So I'm gonna try starting smallish with the aggro plan:
2019/07/03 updates
CUT
-Trophy mage has just not been what I want to be doing mostly lately. Too slow. Not getting any other creatures is a big issue too.
-Boreas Charger I *still have never drawn* no idea why. But I owe someone an apology on smothering tithe, it's turned out to be almost the format's most defining white card. so I have to at least try it and this is the only thing I can cut.
ADD Smothering Tithe - I think another way to generate really big mana is worth trying, and I think I misjudged this card initially. Going to try it anyway. Windborn Muse - really need to try to do something to stave off some early aggro deaths.
I would be fairly surprised if there were not some sort of enhancement of the criteria to broaden the "combos with multiple things" item that currently exists (undesirable game states). And because "undesirable game states" is so broad and relatively crappy as a criteria I think it will receive a lot of clarification if it stays around.
The best hatebear in EDH is Notion Thief and it's not particularly close; the reason is because it's both asymmetrical *and* provides a concrete benefit. That's generally what the requirement is for hatebears to be good.
If you want a library hate search bear, it'd probably be best to be templated like:
If an opponent would search their library for a card, instead you both search the top 10 cards of your libraries with the same restrictions and reveal if
the effect requires it.
I think the narrative that incremental damage isn't meaningful is a bit exaggerated. I have died to ancient tomb and mana crypt before and also been pressured into going for a combo early and losing as a result many times. It's true that tempo plays against life totals are generally less effective in edh, but I feel like that could as easily be a popular feature as a bug.
It's not about language policing - I'm genuinely asking, what definition are you using for kingmaking? Because I can't think of any definition that would include the circumstance you're talking about. Is everyone "accidentally kingmaking" unless they win or do absolutely nothing? Seriously, what do you even mean?
re: Ramp - I think you're probably trying to draw the comparison out further than it is meant to be. In EDH, ramp decks are gonna ramp. The point is merely that ramp decks aiming to ramp harder is a potential consequence of making games faster because if they want to keep playing bombs they need to be even more consistent about ramping. Perhaps they will play more interaction but I think that this is probably not likely - they'll play bombs that stabilize (e.g. Thragtusk and Wurmcoil Engine instead of [card]Ulamog, the Ceaseles
In general I think aggro decks often determine the outcome of games despite having very little chance to survive once they become arch-enemy by killing (or nearly killing) another player and having a dominant board state. And I do consider that accidental kingmaking even if their intention is to win, but only if they are very unlikely to win.
I am unsure whether lowering the life total would actually help aggro players or just make this scenario of the aggro player determining the winner be more common. I suspect it's possibly a bit of both so it might be a wash--both aggro players killing at least one person but also aggro players might win more?
Generally speaking I do think that lowering the life total will make it much more likely for one player to die early, which is not something I think is great for the format -- more bench time is not desirable in my opinion.
I thought that putting "accidental" in front of kingmaking would make it clear that it wasn't by design on the aggro player's part, but please continue language policing, it's fun for me. Just don't send me an invoice for editing services because I'm not paying that unless someone starts paying me $$$ to play against Edgar.
I was unclear that I mean metaphorically I see 3 aggro decks for every tryhard combo deck perhaps. But that was my intended meaning there. I suspect that aggro-ish decks (aggro-ramp or true aggro) are probably about twice as common as dedicated combo if not more. But among the casual crowd I think you'll see more aggro with lower life totals.
And honesty I don't enjoy aggro games very much; it's again not about what I want, but I will say anecdotally most players don't love getting aggro'd. I used to play a very aggressive Skullbriar deck that would typically kill someone on turn 4 or so and then lose. Nothing but complaints about that.
You're missing how ramp works; ramping hard will sometimes lower your real curve. Look at Tron in Modern. It's got one of the lowest curves in the game because all it does is ramp. most Modern and Legacy ramp decks are the same way. Downward pressure on curves presses decks that want to play bombs to ramp harder. It's closely connected.
Downward pressure on curves is not the same as downward pressure on average CMC.
I think if you take a peek at CEDH lists you'll see that faster games lead to more ramp not less, it just leads to cheaper ramp. Almost every CEDH deck is playing the same pile of 0-1 cmc ramp with a little 2 sprinkled in.
When I see you brushing concerns aside with "I see this as 100% major win" and "pure upside" I think it is clear that you're not really engaging with a fairly nuanced issue and it makes me inclined to disagree with you simply because I feel like the side making absolutist arguments is usually wrong when talking about complicated subjective things. Reminds me a lot of the Planeswalker discussion.
Fundamentally it does not matter how you see it. It matters how the population that plays EDH sees it, and in order to make good decisions we need to see things from broader perspectives.
My thinking is you would stand far less risk of negatively impacting the format if you just started banning the top 3 combo cards every year or so. Eventually the available combos will get so clunky or narrow that they are worse than just playing magic or aiming for pseudo-infinites like saccing 50 tokens to zulaport cuttthroat. Or they'd be very vulnerable to random hate.
It wouldn't take very long going 1-3 at a time that playing combos would start to have a real cost; you wind up playing garbage cards like mischievous quanar or stuffy doll.
The problem with combo today is more than tutors in my opinion; it's that too many combo cards are just damned fine cards on their own these days. Baaack in my day we had to slum it with rings of brighthearth and staff of domination and 3 card infinite mana combos that required an outlet.
Nowadays the kids play 4 mana infinite mana combos and a general with a mana sink, and both cards are pretty playable on their own.
Again, I don't think that this is necessarily, well, necessary. But I think it's a far more responsible approach than trying to ban an entire class of card, all the good mana rocks, or adding weird awkward rules that require people counting 20 cards from the top of their library every time they want to tutor, etc. Or even making major changes to the structure of the rules that have stood for 10 years.
Weird statement to stand by, considering it doesn't even really make sense. You wouldn't play a game that you normally play recreationally, for ANY amount of cash, with a relatively minor rules tweak (that would, at worst, make the game shorter and thus a better $ per hour rate)? Somehow I doubt you'd actually be so true to your principles if someone was actually offering that hot, hot cash.
I know, it's just a saying but...it's a stupid saying. All you really mean, presumably, is "I'd rather not play against Edgar markov in 30 life rules". Which I think is totally fine. I'd rather not play against Gitfrog with ANY rules, but I still do it, because it's part of the game and people can be tryhards if they want. There SHOULD be aggro commanders you don't want to play against, just like there are so, so many combo ones.
You're only down on life if they've been targeting you. If you've been successfully politicking you'll be down an opponent or two, then you board wipe and you're way ahead. You know - hold up your removal for edgar turns and use it unless they promise not to attack you? Hold back threats so you aren't their biggest concern? Y'know, good politics? Can't help you with a punchable face, though. Maybe try plastic surgery?
Yes, I stand by the obvious meaning of the statement. Sorry for using a commonly understood idiom. But good use of everyone's time being the language police.
You're backsliding into just trying to score internet points again.
*Someone* is down on life regardless. I think the likelihood exists that the game would be less fun if there were more games that were decided by an early aggro explosion accidentally kingmaking someone. Maybe it's good, maybe not. I think possibly not at least.
It's definitely different than playing against combo players for me even now, and it would be much different with lower life totals.
edit: Re: tryhard decks - there are a lot more aggro decks than tryhard decks. I see about 3 Edgars for every Gitrog.
Well, there is some value in intentionally putting someone to 3 or less, letting them know you have a bolt in hand, and then using that leverage to make them do your bidding. Going face can be very relevant in that case. You've basically got a repeatable mindslaver.
Not to derail the conversation to lightning bolt again for no real reason
Pokken, any response to my argument besides "they probably won't actually do it"? (Which is probably true, but even more true if no one advocates for it)
I've lost track of which thread I've talked about things in, but I think there are so many potential bad side effects of speeding games up that I think it's not worth the risk. Some things people think are automatically good like faster games but I think that's certainly arguable. I certainly would not want to do anything that slowed games down a lot but by the same token I think speeding them up may be undesirable.
* More pressure on budget manabases which are uncommonly bad in the early game (I think this is the one that concerns me the most honestly)
* More downward pressure on curves
* More pressure to ramp harder
* Pressure to play strong commanders because when you see fewer cards it's better to have a really good one available all the time (this goes with some potential unforeseen consequences specifically for commanders with Haste, Tap Effects, and Ramp in their text boxes)
* Pressure to combo even faster because life totals are under more pressure, generally normalizing combo in casual gameplay to combat aggro
* Many life-pay cards are driven toward the fringes of the format (good and bad both I think)
* Voltron gets a lot worse and it's already quite poor
And really the list just keeps going on and on the more I think about it.
I would not mind if they did something like:
1) Life total pace option was explicitly codified (30 for fast, 40 for medium, 50 for slow) so people were more inclined to test it
2) A season of 30 life (akin to silver bordered time)
The thing that bothers me the most is how much I think it would crap on budget manabases. They get a slight boost with fetches and shocks being very slightly discouraged but man ETB tapped lands are horrible now I can't imagine how much they would be with faster games.
I'm not going to get sidetracked into a how your friend builds or plays his deck discussion but I stand by my statement Aggro decks are somewhat different than combo decks in the texture of the games, at least for me personally.
The most basic element of it is that when I stop a combo I'm down a card or two and the game goes on. When I stop an aggro deck I'm down 30 life (or 20, heh) and a card or two, and the game goes on. I'm much closer to death after stopping the aggro player.
Not all the time of course, but perhaps because I've got a punchable face, or because I try to be an uncommonly good sport about being focused on, I am the target of aggro players at a higher rate than you would expect in a 4 player game
That's a pretty huge list. And you'd need to get basically all of those or at least a good subset.
And that all is completely leaving aside the fact that there are a ton of generals with one card combos with cards like staff of domination, food chain and curiosity. One card combos are extremely easy to execute if that's your focus and there's a pretty significant variety.
mystical teachings is another pretty strong option you'd see a lot more of if the cheaper ones were banned. Not to mention more exotic stuff like quiet speculation.
I mean, edgar also is a 4/4 hasted anthem that pumps himself to 5 when he attacks too so not like they're gonna be unable to finish someone off after a wrath. You couldn't pay me to play against an edgar deck with 30 life.
2019/07/03 updates
CUT
-Trophy mage has just not been what I want to be doing mostly lately. Too slow. Not getting any other creatures is a big issue too.
-Boreas Charger I *still have never drawn* no idea why. But I owe someone an apology on smothering tithe, it's turned out to be almost the format's most defining white card. so I have to at least try it and this is the only thing I can cut.
ADD
Smothering Tithe - I think another way to generate really big mana is worth trying, and I think I misjudged this card initially. Going to try it anyway.
Windborn Muse - really need to try to do something to stave off some early aggro deaths.
Paradox engine banning feels high likelihood to me.
Alms Collector is another decent one.
If you want a library hate search bear, it'd probably be best to be templated like:
If an opponent would search their library for a card, instead you both search the top 10 cards of your libraries with the same restrictions and reveal if
the effect requires it.
re: Ramp - I think you're probably trying to draw the comparison out further than it is meant to be. In EDH, ramp decks are gonna ramp. The point is merely that ramp decks aiming to ramp harder is a potential consequence of making games faster because if they want to keep playing bombs they need to be even more consistent about ramping. Perhaps they will play more interaction but I think that this is probably not likely - they'll play bombs that stabilize (e.g. Thragtusk and Wurmcoil Engine instead of [card]Ulamog, the Ceaseles
In general I think aggro decks often determine the outcome of games despite having very little chance to survive once they become arch-enemy by killing (or nearly killing) another player and having a dominant board state. And I do consider that accidental kingmaking even if their intention is to win, but only if they are very unlikely to win.
I am unsure whether lowering the life total would actually help aggro players or just make this scenario of the aggro player determining the winner be more common. I suspect it's possibly a bit of both so it might be a wash--both aggro players killing at least one person but also aggro players might win more?
Generally speaking I do think that lowering the life total will make it much more likely for one player to die early, which is not something I think is great for the format -- more bench time is not desirable in my opinion.
I was unclear that I mean metaphorically I see 3 aggro decks for every tryhard combo deck perhaps. But that was my intended meaning there. I suspect that aggro-ish decks (aggro-ramp or true aggro) are probably about twice as common as dedicated combo if not more. But among the casual crowd I think you'll see more aggro with lower life totals.
And honesty I don't enjoy aggro games very much; it's again not about what I want, but I will say anecdotally most players don't love getting aggro'd. I used to play a very aggressive Skullbriar deck that would typically kill someone on turn 4 or so and then lose. Nothing but complaints about that.
Downward pressure on curves is not the same as downward pressure on average CMC.
I think if you take a peek at CEDH lists you'll see that faster games lead to more ramp not less, it just leads to cheaper ramp. Almost every CEDH deck is playing the same pile of 0-1 cmc ramp with a little 2 sprinkled in.
When I see you brushing concerns aside with "I see this as 100% major win" and "pure upside" I think it is clear that you're not really engaging with a fairly nuanced issue and it makes me inclined to disagree with you simply because I feel like the side making absolutist arguments is usually wrong when talking about complicated subjective things. Reminds me a lot of the Planeswalker discussion.
Fundamentally it does not matter how you see it. It matters how the population that plays EDH sees it, and in order to make good decisions we need to see things from broader perspectives.
It wouldn't take very long going 1-3 at a time that playing combos would start to have a real cost; you wind up playing garbage cards like mischievous quanar or stuffy doll.
The problem with combo today is more than tutors in my opinion; it's that too many combo cards are just damned fine cards on their own these days. Baaack in my day we had to slum it with rings of brighthearth and staff of domination and 3 card infinite mana combos that required an outlet.
Nowadays the kids play 4 mana infinite mana combos and a general with a mana sink, and both cards are pretty playable on their own.
Again, I don't think that this is necessarily, well, necessary. But I think it's a far more responsible approach than trying to ban an entire class of card, all the good mana rocks, or adding weird awkward rules that require people counting 20 cards from the top of their library every time they want to tutor, etc. Or even making major changes to the structure of the rules that have stood for 10 years.
Yes, I stand by the obvious meaning of the statement. Sorry for using a commonly understood idiom. But good use of everyone's time being the language police.
You're backsliding into just trying to score internet points again.
*Someone* is down on life regardless. I think the likelihood exists that the game would be less fun if there were more games that were decided by an early aggro explosion accidentally kingmaking someone. Maybe it's good, maybe not. I think possibly not at least.
It's definitely different than playing against combo players for me even now, and it would be much different with lower life totals.
edit: Re: tryhard decks - there are a lot more aggro decks than tryhard decks. I see about 3 Edgars for every Gitrog.
I've lost track of which thread I've talked about things in, but I think there are so many potential bad side effects of speeding games up that I think it's not worth the risk. Some things people think are automatically good like faster games but I think that's certainly arguable. I certainly would not want to do anything that slowed games down a lot but by the same token I think speeding them up may be undesirable.
* More pressure on budget manabases which are uncommonly bad in the early game (I think this is the one that concerns me the most honestly)
* More downward pressure on curves
* More pressure to ramp harder
* Pressure to play strong commanders because when you see fewer cards it's better to have a really good one available all the time (this goes with some potential unforeseen consequences specifically for commanders with Haste, Tap Effects, and Ramp in their text boxes)
* Pressure to combo even faster because life totals are under more pressure, generally normalizing combo in casual gameplay to combat aggro
* Many life-pay cards are driven toward the fringes of the format (good and bad both I think)
* Voltron gets a lot worse and it's already quite poor
And really the list just keeps going on and on the more I think about it.
I would not mind if they did something like:
1) Life total pace option was explicitly codified (30 for fast, 40 for medium, 50 for slow) so people were more inclined to test it
2) A season of 30 life (akin to silver bordered time)
The thing that bothers me the most is how much I think it would crap on budget manabases. They get a slight boost with fetches and shocks being very slightly discouraged but man ETB tapped lands are horrible now I can't imagine how much they would be with faster games.
The most basic element of it is that when I stop a combo I'm down a card or two and the game goes on. When I stop an aggro deck I'm down 30 life (or 20, heh) and a card or two, and the game goes on. I'm much closer to death after stopping the aggro player.
Not all the time of course, but perhaps because I've got a punchable face, or because I try to be an uncommonly good sport about being focused on, I am the target of aggro players at a higher rate than you would expect in a 4 player game
That's a pretty huge list. And you'd need to get basically all of those or at least a good subset.
And that all is completely leaving aside the fact that there are a ton of generals with one card combos with cards like staff of domination, food chain and curiosity. One card combos are extremely easy to execute if that's your focus and there's a pretty significant variety.
Based on the number of people playing dark petition, ad nauseam, grim tutor, survival of the fittest, beseech the queen, idyllic tutor and fabricate and whir of invention and chord of calling and intuition there is no way you make more than a dent with just cheap tutors.
mystical teachings is another pretty strong option you'd see a lot more of if the cheaper ones were banned. Not to mention more exotic stuff like quiet speculation.
It still sees a bit of play in tap commanders like selvalas, kydele, yisan, arcum, etc.