<a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Vivi Ornitier" href="#" target="_blank">Vivi Ornitier</a> | Art by <a href="https://toniinfante.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Toni Infante</a>
Hello, and welcome to Am I the Bolas?
This column is for all of you out there who have ever played some Magic and wondered if you were the bad guy. I'm here to take in your story with all of its nuances so I can bring some clarity to all those asking, "Am I the Bolas?"
I'm ready to hear you out and offer advice. All you have to do is email amithebolas@gmail.com with your story, a pseudonym you want to use, and of course, only include details you don't mind in the column! You might see your story below one day. You might even hear it on the podcast. Which podcast?
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter wp-image-25893" src="https://commandersherald.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/bolcast_logo430x430-300x300.png" alt="" width="249" height="249" />
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/@AmITheBolcast" target="_blank" rel="noopener">THIS PODCAST!</a>
I'm Mike Carrozza, the guy you can play Commander with at <a href="https://facetofacegames.com/collections/category-shopify-tour-events-commandfest-ottawa-2025?srsltid=AfmBOop0201qzEYLjYt2PiKcTtVF_s-Ch8Zc5vEOr3n1WPPbuBeayAnh#SpecialGuests" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Face to Face's Command Fest in Ottawa</a> September 6th and 7th!
<div class="edhrecp__cards"><div class="edhrecp__card-container" name="Golbez, Crystal Collector"></div></div>
Come say hi! I just built this guy and I need to get reps in!
This week, I swear if you come for me, this becomes 1v1.
(Post edited for brevity, clarity, and then some.)
<hr />
<h2>SUBMISSION</h2>
<div dir="auto">
Hello Mike,
Something that happened in a recent FNM Commander game left me reeling, yet I still left the game unsure whether I was the one at fault. I was playing my casual <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Kurbis, Harvest Celebrant" href="#" target="_blank">Kurbis, Harvest Celebrant</a> +1/+1 counters deck, and I was up against a <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Damia, Sage of Stone" href="#" target="_blank">Damia, Sage of Stone</a>, <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Infinite Guideline Station" href="#" target="_blank">Infinite Guideline Station</a>, and <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Vivi Ornitier" href="#" target="_blank">Vivi Ornitier</a>. I was initially cautious about the Vivi deck since I knew it can easily go infinite out of nowhere, but luckily the Vivi player only had a few <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Island" href="#" target="_blank">Island</a>s and a <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Sol Ring" href="#" target="_blank">Sol Ring</a>. 
At this point it's around turn five and nobody has really done much yet, but the Vivi player now has eight cards in hand and starts looking at my creatures on board. I currently have a few small creatures but most notably a <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Rishkar, Peema Renegade" href="#" target="_blank">Rishkar, Peema Renegade</a> that I'm heavily relying on for mana, and I warn the Vivi player that I will retaliate if they remove any of my creatures. It's also worth mentioning that I deliberately avoided attacking the Vivi player up to this point because they had missed land drops and currently had no access to red mana.
The Vivi player, undeterred, cast a <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Reality Shift" href="#" target="_blank">Reality Shift</a> on my Rishkar, stating that they didn't want to discard down to hand size. I admit that the Rishkar was probably the best target at that moment, as the only other player with creatures was the Damia player's <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Dark Confidant" href="#" target="_blank">Dark Confidant</a>, but I let the Vivi player know that I was going to start attacking them because of this. The Vivi player took my comment as a personal attack and automatically countered the <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Case of the Trampled Garden" href="#" target="_blank">Case of the Trampled Garden</a> I tried to cast on my next turn, with their justification being that I was going to use it to buff the creatures that I was going to attack them with.
So at this point, the Vivi player has removed two of my important cards despite the fact that I haven't actually done anything to them other than threaten to retaliate, and I am incredibly upset by this. I cast my ironically-named <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Over the Edge" href="#" target="_blank">Over the Edge</a> to destroy their <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Sol Ring" href="#" target="_blank">Sol Ring</a> and proceed to attack them with all of my creatures for the next several turns, reminding them that they brought this on themselves. 
While we are both arguing over this, the <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Infinite Guideline Station" href="#" target="_blank">Infinite Guideline Station</a> player quietly casts a <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Mirari&#039;s Wake" href="#" target="_blank">Mirari&#039;s Wake</a>, something both of us could've easily removed if we hadn't spitefully wasted all of our interaction on each other. Neither of us ever found another land, and we lost a few turns later to Spacecraft shenanigans directly brought about by the <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Mirari&#039;s Wake" href="#" target="_blank">Mirari&#039;s Wake</a>. The next game we play the exact same decks and the Vivi player wins on turn five with a groan-inducing <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Quicksilver Elemental" href="#" target="_blank">Quicksilver Elemental</a>, yet they are still angry at me for my threats and retaliation during the last game.
That brings me to my current dilemma. Am I the Bolas for making threats and retaliating against unprovoked interaction? Should I have just sat there quietly and let it all slide? Or should I have just not mentioned any of my planned retaliation until after the fact?
Sincerely, 
Provoked Bear
</div>
<div dir="auto">
<div class="edhrecp__cards"><div class="edhrecp__card-container" name="Over the Edge"></div></div>
</div>
<div dir="auto"></div>
<hr />
<h2>VERDICT</h2>
Thank you for writing and asking me to weigh in on your story. As I mention every week, if folks don't write to me, there's no column, so if you, the reader, want to send me a story, whether it's your own or one from Reddit or a friend's, please send it to amithebolas@gmail.com and I'll get to it here.
I don't think this is Bolas energy, especially since it was mutual. If I were the Guideline or Damia players, I'd be pretty stoked, actually. You're telling me a ticking time bomb is being kept in check by the stompy deck and the stompy deck's being controlled by the bomb? And I just get to hang out and put together my own little machine? I'll stay quiet and use this to my advantage!
The most important point of all is this: I hope this heat didn't ruin the vibe of the hang. Something like this can definitely put a strain on the social dynamics and I really hope you lot were able to keep things light enough to enjoy yourselves.
Vivi is a scary-as-hell legend to see in the command zone. That turn-five win off the <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Quicksilver Elemental" href="#" target="_blank">Quicksilver Elemental</a> absolutely illustrates why. Them looking at your creatures to not have to discard to hand size is fair enough, but it's almost like they forgot they're playing a Vivi deck. You want all the heat off of you until you can pop off. That <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Reality Shift" href="#" target="_blank">Reality Shift</a> didn't have to be something you discard and I'm sure there are a few cards in that hand that wouldn't be the worst to let fall to the graveyard.
Imagine a card in the Vivi player's hand having an extra line of text that reads "Discard this card: target Kurbis player cannot attack you for a turn." Not to mention, you could still play the <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Reality Shift" href="#" target="_blank">Reality Shift</a> later if you discard that eight-drop that's not likely to hit the stack anytime soon. Open up the conversation! It's time for politics!
You went hardline with it. "I was not attacking you because you haven't been up to much, but if you hurt me, I will undo my kindness and good will toward you." Not a quote but that's the subtext, right? Vivi has the choice to declare war or to use this information to their advantage and they chose war. Rishkar is most definitely the correct target of all available targets on the board and letting you get out of hand might be tougher to deal with in the later game, but as you saw the next game, I'm not sure anybody else should be as feared as <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Vivi Ornitier" href="#" target="_blank">Vivi Ornitier</a>.
I think you could have kept it quiet and just started attacking the Vivi player. It would have avoided the whole spot removal war you guys had going on. It could have ended there; you take your lumps and move forward. That said, I want to discuss threatening a player with certain actions in Magic.
If you're going to be making a threat, you have to be ready for what can come and also recognize that you still need to find ways to budget your gameplay to keep others in check as well as advancing your own plan. When you make a threat at the table, you're changing the difficulty setting of your own game. You're broadcasting your plans, and you're also informing all opponents what's most important to you in the moment.
If you're okay with this, you can do your thing, but keep in mind the following rules I hold for myself when making any threats in game:
<ol>
<li>Be fun and light. It's still a game, make sure that you get your message across but don't ruin anybody's night.</li>
<li>Convey specifically the events that will provoke your retaliation and set a limit for yourself on what this retaliation looks like.</li>
<li>Be ready to pivot if something else presents itself as a bigger problem.</li>
<li>Keep all of it to one game. No carrying things over.</li>
<li>Follow through. Diluting your word isn't going to help you overall. It's also a matter of making sure you take your own threats seriously. Consider the action you're threatening more carefully and therefore make fewer threats overall.</li>
</ol>
You follow these rules and you'll find yourself making fewer threats, but you'll have a better time with it when you actually do.
Here's an example for me. I have my <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="The Ninth Doctor" href="#" target="_blank">The Ninth Doctor</a>/<a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Clara Oswald" href="#" target="_blank">Clara Oswald</a> Grixis Upkeeps deck that I really love. It's a slow deck that aims to survive a go-round the table and stack five-plus times worth of upkeep triggers from a board filled with crazy enchantments. Easily disruptable, but it's also a deck people like to see go off so I get left alone quite a bit.
It's also pretty all-in on the strategy. It needs a lot of grace to work. It's the only deck I run land destruction in and stax pieces like <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Rising Waters" href="#" target="_blank">Rising Waters</a> - I really need to slow things down to survive.
One time, my friend Chris (hi, buddy, love you!) wanted to destroy my <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Court of Vantress" href="#" target="_blank">Court of Vantress</a> which had not had a chance to turn into anything. There weren't many targets available to Court on the board anyway and I had had a pretty rough start. Chris thought the Court could go off pretty well if things just started to suddenly work out for me. I told him that if he destroyed the one non-commander, nonland permanent I had managed to stick into play that I would vow to wreck his board in retaliation.
He destroyed the Court and I said, "Alright, boys, no need to worry about me; I'm Chris' problem now." Then I made good on my promise when I played <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Recantation" href="#" target="_blank">Recantation</a> later in the game and popped it to return most of his board to hand. However, Max (hi, buddy, love you!) had become quite the problem with his Angel deck and Chris and I were able to call a truce before I used <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Recantation" href="#" target="_blank">Recantation</a>. I used my <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Vile Requiem" href="#" target="_blank">Vile Requiem</a> to kill some Angels, making a deal with Chris that when Max is more subdued, I'd come back to him.
We had a laugh, made the deal, and I stuck to point five in my rules. We all then lost to Eric (hi, buddy, love you!) whose <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Zirda, the Dawnwaker" href="#" target="_blank">Zirda, the Dawnwaker</a> deck was the real threat the whole time. We shuffled up and played another, Chris and I no longer enemies.
In the story, I'll admit I make a case for Chris killing the <a class="edhrecp__link-a" content="Court of Vantress" href="#" target="_blank">Court of Vantress</a>. I eventually got to land a few things that controlled the table and stocked up some upkeep verse counters. Notice how the rules I gave myself allowed me to keep the vibe light and still have fun without feeling like I needed to be all-in on killing Chris. By specifying your threat, you allow yourself the grace needed to pivot and still be in control of your own game.
All told, this could have been "Removal happens. That's Magic, baby!" but that's not what people come to this column for. While yes, you have to be okay with your stuff getting removed, you can also use many different tools in your kit to advance your game and sometimes that means threatening an opponent with spot removal. This could either goad an opponent or deter them, but it's the kind of swing you can take that can sometimes make things more interesting or go exactly your way.
I do believe there should have been more threat assessment of the board rather than racking up points in the spot removal war happening, but sometimes our humanity takes over. Being met with a barrier or a hurdle can be frustrating and sometimes your reaction is a little more extreme than you'd like it.
Take stock of yourself in your games; get your hands on the reins and give yourself a pull when you're too heated. Ask yourself if the threat you're making is worth it to you. Nine times out of ten, it's more advantageous to let it go and move forward. Keep it to yourself and start attacking. But that one time out of ten, you'll be able to show your opponents that you're not one to mess with while still being one they love playing with.
No Bolases. Thank you for giving me an excuse to write about making retaliatory threats in Commander!
<div class="edhrecp__cards"><div class="edhrecp__card-container" name="Kurbis, Harvest Celebrant"></div></div>
<h3>More Bolas:</h3>
<blockquote class="wp-embedded-content" data-secret="ja0IE7fWDd"><a href="https://edhrec.com/articles/am-i-the-bolas-reputation/">Am I The Bolas? - Reputation</a></blockquote>
<iframe loading="lazy" class="wp-embedded-content" sandbox="allow-scripts" security="restricted" style="position: absolute; visibility: hidden;" title="&#8220;Am I The Bolas? - Reputation&#8221; &#8212; EDHREC" src="https://edhrec.com/articles/am-i-the-bolas-reputation/embed/#?secret=pr4TeLaU33#?secret=ja0IE7fWDd" data-secret="ja0IE7fWDd" width="500" height="282" frameborder="0" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0" scrolling="no"></iframe>
<blockquote class="wp-embedded-content" data-secret="jqPqvhIJcJ"><a href="https://edhrec.com/articles/am-i-the-bolas-deal-or-no-deal/">Am I The Bolas? - Deal or No Deal?</a></blockquote>
<iframe loading="lazy" class="wp-embedded-content" sandbox="allow-scripts" security="restricted" style="position: absolute; visibility: hidden;" title="&#8220;Am I The Bolas? - Deal or No Deal?&#8221; &#8212; EDHREC" src="https://edhrec.com/articles/am-i-the-bolas-deal-or-no-deal/embed/#?secret=gtI5GIDbTs#?secret=jqPqvhIJcJ" data-secret="jqPqvhIJcJ" width="500" height="282" frameborder="0" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0" scrolling="no"></iframe>
<blockquote class="wp-embedded-content" data-secret="S9S2NshWSd"><a href="https://edhrec.com/articles/am-i-the-bolas-salty-for-your-losses/">Am I The Bolas? - Salty for Your Losses</a></blockquote>
<iframe loading="lazy" class="wp-embedded-content" sandbox="allow-scripts" security="restricted" style="position: absolute; visibility: hidden;" title="&#8220;Am I The Bolas? - Salty for Your Losses&#8221; &#8212; EDHREC" src="https://edhrec.com/articles/am-i-the-bolas-salty-for-your-losses/embed/#?secret=3bDni47L1J#?secret=S9S2NshWSd" data-secret="S9S2NshWSd" width="500" height="282" frameborder="0" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0" scrolling="no"></iframe>

target removal

Am I The Bolas? - Promise of Retaliation

Which Disenchant Should I Run in Commander?