Thanks guys, Lamia should be the best for me because the entomb and passive effect are very relevant to the themes my cube is built around, and the lifelink is part of a tiny archetype for me. Agree that i’d rather just have Entomb but LOL that price is whack!
General Fight Club
- Thread starter Jason Waddell
- Start date
The dream would be to dredge Connoisseur off Stinkweed Imp, then unearth him to entomb Lab Maniac and drop Phyrexian Reclamation or Palace Siege next turn, right?
I run Final Parting with a sticker on the inner sleeve.
Man when the picture gets this large you can really see that I haven’t attached the sticker exactly straight
Man when the picture gets this large you can really see that I haven’t attached the sticker exactly straight
imperfections are the charm point of homebrews!
I like to cut out mana cost and P/T boxes from cards that have the new desired stats and use double sided tape to attach. They appear almost perfectly normal aside from a slight bump that can be felt in the sleeve if one looks for it. Whenever I make a new one (currently not running any) I show them to one of my players and have them guess what's wrong with the card. Most times I am met with blank stares.
Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
This idea is going to cost me ten years of my life if/when I finally get around to doing that "everything costs 1 mana less" cube
i am lazy so i just sharpie anything that i want custom... my favorites are a Borderland Ranger with the word “basic” crossed out, a Pyrewild Shaman with “you may pay 3. If you do,” crossed out, and a Liliana's Shade that costs BB.
Will this only leave a slight bump? Isn’t it twice as thick as a normal Magic card + a little extra from the double sided tape?
Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
I was planning to see how it looks if you cut out the casting cost of the original card with a sharp knife, and replace it with the new one and use just a single tape on the backside of the card. Depends on how clean of a cut you can make, I think. Maybe it's easier to replace the entire top right corner if you're changing the casting cost.
Sounds like an experiment I would like to hear the outcome of!
The reason why I have that whole “New cost” text and the mana cost below the old mana cost is because I want it to be VERY clear that the card is changed. In fact I do not want any soul to just look at the card real fast and make an assumption that the card is unchanged. Magic players misread cards all the time. Even if there is no good explanation for it. This is normal because Magic cards are quite complex and the cards we misread are typically new cards. However if the mana cost change is not in focus, we are giving the players very good reasons to read the cards wrong because we have already seen the cards before and thus we know the mana cost of Final Parting to be 3 generic and 2 black.
The stickers I use cannot be felt since they are super, super thin.
In the end I worry about having an altered mana cost that is almost too well done
The reason why I have that whole “New cost” text and the mana cost below the old mana cost is because I want it to be VERY clear that the card is changed. In fact I do not want any soul to just look at the card real fast and make an assumption that the card is unchanged. Magic players misread cards all the time. Even if there is no good explanation for it. This is normal because Magic cards are quite complex and the cards we misread are typically new cards. However if the mana cost change is not in focus, we are giving the players very good reasons to read the cards wrong because we have already seen the cards before and thus we know the mana cost of Final Parting to be 3 generic and 2 black.
The stickers I use cannot be felt since they are super, super thin.
In the end I worry about having an altered mana cost that is almost too well done
You could probably cut both cards at once with a good enough blade, ensuring the cut is the same size.
But Vel maybe be right (again, ugh) that the edit needs to be noticeable.
<3 Love you
Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
Sounds like an experiment I would like to hear the outcome of!
The reason why I have that whole “New cost” text and the mana cost below the old mana cost is because I want it to be VERY clear that the card is changed. In fact I do not want any soul to just look at the card real fast and make an assumption that the card is unchanged. Magic players misread cards all the time. Even if there is no good explanation for it. This is normal because Magic cards are quite complex and the cards we misread are typically new cards. However if the mana cost change is not in focus, we are giving the players very good reasons to read the cards wrong because we have already seen the cards before and thus we know the mana cost of Final Parting to be 3 generic and 2 black.
The stickers I use cannot be felt since they are super, super thin.
In the end I worry about having an altered mana cost that is almost too well done
Yeah, I totally agree with you on the clarity issue. In a regular cube, replacing the mana cost of only a handful of cards in the entire pool could be confusing. I was contemplating this technique for a hypothetical cube where every card's casting cost is affected though
I actually own a cube where only some cards have a changed casting cost, but the entire premise of the Heritage Cube is that cards get changed in different ways over time. I don't actually point out on a card what exactly changed (be it the casting cost, the card type, text, or power/toughness), but I do use several visual cues that inform a player something is up and they have to read the card twice.
https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/heritage
The entire cube consists of commons and uncommons that get modded once or twice (the maximum) over the course of multiple sessions. I proxy the modded cards, putting one asterisks before the card name for each mod that got applied to the card, I change the rarity to rare (for one mod) or mythic (for two mods), and I flip the artwork of the card. Compare, for example:
This works perfectly, but it's obviously harder/impossible to achieve this if you're trying to not use a proxy on purpose. You can't use most of my tricks if you cobble together a card from various parts of real cards.
Man, I miss cubing... This cube is such a riot to draft!
This is a perfect way of doing it in my opinion. For The Heritage it is perfect!
1. The stars. A perfect solution. It will help the players notice something is up. It will also tell them if a card can be upgraded twice, one or no times depending on the amount of stars. It will also help you identity the cards faster between tournaments.
2. The rarity upshift would normally be meh in a cube but for your cube it is perfect because you don’t include rare cards! Here I wish you would add an additional rule: Either
2A. Let all cards in your cube be uncommon. This is a design constraint. All uncommons can be upgrades twice to rare and mythic rare.
2B. Let all cards be common. This is a design constraint. All common cards can be upgrades thrice to uncommon, rare and finally mythic.
2C. Let all cards upgrade as many times as they can until they hit mythic rare. In version 2C you can include commons, uncommons and rare cards. And I guess mythic rare as well but if you do, then they can’t be upgraded.
This would make your rarity rule a lot cleaner if you ask me and create so much short and long term depths.
3. Flipping artwork. The only thing you do that doesn’t excite me. If there were several ways of flipping, it would be cool.
1. The stars. A perfect solution. It will help the players notice something is up. It will also tell them if a card can be upgraded twice, one or no times depending on the amount of stars. It will also help you identity the cards faster between tournaments.
2. The rarity upshift would normally be meh in a cube but for your cube it is perfect because you don’t include rare cards! Here I wish you would add an additional rule: Either
2A. Let all cards in your cube be uncommon. This is a design constraint. All uncommons can be upgrades twice to rare and mythic rare.
2B. Let all cards be common. This is a design constraint. All common cards can be upgrades thrice to uncommon, rare and finally mythic.
2C. Let all cards upgrade as many times as they can until they hit mythic rare. In version 2C you can include commons, uncommons and rare cards. And I guess mythic rare as well but if you do, then they can’t be upgraded.
This would make your rarity rule a lot cleaner if you ask me and create so much short and long term depths.
3. Flipping artwork. The only thing you do that doesn’t excite me. If there were several ways of flipping, it would be cool.
this is just me saying the first thing off the cuff pre-coffee, but it would be hella cool if you palette swapped the upgraded cards like the alternate costumes in N64 Smash or whatever
Wooooooooow great minds.. I thought exactly the same.
Then decided I had written enough and wanted to wait and see if Onde liked the other idea first
And by great minds is just mean you haha
Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
Haha, cool suggestions, but honestly, I chose the proxy alterations to be low maintenance / easy to apply. Putting all the art through a filter means extra work, especially if you want to do a palette swap instead of an "easy" filter. I've been doing some Google searches, and palette swapping isn't easy at all. Flipping the art is just one of those cues that might look silly, but it just so triggers that subconscious "something is off here" feeling in enfranchised players and it's trivial to implement
As for the rarity restriction, this is my blurb when I introduce the cube to my drafters:
*****
The Heritage Cube is a Peasant cube where you can permanently mod (alter) the cards you draft. An individual card can be modded up to a maximum of two times. Previously modded cards can be recognised by the following alterations:
I started it as a Peasant cube, based on the theory that the mods will 'rarify' your cards for you. A card like the Audacious Thief above feels rare in power level, even though it's baseline is decidedly not. While I like option 2C in theory, there are enough strong commons in the cube that reallydon't need a third mod. The Audacious Thief above is, again, a good example, but there's also a 3/1 Faerie Seer floating around. I was able to get in a few drafts before COVID-19 hit the world, and didn't get a single question about the rarity distribution in my cube, so I actually think the current approach is pretty clean in practice.
Note that I don't mean to say your idea is not clean, because it totally is! I'ld love to see someone try out that variant, but if anyone does, be very aware of the commons you put in your cube. Modding a card three times is really strong!
As for the rarity restriction, this is my blurb when I introduce the cube to my drafters:
*****
The Heritage Cube is a Peasant cube where you can permanently mod (alter) the cards you draft. An individual card can be modded up to a maximum of two times. Previously modded cards can be recognised by the following alterations:
- The card name is preceded by one asterisk (for one mod) or two asterisks (for two mods).
- The rarity of the card is changed to rare (for one mod) or mythic rare (for two mods).
- The art of the card is flipped when compared to the original.
I started it as a Peasant cube, based on the theory that the mods will 'rarify' your cards for you. A card like the Audacious Thief above feels rare in power level, even though it's baseline is decidedly not. While I like option 2C in theory, there are enough strong commons in the cube that reallydon't need a third mod. The Audacious Thief above is, again, a good example, but there's also a 3/1 Faerie Seer floating around. I was able to get in a few drafts before COVID-19 hit the world, and didn't get a single question about the rarity distribution in my cube, so I actually think the current approach is pretty clean in practice.
Note that I don't mean to say your idea is not clean, because it totally is! I'ld love to see someone try out that variant, but if anyone does, be very aware of the commons you put in your cube. Modding a card three times is really strong!
I was thinking it would be fun to have a cube where every card had been sharpied somehow. I particularly like removing words from text boxes. It's kind of difficult to find a good number of cards that get cooler and are an okay power level just by removing part of the text box, though. Gets a little uglier, imo, when you sharpie a new number over an old number.
Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
Don't forget that you can cross out mana symbols as well
Chris Taylor
Contributor
Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
Oh I don't know about that, I drew heavy inspiration from an existing cube ( https://cubecobra.com/cube/overview/5d8416b5bc8ca26a572982f0]link[/url]), which in turn was inspired by two articles (linked on their overview). As they say, I stand on the shoulders of giants
That doesn't mean exploring tangential ideas isn't worthwhile though, so I really appreciate you and Brad thinking along!