Card/Deck Making Gruul do more than stompy, or make stompy Gruul more interesting?

[Lucre]

Like, I like what it does because I can't help but play value graveyard decks, but when I read @Grillo say "It's a great ramp target" I immediately thought to myself you're in a weird place when you are playing the ramp target that requires you have more ramp targets in your deck while to a lesser extent you already want to have one on the field lol. Lets face it 4/4 will probably already be the largest guy in the arena in a lot of matches and your green deck probably got it out a turn or two early already right?

Like fuck if you get wrathed your game is probz all over rite? Beside the point though.

I guess green decks probably want to play more 4+ cc spells just to help with their god awful card selection and to balance out the fact that you are drawing land equiv 50% of the time. Of course all those 4+ cc spells are all creatures because what else does green know how to do thats worth a damn going into the midgame?

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

Like, I like what it does because I can't help but play value graveyard decks, but when I read @Grillo say "It's a great ramp target" I immediately thought to myself you're in a weird place when you are playing the ramp target that requires you have more ramp targets in your deck while to a lesser extent you already want to have one on the field lol. Lets face it 4/4 will probably already be the largest guy in the arena in a lot of matches and your green deck probably got it out a turn or two early already right?

Basically, you're trying to say its a win more card. If we were playing a constructed format competitively, I would agree and dismiss the card.

However, since the problem that G/R has at higher power level is that its boring, I think its worth considering. See the unwritten adds a little spice to an otherwise boring archetype by giving it a way to cheat game winning creatures into play with a little work, and if you just play it as a 6 mana spell blind, its not a bad value spell. Getting 8-10 mana worth of creatures into play isn't bad, especially when they all have some kind of ETB. More importantly, people go nuts and have a blast with mediocre reanimation archetypes, which this isn't too far removed from. At the end of the day, its a way to give Gruul that big play combo feeling that the Timmy and Johnny players enjoy.

Thats not to say that I think its a great deck (I think I've beaten the "I hate ramp" horse to death) but what are you going to do with this color pairing? Wildfire has issues, monsters is boring, pod and planeswalkers are ok.

There are also numerous reasons why someone may not wish to run natural order, mostly revolving around how easy it is to setup. It also dosen't really push you into specificaly G/R.

 

[Lucre]

no I'm saying its a card that is pick expensive to draft around. Its only as good as the rest of your deck, it takes work to have value and the reward is not that much better than I dunno, being able to find your relevant threat with a better card that does more things at a cheaper rate.

 

[Lucre]

I don't think GR is a good deck in most cubes, I do love it when it is but usually its kinda dross.

 

[Rasmus Källqvist]

I don't think GR is a good deck in most cubes, I do love it when it is but usually its kinda dross.

Do you want gruul to be good?

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

no I'm saying its a card that is pick expensive to draft around. Its only as good as the rest of your deck, it takes work to have value and the reward is not that much better than I dunno, being able to find your relevant threat with a better card that does more things at a cheaper rate.

I think its a given that natural order is the stronger card, from a power max perspective. Its one of wizards mistakes, which is why I excluded it.

However, "draft around," "investing picks," "only as good as the rest of your deck," "work for value" are all reasons why I suggested the card in the first place. Whatever cheat card you add, to function as a sub theme, it absolutely must function as a build around, and just not as random, effortless value.

I'm not married to see the unwritten, and I suggested other cheat cards (which also benefit from some build around effort) such as garruk, caller of beasts. However, see the unwritten, due to the ferocious trigger, naturally fits into specifically G/R better than other cards, hence why I think it deserves a bit of a look.

 

[DreamPaint]

@Lucre, I think you are undervaluing See the Unwritten on it's face value without ferocious. It's perfectly fine without, and it's more of a tutor/card selection card than a ramp target. Here is a list that I played where See the Unwritten was quite good:

Junk Constellation

As you can see, it was virtually impossible to trigger the ferocious, but the card was great. The difference between Elesh Norn and Hornet Queen costing six and costing seven is pretty huge, and being able to find the appropriate target for the situation is nice as well. See the Unwritten is a card that constrains deckbuilding, but I think it's fun to have some cards that only fit into certain archetypes and pay you off for being in said archetypes.

On topic of Gruul, the two R/G builds that see play in my cube are Ramp/Monsters hybrid deck and Zoo (if that counts?). Sample deck from yesterday's draft (undefeated):

Big Zoo

Talking about just straight up red-green though, usually how I approach drafting that deck is just take every piece of burn and then just play value green creatures, sample decklist:

Sample R/G Ramp

This is just kinda a rough-draft of what I would try to draft. Usually I'll be splashing another color though.

 

[Eric Chan]

Alright, you guys have sold me. Because I think it'll also be fairly difficult to trigger ferocious in the kind of decks that want See the Unwritten, I'm going to try its instant speed cousin instead, Summoning Trap.

 

[Lucre]

I think its a given that natural order is the stronger card, from a power max perspective. Its one of wizards mistakes, which is why I excluded it.

However, "draft around," "investing picks," "only as good as the rest of your deck," "work for value" are all reasons why I suggested the card in the first place. Whatever cheat card you add, to function as a sub theme, it absolutely must function as a build around, and just not as random, effortless value.

I'm not married to see the unwritten, and I suggested other cheat cards (which also benefit from some build around effort) such as garruk, caller of beasts. However, see the unwritten, due to the ferocious trigger, naturally fits into specifically G/R better than other cards, hence why I think it deserves a bit of a look.

I don't really think we can have conversations about cube if you are using very total rhetoric like "its one of wizards mistakes and thats why I don't cube it".

I don't even know why you brought up natural order the cards feel very different to me lol.

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

Yeah, I don't think this is productive either.

To clarify, I mentioned natural order because of your double post on page 4, where you shot down see the unwritten and than stated that natural order is probably your "fave big cheater." It looked like you were framing the conversation, though I suppose in retrospect it could have just been a random observation.

But I think we can move past that.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

I finally got around to the Fates Reforged update, but funnily enough I already had some changes in the works for Gruul. I doubled up on a card that hasn't been mentioned yet, but feels like it segues nicely into the land theme, because most of the support spells fill your graveyard with so much more than just lands, like creatures...

 

[Rasmus Källqvist]

I had it under the Monster Meal section in the op would you rather play two nemesis of mortals, or one nemesis and one ghoultree

 

[Onderzeeboot]

I had it under the Monster Meal section in the op would you rather play two nemesis of mortals, or one nemesis and one ghoultree

Oops. The OP is, like, so long ago! I would rather play two Nemesis of Mortals in my cube, because it plays nice with the +1+1 counter theme and because I like snakes!

 

[Lucre]

Those creatures would be better if you doubled up on evoke guys and potentially some cyclers
Lots of cards would be better / more reasonable inclusions with that change though.

 

[Rasmus Källqvist]

what more spells-on-legs stuff are there? Supporting Nemesis is probably already done partially by the Pod and Mulch-decks.

 

[Lucre]

Well we can start by adding these idiots to the list



Whats that horrible red one you are all on about? What about the 3/1 edict?

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

I usually find that nemesis or ghoultree lend themselves better to BG due to blacks ability to both add to and exploit the yard.

I like the idea of using bloodrush to bridge the two archetypes though



Being the ones which scream "play gruul" the loudest.

 

[Laz]

Those creatures would be better if you doubled up on evoke guys and potentially some cyclers
Lots of cards would be better / more reasonable inclusions with that change though.

I keep having this strange idea for a cube that I term "The Lucre Cube aka. The 'draw-a-card' Cube". It works on the simple principle that as many cards as possible should cantrip or cycle, because having a full grip of options is awesome, then working out what how to use the dynamic that emerges when graveyards fill fast and players rip through their deck.

As for the 'stock the graveyard with creatures' mechanic, I am not sure it feels quintessentially Gruul. While Bloodrush does support it, I don't know how it all fits together. I thought the payoff was undercosted fatties, but Bloodrush requires you to be beating down with creatures already in play. Ghoultree and Nemesis of Mortals always felt a little more Golgari to me, though I can see Jund as well (Faithless Looting is a sweet card).

Another mechanic in Red which puts creatures into the yard is Echo, e.g:


There is probably design space for pushed cards in the style of Hammerheim Deadeye, where the Echo cost (possibly far) exceeds the casting cost, making it like a variant of Evoke. Going down the Echo route would make some sort of Fires theme pretty sweet as well.

 

[GenericZero]

I usually find that nemesis or ghoultree lend themselves better to BG due to blacks ability to both add to and exploit the yard.

I like the idea of using bloodrush to bridge the two archetypes though



Being the ones which scream "play gruul" the loudest.

I really just want to throw this out there. Bloodrush is probably the best Gruul mechanic of all time. Something about it just feels oh-so right.

 

[Rasmus Källqvist]

I totally agree that it's a golgari card rather than a gruul card so if if anything I veered off track.

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

On the plus side, the major problem with cards like ghoultree and nemesis is the lack of trample, which gruul cards like ghor-clan rampager nicely solve. Bloodrush in general helps broaden the appeal of cards like ghoul tree, nemesis and kessig cagebreakers, which otherwise can feel a bit narrow. This actually isn't a terrible pivot point for the archetypes.

It also should be noted that for this to be sweet, you kind of need to tune things to the right power level. You want those big golgari cards to feel powerful, not clunky.

Fwiw I've generally found nemesis to be worse than ghoultree, as nemesis actually costs quite a bit more, even if its spread out over 2 turns. Not that I'm suggesting nemesis automatically > ghoul tree (the counter synergy is sweet) just that it should enter into the calculus.

 

[Chris Taylor]

Well we can start by adding these idiots to the list



Whats that horrible red one you are all on about? What about the 3/1 edict?

Not sure on "the horrible red one", but I assume the latter is these two?

Jeez that illustration from the dual decks...

 

[Diakonov]

How much would it take to allow madness to be a playable nonpoisonous theme? My greatest concern is that the discard-outlet requirements would mean lowering the cube power level significantly. I suppose you could triple up on Wild Mongrel, but you probably still need more.

 

[Rasmus Källqvist]

My biggest concern is what madness card are worth worth running to begin with? I can see how both madness cards and disc outlet are easier to get hold of at lower power.

 

[Diakonov]

If we can assume that we get to pay the madness cost: