Commander "Would You Rather?" | EDHRECast 306

I really wish we could also have had Dana's perspective in this episode

"Prose and cons" is an AMAZING joke, Matt.

I think the big problem you were seeing in the Eminence vs Cheating tax is that the examples you were presenting about Derevi and Yuriko were the most egregious. I think the main problem with both of these commanders is that you can just cheat them with Activated Abilities, which means you can put them into play even if they get killed immediately (for example if you attack with multiple unblocked creatures in Yuriko's case). I think if you make them Triggered abilities or restrict the activation to some sort of "quest" that is difficult to achieve then that could be an interesting design space (for example, you can cheat them for an alternative cost if your opponents milled 20 or more cards this turn only once per turn, whenever you attack with 6 or more creatures, if you had 4 or more creatures die this turn, etc).

You should create youtube polls to see what your viewers think of these choices!

For the Eminence Vs Cheating Tax, I feel like Eminence is such an underused mechanic where instead of giving you an insane ability like Egdar, Why not give us an insane commander with a downside like your maximum handsize at the start of the game is 4 but you draw 2 at your draw step or all your lands enter taps but taps for double kind of thing

The cheating cmd tax I feel is more fair when it's like "this costs X less for Y variable"

Re: Eminence Vs Tax Fraud: Eminence is by far my favoured of the two. The main reason is that it has significantly more design space being a mechanic and not the result of one. While the examples we have now are pushed and widely considered a mistake there are so many ideas left unexplored with Eminence. One thing I'd love is a Eminence ability that sets up for when the creature enters the field. That way removing the commander stops the part of the effect you're worried about.

On the subject of cheating commander tax, I would at least be interested in things like Liesa, Shroud of Dusk where instead of paying mana for commander tax, you have to pay something else. There are only so many other things I feel would be a reasonable other cost to supplant commander tax, but I at least find that interesting.

I speak as someone who plays Tergrid intentionally, and I've found the way to make playing against her not completely unbearable: Group Hug. Yes, you read that correctly. Group Hug. The Idea is this: Make everyone mass draw as much as possible, then let the opponent choose what they want to discard instead of hand ripping them. They have the full control to decide what they give you (if anything, remember that Tergrid can only steal permanents, if you pitch an instant/sorcery she gets nothing!). If you try to dump your hand of creatures/artifacts/enchantments, then you have the removal for some of that (creatures mostly, remember black isnt exactly great at artifact/enchantment removal). So yes, Im still packing those mass sacrifice spells because I do eventually try to win with everyone elses stuff, but Im not trying to stop you from playing the game, Its the opposite: I want you to play MORE for fear of having to discard it yourself and give it to me completely cost free.

Your take on infect surprised me! Around here, almost everybody hates infect decks, but has no problem with taking the L through Triumph of the hordes. Nobody really wants to have to race against a gazillion infect/toxic/poison and proliferate sources from tun 1 or 2 on. Taking a hit with Triumph almost always is perceived as any other overrun-like effect and more often than not the combat damage would have done pretty much the same without the infect, but the +1 and Trample was neccessary to push enough through to the dome.

Counterpoint to stick together: I play it in my party deck, and opponents surprisingly often have about 2 party members. It has never been a 1 sided board wipe for me

Disagree that Anzrag's Rampage is an easy swap-in for Vandalblast. Every card exiled other than the creature chosen stay in exile. So you can easily be setting yourself up for failure, by exiling key strategy pieces.

The Percy Jackson show is actually very good, close to the books with some fun additions, I recommend Edit: as for ward, I'd prefer more ward 1 or enters with shield counters, and treasures can exist as long as they enter tapped and are on more mana expensive cards and/or non-permanents non-repeatable effects

@49:03 hahahaha "Who hurt you, Joey?" Immediate response: "ahhh"

One downside to Anzrag's Rampage, the remainder of the exiled cards, would remain in exile. If X was a large number you would lose access to a considerable portion of your deck.

To the stax vs chaos debate: "Chaos is Stax for people who think they're quirky" - Tomer, 2023

I don't mind stax decks. If my deck is strong enough in interaction then I can keep up most of the time. There's a puzzle there and they usually have an end-game in mind: a wincon. Chaos decks feed on not working towards a win. They usually take longer because of this and the rules being a headache, and resolving every single spell takes a million years and trading cards hoping they don't get bent by other players. And here's the thing: the better/more synergistic your deck is compared to other peoples, the less likely you are to win. Because your strategy is both being dismantled and also being given to other people.

Voja is clearly designed to be a changeling commander... [shivers]

Idea: to borrow from Companion a bit, have Eminence abilities that encourage building a certain way. Example: "Eminence: [do whatever.] This ability triggers only if ~ is in the command zone and all creatures you control have power 2 or less, or if ~ is on the battlefield."

I think Eminence can be a great ability for underplayed tribes. The problem with Edgar isn't just that it's a super pushed ability, it's also that Vampires are already a good tribe. Give Edgar's ability to something like Griffins and it isn't nearly as problematic.