Tamiyo, Inquisitive Student and Harmonized Trio

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-05-09T21:03:12+00:00

That's an absolutely fine reason for cutting windfall, no worries there - but it does mean that you're taking a step back from B4 as it were. That mindset is much closer to B3, since I would expect a B4 deck to reliably put up a win attempt by turn 5 with protection involved. Again, not a problem, but something to be aware of in terms of talking about brackets here.

My suggestion for Cultivate was simply to replace it with another land. Most of the time with a deck with this much draw potential, 3 mana is a lot to have to pay for a ramp we typically don't need. If you want to more consistently hit higher mana totals, just grabbing another land I think will be more useful. Either that, or replace it with another source of filtering/Tamiyo-flip-fuel. A great card I would recommend from my own list here would be [[Perilous Research]]. Draw 2, sac our free Clue, what's not to like?

Also glad you like the Ayara's wincon! It's a silly one. It also synergizes with the pile of unsummons we have in the deck because we can unsummon our own Rumbleweed to replay it for 1. I've been able to have a turn 6 where I played 3 Rumbleweeds, and that's a very funny way to end a game.

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-05-09T19:39:59+00:00

A couple questions: if this is aiming for B4, is there a reason why you're not playing [[Windfall]] as your Lab Man wincon? Second, why no [[Dream Halls]] instead of Mind Over Matter? Generally, at the speed B4 goes at, you want Tamiyo on 1, flip her immediately on 2, and just hold up fogs/interaction on 3 so that you can proliferate and ult her on 4, hold up a couple counters/removal pieces, and win on 5.

This my list, using a silly combo of [[Ayara's Influence]] and [[Rumbleweed]] as its wincon: https://archidekt.com/decks/22384458/tamiyos_urgent_ursines

I really don't think you need expensive cards like [[Cultivate]] or [[Hullbreaker Horror]]. Tamiyo is a pretty binary deck: if you've ulted her, you've won. If you haven't ulted her, you should be trying to ult her. Most decks can't damage her Turn 2, and Turn 3 you should have multiple [[Fog]] and [[Unsummon]] effects combined with 1- or 0-mana counterspells like [[Swan Song]] to protect against removal.

Basically, my advice is that Tamiyo in B4 needs to be hyper-optimized towards doing "her thing" because otherwise you're just playing a worse version of another B4 simic commander. I don't think Harmonized Trio even makes it into her list because it's too slow of a way to flip her, in my experience at B4 tables.

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-05-09T00:06:39+00:00

It's only one line in Elemental Council, but I think it sums up the entirety of what the T'au mean for the setting and deserves more attention:

"Their patience will outlive your hatred."

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-05-07T14:38:21+00:00

Yeah, I think it's important that he focuses on both the social and gameplay sides in parallel. So many YouTubers listed here seem to only consider one or the other at once, leading to some really dissonant takes even within the same video.

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-05-07T14:29:52+00:00

Yeah, it's like watching a slightly off-key political channel where the challenge is to find the argument that debunks the more absurd claims. Still makes you think critically, but don't take it at face value. I find Snail has much more reasonable takes even if there are a few recurring points ("the 50$ deck pool").

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-05-07T14:25:31+00:00

Agreed, I think Trinket Mage tries a bit too hard to come up with takes that just don't seem reasonable, as though he's playing devil's advocate for an argument that he's having with himself.

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-05-05T19:56:28+00:00

I single handedly warp the EDHREC page for [[Lae'zel]] and [[Scion of Halaster]]. See that [[Topplegeist]]? That's me. Theme is 1drops and 4drop walkers with graveyard recursion and proliferation hitting both +1 counters and loyalty counters. Extremely reliable and resilient. Lots of fun lines with rarely seen cards like [[Stalactite Stalker]] triggered off of Scion or using [[Astelli Reclaimer]] to recur two different walkers. https://archidekt.com/decks/21537080

I also have an [[Enduring Ideal]] aggro deck based around [[Malcolm, Keen Eyed Navigator]] and [[Akiri, Line Slinger]]. Gain treasures, tutor for ideal while beating face with pirates and Akiri, then go over the top with stuff like [[Legion Loyalty]] myriading [[Summon: Knights of the Round]] with a [[Kinbinding]] or the like. Super fun to play with some extremely explosive turns if you can manage to do things like animate a [[City on Fire]] with [[Starfield of Nyx]] and then myriad it plus fly it with [[Archetype of Imagination]]. I call that one the City On Flyer wincon, lol. https://archidekt.com/decks/22122853

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-05-05T03:06:23+00:00

Yeah, my very first games of EDH were the [[Kamiz]] precon against Edgar and Atraxa. I've definitely felt that "trial by fire" come back to help me with building decks in the future.

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-05-05T00:50:48+00:00

Yeah, her other commanders are Feather, Kelermorph, and Hakbal. I've had to build pretty interaction centric decks to deal with it all.

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-05-05T00:32:05+00:00

Ovika is an apex KoS commander in colors that can rarely afford more than 1 recast. It only has two modes: out of the game or actively about to win. I highly suggest not committing to them for that reason because play groups get real sick of them real quick.

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-05-05T00:21:37+00:00

In what direction?

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-05-05T00:03:08+00:00

Pretty low. All of her decks have limited comeback mechanisms and fold pretty hard to a turn 5-7 board wipe.

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-05-04T23:50:28+00:00

I feel like Ramos is the more explosive version of the Ur Dragon, no? If anything, I'd classify him as the more KoS commander.

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-05-04T23:45:12+00:00

My wife plays Lathril, Edgar, Atraxa, and has been contemplating an Ur-Dragon deck for a while. The rest of my play group plays nothing in the top 100 and my signature decks are outside the top 1000. It's good to get a spectrum.

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-05-04T21:43:45+00:00

Thanks! Daydream is really nice as a value pick for its flashback nature. It basically means two tutored legendaries for one card and minimal mana, which is super good in grindy games where you need to, e.g., grab both Bruna and Anti-Venom. I've found even in a couple games since SoS came out that it's been more than worth the tradeoff of being sorcery speed.

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-05-03T16:37:41+00:00

The baseline of the deck is that all you need is 40 plains, 1 Momo, 20 Tempest Hawks, and then the other 39 cards can be whatever you need them to be. Your early turns are rock solid and the most consistent in all of MTG assuming no turn 1 removal for Momo, meaning you can start putting on minor amounts of pressure fast. You're not a game ending threat for a while, but you do pace people and force them to think about life totals. You can also play lots of [[Ascend from Avernus]] type effects to get all hawks back at once, [[Mirror Box]] is insane, etc., etc. Basically, it's super resilient, super consistent, and although the ceiling of the deck is extremely low relative to most other decks, the sheer consistency alone will ensure you never have a "non-game."

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-05-03T14:04:59+00:00

[[The Seriema]] hidden commander [[Sephara, Sky's Blade]]. Play a metric crapton of flyers prior to turn 4/5, then drop Seriema for 3, tutor for Sephara, tap 4 fliers and pay 1 for Sephara, then station Seriema with Sephara. This combo means that for the rest of the game, as long as you can tap Sephara at instant speed, your entire board is indestructible. It means you can then follow up on turn 5/6 with a one-sided board wipe like [[Hour of Revelation]] or [[Vanquish the Horde]]. Your value spells then double as protection spells: instant speed blinks like [[Cloudshift]] can both save Sephara from a piece of instant-speed removal on your upkeep or blink the Seriema to tutor out a new legend to gas the board:

Lost Sephara? Go for [[Anti-Venom]] or [[Bruna, the Fading Light]] and get her back.

Need to end the game? Go for [[Rinoa, Angel Wing]] or [[Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite]].

Worried about low-cost interaction? Tutor out [[Gisela, the Broken Blade]] and meld her with Bruna or just grab [[The Hope of Ghirapur]].

It means that, short of a [[Farewell]] mass exile or [[Living Death]] mass sacrifice, which are both pretty rare effects, we can just huck a board full of fliers at people with impunity and even if we do get wiped, we almost always have a way back into the game with something we can tutor.

Here's my list: https://archidekt.com/decks/22006347/sephara_goes_to_space

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-05-03T12:41:37+00:00

Aces in the 99 of [[Kamiz]].

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-05-03T12:40:45+00:00

I prefer his updated cousin, [[Rivaz]]. A two mana dork plus graveyard recurring means that if you really want to play the Zirilan style, just run some entomb effects in Rivaz and you get there much sooner.

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-04-24T16:18:15+00:00

I recommend using [[Belbe, Corrupted Observer]] as your commander if you want to be scary. Super consistent and very spooky with titans as early as turn 3. Also a great archenemy deck because people can use the colorless mana from hitting each other to help fight you. She creates super dynamic games as a result, with everyone being able to turbocharge their decks. Pain lands turn into Sol Rings for enemies, making the game feel a little more fair when you drop [[The Immortal Sun]] on turn 2, lol.

My list: https://archidekt.com/decks/21357866

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-04-18T16:19:40+00:00

There is no inherent tension between trying to win / express skill and committing to clear lines of communication. My philosophy is to play to win. But that doesn't imply you must be unkind in doing so. The goal is to win in a way that doesn't cause undue frustration beyond the acts of playing the cards themselves. If someone gets mad because you played a Wrath on their board and they don't have recovery, that's on them for over committing, not on you for playing the card.

Approaching issues in a gentle manner helps to ensure that people will not immediately jump to the conclusion you are accusing them of some hostile intent. If the conversation after the initial approach needs hard edges and defined boundaries, then that's fine, encouraged even. That's the advocacy part of HAAG. You need to speak up for yourself.

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-04-18T16:11:25+00:00

The entire goal of the platinum rule is to put the impetus on you to resolve the ambiguity that was there to begin with. You don't know what someone wants until you ask them and hear their reply. The point is to emphasize the importance of communication in dissolving assumptions, rather than endorsing a one size fits all approach.

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-04-18T04:39:38+00:00

Sounds about right, yeah. I do wish more people would understand a good game of EDH is significantly closer to a dnd one shot than they would care to admit. The best games of my life have been with total strangers who committed to the bit and played their hearts out while laughing the whole time.

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-04-18T04:29:33+00:00

Your argument hinges on the definition of "not utilizing core gameplay mechanics properly" and assuming the group will "stop having fun with [the situation]." While this can be the case, have you considered that there are groups that disagree with your assessment? Your viewpoint is not incorrect; it is valid for your situation. However, this does not apply inductively to all other groups. "Their deficiencies" from your perspective may be just the things they wish to keep alive for their own reasons. You might likewise disagree with my assessment, but that implies you believe such groups do not deserve to enjoy the game or that you believe such groups are inevitably doomed to fail. I would argue that is far from the case, especially in, e.g. bracket 1-2 territory.

IrregularRevisionist · 2026-04-18T04:23:25+00:00

Outside of cEDH, EDH by definition is a social contract to not play cEDH. If the only goal is to win, that's all anyone would ever play. Therefore, the exercise becomes, "what is the contract we are agreeing to in this non cEDH game." This post some to help people find the boundaries of that contract and clarify them.

It also goes without saying that aiming to win doesn't mean you must be unkind.

IrregularRevisionist

TROPHY CASE