Repeat after me: “Synergy is not the same thing as having a game plan.” No. No. Don’t just read it. Say it out loud with me. For real. Let’s say it again: “Synergy is not the same thing as having a game plan.” Good! Now that we’ve got that in your head, we can really…
Read More
You may have noticed that the further we’ve progressed into the Unified Theory’s MDTAS system, the more we’ve discussed the “character” of your deck. This isn’t a coincidence. Every deck needs mana sources, and the rules that help players improve their mana base can be broadly applied. Every deck wants card draw, so resource acquisition…
Read More
Up through this point in the Unified Theory of Commander, we’ve been primarily concerned with what our own decks want to do. Threats define the goals of the deck, while Draw and Mana give us access to those threats and the ability to cast them. As we move into the fourth element in our theory,…
Read More
Imagine for a moment that your commander is an actual living being someplace out in the Magic multiverse. He, she, or it wants something. Can you say what that something is? Does she want to grab a sword and slice someone open? Does he want to make it impossible for his enemies to cast a…
Read More
What kind of deck do you really want to build? This question is at the starting point of every Commander deck, isn’t it? There’s no sense in building a deck that won’t be fun to pilot. So EDH players need to start with this question and then continually revisit it to make sure that the…
Read More
We’ve already spilled quite a bit of digital ink discussing the first two elements of the Unified Theory of Commander: mana and draw. Over the last four articles in this series, we learned why to make mana production a priority during deck construction and how to utilize card draw to create options that help our decks succeed….
Read More
There are ways around just about every rule ever made by mankind. We’ve all learned to push the boundaries and discover which rules really apply and which ones are not fully enforced. Kids learn which parent to ask to get that extra TV show before bed. Students figure out which teachers are pushovers that let…
Read More