Collecting Competitive Cards For cEDH
Magic can be expensive, and fully-fledged cEDH decks definitely so, with most quickly racking up price tags in the thousands of dollars, but for those among us seeking to break into the format and start de-proxying some of our lists, there is a way to add some order to this market madness. Not every staple is big expense, and not every card is worth its cost, so let's get into assembling a collection, shall we?
Basic Principles
Before we get into the cards themselves, let's talk about the three big principles underlying how I like to order my collection purchases, something which has proven to be very helpful when it comes to maximizing utility while minimizing cost. First off, ubiquity.
Ubiquity is fairly straightforward. Essentially, ubiquity is the answer to the question "What percentage of my decks are going to play this card?" While this question immediately has implications regarding color identity (even putting aside power level, chances are that your colorless cards will have a greater deal of ubiquity than your colored cards), it is important to look beyond just the percentage of decks that can play a card. Not every player necessarily wants to play every color, so taking a moment to think about what decks make you happy is actually a really important step in being financially savvy. Don't buy an Ad Nauseam
Now, the keen-eyed among you may have noticed that there is a temporal component to my definition of ubiquity. By shifting the emphasis away from simply objective ubiquity (percentage of the meta) to personal ubiquity (likelihood of inclusion in favorited strategy), we necessarily come up against the problem of shifting desires. If you asked me two years ago what cEDH decks I would have in my repertoire, I certainly wouldn't have thought I'd have Korvold, Fae-Cursed King
Like I said at the outset, Magic is expensive, but beyond that it is also dynamic. Jace, the Mind Sculptor
Finally, we've come to the last one: bang for your buck. The name says it all. In essence, cheaper cards need to do less in order to be worth the money, and expensive cards need to do more. Sol Ring
When you start mixing and matching these principles, some important considerations emerge. Jeweled Lotus
Collecting by Function
Now that we've identified how we are going to pick cards to buy, it's important for us to talk about our strategy for purchases, something which rests primarily with sequencing. In this case, that means grouping cards by function and prioritizing certain functions over others. By now, you should have already picked up the more affordable parts of cEDH, your Swords to Plowshares
First, mana. Magic's all about casting spells, and it takes mana to do that, so it's only right that we start of here. First - and I cannot stress this enough - dual lands should not be where you enter cEDH. While they make great investments with solid price trajectories and ubiquity scores, the bang for your buck is so lackluster that they simply aren't worth considering (at least, not at the beginning). Instead, a full slot of the ten shock lands and ten fetch lands is an excellent way to break in. You'll be able to assemble the foundations for any deck you'd like to play, cEDH or otherwise.
Next is the nonland mana. While it is true that Mana Crypt
After mana, we begin to enter the realm of strategy-dependent pickups. Sure, every list will have some sort of interaction, but what exactly that package looks like - and consequently, your priorities for expenses - will vary from list to list. One thing is for certain, though: if you're in blue you will be playing counterspells.
Of the three big counterspells - Force of Will
After interaction comes tutors. Thanks to the recent release of Dominaria Remastered, these don't cost nearly as much as they did a while ago, but if you're saving up to spend money elsewhere then this is another excellent opportunity to lean in the "quantity over quality" arena, and by that I mean skip out on some of the black tutors for other options. If your deck can afford it, pick up tutors from other colors instead; they won't fill the same roll, but you'll be saving a good chunk of change. You can buy one of each other tutor - Worldly Tutor
Finally, we come to win conditions, something which can vary wildly in cost between cEDH lists, so let's go over some of the more common ones.
- Witherbloom Apprenticeand Chain of Smog: We've already covered the primary support pieces for this (i.e. tutors), so congratulations! You're all good to go.
- Dockside Extortionistand...anything (Temur Sabertooth, Emiel the Blessed, etc.): Dockside Extortionist, while a bit costly, hits every quality we discussed earlier out of the park. It packs a wallop, has already been reprinted recently so there doesn't seem to be much information pointing towards when to buy a copy, and it is everywhere. Even if Dockside isn't your win condition, this is an expense worth picking up.
- Thassa's Oracleand Demonic Consultation/Tainted Pact: Each of these cards individually is a reasonable enough expense, and putting the whole set together presents one of the most efficient wins in the format. $35 well spent.
- Lion's Eye Diamondand Underworld Breach: This is one of our trickier categories, especially considering it usually is accompanied by another expensive card, Intuition. Overall, while I wouldn't say that LED is the first card to deproxy in your cEDH list, it being a Reserved List icon means that - similar to Null Rod- you're going to want to pick one up sooner rather than later.
Wrapping Up
Before jumping in to snag a card at a discount, or even picking up something incredibly powerful for a deck you might play someday, the first thing anyone buying into cEDH needs to think about is "When will I play this card?" After you've sorted that out, sequencing your purchases by function will aid tremendously in constructing a considerable Commander collection. As we've seen with some of the example cards in each category, prioritizing ubiquity and impact while considering price trajectory can save us a good deal of money, precious resources to be spent on other Magic cards down the line.
