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I just got destroyed in Commander (EDH). Worst part of it is that the deck that killed me can do it over and over. It has a guaranteed 4-5 turn win. (EVERY TIME)

It felt a bit broken to me, so I wanted to see if all the cards that were used to destroy me were legal for commander.

But the only site I can find is http://mtgcommander.net/rules.php.

Does Wizards let this external site dictate the banned cards for this format?

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    Out of curiosity, what was your opponent doing to guarantee a win? 4-5 turns is a lot of time to react! – bengoesboom Dec 31 '13 at 5:21
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    mtgcommander.net is the authoritative source for EDH/Commander – ikegami Dec 31 '13 at 8:32
  • "guaranteed" is also a pretty high bar, for seeing only ~13 cards out of a deck full of singletons. – Cascabel♦ Dec 31 '13 at 14:40
  • @Jefromi With EDH's deep card pool, it's easy to stack a deck with tutors. Despite the banned list, there are a lot of effectively-one-card combos in the format (::cough:: Hermit Druid). – Alex P Dec 31 '13 at 14:54
  • @AlexP I knew there were a lot of tutors just not that there were that many! – Cascabel♦ Dec 31 '13 at 15:35
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The Commander format (née Elder Dragon Highlander) began with a bunch of judges entertaining themselves over the course of long, major tournaments, with cards that rarely saw play; Sheldon Menery in particular, who was at the time a level 5 judge although he has since retired from Magic judging.

As the format grew, the EDH Rules Committee formed, and they created "the" banlist -- while many groups customize the list to their own metas, and there is a different banlist designed for 1v1 play[1], the banlist maintained by the RC was the gold standard for EDH.

When Wizards wanted to get in on the action, they decided to let the RC maintain their autonomy, although they did need to brand the format, hence the name change to Commander instead of EDH. While commander is now a supported casual format, even to the point of being available for scheduling via the Wizards Event Reporter software, playable in Magic Online, and detailed in the Comprehensive Rules document, the rules of the format continue to be maintained by the RC.

The RC has synchronized their rules/banlist update schedule with that of Wizards, which helps to avoid confusion from mismatched information.

In short: The banlist posted on mtgcommander.net is the official banlist.

Notes

  1. Duel Commander, occasionally called "French" EDH. The Duel Commander rules and banlist are maintained by a separate group from the Commander Rules committee, and Duel Commander is not supported by Wizards in the way normal Commander is.
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  • Solid answer. Thanks. Also explains what French Commander is, which I had been wondering. – Vaccano Jan 1 '14 at 0:20
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That list is correct. You can find the same list on Wizard's site here: https://www.wizards.com/Magic/TCG/Resources.aspx?x=magic/rules/100cardsingleton-commander.

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