Welcome to 3 Card Magic, the most minimalist Magic format in the world!
What's 3CM? The basic concept is simple: make a deck consisting of any three Magic cards, and try to beat all the other decks! If you're new here, you should start by reading the 3CM Primer. Deck submissions should be PM'd to me, CommanderJim, or emailed to [email protected].
The Rules
Deckbuilding Each player creates a deck of three Magic cards following the banned list, and any additional restrictions imposed by the current format. (See Round Types below.) Decks are submitted to me via private message with "3CM" and "Deck" somewhere in the title. My deck is finalized before reading these PMs; if you'd like me to send you a verification PM with my list in it, just ask. You may update your decklist up until the deadline. (Unless you've asked me to share my list with you.)
If you send me a deck that can't win against a deck with three blank cards, I'll ask you to confirm that you're aware of this fact. This rule exists to prevent people from accidentally submitting decks that don't work, while still allowing Karn Liberated decks and other such shenanigans.
Gameplay After the round is closed, each deck plays against each other deck twice, once going first and once going second. Normal Magic rules apply to a game of 3CM, except for the following exceptions.
Players don't lose the game for drawing from an empty library.
If the original source of a random effect (i.e. coinflip) comes from one player's deck, the other player chooses its outcome.
Effects that get cards from outside the game (Wishes, Research // Development, Ring of Ma'ruf) cannot be used to find anything.
Games are played with the contents of both decks known to each player at all times. Players will always play optimally and to win.
Scoring When the round is closed, a spreadsheet of all the decks and matchups is posted, to be filled in by the players. Players are encouraged to double-check the matchups graded by other players, since mistakes are often made when complicated decks are involved. A win is worth 3 points, a draw is 1 point, and a loss is 0 points.
Round Types A season consists of four rounds: two vanilla and two alternate formats. Vanilla: These rounds follow normal rules, but have a banned list that changes every season. Alternate Formats: These rounds use special rules that might effect deckbuilding, gameplay, or both!
Fabulous Prizes When a round is done being graded, prizes are awarded! Grand Prizes are given out at the end of the season. Round Prizes: The winner of each round may suggest an alternate format (in either category) to be put on the poll next season. Consolation Prizes: The lowest-scoring player of each Vanilla round picks one card from that round's winning deck to add to the next season's Vanilla banned list. Grand Prizes: The top-scoring players of the entire season each get to make some number of changes to the Vanilla banned list, based on their rank. Each change allows that player to either add a card or remove a card. First place gets three changes, second place gets two, and third place gets one. Note: A card may not be unbanned if it was newly banned at the start of the season.
Tiebreakers 1. Head-to-head: Whoever has the most points from games against other the other tied player(s) wins the tie. 2. Match-Wins: Whoever won the most games wins the tie. (Ignore draws.)
Previous Seasons
Season 1 Season 2 (Winners: thatmarkguy, CommanderJim, Yarium) Season 3 (Winners: Hello World, purple shrimp, mjack33) Season 4 (Winners: razorborne, masterofdoom, thatmarkguy) Season 5 (Winners: razorborne, door (dooooooooooor), Hello World) Season 6 (Winners: POSValkir, thatmarkguy, door (dooooooooooor)) Season 7 (Winners: CommanderJim, thatmarkguy, GobO_Scarlet) Season 8 (Winners: CommanderJim, thatmarkguy, mjack33) Season 9 (Winners: thatmarkguy, silasw, POSValkir) Season 10 (Winners: vlord, thatmarkguy, silasw) Season 11 (Winners: POSValkir, mjack33, silasw) Season 12 (Winners: Rubik, POSValkir, CommanderJim) Season 13 (Winners: thatmarkguy, Rubik, POSValkir) Season 14 (Winners: Rubik, Golgari_Spy, thatmarkguy) Season 15 (Winners: Golgari_Spy, thatmarkguy, Rubik) Season 16 (Winners: thatmarkguy, POSValkir, Golgari_Spy) Season 17 (Winners: door (dooooooooooor), thatmarkguy, Golgari_Spy) Season 18 (Winners: Golgari_Spy, Edacade, door (dooooooooooor))
Scoreboard
Your average match points for each round are summed together to generate your score. Rank|Name|Total Score|Round 1|Round 2|Round 3|Round 4 1|thatmarkguy|14.64|4.00|3.43|2.38|4.83 2|POSValkir|14.30|5.50|3.43|3.38|2.00 3|Zlehtnoba|9.74|2.83|2.57|3.00|1.33 4|Aaarrrgh|9.21|0.50|3.71|0.00|5.00 5|Edacade|8.96|1.00|3.71|2.25|2.00 6|CommanderJim|8.95|4.00|2.57|2.38|0.00 7|Golgari_Spy|8.78|2.83|2.57|2.38|1.00 8|mark777|7.75|0.00|0.00|3.75|4.00 9|Hello World|3.00|0.00|0.00|3.00|0.00 10|Rubik|2.75|0.00|0.00|2.75|0.00 11|door (dooooooooooor)|1.71|0.00|1.71|0.00|0.00
Past Round: One Card Open Mark one card in your deck as "open". After the first deadline, all "open" cards are revealed to everyone and players may change their other two cards until the second deadline. Begins Friday, September 9th 1st Deadline: Monday, September 12th 2nd Deadline: Wednesday, September 14th
Past Round: Commander Three card deck, plus a commander. All commander rules apply: singleton, color identity restriction, 40 life, commander damage, commander banlist in addition to normal banlist. You should definitely check the commander banlist, since it contains cards like Black Lotus and the original moxen. Begins Friday, September 16th Ends Wednesday, September 21st
Detailed Rules
Basically, we're following the same rules written here, but with 4-card decks instead of 100. Singleton: No two cards in your deck can have the same name, except for basic lands. Color identity: The color identity of each card in your deck must fit inside your commander's color identity. Life: Each player has a starting life total of 40. Commander: Your commander is a legendary creature of your choice (or a planeswalker that explicitly says it can be used as a commander). It starts the game in the command zone. You may cast your commander from the command zone by paying its normal costs plus for each previous time it was cast it from the command zone this game. If a commander would be put into a library, hand, graveyard or exile from anywhere, its owner may choose to move it to the command zone instead. Commander damage: If a player has been dealt 21 or more combat damage by a single commander this game, that player loses the game.
Psst! You! Yes, you! Get over here! Can you keep a secret? I'll take your silence as a yes. Look, my usual sources have assured me that there is no new set legal this season, but... I found something.
It all started at the beginning of last season. We were playing Vanilla, as usual. I was ready to see some decks similar to the previous season, but then out of an Ancient Tomb appeared a pair of not-so-ancient wolf-operated mechs. They quickly destroyed the competition, leaving door and thatmarkguy to share the victory. I immediately went to my superiors. "What, we're just printing 5/5's for now? You didn't tell me a new set came out!" They gave some bland excuse, "Oh, we thought you already knew", and sent me on my way. In the Vanilla Redux, I noticed that the wolves had migrated to otherlands, but the Ancient Tomb was still there. I checked inside, ready to fight a robot, but found myself blinded by a brightly glowing ball. Before I could figure out what was hapenning, I heard some frantic ticking and blacked out. When I woke up, Golgari_Spy had claimed victory. I never trusted that guy. Something about the name... Anyway, that's not all. We then played a round where we bid life for the chance to use an extra card. Some players bid high, some bid low, and some decided to go right in the middle. door took the biggest risk, bidding down to a starting life total of 3, with no life gain whatsoever. This let him cast 10/10 shadows for just one black mana a piece, winning him the round. That's when I started putting it together. 3 life plus 1 mana plus 10 plus 10 is 24. Add 1 more for 1st place, then subtract that from the 30 points door scored that round, and what do you get? 5. That's right, the exact number of colors one would expect to see in a new Magic set. But wait, there's more. In the final round, everybody got free mana every turn. Edacade took advantage of this by using the brutal counterspell Dismal Failure alongside an increasingly-large manland. Golgari_Spy, meanwhile, decided to invite Emrakul, the Aeons Tornthrough the breach, wait a few turns for suspense, then do it again to finish the job. Both players tied for the victory, and I started to realize... there were multiple ties for first place this season. In fact, there were 2 ties, each tie between 2 players. The 2's must be important, but... aha!
That's when I figured it all out. There is a new set legal this season. Something secret, something involving 2's. It must be... Conspiracy 2! Eureka!
Well now that we've torn apart that web of deception and lies, let's get to this season's banlist changes.
Several powerful colorless threats have been eliminated. Thought-Knot Seer is back, though. It first appeared in a world where Black Lotus was legal, so it'll be interesting to see how it does without a painless way to play it on turn one. Wood Elemental is also legal again, in case you enjoy using your entire deck and several turns just to put a 1/1 onto the battlefield.
Uh oh, here come my superiors. Just play it cool, act like everything's normal, and join me for some 3 Card Magic.
New Round: Vanilla Saturday, August 27th Ends Wednesday, August 31st
it was worth the wait for the quality thread title
(ironically the conspiracies themselves are banned via being banned in vintage, but allowing conspiracies is probably better as an alternate-round concept honestly)
Yup, we had some fun years back with an alt round based around Conspiracy I conspiracies, and I'd be happy to see us do it again.
As for the rest of the new set... I expect Kaya, Ghost Assassin will become another solid option in the 4-slot in Lotus decks (particularly Leonin Squire builds). It covers a lot of bases - it has its own wincon that can outrace a 1/1, it has LotV-esque turn-it-lands discard as disruption, it can remove tokens properly (unfortunately as temporary-repeatable removal on larger threats, its own lifeloss makes it a nonpermanent solution). Don't think it's viable in nonlotusworld, though - we can land it T2 (Ancient SpringCrystal Vein can land it T2), but T2 discard isn't especially strong, especially being so vulnerable to T1 discard itself.
...I don't see anything else of any particular 3CM value though. Nothing jumps out at me like Hangarback and Lupine did.
Joined: Oct 04, 2015 Posts: 4649 Location: Alchemist's Refuge
Identity: Male
Preferred Pronoun Set: he/him/his/his/himself
It bothers me when I forget what deck I submitted when it gets closer to time for the round match-ups to begin...Luckily, I hardly ever use the PM system so it's easy to go look it up.
Edit: Yeah, no, I need to change my deck. I don't know why I thought that was a good list.
I think I did decently, but I can't do the math right now, so I could be completely wrong there.
Maybe it would be a good idea to compile a list of inactive players and PM an invitation/reminder? I would love to see this get up to at least twelve players again.
Now that this poll is officially over, it's time to congratulate Aaarrrgh for designing Hill, which has been decided by popular vote to be the Card of the Month for October 2013!
Posv, you've listed a 4 against me but I think it's a 3. On the play, Meddling Mage names Mox Jet. All you're left with is a Mutavault that can only activate itself after it taps itself, which isn't useful attacking nor blocking.
Posv, you've listed a 4 against me but I think it's a 3. On the play, Meddling Mage names Mox Jet. All you're left with is a Mutavault that can only activate itself after it taps itself, which isn't useful attacking nor blocking.
Now that this poll is officially over, it's time to congratulate Aaarrrgh for designing Hill, which has been decided by popular vote to be the Card of the Month for October 2013!
Now that this poll is officially over, it's time to congratulate Aaarrrgh for designing Hill, which has been decided by popular vote to be the Card of the Month for October 2013!
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for each previous time it was cast it from the command zone this game. If a commander would be put into a library, hand, graveyard or exile from anywhere, its owner may choose to move it to the command zone instead.
