Color Shifted Commander
Commander (EDH) forum
Posted on April 8, 2019, 11:47 p.m. by Last_Laugh
I've had a random thought that I can't seem to get rid of. Changing a multi color general's primary color to another color with a challenge in mind rather than degeneracy.
I want to do this for the deckbuilding challenge of starting from scratch with no real resources for help. I'm not out to try to break a commander by adding an obviously easier color either and I have few good examples that I've actually considered below. I'm after people's thoughts on this... would you play against this sort of deck or would this be a no-go if someone in your meta tried it?
Marchesa, the Black Rose - Dropping Black and Adding White. Green would make things too easy no matter what color you dropped, but American Marchesa? No black means Marchesa typically loses over half your deck and your efficient life manipulation.
Animar, Soul of Elements - Dropping Green and Adding Black or White. Due to the way Animar's protections are his off colors, I'd also want to change his protections to stay that way. Adding Black or White seems more acceptable here than Green in Marchesa. Dropping green from Animar is such a shake-up (like 2/3 of an avg. Animar deck) I wouldn't know where to start and that sounds fun to me.
Has anyone considered this for another commander?
DrukenReaps says... #3
Interesting idea. I would be ok with someone doing this as long as they say as much before the game.
April 9, 2019 1:59 a.m.
ShutUpMokuba says... #4
Very good idea. I would certainly try it. But in my playgroup i think everyone will end up exchanging colours in order to improve their decks so, in my case, the deckbuilding challenge would become a "cheat the rules to improve your deck" ahahaha..
April 9, 2019 5:28 a.m.
You could with in your group do the challenge of you chose the commander but your group choses the color to drop and what to replace it with.
April 9, 2019 9:08 a.m.
Personally, if I were doing this, I would also modify the rules text accordingly so the new card fit with its new identity's slice of the colour pie. I think that would be a pretty interesting challenge--not just "what if Marchesa, the Black Rose was Jeskai," but "what if Marchesa, the Black Rose had always been Jeskai?"
But that could be pretty complicated and difficult to keep track of, so there are some logistical concerns.
April 9, 2019 9:19 a.m.
Last_Laugh says... #8
That does sound complicated to keep track of on the fly cdkime. Granted I'm not sure if Im 100% following. Like full on tweaking abilities or replacing keywords with more color appropriate options? I think the latter of those 2 if easy to track would be okay, similar to Animar's protections in the example in my first post where I'd want protection from his off colors still.
Pervavita - That is a good idea, especially if the integrity of someone's motives for a change like this were questionable. I personally ran color options past people in my meta and was honest. I.e. I considered White Blue Captain Sisay but said I'd omit stuff like Raff Capashen, Ship's Mage and GAAIV so it wasn't just oppressive stax and I'd have to get creative.
April 9, 2019 11:27 a.m.
Last_Laugh says... #9
Or like American Marchesa suddenly needs to attack the lowest life? It's not the best representation of color pie fixing unless we factor in 'Kick em While They're Down' being American (at least in Texas).
April 9, 2019 11:35 a.m.
In retrospect, I do not think you would have to change Marchesa, the Black Rose , but she is a very unique situation, as her final ability can be justified under either black or white.
Let's break down her three abilities:
Dethrone: Dethrone is exclusively found on Red and Blue cards, so that will be fine.
Other creatures you control have ave dethrone: Again, Red/Blue, the addition of white instead of black might make this ability make more sense, since White often has cards that spread around abilities to your creatures.
Whenever a creature you control . . . end step: Returning creatures to the battlefield is both in the realm of white or black, so you could justify this as well.
Animar is a more tricky, and thus interesting, example. Let's say we took Animar and made him
First ability: This would probably change to "Protection from white and from green."
Second ability: Whenever a creature dies, put a +1/+1 counter on Animar. Why this? This adds an element of black, which tends to have effects based on when creatures dies, and removes an element of green, which cares about when creatures are cast or enter the battlefield.
Third ability: Noncreature spells you cast cost 1 less for each +1/+1 counter on Animar. This ties in Red/Blue, which tend to care about casting noncreature spells, rather than creature spells.
I think those abilities more fit with a Grixis identity, while still keeping some of the feel of the original card.
April 9, 2019 noon
Last_Laugh says... #11
Not entirely unmanageable but it'd definitely require printing something off a custom card creator.
That version of Animar (Decimar?) would be a tough but interesting build. I'd think a controlling gravepact/tokens strategy maybe? Not sure how to best take advantage of a non-creature discount (or if that's too flexible and should be limited to instants/sorceries or non-creature permanents?). Decimar Superfriends with Gravepact/Token sub-strategies for the win!
I probably wouldn't try to do this. It's a tough sell on top of a tough sell lol. It's fun food for thought though.
April 9, 2019 1:08 p.m.
I mean at what point does it stop being "modifying an existing creature" and just "creating your own (balanced) commander for fun and seeing if your group is ok with it"? Honestly I'd be way more ok with someone saying "hey I wanna use a custom commander for fun. Check it out and see if you're ok with me running it" than someone saying "can I use animar, but with a ton of modifications to make it do what I want it to do?"
Perhaps this should more be a discussion of whether its ok to invent your own commanders for casual play. As far as I'm concerned, that's A ok
April 9, 2019 7:43 p.m.
Last_Laugh says... #13
DuTogira - As I said, I probably wouldn't go that far because this is a tough sell already. But sticking to just a color shift where I sacrifice a Commander's primary color for a weaker one I feel is a more realistic ask.
April 9, 2019 8:17 p.m.
ZendikariWol says... #14
Windmill slam add Green to Feather, the Redeemed . Would it make sense? No. But ohmygoodness the toys that deck would have to play with! I already built it amd it's awesome in Boros, but that green would give it a LOT of removal and a WHOLE LOT of trample.
channelfireball12345 says... #2
I’ve not thought of anything like this before, but neat concept!
April 8, 2019 11:50 p.m.