Commander Deck

 Well, my wife has been encouraging me to get out more so I reached out to a member of a commander playgroup ( commander is a way of playing Magic is that basically unique in that it is a multiplayer format rather than a one on one format) that I hadn't participated in for quite awhile. They are still playing and it just so happened that I reached out on Saturday and they play on Sundays. So I decided I wanted to brew up a commander deck. I had mentioned to my wife having some good cards for a mono-black deck. I have like 10 precons (decks built by the company that makes Magic and sold as one whole) but those decks just don't measure up to the creative deckbuilding of the guys in this playgroup.

So basically I had some good cards like Sheoldred the Apocalypse that I had bought for standard deck that I wanted to make but never finished. There were a few in that class like Phyrexian Fleshgorger and some others. So then I also had this Witherbloom Strixhaven commander deck that is black and green. Basically that deck was pretty weak even after the guy who sold it to me helped me to upgrade it. So basically even given that when I play with the twins we just play precons, this witherbloom deck is really too weak to compete so we never use it. So I decided to tear it down and strip the black cards out of it. It does have some good cards in it. So that is another chunk of the cards in my commander deck. I didn't use every card from either the standard or the witherbloom commander deck. Then the rest of the cards are a selection from the other cards I own. Starting with mythic rares like Liliana of the Veil, and then into some good rares, etc.

So, as far as theme goes it is trying to play with life gain and loss. So there are some mechanics that gain me life and some mechanics that drain life from opponents when I gain life. Sheoldred is my commander so that is some life gain right there... The other commander I was considering was Vito but chatgpt thought vito might be more salt inducing (causing opponents to get upset at the play style). Which is funny because Sheoldred is pretty salt inducing from what I know.

Another thing to consider is that I own a copy of Exquisite Blood. This is powerful card that creates an infinite game winning loop when paired with Vito or Sanguine Bond (both of which are in my deck) and maybe a few others. So I bought this card specifically because of this combo but the problem is that this playgroup kind of frowns on infinite combos. So at first I left it in with the rationalization that I don't have cards that allow me to search for a card I want in my deck so it probably wouldn't be in my hand or on the board at the same time as the other combo pieces. But after more thought I just didnt' want to be in a situation where my only legitimate play was to play the infinite combo. So what I did is that I took Exquisite Blood with me but not in the deck. And then I asked Eric about how people would feel about that card and he seemed to say basically what I thought. Combos good, infinite combos bad...

So that is just part of playing with real people. To some extent you have to be a good sport and recognize that a commander group like this is primarily a social and casual kind of deal. And basically I am just kind of trying to reconnect with some real people and get out of the house etc. So my priority here isn't to win but to play nice with the etiquette of the play group. So anyways, both Eric and Jeff were fine with Sheoldred as my commander.

So, anyways here is the deck.

 

 

 

 

So anyways, I went down there and it just happened that Eric was the only other person to show up (at first). So I played two games with him just the two of us. I have mentioned Eric in this blog before. He is a pretty cool guy with a cool dog and a somewhat mysterious job that is in the games industry and involves a lot of travel. He is the resident brewmaster. By that I mean he spends a lot of his free time building new decks for a variety of ideas. Most of the time he is not interested primarily in creating powerful decks although his decks are usually pretty good. He is like to create decks with themes.

The first game I didn't draw enough lands (these are the cards that give you the energy to cast spells). So although I was able to get some cheap creatures out and do some serious damage to his life total I was kind of just stuck with my more expensive spells just sitting in my hand and I so I wasn't really able to interact with what he was doing on his side of the board. So he had some mana trouble at first but eventually he got his engine going and there wasn't a lot to do so pretty soon he killed me.

The third games was a more back and forth affair but I was able to pull off a win which I felt pretty happy about. This one I got out Sanguine bond in conjunction with sheoldred so I got some of my life gain / drain combo working although it was a somewhat slow process kind of pinging away at him. But in the end it was enough for the win.

So then Jeff showed up part way through. I have only played with a Jeff a couple of times quite a while ago. He is a nice guy also. So anyways, then we played a three person game. In this game I got Liliana out early and the whole ability to make everybody discard a card really worked to kind of sabotage eric. I also got out my ob nixilis planeswalker and in conjuction with sheoldreds ability it meant that I could add loyalty counters to him while drawing cards with the "downside" being that I gain one life. (basically his ability is that I should lose one life to draw a card, but sheoldred says you gain two life when you draw a card.) So that worked to some extent and Eric died before too long. so it was just me and jeff. But what it came down to was that I needed a boardwipe (a card that would kill all the creatures on the board) because jeff had more creatures than me, but most of my removal cards were more targeted to just one creature. Both board wipes and targeted removal are good. They are just better in different situations. So anyways, in the end jeff overpowered me.

So overall I am pretty happy with how my deck performed. This is really the first time I have brewed and actually built a commander deck, not to mention actually getting to play it. (commander decks are more intimidating to brew because they contain 100 cards, most of which have to be unique, whereas other constructed formats usually feature 60 card decks where you allowed to have as many as four copies of each card in the deck). I also brewed it this weekend with just cards that I already owned which also feels good.

I asked Eric and Jeff for feedback. They both mentioned feeling I need more card draw. They disagreed in that Jeff felt I should have more protection for my commander like an equipment that give hexproof or something like that. Eric disagreed and felt that might push the deck to the point where it is too unfun to play against.

So overall pretty satisfactory experience! 

Some more thoughts, hopefully a bit more practical

One big one I have been thinking about is negative feedback. Losing is negative feedback. A big part of improvement seems to be finding a way to handle that negative feedback both emotionally and intellectually. This is something I struggle with. To be honest, I don't think I am the worst at handling this aspect of games but I am also not the best. There are a lot of ways of handling that negative feedback. For instance a big one for chess players can be changing your openings. Basically this is a way of shifting the negative feedback from yourself to something else. The world of gaming is full of dodges like this. But if you want to improve you have to handle negative feedback in a mature and responsible way. I am generally pretty mature about losing in some ways. I can say "Good game" after a loss even if I feel upset about losing. I feel like that is a good thing. But in a way it still misses the point. The point is that you have to accept that you are getting negative feedback and you have to take it as showing a weakness that you can improve on. It is easy to blame the game and say it is unfair or something like that. But you also have to avoid beating yourself up. I guess probably my worst fault is just that a lot of times I get disheartened by losses. I start to lose faith in progress and start to feel I would rather be doing something else. So that is something I want to work on. I just feel like somehow I have to work at accepting losses as part of the game. There is part of me that dreams that I can just win the vast majority of the time. So, I want to work on improving in terms of accepting losses as indicating points where I can improve. This is not easy. I feel it is important to kind of give myself credit that to some extent I do take losses as having to do with my skill. But I feel like I lack some kind of fortitude in terms of like processing that in a way that is productive. I feel like to be fair to myself, this is really not easy and a lot of people never get there. So just recognizing that this is what needs to happen in my own gaming is a good step. So that is a big one. I also think that I have to recognize that this is a process and be patient with myself. A lot of times in the past I would have the mistaken belief that recognizing a problem was all that it took to correct it. As soon as I recognized the problem I expected that I should immediately correct course. But this is not at all how it works. Working on your game is a tough process. Recognizing that there is a problem is just the first step. You have to be patient and work at it bit by bit.

Another one that I have kind of recognized is that there are two parts of me. One part is competitive and one part just wants to have fun. The competitive part wants to improve and get better. The part that just wants to have fun wants to avoid discomfort. The problem is that in the past I would go all one way or the other. I would get really intense about improvement and feel like that is what I really want and that is really who I am. Then I would burn out. So then I would swing in the opposite kind of direction and would start to think I just want to have fun and do whatever I feel like in the moment. So I would just follow my nose for awhile. Eventually though I would feel like I was in a dead end and I didn't really have any direction. So the breakthrough I had the other night is just to recognize that I really am both of these things. I really am competitive in some ways. I do care about the results. I want to have some direction and purpose in my gaming. But at the same time, there is part of me that is just curious and kind of wants to investigate random stuff without any practical value. Just create cool magic decks or look at random openings in chess. So really both of these are part of the picture. It is not satisfying to say "games should just be for fun" and like think I should not care about winning or losing. But at the same time, a big part of the reason I am interested in games is just for curiosity and finding cool stuff. So the way forward has to be a mix where I have room for both. I am not really sure exactly how to manage that but I feel a lot better for having escaped that false dilemma.

Being practical is another one I was thinking about today. I feel sometimes I kind of get caught up in pipe dreams of wanting to be a pro at whatever game I happened to be hipped on. I also like to learn about the history of the games I play. So those things are not all bad. I just think I need to have a clearer idea of when I am learning something just for curiosity's sake and when I am doing something practical. In some ways I can be practical but I just feel like I kind of spend too much time kind of chasing will o the wisps. Basically, a prime example is playing over commented historical games of chess. This is something I like to do and have spent quite a bit of time doing. But basically it is not really a practical thing to do. Of course it is not a total waste of time but basically the concerns of top flight grandmasters are very different from my concerns when I play. I am not saying I should never play over commented master games. But I think I need to have a clearer idea that it is mostly just for fun and is not really a practical way of getting stronger. A more practical activity would be reviewing my own games and looking for lessons. Of course tactics training is very practical and I have done a lot of that also. So I am not all daydreams and no action. I think it is just sort of a question of being honest about my motive. It is kind of easy to fool myself and say that I am working on my chess when I am kind of just wanting something relatively easy to do. It is the same thing with magic. It is fun to watch gameplay videos where someone explains how their deck works and then shows themselves playing it online while explaining to viewers about their thought process. But a much more practical activity is brewing my own deck and testing it out. Both have their place. I am not saying it is bad to watch those videos. But I think I have to have a clearer idea of what is kind of a cop out sometimes instead of doing real work.

 

 

Two Chess Games

Well, a couple of tough losses here...

https://lichess.org/74YHxokTVLra

 https://lichess.org/iqOWRT71yw74

In the first game I didn't put up much resistance so it was fairly uneventful win for the opponent. This is because I really didn't believe his plan had merit so I continued moving my pieces to the king-side. Basically I thought there wasn't enough space for him to do anything, he was just working with two files. Secondly, I thought that because the pawns were balanced that there was nothing he could do but trade a few pawn leaving it symmetrical. But he proved me wrong. He showed that he could engineer a protected passed pawn and that the passed pawn I gained wasn't worth much and was easily captured.

The second one I played tonight. This was more of a heartbreaker. Basically I spotted a tactic that won a piece for a pawn in the opening. I then played to trade pieces since I was ahead in material. But the opponent to his credit didn't fold, dug deep and found a tactic of his own to win back his piece. The rest of the game was hard fought. I was able to mount some pressure against his king and queen with some pins that could turned into something if mishandled but the opponent kept his head and found a way through. Perhaps I didn't do the best. I got a bit worried about time pressure and my playing sped up. In the end his pawns won the game. 

Excited about Magic again

 Well, I have also gotten excited about Magic again. A big part of that has been deciding to try a new format. Basically there are many different ways to play Magic. Mostly the rules of the game are the same, the main differences are about how you go about building your deck and what limitations you have to work within. This new format is called Pioneer. It has actually been around awhile but now it is possible to play on Arena where I have made the biggest investment in terms of cards and have a good number of wildcards available. (wildcards allow you to craft any card you want). Technically, Pioneer on Arena is still missing a good chunk of the cards that are available in the paper version but it is most of the way there.

So, the other night I was just browsing through the pioneer legal cards and came up with an idea for a deck where you would use spells to pump creatures that would also get a bonus from you casting spells.

Here it is.

 

So, I played 8 matches the other night and went 4-4 on the ranked ladder which is ok I think. I am not super experienced with deck building but it is the part of Magic that I am most attracted to. I did get a little bit of feedback from chatgpt but I didn't take all of its advice. For example it was kind of negative about the card "Jump Scare" but I feel it is good and it helped me win at least one match. 

Slow Chess Game

 Well, part of getting excited about chess again has been joining a training program at Chess Dojo. This is a site run by some titled players (one of whom has a PhD in philosophy). One aspect of this playing slow games. This can be done in a variety of ways but they also have online tournaments where you play with other members. I played my first game this last Sunday.

 https://lichess.org/mXrSXPu39oM4

 The game was a pretty uneventful draw. I thought I had an advantage in the endgame because he has isolated c and a pawns and my king is more active, but I wasn't able to make anything of it. It seems like he might even be winning in the final position since he has gained the opposition between the kings and I will be forced to abandon one side or the other if he wants to go for it. He told me afterwards the end position was a dead draw. Not sure if that is his opinion, analysis, or if he checked with a computer. Anyways, it was my first slow chess game in over a year so a draw is not a bad result. 

Update 12

 Well, May was a pretty lean month as far as the blog goes. I guess I was kind of bouncing around a bit and everything felt a bit tentative or uncertain as to what direction I am going in. Got bitten by both the chess bug and the baseball bug and lately the Magic bug again. Some various thoughts have come up.

I) A control mage identity: In Magic the control archetype is one that focuses on a more defensive, and reactive strategy. Instead of aggression you focus on countering your opponents threats. But magic is a deep and sophisticated game so there are a lot of variations and gradations of this strategy. But this archetype is clearly present in chess as well. Petrosian is the world champion who most clearly represents this control mage aspect. But others like Capablanca and Karpov also focused on controlling the opponents counterplay and trying to win with less risk. Part of me feels very drawn to this kind of identity and wanting to explore it in various games. But part of me also feels a bit repulsed by it. There is part of me that also feels drawn to the aggro strategies or the aggressive attacking and sees the control strategy as kind of bloodless and joyless. So that is an interesting duality. Overall I would say I am definitely more interested in the control side of things but I guess in a way I don't need to limit or pigeonhole myself. I guess my idea is to see this idea of a control mage identity as something I can grow into and is more of a starting point rather than necessarily an endpoint.

II) Negative feedback: Basically I have just been thinking that I dislike negative feedback. I dislike losing. I am not the kind of player that tends to rage when I lose. I am more the kind of player that just loses heart when I lose. But one thing I have often heard in the chess world is that it is necessary to review your losses. I think I need to work on coping better with negative feedback and doing more to learn from it rather than getting disheartened.

III) Variety as opposed to focus: Another one that has come up repeatedly in my gaming journey is just this idea of like variety vs focus. I feel like the default view in culture in general as well as in gaming is that focus is better than variety. That you need to get rid of things and just focus on what really matters and get good at that. But I have struggled with this and it seems like a lot of times when I try to do that I end up getting burned out and losing interest. I have tried to take a more polyvalent approach to gaming before but I always seem to collapse into the default idea that I need to focus on one thing and master it. So again, lately I am moving more in this kind of polyvalent direction and wanting to have various games that echo each other and build meta-game ideas (like my control mage identity idea).

That's about it for now. Hopefully I can come up with some good ideas for the blog in June!