Hi Folks,
I am here to talk about the format. First of all, I have to make some disclaimers, that might be helpful to understand the following post right.
1. I am not an english native speaker. Please overread my mistakes.
2. Budget is not the matter here. I earn enough money to buy whatever card I want to buy.
3. This is my opinion. If you want to read this post, its your own choice. You have been warned.
Who I am and where I come from I play magic the gathering since alliances and won several small competitions in my area. I play prereleases and friday night regularly. I am very interested in the cards, the mechanics and the possibilities of interactions. If you want to categorize me, I am somewhere between jhonnie and timmy. I like to create decks and I like to play cool things. Winning is not so important, than having a good time. That is, why I was interested in commander. I played the format for a year now on a non regular basis (about 2-8 hours a week).
What commander should be ..."Commander is designed to promote
social games of magic."
It is played in a
variety of ways, depending on player preference, but a common vision ties together the global community to help them
enjoy a different kind of magic. That vision is predicated on a
social contract: a
gentleman's agreement which goes beyond these rules to includes a degree of interactivity between players. Players should aim to interact both during the game and before it begins, discussing with other players what they expect/want from the game."
Here is the link
http://mtgcommander.net/rules.php What I encountered during my games ... I tried to play commander in four different citys in five different stores. In all stores there were magic players from the whole range, casual to professional. They had fun during games of Standard and Legacy (which I play, too). Almost none of them had that much fun during any commander match I encountered. Me neither. Almost every game was dominated by a cheap combo win in turn 7-10. The size of the group did not matter. There were duels and groups of 3 to 5. The combo wins were almost always with unlimited turns, unlimited damage or unlimited life. Even, when I tried to build my deck comepletly around disruption, removal, graveyard hate, commander hate, I failed to hinder such a win. I only delayed them. I played several commanders (taysa, glissa and karador, rafiq, jor kadeen. No exeptional weak or troll-commander.) I won ocassionally against random players, but the games finishing in a turn below 10 with some tutored (and most of the time counter protected, @Force of will) combo trick were way too many to count. 8 out of 10 at least. All four citys were the same. There sat one guy and played his trick and won. And everybody sighed, shuffeled their cards and returned to start. That was no differend kind of magic. That was the same style of magic I see and play with 60 cards. Just more randomized.
What the problem was The problem of this format is, that most players (I encountered) think of commander as "legacy big". They optimize their decks to achive cheap wins, locking out other players entirely. "Contamination and bitterblossom in turn 3? Can't handle it? Your problem". "No disruption ready for mikaeus and triskelion? Sad for you and not my fault bro." There was
no social aspect to most matches I played, no diplomacy and way to little fun. I have seen casual players coming up with a cool deck Idea, getting outcomboed before even hitting the table with some thread and never returning again to the commander-evenings. The combo player always telled their story of "this is the game. face it noob. or cry at home" (yes, they were mean, too). More than once I started to talk about playing style and how much fun it would be to play a bit lower, to house rule away those cheap wins and just to have a good time. I failed. Few others who tried the same failed, too. There was no chance to come to an agreement. I tried to explain the format to them, tried to underline the social aspect, linked this page and the disclaimer I quoted earlier. No chance. The hardest hitting argument was always: "What is not exactly on the banlist is fine."
Consequences So the 'spikes' rule our stores, you might say. Yes, they do. And the rules protect their way of playing, cause the only language they understand is a clear banlist. So why not gather some friends and don't go to the stores anymore? Well, I did. Like most other players do. Same story. They played at home and in the stores. First two games, they show up with a nice deck and we have a little fun while chatting, drinking beer and eating prezels. Everybody enjoys the evening. Then they play at the stores again, get beaten and return to the friend matches with the same monster-of-a-deck as before. "Thats the game bro. Face it", they tell and our fun is lost. So why not use some kind of combo hating blue hard counter deck? Cause I am here to have fun. And I don't like it to be forced to a decktype to see some game hit the 15th round. So why then not gather some people with the same social focus of the game; other Jhonnies and Timmys? ... Well, I prefer not to. I want to meet and play with new people and chat with them in a gamestore. So I quit the commander format and returned to legacy. At least, there is no vague fluff about social and gentlemen's agreements there. Everybody knows the exact rules, the forced meta game, and everybods is ok with both of them.
"So you are yust whining here, bro? Not cool."
"No, I don't. I tell my story to encourage a (new) discussion about how this format is ruled and handeled, to change something, maybe."
How the problem could be solved easily If I am right, commander encourages interactions between players and new fun ideas of playing. To ensure that (in my opionion) there has to be a better and longer banlist. it is true: That cancels out some cards and tricks, who are loved by some spikes. So what? Spikes do have their formats for these things. To cancel out some open minded players or to regularly punish new and interested players is far worse and non social. See, the idea of self reglementing local player groups does not work (at least in our area). People are lazy and used to follow strict bannings and to abuse cards until they break the game. They are encouraged to do so, cause wizards of the corast adopted edh (and renamed it commander) to make more money. Wizards does not tell people the gentlemen's agreement fluff. They tell people the plain rulez and the bannings and are done with it (see
https://www.wizards.com/magic/tcg/artic ... -commander). They sell commander as 'some new format with some strange rules', that has to be broken and won, like every other format. That is their spirit of commander and they are winning. This community is losing the voice in the format and is reduced to the banlist, which they adopt. 'The spirit of edh', the social and gentlemen's style of play, is about to get lost. Do you really want this format to become some kind of "legacy single card multiplayer"? Sometimes, even the gentlemen do have to make their rules clear. This time is now.
Thanks for reading. If you had differend experiences with the format, I really honestly envy you.
Discuss if you like to.
Please remind yourself, that I will not read (expected) flamings.
You will write them without ever hitting your target yust for yourself.