How To Aggro In Commander | Tolarian Tutor | A Magic: The Gathering Study Guide

Commander is a format generally defined by value engines of various shapes and flavors due to high life totals multiple opponents and the variance inherent two 99 card Singleton decks commander games are known for being long and grindy but who cares about any of that when we are playing aggro woohoo so let's cut to the Chase and just turn our creatures sideways and let our opponents do all the math right well maybe there's a little more to it than that you see aggro has a hard time adjusting to the parameters of Commander's multiplayer environment this is especially true given that the traditional goal of aggro decks that is remove your opponent from the game before they even get to play it is anical to the spirit of casual Commander but that doesn't mean you can't play aggro it just means that if you do want to bring an aggro deck to your commander game Knight you will need to approach playing the archetype very differently in Commander than you might be used to in a 1V one format not to worry however because this video will cover how to build and pilot an aggro deck in the commander format with the goal of maximizing your deck's success rate while keeping in mind the most important rule of Commander everyone at the table having fun we're not beginners anymore this is a video guide for those who know how to play Magic and want to get better this is Taran tutor the commander lessons [Music] let's begin with obstacles with aggro in commander and how to overcome them the first and most often discussed obstacle that aggro decks face in Commander are high life totals in 1v1 formats your opponent only has 20 life to defend that means burn deck have to cast seven lightning bolts while creature aggro decks must connect with the Savannah Lions 10 times that's a steep hill to climb in and of itself but certainly manageable if your deck was 20 mountains and 40 lightning bolt equivalents you would kill your opponent by turn four if it was 20 planes and 40 Savannah Lions you'd also kill your opponent in combat on turn four in Commander your opponents have a combined life total of 120 life so that's actually 42 lightning bolts or 60 hits with your Savannah lions in other words both traditional single Target burn and traditional aggressive creature strategies cannot viably translate from 1 V one to Commander these strategies must morph into something different in order to deal enough damage to win the other challenging Commander is the problem that crops up with being an aggressive strategy to a game with multiple players in a one V1 game the player who is the Beatdown does not need to concern themselves with defense they can freely send their entire team into combat safe in the knowledge that they will win the race if their opponent decides to Counterattack in a multiplayer format that's a lot less true maybe the aggro player would win a race against one of your opponents but all three of them every attack you making Commander leaves you vulnerable to as many as three attacks if your opponents decide to do so and if your opponents realize they are in danger of dying to your aggression they will probably team up to prevent that from happening the last OB obstacle that aggro decks face is that the traditional goal of ending the game as early as possible does not naturally jive with the progression of a typical commander game it is very hard for most casual commander games to end early and when they do many players dislike feeling like they didn't get to play at all if you consider all these constraints in context with one another they point you in a few specific directions in deck building cards that can hit multiple opponents for damage at once are more valuable than single Target burn spells permanence that repeatedly deal damage either directly or through combat are more valuable than single instance damage and ways to kill opponents despite their large life totals are extremely desirable part two building your deck the first thing you'll need to do before you even pick a commander is to pick a micro archetype the various methods for translating aggression into Victory and Commander each form their own mini pillars under the larger roof of aggro now there's some Nuance to these distinctions but generally speaking the five micro archetypes within the macro archetype of aggro are Punisher go wide beat down Voltron and of course poison mhm poison Punisher decks are the closest equivalent to a burn deck in Commander but instead of using individual direct damage burn spells they use permanent based damage sources that repeat ly Bonk your opponent's life totals directly over the course of the game there are a wide variety of these kinds of decks but as a general rule Punisher decks make everything hurt from land drops to casting spells to drawing cards another look for an aggro deck is the go wide strategy yes a pile of Savannah Lions won't pack the same punch in Commander as they do in 1V one but for piles might go wide decks tend to be token Decks that amass a huge Board of small creatures ideally faster than any other player at the table can muster alternatively you can pump out a few big creatures that hit hard and quickly before your opponents have adequate defenses or removal these decks can be harder to successfully pull off as the plan tends to often have a bigger Target on their back even more than other aggro decks but if you're prepared for that inevitability this type of deck can be a ton of fun A variation on the Beatdown archetype is a Voltron deck which beats down with a single massive creature loaded up with modification generally these decks seek to take advantage of the commander damage rule to quickly remove opponents be careful that you have adequate protection on your modified creature it will be devastating if your opponents can remove it another method for circumventing High Life totals is through poison damage in fact effectively reduces each opponent's life total to 10 and prevents them from healing from that damage through traditional means these kinds of decks are among the most powerful aggro decks but bringing one to Commander Knight is a risky proposition and Commander as some players take issue with infect as a win con the archetype you will choose will dictate much about how you build your deck each archetype requires pieces that are distinct from one another and have very little crossover between archetypes Synergy is very important to EDH aggro many aggressive cards are fairly weak on their own but the better that those cards can combine to be more than the some of their parts the better your deck will be able to keep up with your opponent's Big Splash asy plays generally your interaction will be sparse the vast majority of your deck should consist of proactive Synergy cards even most aggro commanders are fairly directional it would be hard to build a token deack Around zozu The Punisher or a Punisher deck around lth thrill blade of the elves for example these constraints aren't a bad thing though after all limitations breed creativity having a direction makes deck building a lot easier one thing that should be relatively Universal among aggressive Commander decks regardless of archetypes is a way to rebuild from setbacks spot removal blockers life gain and board wipes are all common in commander and all of these are effective ways to diminish aggressive strategies if you find yourself hit with a board wipe you'll need a way to claw back into the game or else that board wipe might as well have been a player wipe the potential counterplay to interaction is as diverse as the aggro archetype itself there's protection spells like tfer protection Mass recur i spells like patriarch's bidding and card draw like Hunter's Insight that keep your hands stocked for when it comes time to rebuild resilience is key in Commander otherwise the fragile nature of an aggro game plan will be highly exploitable by your three opponents all three of these categories of cards should appear in your deck a card Advantage is by far the most important of them you can't simply empty your hand early and hope that your opponents will fall over you need to follow up your pressure with more pressure and then even more pressure after that consider the current Boogeyman of the commander format Voya a Jaws of the conclave many would argue that Voya addresses the issues with aggro too well he puts a lot of pressure on your opponents quickly draws you a ton of extra cards is difficult to interact with thanks to his Hefty Ward cost and has vigilance making counterattacks mostly ineffective now I'm not advocating one way or another that you do or don't build a Voya deck in command but what I will say is that you can learn a lot of valuable lessons for how to build a strong non Voya aggro deck from studying decks helmed by this angry wolf one last thing to keep in mind in deck building Mana is a big concern with aggro decks as well because the early game is so important for pulling off an aggressive win stumbling on lands early is far more punishing to this archetype than any other archetype in commander commander naturally self-corrects a bit from this kind of variance because players who get Mana screwed tend to be left alone by the rest of the table until they can draw out of it this grace is generally offered to aggro players too but the issue is by the time an aggro player is drawn out of their Mana troubles the rest of the table will be too well prepared for an aggressive strategy to adequately threaten them as such you should pay special attention to your Mana base and ensure that you will have enough lands and colored sources to cast your spells with high consistency Frank carsten a mathematician magic Hall of Famer and writer for channel Fireball has calculated the likelihood of having the colored Mana you need on a given turn based on how many you play taking into account Mulligans by his metrics you need 23 sources of a given color in your commander deck to have a 95% chance of having that color on turn one you need 33 sources of that color to have a 95% chance of having two sources of that color on turn two untapped dual lands are therefore hugely important in multicolor aggro decks while monocolor decks need to be careful with how many colorless utility lands they run you shouldn't plan to have too much help from Mana rocks either with some exceptions most aggro decks should avoid putting Mana rocks in their deck that cost more than one Mana as you are much better off playing a threat of some kind on turn two than you are casting a ramp spell ramp is great for accelerating into the late game but aggro decks want to deal as much damage as possible before anyone reaches the late game if you'd like a more detailed guide to building manabases for Commander you should check out our updated manabase video here it goes into extensive detail about how to build a Mana base for just about any commander deck however you decide to tackle the challenges that aggro faces in EDH the most important thing is that you keep those challenges in the Forefront of your mind when putting together your deck ask yourself how the cards you want to include interface with the constraints put upon aggro decks if they don't help your cause or worse if they actively hinder your cause you should unfortunately leave that card out of the Party part three piloting your deck once you have your well-tuned aggro deck there's one last piece of success you'll need to practice piloting your deck in a way that doesn't lead to your own early exit either From Any Given game or from your play group as a whole because they don't want to play against your deck anymore the fundamental Obstacle of trying to establish a threat capable of killing three opponents quickly is that your opponents will generally have a nervous system and can therefore spot you attempting to do so from a mile away and react to it before you can succeed as such politics are more important to EDH Agro than to any other archetype subtly directing attention away from yourself is a skill you can learn like any other pointing out your opponent's threats such as a turn one soul ring or early Mystic rora can help divert some of the unwanted eyes at your board if you focus your initial attacks on the opponent who is furthest ahead you can spin this as something you're doing for the whole table if someone offers to leave you alone if you leave them alone take them up on that two opponents is 33% less than three some aggro decks are easier to politic with than others a Punisher deck for example that hurts you in addition to your opponents can be spun like we're all in this together a fast Voltron start may prompt players to bargain for their lives in ways that you can take advantage of these attempts may not always work but they are a tool that is worth keeping in your tool box an important aspect of successfully piloting an aggro decking Commander is recognizing when it's time to take your foot off the gas damage output wise if it's looking like your opponents have caught up to your board presence then shift gears to a more defensive posture stay out of combat more than you might feel inclined to while while you muster up an alpha strike out of nowhere when you're in this position be aware of a potential board wipe coming and plan accordingly constantly holding up mana for your protection spell or finding your recursion spell as soon as possible not only is it difficult to kill your opponents as quickly in Commander as it is in 1 V one but you don't really even have to do so the key is not to deal damage quickly but rather to deal damage consistently think of the High Life totals not as a steep hill to climb but as more damage you get to deal you're an aggro player don't you just love dealing damage isn't it great that you get to deal six times as much damage as you get to deal in 1V one huh huh and along those lines I hope this video has helped you in figuring out how to be better about dealing that damage but aggro isn't the only way to play in Commander be sure to also watch our previous episode on how to improve your skills with control a video that I feel even aggro players could learn a thing or two from no you're enemy am I right you can check out that video here or Linked In the description until next time this is tarian Community College I'm the professor our writer is the one and only Jesse robkin and remember it's not about winning individual games of magic it's about getting better win or lose [Music] [Music] on the season finale of Shuffle up and play we have brought our very first Commander decks my name is Kenji egashira better known as numat the nummy I'm Sam from ristic studies I'm spice atak and if I'm here who's flying the plane who are you I already said it oh note to Future editor leave that part in that's draw that insurrection reveal a land tax my God I don't think I was a very fun player to play against back in the day you literally announce yourself as going to destroy all our land that's fair that's fair is there anything that I am scared of are you scared of the future oh don't start this again bane of progress you got a crisp 20 to make me not pick that one no comments this is the first episode of Shuffle up and play where I'm not immediately targeted well thanks for reminding us oh yeah props here get him get him ah gosh you non- good gamers

Channel: Tolarian Community College

Views: 87,189

Keywords: magic: the gathering, commander, mtg commander, command zone

Id: _y2NF5MsrVU

Length: 16min 4sec (964 seconds)

Published: Mon May 27 2024