The Dockside Extortionist Combo

art by Forrest Imel

Elder Dragon Highlander (EDH) or Commander is an inherently broken format which regulates itself with the addition of a “Rule 0”. For those who don't play commander or Magic: The Gathering, Rule 0 is a pregame discussion that establishes how you want to play the game you are about to have. If you have played Dungeons and Dragons the equivalent of Rule 0 would be a Session 0, or the session when you reunite with your playgroup and Dungeon Master and discuss the in and outs of the campaign. Other Magic: The Gathering groups don't have a Rule 0 discussion because it's inherently known the experience they want. That kind of group play with a type of Rule 0 called cEDH, or Competitive Commander, or basically play to win. However when a card becomes “too problematic” to the target audience, low power level playgroups, the Rules Committee takes action and ban the card. 

(If you found this blogpost and dont play Magic: The Gathering I'm so sorry and I hope your brain doesn't rot with all the jargon. However, I will try to make it as explicative as possible)

When we talk about problematic or polarizing cards in Commander, including cEDH, content creators and players seem to have their lists in which they bash on the cards on these lists. Some of the cards include, but are not limited to, Armageddon, Cyclonic Rift, Sol Ring or any net positive mana rock, Thassa’s Oracle, Krark, the Thumbless, and Dockside Extortionist. All of these cards have sparked some kind of discourse on all social media platforms Magic: The Gathering (MTG from now on) is discussed. However, lately, all the buzz in mostly every social media platform I frequent are people saying that Dockside Extortionist should be banned. 

For those who don't play commander, Dockside Extortionist is a 1 power, 2 toughness Goblin Pirate for 1 and a red with “When Dockside Extortionist enters the battlefield, create X Treasure tokens, where X is the number of artifacts and enchantments your opponents control.” In MTG terms Dockside Extortionist is a “ritual” card. The term ritual in MTG is used to categorize a subset of cards that give you Mana, the necessary resource used to play your cards. However, in the case of Dockside Extortionist, it gives you Treasure tokens which you transform into mana, by sacrificing the Treasure tokens, instead of giving you the mana directly for you to use. 

Dockside Extortionist is a card that by its ruling is inherently better in the late game, or when the game has progressed. However, MTG is a game where it game pieces, cards, trump the basic rules of the game. In the ideal game of Magic the players play one Land card each turn, if available, and each land can add one mana per turn. However when you play a “ritual” card what that card does is accelerate the creation of mana to play more “expensive” cards faster rather than waiting until you have the necessary resources on the playing field. The creation of treasure tokens is what scares people the most because tokens are treated like a normal card, from mana value or mana cost to the types to the power and toughness. All in all, cards in the game that interact with artifacts can interact with these tokens, cards that trigger when a permanent goes to the graveyard also interact with the tokens, and finally treasures can give you access to all the colors in the MTG color pie. Giving the tokens more value than being just the resource you need really makes this a powerful card.

However, the net value of the effect, adding mana, more often than not is double the casting value of Dockside Extortionist making it the most profitable ritual right before Jeska’s Will in cEDH. The fact that the mana that Dockside produces come in the form of artifacts increments the added value of the card, depending on the kind of deck you play Dockside, making it even more profitable in the shell you play it in. In lower power level metas Dockside increases in value later in the game since during these games players tend to start casting cards that start gaining value of the board state after turn 2 or 3. 

For example, gaining value from the board state, the turn 1 Mystic Remora you will see it more often than not casted in  cEDH because players, in this meta, understand that in turn 1 players will trigger it, Mystic Remora, with the mana rocks of other players because they need to win faster than you and then you start a turn 2 with Dockside netting you 4 or 5 treasures. In a lower power level casting Dockside tends to happen between turn 3-5 that are usually the turns right after people finish setting up their boards. This is what I have generally observed, and perceive as truth.

People tend to compare Dockside Extortionist with Primeval Titan with the fact that everyone one want to abuse its ability. This is a fair statement. Dockside Extortionist tends to get better after a player plays the first time because the treasures, which are artifacts, count towards the trigger of the new Dockside played by another player. In the same way people tend to clone or steal Primeval Titan to get its attack trigger and reanimate it bringing it to the battlefield to also make its ability trigger. So for a Dockside to be abused by other players they would need to be in very specific archetypes, reanimation and clones, but this does not make the comparison a moot point. However, when we see Primeval Titan and Dockside we see that Titan, Primeval Titan, is a combo enabler in the lands archetypes since with its ability you an tutor lands that will either disrupt the status quo of the board or look for a lands combo which is more difficult to interact than with the artifacts that Dockside creates. More value is added to Titan since in lower power levels interacting with lands is considered more of a taboo than in higher power levels. 

However, having said all this, I don't think Dockside Extortionist should be banned. There are cards that are more detrimental to the health of the format than Dockside Extortionist. For example, cards that produce fast mana have always been a topic of contention because, like many people, they tend to warp the games to the people that pay the fast mana faster than the other people. However, in my personal opinion, these cards have not been banned because all the sealed products Wizards of The Coast have sold that include cards like Sol Ring, the most requested card to be banned and that still hasn't been banned. And is perfectly abusable in the artifact shells. Another card that has been a point of contention is Mana Crypt. All in all, there are a lot of cards that are extremely abusable in EDH/cEDH. Instead of banning cards like Dockside Extortionist is banning the cards that make these types of cards abusable, for example Deadeye Navigator. Wizards like their creature cards to have value with good “Enter the battlefield” triggers and while Dockside Extortionist is an amazing card, cards like Deadeye Navigator will always slip to the cracks while wizards keep printing creatures that generate value to the players. 

There's always new problematic cards and I think Dockside Extortionist is just the poster child of the lower power level of play for gaining access to mana for an easier way to win. The game needs to end Dockside is a ritual that helps you get the advantage to win or just win through some combo.

If you don't want to play against certain cards, remember, you can always talk to your playgroup about what you don't want. Another very powerful thing you can do is evaluate where your deck or against what your deck loses and strengthen those weaknesses or build your deck in a way where it can exploit those weaknesses. Yes, many EDH players take pride in the creativity of their decks but at the end of the day it is either you complain or don't but if you dont you have to tolerate certain cards that you don't like or make changes to your deck to be able to deal with those cards.

In the end, its a game, games are meant to be played, won, and lost, and there are different strategies in MTG for winning, and losing. Remember to have your Rule 0 discussions and have fun.