General CBS

[shamizy]

Which expensive finishers do you all recommend? They need to hit the sweet spot of being good enough to justify putting the effort in but not oppressively good if reanimated etc. ahead of schedule.

I'm pretty happy with my current suite of creatures:



I'd say that among these, the only "pure reanimator" creature is Sheoldred while the rest of them play pretty well in normal strategies. I try to avoid straight up reanimator only bodies because they often end up being too narrow or too reliant upon the enablers. Sheoldred is cool as another reanimation engine by herself, board control, and a card that isn't too difficult to actually interact with while on the field since she dies to most common removal. The artifact creatures have fun synergies to exploit with Daretti shenanigans, most of the green creatures are fine to just ramp into, and the rest slot pretty favorably into more controlly/defensive decks that come together. Emrakul is one that you have to work for with a bit of ramp or dedication to self-mill/graveyard filling, but it's a ton of fun to pull off. Not anywhere near as obnoxious as spin the wheel was in Standard. Emrakul was also at the head of one of my favorite draft decks I ever assembled:

Emrakul Ungiven [Shamim]

 

[Onderzeeboot]

Oh, I forgot, but I recently put this one in.



It's super sweet! It bins itself and digs for your reanimation spells at the same time, and it's a serious clock that can't be chump blocked. You don't even need green to use it! I was blown away by how well this played for a common, you should definitely give it a try imho.

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

That card played really badly for us, outside of retail limited.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

That card played really badly for us, outside of retail limited.

Huh. No Necromancy in your cube?

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

Its a 7 mana brick, so its a pretty terrible finisher for people on a ramp plan.

 

[Salmo2]

Yeah it seems horrendous, if you really want a big stupid cycler play Krosan Tusker. Your reanimation targets can't be so easily removed in cube.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

Hmm... It's probably my environment then, but it kicked some serious ass in my last draft. Then again, there's not a single Titan in my list, and Aetherling got cut for being too annoying to deal with...

 

[Salmo2]

I mean, one draft is not a great sample size. You also don't have a ton of good removal, so things that die to removal are inherently better. But like, I think most cubes have more removal than yours, so it's no surprise that the 7/7 lived and attacked.

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

Just to help clarify, my format is lower powered, with worse removal.

Still bad

 

[Salmo2]

with worse removal.

That's debatable. It's like you guys are having a bad-removal off lol

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

That's debatable. It's like you guys are having a bad-removal off lol

Man, I sometimes forget you only do power maxing lol

In lower power formats the threats aren't really capable of exerting the same type of pressure they are in your format. When your creatures start to be a guaranteed double spell, removal has to be ultra-efficiently costed to allow the answering player to keep pace in spell castings. When you have a bunch of creatures that are giving a guaranteed spell effect regardless, and are removal checks in themselves, removal needs to be as unconditional as possible. This is due to the game becoming progressively more tempo and threat focused.

When your format starts to run lower power threats with a focus on activated and triggered abilities accruing value over turns as part of an engine, you can start diversifying your removal, which creates the turn gaps you need for cards like that to do anything.

As you noted, thats probably why we got an anecdotal instance of sandwurm doing something.

However, the removal should still be reasonable, with very light conditions attached, though I am sure from your perspective anything that isn't path to exile, swords to plowshares, or toxic deluge probably looks like lash of the whip.

I've ran formats with actual, deliberately bad, removal intended to open up space for board state building, and even in that format, once you get over 6CC, if its being hardcast, it had better come with an ETB or some similar mechanism to compensate for being hit by interaction. A player is investing their turn into that type of play, and almost any interaction that interferes with that type of investment is devastating.

Though thats only part of that cards problem, the other part is that my top end threats (and his) soundly outperform a vanilla 7/7 for 7.

 

[Salmo2]

This has nothing to do with having a power max cube, Onderzeboot just barely has any instant speed removal that deals with this guy along with lacking other interactions outside of like wraths. In your cube it makes a bit more sense since it's a budget cube of sorts (that's what penny pincher is referring to, I'm assuming) but if you make a format that lowers power level, then more removal tends to be better because even in a low powered cube a vanilla 7/7 shouldn't be dealt with. In fact, formats with the most removal tend to be the best IMO since the shut-down or best creatures all have answers or possible ones. If the 7/7 sandwurm takes over in a format with a ton of removal, then it's the player's fault, but if I don't provide my players enough answers for that 7/7 then how should they be able to answer that vanilla creature as is? And yeah, there is obviously some good removal, but you shouldn't have a 7/7 vanilla running rampant.

Im not saying 'do everything the power max way' because that's not a good way to think, but there's no reason to be afraid of removal. Good removal is the hallmark of a good format, or rather it is almost always a key to some degree IMO.

 

[Salmo2]

shouldn't be hard to deal with* sorry I can't edit posts for some reason

 

[Onderzeeboot]

It's not a vanilla 7/7, it bypassing weenies has actual in-game impact, and as a 7/7 it's bigger than almost every other card in my cube. There's only two creatures that beat those stats. I mean, it's still a brick, but it's not nearly as useless as you make it out to be. Plus, double Necromancy in my cube We'll see though, it might very well turn out more underwhelming than I thought. I can always cut it later

 

[Salmo2]

I'm not saying it's useless, clearly it's a clock, I'm saying that having so few answers--especially efficient ones when you're selling double necromancy to bring it back-- is what's not great. Nor am I saying add path/swords/etc., but I imagine that the lack of removal plays a strong part in how good a creature like Sandwurm should perform.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

I'm not saying it's useless, clearly it's a clock, I'm saying that having so few answers--especially efficient ones when you're selling double necromancy to bring it back-- is what's not great. Nor am I saying add path/swords/etc., but I imagine that the lack of removal plays a strong part in how good a creature like Sandwurm should perform.

There's, like, 10 answers in mono white alone, not counting enchantment removal for the Necromancy. Ok, it's the color with the most answers, but there's some hidden in the multicolor section as well, which is much larger than in regular cubes. Also, overloading on removal isn't something I'm very fond of. I tried that, and I like the current setup much better. Games are back and forth affairs, there seems to be enough removal to change board states, but also not enough where creature combat isn't a common way to die for a creature anymore.

 

[Salmo2]

I have a hard time counting conditional removal and wraths as the answers you need since you can't just fire one of those off without either meeting a clause or running into awkward situations you shouldn't have to, and if that's the color with the most answers then that explains a lot. Like, if I'm holding blessed alliance and wurm and a couple bros attack, then I don't actually have removal there. And it's not impressive to spend a wrath to deal with a sandwurm, especially since you will inherently fall into card disadvantage scenarios with those routes.

I guess it's tough to move forward arguing experiences, so cheers and happy cubing.

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

In fact, formats with the most removal tend to be the best IMO since the shut-down or best creatures all have answers or possible ones.

This seems to be a slightly different topic, more related to density of removal than quality of removal.

I do agree, however, that removal should be proportional to the threats it has to answer: which is why power max formats naturally run the most efficient removal spells, and lower power formats always can afford to reduce the efficiency of their removal.

That being said, I have no idea how proportional his threats are to his removal, as I've never played the format. His threats seem to be stronger on average than mine though, at a glance, and he runs more--less conditioned sweepers--so I'm assuming a higher powered format than mine across the board, but their might be a removal issue.

At any rate, the wurm is a weird suggestion to a dude that just said he's down with running avenger of zendikar.

 

[Salmo2]

They're not really that separate, mainly because Onderzeboot both lacks removal and the removal he has is overall low-quality in contrast to his threats.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

I have a hard time counting conditional removal and wraths as the answers you need since you can't just fire one of those off without either meeting a clause or running into awkward situations you shouldn't have to, and if that's the color with the most answers then that explains a lot. Like, if I'm holding blessed alliance and wurm and a couple bros attack, then I don't actually have removal there. And it's not impressive to spend a wrath to deal with a sandwurm, especially since you will inherently fall into card disadvantage scenarios with those routes.

I guess it's tough to move forward arguing experiences, so cheers and happy cubing.

Switch the removal spells in those two scenario's and you've got the perfect answer in hand, but yeah, we're pretty much living in different worlds as far as our cubes go. Thanks for the input anyway. I've never had a complaint before about a lack of removal, but I'll ask my drafters next time. I know I recently drafted a deck that lacked removal, but I distinctly remember passing good (well, in my cube anyway) removal for threats, when I should probably have valued removal higher considering the density of both in my cube.

I'ld be interested in your feedback on the two winning decklists from last session: http://www.cubetutor.com/cubeblog/67469

The winning decklists respectively run 5 and 7 creature removal spells of some sort. The first deck is a Naya aggro list, the second an Esper control build. I never had the feeling these decks didn't have enough removal, so I wonder, do they run enough in your eyes? I love that two completely different archetypes won those back to back drafts, and knowing that the archetypes that arose last time were super close to what I envisioned and that the players highly enjoyed their games, I'm hesitant to change the fabric of my cube too drastically. That approach might lock me into some suboptimal choices though, so some outside input from a different vantage point is appreciated!

 

[Salmo2]

I'd like to see the removal suites for 1-2 color decks instead. 3+ color decks *should* have good removal--you're splashing often for removal and bombs in all limited formats, and if your three color decks can't scrape enough together then that's not great. The first deck looks a lot better than the second one, though neither are necessarily bad.

Also, you have to look at why the decks that lose, lose. Are they losing because of poor play? Deck choice? Selections of cards available? This is generally more important then why the best decks win, unless the best decks is always a specific deck.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

I'd like to see the removal suites for 1-2 color decks instead. 3+ color decks *should* have good removal--you're splashing often for removal and bombs in all limited formats, and if your three color decks can't scrape enough together then that's not great. The first deck looks a lot better than the second one, though neither are necessarily bad.

Also, you have to look at why the decks that lose, lose. Are they losing because of poor play? Deck choice? Selections of cards available? This is generally more important then why the best decks win, unless the best decks is always a specific deck.

Thanks for the feedback! I have only done three drafts with this specific cube, but I like the range in performing decks so far. The first draft was won by a Grixis spells matter deck. Among the runner ups were a GW +1/+1 counters deck, and Temur Midrange deck with some nice graveyard synergies. Also, the format is specifically geared towards 3+ color decks, so that may make the lower removal count less noticeable. That would explain why noone ever complained about the issue. Looking at why the worst decks lose is good advise, I've never done that after any of my drafts. Definitely something I should remember to do next time around.

PS That Mindslaver should be cut from my cube. It did stone cold nothing in the deck.

 

[japahn]

The Dark is the only expansion that has no representation in my cube. I'm considering adding something just for the sake of completing it.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

The The Dark version of Elves of Deep Shadow has gorgeous art.

 

[Salmo2]

Felwar Stone isnt bad but if you don't play 2 mana rocks I prob wouldn't play stone. Those tend to all generically play the same i.e. providing ramp to non-green decks and minimizing green's impact in that regard. A few don't break the bank, but they exponentially get more noticeable.

Maze of Ith is very much an unfun card. Some people also think it sucks, I don't personally but against some strategies it does. It's a card that either shuts down your opponent or feels like a wasted card, tends to be closer to the former than the latter.

Magus of the Moon is probably better in limited/cube than Blood Moon, as Blood Moon is mostly famine until you feast hard. I've definitely seen decks that would fold to Blood Moon, but most other decks are running 5-10 basics. At least Magus can attack, which is better even if its more fragile since Blood Moon effects are feast or famine.

Ashes to Ashes was great in Pauper, but Pauper is grindy. If your format is grindy enough and slow enough to want that AND not get punished by the 5 life it's good, but there's probably plenty of better black removal that won't dome you for a quarter of your life.

Elves tend to always be good. Deep Shadow proves the life barely matters, and even Boreal Druid proves the color doesn't matter. It's probably the safest to add unless you don't run elves.

Ball Lightning is OK, but I'd rather run something like the 3/3 wither haste that's gruul hybrid and just make that work instead. It's fine if you need a curve topper and plays better than Im giving it credit for, but it really only fits in one deck and is useless outside of it.