Before you freak out, this is not a blurb about Biden and Trump. Though, the view of politics in EDH also has very drastic viewpoints. I’m talking about sitting down for a game of commander, slinging spells, and attacking with creatures. You are there, and one player is running away with the game. Your opponent looks at you to hand you an olive branch and says, “I can deal with them, but….” WHAT?!?! You are telling me you can solve the table’s problem, but instead of doing it, you want to hold everyone else hostage?! And there you have it. Politics.
Before we get too deep into this, let me clarify what politics is. Politics is table talk and players making deals with other players to deal with an obvious threat, usually in trade for some sort of immunity. This is a unique aspect to EDH that you don’t see in other formats. Some people think any table talk is politics, but I don’t hold that view. If you are just stating, “Hey, this is part of a combo,” or “Those cards are big issues,” for the most part, everyone would agree, and if the guy in control of those cards is being honest, he would also agree. Politics is the actual deals being cut and made to deal with problems while gaining immunity, which is the view I hold.
With that, my view is anti-politics. In our playgroup, people won’t even ask me to make a deal because they know I won’t. I have this stance for a couple of reasons, but I won’t bore you with all of them. However, I will touch on the one I feel is the most damning for politics, which is… If you need to make deals to win, did you really win? This has sparked, we will call them debates, amongst our playgroup. I like the idea of building a deck, playing it, and letting the randomness of your draws and what spells you choose to play decide the winner. I don’t mind table talk and discussing threats and assessing, but someone asking for full immunity so they can deal with a threat is crazy to me. What you just said is, “I can deal with it, but I know I will probably become the threat next, so I don’t want you to touch me, so then I can win instead of them.” I just feel like any time a deal is extended, it is being done because they know they can win. Also, the other thing to consider is there is always a threat at the table. Once one is taken down, someone else immediately becomes the threat. It is usually the person making the deal too. Just play the game and draw cards. If you didn’t draw the right cards to win, so be it, but don’t tell me you won when in reality your other opponents were too shortsighted to realize any deal they made with you was going to get them killed.
So, there you have it, my defense against the “dark arts” known as politics within EDH. I’m sure my friend and co-host Jeff will write the pro-politics article to counter mine and make well-worded and articulate arguments on why politics are great, but just remember… He who offers peace with one hand usually carries a stick in the other.