This is a list of staple cards for my pod's EDH format. We play on Cockatrice on the Tetrarch server, under the Constructed room, on Saturdays, 3:30-4:00pm PST start, usually for 3 hours (2-3 games typically). If you're interested in joining, DM me on Discord at Laggy#0637.
The pod rules follow below.
1. Tutor Effects Banned
- 1a. General tutor functionality is banned (library-wide searching or functional equivalents) - this includes commanders (Scion of the Ur-Dragon) and targeting opponent's libraries (Praetor's Grasp.)
- 1b. Library searches can still target basic lands if they were able to do so before (so both Demonic Tutor and Lay of the Land can grab a basic land, but Sunforger cannot.) This essentially exempts basic land search functionality.
- 1c. Targeting basic land subtypes (Farseek, Wood Elves) or singular specific cards (partner with effects, Asmoranomardicadaistinaculdacar) is also legal. Targeting ANY land (Crop Rotation, Kura, the Boundless Sky) or a non-basic land subtype (Circuitous Route, Urza's Power Plant) is not; such effects are limited to basic land searching as per rule 1b.
- 1d. Companions are legal - they are not searched for and have rigid deckbuilding requirements.
This creates greater variance with decks, so that they don't play the same every time and emphasizes the nature of 99-card simpleton deckbuilding.
2. Infinites Banned
- 2a. Doing an infinite interaction (generating infinite mana, life, damage, ETBs, etc.) is banned. Near-infinite combos are legal.
- 2b. You can have potential infinites in your deck as long as you don't start them, defined as playing a series of actions that can be a potential loop/iteration of an infinite. (e.g. you can play Felidar Guardian to bounce Aminatou, the Fateshifter or vice versa, but you can't do both.)
By removing infinites as a default win condition, this makes slower decks viable and raises the average mana curve of games.
3. Land Destruction Banned
- 3a. Land destruction effects (cards that destroy/exile/bounce/sacrifice/steal lands) controlled by other players do not affect your own lands. Cards that explicitly affect land mana functionality (Blood Moon, Back to Basics, Hall of Gemstone, Contamination, etc.) are banned. Cards that have these effects stapled to them as additional non-optional text ignore those parts and do not otherwise fizzle. Permanent destruction effects (Beast Within) attempting to target lands fall under this.
- 3b. This protection does not extend to effects you control (Harrow, Myriad Landscape, targeting your own land with Angelic Purge, etc.)
- 3c. A player can choose to forfeit this protection at immediate speed (ignoring the stack) if they so desire (as a response to annihilator, etc.) In this scenario, they forfeit said protection until the end of the current turn.
- 3d. This protection does not extend to lands that have (or have gained) other card types and are targeted by effects targeting those nonland types. For example, artifact lands (Seat of the Synod) can be destroyed by Vandalblast, lands that have temporarily become creatures (Celestial Colonnade, Sylvan Awakening) can be exiled by Swords to Plowshares, and so forth. Such lands with additional card types are also vulnerable to permanent destruction effects.
This prevents players from being shut out by Armageddon and friends, and lets them keep a safe mana base so that they continue to be able to play cards and participate in the game.
4. Deck Budget Limit
5. Pseudotutor Ban List
The following cards, while not strictly tutor effects mechanically, do similar things in practice (allows one to search their whole library, reduce their library to fetch a specific card, etc.) and thus are banned.
6. Generic Value/Impact Ban List
The following cards are deemed both too generically good and having outsized impact on deckbuilding and game state, and thus are banned. (Note that all fast mana rocks like Sol Ring and fetchlands are included on this list.)