A trip down memory lane gives great perspective on the current state of the format. Patreon / edhdeckbuilding The T-shirt I'm wearing intotheam.com/EDHDeck promo code: EDHDeck
Nekusar the Mindrazer. Absolute terror back in the day. I don't actually think he's powercrept at all, since new Wheel effects keep getting released. But for some reason I never see him anymore.
In the past few months, swapped in Tolarian Winds, Chandra's Pyreling, Fists of Flame, Orcish Bowmasters, Bloodletter of Aclazotz, and Bloodchief Ascension to my Nekusar wheels deck. It is STILL getting goodies for the 99. Also, Underworld Breach and Kess (Dissident Mage) are pretty nice.
Titania is still my favorite commander and is my longest lasting deck. To this day it still has a high win rate. My favorite memory wit it was when I had her out, around 8 lands and someone played a board wipe, in response I played natural affinity, turned everyone's lands into creatures. I proceeded to win when it came to my turn.
I loved OG Omnath. I always packed a lot of ways to flash in creatures into the deck so if Omnath ever did get removed, I could use some of the floating green and flash him back in so he'd "catch" the mana before it disappeared
a good Omnath deck will have three things in it, ways to ramp like crazy, ways to give Omnath evasion and most importantly ways to protect him. There are so many cards you can run in the deck to keep him on the battlefield it makes him very difficult to get rid of
Yeah but back then, green didn't have too much protection besides giant growth and Regen. instant speed hexproof and indestructibility was non-existent in green.
Absolutely adore my Seton deck, but the poor old guy has been power crept over the years. He's one of the three decks along with Azami and Shirei that I've kept for years and have never disassembled, because hes a joy to pilot. Also its absolutely hilarious to drop a ritual of subdual when you've got a board full of druids.
Wort the Raidmother is my pet favorite. She is slow but can still absoutely blow up. Green token spells with ramp. She's slow to get going, but it's hilarious turtling until turn 7, then dumping 28 lands on the board, 50 creatures on the board and drawing your graveyard. Then you usually lose because everyone else has resources at that point (and I prefer winning through eg Primal Bellow over Craterhoof or Fireball shenanigan). But you get to be The Problem before you die after a few turns, and to me, that's what Commander is all about.
I think Sidisi was mainly feared during the dredge era when Sultai was the meta. I think Grixis is more the CEDH meta now. Red treasure replaced green ramp.
I play Sidisi but in a zombie tribal deck. Living death is in there but the deck is not built around it so it's a quite casual thing. Many commanders can be terrifying if you play them in a scariest way possible.
To answer the question regarding boardwipes (13:15) I'd say it depends on way too many factors. Since I play mostly go-wide decks, I rarely have more than 2 boardwipe in my decks, but I'll have a couple of fogs and protection spells instead. I am not gonna build every deck with the idea that I *need* to have all the answers to *every* kind of situation. It's just a little silly to expect everyone to have many answers to many different kind of problems. Like the red player you mentioned, what are you expecting them to add to their deck other than blasphemous act? red is terrible at effectively wiping creatures off the board...
Weirdly I have the opposite experience to demo, people back in the day played 5-7 board wipes and nowadays play less. Removal back then was just so bad/inefficient/nonexistent that it demanded board wipes in some point removal spots. Oblivion stone got to $50 because it was such an omnipresent card. Nowadays the game is so fast people complain if there are too many wipes because they just want to play fast linear decks that can’t grind late into the game. Kinda like magic zoomers and I’m a boomer in that regard
@@Lazydino59I think that board wipes were necessary when hexproof was commonplace. Then they stopped adding hexproof and went with ward, which in Commander was not that problematic, so removal was more cost effective and drawing cards was easy. Then they started just giving everything ward, so now it is sliding back to board wipes versus single target removal, because if you have to pay 4-5 to kill something, you may as well kill a lot of things for 4-5.
@@Dragon_Fyre hexproof was never as rampant as ward was. Dealing with hexproof honestly wasn’t much of a consideration for most deckbuilders. Card advantage back in those days was MUCH worse (particularly outside of blue), so board wiping was card advantage in a way. Also games were long enough you could wrath and rebuild on the same turn, whereas today games are fast enough you don’t have the mana to 6 mana wrath + cast 5 mana of spells. Also longer games meant getting deeper into your deck which meant seeing more wipes and delaying the game longer. Honestly number of wipes is somewhat unchanged over the years, when wipe stonks are high you see 4-6 and when they’re low you see 2-4. Just feels like they were more present back in the day because much longer games
Having a great time with my pod watching this. We've had (or still have) almost all commanders in this list. Wort and Seton are still out there, but we always say that considering all the power creep we've seen, Wort would cost like 4 mana now. My Seton is a druid tribal that wants to steal lands with Gilt-Leaf Archdruid and hit hard, and while it's not as streamlined as commanders are now, it's still a lot of fun. We're feeling very old now, what with product fatigue and out-of-the-box precons that are just as good (or better) than decks built from scratch. Young players have it easy nowadays (shakes fist, yells at cloud). My first deck ever was a THRAXIMUNDAR, but there's no way in hell I'd build a SEVEN-MANA COMMANDER GRIXIS deck today
Would you mind to make a CeDH version for Kozilek, the Great Distortion or perhaps for Zhulodok, void gorger in colorless? I need pretty heavy recommendations about how to make it shine or get more interactions.
You'll get a 5/3 any time a land goes from your battlefield to the graveyard. Titania doesn't care why the land went to the graveyard or if the land is no longer a land by the time it's in the graveyard (ashaya makes non-token creatures into forest lands for instance)
Yes, because you don't have to prove that there was a legal target (or there might not be a legal target), and Titania only cares that a land went from the battlefield to the graveyard.
I got the Ezuri deck with Sage of Hours and I feel like our pod is all over the place. There are commanders like Kennrith, Sliver Overlord, Prosper or Yuriko, but also Yoshimaru/Keleth aggro deck, Twelfth Doctor/Rose deck and such. So if I play against the Kennrith deck or something along those lines I don’t have a problem pulling out Exuri and take their attacks while the more casual decks develop. I win some and lose some.
I made a wort the raid mother deck about 2-3 months ago. Its a goblin tribal deck. It is definitely a scary deck, can be a bit more on the glass cannon side, but can easily kill everyone turns 6-9 though cards like like kindred summon/charge, overwhelming stampede, triumph of the hoardes, and beast master ascension. You can also draw a ton of cards from cards like cathartic reunion, big score, shamanic revelation, and rishkar's expertise. last you can easily get a ton of mana easily with stuff like harvest the seasons, brighstone ritual, seething song, and mana geyser. Ive even had boards with no creatures drop my commander and in the same turn win. my play group is definitely terrified of this deck.
I still run Rafiq, Aura/counter/removal voltron. it was my first deck i built and it's my heart of the cards deck that seems to give me exactly what i need...sometimes lol.
Good sir, thankyou for giving a shout out to Wort! I feel as though there is a place for it still cause with the mulligan changes it doesn't take much in a casual pod to find Cord of Calling and win...! ;)
Wort got to the scary level because of Vexing Shusher. That was a great way to protect your big spells and easy to tudor in green. E-Kraj - i remember these decks being fitting home for Graft creatures. deck did a lot of crazy things in a unique way back then. +1/+1 counters weren't as easy to come by then so trying to "break" +1+1 counters and gave a lot of life to unused cards. The deck got out of hand very quickly and you didnt always see it coming.
i love voltron but i agree with it sucks taking one person out and then having that time gap in between starting new games. thats why i always run essence harvest or fling effects to kill the other players quickly as well so that we can start a new game relatively fast.
I look at Experiment Kraj and I think it's why I love Volrath, the Shapestealer so much. I went for it for a bit of nostalgia (and didn't want to build mono-black again), and holy moly, it's wild what I can get up to, especially when I borrow opponents' creatures.
I think a commander’s shelf life is important; a commander that is in the top 50 on edhrec for over 10 years is too broken for casual imo. If you love the commander, even if power crept, then that’s the sweet spot imo. Naturally, legends should either be very narrow/focused, higher costed if inherently stronger, or be janky af but more aggressively costed. Id rather the 99 cards not get power crept so much, but have legends be the way to change edh and make for more variety and unique builds For example; sac deck in orzhov love teysa but there’s ilas il kor at 2 mana that is less good but still does orzhov aristocrat things. Make the commanders less efficient but more easily cast, or make a commander high cmc with a narrow way to reduce cost down.
Wort is probably one of my earliest builds. My theme was a heavy on transmutation spells into token generator creators. Selvala's Stampede is extra busted with her
Sidisi is a cEDH Commander for Food Chain. You gain infinite mana through Food Chain, then cast Sidisi to mill your library and then Dread Return a Lab Maniac with the Zombie tokens.
Yeah, recently lost a game I thought I had sealed up pretty well thanks to Ezuri + Sage combo I didn't know was a thing. Gunning for the Ezuri player first every time now, can't risk the 2 card combo lol.
someone I follow on Moxfield has a Wort storm deck, with the landfall minotaur that gives you extra combats and ashaya which turns your creatures into lands
Sidisi dredge was a real problem. It's a deck that was just incredibly consistent, and would absolutely run away with the game if you didn't have graeyard hate. Even if you did, sidisi can survive its graveyard getting exiled, even multpile times. This is a time when colors mattered way more when it came to the strength of a commander, and this was in the best 3 colors. You got the benefit of playing literally all of the best cards in the format, so you could always ignore sidisi and curve out. And the self mill aspect essentially gave you a second hand available to you through reanimation and eternal witness effects. It was very easy to, by turn 4, have a board state that required board wipes, and cards like golgari grave troll and dread return often meant that multiple board wipes and graveyard hate cards were required to beat the average sidisi player. It was one of those commanders that created an archenemy turn 0.
So I play an omnath deck and as long as there is mana in my pool removal won't work because I play a large suite of snakeskin veil/heroic intervention effects. I almost always have one or two on opening hand.
I still have my sidisi deck, it's not fast but it's pretty resilient to getting the graveyard exiled. Certainly not the strongest deck I have but it's up there. Also used to have an experiment kraj deck I often think about it every time I add counter manipulation into a deck, I have built a lot of counters matters decks in the intervening years.
My group of friends and I all run 2 board wipes as an unwritten rule. We have seen a significant decrease in play time, and tbh, I think games have been more enjoyable. Everyone gets to do their thing, and if someone is running away with the game then they are just archenemy or the game ends and we play again. The only problem I would say we have is a grid lock with board that are all big and no one wants to make the first move and then get a crack back that takes them out. Still, I think grid lock games wrap up faster than board wipe games.
I have a wort spellslinger/Storm deck and probably one of my favorite decks. It's so simple and I don't run any of the big staples and protection. Ive won easily on turn 4 and usually when I start chaining and copying spells my buddies tell me you win lol! Wort is still to this day is strong and scary.
Sram: I have a smilar strat with mono Green storm around Nylea, Keen-Eyed, by tossing her out and gaining value out of playing a bunch of 0 and 1 drop artifact creatures for free. Wort, the Raidmother: One of my favorite decks, but one of my least used because my strat with her is Gruul Ponza. the theme is all about copying land destruction spells to stall the board and ramp into huge creatures (It that Betrays, Pathrazer of Ulamog, Giant Adephage, Crush of Worms for example)
In my decks with white , I make sure that I have a Sunblast Angle in the deck for board wipe . I think it's one of the best board wipes in the game , maybe a little expensive to cast but definitely one of the best board wipes .
Wort is still viable. She actually has so much support. Her mana cost is the only bad thing about her. But her effect is so good. You can quickly get out mana tripplers and doublers and hit the whole table with big fireballs.
I'm building a mono white banding deck and I'm looking for a janky commander to head it. I'm leaning towards Konda, lord of eganjo but I'm up for suggestions.
Sram certainly does not stand out among current equipment or aura Commanders. Boros and Azorius have far better and more innovative options for that archetype (even mono white does). Selesnya is even more viable mixing Aura with Enchantress if you really want card draw as a focus.
I feel an old Commander that has very much fallen off is Karador, Ghost Chieftan. Seems like too much graveyard removal to make his investment worth it. Which saddens me, as he was my very first commander (still have the card).
I think these are all less spooky these days when we are looking back on how the format used to be. I bet if someone built around those very same commanders with all the new cards/decent reprints, some could still get a little spicy. Nekusar, imo, is still a very spicy commander. He used to run the show, but if you build him right, it gets nuts.
I've got a Experiment Kraj deck but I intentionally keep out as many infinite as possible. I th9i have one or two but they require 3 or 4 cards and I can't tutor for any of them. I focus more on value and using my opponent's activated abilities which means I have to put a lot of focus on getting mana of any type. It definitely makes the deck building process more fun than if he had a "you may use mana of any color" line of text.
My list would prob be way different tbh. Azami and Arcum Dagsson back with partial Paris mulligans were notoriously powerful. Rafiq and uril and zur were also incredibly scary to play against. Uril and Zur still are pretty terrifying nowadays though but people don’t play them anymore tho so idk if they’d count. Edric and Erzuri (both ezuri’s) demanded board wipe by turn 6 or lose. Most of your list was pretty strong but none of those I’d really be fearful of more than any other deck at the table like a arcum or edric
Progenitus, child of Alara, maelstrom wanderer, meliria, Mishra Artificer, jhoira of the ghitu, teferi of zalfir, obzedot ghost council, memnarch, niv mizzet the firemind, animar Mishra was one of the first cascade-like creatures.
Sidisi: Graveyard hate has become so much easier for people to slot into any deck, decks that rely on the graveyard to win feel like too much of a gamble.
Should also be said Kraj would essentially steal your opponents cards just because it doesn't specify, "Creatures you control" so yes, definitely a bloody menace.
I love how Wort is on the list like she still isn't pop off sepllslinger queen. I constantly rebuild her and break her apart cause she's STILL TOO STRONG.
As someone who had a wort deck for about 10years now I dont feel like she ever was that scary. Sure it just might be that i build her as a big mana token deck but even back then she never felt broken and I dont rhink i was targeted specifically for playing her either.
Wort the Raidmother is just a casket of powder, especially now with the many treasure generators in sorcery/instant. Although, you don't even need to play her to make her teryffying, that art is just pure nightmare fuel...
I still have a Seton deck he's one of my cedh decks an I get targeted very fast when I use him cause I love gaining control of everyone's lands for the whole game lol
I find the statement that people didn´t play boardwipes weird. In the meta I started to play in 5+ Boardwipes were the norm. People splashed white just to play Wrath of god sometimes. What made Rafiq and Titania scary is that they could come in under boardwipes and win. Rafiq by equiping boots, Titania with instantspeed sacc outlets for lands. Cool to hear how different metas can be
Exactly. Lightning greaves is the reason for all of that. Everyone was running it. It was the sole reason a lot of these Voltron commanders were terrifying. Lightning greaves made board wipes and edicts necessary. I quit magic right when hexproof started to appear around innistrad and Kahn's. Came 3 years ago and hexproof was more common but not as common as ward.
Whenever someone combos off, my group usually writes them off as the winner, and then we continue playing a 3-player game with the same board states because combos are buzzkills for me.
She still is terrifying to those who under predict how fast she can get online when you have all the best landfall tools and premium green fetch lands and non basic power houses like dark depths, gaea's cradle, strip mine. Crucible of worlds becomes the most terrifying card with her in play. We have about 5-6 of those effects now. If anything, she's definitely more consistent than she's ever been.
Ezuri was the first deck i built that i considered too powerful. Too easy to get infinite mana, card draw, extra turns, tokens, etc. All it took was a Selvala, umbral mantle, and Urza, Lord High. And it was stupid easy to tutor for those combo pieces too
Most of the commanders you listed have never been super popular, and also have never been really even good, let alone terrifying outside of hyper casual kitchen table stuff. I expected this list to be like Nekusar, Kaalia, Narset, Edgar Markov, etc. Commanders that actually demanded immediate answers.
I like it in the 99 for Narset, Enlightened Exile to keep opponents on the defense while I build up an alpha strike. Double prowess and double-strike means my opponents have to keep something to throw in its way each turn or risk getting wrecked in one hit as well as re-think attacks with anything non evasive that they don’t want to lose. It can just be a fun creature.
I use Shu-Yun in the 99 but I play Narset, Enlightened Exile as the Commander. The only reason I might prefer Shu-Yun is politics (“attack someone with your Commander, and I will boost its power and give it double-strike so that you can kill them with Commander damage”). You can just have a duelist heritage though for doing that which is free and you can do it every turn, so sell weapons to both sides of a conflict.
I suspect the fear of Sidisi comes partly from confusing her for the other Sidisi. People hearing talk of a super strong Sidisi deck and not realising they were talking about the other one. Because I definitely remember hearing people talking about how good the mono black one is, but never the sultai one. At least that's my experience
Sidisi, Brood Tyrant can be played very fairly -- she's not like Stella Lee where she will combo out on accident. However, she's a combo engine in the command zone and there are several cards that just allow her to mill your entire deck and then resolve the Thassa's Oracle for the win. She's usually not scary because players want to play Sultai zombie tribal or something.
