Card/Deck Prison in Cube

[Grillo_Parlante]

Following in the footsteps of Safra's combo thread, I wanted to get an idea from people about the role that they feel prison archetypes play in cube (if any), and what form they should take.

I've seen a few people both on this board and elsewhere say that they like prison, and that they feel it can be a fun archetype for both players, but how would that look?

The prison cards I've seen on this board have mostly been tangle wire--which I feel in most of our cubes is being mislabled a prison card and is more a tempo card--and occasionally smokestack and braids, cabal minion. The latter has never caught on for me because they are seen as narrow cards for that specific archetype, though I think maybe the issue is that I was never supporting a big aristocrats style deck, which those cards could probably neatly fold into without being poisonous.

I'm not really sure how to classify these archetypes.

U/W Tithe

Cards like propaganda, ghostly prison, windborn muse, fade away, Rhystic Circle, Grand Arbiter augustin iv, icefall regent, Magus of the Tabernacle, monastery siege, and the newly printed archangel of tithes all gradually create a boardstate where attacking is difficult. Of course the problem with this is that getting people to draft aggro can already be diffcult, without running cards like propaganda or ghostly prison that effectively shut down their deck. Where should the line be drawn?

There is also the hate bears approach (which has never worked for me because cube tends to be so creature focused) of thalia, guardian of thraben, and the newly printed vryn wingmare.

The most extreme and unpopular variants of this include cards like sphere of resistance, lodestone golem, nether void, and trinisphere,

Turbo Fog



I'm not sure if this bleeds the line with combo decks, but another approach is to blank the combat phase. While its unlikely you'll have the density of moment's peace to have a true turbo fog deck, you can run cards like spore frog or stonehorn dignitary to blank combat. This can be done using a familiar combo shell, splinter twin, oath of ghouls, or tortured existence + dredge creature. I suppose we can also include effects like solitary confinement and magus of the moat under this heading.

Tap Prison



Cards like glare of subdual, opposition, or tangle wire with the right support, can tap down a board and slowly constrict what an opponent can do.

Reparations Prison



Cards like Michiko Konda, Truth Seeker, Rayne, Academy Chancellor, and reparations that put you ahead for an opponents actions.

Stax



I put all sacrifice effects into this catagory, so smoke stacks, braids, descent into madness, pox, world queller, and smallpox all reside here. This is the slow constricting of resources.

Stasis Prison



Probably the lease popular, this is a family of cards that want to stop you from untapping in some way: stasis, winter orb, static orb, meekstone, tangle wire, rising waters, embargo, crackdown, marble titan, Hokori, Dust Drinker, and back to basics.

I also feel like gaddock teeg and manabarbs belongs in this list somewhere.

So, is prison a dead archetype? Are there ways to build it so that it provides a fun cube experience? Are people that enjoy this archetype just crazy? Do some of the newer printings look desirable compared to the old ones?

 

[RavebornMuse]

On Prison: All of those are a bit too "unfun" for me except for Magus of the Tabernacle and the quirky almost-board-wipe Fade Away, which feels more like a tempo-styled wipe than a prison-level card. I love Grand Arbiter Augustin IV but don't run him currently since I really like where Azorius is at right now, power-wise (it's a good enough colour combo right now). The new Angel seems worth running, as well, though I'll probably be waiting to see how much she costs before I dive into trying her.

On Fog: I would never, ever, ever run Fogs in Cube. Magus of the Moat is potentially runnable (I don't think I'd call him a Fog though), but also risks "unfun" territory.

Tap Prison: I don't like tap prison at all. Again, it's a bit on the unfun side.

Reparations: I actually had Michiko in my original list, until I realized she wasn't doing much of anything in it. I might try her at some point, but the rest seem a bit too weak.

Stax: I love stax, and Braids is big fun over here. I don't recommend Pox at all, though, or Death Cloud; they're both just a bit too demanding for my uses, and I doubt any cube without some serious power to it could handle their demands. I recommend this prison-style archetype pretty highly, but it can be a bit of a mess, especially if it's a strategy that makes your players mad. Smokestack is a bit slow, though; it always seems a bit underwhelming compared to Braids, which is something I'm attributing to the extra turn of waiting to start eating your opponent's things.

Personally, I'm slowly building up a top-of-the-deck prison archetype in my cube, which hinges mostly on Lantern of Insight. It can do some fun things in several decks, and its shuffle effect can be crippling in a tight, grindy game when the top of the opponent's deck is a much-needed bomb, or when you're topdecking a land and you really, really need to shuffle up something potentially better. The price spiked recently due to Modern I believe, but it's a card that's been a lot of fun over here despite looking like trash, giving extra value to fetchlands especially, and it's a card I want to see about supporting more, perhaps with a Thought Scour or two in the future; incidental little mill like that goes a long way with the Lantern. Knowing what your opponent's drawing into is great for control, and knowing when your opponent is drawing counterspells encourages better play sequencing. I have some cards that make the Lantern more valuable (Altar of Dementia and Ghoulcaller's Bell, the latter of which is under a strict trial period but helps the surprisingly-easier-to-put-together-than-you'd-think mill deck), but I feel like it's a prison strategy that only demands a light touch to give some good payoff.

 

[Dom Harvey]

It's very difficult for prison to be consistent (in both drafting and deckbuilding) and fun in Limited. Smokestack/Braids is the closest you'll get I think; beyond that, you can create locks with stuff like Forbid, Venser + Crystal Shard, Eternal Witness + Cryptic Command which are more interactive than actual prison.

Shoutout to Magus of the Tabernacle though.

 

[ahadabans]

I like prison decks. But I do think they can rub people the wrong way. So it's important they they feel beatable even when the prison component is online.

I ran Opposition for a long time and no one ever broke it (amazingly). But it's definitely a busted card due to the ability to lock someone out mana-wise. I've since removed it from my cube. Glare of Subdual on the other hand is effective without ever feeling unbeatable. I am a pretty big fan of that card honestly. In fact, I was doing some testing today and that card single handedly kept me in a game I should have lost. It's a great control card for GW.

Stax is another really fun archetype to play. Smokestack itself can be a little slow since you need two turns to get it online, but Braids is not since it kicks in right away. I'd run Braids even if I wasn't supporting Stax. His effect is unique, powerful, and being a creature there are plenty of ways to interact with him. Wonderful card. Smokestack is has a higher ceiling and lower floor. Being an artifact, it's harder to get rid of. If you have a way to abuse the effect, you can do multiple soot counters and just wreck the board state. On the other hand, if you are behind this card is utterly useless in my experience.

The tempo stuff is good too. Tangle wire and Hokori in particular are quite fun. Statis and Winter Orb though, not so much.

In the same vein (not sure if you consider this prison, but mechanically I think it's the same thing), I also run a little land destruction in RG (Mwonvuli Acid-Moss, Avalanche Riders - love both these cards). Avalanche Riders in particular is so horribly abusable via synergistic effects (Alesha, Mimic Vat, blink effects).

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

Yeah, I think land destruction should count. That theme is really unpopular though everytime I bring it up.

Another card that works well with the blink riders theme is invader parasite. Petravark is another card thats maybe a little bit more fair since you can kill it to get the land back.

How does the lantern deck look? I really like the idea, its a super intersting effect, but I excluded the card from the innistrad theme cube because I assumed it was too janky.

What do you guys think of some of the newer azorius tithe cards?

I know grand arbiter is too slow for a lot our formats, but I love the way that he and the familiars act as ramp cards for Esper decks. It just seems like it feels more tempo prison than lockout prison. Icefall regeant, fade away, tangle wire, and monastery siege seems to fit that model, with the possibility of a hard lock if you can infinte blink the tangle wire, or recur the fade away with a familiar combo.

I'm kind of surprised people enjoy both braids and magus of the tabernacle.

 

[ahadabans]

Yeah. I wouldn't go all-in on an LD package anymore than I would go all-in on a random discard package. But I do like to sprinkle a few of those effects in there. It's part of Magic's history and I want to represent that even if I'm not necessarily advocating for LD.dec.

Hippie for example is just a cool and nostalgic card. It's slow, vulnerable, has zero synergy with my major themes. I don't care though. It can still win games sometimes (but doesn't feel oppressive), the tenth edition artwork is glorious too. I think the day I drop hippie is the day I've let my cube get too modern.

Maybe it's my removal density, but Braids is not hard to get rid of. He dies to pretty much everything I run which doesn't have a terror clause. I have no experience with Magus of the Tabernacle, but that massive butt looks pretty hard to deal with and his effect is pretty nasty. So I can see that guy being abusive. I don't know though, he pretty much says "Fuck You" to tokens and I can dig that. Now I sort of want to try him out just to see how he does. Pretty sure I have a copy of that somewhere.

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

Honestly, I'm starting to wonder if hippie is not a much better cube card that I've given it credit for. Most of black's hand disruption kind of sucks in cube, and hippie seems like its at a reasonble point: 3cc recurring discard. As long as your format isn't too fast, it seems like a decent place to be.

I'm more surprised because braids seems like the type of card people would hate: a slow constriction that eventually hates them out of the game. How long does she usually survive? Is it more like a fun smallpox effect in practice?

Smallpox was one of those archetypes I always wanted to have work, but never did. Seems like a lot of fun.

 

[RavebornMuse]

Yeah, I think land destruction should count. That theme is really unpopular though everytime I bring it up.

How does the lantern deck look? I really like the idea, its a super intersting effect, but I excluded the card from the innistrad theme cube because I assumed it was too janky.

I'm kind of surprised people enjoy both braids and magus of the tabernacle.

Land destruction is also really popular for my group, so, we're probably kind of outliers, hahah.

Blinking Tangle Wire and Phyrexian Metamorph-as-Tangle-Wire with Brago, King Eternal was a hilarious lock I was able to assemble a few drafts ago - more hilarious when it was disrupted after the first double-Tangle-blink, heh.

As for the Lantern deck... Usually, you want some combination of the following:
Lantern of Insight - The crux of the deck, obviously. Seeing the top of your opponent's libraries helps sequence plays and stop beatdown. I prefer it in a control shell as a result, and control-mill if possible, but it works well enough for aggro that I've seen it ran profitably in a heavy-hitting deck that had a nice topend finisher to know when to play around the other player's removal.
Altar of Dementia - A fantastic combo piece with Lantern, improved greatly by recursive bodies. Altar can already win games plenty fine on its own as a soft mill tool and disruption element; with Lantern and something like Murderous Redcap or a Curse of Shallow Graves (swing in, sac before it connects, and you've got a new zombie to swing again next turn!) it disrupts almost surgically, peeling away needed topdecks. It's important to remember that most decks only really contain 3-7 truly game-changing threats; once you stabilize in a control shell, getting rid of those pesky elements can really lock down a game.
Cabal Therapy - This is almost cruel when you know what your opponent has in hand. Save the flashback for later, when you allow your opponent to draw something non-instant that they're saving to try to play around your counters/removal. Priceless!
Thoughtseize - Always good, but better with Lantern. Instead of peeling away the best card that's there at the moment, Lantern allows you to see what's going on and peel that away specifically, provided it isn't cast.
Oversold Cemetery - Always a great value engine, it pairs really well with Altar of Dementia and Lantern of Insight. Feed to Altar and get it back next turn, or get back those nifty creatures you threw away with Dakra Mystic. Value!
Pain Seer / Dark Confidant - Remove the mystery life-loss and plan your attacks/taps better! In a more controlling shell, Icy Manipulator can make for a cute card-draw engine.
Dakra Mystic - This card is fun to me, even without Lantern. But with Lantern, you can use its effect more surgically. See a land they're about to top deck? Let 'em have it and save your mana. See a card you wanna get rid of? Dakra time!
Mindshrieker - This has always been fun, but a bit weak due to the variance. Variance no longer! Eat their expensive topdecks! This gets even more hilarious if you feed it up huge and then throw it to the Altar.
Riddlekeeper - If you've got a good prison strategy going, your opponent can be hesitant to attack into this effect and mill something off the top that they think can help them break through. Usually, this is more of a mind game than a strictly necessary piece, but Riddlekeeper has discouraged a fair number of attacks with Lantern out, and the subsequent draws just end up getting fed to counterspells or removal.
Fetchlands - great to shuffle your library to get something better on top. I pick Fetches highly in a Lantern deck.
Planeswalkers - Lantern control gives you a lot of muscle for keeping the board in a stalemate, and that's where Planeswalkers shine.

...And some removal/counterspells, of course. This deck really wants Altar of Dementia for a mill win, though; Lantern of Insight on its own is only so useful as an actual prison effect. Usually, it's just a way to shuffle something nasty away, which feels useful enough to see play virtually every time it's drafted. Targeted mill and discard is what the deck wants the most. I'm still exploring cards and interactions to bolster this strategy, but I can't speak more highly of how fun this control deck is to pilot, and how tense it can be trying to break the inevitable lock-out. It's helped to elevate the value of artifact/enchant removal a good bit, as well, which is interesting, as those are typically such boring picks.

The funniest thing this deck has done so far over here is see a jank G/B/U deck mill an opponent out with Mesmeric Orb and Altar of Dementia eating a bunch of Eldrazi Spawn from Awakening Zone and a Courser of Kruphix after a Garruk Wildspeaker ultimate.

Honestly, I'm starting to wonder if hippie is not a much better cube card that I've given it credit for. Most of black's hand disruption kind of sucks in cube, and hippie seems like its at a reasonble point: 3cc recurring discard. As long as your format isn't too fast, it seems like a decent place to be.

I'm more surprised because braids seems like the type of card people would hate: a slow constriction that eventually hates them out of the game. How long does she usually survive? Is it more like a fun smallpox effect in practice?

I love Hippie as well, though my cube is a bit too full of value black creatures to run him currently. He's on the table for my next upgrade post-Origins, though.

As for Braids, I love her. She usually dies the turn she's thrown down, gets reanimated, eats some things, gets removed again, gets Oversold Cemetery'd, eats some more, etc. For something truly oppressive, a T3 Braids off something like Pentad Prism can be a soulcrushing victory in a hurry, but I find that situation hasn't happened successfully and feels like the same boogeyman T2 Reanimate is persecuted for. In a low-tutor environ (mine), a T4-5 Braids is more common, and feels pretty fair given her small body and the wealth of removal available.

 

[ahadabans]

Random discard is brutal. That's the only reason hippie is good. 2/2 flyers for 1CC are under the curve. Even in my list.

As far as Braids goes... it depends on the match-up. He dominates decks with light removal. Against Rx, it's opposite side of the spectrum. He's dead as soon as he hits the table most of the time unless you were dropping threat after threat before you put Braids in play. There are times you can't keep Braids active because you run out of things to feed it and he ends up just an expensive delayed edict. We always talk BCS where you've got a token producer and Braids is just wrecking face, but games don't always play that way. Sometimes you drop braids with a bloodghast and no land and you don't draw a land and then things start to get dicey. Do you start sac'ing lands to keep him active and hope you draw a land? Or do you cut your loses and just sac Braids? I really enjoy playing that card. Now what I will tell you, is what you run with it can impact how oppressive he plays. Ophiomancer proved to be a bit on the overkill side. So that got cut. Braids + Lingering Souls is also a very harsh pill, but Lingering Souls is just broken with everything so I don't hold that against Braids.

Smallpox is rarely a good turn 2 play. It's better later in the game (turn 3 or 4 typically). You need an engine in play (or be able to cast one after) before you can really play that card and not hurt yourself more than your opponent. After all, that card with zero synergy is straight up card disadvantage. If I have a land in hand and something like Messenger out, that is when I'll windmill slam a smallpox. That's a nasty play in particular (Messenger into Small Pox). It's equally great to do smallpox if I have Haakon in hand and enough land next turn to play him from the yard. Entomb nameless inversion and the game is over. That's as combo as I get.

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

I like a lot of that raveborn. It seems like you have prison pieces, but its a multi-card combo to be able to "lock" someone, and even than the lock is disruptable.

oversold cemetery is certainly a card that I've overlooked, and it seems like an interesting engine card--it reminds me a bit of genesis. There are all sorts of interesting soft locks that it can enable (chittering rats). Riddlekeeper looks like another card I've overlooked.

Thats probably the best way to incorporate braids, as part of a sort of value reanimator deck (which seems to increasingly be the direction I'm drawn for reanimator).

 

[Diakonov]

I always forget about Manabarbs. That card is actually pretty interesting. I think you can throw Ankh of Mishra into that group as well. They both have nice compatibility with aggro, too.

Damage-based prison sounds reasonable to me since your opponent arguably maintains free range of movement, but it still creates that "the walls are closing in on us" feeling that is uniquely prison. The whole concept of changing the environment around you while being more well-suited to the new climate is a very fun thing to build around.

In constructed it works more easily because you can come prepared with answers, and being able to interact on some level is the most important key to making a game against prison fun. Either it must have semi-easily exploitable weaknesses or there must be a number of answers that aren't too hard to come by. Disenchants and particularly bounce spells come to mind. I'd lean more toward decks that rely on permanents in play which can be disrupted than something like land destruction.

 

[ahadabans]

Great post Rave. Oversold Cemetery is a card I bought a copy of awhile ago and just never ended up adding it to my list. But I might look for a place for it. It has a lot of synergy with some of the graveyard shenanigans I'm pushing.

Lantern seems really interesting as well. Is it too narrow though?

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

The whole concept of changing the environment around you while being more well-suited to the new climate is a very fun thing to build around.

Thats a really interesting way to think about prison: framing it as putting the cube environment in flux and than being better equiped to survive in the new enviornment, makes the archetype sound so much more dynamic and intriguing. There should be a certain level of inherent interactiveness to the prison pieces than, to demonstrate the idea of a shifting world.

I think I want to move away from two card prison combos than, and more on cards that control the structure of the game: manabarbs, lantern of insight, and braids, cabal minion all seem to do that in different ways.

I also really like these as proactive ways to disrupt combo decks.

 

[CML]

Cards like glare of subdual (...) with the right support, can tap down a board and slowly constrict what an opponent can do.

"the right support?"

 

[CML]

i actually like a lot of these cards and will briefly cover why i exclude most of them.

good:
smokestack, icefall regent, thalia, thalia horse (probably), tangle wire

smokestack is a fun build-around and im not opposed to braids either. ditto lodestone golem.

possibly good:
winter orb (no idea, interested in other experiences)

too good:
meekstone, manabarbs, glare of subdual, opposition

there is a special circle of hell for people who put opposition in their cubes.

not good enough:
almost everything else

other good cards kind of like these:
volrath's stronghold, nephalia drownyard, mindslaver, academy ruins, etc.

design principle: when someone wins by assembling a lock with two or more pieces, they deserve to and it's fun. when someone wins by dropping a 1-mana artifact or 4-mana enchantment, that's stupid

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

Winter orb is pretty terrible, it was only listed for completeness sake. Same for static orb.

 

[vennythekid]

I like the concept of "environmental change". It encourage drafters to build synergies that take advantage of the environmental changes they present. Looking through the Gatherer for cards that look like they have that kind of symetircal impact:

 

[CML]

if only any of those cards actually did anything. here's a few more thoughts:

humility is surprisingly fun. people think it's moat but it's not. it's a great build-around.
silent arbiter never really caught on, no idea why.

 

[James Stevenson]

Braids... His... him

But seriously, what I've always wondered about Stax and Braids is how does the rest of the deck look? What are you doing if you don't draw these cards? Is it just a valuey midrange deck?

 

[Jason Waddell]

Do people consider opposition to be net fun positive? I haven't had too many bad cube experiences with it.

Opposition + Master of Waves seems like a good time or a bad time, depending on your perspective.

The CFB Cube crew was pretty anti Smokestack for being a shitty card. My experiences with it were dichotomously in the "shitty" and "backbreaking" category. I have opened a game with T1 Bitterblossom, T2 Smokestack, but that was in an early cube iteration.

Interactive prison is fun, if you want it in your environment I say make a crack at it, then modify / remove it if complaints arise.

 

[Dom Harvey]

Opposition is really stupid

 

[RavebornMuse]

But seriously, what I've always wondered about Stax and Braids is how does the rest of the deck look? What are you doing if you don't draw these cards? Is it just a valuey midrange deck?

Since most Black decks in my cube want to have recursive shenanigans anyway, the prescence of Braids does little to shape the deck outside of politely requesting acceptable fodder to be sacced repeatedly. One of the things I love about Braids is you can throw her in about half the decks that pick her up - she isn't a demanding mistress at all. Slot her in, play black with a few recursive/token-making tools if you can, and grin evilly when you cast her. I feel a lot of people have the impression she's some Vile Engine of Moste Darke Designe; really, she just wants to be a nice value card that plays exceptionally wickedly with some buddies. That, to me, makes her one of the most fun designs in Magic's history. I think the reason she has such a bad rap is she can maul opponents in really powered environs; most Riptide-style cubes encourage gradual build-up and bodies on the board, so she isn't some imminent doom being thrown down on T1 or something like she can be in mainstream environs.

 

[Chris Taylor]

Do people consider opposition to be net fun positive? I haven't had too many bad cube experiences with it.

Opposition + Master of Waves seems like a good time or a bad time, depending on your perspective.

The CFB Cube crew was pretty anti Smokestack for being a shitty card. My experiences with it were dichotomously in the "shitty" and "backbreaking" category. I have opened a game with T1 Bitterblossom, T2 Smokestack, but that was in an early cube iteration.

Interactive prison is fun, if you want it in your environment I say make a crack at it, then modify / remove it if complaints arise.

I've basically never seen oppo do anything except a few times where it did waaaaaay too much

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

But seriously, what I've always wondered about Stax and Braids is how does the rest of the deck look? What are you doing if you don't draw these cards? Is it just a valuey midrange deck?

That was more or less the problem I had with the cards, but at the time I was still trying to run combo reanimator with a bunch of crappy 4cc reanimation spells and poor targets. Braids seems like a really good fit in a grindy midrangy deck with a value reanimation focus.

Stax I would probably still pass on: I think its too much to invest your turn into something that slow.

seems like a lot of fun.

 

[James Stevenson]

Mindslaver seems like a lot of fun.

I ran it for years, it was a pet card. Even when I drafted it I would cut it almost all the time. I had no ways to recur it - it was just a fun control finisher. Sadly it's just too slow like that.
Has anyone made it good in cube?

what else?