Commander is difficult. It has all the complexity of every other constructed format, except with an almost completely unrestricted card pool and only a loosely defined metagame. You sometimes have good ideas about what is going on. Sometimes, things are completely off the grid. It is important to isolate certain skills so that we can train them without having to worry about other difficult aspects of the game. The same way an athlete uses certain drills and exercises to improve specific aspects of their body, so too can we develop ourselves by isolating skills.
First, if you are unfamiliar with Momir Basic, it is a blast to play and I highly recommend it. You can read the full description of the format here: B00M! I am not going to discuss the actual strategy of Momir or my opinions on MtGO Avatar formats. I encourage you to mess around on Magic Online and play a few games. The rest of this discussion is going to require a working knowledge of the format.
Things you don't have to worry about in Momir:
- Mulligans - The first decision of the game. Often the most difficult. Many constructed games are won and lost by poor mulligan decisions. In Momir, you have the option to mulligan, but there is never a strategic reason to do so....therefore you never have to and you never have to think about it.
- Mana screw/flood - Your deck is entirely composed of basic lands. You choose which lands to play from your hand and you draw a new one every turn. This ensures you will always have enough mana to make a play and you will always be able to utilize all of your mana.
- Choice of play - The voice of the internet has not achieved consensus about whether or not it is correct to play or draw. There are legitimate benefits to both, but whether the choice is relevant in any given game depends entirely on what creatures you get out of Momir. The easy trick here is that you will already have picked out your strategy ahead of time, so you will always know which option is best your for your play style.
- 'Sandbagging' - You don't have disruption or removal in your deck, as I mentioned. As a consequence of this you don't have to think about using said removal now or saving it for later. You don't need to think about the Blightsteel Colossus in your opponent's hand...he doesn't have it.
- Hidden Information - You don't know what lands your opponent has in hand, but that isn't typically relevant. You opponent has only lands in hand and can't ever draw anything else. So basically everything you need to know is available. Sidenote: there is a generally accepted order to which lands should be played when. If available, you want to play Mountain > Swamp > Island > Forest > Plains. If you see lands played in a different order then you know either that your opponent doesn't have a certain type of land in hand or that they simply don't care (read: is not very skilled/educated about Momir).
- 'Land Mines' - You don't have to worry about losing out of nowhere. Your opponent isn't playing a combo deck. They aren't assembling some unbeatable engine. The possibility of them making a super-sick bomb is ever-present, but you can't control for that and there isn't much you can do about it except for trying to leave blockers for a Haste Creature. At some point, your opponent is going to start making a Creature on every turn, expect it.
- Resource Advantage - Caveat: Your life total matters. A lot. Other resources are somewhat fixed. In the late game, you will usually have the same number of lands (8) and the same number of cards in hand (0). Unless one of you breaks the symmetry somehow, e.g. with a mana acceleator or card-drawer, then things are going to stay more or less tied. You each have the same potential to get these extra resources and their appearance is totally random, so you don't really have to plan for it, but you do have to react appropriately when they show up.
- The Metagame - There is no such thing as a bad match-up. There are only a handful of strategies, so it is easy to familiarize yourself with the strengths and weaknesses of each. Most people just pick their favorite or the one they think is best and run it the same way each game. You have the same deck and the same capabilities as your opponent. There is no budget deck. There is no insanely overpriced card that ruins formats. It is purely read and react to what happens in the game and what your opponent's strategy is.
- Construction - Technically, the composition of your deck does matter to some degree, but most everyone can just find the tight decklist online, or right here: 15 Mountains, 12 Swamps, 11 Islands, 11 Plains, 11 Forests. Pretty simple. You don't even need to understand why this is good. Just play it and don't worry. Netdecking at it's finest.
- Zones - If it isn't in play, it really doesn't matter. The lands in the graveyard are pretty much gone. Only a handful of creatures will ever interact with them. The tokens you make get exiled and cease to exist when they leave the battlefield. So, they are gone forever. You can't 'cheat' stuff into play or fiddle through your deck that much.
- Side Boarding - There ain't no side and there ain't no board, there is just the tokens you make.
Things you do have to worry about:
- Math - You have to keep track of life totals, power/toughness, and where your opponent's curve is topping out. Momir will develop your combat math to pro levels. Knowing when you are ahead or behind is extremely important.
- Reading - Read every single token that comes down. No exceptions. You have to know what everything on the board says at all times, this is mission critical info and tiny mistakes will cost you the game. This mental skill is one of the few advantages left in this format. You need to be able to keep track of what your opponent has in terms of creatures and lands and what you have as well. Protection, Landwalk, and Islandhome are surprising relevant.
- Memory/Knowledge - Remembering what cards exist in the game of Magic is hard. There are thousands and thousands of creatures. But there are some key things you will want to know that can give you an edge. There are more Haste creatures at CMC 4 than at any other mana cost, for example. That could be handy knowledge if all you need is one extra attacker or one point of damage to win the game this turn. You should get an idea for the relative concentrations of cards with certain abilities at each CMC. You might be thinking that this knowledge isn't going to be useful in Commander, but there is a corollary: Start building up your knowledge base of cards relevant to Commander. Know what kinds of things a deck plays on a given turn. Both with respect to particular decks and the format in general. Even easy things are a good start. If your opponent has a ramp card they will be playing it as early as they can. Sixth and seventh turns are usually going to be spent casting threats. What counterspells can your opponent have given his open mana? These are smart questions to be asking that will help you win games through sheer awareness.
- Sequencing - When to attack first. When to make a token first. What if you get a Haste guy? What if you get a Bloodthirst guy? This happens. It is important to think carefully about how you use your turns. Know when and why to use each option available to you and do so correctly.
- Targeting - You will still have to make some choices about what to use and what to use it on. If you make a Nekrataal you still have to figure out which creature to target with the ability to maximize your chances of winning the game. It is important to think long-term and perceive the situation accurately. Don't make short-sighted decisions that will cost you later.
- Tempo/Racing - Although most games are a race, they tend to last pretty long. Every turn you can pressure your opponent increases your chances of winning. Games essentially always end with damage, every point is important. Read the board state correctly and don't let points of damage slip by. Take every advantage you can get. If you just sit around waiting for a bomb card to come out there is a 50/50 chance it will be on your opponents side of the table. Minimize the variance through superior play skill.
- Board Stalls - Because each player generally makes a Creature on every turn...and because the majority of Creatures at a given CMC are nearly equivalent in power level, the board tends to remain at parity until the symmetry is broken by one of two things: 1. Making a Creature whose power level is dramatically off-curve i.e. big hits or misses. E.g. Oracle of Mul Daya or Cognivore. 2. Someone decides to skip a drop in order to make a creature on a later turn. Typically, people don't make one drops, but if you make one and your opponent doesn't. You will have an extra creature for several turns...for whatever that turns out to be worth. The skill to develop here is to know when it is safe to attack to try and end the board stall and what price you are willing to pay to do so. Making sure you come out ahead on creature trades and don't take excessive amounts of damage to keep your guys on the table are key concerns.
I hope you enjoyed this article. This is a new thing that I am going to be trying over the next few weeks. Talking about the merits of other formats as learning tools instead of outlets for play or socializing. It is important to try and improve your game as much as you can. You will win more and have more fun as you gain a deeper understanding of the different mental levels of the game. You may not like playing other formats. I for one, really like playing Commander. I don't like Standard, but there is always something to be learned by broadening your horizons.
-GG
No comments:
Post a Comment