The Biggest Mistakes You Can Make in Commander | Commander Clash Podcast 149

[@RCCrisp]

Wonder if Richard is going to say "playing good cards so you annoy the rest of the table and get yourself killed."

[@RyanMclain]

ROF'nL

[@Todesnuss]

Literally the Tempo segment lel.

[@JimPea]

Beautiful.

[@kurowasanabe]

Looking forward to the top comment being skipped again next week.

[@noahfriedrich4686]

​@@kurowasanabeWell it does make a once really fun aspect of the podcast into part that I now just skip because the top comment is basically the exact same thing every time

[@discoviolenza1984]

Lol. Seth mentions waiting to cast Henzie one of the few creatures that gets better the more he dies.

[@Bstone410]

Henzie comes down ASAP, I dont run mana dorks in that deck for any other purpose. Same with Rocco, I need to be generating food and +1+1 fast as possible.

[@jacobstarbrow6288]

lmao exactly. My Henzie comes down as soon as I can cast him and I love when he gets removed, those non existent blitz cost win the game basically.

[@dee-wreck]

@@Bstone410 Rocco is a good counterexample because half of its value is generated on the end-step.

[@shaunwilliams8943]

Exactly, henzie pretty much never gets killed on my board because my pods understand the value of me just recasting him. It’s a catch 22 in a lot of ways though because it would slow me down but they just see potential future value, so I usually end up iust getting to play my Ojer Kaslam or Ilharg and cheating in something terrible on turn 4

[@khathecleric]

Pantslava does that for me because she always discovers into a 2 land ramp spell or a draw engine.

[@plaidpoet]

Guesses before watching: Seth: not playing enough Hedron archives. Tomer: a reasonable enough take ignored by the others. Richard: running any removal or wraths at all. Crim: playing forests.

[@spawn9892001]

pretty much spot on for Richard

[@tierfunmtg]

Richard: How good is any given card if you add a mana to its cost? Also Richard: Run taplands, tempo doesn’t matter.

[@Zoggiii]

Being Phil, playing Sol Ring on Turn one & saying stuff like "Next Turn is gonna be huge" :D

[@kevinthecarpathian]

Richard: Inkshield is unplayable Also Richard: I am fine not casting my commander and leaving all of my mana up

[@zweis]

The problem is no one is full swinging at an Orzhov deck with 5 untapped mana. They'll just chip you down

[@kevinthecarpathian]

@@zweis Even setting aside the casting the commander argument, Richard's whole philosophy is having cheap blockers and grinding out games. A lot of variables obviously but grindy games last at least until turn 9-10 and even not including any ramp that is a lot of available mana while also being able to deploy cheap chumpers to stop the worst chip damage. Also if you aren't deploying huge threats and leaving mana open there are probably bigger threats than you at the table. He also loves fogs which means he is totally fine with leaving 1-3 mana open anyways. All of this leaves me very confused why he wouldn't play the fog that can actually win games.

[@holstenmason]

I think mistakes are a matter of perspective in some respects, I enjoy being archenemy way more than I enjoy winning

[@ethancoyne7059]

Richard at this point your gonna just need an entire podcast about the topic the comment was talking about or its just gonna be the top comment every week forever

[@smtyke]

Yes! Appease the Comment Gods!

[@noahfriedrich4686]

Except his point is made and he won't change his mind, they already discuss the topic almost every podcast so I'm not sure what else they would say.

[@JonReid01]

@@noahfriedrich4686 I agree, it wouldn't be a discussion we haven't heard a million times already

[@Savagely1]

There should be a week where the pod all plays past Richard decks (including Richard), then we can see whether it's correct to play no interaction.

[@jmnaccount]

I think a better way of putting Crim's point is distinguishing between your deck "doing the thing" and actually winning. Your deck can absolutely do it's thing without winning, and once you realize that, games get a lot more fun.

[@Bleuchz]

Crim is the voice of the comments today haha. Richard saying he doesn't need to run interaction is ABSOLUTELY only because other people at the table do.

[@LunaLasceria]

But that's exactly it, Crim saying that Seth and Richard benefit from him being in the pod is actually perfectly missing the point -- If other people are BENEFITING from your presence, then you're clearly actually not playing to maximize your own win percentage. Which is totally fine, if it's a playstyle / fun thing! Crim doesn't play control because he thinks that he's mostly likely to win that way; he does it because he enjoys it. But then you don't get to say that other people are making the "mistake" of not playing enough interaction and only "getting away with it" because you pick up the slack. That's the opposite of a mistake -- it's them CORRECTLY exploiting your preferred playstyle.

[@OGTahoe3]

If a commander gets removed it only costs mana to get back. If anything else gets removed it usually costs a minimum of 1 card and mana to get back. So if you have a card in hand and commander that helps you draw then I'd rather use the commander because if it gets removed, there is 1 less removal for the next card

[@JonReid01]

This is usually my strategy too

[@totakekeslider3835]

Yup, it’s a free resource that you always have access to. Even if it’s 9 mana after dying twice, you’ll still have access to it later in the game. And who knows? It might even *gasp* live for a few turns without getting removed and you can do something with it, unlike in fairy tale Richard-land where everything you do always gets removed every time.

[@Jerhevon]

I remember this from another streamer I watched ages back. Of course it helps if your commander is one of the value ones. Such as Pantlaza. Where deploying it doesn't just save resources and spend mana, but actively gathers resources for you. I can't say the same for Neyam Shai Murad. Very little impact, not even defensive impact like say Vorosh as my commander and plan C. (Large flying defense when I may not have enough of that.) Neyam though? Unless I'm poised to cheat in something notable, it's just a finicky little value engine.And not even a swift one :)

[@JonReid01]

@@Jerhevon I think you're missing the point a bit tho... It's about having a threat for people to waste removal on. I'd much rather someone burn a removal spell on something I can get back from the command zone vs something getting exiled forever or in my graveyard where I can't get it back. I'm happy when people remove my commander because I'm confident I'll draw into stuff they wish they would have saved that spell to remove.

[@Jerhevon]

@@JonReid01 That's fine. I was mostly chiming in in support of casting commander to eat removal. And as with everything, some types of commanders are also just better at that. :)

[@dee-wreck]

The Tempo conversation just made me think I have no idea what people mean by Tempo. My best instruction of it was from a Rebell Lily video, where "Tempo is the effective mana's worth of effect you've invested in your board." Example, a Delver of Secrets is really good Tempo because it's a 1 mana investment that turns into a 4 mana value creature. With that frame of mind, I think Tempo is still valuable to learn to leverage. Slivers, for example, is a Tempo deck. You play a bunch of 2-3-4 manavalue creatures but your board ends up looking like a bunch of 5/6/7 mana value creatures.

[@LunarWingCloud]

I love Tomer's rants this episode. Peak Tomer this episode, we love to see it

[@colecarmichael5724]

Richard is calling for help with all these takes

[@NoNo-qt4ov]

Cant believe Richard showed a picture of the top 8 comments calling him and Seth out for their "your opponents will just kill you" argument and then just didnt really discuss it, only to them use the same argument this episode. Absolute classic 😂. Edit: Spelling

[@ohfish9499]

Because Richard has explained it so many times lol. He’s been saying this for literal years, it’s “juice isn’t worth the squeeze” argument and it does make some sense even if I don’t fully agree with it. It comes down to don’t play something too scary in your deck if you don’t have the ability to back it up and use that advantage. Like for example you’re playing a sygg river cutthroat dimir deck and you accidentally reveal a Thassa’s Oracle on like a fact or fiction. Maybe you’re playing it just as a low mana value merfolk, but smart players will just kill you if they can because they see Thassa’s Oracle and expect you to be some sort of combo deck.

[@sixfourteen614]

They gotta rename this podcast to the "Dunk-on-Phil-Cast"

[@mikaeljordan]

I do often feel that Phil gets undeserved heat

[@James-mm8pr]

I’m all for playing more lands. The more infrequent one plays, hitting land drops becomes more important. I play a few times every couple of months. During those games I want to make sure I give my deck a chance to do its thing.

[@cheesehuffa9791]

Biggest mistake is building a deck that doesn't fit your playgroup. Fun is the most important part of commander!

[@seanedgar164]

This fr, these guys don't seem to realose that their nonsense only works because they all have strange takes. Tomer is the most reasonable and he's struggled to enjoy games so much

[@chrisv6435]

what is fun

[@alancrow7325]

Crim's comment about baiting out removal using your commander is something I agree with and do often. Yes I lose the commander and it is taxed, but at least I can recast it for 2 more. I prefer to let my recurrable threats to eat removal

[@spawn9892001]

the biggest mistake that a lot of players make is evaluating cards based on playing them on cruve. In most games, you will not see a specific card on a specific turn. That's why we stress running so much ramp and card draw.

[@crawdaddy2004]

I think your argument is self-defeating. Mana isn’t just about playing a 1-drop on turn 1 and playing a 4-drop on turn 4. You run Night’s Whisper, so on turn 4 you can draw two cards and then cast a Cultivate (assuming you played a Ramp spell previously). Casting multiple spells in a turn is usually more powerful than casting one big spell (USUALLY, yes I realize Expropriate exists). I run cantrips, so I have more control over my game plan.

[@ich3730]

@@crawdaddy2004 Also because dealing with 2 medium things is harder then dealing with one big thing. If someone counters or kills the 6 drop bomb you played, you just got time walked behind the barn. If someone counters one of your two 3-drops, you still have the second thing.

[@spawn9892001]

​@crawdaddy2004 I'm not entirely sure how my logic of "don't evaluate how good a card is based solely on cruving out into it" is disproven by taking about how double spelling is the way to go. perhaps I wasn't clear. I'm referring to the large number of creators that look at a 3 drop and say it's bad because you want to ramp on turn 3, not play xx card. As opposed to going, "This 3 drop is perfect for turn x when I can drop it with something else."

[@dontmisunderstand6041]

@@crawdaddy2004 You're misunderstanding what the OP is talking about, pretty substantially. OP is saying that "this is good for a 1 mana spell" is the wrong way to look at a commander deck. You need to be able to say "this is a good card, if it resolves". Not when you cast it on curve. Whenever you cast it, ever. And the reason I can confidently say you misunderstood what the OP was saying is that you literally repeat that idea in a different manner, as if it contradicts that idea.

[@crawdaddy2004]

@@dontmisunderstand6041 @spawn9892001 Now I feel dumb - rereading it, you are absolutely correct.

[@crazyvikingboy2856]

I feel too many people will have decks and not run sufficient redundancy. I play Henzie and I’ll have other creature cost reductions, I’ll play sneak attack to have the same haste plays and EOT death triggers, and otherwise. In Talrand I run poppet stitcher and the new Geralf and the Ravnica wizard that makes birds, etc. Unless your commander is entirely unique, play more redundancy.

[@ethanglaeser9239]

Seth "I don't want to feel guilty about attacking people". What is this guilt thing? I feel no remorse.

[@mildtotemperate]

Richard seems like the happiest guy ever. When he talks he's always smiling or giggling.

[@andyspendlove1019]

What Seth describes at 46:54 is literally the meaning of tempo. Thats the tempo play style, playing threats and doing the thing instead of durdling or sweatily trying to interact with everything.

[@danylerasu4917]

I don't think "Getting to do your thing" should be synonymous with "popping off." In my muldrotha deck, "doing my thing." Isn't milling the rest of my library with hermit druid after casting thoracle. "Doing my thing" is having out a merfolk looter type card, and a dredge card in grave, or casting an animate dead on some big creature. If I get to play Muldrotha and cast something impactful from my graveyard, I did my thing. A better example is probably my Preston Garvey deck. The deck is built around enchanting enough of my lands that I can go infinite with Aggravated assault, but that's not "doing my thing". Sure if I get to go for the line, I'm hyped, even if I don't win. But "doing my thing" is getting my commander out, and playing enchantments, then swinging with my commander and playing more enchantments. "Doing my thing" should not be the same as "popping off" and it definitely isn't the same as winning.

[@dontmisunderstand6041]

A single combo is never "doing your thing". If "your thing" is an extremely improbable game-winning combo, you didn't build a deck at all. That's a pile of garbage. "Doing your thing" is more like... ok, this is a taxation deck. Or this is an aggro deck. Or this is a recursion loop deck. Those are things. "I have to cheat out Omniscience or I can't cast spells" is not a thing your deck does.

[@danylerasu4917]

@@dontmisunderstand6041 This is my point exactly. Players seem to think if they don't do some ridiculous Rube Goldberg that essentially (or sometimes literally) wins them the game, they didn't do their thing. Obviously if you build that way, no, you're not going to be able to do your thing. If you're playing a winota deck, and you don't get to swing with a non-human with her on the battlefield, that's not getting to do your thing. Playing a self mill deck, and someone starts the game with leyline of the void on the field is not getting to do your thing if no-one can remove it before someone wins. Not getting to combo off is NOT, not getting to do your thing

[@adambick9837]

Played against a guy who was running 23 lands in a ramos deck, no basics, a few mana rocks, and lands like lotus field that got rid of his lands. We had to convince a buddy to not play the card Wave of Vitriol to not send this guy to the absolute shadow realm.

[@bryanstrahm9961]

Ah, I see Crim is finally learning about Richard's sandbag strat to win.

[@dontmisunderstand6041]

The actual biggest mistake people make in Magic The Gathering (not just commander) is refusing to learn how to utilize hypergeometric distribution to improve their deckbuilding.

[@atk9989]

Way to much sweat for a casual format.

[@dontmisunderstand6041]

@@atk9989 That's not "sweat", that's just the fundamental basics of deck construction. It's just a thing you have to know in order to build a deck that functions the way you want it to. Neither you nor your opponents are going to have fun if you can't play the game due to not having built your deck in a way that lets the game be played.

[@Woozychu]

@@atk9989nah he’s right, playing 40 lands sucks if you don’t need it, calculator smoothes all my mana bases out

[@tierfunmtg]

Nothing has upped my EDH deck building skills more than that calculator’s cold, hard math

[@Jerhevon]

@@dontmisunderstand6041 And it just takes a lot of finessing things. Playing games and then going I could use a little/lot of X, and then taking out the cards that frankly keep disappointing you when you draw them in that deck.

[@ethanhughes3515]

Tomer going off and representing the comments at Seth and Richard

[@austinmairet1772]

I think tempo as a concept is not the same as tempo as a deck archetype. The concept of tempo is I spend one mana to trade with the a card you spent 2+ mana on. It takes advantage of you spending your mana more efficiently than your opponent. Tempo decks often reverse tempo themselves after they have stuck a threat because they don't want to tap down unless they have to. Mana goes to waste a lot in heavy counterspell match ups.

[@zeroisnine]

Richard doesn't understand tempo and just globs it with aggro/rush. Tempo isn't about being the fastest, it's about being faster.

[@matthewpatton9221]

Tempo is a reference to chess Tempe' which is essentially gaining another turn. Turning a big move into nothing with minimal resources is a tempo move. Maybe a toxic proliferation deck could actually tempo in commander. Bounce something proliferate, counter proliferate, draw proliferate. It's really hard to effectively gain turns on multiple people, thus the 1v1 part.

[@jakecarlson3709]

Tempo is a music term that has existed since before Beethoven, and refers to the speed at which the music is played (usually measured in beats per minute). This was brought into games and refers to the pace of play. High tempo decks (typically referred to as either aggro or just tempo decks) focus on winning as early as possible, make plays that commit large portions of their resources, and typically run out of gas relatively quickly if they don’t win early. Low tempo decks (usually called either control or value decks) typically slow down the pace of play with lots of interaction, attempt to maximize the value of each individual card, and typically win late through having the most resources available to them.

[@matthewpatton9221]

@jakecarlson3709 Tempo was a word long before the mathematics of music was discovered. Do you really believe that the first thing the word "speed" or "pace" got applied to was music?

[@savinobalducci6148]

​​@@matthewpatton9221 having an infect deck in a tempo style is a really clever idea, get everyone a poison counter and then just slow down everybody while incidentally proliferating

[@henrye3935]

My one to add to this would be that people overvalue their opponent's threats and undervalue their value. For example, someone might see a Court of Grace and destroy it thinking, "One 4/4 a turn is insane!" but then they leave alone the Fecundity that's quietly drawing its controller three cards a turn. Also, regarding lands and ramp: If you don't play a land the same turn as your ramp, then you didn't ramp. You paid mana for your land drop.

[@zweis]

1:07:01 Seth "It's a tempo play" line is the funniest thing I've heard since the last time I commented about him saying the funniest thing ever

[@hugovellver5114]

Tempo decks means you outpace your opponents with cheap general interaction(bounce, etb tap, etc) and close the game while doing so , you make them go slower , having a deck that runs faster is also another kind of tempo wich acceleration is for , constant plays , Ramp is one explossive play that is hard to interact, control is card advantage in every solution and do not die , combo is a one turn interaction that ends in a win or concede

[@dontmisunderstand6041]

Stax is a tempo strategy.

[@Jerhevon]

And even outside the tempo decks themselves, the game itself has a rythm. If your removal costs 3, and must be played now, but also prevents you from casting your Solemn to build up your board state, that's a real cost to what you can do as opposed to your opponents.

[@imaginarymatter]

Running too many utility lands -- particularly colorless utility lands. The usual justification for utility lands is that they have a low opportunity cost but a low opportunity cost is still an opportunity cost. For example, Reliquary Tower is the most played colorless land seeing play in ~28% of all decks and this card should see significantly less play. Having to discard to hand size is not a common occurrence throughout the game. Even if you do have to discard to hand size your effective hand size is larger than seven since some number of those cards are going to be excess lands, early cards that are no longer relevant or impactful, interaction you don't need, and/or cards you can't play because mana costs limit once you can play per turn. The opportunity cost of Reliquary Tower is that it's a colorless land and players slot it into three color decks, color intensive decks, mono black (i.e. Coffer decks), etc. If you watch gameplay videos people play an early game Reliquary Tower and then get color screwed. If you play Reliquary Tower keep track of the number of times you can't follow through on a line of play because the land is colorless versus the number of times discarding to hand size is relevant. Another example is Field of the Dead -- a utility land that has no utility until you reach at least seven lands. Decks with no land ramp (e.g. UBx zombie decks) erroneously run Field of the Dead. And it rots on the battlefield until the late game where the one or two zombies it produces aren't relevant. Cabal Coffers is another example. I think it goes unnoticed by many players but Coffers needs 4 swamps in play before it actually mana positive. Every non-Swamp in a Coffers deck runs a significant opportunity cost. The usual justification is that Urborg fixes all Swamp problems. However, getting both of those lands into play usually requires spending your precious tutors to find the other half. As an aside, when playing the greedy mono-black deck consider using land removal on the Urborg instead of Coffers -- because Coffers requires a critical number of Swamps in play sometimes blowing up the Urborg causes the Coffers to become mana negative because of a lack of Swamps.

[@danielsniff6405]

Atleast field of the dead is a thematic inclusion in a zombie deck, instead of a generic staple in good stuff lists.

[@egoish6762]

All great points, reliquary tower should see play in 0% of decks as it's a functionally useless utility land if you have any decision making capabilities. I've been stung by my field of the dead in zombies but i keep it in for theme and i make sure to run 20 swamps in my coffers deck.

[@danielsniff6405]

@egoish6762 I don't know about that. I have a mono green deck that draws a lot of cards, and reliquary tower hasn't ever hurt my mana. Discarding ten cards at the end of turn is also pretty tedious. I think it's fine in any 1 - 2 color deck that consistently draws above hand size.

[@egoish6762]

@@danielsniff6405 yes 0% of decks

[@danielsniff6405]

@@egoish6762 have you played a blue deck before?

[@andrewtaylor5883]

My biggest mistake is forgetting I can't see the big picture [of the active player]. More often than not I [regrettably] have questioned other's decisions because I am judging the play off of what I know. It's hard to remember that the same I am playing is only 25% of the full picture at any given point

[@haroun1760]

Tomers face when Seth was talking about resolving a Conflux was priceless and then saying Sea Gate Restoration is a MDFC had me pauze the video untill I stoped laughing 😅

[@baltosstrupelos302]

Crim is 100% right on the Faerie deck; Tempo is when you mix aggro and control, to edge out your win. You don't notice the aggro, because of the big life totals, and other, more distracting things happening, so it looks like Control only.

[@maximilianlopez196]

Pretty sure one of the only true tempo decks in edh is Edric.

[@SmashCentralOfficial]

37:12 Real Tempo in EDH is hitting all your land drops.

[@jaredwright1655]

I swear every game comes down to who had the most mana or cheated the most mana in play. Reanimator for example

[@dontmisunderstand6041]

@@jaredwright1655 That's generally how resources work. If you have more resources you can accomplish more things. That's not even an mtg thing that's just everything.

[@bennettpalmer1741]

I'm convinced Richard doesn't actually know what "tempo" is. He was talking about "outdrawing the opponent" or "trading 1 for 1 doesn't work in commander, because you have multiple opponents who will collectively draw more cards and cast more spells than you" But those concepts have nothing to do with tempo. Tempo is all about time management. If you have a 3 turn clock, for example, you only need to keep your opponents from interfering for 3 turns. It doesn't matter if you are trading resources 1 for 1 with the entire table, or even casting 0 for 1 cards like unsummon. If you have the resources to hold them off for 3 turns, you win, even if doing so puts you "behind" on cards in hand or available mana or whatever. That's tempo. This is an extraordinarily powerful concept in commander, if anything it's significantly stronger in commander than it is in conventional 60 card formats. Casting cyclonic rift doesn't actually lose your opponent out on any cards. They all go back to their hands where they can recast them in the future. The only thing it gains you is tempo - your opponents are slowed down and need to waste time setting up again before they can influence the game, while you can spend that time snowballing and winning. Fogs are also tempo cards - you don't actually destroy any of your opponents creatures by fogging most of the time - but what it does is buy you some additional time to recover and deal with their board or push through your own lethal attack. "The fog meta" is fundamentally about understanding that in a format where you cannot realistically expect to outvalue or overpower your opponents, you can still out tempo them, and that's typically the key to winning a game.

[@barrelrollio]

This is a perfect breakdown. Mono-Blue Tempo (2019ish) was a great deck for understanding tempo - lay down effective cheap beaters (set the clock), buff them or add resources (curious obsession), and protect them by any means necessary (counterspells).

[@dontmisunderstand6041]

Tempo is why you play an untapped land instead of a tapped land. Card advantage is why you play a surveil land instead of a shock land. Card advantage is not tempo, tempo is not card advantage.

[@dontmisunderstand6041]

I do think it's worth noting... you can indeed plan to outvalue and then overpower your opponents in a 4 player free for all. You can build to be the archenemy and still win, without the decks being dramatically different power levels. It just requires a fundamentally different approach than building and piloting a deck that factors politics into its game plan. As an example, you will NEVER run enough removal to win a 1v3. But you can certainly run enough threats to force the 3 to team up. We see evidence of this in both directions in Commander Clash almost every game. So, to optimize for the plan to outvalue and overpower in a 1v3, you ditch all of the 1 for 1 removal instants. You ditch most of your board wipes too. If it doesn't do more than just the one thing one time, it's not a great card for this strategy. Ideally you want every card to do multiple things, whether that's in the form of turn by turn incremental advantage or modality. And you want each of those cards to synergize, so that each new card you play is a larger and larger amount of incremental value.

[@BoardWiped]

The best part of playing more lands isn't that you mulligan less, its that you can mulligan MORE to find your better spells!

[@neonron8812]

Rolling dice for attacks is one of the worst things in commander. Stop it! Just declare the attack.

[@RyanEglitis]

At the very worst, attack the player who went first if you really can't decide.

[@wesleywyndam-pryce5305]

I have never seen that, it sounds terrible

[@Jerhevon]

Sometimes there just isn't enough information. I take full account for my attacks, but it's not enough impetus for me to overly care. True most times I do chose whoever ramped or whatnot. And sometimes, you just went first, got a 2-mana critter, and need an initial target. And following turn, if some how nothing changed, hit another person.

[@koolaiddude7685894]

Lol never imagined my sarcastic comment about Crim being in the thumbnail would make headlines 😂😂

[@zgmfx42ssaviour]

Sorry Richard, tempo is an actual deck type in edh. Tomer mentioned Edric, but the signpost commander for me is Yuriko- the better Edric. You stick a threat on turn two, draw cards and kill people with it, and play an insane amount of cheap/free interaction that protects your cheap threats and stops your opponent's gameplans. If that isn't the exact plan that the infamous mono blue tempo deck from a few years ago, idk what is. Edric largely does the same thing, and some people include Gix, but I think blue is basically a must-have for the strategy.

[@rquer7913]

If this would be an anime, Tomer would be the cocky protagonist, Seth the chill buddy, Richard the wise mentor and Crim... we all know that Crim would be the wannabe villan that sacrifices himself at the end to save the day.

[@welbenn]

There's no absolute rule that makes sense 100% of the time in Magic. For example, this first "mistake" of casting your 3 mana commander on turn 3 is a complete nonsense in my case. Just because I play Shorikai as my commander, and it is way harder to kill an artifact than kill a creature. If I wait to cast Shori on turn 6 because so I'll have a counters Pell to protect it's cast, I'll lose lots of draws. And that not to talk that is waaaaay better to counter the shannaningans that Shorikai will throw at you than Shori itself.

[@jakecarlson3709]

I’m in the same boat playing grist. My commander is a planeswalker that generates tokens and mills me. My deck is built to play out of my graveyard. There is a reason that “dies to doom blade” is a meme in this community

[@Jerhevon]

I will say I would try to hit 5 mana for Shorikai so I can get at least one activation out. Not done it as a commander yet, just in the 99 of a couple decks. It's such a cracked resource engine.

[@Grief111]

We have a term in our play group for the person that might not have the highest life total, but they're in the lead. We call it "theoretical throne" vs the "throne".

[@Alikaoz]

Finally a podcast where the answer is "to listen to Richard"

[@jerzNC]

The biggest mistake i most commonly see is decks not running enough redundancy and synergy with the commander. A lot of new players or inexperienced players fill their decks with non synergetic draw, ramp, creatures, and spells because those cards are "generically good".

[@ich3730]

Weirdly, i have the opposite experience. Generic, good cards consistently perform in most games. Thats why they are called good after all. Most new players i see often are way too obsessed with synergy. Like playing a 5 mana counterspell that makes three clue tokens over something like OG counterspell because "it makes clues, this is a clue deck, so the card must be better because the same words appear on all of my cards"

[@dontmisunderstand6041]

@@ich3730 Consistency at the cost of effectiveness is bad, because fundamentally you will NEVER achieve a level of consistency that matters in more games than having a higher ceiling. That's just how the math behind a randomized deck of cards works. You don't need to play a single staple to build a deck that does everything it wants to, where every card synergizes with each other to create more benefit than any 2 cards would individually, and where every spell is a spell you want to cast if you can.

[@seanedgar164]

Tempo normally requires disrupting your opponents' plays so that they fall behind or struggle against your threats. Mostly counterspelling to clear the way for or protecting your attacks

[@imaginarymatter]

I think a big mistake is suffering from Keyword-itis -- an affliction in which players build decks or decks around Commanders with a particular keyword by filling the deck with cards with that keyword with no regard for any other considerations. Let's use Padeem, Consul of Innovation as an example. This card sees heavy play in the 99 of artifact decks. On the surface level this makes sense: it gives artifacts hexproof and even might draw you cards. It's perfect, right? However, not all artifact decks are the same. Look at popular artifact Commander decks like Breya or Urza, Chief Artificer. These are artifact decks but they want a particular type of artifact. Breya wants lots of artifacts because she is sacrificing them, Urza wants lots of artifacts because it discounts his mana cost and makes the Karn-structs bigger. These demands lean very heavily towards going wide with artifacts. The best cards in these decks often produce a large amount of artifact tokens -- tokens which have 0 cmc created from non-artifact cards. Padeem, however, is a snob. He doesn't care about artifact tokens, he cares about singular artifacts with high mana values -- the opposite of what Breya and Urza want in their 99. The error here is that because Padeem says artifact in his rules text he automatically goes in the 99 of artifacts decks. But many artifact decks have incredibly low top-end mana values for their artifacts so Padeem often only handing out Hexproof to less than half the deck. A broader example is Tribal decks. Let's use the case of Sidar Jabari of Zhalfir. This card practically shouts knight tribal: he has a knight creature type, he has an eminence ability that says knight, a combat trigger that says knight, and even has very knightly looking armor in his card art. However, Sidar Jabari is not a knight deck at least in the sense that he is a Commander that scales with the number of knights in a players deck. Let's look at the Eminence ability. It only requires a single knight to trigger. It doesn't matter if you have 1 knight or 100 knights, that effect will only trigger once per attack step -- Sidar Jabari attacking alone is enough to trigger that ability. Additionally, his combat damage trigger can only bring back a single knight; because of that you likely only want to reanimate the highest cmc knight available in the graveyard. The Sidar is not a knight deck -- he's simply a Commander that wants to play some knights in the 99. Limiting the deck to knight tribal makes for a weaker deck since there is no benefit to running almost exclusively knights.

[@amatheuslc]

Crim actually brings up an example of it in his Alela deck. She's a faeries deck, but her best ones are Mana Drain, Consider and Deadly Rollick.

[@imaginarymatter]

@@amatheuslc I was considering about ranting about Newlela just because that's one I personally play. She really is a Flash/Instant deck and running Sorcery speed faeries hoovers up the mana you could have used to play at Instant speed on your opponents' turns which also makes faeries, so playing the sorcery speed faeries don't even break Faerie parity -- not that Alela particularly cares about Faeries being the three you need to max out on goading. The only non-flash faerie I run is Tegwyll, ironically, just because of how many cards he can draw.

[@glensimpson1934]

@imaginarymatter I agree with your stance on Padeem, but you take on Sidar Jabari is a hot one. I've been piloting that deck for almost a year know and it's definitely knight tribal, and it definitely wants lots of knights. If you don't have a lot of knights he doesn't function, because he requires knights to do his thing. If you have a lot of non knights you won't get his powerful triggers. You also don't always want to reanimate the highest cmc knight back. Getting our knights that provide protection, like Knight Exemplar, or give him double strike, like Silverblade Paladin are often what you want to bolster your strategy and board. Sidar IS a knight deck, through and through.

[@christopherlee2828]

Making smarter attacks is the biggest mistake i see around my playgroup. Rolling a dice to atk, or attacking the life gain player. Even if the random 3 damage is being dealt to someone with 100+ life. While the mono black krrik player whos on ad naus is at 12 or whatever idk, i 110% agree with that mistake.

[@ianleggett8429]

I think here there are two different definitions of tempo here. One the deck archetype and one is your own ability to play cards and use your mana efficiently. One looks at your opponents tempo and the other is more concerned with your own tempo.

[@MrGeoghagan]

Richard is 100% spot on with the tempo argument. It gets exhausting hearing things like "I don't want to use my removal and risk losing tempo". You never had tempo, and unless the decks are way too different in power level, no player will ever truly have tempo.

[@dontmisunderstand6041]

Not in multiplayer, no. The existence of multiple people effectively guarantees that tempo is irrelevant.

[@baltosstrupelos302]

My Tempo in 60 card was that flash deck from standard way back, with Brineborn cutthroat. The goal: build up a beater, and hit the opponent, protecting my threat, and countering/bouncing their threats/answers. My commander Tempo deck is much the same. I went all instants, with Derevi as CMDR. I put +1/+1 counters on my commander, phasing, protecting, countering etc, while dealing my 21 CMDR damage. Even if they get removed, Derevi always comes back cheap, and we build up again. It's the same play pattern as in 60 card, but you need to pick your counter battles, and attack targets carefully. Oh, and politic a ton.

[@DylanHunter64]

The biggest mistake I see people make is not doing much to take the heat off of themselves. So many fears or worries by the table (even justified) can be explained away with truth just by describing anything else that's scary in the game or by simply underselling what you're actually doing.

[@jaredwright1655]

I'd follow that up with a similar player, the one that doesn't explain how they win or what the combo pieces are, so they get killed out of fear and confusion. I always tell people "this thing is what I really need to go off. I have cards to get it back later, but it takes time." As long as you don't lie about what your deck does, you'll die when you deserve it and not when you don't!

[@Jerhevon]

Like just accepting responsibility for your plays. I'm sorry, your commander is scary. Bad things happen if you untap with it. We're not just ganging up on you for no reason. (Also mind the hyperbole, 3 attacks from 1 person with a 3/3 are attacks of opportunity, not a complete assault. Though sometimes my only answer is indeed player removal.)

[@ericschartenberg7592]

Hi, it was great to see Richard while I was volunteering on Monday. It made my day! Great podcast as always.

[@Theanthill216]

Top 3 edh mistakes: 1.) not playing enough lands; under 37 lands is criminal outside cedh meta, BUT this aint cedh so play more lands. 2.) playing too high power decks for your lgs/playgroup. Do not be “that person” that no one wants to pod with cuz you’re miserable to deal with either deck wise or attitude wise. 3.) wasting removal & having poor threat assessment, OR making deals with the player who is winning so you buy a turn’s amnesty.

[@Jerhevon]

I will say I'm immediately more likely to interact with you if you're trying to get me to leave your stuff/life total alone. XD

[@empurress77]

Playing anything early is in expectation of removal, True story. Here's the thing: When i play an early creature i'm fishing for removal so something else can be more likely to remain in play. Commanders are quite good for this because of the ease of replating them.

[@fabiogliosci8305]

thank you for all the fun podcasts and videos you guys do. They are all great in their own way

[@Woozychu]

Richard is actually just insane

[@austinbrown2833]

One of my favorite things I’ve heard that I use for when I play commander is the Blue shell in Mario cart never hits the guy in second, if you can coast in 2nd or third then make a push for game after a board wipe or something feels good

[@RobiousIllyrian]

We need Phil on the cast to defend himself as example #1 for everything XD

[@user-rm8ot4tf4f]

If i know that i have 25% chance of winning whats the point of playing boring interaction when i can play sweet haymakers or synergistic pieces that are more fun to play

[@foxrogge6298]

I agree with the lands, I was playing a Kenrith deck and I was hitting a land each turn, and I got enough that I played Pir's Whim for Field of the Dead into Hour of Promise for Dark Depths and Thespian's Stage and activated it to make a 20/20 and gave it haste with Kenrith.

[@jameslove90]

This has been one of the funniest and entertaining podcasts you've ever done. Great topic, great energy and Tomer was really on fire 😂 Also, many things you guys have said are indeed true.

[@ebonezra8073]

13:37 "Think about what your commander/X is doing;" can summarize most decisions in EDH. It's easy to say always run 37+ lands, but if you just think about what your deck is doing, you may only require 35 (or less- oooohhh!). Don't just do things because you can - be strategic. Would you cast Open the way if you're behind on lands but your opponent has blood moon - and you don't have basics to grab? Maybe someone will destroy blood moon, but you have to think through decisions, not just make them blindly because you can.

[@dontmisunderstand6041]

Your commander is not relevant to the decision of how many lands to run. The rest of your deck is. Because the focal point of your land count is on probabilities with the opening hand. Because you will necessarily always be including more lands than your deck functionally needs or wants, in order to make the probability of your opening hand being playable higher. The spells in your deck determine how many lands are in an acceptable opening hand, which is the the most important factor in determining how many lands your deck needs to run.

[@ebonezra8073]

@dontmisunderstand6041 would you have still responded if you realized I was saying, "Think about what X is doing." I was talking about the thought process, not specifically about the commander. Don't misunderstand me. My argument is not about lands either.

[@gabriellecureux5528]

man the first thing I think about with Seth making mistakes was when he forgot the play siege rhino in his 100 rhino that was hilarious

[@shadowpsyke]

Refusing to sweep the leg. Specifically in a game with high powered decks. Simic value commander? Take it out immediately. 5 Color goodstuff? Bloodmoon. Elfball? Boardwipe. Combo player? Attack them first. If people are going to jam their decks with the best staples in the format, I'm not going to wait for them to "do their thing", because I've already lost by that point.

[@mattlawton11]

Seth saying Commander is playing 100 singleton cards reminds me: put more basics in my decks

[@wchenful]

Haven't watched the episode yet but I'm guessing that one of the mistakes is "not paying 1 for rhystic"

[@T_Peazy]

Richard, tempo in commander (as crim said) is playing a card that generates you multiple instances of multicard value. Rhystic study. Planeswalkers. Bitterblossom.

[@T_Peazy]

Armageddon is s tempo card. It's anything that breaks the 3 to 1 disadvantage

[@juliangrace-martin1740]

I have an idea about the tempo discussion: in 1v1 the definition for a tempo deck most always be a deck that uses answers for opponent's cards that are more mana efficient and gets ahead on mana in every other way it can to get ahead on board, so you can't play the full tempo strategy in commander against 3 opponents. The Edric and tymna style cares more about maximizing advantages from having better board presence than opponents so you aren't winning by getting ahead then stopping your opponents just long enough, but you are just using that as a way to get better engines going. It seems like it does use an aspect of tempo since it needs to be ahead on board but it doesn't need to be harming the opponent if they are spending resources on ramp and drawing.

[@SterileSauce]

The biggest mistake that’s easy to make is feeling rushed to take your turns and ending up missing triggers or being as efficient as possible. People can be patient and respect your time. Just be sure to goldfish your deck when you can if it’s complex

[@orpheos9]

Counterpoint. Sometimes in casual tables it’s fine to rush a little bit and potentially lose a bit of percentage points of winning so that everyone has a better time.

[@SterileSauce]

@@orpheos9 I fully agree. There’s definitely a good middle ground between sweaty 5min turns and not stressing about being as optimal as possible

[@oafkad]

"Part of the fun of singleton is all the variance!" *Every casual commander player with 10 tutors being confused.*

[@ArtoPOE123]

you can tempo 1 vs 3 by making sure that those 3 cant play the cards, its called stax, and it really cares about tempo

[@coreysierchio4650]

I like the idea of not expecting to win every game. *Thanks for the Content!*

[@kaemonbonet4931]

The example richard had on screen for, "dont play your commander early" was one of the worst examples of that rule. Lol. Tolsimir is great to play early if you have a couple attackers on board. If you have the choice between tolsimir and ramp, maybe you still play ramp but casting on turn 3 or 4 to draw two cards is great.

[@alexduea]

Awesome video

[@DRAGHNALL]

Well the ending message is Get Good. Let us see if they do indeed Get Good. My money is on Crim, and no one else.

[@ben_clifford]

Richard had the best hot takes this time (somewhat surprisingly)

[@helfiswelf]

“Pull a Seth!” Dang Richard, I didn’t think you played Go for the Throat turn 1 of the podcast.

[@cheesyz81]

Richard I tried some fogs in a few decks, and this weekend I won a game directly because of the fogs one being Dawn Charm and Obscuring Haze stopped someone trying to hit me with Boros Aggro and artifacts. Fogged em 2 times back to back after helping them clear the table and always kept 3 mana up so they were afraid to target me because of Teferi's Protection. They had Winds of Abandon the table to mana was not an issue at the time and I was drawing so many cards a turn the extra mana was helpful in the long run.

[@electricblue2920]

I've always opted for protection cards over removal

[@user-xe7js2nn1j]

I think biased threat assessment is not always bad. If you don't play cEdh, sometimes removing a hated card and letting another opponent win can be funny

[@canoli62]

As for number of lands in deck. First question - deck power level and are you running fast mana. There are absolutely decks that don't need all the lands because about 1/4 of the rest of the deck is mana production. Similarly specific deck types, elfball, for example, can easily get away with fewer lands, relying instead on dorks. Second question - are you using MDFCs wrong?. One thing I have noticed a lot of is that people include a lot of MDFCs / Channel Lands, count them as lands in their mana base, and then basically never use them as lands. If you are doing this, then you need to start counting them as spells, not lands. If you have 5 of these lands, and 34 lands in your deck but never play the land side, then that's 29 lands. Third question - how much land-based ramp / fetch are you running in your deck. More than anything else, these spells let you reduce your land count. If you have 10+ spells in your deck that will pull lands out of the library, then you absolutely can run fewer lands. If you are relying on rocks or rituals for your mana ramp, then you still need all the lands. Note - these spells often require basics. I think this is where you guys often go wrong (and i think you know it). You have like 3 basics in the whole deck and then draw into them early, making your ramp package useless. Double the number of basics.

[@dontmisunderstand6041]

To the first question: whether your playgroup lets you cheat the mulligan process determines whether this point is valid. The reason roughly 40% of the deck being lands is correct is because the starting hand is the place where lands are most relevant, not because decks actually need that much mana to function. If your extra mulligans that happen as a result of cutting lands in favor of mana rocks/ramp can't just be cancelled out by your playgroup being nicer than your sharking behavior deserves, your deck is functioning worse by doing what you suggest. To the second question: no notes, this is correct. If you're not willing to lose the spell to iron out the kinks in your mana, don't count the MDFC as mana. Simple as that. To the third question: fetches do not allow you to reduce your land count substantially. Fetches are neutral in terms of mana consistency, but make you less likely to hit the top of your curve by using them. Only reduce land counts because of them if you run an extremely low to the ground deck with tons of card draw engines. Ramping 1 land with 1 card is functionally just a fetch that also happens to cost mana in exchange for advantage in future turns, you can't really consider it to be lowering the correct land counts either. However, ramp that gets you multiple lands with 1 card CAN be counted as a reducing factor, because it is literally more than one land.

[@wesleywyndam-pryce5305]

you're 3rd point is incorrect. spells that put lands in hand can be counted sparingly among lands. if you have cards that take lands and put them directly onto the battle field then YOU NEED MORE LANDS to hit every land drop because your pulling them out on top of needing to play 1 land every turn already.

[@wesleywyndam-pryce5305]

​@@dontmisunderstand6041 this is why I will not give you an extra mulligan if you have less than 40 lands. I know its a casual game but I will not reward greedy deck building. and you have 40 the only time you should ever need an extra is from 1/100 bad luck.

[@dontmisunderstand6041]

@@wesleywyndam-pryce5305 With 40 lands in your commander deck, there's a 58% chance you hit all 5 of your first 5 lands drops, with no assistance. The chance is 72.6% to turn 4, and 85.2% to turn 3. This is taking into account the fact that you draw cards each turn. If we're talking about just the opening hand, we have a 30.2% chance of that having 3, 20% for 4, 7.5% for 5, and a combined 1.7% chance for 6 or 7. What this means is, for your 3rd land drop, it's twice as likely that you had it in your opener as it was that you drew the 3rd land. For the 4th it's a bit better than a 50/50 on that, and for the 5th it'll be approximately 1 in 12 games that you start with it and, out of the roughly 7 in 12 games that get there. Again, all unassisted. For something like Rampant Growth, the floor is a 2 mana evolving wilds, and it functionally can be superior. And there's a 94% chance that you can cast a Rampant Growth on turn 2 if you have it in your hand, compared to the 100% chance if that Rampant Growth were just a land in your deck. That 6% is why you can't safely count Rampant Growth as a land. However, if we take something like Cultivate instead, we now get 2 lands with 1 single card. Drawing this card is roughly similar to having 2 lands in hand, if we have the 3 mana to cast it. If we counted Cultivate as a land in our calculations, taking out 1 land to put in cultivation, we have an 83.7% chance of having 5 lands on turn 5 if one of those "lands" was the Cultivate we counted as a land, and we only bring the actual probability of hitting the natural land draws out to turn 5 down to 55%. There is a 10% chance we get Cultivate specifically in time to cast it. We traded a 3% chance to miss our 5th land drop for a 10% chance to make it nearly 1.5x more likely that you hit that 5th land drop. Sorry if I didn't explain this properly, but the point I'm making is that the math does very literally support exactly the thing I said about land based ramp/fetch.

[@ms.sysbit5511]

I think the biggest mistake is folks forgetting to have fun. Doing your thing does not mean winning; it means playing the game meaningfully. If your deck is only fun when you are winning, that’s the experience you signed up for. Bear in mind that all things equal you will lose more often than you win in EDH.

[@eon2330]

As for holding interaction..... seth removing interaction from his deck honestly makes sense.... since he always never pays for rhystic study or rhystic study like effects, so like... the opponent always has tons more questions than he ever has answers. Tempo decks in commanders usually are power level x decks when everyone else is playing much lower power level y decks. The commander is USUALLY the engine that allows this style of deck to function. For example Kenrith+ leyline + rhystic study+ seed borne muse.... Yeah you can call that "tempo". Its an insane amount of power that shouldn't have been allowed to exist and usually only exists because someone didn't pay the 1 a bunch of times so someone got 9 free counter spells. Its far easier to win, than it is to do 4x as much as others every turn consistently.

[@talonjansen8926]

It needs to be said: tempo is a play-style, and both the term and concept are slightly ambiguous. Tempo does look different depending on the format. In Commander, you might find yourself making a tempo play without knowing it. Likewise, you might end up playing Modern and think you're "playing tempo" when you're actually playing a different "archetype".

[@wesleywyndam-pryce5305]

if you out tempo 3 players your deck is stronger than the table. that's why tempo as we understood it in 60 card does not translate for 1v1v1v1 from 1v1.

[@Jerhevon]

Sometimes games just go weird. A couple weeks back I basically had a T3 Mist-Syndicate naga solo a table. No relevant interaction early on. And then no board wipes cast once I was swinging with 5+ of them. Oh and still a counterspell in hand just in case.

[@wardnabob]

I could watch a whole show of angry Tomer.

[@VentusVee]

Here is you easy answer to how many lands you should be running. 38-42 lands. Regardless of ramp, regardless of mana value, or anything! If you are playing a deck theme that is not specifically Ramp.deck (AKA Kinnan or Elves) you should NEVER go below 38 lands! Going above 42 can also be fine, but then I would recommend having a good reason to go that high! Like a Necropotence deck or similar. (For a weird example of wanting more lands, in my Lands Based Paco and Haldan deck, I run more Lands so I can consistently be sure there are at least a few lands in my exile that I can play. But even that is just to power down that OP deck sometimes)

[@winter945]

I find it funny being told I may not being running enough lands by Tomer, then running the formula on my deck and discovering that actually 35 lands is too many, thanks Tomer!

[@oafkad]

For once I agree with Richard. I played Sisay, for instance, once I can also trigger her ability at any time at least once on the same turn cycle she resolves.

[@TheWoelrat]

Haven't watched yet, but is the answer: Trying to reason with Richard?

[@ajphillips3614]

I think they're confusing misplays with mistakes.

[@Razokk]

Yuriko is the one and only tempo-viable commander, and shes broken as hell. Consistently early threats to the whole table that eat away at everyone, backed up by permission and removal and an infinitely replayable commander.

[@josht3186]

Dude I feel ya. I have like 20 decks. The least amount of lands in any of my decks is 35 in an elf ball deck. The most is 57 in a lands deck. I always start out at 39 as a base when I go to start brewing.

[@punkypinko2965]

The first point about waiting to play your commander is true. I've learned to not just play Lathril on turn three or four. There's almost never a reason to do that. Now, if I have protection and way to buff her or make her unblockable, then sure, maybe. Otherwise, I'm just painting a target on my back for no reason. She'll just get removed. But I am now considering Crim's point and intentionally prompting the casting of removal spells from my opponents at some point in the game ...