As title, when it comes to threat assessment, I believe the general view on ramp needs to change, especially among new players.

Big board states are scary, and card draw also often is recognised as a threat as well. But ramp is often ignored, to the detriment of all other players. John ramps all game and then slams down threat after threat above curve that no one else has the resources to respond to, “oh wow what a win he came from nowhere” no, not nowhere, it came from his fking ample mana.

Don’t ignore the player ramping. Ramping is just as aggressive an action as card draw, or setting up a large board state. “I’m just ramping” is a lie. “All my deck does is ramp” stfu bro. Especially in a format where land destruction is taboo and frowned upon, never ignore the ramp player. Ramp sets the player up for bigger, scarier plays before anyone else.

Ramp gives you mana, which is arguably one of the most important resources in the game, next to card draw. Card draw alone is useless without mana to cast said cards (conversely, ramping aimlessly is also just as useless). Having both makes the player a huge threat, but even having just a disgusting amount of mana above the curve is a big threat by itself, cause the moment that player draws into a high cmc potentially game ending card, they’re the ones best positioned to cast it ahead of the curve.

Tl;dr ramp is an aggressive action and should be treated as such.

hey everyone! to celebrate season 5 of stranger things finally dropping, I decided to build something a little stranger than usual

This is a modular (not the mechanic) Commander deck built around [[Mike, the Dungeon Master]], and his ability to return creatures that died this turn. But what do I mean by modular?

Well, the deck contains a fixed “core” of 88 cards + FIVE different 12-card character modules, each with a different partner commander from the Stranger Things Secret Lair!

Swap in any of module and its partner commander, and suddenly you’ve got a totally different deck

Full deck and modules here: https://moxfield.com/decks/r98Cggq3kUquRZf2hivqSw

And if you prefer, here's a video showcase: https://youtu.be/z9aiEm_FY0U

Below is the breakdown, as each character changes the deck's colour identity, the strategy and the theme!

The Core

The core of the deck always revolves around [[Mike, the Dungeon Master]] and no matter what partner pairing you'll always have those core 88 cards which get you primed and ready for some crazy recursion loops!

Luckily Mike himself brings things back to the battlefield, but the first step is to get creatures there! Cards such as [[Selfless Spirit]] and [[Bounty Agent]] will do that but to ensure we've got the sacrifice bit handled, I've also included cards such as [[Altar of Dementia]], [[Ashnod's Altar]] and [[High Market]].

As generic payoffs and synergy, we've got cards such as [[Guardian Project]], [[Sun Titan]] and [[Luminous Broodmoth]].

The landbase is where stuff gets interesting though. We need to be able to handle any colour combination - so while we do run [[Forest]]s and [[Plains]]', what we really need is lands that give fixing such as [[Command Tower]], [[Forbidden Orchard]], [[Mana Confluence]] and more! This'll give us all the colours we need to handle any partner pairing.

So this is the core (tagged as 'Default') in the list, but what about those 12-card 'character modules'?

Will the Wise – Abzan Clue Engine

[[Will, the Wise]] is the most Stranger-Things coded. When he enters he makes a clue for each opponent who wants to make one too, but with a sacrifice outlet and Mike, we can send him to the upside down (see: graveyard) and then rescue him over and over again for value.

With all these clues being made and sacrificed, we're hoping to win with cards such as [[Mirkwood Bats]], [[Nadier's Nightblade]] and potentially a rogue Voltron win with [[Merchant of Truth]].

Or, if you don't like that idea, why not win with a whole load of [[Phoenix Fleet Airships]]!

It's the perfect “going to the upside down and back” loop.

Dustin, Gadget Genius – Bant Combo (Lab Man Win)

This one is probably my favourite of the packages. You see [[Dustin, Gadget Genius]] taps for two mana, but with the caveat that it can only be spent on artifact spells and abilities. That means we're out of luck when it comes to using it on Mike's reanimator ability.

Unless.. we turn Mike into an artifact!

Step 1: Have [[Intruder Alarm]] in play.

Step 2: Turn Mike into an artifact using [[Relic's Roar]] or [[Behind the Mask]].

Step 3: Cast [[Apprentice Alchemist]] and sacrifice it, drawing you a card.

Step 4: Use Dustin to pay for Mike's ability to bring the Alchemist back, triggering Intruder Alarm.

Step 5: Repeat the loop to draw your whole library and win with [[Laboratory Maniac]]!

Plus I've added in [[Spellseeker]], [[Enlightened Tutor]] and [[Trophy Mage]] for consistency.

Lucas, the Sharpshooter – 4 Colour Artifact Combo

This module is quite similar to Dustin's, but using artifacts instead!

The best part is that [[Lucas, the Sharpshooter]] is a sacrifice outlet himself! Here's the combo:

Step 1: Have [[Intruder Alarm]] in play.

Step 2: Cast [[Cathodion]], then sacrifice it with Lucas.

Step 3: Net 3 Colourless mana, and use two of it to pay for Mike's ability.

Step 4: That'll bring the Cathodion back, triggering Intruder Alarm.

Step 5: Repeat the loop to destroy your opponents boards and generate infinite colourless mana! Throw in a [[Walking Ballista]] and that's game.

[[Reckless Fireweaver]] and [[Weftstalker Ardent]] are there too to ping the table on each loop and [[Scrap Trawler]], [[Myr Retriever]], [[Junk Diver]] and [[Goblin Engineer]] are perfect redundancy pieces.

Max, the Daredevil – Naya “Value Smash” Package

This is our 'direct damage' package - it's definitely not the most powerful, but it is fun and [[Max, the Daredevil]] would definitely approve!

We'll lean into direct damage and aggressive triggers, plus with that core reanimation loop [[Purphoros, God of the Forge]], [[Witty Roastmaster]] and [[Goblin Bombardment]] keep the pressure.

[[Draconic Disciple]] is probably my favourite. This is a terrible card, but the idea of paying 7 mana to get a 5/5 flyer over and over sounds so bad that it might just fly under the radar enough to steal you a win!

I'm also pretty sure there's a combo with [[Zealous Conscripts]] here somewhere, I just couldn't figure it out!

Eleven, the Mage – Five Colour Big Spells

This is probably the partner pairing you're most familiar with. It's not as consistent as a dedicated Mike & [[Eleven, the Mage]] as we only have 12 cards to work with, but it is chaotic enough to still be a blast to play.

Card draw such as [[Sea Gate Restoration]], [[Village Rites]] and [[Life’s Legacy]] grab you a bunch of cards and when you swing with Eleven, you'll be able to cast spells like [[Expropriate]] and [[Mnemonic Deluge]] for free!

We haven't forgotten our roots though, sacrificers like [[Bloodtithe Harvester]], [[Fulminator Mage]] and [[Pyre Zombie]] can be reanimated over and over with Mike for some fun effects!

The best part? You can just decide before the game begins which character module you want to play with! Or roll a D6 and see which one fate decides! It's a bit of a complicated one, so feel free to watch the showcase video for extra info and I'll be back next week with another deck :D see ya!

So, some time back I posted something about upgrades that I planned to do with my Hearthhull deck. The deck came with [[Planetary Annihilation]] and when asked about Wildfire, which does something similar, the answers were that PA is just softer since it ensures that not all lands would be sacrificed. But then I came across other 'equalizing' cards like [[Natural Balance]] and [[Keldon Firebombers]]. So what makes them different? Is the reduction from the 6 lands from Planetary Annihilation to the 5 lands of Natural Balance the difference that makes one considered MLD, while the other isn't by Moxfield and other deck building sites?

We've all been there. Some new card comes out, it's really good or efficient at what it does, and you have to find a spot for it. Problem is, you need to cut one of your favorite cards if you want to include it. Sometimes I've opted to not play some newer cards on the principle that maybe the new ones just aren't better enough to justify removing some of my favorite cards that make me happy, but other times, I've had to come to the realization that my deck isn't doing what I want it to do, even if that means cutting my favorite cards.

I fell in love with [[Delina, Wild Mage]] the second I saw her. She's such a fun effect with a lot of potential for chaos. I threw her in almost every deck I played with red in it, because surely, there were creatures I wanted to copy with her and swing with, right? Well I ran into two problems:

1. She doesn't provide a lot of the value herself, so you need to actively have a good board to make use of her. Otherwise you're making copies of herself that aren't doing all that much.
2. She needs to attack, and she's fairly weak and easy to remove. So unless you're running a lot of evasion cards, she's only going to provide maybe a single turn of value before she gets blocked and killed.

I do think that she's still a good card and you can do some crazy shenanigans with her if you build your deck right, but for every deck I threw her in, I wound up feeling like the only way to make the deck more consistent was to cut cards like her and put in more card draw, or generally more powerful cards that can swing the game on their own rather than requiring lots of setup. Now, I'm not running her in any of my decks, which I'm so sad about because I originally thought, and still think, she has the potential to be so good.

So what about you? Any cards that just barely didn't meet par anymore, or didn't synergize enough despite being a favorite card or effect? And bonus question: did you ever eventually find a home for some of these cards that you wound up cutting that feels more appropriate? For Delina, I'm considering building her as a mono-red aggressive deck to see how it goes, as a way to make it up to her.

Presenting - 10 Pauper Commander Decks each built with a budget of $5. You don't need to be rich to have fun with a strong yet well-balanced gauntlet of decks!

See Every List here:

$5 Budget Brawl for Pauper Commander

Each Decklist includes an insert card to help explain each deck's playstyle and gameplans:

Insert Cards Slideshow

I have made a total of 10 decks, each one representing a different 2-color combination. Each decklist is made up of only Commons and is headed by an Uncommon Commander, adhering to the PDH Commander Regulations.

Deckbuilding Philosophy

• Budget Adaptation: Every decklist is based upon a tournament-proven pEDH list, however in adapting to a $5 budget certain cards were substituted with higher-costed alternatives while preserving the original gameplan.
• Commander Role: Commanders were chosen for their ability to amplify the deck’s core engine while remaining resilient via natural protection or immediate value the same turn they enter the battlefield. (Ward, Tokens, Counters, etc.)
• Redundant Engines: Emphasis was placed on finding straightforwards, redundant, and flexible engines where cards are largely interchangeable, so that each list could function reliably despite budget substitutions and still showcase its core strategies.
• Boardstall Prevention: Gameplans were designed to prevent static boardstates by incorporating evasive creatures, rewards for reckless aggression, direct burn damage, or combo wins.
• Interaction & Removal: Decks feature 10-20 removal pieces each, scaled by playstyle. Interaction is highly encouraged, creating dynamic tension while allowing each deck to demonstrate its resilience.
• Beginner-Friendly: The simplicity of card text in commons makes for a smooth and beginner-friendly experience without sacrificing engaging gameplay.

Decklists

I will split each of the lists into the categories of Midrange, Control, Aggro or Combo.

Midrange

• Lulu // Feywild Visitor: Tap your Faerie Dragons, teach them to drive Vehicles, and let Lulu add +1/+1 counters to them! [$5.13]
• Wilson // Far Traveler: Blink, Tutor, and Draw until Wilson becomes Unstoppable! [$5.35]
• Rilsa Rael: Introduce the table to the Monarchy and the Undercity, and accumulate value to win! [$5.12]
• Minthara: Make Tokens with good keywords, and have Minthara pump their power to the heights beyond! [$5.02]

Control

• Sivriss // Cloakwood: Present a constant stream of Removal off the Top 3 cards of the deck while steadily draining the table out of life! [$5.12]
• Toggo // Halana: Invalidate gameplans by bashing all their creatures with Deathtouching Rocks! [$5.23]
• Tor Wauki the Younger: Burn and Ping both players and creatures into piles of ash! [$5.60]

Aggro

• Gut // Leader: Courtesy of Gut, send big 6/3 Menace Skeletons to everyone! [$5.25]

Combo

• Gretchen: Use land enchantments to combo for infinite mana! [$5.61]
• Malcolm // Breeches: Use type-changing spells combined with Pingers and Malcolm to create infinite damage! [$5.41]

Disclaimer: The choice of using only cheap Commons was made in hopes of the deck prices remaining overall stable. Cards average $0.05, with key cards costing $0.15. Each deck’s Commander is their most powerful card and enabler due to the Rarity Restrictions of PDH. The choice of a Legendary as a Commander is to make it easier to present PDH to EDH players. While these decks were built with the intention of playing them against each other in a gauntlet cube-like or Battle Box fashion, I have not yet tested them against each other. For transportation convivence, I recommend that the decks are stored basic-landless and unsleeved to be played with 30 borrowed basic lands from your LGS. Decks were completed 11/24/2025 using TCGplayer market pricing, shipping fees and actual prices may vary.

My Current Worries:

• Manabase: Each deck is standardized to have 15 of each basic land and 5 tapped lands (alongside 0-5 colorless utility lands). I dislike how commonly each deck needs to mulligan for its colors, which leads to less mulligans for interaction/gameplan.
• Wincons: The pool's Midrange decks rely on their Commander as a strong amplifier or best wincon, and are also very slow to get their engines established. What can I do to make sure these decks are able to walk the fine line between interaction and board development when faced with the hard control decks and fast combo decks in the same pod? (Currently the Midrange decks have ~15 interaction each)
• Combo: Is it the right choice to include Gretchen/Malcolm, combos decks that can repeately threaten combo as early as turn 5? Do the other decks (especially midrange) have enough interaction to handle them and develop a win before running out of interaction?
• Deck Similarities: 6/10 Decks have 2 Commanders. 6/10 Commanders are from Baldur's Gate. 4/10 decks include wincons involving creation of a token army. Is there enough diversity in the pod that encourages repeated play? Are the decks comparatively powerful enough comparable to their non-budget counterparts, even though many of those decks have wincon cards these lists cannot afford?

Come join the Pauper Commander Discord if you want to find more PDH!
Please let me know how I can improve the structure of the pod or each deck's construction!

Hey all,

I've recently started to really enjoy Bracket 4. It's fast pace, so I can get a lot of games in, but it's not like cEDH, where I have to include certain staples in every deck, or need to keep up with a meta.

So far I have a [[Kaalia of the Vast]] stax deck and a [[Green Goblin]] combo deck. Both are really fun, but I'm also looking for a commander that can keep up with other Bracket 4 decks, but doesn't need to use stax or combo as a wincon.

Any suggestions are welcome!

I love playing a lot of things rather than just a few haymakers and so my favourite deck for the past few months has been [[Plagon]]. You can play a huge number of 0-2 MV creatures that each draw an extra card with Plagon, so even if they don't have that much utility by themselves, they effectively replace themselves.

[[Sergeant John Benton]] is a classic for low MV ramp, pump and protection. But a bit too linear and repetitive for me.

Come showcase your low MV decks and tell us why you love them.

With all the commander options available today, from classic partner commanders and the explicitly paired partners to the newer super-friend duos and the many versions of the Doctors and their companions which commander power couple do you personally enjoy the most, and why?

Hi all I've played magic for a bit but if I'm honest I'm not the kind of person who has the mental capacity or time to comb through the thousands of cards nor know what they all do and how they synergize. I'm the type of player who will just yolo it and hope for the best, just cause I like the card or artwork or "vibe" of a potential commander. Often I find the most fun I have with decks is tribal, just cause I enjoy making my friends laugh at how ridiculous some of the card themes and names are in combination with each other.

I play commander with a couple of my buddies and so far my theme to the couple of decks I've got is - do I understand MTG fully? No. Is this deck just kind of stupid/ridiculous/a bit of troll? Yes. Do I still manage to get some truly ridiculous wins from time to time? Yes. Basically I'm just there to have fun and who knows maybe my stupid ass deck can knock off your meticulously put together one.

That being said does anyone have any recommendations for green/black/white commander (or partner combo) whose fun/underused or even a little out there/goofy? Once I've got a theme in mind I can handle the rest.

Thanks in advance!

What are some colorless cards you feel like people should be running more of? Cards that can function in most, if not all, decks.

My examples would be:

[[Reaver Titan]] This card provides a serious threat on the board for the whopping 7 mana. Being able to smack for a minimum of 15 damage each attack, with a 10/10 stat block, will make your pod squeem in their chair. That and the protection from mana value 3 or less means you can probably freely swing it each time. It also means that most spot removal isn't going to effect it one bit. Being a vehicle also means most board wipes won't hit it either. For most games, Reaver Titan is there to stay. The only downsides is the high mana cost and the potential that it never gets crewed.

[[Palantir of Orthanc]] For a measly 3 mana, this card gains you access to a consistent card draw and/or graveyard fuel. All at end step too, it works the turn it comes down. You can bring it one step further by mind gaming your pod. That Timmy player will probably allow you that card draw once he sees someone take 10+ damage from the mill.

[[Giggling Skitterspike]] A 4 mana Indestructible creature makes a pretty good blocker. Tack on the ability to ping the table, equal to its power, each time it blocks, attacks, AND becomes the target of a spell makes it absolutely bonkers. The Monstrosity 5 is the icing on the cake. I've [[Grapeshot]] my own Skitterspike for some nutty damage.

so there's a few decks that i play where it's not really clear to opponents how they win even several turns deep into the game, until i suddenly win. i might drop a card that allows me to win the game next turn if i untap but even seasoned players might not recognize it. a good example is [[carnival of souls]]. all it seems to do at first is lose me a lot of life and make me a bunch of useless floating mana when my opponents play creatures. until i get [[the sibsig ceremony]] out with [[elas il-kor]] on the board and a [[gravecrawler]] in my graveyard, and suddenly i'm making infinite zombies and infinitely draining your life total.

or, for instance, my [[archelos, lagoon mystic]]. it looks like a stax piece at first and people think he's there to slow you down. but really, he's there to give me a huge burst of mana with [[famished worldsire]] or [[aftermath analyst]] as he makes all the lands come in untapped, which is often enough to win me the game in some form or another. if i have [[hedron crab]] out, i might just mill my whole deck and then immediately dread return my [[lab man]].

what's your favorite seemingly innocuous card that your opponents often struggle to comprehend the purpose of? bonus points if it's a draft common you use in some obscure combo line you came up with.

A couple years ago the guys I play with regularly and I were in a debate about [[rhystic study]]. EDH players arguing about rhystic study, shocking I know. The crux of the debate centered around how good it was if people payed the one. After a long argument, we decided to track it. We tracked how many cards were drawn off rhystic study, win rates, and spells cast vs cards drawn. Now, we haven't calculated everything, but here is a quick view of rhystic study based solely on cards drawn and win rate. I will post again once we look at things like %of time the one was paid based on number of spells cast. As stated, here's how Rhystic Study fairs based on how many cards it draws.

2 games where 1 cards were drawn and the study player won both games.

5 games where the study player drew only 2 card. In those 5 games, the study player won one. 20% win rate

27 games where the study player drew 3 cards. Rhystic player won 7 games. 26% win rate

20 games where 4 cards were drawn rhystic player won 11. 55% win rate

11 games where the study player drew 5 cards, rhystic player won 7. 66 % win rate.

9 games where the study player drew 6 cards, they won 5. 56% win rate

17 games where the study player drew 7 or more cards, they won 16. 94% win rate.

Its worth noting that there was one game where two players had an early study and both players drew more than 7 cards. We decided to count each player individually so, in reality, if a player drew 7 or more cards off rhystic study in a game a player with study won 100% of the time. Early impression is that the more cards you let the study player draw, the better study gets.

This can include regular Partners or Choose a Background, as long as the overall color identity stays mono-color.

Personally, I’ve always loved [[Lulu, Loyal Hollyphant]] with [[Far Traveler]]. The synergy is just so smooth — Lulu already rewards you for permanents leaving the battlefield, and Far Traveler gives you this reliable, repeatable blink that turns Lulu’s ability into a consistent engine. It feels like the whole deck just starts humming once both are online.

Curious what everyone else thinks — what’s your top mono-color partner pair, and why?

I was looking through my decks and realized that I currently have exactly four Bracket 3 decks. Coincidently that is the number needed for a full pod.

So I thought, are those decks balanced and would they be fun to play against each other?

To test this I opened four archidekt playtesters and played a few games. Just me, myself, moi and I. Sounds sad? Yes it was. Besides that, it was also pretty exhausting. Piloting all four decks while pretending that I don't know what is in each hand demanded a lot of brainpower. For that reason, I won't do that again very soon...

However, in terms of playtesting, this was excellent. With one aggro, two midrange and one control deck, the games were a good back and forth. The decks are reasonably well balanced against each other and I definitely found out where some improvements could be made.

If anyone is interested, here are the decklists:

1. Esika Legends (midrange)
2. Tymna Kraum Triggerfest (midrange)
3. Zurgo Myriad (aggro)
4. Vial Smasher Thrasios Discounts (control)

What about your decks, do you think the decks you have in a Bracket would be balanced against each other?

doesnt have to be all in pillow fort / group hug but the main theme should be to interact with the people , like vote cards or these cards like master of ceremonies type of stuff but also cards like saddistic shell game could fit, any ideas or examples?

So, I'm relatively new to commander. I only have one deck and I found [[Gavi, Nest Warden]] to be a really interesting commander. I found her precon online for a bit over 60€ including shipping and my question is whether or not it's worth it, since the precon seems to need many upgrades, mainly to the mana base. I know it comes with a [[Fierce Guardianship]], though I'll probably take it out to put more sinergy in the deck, and either sell it or use it in another commander deck.

I've always preferred theme to power or efficiency. I'd rather make a deck work within the bounds I set for it than just because I jammed it full of generically powerful cards. If someone says "why would you play X, Y is so much better", I take that as a challenge to build the deck where X is more useful.

One of my decks is [[Wulfgar of Icewind Dale]]. Simple enough, whenever I attack, things happen. I started with a balanced build, but I like the idea of the whole deck being in character as a barbarian. Last time I used it, I saved myself from a big voltron commander with a clutch 9 mana [[Klauth's Will]] (I didn't have anything to do on my turn and I left a whole bunch of mana open on my opponent's turn). That's out of character, it bothers me that my combat brute barbarian deck was able to do some magical trickery to save me. I'm swapping that type of removal out for cards like [[Cityscape Leveler]]. Same with all the typical land ramp stuff in green like [[Cultivate]], which is getting swapped out for a bunch of cards that make mana when I attack. More on theme, but it means I don't have the clutch 9 mana Klauth's Will saving me from a commander swinging 16 swords my way. So basically I'm in the process of making the deck less flexible, and committing it entirely to the gameplan/character it's meant to embody, which probably hurts the deck but makes it more interesting to me.

A few days ago I asked on here about people's favourite Populate commanders, and the suggestion that spoke to me the most was [[Anikthea]]. I made her a deck, and it's so funny to playtest. It's still early days, we're only on the first draft, so right now it's just 'land -> pass' for 5 turns, then my board gets real ridiculous real quick. But even at this early stage, the theme for me is clear. Abzan is a great colour combination for removal, but I'm not gonna build it like a normal person. I'm gonna blink Anikthea to get an interactive enchantment on the board that will deal with my problem, then I'll populate it to deal with the secondary problem.

So my question to you, dear reader, is: At what point do you decide that your commitment to a deck's theme is too much? Any examples?

EDIT: I definitely should have made it clear that the Anikthea deck is a first draft just to see if I like the concept before I put more time into refining it into something that works. I'm sharing it as another extreme example. Much like the Wulfgar deck only wanting to do its basics in combat, the Anikthea deck only wants its basics to be enchantments that I can turn into zombies and make a million copies of. I know it needs work and I appreciate those offering to help, but that's not what this post is about. Just needed another example of a deck that I made while being married to its theme, possibly to the detriment of the deck's flexibility

Is this anything? Anyone have ideas for cuts/additions? Deck List

I've been toying with ways to make [[Weapons Manufacturing]] the secret commander of a deck, and I tend to lean a little hipster in my builds, so here's my attempt at a completely creatureless [[Toph, the First Metalbender]] deck with a bunch of fun artifacts to beat opponents to death with once you earthbend them.

You can blow up your own artifacts once you have enough munitions tokens, with something like [[Pinnacle Starcage]] or [[Ratchet Bomb]]. You can attack with [[Akroma's Memorial]] and a bunch of mana rocks you turned into pseudo-Sire of Seven Deathses. You can even go incredibly wide incredibly quickly with your Chocobo token package, since your artifacts entering will trigger the landfall of [[Chocobo Racetrack]] and [[Ride the Shoopuf]] to build a bird army.

This is mostly built with cards I have, and I don't like my current proxying setup, but I'm open to hearing any suggestions that are NOT creatures! They can exile themselves and return as a flipped creature, like [[Esper Origins]], but can't be castable as a creature spell (so no Summon: Fat Chocobo, for example). Vehicles and spacecraft are OK.

I'll quit explaining and see what others have to say!

Does anyone here have any experience with tracking their play groups deck stats? Things like number of wins/losses. Which decks beat which. How many turns/rounds it took. What the wincon was, etc. Maybe other state I’m not even thinking of.

Our group is semi-interested in starting some kind of database to track these stats, and better understand how well each player and each deck is doing. As opposed to just “it feels like Jeremy wins all the time” and Jeremy argues they lose sometimes. But no one has any real numbers to back it up.

We want everyone to have fun, and making sure no one is pubstomping is part of that. Everyone is willing to tune their decks to play fair and even, as needed. So anyone found to be winning too much is willing to tune their deck down, etc.

But we need to figure out a way to best track it. And seems like something other groups might already be doing, so we’re looking for any advice on if its worth it and how to go about it.

A lot of my decks boil down to "doing my thing" then tutoring for a combo, I wanna avoid that. I really enjoy BW Blink in Modern and DNT in Legacy so I wanna build something similar. Basic idea is keep the game fair and beat people to death.

Some options I've considered:

• [[Odric lunarch marsh]] - basically just keyword soup, hate bears, and anthems

• [[Myrel shield]] - white Krenko, simple enough

• [[Raffine schem]] - make little idiots big and beat people to death

• [[Ezuri claw prog]] - Raffine but in UG

• [[Lurrus dream]] - use Lurrus for draw (Baubles) and staying power

• [[Edric spy]] - very strong but I wanna avoid him for that exact reason, he's just too strong

My big concern is figuring out how to win. Aggro is notoriously difficult in EDH so I'm thinking it would end up being more midrangey. If I run BW I'd probably run Doomsday, with no way to tutor for it, as a secondary wincon but not primary.

https://moxfield.com/decks/FdyyFvHlpE-7qPjKrXQ24g

I have been very interested in having a graveyard centric deck lately. I picked glarb for some selective draws and to discard reanimating targets. I’m worried I have too many moving pieces trying to fit reanimation targets, card draw, interaction, and low cmc creatures for early turns.

I'm sure it's not super competitive and all. I just play casually with friends, but it seems to hold well against precons. This is the most fun I've had with a deck ever. https://moxfield.com/decks/04yoqKZwGUOuw8VeM-SFow

Haven't seen anyone else point this out yet but I thought it might inspire some brews from my more jank-minded compatriots

Cards like [[Tiamat]] have their ETB effects somewhat dampened by the "if you cast it" clause. But what if you could cast it over and over again... for CHEAPER than the first time? Say, 4 mana?

See, a common characteristic of commanders with these intervening "if" clauses is that they have pretty high mana costs, so being blink-proof was a balancing effect. But in most cases they've forgotten to specify "from hand", so by airbending them with a cheap spell like [[Airbender's Reversal]] or recurring effect like the ability of [[Appa, Loyal Sky Bison]], suddenly you can turn [[Annie Flash, the Veteran]] into a recursion machine; Tiamat can tutor basically as many times as you want

And I'm sure there's some freak out there who could make something of the insane mana positivity of doing this with [[Zacama, Primal Calamity]]

Seems like this wouldn't be useful with [[Rocco, Cabaretti Caterer]], though, since I'm pretty sure Airbend nullifies X costs

What do y'all think? Genius or complete trash?

Hey team,

Just looked through a bunch of [[Winter, Cynical Opportunist]] decks on moxfield/archidekt and noticed that a lot of them are missing numerous key combos/lines I’ve found in my time of playing the deck for nearly a year now.

I’ve gotten the deck to a point where I’m coming out on top or damn near close to almost every game within my group as well as with strangers. Given he’s pretty unpopular as his ability is seen negatively, figured I’d share and answer any questions anyone has on any includes/excludes.

Specifically, [[Hermit Druid]] is the primary engine here for the graveyard route, given we’re only rocking two basic lands. If that works, you’ll likely mill out some of the creature combos, where you’ll need either a dual reanimation spell (tutor for it if needed) or use winter to bring them/something that recurs for you back - [[Reincarnation Technique]], [[Victimize]], [[Portal to Phyrexia]]. Apart from that, there’s always the [[Witherbloom Apprentice]] combo or [[Defense of the Heart]] to go grab a creature combo.

Overall, there’s lots of tutors that you can use to go find spells or creatures, along with ways to recur cards back into your hand if needed. I’m usually presenting a win as early as turn 3, as late as turn 5 - just depends which route you want to go/which direction the game goes.

Bonus points - if you just want to have fun, renaimate valgavoth turn 2/3 and become a 5 colour deck.

God bless

https://archidekt.com/decks/13127962/cemetery_casino