Cards We Insta-Cut | EDHRECast 273 

The cards I end up cutting immediately are ones that I put in because I got too deep in the weeds of Magical Christmasland, and how theoretically powerful cards are when I have particular board states and fancy interactions. When I get them they come out by themselves, and then... just do nothing. Now I have a rule of synergy-seeking that any card in a deck has to be good when it's just by itself, unless it also has the potential to instantly end the game without much other support.

Talking about win-more cards was brief, but could that be flushed out into a full episode in the future? What defines a win-more card, what some of the most played ones are (and commanders that could actually use them outside of win-more situations), etc.

Lidless gays was a better dad joke that the vegetable ones, I hate to break it to you Matt

Probably the smoothest challenge the stats segway I've ever seen tbh, props to Matt

Lmao that lidless gaze joke made me laugh way too much

I've started actively cutting cards from my decks that i don't want to play against. Trying to be the change i wish to see in other people

Fierce Guardianship. Not because it was bad, but I felt bad casting it. Even among "free" counterspells, it is TOO free.

Important to remember that these experiences are personal. I just played a game yesterday where for about 10 straight turns in a row, my opponents cast two spells per turn. I know because one player had Mangara and was triggering it every turn. I remember thinking " man i wish i had a Monologue Tax right now"

I focus on the FEELING I get when I draw the card in context. Relative to each deck, I imagine how it'll feel for me to see a card in my opener, in midgame, or late game when I'm top-decking. And however that makes me FEEL is how I determine those final cuts.

9:03 Yes! Vesuvan Drifter has a very important place in Kenessos, Priest of Thassa. It is an all star in that deck! Especially with brainstorm/worldy tutor shenanigans to set your top card to be a huge sea monster. You can worldly tutor up a spawning kraken for instance, attack with drifter (now a spawning kraken with flying) and then activate kenessos before combat damage to get two 9/9 krakens. It is HILARIOUS (for you).

I cut Expropriate from my Yuriko list when I first played it and realized it would never do the cool thing of taking extra turns/permanents - people would just scoop.

I thought the exact same thing about leyline immersion as well matt

Monologue Tax: I have a group hug deck that, among other things, gives everyone extra mana and draws on their turn. Monologue Tax is amazing, because everyone has the resources to play extra spells, so I’m coming back to my turn with several treasures, which gets me to my win condition bombs very quick. It also helps that my pod has up to 6 people, so having an extra five mana when my turn hits is always nice.

Monologue tax is great! It’s never removed like Smothering Tithe and make like 5-10 mana each game

I once cut an entire deck because it was far too strong for my playgroup. Sleep well sweet Elsha of the Infinite.

Great episode, and the Lidless Gaze joke was perfection!

My favorite cunning rhetoric moment was when I countered a friends spell with memory lapse, he got mad attacked me thus giving me the card I countered. It was the perfect moment for my sphinx deck

I actually had a positive experience with monologue tax last night, In my Marneus Calgar deck. With my commander in play it generated five treasure tokens, and drew five cards. I bought a pack shortly after ended up pulling a Lotho and swapped it out immediately after

Monologue Tax is the version of Smothering Tithe that doesn't make people hate you. When I see a player use Monologue over Smothering I respect them. When I see a Smothering tithe I immediately try to hate them out of the game 'cause they are up to

More in the vein of Matt’s first example: Worldslayer equipped to Zurgo Helmsmasher not only did the Worldslayer return to the box never to be seen again, but the whole deck was deconstructed.

Monologue Tax could be pretty neat with a commander that lets each player cast a spell for free repeatedly or something like that.

At first glance I thought Kaho, Minamo Historian was bonkers for my spellslinger deck. I found it was just too slow for what I was wanting to do, so it got cut after trying it once.

My instacut was Boros Battleshaper. I did not need to deal with identifying two targets every battle step. Loved it’s performance but no thank you to the mental upkeep.

The discussion of Vodalian Wave Knight I've also had with similar cards. I now have my own deckbuilding rule - the deck either makes token or it makes counters but it doesn't do both

I love these observations because for example: Restoration of Eiganjo is one of my best feeling cards in my Ephara, God of the Polis deck, where it ends up doing just about everything I could ever want it to: hit landdrops, ramp or reanimate key pieces, enter later as a creature and make tokens for even more ephara triggers? (evenhelps me with rule of law effects that are fairly common in my playgroup). All while at the same time it was a good cut for you.

Best comment from Matt in this episode : cut the cards that makes you “win more” 👌🏻

Thanks for making these videos! I love the analytical, but still very light-hearted and fun atmosphere that you create, when you are talking with each other about the various cards. And I learn something new with each video. Thanks guys and gals!

InstaCut maskwood myself from my minsc & boo timeless heroes deck. The prospect of card draw on any of my minsc flings was cool, but... There has been games where if i minsc flung my biggest creature to close out a game, i would have draw out my deck if it were a hamster.

I put a monologue tax in a custom commander deck that I based on my DnD Bard, the card is meant as a "I'm the one who is suppose to be talking" flavor card in the deck, and maybe it's just the people i normally play with, but that card has produced me so many treasure tokens. I find that people want to do multiple things in a turn, and making me one treasure doesn't feel punishing enough for my opponent, so it ends up pretty low on the removal priority.

Vesuvan drifter, as vesuvans are in general, is made for cloning decks. Works great in those.

Battle Angels of Tyr is one I had to take out after my first game with it. It was just a lot of work to keep track of everyone's hands, land base, life totals and etc to see what triggers I get.

I moved Maskwood Nexus from the party deck to the mind flayers deck. It's kind of horror typal, kind of mill, kind of reanimate/stealer deck, so the Nexus (and Arcane Adaptation as backup) helps by turning the creatures you steal into horrors.

Most combos I play are play once and then cut. I like knowing they are in the deck and I never force them with tutors, I just wait for them to come up naturally. I like to switch it up once something has been pulled off. The one card I have removed immediately from a deck is Kormus Bell from Toxrill.

I’d bring up an example, but honestly I have so many that I can’t pick just one. Any painful quandary effect, dockside extortionist, monologue tax, and many many phyrexian and ashnod’s altars. None of them hit right with the table. Either too powerful or did very very little. That doesn’t even include all the entire decks that I’ve built and hated and decided to cannibalize. The more it happens, the less frequent it becomes and I love it! The decks were still fun, and the cards will almost always have another use.

Joey’s joke was a banger! Well done Joey 😂

I'm glad you started the video with a card that wasn't underpowered, but instead just annoying to use at a table. There are so many objectively good cards that I don't use in my decks for the exact same reason: I don't want to waste everyone's time while I try to do complicated math.

I play a lot of counter/token heavy decks, and switched to a new system where I keep a tray of those glass gaming stones (half marbles) of different colors, and I just quickly grab and drop them into play during my turn instead of trying to find token cards or upticking dice. Rifling through tokens and spinning dice or upticking spin counters is SO slow. Instead, say Cathars' Crusade triggers, I will very quickly drop a stone on each of my creatures. I use green stones for +1/+1 counters to match my green dice. And it takes almost no mental attention to do, so I can continue taking other game actions while absent-mindedly dropping stones. I just need to grab the right color stones, and tell my play group what the colors mean (like Red is Treasures, Black is Clues, Blue is Time Counters). Then AFTER my turn, I'll clean up my board and replace stones with proper tokens and dice. This greatly speeds up my turns and makes my board state clear to everyone.

A recent one of mine is Horn of Gondor in my tokens deck. I realised quickly that even though my commander (queen allenal) makes the etb better I need more humans. I also agree regarding Cathar's crusade. I cast it as an overrun, otherwise it takes forever.

I really liked the idea of including Brindle Shoat in one of my token decks (without sack outlets mind you) after having some great experiences experimenting with Reef Worm. Turns out neither the spawning Boar did much when board wiped nor did it prevent people from attacking for chipdamage due to wanting to pop it for bigger stuff, was for some reason more disappointed then I should have been^^'

Hey Joey can I recommend Ellyn Harbreeze, Busybody. It seems like it might be good to replace Bennie Bracks. I have always been impressed with how it plays in my deck. At worst it’s an idol of oblivion which is something usually good in a token deck best case you get to search half your deck for the cards you want at that moment and are ready to press for the win. Plus no one knows the card so it has no threat level to the table. It can be a little slow waiting for summoning sickness and only once a turn cycle but I love the card and think it is underrated for token strategy’s

10:58 actually playtest the card before you commit to purchasing it. Wish id done that before i bought a Savannah for my Orzhov deck...

lidless gaze every time I have played has been amazing. The important part is you slap it down when you haven't yet played your land for turn. Easily from my experience each time I've cast it, it's been draw 3-4 cards.

Maskwood Nexus is such a great card in my Admiral Beckett Brass deck. It makes sure everything her pirates pressgang able to grant their bonuses to my field, it also makes sure that everything I have counts as a pirate as well so I can keep pillaging.

Attempt?! That Joey, was absolute fireee🔥💯😂

Bothersome Quasit is in my Blim deck. Great for keeping threats away from me and getting attacks through.

Bravo Joey, amazing Segue into Challenge the stats :D

Those "oops" cary over cards was from my aggressive mill deck. I now run captain N'gathrod. It reanimates stuff from opponents graves at the end of turn, and my cary over cards from the prevoius version was Leyline of the void😂😂😂

Joey I’m only thirty seconds in, get out of my head, I also thought of Sam and the potatoes and couldn’t get it out of my head before you even said it 😂

Wrenn and six was one I thought was amazing in modern but didn't fit in my hasazon desert tribal deck.

I added leyline immersion to my Kalamax deck and it's amazing; protection, mana, tapping Kalamax at will, it does it all.

I have Restoration of Eiganjo in my Kykar, Wind's Fury deck. It definitely has a lot more value if you aren't playing green, as it lets you find a plains out of your deck.. then discard it and put it onto the field from your graveyard. white land ramp is real... but tom bombadil has access to green doing it better. it also recovers my Impact Tremors and other low mana synergy pieces if they get killed

Hallowed Moonlight is the one for me, i drew this card, looked at my battlefield and saw that i was playing a reanimator deck and imediately realized, that card could force me to not make any other play on the turn i cast it, then i realized that half my decks are reanimators and the other half are tokens, so none of my decks could support this card

40:08 I feel it, also I decided to add an enchantment that can give haste, now my dance of the mane has became one my victory condition.

Burakos, party of 4 with Folk Hero sounds like a great deck. Really makes me want to build it

in my edgar deck I had a simiar situation to the vodalian wave knight. I just ended up getting +1/+1 counter dice, and they make everything SOO much easier!! Would definitely recommend

Dude, cutting Vodalian Wave-Knight? Starting the episode with a stab to my heart already. It's one of my favorite cards in my Sidar Jabari deck. I'd recommend playing in a deck not focused on tokens, that way you only need to put dice on actual cards, instead of tracking different tokens with dice for both token quantity and counter quantity.

I will fight you on this Matt: Monologue Tax is a great card. I use it along with Mangara the Diplomant in my Darien, King of Kjeldor list and i get insane value over the course of a game. I get that its lukewarm compared to the insanity that is Tithe but I think youre overselling how mid the card is, when it is there for consistent value.

I played Insurrection once in my Karlach, Fury of Avernus, extra combats, deck. It was such a feels-bad moment for the whole table that I cut it. 😮

Every vampire in the Edgar precon over 3cmc, except Malakir Bloodwitch and Drana who has her own deck, have been in a shoebox from day one. I pondered Sangromancer and Bloodsworn Steward for my less min-maxed Maid of Dishonor deck, but there still were behind like 8 other vampires who didn't make the cut.

37:00 Sadly, I actually cut Bennie from my Regna & Krav deck. The way the triggers line up means that Bennie doesn't see the tokens created from Regna, and there are not many other ways in the deck to consistently make tokens on other player's turns (yes, ophiomancer is a thing though). I played against an Ephara deck recently and we got absolutely buried in value. I put it in Kykar now, haven't drawn it but curious to see how it will do.

Lol.... River song from my temur doctor who exile deck. Drawing from the bottom of the library is such a pain if you don't build around it. Great commander bad in the 99

I had not paid attention to Vesuvan Drifter when it came out. Seeing it here, I seriously might add it to my The Ever-Changing 'Dane deck. The deck is pretty light on EtB triggers and has lots of big creatures with death triggers. Ideally I'd use this card with Volrath's Stronghold, but it has a pretty strong chance of just being a strong inclusion in general. Could be worth the slot.

Not only does Magda care about Dwarves, but Nexus also allows you to search for any creature as if it were a dragon

Monologue tax is a cheaper version of smothering tithe for players who want treasures but can't afford the $50 card, or who don't want to run the heavily taxing card that makes them the threat. I personally have one in isshin, and it doesn't do much early on, but it gains a bit of momentum later.

On the Leyline Immersion challenge: I'm also not seeing it in enough of Raggadragga deck. Extra ramp, protection and +2/+2. Having him tap for 5 mana also makes him an appealing target for his own trigger to get himself into Commander Damage 1 shot range.

Love Bothersome Quasit. I run it I'm my dragons approach deck because I can make any flyers just unable to block my dragons

Vesuvan Drifter seems cool in something like Satoru who has all these huge creatures with combat effects like blightsteel, ancient blue dragon especially in conjunction with vamp tutor, scheming symmetry etc.

Lidless gaze lets you play lands so even worst case scenario you secure your next two land drops (assuming you play this without land drop first)

I play Bothersome Quasit in my Abaddon (storm, cascade, copy, spellslinger)

15:53 omg I love joey so muchhhhh. Icon. Absolute icon

I’ve had cunning rhetoric work as designed many times, but my playgroups had lots of “hit you for 4” instead of alpha strikes or instant deaths.

Leyline Immersion is absolutely nutty in Henzie. You're never attacking with him anyway, and it makes you able to add a 6 drop to your plays every single turn.

Yes. Tokens or Counters, choose your stress. Choosing both is just self-defeating on board state management.

Leyline Immersion was my consideration for najeela, but the restriction was a downer. Could be good in derevi, jodah or sisay.

Alternative argument for dance of the manse: at ×=5 (which might be its best mode anyway) it still gets duplicate board wipes plus multiple reanimators.

I have only cast alms collector a couple of times but, one time was against a Jace the mind sculptor +0 and it felt glorious

Leyline immersion in my Gwenna, Eyes of Gaea deck is very fun

Loved the episode! CMDR Central "the other podcast" had episodes about "homework cards" from newer sets and a few weeks later they'd report whether those cards proved to be good or not. Do you think you could make a series in a similar vein?

I can understand that Maskwood Nexus would possibly have a "better" card in your specific deck. That said. In an environment with a lot of removal it can very much be the clutch card you want. The "land drowned" insurance and the board wipe insurance as well as just the extra body against "Wide" decks insurance really should not be undervalued.

The cards that always catch me are ones that have some very strong upsides, but their bonus ends up being a little too niche. Its why I can never find room for Anafenza of the Foremost.

21:58 Maskwood Nexus is the Chromatic Lantern for creature types.

Leyline Immersion in kalamax is also so good!

My picks: -) Angel of Vitality: my Angel tribal deck is not focused on lifegain and she pumps herself only; Righteous Valkyrie is better in any way -) Eradicator Valkyrie: both a monoblack deck and a Orzhov deck are focused on tokens, sacrifice and reanimate; she only provides lifelink and a small edict. Cut -) Kazandu Tuskcaller: my elves-powered big creatures deck cannot siphon so much mana into a so fragile non-elf slow token spawner. 1 copy just dor fun. -) Echo Mage: way too much mana for way to few benefits in my Wizard-heavily-based deck, focused on wizard control and milling upon drawing or with some instant/sorcery -) Brimstone Mage: similar to Echo Mage. 15 mana for a non-Goblin Lightning Crafter -) Magus of the Coffers: in my monoblackde k mentioned above, I have too much non swamp lands and not enough money to buy an urborg, so by the time I can drop a 5-6 mana ramper (?) I no longer need that much mana, since all other pieces are already in play. Nyx lotus works just fine

I cut Shivan Harvest from my Purphoros deck. I really wanted to hate on nonbasic lands but I never had the time to invest Mana because Purphoros is always public enemy number one and I don't have the turns or Mana to take apart my opponents lands when for the cost of casting the Harvest and using it I can cast Ruination and make people scoop.

Maskwood nexus is amazing with Umbris. That horror that exiles the top card of an opponent's library every time a horror dies. So with Umbris out, play Maskwood nexus, you play phyrexian altar and you cast a gravecrawler. Now you have won the game, because: the maskwood nexus turns the Gravecrawler into a horror and it turns Umbris into a zombie, so you sac the crawler to the altar, get a black and recast it over and over and over from the grave exiling every card in your opponents' libraries and you simply pass the turn and win.

Just so you know i'm going to build into a deck, an Alms Collector, Bennie Bracks, Zoologist. Howling Mine, Black Vice, Prosperity, Vedalken Orry, Monologue Tax, Smothering Tide, Maskwood Nexus (With a way to untap it every turn) just to annoy Joey. (*In spirit if never in person)

I mean, white isn't great for it, but any kinda hug or hand punishing deck that encourages or forces your opponents to draw (Nekusaur, howling mine, etc) it can be useful, but granted, white is rarely the color for that. particularly as most of the poignant examples are grixis. Edit- forgot to mention I was talking about monologue tax... still not the best as there are far more useful spells/enchantments that will trigger more than once Edit 2: Benny would be good in Ghired (Prolly mispelled, the populate pre-con commander in Naya)

If you play Fevered Suspicion with Prosper, Tome Bound out, you're going to get 7 treasures which kind of makes Fevered Suspicion cost 1 mana. There are times when we play 5 or 6-man pods which makes it even better. It's so fun to resolve.

I think crafty cut purse would actually work well in an orvar the all-form deck

Leyline Inmersion + Rona, Herald of Invasion in a Jodah, the Unifier deck ... that's the type of friend I have...

Love you guys!

I tried Arcbound Crusher exactly once in my Urza, Chief Artificer deck - a 0/0 Artifact Creature with Trample, Modular 1, and Whenever an artifact enters the battlefield, it gets another counter. I thought this would be an effective second-of Kappa Cannoneer.... It's not. It dies to a sneeze & a 4-mana 1/1 is just not enough.

Alms Collector is particularly good against wheels. And with wheels, but I can't think of a commander that can run both.

I have some examples of cards that I cut... or at least should have cut... or some I just didn't put in at all, because they just aren't fun to play against. In my Grand Warlord Radha deck, attacking is primarily done to generate mana rather than deal combat damage. I was running Aggravated Assault until very recently, and every time I drew it I was like "this card either does nothing (if I have fewer than 5 creatures, it spends more mana than th3 extra attack generates)... or it is a single card that comes out of nowhere to do infinite damage and end the game in a rather unsatisfying way for everyone (if I have 5 or more creatures, it pays for itself as many times as I want it to). There is no middle ground, no use case where it's a fun card. It's either terrible and I'm afraid to put it out at all, practically dead, or busted. So out it went (finally). And then I have a Vaevictus Asmadi, the Dire deck that I was considering the card Varragoth, Bloodsky Sire for. Vaevictus has an attack trigger to have each player replace a permanent on their field (that I get to pick for everyone) with the top card of their library if it's a permanent (unlike Chaos Warp, there is no shuffle before hand). and of course, I'm running top of library manipulation (Sylvan Library is actually a synergy card instead of just value!). But Varragoth does that too well, he has vampiric tutor as his boast ability. So it would mean I always have exactly what I want entering off of Vaevictus' trigger... usually starting with Asceticism. Which just isn't fun for anyone.

Tergrid in Nekusar deck. Casted once, had the fun with wheeling. Then the god of salt was removed (pretty much a win).

Vesuvan drifter should be better (probably still not great) in kenessos for example. Cuz it will at least let you turn it into big creature with flying for the turn. And if you dont find top deck manipulation cards yet, turn 3 vesuvan would let you know if you should use kenessos's ability when turn 4 comes around. And shapeshifter would make it stick through a whelming wave i think. Maybe ill throw it in

Tbf Vodalian wave knight is easier to track because it doesn't trigger every time a creature enters, so making a bunch of creatures doesn't have the same "ok they all enter with x +1/+1 counters where x is the number of creatures you make"

I don't understand how it was so hard for Matt to get Treasures from Mon Tax? I see people only cast a single spell on their turns almost never. 2+ spells is far and above par for the course. And if you're not getting Treasures from it, if it's cause your opponents are going out of their way to not cast extra spells, then it's still helping you out by slowing them down.

Nothing rhymes better than Yeet and.... Skeet 😆💀

How about Leyline Immersion on Raggadragga?! 😃 There's where I have mine.