Totally non-bias opinions only ;) how would cEDH react to banning the top tutors?

[pokken]

Another thought I had was that without tutors you're incentivized to play commanders who tutor and commanders who combo with lots of things, which means CEDH would probably be a lot about Zur the Enchanter and Arcum Dagsson type cards. Shimmer zur gets a lot better if no one else can tutor for Necropotence.

[3drinks]

There is already a format taylor-made by prominent cEDH content creators that has tutors banned, along with fast mana amongst other things, called Conquest. Life total is lower, commander damage is lower, Planeswalkers can be your commander too.

Turns out, it just becomes the same race to early combo, only with extra steps. I did find watching Nahiri, Storm of Stone storming off with a Skullclamp pretty amusing for the first time however. Aggro can exist as the efforts to lower damage thresholds imply, but by and large its still combo nonsense. Pretty funny to see Pako & Haldan get effectively banned in it however.

If people cared about flyby-night popup formats with seven fans, Oathbreaker would still be a real thing that is happening.

[Dunharrow]

I have long maintained that tutors go against the spirit of singleton, and if I had it my way I would ban the strongest tutors in the format.

I think the more people are tutoring, the more casual metas creep into stronger metas. It is easier to win out of nowhere. It is easier to put combos in the 99.

In my opinion, banning the top tutors would help keep casual metas, casual.


But what would happen to cEDH? Would it shift from tutor to card draw? Would it play worse tutors? Would the format revolt and splinter into having its own banlist?
Let's say, for argument's sake, the RC banned Demonic Tutor, Enlightened Tutor, Mystical Tutor, Vampiric Tutor and Gamble (I am not sure what the 5th best tutor is lol)

What would happen to cEDH? I have mostly steered away from playing cEDH. I just don't enjoy it. As such, I have no idea what would happen.

I'm going to always disagree on tutor bans. Tutor's aren't your problem, the way people use them are. In my more casual decks, tutors typically find me some way to draw cards or ramp. In my cEDH decks, tutors find me wins as fast as possible.

My issue with tutors is less what people are tutoring (though it helps people combo more and justify playing bad combos like Mike + Trike)... My main issue is making games repetitive. I enjoy commander largely because of the singleton nature, and I find that tutors violate that key aspect (and Sheldon has also stated that tutoring going against the spirit of the format somewhat). My thought is that if you ban the best 5 or so tutors, most people will not replace them in their decks with worse tutors. They will just put other cards in those slots. Demonic Tutor is easy to justify in any black deck. Grim Tutor is not.

I'm going to say this as an outside perspective and leave it here.... You need to have a discussion with your playgroup on power.

Power is not my concern, but I do think banning the top tutors would decrease power at casual tables a bit.

Finally, I want to say my thoughts on your (and probably many players) avoidance of cEDH. I was there, I wanted the long games of commander. Once I started playing cEDH i realized, those games take just as long but there is a LOT more going on. cEDH is played on the stack, casual is played on the board. In all reality, very few games are actually won turn 3 or before in cEDH, but there will be ATTEMPTS. It's extremely fast paced and you have to have much more game knowledge, but you still game the same overall time spent playing the game.

cEDH is definitely interesting, but I don't enjoy it for the same reasons I don't enjoy Modern. Namely, it is hard to innovate and make unique decks, because the tier 1 decks are all well-defined and will crush most home brews. cEDH is just not for me. I tried to turn my Karador deck into a cEDH version by cutting my fun inclusions for mana dorks. It's weird. I just don't like it as much.
I will happily watch cEDH, but it is just not how I want to play magic.

[UnNamed1]

Finally, I want to say my thoughts on your (and probably many players) avoidance of cEDH. I was there, I wanted the long games of commander. Once I started playing cEDH i realized, those games take just as long but there is a LOT more going on. cEDH is played on the stack, casual is played on the board. In all reality, very few games are actually won turn 3 or before in cEDH, but there will be ATTEMPTS. It's extremely fast paced and you have to have much more game knowledge, but you still game the same overall time spent playing the game.

cEDH is definitely interesting, but I don't enjoy it for the same reasons I don't enjoy Modern. Namely, it is hard to innovate and make unique decks, because the tier 1 decks are all well-defined and will crush most home brews. cEDH is just not for me. I tried to turn my Karador deck into a cEDH version by cutting my fun inclusions for mana dorks. It's weird. I just don't like it as much.

I get that. The play style isn't for everyone, there's a lot less politics and more cut-throat.

However, there are a lot of tier 2 decks that will stomp over cEDH. If you can disrupt their early win, and be on board by turn 4/5, most cEDH decks don't have blockers or a big board presence. The other thing is cEDH decks burn through life. You start getting in some early damage, you can hurt them a LOT and in result make them slow down. They won't want to take 3 damage or more a single turn on their own account if you and the rest of the table hit them for 2-3 a piece as well. A lot of it comes down to what the decks are made to do. I've lost plenty of games because my deck plays on the stack and my opponents play on the field. Just a thought.

[Dunharrow]

Finally, I want to say my thoughts on your (and probably many players) avoidance of cEDH. I was there, I wanted the long games of commander. Once I started playing cEDH i realized, those games take just as long but there is a LOT more going on. cEDH is played on the stack, casual is played on the board. In all reality, very few games are actually won turn 3 or before in cEDH, but there will be ATTEMPTS. It's extremely fast paced and you have to have much more game knowledge, but you still game the same overall time spent playing the game.

cEDH is definitely interesting, but I don't enjoy it for the same reasons I don't enjoy Modern. Namely, it is hard to innovate and make unique decks, because the tier 1 decks are all well-defined and will crush most home brews. cEDH is just not for me. I tried to turn my Karador deck into a cEDH version by cutting my fun inclusions for mana dorks. It's weird. I just don't like it as much.

I get that. The play style isn't for everyone, there's a lot less politics and more cut-throat.

However, there are a lot of tier 2 decks that will stomp over cEDH. If you can disrupt their early win, and be on board by turn 4/5, most cEDH decks don't have blockers or a big board presence. The other thing is cEDH decks burn through life. You start getting in some early damage, you can hurt them a LOT and in result make them slow down. They won't want to take 3 damage or more a single turn on their own account if you and the rest of the table hit them for 2-3 a piece as well. A lot of it comes down to what the decks are made to do. I've lost plenty of games because my deck plays on the stack and my opponents play on the field. Just a thought.

You are right, but it is an uphill battle and in the end, not what I enjoy doing.

[DirkGently]

I think people overemphasize the "singleton increases variety" element a little. Having an always-available commander MASSIVELY reduces variety - look at how much people whined about repetition when companions were a major part of standard. And I'd argue that having a commander - despite the fact that it reduces variety in a major way - is the single most fun element of the format. The big draw for TCGs in general as compared to a board game or whatever is that you get to customize your strategy in the game before coming in. Ultimate variety isn't actually appealing either, or we'd all play calvinball (go go gadget old reference (go go self-referential reference)).

I think having a commander, and having 100-card singleton, roughly cancels out and brings us on par with the 60-card 4-of formats in terms of play-pattern variety. I think what really sets commander apart in terms of variety isn't the play patterns of a single deck, but the number of "viable" decks in a format that avoids focusing on top-tier deck construction. And while tutors can certainly bolster the power level of the cEDH decks, cEDH deck construction is already much lower variety than classic commander. For classic commander, I think tutors can be used for good or for ill - there are decks that always want to dig for the same combo pieces to end the game (i.e. curiosity for niv) and there are decks where the tutor is just a jumping-off point for more variety (i.e. tutoring Cabal Coffers in Geth, Lord of the Vault).

Idk if this is helpful at all, since the topic focuses on cEDH which I don't have a lot of experience with (nor desire for). But I don't support banning tutors for classic EDH. Unlike, say, Limited Resources which can only be used for evil, tutors are only as evil as the deck using them. They're a way to optimize a strategy, but to me, optimizing silly strategies is a lot of what makes the format great, and I wouldn't want to lose that. The important thing is to start with a fun goal, so that optimizing it merely makes it viable instead of oppressive.

[Dunharrow]

I think people overemphasize the "singleton increases variety" element a little. Having an always-available commander MASSIVELY reduces variety - look at how much people whined about repetition when companions were a major part of standard. And I'd argue that having a commander - despite the fact that it reduces variety in a major way - is the single most fun element of the format. The big draw for TCGs in general as compared to a board game or whatever is that you get to customize your strategy in the game before coming in. Ultimate variety isn't actually appealing either, or we'd all play calvinball (go go gadget old reference (go go self-referential reference)).

I think having a commander, and having 100-card singleton, roughly cancels out and brings us on par with the 60-card 4-of formats in terms of play-pattern variety. I think what really sets commander apart in terms of variety isn't the play patterns of a single deck, but the number of "viable" decks in a format that avoids focusing on top-tier deck construction. And while tutors can certainly bolster the power level of the cEDH decks, cEDH deck construction is already much lower variety than classic commander. For classic commander, I think tutors can be used for good or for ill - there are decks that always want to dig for the same combo pieces to end the game (i.e. curiosity for niv) and there are decks where the tutor is just a jumping-off point for more variety (i.e. tutoring Cabal Coffers in Geth, Lord of the Vault).

Idk if this is helpful at all, since the topic focuses on cEDH which I don't have a lot of experience with (nor desire for). But I don't support banning tutors for classic EDH. Unlike, say, Limited Resources which can only be used for evil, tutors are only as evil as the deck using them. They're a way to optimize a strategy, but to me, optimizing silly strategies is a lot of what makes the format great, and I wouldn't want to lose that. The important thing is to start with a fun goal, so that optimizing it merely makes it viable instead of oppressive.

Great feedback DG. It's true that having access to the commander every game kinda flies in the face of variation. I also know that tutors enable many strategies, not just searching for combo pieces. I have two rakdos decks that play a lot of tutors, because otherwise the decks kinda just fall apart.
I still think banning the best tutors would be a net gain. You still have access for tutors for decks that need them, but decks that don't need them won't feel obliged to run Demonic Tutor et al.



On another note I did a Strixhaven draft yesterday with Demonic Tutor and man that is a weird card for limited.

[DirkGently]

I still think banning the best tutors would be a net gain. You still have access for tutors for decks that need them, but decks that don't need them won't feel obliged to run Demonic Tutor et al.



On another note I did a Strixhaven draft yesterday with Demonic Tutor and man that is a weird card for limited.

I would think demo would be basically meh in limited. Like, good if you've got an amazing bomb, but potentially not worth playing in a really aggro deck, for example. Annoyingly NZ is getting Strixhaven a week late

When I argue I tend to talk about how I approach the topic in my builds, since that's the thought process I understand best, but in my experience playing other people they mostly seem to follow very different ethos. I will say I tend to run a significantly higher percentage of tutors than what I've seen, by my estimation, since I'm often trying to run fairly focused decks rather than broader synergies. I intentionally avoid easy combos for those decks that could lead to repetitive play patterns.

By contrast, I don't see a TON of tutors on the other side of the table. In terms of how they're used, while occasionally it's of the "I tutor for my combo piece" variety, what seems to be more common among people with tutors and a combo is people intentionally NOT tutoring for their combo piece in an effort to "play nice", which annoys me way more because of my ongoing eternal war with the format vis a vis pulling punches, yadda yadda yadda. But I think it's at least fair to say that most people see the issues with running tutors in a deck that enable a very repetitive, linear play pattern - they just solve it in the opposite way that I prefer to.

Overall I can't say I've seen people following very linear tutor strategies to be a major sticking point in my experience - far more common are decks that just hemorrhage value without tutors being necessary to spiral out of control. And I also think people are way more likely to self-correct (in some form) away from repetitive tutor-focused strategies than they are for the value-hemorrhaging kind which are more accepted and "fun". So for me personally, I don't see tutors as one of the top boogeymen in the format, or eliminating them as a crucial issue.

[NZB2323]

Do people not play Worldly Tutor in cEDH? Why would they ban all the good tutors in every color except for green?

In any case, it would make Yisan, the Wanderer Bard even better.

[Dunharrow]

Do people not play Worldly Tutor in cEDH? Why would they ban all the good tutors in every color except for green?

In any case, it would make Yisan, the Wanderer Bard even better.

I don't know if they do. I think it is because of Eladamri's Call and Survival of the Fittest and Green Sun's Zenith... but maybe it belongs there. Probably in the top 10 at least.

I think it makes sense that if you were to ban the best tutors you would ban them from the strongest colors - Black, Blue and Green.