Reuke 540 (Opinions Wanted!)

[Ryureuke]

Greetings cubers,
Let me start by thanking everyone in advance. I have been Cubing only a short while and wish to get advice on my cube. Is it unbalanced? It it missing something? I need opinions. Since most of the people that have drafted my cube are new players, they don't have much helpful advice. Please help!

http://www.cubetutor.com/visualspoiler/24300

 

[ahadabans]

You curve looks solid (I pasted the list into deckstats and got 2.91 average - that's pretty low). Curve is usually the first place guys go wrong but you are in good shape there.

The one thing I would take a look at is your fixing though. At 540, I think you need way more fixing than you have. At 450, I'm running 5 cycles essentially. I'd run 60 fixing lands at 540. Not sure your stance on running multiples, but fixing lands is where I think you make the biggest impact on cube play by doubling up. Lots of guys do double fetch. I'm doing double shock single fetch at the moment.

I'm also leary of super powerful artifacts. Sol Ring is just broken and out of place in a lower powered list. Myr Battlesphere is also pretty crazy and any color can run it. It's expensive and I don't see tinker, so you may be OK.

 

[FlowerSunRain]

I miss playing Deep Sea Kraken, I should see if it still has a role in my list.

Sol Ring is completely out of place here. Some of the creature choices seem really weak compared to their peers, the Emissary cycle, Misthoff Kirin, Death-Hood Cobra, for example. A few of the spells too. You could definitely use more lands. Painlands, I think, would be a nice.

We should probably move this thing into the cube list forum. Also, it would be good to know what you want out of this list. It looks like it would be pretty playable, but with a big list like this, its hard to predict how playable a lot of the cards are because its tough to see if the decks that support then "work". I've been guilty of running completely "useless" cards for multiple drafts in my 540 list, because I didn't have to vision to see that they really had no purpose. Conversely, cards I think work with one specific purpose get used in completely different decks all the time, so its fine to run useless cards for a while just in case. That said, we are here to give extra sets of eyes, so if you can add any more specific details, I'm sure you'll get better feedback.

 

[Ryureuke]

Ah, I did not realize there was a section for cube lists. Sorry about that.
Thanks for the sound advise. I have thought about taking out the Battlesphere. It seems to be extremely powerful for this cube. Also, I will look into subtracting Sol Ring and adding more lands. Currently, I'm working on getting the Ravnica guild lands together.

 

[James Stevenson]

I can move this thread over there if you like. Should I rename it as well?

 

[Ryureuke]

Not sure what to name it. I call my cube Reuke 540. Maybe that. As for my goals for the cube, it's designed mostly with fun in mind, less emphasis on the competitive aspects of cube. I like cards with options and I definitely want card interaction.

 

[Kuldahar]

My only suggestion to start with is change your mana base. I think the general consensus here is that people who have adopted 'the riptide way' say it's one of the best things they have done and never looked back. Dont be afraid to break singleton because of stupid 'gentleman's rule', even if it is just the lands! Double fetch lands, and double shocks, and you will not regret it.

 

[FlowerSunRain]

If you want options, the best place to start is cards like the multicolor charms from Ravnica/Planeswift/Alara/Khans. Those cards mostly decent power level and give you a lot of interesting choices. Obviously you need good mana to run them, though.

With regard to your idea for "fun" and "less competitive", I think what many people find less fun is the very extreme archetypes. Burn, decks that curve from goblin guide to hellrider in order to end the game at turn 4, draw-go control, insta-kill combos. These types of decks are often what people describe as frustrating, because they try to kill the other player while interacting as little as possible or seek to completely shut down the opposing deck's gameplan. Most people accept that they will lose games, but they want to see there deck at least do what it does before it goes down.

As such, one think you might want to focus on is "middling" your cube. Get rid of the one drops whose only purpose is to end the game as fast as possible. On the other end, make sure your high cost creatures aren't solo-game winners, because without pressure they are going to be cast most games at a reasonable life total. Fill up your deck with multipurpose instants and utility creatures that will give the players tough targeting and sequencing choices that feel like they matter, but since the games are going to last a few turns, they won't feel high pressure. Single cards that demand immediate removal. Finally, make sure the cards you include are offensive in nature, because a slow cube with weaker high cost cards can definitely become a grindfest if you aren't careful. Prefer targeted removal to wraths, high power to high toughness, and engines that end the game to those that stall.

 

[Ryureuke]

Thanks again flowersun. I just edited my cube (unfortunately before reading the last post). Also, I haven't put the lands in yet. I'll have to order those. Again, the good advice is appreciated.

Okay, so I don't think I mind competitive as long as people can still "fight back" per say. No, channel into emrakul on turn two, no super land destruction decks, no boomerang isocron scepter, etc.

 

[quanta]

I enjoyed drafting your cube. A few comments

Seems like you can draft control, midrange, or aggo pretty easily and they all look close in power level at a glance.

Skeleton Shard is a neat card; I've never seen it before. I think you probably want more artifact creatures though to make sure it's playable. I see you've got 10 colorless artifact creatures and a few colored ones. I think this makes it hard to get enough artifact creatures for skeleton shard to be worth it.

I think you've achieved your goal of avoiding anything that has no way of "fighting back". The only thing that makes me leery is reanimator. You only have a few reanimation spells but the two mana enchantment ones are really strong. I think your reanimation targets are mostly answerable enough or low enough in power and that having everything come together is fairly unlikely but still... Occasionally you'll be able to draft something like this

quanta413's Grixis Reanimator draft of Reuke 540 on 25/06/2015 from CubeTutor.com

And while this deck looks totally sweet, I could also see it being frustrating to play against since although unlikely, it's possible to go turn 1: faithless looting discarding Ulamog's Crusher into turn 2: animate dead. That's the extreme scenario, but I don't think it's that unlikely for this deck to reanimate a fatty on turn 3 or 4. And I think a lot of decks would just scoop to that. On the other hand, I could also see this deck collapsing on itself sometimes.

I'd probably move towards reanimation spells that either cost a little more mana or require more work from the player (like stitch together requires threshold).

On the other hand, it feels pretty great when you do manage to get a reanimator deck to come together right now.

There are a few cards which seem to have a way lower power level than most of the cube and also don't seem to do anything very interesting. Like trailblazer's boots, I think it's often a do nothing and you'd be better off with something that grants unconditional unblockable-ness. Prowler's Helm or Whispersilk cloak maybe? Fleetfeather sandals is another equip that seems really meh to me. I think most of your equipment choices are good though.

 

[Ryureuke]

Thanks for the advice! And the draft! I've been thinking about taking out Hornet Queen, but I might just be wary of her because of her performance in standard. Thoughts?

 

[quanta]

Your cube has a fairly high power level and a good density of sweepers and multitarget removal and hornet queen does cost 7. I think it's ok to ramp into at least; maybe a bit scary strong if reanimated early since it can't be taken out by spot removal.

I've only played against hornet queen once in M15 draft and it was kinda BS there but your cube is a lot higher power level than that.

 

[Chris Taylor]

Hornet queen is the kind of green fatty you want when your player requires it to stabilize having been beaten on up until that point. Avenger of Zendikar fulfills this role nicely as well, if you prefer a more surmountable creature initially but harder to break through over time.

However, played in midrange, cheated out, or other shenanigans? Hornet queen will ruin a game. It can be brought back with reveilark, but the first time I saw someone do that in my cube it basically made me vomit. Nobody wants to play against that.

I'd recommend Avenger of Zendikar if you ever plan on being on the receiving end (Which you should consider, it's how your drafters feel 100% of the time after all), even though Hornet Queen is likely the stronger card. But hey, if it wins games and your players are okay feeling violated, have at it.

I don't think you need both.

 

[Ryureuke]

I will give the Avenger a look. Considering I took out a good deal of the recursion though, the Queen might be okay. No Revilark in the cube either so don't have to worry about that.

 

[quanta]

I don't remember if this was true pre-changes too, but I like how you have quite a few high end creatures that act like sweepers. Seems like a good way for ramp decks to stabilize and to break board stalls when things get grindy.

The increased fixing is a nice improvement. Extremely minor comment on the lands. I see the advantage of terminal moraine over evolving wilds but I still wonder if terminal moraine is really going to be wanted by any deck; for it to actually be fixing it basically costs 3 mana and it only fetches basics. Maybe myriad landscape would be more interesting? It's basically an expensive colorless rampant growth in land form. It fixes and ramps and it can just tap for colorless if you don't need fixing. Or maybe Mirrodin's Core or Tendo Ice Bridge if you're looking for another land that can fix for any color and enters the battlefield untapped.

Ramp seems like a great archetype in your cube and seems well balanced given the high density of good removal and the choice of high drops seems rewarding but not oppressive.

One thing I'm wondering is if you are intending to support any more narrow specific themes (for example, +1/+1 counters matters, flicker, tribal, etc.) or just the broad macro archetypes (aggro, midrange, control, ramp, etc.) ; I don't see any narrow themes, but I could be missing it. Your cube's also big so it's a bit harder to support narrow themes anyways. I think there are advantages to going either way and I like your cube as is, but there are a few cards that seem out of place since in my mind they lack the broad playability that it looks like you are going for. Like carnage altar. You've got to spend 2 and then 3 and sacrifice a creature to draw just one card. It's hard to get any card advantage from it unless your creatures like being sacrificed or they are tokens. And even if you are sacrificing for value, it seems like you'd have to activate it at least 3 or 4 times to be even vaguely worth it. Culling Dais seems like a better version of a similar effect.

Freyalise, Llanowar's Fury is another one. You've got to either really want to make elves or ramp to some super expensive stuff (and she already costs 5 and only makes one elf a turn, so I'm not even sure if she's actually good even for that) for her to be any good. I think Nissa, Worldwaker both makes more useful creatures from your lands and ramps better in almost every situation; her ultimate is also game-ending in almost any situation whereas Freyalise's seems underwhelming a lot of the time. If you don't have a Nissa, Worldwaker I don't think I'd necessarily rush out and buy it if you don't want to proxy it, but I think any green planeswalker except Nissa Revane would be better than Freyalise.

 

[Ryureuke]

Hey guys, it's been a while but I've made quite a few changes to my cube! I feel like black might be too powerful but I'm not 100%.

 

[B8R]

I think if I was in your playgroup I would probably exclusively draft the following big midrange and control decks:

-Signets into Wurmcoils/Titans
-Bx reanimator
-UR Wildfire/Upheaval
-Gx Signet Oath/PW's/Fatties
-Ux Control with busted blue card draw
-Go into white for only 3 cards: Balance, Sun Titan, Elspeth SC

Those seem to be where the power lies. All the tools that aggro uses to fight these look gone so I would stay away.

If you are on the casual side I would power these down. Just my 2 ¢!

 

[ahadabans]

Pretty high powered list. Assuming that is the direction you want to go, I'd probably do the following:

Faith's Fetters in for Suppression Bonds - bonds looks really low power to me. Fetters is unconditionally better unless my reading comprehension is off.
Guardian of the Guildpact - peasant card which looks out of place here. And even if this ends up winning some games, it's using protection (the worst way possible to do it).

Jetting Glasskite - another peasant staple that looks severely underpowered next to Frosty and hyper card draw Sphinx.
Mystical Teachings - sweet card, but I don't think it's works in a list this strong. Would like to be proven wrong though.

CryptBreaker in for Putrid Imp - I don't care what anyone says. Imp sucks. Funeral charm used on myself is a better discard outlet (because it has other useful modes).
Fallen Idealb - looks sketchy. Auras in general are dangerous with good removal (instant speed stuff). I would never run that card in a deck from a list like this.

Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary in for Garruk's Companion - not buying that as a viable card here. Rofellos is pretty busted and the best reason to run green.

Some of the guild cards like questionable, I might shrink down to 4 in each color.