General Fight Club

[Alfonzo Bonzo]

What were your experiences with Isperia? It looks really interesting in your list as a spicy card, but than I saw you post about how she was a bit underwhelming and I was all

Me? I don't have it in my list, and to be fair I haven't played it, just throwing out opinions, but:

* casting cost is heavy
* you have to attack and deal damage
* they have to have a card in hand
* you have to guess it
* you have to have other flyers in your deck to fetch

It certainly reinforces the flying theme, but it feels like a lot of work for limited reward.

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

Oh I meant rav, he had it in his cube when he first posted it.

It looks terrible, but I want it to be good.

 

[ravnic]

It was good some times, mostly with a lot of bounce, but it's just not a cube card, I guess. Because mostly something simple like Murder of Crows would've just been better. Sadly, because Isperia is one of my alltime favorites, the artwork ist just stunningly beautiful. And I'm always keen to find some gems no one is playing.

Luckily I have a RAV Draft sim where she finds a home.

The debate is only what's the right replacement, and Migration and Cloudblazer are the candidates so far.

 

[inscho]

I had a sweet Isperia sphinx tribal edh deck back in the day that was a tooooon of fun, but it'd be really awkward in cube.

 

[whydirt]

Pick Three

 

[inscho]

3? wow

I run Twilight's Call only because I run Flayer of the Hatebound. Without Flayer, I think Twilight would be the odd man out for me. The other cards are more interesting imo.

 

[whydirt]

I actually just added Flayer after seeing it in your cube.

 

[inscho]

In that case, I really like Living Death's situational wrath mode....but having it alongside Twilight feels a little excessive. For instance, I've shied away from Destructive Force alongside Wildfire for the same reason. Will you be running the Dread Return in addition to the three of these?

 

[Alfonzo Bonzo]

One of the things I like about your cube is the consistency of both living death and call, allowing for things like this

living death combo from CubeTutor.com

And this

g/b living death/merchant recursion from CubeTutor.com

Please keep both.

 

[inscho]

Those decks are sweet. I stand corrected.

 

[whydirt]

Sure, but I feel like Ever After would fill a very similar role in either of those decks. I just need to decide whether I want a higher ceiling (Twilight's Call) or a higher floor (Ever After). Call probably leads to the better cube story moments, so that's where I'm leaning at the moment.

 

[Velrun]

Ever After is quite boring in almost any situation if you ask me.

 

[ravnic]

Yup, Ever After would be my cut easily. If I had to cut another one, it would be between Victimize and Call, depending on how you support regular reanimator. But even if I would build a cube with only 5 black cards, I would not exclude Living Death.

 

[James Stevenson]

Yup, Ever After would be my cut easily. If I had to cut another one, it would be between Victimize and Call, depending on how you support regular reanimator. But even if I would build a cube with only 5 black cards, I would not exclude Living Death.

Living Death is awesome, and a brilliant archetype anchor, but it's also super busted. It's often like a 6-for-1 that leaves you waaaay ahead. Just sayin. I still run it.

 

[inscho]

And now for something completely different...

So I'm searching for a bomby colorless creature to cheat in that isn't completely oppressive (within the context of my cube). I started with:



Which is fine, but doesn't feel like it was quite enough reward for committing to Oath of Druids, Reanimator, etc. My creature cheat decks are in general a turn or two slower than optimized. I haven't given any of the other options a test in real life, so help me pick one to test out on Tuesday:



Open to other suggestions as well.

 

[yan]

some weaker ones

oh colorless. why? all i have is angelic rocket in that slot

 

[safra]

I really like the new Kozilek:


He 'protects himself', which justifies putting a few cards into setting him up, there's an on-cast trigger just in case making is viable in your environment. Big dude, hard to block, harder to kill, but (sometimes) dies to doom blade. My cheat decks often 'cap out' at Dragonlord Atarka.

I also play this custom card that's been good for cheat strats:

 

[inscho]

I suppose it doesn't need to be colorless tbh. I like that Kozilek a lot, but don't have any specific wastes support in my cube.

Taking into account welder shenanigans, this is a loose list of high cmc reanimator targets currently in my cube:



Half of these aren't particularly exciting to commit to in a creature cheat strategy, either in board impact or the fact they could just be hardcast. Dragonlord used to be Borbo....which I still really like a lot tbh. Looking at this grouping I'm thinking I need to tweak a lot more in this suite to get a better balance.

 

[anotak]

oh hey one of my customs is still around like 5 years later

that's neat

 

[Velrun]

oh hey one of my customs is still around like 5 years later

that's neat

Which one?

 

[Wumpa]

Thoughts on the merits of these two? I don't think I can afford to make room for both cards but they'd both fit nicely into my current format which features double wildfire, double fetches, and ample loam/molten vortex support (with aristocrats sac outlets). For reference my current cube is: http://www.cubetutor.com/viewcube/77868

 

[ravnic]

I prefer Vinecrasher, IN CASE you have enough support to put cards and lands especially into your graveyard

 

[xyz]

My roommate and I are huge fans of AEther Searcher. I would go so far as to say it's the quintessential expensive fatty for cube, colorless or not. It ticks almost all of the fatty boxes; effective to reanimate, is an artifact, reasonable to hard cast, and somewhat resilient to removal or mind controls. The few weaknesses are that it doesn't generate repeatable value or flicker well, unless you get creative (Pollenbright Wings? Bow of Nylea? Seasons Past?). But, that's its strength! Creativity! It makes drafts more exciting and replayable because you'll get something different each time. What kind of fatty do I want to craft this time? How can I build around it early in the draft? If it's later in the draft, can I afford to fit this powerful off color card in my deck? Drafting aside, it's also perfect for cube design. You get a variety of top end fatties that play a little differently each time for a single efficient card slot. No need to rotate out finishers and it helps prevent an overload on them. Of course you'd still include your favorites, but if you could only include one, AEther Searcher would be my vote.

 

[Alfonzo Bonzo]

Thoughts on the merits of these two? I don't think I can afford to make room for both cards but they'd both fit nicely into my current format which features double wildfire, double fetches, and ample loam/molten vortex support (with aristocrats sac outlets). For reference my current cube is: http://www.cubetutor.com/viewcube/77868

Vinecrasher is better for you I would say. I like world shaper but you d don't have self Mill in green so less useful.

 

[Wumpa]

Vinecrasher is better for you I would say. I like world shaper but you d don't have self Mill in green so less useful.

Fair point, looking at World Shaper with fresh eyes I see how clunky she is and I'm a lot less enthralled, although I feel like with a few minor changes should could have made for a fantastic cube card. What have the experiences been for you guys with the Vinecrasher? I've always tinkered with adding him to my lists but I've yet to get any first hand experience playing with him.