What Makes Me Salty in EDH

[@MomirsLabTech]

Im with Trinket. Individual cards and strategies dont cause salt for me, but spite plays and people getting incredibly upset about not winning/their thing being interacted with does. Like bro these are basic mechanics of the game, please get over it.

[@Controlqueen31]

People need to learn that, if their deck get nuts with their Commander out for two or three turns, I'll make sure to blow It up or point out what the deck can do to other players. That's how this format works

[@joemontondo9113]

Counter point, ensnaring bridge.

[@jben6]

@@Controlqueen31 I would go farther and suggest that if a deck cannot work without its commander in play, it needs to be reworked entirely.

[@Kryptnyt]

I think spite plays are just part of the environment, if you remove something expect to get attacked and all that, what I don't like is premeditated collusion. Like I'm playing a game on MTGO and someone mentions to me that the other three players were in a discord call the entire game, that tightened my bloodvessels.

[@SwedeRacerDC]

​@@jben6 In some cases, it's just the spitefulness of a deck being neutered in general. Or it becomes unfun, because you chose the commander because you find them fun and interesting and not having them makes the deck much more boring. So not having them out might not be the end of the game, but it just takes away the fun of the deck. I might use alternate win cons, but a lot of these aren't as fun. Do I want to win by going infinite? No, but if you try to remove me as a player and setting off a chain reaction to attempt going infinite and taking over is needed, I might do it. Then it's not as fun for everyone.

[@imaginarymatter]

I originally thought Eluge, the Shoreless Sea was a freshwater fish. But after running him as a mono-blue control deck with Enter the Infinite / Thassa's Oracle wincon I learned he is definitely a salt-water fish

[@NeonV01D]

Small tip: Swap Thoracle for Nexus of Fate. It still wins you the game with Enter the Infinite, but isn’t a dead card if you draw it naturally.

[@totakekeslider3835]

I made this deck too but I decided it would never see the light of day for how miserable it was to play against while goldfishing: Constantly returning everything back to everyone’s hand, countering big things here and there, and getting incremental value (until I draw into the same combo you have), etc. I guess this is just the mono blue experience. The only way I’d actually build it is if I went against my personal rule of no tutors in my decks, just so I could find the combo quicker and put everyone out of their misery, lol.

[@mr.mammuthusafricanavus8299]

LOL Not like getting a free spell from Eluge in a colour that can set up infinite blink loops and draw cards would be a problem in a game about resource management, nope not a problem at all here ;p

[@howlovely9631]

You could technically make him even more salty by playing stasis and winter orb. Eluge cheats recourses so it breaks parity

[@tinfoilslacks3750]

Imagine playing Thoracle at all, eww

[@Jeramiahstool]

I wastelanded someone on turn 3 cuz they had ramped to being able to cast their 6 mana commander their next turn and they instantly scooped and just sat at the table being snarky towards me til the game was over. Dude was 30 btw. I agree the biggest problem is adults not knowing how to act like adults.

[@jaredchristman3380]

Mass land destruction is something that should be announced, but targeted land destruction should be expected.

[@spacecanary8786]

Fun fact: Vexing Shusher can also make removal spells immune to Ward abilities.

[@Kryptnyt]

"I will avoid paying this Ward 1 by paying one to activate my Vexing Shusher!"

[@vovlasc9817]

@@Kryptnyt Most creatures that people would want to remove with ward have at least ward 2 or ward: sacrifice/discard/etc

[@toastedmarsh6185]

702.21a Ward is a triggered ability. Ward [cost] means “Whenever this permanent becomes the target of a spell or ability an opponent controls, counter that spell or ability unless that player pays [cost].”

[@Kryptnyt]

@@vovlasc9817 Sure, but it's still funny to do it for the ward 1

[@Will_Morand]

@@KryptnytIt’s like when a Rograkh player swings at you turn one with their 0/1. Yeah it does nothing, but it’s funny regardless.

[@Skipston55]

When my friends and I started playing EDH about a year or so ago, my best friend made a Yurioko deck right out of the gate. It didn't have some of the truly oppressive combo pieces, but nonetheless, it tore through our play group for a few games, and I was consistently salty about it. "Oh it skips command tax" "It ignores my own board state too easy!" were my complaints, and I'm still kinda in the air about the commander ninjutsu thing but that's a topic for another day. Ultimately though, I came to appreciate the deck. It put a timer on the game that everyone now had to respect. Riskier plays had to be taken, and sometimes Yuriko would get her neck snapped turn 3 as we understood target prioritization better. Context is everything in EDH, and what at first I believed was an OP boogieman I now know is just another creature, with all the same answers as any other creature. Now that we're all better at the game, that slippery ninja now holds a knife sized hole, I mean place, in my heart.

[@totakekeslider3835]

I think in the case of Yuriko, she’s an exception because of just how fast she is. She can still just plow through an entire table if everyone at the table isn’t equipped to deal with it. It puts a timer on the game, sure, but I think it’s also way too fast for most casual tables. I can see how it would lead to an arms race of everyone needing to make their decks faster just to combat it and raising the group’s power level overall over time.

[@brendans1983]

Beautiful comment 🍻🤘

[@this_is_america_speaking]

This right here in my group I'm the aggressive player I'm always attacking putting people on clocks this in my opinion keeps the game moving I can't stand it when I see people say "no one has attacked yet so I'll just wait" never wait even in a casual game the goal is to win sure you can have fun and still lose but your playing a game winning said game is always the goal

[@evanprimeau3810]

@@totakekeslider3835 Unless they're playing Doomsday Combo, or Thoracle/Consult with a ton of tutors to turbo it out, Yuriko can often be dealt with pretty easily with removal. People just don't understand Yuriko, and they remove YURIKO instead of the dorks she uses to cheat herself out. Remember: most Ninjas are low power creatures with cool on hit effects but NO evasion! The real threats are, ironically, the Ornithopter/Slither Blade dorks that will get around you blockers. Kill those, and suddenly Yuriko is a 1/3 that has no text, because she can't hit through. Don't KILL YURIKO, she's just going to come back: turn her into a Frog, an Indestructible Insect, a Citizen, an Elk, Imprison her in the Moon for god's sake! As a Yuriko player, I constantly play against people who have god awful threat assessment, and refuse to analyze the play pattern they're seeing every turn to recognize that Yuriko has major weaknesses that every single color in the Color Pie can exploit, they just don't. A single Lightning Bolt on the turn 1 dork can set a Yuriko player behind 2 whole turns, because they can no longer play a Turn 2 mana rock into Ninjustuing Yuriko over the dork, and replay the dork. People don't want to admit it, but in reality, it's often not the decks or cards that are "unfair". It's that many players are too goddamn stupid to adapt to different playstyles. Yuriko specifically abuses the reluctance of players to remove small creatures with 1 for 1 removal, due to the cognitive dissonance of it not being a "good trade', when in reality, it is the correct play.

[@adriadelafuente3648]

She's still a goddamn menace, and commander ninjutsu, just like Eminence, is an inherently broken mechanic. Having played against her and Derevi, every commander that skirts around the commander tax is infuriating.

[@AutumnReel4444]

-Removal is based. -If a player is going to trouble you or annoy you, kill them! (in the game lol) -Casual format exists to have fun. The most important part of fun is the deck you are playing. Let people have their favorite deck.

[@througtonsheirs_doctorwhol5914]

I love that at our LGS the salt is not the concern. People can play competitive in the pods of EDH any eekend. Friday commander is openly letting people bring out their monstrous decks and anyone can discuss rule zero to get or not into the pods who openly allow competitive deck building in 4-player commander casual play.We are competitive casual. The way i love pushing myself even in 1player video games like RPGs

[@Arctanis-vt3hl]

The reality is that certain strategies are not fun to play against. Stax at a casual table doesn't work. At a high powered or competitive table, it's perfectly fine because if you're playing to win you usually don't care how the win happens. With casual, the difference is that most people are just trying to do the thing that their deck was built to do, even if they don't win. That' s why it's called casual. Stax prevents most decks from doing what they are designed to do without dedicating a considerable amount of resources trying to stop the Stax player. This still means that you're not doing what you want to do, you're just spending your time stopping someone else.

[@Varmint111]

@@Arctanis-vt3hl This is the one. "The most important part of fun is the deck you are playing. Let people have their favorite deck." - What if my favourite strategy is to make sure the life drains out of your eyes as I play every single permanent that says some variation of "players can't do X"? You can play that deck, against a deck prepared to deal with it. It's about social contracts (rule zero discussions) and how the internet is kind of this wierd pile of noise that you're "overhearing" from all playgroups simultaneously who all have different perspectives, skill levels, budgets, etc.

[@01cortomaltese]

What makes me salty : being the only one at the table having answers for big threats.

[@howlovely9631]

Thats when you pull out removal check cards yourself. Collossification, alexios, busted overcostes cards like koma, toxrill etc

[@jacobphillips7962]

I have started leaving my control deck at home, because at my LGS, i just get turned into the teacher/policeman of every game i play. “Why did you counter my thing and not his!” And “what do you mean you’re countering my nyx bloom ancient!!!” And then i just win the game myself when i finally go off, because no one can interact with my turn 15 win con.

[@Joebob31100]

For real. A little while back I was playing at a lgs, and I sit down at a pod against UG Value Pile and two other guys. I had to spend every single piece of removal I had on the UG deck just to stop him from winning turn after turn. And when he finally played a card I couldn't stop, one of the other players had the balls to ask if I had an answer to that. Like, bro, when are you going to have an answer to something instead of relying on me to do it all. The UG deck won a turn later. smh

[@bobisoft2k5]

Yeah how dare people have shuffled decks with no guarantee of having answers in hand! The hell, indeed!

[@sacrenough]

It took my forever to learn this about control in multiplayer. "Only remove the threat once it threatens you directly."

[@beingbag2606]

Split second is worth a mention. It's really good against high power decks that play the stack and is generally mid against low power decks that don't. Scales to your game really well.

[@steveheist6426]

And the floor on Krosan Grip is still Naturalize so it's not really ever *dead* as a removal spell

[@M0th3ater]

I couldn’t disagree more, i think if you’re playing a higher power game, every mana is worth more and more, and the premium you gain for protection hardly seems worth it. If they ever print split second on a better effect then that might change, but there aren’t any yet. Naturalize isnt the standard for that effect anymore, we’ve had a half dozen better versions printed at 2 mana and common.

[@Da808info]

As the person with the most experience in my pod, many people tend to throw things my way when they aren't sure who to attack or what to remove. "He's a good player, and has something on the field, so I am going to blow it up." Sometimes I am able to politic my way out of it, but I catch a lot of hate because of my table rep. More so than any other reason. I consider it a gesture of respect.

[@elijahlyons8164]

Yeah, sometimes that's the attitude. Just like it's not common to remove the least experienced players stuff since they are still learning

[@omologo95]

Same here. I dont mind it at all. Two people can beat down on me over several turns just because I know shit, but if the third guy is who i consider the threat then thats where my energy is put into.

[@legoyoda9026]

Yeah I feel that I’ve been playing the longest and I am the ire of everyone’s removal

[@andrewgreenwood9068]

Same here. I don't play much commander (my playground likes 60 card with everyone in one game) but the dynamic is similar.

[@casualgoats]

Speaking to the attitudes of players, theres a guy I occasionally play with who obliterates me every game. Its a no chance on sight. However, this man's attitude is bliss and joy in such a pure way that I just can't hold animosity towards him showing me vast possibilities of doom.

[@Lazydino59]

This video really imo is one of the cruxes why commander can’t stay the face of magic. Competitive constructed taking a backseat to battle cruiser commander means players aren’t accustomed to things such as mana denial as a strategy to win, hard control, etc. socially banning archetypes that are battlecruiser-unfriendly really is not healthy and will always lead to an arms race where everyone tries to go bigger and faster and devolves into a combo-fest

[@shorewall]

Commander is basically Kitchen Table Magic. It is the most popular, but the Spikes have no place in it.

[@maximillianhallett3055]

@@shorewallAnd yet cEDH exists and I find it way more casual than so-called Casual Commander. Hint, getting upset about how you lose isn’t very casual.

[@xavierlanglands9486]

It's not even battle-cruiser imo anymore. All the commander cards are so pushed and synergistic that classic "play one amazing thing a turn" decks just cannot work.

[@felipearaujodominici3057]

It's simple: "commander is not magic"

[@PM-xc8oo]

I think it depends on your playgroup. If you have a core group of people that you play against a lot you can definitely ease them into some saltier strategies such as Obliterate with a bunch of planeswalkers on board. It requires building up some social capital and trying not to be a jerk about it but it is doable. Probably no hope of doing it against randos on Spelltable though.

[@richardpennertz8180]

"If you're in Naya colors and you can't beat *an* artifact, that's on you." That's pretty much as true a statement as can be made about deckbuilding.

[@miketothefitz]

It’s really weird this is a thing, my uncle and I have a playgroup and we’re all like “play whatever” like we don’t care if it’s busted or not, it’s just a game. We chalk it up to “wow, I wish I thought of that card/combo/mechanic” Maybe that’s just my playgroup but we’re all really chill about it.

[@Aelesis]

Absolutely loved the point you stressed in the "post-video rant" about the responsibility of experienced players to set the right tone for new ones -- *demonstrating* the attitude towards things like stax pieces and even counter-control strategies as "sharpen up your decklist, be observant, overcome the challenge" does so much more for the health of the format, hell, the game as a whole, than sectioning off certain cards and strategies as "not worth being at the table with". Great video!

[@milii113]

I agree to a certain extent especially when it comes to removal, if you don't run at least 2 ways to remove a creature/artifact/enchantment then I think you aren't really playing interactive magic, but if the response to any gripe about a deck being stronger than the others at the table is "make your deck stronger" then you're just recreating a competitive format arms race. I don't see any problem with a player saying that they don't want to play with certain or even all of my decks, that's their choice! But it's also necessary for it to go the other way as well; if I know a pod at my LGS has very low power decks or gripes about removal, then it's my responsibility to not play with them or at least play decks that conform to the table. I will say the back and forth can be fun when in consistent pods where you generally know the strategies of the other players and are all working to improve your decks, and if new players are asking "how do I make my deck better" then by all means help them, but people shouldn't be expecting everyone around them to play to their power level

[@geoffreywampach2588]

The only deck that I suggested another player take apart was a flicker control deck that had no win-con except opponents skipping their turn. Yes, our group could get adjustments to take this on, but his turns were long and being told to skip another of my turns was just not enjoyable, especially when it didn't give him the W on the third round of it.

[@WallsEryx]

Several years ago I had a Melek deck that played tons of extra turns. I think I had one or two wincons, but it was mostly chaining so many extra turns together that everyone just gave up. On hindsight, I really needed an ass kicking. I was insufferable.

[@christianmacintyre5453]

I have a brago flicker deck i dont really play anymore, it had some combos for infinite mana, flicker, draw, and more, and thassa's oracle. The purpose of the deck outside of combos was to remove my opponents entire board, often including lands, so they cant do anything about the small amounts of azorius damage they are taking. The deck never fully won a single game because the opponent always scooped when they realized the situation had become impossible, and the deck often took 10+ turns to win. I think its a lot of fun and also hilarious, but i switch off of it since noone wants to play against that

[@toedrag-release]

That's my problem when a deck has no wincon especially when their deck is an archetype that slows the game down

[@FullPlateJacket]

@@christianmacintyre5453 The one EDH game I'm still salty about years later was because of a Brago deck that sounds very similar to that. I played a bounceland as my turn 2 play and then had to sacrifice it because the guy immediately played a Rishadan Cutpurse on the next turn. The Brago deck was clearly a massive power level mismatch for the table but it was the only legal deck the guy had on him because apparently every single other deck he owned was made invalid because of the then-recent ban of Paradox Engine.

[@christianmacintyre5453]

@@FullPlateJacket Just because of paradox engine? I feel like he could've just put in a basic land in it's place

[@mintcoded]

See... I know at this point that it's kinda a meme, but a lot of casual players really enjoy the idea of "everyone getting to do a thing" because they have an hour or two a week to enjoy a hobby that they spent money on. They also either tend to travel to a store or a friend's house (or prepare their own as a host). It can be very difficult to arrange a game at all sometimes, and when a player at said game is just playing a deck that by its inception stops an opponent from being able to play, that can be very frustrating for everyone. I absolutely agree that people getting excessively angry or telling someone to just dismantle a deck is genuinely too far, but the thing about Commander is that it is a very popular format played very casually by a lot of people. I'm not trying to just downtalk your points, and think that for instance discussing what you consider to even be a casual card or not would be a really interesting bit of insight. You mention that someone playing a card that says "Your opponent's can't use the one thing they built their entire deck around" can be beaten by a single counterpsell, but this also would apply to the exact same scrambleverse mention, no? Yes, your example was essentially someone doing what would universally be considered a degenerate move to create their own fun, but creating a Jorn, God of Winter and Stasis Orb board is also the win condition of just stalling out an entire game, potentially leaving three people without an untap phase, while the Jorn player untaps their things every turn. If someone locks down the entire board and nobody can play, waiting three turns to presumably draw all the lands you need, and assuming you had the cards to interact... It makes the "run removal" point a little weaker. I think a reasonable argument can be made that someone may create a deck (hug or chaos) without a real win condition to create unique and engaging games every single game. Ignoring the example of copying a spell that doesn't do much but elongate a game, there can be a real merit to creating weird situations. Your specific example is truly awful and I am sorry you had these experiences. The biggest issue with Commander, which applies to all of your points, is that it looks like people don't communicate in the pre-game.

[@tinfoilslacks3750]

Let's not forget that counterspells are unique to 1 of the 5 colours, and commander has hard deckbuilding restrictions on colours. "Just run counterspells in your golgari deck".

[@hblazer6458]

Often the problem is with people running many of those stacks/high power/expensive cards is that they get salty when you counter/remove them like they needed that to play/combo/get in the game. This is a deckbuilding issue like playing a voltron/monolith commander deck with no protection. When your deck needs smotheing tithe or rhystic study to be good, your deck isn't.

[@paperwatt]

Also when you do get better at packing the answers you need, it feels so, so good. I've lost far too many games to a friend's glissa the traitor deck. A couple pieces of graveyard removal and I've watched that deck fold in on itself it's so satisfying.

[@grimbogrambo8058]

I love your take and views on edh, it's really helpful and I appreciate how chill your videos are! Cheers

[@Quiczor]

I also find that players complaining about removal when they are playing only game ending level cards is a problem here too. Like if they play something that if given 1 turn alive will basically swing the entire game then yes we have to remove it, but it feels bad when they are only playing those high cost cards and ramp so the options are basically, completely deny a person existing or lose the game immediately.

[@DragoSmash]

i agree soooo much with your take of "cards shouldn't make you upset, attitudes should" someone who sits with a clearly overtuned deck in a casual table, flipping Dockside Extortionist, Ragavan, etc, i don't hate those cards, i hate the player for sitting to be a bully in a clearly casual table i hate when someone decides to let the player with a Tamiyo with enough counters to ult slide just to kill some of my random creatures and then proceeds to be an ass to everybody except the player who drew half their deck with Tamiyo

[@lancesmith8298]

I do not dislike the guy who stomped my Gishath proxy deck with Golos for having better cards than me. I dislike that guy for telling me “yeah, this Masterwork Mana Vault was a birthday gift” and “I have more decks I could play with the same commander, if you want”. The cards are just a possible hint to the very real privileged asshat behind them

[@xPr0j3cTxSiNx]

The point you made about "change your deck to play against X deck" just turns a casual format into an arms race. Opponent plays blue? I'll play "can't be countered" cards. They can't counter my stuff? They'll update their deck with bounce and removal. Also, what if they suddenly decide to just play another deck? The cards should not have been added because you're trying to counter another strategy; it should be to shore up your biggest weaknesses and cover a wider array of common issues.

[@thetrinketmage]

Right but what if you play a different deck? Will they cut every counter spell in favor of bounce spells because one player plays a few can’t be countered effects? And a bounce spell is 100% weaker than a counter. So is this not also a win for you? I just don’t get how this would be a problem

[@xPr0j3cTxSiNx]

@@thetrinketmage the issue is that we're switching cards to fix a problem born from salt. It's one thing to playtest a deck at a group and think "I didn't have enough card draw or removal," but you're just inviting salt by switching out cards for your deck to play cards that beat the things that make you salty. I believe it can be subjective whether bounce is inherently weaker than countering. In a cedh perspective, its objectively worse; in a casual perspective some people will just find the switch annoying anyway, especially if they committed to the idea of "add cards that beat the first strategy (counterspells) that made me salty."

[@drunkcapybara7004]

@@xPr0j3cTxSiNx I think it's more about finding a middle ground. Warping your deck entirely just to beat a specific strategy is of course a big overshoot, but if something specific does make you salty, especially when it happens repeatedly, it's probably a good decision to add at least a few cards than can deal with it well.

[@Diamior]

ig it goes down to "adapt to your meta" credo. thanksfully, many removal have broader application than just "i play stax hate" If both player try to adapts to eachother, while also adapting to every single other decks they frequently encounter, they should end up on something that is generic enough to do something against every deck, and specific enough to target play patern they dont wanna face.

[@thetrinketmage]

@@xPr0j3cTxSiNx How is adding savage summoning to help beat blue decks inviting salt? Also bouncing is 100% weaker than countering. That is not subjective. I would always rather have my creature bounced so I can replay it next turn than have it countered and lose the card. If the blue deck suddenly drops every counterspell for unsummon effects this is a win in my book

[@jcstaff1007]

14:12 going by your definition. A lot of cards, even outside of being used as a combo piece would be incredibly hard to interact with. Grixis can’t interact well with enchantments. (Now it can more often thanks to feed the swarm and the new card from duskmorn) and dockside can’t be interacted with outside of blue stifles/counters and niche white stax pieces. Not to mention dockside often propels players to a win through sheer value or a combo. So are these types of cards ok to run in casual in your opinion? Dockside, smothering, rhystic/mystic?

[@tthien93]

In addition many casual edh players don't run that much removal so sometimes even 3v1 doesn't work well either

[@Gork862]

In my eyes, cards like dockside and the others you mentioned are high-power cards. By putting it in your deck, you’ve just made your deck stronger and now it’s a higher power level. As long as you’re still playing against equal power level decks, it won’t matter. But if you show up acting like your deck is a 6 and then pop out a dockside I’m gonna be upset, not because of the card but because you lied about how strong your deck is.

[@Blacklodge_Willy]

​@@Gork862 a dockside alone does not make a deck more powerful. If it's lower power games you're playing, what board state do you have in mind that would make the dockside go off? I've seen Dockside in lower power games make 2-3 treasures, doesn't seem too strong in that situation.

[@jcstaff1007]

@@Blacklodge_Willy it just made 12 treasures last game and was copied twice more. It didn’t win but 36 treasures in a turn is absurd.

[@milii113]

@@Blacklodge_Willy But even in that case it's a 2 mana card that gives you, at bare minimum in most pods, 3 treasures so it's mana positive. But in most games, especially with precon sets and the like, you're much more likely to see it make 6+ given everyone has at least one artifact/one enchantment. It might not be an instant win, sure, but very *very* rarely is it anything less than a mana positive 1/2. There's also the question of price, which of course isn't necessarily a direct comparison to cost, but throwing down a single card that costs more than my entire deck just feels shitty. Doubly so because most of the time if someone is masquerading their deck as low power and does something like that, it's not stopping at dockside.

[@pyroshadow33]

hmmm the problem with the mindset you describe is if my complaint is "how do i beat blue counterspell deck" and your answer is "include a few of these cards", I still have to draw 1 or 2 cards while my opponent just has to play the game normally. then if I'm throwing in 1-2 tech cards for every matchup eventually my deck doesn't do anything on its own. sure i can have 3-4 pieces of enchantment removal, but my enchantress opponent has a deck that is built around slamming stax pieces every turn and I have maybe 10 draws to find one of those cards before I'm dead. I know that we can't win every game but unless we're playing with a lot of tutors, saying "just include a tech card" doesn't solve anything considering most cards in the deck are never seen. Even the discard bit, which I do agree with helps for control decks that need to keep hand advantage it ends up turning the table against you if you make everyone discard or otherwise you end up just focusing one person down and come in 3rd as the other two do what they want

[@thetrinketmage]

I disagree! 1 you could play destroy all enchantment effect not just spot removal. But also there is likely only a few enchantments that actually stop you from doing your thing. A ghostly prison might slow you down so unless you are a token deck you can probably fight through it. If you remove the humility then you can attack by just paying 2. Also if everyone is playing 3 pieces of enchantment removal don’t they also have the option to remove that thing. This is where the politics comings into play

[@altcenter4944]

​@@thetrinketmageThe worst games of Magic I've ever played has been games where my opponent has had an entire hand of removal, preventing anything from happening as we're on turn 7 and no creatures have lasted a turn, no damage has been dealt, and more importantly they're super smug about packing enough removal

[@thetrinketmage]

@@altcenter4944 Not going to deny that some players can be weird and annoying but, it's really hard for a control deck to just have infinite removal. I've played a lot of control over the years and it's really difficult to actual stop everything without some removal engine which takes a lot of time to set up. I'm willing to bet there is something that could be done before the game gets to that point

[@MothCoveredRock]

Great vid, great takes, perfectly summed up my issue with fast mana at casual tables in like one offhand sentence Also fuck scrambleverse, if someone plays a scrambleverse i just say “hey this one’s not for me” and peace out, feels like a card meant for a game where all of the pieces are meant to go back in the same box at the end of the game, not a game where we all pay money individually for our game pieces and some of them are very expensive

[@drunkcapybara7004]

I like the card but i can see how it makes people salty especially when it doesn't contribute to a win. I'd love to hear your thoughts on me playing it in a deck that steals cards but hasn't been doing enough with them, where i plan to change the commander to Don Andres (+2/+2, menace and deathtouch on your creatures you don't own) for that reason. Do you think it's okay to run it in this deck, or still way too much of a pain?

[@MothCoveredRock]

@@drunkcapybara7004 Just play one of the many mass theft effects and win the game, it costs about the same as an insurrection but it's random and worse and might just screw you. If you want to play it that's fine but I don't think there's a legitimate "it's a powerful card" argument for it

[@bkaneshiro14]

Ah, but consider: Playing scrambleverse in a Krenko deck so you can roll click-clacks for your 50+ goblin tokens for 30 minutes

[@seanedgar164]

"Run more removal" isn't a be all end all. Some stuff will just suck to verse but you can always step away or find people who fit your vibe best

[@bye1551]

Yeah and the "play stuff that can't be countered" is just laughable to me. Oh yeah if I don't want free counter spells disrupting my game plan and win condition, I should just pivot my entire game plan and win condition so they can't be countered. Definitely reasonable, I'll just change my Tatiova deck to a Koma one I guess.

[@maxpelaez4955]

I get the point of the vid, but yea it's hard to really get what u need when u need in 100 card singleton w/out a big density of tutors and the niche answer to specific decks can be absolutely useless in other games and feel bad

[@ENCHANTMEN_]

"just draw the out bro" doesn't really justify using cards that effectively say "your opponents can't have fun" in a casual format. Counters don't make unfun cards fun.

[@ENCHANTMEN_]

In one Pokemon Smogon format, there was a strategy using Baton Pass that was extremely easy to disrupt and not very good, but also very frustrating and uninteractive to play against. So they banned it, not because it's overpowered, but because it makes the game worse by existing.

[@thetrinketmage]

I played a lot of smogon and you can still do many baton pass things. I think a better example would be sleep clause. Which was overpowered and stalled out the game. I think playing a pillow fort card that makes it hard for your opponents to attack you is very far from they “can’t have fun”

[@jmanwild87]

​@thetrinketmage i mean i think they're referring to stuff like playing a winter orb or something. Even if you have the removal for it in deck it can be very miserable to play against something that slows you to a crawl if you don't have an immediate answer for it. And the issue with something like discard for decks that can't really deal with cards like enchantments is discard doesn't stop stuff that already hit the table is proactive and useless in the late game along with having the normal one for one issue in commander. Counterspells at least have the benefit of being reactive and therefore are always capable of stopping a game winning spell.

[@derrickwarner1]

The social aspect of commander is why playgroups “ban” certain cards or decks. When salty cards/decks become the reason small playgroups disband. Playing at a LGS with randos is a different matter.

[@boochin]

So I have a Zedruu deck that is literally designed to not be fun. Yes it plays scrambleverse, yes it plays thieves auction, yes it plays mindslaver, but the whole thing is proxied and not meant to just be played with strangers. I built it as a joke, I've played it twice with friends and both times ended in just some unresolvable combo and everyone enjoyed themselves. Chaos as a archetype has to be done very precisely or else it just becomes unfun.

[@GeneralJerrard101]

Rhystic Study always makes me salty. You either let an opponent run away with the game, or all your spells cost 2 more and you don't get to play. Don't tell me to just run removal, black has maybe two cards that can touch it, red will need chaos warp. And no one at the table is willing to bully aomeone for having it because... I don't know, maybe because all of them are running it too, or running a deck so fast it won't matter.

[@iTXivilai]

2 cards out of the thousands that exist for me. Jeweled Lotus and Fierce Guardianship. Both say the word commander and are free spells. yes plenty of other cards do this but these 2 are, I think, the most egregious offenders of the most negative aspects to come out of RnD in recent years.

[@simon_herts]

Personally I dislike any card that has the word 'commander' printed on it. But if my opponent plays them, I won't complain. Their deck, their fun!

[@greatbrandini3967]

​@@simon_hertsI disagree, there have been many cards designed for Commander that aren't problematic. Command Tower, the lieutenant creatures, the storm cycle (copied for each time you'd cast your commander), equipment with "equip commander" costs, or the green enchantment that cuts your commander tax in half

[@simon_herts]

@@greatbrandini3967 Fair enough, some of them are alright. I just don't enjoy playing with many of them

[@simon_herts]

@@greatbrandini3967 it's not that they're problematic, I just don't find them interesring personally and to me they represent the larger problems caused by Wizards pushing this format. But there are exceptions, the orzhov creature that lets you pay commander tax with life is a really interesting design imo

[@traycarrot]

​@@greatbrandini3967I disagree. They never that the cards were problematic, just that they disliked those cards. There's a solid case for ubiquitous catch-alls like Command Tower to be disliked. Lieutenant and other one-off effects could be seen as too generic (the drake that draws) or awkwardly narrow (the zombie that deals exactly 3) to add anything interesting to the format.

[@freddyberr1523]

That's true, many people are upset when they not only have to do their thing but also interact with the other players. I often see that with my Karn or Enchantment Deck no one interacts with you until the Critical Mass is reached and you win because your own game plan is simply brought forward. The biggest level of frustration usually comes from the lack of answers in your own deck.

[@tomleggosaurus1]

I'm very new to commander but I'm already experiencing a decent amount of "why are you targeting me????" Because I'm performing game actions to increase my chances of winning? It's possible my threat assessment isn't very good yet, but usually there's logic to my decisions. I'm not bullying you, or picking at random. And I will virtually never ask why an opponent attacked or targeted me. It's basically a compliment if they think I'm worth their Path to Exile/etc.

[@shaan__real]

i absolutely agree that interaction and removal is super fun. I've only been playing a year, starting with a dimir faeries deck, so maybe that's why i like interaction so much, but when i went to magicon, i realized how little interaction people run. when playing a mid power table, i played caesar, who i said "this is my lowest power deck, and its a fairly upgraded precon. if you remove caesar, the deck doesn't do as much, but if i go unresponded, i will be going insanely wide", and then proceeded to destroy the other decks because i simply remove stuff and none of my things ever get removed. the main group i play with play a lot of interaction, so i never realized that this was the attitude of a lot of commander players

[@Shimatzu95]

Something something, controlplayer says just control the board. In all seriousness, saying play more removal is a good way of being correct without being helpful. Generally I would consider a casual game to be one where cards that shut down entire strategies unless removed to not be in the ideal of the format. That said the inability of people to objectively control the powerlevel of their deck is something i belive only a acive change of the banlist (aka banning for powerlevel and salt) can fix, since rule 0 can go both ways just unban salty cards there.

[@milii113]

I think the problem with a more aggressive banlist is that it doesn't really solve the core problem of people not correctly (on purpose or not) identifying the power of their decks because all it will do is pull the ceiling down without actually solving most of the problem. If you ban all the cards that make a 10/10 what it is, then the 9s become the new 10s and everyone salty about someone's 8 pubstomping their group of 6s don't see any benefit. If anything it'll cause more harm because people will forgo rule 0 and simply think "if my deck is legal, it's fair to play in every pod" which will just cause more problems for casual players. There is something to be said about controlling high-salt cards even as a "recommended not play" list, but that won't cause the core conflict that happens which is mismatched power levels.

[@halfjack2758]

contamination makes me salty because the out to it, outside of counterspells, requires getting both the enchantment removal and a mana rock that gives the color to cast it, and there's a lot of black decks that can play it and keep it up indefinitely

[@thetrinketmage]

Contamination is a weird one. Since one 1 hand mana rocks get around it and many decks play mana rocks. But green decks will get destroyed. I’d lean towards it’s high a power card

[@WookieRookie]

Thank you for giving advice! Scrambleverse is already in my Blim deck, but I have to put 5-6 cards there to complete it, now I know that I can put some copyspells to make my opponents concede due to boredom

[@Pyberspace]

I was so happy when the Ygra player in my main playgroup cast a Savage Summoning, and said "I put this in my deck because you kept countering my commander." I love the idea of a playgroup having a horizontal arms race rather than a vertical one, i.e. the deck budget/power level doesn't increase over time.

[@stefanandreasson6408]

We've had two intances of people having to take apart their decks in our playgroup. One person ran a boardwipe deck with an indestructible commander, which was he's only wincondition. No buff spells, just one commander with 7 power. He ran around 30 boardwipes and to kill us he had to swing 3 times at each player, if we didn't scoop one player would lose first and have to wait around 3-4 hours for the next game unless we scooped. Big part of was that we were running very low power, mostly precons or similar so the only way for us to win was to take him out first. So we would team kinda like you said in the video, but then we would always just end up playing a 3 pod game... The second was a Myra dice/storm deck. Since he had to roll so many die for each of the carousel s + reroll those die and storm he would easily on average take 30-40min turns consistently with extra turns. He really loved this deck and this I kind of feel bad for him having to take it apart but it was just not sustainable. He was very dependenant on the commander so he would also run a lot of protection, the way to shut down the decks was to never really let him play the commander but then he would do nothing all game. I guess with age I value time a little more and since I can only play commander a few days a week tops I really dislike games that are so long unless there is a lot of back and fourth. But maybe this is just a que that I also should run more interaction. Any thoughts regarding the decks?

[@jben6]

Sadistic Hypnotist in a BG Nath deck is brutal. In any deck with regular token generation, its a beast, but it shines in Nath.

[@adammcwey7374]

Man I wish you were in my playgroup. We all need more people acquiring this mentality.

[@DaGraveCrowder]

My favourite way to deal with Spore Frog loop is to disrespect 'em with an Insult // Injury

[@simon_herts]

Well that's one way of course, but what cards would you play?

[@DaGraveCrowder]

@@simon_herts Not sure I understand, you just attack them surely?

[@simon_herts]

@@DaGraveCrowder I also like to insult my opponent, but you also need an in-game plan!

[@DaGraveCrowder]

@simon_herts Are we on the same page in that Insult // Injury is a card in this case, not a phrase? I'd insert it in a Boros attackers deck if a playgroup member kept doing the Frog loop. Or maybe Isshin

[@omologo95]

​@@DaGraveCrowder Pretty sure he was just being cheeky here

[@sarahbuck2506]

Part of the problem is the different philosophies of "casual". Casual, to me, is we all play our favorite jank as competitively as possible. Casual, to some of my other friends, is we are using the pretext of a card game to enjoy social interaction, and there is no desire to pay much attention to the board state or focus too much on winning.

[@siukong]

I agree, I think the definitional issue is one of the main underlying problems that's causing a lot of the disconnect among players. There's probably at least like 10 different ways we could validly define "casual vs not-casual" (you've already mentioned two of them).

[@101stumphead]

I truly believe a large issue is so many, possibly most, commander players have never played 1 v 1 magic before. They become introduced through thr precons because, hey, that's what is on the shelf. And those precons hyper focus on constructing a board state of value engines and put their efforts on supporting their synergy. The way those decks are conducted is with minimal interaction sonolayers believe everything is a clock. They treat it like settlers of Catan instead of realizing they can burn down crops of their neighbors or remove their railroads. My deck with the most wins currently is a green white dragon tribal dekc with a heavy focus on instant interaction. It uses a surplus of both removal and protection. About 20 or more cards are instant interaction. The deck does not focus a lot on the board so it goes unnoticed, then it just smacks really hard with a big dragon and when people try anything I use protection spells and then remove their biggest threats to disrupt their engines

[@princesssleepyhead8043]

a "no win stax deck" is really fun if you can get other players to also build decks that increase the games entropy. I play a scrambleverse, thieves auction, hive mind, shared fate, etc deck, and my friends play decks that have multiple mana flare abilities, cause insane card draw, and do crazy burn. We call it "killing magic the gathering" and have a ball every time. People dont like feeling helpless in games, which is why interaction is good, but also letting people know what youre up to. For the record you should never scrambleverse or thieves auction with people you dont consider friends imo.

[@milii113]

Fully agree with the last point, stax and the like that introduce massively warping effects largely cause salt because they're often unannounced. If I'm going into a normal pod and say "I'm playing a full artifact deck" and my opponent doesn't say anything about the Null Rod they have in their otherwise normal deck, I'm gonna get a little bit salty because suddenly I'm not able to play the game at all because of a completely stray card. But if you sit down at a table and say "Hey I'm playing mass land destruction/theft" and everyone agrees to that then you're much less likely to run into any negative pushback, just have backup options if people don't vibe with that playstyle

[@shmergulflargamish524]

I've got my own "Entropic Bureaucracy" deck that sounds like it's doing similar stuff, but alongside stuff like Zur's Weirding and Teferi's Puzzle Box

[@boorango122]

the only times I have been salty from an edh game where a card was relevant to the salt are one incident where one player played exploration turn one and snowballed while more importantly behaving exceedingly badly, and the time someone played a card to slow down the archenemy that incidentally locked my deck out of being able to help deal with said archenemy/function at all

[@muddlewait8844]

If someone takes me out of the running by Mind Twisting me, you better believe every other card I manage to draw before losing is going towards making sure that specific player doesn’t win. Is that kingmaking?

[@adriadelafuente3648]

It's respectable spite. If you're spending 8 mana to make my game unplayable, it's only fair I respond in kind.

[@ErikReischitz]

I'd say it's the same principle as taking the best blocks to take creatures out while being swung at for lethal. I'd argue it's just optimal play (in case you actually can't be a real part of the game) since it is a bit of a detergent for that player to do that again in future games.

[@bye1551]

"king making" is a stupid complaint, in my opinion. You're still alive, try and take someone out, try and win. You're not dead till you're dead and if your final breath is spent cursing the annoying player at the table, so be it.

[@traycarrot]

​@@bye1551The two statements are at odds with each other. 1. Try to win. 2. Spend the game kneecapping one player out of spite. Those two can sometimes be the same thing, but very rarely aren't. I'm always amazed when I watch cEDH and Player A counters a game winning play of Player B, but Player B attacks Player C with a creature or two because they have a Necropotencr. Good threat assessment like that would NEVER happen in casual because people at the end of the day aren't interested in winning. They want the dopamine of their deck doing its thing or the smug satisfaction of kneecapping the person that stopped them, winner be damned. P.S. If someone interacts with you and you call them "annoying" and target them for the entire game, you're probably the annoying one.

[@bye1551]

@@traycarrot what? Kneecapping the player who's steamrolling you is literally the only way to win. If you're losing, and you cannot win, but someone earlier in the game put you in that position, it's entirely reasonable to ensure they can't win as well. If for nothing else, so they remember that next time they want to take you out and have to remember to fully finish you off next time and not count you out. Acting like as soon as you can't finish 1st you should just scoop is ridiculous, have commander players never heard of playing for second? Imagine if in competitive civilisation, everyone gave up as soon as someone was ahead of them in techs, or if everyone just agreed to give up in monopoly because 1 guy had 3 properties and everyone else only had 1 each. Good threat assesment should come first, sure, but "king making" is just what people call threat assesment that doesn't make sense to them. Sure you might be behind on board, but I know you can ruin my game plan because you did so earlier and I have to take you out, even if there's someone who's a bigger threat right now, because I think I can come back and beat their more dominant position later. You don't have access to people's internal thought process, what looks like a spite play to you could be a reasonable decision to them. Even if it is a spite play, that's an investment in a future game to not target me because I have resources to eliminate a singular player easily even if I can't win the entire game. 2nd is better than 3rd is better than 4th. I've played Voltron decks where the game plan in the mid-late game is banking a bunch of threats in my resource piles like graveyard and hand specifically to threaten to take out anyone who targeted me while I let them all whittle eachother down so I can go for a win. Sure, I'd be king making and it'd be a spite play, because whoever targeted me would lose and someone else would win, but next game they know I'm not bluffing.

[@thebigsquig]

The nickname for cards to deal with salt should be “pepper”

[@webbc99]

I also really hate this philosophy that if you play a bunch of incredibly un-fun cards, and then act like it's everyone else's fault that no one wants to play with you... Telling people to add more interaction is such a copout, especially because these cards directly frustrate efforts to interact and draw into the interaction pieces. There is a reason those cards are on the salt list, many, many people do not enjoy games where they are played. It's a social format, as you said, people can concede at any time and find a different table. Imagine if after playing any board game with you, the other three players get up and find someone else to play with because you are so un-fun to play with. If your playgroup is fine with it then that's cool. But just because you like a card or deck doesn't mean it's fine to subject three unwilling participants to it, and then expect them to be the ones that change their perspectives and their decklists to suit your playstyle. When people say "play more interaction" what they are usually meaning is "I refuse to acknowledge that I am not fun to play with", which is annoying because there are people that genuinely don't run enough interaction. But it's being used by stax players to blame everyone else for not liking their anti-fun decks. There is no difference between Scrambleverse and Obliterate. Both end the game in an unsatisfying way, everyone stops the game they were probably enjoying up to that point, sighs, concedes, and hope you don't do something equally annoying in the next game.

[@tinfoilslacks3750]

There's a reason *WotC stopped printing cards like this over a decade ago,* they're bad for the game. If WotC actually had meaningful control over and the ability to curate edh as a format, you bet your ass rhystic, winter orb, scrambleverse etc. wouldn't be a legal card in the format's card pool.

[@TinyLokiGaming]

One of the people in our pod was doing Mono U Urza stax and Thoracle/Jace wincons. I started running Geier Reach Sanctum as a counter

[@keef920]

I’m interested to hear how salubrious snail deals with salt…

[@greatbrandini3967]

I would assume he'd just shrivel up and die. I hear snails don't handle salt too well

[@Gingerbreadley]

Just build your deck to answer an opponents deck and just fill your deck with removal only works if your opponents are doing the same. I did this for years till one day I noticed the format had changed everyone had pulled their removal and we were just expecting others to answer threats. I’m sorry but it’s not an answer when your opponents are running storm artifact combos and stax. None of them want to run answers because it slows their race and filling your entire deck with answers isn’t a solution. If you say “hey can you run more interactive decks” they are stuck between wanting to scrap their deck because no one wants to play them or building a deck type they don’t like. I got a good group now where we all try to be interactive but people have different expectations for commander and some people are just greedy.

[@andrewspears8891]

Find ways to build answers into your play style/deck. There's always a way. Artifact combo/storm answer is Rule of Law/Stony Silence type things. Depending on the style of loop, you could also include Rest In Peace if it's graveyard loops, Doorkeeper Thrull (it's a creature though) and the likes for stopping etb loops. And there's an easy handful of commanders that all synergies around enchantments. Build up to slow their game down, and beat face until they submit.

[@Gingerbreadley]

@@andrewspears8891 right but then I’m just playing a stax control deck built to police the table that was the problem. I wanted fun interactive decks i didn’t want to be forced to run tons of removal to be basically the sole check on things. Everyone else ran removal to allow their combos I was only running it to stop them. It’s just a difference in play styles. They have more fun now goldfishing and trying to race. I have more fun at a table where everyone runs their own answers threats graveyard hate etc.

[@AdmiralAlfredo]

​@@Gingerbreadleyyou're doing it wrong. Run answers to problems YOUR deck has. Your job is not to be the fun police for the other 2 players.

[@Gingerbreadley]

@@AdmiralAlfredo you would play great with them! I’m not interested In that kind of a game tho.

[@AdmiralAlfredo]

@@Gingerbreadley I fail to see the issue of you, as a player/deckbuilder, taking measures to protect your plays. Honestly if you are unwilling to do the bare minimum in making good decisions and building your deck with some removal (mind you, no one is telling you to run 20+ pieces of removal spells) then you shouldn't be upset when you lose the game. It's not the responsibility of other players to play around your inadequacies because you personally choose to handicap yourself for no reason other than a false sense of pride. Sure, don't play with people who don't give you the experience you want but with that mindset, you're not going to have anyone to play with at all.

[@Sunborne187]

it kinda sounds like you want us to play with sideboards in EDH? I mean, very few decks can be "oops, all removal" decks without losing what makes the deck synergize. This is why, for the most part, i play interaction that synergizes in some way with my commander.

[@thetrinketmage]

Not so much a sideboard but build for your meta. A few years back I had 2 friends playing talrand oops all counterspells. I didn’t sideboard for them but I certainly added more uncounterable things to my decks and it helped a lot. If nobody plays blue in your playgroup then maybe you can play more instants or sorceries since those can’t be stoped as easily without blue. It’s fine to tech for what you generally see

[@garethrns]

This video was the impetus I needed to build my Maralen/Puzzle Box deck.

[@captainfirebeard3340]

I lean more towards having multiple decks on hands (depends on the pods you play). I'm fine with losing to powerful decks, but there are deck types that essentially stop others from playing the game (Hi Bouncing Brago) and stop being fun to play against game after game after game. So this way you play a few games with the deck you love but then swap off if you notice your podmates losing motivation to play. This also helps prevent players from hating specific cards since they aren't constantly on the receiving end of the card every single game. If you play in pods with new players or people that only use Precon, this can be great to try out new decks with different mechanics, cards, win cons you're not familiar with. And shows how exciting the format can be.

[@iceghost27]

Poor threat assessment is something that can make me salty. Specifically when I recommend stopping a serious problem at the table that could kill us all, but someone removes something else instead that is just not worth it. Oh, and players who should know better not paying the 1. 😢

[@link5236]

Hey I’m just getting into commander and your videos have been a godsend

[@matthewmoran1866]

honestly, same. There's so much good stuff on this channel and lots of great advice for dealing with both the mechanical and social aspects of the game.

[@Quiczor]

An interesting point I find as you mention removal being good for the game because it deals with things that give you problems. Yeah I totally agree with this, though to a certain point I am noticing the powercreep of magic the gathering, with lower and lower cost cards being problematic and requiring removal. This is also partially because I am coming back to magic after 10 years, but way more often I'm finding 3-4 cost cards that are 100% removal required basically the turn they drop, which leads to more removal being required in the decks, which then eventually leads to the choice of, do I want to play more removal to increase my chance to deny their plays, or just commit more to value on my side to force them to remove my stuff.

[@rickerpelding7606]

EXACTLY! At this point I'm playing little to no removal and playing more cards that need to be removed.

[@OpticPlay_]

As a new player, what is your answer to discard? My friend plays the bat god, and usually on turn 2 he’ll play a card that reveals my hand and discards. It triggers me everytime and I usually focus on them the rest of the game. So far discard is my biggest salt trigger. Also so far I only buy precons so any anti-discard precon recommendations would be dope.

[@CharlesLeeRay812]

Give yourself Hexproof. There's a Leyline that does it. Ivory Mask. One of the white uncommon Planeswalkers from War of the Spark does it too.

[@TheAngelRaven]

Look around for Reanimator Decks to either build or Precons like Mirko. Discard is strong when it hits everyone and weak when it hits 1 person at the table, so if it's you then make sure they realize 'Alright, but I'll probably reanimate it later'. I have the Necro Precon and it's the perfect Discard-Hate deck. If you LET me put stuff in my graveyard, understand I intend to bring it back out.

[@jacobklein-cohen3704]

I'd suggest reanimation or graveyard decks in general for playing against discard. It basically makes your opponents threats into setup for you. Fortunately one of the precons from the upcoming set is a graveyard deck called death toll, which is quite reasonably strong.

[@thetrinketmage]

Oh weird they play targeted discard in edh? You could play cards like leyline of sanctity and ways to give you hexproof. But it’s probably better to try and run a lot more card draw. Card advantage (things that draw 2 or more cards) is the way to beat that! Best of luck

[@jben6]

Objectively, targeted discard is suboptimal in a multiplayer game. I burn a card to make you discard one or two cards, while the other players roll their eyes and chuckle. As others pointed out, reanimation and other recursion gets around discard. Now mass discard (like Mindslicer) is awesome and playing it is the mark of royalty.

[@ryanthomas9226]

I love this, recently been having a lot of games where lathril or krenko has 40 damage by turn 5 and yes it's annoying but rather then blaming the player for making it insane I took it upon myself to build decks that counter it or at least can go toe to toe. I think there is too many feelings about the commander sometimes and people need to remember to combat their local meta that way everyone has fun

[@LolcatRS]

That part at 15:10 got me, I was expecting an actual answer lmao

[@DAsrada]

I play a Nadier and Keskit Aristostax deck, basically using Smokestacks as a sacrifice engine - I can keep sacrificing stuff well past the point anyone else can. I was kind of impressed by how my playgroup didn't really mind. I was breaking parity and in fact benefitting off of having to sacrifice to it.

[@ThisNameIsBanned]

The thing with giving up is, you are allowed to, and players SHOULD play with it in mind. If you "depend" on lifelink or any combat trigger to winning without them conceding, you have to play accordingly, and if you they concede and you lose, ask BEFORE you swing and then maybe dont play the card or dont attack, as they will drag you down with them, thats the cost, and you have to play with that in mind. cEDH tournaments usually handle that with a rule that if you want to concede you can do so "sorcery" speed, to work around all that stuff (of course you can just walk away, but for all purposes of the game you virtually stick around till you can concede). There are a couple of such rules the normal rules of the game could (and should) adapt for multiplayer, so the issues that makes salty games are dealt with by the rules. Otherwise, if its legal to do, thats the game you play, if you dont want it, make house-rules and let everyone know.

[@vileluca]

I recently got complaints that my $30 budget Prossh deck had a Goblin Bombardment combo in it. So i rebuilt the deck to rush out Prossh's kobolds and buff them with stuff like Pack Attack. No combos, just kobolds aggro. Its been a month and the deck has yet to lose.

[@DarkJusticeMetal]

I am excited to build my first stax deck, mainly so I can see how my playgroup navigates around it. I'll be sure to remind them that they have two other allies to help solve the problem I present

[@howlovely9631]

Just a tip when building stax in casual. I reccomend having commander that draws cards in zone. In slower games you will see more cards than others which allows you to get to cards that break parity on stax. From my personal expirience I definetely do not reccomend running stax piece in command zone.

[@HighTechCinnamon]

What commander will you be running for it? I'm currently running Urza Lord High Artificer and it's really strong.

[@RaisinBrin]

I turned my Ghired, Conclave Exile deck into a stax deck and it was pretty successful...no hard locks just the slow everyone down kind of stax...mostly creature based one since it was a God-Phoaroh's Gift deck at heart...making your opponents have to play "fair" magic was a pretty decisive win con most of the time

[@variksigurdsson1447]

When I was newer to the format, I used to hate control for "not letting people play", but if you deck loses to control you should look at why it does. Just as removal is important, alternate win-conditions are as well. My go tall combat deck slots in Fling and Ram Through to get around stasis or ghostly prison effects directly to lifetotals, for example.

[@siristhesalamander4186]

We're busting out of basic social skills with this one🗣🗣🗣🔥🔥🔥

[@denp2517]

There is a guy at the lgs I often go to that only plays a dimir faerie control deck that sends everything on your board back to your hand or deck. The deck is often ignored by the entire table because it doesn't do much untill in the late game and then he always wins. When I decided to try to take him out as fast as i could while I still could he got so increadibly salty and angry with me that I did not let him win as per usual. This was a guy in his 30's while at the time I was 18. Imagine just screaming at a guy half your age because you can't stand losing. Anyway, he grabbed his Koma deck after that. What I am trying to say with this is that I totally agree with the video, I do not remember a single card from both those decks, I only remember that the decks re increadibly annoying to play against.

[@HelenoPaiva]

Can’t be countered… laughs in mindbreak trap.

[@ellie6091]

Quick question for Trinket/everyone. Is Storm, and associated mechanics like copying spells, salt inducing? Context: I bought the Quick Draw commander precon from Thunder Junction but it has an abnormally high Salt score, and any cards I want to upgrade it with (eg,Thousand-Year Storm, Ignite Memories) also seem to have a higher than average salt score.

[@thetrinketmage]

I actually make a whole video about long turns that nobody watched. Personally I think it’s fine. People should be allowed to pop off some times why not!

[@ellie6091]

@@thetrinketmage I'll go check it out, thanks

[@thetrinketmage]

@@ellie6091 Here is a link: kzbin.info/www/bejne/moPIcoGVor6cfrcsi=tvzD_rVZR1HwZvkw

[@ellie6091]

@@thetrinketmage I've already watched it since you replied, but thank you!

[@izaiahsundquist6877]

Cards don't make me salty. It's how the people who play the cards that makes me salty. For example, one of the top things that makes me salty is if someone is playing a stax deck and they keep apologizing for everything they do when I feel like they should embrace their role of the "villain".

[@thomaspetrucka9173]

You don't disclose cards? How far does that go? Do you answer if someone asks whether you're running free counterspells? Combos? My philosophy is that if it's a casual game, have a casual mindset. Be open about what you're doing and give information freely. If it's competitive, let them burn in hell.

[@thetrinketmage]

If someone asks me a question I’m not going to lie or refuse to answer. I just done lead with anything.

[@fish7678]

I'm the control/combo player of my group. Most everyone else is playing mid-range synergy or big stompy decks. The amount of games I've been the only player to cast more than one removal spell is staggering. Some games I can blow up win cons and nobody's mad. Another game, I blow up a draw engine, and I get a big ole middle finger. The threat assessment of my pod is just so poor. One player killed my Death Pits of Rath, which (thanks to Caltrops) was stopping the Nahiri Voltron deck from attacking with a 13/7 double strike commander. They blew it up because, "He (the Nahiri player) told me to blow it up." They died the next turn because they had no blockers. Can't make this stuff up.

[@reezethevampire]

I don't get salty about decks or cards. I get salty about players. So many people I've played EDH with get really offended when you try to win, or kill their threat, or play a card they don't like. Oddly enough, the main reason I clicked this video is because I saw Scrambleverse in the thumbnail. Scrambleverse is one of my all-time favorite cards, but I've had at least 30 people in the past 5 years scoop the second it hit the stack. Dude, it's a silly card - I enjoy it because it really morphs strategies and randomly gives some players huge power which results in a super interesting game. I can agree that doubling that effect is...absolutely insane.

[@MrAmazing3]

I really don't like the point of "Why play a casual format if you're not gonna play a deck you want to play". The whole point of "casual" is that you're not just trying to play to win, but to play to have fun and that's what everybody else is there to do as well. If your idea of having fun is getting to stop everyone else from going off so that you can, maybe save that deck for some serious play like in a tournament, because that's just ruining everyone else's fun. Individual cards that immediately make the game harder for everyone else at the table *is unfun*. By definition, it's stopping others from having fun and playing their decks how they planned to. Things like card engines that force players to repeatedly sac creatures, or cards that increase spell costs or limit card functionality. Target interaction to take care of threats is one thing, but board interaction is almost always something that causes salt at the table. Having a fun game of Magic is a group effort and I would argue a responsibility of everyone at the table. If you decide to bring a deck that's going to ruin the experience for everyone else, you're shirking that responsibility in favor of your own selfish enjoyment. That's definitely why talking about deck strength in a group is important, so that players don't get steamrolled against a deck with better synergy. I will say that a lot of the salt I've typed out stems from a certain mono-black deck a person I play with literally calls "pain", but I honestly think that cards that interact with a majority of the board aren't fun in casual commander.

[@redwood1542]

what do you think about scooping to stop someone from using your stuff to win/beat another player?

[@thetrinketmage]

I would consider that something outside the game and it does annoy me. If someone did that even if it “saved me” I would concede

[@sidders1943]

As a stupid Izzet player, I despise stax, but recognise that it is designed to counter my style of dumb play as many cards as possible in a turn. I mostly try to play the silliest cards that are on theme and as such my deck can fold to itself and has zero answers to big green boys, but that's my choice and fair enough if you want to play things my deck sucks against. I'm just out here making your board wipes and removal spells mostly useless.

[@SmilingJack100]

I am absolutely salty about individual cards. Rhystic Study, Smothing tithe, and craterhoof, as exmaples, because they are so wildly powerful, they completely destroy any alternatives you'd put in that slot and therefore make the game less creative and interesting. And price absolutely does matter, since it makes the game sort of pay-to-win, at least to an extent.

[@thetrinketmage]

I do agree those cards are lame to an extent. Because things like craterhoof do push other overrun effects out of the format because of its raw power

[@SmilingJack100]

@@thetrinketmage it's not just that, but Rhystic study crushes any other card draw effect, ditto the one ring, smothering tithe crushes any other white ramp, TBH, a lot of cards that are so overwhelmingly best in slot including sol ring and thassa's oracle should be banned, I think the game would be much more fun that way.

[@SmilingJack100]

It doesn't just push other overrun effects, it pushes out any big stompy creatures cause they pale in comparison to the "auto win button' that is craterhoof, I hate it. Hot take, the game would improve massively if all of the following were banned: -dockside -craterhoof -smothering tithe -rhystic study -akroma's will -jeska's will -Thassa's oracle -torment of hailfire -Mana Crypt -Mana Vault -Chrome Mox -Jeweled Lotus -Sol Ring

[@througtonsheirs_doctorwhol5914]

I love that at our LGS the salt is not the concern. People can play competitive in the pods of EDH any eekend. Friday commander is openly letting people bring out their monstrous decks and anyone can discuss rule zero to get or not into the pods who openly allow competitive deck building in 4-player commander casual play.We are competitive casual. The way i love pushing myself even in 1player video games like RPGs

[@woliver2200]

I was about to take apart my storm deck with Aragorn, but then I watched this video. Thanks!!!!

[@cookiesandmilk6421]

In regards to stax. I don't agree that the end of the game is what creates the salt with cards of that type, it's more to do with the inability to play. A win that amounts to: play threat -> protect threat -> win (hopefully in a reasonable amount of time) shouldn't, and I personally find rarely does, make people salty. But when you restrict others from playing the game so heavily that it's a slog for 3 out of the 4 players at the table is when salt comes about. When one person gets to play more than the rest of the table combined or even anything half that bad, that rest of the table will almost certainly not be having any fun and lose interest in the entire game incredibly fast. When you sit at a casual table it should be reasonable to expect that you will be able to play a game of magic the gathering, not watch one other person completely dominate a table with barely any hope of getting back on your feet. It's the same reason why people don't like having one person at a table whose deck is way higher power than the rest. Thank you for coming to my ted talk!

[@MrEforEveryone]

An opponent's Smothering Tithe once gave me the win. Everyone started to team up against them and ignored my Slivers. They were salty about paying the 2 while my Slivers reached critical mass

[@monsieurm0u731]

Love the withering torment example XD. That card came out like today. The only other viable option being feed the swarm, it's weird to point out

[@thetrinketmage]

I was trying to think of a mono black example and honestly this it. I originally had a tangent saying mono black just lacks good non creature removal and that’s a cost to playing it. But no more!

[@siukong]

There's also Ghastly Death Tyrant (Feed the Swarm on a creature), and Shatter the Oath. Plus maybe half a dozen mono-black enchantment removal with the downside being the opponent gets to choose. (eg "each opponent sacrifices an enchantment" on Mire in Misery) Which still can sometimes act as "targeted" removal if the problem enchantment you want gone is the only one on your opponent's board. Then we can add in like 20 or more colorless cards that can take out enchantments via any-permanent removal. Like Goblin Firebomb, Argentum Armor, Introduction to Annihilation, Oblivion Stone, Unstable Obelisk ... Not all of those are going to be as mana-efficient as a Naturalize but that's to be expected when it's not a strength for the color. Plus, some of the gap gets made up for by blacks ability to more easily tutor up these answers on demand. It's certainly a better state of affairs for mono-black than ~15-20 years ago, when the only non-colorless artifact removal it had access to were Phyrexian Tribute and Gate to Phyrexia, and it had literally zero direct ways to interact with enchantments and had to fully rely on discard/sacrifice effects, or artifacts/All is Dust.

[@Tsunderrated]

I played against someone at a magic fest once who cast a scrambleverse to "give us all more time to play magic"

[@Cactus420]

I am one of the rare players that play a chaos no win con deck. The goal is Divine Intervention.

[@dallasfavel4817]

Oh I establish my own win conditions when I make the deck. "This deck wins if I get a thousand tokens" "This deck wins by frustrating my opponents into quitting and asking me to play a new deck." "This deck wins If I get to complete my jenk seven card loop." "This deck wins by, dealing three thousand damage in a turn." "This deck wins when I see the look of shock and horror as they realize no one will be played any spells this game." Anyway, the one frustrating my players is my chaos deck. I reoccur brand with isochron scepter. Coadie. That deck also has two suicide spells in it, where if I hit them with the book I'll probably lose the game.

[@jakinbandw]

I have a deck that has the entire plan of playing Humility and then Dovescape. Ideally I manage to drop a few anthems while setting up so that I can survive the resulting flood of birds.

[@dallasfavel4817]

@@jakinbandw I was once in a game where a storm deck.I'm copied death by dragons, twenty four times.

[@dallasfavel4817]

@@jakinbandw I love that that's hilarious.

[@eccod]

I don’t play commander, but I used to play Legacy a ton back in the day. A few things always made me salty. 1) Force of Will, because every single regular at the LGS I played at ran a playset. I started maindecking red elemental blasts, which won me a few tournaments. 2) Storm combo, because it felt like I had to just sit there while they played solitaire.

[@I8venison]

Thinking about what you could have done or what you can change about your deck to handle different situations is why I've been keeping up with magic for the last 10 years. My Goreclaw deck has so many tech pieces put in and pulled out depending on how it performs. He's pretty right imo :)

[@LukeFromNY]

Spite plays. “You did this to me last game so I’m targeting only you this next game” King making is ridiculous. Why did we just sit here for an hour for you to give up and waste all the other players time? Just bad plays in general too…not making deals not talking and being social just being quick to act not thinking about the state of the current game.

[@AxillaryPower2]

In my experience, "giving up and king making" and "scooping up" are related. I've had the outcome of matches that completely change when one of the players not concede. It's tainted my whole view on concessions, invalidates an otherwise proper game, and has given me the idea that either the whole table needs to concede or no one does. I played a game where one of the players played a winter orb. I was actually excited to work around the stax and strategize around it. But after a turn rotation, the player said he had his fun and scooped. I was shocked and pissed, like we weren't even playing the same game.

[@Shikigami6]

Definitely agreeing about people playing waaaay to few interaction spells or even worse, getting salty about interaction. The only things that make me salty, is when it is hard for most decks to interact with it. If my mono-black deck gets shut down because of a Dauthi Voidwalker: fine, black is very good at removing creatures and I should be able to handle it. If my mono-balck deck gets shut down because of something like Rest in Peace: Well, guess I will just sit there until I topdeck my Feed the Swarm. but even then it is fine, because it is somewhat my bad for relying to heavily on one strategy. The most salt inducing card for me personally is Dockside Extortionist. 1. People somehow think it is a casual card (maybe because its a creature?) and will put it in all kind of decks. 2. It is so hard to interact with since most people will reanimete or flicker, even if you destroy or counter it. 3. It gives a stupid advantage for not just one turn like a ritual. 4. It fits into almost every strategy. Is still don't understand why something like Primevil Titan is banned because it is "game warping", while Dockside does the same thing but 4 turns earlier.

[@KHJohan]

I have a Gonti Theft deck, that I've stopped playing. Theft decks are salty in general for LGS, a little because you use other people's cards, that they wanted to play, but mostly because people are afraid of the possibility of losing their cards by accident simply due to the physical placement management of "stolen cards". If I ever become part of a consistent pod, I'd probably play it, otherwise it's simply too salty.

[@jaceg810]

Soo, I should try to rescue my Oloro creatureless creature hate deck from behind the shed, where I last left it? It was a blast to play grindy control matches, and with a bit of a facelift, it can have some more win conditions.

[@joshfinch7041]

it definitely wasn't a rant in my humble two cents, but ya I used to get salty at my friends 16 counter spells and 4 board wipes with elixir of immortality/ sphinx's rev back in my modern days but now I learned ways of dealing with it

[@VendiVidiVinci]

Something i would add is that it is OK If you can't beat a card/ set of cards. You dont always be ready against every decks if you can accept to bite the bullet. You can always surrender and look for an other pop, or ask someone to lend you a deck.

[@brimmusic4270]

Im new to EDH and have a question to you (and this comment section in general): In my playgroup there is a mill deck and a steal deck. I hate both, because I enjoy playing my cards and not getting my deck ripped every other turn because I play a for fun deck (dicerollers). What can I do against those kinds of decks? I just feel like every game I cant even draw any good pieces, because they get taken from me before I get a chance.

[@thetrinketmage]

For mill you just need to relentlessly attack them. Mill cards themselves don’t usually add to defenses on board nor do they remove your stuff. Just running them down is your best option! For a theft deck, you need to do one of 2 things. Either play low to the ground cheap creatures and attack them or play it safe and try to bait out theft effects on your weakest things first!

[@brimmusic4270]

@@thetrinketmage Thanks for your response! I will try to run down the Mill guy, but the steal guy rips the cards from my deck. Its a Don Andre "Exile and play" type pattern. Probably the best tip is again go for face and force them to play more defensive instead of letting them run with what they got?

[@mangomusli572]

​@@brimmusic4270 If you play more graveyard recursion you could turn the presence of the mill player into an advantage

[@thetrinketmage]

@@brimmusic4270 Oh it's an exile and cast not just theft from board I see! Yes those effects are pretty slow just attacking them can usually help out there as well! Best of luck

[@imaginationave3687]

*Ahem* FIR-(falls into a river) A MAN HAS FALLEN INTO A RIVER, IN LEGO CITY!

[@Magnafiend]

I do agree with a lot of this. Stax isn't a bad thing, and the problem is that people conflate stax with purposefully stalling and resetting the game state without a plan (like your 4 mana armageddon example). I feel a lot of the people who complain the most about "salt" is the result of one of three factors: 1 - Power imbalance at the table / typal imbalance at the table. This basically results from either one deck being a LOT stronger, or just having some key cards that make the deck a lot stronger when those cards are hit than the rest of the table (prime example is one deck running all the fast mana like crypt, vault, A-Tomb, Jeweled Lotus,) and people remembering those games where those players hit those fast mana cards turn 1-2 and the game basically became a wash because of it OR the playgroup legit only runs big battlecruiser decks and then get mad when one player plays a stax deck who's strategy by nature just keeps them all in check. Ways to fix this would potentially be allow proxies for those fast mana cards to either drive up the power level of the other decks or come up with a uniform expected general power level or budget restriction for a set of new decks so that you have something all at a similar level to go with when you want a more even and dynamic game 2- Lack of removal (as you mentioned). A lot of players (especially newer ones) really undervalue just how much removal needs to go in a deck. A lot of times people get so caught up in doing the thing that they almost completely neglect removal altogether (hell, I'm guilty of it myself at times). Personally I try to run at least 10-15 sources of removal in all of my decks, though I try to make as much of it overlap with my deck's theming and synergies as possible (for example I'm working on a list for Aribella the new power 2 or less tribal from duskmourne. Do you know what creatures all have power 2 or less? If you said all those creatures with O-ring stapled on to them, you'd be correct!). 3- Inconsistency in deck construction. This one is a bit of a tricky one, but as you mentioned, most people remember how a game ends more than moments throughout the game. Lets say someone in your playgroup has a Captain N deck. The theme is milling opponents and stealing their really good stuff for yourself. Ok, cool, solid theme, solid strategy, the deck has a plan and a way to get there. Now take that same deck, throw in a handful of tutors, a demonic consultation and a thoracle. Now you have a deck that will half the time maybe go for the tactics of mill/theft, but as soon as a tutor hits hand or they get one piece of a combo, will shoot for the combo win out of nowhere. Now you have a deck where while it CAN do some interesting and dynamic things, everyone else in the pod will only see it as a dark thoracle combo deck and try to nuke it out of existence and not let it get there, either through removal, things to shut down the combo like torpor orb, etc, because people will remember the games it won out of nowhere and killed the pacing of what was up until that point an interesting game vs the games where it was doing it's thing and going along with the gameplan the deck was designed around. This is the reason I don't run two card win cons or infinites in most of my decks unless the deck is specifically built around getting those off (my old grixis Mishra deck that made token copies of non-creature artifacts for example was built around getting infinite value engines and time sieve loops going). The difference between that and the other example is Mishra was designed to go for those from the start, and had multiple combos and plays it could make by abusing token creation and doubling up on non-creature artifacts, it's very clear that the deck is a ticking time bomb that needs to be dismantled before it's too late. The Captain example on the other hand, was just randomly shoved in there and seems to come up out of complete nowhere regardless of what else the deck has going on.

[@curtisjamesbw]

In my playgroup, we have one rule and one rule only; Salty or Spicey plays.

[@I_Am_Kas]

I once got eight copies of Scrambleverse on stack, with over two hundred creatures, mostly tokens, in play and a single sac outlet that couldn't sac itself. In other words, we are forced to go through all eight of them, because we don't know who's going to sac what and get how many triggers from its ability. As per my plan, everyone else conceded and I won yet another game with Magic the Gahterings best wincon, scrambleverse.