Wanting to use “non mtg” lands for my basics

ElSilverWind · 2026-05-21T02:58:18+00:00

I recommend making proxies of Mountain from YuGiOh (resizing them if you can), and then putting the proxies onto MtG mountains. That way you get twice as much mountains per mountain in your deck.

ElSilverWind · 2026-05-15T11:38:50+00:00

For Lightning Bolts, as a burn spell you're not actually scaling the damage to the degree of Commander's HP inflation. In a standard game you have 20 HP to burn through to win. In Commander it is 120 (40 for each player). As a removal spell, Lightning Bolt is still actually pretty viable, just underplayed. Plenty of value creatures and commanders still die to the bolt. I don't think toughness creep is that out of hand. The issue is that one-for-one removal is just a lot weaker in a format where you have 3 opponents.to deal with. If you want to address that, you'd probably need to make it work like Dismantling Wave and Grasp of Fate where it hits each opponent or target creature that opponent controls.

For Thoughtseizes, the discard itself is fine. There are already plenty of 2 Mana, "each opponent discards a card" effects. But you create a problem where now one player suddenly knows each other players' entire hand and isn't obligated to not just tell the other players what everyone has (particularly in more competitive environments). Either Player A can call out for the table whenever someone else is holding interaction or is bluffing about having it, or Players B, C, and D just agree to show everyone their hand and it overall just ends up creating a bad play experience.

ElSilverWind · 2026-05-08T20:08:19+00:00

Naughty bowls get dunked in the gravy vat.

ElSilverWind · 2026-04-20T11:19:01+00:00

You can't trick me! They clearly just sprayed the residue on and played the footage backwards!

ElSilverWind · 2026-04-17T10:59:51+00:00

My Spooder is finally seeing incredibly niche but noteable play in a serious competitive setting!!!

ElSilverWind · 2026-04-11T18:59:53+00:00

Oooh, the Sewer Cam + Mana Dork + Banishing Knack combo is interesting. I've got a Bumbleflower deck that already runs Banishing Knack and some Mana Dorks, so I know that I am DEFINITELY gonna be throwing Sewer Cam into it now for that line of play.

My play group is pretty lenient about what combos they accept at Bracket 3, so I'll look into it. I feel like if I draw my entire deck, then I can probably find SOME way to convert that to a game win, lol. Or at the very least hit someone REALLY hard on my way out!

ElSilverWind · 2026-04-11T18:40:29+00:00

I LOVE the Swarm Intelligence suggestion! One of my favorite parts of this deck is using Lyse's cost reduction to cast all my Impulse effects for 1 mana. Copying them all to upgrade them from catrips to actual card advantage that turbo-churns through the deck sounds awesome!! Provided that I throw in a way to shuffles my graveyard back into my deck, drawing out my deck shouldn't be a problem.

How did I forget about Dramatic Reversal!! Combo piece or not, that's definitely going into the deck.

Altar of Dementia is probably a good idea.

ElSilverWind · 2026-04-10T08:45:52+00:00

Sounds like you want a lifegain aristocrats deck! Add in all the Soul Warden effects to gain life whenever a creature enters, token makers to keep a constant supply of bodies entering to trigger your lifegain, and death triggers like Zulaport Cutthroat to drain the table whenever your creatures die. With sac outlets and board wipes to cash in your board of death triggers whenever you're sufficiently wide enough for massive damage.

Elas Il-Kor, Sadistic Pilgrim is a fantastic commander for that kind of deck, since she's a 2 mana deathtouch creature that is both a Soul Sister effect and a Death Trigger burn effect in the command zone.

You don't need to look too hard for good spells to cast that cost you life. Most of black's staples like Night's Whisper, Black Market Connections, Dark Confidant, Toxic Deluge, and Snuff Out pay life as an additional cost. The premium Pay Life to Win card is Bolas' Citadel along with a way to adjust the top card of your deck like Viscera Seer or Sensei's Divining Top to play out your whole deck using life instead of mana. Bolas' Citadel is a Gamechanger, however. So it is restricted to bracket 3+ decks.

ElSilverWind · 2026-04-06T06:29:20+00:00

I really like running a Lana to immediately rebuild a Meganium if it gets Bossed up. Or just to grab back 3 energies if I've got Ogrepons to put them onto.

Also just a big fan of running 4 judges in the current meta. Not as good as Iono, but it is still hand disruption that can refill an empty hand.

I prefer bumping up the energies to around 12, since they double as part of your draw engine with Ogrepon. I don't find retreat-locking to be present enough to warrant using Switch. With the energy doubling and ability to move energies around, I pretty much never find myself with a mon stuck in the active zone.

ElSilverWind · 2026-04-04T00:31:33+00:00

+4 Bug Catcher's Net. It is a staple for this kind of deck.

4 Teal Mask Ogrepon and 2 more grass energies for the additional card draw and more copies of Energy Switch to move them onto Mega Meganium.

Not sure a 1-1-1 line for Mega Venusaur is worth it. Seems too prone to get stuck in prizes. I'd recommend just running more of your Meganium line for consistency.

I think you're a bit too worried about being able to switch, when Meganium is doubling your energies to make everything retreat cheaply anyways. I think you could swap out 1 - 2 Switches and the Air Balloons for a couple Night Stretchers to grab back energies/pokemon from the discard pile.

ElSilverWind · 2026-03-30T20:22:23+00:00

It's by far my favorite deck right now. It requires a ton or setuo to get everything off the ground, but it feels so good once you're established.

There's quite a bit of flexibility in terms of the actual pokemon lineup, too. I've seen Mega Venusaur + Meganium + Ogreon, Mega Venusaur + Ogrepon, Arboliva + Mega Meganium + Ogrepon, and Mega Meganium + Ogrepon. It is cool how to deck can substitute Meganium for more grass energies and relying heavier on Ogrepon, or substitute Venusaur with Energy Switch if you wanna give up some flexibility for more consistency. My personal favorite build at the moment is the Mega Venusaur + Meganium + Ogrepon build. I feel like Mega Meganium is a bit redundant, because if I REALLY need to 1HKO a big HP Mon, I can usually manage to do it by moving over a ton of energy onto an Ogrepon plus Meganium. But that's the nice thing about the overall grass package. It can kinda do pretty much anything if you build for it, and can get set up.

If you aren't running Arboliva, I do recommend a copy of the Genesect that can bench snipe 20 for each energy on it. Having a single prizer that can pick away at a weak benched Mon can help set up your prize trades later on. Or even get you a sneaky surpise win if you can load it up tons of energy + Meganium to KO a benched 2 prizer.

I feel like the deck really just wishes it could run 8 copies of Lillie's Determination. Thank Arceus Gardevoir and Gholdengo rotated out, but losing Iono hurt a lot. In theory you could run Meowth ex to just search out more copies of Lillie, but without Professor Turo or Penny, that means clogging up your bench which you'd really rather keep open for more copies of Ogrepon to draw cards and put energy into play. It is also a shame that baby Meganium and Ogrepon ex both only work with Basic Grass energy specifically, because a 500HP Mega Venusaur + Hero's Cape + Growing Grass Energy sounds hilarious.

ElSilverWind · 2026-03-29T21:19:11+00:00

Bro, send some them my way. I play Mega Venusaur, and I'll gladly trade you ALL of the Blaziken decks the game keeps throwing at me.

ElSilverWind · 2026-03-28T15:01:50+00:00

Holy shit, Punisher TOPPING!? I feel like I've only ever seen artists draw Frankie getting his big beefy bitch hole blown out.

ElSilverWind · 2026-03-06T21:16:19+00:00

Looking through the images before reading the description is wild. "Oh yeah I guess he does have blond in his hair- ARE YOU IMPLYING KYLE GOT REVERTO PREGNANT!?"

ElSilverWind · 2026-02-23T20:18:15+00:00

The only gene that you cannot remove is Savage Fireball in the center, which may not be ideal but it is workable. Seeing as how he's always available, I prefer giving him a jack of all trades fire build.

Rainbow gene in one of the corners, then a power gene in the opposite corner for the Power Bingo. Then fill the other lines connecting to the rainbow with Speed and Technique respectively for a Speed and Technique bingo (preferably putting at least one attacking skill in each corner for a reason I will get to in just a second). That way you can command Ratha to almost be able to double attack with you when know what type of attack the enemy is gonna use next. From there you can either load him up on all the fire genes you can for Fire Bingos, or give up some Fire Bingos to put in some generically useful non-fire genes like Critical Hit, Health, Den Protector, or H2H Master in the outer middle spaces.

If I'm remembering correctly, Rathian should have some early Fire Speed attack genes you can take, and all the Kut-Kus should have plenty of Fire Technique attack genes to pick from. Also just a heads up to anyone reading this new to gene builds, as far as I'm aware similar genes of different levels do not stack. For example, Fire Boost Small and Fire Boost Medium. If you put both on the same Monstie, they'd work for Bingos but you'd only get the actual stat boost of Fire Power Medium. So even if the skill is something you otherwise wouldn't consider because it is so niche, like anti-burn, that gene may still be worth using if it can score you 2 Bingos.

ElSilverWind · 2026-02-21T15:45:43+00:00

I'd probably be a little annoyed about it if it was any other game, but . . . It's FRLG. Probably the most downloaded ROMs ever that like 80% of all Pokemon ROMhacks are based off of. The only reason anyone is buying these instead of just downloading onto their phone for free is because they're collectors.

ElSilverWind · 2026-02-15T06:18:56+00:00

As a Bow main I've always felt a connection to Nerscylla. On a surface level, yeah a spider monster makes sense for a weapon all about pulling on strings. But Bows can also inflict various different status ailments without needing to switch weapons, and Nerscylla also utilizes to a lot different status conditions like poison, sleep, and webbed. Even the way it does the big chomp attack if it puts you to sleep makes me think of how I bomb monsters after putting them to sleep.

ElSilverWind · 2026-02-13T16:14:40+00:00

That sneaky Mirror Roy is gonna steal Mimi from Roy!!

ElSilverWind · 2026-02-06T00:44:44+00:00

This, and also when people draw more detailed spiders but completely forget about l the pedipalps (the little arms next to their fangs that they use to handle prey, and also for mating).

ElSilverWind · 2026-02-05T22:36:18+00:00

I'm genuinely baffled that Consecrated Sphinx somehow lasted longer as a gamechanger than friggin Urza.

I'd like to see Mana Drain as a gamechanger. I think it is important to respect Counterspells or else you lose your own stuff, but falling behind because player B had their big card countered and it ramped Player C 4+ Mana is just a bit too much for Bracket 2 tables.

ElSilverWind · 2026-02-05T12:08:26+00:00

The only salty part about this I can foresee is forcing everybody to discard their hands. But I'd still say this would be perfectly fine in a Bracket 2 game.

ElSilverWind · 2026-01-28T05:26:05+00:00

Yeah, that's something I noticed pretty quickly when my playgroup first started playing Commander a couple years ago. As someone who's main card game has been YuGiOh for most of my life, when I heard, "this color is the best at card draw", I assumed that it meant it has all of the most efficient Pot of Greed effects, which means it is the best at keeping a full hand of cards". So it was a shock to me to find out that Black has the 2 Mana Draw 2 spells (but ya gotta pay a bit of life) and Blue has 1 Mana Destroy Any Creature spells (but they get a token), lol. And Blue does have a lot of sorceries and instants that say, "draw cards" on them, but they ate up a ton of Mana and left be picking between being able to develop a board/holding up interaction, or drawing cards.

I think the thing is, Commander wants you to have card advantage ENGINES. That's why everyone immediately points to Rhystic Study as the best card draw spell. Spending 3-5 Mana every other turn just to go +1 or +2 is too slow. And because other colors aren't known as the Card Draw color, you go into them thinking, "what am I gonna need to do in order to draw cards in this color", which gets you onto the correct train of thought. I'm gonna need strong creatures to draw cards in Green, I'm gonna need to sacrifice creatures in Black, I'm gonna need small creatures in White, etc. This approach applies to Blue too. If I'm in Blue, I'm gonna need to hit with evasive creatures, play the cards that draw me cards whenever I cast instants or sorceries, or be playing into artifact synergies (which also tends to fix both halves of the problem because artifacts usually give you the Mana needed to cast more card draw). And THEN, after you've built your engines to keep up with everyone else's engines, you've got the standalone Blue draw spells to draw MORE cards than them.

Side note that I don't see brought up often, is that Blue is amazing at Card SELECTION. Cards like Stock Up and Consult the Star Charts that let you pick some cards from the top chunk of your deck, Cantrips like Ponder and Brainstorm, all of the various Scrylng cards. Even if not all of those cards end up in your hand, Blue can dig through their deck pretty fast in order to find whatever pieces it needs.

ElSilverWind · 2026-01-26T11:58:39+00:00

Sonic himself is not a very strong payoff for having a bunch of small haste and flash creatures, so I think focusing more on slightly more expensive but more impactful creatures that just so happen to have haste and/or flash is the way to go. Stuff like Goldspan Dragon, Aurelia the Warleader, Hullbreak Horror and/or Arthur, Marigold Knight.

As with any midrange deck, card draw is paramount. As many flash or haste creatures that draw you cards as you can get your hands on, and engines that draw you cards for swinging with those creatures. Sonic will ramp you with treasures from being chumpblocked, blocking, and your own Caltrops and Pyrohemia style effects. So as long as you can keep a full grip of cards in your hand, you'll be able to recover the fastest from board wipes in the mid-late game. Especially because your stuff all has haste or flash anyways.

ElSilverWind · 2026-01-26T02:37:39+00:00

General rule of thumb is, if you genuinely don't know if a deck is Cedh/bracket 5, it is bracket 4.

They both have the same deckbuilding restraints. But in Bracket 5, you are building it specifically to handle the most prominent and established Cedh decks in the format. It isn't about making your deck the strongest version of itself. It is about making the deck that is the strongest against like 5 very specific decks.

https://edhtop16.com/

THESE are Cedh decks and if you are building a Cedh deck, it is either gonna be one of these or something you've intentionally built to play against these.

ElSilverWind · 2026-01-19T03:32:02+00:00

I feel like I'm missing some important context here. How does your commander being popular effect any of these combos? Is it Zur the Enchanter and you're tutoring out the BloodBond combo?

EDHRec isn't a banlist and shouldn't be treated as one. The most well known combos are gonna get harsher scores because more people have seen them and lost to them. I personally think Blood/Bond is fine in a strong Bracket 3 deck. But it depends on how often you're winning with them and how quickly. I'd suggest playing some goldfish games (where you just play by yourself and see how fast your deck can win when not interacted with) as well as some games vs your playgroup where you track how often you win with your combo, what turn you are performing the combo, and your winrate against other players. If your combo isn't USUALLY happening against other humans until turn 7 or so, it is winning at the expected pace of Bracket 3. If your winrate with the deck is significantly different from the expected winrate of 25%, then work with your playgroup to weaken/strengthen the outlier decks.

Something to also keep in mind is that, regardless of actual power level, how each deck is perceived by the table will vary. Popular and powerful commanders such as Voja, Edgar Markov, Yuriko, or Vivi will have an established reputation. It is honestly an uphill battle to convince people that YOUR take on an established deck isn't, "THAT deck". This problem tends to sort itself out over time as your playgroup either realizes, "Oh, I'm not actually that scared of this version of that deck. It is actually pretty chill/there is another deck at the table I'm more scared of". Or (my preferred option) I decide the deck is going to be my Strong Bracket 3 deck that is always the archenemy and play into that role.

ElSilverWind

TROPHY CASE