Your Favorite Commander is Boring
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- Опубліковано 19 тра 2024
- #mtg #thetrinketmage #trinketmage
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I'm in the camp of where I don't care if people play the really good commanders. My only problem is if they start making a fuss about their commander getting targeted. Like who in their right mind is going to look at you cast Gishath, and just not deal with it? "Oh I require set up and mana" my brother in christ, you and me both know you just need to hit to get your dinosaurs to get your deck going.
As someone who has a Gishath deck, this is so true. If you play a popular Commander you lose any right to complain if it gets countered or removed.
This is legit the exact problem I have.
"Why won't you let me resolve my commander?"
Gishath is just bad, It's so obvious what's going to happen. No one builds a midrangy dino deck where the gishath is just a value engine. Every time it gives you like 30 mana worth of cards
@@irou95 And this explains Gishath is bad how?
@@ProphecyPhrase Look at the mana cost, there is your answer
As much as the new Obeka is super interesting to me, I just KNOW every deck that people build with her is going to be taking 20 minute turns while they resolve 6 triggers per upkeep, 3 times per turn.
I saw her but shes geixis so she cant go in my suspend deck
I immediately was super excited when i saw her and started brewing immediately. The problem is not that I would perceive having to take long turns or even stack multiple extra turns, but just that I wasn't able to make her fun. The version(s) that I was able to brew all turned out to be "too voltron" to be fun because to get the needed pay-off, I needed to get between 15-20 extra upkeeps. And that meant leaning very heavily into voltron strategies and that meant leaning very heavily into protection and that made the deck unfun (from my perspective) because either I work my butt of to get Becky out and protect and buff her so that she can swing at someone unblockable for 15+ damage and then I probably win (unless someone has a disenchant for my throne or something) or someone has a disenchant or fog or anything else that stops me and then I did all of that work for nothing. That is exciting, but also too "all-in" for my personal taste.
There is an enchantment that mills every opponent for 10 on the upkeep, you can win on the spot with that if you feel like being fancy
@@robertomacetti7069 I'm aware of the court-cycle and included it in my brew, but that's kinda what I mean: I either get a ton of upkeeps and win - or I mostly just flounder around. I'd personally love to have more cards like Dragonmaster Outcast or Skyline Despot, cards that pull me far ahead with even a decent amount of extra upkeeps without one-shotting everybody.
@@Nr4747 very fair
To a degree, I like seeing commanders with "Expectations". I'm newer to the game, so if I see a deck I know well/vaguely know its gameplan, I can focus on finding the "winning plays" for OTHER more fringe decks at the table. Lets me focus on learning more "new" stuff. Then again, I have shown up to an LGS and, totally by chance, ALL THREE OTHER PLAYERS PULLED OUT AN ATRAXA DECK and looked at ME expectantly while laughing about it. THAT was a wild yet awkward moment. (And 2 were infect so it was a very quick game.)
That's wild. Hope you enjoy the game. I find myself playing themes. It's very fun. Blink decks are fun also. Strong depending on the effects your attempting to multiply. But ehh just a few shoutouts. Take care good ser.
Lol i had a similar game where me and 2 other people all pulled out Ruric Thar decks, and the 4th guy had artifacts. That poor last guy got domed for 18 for playing a mana rock 😂
@@jacobreserved2144 nobody enjoys a game with an Infect deck. That's the point.
If you run infect, you don't want other players to have fun.
I'd scoop if someone plays a card with that, not because I'm sure I'll lose, but because I don't play against it on principle.
@@NerobyrneWhy isn't Infect fun?
@@lum26akua28 because proliferate is extremely boring and has little counter play outside of blue
This is all true but you fail to consider that when I resolve a Honden of Seeing Winds to draw 11 the happy chemicals in my brain enter overdrive
If drawing a lot of cards tickles your fancy, might I recommend Rielle the Everwise. Cathartic Reunion goes from discard 2 to draw 3 into discard 2 draw 5. Tolarian Winds turns into discard your hand and draw twice that many cards.
lmao my go shintai deck is one of my favourite when people realised i'm drawing a bunch of cards gaining a bunch of life
Remember to pair it up with like Paradox Haze
Went all in on that once, drew like 50 cards in 2 turns and then killed myself on the 3rd, worth it because I also deleted someones library with a Neverending torment during it.
@@otterfire4712 Rielle is one of my most unassuming decks. Especially since I run a lot of cycling in it. Surprises even more when people discover Lab Man/Oracle isn't my wincon. lol
@@UniversalJuan Unfortunately, I kind of hit an impasse with Rielle and my usual playgroup. I had optimized the build to such a degree that anything short of some serious hard sacrifice effects to keep my commander off the board wouldn't be enough for Rielle to pop off and blow out my opponents. I've since taken a step back to try out other stuff so my enjoyment of her isn't completely tarnished. I'll revisit her at some point, it's hard to find a draw heavy commander who isn't somewhat reasonable with their drawing system.
It doesn't bother me at all. I play some popular commanders and I play some not so popular commanders. One person's "boring" is another person's "fun and exciting". So no I don't sigh when I see a super popular commander on the other side of the table and I don't find it boring and start railing at the sky about the good old days. I will say I don't get to play as much as I used to so I'm just happy when anybody wants to play, no matter who they have in the command zone.
Wholeheartedly agree! I think Internet discourse has amplified this into more of a concern/ issue than it actually is for the majority of people.
I can’t say I agree. I run a wilhelt deck but it’s a total bottom up build meaning the deck can function just fine without him but he does act as an accelerator.
In a zombie tribal theme Mikeaus is one of the best card you can use IN THE 99 but is terrible as a commander.
First, there are not many cards that use undying, second it’s a 6 mana commander and third it’s mono-black which to me, greatly limits the number of support cards I can use.
Gisa and geralf just doesn’t do enough. Again such a build would be limited to just recursion synergy but how does that work if someone drops a black Leyline from their opening hand?
You’re suggestions are terrible and basically you’re asking someone to build a deck that is easy to defeat aka the same Leyline card will shutdown mikeaus too.
Sounds like what you are asking is to just build a creative, low power jank deck which is fine if you are in a pod of low power jank decks but otherwise expect to lose……A LOT and consistently losing bc your inconsistent theme deck lacks any powerful synergy or acceleration is just not fun.
Thanks but no thanks!
It feels like this argument is a bit all over the place. You talk about generic value commanders and then in the next breath you talk about commanders that “build themselves” because they have a very specific niche. These are completely different. It feels like you are just saying “be hipster and don’t play the stuff that you see all over the place”. That’s a perfectly fine argument, but I feel like its mixed in with a potpourri of other arguments
Totally agree. It comes across as not liking the new age of commander design while also admonishing people for building the popular older commanders. I’m not sure what they’re suggesting you go and do then.
What trinket mage is getting at is generic value commanders just about always run the same cards in the colors they are in, they can't be very unique against someone who is playing the same commander. And with tribal or specific niche commanders every version of that commander will run 70 to 80% the same cards, both of these styles of decks lower the diversity of decks that are played. I have a Sliver Overlord toolbox deck and I have gone up against other sliver tribal decks, every sliver deck runs the best slivers and do the exact same thing but in different flavors. And Sliver Overlord is such a problem commander that it doesn't stay on the field very long. I also have a korvold fey cursed king lands matter deck, and I sacrifice lands and its my favorite deck but everyone known to keep korvold off the feild. I love both of those decks but they are predictable in their play style. I've been trying out lesser known and less generic value commanders and its spiced up my commander table to the point that its gotten my regular pod to build decks with these types of commanders and its gone from stale games where the match ups are memorized to a tug of war again.
Just because an argument has multiple points of persuasion doesn't mean it's a "potpourri". A lot of the most popular commanders are incredibly boring. Some are so generic and can be a value engine for good stuff. Others do so much, but in very specific situations. Either case can be very boring. I do plan to build Atraxa, but not infect or superfriends.
The argument could be refined a little. It's a bit in process and I would say the video is not outright aimed at convincing people not to play certain commanders, but to raise awareness about an issue.
The issue is that if your commander deck either wins big or loses big, it's probably boring. Either you do all the things because the commander is too easy to play and you happened to pop off. Or you got hated off the table because everyone sees that commander and knows it's usually good so they target you. That's not fun. If you're playing in a pod where everyone tends to play pretty even, then this argument may seem silly. But if you've played with random people, you've probably played very boring games, even if you try to have rule 0 convos.
Holy shyt look at the mythic rare level WoT 😂 The white knight just ETB'ed. Lmao
@@david-chadsvenson6960 My deck wins big or loses big without that, but it's mostly because my playgroup tends to believe they want low power and then build high power decks, while I actually build low power and if I pop off then whatever I did ends up getting banned :|.
I’m starting to get the feeling somebody here really likes Sunforger lol
I’m not addicted to brewing sunforger decks I can stop whenever I want!
Did you mean "Funforger" ?
One could argue that any commander that _does a thing_ builds itself. Kalamax wants exactly three things, being tapped, casting instances, and getting extra copies of said instances. There is not a whole lot of leeway in what goes into a Kalamax deck. Kenrith on the other hand, can go in a whole slew of directions. Want to build a degenerative infinite combo factory? Go for it. Want to play group hug? Absolutely down for it. 5 color reanimator deck? Kenny's got you covered. Generically good commanders offer flexibility on what sort of archetypes they can cover.
He's the commander of my 5 color hat themed deck. Just look at his multiversal legends art. The man has quite the epic hat.
Problem is most versions will be the same cookie-cutter version, lik Atraxa is 80% of the time just superfriends. Kenrith is a special situation because he doesn't say what you're going to do, but I suspect most Kenrith decks are 5c value piles instead of focused shenanigans.
@Adrianovaz2007 there is no way 80% of atraxa is super friends. The idea of proliferate is too nebulous for the top commander of all time to be that railroaded.
@@Adrianovaz2007I thought it was 80% infect.
my problem with atraxa is really her four keywords and four colors. ik she came in the four color product, but having witchmaw colors on a dude that says proliferate is bad news. i wouldn't mind atraxa decks being super friends, or infect, if atraxa couldn't kill literally anything
Quintorius is "Budget Friendly" until you have to spend $183.99 on a copy of Elephant Graveyard just to Regenerate Target Elephant. How else am I meant to protect my Boy
Lol
just use your printer and be happy
P R O X Y for the love of God. Wizards doesn't care about you and is never going to reprint reserve list cards, so just fake one in. Then, if you decide it's not worth it, you remove it from the deck at no financial cost to yourself.
@@pokemaniac333 i know how to proxy i just think it's funny that the 200 dollar reserve list land that specifically regenerates elephants is a card that exists
I’ve gotten surprised by the Reserve List in this exact way multiple times. Welcome to the club. 🎉😂
Jokes on you, i use Grist to make bugs
Hell yea I love bugs 🐛
A person of culture and taste I see. Glad there is another one out there.
No matter the commander you are fighting my 99.
That means you build good decks!
^ Absolutely unhinged things that Stax players say
"You are fighting my 99"
-dudes with 12 tutors in the deck, probably.
@@varsoonhks3211 1 tutor only. Lot's of removal tho.
@@varsoonhks3211 no wtax, my deck doesn't stop you from playing your deck but whether you keep things on the field is another question.
My favorite deck is a 4th crusade themed Baird Argivian Recruiter deck, the highlight is a "quest for the holy relic" and no legal targets for it.
That is a wild theme for a deck
Adding some sword to crusade with would fit there perfectly though, why not add one?
While you bring up valid points, I believe they are being made from a selfish point of view.
"I'm tired of seeing X commander because I know what they are going to do. They are to common and every build is the same."
Its understandable to be frustrated at seeing common decks and "staples", but you're not the one running them. You're not the one playing them because you find it fun.
I understand the frustration of seeing commander being streamlined due to WotC is focusing on it as a format and over make products for it. But that's not what I feel is being argued here.
Gishath got a good friend of mine into Magic when Ixalan came out cause "dinosaur stompy is fun". Atrexa broke me out of my "I only do beat down" deck design when she first came out, and ultimately lead me to explore wincons outside of damage.
If you're enjoyment comes from using unique commanders and cards, more power to you. But others find enjoyment through other means, which is equally as valid as yours.
Maybe I’m being selfish but I want to stress I’m not upset at staples and I do commonly run them. I just said Atraxa being in 4 colors means you get access to all the staples so she ends up being the best commander for a large amount of themes
@@thetrinketmage Well I appreciate you clarifying that for me.
And you're 100% allowed to be selfish and feel how you feel, it's your channel and you're just venting your frustrations/thoughts.
I just wanted to make the point that everyone derives enjoyment from commander in their own ways. And although common commanders, they atleast serve as a good entry point for a chunk of the community for how easy they are to play/build around.
Generic Goodstuff are basically non-decks.@@thetrinketmage
Animar is my favorite, and my oldest commander deck. I love him, and I love the deck, but I REALLY love budget commander. We have a budget league restricting every card to under $1. It's a ton of fun.
The problem with build around commanders is similar to some of your initial examples; if they die too much then you just lose. A lot of people try to build decks that don’t necessarily need their commander to function.
I'm currently trying to put together a very low-power build for an Ertha Jo deck once OTJ hits. Finding weird, neat interactions has been a ton of fun!
Controlling 2 players with Mindslaver? Milling a ton with Keening Stone/Sands of Delirium? Burning a bunch with doubled Voldaren Thrillseeker effects? It's been a blast trying to put an idea together~
She looks so cool!
I feel like every time someone argues a popular commander or "builds itself" commander is boring, i feel like the immediate question is whether the deck is boring to play with, boring to build, or boring to play against, or if the complaint is just the commander is popular.
I feel like if we're arguing the commander is boring to play with, then I feel these sort of videos work.
If the argument is it's boring to build, then I also think there's merit there, though I think there's a bit of expectations on what the watcher of the video actually finds enjoyable out of the build process (sometimes I want yo find interesting cards that fits the theme, sometimes I find an interesting commander that I want to build around. Not everyone wants to dig around looking for a commander just to find something different).
If the argument is a commander is boring to play against, then I feel like suggesting a different commander is questionable most of the time (are we sure the problem isn't lack of interaction?)
And if we say "it's too popular, it too well known how to deal with it", then I feel we're underestimating the other rarer commanders too much and we're making questionable personal arguments to people who disagree with the idea wholesale
For the record, i played with a proxy friendly group a while back, and I don't feel we ever was bored of just generally "build themselves" commanders. Often, it was either the commanders that were crazy strong or the decks that struggled to do anything after being stopped once. My main struggle with building Go-Shintai wasn't that it built itself, but that it just didn't have enough room to be consistent if you built the generic shrine deck, compared to another deck that built itself like Ur-Dragon or Isshin (or my old Wulfgar deck). And Go-Shintai just doesn't give enough room to do anything else
That’s the only argument this cock gobbler made. Literally is advocating for people playing new obeka and acting like it isn’t boring. It’s the most linear commander in recent years
I totally understand your point, but I love my Korvold deck (even though it still is on playtesting) because my first deck was Vaevictis Asmadi, The Dire. It was basically a juund sacrifice deck that made a chaos warp to each player whenever he attacked. I loved the chaos it made in the table, but it lacked a lot of power. Korvold basically fits as the new commander for the deck, and I love so much that I can still play Vaevictis as my alternate commander, and he's there as my pet card because of how much I love him and the memories of my first games. I know Korvold is really powerful and very common in many tables, but I built him different and more focused on aristocrats than on treasures, which is the most-common theme.
I think building famous (or infamous) commanders in a different way might be very fun! And I really don't mind a lot playing with famous commanders as long as the table hits the same power level. But you know, every deck is a 7 so...
He didn’t have a point.
I enjoy playing popular commanders in the nonstandard ways. I have an Isshin deck that, instead of being legendary typal, wants to make as many tokens as possible. And I've been trying to figure out an Ur-Dragon Changeling deck that gets value from all sorts of typal effects. Just another way to spice up the most common commanders.
You got quintorius very wrong, he can also target planeswalkers, battles, artifacts or enchantments.
Quintorius is my first and possibly only Boros commander, took me years to find one worth building. It is built around vehicles since he provides bodies to crew them, damage multipliers, creature tokens and polymorph effects. It also runs a ton of removal and interaction so functions well as a spell slinger however chaotic it ends up being.
@@sixzerotwoI agree with you in most cases, but I've come across a few really interesting Boros builds. Can I interest you a Boros control deck based off equipment you usually never see? Or a Boros planeswalker mutate deck?
@@joedoe7572I am not sixzerotwo but I want to hear it!
@@joedoe7572 actually intresting decks. Nowadays i changed my decks and started to give a subtype or a roleplay theme. My mardu human deck is a cultist deck now or esper vampires
@@SandOfToru sorry, I just saw this now somehow. Which one do you want to know about? equipment control or planeswalker mutate?
I feel so called out right now as I have a Gishath and a The Ur-Dragon Deck. They are my two most favourite decks and the decks where some of my most valued cards go into.
I understand that Gishath and Ur-Dragon are some of the biggest examples of a "boring" commander, and I understand that going into it and building the deck. I understand that some games I will do nothing where I either die before I cast my Commander or I get out my Commander and snowball the rest of the table. But the reason why I play them is not because they are popular but because dinosaurs and dragons were a big part of my childhood. That part resonates with me, and seeing the cool art and striking designs resonates with me.
I love the idea of a giant dinosaur calling forth an army of dinosaurs upon damage. I love the randomness of it and seeing how many times I can get the trigger of and what I hit. I see every game of Gishath as a sort of mini game that can make each game exciting as of itself. I love the Ur-Dragon as the thought of flooding the board with big beautiful fire-breathing beasts and swinging in for big numbers.
While this video has great points, I don’t think it is so black and white. People play Commanders for different reasons, and I think that is a good thing and why Commander as a format is so great. Why some people can play these Commanders for being good, I believe there are others who play these Commanders for reasons that aren't so obvious.
Sorry for the wall of text. It's like 2.30am for me right now and felt like putting my opinion in.
I appreciate your wall of text! And I also agree a bit! It’s not so black and white! And I could go further into both sides of the argument though that would make the video very long. So I am mostly arguing for what I prefer, but it’s an opinion piece overall and I think your view is valid!
@thetrinketmage Oh yeah, of course. This sort of topic can go in so many different ways and directions that we will be here forever. I completely respect your views and opinions. They are completely fair. I can see why someone would want to play against commanders who aren't so recognisable. They want to see something fresh, something innovative. Something that actually takes deck building skill and not just a 70 card decklist and fill in the rest. For example, I have a Falco Spara Bird Tribal and a Sefeis dungeon deck that plays all the bad dungeon cards because I find that so fun.
The problem I have with commanders like Gishath is that a lot of them pretty much read 'If this resolves, you win the game'.
So everyone else is playing Magic, swinging for damage here and there, building their engines, but commanders like that are like just bringing a gun to the table and saying, "Well, I'm going to count to [MANA COST] and when I get there, I'll aim this at one of you and pull the trigger." It tends to make games where we either need to rally to stop that or hold the proper counterspell/removal/etc to stop that, or we all just get fucking shot and aren't allowed to keep playing that game of Magic anymore.
That all said, a pretty simple pre-game conversation about what kind of game people want to play can suss out if everyone's fine with it or not. It just generally isn't my jam.
On the subject of The Ur-Dragon, I've been considering replacing them with Rith, Liberated Primeval as my "Big Dumb Dragon Deck".
While you lose access to Blue and Black, and don't get the Herald's Horn effect, you get both main colours for Dragons (Red and Green, in that order) which happen to already be the best for generating all the mana Dragons need, and your Commander only costs 5 mana and provides them with protection (Ward 2) which counteracts the hate Dragons seem to draw.
I'm new to the game. My first deck was the atarka precon. I've switched to ur dragon after 1 game.
It's funny to me to see ur dragon be called "kill on sight". I frequently see ur dragon hit the board and resolve successfully without the game beeing over. Something like miirym on the other hand is way more explosive.
I understand how ur dragon is "boring" as dragon tribal commander. On the other hand I don't think there is a more fun one. To have access to all dragons I have to play all colors. From those I feel ur dragon has the most consistent/fair impact on the game.
I made a Go-shintai deck, but I only run 2 shrines in it. The main idea of the deck is to use cards like "presence of the master," "cephalid shrine" and the black 2 mana one I can't remember the name of together with "Multani's Presence" to draw cards and get enchantment into the graveyard, until I find my zombie making enchantments so it goes from a self countering enchantment deck to a zombie tribal deck where i "resurrect" the enchantments too
My thoughts are this: I enjoy changing up my 99 cards often just for a different flow. So I aim for generic enough Commander strategies that allow me to swap cards on a regular basis without nerfing the power level of the deck. Recent Examples: Loot, the Key to Everything, Kellan the Kid, Jarad, Golgari Lich King.
The week before Obeka was announced, I finally caught with my podcasts up to the Doctor Who sets and heard about The Ninth Doctor and Clara Oswald getting triple upkeep triggers. While the upkeep payoffs are pretty similar for both, it's fun to see there's two different approaches for this theme now.
Oh I forgot about that commander pairing
I love playing weird dudes. My favorite deck is a zombie tribal with Mouth of Sauron as the commander and a mix the amass lords that give zombie tokens keywords and the amass lords that give orcs keywords. There are also several mill zombies that help assist his etb and clones/blinks for more triggers. Then evasion for the giant Zombie Orc army
I definitely had this issue with my Dimir Champion of Stray Souls deck. The commander was Zellix with Agent of the Iron Throne, so I was tempted to lean closer to more generic mill or aristocrat pieces. This weakened the original identity of the deck.
Now I lean heavier into the sacrifice to reanimate cards. It may not be as strong as a more straightforward build, but has regained it's identity.
My favorite commander deck is Zirilan of the Claw, he's a 5 drop mono red commander themed around tutoring out dragons, but they exile at end of turn. I like making more copies, to make a very agressive but not very defensive dragons deck. Nothing really stays unless shenanigans like blink is involved. Its really fun to play. It can be hard to not use the same dragons as openers every time though.
my favorite commander is the dimir alela that goads a creature when you connect with a faerie
Wayta has been one of my favorite brews ive done! Glad it got some love here. You mentioning slipping under the radar and its so true. Even though shes crazy powerful people usually go after the Atraxa or other crazy commander on the table
I think like you said a hurdle is sometimes a fun include in the deckbuilding process. Like a companion or a budget limit.
as someone who built sefris of the hidden ways. the deck kinda did build itself.
boss creatures.
looters.
dungeon etbs
reanimate stuff
but honestly playing the deck has been the most fun ive had in commander in a while. being so resilient and threatening while having a lot of answers to almost anything thrown at me is a better experience than just play big creature, try to swing and it gets killed by removal.
It's easy to enjoy the "boring commanders" cause they can feel fun and good to play. I have been watching your videos recently and I really like your approach to constructing commander decks. Trying to have a more unique approach to the deck while still highlighting the commander like you did for the tapped zombie video. c:
Currently building one of every commander. There are some commanders no one has ever played that are actually pretty interesting.
Like one commander deck for every legend? That’s insane
@@thetrinketmage yeah I'm going alphabetically. Earlier ones need tweaking but I'm almost to 1k on moxfield, in the O's. Working on Olivia Voldaren
@@kilroy1365Don't forget Nebuchadnezzar. He looks fun.
@@benjaminloyd6056 already have him built, and he is very fun
Love your guts to attack everyone. Keep it up!
Personally, I like playing against atraxa because you never know what direction they take it.
I think there are a lot of people who also keep away from the top commanders in agreement
@@thetrinketmage I'd argue that Atraxa ISN'T a generic value commander. Proliferating counters gives TONS of options. It just gets a bad rap because it often gets railroaded into being Superfriends (which are the practical definition of 'generic value').... or infect.>
@@zackkelley2940yeah, my Atraxa deck doesn't have an option on EDHREC. It's Myojin tribal
@@joedoe7572 I'm partial to charge counters myself.
my favourite commander is my "Zangief VS The Multiverse" pet deck, a Jund fight/stompy list all about pulling ahead on board with ramp and fight removal, then flipping all the battles.
I’ve been convinced yet again to try building Quintorius into a deck I enjoy playing… 5 times the charm?
I think people overstate the tribal necessities of Leori. The planeswalkers you want to put in a Leori deck are already mostly Jaces and Chandras and Teferis I've built two decks for her and one has the rule I can't put more than three of a planeswalker in it just to prove that she's not a planeswalker specific commander.
My sweet baby boy Quintorious showing up here is too good. One of my favorite decks and I put the other 2 versions of him in the deck too for the great exile/graveyard removal synergy.
yes my go-shintai was made really easy ,i build the deck as a joke from lol shrines and it became one of if not my best deck. my other top deck being Golgari lifegain with Ikra and Reyhan at the helm.
Overall, I agree with the mood and tone of your video. In my Muldrotha deck, I'm running a poison counter/toxic subtheme to the deck to spice things up. When it comes down to it, it's surprising easy to fall into the basic tech options you see for most of the most popular commanders.
And this is why one of my decks I enjoy the most are those that I went either fully into the theme, like dice rolling (Space Family Goblinsons) and use any card that rolls dice no matter how bad it is or using a commander that doesn't necessarily benefit the theme directly but still works well with it like going dinosaur tribal with Ognis, The Dragon's Lash. put in some haste enablers for your dinos and a few cards that give extra pay off for using treasure tokens and you got a fun dino deck that ramps itself not too quickly.
This makes a lot of sense to me, my whole group has those snowball decks.
My pet deck is the OG Chromium and whenever I go to a new game store I always bring it people always get their cracks in about him costing 8 mana and it’s not the most winning deck in the world but in the 100 or so games I’ve played since last year I’ve not seen anyone else do Esper Voltron so I’m always happy to show him off
Chromium is such a cool card in both versions of the card. I think it's really interesting that he has evasion and a keyword that makes it so you want the card blocked, the way I want to build it would be to try and give Chromium trample and lose flying/give my opponents creatures flying so i can get maximum value from the card
@@technodragon990 the way I did it is put in some equipment that takes away his flying and then added stuff that would want people to mass block him and the true cornerstone is Nemesis Mask it simply says “you will block me”
For a long time I intended to build Atraxa "all kinds of counters" but never got around to it. Now a bunch of the cards are going into Me, the Immortal instead.
my only commander decks are Ozbedat Ghost Council and Alesha. Most tables i sit down with have never seen either of them before. Ghost dads are mostly a life drain deck, but the commander fuels ETB effects and Revolt triggers, too! Alesha is reanimator combo kills mostly, but i run a handful of creature's that etb with counters to bypass her restrictions. They're both pet decks and very close to my heart, so I'm okay with them being a little more generic.
Wayta is so much fun, my favourite deck... and also pretty nice to build because while there are a ton of enrage creatures, you can't just put them all in.
Going on zombie tribal, my favorite is Lord of Tresserhorn. First commander deck I ever made, still love it to pieces.
About a year ago, i wanted to build my first commander deck as a Jund artifact sac deck, and i'm glad i chose Ziatora instead of Korvold. Building around a commander that doesn't fuel itself, and doing that in a somewhat unusual way as well, was a lot more interesting than what i'd expect building Korvold would be like.
Also, before i had my own commander deck i got to play with an Ur-Dragon deck that played a ton of shapeshifters and strong tutors or payoffs for niche tribes, so it's safe to say that even with a popular and powerful commander you can make a very unique deck that doesn't run away with the game.
Don't worry i won't build a wilhelt zombie deck......instead I'll make a Atraxa zombie deck. 😁
I appreciate the creativity
I made a self mill zombie deck, my first self made commander deck. Mill the deck, mass graveyard pull, swing for lethal. Has a few actual combos and of course zombie synergy. Picked the commander after who ended up being Wilhelt. Bottom up decks are always creative
I have a Geth, Lord of the Vault deck that kinda fits what he was talking about. I love it!
I think Geth is pretty underrated
I'm gonna be honest, Atraxa is a really bad example for what you're describing. Without a board that can take advantage of her trigger, she's a 4/4 with keyword soup. While slightly broad, proliferate slots her into leading a few specific deck archetypes rather than goodstuff piles, which increases diversity in terms of one Atraxa deck versus another. She can lead either +1/+1 counters or superfriends, without outright telling the pilot to do so in her rules text. Compare this to the infamous similarity between Go-Shintai decks, a textbook case of the commander telling you exactly how to build it.
The more modern "setup and payoff" commanders like Korvold, Chulane, and Prosper are significantly more egregious due to how little they ask of their pilot and how wide of a net they cast in terms of things they synergize with.
She can also do sagas and infect. If your into those sorts of things.
Yup, Atraxa is the most popular for a reason. You can literally have 6 or so different decks with her at the helm and they'd play and do different things. I gotta say though, I think Korvold is more of a power issue rather than a narrow issue. You can build an all Eldraine theme deck, landfall, food tokens , treasure theme etc. but he just so happens to be the enabler and the payoff.
she is more of a golos-tier problem, where she is good for a very large pool of themes, and thus becomes a generically good commander for a lot of stuff - but she for sure doenst build herself as much as shintai.
i still absolutely despise her, especially with superfriends
I agree about Chulane & similar being basically setup & payoff stapled to 1 card from the command zone. Voja, Jaws of the Conclave might be THE most egregious example I've seen so far though - all it asks for (really) is that you have elves in your 99 and maybe some optional wolves. Voja will be down on 4 at the latest, possibly 3, and then is a repeated board-builder and card draw engine.
If they'd kicked down the ward to 2 and maybe understatted it a bit (4/4 for 5 would probably be fine) it would have been playable. As it is now, it's just going to be a deck that wrecks casual decks while being too slow for cEDH.
@@51gunner I think this might be deliberate. We have had a lot of nicely designed, balanced and fun commanders, but there has also been at least one absolutely OP beast every set so far.
i.E. we got a huge amount of "do it twice" commanders, and they obviously absolutely wreck shit
To answer your final question; the only issue I have with people playing powerful popular commanders is the frustration they have when said commander is targeted. If you do not have a way to protect your commander that your deck relies one to operate, then maybe we need to scrap it down and rebuild it.
12:19 I too am nostalgic for the "old" type of commander cards that just happened to be in standard sets, back when we only got approximately 5 legendary creatures in each set. I think since about after C19 or something, WotC heavily started making cards in EVERY set and format that are specifically designed with Commander in mind. And I kind of dislike that, that's also why I am taking apart commander decks that I've built around these newer commanders.
My main deck is Kaseto, Orochi Archimage , from the third pre-con set, back when they only printed like two cycles for commander per deck
I can fully understand your thoughts! That's why I love my codie deck with zirda as a companion that wins over storm/voltron because no one expects it with codie. It's also why I built a Kairi, the swirling deck because nobody knows it as a commander. I also immediately built the new Obkea because I find it super interesting and there are many routes you can take.
Solid video. I agree on many of the points, though I will say that some of these popular Commanders were in precons and thus easy to acquire. I grabbed the Lathril BG elves precon because I was excited for more BG elf support, but after playing her a few times, realized she wasn't for me. I'm now trying to get BG elves to work with Tyvar the Bellicose because I think swinging in with deathtouch elves is a blast.
Mentioning Gishath is a tough one for me. I had tinkered very casually with Commander since the first decks, but original Ixalan and Gishath was my first real push in the format and playing regularly. Eventually, the deck took a backseat because getting new Dinosaurs was a slow process, and I felt the deck was stagnant. I dusted it off and made some upgrades with Lost Caverns and didn't realize how popular he had become. Playing 8 mana for a Commander everybody is holding removal for just feels wrong to me. I might be switching soon.
Overall though, my favorite decks have been ones with Commanders that are more nostalgic - Jeska, Warrior Adept & Slobad, Goblin Tinkerer are two that are my personal faves. Despite being a strong Commander, my Toski deck is entirely focused on squirrels, so that makes for interesting choices. I also enjoyed building and playing Kibo, where my creature choices were relatively sub-par, but the support cards led to many interesting decisions and interactions.
tbf, my first REAL commander deck i ever made is based around Abomination of Llanowar (mostly because I was scrolling through scryfall alphabetically for commanders and yeah) but uses no token creation (technically I have a card that does, llanowar mentor, but it not central). It also ended up becoming a voltron deck.
I also have a deck centered around Apothecary White, which is truly just a mono-white human token deck, but through foods mostly.
My first commander deck I built, over 10 years ago and that never undid, is Rhys the Redeemed, and I think the most unique deck I built, although not the most exciting commander, is an aggro Ephara deck. I built it as a proof on concept that, yes, WU isn't strictly control.
I used to run Gishath for dinosaurs but inevitably when they didn't print any more enrage dinos I split my deck into two, one is Wayta and the other Pantlaza. Pantlaza is also a pretty boring commander but she's much cheaper and enters the battlefield earlier than Gishath, and also gets you bunch of free dinosaurs just like Gishath. I do run both an old and new copy of Gishath in the 99 of both however.
Enrage tribal dinos is very interesting because it's functionally Naya Control, which is not a color combo you expect you go against, until suddenly I have Trapjaw Tyrant and Pyrohemia on the board.
Funny you bring this up, because after my Gishath update with Lost Caverns, I found that I cut a lot of the Enrage Dinosaurs, like Trapjaw, Silverclad Ferocidons, and Polyraptor. While I enjoyed playing Gishath a ton, waiting for new Dinosaurs took the fun out of it for me (the deck felt like it was pretty stagnant and built itself), and now that the years have gone by and he's so popular, I find myself wanting something that isn't everybody holding removal against me. Decisions, decisions....
My overall favorite was Rielle because you really should build around her discard mechanic, and I run cards I never would touch otherwise.
While of my commander decks include four of the top six most popular, I have built each of them in a way that isn't popular. Miirym is "only clones", Ur-Dragon is "tribal tribal", Isshin is "you sure you want to attack me?", and Atraxa is Myojin tribal. The rest of my decks use much less popular commanders
You'll take Pantlaza from cold dead hands!
Your damn right it was a pain to find that precon!
I just started MTG and i wanted to build a dragon deck and saw Ur dragon deck, i also buyed tiamat and since they are both big rainbow dragon commanders i guess i could tiamat ? Or is it of the same standard ?
Urdragon is in its own top class. Tiamat is good
@@jeffreydoyle3143 thanks
One of the issues I've had with Wizards expanding on a concept like shrines or adding new abilities is that they typically do it once then abandon it for a while before it gets something new. If they're gonna add new shrine-based cards or just new abilities in general, they should make it for more than one set even if it's just sprinkled in after the big one that had it. That way it adds more flexibility and choices so it's not always the exact same thing.
I love getting looks of curiosity from people when I shuffle up my Hogaak, Risen Necropolis deck. I'm also brewing a Midrange-y Control deck with Atraxa, Grand Unifier. The deck has the restriction of only using cards that have been printed at least once as a common or uncommon!
I used to agree that a deck that builds itself, because it's a popular commander/has a powerful heavily supported theme, is boring but this was coming from someone who enjoyed janky decks that do something unique and "fun". THAT was what I found enjoyable and interesting about commander but that doesn't mean every other player builds their decks like this because commander is a GAME for FUN and it's a matter of perspective. I hate blue combo decks, I think they are boring, I would never build one, but if someone plays one I won't hate them because they are playing a game and having fun and that's what they find interesting. When I deck build I scryfall the stupidest cards that aren't good and that's great, but Timmy goes to edhrec and gets the best dragons for his Ur dragon deck as he wants to play the game explosively while thinking less about deck building and that's great too.
Agreed! I’m all for people playing whatever you want! I’m never gonna refuse to play against anyone based on their commander alone, it’s just a preference that’s all!
@@thetrinketmage Until you run into a rebel that loves Griselbrand😂
What do you think of Thrasta, Tempest Roar as a commander? I like that it has trample over plainswalkers and the commander zone pay is negligible with cheap mana spells. Plus you can cheat it in play with their spells they cast on your turn too if they try countering it. I want to make it exciting when I go to play.
I just tested a Obeka with Initative theme, easily the most fun deck iv ever brewed. Also great video, a lot of the stuff you said is the reason i stopped playing my Lathril blade of elves deck.
I agree that building around a weird uncommon commander is probably the most fun, and that's the reason I believe the format is so great. But the reason why I also run The Ur-Dragon on dragon tribal is simply the cool factor of having the actual progenitor of dragons at the helm. Flavor wise, it just makes too much sense. Another option would be Tiamat, but at that point, you're now building around 5 pieces you want to use to win rather than just big dragons.
I know this doesn't take gameplay into consideration since you could just as easily just go wide with Miirym or Lathliss as your commander, but I think it's the reason why so many people just play Ur-Dragon. Besides Emminence just pulling enough weight without having to cast it at all.
Definitely agree! The art alone got me hooked the first time I saw it!
i know what you mean, i was doubting at making an Sliver deck because of this issue, its always the same Slivers, in the same order, to do the same thing
i guess i just really love the little critters because i did make the deck even if its boring, though i am going to play it in 2 modes, hardcore boring mode, which is the standard way to play them, or Sliver Slot Machine fun mode, where i play The First Sliver as my commander and fill all the creature slots with random slivers in my collection
still, i made an Atla Palani deck with Wurms instead of Dinos
and a more generic Arcades deck because one of my long dreams was to make a Wall deck
Hey, I recently made a budget edh wall deck, with "Arcades the strategist" as a commander. I haven't try it but I look forward haha
A good way I've found to increase the variety of my decks is to completely cut out Made for Commander ™️ cards. It really helps you focus on interesting design spaces that are otherwise neglected. Some examples I have:
-Ognis Treasures
-Greasefang Vehicle Reanimator with a discard outlet subtheme
-Nemata Saproling Aristocrats
-Satsuki Saga Enchantress
This. I have been playing Muldrotha for what feels like a decade, sprinkling in the odd new card every couple of sets. I counted it up the other day: my deck represents 58 different sets, and only around 5 cards that came from a Commander set. I love this deck and it feels like a little adventure to play, though it remains very strong and more-or-less optimized. My joy playing this deck is greatly enhanced by the incredible variety I've stuffed into the deck.
For a bit of context, I hate using pre-cons and won't be buying commanders where you automatically know 70% of the cards that will be included. I don't mind fighting against them at all, just to be clear, but I don't care for them. Deckbuilding, to me, is just as important a journey as piloting the deck.
I did a deck about ivy, gleeful spellthief which is about doing copy of aura and mutation! I dont see this commander a lot and it is pretty cool to play. Also it can be budget as you said because its not some card that you see all the time! Hope this commander is played more
Something I do to make deck I have that get too repetitive for me is to play a secondary commander option as the commander instead that has limited synergy with the deck. All my decks have multiple commander options I can devolve to if I want to change things up especially if the deck is supposed to work a certain way. A good example of this is when I play my teysa tribal human deck with the newest teysa instead of teysa orzov scion. It changes everything around and keeps the deck from being too boring if I play it too much.
How popular of Jolrael Voice of Zhalfir? I've been wanting to build a commander deck around her for a while now
No one can stop me from playing Edgar! 😤😤😤
They can stop playing with you. As they probably should.
@@liberty2087 Edgar isn’t that bad. I don’t think anyone I played has actually complained about him much. I get more complaints about my Xenagos extra combat deck.
When I was new, I went through a phase of 2014-2016 commanders that people had all stopped playing and I feel like I hit a lot of this idea you've presented, and it does make sense.
I feel like Atraxa specifically is not that good though, always felt like my weirder commanders were better and less hated, which just means.. way better. Like when I had a Raff, Weatherlight Stalwart deck and an Atraxa deck at the same time, Raff is just a better commander and he isn't hated.
my personal fav bc it was my first commander is Ayli and shes like less than 10% of decks or something while my second fav is Hapatra
Mikaeus is my zombie commander!! And I have a Thalia and Gitrog deck built purely as a voltron glass cannon that I think is really different and cool.
Ehehehehe. My favorite commander is Florian, Voldaren Scion. I play cards like Pox, Fraying Omnipotence, Descent into Avernus and Havoc Festival. :)
My favorite commander is actually Moira and Teshar (the 2 put together), makes for an interesting reanimate and flicker deck that is far less durdly than other flicker decks, has enough cards that are strong on their own that it doesn't rely too much on the commander.
I am still using Sisay for my shrines deck, the shrine engine is strong but monotonous, so I made it a lot spicier by running ultimatum and epic spells tribal on top, the deck forgoes a lot of enchantress type effects and instead focuses on maximizing Epic Spell potentials, Shrines happens to synergize super well with Epic spells, in fact, the deck is actually built around the Epic Spells to flip the table upside down at a moments notice, Shrines which brings each other out and are all legendary meaning it qualifies for a major load of Put effects that bypass Epic restrictions.
This makes for a Shrines deck that can choose to play like a normal shrines deck, or suddenly starts to delete 10 cards from opponents deck every turn, while still outputing shrines to keep up some board relevance.
I agree with branching out and playing unpopular commanders. My zombie commander is Varina, Lich Queen, I personally have never seen someone else use her before
I wanted to play korvold because I love everything about it, but I didn't want to make a simple treasure tribal or aristocrat. "it's too strong", "it's a kill onsight", "I already have treasures or aristocrat" so it kinda went in suspend.
Then, as I was looking at old cards, I find old devour cards that I had in middle school and remembered HOW MUCH I loved it. Now : devour is objectevely bad/not that good, but, with korvold OP effect and the right color (also, just theme honestly) it fit ! And because it's a childhood kind-of deck I decided to make it also partly goblin tribal to use as fuel for my devour threat.
The deck needs some tweaks, but it works ! Devour is still a bit weak, but since people are afraid of korvold they ABSOLUTELY keeps their removal and counterspell for him. But since the deck is not (mainly) built around korvold, it can work alone ! and now I sacrifice 5 goblins to make a 35/35 flying trample that hit for 20 damages blast on etb :D
Korvold is great in any scenario because it's such a good way to dupe threat-assessment that it makes the deck (therefore the archetype) work by giving it more time ! And he's now a win win : or i play him and it dies, ok I still got my monstrosities; or it surives and I got to draw 10 cards on my monster and I have now two threats since korvold itself gets bigger.
I wanted for a long time a korvold deck, a devour deck, and a goblin deck, but didn't because i respectevely didn t want something broken, not something too fragile, and not something too simple. Now : I have a new fav deck
Those super popular commanders also get old to play against really fast. I sometimes even just concede the game before it starts when I see another go-shintai deck on brawl because of how often I get paired against it and am tired of it. Also funny how zombies are mentioned at the end because since I am working on a zombie build right now too, but I'm using Henry wu as the commander.
Have you done one of these covering Tergrid?
Like a video on Tergrid specifically? No I haven’t talked about her yet
@@thetrinketmage this video came up when I was browsing for content on her lol
@@monomanamaniac oh weird...
@@thetrinketmage I mean, it's the kind of list you'd certainly find her on.
my favorite deck is minotaur tribal with neheb the worthy. I went full glass cannon because i like seeing big numbers from having so many damage doublers like furnace of rath and dictate of the twin gods out. That said i love my fair share of jank like Arjun, the Shifting Flame where i have a % chance at dying to my own deck or winning via labman; or trying to make monoblue zombies or uhh..... Zabaz Glimmerwasp Modular (I wish there was more modular support tbh I enjoy this deck a lot).
What are yallz favorite deck(s)?
I definitely prefer legendary designs that have wiggle room, it lets you put more personality into your decks and make them feel like yours verses an EDH netdeck.
I built wayta as a Boros Reckoner/Brash taunter deck, verses dinos. Add cards like Martyrdom and it’s basically uno reverse card tribal. So much fun, and it feels like my deck. Whereas my group has a Gishath and a Pantlaza, and they feel the exact same in practice even though one is a blink deck.
🤜🤛 that's exactly how I built my Wayta deck! Did you put all the en-kor's to l in yours too?
Honestly, what Commanders people choose to play isn’t even close to my biggest issue on a Friday Commander Night.
It’s the guys and gals where it *doesn’t really matter* what Commander they choose to play, because every single deck they build has (10-12) pieces of Spot Removal, (4-8) Boardwipes, and (The only real variance in these Esper/Dimir Counter-Removal Piles) X# of Counters, a third of which are free.
Interaction is wonderful! Interaction is vitally necessary!
Interaction becomes, “I think I’m going to make an early night of it,” when I can’t catch *A* game where it’s not minimum 2 of these, and often 3. All engaged in a rousing round of Who’s Gonna Thoracle?
Next to that, I will *gladly* even EAGERLY sit down against an Urabrask Pod-Killer, Some Egg-Hurling Dino Cheating, and Voja going buck-wild with some knife-ears.
I can’t speak for anyone else, but those games where any Commander that facilitates an active attempt to win the game by combat gets removed every single time it leaves the CZ, the *very instant* it leaves the CZ, and a Wipe occurs every single time there are more than 6-7 creatures *total* on the field, so the game ends up having 4, if not 5 distinct board-rebuild series of turns?
Nothing that happens in EDH is less fun than those games, and they seem to be getting more common all the time.
“Don’t think. Don’t experiment with deck-building. Just hurl answers at everything that moves, and wipe if someone stymies your spot removal. Doesn’t matter if that wipe does nothing to advance towards your win. You’re just stalling until you’ve armed your Thoracle and acquired the Counters to stop the rare Interaction that can prevent it from resolving.”
That fairly describes 66% of the Esper and Dimir decks in existence.
People prone to playing Counter-Removal Piles aren’t going to stop because you played something that wins *slower* . All that does is instead of you leaping out of the trench into withering machine-gun-fire while armed with an assault rifle, you’re charging the machine-gun nest armed with a musket.
I loathe this, but I’ve begun asking myself during every deck I design, “Am I doing everything in my power to shut down as much interaction as humanly possible?”
The Esper/Dimir crowd is what made a Commander like Voja so wildly popular, and that’s frigging awful, but what’s the alternative to making Commanders quasi-immune to Spot Removal?
Are we just supposed to accept that EDH is functioning as intended when a Commander lacking Haste dies before it can swing once literally 85-90% of the time?
It’s not fun.
krenko was one of the first commanders I specked out a build on my own.. (I also tweaked the lathril precon because I use to play modern elfball) but it's no where near my favorite and I don't normally pull them out because they are both KOS commanders.. my heart will always belong to Prossh, skyraider of Kher and Jund Sacrifice.. although I do really enjoy running my Wurm Tribal around Trostani, Selesnya's Voice too
I will also add that I don't care about the power level of the pod... but I do get annoyed when people are running these KOS commanders and complain about being targeted
I usually have to wait until I get a flash of inspiration or get really into a concept or idea before i make a deck. Any deck I've made on a whim or one that was based on a popular commander I've generally disassembled or lost interest in, like Nekusar or Miirym. All my decks, except one, that I've made with that passion I still have and play, and that count is up to...12 now.
Also ill be honest too, I generally don't like seeing someone with the same deck as me. To me it feels less personalized and unique to me if someone has the same commander as me.
I agree totally, tho i am one of those players who is a Hipster. My recent Favorite Deck is Atsushi , the blazing sky. I tried to figure out how do i trigger a death trigger a lot in mono red! My Answer is all the temporary clone effects. And i have some of the Treasure/artifact synergy to have a gameplay as well.
I love mono colored decks too.
Oh hey you featured my favorite commander at the end there, tymaret
I like building a deck before giving it a commander. I've done it with Gonti and Ruhan. Gonti fits in flavor but not necessarily mechanically with their deck. Ruhan is just there for his colors.
Neyam Shai Murad has been one of the more satisfying commander decks i have played around with in a long time. Very interesting ability with a lot of interesting applications. Good for the brain 👍
This is exactly why I decidet against building a Omnath, Locus of Creation deck. I love playing Lands and Landfall, but when I had my first draft of a deck together, it didn't really felt like my own creation. That's why i rather settled on a mono black Lifegain deck around OG Erebos. Mono B may still force me towards some staples, mainly when considering win-cons. Though, he still feels way more unique and was much harder to make work, not like I was copying a solved commander.
Just found this video today, already have a Quintorius Loremaster deck, it's one of my favorites. So many of my cards are just discard, draw that I straight up call that deck the Circus, because it's just three Elephants on Unicycles. (Yes, Quintorius Kand and Quintorius, Field Historian are there, too.)
I love my G&G deck. I never even considered switching to wilhelt for a second. Playing bad draft zombies to self mill into future bad draft zombies is the life!
I do like Talrand alot. I know it looks like a generic "i'll counter everything" deck, but being in mono blue forces you to run some really weird interaction stuff like chilling trap in order to amass the drake army.
I've seen a really cool Talrand deck that specifically runs no counter spells. If you're interested, check one of the recent MTGmuddstah videos
I remember before they errata'ed the Planeswalker rules. If you animated a walker and put counters on it, Experiment Kraj could just activate all the abilities infinitely.
Oh that’s true!
Really? Ouch.
I think the good thing about Atraxa is that there are so many different builds. Go Shintai is pretty much only shrines. It's uninteresting and the deck building is linear. At least some of these are open ended as opposed to new Riku and Obeka. Building those decks involves googling "choose" and "your upkeep" and putting everything in the list. Every one of those decks is basically the same. At least Atraxas are different. I also played against a fun GW Kenrith deck. That was lovely.
I started to build a Deck around the Archimandrite. I found the commander as i searched another card in my "trash rare" binder. Need more monks....