EDH/Commander general

wtf is this card? wtf is that wording? why is it an enchantment? so many questions!

Last printed in Unlimited (complete gimmick though, I bought mine for only 10 bucks), so you want to ignore that wording and look up the oracle wording.

Basically:
Play Lich, lose all life.
If you would gain life, instead draw that many cards.
For each point of damage you take (NOT LIFE LOST), sac a permanant.
You lose if lich goes to the graveyard (and only the graveyard) or if you can't sac a permanant.

Huge gimmick. You use it to set your life to 0 and use cards that equalize life amongst all players.

Karador Boonweaver is my main deck (the primary group I play with is pretty cutthroat) so I've got a pretty fantastic hatebear package. Sadly Teeg spiked to more than I wanted to spend on a Teeg, and I didn't already have one.

I love this deck.

What does your playgroup look like?

Just play Selenia.

ok now I get it.
seems pretty janky i like it.

Selenia Dark Angel? Why?

If you play Lich, you need to win ASAP because you just gave your opponent a new win condition.

Makes the same deck except your combo piece is in the command zone and it doesn't come with any "lose the game" conditions besides the occasional bolt.

What's the best way for token decks to deal with elesh norn? Running a teysa token deck and that seems to be the decks biggest weakness. Karador would just cheat her out and keep bringing her back, can't exile because sac outlets and everything of mine is just dead. Graveyard hate is the only thing I can think of

its wicked situational but Extirpate is exactly what you're looking for when Elesh Norn is in the graveyard

The main thing you should know about Elesh Norn is that once she comes out it becomes a game of everyone trying to get their own slice of the Elesh Norn pie. Eventually after all the Rite of Replications have resolved you're left with a board of precisely four -2/1 Elesh Norns angrily glaring at each other.

In short, the answer to Elesh Norn is your own Elesh Norn.

Thanks :v

Our group is pretty large and varied, and like you said cutthroat. The arms race at my LGS had started before I even started playing Magic, so it's Craterhoofs, combo decks and counterspells as far as the eye can see. Everybody has multiple decks, but lemme see, we have at least 3 Narsets, Kami infinite turns combo, Roon, Animar, Tasigur, Jarad, a few people have some really good tribal decks, an Azami, somebody just built Nekusar but it's not very good yet. I have a bad habit of building way too many decks, so I have the one I posted, Krenko, Zur, Zurgo, Narset, a Mishra deck that really isn't good yet, Slivers, Endrek, Mayel, Melek, and I'm working on building Experiment Kraj. But yeah, despite the high levels of bullshit that go on there, stax effects really cause some serious butthurt. Might just be because nobody at the stores in my area plays those kinds of decks yet, with the exception of the 5-color chaos deck that occasionally gets played. It was the same way when I started packing MLD in my Zurgo deck though, now that I think about it. People were really upset about it first, but eventually got used to it.

Thinking about packing an Altar of the Brood in there somewhere for when I repeatedly re-drop all my lands, what do you think?

I want to play R/B/W and own Oros, Tariel, Kaalia, and Zurgo. I picked them up all as singles and haven't built anything yet. My meta is just me, my friends and 3 heavily edited 2013 pre-cons.

I was wondering what to build and with who as my commander.
I'm torn between Zurgo artifact voltron/warrior tribal and Kaalia cheat fatties MLD.

What do y'all think?

Zurgo voltron is a ton of fun and an awesome deck. Strap a bunch of crap to him, throw an Assault Suit on him and watch your opponents beat each other to death! Favorite equipment in mine are, besides the suit, Whispersilk Cloak, Tenza, Godo's Maul, and Moonsliver Spear, so while your opponents attack each other, he spits out flying blockers for you.

What cards do I need to pimp out the following commanders

Jor Kadeen
Surrak (Temur)
Esper giant guy from the pre-con deck.

I wanna prioritize the Esper and Jor Kadeen ones though.

youtube.com/watch?v=cRZHeZ6WwAY

What

What is good and cheap(cast cost wise) for graveyard hate, besides relic of prog and rest in peace?

Tormod's Crypt, obviously.

Alright since we're on the topic of Hatebears, I'm thinking about building Alesha. What are the best bears to use in Mardu? Particularly stuff that triggers on player damage and ETB

I'm really tired of Alesha please stop.

It might be one thing if she wasn't fucking terrible and literally always the exact same deck but she isn't ever so just stop.

Bojuka Bog
Anafenza
Angel of Finality
That one white flash gargoyle

Alesha is a snoozefest-- build Zurgo instead.

Alesha is usually always the same deck, sure, but it's not terrible, even if you don't like the card

martyr of bones, heap doll

What's some of the best blue draw for a high ramp deck? Something like pic related. Main problem atm is that I get stuck with tons of lands and mana rocks (necessary), but I have nothing in my hand to play. I need to draw into creatures more easily.

grafdigger's cage

She can be stax, combo, reanimator, toolbox, or some combination of those and is the best commander I'm her colours.

Litrally everything you said is wrong.

Tormod's Crypt
Bojuka Bog
Nihil Spellbomb
Rakdos Charm
Withered Wretch
Scavenging Ooze
Planar Void

Nihil Spellbomb
Leyline of the Void is free 7/99ths of the time.

>Recurring Insight
NOOOOOOOOO

Thanks fellers.

Is there anything on the maybe board that I should main board? If so what do you think I should cut for it?

tappedout.net/mtg-decks/zo-zu-land-hate-edh/

Opportunity, Dragonlord's Prerogative, Blue Sun's Zenith or any other X blue draw.

Any jace besides shitpact
bident of thassa
catalog
divination
dig through time
treasure cruise
Consecrated Sphinx
Rhystic study

No one in my group has ever played her, so it'll be new for us

>7/99ths of the time
I love you

Alright guys I think it's time for my group to learn a vital lesson about the importance of mana rocks

Time for Hokori. I've never done stax, but I'm guessing efficient beaters, cheap fliers and/or a Voltron package would make for a decent wincon

Don't forget Storage Matrix to make it extra annoying.

*buildinghimintensifies.jpg*

Gonna build it now. Thanks for the encouragement

I'll admit that Hokori is a really tempting build, but as someone who specializes in mono-colored Kamigawa block commanders I would advise against building him. He is just one of those commanders that just works better as support for another commander instead. In particular he makes a great addition to a Yosei, the Morning Star deck.

I don't personally run him in mine because I run a fairly tight ship as far as redundancy goes, but he can be some great value and early game hosing.
tappedout.net/mtg-decks/yosei-sacrificial-edh/

If you are set on Hokori (honestly I can't blame you, I like to run jank too) here are a few hints:
-I would recommend looking into planeswalkers because of how mana efficient they are.
-Mono white has more graveyard tech then you would expect, mostly tied up in enchantments, so aim for an enchantment heavy stax.
-Tax effects run great in him, Ghostly Prison, Sphere of Safety, Archangel of Tithes, Spelltithe Enforcer, Magus of the Tabernacle, etc.
-Look into flicker and O-ring effects to allow you to bypass Hokori's effect on your turn.
-Sun Titan is amazing value in any mono white deck, in a stax deck it can be a win con.
-Always have a way to remove Hokori on hand just in case, High Market, Mouth of Ronom, Blasting Station, Spirit Bonds, etc.
-Kismet effects are your best friend.
-Only run Blinkmoth Urn if you also have a way to tap and untap it.
-Martyr's Bond in stax.

>can ramp and stax get along?
Nope. It's impossible. A cock juggler playing stax is going to eat all my aggro as fast as I can throw it, and neither of us will win. I can deal with control, I can even deal with MLD, but stax deserves no mercy because they will never be merciful. I'd rather cast Armageddon and lose horribly than let a stax player win.

How exactly will Armageddon set back a deck designed to play with limited Mana? You'll just be helping the stax deck out.

You are a bastard and I like your style

I don't really know. It made more sense in my head. This is usually how I play against stax:
>lose the first game almost instantly because I love high cmc
>swap to newzuri infect
>if that doesn't work, buried alive into elesh norn with entomb

Was just about to say what said. I am a Teysa player myself and Elesh Norn slots perfectly into her 99. You now get an insane stream of recurrable 3/3 tokens which also don't get hit by Retribution of the Meek, while the enemy sucks fat phyrexian cock. An answer to enemy EN is Demonic Tutor > EN.

Meanwhile, my Teysa list: tappedout.net/mtg-decks/nin-wip-1/

Oops, wrong list: tappedout.net/mtg-decks/little-teysa-3/

tappedout.net/mtg-decks/reaper-king-20-4/

To the guy I was talking to about Reaper King yesterday: did I make my deck more degenerate?

user you should probably know that I am building this deck to spite my group

They do not like that I run a good number of artifacts in all of my decks and I am using Hokori to teach them that rocks are an important part of a well-balanced deck

Wait what? Why do they take issue with you running mana rocks of all things?

Aside from mentioning Yosei, my suggestions were all for how to make a Hokori deck better. Just saying.

If you are purely going down the spite route then there are a few other options out there too:

-Zo-Zu the Punisher land hate: Definitely teaches people to not rely on land, and a bit more consistent then a Hokori deck. tappedout.net/mtg-decks/zo-zu-land-hate-edh/

-Maga, Traitor to Mortals/Oona Queen of the Fey/Ambassador Laquatus: Can all outright kill people if they have the mana, so just focus on ramping really really hard into infinite mana combos before they even get the chance to do all that much.

-Maraxus of Keld voltron: One of my pet projects, my plan is to mostly run mana rocks, token production, and board wipes. Basically you just ramp faster than anyone else at the table and swing across with a huge Maraxus. When other people start to get a reasonable board then you just wipe it, and you ramp so quickly that you are always going to reestablish faster than anyone else at the table. Honestly your meta seems like the perfect place for a deck like that because of how slow everyone else would be without mana rocks.

-Numot, the Devastator: LAND. HATE.

-Vorinclex, Voice of Hunger: Mana excel and land hosing at the same time. You don't even need to run mana rocks in this one, so it would be a more subtle prompt, but it definitely has a better diversity of potential win cons than Hokori.

-Zedruu the Greathearted: A bit of a weird suggestion but hear me out, kill them with kindness. Force them to see how awesome mana rocks are by forcibly giving them to them. If they actually get the chance to use them then it wont take long for them to learn to love them.

-[INSERT MARDU COMMANDER HERE]: RWB has the best land hate in the game, so if you just build around land hate first and foremost the commander can be a bit of an afterthought with this color identity.

What kind of neato stuff would you recommend for her?

Not rocks, more just artifacts. My first couple of decks were very heavy on artifacts (Bosh and Godo), so they have a special place in my heart. I learned early that mana rocks are essential, they haven't yet, I think they just get annoyed by the amount of brown and grey on my field

I considered Zo-Zu but I build a lot of red. A lot

I'm building BUG reanimator give me some cards boys, listing what I already have

>Hell's Caretaker
>Animate Dead
>Reanimate
>Dread Return
>Dance of the Dead
>Necromancy
>Ever After
>Rise from the Grave I know its a bad card but I'm making due for now until I get better options

Ever after is strictly worse than victimize. Entombed is good, but pricey. Beacon of unrest is super rad.

Usually you don't want your cards on your library, but with necropotence, it doesn't really matter. Which you should also have.

I doubt its just what your cards look like, but if that's their problem then you might want to consider just running a bunch of alters.

Based on what I've heard I would definitely recommend trying Zedruu the Greathearted. I know this sounds weird coming from Veeky Forums of all places, but sometimes escalating conflict isn't the answer. A more friendly and educational group hug approach might be useful to win them over, at least rather then trying to sabotage your meta to the point where they are forced to change.

I can feel for ya, red is one of my favorite colors to work with too, I mean just look at my name. But specialization isn't necessarily a bad thing. I work with mono colored decks so much that I know a ton of weird obscure tech that lets you warp the color pie a little. Take Blood Frenzy for example, sure its situational, but its a kill spell for mono red that no one expects. If you already know whats good and what you have available to work with, then you can make some scary things fairly easily.

I'll definitely have to get a beacon of unrest. I get ever after is worse but the replacement effect is nice. I'll have to get victimize as well.

I was under the impression necropotence was more for mono black than Bx

I guess on second though I might leave it out in tricolor. Its certainly in all my dual color decks, though.

This goes infinite in my Endrek deck with Phrexian Altar and Dark Prophecy. Or actually, any creature and dark prophecy, so long as I have a blood artist or blood artist-like creature out. Need to get one of these :0

Volrath's Stronghold
Lim-Dûl the Necromancer
Nezumi Graverobber
Sheoldred, Whispering One
Sidisi, Brood Tyrant
Tasigur, the Golden Fang
Varolz, the Scar-Striped

Seems like a fairly overlooked card. I just stumbled on it in my collection and have had some fun with it, even though my decks aren't built to abuse it.

I don't play her, but these are the best two decks I've seen for her. Just swap out pricey cards as needed.
Combo:
tappedout.net/mtg-decks/lets-put-a-smile-on-that-face-1/
Stax:
tappedout.net/mtg-decks/alesha-stax-1/

I think she'd be most fun played halfway between those two, leaving out the pricey bits.

Sorry to play the dummy here but this card is confusing the hell out of me. Can someone translate it?

Enchanted creature can't be blocked by artifact creatures.

Prevent all damage that would be dealt to enchanted creature by artifact sources.

Enchanted creature can't be the target of abilities from artifact sources.

Thoughts on Endless Cockroaches as a sacrifice dummy for a sultai aristocrats deck, in the spirit of reassembling skeleton, bloodsoaked champion and Marang River Prowler? Is Deathrender worth including in the deck to get the combo with it, if the deck doesn't have many big expensive fatty creatures?

Butthurt sounds right. If you're thriving in a group that's as powerful as you say (assuming you're regularly playing against the other combo decks) I'd say they probably just need to learn to deal with it. I can't imagine how an Animar or Narset would have a major problem fighting this.

Altar of the Brood seems worth playing since it can be found with Trinket Mage and Fabricate. I'd say it's worth trying as an alternate win condition; it's always worth having more than one obviously but I imagine you're pretty hard to stop once you've already gone off.

Seer's Sundial is pretty strong, but it's usually played alongside mana doublers. Patron of the Moon likes to run those but I don't see them fitting into the stax list, though Teferi Stax will usually squeeze one in (Extraplanar Lens with the full set of Snow-Covered lands is probably optimal). Snapcaster is also probably worth slotting, but he's unfortunately expensive now.

You don't really have any direct graveyard hate, nor do you have any answers to Iona. That's not necessarily a bad thing; I'm assuming the plan is just to not let those things resolve or to keep people off mana. The good reanimator deck is a pretty tough opponent for you, but I'd just say keep building to your meta and figure out what works; if Patron of the Moon is becoming the archenemy then I can't imagine you're the problem.

Alright, I appreciate it. I needed a Magic anthropologist to translate these ancient runes.

I think it's just what I build. I'm a Johnny to the core and my board state can get... unruly. Lots of text to read, lots of triggered abilities. A big part of that is artifacts

>friend literally just figured out the Sage of Hours/Ezuri 2.0 synergy
Aw shit

tappedout.net/mtg-decks/molimo-voltron/
I need to cut around 20 cards, and I may be missing a few good ones. Any help?

Why does she have Feldon's Cane

They're not in the same plane are they

"Enchanted creature gains Protection from Artifacts"?

>guy packs Caged Sun into every deck he builds
He seems to think it's the best card in the format since it accelerates my mono-color decks so well at 6CMC. He currently has it in Newzuri, Doran and Sedris

Use with cards with "Players can't gain life".

You can just use Aluren if you don't have it already.

I've seen Deathrender pull some considerable weight but the meta it was in was a relaxed one. Not too sure if it works great in a cutthroat environment.

i know it's not very good but i love Rescue from the underworld in theros block.

It's pretty fun because you can sac something with a nice ETB or on death effect and get double value out of it.

tappedout.net/mtg-decks/oprah-cracked-out/

does it looks legit? how can i improve this?

This is what im currently running its a fair bit of reanimation some counterspells and some fatties

tappedout.net/mtg-decks/memeoplasm-reanimator-1/

Caged Sun is superb in any black-colored deck simply by stirring in Uborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth.

tappedout.net/mtg-decks/torrentiaplasm/

my current build

Doomed Necromancer is good.

Which he doesn't have

I want to build something, but I have 5 decks and feel like I should really set to tuning those first. I think I like theorycrafting and building more than I like playing, which is a problem

Corpse Dance. Corpse Dance plus Hell's Caretaker is a helluva combo.

I really only use Caged Sun in monoW, monoR, and monoB because G and U have ramp/draw where W and R don't have much of either and B likes to have big mana.

>tappedout.net/mtg-decks/torrentiaplasm/
I could make Plasm so easily with the cards I have but don't know if I wanna go all in.

Guess he doesn't have a brain either

Those are my mono-color decks too. I honestly think it's because the first time he ever saw it (he's fairly new to actually playing, been cracking packs since Nemesis), I also had an Extraplanar Lens on T1 that pretty much sealed the game right there. Sun and Gauntlet of Power came out afterwards. Shit went downhill for him after that.

He's... averse to buying singles. Great guy and really fun to play with, but his decks are mostly hot garbage. I'm really not a good deckbuilder but his decks are awful. I think he knows it too, I owed him pizza money once and he requested I pay him back in cards for Newzuri

What do I use for a budding hydra deck? I already have a competitive deck, I'm just trying to build up a really fluffy and thematic checklist.

I'm kind of put-off that phytohydra is the only white hydra, and so I'd need to run proggy if I wanted to include him.

3 decks I'm looking to build are hydras, insects, and spiders (will be using Ishkanah when she drops). What commanders would be thematically fitting?

Yeah, I can understand that, I've got a monoU deck that uses it, but it also definitely uses Extraplanar Lens with snow Islands to make huge amounts of mana to play leviathans and other huge U creatures. Its definitely most useful in my monoW deck though, because when you miss land drops you're just fucked, and it really makes that deck more playable.