Melvin and Vorthos in EDH
Commander (EDH) forum
Posted on March 18, 2015, 8:31 p.m. by dagan94
Figured this might be a fun discussion for some folks in the community. EDH in my opinion has always been a format dominated more by Vorthos and Melvin than it is by Timmy, Johnny, and Spike. After all you gotta build around either your commander as a character or by his game mechanics.
How do you prefer to build your decks?
Do you prefer Vorthos, such as the idea of your deck crashing down like a storm? Are you more of Melvin, enjoying finding what interactions work best with your commander to achieve victory?
What are some of the most fun decks you've played with or against, and what made them fun for you?
MindAblaze says... #3
My Mayael the Anima commander deck had a whole backstory behind it as I was constructing it. The idea of a being connected to the behemoths just appealed to me, and bringing Garruk in as support with all his experience with fat creatures really tore at the Vorthos in me...even if it's not totally canon. Mayael allows for a pretty Melvin build with (some) room for not going balls deep...I like it.
March 18, 2015 9:02 p.m.
weisemanjohn says... #4
I have a tendency to build based around my chosen commander and as a result have extremely fragile decks that when they work, work well (I'm looking at you Krenko, Mob Boss and Brago, King Eternal) but if my commander gets targeted (as they do frequently unfortunately) the deck stalls to the point that it no longer functions effectively.
March 18, 2015 9:12 p.m.
I can wholeheartedly agree with this. My Grimgrin deck is purely flavor. Gisa, Geralf, Mikaeus, and (soon) Liliana in the same deck? Sign me up. Heck, Lim-Dul and his vault.
I have issues picking generals and building decks because I like non-linear decks with lots of flavor. To date, Grimgrin is my only stable deck for this reason.
March 18, 2015 9:14 p.m.
Personally my favorite deck is my Braids, Conjurer Adept. Largely I'm driven by my inner Melvin when building it, how do you twist a group hug into a slug. What ways can I use blue mechanics to capitalize the abnormal mechanics that comes with her. My favorite deck I ever played against was a Skittles deck. It was more Vorthos in style, and was a group slug style deck despite the commander, and the battle between us as we crushed those in our way made for one of the most epic games I've ever done. Kind of where I got the title of the deck "clash of wills" from.
March 18, 2015 9:46 p.m.
ThisIsBullshit says... #7
Idk my Kaalia EDH deck is literally just Timmy/Spike, nothing really Melvin or Vorthos about it
March 18, 2015 10:42 p.m.
GhostChieftain says... #8
I guarantee I am a vorthos. However, I feel vorthos is just a patient johnny.
March 18, 2015 11:09 p.m.
@ ThisIsBullshit There are definitely some melvin and vorthos mechanics to Kaalia. With that said if you just want to play a Timmy/spike style commander couldn't have said a better one myself. It can be argued by building angels, demons, and dragons into your deck (I'm assuming, I haven't looked... I'm probably right) there is vorthos, but that doesn't mean that's what your approach was. Those creatures just happened to be the most competitively viable using Kaalia, who happens to be very competitively viable as a Timmy deck.
@ luther Johnny is more about combos and making interesting strategies work. Vorthos cares more about the story of the card, the consistency of the story, and the flavor of what the card is. A Vorthos player may be into magic thanks to their interest in the artwork or story, and honestly could care less about what any card actually does. For example Ugin is a dragon with ties towards Zendikar and has been established as a colorless planeswalkers based off his spell Ghostfire. Vorthos players could care less about what Ugin does, but his abilities are consistent for what we know about him. My brother personally loves dragons and Ugin is one of his favorite, despite him playing mostly red! He stated that he didn't care what Ugin did, but his first ability needed to be ghostfire in planeswalker form. He's a primarily Vorthos player, and secondarily a spike player. His favorite freaking card is Lightning Bolt and he literally has no problem shouting "lightningboltlightningboltlightningbolt!!!" in the middle of a game.
March 19, 2015 8:01 a.m.
GhostChieftain says... #10
Ahh, very well. I rescind my earlier comment. I had never heard of either of the terms and went strictly off of the fact that you said it crashes down like a storm. And that is exactly what my decks do, for the first bit I am chargin mah lazer and then I shoop-da-whooooom. Thank you for clearing that up for me. I suppose I am just a patient johnny like I said. I mean, if I combo off early thats cool, but i will still have to fight 3 other people and they will likely kill me. If I wait and just use answers and slowly prepare the energy I need to spirit bomb the very last person, I will usually not be stopped. Plus if a card doesn't have a bunch of interactions in my deck I usually wont use it.
March 19, 2015 9:10 a.m.
Glad to clear that up a little. As for how you like to play, be sure to remember to say veryyyyyyy slowlyyyyyyyyy KAAAAAAAAAMMMMMMEEEEEEEEEEE HAAAAAAAAMMMMMMMMMEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA right before killing the final player.
On a more on subject topic however, there are some great themes I can think of you might enjoy. Ghave, Guru of Spores is a great combo monster with access to a lot of cool sac and counter shenanigans. For proper laser charging I'd highly recommend Heartless Hidetsugu, largely because his ability to 100 to none all opponents at once is frickin beautiful. Finally you can take on the challenge of a Kozilek, Butcher of Truth. Not exactly as combo oriented as the previous two, but the limited tools you have encourage some really inventive ways to pull him off as a commander, not to mention it feels boss to be firing this particular spirit bomb in someone's face.
March 19, 2015 9:26 a.m.
GhostChieftain says... #12
Ghave would be fun, but I run a karador and a marath. I would have to dismantle both to make it and those are my favorite two decks. As for heartless, I super hate running mono red. Kozilek would be way to expensive for me to run. Simply from getting the lands and the commander I would be at like 70 bucks.
March 19, 2015 9:37 a.m.
jandrobard says... #13
I sort of think of things from a melvin perspective when choosing commanders.
March 19, 2015 3:53 p.m.
Anyone in particular come to mind? One of the best Melvin cards I've seen include Riku of Two Reflections for commander.
VictorSilvertome says... #2
I enjoy a lot of Different decks with a lot of different strategies . But I think the most fun I've had Is showing up to a game store that I've never played EDH at with my deck Tattered Banners & Bloody Flags and smash every single person at the table with it.
March 18, 2015 9 p.m.