AITA: MTG Edition | Izzet + New Players = Disaster?

[@billwithers4762]

lmao! 8 extra turns in a row without winning from it? Yeah I'd be pissed lol

[@truckdrivermm]

LMAO

[@Javiolanti]

I think it depends. First, it sounds like the group NEEDS more interaction. If the commander is coming out and you know what its gameplan is, removal is the name of the game. This is true for any deck that snowballs, like through mana doublers, decks that do stuff on every person's turn, or cases like this with extra turns. If you can't stop the snowball early on before it gets out of hand, you will have a bad time. But on the other side, extra turns can be okay if they get resolved quickly. I've seen people take 5-10 minutes on just one turn, so if someone is taking 8 turns and resolving all of those turns in 10 minutes? That's actually pretty efficient. So the izzet player NEEDS to make sure that if they're going to play decks that have this many steps, they complete it quickly. The extra turns are superficial if they're taking as long as the rest of the group does on their own respective turns. I'd say the poster is the asshole in this case. It doesn't sound like the playgroup has done what's needed to shift their meta to handle the threat, and just downright telling a player to stop playing a deck after they already revised it to be at other players' cost and their own monetary investment is rough. I'm mildly curious how the izzet player got 54 damage on electrodominance on turn 4. It seems like a very specific number, it isn't infinite, so the izzet player must've gotten a ton of extra turn spells one after the other and ramped up somehow alongside that. If they're reliably ending the game on turn 4-6, it's reaching CEDH levels, and that alone is a reason to revise the deck. Thank you for the post. I don't watch Twitch, but I enjoyed your commentary. Best of luck to your streaming career.

[@thewheelsman29]

Yeah, turn 4 54 damage Electrodominance means that it could only have been copied 1 time and if they are paying 29 mana into something turn 4, that's game at most tables. That either shows an extreme power imbalance or a complete lack of interaction.

[@emocelot]

i've never played extra turns cards, even in decks where they're actually good or win conditions, because i've been in the situation where I watch someone take 30 minutes of extra turns then pass, not even winning the game.

[@thewheelsman29]

I think both people are kinda wrong here. The poster first complained about cost, then about combos when the other guy reduced the cost of his deck. The guy that is being complained about isn't really working to find a solution, just trying to meet the asks at a bare minimum. They should both be working together to better understand how to deal with this. Maybe the poster and others need to be taught about the value of interaction, maybe the guy being complained about needs to take a specific combo out of his deck, I don't know. But neither party really seems to be trying to work together for a solution, just complain about the problem. People need to learn to have good conversations with each other about expectations, what they want out of games, and what they don't want.

[@cookiesandmilk6421]

My pod had very similar experiences early on. We were super determined to flat out ban all the cards we thought led to bad play patterns like 15 minute turns or hyper efficient "interact right now or lose" style cards. We had a ban list we maintained regularly and talked about all the time. By the end of it we had just under 360 cards on the list. This really really hurt us as both deck builders and players, since we just never had to deal with strategies that would take advantage of the shortcomings in our decks or plays. Nowadays we don't have a ban list anymore and it allowed us to grow into better commander players. Almost all the kill-on-sight commanders we had previously banned just aren't an issue at our tables now, because we learned from being exposed to those cards that the decks built around them usually crumble very hard when their commander isn't available, so we loaded up on removal. As a result of that all decks in the pod that have must-kill commanders at the helm have started using considerable amounts of deck space to protect their commander, making them more interactive and engaging and less outrageously explosive at the same time. Meaning when they do go off eventually it doesn't always result in a win right away. Commander becomes a self-regulating format if you try to find solutions to problems your opponents present you with and they try to find solutions to your solutions. It's much better for you as a player and socially as well to go about it like that. That DOSEN'T mean you have to like every kind of play pattern or win condition or put up with them for forever. If your pod really can't stand a deck at all, you should definitely talk about it. But at least collectively think about what YOU could do differently, both in the deckbuilder and inside the game, before going off on somebody for playing what they like.

[@AlexOvTheAbyss]

If his fun is stopping other people's fun, I would tell him he is no longer invited. I do kind of relate to the whole money vs power thing. Maybe six months after I started playing, I did start throwing money at cards to make my decks "better", and all it did was remove my fun from the game. Another thing I'd suggest to them - if he wants to keep doing this, just get with everyone and agree to always target him down first to see how he likes his fun being taken away.

[@shytwilii]

Was lovely to see you at the twitch stream!! Thank you for hanging out :D I think every new MTG player struggles with Money VS Power. My hope is that more groups become proxy friendly so that the lessons learned during this struggle aren't wallet breaking lol

[@AlexOvTheAbyss]

@@shytwilii Oh definitely! Only issue I've had with people using proxies was when one person decided to proxy about $500 worth of cards to sky rocket the power of their Edgar Markov deck without telling us. Glad I was able to catch a stream! It was fun! Hope to catch more in the future!

[@wrightshelby92]

As someone who 4 - 5 years ago began my magic journey as well, I used to put $ value on power. And slowly figuring out that was the case to now having a $1400 paper weight of a deck because it’s a tribute deck, foiled as best it can be, and no one likes playing against it. It doesn’t win. I has 2 ways to win, no tutors, a few good ways to draw. But that’s it. I let the cards draw where they draw.

[@p45yourfired3]

This is really interesting because when i had been playing about 4 months i built the otter storm deck and used arcane bombardment and discontinuity and played at an lgs store...i did win my game however it became apparent that i did not fully understand the stack with arcane bombardment it led to me ending peoples turns in their upkeep while i floundered for a win with the stormsplitter.... Moral of the story i took the deck apart until i can be confident i fully understand the workings

[@jallportc]

G says the pod shouldn't try to stop him from having fun "his way" but he's gotta realize, this is a group setting where everyone wants to be having fun! If the group decides they're not having fun with the way you play, they won't want to play with you any more, and that's not being petty, that's just what it means to be part of a community.

[@ReyaadawnMTG]

This is why my primary EDH deck is Ojer Axonil. Gotta keep games under 30 minutes

[@SyxxPunk]

At first I thought it was just Izzet in general, but an extra turn spam deck is something that should be really ready to disrupt, but at the same time it's horrendous to bring that to a new pod. It's why I made a group hug deck specifically to use around new players.

[@huggelion]

honestly if i was them and they wouldnt stop playing the extra turn deck i would play aggro or a lot of counter spells and just target him

[@yohnazo]

A big thing that I enjoy is enjoying other people's plays and their turns, either interacting with them or just by watching and seeing what happens. Definitely something that would help in a 6-players pod. It's great to enjoy the game, not just your part in it. 8 turns is a lot though.

[@caseymckay5660]

From what I just looked up, a simple counter spell would stop the spell AND alania from triggering. Idk why you wouldn't run counters if you had the color for them in your deck

[@dimitriid]

I don't want to say *yes* outright, but there's a couple of things to consider. First, this is usually *the natural progression of any commander group* given dedicated players on a long enough timeline: There's always going to be someone (Or even a few players) who engages far more deeply with some aspects of the game first while the rest of the table usually was happy with the exact same deck, usually a variation of 'I do the thing' style of just focusing on their own gameplan and have very little answers (Beyond packing some board wipes, which no they're not an answer since they mostly just affect other creature strategies and have little to no effect on combo or storm decks) The second point is that everyone is also tempted to establish some sort of balancing act: Establish a price limit (In this case limiting/disallowing proxies) trying to use some other power level tools or slight alterations to the format (In my case it was suggesting Pauper Commander, which still had the strong players closing games in 4-6 turns anyway) However, just like you've found out, it's very easy to the dedicated player to still come up with ways to push their strategy nobody is prepared for even within said constrains. I'm afraid I don't really have the answer so to speak: I just know it's very common for some people on most tables to grow on their interest way beyond the socially acceptable confines of a casual table. I don't think either side handled the situation like they should but it's very clear your friend needs to try to find some more people interested in high powered EDH or even CEDH altogether to test out his ideas since well, extra turn spells are not at all a problem on CEDH: most people on those tables are prepared to win at instant speed on top you casting a stormed-out extra turn spell before it resolves and if not, well those are the tables that would enthusiastically scoop and go 'That was great! Let's play again' and just keep going because they might have been caught without a response *this time* but they're ready to have answers next match.

[@leadpaintchips9461]

Frankly the a-hole is the person getting angry that his 8 turns in a row fun was making the rest of the group scoop and wanting to stop playing.

[@SideHustleGaming46]

"8 turns in a row" was all I needed to hear. That guy was being an asshole.

[@Saxus43]

The only time ive ever gotten 8 turns is when I hit 2 other players' Expropriates with an Etali. and I still killed everyone on the next turn anyway.

[@tyeklund7221]

As an izzet player, no i can get to 10 mana turn 3 or 4 easy. I used to have an extra turns deck and it can lock the game down quickly

[@Osuronohito]

I have a couple of decks that take forever, specifically a cheap Jhoira deck that can take extremely long turns. I do not play these decks unless given permission from a pod that knows full well what I'm doing. NTA.

[@jamespanter6768]

Of all the win-cons the one that is never mentioned is the concession win. Forcing a player to concede is a strategy albeit a strategy that makes you a target when you play that strategy. And if you are playing a masturbatory type of deck don’t be surprised when other players hate on that deck.

[@TheDevlain]

Normally, 3 to 4 extra turns should suffice to win. When I go this route I try to know exactly how I want to end the game and scale in that direction or if I have an infinite turn loop I just demonstrate de loop, I provide some menace and countermagic and I ask my opponents to concede. If they don't want I just repeat the loop and attack for 2 every turn for X turns as fast as I can. Normally people concede anyways before the 8th time you have a 2/2 that couldn't be blocked and infinite turns. If your win condition is cumbersome it is your responsibility to be as agile and prepared as possible to avoid wasting everybody's time. I think it is a rule of courtesy.

[@wrightshelby92]

@@TheDevlain I can agree and understand about being agile with your loops, as someone who has had to demonstrate the 1 or 2 I have in the few decks I do have. I do also feel that as a newer player and based on the context given they may have net decked their deck, and it may not have provided sufficient information to explain the loop. As well as the player may not have taken the time to understand it completely and how to explain it efficiently. New player syndrome of “this is a combo and can go infinite so I win” but someone may have a response and had a specific timing has to be made aware of how it works to respond properly, and as a pod of new players they may not be wholeheartedly aware of how to interact if they are told it is infinite etc.

[@TheDevlain]

@wrightshelby92 that's why you should ask for concede and don't demand it. It is a way of saying "I think in this context I'll win. You want to play 'til the end or do we go to the next game?" You should try to not sound cocky but really interested on everybody's time. If somebody thinks they could interact he will decline the offer and ask you to continue.

[@wrightshelby92]

@ completely agree asking for concession without being cocky about it is definitely the best way to go about it. I think in this context from my perspective it could be new players not fully understanding the loop, and new players not knowing how or when to interact when presented with a loop. Especially when someone may have the right response but isn’t aware that they do. And presenting a loop and asking for a concede is a valid option but could prove less effective when new players are involved. I was personally so I can not speak for anyone else, I was taught with the mindset of challenge everything when presented a loop. Reason being is someone at the table who isn’t presenting the loop may not understand it, and may need it explained differently to know how it works and when they may be able to respond and use it as a teaching moment even if someone doesn’t have a response. All that comes from a place most effectively done when the loop is properly explained by the player demonstrating said loop. Net decking is nice and helps learn older cards and combo pieces for new players but some websites either don’t explain it, or do explain but poorly. And as a person who almost fell victim to a non existent explanation or poorly explained one when I was newer to the game, I know the mindset can be “I have a loop it goes infinite I win. I don’t know how but I win” is where I was coming from with my perspective.

[@dimitriid]

This is why the only extra turn cards you see in cedh are the red ones, variations of 'Take and extra turn and you lose the game after that turn' because it really should be just a way to get your mana backs and untap some permanents you might need for a win condition. So the only thing I'd suggest is having some other win condition on top: I do have a deck that can generate infinite turns (Oswald Fiddlebender monowhite arti deck) but I also pack a lot of other win conditions to just declare 'Well I know have infinite turns and will eventually draw/tutor for Walking Ballista and infinite mana and just do infinite damage to all of you' and proceed to scoop if there's no answers: the table doesn't needs to see me take *8 turns* for me to eventually draw what I need we can just assume since there's no answer (I.E. I resolved a Grand Abolisher first so there can be no answer) we just assume the win, scoop and move on.

[@wrightshelby92]

@@dimitriid This is very accurate. And I personally feel like I am seeing things from the perspective even from myself that are based in how we have been molded as players over our time of playing the game. But the story was from the perspective of a player that had only been playing for a short time same with the rest of the play group so their knowledge of the game and how things work may be limited and skewed by the players around them. Without further context of boardstates, hands, etc… we have to be mindful of what was happening at that moment. Because you can take many turns and do a bunch of damage but how it happens can make a difference as well as there being a chance at a card like Angels grace coming up.

[@kcanterb81]

Nice feedback and insight! the AITA MTG stuff can be hilarious!

[@tongaexpress]

Missed you :) Love your content and I am looking forward to more to come we hope!

[@bloodshotblock]

So i learned the hard way dollar values don't equal power level many dragons cost 10 plus dollars but if your ramp and interaction sucks you'll be lucky if you cast more then one or two a game point is expensive cards don't win games a cohesive synergistic deck with a plan of a attack and interaction wins games be it controll, big stompy, tokens, whatever your style you need to plan for it

[@nicograsso3907]

you don't need expropriate for 8 turns you can just chain extra turn spell,.and in a lower power/beginer pod people won't know to hold up conter spells if they have them. A lot of them have an exile when played clause and they might not be doing that to cast them back from grave but it could just be that there's a lot of them in their deck, a quick check on srcy fall showes 50 so each extra turn has a coin flip to draw you another extra turn and the commander is copying them so you now have a roughly 75% chance of finding an extra turn all of this is not counting any draw engiens you may have. from their you can just stall doesn't matter if the extra turn cost all you mana because you copied it so the first extra turn you keep the chain going with the follow up extra turn (again copied) and the second extra turn you are free to cast what ever you like. These decks are really easy to build so I can 100% see a new player doing so with ease, and can be shut down withcounter magic and sending early attacks their way. Now does the fact that there is counter play make the okay imo yes , but only at high powered tables that have the tools to handle it in a similar vain to infintes combos or staxs, becuase damn does it suck to be playing low to mid power only to say you can't play the game any more.

[@PsychoticSashimiS]

They're both in the wrong but it baffles me how they don't run enough interaction and how someone DOESN'T win with so many turns 💀

[@WladcaPodziemia]

Well, Is it OP's issue, or whole Pod's issue? BTW after 2 months nobody discovered any kind of counter-spell or instant speed removal, or even focusing izzet player to stop it?

[@ThaMobstarr]

Tbh extra turns are fine. But you need to progress through them pretty quick. I would actually set a time at which he shall finish all his turns. Let's say he has 10 minutes to finish all 8 turns. If he doesn't get it done, I would say that he has to turn over to the next player. Also he DEFINITELY is supposed to win. Considering the money value of the deck: Yeah have a discussion maybe which cards are too powerful, for example, no fast mana.

[@Haschlatte42]

I rly like this video series, hope you make more, def have my sub :)

[@shytwilii]

1000% thank you for the support

[@todharter5195]

They're newbies, they don't have any interaction, so they just get taken by this. I think the guy described was a jerk, but if you run with 12+ removal/counter, it is unlikely it will happen...

[@Threeve703]

Sometimes turns are long. The other day I played a Tatyova deck whoo took a 20 minute turn in a 45 minute game. Then they won next turn. Going 8 turns in a row without winning? That's a problem.

[@michaelkerr2194]

Nobody could beat him? They knew what he was bringing 3 times in a row and nobody could stop him?

[@demonicgrub1025]

I'm sorry, but if you don't think people should reach 10 mana in a game, you are doing at least 1 of the following 3 things. Playing Cedh (fair enough, if that's what everyone signed up for), not ramping well enough, or not running enough interaction. A mid power deck should be presenting winning board states around turn 6-7, that doesn't mean they should just win every time they get there first. If your deck can't answer that winning board state, and isn't consistently getting there first, you just have a bad deck.

[@shytwilii]

I meant like comfortably spending 10 mana on something then proceeding to do other things while the rest of the pod just watches you haha If one person spends that much mana on ONE spell, the rest of the pod should have answers. The fact all they can do is just watch is the issue. And yes, I play higher-powered MTG between power levels 7 to 8 :) Sorry, this is recorded live on Twitch so sometimes all of my points don't come across very well. Also, the only decks I have such high CMC in are my cheat decks like Jodah and Kaalia. So that high of a cost of card is weird to me. I like to keep my average CMC below 4 and optimize the crap out of my mana base for super efficient decks. I'll have to do some deck techs on here soon. My decks are super fun :D

[@Bakanlink]

I just dont understand those kind of people, they complain about solitaire game plans yet they dont run interaction, their only interaction being combat and most probably up until its lethal, because they dont want to hurt other people feelings or look like assholes for attacking without provocation, but when they see an interactive deck like control decks they cry because they get their threats negated/removed. Adapt to your table going up in power, not asking someone to downgrade to play at your level. I just cant see the fun on playing a deck that can't handle stuff because it lacks interaction and cant win because its not a combo deck.

[@meoka2368]

Start dropping some anti-commander cards, like auras that remove all abilities.

[@YourFriendTheComputer]

OP Absolutely is the asshole. Not because they scoop but because of how they attempted their 'Rule 0' conversation with "G" and came in hot, by their own admission. That is how you force people to swap to being defensive and thus not internalizing your requests. While it isn't OP's job to play with "G", if they want to play with "G" they do need to find a middle ground. The deck is either a chaos deck and nondeterministic in how it wins (which was not mentioned, just extra turns) or the G's deck is unstable/doesn't know their deck. Unstable decks you help them tech out the deck with suggestions. Not knowing the deck you tell them to goldfish it more so they know what their lines of play are. If it's stuff like Expropriate Copy as their way to Time Stretch into these absurdly large combos of turns: Stop giving him time and give him money instead. After that RUN INTERACTION. Battlecruiser decks running little to no interaction are absolutely the assholes when they bitch about a combo player popping off as then they're effectively bitching about the combo player having 'Bad-Wrong-Fun' because it doesn't fit within the Battlecruiser player's deckbuilding style. Lead by example the type of environment you want to play in, which includes giving help when others are struggling to achieve their deck's power fantasy.

[@szepi79]

I dont understand why the other players are allowing this. I mean gamewise. No single player can survive if all other 3 gang up on them. Also, if you allow proxies, why dont OP and the rest use them? Or they can choose not to allow them. The friend is still an a-hole here, but OP sounds like a kid who gets his lunch money taken away every day, and yet he does nothing against it.

[@hellothere-us7iw]

But that is izzet though.

[@leonardwisniewski3418]

100% would build counter.deck just to lock the extra turns player out of the game. I'm petty though.

[@leadpaintchips9461]

Build a Tamiyo, Inquisitive Student proxy deck. Draw half your deck by turn 4 and have no maximum hand size, with every alternative cost counterspell in the game along with all the "X/X, where X= hand size".

[@ChristopherMorris-u2r]

Yay new video 😊 should keep uploading

[@shytwilii]

Will be uploading once a week! :D

[@metoo1477]

New players need to learn to play interaction. Players can only do dumb stuff if you let them.

[@metoo1477]

Racing to the finish line is not how you play magic, if that’s what you want to do, just play rock paper scissors

[@RobbinThaHoodlums]

If you play mtg arena, i think uploading some content on that would get some good engagment, im always looking for arena videos, and i know others feel the same #brokegang

[@shytwilii]

I play the big three on my twitch: Arena, Mtg Online, & Spelltable :) I'll look at repurposing some of the content for here haha

[@RobbinThaHoodlums]

@@shytwilii that would be awesome, I went over to your twitch and saw some form of a digital version ( I'm very new and am pretty ignorant to the magic sphere) but when my prime sub renews ill sub and watch your arena VODS

[@RobbinThaHoodlums]

I think my comment got swallowed by the void because I posted it and is gone, short version, when prime sub renews ill drop it ur way, I'm new to magic and can only afford arena lol, idk what the other two are but ill check out the VODs when I can sub

[@RobbinThaHoodlums]

@@shytwilii and on the repurposing aspect, there are a lot of good channels that are solely just repurposed twitch/stream content so doing that to put more videos in the algorithm as well as the AITA and other original content should do nothing but be a net positive for the channel

[@huggelion]

if you play play causal commander and you build a high powered deck to win i think you did something wrong also the guy just needs to find a different place to play commander with people who are all on the same level so he also can have fun.

[@joshdean7523]

Seems like he isn’t a good fit for your play group. Nothing against him, but probably not worth inviting back if he wants to play those types of decks.

[@tricky5222]

Just stop inviting him. He can find a group to play with that he doesn't mind and you can tune down power level. This is always going to be the problem of casual magic. It's just not a game of grey area

[@pinglocalhost]

Just play blue 💙 😂

[@dragade101]

It is OK to not play with someone. That if their idea of Magic greatly differs from your idea: dont play against them. Magic means a different game for different people. Finding people who are like-minded is ok. By extension, dont play EDH with people who you dont get along with. An example: I know this content creator who seems nice and I would love to shake their hand but I know fundamentally we see and play Magic for completely different reasons. It’s a social game for me and they don’t see it that way. I feel sad they see the game this way (as a transaction) but I’m not going to spend my energy trying to change that. If some blue kid wants to play extra turns for days, great. They should go into their closet to do this.

[@dragade101]

After 2 extra turns and they seem to be going for 3, 4 or N more extra turns, then yeah, say Good Game. You came to play a game of Magic. They brought a solitaire machine. (I'm perfectly fine for the proxies they bring. That doesnt bother me, especially based on how WotC is shitting on Magic. The forbidden part is turning Magic into solitaire.)