[MCD] Wishes

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BeneTleilax
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Post by BeneTleilax » 2 years ago

onering wrote:
2 years ago
My main objection to "swishing" is that it could be annoying if a person makes up a bunch of wishboards to switch in and out depending on opponents.
I do not think people will do this. I do think we'll see swishboards used to share a staple between decks, even if it's suboptimal. People already swap out such cards between decks before a game, and that's even more high-effort. In fact, the only times I've seen people "board in" cards between games, it's been shifting the same Tundra or what-have-you between five decks. While spending a wish to get your staple might be slightly worse to having it in your deck, it makes up for it in part with flexibility. The way I see it, how you share a card between decks is already one of the standard arguments in EDH metas, and wishboards will further complicate that.

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duducrash
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Post by duducrash » 2 years ago

Jemolk wrote:
2 years ago
@pokken -- I don't see the danger you're worried about here, frankly. Delver of Secrets is a crazy good card in Legacy. In commander? Meh. Monastery Mentor is absolutely ludicrously busted to hell and back in Vintage. In a more battlecruiser-style commander meta? Pretty weak, actually. Cards depend pretty heavily on their environments to determine whether or not they're good. Burning Wish is very strong in Legacy, yes. That doesn't mean it would be overwhelming in commander, though.

Lowkey off topic but Monastery Mentor rocks.

-

If you are looking for answers, even 3 slots might be too much. Idk, RIP, Aura Shards and The Immortal Sun . Idk. Why run any speciric hate card that you would if you can run a wish and have 3 answers. Every deck would run. The top ones

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DirkGently
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Post by DirkGently » 2 years ago

onering wrote:
2 years ago
Dirk, when your method is insulting, expect to be insulted. It's astonishing to me that you feel like your the victim here. Getting aggressive like you do pisses people off, and I'm not afraid to hurt your feelings by calling you out on it. I'm clearly not the only person who feels that way, so assess your behavior or keep earning the insult. We shouldn't be falling to this low level of discourse, but that's what happens when your argument style is, at best, insufferably smug. You want people to engage with your arguments like gentlemen, right after accusing them of fear mongering, telling them their experiences are irrelevant, and belittling them (hurr durr have you played this format, this totally isn't an insult I'm both super smart and super polite durr). "Oh, I just said your ideas were stupid, not you, how dare you get mad I'm the victim!" %$#%$#% dude, nobody buys that %$#%. And you do it all the time. I usually let it go, but this time it stuck in my craw.

I'd respond to the points you made in your most recent post, some of which are good and some of which aren't, but as you clearly want to continue to assert your behavior is totally acceptable while playing the victim, I have no interest in treating your mind ideas with respect while you can't muster the same for myself or others. You want to be taken seriously and treated with respect, don't belittle people's ideas or experiences because they don't align with your own, and don't complain about being attacked when you throw the first punch.
In criticizing someone's arguments, it's not possible to avoid some degree of criticism of that person - that argument is a thought that came out of their head. If I say "this argument is bad", the most banal opposition imaginable, if taken personally it translates to "you had a bad thought". That's a necessary consequence of talking through opposing viewpoints.

Calling someone a dick isn't. I don't expect anyone to be perfectly polite - lord knows I'm not - but I do expect them not to make personal attacks. And before you go equating my "are you sure you've played this format" quip - in context that was obviously not literal. No one reading that thinks "he actually believes onering has never played commander before". It's obviously a criticism that I think the particular concern you voiced doesn't match with the reality of playing the format.

Someone reading your post would very reasonable conclude that you actually think I'm a dick, because evidently you do.

The feeling isn't mutual. I'm still happy to talk with you so long as we stick to critiquing ideas. If you can't do that, though, then I'm done. I enjoy a spirited debate, and I encourage you to attack my bad ideas as harshly as you like, but I don't have any interest in trading insults. It stresses me out and it's not fun.
BeneTleilax wrote:
2 years ago
Comp rules aren't super clear, and specify a 15 card sideboard and 4-of card limit. Those would need to be remade for EDH. They're also very tournament-based, so most of the other relevant ones (like deck restriction interactions) are phrased in terms of the order in which you set things aside before shuffling, which isn't particularly new or casual player friendly. Also, the companion vs. general thing is counterintuitive, as both are card-contingent deckbuilding restrictions. That could be remedied by setting companions to also effect the wishboard, but again, would require another ruling/clarification. That is absolutely the sort of confusion that leads to casual players accusing each other of lying and cheating.
I meant piggybacking insofar as is possible to keep them conceptually similar. Limiting to 3 (or whatever number) would require clarification etc. Although thinking about it more, the different use cases and particulars does make them different enough that it probably requires more clarification than I initially thought.

I'm not so sure about lying and cheating though. Which action do you think casual players are going to do that would be considered as such? Situations that might be counterintuitive like the companion example I think would be really rare, and probably more of a "hmm, maybe we should look up the rules to be sure" sorta thing than a "I shall stab you with a pencil for your crimes" sorta thing. I've generally seen people be pretty chill about accidental rules violations in commander.
I thought you didn't want wishboards to be limited to tech answers? That might be their strongest use-case, but once they're a thing, people will use them for whatever. Combo pieces, finishers, needlessly convoluted engines, a card they want to share between decks, etc.
I think many people will use wishboards for a wide variety of things, but the specific concern I was addressing was that someone would make multiple sideboards for different configurations of opponents. That only really applies to using narrow answers, at least I would think. I.e. in my previous Wort example, idk why you'd change your proactive wishboard based on which decks your opponents were playing.

And if someone is going to that much trouble (which would be kind of a lot of trouble - you'd need to figure out the counters to their decks which need to be hittable with your wish, and then put them into combinations based on covering the most different permutations of players, and that's all assuming everyone only has one deck which isn't that common in my experience) I think it's pretty unlikely that they don't know they're cheating, or at least abusing the spirit of the rules.
I've seen people pretty embedded in a local EDH meta who don't know how anything beyond EDH and limited works.
Limited also has sideboards, and wishes (and learn) can only hit cards in those sideboards.
I know this because I had whole conversation with one of them about why Flusterstorm was worth money.
I think that's way more arcane knowledge than how a sideboard works. I don't know hardly anything about the best decks in modern, standard, legacy, vintage, pioneer, or whatever else and have been surprised by the price of cards that are popular in those formats.
Very online EDH players know how other formats work, but we're also disproportionately players who bailed out of older formats. A fair number of folks came over from 60-card casual when the format was small, and all all the knowledge they've since acquired is pretty localized to EDH. Those are, often as not, the ones setting meta norms from "above" or a place of social authority/experience, I've found. The newer folks, after EDH blew up, have increasingly only *ever* played EDH, or only EDH and draft/sealed.

A lot of those formats are legitimately dying, and with them their bases of expertise. I don't think my local store has had any 60-card Constructed events in years. That, or they're becoming increasingly siloed, where Standard/Modern players just aren't interacting with EDH players that often, and so aren't exchanging "common" knowledge about their respective formats.
There will probably be a small percentage of players who do need the whole concept of a sideboard explained, and a significantly larger number who need information about the specifics (i.e. in how they differ from sideboards in other formats), but that seems like a temporary growing pain to me. Every other format uses boards already, outside of kitchen table, and they're probably breaking half the rules anyway (which is fine, y'know, let them enjoy their ignorance, I know I did when I played like that).

Even if somehow there's someone who is plugged in enough to figure out all the hard counters, and smart enough do the permutation math, and enfranchised enough to buy multiple copies of all the cards they need to put the permutations together, but ignorant enough to not know how sideboards are supposed to work on a fairly basic level...I mean, they'll figure it out pretty quickly when people notice them picking through a deck box of pre-configured sideboards and call them out. Unless they're doing it secretly to avoid detection, in which case they know they're cheating, and I don't think fretting about cheaters is something worth worrying about in a casual format.

@duducrash you can just run the immortal sun and aura shards in your mainboard, they're pretty damn good cards. Then you can just hit them with your tutors, of which much more exist. RIP is a bit more niche, but I think mostly because most decks themselves have a degree of gy interaction that they'd rather not screw up. Scavenger Grounds on the other hand is imminently mainboardable even in decks that do use the gy from time to time.

If any combination of 3 cards are strong answers to most decks in the format, those cards are probably just good cards that probably don't need to be wished.

I agree about the MM smear through. That card is pretty sick in commander too.
Perm Decks
Phelddagrif - Kaervek - Golos - Zirilan

Flux Decks
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
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Dunharrow
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Post by Dunharrow » 2 years ago

I will chime in here and say the following:
Dirk, I have several times been super frustrated by our discussions. You are very dismissive of any argument you disagree with. It's not a reason to straight-up insult you, but I am happy that people are calling you out on it. A discussion only works if you are willing to consider the value of the other person's perspective. I do not think you make enough effort to consider other positions. It makes it frustrating to discuss with you and I have personally made an effort to avoid conversations like that. You are not the only one in this forum, though. I think we can all be a little more empathetic. I will also say that sarcasm can sound insulting, even if you don't intend to be insulting.

Onering, I will say that I agree with some of what you said, but you can be more polite in calling someone a d*ck. Be more constructive with your criticism. Your post will likely get this whole thread locked again.
if the responses to your posts are frustrating, take a hike. I do the same. I try to avoid the rules forum because it gets under my skin. I love these discussions but hate the way people argue.
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BeneTleilax
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Post by BeneTleilax » 2 years ago

DirkGently wrote:
2 years ago
Situations that might be counterintuitive like the companion example I think would be really rare, and probably more of a "hmm, maybe we should look up the rules to be sure" sorta thing than a "I shall stab you with a pencil for your crimes" sorta thing. I've generally seen people be pretty chill about accidental rules violations in commander.
Any card that sets a deckbuilding restriction doesn't apply to the sideboard in comp rules, because of order of setting aside. Now, I think we're both in agreement that Color Identity should apply to wishboards, which would put it at odds with comp rules for everything else. The times I've seen rules debates get heated is when the "violator" is actually in the right and won't step down after being "corrected" but the explanation is complex and when someone apes something they've seen another player do legally, without understanding what made that legal and what they're doing illegal. Any disagreement between deckbuilding restrictions is going to cause both of those scenarios.
DirkGently wrote:
2 years ago
Even if somehow there's someone who is plugged in enough to figure out all the hard counters, and smart enough do the permutation math, and enfranchised enough to buy multiple copies of all the cards they need to put the permutations together, but ignorant enough to not know how sideboards are supposed to work on a fairly basic level.
That's not how meta-specific answers in casual metas work, in my experience. Also, casual metas tend to be inbred metas, so you have a lot of really weird hate. It's less "what are the most common strategies in my meta, how is my deck weak to them, how can I best exploit their weaknesses, how does this serve the general strategy of my deck, etc." and a lot more "Man, if Joe hadn't reanimated that Titanoth Rex, I totally would have won last game. Oh hey look, there's a Crypt Incursion in my box!"

There's also the "cult of the kitchen table" in EDH, where even the people slamming Chulane and The Great Henge imagine themselves as simple casuals playing a chill kitchen table game. I've also seen people get offended when someone's tried to draw a line between 75% and more casual play. "Casual" is often not only a descriptor of relative power level, but an identity marker both for those who are nostalgic for an earlier EDH and those who jumped ship after bad experiences in competitive constructed. Because of that, EDH is one of the few formats with a strong "upwards" flow of norms, from very casual to barely-not-cEDH. That's reinforced by the RC deliberately focusing on kitchen table play in their rulings and communications.

Because of the second factor, if you want to convince the RC, a solution that largely dismisses kitchen table play won't hold much water. The one notable exception, the Flash ban, only happened because the cEDH people were able to get a sizeable coalition of less-invested players on their side, and it was a much smaller change (a single card ban, rather than a rules change). Even then, it's still one of the most contentious recent updates to the rules.

onering
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Post by onering » 2 years ago

Dunharrow wrote:
2 years ago
I will chime in here and say the following:
Dirk, I have several times been super frustrated by our discussions. You are very dismissive of any argument you disagree with. It's not a reason to straight-up insult you, but I am happy that people are calling you out on it. A discussion only works if you are willing to consider the value of the other person's perspective. I do not think you make enough effort to consider other positions. It makes it frustrating to discuss with you and I have personally made an effort to avoid conversations like that. You are not the only one in this forum, though. I think we can all be a little more empathetic. I will also say that sarcasm can sound insulting, even if you don't intend to be insulting.

Onering, I will say that I agree with some of what you said, but you can be more polite in calling someone a d*ck. Be more constructive with your criticism. Your post will likely get this whole thread locked again.
if the responses to your posts are frustrating, take a hike. I do the same. I try to avoid the rules forum because it gets under my skin. I love these discussions but hate the way people argue.

Yeah, I could have been more polite, but I've had enough of it. It's not like I haven't constructively criticized him over this before. At some point, people need to be confronted with their %$#%$#% in blunt terms. That he still refuses to acknowledge he was out of line, and indeed defends it by trying to draw a meaningless distinction between belittling and mocking what a poster says and belittling and mocking that person in order to smugly claim the moral high ground just reinforces my choice of words.

But %$#% it, I'll walk it back. Dirk, maybe you aren't a dick, but you've been acting like one. You've made a lot of dickish comments. Stop that %$#%.

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DirkGently
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Post by DirkGently » 2 years ago

BeneTleilax wrote:
2 years ago
Any card that sets a deckbuilding restriction doesn't apply to the sideboard in comp rules, because of order of setting aside. Now, I think we're both in agreement that Color Identity should apply to wishboards, which would put it at odds with comp rules for everything else. The times I've seen rules debates get heated is when the "violator" is actually in the right and won't step down after being "corrected" but the explanation is complex and when someone apes something they've seen another player do legally, without understanding what made that legal and what they're doing illegal. Any disagreement between deckbuilding restrictions is going to cause both of those scenarios.
It is a bit more complex than I initially thought, so having a clear rule is probably necessary. Something like "each deck may have a 'wishboard' of 3 additional cards that are considered 'outside the game' for cards that reference that zone. You can only use cards that could be included in your deck." I guess that doesn't clarify the companion issue, but that seems rare enough that going into the comp rules in reasonable?
That's not how meta-specific answers in casual metas work, in my experience. Also, casual metas tend to be inbred metas, so you have a lot of really weird hate. It's less "what are the most common strategies in my meta, how is my deck weak to them, how can I best exploit their weaknesses, how does this serve the general strategy of my deck, etc." and a lot more "Man, if Joe hadn't reanimated that Titanoth Rex, I totally would have won last game. Oh hey look, there's a Crypt Incursion in my box!"

There's also the "cult of the kitchen table" in EDH, where even the people slamming Chulane and The Great Henge imagine themselves as simple casuals playing a chill kitchen table game. I've also seen people get offended when someone's tried to draw a line between 75% and more casual play. "Casual" is often not only a descriptor of relative power level, but an identity marker both for those who are nostalgic for an earlier EDH and those who jumped ship after bad experiences in competitive constructed. Because of that, EDH is one of the few formats with a strong "upwards" flow of norms, from very casual to barely-not-cEDH. That's reinforced by the RC deliberately focusing on kitchen table play in their rulings and communications.
Maybe I've lost the thread of what we're talking about. I thought we were talking about some hypothetical player who ignorantly but non-maliciously tries to pull of the multiple sideboards "trick"? I would think in a casual inbred meta there wouldn't be any need to swap cards around since you're playing the same people every time. Or maybe you mean to quote a different part of the discussion? I remember mentioning inbred metas but I'm not sure how it relates to this argument.
Because of the second factor, if you want to convince the RC, a solution that largely dismisses kitchen table play won't hold much water. The one notable exception, the Flash ban, only happened because the cEDH people were able to get a sizeable coalition of less-invested players on their side, and it was a much smaller change (a single card ban, rather than a rules change). Even then, it's still one of the most contentious recent updates to the rules.
When I mentioned kitchen table, I meant 60-card-casual, as being the only significant format (besides commander) that doesn't use sideboards (I think). Not talking about kitchen table commander. I'm not trying to dismiss kitchen table commander, only point out that anyone who has interacted with practically any other format (including limited) should have at least a rudimentary understanding of how sideboards work, i.e. you can't just switch them around all the time. And so I think the number of players who would think such a practice was acceptable, even right when the rule was implemented, would probably be very low, and even lower once people get used to it.

Although it does make me wonder if there are any modern/standard/etc players who try to min-max by tailoring their sideboard to whoever came to FNM that night. "oops, none of the affinity players came, guess I'll replace this artifact hate with more tron hate" or something like that. I'm sure someone somewhere has. In that circumstance, though, people are more likely to only have one deck they play, and it'd be easier to see who you're going to play before sitting down, so I imagine you'd have an easier time concealing your shenanigans. Plus there's actually something on the line, so it's at least 5% less pathetic.
Perm Decks
Phelddagrif - Kaervek - Golos - Zirilan

Flux Decks
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
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pokken
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Post by pokken » 2 years ago

onering wrote:
2 years ago
My main objection to "swishing" is that it could be annoying if a person makes up a bunch of wishboards to switch in and out depending on opponents. Tying the wishboard to the deck would, I think, cut down on it and make it less obnoxious, basically it would help keep the situation the way it is now, where the people who currently switch out cards would do so but you wouldn't see it expand or become completely obnoxious with some dude bringing 4-5 specialized wishboards. These are solvable concerns.
I just don't see how you can "tie the wishboard to the deck" in commander. We don't register our decks or anything. I can make 30 7 card wishboards or even just construct the wishboard at game time.

My point about swishboarding as a consequence is that:

Because of the rules of commander as a best-of-one non-registered format, wishboards have far more flexibility per-slot than in tournament magic, therefore each slot is far more powerful than it would otherwise be.

When I go to play a tournament my sideboard is the same every game, all 5, 9, 15 games, whatever. If I go to the game store, my wishboard can get tweaked literally every game. Is it poor sportsmanship? Maybe? But it's explicitly allowed because each game is a separate thing. There is no way to make a rule from game to game in commander - for the same reason people can change their commander between games (I used to have a deck that had alternate commanders to modify the power level, and this is perfectly allowable).

Do I think most people will just have static wishboards per deck? I think that the lower the number of cards in a wishboard the more likely they get lumped in with the deck -- start talking about a 15 card wishboard, no one is going to want to maintain those for each deck.

And I want to reiterate that the simplest way to prevent cheating/poor sportsmanship is to make wishboards live in the command zone and be face up so everyone knows what they're getting into :P Without that rule, I remain 100% anti-wishes in any form even 3 cards. There should not even be the possibility of the sort of passive cheating of "oh, let me go get my wishboard out of my other box. Surprise I have the card I need!"
Last edited by pokken 2 years ago, edited 1 time in total.

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Post by benjameenbear » 2 years ago

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Post by BeneTleilax » 2 years ago

DirkGently wrote:
2 years ago
Maybe I've lost the thread of what we're talking about. I thought we were talking about some hypothetical player who ignorantly but non-maliciously tries to pull of the multiple sideboards "trick"?
The original post I was responding to was this:
DirkGently wrote:
2 years ago
onering wrote:
2 years ago
There are lots of smaller LGSes where you can cover all of your bases with a couple 7 card sideboards because there are only like 12 regulars and each only has 1 or 2 decks you'd want to sideboard something against that this scenario will happen enough for the RC to hear from people pissed about it.
Does anyone play in a meta where this is true? I've played in a lot of places, and one common factor I've seen is that most people who have strong decks have a lot of decks, though you only need 2 to put a major dent in this plan.
I think that casual metas below a certain size are prone to strategic inbreeding, and wishboards will push more metas below that threshold by increasing the viability of narrow answers. I don't have experience with casual players running wishboards, because they aren't legal yet. I do have experience with casual players running narrow hate cards, which seemed the most relevant example. The point I see is that "running specific hate for your meta" does not entail "knowing the optimal answers and being plugged in enough to understand other format norms".

In my answer to onering, I explained that the core support, in both online and offline debates, for swapping wishboards is likely going to come from people sharing a staple between decks. Once that is accepted, strategic swapping will move in under its cover. I've already seen this with the proxying, where someone will get approval to run proxies of a card they own to share it between decks, which then normalizes proxies of all kinds.

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Post by onering » 2 years ago

pokken wrote:
2 years ago
onering wrote:
2 years ago
My main objection to "swishing" is that it could be annoying if a person makes up a bunch of wishboards to switch in and out depending on opponents. Tying the wishboard to the deck would, I think, cut down on it and make it less obnoxious, basically it would help keep the situation the way it is now, where the people who currently switch out cards would do so but you wouldn't see it expand or become completely obnoxious with some dude bringing 4-5 specialized wishboards. These are solvable concerns.
I just don't see how you can "tie the wishboard to the deck" in commander. We don't register our decks or anything. I can make 30 7 card wishboards or even just construct the wishboard at game time.

My point about swishboarding as a consequence is that:

Because of the rules of commander as a best-of-one non-registered format, wishboards have far more flexibility per-slot than in tournament magic, therefore each slot is far more powerful than it would otherwise be.

When I go to play a tournament my sideboard is the same every game, all 5, 9, 15 games, whatever. If I go to the game store, my wishboard can get tweaked literally every game. Is it poor sportsmanship? Maybe? But it's explicitly allowed because each game is a separate thing. There is no way to make a rule from game to game in commander - for the same reason people can change their commander between games (I used to have a deck that had alternate commanders to modify the power level, and this is perfectly allowable).

Do I think most people will just have static wishboards per deck? I think that the lower the number of cards in a wishboard the more likely they get lumped in with the deck -- start talking about a 15 card wishboard, no one is going to want to maintain those for each deck.

And I want to reiterate that the simplest way to prevent cheating/poor sportsmanship is to make wishboards live in the command zone and be face up so everyone knows what they're getting into :P Without that rule, I remain 100% anti-wishes in any form even 3 cards. There should not even be the possibility of the sort of passive cheating of "oh, let me go get my wishboard out of my other box. Surprise I have the card I need!"
I think small sized boards make it less effective to switch because no matter what you aren't countering every strategy at the table with a board. The convenience of swapping out single cards in a wish board means it would probably happen a little more often just due to it being more convenient compared to swapping out cards in the 99. Your suggestion that the wish board cards are revealed as part of the deck is a good one, and what I was thinking of when I said tie the wish boards to the deck. I don't think having them live in the CZ is a good idea though, since I don't think wishes should be able to grab a commander or companion. If you had the wishboard live in the CZ it definitionally would not be outside the game, so wishes would have to have their function changed from grabbing stuff from outside the game to grabbing stuff from the CZ, and differentiating between wishboard cards in the CZ and other cards doesn't seem like it can be done in an intuitive way. It would be less complicated to simply define the wish board as being tied to the deck and needing to follow all rules of deck construction, and to be revealed at all times.

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Post by Jemolk » 2 years ago

Been off and distracted by other things for a while, so to address a bunch of the replies to my last post at once --

As Dirk pointed out, things like The Immortal Sun and Aura Shards are absolutely maindeckable, and the only reason I don't run Rest in Peace is because I don't want to get burned by it myself. I've absolutely seen people running Collector Ouphe as well. Good card, very nasty thing to throw in an enchantress deck that doesn't have any artifacts. Not unlike Titania's Song in that regard. All of them are eminently removable, provided you're not too all-in, and I think the consideration this requires of people for interaction is a good thing.

If your ETB-focused deck can't work around Torpor Orb, and I find your ETB deck annoying to play against, it's not that I'd pull a Torpor Orb out of an arbitrary wishboard. No, I'll just play Phage, which runs Torpor Orb for its own benefit. Also a fun type of deck to build and play. I built it right around the time Yarok was becoming a big thing after it was printed, actually, specifically so that I'd have options if I got tired of dealing with ETB nonsense. And my experience has been that this need to be at least theoretically able to interact outside of the core synergy of the deck, of which this is one example, has offered a bit of a limit to the degree to which people can just jam their decks full of absurd value engines. If wishboards make that more common, that sounds like an advantage to me -- a check on the level the strongest value engines and strategies are allowed to reach unopposed. It's still going to be rarer that I draw a Golden Wish for a hate card than that you draw pieces of the main core engine of your deck, and you can still use that core engine to find answers -- it just gives an opportunity to fight back without dedicated maindeck space to answers for every possible engine.

It's sort of like, to my mind, how the existence of Force of Will in Legacy and Vintage force the combo decks to slow down enough to be possible to deal with by means other than Force of Will, because if they don't, they just auto-lose a crapton of matchups. If we're worried about Flashfires and friends, meanwhile, I'd have to ask why, since I think far more than mere narrowness keeps those from being played. In fact, I'd say narrowness is the least of the reasons why those are avoided, with trying to avoid being a jerk being the largest.

I'm not sure I understand the objections fully, to be honest, given how clear a counterpoint all this seems to me. Makes me wonder if I'm just straight-up missing something crucial. Though I suppose it's also possible our perspectives are simply that irreconcilable.

Yet again, I have to say -- while these various concerns may not actually be hyperbole, they feel very much like hyperbole to me, and I haven't yet seen a justification of why these things not only could become problems, but definitively would. Maybe you all think the risk is enough reason to avoid it, but if so, I'd appreciate if that more grounded point were the explicit argument, rather than the more difficult-to-defend version that I've been seeing.
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Post by Dunharrow » 2 years ago

Jemolk wrote:
2 years ago
Been off and distracted by other things for a while, so to address a bunch of the replies to my last post at once --

As Dirk pointed out, things like The Immortal Sun and Aura Shards are absolutely maindeckable, and the only reason I don't run Rest in Peace is because I don't want to get burned by it myself. I've absolutely seen people running Collector Ouphe as well. Good card, very nasty thing to throw in an enchantress deck that doesn't have any artifacts. Not unlike Titania's Song in that regard. All of them are eminently removable, provided you're not too all-in, and I think the consideration this requires of people for interaction is a good thing.

If your ETB-focused deck can't work around Torpor Orb, and I find your ETB deck annoying to play against, it's not that I'd pull a Torpor Orb out of an arbitrary wishboard. No, I'll just play Phage, which runs Torpor Orb for its own benefit. Also a fun type of deck to build and play. I built it right around the time Yarok was becoming a big thing after it was printed, actually, specifically so that I'd have options if I got tired of dealing with ETB nonsense. And my experience has been that this need to be at least theoretically able to interact outside of the core synergy of the deck, of which this is one example, has offered a bit of a limit to the degree to which people can just jam their decks full of absurd value engines. If wishboards make that more common, that sounds like an advantage to me -- a check on the level the strongest value engines and strategies are allowed to reach unopposed. It's still going to be rarer that I draw a Golden Wish for a hate card than that you draw pieces of the main core engine of your deck, and you can still use that core engine to find answers -- it just gives an opportunity to fight back without dedicated maindeck space to answers for every possible engine.

It's sort of like, to my mind, how the existence of Force of Will in Legacy and Vintage force the combo decks to slow down enough to be possible to deal with by means other than Force of Will, because if they don't, they just auto-lose a crapton of matchups. If we're worried about Flashfires and friends, meanwhile, I'd have to ask why, since I think far more than mere narrowness keeps those from being played. In fact, I'd say narrowness is the least of the reasons why those are avoided, with trying to avoid being a jerk being the largest.

I'm not sure I understand the objections fully, to be honest, given how clear a counterpoint all this seems to me. Makes me wonder if I'm just straight-up missing something crucial. Though I suppose it's also possible our perspectives are simply that irreconcilable.

Yet again, I have to say -- while these various concerns may not actually be hyperbole, they feel very much like hyperbole to me, and I haven't yet seen a justification of why these things not only could become problems, but definitively would. Maybe you all think the risk is enough reason to avoid it, but if so, I'd appreciate if that more grounded point were the explicit argument, rather than the more difficult-to-defend version that I've been seeing.
There have been many arguments. Regarding the points you have made - yes, any deck can play rest in peace, but as you mention many of us leave it out of the deck because it hits our graveyards too and maybe you want to run Eternal Witness.
Or maybe my deck is particularly bad against enchantress decks. I don't want Back to Nature in my main because it is usually a dead card.
Wishes do two things:
1. Take dead cards out of your deck
2. Give you answers to things you would not normally maindeck an answer to.

This creates a situation where it is kinda incorrect to play narrow cards that could be dead draws. Just make a good wish board with a few hate cards, a card draw spell and a threat, and you are always going to be happy to draw that wish.
And next thing you know, wishes are basically auto-includes.

Sure, people could put Flashfires in their wishboard. I don't think it's the main concern but definitely a concern. Some people will play Wish and put Ruination, Flashfires and Boil in the board. And why not Vandalblast and Insurrection. 4 hate cards and a win condition, all I need is a card draw effect and I am pretty solid.
This is actually more likely what would happen with toolbox decks. You have a ton of narrow cards you can tutor in a pinch. So what do you do with your wishboard? You put narrow cards that are too narrow to be in the maindeck.
Obviously not fun, but if people are playing stax regularly in EDH I don't think this is a stretch of the imagination.

Anyway, that seemed to be the argument you were struggling to understand and I hope I have made it clearer to you.
There are other arguments, of course.
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Post by DirkGently » 2 years ago

Dunharrow wrote:
2 years ago
There have been many arguments. Regarding the points you have made - yes, any deck can play rest in peace, but as you mention many of us leave it out of the deck because it hits our graveyards too and maybe you want to run Eternal Witness.
Or maybe my deck is particularly bad against enchantress decks. I don't want Back to Nature in my main because it is usually a dead card.
I wouldn't run back to nature, but I'd happily run Farewell or Austere Command or...that other 5cmc one I forget...or Bane of Progress, or whatever. Back to nature's main advantage compared to those is that it's very efficient. But if you're wishing for it, it's a lot less efficient.
Wishes do two things:
1. Take dead cards out of your deck
well, those cards were probably never in your deck. I guess you can say it does either 1 or 2, but I think 1 will not be common. And even if that does happen, it seems fine? Like in the most egregious example, if they were running flashfires in the main and now they have it in their wish pile...either way they're running flashfires. Their deck is overall better now but their deck strength wasn't the problem imo.
2. Give you answers to things you would not normally maindeck an answer to.
That's true but I think it's okay, except in the case of answers that I don't think many people will actually run (and which should be banned) i.e. flashfires.

And let's not forget all the non-answer uses for wishes. I really think my wort example was pretty good and I'm a bit sad no one has engaged with it at all.
This creates a situation where it is kinda incorrect to play narrow cards that could be dead draws.
That's always been true, though.
Just make a good wish board with a few hate cards, a card draw spell and a threat, and you are always going to be happy to draw that wish.
Probably not when you're developing. You're trading efficiency for flexibility, so when efficiency is paramount, it's going to be significantly worse than a card that does something directly. As anyone who's be forced to demonic tutor for a land can testify.

Also we're kind of assuming living/burning wish, but most wishes cost 3-4 which is REALLY inefficient. And living/burning wish are (with the exception of the obnoxious and bannable land hate) not able to pull super nasty counters, as those are mostly artifacts and enchantments. Like I think the burning → answer sequence is pretty close to just casting Farewell in most cases.
And next thing you know, wishes are basically auto-includes.
Aside from burning/living which are type restricted (and I guess glittering but that's pretty color restrictive) the wishes are all 3+ cmc I think, which makes them comparable to Grim Tutor, which has no type restrictions yet is only in 7% of applicable decks, and diabolic tutor up to 11% presumably because it's cheap as dirt. Especially with only 3 targets, I would definitely argue that the greater flexibility to use high-impact but likely-dead cards via a wish is outweighed pretty significantly by the much greater number of targets a tutor can get. Not to mention a tutor hitting cards good enough to be in your deck - whatever you fallback wincon in your wishboard is, it's not as good as the one in your deck.

I guess it depends by what you mean by "auto-includes" but if you mean "most people will want to include it" I think the evidence indicates that this is very unlikely.
Sure, people could put Flashfires in their wishboard. I don't think it's the main concern but definitely a concern. Some people will play Wish and put Ruination, Flashfires and Boil in the board. And why not Vandalblast and Insurrection. 4 hate cards and a win condition, all I need is a card draw effect and I am pretty solid.
I think we should ban all those MLD cards, regardless of what we do with wishes. But I think the main argument against any of them is that people tend not to play them because they violate the social contract, not because they're dead (ruination is rarely dead tbh, unless you are running lots of nonbasics yourself in which case it's still bad in the wishboard).
This is actually more likely what would happen with toolbox decks. You have a ton of narrow cards you can tutor in a pinch. So what do you do with your wishboard? You put narrow cards that are too narrow to be in the maindeck.
What sort of deck do you consider a toolbox? A deck with a lot of tutors and narrow answers? I don't think I've ever seen a deck that operates in that way irl. Anyway with only 3 cards, extremely narrow cards mean you're very very likely to end up with a dead wish. Refer back to my long list of archetypes.
Obviously not fun, but if people are playing stax regularly in EDH I don't think this is a stretch of the imagination.
The MLD isn't fun because MLD isn't fun and should be banned, even though the vast majority won't use it out because of social pressure. The other stuff I think is fine. Vandalblast is very mainboardable anyway. It's the fifth most played red card in the format.
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Post by onering » 2 years ago

Jemolk: Basically what Dunharrow said. I'll elaborate that the likelihood of these things actually becoming problems is lessened by using wishboards instead of allowing open ended wishing, and that likelihood is further reduced the smaller the wishboard is and if the wishboard is explicitly tied to a deck rather than wishboards being something that its acceptable to switch out at will.

The last part, the recent discussion about 'swishing,' is really more about setting expectations: if the wishboard is considered the equivalent of the commander or companion, part of the deck but not included in the 99, then that sets an expectation that you should build the wishboard for the deck and use it with the deck, while if wishboards are considered separate from decks it can create the expectation that, so long as the cards are legal, its socially acceptable to just switch wishboards depending on what people are playing. How it differs from the status quo where people can switch cards out of decks but its not commonly done is that its been established that switching out cards specifically to counter someone's deck for the game isn't socially acceptable. Its intuitive that you build your deck before the game, so last minute switching cards intuitively feels cheap to a lot of people, so even if they could swap out a couple artifact hate cards for enchantment hate cards when they see they'll be playing against an enchantress deck and not artifact decks most people won't do it because they'd feel like they're being cheap. If you have a wishboard with narrow answers, then you've already taken a step towards in the moment meta gaming, you have a wishboard specifically so you can counter specific strategies depending on what you face. Rather than having to decided whether to use your main deck slot for, say, artifact hate or enchantment hate, you stick in a wish in that slot and run both in the wishboard, plus gy hate and/or etb hate and/or whatever else. Since countering your opponents strategies with a game time decision, rather than during deckbuilding, is the purpose of the wish board, swapping it out intuitively feels more like you're just playing the mechanic correctly by making sure you have the right cards for the matchup, as opposed to feeling cheap. Tying the formation of the wishboard to the deckbuilding process creates the norm that wishboards aren't meant to be switched out as a game time meta play, which aligns it with the norm around switching cards in the 99. Once again, its something that's intended to make the risks of allowing wishing not actually play out in practice.

In short, having people add a few maindeckable hate cards to a wishboard for a deck so they can trade mana efficiency for flexibility and freeing up deck slots is probably not going to be a problem. The key is crafting the wish rule to ensure that is the "worst" thing that wishes will practically bring to the format. By having to make choices based on limited space in the wishboard, players who want to meta will find it feasible to only include hate cards to target strategies that actually need to be targeted in their meta, while if the wishboard is too big they'll do that and then still have room even after adding a generically good card or two, at which point why not throw in some less relevant hate just in case, and that's when wishing's ability to cause problems increases to the point where its relevant.

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Post by Legend » 2 years ago

I agree with you about the land destroyers being the real problem, but better safe than sorry and nobody's playing the other ones anyways so they won't be missed.
DirkGently wrote:
2 years ago
. . . taking the stance "we should legalize wishes! btw we're gonna need to ban this massive list of cards," seems like a weak bargaining position, to say the least.
I think that was true back when color-hosing and WISHING were on equal footing, but Wizards hasn't designed a color-hoser in 20 years, and color-hosers go against the spirit of casual play. Surely it isn't unreasonable to ban a finite number of actually problematic cards rather than keep an ever-growing list of WISHES behind the dam of a rule. There's already 50ish cards (and counting) with an effect ruled to not function in Commander so that 25 of the most unfair, unfun cards in the history of the game can stay off a ban list. It makes no sense. All that to say, I think it used to be a weak position but has become a strong position.

A couple of WISHES may need to be banned too, and that's fine. Not all WISHES are created equal. I think we, along with most people, agree that each WISH should be subject to the same criteria for banning as all other cards and that whatever issue Karn, the Great Creator might pose is no reason for Research // Development or Study Break to not function.

EDIT: Speaking to WISHBOARDS, Commander already has them. They contain three Dungeons and up to one card with companion. (According to the comprehensives, all players are considered to always have all dungeons.)
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Post by onering » 2 years ago

Legend, as has been explained to you multiple times, Dungeons don't function as real cards you can grab, but as more complicated emblems, and companions reside in the command zone in commander. And with dungeons specifically, the fact that you don't actually need a dungeon card to use Venture and the dungeon mechanic in sanctioned tournament play is all the proof needed that dungeons aren't cards. If a judge can look at someone's poorly drawn dungeon scrawled on a napkin and say "its legit", then dungeons aren't cards.

At least when you mention companions you touch on a way that the RC could allow wishes to function without actually creating wishboards, by specifying that you can have a number of cards start the game in the command zone and count as outside the game for the purposes of wish effects and similar. That seems a lot clunkier than actually making wishboards, since it would errata wishes, learn, and similar effects to refer to cards in the command zone in commander and either allow them to grab companions and commanders or specify that they can't. I'd much prefer they just create a wish board rule from scratch that is designed to mitigate concerns about wishing while accommodating the effect.

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Post by DirkGently » 2 years ago

Legend wrote:
2 years ago
I think that was true back when color-hosing and WISHING were on equal footing, but Wizards hasn't designed a color-hoser in 20 years, and color-hosers go against the spirit of casual play. Surely it isn't unreasonable to ban a finite number of actually problematic cards rather than keep an ever-growing list of WISHES behind the dam of a rule. There's already 50ish cards (and counting) with an effect ruled to not function in Commander so that 25 of the most unfair, unfun cards in the history of the game can stay off a ban list. It makes no sense. All that to say, I think it used to be a weak position but has become a strong position.
There are 2 main problems.

1) Saying "we should preemptively ban all these cards because they might become problematic with wishes" implies that wishes pose a lot of danger to legalize. If the list of dangerous cards is so long, who's to say that some weren't missed?

2) The bigger the shakeup, the harder to overcome inertia. Sure, most of these cards aren't being used by hardly anyone, but optically it's a big change. "Commander bans 30 cards" is going to get a lot of attention, and of course a lot of people will be saying "wait, they banned flashfires but not [actually played card]? wtf?" It just makes it seem like a much bigger deal, which makes it harder to convince anyone to do it.

I think the smart approach would be to go with the 3-wish rule, do it face-up if you really want to play it safe, and just keep an eye on color hate to see how it plays out before going ballistic with the banhammer. I think there's a very strong chance that actual usage of those cards won't become wildly different, because I think social contract is the primary thing preventing people from using MLD.

and yeah don't bother with the dungeons. Basically they're just really detailed reminder text, to my thinking.
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Post by pokken » 2 years ago

The more I think about it the more I'd welcome a wild west quarter of wishing. Just make it work as Legend intends for a quarter and see what it's like.

I used to be against that because I thought it'd be a slippery slope, but now I am ready for it to prove me ridiculously right :)

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Post by DirkGently » 2 years ago

Yeah....I don't want to trial-run unrestricted wishes because I think it very well might prove you right lol. Not as regards flashfires (though I'm sure those would become more popular, not sure if it'd be problematically popular) but as regards time monopolization, and potentially auto-include-ness.

Smart approach is to start safe and loosen up if things are going smoothly, not open the floodgates and hope it works out.
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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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pokken
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Post by pokken » 2 years ago

DirkGently wrote:
2 years ago
Yeah....I don't want to trial-run unrestricted wishes because I think it very well might prove you right lol. Not as regards flashfires (though I'm sure those would become more popular, not sure if it'd be problematically popular) but as regards time monopolization, and potentially auto-include-ness.
So this is a subtle distinction but the reason I stress out about flashfires et al is *because* many wishes will become de facto autoincludes if the wish pool is large enough (anywhere from say, 5 to infinity). At 3, i think only Living Wish and Burning Wish will see any play at all, and they will not be great. Probably the only problematic card in 3 wishes is Karn, the Great Creator (because Lattice combo is almost free there).

But with unlimited wishing I think it's virtually guaranteed that living, burning, wish, cunning, and mastermind's as well as karn will all see lots of play, and even Golden Wish would see *some* play.

Once Living Wish and a wishboard becomes the standard in green decks, you are flat out going to see hate cards show up in them if the wishboards are large enough, and so you have two things:

1) An additional very powerful tutor
2) Additional games influenced heavily by narrow hate cards

You don't really get one without the other because playing expensive wishes for narrow hate cards is whatever, go ahead and waste your mana when you could just play Austere Command for the same price. And it's rare because most people aren't going to play Golden Wish.

But when the wishes are good enough they're always there and you always have great options with them, it's going to be a regular thing that someone Living Wish's for Arcane Lighthouse and craps on your hexproof deck.

onering
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Post by onering » 2 years ago

I'm not worried about someone living wishing for Arcane Lighthouse. That, to me, is a fair use for wishes and an argument in their favor. That kind of counter play is good for the format. I'm worried more about the more extreme hate cards that are better used to just take someone out of the game rather than reign in a strategy. That's why Flashfires is a concern. Shattering Spree reigns in artifact decks, which can easily get out of hand and are probably going to be able to rebuild after having all their artifacts wiped. It simply slows them down, and is fine counter play. No artifact deck should fold to a Shattering Spree unless its perfectly timed and they really overextended.

Flashfires, OTOH, can just nuke a mono white player. So say your in a 4 person game, and Tammy is running mono white and Jake is running UW. Your other Burning Wish options aren't really relevant, but that Flashfires can just end Tammy and significantly hinder Jake, so its the correct play. That runs into the "Build casually, play competitively" adage the Sheldon holds as core to EDH. If you have access to it, you should play it. Unlimited wishing means you have access to it if you own it, so it becomes impossible to build casually around it. Every time you draw Burning Wish when Flashfires is the correct play, you have to actively hold back to avoid ruining the game.

There's a wide gulf between Arcane Lighthouse and Flashfires, and that gulf is populated with hate cards that range from totally fair and cool like Lighthouse to game ruining nonsense like Flashfires. The smaller the wishboard, the less likely that people will run the worst offenders. Smaller wishboards, when used for hate cards (rather than random stuff like making Fae of Wishes a value play), will put in hate cards to counter the most dominant strategies they expect. That's the ideal use for hate cards. The larger the wish board, the more room for less relevant hate cards, and eventually your able to start putting in things "just in case" and that's where the problem starts.

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tstorm823
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Post by tstorm823 » 2 years ago

onering wrote:
2 years ago
The larger the wish board, the more room for less relevant hate cards, and eventually your able to start putting in things "just in case" and that's where the problem starts.
I kind of disagree with this. If "build casually, play competitively" is a sufficient philosophy to limit problematic card usage, and I believe that it is, that would apply to wishboards just as much as maindecks. If you limited someone to even a 100 card wishboard, they would still have to make the active decision to put Winter Orb into that pile before they could wish for it, and people building casually would not do that, regardless of how big the limit is. If I'm not making the sort of deck that would maindeck Winter Orb, I equally would not put it in a wishboard. If, however, the limit does not exist, I personally own a Winter Orb, so I could wish for it just by virtue of having that binder with me. I don't think all the calculations on how big a wishboard should be are justified, I think the important thing is to make people decide what they personally want to play in a vacuum rather than calculate the most effective card in their collection for a specific set of circumstances.
Zedruu: "This deck is not only able to go crazy - it also needs to do so."

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pokken
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Post by pokken » 2 years ago

onering wrote:
2 years ago
I'm not worried about someone living wishing for Arcane Lighthouse. That, to me, is a fair use for wishes and an argument in their favor. That kind of counter play is good for the format.
I disagree, I think if you want to play Arcane Lighthouse you should have to suffer for it. It's fine to play it if hexproof is an issue in your meta. But put it in your deck and suffer the consequences. That's the point of commander's non-sideboarded design - if you want narrow hosers you have to draw them sometimes and not like it. With a sufficiently sized wishboard you are always going to be thrilled to see Living Wish - it ranges from slightly worse than Demonic Tutor to slightly better**, which is pretty darn great.

I would be fine if you could *only* get trash narrow hosers, but the fact that Living Wish represents a great bomb, land fixing, or getting a hate card is problematic to me wish wishboards up in the >5 range. You shouldn't be able to get the benefits of playing Arcane Lighthouse while simultaneously getting to fix your land with a good land, or get a bomb creature, or whatever *and never suffer the consequences of drawing the trash cards in your wishboard*.

** again, with a sufficiently sized wishboard

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DirkGently
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Post by DirkGently » 2 years ago

pokken wrote:
2 years ago
I disagree, I think if you want to play Arcane Lighthouse you should have to suffer for it. It's fine to play it if hexproof is an issue in your meta. But put it in your deck and suffer the consequences. That's the point of commander's non-sideboarded design - if you want narrow hosers you have to draw them sometimes and not like it. With a sufficiently sized wishboard you are always going to be thrilled to see Living Wish - it ranges from slightly worse than Demonic Tutor to slightly better**, which is pretty darn great.

I would be fine if you could *only* get trash narrow hosers, but the fact that Living Wish represents a great bomb, land fixing, or getting a hate card is problematic to me wish wishboards up in the >5 range. You shouldn't be able to get the benefits of playing Arcane Lighthouse while simultaneously getting to fix your land with a good land, or get a bomb creature, or whatever *and never suffer the consequences of drawing the trash cards in your wishboard*.

** again, with a sufficiently sized wishboard
You do "suffer" for using a wish, though. You have to pay mana to cast it. In the circumstances you search for arcane lighthouse, that's worse than if you just ran arcane lighthouse in the main. As I mentioned before, if you've played demonic tutor, you've surely had games where you wished it was just a damn swamp because those 2 mana really slowed you down. That's not nothing. It also means you're sacrificing one of your wish slots, regardless of how many you have (unless it's unlimited). Besides, arcane lighthouse in particular already has a low cost to include it in the deck, being a land. It's not like flashfires that can be utterly dead. I run arcane lighthouse all the time in decks that have a lot of targeted removal and are 1-2 colors.

I think with unlimited wishes living wish might be on par with demonic tutor, maybe. Anything less and it's definitely weaker imo. For one thing, the 100 cards you included in your deck are, presumably, the 100 best cards for your strategy, so not being able to fetch those is a pretty big downside. Second, there's a lot of situations that living wish can't really bail you out of. First one that comes to mind is wiping the board of creatures. There are a few creatures that do that, but the only ones I can think of are very expensive and/or have additional limitations (and are subject to color restrictions). Or maybe you want to destroy enemy artifacts/enchantments without touching your own. And there are tons of effects that you can get off creatures, but at a significantly high price than on another card type. You want to reanimate off dtutor? That's 3 mana total. You want to reanimate off living wish? That's 7. Grave hate? If you've got it mainboard, it can be very cheap and effective off dtutor. Pretty pricey off wish though. Sure, there's a lot of flexibility when you're talking about unrestricted wishes, but the efficiency is pretty rough. As soon as you say there are steep restrictions on how many targets, the flexibility tanks and the comparison gets a lot worse for wishes. Not to say demonic tutor is a good point of comparison for fairness, but I don't think any wish can even come close to it at 7, let alone 3.
Perm Decks
Phelddagrif - Kaervek - Golos - Zirilan

Flux Decks
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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