I also wanted to ask about stuff like distortion strike and reckless charge / anthems, people are playing more creature buffs now and I also was curious about how those felt to people drafting those colours that weren't trying to be aggressive. I assume those cards go late and are mainly only scooped up by aggro / delver / voltron decks.
General CBS
- Thread starter James Stevenson
- Start date
Chris Taylor
Contributor
Most more means "Going from zero of these cards to 1-2 of these cards".
Control still has plenty of options, since basically every white deck ever wants path/Oring etc.
One thing I've noticed is trying to give the pump spells a bit more utility as well: Reckless charge grants haste, distortion strike grants unblockable, etc. So the charge's power boost is strong for guys with double strike and prowress likes that strike has rebound, but sometimes strike just gets cast on vengevine to force through damage, or blade splicer gains haste off charge's flashback to seal the game.
they do tend to wheel for aggro decks, but so does compulsive research for control usually.
Just found my favorite magic art:
Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
Clearly you should run a wedges/shard cube like Jason proposed so you can just put them in mono color, because the hybrid cost matches the two guilds the main color is in!
Of course with the five guilds I've chosen (Orzhov, Dimir, Izzet, Gruul, and Selesnya) I can only run Daghatar the Adamant (blegh) and Shaman of the Great Hunt (sweet!), but, well, anyway...
Of course with the five guilds I've chosen (Orzhov, Dimir, Izzet, Gruul, and Selesnya) I can only run Daghatar the Adamant (blegh) and Shaman of the Great Hunt (sweet!), but, well, anyway...
Dom Harvey
Contributor
Thought experiment: how much P/T would a vanilla creature need to have to be playable at 3A? At 2AA? 1AAA?
my take
3 cmc: 4/4 - Loxodon Smiter is a fine man
1 cmc: 2/2 - Isamaru, Diregraf Ghoul, and Phantasmal Bear are all borderline cubeable
2 cmc: ?? - no one has ever clamoured for Watchwolf or Kalonian Tusker. not sure if some extreme p/t combination would be playable, like 1/5 or 5/1
3 cmc: 4/4 - Loxodon Smiter is a fine man
1 cmc: 2/2 - Isamaru, Diregraf Ghoul, and Phantasmal Bear are all borderline cubeable
2 cmc: ?? - no one has ever clamoured for Watchwolf or Kalonian Tusker. not sure if some extreme p/t combination would be playable, like 1/5 or 5/1
whoops, i totally misunderstood the question 
agree with Diakonov, 5/6 is a good starting point
edit: on second thought, maybe 6/6? Deadbridge Goliath didn't make any waves when he came out, and he was a guy with upside
agree with Diakonov, 5/6 is a good starting point
edit: on second thought, maybe 6/6? Deadbridge Goliath didn't make any waves when he came out, and he was a guy with upside
Laz
Developer
I use set classifications for my cube, so they are going into ( White U Blue )' , ( Green U Blue )' and ( White U Black )' respectively. Now I just need to pretend I have some elaborate equations to define how many cards I need in each set-space.
omfg everyone knows yasova is a 2 colour card jesus.
Taisgur should take up half a 3 and a 4 slot but I wouldn't cube it over half a ophiomancer and half a skinrender so you probably only want it in 450+
(can you believe these people still wont TRY double fetch?)
1CCC is a really hard card to design kitten, it's very hard to rationalize in a cube.
I really like when a card's french vanilla body is its special ability (like beating up every other drop on that spot in the curve and being hard to remove, being the biggest flyer for a couple turns, being a short clock) but that is so much less relevant in a cube full of bombs and accelerated plays unless you are being really intentional with your design.
I also think base power and toughness for being cubable is kinda scary because these monsters get hella big and become real hard question games where you win or you lose based on how prepared you are instead of having a nice time with a tempo/value accrual match.
Taisgur should take up half a 3 and a 4 slot but I wouldn't cube it over half a ophiomancer and half a skinrender so you probably only want it in 450+
(can you believe these people still wont TRY double fetch?)
1CCC is a really hard card to design kitten, it's very hard to rationalize in a cube.
I really like when a card's french vanilla body is its special ability (like beating up every other drop on that spot in the curve and being hard to remove, being the biggest flyer for a couple turns, being a short clock) but that is so much less relevant in a cube full of bombs and accelerated plays unless you are being really intentional with your design.
I also think base power and toughness for being cubable is kinda scary because these monsters get hella big and become real hard question games where you win or you lose based on how prepared you are instead of having a nice time with a tempo/value accrual match.
Hopefully Lurking Automaton will start mining some data about that question.
?????????
I just thought I'd bring cards that very closely resemble what you posted to the table to give an idea of viability, since they've all already been discussed to death. Aren't they an easier jumpoff point as something most have tried than theoretical cards that are minutely different? Thoctar is gold, of course, but it's literally what you posted.
I didn't mean to stop discussion, just give it another perspective. My bad.
I didn't mean to stop discussion, just give it another perspective. My bad.
Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
I run Woolly Thoctar, it's pretty efficient statwise.
Uh, ease off there, Lucas. Nobody is stopping any discussion. My advice to you would be to stop assuming everyone is out there to criticize or 'get' you; especially on the Interwebs, it might be prudent to grow a thicker skin.
4/4!
I run Loxodon Smiter, and I'd more than happily cube a
4/4!My skin is thick but it's also prickly. I've dealt with ribbing and being misdirected and now I give love bites back. All in good fun right? lol gander geese etc.
I dunno if you've been anywhere else on magic forums or stores and you have an idea ya realize people cannot wait to find a way to get a last word in, I think it's the incessant need to find their own "line" that many magic players have. Usually you put something out there and someone throws out a textless reference to 3 disqualifying examples and they are more or less just attempting to shut the door on the conversation without meaningfully engaging with it.
But of course I'm above that, so like a martial arts expert I used the maneuver's momentum and kept on rolling.
Yo, @Bootman, how often do people play thoctar? Thats my main gripe with those cards, I just don't find a lot of decks are excited to be in XYZ and it really only does one thing.
NP @Goldernpinapple I guess I'm just a slow learner or something. I didn't mean to snap at you, it's just I'm sorta #sassybynature and I couldn't think of anything but saying "yeah I know but I don't care" to the examples there. I guess it doesn't help that we all have vastly different ideas of what is cubable but in the discussion above we are talking about BS like 2CC 5/6 creatures so I assumed I wasn't gonna have to address concerns about obsoleting yeva lol.
@Eric you know you continue to have my utmost confidence. I will take your criticism of my "brusqueness" to heart. I would hate to become known as a churl!
So guys what do you think of my french vanilla alternatives and enormous idiot 3 drop. I was making green 3 drops recently because of the thread and this is one of my better ideas:
Creature - Elf
When NAME enters the battlefield or dies put a 1/1 green elf token onto the battlefield.
2/2
I dunno if you've been anywhere else on magic forums or stores and you have an idea ya realize people cannot wait to find a way to get a last word in, I think it's the incessant need to find their own "line" that many magic players have. Usually you put something out there and someone throws out a textless reference to 3 disqualifying examples and they are more or less just attempting to shut the door on the conversation without meaningfully engaging with it.
But of course I'm above that, so like a martial arts expert I used the maneuver's momentum and kept on rolling.
Yo, @Bootman, how often do people play thoctar? Thats my main gripe with those cards, I just don't find a lot of decks are excited to be in XYZ and it really only does one thing.
NP @Goldernpinapple I guess I'm just a slow learner or something. I didn't mean to snap at you, it's just I'm sorta #sassybynature and I couldn't think of anything but saying "yeah I know but I don't care" to the examples there. I guess it doesn't help that we all have vastly different ideas of what is cubable but in the discussion above we are talking about BS like 2CC 5/6 creatures so I assumed I wasn't gonna have to address concerns about obsoleting yeva lol.
@Eric you know you continue to have my utmost confidence. I will take your criticism of my "brusqueness" to heart. I would hate to become known as a churl!
So guys what do you think of my french vanilla alternatives and enormous idiot 3 drop. I was making green 3 drops recently because of the thread and this is one of my better ideas:
Creature - Elf
When NAME enters the battlefield or dies put a 1/1 green elf token onto the battlefield.
2/2
Creature - Elf
When NAME enters the battlefield or dies put a 1/1 green elf token onto the battlefield.
2/2
Love it, I'm going to see if I have any green 3's I don't like.
Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
It is plenty playable in my cybe, but my cube is a terrible comparison for your cubes I guess, because I went down the rabit hole and actually build that multicolor cube with 5 shards/wedges Jason wrote an article about some moons ago. If the nature of your cube is so that 3-color decks are well supported, and Naya comes together often, I would say run it. If two-color, or even mono-color decks are happening more often you'ld best stay away.
That said, 5/4 for 3 mana is really good in an aggro deck and puts tremendous pressure on your opponent. It also helps that my removal isn't as flexible as "regular" cubes. Oh, and I run 4 tri-color lands per shard/wedge (2 of them (at the moment) custom) in my 450 cube, so there's way more fixing that encourages you to play three colors than in regular cubes.
PS. Nice elf. I like little token-makers like that.
I dunno about that, man. He gets RELLY big. I would agree that the size starts to go up exponentially, though, so maybe that data wouldn't be super useful to consider four-drops.
Side question: has anyone messed around with customizing robots that affect the draft process?
Slightly-More-Impatient Automaton
CC: 4