The importance of "having an answer" in your deck

User avatar
3drinks
Kaalia's Personal Liaison
Posts: 4831
Joined: 4 years ago
Pronoun: he / him
Location: Ruined City of Drannith, Ikoria

Post by 3drinks » 4 years ago

Rumpy5897 wrote:
4 years ago
I'm not following your logic here. Answer density has nothing to do with the deck's win plan. Just to illustrate, my Feather and Ghired both pack extremely similar removal suites. One is a horribly uninteractive cast spam machine, the other is straight-faced aggro. If you look at linearity from a conceptual angle, anything with a game plan qualifies as linear. Ghired (the less conventionally linear of the two, as most of Feather's games end with Phyrexian Altar setups) plays creatures, copies them and punches people. The exact configuration of copied creature, copy engine and various support/value pieces kicking around may vary, but the overarching idea is the same. Kaalia cheats in fatties and screws with resources to break symmetry. You get the point.

That said, I don't think anyone's advocating for an answer-less goldfish town, just for some restraint to stop games degenerating into a never-ending removal garbage fire. My most interaction-light decks still run five pieces of removal, which allows some hope of having a response in an emergency.
The OP, at least to my understanding of it, is asking about playing one universal answer in a deck to focus the rest of the deck on a game plan. If I'm wrong, I'm wrong, but that's how it reads, to me anyway.

Modern
R{R/W} 87guide Burn
Commander
WRKellan, the Fae-Blooded // Birthright Boon (local secret santa gift)
RTorbran, Thane of Red Fell (Red Deck Wins)
WBRAlesha, Who Smiles at Death (Slivers)
WBRKaalia HQ

User avatar
FoxOfWar
Posts: 84
Joined: 4 years ago
Pronoun: she / her

Post by FoxOfWar » 4 years ago

hyalopterouslemur wrote:
4 years ago
FoxOfWar Allow us to introduce ourselves

(Seriously, that's a whole other question on overrated cards, but since you're already in green, Overwhelming Stampede is generally better. You just need a creature with power 3 or greater to make it equal Overrun but easier to cast, power 4 or greater makes it better.)
I was actually really just referring to the archetype, commonly referred to as Overrun variants, but, yeah. Dunno when I've last actually cast good ol' Overrun, heh.
36 decks or so...
Show
Hide
Hope of Ghirapur Swordpile - Ghosty Blinky Anafenza - Nezahal - Big, Blue and HERE! - Gonti Can Afford It - Kazuul, Tyrant of Chandras - Polukranos, More Mana - Azor Takes Flight - A3OS System - Vona Life Pain - Angel With a Whip and Her Pet Fox - Tolsimir Wolf Crusade - Dragonlord Steal & Copy - Arjun, the Mad Flame - Tatyova's Mad Lands - Zegana's Simic - Chainer Does the Value Dance - Polukranos, Unchained - Running Thromok - Sydri's Loco-Inspiraion - Zedruu the Furyhearted - Estrid Land Animation - A Case of Tariel's Persistent F*ckery - Tail of the AristoCat Humanitarian - Karador, Tomb Operator - Tayam Re-Curses - Jeleva... does... things - Sidisi, Death is Served - Omnath, Blink and You're Missing - The Negatiweaver - Breya, Eggs, Breya'd Eggs - Ishai and Reyhan Dicepile - Kynaios and Tiro Landfall Impersonations - Tana and Ravos' Regal Gatekeeping - Yidris of the Chi-Ting Corporation - General Tazri's Utterly Amazing Allies

User avatar
BaronCappuccino
Posts: 246
Joined: 4 years ago
Answers: 1
Pronoun: he / him
Location: Quiet Corner

Post by BaronCappuccino » 4 years ago

My current deck is Korvold, Fae-Cursed King Jund Goblin Tribal, and in a perfect world, it gets to play Goblin Matron, Goblin Wizard and Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker to be able to cheat in any answer that's been printed on a goblin subtype. Goblins are particularly good at running a bunch of silver bullets. Sadly, no other tribe is as self contained. I wouldn't run one-of answers without a reliable tutor density. The whole point of Commander is scrapping the whole point of commander, and inconsistency isn't my thing.

User avatar
bobthefunny
Resident Plainswalker
Posts: 467
Joined: 4 years ago
Pronoun: he / him
Contact:

Post by bobthefunny » 4 years ago

darrenhabib wrote:
4 years ago
How important do you think it is having at least one answer in your deck to almost anything that can be done in commander?
Running answers is absolutely important. However, having an answer for every situation that could arise is superfluous. Magic is a complicated game, and it's near impossible to figure out every single thing that can come your way. Instead, focus on the things you expect to encounter most often - usually that's more than enough.

Every threat has two answers - the first is to remove the threat, the second is to remove the player. So if you find that your normal suite of answers doesn't deal with threat, you can always turn to option 2.


Most of my answers are in the form of removal. I like to run about 10 removal in any given deck. About 2-3 single target removals, 2-3 artifact/enchantment removals, 2-3 catch-all removals, and about 3 wraths. Other answers can depend on the deck, and what the deck's plan is. If I'm playing an aggressive deck, it might be protective spells, like Heroic Intervention, or Make a Stand. It might be something to take away a key play at a linchpin moment, like Imp's Mischief, or Wild Ricochet. If I just need a specific creature (commander) to stay alive, I might have cheap counters, like Avoid Fate or Not of this world, especially if I'm playing colors where it's not usually expected. If I know that I might not have a large board presence, and I'm worried about my defensive capabilities, I might run a fog effect, especially in colors where it's not expected.

But in the end, while you need to be able to interact, you also don't want to overload and bog down your deck with too many situational cards. Sometimes the best answer is to make people react to you, instead of waiting for them to have the initiative.

Post Reply Previous topicNext topic

Return to “Commander”