it was definitely futile against him but he was still fun to hang out with, he helped upgrade my deck and of course taught me how to play. So in my case Tergrid carries a lot of mixed feelings with her because damn I felt like I can't do anything, but I learned a lot, had fun and that one win even though it was insane rng at work felt so good
If a colorless similar costed (arguably easier to cast and can be stuffed into any deck that generates alot of mana) creature like void winnower which makes 1/2 the game unplayable for the entire table is unbanned, then iona only picking on a single color is fine. Rule zero can adjust for mono color decks.
I used to be pro unbending Iona, until I realized how commonly we were getting "create non-legendary token copy" cards nowadays. Turboing out 5 Ionas sounds super cancer, and I don't want it.
But is this easier to do than any other conventional way to win the game, such as natural order into craterhoof? I think the very high risk and generally limited reward of Iona makes her fine to unban, even if there are edge cases where she can lock out the table.
@@manatarakona9593 Yeah, there are easier ways to win, but that's not the problem. The problem is that this would be incredibly toxic to play against, and a lot of people would definitely play decks centered around doing it. Moreover, we do have to consider that such a strategy would only become easier to do as more "non-legendary token copy" cards come out. It's for the best to nip the potential problem in the bud by leaving her banned.
@@magicianofd8434 The toxic argument always loses me when we have stax, land destruction, chaining extra turns, etc. I'm more than happy to have Iona banned if all that other stuff goes, I just don't think the inconsistency helps.
Out of curiosity did you play when she was still legal? Because I did and the general community consensus at the time was that she was hardly ever seen. And we had non legendary clones already from war of the spark and OG sakashima.
I think she was banned because Shivam on the CAG lobbied heavily against her to the RC. I think that's terrible precedent to ban something...
@@manatarakona9593 Yeah, and I never saw her either which is why I was pro-unbanning her until recently. With the current trend of the card game, I think there is a real concern that Iona would become too abusable as newer cards come out.
And as annoying as stax is, there's a huge difference between that and potentially preventing any non-Eldrazi commanders from playing the game at all.
As well, Commander is supposed to be a more casual centered format, the ban list shouldn't only be taking into consideration how powerful a card is. They should be considering what play patterns the card fosters, and whether people actually have fun engaging with them. I think Iona inherently leans towards strategies that I want don't play against, and no one I know does either.
And sure, we can agree that there's probably a lot of cards that also deserve to be on the ban list, but that doesn't mean taking off Iona is a good idea.
But why even go that far? Iona already locks out mono colour commanders by herself. One Iona is already too many.
Cyclonic rift is a card I play in all my blue decks and I always hold it in my hand instead of playing it because it doesn’t feel fun to cast
Major "old man yells at the banlist" vibe from the thumbnail, btw :D
The cards I would consider banning are the mass chaos exchange everything like Scrambleverse and Thieves' Auction. Are they competitive cards? No but they just mix everyone's cards together in a needless mess which probably should only be done with good friends.
They never create a fun game experience and have no competitive upside. I hate mass goad because it's poor taste and "choas" that doesn't affect the caster. All pregame convos
Thankfully I think they realize they pushed a bit too much goad and made a card in the investigate Bant deck that can remove it and give you clues for each creature. Yeah can't say I have much love for mass goad so here's to seeing more options to remove or prevent it.
@@seanedgar164 I don't see how being forced to attack is equal to chaos cards. Sure it's annoying, but it gets folks swinging rather than sitting on their butt, and that you know it's coming means you can lean combat into your favour.
of the interesting banned as commander discussion, is it crazy to say griselbrand would probably be powerful but fine if you had to cast it from the command zone, but is wayyyy too strong when you can somewhat easily cheat its casting cost
I have a deck with coalition victory in it ONLY because it's from the 60 card Turing complete deck. I do let others know and the conditions that I play it are if 1): everyone agrees that it's a dire situation and I have the condition to cast it or 2): the deck does what the deck is suppose to do. If the other players don't agree to that then I play a different deck.
If you play just if your friends at home, the banlist those not matter then, just talk with your friend if Golos is okey or if you should ban Sol ring.
The ban list is more or less just for when you are goin to a new place with new people, So all of you are building your deck with the same possibility and same rules.
SO if your play group HATE Sol ring ban it, but dont get angry/Sad when you are not playing with your friends and you see a sol ring........
Not everyone has a playgroup however. In fact I’d argue most people don’t, most people go to a local card shop to play in my experience
For me, i really dont see good reason for sylvan primordial ban. Its 8 mana creature, thats point where haymakers should generally be.
If someone can repeatably blink it, he's already winning. Its not that much different from Terestodon or woodfall primus. The bad use case is same for all of them, someone just repeat blink them to blow up all lands, which is not fun but its more of a corner case that is already lond of self regulated by "land destruction is bad" social contract.
Prime time ia worse for 2 reason mentioned in episode.
1) its repeatative on its own without shaeningans involved.
2) Its toolbax full of basically uninteractable goodstuff. Big mana from coffers, darkdepth for beating, field of dead for go wide, strip mine for resource denial, bojuka bog or scavanger geound for GY, valakut for removal or direct damage. So many option, and in most cases its against social contract to interact with them.
Thassas oracle is more bannable than dockside
how often do you see it in casual games? in my experience rarely
do people know about yes.
when you build a deck do you build it to interact with other players or just do the theme?
the reason i ask is because in cedh most deck have interaction for this card.
and can stop it very easily aside form being easy to spot it easy to interact with that, aside it kind of self regulates to cedh table for the most part
banning it would do nothing but move everyone to jace or lab man to end the game both with the same effect and strategy.
@@davies250 except you're ignoring that thassa's oracle is much better than lab man or jace. You have a ton more answers. You can remove either in response to the demonic consultation whereas thoracle can only be countered on the stack or have the ability stifled. That being said, I'd rather just ban demonic consultation for interacting poorly with the singleton nature of the format.
also one of the difference between primetime utility and hulk is that hulk get creatures and primetime gets lands and its frowned upon to destroy lands. So it feels like if you get 2 toolbox land its way more then if you get 2 toolbox creatures (sure hulk can combo off but you can still try and interact with most of it ), imagine if a hulk player said "ill get these creatures but don't touch them"
Flash was banned because it was a menace in cedh and not played in casual. Imo thassas oracle who came out when flash was banned should be looked at. Casual has other cards like labman and jace from war of the spark, but thoracle is a menace in cedh and i dont see casual decks running it at all
Flash was banned partially cuz it's such strong enabler for many unhealthy or unfun stuff.
Cheating big etb or die triggers way ahead of curve.
Even prothean hulk. I played with guy who argued that it was very casual to use flash + prot hulk to turbo discard at turn 1, and basically lock game. Cuz he didn't win on spot so it's not cEDH...
Sylvan primordial biggest unfun thing that could be done was to drop it turn 1 when you play last, you have 4 mana rest of table have 0. You are still nowhere near winning game, but you made sure that game will be way slower for everyone else.
It was strong for cEDH for sure, but it was incredibly unfun for normal commander when someone decided to use it.
What i've heard about Prime Time is that it's really game warping. as soon as it hits the field it becomes EVERYONES main plan. you clone it, steal it, reanimate it, and whatever else you can possible do to get the value for yourself.
You can say the same about Dockside except that Dockside is better in every way
@@clashcitycretin10 was just talking about the unbanning of primtetime topic. I would have 0 problems with banning dockside
I'd rather cards be errata'd than banned but it leads to a slippery slope of what cards deserve one, so I'll leave my thoughts and status vote.
I know many would say CycRift, but I love that card as a mono blue answer to indestructible/hexproof boards. Vote: stay unbanned
Primetime is so iconic, but make it add the lands to your hand or at most cultivate style where one hits the field and the other goes to hand. (Even searching two basics is too good since it happens on attack trigger as well) Vote: stay banned
Tergrid is the kind of card that needs to be a once per turn trigger, and if that's still too much, only if it happened on your turn. Vote: stay unbanned, but social contract
Dockside Extortionist is Primetime on crack. Even if it made one for each player with an arti/ench, it'd be good, so put it at 2R and we'd be solid. Vote: banned
If Iona was unbanned and I had a copy of it I would definitely throw a copy of it in my Kaalia deck. That being said I have a lot of angels in that deck that are also hate pieces so it wouldnt stand out; like chancellor of the annex, drana and linvala, liesa shroud of dusk, and serras emissary.
If you and your playgroup were to do a one-off no bans Commander night, I'm curious what spicy banned cards would you play with?
Prophet of Kruphix and Primeval Titan for me. I miss those guys!
Honestly? None. There's already a ton of busto cards I don't play with. I also don't need a bridge when I shoot pool.
For Challenge the Stats, I think Bond of Discipline is a great card but I expect is frequently replaced by better cards such as Akroma’s Will. It’s a good budget option though…
I just still don't like that effect, it's the cheaper version for sure. Free mass attack and I can't die on crackback sucks for nonblue decks
I think having common sense and deceny is the most important thing rather than ban lists, there are gross cards that aren't banned that you should know better than to run in lower power decks.
51:33 I either run drannith as my only stax piece in a deck or I run it in my cEDH stax deck. I currently only have drannith in one deck and it is my Ellivere stax cEDH deck.
We can be responsible lol
This is me realizing that Primeval Titan allowed you to grab two NONBASIC lands.... jesus. I agreed with the ban back then assuming it only grabbed basics.
Today, grabbing basics at that rate isnt that scary, but grabbing any lands at all... yeah thats still bannable.
Banning Demonic Consulation & Tainted Pact
To start off, I think Thoracle in a mono blue devotion deck is rad and a nice alt wincon and by itself is a decent card. It's just the cards that you MUST play in order to make it broken create an issue.
Both of these cards check a minimum of 2 boxes on the ban rules list. Plus they have the added problem that they are not being used for their originally designed purpose.
If you want to search for a card play literally any and all of the modern tutors.
These cards are only played because Thoracle exists and only because they can remove your whole library.
If we also want to reference the secondary market, it has also taken what should be a bulk box card and turned each of them into $15 cards.
That is my hot take, leave Thoracle alone, ban the dumb cards that you are forced to play. Thank you.
First of all: Nice video.
Now, I would love if CEDH have his own ban list and separate treatment than the regular EDH, because the spirit, the motivations and the intentions are different. That will be fair for both kind of players, like it's in French Commander, for example.
And finally, taking one of the most important values of Commander/EDH: this is a format of everyone; why the committee don't ban the reserved list? Magic said that they not gonna reprint those cards, and many of them acquired a ridiculous price, making them impossible for most of the players (specially new). But some old school players (like myself), has them because we were playing for soooo long. And for me, that feels very unfair and gives me the "pay per win" feeling sometimes (like when someone plays a Gaia's Cradle or Mana Crypt).
Iona at this point is basically only a Reanimator/Sneak Attack card at this point in commander. Games are getting so much more faster that natural 8 drops aren't really playable anymore.
9*
We can't mention the ban list without mentioning basketball.
I Appreciate the baseball references Dana.
Dockside Extorsionist does not get self-regulated, the only reason why it's not played in every single red deck is unfortunately only because of it's price 😢
If you think Bond of Discipline is fine, those angel decks could also run Subjugator Angel.
I like the Dad jokes, but then again I liked the opening song bars they used to do on Command Zone too?
I had quite a lot of problems with cedh cards staying unbanned. Most of the games I had with strangers ended with one guy bringing a cedh deck with 3000 dollars worth of fast mana. I understand that some people enjoy playing poker with magic cards, but it really has to be a separate format since it's a completely different and some of it keeps bleeding into normal games. Maybe it's a regional thing, since in Italy people are particularly sweaty about games, and FNMs and casual events are full of people who come intentionally to pub stomp. I feel like having a gun available as an option for a knife fight, even if discouraged by the community, let's people to act in bad faith.
A big contributing factor is that other formats are by default competitive, and going to a casual modern event, you expect people to bring meta deck or brews based around meta, while EDH is casual and we expect to meet people with medium level of power, sometimes even precons and junk combos.
Sol Ring in Modern Horizons would have all the tron players salivating
Prime time argument is simple: dies to removal. First if you’re not running removal, what are doing? And second you’re smartly holding that removal for when something “big” happens. Apex Devastator is a cast trigger so no matter what they’re getting the cascade. There are also a ridiculous amount of big splashing green cards: great henge, vaultborn tryrant, avenger of zendikar are 3 more without thinking. Use removal and use it wisely. To me the prime time argument is not just about the “weeee” factor that was talked about. Because if you’re playing smart you’re saving removal for that “weeeee” moment. If prime time happens, the table LET it happen
I dont agree iona would not self regulate. I might be bias because it was a heavily played card in my local area but it ruined commander so much having it around.
30:03 both of these cards are in my Hylda deck.
I wouldn't necessarily campaign to have Cyclonic Rift banned, but I would be pretty happy to see it go. It's not a problem when it's used to close out games, but I find more often than not that it extends games to a tiring degree.
I must be in the minority of people who feel the banlist is pretty dang good and that the RC has done a great job.
Commander isnt just cedh and casual its myriad different styles due to a vast card pool.
Its precon v precon
Its battlecruiser
Its not quite cedh salty meaness
Its jank
I love the variety of games and decks the format encourages.
Pubstomping is rude and should be discouraged, but bans will not solve this. I can bring my Marwyn the nurturer list to a casual table and clean house with an early umbral mantle or staff off dom. Ive won with a 1 land hand with my elf ball list. Its very very fast. Ive beaten a tuned Urza deck more than once, and i dont see umbral mantle being anywhere close to banworthy.
Furthering sometimes i enjoy spiky rudeboi games. Ive played inna game where i got hit by Armageddon twice and fought through it with decent draw and a burgeoning, it was a fantastic memorable game. I post to a Mindslaver lock, but we all brought strong decks. I mean one person played GAAIV and became an instant frenemy before the game started.
Banning cards because you dont like them or the games isnt the same.
Edh isnt just one (or two formats) its so many.
My least favorite card in all of Magic is Humility, but i dont want it banned.
Pubstomping will happen even if there are a hundred bans.
We need to work on creating a culture around the games we seek.
Banning isnt the answer to this.
Communication is. And since i started years and years ago i think the communication around games has improved. My LGS has taken several paths to improve gameplay and reduce pubstomping.
Iona against a Pod that shares a color:
T1 Land, Sol Ring, Lightning Greaves
T2 Jeweled Lotus, Kaalia, Equip, Attack Iona out, GG next
As one of those people with an angel deck, banning Iona sucked only cause it was 20 bucks when I picked it up and at the time my deck was much more prisony because of the angels available at the time and i leaned as hard as i could into the flavor of the named angels. Now i honestly don't think I could put her back in, it's doubly worse cause my angel deck is a 5 color deck, and I've tried to squish down my curve as much as possible and it still doesn't get running till like turn 5.
On the point of it being an only option to run when it was banned, there were I think 12 or 13 (maybe?) angels at mana value of 3 or less, and the only not really bad ones were Jenara Asura of War (still in my angel deck) and Resolute Angel (one I traded a Sliver Overloard to my wifey for. She has a sliver deck, I don't intend to build one), and a lot of the 4 Mana Value angels weren't that good either. It was a steep drop off in playability when going from a 5 to less. To give an idea of how bad those options were, one was a 3 mana 3/3 that would give your oppnent(s?) A free 3/3, there was no pool of cards, only a thimble
Smothering tithe for sure could go. Rystic study as well. I like to think if it costs one more mana, especially a pip, would you still play it? For both of these i would say yes. That addition would make them much more reasonable though.
I would ban both not because they are overpowered. But because they slow down games with people thinking and calculating if they will pay. Mystic Remora is better as the cost is high enough that people can easily decide.
@@AlwaysGrowing0 I agree that is another good reason
Bans: Cyclonic Rift, Mana Crypt, Jeweled Lotus
Unbans: None
If I were gonna unban anything, it would honestly just be Panoptic Mirror. Card was banned in the very first list, where test games were played as 2 player games where each player had 100 life (og rules were 200 life split evenly amongst the players) and Shahrazad was legal. It was banned because imprinting Shahrazad was a nightmare. The argument these days is "ohhh infinite turns ohhhh armageddon" but there's way easier ways to get infinite turns than investing like 10+ mana into PM, and if you try to imprint something degenerate like Armageddon the mirror extremely isn't making it all the way to your next upkeep. Players have so many more ways to deal with it these days that it isn't really an issue anymore.
Also Banned As Commander should totally come back.
Re: Iona
There are many mechanics that lock entire player(s) out of the game.
Forced sacrifice, STAX, Original Vorinclex, pillowforts, discard, exile, solitaire loops, graveyard hate...
I've sat through many, many, many EDH games where I was unable to play for many turns, until another player removed the problem, and I came back into the game with a full hand and plenty of mana.
The difference is that Iona literally reads as 'can't' where other mechanics, the 'can't' is merely subtext.
I think you'd be surprised how many anonymous players would (and do) run the shut off effects. The ban list is for anonymous play, and for regulating cEDH. I think nbanning is fine and playgroups can always Rule 0 them IN.
So I know Tergrid as commander SUUUUUCKS, but what about her in the 99? I was considering her in my Davros deck for instance.
As a landfall player, I fully endorse Primetime staying on the banlist. Given the fact that you can already do obnoxious things without the titan
Prime time is just so fun to play and won't win the game by just triggering his ability once. Protean Hulk can and will often win the game with just one trigger and is considered not casual for that reason alone.
I think only some cards have a time when they were egregious and no longer. But Sol Ring and Dockside are NOT that. They still cause extremely swingy games.
Price is also no object, if many people are now more welcoming of proxies. So Sol Ring and Mana Crypt should go together if one does.
I honestly feel smothering tithe is fine.
Sure, in some metas it's broken, but on those metas, many things are - and it's not the way my pod is playing.
Tergrid is even a may, too bad it wasn't forced to take control of whats discarded and sacrificed. Would be interesting to tech against them.
For me, the card to ban is an easy decision. Cyclonic Rift. It is a beautiful card, just a bit too good in every direction.
It hits mana rocks, enchantments, creatures, tokens, all at instant speed with no friendly fire. It isn't a target effect, so it hits through hexproof, shroud and ward.
It never has a weak moment. If you are behind you get several turns to catch up, it breaks deadlocks, it snowballs advantages.
You can see it coming, and do very little to stop it. Without a counterspell or mass flicker, you're toast.
It is leagues ahead of all similar mass removal spells.
I'd like to unban Big Emmie, it's not fair that she was banned for (essentially) power level, 'people use her as a pub stomp Commander' means a lot less when you can do better stuff faster, and arguably with more consistency (especially since Colourless is pretty bad at drawing cards consistently/early). I have an Eldrazi deck, but it's a Gruul deck because I wanted better ramp options, and I also wanted other perks from Gruul. It's a janky deck, but it can still steal wins because it can use Green ramp.
The card I'd ban is a bit of a tough call, I'm not sure if I'd still say we need to ban Opposition Agent (I still don't like it at 3 mana and think it's more toxic as a random card than Hullbreacher was), I'd love to see less fast mana but more people are already coming to that conclusion (you used to see almost no decks without Sol Ring, now you see them here and there), Dockside is still pretty toxic I guess? My problems with it are that it's very easy for it to be mana positive, and since it's on a body it's comically easy to abuse it as a Ritual. It was a design mistake to print the best Ritual ever as a creature, but in practice people don't mind it in cEDH, and many people insist it's not a problem in Casual (I partly disagree, but you can run There and Back Again to make a heap of treasures to work with, and Smaug combos with a LOT of cards as well), so I'm not sure if Dockside 'needs' to go. I think Thoracle is a strong enough win con that it's on the edge, but I think it ultimately 'is fine' in that it's relatively easy to interact with, and is tough to do at instant speed (compared to Flash Hulk for example, where you could Flash only to have someone else Flash on top, and a 3rd person Flash on top of them, the reason it had to go wasn't just it's power level, it was that it was an incredibly annoying win con because it ate up lots of cards in your deck and was objectively the best thing you could be doing at the same time. This meant it warped the meta immensely, until cEDH became openly less fun. As 'samey' as cEDH feels now, it used to be worse before Flash was banned. In contrast their are a ton of win cons out there that are all 'viable', so many it's hard to count, and people play tons of them and sometimes beat Thoracle. The fastest decks in the format for the record don't use Thoracle, they are Rakdos Turbo decks, thus Thoracle is a fine addition to the meta. I wouldn't mind seeing Rift or Rhystic Study banned, neither uses enough U pips to be fair, and both are game-warping and can easily generate toxic game states.
I think that Library of Alexandria and Emrakul, the Aeons Torn should be unbanned. Commander has changed a lot since they were originally banned. I think these cards have an effect that is too weak in the case of Library or an effect that is good, but way to expensively costed for that effect; in the case of Emrakul; both very safe unbans in my book.
If anyone happens to be running Garruk's Uprising just for the 3 mana trample buff I point you to a spell costed 1 less that will fill the same role:
Primal Rage
As someone who has played Edh since 2011, I can tell you Primeval Titan would still be a problem if it came back. I would love nothing more than to resolve a Primeval titan in a Cedh pod, search up Gaea's Cradle and maybe Nykthos for a massive boost.
I played Paradox Sisay until it was banned, one of my favorite decks of all time. The only real tangible fixes I can think of is to either add a "Basic Land" rider on Primetime's ability; or to remove the ETB altogether.
Anyways I understand the things I would like to see and play are definitely not in the best interest of the game as a whole. Magic keeps adding new problems to solve. While they may learn lessons for now, they often slip and designs like MH2 Evoke Elementals and Bowmasters show up.
On the Sway the Stars topic, that exact same logic applies to Worldfire too. It's a form of hypocrisy to say one is Ok while the other is not.
There is one small petition that i would to be banned and thats Mirrym Sentential Wyrm and thats only because i have personally never seen the player that resolved one loose. I also understand thats a bad argument because "play more removal" or there are plenty of commanders that if they get to untap with you will likely loose (looking at you Niv Mizzit). But there is something that feels back breaking about copying creatures with some of the best text boxes in the game.
Prime time is disgusting and absolutely more powerful than the 10 mana cascade x 4.
Being able to tutor your two card combo for one card is just insane.