Favorite Format or time in a format?

[burn your face]

Hi Everyone,

I just thought it would be interesting to talk about everyones favorite format, and/or period in a format they really enjoyed playing in.

Thank

[burn your face]

Oh.

I really like modern, pauper, and recently pioneer. I think I liked modern the best pre guilds of ravnica, and especially when hollow one was good.

[Morganator 2.0]

I could have sworn we already did this topic.

https://deckstats.net/forum/index.php/topic,19125.0.html

[burn your face]

Yeah I saw that topic, and while it was very similar, I was curious about what peoples favorite era for specific formats was as well. Formats like standard change very frequently, but pretty much every format changes over time.

[Aetherium Slinky]

I could have sworn we already did this topic.

https://deckstats.net/forum/index.php/topic,19125.0.html

Not fair. That was four years ago.

Commander is my favourite format. Haven't played for that long so I don't have a favourite era but it definitely isn't this one where salt, judging, and belittling critique are rampant on the internets. Not our community, but perhaps some others.

[MonteTribal]

I really liked early modern. Even though Splinter Twin was pretty oppressive, it was a fun format. Bogles was competitive, American Control (now Jeskai Control) was super fun to play against. Lists were slightly untuned by today's standards. Now modern feels kind if degenerate, but it's still nice from time to time.

I think I will like pioneer once it settles a little. Early modern was like trying to find a footing. Early pioneer lives by the mantra "Try to break the format". Once the ban hammer sits still for a minute, I think it'll be fun.

Pauper will always be my go to though. High power, great diversity, lower investments. So much brewing potential. And as the game gets more complicated, that opens more potential for "low complexity" interactions.

[Xaarvaxus]

EDH is really the only format I play anymore though I've been meaning to get back to booster drafting for Throne as well as trying Cube draft at least once.

For favorite time period, everything seemed great when I started in 4th ed as the game was bright and new and there wasn't much netdecking, etc.  So much of what was printed back then was pure dreck but it all felt like there had to be a way to make it good.  I sleeved up and played way too many cards like Mtenda Lion trying to make a green stompy deck before there was a viable green stompy deck, emphasis on try.  Erhnam Djinn became one of my all-time faves that I still have a soft spot for [but no longer play].

I loved drafting Urza's block and was probably doing 7 or 8 drafts each week throughout.  Even with how much product I buy today, I probably still have bought more Urza's Saga than any other set.  My absolute favorite though was drafting original Innistrad.  That set brought me back to Magic after a pretty lengthy hiatus as I'd stopped playing with the release of Mirrodin [and I mean right at release...I bought a box, cracked it, loathed everything about it and pretty much stopped playing], only occasionally buying a handful of packs for nostalgia's sake.  Innistrad had such great gothic flavor and such amazing deck types to draft, though I never was able to put together the Spider Spawning deck because everyone else at the table typically raced to draft it.  Ended up playing either blue white spirits/humans mix or mill as it was usually open.  But I have very fond memories of that particular draft season.  Sadly, Dark Ascension didn't add much and Avacyn's wasn't that much fun to draft and I pretty much haven't drafted since.

[ApothecaryGeist]

I play casual Commander.  I have the cards where I could play competetive EDH (cEDH).  I prefer the social nature of casual.  I've been playing Commander regularly since 2011.  It's the only format that I have played extensively.  Any time is a good time to play Commander.  As cards never rotate and new sets always bring new fun.


I do enjoy limited events at prereleases.  My wife often comes with and we play Two-Headed Giant.  My all-time favorite prerelease sets have been  Urza's Legacy, Zendikar, and Amonkhet.


I do like to play cube draft once in a while.  I'm not very good at building them myself.


I've thought about getting in to Pauper.  I haven't built a deck yet though.

[BoBWiz]

I only play paper.

I really like drafting. There is no special period.

Since Tarkir I played some Standard and enjoy it. I got a good deck the time kaladesh was in and the saheeli-combo was banned. (Grixis Herald)

Pauper is one of my favorites, but i do not play it very often. Latest I got a cromatic black deck but the astrolab was banned

My very favorite format is circle (I guess earlier it was called melee - you attack just in one direction.) In our playgroup are no bans. So you're free to play what you want. Deckbuilding is very special. You have to prepare for everything.

[robort]

I have to say it is casual commander. I just enjoy the multiplayer aspect of that game. I used to draft quite a bit before I found out about commander though. I tried standard but I can't stand the meta or netdecking. So commander it is and I always have a blast.
However the favorite story of mine when I went to draft at FNM one night and brought my standard deck. I was talking to this fellah who asked if I was into standard , said yes and showed him my deck. He went on about how my deck wasn't that good and how he was going to this GP over the weekend et-cetra. Well I drafted pretty good that night and started 2-0 and low and behold I face this guy. I went 2-0 against him making me 3-0 for that night. 2nd time ever I went 3-0 so not only going 3-0 felt good but beating him for the win felt so much better

[Marshstepper78]

My primary format is casual Commander now. Our meta became increasingly cutthroat and it became less and less enjoyable playing Commander. I felt that the more competitive the meta became, the less room we had for fun commanders and rogue strategies. We have since made efforts to re-inject some fun and diversity back into our meta. We have been good at self-policing this new meta direction - the idea is to not use card interactions that are very difficult to interact with or play with Commanders that are too oppressive. It's fun seeing everyone have a chance to built up their board and for games to last longer. It's all about quality of games over quantity of games in any given evening. Communication has been key.

My other prefered format is pauper. It's Tortured Existence's fault. I'd love to have, at some point, a Tortured Existence deck for each colour combination, each unique in approach and card selection.

I have one Oathbreaker deck just for fun, but we don't play that format very much. I toyed around with Tiny Leaders when it was a thing, but interest waned in our group. However, Tiny Leaders was fun while it lasted; if you stayed away from the top decks, the format was honestly a blast. There's something about singleton formats that appeals to me.

I tried my hand at Pioneer recently and I am really loving it. This is the most fun I've had with a 60-card constructed format in a very long time.

[Aetherium Slinky]

I toyed around with Tiny Leaders when it was a thing, but interest waned in our group. However, Tiny Leaders was fun while it lasted; if you stayed away from the top decks, the format was honestly a blast. There's something about singleton formats that appeals to me.

I completely forgot about it! It was a fun time in life, fast games, interesting strategies. Actually taught me a lot about deck building and how decks scale up, which cards work both early game and late game etc. A TL deck could be almost directly converted into an EDH deck by adding some lands, 20 CMC 3-5 (draw & ramp) spells and a couple of big bombs. I still have a ton of TL decks saved here on deckstats and it's sad that the format died so quickly. Just checked and the admins of TL haven't updated the banlist recently so I guess that's now officially dead. I really hoped and wished it wasn't a format invented to be a cash grab for the admins or founders or whatever they're called.

I'd like to change my answer to Tiny Leaders before it was solved.

[Marshstepper78]

I've had the same Magic playgroup for over 20 years and have never played at a LGS so the issue of a ''solved'' format luckily never concerned us. We just avoided the ''top'' Tiny Leaders commanders and opted for funner decks. That solves the ''solved'' problem hehe.

[robislookin]

i am new to this site, first and foremost. and i have only recently returned to playing MTG on a regular basis this past year.
and i have to say that EDH/Commander is my favorite. it reminds me of how we use to play back in the Wheatherlight days (when i first played)

we would get together at a friend's place and play a free-for-all. it might be 2 or 3 of us or as many as 10 playing.

we didn't have percons, we just played with what cards we had and dealt with it. 5 color was the norm not the rarity.
we also lost a card at random if we lost the match. but usually not because it was a friendly game.

we were just there to have fun. if we won so much the better.
and by the way, this is when i was in high school. im now a grandfather.

i also got my son into magic back when he was in Jr. high.

i am getting into Brawl as well for those times when its just 2 of us schmucks playing.