Somehow, the Sliver Overload guy wasn't the most hated at that table
Hi everyone.
We’re trying something different on 99EDH this weekend. After organizing our first EDH night at my store, we had an okay turn out for the first time out, 9 people including me. I had brought my video camera but I grabbed the battery that didn’t hold its charge so I didn’t get the interviews like I wanted. I’ll see if I can fix up the footage I did shoot and edit it all together for you.
Anyway, we had a pod of 5 and a pod of 4 playing with many different styles and, luckily, all different Generals. The table of 5 was locked down by a Karn deck while the table of 4 had a Teneb deck that was stealing everything that people were sacrificing. Was it as annoying as the Karn one? No, not by a long shot. But that got me thinking:
Which General do you hate to play against the most?
Is it the General that takes over a game, or the wins quickly? What General do you groan when you see an opponent play it?
Throw it in the comments below and let’s start a dialog. If people like this, we’ll start doing it every Friday. If not, hey don’t worry about it.
A note about commenting: I’ve got it set that if you’ve never had a comment on this site, I have to approve it (it sends me an e-mail and I make sure it’s not spam) and then it goes up. You don’t have to send it five times. Be nice, but go ahead and rant on here if you want.
I Got 99 Problems But a Commander Ain't One 
May 21st, 2010 at 1:06 pm
Erayo. No question the most obnoxious legal general in existence (Braids, Cabal Minion is the most obnoxious ILLEGAL general: “Hurr Land-Ritual-Mox-Diamond-General-GG Hurr”). At least other generals win you the game; Erayo says that nobody ELSE on the table can win until they have enough mana to cast 2 spells in a turn, and once Arcane Lab comes out not even that will avail you. That said, I once got the table out of Erayo lock via a Boseiju-protected Wipe Away. At least one of the other players offered to do something not appropriate to mention on a family site such as this.
Rofellos is also pretty obnoxious, but at least he requires a 6 mana artifact to win, and Darkblast makes the Rofellos player a Sad Panda. You can also hilariously blow out the guy playing Rofellos/Staff if you, for example, have a Magus of the Jar on board, he draws his deck, then plays Concordant Crossroads to give his incoming fatties haste. Yeah, that says ‘Enchant World” there, buddy. š
May 21st, 2010 at 8:15 pm
Zur is absurd. When I see Zur online I auto concede. (Play Zur, attack, gg)
Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind can be pretty lame due to the fact that it has many one-card instant win combos
Jhoria could be lame also if they play mass LD (like obliterate)
I personally also dislike mono-blue generals such as Teferi and lady of scroll, it makes the game very inactive and slow
May 21st, 2010 at 10:33 pm
Well, let me run down the list here by color:
Red: Kazuul is annoying, especially for aggro, but other than that he’s fine for the most part. The two biggest threats that I quickly go after in this color are Kiki-Jiki and Norin, the former for the inevitable combos, the latter for using the really annoying “comes into play” effects that red has.
Black: Good Lord, Maga, Traitor to Mortals. I see this guy on the command zone, the player needs to die. He has to, because in the late game he’s just so, so stupid with coffers and Urborg. Mirri the Cursed is also pretty bad due to the haste and flying. It’s hard for some decks to deal with such an early threat. Black doesn’t really threaten me like the next color on the list, because for the most part their strategies are all focused around one or two points.
Blue: Uggh. This is the single most dangerous and irritating color in the EDH format for generals, at least in my opinion. I wish that there were more like Lorthos and less like Teferi. The following generals in this color are all hated by me:
1) Kira, great glass spinner. Oh, you take my stuff and I have to spend two cards to get it back or deal with it. Lovely.
2) Teferi. Nothing quite like not being able to play instants except at sorcery speed, and getting to deal with flashed in K. Leviathan.
3) Erayo. I see it, I leave the game.
4) Arcum Dagsson. Let me just get my Darksteel Forge here.
White: Hokiri, Dust Drinker is annoying, as it copies blue’s strategy of denying players. Akroma can be a worry, but is for most decks manageable.
Green: None. Some may say that Rofellos should be here on everyone’s list, but I disagree. The problem is not Rofellos. It is the staff. That staff, the one right there. That’s what needs to be banned, not Rofellos. But I’m getting off of the subject. Forgive me.
Multicolor: Sliver overlord can just overwhelm everyone at the table. Jhoria can make lives miserable with shenanigans involving LD and Eldrazi. Sharuum is a total pain in the posterior. Yay, we got rid of the D. Forge! Aww, he got it back.
Colorless: Karn has some moves, but is manageable unless you leave him alone for a period of time. Kozilek is surprisingly effective, and can be frustrating to deal with repeatedly. Really, I hate all Eldrazi. SO MUCH. F#$*&G Annihilator.
May 22nd, 2010 at 12:57 am
I personally have a smaller playgroup than most so we didn’t have many broken general’s. For us I’d think the most hated was Kresh, the Bloodbraided because the deck was almost guaranteed to win the long game, every time.
Although I admit that when I’ve played others, Erayo was a horrible, horrible thing.
Similarly Zur and Momir Vig can be awful (Momir for the same reasons as Rofellos above)
May 22nd, 2010 at 7:09 am
Rafiq and Kresh are some of the scariest, especially when they’re suited up and ready to go. They get out of hand so quickly. I’m thinking Uril would be the same, but i haven’t played against Uril yet.
May 22nd, 2010 at 9:20 am
What’s the best site for seeing EDH decklists?
My least favourite generals are mono-blue. Although it is not that much of a problem in multiplayer, because most people just gang up on that player.
May 22nd, 2010 at 10:39 am
MTGSalvation’s EDH deck thread has a great number of EDH decklist. While I’ve gotten a little away from that recently, I’ll be throwing some more up soon. I haven’t felt that this blog shouldn’t compete with that in terms of shear quantity: http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=194327
May 22nd, 2010 at 6:12 pm
The wicked lady (Azami lady of Scrolls) is possibly the worst in 1v1, the deck just counters everything and draws a childish amount of cards, it is possibly the only general that I find is no fun to play against.
May 23rd, 2010 at 11:05 am
Uril. It’s the same game plan every time. Cast him early, make him unblockable, and another enchantment or two to make him huge, and bam, everyone’s dead pretty quick.
Strangely, no one I play with seems to see it coming ever…
May 24th, 2010 at 8:04 am
Unblockable isn’t Uril’s secret sauce; Trample is. You can usually turn an Uril with trample into a two-attack murder machine.
May 25th, 2010 at 1:27 pm
Two attacks? You’re doing it wrong.
Turn X, play Uril
Turn X+1 enchant with Battle Mastery and Rancor, swing for the kill
May 24th, 2010 at 11:38 am
YES.
Uril was my first general, mainly because he was the only thing general-worthy in my binder at the time. I have had my friend who plays Karn refuse to play me because Uril is “too good” and can’t be dealt with outside of mass removal or a ridiculously disadvantageous combat step.
The troll shroud is incredible, and with Eldrazi Conscription or some of the new totem armor auras, I have had little problem using him to plop down a quick victory.
I did successfully swap him out for Rith the Awakener for a few games, which abuses the hell out of a rapidly growing Saproling army. My two other generals which are in the process of being built are Wrexial, the Risen Deep and Sek’kuar, Deathkeeper.
Sek’kuar has a lot of stuff using Evoke, Devour, and various sacrifice and dredge abilities. Not terribly competitive, but a lot of fun to play. This deck is what I had used to find out the usefulness of Basilisk Collar with Deathbringer Thoctar.
May 23rd, 2010 at 12:13 pm
In my very small playgroup, I loathe Teeg. I play a mono-black deck and he tends to shut it down handily.
May 24th, 2010 at 6:18 am
Allow me to shamelessly plug that I am maintaining a ‘most hated generals’ thread here;
http://forum.dragonhighlander.net/EDH_Forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=3275
on the EDH mothership. Right now the top spot is tied between Zur and Erayo.
Personally, I hate Arcum Daggson because of the endless tutoring and the tendency to inevitably go to disk/forge/lattice BS, and Jhoira for the tendency to play ‘haups and obliterate… ever.
May 24th, 2010 at 3:05 pm
Don’t worry about shamelessly plugging, I do it all the time.
May 25th, 2010 at 3:55 am
In my league we adopted the fair play rule, so there is no infinite combos or degeneracy. So my most feared generals are those that one shot people. Rafiq is the worst.
May 25th, 2010 at 5:07 am
Ran into Hitisugu the other night… was a very short game. Also Thada Adel displeases me, oh you have a sol ring I’ll take that uggh.
May 25th, 2010 at 5:35 pm
At our playgroup Uril is definitely the most hated general. The guy who plays it allways complains that he never wins. which is true. Because our Dakkon Blackblade and Niv Mizzet, the Firemind and Sen Triplets players never let Uril resolve. Uril is hated because he is difficult to answer. I personally don’t like Thada adel because she is constantly allowing players to search other players library’s which takes forever.
May 26th, 2010 at 12:24 pm
pheddelgrif. The player who uses him in my group just goes infinite and the game turns into a huge slog, where he just gains tons of life and gives anyone who is attacked hippos. Annoying as $&@?$@&!!
May 28th, 2010 at 6:50 am
I currently am the bane in my FNM EDH group with my Linvala Deck. Kormus Bell + Urborg + Linvala = no mana. Too bad these guys haven’t learned about the power of artifacts that make mana yet… oh well.
May 28th, 2010 at 11:58 am
[…] think that last week’s experiment was a success. There were a number of good responses, and I figured that this was a logical […]
May 31st, 2010 at 8:28 pm
I run Mageta, the Lion, so uril is never a problem for me :). Trust me, I know because my friend plays a mean Uril deck.
June 9th, 2010 at 5:05 pm
I’d have to say that I loathe Grand Arbiter Augustin IV, simply because it slows down everybody but the guy who’s playing it. Luckily the guy who plays with him in my playgroup has learned to not play his general every chance he can get, as he paints a large target on his head after that
June 14th, 2010 at 3:59 pm
I’d hafta say that the worst general I ever have to face with my group of players is my friend’s Dralnu deck. I remember when I first got into magic, and my friend had told me about EDH, and he showed me the sheer power that his Dralnu deck had. It was amazing. He had so many counterspells and creature destruction spells, and a Dread to keep him safe and a Guile to steal ever countered spell away from other players, it was like he was playing with everyone’s deck as his own! And once he managed to play Time Stretch, it was all over. He’d use Dralnu with it to get himself 4 turns in a row, and sometimes uses his Szadek as a win condition to mill the crap out of his opponents.
After seeing the deck in action, I asked if I could play with it, and he let me. It was insane! I had no idea how to make the deck work. I’ve come so far in my Magic playing abilities since then, and even now I can’t make Dralnu work as well as my friend does. It’s just a horrible general to play against, even moreso when it’s in the hands of he who created it. That is why, as of now, Dralnu is my most hated EDH general to play against. But, soon I will have an amazing Thraximundar deck to combat him with, and then we’ll see who’s general is more worthy of the others’ hatred. š
June 15th, 2010 at 1:52 pm
While I do agree that Zur, Uril, Rafiq and all those are powerful, I don’t think they are all that broken. They are all played in my group and there are always answers to them.
The one that we seldom have a good answer to is Omnath, Locus of Mana. He is like Rofellos that doesn’t need a Staff of Domination to be ridiculous. Sure, you can kill him a few times but he always. comes. back. Also, unlike Rofellos, Omnath can easily win games by himself, even more efficiently (in my experience) than Rafiq or Zur, because all you need is mana ramp to make him stronger.
He is also absolutely crazy with cards like Chameleon Colossus or Seedborn Muse. or both…
June 15th, 2010 at 3:44 pm
I keep seeing Zur pop up on here, and it kinda makes me wonder what the decks attached to Zur look like that you guys play against. I play my friend (same friend as in last post) all the time against his Zur deck, and it’s good, as long as Zur stays standing. But I’ve learned that the deck basically revolves around him, and without him, it falls apart. I guess what I be sayin is that in my experience Zur is easy to get rid of compared to Rafiq, Dralnu, and I’ve never played against Uril. Huh…
Anyway, silly question I can’t seem to find the answer to anywhere else. Does Erayo’s flip ability trigger if she is the fourth play of the turn? Figured you’d guys would be the ones to know š
June 16th, 2010 at 4:07 pm
Anyone who thinks that Rofellos needs Staff of Domination to be ridiculous obviously hasn’t seen a correctly built Rofellos EDH deck. ROFL-os is obnoxious because he provides a lot of mana, and he’s available to cast turn two every single game. This means that the Rofellcopter player is free to fill his deck with nothing but forests, removal, maybe some tutors, and a metric buttload of ginormous fatties. My friend has a Rofellos EDH deck, and let me tell you, if you don’t have an answer to Brian ‘Fellos right then and there (or if he’s gotten Lightning Greaves on Rofellos), the game’s gonna go something like:
turn 3: Primalcrux
turn 4: Khalni Hydra
turn 5: Verdant Force
turn 6: Vigor followed by Silvos, Rogue Elemental
And it only gets worse from there.
After getting trounced by Rickroll-fellos for the umpteenth time, I decided to craft my own super-obnoxious EDH deck. Looking through my binder, I noticed a foil Arcum Dagsson. The deck I ended up with is so absurdly curb-stompariffic that I refuse to use it, except against the most brutal EDH decks, like Rofellos. Though I might use it as an Archenemy deck, provided the opposing team has, like, a dozen or so players.
June 21st, 2010 at 9:17 am
First, @theMarc: you made me laugh all the way through your post, “Rickroll-fellos” indeed! But in a more serious capacity, I know the power of the green cabal coffers on legs.
I actually tend to build the “most hated” general decks, because I am a johnny at heart and enjoy making all the pieces come together. I have the jhoira of the ghitu deck at my table that says if i resolve my general there is an eldrazi and an apocalypse about to hit the suspend stack. I also have the grand arbiter deck that tells everyone they can’t play anymore while i resolve a storm herd and win with horses.
While I build the decks that my group hates, one of my friends in this group is my nemesis, because he can turn the table against me then win with wrecks-it-all every time. This causes no end of grief as he will play everything in blue and black to steal, copy and just own your things, gather specimens to counter storm herd, blatant thievery to get my prison effects…my group doesn’t quite understand that, because he more underhanded with it.
So my most hated general right now, is Wrexial the Risen deep….though I will most likely hate erayo when he builds it as well.
–shroomofinsanity–
June 24th, 2010 at 9:34 pm
I use Sisay and I out of 25 games have lost only 3 games. I cant believe no one gives him the credit he deserves.
June 25th, 2010 at 4:02 pm
Sisay is a girl #1. I always though Sisay to be a good fair general. Beat with dudes it’s fun, not a degenerate combo that wipes everyone out. You have the illution of being able to pull it out against Sisay.
Erayo is by far the most annoying Genral to face.
August 2nd, 2010 at 3:48 pm
Since the first thing to show up is usually Gaddock Teeg, Gaea’s Cradle, or Rofellos, I find Sisay really obnoxious.
June 25th, 2010 at 7:30 pm
The worst I’ve played against has to be Maralen Of The Mornsong. While not that scary at first glance, if you have a deck filled with high costing cards (as many EDH decks do), she’ll dominate you. My friend used her as his first general, and he has very few creatures in the deck. Basically, he gets her out as soon as he can and the rest of the deck is a toolbox of cards that screw you, and with those cards, you’ll have less life than he does. Playing green? Turn 4 Deathgrip. No more spells for you. Lots of cheap creatures? Consume The Meek. I could go on, but I’m sure you get the idea. Awful…just awful.
July 3rd, 2010 at 1:15 pm
There was a period of time when I was forced to stop playing my Balthor the Defiled deck. Something about playing tons of global removal with the ability to instantly recover upwards of seven times due to your coffers and whatnot just makes people want to leap across the table.
July 8th, 2010 at 9:41 am
My group is quite the small group with only 6 players (we just decided to drop the tournament and stores due to the incredible amount of jerks and net decks populating the place, fun was not what they wanted only money)
So I finally convinced my group to play EDH and well, our pool of generals is quite small.
I was using Crosis the Purger, but it wasn’t working much. So I Switched to Numot, The Devastator and now I am this close to getting him banned in the group.
Since it gets into the table as soon as turn 4, it begins blasting lands left and right and basically landlocks the game leaving me playing alone. yes it is very easy to kill, but that soon in the game a 6/6 that breaks the lands is not that easy to deal with, specially if it gets to destroy the colors that were going to kill it.
Maybe it’s the philosophy of my group.
September 9th, 2010 at 4:31 pm
in my casual group my niv mizzet is the only “forbidden” deck. although it is also the only infinite combo any of them has seen. other generals in this pod include a toolboxy momir vig deck, a simply rules bending kaervek deck, a “black white tokens is good in any format” teysa, orzhov scion deck, a progenitals deck, a sisters of stone death super fatty deck, and a savra sac engine deck. the point i am trying to make here is that generals can be played a whole bunch of different ways. the progenitus player chose progenitus not because it had protection genitals (see above spelling) but because it allowed him access to all 5 colors in his ARTIFACT DECK… yeah you heard me right. i even took the curiosity/eye combo out, and it was still considered to powerfull to be played. just an interesting look at how casual groups look at cards differently i guess.
June 4th, 2011 at 12:37 pm
Well, I play Azami. I play with Mind over Matter *and* Intruder Alarm. I play High Tide, Caged Sun and Gauntlet of Power for my Mind’s Desire and Brain Freeze, (No Tolarian Academy + Candelabra, I spent too much for a casual deck anyhow) and Hinder/Vendilion Clique + Tunnel Vision. Yes, my deck can be crazy, but because I use all of my tools (Specifically Ancestral Visions/Blue Sun’s Zenith {also a win condition}) politically, people actually enjoy playing the deck. I keep Sol Ring and Grim Monolith out of it to give a couple of my aggro friends a chance before it gets going, and they’re happy with that. If anything, the ‘all my counters are become spelljacks’ with Guile is the most annoying thing for our group. Even an ‘un-fun’ mono-blue permission deck can be fun if you play it that way. And sending a counter in to save a friend can do a lot for you in the long run. It doesn’t matter what general you’re playing, or even if you are playing otherwise degenerate combos, as long as you do so in a playful and fun manner. I chose to play Azami before I’d heard about MoM and Intruder Alarm, because I’m blue to the core. Our group is more than happy to have Azami, because she’s played right. To win, of course, but not to abuse the other players.