General CBS

[safra]

I think party is interesting for several reasons. One is that it is actually four different creature types instead of one. And it is classes instead of races which is also a bit different from what we are use to. This has no actual implications in Magic but it does create a situation where you can have a Human Rogue and a Faerie Wizard be part of the same tribal. It feels a bit like a collector items because you want one of each type. Or as many different ones as you can get. Finally I enjoy that all colors have equal good access to the tribal so I have chosen for it to be the tribal of the cube. I also have a minor subtheme of Dragons but they only have three payoff cards.

1 - 2 - 3

Downside of party is that the payoff cards are not very powerful and there are not so many of them. I am thinking about doing something about that with custom cards.

I do not think it is a challenge to keep track of how many members each player has of the party. It’s on par with tracking delirium I would say. Maybe a bit more than simply counting the number of Elves of Merfolks on the battlefield. But not enough to stop me from doing the tribal I find most interesting and who also happen to be spot on flavor wise for a D&D flavored rogue-like, deck-builder cube.

You're missing some dragon synergy pieces! At a variety of power levels (and for both players), there's:

--------
I found Party to be finicky and difficult in retail draft and almost totally unreliable in Standard, where it existed mostly in a UW angels deck with Linvala, Shield of Sea Gate and Angel of Unity. Despite being full of clerics, getting to slam the tribal payoff warriors, undercosted removal that I remember being solid in standard, neither the UW angels party deck (anchored in clerics and warriors) or the grindier RB deck (anchored around Rogues and Wizards) ever seemed to 'get there'.

Given that you say that in your cube the payoff cards aren't powerful, I don't think Party has any chance of being a real thing players care about. I think custom cards are a way to fix this, as you say, but I don't think the issue with Party is the bookkeeping - as you say, both players can just stop and count - but that the mediocre reward isn't even worth the minimal bookkeeping. good luck solving this![/c]

 

[TrainmasterGT]

Now we have a few (good) Charming creatures, what with Charming Prince, "Charming" Channeler, "Charming" Bloodmage and Charming Scoundrel, wondering what's on the wishlist for a green CMC2 or 3 creature with "ETB: Charm".

I'd rather they just complete the cycle of five 2 mana creatures with Charming in the name. I don't think Aether Channeler or Callous Bloodmage are worthy successors to Charming Prince.

 

[MilesOfficial]

You're missing some dragon synergy pieces! At a variety of power levels (and for both players), there's:

I have wanted to get Dragon tribal going in my Cube as a small sub-theme that only takes up 2-3 slots (plus substituting a few roughly equal cards in to up the density of the creature type). It all started when Boneyard Scourge was printed in the 2017 Commander decks, and seemed like a super fun recursive threat that wasn't wholly embarrassing on its own. Creatures have gotten more powerful since then, and I would have a rough time justifying it now even if I did go for it, but Rivaz of the Claw is exactly the kind of single-card build-around I love so there's a part of me that wants to jam my Rakdos Looting decks with the Timmy-est of creature types.

Some other dragon cards that contribute to the theme you might have overlooked that are a little less explicit include:



A respectable and forgotten bear that helps ramp them out earlier (and can be recast easily for more shenanigans with Rivaz).



ETB wipes the board of non-dragons, usually. (This one's currently in my list!)



A marginal playable already that's been in and out of my cube a few times that works well in the big red style decks that this theme is naturally suited for already.



A double-striking 3-drop dragon that fills up your graveyard the second time you cast it (or if you cast it from there with Rivaz! Another one that's already in my list)


Yet another dragon that works well in big red lists that's already proven itself in my cube!


I've tried this out and no one except me was ever willing to make it work, so I get that it might be too much to ask, but I adore this dragon as well.


Love this card, but unwilling to add venture into my cube for just one card (or at all for that matter). It was neat in draft and standard though.


This is a surprisingly useful, especially with the rate of humans in my list. Didn't stick around too long from the competition, but not one to ignore in lower power levels.


Just a neat card that happens to be a dragon. Annoying background text though.

A last point though, Sylvia Brightspear is so frustrating for me because even though its extra text basically says "draw a card", the additive distraction isn't worth it for me. Maybe I'll try it out some day with a sticker because it's one of those one-card-archetype-enablers that I adore.

 

[Aston]

I'm sure we had a thread a while ago about a "berserker" archetype with ways to make high power creatures and then push them through, am I misremembering the name or just making it up completely? I've not had any luck searching for it.

 

[Brad]

On the topic of dragons, I had an idea to make a cube that's like Kaalia vs ???. It would pack some sweet angels, demons, and dragons as mid-top end in W, B, R. The issue is that I'm not sure what blue and green are doing and I'm also not sure how the creature types matter other than Kaalia likes them.

Maybe someone can expand on that.

@Aston It's definitely called berserkers, but I don't have a link or any more info.

 

[blacksmithy]

I'm sure we had a thread a while ago about a "berserker" archetype with ways to make high power creatures and then push them through, am I misremembering the name or just making it up completely? I've not had any luck searching for it.

try safras cube blogs, she runs it sometimes and had the most success with it

 

[StrionicAdventurer]

On the topic of dragons, I had an idea to make a cube that's like Kaalia vs ???. It would pack some sweet angels, demons, and dragons as mid-top end in W, B, R. The issue is that I'm not sure what blue and green are doing and I'm also not sure how the creature types matter other than Kaalia likes them.

Maybe someone can expand on that.

@Aston It's definitely called berserkers, but I don't have a link or any more info.

Sounds like a great matchup against

 

[Brad]

Sounds like a great matchup against

GU color identity, but that's a blue card right there. Those creature types are so blue.

 

[Seeker]

There's also

same colors same list

They just kind of shrug when it comes to "giant sea thing" being a little green for Kiora's sake.

 

[Mown]

The green part is actually casting them.

 

[Karshtakavaar]

To add to the Dragon discussion (Though not really incredibly tribal)

Scourge of Nel Toth
I've tried this out and no one except me was ever willing to make it work, so I get that it might be too much to ask, but I adore this dragon as well.

I play him with Gravecrawler and other recursive Zombies (Like Bladewing's Thrall *wink*) and they are the best of friends.
No seriously the card's actually okay.

 

[Seeker]

The green part is actually casting them.

you did my little lad Kraken Hatchling dirty

also, speaking of, there's the funny Arena Kiora:

which is totally fine if you carry a stack of the little turds

 

[blacksmithy]

that kiora is in fact funny and pretty good in standard-ish power levels. make 8/8 smash rawr

 

[TrainmasterGT]

I found The Gay Girls Cube the other day, and I love it! It has such a nice aesthetic. Here are a couple of example packs:

Spoiler: packs

I never put too much thought into building aesthetics-oriented Cubes before, but this environment has shown me that it might be an interesting possibility. What do you all think?

 

[gaytransmulldrifter]

I've kicked around a few ideas for aesthetically-curated cubes here and there, and I think it's a lot of fun to flip your usual card choice process on it's head. Feels weird and cool to look at the art first before you even begin to look at the textbox or the stats, and it is immensely satisfying to look at the visual spoiler on cube cobra for a cube that's curated for art and aesthetics (just look at all these cute fuckin guys). The absurd amount of art tags on Scryfall also helps a lot for working on these kinds of cubes.

Two of the biggest issues I've run into while trying to work on stuff like this:
-Balance: When you're aiming for aesthetic choices above everything else, it becomes very difficult to balance your card pool. Often times I'll look at a card for that pets cube and be like omg its perfect look at this sweet little man but the card just sucks shit on rate and it would be hard to justify putting it in any cube. And the opposite, cards that have perfect aesthetics, but are just way outside the range of what the rest of the cube is doing. I think you can solve this by introducing tons of customs and modifications to make the cards more in line with each other, but that's a lot of work and does somewhat dampen the spirit of trying to curate a list of real cards that fit in an aesthetic box.

-Narrow cards: A lot of aesthetically perfect cards just won't work without the proper support. I think this can be alleviated somewhat with (again) customs, and also maybe allowing the cards to guide you toward specific themes, but there's always going to be stuff that FEELS perfect but just won't work.

I think your best bet for actually producing a functional cube out of a concept like this is to try to keep your theme as broad as possible, so that you have a wider card pool to work with. I would definitely love to see more folks pursuing these ideas!

And of course I love the Gay Cube

 

[TrainmasterGT]

I've kicked around a few ideas for aesthetically-curated cubes here and there, and I think it's a lot of fun to flip your usual card choice process on it's head. Feels weird and cool to look at the art first before you even begin to look at the textbox or the stats, and it is immensely satisfying to look at the visual spoiler on cube cobra for a cube that's curated for art and aesthetics (just look at all these cute fuckin guys). The absurd amount of art tags on Scryfall also helps a lot for working on these kinds of cubes.

Two of the biggest issues I've run into while trying to work on stuff like this:
-Balance: When you're aiming for aesthetic choices above everything else, it becomes very difficult to balance your card pool. Often times I'll look at a card for that pets cube and be like omg its perfect look at this sweet little man but the card just sucks shit on rate and it would be hard to justify putting it in any cube. And the opposite, cards that have perfect aesthetics, but are just way outside the range of what the rest of the cube is doing. I think you can solve this by introducing tons of customs and modifications to make the cards more in line with each other, but that's a lot of work and does somewhat dampen the spirit of trying to curate a list of real cards that fit in an aesthetic box.

-Narrow cards: A lot of aesthetically perfect cards just won't work without the proper support. I think this can be alleviated somewhat with (again) customs, and also maybe allowing the cards to guide you toward specific themes, but there's always going to be stuff that FEELS perfect but just won't work.

I think your best bet for actually producing a functional cube out of a concept like this is to try to keep your theme as broad as possible, so that you have a wider card pool to work with. I would definitely love to see more folks pursuing these ideas!

And of course I love the Gay Cube

I agree, I think if I were to build an art-curated Cube, the criteria for inclusion would be broader than "cute little guys" or even "cards which contain characters which could feasibly be Lesbians." I would probably just take the "cards with art I like" approach and maybe include some cards that fit into a broader theme that emerges from that. Not really sure what that would look like at this point in time.

 

[LadyMapi]

What do you all think?

I think it's a neat idea, though I'm probably the wrong person to give it a try (I'm a bit art-blind).

 

[Velrun]

[/c]

Thank you for the suggestions. I might try out Invasion of Tarkir on Level 2 which is quite late in the draft. It's too powerful to go in earlier I would say. The others are too much of a dragon-or-nothing kind of card which is not what I am looking for. The Dragon tribal is a subtheme with only very few payoff cards. And those payoff cards should work without dragons too. Right now I only have those three cards shown on the previous page and they all work without a Dragon. They just get better if you run Dragons.

The only Dragons I run in the start of the draft are the uncommon and common ones from D&D and Baldur's Gate. Examples:
Black Dragon, Young Blue Dragon & Young Red Dragon

 

[Humpty_Dumpty]

Now we have a few (good) Charming creatures, what with Charming Prince, "Charming" Channeler, "Charming" Bloodmage and Charming Scoundrel, wondering what's on the wishlist for a green CMC2 or 3 creature with "ETB: Charm".

Like yeah, we have Gala Greeters, Sentinel of Lost Lore and Tranquil Frillback, but none of them are quite the right templating for me to think of them as part of the pseudocycle.

Why don’t any of these idiots give me two choices from four when they enter the battlefield?

 

[Brad]

Why don’t any of these idiots give me two choices from four when they enter the battlefield?

Cryptic Commander 3UUU
Creature - Elemental Wizard
Flash
ETB: Cryptic Command
Evoke - 1UUU
6/6

New MH3 design. I was gonna make it super broken as fuck, but this actually seems reasonable. An upgrade to be sure, but it's not like Cryptic is what it used to be.

I do like "Command"er as an idea for a cycle. The imbalance of the Lorwyn Command cycle could be fixed by attaching bodies.

 

[LadyMapi]

Alternatively, something like...

Kayla's Commander -
Artifact Creature - Construct
When ~ enters the battlefield, choose one. Choose two instead if it was evoked.

• Put a +1/+1 counter on target creature you control. It gets double strike until end of turn.
• Search your library for a basic Plains card, reveal it, and put it into your hand. Then shuffle.
• You gain 2 life, then scry 2.

Evoke
2/2

With the idea being that the body is one of the modes.

 

[LadyMapi]

An absolutely stupid idea I just had, that I'm still thinking of the ramifications of:

Instead of "sacrifice [blank]" being "put [blank] into the graveyard", make it "donate [blank] to villain".

 

[Brad]

An absolutely stupid idea I just had,

Average Mapi post be like

 

[LadyMapi]

Look, I only have stupid ideas. I don't have much to post about otherwise.

 

[Velrun]

Cryptic Commander 3UUU
Creature - Elemental Wizard
Flash
ETB: Cryptic Command
Evoke - 1UUU
6/6

New MH3 design. I was gonna make it super broken as fuck, but this actually seems reasonable. An upgrade to be sure, but it's not like Cryptic is what it used to be.

I do like "Command"er as an idea for a cycle. The imbalance of the Lorwyn Command cycle could be fixed by attaching bodies.

This is what I hate most about the Modern Horizons products. Lazy design made to upgrade and therefore obsolete iconic designs simply to sell packs in a lore-free set. There’s nothing creative about these designs. And they add nothing to the game except power creep.