The Most Popular Companions in Commander | EDHRECast 111 

It's not fair that you all have such good quarantine hair! Love the content.

I’d like to challenge the stats on Scheming Symmetry in Gonti, Lord of Luxury. If you cast it then Gonti on the same player, at worse it’s a 1 mana demonic tutor, at best, when you make a deal, it’s 1 mana search for two cards. So good!

The intro music is tied to a pleasant memory in my brain. I dont know what, but it makes me happy.

I've been brewing with Jegantha in my Ur-Dragon deck. I lost a bunch of dragon synergies with Lathliss, Crux of Fate, Scourge of Valkas and a few more. To replace those, I now included stuff like Maelstrom Nexus/Archangel/Wielder to go in a more "cheat stuff into play" direction. And there are still a lot of good dragons left, too. The list feels a lot more exciting this way! Also, I just wanted to say that I just discovered this podcast a few weeks ago and have been really enjoying it! The "challenging the stats" segment is my favorite part. :)

This should be revisited in a year to see whats what. Maybe in a couple year.

I just got my preordered Zirda today and needed to cover its ears for the end of this video. I intend to snuggle her to death, and I built a Kenrith deck just for her to companion (though I’ve yet to post it online). Haven’t play tested it yet because pandemic, but I have faith!

Possible Challenge the Stats: Rofellos's Gift. 78 decks TOTAL on EDHREC. Sure, enchantress decks have all kinds of ways to get stuff back but being able to get the cast triggers again is relevant.

I am working on a Brokkos-Keruga deck. Great podcast as always. Have a fantastic day folks.

i think the farier way to evaluate popularity of a companion card is sum their apperance as companion , commander and as 99.

I really don’t understand why Zirda is on the bottom. Looks so much fun to me to build around this! Lots of opportunities to go nuts as companion (and commander)

Horde of Notions with Kaheera, 5 colour Elemental tribal is the Companion deck I was planning to build!

Love your show!

mentor of the meek + shielded by faith is the combo people run I assume since if your playing Siona your main goal is infinite soldiers

Looking towards building Vial Smasher + Ikra Shidiqui with Obosh as a companion - access to green gives us some better ramp and having access to two 5 cmc cards from the start is nice for Vial Smasher.

I've actually brewed sultai Sidisi/Gyruda on a budget and it has become the bane of my playgroup

I’ve been working on putting together a Niv-Mizzet Reborn deck and I toyed with the idea of using Jegantha as a companion. The problem I have is there are a lot of cards I want to use that while they are two colors for Niv, they also have two mana symbols of one of those colors. Time Wipe for example, but also quite a few of the two color split cards from the different Ravnica sets as well.

Commander's Quarters posted a Kenrith Cycling deck with Zirda as companion that seemed super fun.

I had assumed Zirda would be #1, so watching this with the descending order was super-weird. I thought, "Surely Zirda will be first. It's infinite by itself with Grim Monolith or Basalt Monolith. It synergizes beautifully with some already excellent cards, like Staff of Domination and Walking Ballista. It works alongside good commanders like Sliver Queen and Kenrith. So it might not be as crazy as it threatened to be in Legacy, but Zirda is still the bomb." And then... "Oh, #1 is Kaheera, of course. Not surprising. Tribal decks are popular and that thing works with like a zillion different Tribal-theme decks. I forgot to account for that. Kaheera is totally #1, and then Zirda would be #2 behind it..." "So #2 is Jegantha? I'd have thought the color identity would be an issue there, but I guess five-color decks are popular. And ruling out double pips doesn't cost much, so it just fits into most of those decks anyway. Still, Zirda should be next..." "Really? Keruga at #3? Its restriction seems much harsher than Zirda's and for less payoff. This surprises me. Puzzling, but that Keruga beat Zirda, really." "Umori? What? No. Fake news! This can't be right. Umori beat Zirda? Umori is like the worst one of these. What did I miss? Alright, I did forget that Kethis existed and I guess I can see how that might seem like a fun kind of deckbuilding challenge. 'Oops, All Legendary Creatures.' Ha ha, very funny. I find it baffling that this would beat out Zirda as a companion." "Gyruda also beat Zirda? What is going on here? Where's this data coming from? Are these all troll builds? This can't be right..." "Oh look, Obosh is also somehow ahead of Zirda. I'm over it though, you know. Only odd converted mana costs and lands. I mean, no problem, right? I don't even care anymore. Have fun not being able to even, or whatever. People make strange choices. Zirda is criminally underplayed, presumably next-to-last right before Lurrus, which can only be used as a companion with two commanders." "Oh. Well, OK then. I give up."

I have Umori ad a companion to Chevil and use creatures with deathtouch, ponhets and good etb effects that sac/kill creatures on entry.

Current brew for Obosh as a companion = Nekusar + wheeling = shenanigans :D

Use Keruga, the Macrosage as a companion in a Pir/Toothy deck.

Judith, the Scourge Diva Relentless Rats Deck with Obosh as Companion.

Made a Ludevig/Vialsmasher deck with Obosh and it's pretty crazy

Lots of the NIv-Mizzet "want to hit" are double pips, it's hard to cut everything that you'd want here since most multi-color board wipes you'd be looking at are WWx.

I'm so surprised about Zirda tbh. Like it seems nuts with Breya, that deck was already combo nuts, let alone the zirda basalt manalith infinite mana combo. And starting with a combo piece on the board as a 9th card is bonkers.

I feel like in standard mono red is still better than mono red obosh. Do you guys have decklists that prove me wrong?

Roons blink spells are mostly two mana(Teferis Time Twist, flicker, sirens ruse, flicker of fate, turn to mist, otherworldly journey etc)so I wouldn’t wanna sacrifice that.

I'm surprised Umori isn't seeing some play in Karador and Nethroi lists. I've been playing Umori as a Companion in a Nethroi Brawl list and it's good (not great, but a lot of fun). I would think Karador would be the best place for Umori because the deck already wants creature version of a lot of spells.

Love the show, guys!!! Thanks so much! QUESTION: Any reason why we can no longer find or view dozens of old episodes on EDHRec.com or on RU-vid! Many of them are now Missing In Action! (They were there before.....Now gone!....I was going back & listening in order from Episode #1 through to today....and then a few weeks ago MANY of them inexplicably disappeared! Russian Hackers??? Please advise....)

Mentor of the meek is in there because people have it so they put it in. If they had access to other enchantress cards they'd run them.

Once people start building Mitch's Kenrith Cycling re-animator deck, Zirda won't be in last place anymore.

Maybe Yorion is good with Roon of the Hidden Realm. Please bring a special about Zirda! I made a Kenrith- Zirda Deck and it's really nice.

Well... I checked my Sisay deck and Jegantha would be horrible for how I've built. I'd have to pull out 2 of my only legend combos that Sisay can grab all the pieces for and Kamahl's Druidic Vow... Vow is just so powerful in the deck I don't understand why anyone would want to run a little mana production over it.

Am I the only one that like alot of the companions in the 99?

Question what about the blue white

As a mostly commander player the companion mechanic doesn't bug me since the requirements are really difficult to meet most of the time. In 60 cards formats it is pretty broken

I won't be running Kaheera in my Arahbo deck tbh (well maybe in the 99 but not as a companion). I would have to cut Stoneforge Mystic, Sun Titan, Avacyn, Angel of Hope, Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite, and Sigarda, Host of Herons... Does not feel worth the trading those 5 for Kaheera imo. It would be cool to run a companion in one of my decks but the only other deck that wouldn't need to change much would be putting Jegantha in my Sliver Queen deck and I would still need to cut Mana Echoes and Eternal Witness so again it doesn't feel worth it. I mean the deck had to have enough ramp and fixing to run well before Jegantha came out so it is just not that necessary and a 5 cmc mana dork is just super meh in commander imo. I feel like if I want a companion deck I'd have to make one from scratch and that too does not really feel worth it as it isn't like a commander that you can re-cast. I don't know, just my 2 cents. *Edit* A note on what you mentioned about Umori. I think the main reason Umori is showing up in silvers deck is specific to The First Sliver and Sliver Hivelord in that those two sliver commanders in particular (Sliver Legion as well to some extent) can really benefit from only running slivers as it let's them have an indestructible board or cascade for ages (or get really big in Legions case). On the other hand Sliver Overlord doesn't care about only having slivers because it can grab the slivers it needs so instead of a billion slivers it benefits a lot more from supporting cards of other types and so will naturally gravitate towards Jegantha more. And let's be real, Sliver Queen is a combo deck. Does it have to be? No. Is it always? Most of the time. So of course it's just super unlikely to see Combo Queen running Umori. I can kind of see the appeal in the two that people are building around. Also, imagine Umori in play along side Morophon and it kind of makes sense why a sliver deck might prefer the static cost reduction from Umori over Jegantha's ability (and I guarantee those sliver decks running Umori are playing Morophon too, or else they should be). Umori in combination with morophon will let you start casting slivers for free and with The First Sliver especially that will get crazy fast.

Pir and toothy & keruga aka toothpick deck. Run teeth tribal (as in only cards that are showing teeth) Win by self decking. (Jace wom and lab man)

I'm surprised Horde of Notions isn't a major commander for Jegantha: Jegantha is an elemental, & it taps for the exact cost of Horde of Notions' activated ability. How is Kaheera showing up more often there?

Why would your commander need to follow the companion deckbuilding restriction? It says specifically cards in your deck. Your commander is not in your deck so it should be excluded.

so it it's "in" a deck, how do you know if it's the companion or if it's in the 99?

I'm baffled that no one has brewed a Reaper King and Umori deck. Seems viable match as it'll allow you to run both artifacts and creatures.

whenever I read Karuga I think of the Beach Boys. Karuga, Jamaica, oh I want to take you to Bermuda, Bahama, come on pretty mama Key Largo, Montego, baby why don't we go oh I want to take you down to Kokomo, we'll get there fast and then we'll take it slow That's where we want to go, way down in Kokomo

Zirda is going to be in kennreth

Umori has the potential, save more mana than Jagantha can utilize when casting slivers. Typically, slivers only have 1 or two pips, and unless you're casting a legendary sliver, jagantha isn't worth casting in most cases.

Yay!

I'm kinda sad to see nobody else is running Umori artifacts with me.

people are crazy to not run kenrith zirda, REMEMBER THAT ZIRDA'S CLAUSE IS JUST PERMANENTS JUST RUN MANA DORKS, MANA ROCKS you can run biomancer's familiar still and i run a Prismite, Zirda, Basalt Monolith, Kenrith draw your deck play all creatures and pump with finale of devastation for lethal

10:35 or something, it is sisay weatherlight captain not captain sisay

Keruga seems like a bad tishana to me

He constantly pronounces Greven "Graven" and it drives me insane every time. There's no A in his name!!!

Re: “Yruda” Can someone explain to me why so many MtG content creators think it’s cute or clever or whatever to intentionally mispronounce the card names?

my wifi password is Yoshi's Island

Is it just me or does anyone else just shake uncontrollably when anyone says the word elk?

I don't get the banning of lutri, "there's no building challenge" is a weak argument when its not good!

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Commander/Companion, Arahbo/Kaheera, Magic Legends/Commander Legends, many many more, you get my point. WotC is runnin outta good, fresh, distinct ideas & their good customers, us, r runnin out of mental capacity to well-distinguish every single of the gazillion things that WotC’s vomiting on us at an alarming rate. The product fatigue is real. The we-can-no-longer-tell-1-card/product-from-that-other is real. Hope to garner more nay-sayers to keep bugging Hasbro/WotC & try to wake them up to the fact that this sustained rapid firing rate just cannot last long without something breaking. Slow down, think up good ideas, put good products out there, reprint important cards meaningfully adequate.

sorry to hand out the dislike guys, you are definitely a great channel, I'm just obligated to slap a dislike on anything related to Companions in magic these days.

Drop the announcer/newscaster voice.