Commander Cookout Podcast, Ep 470 - How Much of a Bad Thing is Good?

That was the worst job you've ever done.

Halosmoco Podcast, Episode four seventy. I'm Brando. I'm here with Ryan and we're gonna talk about going too hard on the.

Pain now in our theme.

Hey Ryan, We're back for yet another whirlwind adventure. How you doing?

WHOA what is going down?

Whole bunch is going down. We've got a live studio audience. It's very exciting. It's one of the last times we're all gonna be together before the great big holiday season. We're going to deck to talk about some stories, to tell some people, to thank, some things to update y'all on. But before we get to any of that, we have to thank her official business, Daddy's Fusion Gaming Online dot Com there source for all your gaming needs, as well

Still they think we're pros. We're definitely Joe's that's it.

We're doing our best. But we're gonna get there for you in the new year. We're gonna talk a little bit more about that kind of stuff a little bit later on the show. But thanks to those people for

I love how you're doing all the work and I don't have to do anything.

I'm trying hard.

I don't know what they're going hard on the paint, as per your very intense intro. I got an email the other day about somebody listening to episode like eighty seven or one hundred and forty or something like years and years and years and years ago. So I went back and loaded up the episode, and when I hit play, it just played the start of the show, and it was like, Hey, you're listening to Commander Cookout Podcast, episode

Well, there was a time where the thought was, Brando, you gotta go a little slower because so people can understand what you're gonna say. And then eventually we leaned into the game.

It's not stupid, we're just freight training.

That's stupid. What that is You can keep up or you can get left behind.

Well, hey, if you're if you're into magic the gathering, it's either get excited or yeah, or don't. That's the whole business model.

You can get excited or just lose.

Oh, that's the whole business model. There it is. Hey, we're probably gonna talk a little bit about that on our year end wrap up show in a couple of weeks. I want to go through a little bit of podcasting business that you brought up.

Can I make a very quick sports reference? Yes, always paying more excitement to win games. Who are we the New York Mets.

Or the or the New York Yankees? No, very most specifically the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Now, didn't the Mets pay some gud like seven one hundred million.

Dollars thirty six million? Producer Gary seven hundred and thirty six million, Wan Toto? Yeah, yeah, man, they haven't won a World Series yet, so.

Of course they haven't. They're the Mets, and they're not gonna win a World Series even I know that they haven't for everybody in New Jersey.

They haven't technically paid to win yet because they haven't won yet. But the Dodgers shirt did. Yeah, okay, so cecio holiday. You see it on the screen if you're watching on YouTube, which just should be big. Thank you too, editor Joe. Of course we appreciate him.

He's fine.

Yeah mostly, Yeah, for sure, big thanks to Pilo Bones. Like you said already, I a little bit want to give the nation a little bit of an update because we're gonna do a deck today, we sure are, but we're gonna combine it with a topic because we are at the end of the year, and honestly, over the course of the year, I've gotten.

About I want to say, about fifty to fifty feedback on I like deck techs, I like topics, and so it's one of the last episodes of the year. We're gonna do both, all right. So before that, though, we got some we got some exciting stuff. It's it's actually it's actually cool stuff.

So new Patreon benefits coming up in the new year, and we don't want to let the cat out of the bag yet because we're not one hundred percent sure how we're gonna utilize the damn studio. Big thank you to producing Gary for letting us use it here. We're not sure how we're gonna use it yet. But there's a whole bunch of cameras and they're streaming like live streaming capabilities, and there's like.

We can cocktail arcade machine kind.

Of set cameras wherever we need them as long as they're not up anybody's skirts.

And you don't know that, well, I mean people are into that.

I know kink shaming in the nation. I suppose I could shoot one up Uncle Brando's skirt.

I have a skirt. Yeah, cool, whatever, Maybe.

That'll be a benefit.

What are you gonna do make fun of me for watch every What are you an asshole?

That was one thing new benefits and another one is we I guess sort of. Just today for the damn studio, I was sweat. Everybody was drinking beer. I was the only one.

Yeah, we're drinking some beer.

And we finished the second set that's in here, and now it it could give us a new look. It could give us a whole new look.

Actually looking at it, it actually did. It did a good job.

Hey, there we go. Well, I I only nailed the boards on it.

And I don't compliment you very often on purpose.

So I compliment the size of your wiener all the time. I know, and it's it's worked over, and you know what, listen, it's the end of the year. And I'm just I'm I'm it's not a euphemism for anything. I compliment the size of his wiener all the time. He really does all the time. Sometimes I'm like, I've never seen it, but I just I just I just legends I've heard the legends. Yeah, that's it. That's it. If this is the first time you've tuned into Commander Cookout podcast, We're sorry, welcome.

Welcome aboard. Oh okay, okay.

And here's one that I'm actually really excited about. Yes, we got a ton of feedback on and and and it was remarked earlier in the day that people just

Also, we got lots of first deck for Gary decks.

Oh so many.

I do have one of them put together. But Gary didn't come to Calgary, so he didn't get to play it.

Oh, yes, I told him the wrong date on purpose. Yes, yeah, he did go to Calgary, but nobody was there. He walks into the convention center. He looks like that meme with with John Travolta.

He showed up to the the Hitman bar and girl had an absolutely mid meal. Yes, but like in really great ambiance.

Yes, that's French for ambience.

It was just a little disappointed because nobody else was there.

Oh no, No. The other thing too, is we've got other a few other like friends and people that have want wanted to be involved in the show and learn magic, or whose family family players learn magic, family members family magic. Yes, and we thought, hey, what a better what what a great opera tunity to feature other people and kind of recreate those episodes that actually turned out to be kind

Or if you have a concept that you want to have delved into but you're not sure how to bridge the gap or broach the subject or whatever. Send it in and maybe we can we can make it happen for you. Maybe we can be that the microphone that explains to the person in your life that you would like to get play in or like to learn more about the game. Maybe we can distill something down and help you send it into us on the Discord comdical

Or if you're Patreon support, there's a messenger service there as well. Now, if if you hate all that, you don't like the way that any of that sounds, none of the regular command or cookout stuff's going anywhere. There's still gonna be bullshit, deck techs, beer drinking, CEO experiences, Canadian tours, face to face games, fricking Plinko, all that stuff.

I got a can of coffee next to the table right now.

It's awesome ccoffee. Yep, for sure. And that goes to say that new merch coming in twenty twenty five, Sidewalk Slam coming in strong, major comeback, and the other thing, the last thing that I wanted to touch on before we get into the deck tech and this is this is a little bit of the look ahead for twenty twenty five that we're going to be doing in the next couple of weeks.

It's the look ahead to the look ahead if you will.

Yeah, we're we're really looking in twenty twenty five to beef up our community Spotlight playlist. We've talked to a bunch of Canadian retailers. I've talked to a few members of the nation who have liked their own small bit businesses and stuff that we want to help them have a platform.

Frogs with jobs.

Baby Frogs are jobs, and you know what, Like twenty twenty five I want to be the year of giving back to CECO Nation. I think that we don't do that enough. Like we say thank you and we host people for the CEO Experience, and we have booster packs and there's gifts by its Dude Soup, But that's only like ten or twelve or fifteen or twenty people at a time, and there's a lot more members of the

If you will, If you have a gruel deck you'd like to see feature, and you can certainly send it into us. If not, then we're going to have to come up with a girl piece of shit.

Uncle Brando's grueling Christmas.

Oh baby, I've built most of them, so I would have to delve deep. And don't make me delve deep that much time.

Uncle Brando's Deep Christmas.

Nobody, nobody wants to see that. Oh no, I think it's so deep nighty you can hear the bells.

No more, it's so deep you can't see the bottom.

We're gonna be so deep Santa can't find you no more. There will be no coal. Oh, there will be no presence under the tree.

Oh, they'll be a present. It's gonna be special delivery.

It's glowing moss and lizards. It'll turn you to stone.

Lizards with no eyeballs because they don't need to see.

That's right, Derek.

Then we've got our twenty twenty four look back on all of the shit that went wrong this year. Oh, there was a lot of that, and then after that we've got our twenty twenty five that sounds weird look ahead to all the shit that we think is going to go wrong and all our predictions that were totally going to be right about.

You know what, I far be it for me to be the one that's positive. I think twenty twenty five and it's all it's not a hot take, but it's a take. I think it's going to be better than people expect it to be. Oh, I think twenty twenty five is going to be a particularly good year.

You're just excited about Final Fantasy, You freaking.

Web, It's not. I am excited, but that's not the only reason I think that fine. I think that twenty twenty five is going to be a make or break here for Magic. And here's a little spoiler for the look ahead because Hasbro.

Who owns Watsie, never heard of them.

Not stupid. Oh, they adjust quite quickly to They're not a company that forces a lot of stuff. If something sucks, they cut it because then they're losing money and they hate that.

Yes, see what every board see every board game except for Magic, Monopoly and Clue.

Yeah, they just need to be excited all the time. And so I think that this is the year where Magic the gathering people. We're gonna have a bigger impact than we think I think in twenty twenty five. So moving forward, I hope so well as a direction or not, they're gonna they're gonna listen to us this year.

I really do, And I believe that as one of Hasbro's main money makers. Maybe you're right. Yeah, right, they've already listened to us and put less booster packs in boxes that nobody wanted. That No, apparently retailers wanted that, they didn't want that. They I'm just saying what Weekly MPTG said.

Weekly MTG. They can I don't want to say they can blow it out their ass, but they can't. Sure I said it. You know they can blow it out their ass.

Okay, Uncle Brando deck deck today, Hell yeah, buddy, Okay. Unpopular deck strategies and how hard to lean in. So we've got your deck and we're going to use it as an example with supplemental examples of other decks that we've had with unpopular strategies to kind of talk about it.

We're going to talk about the thing it creates.

Well done, dude, Yeah, freaking dumbasses. Okay. So Rev Tithe Extractor. So do you think anybody got it in the pre show hints, I'll bet you everybody got it. I bet you nobody got it. But you're seven. We were really seven brain cells, seven out of ten brain cells. Okay, so ten possible brain cells, they have seven of them.

All them are firing all the way and missing because you only use what like twenty two percent of your brain.

Twenty two percent of seven, So they're using two brain cells.

Yeah. Well, because if you only have seven out of ten that work, and you only use two out of the ten that are possible, the odds are your brain's all the way functional.

Okay, brandology Rev Tithe Extractor three three Human Rogue black three. Whenever you attack target, creature gains oh death touch until under turned.

Yeah, I forgot that so many times.

That's pretty good.

So many times.

Whenever one or more creatures you control deal combat damage to a player, create a treasure to then look at the top card of that player's library and exile it. Face down, you may cast that card as long as it remains exiled, and uh, that's it. And that's kind of like gaunty. That's kind of like Regavan. That's kind of like uh, steal your stuff dot thing. Yep, right, mono black. So you can't really do multiple combats to do to do multiple steals. But if I attack, oh no,

Make three trash and you technically draw three cards. You can't play the lands.

Okay, just a little poopy, but and this is important.

I learned this in the kind of thought theory crafting it as I built it. First strike slash double strike is another instance of a creature dealing damage. So if you can hit everybody in the oh no, just double strike if you won't first strike as well, because first strike is its own step.

Yes, but it doesn't deal damage.

Again, it doesn't. But if you hit somebody with a first strike thing and a non first strike thing, oh, treasure card and then treasure card again, yes, and then double strike is treasure card treasure card, so.

It's treasure card from first strike and then your other guys get treasure card again. Yes, yeah, dudes.

And then if your dudes have double strike. In this example, you make six treasures a turn and draw six cards, but none of them are yours.

Yeah, okay, No, why are we talking about this in strategies that are unpopular?

And I'm gonna tell you, people hate it when you steal their stuff. And you know this as well as anybody because Ryan and you might not know this unless you listen to the pre show like's Mill.

I think they probably know that.

What Mill does is stop people from playing the cards that they've milled, not their decks or their cards.

The cards that they assume that they're gonna have the agency to play.

I would have drawn that next turn.

Well, you took one of my best cards. You took my wind condition. Oh man, that was on the top of my library. That would have been so good if I could have played that, And that's why I put it in my deck.

I absolutely did that yesterday too, and we'll get to that later on in the deck. But people hate that stuff. They hate it, and with I think that in my experience, I've played Mill, I've played Turgrid, I've played all those steal your stuff, and this one while people don't necessarily.

Like this, they don't see the card right. No, they don't like Gaunty. They don't see the card.

Correct, which is kind of a little fun minigame in itself. It was like, oh, did Brando get good stuff? And you always look at it as if you were reading it, even though it's a basic land yes, because they think you got something really good, even though it's a mountain. I did that so much yesterday. It was so good. But so this one is a little bit less I think hateful than some of the like like a male or a just straight up disc card or just steal your stuff.

It only gets one card at a time, but.

You get one one or two if you're really set up with yeah.

Yeah, And of course you would build your deck in that way. It isn't like getting archive trapped and getting thirteen at once, yes, or getting broove ACKed and getting twenty six at once, or half your library to traumatized.

Right, So nobody was nobody was mad at what I was doing until I got them with their own card. Yes, right, And I was like I'll do this, well, I'll counter that and your counter spell, like.

Why do you think that is is that because because you're doing the thing that they put that card in the deck so they could do exactly that. Is that the same feeling as removing their agency, like when you get hit for a thirteen mil or twenty mil.

I think it's more like it's a jealousy. The example. The example is I'm playing against Daden. Aiden has a deck he calls Blues Clues that's mono blue and it makes clues and then use things to make the clues into dudes and then kill you with them.

Yes. And one of the things he uses to do that cyber dying overdrive dye. It makes all of your your treasures are clues into four four creatures.

Were flying first card I stole from them.

Yeah, and that's one of two win cons in his deck.

Yes. And as you might have heard if you listened to and Ryan read Red rev she makes treasures every time. And so as you're just kind of doing the thing, you're just amassing a pile of treasures. And it came to a Pomos like, man, I need to kill that guy.

You need to kill f you Aiden?

Yep is what you cyber drive dude. All my treasures are four four is with flying.

Yeah, die take thirty six or whatever it was, and he was like twenty eight or whatever.

God damn it. I wanted to do that so bad, right, it's yeah.

Because he had like fourteen clues, and like fourteen clues is kind of shitty unless you have that exact card exactly. Not like he didn't also have all that glitters or or the other things that make all of your artifacts into four fours, like marching machines and all that.

I just got lucky and it was cool, and it was it was a neat experience. But I found that this one was a little bit less hateful. Although people were once they figured out what I was doing, they were making it more difficult. In my head, when I built the deck, it's like I'm gonna do one, right, I do one damage to you every turn, nobody cares. Correct to get your chip, it's take one. But when it's take one, and then I make a treasure and I get your top card, now people are paying attention,

Okay, in your experience now playing Rev a couple times and playing with or against Gaunty because I know you have Yep, Okay, I'm gonna hit you for one and MIL one card or draw your card for you with REV. Right, that's gonna happen every turn, yep. And if I if I as the Mono blue mill player, uh, mill you for one a turn like during my upkeep you mill one or two?

Yep.

People hate that. People hate that and will go after me. Oh did people hate that and go after you when you when you drew their top card? Did they hate that like they hate MIL.

It didn't.

They don't get to see what it is, so it's not like you're you're it's not like they're losing it because they don't know what it is.

In the experience I've had so far, it turned into it wasn't like I'm gonna all that attack Brando to stop him from what he's doing. It turned into more like I've got this piece of removal that I could use on something, and I'm gonna do something to stop at Brando's doing, which is less frustrating because it's not like I'm the threat, because if I had a bunch of good shit, I would have played it all because I had the manage to do it. But I just

Well you know what, Like I don't even know how much of the deck we really need to do, because I think this conversation is better than doing half of a deck tech how many things like how hard do

And when I built it, when I sat down and I looked at my stuff and I put the deck together, That's what I thought in my head. And then once I kind of had that all laid out on the table in front of me, I was like, well, is it good enough? Should I should I come up with every we talk about all the time. Game is gonna end ye, your your deck has to be able to win. And the way it was initially conceived it it didn't.

What did it do? It It just what was the point of it? Before you realized it couldn't win draw.

The maximum number of my opponent's cards and then use them to win. But then I realized, like, and after playing it a couple of times too, it became more solidified. Where if you're playing a deck like REV in a really tuned meta, what you're gonna get is key pieces of removal or interaction and combo pieces that we can use to win a game.

Yes, that happened to me with my with my Grima, where I steal stuff and I got three fight cards in a row. I had a one four and everybody else had two two's, and it was useless to take their stuff because it was all fight cards.

And that's the floor where what I was getting was I was playing with a bunch of guys that were playing like kind of kitchy, just random not random decks, but decks that are built to do the thing that the deck does. Yes, and when you're taking parts of that, you're gonna get a too too flyer with haste for

Yeah, And that's fine because you have no way to find it, so it's not gonna be that consistent.

And I literally put wasteland and strip mine in for homeword path.

Oh that's pretty good, that's fine, that's fine tech.

Yeah, that's literally why they're there.

Okay, So okay, I want to stealing stuff, Yes, we've highlighted. That's a strategy that people don't necessarily like.

They don't like to see their own deck doing the thing that their deck is meant to do. Yes, but it's not them doing it.

Yes. Mill is another one removing their theoretical agency, removing their theoretical strategy, even though it might not have been cards that they ever saw in the game. Ever, you're probably if you're not playing tutors, you wouldn't have seen card number sixty five in your deck unless you got milled. Okay, so hold on a second. Okay, okay, stealing or or you're stealing off the top of libraries. But I mean like control magicing, ye, and it's little brother cloning, right,

Usually clones at the bottom, then stealing because they got to play it and maybe they could use it, yep, and then straight up stealing, stealing.

After they've spent manat to cast it.

Although I find people get less agitated about that than if you just take it and they didn't play it because they lost that Like I'm gonna play my whatever, and I'm gonna get you. And then a couple of turns later was like, I'm gonna take that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think I think exiling face up and you can play at anytime, and then not playing it so they never have a chance to kill it and get it back out of their graveyard, right okay. And then the last one that I want to talk about, and all of these things are things that you can lean into a little bit as part of your deck's strategy or substrategy. The next one is stacks, and that one is probably the most has the most negative connotation

With a corrupted conscience and then kill you.

Yeah, yeah, you're right, Like I'm spending less manna to gain control of your card thereby like giving me that card and making you lose it. But that's not what my deck is about. So when you have strategies like this or cards that do this within a strategy, how hard do you lean in and when does it become

And I think that's the that's the key point that I was kind of curious about I'm looking for. If you want to comment down below, look the list, or listen to the show, please let me know or or or or from you what I ran into with this list specifically after a couple of games. What my I leaned as far in as I could with the cards that I had at my house.

Yes, and leaning in with rev specifically is unblockable guys to maximize, like to draw three extra cards pertec.

It's dudes that I play on turn one that you're not gonna be able to block until turn four. And by the time it's turn four, I'm probably gonna have something else that's even harder for you to block.

And those are like the the the guys with shadow like Dothy Slayer and Horror and Fairy Dream, Thief and Hope of Gearport's got Flying Nether Trader, Tormented Soul, Vampire, Cutthroat, guys that are impossible to.

Block, Ginger, brute, Vulks, can't.

Blocked unless somebody has haste. Yeah right, Yeah, those are.

The kind of cards that you're gonna play, right, And but here's the thing with those cards, they're all small. Yes, And I don't know if you've ever noticed this, but I've learned it over the last week or so as I built this deck. Did you know that things that can't be blocked also usually can't block?

Yeah, especially in black hate yeah so's or things that have haste.

Can't be blocked. There's a lot of nice in the wind, yes, dex so like and I leaned right into it and I got just slapped.

So if you're playing, like against a dinosaur deck, let's say you, of course are making treasures to make up for the lack of ramp in your mono black deck, right, but have that you're hitting people for one and one and one to draw three cards? Is that worth taking twelve on dinosaur players? Turn?

And if if it turned into You're gonna hit me for twelve and then I'm gonna hit you for sixteen and then one and one and one, then yeah. But again in this case, like because I leaned so far into the strategy and I want to do what REV does, and that's kind of it. I don't want to just do mono black stuff. I want to do REV stuff.

That is cast your opponents multi colored, not just black cards.

I want to play your best stuff and win with it. But I've discovered, through trial and error and playing it that maybe I don't get those things. Maybe I don't get the things I need. I don't get Galta, I get forest.

You could get Galta or forest, yes, and there are times where you did get forest from three players instead of Galta from three.

Players exactly, and those are and if you don't get the the galt. Maybe galt is a bad example because I's like the one of the better things you could get. But like, if I don't get like a really good thing, what I'm left with is a bunch of one ones

You know what I'm gonna I'm gonna focus on the negative space in a couple of those things. Is you could get forest, forest, forest instead of galta galta galta, Right, and so could the dinosaur player. Of course, so could they, but they probably want that forest to get them to the next thing that is also not galta like like any other big green dinosaur.

Right, And in this particular case, forest means nothing because I can't play them. But further to the point of how far are you lean into the game we were talking about, like your stacks and your turget there's a certain level where if you're going to play a stax deck, you gotta lean into it. Because otherwise you're just playing annoying crap. We have a guy at or local LGS.

We'll just our local local game store.

Yeah, and they'll just pop in with like a random stacks piece, Like what the hell are you doing? That turns your deck off too, and they're just yeah, well I have one. It's like, now you're gotta play through Winter Rob.

For your reason, yes, or you get the really immature, socially immature response, I thought it would be funny. I just want to annoy guys. Right, Well, you're gonna get focused off of the table because you put one card in your deck because you thought it would be funny, and guess what it isn't. And we touched on this in the pre show. When your opponents aren't having fun, you think that that's gonna be funny, but it actually isn't. It actually isn't gonna be fun for you because nobody

I will never complain about playing against the st but I will give people shit if they just play like a random, non parody breaking stacks piece. That just f's everybody Like if you drop a turn two null rod off of a soul ring, like what are you doing? Why are you doing that?

Because your should ring wouldn't even untap exactly.

It's like, well, it's gonna be funny. It's like, no, man, like, why are you doing that? It's just making the game takeaway longer. Well, everybody plays treasures and I want them to work. Come on, but lean into that stuff. If you're gonna play tur Grid and I did this on Sidewalk Slam and in my list and people can see those things, lean into it. Play pos play all those guys that come into play. Everybody sacks a thing, play that shit, because if you're gonna do it, do it.

I think.

But this is a thing like this one rev like how hold on don't?

I don't can't leave that thought yet. Kay, there was a time where where you would and we've said it on the show Shields Down tur Grid or Shields Down talks or it's not that talktural deck and you have to qualify it. I think I'm at the point where AI either assume that it is or it just is that deck. And I think there's not really any secrets in Commander anymore. There's no secret strategy, there's no hidden

Why would you do that?

Why don't you play any other black command Why don't you play freaking like Gallo Braid or morn Fin if you freaking deep cut there, if if you only have one discard card in your mono black deck.

Right, if you're not gonna do it, lean in or don't, right, don't bother doing it. And but there are those those gray area commanders, and this is one of them. I'm trying to think of another one, like off the top of my head.

Anamar is like that because because there are known lists non c EDH list, and then there's anamorphs el Drasi morphs, there's artifact, an Anna ARTIFACTO morphs.

No no, no, it's morpha facts.

No no, it's not morph it's Anna facts and art of art of man. I can't do it. But it's an artifact animal list, right, And it's halfway in between being just regular bullshit and and CDH.

And there's I think that there's gradients in all lot of those kind of decks, and this is one of them where it's there's how far do you go into it? Like how far do you lean in? Especially what you're doing is gonna be on Oh no, I I just got it. I just got it. I just got it.

Okay, Okay, some commanders. Let's say Turggert again is representative of the strategy Grand Arbiter Augustine the fourth representative of the tax strategy. Yeah, okay, So if I'm doing that, that's what I'm doing. Okay, Okay, if I'm if I'm playing that commander and not doing that, play literally anything else, and you and your opponents will have a better time

One profit prosper Prosper Yeah, right, like wolf lady, Well.

This isn't representative of anything, So I think there exists a gradient where you can say, yeah, there's some big Mono black Demon bullshit, but there's also some steel your stuff because that's how I have my my card advantage. Instead of draw to lose to I'm gonna draw your cards because probably you're playing good cards in your deck.

And that's why I wanted to do it, because then I don't have to place shit like sign in blood.

I guess my card and it gives you a unique gameplay experience. Remember when that was the backbone of Commander Cookoat for the last eight years.

And that's something that that thing that this deck does that every time.

Oh man, because you're playing you have access to four hundred cards with this deck. Yeah that's cool. You ever think of that?

Yeah?

Okay, So some strategies have a representative commander for that strategy. Some strategies are just ironically that strategy. Like if I was playing, if I was playing my balthor Mono Black Zombie deck just kidding, it's a Stax deck, right, that would be an ironic Stax deck.

Right. In that case, I would have to lean all the way in, right, I locked the whole game out forever until we just draw discard draw discard until I have enough shit in my graveyard that I can win, and then I bowthor them back. Yes, and I hate it. I hate every moment of that.

Yes, my parody is on turn ninety six. Yeah, when eighty five cards are in my graveyard, I reanimate them all and kill you to death with gray Merchant. Yes, and frickin' massacre worm the worst. Oh, but that would be like an ironic thing that I would have to lean into, because who can stay alive that long unless you're staxing everybody?

Yeah? Right, I feel like that would almost be right representative at that point, and.

There's there's no gray area there though. It's not like, oh, I'm playing this because it's an artifact and it interacts with my commander and it's and it's good for my meta, and I thought it would be funny. No, I'm either doing it or I'm not right, or if I want to do that kind of that kind of stuff, I'll play Turgrit and actually fucking do it. Right, man, is so goody good.

I shouldn't take her up. No, I should have taken it.

I do know I did.

I took her that I actually took her apart to build uh tour brand and Rankell and I took tour Brann and Wrankle apart to build.

Rev There you go. Well, hey, we've spent a lot of time. I don't even know what our time is their producer, Gary, what are we looking at?

Okay, we can we can talk some cards.

Let's talk some cards. Any surprises in this deck that you think people ought.

To know about? Yes, who don't want to?

Just look at Dahrek dot com because you could.

Let's go to the draw the tot and draw for just a second. I want to talk ron. I want to talk about some of these because there's some neat there's a couple of neat cards that you're not gonna play anywhere else. Probably.

Okay, Well, we got a dark Tutelage.

Yep, that's a dark confident enchantment.

You've got a vampre Tutor, which just searches for shit.

I want that to be a dark confidant. Probably, here's a here's the thing. I don't own one, so I played Vampire Tutor instead. If I own a Dark Confidant, I will cut it. I will cut the van because you can attack with it. Yes, yeah, and most of my cards cost two, so I don't care if I take some damage. I also play a Dark Star Augur, which is a flyer that's a dark confidant that can create a one to one Dark Confidant. Very cool, underrated card.

Yeah that's a new card from.

Bloomboro seventy or sixty nine. Nice American sense.

Right there you go. And if you want it to save five percent good Diffusion Gaming online dot Com use CCO holiday promo code. That's right, get yourself a discount.

Now, the last two cards in this section of the ones I want to talk about.

Oh yeah, wait, this one, this one does not cost two. Read got six.

Staff of Eden Vaults keys a legendary artist fact for six. When it comes into play, you put target legendary permanent from a graveyard into planet of your control.

That's already doing what you want to do.

That's already pretty cool. Then it also has tap draw card for each permanent you control but don't own. Ooh, so the more stuff you've played from your opponents, the more cards you draw by tapping this card.

That's really good. Yeah, that's good. I actually I think that that's a good fit for this deck. Not so good as dark confidence. Yes you sure, you take some lea.

This is a good I like this one. You read this one.

We've got a Prator's grasp a sorcery for black Black one. Search your opponent's fricking library. Search your opponent's library for a card an excelent face down. Then that player shuffles their library and you look and play that card for as long as it remains excellent.

You demonic tutor your opponent's library.

Hey do you play like a Gester's Cap in here? Oh?

I probably should.

Hey, I don't think that you can play those cards, though they can. Jester's Cap or Jester's Mask or both. They both do something thing similar where it's like search your opponent's.

Ship library and take the thing out forever.

Yeah, what else did you want to talk about?

Here's another one that I wanted to do, where there's a Valgavath, the Valgavath blood Bud, blood Sky.

Sire, Butthole sire.

Yeah, blood Sky Sire. This is a game outside the game card that I love in this deck. Okay, it's a two three death toucher for Black two. When it attacks, you can pay Black one to search target or target player searches their library for a card, then puts there, puts that card on top of it. Let's say, let's just say, for example, five Color of mona white angelra is playing Avason. Yes, how are we going to get through this fucking Avason? Well, we need a path?

Well are you I'm playing a white deck. Are you me to search my ship?

Can you attack me? Exactly? Are you? Are you playing one? Well you want to take one? Well, yeah I do. So you get in with Valagavath and you're one one and you search your library for a path. I use rev to get it and use my treasure token to path the Avison.

Yes, or you're a chromatic lantern.

That you also have in here, which I also play. It's it's a fantastic political card that is so overt like it's literally like, well, what do we need to kill this bro?

Well? Can you do you have it?

Yeah? I do, Well, let's find it and let's do that. Okay, let's do the thing.

That exact scenario.

It's like power Rangers all more. It's morph in times go together.

That exact scenario, except if you Alex is also playing, and I search for my path and you cast it, except it's on one of Alex's shit and you dirty double cross me and Alex and kill Alex and then you do something else that angel Aaron's avison. Oh man, can you imagine? Can you imagine the the ship that would go down?

But here's the thing with that one, because that'll then it'll never work again.

Yeah, you just dude, you just have to freaking politick and lie.

Everybody is the one that's the liar. I'm the one that's probably.

Gonna cheat, which is also just lying.

Well yeah, but it's just it's lying without getting caught.

Okay, let's read these Gestures cap four drop artifacts. You pay two tap sacket, search target player's library for three cards Exylum. Then that player shuffles. Yeah, yeah, that doesn't do what we want. Okay, then we've got Gesture's mask comes into play taped costs five. This originally from ice Age,

Why would you ever do that?

Because you can target yourself no opponent target opponent.

Why would you ever do that?

Maybe you know what's in their hand and they got a banger like angel Aaron's got an avison in his hand.

But if you put their hand back, they could just search what was in their hand and get it again. This card sucks. I say it was stupid. That was a bad set.

They put their hand on top of their library, then they searched their library. This card is stupid.

They could have been like, nah, that's what they can say. Nah. Wait, I don't think that they paid. I paid five and waited a turn and then paid another one. I think that's sacked a card that.

I think that they still search for a piece of removal and team up. I think in the same example that you gave with angel Aaron's avison, I think that I would still search for something that would kill it.

They just find their combo and win. I'll definitely get in five called the model angel Ane. By winning the game with all the cards, I.

Just better, even better. Okay, I'll get the path to exile and then I'll combo.

I'll pass it is I want to I want to stay to the deal.

Yes, then I'll no lying or cheating there. Hey, life lessons a commander cookoud See, we've come full circle. We pretended that we were gonna lie and cheat, and then we then we totally held fast to our original plan.

Takes us right back to a tractable where you said that he was going to end the turn with his land in his hand or whatever, and he did because he was shuf was he lost?

I go down as one of my hot might go down as one of my my dirtiest moves ever. What a sucker shown to barrass What a guy? What a loser at magic? He just doesn't win games when he plays against me? Right here? All right? Well, should we even read.

Justter stept it's probably it's probably way worse any.

Any other surprises in your revenue any others you You said you've got lands, and I do this in my in my mind skinner deck for the same reason. You've got Eye of the Hive of the Eye Tyrant, which turns into a three three black beholder creature with whenever this creature attacks X out the top card of Defending players Library or yeah, defending player's graveyard. Yep, sure it also has flying right, that's got menis, I think menace, yes, menis, so they can't it's harder to block.

So it's tough to block. And if you get the showcase art, which I have, it also has a picture of me on it, which is great.

Yeah kind of that guy does look it looks a lot like me when I'm like, I hope editor Joe's got the the D and D book cover version of that up on the screen. And then you've got an ink moth nexus because it's a flyer yep. And you've got a a what's the last one?

I have a Meschwiz Factory because I own one, not because they're so rude, but like I got one out of the I got one, like a secret one comes a two two and I thought it was cool. Yeah, it's a two two that like people forget about and they tap out. It's like I'm get you with my land dickhead.

Yeah, and then you draw a card. Yeah, yeah, I do. I've got a Fairy Conclave in my mind Skinner deck because I can hit for two and mill an extra two. But if I have a mind skinner to attack because it's unblockable, and then I've got a fairy Conclave that I can attack with, but equip with like a bone bone hoard sure gives plus x plus x for each card in all each creature in all graveyards, so it gives like plus thirty to my to my fairy Conclave attacks.

Some of them are cool. They're they're making them more efficient. There was two other cards I learned the secret power of playing stand. I mean, maybe I'm just the first one to I'm not the first one, but I think maybe I'm just realizing this. But Ubliet's a really good card in Commander.

Oh yeah, it's it's basically Oblivion Ring but in black. But but but it phases. Yeah, it phases.

Now it gets the Commander the way you want it to, because the most Oblivion Ring doesn't where Zubliet does. And I am playing that in the form of Beholder's paralyzing ray.

You don't just play Ubliet.

I don't.

I don't bad.

I don't actually have a regular Bubiet. I only have the singular one. That's why I bought that secret lay, so we gonna have abet.

One hundred percent of the ubliets that I own are from Arabian Nights. That's way cooler than I'm a try hard.

Yeah, that's way better. And the other one that I just a card that's way cooler. Maybe not the best, but way cooler that I think people give it credit for is a bistle Harvester.

Oh that sounds like a cool name.

Is It's great? It has cool art. It's right at the top over here. Oh yeah, it's black black one for a demon warlock three to two. You can tap it to exile a card from a graveyard. It's a graveyard removal, and you get a token that's a copy of that creature as long as the creature died that turn.

That's a nightmare in addition to its other types.

And then if you do it again like you have to, you only have one nightmare token at a time. But man, like it's the dividends. It's so good, Like it was remarkably good.

You know what I like about that is if something did get cast by your opponents and killed or milled or whatever, it's in their graveyard. You can remove it. That's good. We already know the graveyard removal is good. But I'm still playing this card. I'm still enacting that steal your stuff strategy, but now I'm doing it in a way that is traditionally black instead of drawing off the top of your deck. So I like that as a as a functional and flavorful strategic, flavorful include in the deck.

I like that lot. And I just want to talk about this one card that I just this is fucking cool. It's called outrageous robbery.

Outrageous robbery is an instant, an instant, mind you for black black X target opponent exiles the top X cards.

Of their library face down.

For as long as they're exiled, you can play them, and you can use man as if it was any to play them.

What you're saying is we have the opportunity to do black Mill.

Yes, yeah, did we just did?

We just everybody turned it off.

We did it. Everybody securly a mill deck as long as you have outrageous robbery.

So much.

But here's the thing. You're playing a land Yep, you're playing the BDB black package. So you can make a ton of manna and you're making a three treasure every turn. I played this. I played two out of two games last night. I played Outrageous Robbery in both of them, and I did it for not less than thirteen each time.

Because you can do it at the end of your turn and as long as they remain XIL, you can just you can just play lands every turn off that.

Yes, you may play those cards for as long as erabadex.

What yeah, look at and play those cards.

Yeah, yeah cool, Yeah, go get one monto Black Bill mill Baby, pick it up. And there's lots of other kind of neat stuff that I leaned basically anything that said I told you when we talked about rev a couple of weeks ago. I've been kind of conserving all the cards that are like that where it says draw cards off your opponent's library upon stuff.

Usually those are red cards.

Hey, well, usually red is from you, Black is from your opponent.

Oh Red also likes cast from Exile. Yeah, Red also likes that.

Black just likes to take your opponent's shit. And you can't just say draw card off your opponent's library.

That's yeah. Magic. Magic rules aren't structured that way.

Yeah, but This is saying essentially that where you draw card off your opponent's library, and so I kept all the cards I could find that do that. And that's why I wanted to build this because it's like, man, like, I don't have to do anything. All I have to do is build a deck that doesn't damage every turn, and I can just take advantage of your hard work. I don't have to do shit.

You know what My favorite part of this is, and I'm gonna take it back to kind of the the crux of the conversation is to do that quickly and effectively, like to drop rev on turn four and be able to hit three people by that time. You need to play little guys traditionally ones that aren't going to win you or go over the top at the top end of the power level in Commander, so you are limiting yourself.

That's a hot take.

I say, lean all the way in, and maybe you can split your deck. Maybe some strategies allow you to say, oh, I've maximized however much of this that I actually need because I'm playing a ton of card drawn scry, but card dron scry is like the bones of my deck's that's not the strategy, it's the enablement that I need to make my twelve card redundancy that I've leaned all the way into work, right, lean all the way in or fucking don't, I don't know, don't don't, don't, don't

Know, Pox, Yeah, only I only play Pox, and then play them all, then six tutors to find Pox, and then nine more cards that put Pox back in my.

Hand, play them all and you know what do do? Okay? Then that's leaning all the way in on pox. Yeah, and pox is like your win con. How different is that than making uh what did you call it? BBC black MANA b BBM big black MANA. And they just and then just saying exanguinate take fifty two, take enough, Like how is how is that any different? Right? So I say lean all the way in, because that's how you're gonna get that over the top end game power

Do you think Ryan's right. You should let us know down in the comments because I'm still building this and should I lean in harder? Should I cut things that cost seven like the elder brain?

Who never cut the elder brain?

Should I just the elder bring I don't know what the elder it's down here, it's in shakedown because you're shaking people down.

Or the elder brain looks exactly what you think it would look like. Yes, it does if you're grabbing it and squeezing it, so it's all viny. Yep. Yeah, it's a six six for seven minutes. When elder brain attacks a player, exile all cards in that player's hand, and then they draw that many cards. You may play land and cast spells from among the exiled cards as long as they remain exiled. If you cast a card this way, you may spend manna as the older Manna of any color to cast it.

Just draw their hand.

Yeah, that's fine. That does the exact same things as a frickin' rev.

But should I cut that for a go for the throat?

No? Because this card can win you games if you if you randomly, because you will because you have randomly whiff on stuff that you're stealing. This card can win you games. It's because it takes away what at the point that you're at seven mana. Probably they have cards that are at the point of the game left over in their hand that are going to win them the game. Now you have those cards, and you have a six to six. This is the kind of card that does

Elder Brand's a good card.

And that's you leaning all the way in on your strategy. That's them and you getting a unique experience. It's you playing a card called a frickin' elder brain.

Yeah. Look, and it looks like an actual brain I thought it looked like I'm not saying that's what I mean. I mean like, okay, I'm just.

We're talking about the same thing that never happens.

It never happens. Yeah, two kicks in the ass if you look at it. Bro.

Finally, I was my final thought of the day. Lean all the way in.

I'm leaning all the way in to the mic to say extra big thanks Diffusion Gaming Online dot Com and a our official business Daddies, as well as a great place to buy your magic gathering cards when you use special promo code c CEO holiday to save yourself five percent of all the blingy steal your opponent shit that you could possibly want.

All the brains you can look at there.

It is big thanks to Pile of Bones Brewing Coal. They provide us with beer and good times and great friendships. It turns out there's a lot of nice people that work there. Support them if you're in our part of the country or anywhere else. They're good people. Big thanks to producer Gary and the Damn Studio for putting up with us. We're here late on a Friday night and we all could be out partying no lier, no line, doing work, hanging out. We're having a great time and