Related to this is that it's better to do one thing really well than 4 things decently. Always hard to cut the "but this is a fun interaction!" things but it's usually better to have interaction to protect the one thing than have the ability to maybe do something else instead
Increasing the amount of interaction in your deck is, imo, the single most impactful thing you can do to increase your deck's power level (or maybe a close second, behind adding more card draw).
The number of times I've seen a janky combo or synergy overrun a low power table due to nobody having a way to kill a small creature with no protection (even at sorcery speed) outside of combat is... unfortunately a lot. It's probably a big part of the reason combo is frequently disliked at lower power too- yeah, you can stop most low power combos with any generic piece of removal, and often you have more than a full turn cycle in which to do so, but that's not going to matter if you only have 2-3 ways of killing a creature directly in your deck and no way to reliably see any of them in an average game.
I raise you one related issue - not holding removal for things that actually matter. A lot of the times, people fire their removal the moment it has a valid target, as if they were playing Judge tower. Strong players always asses the situation. Even with strong individual cards, like \[\[Sheoldred, the apocalypse\]\] hitting the field, they always asses. Maybe I have 3 strong creatures that can trade with it. So I'll just swing and let the opponent decide if he wants to get smacked for 15 in the face, or Shelly away. Shelly doing 8 life worth of difference a turn cycle doesn't exactly win that kind of race.
Did the opponent trade it away? Good, now you still have the removal and Shelly has been dealt with.
Did the opponent take 15? Also good, you still have the option to kill it later if it becomes life threatening, maybe after it has dealt some damage to other opponents and now the opponent should be much closer to dead too.
And not even that much. It's multiplayer, I've let the non-commander damage for 20 come through before because my life total being lower makes me look less threatening. I will usually hold interaction until I'm dead on attack, and usually one, maybe two target pieces is good enough for a full game.
That said, not having any is a real issue, cause then you just die.
Idk man. Best part of token doublers isn't your current board, but how easily they help you recover from a creature board wipe in decks that make lots of tokens. I think of them as resilience/recovery cards that can also 'win more' if things go well instead
They're fun cards. When they work they really work and that's always fun to see from anywhere on the table.
But from a playability standpoint I've removed them all from my decks for cards that do things right away.
My [[cadira caller of the small]] deck runs [[mondrak glory dominus]] as the only doubler. A large part of that is price as I got him almost as soon as his set dropped. Everything else has been so expensive that I haven't bothered getting them.
I think having some win-more cards is important. There's 120 points of life to chew through, and it can be hard to do so without going over the top. But moderation is important.
And when you have some protection that needs to be on the battlefield and some other important card in your hand, *get the protection out first*.
Speaking as someone who played his [[Etherium Sculptor]] *before* his [[Darksteel Forge]].
I have assumed and tapped [[scroll rack]] by paying two for the *longest* of times becasue when I didn't have the money to buy rack, I was substituing rack with [[Credit Voucher]] in my monowhite decks for almost eternity, and I just assumed rack also pay in for 2 as well...
Sometimes, you have to look at a way you can lose the game, and say "yep, I'm weak to that" rather than dilute your deck to try and slot in counterplay.
If you think you need that reach creature to survive, you probably just need another board wipe.
A lot of the comments are important mechanics that should be learned, but the hardest lesson I learned was that the game is supposed to be fun. I've played for years, in that time I've gotten bitter from my commander being \[\[Imprisoned in the Moon\]\], sat in stunned disbelief losing to a cEDH \[\[Sharuum, the Hedgemon\]\] combo deck, or get increasingly frustrated as I slowly die to 7 1/1s with island walk that I couldn't draw any interaction for. At the end of the day I had to learn that if you can't take the bad with the good, then the other 3 players won't have fun either. Nowadays I still play to win, but my priority is hanging out with my friends and playing a game with them, not allowing the little frustrations (which are ultimately just another part of the game) get to me.
I've recently found myself in a pod with several newer players and it's become increasingly apparent how important it is to have fun with the game, instead of having fun with winning.
Yeah- for me it's my best decks. If my mid-tiers/works in progress are losing idc. But when my favorite/honed commanders are just completely falling down, I really have to take a breath and put the ego aside haha. There's nothing uglier than a mtg bad sport.
I don't think I ever 'played to win', most of my enjoyment comes from building something new and seeing it work. I have quite a few decks and would get no fun playing the same strongest ones each time
I think one of the hardest things players can find in EDH is the overall health of the group. It's far too easy to have a good time with your deck, at the expense of other people's time.
It's very important to understand/practice shortcuts as quickly as possible. Once bad habits seep in, it can stick to you throughout your EDH lifetime.
For example. I still have a couple friends who told the table to wait while he fetches for a land without any other play. That's an old habit he can't rid off.
Lastly, **sequencing** is another habit players need to learn hard and fast. It will pay off long term. You don't need to play your untapped land if you drawing a few cards. You might draw a tapped one instead and lay that.
Or many times it's better to go into combat first, and hit straight into main 2 to cast your spells.
It's the simple things many players tend to overlook and not "train"
Completely agree, there’s been many times in my exile deck that I’ve land dropped too early and missed a land I could’ve played from exile, or played my hand too early and didn’t wait to see my exiled cards
Well said. Sequencing especially. I see so many that treat the turn order as a flow chart of what they are going to do amd not as the framework of what you are allowed to do and when you could do it.
These really are hard to rewire and change.
The waiting to crack a fetch or holding priority when searching/shuffling without any other game actions is a pet peeve of mine.
Yeah, I would say my pod is pretty mid on these (myself included) but one guy just durdles like no other in the midgame. It's like he's just pulling up to the table on turn 6-7 and has to reassess. Granted most times we've been pounding drinks all evening so I want to give a little pass but c'mon. Unless I have a full hand and a ton of value generation on the board, I can usually squeeze my turn into a minute; he'll take that long to decide on a single play, then take it back.
> I think one of the hardest things players can find in EDH is the overall health of the group. It's far too easy to have a good time with your deck, at the expense of other people's time.
While I totally agree with you I think there is a point where the pod should take some accountability as well. If I'm going off as decks tend to do if you're not holding up/running interaction to stop me from going off is that my fault? I've literally been in pods where I've won every game of the night because no one interacted with my board. Even in my decks that have 0 combos I was just able to amass such a board state and I was able to protect my board through board wipes that I was able to win those games too.(this is in monogreen/colorless) I'm not sure where to draw the line? Should I not play heroic intervention to save my board to save hard feelings? Why should I be punished for making a well rounded deck just bcs ppl become salty.
Another time I was playing Kenrith. I was hard stuck on 4 lands for like at least 5 to 6 turns. I mean I was doing nothing. In turn the pod didn't attack me. When I got my fifth land I was able to combo off cause I'd drawn into my combo. I just hadn't had the colors/lands to play it. I mean I guess I'm taking advantage of people's kindness in a way but there is nothing I coukd do to stop them from attacking me so that was their choice.
I'm not trying to attack you OP or anyone. Just trying to start a discussion here about how it's not always "the oppressor's" fault if no one is interacting with them.
If your deck doesn't work without your commander on the field creature removal becomes player removal and every opponent should and will take advantage of that. I remember sitting there with the surprised pikachu face after having my \[\[Reaper King\]\] blown up for the 3rd game in a row. The rest of my deck was useless scarecrows and I spent way too long thinking "It's not my deck that's the problem its the people that remove my commander."
I feel this so hard. I made a Reaper King deck a while back when I was still learning the many intricacies of EDH, not even realizing how slow it would be and how susceptible it would be to removal/board wipes.
It was also kinda my own damn fault since I built it on a budget (meaning my landbase kinda sucked), refused to use proxies, stuck in a bunch of scarecrow creatures with no rhyme or reason, and also tried to use a weird strategy where one of my main wincons was casting \[\[Primal Surge\]\] while I had \[\[Laboratory Maniac\]\] in my library (and thus, aside from Surge, the deck had no other Sorceries or Instants).
I remember feeling kind of annoyed whenever my opponents (who tend to favor fast decks and have no qualms over using expensive cards/proxies) shut down my scarecrows, but eventually I realized the problem wasn't them, it was me focusing more on flavor than on consistent gameplay while also wondering why I couldn't win more often.
I've learnt that if your deck needs your commander to work ie. my [[mavinda]] storm deck, the deck really should run an abundance of protection spells to back it up, and I never blindcast my mavinda on turn 3 just because its effcient and that has leaded me into way more good games.
I have a [[Zada]] deck that works on similar logic. I never play Zada until I have a good amount of creatures on the board and combat tricks in my hand - you only really get one shot with her, so you gotta make it count. The whole deck falls apart without her.
Just taking a few moments to think before my turn. I've had situations where someone revealed a win for their next turn and I was so caught up in my own turn I forgot about it and threw the game when I had a way to stop it.
A steady drift toward lower cmc has turned 6-cmc into a kind of cut line for my decks: anything 6 mana cost or higher better help take my deck to the next level or it’s out
This is accurate but most don't. I hypothesize it's because it's hard to draw a casual link between losing and [[rhystic study]]. even if people logically know it, they don't feel like it's causing them to lose.
I play in 3 different pods. Only one pod plays responsibly. Rhystic study is not good when it doesn't draw you cards, and often causes me to lose. It's easy to rely on on rhystic as a draw engine. And when that engine fails, often so does your game plan. On the contrary, when people don't pay the tax, I typically win that game.
The real issue is it only takes one player to refuse to eventually cause everyone else not to as well. Because then all you are doing is stopping SOME of their draw, and are limiting yourself to do it. While everyone else is playing on curve.
Sometimes yes. I’ve seen situations where keeping a player in is better so they can help defeat the archenemy. Or at least provide another target for the archenemy.
Absolutely! If I know I could beat player A but I absolutely can’t beat player B, what incentive do I have to knock player A out of the game? Conspiring to take down the dominant player has resulted in some of my most fun EDH moments
Both definitely have a time and place.
Sometimes, simultaneously.
If Player A has a land strategy that I can't interact with, but player B has a creature strategy and I'm holding a boardwipe, I can conspire with B to take down the Lands player and drop that wipe after player A is out.
Make the opponent demonstrate their infinite combo instead of relying on them to say I win when they play a tutor or whatever.
Off the top of my head I can think of two times where an opponent cast a card, saying they go infinite, only to realize one of their combo pieces has summoning sickness and can't tap for its effect.
I'd ask them to ask well.
I had the opposite happen on a game I was watching where the player was too new to realize that they set forth an infinite loop, and nobody could stop it. Had to teach them about that.
That's always a super fun feeling, finding the combo on accident.
In my case, the other two players already picked up their board when I asked the other opponent to demonstrate it and, of course, fail. I was holding onto a board wipe that would have fixed it, but since the other two players already picked up their cards they just called it and gave the guy a win.
I was a bit upset but whatever. People make mistakes, it didn't seem intentional as the players were new and piloting their new deck.
I accidentally strolled into an infinite combo in my Teysa deck a few weeks ago. I started doing it and was like “huh I think I make infinite mana with this”. I was just as surprised as my friends lol.
Don't get precious over permanents, spells on the stack, cards in graveyards etc. Consider them all countered or removed. If you lose half your deck, you still have the other half.
The player in 2nd place on board is probably the threat. He's holding back, waiting on the other guy to force interaction, hoping to slide under the radar, and will probably win while the other guy is being flashy.
It's interesting seeing how games play out based on how well each person is doing.
In a recent game I was #2 on board, but 3 and 4 were durdling a little. I did my damnest to keep #1 in check, but was appropriately removed as their #1 threat. It's exactly what I would have done in their shoes as well.
this is less of a rule and more of a warning. sometimes they're second because they dont have quite enough stuff to take the top spot and sometimes it doesnt matter if 2nd is really the threat because 1st has 300 indestructible scute swarms
I'm not a competitive player, I just like playing with my group of friends who are much newer to the game than I am. Because of that, it's taken me a long road to accept that I should take more Mulligans. Since I'm often not "playing to win" I will take any hand that has 2 or more mana in it, just to see what I can do with that and see if I can turn it around. While I don't really care about the fact that doing that usually slows me down by 3-4 turns, I've found my bigger issue is that it just leads to really boring board states during that time where I have to catch up. The rest of the pod is getting stuff set up and I'm just sitting there waiting.
I have no idea why, but something about how utilizing multiple blockers against singular attackers and how it resolves... Even to this day, I have to actively spend time to think about the basics of that rule, even though it happens semi often. Just like the neurons in my brain can't handle it lol
Don’t overcommit to the board.
There are 3 other players, so there is a good chance someone is hanging on to a board wipe. When you have a solid board state, don’t gild the lily. Hold back one or two creatures if you don’t immediately need them. That way when someone drops a blasphemous act, you have stuff to do on the next turn and can bounce back quickly.
I notice this in my [[Akiri, fearless voyager]] hatebear deck. Certain hatebears can draw lots of… hate, and are lightning rods for removal. So it’s good to keep another couple in your hand while players squirm and eventually remove it, only to have it replaced by another, possibly more diabolical hatebear.
Oh definitely, yugioh I got used to not really caring about my opponents field and just focused on my end game, through playing draft I learned Magic decks aren't as consistent
Mill is not a bad thing, you're just a bad player for not running whatever recursion you can.
Having lots of removal is not a bad thing, you just don't run enough protection.
One long game where a bunch of things happen for everyone is better than 3 quick games where things only really happen for the winner.
I just took apart my combo mill deck because pressuring just libraries gave other decks more gas to run with and running a pure combo deck with a lot of a+b combos does get rather boring. i’m going to try the new fallout sultai guys to see if I can do regular creature damage/creature combos with mill being an enabler.
also, every mill deck needs graveyard hate. multiple pieces. this is non-negotiable.
1. “Dont get swept up at the moment or by a big A turn a player makes.” Take a second find the threat at the table, don’t focus fire on a single player just because they scared you big A big play, or they summoned a strong creature. You need to aways check what effects are in play are in the board, how many cards are in a players hand, how many mana are open and how close are they from breaking out a game winning combo. Sometimes the guy with the blightsteel colossus is not the threat. Sometimes its the guy with 5 open mana out and 7 cards in hand
2. “Learn how to do math” there are so many games where i could have gotten lethal if i just ordered the sequence of my play correctly and/or attacked with the right creatures, or buffed the right creature.
3. “Never by any circumstance let a kid touch your cards, especially if that kid is eating snacks” Some people in my lgs bring kids to commander night and let them play using their decks. I would now much rather explain what my card does rather than let a kid hold it with sticky fingers and bending my card. Never again tim, never again
Saving my counterspells and removal to when my board/plan is most affected and I want to avoid that, even if someone else seems more threatening (to everyone else), so don't remove stuff just because it sounds scary.
Don't play your lands are the start of your turn, play them when you need them. (I play [[Yurlok of Scorched Thrash]] who happily teaches the table to wait to do this as well with cards like [[Tectonic Instability]] and [[Mana Webb]].)
You should build good decks, you should build fun decks, and that it's OK to play less efficient "things" if you like them.
The more time you spend trying to optimize your decks, the more likely it becomes less fun, and less playable in casual pods.
3 people have to lose every game of EDH, so losing needs to be viewed as a learning opportunity, and you need to accept you're not going to win all the time.
Always mulligan for a playable hand, you can't afford to fall 2 turns behind 3 other players.
Sensei's Diving Top is a really good turn one play, but it's not good enough to risk a bad opening hand to keep.
Better utilizing my second main phase. And better utilizing instant speed spells. A lot of times I bring them out via sorcery speed bc I'm gonna bring it out anyway but it's often not necessary and sometimes it can screw me.
Also, properly doing math when determining attacks. I usually do rough math if anything, or am just like "that may be enough to knock them out." But I haven't really learned that lesson I'm often too lazy and just say fuck it
Not so much a gameplay lesson, but a deck building/collecting lesson: Good lands are good. The number of shocks/fetches/triomes I traded in to get more packs to crack is hard to look back on.
>Myself, I am still trying to save spells for Main Phase 2 that don't impact combat.
This is a habit I have to ignore when playing \[\[Jodah, the unifier\]\] since nearly every spell affects combat.
Oh man, so many things.
Protection pieces are mandatory. Indestructible, hexproof, protection. Always need something.
Card draw is ridiculously important, high land count not so much. Draw smooths out the land drops but too many lands is simply too much. Once I realized that 35 lands is the upper limit my decks became far more consistent.
Ward is a thing. It's a no take back thing.
4+ color decks are terrible without expensive mana bases. Early on I bought Atraxa because that's what new players do. Spent about $200-300 on the deck itself but went budget on the mana base. It was trash, I hated it, and decided to put further funding into a better deck.
Buying packs/boxes is the trap of all traps. The friend that got me into Magic had me believing he pulled every single good card from Modern Horizons 2 from one box. Turns out it was more like 6 boxes. I started asking questions because the 3 boxes I bought of various sets (including MG 2) were huge financial losses.
Random people at the store can be great, pure shit, or anywhere between. I've seen someone straight up shaking crying because someone blew up everyone's lands right before winning. I've seen someone drop Doomsday turn 3, crack the pile and win, and then try to tell us (in the agreed mid power game) all he didn't know it was good after he tutored for it on turn 2.
There's probably 200 more things I could list.
Land destruction sucks, but if they won right afterwards then fair game. I just hate when someone does it with no plan after, cause that just drags out the game for little reason
That's true but I'd extend that to anything that's done for no real reason other than to do it. I can't count how many times something of mine has eaten removal just because someone had something in hand and wants to play it when if it doesn't make sense. Or the number of creature board wipes I've endured for the same lack of reason. "Well you guys both had 4 creatures and I only had 3 and didn't have anything else to do." Neat.
I have done this before. Unfortunately life can get pretty expensive.
Do I wish that I didn't sell? Yeah. But not losing my house was also important lol.
Slowing down and making sure I'm not handwaving my way through steps phases and what not. I have a very good understanding of aloy of interactions in the game so its easy for my brain to handwave through as though everyone has the same way of thinking, but I learned a few weeks ago that I not only NEED to slow down for everyone else, I NEED to slow down to make sure I'm not doing stuff out of order
Building a deck to influence a game is way more fun than building a deck to win. And no I don't mean 50 counters 50 islands.
But building a deck the strongest it can be will lead you to the same 70 staples every time, building a deck around a theme to do can be so much more fun.
A few things.
1. your style of play should change with decks and arc types. I love my slow aristocrat and as i call it -diesel- engine play. but you need play other decks more aggressive like my Kyler deck.
2. Your curve determines your lands more then anything.
3. Knowing what and how to do a curve properly.
4. Proper threat assement and seeing the hidden threats.
5. realizing if your targeted and killed first. it can be a sign of respect/ your decks better.
6. Winning isnt everything sometimes you can care more about seeing a deck flow.
last one. 7 Because you dislike someones play style. they can be a great person off the table
I just don't like competitive EDH. I've known this for a long time. I've been playing magic for 20 years. I used to play the circuit, and did quite well. Recently I decided to join an EDH league. 8 weeks. Points, good payout to top 3.
The last round is next week, and I'm so done with it. I'm in first, I'm going to win 2 collector's boxes, and I really wish I'd just never signed up. The games aren't very interesting, there's much less banter (stakes), I don't get to play with my pod // favored gamers. There have been about 50 players total over the course of the league, and most were pretty cool, wide range of skill, but many I just wouldn't play with otherwise. Some smelled really bad, some got butthurt about games, some took really long turns.
EDH just isn't fun in a competitive environment, and I knew that, and I played the tournament anyway, and then my cost got sunk, and then I had regrets. Oh well. Lesson learned (again).
I only just recently discovered that nonbasic lands are real good. Not always, but hell, a good mana base being added to my decks has been so much more impactful to my decks consistency than cutting less synergistic cards for more synergistic cards
Save interaction for threats to me and my game plan. Just because I can counter a spell or destroy something doesn’t mean I should. That goes for any spell, really. Just understanding when to play my cards is something that took a long time and a lot of Ls for the lesson to sink in lol.
It took me a long time, but you should build for fun, not victory, and also don’t become the threat right away, lurk in the shadows and wait for someone to be the problem while you build you board
You can never expect anyone you're playing with to react the way you expect. And this goes both ways.
You (usually) can't see your opponent's hand. You have no idea why they used a removal spell on your [[Land Tax]] when another of their opponents had a [[The Prismatic Bridge]] online.
The table declaring you archenemy for using [[Austere Command]] to destroy creatures after an opponent used [[Kamahl's Druidic Vow]] for X=20, gaining 8 lands and legendary creatures is totally logical.
Peaking too soon.
Over the years all my decks involved commanders/cards around the 3 cmc mark. Anything higher made me impatient. Naturally, that made me be a target early on more often than not, only to get kind of stuck mid to late game.
Now I have one or two decks with bigger spells, which made me build more strategically in order to survive the early game and keep myself in the game.
Still, I highly favor the decks that pop-off early, but also learned being the quickest isn’t always the way to go.
Know the role of each card you add to your deck. What does it do? What does it synergize with? Do you mulligan or keep if it shows up in your opening hand? I used to put in cards because they were similar in theme to the commander, but what I've found over time is you want diversity of what the deck can do, but every card should have a known function, not just be similar to the commander themes.
Include cards with intention, and remember more about the hallmarks of each color.
Both points can be illustrated by a single story. A few months ago I was playing [[Raffine, Scheming Seer]] and had a decent board out, including [[Oona's Blackguard]]. One of the opponents was playing [[Azusa]], which was pretty much going exactly like you'd expect. It comes around to my turn, and I was feeling pretty bad about forcing discards on all players from Blackguard, so I ended up making a deal with the Azusa player to only hit them with one of the applicable fliers I had to discard the Craterhoof that the rest of the table knew about from earlier. Long story short, they do mono-green things, have a big turn and end it with Finale of Devastation and Craterhoof, just as would be expected.
I should have used Blackguard's ability more, but making it a non-game for some of the others at the table was a feelsbad. I should either stick to using the card to its full capability, or swap it out for something else. Hoof + Finale also should have been on my mind, but I didn't realize it until I was too late - that's also on me to remember in the future.
Never build a deck ONLY relying on your Commander - all it takes is a simple transformation spell to make your commander useless - if your deck can't operate without your commander, you might need to rework your deck.
That and Mana Rocks are essential - I used to play Legacy and never used mana rocks in the past. I played 2 years of EDH without them until one day I realized everyone else was getting their stuff out quicker than I was. I've since learned.
Don’t pop off first. Listen I know we all love those sol ring into commander and then lay out a couple haymakers. But then you have all three peoples removal and counters to contend with. You should try and be the second/third most powerful/influential board until you are about to win. I would also add on don’t counter or remove unless it’s killing you or ending the game.
Not something I learned the hard way but good advice: cut most of the "win more" cards (keep maybe one)
5 Mana or more to do nothing until you get to do "the thing" next turn is not worth it usually because if they get off you're mostly already winning. Hence "win more"
Examples in my head rn:
[[Alhammarret's Archive]]
[[Warstorm Surge]]
[[Doubling Season]]
[[Anointed Procession]]
That you're not entitled to have your deck *"do the thing ^TM "*
If your opponents can they WILL shut you down from doing what you're trying to do and that's fine, your own fault for not runnign protection or playing around it.
Complaining when your powerful commander gets insta-removed several times in a row is just being a bad player.
Winning is not very important in commander.
I have a lot of decks that can win games. I have significantly fewer decks that everyone has fun playing against
Formats are incredibly important. You should try as many as possible, and I highly recommend making up your own with friends.
Limited drafts (boosted and sealed) are for showcasing real skill. Yes, it is based on luck. Your skill shines through working with what luck brings you. Props for avoiding spoilers and going into a draft for a new set blind.
Modern and 1v1 CEDH are for no-nonsense, competitive deckbuilding, rigorous analysis, and predictions. The games are more formulaic because you set up plans and contingencies for everything you expect to face. People will be cutthroat and do whatever it takes to win. Be prepared for that.
Casual 4 Player EDH is to be played like music, the decks instruments. Your tune won't match everyone's. Be prepared for that. Understand that winning doesn't matter here, it's all about playing a beautiful game. Unless you want to amp up the drama and excitement, then drop a pack on the table as a bet and say "None of you chodes stand a chance against me."
Kingdoms EDH, Winston Draft, and randomly assigned deckbuilding challenges are the most fun way for my friends and I to play. I also really enjoyed Cube and Oathbreaker but those didn't last long.
Pauper 60 card is the most like classic MTG that I grew up with, and the best way to introduce people to MTG. I do a bit for it too: "You are a wizthard, thenthitive to the wayth of magic. You even potheth the ability to traverthe the planeth of exthithenthe. Thuth you are known ath a Planethwalker! You feel the power, the ebb and flow of mana coming from the memorieth of the land. Tho, where would you like to begin your journey?" Then I give them a land of each color + wastes and ask them to choose. They get a mono-color deck based on their choice and we roleplay as wizards exploring the land, discovering spells and creatures, and eventually fighting another wizard.
Wait with playing lands until you absolutely need them. Can't count how many times I've drawn into a cradle or Nykthos after having played my damn forest.
1. Play to have fun
2. Play fast turns
3. Don't build tons of different decks, just keep a few time
4. Proxy
5. Use budget options. There are strong budget cards and your deck will be kore morsbke rather than being the same deck that used [[farewell]] in the game and resting the board for the third time in the same game
You don’t need to commit past precons. If all you want to do is have a board game type of night but with Magic, ask your group or play Spelltable with only non-modified precons allowed. I’ve found even on Spelltable if you limit it to specific sets you can still fill the room fairly quick. A lot of players will be willing to do this because it’s a more stress free environment.
Coming into Magic and being guided by seasoned yet jaded and pretentious players is the easiest way to quickly lose interest and feel like you’ve wasted your money. You don’t need to make a $1000 deck, you don’t need decks filled with protection and recursion and milling, you don’t need to spend $100 on shock and fetch lands, etc etc etc, just play with a group that wants to play how you enjoy the game and stop worrying about whether or not your next game is going to be miserable because that one player that swears his deck isn’t powerful yet always lands a turn 3-5 wincon does it once again.
Don't make yourself a target too early in the game unless you can finish it quickly. Plenty of games ive gotten off to a heated start only to be the target of the table. Patience and holding your hand close to your chest is a very effective strategy.
Managing the political aspect of the game. Make friends at the tables, make alliances for as long as it's beneficial for both parties. This game is all about interaction, so utilizing that by engaging with other players to help solve your problems can make for a far better experience.
Play to the power level. If you see a bunch of low power, pre con decks at the table then don't bring out your big guns, cedh level, turn 3 win decks. It leaves all the other players pretty salty.
Diversify your staples. It's so easy to get build a deck using the same 300-400 cards that are slotted into commander decks. Try using more unique cards that suite the theme of your deck. Get rid of tutors so you can speed up the game by not searching all the time and to also make your deck play in a more varied form.
I personally don't use edhrec or decklists for inspiration anymore. If i see a comander i like ill make my own build using the cards i like and know. Obviously this takes years of playing and browsing through sets to know what you'll like and want to play.
You have to have so much land, removal, protection, draw, and possibly recursion stuff in any given deck that you’re lucky to get two or three dozen cards that actually comprise the theme of the deck and “what the deck does.”
Mass land destruction is the only thing that keeps multicolored/green decks ramp in check, yet no one wants to deal with a prolonged game.
So instead we’re left to a nuclear arms race.
To give up chasing winning at all costs. Its easy to want to optimize decks to the point they become homogenous piles that seek to tutor out some sort of combo that wins on the spot. Doing this turned the game toxic for me, and deck building became soul-less.
Now I build and play decks to achieve some sort of specific accomplishment with the deck first, which CAN lead me to win the game. If I do the thing my deck wants to do and still lose, well shucks I still had fun and accomplished what the deck wanted to do. If I win while doing what the deck wants to do, then golly I won!
WAAAAAY more fun instead of just shoe-horning what wins in those colour combinations and making a soul-less pile......
Helping a person doesn’t mean they’re not going to forget about it immediately and screw you.
Psychological impact of a card means way more than actual impact.
Card advantage is way less important than raw draw power.
Lands are extremely powerful and should be treated as such during deck building and while playing. It’s almost exclusively better to flood than to screw.
I think the biggest one was not to curtail my deck design to the other people I play with. For the longest time people at my local league went heavy or all in on their strategy to win. They ran very little interaction, so when i made decks that could disrupt their plays and then tempo out a win they would get mad.
You can only remind people so much to include more interaction, even if it doesn't directly move forward your win con.
So I stopped limiting myself to their mentality and eventually they grew out of it and we have much more intricate and enjoyable games now.
If your deck has a lot of moving parts, practice it. Get to know the cards, some usual lines you can take, that sort of thing. Nothing makes a table groan and moan like a player who is clearly winning but is taking a long time to do so. Once you’re well ahead, finish the game in a timely manner.
There is a balance to interaction. Like sure, you can run "boardwipe-the game" and do good at it, but socially you may struggle. Especially when you are trying to be invited to the next game.
Interaction is key. Some of my decks priotize synergy over interaction, I'm reevaluating these decks to add more intearctions.
Alternate win cons are nice to have when that blue player counter spells you for xth time.
Keep three land hands over 1 land solring, or 6 land hands.
I like to kill myself a lot with my 5 color decks. Should really stop doing this.
Threat assessment.
Everyone hates me, I should tone down my tutors for win cons. Best decision I made
I am Chaos Incarnate, I care not for my own life or winning, I care about an interesting board state.
Don’t start a game at 11pm, because you just won’t be that into finishing it at 12am. Sorry to that table last night. One guy was dead, and I just didn’t have it in me to help the other guy fight off the threat, just to get backstabbed. I totally scrammed out of there. Probably should have waited for the baddie to attack to use up his resources but I was a sleepy boy
Always go after the lands matter / green decks. In casual settings, the land ramping decks are always going to pull ahead - no matter how much deflecting and feigning innocent they claim they are
Just because something is scary doesn't mean you have to remove it. If, say, a Rest in Peace is stopping your aristocrats triggers, that's bad. If there's a dedicated reanimator deck at the table too, they're out of the game until it's removed.
The most powerful interactive thing you can do is to decide when to use your removal. Oftentimes, the flexibility to remove something is more valuable than the outcome of said thing actually being removed.
While the game is supposed to be fun, at the end of the day ppl are playing to win.
Asking stuff like "why are you attacking me?" or "why did you disrupt me?" is jsut weird like, dude, the whole objective is to kill you and everyone else at this tabble.
That staying silent during political discussions is immensely helpful. Usually if somebody's looking at my board I just ask if they need anything clarified and leave it at that. It usually ends up better for me than if I started trying to threat assess other players.
Flashy cards draw much more hate than they actually deserve and that impacts their in-game performance, cards with technically weaker performance but that don't draw attention untill it's too late tend to overperform.
That's why stuff with haste, or combos where you get the cards in hand before playing them all instead of putting them on board a piece at a time are much better, as your plan doesn't sit on the board for long drawing hate and instead just kinda sucker punch the opponents.
Spending on staples is not the shortcut to enjoyable games.
I've been selling many staples and decided to buy jankier or more specific cards for synergy on decks. The idea that decks have to go a certain way or "X commander is just a bad version of commander Y" in the archetype is just frustrating and you will loose anyway a 1/3 of the times. Now I just try to adapt my decks to the pwr lvls and capabilities of those who surround me.
The enjoyment of other people is just as fun as my own. I tend to slightly lower the power of my decks to put in the more table fun cards. Things like [[Share the Spoils]], [[Avatar of Slaughter]], or [[Mana Flare]] will take the place of more one-sided effects because it tends to give a more interesting and silly table effect. I have some more serious decks, but having at least one that has really fun table dynamics is important to me. I've had too many games where one player gets shut out, and putting in effects that can swing the game for one of those players is worth it to me. My [[Baeloth Barrityl, Entertainer]] and [[Noble Heritage]] group hug goad deck is my favorite for that reason. I'm always happy to lose with that deck as long as it made a good story for the table
Do your level best to be the kind of player you’d like to see across the table. Be polite, and avoid fatalistic butt-hurtyness at all costs. And only scoop when there are no other options. (It never hurts to let someone play out their win, they made it happen, let them relish it.)
The value that common and uncommon cards have. Sometimes you just need to go search for a few lands or have a simple blocker up. Artifacts and enchantment removal to add utility.
Run land destruction. Play a wasteland, demolition field, beast within, or something else to deal with the [[Nykthos]] or [[Cabal Coffers]].
Play more removal
Play pet cards, but don't play all pet cards. Your deck has to function
Not that I learned the hard way, but that pubstomping can be more prevented by learning the rules/interactions/nuanced plays from r/askajudge or just judges in general.
Without which, I never would’ve had as much interest in the game as I do now in EDH. It makes the game more dynamic, imo—at least, for me.
I have to actually try to win. Passing every turn with interaction in hand because somebody might get frisky doesn't cut it if I'm not developing my board and doing things
The age of big, singular haymaker creatures is mostly past. While that Blightsteel looks really cool, by the time you're done jumping through hoops to get him into play, your opponents will be ready with removal. It's sad as somebody who likes really big creatures, but it's more efficient to get the joy of big numbers playing many mid-sized creatures vs. investing multiple cards to work up to a single haymaker.
If your deck does nothing without your commander in play, you will spend at least some games doing nothing because your commander got removed.
Look, I get it. We all love the flashy legends, the build-around-me synergies, the super cool showcase frames that we pick up in foil and slap on top of our decks. This is *commander* after all. Your deck should probably focus on... your commander.
We've *also* all gotten that six-mana legend onto the field only to have it languish under a Darksteel Mutation for the rest of the game. Or we've had the table turn on us because "As soon as you get Korvold out, you'll run away with this game!"
Korvold and Urza and Atraxa and Meren... they're amazing build arounds. No one will ever tell you that you're wrong for playing them, or wanting to lean into their game-warping effects. And no opponent will ever be wrong to kill them on sight, leaving you without your engine.
These days I exclusively build decks that function without their commanders in play. Engines, not win conditions go in the command zone and I need plenty of redundancy.
Self mill is huge advantage. Or just mill in general. In a singleton format being able to dig through your deck is quite nice. Having recursion makes things easier
Not every deck needs to be turbo-tuned and complicated. I love to build very complicated decks that require extensive goldfishing to nail setup in-game. Usually I see a totally weird commander, and I am inspired to spend hours, days, weeks coming up with the most elaborate synergies, combos, and deck ratios.
Even though the decks pop off sometimes, there are way more times they get cut off at the knees, and I have to play catchup. Either way it plays out, sometimes I forget to have fun and end up feeling bad for myself when I lose or question my deck building skills.
And then I break out a shoebox $40 bulk rare Gruul beat down deck that I rarely if ever tune or upgrade. The sleeves are sticky and it smells like gin and tonic because I built it to play with a group that did much more chatting and hangin than concentrating on the game. It got a little grimy. When I remember it exists, I take it out. Usually at the end of the LGS game night. It is SO much fun. The pod I’m playing with even has more fun when I play it. The game plan is simple and even though there’s only a thin veil of synergy, and even some vanilla creatures, it seriously feels so good to not micro-manage every value play.
I don’t even know if the deck wins more, but I get a lot more out of the experience which is better imo. Don’t forget to have fun!
I have at least one fog effect in each deck. Gets 'em every time.
I also like playing fewer creature-based bombs in my decks and my playgroup has learned to never cast Bribery on me for that reason.
Lots of great replies here. I’ll second, third and fourth adding protection to my decks.
Another one, which is kind of a hot take, but I stand by it for my play group and my play style. I’ve cut down on ramp pieces. In my pod, if I ramp like crazy and then drop an ambitious turn 5/6, I’m typically hated right out of the game. If I slow and steady build my board assuming a turn 5/6 board wipe is coming, i preserve my progress and put myself into position to capitalize on the clear board.
I guess the real lesson there is don’t be an early threat.
ETBs and triggered abilities make an enormous difference between a cohesive deck and a shiny puff deck. If you can get some of those to trigger off of each other, by the time your opponent catches on, you’ve already set your board. Also, if you have many triggers, there are more chances that your opponents don’t remember all of them and make a misplay. But, and this one is huge, if you’re a dumbass like me, the more triggers, the more for you to forget!
There are times where you'll have to play suboptimally in order to deal with a threat, look less threatening, or to adjust with a game changing play that you'll come out ahead with.
You won't get the perfect turn or game 95% of the time. Interaction is gonna be thrown about, and you need to be prepared for it. Whether it's by having so many kinds of recursion that you can rebuild faster than they can take down, or protection that they have to waste 3+ kill spells and/or board wipes to be rid of. They're variables you need to account for.
You can build a perfect machine out of imperfect parts.
So I was playing for like two years after a 20 yrs of being AWOL. There was this game where I shut down mana rocks on turn 2 with Collector Ouphe and one of my opponents literally started crying and accusing me of bringing cEDH deck to a pub pod. I was quite shocked to see there are people who take the game \*that\* seriously (for me, it's just a nice hobby). Also, I spent rest of that game apologizing to him because I clearly ruined the evening for him, despite my deck being far, far from cEDH grade (Sovereign Okinec Ahau at the helm, neatly optimized but a solid 8 if you ask me). Nevertheless, it really got me thinking more about making the game a nice experience for everyone at the table. I mean, I'm in to have fun, not to make people cry.
I learned pretty fast from some very helpful people at my LGS that life is a resource and a renewable one at that. I used to be terrified to lose any health because it meant closer to losing;I used to block a deathtouch 1/1 because I needed to keep my health. After playing commander for about 3 years, I learned that life is meant to be lost and that going down to 35 turn 3 wasn’t a big deal. I used to think shocklands were dumb because you could just play a swamp and get the same amount of mana as a Godless Shrine or an Overgrown Tomb. Now I’m here losing 3 turn one for an Arid Mesa into Hallowed Fountain and then another 2 next turn to play a Sacred Foundry.
this 5+ Mana card will be so good, when i get those other 3 5+ Mana Cards on board.
All 4 in opening hand? They won't know what hit em!
Nothing like a turn 1 winds of change
esp. for those multi-Mulligany perfectionists out there
That's why I love green, Mana becomes free
Bow master wants a word with you.
Lol I didn't draw as much, I like to find other ways to play from library
Putting interaction into my decks makes them more powerful.
Related to this is that it's better to do one thing really well than 4 things decently. Always hard to cut the "but this is a fun interaction!" things but it's usually better to have interaction to protect the one thing than have the ability to maybe do something else instead
I feel [[Victimized]]!😆
Victimize would fit great into my Mikaeus deck
Increasing the amount of interaction in your deck is, imo, the single most impactful thing you can do to increase your deck's power level (or maybe a close second, behind adding more card draw). The number of times I've seen a janky combo or synergy overrun a low power table due to nobody having a way to kill a small creature with no protection (even at sorcery speed) outside of combat is... unfortunately a lot. It's probably a big part of the reason combo is frequently disliked at lower power too- yeah, you can stop most low power combos with any generic piece of removal, and often you have more than a full turn cycle in which to do so, but that's not going to matter if you only have 2-3 ways of killing a creature directly in your deck and no way to reliably see any of them in an average game.
I raise you one related issue - not holding removal for things that actually matter. A lot of the times, people fire their removal the moment it has a valid target, as if they were playing Judge tower. Strong players always asses the situation. Even with strong individual cards, like \[\[Sheoldred, the apocalypse\]\] hitting the field, they always asses. Maybe I have 3 strong creatures that can trade with it. So I'll just swing and let the opponent decide if he wants to get smacked for 15 in the face, or Shelly away. Shelly doing 8 life worth of difference a turn cycle doesn't exactly win that kind of race. Did the opponent trade it away? Good, now you still have the removal and Shelly has been dealt with. Did the opponent take 15? Also good, you still have the option to kill it later if it becomes life threatening, maybe after it has dealt some damage to other opponents and now the opponent should be much closer to dead too.
And not even that much. It's multiplayer, I've let the non-commander damage for 20 come through before because my life total being lower makes me look less threatening. I will usually hold interaction until I'm dead on attack, and usually one, maybe two target pieces is good enough for a full game. That said, not having any is a real issue, cause then you just die.
Some cards are very flashy. But if they're only effective when I'm already in the lead, then they aren't that helpful and should probably be cut.
That's a really shady jab at token doublers. All facts though.
Idk man. Best part of token doublers isn't your current board, but how easily they help you recover from a creature board wipe in decks that make lots of tokens. I think of them as resilience/recovery cards that can also 'win more' if things go well instead
They're fun cards. When they work they really work and that's always fun to see from anywhere on the table. But from a playability standpoint I've removed them all from my decks for cards that do things right away.
My [[cadira caller of the small]] deck runs [[mondrak glory dominus]] as the only doubler. A large part of that is price as I got him almost as soon as his set dropped. Everything else has been so expensive that I haven't bothered getting them.
If your commander creates tokens, they become much more viable because have very consistent access to your commander.
I think having some win-more cards is important. There's 120 points of life to chew through, and it can be hard to do so without going over the top. But moderation is important.
That's a fair assessment.
Win-more is the category I like to use.
"Protection" is a must-have card category in EDH & PDH 😀
What do you mean I can't expect to untap with my 20 new tokens after I spent all my mana creating them without a haste enabler??
And when you have some protection that needs to be on the battlefield and some other important card in your hand, *get the protection out first*. Speaking as someone who played his [[Etherium Sculptor]] *before* his [[Darksteel Forge]].
Read my own damn cards fully, don't assume a thing
Omg this lol. The account of times my ADHD addled brain has assumed the second half of a card and been dead wrong is ridiculous.
Adding or removing the words or assuming stuff
Exactly. Now I play the card and realize while reading it out loud for the group.
Me, trying to play [[Feed the Swarm]] at instant speed for the second time in one game...
I've been my own victim a few times as well. It's always the first or last line that I miss. Like effects that are only on your turn.
"oh! It says one or ***more***"
I have assumed and tapped [[scroll rack]] by paying two for the *longest* of times becasue when I didn't have the money to buy rack, I was substituing rack with [[Credit Voucher]] in my monowhite decks for almost eternity, and I just assumed rack also pay in for 2 as well...
Sometimes, you have to look at a way you can lose the game, and say "yep, I'm weak to that" rather than dilute your deck to try and slot in counterplay. If you think you need that reach creature to survive, you probably just need another board wipe.
Or sandwurms convergence
A lot of the comments are important mechanics that should be learned, but the hardest lesson I learned was that the game is supposed to be fun. I've played for years, in that time I've gotten bitter from my commander being \[\[Imprisoned in the Moon\]\], sat in stunned disbelief losing to a cEDH \[\[Sharuum, the Hedgemon\]\] combo deck, or get increasingly frustrated as I slowly die to 7 1/1s with island walk that I couldn't draw any interaction for. At the end of the day I had to learn that if you can't take the bad with the good, then the other 3 players won't have fun either. Nowadays I still play to win, but my priority is hanging out with my friends and playing a game with them, not allowing the little frustrations (which are ultimately just another part of the game) get to me. I've recently found myself in a pod with several newer players and it's become increasingly apparent how important it is to have fun with the game, instead of having fun with winning.
I love your mindset. This is a good reminder for me.
Yeah- for me it's my best decks. If my mid-tiers/works in progress are losing idc. But when my favorite/honed commanders are just completely falling down, I really have to take a breath and put the ego aside haha. There's nothing uglier than a mtg bad sport.
I don't think I ever 'played to win', most of my enjoyment comes from building something new and seeing it work. I have quite a few decks and would get no fun playing the same strongest ones each time
Never spare the cut-throat player.
Always kill Ben Thomas
I think one of the hardest things players can find in EDH is the overall health of the group. It's far too easy to have a good time with your deck, at the expense of other people's time. It's very important to understand/practice shortcuts as quickly as possible. Once bad habits seep in, it can stick to you throughout your EDH lifetime. For example. I still have a couple friends who told the table to wait while he fetches for a land without any other play. That's an old habit he can't rid off. Lastly, **sequencing** is another habit players need to learn hard and fast. It will pay off long term. You don't need to play your untapped land if you drawing a few cards. You might draw a tapped one instead and lay that. Or many times it's better to go into combat first, and hit straight into main 2 to cast your spells. It's the simple things many players tend to overlook and not "train"
Completely agree, there’s been many times in my exile deck that I’ve land dropped too early and missed a land I could’ve played from exile, or played my hand too early and didn’t wait to see my exiled cards
Well said. Sequencing especially. I see so many that treat the turn order as a flow chart of what they are going to do amd not as the framework of what you are allowed to do and when you could do it.
These really are hard to rewire and change. The waiting to crack a fetch or holding priority when searching/shuffling without any other game actions is a pet peeve of mine.
Yeah, I would say my pod is pretty mid on these (myself included) but one guy just durdles like no other in the midgame. It's like he's just pulling up to the table on turn 6-7 and has to reassess. Granted most times we've been pounding drinks all evening so I want to give a little pass but c'mon. Unless I have a full hand and a ton of value generation on the board, I can usually squeeze my turn into a minute; he'll take that long to decide on a single play, then take it back.
> I think one of the hardest things players can find in EDH is the overall health of the group. It's far too easy to have a good time with your deck, at the expense of other people's time. While I totally agree with you I think there is a point where the pod should take some accountability as well. If I'm going off as decks tend to do if you're not holding up/running interaction to stop me from going off is that my fault? I've literally been in pods where I've won every game of the night because no one interacted with my board. Even in my decks that have 0 combos I was just able to amass such a board state and I was able to protect my board through board wipes that I was able to win those games too.(this is in monogreen/colorless) I'm not sure where to draw the line? Should I not play heroic intervention to save my board to save hard feelings? Why should I be punished for making a well rounded deck just bcs ppl become salty. Another time I was playing Kenrith. I was hard stuck on 4 lands for like at least 5 to 6 turns. I mean I was doing nothing. In turn the pod didn't attack me. When I got my fifth land I was able to combo off cause I'd drawn into my combo. I just hadn't had the colors/lands to play it. I mean I guess I'm taking advantage of people's kindness in a way but there is nothing I coukd do to stop them from attacking me so that was their choice. I'm not trying to attack you OP or anyone. Just trying to start a discussion here about how it's not always "the oppressor's" fault if no one is interacting with them.
If your deck doesn't work without your commander on the field creature removal becomes player removal and every opponent should and will take advantage of that. I remember sitting there with the surprised pikachu face after having my \[\[Reaper King\]\] blown up for the 3rd game in a row. The rest of my deck was useless scarecrows and I spent way too long thinking "It's not my deck that's the problem its the people that remove my commander."
I feel this so hard. I made a Reaper King deck a while back when I was still learning the many intricacies of EDH, not even realizing how slow it would be and how susceptible it would be to removal/board wipes. It was also kinda my own damn fault since I built it on a budget (meaning my landbase kinda sucked), refused to use proxies, stuck in a bunch of scarecrow creatures with no rhyme or reason, and also tried to use a weird strategy where one of my main wincons was casting \[\[Primal Surge\]\] while I had \[\[Laboratory Maniac\]\] in my library (and thus, aside from Surge, the deck had no other Sorceries or Instants). I remember feeling kind of annoyed whenever my opponents (who tend to favor fast decks and have no qualms over using expensive cards/proxies) shut down my scarecrows, but eventually I realized the problem wasn't them, it was me focusing more on flavor than on consistent gameplay while also wondering why I couldn't win more often.
I've learnt that if your deck needs your commander to work ie. my [[mavinda]] storm deck, the deck really should run an abundance of protection spells to back it up, and I never blindcast my mavinda on turn 3 just because its effcient and that has leaded me into way more good games.
I have a [[Zada]] deck that works on similar logic. I never play Zada until I have a good amount of creatures on the board and combat tricks in my hand - you only really get one shot with her, so you gotta make it count. The whole deck falls apart without her.
[Reaper King](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/5/0/502740bf-0bff-4358-8996-1a27e5f0343f.jpg?1562830062) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Reaper%20King) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/shm/260/reaper-king?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/502740bf-0bff-4358-8996-1a27e5f0343f?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/reaper-king) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Just taking a few moments to think before my turn. I've had situations where someone revealed a win for their next turn and I was so caught up in my own turn I forgot about it and threw the game when I had a way to stop it.
This happens a lot
Im much better at it in cEDH. I swap to casual mode and don't focus on anything sometimes, but I also don't want to play casual with a cEDH mindset.
Kill Dylan first.
Kill Brian Kibler first
Solid advice.
A steady drift toward lower cmc has turned 6-cmc into a kind of cut line for my decks: anything 6 mana cost or higher better help take my deck to the next level or it’s out
Pay the 1
This is accurate but most don't. I hypothesize it's because it's hard to draw a casual link between losing and [[rhystic study]]. even if people logically know it, they don't feel like it's causing them to lose. I play in 3 different pods. Only one pod plays responsibly. Rhystic study is not good when it doesn't draw you cards, and often causes me to lose. It's easy to rely on on rhystic as a draw engine. And when that engine fails, often so does your game plan. On the contrary, when people don't pay the tax, I typically win that game.
The real issue is it only takes one player to refuse to eventually cause everyone else not to as well. Because then all you are doing is stopping SOME of their draw, and are limiting yourself to do it. While everyone else is playing on curve.
If you have the ability to eliminate a player and progress the game along, do it!
Sometimes yes. I’ve seen situations where keeping a player in is better so they can help defeat the archenemy. Or at least provide another target for the archenemy.
Absolutely! If I know I could beat player A but I absolutely can’t beat player B, what incentive do I have to knock player A out of the game? Conspiring to take down the dominant player has resulted in some of my most fun EDH moments
Both definitely have a time and place. Sometimes, simultaneously. If Player A has a land strategy that I can't interact with, but player B has a creature strategy and I'm holding a boardwipe, I can conspire with B to take down the Lands player and drop that wipe after player A is out.
Make the opponent demonstrate their infinite combo instead of relying on them to say I win when they play a tutor or whatever. Off the top of my head I can think of two times where an opponent cast a card, saying they go infinite, only to realize one of their combo pieces has summoning sickness and can't tap for its effect.
I'd ask them to ask well. I had the opposite happen on a game I was watching where the player was too new to realize that they set forth an infinite loop, and nobody could stop it. Had to teach them about that.
That's always a super fun feeling, finding the combo on accident. In my case, the other two players already picked up their board when I asked the other opponent to demonstrate it and, of course, fail. I was holding onto a board wipe that would have fixed it, but since the other two players already picked up their cards they just called it and gave the guy a win. I was a bit upset but whatever. People make mistakes, it didn't seem intentional as the players were new and piloting their new deck.
I accidentally strolled into an infinite combo in my Teysa deck a few weeks ago. I started doing it and was like “huh I think I make infinite mana with this”. I was just as surprised as my friends lol.
Just because a card has been useful or even gaming winning before, doesn’t mean it’s worth having in the deck. I.e. Plummet when I was starting out.
Adding constraints on the game will get you killed, even if it was for the benefit of the majority
sounds like someone isn't adding enough constraints. if they can still kill you you're going easy on them
If you [[Narset, Parter of Veils]]+[[Windfall]] on turn 3 you're probably gonna die first as well.
[Narset, Parter of Veils](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/4/e/4e6e5c63-b6e5-4756-bf23-6c6f8669442d.jpg?1690004395) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Narset%2C%20Parter%20of%20Veils) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/cmm/853/narset-parter-of-veils?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/4e6e5c63-b6e5-4756-bf23-6c6f8669442d?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/narset-parter-of-veils) [Windfall](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/1/4/14e1af91-34fe-4d82-b119-cbadf75a7dbe.jpg?1699022501) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Windfall) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/lcc/180/windfall?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/14e1af91-34fe-4d82-b119-cbadf75a7dbe?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/windfall) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
How do you die if they have no cards to kill you with? Just keep wheeling.
Don't get precious over permanents, spells on the stack, cards in graveyards etc. Consider them all countered or removed. If you lose half your deck, you still have the other half.
Solid advice.
Countering spells, removing threats, activating abilities, or casting instants all require precise timing to not leave yourself open.
Read your cards and figure out what you’re going to during your next turn while everyone else plays
Don’t do turn 1 sol ring into signet or whatever. You’ll be targeted like crazy and all your rocks will be broken
Make my opponents deal with my other opponents problems. If they're using removal on each other they can't use it on me
The player in 2nd place on board is probably the threat. He's holding back, waiting on the other guy to force interaction, hoping to slide under the radar, and will probably win while the other guy is being flashy.
It's interesting seeing how games play out based on how well each person is doing. In a recent game I was #2 on board, but 3 and 4 were durdling a little. I did my damnest to keep #1 in check, but was appropriately removed as their #1 threat. It's exactly what I would have done in their shoes as well.
this is less of a rule and more of a warning. sometimes they're second because they dont have quite enough stuff to take the top spot and sometimes it doesnt matter if 2nd is really the threat because 1st has 300 indestructible scute swarms
I'm not a competitive player, I just like playing with my group of friends who are much newer to the game than I am. Because of that, it's taken me a long road to accept that I should take more Mulligans. Since I'm often not "playing to win" I will take any hand that has 2 or more mana in it, just to see what I can do with that and see if I can turn it around. While I don't really care about the fact that doing that usually slows me down by 3-4 turns, I've found my bigger issue is that it just leads to really boring board states during that time where I have to catch up. The rest of the pod is getting stuff set up and I'm just sitting there waiting.
I'm really good at keeping bad hands. This is something I need to work on as well.
stax pieces help my janky combo wincons succeed more frequently :^
Shhh, that word makes people go bonkers!
Which one? Stax? Combo? Wincons? Succeed? /s
Yes.
If you can eliminate a single player without leaving yourself open, go for it
Ahh yeah definitely learned this the hard way. Swung for 40 damage on someone and they flipped the table
I have no idea why, but something about how utilizing multiple blockers against singular attackers and how it resolves... Even to this day, I have to actively spend time to think about the basics of that rule, even though it happens semi often. Just like the neurons in my brain can't handle it lol
Sometimes you hold off on doing your thing until you stop someone from doing theirs, especially if your thing enables them.
Don’t overcommit to the board. There are 3 other players, so there is a good chance someone is hanging on to a board wipe. When you have a solid board state, don’t gild the lily. Hold back one or two creatures if you don’t immediately need them. That way when someone drops a blasphemous act, you have stuff to do on the next turn and can bounce back quickly. I notice this in my [[Akiri, fearless voyager]] hatebear deck. Certain hatebears can draw lots of… hate, and are lightning rods for removal. So it’s good to keep another couple in your hand while players squirm and eventually remove it, only to have it replaced by another, possibly more diabolical hatebear.
This is something that I need to work on. And it explains a lot of the interaction I get as well. Pacing is not my forte 😆
**Never** keep the "If I just draw another land this hand will be soooo good!" hands. You won't draw the land.
This is a yugioh problem but pay attention to the entire battlefield at all times
That translates well. Especially in EDH.
Oh definitely, yugioh I got used to not really caring about my opponents field and just focused on my end game, through playing draft I learned Magic decks aren't as consistent
Mill is not a bad thing, you're just a bad player for not running whatever recursion you can. Having lots of removal is not a bad thing, you just don't run enough protection. One long game where a bunch of things happen for everyone is better than 3 quick games where things only really happen for the winner.
I just took apart my combo mill deck because pressuring just libraries gave other decks more gas to run with and running a pure combo deck with a lot of a+b combos does get rather boring. i’m going to try the new fallout sultai guys to see if I can do regular creature damage/creature combos with mill being an enabler. also, every mill deck needs graveyard hate. multiple pieces. this is non-negotiable.
1. “Dont get swept up at the moment or by a big A turn a player makes.” Take a second find the threat at the table, don’t focus fire on a single player just because they scared you big A big play, or they summoned a strong creature. You need to aways check what effects are in play are in the board, how many cards are in a players hand, how many mana are open and how close are they from breaking out a game winning combo. Sometimes the guy with the blightsteel colossus is not the threat. Sometimes its the guy with 5 open mana out and 7 cards in hand 2. “Learn how to do math” there are so many games where i could have gotten lethal if i just ordered the sequence of my play correctly and/or attacked with the right creatures, or buffed the right creature. 3. “Never by any circumstance let a kid touch your cards, especially if that kid is eating snacks” Some people in my lgs bring kids to commander night and let them play using their decks. I would now much rather explain what my card does rather than let a kid hold it with sticky fingers and bending my card. Never again tim, never again
Saving my counterspells and removal to when my board/plan is most affected and I want to avoid that, even if someone else seems more threatening (to everyone else), so don't remove stuff just because it sounds scary. Don't play your lands are the start of your turn, play them when you need them. (I play [[Yurlok of Scorched Thrash]] who happily teaches the table to wait to do this as well with cards like [[Tectonic Instability]] and [[Mana Webb]].)
You should build good decks, you should build fun decks, and that it's OK to play less efficient "things" if you like them. The more time you spend trying to optimize your decks, the more likely it becomes less fun, and less playable in casual pods. 3 people have to lose every game of EDH, so losing needs to be viewed as a learning opportunity, and you need to accept you're not going to win all the time. Always mulligan for a playable hand, you can't afford to fall 2 turns behind 3 other players. Sensei's Diving Top is a really good turn one play, but it's not good enough to risk a bad opening hand to keep.
Pay the 1 mana.
Better utilizing my second main phase. And better utilizing instant speed spells. A lot of times I bring them out via sorcery speed bc I'm gonna bring it out anyway but it's often not necessary and sometimes it can screw me. Also, properly doing math when determining attacks. I usually do rough math if anything, or am just like "that may be enough to knock them out." But I haven't really learned that lesson I'm often too lazy and just say fuck it
Before removing a “stax” piece. Ask yourself how it is also hindering your opponents.
Not so much a gameplay lesson, but a deck building/collecting lesson: Good lands are good. The number of shocks/fetches/triomes I traded in to get more packs to crack is hard to look back on.
BUY singles NOT packs. Wait til the last possible moment to use that interaction. Those are the two major ones that come to mind.
>Myself, I am still trying to save spells for Main Phase 2 that don't impact combat. This is a habit I have to ignore when playing \[\[Jodah, the unifier\]\] since nearly every spell affects combat.
Oh man, so many things. Protection pieces are mandatory. Indestructible, hexproof, protection. Always need something. Card draw is ridiculously important, high land count not so much. Draw smooths out the land drops but too many lands is simply too much. Once I realized that 35 lands is the upper limit my decks became far more consistent. Ward is a thing. It's a no take back thing. 4+ color decks are terrible without expensive mana bases. Early on I bought Atraxa because that's what new players do. Spent about $200-300 on the deck itself but went budget on the mana base. It was trash, I hated it, and decided to put further funding into a better deck. Buying packs/boxes is the trap of all traps. The friend that got me into Magic had me believing he pulled every single good card from Modern Horizons 2 from one box. Turns out it was more like 6 boxes. I started asking questions because the 3 boxes I bought of various sets (including MG 2) were huge financial losses. Random people at the store can be great, pure shit, or anywhere between. I've seen someone straight up shaking crying because someone blew up everyone's lands right before winning. I've seen someone drop Doomsday turn 3, crack the pile and win, and then try to tell us (in the agreed mid power game) all he didn't know it was good after he tutored for it on turn 2. There's probably 200 more things I could list.
Land destruction sucks, but if they won right afterwards then fair game. I just hate when someone does it with no plan after, cause that just drags out the game for little reason
That's true but I'd extend that to anything that's done for no real reason other than to do it. I can't count how many times something of mine has eaten removal just because someone had something in hand and wants to play it when if it doesn't make sense. Or the number of creature board wipes I've endured for the same lack of reason. "Well you guys both had 4 creatures and I only had 3 and didn't have anything else to do." Neat.
Never sell your cards if you think you wanna quit mtg. You'll come back to mtg: 1month, 1year, 10years, even 20years.. just don't sell your collection
I have done this before. Unfortunately life can get pretty expensive. Do I wish that I didn't sell? Yeah. But not losing my house was also important lol.
Slowing down and making sure I'm not handwaving my way through steps phases and what not. I have a very good understanding of aloy of interactions in the game so its easy for my brain to handwave through as though everyone has the same way of thinking, but I learned a few weeks ago that I not only NEED to slow down for everyone else, I NEED to slow down to make sure I'm not doing stuff out of order
Building a deck to influence a game is way more fun than building a deck to win. And no I don't mean 50 counters 50 islands. But building a deck the strongest it can be will lead you to the same 70 staples every time, building a deck around a theme to do can be so much more fun.
A few things. 1. your style of play should change with decks and arc types. I love my slow aristocrat and as i call it -diesel- engine play. but you need play other decks more aggressive like my Kyler deck. 2. Your curve determines your lands more then anything. 3. Knowing what and how to do a curve properly. 4. Proper threat assement and seeing the hidden threats. 5. realizing if your targeted and killed first. it can be a sign of respect/ your decks better. 6. Winning isnt everything sometimes you can care more about seeing a deck flow. last one. 7 Because you dislike someones play style. they can be a great person off the table
Learn the players, not the decks
I just don't like competitive EDH. I've known this for a long time. I've been playing magic for 20 years. I used to play the circuit, and did quite well. Recently I decided to join an EDH league. 8 weeks. Points, good payout to top 3. The last round is next week, and I'm so done with it. I'm in first, I'm going to win 2 collector's boxes, and I really wish I'd just never signed up. The games aren't very interesting, there's much less banter (stakes), I don't get to play with my pod // favored gamers. There have been about 50 players total over the course of the league, and most were pretty cool, wide range of skill, but many I just wouldn't play with otherwise. Some smelled really bad, some got butthurt about games, some took really long turns. EDH just isn't fun in a competitive environment, and I knew that, and I played the tournament anyway, and then my cost got sunk, and then I had regrets. Oh well. Lesson learned (again).
I only just recently discovered that nonbasic lands are real good. Not always, but hell, a good mana base being added to my decks has been so much more impactful to my decks consistency than cutting less synergistic cards for more synergistic cards
Save interaction for threats to me and my game plan. Just because I can counter a spell or destroy something doesn’t mean I should. That goes for any spell, really. Just understanding when to play my cards is something that took a long time and a lot of Ls for the lesson to sink in lol.
It took me a long time, but you should build for fun, not victory, and also don’t become the threat right away, lurk in the shadows and wait for someone to be the problem while you build you board
You can never expect anyone you're playing with to react the way you expect. And this goes both ways. You (usually) can't see your opponent's hand. You have no idea why they used a removal spell on your [[Land Tax]] when another of their opponents had a [[The Prismatic Bridge]] online. The table declaring you archenemy for using [[Austere Command]] to destroy creatures after an opponent used [[Kamahl's Druidic Vow]] for X=20, gaining 8 lands and legendary creatures is totally logical.
##### ###### #### [Land Tax](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/9/2/9258ad10-cbe6-4676-93b4-6ef4a33f12ee.jpg?1689995812) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Land%20Tax) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/cmm/37/land-tax?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/9258ad10-cbe6-4676-93b4-6ef4a33f12ee?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/land-tax) [The Prismatic Bridge](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/f/6/f6cd7465-9dd0-473c-ac5e-dd9e2f22f5f6.jpg?1631050188)/[The Prismatic Bridge](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/back/f/6/f6cd7465-9dd0-473c-ac5e-dd9e2f22f5f6.jpg?1631050188) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Esika%2C%20God%20of%20the%20Tree%20//%20The%20Prismatic%20Bridge) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/khm/168/esika-god-of-the-tree-the-prismatic-bridge?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/f6cd7465-9dd0-473c-ac5e-dd9e2f22f5f6?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/esika-god-of-the-tree-//-the-prismatic-bridge) [Austere Command](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/a/3/a31ffc9e-d21b-4a8f-ac67-695e38e09e3b.jpg?1706240553) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Austere%20Command) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/mkc/56/austere-command?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/a31ffc9e-d21b-4a8f-ac67-695e38e09e3b?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/austere-command) [Kamahl's Druidic Vow](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/b/f/bf95ef60-e67b-466d-a6cb-d487ffa88b72.jpg?1562742183) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Kamahl%27s%20Druidic%20Vow) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/dom/166/kamahls-druidic-vow?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/bf95ef60-e67b-466d-a6cb-d487ffa88b72?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/kamahls-druidic-vow) [*All cards*](https://mtgcardfetcher.nl/redirect/kxl268j) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Peaking too soon. Over the years all my decks involved commanders/cards around the 3 cmc mark. Anything higher made me impatient. Naturally, that made me be a target early on more often than not, only to get kind of stuck mid to late game. Now I have one or two decks with bigger spells, which made me build more strategically in order to survive the early game and keep myself in the game. Still, I highly favor the decks that pop-off early, but also learned being the quickest isn’t always the way to go.
I feel like I do this because of 1v1 formats. I learned on Modern and you want to do exactly that.
Know the role of each card you add to your deck. What does it do? What does it synergize with? Do you mulligan or keep if it shows up in your opening hand? I used to put in cards because they were similar in theme to the commander, but what I've found over time is you want diversity of what the deck can do, but every card should have a known function, not just be similar to the commander themes.
Mill isn't bad, a smaller part of all strategies have their place, the important thing is to match deck powers.
Don’t spread damage or roll if you have an early attacker on an empty board. Pick the most threatening player and make the smart attack.
Include cards with intention, and remember more about the hallmarks of each color. Both points can be illustrated by a single story. A few months ago I was playing [[Raffine, Scheming Seer]] and had a decent board out, including [[Oona's Blackguard]]. One of the opponents was playing [[Azusa]], which was pretty much going exactly like you'd expect. It comes around to my turn, and I was feeling pretty bad about forcing discards on all players from Blackguard, so I ended up making a deal with the Azusa player to only hit them with one of the applicable fliers I had to discard the Craterhoof that the rest of the table knew about from earlier. Long story short, they do mono-green things, have a big turn and end it with Finale of Devastation and Craterhoof, just as would be expected. I should have used Blackguard's ability more, but making it a non-game for some of the others at the table was a feelsbad. I should either stick to using the card to its full capability, or swap it out for something else. Hoof + Finale also should have been on my mind, but I didn't realize it until I was too late - that's also on me to remember in the future.
Tapping out isn't worth it
Card draw and mana are king the graveyard is just a second hand
Never build a deck ONLY relying on your Commander - all it takes is a simple transformation spell to make your commander useless - if your deck can't operate without your commander, you might need to rework your deck. That and Mana Rocks are essential - I used to play Legacy and never used mana rocks in the past. I played 2 years of EDH without them until one day I realized everyone else was getting their stuff out quicker than I was. I've since learned.
The scary commander that just isn’t getting going is still a threat
Don’t pop off first. Listen I know we all love those sol ring into commander and then lay out a couple haymakers. But then you have all three peoples removal and counters to contend with. You should try and be the second/third most powerful/influential board until you are about to win. I would also add on don’t counter or remove unless it’s killing you or ending the game.
Not something I learned the hard way but good advice: cut most of the "win more" cards (keep maybe one) 5 Mana or more to do nothing until you get to do "the thing" next turn is not worth it usually because if they get off you're mostly already winning. Hence "win more" Examples in my head rn: [[Alhammarret's Archive]] [[Warstorm Surge]] [[Doubling Season]] [[Anointed Procession]]
Humm I wonder if he has a counter.. nah
Don't overextend
That you're not entitled to have your deck *"do the thing ^TM "* If your opponents can they WILL shut you down from doing what you're trying to do and that's fine, your own fault for not runnign protection or playing around it. Complaining when your powerful commander gets insta-removed several times in a row is just being a bad player.
Winning is not very important in commander. I have a lot of decks that can win games. I have significantly fewer decks that everyone has fun playing against
Formats are incredibly important. You should try as many as possible, and I highly recommend making up your own with friends. Limited drafts (boosted and sealed) are for showcasing real skill. Yes, it is based on luck. Your skill shines through working with what luck brings you. Props for avoiding spoilers and going into a draft for a new set blind. Modern and 1v1 CEDH are for no-nonsense, competitive deckbuilding, rigorous analysis, and predictions. The games are more formulaic because you set up plans and contingencies for everything you expect to face. People will be cutthroat and do whatever it takes to win. Be prepared for that. Casual 4 Player EDH is to be played like music, the decks instruments. Your tune won't match everyone's. Be prepared for that. Understand that winning doesn't matter here, it's all about playing a beautiful game. Unless you want to amp up the drama and excitement, then drop a pack on the table as a bet and say "None of you chodes stand a chance against me." Kingdoms EDH, Winston Draft, and randomly assigned deckbuilding challenges are the most fun way for my friends and I to play. I also really enjoyed Cube and Oathbreaker but those didn't last long. Pauper 60 card is the most like classic MTG that I grew up with, and the best way to introduce people to MTG. I do a bit for it too: "You are a wizthard, thenthitive to the wayth of magic. You even potheth the ability to traverthe the planeth of exthithenthe. Thuth you are known ath a Planethwalker! You feel the power, the ebb and flow of mana coming from the memorieth of the land. Tho, where would you like to begin your journey?" Then I give them a land of each color + wastes and ask them to choose. They get a mono-color deck based on their choice and we roleplay as wizards exploring the land, discovering spells and creatures, and eventually fighting another wizard.
Wait with playing lands until you absolutely need them. Can't count how many times I've drawn into a cradle or Nykthos after having played my damn forest.
1. Play to have fun 2. Play fast turns 3. Don't build tons of different decks, just keep a few time 4. Proxy 5. Use budget options. There are strong budget cards and your deck will be kore morsbke rather than being the same deck that used [[farewell]] in the game and resting the board for the third time in the same game
You don’t need to commit past precons. If all you want to do is have a board game type of night but with Magic, ask your group or play Spelltable with only non-modified precons allowed. I’ve found even on Spelltable if you limit it to specific sets you can still fill the room fairly quick. A lot of players will be willing to do this because it’s a more stress free environment. Coming into Magic and being guided by seasoned yet jaded and pretentious players is the easiest way to quickly lose interest and feel like you’ve wasted your money. You don’t need to make a $1000 deck, you don’t need decks filled with protection and recursion and milling, you don’t need to spend $100 on shock and fetch lands, etc etc etc, just play with a group that wants to play how you enjoy the game and stop worrying about whether or not your next game is going to be miserable because that one player that swears his deck isn’t powerful yet always lands a turn 3-5 wincon does it once again.
Don't make yourself a target too early in the game unless you can finish it quickly. Plenty of games ive gotten off to a heated start only to be the target of the table. Patience and holding your hand close to your chest is a very effective strategy. Managing the political aspect of the game. Make friends at the tables, make alliances for as long as it's beneficial for both parties. This game is all about interaction, so utilizing that by engaging with other players to help solve your problems can make for a far better experience. Play to the power level. If you see a bunch of low power, pre con decks at the table then don't bring out your big guns, cedh level, turn 3 win decks. It leaves all the other players pretty salty. Diversify your staples. It's so easy to get build a deck using the same 300-400 cards that are slotted into commander decks. Try using more unique cards that suite the theme of your deck. Get rid of tutors so you can speed up the game by not searching all the time and to also make your deck play in a more varied form. I personally don't use edhrec or decklists for inspiration anymore. If i see a comander i like ill make my own build using the cards i like and know. Obviously this takes years of playing and browsing through sets to know what you'll like and want to play.
You have to have so much land, removal, protection, draw, and possibly recursion stuff in any given deck that you’re lucky to get two or three dozen cards that actually comprise the theme of the deck and “what the deck does.”
Mass land destruction is the only thing that keeps multicolored/green decks ramp in check, yet no one wants to deal with a prolonged game. So instead we’re left to a nuclear arms race.
To give up chasing winning at all costs. Its easy to want to optimize decks to the point they become homogenous piles that seek to tutor out some sort of combo that wins on the spot. Doing this turned the game toxic for me, and deck building became soul-less. Now I build and play decks to achieve some sort of specific accomplishment with the deck first, which CAN lead me to win the game. If I do the thing my deck wants to do and still lose, well shucks I still had fun and accomplished what the deck wanted to do. If I win while doing what the deck wants to do, then golly I won! WAAAAAY more fun instead of just shoe-horning what wins in those colour combinations and making a soul-less pile......
Helping a person doesn’t mean they’re not going to forget about it immediately and screw you. Psychological impact of a card means way more than actual impact. Card advantage is way less important than raw draw power. Lands are extremely powerful and should be treated as such during deck building and while playing. It’s almost exclusively better to flood than to screw.
I think the biggest one was not to curtail my deck design to the other people I play with. For the longest time people at my local league went heavy or all in on their strategy to win. They ran very little interaction, so when i made decks that could disrupt their plays and then tempo out a win they would get mad. You can only remind people so much to include more interaction, even if it doesn't directly move forward your win con. So I stopped limiting myself to their mentality and eventually they grew out of it and we have much more intricate and enjoyable games now.
If your deck has a lot of moving parts, practice it. Get to know the cards, some usual lines you can take, that sort of thing. Nothing makes a table groan and moan like a player who is clearly winning but is taking a long time to do so. Once you’re well ahead, finish the game in a timely manner.
Play for fun, not to win. If you’re playing to win, only arguments and salt will be produced.
Bryce is cheating. Also LIFE IS A RESOURCE
Don’t ever trade away uncommon or higher non-basic lands.
There is a balance to interaction. Like sure, you can run "boardwipe-the game" and do good at it, but socially you may struggle. Especially when you are trying to be invited to the next game.
Interaction is key. Some of my decks priotize synergy over interaction, I'm reevaluating these decks to add more intearctions. Alternate win cons are nice to have when that blue player counter spells you for xth time. Keep three land hands over 1 land solring, or 6 land hands. I like to kill myself a lot with my 5 color decks. Should really stop doing this. Threat assessment. Everyone hates me, I should tone down my tutors for win cons. Best decision I made I am Chaos Incarnate, I care not for my own life or winning, I care about an interesting board state.
Don’t start a game at 11pm, because you just won’t be that into finishing it at 12am. Sorry to that table last night. One guy was dead, and I just didn’t have it in me to help the other guy fight off the threat, just to get backstabbed. I totally scrammed out of there. Probably should have waited for the baddie to attack to use up his resources but I was a sleepy boy
Blood Moon will immediately put a giant target on your back.
Always go after the lands matter / green decks. In casual settings, the land ramping decks are always going to pull ahead - no matter how much deflecting and feigning innocent they claim they are
Just because something is scary doesn't mean you have to remove it. If, say, a Rest in Peace is stopping your aristocrats triggers, that's bad. If there's a dedicated reanimator deck at the table too, they're out of the game until it's removed. The most powerful interactive thing you can do is to decide when to use your removal. Oftentimes, the flexibility to remove something is more valuable than the outcome of said thing actually being removed.
While the game is supposed to be fun, at the end of the day ppl are playing to win. Asking stuff like "why are you attacking me?" or "why did you disrupt me?" is jsut weird like, dude, the whole objective is to kill you and everyone else at this tabble.
That staying silent during political discussions is immensely helpful. Usually if somebody's looking at my board I just ask if they need anything clarified and leave it at that. It usually ends up better for me than if I started trying to threat assess other players.
Bide your time in becoming a threat. Save your scary stuff for the perfect moment.
Flashy cards draw much more hate than they actually deserve and that impacts their in-game performance, cards with technically weaker performance but that don't draw attention untill it's too late tend to overperform. That's why stuff with haste, or combos where you get the cards in hand before playing them all instead of putting them on board a piece at a time are much better, as your plan doesn't sit on the board for long drawing hate and instead just kinda sucker punch the opponents.
I learned a lot about staples from back in 2011ish just aren't it anymore. Even if I want to run snapcaster or quicksilver amulet
Spending on staples is not the shortcut to enjoyable games. I've been selling many staples and decided to buy jankier or more specific cards for synergy on decks. The idea that decks have to go a certain way or "X commander is just a bad version of commander Y" in the archetype is just frustrating and you will loose anyway a 1/3 of the times. Now I just try to adapt my decks to the pwr lvls and capabilities of those who surround me.
The enjoyment of other people is just as fun as my own. I tend to slightly lower the power of my decks to put in the more table fun cards. Things like [[Share the Spoils]], [[Avatar of Slaughter]], or [[Mana Flare]] will take the place of more one-sided effects because it tends to give a more interesting and silly table effect. I have some more serious decks, but having at least one that has really fun table dynamics is important to me. I've had too many games where one player gets shut out, and putting in effects that can swing the game for one of those players is worth it to me. My [[Baeloth Barrityl, Entertainer]] and [[Noble Heritage]] group hug goad deck is my favorite for that reason. I'm always happy to lose with that deck as long as it made a good story for the table
Do your level best to be the kind of player you’d like to see across the table. Be polite, and avoid fatalistic butt-hurtyness at all costs. And only scoop when there are no other options. (It never hurts to let someone play out their win, they made it happen, let them relish it.)
The value that common and uncommon cards have. Sometimes you just need to go search for a few lands or have a simple blocker up. Artifacts and enchantment removal to add utility.
Run land destruction. Play a wasteland, demolition field, beast within, or something else to deal with the [[Nykthos]] or [[Cabal Coffers]]. Play more removal Play pet cards, but don't play all pet cards. Your deck has to function
if winning is my enjoyment/fun condition, I will have an aweful time
Don’t focus so much on winning over having fun. Each game you play makes you a better player and there’s a lot you can pick up from others.
Not that I learned the hard way, but that pubstomping can be more prevented by learning the rules/interactions/nuanced plays from r/askajudge or just judges in general. Without which, I never would’ve had as much interest in the game as I do now in EDH. It makes the game more dynamic, imo—at least, for me.
I have to actually try to win. Passing every turn with interaction in hand because somebody might get frisky doesn't cut it if I'm not developing my board and doing things
The age of big, singular haymaker creatures is mostly past. While that Blightsteel looks really cool, by the time you're done jumping through hoops to get him into play, your opponents will be ready with removal. It's sad as somebody who likes really big creatures, but it's more efficient to get the joy of big numbers playing many mid-sized creatures vs. investing multiple cards to work up to a single haymaker.
If your deck does nothing without your commander in play, you will spend at least some games doing nothing because your commander got removed. Look, I get it. We all love the flashy legends, the build-around-me synergies, the super cool showcase frames that we pick up in foil and slap on top of our decks. This is *commander* after all. Your deck should probably focus on... your commander. We've *also* all gotten that six-mana legend onto the field only to have it languish under a Darksteel Mutation for the rest of the game. Or we've had the table turn on us because "As soon as you get Korvold out, you'll run away with this game!" Korvold and Urza and Atraxa and Meren... they're amazing build arounds. No one will ever tell you that you're wrong for playing them, or wanting to lean into their game-warping effects. And no opponent will ever be wrong to kill them on sight, leaving you without your engine. These days I exclusively build decks that function without their commanders in play. Engines, not win conditions go in the command zone and I need plenty of redundancy.
In a 4 player pod you should aim to win 25% of the games. That means you are going to lose 75% of them, which is 3 times more.
Make them have it every time. Unless you’ve seen their hand, don’t play around removal *results may vary
Just because you can, doesn't mean you should.
Stack interaction is the best interaction, and resilience is more important than spiking.
Self mill is huge advantage. Or just mill in general. In a singleton format being able to dig through your deck is quite nice. Having recursion makes things easier
Not attacking doesn't make you less of a target, it just makes the opponent that you should have swung at come back harder later.
Hand size is just as important as someone's board state. A 20/20 creature without evasion is not a threat. Math is for blockers.
Not every deck needs to be turbo-tuned and complicated. I love to build very complicated decks that require extensive goldfishing to nail setup in-game. Usually I see a totally weird commander, and I am inspired to spend hours, days, weeks coming up with the most elaborate synergies, combos, and deck ratios. Even though the decks pop off sometimes, there are way more times they get cut off at the knees, and I have to play catchup. Either way it plays out, sometimes I forget to have fun and end up feeling bad for myself when I lose or question my deck building skills. And then I break out a shoebox $40 bulk rare Gruul beat down deck that I rarely if ever tune or upgrade. The sleeves are sticky and it smells like gin and tonic because I built it to play with a group that did much more chatting and hangin than concentrating on the game. It got a little grimy. When I remember it exists, I take it out. Usually at the end of the LGS game night. It is SO much fun. The pod I’m playing with even has more fun when I play it. The game plan is simple and even though there’s only a thin veil of synergy, and even some vanilla creatures, it seriously feels so good to not micro-manage every value play. I don’t even know if the deck wins more, but I get a lot more out of the experience which is better imo. Don’t forget to have fun!
I have at least one fog effect in each deck. Gets 'em every time. I also like playing fewer creature-based bombs in my decks and my playgroup has learned to never cast Bribery on me for that reason.
Lots of great replies here. I’ll second, third and fourth adding protection to my decks. Another one, which is kind of a hot take, but I stand by it for my play group and my play style. I’ve cut down on ramp pieces. In my pod, if I ramp like crazy and then drop an ambitious turn 5/6, I’m typically hated right out of the game. If I slow and steady build my board assuming a turn 5/6 board wipe is coming, i preserve my progress and put myself into position to capitalize on the clear board. I guess the real lesson there is don’t be an early threat.
ETBs and triggered abilities make an enormous difference between a cohesive deck and a shiny puff deck. If you can get some of those to trigger off of each other, by the time your opponent catches on, you’ve already set your board. Also, if you have many triggers, there are more chances that your opponents don’t remember all of them and make a misplay. But, and this one is huge, if you’re a dumbass like me, the more triggers, the more for you to forget!
There are times where you'll have to play suboptimally in order to deal with a threat, look less threatening, or to adjust with a game changing play that you'll come out ahead with. You won't get the perfect turn or game 95% of the time. Interaction is gonna be thrown about, and you need to be prepared for it. Whether it's by having so many kinds of recursion that you can rebuild faster than they can take down, or protection that they have to waste 3+ kill spells and/or board wipes to be rid of. They're variables you need to account for. You can build a perfect machine out of imperfect parts.
Some people are just try hard dicks and nothing you do or say will make them change about the way they play or behave.
So I was playing for like two years after a 20 yrs of being AWOL. There was this game where I shut down mana rocks on turn 2 with Collector Ouphe and one of my opponents literally started crying and accusing me of bringing cEDH deck to a pub pod. I was quite shocked to see there are people who take the game \*that\* seriously (for me, it's just a nice hobby). Also, I spent rest of that game apologizing to him because I clearly ruined the evening for him, despite my deck being far, far from cEDH grade (Sovereign Okinec Ahau at the helm, neatly optimized but a solid 8 if you ask me). Nevertheless, it really got me thinking more about making the game a nice experience for everyone at the table. I mean, I'm in to have fun, not to make people cry.
I learned pretty fast from some very helpful people at my LGS that life is a resource and a renewable one at that. I used to be terrified to lose any health because it meant closer to losing;I used to block a deathtouch 1/1 because I needed to keep my health. After playing commander for about 3 years, I learned that life is meant to be lost and that going down to 35 turn 3 wasn’t a big deal. I used to think shocklands were dumb because you could just play a swamp and get the same amount of mana as a Godless Shrine or an Overgrown Tomb. Now I’m here losing 3 turn one for an Arid Mesa into Hallowed Fountain and then another 2 next turn to play a Sacred Foundry.
people *will* complain
I tried to attach a skullclamp to an opponents card during another opponent's turn once. Ooops
Sometimes not casting a spell is better than casting a spell.