Making Decks for New Players | EDHRECast 256

[Music] thank you hello and welcome to the edhretcast where we're all about commander data and dad jokes my name is Joey Schultz and I'm joined by my fantastic co-hosts up first he kinda can't get over the fact that the new Tom Bombadil card is dressed exactly like Paddington Bear it's Matt Morgan Joey did you know well I guess the question is do you know why Hobbits are the best gardeners uh uh there's a hairy feet joke in here somewhere I'm sure gross no it's because they're the only ones that can use Frodo synthesis ah science yes science in deed all right I I don't know how to react to that one we're just gonna move on up next let's get to Dana yeah he just cast a you cannot pass spell and promptly found himself unable to pass the turn it's Dana Roach I'm kind of disappointed in all of these Hobbit jokes they are really good people they don't look down on anybody and I don't know how you guys can make fun of them like this all right so is your temper a little short when it comes to hobbing jokes yes yes oh my goodness y'all are absolutely ridiculous and I know that you're really excited for the upcoming Lord of the Rings set but for absolutely for this episode though Matt what are we talking about in this podcast episode or right here this week we are going to talk about how we would build decks for newer players people just getting into the game building their first decks or they just need help building a deck what's that process look like and we should quick shout out that this was suggested to us by by Jason Vickery of uh be the one Grimm who we just played some games with on our stream at twitch.tvhredcast yes yes indeed great shout out but I regret to inform you that Matt you are incorrect about the topic of the show the first thing we're actually going to do is challenge the stats okay because I need to segue into the podcast segments one of these days I am desperate you don't I wow I didn't talk to the manager you you haven't even started the show so I can't challenge I was not ready for that well I was not prepared for that they have stolen my Segway into challenges and stats every day this year I'm getting one of them no it's okay we can actually put it at the halfway point as usual but I needed to get my Segway in one I was having withdrawals okay you guys that's fair Matt I hope you're proud of me I'm sipping very disappointed tea in your direction all right real talk the actual thing that we're going to start off is with some quick shout outs before we get to our main topic first we'd like to thank Chase also known as manic curves for help that in the show you can find them on Twitter at manicures edhrek has partnered with coalesce apparel and design makers of the best magic merch you'll ever find use code EDH Rec for 10 off any order at coalesce their apparel is slick and stylish we of course recommend the EDH Rec collection and there are tons of others you can check out like their new Riptide project or they're keeping it 100 collections too with really fun designs so once again that's code edhrec for 10 off your order and if you'd like to support the show you can do so by liking and subscribing this video on YouTube subscribing on your local podcast apps or by going to patreon.com edhretcast we have Patron tears of all levels whatever you want to get it's just a nice way to get yourself a little perk back for supporting the show and it has the very special weekly shout out and this week that Patron Shadow is going go to Levi Stevenson so Levi I know that you're an Iowa State football fan and that's very disappointing to me being from Kansas but we do appreciate the support and I do support your your podcasting as well so if you like some college sports podcasting you can check out Levi I guess but Levi Stevenson thank you even though you're an Iowa State fan wow I I did not see that thing it got personal this week the shout out got personal yeah that's absolutely ludicrous I love it okay let's get into our actual topic here about building decks for new players things to do things to avoid crafting experiences for people who are a little bit newer to the game of EDH and Dana I guess um let's put the ball in your court to start when it comes to the actually the reason I want to do this is because recently on this show you mentioned having a an elf deck that you build for new players that sometimes it like you'll just be like ah you can keep it um because it's a cheap deck for you to throw together and it's fun to play against new folks and I guess I wanted to interrogate that a little bit so let's uh put the ball into your quote when it comes to how we built that deck and why and things that went into it I guess yeah so often probably three different sets of experiences in the last say a year or so regarding this um so you know my son has kind of got into playing a little bit so I I put a a rabble cat deck together for him and let him pick what he wanted to build and he liked that theme he likes animals so so we built a cat deck there and then I had built that marble and the nurturer deck that was supposed to be like I said one that I could give to a new player and just let them keep after they played it and then um I put one together for a friend of mine as well I could put on stream a blue black fairies deck who was also relatively new to the game so I I had three different like kind of similar audiences that I built three different decks for roughly in the last year um and one of the first things I did after both the deck was was play the decks myself and then let them play it and and the the difference and experiences in in me playing particularly the first draft of those decks because I built them roughly at the same time how they played for me and how they played for a relatively new player to the game were very very different things and that was um quite an eye-opening experience I would say have you noticed that maybe a newer player is less willing to play stuff like night's whisper losing life to draw cards which is one of your favorite cards ever yeah with experience you know the value of losing life to draw cards but to a new player it's not immediately obvious so yeah those little things crop up there's probably a broad category of things that there that we could all lump in together losing the life to accomplish a thing is definitely one that is not intuitive at all to new players the other one that really jumped out at me that's kind of a similar is is in the arabo deck about for my son is sacrificing creatures um so prickly one of the things green does is it has multiple ways that you can sacrifice a creature and draw cards and and oftentimes also gain life equal to that creature's power and that Arab deck there's a bunch of like small cats but arabo has ability his abilities to pump those cats up so like you can attack someone with this this relatively innocuous creature and Pump It Up multiple times to do a good bit of damage and then that doesn't feel bad to sacrifice that creature in your second main phase after you've pumped it up you know to draw eight or ten cards unless you're a new player then like that that I discovered when he was playing that deck the thing that felt super powerful to me was something he didn't he never wanted to do he did not want to sacrifice those creatures to drop out your cards because that felt like an a net loss to him that that was very unintuitive and felt very strange and the same thing applies to like losing life through our cards as well new players I found really don't like something that feels like a negative even if the positive might outweigh it well yeah there's there's so many of those new player misconceptions and maybe not misconceptions but the the hurdles that you should mentally you have to get over when you're getting into the game I remember when I first started playing it was right around Ravnica it was oh these these 20 lands like you have to pay too live for him to come in untapped like that doesn't make any sense that's that's stupid and so it took a while admittedly to kind of get over that because when I first was playing as a kid there were no shock lanes that didn't make it we also were playing unsleeved on the concrete like all the heathens but sure yeah there are so many things that just seem counterintuitive like I I put effort into putting this creature on the battlefield why would I want to sacrifice it why would I want to pay life to have this land coming and tapped when I can just play a basic there's a whole lot of those different things that you just have to mentally get over as you're kind of getting more and more exposed as a as a new time player and what I found was the most effective way to to deal with that too um was was not to not do any of it but just to like put one of those effects maybe in the deck uh you you know the newer player who was playing that fairies deck for example really did not like the the sign in Blood and the Knights whisper and the read the bones and the you know singing study or something on the deck there was half a dozen different things that Drew you cards in in cost you life in the process but if there's just one of them like just the one sign of blood that occasionally they use that is what I found was most effective if you put one of those things in there so they could like get a taste for it but didn't feel like they were being overwhelmed with this one negative effect so occasionally I can lose life to draw cards our occasion I will sacrifice a creature versus doing it a bunch of times even if during the bunch of times might be better not overwhelming them with all of those negative choices I found it was kind of the way to ease them into getting used to doing that that's a really great observation the word overwhelm I think might come up a couple more times in this podcast yes I mean a new player dealing with a hundred cards like I mean I know that we've all reached that point in our deck building where we feel like a hundred cards is too restricting because there's so much that we want to put into a deck but initially when you're handed a pile of a hundred unique cards you're like uh and then it gets even worse worse in air quotes because you're also dealing with the hundred other cards of each respective opponent's deck like the battlefield is messy and complicated and way so much to take in all at once so I definitely find a thing that I want to do whenever I'm building or teaching a new player um whenever I'm building four or teaching a new player I don't build new players all right gotta watch my words um but it is definitely a a bringing things back down to Basics and keeping things basically as simple as possible and having things uh iron down to small Concepts definitely helps a lot like Danny you mentioned that cat deck or that fair Aries deck I find that like the Simplicity of this is a deck full of dragons this is a deck that cares about lands you play land and you make a thing off of rampaging bailout like things like that these are straightforward Concepts that also are extremely exciting and so having the excitement and the Simplicity can really help narrow things in and allow greater Focus for that player yeah again Joe just don't overwhelm them one thing that I would highly highly recommend to folks what they're when they're explaining how to play to to new players is don't overwhelm them and one way to do that is just keep everything on board there's a lot to keep track of and so telling a new player to watch out for things that are still in the hands instead of things they can't actively track and see on the battlefield that's a huge way to to take advantage of just okay this is what you got to worry about the things that are here don't worry about what's in their hand because that's just a more advanced concept and so keeping things on the battlefield that's what they have to focus on just so that there's there's not too much they have to process and kind of think about in the back of their head that's going to allow newer players just to kind of process and kind of you're not throwing them in the deep end handing them a combo deck you're saying okay like we're gonna do things pretty straightforward and keeping things on the battlefield just sorcery speed even yes that is going to there's a reason that Hearthstone is so much more accessible than magic for for people just casually playing because pretty much everything happens at sorcery speed that's one thing that just will help people get into the game is keep things sorcery speed don't worry about counter spells whatever that's just gonna overwhelm people I I really like that point about instance I'd like this stack is easily one of the most complicated things to teach players yeah about this dang game like and and I think we can all remember those confusions that we had entering into magic like you don't know can I attack only players or can I attack creatures when they're tapped like these are questions that genuinely came up for all of us because we didn't know the rules that seem obvious to us then you know in retrospect but like things about instance it is a way more advanced version of that so if you are going to include any instant in a deck Matt I totally agree something like counterspells players might be a little confused about what are the type of spells I should counter and if I do include any instance in a deck it tends to be more of like I'll use the card inspiring call as an example here something that straightforwardly gives your stuff indestructible that is an instant that makes itself extremely obvious when it is optimal to cast because it's like oh is my stuff going to die instead it doesn't and you don't like the player holding that card doesn't have questions about when am I supposed to use this it becomes a little bit more obvious because the card is so much more straightforward well inspiring calls a kind of a perfect example of a card too because it kind of scales in complexity you can give that to a new player and they can be like oh this draws me a couple cards to make myself indestructible so I'm going to cast this an attack and this is going to be this this useful card I have that like lets me swing out and my stuff doesn't die but then there's the added layer that or you can you can use it at instant speed in response to someone trying to blow up your thing but I don't need to think the card still works before they get to that level it's still going to be an effective card they can use just as an offensive tool and then as they get better at the game and start seeing more of the board it also has the ability to use it defensively and like so it's it's going to scale with their ability to play the game and that's a really useful thing I think to put in a deck well and even if you're going to put instance in there make them the type that they're not going to be bad if you play them at sorcery speeds right yeah like a single Target removal like swords to plowshares okay this thing's scary I can get rid of it right okay I'll do that it doesn't matter as much if it's main phase or instant speed whatever is going on so there's certain types of cards and and you'll kind of get a feel for that the more that you get exposed to the game but you'll see is this a good good card for a new player to try and figure out probably not and so just weeding out those things just reducing the decision trees that's going to be the biggest thing is just I the three of us have been playing for forever and I still get decision paralysis trying to figure out what I'm going to do on my turn much less handing me a deck that I've never played before and so that's definitely a real thing is just don't overwhelm folks with all the decisions that they can make just give them something that's gonna almost not quite pilot the pilot itself but they're gonna have the minimal amount of decision trees to make just to get through a simple turn another thing that I definitely notice myself wanting to avoid index that I built that a new player is going to Pilot is excessive shuffling yeah like tutors in general are an absolute note like I know that people want demonic tutor to get more reprints because the card shouldn't be as expensive as it is but like I have occasionally seen on the online so people are like why don't they put these into pre-cons and I'm like you should know why they don't put these into pre-conscious you should not make that decision right don't put that onto a person who's just picked this up they have no idea what they're gonna to go searching for and that honestly also goes for even simple land searching effects sometimes too like a fetchland some arid mesa into a temple Garden situation is an absolutely great Synergy especially if you're playing like some type of landfall deck or something like that but a new player doesn't know what the optimal thing is to get for that they just see that they lose a life and then they have to spend a lot of time shuffling and they didn't know that they were supposed to get this dual-type land the lands can have two types like that's all a lot of information to process and you're just putting this loading screen into the game whenever you're having to shuffle the deck a whole lot so I'll sometimes you know Arcane Signet is a much more straightforward ramp Advantage spell than some of the other land Searchers out there and that sometimes is a thing that I take into consideration when making a deck that I know a new player is going to be handling well it one thing that I I kind of feel bad that we didn't kind of lead off with almost is when you're helping somebody build their own deck ask them questions ask what they like to do because one thing that I know I tend to do is I I have a personal preference Joey Dana you both have personal preference we we all have certain things that we like to do ourselves with the game and so one thing that's going to help us get away from that is just asking the new person questions about okay so you you've played Dominion that's another deck building game what types of decks do you like to build in that or or other games what do you like to do what's a playstyle you like and the more questions you ask somebody that's going to help you understand okay what's going to be a good color combination what's going to be a good Commander to give them what's a strategy they could explore first just to get exposure and have those corollaries where you're gonna okay I know this kind of a strategy I'm good at that I enjoy doing that so I'm going to give them this type of deck that's one thing just you're gonna help make that connection you're not going to give them if you gave me one of Joey's free animator decks I no but B I I might struggle with that just trying to to go along and so if you give it to somebody who doesn't enjoy that type of strategy you may just lose them all together so asking questions just discover what that person likes that's gonna help you so much in the discovery process yeah the it's kind of the the talking about people not liking to to lose life or sacrifice creatures or whatever the reason they don't like those things is because they want to have have a healthy life total and they want to play cool creatures they don't want to lose those creatures well so give them cool creatures right give them something that they can that they can see that that great powerful Dragon with fantastic art that's going to do a neat thing that you can put into play and feel like they are doing something impactful that feels really good like that there's a reason they don't want to sacrifice that cool dragon or even that that smaller inaccurate was cat because they want to play those things and do something with them so lean into that and you talked about asking what they want a lot of times they'll they'll be much more inspired by some kind of a cohesive themed deck whether it's you know a cat deck or a dragon deck or whatever something built around a particular creature type theme or a deck that's just doing something that's recognizable and understandable I think you definitely run the risk of getting the weeds with too much complexity sometimes with themes but you don't have to you can still build something kind of clear and understandable that gives them something mentally to latch onto oh this is an elf deck I'm playing a bunch of elves that are going to do this particular thing that's an easy thing to grasp onto and then they can like enjoy having fun with putting those elves sideways and swinging in or whatever so I think that's that that's two things kind of tied in together there Matt the the ask them questions find out what they like and then give them what they want generally speaking which is to play those powerful fun creatures but yeah like if they want to play big dumb creatures give them a deck that is terasted on in it because that is one of the biggest gnarliest cool things that for a new player to see it's like oh this big freaking dinosaur that blows things up or if they like they're like oh I like to be sneaky and I you know stealthy about that give them a dimir anawan deck that has all the Rogues and they can be stealthy and evasive there's is all sorts of different things that you can just kind of you find out what they want and then like Dana said give them what they want don't don't say oh you like to turn things sideways I'm going to give you a Spell slinger deck no and there's so many options people you can find something that's going to fall in line with what new people want to do and it is like further complicated I think like I was teaching a new player who really enjoys um who plays DND a lot and who really enjoys neckromancy as and I was just like that resonates with me I've got plenty of decks that do lots of reanimation and stuff but actually finding a deck that was like actually good for this player to learn it it was a little bit tougher because you know will Health involves sacrificing a bunch of stuff and there's a lot of reanimation that I have in my will help deck but zombies really didn't make a whole lot of sense for the way that this person played so that is actually kind of what inspired me to make that vohar reanimator deck that I've played with you guys on stream because that is a much more straightforward version of reanimation it's just like a things in the graveyard I bring it right back out as opposed to Will Health which is like plenty of reanimation is in that deck it's true but it also involves Dana as you mentioned a lot of sacrificing of creatures so even though I did find a graveyard deck for a person who thematically wanted to play around graveyards I didn't find one that actually had any adhesion or cohesion that resonated with that player and that took a little bit of trial and error before I actually finally was able to find something that worked out and Yeah It's just sometimes that is a little bit tougher because you might know oh I want to play graveyards or I like artifacts a lot but there are different Avenues into each of those themes and so that is also worth digging into a little bit to make sure that you found the right way that that particular theme speaks to that player and particularly with a new player you know they probably don't know much about the game and maybe they will just instinctively know oh dragons sound cool but if they don't let them look at some cards the reason I wound up building dimir um fairies from my friend who about attacked four was because I let her look through a bunch of my cards I was not expecting her to pick that but she's like why do all these theories look kind of evil well they kind of are I guess on the particular plane they come from they are you know they're not like nice tinkerbell-esque fairies for the most part most fairies and Magic are kind of mischievous if not I'll write evil she's like I kind of like the art on all these fairy cards I I'm into the this kind of kind of cruel insect looking fairies oh my God there we go I wouldn't have thought that but like that was something that resonated with her that that's a relatively easy thing to do is just give the person some cards let them take a look and see what they connect with the art makes a difference a lot of times Dana that's a point that resonates with me because when I was teaching my cousin to play it kind of came down to the same thing Matt you'll love this uh eventually the the thing that resonated with her most was omnath of Rage because it was a bunch of angry jelly beans and she really wanted to throw a bunch of angry jelly beans at people yeah and like that was the sticking point that was the cohesion that suddenly made her really Delight in in what the game was happening and then it she proceeded to stomp on all of her faces because it was it was a really fun time but like the joy didn't just come from the gameplay The Joy came from the art and the thematicism like you were pointing out I mean I I can appreciate your cousin a liking angry omnath but also B resonating with taking the Segway to challenge the stats because that's something that certainly we can all appreciate so uh for for the sake of your cousin give give her a hug for me but also thanks for letting me steal the Segway into challenging the stats where we think stats are high or lower whatever it is Joey says but here we're gonna challenge stats it's been so long since I've done the segue you can't even remember my usual Segway Spiel I can't you're right I can't oh you brilliant Mastermind I hate and love you that this is where we have the old lady from Titanic saying it's been 84 years since Joey got to do the Segway she's so kind and old but she remembers for you Joey oh no I'm gonna throw Matt into the ocean along with the heart of the ocean [Laughter] let's let's take a break and I'll find my dignity soon well we were talking about paying life to drug cards earlier and in one of my favorite cards in recent years is stinging study which is a five minute instant you draw cards and lose life equal to the Mana value of your commander um I tend to run in index that have a higher CMC Commander four five six Mana because spending five minutes to draw that many cards is a pretty good trade-off most of the time but it doesn't do you much good if you've got like a two minute value Commander or a three minute value Commander um feels less impactful for for paying that much Mana um but saying study is worth noting it's in 25 000 decks almost 26 000. one card that is also black that also costs five Mana is a necrologia that's only in under 7000 X 688 rack next necronologia pay um x-life and draw X cards that's it you can only play it during your end step so it's a um instance value it's not as quite as flexible as seeing study where you can wait and see if you need to use your Mana for something else and before the end of the turn draw a few cards but similar effect you're spending five minutes a Mustang study and as much life as you want to pay and you're oftentimes paying five or six with singing a study same thing about the same amount of cards um like I said it's not quite as flexible but for being able to basically draw the same amount in Decks that really don't want to be drawn saying study it's a pretty efficient draw spell to the point where I do think if saying study isn't that money Dex necrology should be in more than the quarter of the amount of stinging study so take a look at it if you like that effect like that kind of thing in black but don't have a commander that supports seeing study nectar Roger is a pretty solid card oh my goodness this card is Bonkers and like sheltered the apocalypse or quasa auger of agonies Right Where where it winds up putting you life ahead what and it's only in 20 of quasidex and 25 of shoulder decks and like yeah you oh my that's oh it hasn't had a reprint in a while it's probably a car people just don't even know it's a card that exists so I would say it's pretty seasoned and it's the sea the time it's been around wow that's an absolutely Wild One Dana I like it a lot all right I'll move to my challenge here and this is actually our listener submitted challenge the stats of the week which comes to us via email from one Nick comp who has a very cool challenge for Miram Sentinel worm decks and it stars the card cryptic Gateway which is a card that I have absolutely looked at and wanted to make work before and I've never been able to justify it but I think that Nick has found a very good reason to play it in a Miriam deck cryptic Gateway is the five Mana artifact that says you can tap two untapped creatures you control and you may put a creature card from your hand into play that shares a creature type with each creature tapped this way so this would be a great deck a great card for things that are built around a specific creature type but also usually a lot of those things like elves and zombies or goblins or stuff like that are cheap enough that you're not gonna want to take a speed bump on a card like this that will take a whole turn just so you can start cheating stuff like you'd want to play this in a deck that has high cost stuff but if you're playing high cost stuff then tapping them is a big ask so it's kind of a card that's never really Justified itself to me in a lot of decks but Nick points out a Synergy with Miriam Sentinel worm here that is actually kind of nutso like near in Sentinel worm is that team or dragon that gives you another copy of every dragon that you play so with miramin play and with the Gateway every time that you use this ability to cheat a dragon into play you have two dragons and now you can tap both of those two play for free another dragon and as Nick points out in the email that he sent us you can also potentially in that deck play a lot of cards like Garrick's Uprising and Tamer ascendancy and a lot of other draw spells like that that um will just make you refill your hand as you're going Mira might be like the one most amazing case for cryptic Gateway that I've ever seen and Nick points out that this has won him quite a big number of games ever since you tried it it does seem like a win more card in a lot of places but Mira might be one of the places that is best suited for this very strange card it also just got reprinted in dominaria remastered if folks want to make their already amazing bureum decks even more spicy this is definitely worth a look and it's currently showing up in only like 200 out of the 11 000 Miriam decks out there this is a cool sleeper pick I think it's absolutely fantastic to bring that forward thank you so much for that challenge yeah Miriam decks go Burr but finding new ways for it to go Burr that's actually kind of hard to do so well well played there so I'll wrap it up then with my challenge which is going to be for glissa sun Slayer deck so it's the new one from firexial will be one Dana I know that you've switched your old glissa into the new glissa so I'm curious to see what you're gonna cut uh say about this challenge so the new glasses on Slayer so there's a lot of different things going on some people are doing elf decks with this some people are doing sagas some people are doing it just straight enchantress so there's all sorts of different strategies are kind of coming into the typical well if you look at the page for glissa sun Slayer it's all over the place there's a whole bunch of different strategies but I do really really like that they're people are playing around with sagas they're putting any Saga that you can into the new glissa uh sagas they're the enchantments that age up or however they get new chapters and you get new effects every time it goes to a new chapter so there's a lot of cool things going on there and they're getting a lot of really cool synergies you're playing seeing stuff like throw parasite hex parasite theroped which I didn't even know was a real card until I was looking at glissa's page so there's a lot of really cool things that are going to manipulate the the page counters or whatever the counters are the Saga chapters on all your different sagas one card that I'm not super sold on just because it's a one-time effect versus a lot of the other effects that you have where they're repeatable is going to be vampire hex Mage so vampire hex Mage is black black for a vampire shamans a two one with first strike that you can sacrifice vampire hex Mage to remove all counters from Target permanence which means you could sacrifice a vampire hex Mage to reset one of your sagas and then it starts over and you get all the effects all over again but for all the other cool cards that you're playing in The Saga focused decks the stuff like power conduit which you can remove a counter from a permanent control to put a charge count on an artifact or put a plus one plus one counter on a creature there's so many cool little cards that you're playing in The Saga focused glissa Decks that vampire hex Mage to me is kind of underwhelming it's it you only get to use it once it's not a card you if you're sacrificing it and you're playing regrowth effects you're probably not going to want to regrowth your vampire hex major is going to want to regrowth the powerful Saga all over again or maybe the verduran enchantress so you can keep drawing cards whenever you cast more sagas I just I do don't know if that's the type of card that you want to make room for 30 percent of glissa decks are doing that which is pretty high when you consider that not all of the decks on glyces page are are doing The Saga strategy so it's probably higher when you look at Saga specific decks so there's all sorts of different other ways you can do that thief of blood Joey I know is one that you're very very in love with that removes all counters from all permanents there's a lot of really cool ways you can do it on mass but vampire hex page to me it's just it's not worth the card when you're already doing that with so many other strategies that are repeatable so if you're playing glissa sagas maybe take vampire hex Mage out of your decks if you're playing it with dark depths then by all means yeah for sure there but um a two-card combo does not a deck make yeah I would actually kind of I I would almost say it like to I guess to add on or like in my opinion a lateral move or something for that challenge would also be like ethersnap could also be another thing worth taking a look at yeah yeah that's the five minute source of remove all counters from all permanents and Exile all tokens and like my criticism there with the sagas is that a lot of the sagas make tokens and put counters on things for you so if you cast an ether snap you are resetting the Saga but you're also getting rid of the token and all the counters that it gave to you so like that would almost be one like and you can't even recur that one so that one is the one that I give a little bit of side eye to yeah there's a lot of collateral damage with either snap that I I'm not a huge fan of yeah which is a shame because I want to like that card but Matt as you pointed out I like thief of blood just a little bit more that's probably your your does your pick du jour whatever alrighty let's get ourselves back into our topic talking about things that we do and that we don't do when creating experiences for new players in EDH and a big one a big one that I want to throw in here that like I mean we mentioned keeping it simple in the first part of the show but I really want to reiterate it here is like making sure to avoid for example cards that have keywords without descriptions on them or like cool rules tricks that are cool for an experienced player are just going to be very confusing for a new player um so just try and tamper those down and this can be tricky like when I was building a deck for a new player I had a copy of Sky Hunter Strike Force which is a really neat card that gives all of your stuff the melee ability which you know Buffs up all of your stuff if you attack multiple opponents and it was like this I think would be a pretty straightforward card this is kind of neat and it encourages a nice aggressive pattern it's a a new card once you have your commander in play get stuff on board it's exciting the problem was that I had the full art version of that card and it does not explain what the melee keyword does and like that's just going to cause a lot of questions for new players so like that's another small way that these cards can sometimes crop out is just like keep keep things simple even the word flying is can be confusing even the word trample is already a lot to learn throwing a bunch of other keywords in there too is very distracting when everything is coming at you all at once yeah that's definitely an easy thing to to mess up as an experienced player as well um you take for granted how a lot of these things work and you don't need the text to remind you what how that keyword functions new players this is I mean it's Greek to them it's a functionally a foreign language when they start seeing somebody's keyword Pop Fun Cards um and even when they're explained it's challenging sometimes let alone when it doesn't have any explanation guys I I am legit not kidding about this and I feel like people are going to listen to me right here and think that I am lying or that I am exaggerating about this I am not I legit once met someone in a game store who had a deck that they said was for new players and I am not joking about this it was a tasker combo deck and the deck contained cards such as the textless version of cryptic command I that that memory haunts me it sticks I I Lurch upright in bed screaming thinking about that because I was just like no all of that is not it's just it was a good example of what not to do I'm gonna challenge the stats on them saying that's a new player friendly because that doesn't make sense a cryptic command is one of you can have like Hall of Fame level competitive players that don't play cryptic command well and so giving a textless version of that to a new player that uh I I would question that person Matt Pop Quiz what are all the modes of cryptic command do you know I'm off the top of your head counter Target spell draw card not just the modes the sequence of the modes on the card is relevant and how they resolve it's not only do you do you need to know the modes you need to know what order the listed on the counter Target spell draw card that's all cards that's that's all that's all there's a tap All Creatures mode I think isn't there if you've played in a ptq which they don't exist anymore so you probably haven't but if you played into ptq back in the day you would know cryptic command only says counter Target spell drop card draw card yeah yeah oh my God to everyone watching the YouTube version of this comment below with what crypto command does wrong answers only also while you're there questing these right but yeah that is I think like a really big example that's easy for me to point to but there are other small ways that this can manifest too and like cool tricks that we're proud of as deck builders are the kind of things that will put into our own decks but in the hands of someone who's a little bit less familiar it won't be obvious like the card reconnaissance I think is another great example here and that's a card that I've put into some of my decks before that's the really Nifty white enchantment that lets you untap your creatures but the reminder text on the card is actually a lie given the way that the rules have changed since that card was printed and it's never had an updated printing it says that the creature wouldn't deal combat damage when you remove it from combat and untap it but you can actually activate that effect in the end of combat step after damage has been dealt and untap your creature and basically give it a pseudo form of vigilance even knowing the rules of this game that card is confusing you know and it'd be a card that I'm proud to play in my deck but if I have that card in my deck I'm probably going to take it out before I give that deck to a new player well and I would even take that piece of advice Joey and and take it a step further I would dare even say don't put too many of your own pet cards in the the deck for the new player so if you're helping somebody build their deck for the first time don't don't suggest all these cards that you know and love and just say oh I swear it's good I I it's just trust me it's a good card we we talk on the show all the time about the cards that Dana especially the cards that seem to be super good when somebody else plays it but when you put it in your own deck it is super underwhelming and disappointing and then you put it back in a box for disappointing you the there are cards like that all the time so don't if you're helping somebody build their own deck for the very very first time again all the things that we've said kind of culminated into one point of just don't tell people to play so all these cards that you find very very good that maybe are a little more specific to things that just the way you tend to play well a good example that I think at this point I would I would almost say that liquid metal torque is I don't know if I'd call it a pet card but it's a card that we all love very few cards in the last couple years that we as a group like more than liquid metal torque and it seems relatively straightforward it is not at all and that's one I discovered in that Fairy Deck that I put in there that I assume would be oh that's it's a Mana Rock and you can turn things into artifact and that's self-explanatory it was very complicated for the two different newer players to try to play that deck they did not know what it was doing or why why do they want to turn stuff into artifacts what can I do with that I'm like well I'll try to explain you know if you have a removable spot that hit artifacts or something else was about artifacts you can like I don't that doesn't make any sense I don't understand so is it no longer the thing that it is there's just a lot of questions that that card opens up that that seems easy to a player like us and and we all love that card but the reasons we love that card are the reasons it's difficult for a new player to use right I have this herb board just the herb work tapped for Mana it doesn't say so on the card yeah yeah and I could already see a bunch of comments on the YouTube video of people saying oh a liquid metal torque it's super easy Once you I understand the rules but again we're talking about people who don't necessarily understand in all the rules yet this is for people that are just getting into the game and chances are if you're watching this podcast you might be helping people build decks but you're probably not in you're probably super invested you've already built your own decks so if you're the person that's new trying to figure out how to build your own deck like you probably aren't listening to this because you just you're not into the game that much I I'm not Theory crafting that one like I've never seen a new player try to use cryptic command I'm assuming it's probably challenging a text was cryptic command for a new player my assumption is that's hard but I guess I never witnessed it I've witnessed people trying to like use Liquid Metal torque and it is a difficult thing to grack for a newer player for sure yeah it's like that's that I'm not just guessing on that one I've seen it yeah expecting new players to pick up on all the things you can do when you're changing card types that's just it's one of the it's something that they'll pick up with time obviously because we a lot of people that would be listening to the show like oh yeah that makes sense but we're also very invested we understand some of those more in intensive rules interactions like changing card types very similar Matt to saying like don't play your own own pet cards is be aware of when you're perhaps inadvertently forcing your own pet style onto someone too yeah yeah yeah and that often manifests in the form of the cards you suggest but like I I tend to be kind of a reckless player in terms of how many how I treat my life total and how many basic lands I would be willing to run in a deck like I'm aware of that like that's that's something I intentionally or I'm aware that I tend to do in my decks my instinct when I was burning up for steal these eggs early on was to like prove them how I would normally brew a deck and that's def that's also something challenging for a new player to try to play with a style that perhaps might not be their style um and it's difficult to play with if you aren't using to play you're not used to playing that way yeah I mean just letting letting players make the decisions of what cards finally go into those decks as they're learning how to build just just let them pick the bad cards and let them have that learning experience of okay I like this card I want to play this but it's actually not very good it never really succeeded for me let them have those learning experiences because that's going to equip them for future decks when you're not around to kind of help build and and suggest cards so let people have those experiences of why cards might not be as great as an otherwise better suggestion yeah our own ego does not enter into the equation of someone else's enjoyment yeah very much and I I I and please don't think that like we're coming from this of a like this has never happened to us we're talking about it because it probably has happened because I know I 100 have done this before when I've been trying to explain to new people I my my partner has two teenage daughters who have asked oh Matt what's this podcast about is I've tried to explain the game to them 100 I have been biased in my explanation of what cards do so it's it's not that we're saying oh you should never do this because we're all guilty of this as well yeah Matt kept on saying that like oh yeah graveyards and Aristocrat stuff is all like really bad it's stupid yeah never never do that yeah completely showed his bias and those and don't don't wear scarves ever because they don't even keep you warm how I didn't say I didn't say that my sartorial choices are not on trial on this podcast thank you very much uh Dana kind of relating to something that you just mentioned about uh I I forget exactly the Segway I'm completely out of Segways in this podcast apparently but it prompted me to um want to ask another type of question here about do you think that a newer player's deck should be more commander-centric or Commander agnostic should a lot of the cards relate to the commander being in play Matt I'll use your Kyler deck as an example I think that's a very strong candidate for a deeply commander-centric deck where if Kyler is not in play the deck kind of falls apart um which is a very eggs all in one basket it's really exciting when it works but it can all fall apart pretty easily and a player can get maybe stuck top decking or stuff like that do we think that that is a good experience to go with for a new player or Dana would you say that that's the kind of thing that you'd want to avoid and that you'd want the deck to function without the commander necessarily being on the battlefield um I think the deck is probably for in a new player's hands they're it's probably better served being Commander agnostic in terms of like power level but I think if you you are playing with them and you are going to be intentionally pulling a few punches and like not making not making the optimal play to to handicap them it's probably a more fun experience to play with a commander-centric deck for a new player um so I guess it just depends on what the environment is if it's an environment where like you are going to have a little bit of control over how the game goes and how badly you can limit their ability to play um then I think it's probably more fun to play with the deck that really revolves around that commander and really like fires in all cylinders when it's in play okay I I really actually agree with that yeah just if you're if they're newer to the game then probably giving them is a deck that doesn't really need the commander is probably the right move but if they've played a little bit of magic maybe they played Arena but they're learning Commander then maybe yeah giving them a commander focused deck or maybe not focused you probably don't want to give them like a Voltron deck because that still might be a little too much but something that benefits a little bit more and kind of raises the floor that might be a better choice if they are a little familiar with magic but not Commander okay I've I've kind of noticed that especially like I noticed that new players are really excited to play the commander a lot because that's what this format is so I I struggle with the same question uh I think generally the thing that I've come to is that if the deck is commander-centric honestly this is going to be true regardless but like especially if the deck is commander-centric there is no like cap on the number of card Adventure spells that you can put into that deck that will be wrong yeah make sure that you never wind up with a situation where that person would get stuck top decking because that right there is really a thing that will make a person fall out of love the first or second time that they play the game is if they can't do a dang thing and even if it's Overkill even if you think you're playing some of the bad card draw spells in this color combination there's no shortage of the number of them because anything that will get the player and keep the player back in the game is clutch so so clutch so so Dana touched on something that I I really really like and Joe you also did too so what are some things that you would do when you're actually playing the game so say that they've they've built their first deck they've made their own card choices everything in those first few games what would you be looking to do or not do in those games just to make sure that experience like you said Joey don't don't create bad experiences what are some things that you're looking out for in the game with those new decks I'm not going to cast a dank smothering tyleristic study I'm just not I just there's no nothing is going to kill someone's joy in a new game than me saying repeatedly do you pay the one do you pay the one do you pay the two yeah I just they're great cards I probably wouldn't even put those into their deck though like they're obnoxiously powerful but they're also obnoxious and I just I don't think that they create a a great first impression that's that's one of my first things that's definitely a good call um I would focus on decks that are um easy to recognize the threat based on what's happening on the board um the opposite of that would be Mike Edison Chrome deck for example that tends to win out of nowhere ketta swings in and looks relatively innocuous and all of a sudden everyone takes 40 because I dropped you know multiple creature Buffs and then double the damage and double the damage and copied the damage double or something that would be a miserable experience for a new player because they they'd have a tough time understanding when the game was going to end I would want it to be very to play a deck that was very clear this isn't this is a threat that I've just played you need to respond to it or deal with it or things will happen make it all be something that they can recognize um and if you draw that thing that like the the card they're like oh I see how I can like all of a sudden do this big explosive thing maybe just don't do it like you have to pull punches sometimes against new players and I think that's that's yeah there's absolutely nothing wrong with that um with with not playing some things that like could create a bad playing experience yeah you don't want to cuddle people forever but like the first couple games absolutely and that point right there was what I I very much appreciate that people talk about oh you shouldn't ever sandbag or you shouldn't give players wins and we're not talking about giving people wins but making sure that you give people an opportunity to play the game and get to do the thing I remember I was playing at a shop years and years ago and and there's a player who very obviously was they'd played maybe enough games to fill one hand and I had a memory jar in play and they they were stuck on three lands they were they their deck was objectively like a just a pile of draft comments uncommon so everything cost like seven Mana so on their turn I activated a memory jar just to give them a chance to draw their fourth land and they didn't but everybody at the table was like why are you doing I'm like because I want this kid to be able to play the dang game everybody else is already on 12 Mana let them get to participate because yeah beating down on the new person just because oh well they didn't know how to build their deck as well as I did that's gonna make somebody never want to come back to the game again so yeah absolutely Dana what you said maybe pull some punches when it comes to not killing their thing so they get to experience and see what it feels like and what is good about their deck this I I swear so uh Commander advisor group member shivambot has actually made this point several times on his own show and online and I swear any anytime that he makes the point that he wants to create an exciting game rather than always playing to his outs and so sometimes that involves pulling a punch here and there there are so many volatile reactions to his statements about that and it's very sad to to see those reactions because I think that creating a fun experience for everyone is a great way to make sure that a player wants to come back and see more of the game and what it can offer yeah as opposed to always playing to your outs and that's just it's there there are some folks who would prefer to win than to let everyone have fun and that sucks sometimes I don't want to linger on it because it makes me sad but it is an energy that I see sometimes out there that I would like to push back against is what I'm trying to say and if you do pull a punch on a person do not let them know oh God no yeah make them feel bad about that because why would you do what like why take the the air out of them when you just you know if you let them have the moment let them have the moment if you're gonna let them have it so I said many episodes ago like build the Decks that you want to lose against and Sheldon mannery who says all the time online be the type of person that you would invite back to the Pod it's totally possible for you to play the game have fun and still make sure that the the other person that was new to the game had an enriched experience because of your participation and so maybe yeah their deck didn't cooperate but they still will say ah I had fun playing with you so let's play again that's the ultimate goal just create those social memorable experiences very much when my son was seven and I taught him to play basketball I didn't block every shot he took that I could have and the fact that I didn't do that is probably why at 15 he still plays basketball with me there you go uh Matt to Circle back around to another thing that you had asked earlier your early question about uh stuff to create for players another thing that I also want to make sure this I guess kind of comes back to the original thing is like those exciting synergies and leaving room for discovery for that person is another important component for that it's not just like oh this is a cool Synergy but also like if you put stuff into a deck that will be fun when they realize it but it also isn't super complicated to realize it um even if it's simple Synergy the feeling that that person can have when they put those pieces together themselves is another thing that I think will really cement them into liking the game um so to use an example of this a recent challenge the stats that I had on this show was actually for myosians with a Lazelle and Master Chef deck and the reason that that was on my mind was because I've actually been teaching my ex-boyfriend how to play the game recently and was building this deck for him to enjoy and I put in those myogens and I was just like I think that this would be an exciting fun card to aim for but I'm not gonna over explain it if it does happen and it did happen it did get to happen where that myosin came in with an indestructible counter on it and then another one because of lazelle's ability giving additional counters and not only that in that same deck it has two commanders I put one of those Commander Storm cards like Imperial storm or something which gives you additional copies for each time that you've cast your commander well the deck has two commanders y'all the look of delight when he discovered those synergies that's what made him want to keep playing like that's the kind of thing that is so absolutely exciting you know so having those pieces that someone can put together themselves is another thing that I would want to make sure to to aim for as much as possible when creating an experience for a new person letting them discover something is really a joyous thing to experience well and giving players the time in game is huge too sometimes you know you have to draw to those cards and play the the deck a few times to really see all the cards so make sure you're not ending games too quickly and this kind of comes back to what we talked about a minute ago is maybe pull some punches just don't win on turn four that's not the the new player probably has barely had a chance to really read the cards in their hand much less do anything meaningful so don't end the games too quickly but also don't let them linger either you want to have a sense of everything's moving forward I mean games gotta end make sure that the per the the action keeps moving forward but I mean wait till everybody has a chance to kind of do the thing yeah find that happy medium of the game didn't end too quickly but it also didn't drag on for forever a game full of five board wipes would not be a great cohesion point for a new person no but also a game that ended on turn five would not really let them live in the experience that we were all hoping to get either that's that right that finding that sweet spot and and Dana I'll bring up a point that you mentioned earlier the way that the game ends is also going to be huge and out of nowhere ending kind of robs them of that narrative fulfillment a little bit and so an ending that feels more inevitable that you can see coming it's like ah okay like that actually at least feels right in a way as opposed to uh I I couldn't have done anything about you know your ketis and chrome example and that's a really great thing to pay attention to is how the game will end for sure well speaking of how things end this is probably a good time to end this podcast I will still just segue from Joey as well wow oh goddess got him I I can't argue with that that's brilliant um and that's that's one you can't do as part of the shotgun can't try to jump ahead of me on that one yeah welcome to the EDH retcast well it was good talking to you all not a good episode oh man the Segway the the stealing of the Segways in 2023 is maybe my favorite running bit that we've ever done um I can't wait to see how this turns out as things progress this is the where I've upped the ante so I'm kind of worried about next time you guys are gonna keep stealing this but yes absolutely listeners we would love to hear from you but your thoughts about teaching a new person and how to uh get them to feel the excitement that we all feel for this game and how that goes for you tips and tricks are a great thing to leave in the comments below and also don't forget to leave in the comments your thoughts about what cryptic command and questing Beast do no cheating all right wrong answers only uh but yeah let's call this episode to a close and fellas if our listeners want to get in touch with us on the online where is it that they can find us all Matt so you can find me on the twitters at mathis55 where I'm tweeting about how questing Beast has trample I think you can also find us at twitch.tv edhretcast every Wednesday evening where we're streaming games we're having guests on every single week and it's always a super fun time so make sure you tune in for that as well and Dana you can find me on the Twitter birds at Dana roach and I'm running articles for idiotrek and command Anders Herald and you can find all of us together at patreon.comcast and I'm Joey Schultz you can find me on the online at Joseph M Schultz where I'll be telling Matt that uh it doesn't have trample it clearly has flying right uh you can also find the cast at edhrekcast on the Facebooks and the twitters and if you have a question for us you can contact us at edhrekcast gmail.com our thanks go out once again to chase for assisting me with the post-production of the show and who definitely knows all the text to questing Beast no doubt you can find them online at manicures listeners will be back at you next week with more data and insights but until then remember EDH wreck your deck before you wreck your deck [Music]

Channel: EDHRECast

Views: 37,744

Keywords: magic the gathering, commander, edh, edhrec, mtg

Id: -UvpnJ6f9b0

Length: 55min 49sec (3349 seconds)

Published: Fri Mar 24 2023