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I played with Jon Loucks' playgroup for a summer and I think their cube was pretty fat but was very combo-friendly. I pretty much can't draft cubes without drafting for combos now and have an unhealthy fondness for eternal witness and crystal shard (which are cards that just make every other card better and should be in every cube). Actually since the OP touched on storm in cube I'd like to talk about it since it's actually my favorite thing to run and isn't that risky. The thing is depending on the cube some of the good value cards just turn into strong enablers and you just have to play them correctly. Things that help storm (don't draft storm outside of a power cube imo): All power, but especially moxen since they can be used for storm count Yawgmoth's cards (Will and Bargain) Necropotence Suspend (usually just rift bolt and sometimes lotus bloom) Ad Nauseam Bob (extra cards that won't dome you hard? hell yes) and other bobesque effects. Blue Cantrips Manamorphose (half ritual half cantrip all extremely narrow) Rituals Chromatic Star and things like it Treachery, Rewind, Remand Other mana generating artifacts like Grim Monolith Anything that lets you untap a Tolarian Academy MEMORY JAR Relevant cards with storm: Mind's Desire (Wanted storm count: 4-6) Dragonstorm (depends on the cube) (Lethal count: probably like 3) Empty the Warrens (Lethal count: 10 and an untap) Tendrils of Agony (Lethal count 6-10) Grapeshot (Lethal count: 20  )Brain Freeze (Lethal count 8-10) Ignite Memories (Lethal count: oh god this is hard but 6 is usually good since most people won't be sandbagging lands for this) Good non-storm support cards: Some hideaway lands(let you cast your stupid powerful spells anyway) Cards with good value Greater Gargadon (okay GG is just amazing all the time) Fire/Ice, Turn/Burn, Electrolyze: Most storm decks are base U/R (with access to black for Ad Nauseam and/or Tendrils) so you'll just get access to good value cards. Good dragons (if dragonstorm is a thing) Most cubes should have at least yosei, keiga, and kokusho (rip Bogardan Hellkite though) and two of those are basically on-color for a storm deck. Remember that changelings are dragons too (okay this isn't really relevant at all). And of course probably a version of Niv-Mizzet himself, that would be a good dude to dragonstorm out. Trinket Mage and his buddies (Top, Scroll, etc) A storm friendly cube should have all those cards to make the deck usable. Note that mind's desire, dragonstorm, and empty the warrens are actually pretty splashable in multiple strategies, since Mind's Desire for 4 is just "good value" sometimes even if it doesn't just win the game. Ad Nauseam is pretty awesome but takes some knowing your deck to not die to accidentally. Basically the idea is you want a good amount of power but even without going off you should be hitting good value while waiting for your big turn. Cubes generally have all sorts of combos but the power of Storm is that it generally derives from a wide variety of sources in the cube itself instead of needing specific cards. In fact, the main problem with storm is that its core cards are narrow to the point where you don't often want them elsewhere (except Empty the Warrens in a beatdown deck maybe) but that also makes it strong - you can compete early for power instead of your particular combo and then use Storm as a win condition. Zoness fucked around with this message at 07:38 on Jul 17, 2013 |
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Jul 17, 2013 07:14
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Kasonic posted:-Is a cycle of artifact mana fixing too much? I'm currently using the Keyrunes because of how well they play in Ravnica block, but their power levels really vary. I was thinking of using a Cluestone/Signet/Keyrune mix, if I keep the cycle. I feel like artifact mana fixing should be considered in opposition to land-based fixing but should also be used to bolster cards that interact with artifacts. Signets are also probably some of the most powerful artifact fixers printed (more so than talismans imo), more so than keyrunes or cluestones imo. Having all 3 is probably excessive but I'd take signets over the other two any day, probably. If you want mana producers that can become creatures that don't fix, look to the time spiral totems. While probably nobody is gonna play Chronatog totem the other ones are pretty nuts.
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Jul 17, 2013 16:36
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Booster Tutor is one of the best cards to have in a cube ever.
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Jul 17, 2013 19:05
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Tonde Mo Nai posted:Oh yeah, to clarify the Dragon's Maze changes have been made, the cubetutor list just isn't updated yet. Aetherling, Voice, and Ral Zarek are in, Far//Away is being tried, and Pyrewild Shaman got put in, but I'm not too wild on him. Coffers is good if you have mind twist or enough drain life effects or support for like a mono-B ANT type finish. Maga is also a good man to use with coffers but he's not really dependent on a lot of B. Death Cloud is also a good reason to want to use Coffers, and Mutilate doesn't hurt. Also mono-B stax loves coffers afaik. Here's a list off the top of my head (also cards that go well with (also some of these worked well with Enduring Ideal!), you should aim for cards here that are good outside of being fetche: Dream Halls Yawgmoth's Bargain Mind over Matter Form of the Dragon (or Moat if you're a wuss) Dovescape Recycle/Null Profusion Decree of Silence I'm probably forgetting a few good ones but these are all cool big enchantments that win games pretty hard. EDIT: Also since when was Venser, Shaper Savant not cube material any more? Dude has one of the coolest abilities written, he's like remand or boomerang on a man, what more can you ask for? Zoness fucked around with this message at 21:15 on Jul 17, 2013 |
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Jul 17, 2013 21:00
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Nibble posted:Storm seems too difficult to support as a full deck archetype. Would it be worth it to throw in a few enablers (Grinning Ignus, Seething Song, Manamorphose) and a couple Storm cards (Empty the Warrens, Storm Entity) and leave it at that? There's some potential there to just generate big mana to play early fatties if you're not on the actual storm plan, and it would work nicely with some other cards like Guttersnipe, but I'm not sure if there's enough there. And Empty the Warrens seems totally fine if you play it turn 5 with a one-mana burn spell ahead of it, so I'm not worried about it being totally useless. I wrote a bit on Storm and it's reliant on power and/or rituals. Rituals also play decently with enormously powerful high-cost drops while power is just a thing you decide whether you have or not. If the power level of the cube is relatively low then Storm isn't going to be particularly interesting.
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Jul 17, 2013 21:57
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Plow under is ridiculously strong in a stompy deck because it's basically a time walk or even a double time walk against a control deck when you power it out on the backs of some mana elves or acceleration. Then you eternal witness it back to your hand and your opponent just scoops. But other than that yeah i dunno. All right, I'm cube drafting on MTGO right now and I managed to make a deck with like 5 creatures. Whoever said storm support was dry was right  .EDIT: I may actually be able to win a game off a tendrils for 8 to him though! EDIT 2: 7 cards left in my deck and i can't draw my friggin tendrils aaaah EDIT 3: Okay worst part is playing a storm cube deck takes forever to step through and you end up running out of time. Also I piloted that list like an idiot but it was really amazing. Zoness fucked around with this message at 02:18 on Jul 18, 2013 |
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Jul 18, 2013 01:27
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Jenx posted:I tried this out, and ended up with this monstrosity. I kept seeing all kinds of bombs, but little to no ramp, so I ended up just drafting every signet I could find (and I think I still missed one, since it didn't table). I'm not quite sure what Gifts is doing in this deck, but I figured I might as well use it to find me all kinds of signets and stuff. The power of gifts generally depends on the deck archetype but there's a few pretty strong gifts packages available but the card is pretty weak overall if you can't put them together: 1. Life from the Loam, Academy Ruins, Crucible of Worlds, Mindslaver - this package will assemble the Academy Ruins + Mindslaver lock pretty much no matter what. 2. Reveillark, Body Double, a sac outlet, and a 187 effect 3. Kiki-Jiki, Pestermite, at least one reanimation effect, something else revelant 4. Etc. Basically the idea behind having amazing Gifts Ungiven packages is to identify a two card combo such as Ruins + Mindslaver, Reveillark + Body Double, or Kiki-Jiki + Pestermite and then pick two other cards that ensure you hit your plan. For example, in case 1 the fastest case is if you get Ruins + Slaver in hand. If both get binned you can Life from the Loam or Crucible Ruins into play then use Academy Ruins to retrieve Mindslaver. Crucible and Life from the Loam exist as ways to get Academy Ruins for sure, etc, and you could probably play something instead of the crucible or life from the loam to make sure you get mindslaver faster, etc. Also something like: Yawgmoth's Will, Snapcaster Mage, Recoup, something else should be a fun gift pile to make in a combo deck. Basically Gifts is only particularly good if you've got something really explosive for it to pick up, or at least really good value.
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Jul 18, 2013 08:04
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WhiteWolf123 posted:Sweet! A cube thread for Goons. I've been waiting for this OP for a while. Yawg's Will with no Tendrils of Agony is like the biggest tease ever. I pretty much have two horrible problems when it comes to cube drafting. The first is my love for Storm. The second is my love for Eternal Witness. Thank goodness the two are pretty much mutually exclusive. Also: Cube Bots really don't value Crystal Shard much even when it's probably one of the more degenerate effects in most cubes. Grixis Super Friends! EDIT: I see Storm as a fun exercise to try to assemble but also as not that hard to make work. Empty the warrens for 6 tokens is fine. Grapeshot pinging 4 dudes is probably pretty good. Ignite Memories on a storm count of 4 is basically lethal depending on the matchup and Mind's Desire is just good. Tendrils for 4-6 copies, while not lethal, is going to make you a lot harder to kill and is fine. My thoughts on storm is playing creatures (aside from like Iona and Kokusho and Witness) is for chumps when there are so many steal effects and creatureless lists void all the good removal that is present in most cubes, and if I'm going to not play creatures I should go big. Zoness fucked around with this message at 18:57 on Jul 19, 2013 |
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Jul 19, 2013 17:40
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cheetah7071 posted:It's possible that it's different in other cubes, but I've found in the cube I play most often that crystal shard just isn't worth the time and mana spent on it--rather than repeatedly spending six mana to chump block with mulldrifter and recast it, it seems far better to just keep making plays that advance your board. Yeah I mean machine-gunning things with 187 effects is pretty awful. Like who'd want to do crystal-shard + mystic snake? What a weak effect! I probably wouldn't pick crystal shard over power but if you have Witness + Shard in your deck every broken card you get just gets better because now you can play those broken effects again. Mulldrifter + Shard is probably the dumbest most expensive way to play it out and really how are you not finding gas if you ARE recurring mulldrifter?
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Jul 19, 2013 21:24
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So I drafted this sweet pile: I found out the one problem with the only way I ever want to play cube: I can't do the mana calculating fast enough, which is especially bad on mtgo. I really should have played more TEPS!
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Jul 20, 2013 05:00
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The Lord of Hats posted:What's necessary for an artifact-centric archetype in a non powered cube? I just realized I have both Tezzerets, but I know it requires the effort to make sure the deck is there. I'd go with a how Modern Masters did it and throw in some more Esper support cards as well as some metalcraft cards from SoM (etched Champion for example). You end up with a heavy reliance on 187 effects, though. As someone who played Open the Vaults in standard I'd start with cards from that decklist and tack on some core cards from affinity, some 1-cost baubles for Trinket Mage to find and Auriok Salvagers to work with, and probably some strong Equipment cards. I can put together a more useful list but for a non-powered cube Artifacts have to be an end as well as a means to an end, since I'm assuming you're not running silly things like Tolarian Academy or Tinker.
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Jul 21, 2013 06:00
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I made a bit of an initial list of what I think are "cool" artifact effects to go with the Tezzerets in a non-powered cube. http://cubetutor.com/viewcube/1948
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Jul 21, 2013 19:05
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whydirt posted:When we only have 4 players for (peasant) cube night we often end up doing two-headed giant sealed. I've been thinking of trying out an EDH-lite format for these matches using the 6-drop shard and wedge dragons as the generals. I've also thought about using a cycle of mono-colored generals as well, probably ones that cost 3XXX (white, blue, and red only have one such creature, while green and and black have some options to pick from). Don't make anyone play Mono-U. It leads to the dark side, even if you pick only new cards.
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Jul 25, 2013 05:05
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toadee posted:I have an awful, awful, stupid thing at http://cubetutor.com/viewcube/1977 Well you should really take out the cards that people wouldn't even be happy to see in a normal draft, like Drainpipe Vermin. Un-cards are neat but honestly the upkeep ones just become a pain. But yeah I don't think cards that most of the time don't make the cut for 23rd card in their own draft format or won't see constructed play belong in a cube.
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Jul 26, 2013 20:47
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I think Gotcha cards just end up being annoying, while Blast from the Past is hilarious. Booster Tutor is always good. Farewell to Arms is one I like though.
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Jul 26, 2013 23:24
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Death Pits of Crap posted:So I've been thinking about making a relatively small "brutal cube" around ridiculous unfair cards. In powered cubes it seems like traditional "aggro" just gets outclassed by inconsiderate decks, and even in un-powered cubes facilitating successful aggro decks can be rough, so I decided a powered cube shouldn't be implementing those pitfalls in the first place. Aggro Decks with good beaters (wild nacatl, goblin guide, figure of destiny) and good hatebears (Kataki, Thalia, Ethersworn Canonist, Gaddock Teeg, Aven Mindcensor, Linvala, Hokori) really pressure 'unfair decks' pretty hard. Armageddon + Aether Vial is the ultimate weapon an aggro deck has against an otherwise unfair deck. Voice of Resurgence is also a strong tool against 'unfair' decks. Dryad Militant probably makes Yawgmoth's Will (and Kitchen Finks, to an extent). I played a powered cube and the guy that consistently drafted R/g with Tin Street Hooligan, Burning Tree Shaman, and land destruction put up good results pretty consistently. Look at Kataki for example, he just invalidates Moxen. Ethersworn Canonist says "shoot me" or don't combo. Gaddock Teeg shuts off most strong effects. Thalia makes brainstorming awful.
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Jul 29, 2013 23:38
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logis posted:My cube is true* singleton. When you cast Symbol Status, you can be sure that you will be making the maximum number of tokens. We generally use Booster Tutor to pull a pack of 15 random cards from undrafted parts of the cube, but if you always draft the whole cube then yeah other boosters would be a thing. Death Pits of Crap posted:None of the creatures Zoness suggested are what I would describe as "dumb aggro beaters." They're aggro beaters that stifle powerful effects. The only cube archetype that seems able to make good use of multiple vanilla creatures is mono-red. Stoneforge Mystic, Goblin Welder, and Grim Lavamancer are all creatures that can give beatdown decks fits (although there are probably better tools to shut them down that don't cost 2WW, I kind of just pulled that from a constructed hatebear list admittedly). I'm going off of WhiteWolf's cube here just as an example, I feel like there are some drops I used to like in aggro that are missing here. I've noticed that people have cut Slith Firewalker and Stingscourger (and Tin Street Hooligan!) a lot, they were potent aggro drops back in my cubing days. I really don't think Mogg Fanatic is particularly impressive any more (but neither is Goblin Arsonist ). I think Blood Knight and Fulminator Mage should see more inclusion. Rift Bolt would help bring up the number of good burn spells and Banefire still has advantages over some of its other fireball-related counterparts.I like the inclusion of Cursed Scroll and think that Karrgan Dragonrider, Burning-Tree Emissary, and Boggart Ram-Gang would probably help aggro decks a bunch. Just an idea of what red creatures I like playing in a cube.
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Jul 30, 2013 07:11
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Kasonic posted:Is this high one-drop count suggestion true for peasant as well? Control is generally less ridiculously powerful in peasant since there aren't too many great card draw effects at common. There also aren't that many great 1-drops at common.
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Jul 31, 2013 22:27
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Zero_Grade posted:I went with a cheap option a while back and bought a bunch of clear Ultra Pro Deck Protectors off Ebay. Cost $25 per 500. Ultra Pros break like nobody's business though. Personally I love KMC's and then Dragon Shields.
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Aug 20, 2013 15:01
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Stinky Pit posted:I agree wholly, I just don't know what would be interesting in their place. Filter Lands and Karoos come to mind, but they're definitely more control and midrange oriented.
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Sep 4, 2013 18:51
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As an avid mana-drafter I say that if the first 5 packs go without some kind of nonbasic mana source whether it be fixing or acceleration (or an engine card of some sort) in at least one pack I'm already kind of disinterested in a particular cube.
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Oct 31, 2013 08:01
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Hopping Ghost posted:How much do you think would be enough for you to be satisfied with a 360-card cube? I counted mine up and between duals, rainbow/basic-fetch, artifact mana, etc. I have only 30 nonbasic sources (not counting ones that are only available in certain colors, like Green's mana dorks, etc). I know that's kind of a nebulous/subjective question, but I've never built a cube before and most of my friends have never drafted one before, so I don't have a lot of prior preferences to mine within my playgroup. 30 is probably fine - I dunno, it's the kind of thing that takes tuning I'd say.
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Oct 31, 2013 08:19
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Some Numbers posted:A while back I wanted to see if I could make a Peasant Multicolor Cube. My first version functioned, but I built it right before RtR and had, in my opinion too much mana fixing. I like the idea but I feel like three-color cards are a little too narrow, given that the fixing isn't great (by design) and you're likely to go three colors because the saturation of cards for a 2-color deck isn't there so three-color cards are not going to see much competition. Also I think cluestones are weak and for guild artifacts you should go for Keyrunes/Cluestones. Also RUG seems really good. How do you feel about certain utility lands like Vitu-Ghazi? I feel like tokens could use another generator like that to make something like Naya Tokens work (Tokens + Hit // Run  ).
Zoness fucked around with this message at 19:27 on Dec 23, 2013 |
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Dec 23, 2013 19:24
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Some Numbers posted:I'm not sure what you're trying to say here. My idea was that the Shard cards would be really powerful, strong enough to warrant a slightly weaker manabase. In practice, almost every deck is at least three colors, so the Shard cards are mostly big bombs (Slave of Bolas, Gloryscale, etc) and really flexible cards (Crystallization, Ambush Beetle, etc) I was more thinking that cards like Dromar's Charm and Naya Charm are really not going to be hotly contested given the nature of the cube. This may or may not be okay, I was just thinking that I was never excited to see one that wasn't in my color combination. Actually I guess the thing isn't so much about RUG as U/R/x having what on the surface seems like the most saliently flexible plan compared to the other color combinations. Also I didn't see the utility lands in the spells section  . Also yeah I meant signets over cluestones, that was a brain fart. If signets are too powerful what about Talismans? The main thing I don't like about Cluestones is they compete for the three-drop slot as opposed to propel you to the four-drop slot and I think fixing/acceleration at 2 CMC seems better in the abstract.
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Dec 23, 2013 19:58
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Just taking an initial look there's a ton of cards I wouldn't ever want to pick in any draft, cube aside. Healing Salve and Blessed Reversal, for starters. Those aren't 'cube' cards  .
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Dec 31, 2013 16:55
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revengeanceful posted:*I'm not a fan of Knight of Cliffhaven. Spending two turns to make a 2/3 flyer seems pretty subpar. Accorder Paladin, Daring Skyjek, Mistral Charger and Youthful Knight would all be fine replacements. About levelers in the abstract this is a really poor opinion. Not every card can be student of warfare levels of game-ending, but the point is that you get a  .Also Zoness fucked around with this message at 16:59 on Mar 13, 2014 |
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Mar 13, 2014 16:39
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Death of Rats posted:Is there any reason this might not work with a cube as the Battle Box? Perhaps with the rider that lands have "Exile ~ from your hand: draw a card", so I don't have to pull them out before starting (and increasing the possibility space slightly, as players would have possible access to extra lands if they felt they wanted them). I'm always looking for low player count cube variants, so this is really cool. Card quality really, cubes tend to be about smashing broken cards at each other but that's not the point of a 'battle box'.
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Oct 9, 2014 15:55
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Bubble-T posted:Hey cube thread, my buddy is planning to build a cube for us to draft with. I've played magic on and off for years but am pretty unfamiliar with recent sets and have never built a cube, so I thought I might post it here and see if any of you had criticisms or ways to make it better before he spends a bunch of cash on it? I don't like the disparity in card quality. Having drafted a bit of SSE there's cards that were strong specifically in that format but don't really work when drafted outside of it, and I feel like the duos in particular fall into this camp. The high availability of hybrids with non-hybrids makes signaling look like a nightmare. Particularly not a fan of all the lieges since they probably make picking colors a nightmare and aren't similarly strong in power level and/or outright unplayable cards that only really seem to exist to spike up cards like Master of Waves. Also I get that there's a merfolk theme but there's something wrong if Wanderwine Prophets is playable, because I'm pretty sure it was not playable in LLM or LLL draft. But yeah mostly the power level of some of these cards is mad questionable. It's cool if they play well I guess but I wouldn't ever be happy to pick up a spitebellows, for example. ChewyLSB has a pretty cool modern -FRAME- cube (because he's a meth addict who loves the modern frame) that could be a good starting point if you want a cube of modern cards, and i think the cubetutor site has other cubes with that stipulation. But yeah I like the idea and synergy and LLM and SSE were two of my favorite draft formats, but I fire up cubetutor and I see this pack: Transguild Courier Infest Merciless Eviction Cenn's Tactician Moonglove Changeling Sootstoke Kindler Flamekin Harbinger Adaptive Automaton Cracklebuff Runed Stalactite Cairn Wanderer Mirrorweave Corrosive Mentor Trostani's Summoner Frogtosser Banneret None of these are like, cards I would be excited first picking in a cube, especially when Cryptic Command is in the same cube, the creatures aren't particularly efficient bodies and the removal is overcosted. (the pick is probably merciless eviction) I mean, here's where it gets complicated, maybe the lackluster individual cards support more strategic depth and that's the goal, that's fine, but then cards like Cryptic Command really feel out of place. Zoness fucked around with this message at 08:25 on Oct 21, 2014 |
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Oct 21, 2014 08:12
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