Emblematic Problems & Bad Reputations | EDHRECast 252

Is poison a problem, or just Triumph of the Hordes? Is Dockside Extortionist the issue, or are Treasures in general? This week we try to figure out which keywords & card groups deserve their bad reputations, and which are the result of just a few standout troublemakers.
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[@andrewpeli9019]

Mechanics that make combat relevant is a good thing for the commander format. Commander damage makes the format more healthy. And poison counters do as well. Johnny is going to whine, because Timmy got a new toy. But as long as tutors are legal in the format, Johnny is in the better position.

[@IamJoshEast]

100% agree. Its just okes who are salty about dying out of nowhere that are whining. Infect is just not an issue, its a perfectly legitimate alternate wincon

[@Krimson51]

@@IamJoshEast I personally prefer lower power commander, which often means taking out efficient combos that win on the spot. Cards like triumph of the hoards in certain decks (any go wide strategy and even some tall ones) feels like a win out of nowhere effect which is identical to combo wins. It’s not objectively better or worse for the format, just a different power level and that’s important to think about.

[@andrewpeli9019]

@@Krimson51 I won't say that it's "exactly" like a combo win. It's a lot easier to stop a combat based effect than a spell based one, since you can interrupt the spell or the creature and there is also blocking. Additionally, triumph of the hordes and tainted strike tend to "just" be a card in the 99, as opposed to most combo pieces which very usually get tutored up game after game. When playing against stompy green, you should be monitoring their board state and expecting overrun effects when their board state hits critical mass. That's not out of no where at all. Similarly, when playing against voltron strategies, you should expect effects that make the commander hit for leathal, such as tainted strike. Neither of those cases are "out of nowhere" like someone vamp tutoring the other half of a combo on the end step and then winning with oracle or something like that.

[@Ianoxen]

True, I remember before the power creep years ago that combat based winning is almost none existent when there were players who were just laying back with tutors and then combo with control to back it up. Now that there are more pieces to stop immediate wins, combat is more relevant.

[@theodorereggiardo77]

I just dont like how its half the total that commander damage is. Feels like it invalidates commander damage, or at least diminishes it. I was commander damage to still be a format defining rule, but it seems like it hasnt been for a while.

[@MomirsLabTech]

Matt discovering power creep, along with denoting it as some cards getting "more worser" was pretty funny to hear. Lol

[@janMelantu]

Eminence has a huge mark against it that Experience Counters and Companions don’t: it always works. Like yeah, you can’t interact with experience counters, but they don’t do anything on their own. The creatures that interact with them can be removed. Companions don’t effect the game until you pay for them (twice) and get them onto the battlefield, then they act like every other creature.

[@chriswarner8906]

Exactly this. Companions and experience counters have nothing on eminence. Eminence is the worst idea ever. It's either toned to the point of useless, or it's busted. I literally gave away the Ur Dragon because I couldn't stand how it invalidated all other dragon options.

[@Sivarias]

The problem with eminence is that they already printed the weakest possible version of eminence and it's still broken. "At the beginning of your upkeep, you gain 2 life". Oloro had eminence before eminence was a thing, and Oloro to this day has a reputation of being an unfun commander to play against because it gets so oppressive.

[@Garl_Vinland]

I literally would play the Ur dragon, and only use red mana in my mono red dragon deck. Just having a constant cost reduction was enough.

[@rafaelribeiro1871]

When you were talking about deck building restrictions I was immediately reminded of the emblematic problem of 5 color commanders and how easy and prevalent it is to just put the best cards of each color in the deck. I was reminded of Go-Shintai of Life's Origin and how it can easily go down as a good stuff deck, but with enchantments instead of a shrine tribal deck.

[@bye1551]

My problem with eminence is that there is no downside. An eminence that had a downside or at least a toned down version of their on board effect would be infinitely more balanced. But in general, the mechanic is broken. I think companions are an inherently less broken effect than eminence because at least that forces strange deck building restrictions. What Joey described as the cool factor of eminence is actually the coolness of companion and doesn't really exist for eminence.

[@yugioh1870]

I don't agree. There is a very real cost to having a specific commander in the command zone. and this is something that more lower power tables who will regularly get blown out by time stretch and expropriate don't understand but not having one of the actual gas cards in your command zone often times doesn't do a lot. Like.sure you can play a pretty fascinating impression of fair magic by just playing big dragons, but then you get wrathed and you're sitting there with one or.two cards in hand and a commander that you can't cast for another 3 or four turns if you even get the mana for it. eadgar is much the same way but you have to play vampires to do it and vampires aren't good in real commander games

[@the_r4ts]

My stance has been that eminence is not an inherently broken mechanic, but the original eminence commanders (specifically Edgar and Ur-Dragon) were overtuned. Sidar Jabari of Zhalfir is an example of a balanced card with eminence. I am currently playing him in a precon league and the table (myself included) forget about the ability because it is not majorly impactful, but it helps the knights deck churn along. And that is how I think eminence is best appliod: smaller effects that are suited for niche decks.

[@deifiedtitan]

As long as combo is still a thing I don’t see how any ‘out of the blue’ infect/poison strategy can be considered problematic. At worst, it’s a board based combo that took far longer and required more to go correctly than most other combos do.

[@Playingwithproxies]

100% agree combo players want to tutor a card on turn one and two and win on turn three with force and pact backup i don’t see how anything else could be a problem.

[@andrewsparkes6275]

I think that's a false dichotomy. The real comparison is between "Three/four-piece combos, or dealing a normal amount of damage" vs "Two-piece combos where your commander is one of them and loads of tutors to get the second, or dealing 1/4 of the amount of life all at once out of nowhere". I don't think anyone has any problems with the type of combo in the first category, whereas easy "1 card combos" usually DO make people just as salty as infect. As an aside, the middle ground of "Voltron damage, or slow infect genuinely built up over turns" probably also has that middle ground of creating some feel-bads but not as much as a quick combo/Triumph win.

[@adamrobinson6951]

The only Infect card I'd ban is Tainted Strike. It's too easy to target an unblocked or trampling creature and take someone out of the game with no setup or synergy. As long as they don't continue to print loads of ways to give poison counters, I don't see an issue. If we reach the point where more people are losing to poison than to commander damage, mill or normal life loss then the target may need reassessed.

[@rocker1296]

One turn/out of the blue infect/poison doesn't bother me, I don't like the infect/poison into proliferate strat. I can't exactly explain why, but there's just an anxiety about it that I don't like, I'd say that part of it is that it's such a broad strat, so there is no one thing I can do to take care of it, and there's just enough different ways to give people infect counters that I can't reasonably stop it from happening without just outright killing the infect player.

[@TheCoopman35]

Edgar markov biggest issue for me is he just invalidates other vampire tribal commanders

[@mr.joesterr5359]

That isnt a problem since you can always brew with other vampire commanders. Anowon is still a monstrously strong deck. Evelyn is also stronger than edgar just flat out as a vamp commander.

[@janMelantu]

Edgar Markov is truly the Golos of Vampires. Before Golos was banned, it was starting to become “why would you play any other commander when you can just play Golos”

[@dcrappa1]

My issue with Edgar Markov is the one person in our playgroup who runs him will get board wiped 3-4 times and rebuild it next turn like nothing ever happened

[@rara2ra2yrra3racjj2]

@@dcrappa1 I'm that Edgar player, and let me tell you, that's not exactly how that goes. It's safe to say that it's relatively simple to rebuild after the first board wipe, however, anything more than that is just exaggeration. Sure, you can probably put more bodies on the battlefield, but those are still just 1/1s with no abilities, and even if you have eight of them, that's not threatening in the slightest, which means they can just be ignored. You can rebuild the quantity, but you can't rebuild the quality. This is why I run a good amount of card draw, as well as protection spells, sacrificing even the precious land slots for it, knowing that it's gonna bite me in the butt sometimes, just so that I have some sort of contingency plan, in case my opponents deploy more than one board wipe. Four board wipes almost always means lights out for me.

[@dcrappa1]

@@rara2ra2yrra3racjj2 not really. All he plays is one drops and ways to get the cards back. We would wipe out 10-12 vamps also clearing our own boards in the process just to have him next turn make 6 more vamps and start snow balling again. It's death by a thousand papercuts

[@flamingrock9978]

as an inalla player with 2 ur-dragon players in my LGS playgroup, inalla is MUCH stronger than edgar or the ur dragon. the value from copying ETB's is ridiculous, and inalla is an amazing value and combo deck

[@saulofernandes4949]

Same here and i have to say that half of the time i just win before the ur dragon players puts any dragon in play. Inalla Spellseeker is the most broken combo in the format

[@PraetorGix]

LOL this was the second best segway of the season (after the "creator of the segway" segway ofc), well played Matt XD

[@drpepper998]

The problem with posion counters in commander is when more than one player plays a posion deck. Last week between the two people playing a posion decks in the pod, the two non-posions player were dead in four turns (I was one of them). We had no chance to do anything when two players put on counters. I took my turn and then when it was back to me I had 5 counters on me. By my next turn i was dead. So much fun....

[@murphyspell7125]

If you can't beat em, join em.

[@simonkuccera8399]

I want Eminence to come back actually... but not as upside, instead as fun deckbuilding restriction or downside. Like 5c commander that says "Eminence - you can't cast spells with 2 or less colors" or something like that.

[@Playingwithproxies]

That would be interesting just as long as the upside is strong enough but not too strong to counteract it.

[@jordangroblewsky2087]

That's basically just companion, which was trying to emulate commander anyway so I guess there's precedent for it.

[@aklepatzky]

So companion 😂

[@jernmon]

I think Hamza might be a good example of a "fixed" Eminence, in that it is a limited effect when in the command zone (cost reduction just for him; and in this case, even in effect when in hand) which is then upgraded when in the battlefield (cost reduction for all your creature spells). Eminence would have a better reputation if it cared about where the commander was instead of just being "this effect is active while in the command zone"

[@andrewsparkes6275]

I wouldn't even really count cost reduction for itself as Eminence. A better use of Eminence would be to have a NEGATIVE use for you in the command zone, paired with a second slightly better than usual ability on the battlefield. This would actually force you to you to get the Commander out on the battlefield ASAP, where while it'll still have the drawback of the Eminence ability as that applies both to CZ and the battlefield (say "Whenever an opponent plays a land, you lose 1 life"), it'll be outmatched by an amazing battlefield ability (say "Whenever a land enters the battlefield under your control, each opponent loses 2 life and you scry 2.").

[@cronchable]

Don't know that I agree to the point about the restrictions making Eminence less bad, because those restrictions aren't exclusive to Eminence. Many commanders give you a restrictive theme you have to stick to if you want to use them effectively.

[@Helixcards]

i think that the hornet nest question the stats is off cause if you have fight spells in the deck, it generates an army at 2 mana and instant speed. ive used it to great effect to end the game by having it fight an opponent's absurdly large creature then kill them with fynn triggers on my turn.

[@jovismarshall]

32:50 Eminence is not a deck build restriction, there is no down side to running non vampire cards only upside to running vampire cards, that is the opposite to a restriction, the companion mechanic is an example of a deck building restriction, where the deck is only legal if it meets requirements. i do actually think both machanics could be revisited, but companion cant be reprinted into modern and needs both harsher color and deck requirements. and eminence is a knife edge where if its too good it gona to be way too good and if its bad (or has actual down sides) it would be unplayable or worse unfun to play.

[@shogun452]

I can’t disagree more with the companion vs eminence discussion. While I understand the new player argument, that’s just magic; there’s so much nonsensical rules garbage a new person needs to learn, I don’t think companion is too outside the norm. I think companions can be very fun if used as a unique deck building challenge for a stale commander. Sure they can be broken, if you have combos built around them, but that’s no different than a normal legendary with a combo deck built around them. Eminence on the other hand is inherently broken because it does not require real deck building restrictions (any more than other tribal commanders) to get the benefit. A vampire or wizards deck with an eminence commander at the helm is instantly more powerful than one without, and that’s a problem.

[@Crow_Saw]

I've taught a lot of kids to play magic (my kids, nieces and nephews, students - I run a club) and in defense of semic, it's a fantastic starter color. Because new players are unfamiliar with the game, giving them extra resources to help balance their inexperience can help level the playing field. It helps them feel like they can keep up and like they have the opportunity to do things in a game of commander. I also feel like many of them "grow out of it". By the time they're building their own commander deck they want to sample other colors and mechanics because semic has given them a foundational confidence in their understanding of the game.

[@jinxed7915]

Fantastic starter color is a hilarious if unintended backhanded compliment for Simic* decks

[@pre-usedphantom7397]

Infect and toxic creatures aren’t the problem since most are easily susceptible to removal or intervention. I think you guys are right about how the most threatening aspect of infect are the cards which can give other creatures which are already balanced for non-infect mechanics are given the keyword. The only exception that comes to mind is Blightsteel Colossus. I have a Fynn the fangbearer deck and getting to 20 poison counters on each player in a game of commander when people have superfriends and combo decks is improbable at best.

[@illusivespecter8124]

Matt you hit the nail on the head combat damage based infect/toxic is whatever the issue is the metric ton of cards that are now saying put poison counters for no reason and giving g a benefit at the same time like give each opponent a poison counter then draw or proliferate or stuff like that I have literally lost games to poison counters and never got hit once by combat poison damage. This leads me to just play my stronger combo oriented decks but then it's just a meh game overall because odds are besides all the poison that deck probably isn't matching up

[@redbirdriot]

So I'm going to watch the whole thing, but skipped ahead just to catch the segue joke. Was not disappointed. Keep the streak alive!

[@maggiek8616]

For Luttri I do still wish he was legal in the 99. He's a strictly worse Dualcaster Mage. I think MaRo himself has said companions are unlikely to ever return, in part because the design space is so small with how many restrictions you can have in ways that is easy for your opponents to track. I disagree about the natural deck building challenge eminence poses vs companions. If you're playing Edgar, you're going to cram your deck full of vampires. If you were already playing Elementals, you're going to add Kaheera. I enjoyed looking at the options available as alternatives to Azusa or Solemn Sim that fit within the creature types. Simic really has earned itself a bad reputation, likely because we had things like Oko, Uro, Aesi. Experiment Kraj needs some more love honestly with all the counter synergies people are playing nowadays

[@Level_1_Frog]

People are way too hard on companions. In other formats, I absolutely understand the misery that having an extra card in the hand can have, especially when they're as strong as Lurris or whatever, but I think companion in EDH are much more fair. I absolutely love Keruga, Gyruda and Obosh, and to counterpoint the criticism that you might build a deck with illegal cards- just run your deck through moxfield or archidekt and it will tell you if you're using illegal cards. It's like a non-issue. Eminence is a lot more problematic because you're getting so much power without doing anything, as opposed to the harsh deck building restrictions imposed by companions.

[@felipeguidolin1055]

Players dislike not being able to interact with stuff. Eminence is something that happens from outside the game, Emblems cannot be touched, Poison counters cannot be removed... People used to complain a lot about planeswalkers, but that stopped after we got a few removals.

[@MTG0001]

For hornets nest, the post mentioned the decks source of direct damage was fight spells that target opponent's creatures meaning you couldn't fight your hornet nest. I'd like to argue that you could use those fight spells to have hornet nest fight the largest creature an opponent controls for a large amount of bees. Though this strategy does require you to play fight over bite spells so that might be too much of a cost.

[@jlbrooks74]

Agreed. Make the nest fight a huge opponent creature to make yourself a ton of deadly flyers. Still a keep imo

[@Playingwithproxies]

There is a fight spell that gives your creature indestructible but only one I can think of.

[@PhakeJake]

Yea when I was listening to this I was like "umm yea you don't want to punch your own nest, you make someone else do it."

[@wananana15]

Dang. I usually agree with Joey but i highly disagree about the eminence vs companion situation. I don’t see building a tribal deck as a deck building restriction. It’s a whole archetype. It’s the fact that it’s an ever present thing that you can’t interact with which makes it just that much better than any other commander of that build. The number of times I’m building or upgrading a vampire deck and I think “just build Edgar cause it’s literally free value and better than every other option”. At least companion is an actual deck building restriction that doesn’t change the game at all. If I’m playing an Arahbo deck with kahera as a companion, arahbo is doing 10xs more work from the command zone than kahera could ever do. Especially if she’s removed.

[@TheRDRipley]

Love the show and this is just my two cents. My inherent problem with poison counters is similar to experience counters, emblems, etc. Once I'm poisoned I cant interact in any meaningful way to remove them. Outside of removing the poison player from the game. This creates an imbalance where I have to overcompensate to ensure I live. This wasnt as big of an issue until proliferate and ways to give opponents poison counters became a more viable strategy. Its similar to mill (a strategy I do enjoy) where unless someone has a way to put their graveyard back in to their library, they are incentivized to remove the mill player from the game. Does that mean poison or mill are unfair mechanics? No. Both are average to ok at best (where they should stay). However if wizards was to introduce a way to remove poison counters then I think more people would play infect. It would create more interesting gameplay and less feelbads. I also want to point out an inherent flaw with using the absence of poison decks on edhrec to support the "clearly these decks arent a problem" point. In fact, I would argue that it makes it that much harder to draw any conclusion. In those situations, outside data is necessary to be able to draw any concrete conclusion. Good lord thats far too many words for a youtube comment. Im a huge nerd and love statistics and statistical analysis so I couldn't help myself. Keep up the awesome show!

[@nickel_n_dime719]

Saying Edgar Markovs or the Ur-Dragons Eminence ability is a deck building "restriction" is really odd to me. Would you say that Wilhelt specifying zombies instead of any creature a restriction, or would you just say, "Wow, what a great zombies commander!"?

[@jefftaylor8077]

I have a Nethroi, Apex of Death deck with Umori as a companion that my play group really likes. I know that’s a fringe case, but it’s just to say that companions aren’t always an issue.

[@Will_Morand]

“All 8-drops win the game.” Show me the game where you took over and won with Charging Binox.

[@techpriest8965]

My first commander build (I got a Vrondiss, rage of Ancients precon to start my commander journey) is Volo, guide to monsters. And I fell in love with the deckbuilding restrictions and of course, valueeee. But I don't see Volo as problematic. Deck is quite parasitic in a sense that it relies heavily on Volo and not many cards can carry the deck to victory without Volo.

[@adamrobinson6951]

I strongly disagree with the idea that playing Simic is easy mode - and I don't even own a simic deck. Sure, you're capitalising on synergy with the resources you'd need anyway. But resources aren't the only factor in a commander game - there's developing a boardstate, reducing an opponent's life total, removal, graveyard recursion, defending yourself etc. Every commander should have synergy with something the deck would be doing anyway. In Dimir Rogues, I'm trying to sneak through combat damage. In Hydra tribal, I'm trying to ramp into the biggest creatures on the board. In Boros artifacts, I'm cheating out resources faster than Simic could ever dream of. These are all things the decks would be doing anyway - so why is it only gaining resources that gets grief? If I play a deck with nothing but cheap evasive creatures, I'll have a strong aggressive curve. If I play a deck that's nothing but ramp and card draw, I'll lose every game.

[@ingolf82]

I lend my friend my Esix Fractal bloom deck and he managed to kill all the players at the table with triumph of the hordes, not all at once, one by one. he kept getting it back from the grave by making a copy of eternal witness so he killed everyone with infect one by one with the same card. I have never done that myself lol. Gavin Verhey has openly admitted that the Eminance commanders were a mistake. He designed them and it is one of his biggest regrets I own a Edgar Markov deck. I actually cast Edgar quite regularly there, his ability when he comes out is very relevant. he has haste and first strike so he rarely dies in the chosen attack and he buffs all your attacks permanently. Ur-dragon is 9 mana. if you can't get a hold on instant speed removal by the time the ur-dragon is cast, you might be losing the game regardless. I think that secretly, Inalla is the biggest problem of these 4 commanders. I have seen cEDH players go off turn 1 and win with Inalla. none of the others can do that. I agree that the Simic value train is a problem. I have an Esix Fractal bloom deck that goes nutty with budget cards like Avenger of Zendikar. but is a very late game deck, it is not fast, despite being in Simic. have lots of ramp, it's just, not very fast and that is on purpose.

[@Jerhevon]

I have a bant populate deck myself, and Eternal Witness is certainly my favorite token creature.

[@EpicGamerz01]

Some people might watch this show for their vernacular, I watch to see Joey squirm whenever someone steals a segue

[@kurtmooreca]

Biggest problem with Companion is that it was changed post Ikoria, used to be it started in exile (or outside game technically) and you could just add it to your hand at any time, so if you built decks around it right you could just pull this card to your hand at any time, then cast it and get its benefits when ever you could make use of them and protect the cast or it when it sticks. Yorion really pops to mind for Commander because you already covering the 80 card cost by playing with a 100 card deck. Build a deck that likes to flicker stuff and poof Yorion comes down from outside the game and just takes it over. Or like setting up a board for an Obash, you could bring it in when you could just dome people and protect it for free. However they did change its ruling and now it costs 3 Generic to bring to your hand from exile, which greatly limited the timing and opportunity to set up these "I Win" situations with certain companions due to a more restrictive mana demands (and essentially costing you your same turn protection mana just to add it to your hand and delaying you a turn at least). Problem is, none of the Ikoria Cards say this, so unless people follow magic closely or play in a community that knows that ruling changes exist, it is really impossible for them to know how the mechanic now functions because 0 of the Ikoria Companions have printed text saying : Pay 3 to put this in your hand. Only the recently released alt art companions in Multiverse Legends posses that text. Even the etched foil original art MUL cards do not state : Pay 3 to put this in your hand. So not only are some Companions really powerful and can win games when they enter play, none of the cards most people have come across have the proper wording on them, and without people who know the change around to teach them, it can lead to some drama when they learn at the table on a Friday Night (although my LGS is pretty casual and we typically ignore the companion cost if the person wasn't aware of it...because it doesn't say it on the card how could they be). (WOTCs second attempt at this type of interaction went way better, Foretell from Kaldheim I believe was brilliant).

[@carloscasas3381]

I completely agree with everything you've said and I don't want to be that guy but yorion doesn't work as a companion in commander. Yorion wants a deck to have at least 20 over the minimum deck size and in commander the minimum deck size is 100 so that'll require a 120 card commander deck. The issue is that commander also has a maximum size of 100 so it's impossible outside of rule 0 to run a yorion companion in commander.

[@shondralyon-brown1603]

Just got to the section on whether or not Simic is just the good stuff color pair and I tend to agree in some cases and disagree in the case of Lonis, Cryptozoologist isn't necessarily "easy mode". She wants specific cards and specific lines of play, but I absolutely love the deck!!

[@jinxed7915]

To add to your comment, the Simic criticism mostly arises out of the fact that until about a year or two ago, a lot of generic-ly good Simic commanders *were* being released, and players were frustrated with that. In fact, the criticism extended to Simic's design space as a whole, which was all over the place and only seemed coherent when it came to being good in a generic way. For what it is worth, the design for Simic commanders has certainly improved as of late, and to paint the criticism in a fair light, players aren't saying *every* Simic deck is generic goodstuff easy mode, but rather they are rolling their eyes at specific Simic commanders like Aesi or Tatyova that are just plain uninspired

[@BadDrummerCarl]

Eminence as an effect in general is strong and could be balanced but Inalla and Edgar really are overpowering. I can't say I've ever had a fun time against those decks regardless of what the player says their power level is

[@donvielenio8956]

There's no way, an always active Panharmonicon effect in Command Zone could be overpowered.

[@theodorereggiardo77]

@@donvielenio8956 What if we made it cost 1 life in addition to 1 mana? Every commander player knows that life is a resource that must be hoarded in commander and there is little room to spend any!

[@donvielenio8956]

@@theodorereggiardo77 True that. Noone would pay 2 life to cast a Mental Misstep, that card is borderline unplayable and needs a buff, like creating a treasure, too.

[@Appl3Bird]

I think infect and toxic as a mechanic are good but i do think with how much more proliferate cards there are with all will be one it makes it seem like a bigger deal and more annoying. Knowing they only need 9 cards to kill someone. I feel we should atleast make it 15 for commander or change it so proliferating cant target players or permanents

[@philippniemann8842]

29:04 I Love my Queza deck. As an alternative and addition to "peer into the abbyss" I highly recomment "necrologia" - 3bb : you pay x live and draw x cards

[@murphyspell7125]

Especially if you stick a Reliquary Tower and cast a wheel that draws the highest amount discarded next turn.😏

[@melephs_cap]

I recently saw someone aggregate some EDHREC color combo data and found that Simic is in 5th place in popularity, behind rainbow (far in first place), Dimir, Golgari, Gruul, and Izzet. (Boros and mono-black are not far behind.) It does seem to have the biggest proportion of pushed value engines for mana and card draw, especially recently, but it's not a dominating force. I also feel like the amount of clever Simic commanders is obscured by the recent and more popular value engines.

[@garagavia]

If you want a cool simic commander I've been enjoying Tanazir Quandrix. He puts on the beats, which is always a fun and fair gameplan.

[@Buchaus]

I would absolutely buy an "if they play an 8 drop, play a 9 drop" T-shirt or playmat

[@uphillwalrus5164]

Inalla’s eminence ability is by far the strongest

[@normative]

Eminence could open up interesting space if it always came with a downside (or at least a downside that remains in effect while the card’s in the command zone). Both in terms of checking the power and in terms of creating an interesting puzzle for opponents-how do we maximally exploit this bespoke disadvantage?

[@gianniniolu2218]

There exists a through line with the problematic mechanics that were discussed in this video and it is inability to interact with one thing or the other. Interaction is one of the cornerstones of magic. Outside of leeches, there is no way to remove poison counters and is generally a waste of a slot in any deck unless you are purposefully meta gaming against your pod. Poison counters, experience counters, and eminence truly fall into a realm which has typically been reserved for the most difficult thing to do, ulting a planeswalker (though this has become much easier as of late). If there were ways to interact with these then I think there would be much less discussion of them being too broken

[@empurress77]

Well said!!!

[@davidtuffelli-rail2214]

This lacks of possible interaction makes it that you have to kill the infect players as quick as possible. Then these player whines...

[@light-chemistry]

“Eminence is good because it forces people to build around their commander” is a really bad take for so many reasons

[@maggiek8616]

And the argument that companion is bad for unnaturally warping your deck building is also a pretty awful take.

[@light-chemistry]

​@@maggiek8616 yeah that was insane to me. Like if you really want to compare companion vs eminence... just look at the EDHrec stats? Way more Edgar/Ur-dragon decks etc than there are companion decks that is for sure. And it's ironic these guys are so anti-companion because the one format companions did not ever come close to breaking was EDH (apart from Lutri I suppose, but that was banned straight away, and I'm not sure it would have broken the format in the way e.g. Lurrus broke modern), precisely because the restrictions on them were severe enough that you were actually powering down your decks if you ran like Lurrus or Obosh or Gyruda as companion. Like you were literally being encouraged to look for alternate cards to put in your deck to meet the restrictions, instead of just staples, which is a positive thing for the format. By contrast you get a free urza's incubator on turn 0 for Ur Dragon, free young pyromancer for edgar and inalla, free lifegain triggers with Oloro. And all you have to do is play cards you were going to play anyway? How is that not just absurdly broken? I don't see how you could ever power down eminence enough that it's "fair" without making the commander unplayable. Even Arahbo is actually pretty strong - a free giant growth every turn is actually pretty good. So I personally don't think they should ever print companions again, but I do think these guys were going after the companion mechanic for what it did in other formats, not commander - they just wouldn't say so, and it's weird that the fairness of companion (in commander) was criticised whereas the distinct unfairness of eminence was held up as a positive?

[@Playingwithproxies]

@@light-chemistry agree eminence is equivalent to starting the game with a emblem. No one can stop it the only requirement was that it only helped a single tribe.

[@tailradishtcg5256]

Love the episode as always! To be honest I'm just happy that my boy Kenessos got mentioned as a positive example for Simic decks. It's wonderful, I hope we get to see some interesting designs like it in the future!

[@AdoreHorror]

I really like the 1:1 converstaions when someone is missing, no matter who is missing. Two hosts always get in the weeds a bit more than usual, I would love more 1:1 discussion content!!

[@Acecrafter99]

My issue with poison is proliferate as a mechanic. It can get to the point where you die to poison without ever even being attacked and the proliferate player just pillow forts and counterspells to victory.

[@andrewpeli9019]

If a player is somehow getting a poison counter on you and then controlling the board, casting counter spells, and prolifering 9 times... that person worked hard and earned that win lmao. That sounds like an absolutely exhausting way to try to win a commander game.

[@SamuelKacerik]

@@andrewpeli9019 It's much easier than you think.

[@Acecrafter99]

@@andrewpeli9019 You can proliferate 9 times in like 2 turns. The counterspells are like 1 or 2 mana. Sometimes free. It's not that hard especially with attack taxes on board.

[@murphyspell7125]

Hmmm, the new stax.

[@greenscalekingdom3143]

So I have recently built a Garth One Eye deck that I have dubbed: Garth Seige Master. I believe we all know where this is going right? I put 30 of the 30+ battles in it. After a few games I realized not all battles were needed. But as I play there were certain battles I felt are 100% more one-sided vs others. I just wanted to add that maybe battles will be under this discussion in the future, and I just wanted to be the first lol. 23:47

[@Strung0ut79]

I have a Muldrotha with Gyruda companion deck. It's one of my favorites, even if I can't run sol ring. 😀 We even joke around the table making sure each card is even mana cost. But I can see the hate for having gyruda as an extra card that you get in hand on turn 3. Even though you know it's coming.

[@maggiek8616]

I play Morophon with Kaheera as the companion. Honestly it's there because 9/10 times I never want to draw it haha. But the amount of times I've been questioned about Regal Behemoth because it's one printing says "lizard"

[@loozerid]

The problem with poison, is not even poison it is proliferate. This set has made proliferate so much easier and you can power out 9 poison counters in one turn on each opponent.

[@lapinrouge8876]

Muchas gracias por su trabajo y contenido para todos nosotros muchachos. Thank you for your work guys

[@Aryst4r]

Adrix & Nev have an interesting gimick, it ties in well with the fractals, however fractals have to little support.....sadly

[@ryandavidson3610]

Considering Jace got compleated and we’re imo VERY likely to get an infect reset button I don’t see this being a problem for long, but the problem I’ve always seen people have with infect is that if you get a poison counter, you realistically have no playable meaningful interaction to that, like there is no PLAYABLE card that interacts with poison counters meaningfully, as in removing them I mean

[@MaleusMaleficarum]

This has been my issue since Poison was introduced in THE DARK. 😆

[@matthewollar9842]

29:34 Day’s Undoing showing up in those decks is most likely a misunderstanding of how the stack works. Make a video about that 😉

[@DrLizaroj]

“8 drops win the game!” I play a mono u eldrazi deck and I can drop one of the titans pretty consistently turns 2-4. Let me tell you, they don’t just win the game even with their cast triggers. I rarely get one attack with them, even the non-annihilator ones. And then when people see the first eldrazi, they will go out of their way to destroy my board state absolutely. Meanwhile, the simic deck starts going off and everyone gets mad I don’t have any counterspells left since they even countered my card draw spells and destroyed my mana rocks 🙃🙃🙃 when an large creature hits the field, suddenly 12 damage to one player becomes larger than infinite damage to everyone in people’s minds

[@lightfut]

I wonder if eminence could be better served if it could be interacted with like an enchantment. Get one for free at start of game, then force them to cast the commander to refresh the effect? Idk just a thought

[@jmanwild87]

Like Eminence: You start the game with a legendary enchantment token named Eminence with *insert Eminence effect here.* when you cast *insert commander here.* create Eminence (if you really wanted to future proof it. Have it say if you don't control Eminence, create it.)

[@lightfut]

@@jmanwild87 yeah, something like that. I'd even go so far as to want it to not be an actual enchantment so it doesn't interact with constellation, etc. But that's the idea

[@jmanwild87]

@@lightfut it has to be a token permanent of some kind. Enchantment is probably the least abusable

[@lightfut]

@@jmanwild87 right, probably, unless a new permanent type was created with associated errata to allow targeting.

[@epicosity1224]

"... but listeners we definitely want to hear from you!" Alright, you'll hear from me then! 1. Infect is scary for sure but not problematic I think. If people _really_ want to raise the poison counter limit, I think 15 would be a fair compromise. Play interaction and you're probably fine against normal infect, toxic/proliferate should be a viable win condition. 2. Chaos just seems annoying. Viable strategy? Sure. Fun? Eh... probably not for most people. I don't mind doing weird janky effects but I totally get other people not liking it. 3. Treasures... have only become a real problem since these recent sets like Capenna. Dockside Extortionist (in the right group), Old Gnawbone, and Smothering Tithe are absurdly strong and Matt is right on with it. I personally believe these "banner cards" are the biggest issue, Smothering Tithe most of all. I'm cool with treasures being in colors other than green, I like having some ramp there, but when it comes to those huge generators it's really game warping. Also no, Professional Face-Breaker is not game transforming. Compare it to something like Dockside or Tithe that either immediately do their damage or linger too long, Face-Breaker might make a treasure the turn it comes down or the turn after. Past that, further treasures tend to be incidental. 4. I like effects like Arahbo! Plus he's a big cat and come on, we all love big cats. But yes, while focusing an Eminence ability over a specific area instead of a general one is neat, it seems like a huge challenge to balance. It provides a good direction for deckbuilding but if they revisit it I hope they tone it down. 5. Errata the word "companion." Just... remove it completely. Like, sorry, it's cool in concept but oh my goodness it was executed so poorly and should've been completely redesigned or scratched out entirely. 6. Hey, there are cool Simic commanders that don't reward basic gameplay, like Lonis, Ivy, Esix, uh... Grolnok? Self-mill in Simic... well I guess the point stands that I won't ever see anyone _actually playing_ some of these commanders. Simic _can_ be easy mode, but that feels unfair to Simic; so can other colors. There are more interesting things out there that I think we just don't see enough of. 7. Big spells command a game, agreed. They should. They usually don't win outright, but they demand attention. Again, playing interaction helps these things not kill you!

[@thegarunixking1101]

I will push back on the Companion discussion because of a single card: Umori is fine. It doesn't have any wonky interactions, it's easy to track and make sure a deck with it is legal, and it's just a perfectly alright card that has an actual downside to playing it.

[@RuudAwakening]

Done it twice! Glissa the traitor oops all artifacts and Henzie Toolbox “only beatfacers allowed”

[@jmanwild87]

Keruga also works as do the ones that interact with mana cost. Only having even or odd mana costs is a legitimate downside, and lurrus may be busted in 60 card formats, but he and Keruga I've never seen. Hell, the only one that is debatably an issue power wise is Zirda because of the shenanigans.

[@RBGolbat]

@@jmanwild87 Lurus is busted because it’s effect is active every turn. If it was only the turn it was cast, then it would be much more manageable.

[@jmanwild87]

@RBGolbat Lurrus is busted because it is an 8th card in your opener that people can just run in the majority of 60 card formats with basically no downside to then repeatedly use cards like lotus petal. If it wasn't a free 8th card it's not a problem. And it's not a problem in commander because you're just going to get outscaled by your opponents

[@RBGolbat]

@@jmanwild87 50% of companions weren’t busted because their deck building requirement wasn’t worth the effect. Being an 8th card alone isn’t an issue. The issue was both it wasn’t a significant enough requirement to meet, and it’s effect would’ve been great even if it wasn’t a companion.

[@martinheraud1744]

What about vert powerfull commander with punishing Eminence? Like Eminence : you lose 4 life a turn

[@SeeToTheLemson]

Matt’s Kafka reference alone deserves a like. I didn’t expect a stompy spellslinger to be that sophisticated. I certainly have some egg on my face.

[@bladetb3934]

There should be a threshold of mana cost that causes you to win the game. Just like there are enough combo-able small cards that once you hit a certain number you probably combo some how and win. Most decks that have any level of combo ability once they get 5 to 7 pieces on the board for a turn they win, and that's low power. High power they only need one or two cards out before they can win.

[@nathanieldewalt1707]

Poison and Experience counters as well as energy all have a similar problem... Lack of interaction. Simple solution make more interaction of counters on players

[@Sicacast]

My main gripe in the past with Commander is the general sense of "Play stuff you like! Except that thing..." There are far less fair strategies than having to connect with someone with a creature, that you then have to resolve a spell onto, to grant infect to. Staring at the multitude of two card, beat the entire table strategies that exist in the format, such as Tainted Pact + Thassa's Oracle, it seems like a strange thing to have salt over strategies that more or less still involve combat. Especially when interactive defenses such as countermagic or removal exist.

[@jmanwild87]

I suppose the difference is. With infect that player is killing you and then will probably die because infect is incredibly easy to kill one player with but is incredibly hard to kill a table with. At least with 2 card combos (something people also find incredibly frustrating in casual), the game is over. GG, shuffle up and go next. Whereas infect can effectively nuke a player from orbit, then struggle to kill everyone else.

[@jinxed7915]

Ur-Dragon being the worst Eminence offender is definitely one of the more bizarre takes I've heard. The fact that dragons cost so much is *why* it's not broken. If you've got 7 mana available with a 4 mana dragon and a 6 mana dragon in hand, you can still only cast one of them. If Ur-Dragon was another commander that gave humans or elves the same discount, then yes they would be the worst offender by far, but giving a small generic discount to big fuck spells is borderline fair. Also, to the point that Ur-Dragon is egregious because it has an attack trigger that pays you off for the dragons it was discounting? Of course it does! It's a *9 mana spell!* It doesn't even come with haste so you're left to wait a turn or use another card to let it attack immediately if you want the payoff that, again, is justified by the massive mana investment. Also, the same payoff for previous Eminence ability argument could be said about Edgar, so why does he get a pass? I also found the justification that Eminence isn't as bad because it requires a cost in the deck building process to be.. certainly one of the takes of all time. All of the Eminence commanders are designed to be tribal decks, so the deck building cost is simply that players... build their deck how they were going to anyways. Yeah it's not a compelling argument.

[@AzkuulaKtaktu]

8 drops end the game is a parroted gem of wisdom from Josh Lee Kwai, a famously creative and open-minded flavor fiend.

[@Jerhevon]

I feel people use it as an excuse to play certain things. As in 8-drops should end the game. That gets a hard disagree from me. I agree they should be game warping and rewarding. But there should be room for counterplay and responses. I admit this gets tricky with any spells-matter deck especially. Though getting up the mana for any good Devil's Play or Crackle of Power is a feat in and of itself.

[@Garl_Vinland]

8 drops effect the game flow* they should turn a losing fight into a threat, but they shouldn’t end the game on the spot

[@the_names_rob]

I made a mono red edgar markov deck. Ie no black or white mana sources. And it is pretty powerful. This was even before the most recent innistrad

[@Tuss36]

I think for treasure the idea is that it's an extra bonus that's a bit stronger than scry but not as good as drawing a card. Comparing them to drawing cards is a good way of thinking about it as well. If someone has a grip of 20 cards, they're about as intimidating as someone with 20 treasures. But if someone has drawn two extra cards, it's about as threatening as two extra treasures. Consecrated Sphinx is to Old Gnawbone as Elvish Visionary is to Wily Goblin. There is debate on which itself might be stronger, but it can be a general rule of thumb that if the treasure-making card drew you cards instead, whether that'd be crazy or not, though be sure to compare it to established cards. Making a treasure for each creature you control might sound crazy, but few would say Shamanic Revelation is OP. Details apply of course (creature flicker vs sorcery, etc.)

[@gavinforbes5645]

Disagree on Hornet’s Nest in Fynn. If no one’s attacking into it then great, you’re not being attacked. But also one of Fynn’s primary forms of removal is fight spells, so if you can fight something huge with your Hornet’s Nest at the end step before your turn you come out with a horde of flying deathtouchers. I think Hornet’s Nest deserves its spot in that deck.

[@jaredwonnacott9732]

Considering I just decided to overhaul my Adrix and Nev deck to include a few more treasure cards and the first time I ever drew one, I immediately was able to empty my hand and win by the next turn, yeah, treasures are busted. Prosperous Innkeeper should not be that good. Eminence is a great mechanic, but it needs to be really janky, not all-stars. A commander that has "Eminence: Beast creatures you control with mana value 6 or more have trample" would be perfectly fine.

[@bryceduyvewaardt8136]

I’ve built and played 6 different companion decks at my locals for a year now and everyone’s been cool about it, both with longtime players and new ones. I explain briefly at the start how I’ll need to pay 3 to get it in my hand, what the restriction is and if the creature dies or is exiled, I can’t re-play it so it’s less resilient than a commander. When explained this way, I think it reduces confusion for players unfamiliar with the mechanic. If it’s revisited in the future, I just hope the cards are exclusive to commander formats somehow so other formats aren’t disrupted again. I’d love to see G/R, U/R and U/W companions made that are compatible with commander decks without needing to rule 0 ones in that can’t legally be played with.

[@Rouricht]

xD Red and White are my favourite Commander colors. Those decks always are the most fun to play since they dont do the classic boring goodstuff things. :D

[@colinlynch6491]

Biggest issues with companion in edh, why can we play cards from outside the game, but not find cards that are outside the game? A companion should work more like the conspiracy draft cards that you reveal from your deck and put it in the command zone if your deck meets the restriction

[@Spike-hl2mw]

You can't play cards from outside the game in EDH. There are no sideboards/lessonboards, and things like "wish" cards or Spawnsire of Ulamog 's second activated ability don't work in EDH.

[@jmanwild87]

@user-cv4sl5to4b Companion has been ruled that it does work, though making it the outlier

[@colinlynch6491]

I'm aware of how the wish cards and companion actually work. I don't agree with the rules reasoning they gave for why wish style cards don't work but companions do.

[@jinxed7915]

I think the reasoning is that part of commander is having to limit yourself to 100 cards, and Wish effects violate that by allowing you to effectively play with any stupid large number of cards you own and have nearby. Even if we just restrict it to a proper 15 card sideboard, that's still abusing the 100 card rule. I'm a bit ambivalent about the rule, but EDH is probably better for it, especially since it is ripe for abuse with cards like Karn, The Great Creator. I'm more frustrated over the fact that the Rules Committee was willing to go out of their way to change the rules to allow Companions to work, but apparently not willing to just add a rule that would restrict Lutri from being your companion, and instead felt the need to ban them outright.

[@colinlynch6491]

@Jinxed I agree, I just don't think companion should work, unless it counts as one of the 99. Because as you said we have no side board for the card to be from. Canadian highlander literally looked at the companion mechanic and said, sorry, we don't have sideboard, go play them in commander

[@claygillman9351]

Matt, I wasn't listening to you 2 years ago. So thanks for the challenge Joey. I just ordered Day's Undoing, because I didn't even know about that card. I have a couple of decks i want it in.

[@willvmurdaugh]

The threat of toxic absolutely lies in proliferating. It's more mana efficient than ever to proliferate. All the poison player has to do is get one counter on each opponent and start slinging proliferate spells.

[@andrewpeli9019]

Proliferate support definitely helps poison counter decks close out games. Having just built Ixhel, proliferate has finished some games but it's still more common to see players taken out through combat based effects. Planewide Celebration is a card though!

[@jayjayhooksch1]

​@@andrewpeli9019 proliferate is very strong. I run a Venser Corpse Puppet deck with only 1 infect/toxic creature and it's still easy to poison all my opponents out by turn 7-8. It could be even sooner, but I build all my decks to go off turns 7-9 for power level and my playgroups fun in mind.

[@murphyspell7125]

So, storm isn't good to have either?

[@caedmonr112]

I appreciate Matt's final comments about companion. Companion introduces a lot of cool deckbuilding restrictions and I think there should be more printed into a commander focused supplemental set to create new types of decks. I don't think there's a ton of design space available for companions, but I want it to be explored fully. My favorite decks I've made have been companion decks, and I think they're very interesting and fun to play against. Other formats have given companion a bad rap where they're not really bad at all in commander, and even create new unique decks even within specific commanders. Companion is great. More companion please

[@chrishiggins2651]

I think that all 8 drops SHOULD win the game, or at least put you in a position to do so, but not necessarily all of them do.

[@murphyspell7125]

If that were true, everyone would be trying to just ramp to 8 mana to win.

[@ACertainGuy0]

Weird take about treasures/dockside: I think both are an individual problem in their own right. I think treasures being everywhere is an issue, but dockside itself is its own special case. If they never made a single treasure/gold generating card in all of magic and ONLY made dockside, the card would STILL be insane, probably more so because nothing else would do something like this. Dockside in a vacuum is a problem itself, it just happens to share a niche with something else that is also a problem.

[@Jerhevon]

Treasure on little things is interesting. A treasure here, a treasure there. But it feels like the line is about 3-4 treasures. 3 treasures off a single effect feels dangerous, no matter how much mana wa spent, and 4+ feels downright broken. Having Gnawbone and Ancient Copper dragon giving 7-10 in the most basic case is downright ridiculous. Seeing Dragonspark Reactor jump to lethal levels in a single action... and having the ability to be activated off the same treasures that powered it up? Just ludicrous. Even Brass's Bounty feels ridiculous and terrible to see resolve. Sadly only tried it one deck, and multiple other people proceeded to cast it, so I cut it. So mostly only ever seen it resolve for other people.

[@jeffe2267]

I think Eminence could be tuned by making it require you to cast your Commander X times (e.g. 2).

[@leonfriedemann9151]

1 time would help a lot allready

[@drakko95]

I feel like Simic got the reputation that it did, because if you add blue to anything, a large portion of the player base will hate it, regardless of what it actually does.

[@iTzZJaSoNxX]

Eminence having an additional requirement like casting it once makes sense to me. Otherwise, it's free, can't be interacted with, and deincentivizes casting your commander. To justify eminence by noting the cost to build around does not suffice. What are your thoughts?

[@NerdByAnyOtherName]

I feel that Poison is something that is fine right now, but that the community and the rules committee need to be keeping an eye on. My concern is that with ONE, Poison and Proliferate is much more accessible and visible than it almost ever has been, particularly due to it being in a pre-con, and so a lot of the arguments for why poison is fine and balanced where it is, which often boil down to "there aren't that many sources of infect so just remove their creatures/leave up blockers" and "there is only ever 1 infect deck at the table, so in the worst case scenario just kill them", _may_ be somewhat mute and/or shortsighted because there are more ways than ever to add Poison counters and we are likely to see more tables with more poison decks and more incidental proliferate. 20 might be a little overkill, but I could see the RC maybe pushing Poison to a 15 counter victory sometime in the next 6 months depending on whether Poison ends up sticking around as a new mainstay or if it goes the way of Mutate and Foretell

[@Playingwithproxies]

Wrong about days undoing the neckusar draw triggers won’t be placed on the stack until after the days undoing is resolved. If I am correct they will all be placed on the stack at the end step. Great card keep running it.

[@TaIathar]

Day's Undoing still works in decks that can give it "Flash", so the Queza decks in particular don't have a problem running it because of cards like Teferi, Time Raveler and Flash. Additionally, even if the card nonbo's with the commander effects, you still get a reset on the graveyards of players playing recursion stuff. Even without gaining the effects of those commanders, the impact the card still has on the politics of the game is there. If there's another blue player at the table, they might be inclined to counter it. It's also just a good way to refill your hand when your hand is low. I don't think the 1-off nonbo is a reason to stop running the card entirely. It has relative use in the decks that play it.

[@davidhowell1415]

11:09 this is me and I’m about to buy some new chai didn’t know existed. All of these cards were printed when I was on a break from the game

[@xaviersandoval1765]

If anyone actually wants a deck that Day's Undoing fits perfectly into, Najal the Storm Runner. He lets you cast sorceries as though they had flash. Use Days Undoing to refill hands and then end your opponent's turn before they get to make use of anything, and you get to untap with a fresh hand.

[@3OOM9]

Days Undoing just ends the turn if it was yours. You can't end you opponents turn with it

[@xaviersandoval1765]

​@@3OOM9 Ah shit, you're right. Reading the card explains the card.

[@j.m.4508]

55:15 - this is a weird point. Craterhoof doesn’t end games because it requires a set of conditions to be true and can be interacted with???? That goes for all big-CMC game-winners? Nobody is saying that a single Craterhoof wins games, because Magic is a game where you build a deck that works towards a winning game state.

[@DUES_EX]

We need combat ways of winning in commander because commander is harder to win on with a aggro deck commander. It’s a lot easier to win commander durdling into a combo win

[@TalenLee]

I think the implication that the simic commanders that aren't pointedly niche 'don't have heart put into them' kinda sucks, honestly. Considering how much the new player experience is considered important, extremely basic, accessible commanders that let players do the things they want to do in those colours doesn't strike me as a bad thing.

[@Lilbru123]

thank you, this is how I feel exactly. coming from other games, the more accessible commanders from simic is the only reason I ever got into this game. I needed the decks focusing on lands and draw to actually learn the game and experience what else is possible

[@jlbrooks74]

Lutri as companion was a free card in its original form. Eminence operates in very much the same way. Free card (value/effect) for absolutely no cost

[@kenga_9700]

I think companion could be saved by making the restriction be based on your commander. By using a specific card name is your commander as the requirement to be a companion, you could basically print a partners with card for an existing legend that doesnt have partner or partners with.

[@alexchorel-campanozzi8275]

I have a Inalla eminence deck, normally I dont like tribal decks for its lack of interactions and strategy between cards imo tribals easily become goodstuff deck of a tribe but inalla was different it forced me to restrict myself so much that i enjoyed, I've made a ETB wizard tribal with burn dmg as wincon. Inalla profits the most from ETB, activated abilies and attack triggers due to the copy and haste - I had to look to almost all wizards one by one to see wich ones to add to my deck

[@ryanbolson23]

26:58 paused the video to say obviously it’s in there because you can run right spells in a deathtouch deck as targeted removal, so instead you just fight the biggest thing on the board and get a ton of infect bees

[@alanevans5353]

The problem with infect is that typically the infect player knocks someone else out very early in the game, and then doesn't have a way to close out the game against the other players, so you have one person who is locked out of having fun because they drew the short straw and the infect player got them first. The same is true of voltron but usually at least a voltron commander is ready to swing at the other players in their next two turns, so they aren't intending to kill one player and then sit and do nothing the rest of the game, whereas infect tends to do that more often than not.

[@nikolamatasin3877]

10:10 while I feel that at times, Overwhelming Stampede, even things like Kamahl or End-Raze Forerunners or Overrun, Biomass Mutation, GE Rhonas... would win the game, there are times where Triumph of the Hordes just does too much for 4 mana... also... those other cards mostly have to win you the game on the spot, Triumph of the Hordes does not. Additionally it works really well in "go wide" decks, sure some others do too, but The Hoof is also a lot more expensive to cast for example... The other day I was playing Chulane deck, which is quite poorly made, plus I was drawing wrong parts of my deck the whole game (no mana rocks, nor land tutors for the whole game), and... at one point with 4-5 creatures out and Vivien, Monster's Advocate, I was dead on board to Rakdos Vampires player, all of her 5-6 creatures had 13+ counters on them, she had a few flyers too. So with Vivi -2, cast GE Oketra, find Linvala, SoSG... I've went in, gave my things Indestructible with Linvala, and cast Triumph of the Hordes just to weaken her board a bit, so she can't one shot two players with 1 creature each, she took 7 Poison Damage, and blocked rest of my stuff, which lowered her power a bit, next turn she boardwiped while keeping her board, attacked with 3 creatures in order to kill me and other leftover player, but he had Aetherize and we've both survived. lol 2 turn cycles later, I've had Vivien CotW out (gives Flash), Gisela, the Broken Blade exiled with it, and Chulane and Oji, and 3/3 token with Reach out, IKO Vivien was still out, as turn was being passed to me, cast Gisela, and... with 3 creature on the board (Oji, the Exquisite Blade, Chulane and Gisela), I've top decked Ohran Frostfang, -2 on IKO Vivien, get Eternal Witness out of the deck, Triumph back into hand, cast it, send Gisela on Vampire player, Trample, Deathtouch (from Ohran), First Strike, Infect was enough to get through 2 of her 20+/20+ Flying blockers and eliminate her. Attacked the other played with Oji and Chulane, drew 3 cards, Selfless Spirit among them, and on cast of Selfless Spirit, drew Flawless Maneuver too, and next turn with Oji, flickered Witness to get back Triumph... Sure it's a convoluted way to win, and since deck doesn't have Proliferate, nor Tutors other than IKO Vivi, it doesn't really have that much chance of getting TotH back into my hand. But with the board I've had, and the board I was facing... 5 Craterhoofs in a turn wouldn't solve my Flying Vampires issues, nor would have I been able to eliminate the Vampire player with any Overrun effect other than Triumph.

[@FriendlyNewt]

You guys are the best please increase to two episodes a week.

[@JD-gk7eh]

I think the big difference between Triumph of the Hordes and things like Overwhelming Stampede/Craterhoof is how little Triumph can end a player with and how you can have a good position in the game and gets you when it shouldn’t. Example: you have 45 life and some creatures. You attack with some or all of them because no one else does. Opponent has a couple 4/4s but you can take 8 with your life total, no sweat. They cast Triumph and you die. So do you always have to have blockers back to guard against 2 creatures that might go infect? That’s unreasonable and you can’t play in fear like that and actually do well. So you lose at random when perhaps you really played well and did it all everything right-it’s just bad luck you lost because literally no other card would have beaten you there.

[@joeribaars5481]

poison could be raised to 15 without losing its power and would make it harder for that instant win, 20 might be to high and might hurt.

[@numnut154]

I think 90% of the time Eminence will be misused in design, but I think there are cases where it could be used to enhance fringe strategies. A (probably bad) example would be something like colourless Eldrazi decks, where making a Scion on upkeep or something would be flavourful (as it heralds the arrival of bigger Bois) and does that little bit extra to help a specific strategy explore a few more options in deck building.

[@bearrington2024]

For eminence, the Ur-Dragon's ability is really not that good. The Ur-Dragon is scary because its a 10/10 that Genesis Ultimatums on attack. If my opponent never casts Ur-Dragon then they lose like every game. The Ur-Dragon is scary because it breaks the social contract; players ramp hard for like 3 turns and now magically have a hand full of broken 6+ drop dragons, so by not interacting with their mana they drown you in card quality and high power flyers. He's arguably not even the best dragon commander, with the RUG "double your dragons" one out now. Even Edgar isn't bad. His eminence is strong, but the 1/1 needs a ton of synergy to do anything. His on field effect is worse off for it, to. The problem is that no other vampire legend came out to beat his generic power, so he is still the best vampire tribe commander. Eminence is a cool design space that because people are afraid won't get more iterations. Like would the mechanic be bad if there was a commander that had "eminence - something negative" and then like a phasing/self removal to counter a strong ability? Oro's "Eminence - gain 2 life" is comically bad.