General CBS

[Rusje]

As said by many: number of words does not equal complexity. This holds true not only for reminder text but for abilities as a whole.

Thing is: having many different keywords/abilities does require more capacity, but one can have a cube with 6 wordy abilities and avoiding any other and be fine.

On the other hand, some abilities are much harder to grok than the number of words in the reminder text would lead to believe.

Not to be a buzzkill but what do we gain with continuing with this?

 

[Nanonox]

Not to be a buzzkill but what do we gain with continuing with this?

Personally, it’s the first time I’ve seen my list sorted like this. It makes me reevaluate some slots. Is Glimpe the Impossible (top 3 in Red for me) really worth it when it isn’t a crucial card but high on the wordiness scale?

Plus this is cube. I’m going to over analyze my list with any amount of metrics!

 

[ravnic]

Yeah, wordiness isn't equal complexity exactly, but definitely is a factor. I also didn't think of specifically Glimpse the Impossible in that way for example.

 

[MilesOfficial]

As said by many: number of words does not equal complexity. This holds true not only for reminder text but for abilities as a whole.

Thing is: having many different keywords/abilities does require more capacity, but one can have a cube with 6 wordy abilities and avoiding any other and be fine.

On the other hand, some abilities are much harder to grok than the number of words in the reminder text would lead to believe.

Not to be a buzzkill but what do we gain with continuing with this?

I think it's just another helpful datapoint. I'm really pleased to be able to see my Cube organized in this way, and looking at the top few cards in each color side-by-side made my eyes gloss over in a way that I'm sure happens even more for my comparatively much less engaged playgroup.

I'm not going to just auto-cut the top 5% of wordy cards, but I try to be more thoughtful about what I include/keep in my list based on this element if only to make it so that newer players don't have to spend 5 minutes reading their P1P1 before even considering the cards.

 

[shamizy]

Not too surprising, mostly the remaining DFCs as expected:



If I go non-DFC for Jeskai colors I get:



Word count is definitely something I'm cognizant of when building out my cube. It's easier to make an allowance for classic cards or those that have greater familiarity with my players, but tougher to do that for something brand new that some people may have never played with before. It also comes down to how simple mechanics are to understand as well, the language being deployed, if it's a variation of other familiar mechanics, etc. So if we were to look at something like UB cards I've included:



Mawloc is more or less just a weird kicker variant; pay more and you get to draw a card otherwise it's a fight creature with exile upside. We've seen fight creatures time and time again over various Limited formats. Alpha Deathclaw is just two potential shots of a Vindicate. Caesar is much more complex than these two, but all of these effects are pretty common and not too difficult to understand. Choosing where to use your "complexity points" in a cube's design is very important in crafting something that doesn't feel overwhelming to players who might be less engaged with Magic as a whole.