jaymc1130: Dial it back in - remember you've posted on somebody else's decklist effectively calling it trash, then abusing the person when they disagree with you. And seeing these comments as a third party, you were in fact the one that fired the first shot. Especially since when a similar thing happen on your list a while ago, you went and deleted all trace of the comments.

The reason people have issue with your comments is the air of arrogance you come about this with. You're trying to tell the whole commutity that they (rightly or wrongly) are all idiots and that you and your playgroup are the only ones who hold the key to perfection in deckbuilding. IN addition to that, you have flat out told me (and others) that they are wrong (not just that you disagree with them) and have been quite hostile about your opinions, even to the point of making derogatory remarks with no other intention that to be derogatory. I'm not talking about this because I want to see you get silenced (or whatever conspiracy theory that could be thought up), but your attitude will get you in trouble at some point. So it is for your best interest to dial it back in - you have some good deck building ideas and I don't want to see them get quashed becuase of your aggressive attitude.

As for your comments about the three cards, what I don't agree with is that you've said that decks are bad when they have single points of failure, however then are claiming that cards which address this single point of failure are also bad. In a vaccuum, yes, Disenchant is better than Leonin Relic-Warder . However here, the card does triple duty (enabling primary combo, providing secondary combo and acting as out of combo removal).

As for my meta, I have come across all the kinds of cards your deck runs - I have played against them and play against them on a semi-regular basis. However what I have found is that there are plenty of ways to play around/through them - my list does this. I'm not saying it's the most powerful list in my playgroup, becuase at top tier play I don't believe that there is a single list htat holds this title (your deck included). Again, it's dangerous to assume that no other player has the experience that you have or the insight that you do.

How exactly did I fire the first shot when, as you so succinctly put it, this individual came into MY list and did far worse there, with a friend no less, constantly berating me and the concept while phrasing things in as two faced a manner as possible to avoid an obvious instance that would required some sort of punishment?

The nonsense in that statement alone is confounding.

And yet again in his own list he's resorted to insulting me despite the fact that I did nothing of the sort to him. All I posted was objective statements about fundamental principles, I never once referred to him with an insult or called him something along the lines of "irrelevant". No, that's twisting things pretty hard to say I fired any sort of shot, let alone fired it first.

As far as Relic Warder, no, it's not a better card than Disenchant in a vacuum, it does not offer the same utility or permanence of result at instant speed and timing is a critical element for competitive multiplayer. It does not matter that it opens up additional avenues along the main combo line, as the entire fundamental principle is that this line will not be available against the most competitive concepts in the format. So again, the best thing Relic Warder would have going for it is that it is a 2/2 and can maybe, just maybe provide some degree of pressure. It does not pull triple duty in any sense without the main combo line being available. The card is simply inherently less efficient in a vacuum for any purpose outside of those related to said combo line. This isn't opinion, this is objective fact based on basic fundamental principles of not just the format but MTG in general.

As for your last point, it's extremely clear that I DO have some experience that no other player happens to have within the community at large. Look at the people the community over who, with no experience related to what I'm discussing what so ever have to say about what I'm discussing. If any one else had ANY amount of experience with what I'm talking about then the discussion wouldn't be a one sided "you can't be right because we've never seen it before, let alone seen it win". That's the argument of the community at large, and it's that argument precisely because THEY have zero experience with these fundamental principles, they've never even thought about it, but some people have and those people did a very good job of explaining it to me. The simple fact of the matter is that no one else in the entire cEDH community happens to have the insight I have on this matter and that is why they constantly berate, belittle, and nay say. They've never seen something this complex, this subtle, this advanced, and can't even begin to comprehend what to make of it. That's just fact. If any one else had ANY degree of experience what so ever with what I'm trying to explain to the community at large then the entire community wouldn't be sitting there hurling insults and demeaning comments at me for over a year out of pride and ignorance. Period.

jaymc1130: On THIS decklist. I can't speak to the specifics of what was said on yours, becasue as I stated, the comments were deleted. And if what you say is true, to then come back an post someing inflamatory on somebody else's list as what, revenge? seems rather silly. Bringing ego to a fight is only going to see it get hurt.

And I don't agree with Megalomania's repsonses either, however you are bringing it to their decklist. Just like if somebody was actively being abusive on your list I would tell them to calm down (again, I can't do that because most of it happenend while I was asleep and then comments were deleted).

Again with the Disenchant vs Leonin Relic-Warder - my issue with your statement is that you're saying that the deck is bad because of single points of failure, but when cards are introduced to address this, you're just ripping on them as well. Again, you don't think they are optimum and you can hold that opinion, however if they are working in the meta they're played in then they are achieving the desired resutl. Simple as that.

On your last point - yes, you do have experience with your deck. I'm not doubting that. The probelm here is that you're assuming that A) poeple have never tried to use these cards as a win condition before and B) You hold some huge amount knowledge about the entirity of competitive commander than nobody else does.

I have seen lists where one of the win conditions was looping Extract (this was a The First Sliver FC deck). Hell, I even ran it for myself in one of my lists, using it purely as proactive hate. However I came to the conclusion that it wasn't actually that good and dropped it. And look, there are newer cards that have come out that might make it good again, however the point I am making is that I doubt thtat you're the only person (or your playgroup is the only one) who have looked to use these cards. Maybe poeple have tried the cards like I did and came to the conclusing that there are just better option like I did?

The second part of this is that your attitude in general needs some work. I say this becuase you are coming into basically any dicussion of magic preaching that you're the smartest person in the room. Even before you likened your deck being the best cEDH possible to the theory of gravity. There are a lot of poeple who play cEDH a lot, often times running youtube channels, discord discussions, are active on the reddit subforums and in general have spent a lot of time getting their name out there as well established eCDH players. So when you, a no name who has been playing this stragety for what, 12 - 18 months comes in here demanding that this is the pinnacle of cEDH and that everybody else doesn't have a clue, especially with not much more than hearsay about the 1000's of games (which equates to 3+ games a day, every day of the year and so, even if true sounds exaggerated) then I can understand why said players are dismissive. There are lots of ways that you can positively promote you list, however the way you have been going about it is detrimental to both it and your reputation.

The key thing here is humility - I won't ever tell a person to not argue a point hey believe in, however don't assume you're the smartest person in the room. Ths is a huge danger, especially with games like MtG. Even if you're good, there will always be somebody (generlly who is pretty outspoken) who will school you. And I am speaking from experience as having to learn this lesson the hard way.

Just because some random guy happened to agree with me doesn’t mean he was my friend. If I remember it correctly, I went to your decklist after you posted the same things here on the other guy’s list.

This has become kind of your MO. You’d bash someone else’s list so you can brag about yours. Lol. I’m okay with it though. Like the other guy said, you come off as a douche so good luck winning people over to your crusade.

enpc Ah, so this is where you keep getting caught up, the single points of failure aspect. What you fail to realize, and this was a statement I already made earlier, is that adding in Relic Warder doesn't ever address the 2 critical points of failure. This is a list with one real combo win line, it mills everything, constantly shuffles and reuses Narcomeba, has the Eldrazi to prevent decking itself, and it pings when it can repeatedly sacrifice a creature (Altar of Dementia is not even remotely close to reliable as a win condition as there are tons of standard meta decks that "win condition" can't beat, the mirror, Gitrog, any deck with Nexus of Fate, the list goes on and on and on). It doesn't have an alternative win line aside from doing precisely that. It has a LOAD of ways to better enable that line, but ZERO lines to take assuming that line is down for a combo win. The list doesn't generate infinite mana, can't loop, has no other combo wins, and is limited to strictly creature beats should either Narcomeba or the Eldrazi be exiled (and it additionally has no ways to return cards from exile).

Adding in Leonin Relic Warder does nothing to address the single points of failue, it just adds more cards that are directly and only useful in relation TO those points of failure. If you want to get uppity about it then just removing Zulaport Cutthroat prevents both the Warder/Necro line and the Meba/Mill line from functioning to win the game (while forcing additional resources to be used to potentially find and tutor up Altar, which won't be possible most combo turns considering the resources invested just in assembling the main combo enabling lines as well as being no assurance of winning against a huge number of meta cards in standard meta decks). It's a list with so many critical points of failure that it's almost hard to imagine it could ever be competitive against the most competitive stuff possible and the "redundancy" elements to protect this points of failure are more cards that also rely on those exact points of failure that they are supposed to be "protecting". Again, it's like fighting a ghost, a phantom, a shadow. You can't actually achieve anything no matter how hard you strike at it. No matter how many more pieces might be added to continue to make additional use of these 2 critical points of failure won't increase the critical point of failure count. The ONLY way to do that is to include alternative win lines, only the deck is so jam packed full of inefficient stuff to further enable the same combo lines, without actually providing any degree of resiliency what so ever, that it doesn't have the card slots to devote to anything else. This is why it's impossible in this day and age to be competitively viable (except when specifically meta gaming for a 100% known environment, never the case in a tourney) when devoting 20-30% of a decks card slots to a single way to win. Lab Man, Aetherflux, all these other standard meta things just don't cut it competitively at the top end of the spectrum in general, and especially when the supporting cast of cards is so dense while relying on that critical point. This is why the Warder is an ineffective addition as it further dilutes deck consistency due to inefficiency.

As far as being the smartest person in the room?

I am. Sorry if that irks you, or others, but the simple fact of the matter is I test in the 99 percentile and have since kindergarten. I got just shy of a perfect score on my SATs, I have an IQ around 150. It's extremely unlikely I'm ever NOT the smartest person in the room. That's just reality. You know what really is annoying? Being told by the other people in the room around the middle of that bell curve silly cliches like "You're not the smartest person in the room". Good lord almighty does that ever piss me off, and quite frankly the internet is just chock full of folks way below that level and it's mostly only those folks talking back on internet forums.

You might not like that, but, again, that's just the reality of the situation. Quite frankly, I'm weary of this entire conversation, and quite annoyed by many things that have been said. Certainly annoyed at being framed as the "douche" as another put it when the only things I posted (prior to being belittled) were insights and facts that were met, yet again, with insults and berating comments.

It's exactly what my playgroup said would happen, and I cannot fathom why I ever have any faith in humanity when this is what is constantly displayed on the internet and all walks of life.

So what is the point? Is everyone supposed to ditch the current meta just because 4 people in the world play your strategy? I totally get how easily decks having single points of failure can be dismantled. I have at least one deck posted here that uses PG for that purpose. What now?

Unless people actually start going after those single points of failure, unless the likelihood of going against “inception” decks becomes high enough, I don’t see any reason to make the premature adjustments. I have been reiterating that point ever since we started conversing and you’ve been trying to bury it with irrelevant point after irrelevant point.

jaymc1130: Not to sound liek a broken record, but again, your arguement is inconsistent. So the deck is suppose to have 1 point of redundancy? 2 points? 3? You have to draw the line somewhere. And for this list in the meta it's played in, 1 point of redundancy apparently works. And the tradeoff, something that a slower, more controlling deck doesn't have is speed. That is the one benefit of hulk decks. While they are fragile, thay can be stupidly fast, especially given the number of pieces they need to start. And looking at your list, There are only two pieces that you need to attack to effectively shut the deck down (if you're wondering, they're Elixir of Immortality and Dramatic Reversal - I'm happy to go over my logic though here is not the best place).

As for being the smartest in the room, that is a very dangerous game to play. The best piece of advice I can give you on this is "the sooner you get over yourself, the better off you'll be". I'm not trying to be rude, that is genuine advice (that I apply to myself). There is a big difference between knowledge and wisdom. Because as smart as you might be, you've proceeded to alienate yourself and your viewpoints. Again, I don't want to get into it all here (am happy to discuss elsewhere) but I can tell you that there is a lot you don't know. I'm going to leave this bit alone though, but am happy to continue that card discussion here (as long as poeple can be bothered).

enpc There are at least 3 points in my list you have to exile. For every single aspect. Some have 4. 3 points has proven a reasonable cutoff.

You can't cut off infinite mana without exiling one part of each infinite mana producing combo (there are 3) and also exiling Karn. 4 points.

You can't cut off win conditions as there are too many loopable wins available, Ashiok, Trophy, Swan Song, Shaman (if active), Windfall, Extract, Praetor's Grasp, etc.

You can't off loop enabling without exiling Karn, Elixir, and either of Narset's Reversal or Timetwister in it's current set up. Memory's Journey and Gaea's Blessing in some set ups brings that count to 4 points with 3 as listed.

All of these cards are independently useful as well, unlike something like Lab Man. The least useful thing is probably the Forge that replaced Paradox Engine.

It's quite clear what the ability to assess decks quickly is for the community at large, despite the detailed and lengthy efforts made to assist in precisely that matter.

As for speed that's part of something else I already mentioned about glass cannon combos way earlier, they either get to protect the combo by not advancing board state (sacrificing the speed element in the process) or they get to advance board state and leave the combo unprotected. Either scenario is a win for an Inception strategy. There is nothing a meta deck can do that doesn't benefit Inception, hence the point of the deck, it's dominance as a concept, and relegation of all other strategies to less competitive tiers if viable at all in such an environment.

The only dangerous game is the one the sheep play. They'd rather stick to what they know than be on the cutting edge, thinking for one's self is too difficult, better to be told what to do. As far as I'm concerned the sheep can stay sheep at this point, they'd rather be slaughtered than evolve.

I've alienated no one, these people already had made up their mind's well before any discussion was ever had and no amount of logic or insight would possibly change it.

Let’s say you’re 100% correct. Am I supposed to make adjustments to my list based on a deck I won’t be playing against any time soon? How is that even logical or insightful?

If you propose to avoid flying on a space shuttle because commercial flights won't be coming soon then you would also be missing the point.

Were people supposed to adjust how they approached warfare in the 1920s just because planes were only new inventions and wouldn't be used expressly for that purpose for some time yet to come? Of course they were. And part of the rise of Nazi Germany can be attributed to most of humanity refusing to comprehend the new reality of warfare in the 20th century.

Evolution and progress are inexorable forces.

What you do is play the concept against opponents. They see it and how effective it is. You get to soak up the accolades while the community adjusts and accumulate wins. Once people have had enough of losing to the concept consistently they begin to adjust to it and play it themselves (this is how ALL decks become relevant parts of the meta). At which point you will be required to adjust old meta lists should you desire to ever compete with them in the future (and being dead honest as this is the exact process we went through ourselves, most meta concepts could not adjust well enough to ever consistently win, some meta standard concepts like Flash X and Chain Veil were so awful they very nearly lacked the ability to win at all).

The point of identifying these weakness in the meta for you and the community at large is simple, so you can start to play the emerging dominant concept and learn to preempt the meta shift by educating yourselves on how your future adjustments would need to be made. I'll tell you again, just as I told you before, you can keep playing the old standard meta stuff all you want and never familiarize yourself with something new if you want, but this only puts you at a disadvantage when, eventually, other people choose not to do so, choose not to tread the same endlessly reiterated paths of stagnated innovation, choose instead to try out the new emerging threat and succeed with it because of the fundamental principles I continue to highlight. Or you can try out something new yourself, succeed with it yourself, and redefine your own horizons because you stopped being scared to walk an unfamiliar path you lacked an understanding of at first while beating the rest of the community to the punch.