Tomer fighting from the editor room 😂

Fascinating hearing Crim actually defend green getting draw power while everyone else is against it. Feels like opposite day.

A huge part of Color Pie discussion in Commander that people miss out on is the Legacy Cardpool. The larger the card pool, the further back you pull your perspective, the more blurry the Color Pie gets. Each color has evolved over time (which is mentioned) and will continue to.

I think what's really being overlooked here is that the color pie was designed with 1v1 formats in mind. The color pie attempts to show the uniqueness of the colors by assigning strengths and weaknesses that are fair in a 1v1 format. Red not being able to remove a creature with 7+ toughness and Green/White not being able to draw cards are not reasonable weaknesses in Commander. What's difficult is trying to stay true to the ideals of the color pie while also supporting the colors in the context of Commander. Overall I wouldn't say giving White card draw in Commander that "feels like it adheres to the color pie" is a bad thing because it's something White desperately needs to stay relevant. There's some extreme where this leniency breaks down, but I can't say it's categorically a bad thing.

"I'm glad green got to draw cards" Crim said through gritted teeth.

Gotta get in by saying that Blue exiling artifacts was made for sixty card formats, but since getting a token in exchange is such a negligible cost in commander they had to axe the plan entirely. Ethan Fleischer did a Blue Council of Colors interview with MaRo recently and was very clear about this.

9:45 - It's the most played because a whopping THREE of the 5 colors struggle immensely with enchant removal. It's not a good card in any deck with white/green, but the other 3 colors are so desperate that a sorcery speed Mortify with downside starts looking more appealing. As for the "old artifact removal isn't played" argument, that's probably because the only that isn't straight-up unplayable is Gate to Phyrexia at $50 while only working well in sac decks.

The thing I think saffron is missing that while weakness and strength should be empathized to colors; the fact of the matter is that the strengths and weaknesses of the colors are hardly equal and they were never actually balanced from the start of the games existence. Green not having proper board wipes or counterspells is hardly on the same level as white being restricted from card draw for so long.

I think we are seeing an evolution of the pie, from colors having a binary (things they can do and things they can’t do) to a three part pie where colors have their strengths, they have things they can do less efficiently, and things they still can’t do

I'm really a fan of this 5 man podcast setting! Everyone added good points

Maro comes in with a steel chair to teach everyone the meaning of bend vs break

You hear a lot of big talk on this channel, but I'd like to see the commander clash crew put their ideas to the test! So, I'm issuing this challenge: color pie week! Here are the rules: 1. Each person makes a mono-colored deck of a different color. 2. Each person has to make their deck while observing the color pie as strictly as possible! Green can ramp to the moon and play big creatures, but no boardwipes or creature removal, blue is the only color with access to any kind of card advantage, white is the only color with access to boardwipes, etc. 3. No using deck construction or colorless spells to get around color pie restrictions. For example, no using mana rocks to ramp in non-green decks, and no flickering cantrip creatures in white! I don't think that you would even need to play a game with these rules to see that color pie shifts help the game feel more fun and balanced, and that these rules wouldn't make for a very fun playing or viewing experience, but the Commander Clash can always play a game with these rules and prove me wrong!

While I definitely enjoy Tomer being in the cast, him getting saucy while editing is certainly hilarious haha.

LOL at Tomer "writing over" the opinions of the others.

They literly said that they were expanding the color pie, thanks tomer for adding it as text. Also in commander there are "old cards" that break the color pie that they are more common than other formats. I think there are more color pie breaks in modern than commander by modern I mean modern horizons XD

I mean look at standard. White has so much card draw in wedding announc and warden that it can play midrange gameplan all by itself. I'm 100% sure both of those cards were made with commander in mind.

Maro has talked about how they COULD make the following: A Flash 3 mana Green creature with deathtouch that fights on ETB. But, they haven't yet. His reasoning was "That's just a Murder."

Restrictions breed creativity - Mark Rosewater

I feel like artifacts was always the solution to this. Every color can use Karn Liberated to remove any permanent type if they really really wanted. But it is expensive. Artifacts should be an overcosted or worse version of effects that decks can use to shore up weaknesses. We don't need color pie breaks

Can we get a follow up 10 to 15 minute episode with Tomer joining in? Maybe make it a mini cast.

Almost spit out my coffee when I saw Tomer's editor POV comments; wish he was here for this one

I am feeling Tomer's agony in having to express all this stuff from the editor's room. Might be the most editor's notes we've seen thus far. Also, I'm surprised the folks get so hung up on destroying permanent types, since that's honestly never felt like a particularly defining aspect of the colours to me. It's like agonizing over a technicality.

I wish Tomer had been on this one too. As he pointed out on screen, Feed the Swarm isn’t a color pie break. They expanded the color pie to give enchantments a third color that can remove them (G,W,B) the way artifacts have three colors that hate them (G,W,R). It makes sense. It was interesting to see Seth and Richard represent the boomer mentality toward the color pie and Crim and Phil represent the progressive young blood philosophy. It made for an interesting podcast. But Richard and Seth acting like the color pie doesn’t exist anymore so “why not add a sixth color, it can do everything too” is kinda ridiculous.

Kamigawa coming out right after Innestrad really was enough for Farewell to make everyone forget about Vanquish the Horde

On Blasphemous Act, the crew is waaay too fixated on the scenario when it's 1 mana wrath. In my experience it's NOT always so efficient.

For Phil: Ezuri’s predation is pretty good in my Naya beast deck, it focuses on ramping so getting to 8 is pretty easy and playing big creatures means that I’m really only worried about small creatures in go-wide strats which Ezuri’s predation is made for. Also, Ezuri’s predation is actually pretty great pseudo card-draw and can even be a finisher with enchantments like Garruk’s uprising and elemental bond for draw as well as warstorm surge and aether charge for damage

Tomer didn't fight hard enough, the Council of Colors and Maro are crying right now

I think it's worth trying to figure out which of these color pie breaks are due to commander, because I don't think Feed the Swarm was created for commander.

In terms of color pie breaks, I like restrictions rather than requirements (I know the line is a bit fuzzy) so for example rather than a green counter spell that says "counter target spell that targets a creature you control" would be more palatable than "counter target spell if you control a creature with power 5 or greater". Pharika's libation feels like a more okay break than feed the swarm because it doesn't always hit what you want rather than hitting whatever with a requirement or downside. You can also give people different ways of interacting on a specific axis. If you want all our most colors to have the ability to interact with spells before they resolve, then there are more creative ways to do that than to give them all counter spells. Black gets hand attack, white gets effects like meaning mage and Thalia that make it harder to cast them, white and green can both stop things that mess with your stuff, and red can change targets, copy a spell, or hurt you for casting them with eidolons and cemetery gatekeepers. The next time you complain that not every color has counters, ask why no one complains that not every color has hand attack. I will also add that the color pie can be bent a bit for the flavor of specific sets. White getting zombies on Ahmonkhet for example, or blasphemous act dealing 13 because it's Innistrad. Blasphemous act is also only 1 mana in commander. In other formats it's often more expensive. If your opponent has 4 creatures and you have none, it's more expensive than wrath of God. Once they know you have it, it's easier to play around by not committing to the board. Given that star of extinction is 7 mana and so of you accepted it, if this is at 6, surely that's not a break. Also I would like to speak out in defense of gate to phyrexia in commander. It's a two mana enchantment they can blow up an artifact every turn at the cost of just a single creature, which of course isn't that big of a cost. The reason it doesn't see much play is primarily because it is on the reserved list and is therefore $65. Arcum Dagson and shape anew also deal with artifacts in blue in a similar way, though I guess Dagson is only artifact creatures.

I actually think Crim's example of Overcharged Amalgem is a perfect card to showcase the Color Pie Working Great Strategically. Zombie decks are primarily Blue/Black (sometimes white now with amonkhet) and WoTC is aware of this. They put a card that can counter in blue's pie but knowing that it'll likely be in a deck with black as well, gives its ability functionality in a black flavorful way. Thus creating a way for zombies that wouldn't normally run counterspells (unless there was just a really good one to run) to run a counter spell

Tomer's editing game on point. Wish he could have brought those into the actual discussion.

I think we need a part 2 with Tomer.

I think counter spells are considered within color pie for white but wizards are too squeamish to print them because how bad most people hate being counter spelled.

I agree that a lot of the examples are from before commander was popular so it doesn't seem like commander is the main cause. Beast within sees almost no play in 60 card decks. So it was bad enough that it wasn't that big of a color break.

I always just thought that making colorless able to do anything at an increased cost was the normal, more reasonable option. Or the other route of making colourless cards that synergized easier with the colors. That was the original trade off. The issue we had with that though is colorless solutions becoming a "Must have" staple, so...

I feel like it is incredibly flavorful for black to be breaking the color pie so long as there is a significant life / sacrifice cost. Their whole thing is more-or-less 'power at any cost'.

Seth really needs to learn the difference between a "color pie break" and a "color pie change". It's not a break that black can destroy opponent's enchantments now!

Wizards of the Coast has written more on the topic of game design for card games than anyone on the face of the planet. I'd love for you guys to read what they have to say if you're gonna dunk on them. I think a lot more of these cards makes sense when you take into account their process.

Feed the Swarm is by definition not a color break, since it's part of black's identity to remove enchantments now.

All colors should be able to do basic things like: interact, draw cards, and ramp. Each color can do things in a different way. The colors can feel different and do things better based on color and it still be a good game. Relying on printing artifacts to make ramp viable in nongreen decks pushes decks to be extremely samey, whereas of there was color based ramp that was balanced you could have 15ish staples for mana in commander decks and then you can use the rest of the slots to play cards you want to.

I think starting each podcast with a 'definitions/priorities' section would be helpful. Currently it's very easy for the conversation to wander or become circular as we don't even have an idea of what they think a positive or negative outcome looks like etc.

I think it's been accelerated by commander. Color pie breaking in general is as old as the game itself though.

Editor Tomer raging in silence behind that keyboard lol

Crim made a lot of good points here. If Iona is banned because it can shut a mono color deck out of the game then Feed the Swarm is a good thing because one enchantment could previously shut a mono black deck out of the game. Color pie breaks are good sometimes and especially when they're done not too often.

I think the best color pie breaks are the ones that you need to include in a mono-colored deck but can easily ignore on multi-colored...

actually, the more i think about it the more i like the idea of colorless being the "6th color" of magic. that way you can break the color pie with the tradeoff that the colorless spell is overcosted. that way, it rewards the player for choosing to specialize in a color, but still gives the player options outside that color's strengths.

That was a very colorful conversation. Do you know what else would be a colorful conversation? A charm/command/modal spell tier list.

I think the thing that breaks the colour pie isn't usually individual cards. It's a mixture of how splashable it is (its ubiquity) and its power relative to the home colour as Crim argues. For instance, blue is the counterspell colour because the pool of cards runs deep and decks running it are unlikely to play Tibalt's Trickery, Lapse of Certainty, or Imp's Mischief when even second tier blue counters outclass them. It's difficult to see these as breaking the colour pie as the effects are uncommon enough and don't match up to the home colour's options. Beast Within, on the other hand, is especially notable by any metric of colour pie break. It's literally the same in terms of power as Generous Gift, it's better than Chaos Warp in the majority of cases, and more versatile than the blue counterparts (Resculpt and Ravenform) and on top of versatility, it's faster than the black counterpart (Feed the Swarm). Green doesn't destroy creatures and yet Beast Within will appear in even 5 colour decks because its so splashable. In terms of breaking the colour pie it's tough to match up to it... unless you look at Smothering Tithe. Ultimately, the colour pie isn't broken by cards that give colours token access to an effect unless that effect is so good it eclipse's the home colour's options. Not to say that those cards like red counterspells aren't breaks from the colour pie but they don't break it. On another note. I am also not sure it's fair to lay the blame at commander's feet for colour breaks. Modern Horizons 1 & 2 are Modern sets. DRC and Murktide may be a better Delver and Goyf respectively but they were designed with Modern explicitly in mind. Maybe the reason Feed the Swarm seems particularly egregious is because of Black's access to tutors but really, one Feed the Swarm in 100 cards is not a fix for commander players. Yes it's infinitely better than no enchantment removal in the games you see it but of those 1 in 5 games (going on having drawn roughly 20 cards from the deck), it only matters more than any other creature removal if there actually is a problem enchantment at the same time as it is in your hand. So, I don't think these cards are designed for commander unless they are flooding the colour with breaks of the same kind. Token colour breaks suit a design for 60 card formats with 4 ofs far more than 100 card singleton. Designing for commander may be detrimental in other ways but I don't believe that colour pie breaks are one of those ways. EDIT I am realising this is a mostly critical comment and hope that it comes across as being invested in the game and loving the show and engaging with the opinions therein.

Colour-shifted Beast Withins: Feed the Swarm 2.0: 2B [Instant] Target permanent's controller sacrifices it. You lose 5 life. Blue actually already has many of these: Regress, Consign to Dream, Resounding Wave (removes any permanent via bounce rather than destroying - which is weaker but Blue also has much cheaper versions of the same effect)

I really like the idea of restricting Black to only being able to destroy/remove/exile opponents enchantments. I never realized the connection for Black wanting to remove their own enchantments. Full disclosure: I've splashed in a few White lands just for a Disenchant or two for so long in never had an issue with Disenchanting my own stuff. 🧐

I feel like this is a pretty fascinating topic to me. I think colorless spells that do everything inefficiently is the solution. I looked forever for enchantment removal in my mono black deck and other then feed the swarm my other solution was intro to annihilation. It’s five mana and sorcery speed but I’m happy I have at least have an option. I like having that restriction in deck building. I purposely only play three colors or less with most of my decks being at two and like only one or two at three. I enjoy trying to find interesting work arounds.

If I can try to articulate what Crim and Seth might be trying to say, I think color pie breaks are ok when it comes to interacting with permanents. We have well-costed colorless land removal, colorless graveyard hate, and every color has some way to remove creatures. All colors should be able to remove artifacts and enchantments as well with varying degrees of difficulty and success. Changes to card draw are more or less a reaction to the damage already done with green getting the amount of card draw it already has. And when it comes to stack interactions, I like Tomer's input of Reprieve for White and Tibalt's Trickery (you shouldn't be able to target your own spell) for Red. Give Green a hard counterspell at mana value 4 that gifts your opponent mana/ramps them non-basics. Personally, I feel all colors need some form of playable enchantment removal. Enchantments are certainly the strongest permanent type in my play group. Mass artifact removal is also tantamount to mass land destruction so Red and White feel hamstrung in what should be solidly in their wheelhouse, while the modal and targeted aspect of green artifact removal spells lets them feel unimpeded in spell selection and judicial casting. I also feel WotC shouldn't be printing cards catered to the Commander format outside of the Commander Legends sets, so I understand how difficult it can be to create a coherent argument about these topics. A question I can't quickly resolve is, what should the difference be between colorless permanent removal and colored permanent removal? Downsides? Frequency of printing? Idk. I just disagree with Seth's 'we have remove target permanent at home' approach.

On the topic of Blasphemous Act and Star of Extinction, MaRo has said that the Act is a break and that even the star is a severe bend/ almost break that was allowed due to flavor.

PRO TIP: Theft effects are Blue-Removal. You're literally removing the threat from the enemy board, and youre also getting a card as well. And when the average cost is 5-6 mana, it's kinda nuts when you think about it: "remove" a high cost threat and "cast" your own copy of it for 1 card and 5-6 mana. #runmoretheft

My real problem is that more and more cards are staples for commander. Causing decks to look very similar. And also like need it or you won't compete. Just my feelings.

What about a black counter spell that reads something along the lines of this: “As an additional cost to cast this spell, sacrifice a creature. Counter target spell with converted mana cost X or less. X is equal to the power of the creature you sacrificed to cast this spell.” In that scenario you’d only be able to counter big spells if you give up a big creature as well. Much less effective than a 2 mana counter anything and still somewhat flavorful for the black color pie. Just a thought 🤷🏽‍♂️

Just a note about all the counter spells, every color has something and black is even life lose for counter spell. Withering Bloom.

I love that black can deal with enchantments. I think it's a design mistake for enchantments to randomly be the hardest permanent type to kill.

“Pongify is blue’s thing.” Pongify/Rapid Hybridizaton effects are confirmed breaks by MaRo. I think the main thing that gets missed in this discussion is that even if you do get a break, usually you don’t have enough similar spells in that colour to justify running it as though it was a gameplan. “Should green have all this direct removal?” It has one spell, all the rest is conditional. If you aren’t playing with (nonland) tutors then it’s going to come up once every dozen games for that deck. Also the fact that it’s an eternal format. What the pie was isn’t how it is today. How it is today isn’t what it’ll be ten years from now. Another thing said by MaRo; Eternal is where all your mistakes live forever. Gives you a very warped perspective of what the colour pie is now if you’re looking at it through the commander lens

I think if they want to add pie breaks or bends to help out commander, print them in commander sets not in standard. Also the solution for the blue mana 3 drop catchall is it's at sorcery speed.

The real issue is that the colors, in EDH, have almost always had answers in their reach. Colorless provides a LOT. My mono black deck ran ugin, karn, and ulamog x2. I could remove any type of permanent. Does white need draw? Add skullclamp and mindstone, among many other one sided draw artifacts. There was no real reason to blend the pie, other than "bc i want it."

Alright, calling Damnation a 'break' is actually breaking my brain right now. Is the word bend going to be mentioned at all???

Ezuris predation is somewhat hard to use as a wrath but has several interesting variables. Wort and Adrix can doubble its potency (wort literally) and there are several static power boosts in green as well so when its a 7/x or something instead it becomes much better as a wrath. In addition you always keep the rest of your own board.

Green's counterspell could be 5 mana and you have to shuffle 3 of your lands back into the deck, actively countering their own ramp

Green has had a second pie hidden in the oven for a while now....

Personally, I think colour pie breaks are fine as long as they're worse than the *worst option* of whatever the best colour at that effect has. So, for example, no counterspell outside of blue should be better than the worst blue counterspell, either in limitation of options and being super niche OR in cost.

How could y'all forget Wild Magic surge?! The best all permanent removal in red since Chaos Warp! Sure they are guaranteed to get another enchantment if they have another in the deck, but if you target a really powerful oppressive one, it's probably worth it. Especially if the one they get off the top is a lot cheaper than what they spent on the one you removed

I'm perfectly ok with each color being able to do most things, just with stipulations. For example, Blue can draw cards with zero stipulation or downside, Green can draw cards equal to a creature's power. Black can kill creatures unconditionally, Green can kill creatures by making one of its own creatures fight.

If White card draw is "too good now", why do players naturally avoid using them when given access to other color combinations outside of Boros? The problem with the current White card draw is that it's inflexible with build design (the deck must be playing auras or creating weenies to consistently perform these draws) and the alternatives often requires piggybacking/reacting rather than being active (when an opponent does this, then you may draw 1 card per turn). In Aura, Weenie/Token decks you have so many creatures that let you draw from playing your deck normally, however outside of these archetypes you're really limited. Additionally a huge amount of these White card draw is also still done with creatures (Welcoming Vampire, Archivist of Oghma, Loran of the Third Path, etc) which are the most frequently to removed permanent type; and some genuinely just do not fit in a deck's theme (not all Mono-White or Boros decks focus on making tokens creatures or weenies for card draw, so Welcoming Vampire or Tocasia's Welcome might not fit). Therefore I think it's great to see more diverse options that focus on different permanent types and methods that do not require piggybacking as they allow for more obscure commanders and deck themes to focus on their gimmick. There is clearly more support for White card draw in the last year specifically, but the majority of available options are still inflexible to overall deck creativity as opposed to Blue/Black/Green where you can have flexible staples fit into in any theme (encouraging the rest of the deck not focusing on what allows card draw or ramp to be creative). White should obviously not be the best color at card draw (that's Blue's archetype), however as the game expands it needs some flexibility to keep itself from top-decking outside of Auras/weenies/low-CMC creatures. I personally believe Loran of the Third Path (which is still Hugs, but I like the politics) and Archivist of Oghma (still piggybacking, not very interesting or exciting) were the best two White card draw additions we have gotten in 2022 in terms of being usable in all themes where White is present. Cards like Wedding Ring and Smuggler's Share are neat, but are not considered staples for a reason. To be clear, I'm not advocating for White to gain a staple down the line like Smothering Tithe but for card draw (aka White Rhystic Study), but the existing set of options other than Loran of the Third Path and Archivist of Oghma are not flexible enough to be staple in decks containing White. The only cards I see from White in every deck containing the color are Teferi's Protection and Boardwipe/Removal spells which is great for White's identity, but highlights how card draw is not "too good" in White. The dangerous line that should be avoided in what we see in Green with ramp; namely that if you aren't running the staple ramp spells (Cultivate, Rampant Growth, Three Visits, etc) in a deck with Green then you're intentionally powering-down your deck. This leads any deck with Green, regardless of theme, to always run these Green staples ramp spells from Mono-Green decks to 5-color decks, which does reduce the creativity aspect when Green is in your deck (5-10% of your deck should be the same specific Green ramp spells for every deck). Staples in each color are important but risk homogenizing decks outside of their commander's gimmick. You can tell White lacks true value for card draw when you pair White in any combination with Blue/Black/Green and you likely wouldn't include the majority of White's card draw options (outside of Selesnya weenies). EX: Why use Archivist of Oghma or Smuggler's Share in Orzhov if you have Black Market Connections, Phyrexian Arena, Bolas Citadel, etc? Boros is the only combination the desperate enough to fully rely on White for card draw since Red is so poor at doing so itself outside of impulse draw and wheeling, which again isn't always going to be desirable for every Boros deck.

Something I wanted to add as I’m not sure if it was mentioned, but Emerald dragon from Baldurs Gate is a mono green stifle effect for 3 with a 4/4 flying trample body attached to it. It’s not terrible. Granted stifle isn’t the strongest interaction, but you can stop combos and some interaction is better than none.

Probably a bad take, but to me the only color pie break needed rn is better interaction for black. As far as i know the black way of dealing with non-creature spells was discard but cards like thoughtseize are bad at 4 player tables, maybe that would change if wotc printed discard spells that state "all opponents reveal their hands and you pick and discard one of those spells" instead of just targeting one opponent? I dunno, in regards to everything else to me it always felt like every color already had a way of doing everything without compromising its identity within the color pie.

How did they all miss that counterspells are literally in white's slice of the color pie? White is SECOND for counterspells (in the sense that counters aren't in any other color, even if it is technically tertiary for white), but Wizards doesn't print them because people don't like playing against counterspells."

black is actually supposed to be able to do everything except deal with artefacts. that's it's color identity it does what the other colors do at the cost of life (both your own life and the life of your creatures) Also, as someone who owns 6 mono-black decks why would I care about having enchantment removal I'm already playing oblivion stone and Nev's disk to answer enchantments and artifacts in my black control decks. also, black does have a counterspell it's 1B lose 3 life counter target creature spell. it's basically another doomblade but it prevents ETBs also, y'all don't understand veil of summer it's factually a counterspell, it's used in legacy for exactly 3 things 1) countering thoughtsieze 2) countering Force of Will or Force of Negation 3) pushing a combo through. In no world is Veil used to protect against a combo. I actually think a colorshifted Planar Cleansing would be very interesting. Farewell already is better then it so it's not like white is losing to black by doing this, and it would be a cool call back to wrath of god colorshifted into damnation because planar cleansing is the successor to Wrath of God

Hot take: This disscussion is pointless. Colorless can and always could do everything in the color pie. People just aren't brewing enough. The only only thing the "color pie break" cards do is introduce these effects to the masses. For example I remember back in the day around the time first Commander Precons came out Sultai didn't have nearly as much board wipes as anything in White, but you still had enough to fill a deck - Damnation. Oblivion Stone, Life's Finale, Decree of Pain etc. As far as black enchatment removal - I had a Gonti deck and yes there wasn't much spot removat for enchantments couple of years ago, but with Karn, Ugin, All is Dust, Meteor Golem, Oblivion Stone, Perilous Vault - well I never lost to an enchantment. If anything I think the deck was actually better at dealing with enchantments and artifacts since many of my other decks didn´t have board wipes that could hit them and it wasn't an angle I would evaluate for them. For card draw it was limited but you always had enough even in green and white with Skullclamp, Mentor of the Meek, Soul of Harvest, Staff of Nin etc. It wasn't great but neither are most of the new cards no matter what the internet says. The only real argument left is efficiency - as long as the new cards aren't making these effects too efficient for the color we are more then fine. Esper Sentinel, Beast Within or the Great Henge. Those are only ones that could be considered a problem.

What is the best green burn spell that was alluded to?

"These are all just worse beast within". True, but that doesn't justify further breaks imo. Just because there are worse culprits doesn't mean everything below is fair game. It's this train of thought that leads to worse power creep and breaks

Not sure if this gets addressed at some point, but to get it off my chest (and boost for the algorithm) here’s some definitions. A color pie break is when a color is allowed to do something it can’t normally do that undermines its fundamental weaknesses. A color pie bend is when a color is allowed to do something that it doesn’t normally do in a specific environment and doesn’t undermine that colors fundamental weaknesses (eg. Green Magecraft) Colors can also just have things added to their color pie as Magic develops. Enchantment removal is black now to balance Enchantments and Artifacts by having 3/5 colors with answers to them each. Vigilance is blue now to give it more creature abilities and it could untap creatures anyways. Bounce counters are white now because tax and delay effects are in white and they want more stack interaction. White can have cantrip creature and draw cards as long as it’s tied to something white cares about (weenies, enchantments, lifegain) and generally restricted to one card a turn. Green can draw cards as long as it’s tied to something green can do (high power creatures, enchantments, etc.) There is a point where this abilities could be added to the colors where it waters down the color pie and every thing is a color pie break, but I don’t think most of the changes that were called “breaks” are actually “breaks” and I think they’ve been a net positive in terms of balancing the game personally.

I don't want four people having a discussion and the editor butting his head in every three minutes. If Tomer want's to be part of the discussion he can be there for it.

I think another point to add at 14:39 would be that these spells that allow a color to break the color pie in being able to do something that it would not normally do should have not only just the color's flavor and what it does like Crim explains, but also have not easy to cast mana values. What I mean is 'Feed the Swarm' should have been three black mana socery speed for what the card is doing on top of paying life to do so. That I think is how keep from getting too crazy with them as you need to make them specialized to mono color decks or at least dual color decks to avoid power creep and the issues your talking about in my opinion. I would like to say that I don't want the color pie to be broken easily if that makes sense. You should have to work through the hoops of the cards being hyper specialized to the color. It gives mono colors an edge while not breaking the more powerful multi-colored decks.

1:34:59 I started playing during Fallen Empires, and the again during Tempest. When Invasion block added the ability for green to destroy artifacts and enchantments, it felt off. A few years later, we got the first Mirroden block, and green was the color that hated artifacts, while all the other colors synergized with them. Now, I got where Wizards was coming from, and I like green's ability to remove artifacts and enchantments. Another example: Over time, pinging moved from blue to red. In Planar Chaos, red got a "color-shifted" Tim. But red already had a couple of pingers by then, so that didn't feel bad. My point is: the color pie has been shifting since the beginning of the game (in fact, the worst set for color pie "breaks" was probably Alpha lol). As long as Wizards doesn't shift things too quickly, and they have good justifications for the shifts, I'm cool with it.

Here’s where I’m at. Using counterspells as an example. White - delay, lapse of certainty is perfect. Blue - straight counterspell Red - redirects, chaos and copy Black - I think redirects work great here. Imp’s mischief is perfect. Maybe have some effects that force redirect to your own creatures? Similar to Crim’s sac effect but more narrow. Green - stick with what green does best. Uncounterable is the stack equivalent of trample. It forces the effect through.

I think it's pretty simple: If I have to play around an effect when facing a color, that effect better be in the color's central mass, if I'm using a color pie break to answer what my opponent is doing then it's good for the game.

Lapse of Certainty has synergy with best sword 😂

I’m 100% with Seth here. Color pie = unique identity and is a core aspect of what defines Magic. Muddying the waters by giving every color the ability to do anything and defining the identity by the restrictions that come with the ability instead weakens the whole concept. It also reduces deck building restrictions and the problems that you have to overcome. Those restrictions bred creativity and are good for the game

Phil, my dude, Phasing of Zhalfir!

I think color pie breaks are good in the sense that there shouldn't be a situation in which one deck loses a game because it can't get around something because it's colors have no way of doing it. I had a dimir deck and I lost to an azarius deck all because I couldn't destroy one artifact. My entire deck was basically locked until I could get rid of one artifact and I didn't have any way in my deck to do it because at the time there was no way of getting rid of artifacts in blue or black. I had to rely on artifacts to remove artifacts which was way too costly and slow. I eventually dismantled the deck because it was such a bad experience and I had no effective solutions.😢

I think the central issue is that some effects are just better than others. Drawing cards and ramping will always be stronger than dealing damage or removing problem permanents. Especially in a multiplayer format with 40 life. On the other hand, in commander all players need to be able to deal with every kind of possible threat. All decks use almost all permanent types and with four opponents you need multiple ways of dealing with each one. However, if you give each colour access to each effect you make them all the same and if you give green draw as well as ramp you just make one colour legit better.

My favorite "break" is definitely Dead / Gone, i love how it's arguably a Shock with a horrible creature bounce spell attached to it

I've seen seasoned Magic players tell me not to play Lapse because it's so bad but they are either thinking of it in a CEDH setting or as a Blue Control deck would use counter spells. None of them realize it's there to stop that guy who is trying to stop you from popping off like Richard said, it's to protect your win con, not to control the whole game. I also think people play Teferi's Protection for the exact same reason where Lapse in some cases would be better. I also like Martyr's Cause for the same type of use case in creature/token decks.

34:55 I know this is kind of old, but how does the Crew feel about green getting a counter spell with the "clash with an opponent" mechanic: choose an opponent. Each reveals the top card of their library. The card with the highest cmc wins. If you win, counter target spell. Broken Ambitions but different. This gives the deck with the biggest mana values an edge. Maybe it's costed 2GG.

Color pie bending and breaking is usually fine. However if it happens too much it'll get same-y. Green having a good counter spell does nothing to affect the overwhelming number of shitty to great counters blue has, for example. The main issue is that because they are designed for commander to be singular, unique and powerful they become staples instead of niche tech cards. At a critical mass, they'll be just like sol ring, arcane signet, etc

I agree Phyrexian Tribute is too bad to play as black artifact removal, but it's not too expensive. Gate to Phyrexia though, I'd play it in a monoblack deck if it wasn't for the price. It's only two mana, repeatable artifact removal and you only sacrifice one creature.

One thing that was frustrating was hearing examples of cards brought up as metrics for color pie breaks as if they represented a trend rather than being an exception. Murktide Regent is a color pie break, but it's also an *extremely* pushed card, so I don't think it's necessarily indicative of a greater trend in blue. Same with Richard saying that green could hypothetically get a GG counterspell because the best blue counterspell was the Force cycle - I don't think we should consider Force of Negation or Force of Will as the archetypical rate for a blue counterspell, but rather cards that are outliers. The typical blue blanket counter printed in sets is a Cancel with slight upside, so a green equivalent would need to be worse than that.

I think color pie breaks are fine as long as the flavor of the color is preserved. Fight as a mechanic feels very much green. It is removal -- but unlike black where I cast death magic or red where I channel the elements of fire and lightning -- green removal is me ordering my baloth to munch on your wizard.

Blasphemous Act is definitely worse then most other sweepers. It's not THAT hard to get a 14/14 in commander, especially with a temporary buff spell. If it's not able to clear the board, then whichever opponent has that really big creature is in an even better position because there are no chump blockers left.

As a game designer, the problem that I have with color pie breaks may not be the mechanical impact they have on a game but rather the loss in identity they represent. Green is supposed to respect the natural cycle of things, using magic being part of it. Artificial things needs to be destroyed, the strongs will fight, things like that. Countering a spell is not even allowing things to happen, and that's not green. Blue exiling is the same thing. They already gave this to red, but shuffling the creature into the library of the caster feels blue. I would be fine with that type of effects. Even putting the card Xth from the top of the library, playing with time and shifting opponents plans to make them stumble. The thing is, if colours don't have strong identities, it would be harder to feel special by playing certain colours instead of others. This choice should matter, the way of doing things should be different from a colour to the other, otherwise you end up with the same type of staples in every colours, and it's a bit sad that the flagships for a colour could be easily compared with other flagships. So, don't break the colour pie, be creative in designing cards :)

What about the fun that comes from the Color Pie actually having hard limits? If you like deckbuilding a big part of the enjoyment you can get from it is working around the restrictions, and those restrictions come from the Color Pie existing and actually being enforced (most of the time). Compensating for the weakness of your color right now in Commander involves thinking through your gameplay, leaning into your strengths, and finding slick ways of getting around those weaknesses. If every color just hypothetically got a bunch of spells with every effect tomorrow, but flavored for them, that makes deckbuilding way more bland. It would just boil down to "Put in all the really good effects that my color is best at, then put in the spells we just got.". For example you are making a Mono-Red deck. Playing into what that color is good at, you play a lot of cheap creatures and efficient burn spells. You could currently put in some things within Red's color pie to circumvent those weaknesses. Some bigger creatures and spells to finish off a game if you can't finish everyone off quickly enough. Some punisher cards to stop the game from dragging out. But you still have a glaring weakness. If your board gets wiped, it's basically over for you. The only way you could come back from that is by casting a huge burn spell or pulling off some combo that spits out tons of hasty creatures. And you spent the last 4 turns beating the crap out of everyone so either one of those two outs are almost guaranteed to be countered directly or indirectly. That's the trade-off though. Red is amazing at coming right out the gate and blasting people with damage, and has the bigger burn spells to finish people off if need be. But board wipes and counterspells can destroy you. What if Red just got universal counterspells though? And not Tibalt's Trickery, like just a couple counterspells at RR (or maybe even a free one) with a tiny hoop to jump through that is negligible and feels flavorful. Or maybe they cost 1RR, not super efficient, but they also burn the controller of the spell. I think that would suck. Those spells would remove a big downside for Red, and it would almost certainly make deckbuilding significantly more boring. Why try to figure out how to play through your weaknesses, when Wizards just printed some cards that get rid of those weaknesses? Once again this isn't actually happening yet, thankfully, but I'm just pointing out that liking the Color Pie and it's restrictions isn't just about tradition or some Old Man Yells At Cloud stuff. The Color Pie having hard boundaries has upsides too.

My favourite colour-pie break was last Friday at my lgs, when I was playing my mono green deck and I casted 4 mass draw spells, getting into the Beast Within to remove the final problematic creature on the board so I could win!

you underestimate red sweepers. There's the ones like Burn Down the House (which is kinda mid) but there's Jokuhaups, which is definitely awesome.

I think there should be color pie breaks in all the colors but they need to have down sidesides for doing so and I was thinking about it and I think I have a list of downsides for each color. White - opponents gain life equal to spell cost and be high spell cost to do so, Blue all opponents draw card or 2, Black you lose life equal to something, Red stone rain your own land or opponants deal damage to target on board and Green opponents search library for lands or can play additional lands. This would invert the core thing the color does and lets the other players get a core benefit from it and let the player go outside of the benefit.