Brad Loves Eldrazi

[Brad]

Depends on how you view the Eldrazi for me. If it stops at ROE for you, I think eschewing the colorless costed ones makes sense. For me personally, they are part of the Eldrazi and deserve to be in an Eldrazi cube.

I like your first mana base mostly because there are more untapped sources. I would hate to have the mana to cast a big Eldrazi only to have my 10th land ETB tapped. Also less shuffling is nice!

I think that Kozilek costing CC in particular is a big motivator to keep the C costed guys around. Other than Emrakul1, I think that all of the titans should have a spot.

I was considering Evolving mana base plus Pains and Filters. There's 39 unique arts on Wilds Expanse Passage Vista.

I could also say fuck it and run like 20 Vistas.

What about...

?

I forget if I'm running Flickerwisp or if I'm running Guildless Commons.

Vestige might be appropriate. I do have like 6-10 lands outside of the main cycles that produce C as well as 10+ Eldrazi token producers.



Maybe adding my custom fetches (X or Wastes) to the current mana is the best solution. It's also possible that none of this is an issue, but I'm nervous to have a player not have access to CC for their Kozilek when they have ten mana because that feels so bad.

 

[Brad]

Notes:

Damn. Short list and they mostly revolve around Swamps. Not an issue for my previous cube.

EDIT:

 

[LadyMapi]

The Tainted cycle bothers me, because I want there to be a mono-black member... but I think those are called "Swamps".

 

[Chris Taylor]

The Tainted cycle bothers me, because I want there to be a mono-black member... but I think those are called "Swamps".

It's called Cabal Coffers actually

I think that Kozilek costing CC in particular is a big motivator to keep the C costed guys around. Other than Emrakul1, I think that all of the titans should have a spot.

I was considering Evolving mana base plus Pains and Filters. There's 39 unique arts on Wilds Expanse Passage Vista.

I could also say fuck it and run like 20 Vistas.


I forget if I'm running Flickerwisp or if I'm running Guildless Commons.

Vestige might be appropriate. I do have like 6-10 lands outside of the main cycles that produce C as well as 10+ Eldrazi token producers.



Maybe adding my custom fetches (X or Wastes) to the current mana is the best solution. It's also possible that none of this is an issue, but I'm nervous to have a player not have access to CC for their Kozilek when they have ten mana because that feels so bad.

Crumbling Vestige is real bad as a baseline though. Can I recommend Tendo Ice Bridge, or possibly AEther Hub?

 

[Brad]

Fuckin' splashed whatever I wanted in my Jeskai deck off of a few Triomes. Those fuckers gotta go.

Flying feels really strong right now. Might have to add a couple green Naturalize+flyer kill kinda spells. Removal isn't exactly lacking, but flyers won a lot of games today.

I cut all the 3C cards for being too narrow and too easily Triomed. Maybe they'll come back later.

I cut most/all the "deal 1 damage to all" cards that were intended to stop Eldrazi tokens because they can blow out the 2/1 aggro decks so early in the game.

5C Jeskai aggro-midrange 3-0
Sultai midrange Primeval Titan 2-1
WU Skies 1-1
Abzan Ramp 0-2
IDK, he dropped out before I played him 0-2

Skies vs Abzan was really close. Abzan's other loss was to Jeskai, which was a close 2-0. Everything felt pretty alright, but I felt dirty fetching Triomes.

 

[ravnic]

I could also say fuck it and run like 20 Vistas.

Do it. It's awesome.

 

[Brad]

Do it. It's awesome.

Have greed piles increased since adding all the Vistas? Been hating the mega-splashing that Triomes enable.

 

[ravnic]

No, not at all. I didn't even see a deck with more than three colors since I went for the 18 Vistas a year ago – including splashes. I think they work out like that, because they aren't rainbow fixing, they are a basic land of your choice. You can't go Baleful Strix into Flickerwisp even with three Prismatic Vistas as your first lands.

Pros
• Fixing for everyone in the draft even when only a smaller part of the cube is used.
• Less real estate is needed for the same amount of effectively used fixing. I went down eight fixing lands and now see slightly more fixing lands in decks on average.
• No rainbow fixing, so they make colorful greed piles not more appealing.
• Synergy upsides of fetches: Landfall, delve, descend ...

Cons
• Shuffling might increase slightly, although on average people play, I'd guess ~2.75 Vistas in a deck, so it hasn't been that bad for me.

 

[Brad]

Looking for removal that is strong as well as being fair to people casting 10 drops.

These all look good if there's Planeswalkers in the environment. I'm about to do an extensive scryfall search, but I'd love recommendations for walkers in this environment.

EDIT: I probably won't actually add walkers, but it's still a maybe.

 

[Brad]

Some updates:

Cut <> costs.
Debating the mana base as a result. May break singleton for fetches and/or Vistas.

Somewhat considering a removal of actual Eldrazi and shifting to a focus on big-"Kicker" cards like Green Suns' Twilight, Mirrorshell Crab, Stormkeld Vanguard, and Winds of Abandon as the top end that isn't a liability in your hand early. The Eldrazi are feeling like too much of a cube design liability and they haven't performed exceptionally well so far. Still trying to tweak things for them, but they're only a handful of cards in the cube, but influence so much.

Just re-did my multicolor sections. Down to 5 cards each. I'd love a second opinion there.

 

[Brad]

These fuckin' things cost so much more than other good cards. Strugglin' to make 'em work.

 

[LadyMapi]

I mean, if your core design goal is "make the OG Eldrazi fun and cool", and you've got "good" cards that outclass them... those "good" cards are bad in this context and you should scrap them.

Or you could just admit to yourself that you do not, in fact, love Eldrazi, and change the name of your cube. Your call.

 

[Brad]

I mean, if your core design goal is "make the OG Eldrazi fun and cool", and you've got "good" cards that outclass them... those "good" cards are bad in this context and you should scrap them.

Or you could just admit to yourself that you do not, in fact, love Eldrazi, and change the name of your cube. Your call.

I've got one list going that's got bounce/scry/surveil/pain/filter as the mana base. Trying to slow it down and keep some colorless presence with MH3 teasing that it'll be relevant, but it's really hard to get to 10 mana.


Do it for them!

 

[LadyMapi]

but it's really hard to get to 10 mana.

Sounds like you need more ramp, then, and/or cards to help stall out until you can slam BIG ELDRAZI. I dunno, put Eye of Ugin in the BLB or something.

 

[Brad]

Sounds like you need more ramp, then, and/or cards to help stall out until you can slam BIG ELDRAZI. I dunno, put Eye of Ugin in the BLB or something.

I wanna play it so badly, but there's a ton of good cheap Eldrazi that it breaks.

I have a lot of ramp and probably need to make my 6 drops shittier so that they don't reap the rewards of the ramp before the Eldrazi get to.

 

[Nanonox]

Strugglin' to make 'em work.

Going to dump some suggestions, most of which you probably considered already, but whatever.

I'm tinkering with some weird Black ramp in a new project and thought it could maybe apply to your Eldrazi cube:



Combine these with mana producing sacrifice outlets and you have an interesting tension between sacrificing board presence for ramp. And that ramp is mostly colorless which means it will go towards casting the Eldrazis.



It would also go well with your Catacomb Sifter and other Spawn creators. Food Chain would tie it into Green further. Then maybe you use alternate casting costs to get tons of mana or use weird cheat.



You could also lean more into artifacts with



And a bunch of value artifacts (Chromatic Star, Prized Statue, Ichor Wellspring, ...). Or use Tezzeret, Master of the Bridge to ramp from 6 to 10+ mana without too much trouble.

Maybe some long-term ramp?



Hope this gives you something to work with!

 

[Brad]

Going to dump some suggestions, most of which you probably considered already, but whatever.

I'm tinkering with some weird Black ramp in a new project and thought it could maybe apply to your Eldrazi cube:



Combine these with mana producing sacrifice outlets and you have an interesting tension between sacrificing board presence for ramp. And that ramp is mostly colorless which means it will go towards casting the Eldrazis.

Had or have all of this. Great minds.

Food Chain would tie it into Green

A little scared of how early this stuff can get our big boys out there.

You could also lean more into artifacts with

This is a great suggestion, I think. I missed these ones. That said, I'm debating adding an artifact theme to the cube. It's already themed around big mana as a full format theme and it looks difficult to accommodate both. We'll see what MH3 tells me to do.

Stockpile might be good? Little slow and sucks to hit on like turn 5. Storage lands GOTTA be too weak, right?

 

[Nanonox]

The storage lands don’t get there, but were an example because I don’t know if there are any similar effects.

Random thought:



Makes your Spawns and Scions into 3/3 and has synergies with casting big mana value spells. Seems decent, but I haven’t actually checked how many token producers you have.

 

[Brad]

Raggadragga is a really sweet idea, but competes with

for a slot.

I have high hopes for Forsaken Monument with MH3 coming.

 

[froggy]

I think Raggadragga is a lot more interesting than Spellbreaker as an enabler, but that's just me aha

 

[Brad]

I think Raggadragga is a lot more interesting than Spellbreaker as an enabler, but that's just me aha

Maybe, but those 3 are gonna be 1-2 of my 3-5 Gruul cards. It's a competitive slot.

A lot of the definitive ideas and numbers are waiting on MH3 to show me the other Eldrazi. It's killing me to wait.

 

[Brad]

Myself and my three most available friends scheduled to draft today. We invited five of our other friends, but they're adults and were all busy.

We did a draft where we picked one card for first pick and two cards for each pick after that.

I ended up in a 16 land BR deck with 6-7 one drops and 7-8 burn spells.

ROUND ONE
Opponent is on WR aggro midrange

Game one I kept a 2 lander with some one drops and stuff. Ended the game on 8 lands with 6 spells (meaning I drew 1 spell and 6 lands). Managed to win it.

Game two I draw a 6 lander and ship it back. Opponent mulligans and we agree to both draw 7. Kept a 3 lander that ended on 8 lands, 8 spells. Managed to win this one off of an 8/8 Shivan Devastator in my 16 land deck.

Matches 1-0
Games 2-0

Opponent wanted to play again, as the other two players had taken longer in deck building and had slower decks. Having drawn terribly and managing to go 2-0, I figure I'll crush him in the next game.

Game three I keep another 3 lander. Ends on 8 lands, 8 spells. I lose this one.

Game four I keep a 2 lander that ends on 6 lands, 8 spells. My Goblin Guide gave my opponent 5 lands in 6 attacks, including the first 4 attacks. I lost this one.

My draw steps against opponent one yielded 20 lands and 12 spells.

ROUND TWO
I played the winner of the other two. He was on GBr midrange ramp.

Game one I draw a decent hand. 2/1 into 3/2 with some burn. No flooding here. Easily take it.

Game two I don't fully remember my keep, but it must have been 2-3 lands. I remember I ended with 9 lands and 7 spells seen.

Game three I kept another 2 lander. Played Grim Lavamancer into Dreadhorde Arcanist and discovered that they don't really work in a format that isn't packed with fetches and cantrips. I flooded again in this game, but those two are on the chopping block. I drew both of them a few times each today and they hugely under performed. Lavamancer had a cute play against a Tarmogoyf, but it lacks fuel.

Matches 1-1
Games 5-4

ROUND THREE
This was against one of our newer players who is getting quite a bit better. Their deck was a pretty decent WU flyers with a few outlier cards that probably shouldn't have made the cut.

Before the round, I joked that I'll finally draw well and crush her.

I finally drew well and crushed her. Curved out every game, ended on 4-5 lands drawn every game, burned off anything she could play because her creatures were mostly small.

Matches 2-1
Games 8-4

THOUGHTS
I liked the draft format, but playables were short due to fewer cards seen. Might do 4 packs of 13 next time or something.

Warhost Frenzy sucks. It costs a lot for the deck that wants it and can easily do nothing.

Grim Lavamancer and Dreadhorse Arcanist lack the supporting cast to shine here.

I was playing black, but had almost no way to kill anything with 4 toughness. This is likely a side effect of trying to protect Eldrazi from getting removed too easily and needs to be looked into.

Gala Greeters seems really good. It feels like a 2 mana Baneslayer. Grow a bunch OR ramp OR gain life? Seems far too versatile and I surely would have lost to it alone had I not killed it immediately.

 

[Brad]

"I sure am excited to play Magic with my friends!"

*Draws 7 lands in 8 draw steps*

"Do you guys want to learn how to play Yu-Gi-Oh?"

 

[Brad]

I think I need to add clues to the token pile. What token should be on the backside? I have:
Spawn // Scion
1/1 W flying Spirit // Treasure
Clue? // ?????

I'd really like feedback on which token is best.



I'm currently looking at cards with flying/trample/menace to increase counterplay to the increase of Spawns coming with MH3. Aggro isn't popular right now.

Let me know if there's any anti-Spawn counterplay I'm forgetting. I don't really want -1/-1 to all, as that kills so many aggro plays.



Do I want walkers? They have such a variety of effects, but they often felt like GRBS.



I think I need to weaken my 5-6-7 drops to give room for aggro to kill someone as well as to encourage going above 5-6-7 on the curve and pick up the Titans.

 

[TrainmasterGT]

I think I need to add clues to the token pile. What token should be on the backside? I have:
Spawn // Scion
1/1 W flying Spirit // Treasure
Clue? // ?????

I'd really like feedback on which token is best.

Probably 2/2 Black Zombie, 2/2 Green Cat, or 2/2 Red Goblin Shaman with "Whenever this creature attacks, create a treasure token." Not sure exactly what tickles your fancy but all of those tokens have some cool options. I would presume Food is also on the table– complete the trifecta and add Academy Manufactor!

Do I want walkers? They have such a variety of effects, but they often felt like GRBS.

Walkers are not monolithically GRBS, I think you can definitely find some cool options. Judging by a couple of your other comments, it looks like Aggro needs a buff, and if you buff Aggro, a lot of the Planeswalkers actually become pretty reasonable!