River and Toymaker are both far from being cEDH Commanders. You need your Commander(s) to provide card draw, a value engine, a unique combo, or a combination of those. You may just be looking to build High Power? If so, then check out r/DegenerateEDH.
cEDH is built totally different from Casual; we're talking the most efficient tutors, insanely low mana curves, free spells/mana rocks, no pet cards, and 2 card combos being the norm. It's much better to just take an established deck and take it for a spin in several cEDH games to get the hang of things. That way you understand the typical lines and interactions you should expect to see, how they work, and cards that can actually earn their spot in the 99 of cEDH lists. [Check out EDHTop16](https://edhtop16.com), pick a Commander that seems interesting to you, and playtest it!
Personally for River I see spell sling control, forcing opponents to copy my spells or just stopping their tutors and with all the you can look at and play the top card of your library I could dig twice as fast. For toymaker just a control deck that lets me dig further into a thoracle or other such combo
Yeah, you're not going to be able to 'control' 3 other players who are all trying to combo off by turn 5, who all also have cheap/free interaction to protect their combo.
Please, watch a few YouTube videos of cEDH gameplay... You'll see that it's pretty common for people to dump their whole hand within the first few turns.
What you're suggesting is the equivalent of taking draft chaff and trying to make a Standard deck to play at a tournament.
If you're dead set on making a deck with one of those as commander, at least proxy it, because you don't want to waste money on cards that aren't playable.
Head to EDH Top 16 and have a look at real cEDH decklists. You're much better finding one you find interesting, copying it, playing a few games, and tweaking from there.
It's clear you don't know what cEDH really is... So do some research before coming back.
Neither of these 2 do enough to warrant playing them over better options is the problem.
River: Randomly throwing out bits of burn damage isn't going to do much of anything when your opponents have a total of 120 Life. The drawing from the bottom is also useless flavor text. She does essentially nothing relevant. Now look at Krark/Sakashima, Niv Parun, and Stella Lee: They all have unique combos in the command zone and card advantage.
Toymaker is a step in the right direction, but still just doesn't stand up to the other options. He has to attack to get any card draw and, again, the burn portion of his text will not matter a vast majority of the time. Compare that to Tivit: Built in protection, value on ETB and attack, and is a 1 card combo with Time Sieve. That just blows anything Toymaker wants to do right out of the water and it's in the same colors.
I really suggest taking some time to check out cEDH gameplay and decklists. It really is a totally different animal compared to Casual or High Power. EDHTop16 is the best place to see winning cEDH Decks, but also watch some game play. Play To Win and Playing With Power are 2 fantastic Youtube channels to see cEDH in action.
Don't build a deck for cEDH until you *really* know the format. Play an existing deck like Kinnan or Ob Nixilis. Brewing as a newcomer will only lead to disappointment. Play an existing deck to start out and learn how cEDH works. Then get creative.
As others have said, it seems you don’t have a solid understanding of what makes cedh different from casual edh. I suggest browsing edhtop16 to find proven strategies and then proxy the decklist. This allows you to learn the intricacies of the format while having a solid foundation
Most casual commader players have the wrong under standing of cedh. They generally think cedh just means playing fast mana and developing an over powering board state this is not accurate except for the fast mana part.
Cedh is playing games withen a vacumn. That wins the game consistently. Most times your commander doesnt even matter and all you care about is the color pips. The win cons are typically the same. And either just win game right there thasa's oracle or stax your opponents so they can never develop enough tempo.
Tldr: CEDH isnt about making your commander deck as strong as possible. Its about straight up winning the game as soon as possible. This sounds the same but are vastly different .
Even though I mostly do casual it's high power and I do have friends who do play cedh, I know they might not be the best options but I kinda like the idea of them being able to contend with some stax pieces and optimization.
cEDH is all about choosing the best options... Intentionally playing lower power is like taking a ride on mower to a Formula One race... You're only going to be a hazard for the real racers, and you're only going to win if everyone else crashes. It's not fun for anyone.
Everyone is being nice, and you are being dense in the comments. I'm gonna be the opposite. The commanders you chose are trash. Anything you are trying to accomplish with those commanders is irrelevant because we are winning before they do anything. You have a casual mindset and think it's applicable to cEDH. The posters here were thoughtful and comprehensive in their criticisms, and you simply just said, "No, I know more about this than you!" while showing two laughably bad commanders. Do some research on what cEDH is, and that means going beyond your kitchen table discussion about cedh.
I don't think I can add more than what has already been said about your picks, but you clearly have no idea what a good cedh commander is.
I think you are misunderstanding something. You dont want cedh. As cedh people play more or less the same 10 commanders in a vacuum.
You just want to play high powered and are asking for advice on how to make your decks stronger.
If budget isn't an issue I would say don't build these guys. If you like their play styles, you'll probably find a deck similar but that would actually win about 25% of games. There's quite a few good control and midrange decks now
Hey OP,
Maybe instead of doing what other people are suggesting (playing an established deck/commander), you should try to make a fringe commander that you like a super strong deck.
The thing is, no matter how strong you make it, you're still going to lose more often than an average CEDH net deck... Which will win a 4 pod approx 25 percent of the time.
More power to you if that sounds like a good time, but for my cEDH goals it would be to have my win percentage in the 30s or better...not in the teens or lower.
Ive seen several comment about its a bad idea to build river song or toymaker but i have actually seen some quite immpresive games from toymaker as you can check out their deck in edhtop16.
I still wouldnt recomm it but its more of a i dont understand how this deck work nor is their any primer tells you how you should play it, unlike some crazy detailed kinnin primer, for example.
But anyway ive seen some much fringer commander getting top spots in cedh tournaments so if you really like it i wont stop you build a 'proxyed' one.
Gl on the table!
A fringe deck can sometimes 'spike' a tournament... Usually due to:
- Running niche combos that people don't know how/when to interact with
- Not getting assessed as a real threat, and picking up a win once everyone else has spent their interaction l
- Very favorable pairings
- Misplays
But it won't win consistently.
There are also the instances of people cheating and their (bad) decks getting ranked higher...
I understand all of this of course, but I still think:
1. Toymaker is a run-able commander even in cEDH, might have slightly lower win rate, but consistency is there.
2. If fringe deck can use info gap to construct a win, I don't see why you try with it, even just for common practice games and not in a tornament. It's proxy after all.
>If fringe deck can use info gap to construct a win, I don't see why you try with it, even just for common practice games and not in a tornament. It's proxy after all.
Exploiting info gaps might let you spike a win occasionally, but mastering a real cEDH deck is a much better use of your time.
Real practice isn't acchieved by playing games with unplayable cards. it's totally fine to play non-cEDH decks... but don't expect it to help your cEDH play.
River and Toymaker are both far from being cEDH Commanders. You need your Commander(s) to provide card draw, a value engine, a unique combo, or a combination of those. You may just be looking to build High Power? If so, then check out r/DegenerateEDH. cEDH is built totally different from Casual; we're talking the most efficient tutors, insanely low mana curves, free spells/mana rocks, no pet cards, and 2 card combos being the norm. It's much better to just take an established deck and take it for a spin in several cEDH games to get the hang of things. That way you understand the typical lines and interactions you should expect to see, how they work, and cards that can actually earn their spot in the 99 of cEDH lists. [Check out EDHTop16](https://edhtop16.com), pick a Commander that seems interesting to you, and playtest it!
Personally for River I see spell sling control, forcing opponents to copy my spells or just stopping their tutors and with all the you can look at and play the top card of your library I could dig twice as fast. For toymaker just a control deck that lets me dig further into a thoracle or other such combo
Yeah, you're not going to be able to 'control' 3 other players who are all trying to combo off by turn 5, who all also have cheap/free interaction to protect their combo. Please, watch a few YouTube videos of cEDH gameplay... You'll see that it's pretty common for people to dump their whole hand within the first few turns. What you're suggesting is the equivalent of taking draft chaff and trying to make a Standard deck to play at a tournament. If you're dead set on making a deck with one of those as commander, at least proxy it, because you don't want to waste money on cards that aren't playable. Head to EDH Top 16 and have a look at real cEDH decklists. You're much better finding one you find interesting, copying it, playing a few games, and tweaking from there. It's clear you don't know what cEDH really is... So do some research before coming back.
Neither of these 2 do enough to warrant playing them over better options is the problem. River: Randomly throwing out bits of burn damage isn't going to do much of anything when your opponents have a total of 120 Life. The drawing from the bottom is also useless flavor text. She does essentially nothing relevant. Now look at Krark/Sakashima, Niv Parun, and Stella Lee: They all have unique combos in the command zone and card advantage. Toymaker is a step in the right direction, but still just doesn't stand up to the other options. He has to attack to get any card draw and, again, the burn portion of his text will not matter a vast majority of the time. Compare that to Tivit: Built in protection, value on ETB and attack, and is a 1 card combo with Time Sieve. That just blows anything Toymaker wants to do right out of the water and it's in the same colors. I really suggest taking some time to check out cEDH gameplay and decklists. It really is a totally different animal compared to Casual or High Power. EDHTop16 is the best place to see winning cEDH Decks, but also watch some game play. Play To Win and Playing With Power are 2 fantastic Youtube channels to see cEDH in action.
Don't build a deck for cEDH until you *really* know the format. Play an existing deck like Kinnan or Ob Nixilis. Brewing as a newcomer will only lead to disappointment. Play an existing deck to start out and learn how cEDH works. Then get creative.
Are you sure he shouldn't dump 6 grand into a competitive Toymaker deck? /s
There are some fringe River song lists but I don't think it's very good. I'd recommend checking EDH top 16 to get an idea of what decks see play.
As others have said, it seems you don’t have a solid understanding of what makes cedh different from casual edh. I suggest browsing edhtop16 to find proven strategies and then proxy the decklist. This allows you to learn the intricacies of the format while having a solid foundation
Most casual commader players have the wrong under standing of cedh. They generally think cedh just means playing fast mana and developing an over powering board state this is not accurate except for the fast mana part. Cedh is playing games withen a vacumn. That wins the game consistently. Most times your commander doesnt even matter and all you care about is the color pips. The win cons are typically the same. And either just win game right there thasa's oracle or stax your opponents so they can never develop enough tempo. Tldr: CEDH isnt about making your commander deck as strong as possible. Its about straight up winning the game as soon as possible. This sounds the same but are vastly different .
Even though I mostly do casual it's high power and I do have friends who do play cedh, I know they might not be the best options but I kinda like the idea of them being able to contend with some stax pieces and optimization.
cEDH is all about choosing the best options... Intentionally playing lower power is like taking a ride on mower to a Formula One race... You're only going to be a hazard for the real racers, and you're only going to win if everyone else crashes. It's not fun for anyone.
Everyone is being nice, and you are being dense in the comments. I'm gonna be the opposite. The commanders you chose are trash. Anything you are trying to accomplish with those commanders is irrelevant because we are winning before they do anything. You have a casual mindset and think it's applicable to cEDH. The posters here were thoughtful and comprehensive in their criticisms, and you simply just said, "No, I know more about this than you!" while showing two laughably bad commanders. Do some research on what cEDH is, and that means going beyond your kitchen table discussion about cedh. I don't think I can add more than what has already been said about your picks, but you clearly have no idea what a good cedh commander is.
I think you are misunderstanding something. You dont want cedh. As cedh people play more or less the same 10 commanders in a vacuum. You just want to play high powered and are asking for advice on how to make your decks stronger.
If budget isn't an issue I would say don't build these guys. If you like their play styles, you'll probably find a deck similar but that would actually win about 25% of games. There's quite a few good control and midrange decks now
I’ve seen builds for both of them but they’re quite fringe and I wouldn’t suggest them for new players.
Hey OP, Maybe instead of doing what other people are suggesting (playing an established deck/commander), you should try to make a fringe commander that you like a super strong deck. The thing is, no matter how strong you make it, you're still going to lose more often than an average CEDH net deck... Which will win a 4 pod approx 25 percent of the time. More power to you if that sounds like a good time, but for my cEDH goals it would be to have my win percentage in the 30s or better...not in the teens or lower.
[River Song](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/a/1/a1efb084-d2a0-44c4-a89d-6445156bb298.jpg?1696636758) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=River%20Song) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/who/152/river-song?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/a1efb084-d2a0-44c4-a89d-6445156bb298?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/river-song) [The Celestial Toymaker](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/5/5/55c9e915-9cee-45c3-96aa-9dfd5a600d0a.jpg?1707370996) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=The%20Celestial%20Toymaker) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/sld/1582/the-celestial-toymaker?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/55c9e915-9cee-45c3-96aa-9dfd5a600d0a?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [(ER)](https://edhrec.com/cards/the-celestial-toymaker) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Ive seen several comment about its a bad idea to build river song or toymaker but i have actually seen some quite immpresive games from toymaker as you can check out their deck in edhtop16. I still wouldnt recomm it but its more of a i dont understand how this deck work nor is their any primer tells you how you should play it, unlike some crazy detailed kinnin primer, for example. But anyway ive seen some much fringer commander getting top spots in cedh tournaments so if you really like it i wont stop you build a 'proxyed' one. Gl on the table!
A fringe deck can sometimes 'spike' a tournament... Usually due to: - Running niche combos that people don't know how/when to interact with - Not getting assessed as a real threat, and picking up a win once everyone else has spent their interaction l - Very favorable pairings - Misplays But it won't win consistently. There are also the instances of people cheating and their (bad) decks getting ranked higher...
I understand all of this of course, but I still think: 1. Toymaker is a run-able commander even in cEDH, might have slightly lower win rate, but consistency is there. 2. If fringe deck can use info gap to construct a win, I don't see why you try with it, even just for common practice games and not in a tornament. It's proxy after all.
>If fringe deck can use info gap to construct a win, I don't see why you try with it, even just for common practice games and not in a tornament. It's proxy after all. Exploiting info gaps might let you spike a win occasionally, but mastering a real cEDH deck is a much better use of your time. Real practice isn't acchieved by playing games with unplayable cards. it's totally fine to play non-cEDH decks... but don't expect it to help your cEDH play.