Deckstats Forum
English-language Forums => Commander Discussion => Topic started by: Aetherium Slinky on September 15, 2021, 01:54:38 pm
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Ah yes, MLD doesn't let people play Proper Magic(tm), stax makes people's lives miserable and combo is just lame because there's no warning (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Warning). Popular thoughts, at least on Reddit.
What are some of your controversial opinions you need to argue for ages and ages to get your point across?
Mine is that the aformentioned play styles are okay. I don't see why people should limit themselves to one or two popular strategies. Let's break this down:
- MLD: is a good way to limit resources. Preventing card draw is somehow okay but restricting available mana is not. Why? Both approaches prevent players from casting too many spells hence both stall the game allowing for the player in question using this strategy to pull ahead by breaking parity or just outvaluing other players in a longer game. I think it's a completely valid approach and touching people's lands shouldn't be a taboo.
- Stax: kind of the same thing... Denies resources, lets you pull ahead and break parity somehow. Why is this so bad? From my point of view stax decks provide a puzzle that the other players must solve in order to continue playing Magic normally. Hard lock means you've reacted too late and the game is over. Just scoop and move on to the next game, accept that you've been defeated. No need to keep playing if you can't do anything. Soft lock...well, if you can't break it soon then also just scoop and move on. The stax deck should always provide a proof of a winning state so it's not like they get a free pass but there's absolutely no reason to play 40 turns manually if there's no way out (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=No+Way+Out).
- Combo: is a thing. There are nearly 22 000 commander legal cards (whoa, ApothecaryGeist) so finding combos isn't exactly hard. It's a real part of the game. Besides - combo decks usually have weaknesses like being vulnerable to combat damage, removal or counterspells. There are ways to stop combos. (https://deckstats.net/forum/index.php/topic,57320.0.html) The "setup" for a combo deck is to draw and tutor. Leave mana open for your interaction and you're safe. Don't waste it on mediocre value engines or threats. Hate on tutors. Hate on excessive card draw. Every colour has access to some sort of hate - if not then colourless artifacts can be really powerful. Know that a combo deck is always waiting for the right moment. Don't give them that. Aggro them to death, there's absolutely nothing a combo deck can do if you're holding up mana for a removal spell or a counterspell (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Counterspell) and you're attacking them. Convince the rest of the table to do the same.
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I don't understand why CEDH is a thing. Just play Modern or Legacy (Vintage if you are that lucky).
I don't understand why so many people strive towards CEDH levels. EDH used to be a casual format, some how it rarerly is any more.
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I couldn't care less about proxies. You want to proxy an entire deck, with Timetwister (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Timetwister), Cradle and Angus Mackenzie (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Angus+Mackenzie) as a commander? Sure, I don't mind. As long as the cards are printed or anyway recognizable.
Mill is a perfectly fine strategy and totally not a feel bad. Actually, I play a lot of graveyard decks so... Keep them mill decks coming 8)
Counterspells are perfectly fair and fine removal spells. There's basically no difference between Counterspelling your Llanowar Elf or Doom Blade-ing it.
Chulane and Korvold suck, they're bad designs, and I'm not gonna believe you when you say that your Korvold deck is "not that kind of Korvold deck". I'm gonna try my hardest to murder (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Murder) you or to keep your commander out of the battlefield.
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Not strictly a Commander opinion, but all of Magic in general: Infect was a mistake that makes the game so miserable someone should've lost their job over it. Made worse by having Proliferate being able to increase counters on players.
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Block Constructed, Brawl, Commander, Historic, Legacy, Modern, Pioneer, Planechase, Standard and Un should be the only formats, official or otherwise. Play whatever you want with your friends, but don't drag the rest of us along with you.
"Guilds of Ravnica Block" is a legitimate option for Block Constructed, and so shall Innistrad: Double Feature be.
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There's Commander. And then there's those weird formats that let you use more than one copy of a card. ;D
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There's Commander. And then there's those weird formats that let you use more than one copy of a card. ;D
Disgusting, I know. Imagine playing 4 copies of a card in 1 deck!
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I don't understand why CEDH is a thing. Just play Modern or Legacy (Vintage if you are that lucky).
I don't understand why so many people strive towards CEDH levels. EDH used to be a casual format, some how it rarerly is any more.
This.
Standard, Modern, Legacy etc are competitive formats, Just play one of those if you want to play competitive.
- it is more difficult to play well and read the board correctly in Commander than in competitive formats because it is much less predictable and you have more than one opponent at the same time
- A good Commander deck is not necessarily a deck that wins often, but a deck that frequently manages to set up the strategy for which it is designed and which forces other players to team up against one
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- it is more difficult to play well and read the board correctly in Commander than in competitive formats because it is much less predictable and you have more than one opponent at the same time
- A good Commander deck is not necessarily a deck that wins often, but a deck that frequently manages to set up the strategy for which it is designed and which forces other players to team up against one
There's just an additional dimension to it. I can't put my finger on it quite precisely but essentially the game extends beyond the table, i.e. the board state. You need to look up and open your mouth and talk with the other players. A good commander deck does not dictate how well the game goes, you also need to be a good player. And by a good player I mean you need to have both: a good understanding of how decks and probabilities work (just like poker, vintage, legacy) and you need to be socially suave in order to be able to push your own plan through the table. It's not random, it's more about waiting for the right moment instead of just rushing your plan. So...yeah, playing in a commander pod is inherently different from playing in a legacy table.
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I don't get to have a legendary creature next to my deck in Legacy and Modern. I also don't get to face off against multiple opponents at once. It's a different experience.
Most of my controversial takes are very heavy stuff that could be entire discussions on their own. If you're really interested... I'll think about it. For now, some of the lighter stuff.
I think that the order of the colour pie is wrong. WUBRG makes no sense. It should go GURWB, so that way the basic lands are in alphabetical order; forest (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Forest), island (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Island), mountain (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Mountain), plains (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Plains), swamp (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Swamp). I also think the alphabet is in the wrong order, but that's this whole other thing.
From a flavor standpoint, counterspells make more sense being white than being blue. White is the colour for defensive and protective abilities. It's also associated with law and regulation. Counterspells work here.
More specific to commander, I think that green makes a better support colour than blue, and if it wasn't for Urza, mono-green would be dominant to mono-blue.
Kenrith, the Returned King (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Kenrith%2C+the+Returned+King) should have also bit the dust along with Golos. He's also just 5 colour goodstuff that can easily be used for any strategy.
We need another commander set with 4-colour commanders (that aren't partners).
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Most of my controversial takes are very heavy stuff that could be entire discussions on their own. If you're really interested... I'll think about it. For now, some of the lighter stuff.
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I also think the alphabet is in the wrong order, but that's this whole other thing.
I'd like to hear more about both of these.
Also, the people downvoting people for giving their unpopular opinions (as OP requested) should really do some critical thinking and understand that the purpose of this whole thing is to get opinions people disagree with.
My unpopular opinion: This game is slowly dying due to oversaturation (it's not irreversable, though). When too much s*** is being added, it's less likely new players will stay with the game (too daunting for them) and veteran players will get exhausted trying to keep up. Combined, the audience should start shrinking if the game continues the way it's going.
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From a flavor standpoint, counterspells make more sense being white than being blue. White is the colour for defensive and protective abilities. It's also associated with law and regulation. Counterspells work here.
We need another commander set with 4-colour commanders (that aren't partners).
I completely agree with the white/blue flavor argument, but I do sort of appreciate just how well blue currently fits the role of the snobbish wizard you love to hate, compared to a benevolent sage, a wild druid, a self-destructive necromancer, and a reckless sorcerer.
In regards to 4-color commanders, I think they're super important for the format and at least every other set should have one; slow leak them out, but leak them consistently. 5-color commanders should be super rare, and both narrow and powerful to reflect that. 4-color gives you options while preserving the flavor of variety.
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Not strictly a Commander opinion, but all of Magic in general: Infect was a mistake that makes the game so miserable someone should've lost their job over it. Made worse by having Proliferate being able to increase counters on players.
This seems like the least controversial opinion here. So, here's mine: I love infect. I think WotC did a great job by making it a really powerful, horribly undersupported mechanic. Sure, Grafted Exoskeleton (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Grafted+Exoskeleton), Phyresis (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Phyresis), and Triumph of the Hordes (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Triumph+of+the+Hordes) probably could have been better off not existing, but most cards with infect are really weak and overcosted. The notable exceptions being Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Skithiryx%2C+the+Blight+Dragon) and Blightsteel Colossus (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Blightsteel+Colossus), MAYBE Putrefax (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Putrefax). The rest are basically garbage like Tine Shrike (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Tine+Shrike) or Tel-Jilad Fallen (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Tel-Jilad+Fallen).
It's really fun trying to put together a win with nothing but otherwise unplayable cards, proliferate effects, and combos like Putrefax (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Putrefax) + Chandra's Ignition (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Chandra%27s+Ignition) in Xenagos. It's even better that infect doesn't affect other players' health; it feels like playing on a different axis from normal magic. Plus, it's a mechanic that was intended for standard and got a huge boost in power when it came to commander, as far as still only needing 10 counters to kill. That's EXACTLY the kind of thing people usually like in commander.
I know, I'm practically the only one that thinks this. I don't care. Infect is great.
PS. Combos are cool, too. Infinite mana Rube Goldberg machines are the reason I play commander.
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I don't get to have a legendary creature next to my deck in Legacy and Modern. I also don't get to face off against multiple opponents at once. It's a different experience.
Maybe it's just me and my freinds, but we play three player together whenever we are three that wants to play Modern or Pauper.
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Not strictly a Commander opinion, but all of Magic in general: Infect was a mistake that makes the game so miserable someone should've lost their job over it. Made worse by having Proliferate being able to increase counters on players.
This seems like the least controversial opinion here. So, here's mine: I love infect. I think WotC did a great job by making it a really powerful, horribly undersupported mechanic. Sure, Grafted Exoskeleton (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Grafted+Exoskeleton), Phyresis (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Phyresis), and Triumph of the Hordes (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Triumph+of+the+Hordes) probably could have been better off not existing, but most cards with infect are really weak and overcosted. The notable exceptions being Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Skithiryx%2C+the+Blight+Dragon) and Blightsteel Colossus (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Blightsteel+Colossus), MAYBE Putrefax (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Putrefax). The rest are basically garbage like Tine Shrike (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Tine+Shrike) or Tel-Jilad Fallen (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Tel-Jilad+Fallen).
It's really fun trying to put together a win with nothing but otherwise unplayable cards, proliferate effects, and combos like Putrefax (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Putrefax) + Chandra's Ignition (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Chandra%27s+Ignition) in Xenagos. It's even better that infect doesn't affect other players' health; it feels like playing on a different axis from normal magic. Plus, it's a mechanic that was intended for standard and got a huge boost in power when it came to commander, as far as still only needing 10 counters to kill. That's EXACTLY the kind of thing people usually like in commander.
I know, I'm practically the only one that thinks this. I don't care. Infect is great.
PS. Combos are cool, too. Infinite mana Rube Goldberg machines are the reason I play commander.
I agree with you actually. I find infect to be perfectly fine and actually a bit underpowered in commander.
Apart from Triumph of the Hordes (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Triumph+of+the+Hordes), which usually has a similar effect to other cards like Overwhelming Stampede (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Overwhelming+Stampede) anyway, it's super difficult to kill three players using Infect, also because as soon as you kill one you're usually immediately targeted.
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I think infect has a very divided fan base. Some hate it, some love it. There doesn't seem to be a consensus except that people feel strongly about the camp they're in. So the "unpopular opinion" can go either way as far as I can tell.
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Most of my controversial takes are very heavy stuff that could be entire discussions on their own. If you're really interested... I'll think about it. For now, some of the lighter stuff.
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I also think the alphabet is in the wrong order, but that's this whole other thing.
I'd like to hear more about both of these.
The alphabet one is this quick thing. I think the letters should be ordered by their frequency in the english language. You do the six vowels first (including "Y") and then all the consonants, and they're ordered by how often they show up. The current order of the alphabet is completely arbitrary. The new order should be:
E A O I U Y T N S R H D L C M F W G P B V K X Q J Z
The other topics I'm still on the fence about. Deckstats has shown itself to have a mature group of users, so I certainly have higher hopes of a quality discussion here as opposed to anyone else. Still, there are always risks to sharing opinions online, and these are truly controversial, so there's no going back once they're posted.
I'll probably do them over the next week as their own topics. The first one is a conspiracy (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Conspiracy) hypothesis of mine, so it will be the least controversial. The second one is on a touchy subject so I hope that everyone can be respectful about it. The third one is the worst, which I might not do depending on how the other two go.
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The alphabet one is this quick thing. I think the letters should be ordered by their frequency in the english language. You do the six vowels first (including "Y") and then all the consonants, and they're ordered by how often they show up. The current order of the alphabet is completely arbitrary. The new order should be:
E A O I U Y T N S R H D L C M F W G P B V K X Q J Z
That's a cool idea. Only problem is that the frequency of letters would change over time, right? Certain words fall out of use, new words are introduced, etc. so the ordering of letters would have to change, which would be a major pain for alphabetizing, learning the language, etc.
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E A O I U Y T N S R H D L C M F W G P B V K X Q J Z
I hate that this still works to the tune of Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star
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The English alphabet is based on the Latin alphabet, which is foundation of all Germanic and Romance languages. From all I can speak English, French, Portuguese and Dutch with the daughter language Africans. I'm not good with Italian, Spanish, German and any Scandinavian language as they're pretty similar. Bulgarian alphabet? Bulgaria invented the Cyrillic alphabet as written in Wikipedia and widely known by educated people I believe all over the world. So, all other languages that use it owe us "Language and Alphabetic Foundation". All? Russia, Mongolia, Kazakhstan and all other former Soviet republics as Belarus and Ukraine, albeit that Belarusian language can hardly be described as a language at all, but mere Russian with some variation. I am not good however with Russian speaking itself. I can understand Mongolian "gibberish", for real, but Russian is a weak point. Also the Kazakh language is "армаган юмлурган кольнктюруан" :) and hardly to believe I can understand it as well, but I am not good with grammatical cases in Russian and I can speak modestly well, but so most educated Bulgarians, and many Russian philologists or with classes at Sofia University can speak way better than me. It's great language. А Б В Г Д Е Ж З И Й К Л М Н О П Р С Т У Ф Х Ц Ч Ш Щ Ъ ь Ю Я. That's our Alphabet. We invented it way back in 9th century. Mongolia conquered the world for it. Toktai came for it. But before that Kiev Russia came with the Varyaz, had wars with Bulgaria and exchanged and traded but took the alphabet as well. For which they're going with generational in Slavonic and Alphabetic from the Balkan Kingdom or Princedom Bulgaria. The Russians have "мяхкий знак" (ы) and Ë (ë). Their only umlaut/diaresis. Like (йо/yo). But most of their general dictionary is directly taken from Bulgarian, however the grammatical cases are killing it for me as Bulgarian language doesn't have any grammatical cases, but many educated Bulgarians can speak it very well. Enough with the lecture.
I think about Infect and such abilities as Poison and Wither, that they could be easily confused with one another in a Proliferate deck, but I don't think that most people here in Bulgaria play them on EDH table. Poison is the worst in my opinion. It kills you for sure no matter what and on FNM it was disaster for me, but at other points I have turned the tide. And I have to agree that these abilities are underpower in EDH, but they have presence in Modern.
Back to the topic: I can only want to disallow (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Disallow) the usage of Eldrazi in FNMs. It just kills the game for me and other Tribal players. I can hardly scramble for a win at the event. Therefore, I haven't been at any event also owing to the pandemic. I am also lazy a bit and Fridays pass and go, so I hope and suppose to go at the end of the year, p'haps? My mother is in Bulgaria for several weeks and I doubt that I'll frequent in the next couple of events. Don't know. Hopefully, I'll go at the Crimson Moon days.
Regards:
Chavo
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Mill is a perfectly fine strategy and totally not a feel bad. Actually, I play a lot of graveyard decks so... Keep them mill decks coming 8)
Funnily enough, my apparently-unpopular opinion is that mill is the worst thing ever. Not just because it's "feelbad" and makes for unfun play patterns (it does), but because I just think the decking rule makes no sense. The idea that trying to draw a card should lose you the game seems completely random to me (particularly given that in most formats, there is no limit on deck size!), and the fact that this weird oddity then became a semi-feasible wincon is particularly galling. It's like, why didn't someone say "oh, ha, yes, you can win with Millstone (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Millstone), that was a really stupid oversight of us when we wrote the rules, let's go and fix that or at least not keep printing mill cards"?
Apparently, not many other people agree with me. They tend to say things like "well, it's necessary to stop the game going on forever!" (which obviously makes no sense). It literally makes me want to quit Magic and find a game with less stupid rules!
That, and it's super un-fun because it's almost completely separate to everything else about Magic (doesn't synergise with most things, rarely countered, easy to counter but rare enough that you don't usually bother, etc - just like poison, by the way) which is just in general bad game design.
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I don't understand why CEDH is a thing. Just play Modern or Legacy (Vintage if you are that lucky).
I don't understand why so many people strive towards CEDH levels. EDH used to be a casual format, some how it rarerly is any more.
I half agree. My own controversial opinion is that EDH is cEDH, because playing cEDH-style is legal by the EDH rules and just more effective. If you want EDH to be what EDH is "supposed" to be, you need to change its rules so that it actually is. Honestly, I think they should just split the format. Then again, EDH would probably need a really big ban list to satisfy me... :)
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The only thing controversial about infect is how badly infect players take it when the game turns into 3 on 1. Two weeks ago I literally had an infect player start swearing when I showed my hand to the player next to me who was at 6 infect on turn 4 and said "I have two options to wreck captain infect, which do you prefer?"
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Mill is a perfectly fine strategy and totally not a feel bad. Actually, I play a lot of graveyard decks so... Keep them mill decks coming 8)
Funnily enough, my apparently-unpopular opinion is that mill is the worst thing ever. Not just because it's "feelbad" and makes for unfun play patterns (it does), but because I just think the decking rule makes no sense. The idea that trying to draw a card should lose you the game seems completely random to me (particularly given that in most formats, there is no limit on deck size!), and the fact that this weird oddity then became a semi-feasible wincon is particularly galling.
The fact that there were cards in Alpha that made the opponent draw cards (like Ancestral Recall (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Ancestral+Recall) and Braingeyser (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Braingeyser)) show to me that the possibility to mill out the opponent was considered legitimate from the very beginning of the game.
The original text of these cards even say "force opponent to draw", which kinda tells me that they knew it could be a "bad" thing for your opponent in some situations.
I don't see the rule of losing when you have 0 cards in your deck as any more "random" than the rule of losing when you have 0 life. They are just two different ways you can lose the game.
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Mill is a perfectly fine strategy and totally not a feel bad. Actually, I play a lot of graveyard decks so... Keep them mill decks coming 8)
Funnily enough, my apparently-unpopular opinion is that mill is the worst thing ever. Not just because it's "feelbad" and makes for unfun play patterns (it does), but because I just think the decking rule makes no sense. The idea that trying to draw a card should lose you the game seems completely random to me (particularly given that in most formats, there is no limit on deck size!), and the fact that this weird oddity then became a semi-feasible wincon is particularly galling.
The fact that there were cards in Alpha that made the opponent draw cards (like Ancestral Recall (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Ancestral+Recall) and Braingeyser (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Braingeyser)) show to me that the possibility to mill out the opponent was considered legitimate from the very beginning of the game.
The original text of these cards even say "force opponent to draw", which kinda tells me that they knew it could be a "bad" thing for your opponent in some situations.
I don't see the rule of losing when you have 0 cards in your deck as any more "random" than the rule of losing when you have 0 life. They are just two different ways you can lose the game.
It's also worth mentioning that from a flavour perspective, one could argue that the "lose when no cards in library" rule makes perfect sense.
From a flavour point of view, playing a game of Magic is supposed to represent two (or more) Planeswalking wizards having a magical battle. The library is supposed to represent the individuals mind, made up of the spells they know how to cast. It's why so many card draw/cantrip spells are themed around concentration and clearing the mind and why so many mill cards are themed around insanity. Mill is your way of confusing your opponent, unraveling their mind, so that they can't access the spells they know. If your library is empty, so is your mind. You have nothing left to cast, so you lose the battle.
Obviously this role playing aspect of the game doesn't mean anything in modern competitive magic, but it makes sense when you consider (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Consider) how old the rule is and how much more of a thing the flavour representation was back then.
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I agree with the comment about needing more four color commanders. I'd love to have access to a WUBR zombie commander with a zombie-centric effect where I could really grind out some zombie mayhem. To finally have access to adding the red Nehebs, Anathemancer (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Anathemancer), and Dreadhorde Twins (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Dreadhorde+Twins) to Corpse Knight (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Corpse+Knight), Grimgrin, Gray Merchant, and the rest. Oh man. Talk about heaven!
I know, I'm practically the only one that thinks this. I don't care. Infect is great.
I love infect. Just like Commander damage, it is a valid win condition. I use to love suiting my Daxos of Meletis (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Daxos+of+Meletis) up with Grafted Exoskeleton (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Grafted+Exoskeleton), another buff or two, and swinging for lethal.
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It's also worth mentioning that from a flavour perspective, one could argue that the "lose when no cards in library" rule makes perfect sense.
From a flavour point of view, playing a game of Magic is supposed to represent two (or more) Planeswalking wizards having a magical battle. The library is supposed to represent the individuals mind, made up of the spells they know how to cast. It's why so many card draw/cantrip spells are themed around concentration and clearing the mind and why so many mill cards are themed around insanity. Mill is your way of confusing your opponent, unraveling their mind, so that they can't access the spells they know. If your library is empty, so is your mind. You have nothing left to cast, so you lose the battle.
Obviously this role playing aspect of the game doesn't mean anything in modern competitive magic, but it makes sense when you consider (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Consider) how old the rule is and how much more of a thing the flavour representation was back then.
Wounderfully explained.
The part about the importance of flavor makes me think about the playtest version of Swords to Plowshares (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Swords+to+Plowshares), which stated that a creature would "take up farming" :)
(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/E-YGa4oWYAEwGnm?format=png&name=900x900)
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The original text of these cards even say "force opponent to draw", which kinda tells me that they knew it could be a "bad" thing for your opponent in some situations.
I'm dubious of this. It seems more likely that those were intended to be used on yourself and were just written more permissively, either by accident or "just in case". There are, after all, punishing effects. Very early mill cards seemed more like anti-scry or anti-tutor than anything. You may be right, of course; that was well before my time. It wouldn't improve my estimation of it... in fact, it being a deliberate (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Deliberate) decision seems worse. :)
I don't see the rule of losing when you have 0 cards in your deck as any more "random" than the rule of losing when you have 0 life. They are just two different ways you can lose the game.
It is, because lowering someone's like to 0 is very much the aim. More life is good, less life is bad. Your deck is completely different; in every other situation, drawing cards is good. It's not even like a punishing effect (like Nekusar) because a) it's the normal rules of the game and b) it creates a cliffhanger scenario, where drawing cards is good until, suddenly, you lose. A cliffhanger scenario is potentially interesting, but usually just makes for bad gameplay.
It's also worth mentioning that from a flavour perspective, one could argue that the "lose when no cards in library" rule makes perfect sense.
From a flavour point of view, playing a game of Magic is supposed to represent two (or more) Planeswalking wizards having a magical battle. The library is supposed to represent the individuals mind, made up of the spells they know how to cast.
It does, until you actually think about it.
Sure, my deck represents the spells I know. I can't cast anything not in my deck. That makes sense. But then, what does it mean to have four copies of a spell in my deck rather than only one? Surely, knowing more spells is better... but putting more spells in my deck is not. Rather, the power of my deck is more like the average of the spells in it.
It also doesn't explain why you would lose. So I forgot all my spells... so what? How is this different to having only five land cards left in my deck? If my board state is still sufficient that I can win, why do I even need to cast spells?
Perhaps more importantly, what then does it mean to draw cards? I no longer "know" the cards in my hand... but I can't cast them unless they are in my hand? Drawing too many cards is the same as forgetting all my spells (except I have to draw them to cast them)? They've moved into some sort of short-term memory but my lower-level brain functions have shut down? :-\ Honestly, it makes very little sense, and that's fine because it's just a game with a bit of theming and a lot of abstraction, but in that case I don't think one should make silly game rules off the back of it.
*shrug* I may be the only person who sees it this way but, hey, you asked for unpopular opinions.
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Ummm... unpopular opinion... I will go into a complete category of the "you can't" cards. Everything from MLD, Stax, Tax, and anything in between. Cards that don't allow you to do a normal game of magic. The cards that make you think "F@%k" when they come into play. I personally don't mind them if they come into play. However there has to be a strategy as to why you are playing them compared to just playing them for smite (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Smite) or just because you think they are cool. Some of these strategies are indeed to slow your opponents down. Just how slow though do you need to slow them down? I would think there is an unwritten rule to what the general (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=The+General) consensus to how long a commander game should be. If it is continually going beyond the consensus then you should re-evaluate your strategy.
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Cedh is infinitely better than casual and it teaches you how to actually convert cards in hand into resources like mana to actually play the game. All of edh is drawing cards and ramping to play spells.
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Cedh is infinitely better than casual and it teaches you how to actually convert cards in hand into resources like mana to actually play the game. All of edh is drawing cards and ramping to play spells.
Cedh doesn't include on average more fast mana (ie, ramp) and more card draw as a way to play their spells? ;)
I could argue the opposite point. A Cedh deck takes less skill to play as the deck looks to win virtually the same way every time whereas casual edh played without tutors takes more skill to play as it can win a variety of ways each game due to the nature of the singleton format.
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My controversial opinion:
We do NOT need more 4-color commander. We do NOT need any 4-color commanders at all. Nor the partner commanders that enable 4 colors.
Restrictions breed creativity. the spirit of the format is to build large, creative decks. Having access to 4, or even all 5, colors gives a builder too many options.
Commanders should be restricted to 3 colors or less.
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It's also worth mentioning that from a flavour perspective, one could argue that the "lose when no cards in library" rule makes perfect sense.
From a flavour point of view, playing a game of Magic is supposed to represent two (or more) Planeswalking wizards having a magical battle. The library is supposed to represent the individuals mind, made up of the spells they know how to cast.
It does, until you actually think about it.
Sure, my deck represents the spells I know. I can't cast anything not in my deck. That makes sense. But then, what does it mean to have four copies of a spell in my deck rather than only one? Surely, knowing more spells is better... but putting more spells in my deck is not. Rather, the power of my deck is more like the average of the spells in it.
It also doesn't explain why you would lose. So I forgot all my spells... so what? How is this different to having only five land cards left in my deck? If my board state is still sufficient that I can win, why do I even need to cast spells?
Perhaps more importantly, what then does it mean to draw cards? I no longer "know" the cards in my hand... but I can't cast them unless they are in my hand? Drawing too many cards is the same as forgetting all my spells (except I have to draw them to cast them)? They've moved into some sort of short-term memory but my lower-level brain functions have shut down? :-\ Honestly, it makes very little sense, and that's fine because it's just a game with a bit of theming and a lot of abstraction, but in that case I don't think one should make silly game rules off the back of it.
*shrug* I may be the only person who sees it this way but, hey, you asked for unpopular opinions.
You definitely make some good points here.
From my point of view, I think there are a few things at play here.
I think a library representing a wizards mind is supposed to me more of a representation than a one to one comparison. It's more of a thematic way to explain what is going on "in universe" and doesn't need to answer every single eventuality with a concrete comparison. Playing four of a card doesn't mean "I can remember how to cast this spell exactly 4 times and once I've done that I will forget (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Forget) how". It's more in line with "this is a spell I am comfortable with and can cast with relative ease". If we look at it like this, I feel that it makes more sense.
I also don't think a library is supposed to represent memory, but ability. It's not a case of "what can I remember to cast" but "what do I have the ability to cast". If my opponent has driven me insane (milled me), my ability to cast spells is gone. It's not that I don't have the memory, it's that I don't have the capacity.
I kind of see it like this:
I run 4 copies of opt (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Opt) = I'm a wizard capable of quick thinking and decision making. I can assess my capabilities and limitations quickly to help me better find the right answer for my current situation.
I run 3 copies of Genesis Ultimatum (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Genesis+Ultimatum) = This is a spell I have studied extensively as I believe it will help my beat my fellow wizards. But it is harder to cast. I have to exert a lot more resources to do it.
I run a copy of Lurrus = It's a spell I've read about, but it's not key to my plan. Might come in handy one day though.
Within the context of this flavour analysis, I see drawing cards as simply thinking. If my opposing wizard has just cast a spell that summons a dragon, I need to think of what I can do about it. I might already have the answer at the forefront of my mind (in my hand). I might think of a way to kill it (draw a removal spell), think of a way to summon my own creatures to fight it (draw my own dragon spell), or might not think of anything relevant by the time it has killed me (draw nothing that helps). Again, to me it's not a case of memory, but ability, and isn't a direct one to one comparison.
I also think losing the game with 0 cards in your library is absolutely the right choice from a gameplay perspective too. Milling yourself out entirely is incredibly easy if you are trying to, and a lot of cards, decks and archetypes look to make use of a stocked graveyard. The potential to mill yourself out and lose as a result does a lot of work for balancing these kinds of decks. If you could just dump your whole library in your graveyard and not be punished for it, you'd be at a significant advantage. I see it as a similar rule to the maximum hand size rule. The game needs inherent ways to balance (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Balance) it, and if you want to flout those rules, you need to play specific cards to allow you to do so (for example Lab Man and Reliquary Tower (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Reliquary+Tower) respectively).
Also, I hope it comes across in my replies, but I am by no means saying that my view point is the correct one and anyone else who holds a different view point is wrong. This is just how I see it, both from a flavour and gameplay perspective. It's all personal conjecture.
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Theme-wise, sure, but I don't think it makes sense to use the flavour as a reason for the rule, because once you start trying to apply the theming that strictly it breaks down. If drawing cards is thinking, drawing 100 cards should really let you come up with an answer - but before you can cast that answer you lose? It just doesn't make sense to me. Perhaps if you lost when your deck and hand were empty (though mechanically that wouldn't work because you'd just not play your last card(s)), and even then I don't really see why I would lose when I've forgotten all my spells - I'd just not be able to cast any more spells.
As for the mechanics of it, I guess I can see that, but I'm not sure that that was really a deliberate (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Deliberate) decision or that it's really necessary or sufficient. The decking rule doesn't do a whole lot to balance (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Balance) graveyard-type strategies in most cases and, as I said, does it in a "cliffhanger" sort of way which personally I don't really like; it's a very all-or-nothing effect which doesn't at all curb those strategies until they just lose.
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The fact that there were cards in Alpha that made the opponent draw cards (like Ancestral Recall (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Ancestral+Recall) and Braingeyser (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Braingeyser)) show to me that the possibility to mill out the opponent was considered legitimate from the very beginning of the game.
The original text of these cards even say "force opponent to draw", which kinda tells me that they knew it could be a "bad" thing for your opponent in some situations.
I don't see the rule of losing when you have 0 cards in your deck as any more "random" than the rule of losing when you have 0 life. They are just two different ways you can lose the game.
As someone who was playing back then ... you're giving "they" and "them" an awful lot of credit.
"They" were Richard Garfield and a group of four or five of his friends who playtested the game. That's it. Each game piece was intended to be as flexible as possible as the target market was RPGers. (In person play, as the internet was barely a thing prior to 1993.)
I can also say that in 1993 the concept of losing a card game when your deck ran out of cards was quite novel. The expectation for card games at the time is that you play to a specific endpoint. If you run out of cards before that, you just shuffle up the discard pile and keep going. Alternatively some games would make an empty deck an endpoint, but you would score the game at that point. Either player could still win.
Draw from an empty deck equals game loss was a very new concept. As such there was a lot of discussion about it at the time. The story was that during playtesting, the game would come to a stall on a not infrequent enough basis. So this was their solution. The entire concept exists just to make the game eventually end in the early days.
So did they know that you would want to end the game by Brainstorm-ing your opponent. Maybe? They also wanted all the cards to be as modular as possible. Maybe not?
It's very hard to discern the intent from the early cards. Standard templating was almost non-existent. Each card was worded on its own merits. And this was a time when Ante was still very much a part of the game.
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Perhaps if you lost when your deck and hand were empty (though mechanically that wouldn't work because you'd just not play your last card(s)), and even then I don't really see why I would lose when I've forgotten all my spells - I'd just not be able to cast any more spells.
As for the mechanics of it, I guess I can see that, but I'm not sure that that was really a deliberate (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Deliberate) decision or that it's really necessary or sufficient. The decking rule doesn't do a whole lot to balance (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Balance) graveyard-type strategies in most cases and, as I said, does it in a "cliffhanger" sort of way which personally I don't really like; it's a very all-or-nothing effect which doesn't at all curb those strategies until they just lose.
*sighs*
I have a story for you, sir.
Once, I was a noob. I didn't know about the draw death rule, and neither did my opponent. We were both really bad at the game with a half-cooked understanding, but we knew how to cast spells and do combat. That was basically it. We were using the free "welcome decks" that game stores hand out to get people hooked, and we were having a good time. The only problem was that there were no board wipes and very limited removal in those decks, and it got to the point when there was no reason for either of us to attack, because whoever attacked first would just lose a bunch of creatures on the other person's blocks, and then die on the crackback.
We ran out of cards in our decks, neither of us were attacking, and there were no cards in our hands, and no activated abilities on our creatures to sink mana into. It was hell. The game ended in a draw (no pun intended) because we were sick of sitting there and just passing the turns to each other.
Frankly, it doesn't matter if you don't think that the flavor of it makes sense. The function and the flavor agree with the "draw death" rule, and it would be painful if games like the one described above could happen in professional Magic. Personally, I love boncoswoll's explanation of the flavor and think it makes complete sense. If you won't agree with that, then you should at least agree that the stale nature of a card game with no cards in it is worth avoiding with a useful rule such as this.
But in the end, this whole thread is about controversial opinions! So, I do not look down on you. Your opinion is as valid as anyone else's, and if you choose not to agree with mine, that's okay with me.
EDIT: The noble ApothecaryGeist posted just seconds before I did, so this might seem like a copy-post. I assure you, it is not: Two people thinking the same thing is just further consolidation of our shared opinion.
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Honestly, I don't see why a draw isn't the right outcome for that situation.
I have a similar but different story from when I'd just started Magic, which perhaps influenced my own opinion on the matter. I was playing essentially a lifegain vs lifegain deck matchup on Arena. Then suddenly I lost. I had no idea why. Looking back, I assume I ran out of cards, but nobody had ever told me that this was a rule and I'd just assumed that it wasn't, because why would you have such a rule? I honestly hadn't really thought about it, but I think had some vague idea that you'd just shuffle your discard pile back in, like in Dominion or something (I now realise that this has its own problems, primarily lands). This was also a pretty bad feeling for a new player!
The "it's necessary to the end the game" line is also bogus. I don't think you need that in most cases - these matchups are fairly unusual, and a draw makes perfect sense. Chess by the way has the same problem and they just have a three-ply repetition rule. It also doesn't actually solve the problem - there are plenty of reshuffle effects, so it's still possible for a game to go on forever (in fact, it's mathematically impossible to determine even whether a game will end, in general). I hadn't considered the case of new players so much, I guess; those won't deliberately be building decks to go on forever, which you kinda have to do. It still feels like, at best, an ugly hack - to me, anyway. As I said, a surprising number of people seem to disagree with me. :)
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Honestly, I don't see why a draw isn't the right outcome for that situation.
I have a similar but different story from when I'd just started Magic, which perhaps influenced my own opinion on the matter. I was playing essentially a lifegain vs lifegain deck matchup on Arena. Then suddenly I lost. I had no idea why. Looking back, I assume I ran out of cards, but nobody had ever told me that this was a rule and I'd just assumed that it wasn't, because why would you have such a rule? I honestly hadn't really thought about it, but I think had some vague idea that you'd just shuffle your discard pile back in, like in Dominion or something (I now realise that this has its own problems, primarily lands). This was also a pretty bad feeling for a new player!
The "it's necessary to the end the game" line is also bogus. I don't think you need that in most cases - these matchups are fairly unusual, and a draw makes perfect sense. Chess by the way has the same problem and they just have a three-ply repetition rule. It also doesn't actually solve the problem - there are plenty of reshuffle effects, so it's still possible for a game to go on forever (in fact, it's mathematically impossible to determine even whether a game will end, in general). I hadn't considered the case of new players so much, I guess; those won't deliberately be building decks to go on forever, which you kinda have to do. It still feels like, at best, an ugly hack - to me, anyway. As I said, a surprising number of people seem to disagree with me. :)
I 100% agree with you that this rule is not intuitive in the slightest. It is so far removed and different from how most games handle this scenario that it is very jarring when you first come across it.
Similarly to a lot of people, my first interaction with this rule came about when I was relatively new to the game. My friends and I were playing some casual kitchen table magic and I happened to get through my entire deck. None of us new what the ramifications were of this. We assumed you'd either shuffle everything back in or just stop being able to draw new cards, so we searched for the answer and nope. Turns out I lose. Cool.
That said, it being so unconventional is partly why I love it as a rule. Magic in general is a game that comes under a relative amount of criticism due to its archaic rulings. Resource management is the big sticking point here. A lot of newer games handle resources in far more graceful and intuitive ways that Magic does, and we've all been in situations where we've been mana screwed. But I love this aspect of the game. I love that no matter how well my deck is built, variance always plays a part and I am never guaranteed for that not to happen. For me, these little quirks leftover from the early days that are too ingrained in the game to ever be changed give the game so much character and give us so much insight (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Insight) into the games history and growth that I love them, even if they are weird or counterintuitive.
I also like the "can't draw you lose" rule as it makes things like Mill and Lab Man viable win conditions. Variety is the spice of life as they say, and being able to close out games in ways other than combat is only a good thing (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=A+Good+Thing) in my opinion. Magic as a game is often praised for being inherently well balanced (as a set of rules, not talking about individual busted cards here). Every archetype has strengths and weaknesses. If you were never in danger of being milled out, suddenly things like life gain become incredibly more powerful (obviously there are other ways to beat life gain decks too, this is just and example).
I personally think that having the game result in a draw would feel more like an ugly hack. I would feel incredibly unsatisfied as a player playing games that ended in a draw after what would likely have ended up being a prolonged and extensive game. I like that there are consequences to this kind of game, and even when games devolve into "who is going to draw themselves out of the game first", I find that kind of race as equally exciting and fun as the race to reduce life totals to zero. Again, this is just me though. I'm not trying to convince others to agree with me, just enjoying the conversation.
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That said, it being so unconventional is partly why I love it as a rule. Magic in general is a game that comes under a relative amount of criticism due to its archaic rulings. Resource management is the big sticking point here. A lot of newer games handle resources in far more graceful and intuitive ways that Magic does, and we've all been in situations where we've been mana screwed. But I love this aspect of the game. I love that no matter how well my deck is built, variance always plays a part and I am never guaranteed for that not to happen. For me, these little quirks leftover from the early days that are too ingrained in the game to ever be changed give the game so much character and give us so much insight (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Insight) into the games history and growth that I love them, even if they are weird or counterintuitive.
I play a lot of tabletop games, but admittedly Magic is the only TCG I've really invested time into, aside from Pokemon when I was a lot younger. The one thing that has made for the most enjoyable gaming experiences, in my opinion, is clearly defined parameters and expectations. I love that Magic has a pretty much guaranteed, definitive end to every game. There are only some niche scenarios that I've ever seen where a game has truly ended in a draw, and they're so one sided in who initiated the situation that we usually consider (https://cards.deckstats.net/magiccard.php?utf8=1&lng=en&card=Consider) that person the loser (e.g. establishing an infinite loop with no win con). These parameters definitely inhibit "ideal" gameplay of pure strategizing and lead to frustrations, but I think it's these warts (and all) that are indicative of the true success of the overall game: having to come up with creative solutions to combat these limitations and the variance it fosters.
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Magic doesn't have a clearly-defined end state; games of Magic can literally go on forever. It's arguable that it has the least guaranteed end of any game ever.
I'm not sure I buy that decking is a necessary counter to lifegain decks. Mill isn't even considered a serious strategy most of the time, and I don't think that lifegain decks are super-powerful in all other conditions. I'm all for rock-paper-scissors type setups, but I don't think anyone says we need infect or poison for that same reason.
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Commander games are long enough to allow mill, infect and commander damage as alternative wincons. Also lifegain needs to have reasonable answer.