Anyone else play without Commander Damage?
Commander (EDH) forum
Posted on May 11, 2023, 4:03 p.m. by Tsukimi
I'll start this off by saying that I have a very unique playgroup. It's a few close friends, and everyone in our circle who plays was taught MTG by me. They've come a long way, but most do not play much magic outside of our EDH games and some casual Arena at most.
When I first started establishing this pod, we had quite a few strong Voltron type decks. (Rafiq was a mistake) No one liked the idea of commander damage, as an extra factor to keep track of, as a win condition, etc. We just kind of . . . all agreed that we didn't enjoy the rule so we wouldn't include it in our games.
A few years later and we still play together regularly. None of us miss the commander damage rule or have considered reintroducing it to our games. I am just curious, anyone else play without the commander damage rule? Or have any other weird or fun rules your pod employs that you enjoy?
I.E. We also made a clause that if anything would infinite, it instead only triggers once per turn. It's honestly made the game a lot more fun!
I've also never played with commander damage. It just seems.... Unnecessary to me.
May 11, 2023 9:15 p.m.
My playgroup hasn’t played using CMDR damage since I was welcomed to the group in 2017. Prior to that I am unsure.
May 11, 2023 9:58 p.m.
I think that Commander damage is a key component of the game. It forces lifegain decks to have an actual win condition. It's also really necessary for the whole voltron archetype to exist.
And you can also get some great moments from Commander damage. A couple weeks ago I just won via commander damage with Mayael the Anima. I consider that an achievement unlocked.
May 11, 2023 10:07 p.m.
nammertime says... #6
I have decks that rely solely on commander damage to win. It's a good counterbalance against life-gain and is useful as an extra thing to monitor. It's part of the rules and allows for deck designs focused on monster hits from the commander... which I believe is a boon to the format.
We all keep track of a zillion things already, with some decks having so many counters and tokens that you need an Excel spreadsheet, so what's another life total?
May 12, 2023 8:34 p.m.
I tend to run fairly Commander centric decks, such that Commander damage will likely come up, but it's hardly rare for it not to matter due to other damage sources, even in a deck where I expect to win with it most of the time.
I don't think it breaks the game to take it away, but I also think you can usually tell when it might be an issue and track it. I don't need to worry about it in some of my more dedicated combo decks, some of those decks almost never attack, it's just not worth the negligible risk, but other decks it 'sometimes' matters and it's a hassle that you always need to track it 'just in case'.
As people have noted, some decks can gain a ton of life and this can keep games more manageable, so it's probably a good thing to have, but it's vaguely annoying for some decks/metas for sure. Between helping Voltron (generally a bad strategy) and preventing obnoxious strategies (life gain without a win con) I think Commander Damage justifies itself, but I can totally see people who don't like Voltron collectively deciding not to use it. I feel like if you removed the threat of losing super quickly due to not having blockers changes the nature of the game a fair bit as well, so if you take away Commander Damage you end up with more all in combo decks, assuming people are trying to optimize for the rules.
May 13, 2023 1:35 p.m.
SteelSentry says... #8
I've seen the argument a lot that Commander damage wins outside of Voltron decks are pretty rare, but I enjoy that if you can rack it up near a kill it forces slower decks to commit to the table or make unfavorable blocks. My Erinis, Gloom Stalker/Agent of the Shadow Thieves deck has never gotten a commander damage kill, but I often end up eating the likes of Blood Artist, Rashmi, Eternities Crafter, etc. more or less for free.
I've certainly been on the recieving end of that dilemma, but it's an interaction that feels integral to the format at this point.
May 14, 2023 6:14 a.m.
Gidgetimer says... #9
Different strokes for different folks, but to me both house rules that you mention in the OP make the game very much worse. I don't like Battlecruiser Magic and frankly am not just chilling. I think that every action taken from the very first turn should be in service of bringing the game to a close.
Commander damage is a safety valve against lifegain and pillow fort completely stalling the game out. As is combo. For players who don't enjoy extremely long games both are necessary parts of the game.
May 14, 2023 9:07 p.m.
Gidgetimer and everyone thank you for your feedback. I have been reflecting on the ways this might warp our meta and games a bit, and I'm going to reintroduce commander damage when we play this weekend and see how people feel, I think we should reincorporate it.
Infinite combos however.... Never sat right with really anyone in our playgroup. We have a lifegain deck and a pillowfort deck, and we've never had issues past one or two times of games running too long, and we play a good deal. I think commander damage will help offset those decks, but infinite combos are a no go as of now. The once a turn trigger has been plenty strong, and prevents anyone from winning in a way that we don't find fun or interactive, including the winner lol.
I appreciate everyone's insight! Being the like defacto manager of your casual pod can be a bit weird at times, so I always value feedback like this!
May 16, 2023 11:08 a.m.
TypicalTimmy says... #11
I'll admit, I've played a few games where commander damage is a bit of a feel-bad. Like, oh you ramped it out T2 and T3 you hit me for 8. T4 you hit me for 8. I drew a land, so good game. Let's shuffle up annnnnd you got him out T3 this time. Welp, good game let's play something else. Oh that's all you've got? Yeah I think I'm just going to go home.
Not even joking.
Losing is perfectly fine. I don't mind losing. But spending an entire night realizing you are so underpowered that you literally can't do anything? Sorry but being told "no" for the next 3 hours isn't exactly my idea of "fun".
On the same token, (HA!), I've had games where I TKO someone with commander damage. Yeah, it can be fun but also to watch your opponent emotionally sink down because they lost so easily... just feels bad.
That's why I generally do not like infect. The infect mechanic is fine. I disagree with 10 but it is what it is. But to watch someone become so upset over it, just sucks the fun out of the game for me.
We are here to have fun, not get our feelings hurt. So if you can modify the game to make it more enjoyable for the table as a whole, you have every right to do so.
EDH is a social game. Consider the rules more akin to "guidelines" and just play how it feels right.
May 18, 2023 2:21 a.m.
The real issue is infect and commander damage are weak strategies already removing them or making it even harder push the game even further to a mid-range combo game which commander has already shifted too in large part.
Removing that risk of early death from what little aggro works just turns it into the only two real viable strategies are turbo combo or mid range value combo most already feel that is the case. Now you just reinforce that behavior. Sorry feels bad will always happen in MTG.
FormOverFunction says... #2
I generally don’t utilize commander damage, but I feel like it’s a good approach to handling extremely long games; maybe something like significant lifegain scenarios. I do think that it’s less relevant, as we get more Voltron/swarm decks that are doing damage-per-turn in increments of “starting life for the table”... the 21 damage can seem downright quaint ;p
May 11, 2023 6:30 p.m.