Seasons is potentially better in higher powered lists for the same reason regrowth and tutors tend to be. There will be broken cards you will want to reuse that are considerably better than the average cube card you could draw. That said, seasons does look like a fun card to build a deck around.
General Making control decks more interesting
- Thread starter Dom Harvey
- Start date
I came here to recommend another look at Seasons Past. Y'all did not disappoint me. 
I think I might have to test the card. Six mana sounds right to refill our entire hand from your graveyard once you stabilize. I don't usually like spending that much mana for an effective do-nothing, but you probably go off next turn and effectively win if you were already in a good position. That's something I would love to see Gx control decks doing.
Also, Sylvan Library is great. 10/10
I think I might have to test the card. Six mana sounds right to refill our entire hand from your graveyard once you stabilize. I don't usually like spending that much mana for an effective do-nothing, but you probably go off next turn and effectively win if you were already in a good position. That's something I would love to see Gx control decks doing.Also, Sylvan Library is great. 10/10
I've created a thread for the deck post I made (see below). Didn't know how to directly transfer, so I brute forced it! If you are wondering what all the awesome compliments are for, check it out!
So I've been obsessing over the thought-provoking gem gifts ungiven since this thread got churning, and I think I've gotten a pretty cool mental space built around it. To preface, my main criteria was finding cards and angles that are solid and playable on their own. This was priority number one for me, as creating poison in an environment is bad news bears. Second priority was finding cool secondary interactions outside of the scope of what I was initially seeking. I actually think I was pretty successful, and without further ado, my thoughts made tangible:
What I came up with at the culmination of my notes, probing thread questions, and gatherer searches wasn't just a subset of cards... it was an archetype, a scheme, a strategy. It was a deck, that in my head has been
START YOUR ENGINES ( )
Now, kinda corny name aside, it is entirely descriptive of what I came up with. In general terms, I found that with a few card switches you get an incredible number of advantage engines built into the temur colors. The deck/archetype I built up is largely an amalgam of these. The goal is to collect and utilize advantage engines to overwhelm your opponent. In this way the deck is largely control-based, being focused on winning through card and velocity advantage built up far beyond your opponent. Gifts comes in as a way to tutor out and assemble various engine pieces, alongside the rest of the draw suite the deck would have for this purpose. Its an extremely important piece of the deck, but not 100% needed (hopefully). So here's some of the components of the archetype:
The Engines:
+
+
+
+
+
+
And so on (?). I realized that a lot of these engines were just one step away from being in cubes already, and generally speaking are of fine power levels individually. There are certain cards less useful than others, but so is life, I think. What I ended up realizing is that these engines are fine in individual units. Even talked about thoroughly in threads other than and including this one! But together. Together they all add value to each other for a mean machine of advantage. The deck plan becomes one that harkens back to when two+ combos were first jammed in constructed decks (dark depths combo and... something else). A game plan of overlapping and synergistic value, leading to more consistency on individual plans, and more backup plans in general. Some examples would be Trade Routes adding value and redundancy to the loam/vortex plan, or daretti engine + goggles deck.
How would the deck play out? As I'll be going over, probably mostly like a RUG value-control deck would. Early defensive plays, disruption with burn, countermagic, draw, but a glue of multiple individual synergies stacked up. This is what gives the Gifts plan its power. What engine are you really tutoring up? What pieces do you already have? What revulsion might you get/have that makes the point moot? Below imma get into some of the most important elements my mental machinations have come up with. Ive already got the engine pieces listed up above, but theres more than that.
The draw and advantage
Just as any card advantage deck, draw is very important for the deck plan. Here's some stand outs:
The progenitor of the whole idea, and a very important piece of the deck. Its the pod like pod is to its deck. Hell, pod might even be one of the cards you are getting with gifts! There are a ton of good piles to get with this card, some that angle towards one plan, some that just overwhelm with things you can get to do. A lot of these have eternal witness in them. we'll touch on that later.
-Daretti, scrap savant
-chromatic star
-Obelisk of alara, pyromancers goggles
-Eternal witness, nostalgic dreams
This pile aims to start the value train of obelisk, without the pesky 8 mana for one use. Nostalgic dreams is stellar here cause it can swap the obelisk into the grave for star/daretti if needed. Goggles is bonus for double engine searching.
-punishing fire
-grove of the burnwillows
-life from the loam
-Horizon canopy?
This pile is the loam pile, basically, but you've got a guaranteed punishing fire inbound. I tossed horizon canopy on cuz its awesome, I run it, and it fits the deck theme. Could be something mean like ghost quarter, etc.
-lightning bolt
-geistblast
-lightning strike
-lightning axe
This deck can still benefit from the same redundant-value piles you might expect, any of which could be replaced with recursion. I feel like I could go on but won't, because the idea is clear enough
These pieces are all valuable secondary dig/tutor CA pieces that help fish out needed parts for your engines-under-construction. Digging for Gifts is correct sometimes, I feel. Importantly these pieces still play generic CA for the controlling aspects of the deck.
A valuable card drawing enchantment on its own, it really shines as an enchantment that is digging for engines... and is itself an engine. Fits into the same loam machine as vortex. Sweet.
This little gem pulls double duty fueling the yard and digging out valuable early blockers/set up creatures. Also good in a value gifts pile, and as the discard of something like lightning axe/compulsive research.
The recursion
Anything. As much as possible. Eternal witness is the all-star of this category, but basically anything helps. Seasons past would be bankers, greenwarden, and archaeomancer all work. Special shootout to Nostalgic dreams. It lets you flip gift picks to the way you want them, it combos with geistblast and life from the loam, and is solid on its own.
The meat
This is the UG durdle portion of the deck. Small, valuable creatures with ETB or other effects are solid. Some of the best would probably be
courser of kruphix
Omenspeaker
Snapcaster mage
Tarmogoyf
Wall of blossoms
Thing in the ice
Flametongue kava
Feldon of the third path
Shardless agent
Jori en, ruin diver
Sylvan ranger
Again, I could go on, but I think I've laid out the idea. Another neato track to take is built-in spells matter. That would add stuff like
stormchaser mage
Young pyromancer
talrand, sky summoner
The control
Classic UR here. Counters, burn. There are certain cards with engine capacity, and that fit better for stuff like goggles, but fairly generic here, I think? Probably less hard counters and more like Remand, also, as you work towards your value engines rather than trying to completely controlling them out of the game.
The lowdown
I'm running out of gas something fierce, and this is happening on my tablet so my eyes and neck and everything are crying. What I'm trying to get across in the end is that I think I've gathered up with a cool, reclusive, interactive, non-poisonous archetype for RUG, something beyond "monsters + draw", and I think I'll be putting more effort into it. Maybe this should be a new thread? I got too far before I realized that.... anyway, y'all chime in, and I hope to flush out more coherently what I'm trying to cook up here. Hopefully I'll try some sample lists and all that as I continue to polish this. Thanks for sticking through if you got here! You the best
What I came up with at the culmination of my notes, probing thread questions, and gatherer searches wasn't just a subset of cards... it was an archetype, a scheme, a strategy. It was a deck, that in my head has been
START YOUR ENGINES (
)Now, kinda corny name aside, it is entirely descriptive of what I came up with. In general terms, I found that with a few card switches you get an incredible number of advantage engines built into the temur colors. The deck/archetype I built up is largely an amalgam of these. The goal is to collect and utilize advantage engines to overwhelm your opponent. In this way the deck is largely control-based, being focused on winning through card and velocity advantage built up far beyond your opponent. Gifts comes in as a way to tutor out and assemble various engine pieces, alongside the rest of the draw suite the deck would have for this purpose. Its an extremely important piece of the deck, but not 100% needed (hopefully). So here's some of the components of the archetype:
The Engines:
+ + + + + + And so on (?). I realized that a lot of these engines were just one step away from being in cubes already, and generally speaking are of fine power levels individually. There are certain cards less useful than others, but so is life, I think. What I ended up realizing is that these engines are fine in individual units. Even talked about thoroughly in threads other than and including this one! But together. Together they all add value to each other for a mean machine of advantage. The deck plan becomes one that harkens back to when two+ combos were first jammed in constructed decks (dark depths combo and... something else). A game plan of overlapping and synergistic value, leading to more consistency on individual plans, and more backup plans in general. Some examples would be Trade Routes adding value and redundancy to the loam/vortex plan, or daretti engine + goggles deck.
How would the deck play out? As I'll be going over, probably mostly like a RUG value-control deck would. Early defensive plays, disruption with burn, countermagic, draw, but a glue of multiple individual synergies stacked up. This is what gives the Gifts plan its power. What engine are you really tutoring up? What pieces do you already have? What revulsion might you get/have that makes the point moot? Below imma get into some of the most important elements my mental machinations have come up with. Ive already got the engine pieces listed up above, but theres more than that.
The draw and advantage
Just as any card advantage deck, draw is very important for the deck plan. Here's some stand outs:
The progenitor of the whole idea, and a very important piece of the deck. Its the pod like pod is to its deck. Hell, pod might even be one of the cards you are getting with gifts! There are a ton of good piles to get with this card, some that angle towards one plan, some that just overwhelm with things you can get to do. A lot of these have eternal witness in them. we'll touch on that later.
-Daretti, scrap savant
-chromatic star
-Obelisk of alara, pyromancers goggles
-Eternal witness, nostalgic dreams
This pile aims to start the value train of obelisk, without the pesky 8 mana for one use. Nostalgic dreams is stellar here cause it can swap the obelisk into the grave for star/daretti if needed. Goggles is bonus for double engine searching.
-punishing fire
-grove of the burnwillows
-life from the loam
-Horizon canopy?
This pile is the loam pile, basically, but you've got a guaranteed punishing fire inbound. I tossed horizon canopy on cuz its awesome, I run it, and it fits the deck theme. Could be something mean like ghost quarter, etc.
-lightning bolt
-geistblast
-lightning strike
-lightning axe
This deck can still benefit from the same redundant-value piles you might expect, any of which could be replaced with recursion. I feel like I could go on but won't, because the idea is clear enough
These pieces are all valuable secondary dig/tutor CA pieces that help fish out needed parts for your engines-under-construction. Digging for Gifts is correct sometimes, I feel. Importantly these pieces still play generic CA for the controlling aspects of the deck.
A valuable card drawing enchantment on its own, it really shines as an enchantment that is digging for engines... and is itself an engine. Fits into the same loam machine as vortex. Sweet.
This little gem pulls double duty fueling the yard and digging out valuable early blockers/set up creatures. Also good in a value gifts pile, and as the discard of something like lightning axe/compulsive research.
The recursion
Anything. As much as possible. Eternal witness is the all-star of this category, but basically anything helps. Seasons past would be bankers, greenwarden, and archaeomancer all work. Special shootout to Nostalgic dreams. It lets you flip gift picks to the way you want them, it combos with geistblast and life from the loam, and is solid on its own.
The meat
This is the UG durdle portion of the deck. Small, valuable creatures with ETB or other effects are solid. Some of the best would probably be
courser of kruphix
Omenspeaker
Snapcaster mage
Tarmogoyf
Wall of blossoms
Thing in the ice
Flametongue kava
Feldon of the third path
Shardless agent
Jori en, ruin diver
Sylvan ranger
Again, I could go on, but I think I've laid out the idea. Another neato track to take is built-in spells matter. That would add stuff like
stormchaser mage
Young pyromancer
talrand, sky summoner
The control
Classic UR here. Counters, burn. There are certain cards with engine capacity, and that fit better for stuff like goggles, but fairly generic here, I think? Probably less hard counters and more like Remand, also, as you work towards your value engines rather than trying to completely controlling them out of the game.
The lowdown
I'm running out of gas something fierce, and this is happening on my tablet so my eyes and neck and everything are crying
. What I'm trying to get across in the end is that I think I've gathered up with a cool, reclusive, interactive, non-poisonous archetype for RUG, something beyond "monsters + draw", and I think I'll be putting more effort into it. Maybe this should be a new thread? I got too far before I realized that.... anyway, y'all chime in, and I hope to flush out more coherently what I'm trying to cook up here. Hopefully I'll try some sample lists and all that as I continue to polish this. Thanks for sticking through if you got here! You the best That is a fabulous set of packages. I applaud you, sigh. That's pretty much exactly what I'd want my R, U, and G sections to be doing in a high power cube with graveyard themes (i.e. Pretty much every cube I make to play). And you've pieced it all together and put a neat little bow on it. Thank you!
EDIT: go ahead and make your own thread for that magnum opus. In fact I have a suggestion to the mods: make that post part of a new sticky thread titled something like "Ready-Made Cube Packages" or "Need a Theme? Start Here!"
Posts like that one are so useful to cube architects trying to organize their thoughts, and they're always buried in the middle of a random thread because the conversation in that thread resulted in a huge light bulb moment for someone. It's one of the great things about RTL, but at the same time it'd be even greater to start consolidating posts like sigh's for easy access.
EDIT: go ahead and make your own thread for that magnum opus. In fact I have a suggestion to the mods: make that post part of a new sticky thread titled something like "Ready-Made Cube Packages" or "Need a Theme? Start Here!"
Posts like that one are so useful to cube architects trying to organize their thoughts, and they're always buried in the middle of a random thread because the conversation in that thread resulted in a huge light bulb moment for someone. It's one of the great things about RTL, but at the same time it'd be even greater to start consolidating posts like sigh's for easy access.
Again, well put together! I enjoyed the read, and this is something I think I'll get myself into the next time I re-organize the TECH MAGIC cube.
Polling opinion here: how many copies of Gifts Ungiven would a cube bathing in these engines/synergies want to run? I'm thinking 2-3 but I've got no real idea. Does anyone have experience with non-singleton Gifts, or have a strong intuition?
Polling opinion here: how many copies of Gifts Ungiven would a cube bathing in these engines/synergies want to run? I'm thinking 2-3 but I've got no real idea. Does anyone have experience with non-singleton Gifts, or have a strong intuition?
Wouldnt it be enough with gifts, fact or fiction and some tutors?
Dom Harvey
Contributor
If we are still potentially pursuing the mystical teachings control deck, I'm loving
Season's Past is a great engine, and one I'm considering for my personal cube currently. It works best with a cheap tutor such as DT or Dark Petition, so you can just keep cycling it for a soft lock.
I've been looking at Seasons Past as well, but it's not doing enough for me as just a control tool. Does anyone have any thoughts on or experience with it as a combo card?
Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
That's combo, not control.
Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
Perfect!
Though...
Though...
What an odd distinction to make. This thread has a lot of Gifts and Loam things going on anyway and it's a tight package that can be included in a control deck at the cost of 3 slots to quickly close out the game. No reason control decks can't win with a combo.
I personally don't see anything wrong with that. Here is where Gifts really shines because you can devote 2 slots for something like
Maybe a little less "combo", but also takes less space. Anyways, gifts is obviously a way to make decks more interesting, just by the flood of responses above
Takes less deck space, takes more cube space. I'm not interested in having a big dumb uninteresting creature in my cube, and Gifts for Unburial Rites and a fatty hardly counts as making control decks more interesting IMO.
RIP Twin, favorite deck of all time
RIP Twin, favorite deck of all time
That's a cool little combo, but it's a wee bit slow to pull off effectively. Unless I've ramped out an early Gifts, that looks like a T6 play and you've spent the previous two turns not playing anything to impact the board.
The only problem I have with Splendid Reclamation in general is that you'll be taking off your entire turn for it in most cases after devoting a bit of set-up with less powerful cards (like with self-millers). It's a powerful effect for sure, but it's too dependent upon how aggressively you can fill up your grave with lands. For instance, I snap-included it in my Sidisi EDH deck because of obvious self-mill and it's fantastic whenever it ramps 3-4+ in one shot, but it's only capable of that because that format is much slower with way more set-up time. You have more windows of opportunity to fire it off without facing any real pressure against most decks. In cube though? You almost certainly have to fire it off T4 or T5 to reap the most benefit from it (while on the play) or else you might just get your head bashed in by actual threats.
If your cube isn't all that high of a power level and your players can't be punished for a 4 mana card that doesn't impact the board initially, it can be a fine inclusion. I think it's a little greedy in a Gifts package though.