Grenzo was the first creature I ever saw that made me think "I wanna make a commander deck around this." I haven't made it yet, but I've been slowly adding things to the decklist. We actually had a lot of similar ideas for how to take the deck.
I never really liked spellslinger decks , but when I built melek reforged, it became one of my all time favorites. Something about stuffing it with so many big, splashy spells and 5 mana counterspells all discounted made it feel so incredible.
I have a bunch of decks, but I usually choose a theme or mechanic that I can build around. The type of deck it becomes usually comes into shape after I find the essential cards to keep the theme / mechanism as efficient as possible
funny that you made this video, i recently built a lands deck in gruul, my least favorite type of deck in my least favorite color combo, but built it as a control deck and its been pretty fun
I didn't like spellslinger decks until they made Eris, Roar of the Storm because she makes dragons with spells. I didn't like combo decks until they made Siyitri, Dragon Master because she combos with dragons. I didn't like artifact decks until they made Galazeth Prismari because he is a dragon...
Hey trinket mage! I wanted to let you know I love this take. I think pushing your comfort zone in magic is crazy important and you need to play all sides to understand the strengths and limitations of them! That being said, my deck im forcing myself to build is a Glissa the Traitor list. I have never enjoyed artifact decks, but I love Golgari. This deck allows me to play in a design space I am familiar with while also trying a new batch of cards I have never tried!
I'm a very aggro player. Any and every deck I play, I end up using a "hit em hard and fast" approach, even when I'm piloting a friend's deck. I have a deck with a goad subtheme I've been using to introduce myself to a more control style while still working with some aggro stuff. I have so often played impulsively, so it's been some serious effort to learn new, "slower" approaches.
I had a hard time finding a simic deck I liked. All of them just ended up being pointless value engines that are either too strong or too weak and always boring. Recently I finally cracked an Uro deck that I like. While idk if its a permanent addition to my roster, I enjoy playing it.
I think when I started, I gravitated most towards graveyard and sacrifice decks, generally stuff that's slow, grindy, and tries to keep everyone in the mud with you haha. Over the years tho I've def embraced trying new things and now I got an artifact combo deck, a Voltron deck, a go wide beat down deck, and so on...
I honestly thought this deck would be about building a deck you thought you wanted until you played it and hated playing it. I guess it ended up being kinda that in part with Mr. Foxglove. But it also ended up being more about building into an archetype you hate and loving the deck. That's great. Finally, I am a big proponent of doing deck swaps as I play with friends to have fun and see what it's like from both sides. This helps you really learn the game better as well.
My favourite colors have always been blue black and red, one of the first alt win cons decks i built was a ramses assasin lord poison deck where ramses swings for the final hit to win the game.
I've been trying to make a Foxglove deck and decided to try a control style, which I am unfamiliar with. I heard that you had a list so I started looking at it for inspiration. Those six-ish group hug cards were the first I cut, but am still trying find the balance of reactive and proactive cards.
I don't hate playing against combo decks, but I don't always love playing them myself and I don't think I've ever built one before. Though, I've been enjoying Rakdos Tree in pioneer and recently decided to make a commander version with Olivia Mobilized for War. Its been fun figuring out how to build it and play it. One of my favorite things in magic is to play a bunch of common and uncommons and make them more effective, and this combo does that in a way that doesn't feel stale.
Great video! I normally play big stompy naya or golgari reanimator, but when I saw Josh Lee Kwai play Jolrael, Voice of Zhalfir on Extra Turns ep 45, it got me interested in her. I used his decklist as a base and took out all the stuff related to animating lands because I don't care about that. I realized I could focus more on controlly mass bounce effects like Flood of Tears and Consuming Tide, and rebuild faster than anyone else because for 4 mana I get a hasted flyer that draws me a card. I really liked the Seasons Past + Mystical Tutor value engine you mentioned in your "These Decks Never Run Out of Gas" video, so I basically built the deck around that, with lots of instants. I ended up really enjoying this deck more than I expected, because for the first time, I regularly had mana open and responses to the degenerate BS my friends were playing instead of tapping out every turn to turbo out my own threats. I recently added in some more stax like Winter Moon and Cursed Totem but they haven't showed up in a game yet. We'll see how my friends respond lol. I see Elesh Norn, Cyc Rift, and Grave Pact pretty regularly, so I think it will be fine.
I recently made it a challenge for me to finally crack down and make a commander deck for every single colour combination in the game. All 32 of them. The idea was to try and broaden my horizons, to stop myself from stagnating into this pool of Black, Blue and Green in any combination. When taking on this challenge, I knew one particular colour was going to be a real struggle for me. Selesnya. It's funny really, because this is a very specific outlier. I like green. I like white. Using either or in any deck is no hassle for me. Just that when the two come together, it somehow always feels like the most underwhelming thing in the universe. I place most of the blame here on the pool of Commanders. It feels like any time I scroll through my options for this combo on EDHrec, the effects all begin to blend together into this grey soup of basically 3 playstyles. Make a shitton of tokens, pass around a fuckton of counters or enchantress. Not that there's anything wrong with any of it, just that it feels like every Commander feels like all it's interested in doing is giving you what I've often called "The participation award" effect. As in, you do the thing, you draw cards. Nothing more imaginative. You have some oddballs like Emiel or some of the oddly staxey commanders, but I don't see a world, where I'd play them over other options in better colours. It's not that Selesnya is bad at doing these anything it does, but it often times feels like it's the most boring in how it does it. Ultimately though, back against the wall, I'm probably going to end up with Captain Sisay as a legend toolbox plan. As I said, I love green and I love white individually, so when the commanders for the color-combo inspire no excitement, just run a soup of your favourite cards in the colour.
Very similar to my Marisi breaker of the coil deck all about adding rules about how to block. Doesn’t do a lot of damage most of the time but that’s what opponents are for. I can usually muster one alpha strike to take out the last one standing
I started playing magic towards the end of June this year. I love White and Green and Red, so Naya is an incredible thing for me. I love playing things like Hazezon or derivatives like Gruul beatdown or Boros Burn/aggro. I even found myself loving Black through a Kambal, Profiteering Mayor deck that was my first ever deck for commander (still probably my strongest). But through all of this, I couldn't STAND blue. Blue control took such a lax approach and passive mentality for playing the game. Until Duskmorn. Duskmorn introduced me to the Mindskinner, and I absolutely love this card from a comedic standpoint. So much so that they are now my newest addition to my commander decks as a mono blue voltron mill deck that "controls" just to be the scariest mf at the table. Still can't say I like Blue too much, but I am certainly more amiable to it.
I actually just built grenzo! Looking at your list mine is a lot lower to the ground and DEFINITLY a lot more budget (the first version was at around 30€, with some additions now it's ended up a little over 40) I ended up building it because most of my decks have been either midrange value or control, and i wanted to make something where everything is a lot smaller. My list is in a bit of an intersection between forced combat, small things matter, and goblin token value. My favorite recent addition from duskmourn has been "Painter's Studio // Defaced Gallery" where someone at wotc decided to staple together goblin oriflamme and reckless impulse
I find myself in a dilema rn, i don't know what archetype i don't like, in these 10 years or so that i play magic, i already tried almost everything and don't dislike any specific strategy
I found it interesting when I did the same idea. I have always hated infinite combos, especially when they just win out of nowhere. I decided then to make an infinite creature combo deck with Rocco, Cabaretti Caterer that uses Rosie Cotton and Scurry Oak like effects to make the creatures, then a haste enabler or etb ping damage to kill on the same turn. It has turned out to be one of my favorite decks because while it is budget, it plays like a puzzle, trying to get all the pieces together with protection to complete the combo through any removal players might have.
i'm like you: i dont really enjoy red as a color. i dont like impulse draw and the "jankyness" / "randomness" of the color. But then my brother came around with his newly brewed mono red control list. At first i laughed at the idea, a few turns into the game is was absolutley hooked: mainly because of the commander: Jaxis, the troublemaker. Three mana for drawing/two discard one AND make a creature copy with haste is just insane value while casualy dodgeing commander tax. Long story short: i brewed about 10 hours in the last two days and the possabilies just seem endless. I'm in love
Not quite the same but I always hated mill. So the logical step I took was making a Mycotyrant self mill deck. I got really used to watching cards I wanted in hand go to the graveyard lol. But it's one of my favorite decks now, and I don't hate playing against mill as much.
I love this video so much because of how many times I had to force myself to use different playstyles. Green and black graveyard shenanigans was always something i loved. Because I found aggro, staxs, and Infinite combo to be boring. But as time went on, I've built and playtested just about every common playstyle. But even now, red white aggro is something I hate to play. (Sorry for the small rant)
I have like 4 rakdos decks and 4 dimir decks. I just really don't like green, I've been looking for so long to find a Simic commander that interests me and its just all boring generic value.
I played a grenzo tokens/evasion/funny goblins list that would frequently do comedic things for the first few turns and then struggle when the commander was inevitably removed a second time. Shoutout to mountain goat in that list, truly the GOAT of goats
My current physically built decks are a decent range (I have way to much free time so I kind of sometimes will just sink a few hours into making a list on Tappedout) Got dimir mill/control/theft, dimir looting payoff, naya go tall artifact aggro, boros go wide token aggro, the Necrons precon with only 3 subbed out cards, and izzet draw cards. Also close to having a mono-white phyrexian tribal finished. Taking into account all the random lists I have put together online - my least built deck is simic. I like blue and I like green but together without any other colors with them I find it hard to brew simic without it being tribal or just piles of value engine. Hell, the one simic list I have I literally just called "Random Simic Bullshit Go!" with the new Tamiyo from MH3 being the commander with the idea being that you just get so much value so quickly that you can sneak in Tamiyo's -8 before anyone realizes what's going on. The new Zimones from Duskmourn interest me, the precon one because it is doing something really different that is still effective, and the main set one because of how hyper-specific its effect is. In all honesty though, that simic value pile might end up being my next physically constructed deck cause I got that Tamiyo from my first MH3 pack and the acquisition of said pack has some personal emotional stuff tied to it. As far as specific card "types" go? I have a weird aversion to stuff that just flat out says "you win the game". Combo loop that does infinite damage? That's fine. Simic Ascendancy or Thassa's Oracle? I despise that stuff.
I HAD a massive distaste for spellslinger decks because they go infinite or close to it so often that you either die first or make everyone sit there as you win via combo. Also black has always felt really boring. It’s just creatures dying and coming back and dying again for profit. So easy to make loops that win out of nowhere. That was until I made orzhov spellsling using the kaldheim angel that gives you a free strategic planning whenever you cast your second spell. When you have very limited access to storm enablers and payoffs, the challenge is fun again. Racing your own life total to draw cards since you can’t use the aristocrats cards well gives you an entirely new axis to worry about. It’s been a blast watching my life total yo-yo around as I dig for removal and finishers I need to survive or end the game.
I'm a control/combo/graveyard player and my pod "hates" me for it. They often play creature decks and get frustrated when I blow up/steal their value engin or counter their big play. Which I can understand. They got PTSD from my Volo deck being at 1 life then gaining 260 life from Verdant Sun's Avatar and from my Marchesa thief deck and almost don't wanna play against them anymore (or just kill volo on sight, I now have 15 protections in the deck and I feel it's still not enough). I just reworked Marchesa cause I feel I don't want to be such a pain in the ass for them and it was the most salty experience for them (I let go of the thief theme). But playing against aggro gruul decks made me wanna try aggro or at least something close. But I still can't find to get into it. Just building the deck bores me. I can't find something that excites me. I recently build a pauper EDH deck and stumbled upon Lulu - knowing that I didn't want a blink deck. So I build a mono white sacrifice deck that I seem to really like :D but again, tried to make it more aggro and after goldfishing a bunch, felt like the aggro wasn't good enough and went for more of a midrange deck. So I'm open to ideas! =D And thanks for the video!
Extrapolating out from the point of stepping outside of your comfort zone - playing a tuned list made by someone else will make you a better deckbuilder. If you're a brewer and hate sticking to established ways of building, using something established will give you so much insight into why certain choices are popular, what works, and what doesn't. As someone essentially playing rogue decks, you gotta know the enemy. On the main topic, 3/3 Elk's Kura list got me looking at the NDK dragon cycle and I started playing around with an Atsushi list. I haven't played monored since my chaos draft days, and its been fun trying to make this weird dragon work as a commander.
It's so strange to me to even be asked to consider asking my friends if I can proxy something. I really don't adequately appreciate the bubble I live in where seemingly everyone is proxying most of their cards. It makes me dread ever going to a different LGS, I fear I've stumbled into a weird alternate universe where everyone proxies and buying cards is the outlier and I'm starting to get more and more afraid of what might happen if I ever go to a different community/LGS.
I agree with what you are saying, and in my opinion, playing a commander or a colour combo you don't like or is less experienced with makes you a better player in general. Fx, I made a kaylia deck that I was super excited to play, but I learned that it is a big threat, and whenever I played her, it got counted or removed, so I leaned to be better at politics and managen my bord state
I tend to like making unique and relatively slow decks, such as my White/Blue dragons deck with Ojutai, Soul of Winter, or my Banding Tribal deck that runs all 5 of the Legends banding lands, or my Relentless Rats deck that uses Simic Nashi to make token Relentless Rats that I can populate. All that being said, I don't tend to make aggressive or stompy decks that often, also i don't tend to make decks with the intent of winning as much as the intent of playing a certain way and then winning and winning from doing that thing. My most recent deck is Vannifar, Evolved Enigma, which revolves around under-costed creatures with some sort of drawback, such as Phyrexian Dreadnaught, Eater of Days, Arixmethes, etc. (as well as cards that synergize with manifest) that I play face-down as a manifested/cloaked creature and then flip up for cheap. It is a quite aggressive deck that runs out of cards quickly and tries to win just as fast, and it's a stompy deck made my own way. I still have to think about what order I'm going to do things, but also I have big creatures to just slap people in the face with.
I'm actually working on a control deck not a fan of control wanted to try something different to mindless aggro sadly my playgroup has claimed that they will never play against it because they can't get a board state I'm sitting here like that's kinda the point of a control deck I wouldn't even say it's that oppressive like it does the job but the commander is triad of fates super slow deck even when I have untap shenanigans in play
I disliked aristocrat stuff, so imagine my surprise when my token spamming Chatterfang deck slowly morphed into an aristocrat combo deck I have plans on making a control, recursion, enchantress and storm deck at some point to broaden my horizons
One thing you need to get used to when playing decks you dont like Mill is being hated out. People hate it and they will focus on you depending what you are doing. I run both Mill and Theft and while they are fun to play people dont like it and will kill you first a lot.
My fav color is black and for long time i dont like red, my least fav color. And for my 2nd commander deck i decide that I want to try bit more combat focused deck or aggro. So i make bria deck. Since i had 2 phase of upgrading it after like 20 games i realize i cant stop playing it and red is now my fav color. The way you try to offset weakness creatively just so interesting. Exiling card as draw, shooting people straight in their face with lightning bolt. Sometimes forcing yourself to just try new thing is the key. Start with budget first get the feeling so its not wasted spending. And only get card that at least flexible enough to fit in random deck
I will agree with many points, but the arguement agaisn't control decks comes from strandard format. Let me explains I used to play 1v1 standard format (60 deck 20 life etc) and control decks ALWAYS won over anything that wasn't aggro, because you only need to prevent 1 player from doing anything and you are always likely to have access to those cheap/high value counter cards or stax effect since you have 4 copies of them and blue have a very good draw options. Now in commander, you have 3 players to consider and only have 1 copy of each card. Suddenly, that's a lot of of heavy lifting to grind a win through control. But that mindset of hating control decks is still present because of the 1v1 format. I am a good case because it took me a long time to get rid of the "Hate control deck" mentality and understand that, in a multiplayer environment, it is a lot less impactfull.
Hey RUclips, I need some insight (if you mind reading): Im your casual gruul ramp-big creture player (Svella), but I really like control in other formants. Problem is, creature-less control forces me to run sorcery win conditions that seem hard to interact with (less interaction = anticliamtic win). I dont know if I will enjoy ending a game (that other 3 people are playing) out of nowhere by copying a deal X damage spell, or stealling all creatures. But if I dont go for this explosive wincons, there is no wincon at all in draw-go control. Maybe I one of this "plays fair magic" guys, but i will love to enjoy "fair" control that actually has a gameplan. Maybe explosive wins dont feel that bad, idk, this conundrum has being in the back of my head for like 3 weeks, Im going bananas.
Have you tried draw go with a theft theme? The wins are still creature based and it can still be a control deck. Plus theft decks scale with the table very well
Doing this right now with a Yawgmoth aristocrats deck. Always disliked graveyard/sacrifice themes, but I want to see if thats actually true or I just had some bad experiences.
im a big fan of alternate wincons but people get upset i also really like combat tricks, but people really hate dying to commander damage. they look at me like im an infect player after i double strike invigorate mutagenic growth them from 40
@the_trinket_mage hey I thought this was a very interesting video. Any possibility you could help me out with a suggestion for something to try? Currently my decks are Azorius Control (Hylda Of the icy Crown) Boros Goad (Nelly Borca) Simic Landfall (Zimone Mystery Unraveller) and a bunch of artifact decks like tetzin the gnome champion, saheeli sun's brilliance and Oswald Fiddlebender. I wanna try something outside of my comfort zone, an archetype I don't usually play.
that whole joke about "blue mage learns about turning creatures sideways" feels a bit out of place knowing that Blue has a lot ways to tap permanents with things like enchantments or stun counters, also Blue aggro is totally a thing, just not explored often in sets because they have to reprint the same control and hand advantage spells over and over but things like Unblockable weenies, Ninjutsu, Merfolk and so on can work pretty decently for aggressive strategies.
what a throwback for me i have always loved control, but i suffer from a curse of building control without a wincon so when i returned to play i build Walls, because loooong back when i started playing MTG i LOVED the concept of walls, so my first commander deck was Walls then i discovered Panglacial Wurm and how wacky its effect is and decided to build a Wurm deck but then i started to notice "hey, i am building aggro walls, aggro wurms, and some other decks i have in mind (Slivers or Dragons) are also aggro....how about i try to get back into control? how about i try to use the color i hate the most (Black)? and what about the wincon?" and so my Tergrid deck was born, its wincon is everybody else's wincon, and i honestly had fun building a mono-black deck, i had NO idea black has absolutely no artifact removal, it did gave me a lot of perspective of how black works
It’s not very good as a politics card. I made a tweet about it a while ago. And a decent amount of people treat it as such so it called it on here. But I agree with you it’s not good for politics
Crapping on politics cards is such a dumb take. Politics is literally what makes those cards fun. Sometimes they may backfire, sometimes you make a lot of value, sometimes you can make friends etc. It sounds to me like you are completely missing their point. Those cards are perfect for casual format like commander.
I’m not saying anything bad about politics cards in general. I just don’t like those cards I showed in the video. So it’s an example of me using cards I don’t normally enjoy. Nothing against those cards in particular though
Trinket mage is never pregnant but never fails to deliver
i can fix that
Not yet 😏
o_O
🤨
I mean... Not wrong, but what!?
Grenzo was the first creature I ever saw that made me think "I wanna make a commander deck around this." I haven't made it yet, but I've been slowly adding things to the decklist. We actually had a lot of similar ideas for how to take the deck.
I never really liked spellslinger decks , but when I built melek reforged, it became one of my all time favorites. Something about stuffing it with so many big, splashy spells and 5 mana counterspells all discounted made it feel so incredible.
I have a bunch of decks, but I usually choose a theme or mechanic that I can build around. The type of deck it becomes usually comes into shape after I find the essential cards to keep the theme / mechanism as efficient as possible
funny that you made this video, i recently built a lands deck in gruul, my least favorite type of deck in my least favorite color combo, but built it as a control deck and its been pretty fun
I didn't like spellslinger decks until they made Eris, Roar of the Storm because she makes dragons with spells. I didn't like combo decks until they made Siyitri, Dragon Master because she combos with dragons. I didn't like artifact decks until they made Galazeth Prismari because he is a dragon...
I'm glad you know your type. 😂
Hey trinket mage! I wanted to let you know I love this take. I think pushing your comfort zone in magic is crazy important and you need to play all sides to understand the strengths and limitations of them! That being said, my deck im forcing myself to build is a Glissa the Traitor list. I have never enjoyed artifact decks, but I love Golgari. This deck allows me to play in a design space I am familiar with while also trying a new batch of cards I have never tried!
I'm a very aggro player. Any and every deck I play, I end up using a "hit em hard and fast" approach, even when I'm piloting a friend's deck. I have a deck with a goad subtheme I've been using to introduce myself to a more control style while still working with some aggro stuff. I have so often played impulsively, so it's been some serious effort to learn new, "slower" approaches.
I had a hard time finding a simic deck I liked. All of them just ended up being pointless value engines that are either too strong or too weak and always boring. Recently I finally cracked an Uro deck that I like. While idk if its a permanent addition to my roster, I enjoy playing it.
What made this Uro list special?
I think when I started, I gravitated most towards graveyard and sacrifice decks, generally stuff that's slow, grindy, and tries to keep everyone in the mud with you haha. Over the years tho I've def embraced trying new things and now I got an artifact combo deck, a Voltron deck, a go wide beat down deck, and so on...
Grenzo is so funny as a theft commander. Like low to the ground dudes with evasion in red are so funny for theft
I honestly thought this deck would be about building a deck you thought you wanted until you played it and hated playing it. I guess it ended up being kinda that in part with Mr. Foxglove. But it also ended up being more about building into an archetype you hate and loving the deck. That's great. Finally, I am a big proponent of doing deck swaps as I play with friends to have fun and see what it's like from both sides. This helps you really learn the game better as well.
My favourite colors have always been blue black and red, one of the first alt win cons decks i built was a ramses assasin lord poison deck where ramses swings for the final hit to win the game.
I've been trying to make a Foxglove deck and decided to try a control style, which I am unfamiliar with. I heard that you had a list so I started looking at it for inspiration. Those six-ish group hug cards were the first I cut, but am still trying find the balance of reactive and proactive cards.
I don't hate playing against combo decks, but I don't always love playing them myself and I don't think I've ever built one before. Though, I've been enjoying Rakdos Tree in pioneer and recently decided to make a commander version with Olivia Mobilized for War. Its been fun figuring out how to build it and play it. One of my favorite things in magic is to play a bunch of common and uncommons and make them more effective, and this combo does that in a way that doesn't feel stale.
Great video! I normally play big stompy naya or golgari reanimator, but when I saw Josh Lee Kwai play Jolrael, Voice of Zhalfir on Extra Turns ep 45, it got me interested in her. I used his decklist as a base and took out all the stuff related to animating lands because I don't care about that. I realized I could focus more on controlly mass bounce effects like Flood of Tears and Consuming Tide, and rebuild faster than anyone else because for 4 mana I get a hasted flyer that draws me a card. I really liked the Seasons Past + Mystical Tutor value engine you mentioned in your "These Decks Never Run Out of Gas" video, so I basically built the deck around that, with lots of instants.
I ended up really enjoying this deck more than I expected, because for the first time, I regularly had mana open and responses to the degenerate BS my friends were playing instead of tapping out every turn to turbo out my own threats. I recently added in some more stax like Winter Moon and Cursed Totem but they haven't showed up in a game yet. We'll see how my friends respond lol. I see Elesh Norn, Cyc Rift, and Grave Pact pretty regularly, so I think it will be fine.
I recently made it a challenge for me to finally crack down and make a commander deck for every single colour combination in the game. All 32 of them. The idea was to try and broaden my horizons, to stop myself from stagnating into this pool of Black, Blue and Green in any combination. When taking on this challenge, I knew one particular colour was going to be a real struggle for me. Selesnya. It's funny really, because this is a very specific outlier. I like green. I like white. Using either or in any deck is no hassle for me. Just that when the two come together, it somehow always feels like the most underwhelming thing in the universe.
I place most of the blame here on the pool of Commanders. It feels like any time I scroll through my options for this combo on EDHrec, the effects all begin to blend together into this grey soup of basically 3 playstyles. Make a shitton of tokens, pass around a fuckton of counters or enchantress. Not that there's anything wrong with any of it, just that it feels like every Commander feels like all it's interested in doing is giving you what I've often called "The participation award" effect. As in, you do the thing, you draw cards. Nothing more imaginative. You have some oddballs like Emiel or some of the oddly staxey commanders, but I don't see a world, where I'd play them over other options in better colours. It's not that Selesnya is bad at doing these anything it does, but it often times feels like it's the most boring in how it does it.
Ultimately though, back against the wall, I'm probably going to end up with Captain Sisay as a legend toolbox plan. As I said, I love green and I love white individually, so when the commanders for the color-combo inspire no excitement, just run a soup of your favourite cards in the colour.
Very similar to my Marisi breaker of the coil deck all about adding rules about how to block. Doesn’t do a lot of damage most of the time but that’s what opponents are for. I can usually muster one alpha strike to take out the last one standing
I started playing magic towards the end of June this year. I love White and Green and Red, so Naya is an incredible thing for me. I love playing things like Hazezon or derivatives like Gruul beatdown or Boros Burn/aggro.
I even found myself loving Black through a Kambal, Profiteering Mayor deck that was my first ever deck for commander (still probably my strongest).
But through all of this, I couldn't STAND blue. Blue control took such a lax approach and passive mentality for playing the game.
Until Duskmorn. Duskmorn introduced me to the Mindskinner, and I absolutely love this card from a comedic standpoint. So much so that they are now my newest addition to my commander decks as a mono blue voltron mill deck that "controls" just to be the scariest mf at the table.
Still can't say I like Blue too much, but I am certainly more amiable to it.
I actually just built grenzo! Looking at your list mine is a lot lower to the ground and DEFINITLY a lot more budget (the first version was at around 30€, with some additions now it's ended up a little over 40)
I ended up building it because most of my decks have been either midrange value or control, and i wanted to make something where everything is a lot smaller. My list is in a bit of an intersection between forced combat, small things matter, and goblin token value.
My favorite recent addition from duskmourn has been "Painter's Studio // Defaced Gallery" where someone at wotc decided to staple together goblin oriflamme and reckless impulse
I find myself in a dilema rn, i don't know what archetype i don't like, in these 10 years or so that i play magic, i already tried almost everything and don't dislike any specific strategy
That's not really a dilemma 😊
May I introduce you to land destruction group hug?
I found it interesting when I did the same idea. I have always hated infinite combos, especially when they just win out of nowhere. I decided then to make an infinite creature combo deck with Rocco, Cabaretti Caterer that uses Rosie Cotton and Scurry Oak like effects to make the creatures, then a haste enabler or etb ping damage to kill on the same turn. It has turned out to be one of my favorite decks because while it is budget, it plays like a puzzle, trying to get all the pieces together with protection to complete the combo through any removal players might have.
i'm like you: i dont really enjoy red as a color. i dont like impulse draw and the "jankyness" / "randomness" of the color. But then my brother came around with his newly brewed mono red control list.
At first i laughed at the idea, a few turns into the game is was absolutley hooked: mainly because of the commander: Jaxis, the troublemaker. Three mana for drawing/two discard one AND make a creature copy with haste is just insane value while casualy dodgeing commander tax.
Long story short: i brewed about 10 hours in the last two days and the possabilies just seem endless. I'm in love
Jaxis is such a fun card to use! She wasn’t a commander but in the 99 was always fun!
Not quite the same but I always hated mill. So the logical step I took was making a Mycotyrant self mill deck. I got really used to watching cards I wanted in hand go to the graveyard lol. But it's one of my favorite decks now, and I don't hate playing against mill as much.
This is exactly the story I wanted to see in the comments
I love this video so much because of how many times I had to force myself to use different playstyles. Green and black graveyard shenanigans was always something i loved. Because I found aggro, staxs, and Infinite combo to be boring. But as time went on, I've built and playtested just about every common playstyle. But even now, red white aggro is something I hate to play. (Sorry for the small rant)
I have like 4 rakdos decks and 4 dimir decks.
I just really don't like green, I've been looking for so long to find a Simic commander that interests me and its just all boring generic value.
I played a grenzo tokens/evasion/funny goblins list that would frequently do comedic things for the first few turns and then struggle when the commander was inevitably removed a second time. Shoutout to mountain goat in that list, truly the GOAT of goats
My current physically built decks are a decent range (I have way to much free time so I kind of sometimes will just sink a few hours into making a list on Tappedout) Got dimir mill/control/theft, dimir looting payoff, naya go tall artifact aggro, boros go wide token aggro, the Necrons precon with only 3 subbed out cards, and izzet draw cards. Also close to having a mono-white phyrexian tribal finished.
Taking into account all the random lists I have put together online - my least built deck is simic. I like blue and I like green but together without any other colors with them I find it hard to brew simic without it being tribal or just piles of value engine. Hell, the one simic list I have I literally just called "Random Simic Bullshit Go!" with the new Tamiyo from MH3 being the commander with the idea being that you just get so much value so quickly that you can sneak in Tamiyo's -8 before anyone realizes what's going on.
The new Zimones from Duskmourn interest me, the precon one because it is doing something really different that is still effective, and the main set one because of how hyper-specific its effect is.
In all honesty though, that simic value pile might end up being my next physically constructed deck cause I got that Tamiyo from my first MH3 pack and the acquisition of said pack has some personal emotional stuff tied to it.
As far as specific card "types" go? I have a weird aversion to stuff that just flat out says "you win the game". Combo loop that does infinite damage? That's fine. Simic Ascendancy or Thassa's Oracle? I despise that stuff.
I HAD a massive distaste for spellslinger decks because they go infinite or close to it so often that you either die first or make everyone sit there as you win via combo. Also black has always felt really boring. It’s just creatures dying and coming back and dying again for profit. So easy to make loops that win out of nowhere.
That was until I made orzhov spellsling using the kaldheim angel that gives you a free strategic planning whenever you cast your second spell. When you have very limited access to storm enablers and payoffs, the challenge is fun again. Racing your own life total to draw cards since you can’t use the aristocrats cards well gives you an entirely new axis to worry about. It’s been a blast watching my life total yo-yo around as I dig for removal and finishers I need to survive or end the game.
I'm a control/combo/graveyard player and my pod "hates" me for it. They often play creature decks and get frustrated when I blow up/steal their value engin or counter their big play. Which I can understand. They got PTSD from my Volo deck being at 1 life then gaining 260 life from Verdant Sun's Avatar and from my Marchesa thief deck and almost don't wanna play against them anymore (or just kill volo on sight, I now have 15 protections in the deck and I feel it's still not enough). I just reworked Marchesa cause I feel I don't want to be such a pain in the ass for them and it was the most salty experience for them (I let go of the thief theme). But playing against aggro gruul decks made me wanna try aggro or at least something close. But I still can't find to get into it. Just building the deck bores me. I can't find something that excites me.
I recently build a pauper EDH deck and stumbled upon Lulu - knowing that I didn't want a blink deck. So I build a mono white sacrifice deck that I seem to really like :D but again, tried to make it more aggro and after goldfishing a bunch, felt like the aggro wasn't good enough and went for more of a midrange deck.
So I'm open to ideas! =D
And thanks for the video!
Extrapolating out from the point of stepping outside of your comfort zone - playing a tuned list made by someone else will make you a better deckbuilder. If you're a brewer and hate sticking to established ways of building, using something established will give you so much insight into why certain choices are popular, what works, and what doesn't. As someone essentially playing rogue decks, you gotta know the enemy.
On the main topic, 3/3 Elk's Kura list got me looking at the NDK dragon cycle and I started playing around with an Atsushi list. I haven't played monored since my chaos draft days, and its been fun trying to make this weird dragon work as a commander.
It's so strange to me to even be asked to consider asking my friends if I can proxy something. I really don't adequately appreciate the bubble I live in where seemingly everyone is proxying most of their cards. It makes me dread ever going to a different LGS, I fear I've stumbled into a weird alternate universe where everyone proxies and buying cards is the outlier and I'm starting to get more and more afraid of what might happen if I ever go to a different community/LGS.
You're telling me to build a simic deck which is against my morals XD
Fair…. But what about Gor Muldrak? He is pretty weird and not normal simic!
@@thetrinketmage that is pretty interesting
I agree with what you are saying, and in my opinion, playing a commander or a colour combo you don't like or is less experienced with makes you a better player in general. Fx, I made a kaylia deck that I was super excited to play, but I learned that it is a big threat, and whenever I played her, it got counted or removed, so I leaned to be better at politics and managen my bord state
I tend to like making unique and relatively slow decks, such as my White/Blue dragons deck with Ojutai, Soul of Winter, or my Banding Tribal deck that runs all 5 of the Legends banding lands, or my Relentless Rats deck that uses Simic Nashi to make token Relentless Rats that I can populate. All that being said, I don't tend to make aggressive or stompy decks that often, also i don't tend to make decks with the intent of winning as much as the intent of playing a certain way and then winning and winning from doing that thing.
My most recent deck is Vannifar, Evolved Enigma, which revolves around under-costed creatures with some sort of drawback, such as Phyrexian Dreadnaught, Eater of Days, Arixmethes, etc. (as well as cards that synergize with manifest) that I play face-down as a manifested/cloaked creature and then flip up for cheap. It is a quite aggressive deck that runs out of cards quickly and tries to win just as fast, and it's a stompy deck made my own way. I still have to think about what order I'm going to do things, but also I have big creatures to just slap people in the face with.
I'm actually working on a control deck not a fan of control wanted to try something different to mindless aggro sadly my playgroup has claimed that they will never play against it because they can't get a board state I'm sitting here like that's kinda the point of a control deck I wouldn't even say it's that oppressive like it does the job but the commander is triad of fates super slow deck even when I have untap shenanigans in play
triad of fates seems like a super cool control commander! could u send the list?
I disliked aristocrat stuff, so imagine my surprise when my token spamming Chatterfang deck slowly morphed into an aristocrat combo deck
I have plans on making a control, recursion, enchantress and storm deck at some point to broaden my horizons
One thing you need to get used to when playing decks you dont like Mill is being hated out.
People hate it and they will focus on you depending what you are doing.
I run both Mill and Theft and while they are fun to play people dont like it and will kill you first a lot.
You're not alone. I hate it, too.
Wreckingball is the goat
My fav color is black and for long time i dont like red, my least fav color. And for my 2nd commander deck i decide that I want to try bit more combat focused deck or aggro. So i make bria deck. Since i had 2 phase of upgrading it after like 20 games i realize i cant stop playing it and red is now my fav color. The way you try to offset weakness creatively just so interesting. Exiling card as draw, shooting people straight in their face with lightning bolt.
Sometimes forcing yourself to just try new thing is the key. Start with budget first get the feeling so its not wasted spending. And only get card that at least flexible enough to fit in random deck
I will agree with many points, but the arguement agaisn't control decks comes from strandard format. Let me explains
I used to play 1v1 standard format (60 deck 20 life etc) and control decks ALWAYS won over anything that wasn't aggro, because you only need to prevent 1 player from doing anything and you are always likely to have access to those cheap/high value counter cards or stax effect since you have 4 copies of them and blue have a very good draw options.
Now in commander, you have 3 players to consider and only have 1 copy of each card. Suddenly, that's a lot of of heavy lifting to grind a win through control. But that mindset of hating control decks is still present because of the 1v1 format.
I am a good case because it took me a long time to get rid of the "Hate control deck" mentality and understand that, in a multiplayer environment, it is a lot less impactfull.
there's a gene that makes cilantro tastes like soap?
Hey RUclips, I need some insight (if you mind reading): Im your casual gruul ramp-big creture player (Svella), but I really like control in other formants. Problem is, creature-less control forces me to run sorcery win conditions that seem hard to interact with (less interaction = anticliamtic win). I dont know if I will enjoy ending a game (that other 3 people are playing) out of nowhere by copying a deal X damage spell, or stealling all creatures. But if I dont go for this explosive wincons, there is no wincon at all in draw-go control. Maybe I one of this "plays fair magic" guys, but i will love to enjoy "fair" control that actually has a gameplan.
Maybe explosive wins dont feel that bad, idk, this conundrum has being in the back of my head for like 3 weeks, Im going bananas.
Have you tried draw go with a theft theme? The wins are still creature based and it can still be a control deck. Plus theft decks scale with the table very well
Doing this right now with a Yawgmoth aristocrats deck. Always disliked graveyard/sacrifice themes, but I want to see if thats actually true or I just had some bad experiences.
Sending this to my friend who plays grenzo
im a big fan of alternate wincons but people get upset
i also really like combat tricks, but people really hate dying to commander damage. they look at me like im an infect player after i double strike invigorate mutagenic growth them from 40
Trinket Mage doesn't like RED!? The BEST color in MAGIC?!?
@the_trinket_mage hey I thought this was a very interesting video. Any possibility you could help me out with a suggestion for something to try? Currently my decks are Azorius Control (Hylda Of the icy Crown) Boros Goad (Nelly Borca) Simic Landfall (Zimone Mystery Unraveller) and a bunch of artifact decks like tetzin the gnome champion, saheeli sun's brilliance and Oswald Fiddlebender. I wanna try something outside of my comfort zone, an archetype I don't usually play.
Heyyy I also have the gene that makes cilantro taste like soap
I'm going to get goreclaw out and start casting 7 drops
Man, how many painful dinners did it actually take your parents to believe the greens they served you REALLY tasted like soap?
Not many actually my mom is Turkish and it’s cilantro isn’t used that much so it didn’t come up too often
I built a red white reanimator deck. It is awful, I dislike boros because the lack of consistent true card draw
that whole joke about "blue mage learns about turning creatures sideways" feels a bit out of place knowing that Blue has a lot ways to tap permanents with things like enchantments or stun counters, also Blue aggro is totally a thing, just not explored often in sets because they have to reprint the same control and hand advantage spells over and over but things like Unblockable weenies, Ninjutsu, Merfolk and so on can work pretty decently for aggressive strategies.
what a throwback for me
i have always loved control, but i suffer from a curse of building control without a wincon
so when i returned to play i build Walls, because loooong back when i started playing MTG i LOVED the concept of walls, so my first commander deck was Walls
then i discovered Panglacial Wurm and how wacky its effect is and decided to build a Wurm deck
but then i started to notice
"hey, i am building aggro walls, aggro wurms, and some other decks i have in mind (Slivers or Dragons) are also aggro....how about i try to get back into control? how about i try to use the color i hate the most (Black)? and what about the wincon?" and so my Tergrid deck was born, its wincon is everybody else's wincon, and i honestly had fun building a mono-black deck, i had NO idea black has absolutely no artifact removal, it did gave me a lot of perspective of how black works
bro 😱😱
You keep on saying that -Cut a Deal is a politics card-, I don't think it means what you think it means.
-Inigo Montoya
It’s not very good as a politics card. I made a tweet about it a while ago. And a decent amount of people treat it as such so it called it on here. But I agree with you it’s not good for politics
🤔
Crapping on politics cards is such a dumb take. Politics is literally what makes those cards fun. Sometimes they may backfire, sometimes you make a lot of value, sometimes you can make friends etc. It sounds to me like you are completely missing their point. Those cards are perfect for casual format like commander.
I’m not saying anything bad about politics cards in general. I just don’t like those cards I showed in the video. So it’s an example of me using cards I don’t normally enjoy. Nothing against those cards in particular though
Stigma lasher in your mouth lol gottem
Nah, you built a Novelty deck. You love Novelty decks.
It's novel because he avoids it because he hasn't historically enjoyed it.
Combo decks are lame 🤷♂️
🤔