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Author Topic: Thoughts on Phyrexia AWB1, Toxic & commander  (Read 886 times)

Kelly

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Thoughts on Phyrexia AWB1, Toxic & commander
« on: January 28, 2023, 06:42:33 pm »
Replacing 40 life in commander with 10 'points' is by default twice a powerful as designed (for standard).  This circumvents the point of commander as a longer format with more time for folks to play splashier cards, leading Infect to be met with disdain in most pods. 

The Toxic mechanic, contained within the confines of standard seems like a decent attempt to rework Infect, but in commander, it unfortunately encounters the same '10 points' problem.  To me, this seems a wasted opportunity (and a lot of new cards I don't need as a result).

What if poison was reworded to reach half of the starting life total, instead of just 10 points? (ie 10 points for standard, 20 points for commander).  Any better then?  What do you think?


AlltheTokens

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Re: Thoughts on Phyrexia AWB1, Toxic & commander
« Reply #1 on: January 28, 2023, 07:39:16 pm »
Requiring 20 poison counters for a loss in commander might limit some of the salt from playing it.  Maybe a few people who have people playing infect in their pods should try to test out this idea.  Toxic looks less salty than infect on the surface, but when you combine in the huge amount of proliferate in AWB1 it is going to result in even faster kills.  More sources of poison and more proliferate will make current inflect strategies even meaner. (except for the Blightsteel Colossus OTK, nothing can make that worse)

Morganator 2.0

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Re: Thoughts on Phyrexia AWB1, Toxic & commander
« Reply #2 on: January 28, 2023, 08:43:49 pm »
Infect is fine. I can see the issues in 1v1 formats but commander is multiplayer. While you only need effectively 10 damage to take a player out of the game, you're dealing that damage on your own. As a result, infect is way underpowered. There's about 4 good infect cards for commander.

Blightsteel Colossus
Grafted Exoskeleton
Tainted Strike
Triumph of the Hordes

So infect is good for complementing a deck, but as a strategy for building a deck around, it falls flat. I've never been in a situation where it felt overpowering or unfair.

fire5167

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Re: Thoughts on Phyrexia AWB1, Toxic & commander
« Reply #3 on: January 28, 2023, 09:09:00 pm »
Infect is not good in commander. Making it more difficult to win with infect in commander would just make a fringe archetype oven worse. I mean, if there are no infect decks in the cEDH metagame, it can be said with near certainty that infect is not too powerful.

robort

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Re: Thoughts on Phyrexia AWB1, Toxic & commander
« Reply #4 on: January 29, 2023, 02:56:34 pm »
I have playing for awhile now and I hardly see any type of infect in Commander. Once the table see's that you are trying to do and use infect then you become the target. Eliminate the infect player and then get back to business of playing. Then the only time it ever feels bad is it usually takes out 1 player. That player usually has to sit around now and wait for the game to finish. So it is hard enough trying to get everyone 10 poison counters as it is not a strong mechanic and I just couldn't imagine it becoming 20. At 20 would then make the mechanic basically null and void.
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Rose the Budget Queen

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Re: Thoughts on Phyrexia AWB1, Toxic & commander
« Reply #5 on: February 01, 2023, 01:53:51 am »
I agree with the others about infect not being nearly as terrifying as it looks on paper. Even with commanders like Atraxa and the plethora of proliferation cards that are out now and are coming out. I'm saying this as someone who ran a fairly successful Fynn, The Fangbearer "deathtouch tribal." I was ALWAYS the first one to get taken out, as everyone knows if they don't kill me quickly I will poison them to death. Even newer casual games I would get ganged up on. In a 1v1 setting, yes, Infect, Toxic, and poison are a bit overpowered. But the second you drop heavy poison damage in a 4 player setting, you WILL get ganged up on. Is it a "unfair" mechanic? Yes, if it's left unchecked. But no one leaves it unchecked.

Kelly

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Re: Thoughts on Phyrexia AWB1, Toxic & commander
« Reply #6 on: February 01, 2023, 08:43:30 am »
Interesting mix of replies, thanks!  Underpowered to archenemy.  I guess my overall take is, the proclivity to break it in commander makes it unfun to play against, yet Toxic within the confines of standard seems like a potentially fun alternative line of play.  Perhaps some mechanics are simply better suited to a curated environment like standard.  I think I'll draft it and see how it goes.

anjinsan

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Re: Thoughts on Phyrexia AWB1, Toxic & commander
« Reply #7 on: February 04, 2023, 12:18:15 am »
Typically, these sorts of mechanics are less bad in commander, just because... well, it's all relative, right? And commander has all sorts of crazy stuff flying around. Also, people kind of have to pack removal (of all types) in EDH because you can't expect just to win with a dumb aggro deck that can't actually interact with a lot of stuff, and board wipes happen, and you're facing multiple foes. Thus, there are just a lot more chances for you to face the right sorts of answers for whatever silly thing you're doing.

(For comparison, Fynn was obnoxious in Standard, and I suspect that the likes of Venerated Rotpriest will be, too)

Also, "underpowered" and "archenemy" are not mutually exclusive! Infect is perhaps underpowered in part because it's so often the archenemy, because it's widely hated. Or, consider "kill on sight" commanders like Tegrid - these are powerful if left unchecked, so they're not left unchecked; overall, they're often not overpowered at all, but they have the potential to get out of hand if they're not targeted.

Anyway, to come back to the question... in general, I am not actually that keen on this kind of alternative wincon. I find them often to be... sort of parasitic? For a start, poison and mill don't really do anything unless they do everything; in a multiplayer game especially you can't exactly combine forces with anyone. Conversely, they subvert the expectations of the game and are hard to combat. We rightfully expect that our life total is important, but no matter the number of blockers we have or the board state we create or the card advantage we might have, we can still lose to poison counters or decking out. Infect is actually better in this respect because it's on creatures that have to hit you, but ETB poison + proliferate is rather horrid this way since it can at times be impossible to deal with short of player removal.

It can be healthy to have alternative wincons, to stop lifegain being too annoying, or to keep the game fresh - but when they're not really designed in from the start, they can feel... well, that's why I say "parasitic" (not just because of Phyrexia and parasites).

Toxic feels like an effort to make a better-balanced, "fair" version of poison. It sort of limits the amount of poison you can inflict per turn, and it also doesn't stop you from lowering life totals at the same time. Corrupted is a way to get payoffs before you hit 10 counters so it's not so all-or-nothing. They also seem to have added a bunch of noncombat ways to give people poison counters and some way more pushed proliferate, so I'm not sure what they are on or how that will pan out, but it may work.

Der TodesKnopf

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Re: Thoughts on Phyrexia AWB1, Toxic & commander
« Reply #8 on: February 05, 2023, 03:04:06 am »
People get cautious when they hit 10 life, with infect you start every game at 10 life; basically doing 90 damage by sitting down at the table...
Even the most casual player can see the great potential for infect, but it had not enough support so far.
And honestly it was not really fun piloting such a deck you have weak creatures that cost too much, you will focus down one guy and die.
So I feel Toxic is a more interesting and flexible mechanic. Combine that with Corrupted and you shift from an aggro one-shot deck, to a more midrange or control utility deck.
Proliferate could feel un-fun for some as it is not very interactive, but I hope not as I'm about to build one XD.

New Venser+Geths Throne+Dross Scorpion+sac. creature = infinite proliferate^^

HowlingLotus

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Re: Thoughts on Phyrexia AWB1, Toxic & commander
« Reply #9 on: February 05, 2023, 05:19:52 am »
I honestly don't think it's a big issue, considering how many commanders can one-shot someone if they get through with one pump spell or one really efficient equipment. That's before delving into how many decks can combo off early turns, even in a casual setting.

There is always going to be a clock at the end of the day, just depends on what everyone is playing.

I do think Toxic adds more options to play Poison in a control shell versus the pure aggro Infect usually wants. Toxic (and Corrupted once active) allows for getting a few counters on each opponent and then shift into a defensive position and proliferate, whereas Infect (from what I've seen) tends to focus one person and the other players stabilize to beat the Infect player down.

Of course, a person can't sit down and NOT expect to get some hate for playing Toxic or Infect before the game even starts. This problem, however, isn't limited to this archetype. Most popular commanders probably get a response out of people before a game even starts, even if the person is playing a way lower power level version or goofy jank build. Though I understand why people act that way, even if I don't agree on it. Though that could simply be from playing with people the odd time that play more competitive and just assume my deck is cEDH because I happened to pick "insert commander here".

I guess an odd opinion would be whether or not a person only ever plays in 4 player games? My friend group is pretty laid back and casual when it comes to EDH, and we often have games (EDH or otherwise) with more than 4 players. Many strategies become harder to pull off as you increase your number of opponents past 3, but I still feel like I'm going to give Toxic a try.
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Aetherium Slinky

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Re: Thoughts on Phyrexia AWB1, Toxic & commander
« Reply #10 on: February 06, 2023, 09:20:51 pm »
I would argue that for commander infect isn't 10 poison, it's 30 poison because you need to get through to everyone and nobody is going to help you. In a regular game on average you need to deal 40 damage (out of 120 life) because the other players can usually be expected to deal some of that damage for you. It's not like you're the only one attacking. With poison there's nobody else there so you need to personally deal all 30 damage to your opponents. Is the reduction from 40 damage to be dealt to 30 damage to be dealt a huge step? Not in my opinion - especially when you can't even strike a deal with anyone and you'll become the archenemy easily.

The situation is obviously very different if there are no combat decks around. Depending on the amount of pillowfort it's either easier or more difficult than in a "casual" (non-comp) combat meta.
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anjinsan

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Re: Thoughts on Phyrexia AWB1, Toxic & commander
« Reply #11 on: February 06, 2023, 11:41:13 pm »
The whole "you only have to deal 10 damage!" thing is a bit silly, though; regular damage is easier to deal, and everyone at the table is dealing it, and people are spending their own life on things. And, honestly, as annoying and frustrating as proliferating poison counters is, it's slow, and we far more frequently see infect used as a knockout blow with Triumph of the Hordes or Tainted Strike.

It may be interesting to see if, with this new set, anyone ever ends up sat down vs two or three poison decks at the same time; that feels like it could be brutal for everyone else, since all those counters will add up quickly!  :D