SCD: Golos, Tired-Ass Pilgrim

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Dragoon
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Post by Dragoon » 3 years ago

@ZenN : I actually did the math about the results of activating Golos when I was trying to get a feel for the deck, using hypergeometric calculation.

If you are playing a 38 lands deck, here is the rundown:
  • Around 5% chance to get three lands
  • Around 27% chance to get one spell and two lands
  • Around 44% chance to get two spells and one land
  • Around 23% chance to get three spells
This also means that you have 77% chance of hitting at least one land each time you activate Golos (this has come to bite me sometimes, as I have the bad habit of starting my first main phase by playing a land when I play my other decks :P). Those stats however do not take into account the nature of the spells, and hitting a utility spell is not the same as hitting a huge bomb. I would say that the "1 good hit per activation" is a good approximation.

Now you might abuse this by only playing huge and pricey spells (which seems to be what the "Big Mana" theme on EDHrec for Golos is, with 30 spells at 7+ CMC). At that point however, the deck is basically unplayable without Golos out, and the deck becomes very much like a glass cannon with a really linear gameplan. According to EDHrec data, that type of build only represents around 6.5% of the Golos decks, the other themes having a much more usual curve.

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Post by ZenN » 3 years ago

Dragoon wrote:
3 years ago
Now you might abuse this by only playing huge and pricey spells (which seems to be what the "Big Mana" theme on EDHrec for Golos is, with 30 spells at 7+ CMC). At that point however, the deck is basically unplayable without Golos out, and the deck becomes very much like a glass cannon with a really linear gameplan. According to EDHrec data, that type of build only represents around 6.5% of the Golos decks, the other themes having a much more usual curve.
The actual good decks trying to do that plan are going to do it with top deck manipulation. You only need a small number of 7+ CMC cards if you've got all the good top deck tutors and the staples like Scroll Rack, Sensei's Divining Top, Sylvan Library. That way you can actually play your deck without Golos, especially if you've got some number of other cards to help do that plan when you get locked out of Golos in one way or another.

EDIT: Out of curiosity, I counted up the number of cards in my Golos list I consider to be "good" hits (which was ~32, being generous since several of them are just "okay" hits and not really "good"), and figured the hypergeometric distribution.

With 32 "good" hits, that gives the following percentages (roughly) on blind activations:
  • 31% chance of whiffing entirely
  • 45% chance of getting 1 hit
  • 21% chance of getting 2 hits
  • 3% chance of getting 3 hits
This means that nearly 1 out of every 3 Golos activations will be garbage, while only 1/33 will be amazing, 1/5 will be good, 1/2 will be okay.
Clearly OP. Ban immediately. /s
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Golos, ETB Pilgrim - Value Town
Maelstrom Wanderer a.k.a. The Kool-Aid Man
Korvold, Fae-Cursed King - OM NOM NOM
Kykar, Wind's Fury - Spellslinger + Tokens

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Post by pokken » 3 years ago

Counting getting rid of lands off the top of your deck and letting you play them if you sequence correctly as 'whiffs' seems wrong to me. As mentioned even a tiny amount of topdeck manipulation rapidly gets bananas.

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Post by ZenN » 3 years ago

pokken wrote:
3 years ago
Counting getting rid of lands off the top of your deck and letting you play them if you sequence correctly as 'whiffs' seems wrong to me. As mentioned even a tiny amount of topdeck manipulation rapidly gets bananas.
You would not play a card that said something like, "7: Exile the top 3 cards from your library. You may play a land from among them." When I spend 2WUBRG and get exactly that, I absolutely consider that a whiff. If I spend multiple turns on activating Golos and keep getting that, I am very probably losing that game.
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Golos, ETB Pilgrim - Value Town
Maelstrom Wanderer a.k.a. The Kool-Aid Man
Korvold, Fae-Cursed King - OM NOM NOM
Kykar, Wind's Fury - Spellslinger + Tokens

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Post by pokken » 3 years ago

ZenN wrote:
3 years ago
You would not play a card that said something like, ": Exile the top 3 cards from your library. You may play a land from among them." When I spend and get exactly that, I absolutely consider that a whiff. If I spend multiple turns on activating Golos and keep getting that, I am very probably losing that game.
No, but when that's the floor and it's still pretty okay (like I'm not freaking out depressed about it) I'm pretty happy with the exchange.

In practice it just never feels like it's that bad to me, and it's usually some degree of amazing.

The sheer power of looking at the board and going: I can advance this for 7 mana without having to commit a single resource from my hand, and basically force sweepers by pumping mana into Golos. It's huge.

You guys are severely underselling it in my opinion -- or you've got some tuning to do. Consider cranking your top end up a little.

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Post by Dragoon » 3 years ago

pokken wrote:
3 years ago
You guys are severely underselling it in my opinion -- or you've got some tuning to do. Consider cranking your top end up a little.
Don't wanna. :P It's a theme deck first and foremost, so no Sensei's Divining Top or Brainstorm, no matter how useful they can be for the deck! Live by the chaos, die by the chaos!*

*Not an actual chaos deck

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Post by pokken » 3 years ago

Dragoon wrote:
3 years ago
pokken wrote:
3 years ago
You guys are severely underselling it in my opinion -- or you've got some tuning to do. Consider cranking your top end up a little.
Don't wanna. :P It's a theme deck first and foremost, so no Sensei's Divining Top or Brainstorm, no matter how useful they can be for the deck! Live by the chaos, die by the chaos!*

*Not an actual chaos deck
Well obviously you don't need to either with your average CMC of what like 4? :)

Are you really whiffing that much? I'd bet your deck hits bombs pretty regularly.

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Post by Dragoon » 3 years ago

pokken wrote:
3 years ago
Well obviously you don't need to either with your average CMC of what like 4? :)
It is around 4.5 right now, I would like to lower that curve but the random cards tend to be pretty high CMC as WotC really does not want them to be tournament-playable (I'm pretty sure Haphazard Bombardment wouldn't have broken Standard in half at 5 CMC but whatever). The last years have been good though, and I'm glad to see the newly spoiled Plargg, Dean of Chaos/Augusta, Dean of Order.
pokken wrote:
3 years ago
Are you really whiffing that much? I'd bet your deck hits bombs pretty regularly.
I actually don't objectively know. I haven't been keeping track during games and as we all know, human minds tend to remember more easily when things go south. :P
That's why I tend to use those hypergeometric calculations to get objective data. Honestly, I think it's about right at the moment. Sometimes I whiff entirely, sometimes I get an explosive activation. It is definitely high variance and I remember some times when choosing to activate Golos actually lost me the game, ironically. On the other hand, I have yet to hit my Primal Surge in a non-goldfish game! I'm sure I'll end up hitting Chaos Warp right after it though. xD

EDIT: correction of spelling mistakes
Last edited by Dragoon 3 years ago, edited 1 time in total.

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Post by ZenN » 3 years ago

Modifying my deck to have a heavier top end would, 1) make the deck worse whenever I can't use Golos, 2) mess with stuff like my Birthing Pod/Eldritch Evolution curve, and 3) make a few things, like Sun Titan, slightly worse. And at best this would improve the numbers by a few percentage points.

Like, 32/99 worthwhile hits is hardly a low density. We're talking about a third of the deck being stuff I'm happy to hit off of a Golos activation. I posted the numbers. The math doesn't lie. You're welcome to redo the hypergeometric distribution yourself if you don't trust my results. The simple fact of the matter is that without either A) making your deck garbage by having a super high big-spell density, or B) having a good amount of top deck manipulation, then Golos's activated ability is just rarely better than "pretty okay".

I do have things like Vampiric Tutor and Sylvan Library, and if I felt I needed it I could make room for some more top deck effects. That would most likely be a trade off of built-in redundancy in favour of improving the consistency of Golos's ability, but unless I were ALSO playing particularly big things to be putting on top it's really not worth it. And at that point we're just talking about a completely different deck. That deck is not my deck.

You could absolutely build that deck, though. You can totally build a super sweet "cheat in big stuff" deck around Golos, the same way people have done for years with Maelstrom Wanderer, Narset, Enlightened Master, Mayael the Anima, etc. In fact you probably include some number of those others in the 99 as backup. And then you have super big dumb spells like Expropriate, Apex Devastator, and major Eldrazi, and then fill the rest with top deck manip, ramp, and counter spells/protection. Sounds like a sweet deck. It's probably the "best" way to build Golos (not counting dedicated infinite mana combo). If I didn't already have a Maelstrom Wanderer deck, or if that's what I was using Golos to replace, then it's probably what I'd be doing.

I can see how playing against that deck would get old, depending on what big dumb spells are in it and how it's played. But there are so, so many commanders that you can make the same argument about, and very few of them have ever been banned, and those few that have are either more obnoxious than Golos or else don't really deserve to be banned anymore (like how can Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary belong on the ban list when we have Kinnan, Bonder Prodigy...?).
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Golos, ETB Pilgrim - Value Town
Maelstrom Wanderer a.k.a. The Kool-Aid Man
Korvold, Fae-Cursed King - OM NOM NOM
Kykar, Wind's Fury - Spellslinger + Tokens

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Post by pokken » 3 years ago

I think there's probably a happy medium there where you have just a bit more top deck manipulation-- top and worldly tutor for example - and a couple more bombs. And you'll probably move that direction naturally as you start seeing how much better it is to cast stuff off the top than playing cards from your hand.

I have played a lot of golos and spun the wheel a bunch. I just disagree with you on the value. I appreciate your perspective as always.

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Post by onering » 3 years ago

I think considering any activation that doesn't flip a bomb to be a whiff is just wrong, especially the way Zen does that would include flips like a land and 2 utility spells a whiff. 7 Mana for digging three deep into your library and getting a land and casting two spells, like another ramp spell and a piece of removal isn't a whiff. You'd have been able to play that from your hand for less Mana, but at the cost of three cards from your hand. Two reasonable spells and a land in card advantage form for 7 Mana is solid. You'd like a bomb, which even Zen calculates as a 67 percent chance of getting at least one per spin, but a land and two spells is an enviable fail state. Hell, even the worst possible outcome, the 5 percent chance of getting 3 lands, at least gets you through a Mana pocket and you still get ca out of it.

Like, that's what's so nuts about Golos. Even with Zen's estimates, 67 percent of the time Golos is pooping out 3 cards that are at least as good as what you could have played from your hand for the same mana, but in the form of CA that puts you up 3 cards. Then, most of the remaining 33 percent of rolls is close in value to what you could have played from your hand, but in the form of CA that puts you up 3 cards, a factor that would arguably make most of those flips better than casting cards in hand of slightly better quality. The actual bad outcomes are so rare that they are equivalent in likelihood to the absolutely bonkers (three "good" hits outcome) and only 1/4 as likely as the really good outcomes (2 "good" hits). When even Zen's math points to spinning the wheel being the right choice given a random set of cards in hand, that's a clear indictment of the card. The only time's it's not right to spin the wheel is if you have specific answers that you need to cast in hand, your combo is in hand, or the cards you will cast from your hand instead of spinning the wheel are so much greater in quality than an average card from your deck that their combined value over replacement outpaces the value of netting three cards for free (assuming spinning the wheel and casting these cards both take 7 Mana, going up three cards from Golos is free). Those are fairly rare situations.

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Post by pokken » 3 years ago

onering wrote:
3 years ago
7 Mana for digging three deep into your library and getting a land and casting two spells, like another ramp spell and a piece of removal isn't a whiff.
indeed. we don't say Impulse is mediocre because sometimes you don't like any of the 4 cards you see :P

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Post by ZenN » 3 years ago

I think @onering may have read some of the math incorrectly, but even disregarding that, I'm not saying that hitting a land and two utility spells is a whiff. I'm saying when I hit land, Counterspell, and like Beast Within or something, that is absolutely a whiff. Odds are good that I've just spent lost of my turn to do very little. If I'm lucky there's a good opportunity target to hit with the removal, and I made a land drop, and I exiled a spell I'd have rather had in hand. Wooo.

And now just Counterspell specifically. When I was counting up cards I'd be happy to hit, that was most importantly excluding the cards I just actively never want to see on a Golos activation. The counters, things like Finale of Devastation, Cyclonic Rift etc. I count 8 such cards in my list, leaving a 22% chance of hitting at least one of those on any given Golos activation.

Then we look at lands. 30% chance that any given activation have 2+ lands in it. Two lands and something useful might be still good, if the something else is good. Three lands is definitely not.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying Golos's ability is bad. Not even close. What I'm saying is that it's not nearly as strong as people's confirmation bias tells them it is, and the numbers demonstrate that. It's obviously still good enough that I'm playing him. Not only that, but it's not even the first deck I've put him at the head of, and I'm sure it won't be the last.
Commander
Golos, ETB Pilgrim - Value Town
Maelstrom Wanderer a.k.a. The Kool-Aid Man
Korvold, Fae-Cursed King - OM NOM NOM
Kykar, Wind's Fury - Spellslinger + Tokens

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Post by onering » 3 years ago

Ok, I'll adjust somewhat based on the idea that you have 8 cards in your deck that you just can't cast with Golos, or which like Cyclonic Rift are much worse when cast with Golos. I still say you discount the value of a land and two ok cards, or even a land, something ok, and another land or something uncastable. The latter still at least puts you up two cards, as a fail state, that is only about half as likely to happen as an outcome that is at minimum better than playing median cards in your hand, and a 3 lander being only about as likely as 3 "good" hits, the math works out to spinning the wheel most turns. I think I pretty well covered the situations where you shouldn't, and how uncommon they are compared to where you should.

I'm not arguing that there aren't outcomes that aren't that good, nor that those outcomes, collectively, don't have a significant chance of happening. What I'm saying is that most of the not so good outcomes are just ok, that the average not so good outcome is still ok, and that the average good outcome is pretty good and about twice as likely to happen, which makes the benefits significantly outweigh the risk. And this is in a deck that isn't even trying to take advantage of Golos at all, and runs a significant number of cards that interact poorly with him. Even in such a deck, spinning the wheel is going to be the right call more often than not, and is going to pay out well twice as often as it gives mediocre returns.

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Post by pokken » 3 years ago

ZenN wrote:
3 years ago
What I'm saying is that it's not nearly as strong as people's confirmation bias tells them it is, and the numbers demonstrate that.
In your deck with almost no attempt to maximize the ability it ranges from 'not a great use of 7 mana but not horrendous' to 'I win!" so I don't think it proves what you think :P

-----

We also have not covered a lot of absolutely not corner case situations where Golos destroys other powerhouse plays in the format -- Golos laughs at cards like Hullbreacher that shut down entire decks nowadays. He comes back from being notion/wheeled, he beats puzzle box lock, he gets you out of being hellbent no matter how it happens.

The sheer power of never being empty handed because you can always fall back on spinning the wheel is truly absurd.

(I got my first introduction to how completely overpowering Hullbreacher is the other day lol :P)

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Post by onering » 3 years ago

pokken wrote:
3 years ago
ZenN wrote:
3 years ago
What I'm saying is that it's not nearly as strong as people's confirmation bias tells them it is, and the numbers demonstrate that.
In your deck with almost no attempt to maximize the ability it ranges from 'not a great use of 7 mana but not horrendous' to 'I win!" so I don't think it proves what you think :P

-----

We also have not covered a lot of absolutely not corner case situations where Golos destroys other powerhouse plays in the format -- Golos laughs at cards like Hullbreacher that shut down entire decks nowadays. He comes back from being notion/wheeled, he beats puzzle box lock, he gets you out of being hellbent no matter how it happens.

The sheer power of never being empty handed because you can always fall back on spinning the wheel is truly absurd.

(I got my first introduction to how completely overpowering Hullbreacher is the other day lol :P)
As an off topic aside, are the treasure tokens from Hullbreacher better than the cards from Notion Thief? Even when Notion Thief was new it was cheap, and it was by far one of the best cards in its craptastic set, while Hullbreacher is $25 in a good set. Hullbreacher being mono blue must have something to do with it, and being a merfolk maybe, but I'm wondering if mana might matter more than cards.

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Post by pokken » 3 years ago

onering wrote:
3 years ago
As an off topic aside, are the treasure tokens from Hullbreacher better than the cards from Notion Thief? Even when Notion Thief was new it was cheap, and it was by far one of the best cards in its craptastic set, while Hullbreacher is $25 in a good set. Hullbreacher being mono blue must have something to do with it, and being a merfolk maybe, but I'm wondering if mana might matter more than cards.
3 is soooo much less than 4. obviously notion thief is more powerful but it's mainly the mana cost and being mono blue.

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Post by Mookie » 3 years ago

onering wrote:
3 years ago
As an off topic aside, are the treasure tokens from Hullbreacher better than the cards from Notion Thief? Even when Notion Thief was new it was cheap, and it was by far one of the best cards in its craptastic set, while Hullbreacher is $25 in a good set. Hullbreacher being mono blue must have something to do with it, and being a merfolk maybe, but I'm wondering if mana might matter more than cards.
Three mana is a pretty significant upgrade over four, and the extra toughness isn't irrelevant. I would also assume that Dragon's Maze was opened significantly more than Commander Legends. Notion Thief has also been reprinted a few times, which doesn't hurt. But yeah, the main reason is probably that it's mono-blue, and thus fits in significantly more decks. Anecdotally, I've seen Hullbreacher + wheels show up waaaay more often than Notion Thief + wheels ever did.

...I'd also contemplate how much of its price just comes from hype though. When Notion Thief came out, EDH wasn't a significant contributor to card prices. Would it be more valuable if it were released today? Possibly.

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Post by UnNamed1 » 3 years ago

I will say this and only this about Golos.

The matchup is boring 90% of the time. He has a braindead linear plan, and that is to ETB, get a land and use his ability and hope for the best. The pilots have "deniability" as its "chance" as to what they hit. They get salty if you shut him down as most of the time the deck revolves around getting stupid value for 7 mana while holding up a grip of counters.

In my experience, the issue has been more the type of people who play Golos, rather than Golos himself. Unfortunately this does lead me to believe that Golos as a commander is perfectly fine. I personally will never rebuild him, as boring and repetitive gameplay is well....boring. I don't think he needs banned, as eventually people will move on. Trust in that 1 or two counters aimed at Golos will typically slow the deck down enough to move forward with a good game.

Golos requires a shift in gameplay, but i believe that is needed for a healthy format. I don't think banning Golos is the answer...

On an aside about Hullbreacher.....It's a good card but I've had so many people scoop to playing it that makes the general overall play unfun. Definitely more powerful than Opposition Agent, and I personally was more worried about Agent. We've had to re-instate the house rule of scooping at sorcery speed as so many will scoop in response for no reason beyond denying resources and kingmaking. In a multiplayer format I believe scooping at instant speed is unhealthy for the game.

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Post by ZenN » 3 years ago

UnNamed1 wrote:
3 years ago
We've had to re-instate the house rule of scooping at sorcery speed as so many will scoop in response for no reason beyond denying resources and kingmaking. In a multiplayer format I believe scooping at instant speed is unhealthy for the game.
Yeah, that sort of spite was a very big thing in my group for a long time. It was only about a year ago that we collectively decided that scooping in response to things was a no-no. I definitely agree with you that it's unhealthy for a multiplayer casual game.

In regards to the ongoing aside about Hullbreacher, I've only played against it once so far, and it was in a The Locust God Wheels deck, where he was able to just chain together enough Wheels until he had enough tokens to kill us all. Hullbreacher end of turn, then untap, cast The Locust God and then Wheel of Fortune. So that was "fun". Overall I think it's a fine card. It's probably better than Notion Thief just on the merits of being cheaper, a single colour, and ever so slightly more survivable. It's busted with all the same combinations of cards, generally speaking.
Commander
Golos, ETB Pilgrim - Value Town
Maelstrom Wanderer a.k.a. The Kool-Aid Man
Korvold, Fae-Cursed King - OM NOM NOM
Kykar, Wind's Fury - Spellslinger + Tokens

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Post by TheAmericanSpirit » 2 years ago

So I threw together a Golos Field of the Dead deck just to see how bad it was. Out of 3 games played (against Jorn stax and Karador Humanimator combo) I won two, and the third could have been had but I didn't bog the Karador out of his combo in time. Overall, the games weren't even close for the majority of the experience. I think I only spun golos once but simply fetching nonbasics put me so far ahead. At one point I got wiped and generated 30 zombies the next turn anyway.

I now believe golos may be a problem. 27 more games will give me a statistically significant sample size, but I dunno if my playgroup is gonna stomach that.
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Post by DirkGently » 2 years ago

I haven't played against a field of the dead Golos deck, but I think any game where your commander could have been replaced with Reap and Sow and you still would have won, I don't think that means the commander is OP. Maybe it means the archetype is OP, or maybe it means your deck is OP, or maybe it means FotD is OP, or maybe it just means your opponents sucked and/or had bad draws. But fetching a land for 5 mana is not overpowered, let alone 7 or 9. If having 5 mana nonbasic tutor in the CZ is backbreaking then that has to be an indictment of the cards around it, not the card itself.

Anyway, that's not actually what I wanted to talk about, but rather that I had my first experience playing against Esika, God of the Tree // The Prismatic Bridge last night and...hoo boy, %$#% that card. His deck was really low-powered, running cards like Traveler's Amulet and Arboreal Grazer, and it was still incredibly stupid. His hits weren't even that huge (best hit he got was Liliana, Dreadhorde General), but it still dominated the game until I hit a lucky Hour of Revelation, which still ended up drawing him 14 cards. I shudder to think of how ridiculous that commander would be in a deck that wasn't hot trash, where every creature/planeswalker costs 6+ and the rest of the deck is counterspells and removal.

So I'm curious if other people have played against Esika yet and what their opinions are, and whether Esika or Golos (or Kenrith or Najeela or...) are the most groan-worthy 5c commander. Personally I think Esika is probably worse, since Golos does put restrictions on all the cards in your deck - Counterspell is a pretty rotten hit off Golos, for example, as are most low-curve utility spells, whereas Esika can run anything she likes instant/sorcery/artifact/enchantment-wise (and as many lands as she likes), so long as her planeswalkers and creatures are big beeferinos. Also she's much harder to kill, and often won't die to answers that kill the value she produces - Wrath of God will clean up all the praetors and eldrazi perhaps, but then she just slams another big dumb fatty on the next turn. Whatever you may think about golos' whiff chances, there is at least SOME chance, Esika has zero chance of whiffing. And perhaps the biggest issue, she requires no additional mana investment, so she can trivially keep up answers while developing far faster than the other players who are investing actual resources. Although on the plus side, at least she doesn't give any value if killed immediately, and she can't hit Expropriate or other obnoxious sorceries.

EDIT: curiously, her EDHrec page is one of the most confusing ones I've seen - most of the popular creature slots are populated by Gods, which (1) is a terrible non-deck and (2) still is only ~26% of the decks, yet there's only a scant few generic bombs on the list. No Eldrazi, no Praetors, none of the stuff you'd actually expect. So I have no clue what everyone is actually doing with this card tbh. Maybe it's somehow safe, simply because it's so trivial to break that everyone decided it would be too boring?
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Gollum - Lobelia - Minthara - Plargg2 - Solphim - Otharri - Graaz - Ratchet - Soundwave - Slicer - Gale - Rootha - Kagemaro - Blorpityblorpboop - Kayla - SliverQueen - Ivy - Falco - Gluntch - Charlatan/Wilson - Garth - Kros - Anthousa - Shigeki - Light-Paws - Lukka - Sefris - Ebondeath - Rokiric - Garth - Nixilis - Grist - Mavinda - Kumano - Nezahal - Mavinda - Plargg - Plargg - Extus - Plargg - Oracle - Kardur - Halvar - Tergrid - Egon - Cosima - Halana+Livio - Jeska+Falthis+Obosh - Yeva - Akiri+Zirda - Lady Sun - Nahiri - Korlash - Overlord+Zirda - Chisei - Athreos2 - Akim - Cazur+Ukkima - Otrimi - Otrimi - Kalamax - Ayli+Lurrus - Clamilton - Gonti - Heliod2 - Ayula - Thassa2 - Gallia - Purphoros2 - Rankle - Uro - Rayami - Gargos - Thrasios+Bruse - Pang - Sasaya - Wydwen - Feather - Rona - Toshiro - Sylvia+Khorvath - Geth - QMarchesa - Firesong - Athreos - Arixmethes - Isperia - Etali - Silas+Sidar - Saskia - Virtus+Gorm - Kynaios - Naban - Aryel - Mizzix - Kazuul - Tymna+Kraum - Sidar+Tymna - Ayli - Gwendlyn - Phelddagrif - Liliana - Kaervek - Phelddagrif - Mairsil - Scarab - Child - Phenax - Shirei - Thada - Depala - Circu - Kytheon - GrenzoHR - Phelddagrif - Reyhan+Kraum - Toshiro - Varolz - Nin - Ojutai - Tasigur - Zedruu - Uril - Edric - Wort - Zurgo - Nahiri - Grenzo - Kozilek - Yisan - Ink-Treader - Yisan - Brago - Sidisi - Toshiro - Alexi - Sygg - Brimaz - Sek'Kuar - Marchesa - Vish Kal - Iroas - Phelddagrif - Ephara - Derevi - Glissa - Wanderer - Saffi - Melek - Xiahou Dun - Lazav - Lin Sivvi - Zirilan - Glissa - Ashling1 - Angus - Arcum - Talrand - Chainer - Higure - Kumano - Scion - Teferi1 - Uyo - Sisters
PDH - Drake - Graverobber - Izzet GM - Tallowisp - Symbiote
Brawl - Feather - Ugin - Jace - Scarab - Angrath - Vraska - Kumena
Oathbreaker - Wrenn&6

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WizardMN
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Post by WizardMN » 2 years ago

DirkGently wrote:
2 years ago
EDIT: curiously, her EDHrec page is one of the most confusing ones I've seen - most of the popular creature slots are populated by Gods, which (1) is a terrible non-deck and (2) still is only ~26% of the decks, yet there's only a scant few generic bombs on the list. No Eldrazi, no Praetors, none of the stuff you'd actually expect. So I have no clue what everyone is actually doing with this card tbh. Maybe it's somehow safe, simply because it's so trivial to break that everyone decided it would be too boring?
She is finally a general for "God Tribal" so it seems that is what people wanted to build. I don't think it is really all that confusing since the only 5 color God otherwise is a false one.

As for the rest of the bombs, perhaps you are right that people just didn't want to go straight bombs with her. Who knows. I have faced a couple and they don't seem nearly as bad as Golos but obviously our experiences regarding both differs.

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Post by toctheyounger » 2 years ago

DirkGently wrote:
2 years ago
Anyway, that's not actually what I wanted to talk about, but rather that I had my first experience playing against Esika, God of the Tree // The Prismatic Bridge last night and...hoo boy, %$#% that card.
I think to my mind this is a pretty common opinion regarding superfriends. It's part of the archetype, that because of the way walkers work they must be dealt with or you're out of the game, especially (but not exclusively) if they have emblems. Even if they don't, once you've got a density of walkers in play you're still playing uphill against a variety of effects on the board that literally cost the superfriends player nothing in resources. It's the ultimate in draw-go control; you chew away at the board, hold up removal or permission and throw down the odd value multiplier like Doubling Season, Deepglow Skate, Flux Channeler or any other proliferate nonsense. It's fairly easy to weave a pretty strong deck together just through density of walkers, even if they're not optimal - even the fairly average ones you still don't want them hitting an ultimate.

I ran a Vial Smasher the Fierce/Kraum, Ludevic's Opus grixis superfriends shell up until recently, and it was very much like this. I remember working on a primer application for an alt-win-con deck (funnily enough I think it was a Golos, Tireless Pilgrim) and there was this great section that focused on the concept of threat overload. You put enough scary things on the board, and a)your opponents' threat assessment stops being as effective or relevant and b)your opponents start to need really specific cards to stop you from winning. That's exactly the metric that superfriends work on, and anything at the helm that enables that is gonna be busted.

Not gonna lie, Esika, God of the Tree // The Prismatic Bridge doesn't look fun to play, and it's probably more specific than Golos, Tireless Pilgrim, but I do still feel like Golos, Tireless Pilgrim is stronger, purely because he's not modal; you have a non-conditional land search AND casting stuff from the top of your library for free. The former even plays into the latter, which is just gross.
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Post by pokken » 2 years ago

DirkGently wrote:
2 years ago
I haven't played against a field of the dead Golos deck, but I think any game where your commander could have been replaced with Reap and Sow and you still would have won, I don't think that means the commander is OP. Maybe it means the archetype is OP, or maybe it means your deck is OP, or maybe it means FotD is OP, or maybe it just means your opponents sucked and/or had bad draws. But fetching a land for 5 mana is not overpowered, let alone 7 or 9. If having 5 mana nonbasic tutor in the CZ is backbreaking then that has to be an indictment of the cards around it, not the card itself.

Anyway, that's not actually what I wanted to talk about, but rather that I had my first experience playing against Esika, God of the Tree // The Prismatic Bridge last night and...hoo boy, %$#% that card.
The problem with golos is the activated ability plus guaranteed field of the dead. Not just one or the other. Or guaranteed world tree, sanctum, cradle, coffers. People had a hard time beating my mono red nykthos golos, that decks win rate was 50%. And it put the t in trash.

Esika seems broken as %$#% to me tbh. Oath of druids is banned in legacy and now it's your 5 color commander. But it can get walkers so let's just put the nuttiest self defending walkers and a couple copies of consecrated sphinx (say nezahal, sire of stagnation, niv parun?). Oh and it's asymmetrical.

I have been thinking of building it as my old oath of druids style deck, seems sick.. but I imagine people would get real tired of csphinx in the cz backed up but a million counterspells.

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