Perspectives (Again)

What we have here is a Commander game with me playing Jeleva at the top, Noah with Horde of Notions at the bottom, and stonethorn with Experiment Kraj on the right.

I made two mistakes in this game, the second one being irrelevant to my story and probably stemming from the first. However, I'd like to start with the upside.

Jeleva: still fun. I managed to get her out twice and although I didn't really hit any spells worth playing either time what I was able to do was remove cards from the game that might have been troublesome otherwise. There's always the psychological battle in Magic and seeing your stuff disappear tends to be a downer. I actually was starting to wish for ways to kill Jeleva at will, so I could have more opportunities to pilfer through my opponent's spells.

However, I made a very big mistake on turn seven. Noah was getting a nice combo set up using Sword of Light and Shadow, Eternal Witness and Phyrexian Altar to reuse anything he felt necessary. One notation from that game is that I have a lack of artifact removal with Jeleva and artifacts have been problematic in nearly every Commander game I have ever played. stonethorn, however, has green which means he's got that kind of removal. All I have to do is hope he'll draw into it: I can even copy that spell with Wild Ricochet.

I have a Spiteful Visions on the table (which I played to help kick the game into gear) and draw into Price of Knowledge. My thought it simply: this is a powerful card and I should play it. It's not like I'm taking over Noah's position as the actual threat here.

stonethorn promptly Krosan Grip'd my enchantment before the end of my turn and I no longer had mana available to play Wild Ricochet or anything else.

I couldn't understand why: it seemed like a play against me personally and that doesn't jibe with how Multiplayer should work-or how I thought stonethorn plays. I have a very important rule in Multiplayer games: play the board, not the person.

I have this rule because it's very easy to get wrapped up in vengeance. Too easy, frankly: the sting of a loss last game-or last week, or last month-is the kind of thing that humans get invested in payback.

And payback is a bitch. But that bitch goes both ways and I have seen players willfully ignore opportunities to win, screwing themselves over, in order to feed some kind of payback monster. I've done it myself, which, of course, is why I created the rule. Don't make it personal, play the best game you can and play that board.

The board said that Noah's position was a problem because he had an actual engine going on. I had some synergies but nothing that could really establish myself. So what happened?

I forgot to put myself in someone else's shoes. Just because you play the board not the person doesn't mean you should forget that people are in the game! From stonethorn's perspective, he was looking at taking 9 damage next turn and perhaps the turn after that, with no way to establish a foothold in the game and live long enough to knock Noah off his trajectory. Why should he allow that to happen?

Essentially, I forced stonethorn into a lose-lose situation, which compounded my poor board position and reinforced Noah's and I did this because I thought of doing cool things myself, rather than considering the position of other players. In a way, I played myself, not the board.

And that's all for this week. Thanksgiving means a break from writing. See you in a week!

Slim Margins or: My Games with Cruel Ultimatum

It doesn't matter how good the deck is if you don't read the cards.


The good news is: Jeleva is a fun Commander; one that creates interesting problems to solve, both for me and for my opponent. Of course this can also represent a huge challenge too: I found myself approaching new situations with the confidence of someone facing an old problem and it cost me in the matchup I had against Fuz playing his Sedris deck. One particularly epic game-pictured-was lost after I cast Decree of Pain, then Jeleva'd out a Cruel Ultimatum. Before I could cast it though, Jeleva was killed and Cauldron Dance hit me with a Nemesis of Reason AND Nicol Bolas. It was like being Ultimatumed: Take 10, discard your hand, mill 10.

All was not lost, though! With an empty board, Fuz gets Sedris in play and I draw Thraximundar! Except what I read was: Sedris has Unearth 2B. This is not what the card says.

So I didn't attack and lost.

In game 3, the Epic Moment came on the last play: Jeleva was facing Nicol Bolas and I had a slew of options to consider casting from Jeleva's ability, including Demonic Tutor and Crosis's Charm. I knew I had a Cruel Ultimatum in my deck, so I felt that a Demonic Tutor for that would be my best play. I would lose Jeleva but win the war.

I attack, Demonic Tutor the Ultimatum into my hand and put Jeleva in the Command zone, as she was blocked by Bolas. Then I look at my mana and slump. I don't have RRRBBBUUU. I can't cast Cruel Ultimatum. I have the right number of mana but I don't have the right colors. So I concede and explain the situation to Fuz.

"You have the right mana to cast that," he says.

Which was a very, very discouraging moment. I had the right play. I did the right thing. Then I sabotaged myself by giving in my the "Oh god you screwed up" voice in my head instead of taking a moment and double checking everything.

Jeleva Overhauled

All of the Commander 2013 decks need an overhaul. It's just what I do--what everyone will do, eventually. I'm going to start with Jeleva because of all the decks, this is the one that had the obvious pull: True-Name Nemesis. That's a card which is brilliant in 1v1 matches but in multiplayer, not so much. Plus, I have a merfolk deck to plug it into.

So: let's start with the roster:

Commander: Jeleva, Nephalia's Scourge	Artifacts 1 Sol Ring 1 Armillary Sphere 1 Swiftfoot Boots 1 Obelisk of Grixis 1 Temple Bell 1 Mirari 1 Wayfarer's Bauble 1 Eye of Doom
Lands 1 Akoum Refuge 1 Bojuka Bog 1 Command Tower 1 Crumbling Necropolis 1 Dimir Guildgate 1 Evolving Wilds 1 Grixis Panorama 1 Izzet Boilerworks 1 Izzet Guildgate 1 Molten Slagheap 1 Rakdos Carnarium 1 Rakdos Guildgate 1 Rupture Spire 1 Temple of the False God 1 Vivid Creek 1 Vivid Marsh 9 Island 8 Swamp 5 Mountain 1 Opal Palace 1 Urza's Factory	Creatures 1 Augur of Bolas 1 Fog Bank 1 Nightscape Familiar 1 Moroii 1 Nivix Guildmage 1 Guard Gomazoa 1 Guttersnipe 1 Echo Mage 1 Vampire Nighthawk 1 Viseling 1 Mnemonic Wall 1 Charmbreaker Devils 1 Uyo, Silent Prophet 1 Thraximundar 1 Jace's Archivist 1 True-Name Nemesis 1 Terra Ravager 1 Diviner Spirit 1 Hooded Horror 1 Nekusar, the Mindrazer 1 Baleful Force
Sorceries 1 Tempt with Reflections 1 Infest 1 Fissure Vent 1 Incendiary Command 1 Phthisis 1 Cruel Ultimatum 1 Decree of Pain 1 Army of the Damned 1 Prosperity 1 Skyscribing 1 Molten Disaster	Instants 1 Vision Skeins 1 Soul Manipulation 1 Grixis Charm 1 Sudden Spoiling 1 Dismiss 1 Wild Ricochet 1 Annihilate 1 Opportunity 1 Starstorm 1 Strategic Planning 1 Crosis's Charm 1 Illusionist's Gambit
	Enchantments 1 Propaganda 1 Spiteful Visions 1 Arcane Melee 1 Curse of Inertia 1 Curse of Shallow Graves 1 Curse of Chaos 1 Price of Knowledge

I am going to keep Thraximundar and Nekusar, the Mindrazer in there. Nekusar because it's good to have a substitute general and Thraximundar because it's good to have a 'Bite me,' card. Of the two, Thrax is most likely to come out when I need a 'Bite me' card in a different deck.

Removing; True-Name Nemesis and all the Curses.

I've come around a little bit on the Curses (I'll have a deck to show off why in a few weeks), because I think their place is mostly going to be in 60 card duel decks; in multiples I believe they will be outstanding. In multiplayer, I'm faced with giving my opponents things that I'm going to have to deal with later: cards, creatures, better creatures, or life. If I curse Noah to encourage stonethorn, I still have to deal with stonethorn eventually, only now he'll have more zombies than he did before. Who needs that?

So no. Curse of Inertia is probably the most innocuous because the effect is temporary and Curse of Chaos has the benefit of meshing with Nekusar's ability but again: better in multiples against a single opponent.

As replacements, I put in Cognivore, Magnivore and Trench Gorger. Of these, Trench Gorger requires the most justification but the theory is: removing lands gives me a higher density of spells, which then increases the likelihood of hitting Jeleva's ability. All of them are good monsters though with effects that I think will make this deck more fearsome.

And if Trench Gorger doesn't work out, Trench Wurm is in the wings. Nobody ever likes to see Trench Wurm, which I say is a good thing. 

I took out the Baleful Strix because I recently acquired 3 more, so they're going into a deck with Lieges in them. I put in a Moroii in its place: the life loss isn't much and the efficiency of a 4/4 flier outweighs it easily. 

Finally, the fishy elephant in the room, True-Name Nemesis. Now on the one side, I do like to see Wizards take these chances. Commander offers them an opportunity to inject new ideas into high powered formats like Legacy, where all of these cards are legal to play.

Buuuut TNN is also a very expensive card. I'm not sure how much good it does to inject powerful cards that can shake up a format in such a way that very few people are allowed to play that format. I suppose the exposure might help and, if enough Commander product ships that the cost of those decks are kept in check that might be OK, however current trends are not encouraging; the Mind Seize deck was selling for $60 at the time of this writing-and sold out at StarCity Games. That can only mean that the price will likely go up, when SCG gets more. (The 'suggested' price at Amazon? $150. With a 'discount' to put it down to $60....what the hell?)

Still, TNN is a card that is terrible in multiplayer. That's just the fact of it; it wants to be in duel decks, specifically a merfolk one, which, of course, I have. Swapped for Radiate which feels more in sync with what this deck wants to do, in addition to having cool potential interactions with the Commander format. I look forward to taking this for a spin.