Companion Mechanic

[ISBPathfinder]

Gyruda, Jegantha, Kaheera, Keruga, Lurrus, Obosh, Umori, and Zirda

So, obviously Lutri, the Spellchaser was going to be a big issue if allowed to work as a companion because it essentially didn't require any deckbuilding but I feel like all of the other companions are so bad and so hard to build around in this format that I have seen like a single instance of someone including a companion in commander. I wanted to reach out to the community and see and hear a bit more about what experiences with the companion mechanic has been.

I guess I am trying to fish for other people's experience with companion in commander to date. My experience has sort of been that its too restrictive with too little payoff for it to seem worthwhile.

This thread is a roundabout questioning if Lutri, the Spellchaser should be unbanned and the companion mechanic just not allowed due to wishboard rules. I do personally wish that they had never made the exception as it doesn't make sense to me but given how long it has been I still kind of haven't seen anyone make use of it but the banned list did get expanded to allow companions to be legal outside of this guy which is an exception that isn't needed if companion as a mechanic doesn't function. This is not a banned list discussion, I am asking for experience with the companion mechanic as it is right now.

[pokken]

Still hate the mechanic, still wish it had not been allowed. I never see it because it's mostly trash, but the couple times I've seen it it was just some linear bullcrap designed to play commander and companion to make the game the same every time.

If it had not been nerfed it would be everywhere for a few builds, primary Kenrith/Zirda. and Sisay/Jegantha

Kenrith-Zirda combination was truly the pinnacle of bullcrap with Sisay/Jegantha close behind.

[Myllior]

Amongst the two groups I play with, I haven't seen a single companion used in maybe 40+ decks. Certainly a lot of those decks predate companions - so the investment needed to adjust the deck to fit a companion would be a hurdle - but it doesn't seem to register when discussing new decks either.

There are two times that I've seriously considered playing a companion since its inception,

1. Obosh, the Preypiercer as companion to Vial Smasher the Fierce and Kraum, Ludevic's Opus. I wanted to build this as a delver-esque control deck that won through Vial Smaher triggers and Kraum beatdown, in which case having Obosh as a readily available damage doubler was sweet. (If this sounds familiar, I got the idea from darrenhabib's build with the same commander/companion setup). However, before I finished designing it, WotC changed the companion mechanic so that it cost 3 to put the companion to hand. Adding the cost of a tutor onto the companion meant that it was no longer worth sacrificing much more powerful cards such as Fiery Emancipation and Wound Reflection, which I could tutor for and play for the same cost. The deck ended up as Vial Smasher the Fierce and Sakashima of a Thousand Faces with Obosh in the 99 and it does everything I want it to.

2. Jegantha, the Wellspring as companion to Sisay, Weatherlight Captain. Original, right? cEDH lists were constructed so that this was literally a game winning combo residing entirely in the command zone, so the extra 3 was justifiable. I wasn't interested in running a list that would win on the spot (Shrines are where it's at) but there's no denying that any game in which Jegantha came down would get turned up to 11. In the end, I decided to forego Jegantha as a companion since it allowed me to run Nature's Will, Seedborn Muse and Mana Reflection (among others), leading to a build that can still be explosive but is more resilient and less glass cannon.

So they offered some creativity in deck building and were interesting to consider but, for me, they were ultimately a swing and a miss.

[Jemolk]

I've seen Keruga, the Macrosage show up before. Interesting restrictions created by that one, and it made both the deck and the game more unique for its presence. There's also one I've been planning to make use of, and that's Kaheera, the Orphanguard in cat tribal, simply because it's a total freeroll. They're not going to show up that often, over all, but I think that's fine. Few cards should show up so often that they become universal experiences. I think the real question is, when they do appear, is it more interesting to have them around? I find the answer is yes, in the very rare cases where it happens near me.

[Gamazson]

I have only seen Lurrus of the Dream-Den & Karlov of the Ghost Council together, but I can't recall that player ever casting Lurrus. I know that the deck has since been deconstructed.

[TheGildedGoose]

I got bored and grew fascinated by the building restrictions imposed by some of the companions pretty recently, but they're almost all terrible, so I only ever built Gyruda_Clones.dec.

Spoilers: it was terrible, and it never got past a beta build.

I agree with the sentiment that they're too much work for too little payoff.

[duducrash]

I'm brewing Killian, Ink Duelist with Lurrus of the Dream-Den it isnt particularly good. But it isnt specially linear or anything. I think they are restritive enough to generate some fun deck building but the payoff isnt good enough to do so.

I do wish theyd free the beautiful Otter at least outside companion

[DirkGently]

I built a fair number of companion decks. Overall I really like the deckbuilding restriction and I didn't find any of the companions to create excessively linear experiences. The fact that they die normally makes them much trickier to build around than commanders, but still really fun to always have at least once. Haven't seen a lot of other people doing it, but I've seen a few. EDH is all about intentionally weakening your deck to make it fun to play. Companions do exactly that.

I feel like the RC had the rug pulled out from under them. They went through the trouble of modifying the rules to allow for the mechanic - which was, to be fair, almost always going to weaken a deck that accommodates it, but still a fun variation to try out - based on how the mechanic worked at release. And then WotC errataed the mechanic and made it much less appealing to appease the whiners in the competitive constructed formats. So now the RC has modified the rules to accommodate a mechanic that hardly anyone uses because of how badly WotC nerfed it. And whenever you do use it, it feels clunky AF.

Not to mention limited. IKO limited was unbelievably fun because building around companions added so much diversity to deck construction. That set was so much fun to draft, it got me to play ARENA. I drafted it so many times I got a complete 4x collection - commons uncommons rares and mythics - purely from drafting. And now companions are mediocre and barely worth building and the format is much less fun. I stopped drafting arena right after the nerfs hit and I've never gone back.

So in summary, %$#% competitive constructed for ruining the fun of companions in the good formats. And %$#% wotc for their terrible solution of functionally errataing the mechanic across all formats instead of just doing the reasonable thing and banning the companions that were problematic.

Lutri isn't that interesting imo. There are a million billion other commanders to choose from.

[TheAmericanSpirit]

Hate the mechanic, always have. The nerfs are evidence enough that even WotC knew they went too far with companion. I don't think Lutri should get a pass because WotC screwed up when she's literally part of the aforementioned problem.

Good riddance to bad rubbish. WotC can and should make cool stuff without jumping any sharks in the process. Though I do feel for those who enjoyed the mechanic without intent to abuse it, for them bans/nerfs/errata/"alchemy" like this always suck.

But me personally? Gimme your heaviest hand. No, heavier. %$#%$#% it, did I stutter? Your heaviest hand. Okay, that'll do. Now whack companions straight into the jank bin. *POP* Wow, nice shot.

[Hawk]

Inspired by Dirk, my wife and I tried a deck we deemed "The Power of Three" - Jeska, Thrice Reborn + Falthis, Shadowcat Familiar + Obosh, the Preypiercer - three cards in the command zone and lots of multiplicative effects. We've found that in general the deck isn't that great and Obosh's deckbuilding requirements 100% don't make up for his payoffs. If the deck sticks around, we're likely to ditch Obosh to be able to run all the good 2-CMC rocks, removal, and tutors, and make the deck a more steamlined voltron monster. More likely, it's gonna get dismantled for Prosper, Tome-Bound or Kalain, Reclusive Painter treasures.

Currently, Kaheera, the Orphanguard is in the companion slot for Mirri, Weatherlight Duelist cats and toys, but that's because the deck met the requirement at release. Even then, 3 mana at sorcery speed to "draw" Kaheera is meh and there's been a temptation to just stuck her in the '99 instead.

Lurrus of the Dream-Den has proven a great Commander, but would be hard to play as a Companion.

Overall the mechanic was broken-bad in all formats except ours, and the nerf to it made it "feel bad" such that I'd never go out of my way to try it again. Which is a shame, as normally this is exactly the kind of design I adore and it was so much fun to find a way to make that power of three deck work with half of the staples off the table.

[onering]

So in summary, %$#% competitive constructed for ruining the fun of companions in the good formats. And %$#% wotc for their terrible solution of functionally errataing the mechanic across all formats instead of just doing the reasonable thing and banning the companions that were problematic.

Lutri isn't that interesting imo. There are a million billion other commanders to choose from.

Nah, %$#% WotC for doing such a bad job balancing the cards and conceiving of the mechanic.

1. The RC only had to make a special exception to their rules because Wizards %$#% up and didn't just make the companions reside in the CZ. The CZ exists in all formats because emblems use it. If companions used the CZ, Commander's rules would have accommodated it just fine.

2. Wizards didn't understand how to balance the mechanic at all. An extra card you "draw" in your opening hand every game is very powerful (see: commander), and while the deckbuilding restrictions can theoretically make them balanced, Wizards sucked at designing those restrictions, possibly because there's such limited design space for the mechanic and they had to stretch to find 10 designs, all but admitting that they needed to ignore commander for 2 of them because otherwise they couldn't make all 10. It should have been obvious that Lurrus was bonkers broken in certain formats for instance, and should have had a different ability or been bigger and cost more. Certain companions were just fine as printed, and the 3 mana added makes them garbage. Others were under costed and the 3 extra mana makes them fine. The fact that Wizards put out a bad product and then had to use a one size fits all "patch" meant that we went from some companions being bs and others being fine to some companions being fine and the others being trash. Jegantha and Zirda weren't balanced in this format before the errata.

3. Wizards designed one card that was impossible to play in commander due to the 100 cad limit, and another with a "limitation" that simply isn't except for corner cases (the few cards that you can run in multiples even in singleton formats) which guaranteed a ban. Lutri obviously isn't OP, but an extra 3/2 with flash for 3 you always "draw" at the start of the game, but only for URx, was nevertheless an advantage that you didn't have to make any sacrifices for, and thus unfair, which the RC told them ahead of time. Wizards, before the errata, already nuked two of them out of the format by their designs. Commander was already down a fifth of the mechanic to start with!

Wizards ruined the mechanic, not players who didn't want their format ruined. At the end of the day, its on them for taking an interesting idea for a mechanic and churning out a poorly designed product.

[DirkGently]

Nah, %$#% WotC for doing such a bad job balancing the cards and conceiving of the mechanic.

YMMV but I think the conceiving is fairly brilliant. Most other cards that get printed might end up replacing 1 card in the 99 - whoopideedoo. Companions at least conceptually multiply the number of builds massively, making big changes to any deck they're applied to. I think it's a great idea overall.

Balance-wise I think they were great in commander (aside from lutri) and limited (and I think other formats are boring and don't care about them - but for people who do care, just ban them dammit).

1. The RC only had to make a special exception to their rules because Wizards %$#% up and didn't just make the companions reside in the CZ. The CZ exists in all formats because emblems use it. If companions used the CZ, Commander's rules would have accommodated it just fine.

I'm not the rules manager so I'm not going to pretend to have certain knowledge on this front, but I find it unlikely that they didn't consider that. I assume there's a good reason why they didn't want to do it like that.

Anyway it's not like commander needed to add an entire new rule. They just had to tweak the language of an existing rule in a way that didn't impact any other cards. That seems like a pretty small issue to me, even if optically it's been blown out of proportion.

2. Wizards didn't understand how to balance the mechanic at all. An extra card you "draw" in your opening hand every game is very powerful (see: commander), and while the deckbuilding restrictions can theoretically make them balanced, Wizards sucked at designing those restrictions, possibly because there's such limited design space for the mechanic and they had to stretch to find 10 designs, all but admitting that they needed to ignore commander for 2 of them because otherwise they couldn't make all 10.

I think it is probably fairly difficult to find space for a mechanic like this. Doesn't make it a bad idea, although I do wish they'd found another option instead of lutri. Plus tracking lutri is awkward in other formats too, and can be cheated unlike the others.

I think Yorion is a pretty low bar to include considering how powerful it is, and it's a bit of a bummer it doesn't work under the current rules of commander. But I also think the max card rule is dumb and should probably be abolished, which would open that design space.

It should have been obvious that Lurrus was bonkers broken in certain formats for instance, and should have had a different ability or been bigger and cost more.

Nah Lurrus is awesome. Just ban him in those formats.

Certain companions were just fine as printed, and the 3 mana added makes them garbage. Others were under costed and the 3 extra mana makes them fine. The fact that Wizards put out a bad product and then had to use a one size fits all "patch" meant that we went from some companions being bs and others being fine to some companions being fine and the others being trash.

Wizards ruined the mechanic, not players who didn't want their format ruined.

I do agree that ultimately the fault lies with WotC for applying a poor solution to the problem. It's not even a good solution for competitive constructed formats as far as I can tell. They should also probably have seen the problem for other formats coming and planned better for it.

I don't know that there was much room to design them where they'd be interesting in commander but not problematic elsewhere. I guess Obosh is maybe the sweet spot, I don't think he's seen much play in other formats? But he's definitely interesting in EDH.

[BeneTleilax]

Companion was a mistake, and should not have been allowed into EDH. Any rules hacks will just beget more special pleading for other, even less elegant rules hacks. I don't really take issue with it on the basis of power level, but on the basis of elegance and format coherence.

[Legend]

I am asking for experience with the companion mechanic as it is right now.[/i]

Haven't had any game experiences with companion since Ikoria Limited, in which 2/3 of the time the card was part of the main deck. I don't recall ever playing with or against a Commander deck that had a creature card with companion in the deck or outside the game. I've seen one Commander deck with Lutri as the commander but didn't see the deck played. I love the companion mechanic because with it Wizards destroyed years of dodgy Rule 10 apologetics.

[Cyberium]

I like companions, even if some had design flaws. I've always been fond of "extra effects at extra cost" mentality, so alternating a commander's intended play style by adding extra restrictions is both creative and flavorful (symbolizing how on Ikoria where people change themselves to match their companions). Now, if only their restriction matches their power level, it would've been perfect.

I think they should've released two sets of companions, ones with power level matching 60 cards Standard, the other with 100 cards Commander precons, that way they could design effects better for either format instead of changing its rules. They should've just banned Lurrus and keep the companion "cost", now they make it difficult to use.

I want to see more companions in the future, though I doubt WotC would go back and improve an old mechanic without some due cause (*cough* $ *cough*), consider our trip back to Kamigawa didn't bring back my favored arcane/spiritcraft mechanic.

[onering]

Nah, %$#% WotC for doing such a bad job balancing the cards and conceiving of the mechanic.

YMMV but I think the conceiving is fairly brilliant. Most other cards that get printed might end up replacing 1 card in the 99 - whoopideedoo. Companions at least conceptually multiply the number of builds massively, making big changes to any deck they're applied to. I think it's a great idea overall.

Balance-wise I think they were great in commander (aside from lutri) and limited (and I think other formats are boring and don't care about them - but for people who do care, just ban them dammit).

1. The RC only had to make a special exception to their rules because Wizards %$#% up and didn't just make the companions reside in the CZ. The CZ exists in all formats because emblems use it. If companions used the CZ, Commander's rules would have accommodated it just fine.

I'm not the rules manager so I'm not going to pretend to have certain knowledge on this front, but I find it unlikely that they didn't consider that. I assume there's a good reason why they didn't want to do it like that.

Anyway it's not like commander needed to add an entire new rule. They just had to tweak the language of an existing rule in a way that didn't impact any other cards. That seems like a pretty small issue to me, even if optically it's been blown out of proportion.

2. Wizards didn't understand how to balance the mechanic at all. An extra card you "draw" in your opening hand every game is very powerful (see: commander), and while the deckbuilding restrictions can theoretically make them balanced, Wizards sucked at designing those restrictions, possibly because there's such limited design space for the mechanic and they had to stretch to find 10 designs, all but admitting that they needed to ignore commander for 2 of them because otherwise they couldn't make all 10.

I think it is probably fairly difficult to find space for a mechanic like this. Doesn't make it a bad idea, although I do wish they'd found another option instead of lutri. Plus tracking lutri is awkward in other formats too, and can be cheated unlike the others.

I think Yorion is a pretty low bar to include considering how powerful it is, and it's a bit of a bummer it doesn't work under the current rules of commander. But I also think the max card rule is dumb and should probably be abolished, which would open that design space.

It should have been obvious that Lurrus was bonkers broken in certain formats for instance, and should have had a different ability or been bigger and cost more.

Nah Lurrus is awesome. Just ban him in those formats.

Certain companions were just fine as printed, and the 3 mana added makes them garbage. Others were under costed and the 3 extra mana makes them fine. The fact that Wizards put out a bad product and then had to use a one size fits all "patch" meant that we went from some companions being bs and others being fine to some companions being fine and the others being trash.

Wizards ruined the mechanic, not players who didn't want their format ruined.

I do agree that ultimately the fault lies with WotC for applying a poor solution to the problem. It's not even a good solution for competitive constructed formats as far as I can tell. They should also probably have seen the problem for other formats coming and planned better for it.

I don't know that there was much room to design them where they'd be interesting in commander but not problematic elsewhere. I guess Obosh is maybe the sweet spot, I don't think he's seen much play in other formats? But he's definitely interesting in EDH.

I agree that there was limited design space for the mechanic, but I think that's a sign of a bad mechanic if you can't design 10 cards with it that can work in commander. I also agree that the 100 card exactly rule should be changed to 100 card minimum, but as it stands it's still annoying that it ended up that they picked a requirement that is impossible under the current commander rules.

As for Lurrus, it should have cost 2 more and been bigger. It's probably better as a commander this way, but it's way undercosted as a companion under the original rules. I'd rather it have been beefier and worked better as a companion and had that result in all companions working better. I believe Yorion was an issue in standard or modern as well and could have used another mana in it's cost, and the Firefox is another that should have cost 5 and been bigger. Better attention to mana costs on wizards part would have made the mechanic work as designed without having to be nerfed.

[DirkGently]

I'm not really an expert on balancing other formats so idk about that. In commander using lurrus is really difficult in terms of commander options so imo the balance was definitely fine, and making him larger is a pittance for increasing the cost (making it much weaker as a commander or a companion), so I wouldn't personally approve. Ofc I'd rather they had made them weaker if it could have prevented the nonsense that went down, but I still think the best option was just banning the problem ones like lurrus.

It'd be interesting to think of alternative requirements for lutri and yorion. It has to be easily verifiable (which lutri isn't anyway) and ideally different from other companions. Could do "no [card types]" although that's similar to umori. Inverse of jegantha would be interesting.

[RxPhantom]

I have literally never played against a deck with a companion and I have no desire to build one myself. They're bad.

[FenrirRex]

I have built two companion decks, with only one still together, and have seen next to nothing of them in my playgroups. Pre-companion nerf I put together a very fun Muldrotha, the Gravetide + Umori, the Collector that was all creatures, but with a lot of artifact and enchantment creatures to still get some play out of Muldrotha- lots of fun, but infinitely worse when the errata tax hit. The other, still together, is Rin and Seri, Inseparable cat tribal with Kaheera, the Orphanguard since Dog support is more or less nonexistent, just making it 99% cats (with some elemental-based card draw) is essentially free.

I would like to see the mechanic excised entirely, as I do not like wish boards and the rule bend has always felt wrong. I would like to see them all available in the 99 since Lutri is essentially harmless if she isn't "free," though this appears to be the prevailing opinion anyway.

[Sinis]

The nerf really soured my desire to play them. I have only built one and still play it currently: Surrak Dragonclaw with Keruga, the Macrosage.

Keruga's requirement is kind of a fun puzzle to play with, where you're playing things that have mv 3, but can be cast for less. Heaven // Earth, some cards with Suspend, some new Channel stuff from Kamigawa, Evoke critters, adventurers (like Bonecrusher Giant // Stomp and Brazen Borrower // Petty Theft).

Is casting Keruga ever worth it? Sometimes; I play Keruga in maybe 50% of games. It's nice to have it in your back pocket, but paying 3 and then 5 is pretty much worse than something like Shamanic Revelation (which I also play).

So, partly, it just feels like I play it for the restriction, and then some fairly reasonable payoff if I'm out of gas. The other half of playing the deck is that the restriction is at the very front of my mind, and it's interesting to see how quick or how slow other people's decks are. I frequently don't have plays for turns 1/2, and I was a little surprised that many people ... also don't have plays on turns 1/2.

So, I guess I recommend building/playing some of them (maybe not Kaheera, but, I'd absolutely do Gyruda, Lurrus, Obosh, Zirda), if anything as an interesting exercise in building/playing, to see what you can do without, and how/if you're going to mitigate the shortcomings from the companion's requirement (i.e. this is the first blue deck I've made since RTR that doesn't have Cyclonic Rift because I bought a ton of copies when RTR came out, knowing that I wanted to play it).

[BaronCappuccino]

Before WotC changed the way companions worked, I was playing Rakdos colors, and it almost felt like an obligation to make Obosh work. It was an obsession. The problem was, I'd just invested in the AAA mana rocks and they were a difficult thing to part with. Never ended up happening. I sold out of the AAA tier commander to get back to casual, as well as back to the mono color decks I like best. Barring the release of mono companions, I don't see myself using them, and even then, I wouldn't try hard to make deck changes.

[duducrash]

So, with the new stranger things partners Lurrus of the Dream-Den gets new possibilities; Will the Wise and Will the Wise with Lucas, the Sharpshooter which is nice

[freelunch]

They never struck me as something that needed a rules change to support. If you want to play a Companion deck, you can Rule 0 it. There was no need to modify the Wish rule and I'm still sour about that.

[ISBPathfinder]

They never struck me as something that needed a rules change to support. If you want to play a Companion deck, you can Rule 0 it. There was no need to modify the Wish rule and I'm still sour about that.

Not only did they have to bend the rules for it they also had to ban one of them to make the others playable as companion. The UR one could be a legal card in the 99 / as a commander without a problem if not for the companion mechanic.

[UnfulfilledDesires]

I love the companion mechanic because of the adorable flavor & how the deckbuilding restrictions push to me to make lists in different ways & play cards I otherwise wouldn't. I'll be very said if they ban the companion mechanic in commander. I have a whole set of decks built around the eight companions that function in the format.