@illumfolly lol, nope.

seriously, Ruric thar isn't very good, and a single tournament where he did "alright" is not enough to warrant moving him up.

the is that he paints a target on you, even if he does apply pressure, b/c everyone wants their spells. Not to mention that b/c he is forced to attack the aggro will provoke people and possibly force him to attack into death.

overall, much better commanders, but even not considering that he's still pretty meh.

The only problem that I see with Ruric is that he'll do amazing in a competitive meta (as seen) but not so well in a casual meta. Cards like Meltdown, Ground Seal, and Blood Moon are amazing against the decks that rely on shaky combos, but not so well on decks that like to durdle for the first few turns then cast dragons and angels. I believe I posted an anti-meta deck a while back that was rejected as we were basing the tiers off of individual decklists. Maybe times have changed, but we should put a disclaimer that this deck is specifically anti-meta.

My attempts to build a $400 Mayael the Anima deck, and lesser decks for Thraximundar, Purphoros, God of the Forge and Anafenza, the Foremost have all failed to win a MP pod. Naturally, I'm looking elsewhere, starting with this list. Jeleva, Nephalia's Scourge sounds like it could be fun to build around, but one of the other players in my meta is building her, and I'm avoiding mirror matches. Now maybe a little discussion?

Pretext: I can't afford or build any Tier 1 decks, so I'm forced to look into T2 and beyond.

• Alesha, Who Smiles at Death: I play her as an aggro deck in tiny leaders, so I guess I can't imagine her as a Tier 2 commander with a stax archetype around her? I don't play stax, so maybe I'm too nubile, but don't you want stax affects to stay on board and not swing into their inevitable deaths?

• My other grixis option is Sedris, the Traitor King, who sounds fun since I developed a strong love for reanimator during the Theros block. However, you linked a $4,500 deck. Srsly? Now I gotta google Sedris decks for people not named Bill Gates.

• I want to be sold on Yisan, Wanderer Bard due to his mono-colored nature, but in multiplayer there's so much removal that there's almost no way I'd ever be tutoring for more than a Reclamation Sage. I may not be well versed in green cards thru the history of magic, but I feel like a mono-green deck would lack answers with 3+ other players building bigger boards than your own. Having never played him, it's improper to say he's not Tier 1, but as I'm typing, I just can't fathom it.

• Cheers.

I can say with certaintly that if you play with yisan you will almost always have the biggest board. I would encourage you to play some solitaire with a good yisan deck on tapped out before you dismiss him. He make himself immune to most spot removal by turn 3 every single game and green has tons of effectively costed answers to everything but creatures. The lack of creature removal is rarely an issue tbh since competitive edh is usually creature light and you will almost always have more creatures than anyone else on the board

Just a sidenote: I feel like 90% of the Yisan hate is due to ignorance. He looks like he would suck if you have never seen him in action and most people labor under the misconception that green "lacks answers" so people assume he must suck.

thewyzman: Some responses:

• Jeleva isn't usually built around; she's a placeholder (most off the time) for Grixis Storm.

• Alesha is also played as a placeholder about 60% of the time, it's just that the other Mardu generals are bad.

• The amazing thing about Yisan is that you can build him to your meta. For example, my meta is artifact/enchantment heavy, so I run a bunch of cards that might be dead in other groups: Natural State, Nature's Claim, Deglamer. You may want to run anti-removal cards: Sylvan Safekeeper, Oak Street Innkeeper, maybe Soul of New Phyrexia. Play a few games with placeholder cards, then get the anti-meta cards.

But, yeah, Tier 2 Ruric Thar... it'd be funny

@thewyzman: If you're looking for budget Sedris, I can recommend a few cost reducing replacements. The core of the deck (Splinter Twin combo and a strong foundation of wheels, tutors, and control elements) is relatively cheap. The main cost comes from cards like Imperial Seal: cards that aren't extremely important to the function. Just give a price to work with and I can easily whip a list up.

Also, if you want a budget competitive commander, Yisan is one of your best bets. Here is a link to a short write up of budget Yisan with several deck links.

So... wait.. okay, I get that he is anti-meta, but then you have Gaddock Teeg. Is the teegmonster not an anti-competitive card? He does pretty horrible in casual as well, but hoses a lot of competitive decks.

Teeg actually isn't all that bad in most casual games, because there's always someone trying to cast big dumb spells like Nissa's Rev or Evangelize and cheap spot removal is usually eschewed for splashy wraths or Insurrection effects. People can still cast spells (albeit painfully) through Thar, but with Teeg in play they just can't.

NarejED, more than anything I'm looking to make aSedris deck with the several hundred grixis cards I have, but if I had to throw down a budget, I'd say $200 (ignoring land base) and worthy of taking down a Narset and/or karador deck

I hate to stir up the mono-green honey pot again so soon after the Yisan discussion, but Seton, Krosan Protector to Tier 2? It's been the general consensus recently over on r/cEDH that he's currently the second strong mono green commander after Yisan, essentially playing 'druid storm' and comboing out most games by turn 4 at the latest.

Also, @thewyzman: Here's a budget version of Sedris I was able to whip up. Sedris Budget. The maybeboard consists of cards that were excluded for budget reasons, but are at the top of the list of cards to add if possible.

NarejED, you can build a "shaman storm" build out of Sachi, Daughter of Seshiro just as easily, should we be moving her up too?

CommanderTherory's list from about 9 months ago. It's not optimized, but it should give you an idea.

I am really interested in that Sachi, Daughter of Seshiro idea. I have playtested it a bit and it is far from optimized, but something funny might come out of it.

There do is a major difference between her and Seton, Krosan Protector though. Seton doest requires your creatures to have haste for them to tap for mana. Also, his CMC is one less... Even if it is more green intensive. The upside of Sachi is that she taps for two mana.

I also think there is a better druid support than shaman, but I am saying this without looking up first, so I might be wrong.

Can I ask why Braids, Conjurer Adept isn't Teir 4?

Braids tier 5!?! There are some incredibly crap commanders in tier 4 that are miles worse than Braids. Im no expert but most cEDH lists have an extremely low cc. How is she not anti-meta? I give you a free Sol Ring I give myself Mindslaver. There is also potential in her abilty to make it onesided enough to do something degenerate. I would imagine Leyline of Anticipation would be involved but I don't really know.

I understand that the random factor makes her not cutthroat competitive but I could see 4 possibly low 3.

Yeah, Braids should be bumped up. Tier 4 at the lowest. I believe moving her up was brought up before, but it got lost in the shuffle.

@Lilbrudder I've PLAYED Yisan dude.

now, my meta might be different from everyone else's, but it probably isn't THAT different.

It got destroyed. In the one game i was left alone I ended it on turn 5 with craterhoof + lots of meeples. In all the other games, however, he stayed out for 1 or 2 rounds tops. It didn't go anywhere. Everything got destroyed, and Aven Mindcensor was played. then torpor the next game. hushwing. etc. he's supremely vulnerable in the color that is pretty much the one with the least removal and prevention. He deserves his spot at a high tier 2, but I still feel like he should be out of tier 1.

As for braids, shes NOT tier 5! I've played her effectively with lots of beaters, and she won a few. high Tier 4.

@DERPLINGSUPREME Not to poke a bear, but I would chalk up an anecdotal experience like that to small sample size. There's only a small number of playable cards that can hate on Yisan's ability (two of them are in the worst color) and it seems you experienced them all. I'm sure every tier one general can go through a handful of scenarios like the ones you described.

Okay so I should have read the rules in full. I play Braids as my casual commander. I apologize for that. But I feel like my point still stands and I'm glad it started the discourse about her placement. (Which I thought at the time was a bit silly lol)

Any interaction with Yisan immediately slows it down -- if not shuts in down.

Torpor Orb is not even in a color.. and the small number of playable cards that hate on Yisan are the same small number of cards that are played by many decks with the intention of shutting down many strategies. All of the solid hate bears constitute "a small number of cards", but they are all good enough to handle Yisan and more. Sure, Yisan has a favorable matchup against resource denial, but not against outright lock strategies.

I really don't know, but all of my playtesting with Yisan has given middling results.

• Elf Storm -- Rule of Law, Linvala, Keeper of Silence, Cursed Totem

• Yisan generally -- Containment Priest, Hushwing Gryff, Torpor Orb, Humility, Grafdigger's Cage, Phyrexian Revoker, Pithing Needle, Linvala, Keeper of Silence ... even Consume the Meek, Sudden Spoiling, Sudden Death, Lodestone Golem

A good derevi, gaddock list plays most of these cards and more. Other commanders have access to fast, efficient removal and to counterspells ... which make them inherently better than Yisan in at least their ability to interact with opponents.

I really like Yisan, but diruptive strategies slow it down and it doesn't immediately win the game. As I said before, that seems really fit for tier 2. It truly does compete well with tier one decks, but if an early counter strategy card hits the board before Yisan starts moving, then the deck struggles to find a way around that and catch up.

To a certain extent, there are plenty of cards that deal with non-creature hate pieces available to Yisan, but creature hate bears or counterspell defended prison pieces are difficult for mono-green to dislodge, more so than other color identities.

I'm on the "Braids is goddamn awful" train.

Yes, most cEDH decks have a low curve, but that doesn't mean they can't take advantage of the free effect. In fact, MOST decks play cards like Consecrated Sphinx, Notion Thief, Elesh Norn, Dead-eye Navigator, Palinchron, Venser, Rune-Scarred Demon, Sidisi, Peregrine Drake, Gilded Drake, Azusa, Gilded Lotus, Oracle, Teferi, E-Witness, a boatload of manarocks, utility artifacts etc and will have one of these cards in their hand.

So you play your braids, each opponent gets to cast their best card in hand for free, and THEN their low curve comes into play, because it's chock full of removal, so good bye Braids and no upkeep trigger for you.

Braids is flat out awful unless you can flash her in at the end of your turn. She's a very fun commander to play, but she isn't remotely competetive.I guess a mono blue control deck dedicated to flashing her in EOT and then trying to win off the free spell would work somewhat, but the crux of the matter is that she can't cheat sorceries or enchantments, so even if you pull it off, you just went through a shitload of trouble to get a free Jin-Gitaxias (Which probably won't live long enough to draw you any cards).

But the thing is Sleazebag, you're talking about a group hug deck. Ultimately the point is that the person who drops the Elesh Norn turn 5 is the person who everyone turns to and goes...WTF? Now granted she is better if flashed in. But she's also very specifically built to be abused by you. Also you must be in a heavy spot removal meta. Mine is not nearly so difficult to keep her alive in.

Braids with Phasing is probably the best use of her I have seen.

Definitely not competitive, but better than t5 for sure