Commander Nights

[Morganator 2.0]

Source here: https://wpn.wizards.com/en/article/scheduling-opens-next-week-commander-nights

Between April 27th and June 18th, there will be a new event for Commander players. You'll be placed in pods of 3 to 5 people, and will aim to accomplish achievements to earn points. Points earn you promo packs.

What do you have to say about this? Does an achievement-based game of Commander interest you?

[Xaarvaxus]

Restrictions that call for unique and interesting deck building generally catch my attention but in looking at some of the achievements listed for the first league, I think a couple of my decks can hit almost half of the list without the need for any modification.  So... right idea maybe but not the best execution? 

[Red_Wyrm]

It looks like they're trying to put a competitive spin on casual commander, which I think would be a disaster because a competitive competition with prizes is going to have all the tier 1 cEDH level decks that can win as early as turn 1, but it this achievement think kind of solves that problem. I mean these achievements, well most of them, require the deck to be built around them or built with them in mind. I think it's a great idea and a good way to get people out to their LGS. I know plenty of people, myself included, don't play at an LGS and this will be great to go and meet new players and expand our pod.

[WWolfe]

I can see where it’ll be a draw to some. I’ve played in a few events like this and they were sort of fun.

[terminalgeek]

Personally, I like the idea of achievements and this possibly being a way to give shops credit for running EDH events. I enjoy brewing new decks but I know some folks prefer to go all in on just one deck and so deck-building based achievements won't be as appealing. Still, I think it's a good way to keep it casual... though it does make me wonder if Back to Nature will see play.

[robort]

It definitely is an interesting concept. My LGS told our regular Edh groups about this right as it came out. Some of the achievements are kind of wacked to try to get. It does bring a spin on things and makes things interesting. I am wondering just one thing though. How many will know the achievements before hand, go to the local LGS and make decks to just only get the achievements just so they can get the prizes/free stuff?

[WizardSpartan]

5. Have 25 or more devotion to a single color.
14. Generate 25 or more mana on a single turn.

Laughs in Ezuri.

All things aside, I'm not really interested in these restrictions. Obviously, if you have an aura-based commander deck, then ya already are fulfilling almost all these restrictions. I'm in an interesting budget level combined with competitive level so that if I invest in a powerful deck, I'm not gonna just buy it to fit within certain temporary restrictions that will change when the next set comes out. Tbh, this gives me standard, rotating deck vibes, and I don't like it.
Looking at the comments, I had similar thoughts to people who have posted already. Certain people will most likely add in hate against the strategy outlined in the restrictions, making it no fun for the rest of the pod. Also, who wants to play a 4 player EDH game with everybody playing enchantments, auras, and constellation effects? Ew, that's so boring.

[terminalgeek]

14. Generate 25 or more mana on a single turn.

First, generating 25 or more mana on a single turn seems to be its own reward. Also, yay mana geyser.

[Morganator 2.0]

Alright, I think everyone has had enough fun with this, so let me either make this better for you, or ruin it.

The achievement system makes this radically different from commander. The ones on the website are just examples of what they may be like. But here's something important...

Which I these achievements actually require you to interact with the other players?

1. Control a permanent with 3 or more auras attached to it.

2. Control 10 or more enchantments.

3. Have 3 or more of your Constellation abilities trigger at the same time.

4. Control an enchantment creature with an enchantment attached to it and an enchantment attached to that enchantment.

5. Have 25 or more devotion to a single color.

6. Have 4 or more cards escape your graveyard in a single turn.

7. Control a Demigod and God of the same color.

8. Control 3 or more Sagas.

9. Target a creature you control with 4 or more spells in one turn.

10. Have 30 or more or more creature cards in your graveyard.

11. Win a game of Commander.

12. Control 3 or more permanents with ‘Temple’ in the name.

13. Have an effect you control cause an opponent’s God to leave the battlefield.

14. Generate 25 or more mana on a single turn.

Just two of them. So here's the ideal strategy. Make a deck designed to get all of these achievements. It doesn't have to be consistent at getting them, just capable. Then, when you sit down at the table, make a pact with the other players. Nobody wins the game until everyone has gotten their max number of achievements. Assuming that everyone follows this, and built their deck to get these achievements, you can stall the game out for as long as you want, and you're guaranteed to get at least 13 points, which is one promo pack. After a second game, you'll have 26, which is either 3 promo packs or one pack and 1 foil promo.

It's going to be very easy to get prizes.

[WizardSpartan]

Ok Morganator, now you're just sucking the fun out of it
You right, though, there's plenty of ways for players to abuse this system, which worries me.
Anothe thing I forgot to mention, there's now a Wizards-sanctioned commander events at lgs's. Once official stuff and prizes get involved, people start bringing decks of unequal power level, which makes gamestores open the whole can of worms of trying to set deck limits to make games fair. The more I think about it, the more it seems bad in reality (no matter how nice it sounds in theory).

[Red_Wyrm]

Oh we love you Morganator, but I do agree with mr Golgari, despite the fact that I dont agree Golgari is for the win.

You're sucking the fun out of it. This is a casual commander event with some competitiveness. You are trying to break it, like cEDH players try to break/solve the format. I doubt this will be a huge problem, but it will most definitely be a problem and I think LGSs will need a way to remedy this, but if someone wants to sit in a 3 hour game for a promo pack, go for it. They've kind of earned it at that point through sheer endurance.

Hmm maybe another requirement could be you need to win the game to get the points. Then youd need to convince 3 other people to sit through 4 games doing that, which I just cant see happening.

[WWolfe]

People already bring decks of unequal power levels to their LGS's now. Granted that's just for casual games but it's not like it's not already a thing, if you enter a 'competition' style event with prize support you should expect the decks to be a little more powerful or geared towards getting the achievements.

There's an LGS about an hour from me that a couple of friends and I go to one Sunday a month when they have EDH events sort of like this with prize support and of course a lot of the decks are more powerful than the decks they normally play at that shop on other days.