Top 5 Current Commander Concerns or have another freak out over Sheldon's thoughts

[SchmertinBooskingall]

Good chat, but

If the solution isn't splitting the format, I think that still offering an appropriate version of a sub-format (along with the several others) is the way to go in order to enhance the opportunities of the folks who are already self-selecting and having good Rule 0 talks.

uhhh....

See! The breadcrumbs!

[umtiger]

There are three ravnica blocks. I've been hoping to play Ravnica only EDH since the latest one came out. And allow for players to use 3 of same shocks as long as they use 3 different arts for their shocks

Of course, I've never been able to convince anyone to try it out. But if someone with clout like RC said something about it, just saying….

Anyone who's played long enough should see Sheldon's talking about.

1.) All of the formats most important cards are non-RL but proxies for anyone who wants to use them responsibly, I've never seen access be an issue.

2.) WotC, please stop printing cards for formats other than standard. I don't think Modern players like facing Hogaaks, EDH players don't like facing endless Merens and Korvolds. Please make/test standard so that it's a good format worthy of flagship status instead of a FIRE piece of crap.

3.) Please ban hullbreacher and stop mentioning wheels and/or underworld dreams.

4.) Rule 0 is the only way to have fun in Edh games But perhaps, they need to instruct/share ways to form good games using Rule 0 rather than just ammo to the fools who constantly complain about about "taking the reins" away from the RC.

[Vertain]

One has to be a very special kind of dense to show Llanowar Elves, Arcane Signet, and Sol Ring as examples of fast mana, only to then say in the same passage, that the strongest of the three isn't in fact the problem, it's that there's too many of the other, weaker ones.

No, I think this point is correct. The issue isn't one Sol Ring in the 99. It will be drawn in the opening hand of a small percentage of games, but.... high variance is sort of the entire point of the format. The issue is when a deck is running ten copies of Arcane Signet - that makes the plan of ramping on turn 2 into bigger plays on turns 3-5 extremely consistent. Accelerating the game by one turn in 90% of games is a much more significant effect on the format than accelerating the game by two turns in 10% of games. A faster format also means that a lot of slower strategies and cards get pushed out of the realm of playability, and places a heavy burden on decks to run lower curves and cheap removal so they don't get tempo'd out.

That is the equivalent of saying Prophet of Kruphix is perfectly fine, this is a high variance format after all, but WotC should really stop printing cards like Seedborn Muse and Wilderness Reclamation, because they make virtual extra turns too consistent of a strategy.

Is anyone clamoring to ban Arcane Signet et al. though? 2mv artifact ramp is the textbook definition of fair. Take those away and we might have a reasonable argument that green's ramp is too good, but as it stands now I can't think of a single green piece of ramp I'd like banned, whereas I can think of at least three pieces of artifact ramp I wouldn't mind going.

I can think of two cards: Exploration and Burgeoning. They both provide an insane advantage when played in the first two turns, with the latter being even more explosive and it also would fit into "interacts poorly with the multiplayer nature of the format".

[toctheyounger]

I certainly wouldn't put Burgeoning ahead of Exploration. And both are pretty good examples of fair cards to my mind. They're both potentially explosive, but without being able to refill your hand they only do so much.

This is again another scenario of asking yourself what you're aiming for in playing these cards. They're fine in a vacuum, if you're up to no good thats on you.

[Mookie]

That is the equivalent of saying Prophet of Kruphix is perfectly fine, this is a high variance format after all, but WotC should really stop printing cards like Seedborn Muse and Wilderness Reclamation, because they make virtual extra turns too consistent of a strategy.

....given that most Prophet of Kruphix decks I played against were running Green Sun's Zenith, Tooth and Nail, and a few other tutors specifically to fetch Prophet, I would say yes, too much consistency definitely contributed to its banning. As another example, I'll call out the printing of Hullbreacher and Narset, Parter of Veils providing a critical mass of draw-denying effects alongside Notion Thief to make wheels strategies too consistent (and partially prompting this discussion in the first place).

[Vertain]

That is the equivalent of saying Prophet of Kruphix is perfectly fine, this is a high variance format after all, but WotC should really stop printing cards like Seedborn Muse and Wilderness Reclamation, because they make virtual extra turns too consistent of a strategy.

....given that most Prophet of Kruphix decks I played against were running Green Sun's Zenith, Tooth and Nail, and a few other tutors specifically to fetch Prophet, I would say yes, too much consistency definitely contributed to its banning. As another example, I'll call out the printing of Hullbreacher and Narset, Parter of Veils providing a critical mass of draw-denying effects alongside Notion Thief to make wheels strategies too consistent (and partially prompting this discussion in the first place).

And because Prophet of Kruphix wasn't someone's pet card, it was correctly identified as the problem and banned, although it took them long enough.

When it comes to the difference in power between Sol Ring and Arcane Signet, Hullbreacher should be compared to Alms Collector, not Notion Thief or Narset, Parter of Veils. And saying "Hullbreacher is fine, people are just running too many Alms Collectors" sounds pretty dumb in my opinion.

I certainly wouldn't put Burgeoning ahead of Exploration. And both are pretty good examples of fair cards to my mind. They're both potentially explosive, but without being able to refill your hand they only do so much.

This is again another scenario of asking yourself what you're aiming for in playing these cards. They're fine in a vacuum, if you're up to no good thats on you.

Exploration is more powerful and consistent than Burgeoning, however I still think the latter is unhealthier. If a player isn't intending to pubstomp, Burgeoning can still turn into "oops, I win" way more easily than Exploration. I'm not saying that the power level of these two cards is too high, because, as you said, they're essentially fine in a vacuum. I was saying, that if green ramp would receive a hit, these two stand out for me as possible candidates because of the reasons mentioned earlier.

[Treamayne]

There are three ravnica blocks. I've been hoping to play Ravnica only EDH since the latest one came out. And allow for players to use 3 of same shocks as long as they use 3 different arts for their shocks

Of course, I've never been able to convince anyone to try it out. But if someone with clout like RC said something about it, just saying….

Except for the "three shocks" thing, you can do this now. The same way I build Tribal EDH according to defined rules that I have posted. You may even be able to have your second and third shocks on the side and two other Lands with which to swap them if you ask pre-game "hey, do you mind if I try this out and you can give feedback on what you think..."

The best way to explore options like this is to play and demonstrate *before* asking others to build to a similar deckbuilding constraint.

....personally, I like the idea of there being some officially-endorsed subformats. I occasionally toy around with various deckbuilding restrictions, but those are difficult to pull off in a higher-powered meta. Similar to how Modern and then Pioneer were created when the previous formats got too mature, I wouldn't mind shrinking the EDH cardpool a bit, if only so different cards can become more relevant. Modern-only, no-reserved-list, no-special-sets.... definitely a lot of options for smaller, lower-powered subformats.

I'm not sure they would even have to be "endorsed" - something as simple as posting the "rules" for some Variant EDH and saying, "Hey, if you want to shake things up, try something like this" would go a long way. In all the years I have been trying to promote Tribal EDH, I've convinced few people to give it a shot; but, as a player, my platform for spreading the word is tiny. They can get the word out faster and further and possibly speak to the people that this will help.

Aside from the "limited card pool" variants - the combined format variants (Tribal EDH, Emperor EDH, Star EDH, Rainbow Stairwell EDH) at least have the option that a deck built for one of those variants are still very playable in a normal game. Whereas something like "Modern EDH" might give a player pause to use that deck in a normal game where there is a perceived disadvantage.

I'm not sure I'm going to phrase this correctly,...

There is this notion that lands are untouchable while simultaneously ramp is a problem. People hate fast mana but without some sort of efficient artifact ramp, you risk giving green way too big an edge if lands can't be messed with also. 4 and 5 color decks go crazy but Blood Moon and Back to Basics are frowned upon in some circles.

With more acceptance of Ashiok, Dream Render, Stranglehold, Aven Mindcensor effects to stop searching out lands (hurts tutors for those who hate them as well), Null Rod, Energy Flux type stuff to hurt masses of mana rocks, and other stax type effects can keep this stuff in check. ...

I probably could have worded some of that better.

No, I think this point is correct. The issue isn't one Sol Ring in the 99. It will be drawn in the opening hand of a small percentage of games, but.... high variance is sort of the entire point of the format. The issue is when a deck is running ten copies of Arcane Signet - that makes the plan of ramping on turn 2 into bigger plays on turns 3-5 extremely consistent. Accelerating the game by one turn in 90% of games is a much more significant effect on the format than accelerating the game by two turns in 10% of games. A faster format also means that a lot of slower strategies and cards get pushed out of the realm of playability, and places a heavy burden on decks to run lower curves and cheap removal so they don't get tempo'd out.

The problem, as I see it, isn't that "lands are inviolate." Targeted LD, I think, is mostly accepted. The problem is that most Mass options are too uniform and will generally hurt the player(s) that are behind far more than the ramp players you are trying to check. I don't know if it is a failure of imagination or if there is some other constraint preventing WotC from making the tools we need to address this problem, but I would like to see things like:

• An enchant player curse that makes a Blood Moon type effect just for that player (e.g. Nonbasic lands enchanted player controls lose all abilities and are Basic Wastes)
• Cheap multi-target artifact destruction that can address artifact ramp early (e.g. Destroy X (each) tapped artifact MV 2 or less)
• Ruination for a single target (e.g. If target player controls more lands than each other player, that player sacrifices nonbasic lands equal to the difference)
• "Catch up" effects that aren't just "ramp" in disguise or lead to discarding most of your hand - since the lagging player might "get" a number of lands to hand, only to discard due to hand size (e.g. For each player with more lands than you, search for a basic land and exile it. You may play those lands for as long as they are exiled)

[pokken]

"you there, sit and don't play magic for a while" is a really problematic effect in commander.

Ask people how they feel about being knocked out if the game by a mindslaver effect it's basically the same.

I would have to sit down and try hard to imagine a worse play experience than single target ruination. Yuck.

[vandertroll]

The fewer cards are getting the axe the better for the format. Trying to steer EDH in a perceived ''it's how supposed to be played" route was nice when it was played among Sheldon and friends but now, for better or for worse, it's way bigger than him or the RC. No one can be pleased all the time and that's why Rule 0 is paramount for a good game experience in EDH.

I think that many people (myself included) are having a hard time to realize that many times they confuse the premise of "this card should be banned" with the premise of "my playgroup is 80% douchebags who can't agree on playing with decks of a similar-ish level and I am not having a good time" . Between adults who play regularly it should be easy to regulate your decks' power level. On the other hand, when I go to play on a LGS with strangers I try to carry decks with various power levels because I just want to have a good time.

I have tons of respect for Sheldon but he is not a game designer and that shows on many of his arguments in this post.

TL;DR Don't be an asshole to your playgroup, play comparable decks and wear body deodorant.

Edit: I saw @pokken 's post above mine. Sometimes not being able to play magic in the corner because of a spell or an ability is part of MtG! Trying to recover from a bad boardstate and sometimes get a win can be even more rewarding. If there is saltiness on the group about this, having a discussion should resolve the situation

[pokken]

The fewer cards are getting the axe the better for the format. Trying to steer EDH in a perceived ''it's how supposed to be played" route was nice when it was played among Sheldon and friends but now, for better or for worse, it's way bigger than him or the RC. No one can be pleased all the time and that's why Rule 0 is paramount for a good game experience in EDH.

I dunno man, I have played a lot at LGS' since 2016 or so and banning stuff like Prophet of Kruphix, Sylvan Primordial and Paradox Engine have greatly improved the casual play experience. I've always had decks of various power levels but any power level playing against Prophet.Dec was unpleasant.

I think they're doing a pretty solid job overall but I think a few more bans are probably warranted. The format's growing so fast both in players and card pool that I think they've gotten a bit behind on their Meta Shaping bans which have always been really effective for improving my experience anyway.

Edit: I saw @pokken 's post above mine. Sometimes not being able to play magic in the corner because of a spell or an ability is part of MtG! Trying to recover from a bad boardstate and sometimes get a win can be even more rewarding. If there is saltiness on the group about this, having a discussion should resolve the situation

I guess, but there's a big difference between "No one can play artifact abilities because of Stony Silence but you're the most effected" vs. "I blew up all your lands but no one else's, have fun digging out!"

Ruination in some decks will function as a win condition where you mosty bork the entire table. I'm not 100% against that though I tend to not want it in lower powered decks where I'm not running as much countermagic.

But ruinationing one person? You seriously think that's a good card design?

[kirkusjones]

@pokken would single-target ruination really be all that bad? I feel like the lower power decks wouldn't want it and the 75% and above would use it to punish those decks that skimped on basics. A check on the Golos player wouldn't be all that terrible, would it? And knowing you have the chance to get blown out might make someone think twice before cutting a basic to jam a utility land. There should be a risk to running non-basics. As things stand right now, there really isn't.

Of course there are going to be buttplugs that use it to kneecap a player in a low power game, but they were going to find a way to do that regardless of this theoretical ruination's existence.

EDIT - more and more these threads (and Sheldon's last couple of articles) feel like EDH's version of Festivus. We all have cards/effects we dislike, but our personal distastes shouldn't shape the overall format. I get why stuff like Prophet and Primordial had to go, but Exploration and Burgeoning? Serenity now!

[pokken]

@pokken would single-target ruination really be all that bad? I feel like the lower power decks wouldn't want it and the 75% and above would use it to punish those decks that skimped on basics. A check on the Golos player wouldn't be all that terrible, would it? And knowing you have the chance to get blown out might make someone think twice before cutting a basic to jam a utility land. There should be a risk to running non-basics. As things stand right now, there really isn't.

Of course there are going to be buttplugs that use it to kneecap a player in a low power game, but they were going to find a way to do that regardless of this theoretical ruination's existence.

Questions like "would it really be that bad?" should be obvious clues that it's a bad idea. It sure as heck wouldn't make anything better.

There already is a risk to running nonbasics. Getting actually Blood Moon or Ruination or Wave of Vitriol'd or whatever.

I'll always remember my early days of the format when I had a Wort, the Raidmother deck and I ran Wake of Destruction and bopped my buddy who was playing mono black out of the game. He was...not pleased. His deck was strong and he was probably going to win, but he had to either scoop or sit there while we killed him.

Play patterns of "I hope you specifically have a counterspell or you are completely hosed, but everyone else is fine" are not things we should be adding more of.

And they sure as hell aren't solutions to anything.

edit:

I should add that far and away the most likely situation with enchant player blood moon/ruination is that no one ever plays them because they're pretty bad at a lot of tables and people usually do not play "delete target player" effects because they know better.

[Vertain]

@pokken would single-target ruination really be all that bad? I feel like the lower power decks wouldn't want it and the 75% and above would use it to punish those decks that skimped on basics. A check on the Golos player wouldn't be all that terrible, would it? And knowing you have the chance to get blown out might make someone think twice before cutting a basic to jam a utility land. There should be a risk to running non-basics. As things stand right now, there really isn't.

You mentioned the problem behind single-player ruination right there. It's the lower power decks, the ones that want something like that the least, that have the hardest time keeping up with ramping.

Also, I don't think punishing non-basic lands too much actually solves the problem at all. Because green decks can ramp into only basics just fine, and still have not much of an issue with colour fixing most of the time. All it would accomplish is making the mana bases on non green decks worse, either by being more risky or less efficient. And that is literally the opposite of what we're trying to accomplish.

What I think would help the most would be meaningful stack interaction outside of blue. Withering Boon is the only remotely good card I can think of in that regard, and red keeps getting interesting tool in that direction (Chef's Kiss and Deflecting Swat come to mind), but they're awfully situational. The reason is, that dedicating too many deck slots to ramp instead of potential threats/answers leaves one vulnerable to getting the remaining key cards countered, which is a lot more of an issue if that can come from more than the one blue player. Also, it would help rein in problematic cards like Expropriate, where as a non blue player you have to just suck it up and accept that you just lost the game.

[kirkusjones]

How often do you run into Blood Moon and company, though? You said yourself people hardly run them. The small chance that you're going to run into them is far outweighed by the efficiency of running non-basics. And Wave of Vitriol costs 7 for crying out loud. I get it: ramp ramp ramp, surf's up non-basic bros, but why not just win the game at that point?

As for single-player non-basic hate, you've made it clear that you think there's no place for it, so I won't try to convince you. It makes sense that you'd be opposed when you've touted the fact that you've moved away from "ramp dependency" in your deck-building, but as with all choices made in that process, there has to be a cost/risk.

Edit - Withering Boon how did I not know this existed!? Thanks for giving me something new to find room for in Vilis.

[pokken]

How often do you run into Blood Moon and company, though? You said yourself people hardly run them. The small chance that you're going to run into them is far outweighed by the efficiency of running non-basics. And Wave of Vitriol costs 7 for crying out loud. I get it: ramp ramp ramp, surf's up non-basic bros, but why not just win the game at that point?

As for single-player non-basic hate, you've made it clear that you think there's no place for it, so I won't try to convince you. It makes sense that you'd be opposed when you've touted the fact that you've moved away from "ramp dependency" in your deck-building, but as with all choices made in that process, there has to be a cost/risk.

Making them single target is certainly not going to make them more enticing to people when they are already risky propositions.

I run Blood Moon mostly in mono red or gruul decks, and I'll put it in there if it makes sense. I'm more of a Magus of the Moon guy since it's easier to interact with.

I don't know that many 7 mana game winning plays, but Wave of Vitriol is pretty damn close at most tables--if I can squeeze my deck down to mostly creatures I definitely run it in mono green, and it's not bad in Gruul landfall either.

It's a complete and total house in Titania, Protector of Argoth too

[Guardman]

I agree with most of what Sheldon said (and I have thoughts, but not the time to write them down), but one thing I do want to nitpick is that Rule 0 is doing way too much work and doesn't address one of my main issues I have when playing, which is playing with new people or random people. At least pre pandemic, at least half of my games, if not more, included at least one person not in the "playgroup" (though I use the term loosely). This was because my LGS got a lot of random people who weren't part of the regulars that came in because they were in the area. Rule 0 just isn't capable of working in groups that include random people. Because of that I would prefer that the RC emphasize Rule 0 less and include more concrete guidelines

[PrimevalCommander]

• "Catch up" effects that aren't just "ramp" in disguise or lead to discarding most of your hand - since the lagging player might "get" a number of lands to hand, only to discard due to hand size (e.g. For each player with more lands than you, search for a basic land and exile it. You may play those lands for as long as they are exiled)

I just wanted to +1 the bolded sentence. Great way to make a very fair catch up card that doesn't result in you discarding all your catch-up lands, or getting too much of a boost in ramp. The "Play cards from exile" has become more common than ever. Giving this template to white would really help it come into its own in ramp.
Boreas Charger does a good job as well, putting one into play and the rest to hand is a good template as well.


I think the article hits on some good points. As other formats become less accessible, or less fun, new and experienced players alike move to commander and bring their own expectations of how a game should play out.

On Ramp, green ramp is one of the best things to be doing during the early game. So you either need to be doing that, or severely pressure the early game and punish the slow start that some green players have due to taking turn 3 and 4 off for ramp. This means playing a much lower average cmc deck that can put a fast clock on the rest of the table. This arms race starts to spiral into a race to the bottom of the mana value average, which is overall negative for the format build on 7 & 8 mv bombs.

Really trying to cultivate a sense of power level matching might be able to soften this effect, except the slower the game is, the better BIG RAMP is, which puts everyone not in green at 75% or lower tables at a severe disadvantage. If games go to turn 10-12, and the green player untaps with 15 lands and the white player untaps with 10, there is a mana dependency that cannot be understated.

Artifact ramp helps non-green players catch up, so I don't see that as a problem. All the broken rocks have already been printed for longer than a decade, and all the 2mv rocks are right where they should be in my opinion. Though Arcane Signet is just boring.

[kirkusjones]

Back in the commander net days, we had proposed including a welcome letter from the RC with the inserts in the commander precons that pointed people to the philosophy document and said something like "welcome to the best format in the game, we're here for fun, interesting and challenging games" or something of that nature to help set up expectations around Rule 0 from the start. Sadly, all that work disappeared when those forums went down.

[pokken]

If everyone had their average CMC written on their deck box it'd probably solve like 80-90% of the power level matching issues.

I've been using this guideline for myself lately and I play my 3.5+ decks with randos and then <3.5 decks if they handle that well, and then my 2.5-3 decks if they're going hard.

[Dunharrow]

If everyone had their average CMC written on their deck box it'd probably solve like 80-90% of the power level matching issues.

I've been using this guideline for myself lately and I play my 3.5+ decks with randos and then <3.5 decks if they handle that well, and then my 2.5-3 decks if they're going hard.

The average person doesn't know their average CMC...

[pokken]

If everyone had their average CMC written on their deck box it'd probably solve like 80-90% of the power level matching issues.

I've been using this guideline for myself lately and I play my 3.5+ decks with randos and then <3.5 decks if they handle that well, and then my 2.5-3 decks if they're going hard.

The average person doesn't know their average CMC...

True but it's a simple thing to figure it out. Enter your deck into anything and it tells you.

I've never seen a single metric anywhere near as predictive.

There are some weird decks where it doesn't work (golos high cmc tribal, shadow born apostles) but by far the exception.

[Dunharrow]

If everyone had their average CMC written on their deck box it'd probably solve like 80-90% of the power level matching issues.

I've been using this guideline for myself lately and I play my 3.5+ decks with randos and then <3.5 decks if they handle that well, and then my 2.5-3 decks if they're going hard.

The average person doesn't know their average CMC...

True but it's a simple thing to figure it out. Enter your deck into anything and it tells you.

I've never seen a single metric anywhere near as predictive.

There are some weird decks where it doesn't work (golos high cmc tribal, shadow born apostles) but by far the exception.

I think you're 100% right that it is a good indication

I would personally hate to keep track of the average CMC. I make modifications to my decks all the time and have 20 decks. I don't want to spend time putting them online because I will need to update them so often.
For me it's just not something I will do.

[pokken]

I would personally hate to keep track of the average CMC. I make modifications to my decks all the time and have 20 decks. I don't want to spend time putting them online because I will need to update them so often.
For me it's just not something I will do.

I would definitely have a go at entering your decks. It makes making changes a lot easier once you get used to it, since you can easily look at the whole deck without having to sort it.

[Thecasualoblivion]

Looking at the article:

Wheels—I've honestly never seen a wheel deck in the wild, so I don't really know how bad this is. I've seen cards like Hullbreacher in play in games without wheels, and while it and some of the others can be obnoxious cards I don't think they're ban-worthy on their own. It makes me wonder how big of a problem this is.

Decay of Other Formats—I think modern and standard refugees are a bigger problem than Sheldon thinks, because the communities for Legacy and Vintage are so small, too small to have the impact we've been seeing. I think Sheldon is personally in a place where he sees more Legacy and Vintage than the rest of us, so it's a matter of perspective. For the most part, I think he is mostly correct in saying that cEDH has more or less stayed in its own place and hasn't caused a tremendous amount of trouble for the rest of us. That being said, from personal experience I regularly encounter cEDH players, mostly refugees from other formats, who don't understand the distinction between casual and competitive play and there are some of them don't respect the distinction. On the other hand, I've seen casual EDH players with a higher level of hostility towards cEDH than is warranted.

Excessive Ramp—I don't really see the issue here, other than maybe ramp becoming so ubiquitous that you can't skip it.

Homogenization/Get Gud Scrub—Some of this I do blame on cEDH, some otherwise casual players get tempted to the dark side and end up sneaking some cEDH tech into casual play that otherwise wouldn't happen. This happens because the tech has entered the public consciousness and is readily available. Some of this is also some of our newer and more competitive players not understanding or occasionally not respecting the casual mindset. I don't really see this issue on the casual side in open FLGS play, as there is real competitive pressure there. Even when running genuinely casual decks, some cards are better than others and a better built deck will win more. People who regularly play strangers at the FLGS will experience this and either adjust or complain.

The Reserved List—I think focusing on the Reserved List is missing the problem, the problem is cards being too expensive. There has been a change where almost everything on the RL has gotten really expensive where a lot of cards used to be reasonable, but the issue is budget. A lot of people can't afford $100 for a single card. Some can't afford $50, some can't even afford $20 for a card. This is a pay to win hobby, and in a lot of cases you get what you pay for. Powerful cards are often more expensive, and there are expensive cards without any budget alternatives.

Fast Mana/Time Creep—Playing a lot against strangers at multiple local FLGS, the meta such as it is for a casual format like EDH seems to have adapted to 2 mana rocks and the ramp options released over the past few years. 1st turn Sol Ring into Signet is bad, but it's not common. What I do see as a major problem is 0-1 mana ramp that produces more mana than it costs. Sol Ring fits this bill but it's an institution and if it's by itself it's not a major problem. When Sol Ring is combined with Mana Crypt, Ancient Tomb, Jeweled Lotus, and so on I see as a major problem in casual EDH. It's an order of magnitude faster than 2 mana ramp and most of the cards are over $100 each and out of the budget range of most casual players who aren't necessarily on board with proxies of cards they don't own. This is one place where cEDH I think is having a negative effect by bleeding into casual, as those mana sources are ubiquitous there.

[Igzex]

I feel the decay of other formats can be argued to be a problem for Magic in general. I mean, the popularity of Commander as a format kinda was responsible for the Companion disaster and part of me wonders if all these overpowered value cards like Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath and Omnath, Locus of Creation that wreck standard can also be pinned on WOTC trying perhaps a little too hard to appeal to commander players as our format has kind of taken over. It's ok WOTC you don't need to push value engines so hard, you can trust us to be creative. Just relax and make reasonable cards