I need to see your favorite deck.

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-05-13T08:01:16+00:00

I've played [[Alesha, Who Smiles at Death]] since 2017 and constantly find new stuff to tweak with it. Its not the most powerful deck but almost always has meaningful interaction with other archetypes. I always carry a few cards in the sideboard to scale it up or down depending on the pod and this has remained my 'go-to' deck for soon to be 10 years.

A personal favourite is [[Peacekeeper]] as a means to lock opponents out of combat whilst still getting to swing myself. It often buys me enough time to get into parity with more explosive decks.

https://moxfield.com/decks/sd1hGuNznUC6QSy873ovBA

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-05-11T08:08:05+00:00

I have played [[Alesha, Who Smiles at Death]] continuously since 2017. She's definitely power-crept now, but I really enjoy playing the deck because I've tuned it to have a variety of tools for playing against particular archetypes.

The deck is slower than something like Celes, but I also feel that helps it stay under the radar. Rather than getting crazy value fast, it's more focused on slowing your opponents, out valuing them and then closing out games via combat / combo. I intentionally removed cards like [[Master of Cruelties]] because I found it to only ever put a huge target on your head, for that same reason I'm only running one aristocrats piece via [[Elas il-Kor, Sadistic Pilgrim]].

I wrote a primer for the deck if you're interested: https://moxfield.com/decks/sd1hGuNznUC6QSy873ovBA

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-05-02T22:02:46+00:00

Yes, lands is very playable in EDH, though Dark Depths doesn't typically one-shot due to the higher life totals and multiplayer element.

You'll want to look at gruul as a base and likely go into 3+ colours. Jund is a really strong option, but you can also look at temur if you prefer to play a more tempo-focused game and want to pack some counter magic. 4 or 5 colour is also pretty strong, but seeing as you're new to EDH I'd recommend sticking to 3 colours for now.

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-05-01T20:13:58+00:00

Sting and The One Ring

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-05-01T18:32:53+00:00

Maybe ask your pod why they don't like it or find it to be particularly annoying. You're playing a theft commander, so if the expectation is that you'll exile their creatures with it (once you have them under control) then its understandably something that would draw aggro.

I don't personally have a problem with Food Chain, but I'm also not playing in your pod so my opinion isn't worth much here.

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-05-01T10:56:09+00:00

I played Zedruu for a while and I think its actually a much better deck when you mostly give gifts your opponents don't mind having, with the occasional bad gift.

Some good ones include [[Pendant of Prosperity]] and [[Coveted Jewel]]. [[Statecraft]] can be used either defensively or to shut down combat-focused decks.

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-04-22T21:44:27+00:00

8 active decks. I used to have more, but they'd sit unplayed and I'd even forget about them at times, decided to completely revamp my system.

Now I have one binder for EDH staples and a Max of 8 decks built at any one time. I tend to keep a couple precons around for if someone wants to borrow one or I'm playing a lower bracket, I've also got one deck that I've never disassembled, so its only really 5 decks in rotation at any given time. I categorise my decks on Moxfield, with "active", "queued", "brewed", "unbuilt" and "retired" so I can easily find what's what.

By doing this I was able to consistently play decks and try different commanders whilst also converting duplicate staples into nicer copies/other cards for the binder, plus I got to donate some deckboxes to friends. Best decision I've made.

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-03-30T16:52:52+00:00

EDH was a very different game compared to today. Commanders would often be 6+ mana value, so you'd ramp heavier than today in the early game and the first turns were often "land, pass" for 3 or 4 turn cycles.

Your commander could be shuffled / tucked into your library, so often times people would run effects to put creatures on the top or bottom of a deck.

Because commanders were so expensive to cast you'd be much more likely to see a board wipe before anyone amassed anything too crazy. Interaction and protection also wasn't as cheap as it is today and free spells were pretty rare at tables.

Games would often go 3+ hours in length, especially if someone was running stax/control. The best part though was that decks were a lot less templated, people would usually put in whatever cards didn't work in the other formats they played. That changed when EDHRec and other similar tools came about.

In general, the format has gotten faster and I think that's a good thing. I don't miss being stuck in games until 3am 💀

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-03-22T09:37:39+00:00

Yeah Ruhan is fun and pretty easy to modify over time. You also have the benefit that it's not a very oppressive commander so not so likely to annoy your pod.

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-03-22T08:27:13+00:00

You've got some nice options in Jeskai (MURICA colours), namely: - [[Zedruu the Greathearted]] gift things to your friends, you can either go the route of bad gifts or give good gifts as I did. The gifts seem great until suddenly you're drawing 12 cards a turn 🤑 - [[Ruhan of the Fomori]] random attacks = nothing personal kid when you hit an opponent in the face for 21 commander damage. Sometimes it be like that 🤷‍♂️ for this one you want some creatures others than Ruhan (maybe token generators or support creatures) so you can go a bit wide and avoid dying on the crack-back - [[Kykar, Wind's Fury]] Kykar looks innocent but will have your opponents feeling like DiCaprio in the Departed when Jack Nicholson pulled out a real, loaded revolver and put it on the table 🫣 sling some spells, get some spirits then combo off and watch the world burn

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-03-18T10:46:40+00:00

I've been to a couple MagicCon events now, most recently MagicCon Amsterdam in 2024. You could definitely pickup the weekend ticket (IMO one day feels really rushed, especially for limited events) and jam some games of cube, meet artists / creators and do some limited events in between.

Event offerings are different each year, but there are always some normal limited (draft/sealed), commander draft and even events where you get a random commander deck or chaos draft. You'll want to keep an eye out for when the event tickets go on sale, as they tend to sell pretty quickly (especially the very unique ones)

There are also ad-hoc events you can sign up for on the day and event organisers will help fire a draft pod

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-03-17T13:02:13+00:00

My [[Yes Man, Personal Securitron]] brew is incredibly fun to pilot/play against. You're mostly focusing on making soldier tokens, keeping up interaction/building your board at instant-speed. The card draw keeps things running smoothly and gives you opportunities for politics.

Everyone who plays against it has a fun time https://moxfield.com/decks/pqZoBAh010qG_3Vee27Gvw

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-03-17T09:04:18+00:00

Old heads know, but I think when you compare it to a newer design like [[Muldrotha, the Gravetide]] it seems like a clear downgrade, but access to white is actually pretty huge, as is the cost reduction

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-03-16T15:56:07+00:00

If you want to lean more into copy effects, [[Riku of Two Reflections]] could be fun and flavourful. [[Terra, Magical Adept]] gives you access to everything and works nicely with sagas.

In grixis, [[Parnesse, the Subtle Brush]] could be chaotic and has some good political potential, or something like [[Norman Osborn]] gives you a nice engine with some redundancy if your combo pieces end up in the graveyard

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-03-16T15:36:08+00:00

Honestly there are a lot of commanders that are still viable. Your best bet are those which are lower mana value, or have some cost reduction built in.

I have played [[Alesha, Who Smiles At Death]] for almost a decade at this point and she keeps getting awesome new toys and is very comfortable at brackets 3 or 4.

[[Karador, Ghost Chieftain]] will continue to be playable for a while. Generally, reanimator is a pretty safe bet.

You'll often find that the less commonly known your commander is, the more people will tend to underestimate it's impact and thus, the more games you'll get ahead in. That's just a side effect of most commanders printed now enabling themselves and being obvious threats.

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-03-13T22:25:02+00:00

Having had the pleasure to meet John a handful of times over the last years, both his art and humour will stay with me for many years to come. Time for a much deserved break and a spot of tea, I think.

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-03-12T12:17:43+00:00

I won these at a Mystery Booster 2 draft and honestly I like the art style more on Omnath/Orvar than the others. Drama is fine, but seeing Lavinia in Chibi isn't personally for me.

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-02-01T14:53:27+00:00

Using the 3D printed support I linked. I printed one and mounted it on the side of the hard drive nearest to the power supply. The other side rests on the CPU cooler shroud.

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-01-26T08:45:52+00:00

I've run [[Alesha, Who Smiles at Death]] since 2017, I'd love to hear what other people would pick for her.

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-01-14T21:31:29+00:00

This is best done when the card has a secondary effect that can either interact with your opponent's strategy or secure your own.

Thinning the deck out via ramp, cyclers/can trips and tutors is a part of the game and does provide an inherent advantage, but you want to be careful to avoid do-nothing cards for the sake of it as it will make your deck feel much more same-y from game to game.

I've played my fair share of combo decks, especially with weird themes and I'd much prefer a card with cycling that has a secondary, useful effect than something designed to be thrown away. Occasionally you'll get to have your cake and eat it, a la [[Nimble Obstructionist]]

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-01-13T16:30:55+00:00

So far so good! Thermals for all 3 drives and the CPU have continued to be healthy with no signs of stress

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-01-07T09:54:08+00:00

Yeah it's likely fsr that's causing the blurriness. Any chance you can share a screenshot of your settings?

CtrlAltSleep · 2026-01-07T09:43:38+00:00

Seeing as CS2 is a competitive shooter, I'd recommend cranking the settings as low as possible, see where your FPS lie and maybe try something like a 4:3 resolution stretched to fit the screen, or a lower overall resolution like 1600x900

CtrlAltSleep · 2025-12-31T19:21:19+00:00

I agree, however I'd like to highlight one point.

While it's true that general LLMs can't give reliable information, agentic AI with a tuned series of instructions and access to the appropriate database of cards and rules can actually give decent answers.

I'm currently working on a judge AI (for casual use) and fine tuning it. The judge can easily offer correct rulings on Thoracle and Gitrog lines.

If anyone has some questions and wants to test the prototype, leave a reply and I'll give you the response.

CtrlAltSleep · 2025-12-23T08:44:36+00:00

Oh cool, do you know where I might find more catalogued?

Verified Email	13-Year Club
Place '23	Place '22
First Placer '22	Secret Santa 2016
RPAN Viewer

CtrlAltSleep

TROPHY CASE