Swords to plowshares is bad, and here's why
Commander (EDH) forum
Posted on June 1, 2015, 2:27 p.m. by Indigoindigo
Title got your attention? Good. I came across this article and thought it was a really good read, discussing several EDH-concepts I haven't thought about. I'm eager to hear your opinions on it, and if any competitive players disagree with any of it's points.
The title is a trap! Now I must read this article, damn you!
June 1, 2015 2:40 p.m.
Indigoindigo says... #4
I'll give myself a smack for clickbaiting, but I really thought it was a good article worth sharing.
June 1, 2015 2:44 p.m.
NotSoLuckyLydia says... #6
Long post ahead, TL;DR at the bottom.
You know what happens when you play no one for one removal, targeted discard, or counterspells in your deck? Elfball. Eldrazi. Hermit Druid. I see people saying this all the time, and claiming that you don't need removal, because it's card disadvantage. You know what the biggest source of card disadvantage is? Losing. That's 100 cards that your opponent just got rid of. If you don't have ways to interact with your opponent, then you get steamrolled by them doing broken things. Having ways to disrupt the opponent when they're doing degenerate things is how you're going to get to do degenerate things.
That's why many of the best decks in competitive multiplayer are combo-control. I won't summon epoch, but I'm sure he'll see this. The logic in this article is clearly skewed towards playing with and against mediocre decks. When your opponent is casting a hermit druid, and you don't have a removal spell like lightning bolt or swords to plowshares, you lose. That's it. Game over. They pulled off a 300 for 1. Because if there's 3 opponents, each with a 100 card deck, that's 300 cards they just made completely irrelevant by playing a creature that you need to be able to remove or counterspell so you don't die the next turn. The main logic of this article falls apart when your opponent plays Deadeye, or Phantasmal Images a palinchron.
Articles like this are actually a huge hindrance to getting into more competitive levels of edh. Because if you go in thinking "Nobody will be able to interact with me because I'm not interacting with them!" you will get steamrolled by better decks, with better backup plans, and better interaction. This is really easy to demonstrate when playing on mtgo. I regularly play using Karador, 5C Hermit Druid, and mono green elfball. Karador and hermit druid, because they have a significant amount of interaction to deal with the opponent's unfair things, tend to do better than the elfball deck against powerful decks. (Such as Doomsday, Ad Nauseam, other Hermit decks, and Animar.) When the deck steamrolls an opponent, the most common complaint is that they couldn't do anything about it. But a counterspell on Hermit Druid is akin to several time walks. Swords to Plowshares is among the best way to deal with many of the death trigger creatures out of Karador.
Yes, you're losing card parity in the moment when you cast swords to plowshares. But if you don't run swords to plowshares, you'll lose games that you could've won by playing interaction.
TL;DR This article doesn't take into account good decks that play good cards, and by selling itself as an article to help people play competitively, it does more harm than good in the development of players who want to improve their play.
June 1, 2015 3 p.m.
TurboFagoot says... #7
I was about to make a post on how stupid this concept is, but Lydia covered it pretty thoroughly. Great, less typing for me.
June 1, 2015 3:09 p.m.
I don't see an issue with a little bit of spot removal. Sometimes, a permanent just has to be dealt with. Most cards that are X-for-1 effects in non-Blue colors are sorcery speed, so how are they supposed to deal with the combo player without some form of instant speed spot removal?
I'm not saying a deck has to contain a lot, but a single Swords to Plowshares, Hero's Downfall, Beast Within, or Chaos Warp in a deck can help when something has to be dead right now.
June 1, 2015 3:16 p.m.
Yeah this article is just wrong. The mere threat of spot removal is required to keep combo decks in check. Without it everyone would be turn 3 winning every time.
Stop running 1-for-1, instant speed removal/counterspells and get ready to lose hard to combo.
June 1, 2015 3:18 p.m.
ThisIsBullshit says... #10
This is why playing Duel Commmander is great. 1 for 1s are just that.
I ditto what Lydia said. If you don't run removal, then you're going to get rekt by the Kaalia players, the Eldrazi players, and the asshole that's going to run Hermit Druid. You'll lose to basically anything that you can't stop with your own game plan, and that turns into "who can combo off faster" and that's just degenerate.
June 1, 2015 3:23 p.m.
RoarMaster says... #11
Nobody said dont run removal... And using Hermit Druid, the fastest combo in the format is not the best example.
June 1, 2015 3:40 p.m.
Except he literally did when he said this -
"You lose because you spend your entire game answering threats one for one, and drawing a card or two to try and pull ahead. In the meantime, while opponent 1 is sitting there with all his creatures answered, opponents 2 and 3 play out some creatures of your own, and kill you. And you have run out of cards to answer them.
This happened because whenever you play a one for one trade spell, such as spot removal"
June 1, 2015 3:42 p.m.
NotSoLuckyLydia says... #13
RoarMaster this article is about competitive, so I used a competitive example. But okay. Deadeye Navigator. Elfball. Eldrazi. Animar. Karador. Kaalia. You need things out of all those DEAD. Or you lose.
June 1, 2015 3:44 p.m.
RoarMaster says... #14
Yeah, he is talking about 1-for-1 spot removal, Im talking about removal in general. Pure/Simple, Wrath of God, ect, its not to hard to cast 3-4 cost spells on turn 2 in the format really.
June 1, 2015 3:45 p.m.
MindAblaze says... #16
I think what the take home is, and I don't think it came across very well, is that if you try to answer every card 1:1 you're going to run out of cards.
To that I say "Duh."
June 1, 2015 3:48 p.m.
RoarMaster says... #17
ChiefBell Do I really need to link a bunch of 3-4 cost instant speed non-1-for-1 removal for you too? Or can you figure it out yourself that those cards exist and can be used?
June 1, 2015 3:51 p.m.
Rhadamanthus says... #18
I think the author inadvertently missed the point he actually ended up making: It's not that 1-for-1s are bad, it's that trying to build/play an Aggro or Control deck for multiplayer Commander using the same strategies as for 1v1 60-card games is doomed to failure.
NotSoLuckyLydia's point about a "300 for 1" is very important to keep in mind. You need an agile way to interact with your opponents at a moment's notice and by the nature of Magic design almost all such effects are going to be 1-for-1s. An infinite combo, or even just a strong synergy that throws out overly large numbers, always hinges around 1 or 2 key objects. A good player with a good deck who's actually trying to win already has an answer for your Humility/Grafdigger's Cage/whatever that they can blatantly see sitting there on the battlefield (and I bet that answer is a 1-for-1). If you don't have the Countersquall or the Swords to Plowshares then you just lose.
June 1, 2015 3:56 p.m.
I don't know about Chiefbell, but I'm genuinely curious if there are cards I haven't heard of, RoarMaster. Especially if they're non-conditional (i.e. not like Reckless Spite), and cover every color.
June 1, 2015 3:57 p.m.
Yeh. If you could find a large amount of 3 mana, instant speed spells that destroy multiple creatures I'll commend you.
June 1, 2015 3:59 p.m.
RoarMaster says... #21
meecht Nothing is covered in every color. And Reckless Spite is about as conditional as Swords to Plowshares.
June 1, 2015 4 p.m.
I don't like this kind of concept. There are so many cards you don't need to deal with. Even if you have card disadvantage, losing to a big creature with Tainted Strike feels bad although there are so many possibilities to not lose to that... A good deck does not need to deal with every threat because your opponents are busy with dealing with yours.
June 1, 2015 4:01 p.m.
RoarMaster says... #24
ChiefBell Im at work atm, but ill do your guys dirty work on my break and do some card searches for you.
June 1, 2015 4:02 p.m.
Reckless Spite says "target nonblack creatures" whereas Swords to Plowshares says "target creature." That's an important restriction when you're staring down Triskelion + Mikaeus, the Unhallowed combo.
June 1, 2015 4:04 p.m.
My feelings on the issue of the article and it's stance on spot removal is adequately summed up by the following gif
June 1, 2015 4:21 p.m.
Schuesseled says... #28
Almost laughed out my skin when he said Serra Ascendant is bad. Guy has no clue.
Being able to kill one or two opponents for one mana, as this is what this guy does, is ridiculous.
June 1, 2015 4:24 p.m.
Schuesseled says... #29
There is something called over-analyzing which this article is super guilty of. Yes, spot removal gives you card disadvantage (and your target) in a free for all situation, but it also stops you taking 20 trample damage to the face. Which is precisely why you would include it.
June 1, 2015 4:30 p.m.
EndStepTop says... #30
Schuesseled that is a bad card, by virtue of how many opponents you need to kill.A 6/6 for 1 is great but when you have access to the combos you do in edh it's a moot point, your foe(s) will opt to win instead.
June 1, 2015 4:36 p.m.
I've seen somebody go T1 Serra Ascendant followed by Ajani, Caller of the Pride and Gisela, Blade of Goldnight over the next few turns of a game. Everyone died before they even got set up. The power is real...on the nut draw.
June 1, 2015 4:44 p.m.
Epochalyptik says... #32
I got to the "I may cast one land" bit and had to pause before continuing.
I won't say that this guy knows nothing about competitive Commander, but it's clear that he understands very little about the game in general. If you think that casting Swords to Plowshares on Consecrated Sphinx is inherently the same as casting Heroes' Reunion in response to a Lightning Bolt, you are so far up your own ass that you can see out of your mouth. It's like he's trying too hard to be a statistician and not trying hard enough to play the game.
The fact of the matter is that responses are necessary. If you cannot respond to your opponents' moves, you will likely lose. Your 1:1 or 1:3 card parity arguments don't mean anything if I can combo you out of the game unmolested on turn three while you durdle with your Divination effects.
This is ultimately why pseudo-theorists end up making bad arguments. They want to play numbers games, but they don't bother quantifying all of the values at play and end up putting up arguments like this article, which say that it's fine to build glass cannon decks, but that you're an idiot if you try to counter your opponent's haymaker. At some point, you have to realize that, in the numbers game, tactical advantage, strategic advantage, and simply not losing the game all have relative value. It's also not worth trying to assign complex values or formulas to these things because it's very unlikely that you'll produce an honest representation of the reality of the game.
To give a little more background on this idea:
Tactical advantage is a benefit or advancement of your position realized immediately at the time of your play. It's something that you do in order to prevent something from happening right now, or it's something that you do to make a play right now.
Strategic advantage is a benefit or advancement of your position realized later on in the game. It's how you build up your posture slowly over the course of several turns.
Tactical advantage is playing a Swords to Plowshares to kill a creature that will combo off next turn or a creature that might kill you this turn.
Strategic advantage is using your Demonic Tutor to find your Consecrated Sphinx so you can continue advancing your position in the game over time.
Now, these terms represent a wide range of actions and a wide range of investments. They cannot be summarily evaluated using a single metric or a value in a formula. They're plays that have complex effects on the flow of the game and the posture of each player.
And they're precisely why these strict card parity arguments fail to offer valuable insight regarding the format.
I'm utterly astonished that someone could write an article on the value of prison effects and yet refuse to acknowledge, by extension, the value of individual answers to threats. It's a perfect example of cherrypicking and confirmation bias whereby the author only accepts examples of cards that don't 1:X you rather than cards that establish less quantifiable advantage.
I'm beyond astonished that someone could even begin to seriously argue that control is terrible in multiplayer Commander when almost all of the decks ("almost" here being a caveat in case a counterexample even exists) that define competitive multiplayer Commander live and die by their ability to control the game. Combo-control is the archetype to play.
Why? Because it does two things: (1) it gives you a solid and efficient win condition and (2) it lets you shut down other people's win conditions. How does it accomplish the second function? Spot removal. The seemingly unforgivable sin of running surgically precise answers is exactly what allows control to pick the moments at which it can hit its opponents the hardest. How much is buying another two turns worth? How much is invalidating two other combo pieces worth? Oh. You weren't counting? I was.
The author almost redeemed himself by arguing that the "Force of Will principle" is a legitimate phenomenon, but he simply refused to extend the principle to account for situations in which a loss of tempo is an acceptable trade for other kinds of advantage.
In fact, the author was on the very verge of an anagnorisis when he observed that Hermit Druid plays control elements in order to counteract incoming disruption. But again, failure to realize that this highlights a critical reality of the format is his downfall.
Someone who thinks that losing a Strip Mine to get rid of a Gaea's Cradle is a bad move because it isn't a complete solution to your problems is unqualified to assess a competitive environment. That's the end of the line. If you can't understand that cards have tactical and strategic value beyond just being the number of pieces of cardboard you have at any one time, then you are inviting others to educate by example.
June 1, 2015 6:29 p.m. Edited.
Personally I can't agree with the article, there needs to be responses to threats even if there seems to be a card disadvantage. You don't have to respond to all threats, just the ones that doesn't get answered; the other opponents will also want to win and will do what they can to prevent other combos from going off as they try set theirs.
June 1, 2015 7:17 p.m.
DERPLINGSUPREME says... #34
NO ONE who plays EDH, or ANY other format should agree. ESPECIALLY EDH!
one word reason: Avacyn.
June 1, 2015 8:55 p.m.
Epoch, do you plan on leaving a comment on the article page?
June 1, 2015 9:19 p.m.
Xavier4238 says... #37
"That is, if you somehow could play a deck that consisted entirely of 0 mana instants that dealt 12 damage to a player, that would be only just acceptable."
I think he's twisting this a bit, just a little teeny bit ...
June 1, 2015 9:41 p.m.
Epochalyptik says... #38
@xzzane: I did, but then I saw that the article is from 2013 and I stopped.
June 1, 2015 9:46 p.m.
Take Zedruu for example; a deck that aims to just be a giant prick to everyone on the field by giving them bad permanents. It might need to include spot removal, just because it wants to be very political and have total control over interactions between players. Also, a deck that runs ONLY spot removal can't win, of course. Which is why decks run actual cards.
(If any of what I'm saying is wrong, don't hesitate to correct me, I'm kinda tired today.)
June 1, 2015 9:47 p.m.
Epochalyptik says... #40
Oh, and there are only two posts on that site, and they haven't updated it since the above article. Not exactly what I'd call a reputable source of information.
June 1, 2015 9:50 p.m.
Didgeridooda says... #42
I will go back, and read the article later, but I did read the comments here. From what I gather the article does not encompass my understanding of the format at any level. Casual EDH needs spot removal as well.
As far as you go RoarMaster could you please go into detail as to why you feel that way? I am curious what the counter argument is to the general consensus of the comments here. I can not wrap my head around that side.
June 2, 2015 12:28 a.m.
biggestmtgnerd says... #43
It's an interesting article, but not quite correct. First of all, Serra Ascendant does make a 12 point life swing, with 6 to the opponent and 6 life from lifelink. Second, he didn't understand how easily combo can kill if it's not disrupted. I think that he actually did represent combo-control by saying how a control deck should run combo pieces, so I won't fault him for that. I think the point that he's trying to get across is that only running a few counterspells is better than being the draw go player
June 2, 2015 1:13 a.m.
Repeatable sources of removal at instant speed in EDH:
Attrition + Tokens
Aura Shards + Any way to have a creature ETB at instant speed (Pentavus)
Mimic Vat + spot removal on a stick (For best results, use Ashen Rider)
Mimic Vat + mass removal on a stick (False Prophet + sac engine, Sunblast Angel, Magister of Worth in 1 on 1.)
Instant speed reanimation + removal on a stick (Chainer, Dementia Master + Fleshbag Marauder)
I'd rather be running any of these than Swords to Plowshares. If I include 1 for 1 removal in a deck I make sure it's a catch all like Oblation, Chaos Warp, or Beast Within.
June 2, 2015 1:33 a.m.
Indigoindigo says... #45
The post actually answers all the "But what about X card, if someone plays it you will lose"-arguments. The author doesn't say that you shouldn't run countermagic, only 1-for-1 removal like Swords to Plowshares, Path to Exile, etc.
"By running counters such as Force of Will, Pact of Negation, Foil, and Thwart, you can represent countermagic and control presence without any sacrifice in tempo, but with a definite sacrifice in card advantage. This is a necessity of a format in which a player can cast turn one Hermit Druid and win the next turn. Why it must be free is because, while you need to counter that play, you cannot afford to do so at the cost of your own tempo, or you will sacrifice position to the other two opponents."
Epochalyptik: "I'm beyond astonished that someone could even begin to seriously argue that control is terrible in multiplayer Commander when almost all of the decks ("almost" here being a caveat in case a counterexample even exists) that define competitive multiplayer Commander live and die by their ability to control the game. Combo-control is the archetype to play."
In the article I think the author is arguing for combo-control, but not pure control. As biggestmtgnerd says, "I think that he actually did represent combo-control by saying how a control deck should run combo pieces, so I won't fault him for that."
The author is from the TopCommander group on Facebook. They have a few decklists online that looks really solid, but I have little experience with competitive play and is no way an expert. I've seen people on MTGSalvation saying that he's a regular on Cockatrice and that his decks are brutal, though.
June 2, 2015 3:56 a.m.
That makes no sense. Countermagic proactively addresses one threat played by one person. Removal reactively addresses one threat played by one person.
They are almost identical in their respective tempo and card advantage purposes. Perhaps your removal costs 1 or 2 mana and your counterspell costs 0 mana but these are small quibbles if anything at all in a format where 8 mana can be generated T1 without much effort. His arguments are pathetic. Tempo loss is a concern but not when comparing 0 and 1 mana cards. Furthermore there physically do not exist enough 0 mana counterspells to ensure you have one in hand when you need them. Pragmatically that is void.
June 2, 2015 4:41 a.m.
How does running Thwart not mess up your tempo? It sets you three turns back...
Also I'm with ChiefBell, there is literally no difference in card advantage between a counterspell and a removal spell. You can run either as your panic button.
That being said, I think the issue here is not necessarily that removal spells are a loss in card advantage (There's no denying that they are.), but rather that since they are a loss in a card advantage you need to be careful about how many slots of your deck are devoted to keeping problematic permanents from ending the game.
A better use of this article writer's time would have been to calculate how many slots of removal (and counterspells) a deck can support based off of how much card advantage it can reliably produce. (Is the commander a draw engine? Does the deck have a critical mass of spells that can draw a large number of cards? (or tutors for those spells) Is the deck capable of putting other decks extremely far behind it in card advantage? Possibly because it's loaded up with wraths? Or limits the number of cards that can be drawn?)
June 2, 2015 6:24 a.m.
Epochalyptik says... #48
The thing is, the author is trying too hard to make a numbers explanation work and comes across as a pseudointellectual who has no idea what he's talking about. He might very well have several good decks or X amount of experience in the format, but if he cannot understand that spot removal and counterspells are some of the most vital cards in the format and that they are worth playing even at "disadvantage" (card parity is not solely what determines advantage), then he is not in a position to claim to be an expert on the format. This is basic stuff.
He tries at the end to make an argument for combo control, but that doesn't overcome his complete failure to grasp these concepts.
June 2, 2015 6:53 a.m.
RoarMaster says... #49
Didgeridooda Sure, I will expound. For starters, all of the examples given for why spot removal is good in EDH/multiplayer are single player examples, not multiplayer examples like the article was talking about. The whole Hermit Druid example, for example. Some one drops a hermit, your like 'oh dayum, I need to answer that before next turn!' So you Swords it, problem solved right? Spot removal saves the day, right? Maybe if it was 1vs1 yeah, but this is multiplayer. So you Sworded that guys hermit druid, but wait, player number 3 drops another hermit druid on his turn and now your shit outta luck again :( THAT is the difference between duels and multiplayer, multiple 'must answer' cards can and often will be dropped during a round, and spot removal wont save you from losing, just decides who you will give the game to. Mass and multi-target cards can deal with this common issue where single target removal fails. Most of the reasons people are giving for running spot removal are based on the cards cmc, and cmc is and was not the topic discussed in the article.
ChiefBell sorry, I didnt realize we were talking about strictly creature kill cards, I was encompassing all removal in my comments. Off the top of my head for cards that do not lose you card advantage and are instant speed removal, Sever the Bloodline(admittedly at 4 you will lose ca), Slaughter, any black version of Hideous Laughter, any red version of Pyroclasm. But as I said, I was considering artifact and enchantment removal aswell in my view on 1-for-1ing.
EndStepTop says... #2
I agree with what he says more or less. I think spot removal isn't as bad as he makes it to be, but I agree it's tempo loss. I really liked how he addressed how the community sees combo and prison strategies. Really solid article.
June 1, 2015 2:38 p.m.