If there's something that hasn't become apparent to you yet, I guess I should address the elephant in the room: I don't believe in decklists.

At least for Commander.

My goal is never to include a decklist in this series of articles for ManaNation. I can imagine Trick pulling out his hair and about half of my readers have now hit the close tab or the back button. For those of you who decided to stay, that's for keeping an open mind. What follows are my opinions only, and I'm sure not everyone feels the same way (so don't yell at Trick for this piece).

There are two main reasons I tend not to write decklists or about decklists in my articles. The first is that they're kinda boring to read. When you have a deck of 100 different cards (or some number a little less due to basic lands), and you list them all out, your eyes glaze over. Yes, it's helpful to know what you're thinking of, but there's too may pieces to just see names and get how the deck properly works. You could write out the names of all the cards and explain them, but again, it doesn't really do anything.

If you take a look at Sheldon's last piece on Star City Games, he talks about a friend's Thelon of Havenwood's Commander deck now that he (MTGSalvation's wiki said Thelon's a male so I'm sticking with that) is legal as a Commander. Sheldon goes down the deck card by card adding his analysis. Sometimes it's ok material:

Deathspore Thallid: As you know, I'm a big fan of the sacrifice outlets, which prevent people from stealing your goodies. He's certainly also part of the Saproling Explosion plan.

Other times not so much:

Sporesower Thallid: Pretty straightforward in fitting in the theme. I need a few extra words for this line, so I'll mention that Facebook tells me I've been on it for 549 days.

This isn't a shot at Sheldon. This is just the danger of writing these things. It happens all the time with set reviews too, where there isn't much to say about a card, but you have to talk about it. It's a little different in Constructed decklists and talking about the cards that are pretty obvious. Like when Mike Flores talks about Mana Leak in a Blue/White control list. He doesn't need to say "If your opponent taps out, it's a great play to insure you actually counter the spell. Plus, it costs as much as out beloved Counterspell and how can ask for anything better?"

Until someone devises a new way to present a deck list that isn't so straightforward and boring, I'm staying away from them. Read Sheldon's post. I don't like to rag on another person's writing as this is mostly the style of the way he's decided to present this, but I don't feel excited about building a Thelon deck. I want to build one, and I'm sure that a ton of other players do as well. This leads me to point two.

I don't want to tell people how to build their Commander deck. Again, Trick is pulling out his hair because that's kinda why he brought me in here on ManaNation (not for my charming personality and ability to title articles). Story time:

I have a friend who just started playing Magic once again. Like most players, they give up the game due to time reasons, and come back when they can focus on it again. He never really was a competitive player and we enjoyed a format called Seattle Highlander 150 back during the original Mirrodin Block (In fact, you can check out an MTGSalvation article I did years ago about it). But as he stopped playing Magic and everyone I knew migrated over to Commander. I believe I was one of the last holdouts of that format and finally gave it up for Commander like everyone else did.

Anyway, my friend has picked cards back up again and I told him about Commander. He put together a Progenitus Commander deck and asked if we could play. Of course we could. In the course of the first game, I started to see some issues with his deck. Because he only had some old stuff he didn't sell, and my hand me downs (Extra commons and uncommons I had), his deck was extremely underpowered. Not that it's a bad thing, but you could tell some certain things.

He had a cycle of the Mana Myrs, a cycle of the Spellbombs, and wanted to put in the full Volver cycle. My friend was more nuts for cycles then I am. After a few games where I completely beat him down, he asked if we could work on his deck. Of course I was delighted to help and started to pull out my cards to help him reconstruct. It was here that thought of point two: I don't want to tell people how to build their deck.

I firmly believe that a Commander deck is an extension of how someone views and plays Magic. By seeing how someone constructs their deck, you can tell a ton about them as a player. It all falls back into that Spike/Johnny/Timmy dynamic; in a format where you can play almost anything that you want, how you construct your deck is your declaration of Magic.

Before I get angry comments, e-mails (Remember, it's mtgcolorpie_AT_Gmail_DOT_com), and tweets (@MTGColorPie), this is a broad generalization. But, there's a reason it's a generalizations. If you only have one Commander deck, and it's Azumi, or Teferi, or Vendilion Clique or now Memnarch, you're a competitive Spike player. They're most likely filled with the same 40ish spells while the rest are varying due to your chosen Commander. This is not a bad thing, but that's how you get enjoyment from this format. If you have ten EDH decks, all with different colors and types and themes, you're most likely a Johnny. That's not bad either, that's how you play the format.

If you take a look at all my EDH decks, it's all about incremental winnings and synergy. Yes, there are splashy spells as Wrath of God and Terastodon, but those types of things are needed in a format like this. If I throw out a deck list or help you build it, from my perspective, that's what a deck I would play would look like; that's not your way you play. That doesn't mean that everything that I write is skewed towards that perspective; I try to write relevant advice that helps for all kinds of players. [Link to my First Article] You need to have an alternate path to victory if you can't access your General.

Going back to my friend, as I started to strip apart my deck and look through my binder I asked him one question: What do you want to do with this deck? He answered: Play Progenitus. Even though he was playing a five colored deck, he wanted mana ramp and good spells that help him with casting that 10/10 monstrosity. Instead of just me throwing cards at him saying they're good for the format, I showed him different cards, asking if he would like to play them. But they weren't just random cards.

I went to the archetypal Spike/Timmy/Johnny cards. My friend started picking out pretty regularly Timmy cards. From there, I knew where to go.

I started pulling out from my collection splashy spells, ones that gave him options (Hull Breach, etc), ones that created and awesome feeling when played. Maelstrom Nexus was a huge hit. As too was Shard Convergence. Then, after we pulled out a ton of cards, we started to whittle away cards that didn't fit his needs. While he asked my advice on some cards, I let him make all of the choices. He didn't like the three Invasion Dragons from Duel Decks: The Coalition vs Phyrexia, so out they went. I asked him about the Volvers, and how many time he would actually pay 3 life to regenerate one. Those were taken out. The most spellbombs were taken out.

But mostly his decisions. Not mine.

I limited the number of big creatures he had in his deck so that it's not just monsters fill the deck. We looked at which land acceleration filled the deck; which draw spells, which awesome spells. He's got a pet card: Guided Passage. It's in there. Why?

It's his deck.

He told me that he was going to include it whether I liked it or not. I didn't have a problem, though I laughed. We stayed up until 2 in the morning building, and refining this deck. We both knew that this was going to be the final build; mostly because I know Commander decks are never finished and he didn't have some cards that he wanted to put in there. A few weeks later when we met up again, he showed me his changes. Reflecting Pool, Elspeth 2.0, etc.

It's not that my friend doesn't know how to build decks, he needed a starting point. Being gone from the game for so many years, he doesn't know a 4^th of the new cards that have been printed since his absence. He needed a guide through the better part of a decade of new cards, not a "you need Forests to play Green mana" expose. Everyone needs a starting point into something they're unsure of.

And that's some of the appeal of the decklists. Even though they're boring to read, I understand that players want ideas. What else have people done with So-and-So Commander? That, I understand. Figuring out a deck is more than going to magiccards.info and typing in "Dragon" or "+1/+1 Counter." But, as the style currently resides, just spouting decklists aren't cutting it for Commander. Everyone has a different style, and my idea of a good deck might be different than Bennie Smith's idea. And that's great, it's fun, and what keeps the format fresh.

Explore new concepts, take a look at what no one in your area is doing and see if you can do that. If you've heard so much about a certain card and want to try it out, there's no on there saying you shouldn't. This is a fun and casual format and if you aren't having fun with your deck then change it.

Next week, nothing but decklists. No, I'm kidding. You need a place to stat? This will be a jumping off point to help you build your decks rather than just more philosophy.

As for my friend with the Progenitus deck? He's already working on his next one. Commander? Intet the Dreamer.

And you can bet Guided Passage will be in there too. It wouldn't be his deck without it.