General Auras: Do they all suck?

Jonas

Jonas

Looking through what auras are played in people's cubes, these seem like the most common ones (based on cubetutors 360 450 and 720 cubes)

In 360 and 450 cubes:


Going up to 720, the following cards are added to the average cubes:



Are there any other auras that are worth running?

Me, I'm trying out gift of orzhova, hoping that it will be able to do something.

Thoughts, suggestions? Are the only archetypes that want auras bant hexproof and boggle auras?
 
Changling Bob

Changling Bob

I suspect beneficial auras are inversely proportionally as good as removal. If your removal is too good, auras are going to die hard, but then if your cube is too aggro, you need your removal to be pretty good. I think you need a pretty lowish power level, or some really good synergies to get them working.
 
Jonas

Jonas

I only searched on auras, but yes, yes he is. When I remember that it costs 5 to bestow him, and instead manage to cast him as a creature in my combat phase.

Changling Bob said:
I suspect beneficial auras are inversely proportionally as good as removal. If your removal is too good, auras are going to die hard, but then if your cube is too aggro, you need your removal to be pretty good. I think you need a pretty lowish power level, or some really good synergies to get them working.
Click to expand...
So what one would really need is removal M14 style then.
 
Changling Bob

Changling Bob

Much like everything else in cube, your environment determines what's good in the environment. If you have enchantresses, oath of the ancient wood, etc to encourage playing enchantments in general, heroic dudes and hexproof dudes to incentivise carrying them, and rancors, bestow dudes and totem armors to soften the blow when your creature dies, then you can make auras work. If you've got a bunch of unconditional removal which means any aura you play is probably 1-for-2ing yourself, it's probably not going to work out.

E: was M14 removal particularly lacking? I remember there being a higher incidence of auras/enchantments than normal, pointing at theros' theme, but wasn't paying attention to the stuff around it.
 
Jonas

Jonas

It felt like it was mostly damage based removal and all the creatures had big butts. But I only drafted it once, so I don't have too much experience with it.
 
FlowerSunRain

FlowerSunRain

Contributor
You need to have decks that can utilize them and your removal suite needs to respect them.

What helps?

Conditional/Sorcery speed removal. I don't run Bolt, Plow, Path, Snuff Out, Dismember, Doomblade. I do run Hero's Downfall, Tragic Slip, Oust, Flameslash, Prison Term. There is still instant speed stuff for blowouts and efficient stuff cause interacting is good, but its not unconditionally in the same card.

Cheap Counters. Land an aura with mana open, counter removal, ride to victory.

Hexproof. You might hate it, but hexproof is boss with auras. shielding plax

Cards that can mitigate the card disadvantage. Kor Spiritdancer, Enchantresses, Enchantress's Presence, Replenish, Nomad Mythspinner, Rancor style cards, etc.
 
FlowerSunRain

FlowerSunRain

Contributor
By next week my cube adjustments should be done and I'll be playing it heavily until New Years (VACATION BITCHES!!!), so I'll be able to give you good feedback on how the aura heavy strategies worked or didn't work and what direction it might need to go.
 
Konge

Konge

That and Temporal Isolation are probably the only pacifism variants I'd consider playing. I'm still holding out for one which also gives the creature hexproof or shroud, which has always seemed a fun addition to the concept to me.
 
Changling Bob

Changling Bob

Incidentally, it looks like there are three broad themes of auras: removal (including control magics), legit auras and 'we have no idea how to template this ridiculous reanimation spell'.

I assume we're most interested in the middle one here? The other two seem to have fairly well defined niches?
 
FlowerSunRain

FlowerSunRain

Contributor
Blue really does hit auras the hardest. In my cube, blue has some issues as I run exactly zero colorless mana sources and saddle the color with aggro cards, making blue's usual schtick of "I'm the control color!" a lot more dicey and needs to be able to delay while it makes land drops, but I am looking to cut back on one or two bounce spells for this very reason.
 
Eric Chan

Eric Chan

Hyalopterous Lemure
Staff member
FlowerSunRain said:
Conditional/Sorcery speed removal. I don't run Bolt, Plow, Path, Snuff Out, Dismember, Doomblade. I do run Hero's Downfall, Tragic Slip, Oust, Flameslash, Prison Term. There is still instant speed stuff for blowouts and efficient stuff cause interacting is good, but its not unconditionally in the same card.
Click to expand...

I think FSR is very much on the money here. For the beneficial auras to be at all viable, I think a lot of the de facto cube removal would have to be toned down. In particular, instant speed removal at one and two mana. Bolt, Swords, Path, and Dismember would all have to hit the bench in a cube packing an aura theme. Though Shock and Incinerate are probably still fine.

I'm trying to move unconditional instant-speed removal into the domain of three mana spells. Some options are Afterlife, Crib Swap, Eyeblight's Ending, and Slaughter Pact.

Prison Term is a really nice suggestion, I might try that one out.

The nice part about toning down removal to support auras is that you can probably now support combat tricks, too!
 
CML

CML

Contributor
not to be too much of a carceral-state white-bread american but for the love of allah RUN PRISON TERM. what a sweet card

as for spot removal (aura or otherwise) i am firmly in the Wadds camp of "run a lot of it," the downside is that you don't get to play many Auras or tricks but the upside is that your Cube doesn't end up playing like AVR or Theros.

aura removal is pretty much the same as regular removal and you can just throw it in the cube without having it warp your design, but as for pants, who knows. i cut Rancor from my cube because it sucked and now have only Angelic Destiny and the magnificent Boon Satyr, though I wanna try Armadillo Cloak / Unflinching Courage and Gift of Orzhova these cards do more often than not lead to stupid games in the mold of Eric's decorous beef with Loxodon Warhammer. so i dunno
 
Jonas

Jonas

Boosting auras would be neat if they all cantripped at least.

I just noticed Artificer's hex, is that a really bad way for black to take care of equipments? It is horribly slow.
 
Jason Waddell

Jason Waddell

Administrator
Staff member
We had a long discussion of removal and stuff in Google Groups, but I am soundly of the mind that "high strength aggro, high removal density" is good for the interactivity and decision density of your environment. Also, even unconditional removal involves choices, vis a vis "what do I point this at, and when". There's an article on this I'll probably write in January.
 
Eric Chan

Eric Chan

Hyalopterous Lemure
Staff member
I don't disagree with that notion, especially if you want to give cube a Legacy-lite feel, where games are tight affairs fought over inches, and every battle is hard-won. But there's also something to be said for dialing down the removal suite a notch, which allows a whole host of other cards and even archetypes to flourish. Lack of removal doesn't necessarily have to translate to lack of interaction, so long as you give slower decks other ways to defend themselves, such as with better defensive creatures.
 
CML

CML

Contributor
Jonas said:
Boosting auras would be neat if they all cantripped at least.

I just noticed Artificer's hex, is that a really bad way for black to take care of equipments? It is horribly slow.
Click to expand...


good question, before there was bestow there was a far better idea that wizards had ... yours:

164.jpg
49.jpg
108.jpg
126.jpg


this is the "faith's fetters" cycle. its most obvious descendants are scourgemark, chosen by heliod and friends, though knightly valor and a few others come to mind. in a format where mediocre removal was last gasp and good removal was ribbons of night, these were all excellent cards. also do bear in mind that equipment is an (extremely successful) attempt to solve the problems with auras but we're moving into a different thread at this point
 
CML

CML

Contributor
i still say "RGD draft is the only format better than my cube" and smile when the novitiates agree until i realize what they think i mean
 
Chris Taylor

Chris Taylor

Contributor
My answer is the make more of the removal sorcery speed, so that you at least get one good swing out of a given piece.
The absolute worst case on armadillo cloak being Kinda like a sorcery Moment of Heroism, but guaranteed to resolve.

Problem is there's really only one good doom blade analogue: Soul Reap
Don't get me wrong, I fuckin love the thing, but people start to give me funny looks when I have 4 of that instead of my nice foil doom blade and terror etc
 
CML

CML

Contributor
not that i don't love doing things at my speed -- sorcery speed -- but playing green is more fun when you could possibly get blown out mid-combat or some other nasty time. keeps me on my toes.

my cubers have yelled at me to take out soul reap because everything is green, kinda disappointing but i guess with my cube being what it is ...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top