The Dandy Cube (Chris Taylor's Cube)

[Chris Taylor]

New patch notes:
Yavimaya Custodian --> Vinelasher Kudzu
Delver of Secrets --> Ludevik's Test Subject
Shrine of Burning Rage --> Burning-Tree Emissary
Orim's Chant --> Emeria Angel

Cultist Ringleader: Removed First Strike, Added "Pay 2 Life: Regenerate ~"
Reckless Pillager: Wording Change, Sift changed to "you may discard a card. If you do, draw a card"
Relentless Persecution: Changed to oracle wording of Addle

Will update OP once I get back!

 

[Chris Taylor]

Alright, an update:
-Cube spreadsheet is back online after the broken code fiasco, and should link properly again
-Image links are broken because I've now actually organized them instead of dumping them all in my main photobucket folder. I'm working on getting them corrected now.
-Wildfire primer is incoming. Suggestions for wildfire variants? I personally run Wildfire and Crater Hellion, and know of Burning of Xinye. Share your hidden gems!
-Drafted this monday: U/R wildfire (Happy Coincidence?). Highlights: Wurmcoil Engine, Crater Hellion, 3 Clones. Wurmcoil is a seriously strong card. Strong enough that I'm worried about it. Thoughts? I've heard bad things before, but only vague mutterings "Oh, you know wurmcoil engine" and "ugh, wurmcoil". Thoughts?
-Also from the draft mentioned above: Zach (Mr. Go-Deep himself), a buddy of mine drafted a 5 color control deck which proved to me that I should keep runechanter's pike in my cube. Classic LSV style Opener:





-Currently I'm disappointed in the following custom cards:

• The Unknowable: She's based off a green card, and it shows. I know I want another planeswalker-like effect in black. Maybe there's a solution that doesn't involve her?
• Drakken, the Bloodmonger: See above. He seems to play better though, perhaps that's just me.
• Moonlit Guide: Good creatures for Blue Pod decks, GO!
• Lyra, Bandit Queen: She I think could live with a bit of tweaking. Purely a power level inclusion, perhaps she could be more synergistic with red's themes? Jason you might have to help me with this one. What's your dream red walker?

I'll get back to you guys tommorow with more updates.

 

[Jason Waddell]

On the old boards we had an 4-page thread basically devoted to Wurmcoil Engine: https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups=#!topic/riptide-laboratory/FAmmz5r5d50[1-25-false]

 

[Eric Chan]

My thoughts can be boiled down to WURMCOIL RAWHR BAD FOR CUBE.

If you're watching the top end power level of your cube, I'd also keep an eye on the clones. They've printed some dastardly ones recently - Phyrexian Metamorph and Phantasmal Image come to mind - that make it really effortless to shove some clone effects in a cube deck without having a plan.

 

[Chris Taylor]

I found them solid but not gamebreaking, but perhaps that was dependant on the games.
I never once got to clone my own creature, and my terribly high curve often forced me to clone my opponent's dude just to have a blocker (Clone your shread-freak, go)
But I suppose if it's that bad, the only thing worse than one wurmcoil engine is two wurmcoil engines.

 

[Chris Taylor]

Image links no longer broken!

About Draaken, the Bloodmonger:

Spoiler

He seems more salvageable than the unknowable, who probably needs a full remake, or to come out.

Here's my deal: these two were added because I felt there was little reason to have a control deck that wasn't just splashing black for something like lingering souls or vindicate. Blue/White control has seriously eclipsed Blue/Black control in terms of effectiveness, and I can point at a few obvious deficiencies. (which might not be the root cause, but good starting points)

1) Black has 1 good walker (Liliana of the Veil), while white has what, 5? 6? (Gideon Jura, Both Elspeths, Both Ajainis, Venser, Sorin etc)
2) Black lacks hard sweepers outside of Damnnation, and the rest cost 6 (Decree of pain, Life's Finale, Overwhelming Forces). With the increased speed of aggro decks, it becomes harder and harder to 1 for 1 each threat the opponent plays and refuel with phyrexian arena or Promise of Power.
3) All the intellectual focus seems to be on fixing black aggro, leaving many solid control cards being muscled out by the competing archetypes.

Planeswalker design is harder than normal card design I'll admit, but what do you think would be some repeatable effects for a black control deck to have?
I'll stitch the ones which make the most sense and are most desirable onto a walker, cost it and his abilities appropriately, and start testing.

Here's a list of a few I thought of so far:
-Draw Cards
-Gain Life
-Kill Creatures
-Sweep the Board
-Mindslaver effect
-Discard
-Recursion

If I instead just want to fix him, I think the draw ability will be a 0: activation, and I'll move the draining ability onto his plus, and scale it down a bit. His ultimate is malleable, and feels too small. Perhaps a mass tribute to hunger?
Alternitively, if his mana cost scaled up, he could see tribute to hunger as a minus ability, much in the same way Liliana of the Dark Realms has.

I may also double up on damnnation, or provide an alternate sweeper in the form of a new custom card. Black Sun's Zenith has not been cutting it lately, as the second mana after X is really harsh, and synergizes horribly with the large creatures you usually want to have when earthquaking.

Edit: BAM! Maybe this thing?

Waves of Ichor BX
Sorcery
As an additional cost to cast ~, pay X life
All creatures get -X/-X until end of turn.

I originally had this card doing damage as a replacement for rolling earthquake (and in red) in case I wanted to forgo portal cards altogether for price concerns. (Since it is the only portal card in my list at the moment, Burning of Xinye having been swapped out for Wildfire)
It may seem unpalatable, but do remember that earthquake hits both players, and hasn't been used as a kill condition in control decks in a long time.

 

[Jason Waddell]

I wonder if there's a way to balance a Black Sun's Zenith style ability on a Planeswalker. Ideas could be to have a -1/-1 ability on all creatures, or maybe somehow even a -X/-X on all creatures where X is a variable number. You could even have it as a fixed number, like:
-Y: Put 3 -1/-1 counters on each creature.
You could have 'Y' be equal to their starting loyalty. So, you could "cash in" the PW right away as a pseudo-Damnation, or tick it up first.

Your Sorcery seems pretty reasonable, but possibly a little bonkers in the same way that Pernicious Deed is. Scalable board wipes allow you to set up one-sided Plague Winds fairly often.

 

[Chris Taylor]

I've seen a few people have this:
-X: put X -1/-1 counters on each creature.
Seems a little insane, as a walker with pyroclasm as an ability would probably be pretty strong, and this seems almost straight better.

I think I want my walker and my sweeper on separate cards though. Nothing says first pick like the two most desirable card types in cube!

 

[Chris Taylor]

http://cubetutor.com/draftdeck/225
quick draft in at work. Pretty nice red/black zombies deck

 

[Chris Taylor]

Question for you guys:
I'm probably taking out Wurmcoil engine in my next update, and a few other cards have been on my watchlist as "dumb picks"; the kind of card where if you open up a pack with it the other 14 cards kinda blur together, and you start thinking about what you would take if that card weren't in the pack.

Skullclamp isn't my list at the moment because with 4 gravecrawlers and 2 bloodghasts that just seems way too easy, and as you can see I'm not running any power. What cards have you guys experienced trouble with being this sort of "dumb inclusion"? What cards have you removed for contributing negatively to gameplay?

Here's my current watchlist, organized in order of severity (In my opinion):
Wurmcoil Engine: 10/10
It's hard to think of a card that stops aggro colder. This, combined with the death trigger makes it incredibly hard to deal with.
Gideon Jura: 9/10
My cube has a high density of creatures, so Gideon is hardly ever +2ing on an empty board. Forcing your opponent to attack and making all the best trades turn after turn is incredibly crippling, let alone just being the best nekkrataal ever and beating for 6.
Grave Titan: 8/10
Nothing answers him but a hard wrath, and he is an incredibly fast clock.
Coalition Relic: 8/10
Maybe it's the density of insane 6 drops, but skipping ahead two turns like this AND fixing mana is insane. Also it synergises well with green cards, since the only thing more impressive than a turn 4 six drop is a turn 3 six drop.
Sword of Feast and Famine: 8/10
If black could kill artifacts this would be less of a problem, but having your whole deck blanked by a single card you can't possibly answer is the worst feeling. I'm a little more friendly with sword of light and shadow, since it requires a lot more work to be good. (Much like sun titan)
Elspeth, Knight Errant: 7/10
I'd be a lot more okay with her if the Angelic Blessing ability was a minus ability. As it is, doing what she does while only becoming harder to kill makes it play badly.
Umezawa's Jitte: 7/10
While still an insane card, Jitte's been a little more manageable with all the sac outlets to stop it from getting counters. I'm still a little worried though.
Maze of Ith: 7/10
Best described as a removal spell which can only act defensively, and synergises with other removal spells.
Sword of War and Peace: 7/10
Better protections than F&F, but both colors can deal with it and the trigger is less crippling.
Mother of Runes: 6/10
Sometimes she just blanks half your opponent's deck, but she can be manipulated into being vulnerable, like attacking with a dude to force her to give something protection, then using a killspell. Could be a candidate for removal though.
Batterskull: 6/10
I'll admit, I've died to beatdown with this card in play. I think a lot of the aggro decks in my cube go underneath it, or have artifact answers/chump blockers.
Also it has been stoneforged in literally 0 times I think I might have to go achievement hunting
Jace, the Mind Sculptor: 5/10
I'm amazed, but he hasn't been that oppressive in my games. He does the most work here essentially being unsummon with rebound. Maybe we're just doing it wrong.
Trechery: 5/10
Control magic is insane, but it's becoming worse and worse with the times. It's a strong card, but I don't it's oppressively so.
Balance: 4/10
For balance to be good you need to be a creatureless (ish) deck which dumps it's hand, which usually involves playing lots of artifact mana. Artifact mana which is not currently in those proportions in my cube!
Balance as Wrath, Discard 3 cards is probably a good and fair wrath, it doesn't have the insane card and tempo advantage that it's brethren do.

 

[Eric Chan]

Oh man. We had a big long thread about this on the old Google Groups before we migrated over here. Nearly all of those cards you've listed are ones that I myself have identified as being "not good for cube" for one reason or another, and removed in the last two or three months. Some are just automatic first picks, and make the draft portion significantly less interesting. This applies to colorless cards in particular, since taking a universally playable, powerful card that still leaves you open just means any other pick is just plain wrong. Other cards have a debilitating effect on gameplay, and turn otherwise interesting, interactive games into complete train wrecks. The worst offenders do both!

My quick rundown:

Wurmcoil - Even with artifact removal in hand, has a dominating effect on the board. Worse, it's almost always wrong to pass Wurmcoil during draft. Easy cut.

Gideon - Absolutely stomps aggro, and stomps aggro hard. A bit too oppressive for my tastes.

Grave Titan - Insane value, and takes over a game when it isn't answered in 1-2 turns. Like you said, only Day of Judgment et al. answer him, and only a handful of your players will have those effects. Too much board presence for only six mana.

Coalition Relic - Very few cards ramp you from three directly to six, even in green. That you can do this with a colorless card is ridiculous. On top of ramping, it fixes! I always knew it was good, but it took being stomped by a BRW midrangy deck that hit fives and sixes on turn four consistently to make me realize I didn't want this kind of effect available outside of green decks.

Swords - I'm kind of torn. On the one hand, protection is an awful, awful ability to run in cube. Part of the time it might as well not be written on the card, and the other part it completely owns an opponent because they had the audacity to draft a certain colour. The only thing worse than protection? Double protection! So that's a few big strikes against swords. On the other hand, this cycle is quite good against control, and is one of the few pieces of equipment control genuinely has to worry about. I think running two or three swords is defensible, but all five is decidedly too many, and makes the majority of games being about who can slam the sword, or remove it. Light & Shadow is probably fine, because its effect is harder to abuse than the rest. I run Fire & Ice and Feast & Famine, too, but it's up in the air which ones are best to keep in, if any.

Elspeth - She was the best card in my Modern cube. Not kidding. And not close. Good in aggro, good in control, good against aggro, good against control. Nigh unstoppable, save for a lucky Maelstrom Pulse. She has the honour of being one of the the first cards I cut for being at the top of the power curve. Goodbye, and good riddance.

Jitte - You kidding me? GTFO. No, but seriously, it makes creature mirrors completely revolve around the number of counters on this ugly little stabby thing, which is Not Fun. Even with a plethora of sacrifice effects, I don't think that excuses the awful design, gameplay, and flavour of this card.

Whoops, so much for brief. But in short, I don't think you'll really miss any of those cards if you axed them tomorrow. You could always try it, and slot them back in later if you change your mind.

 

[Jason Waddell]

Question for you guys:
I'm probably taking out Wurmcoil engine in my next update, and a few other cards have been on my watchlist as "dumb picks"; the kind of card where if you open up a pack with it the other 14 cards kinda blur together, and you start thinking about what you would take if that card weren't in the pack.

Skullclamp isn't my list at the moment because with 4 gravecrawlers and 2 bloodghasts that just seems way too easy, and as you can see I'm not running any power. What cards have you guys experienced trouble with being this sort of "dumb inclusion"? What cards have you removed for contributing negatively to gameplay?

Here's my current watchlist, organized in order of severity (In my opinion):
Wurmcoil Engine: 10/10
It's hard to think of a card that stops aggro colder. This, combined with the death trigger makes it incredibly hard to deal with.
Gideon Jura: 9/10
My cube has a high density of creatures, so Gideon is hardly ever +2ing on an empty board. Forcing your opponent to attack and making all the best trades turn after turn is incredibly crippling, let alone just being the best nekkrataal ever and beating for 6.
Grave Titan: 8/10
Nothing answers him but a hard wrath, and he is an incredibly fast clock.
Coalition Relic: 8/10
Maybe it's the density of insane 6 drops, but skipping ahead two turns like this AND fixing mana is insane. Also it synergises well with green cards, since the only thing more impressive than a turn 4 six drop is a turn 3 six drop.
Sword of Feast and Famine: 8/10
If black could kill artifacts this would be less of a problem, but having your whole deck blanked by a single card you can't possibly answer is the worst feeling. I'm a little more friendly with sword of light and shadow, since it requires a lot more work to be good. (Much like sun titan)
Elspeth, Knight Errant: 7/10
I'd be a lot more okay with her if the Angelic Blessing ability was a minus ability. As it is, doing what she does while only becoming harder to kill makes it play badly.
Umezawa's Jitte: 7/10
While still an insane card, Jitte's been a little more manageable with all the sac outlets to stop it from getting counters. I'm still a little worried though.
Maze of Ith: 7/10
Best described as a removal spell which can only act defensively, and synergises with other removal spells.
Sword of War and Peace: 7/10
Better protections than F&F, but both colors can deal with it and the trigger is less crippling.
Mother of Runes: 6/10
Sometimes she just blanks half your opponent's deck, but she can be manipulated into being vulnerable, like attacking with a dude to force her to give something protection, then using a killspell. Could be a candidate for removal though.
Batterskull: 6/10
I'll admit, I've died to beatdown with this card in play. I think a lot of the aggro decks in my cube go underneath it, or have artifact answers/chump blockers.
Also it has been stoneforged in literally 0 times I think I might have to go achievement hunting
Jace, the Mind Sculptor: 5/10
I'm amazed, but he hasn't been that oppressive in my games. He does the most work here essentially being unsummon with rebound. Maybe we're just doing it wrong.
Trechery: 5/10
Control magic is insane, but it's becoming worse and worse with the times. It's a strong card, but I don't it's oppressively so.
Balance: 4/10
For balance to be good you need to be a creatureless (ish) deck which dumps it's hand, which usually involves playing lots of artifact mana. Artifact mana which is not currently in those proportions in my cube!
Balance as Wrath, Discard 3 cards is probably a good and fair wrath, it doesn't have the insane card and tempo advantage that it's brethren do.

I think you've identified the main ones, but I also think Balance is stronger than you give it credit for. A two-mana wrath is super valuable.

Cards from that list I don't run:
Treachery (but only because I wanted to try Vedalken Shackles)
Balance
Wurmcoil Engine
Elspeth, Knight Errant
Maze of Ith (I think this is by far the worst offender)
Sword of War and Peace

A lot of these cards are really cube dependent though. Black control is weak enough in my cube that I can't really justify cutting Grave Titan. I don't even know the last time a Grave Titan deck was successful.

Swords get much worse as your instant-speed removal density goes up.

Batterskull is strong, but also beatable. My favorite is killing the germ token and trying to see if you can keep their Lifelink offline long enough to race. Also, populating the germ token turns Morbid on.

JTMS has been less oppressive than Elspeth and Sorin LOA. I'm sure that's a little different in a less aggressive cube. People love JTMS, it is skill testing, splashy and fun.

Jitte is less powerful the faster your environment is. Aside from being Legendary, there's a reason it's not everywhere in Legacy. I don't think it's as powerful as a Turn 1 Deathrite Shaman (maybe that's ridiculous). Jitte is also a little... slow sometimes. After spending 4 mana (at least) and swinging you get to distribute two -1/-1 effects. I know that's underselling it, but it really takes some time to get your money's worth with Jitte. Sure, once it gets going it can take over a game, but very often it just doesn't get going.

 

[Chris Taylor]

Good point about grave titan. Considering I mint be doubling up on damnnation, he might get to stay in.
I'm probably okay with balance since it requires so much work to be good. Sweet interaction with batterskull, shame the only populate card I run destroys artifacts.

Maybe it's just me Jason, but I found shackles incredibly oppressive normally, so it came out when the sac stuff went in.
Relic might come out for worn powerstone, but it can't be foil

 

[Jason Waddell]

You may be right, but I haven't seen it happen with Shackles yet. It's also another one of those cards that gets better the slower the format. I've got my eye on it, but only have about 4 - 5 drafts with it in the cube and I don't recall it dominating any games yet. If somebody pulls together a Shackles + Sac deck, kudos to them, as the sacrifice theme really doesn't live in blue's slice in the color pie.

 

[Chris Taylor]

New Patch!

I've taken this opportunity to remove some of the more overpowered cards we were discussing earlier, and re-tune my artifact mana, as well as remove a few underperformers. For the most part signets turned into talismans and a few miscellaneous ones, but Izzet Signet stayed in because WotC doesn't have the balls to do 10 card cycles ever.
I'm also taking a look at some of the more fringe archetypes in my cube: Tokens(Green, White and Black), Blue Tempo, and Black Control.
I added Gather the Townsfolk because I found most of the token cards lay higher up on the curve, and I wanted the archetype to be a bit less midrangey (though that may be a hopeless effort). I can't wait to see someone Snapcaster this with fateful hour on.
I haven't added too much to the effect of the blue tempo strategy, but it's a tough archetype to nail down. The only blue based aggro deck in recent memory hinged entirely on narrow and arguable overpowered cards (Blue/White Delver + Phyrexian Mana), and I'm not sure that's something I can replicate in my cube, weather I want to or not. I've noticed my blue section only has one 1 drop creature (which is probably excusable, if a little sad of a realization) and the majority of the two drop creatures aren't all that aggressive (except silvergil adept)
I'm brewing some custom cards to shift that slightly, but they aren't fully polished yet. Have any of you guys had success pushing tempo blue? How did you go about it?

Black control remains to be an enigma, but I've pinned down at least one idea: it's certainly more creature based than it's white or blue counterparts. Another damnnation (or Colorshifted Day of Judgement) might be necessary, but many factors are at work. I'm looking towards having it be a more creature based archetype than typical control builds, leaning more towards aggro control than pure control.
Aggro control is as well a hard archetype to quantify, typically being similar in makeup but different in execution than midrange decks. (Paulo once put it in an article: if a control deck is 60 demistifys, and an aggro deck is 60 shatters, a midrange deck is 30 of each, and an aggro control deck is 60 naturalizes)

As well, when I get the chance I'm replacing my archetype based fixing section with the full set of Horizon Canopy lands. It was rather funny, I was considering adding the painlands and adding basic land type erratta on to them (Battlefield Forge being a mountain plains, for EG) but I realized that would make them painless anyways. There are ways to do that, but I'm happy with the level of fetchland to fetchable lands right now. A bit of scouring Deviantart and some templating later, and I'll have me some new fixing options
I actually drafted a black white tokens deck which had more white fetchlands than plains (Which was probably a mistake) this weekend. Interesting draft.
Play of the Night: Spikeshot Goblin, Reckless Charge, Equip Grafted Wargear, Swing for 7, tap city of brass (going down to 1) to deal the final 7.

In > Out = Notes
Gather the Townsfolk > Loyal Cathar = Tokens!
Kami of Ancient Law > War Priest of Thune = Proactive vs Rective
Condemn > Gideon Jura = Opressive

Stitched Drake > Fettergiest =Better Tempo card
Aetherling > Sphinx of Jwar Isle = Testing
Miscalculation > Moonlit Guide = Testing
Daze > Trickbind = Better Tempo card

Puppeteer Clique > Nezumi Graverobber = Pod!
Mikaeus the Unhallowed > Sorin Markov = The Podfather
Stronghold Assassin >The Unknowable = It's a zombie. Holy crap

Tattermunge Maniac > Jackel Pup = It got Searing Blazed
Furnace Celebration > Rakdos Shread Freak = Enabler
Torch Fiend > Hearth Kami = Seems odd playing something worse when I allow multiples

Awakening Zone > Berserk = Tokens!

Steel Hellkite > Wurmcoil Engine = Opressive
Adventuring Gear > Maze of Ith = Opressive
Worn Powerstone > Coalition Relic = Opressive
Bonehoard > Sword of War and Peace = Opressive
Prismatic Lens> Sword of Feast and Famine = Opressive
Tectoninc Edge > Thawing Glaciers = Too slow
Talisman of Progress > Azorious Signet = Re-Working Artifact mana
Talisman of Impulse > Dimir Signet = Re-Working Artifact mana
Talisman of Dominance > Orzhov Signet = Re-Working Artifact mana
Coldsteel Heart > Gruul Signet = Re-Working Artifact mana

Havengul Lich > Recoil = The Podfather, Part 2
Far // Away> Shadowmage Infiltrator = Testing

 

[Jason Waddell]

By Spikeshot Goblin do you mean Spikeshot Elder?

 

[HannesVersmissen]

for the fetchable pain-lands:

Battlefield furnace
Land - Plains Mountain (R)
(reminder)
(T): Add (1) to your manapool and gain one life.
Whenever you tap ~ for mana you lose one life.

Arguably a bit clunky, ut gets the job done
it might work better like this, although less in the spirit of wizards wording.:

Battlefield furnace
Land - Plains Mountain (R)
(reminder)
(T): Add (1) to your manapool
Whenever you tap ~ for colored mana you lose one life.

 

[Jason Waddell]

Oh, and I gotta say Chris, I really love those changes. Out of all the cubes in the world, yours is the one I wish I could play the most.

 

[Chris Taylor]

Glad to hear it Jason!
the only thing about fetchable pain lands is it would be done with some masking tape and pen, not with a whole proxy, which makes wording changes short at best.
ah well, another card that can't be foil.

also you are correct, I do mean spikeshot elder. Boy howdy has he proven himself lately!

 

[Jason Waddell]

By the way I love the term Podfather.

Also, with Furnace Celebration, it's very narrow in the sense that some drafts nobody will even play it, then randomly it'll be awesome and super memorable. Losing to it last week made me very happy.

 

[Chris Taylor]

I can't way to draft the Awakening Zone/Fun-race Celebration/Pawn of Ulamog deck, it looks like such a blast

Also, another card that has proved itself lately?

it may look innocuous, but this card isn't really what it appears to be on the surface. What it really is is this:

+

The game that really brought this to light was when I was getting beaten down by a Junk zombies deck, (Gravecrawler, Lotleth Troll, Blade Splicer, Phyrexian metamorph. Nice Curve!), and stabalized through profane command bringing back flickerwisp to kill a token and lotleth troll, followed by Pianna.

Then I cracked back for 12. Anthems are good!, especially anthems which attack for 3.

 

[Jason Waddell]

That's a pretty nice find. Out of curiosity, on power level alone, would you recommend it over any of the following?

Aven Mindcensor
Silverblade Paladin
Blade Splicer
Flickerwisp
Mirran Crusader
Mirror Entity
Stonecloaker
Mentor of the Meek

 

[Chris Taylor]

Of cards I'd play in token decks:
-Blade Splicer is too key, probably the best 3 drop for both tokens and other beatdown lists.
-Flickerwisp is more universally playable, but pianna would be a more narrow, but more powerful inclusion.
-Mirror Entity has more random bonuses attached (Eg: Coralhelm Commander is in my cube.), I'm not sure which one is more powerful. Depends on the manafixing available (WW1 vs W2/X) and the incedental tribal synergies. This one requires a deep read of a given list.
-Mentor of the Meek could probably be dropped for it. I'm beginning to suspect Mentor is more cute than good, though I'm open to being impressed.

Stonecloaker, Silverblade Paladin, Mirran Crusader, and Aven Mindcensor are all more lackluster in the token based decks, so if you want to cut one of them for Pianna, do so for the reason that you want to include a tokens card over a regular "beatdown" card, not because one is better or worse.

 

[Jason Waddell]

Mentor of the Meek is at its best in a deck that generates automatic tokens (e.g. Planeswalker, Bitterblossom, Awakening Zone). Also not the worst with Ranger of Eos if you're a purveyor of Value Town. It's also sometimes useless.

 

[Chris Taylor]

Hmmm...Interesting:

Passive Tokens:
Elspeth, Knight Errant
Emeria Angel
Hero of Bladehold
Meloku the Clouded Mirror (!)
Bitterblossom
Pawn of Ulamog (!)
Krenko, Mob Boss (!)
Awakening Zone
Garruk Relentless
Sorin, Lord of Innistrad

Active Tokens:
Gather the Townsfolk
Lingering Souls
Midnight Haunting
Spectral Procession
Cloudgoat Ranger
Geist Honored Monk
Grave Titan
Seige-Gang Commander
Nest Invader
Kozilek's Predator
Growth Spasm
Derranged Hermit
Avenger of Zendikar (LOL)
Hornet Queen (Also LOL)
Huntmaster of the Fells
Myr Battlesphere

There does seem to be a bit more Active than Passive token making in my cube, and the passive does seem to be more in-demand cards. It might be one of those cards that doesn't come together that often.