Card/Deck Single Card Spotlight

[Tzenmoroth]

Definitely a "playgroup mileage may vary" card. Seems to be that way for all of the degenerate negative effects. Stuff like land destruction, locks, etc. Its really interesting because a lot of the dichotomy ends up being

"Let people have fun playing the game without such swingy plays and non games"
Vs.
"It brings interesting deck building/counterplay/its a reward for assembling it/and people have fun with that"

Interesting. I am firmly in camp 1. Seeing someone newish to the game sit there dejectedly after experiencing their first upheaval was... more than enough games of that kind for a lifetime.

Newer players are likely in the former camp. A cube does not look quite like mine if it cares about appealing to players who don't have a nuanced understanding of the game. I think our group is good at helping players deal with things like playing around soft locks though. Around here, we beckon new people to the dark side with the promise of black capes and cookies.

On unrelated notes, Magus of the Wheel is amazing and Delirium Skeins at and maybe 4 cards would be appealing. I've been looking for a good "we don't need these hands" effect.

 

[sigh]

 

[Peter LaCara]

Also

 

[Peter LaCara]

On another note



What about this one? I've run it since my cube's inception. It's nearly always a total blowout when it's cast. Is it too much of a blowout? Is there any interesting counter play to this card? Is Dismember just more fair all around?

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

I feel like this isn't quite being framed right; in a vacuum dismember is the more powerful card: its much more flexible in the ways you can practically cast it, has less conditionality, and is easily splashable. If you're looking for a similar but lower powered effect, snuff out seems good.

Would it be over powered in your cube? I have no idea; but if you are following R&Ds design trends, yet don't want to run ultra efficient removal, it seems like a reasonable compromise.

I've played it quite a bit in pauper, and its always felt like a medium removal spell, fwiw. Its great alongside mystical teachings as a 1 of.

 

[whydirt]

I'm not a fan of instant speed spells that can be cast for free. That's mostly because I play with a lot of newer and more casual players, who already face a huge disadvantage against more enfranchised players.

In general, I don't want anyone to feel like they have to have my cube list memorized to avoid unexpected blowouts from removal or tricks.

 

[Laz]

I'm not a fan of instant speed spells that can be cast for free. That's mostly because I play with a lot of newer and more casual players, who already face a huge disadvantage against more enfranchised players.

In general, I don't want anyone to feel like they have to have my cube list memorized to avoid unexpected blowouts from removal or tricks.

I can understand that sentiment, and Snuff Out is certainly going to be a huge blow out in any sort of cube that emphasises vertical growth of creatures. I used to run Snuff Out back when my cube was way slower and control decks rules the environment, where it had no shortage of big must-answer targets.
It was an amazing spell then, simply because 4 life wasn't really as big of a deal in most matchups, as very few decks really pressured life totals effectively. There was one or two aggro decks each draft, but they were super linear, efficient red-deck-wins style of things, against which Snuff Out was never what you wanted your removal to look like, but you could make do.

In my current list, I don't run Snuff Out, but I could probably get away with it because my list is so much closer to the ground these days, and virtually every deck will be pressuring life totals, so 4 life is a pretty serious cost, and you are hardly getting massive value out of it when the best targets are 3 and 4 drops instead of the omnipresent 5-7 drops of my dragon-cube of yore.

 

[Peter LaCara]

I'm not a fan of instant speed spells that can be cast for free. That's mostly because I play with a lot of newer and more casual players, who already face a huge disadvantage against more enfranchised players.

In general, I don't want anyone to feel like they have to have my cube list memorized to avoid unexpected blowouts from removal or tricks.

What's your opinion on Stoke the Flames?

 

[RavebornMuse]

I like soft locks like Forbid because people have fun assembling them and they have interesting counterplay. Its fun to have to time and sequence your spells to play through this kind of lock. Granted opinions vary widely on that point.

I don't see any "fun to assemble" aspect of Forbid, and any decent control deck that packs it will avoid getting played around just fine. "Draw cards" is a pretty standard line of play in my experience; for me, something like Life from the Loam + Exploration + Walk the Aeons is more where my "fun to assemble" measure kicks in. I will say that I have literally never lost a game where I bought back Forbid; it's really not that clever of a card, because in virtually any cube, a good control player knows what they can tolerate resolving and what is worth the buyback. 6 mana, 3 cards in hand, I win; it is 1 counter minimum, but a little under half the time, it's 3+. If control is really shitty in your environ then I guess it does a fine job pumping air into a flat tire, but imho if your route to "interesting control" is a repeatable counterspell that can sometimes win by itself, I'd rather flash in Draining Whelk or use Cryptic Command + recursion. YPMV

 

[sigh]

What's your opinion on Stoke the Flames?

Not whydirt, but convoke is probably one of the most fair cost reduction mechanics there is. In order for Stoke to be free you need 4 untapped creatures you are willing to tap, two of which have to be red.

 

[whydirt]

Yeah Stoke is probably fine, but I've got Outnumber in wide red deck removal slot.

 

[Chris Taylor]

Siege-Gang Commander --> Stoke the Flames
Build your own FTK

 

[sigh]

a couple points to take a look at:

Some people run increasing confusion, right? Is this a weird, grindier version?

Something I never noticed before:

This card is an instant?? Hmm.. That seems pretty strong?

 

[Miasmir]

I think unless you want to prioritize Islands specifically,

is a usually-stronger choice.

I had Engulf the Shore at the prerelease though and it was sick there, because I could decide which things to bounce by sandbagging Islands. Maybe it's worth a try just for getting cute with auras and so forth?

 

[genericco]

Engulf is cool but doesn't play well with cube mana bases.

Increasing Confusion is awesome because it's a win condition by itself, a resilient one since it's strongest when it's in the graveyard.

Startled Awake looks like stinky jank.

 

[Meltyman]

Engulf is cool but doesn't play well with cube mana bases.

Increasing Confusion is awesome because it's a win condition by itself, a resilient one since it's strongest when it's in the graveyard.

Startled Awake looks like stinky jank.

Let me remind you that it a) mills for 13 which is a lot. b) it has skulk, now think about how many cards can block it. How many creatures that can block it actually want to block it ?
I think Stratled Awake is nuts and i think i should give it a whirl actually... i have one at my disposal also hmm...

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

If your goal is to play competitively and win games of magic, I don't really like startled awake. You have to connect a couple times with it, and chaining removal or bounce on it is a giant beating. Worse, it wins on a completely different axis than much of the rest of your deck. As a card, its very vulnerable to all of the issues I raised in the ETB thread, and you end up going into it once or twice, before realizing that this is a very pyrrhic card to run and play with.

That being said, most of our formats aren't competitively focused, and startled awake is a tremendously fun card. Its one of those cards that plays very much like a mini puzzle, that is a delight for both players to try to "solve." While its not competitive in terms of efficiency at winning a game, it is very close, close enough where you can not feel bad running it. In addition, the sensation of decking someone with it is great fun, and the opponent can't really feel bad, because of how much play there is to the card.

 

[Peter LaCara]

Startled Awake is a card that either does absolutely nothing, or a card that wins you the game by itself. I leave it to your discretion whether you want a card that binary or not.

 

[whydirt]

From a pure gameplay perspective, I think Sphinx's Tutelage is a more interesting mill-based win condition. Startled Awake is strictly better for flavor drafts.

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

Startled Awake is a card that either does absolutely nothing, or a card that wins you the game by itself. I leave it to your discretion whether you want a card that binary or not.

That seems like a gross oversimplification: broadly speaking, most magic cards could be discribed as such.

Lab man, for instance, is a card that is very binary by this metric, yet has tremendous actual play to it.

 

[Peter LaCara]

That seems like a gross oversimplification: broadly speaking, most magic cards could be discribed as such.

Lab man, for instance, is a card that is very binary by this metric, yet has tremendous actual play to it.

Well... that's not true, actually. Most cards have a lasting impact on the game, one way or another. They provide bodies on the field. They provide mana. They provide card advantage. They provide tempo. Startled Awake doesn't really do any of those things. Either it wins you the game, or it reads 2UU: Do nothing. I mean, Lava Axe has a bigger impact on the game state, and most of us aren't cubing that.

But hey, like you said, some people might be in to that sort of thing. I don't run Lab Maniac for exactly the same reasons, but I don't begrudge others for doing so.

 

[sigh]

It just seems like a more exciting Increasing Confusion, which has already been mentioned more than once. That card operates exactly the same way (do "nothing" or win the game), and is/was run by at least a few people here. Startled Awake lets you do weird things with it, has that mini-puzzle aspect, and on the very base level can be repeatedly recurred as a 1/1 chump blocker.

I also like that unlike Increasing Confusion, the opponent has that chance to actually do something about it. This means that it probably won't win on it's own, but with the help of the rest of your deck (read: interactive and skill-testing).

~~~~~~

Also you only ever need to connect with it once as a creature, unless one of two things happen:

1. control mirror + opponent counters it
2. You start with it in your grave.

And that's because 26 cards is basically a guaranteed mill-out. 40 - 7 - 26 = 7, so they have until T7-8 to live, which will usually be right around the same time you've gotten 26 milled.

EDIT: ooo! Also, realized that, like Confusion, it's got good synergy with gifts ungiven

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

Well... that's not true, actually. Most cards have a lasting impact on the game, one way or another. They provide bodies on the field. They provide mana. They provide card advantage. They provide tempo. Startled Awake doesn't really do any of those things.

It tends to warp the game around itself because its a game ending threat you can't ignore. And for that reason I've never seen its presence not have a lasting impact on the way a game is played. You can also discard it for value, generating card advantage, or by absorbing multiple pieces of removal (which generates tempo for an opponent).

It really has a tremendous amount of play to it.

 

[MDT12]

This might have come up on this forum a bit, but I just opened a

(and Mana Crypt but that's already sold to a friend after he heard I had one). Now this card (Maze) looks absolutely insane but maybe in a more 'fair' cube like mine it's maybe a bit less problematic. However, locking a creature out of the game seems a bit unfun but I can see decks that want to play it. What are your thoughts on Maze of Ith, can this work or is my suspicion of it being generally unfun a common experience?

 

[sigh]

Play it in control as free uncounterable removal.