CML's Cube (405, polychromatic)
- Thread starter CML
- Start date
Chris Taylor
Contributor
*Crackes Knuckles*
Is doomed traveller even good?
I have similar doubts about weathered wayfayer, far too durdley
Daring Skyjek --> Cloistered Youth, the 3 toughness is HUGE
How is Shrine of Loyal Legions? Seems super slow
Enlightened Tutor is bad
Deff put in wrath of god
Intangible Virtue? You should be ashamed! This thing is poison central.
Cut Tidespout Tyrant. You never wanna run shit that is only good when reanimated, and he is just that. Add FoF sphinx, sweet for reanimator and control
Mystical Tutor is even worse than enlightened tutor. You need to fetch broken shit, which you're too smart to be running
Is disrupting shoal good at all? Is this a travis woo inclusion? Double up on force instead, but I still wouldn't
Okay, does ANYONE play death's shadow? I know it's cool with Varolz, but seriously, that's pretty loose
Hakkon seems super narrow. If you could cast him from your hand maybe, but still
Cut Ophiomancer, add Pawn of Ulamog if you want this kind of effect of free bodies, but this card does bad things to an enviornment
No Fucking Way tombstalker costs 3. You are lying to yourself. 5 probably, 4 in magical christmas land.
Gloomdrifter: Really? Threshold AND a shit body? Add Skinrender or Nekkrataal, NEITHER OF WHICH YOU HAVE ><
Does darkblast do anything?
Is ghastly demise worth the work?
Ashes to Ashes > Reckless Spite. Also gravecrawler weapons.
Cut Whip, that looks miserable to play against.
Furystroke Giant looks to be chasing the dream of red tokens which has no fucking bottom end. Doesn't seem great to me.
Punishing Fire + Grove in the Funsies Draft I assume? Even if it is cute, do you really want a repeatable shock this easy to assemble waltzing around your enviornment, wondering why you don't get aggro decks anymore?
Wheel is shit and has always been.
How consistent is Skyshroud Elite? Does he suck if you play him on T1? Maybe make him Experiment Three and add some proliferate cards for sweetness
Borderland Ranger seems loose. Maybe I don't know the power, but he seems like boring limited filler, not shit I'm excited to pick.
I refuse to believe that omnath is anything more than asking to loose to black/blue. Nice decision density as well, by the way.
KALONIAN HYDRA? REALLY? I thought you were better than this! Friends don't let friends run Phage!
Deffs move cradle to funsies draft. I've played it enough in white weenie for sword equip costs that It'll deffinitly do well.
Judge's Famaliar is shit. I think you might like Medomai though.
I wouldn't even play single Kird Ape, 1 drops is not where grull needs help. As weird as it sounds, I think your cube might really like Zur-Ta Druid.
Avecyn's Pilgrim is green bro
Loam Lion is even less justifiable than Kird Ape
Coiling Oracle doesn't seem worth the effort to me. Temporal Spring!!!
Izzet Charm doesn't look spectacular, but maybe I'm wrong
Thornscape Battlemage is the worst fire imp ever or the worst viridian shaman ever, or a bad 3 color card. Cut it.
*Drops Mike*
Is doomed traveller even good?
I have similar doubts about weathered wayfayer, far too durdley
Daring Skyjek --> Cloistered Youth, the 3 toughness is HUGE
How is Shrine of Loyal Legions? Seems super slow
Enlightened Tutor is bad
Deff put in wrath of god
Intangible Virtue? You should be ashamed! This thing is poison central.
Cut Tidespout Tyrant. You never wanna run shit that is only good when reanimated, and he is just that. Add FoF sphinx, sweet for reanimator and control
Mystical Tutor is even worse than enlightened tutor. You need to fetch broken shit, which you're too smart to be running
Is disrupting shoal good at all? Is this a travis woo inclusion? Double up on force instead, but I still wouldn't
Okay, does ANYONE play death's shadow? I know it's cool with Varolz, but seriously, that's pretty loose
Hakkon seems super narrow. If you could cast him from your hand maybe, but still
Cut Ophiomancer, add Pawn of Ulamog if you want this kind of effect of free bodies, but this card does bad things to an enviornment
No Fucking Way tombstalker costs 3. You are lying to yourself. 5 probably, 4 in magical christmas land.
Gloomdrifter: Really? Threshold AND a shit body? Add Skinrender or Nekkrataal, NEITHER OF WHICH YOU HAVE ><
Does darkblast do anything?
Is ghastly demise worth the work?
Ashes to Ashes > Reckless Spite. Also gravecrawler weapons.
Cut Whip, that looks miserable to play against.
Furystroke Giant looks to be chasing the dream of red tokens which has no fucking bottom end. Doesn't seem great to me.
Punishing Fire + Grove in the Funsies Draft I assume? Even if it is cute, do you really want a repeatable shock this easy to assemble waltzing around your enviornment, wondering why you don't get aggro decks anymore?
Wheel is shit and has always been.
How consistent is Skyshroud Elite? Does he suck if you play him on T1? Maybe make him Experiment Three and add some proliferate cards for sweetness
Borderland Ranger seems loose. Maybe I don't know the power, but he seems like boring limited filler, not shit I'm excited to pick.
I refuse to believe that omnath is anything more than asking to loose to black/blue. Nice decision density as well, by the way.
KALONIAN HYDRA? REALLY? I thought you were better than this! Friends don't let friends run Phage!
Deffs move cradle to funsies draft. I've played it enough in white weenie for sword equip costs that It'll deffinitly do well.
Judge's Famaliar is shit. I think you might like Medomai though.
I wouldn't even play single Kird Ape, 1 drops is not where grull needs help. As weird as it sounds, I think your cube might really like Zur-Ta Druid.
Avecyn's Pilgrim is green bro
Loam Lion is even less justifiable than Kird Ape
Coiling Oracle doesn't seem worth the effort to me. Temporal Spring!!!
Izzet Charm doesn't look spectacular, but maybe I'm wrong
Thornscape Battlemage is the worst fire imp ever or the worst viridian shaman ever, or a bad 3 color card. Cut it.
*Drops Mike*
Chris Taylor
Contributor
Also, while awesome, scavenging ooze isn't exactly aggro friendly, since he gains life and has a huge butt
I don't actually mind the occasional anchor card like Intangible Virtue, as long as the narrow cards are not very high in number. If you can open up new playable decks with minimal, dense support then I think there is merit.
Dom Harvey
Contributor
Anchor cards are fun but they - and fringe strategies in general - can only exist comfortably in an environment in which your bread-and-butter aggro/control cards feature heavily. If you try to bend it too far the whole thing snaps.
Yeah, I learned that lesson when I tried to make Dream Halls a playable archetype.
CML
Contributor
i love the CT cube deconstructions because most of the judgments are solid and a few are absurd. it is like a drunken relative going on a decorous rampage at christmas only to then voice his undying support for the tenets of libertarianism. anyway because it's christmas i forecast having little to do but riptidelab for today (especially since i ate a giant weed brownie last night) so i'm gonna make a reply and fuck around with my cube for a while
-yeah doomed traveler is good
-ww probably not (an old cut) but wanted another land tutor, likely it will just go away again after this week
-cloistered youth was mediocre even in ISD draft (this is errant judgment #1) and skyjek is lots of fun, more play to it than accorder paladin imo
-shrine is good clean fun
-e. tutor is pretty bad, could take it out
-i wanna give virtue a wheel for a week or two though i agree with you in principle
-day is in already and i have damnation, is a 3rd identical card more fun than something like austere command?
-FoF sphinx is terribad compared to Tyrant (errant judgment #2), it's in a better design space but is a much worse card, sadly
-mystical tutor is nuts (almost counts as two errant judgments) even with cut upheaval. terminus is a funny target
-disrupting shoal: just trying it out (i like the double force idea, though)
-death's shadow and haakon i'm just trying out too, they'll likely come out
-ophiomancer has been pretty enjoyable (i'm not counting any more) and pawn of ulamog is a mediocre draft uncommon
-tombstalker used to cost 3 with the cantrips but now costs 4, i guess?
-gloomdrifter is great fun, i don't know why this forum loves putting in every possible nekrataal variant
-yeah darkblast does things
-ghastly demise is a sweet card but eh expunge is less work youre right
-ashes to ashes is also sweeter than spite, good call
-whip is great fun too
-furystoke is awesome
-dunno if the pfire experiment will work but i'm gonna give it a go for a week or two
-yeah ill cut skyshroud elite, and i do love x1, lol at proliferate cards though
-borderland is strong, somewhat more suited for a fast environment than yavimaya elder (http://sales.starcitygames.com/deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=55192)
-omnath is one of my prouder inclusions of late
-trying the hydra over some other 5-drops right now ("but it's good with proliferate!")
-cradle: sure good call
-judge's familiar is pretty good, i'll check to see if i need anything in the "gold 6-drop that does nothing" slot but probably not
-kird ape: wtf man don't be like that
-loam lion: see above
-coiling oracle: yeah sure
-izzet charm: yeah it's pretty meh but it's versatile enough. could be just a case of pet card
-thornscape battlemage: perfection
gather 'round the fire-pit for story-time -- on Wednesdays I tutor a kid in math who wants nothing more than to consume the hour talking about his magic cards. one memorable session involved his saying "i want to play with my sporemound, but i don't have any saproling tokens." the other day, when i told him his axebane stag was worse than his dryad militant, he was flabbergasted, and i was immediately taken back to childhood; at this point in my life, it's very easy to forget that i too loved my island fish jasconius, or, even as recently as three years ago, for example, had no idea modo had a trading function. when i see medomai the ageless suggested over judge's familiar, though, it helps me get back within that mindset -- though a love of proliferate is from a different kind of youth, and picking on kird ape and loam lion (http://magic.tcgplayer.com/db/deck.asp?deck_id=1163205) was a phase i skipped (though maybe aggro would be better without 2/3's for 1?) not like i bought savannahs and taigas as a small child, though, i've never really had much of a speculative sense...
/endcounterrant
anyway, though my counterrant is long, the list of things i like is often longer; but even if there was just one good suggestion, it would still have been worth it, which is not a popular idea on bad magic forums, which is all the rest of them. one thing i enjoy about this forum is that we all come from different places -- the people in my facebook cube thread have made 2013 my most successful social year since 2005, and RiptideLab reminds me that mtg is, at its best, a game about people. the pluralism and liberality here is in stark contrast to the kind of culture too common in other communities here and has brought me much joy
here's to fresh sets of eyes, swear words in public forums, the occasional ad hominem, good game design, and only being dogmatic and self-justifying pricks some of the time. merry christmas riptidelab
-yeah doomed traveler is good
-ww probably not (an old cut) but wanted another land tutor, likely it will just go away again after this week
-cloistered youth was mediocre even in ISD draft (this is errant judgment #1) and skyjek is lots of fun, more play to it than accorder paladin imo
-shrine is good clean fun
-e. tutor is pretty bad, could take it out
-i wanna give virtue a wheel for a week or two though i agree with you in principle
-day is in already and i have damnation, is a 3rd identical card more fun than something like austere command?
-FoF sphinx is terribad compared to Tyrant (errant judgment #2), it's in a better design space but is a much worse card, sadly
-mystical tutor is nuts (almost counts as two errant judgments) even with cut upheaval. terminus is a funny target
-disrupting shoal: just trying it out (i like the double force idea, though)
-death's shadow and haakon i'm just trying out too, they'll likely come out
-ophiomancer has been pretty enjoyable (i'm not counting any more) and pawn of ulamog is a mediocre draft uncommon
-tombstalker used to cost 3 with the cantrips but now costs 4, i guess?
-gloomdrifter is great fun, i don't know why this forum loves putting in every possible nekrataal variant
-yeah darkblast does things
-ghastly demise is a sweet card but eh expunge is less work youre right
-ashes to ashes is also sweeter than spite, good call
-whip is great fun too
-furystoke is awesome
-dunno if the pfire experiment will work but i'm gonna give it a go for a week or two
-yeah ill cut skyshroud elite, and i do love x1, lol at proliferate cards though
-borderland is strong, somewhat more suited for a fast environment than yavimaya elder (http://sales.starcitygames.com/deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=55192)
-omnath is one of my prouder inclusions of late
-trying the hydra over some other 5-drops right now ("but it's good with proliferate!")
-cradle: sure good call
-judge's familiar is pretty good, i'll check to see if i need anything in the "gold 6-drop that does nothing" slot but probably not
-kird ape: wtf man don't be like that
-loam lion: see above
-coiling oracle: yeah sure
-izzet charm: yeah it's pretty meh but it's versatile enough. could be just a case of pet card
-thornscape battlemage: perfection
gather 'round the fire-pit for story-time -- on Wednesdays I tutor a kid in math who wants nothing more than to consume the hour talking about his magic cards. one memorable session involved his saying "i want to play with my sporemound, but i don't have any saproling tokens." the other day, when i told him his axebane stag was worse than his dryad militant, he was flabbergasted, and i was immediately taken back to childhood; at this point in my life, it's very easy to forget that i too loved my island fish jasconius, or, even as recently as three years ago, for example, had no idea modo had a trading function. when i see medomai the ageless suggested over judge's familiar, though, it helps me get back within that mindset -- though a love of proliferate is from a different kind of youth, and picking on kird ape and loam lion (http://magic.tcgplayer.com/db/deck.asp?deck_id=1163205) was a phase i skipped (though maybe aggro would be better without 2/3's for 1?) not like i bought savannahs and taigas as a small child, though, i've never really had much of a speculative sense...
/endcounterrant
anyway, though my counterrant is long, the list of things i like is often longer; but even if there was just one good suggestion, it would still have been worth it, which is not a popular idea on bad magic forums, which is all the rest of them. one thing i enjoy about this forum is that we all come from different places -- the people in my facebook cube thread have made 2013 my most successful social year since 2005, and RiptideLab reminds me that mtg is, at its best, a game about people. the pluralism and liberality here is in stark contrast to the kind of culture too common in other communities here and has brought me much joy
here's to fresh sets of eyes, swear words in public forums, the occasional ad hominem, good game design, and only being dogmatic and self-justifying pricks some of the time. merry christmas riptidelab
Chris Taylor
Contributor
I'd agree with you, but I don't think virtue is the card to do it since it would fit well (arguably, anyways) into aggro decks if it didn't say token on it.
Oh I love a good christmas shouting match
-Cloistered Youth, I'd take context here for a lot. She survives battle with a bear, while neither of them do (though I think accorder paladin is better if you want a token card). We talked for so long about how 1 power are just not what you want, and how everything should have 2 power, clearly these things are related, right?
-I'd say so, since Austere Command kinda sucks. Nickenamed Akward Command for a reason man. I've barely ever seen this be more than wrath
-Tidespout Tyrant is uncastable except in extreme situations, and Fof Sphinx gives reanimator decks more fuel. Check and mate.
-Terminus is a okay, but what are you feching otherwise? 2 card combos in which one card sucks every other time is bad, and it's shit as a toolbox card (Since you need a turn)
-Don't be so quick to dismiss Pawn, I like him a lot more than his appearance would suggust. The mana is relavant, the multiple bodies are relavant, the higher top end than ophiomancer is totally relavant. Don't knock it till you try it.
-Tombstalker costs 5-6 in my book, and I know you've got the fetchlands and the cantrips going, but I still don't believe it. Keep an eye on this fella, you might be turning a blind eye.
-Because nekkrataal doesn't need threshold
(Also sometimes they have 3/3s)-I dunno man, Yav Elder still blocks really well. I suppose ranger attacks better, but thats me. I don't really like either card, myself
Stupid horrible green 3s-Loam Lion: Yeah I be hatin. What you gonna do about it?
-Thornscape Battlemage: Perfection of what? Mediocre draft commons?
Merry Fuckin' Chrismas Everybody
To butt in here real quick, I like Daring Skyjek the most out of the suggested three-power two-drops. Cloistered Youth has a real downside, and is pretty vulnerable the first turn it's in play. Accorder Paladin is a fine man, but tends not to survive any combat phase where the opponent's board isn't empty. Daring Skyjek, I find, has three 'phases'. He often gets in for three at the beginning of the game, before the opponent is set up (especially if you're on the play). Then when the bodies show up on the other side, he kind of hangs back for a few turns. But when you bring in the cavalry yourself, he gets his mojo back on, and takes to the skies for decent chunks of damage.
I've tried all three, the Skyjek is most playable and useful around here.
I've tried all three, the Skyjek is most playable and useful around here.
CML
Contributor
SHOUTING MATCH?? BRING IT ON!! Two ancient lineages of rageaholics converge in the figure of ME, and I revel in it every Christmas. I will now write a learned and passive-aggressive deposition instead, I wonder if this could be an article?:
So it's not that I'm the alpha and omega of card evaluation just because I'm addicted to Constructed Magic, but as I've experienced it, the main weakness of this forum -- some of the feedback that's led to my less successful changes -- lies in misevaluations of cards' power level. It's also not that anyone here is worse than my abstract, theorycrafted evaluations, as I'm sure there exist written records of me proclaiming the craptacularity of Domri and Deathrite and the ascendancy of Tibalt -- it's more that a lack of a Constructed context makes it difficult to evaluate card choices, especially the idiosyncratic choices that make RiptideLab worth reading and contributing to. Obviously overpowering quality in Constructed and overpowering quality in Cubes x, y and z are not one and the same, we've all spilled a lot of ink writing perceptive things about the sensitivity of context, Cube plays out somewhere between Legacy, limited, and (shudder) EDH, but a card being strong in format A does suggest being strong in format B more than "it looks good" suggests it's good in format B.
In other words, I suspect a lot of theorycrafting in card evaluation here. At any rate, the misevaluations I often see are of the strain I see at places like Standard FNM at Card Kingdom -- not totally divorced from the competitive world, but on its outskirts.
Take Cloistered Youth, for example -- it was initially thought to be a first pick in ISD draft; it looks fucking good. You don't even need to like women to like it! But then I played with it and lost a bunch, the 1/1 thing and 1 life thing were both relevant, etc. and still I first-picked it for a while before I learned it just wasn't good. It always had a very high ratio of looking awesome to being awesome. I don't fully know why (the weakness to the common aura-based removal in ISD was surely a piece of the puzzle in addition to the less format-sensitive "coming out as a 1/1 is a bummer" and "sure sucks to lose a life a turn in a race!") but this to me is a more interesting line of inquiry than "Is Cloistered Youth good," because, well, it isn't, not in my Cube, and I know this because I've already tried it, looking for a nice aggressive card that cost 1W and could swing fearlessly into 2/x's. Again, this kind of reasoning has its own bias (everyone gets attached to their pet cards and Riptide is often good at getting us to throw out our babies) and MTG wouldn't be a fun game if we weren't all fucking up all the time but the nicer thing that keeps us coming back, occurring intermittently like crack to lab rats, is that we all sometimes grasp an essential truth that puts us ahead of the game via our own subjectivity -- Wadds breaks singleton; I spam miserable Martyr of Sands decks -- and one of these truths is that Cloistered Youth is a giant piece of shit.
Constructed is also nice because it lets me find and learn from other people's sweet and true discoveries -- standing on the shoulders of giants, sure, but also scrabbling up to the top, and maybe some day even being stood on; English students know that being a referent is the closest thing to deification. Here are some nuggets:
-Accorder Paladin also looks great, but it saw almost no play in Standard; though this wasn't enough to dismiss it on its own, as Ral Zarek is awesome, and Goblin Wardriver was played, contemporaneously, in that very high-powered environment, I decided it was worth a try and then, after it didn't work, I took it out. It turns out one thing a one-powered guy does is ... trade with an Accorder Paladin (but not always a Daring Skyjek).
-Austere Command might very well suck in Cube, but it might not. Six mana is verging on unplayable for a Constructed Wrath (though October Standard has had a few sleeve up their Planar Cleansings, another card well worth trying) but remember that Cube is slower than Constructed and so maybe there's room for that extra flexibility to knock the Command into Cube respectability, if not enshrinement. (Flexibility is another card attribute that's often underrated -- who the fuck thought GOLGARI CHARM would be a house in Legacy? Not me.) The note I have on Wrath is that my playgroup is pretty averse to my worse experiments in breaking singleton (double Figure of Destiny going last-pick was enough to convince me of this) so I'm reluctant to throw in a third 4-cmc card that says "Destroy all creatures" and not much else.
-Yeah, Tidespout Tyrant is hard to cast, but Cube is still slower than Constructed by a long shot, no matter how extremely low we push down the curve (Recurring Nightmare, for example, isn't played in Legacy but would break each and every one of our Cubes because its mana intensiveness isn't as important here), so it happens sometimes (though 7 is obviously more ideal), and, unlike Sphinx of Uthuun, it's a powerful card that's still in almost every Legacy Reanimator 75.
-Mystical Tutor is the kind of card that looked terrible to me when I was ramping up to full-blown MTG addiction, but it's banned in Legacy (due to enabling too great a consistency in reanimating Tidespout Tyrants -- I am not making this up) and though obviously I have tamped things down a lot here, there's no lack of high-impact targets in my Cube, most control decks like it (Cruel Ultimatum or, I dunno, Austere Command?) and it's a fun card to play with and against; the nice thing is that it's instant-speed without making you build the kind of draw-go deck that doesn't exist in Cube, unlike the comparable and unplayable Mystical Teachings.
-Gloomdrifter (a 4-CMC effort at "variety in sweepers") is weird and awesome and a Zombie and requires some drafting around and some setup, Nekrataal does the same thing as a handful of other creatures in my Cube.
-Ophiomancer + Goblin Bombardment is a higher end than Pawn could ever have, and though Pawn looks good during my disastrous Modo binge of 2010-2011 I drafted Rise one fucktillion times, encompassing a large enough sample to render a damning-with-faint-praise judgment upon the Pawn.
And so on.
Ho ho ho!
So it's not that I'm the alpha and omega of card evaluation just because I'm addicted to Constructed Magic, but as I've experienced it, the main weakness of this forum -- some of the feedback that's led to my less successful changes -- lies in misevaluations of cards' power level. It's also not that anyone here is worse than my abstract, theorycrafted evaluations, as I'm sure there exist written records of me proclaiming the craptacularity of Domri and Deathrite and the ascendancy of Tibalt -- it's more that a lack of a Constructed context makes it difficult to evaluate card choices, especially the idiosyncratic choices that make RiptideLab worth reading and contributing to. Obviously overpowering quality in Constructed and overpowering quality in Cubes x, y and z are not one and the same, we've all spilled a lot of ink writing perceptive things about the sensitivity of context, Cube plays out somewhere between Legacy, limited, and (shudder) EDH, but a card being strong in format A does suggest being strong in format B more than "it looks good" suggests it's good in format B.
In other words, I suspect a lot of theorycrafting in card evaluation here. At any rate, the misevaluations I often see are of the strain I see at places like Standard FNM at Card Kingdom -- not totally divorced from the competitive world, but on its outskirts.
Take Cloistered Youth, for example -- it was initially thought to be a first pick in ISD draft; it looks fucking good. You don't even need to like women to like it! But then I played with it and lost a bunch, the 1/1 thing and 1 life thing were both relevant, etc. and still I first-picked it for a while before I learned it just wasn't good. It always had a very high ratio of looking awesome to being awesome. I don't fully know why (the weakness to the common aura-based removal in ISD was surely a piece of the puzzle in addition to the less format-sensitive "coming out as a 1/1 is a bummer" and "sure sucks to lose a life a turn in a race!") but this to me is a more interesting line of inquiry than "Is Cloistered Youth good," because, well, it isn't, not in my Cube, and I know this because I've already tried it, looking for a nice aggressive card that cost 1W and could swing fearlessly into 2/x's. Again, this kind of reasoning has its own bias (everyone gets attached to their pet cards and Riptide is often good at getting us to throw out our babies) and MTG wouldn't be a fun game if we weren't all fucking up all the time but the nicer thing that keeps us coming back, occurring intermittently like crack to lab rats, is that we all sometimes grasp an essential truth that puts us ahead of the game via our own subjectivity -- Wadds breaks singleton; I spam miserable Martyr of Sands decks -- and one of these truths is that Cloistered Youth is a giant piece of shit.
Constructed is also nice because it lets me find and learn from other people's sweet and true discoveries -- standing on the shoulders of giants, sure, but also scrabbling up to the top, and maybe some day even being stood on; English students know that being a referent is the closest thing to deification. Here are some nuggets:
-Accorder Paladin also looks great, but it saw almost no play in Standard; though this wasn't enough to dismiss it on its own, as Ral Zarek is awesome, and Goblin Wardriver was played, contemporaneously, in that very high-powered environment, I decided it was worth a try and then, after it didn't work, I took it out. It turns out one thing a one-powered guy does is ... trade with an Accorder Paladin (but not always a Daring Skyjek).
-Austere Command might very well suck in Cube, but it might not. Six mana is verging on unplayable for a Constructed Wrath (though October Standard has had a few sleeve up their Planar Cleansings, another card well worth trying) but remember that Cube is slower than Constructed and so maybe there's room for that extra flexibility to knock the Command into Cube respectability, if not enshrinement. (Flexibility is another card attribute that's often underrated -- who the fuck thought GOLGARI CHARM would be a house in Legacy? Not me.) The note I have on Wrath is that my playgroup is pretty averse to my worse experiments in breaking singleton (double Figure of Destiny going last-pick was enough to convince me of this) so I'm reluctant to throw in a third 4-cmc card that says "Destroy all creatures" and not much else.
-Yeah, Tidespout Tyrant is hard to cast, but Cube is still slower than Constructed by a long shot, no matter how extremely low we push down the curve (Recurring Nightmare, for example, isn't played in Legacy but would break each and every one of our Cubes because its mana intensiveness isn't as important here), so it happens sometimes (though 7 is obviously more ideal), and, unlike Sphinx of Uthuun, it's a powerful card that's still in almost every Legacy Reanimator 75.
-Mystical Tutor is the kind of card that looked terrible to me when I was ramping up to full-blown MTG addiction, but it's banned in Legacy (due to enabling too great a consistency in reanimating Tidespout Tyrants -- I am not making this up) and though obviously I have tamped things down a lot here, there's no lack of high-impact targets in my Cube, most control decks like it (Cruel Ultimatum or, I dunno, Austere Command?) and it's a fun card to play with and against; the nice thing is that it's instant-speed without making you build the kind of draw-go deck that doesn't exist in Cube, unlike the comparable and unplayable Mystical Teachings.
-Gloomdrifter (a 4-CMC effort at "variety in sweepers") is weird and awesome and a Zombie and requires some drafting around and some setup, Nekrataal does the same thing as a handful of other creatures in my Cube.
-Ophiomancer + Goblin Bombardment is a higher end than Pawn could ever have, and though Pawn looks good during my disastrous Modo binge of 2010-2011 I drafted Rise one fucktillion times, encompassing a large enough sample to render a damning-with-faint-praise judgment upon the Pawn.
And so on.
Ho ho ho!
I am going to cast my vote in favor of Ape, Lion, and Izzet Charm.
After Eric's argument I think I'm going to swap Accorder Paladin for Skyjek. The Battle Cry has so rarely been relevant. I don't really agree with CML's Cloistered Youth rant, and, similarly didn't understand when people were trying to dump on Wretched Anurid, as 3/3's for 2 with life-loss attached have been pretty great here. I happen to not run either at the moment, but that's less in the interest of efficiency.
CML if you're running Pod I don't really see how you can justify not having Nekrataal or Skinrender.
I think you're being delusional on Tidesprout Tyrant. But I haven't really seen it in action. My rule for Reanimator targets was always "do I want this in a non-reanimator deck too", and I don't know that we fit the bill here.
Wraths are sweet.
CML if you're running Pod I don't really see how you can justify not having Nekrataal or Skinrender.
I think you're being delusional on Tidesprout Tyrant. But I haven't really seen it in action. My rule for Reanimator targets was always "do I want this in a non-reanimator deck too", and I don't know that we fit the bill here.
Wraths are sweet.
In the category of Eight-Drops For Reanimator That Can Realistically Be Cast, I nominate Craterhoof Behemoth, Terastodon, and Woodfall Primus, with an honourable mention going to Griselbrand.
I don't know that my blue control decks around here ever want an eight, unless it's like an X spell like Sphinx's Revelation.
I don't know that my blue control decks around here ever want an eight, unless it's like an X spell like Sphinx's Revelation.
CML
Contributor
So being Green makes hard-casting 8's more realistic?
I kinda wonder if G'brand would be fun in Cube. How do y'all feel about the big four reanimation targets
Griselbrand
Jin-Gitaxias
Iona
Norn
Blind Creeper over Wretched Anurid, imo (it's a fun sub-game) if you must run one
maybe another 4-cmc wrath would be amusing. i'll bring these up should i be able to get cube going today
I kinda wonder if G'brand would be fun in Cube. How do y'all feel about the big four reanimation targets
Griselbrand
Jin-Gitaxias
Iona
Norn
Blind Creeper over Wretched Anurid, imo (it's a fun sub-game) if you must run one
maybe another 4-cmc wrath would be amusing. i'll bring these up should i be able to get cube going today
Well, is there any other colour that wants eight-drops? I've tried stuff outside of green like Bogardan Hellkite, but nobody in my group ever bites. I'd actually love to run a sprinkling of eights, but people here barely even play sevens without the crutch of green ramp.
Elesh Norn was a bit oppressive here, because not only does she Wrath, she makes sure your whole team is crippled from that point onwards. I actually run Iona, but because she's nigh-uncastable and reanimator rarely comes together, she's hit the board like twice in the last six months. I think Griselbrand is the right balance of risk and reward, assuming you're not running the insta-win Entomb / Reanimate package, and are making your players work to get him into play.
Elesh Norn was a bit oppressive here, because not only does she Wrath, she makes sure your whole team is crippled from that point onwards. I actually run Iona, but because she's nigh-uncastable and reanimator rarely comes together, she's hit the board like twice in the last six months. I think Griselbrand is the right balance of risk and reward, assuming you're not running the insta-win Entomb / Reanimate package, and are making your players work to get him into play.
Chris Taylor
Contributor
Tidespout also doesn't provide value until you untap, and has a small body (Comparatively)
Also Jin costs 10. TEN.
Gristle maybe, but I've found most 8s really unreliable.
Also Jin costs 10. TEN.
Gristle maybe, but I've found most 8s really unreliable.
I think it's perfectly reasonable to run a cube with no 8+ drops. I currently have Craterhoof as my only one, and am likely swapping it out in the next update.
for another wrath, i'v been wondering what a 1WWR, 1WWG or 1WWB wrath would look like, given that U gets you uncountrability.
Green does make CMC8 or higher more plausible. norn hitting the field is just depressing
ordering a blind creeper as we speak, weird i didn't have that card.
Green does make CMC8 or higher more plausible. norn hitting the field is just depressing
ordering a blind creeper as we speak, weird i didn't have that card.
CML
Contributor
^^^ i like this line of thinking, the B one could exile (this is no more pushed than verdict)
today we had some magnificent Green devotion decks feat. Nykthos and giant monsters, which pleased me. i also made "expedition map cruel ultimatum control" feat. grove / pfire as well as crucible / mouth of ronom and it was also awesome if sucky. expedition map my good men
let's talk about crypt champion
today we had some magnificent Green devotion decks feat. Nykthos and giant monsters, which pleased me. i also made "expedition map cruel ultimatum control" feat. grove / pfire as well as crucible / mouth of ronom and it was also awesome if sucky. expedition map my good men
let's talk about crypt champion
I'll activate Birthing Pod sac my Bone Shredder go get Crypt Champion get back my Bone Shredder. CAN YOUR MIND HANDLE THE VALUE I JUST UNLEASHED.
CML
Contributor
I did a big update and threw in 4 Rune Snags because I couldn't figure out what else to put in the Blue section and the control mirrors the other day were kinda dull without Counterspells. The rest of the update is probably BS and there's no way Voidmage Husher isn't the worst card I've ever put in my Cube but eh, you know.
Another thing I wanna try is Seismic Assault for the millionth time. turns on red devotion and goes well with the crucible, loam, demigod thing, i guess. i wonder if i can make dredge a fun thing in my cube again?
but i digress! Maybe I'll make a counter thread tomorrow. here's something to start it off:
force spike
spell pierce
spell snare
mana leak
memory lapse
miscalculation
remand
4 rune snag
counterspell
complicate
forbid
glen elendra archmage
cryptic command
condescend
force of will
Another thing I wanna try is Seismic Assault for the millionth time. turns on red devotion and goes well with the crucible, loam, demigod thing, i guess. i wonder if i can make dredge a fun thing in my cube again?
but i digress! Maybe I'll make a counter thread tomorrow. here's something to start it off:
force spike
spell pierce
spell snare
mana leak
memory lapse
miscalculation
remand
4 rune snag
counterspell
complicate
forbid
glen elendra archmage
cryptic command
condescend
force of will
I've recently been doing a lot of graveyard/dredge interaction in my peasant cube and my cube I'm working on designing from the ground up and all I can say is it's been a huge success and incredibly fun. I would highly recommend it and if you want suggestions or someone to bounce ideas off of I would say I'm probably your guy. Graveyard shenanigans are my thing the way Gravecrawler is Jason's.
Chris Taylor
Contributor
Yeah I added in some more counters, and nobody ever really convinced me that things like rune snag was worth seeking out over the mana leaks I still had in my binder from standard season. Like Kindle, I'm not really sure ye olde soft counter is a card that needs to be complicated like that.
Leak doesn't really seem like a card that needs to be either made worse or have incentives attached to it.
Short Critiques:
force spike: Love it. Nobody expects the spanish inquisition of kozilek!
spell pierce: Less of a fan, though I'm creature heavy
spell snare: Never tried this. Seems like it would be horrible in your cube, what with the 3/4 CMC fetish
mana leak: Solid and loveable.
memory lapse: Little more feelbad than remand, but probably more fair.
miscalculation: Like mana leak, but with a more realistic play around option and cycling is sweet. If only that illustration weren't so goofy
remand: Strong and beloved
4 rune snag: *Shrug*
counterspell: Yeah, 1 is probably needed. I don't like that there's no play to it, so I wouldn't double, but I'd keep the 1 in.
complicate: This card has never been good for me, since even splashable cancel is kinda bad, and the cycling is kinda narrow. Good in counter mirrors?
forbid: I don't really think so, it's either super strong or super bad, not a dynamic I like.
glen elendra archmage: Also great, and sweet for pod. Bit of a hedge for the control mirror, but blocks solidly, so it's not bad against aggro either.
cryptic command: It slices! It dices! It makes Juillenne Standard Formats!
condescend: I dunno, most of the appeal for x spells for me is how sweet they are when you've ramped up to like 8 mana. This one just ends up being kinda cool cancel at that point. I like me some scry, but I think an X counterspell is missing the point
force of will: I've had mixed success. I kinda wish it hardcast for or could pitch non blue cards (But you needed an island in play or something)
Leak doesn't really seem like a card that needs to be either made worse or have incentives attached to it.
Short Critiques:
force spike: Love it. Nobody expects the spanish inquisition of kozilek!
spell pierce: Less of a fan, though I'm creature heavy
spell snare: Never tried this. Seems like it would be horrible in your cube, what with the 3/4 CMC fetish
mana leak: Solid and loveable.
memory lapse: Little more feelbad than remand, but probably more fair.
miscalculation: Like mana leak, but with a more realistic play around option and cycling is sweet. If only that illustration weren't so goofy
remand: Strong and beloved
4 rune snag: *Shrug*
counterspell: Yeah, 1 is probably needed. I don't like that there's no play to it, so I wouldn't double, but I'd keep the 1 in.
complicate: This card has never been good for me, since even splashable cancel is kinda bad, and the cycling is kinda narrow. Good in counter mirrors?
forbid: I don't really think so, it's either super strong or super bad, not a dynamic I like.
glen elendra archmage: Also great, and sweet for pod. Bit of a hedge for the control mirror, but blocks solidly, so it's not bad against aggro either.
cryptic command: It slices! It dices! It makes Juillenne Standard Formats!
condescend: I dunno, most of the appeal for x spells for me is how sweet they are when you've ramped up to like 8 mana. This one just ends up being kinda cool cancel at that point. I like me some scry, but I think an X counterspell is missing the point
force of will: I've had mixed success. I kinda wish it hardcast for
or could pitch non blue cards (But you needed an island in play or something)
CML
Contributor
ahhhh Jeff Laubenstein at his finest. i kind of like the comic element to the art here, when was the last time anyone ever laughed at a Blue card?
bonus points if you can get another laubenstein opus show and tell with it.
quick hits:
-i experienced the tilt that is Memory Lapse (ok, extra tilt) in the holiday cube the other day, where it says that not only have you done nothing, you will continue to do nothing. awesome
-anyone like hinder?
-FoW is kinda mediocre but as long as we can agree disrupting shoal is the worst fucking card in the universe
-the 3/4 fetish slur will not be allowed to stand sir. custom card idea: spell snare for CMC 3 or 4
bonus points if you can get another laubenstein opus show and tell with it.
quick hits:
-i experienced the tilt that is Memory Lapse (ok, extra tilt) in the holiday cube the other day, where it says that not only have you done nothing, you will continue to do nothing. awesome
-anyone like hinder?
-FoW is kinda mediocre but as long as we can agree disrupting shoal is the worst fucking card in the universe
-the 3/4 fetish slur will not be allowed to stand sir. custom card idea: spell snare for CMC 3 or 4