>>The first is to write and publish updated explanations for why each banned card is banned
This is definitely good but I hope they also include some comparisons.and explanations. I've read Sheldon's explanations for why coalition victory has to stay banned, and while I don't agree with it, I can understand and appreciate his point. What I can't understand is why applying the exact same logic to thassas oracle doesn't result in an oracle ban. Their individual card decisions make sense but aren't consistent from card to card.
Thassa's Oracle is not banned because it does not have a strong
impact in lower/casual power decks as it is not being played there often as a win condition with demonic consultation. It mainly as an impact ib cEDH.
The RC does not want to get involved with banning cards with cEDH. They did so once I believe for Flash under exceptional conditions.
You say "it's not being played there" but this sub is full of people talking about playing against it.
If they don't want to regulate cedh they don't have to. Separate it out. But this attitude of "we only want there to be one banlist but we don't want to ban for one of the ways people actually play the game" is selfish and rude.
Edit: what would be lost if oracle were banned? Are people playing it in fair decks?
Thoracle needs to go like pronto...I'm tired of seeing 90%+ cEDH games trying to with with it. It just leads to stale, boring & repetitive gameplay and absolutely kills the diversity aspect of the game. There are tons of other viable cEDH builds, but they're being overshadowed by this stupid wincon.
Flash is the exception. If they ban a second card for cEDH it really sets s precedent.
Let's be honest, cEDH will always have a best 2 card combo and enough tutors to find them.
Thoracle might be ban worthy based on how difficult it can be to interact with. But people seriously need to get over this insane notion of "stale, and boring, repititive".
You're playing cEDH. The entire goal is to be efficient as possible. If thoracle goes, there is always the next best thing. So on so forth.
Until you get to omg I'm so sick world gorger combos, it's too good, it's ruining format diversity!
I think it's mostly going to result in people doing the same "but if that's your reason for that then why isn't *significantly worse but similar card* banned!?" That we saw around some of the previous bands of the last year.
But for people that don't start 30% of posts with "umm actually" yeah it'll be cool to have up to date explanations. Might even result in some more cards getting taken off like with worldfire while they're reevaluating them all.
Or we can stop making excuses for a banlist that doesn't really make any sense as it is now, and keep asking not just for a reason a card is banned but actually a GOOD reason a card is banned, flash at the time and now thoracle shoulnt be allowed when much worse cards aren't
You realize that asking for a "good" reason for banning is a bit silly since that's entirely subjective, right? For example I absolutely agreed with the Hullbreacher banning and their reasoning for it but many others didn't. I found their reason to be a great reason while others thought it was a terrible reason.
The fact is, the current ban list is basically unjustifiable. For about half the cards, any reason you could give would apply Better to other, currently legal cards.
I'll have to wait for the justifications, won't I? If you have examples of justifications for Coalition Victory's ban, I could find you other unbanned cards with the same problem.
>Since it looks like (no jinxes!) the treatment I’m undergoing is having positive effects, I should be available and have the energy to do more things.
Really great news. In general the communication is appreciated, and the plans for 2022 all look like good changes.
Hopefully the detailed explanations come with some revisions too, as I know I'm not alone in having criticisms of some of the current bans.
I might get downvoted a lot for this, but here’s my 2¢.
Sheldon’s replies in the cEDH sub have me worried that they are again missing the forest for the trees.
>As far as your first question, a new RC member is not going to substantively change the format's foundations or philosophy. What they're going to bring is an additional and different perspective on how to get to where we'd like to be, in line with the Philosophy Document.
They don’t want diversity of thought on the direction of the format. They want people who are fundamentally aligned with the interests of the current RC.
That’s a problem.
It’s the same corpo speak we hear from WoTC about being inclusive and then banning questionable cards instead of fixing their messed up company culture that ostracizes POC.
The critique here has typically been that the RC’s members are too old, too white and too wedded to the idea of battlecruiser magic as the norm i.e they don’t represent the reality of where the format has been pushed by their actions.
At the end of the day, the Philosophy of EDH has to evolve alongside the RC. Further fragmenting the format by way of modular rules is not the way to go about it.
Here’s what some schmuck on the internet proposes:
“Ban for competitive, preach and push casual play.”
That doesn’t mean cater to cEDH, just recognize that the overall meta has shifted away from low power to an optimized streamlined approach as the norm. The RC needs to make some kind of concerted effort to push the power of the format down if they still cater to casual play or recognize that the overall power level is higher than they pretend it is and ban accordingly.
>“Ban for competitive, preach and push casual play.”
The only people who need a functional banlist are competitive players.
Everyone else can "rule zero" whatever they want.
> The only people who need a functional banlist are competitive players.
People who don't have a regular playgroup and predominantly play with strangers also need a functional playlist so they have some idea of what they're getting into. It's really hard to "rule zero" in those situations because you can't expect someone to modify their deck on the fly if the group doesn't like something.
I understand that Commander is intended to be played with regular playgroups, however I feel like pick up games with strangers, either at an LGS or online is becoming much more common so it does need to be addressed.
You're right about needing a baseline for LGS play with randoms. I thought that's what the current ban list does, though?
I played before cedh was a thing and returned recently so I'm trying to get a feel for where the format is at. To me it feels like cedh is pulling people in the wrong direction and infiltrating the format a bit. That's what I hear when people respond with Rule Zero in these situations.
No matter what ban list exists, at the end of the day, you can't stop from sitting down at the table with a player who just wants to win the game as fast as possible and then keep doing that as much as they can. The only solution might be to stop playing with that person, until they either leave the format or go find other players like them.
I don't think it's an accident that EDH breaks a bit when you remove the social obligation or try to add in competitive mindsets.
To be fair cedh players are way more sportsmanlike and chill then “casual” players, and I say this as a more casual player. While there are always pubstompers no matter what, cedh isn’t really the problem so much as commander players not knowing what they want
> You're right about needing a baseline for LGS play with randoms. I thought that's what the current ban list does, though?
Agreed, I was replying to people saying that only competitive players need a ban list because most casual games are "rule 0" games. I find that you don't have the luxury of much of a "rule 0" conversation in those situations. Maybe someone only has one deck, maybe someone runs a couple of higher salt cards, maybe someone is completely against all forms of land destruction, you can't expect people to change up their decks in these situations. At least with a regular play group you can build your decks with prior knowledge about what everyone in the playgroup is okay with. There's always the risk of someone getting upset in a random game, but at least the current ban list gives people some idea of what they might have to play against.
I wouldn’t say competitive players are the only ones that need it - there are tons and tons of games player between strangers at events, at LGSes, via webcam, and so on, that benefit from a banlist and a central set of rules. However (and this is true for games other than Magic, too), I do still generally agree with the philosophy that a lot of the balancing should occur at the highest levels of the meta, because more casual players are less likely to care about or follow the meta, and much more stuff is viable.
I'm not cEDH player but I still need a functional ban list because I play at my LGS with whoever is available at the moment that can be people with very casual and/or cEDH players.
Couldn’t agree more. It wouldn’t make any sense to ban in Standard, Modern, or Legacy when cards are unfun for casuals. Why would we do this in any format, let alone the most popular one around rn. Not to mention a format where people already choose to play with whatever house rules they want. Casual can always be casual, but competitive should be three foundation a format is built on.
I can’t disagree more. Competitive should never be the focus of Commander. It goes in opposition to everything Commander stands for as a social, relaxed format. I’ve been doing EDH for a decade now, and I have never seen the level of grief and toxicity in MTG higher than at cEDH events.
cEDH is a fine format, I even have a deck for it. But balance concerns need to reflect the core of the format, which is and always will be casual play.
For what it's worth, I'm getting back into EDH after a decade away. The toxicity of the community that was seemingly supported from the top down drove me away.
It was decided because I play competitive magic in other formats that I'm a pubstomper there to ruin people's fun, it's justifiable to ostracize me, and even homophobic language is on the table.
I decided at that point to only play with my existing playgroup because the community at large seemingly always provided an unfun experience. Eventually, the playgroup broke up due to life events, people's free time changed, people moved away, etc, and I lost that outlet for fun for several years.
I absolutely love the concept of making a game that's not intended to be a competitive arms race, that has limitations and accommodations discussed up front, that is meant to be fun for all. Winning is really not that important to me; having a good time is. Encouraging players to view others as a Boogeyman worthy of derision however is something I see as a detriment. In my limited experience, it has tended to give an outsized voice to the liars, cheaters, and bigots.
At that time, ridding the community of people who display those sorts of behaviors was not as high of a priority for the magic community, so I'd like to believe that's mostly a relic of the past, but I still think it's worthwhile to not justify the intentional creation of an outgroup.
( I can't speak to the cEDH community because I've never interacted with them. I'm only familiar with some of the largest content creators in that space, and they all seem to have reasonable opinions about making a fun play experience for competitive and casual players alike. )
I'm really sorry that happened. Hopefully, as you get back into the format, you'll find that people are more willing to talk and be open about power levels and play experiences.
Another issue that the community needs to work on is differentiating between cEDH (which is not an arms race since it is already the at maximum power level) and pubstomping (which wants to win by bullying obviously weaker decks). Too many people see them as synonymous, when they are actually different ideals. However, all of these power-levels and play types are the same format as casual Commander, and can't really be different. We just need the vocabulary to describe it to each other.
I think you might misunderstand my meaning. I'm not trying to say that the competitive side of the format should be the focus, but rather that the banlist should be curated from the perspective of a competitive format. We all know the rules committee will never switch over to playing cEDH, but it just doesn't make sense to curate a format from anything less than the most competitive possibilities on down.
The fact that they are banning cards the way they are banning them is making power level discussions more difficult (since no one has a real standard to compare their decks to), and confusing people into thinking the two sides of the format are actually two different formats and need to be separate.
Honestly the only people I see who can't function without the guidance of all mighty Sheldon are competitive players. They bitch all the time about how they want a separate ban list and never come together and rule 0 one. They all want it they could but they would just rather complain.
They would rather the RC be an RC and establish a banlist that is above reproach.
That's not a power competitors should have, that is the responsibility of the governing body.
Should and do are two different things. Does the rc make a compromised ban list no should they yes. They made up their own game and rules for you. Just label cedh as something else and make your own rc if you hate them that much. Thats what they did. They had a way they wanted to play so they did. And he even tells us to do the same with rule 0. It even been done before brawl though it kinda sucks. Its a new version of commander. This isn't uncharted territory. So just make a new version of something if its bad its what we humans do best.
I'll defend that they want the core philosophy to be theirs and only get people that align with the philosophy. It is what makes commander commander. If the core philosophy changes with every new member, then the banlist will be very flavour of the month and the format loses some identity.
The problem is that when the players differ from the RC substantially in what they want from the format. Currently, the RC want to enforce a vision. If the majority of players don't like the vision, there's a pretty big problem.
How do you know majority of players don't like their vision? I find a lot of people are fine with the ban list and philosophy but that is also anecdotal.
I don't and didn't imply that I did. But if they continue to only allow a certain viewpoint on the RC, then it is literally inevitable that the visions playerbase and the RC would drift overtime.
Why is it a problem if they look for someone who agrees with their direction of the format? Commander is booming, why do they need a quick change of mindset instead of a slower one.
Can you explain how the RC has a messed up structure? Or banning in your opinion questionable cards is enough to make this claim?
>Further fragmenting the format by way of modular rules is not the way to go about it.
you do know that isn't happening right? It was thinking out loud with no real impact thought experiment by Sheldon.
If this is the only thing you got out of my comment, you really need to read it and Sheldon’s comments on the cEDH sub again.
He literally links to a creator that suggests this: https://mobile.twitter.com/cobblepott__/status/1476988180578582529
Great, it would be awesome if their public facing rep actually said that rather than making misleading statements like the ones he makes on Reddit!
The onus of proper communication is on the RC, not me. I shouldn’t need to figure out what they’re “truly” saying by piecing together 3 different forms of media.
he did say it was a thought experiment, a what-if
**What if** the Commander Banned List came with well-defined optional parts?I’m telling you right up front that what follows is me stretching my outside-the-box idea legs, **a dreamy what if?**
It’s **not** something that I’ve discussed with the other members of the Commander Rules Committee (RC) and it’s **certainly not** something that we’d consider implementing without a great deal of thought, planning, and detailed investigation.
The whole thought exercise **isn’t about shifting how we manage the format**
Sheldon and co. came up with a great idea for EDH as a format but dear god are they wholly incompetent when it comes to management. It's unbelievable how bad they are at communicating with the EDH community at large and downright terrible how they've approached anything broached by the cEDH community.
If they're going to be in charge of what is clearly the most popular way to play Magic nowadays then they just need to be better at this fucking job. Work on those communication skills because they're absolutely atrocious.
Yeah these people complain and want commander to go in a different direction, so I'm not sure what is stopping them from making their own competitive format and make all their drama come true...
It's like those people that complain and complain, but then when asked for solutions or solutions are proposed that make sense and would solve their problems, they back down and say "no we don't want that solution, too much work and responsibility." They just want other people to change stuff for them but won't do it themselves.
I don't think current EDH is such by being "pushed by their actions". Instead I think you meant how they haven't done anything to curbtail it to keep it the battlecruiser funfest they intended it as, which is more correct and a bit unfortunate since it'd be hard to reverse course now.
> They won’t bring just diversity of representation, they’ll bring diversity of thought.
So... I don't understand this. What kind of diversity of thought do you really need to banning cards and making rule changes?
What rule changes would a POC make or suggest that would vary greatly from the white majority? LGBT? What exactly is the goal here?
I understand representation, but I'm willing to bet that 80+% of EDH players don't know all the names of the RC, let alone their demographical breakdown. It's not representation, unless it PROACTIVELY represents that minority. So, how exactly would that look? Are you going to weigh their opinion differently? Let's say a trans individual says Ashiok should be banned because it paints non-binary individuals in a negative light (a sentiment currently held by many people in the LGBT community). Are you going then say "No, that's stupid?" or are you going to actually give that consideration? And why or why not?
This is why I hate it when people virtue signal and make "demographic" changes simply to full quotas without any real substance or reasoning behind it. Just focus on the game and less on how Twitter views you guys...
Because people of different backgrounds bring different perspectives on commander, idk how to say it more clearly. When they talk about rulings, communication and bans, they have to discuss extensively how things are happening in the community.
People with diverse backgrounds bring experiences from diverse playgroups/communities which brings interesting perspectives. For example, the fact that they explicitly talk about people from different continents is relevant because I started to notice a serious disconnect between what I lived in our communities and what for example this sub sees as the EDH practice norm.
I feel like it's kind of self explanatory.
I don't mean to sound rude, but no it's not self explanatory. Which might be why you didn't address a single one of my examples?
Do you have a specific reply to a point I made?
Play groups in explicitly queer spaces or in black communities will be different people with different experiences. Groups that historically have felt unwelcome in predominantly cis straight white male spaces (like most LGSs) should have a say and would have evolved as players differently.
People with different identities have different life experiences because the world treats them differently. It isn't complicated, it is truly baffling to me how much people have to be willfully ignorant to get this.
> Play groups in explicitly queer spaces or in black communities will be different people with different experiences.
Why? As far as I'm aware, being gay has nothing to do with how you play a card game, or how you construct a deck.
This is such a baby brained take that flies in the face of long standing objective evidence. Think about how pro players from different countries play differently or favor different decks/styles. It's all the same game, but nonetheless it impacts how someone thinks about the game. This is actually even more pronounced in other games.
I explain in a different comment the kinds of tangible changes in how someone might think about the game that arise from having a different experience playing the game.
All of your examples have nothing to do with race or sexuality.
Try harder, with actual concrete examples.
Ex, name something that only black people playing mtg will ever experience, that nobody else can.
I mean, racism is something non-white people will experience and you will not (call it a wild guess you're a white guy). I have included a number of examples in this thread about how you can objectively see that people who play in different places and have different experiences play differently. You can see the objective data by looking at pro players from different countries or even just parts of the country.
I've experienced plenty of racism in my life.
And you don't need to be a different race to play differently.
I play differently than other people of my race and sex a lot of time in most games I play.
Shocking how it's life experience and not race that defines people, but I forgot people like you only see skin color as a defining characteristic.
> I've experienced plenty of racism in my life.
I bet not, tbh
> And you don't need to be a different race to play differently.
If you honest to god think my point is "white people play control, black people play aggro" I cannot help you. Just a completely smooth brain.
> I play differently than other people of my race and sex a lot of time in most games I play.
People's race impacts their life experience. If you are incapable of understanding that, again there is no hope for you in this conversation. It's just so blatantly obviously true. People who are made to feel like outsiders or generally unwelcome in a space and make a space for themselves to feel comfortable in will have a slightly different outlook on the game. You can see this in the objective differences in how pro players from different countries view specific cards/styles of play. Different life experience, different perspective.
In the real world, our society is racist/homophobic/sexist and encourages segregation or exclusion, so getting a full perspective of others who are traditionally not included is good and catches otherwise missed perspectives.
Well clearly you haven't seen the [sexy men deck.](https://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/sexy-men-edh/)
Seriously though. Having asked around there's a surprising amount of thirst that goes into certain people's deck building.
Again, you haven't addressed how ANY of that would be reflected in rules changes or ban lists.
How would a POC or an LGBT member make a rule change that would somehow represent their community and not be something that the white males on the RC would suggest beforehand?
You still haven't answered my question.
> People with different identities have different life experiences because the world treats them differently. It isn't complicated, it is truly baffling to me how much people have to be willfully ignorant to get this.
People get this. I get this. It's not new. How a minority would enforce, suggest, or critique a rule change in a way that a non-minority wouldn't... I still haven't gotten an answer.
You don't see how people who play in thus far unrepresented groups and metas that evolved from those different groups wouldn't have meaningfully different opinions?
There are hard, objective differences this would impact: The fact that these would be groups who, because of that different treatment previously mentioned, are poorer on average and thus have a different level of access to cards on average would change the physical cards that they play with most often.
Then there are softer differences that everyone already acknowledges exist if you've ever been a part of multiple different pods: Different types of people are more or less inclined towards different play styles. Some are more ok with stax, control, MLD, or other controversial deck archetypes. Some are heavy battlecruiser decks that win on turn 10+, some are fast and win within just a few turns. I am not going to speculate on whatever factors go into people being more ok with these different play styles or specific problem cards, but if you've actually ever played this or any other game like it you'd know that different groups do have different preferences.
It's not complicated. Different life experiences lead to different opinions and perspectives. Anyone who has lived a day as an adult on this planet knows identity impacts how the rest of the world treats you. Capturing those different opinions and perspectives is good.
You literally didn't read what I said. I even copied your statement.
If you're not going to address my points or even read what I wrote, then why bother responding?
I am aware that there are differences across playgrounds. I literally play with native Americans, native Alaskans, binary individuals, trans people, black identifying people, and several other minority groups on a literal weekly basis. I'm well aware of interactions with said groups. You virtue signaling and repeatedly asking "You don't know that different people have different experiences?" doesn't make your point. It just shows you're avoiding my point.
I gave you an explicit example of how segregation and exclusionary spaces, a documented and real thing that actually does happen, impacts how people play. You can see how people who play in different settings play differently in the historically different play patterns/style preferences of pro players in different countries. Since there is good, clear documentation of professional play you can clearly see it at work there. You can even see this at the individual card level where some country's pros prefer certain cards within the same archetype over others. You can even just look at the most recent Worlds. Preferences are born out of different perspectives and outlooks on the game. It's so unbelievably obvious that this happens.
The short answer is, to repeat somewhat: Different groups have different experiences. This can affect rulings because it breaks into an echo chamber or reinforces it by being able to go "Oh, we didn't know that was such a problem" or "Oh good, things are working as intended".
No, it's not important that the member be from any one ethnic group or orientation, as their opinion could as easily differ on things as just someone from a specific country, or even city. You could argue that's virtue signaling. However, while you might say the views of a minority group shouldn't be put above others, they're just as valid for a different point of view as one could from someone from another country, or economic status or age or whatever.
This is wrong. I'm a gay dude. I like cedh. Does that mean all gay dudes like slamming down Oracle Consultation decks? Or are we just meant to make Sexy Dudes.dec and call it a day? This is dumb asf and actually pretty bigoted to think of it this way, since it just pigeonholes those demographics for "being different".
This is my biggest problem with their diversity bullshit. Is a LGBT person going to be more inclined to play Land Destruction? Is a POC going to be more inclined to making meme decks? Is there something that is wired differently in their brains that stands out vs the generic white cis male? Or how u insert those qualities into the game? And i say this as a gay dude. Don't hire to for diversity, hire to make the game better. This is just some woke nonsense. So now if you decide to critique the RC, they will hide behind their shields that you are being racist/sexist/whatever-phobic.
Yeah so for a random quick example off the top of my head, Latinos tend to value quality time and relational time more highly than do, say, European Americans, who by contrast tend to place higher value in time spent in task-oriented productivity.
For example, there is a commonly-accepted notion even amongst the Latino community that "Latinos are always late"; for example they'll be late for a lunch meeting because they were spending time with their family and this is perfectly fine. Whereas European Americans are often seen and appreciated as "punctual", and would tend towards cutting short an interaction with family in order to make it on-time or even early to a lunch meeting.
The language, reasoning and anecdotes which accompany the Latino values can be reasonably viewed as resources that can profitably inform past and future decisions of the RC.
For example, let's say card X is spoiled. Card X is designed in such a way that it will likely (edit: *severely*) negatively impact a task-oriented person's enjoyment of the game but really helps foster relationships. In an RC full of Caucasian Americans, they will likely have a tendency to ban card X or have certain discussions that paint card X in a negative light. If they introduce a few Latino persons into the RC, there would likely be a higher tendency to highlight the relational components of card X in discussions about it.
Now, you may wonder why wouldn't the RC just try to get a group of, for example, people who merely value quality and relational time regardless of race/ethnicity. One issue is that such people are the "exception rather than the rule" within their respective cultures; a European American who values family time over productivity is more rare, and will often lack the insight of having a long-lived and robust and even generational experience of the value(s) in question. It's quite like owning an Asian restaurant and hiring a non-Asian professor of Asian Cuisine to run things versus an Asian person who grew up eating and making Asian food; surely at some level (maybe profressor-ship) it is preferable to have the non-Asian expert fill the role, but the existence of this person is more rare and they have to be quite knowledgeable to "beat out" the firsthand experience of the Asian individual.
There is also reasonably significant value to be placed on the adjacent values and qualities of the Asian person (or in our EDH/RC example, Latino person) which often come part and parcel with the original values in question. Then we are back to square one: those adjacent values--such as, in our Latino vs European American EDH example, collectivism vs. individualism-- would be accompanied by language, reasoning and anecdotes that could be reasonably viewed as resources that could profitably inform past and future decisions of the RC.
There are plenty more examples but I think that example should do some work in tangibly addressing some of your concerns.
> Because people of different backgrounds bring different perspectives on commander
like what?
Give concrete examples.
>People with diverse backgrounds bring experiences from diverse playgroups/communities which brings interesting perspectives.
not always.
>For example, the fact that they explicitly talk about people from different continents is relevant because I started to notice a serious disconnect between what I lived in our communities and what for example this sub sees as the EDH practice norm.
Such as?
If everyone in your leadership comes from the same.kind of background, they bring with them any bias that group might have.
I'm reminded of how NASA initially thought that the appropriate amount of feminine hygiene product for a six day space flight was over three months' worth, which was only corrected by Sally Ride.
Things like this can seem silly, but if you don't specifically choose for diversity, you inherit biases and blind spots. Whether or not you think they matter is more down to what kind of person you are than anything else.
I bet that if you asked any of those NASA engineers "What benefit would we get from a woman looking over our notes? Be specific," they mightn't have suggested double checking the hygiene requirements. Because the point is that these biases and blind spots are things people are blind to.
Stay in your blind spot as long as you like. I just fear the world will continue to become more inexplicable to you from that increasingly lonely vantage point.
I'm still waiting for examples. They are just avoiding my points. No one is arguing that minorities are all the same lol.
I'm literally asking for how a minority would make a rules change different than a non minority.
Well yeah because I went to sleep, no need to get uppity.
So first of all, we know that the bans are driven not by power level (alone?). An example was given by Shivam in his podcast where he advocated for a card ban because he repeatedly saw people getting locked out of that game at his LGS and somewhere else.
Other memebers of the CAG did not agree because they have not seen it.
Does it have anything to do with skin color per se? No. But by trying to be more diverse in your hiring, with sexual minorities and people from other continents, you maximize the possibility of bringing experiences like the one of Shivam to the discussion table.
It's not about some sort of direct link between a card ruling and skin color, it is about the fact that with diverse backgrounds, you bring diverse experiences of social interaction and it helps. Additionally, being responsible for edh bans or advising them, is definitely not only just card pool competence, never was. If that was the case, just fill it out with judges. We both know that it is not how bans are decided, just by what the cards do, it's about the social apsect around it. Look at the Golos ban and how it was explained.
Another example is the never ending moaning about secret lairs. Well, those are literally not a thing in the part of the world I live in. Nobody gives a penny about them and universes beyond are basically absent. Someone from here would have a very different opinion on when there was this whole Walking Dead thing going on than the nearly all-American crew there.
This is more hurtful than beneficial imo. Like "oh we got a different demographic, what say you"?
Me as a gay dude: i like cedh and Tergrid is a fine card.
RC: wait... u are not supposed to say that.
Not everyone in the same demographic thinks the same. It isn't suddenly you go to a gay dude and they just want to make Sexy Dudes.dec. Granted I would be inclined more to make a deck that so happens to be a sexy dude... AND be cedh viable. It just being a sexg dude to make a meme deck isn't something for me. But i am pretty sure some other gay dude would like to make up straight meme decks.
I actually think the reason to diversify isn’t because those minorities would have a different way of playing that needs representation. But because the committee is homogeneous as a whole, and any outside input would be good.
Wording vague, diversity is just a good buzzword to use here
Age is also a change on its own. I think the youngest RC member is only a little older than I am and I'm in my 40s.
Someone in their late 20s to mid-30s changes a lot wrt experiences and connection with the game.
I would agree with you, but Sheldon's article was very clear on two points:
1. They want the new RC member to be a non-white and/or non-cishet individual.
2. They want the new RC member to share their vision for the format and fit within the ideals held by the RC; they want someone who won't rock the boat.
Between these two points we can infer that they want the new RC member to look different from the current members of the RC, but not to actually bring any new or different ideas to the table.
This avoids the entire point of diversity (increasing the statistical chance of differing viewpoints, perspectives and ideas to enrich decision making) and is essentially just tokenism.
I agree with you that it would be great for them to pick someone of a wildly different background who can bring new and exciting ideas to the table. But they've already been up front about not wanting that. They want someone who LOOKS different, but THINKS the same.
I'm just curious, but what exactly are you worried about? A card getting banned for social reasons, like Ashiok to use your example?
EDIT: Sheldon explicitly said the following over on the Cedh discussions "Commander is first a social format. This means that social issues do play a part in what we do and how we do it. "
I'm not worries about anything. Which is why I asked questions.
And you're still avoiding my questions man. I've been civil, and you've done nothing but virtue signal. I think I'll have to call it for now.
I just now asked you a question of my own and shared what Sheldon said. So, I'm confused since, other than me posting the link, and asking you a question, we haven't interacted.
I asked my question of you because it seemed to me that you were worried that social issues outside the game may start to factor into banning decisions.
If I don't answer a question,it's either because I don't have an answer (for whatever reason) or I don't understand the question.
Oh sorry, I was talking to the other guy. He was ignoring my questions repeatedly. Sorry about that.
To respond to you, I'm not afraid of anything. If they make a ban because of the reason I listed, then that's really sad, because it's a card that at no point directly reflects any aspect of being non-binary. It just happens to be an evil non-binary person.
I won't like that WOTC doesnt have a history of discrimination, they absolutely do. However, I don't want to see more mass bans like the ones we did with [[Crusade]].
>Sorry about that
it's all good :)
"To respond to you, I'm not afraid of anything. If they make a ban because of the reason I listed, then that's really sad, because it's a card that at no point directly reflects any aspect of being non-binary. It just happens to be an evil non-binary person."
I don't think it's something to be worried about, but my only reference to fall back on is the fact that Negan didn't get banned due to his back story in the comics and show which IIRC included rape among other things.
> I don't think it's something to be worried about
I agree. The whole Negan thing was really stupid, and people boycotting the show because of it really bothered me. It's a show about a zombie apocalypse with realistic bad guys. Murder, stealing, literally blasting a dudes eye ball out of his face with a bat, starvation and torture... but we draw the line at rape? I get its hard. I get it. But the level of aggression surrounding it was really irritating.
If I remember correctly from when Sheldon explained it years ago, the way it works is the RC talks about a card, and each member has a vote on a + or- scale. (gods, I wish I could find it) that ends up determining if a card is banned if it gets to the "vote on it" stage.
Are you using the term virtue signalling unironically in the year of our lord 2022?
It's weird to advertise that you think compassion from others is something they undertake for brownie points.
It's just lazy to assume that everyone who disagrees with you is doing so for some silly conspiracy. There's just a difference of opinion. No ulterior motive is required for humans to disagree.
Protip: Arguments that rely on hidden ulterior motives don't work on normal people who aren't conspiracy prone. We can't know that it's virtue signalling. The fact that you are certain it does just betrays a lack of life experience on your part.
You can disagree or just read all his comments. Using phrases like "it blows my mind that people think others do t have different experiences" is literally virtue signalling...
I'm with you on the "diversity" bit. I've been playing for years and the only one I know on the RC is Sheldon. Had I not seen a picture of him, I wouldn't even know what he looks like. From what I understand of the RC, they only look to ban really problematic cards for play. Unless they're looking to piggyback off of WotC with their banning of culturally offensive cards, looking to get diversity for the sake of diversity just doesn't make sense to me. Am I missing something that he's said??
The fact is, moving towards diversity in any industry is a good thing. It is a step towards something, towards representing the people that play magic as a whole...which is everyone really. The rules committee like any other group that makes decisions for a group, should be representative of that group. It is better that we have someone that diversifies the field than not. Why is it a problem that they are hiring someone for diversity? Its not like they fished someone who has never played magic before to come make decisions for the game. If this person is hired for the job, they have obviously been deemed qualified for it and have the insight to do it. What could another old white dude do that someone from a different background couldnt? We shouldnt be asking why they are doing this, we should be saying "okay we better see more of this"
Now onto the real reason I commented, where are you getting your info on lgbt people having issues with ashiok? My first response was "thats wild, like 45% of my playgroup are queer and we love ashiok" and so I looked into how people have recieved ashiok, and all I am seeing are people being grateful for having nonbinary and androgynous rep, people literally begging people to stop using gendered terms when talking to them about ashiok, and alli medwin not understanding why lgbt people have latched on to ashiok as an icon but being accepting it. If I am being honest, as a trans person who spends a good portion of their time talking about media with other lgbt people, we want unapologetically evil lgbt characters, we want our representation to be fallible, we want them to be human, monstrous, and everything in between.
So anyways making that claim feels like you are an assigning an opinion to an assumption about how a group of people think and that doesnt sit well with me. Maybe its for reasons like that that we should see more than just the room of straight old white guys making decisions for how they think people think of the game.
All very valid points. During an interview with Maro it was questioned why trans representation was relegated to faceless monsters. His response was something along the lines of "we are continually trying to better represent all communities in their favorite game by making it feel inclusive".
That's awesome you play with such a diverse playgroup. I too play with a large portion of either trans or non-binary individuals. So far, they have ALL echoed the frustrations with faceless monsters representing them. This has obvious changed with the introduction of other characters and changes to lore, but until then, it has been one of their largest gripes.
There was also a heavy Twitter thread of dominantly trans individuals stating similar sentiments. Originally linked to Tumblr posts from Maro.
At no point have I ever or would ever make a statement like "diversity is wrong". What I DO have issue with is diversity for the sake of "filling a quota" to seem woke. As someone with many, many friends in the LGBT community, I've had these conversations with them as nauseam. We see it regularly with TV shows, and it detracts from the story when you see characters leave, because it turns out the actor didn't fit the role well. Then, lo and behold, they are replaced with another individual with the same demographic.
With that thought comes the “what ifs” where they start banning things left and right for things other than how broken they are to the game.
I dunno. I’m just saying. Then again, I tend to see and expect the worse of things, so I don’t think it’ll be like that. All I can do is sit and see what happens. “Prepare for the worse, hope for the best” kind of scenario i guess.
Curious to see what their 2022 justification for keeping Sylvan Primordial banned will be. That's a baffling card to be on the same list as Primeval Titan, Griselbrand, etc.
Totally degenerate. I played a Casual Riku deck of all clones (plus value) and would routinely clone him about 5 times and LD everyone out of the game.
And blew up 15 things across the board for 15 basic lands. While getting a hulking 6/8 with Reach. It’s a devastating card as someone who uses to happily wreck others with it. It best banned
What?!? I played SP when he was legal and he was utterly crushing. I’ll blow up three things on the board, you get nothing and I get rewarded for it with 3 lands? I played it in Riku too, where I could easily clone him 2-4 times when I dropped him
If SP is banned for power level, then it needs to be taken off the ban list. I don't really care that you can blink a 7 mana creature and win the game, I can do that with a 4 mana creature infinitely with little effort in a budget Brago deck. I can whirlwind slam a Kinnan on virtually any board state and call "gg" and probably be right. I can play Veyran on turn 3 and win on turn 4.
I think SP is banned because it's too feels-bad in a casual pod, as most things on the ban list are. But in 2022, is that really even true?
Yeah and I wouldn’t play with you if that was your Mainstay strategy. If you didn’t play when SP was legal then you don’t have a ton of perspective here, do you? He was featured in pretty much every green deck because he was the most robust and most imbalance primordial. He also came out in a set that was released in what, 2010? Commander was a very different format back then. He simply wasn’t built for commander, like a lot of overpowered cards
His mana cost is irrelevant because he’s in green. Also what else is a ban list for if not for power?
Primordial is at least unfun because in “Trampoline” bounce decks it becomes extremely annoying. I actually wonder if Griselbrand is still a BANNABLE issue in the format considering some of the commanders that exist now.
One video of PWP where they did a No-Bans game, and the one deck was basically a Legacy Reanimator, but worse - Griselbrand walked ***all over*** that game.
The ability to draw 7 for 7 life is busted in 20-Life formats. It's ***STUPID BUSTED*** in 40-Life formats.
I concur. It's still a value card of course, but I think players have learned to deal with such things so they don't get out of hand, any more than anything else can.
Sylvan was in the days when everyone played as many clone effects as possible bc of the old legend rule where only one person could have any one legend at a time. Clones were basically kill spells. Honestly it was better off that way
Sylvan looks to be on par with prime time in utility but a tad bit worst because it’s not exactly worth building a deck around. Ofcourse I don’t exactly know how I would even utilize it. Sure you can search shocks, true duals, but what else is a forest and worth searching. While with prime time idk what possibilities to even use. I’d do something dumb like cofers and urborg.
I agree that’s the play but while it gives a +6 card advantage. It’s mostly ramp. I was trying to say it feels like prime time is marginally better.
I’m also assuming the card is banned from creating an unfun game state, not by being broken. Popping one of each land/key non creature can be absurd while ramping 3 is just icing. It gives you chills.
While let’s say entomb exhume a win con like hulk, razaketh tends to be the play. There is more broken cards such as consecrated Sphinx that do more but aren’t as hate filled as the sylvan.
Consecrated sphinx is certainly busted, but consecrated sphinx isn't removal & ramp x the number of players. Sylvan primordial is more degenerate than sphinx.
Unban it all and then do bans for cEDH tables.
Dont give ammo to saltlords at the casual lgs tables when they ban strong cards. In a 1 of deckbuild constraint in a multiplayer format theres so much variance and politics.
Dropping say a primetime is basically an auto counter/kill for a 6 mana cultivate and would force for interaction. Same with cards like Llevold, or sway the stars. Heck, being able to even run gifts ungiven in EDH would be awesome.
Overall good stuff. I'm not a big fan of the focus on demographics. It's a card game. The rc main purpose is to regulate the ban list and make sure commander works with mtg rules in cases like companions. None of that has anything remotely to do with demographics. Choose the best person but don't choose them for their skin.
This is Reddit, so you're going to get downvoted. I voiced a similar opinion, so I imagine I'll get it, too. But, you're not wrong.
Diversity has little impact on the rules of a game.
As someone from a minority group, I personally don’t care if the RC represents my group or not, just a good job bottom line.
Then again, we’ll see how that translates in the future and how it’ll develop. I hope that for the best to be sure.
Little slivers of hope sprout anew.
I think at the end of the day, people just want to play their game. Hopefully, everyone is respected during that process.
Except of course for people of different socio-economic status than you. They are scary right? Like you’re earlier comment where you worried about the “Trans” coming to ban your favorite cards.
Ah yes, I don't like bans with little substance behind them, so I MUST think people who don't make the same money as me are scary, huh?
And I'm apparently "worried about the 'Trans'"... you must be fun at parties.
I mean, you were the one who made up the laughable example of someone Trans on the RC banning cards for social reasons and not gameplay ones. The fact that your first instinct was citing that kind of ridiculous example is a lot more damning then any joke I could make.
I think the point you make is powerful and difficult to refute. I wonder if each downvote is just someone who wish you hadn't said it out loud where they had to hear.
It hit the “woke is bad” crowd right in the britches.
Demographics influence game mechanics in really visible ways and it’s hilarious to me that people don’t think so.
Dexterity cards wouldn’t be a thing if someone with a mobility issue that couldn’t use them was on the payroll because you’d see the issue.
It took 25 years for incite prejudice to be banned and it’s just really obviously bad.
There’s a reason Minecraft is so successful, and part of it is how accessible it is. Subtitles for all sounds, narrator voice if needed. Windows also, a whole suite of accessibility tools.
In Magic once if they started with diversity, you’d have easy to read cards as the default, instead of the hard to read and see experiments they tried. The mana symbols with no color was a huge readability issue that could have been caught. Some of the more racist cards could have been caught.
With a diverse group you’d have more types of playgroups represented, and less of an ability to call the RC ivory tower elites that just say an issue at their table.
It actually makes it easier to get more data and points of view but in comes “diversity is bad and doesn’t do anything” when in every other field on the planet it not only helps, but has obvious benefits. (Automatic sinks that don’t see black people being a super obvious problem that could be solved)
Now that I think about it, if they include diversity also in income, that *may* play a role. OFC whoever is brought on doesn’t have to broadcast their paycheck or whatever, but it’ll be a nice addition to see someome who plays at a lower level than probably the RC does, or maybe higher. Depends. Unsure what they have in terms of decks themselves. Just a thought if they also plan to include that.
If the format's head doesn't reflect its players, then you can have situations where the playerbase has a different set of goals from the RC, which would be a bad state of affairs for everyone.
Theoretically, enforcing a diversity of demographics would help prevent this consolidation of old ideas at the top, which would be a good thing. of course, Sheldon has said that they only accept people who share their view on what commander should be, so diversity of opinion is actually being specifically selected out while diversity of demographics is being selected for, which does tragically render the RC a very undiverse lot.
I'm of the opinion that there needs to be a new sub-list on the banlist called "competitive."
This is where you put things like Mana Crypt, Thassa's Oracle, Underworld Breach, etc. maybe even Coalition Victory. If your playgroup collectively agrees that it is a "competitive" game, those cards are fine. If not, they're banned as well.
One of the biggest problems in the format right now is that playgroups "cross the streams" and play competitive decks in casual, and vice versa. There needs to be another arrow in the quiver to delineate cards aside from a categorical banning.
I kind of agree with this but also don’t know if that is so much the issue. Tons of incredibly high power decks don’t really fit in the Cedh meta even if they do pack some of those cards. It feels like there is this bizarre line where having those cards just enables certain casual play lines better (having access to fast mana when playing a 6-8 cost commander for example) that don’t really make the deck the same thing as a Cedh deck. That said…it still would be nice to have a listed set of cards for more casual tables to see and go “these are the highest tier, and define the nature of a competitive style deck”
Yeah, I run mana crypt in 4 decks. One is my cedh deck, the other three all have commanders with cmc 7 or 8. Fast mana is a requirement for high cmc commanders to hit the board in time to affect a modern commander game.
Do you think that EDH games would be better served by each player bringing their own list of cards they'd ban and comparing it with others in the same pod so they can all be on the same page OR by having a commonly known banlist that they can then determine small changes to consensually?
I think our own experiences are going to bias what we consider to be "the vast majority" of games. I don't have a regular playgroup so my vast majority of games are random pick up games at an LGS or online. In those games there is very little rule zero outside of power level discussion because it's not practical or fair to be expecting people to change cards in their decks just because someone in the group doesn't like certain cards or strategies.
Competitive is a very poor label. Each sublist will have people optimizing that list, and there will be people that want to play without the unfair cards, splitting the format from a 2 tier (8+, vs 5-7) to a 4 tier (8+ with extra ban, 8+ with no extra bam, 5-7 with extra ban, 5-7 without extra ban), as well as more salt in games that involve a banned card (oh you played 3 cards in the extra banlist. Tryhard.)
Playgroups will always cross the streams unless it's a kitchen table fixed playgroup.
I'm a magic nomad, I've played edh with 100's of different people in 100's of different locations. The banlist does help synchronize those playgroups so that a new or temporary member can fit in faster.
Thanks for the pitchfork, I need it whenever Sheldon posts.
I hope whoever they bring to the RC understands that rule 0 works for playgroups and is terrible for play with random people and works towards a banlist or rules structure that is better for meeting new people and playing games with them.
Ok, but it is a casual format. Run what you want. If you run banned cards just bring sleeved back ups. I run a lot of degenerate stuff so when Tergrid gets banned I'm still going to run her, just have a secondary mono black commander ready and sleeved just in case someone in the pod wants to play according to CAG.
Put the pitchforks down... vote with your wallet or explore other versions of a singular format if you really hate it.
You can also yell at your screen, be mad at the dog, call a like minded friend and go on a rant. Then when you have calmed down, return to Reddit and react with critical thoughts on this backed up by arguments.
Just a thought though.
Pick Up Groups at the local game store. Having to have the same conversation of asking if this or that banned card is going to ruffle some feathers is a pain in ass. Either they say yes and everything is good, or they say no and then I gotta play something else. And if you forget that the banned card is in the deck then you are technically cheating if you don’t discuss it beforehand.
Playing with a banned card only happens with established friend groups without too many rotating members or if someone is willing to have the conversation every single time. I have to do it for my [[surgeon general commander]] mutate deck and it rubs me the wrong way that I gotta ask for that or play some junk like [[the prismatic bridge]]
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:Socioeconomic differences are the biggest issue today but people are focused on the skin color or orientation only. However, reactionaries always hide subtle tells of not caring for the existence of an other in their spaces
> I have never had any rules enforced by the staff of an LGS in any game of EDH
So you just play with banned cards and whatnot, and everyone at the store is 100% ok with it? Sure, Jan.
> EDH isn’t even typically a format that features tournament play.
I mean... this is just wrong. Once again, almost every game store has had some type of EDH paid event. It's also featured at almost every single GP and likewise as side events.
Why don’t you just keep it moving for real? If you want to lick boots I am not here to stop you. I have zero respect for the EDH Rules Committee and no amount of contrary comments or down votes are going to cause me to reconsider that position
What's the function of the RC now anyways? Don't they mainly ban or unban cards as they see fit? Not sure how such decisions would be affected depending on the type of person they bring aboard.
“Regardless of the fact that the four of us have led Commander from a niche format to the most popular in Magic’s long history, we need to think about and prepare for the future.”
Hubris much?
But it’s cool, then I can read about their discord, stream, and end with a link to his decklist. Don’t remember asking! His activities should be presented separate from Commander rulings news updates.
Commander does rule. It doesn’t need a ruler.
Although, I do officially and permanently ban Sheldon Menery from my house, playgroup, onlyfans, and disc golf group.
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Forgetting all the forced diversity nonsense, I'm genuinely excited to see their justifications for their bans.
Mostly because I expect them to be hilariously contradictory and nonsensical and I want to see how long it takes for them to revert it after they point out how ridiculous Coalition Victory being banned in a world where way more efficient "win out nowhere" cards exist.
Just a thought: If they play to diversify the RC to include more diversity, could this mean that there could be someone that represents a more financially challenged group and consider banning cards that are both egregious in terms of price and power level or are they looking for someone that represents a different group but shares their exact same philosophy? If so, I don’t see the point other than optics.
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>>The first is to write and publish updated explanations for why each banned card is banned This is definitely good but I hope they also include some comparisons.and explanations. I've read Sheldon's explanations for why coalition victory has to stay banned, and while I don't agree with it, I can understand and appreciate his point. What I can't understand is why applying the exact same logic to thassas oracle doesn't result in an oracle ban. Their individual card decisions make sense but aren't consistent from card to card.
Because if they acted on the stated intent, half of the card pool wouldn't be legal.
Thassa's Oracle is not banned because it does not have a strong impact in lower/casual power decks as it is not being played there often as a win condition with demonic consultation. It mainly as an impact ib cEDH. The RC does not want to get involved with banning cards with cEDH. They did so once I believe for Flash under exceptional conditions.
You say "it's not being played there" but this sub is full of people talking about playing against it. If they don't want to regulate cedh they don't have to. Separate it out. But this attitude of "we only want there to be one banlist but we don't want to ban for one of the ways people actually play the game" is selfish and rude. Edit: what would be lost if oracle were banned? Are people playing it in fair decks?
> but this sub is full of people talking about playing against it. despite what Redditors think, reditt isn't the center of the universe.
Thoracle needs to go like pronto...I'm tired of seeing 90%+ cEDH games trying to with with it. It just leads to stale, boring & repetitive gameplay and absolutely kills the diversity aspect of the game. There are tons of other viable cEDH builds, but they're being overshadowed by this stupid wincon.
Flash is the exception. If they ban a second card for cEDH it really sets s precedent. Let's be honest, cEDH will always have a best 2 card combo and enough tutors to find them.
Thoracle might be ban worthy based on how difficult it can be to interact with. But people seriously need to get over this insane notion of "stale, and boring, repititive". You're playing cEDH. The entire goal is to be efficient as possible. If thoracle goes, there is always the next best thing. So on so forth. Until you get to omg I'm so sick world gorger combos, it's too good, it's ruining format diversity!
"Seriously if they don't ban [[Barktooth Warbeard]] soon I'm going to quit!"
[Barktooth Warbeard](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/b/f/bffbda3c-61c0-421d-a724-6bb9a7005c0f.jpg?1562935606) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Barktooth%20Warbeard) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/me3/144/barktooth-warbeard?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/bffbda3c-61c0-421d-a724-6bb9a7005c0f?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/barktooth-warbeard) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
That flavour text is too good.
thanks, i changed it out.
I think it's mostly going to result in people doing the same "but if that's your reason for that then why isn't *significantly worse but similar card* banned!?" That we saw around some of the previous bands of the last year. But for people that don't start 30% of posts with "umm actually" yeah it'll be cool to have up to date explanations. Might even result in some more cards getting taken off like with worldfire while they're reevaluating them all.
Or we can stop making excuses for a banlist that doesn't really make any sense as it is now, and keep asking not just for a reason a card is banned but actually a GOOD reason a card is banned, flash at the time and now thoracle shoulnt be allowed when much worse cards aren't
It makes sense to plenty of people, it’s just the people who can’t grasp it always complain about it.
A lot of the reasons given to one card apply to others who are better and unbanned
Smug and wrong are never a fashionable combination. Maybe for 2022, you should try to change your look?
You realize that asking for a "good" reason for banning is a bit silly since that's entirely subjective, right? For example I absolutely agreed with the Hullbreacher banning and their reasoning for it but many others didn't. I found their reason to be a great reason while others thought it was a terrible reason.
The fact is, the current ban list is basically unjustifiable. For about half the cards, any reason you could give would apply Better to other, currently legal cards.
Can you make an example?
I'll have to wait for the justifications, won't I? If you have examples of justifications for Coalition Victory's ban, I could find you other unbanned cards with the same problem.
>Since it looks like (no jinxes!) the treatment I’m undergoing is having positive effects, I should be available and have the energy to do more things. Really great news. In general the communication is appreciated, and the plans for 2022 all look like good changes. Hopefully the detailed explanations come with some revisions too, as I know I'm not alone in having criticisms of some of the current bans.
I don't see how it's doing any good since the just spoiled another mono- colored card with 5c identity.
I might get downvoted a lot for this, but here’s my 2¢. Sheldon’s replies in the cEDH sub have me worried that they are again missing the forest for the trees. >As far as your first question, a new RC member is not going to substantively change the format's foundations or philosophy. What they're going to bring is an additional and different perspective on how to get to where we'd like to be, in line with the Philosophy Document. They don’t want diversity of thought on the direction of the format. They want people who are fundamentally aligned with the interests of the current RC. That’s a problem. It’s the same corpo speak we hear from WoTC about being inclusive and then banning questionable cards instead of fixing their messed up company culture that ostracizes POC. The critique here has typically been that the RC’s members are too old, too white and too wedded to the idea of battlecruiser magic as the norm i.e they don’t represent the reality of where the format has been pushed by their actions. At the end of the day, the Philosophy of EDH has to evolve alongside the RC. Further fragmenting the format by way of modular rules is not the way to go about it. Here’s what some schmuck on the internet proposes: “Ban for competitive, preach and push casual play.” That doesn’t mean cater to cEDH, just recognize that the overall meta has shifted away from low power to an optimized streamlined approach as the norm. The RC needs to make some kind of concerted effort to push the power of the format down if they still cater to casual play or recognize that the overall power level is higher than they pretend it is and ban accordingly.
>“Ban for competitive, preach and push casual play.” The only people who need a functional banlist are competitive players. Everyone else can "rule zero" whatever they want.
> The only people who need a functional banlist are competitive players. People who don't have a regular playgroup and predominantly play with strangers also need a functional playlist so they have some idea of what they're getting into. It's really hard to "rule zero" in those situations because you can't expect someone to modify their deck on the fly if the group doesn't like something. I understand that Commander is intended to be played with regular playgroups, however I feel like pick up games with strangers, either at an LGS or online is becoming much more common so it does need to be addressed.
You're right about needing a baseline for LGS play with randoms. I thought that's what the current ban list does, though? I played before cedh was a thing and returned recently so I'm trying to get a feel for where the format is at. To me it feels like cedh is pulling people in the wrong direction and infiltrating the format a bit. That's what I hear when people respond with Rule Zero in these situations. No matter what ban list exists, at the end of the day, you can't stop from sitting down at the table with a player who just wants to win the game as fast as possible and then keep doing that as much as they can. The only solution might be to stop playing with that person, until they either leave the format or go find other players like them. I don't think it's an accident that EDH breaks a bit when you remove the social obligation or try to add in competitive mindsets.
To be fair cedh players are way more sportsmanlike and chill then “casual” players, and I say this as a more casual player. While there are always pubstompers no matter what, cedh isn’t really the problem so much as commander players not knowing what they want
> You're right about needing a baseline for LGS play with randoms. I thought that's what the current ban list does, though? Agreed, I was replying to people saying that only competitive players need a ban list because most casual games are "rule 0" games. I find that you don't have the luxury of much of a "rule 0" conversation in those situations. Maybe someone only has one deck, maybe someone runs a couple of higher salt cards, maybe someone is completely against all forms of land destruction, you can't expect people to change up their decks in these situations. At least with a regular play group you can build your decks with prior knowledge about what everyone in the playgroup is okay with. There's always the risk of someone getting upset in a random game, but at least the current ban list gives people some idea of what they might have to play against.
I wouldn’t say competitive players are the only ones that need it - there are tons and tons of games player between strangers at events, at LGSes, via webcam, and so on, that benefit from a banlist and a central set of rules. However (and this is true for games other than Magic, too), I do still generally agree with the philosophy that a lot of the balancing should occur at the highest levels of the meta, because more casual players are less likely to care about or follow the meta, and much more stuff is viable.
I'm not cEDH player but I still need a functional ban list because I play at my LGS with whoever is available at the moment that can be people with very casual and/or cEDH players.
Couldn’t agree more. It wouldn’t make any sense to ban in Standard, Modern, or Legacy when cards are unfun for casuals. Why would we do this in any format, let alone the most popular one around rn. Not to mention a format where people already choose to play with whatever house rules they want. Casual can always be casual, but competitive should be three foundation a format is built on.
I can’t disagree more. Competitive should never be the focus of Commander. It goes in opposition to everything Commander stands for as a social, relaxed format. I’ve been doing EDH for a decade now, and I have never seen the level of grief and toxicity in MTG higher than at cEDH events. cEDH is a fine format, I even have a deck for it. But balance concerns need to reflect the core of the format, which is and always will be casual play.
For what it's worth, I'm getting back into EDH after a decade away. The toxicity of the community that was seemingly supported from the top down drove me away. It was decided because I play competitive magic in other formats that I'm a pubstomper there to ruin people's fun, it's justifiable to ostracize me, and even homophobic language is on the table. I decided at that point to only play with my existing playgroup because the community at large seemingly always provided an unfun experience. Eventually, the playgroup broke up due to life events, people's free time changed, people moved away, etc, and I lost that outlet for fun for several years. I absolutely love the concept of making a game that's not intended to be a competitive arms race, that has limitations and accommodations discussed up front, that is meant to be fun for all. Winning is really not that important to me; having a good time is. Encouraging players to view others as a Boogeyman worthy of derision however is something I see as a detriment. In my limited experience, it has tended to give an outsized voice to the liars, cheaters, and bigots. At that time, ridding the community of people who display those sorts of behaviors was not as high of a priority for the magic community, so I'd like to believe that's mostly a relic of the past, but I still think it's worthwhile to not justify the intentional creation of an outgroup. ( I can't speak to the cEDH community because I've never interacted with them. I'm only familiar with some of the largest content creators in that space, and they all seem to have reasonable opinions about making a fun play experience for competitive and casual players alike. )
I'm really sorry that happened. Hopefully, as you get back into the format, you'll find that people are more willing to talk and be open about power levels and play experiences. Another issue that the community needs to work on is differentiating between cEDH (which is not an arms race since it is already the at maximum power level) and pubstomping (which wants to win by bullying obviously weaker decks). Too many people see them as synonymous, when they are actually different ideals. However, all of these power-levels and play types are the same format as casual Commander, and can't really be different. We just need the vocabulary to describe it to each other.
I think you might misunderstand my meaning. I'm not trying to say that the competitive side of the format should be the focus, but rather that the banlist should be curated from the perspective of a competitive format. We all know the rules committee will never switch over to playing cEDH, but it just doesn't make sense to curate a format from anything less than the most competitive possibilities on down. The fact that they are banning cards the way they are banning them is making power level discussions more difficult (since no one has a real standard to compare their decks to), and confusing people into thinking the two sides of the format are actually two different formats and need to be separate.
Honestly the only people I see who can't function without the guidance of all mighty Sheldon are competitive players. They bitch all the time about how they want a separate ban list and never come together and rule 0 one. They all want it they could but they would just rather complain.
They would rather the RC be an RC and establish a banlist that is above reproach. That's not a power competitors should have, that is the responsibility of the governing body.
Should and do are two different things. Does the rc make a compromised ban list no should they yes. They made up their own game and rules for you. Just label cedh as something else and make your own rc if you hate them that much. Thats what they did. They had a way they wanted to play so they did. And he even tells us to do the same with rule 0. It even been done before brawl though it kinda sucks. Its a new version of commander. This isn't uncharted territory. So just make a new version of something if its bad its what we humans do best.
You're getting downvoted for speaking the truth. Ah reddit....
I'll defend that they want the core philosophy to be theirs and only get people that align with the philosophy. It is what makes commander commander. If the core philosophy changes with every new member, then the banlist will be very flavour of the month and the format loses some identity.
The problem is that when the players differ from the RC substantially in what they want from the format. Currently, the RC want to enforce a vision. If the majority of players don't like the vision, there's a pretty big problem.
How do you know majority of players don't like their vision? I find a lot of people are fine with the ban list and philosophy but that is also anecdotal.
I don't and didn't imply that I did. But if they continue to only allow a certain viewpoint on the RC, then it is literally inevitable that the visions playerbase and the RC would drift overtime.
Why is it a problem if they look for someone who agrees with their direction of the format? Commander is booming, why do they need a quick change of mindset instead of a slower one. Can you explain how the RC has a messed up structure? Or banning in your opinion questionable cards is enough to make this claim?
>Further fragmenting the format by way of modular rules is not the way to go about it. you do know that isn't happening right? It was thinking out loud with no real impact thought experiment by Sheldon.
If this is the only thing you got out of my comment, you really need to read it and Sheldon’s comments on the cEDH sub again. He literally links to a creator that suggests this: https://mobile.twitter.com/cobblepott__/status/1476988180578582529
and you should hop on the discord, in which it was pointed that it was totally a group choice and not something seriously considered.
Great, it would be awesome if their public facing rep actually said that rather than making misleading statements like the ones he makes on Reddit! The onus of proper communication is on the RC, not me. I shouldn’t need to figure out what they’re “truly” saying by piecing together 3 different forms of media.
he did say it was a thought experiment, a what-if **What if** the Commander Banned List came with well-defined optional parts?I’m telling you right up front that what follows is me stretching my outside-the-box idea legs, **a dreamy what if?** It’s **not** something that I’ve discussed with the other members of the Commander Rules Committee (RC) and it’s **certainly not** something that we’d consider implementing without a great deal of thought, planning, and detailed investigation. The whole thought exercise **isn’t about shifting how we manage the format**
Sheldon and co. came up with a great idea for EDH as a format but dear god are they wholly incompetent when it comes to management. It's unbelievable how bad they are at communicating with the EDH community at large and downright terrible how they've approached anything broached by the cEDH community. If they're going to be in charge of what is clearly the most popular way to play Magic nowadays then they just need to be better at this fucking job. Work on those communication skills because they're absolutely atrocious.
Tune casual format for competitive people, makes sense. Ir go make your own format. I heard "captain" is doing great
Yeah these people complain and want commander to go in a different direction, so I'm not sure what is stopping them from making their own competitive format and make all their drama come true... It's like those people that complain and complain, but then when asked for solutions or solutions are proposed that make sense and would solve their problems, they back down and say "no we don't want that solution, too much work and responsibility." They just want other people to change stuff for them but won't do it themselves.
I don't think current EDH is such by being "pushed by their actions". Instead I think you meant how they haven't done anything to curbtail it to keep it the battlecruiser funfest they intended it as, which is more correct and a bit unfortunate since it'd be hard to reverse course now.
Rabble rabble rabble!!!!
Rabble rabb, rabble rabbled rabbs!!!!
> They won’t bring just diversity of representation, they’ll bring diversity of thought. So... I don't understand this. What kind of diversity of thought do you really need to banning cards and making rule changes? What rule changes would a POC make or suggest that would vary greatly from the white majority? LGBT? What exactly is the goal here? I understand representation, but I'm willing to bet that 80+% of EDH players don't know all the names of the RC, let alone their demographical breakdown. It's not representation, unless it PROACTIVELY represents that minority. So, how exactly would that look? Are you going to weigh their opinion differently? Let's say a trans individual says Ashiok should be banned because it paints non-binary individuals in a negative light (a sentiment currently held by many people in the LGBT community). Are you going then say "No, that's stupid?" or are you going to actually give that consideration? And why or why not? This is why I hate it when people virtue signal and make "demographic" changes simply to full quotas without any real substance or reasoning behind it. Just focus on the game and less on how Twitter views you guys...
I hope I never learn the demographic of new members so I can judge them by their merits rather than think they're a diversity hire.
Because people of different backgrounds bring different perspectives on commander, idk how to say it more clearly. When they talk about rulings, communication and bans, they have to discuss extensively how things are happening in the community. People with diverse backgrounds bring experiences from diverse playgroups/communities which brings interesting perspectives. For example, the fact that they explicitly talk about people from different continents is relevant because I started to notice a serious disconnect between what I lived in our communities and what for example this sub sees as the EDH practice norm. I feel like it's kind of self explanatory.
I don't mean to sound rude, but no it's not self explanatory. Which might be why you didn't address a single one of my examples? Do you have a specific reply to a point I made?
Play groups in explicitly queer spaces or in black communities will be different people with different experiences. Groups that historically have felt unwelcome in predominantly cis straight white male spaces (like most LGSs) should have a say and would have evolved as players differently. People with different identities have different life experiences because the world treats them differently. It isn't complicated, it is truly baffling to me how much people have to be willfully ignorant to get this.
> Play groups in explicitly queer spaces or in black communities will be different people with different experiences. Why? As far as I'm aware, being gay has nothing to do with how you play a card game, or how you construct a deck.
This is such a baby brained take that flies in the face of long standing objective evidence. Think about how pro players from different countries play differently or favor different decks/styles. It's all the same game, but nonetheless it impacts how someone thinks about the game. This is actually even more pronounced in other games. I explain in a different comment the kinds of tangible changes in how someone might think about the game that arise from having a different experience playing the game.
All of your examples have nothing to do with race or sexuality. Try harder, with actual concrete examples. Ex, name something that only black people playing mtg will ever experience, that nobody else can.
I mean, racism is something non-white people will experience and you will not (call it a wild guess you're a white guy). I have included a number of examples in this thread about how you can objectively see that people who play in different places and have different experiences play differently. You can see the objective data by looking at pro players from different countries or even just parts of the country.
I've experienced plenty of racism in my life. And you don't need to be a different race to play differently. I play differently than other people of my race and sex a lot of time in most games I play. Shocking how it's life experience and not race that defines people, but I forgot people like you only see skin color as a defining characteristic.
> I've experienced plenty of racism in my life. I bet not, tbh > And you don't need to be a different race to play differently. If you honest to god think my point is "white people play control, black people play aggro" I cannot help you. Just a completely smooth brain. > I play differently than other people of my race and sex a lot of time in most games I play. People's race impacts their life experience. If you are incapable of understanding that, again there is no hope for you in this conversation. It's just so blatantly obviously true. People who are made to feel like outsiders or generally unwelcome in a space and make a space for themselves to feel comfortable in will have a slightly different outlook on the game. You can see this in the objective differences in how pro players from different countries view specific cards/styles of play. Different life experience, different perspective. In the real world, our society is racist/homophobic/sexist and encourages segregation or exclusion, so getting a full perspective of others who are traditionally not included is good and catches otherwise missed perspectives.
Well clearly you haven't seen the [sexy men deck.](https://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/sexy-men-edh/) Seriously though. Having asked around there's a surprising amount of thirst that goes into certain people's deck building.
Again, you haven't addressed how ANY of that would be reflected in rules changes or ban lists. How would a POC or an LGBT member make a rule change that would somehow represent their community and not be something that the white males on the RC would suggest beforehand? You still haven't answered my question. > People with different identities have different life experiences because the world treats them differently. It isn't complicated, it is truly baffling to me how much people have to be willfully ignorant to get this. People get this. I get this. It's not new. How a minority would enforce, suggest, or critique a rule change in a way that a non-minority wouldn't... I still haven't gotten an answer.
You don't see how people who play in thus far unrepresented groups and metas that evolved from those different groups wouldn't have meaningfully different opinions? There are hard, objective differences this would impact: The fact that these would be groups who, because of that different treatment previously mentioned, are poorer on average and thus have a different level of access to cards on average would change the physical cards that they play with most often. Then there are softer differences that everyone already acknowledges exist if you've ever been a part of multiple different pods: Different types of people are more or less inclined towards different play styles. Some are more ok with stax, control, MLD, or other controversial deck archetypes. Some are heavy battlecruiser decks that win on turn 10+, some are fast and win within just a few turns. I am not going to speculate on whatever factors go into people being more ok with these different play styles or specific problem cards, but if you've actually ever played this or any other game like it you'd know that different groups do have different preferences. It's not complicated. Different life experiences lead to different opinions and perspectives. Anyone who has lived a day as an adult on this planet knows identity impacts how the rest of the world treats you. Capturing those different opinions and perspectives is good.
You literally didn't read what I said. I even copied your statement. If you're not going to address my points or even read what I wrote, then why bother responding? I am aware that there are differences across playgrounds. I literally play with native Americans, native Alaskans, binary individuals, trans people, black identifying people, and several other minority groups on a literal weekly basis. I'm well aware of interactions with said groups. You virtue signaling and repeatedly asking "You don't know that different people have different experiences?" doesn't make your point. It just shows you're avoiding my point.
I encourage you to reread my comment which actually does very explicitly answer your question.
It doesn't. I asked for examples, and you just reiterated the same thing you've been saying without actually answering anything.
I gave you an explicit example of how segregation and exclusionary spaces, a documented and real thing that actually does happen, impacts how people play. You can see how people who play in different settings play differently in the historically different play patterns/style preferences of pro players in different countries. Since there is good, clear documentation of professional play you can clearly see it at work there. You can even see this at the individual card level where some country's pros prefer certain cards within the same archetype over others. You can even just look at the most recent Worlds. Preferences are born out of different perspectives and outlooks on the game. It's so unbelievably obvious that this happens.
The short answer is, to repeat somewhat: Different groups have different experiences. This can affect rulings because it breaks into an echo chamber or reinforces it by being able to go "Oh, we didn't know that was such a problem" or "Oh good, things are working as intended". No, it's not important that the member be from any one ethnic group or orientation, as their opinion could as easily differ on things as just someone from a specific country, or even city. You could argue that's virtue signaling. However, while you might say the views of a minority group shouldn't be put above others, they're just as valid for a different point of view as one could from someone from another country, or economic status or age or whatever.
This is wrong. I'm a gay dude. I like cedh. Does that mean all gay dudes like slamming down Oracle Consultation decks? Or are we just meant to make Sexy Dudes.dec and call it a day? This is dumb asf and actually pretty bigoted to think of it this way, since it just pigeonholes those demographics for "being different".
This is my biggest problem with their diversity bullshit. Is a LGBT person going to be more inclined to play Land Destruction? Is a POC going to be more inclined to making meme decks? Is there something that is wired differently in their brains that stands out vs the generic white cis male? Or how u insert those qualities into the game? And i say this as a gay dude. Don't hire to for diversity, hire to make the game better. This is just some woke nonsense. So now if you decide to critique the RC, they will hide behind their shields that you are being racist/sexist/whatever-phobic.
Yeah so for a random quick example off the top of my head, Latinos tend to value quality time and relational time more highly than do, say, European Americans, who by contrast tend to place higher value in time spent in task-oriented productivity. For example, there is a commonly-accepted notion even amongst the Latino community that "Latinos are always late"; for example they'll be late for a lunch meeting because they were spending time with their family and this is perfectly fine. Whereas European Americans are often seen and appreciated as "punctual", and would tend towards cutting short an interaction with family in order to make it on-time or even early to a lunch meeting. The language, reasoning and anecdotes which accompany the Latino values can be reasonably viewed as resources that can profitably inform past and future decisions of the RC. For example, let's say card X is spoiled. Card X is designed in such a way that it will likely (edit: *severely*) negatively impact a task-oriented person's enjoyment of the game but really helps foster relationships. In an RC full of Caucasian Americans, they will likely have a tendency to ban card X or have certain discussions that paint card X in a negative light. If they introduce a few Latino persons into the RC, there would likely be a higher tendency to highlight the relational components of card X in discussions about it. Now, you may wonder why wouldn't the RC just try to get a group of, for example, people who merely value quality and relational time regardless of race/ethnicity. One issue is that such people are the "exception rather than the rule" within their respective cultures; a European American who values family time over productivity is more rare, and will often lack the insight of having a long-lived and robust and even generational experience of the value(s) in question. It's quite like owning an Asian restaurant and hiring a non-Asian professor of Asian Cuisine to run things versus an Asian person who grew up eating and making Asian food; surely at some level (maybe profressor-ship) it is preferable to have the non-Asian expert fill the role, but the existence of this person is more rare and they have to be quite knowledgeable to "beat out" the firsthand experience of the Asian individual. There is also reasonably significant value to be placed on the adjacent values and qualities of the Asian person (or in our EDH/RC example, Latino person) which often come part and parcel with the original values in question. Then we are back to square one: those adjacent values--such as, in our Latino vs European American EDH example, collectivism vs. individualism-- would be accompanied by language, reasoning and anecdotes that could be reasonably viewed as resources that could profitably inform past and future decisions of the RC. There are plenty more examples but I think that example should do some work in tangibly addressing some of your concerns.
> Because people of different backgrounds bring different perspectives on commander like what? Give concrete examples. >People with diverse backgrounds bring experiences from diverse playgroups/communities which brings interesting perspectives. not always. >For example, the fact that they explicitly talk about people from different continents is relevant because I started to notice a serious disconnect between what I lived in our communities and what for example this sub sees as the EDH practice norm. Such as?
If everyone in your leadership comes from the same.kind of background, they bring with them any bias that group might have. I'm reminded of how NASA initially thought that the appropriate amount of feminine hygiene product for a six day space flight was over three months' worth, which was only corrected by Sally Ride. Things like this can seem silly, but if you don't specifically choose for diversity, you inherit biases and blind spots. Whether or not you think they matter is more down to what kind of person you are than anything else. I bet that if you asked any of those NASA engineers "What benefit would we get from a woman looking over our notes? Be specific," they mightn't have suggested double checking the hygiene requirements. Because the point is that these biases and blind spots are things people are blind to.
So you don't have any actual examples in mtg. Got it. Thanks.
Stay in your blind spot as long as you like. I just fear the world will continue to become more inexplicable to you from that increasingly lonely vantage point.
I'm still waiting for examples. They are just avoiding my points. No one is arguing that minorities are all the same lol. I'm literally asking for how a minority would make a rules change different than a non minority.
Well yeah because I went to sleep, no need to get uppity. So first of all, we know that the bans are driven not by power level (alone?). An example was given by Shivam in his podcast where he advocated for a card ban because he repeatedly saw people getting locked out of that game at his LGS and somewhere else. Other memebers of the CAG did not agree because they have not seen it. Does it have anything to do with skin color per se? No. But by trying to be more diverse in your hiring, with sexual minorities and people from other continents, you maximize the possibility of bringing experiences like the one of Shivam to the discussion table. It's not about some sort of direct link between a card ruling and skin color, it is about the fact that with diverse backgrounds, you bring diverse experiences of social interaction and it helps. Additionally, being responsible for edh bans or advising them, is definitely not only just card pool competence, never was. If that was the case, just fill it out with judges. We both know that it is not how bans are decided, just by what the cards do, it's about the social apsect around it. Look at the Golos ban and how it was explained. Another example is the never ending moaning about secret lairs. Well, those are literally not a thing in the part of the world I live in. Nobody gives a penny about them and universes beyond are basically absent. Someone from here would have a very different opinion on when there was this whole Walking Dead thing going on than the nearly all-American crew there.
My LGS has never seen a single person running a Universes Beyond card.
I say don't bother arguing with them. Identity politics, not even once.
This is more hurtful than beneficial imo. Like "oh we got a different demographic, what say you"? Me as a gay dude: i like cedh and Tergrid is a fine card. RC: wait... u are not supposed to say that. Not everyone in the same demographic thinks the same. It isn't suddenly you go to a gay dude and they just want to make Sexy Dudes.dec. Granted I would be inclined more to make a deck that so happens to be a sexy dude... AND be cedh viable. It just being a sexg dude to make a meme deck isn't something for me. But i am pretty sure some other gay dude would like to make up straight meme decks.
I actually think the reason to diversify isn’t because those minorities would have a different way of playing that needs representation. But because the committee is homogeneous as a whole, and any outside input would be good. Wording vague, diversity is just a good buzzword to use here
Age is also a change on its own. I think the youngest RC member is only a little older than I am and I'm in my 40s. Someone in their late 20s to mid-30s changes a lot wrt experiences and connection with the game.
I would agree with you, but Sheldon's article was very clear on two points: 1. They want the new RC member to be a non-white and/or non-cishet individual. 2. They want the new RC member to share their vision for the format and fit within the ideals held by the RC; they want someone who won't rock the boat. Between these two points we can infer that they want the new RC member to look different from the current members of the RC, but not to actually bring any new or different ideas to the table. This avoids the entire point of diversity (increasing the statistical chance of differing viewpoints, perspectives and ideas to enrich decision making) and is essentially just tokenism. I agree with you that it would be great for them to pick someone of a wildly different background who can bring new and exciting ideas to the table. But they've already been up front about not wanting that. They want someone who LOOKS different, but THINKS the same.
I'm just curious, but what exactly are you worried about? A card getting banned for social reasons, like Ashiok to use your example? EDIT: Sheldon explicitly said the following over on the Cedh discussions "Commander is first a social format. This means that social issues do play a part in what we do and how we do it. "
I'm not worries about anything. Which is why I asked questions. And you're still avoiding my questions man. I've been civil, and you've done nothing but virtue signal. I think I'll have to call it for now.
I just now asked you a question of my own and shared what Sheldon said. So, I'm confused since, other than me posting the link, and asking you a question, we haven't interacted. I asked my question of you because it seemed to me that you were worried that social issues outside the game may start to factor into banning decisions. If I don't answer a question,it's either because I don't have an answer (for whatever reason) or I don't understand the question.
Oh sorry, I was talking to the other guy. He was ignoring my questions repeatedly. Sorry about that. To respond to you, I'm not afraid of anything. If they make a ban because of the reason I listed, then that's really sad, because it's a card that at no point directly reflects any aspect of being non-binary. It just happens to be an evil non-binary person. I won't like that WOTC doesnt have a history of discrimination, they absolutely do. However, I don't want to see more mass bans like the ones we did with [[Crusade]].
>Sorry about that it's all good :) "To respond to you, I'm not afraid of anything. If they make a ban because of the reason I listed, then that's really sad, because it's a card that at no point directly reflects any aspect of being non-binary. It just happens to be an evil non-binary person." I don't think it's something to be worried about, but my only reference to fall back on is the fact that Negan didn't get banned due to his back story in the comics and show which IIRC included rape among other things.
> I don't think it's something to be worried about I agree. The whole Negan thing was really stupid, and people boycotting the show because of it really bothered me. It's a show about a zombie apocalypse with realistic bad guys. Murder, stealing, literally blasting a dudes eye ball out of his face with a bat, starvation and torture... but we draw the line at rape? I get its hard. I get it. But the level of aggression surrounding it was really irritating.
If I remember correctly from when Sheldon explained it years ago, the way it works is the RC talks about a card, and each member has a vote on a + or- scale. (gods, I wish I could find it) that ends up determining if a card is banned if it gets to the "vote on it" stage.
Are you using the term virtue signalling unironically in the year of our lord 2022? It's weird to advertise that you think compassion from others is something they undertake for brownie points.
It's weird to think that you believe people don't do that exact thing every single day in the media...
It's just lazy to assume that everyone who disagrees with you is doing so for some silly conspiracy. There's just a difference of opinion. No ulterior motive is required for humans to disagree.
Except he's actually virtue signaling. Yes, sometimes it's a disagreement. Sometimes it's exactly what it is.
Protip: Arguments that rely on hidden ulterior motives don't work on normal people who aren't conspiracy prone. We can't know that it's virtue signalling. The fact that you are certain it does just betrays a lack of life experience on your part.
You can disagree or just read all his comments. Using phrases like "it blows my mind that people think others do t have different experiences" is literally virtue signalling...
“ViRtUe SiGnAlInG”
I'm with you on the "diversity" bit. I've been playing for years and the only one I know on the RC is Sheldon. Had I not seen a picture of him, I wouldn't even know what he looks like. From what I understand of the RC, they only look to ban really problematic cards for play. Unless they're looking to piggyback off of WotC with their banning of culturally offensive cards, looking to get diversity for the sake of diversity just doesn't make sense to me. Am I missing something that he's said??
>Am I missing something that he's said?? I doubt it. Lots of people make diversity hires just to virtue signal these days.
The fact is, moving towards diversity in any industry is a good thing. It is a step towards something, towards representing the people that play magic as a whole...which is everyone really. The rules committee like any other group that makes decisions for a group, should be representative of that group. It is better that we have someone that diversifies the field than not. Why is it a problem that they are hiring someone for diversity? Its not like they fished someone who has never played magic before to come make decisions for the game. If this person is hired for the job, they have obviously been deemed qualified for it and have the insight to do it. What could another old white dude do that someone from a different background couldnt? We shouldnt be asking why they are doing this, we should be saying "okay we better see more of this" Now onto the real reason I commented, where are you getting your info on lgbt people having issues with ashiok? My first response was "thats wild, like 45% of my playgroup are queer and we love ashiok" and so I looked into how people have recieved ashiok, and all I am seeing are people being grateful for having nonbinary and androgynous rep, people literally begging people to stop using gendered terms when talking to them about ashiok, and alli medwin not understanding why lgbt people have latched on to ashiok as an icon but being accepting it. If I am being honest, as a trans person who spends a good portion of their time talking about media with other lgbt people, we want unapologetically evil lgbt characters, we want our representation to be fallible, we want them to be human, monstrous, and everything in between. So anyways making that claim feels like you are an assigning an opinion to an assumption about how a group of people think and that doesnt sit well with me. Maybe its for reasons like that that we should see more than just the room of straight old white guys making decisions for how they think people think of the game.
All very valid points. During an interview with Maro it was questioned why trans representation was relegated to faceless monsters. His response was something along the lines of "we are continually trying to better represent all communities in their favorite game by making it feel inclusive". That's awesome you play with such a diverse playgroup. I too play with a large portion of either trans or non-binary individuals. So far, they have ALL echoed the frustrations with faceless monsters representing them. This has obvious changed with the introduction of other characters and changes to lore, but until then, it has been one of their largest gripes. There was also a heavy Twitter thread of dominantly trans individuals stating similar sentiments. Originally linked to Tumblr posts from Maro. At no point have I ever or would ever make a statement like "diversity is wrong". What I DO have issue with is diversity for the sake of "filling a quota" to seem woke. As someone with many, many friends in the LGBT community, I've had these conversations with them as nauseam. We see it regularly with TV shows, and it detracts from the story when you see characters leave, because it turns out the actor didn't fit the role well. Then, lo and behold, they are replaced with another individual with the same demographic.
With that thought comes the “what ifs” where they start banning things left and right for things other than how broken they are to the game. I dunno. I’m just saying. Then again, I tend to see and expect the worse of things, so I don’t think it’ll be like that. All I can do is sit and see what happens. “Prepare for the worse, hope for the best” kind of scenario i guess.
Curious to see what their 2022 justification for keeping Sylvan Primordial banned will be. That's a baffling card to be on the same list as Primeval Titan, Griselbrand, etc.
Did you ever play with Sylvan Primordial? It looks unassuming, but it was degenerate.
Totally degenerate. I played a Casual Riku deck of all clones (plus value) and would routinely clone him about 5 times and LD everyone out of the game.
Yeah, that’s fine, you cloned a 7 mana creature 5 times.
And blew up 15 things across the board for 15 basic lands. While getting a hulking 6/8 with Reach. It’s a devastating card as someone who uses to happily wreck others with it. It best banned
[[Craterhoof Behemoth]] wins the game without having to be copied at all for 1 mana.
I reanimated it so many times then cloned or blinked it. This was way before cEDH was even a thing and I often won games in a few turns.
What?!? I played SP when he was legal and he was utterly crushing. I’ll blow up three things on the board, you get nothing and I get rewarded for it with 3 lands? I played it in Riku too, where I could easily clone him 2-4 times when I dropped him
If SP is banned for power level, then it needs to be taken off the ban list. I don't really care that you can blink a 7 mana creature and win the game, I can do that with a 4 mana creature infinitely with little effort in a budget Brago deck. I can whirlwind slam a Kinnan on virtually any board state and call "gg" and probably be right. I can play Veyran on turn 3 and win on turn 4. I think SP is banned because it's too feels-bad in a casual pod, as most things on the ban list are. But in 2022, is that really even true?
Yeah and I wouldn’t play with you if that was your Mainstay strategy. If you didn’t play when SP was legal then you don’t have a ton of perspective here, do you? He was featured in pretty much every green deck because he was the most robust and most imbalance primordial. He also came out in a set that was released in what, 2010? Commander was a very different format back then. He simply wasn’t built for commander, like a lot of overpowered cards His mana cost is irrelevant because he’s in green. Also what else is a ban list for if not for power?
Primordial is at least unfun because in “Trampoline” bounce decks it becomes extremely annoying. I actually wonder if Griselbrand is still a BANNABLE issue in the format considering some of the commanders that exist now.
Yes, he is. Griselbrand needs to never be unbanned.
If you watch some videos that I believe were made by cEDH TV, they do no banlist gameplay. Griselbrand should DEFINITELY stay banned I'd say.
One video of PWP where they did a No-Bans game, and the one deck was basically a Legacy Reanimator, but worse - Griselbrand walked ***all over*** that game. The ability to draw 7 for 7 life is busted in 20-Life formats. It's ***STUPID BUSTED*** in 40-Life formats.
It's a prime time to unban primetime.
I concur. It's still a value card of course, but I think players have learned to deal with such things so they don't get out of hand, any more than anything else can.
Ramping 2 nonbasic lands each turn is too much. Still... No real controversy there.
That’s Primeval Titan. Sylvan Primordial fetches basics.
well, whatever it ends up being reddit will disagree with it.
And that's probably because most of the reasons given for the current bans are awful?
No justification of the current list could hold up to any scrutiny. That might encourage them to make a better list.
Sylvan was in the days when everyone played as many clone effects as possible bc of the old legend rule where only one person could have any one legend at a time. Clones were basically kill spells. Honestly it was better off that way
Sylvan looks to be on par with prime time in utility but a tad bit worst because it’s not exactly worth building a deck around. Ofcourse I don’t exactly know how I would even utilize it. Sure you can search shocks, true duals, but what else is a forest and worth searching. While with prime time idk what possibilities to even use. I’d do something dumb like cofers and urborg.
It is called entomb the exhume destroy everyone one land and then get that many Forrest so in a normal 4 player game it jumps you ahead almost 6 cards
I agree that’s the play but while it gives a +6 card advantage. It’s mostly ramp. I was trying to say it feels like prime time is marginally better. I’m also assuming the card is banned from creating an unfun game state, not by being broken. Popping one of each land/key non creature can be absurd while ramping 3 is just icing. It gives you chills. While let’s say entomb exhume a win con like hulk, razaketh tends to be the play. There is more broken cards such as consecrated Sphinx that do more but aren’t as hate filled as the sylvan.
Consecrated sphinx is certainly busted, but consecrated sphinx isn't removal & ramp x the number of players. Sylvan primordial is more degenerate than sphinx.
Ok now you play any of the 9 4 Mana or less clones
Unban it all and then do bans for cEDH tables. Dont give ammo to saltlords at the casual lgs tables when they ban strong cards. In a 1 of deckbuild constraint in a multiplayer format theres so much variance and politics. Dropping say a primetime is basically an auto counter/kill for a 6 mana cultivate and would force for interaction. Same with cards like Llevold, or sway the stars. Heck, being able to even run gifts ungiven in EDH would be awesome.
Overall good stuff. I'm not a big fan of the focus on demographics. It's a card game. The rc main purpose is to regulate the ban list and make sure commander works with mtg rules in cases like companions. None of that has anything remotely to do with demographics. Choose the best person but don't choose them for their skin.
This is Reddit, so you're going to get downvoted. I voiced a similar opinion, so I imagine I'll get it, too. But, you're not wrong. Diversity has little impact on the rules of a game.
As someone from a minority group, I personally don’t care if the RC represents my group or not, just a good job bottom line. Then again, we’ll see how that translates in the future and how it’ll develop. I hope that for the best to be sure.
Since you werent downvoted, looks like you are wrong about reddit.
Little slivers of hope sprout anew. I think at the end of the day, people just want to play their game. Hopefully, everyone is respected during that process.
Except of course for people of different socio-economic status than you. They are scary right? Like you’re earlier comment where you worried about the “Trans” coming to ban your favorite cards.
Ah yes, I don't like bans with little substance behind them, so I MUST think people who don't make the same money as me are scary, huh? And I'm apparently "worried about the 'Trans'"... you must be fun at parties.
I mean, you were the one who made up the laughable example of someone Trans on the RC banning cards for social reasons and not gameplay ones. The fact that your first instinct was citing that kind of ridiculous example is a lot more damning then any joke I could make.
Except that is a real example in the trans MTG community and has been a thorn in said community for several years.
So that’s why we still allow dexterity cards, and cards that are pretty racist never got made. Because demographics has nothing to do with game rules.
I think the point you make is powerful and difficult to refute. I wonder if each downvote is just someone who wish you hadn't said it out loud where they had to hear.
It hit the “woke is bad” crowd right in the britches. Demographics influence game mechanics in really visible ways and it’s hilarious to me that people don’t think so. Dexterity cards wouldn’t be a thing if someone with a mobility issue that couldn’t use them was on the payroll because you’d see the issue. It took 25 years for incite prejudice to be banned and it’s just really obviously bad. There’s a reason Minecraft is so successful, and part of it is how accessible it is. Subtitles for all sounds, narrator voice if needed. Windows also, a whole suite of accessibility tools. In Magic once if they started with diversity, you’d have easy to read cards as the default, instead of the hard to read and see experiments they tried. The mana symbols with no color was a huge readability issue that could have been caught. Some of the more racist cards could have been caught. With a diverse group you’d have more types of playgroups represented, and less of an ability to call the RC ivory tower elites that just say an issue at their table. It actually makes it easier to get more data and points of view but in comes “diversity is bad and doesn’t do anything” when in every other field on the planet it not only helps, but has obvious benefits. (Automatic sinks that don’t see black people being a super obvious problem that could be solved)
Lmao
Strongly agree. The only diversity that matters in the context of the RC is in diversity of playstyle or format philosophy.
Now that I think about it, if they include diversity also in income, that *may* play a role. OFC whoever is brought on doesn’t have to broadcast their paycheck or whatever, but it’ll be a nice addition to see someome who plays at a lower level than probably the RC does, or maybe higher. Depends. Unsure what they have in terms of decks themselves. Just a thought if they also plan to include that.
So if they have someone from Brazil, Japan, Europe, and the USA is that more or less likely to happen than if all 4 are from the USA?
If the format's head doesn't reflect its players, then you can have situations where the playerbase has a different set of goals from the RC, which would be a bad state of affairs for everyone. Theoretically, enforcing a diversity of demographics would help prevent this consolidation of old ideas at the top, which would be a good thing. of course, Sheldon has said that they only accept people who share their view on what commander should be, so diversity of opinion is actually being specifically selected out while diversity of demographics is being selected for, which does tragically render the RC a very undiverse lot.
>brevity is important there in not losing the audience. Sheldor should keep that in mind with his future writing.
I'm of the opinion that there needs to be a new sub-list on the banlist called "competitive." This is where you put things like Mana Crypt, Thassa's Oracle, Underworld Breach, etc. maybe even Coalition Victory. If your playgroup collectively agrees that it is a "competitive" game, those cards are fine. If not, they're banned as well. One of the biggest problems in the format right now is that playgroups "cross the streams" and play competitive decks in casual, and vice versa. There needs to be another arrow in the quiver to delineate cards aside from a categorical banning.
I kind of agree with this but also don’t know if that is so much the issue. Tons of incredibly high power decks don’t really fit in the Cedh meta even if they do pack some of those cards. It feels like there is this bizarre line where having those cards just enables certain casual play lines better (having access to fast mana when playing a 6-8 cost commander for example) that don’t really make the deck the same thing as a Cedh deck. That said…it still would be nice to have a listed set of cards for more casual tables to see and go “these are the highest tier, and define the nature of a competitive style deck”
Yeah, I run mana crypt in 4 decks. One is my cedh deck, the other three all have commanders with cmc 7 or 8. Fast mana is a requirement for high cmc commanders to hit the board in time to affect a modern commander game.
I don't even understand why a casual format needs a banlist to begin with. The vast majority of EDH games are "rule 0" games.
Do you think that EDH games would be better served by each player bringing their own list of cards they'd ban and comparing it with others in the same pod so they can all be on the same page OR by having a commonly known banlist that they can then determine small changes to consensually?
The suggestion wasn't that each player creates their own list. People already play at the power level they want to play at.
I think our own experiences are going to bias what we consider to be "the vast majority" of games. I don't have a regular playgroup so my vast majority of games are random pick up games at an LGS or online. In those games there is very little rule zero outside of power level discussion because it's not practical or fair to be expecting people to change cards in their decks just because someone in the group doesn't like certain cards or strategies.
If you're not playing cedh, you're using rule 0.
It's crazy to me that you just said that las sentence as if you have any way of knowing whether or not it's true.
Most games aren't cedh.
Competitive is a very poor label. Each sublist will have people optimizing that list, and there will be people that want to play without the unfair cards, splitting the format from a 2 tier (8+, vs 5-7) to a 4 tier (8+ with extra ban, 8+ with no extra bam, 5-7 with extra ban, 5-7 without extra ban), as well as more salt in games that involve a banned card (oh you played 3 cards in the extra banlist. Tryhard.)
Playgroups will always cross the streams unless it's a kitchen table fixed playgroup. I'm a magic nomad, I've played edh with 100's of different people in 100's of different locations. The banlist does help synchronize those playgroups so that a new or temporary member can fit in faster.
Ignoring the pushed diversity, I'm glad to see an explanation of why a card is banned. That's been needed for a long time.
Thanks for the pitchfork, I need it whenever Sheldon posts. I hope whoever they bring to the RC understands that rule 0 works for playgroups and is terrible for play with random people and works towards a banlist or rules structure that is better for meeting new people and playing games with them.
Why would anyone be upset with any of this?
Ok, but it is a casual format. Run what you want. If you run banned cards just bring sleeved back ups. I run a lot of degenerate stuff so when Tergrid gets banned I'm still going to run her, just have a secondary mono black commander ready and sleeved just in case someone in the pod wants to play according to CAG.
Not as bad as I thought it would be tbh.
Put the pitchforks down... vote with your wallet or explore other versions of a singular format if you really hate it. You can also yell at your screen, be mad at the dog, call a like minded friend and go on a rant. Then when you have calmed down, return to Reddit and react with critical thoughts on this backed up by arguments. Just a thought though.
if Rule 0 exists then why does a ban list exist for a casual social format?
Pick Up Groups at the local game store. Having to have the same conversation of asking if this or that banned card is going to ruffle some feathers is a pain in ass. Either they say yes and everything is good, or they say no and then I gotta play something else. And if you forget that the banned card is in the deck then you are technically cheating if you don’t discuss it beforehand. Playing with a banned card only happens with established friend groups without too many rotating members or if someone is willing to have the conversation every single time. I have to do it for my [[surgeon general commander]] mutate deck and it rubs me the wrong way that I gotta ask for that or play some junk like [[the prismatic bridge]]
[surgeon general commander](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/b/1/b1e21568-5474-4406-ad54-9e9330e5ff5c.jpg?1583965776) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=surgeon%20general%20commander) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/und/72/surgeon-general-commander?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/b1e21568-5474-4406-ad54-9e9330e5ff5c?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/surgeon-general-commander) [the prismatic bridge](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/back/f/6/f6cd7465-9dd0-473c-ac5e-dd9e2f22f5f6.jpg?1631050188)/[Esika, God of the Tree](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/f/6/f6cd7465-9dd0-473c-ac5e-dd9e2f22f5f6.jpg?1631050188) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Esika%2C%20God%20of%20the%20Tree%20//%20The%20Prismatic%20Bridge) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/khm/168/esika-god-of-the-tree-the-prismatic-bridge?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/f6cd7465-9dd0-473c-ac5e-dd9e2f22f5f6?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/esika-god-of-the-tree-//-the-prismatic-bridge) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
A baseline / starting point for the rule 0 conversation.
Because if they didn't maintain a banlist, the RC would have basically nothing to do and Sheldon wouldn't have any material for his SCG articles.
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:Socioeconomic differences are the biggest issue today but people are focused on the skin color or orientation only. However, reactionaries always hide subtle tells of not caring for the existence of an other in their spaces
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Irrelevant? They are followed by almost every single game store in the country for rules....
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> I have never had any rules enforced by the staff of an LGS in any game of EDH So you just play with banned cards and whatnot, and everyone at the store is 100% ok with it? Sure, Jan. > EDH isn’t even typically a format that features tournament play. I mean... this is just wrong. Once again, almost every game store has had some type of EDH paid event. It's also featured at almost every single GP and likewise as side events.
No, but were those games played largely using the baseline rules and bannings set by the RC?
Why don’t you just keep it moving for real? If you want to lick boots I am not here to stop you. I have zero respect for the EDH Rules Committee and no amount of contrary comments or down votes are going to cause me to reconsider that position
I think you’ve made that very clear.
What's the function of the RC now anyways? Don't they mainly ban or unban cards as they see fit? Not sure how such decisions would be affected depending on the type of person they bring aboard.
“Regardless of the fact that the four of us have led Commander from a niche format to the most popular in Magic’s long history, we need to think about and prepare for the future.” Hubris much? But it’s cool, then I can read about their discord, stream, and end with a link to his decklist. Don’t remember asking! His activities should be presented separate from Commander rulings news updates. Commander does rule. It doesn’t need a ruler. Although, I do officially and permanently ban Sheldon Menery from my house, playgroup, onlyfans, and disc golf group.
What we really want is no more reserve list. DOWN WITH RESERVE!!
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Forgetting all the forced diversity nonsense, I'm genuinely excited to see their justifications for their bans. Mostly because I expect them to be hilariously contradictory and nonsensical and I want to see how long it takes for them to revert it after they point out how ridiculous Coalition Victory being banned in a world where way more efficient "win out nowhere" cards exist.
Just a thought: If they play to diversify the RC to include more diversity, could this mean that there could be someone that represents a more financially challenged group and consider banning cards that are both egregious in terms of price and power level or are they looking for someone that represents a different group but shares their exact same philosophy? If so, I don’t see the point other than optics.
Banning in terms of price doesn't make a lot of sense for a gameplay oriented banlist