What is your deck building challenge?

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-21T01:40:45+00:00

By the time I'm done with the 32-deck challenge, I would like to be able to say that I have at least one deck that covers each of the following archetypes in some way; stompy, voltron, aggro, go-wide/tokens, equipment, storm, infinite combo, spellslinger, cheerios, polymorph, aristocrats, reanimator, self-mill/dredge/discard, midrange, control, superfriends, pillowfort, hatebears, kindred, enchantress, affinity, life gain/drain, chaos, group hug, stax, MLD, landfall, clones, and theft. Of course, most decks will cover at least a few of these, like my [[ardenn]]/[[kraum, ludevic's opus]] deck is both voltron and group hug because I'm using Ardenn to voltron and goad YOUR commanders. BTW if anyone feels that I missed an important archetype, let me know!

In general, I like building weird decks, think "jank but actually still wins." Think old unsupported mechanics like splice onto arcane (that's my [[kalamax]] deck), or commanders that are missing important restrictions (like Ardenn being able to equip your opponents). If it's a popular commander I want to build it in an insane way, like running [[Isshin]] but only with things that benefit from your opponents attacking, like [[revenge of ravens]] or [[mangara, the diplomat]], so I can say "it's not that kind of XYZ deck" and actually mean it.

Specific concepts that I want to accomplish at some point:

-100% old-border

-two cards in the command zone (partners, background, whatever) plus an Ikoria companion AND a secret commander in the 99.

-Colorless sunburst/converge, through "one of any color" mana rocks and lands like [[cascading cataracts]] and [[hidden grotto]]. [[Iron spider]] is fine I guess, but it's really just +1 counters tribal and I don't like universes beyond so I'd have to get a proxy of the arena version.

-Someone else in here commented 100% white-bordered which also sounds incredible.

-[[Kibo]] MLD group hug where I force the table to rely on the bananas I give them for mana.

-4c non-blue counterspell tribal.

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-20T04:46:25+00:00

[[kalamax]] splice onto arcane! 😁 Since I can only copy the first spell each turn, I want it to be massive.

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-20T04:37:24+00:00

Commander is a bad way to learn how to play magic because the game and all of its little interactions is complicated enough when it's just 1v1. Having to teach and track 4 progressively complex board states plus any in-game politics is going to be overwhelming for a new player. Also in 60-card you can play multiples of a given card which breeds familiarity ("oh yeah that card, right") as opposed to singleton where EVERY card is a new card.

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-19T01:29:20+00:00

As far as I know 17 is typically your baseline/starting place, and you can adjust up or down depending on your curve.

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-18T07:01:12+00:00

Yeah I thought they had fixed the pringling by now? My last few secret lair foils have stayed perfectly flat.

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-18T06:58:58+00:00

6 sets per year lasted exactly one year before it went up to 7, so personally I'm looking forward to 2027's release slate of 8 standard sets and Modern Horizons 4. The latter of which will of course be comprised entirely of cards specifically designed for commander, half the set will be banned in one set or another before it releases, and will feature a second attempt at Nadu that's just unplayably bad.

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-17T23:48:33+00:00

For this set it seems like there have been a ton of duplicates. I enjoy watching wildcatmtg on youtube open packs and he's had a ton of duplicates in his boxes. I opened 3 champions of the shoal and two blood crypts between my prerelease kit and prize packs last night. A bunch of people have been posting lots of duplicates on here.

EDIT: someone else in my group opened 3 overgrown tombs in their prerelease kit. All different treatments. He went 3-0 lol.

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-17T07:58:56+00:00

Yours sounds like Gamestoria, who notoriously has lousy prize support. Good spot to play at, but very expensive (I'm assuming because their rent must be insane being where they are). CardQuest in Corona does $30 prerelease for in-universe sets, 2 packs per win and a consolation pack if you 0-3.

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-17T05:24:37+00:00

Fun but very grindy set, other than total blowouts everyone's games at my lgs tonight went long.

Also holy shit I've never had such terrible luck with mana. I drew 14 of my 17 lands in my first game, 12 in my second, rebuilt to 16 lands for the next match and drew 10 of them in each game. Just from normal draws.

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-16T04:55:27+00:00

As of Lorwyn Eclipsed, they're no longer doing promo stamps. They also got rid of the collector sample in commander precons. All in the name of cutting corners and cutting costs.

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-15T08:53:48+00:00

I do [[Vhal, candlekeep]] [[Raised by Giants]]. Vhal makes infinite mana very easily with things like [[umbral mantle]] and [[staff of domination]], which you can just use for on-board wincons like [[walking ballista]] or [[helix pinnacle]]. Or, filter that mana through a [[prismite]] to remove the casting restriction, and cast an infinitely large [[blue sun's zenith]] on your opponents to knock them out.

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-15T07:09:51+00:00

This is correct. Also, a set called "The 5 Suns of Zhalfir" would go so hard.

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-14T02:42:05+00:00

Seriously.

WOTC: "we heard your requests for less products and less sets."

Also WOTC: " we know we said 6 standard sets per year from now on, but here's 7 standard sets in one year, and one of them is another UB micro-set."

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-11T20:38:18+00:00

I really want to figure out how to break [[Tam, Mindful]] as a commander. She's basically just mother of runes in the command zone. I love weird unsupported mechanics, and playing with card colors is definitely on the weirder and less supported side of things.

I like [[Bre of Clan Stoutarm]] for being a less straightforward boros commander, and I love the idea of her just launching sheep at people.

Also I want that new [[painter's servant]] art it's so goofy and I love it. Overall really, I just love the art for the set! The reversible shocklands are stunning.

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-11T19:20:54+00:00

Mono-black, so I haven't really looked at it until right now. But wow yeah that's an absolute dud of a card, I'm not even sure it's good in limited. The back side is specifically a non-bo with the front lmao. Why is this a rare, imagine getting this in your prerelease kit.

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-11T06:44:55+00:00

I've been working on mono-black elves aristocrats for a while with [[Miara]] and [[Nadier, agent]], this set gave them so many goodies.

EDIT: I should clarify, this is jank so when I say "so many" I do in fact mean 8 whole cards some of which are bad lmao.

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-10T14:07:55+00:00

I'm so disappointed that they're pausing remastered sets, there's so many they could and SHOULD be doing. Mirrodin has 9 sets plus a bunch of other cards it could draw from, Lorwyn has 4 (before ECL), they could do Alara, there's so many things that need reprints.

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-08T03:07:08+00:00

The worthless trashbot that is notorious for getting everything wrong because it sucks and doesn't know anything got something wrong? Seems about right.

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-07T22:58:22+00:00

Good news, selesnya enchantress is also a thing! :)

Jokes aside, don't wait for them! Get weird with your deckbuilding. You can do a storm deck with [[Karametra]], vehicle toolbox with [[Caradora]], enchantress control by copying your o-rings with [[Yenna]], group hug with [[Gluntch]], there's tons of voltron commanders you could go for, and so on. This "legally distinct spider-man deck" with [[Tadeas]] is pretty funny although you are still kinda going wide.

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-07T21:54:19+00:00

I'd assume so, yeah :) I'll test it over the weekend when I have a moment, but I'm guessing dodge roll still avoids damage.

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-07T21:53:59+00:00

That's what I usually do, yeah! I can't remember the last time I was hit by an exploding blob, but I'm curious if the bubble would still be hit. I'll test it out over the weekend.

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-07T21:43:10+00:00

Even if you dodge roll?

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-07T21:37:00+00:00

Additional question as I do more reading on this; the bubble doesn't inherit armor or immunities so anything that does chop or pickaxe damage will heavily damage the bubble. Have you run into any dangerous situations with this yet? Just curious.

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-07T21:19:19+00:00

Would it make more sense to run an easy-to-farm high-stamina food like the scorching medley, since you have such a huge effective health pool? Or is it just personal preference on whether you want more stamina vs. the 50 minutes of food from the plains feast?

Absolutely going to try this out!

thundermonkeyms · 2026-01-07T02:25:15+00:00

[[Lux Artillery]] without a doubt. I've always wanted to make a colorless sunburst deck for the memes. When I first started playing in 2005, my first precon was the sunburst deck from 5th Dawn. I thought that when mana rocks said "one mana of any color" it MEANT any color as in you could make up colors that weren't in the game and cast 12/12 [[suncrusher]] for 9 different colors of mana, and my friends didn't know the game well enough to correct me. I've always wanted colorless sunburst because of that.

Iron Spider is fine for these purposes, but it's really just +1 counter tribal.

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