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Ep. 21 - Savor the Second Sun
33 Plays7 months ago
We've got plenty of Avatar and deck talk this week. Also, we get back to topics of interest like how do you feel seeing other people playing your commander?
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Transcript
Season Preferences and Heat
00:00:13
Zachary Jeblonski
Hello, hello. It's another episode of Midlife's Crisis. I'm Zach. I'm joined again by Charles.
00:00:17
ciderspence
How's going, Zach?
00:00:19
Zachary Jeblonski
I'm doing all right. you are you a what What's your preferred season? Are you a winter, summer guy? I'm ah i'm a winter guy, personally.
00:00:27
ciderspence
I don't mind winter, but I don't mind summer either. I'm an all-seasons guy.
00:00:31
Zachary Jeblonski
All seasons. You don't have any favorites out of the four?
00:00:35
ciderspence
No, I mean, I think I get hot, I get cold, I'm uncomfortable no matter what, so let's go.
00:00:42
Zachary Jeblonski
um'm I'm just like, man, I just can't can't do the heat, you know, coming from the guy who lived in Atlanta for five years. Yeah, I'm
00:00:48
ciderspence
Yeah, I was going to say, I feel like you had extensive training, but maybe that's where you learned that you don't like the heat.
00:00:48
Zachary Jeblonski
yeah i'm
00:00:53
Zachary Jeblonski
yeah No, I, unfortunately i learned it sooner than that, but I'm very grateful to have moved up north since then. Cause man, I, you know, i don't know for me, I'm fall is probably the best, but I'll take a winner. And then spring is when the, the creeping dread of summer comes in and then summer is when, when everything falls apart, you know, at least that's the way I think normal people think about seasons. It's just the existential dread that summer brings.
00:01:20
ciderspence
I mean, that certainly is a way to think about seasons, I agree.
Holiday Season and Gaming Plans
00:01:25
Zachary Jeblonski
All right, so we got a pretty we got a pretty light week this week. it's It's kind of the calm as we run into the holiday season. But we still got some of the normal stuff. So let's head into our games.
00:01:38
Zachary Jeblonski
I think you had technically had the earliest game of the week on Sunday. Do you want to talk about that?
00:01:43
ciderspence
No, I don't, because I don't remember it. ah
00:01:45
Zachary Jeblonski
Oh,
Gameplay Insights and Sol Ring Impact
00:01:45
Zachary Jeblonski
okay, cool.
00:01:46
ciderspence
i was I was prepared to say I have not played any games since we last talked.
00:01:46
Zachary Jeblonski
Okay.
00:01:50
ciderspence
um I'm trying to think of the games I played.
00:01:51
Zachary Jeblonski
okay
00:01:53
ciderspence
Yeah, I think my last games were Saturday night.
00:01:57
Zachary Jeblonski
Okay, well then that's it.
00:01:57
ciderspence
Uh-huh.
00:01:58
Zachary Jeblonski
All right. So i got I got some thoughts. I got some games in on Tuesday. i think those are the only games since then. So let's let let's start with, I don't think it was necessarily the first game I played. No, it wasn't the first game I played. But going to start with a repeat kind of of a game I mentioned last week, which is I had another match against Centriplets.
00:02:19
Zachary Jeblonski
And I think this game went way closer to what people dislike about Centriplets. So my opponent got an early Sol Ring start, or I think Terminal Sol Ring, and was able to get Centriplets out very early, and then quickly just stripped all of our hands, you know, because unfortunately what I had in my hand was a Roaming Throne.
00:02:42
Zachary Jeblonski
so they were able to play it and then therefore they were grabbing two hands every turn and it was only a three-person pod so very quickly our hands got stripped and that was kind of the end of it i still walked away from the game not disliking centriplets all that much i'm it's it just renewed my hatred for another common magic card which is soul ring It's like one of those things where I'm like, we we were all talking about it at the game end, and I'm like, that game really just hinged on the fact that he was able to get the commander out so quickly.
00:03:15
Zachary Jeblonski
So once again, i'm not saying you should not be salty with Centriplets because I get it. But I also think that like, it's probably worth thinking about the games where it goes really poorly and it's just an unfun game and think about what the true culprit is. And a lot of times it's Sol Ring or Fast Mana.
Fast Mana and Game Quality
00:03:35
Zachary Jeblonski
What do you think? do you think it's just still send triplets or is it the soul ring?
00:03:39
ciderspence
I think it's an interesting perspective that you have about fast mana. I think, first of all, since the bannings, since the two mega pieces of fast mana are gone, I would say I've seen the the quality of the random game I play against strangers to have increased by a lot.
00:03:59
ciderspence
Just not having a person be able to go off on turn one or turn two regularly or semi-regularly. Like, it felt like one out of every four games you were playing in a pod with someone you didn't know who had a dark ritual into, ah what was the mana one?
00:04:17
ciderspence
Mana...
00:04:18
Zachary Jeblonski
Geyser?
00:04:19
ciderspence
No, the one that got banned.
00:04:21
Zachary Jeblonski
Oh, Crypt.
00:04:21
ciderspence
Mana...
00:04:22
Zachary Jeblonski
Metacrypt.
00:04:22
ciderspence
Tripped. Yeah, Mana Crypt. and you'd see Dockside all the time, and then somebody would just have this very, very explosive start that seemed out of the spirit of the pod. um And that was that was less fun, i think, than the average game.
00:04:31
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:04:34
ciderspence
So not seeing that has been great. On the other hand, I mean, I still see Sol Ring periodically, um and it definitely helps that player get out to a faster start.
00:04:45
ciderspence
But I feel like I don't mind the variance of Sol Ring so much um
00:04:52
ciderspence
certainly less than I mined the experience of playing against what I consider to be unfun commanders. But i I think it's interesting that you you seem to mine the variance of a fast start a lot, and you would fault that in a game versus an unfun commander.
Strategies Against Unfun Commanders
00:05:09
ciderspence
I guess If I'm reading you correctly, it's more that you'd rather the table have adequate time to prepare for an unfun commander. And you think that soul ring kind of disturbs the balance of the players having time to prepare for something coming out on curve.
00:05:26
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, it's kind of like... So I look at what I would call like classically unfun commanders. And you know once again, I want to reiterate my position, which is like I totally get it for anybody who finds these commanders to be unfun to play against. and like But the the perspective I've always tried to bring to you know, a centriplets or I played against a mono white, elish the mono white, like original El Shnorn, that sort of thing. Like, or like, you know, I'm just, I think like your traditional, like prison type or, you know, that sort commanders. I look at it like a puzzle of like, okay, I've got next turn is probably centriplets, which means I have to look at the,
00:06:04
Zachary Jeblonski
figure out what my hand will likely be by the time that his centriplets trigger resolves. And I need to make sure that whatever cards are in my hand cannot be used detrimentally against me to an extreme degree.
00:06:15
Zachary Jeblonski
So for instance, last time I played centriplets, I fired off a raise the palisade a turn early than I would want to, which is a four and a blue, choose a creature type, return all creatures that aren't that type to their owner's hands.
00:06:27
Zachary Jeblonski
I fired it up early because I'm like, well, when it gets to him, he can just claim whatever type sent triplets is and then return my stuff. Right. So it's like I'm like i'm going to preemptively board wipe. ah So he can't do it. and And I do like the unraveling of the puzzle, so to speak, when it comes to dealing with these decks.
00:06:44
Zachary Jeblonski
But my my criticism, or my challenge is that with Sol Ring, I don't even get to the puzzle solving stage because he already has enough resources to basically remove my decision capabilities because...
00:06:58
Zachary Jeblonski
i'm not I didn't even have four mana to play my roaming throne ahead of time so that he couldn't have it because he was already ahead. So he could just grab the roaming throne. That's, I guess, one example of that.
00:07:08
ciderspence
Yeah, I get it.
00:07:09
Zachary Jeblonski
So, you know, I mean, like I said, I don't, you know, don't criticize the player, but, uh, you know, I think, uh, you know, one of these days we're going to do an episode on hot takes.
Scooping and Fast Mana Controversy
00:07:18
Zachary Jeblonski
That'll be a good one. Like, course, you know, my hottest take of all time, of course, is that Sol Ring, just like Mana Crypt should be banned, but, uh, we'll save that for another episode.
00:07:28
Zachary Jeblonski
But overall, that that game, I guess the other the other thing that was notable about that game was just that we and me and my other opponent did collectively scoop at a certain point. So we didn't play the whole match out.
00:07:41
Zachary Jeblonski
And, you know, I think I think in a situation like that, that's probably appropriate, you know, like in terms of like when we both had our hands completely stripped and outside of us top decking a board wipe and he not having a counter spell at the same time was like there was just no way back but because if we drew anything, we couldn't hold it. and We had to play it immediately.
00:08:02
Zachary Jeblonski
and that just you know it was just it would it would just be impossible to recover from that point but but i also recognize that if any one of us had drawn removal at any point in time and gotten this gotten in the centriplets out uh the game probably could have turned into ah an actual game at that point because uh the soul rings effect is negated by a two mana commander tax but yeah that's let's get old centriplets here i have a question for you ah Do you have any decks that you only play if everybody in the pod is pretty like on the ball with magic rules and magic cards in general?
Mono Blue Sphinx Deck Complexity
00:08:41
Zachary Jeblonski
Sorry, odd question. I know.
00:08:42
ciderspence
No, I think it's a great question. i would say kind of. if somewhat If I were in a pod and that was the prompt for the pod, I think I would pull out my strongest deck and just go from there.
00:08:48
Zachary Jeblonski
Okay. Okay.
00:08:57
ciderspence
I think that's because that's the deck that I feel the most comfortable having a chance at and at approximately any table with. And I've played it enough that I'm pretty confident in my ability to assess whatever rules come my way as a result of playing it.
00:09:15
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:09:16
ciderspence
um I wouldn't say it's like the most rule-centric or the the most interactive deck that I have, but it is, like I said, the most consistently high-functioning and the most capable of winning despite the table dynamics.
00:09:35
ciderspence
So I think that's how I would respond to that prompt. But I don't have a deck that I think of in particularly that way. How about you?
Complex Deck Dynamics with New Players
00:09:43
Zachary Jeblonski
So I know this would be shocking, but i I asked a leading question because I was going to answer with my with one of mine once you just I was curious to see if you run into this issue. So I don't remember if I've ever played this deck with you, around you or in our pods.
00:09:59
Zachary Jeblonski
But I have a mono blue Sphinx deck piloted by Unesh. And I'll just read the commander real quick. And then I think you'll quickly see where I'm going with this. But the commander Unesh, it's four blue blue flying Sphinx spells. Sphinx spells you cast cost two less to cast.
00:10:19
Zachary Jeblonski
And whenever Unesh or another Sphinx enters battlefield under my control, I've revealed the top four cards in my library and opponents separate those cards into two piles, put one pile into my hand, the other pile into my graveyard.
00:10:30
Zachary Jeblonski
So this is not nearly my strongest deck. i mean, it's a well-performing deck. It it does. tech it pretty much always does the thing it's trying to do, which is just poop out a bunch of Sphinxes and hit people with them.
00:10:41
Zachary Jeblonski
But the reason why I only bring this out, like if the pod is like, I would say multi-year magic veterans is because usually once my engines are going, I'm usually doing what I would call like three to four factor fictions a turn.
00:10:56
Zachary Jeblonski
And I call them factor fictions because that's the name of the the the instant card draw spell that basically does the same thing that Unash's trigger does. And the thing I've realized is that like it kind of creates an unfair advantage for me if I play this deck against people who don't know a lot about magic. Because a lot of times what what newer players will do is they will make, let's just say not great piles. And then there's very quickly an easier or a more justified pile for me to take. And I can...
00:11:25
Zachary Jeblonski
without really intending to, I can take advantage of somebody's, you know, less experience. So this is like one of those decks where i'm like, all right, everybody knows, you know, like how to play magic well and understands threat assessment and, you know, and all that. so then I'll bring this out, you know, because otherwise it just feels like almost like an unfair advantage.
00:11:44
ciderspence
Now, with Inesha's trigger, you get to choose the opponent, right? Who makes the choice?
00:11:48
Zachary Jeblonski
Yes. Yeah. But what I...
00:11:50
ciderspence
So you could, in theory, play it at a table where there's at least one experienced person that just keeps picking that person, but you feel like that would also be unfun for the less experienced players?
00:11:59
Zachary Jeblonski
Yes, because also when I'm like, because you know you know me, I try to minimize my turn times best I can. And I know that just the sheer deliberation of each time going through the trigger takes up a fair amount of time. So usually what I'll do is i will literally just go in order over and over again. So I'll be like, oh, you did the last one. So I'll go, I'll hand the next one to the next one. And then I'll hand the next one to the next one. And you know, it's this way, like everybody in the pod is doing something. They're all like working on their own piles.
00:12:25
Zachary Jeblonski
Because technically, technically, if you really want to play Unesh correctly, and and my opponent copied Unesh a couple times in this game, so he was doing it the correct
Commander Choices for New Players
00:12:32
Zachary Jeblonski
way, which is like, you would resolve each trigger one at a time. So you would hand one pile, we'd go through the whole deliberation process, then you would hand another pile, through the whole. But what I do to kind of speed things up, because like i said, I'm always trying to keep my turn times a minimal, is like, say I've got three or four of them, well, then I'm just handing out all the piles all at once, and then like, you know, you guys all just decide, you know, kind of thing.
00:12:56
Zachary Jeblonski
But yes yes, you're right. i could I could just not hand piles to the newer players, but I also think that, don't know if that also is kind of icky for the newer players. Like they feel left out. i don't know.
00:13:05
Zachary Jeblonski
So...
00:13:06
ciderspence
Yeah, I can see that.
00:13:08
Zachary Jeblonski
but I, but, and then here's the other, like, I, you know, sorry to dwell on this, but like, this is, this deck also has an interesting phenomenon to it, which is like, it's another phenomenon that I try not to leverage because I think it is also unfair, which is I've noticed if this, if if the games go along with Unesh, people just stop trying to separate the piles and they just, they just hand it back to you.
00:13:26
Zachary Jeblonski
Like, cause they get, you know, people get lazy, right They don't want to it anymore. so they're just like, all four and one zero and the other, you know, and I'm like, Yeah, like I get it. Like you don't want to separate the piles anymore, but now you are just literally handing me four cards every time I play Sphinx.
00:13:41
Zachary Jeblonski
So it is an interesting deck. I try to be cognizant of like where every headspace is before I play this deck because like like I said, if it's late in the night, people are tired. Without me even really intending to, I could take advantage of that tiredness because I'm like, oh yeah, they're just going to hand me piles. They're not even going to separate them, you know.
00:13:58
Zachary Jeblonski
but regardless of all that, I still really enjoy it. I really enjoy a mono blue deck where I don't run a single counter spell on this whole deck. it has, you know, has plenty of ways to interact and control, you know, where I need to like an imprison in the moons in the deck, but it's not your standard mono blue deck where, I'm controlling it out or I'm milling. It is, I'm literally trying to beat people down with flying synxes. So I do enjoy that deck.
00:14:25
ciderspence
Yeah, i think I've heard about this deck, but yeah, i I don't think you've played it in our pod.
00:14:30
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, I think I will. It'll be like a, you know, one of those first games of the night kind of, you know, games. i'll I'll bring it out. I think you'll be interested to see it. It's, it's, It's, it's also one of the decks where like, I, I'm not, feel going curse myself now by saying this, cause I'm sure when I play it in my kitchen table, it'll completely fall apart and not do any of this stuff. But it's also one of the decks where I can poop out a lot of lands and it's surprising from on a blue, but like I, I've constructed in such a way where like, there's just a lot of lands going out, which is cool. Cause I have to keep up with all the pips. Like every, every Sphinx has like two to three pips in it. So, but yeah, that's who Nash, uh,
00:15:08
Zachary Jeblonski
I played it against a mono blue copy commander. that got a little silly. He almost almost he almost died because he copied a Nesh too many times. And every time he copied a Sphinx, he was fact-efficienting like four times. So he almost died from milling out. So that was fun
00:15:23
ciderspence
Nice.
00:15:24
Zachary Jeblonski
And then, yeah, I'm trying to think. i literally am brain farting as I am actively trying to remember what else happened. Oh, right.
00:15:36
Zachary Jeblonski
i got I got a game in with our shared commander, Eshki. Nothing too crazy to speak of. That's just a well-performing commander is what that is. that is a you know that That goes high on my list of like if a new player was coming to me and i was like, I want to get into magic and I want to hit stuff with big stuff. you know or i want to you know like I think Eshki is a solid one to recommend to a new player.
00:15:58
ciderspence
Yeah, I agree. i mean, she just, she tells you what to do. She makes it easy to do it.
00:16:02
Zachary Jeblonski
Yep.
00:16:03
ciderspence
And, you know, she becomes her own threat. And I think one thing that's nice in the games I've played with her is she just lets you participate. There are games that you think you're unlikely to win because of the experience level or the commanders of the table.
00:16:20
ciderspence
But it's nice to just be able to swing, you know, on turn four or five with a 10 power creature with trample because that matters. And especially at your commander, it's like you, you know, you were there.
00:16:28
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:16:31
ciderspence
Someone had to think about you or deal with you in order to, uh, Blanchez- affect their game plan and it's nice to just feel like you contributed to a game, um whether or not it goes your way I haven't won with Ashley yet i I imagine if I played her enough I would
Card Discoveries and Synergies
00:16:45
ciderspence
but.
00:16:46
ciderspence
Blanchez- yeah she's just a she's just a fun ah fun commander to play and I can see how you would think she's good for new players, because like I said, you just tell she she does it herself.
00:16:52
Zachary Jeblonski
yeah
00:16:55
Zachary Jeblonski
yeah Yeah, that's another good topic, which is like commanders we we think are good for newer players. And like one of the things I look for in a commander for a newer player is that the commander more or less always does the thing, but also teaches you something. And I think Eshki teaches you like.
00:17:14
Zachary Jeblonski
the balance of creature and non-creature. ah She teaches you how to work with plus one, plus ones, like, you know, and she gives you various keywords, ward, vigilance, trample, right? So, like, she's teaching you a lot, like, but at the same time, it's not so much. It's not that complicated, right? It's not, you know, so I think she's she's just an excellent commander for newer players or people that just really just want to have a consistently good experience because, like, yeah I think every time I played the deck, like,
00:17:41
Zachary Jeblonski
you know I didn't always pop off, but more or less, you're always doing something. i won with my card of the week, though, which is i is Berserk. ah You know what Berserk is? It's an old green card. I think it's a resurgence on it.
00:17:56
ciderspence
Yep, I've seen it in Wolverine decks.
00:17:58
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah. Yeah. So that's, I have the Wolverine copy. and, uh, you know I've been doing my, my project that I think I mentioned maybe a couple episodes ago where I'm literally going card by card through my collection again. my rares and mythics mostly.
00:18:13
Zachary Jeblonski
And just, uh, just seeing if there's any like hidden gems within my own collection that I can, uh, put somewhere and berserk was in there and I was like, Oh, I should probably put this somewhere.
00:18:24
Zachary Jeblonski
So I put in Ashki, and sure enough, the the first game with Berserk in the deck, my opponent had nine commander damage, and I was swinging in with my Ashki that was was like nine or ten, not enough to kill him.
00:18:38
Zachary Jeblonski
He declared no blocks, i cast a Berserk, and that was the end of the game, you know. so I'm excited to see what this card can do. i do really want to do the thing where you cast it on, uh, uh, your opponent's creatures to either knock some knock somebody out or make them sacrifice it And then I guess I should just read it for the for the audience here. it's Berserk is a one green instant cast a spell only during your combat step or only only before the combat's damage step.
00:19:05
Zachary Jeblonski
Target creature gains trample XO until end of turn where X is its power. at the end of the At the beginning of the next end step, destroy that creature if it attacked. So it's a very unique card in that it gives mono green the ability to destroy a creature, which unless I'm, unless I am am mistaken, the only two cards that really do this are beast within and berserk.
00:19:27
Zachary Jeblonski
So it's just a very, very, very versatile combat trick. And unfortunately the price tag also demonstrates that I think it's like $30 or no, it's only 10. Okay. So it's not too bad.
Unique Gameplay Moments
00:19:39
Zachary Jeblonski
But yeah, that's a card of the week for me.
00:19:42
ciderspence
Nice. Yeah, I don't really have a card of the week because I didn't play any games.
00:19:46
Zachary Jeblonski
Oh, that's fine. Cause I brought a second one.
00:19:48
ciderspence
I mean, it's it's not great. but Oh, okay, good. do You got second one.
00:19:51
Zachary Jeblonski
I got a second one. So I don't have, I have, I'm going to break the mold. I don't have a card of the week, but I have a two card, not a combo, but two card synergy that I stumbled into and won with.
00:20:05
Zachary Jeblonski
so I'm going to take you back in time here, back to that Sphinx game. And so we're going to introduce my second card of the week that's going to introduce, I guess you would say a synergy, not a combo, but it Sphinx of the Second Sun.
00:20:19
Zachary Jeblonski
Six, blue, blue. It's a Sphinx, as it sounds. It's flying. At the beginning of your post-combat main phase, you get an additional beginning phase, which is the untap, the upkeep, and the draw.
00:20:32
Zachary Jeblonski
this card's confusing and I'm just gonna take a quick moment because I I've helped so many new players deal with this card, but basically the way this card works is like after combat, a trigger goes on the stack that should the trigger resolve.
00:20:43
Zachary Jeblonski
Once you get through your second main phase, you'll then immediately go into untap upkeep draw, and then immediately from there into your end step. So that's the way it works. So basically what it's saying is it creates the trigger to make this additional beginning phase. The beginning phase does not happen.
00:20:59
Zachary Jeblonski
Before your second main. Okay. Sorry. Anyway, so I had this in play and then i had a previous, uh, I played a previous, uh, card of the week, savor the moment, uh, which gives you an extra turn.
00:21:16
Zachary Jeblonski
but you don't untap during that turn. So I basically swung out into my opponent for like 10 to 15 damage. And I had syncs of the second side the board. uh,
00:21:27
Zachary Jeblonski
and And then I played save for the moment, went to the extra turn because, Sphinx of the second son gives me that beginning phase at the end of my first turn. had tapped everything I was able to swing out and kill. so it was like an extra combat.
00:21:39
Zachary Jeblonski
So basically I'm, I constructed a mono blue extra combat spell.
00:21:44
ciderspence
That's cool. Nice.
00:21:45
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah. So I was like, and I didn't really do it intentionally. Like I had, I had sinks a second on the board and I drew my second son or my, face save for the moment. and I just kind of looked at it and i was like, huh.
00:21:56
Zachary Jeblonski
Oh, yeah, I guess that works, you know. So that was that was that was a cool moment.
00:22:01
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, my two cards. We're just going to bend the rules a little bit. Cards of the week kind of thing. You know, it's more of a synergy between the two, but yeah. but yeah, uh, the last game I got was in with, my soul tie reanimator deck piloted by sin.
Facing Mono White Avacyn
00:22:16
Zachary Jeblonski
It went pretty normally. It was again, the, it was like one of those games where you're really in a locked one V one. And I was locked in a one V one with a mono white Avacyn deck. And I think I put Avacyn right up there with send send triplets as far as deconstructing the puzzle. Right. And like, how do you now that my opponent has a board full of indestructible angels and he has the angel where he can't lose the game and I can't win the game?
00:22:40
Zachary Jeblonski
You know, like, how do you you know, where do you go from there? Like, how do you how do you you know disassemble that board over time and stuff like that? and it's it's a fun, it's fun to play against, you know, sometimes it's, it's, it's, it can be frustrating it fit if you don't have any way of dealing with indestructible and you can't lose and all that.
00:22:59
Zachary Jeblonski
but I can't remember the top my head now exactly how it went, but I know that I was able to find a way to, to, to, oh, I know. I know. Yeah. So basically i did find a way to remove his, his, you can't win, lose the game. And then he died to his own ring damage. Uh, the one ring damage.
00:23:14
Zachary Jeblonski
So yeah, good times.
00:23:15
ciderspence
Interesting. How many angels were there in that deck? i I find that angels at least are flying beaters, so if you leave them alone for enough turns, they will kill you.
00:23:25
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah. He was, he was swinging out. He was doing the thing. i luckily my sin deck has a fair amount of flying creatures as well. So I was able to have flyers that were big enough where I could block and not lose them.
00:23:40
Zachary Jeblonski
And i also had an Archfiend of Despair out for most of the game. And I'll just... And this will kind of solidify why he wasn't able to get too far ahead, which is its six black-black flying demon.
00:23:52
Zachary Jeblonski
Your opponents can't gain life. And at the beginning of each end step, each opponent loses life equal to the life they lost that turn. So he had tons of ways of gaining life, but I was able to keep that Archfiend for most of the game. So he just slowly kind of like died to his one ring.
00:24:07
ciderspence
Gotcha.
00:24:07
Zachary Jeblonski
And then finally, he... you know, he had lost the angel that prevented him from being able to lose the game. But yeah, yeah, I know what you mean. Like he, yeah. Well, because once the Advent comes out and especially as the angels, he can't lose. He's just swinging out like every turn because why not?
00:24:28
Zachary Jeblonski
But no, it was, it was a good game though. A lot of, a lot of interaction. But yeah, I think that was my game since the last time we talked.
00:24:36
ciderspence
Nice.
00:24:37
Zachary Jeblonski
All right.
Deck Projects and High Mana Commanders
00:24:37
Zachary Jeblonski
How about decks on deck? Any decks you're working on?
00:24:42
ciderspence
Well, I finished tweaking my Axes and Allies deck.
00:24:46
Zachary Jeblonski
Nice.
00:24:46
ciderspence
So that's hopefully ready for a game at some point this weekend. And I put together the initial version of my Avatar Kyoshi deck. um I think it's probably still it.
00:24:55
Zachary Jeblonski
Oh, that's the green one.
00:24:56
ciderspence
Yeah, that's the mono green. I'll read her. Let's see.
00:24:59
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, she's cool.
00:25:04
Zachary Jeblonski
It's like, I wish, oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Ikeid, yeah. This is the, keep getting this confused with the saga, but yeah. and Yeah.
00:25:11
ciderspence
Yeah, the saga is also good. I guess it would be cool if the saga was also commander.
00:25:16
Zachary Jeblonski
I really, I wish the saga could be your commander. Yeah.
00:25:19
ciderspence
Yeah. But Avatar Kyoshi 5 green, green, green. Legendary creature human avatar. During your turn, Avatar Kyoshi has hexproof. At the beginning of combat on your turn, earthbend 8. Then untap that land.
00:25:31
ciderspence
And she's a 6-6. So, yeah, it's pretty cool.
00:25:34
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, that's cool.
00:25:36
ciderspence
She makes one thing big and lets you swing with it right away. Um, I just have some, you know, good land stuff in there. Um, we'll see. I don't expect this game to go great, which is maybe why I didn't, you know, trip over myself to get a game in this week. Like this was the main deck I was working on and I, I want to play it, but I don't expect it to be a good time if that makes sense. So, um,
00:26:01
Zachary Jeblonski
It's like magic in general. I want to play. I don't expect it to be a good time though.
00:26:06
ciderspence
Actually, I mean, I do think this would be a fun topic some point. There are some commanders that you want to play for flavor reasons or um for experience reasons, but you're just you just know that for whatever reason, either it's salty or it's so high mana cost, or it's in a color combination that doesn't let you interact the way you expect to need to interact at a given
Fun vs. Challenge in Thematic Decks
00:26:28
ciderspence
pot.
00:26:29
ciderspence
ah you You kind of don't expect it to be all that fun, even though the ideal version of it would be really fun. and you're curious to see how it goes.
00:26:36
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:26:37
ciderspence
So I think that was kind of my disposition this week. It was also a long week. i had a lot of stuff to do. um it was kind of a it was a chore and errand heavy week, but um yeah, I just couldn't at the end of a long day, make myself sit down and try to play my eight mana mono green commander at the average table with strangers.
00:26:44
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:27:01
ciderspence
So, but yeah, but I did finish together, kind of.
00:27:04
Zachary Jeblonski
How many,
00:27:05
ciderspence
So I do want to play it. I do like Avatar Kyoshi, but...
00:27:09
Zachary Jeblonski
I roughly the top your head, how many pieces of ramp you running in that with an eight mana commander?
00:27:14
ciderspence
I think it's like 20-ish.
00:27:16
Zachary Jeblonski
Nice.
00:27:17
ciderspence
I've got some some cheap dorks, some of the play in extra land stuff, and then... You know, a few just like Farseek and whatever.
00:27:28
ciderspence
um Yeah, i mean, I think ramp's going to be pretty important. But staying alive is also going to be important. it's also This also strikes me as a deck that's trying to do a lot. um Because you don't really get to activate the ah heart of your game plan until turn 5 or 6 or 7, you kind of need to stay alive. And because she's going to be a magnet for removal, you're probably going to need to cast her a bunch of times.
00:27:51
ciderspence
um So I think life gain is also pretty important in this deck. Having additional bodies is important in this deck, but also being resilient in face of the inevitable board wipe is going to be a part of this deck.
00:28:02
ciderspence
So i don't know.
00:28:03
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:28:04
ciderspence
This all kind of underscores why i don't think it's going to go great the first time I play it. um I think I'll probably eventually get to a version of it that I think is fun to play, but I don't expect that the original Voyage to to be a swell time.
00:28:17
Zachary Jeblonski
No, I think it, I, yeah, I mean, if you're going to pick an eight mana commander, Kreen is the one you want to have. So I think, I think it can probably do better than maybe you're even thinking it it's going to do. I'd be interested to see it.
00:28:29
Zachary Jeblonski
I guess as a segue from earthbending, ah well, let me just quickly get out of the way.
Deck Experimentation with Maren
00:28:35
Zachary Jeblonski
I'm going to change Oscar into kind of what I talked about last week, which is focusing less on, much, much, much less on graveyard value pieces and more on just playing into timing restrictions. So I have that prototyped out.
00:28:50
Zachary Jeblonski
So I'll probably get that assembled today. And then I guess for my for my future looking thing is i don't know if you have this experience, but you have like commanders that you like you're just like, man, I want to do something with this someday. But for i reason for for whatever reason, i just haven't gotten around to it or it just hasn't made sense. So one of mine an old commander all-star, but I just don't see or played like...
00:29:13
Zachary Jeblonski
ever anymore but i always thought it was cool but i also thought that every way every time people built it they built it in the most heinous ways possible so i'm i'm thinking about making a maron of clan nel toth deck you ever played against a maron she's been around for years
00:29:30
ciderspence
The name sounds familiar. um
00:29:32
Zachary Jeblonski
okay all right i got you Yeah, so Maren of Clan Neltal, she's like, I don't remember where to set you in, but she was like one of those OG, like very powerful commanders. She's a legendary creature, human shaman,
00:29:44
Zachary Jeblonski
two blue are two black green. And whenever another creature you control dies, you get an experience counter. At the beginning of your end step, you choose a target creature card in your graveyard. If that card's converted, mana cost is less than or equal to the number of experience counters you have, you return to the battlefield. Otherwise, you put it to your hand.
00:30:02
Zachary Jeblonski
So, you know, you you play her, you you sack your own creatures, you build up experience counters. Usually you just get enough experience counters where it exceeds the highest CMC in your deck, and then you don't really have to worry about it too much past that point.
00:30:16
Zachary Jeblonski
and you know, so some of the heinous ways that people built her in the past is, the classic one is Spore Frog, which is like a one in a green creature that when you sacrifice it, basically fogs. So basically you just keep looping Spore Frog. So it's just really hard for your opponents to ever like damage you.
00:30:32
Zachary Jeblonski
Another one is Protean Hulk, which is a creature that when it dies, you can then tutor up a total of six CMC from your library, but to the battlefield. So you just kind of loop that and you just dump your library and all that.
00:30:43
Zachary Jeblonski
But like, i didn't really want to do all the heinous stuff with it. um But I was always trying to figure out like what strategy I can do with it. And I think I stumbled upon something that could be interesting. And then I'm finally going to get to the segue, which is what about a Marin of Clan Neltoth deck around earthbending?
00:31:00
Zachary Jeblonski
And you sacrifice those lands that you're turning into creatures. So i'm thinking I'm going prototype that out. The only thing I'm worried about with that is i didn't realize how the prices of avatar cards have gone. so we'll say, cause it might not be economically feasible.
00:31:18
ciderspence
interesting. Now, are you going to play the best earthbending cards are you just going to try to put as many earthbending cards in as you can?
00:31:25
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah. So what I did was I just went on skyfall and I just said, I just searched like, you know, commander, uh, color identity, less than or equal to green format commander earth bend. Right. And, and there's like 23 or 24 cards. So the majority of those, if I want to build around earth bending, need to be in the deck. Unfortunately, like there's some absolute bangers in that deck that are, as far as Costco, like badger, mole cubs, like $50. And, you know, even avatar of Kyoshi is like 20 some dollars.
00:31:53
Zachary Jeblonski
I think the top is like 30, the monogreen top. So, so yeah, I, I'm like, I'm looking at that, but it's like, Oh, is this my opportunity?
00:31:56
ciderspence
Yeah, it
00:32:01
Zachary Jeblonski
Is this my, my one chance or my one reasonable time to be like, and maybe maybe I, maybe I proxy these, you know?
Unique Maren Deck and Reputation
00:32:08
ciderspence
yeah
00:32:09
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah. So we'll say i haven't actually fleshed it out, but i I stumbled upon that idea and I'm like, that would be pretty cool because as long as you have a sack outlet, you're getting the experience counter, you're getting your land back,
00:32:20
Zachary Jeblonski
so you're not even losing a creature to the graveyard anymore. like, I, just I just, was like, oh there's probably things we can do with this. Now, the only problem with that is like, you know, when you get to the end stepping, you're ready to reanimate with Marin, uh, your, your land's not in the graveyard anymore.
00:32:33
Zachary Jeblonski
so
00:32:34
ciderspence
Yeah, but you could run some of the stuff that, like the um the Edge of Eternity's card that mills on landfall.
00:32:40
Zachary Jeblonski
Yes. Yeah, there's, yeah, there's, you know, one of my favorite cards that I just, I feel like I haven't had a chance to run as much as I want is Ripples of Undeath, where it's one of the black enchantment at the beginning, or I think at the beginning of your ah first main phase, you mill three and then you can pay one mana and three life to return one of them to your hand.
00:32:41
ciderspence
Stuff like that to fill your graveyards.
00:33:01
Zachary Jeblonski
It's like a great enchantment. It's right up there with like Shadow of the Goblin as far as like two mana. Like, holy crap, this does so much card advantage for me. But I just haven't had many places to put it. And this would be a perfect deck for it. so So I'm kind of excited to build it. I think my only re reservation is I know, at least with the older magic communities, ah if I pull out a Maren, people are going to already, like the alarm bells are going to go off. And And I don't think a Marin built around earthbending is going to be that strong. So it's going be one of those like cases of like, where going like, do I try and convince you that she's not the strong one or I'm just going to have to just deal with the fact that people are going to jump on me first, you know? So we'll see.
Future Deck Themes and Voltron Commander
00:33:42
Zachary Jeblonski
But I think it's for, I think so I got for decks on deck long in the pipeline is, is I did buy a copy of jaws from the secret layer for a while ago. And I just, I've kind of filled with it. I haven't really settled on what I'm going to do but I think it's going to be a mono red Voltron commander.
00:33:56
Zachary Jeblonski
I'm going to, I'm, I think I'm not going to lean so much into the burn part of it. I kind of want to just, I want to, I want to duct tape a bunch of swords to jaws, maybe around his fins and just kind of do it that way.
00:34:06
ciderspence
Nice. Yep.
00:34:07
Zachary Jeblonski
just imagining a shark with like swords duct tape on it It's just terrifying. but yeah, i think that's what I got for decks on deck. Uh, you good on that front? All right.
00:34:19
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah. So i think it's gonna be a pretty light week this week. I didn't know if you want to touch any of the topics of the week. I I'm going to check, I can check one of them off cause I think it's been sitting on our list for a while, but I was like, yeah, we should check this off cause I'm curious what your thoughts on aren it.
00:34:33
ciderspence
On which topics?
00:34:35
Zachary Jeblonski
All right. So it's it's it's actually the first one listed on there. It's like, does anyone actually enjoy counter decks? And I put this back when Final Fantasy was really popping
Enjoyment of Counter Decks
00:34:45
Zachary Jeblonski
off. And I'm not sure if you ever played against the Tidus deck, Tidus Precon, which is the green, white, blue one.
00:34:54
Zachary Jeblonski
So when I say counter deck, I'm not referring to counter spells. I'm referring to... like and And I'm not even referring to plus one, plus one counters. I'm referring to like all those keyword counters. So I'm going to use Titus because I think he is the probably the most egregious recent example of this. But its the card is Titus, Eunice, Guardian, green, white, blue.
00:35:20
Zachary Jeblonski
At the beginning of combat on your turn, you may move a counter from target creature you control onto a second target creature you control. And whenever one or more creatures you control with counters on them, the other kind of damage to a player, you may draw a card and proliferate. you do this once only do You do this only once each term.
00:35:36
Zachary Jeblonski
So I'm just curious, and I don't know if you are one of them or if you know people are one them, but i I just can't get with the, like, I'm i'm good with the plus one, plus one counters. I got you. We Gucci. we We're good.
00:35:49
Zachary Jeblonski
You take a D20, you fiddle with it. Boom. That's how many plus one. But where it gets out of hand and I just, my eyes glaze over is when it's like, well, I have two vigilance counters on this creature and one shield counter on this one, but I have a death touch counter on that. And then there's a flying counter here. So I'm going to proliferate the flying counter. So there's two flying counters here. Like eyes just glaze over when that happens.
00:36:10
Zachary Jeblonski
and I'm just curious, do you enjoy working with the keyword counters?
00:36:16
ciderspence
Yeah, mean, i I don't have a deck that does this, but I could see a, like for a while, there was a there's a Lord of the Rings commander that moved a counter from something onto something that I considered.
00:36:19
Zachary Jeblonski
Okay.
00:36:28
Zachary Jeblonski
I think there was a Goldberry was the mono blue one, I think.
00:36:30
ciderspence
Yeah, Goldberry, yeah, the mono of blue one um that I considered running for a while. And then my son has the the three colored dinosaur deck that comes in with a counter for each keyword.
00:36:44
ciderspence
among cards that you discard with it when it enters and it
00:36:46
Zachary Jeblonski
Okay. Oh, Indominus Rex.
00:36:49
ciderspence
Yeah, in Dominus Rikes.
00:36:49
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, he's and he's another example of this. Yeah.
00:36:52
ciderspence
Yeah, I think I don't mind this one with the caveat that it has to be easy to see what's happening on your board. I think as long as you have keyword dice, this kind of deck can be interesting and would be fine to play against. But yeah, if you're just writing on an infinite token or just trying to symbolize with regular dice or with you know counters that don't have any words on them and expecting people to remember that the blue one is flying and the green one is...
00:37:21
ciderspence
trample then I can see how that would be not fun to play against. But I could see having fun with a deck like that. I kind of like the deck that you have to bring your own stuff for as long as you bring your own stuff for it.
00:37:31
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:37:34
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, no, I... Yeah, I think you brought up the issues that I have with it, which is that I think I have two main issues. One is... It's very rare, in my opinion. this is kind of like my own boomer. This is like my boomer take, which is like I get cranky when people bring decks that create tokens or create game pieces and don't have them with them. You know what mean? Like...
00:37:59
Zachary Jeblonski
yeah you know, uh, I don't know, you know, as long as a finna tokens kind of cover all your bases, but it's like basically you, Oh, I create tokens, but i don't bring the tokens that I create. So now I have all these weird, know, these dice just hanging out and I don't know what they are. Right. Yeah. So anyway, that's just like my little boomer cranky man thing. But anyway, but yes.
00:38:17
Zachary Jeblonski
the, so the issue there is like, yeah readability for, for opponents. Like I have no idea what's going in your board anymore. And then the other part is the thing I've run into and they're kind of one of the reasons I like,
00:38:28
Zachary Jeblonski
bring this up is oftentimes i don't see those the players playing the deck are even having fun either like because these decks always get to that point where there's just so much going on there's so many counters there's so many proliferate triggers there's so much whatever And the fluster, you know, like the the fluster takes over and they're like, I'm like, and I can't tell you how many times I've seen people like play a game with him and be like, yeah, i'm done with this. I'm never playing this again, you know? And it's like, and I don't know what the solution is because I know Wizards wants to work with this because they keep printing cards like this. They keep.
00:39:02
Zachary Jeblonski
Like Indominus Rex like is a great example. know Titus is a recent example, but they keep printing it. And to me, this reads as, for the love of God, play me on Arena, not here.
00:39:13
Zachary Jeblonski
Like, that's what this reads to me. Because like, oh yeah, video game wise, this all works. It's easy, you know. But I think in paper, I think it's just a little too clunky.
Gameplay Expectations and Counter Decks
00:39:21
ciderspence
Yeah, I think I would just say that I think this also has to do with differing expectations for differing players. um I think a pattern that I see a lot is that a player plays a deck and they're having fun to a point and then they stop having fun.
00:39:39
ciderspence
And I guess the question well, I think there's two sides to it, right?
00:39:43
ciderspence
Like you could certainly have the perspective of, oh, it's probably a deck building or a or a deck piloting error if you stop having fun with the deck that you're playing. But i I think it depends on how long a game you want to play, how long a game you're prepared to play, and what table you're at, right? Like, you were talking about two-hour games that you enjoyed playing at the store.
00:40:07
ciderspence
I personally don't really like two-hour games, and I don't think it's necessarily a function of...
00:40:07
Zachary Jeblonski
Yep.
00:40:15
ciderspence
ah how the game's going i just don't want to pay attention for two hours like that's you know in the end magic is just a hobby and i think we all play it to have fun and so we all kind of try to prepare ourselves to play in a way that's going to be fun i think sometimes the table environment just is such that you're not having fun anymore uh and then it's like i think there can be lots of reasons you're not having fun but i don't like
00:40:37
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:40:44
ciderspence
I don't think it's on the counter deck that a game that goes longer than that player expected makes them seem to not have fun anymore. Um, now it's not necessarily on the table either. They're not supposed to wrap it up in 30 minutes if you want to wrap it up in 30 minutes, but I do think there's some room there for, um, not quite blame sharing, but for, you know, for it to not be going great and there to be more than one reason why.
Including Finishers and Self-Sabotage
00:41:08
ciderspence
Um,
00:41:09
ciderspence
And it it might be the case that like those counter players are prepared to put one to two to three counters on everything and hope that the game is over by then. um
00:41:17
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:41:17
ciderspence
But then it's not and they're putting more and more and more and now they're up to five or six or seven counters on everything and that's overwhelming. Kind of like with a card like Cathar's Crusade, right?
00:41:24
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:41:27
ciderspence
Where like you're prepared to build your board.
00:41:27
Zachary Jeblonski
Yep. I'm so glad you brought that up because I was going to bring that up.
00:41:30
ciderspence
Yeah, you're prepared to build your board up to Alpha Strike, but Let's say you are prepared to Alpha Strike and then there's a Spore Frog effect in play and then you can't get your damage through. So now you're just trying to manage hundreds of counters and you're not progressing the board or you're not progressing the game. I can see how that would no longer be fun in a way that you didn't anticipate. So I think there's a little more to it.
00:41:53
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, I mean, I mean, it's there. Yeah, I would i agree with you. There must be more to it, right? Because it is a theme that seems to be popular that people want to play. And I think you touched on something that is interesting, right? Because it's like, you know, the these decks by their, maybe maybe by their nature, for a lot of people, they are fun for the short and middle game, but not the late game.
00:42:18
Zachary Jeblonski
And that's fine, right? like Because like that's what I want, is I want that short and middle experience. And then if it goes late, then that's just a consequence that I will deal with when I get there kind of thing. I think you're right. Right. Like, you know, there is a lot of, there probably, i shouldn't say for me, but there's a lot of fun to be happy for people who enjoy this in that, like, oh, I've got a flying counter that I've been moving around or proliferating and I got a vigilance counter and, uh, you know,
00:42:42
Zachary Jeblonski
you know, I'm working with these counters and, and it's fun deciding where, which creature gets what and all that. Right. And then it just crosses some, some threshold that's different for every player where I've got seven flying counters on this creature. i don't know, guys, what do you want me? You know, what do you want from me? You know?
00:43:00
Zachary Jeblonski
So, yeah, I just interesting to hear other people's perspectives because I don't really want to ask this question like in the middle of a game or right after a game, because obviously like your experience is colored, not you, but like the rhetorical you experience is colored by whatever happened in that game. But it is always like it is one of those complete archetypes that I OK with never having a deck of.
00:43:23
ciderspence
Yeah, this reminds me of a thing that I've thought about a few times, which is what are the things you want to make sure you have in your deck just to keep yourself from the worst case scenario?
00:43:36
ciderspence
ah Obviously, like stuff like finishers, i like your staples, like ramp and card draw, stuff like that. But Also finishers right are important because they kind of help you avoid situations where you can't close out a game and you wind up playing indefinitely without being able to progress to the end point.
00:43:52
ciderspence
But I also like um having at least a bit of self-sabotage in a deck. Because I think it's satisfying to be able to finish a game that your opponents aren't prepared to finish for you by just bowing out through ah game actions.
00:44:03
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:44:14
ciderspence
I mean, you can always scoop at any time, you know, hopefully at 4-3 speed, but that doesn't feel good.
00:44:16
Zachary Jeblonski
yeah
00:44:18
ciderspence
But sometimes it does feel good to, when you're stuck at 2-life and you're no longer the target and everybody's attacking everybody else and letting you just flounder there, to be able to draw two cards, lose two life, and and leave
Creative Game Exits
00:44:29
ciderspence
the game right.
00:44:30
ciderspence
I think some number of cards like that, are actually kind of fun to have in a deck just to give yourself another out to draw to, right?
00:44:40
ciderspence
Like, this game's been going for three hours.
00:44:41
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah,
00:44:42
ciderspence
If I could just get my draw to lose two life, I could leave it in peace. um Because that feels better than begging one of your opponents to take you out when they otherwise aren't motivated to do so.
00:44:52
Zachary Jeblonski
yeah this is like some weird assisted suicide thing going on here.
00:44:56
ciderspence
Yeah, I'd like to not phrase it exactly like that. But yeah, like a card that helps you get out of, you know, ah a finisher is like a card that helps you get out of a situation where the game a stalemate, right?
00:45:03
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, no, for sure, for sure.
00:45:04
ciderspence
Like, this would be ah a card that helps you get out of a situation where the game is dragging on and on, and you're not able to, you know, leave it in an otherwise satisfying way.
00:45:14
Zachary Jeblonski
No, for sure. I get it. Yeah, i think it's an interesting view because I don't think... I'm sure in one of my 20-plus decks I have ways to do that, but I can't think of all the time ahead if I do have any other ways to do that.
00:45:28
Zachary Jeblonski
Usually it's like a... a... you know, a game that's gone long enough where like something is low enough, whether it's my library or my life total. And I'm like, oh, I can just play this and just end it, end it all, you know?
00:45:39
Zachary Jeblonski
but I think that's, yeah, that's an interesting perspective.
00:45:42
ciderspence
Yeah, deck yourself also totally counts.
00:45:43
Zachary Jeblonski
yes, I think that's mostly how I've taken myself out when I needed to take myself out. you know, not to like dwell on an old game, but like, when I first, cause Unesh is one of my oldest decks. I've had it for years now.
00:45:57
Zachary Jeblonski
And I used to run a lot of clones in it. I would clone Nunesh and then I would, you know, then I would get two triggers on every Sphinx and three triggers on every Sphinx. And very quickly, i stripped all those clones out because boy, deck yourself so quickly.
00:46:11
Zachary Jeblonski
And I didn't want to win with like a lab man technique. But yeah, like, i think that's another interesting topic, which is like, what are like the most fun ways to take yourself out, you know, decking self damage or, you know, just like,
00:46:23
Zachary Jeblonski
I'm sure there's even weirder ways to do it, right? Like play a pact of negation, but then just don't, don't pay the mana on your upkeep or something, you know?
00:46:31
ciderspence
Yeah, that's ah yeah ah that's a funny one.
00:46:32
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah. So there's probably a lot of good ones out there to like, oh, this is, I'm just going to take myself out here. I'm just going to see myself out.
00:46:38
ciderspence
I was playing some Avatar on Arena, and I was at one life, and I wasn't paying attention to my cards, and I was playing an Azula on the hunt, Firebending 2, 4-3, Human Noble.
00:46:40
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:46:48
ciderspence
Whenever she attacks, you lose one life and create a clue token. So I swung in for an attack that I thought was going to be fruitful, and the game was over. And i I wasn't doing it on purpose, but it was funny.
00:46:58
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, love so that's always funny when people do that. It's like, it's always fun. Like, and I'm, I'm very, I try to be very flexible with people in games. Like when somebody like does something like they swing out at me and like, i don't know, there's like, I'm just making something up. Like I have a creature on my board where they lose three life every time for every creature they swing at me or something. Yeah, I'm making something up and I'm like, you sure you want to do that?
00:47:21
Zachary Jeblonski
you know You sure about that? You know, like, Yeah, that's that's another good topic because I know like some of the more sweaty players out there are the mindset of like don't warn your player, don't warn your opponents
Impact of Others Playing Favorite Commanders
00:47:34
Zachary Jeblonski
about something. But I think i think it's in the good spirit of the game to be like, are you sure you want to do that?
00:47:41
Zachary Jeblonski
like
00:47:44
Zachary Jeblonski
But yeah, anything else you want to bring up before we kind of wrap it up?
00:47:50
ciderspence
um trying to think yeah i mean i think we have time for another topic i'd be curious to hear your thoughts on seeing other people play your commander um because this is something that i've thought about a lot um especially there was one commander black panther what common king is a card that i used to see out in the wild a lot and i've seen him played less frequently these days uh but i'll just read it um
00:47:56
Zachary Jeblonski
and Okay.
00:48:00
Zachary Jeblonski
Oh, yeah.
00:48:18
ciderspence
Black Panther, Wakandan King, 2-2, Legendary Creature, Human, Noble, Hero with First Strike. And Survey the Realm. Whenever Black Panther another creature you control enters, put a 1-1 counter on target land you control.
00:48:30
ciderspence
And Mine Vibranium, 3 mana. remove or Remove all 1-1 counters from target land you control onto target creature. If one or more 1-1 counters are moved this way, you gain that much life and draw a card.
00:48:43
ciderspence
um So... I think about a week after the secret layer, I found a copy of this and put it together and played it at an LGS and it was a lot of fun. And then it became one of the less popular ones from that secret layer, but still pretty popular at that time.
00:48:57
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, think he's number two.
00:48:58
ciderspence
And so I got to see a lot of people play it.
00:48:59
Zachary Jeblonski
would say. Yeah.
00:49:01
ciderspence
Well, yeah, I guess, well, I don't know. Storm was really popular and then she became less popular because she was so strong that I think people were having trouble finding games with her. Yeah.
00:49:08
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah, that's kind of what happened to me with her. Yeah.
00:49:10
ciderspence
yeah And then Wolverine was also very popular. So I think those two,
00:49:13
Zachary Jeblonski
That's true. That's true.
00:49:14
ciderspence
But Mulvary may be less popular than Black Panther now, especially after all the land stuff from the past few sets. But yeah, I played a few games with it, had a lot of fun, and then I started seeing other players play with it, and a couple of notable online kind of magic personalities had decks with it.
00:49:34
ciderspence
as the commander. And see seeing those was was a real ego hit because you know those were obviously higher functioning decks than what I what i had put together. ah And so yeah, it's ah it's an interesting dynamic seeing someone else play a deck that you you know have an affection for. it's you know It's pretty frequent to see somebody play a deck that you also play, um but if it's a deck that you like or you're invested in, it can be an interesting experience um on top of that.
00:50:09
Zachary Jeblonski
teas.
00:50:11
ciderspence
it.
00:50:12
Zachary Jeblonski
If I see my commander being played a lot, it does make me not want to play my decks anymore. and And it is not on them. and Let me be clear. It's not on those other players. This is a, this is a Zach problem.
00:50:25
Zachary Jeblonski
And I would say recently, the the two recent, would victims of this is, I'll do the quick one first, which is Hearth Hole, which is the Edge of Eternity's.
00:50:35
Zachary Jeblonski
Blue, black, a green spacecraft that works with landfall synergies and land sacking synergies. I've seen that deck everywhere. like I've gone to multiple stores now and I've i've played against it like from multiple people. So like I've gotten to the point where I can't remember the last time played it. And I'm probably going to take it apart just because it's just there's something in my brain where like i just if I see other people playing my commander, I don't want to play it anymore.
00:50:58
Zachary Jeblonski
guess because I want to be some special snowflake or something. But but the the real the world one is ah in one there's a pretty common player in one of my stores who has also an extremely high functioning Emote deck. And Emote has been for a long time my favorite commander.
00:51:13
Zachary Jeblonski
i but i But even a Modi is not susceptible, is not immune to this because he built a Modi as the degenerate way. And it's the way like like, I don't think it's better than my deck and well better in quotes.
00:51:27
Zachary Jeblonski
It's certainly going to win more, but he built it in a degenerate way where I'm like, yeah, I know you can do that with a Modi, but come on, man. and And I don't know why, but it just left that bad taste in my mouth where i' like, I don't even want to play my Modi right now. So it's one of those things where i'm like, this is obviously a me problem. And I guess, let me de clarify, because I'm sure what what do i mean by degenerate way.
00:51:47
Zachary Jeblonski
He just crammed a ton of clones and extra turn spells into it. So basically like, if you allow one extra turn to go off the game's over because it'll just, it'll just keep chaining and then it'll be over.
00:52:00
Zachary Jeblonski
and I guess I should say, cause don't know if ive even brought up a Modi on this podcast, but Modi, which is traditionally been my favorite commander of all time. Uh, it's three green, blue,
00:52:10
Zachary Jeblonski
uh legendary creature naga druid cascade on cast and then if anybody doesn't know what cascade is when you cast the spell you you basically flip from the top of your library until you hit a spell that's less than the mana cost of the cascading spell and you can play that for free and then finally spells you cast with mana a converted mana cost six or greater or half cascade so i just from like Day one, when we like, or like week one of me playing magic, I stumbled on this card because my friend runs it in one of his decks, not as a commander, but just in 99.
00:52:42
Zachary Jeblonski
And I was like, this is exactly what I want. I love randomness. I love big things. Give it, give it to me in my veins. But there's a lot you can do with Emody and there's also a lot of degeneracy you can do because if you just create bunch of extra turn spells and clones, it's just it just it gets nasty.
00:52:59
Zachary Jeblonski
I intentionally avoid that, but this other player doesn't avoid that. And I've played against that enough where I'm just like, okay, maybe Emody's not cool anymore, but that's that's a me thing.
00:53:09
ciderspence
That's interesting. Yeah, I mean, you don't have to put that on a Modi, but I can see you how it would happen.
00:53:12
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah. Yeah. And it's like, well, I'm like, I'm trying not to let it happen, but like, you know, it's just one of those things where like, i am successful to that. I'll be honest. Like, so, so if any of my, my enemies are out there listening and you're tired of me, say play us playing a certain deck, just start, just start playing it yourself and and and it'll happen naturally.
Creativity in Deck Building
00:53:34
ciderspence
I do think one one thing that goes the other way is i sometimes I think that I'm putting together a different version of a deck. And in those cases, it is fun to see other players play the more traditional version to kind of confirm that I'm doing something different.
00:53:50
ciderspence
um And sometimes I will play... like yeah There was one game where a player played Nazgul-themed deck And I played my Nazgul themed deck that was different.
00:54:01
Zachary Jeblonski
yeah yep
00:54:03
ciderspence
Now the commander happened to be different. They were playing with Lord of Nazgul or something. And I was playing with my Siddhar Jabari deck, um which is Knight Kindred. But it turns out that the nine Nazgul also have the subtype Knight.
00:54:16
ciderspence
So I run the Nazgul in that deck. And then I also run various effects to turn all my other creatures into wraiths. So it was fun to play ah that game. And I've played against other side Arjabaris, and I think that's fine because my version, I'm now doing something different. And so I don't feel the same way about that because it doesn't feel like our decks are in the same space. I've also run into a couple of other Sokka decks.
00:54:39
ciderspence
I haven't seen one that's... There are two Sokka's that are three color that are pretty similar. Sokka and Suki is my Axes and Allies deck commander.
00:54:48
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:54:48
ciderspence
Whenever Sokka and Suki or another ally you control enters, attach up to one target equipment you control to that creature. And whenever an equipment you control enters, create a 1-1 white ally creature token. And then the other three color Sokka...
00:55:00
ciderspence
is Sokka Tenacious Tactician, one blue, red, white, menace, prowess.
00:55:02
Zachary Jeblonski
That's the, yeah.
00:55:06
ciderspence
Other allies you control have menace and prowess, and whenever you cast a non-creature spell, create a 1-1 white ally creature token. So those, they help each other out a lot. They're both in each other's decks, I would imagine, but I've played against other Sokka Tenacious Tactician decks, um and That didn't feel as samey.
00:55:26
ciderspence
Again, there are different commanders.
00:55:26
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah. yeah
00:55:28
ciderspence
Like I said, there's a lot synergy between the two. I could see someone running one of those decks also run the Sakonsuki version of that deck. But again, because i'm because I'm theming pretty hard on axes, I don't expect to run into someone who's also theming pretty hard on axes. So I feel like I wouldn't have that much of a bad reaction to seeing that.
00:55:48
Zachary Jeblonski
No, for sure. And I think you brought up some good examples of commanders that are flexible and give you enough room for creativity. And as much as I love a Modi, like there's, mean, there's only so much you can do.
00:56:00
Zachary Jeblonski
you, you play in big spells, whether they're extra turns or big creatures or whatever, you know? So, And Modi decks, I don't think have as much variety as like a Siddharra does. So I think that's a good point.
00:56:11
Zachary Jeblonski
And Hearth Hole is also the same problem. It's like, there's really only like one way to build Hearth Hole. And so my Hearth Hole is not that much different than another person's Hearth Hole. So that like that that to me is like, that's the death knell kind of thing. It's like when my deck is too similar to somebody else's. And and a lot of it has to do with, because I view deck creation as a creative process. So like when you see, it's like,
00:56:33
Zachary Jeblonski
Not that they're imitating me, right? That's not what I'm saying. But like when you see somebody who has a painting that like basically looks exactly like yours that you spent time creating, you're like, oh. So yeah, I don't know.
Sticking with Popular Commanders
00:56:45
Zachary Jeblonski
It's not always, i will say it's not always a death knell. Like there's been times where I'm like, I'm just going to stick this one out because I know that this commander will stop being popular and I'll stop seeing it after a while.
00:56:54
Zachary Jeblonski
And I'm trying to think of it a good example of that right now, but I know I've done that, but there's other times when it's been sufficient where I'm like, all right, I'm just going to move on from this commander because it's just, know, not what I want to do
00:57:04
ciderspence
If you have an idea for for a Fire Lord Azula deck, that might be a fun one to tuck away because she's very popular right now, but I could see that fading over time as firebending gets solved or whatever.
00:57:12
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah.
00:57:18
Zachary Jeblonski
Yeah. I think, Yeah, she's she's she's the hot stuffer. Now, i'm i'm I thought about it, but I'm like, you know, i don't i don't need another Spellslinger deck. So I'm kind of let i'm happy to let them have it.
00:57:28
Zachary Jeblonski
You guys have your Fire Lorded Zoola decks. You got it. I know you need my permission for it. I'm giving it to you.
00:57:36
ciderspence
Tis the season.
00:57:37
Zachary Jeblonski
yeah All right. Anything else before we wrap it up?
00:57:42
ciderspence
I'm good there.
00:57:43
Zachary Jeblonski
All right, cool. Well, stay warm today. It is brisk 17 degrees outside and we we will talk again next week. Have a good weekend out there and I'll talk to you later, Charles.
00:57:55
ciderspence
Take it easy, Zay.
00:57:56
Zachary Jeblonski
See you.