Commanders We Refuse to Play Against | The Command Zone 651 | MTG EDH Magic Gathering

[@commandcast]

Throw your questions in the comments! We won’t be able to get to all of them, but will answer as much as we have time for!

[@drakko95]

What are your favorite and least favorite strategies/themes to play in EDH, and why? What minutiae makes them fun/not fun to you? The least favorite category obviously barring things like Stax, Discard, etc.

[@WilliamNiles-ro2dl]

I’m all about commander war. 8-12 players all facing off against each other. I am a Tribal player. Planeswalker tribal/Tribal is my thing. The only two cards I rule zero is griselbrand for my Liliana deck (her 4 demons and her contract) and my Iona (from the vault) along with the other mono white angels from that vault box.

[@mmf6236]

Do you all ever consider the player when deciding to play the deck or not? For me you could hand me a lvl 9 deck and im mediocre and you two would still kick my butt unless i got lucky. The same for everyone in my MTG group so we let everyone go as high as they want, but we dont have any 8's and above

[@1notdeadfred]

Who in the office has a knack for taking commanders that have a few very obvious deck directions and building something completely unique? Can we look at the deck building process of them in particular? That would be super fun!

[@Gosagen93]

What to you believe of a Commander format that divides card types in seperate piles, and in your draw step you choose which pile to draw from? To somewhat balance it would look something like this: 1st pile: Lands, 2nd pile: Creatures, 3rd pile: Artifacts/Enchantments/Battles, 4th pile: Sorceries/Instants. This would help Jimmy draw his lands :)

[@TeruMikami819]

Hey I've been a huge fan of the Command Zone for some time. I'm hoping and praying for your Guy's saftey with all the fires over in LA

[@damienjohnson3450]

Agreed! Stay safe you guys!

[@commandcast]

Thank you!

[@only_folls]

What? 🐠‼️I never even got to play them hope they are OK

[@mkdynasty272]

Same! Stay safe, you guys

[@quezer0]

Stay safe guys. Thoughts and prayers including u all in LA county

[@IronRage]

A buddy's alternate "Fun Con" is equipping all 5 of his boots to Felix five boots. We as a playgroup have accepted that if he pulls it off, it's an "exodia" effect where he wins the game on the spot. It's always extremely hilarious when the final boot touches Felix and we all play 300 card pickup.

[@Aros-pr2xr]

Cute

[@Auscilius]

That's awesome man😆

[@jacobnestle3805]

The "Rule Zero Partners" comment at the end has an asterisk. Everyone I've ever met has been cool with someone playing Gimli and Legolas as partners!

[@kennethandrews1111]

I have a friend who has a wyll & Rowan commander deck. It's pretty busted. Lol

[@jamtone4492]

I would LOVE to play odric and akroma. Sadly, odric doesnt have partner though akroma does.

[@j-dubz2349]

That's because it was ridiculous that they didn't have partner

[@conker1847]

It helps that Gimli and Legolas both have no OP printings and they're gruel limited.

[@kennethandrews1111]

@conker1847 there's a Simic legolas so it's temur limited.

[@stealthgrrr]

As someone who has been "stood-up" a lot in the Commander Pod dating metaphor of showing up to game stores, I was feeling pretty down about continuing to search this year. The first year of the pandemic on Spelltable was probably the only year of consistent Commander play I ever had (with people across the country who were all eager to get back to their physical games). But I really appreciated the point about signaling your intent and interest and trying to break though.

[@commandcast]

You'll find the pod that's right for you. Best of luck!

[@dennisbarbieri8122]

shot in the dark, where are you from?

[@stealthgrrr]

@@dennisbarbieri8122 Raleigh, NC

[@Badmanpuntbaxter]

Hey dog, I gave up on locally playing for about 2 months, swallowed my fear for a night and tried the SAME LGS again, and found a pod who I stayed up until 2 in the morning talking to and playing games. One might even become my roommate. I 1000% understand where you're at, what helped me was to just say "I'm looking for the diamonds in the rough", acknowledging that most people weren't gonna be a good fit and to just try and be around the people who gave me the right vibes. In am odd turn of events, turns out the cEDH players were wayyyy happier and less salty. I have never had an interest in the format but I'd much rather change my deck to play around people I like, rather than vice versa

[@Lordofthefries94]

​@@Badmanpuntbaxter i like playing with cedh players more in general these days. Everyone understands that we're at the table to win which makes it much easier to keep from getting salty. A lot of casual players throw threat assessment out the window if you touch their boards or counter stuff. Not that every cedh pod is perfect but I think it's just an entirely different mindset.

[@normative]

I think it’s slightly funny that they chose a thumbnail question whose answer turned out to be: “Eh, we’ll play against whatever.”

[@irockupthebigstuff]

Clickbait...in my MTG...never!

[@peewee0224]

It’s just a really good clickbait question. Negativity gets clicks

[@atk9989]

​@@peewee0224but their answer is pretty much the same as mine, I show up with 60+ decks to my LGS with decks everywhere from precons to CEDH, and if people want to play salty decks I have salty decks I can pull out to play, I even have enough to let the rest of the pod barrow decks to be at the same level so everyone can be playing salty decks, I find when everyone is playing a salty deck like mil, tergrid, stax, and such then Noone gets very salty because that was stated going into the game and you are already doing it back to the other players. Someone dropping a hoser card against you feels less bad when on your turn you drop a card that hoses them back.

[@maxbodifee3263]

@atk9989 60?? you bring a fork lift as well?

[@doomofthedestiny8065]

I mean, I hit 60 decks finally a couple months ago, I did buy a literal suitcase for times I want to carry all five of my deck cases (the ever popular Stanley toolkits) and a sixth, smaller tool case for dice and similar accessories, even the whole binder of tokens just in case, sadly I haven't been able to go to an lgs in ages, but I have the option to bring it all if I do, or I can just pick pick one or two cases and bring a smaller bag.

[@bastian1870]

Finally moved over from only watching commander gameplay to the analysis videos, really helping me understand the game more! Thank you!

[@cannonballbrad9522]

Rachel, your approach to magic at 1:03:00 is so great. I was so afraid to tell people what I like doing Friday nights that when I told people I went to play cards they thought it was poker. I finally had to just say it’s MTG and it ACTUALLY worked at getting one guy into playing with his whole family. But that initial move in being myself was hard. I think we all think we would be judged for liking what we like by strangers to the hobby.

[@lilfroag4048]

32:20 Rachel is hilarious "OH he can do bed times!? CONGRATS" 😂😂 saaame...

[@therachelweeks]

Hahaha. Thank you!

[@jaredchristman3380]

❤

[@Landril]

As an entrenched obsessive player I found one of the best remedies to address the "winning too much" issue is to help the other members of my pod improve their decks! I feel like it addresses both sides of the issue I don't need to nerf my own deck but rather help make my opponents stronger. Currently helping one another is a big part of our pod and now most games are a total crap shoot as to who will win and rare someone wins more than twice in a row. Then we rinse and repeat with new decks as time goes on

[@bobby45825]

That's what I did with my group when they first got into commander. I was playing with proxies and I got them proxies to make it to where 1. They could play with any card they wanted, and 2. instantly shoot down the argument that anyone is winning because they have access to cards others don't. Bonus point is it allowed people in the group to build unique builds sometimes.

[@notjake2089]

I'm almost certain the "other podcast" mentioned at the end of the show is the MTG Goldfish podcast, and it would be really interesting at some point to have them talk about commander philosophy with Richard over there... That dude is on some wild stuff.

[@JakeBros3]

Richard absolutely has some wild takes... He does have a lot of good points though. If anyone has really changed my mind on things, or, better said, made me really ponder on things, it's been Richard.

[@alexanderwaller7354]

Richard resolving Farewell or Boompile would be hilarious on Command Zone. ...or Urza's Glasses

[@nicolasperrin4518]

I absolutely love the goldfish podcast but those groups of people are very different, and the format they play feels very different too (way less goodstuffy on goldfish while in CMZ only rachel builds weird decks)

[@mrTjstephens1]

Richard is a creator you want to actually create his deck just to see how janky and different it is

[@steveolie985]

just so long as its not Seth. That guy is so annoying to listen to. blocked that channel. Richard, and Crim were both great tho

[@ColdCryomancer]

My friends who introduced me to magic in 2019 still have NO concept of chilling out and playing to the power level of the tables decks. They still cling to their CEDH decks from back then and refuse to play anything less. heck they even refused to admit cedh was a thing in 2019. saying "Were all just playing commander." (Tatyova flash hulk, vs Kriik, vs my Ur dragon precon.) Its a shame, because I can't invite them out to magic night if everyone doesn't want to or cant play cedh. So I started playing with a new playgroup and have been now for about 4 years now. The lessons I learned early on playing this game taught me well. They made me a better stronger player who doesn't care about winning every single game. Just this last Friday I didn't win a single game and was focused down every game. my friends apologized saying "Dude you must feel awful." I said "No not really I actually had fun." Nothing will ever make me feel worse than having a pod that refused to adjust power level. or at least try to make sure everyone else was having fun.

[@Ironeyes128]

Hope you guys are staying safe with all the fires over there.

[@djnowickiwicki]

Only You! 🐻

[@Qdrew78]

Lots of love to Command zone cast and crew while the fires are hitting LA region. Rachel is so on point with the enjoyment of just rifling through the collection to create decks. It is fun to find the most random stuff to work well within a deck. Love and laughter in your lives, cheers friends :) Sorry second note: if you’re the group’s boogieman I suggest something fun and maybe silly. I am making a Storm group hug, still creating the puzzle that is a storm turn…. But everyone benefits. Not putting a strong win con in the deck. Maybe incidental maze end deck with copy land enchantment and multiple ways to copy that…. Something easy to disrupt and is cute. Another favorite is goblin games :)

[@commandcast]

Thanks for the well wishes and support!

[@poppamaple290]

I always find it so interesting all the different reasons players have for avoiding going against certain commanders

[@edenconeby8227]

I’ve played 3 Toxrill matches and they all go exactly the same. Now I just sit those games out if someone really needs to play it

[@victimizeakaboomsta8995]

@@edenconeby8227sign me up for those games. Love when I have all the information on someone’s deck and it’s super linear so I can stop their combos at will.

[@benbelanger1814]

​@edenconeby8227 Same. There was a friend of mine, before he took it apart because multiple people told him it was unfun, had Toxrill as one of his decks in regular rotation. If he wanted to play it, I politely declined. I knew none of the things I regularly brought could handle not being able to play my creatures and making something specifically to avoid that downside felt like I was hate-decking the Toxrill build. Eventually, he took it apart for that reason. It's a very competitive deck but it's just not fun to play against unless you also like building fishbowl-style decks.

[@conerchambers1214]

Been following Rachel’s IG story updates and happy to hear that she’s doing alright! Hopefully everyone in the CZ (and beyond), along with everyone in CA is safe!

[@syntheticsylvie]

tbh there's no commander i refuse or would refuse to play against- its more the player behind the commander who is the issue, ya know? if they are bringing power to a casual game, that's one thing, but if they just happen to love an overpowered commander but didn't tune the deck to cEDH level, why not let them play it? idk!

[@josephcarter500]

You said this very well

[@treytonstratton9544]

I very much agree with this. The cards are not bad...the players are.

[@DadsOP]

I think its also on both though, usually theres a power conversation between me and my friends. We base our decks off of how fast they can win by, my narset being a turn 6-9 game ender or my animus which is more 9-15 ish 9 being super lucky.❤

[@lVideoWatcherl]

So seeing, for instance, a Tergrid in the command zone of an opponent would not lead you to refuse to play that game?

[@jdub4670]

@@lVideoWatcherldefinitely not. I like a challenge, and I’ve have some very fun games with people playing all kinds of unexpected decks. But this is coming from the benefit of having regular games. I’m not too bothered by the chance that one player intends to and succeeds in ruining everyone’s day.

[@Blu_Moon_Owl]

Mainly related to this topic at 4:49, that’s how I made Eluge, the Shoreless Sea my first deck I physically bought. I saw the card tried to make a commander for and with a few tweaks became my favorite deck. The effect is unique and makes games intense when you don’t realize it until it’s too late

[@chrissullivan3239]

The idea of a go-pro style making of Game Knights Live documentary sounds incredible. Please make that. That would be so good!

[@KunushiH]

"The Blue Shell" was the perfect bit in this. Hilarious to see it popping up. Great questions and discussions, y'all! Thanks for the video

[@brandonjordan6948]

Huge fan of the Command Zone for the past year and I have been learning so much from you guys so thank you!!! I just wanted to highlight what Rachel said and how it recently happened at my LGS. I play only casual and we have a casual event on Wednesdays. I usually join new pods and we are very beginner friendly. I joined a pod and had 1 player who just started playing, another was play testing a deck, and I was playing a budget deck. The last player pulled out a powerful commander (can't remember what it was) and that player started saying this used to be his cEDH deck but he "had taken out all his combos." We started playing and his first turn was an Alpha dual land, Mana Vault, and another 0 artificat. Turn 2: Bolas Citadel into Omniscience into discard burn engine into Wheel of Fortune. On turn 3 he killed us with another discard affect. I understand you can have that kind of luck with the draw but that seemed to be more of a lie to the table when we had our pregame talk so I packed up my stuff and told him that was not ok nor fun to have played. When he left the store, everyone in the store was in an uproar about the player and other players also were grateful for me saying something to him. I now have started my journey into building an Urza cEDH deck to have ready if I see that player again. I never felt to salty but I ultimately feel bad for the newer players that experienced that so I want to at least protect the fun experience for the others. Is there anything that I can do to make that experience not happen often or better new players experience?

[@SilverionX]

Disclaimer: This is only advice for multi day conventions or events. I haven't been to any magic exclusive conventions but I did go to RPG conventions for almost 30 years and my number one advice is take care of your basic needs. Eat some proper meals, drink regular water, take care of your hygiene and get at least a semi-decent nights sleep. You'll get more out of it, have more fun and it will be better for people around you.

[@GambillDataEngineering]

I've been following for a while and I love the newer background ... I loved the conversation about the most powerful color(s) in commander! I hope you all are safe with all the fires!

[@job12342]

Long time listenere here. I really like your thoughts on accepting you are the target sometimes. I've ran into the same problem where I'm often the target even in budget challenges because I'm more invested then some of the other player in the playgroup. Sometimes accepting you are going to be targeted or like josh said pick your spot to win or play different and interesting lines helps mitigate this within your play group. As a side note what I have begun to do for people within my play group is help them build decks if we do a challenge or I help them build decks in general based on their playstyle/ budget. I've found it is a lot of fun and even got inspiration for decks/ colors I wouldn't normally play.

[@devinkerr5474]

Even testing my decks on moxfield by playing 2-7 turns to see what kinda set up I can get in early to mid game, there have been times I've sat back and been like "Great, that works exactly the way I wanted... I am SO gonna be the problem if my deck pops off like this, though" I've also spent a lot of time playing friends where they FELT I was a better deckbuilder than them, so they started targeting me on principal each game. Every night was archenemy with no upside

[@NKMitch42]

Format speed does feel like an issue in my experience. Brackets might help some if they are well defined and pretty robust, but I think the format can't remain ban averse as it gets larger and more diverse. Rule 0 just doesn't work in many LGS environments. Brackets should actually help find cards that are problematic enough to ban and help make r0 conversations more fruitful, as long as Brackets are well defined and have robust lists of examples.

[@heath1948]

Hate to say it but the brackets are just a cheap excuse for the wizards to not ban high-priced cards. They're basically saying if you don't want to run into these cars don't play it this tier level so they can continue selling these high-price cards.

[@gabecastillo1634]

@@heath1948 there shouldn’t be a ban list anyway, bans only belong in competitive sanctioned formats and casual is not either of those. People just need to find the right pod

[@magnusprime962]

@@gabecastillo1634”People just need to find the right pod” The continuing debate over the banlist demonstrates that’s a lot harder than you might think.

[@gabecastillo1634]

@ it’s a social game and format, people don’t want to work to find a pod, join groups find people play on spell-table, it’s used as an excuse to ban cards and it’s annoying, no other format has this amount or percentage of player base complaining and that should tell u all u need to know.

[@gabecastillo1634]

@ it’s not hard it’s just a process that people are unwilling to follow when it’s easier to just mope down to a local Lgs and complain about cards and people.

[@royal-wolf]

It's awesome you read my question. It was interesting to hear the response, and I agree with needing to keep the power levels fair for Rule Zero Commanders

[@commandcast]

That was a very neat question!

[@ManiacalMudkip]

My crazy story about finding a new play group... I moved to the middle of Arizona, 1.5 hours from a card store, but at that time I was pretty invested in college and MTG. I wrote my phone number down on some of the MTG display boxes at our local Walmart, and a group of people text me and we met for lunch one day, and the rest was history haha

[@danieldepass180]

What should I bring to Magic Con? "What you would bring on a long hike. + 4 decks" What are some things you should know before making gameplay content? " Cue Shia La Beouf meme!" Good stuff guys!

[@prufrock1977]

I used to play against a guy who often played with Gengu of the Realms, but then would say no to other players rule zero commanders. I often thought about saying no to him because he would say no to others.

[@coltonbrown26]

I would have absolutely shut him down, that's a wild ability that can easily get out of control

[@ChristopherPhoenixMusic]

Less than 10% in I'm making this comment. Can we all just take a moment and recognize the episode quality on The Command Zone? Editing, animation, graphics and audio are all very good, and the consistency has been on point this past year. Looking forward to watch the next GKL, as live footage is always the hardest to master. Really great work by all. I'm an audio engineer (25 years) who does multimedia work, so I recognize all the steps that go into creating these and I just wanted to drop my props.

[@YoonnsAvec2N]

true, most people don't realize that kind of thing

[@christophersheaTCG]

34:16 last Friday I realized I hit that point in my Magic career. I was being targeted by the table and felt like I really wasn’t doing much. Another player commented that I’m always the player who has the most permanents on the board and that I seem like I’m doing nothing then I win and then I realized that because Ive spent time obsessing over building and interactions it’s caused my plan C and/or D game plan for the deck to still much stronger than the tables I normally play at and with how much I’ve analyzed games before I seemingly have an answer for everything now which I didn’t have before. I completely agree and understand the frustration that is being talked about here.

[@gabecastillo1634]

The amount of times I’ve been punished for being good at playing the game or building a decent deck is astounding. I could be brain storm locked and mana flooded with no non land permanents out and will still be hit because I “win out of nowhere”

[@bobby45825]

My group would often do that and even devise plans around that to keep eyes at the table glued on me. I started being forced to put cards like "ghostly prison" in to make a point. Then I was running "comeuppance" and other cards like that to show that these sneaky alpha strikes out of nowhere that my opponents could build up because the other players were ignoring them, IS a punishable strategy.

[@cassiemay2397]

Poor Jim getting his rule 0 deck denied

[@bennguyen4664]

yeah that's what I thought too 😅. which also probably means that this happen around their CRAG extra turns episode.... in turms of time period

[@harveyhale1101]

When it comes to commanders I won't play against, or at least begrudgingly and take emotional damage from would always be heavy stax. I would rather sit through heavily OP like a typical Kaalia knowing the game could be wrapped up fast for a new game versus everyone watching 1 player solitaire for over half an hour. I don't know what someone's schedule or life is like at a random LGS night, this could be their only game night for the month

[@Kallistosprom]

I admire the Duelist subscription in your rocket money advert. As an old mtg player that takes me back. Loved the duelist mtg puzzles.

[@BosSoxFan15]

1:32:34 I think white is by far the most complete mono color in the format. It has absurd ramp abusing catch up ramp with bounce lands and lotus field type lands. It has good to great card draw often limited to once per turn, but with things like trouble in pairs, caretaker's talent, tocasia's welcome every deck archetype can find solid options in white. It has the best board wipe in the format along with a host of other amazing board wipes. Then interaction, recursion, it is still always at the top. It is the best color to build a mono colored deck.

[@gabecastillo1634]

Eh in cedh white is pretty mid, as far as casual white is in a pretty good spot rn, same with green as well.

[@BosSoxFan15]

@@gabecastillo1634 Sorry I was not referring to cedh at all where I assume blue is still a pretty powerful color due to its stack interaction. My knowledge of cedh is a single podcast on the basics of cedh and a couple of gameplay videos I have watched.

[@gabecastillo1634]

@ u should get into man it’s really fun. The stack interaction in game is pretty crazy, play to win is a fun channel to watch for cedh if ur interested. As far as mono colored average edh id still give green the edge and white a close second, but if i take out mono colored decks they move down the ranks significantly and blue and black do it for me.

[@ogre589]

I totally get the feeling that the "fun decks to play against" question has. I have a few decks that I can legally play and they aren't always fun for them. My Shalai and Hallar deck has a "prevent spells on my turn" kind of card in it and 3 ways to just outright win the game, 2 are infinite combos and the last is a huge boardwide player removal with the right set up and enough bodies on the field. I have a Tinybones deck that has tons of discard and the one time I played it, I was near immediately nuked from orbit and made to watch the rest of the game basically on the sidelines. Finally, I have a Zimone deck and anyone who has played against Zimone, even just her precon set, can tell you just how oppressive she can be. Mine runs Vorinclex, World Hungerer so you can imagine how everyone reacts when that thing comes out.

[@mightyfangs]

I refuse to play against Zimone. It gets an automatic no from me it’s totally cracked

[@ogre589]

@@mightyfangs My buddy has his own version of this deck, which includes cards that I want for my deck like Abhorrent Oculus and Crucible of Worlds, and me and our other friend locked down his commander with Imprisoned In The Moon for the whole game and he still won thanks to a +1 lands per turn and a Scute Swarm that we didn't have a boardwipe for.

[@PianoRivera]

I've been playing magic for like fifteen years and I never thought to borrow a friend's deck. Surely not a novel idea but new to me, and totally brilliant. Thanks for the advice!

[@MusicismySword]

As a music teacher I can relate to this. Teaching gets you used to being in front of a large group, and anytime you’re teaching you have to be ready for anything. Love the discussion. 👏

[@chickennoodles4491]

22:41 this video is in my opinion the best episode cz has ever put out, it completely shaped how I view cards and build decks

[@AlexMTG_]

29:20 A commander Cube might be worth looking into for this playgroup. Brody could build the cube given his investment

[@oscarthompson7567]

I love Rakdos, Lord of Riots! I recently got back into commander and revamped him from 12 years of not playing. Love the content !

[@MatthewRayFlicks]

At 30:15, on the topic deck power level, a tool I have found a lot of success with is spelltable. There are a lot of 6-7 pods (altered precons, no tutors or fast mana, rare combos, mostly basic lands) you can test decks on… but if you are unsure of if a deck will fit… the 7-8 pods are perfect. You can always host and/or join a game in minutes… and if you are playing anything that touches 8, you will see dual lands, tutors, combos… but not before turn 6-8. It’s a great place to see IF a strong deck you have will be frustrating for players at an LGS or if you will get wrecked by internet 8s and will be an appropriate 7. It’s also a great place to find higher lever games for those mean decks you don’t get to play very often.

[@NickolasBaker-dm5bk]

I've found that finding a playgroup is easiest if you draft at your LGS. I really enjoy drafting but also it's a format that is like speed-dating Magic players. You will quickly find people you enjoy talking to and playing with and those are the people you try to make connections with.

[@Haruki6669.]

Not really a question, but relevant to some of the topics on this episode. I know you got a lot of different segments going on and a full plate, but it would be really cool to see you guys do games playing viewer decks. I'm sure there are tons of viewers that would love their deck to be on game nights, who couldn't make the trip out there to play live, myself included. And it can be very entertaining and eye opening to watch someone else interact with your deck.

[@Deadbeatscottx]

Thanks for using my photos for the MagicCon Chicago slides 🥰 can’t wait to do it again next month

[@joaocisne556]

my next commander project; make a mono-blue deck that is only lands and creatures

[@shanegrant9576]

You mentioned 200 card deck and it reminded me of an idea I was throwing around a while back to make combo's less consistent in our casual group. 124 card decks but you set aside the top 25 cards "outside the game" after mulligans are done. It has the additional benefit of making the wish cards relevant in commander.

[@jordanmorris19977]

I agree, the 32 deck challenge has inspired me to build decks with themes I'd never have considered before, and a lot of them have turned out to be super fun! The biggest fun surprise for me was the gitrog ravenous ride

[@JustinVanTrump]

To answer the question that Finn asked, I personally just build around different archetypes and mechanics, for instance, I have five tribal decks and they are, Elf, Time Lord, Demon, Vampire, and Dragon, and then I have a delirium deck using Winter, Misanthropic Guide as the commander, and I just built a phase out/exile/ card draw deck using The War Doctor and Nardole as the commander, and the. I also have my mono-red burn deck with Kellan, Planar Trailblazer as the commander

[@bloomcrawler]

25:48 My deck also has a key card that's just pure value (Like Skull Clamp), when I tutor for it, my plays are like butter; So smooth! So, I add Moonsilver Key (under a dollar) to Tudor up Sol Ring.

[@BaconJake14]

I remember either from a tweet or his podcast Shivam said he would prefer to build a deck without the option than sandbag the option in hand. In reference to self regulating power level, in addition to removing things like tutors and fast mana and all that, just remove answers and make your win cons bigger. When my buddy started playing I would build decks with almost no interaction. If I wanted to deal with something it had to be in combat. If an artifact was problematic I had basically no way to stop it. If I was setting up a combo it would be like 5 or 6 cards to really go off rather than 2 or 3. It really helped him learn card interactions when he was able to just do his thing and not have me blow up the new creature he pulled that he wanted to try out. And it really helped me enjoy games more when I didn't have the answer in hand and could try to outpace building my board, rather than stare at my Swords to Plowshares or whatever in hand and just let it be a dead card for a few turns. Now I would say he is definitely on par with building decks as me, maybe even better, and even though I still know the rules more, he is in general a much more skilled player than he used to be and our games are almost always really close.

[@angelojohnson9441]

@Finn even if just online with Archedekt or another site, do the 32 deck challenge. It teach you a lot about what you know and what you don’t and gives you new appreciation for things that you otherwise did not have. How do ramp and card draw work in colorless (Hope of Ghirapur)? How do you make only a 100 card +1/+1 counter deck when in more than 3 colors? What do you do when you are seeing well over 10 new cards on each of your turns (Eruth, Tormented Profit)? Have you ever played a lands matters deck that drew 6 cards and had the mana to play ALL of them? What if you played a deck that forced combat if you prefer utility creatures? Why does a Torens, Fist of Angels need an entire table to itself for the counters on all the different tokens when the card is under $1? The path you walk on the 32 deck challenge will be your own and you will learn your own lessons, but you will come away a better deck builder and magic player for it. @Commandcast in regards to the 32 deck challenge: it isn’t an inventory list. I took the 32 deck challenge because I had 4 Jund decks (and at least 7 nonJund decks) and I wanted to force myself, as you said, out of my comfort zone. I now, due to precons, have 5 Jund decks, but they are all different: Delirium, Infect, Landfall, Forced Combat, Mana Burn. SPEAKING OF JUND FORCED COMBAT: @Josh I remember the review of the Lord Windgrace deck and it was why I bought that precon. I remember also your synopsis on Thantis, the Warweaver and how it didn’t really look like you could build a deck out of it. Noe maybe you meant having it at the helm of the precon, but I took a long hard look at what I didn’t like about Thantis: it was a spider that forced combat; two equally terrifying things to me. Then I asked the question: “What would a deck that wouldn’t worry about forced combat have in it and how would it play in multiplayer?” I had never built a deck like that, but that HAD to be the question WotC was asking which meant it had to be one that was answerable if it was a legendary creature in a commander precon. I then immediately realized most other people were also not fans of forced combat, which meant even haphazardly crafting my deck as if forced combat was inevitable would give me a huge advantage. Having come from an Azorius background, it was clear that Jund STILL had more to teach me. @Lillix It has to not be overtly broken and be justifiable as to why it should be legendary. Rofellos? Get out. Channel? Get out. The Nephilim? Sure. Ali Baba? Okay. Puresteel Paladin that is Ash from the Evil Dead Secret Lair? It’s a monowhite Gwen and technically it is Ash, not “just one of many” knights. Jace the Mind Sculptor? No. Jace Berelen? Sure. Shadowborn Apostle? No. A saga? Ehhhh mostly. Grand Calcutron? Yes. The BFM? As long as you aren’t running Geode Golem. @Rachel i hear you about the Urza/Mishra deck. I bought those two decks to combine them and have both commanders IN the deck but Akri and Silas partnered for it (Silas even came in Mishra’s deck, so it was that much easier).m @Rachel: alternate funcons are how I play a lot of the time now and it has brought a lot more joy to playing. @Treebornfrog ban all tutors. All of them. Demonic Tutor to Evolving Wilds. If it says “search your library” it is gone. Reprinting Dingus Egg and Staff and returning Land Destruction as a socially valid option would also literally slow it down too.

[@andreacallegari7137]

In my playgroup, the stongest colors are actually White->Red->Blue->Green->Black. Krenko, Mob Boss is the best deck, but red is also easily splashable in other powerful decks. In our top ten, there are two Gruuls (Omnath, Locus of Rage and Ruby, Daring Tracker), a Temur (Maelstrom Wanderer) and a Boros (Nahiri, Forged in Fury)

[@TRemIk42]

i got really into magic cause my friends played it, and going with them to the store for a few days really made it easier to hang out with random players, cause no matter what there is one thing that we all have in common :) and that is we like to play our decks and that's something that can be arranged even with random people :). plus it doesent have to go into a "now we are super friends" direction at all. The community is good people

[@KLang509]

27:18 I feel like Rachel answered perfectly saying, when you start to not build around the theme of the deck and put in cards that are strictly for power or it’s a good card - that’s when you know you’re making it a stronger deck. The more you do this, the more powerful it becomes. Like does a Blood Token Vampire deck need Jeska’s Will? No not really but putting it in definitely makes it better. If you do this thing 10x then you’re def more powerful.

[@trident042]

I think the biggest question regarding the "most powerful color" segment is; What does red need to get back in it? What do you add to red that doesn't jettison it from last to first in a matter of one or two crucial misstep cards? I think of recent additions like Jeska's Will and my brain does a somersault at the idea we might see even one or two more cards with that level of integral power for red to utilize. My best idea so far is to have red cards that care about number of opponents, and do exponentially better (rather than just multiplicatively) per extra opponent - something like a Battlebond 2 set might have cards for this, because Standard wouldn't, but having cards that are bad in 1v1, good in 2v2, and phenomenal in Commander might be a good setup. Not sure what else you could do, really, or what shape such a mechanic would even take.

[@jul7086]

14:41 i used to have a Kotori and Greasefang Partner deck and it was really fun to play, esper vehicles is really an archetype i enjoyed building around, i even ended up making up a rule 0 commander for it and i have a blast each time i play it

[@charlied8284]

Some guy tried playing Leyline of the Void as his rule zero commander and we laughed him out of the store. He's never come back.

[@Wokkels9741]

Sad

[@1notdeadfred]

I will say this about the "32 deck challenge" trap: I'm doing it specifically because I want to better understand the color pie, and doing this the way I tend to brew (I avoid building decks "the way that everyone does" or playing painfully popular commanders unless there's a specific reason for it) has made me a much better player! Once I complete the 32, I'm just going to focus on my theme decks that feel the most like they clearly illustrate who I am as a person.

[@stumilesyt]

32:45 A fun restriction I've begun using a lot to power down my brews is only using cards available in an early modern frame printing (2003-2015). Scryfall even has a search term! "frame=2003"

[@anjunakrokus]

I also don't have any decks I won't play against. But there are definitely decks (commanders) I'll complain about while playing against it.

[@tigergod1328]

Fun episode about popular 99 cards to put into your deck or that show play in commander. Rhystic Study Sol Ring etc. 😅

[@nkling02]

1:04:50 Go get it Thats what i did!!! Love you guys, love the content. Keep it up! ✌️

[@mattfrisone3961]

I think a great way to control power level is to give your deck weaknesses or parameters. "This blink deck is going to have these 8 insane cards, but I'm going to avoid mass fog effects." "I'm going to run tutors for consistency but not grab Mikaeus / Triskelion unless I'm against a combo deck." "I'm going to pay 20 life to draw cards but not include lifegain." "This deck is going to use attack triggers but not include extra combat cards to go infinite." This is especially relevant when building REALLY strong or hard to interact with commanders. IE: Narset planeswalker build with no extra turn cards. Niv-Mizzet, Parun but no card is worth more than $2 on the cheapest print. Or play really busted cards with a C+ level commander. Sure, you won't win as many games, but it'll allow your deck to "do the thing" without being the big bad end boss every turn cycle.

[@LegacyTangent]

Red's cardpool overall is probably not as powerful, but what I think keeps it at parity with other mono colors are the red commanders themselves. Extremely powerful commanders like Zada, Norin, Magda, Godo, Slicer, Neheb, etc on top of the ones you already listed. These commanders are INCREDIBLE, and they are so powerful that they can support an otherwise unremarkable card pool.

[@thatstingray4147]

Hearing the advice for starting content is making me think of a great channel: Quest for the Janklord. They started out with some creative ideas, filled a niche in the community (gameplay with hard-budget decks), and continue to make really entertaining stuff, even if it has less polish than shows like Game Knights.

[@esoteric1070]

The going outside your comfort zone comment was absolutely true, I used to hate Boros then I built Arabella, Abandonned Doll and it's currently my favourite deck and makes me want to make more Boros decks! Good to get out of my comfort zone! Also would you guys ever consider doing a "balanced" rule 0 episode? Maybe for extra turns or something?

[@sumyungwhiteguy6948]

For the fun decks question! I build a neera chaos deck so I just put a lot of high mana spells with I will never pay the 10-13 mana! It’s a fun deck, I have my CEDH deck and my decent decks. I spend mostly $100 on each deck

[@dominikdutrisac5660]

Funny you mention it because Teferi’s Veil is perfect for my Bilbo, Retired Burglar deck!

[@meant09]

Not necessarily a question but idea that came when Rachel was talking about her alters. I think it’d be really cool for yall to do a full episode on cool collection ideas - lots of newer players in the last few years that may be less familiar or unfamiliar with: alters, artist proofs, artist signatures, tournament stamped cards, etc. be a cool way to showcase some community alter folks too

[@navo6283]

I think I'll answer these questions as well. I think it'll be fun. 1. The short answer is that I'm addicted to deck building, and I passively brainstorm ideas for new decks all the time. The more detailed answer is that I want to experience what it's like to build and play every kind of deck. I have an ever growing roster of decks to choose from, so I never get bored. (Currently 93 decks.) The things that get my mind working on building a deck are either a mechanic, a tribe, a specific card, a commander, or a cool idea. I wanted to build a pirate rogue hybrid tribal deck well before outlaw existed as an example, and I held onto the idea long enough to allow cards to be printed that would support the strategy. 2. I own a Rule 0 Golos chaos/group hug deck. However, I built it before Golos was banned, and it's designed to accelerate the game with the group hug side, throw the game into chaos with the chaos side, and has no wincon. It's basically a stage hazard. If it wins, it's by pure luck. I also can't imagine any commander besides Golos at the helm. I don't bring it with me unless someone requests it. 3. I would politely decline playing against Purphoros and Krenko. Mostly because I'm sick of playing against the deck because they are always built the same way and play the same way.

[@navo6283]

4. I always aim for power level 7 unless I'm specifically wanting something on a different level. 5. I'm rarely the problem, so I don't know how to answer this question. I do know people who could use this advice and tone down their play style. On the other hand, I would have a fun time playing against people on a lower power level because I actually have a lot of lower power decks I never get to play. 6. When I started playing I was given cards and there's many cards I have a special affinity with. The original Mirrodin block (Mirrodin, Darksteel, and Fifth Dawn), the original Kamigawa block (Champions of Kamigawa, Betrayers of Kamigawa, and Saviors of Kamigawa), and 8th Edition are what I was playing a lot of when I started. As such, I am partial to those sets and the cards in them. Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker is probably at the top of that list. I do have a Kiki-Jiki commander deck. 7. No, as Josh and Rachel said, not only are cards designed with commander in mind now, but also there's more cards that do a similar thing. You want to ramp basic lands? In the past you basically had Nature's Lore, Rampant Growth, and Explosive Vegetation. Now you have more than 20 options that do something similar. 8. Never played Magic at a con unfortunately... 9. I have a few play groups. I think the ideal things to do involve being social. Either you can teach people how to play to form your own group, or you can talk to people at your LGS, find out stuff, get their number, get their social, figure out times to meet up. The real trick is finding people you get along with during a game and not argue with too often. 10. I've actually always wanted to start a Magic channel. Resources isn't the problem in my case...it's time. I just need more time. Also, with 93 commander decks, I got content. It's just time! 11. I'm an awkward introvert who freezes up and stutters a lot. I have had some training in college in a public speaking class and a professional practices class for art. Still, I could definitely use more practice getting to a point instead of rambling. 12 and 13. Not really questions intended for fans, but I really like Command Zone and enjoy hearing their responses to fans. My favorite episode...is unclear... I'm just not sure...I like so many... 14. Green, Blue, Black, Red, White I put the colors in this order. Yes, they made some good arguments for white, but I feel like some details with red have been left out. I have a mono red Kiki-Jiki commander deck with dragon tribal and treasure sub-themes. Even with Dockside going away, red is still the king of treasure token production. That combined with impulse draw and rituals can paint a bigger picture of how fast and aggressive red can be. I'm saying all this even though one of my best decks is mono white (Loran).

[@DaijDjan]

Concerning the other card types as rule 0 commanders I think it's fair to point out noncreature commanders already exist in the form of MDFCs. The Prismatic Bridge is an enchantment as commander, f. e. Other than that, I do agree with your take though. Know your audience is the most important aspect ;)

[@ericvernon1182]

Goldfish just posted a Commander Clash where they played spells as their Commanders...seemed very serendipitous since you guys talk about Rule Zero Commander question...

[@mathiasthrane3147]

I agree with the color rankings, but I will say in defense of red, that as a splash color in a deck, it usually brings the cards that actually win the game, especially in combo decks. Say impact tremors, goblin bombardment, firebrand archer etc

[@bnnnaanananannn]

A way I like to control my EDH-decks are the I can't have the same card in two or more decks; i.e. if I want to play demonic tutor and have 2 edh decks with black in them, only one of them can have demonic tutor in it. I've got 6 decks right now and it gets really tricky AND fun to try and put together decks NOT using obivous staples but having to find different options. I also get to see and play with more and different cards..

[@byotip]

On the "How do you build fun decks to play against" (and also "slowing down game" too) In my play group, we've fallen behind mtg release (for motivation reason toward the game as is it going right now) So we build cubes. 20x3 packs, 2 cards picked at a time, At the end of the draft, you choose a legendary creature, shuffle, and every card is a MDFC Command tower, no basic. It takes 20min to 30min to draft, there is no building step, if a cards isn't in your commander identity you can try to mana cheat it, use treasures, or use it as a command tower. We keep two stables cubes: an entrypoint cube with 500 curated cards (basically cards with easy to read and understand text boxes, lot of support of synergies) and one unhinged 1000+ cards cube with strong effects. Cubes let you play those cards you never put on your decks, and even with the chaosiest pool of cards, you probably will have fun. You can also control the power level or speed of the game. An other thing about the speed of the game: I think the main factor of power creep is cards doing too many things, most recent cards are both the engine, the fuel and the pay off. Where you needed 3 cards to build a synergie, you only need one. Where you had niche redundancy, now you have go-everywhere good stuff ready to combo. Creatures that had to deal combat damage, only had to attack, then only had to see other creatures attack. Creature effect which triggered after a turn now triggers when they enter too. The game speeds up because you need less resources and less turn to do the same splashy effect. If I had a magic wand, I would just ask: split all cards that make multiple effects into that much simplier cards.

[@cbinette100]

The easiest and best way to lower power level is raising the curve. If there's an effect you want and they have a 3 CMC option and a 4 CMC option opt for the 4. Instead of mostly 0 or two mana rocks opt for 3 mana. Reducing efficiency is the best antidote for power.

[@Mr_Casey12]

Thanks for touching on rule 0. I've been planning a very silly casual Skeleton Ship/Skeleton Crew rule 0 partners and this encouraged me to go forward with it

[@MitchT97]

Thing is I usually make weird variations of common strategies that usually bring the power level down due to focusing on a trope. Still I seem to annoy some while being vastly weaker than others. Pods I’ve run in are vastly different so it’s hard to find a good baseline power level to play at. My friend will often warn people not to target me necessarily, but to watch me because well. He’s played me before and am guilty of going from last place to archenemy in two turns.

[@LordPyro0]

I built a Gisa, the Hellraiser and Geralf, the fleshwright rule 0 partners deck recently and my main pod decided to just remove ward and giving zombies menace. It worked over very well and felt balanced. Sometimes it takes little tweaks to make it more fair. Dimir zombies definitely has lots of support, but these two felt right paired together

[@TheUniversalEclipse]

I have a Liliana, Heretical Healer Vorthos deck. Every card in it is either has Liliana in the art, is a “Liliana’s something” card, has a Liliana quote, or is tied to her in Lore. I have never once been allowed to rule 0 Griselbrand into the 99. So I have Ormendahl 😢 as the fourth demon. It’s a land so it doesn’t break my rules of all Liliana as much.

[@judahburlingame]

I'm a social studies teacher and let me tell you, teaching is at least 50% acting to get students interested in the topic!

[@joaoluizlimeiralapolli1187]

I've been playing commander for about 10 years or so. I've played a lot in stores, but mostly with my playgroup, who I've been playing with for roughly 8 years by now. I'm the kind of player who wants to break the format, but at the same time, I'm concerned with the speed of the game and having a healthy game where everyone has a chance. From my experience, the best rule we made up for making games better was do rule zero all the tutor spells (I think it would be better to rule zero only the low costed tutors, but my playgroup was a little radical). Anyway, we play like this for a long time, and we have lot of fun. Combos are harder to set up, but they are more awarding and combo decks are more challenging to build and play. I'm never tired of playing and testing new decks in our environment, the randomness of the tutor abscense is so high that we are forced to make more coherent decks, with cards that communicate together through a common strategy. And we can still play the mana bombs and powerful spells that we all love to play. I think the real challenge with slowing the format is the fast combos, and not spells scaled for multiplayer, as mentioned in the video. Cheers!

[@cameroncaler5062]

When it comes to playing your powerful decks against your local pod. I have found that it’s fun to just play those on spell table with others who have similar decks and strength. Then taking your more casual builds to meet your friend’s expectation in deck strength. I don’t have a card shop. I can go play with random people so I mostly just play spell table with randoms. Most people there know what they want to play against.

[@crunchynut007]

I use Delay instead of counterspell because it makes that boardwipe a strategic counter. Do you fill the board for 3 turns blowing away your opponents or do you stockpile for that final counter to go off and go ham - likely with the rest of the table. Its not, better, just adds more flavour to games.

[@ceronmachtdinge]

and regarding red as weakest color: There are a lot of busted cards in mono red, especially for commander. Descent to avernus comes to mind, Sneak Attack / Boar, Magdha, most of the treasure dragons - with some fast mana love, Red can close out games quite quickly. And with chaos cards like Confusion in the ranks, Chaos Wand and Etali, it is definetely the most fun. And you can actually make a Chandra Typal deck. Try to do that with any other planeswalker. anyway, keep up the great content!

[@supertux2998]

As soon as you said it was a UB ozilith deck I knew exactly who you were talking about. I love that bree she made.

[@Dclem742]

who was it?

[@CocoMura]

My alt fun condition is my mono white knight(first strike) deck, playing Springjack Sheperd and filling out the board with 0/1 Goats. All stacked up with Honor of the Pure effects. I've been running that since m12. :3

[@cameronrobertson9800]

17:20 I have a Malcolm, Breeches and, Francisco rule 0 deck. Mainly because I already had a Becket Brass commander deck and I didn't want to take it apart but also because pirates don't care about the rules. The deck also still has a hullbreacher and dockside in it. Very fun to play when some of my friends play their rule 0 decks. If I'm playing against randoms, I use Becket Brass as my commander and swap out the banned cards if they don't want to play against it as a rule 0 deck.

[@guardianazn]

We need a mailbag episode every year!

[@Omaly360]

As far as deciding deck power level I break it into 4 things. Combos, tutors, fast mana, and who the commander is because some commanders are inherently better. Usually if you have 2 or less of these your deck is typically fine.

[@EvilShade82]

Golgari is also the most diverse colour combination of all two colour variants in my opinion. It has so many different archetypes.

[@DerpHerper]

I am also in Brody's position: I recommend building some jank stuff. Looking for janky and goofy cards is still rewarding as an invested player. It also makes the games much more fun.

[@gilliganallmighty3]

The alternate funcon thing is a good goal. In every game, I usually set a goal, and if i am able to cast the minimum spells required to achieve that gial, im happy, even if I get blown out by a counterspell or other interaction. My deck did the thing, and whatever happens after happens.

[@Rococorico]

Expanding on "it depends": that last question has no absolute answer, because there is no viable "absolute" evaluation in a vacuum. There are different axes to gameplay and the strengths and weaknesses are not balanced around a singular axis. If* we focus on four quadrants as core performances, they'd be Proactiveness, Reactiveness, Consistency and Flexibility. Working with just 3 ranks, high, medium and low, and abbreviating to initials (PRCF, hml): WHITE Pm Rm Cm Fh / BLUE Pl Rh Ch Fh / BLACK Ph Rm Cm Fm / RED Ph Rl Cm Fm / GREEN Pm Rm Ch Fl Blue with 3 highs may seem like the best, but being the only one that's low at being proactive balances it out substantially. While it does have access to answers to anything and great card advantage, it can't do all the things all at once. Sometimes you die in combat with 14 cards in hand. You might Cyclonic Rift the board but haven't found a decisive follow up yet, so the next player, with higher proactiveness, takes the opportunity of an empty board to win, or maybe you're showered with interaction because you're the only one with a board and there's not enough mana to cast all 6 counter spells among those 14 cards, and only one of those is free to cast. Then there are artifacts that shake things up quite a bit, and you can use them as artifacts in isolation (colorless gameplay, medium all around) or entwined with how the color supports it. Blue gains a lot of proactiveness with artifacts, but will sacrifice something else if not all three, there aren't enough slots or actions to do everything at high. Red, the next best artificer color, doesn't sacrifice much if any proactiveness and profits immensely everywhere. White and Black both sacrifice flexibility and/or reactiveness while playing with artifacts, and Green gains flexibility at the sure expense of proactiveness and/or reactiveness. *: P "what it can win with", R "what it can interact with", C "how often can it be done", F "how many different things it can do". Nowadays all colors can handle permanents some way or another, but Blue as the only high at Reactiveness is THE color to play on the stack. Blue has plenty of "win conditions", but they tend to be narrow pieces or scenarios Blue has to build and play around to make work, while other colors are far more straightforward.

[@king.eternal5980]

My favorite "bling" deck is an unsleeved deck if VERY heavy played cards. Like Josh's "wave" deck. Cards from as far hack as ABU. Scuffed from the sidewalk, faded.. well loved. It's the deck i play in contrast to my (work in progress) actually blinged deck of my judge foils and old frame foils.

[@FrostSylph]

For that rule 0 question I really feel that about trying to limit the power of it to keep it from feeling unfair. I have a rule 0 deck that I built with maelstrom Archangel that I started by just wanting to play as many of the legendary angels as I could, but I ended up removing some of the more specific angel synergy and now it's more of a WUBRG color-matters big stompy deck that just happens to have a lot of angels in it. I do like where it ended up and I hope people have fun against it but it's definitely toeing the line more than it would be if I left it as it was before.

[@psychot6859]

another question on rule zero, commanders...Nephilim. Mark Rosewater states that they were "technically" legendary.

[@atk9989]

I did the deck of every color, and i have multiple more decks. I do so because I love to play trolling type of decks and i know people would hate to play them every game so i have multiple decks to change things up every game. Like i love chaos, group hug, pramacon, and my O-Kagachi "are you sure you want to do that?" Deck that plays cards that punish people that try to attack me, deal damage to me, or combo. Like deflecting palm.

[@eternaleclypse]

It's always intriguing to hear other peoples evaluation of strength when it comes to the color pie. I disagree, vehemently so, about the evaluation of red. With its reasure production, impulse draw, lifegain prevention, magnifying damage, and making it so damage can not be prevented, I dont evaluate red at being at all worse than white. But this is most definitely meta specific since I evaluate green pretty low.