Now that I have friends locally to play Magic the Gathering with, and I’ve finally bothered to find out what the Commander format is.

I’ve got my hands on some pre-constructed Commander decks. Specifically the Anthology (which is four “classic” ready to play Commander decks from previous sets), and I’ve pre-ordered the 2017 decks (out today I believe).

I think this will be a great format for my friends and I to play. Especially with these pre-constructed decks. We can decide to meet up to play Magic, whip out these pre-constructed decks, select the ones we want to play with, and then play a multi-player game of Magic together.

But naturally I can’t leave it there. Before even playing I have planned to vary the game! After watching the latest episode of The Commandzone (a podcast about playing MtG Commander) they talk about ways to keep the format fresh. One of them was to use the plane chase cards. It’s possible to get all the 86 cards they did for this format in yet another anthology. However I’m not really interested in the decks that also come with it. So I was happy to see that Magic Madhouse sold just the plane chase cards, and the needed die separately. For half the cost of the anthology I get all 86 plane chase cards in a storage box, then for a couple of extra quid the plane chase die. I can live with that. The nice thing about the plane chase cards is that they can be used with more than just Commander.

I’d love a set of the 2016 Commander decks but one or two of them are going for silly money. So not very likely that this will happen. From a couple of YouTube channels I believe that a couple of the 2016 decks were pretty good. Which usually translates to higher demand than supply and the predictable high prices. I could at the end of the day get them. But I have other stuff that is also calling for my hard earned cash. Ok we know I will cave at some point. The semi-interesting thing about all this is when will I cave?