By Mark Mahler

There’s an art to denying resources to your opponents in a social game that simply doesn’t need to exist in other formats. No one in a Legacy tournament would so much as bat an eyelash before casually Strip Mine-ing your mana base like some two-bit Captain Planet villain on a weekend bender in the rainforest, but not so in EDH.

We care too much to do that to our fellow Commander players (and we don’t want to incur the wrath of Captain Planet, either).

More precisely, we care too much about being invited back to play another game with our fellow Commander players, so we take care not to flip the idiom and bring the proverbial gun to a friendly knife fight.  Some say that this takes too many of the big bombs out of mono-red’s arsenal, leaving it with barely enough tools to defend itself from even the casual roughhousing of your average EDH playgroup, let alone a viable way to win, but I prefer to say that it merely forces the enterprising red mages amongst us to be a bit more creative.

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by Mark Mahler

One of the best things about the holidays is coming home. Knowing that you’ll be accepted there for who you are, no matter how big a screwup you might be during the other 364 days reminds me of why I love Commander so much: because it’s home for all the black sheep, goofy cousins, annoying brother-in-laws, and weird uncles that our cardboard clan has birthed (and subsequently forgotten) over the years.

In keeping with that spirit, I thought I’d assemble a list of misfit cards that don’t seem to fit anywhere else in the Magic universe except tagging alongside these particular commanders. Whether you call it a niche or a nice fit, it’s still good to know that every card has a home somewhere for the holidays.

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By Mark Mahler

This week I’m wrapping up my discussion of mono-red, the color so nice I had to write about it twice.

It’s no secret that we here on CommanderCast are a bit biased in favor of everyone’s favorite underdog, but if there’s one thing that the new Commander 2014 product proved conclusively, it’s that playing mono-red can be a lot more fun and flexible than haters give it credit for.

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By Mark Mahler

I’ll admit that the last Friday in January is kind of a strange time to be putting out New Year’s resolutions, but I prefer to look on the bright side: now I only have 11 months in which to break them.

Let me just say upfront that I have no idea if these cards will actually be worth playing. In the interest of full disclosure, I’ve never played with any of these cards before, but that’s the whole point: I want to try some new things in the new year and near the top of my list is breaking out some of the benchwarmers in my collection.

I fully expect some of these little guys to flame out once they hit the big leagues, but who knows what the new year will bring, right? I might pull a rookie of the year out these prospects yet. Real talk from an old school Patriots fan: sometimes you keep playing a Drew Bledsoe long after the time in which you should have given a Tom Brady his shot at the big time.  It’s time for change in 2015.

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By Mark Mahler

I hesitate to label anything in EDH – let alone Magic in general – as “best,” as I feel that the word implies a level of competency in this game that I’m sure I don’t possess, but over the next few weeks I want to shine a light on some of them most useful working class heroes of our shared addiction: the commons.

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By Mark Mahler

Welcome to the weekend, Commander faithful.  The only thing sweeter than getting a few days off from the daily grind is using some of that time to dig through the vast trove of Magic chaff for a few choice gems (or, I suppose, spending time with loved ones and friends, for those of you with “priorities” in life). But enough with the intro–we’ve got tech to talk about! On to round two of “Common Sense”!

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