My first night playing TCGs in the new year, and it was a rather solid night of Commander. I joined 3 other players to make a full pod of 4 for the night, and we got four good games in.
I, for my end, got to play with each of the four decks I brought with me. In order, I played:
1) The Wandering Minstrel - Loss
2) Cloud, Planet's Champion - Win
3) Saheeli, Radiant Creator - Loss
4) Baral, Chief of Compliance - Win
And while I don't have notes on what each of my opponents were playing in each game, that's honestly fine. It has occurred to me that Commander is not exactly a format that's conducive to attempting a play-by-play after the fact, given the tumultuous nature of the format and the pace of play with four separate decks all running at once.
Furthermore, tonight gave me a weird opportunity. In all four games, I kept a hand with one or two lands in them. All four games went incredibly differently for me from there, though.
Game 1 - The Wandering Minstrel
Starting with the Minstrel, my opening hand had Jidoor, Aristocratic Capital and Windurst, Federation Center. Cool, with those two lands, I would be able to drop Minstrel on turn 3 and be able to roll with the game from there.
Or at least, that would be the theory. In a deck with 37 lands, starting with only 2 isn't quite as risky as you might think - statistically, it's a low starting land count (since the deck is, well, just over 37% land since the Minstrel himself sits in the Command Zone, so the average should be around 3), but that just means higher odds of drawing into more lands over the next few turns. I just needed to really hit one by turn 3 and I would have been able to work with that.
I did not hit one by turn 3. Or by turn 4. Or turn 5 or 6.
It was at the point that my opponents were telling me to just go search my deck for a Basic and to play the game from there. I politely declined each time, which... was honestly probably a mistake? But I was the one who kept the two-land hand, I was going to roll with the consequences of that action.
Even if it meant the consequence was that I really did not get to play the game. I made one noteworthy play, and that was using Louisoix's Sacrifice to stop one opponent from playing The One Ring, which cost me my Minstrel to be able to afford it.
Game 2 - Cloud, Planet's Champion
I opened with one colorless land - War Room - alongside Sol Ring and Brotherhood Regalia.
At 35 lands and only 4 mana rocks, this deck has significantly less wiggle room to keep a bad opening hand than the Minstrel does.
And yet, I was not punished. At least, not nearly so badly as the Minstrel was. It took me a couple of turns to hit the mana I needed to "fully" play the game, but I had ample opportunity to drop a few tools into play in advance of Cloud's entrance, and had a couple of other creatures in play that I was able to load up for a couple of early swings. Turn 1, I top-decked a Mountain which on turn 2 let me drop Raubahn into play - who admittedly ate immediate removal - and I did have to use the War Room to draw a few cards at the cost of a bit of life.
But once I did successfully get the mana I needed, I slammed Cloud into play and immediately loaded him up with the Equipment I had previously had waiting for him. Turns out that Trailblazer's Boots giving him Non-Basic Landwalk is incredibly strong since it made my Voltron Deck effectively run with an unblockable Commander. I didn't manage to draw anything that was able to power him up until a few turns later when Ashe, Princess of Dalmasca joined the table and, swinging thanks to the Haste granted by Lightning Greaves, landed me a copy of the Buster Sword.
Teferi's Protection a few turn cycles later kept me alive while one opponent - playing Endrek Sahr, Master Breeder - otherwise wound up in a position where they were able to take out both other opponents at once, leaving me available to swing in for the last few points of Commander damage off of the still very-unblockable Cloud.
Game 3 - Saheeli, Radiant Creator
To be honest, I had forgotten how much land was in this deck. 38 lands with a whole host of mana rocks. So two lands and a Talisman of Impulse should have been more than adequate. Surely I would see another land, right?
Well, I did. A little later than I would've liked, but I got there. I was mostly saved by my Izzet Generatorium, Bespoke Battlewagon, and Conversion Apparatus working together to give me the mana I needed to play the game.
The problem was that I started running into nothing but lands. I didn't have anything to do with my mana, nor with my Energy, and I was stuck durdling a little to try to make a few plays.
Which, unfortunately, was incredibly insufficient. I technically lasted the longest before getting knocked out, but I think that was mostly because I was presenting absolutely zero threat.
Game 4 - Baral, Chief of Compliance
A deck that's designed to play incredibly low to the ground anyway, with a host of inexpensive mana rocks and ways to make my collection of Instants and Sorceries cheaper to cast, the fact that the deck only has 29 lands usually isn't much of a problem.
And this game, that almost wasn't enough. I had a rough time not with mana - I had plenty of that, by game's end, and had once again started with two lands in hand - but with getting anything to do with that mana. I saw precious few of my counter magic - the only spell I distinctly recall was An Offer You Can't Refuse, and that was literally used against me when one player took my turn with Emrakul, the Promised End for a frustratingly efficient turn, where they played my own Sapphire Medallion, countered it with Offer, and used the resulting Treasures to cast Jace, the Mind Sculptor, which they used to bounce their own Emrakul so they could take another player's turn later on. That left me without cards in hand, but I did get to take my own turn after the end of the controlled turn, and Jace's 0-cost Brainstorm effect did some significant work to help me get more cards back in hand.
Despite the Emrakul turn, and despite being knocked to 10 life by the end of the game, I felt like I was targeted down surprisingly little, which saved me in a big way when I was able to scrape together a winning High Tide turn after Narset nabbed a Mystical Tutor for me.
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