Modern Commander Vs. Legacy Commander

I want to start off this propose idea with an empathetic appeal to all sides of this recent banning decision to ban cards that many people loathed and loved before I go into a proposed solution to this divisive ban list.

Aside from the bird, the rocks and goblin definitely hold a spot in many players hearts as great memories played when everyones’ on the same page, and there is a fast paced high power and efficiency interactive race to the end of a game with including funny downsides like getting your commander Swords to Plowshared after you Jeweled Lotus it out too fast left with two lands and no other way to go, or the hilarious ending of dying to your own Mana Crypt trigger.

But there is also the equally opposite frustrating occurrence of sitting down with some strangers or regulars at your local LGS and the player across from you swears up and down his deck is a “power level 7 jank ‘Ladies Looking Left’ build” and found every obscure excuse to run every over powered staple from this 30yo game and suddenly you’re staring down a board that resembles more of a good stuff pile than what was initially described in the attempted Rule0 convo.

What I’m trying to articulate is that there are good reasons to happy or sad at seeing these cards go. I’ve been on both sides of these examples so when I see comments and conversations about these and people insulting each other over their opinions on the matter, I’ll be frank and say it makes me a bit sad that our mutual love of this game can lead to such division.

Both of these and many other good and bad examples are very real experience to people you probably haven’t met on the other side of the country/world and a lot of people are feeling a lot of type of ways about learning that their hated/favorite cards. Let’s try and not attack each other with insults and accusations of being tryhards for playing powerful cards or crybabies when these cards are played. It’s not productive and really detracts from the Gathering aspect of Magic the Gathering.

BUT Onto the proposed solution.

I think that two formats could coexist and solve a lot of these issues without tedious and frankly ineffective Rule 0 Convos and move it towards a swifter and more comprehensive understanding of the two factions of high power good stuff and low power casual and lead to more satisfying games for all parties involved.

MODERN VS LEGACY.

In a lot of ways higher leaning power levels of Commander is similar to legacy/vintage at the moment with the shared eternal card pool in terms of legality. ABUR duals, Mox Diamond, Gaea’s Cradle, Mana Crypt, Sol Ring, Force of Will, Mana Drain and although maybe not quite as relevant in 1v1 60 card formats, retain powerful cards like Rhystic Study, Mystic Remoral, Demonic Tutor, Vampiric Tutor, & Necropotence. All of these cards and certainly several others I’m not including are among the center of contentious power level debates in circles of commander players but also happen to be older cards that aren’t modern legal.

They simultaneously demand a high 2nd hand price tag which is also similar to Legacy/Vintage. I’m certain many of us know or are players that have very expensive decks that are very pricy and take a lot of pride in and enjoy playing where appropriate. This also includes people that don’t purchase the cards and choose to proxy because they want that high power taste that this game can provide. This is a perfectly valid way to play the game and certainly enjoyable as I have come to know. Myself included. I personally have a deck that I put my whole focus on and hope to never take apart and gave it all the love and powerful cards I could.

At the same time can be leveraged by bad faith players to ruin the experience of people that don’t engage in this play style. It does genuinely suck when someone brings a $5k pile to a pod of modded precons and budget brews.

Modern on the other hand doesn’t rely on these powerful cards but is still a rich card pool and many commander decks mostly consist of mostly Modern legal cards. The major exception being made for commander and cards printed into precons. Cards like Sol Ring, Swords to Plowshares, Dark Ritual, Command Tower, Arcane Signet. Cheap staples that may not have been printed after 8th but printed into nearly every precon ever. A perfectly fine and efficient commander deck can certainly be crafted using this more affordable and accessible card pool and will more closely resemble the mentioned “slower, more social games” that the rules committee is trying to curate for the format they were (for better or for worse depending on which side of this debacle you land on) put in charge of. I own plenty of lower cost decks that I enjoy thoroughly even though I don’t have all the powerful legacy era staples.

MODERN COMMANDER VS LEGACY COMMANDER

The proposed formats would be as followed:

Modern Commander would have the Modern card pool + cards printed into Commander Precons and Commander Products with bans that cater more towards the casual vibes that more or less reflects the aims of the Rules Committee shown today. This would also allow Sol Ring to maintain its status as icon of the format without the double standard of banning Mana Crypt and leaving Sol Ring. There is certainly great merit in casual commander and it’s a large reason Magic is doing as well as it is today.

Legacy Commander would be a true eternal format with bans that cater towards a more balanced competitive environment. It gives a place for people that enjoy powerful cards like Mana Crypt, Jeweled Lotus, Dockside Extoritionist and other powerful cards that many are starting to worry may get banned in the future. It also leaves room for potentially unbanning currently banned cards for an even more fine tuned and aggressive envinroment. This would help give the CEDH crowd a great place to stretch their deck building muscles and enjoy the game how they want to enjoy it.

I would propose specific bans for each but I’m just a single mind with limited knowledge on such a vast game. And of course playtesting and time would bring forth more information and illuminate which formats would need which.

My truest hope is that the disconnect between low and high power tables can be easily delineated and amicably catered towards with as few people feeling as if they have no place at a table. A hypothetical “Rule 0” conversation in this environment would go like this: “Are you playing modern or legacy commander” and that’s it. Perhaps a bit more negotiating on certain cards between certain people would still occur, but large portions of the disagreements would vanish as a lot of problematic cards would be relegated in or out of the respective formats. It would diminish common complaints and give each individual the opportunity to foster environments to their taste much more efficiently and without ambiguity.

POTENTIAL PROBLEMS

I’m not as naive as to think that this proposal would come without its problems. I’d like to be as epistemically honest as I can and hopefully answer any potential problems and engage any potential readers.

Legacy Commander would largely represent current day Commander, moving cards out of decks to get to Modern legality would cause a lot of players to abandon a lot of cards I may not even consider. Perhaps doesn’t have to be a hard cut off at 8th edition, but perhaps the cutoff could be somewhere between where the reserved list cuts off and 8th edition? Or maybe notable exceptions like Ashnod’s Altar which is a popular card could be modern legal but isn’t such a powerful card it needs to be relegated to Legacy?

Also the split could cause confusion for newer and incoming players could be a problem. It could be seen as too confusing and lead to accidentally illegal decks. My thought process behind that is we did it when modern initially split off from legacy and both formats still seem to function today with the initial spirit of the split in tact. Also except for tournament play, maybe accidentally including an inoffensive card that isn’t legal in either format won’t lead to to many hurt feelings.

Problematic cards that have been recently printed would still be problematic like The One Ring or Thassa’s Oracle. Easily banned from Modern Commander and left to Legacy for the high power environment.

I know I’m certainly not getting the whole picture. I’ve had this idea for a while but lack the time and reach to really put this theory out there and get the kinks worked out by people that have much more competence than myself.

TLDR:

The bans today got the whole community up in arms in a way much different than any other decision made by WOTC in the past few years. Makes me sad to see people sad and happy that people are sad. A way I hope works better than I thought would be splitting the format into essentially modern and legacy, that way the high power and low power crowds can have their cake and eat it too.