Counterpoint: White doesn't need ramp or card draw
Commander (EDH) forum
Posted on Dec. 24, 2019, 11:39 a.m. by enpc
So recently I have seen a few threads complaining how "white is lacking in card draw and ramp" and how it's some sort of problem that needs solving. So I am going to put this thread forward with the opposite arguement: White is fine where it is. This is for a few reasons:
-
White has some of the best removal in the game and has the largest removal pool in the game. While you personally might not want to play those cards, providing extra ramp and draw for white will enable all of the players who do.
-
Outside of green, white has some of the best land fixing in the game (and this includes ramp effects too). Knight of the White Orchid , kor cartograhper, Land Tax and Weathered Wayfarer are all incredibly strong effects and aren't seen in the other three colours. Not to mention Smothering Tithe .
-
White has very strong equipment and enchantment tutoring, as well as cantripping from both. Just because you don't like to play this kind of draw doesn't mean it should be discounted.
-
White's very colour identity has always focused on slowing other players down to your speed, rather that trying to race everybody else.
I have seen a lot of "But I don't want to play those cards" comments like that is a good arguement for printing more white ramp/draw.
It's really important to understand that the game is bigger than what you want to play - just because you don't want to play all the cards that make you unpopular at a table doesn't mean that there are other players who aren't affraid to. And equipping those players with more ramp and card advantage to make those decks even more potent seems like a bad move.
So I wanted to make this this a place for discussion of the topic, but for once on the side of "it's not a problem and it doesn't need fixing".
Feel free to share your thoughts.
Inkmoth: ohh, absolutely. In no way am I claiming that mono white is viable at the competitive level, because as you stated, it lacks consistency. However my argument is that this is done by design, as giving mono white that consistency would make it too strong.
December 24, 2019 11:58 a.m.
The land ramp is mediocre it helps but it is not green now Smothering Tithe is probably one of the best white commander cards outside of board wipes to come out and they need more things like that card.
Really what great equipment and enchantment tutoring have they reprinted or released recently.
They have Open the Armory that is affordable but come on out side that what else that does not cost your first born child because of lack of reprints. They have I mean Heliod's Pilgrim is ok and Three Dreams is fine if you are running an aura deck but those are special cases.
The real issues is most people in commander run enchantments or equipment the few exceptions that run auras can use the above the issue with enchantment tutor when was the last one printed guess what the three they have all cost $30 plus because they have not been re-printed and nothing similar has been printed in standard Enlightened Tutor ; Idyllic Tutor ; Academy Rector
Then if you are running equipment Steelshaper's Gift is the only one in a decent price range Stoneforge Mystic is used in multiple platforms so the cost is going to stay high Steelshaper Apprentice is meh but is budget; the better option is Stonehewer Giant and his price his creeping up because of stoneforge mystic going up.
Right now I say now the answer is no because everything you referenced is old and cost $$$ because white has not received more stuff along those lines. I would argue that white needs more cards that expand these roles to be true. Right now blue is just as good at getting equipment or artifacts so white is once again a good support color
December 24, 2019 12:19 p.m. Edited.
Well it is also the fact that white’s strongest abilities being land destruction with cards like Armagedon and tax effects like Thalia, Guardian of Thraben are very looked down in and tend to get you hated out of the game by the other players once they know that you are packing hose kinds of cards. People are mostly just looking for answers to fix the area so where it is weak in. I frankly don’t like looking at Smothering Tithe as the answer because we only just got that card this year and it is still only a single card.
December 24, 2019 12:55 p.m.
You say white has some of the best non-green ramp in the game. However, before Smothering Tithe , white ramp is entirely dependent on someone being ahead of you in number of lands. Once you match that number, white ramp is completely ineffective (again, the exception being Smothering Tithe ).
December 24, 2019 4:43 p.m.
RNR_Gaming says... #7
I don't like it as a main color due to it having weak resilience and not being as versatile as other colors. It provides strong stax pieces but its still too weak for a multiplayer format. Only having a handful of good cards is like playing with a handicap. Effiecent removal isn't enough to combat multiple threats. I love Swords to Plowshares and Path to Exile but they just cannot keep up with all the value engines of other colors and if you access threats wrong you basically just wasted a resource.
December 24, 2019 5:15 p.m.
dingusdingo says... #8
I totally agree. While it would certainly make mono white commanders far more viable, white already has enough going for it to make it a sought after color for wedges or dual colored commanders.
White sees lots of play in stax decks, as it packs the most hatebears of any color. Thalia, Guardian of Thraben Leonin Arbiter Aven Mindcensor Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite Grand Abolisher Hokori, Dust Drinker Ethersworn Canonist Kataki, War's Wage are all cards that see competitive play. You have far more fringe cases like Vryn Wingmare Alms Collector Thalia, Heretic Cathar Loxodon Gatekeeper and others which are seen on the fringe. The hatebears become a secondary wincon for competitive by pressuring life totals while also stopping the game.
White also gets a BUNCH of incredible supporting effects for stax builds. Armageddon and the expensive Ravages of War close games. Smothering Tithe plays great under stax. There are also numerous enchantments are shut off combos or lines of play, such as Rest in Peace Stony Silence Leyline of Sanctity Suppression Field and all kinds of less effective variants.
White also gives some of the most efficient 1-for-1 removal. While you will fall behind with 1-for-1's in a 4 player pod, its still important to pack StP and Path. White also gets sweepers for EVERY SINGLE PERMANENT TYPE. You read that correctly kids. You can do A-lot-for-1 trades with cards like Wrath of God Austere Command Cleanfall Paraselene and others.
White also gets one of the best pieces of combo protection available, Silence . White has a few tutors that are playable, Enlightened Tutor Steelshaper's Gift Open the Armory Academy Rector Stoneforge Mystic . You get card advantage via effects like Land Tax Tithe Weathered Wayfarer and more.
True, white doesn't have very many cards with the word "Draw" explicitly on it. You're able to accrue advantage, but its mostly incremental. What white lacks in raw draw you make up for with value. The sweepers are the best example of this imo. The opponent may have drawn more cards than you, but trading 1 card for 10 creatures on the board is effectively 9 card advantage.
I personally enjoy most duals or wedges that include White + Black or White + Blue. I find it to be similar to Green, in that I don't feel bad with having it as a secondary or tertiary color, and that it solves a lot of problems and gives me access to cards I want to run.
December 25, 2019 1:22 a.m.
hejtmane: I don't believe price should be a factor here. I understand that there are a lot of "expensive" cards that are needed to build a solid white deck, however expensive is a sliding scale. I have no problems spending $20-30 on a card for a deck, however to some people that's way out of their price range. Because "expensive" is such a subject term, it's not fair to use as an argument. Not to mention (and assuming most decks are in the same price range), the cheaper the decks are, the easier a time mono-white will have as the game wil be slower in general.
MESS1802: If your ramp is conditional to others being ahead of you and you're at the front of the curve, then the fact that your ramp doesn't activate isn't really a problem. And more than that, realistically when do you ever see that happen?
December 26, 2019 10:42 a.m.
The problem is there are so few cards in white that do anything that they are expensive and there are no budget options. Like blue counter spell is printed at common level and reprinted so they can be had for $1-2 dollars and tons of budget options that are not Force of Will etc. Then while Rhystic Study is way over priced and it is a is a great card you can make do with budget alternatives in commander. Examples Mystic Remora has a lot of value for draw then other options like Coastal Piracy and Kumena's Awakening there are solid other options to get card draw in blue or budget counter spell options in blue etc.
The issue with white is there are not enough so you have to spend a lot of $$$ because there is no budget alternative options because wizards has failed miserably with white. The only thing that stays cheap in white is mass removal and artifact/enchantment removal and some of the target removal is still good. Price does matter despite what people think because it hurts new players the most and it becomes modern all over again you price people out of the game and you have no one to play with. I will never agree price does not matter it always matters and will always matter because not everyone can afford to spend $$$ to keep up with other decks they play.
December 26, 2019 11:49 a.m.
So then what's an acceptable price for an effect? $1? $2? $5? $20? Do you see that trying to use price is completely subjective to what people can afford? Not to mention, there are always options like proxying.
And if price still is an issue, I would think that seeing cards reprinted to reduce price would be the fix here. Because if you add a bunch of playable white draw/ramp then the second it goes out of print, chances are it will skyrocket in price too.
December 26, 2019 11:59 a.m.
It needs to be a combination of reprints and creating more cards that do similar things. I am saying white should have more tools to do what we listed smothering tithes is been a boon for white now they need more stuff like smothering tithe it price is not to bad because the set had a high print rate and the brawl decks while still running in 8-10 range it could be worse.lets say wizards makes a 3 cmc version of Enlightened Tutor printed at the uncommon or even rare level now we have a budget version to the $30 card. This would be similar to Demonic Tutor vs Diabolic Tutor the budget version still gets played in commander quite a bit because of $$$ cost is it as good no but it is still a good card in commander.
Does white need reprints yes and it needs some more cards that do similar things as it old old staples when has white had a tutor that does what Enlightened Tutor does like never it was reprinted once since 2000 and white does not really have another card like it since.
Yes a 3 cmc tutor can be printed in standard when we have 4 cost black tutors that can get any card vs one limited to what it can fetch.
December 26, 2019 12:37 p.m.
dingusdingo says... #13
Wizards really likes where white is for standard/modern. If you see prints for commander, it will most likely be a direct-to-commander set that skips those two. We also have Modern Horizons 2 coming soon(?) which has big potential for the kinds of prints you want to see.
Price point and a collectible card game. . . My position on this is price should never be a factor in the design/release of cards. Proxies exist. Friends exist. Proxy with your friends. If you want to build a deck for tournaments, the stark reality of a collectible card game dating 25+ years is that different cards will have different dollar amounts. Asking them to devalue their own product by intentionally printing cards that will tank the value of their own cards just isn't going to happen. Their older cards having high value allows them to sell their newer cards for higher value as well. A hyper-power printing will sell big, but ultimately reduce the value of their collectible, which causes them to sell future cards for less money. Short term gains for long term detriment. Wizards can see longer than 1 fiscal year in the future. These prints simply won't happen.
Having something off-color makes it unique, and makes it sought after. Giving white huge draw blends color identities too much. There is no point in having 5 colors if all 5 colors have the same strengths and weaknesses. Commander is a 4 player 40 life format. White is a color that plays the value game, same as red. Value is a lot different when the format is 2 players with 20 life. As you push into competitive commander, certain aspects of how the format are set up change how the definition of what a value cards is. White weenie isn't a format in commander (for competitive, at least), while its been an archetype in 2 player 20 card for years and years and years. See what I'm driving at?
Printing the unique and rare cards willy nilly makes them neither unique nor rare. With any discrepancy in power between colors you're gonna run into the same problem. As previously stated though, White has enough going on to lean into value in Commander in a different way, usually by leveraging incremental value over long games behind stax pieces. Playing a card that negates 3 in the enemy hand is the same as +2 card advantage. Sweeping 10 cards for 1 in yours is the same as +9 card advantage. Just because the card doesn't explicitly say "draw" doesn't mean you aren't accruing advantage. You just need to learn what effective card advantage is.
Now compare to blue. You get 2 draws off 1 card, or many more off a card like Rhystic Study . On the flip side, your best form of interaction is via cards like Counterspell where you are forced to make 1-for-1 trades. If blue didn't have raw card advantage, it would never be able to keep up making 1-for-1 trades in a 4 player format. The problem is, blue gets 10-for-1 value from cards like Rhystic Study or Mystic Remora . The draw blue has is too efficient, simple as.
I don't think the answer is giving all colors draw. I think its increasing the efficiency of the baked in answers for neutralizing value. Wrath of God at 3 mana is a better solution to card advantage problems than printing a White Rhystic Study . Unfortunately Black got the best 3 cmc Wrath with Toxic Deluge .
You know how Red has almost no card advantage, and their draw cards are mostly filters like Cathartic Reunion (net 0 card advantage)? Red is still played competitively. They just trade raw drawing for sweepers like Pyroclasm that let them kill of 4 dorks at once, accruing card advantage (+3) while also stopping decks from ramping themselves. Give white better sweepers, other methods of slowing down fast decks, and better incremental value pieces to gain that advantage after they have slowed the decks.
Inkmoth says... #2
All great points, but monowhite just lacks the consistency of the other colors.
Perhaps in casual to semi competitive metas you'll have a lot of success, but in cEDH, white is just terrible unless you're playing Teshar, Ancestor's Apostle or to a lesser extent Sram, Senior Edificer .
December 24, 2019 11:54 a.m.