I'd like to bring up GAAIV again, as I've already said somewhere above that the currently listed deck is probably not that good anymore and recent comments stated tgat as well. Rather than discussing the tier I had offered a replacement for the current list (which I have tested in paper and online for some months) but no one discussed the matter yet.

I felt like TheDevicers list is better. Lupu seems stuck on trying to make something work when it's obviously fading in the meta.

I think if someone came at GAAIV with fresh ideas (like paradox artifacts) it would result in a better deck.

Ok, just to be upfront, my life's been a mess lately so my list is criminally under-tested and likely needs more work. Regardless, I still feel like it's much better than Lupu's as that deck has not been iterated on in ages.

Basically no one really seems to care about GAAIV in any way. The only real innovation I've seen is some lists going for Aetherflux Reservoir and Paradox Engine (engine is legit).

The Tax Man's Paradox

Fwiw I won $ at a commander tournament with Narset, Prossh, and Teferi (among other decks but those were the higher end decks.)

I don't think it makes much sense to try making it work primarily as a combo deck when there are so many commanders among the top decks that have the combo already in the command zone. You just dedicate more slots to finding the combo and still aren't as fast and reliable as others...and you miss a lot of control by doing so. Also no one seems to play AEther Barrier when there are food chain and other heavily creature based combos around? You can't pay this tax with food chain mana, unlike other spheres...

Playing rest in peace as one's own wincon is also better than having to include extra cards to combat the whole lot of graveyard based combos.

My experience with my Augustin's $t4ks (Primer) is that it works better against the decks that rely on creatures to win and there are quite a lot of them among the top decks in this list now.

That may very well be true. I'm super washed up, as I've stated before. I'm personally hesitant to say to use my build but what's up there is certainly not what GAAIV can do in cEDH.

TheDevicer I also don't want to say put my deck up there but...yeah, put my deck up there!

Seriously, I am open for criticism but I feel like GAAIV is best to fight what combo decks are in the top tiers, not to be played similarly to one of those decks.

tishana recommendation: tier 2.5. sample goldfishing statistics are included. Recommendations welcome though

kaminari no koe

Commander / EDH* chaosumbreon87

2 COMMENTS | 19 VIEWS

But it's a blue-green MERFOLK! Shouldn't it go to Tier 1?

But yeah, the list is decent. It goldfishes well. T2.5 works since Tishana is basically a marginally better Zegana.

Im not too sure about that. I was looking through the zeg list for inspiration and i saw deadeye palinchron with no ht package so i might try redesigning it.

@Winterblast - Sure. Real talk though, I think the major issues GAAIV has are related to a lack of accessible win cons, being a step below awesome as a card in the command zone, and hinging a ton on specific hate cards that don't cover enough ground. From looking at your deck, I think your deck is way more matchup dependent than my take. I like it just because it's something different, but I have some serious doubts about it. Still, I would like to add that I haven't played cEDh in something like 3 months, so I'm fucking clueless atm.

Whatever happens, I think GAAIV is criminally under-explored and should be revisited.

This is Child of Alara. While certainly not the fastest deck, it has many qualities that makes it one of the strongest builds for her. She is deceptively fast and incredibly versatile with many avenues to outright win games, and I do intend to post an update of cards I put in the deck since its last incarnation.My Child of Alara - The Antisocial Crybaby

She does'nt try to gimmick win with things like Hermit Druid, any deck can do that. This is a straight up midrange control build with combinations of things such as the gods, ramp, manabond, mirage mirror dark depths, etc... And always threatening to nuke the board, gain value off of Trade Routes and the Locust God, or reanimating corpses with the Scarab God. She can go toe to toe with top tier decks and not come off too badly scathed.

So.... um.... wat?

I took one look and see 54 lands, little to no early acceleration, little to no interaction, and no stax effects to slow opponents.

I'm far too tired to make an in depth comment about this all but I have one suggestion kayakenobi; take a good hard look at the tier 1-2 lists here and tell me how you beat Tazri going off on T2-3 with counter backup, how you beat Arcum Dagsson going off T1-3 like it can. I don't see it. Not in the slightest. Not with your only counter being Forbid and your only two early spot removal cards being cyc rift and swords.

Acceleration is in the form of Exploration, Burgeoning, and Manabond with Nature's Lore. I already said it wasn't the fastest. Nor does it need to be. I'm actually reworking the deck right now anyway. And Tazri's just nuts anyway. And I said... very specifically, She can go toe to toe with top tier decks and not come off too badly scathed. Doesn't mean she will win, just that she can take them on and stand a chance of winning. You know what my favorite way of winning is? turn 1 Gemstone Caverns, Exploration, and Wheel effect to ruin my opponent's plans. And scapeshift with a crucible is a form of ramp as well. I hadn't messed with the deck for almost a year, and just now trying to put it back together again. It's a work in progress currently, and you're right about forbid being a bit sub-optimal.

Anyways, before you toss more insults, understand that combo isn't the only way to win. It's just a problem to solve.

Actually, it can with the proper tweaks. My actual decks to go to the cEDH scene is Sisay and Prossh. As far as the above deck goes, I elected it to be on the list, since they want a list for Child.

As for the insults, it wasn't directed directly at him. I received a couple of private messages after posting it here.

Not every deck is going to combo off, or care about comboing off. Not everything is as it seems either. What am I supposed to do? Copy every other top idea and use it? Am I supposed to make a turn 1 Hermit Druid combo with Child at the helm? Is that what it takes to impress people? It's boring, predictable, and old. Just like Kess is Jeleva 2.0 and Breya being Doomsday combo or Ad Naus combo without regard to what the commander is actually capable of.

As soon as someone sees... what, no sol ring or mana crypt? What, no infinite combo and no necro ooze? Oh my, this deck is bad and you should be ashamed of yourself. Except, unlike those decks, this one is legal in French and mtgo commander 1v1.

Not just that, when you want cEDH, you really should try out Canlander or Duel Commander. A lot more is allowed in both formats and far more enjoyable as a format than multiplayer EDH pretending that being competitive is figuring out who played the Sol Ring first. As it is, I follow a slightly different philosophy. It's called, you want competitive? Well, there's certain criteria which makes it competitive. I do agree that the deck isn't top dog. However, I disagree with the assessment that something is bad because you say it is bad.

However, I must thank you for the comments, it's making me reassess certain cards that I should put in (or back in) the deck. My first version was insanely wtf, treasure hunt, 70+ lands, and awkward ideas that didn't really work that well outside of an ad naus style combo.

Not sure if dropping it below 50 lands is a smart idea, but it's a start.

TheDevicer some card choices are definitely based on the decision to improve certain matchups. With Stax I absolutely don't plan on being the one to prevent a goldfished turn 1-2 win when on the draw, even though I might be able to prevent pretty much everything if I play first. It's a deliberate decision to leave these kind of turn 1 interaction to someone else on the table. What I do in the beginning is to counter mana rocks and drop spheres or hate pieces that must be removed...then it's all about nuking the resources (either gradually or at once) before someone can pay for hurkyls recal, rebuild or whatever and the stuff needed to win.

In paper I play frequently against arcum dagsson, scion (with hermit druid), sometimes Prossh or Teferi and often someone is on the table with Selvala or Elves or whatever and they profit from the top decks throwing hate at each other. For these there are a few cards included that ruin them completely...in online games I have seen that the stuff I play to completely wreck the random local aggro deck works well against the hatebear decks like tana/tymna too. These kind of decks only work when no one really focuses on dealing with creatures in general or when no one cares about combat because 40 life and combo - which is indeed the case if you have a look at the lists in the top tiers here.

It's probably not good enough for the list but here is my Ramos build that I'm testing Ramos is the dragon engine EDH

You said "You know what my favorite way of winning is? turn 1 Gemstone Caverns, Exploration, and Wheel effect to ruin my opponent's plans." But that's not winning.

Your T2 wheel will just be refilling my hand after I dump most of it Turn 1. If anything that's helping your opponents win. Coupled with your extremely limited spot removal or interaction I cannot conceive of how that wins.

If you want a midrange V.S. Midrange example take a look at Yisan then. He has combos but 99% of the time you just win by going up the chain to hoof so about as midrange as you can get.

Your spot removal won't kill Yisan. Like, at all. Also, no early counters to stop my T2 Yisan? Sounds like easystreet. You wheel my hand? Thanks for the free cards. You blow up lands? Inconvienent but I have plenty of rocks and dorks to keep playing. Where you simply don't, not to mention the fact that I can bounce lands to mitigate the damage. (Also, before you say "but child blows up all nonland" I'd respond with "only if it dies, and even then every land wipe you play puts you further from casting him")

My point is this, if you sat down with this list I would feel absolutely giddy with a free win.

I'm not trying to be insulting, really. However you've gotta understand that your deck, in it's current configuration, is at odds with itself, it has no REAL ramp or ways of powering out an early Armageddon aside from maybe burgeoning, it has ONE counterspell and only TWO pieces of removal before T3 and even after T3 it's limited.

I just don't see how you can say it can "come out not too badly scathed" when every time I think of your deck in a pod of any of the tier 1-2.5 generals I can't see anything but you being slaughtered.

What I saw was no deck, so forgive me.

Woohoo, boonweaver, Karador be proud. Any deck can do it. And my deck isn't budget, I own even a friggen diamond valley and it's in the deck. But anyway, if there's already a list then forgive me for not seeing it.

I guess my answers to dealing with combo isn't enough. And that combo is the only way to play at all.

No, not the only way, Yisan and a few others play midrange quite well. Most contain combos but not all of them are tutorable.

Hard control suffers because you have 3 opponents to control not just one. Land destruction suffers because it sets you back just as far and then you have to resolve the actual wincon after that. and aggro has to eat through 120 life which is too much to be winning on T3 typically.

Your issue is speed and interaction. You aren't interacting with your opponents (especially at instant speed) and you aren't able to slow them down with stax effects.

kayakenobi it seems you still don't understand what the purpose of this list is. It took me a while to figure it out myself as well. It's not about the most creative builds with a certain commander but the listed decks are meant to show what the (probably) most powerful way to play that commander currently is. It's also not about putting the same combo in every list and just exchange the legendary creature and shift the colours a bit...it's about finding the strongest way to build a deck around what the commander can offer. With commanders that don't have any really good abilities that could possibly win a game, it's often about building a deck in the colours and only using the commander as a backup. Some are even so bad that you just use them as a placeholder.

Nothing against a casual 5c deck but here the topic is how to win. Creativity is needed to find ways to combat the best available decks but the goal is still to win...not to try making casual mechanics and strategies work in a competitive meta somehow (fun fact:they won't work).

But he owns a "Friggen Diamond Valley". LOLOLOLOL. OMG. I love people they are the best.

n0bunga It's not even a T1 wheel. He starts with Gemstone Caverns, then he plays Exploration, and then still has to come up with a mana somewhere even if he plays 2 lands for turn. Wheel of Fortune costs 3, not really familiar with any 2 drop wheels aside from a miracled Reforge the Soul and that STILL doesn't work cause he's gotta play a land first.

Just saw that Wizards updated the rules for planes walkers by making them legendary in addition to their other typing. Does this change mark a significant change in EDH as a whole; i.e. having Jace Beleren and Jace, the Mindsculpter in play seems cute and pretty powerful to boot; or would it really only affect the decks that are already geared towards a "super friends" playstyle anyway. Captain Sisay looks all that much sexier now too though, since she can tutor for planeswalkers, but I dont know if she cares. Thoughts? Opinions? Ideas?

Hoping we can move on from this but im not sure how diamond valley contributes to the deck. youre not using the lifefor anything like necropotence or ad nauseam so im not seeing how it contributes over high market. If its an arguement about price, oh boy i have these expensive cards, it doesnt imply compeditiveness either. Hell, I've rejected force of will for various reasons before.

That being said, I love seeing new ideas so if you want to submit another deck we dont have one for, we'ed prob be happy to give more advice. If you want a nice measuring stick to see, your deck should be able to kill the rest of the table by turns 5-6 through goldfishing, consistently (i would say at least 70% of the time).

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At some year I'll redesign Zegana. I have some inspiration right now about ramos for storm so I want to give that a try before I rework zegana. regardless if it turns out to be on par consistency wise with my previous submission (the necrotic ooze one I submitted ages back) ill submit both for reconsideration