When is a deck done?
Commander (EDH) forum
Posted on Sept. 10, 2016, 1:48 p.m. by Lightpulsar9
As the title states, I'd like to know when you personally consider an EDH deck to be finished. Yes, I know you can always make improvements as new cards are released. But when do you consider your deck's powerlevel/ general card selection to be done? Do you call a deck finished when it reaches a certain price point? Maybe when it can finally pull off a strategy you want to push? Or when it reaches the same or higher powerlevel than that of your playgroup?
I know I'm always changing up cards in my decks, but there are some that I consider to be finished that aren't completely optimized, but do what I want them to do, and do it well enough for me.
What do you guys think?
PookandPie says... #3
There's no one criteria that is going to fit an appropriate bill to describe being, "Done."
My Arcum and Zur decks are probably my most powerful, but when new cards come out, they're not above being modified, revamped, or even re-done entirely if I want to do something slightly different (I switched Zur from a Doomsday build to Ad Nauseam for fun. I can still do the Doomsday variant if I want, but the difference of 8~ cards is still incredibly impactful).
Every single other deck I own in paper, which is about 10 with an 11th being made sometime soon, receives updates at least once every few sets.
I suppose I stop making large updates to deck lists after playing them and enjoying what they do well enough- Zur, Arcum, and Ghave are my combo decks, Kemba and Uril are Voltron, Sliver Overlord and Yisan are mine and my wife's aggro decks, and Roon and Chainer are control. Zur wins on turn 3-4 by tutoring Necropotence or Phyrexian Unlife, casting Ad Nauseam, and then casting Sickening Dreams for hilariously large amounts of damage, and it does its job fairly well against competitive decks. Arcum is the exact opposite of Zur since it tries to lock the game on the third or fourth turn by pulling Rings of Brighthearth by sacrificing a mana dork, and then sacrificing a Myr Sire or Hangarback Walker to pull both Staff of Domination and Basalt Monolith, generate infinite mana, draw the library and then lock the board with Mycosynth Lattice, Darksteel Forge, Nevinyrral's Disk (among a bunch of other things that can be done- Arcum is surprisingly non-linear, despite what people with little experience with him say, lol). They deal well with everything from Brago to Animar to Grixis Storm, so they typically only receive periodical updates. My other decks, however, get new stuff all the time- I think I've purchased 5~ cards for Kemba this year from new sets because they'd be perfect fits for that kind of deck (stuff like Stoneforge Masterwork or Sigarda's Aid).
So, when the deck does what I want it to do, I suppose, would be when I stop performing 10+ card changes simultaneously and stick to much smaller updates. I don't simply stop updating my decks at any point, however- Roon is getting a lot of love from Kaladesh (Panharmonicon, yes please), Ghave is getting a new card (Animation Module forms an infinite combo with Juniper Order Ranger, Champion of Lambholt, Bloodspore Thrinax, Cathars' Crusade, etc., and Earthcraft, which are all cards I already run), and Arcum is getting Inventor's Fair, with probably 1 or 2 cards for some other decks, too. So, I guess I never really stop updating them, and some of my original decklists are almost 40 cards off from their current iterations.
September 10, 2016 2:21 p.m.
Truthfully because new sets come out all the time, a deck can never be "done"
September 10, 2016 2:38 p.m.
griffstick says... #5
When your satisfied with is as a whole and can't find your self making any improvements my token deck is complete so I started doing a foil process celitifiing it's finished. Click the link to see what a perfect token deck looked like in my opinion
September 10, 2016 3:09 p.m.
Lightpulsar9 says... #6
Quiet, I mentioned that in the original post. My question was, aside from the newer cards, when you you consider a deck to be finished.
I personally have 10 decks at the moment, and I only consider 2 of them (My Melek storm deck, and my Jeleva deck) to be "finished", while the other 8 are always being changed and reworked depending on how they preform or new ideas I have. My main reasoning for calling them "finished" is that they do exactly what I want them to do, at the powerlevel I want. They have a nice win ratio in my playgroup and I don't think they can really be improved without making them too competitive. That's my reasoning for calling them done.
That said, my sidisi and selvala decks are probably stronger and more competitive, while my other decks are still works in progress for finding out how I truly want to build them.
So I really just want to know what makes you want to stop making major changes to a deck, or analyzing how to make a deck stronger. I realize it's a tough question. I was just curious as to how everyone thinks.
Thanks for the replies PookandPie and Simon_Williamson. I really liked those answers. I probably should have expected a lot of the "when it does what I want it to do answers". I just think it's cool to hear what everyone has to say, and how everyone views the format.
September 10, 2016 3:12 p.m.
I consider a deck "finished" when I am completely happy with it and have no intentions of modifying it with the current card pool.
Modifications can come later as new cards release but that is standard. You can't really help that.
So "finished" is when I have no intentions of changing it. I could have a deck that gets completely revamped with the release of new cards but that is dependent upon new releases and obviously we as the players have no control over that.
That is typically how I view finished decks. Another criteria I personally follow is, Foils. I can have my deck list finished, but the deck itself isn't truly finished until I have Foiled it out.
Once deck list and Foils are complete, I just look at all the cards from a new set. Typically though, my finished decks don't change. It is rare that new cards come out that are complete upgrades to my current list. If something new comes out though, it is really easy to "re-finish" the deck as I'll just buy the new card(s) in Foil and I'll be done again.
September 10, 2016 5 p.m.
"A deck is never done, Frodo Baggins. A deck is finished precisely when it needs to." -Gandalf
Seriously though, an EDH deck is a never-ending work of art. You keep tweaking it to perfect that masterpiece you built, even if you scrap it and take it up again later.
September 10, 2016 5:06 p.m.
When it plays well according to my group's power level and appeals to me specifically. That's it, really.
September 10, 2016 5:08 p.m.
See I've already noticed a difference between myself and others posting here.
I like my decks to be as optimized, (in my eyes), as possible. I don't build for my playgroups. I attempt to optimize every deck to do exactly what I want whether it's fun for others to play against or not.
Typically I can't play my Zur the Enchanter deck with people because they hate it but I won't drop the power level to their levels. Kaalia of the Vast was another just rude Commander.
If I need a deck that isn't a complete douche, then I'll typically build a new deck until it is either fun for them to play against while being Competitive, or it becomes overpowered and I start a new project.
Nekusar, the Mindrazer is my newest project I'm working on.
(I suppose I should probably consider a deck finished when I post the updated list here on TappedOut, but I'm notoriously bad at updating my decks on here.)
September 10, 2016 5:14 p.m.
To answer your question... I would consider an EDH/Commander Deck finished when you are happy with your choices and see that no other cards are needed or can do a job better than a previous choices. In truth an EDH/Commander Deck is never finished as you will always see a possible card or combination of cards that you will want or need to make your deck "Better"
September 10, 2016 7:17 p.m.
I personally never finish any of my decks. So to me, they can never be done. My attention is always grabbed elsewhere because I can make the "final push" to finish a deck. I find a new commander, a new theme, or something new to build around and my focus is directed onto that until something else diverts my attention.
However, I've gone back to a few of my older decks and each time I play them, I always feel like they aren't living up to their potential. Maybe it's just me, although I do have the feeling that after each game I play with my older decks, even sometimes my more recent ones, that I think, "Man, I really should take that card out and put in some removal/control/etc"
September 10, 2016 10:15 p.m.
Deckologist says... #13
Never in my case. My decks are always in a constant state of change.
September 11, 2016 1:56 a.m.
freakman13 says... #14
To me, a deck is done when you have realized i's exact purpose and direction and put in the cards that make it do that. It could still be running a subpar card or two for budget reasons, but is at the point where it's changing out counterspells for mana drains or an island for a tundra, not changing entire play styles. These are the decks that don't get rebuilt with a new set releasing, but instead just get the card slotted in over similar, but weaker effect. Examples of this, for me, are Sphinx's Riddle and Demonic Legion. This is unlike my deck Angelic Emergence, which gets completely rebuilt every few sets to try and find the point where it does what I want and figure out how that should be done.
Sim_Will_CMcantfindmehopefully says... #2
I never consider a deck complete, but I guess to answer your question, when it reaches its optimum purpose. The purpose can be to break a certain card, have a thematic flair, have a certain type o mechanic for the sake of that mechanic, etc. This usually happens when I am spent of ideas and can appreciate the deck. This is also about when I post it to tapped out.
September 10, 2016 2:02 p.m.