I’m a man of peculiar tastes.

I like my whiskey, women and books aged to perfection, with bodies that measure somewhere between classy and gag-inducing. Similarly, while I tend to use older and more respectable cards, I usually do so in the most sickening fashion possible. I enjoy creating game-ending lockdowns, going off in the face of my opponents with a lopsided combo, or controlling the game to the point of actually having players ask if they’re even allowed to cast something without setting off a trigger. Aggro, in any form, is below me. This is how I play Magic, this is how I enjoy the game, and is probably how I’m going to continue to play until the game ends, or I do.

Yet, when we put my methods into perspective, it’s shocking that I’ve anyone to play with at all. My non-interactive means of play do not promote community or sportsmanship and certainly are a barrier to anyone with even a passing interest in playing Commander. Considering I’ve been harking on the value of such principles for the last couple of articles, you think for sure I’d hold them in higher regard. That I’d attempt to exhibit such proactive behaviors every chance I got. Truth be told, it’s rare I take my playgroup into consideration when I’m constructing a deck, save for how effective my strategy will be versus Player A over Player B, which is unfortunate, as on a long enough time line this can cause the social integrity of a playgroup to collapse upon itself as the group attempts to deal with That Guy/Gal. This is something I recently have gotten to experience for the third time in a row.

I usually get a chance to gather my fellow neck beards around the table once or twice a week for some great in-person games and for years we’ve had an incredibly healthy meta. Friend A would regularly rotate his builds on a bi-weekly basis. Friend B had a constantly changing list of five color good-stuff and Friend C often used whatever he had at hand. Our games may not have had the explosive outcomes that other playgroups experience, but they had enough variance to be unique every time we sat down. We may have had our preferences for archetypes, but we were constantly experiencing new and exciting ways to play. That is of course until Player C approached me one day and said that he wanted to build a Momir Vig UG combo deck that utilized [card]Time Walk[/card] effects, [card]Psychosis Crawler[/card]/[card]Curiosity[/card], and other wondrously one-sided effects. Naturally, I decided to play the part of the devil’s advocate and oblige. Together we built the only deck I’ve ever regretted letting loose into the wild. It was monstrous, horrid and almost blatantly unfair.

And it won. A lot. So much in fact, our games grew into the very arms races I’ve preached about avoiding. Sure, we tried a few different things to keep Player C in check-A chaos stack, alternative rules, a new ban list, all the tactics that had worked for the two times this happened previously. Each individual player attempted to find a way to deal with Momir’s constant turn taking and game killing ways, but in doing so either left themselves vulnerable to others or completely shut another player out, turning the game into a duel. All the while, Player C refined his list to deal with us and kept moving. Things eventually morphed to the point we were all playing similar decks and could accurately predict the winner nearly 5 turns before they nabbed it.

Sounds incredibly fun, doesn’t it? Were it not for the whiskey and beer we always nabbed before hand, I’m not sure we would have ever completed a single game. But eventually the taps ran dry, and as our booze-veils lifted from our eyes, we were left with the stark reality of what was going on: Our games were starting to suck. Hard. Something had to be done, and soon, or our forays into Commander would be tossed aside in favor of far less entertaining activities. In a small town where your options are limited to hardcore meth, drinking, cow tipping or MTG, it’s pretty important to keep your playgroup alive, even if it means resorting to the most unsavory of means. Since almost everyone in my group had at least one Forest in their list somewhere, I decided to swallow my pride and do something I swore I would never do outside of constructed tournament play.

I made an aggro list. To my surprise, it was just the shot in the arm that my playgroup and I needed.

[cardlist title=(Elf)Ball So Hard by Jack LaCroix]
[General]
Eladamri, Lord of Leaves
[/General]
[Dudes]
Avenger of Zendikar
Chameleon Colossus
Copperhorn Scout
Dryad Arbor
Elvish Archdruid
Elvish Champion
Elvish Harbinger
Elvish Lyrist
Elvish Scrapper
Eternal Witness
Ezuri, Renegade Leader
Fauna Shaman
Fierce Empath
Genesis
Heritage Druid
Immaculate Magistrate
Imperious Perfect
Joraga Warcaller
Lys Alana Huntmaster
Masked Admirers
Nullmage Shepherd
Oracle of Mul Daya
Priest of Titania
Quirion Ranger
Regal Force
Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary
Scryb ranger
Seedborn Muse
Skullmulcher
Sylvan Messenger
Viridian Shaman
Viridian Zealot
Wellwisher
Wirewood Hivemaster
Wirewood Symbiote
Wolf-Skull Shaman
[/Dudes]
[Non Creature Permanents]
Akroma’s Memorial
Citanul Flute
Crucible of Worlds
Sensei’s Divining Top
Skullclamp
Slate of Ancestry
Thousand-Year Elixir
Sylvan Library
Symbiotic Deployment
Wild Pair
Garruk Wildspeaker
[/Non Creature Permanents]
[Spells]
Collective Unconscious
Cultivate
Elvish Promenade
Explosive Vegetation
Genesis Wave
Green Sun’s Zenith
Kodama’s Reach
Primal Command
Skyshroud Claim
Sylvan Scrying
Triumph of the Hordes
Beast Within
Chord of Calling
Crop Rotation
Krosan Grip
Summoner’s Pact
Worldly Tutor
[/Spells]
[Real Estate]
Gaea’s Cradle
Misty Rainforest
Mosswort Bridge
Mutavault
Oran-Rief, the Vastwood
Slippery Karst
Strip Mine
Tranquil Thicket
Verdant Catacombs
Wasteland
Windswept Heath
Wirewood Lodge
Wooded Foothills
Yavimaya Hollow
21 Snow-Covered Forest
[/Real Estate]
[/cardlist]

As with other lists I’ve produced here on Troll Aesthetics before, this is an incredibly rough mock-up of what an Eladamri list should look like, and is quite open to interpretation and adjustment as necessary. The basic idea here is to get a bunch of elves out, turn cards sideways, and with the power of basic math reduce your opponent’s life total. Personally, I think that [card]Mana Reflection[/card] and [card]Primeval Titan[/card] are obviously at home (and lacking) in this list, but I’ve also read of several lists utilizing [card]Null Rod[/card] to great effect. While I advocate this entirely (it completely shuts down mana rocks, Top, and just about every relevant artifact you can think of), I left it out of my own list so that I wouldn’t encounter the unfortunate circumstances of turning a multiplayer round into a two player game. I also immensely enjoy [card]Skullclamp[/card].

I’ve also seen people toy around with [card]Vengevine[/card] and [card]Greater Good[/card], but with the quality of the draw engines this list packs, it feels unnecessary. If I produced more tokens then [card]Doubling Season[/card]/[card]Parallel Lives[/card] would be a given. [card]Concordant Crossroads[/card] and [card]Cloudstone Curio[/card] make infinite mana and draw engines possible, but have been eschewed for the same reason behind [card]Null Rod[/card]. [card]Nissa Revane[/card] however is still an unplayable, 2-slot taking lady of the evening who is as ineffective as she is unnecessary. I might stoop to playing aggro, but I won’t stoop to a night out on the town with miss “look at me, I’ve intensely narrow needs” the planeswalker. Don’t play her for pretty much any reason outside of laughs.

The deck was a rousing success, and a symmetrical approach to a multifaceted problem, with enough punch to level the playing field, but “fair” enough in nature that every player had a means with which to deal with it. While I still stand by the list and the spirit behind the solution, I feel as though I ultimately answered our playgroup problem in the wrong fashion. You don’t stop an arms race with a slightly better weapon, as it just perpetuates the power struggle. The best way to solve a problem like this is by removing what’s created the issue entirely from the equation. Without the troublesome scaffolding, the problem crumbles away to dust.

My playgroup, like so many others, is one composed of some of my best friends. We’ve known each other for over a decade, and as the years have passed on, have an increasingly shrinking amount of time available to socialize. Typically when we do so, MTG is our entertainment of choice, but with the game leaving a bad taste in our mouths, it was time to start turning away the cardboard crack in favor of other, easier ways to connect and network together. We’ve enjoyed exchanging our once/twice weekly Commander game in favor of B-movies and beer, and couldn’t be happier. The last time I played with these guys was well over a month ago, and when I recently suggested it again, I found them ready and eager to get at a game (probably because I threatened them with another viewing of Thankskilling, but we’ll save my thoughts on that delightful bit of cinema for another time). I found their play styles greatly relaxed and much more informal than they had been before, and for the first time in months our games weren’t over-glorified versions of rock, paper, scissors. The power balance of our group had been restored, at long last.

While I’m definitely a picky guy with drink and girls, I know a good time when I see one, and know how important it is to keep a party going  when you’ve got a great crowd to share it with. Doing so sometimes means not just stepping outside of your comfort zone, but away from the situation entirely for a moment of clarity and honesty. Magic is a game built upon social interaction that often attracts basement dwellers and unsavory scoundrels who are content to sit back and sling cards. This is of course the wrong thing to do, as every aspect of your local meta, play group, card pool and more are dictated by the strength of your community. Without it, everything else falls apart. Taking steps towards preserving the ongoing dialogue and interactions that make up your playgroup or local game store, even if it means giving up the games that pulled you together, should be a regular habit of every gamer out there. If you’re meeting up just to play MTG, you’re doing it wrong.

And besides, if you’re trolling them while you’re playing (say, with some horrific, meta-specific elf deck built just to punish them for using green), you’re just  ultimately going to end up trolling yourself. Speaking as a professional in the field, that’s a big no-no, and it’s quite embarrassing.

Until next time friends, enemies and neck beards, remember to play less, talk more, and as always, stay classy.

————————————————-

This article was inspired by Amanda, who had a few questions about scaling playgroups and power levels. Got something you want me to write about, or have a comment/critique/request? Feel free to say something in the comment section below, or hit me up at my email, Jack@mtgcast.com. You can also follow and/or harass me on twitter at the very imaginative and original handle, @jacklacroix. If you’d like to see more of my stuff, including random thoughts on MTG, literature and B-movies, hit up my (NSFW) blog, The Bitter, Better Man: http://jackfromnc.tumblr.com/ . It’s got pretty ladies, and stuff!