Last week, r/EDH asked a simple question: what is the smallest Commander hill you are willing to die on? It became the most active Magic thread on Reddit, pulling in over 1,800 comments of grievances, table rules, and surprisingly strong feelings about how cards get tapped.
We read the whole thing so you don't have to. Here are the ten hills the community voted hardest for, ranked by upvotes, with our take on each.
1. Keep your mana rocks out of your lands (870 points)
"Don't mix in your mana rocks within your lands. It's not the same." (u/blobblet)
Our take: Correct, and it's not close. A Sol Ring hiding behind a Forest is information your opponents are entitled to see. Rocks die to artifact removal, lands mostly don't. Separate rows.
2. Infinite free mulligans breed bad decks (776 points)
u/Antz0r argues that endless "casual" mulligans for a better game just paper over poor deck construction.
Our take: Fair, with a caveat. New players get grace. But if your table free-mulligans every game and your manabase is still 31 lands and a prayer, the mulligan rule is not the problem. Before you touch the mulligan rule, try a ten-dollar mana base fix.
3. Missed triggers expire after one turn cycle (677 points)
u/steelreddit211's rule: remember your trigger within a turn cycle and it resolves, as long as it would not have won you the game. Remember it three upkeeps later? Gone.
Our take: This is basically tournament policy translated to kitchen tables, and it works. Write it into your pod's social contract. While you are at it, make sure everyone knows what Storied, Recruit and Hone counters actually do, because new keywords are where missed triggers pile up.
4. Stop tapping at 45 degrees (651 points, plus a 152-point echo)
"Other people need to be able to see what you have tapped at a glance. It's borderline concealing public knowledge." (u/Logthisforlater)
Our take: Two separate comments made the top 15 on this one. The people have spoken. Ninety degrees or untapped. No diagonal ambiguity.
5. Your command zone is not the battlefield (438 points)
u/TisteAndii can't tell whether your commander is in play when it sits in line with your creatures.
Our take: Playmats with a printed command zone exist for a reason. Keep the zone visually distinct and half these "wait, when did that come down?" arguments disappear.
6. Eating removal is part of the game (416 points)
u/RafikiafReKo puts it bluntly: getting countered, losing a land, paying the Rhystic tax. "If you can't embrace these things, mtg is not the game for you."
Our take: The healthiest sentence in the whole thread. Interaction is the game working as intended, not a personal attack.
7. Mill panic is irrational (272 points)
u/MonsutaReipu on players mourning a card milled 40 deep: you were never drawing that card anyway.
Our take: True in almost every case. The exception that proves it: if your win condition just hit the yard and you have no recursion, you're allowed one sigh.
8. Beware the self-appointed bracket expert (267 points)
"Most of these bracket rule experts don't know wtf they are talking about." (u/Jurple-shirt)
Our take: The bracket system's biggest weakness a year in is exactly this. It runs on shared intent, and the loudest rules-lawyer at the table is usually the one bending it. Expect more on this discourse in an upcoming issue.
9. Your salt is your responsibility (171 points)
"Take responsibility for your own enjoyment. Just be pleasant to play with. That's the actual point of the game." (u/CriminallyCasual7)
Our take: Frame it and hang it in every LGS.
10. Stop counting wins in a casual format (121 points)
u/The-Reddit-Monster describes the player who tracks who has "won today" and targets accordingly, calling the habit "deeply and utterly pathetic."
Our take: Threat assessment based on the current board: good. Threat assessment based on a running scoreboard from three games ago: you have invented a worse format.
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Honorable mentions
A few that missed the cut but deserve airtime: don't cast a tutor if you don't know what you're searching for (109 points), announce your plays out loud instead of silently tapping through your turn (74), and Reliquary Tower is not an auto-include, run a land that produces colored mana instead (73).
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