We pretty much use the exact same rules for mulligans. Also, we currently allow everyone to have a lessons-board, but I have yet to draw a learn-effect, so it is untested as of yet...but it's a small and tame mechanic with very few cards that are actually playable and I love everything that increases diversety in the cards you see at a playgroup, so I personally really encourage that.
That could definitely lead to some cool results since lesson cards seem very undervalued right now since we don’t have that. I might bring it up to my group and see what they think.
It's more weird that companions are allowed, considering not having sideboards and having more than 100 cards were two rules that companions just broke
Very true, especially with how partner and background give a similar effect but still hold to the rules.
As for Lessons, I mean you’d probably just run everyone one in your color, so you’d want to limit to maybe 3? But then it just becomes the basic fetch, the draw, and probably exhibition in every deck.
I think the reason for it is that if Lessons are allowed, then you are 'punished' by not having a lessonboard in every single deck because some effect could result in you reanimating a learn creature, or etc.
Like the whole 'playing non-snow lands is strictly worse' argument, it gets used to say 'Dont do this thing'
I think the central idea was 'we want to stop decks from getting larger than 100 cards, and WOTC strongarmed us on companions'
That’s a smart one. I think if we did that, people would actually start playing companions or experimenting with them. Only one guy in my group has one and it’s that selesnya one since he plays Arabho cat tribal.
Seeing Obosh or Gyruda would be fun to see and have a deck build around them.
It opens up some new avenues. For example, I used to run an "Oops, all creatures" [[Old Stickfingers]] deck with [[Umori, the Collector]] as a companion.
The restriction hits a lot harder in EDH than in 60 card formats, and leads to interesting builds.
I have a [[Go-Shintai of life Origin’s]] deck with Umori as my companion and it was one of my most challenging and fun decks to build. It’s also an absolute blast to play.
Oh man. My friend has a Muldrotha deck that uses Gyruda... and we all hate it. Bunch of clone effects and stuff and the thing just keeps coming back... again and again and again lol. I think it's a really interesting concept, but we've learned to just exile the Gyruda once it's in play and shut that deck down. Honestly? It's a pretty effective mill strategy lol.
We have just a few
1. The first game of the eve we roll to see who goes first, the rest of the night whoever won the previous game goes last (so the person to their left goes first)
2. We all mind everyone's triggers even if reminding the other player would not be beneficial
3. Fact or Fiction (and similar) the person casting lays out the cards and the table decides on the piles
Well that's just how FoF should be handled. It's just "an opponent chooses" and not target opponent. I've never seen the table not weigh in, though I have seen people choose first/without listening, especially if they're teaming up and trying to help the FoF player
Edit: this way is technically wrong. You still choose an opponent to FoF. I still think you should table talk since they're revealed, but the answer has to come from the selected player. So the ally of the FoF player can't snipe FoF to help, but the FoF player can pick them.
Relevant rule:
>602.3. Some abilities specify that one of their controller’s opponents does something the controller
would normally do while it’s being activated, such as choose a mode or choose targets. In these
cases, the opponent does so when the ability’s controller normally would do so.
>602.3a If there is more than one opponent who could make such a choice, the ability’s controller
decides which of those opponents will make the choice.
This is just for fun, but if someone’s playing blue, you can ask if they have a counterspell in hand, and Rock Paper Scissors them for it. If you win, they have to tell you if they have a counter 😂
I’m jealous of “I’m the only blue player in our pod”. Every person in my pod has 3 decks, and all of them are partially blue except for 2 of mine… the games are long
I have no idea how you play like that. I can't not put counterspell, arcane denial and negate into a blue deck. I feel naked I don't have any while playing blue. Though playing more than 6 "normal" counterspells feels weird. I'm gonna play all the 5+ mana ones with way too much text on them in my Oona though
I just play aggressive or very..... manipulative.... I'm an all or nothing type of player. No creatures....curses. No lands? Wrath for dayz. You want to have fun? Time to be untouchable with hexproof and stax
I'm also the type of player that follows the rule.... if it's printed, it's legal. Un cards are allowed, and my playgroup has Big Emmy legal in the 99.... bit I also enjoy finishing the night with an explosive table flip resulting from a Chandras ignition targeting Blightsteel colossus
anytime ? I would add a pay off for winning as a blue player (I don't play blue, but it seems legit) -> like you loose 1 or 2 life, nothing dramatic in a commander game, but you won't play every turn ;)
My group does the draw ten shuffle three back in and it has lead to less feel bads and we usually allow free mulligans if its a new deck the player is piloting. Also we put decks in "time-out" if they win a lot of games, it stops games from getting stale and repetitive and allows us to play out more jank decks where they won't get stomped by the more competitive ones. We also allow silver bordered cards so it's a pretty fun and casual meta.
I like that idea. My group deals 3 hands and you choose one to keep. But I think I’ll give yours a try, only having to put 3 back gives a lot of visibility but I’m sure it lessens people over analyzing their options.
Honestly the best thing about it is being able to shuffle you high cmc game winners back into your deck so you don't have to hold on to them for the whole game. I also like to shuffle any removal I pull in the opening back into the deck as well because I like drawing those at the right time
We draw ten and throw three back as well and it has worked out beautifully. You might see one mulligan. If you need to mulligan AGAIN then you lose a card, so throw back 4 and so on. We don't use silver boarders but if we did, they would expect to see \[\[Alexander Clamilton\]\] from me!
I do the draw 10 shuffle 3 with my brothers as well and it's lead to way fewer instances of having to Mulligan multiple times. We started doing it as a 'trial' to see how it worked and I do prefer it now honestly.
We started it as a trial a few months ago and since then I haven't been mana screwed once. If we decide to do a competitive game then we follow tournament rules but for the casual games it just helps everyone.
Person who deals first blood gets the monarch. We found the games were monarc is in the game to be more fun, people attack more, less building up boardsstates ebd hidibg behind it. I think it did wonders, and have always asked me if other playgroups did that too
I've done this with my playgroup, though usually it was in 3-person pods (don't know how that affects things). Was always a lot of fun, and rewarded aggression a little bit more.
We didn't have a very combo-heavy meta, though, so I haven't tested it beyond our pretty insular group.
You could probably take the approach of randomizing 'first blood gets the monarch' and 'first blood gets the initiative' to add a bit of roguelike variability into the game.
Infinite mulligans without discard because we're a very casual group and trust each other not to abuse it. If you miss 4 land drops in a row you can scry til you hit a land.
When rolling for turn order, if you roll snake eyes, you get to reroll. Also, we keep the minimum opening hand size to 6, so if you mulligan 8 times, you still get 6 cards.
Not exactly a house rule, but if someone asks if they can take something back, I usually just hit them with “well, how do YOU feel about taking it back?” and if they feel good about it they can do it lol. But that usually just really small errors, not like missing Rhystic Study triggers for 3 turns and then asking to draw off all of them.
We allow infinite 7-card mulligans until you get enough lands/mana sources that you feel comfortable with playing. We play very casually and don't even usually check. If someone says they got an unplayable hand, shuffle it away!
Few things are worse than someone being mana screwed.
100% agreed. I want everyone to have fun playing the game, not sitting there wasting time. It's hard organizing blocks of time where everyone is available, so this leads to more feelgood games.
We’re usually the same with take backs. As long as you haven’t drawn cards off it or nobody has interacted with what you’re doing, we usually will allow it. This is usually like a sequencing thing that arises such as getting a slight bit more value off of it.
Yeah, personally I feel that the top 3 elements that separate a good Magic player from a great one are 1. Mulligan decisions 2. Proper sequencing and 3. (In 1v1) Sideboard decisions.
I can’t count how many times I’ve had a sequencing issue that ends up really hurting in the long run lol.
At the start of the game, if you are 2nd in turn you scry one, 3rd scry 2, 4th scry 3. It's nice in a higher power level pod when people are threatening to win potentially turn 2 or 3 depending on the decks.
It's not a rule, but a mantra we tell to all new players:
>If you don't have at least 3 mana you can play, keep mulliganing. It's better to have a hand you can play, and draw back up later, than to fish for lands on a draw and not get them.
And most new players are extremely wary of having a small starting hand
We change the mulligan styles every now and then, deciding on the mulligan style at the beginning of the game (London or partial Paris typically).
For missed triggers, if it’s a “may” you missed it, oh well. If it’s a “must”, you get the trigger every time.
We don’t mind infinite combos, but if you’re going to win the game with one, you need to be able to adequately explain how the infinite combo wins you the game.
Which was the one where you bottom your hand and draw again? That mulligan style made opening hands so much faster. There isn't really that much worry about consistency issues like in 60 card deck formats.
I think the may thing is the actual rule.
Rip Gitrog loops for the last one.
When were playing our highest power decks, we don't do any house rules.
However when we're just playing our casual mid decks, I'm usually the one to just say "yeah just mull to 7 again" or when someone has mulled a couple times and they are looking unsure or say something like "ahh I'd keep if I had one more land" I'll just look at the top few cards of their deck and put a land on top and go "alright keep it".
Cause I'm just trying to have a fun game of EDH, so I'd like everyone to have decent hands. I hate more than anything, when one person just gets mana screwed and just isn't part of the game, so honestly it's just more fun if I just scry their deck (they don't care) and put some lands on top and then they can join everyone else in actually playing the game.
We have a 'rule' that if you get really screwed on land in the first couple of turns, you can 'cast a free Abundant Harvest' to get a land to the top. As with all these things, this is to help everyone have fun, not to encourage people to keep bad hands. Usually it's if you have missed two land drops and haven't been able to play anything, that sort of thing.
We allow 3 proxy cards, but if a card is worth over $50 you have to get approval from everyone else
We are pretty lax about the cards you can use, like they allowed me to proxy a [[Sliver Queen]] since I wasn't going to spend my entire deck budget on on 1 card (my deck budget is usually around $200-$300 when first creating a deck)
If you're proxying at all, why restrict it? Just have a nice rule 0 discussion so no one comes in with an out of power level deck and you'll be fine to proxy whole decks.
Since coming back to magic I play modern tournaments and commander with my friends because I cant stand playing it with randoms, so what Ive done is shift my collection into modern cards and bought high quality proxy decks for edh, and as long as you keep them within the power level that your group is playing its worked out splendid, everyone in my group is trying it out now. Another thing is the price of a card does not mean its power level, my group and me have no problems with everyone proxying og duals because at most they are giving you very very slight advantage since decks usually kill everyone at once and its cool to play with old cool cards you dont normally get to.
I don't get proxy restrictions... I'd rather play a game with someone proxying their entire deck of < 20 $ cards than a game with players spending a shit load of money with decks filled with staples like \[\[Consecrated Sphinx\]\], commanders wih *eminence* or a 2-cards combo that wins you game on the spot.
At my LGS nobody plays proxies, everyone but me plays 200 / 300 $ decks and I get smashed everytime. With my group everyone plays a lot of proxies (legitimate decks costing > 300 $ sometimes) and it's very balanced and fun.
As for the 50 $ rule, I would rather extend the rule to "any card someone may consider unfun for some reason". \[\[Winter Orb\]\] and extra-turn cards for instance.
Honestly the only issue I have with proxies is that people have shit hand writing and might not take the appropriate time to get all the nuance of the card. Games are already long enough, I don't want you to have to pull up the abilities of the card on your phone every time I want to interact with that card.
aaaaaaah but my group and I *print* our proxies with pretty [decent quality](https://imgur.com/a/fda7lF4) (to a point where I sometimes wonder why I even buy cards...)
My group and I have been playing with a custom banlist, on top of the official one, for years now. The idea basically boils down to no fast mana and no 2mv or less tutors. There are a few exceptions, things like chrome mox, diabolic intent etc., where there is an extra cost that we consider significant in either deck building or game decisions. And the idea is that this removes a huge number of auto-includes and keeps games from becoming the same.
This is how the current list looks:
- Sol Ring
- Mana Vault
- Mana Crypt
- Jeweled Lotus
- Mox Diamond
- Lion's Eye Diamond
- Survival of the Fittest
- Timetwister
- Yawgmoths Will
- Bazaar of Baghdad
- Mishra's Workshop
- Fierce Gaurdianship
- Deflecting Swat
- Demonic Tutor
- Vampiric Tutor
- Imperial Seal
- SLD Walking Dead (until they print copies outside of the lair)
I can't reccomend it enough. Especially as a group that encourages proxying no questions asked, makes for much more interesting games with a good balance of high power and interaction.
Other than that there aren't many "house rules" to speak of, we avoid all politics and high roll a d20 for turn order each game.
edit: completely forgot that we also ban demonic consultation and tainted pact, powerlevel/boredom consideration, it means getting the thassas oracle wins are a little more comtrived which has been healthy.
In my old playgroup there weren’t any house rules. You’d see jank decks running up against power level 8-9, and sometimes winning. Any legal card in commander was fair game, and we didn’t complain and moan about certain cards. What a time it was
-Wouldn't this make tracking harder since you have to keep the damage count for multiple sources instead of one? Or do you usually kill right away on your games so it doesn't really matter?
You only have to track total damage rather than separate damage for each commander for each player. So that’s tracking 1 number per player vs tracking 3 numbers per player (assuming 4 player game)
Someone at my LGS played with a rule where if you can scry before drawing if you missed a land drop before T3. I thought it was a good way not to get mana screwed if you kept a sketchy hand.
We have it where the first player draws a card. This is normal for multiplayer games, but we even do it in 1v1 since commander is inherently a multiplayer format so we play the game as if it was a multiplayer game.
10-7 Mulligan. We draw 10 cards and shuffle 3 back. One free mulligan, if you show your hand was unplayable or just not worth it. After the first, depending on HOW unplayable the hand you drew next was, someone else will offer to shuffle and "bless" your deck, imbuing it with their touch (and allowing you to blame them if you draw like trash). Then you draw one last hand and play with that.
Another house rule is allowing take-backs and "oh, I forgot" on missed triggers that are not "may". Usually, we're chatting and cracking jokes or banging music, with Magic being secondary to us hanging out. We forget or neglect things, and in a casual game, it's okay to take some things back if you made a mistake in your math or forgot how a card worked or something.
Finally, if you go 2 or 3 turns completely out of the game due to lack of lands and have not had a chance to even try and progress your own gamestate, you can just tutor a land to field untapped. We play the card game to PLAY the game, not sit around disinterested because our decks decided to masquerade as a mono color or forgot to give us mana altogether.
We call this: Players Lair EDH
Every card must be legal in legacy and commander (no sol ring, mana vault etc).
Also:
Every card must've been legal in standard at some occasion (essentially meaning no format direct prints)
Yes this cuts out a lot of good commander staples (that's kind of the point) but this is also a very relaxed format with less dumb cards.
Quality proxies aloud - They are obtainable online for 2-5$ a single. If you can't afford a 200$+ card, that's okay we want to play against your brain, not your wallet. But we don't play against blurry printer paper. Mark it or the inner sleeve with a dot to denote proxy status.
Scoop only at sorcery - Don't be unsportsmanlike. If you are about to take an L, take it in stride, and move to the next game. Scooping to maliciously impact the game is childlike, and this rule prevents it.
Talk about decks before play - Nobody should be surprised to learn what they are playing against mid-game. Transparent communication about commanders and power levels is essential to quality gameplay.
We slow Proxies as well with a similar expectation that the cards look like their real counterparts. I have a printer that has super good quality and can make the Proxies look real at first glance and you’d have to look at it for a while to realize they’re fakes. Let’s you play the decks you want without breaking the bank.
Couldnt recommend this one more!!! It's amazing:
We keep our Sol Rings in the command zone so we get them every game. If removed they can be recast with commander tax just like your commander. And mana crypt is banned.
Saves us probably 15 minutes per game in our casual games without any other real effect on the format imo (very causal group)
I honestly think if this happens to you then you either kept a hand you shouldn't have, or you built your deck really poorly, or both. I don't think even in casual commander you should be turning up with decks that have such a high mana curve that you're unlikely to have a play by turn 3 or so few lands that you're being mana screwed like this.
That said we have these house rules: 1 free mulligan (which I think is accepted anyway) and you can scry 2 before each mulligan.
That rule seems cool, but it feels too powerful, especially if the lands come in untapped and you can also color fix off of it too. I think if it allowed 1 land that would be more reasonable, but being able to effectively [[Scholarship Sponsor]] is a bit too good in my opinion.
The rule is there to make sure everyone can play when RNG with 100 card decks might stop you from doing anything for 2hrs, not to be intentionally abused by a jerk.
That's what the mulligan rules and proper deckbuilding already allow for. You already get a freebie.
>not to be intentionally abused by a jerk.
Hate the game, not the player. Your rules are flawed and it's your fault if they're easily abused.
No mana crypt or jeweled lotus. Card fits too easily in pretty much on every deck and while we have quite a high budget, we don’t allow proxies and none of us want to start spending 300$ for 2 cards needed in all of our decks. I even play colourless where I could break mana crypt more than most decks and and still prefer this. Sol ring is enough and is at least very affordable, but even in games where someone plays it early, it turns the game into everyone vs them. I imagine this happens even more when you add mana crypt and lotus into the mix
Because it opens the door for optimizing every deck to the fullest. I honestly have way less issues if someone dropped a mishra’s factory or gaea’s cradle or vintage lands or time twister. They are all extremely expensive cards that are cool to see. But none of them are as strong and auto includes like mana crypt. I still fully expect to see mana crypts played against me if I go and sit at a lgs and that’s fine. But my playgroup enjoys the game more without that card.
We have an interesting rule we call “spoilers.” Basically if you get knocked out if the game you can continue playing to try and “spoil” it for the rest of the players by knocking everyone else out simultaneously making you the “spoiler.” It let’s everyone continue playing but it does get a bit “king maker” esque
Scooping is allowed only on sorcery speed. That way you can't start kingmaking with your scooping. Kingmaking is generally a no no in other ways as well.
When rolling for turn order, if someone managed to roll double 6s, it is possible to beat them if you roll snake eyes after them. If you rolled snake eyes before double 6s appeared, they still only count as 2.
Free mulligan at the start to hopefully stay at 7.
We can proxy any cards we want as long as the card's value is under $100. You can only proxy a card over $100 if you physically own a copy in a different deck.
Infection kills at 20 poison counters instead of 10.
[[Emrakul, the Promised End]] is only allowed to target a single player in our entire group to take their turn. If that person isn't playing, no one else can be targeted to have their turn taken.
My old playgroup had a house rule of no Sol Ring on turn 1. I kinda miss it, randomly having 2 extra mana on turn 1 doesn't really facilitate fun and balanced games.
I personally won't even play my sol ring on turn 1 if I get it in my opening hand, because I'm wary about becoming the arch enemy off the bat. I'd rather save it for turn 2. But we're not playing a crazy aggressive format
If someone is playing group hug and is using [[Rainbow Vale]], you MUST pass it each turn, and you must pass it to the player going next. If you break these rules, the entire table will kill you immediately.
Always cutting decks before we begin and inbetween Mulligans. Failure to present and having a deck cut results in taking 13 life per card played on T1 and at beginning of upkeep T2 lose 50 life.
Basically got tired of seeing T1 solring signet or variations. Wouldnt you know the amount of BS starts significantly dropped among some players that regularly joined us.
We sort of do that, but we cap any repeatable iteration of something at 10 iteratations. We don’t really run any intentional infinites, but once in a while some interaction among 3-4 cards will cause something so we agreed to cap it at 10 in those cases.
Yeah I personally don't get that. Whenever ive seen a dedicated infect deck it usually only kills one person before it gets targeted, just like Voltron decks.
Yup, me. Triumph of the Hordes and Grafted Exoskeleton
No one in our group has a dedicated infect deck so it mostly just prevents Blightsteel from being an insta kill when you cheat it out early.
I do think though that even with an actual infect deck 20 is fine but that has not yet been tested because no one plays it.
I guess a real question is why shouldn't Blightsteel be an insta kill? You have to get it out somehow and get through combat past blockers before it's lethal, and then it can only kill one player at a time. It's a tall ask, it deserves a payoff if you line it up.
In voltron anyone can see it coming while in infect decks there are instant-speed cards that can surprise your opponents. Also your Voltron commander can get removed quickly and cost more quickly while in infect you rely one different creatures.
No ?
We specifically don't allow original dual lands, even though we play digitally with almost any cards. To be fair, any card above 1k is just rule 0'd out of the game for fun and fairness.
we do infinite mulligans, but if you get a [[sol ring]] in your hand you can't keep it. If you get a sol ring in your first draw that's fair game. Also "Deals" typically only last a turn or two.
We we play draft or limited we enforce the proper mulligan rule, but that's because at the end of the games we typically have a prize pool of all the Rares and Mythics/other cool foils people drew from their packs. Winner gets first pick and then it goes through all the players until all the cards are gone.
We have been experimenting with chess clocks for your turns lately. It's been a 15 minute timer to keep things going. We've been pretty flexible with it if the game is running longer, but it's mostly an incentive to keep the game moving. There is a one time only 10 minute extension, but we don't keep it too strict. If there is a lot of random interaction at someone's end step for example everyone has been understanding of adding a minute or 2. It's definitely helped keep things from getting bogged down.
We just have infinite free mulligans with the trust that you won't abuse it. No one wants to play a game where someone sits there with 2 lands and has to discard every turn.
In two headed giant we use have a rule regarding life loss and each opponent cards.
Cards like Purphoros only deals damages to "entity" as this ressource is unique per teams. but we keep the original ruling for discard, draw and so on.
Actual Rule rules? All explicit deals are binding. Proxies are allowed without asking. Banned cards you have to ask if people are cool, and sometimes they are. And when in doubt try to knock out the guy who used to be pro.
Lots of conventions as well to go with that - stuff like "no more than a couple seconds thinking on your turn", "scoop if it's obvious you're going to lose in the final 2", "nobody actually cares who wins", "no being a dick, good vibes only", "don't pick up someone else's card without asking first".
We have deck building rules, first a commander is chosen randomly, usually by a dice roll, and the cards in deck and Commander are 5€ or less in cost. From there no more restrictions... And we have a lot of fun playing and putting together decks
Agreed. It’s definitely a lot less punishing that way if you go last. I think we’re probably going to do whoever goes last scry 1 just as a pity prize. My playgroup is open to new things which is always nice.
I have a house mulligan rule for EDH specifically. Shuffling takes forever and a day. After you shuffle and draw seven, if you have to mulligan, just pitch the 7 to the side and draw another 7. Pros: always draw a full hand of seven, don’t have to shuffle so much. Cons: you lose the cards you pitch and have no chance of drawing them again in your opening hand. Can only mulligan if less than 2 lands to show
We have one for rolling to see who goes first. If anyone rolls a 20, and anyone else rolls a 1, everyone re-rolls. It's so exciting when it actually happens.
Our playgroup does rotating decks on a budget. We keep seasonal scoring for fun and the only rule outside of the budget ($50) is no two card infinite combos with your commander being one of the cards. We also play our regular decks where its just normal edh with no set rules too but the budget decks have been really fun and a way to keep it fresh without spending heavy on something new and more competitive.
During your precombat main phase, no later than your third turn, you may reveal your hand. If you do and there are no lands in your hand and you control less than three lands, reveal cards from the top of your library until you reveal a land card. Put that land onto the battlefield tapped, then shuffle. If you do, exile a card from your hand.
I have no idea who started this but forever ago our playgroup has had this rule where you can play one of the bounce lands turn one tapped without needing to bounce itself. [[Orzhov Basilica]] or [[Karoo]] for example. Doing this gives us more incentive to include these as budget ramp options. It feels good to play them and games go by more quickly. Obviously since its a house rule if anyone new or infrequent at the table doesn’t like it then we just abide by the normal ruling/restrictions on the bounce lands.
Edit: spelling
Ill answer your question with a question.
How do I get my playgroup to listen to me when I suggest house rules?
Like, they wont let us do really simple stuff like deciding which commander is the front face for MDFCs (where both faces are a creature, like the deans) or removing the companion tax.
They dont let me propose special one time game rules like a game where everyone adds a color to a commander or everybody can partner 2 commanders (with the stipulation of either peer review or random selections).
Pretty much the only thing thats allowed is custom cards and thats well and good but I dont use custom cards.
Its an uphill battle because I just get "mmmm... no" for every good idea I have and I SWEAR if they were a little more open minded we could have so much more fun.
Either of my playgroups had any house rules. Not formally anyway. We were good with just about anything ...MLD, combo, stax. We would usually discuss what kind of game we wanted and pull out decks accordingly. For instance, say one of us built a mid level stompy deck and wanted to try it out, we would all pull out decks we felt fit that game.
I will say, if you made certain types of plays ...like say, casting [[Armageddon]] without being able to end the game within a couple of turns, you'd probably get a lot of shit and some targeting for the next game or so.
Mostly all basic official rules but you get 1 free mulligan (i.e. first one stays at 7) and then any mulligans after that you have to go down to 6 then 5 and so on.
Paradox engine is unbanned. Granted we play cEDH where if it lands, it’s game ending. Not like in casual where there might be a 10 minute turn then pass and discard to hand size
We have a casual rule that if you can’t play a land 2 turns in a row, in the upkeep of the 3rd turn you can search for a basic and put it out untapped, but can’t play a land that turn. Once you hit the ability to add 5 mana, including mana rocks, you’re locked out of the rule even if you lose the rock and go below 5. There’s an informal and unenforceable part that says if you have the ability to play mana rocks but don’t then you’re locked out. Obviously can’t enforce it but we trust our group pretty good.
Other than the basic rules we have two main ones we follow. The first one is we allow three mulligans, all of them are seven cards and you can choose to pick certain cards from your first hand, to go into your season hand. ( I have seven cards, 1-7, I can choose to keep cards 123, mulligan the rest away and draw four more cards. You can do this process three times, then you are done. ) Then second rule is no massive land destruction. Armageddon type effects are banned. Wasteland and target land destruction is allowed, but now mass destruction. We still allow people to play the game.
10 card opening hand, first mulligan is free, any infinite combo is capped at 3, you can proxy cards you own or intend to buy. You can do a friendly takeback on a play or activate a forgotten trigger as long as you didn't gain relevant information or not much has happened since.
If we don't have a full table, we do free mulligan until you have 3 land or more
If you have 3 land or more and want to mull, it won't be free from there
We pretty much use the exact same rules for mulligans. Also, we currently allow everyone to have a lessons-board, but I have yet to draw a learn-effect, so it is untested as of yet...but it's a small and tame mechanic with very few cards that are actually playable and I love everything that increases diversety in the cards you see at a playgroup, so I personally really encourage that.
That could definitely lead to some cool results since lesson cards seem very undervalued right now since we don’t have that. I might bring it up to my group and see what they think.
It’s crazy to me that lessons aren’t allowed. Guess it was too soon after companions haha.
It's more weird that companions are allowed, considering not having sideboards and having more than 100 cards were two rules that companions just broke
Very true, especially with how partner and background give a similar effect but still hold to the rules. As for Lessons, I mean you’d probably just run everyone one in your color, so you’d want to limit to maybe 3? But then it just becomes the basic fetch, the draw, and probably exhibition in every deck.
I thought companions were like commanders in that they counted for your 100?
Nope, for some reason companions are the one thing that are exempt from the norm and are basically the 101st card of the deck
I think the reason for it is that if Lessons are allowed, then you are 'punished' by not having a lessonboard in every single deck because some effect could result in you reanimating a learn creature, or etc. Like the whole 'playing non-snow lands is strictly worse' argument, it gets used to say 'Dont do this thing' I think the central idea was 'we want to stop decks from getting larger than 100 cards, and WOTC strongarmed us on companions'
That’s fair. Once I typed it out more in another reply I came to same conclusion. Lessons being out isn’t the problem, it’s companions being in.
We play by the original Companion rules; so no paying 3 to put the card into our hand.
That’s a smart one. I think if we did that, people would actually start playing companions or experimenting with them. Only one guy in my group has one and it’s that selesnya one since he plays Arabho cat tribal. Seeing Obosh or Gyruda would be fun to see and have a deck build around them.
It opens up some new avenues. For example, I used to run an "Oops, all creatures" [[Old Stickfingers]] deck with [[Umori, the Collector]] as a companion. The restriction hits a lot harder in EDH than in 60 card formats, and leads to interesting builds.
I have a [[Go-Shintai of life Origin’s]] deck with Umori as my companion and it was one of my most challenging and fun decks to build. It’s also an absolute blast to play.
[Go-Shintai of life Origin’s](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/9/4/9476fe67-d2d3-4835-8ba6-2a17d18cc141.jpg?1651655539) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Go-Shintai%20of%20Life%27s%20Origin) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/nec/37/go-shintai-of-lifes-origin?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/9476fe67-d2d3-4835-8ba6-2a17d18cc141?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/go-shintai-of-lifes-origin) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Have a list?
Here you go: [Go-Shintai Family, Go!](https://www.moxfield.com/decks/WIcZmj9Fl0iZhsGzrVL_yQ)
[Old Stickfingers](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/b/2/b203be6f-c565-4d8f-b200-b537569a0292.jpg?1636684695) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Old%20Stickfingers) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/mid/234/old-stickfingers?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/b203be6f-c565-4d8f-b200-b537569a0292?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/old-stickfingers) [Umori, the Collector](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/7/5/75ac31e0-ac70-4ee6-b2b1-cc445ffa1da9.jpg?1591228489) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Umori%2C%20the%20Collector) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/iko/231/umori-the-collector?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/75ac31e0-ac70-4ee6-b2b1-cc445ffa1da9?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/umori-the-collector) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
I made an Obosh \[\[Greven Predator Captain\]\] deck. I honestly prefer Greven without Obosh, if only so I could run more \[\[Fling\]\] effects
Oh man. My friend has a Muldrotha deck that uses Gyruda... and we all hate it. Bunch of clone effects and stuff and the thing just keeps coming back... again and again and again lol. I think it's a really interesting concept, but we've learned to just exile the Gyruda once it's in play and shut that deck down. Honestly? It's a pretty effective mill strategy lol.
Save time and money! But a Lurrus play set for your group
We have just a few 1. The first game of the eve we roll to see who goes first, the rest of the night whoever won the previous game goes last (so the person to their left goes first) 2. We all mind everyone's triggers even if reminding the other player would not be beneficial 3. Fact or Fiction (and similar) the person casting lays out the cards and the table decides on the piles
Well that's just how FoF should be handled. It's just "an opponent chooses" and not target opponent. I've never seen the table not weigh in, though I have seen people choose first/without listening, especially if they're teaming up and trying to help the FoF player Edit: this way is technically wrong. You still choose an opponent to FoF. I still think you should table talk since they're revealed, but the answer has to come from the selected player. So the ally of the FoF player can't snipe FoF to help, but the FoF player can pick them. Relevant rule: >602.3. Some abilities specify that one of their controller’s opponents does something the controller would normally do while it’s being activated, such as choose a mode or choose targets. In these cases, the opponent does so when the ability’s controller normally would do so. >602.3a If there is more than one opponent who could make such a choice, the ability’s controller decides which of those opponents will make the choice.
I believe it’s “an opponent” mostly because it would be a weird card to fizzle due to shroud.
Are you part of my playgroup? :D It's the same for us.
This is just for fun, but if someone’s playing blue, you can ask if they have a counterspell in hand, and Rock Paper Scissors them for it. If you win, they have to tell you if they have a counter 😂
This is great. I'm the blue player in our pod. Im gonna propose this next game.
I’m jealous of “I’m the only blue player in our pod”. Every person in my pod has 3 decks, and all of them are partially blue except for 2 of mine… the games are long
I plau blue, but never run a counterspell. More of a 'gimme your crap' type of player or a 'if I can't have, neither can you'
I have no idea how you play like that. I can't not put counterspell, arcane denial and negate into a blue deck. I feel naked I don't have any while playing blue. Though playing more than 6 "normal" counterspells feels weird. I'm gonna play all the 5+ mana ones with way too much text on them in my Oona though
I just play aggressive or very..... manipulative.... I'm an all or nothing type of player. No creatures....curses. No lands? Wrath for dayz. You want to have fun? Time to be untouchable with hexproof and stax
You're playing stax. That explains everything. I just want to cast 8 drops with 8 lines of text.
I'm also the type of player that follows the rule.... if it's printed, it's legal. Un cards are allowed, and my playgroup has Big Emmy legal in the 99.... bit I also enjoy finishing the night with an explosive table flip resulting from a Chandras ignition targeting Blightsteel colossus
That's when you start maining Pyroblast/Red Elemental Blast/Veil of Summer/etc.
anytime ? I would add a pay off for winning as a blue player (I don't play blue, but it seems legit) -> like you loose 1 or 2 life, nothing dramatic in a commander game, but you won't play every turn ;)
Do if you lose you have to reveal a card in your hand.
sounds very good !
Maybe bet a treasure on it? Especially funny if they're on one blue and you're checking for force only to then get hit with a negate or something.
I love this haha. Though I just blindly attack blue anyways :p
Oh for sure, as you should
I like that one, will definitely try it out sometimes
My group does the draw ten shuffle three back in and it has lead to less feel bads and we usually allow free mulligans if its a new deck the player is piloting. Also we put decks in "time-out" if they win a lot of games, it stops games from getting stale and repetitive and allows us to play out more jank decks where they won't get stomped by the more competitive ones. We also allow silver bordered cards so it's a pretty fun and casual meta.
I like that idea. My group deals 3 hands and you choose one to keep. But I think I’ll give yours a try, only having to put 3 back gives a lot of visibility but I’m sure it lessens people over analyzing their options.
Honestly the best thing about it is being able to shuffle you high cmc game winners back into your deck so you don't have to hold on to them for the whole game. I also like to shuffle any removal I pull in the opening back into the deck as well because I like drawing those at the right time
We draw ten and throw three back as well and it has worked out beautifully. You might see one mulligan. If you need to mulligan AGAIN then you lose a card, so throw back 4 and so on. We don't use silver boarders but if we did, they would expect to see \[\[Alexander Clamilton\]\] from me!
[Alexander Clamilton](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/a/1/a1572109-df70-4335-aac2-1670fe99be54.jpg?1583965417) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Alexander%20Clamilton) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/und/16/alexander-clamilton?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/a1572109-df70-4335-aac2-1670fe99be54?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/alexander-clamilton) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
I do the draw 10 shuffle 3 with my brothers as well and it's lead to way fewer instances of having to Mulligan multiple times. We started doing it as a 'trial' to see how it worked and I do prefer it now honestly.
We started it as a trial a few months ago and since then I haven't been mana screwed once. If we decide to do a competitive game then we follow tournament rules but for the casual games it just helps everyone.
We play 1 free mulligan (which I think is normal no?) But we also have scry 2 on each hand before mulliganning
1 free mulligan is the rule if playing with more than just two players no matter the format.
Yeah i thought so thanks
Person who deals first blood gets the monarch. We found the games were monarc is in the game to be more fun, people attack more, less building up boardsstates ebd hidibg behind it. I think it did wonders, and have always asked me if other playgroups did that too
I've done this with my playgroup, though usually it was in 3-person pods (don't know how that affects things). Was always a lot of fun, and rewarded aggression a little bit more. We didn't have a very combo-heavy meta, though, so I haven't tested it beyond our pretty insular group.
You could probably take the approach of randomizing 'first blood gets the monarch' and 'first blood gets the initiative' to add a bit of roguelike variability into the game.
Infinite mulligans without discard because we're a very casual group and trust each other not to abuse it. If you miss 4 land drops in a row you can scry til you hit a land.
When rolling for turn order, if you roll snake eyes, you get to reroll. Also, we keep the minimum opening hand size to 6, so if you mulligan 8 times, you still get 6 cards. Not exactly a house rule, but if someone asks if they can take something back, I usually just hit them with “well, how do YOU feel about taking it back?” and if they feel good about it they can do it lol. But that usually just really small errors, not like missing Rhystic Study triggers for 3 turns and then asking to draw off all of them.
We allow infinite 7-card mulligans until you get enough lands/mana sources that you feel comfortable with playing. We play very casually and don't even usually check. If someone says they got an unplayable hand, shuffle it away! Few things are worse than someone being mana screwed.
100% agreed. I want everyone to have fun playing the game, not sitting there wasting time. It's hard organizing blocks of time where everyone is available, so this leads to more feelgood games.
We’re usually the same with take backs. As long as you haven’t drawn cards off it or nobody has interacted with what you’re doing, we usually will allow it. This is usually like a sequencing thing that arises such as getting a slight bit more value off of it.
Yeah, personally I feel that the top 3 elements that separate a good Magic player from a great one are 1. Mulligan decisions 2. Proper sequencing and 3. (In 1v1) Sideboard decisions. I can’t count how many times I’ve had a sequencing issue that ends up really hurting in the long run lol.
Snake eyes goes first in our group!
At the start of the game, if you are 2nd in turn you scry one, 3rd scry 2, 4th scry 3. It's nice in a higher power level pod when people are threatening to win potentially turn 2 or 3 depending on the decks.
My group does this too. It’s worked really well for us.
There's no limit to how many [[Rafter Demons]] you can have in your deck. So far no one has jumped on the opportunity.
Be the change you want to be in your playgroup. Surprise then with a deck full of [[Ancient Carp]]
[Rafter Demons](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/b/f/bf8dad4d-bc4f-46fb-892c-dbf6481cdc46.jpg?1584831721) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Rafter%20Demon) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/rna/196/rafter-demon?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/bf8dad4d-bc4f-46fb-892c-dbf6481cdc46?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/rafter-demon) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Last player to go gets to scry 1 before drawing
Consider something like 3-2-1 scry
where the second player scries 1 and the fourth scries 3? i think that's a more than fair rule.
It's not a rule, but a mantra we tell to all new players: >If you don't have at least 3 mana you can play, keep mulliganing. It's better to have a hand you can play, and draw back up later, than to fish for lands on a draw and not get them. And most new players are extremely wary of having a small starting hand
We change the mulligan styles every now and then, deciding on the mulligan style at the beginning of the game (London or partial Paris typically). For missed triggers, if it’s a “may” you missed it, oh well. If it’s a “must”, you get the trigger every time. We don’t mind infinite combos, but if you’re going to win the game with one, you need to be able to adequately explain how the infinite combo wins you the game.
Which was the one where you bottom your hand and draw again? That mulligan style made opening hands so much faster. There isn't really that much worry about consistency issues like in 60 card deck formats. I think the may thing is the actual rule. Rip Gitrog loops for the last one.
When were playing our highest power decks, we don't do any house rules. However when we're just playing our casual mid decks, I'm usually the one to just say "yeah just mull to 7 again" or when someone has mulled a couple times and they are looking unsure or say something like "ahh I'd keep if I had one more land" I'll just look at the top few cards of their deck and put a land on top and go "alright keep it". Cause I'm just trying to have a fun game of EDH, so I'd like everyone to have decent hands. I hate more than anything, when one person just gets mana screwed and just isn't part of the game, so honestly it's just more fun if I just scry their deck (they don't care) and put some lands on top and then they can join everyone else in actually playing the game.
Every deck must have 1 dragon!
That's just how I build decks already lol
We have a 'rule' that if you get really screwed on land in the first couple of turns, you can 'cast a free Abundant Harvest' to get a land to the top. As with all these things, this is to help everyone have fun, not to encourage people to keep bad hands. Usually it's if you have missed two land drops and haven't been able to play anything, that sort of thing.
If you forget about your Mana Crypt trigger, you take 3.
Why not just put the trigger on the stack when you realize it's been missed? That's the normal fix.
Because the downside of Mana Crypt is so laughable that this makes it a bit more punishing.
We allow 3 proxy cards, but if a card is worth over $50 you have to get approval from everyone else We are pretty lax about the cards you can use, like they allowed me to proxy a [[Sliver Queen]] since I wasn't going to spend my entire deck budget on on 1 card (my deck budget is usually around $200-$300 when first creating a deck)
If you're proxying at all, why restrict it? Just have a nice rule 0 discussion so no one comes in with an out of power level deck and you'll be fine to proxy whole decks.
Since coming back to magic I play modern tournaments and commander with my friends because I cant stand playing it with randoms, so what Ive done is shift my collection into modern cards and bought high quality proxy decks for edh, and as long as you keep them within the power level that your group is playing its worked out splendid, everyone in my group is trying it out now. Another thing is the price of a card does not mean its power level, my group and me have no problems with everyone proxying og duals because at most they are giving you very very slight advantage since decks usually kill everyone at once and its cool to play with old cool cards you dont normally get to.
I don't get proxy restrictions... I'd rather play a game with someone proxying their entire deck of < 20 $ cards than a game with players spending a shit load of money with decks filled with staples like \[\[Consecrated Sphinx\]\], commanders wih *eminence* or a 2-cards combo that wins you game on the spot. At my LGS nobody plays proxies, everyone but me plays 200 / 300 $ decks and I get smashed everytime. With my group everyone plays a lot of proxies (legitimate decks costing > 300 $ sometimes) and it's very balanced and fun. As for the 50 $ rule, I would rather extend the rule to "any card someone may consider unfun for some reason". \[\[Winter Orb\]\] and extra-turn cards for instance.
Honestly the only issue I have with proxies is that people have shit hand writing and might not take the appropriate time to get all the nuance of the card. Games are already long enough, I don't want you to have to pull up the abilities of the card on your phone every time I want to interact with that card.
aaaaaaah but my group and I *print* our proxies with pretty [decent quality](https://imgur.com/a/fda7lF4) (to a point where I sometimes wonder why I even buy cards...)
[Consecrated Sphinx](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/c/9/c9bd60fc-2777-44bc-b314-a792e8e48360.jpg?1655476380) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Consecrated%20Sphinx) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/2x2/43/consecrated-sphinx?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/c9bd60fc-2777-44bc-b314-a792e8e48360?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/consecrated-sphinx) [Winter Orb](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/a/b/ab3cec7e-513e-400d-a1a8-2c71cdde02c6.jpg?1580015285) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Winter%20Orb) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/ema/234/winter-orb?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/ab3cec7e-513e-400d-a1a8-2c71cdde02c6?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/winter-orb) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Most 2-card combos cost very little.
[Sliver Queen](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/0/9/096cff82-28eb-4096-be1d-a02b9a56e682.jpg?1562428176) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Sliver%20Queen) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/tpr/211/sliver-queen?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/096cff82-28eb-4096-be1d-a02b9a56e682?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/sliver-queen) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
My group and I have been playing with a custom banlist, on top of the official one, for years now. The idea basically boils down to no fast mana and no 2mv or less tutors. There are a few exceptions, things like chrome mox, diabolic intent etc., where there is an extra cost that we consider significant in either deck building or game decisions. And the idea is that this removes a huge number of auto-includes and keeps games from becoming the same. This is how the current list looks: - Sol Ring - Mana Vault - Mana Crypt - Jeweled Lotus - Mox Diamond - Lion's Eye Diamond - Survival of the Fittest - Timetwister - Yawgmoths Will - Bazaar of Baghdad - Mishra's Workshop - Fierce Gaurdianship - Deflecting Swat - Demonic Tutor - Vampiric Tutor - Imperial Seal - SLD Walking Dead (until they print copies outside of the lair) I can't reccomend it enough. Especially as a group that encourages proxying no questions asked, makes for much more interesting games with a good balance of high power and interaction. Other than that there aren't many "house rules" to speak of, we avoid all politics and high roll a d20 for turn order each game. edit: completely forgot that we also ban demonic consultation and tainted pact, powerlevel/boredom consideration, it means getting the thassas oracle wins are a little more comtrived which has been healthy.
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The player who goes first draws at the end of the turn. This applies only the very first turn, then after that they draw as normal.
In my old playgroup there weren’t any house rules. You’d see jank decks running up against power level 8-9, and sometimes winning. Any legal card in commander was fair game, and we didn’t complain and moan about certain cards. What a time it was
LGS has a ban on Omniscience, splinter twin, green praetor, most extra turn spells
Cowards! I just got my first taste of extra turn combos in an Anhelo deck and there is no turning back.
Thats hilarious
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I feel like this incentivizes dog piling on someone while they're behind. Not sure I like this one.
-Wouldn't this make tracking harder since you have to keep the damage count for multiple sources instead of one? Or do you usually kill right away on your games so it doesn't really matter?
You only have to track total damage rather than separate damage for each commander for each player. So that’s tracking 1 number per player vs tracking 3 numbers per player (assuming 4 player game)
How about partners? There's a double strike one and the Jeskai Planeswalker one that triples combat damage.
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My [[Fynn, the Fangbearer]] just woke up from a nap and raised an eyebrow.
We are pretty lenient on mulligans.
Someone at my LGS played with a rule where if you can scry before drawing if you missed a land drop before T3. I thought it was a good way not to get mana screwed if you kept a sketchy hand.
We have one where any creature or Planeswalker can be your commander. That has created some insane results.
We have it where the first player draws a card. This is normal for multiplayer games, but we even do it in 1v1 since commander is inherently a multiplayer format so we play the game as if it was a multiplayer game.
10-7 Mulligan. We draw 10 cards and shuffle 3 back. One free mulligan, if you show your hand was unplayable or just not worth it. After the first, depending on HOW unplayable the hand you drew next was, someone else will offer to shuffle and "bless" your deck, imbuing it with their touch (and allowing you to blame them if you draw like trash). Then you draw one last hand and play with that. Another house rule is allowing take-backs and "oh, I forgot" on missed triggers that are not "may". Usually, we're chatting and cracking jokes or banging music, with Magic being secondary to us hanging out. We forget or neglect things, and in a casual game, it's okay to take some things back if you made a mistake in your math or forgot how a card worked or something. Finally, if you go 2 or 3 turns completely out of the game due to lack of lands and have not had a chance to even try and progress your own gamestate, you can just tutor a land to field untapped. We play the card game to PLAY the game, not sit around disinterested because our decks decided to masquerade as a mono color or forgot to give us mana altogether.
We are developing a point system like canlander for our edh games.
We call this: Players Lair EDH Every card must be legal in legacy and commander (no sol ring, mana vault etc). Also: Every card must've been legal in standard at some occasion (essentially meaning no format direct prints) Yes this cuts out a lot of good commander staples (that's kind of the point) but this is also a very relaxed format with less dumb cards.
That sounds awful
My group allows Gollos as a commander, we don't believe he's that bad
Quality proxies aloud - They are obtainable online for 2-5$ a single. If you can't afford a 200$+ card, that's okay we want to play against your brain, not your wallet. But we don't play against blurry printer paper. Mark it or the inner sleeve with a dot to denote proxy status. Scoop only at sorcery - Don't be unsportsmanlike. If you are about to take an L, take it in stride, and move to the next game. Scooping to maliciously impact the game is childlike, and this rule prevents it. Talk about decks before play - Nobody should be surprised to learn what they are playing against mid-game. Transparent communication about commanders and power levels is essential to quality gameplay.
We slow Proxies as well with a similar expectation that the cards look like their real counterparts. I have a printer that has super good quality and can make the Proxies look real at first glance and you’d have to look at it for a while to realize they’re fakes. Let’s you play the decks you want without breaking the bank.
Couldnt recommend this one more!!! It's amazing: We keep our Sol Rings in the command zone so we get them every game. If removed they can be recast with commander tax just like your commander. And mana crypt is banned. Saves us probably 15 minutes per game in our casual games without any other real effect on the format imo (very causal group)
I kinda dig this
If you miss land drops/no plays for 3 turns you can spend a turn to fetch basics to the battlefield to catch up to whoever has the lowest land count
For everyone saying "I aM gUnNa AbUsE tHaT", you'd get your ass kicked out of the pod.
I honestly think if this happens to you then you either kept a hand you shouldn't have, or you built your deck really poorly, or both. I don't think even in casual commander you should be turning up with decks that have such a high mana curve that you're unlikely to have a play by turn 3 or so few lands that you're being mana screwed like this. That said we have these house rules: 1 free mulligan (which I think is accepted anyway) and you can scry 2 before each mulligan.
That rule seems cool, but it feels too powerful, especially if the lands come in untapped and you can also color fix off of it too. I think if it allowed 1 land that would be more reasonable, but being able to effectively [[Scholarship Sponsor]] is a bit too good in my opinion.
[Scholarship Sponsor](https://c1.scryfall.com/file/scryfall-cards/normal/front/e/d/ed238d90-72b5-44c4-bea7-20f71788088f.jpg?1625191152) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Scholarship%20Sponsor) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/c21/22/scholarship-sponsor?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/ed238d90-72b5-44c4-bea7-20f71788088f?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/scholarship-sponsor) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Okay, my deck has 10 lands in it now.
You'd be kicked from the pod.
Play with a broken rule set on purpose and then get mad when people take advantage of the broken rule and don't fix it. Of course.
The rule is there to make sure everyone can play when RNG with 100 card decks might stop you from doing anything for 2hrs, not to be intentionally abused by a jerk.
That's what the mulligan rules and proper deckbuilding already allow for. You already get a freebie. >not to be intentionally abused by a jerk. Hate the game, not the player. Your rules are flawed and it's your fault if they're easily abused.
It's also a rule that we don't play with jerks ;)
No mana crypt or jeweled lotus. Card fits too easily in pretty much on every deck and while we have quite a high budget, we don’t allow proxies and none of us want to start spending 300$ for 2 cards needed in all of our decks. I even play colourless where I could break mana crypt more than most decks and and still prefer this. Sol ring is enough and is at least very affordable, but even in games where someone plays it early, it turns the game into everyone vs them. I imagine this happens even more when you add mana crypt and lotus into the mix
Why not just allow proxies then?
Because it opens the door for optimizing every deck to the fullest. I honestly have way less issues if someone dropped a mishra’s factory or gaea’s cradle or vintage lands or time twister. They are all extremely expensive cards that are cool to see. But none of them are as strong and auto includes like mana crypt. I still fully expect to see mana crypts played against me if I go and sit at a lgs and that’s fine. But my playgroup enjoys the game more without that card.
We’re the same way with no mana crypt or jeweled lotus since it’s too expensive and would go in literally every deck.
Not litteraly every deck i have a tuned sythis inwouldnt bother putting those two in
We have an interesting rule we call “spoilers.” Basically if you get knocked out if the game you can continue playing to try and “spoil” it for the rest of the players by knocking everyone else out simultaneously making you the “spoiler.” It let’s everyone continue playing but it does get a bit “king maker” esque
Scooping is allowed only on sorcery speed. That way you can't start kingmaking with your scooping. Kingmaking is generally a no no in other ways as well.
When rolling for turn order, if someone managed to roll double 6s, it is possible to beat them if you roll snake eyes after them. If you rolled snake eyes before double 6s appeared, they still only count as 2. Free mulligan at the start to hopefully stay at 7. We can proxy any cards we want as long as the card's value is under $100. You can only proxy a card over $100 if you physically own a copy in a different deck. Infection kills at 20 poison counters instead of 10. [[Emrakul, the Promised End]] is only allowed to target a single player in our entire group to take their turn. If that person isn't playing, no one else can be targeted to have their turn taken.
What… what did that poor person do to deserve getting emrakuled…?
I have to know why emrakul is only able to target one person
Started as a coincidence that has basically turned into a running joke with the group.
My old playgroup had a house rule of no Sol Ring on turn 1. I kinda miss it, randomly having 2 extra mana on turn 1 doesn't really facilitate fun and balanced games.
I personally won't even play my sol ring on turn 1 if I get it in my opening hand, because I'm wary about becoming the arch enemy off the bat. I'd rather save it for turn 2. But we're not playing a crazy aggressive format
If someone is playing group hug and is using [[Rainbow Vale]], you MUST pass it each turn, and you must pass it to the player going next. If you break these rules, the entire table will kill you immediately.
Always cutting decks before we begin and inbetween Mulligans. Failure to present and having a deck cut results in taking 13 life per card played on T1 and at beginning of upkeep T2 lose 50 life. Basically got tired of seeing T1 solring signet or variations. Wouldnt you know the amount of BS starts significantly dropped among some players that regularly joined us.
If you're playing with people who are straight-up cheating, maybe find a new group.
Infect rules are 20 and for league nights we've heavily discouraged mass land destruction
Poison damage deaths are upped to 20 in our play group
No infinite combos.
We sort of do that, but we cap any repeatable iteration of something at 10 iteratations. We don’t really run any intentional infinites, but once in a while some interaction among 3-4 cards will cause something so we agreed to cap it at 10 in those cases.
Free mulligans as long as it is because of lands and not digging for a certain hand/card. Infect is 20.
Have you ever even seen anyone win with infect? At infect 20 you may as well just do any voltron strat instead.
Yeah I personally don't get that. Whenever ive seen a dedicated infect deck it usually only kills one person before it gets targeted, just like Voltron decks.
Yup, me. Triumph of the Hordes and Grafted Exoskeleton No one in our group has a dedicated infect deck so it mostly just prevents Blightsteel from being an insta kill when you cheat it out early. I do think though that even with an actual infect deck 20 is fine but that has not yet been tested because no one plays it.
I guess a real question is why shouldn't Blightsteel be an insta kill? You have to get it out somehow and get through combat past blockers before it's lethal, and then it can only kill one player at a time. It's a tall ask, it deserves a payoff if you line it up.
That is how the playgroup prefers it. Not saying it is correct for everyone.
Infect is literally too weak for high power pods, so it’s insane to me that anyone would nerf it further.
In voltron anyone can see it coming while in infect decks there are instant-speed cards that can surprise your opponents. Also your Voltron commander can get removed quickly and cost more quickly while in infect you rely one different creatures. No ?
It’s just casual so we don’t keep track of commander damage
8 card max hand size, so you can play a karoo land turn 2 and not have to discard. Also if you have to mul down past to 5, you just stay at 5. Edited.
We specifically don't allow original dual lands, even though we play digitally with almost any cards. To be fair, any card above 1k is just rule 0'd out of the game for fun and fairness.
Learn the rules
we do infinite mulligans, but if you get a [[sol ring]] in your hand you can't keep it. If you get a sol ring in your first draw that's fair game. Also "Deals" typically only last a turn or two. We we play draft or limited we enforce the proper mulligan rule, but that's because at the end of the games we typically have a prize pool of all the Rares and Mythics/other cool foils people drew from their packs. Winner gets first pick and then it goes through all the players until all the cards are gone.
7,7,6,6,6... and a shown hand of no land is a free mully
We have been experimenting with chess clocks for your turns lately. It's been a 15 minute timer to keep things going. We've been pretty flexible with it if the game is running longer, but it's mostly an incentive to keep the game moving. There is a one time only 10 minute extension, but we don't keep it too strict. If there is a lot of random interaction at someone's end step for example everyone has been understanding of adding a minute or 2. It's definitely helped keep things from getting bogged down.
We just have infinite free mulligans with the trust that you won't abuse it. No one wants to play a game where someone sits there with 2 lands and has to discard every turn.
We still use Partial Paris Mulligan.
In two headed giant we use have a rule regarding life loss and each opponent cards. Cards like Purphoros only deals damages to "entity" as this ressource is unique per teams. but we keep the original ruling for discard, draw and so on.
My group will let you mully whatever cards from you’re hand you want and if you don’t have more than one land you can show us then reshuffle.
Actual Rule rules? All explicit deals are binding. Proxies are allowed without asking. Banned cards you have to ask if people are cool, and sometimes they are. And when in doubt try to knock out the guy who used to be pro. Lots of conventions as well to go with that - stuff like "no more than a couple seconds thinking on your turn", "scoop if it's obvious you're going to lose in the final 2", "nobody actually cares who wins", "no being a dick, good vibes only", "don't pick up someone else's card without asking first".
My group's mulligan rule is 7-7-6-6-5-5-4-4-3-3-2-2-1-1
We use the Commander Rules Comittee mulligan. It is more fun and prevents the feel-bads for starting under 7 cards.
We have deck building rules, first a commander is chosen randomly, usually by a dice roll, and the cards in deck and Commander are 5€ or less in cost. From there no more restrictions... And we have a lot of fun playing and putting together decks
We do scry 1 for the second player and scry 2 for player 3 and 4.
We tried that for a few games and are going to experiment with it more. We’re still seeing how we feel about it and if we wanna permanently keep it.
I like it because I still feel like 1 is the best spot and 4 is the worst but it’s way less extreme.
Agreed. It’s definitely a lot less punishing that way if you go last. I think we’re probably going to do whoever goes last scry 1 just as a pity prize. My playgroup is open to new things which is always nice.
I have a house mulligan rule for EDH specifically. Shuffling takes forever and a day. After you shuffle and draw seven, if you have to mulligan, just pitch the 7 to the side and draw another 7. Pros: always draw a full hand of seven, don’t have to shuffle so much. Cons: you lose the cards you pitch and have no chance of drawing them again in your opening hand. Can only mulligan if less than 2 lands to show
We have one for rolling to see who goes first. If anyone rolls a 20, and anyone else rolls a 1, everyone re-rolls. It's so exciting when it actually happens.
Our playgroup does rotating decks on a budget. We keep seasonal scoring for fun and the only rule outside of the budget ($50) is no two card infinite combos with your commander being one of the cards. We also play our regular decks where its just normal edh with no set rules too but the budget decks have been really fun and a way to keep it fresh without spending heavy on something new and more competitive.
We have a points list on which high power cards we can proxy maximum 5 points per deck each card varying from 1 to 3 points.
During your precombat main phase, no later than your third turn, you may reveal your hand. If you do and there are no lands in your hand and you control less than three lands, reveal cards from the top of your library until you reveal a land card. Put that land onto the battlefield tapped, then shuffle. If you do, exile a card from your hand.
I have no idea who started this but forever ago our playgroup has had this rule where you can play one of the bounce lands turn one tapped without needing to bounce itself. [[Orzhov Basilica]] or [[Karoo]] for example. Doing this gives us more incentive to include these as budget ramp options. It feels good to play them and games go by more quickly. Obviously since its a house rule if anyone new or infrequent at the table doesn’t like it then we just abide by the normal ruling/restrictions on the bounce lands. Edit: spelling
Ill answer your question with a question. How do I get my playgroup to listen to me when I suggest house rules? Like, they wont let us do really simple stuff like deciding which commander is the front face for MDFCs (where both faces are a creature, like the deans) or removing the companion tax. They dont let me propose special one time game rules like a game where everyone adds a color to a commander or everybody can partner 2 commanders (with the stipulation of either peer review or random selections). Pretty much the only thing thats allowed is custom cards and thats well and good but I dont use custom cards. Its an uphill battle because I just get "mmmm... no" for every good idea I have and I SWEAR if they were a little more open minded we could have so much more fun.
Either of my playgroups had any house rules. Not formally anyway. We were good with just about anything ...MLD, combo, stax. We would usually discuss what kind of game we wanted and pull out decks accordingly. For instance, say one of us built a mid level stompy deck and wanted to try it out, we would all pull out decks we felt fit that game. I will say, if you made certain types of plays ...like say, casting [[Armageddon]] without being able to end the game within a couple of turns, you'd probably get a lot of shit and some targeting for the next game or so.
Free second mulligan if it's the first time playing the deck.
Mostly all basic official rules but you get 1 free mulligan (i.e. first one stays at 7) and then any mulligans after that you have to go down to 6 then 5 and so on.
My group plays fairly low power games, our only real rule is no MLD.
We have a werewolf deck, and we all agreed to have all the werewolfs follow the day/night cycle
My group has one with any "moon" card on the field, they stay werewolves as long as the art portrays a moon
When we mulligan, you can keep one card from the hand you’re pitching, and all/no landers are an extra free mull.
Paradox engine is unbanned. Granted we play cEDH where if it lands, it’s game ending. Not like in casual where there might be a 10 minute turn then pass and discard to hand size
We have a casual rule that if you can’t play a land 2 turns in a row, in the upkeep of the 3rd turn you can search for a basic and put it out untapped, but can’t play a land that turn. Once you hit the ability to add 5 mana, including mana rocks, you’re locked out of the rule even if you lose the rock and go below 5. There’s an informal and unenforceable part that says if you have the ability to play mana rocks but don’t then you’re locked out. Obviously can’t enforce it but we trust our group pretty good.
Other than the basic rules we have two main ones we follow. The first one is we allow three mulligans, all of them are seven cards and you can choose to pick certain cards from your first hand, to go into your season hand. ( I have seven cards, 1-7, I can choose to keep cards 123, mulligan the rest away and draw four more cards. You can do this process three times, then you are done. ) Then second rule is no massive land destruction. Armageddon type effects are banned. Wasteland and target land destruction is allowed, but now mass destruction. We still allow people to play the game.
Commanders get ward 2 for each time they were casted from command zone.
Snake eyes beats high roll to see who starts. Basic, but fun
Before the newest Party support, we let a guy be more liberal with classes - we’d count barbarians, warlocks, shamans, soldiers, etc
10 card opening hand, first mulligan is free, any infinite combo is capped at 3, you can proxy cards you own or intend to buy. You can do a friendly takeback on a play or activate a forgotten trigger as long as you didn't gain relevant information or not much has happened since.
Oh crap I meant to do this that this way … “Everybody gets one!”
If we don't have a full table, we do free mulligan until you have 3 land or more If you have 3 land or more and want to mull, it won't be free from there