Erik's "The cool side of Magic" cube

TrainmasterGT

TrainmasterGT

Erik Twice said:
That's probably true. I just never got the payoffs I wanted in green, so I don't run them. Not sure if I'm missing out.
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Personally, I think more people should try enabling the delvelerium piles. The issue is that mono-green has all of the cracked enablers for the deck, but only two of the premium payoffs. That's not necessarily a problem, since most of the payoffs in other colors are still just fine in those contexts, but it does mean the Abundant Harvests, Commune with the Gods, and Winding Way type cards you have to run to enable the deck aren't always slotting into their primary function.

The thing with base Green is that it doesn't really have a lot going on other than ramping (there is some +1/+1 counters and tokens stuff that it can bleed into, but realistically speaking those decks will still play the ramp enablers), so having a second alternate way to build a mainly green deck is pretty useful. The graveyard stuff in green plays really well with the graveyard stuff in Blue and Black. You can use green's creature-based graveyard dump cantrips to help you find your Tasigur, the Golden Fangs, Gurmag Anglers, Tombstalkers and Ethereal Foragers and then cast those cards for their minimum mana cost. These decks tend to skew a little bit further into the support colors than a ramp deck does, but that reduces the burden of the green section when supporting multiple players at the table, so it ends up not being a big deal.

Most of the GY dump stuff also goes into Reanimator and can cross into URg spells pretty nicely. Tarmogoyf and the cantrips already work reasonably well with what a tempo//Prowess deck might be doing, so green can be a nice support color for that deck, too. You could throw in a Quandrix Apprentice if you're feeling extra spicy cultured.

I'm not necessarily sure how you would want to go about this in your Cube but I don't think it's particularly hard to do in general.
 
Erik Twice

Erik Twice

I've been making some additions for my BROs and, before I could even try them out, Nanonox went and tried them first! Here's what I did so far:

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Recomission is a very cool card. Unearth is good and versatile, bringing back artifacts is huge and even the +1/+1 counter has some neat synergies. I love it and repalced the filler slot I had with it.

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Anje's Ravager wasn't doing anything so I decided to try the new dragon. It can come back from the graveyard so it may also fit in discard decks and it's an artifact, so it might do something interesting. Mostly, it's a test. It may actually need to be Professional Face-breaker or something.
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Horde was a filler slot, though a versatile one. I'm going to try the Wurmlet now that green has more artifacts.
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I wonder if a 5 mana Crucible of Worlds is appealing to decks. It has a huge body which survives Wildfire, it can be ramped out and while inefficient, I kind of like it. I cut Duplicant which was a weak slot to try it. This leaves open the door for this:

>

I was a bit unhappy with Ramunap Excavator. Here's the thing. Between Crucible and Life from the Loam, there wasn't that much of a need for a third effect, particularly one on a weak creature that could die at any second. Now with Perennial Behemoth, I can try to cut it. Simian looks fun, it's an artifact, it's good in pod, wlder and other stuff so it's in.

>

There are not a lot of 2 mana equipment that is actually good. Mask of Memory was good, but narrow. Sword of the Animist does have a stat boost, but its effect felt awkard for an equipment. Transmogrant's Crown, however, feels a bit like a fair skullclamp so I decided to give it a whirl.
 
Erik Twice

Erik Twice

I feel I'm very close to finishing the cube (for now) but I have run out of obvious ways to improve it. I don't even have a clear goal for making it better. I guess I could add a colorless sacrifice outlet, change a card here and there, but I find myself blocked from further improvement.

The only idea I've had is to round out from 386 to 390 cards with some of those duplicate Vouchers Shamizy uses. Like this:



The main reason not to do it is that it's not necessary. I have enough slots that it doesn't matter.
 
Erik Twice

Erik Twice

I'm going to have more time than I thought so I'm going to do more changes.

>

First, I should have replaced Aether Searcher with Phyrexian Fleshgorger the moment it got spoiled. It's two slots in one. It's the keyword big reanimation target and also has some blink synergies. While Aether Searcher could be fun, it boiled do an extra 6/4 with too much regularity.

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I used to have an aggro grveyard deck in Dimir colours, but it disappeared when I cut Prized Amalgam. So why not bring it back? I took out Tezzeret, which does very little, and then got another artifact payoff in black with Imotekh the Stomrlord. Rankle just hasn't been doing much, I hoped he would promote tempo decks, but he hasn't. So this looks like a net positive. Also, Imotekh may also work as a bridge between graveyard and artifacts, interestingly enough.

It may be better to run Royal Warden, though.

I'm also going to try to boost Gruul with a Berserkers archetype, or at least see how much support I would need. Hence, I'm copying Inscho with:

 
Nanonox

Nanonox

I love Squandered Resources as a mana engine and I think it gives an interesting dimension to the lands deck. To really make it worth it though it takes a bunch of set up with extra land drops and recursion though.
A second Life from the Loam would be really perfect if you are also jamming the 2 creatures to trigger them repeatedly.

I also think you could maybe expand your Green non-creature section to make the Hydra and Champion less narrow.



These two would go great at both triggering them and making a Green spell aggro deck alongside Rancor and Reckless Charge that you already run. I'd also consider Lizard Blades if Reconfigure is a mechanic you want to try.
 
Erik Twice

Erik Twice

I am so happy with how the cube is turning out. Just a few changes and everything seems better and fresher. Yeah, I'll pay a pretty penny when I have to buy opaque sleeves, but it will be worth it. Anyways, I'm still a few cards slot from rounding up the cube. This is my current list of underperformers:



As you can imagine, some of these underperform more heavily than others. There's really nothing wrong with some of these, I just wonder if they could be better. On the other hand, Arcbound Ravager and Kodama of the West Tree aren't doing anything. By the way, Consider is just the second copy of the spell.

Ideally, I would like to boost the following themes:

Green-based aggro/monsters/stompy. I like the suggestions by Nanonox and I'm trying them out, but I need a few more. Supporting beating the opponent with larger creatures opens deckbuilding options than just drafting as many small creatures as you can.

Lands. I have some very cool pox-like decks come up and the recent additions have helped, but I could improve in that regard as well.

Earthcraft/Tokens. This deck comes together but would welcome some tightening. Kodama of the West Tree should become a piece of support for this deck, but I don't know what to turn it into.

Some decks, I've liked recently:
Golgari Aggro
https://cubecobra.com/cube/deck/63864d134915fb2bb85d8a89

Jund Pox
https://cubecobra.com/cube/deck/638649974915fb2bb85d6103

RG Berserkers (By Nanonox)
https://cubecobra.com/cube/deck/638165252e8871088fed764c

UG Artifacts (Also by Nanonox)
https://cubecobra.com/cube/deck/6381635c2e8871088fed52e3


By the way, Prized Amalgam has been a huge success. It has single-handedly signalled the return of some pretty cool decks and boosted others. Bring back a creature, get a 3/3 for free is a good deal!
 
inscho

inscho

Prized Amalgam is a lot of fun in a discard/recursion heavy environment. In my cube, I find that you often don't need to be able to hard cast it. I've been treating it almost like a pseudo colorless card. With less discard in your environment, it might prove to be a little narrow in the long run.

As far as big green bros:



Are good options. Investing more into discard pays off with green beatdown. For instance, I like the Mongrels and Rootwallas. I know the Mongrels didn't work out for you originally, and maybe you don't want to dig that deep into discard as some of the pieces are slightly narrow and aren't strong on their own. However, the Mongrels can be pretty clutch for pitching the Prized Amalgams, or a dredge bro like Golgari Grave-Troll to pump out a Hogaak, etc. I find them pretty indispensable to Golgari, Gruul, and to a lesser extent Simic. They are not particularly strong in Selesnya in my experience which is a big knock.

Regarding discard: I think you need to either go all in on it as a subtheme or very minimal with it as you currently are. The in between space where it's half-supported is almost definitely going to underwhelm...that's when cards like the mongrels underperform. So maybe it's not worth the infrastructure shake up? just things to think about



As far as Earthcraft/Tokens:


Lands:


Also think Entomb is worth running....gets Amalgam/Bloodghast into the yard early. Finds your Life from the Loam, etc etc etc
 
Erik Twice

Erik Twice

Thanks a lot Inscho.

I'm actually quite happy with where I am with discard synergies right now. I feel I'm often picking up Containment Construct to boost a graveyard or discard theme but it doesn't feel intrusive or wrong to do so. For me the key to Prized Amalgam is just that it's a 3/3 that can come back a couple times to beat down. It's certainly doing more than Tezzeret which was just 4-mana goodstuff I could happily do without.

I've considered many of the cards you mention but I'm scared of their power level. Titania is brutal on her own and easily unfair with Wildfire. Balance is busted and would put a heavy dent on aggro while Wrenn and Six can kill a very large number of the creatures in my cube. I'm also afraid Gaea's Cradle will be an autoinclude in every deck with creatures instead of a synergy pick. I mean, why not?

It's interesting because I used to have a higher power level than both you and Nanonox and now you are clearly a step beyond!
 
inscho

inscho

Makes sense, and I figured as much. I do think Pest Infestation would be a good/safe include for your environment fwiw.

Erik Twice said:
It's interesting because I used to have a higher power level than both you and Nanonox and now you are clearly a step beyond!
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Yeah, GCC v1 was reasonably high powered, but there wasn’t guild parity, and archetypes were more demarcated. I dropped the power level until I felt that each guild had equal complexity and intrigue, and archetypes blurred into one another.

I’d been slowly ramping up the power level for the past 3 or so years as new cards were printed and my cube theory evolved. For whatever disruption Funch’s brief presence here caused, they introduced some ideas that appealed to me, and that I felt I could apply in my own way to my cube. That was probably the first significant spike in power and it’s been on the uptick since.

I recently decided to mostly abandon the power limitation, optimize it the best I can, and plug in new cards to shore up design gaps as they come….I’ve always wanted to be at a higher power level. I guess the idea now is the more autopicks there are, the less automatic those picks become. It feels like there’s now enough high powered cards that are sympathetic to my design goals to where that’s possible (I’m sure Sam Black would disagree lol). It’s precarious, but also nice to finally have the dynamics I’ve been craving since I scrapped v1 and dropped the power level down. I also prefer the rush of opening packs with these splashier cards, it’s a stark contrast to the decision paralysis I felt opening lower powered GCC packs with 15 equally viable picks.
 
Erik Twice

Erik Twice

Since I was only a few cards away, I've deciced to just add a bunch of Earthcraft support and called it a day. Next time I have time, I'll see which cards I don't have and print out proxies for the rest. Let's give it a whirl.
 
Erik Twice

Erik Twice

Damn you Inscho! Now I'm thinking of stuff like this:



Danger, danger! The thing is that, for me, the ideal power level is something where my blink decks are good. They can do some cool stuff, but they are fair. If they start slipping, that would make the cube less fun for me.
 
Erik Twice

Erik Twice

It's just a shame, because all these cards (Except Flagstones) are just a hair more powerful than I'm comfortable with. If Balance were a bit more expensive, if Gaea's Cradle costed one mana to activate or Titania didn't return a fetch, they would all be fine. I would be happy to have them in my toolbox. But I fear they are going to overcentralize the metagame if I add them.

I just see the potential to bridge, say, Lands and control, or having Elvish Reclaimer fetch Cradle, which would be huge. But I'm not sure how I would compensate the rest of the cube. I also think I'll do this:

>

It's a two drop that ties into Earthcraft decks. Seems a far more useful card than Deeproot Champion.

This card also seems like a lot of fun, though I'm not sure I have a slot for it.


I'll have time over Christmas to work on the cube, so I may add some things here and there. I may wait for Phyrexia to come out, though.
 
Erik Twice

Erik Twice

I am so happy with my Earthcraft decks now. They have integrated themselves into other archetypes and now feel coherent as a theme. For example:

Naya Turbohumans
https://cubecobra.com/cube/deck/63b01404bee892509ff45afc

Anyways, I've been running the numbrs and I have both a small amount of cards I can tweak and I have a slight imbalance. I have slighty fewer red, white and blue decks and slighty more black ones. So I think boosting red-based control could help.

I've also thought of support Sneak Attack coupled with blink, perhaps that could work?



What do you think? Any other suggestions?
 
Erik Twice

Erik Twice

I decided to run this little package and it's fun!



And I'm happy with my cube! I made a couple cuts here and there, but it just feels consistant. I feel it's "finished" for now. Sure, I can try to improve it in many ways, but there aren't many things I would actually want to for now. So I'm going to print the proxies and try to get it to the table.

I have a new job so my life will change significantly in the next few months. "Finishing" the cube is one of the things I wanted to do before I started, kind of like finishing a project. That doesn't mean I won't be around or that I won't keep making changes but that I'm happy enough to actually play it and see how others enjoy it.
 
Nanonox

Nanonox

You once suggested this to me:



Combo, discard, cheat and is an enchantment to give redundancy to Sneak Attack. Might be worth a second look with rector!
 
Erik Twice

Erik Twice

The loss of deck names in Cube Cobra has been a huge hit, now I can't even check my own archetypes!

But I can come back a thousand years later to tinker with the cube a bit. First, some obvious replacements:

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I didn't notice at first, but the adventure in Questing Druid is an instant. That means it's even a slight upgrade over the middling Reckless Impulse. So there's no harm at all in replacing Reckless Impulse with it. Quirion Dryad is a fantastic design, which I could never run because its power level is too low for modern standards. Being able to "slot it in" at no real cost is nice. And it actually has some neat friends in the cube like Managorger Hydra and, perhaps, Tchotchke Elemental. So I can actually see it hitting the table and being useful.

Also, it's a human!

->

Reprieve is an automatic include, the question is what to cut. I think Fateful Absence is the closest card to cut. It's the narrowest, it's the same type and same cost. Perhaps Unexpectedly Absent is the better cut but let's roll with it for now.

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However, I don't want to run two copies of Remand. So the question becomes, what to replace the original "soft" counterspell? The most logical replacement is, of course, Memory Lapse. But it's a fairly nasty card so I think Miscalculation could be better. It has slighty more synergy thanks to the discard trigger and it's less oppressive so it's my choice for now.

What do you think? Do you prefer Memory Lapse?

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Some potential changes or additions:



This is an uncommon card: a blue one-drop I like. The green spell is meh but I do have a ton of counter stuff in my cube already, perhaps I can use it to create a new archetype? Either way, I could cut Consider, one of the wizards or what have you.



This could go in as a potential Rector target that doesn't take a "real" slot. However, I'm at odds at what I would cut. Perhaps Grief, Pox or what have you. I don't want to cut Go for the Throat because it's actually in the minority of my black removal spells.

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Green artifacts seems increasingly decent, I believe there's enough stuff to push for it. Besides what I run, you now have:



On a related note, there are more and more cards in my cube that use or benefit from +1/+1 counters but it's not a real archetype. It's just cards that happen to use the same mechanic. I looked into it back in the day, but perhaps it deserves a second look.
 
Nanonox

Nanonox

I think it's a nice counterpoint to the spell based combo decks you have. This creature version is less explosive and powerful than Brain Freeze + LED + Breach, but the mana generation is insane if left alone. You also have some solid card advantage spells to keep the cards flowing and a potential big kill with the Terror of the Peaks.

The downside is that a wrath will really mess you up, but you can take advantage of creature disruption like Thalia, Guardian of Thraben, Elite Spellbinder to work with your engine and mess with their plays.

Maybe a few extra of those like Ranger-Captain of Eos, Spell Queller, Magus of the Moon or Gaddok Teeg would help if you want to go down that route?
 
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