Rule 7 Thoughts

[pokken]

No it's not and yes it has. If a deck cannot function without the commander, then you should work harder to protect it.

...

Making those choices has been part of the journey for me with that deck. If the rules were changed in the ways discussed here, it would be like having involuntary training wheels. It would cut off lines of play that I think are legitimate, and in my opinion, aren't causing trouble to the format as a whole.

If I cast my commander and it's countered or removed that turn, I should be able to cast it again if I am able. Full stop.

Ah, the "no it's not" defense. Can't really argue with that

(Updated to be a bit more fair since there was an argument kinda buried in there)

It's a fair point that having it be difficult to deck build and play around effects that permanently remove commanders is good for the format. I disagree largely because it seems to strongly incentivize playing blue and requires a lot of deck boilerplate. I think that dealing with removal is complex enough.

I don't think you and I will ever see eye to eye on this use. If you like playing Merieke Ri Berit we are just so far apart ideologically.

[onering]

I'm sorry, but how are effects working as intended in any way a quirk in the rules?

[Gentle Giant]

For low-powered/more thematic decks, these kinds of effects can be a major issue though. My Rograkh, Son of Rohgahh / Yoshimaru, Ever Faithful deck would fold to being treed: the odds of having one of the few answers in the deck is quite low.
I think it's important to see, for both sides of this argument, that each side enjoys different things. @RxPhantom, sorry if I assume incorrectly, but it seems you take joy in tinkering with your deck to remove/address weaknesses. Taken a step further: you don't mind to have to sacrifice slots in your deck for cards that perhaps aren't exciting but help your deck maintain its consistency. Thus, play-wise, you want to be able to have the answers available in deckbuilding to build towards answering your deck's problems. Removing a suite of useful removal is problematic because it diminishes your autonomy of building towards being able to take care of issues on your own. Again, I'm making a lot of assumptions here, so correct me if I'm wrong.

I come from a different perspective: I have very little time to actually play, so iterating on a deck after playing with it could be a half-year cycle process (based on one game probably: I like to play a different deck each game). Thus, the point of filling gaps after the fact isn't as riveting/interesting: the turn-over time is simply too long. For me personally, I often build a deck and accept that I probably won't win, but will still have a good time because my deck can execute its vision. For most decks, it needs the commander to do so, and thus these effects are quite obstructive to my enjoyment. Plus, if I were to update the deck, I'd have to sacrifice the highly contested slots of cards necessary to execute the vision to make place for cards that might not fit the deck's vision (e.g. Homeward Path ). I'm sacrificing my fun for consistency, and that is quite the feels bad.

Again, I'm outlining both sides because I feel these effects have a place within certain echelons of EDH play, but I hope to at least make you also see why each one wants what they want. Play preferences also happen at a deckbuilding level.

[Legend]

I'm sorry, but how are effects working as intended in any way a quirk in the rules?

qft. You know why I'm quoting this, don't you? 🤣

[RxPhantom]

I don't think you and I will ever see eye to eye on this use. If you like playing Merieke Ri Berit we are just so far apart ideologically.

She rarely sees the light of day anymore. I only bring her out when power levels are high. She's also the only deck I've ever built that can hang at a cEDH table, and even that's a stretch. I'm fine with theft in general, but I get it if people don't want to deal with constant theft.

[pokken]

I'm sorry, but how are effects working as intended in any way a quirk in the rules?

It is a quirk of the commander rules (a bolt on to main magic) that gives theft and transform an outsized effect against commanders. It's the definition of a side effect. Same as tuck was (although perhaps not to so great an extent because in the library was so much worse)

Gilded Drake sees almost zero play (except previously as a sideboard card against sneak and show in legacy) in eternal formats. It's reliably good because taking someone's commander is extra good.

[ISBPathfinder]

It seems that most of us agree that tuck / theft are at least related to tuck from a standpoint of the intent of rule 7 but where we disagree is with if these mechanics should or should not be allowed. I don't think its a big deal if we don't see eye to eye on this given its a bunch of fans of the game arguing over what the rules of a card game are in some remote corner of the internet the RC might or might not even look into anymore. The chance of this idea going anywhere is kind of small as well. If the RC does read through this list I would love to see that it was at least seen.

[onering]

I'm sorry, but how are effects working as intended in any way a quirk in the rules?

It is a quirk of the commander rules (a bolt on to main magic) that gives theft and transform an outsized effect against commanders. It's the definition of a side effect. Same as tuck was (although perhaps not to so great an extent because in the library was so much worse)

Gilded Drake sees almost zero play (except previously as a sideboard card against sneak and show in legacy) in eternal formats. It's reliably good because taking someone's commander is extra good.

There are many cards that don't see play in eternal formats that get played a lot in commander.

And it's not a quirk in the rules. They do exactly what they are supposed to do. What they do is functionally different from other forms of removal, tuck included, because the creature doesn't leave the battlefield. These effects benefit from being better against commanders because of this, but that's no different from anything that benefits from commander being a multiplayer format.

The consistency argument doesn't really apply here because the current rule is consistent, you can redirect the commander to the command zone after it leaves the battlefield. Adding an ability to remove the commander from play because something happened to it that you don't like wouldn't be fixing an inconsistency, it would be making commanders even more powerful and centralize deck building around them even more, exacerbating an actual problem with the format. It also wouldn't do anything to solve the worst case scenario for theft effects, looping Agent or Drake, because unless you have a commander that wants to combo win on your turn they'll still lock you out by just doing it again next turn. And if you are trying to combo win with your commander, why should that get a boost from a rules change?

I understand that it's a feel bad to see a lower power commander centric deck shut out by one of these effects, but doing that is just a dick move unless they are the last opponent. And it's probably not even the right move, because there are likely better targets.

[ISBPathfinder]

Tuck also varies in other formats because you are usually running a 60 card deck with 4x copies of most things with lower life totals. Games end faster and are more consistent in most of the constructed formats to the point that tuck is usually too expensive and narrow of a removal effect to see play in 60 card formats. In those formats tuck can look a little like exile removal in that it denies a rez target and due to this it usually comes at a premium mana cost as far as removal.

The only situation I have seen where tuck has been viable in 60 card formats was with Terminus due to the miracle trigger being so cheap. It saw standard play and I think miracles was at some point some control deck in.... legacy (I honestly am not really sure).

[pokken]

And it's not a quirk in the rules. They do exactly what they are supposed to do. What they do is functionally different from other forms of removal, tuck included, because the creature doesn't leave the battlefield. These effects benefit from being better against commanders because of this, but that's no different from anything that benefits from commander being a multiplayer format.

I feel like this is semantic quibbling. I consider it to be a quirk because the cards have outsized power due to how the added commander rule works.

We add commander rule, card gets better, that's side effect of the rule we added.

The net net is the additional rule we have made up makes the cards better so it seems valid to consider changing the made up rule to not make them quite so much better.

Because we have seen many many changes to commander rules to adjust the power level and behavior of cards over the years, it's not exactly a surprising conclusion.

Tuck as a for instance is pretty much proof positive but we have many other examples. Mana color production, the zone change rule, etc etc.

[RxPhantom]

Contain your shock and surprise, but I disagree. I don't think it's a negative at all. I'd go as far as to say it's a feature, not a bug. If you don't run any potential answers to enchantments, then you're doing it wrong or you're in mono-red. And sometimes, Magic being what it is, you don't always have an answer for the answer in hand even if you're running them. Sometimes it sticks and I think that's okay.

I just need to take a second to call myself out on my own BS for that bolded section. I hate hate HATE when Commander players act as if there's a right or wrong way to do anything in this format, and here I am saying stuff like this. What I should've said is that "omitting answers to enchantments could prove to be a huge weakness for any deck." But instead I said that garbage above. Sorry all.

[onering]

And it's not a quirk in the rules. They do exactly what they are supposed to do. What they do is functionally different from other forms of removal, tuck included, because the creature doesn't leave the battlefield. These effects benefit from being better against commanders because of this, but that's no different from anything that benefits from commander being a multiplayer format.

I feel like this is semantic quibbling. I consider it to be a quirk because the cards have outsized power due to how the added commander rule works.

We add commander rule, card gets better, that's side effect of the rule we added.

The net net is the additional rule we have made up makes the cards better so it seems valid to consider changing the made up rule to not make them quite so much better.

Because we have seen many many changes to commander rules to adjust the power level and behavior of cards over the years, it's not exactly a surprising conclusion.

Tuck as a for instance is pretty much proof positive but we have many other examples. Mana color production, the zone change rule, etc etc.

A quirk implies something odd. Tuck differed from every other form of removal that takes a commander off the battlefield, except bounce to the hand. That was odd, and counterintuitive given that everything else that makes your commander leave the battlefield gave you the option to send it to the cz. Bouncing it to hand was intuitive because it was usually better than sending your commander to the cz (barring a few odd interactions). Tuck wasn't just better because of the nature of commander, it benefited from a fairly arbitrary quirk in the commander rules that treated it differently from exile and destroy effects, to which it's very similar.

Stealing and treeing are better in EDH because they can target commanders, but they don't benefit from any arbitrary quirks. The creature isn't leaving play, so while removing the tuck rule brought tuck in line with destroy and exile, trying to make stealing and treeing work the same way requires the creation of a brand new rule that functionally changes the way the format works and makes commanders even better, and not just by removing a set of answers. As others have pointed out, this enables players a built in means of recasting commanders if they have no other way to get them off the battlefield (perhaps to rebuy etb effects), and presents the opportunity to abuse costs and drawbacks that put negative modifiers on your own creatures by loading them on the commander and then sending it to the zone without having to invest in a sac outlet. The proposals that try to be simple by applying the rule to every zone also end up removing the risks of sending your commander to the gy in the hopes of reanimating it or recurring it.

In short, it's a pretty drastic rules change that would make cards not function as intended, which makes it very different from changing the tuck rule,. While this is ok if such a change is really needed, I don't think this one is needed at all, but that's besides the point as I've already talked about that.

[RxPhantom]

The proposals that try to be simple by applying the rule to every zone also end up removing the risks of sending your commander to the gy in the hopes of reanimating it or recurring it.

This is an excellent point.

[pokken]

A quirk implies something odd. Tuck differed from every other form of removal that takes a commander off the battlefield,

Stealing and treeing are better in EDH because they can target commanders, but they don't benefit from any arbitrary quirks.

Tuck did exactly what its rules text said. Arguing that theft and tree effects are materially different is groundless. The effects are marginally playable without the commander interaction at best. Tuck has proven to be largely trash without the effect on commanders and so would most theft and tree effects.

Drawing back into it or tutoring for a tucked commander is functionally indistinct from finding a removal spell - it depends on chance and the cards in your deck and your colors making effects available. A matter of degree perhaps.

Cards work certain way and we tailor rules to interact with them in a way that is fun for people.

I do agree that the naive interpretation of the proposed fix is that it is highly problematic in many ways but I think the goal is great and if we agreed it was desirable we could find a good rules fix. Poking at the rule wording is a red herring in my opinion.

[Maluko]

I believe I've said in another thread that my ideal solution was for rule 7 to be written as:

At the start of each player's turn, if any commanders that player owns are not on the battlefield, that player may put those commanders from their current zone into the command zone. If any of those commanders was put into the command zone from the player's library, that player shuffles it.

This rule would solve two issues with the current system:

• It would prevent abuse of commander casts (e.g. Food Chain combo);
• It would prevent accidental feels-bad moments when players let their commander go to a zone where they were expecting to retrieve it later but then don't (e.g. a commander was Memory Lapsed, put on top, but then the library was shuffled because of an effect).

I'm on the side of theft and treeing not being a problem. But maybe this is because I've experienced the feels-bad moments that occurred during the times when tuck was legal. I believe that, while theft and treeing can still create feels-bad moments, they are a good compromise between the interaction you place in your deck and the dependency you put in your commander when deckbuilding. Tuck also had the problem of incentivizing tutoring in case your commander ended up shuffled in your library. Theft and treeing can be solved with removal cards that every deck already runs naturally. There's also Homeward Path and Gruul Charm for those who really dislike theft

[onering]

I'll add that most theft and treeing also gets swept up as collateral damage to things that happen during the course of a normal game of commander, like board wipes or combat. The few that don't see more play though.