"Fast" multiplayer cube

I don't know how your additions will play, but I can tell you one thing. I like all the cards you are adding but the only card you are cutting that I care about is Elixir Of Immortality.

Also, the world is better without Subile Epiphany.
 
I am not sure where I stand in regards to Elixir of Immortality.
I like how cheap it is, that it’s colorless and helps keep you alive. But at the same time, the recursion it offers is “messy”. You get everything back and have no selection. The decks that want the recursion the most in my experience are the combo decks who need a specific card. The Elixir is more tailored to control decks.

At the same time I drafted this combo-control deck











Where you use Displacer Kitten and cheap/free spells to blink Gyruda, milling everybody or casting Mishra's Bauble and Everflowing Chalice with Hullbreaker Horror. Then you can Brain Freeze the opponents easily for the win. Here, the Elixir would fit into the control plan with the life gain and would have been nice in case BF got milled since the Torrential Gearhulk is my only form of "recursion" for it.

How do you feel about

?

Free and colorless, but much more selective and can double as temporary GY hate.



I've also rediscovered a card I had forgotten about



I seem to be drawn to these value 4 mana Black deathtouchers, starting with Gonti, Lord of Luxury and then Vile Entomber. This one might be the right one though as it's easy on the mana, has that third point of toughness for better blocking and more importantly, introduces the Monarch mechanic which is a ton of fun.



My new favorite card Paradox Engine, continues to impress, even outside of Blue based combo decks.

Aristocratic Paradox











At first glance this looks like a typical BW aristocrat deck, and it certainly can play that way with sacrifice outlets, sacrifice payoffs, recursive creatures and spells. But when Paradox Engine enters the mix, it completely changes how explosive the deck can be.
Priest of Forgotten Gods is the all-star as it provides mana and card draw for each use of its ability. Combine that with Hallowed Spiritkeeper and an Unearth and you are off to the races.
You can also keep the cards coming with Loran of the Third Path or keep the fodder going by convoking Hogaak and sacrificing it repetitively.
This deck would be 100% viable without the Engine, but it would be less explosive/combo oriented.

If you already have Earthcraft support in your cube, I highly recommend adding Paradox Engine as further support and an enabler in it's own right.
 
Random cube optimization

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I have 3 Blue four drops that create artifact tokens, I can afford to be more diverse.

Urza is untouchable right now, but Whirler Rogue is a bit more generic. I like it less than Ethereal Investigator who creates more artifacts and potentially more flying tokens. You have to work for them, but not very hard and it changes how high you pick certain cards which is always good for the draft.

Sai’s ceiling is very high and offers some random sacrifice synergies. A 1/4 blocker is also very solid. I have more actual artifacts than ever before, so it seems like a good time to include it.

Sai UR tokens example:
https://cubecobra.com/cube/deck/63b782443dd4bf0f72704b46



I’d love some input on this one. Seems like a decent one mana ramp card, that lets you chain together some cards, provided you have a creature. Not sure it’s worth a cube slot.


Playgroup considerations

Taking an objective look at the cube, and I’m afraid that the artifact support in Black is too much for my drafters.

At the very least Imotekh the Stormlord has to go. It’s a good build around, but has a lot going on. Some is straightforward, some is more subtle and I 100% think they will just ignore the card in a pack.
Phyrexian Fleshgorger is also high up there on the cutting board as the only prototype card and therefore high in complexity cost.

Triarch Praetorian
Royal Warden
Necron Deathmark

The other three are both more tolerable and important. They up the artifact count and meld in with the GY theme already present in Black. Unearth is a great mechanic and the flash on the Deathmark sets it apart from Noxious Gearhulk.

As for replacements, I am eyeing a combination of these saboteur type cards that reward attacking.



I think Gix is a must as a card advantage engine and the incentive for others to attack each other is non negligible. Edric, Spymaster of Trest was good even though it wasn’t in the best color combination for the effect. I’ll probably sharpie out the activated ability as it’s a lot of text for a side use of the card.

After that, it’s close.
Both cards have played well in the past. Rankle has more utility as a discard or sacrifice outlet, but the Hordechief ends games. The off-color ability has proven itself in lategame scenarios before and the life gain is important especially if I add Gix.
Ultimately, Rankle’s versatility and keywords (I have very few flyers in Black!) make it a better fit.
 
I really like that Aristocrats Paradox deck! It has a bit of blink, too, which is fun.

Elixir of Immortality is a pet card of mine. I'm not sure if a fast multiplayer cube is the best place for it, but I do think it's better than Noxious Revival, which, for some reason, has always been dissapointing. Still, remember you can run this over any other trinket if you want to recur a single card:



I do think that Springleaf Drum is worth testing, it's a good card. I would add it to the cube and see if it works.

Gix is a huge addition and probably the best of the Edric, Spymaster of Trest clones. For the 4 mana slot, you really can run anything. Rankle is the most versatile, I cut mine because it was always "the second Yawghmoth", which was an issue at my size.
 
Your comment about Rankle, Erik, has me reevaluating a lot of cards. I don't necessarily want second best options for every slot. Some strategies need more redundancy, but some already have a critical mass.

Instead, I am coming back to some narrow combo cards, specifically mana producers and finishers.

Mana

Mana is usually the limiting factor for combo decks so I want to revisit some options.

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Kykar's ability of sacrificing spirits for mana anytime you cast a spell is the main reason he is being added. Kykar's also offers the fallback of having an army of spirits to alpha strike some clown across the table. It would also cement the spells token theme in Jeskai with Young Pyromancer, Monastery Mentor and Third Path Iconoclast. It isn't exactly needed in that deck since it all ready exists, but would make it more explicitly supported. I like to support convoluted decks as much as possible, but not everyone is in the mood after a week of work. So having an obvious drafting path isn't a bad option to have.

->

Harrow was cut to try some cards out, but the fact that it refunds 2/3 of the mana instantly makes it really good in combo decks. The land sacrifice is also useful in Green as it is easy to recur. If I ever decide there is enough +1/+1 counter support, [[Biophagus]] will be back as it's a great enabler and powerful by itself.



Dockside is easily the best mana producer among all the cards here. It's actually too absurd I think as a 2 mana ritual since it can be blinked and recurred for value. Even though it would be a good fit from a synergy perspective, I will not include it because of how easy it is to go off with it.



Similar to Kykar and potentially better because it is monocolored, cheaper, triggers off of anything and has a relevant backside to draw cards. It's also a MDFC with lots of text and complexity, which is why Kykar gets the nod.



I've been critical of the Artist's vulnerability in the past and I still think it's a big deal, however, I run some cards like Oracle of Mul Daya that are just as fragile and have a high upside too. Sure they get answered sometimes, but generally stay on the battlefield for a couple of turns.
What has me turned off the most is that it triggers with only instants and sorceries. Magecraft makes it more appealing now with Brain Freeze and Chatterstorm, but the fact that not all spells deck would play him is a sign it's likely too narrow.

Finishers

Finishers are hard to come by with multiple opponents. Right now in the cube, Thassa's Oracle, Brain Freeze and Professor Onyx are the main options. This has lead to some cool decks with unfortunately few or no win conditions, which isn't ideal.

->

By itself, Chatterstorm isn't very impressive in a MP format, but the Magecraft cards give it a big boost. Similarly, recursive cards like Regrowth, Yawgmoth's Will and especially Underworld Breach give you multiple casts to trigger Storm again.
I've been on the lookout for a cheap Green token maker and I think the cheap mana cost means that this will often be on rate (2 tokens) or better, making it playable outside of combo.

Speaking of combo, check out this deck I drafted











The tokens from Chatterstorm do so much here. They are mana with Gaea's Cradle, Earthcraft and Ashnod's Altar. They are also a win condition with Impact Tremors and Goblin Bombardment. Or they can simply be roadblocks until you are ready to go off with Underworld Breach or Paradox Engine.

->

Getting Memory Lapsed is miserable, but I still want a tempo counterspell. Remand #2 offers that and more importantly, you can bounce a Storm card to hand, keep the Storm triggers and cast it again!



Interested in one of these as a third and final Storm card. Grapeshot is probably too low impact, but I do like the cheap mana cost for recursion purposes. The 4 mana from Empty makes it hard to chain alongside Underworld Breach and company, even though the tokens would play well in Red decks in general. It might still be worthwhile and would open up some unique RG token combo decks.

One last card for this update

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I want a Blue tokens payoff and it turns out most of the tokens are artifacts in that color. The Overseer combines nicely with Signal Pest to give Blue go-wide decks more support. It's also perfectly playable elsewhere especially thanks to the new Reconfigure cards, Phyrexian Dragon Engine and the 40K cards.
The Goyf is ok and might come back, but I find it a little too prescriptive because it only cares about creatures in the GY.

If you have any suggestions and ideas for more Storm fun, I am always interested!
 
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MoM thoughts (I'll do MoM commander a bit later).

I haven't been super active with my cube this year, but there are some cool cards from the latest set that I wanted to mention in this thread so I don't forget them down the line.
I am not currently interested in adding Battles. Not only do I have no idea how to evaluate them, I also have no interest in additional wordy, double-sided complexity. Same thing with the Praetors. Might be good, wouldn't know for sure!



This is a strong card that could be an alternative to Flickerwisp. However, I don't think being easier to cast and having a bigger butt is enough to outclass the elemental. Flickerwisp being able to target any permanent is a big game. You can trigger landfall or reset a saga. The fun part is that you can also target your opponents stuff and clear a blocker or kill a token.
If not replacing Flickerwisp, I am playing it in addition to it? Not really, no. I like Restoration Angel better because of the flash and being an iconic creature at this point. The 3 drop slot in White is also already very crowded with diverse effects. I'd rather use this slot to promote diversity rather than play the Guardian which can be replaced by things like Ephemerate (of which I run 2 copies of).



I like Reclamation Sage type effects because I run some powerful artifacts and enchantments that I'd like to be answerable and I want to be impacting the board. Sunder the Gateway kind of does this by giving you a 2/2 if you invest more mana. This being a sorcery triggers Young Pyromancer and since you get an artifact, it also is useable by Goblin Welder. I am close to adding +1/+1 counters to the cube which would make incubator tokens great glue cards. Here, I am a bit bummed that it doesn't hit token artifacts since I have a few of those, but it's pretty minor. I've often thought that White could use more proactive instants and sorceries for cards like Leonin Lightscribe and this fits the bill!



A powerful wrath that comes with a win condition. 5 mana is quite a bit for wrath effects, but in my format, I want to give aggro breathing room to deploy. Being in MP games, the incubator token is likely to be huge, but I am not a fan of mass exiling everything. One way to give aggressive decks resiliency is by using stuff like Scrapheap Scrounger that can recur themselves. Removing that avenue is too hateful IMO, so I will likely pass on this.



What a card! 2/4 flying for 3 mana (single {U}) is already very good. Then making artifact tokens for each noncreature spell is exactly the type of open-ended card that I love. In this cube, you don't even need to be transforming the tokens into creatures for them to have utility, since they feed various artifact payoffs. I haven't decided if I want to be including double-sided tokens to the cube yet. If I do, it will be for this card.



Cheap, MP scaling, evasive mana sink that draws cards. Yes please! Appart from the art, this card is a perfect fit for my cube, and I'm excited to try it.



While I don't think I'll be playing the card just yet, I am keeping it in the back of my mind in case more legend matters cards come out. That's a sweet theme I would like to support if it comes together. Looting + mana sink is a good place to be for a 2 drop.



I like convoke and I like evasive threats. This is both of these things and it grants permanent evasion to some of your team. This would break a board stall wide open, which is always something that I am interested in for this cube. This time it's the board complexity of flying counters that are making me hesitate. Things get cluttered with 3 other players, and getting killed by a random dork with a bead to represent flying feels super bad. That said, I run Luminous Broodmoth and it hasn't been too bad so far.



A simpler Lethal Scheme that works with the GY no matter if you convoked it or not. If I wanted to push control a bit more than aggressive decks, I could see myself preferring Pile On to Lethal Scheme. As it stands, not a chance :p



This is the type of design I want to shy away from. No investment, no work, just cheat it out or cast it and get massive rewards. I only mention it because of how powerful it is, and as a player I would want to cast it. But I don't think it would lead to good gameplay, so let's remove the temptation.



There are some narrow effects that I would really like to cube with more. One of them are threaten effects, the other fling effects. Song-Mad Treachery and Kazzul's Fury were both very appealing, but ultimately, the opportunity cost of taking up a cube slot meant I never added them.
Voldaren Thrillseeker might be the Fling effect I've been looking for though! The floor is a 3/3 for 3 which is plenty serviceable. However, there is so much play to this card. Ignoring the activated ability, maybe you want to load up your Lizard Blades with counters (similar to Rishkar, Peema Renegade). Maybe your Ancient Stone Idol wants to say high to the opponent after you've cast Berserk on it.
Backup seems like a great mechanic with lots of interesting decisions. I'd like to find room for a few cards with it.



Cheap beater that fills the GY and has potential value. Hitting an open player is easier in MP games than in duels, so I expect this one to connect semi-regularly. Not a great topdeck later in the game, but the early game might be strong enough to carry it.



This card has me wanting to include a +1/+1 counter archetype into the cube. It's cheap, an enabler, a payoff and can even cycle if drawn too late. Combined with The Ozolith, Rishkar, Peema Renegade and various counters cards, this seems like the start of a powerful archetype. There is also Kami of Whispered Hopes (as an uncommon?!) in the set, which isn't what I want at 3 mana, but cool to have.



I love evasive value threats and this certainly fits the bill. It won't be difficult to snag a cheap removal spell from a GY, making this quite similar to Ertai Resurrected I suspect. However, the Flash and Stifle/Counterspell effects on Ertai put it a notch above the Fairy in my eyes.



This meshes together a lot of different themes which I really like. It does feel a little too easy though. Great offense and defense, great disruption and card advantage. The drawback can even be built into an advantage. This reminds me of Korvold, Fae-Cursed King as a beefy value attacker that is hard to block. Not sure why Korvold gets a pass and T&G don't, so I'd love opinions on this one.

Any that I missed? Would love to hear thoughts.
 
good writeup, the one card i didnt see that you might want to look at is the green cantrip with a picture of Teferi on it... i think?
it is pretty good as green cantrips go, probably somewhere in the neighborhood of Unbridled Growth for me.
 
it is pretty good as green cantrips go, probably somewhere in the neighborhood of Unbridled Growth for me.
I did miss it thank you!

I'm never really sure about these cantrips that can miss. Sure, most Green decks are permanent based, but the floor of mill 2 and gain 2 life scares me. I think I would rather include the Unbridled Growth you mentioned because of the reliability.

In the same vein, I cut Winding Way because whiffing on a cantrip just feels so bad. Though Seed of Hope also hitting artifacts, enchantments and planeswalkers makes it very hard to actually miss.
What is the maximum amount of non-permanents you have in your deck before you cut Seed of Hope?
 
MoM thoughts (I'll do MoM commander a bit later).

I haven't been super active with my cube this year, but there are some cool cards from the latest set that I wanted to mention in this thread so I don't forget them down the line.
I am not currently interested in adding Battles. Not only do I have no idea how to evaluate them, I also have no interest in additional wordy, double-sided complexity. Same thing with the Praetors. Might be good, wouldn't know for sure!
I think this card is actually busted:

I won every game where this flipped in Draft, even ones where I was behind or not in a position where I could quickly close the game otherwise. Turns out, a tormenting voice that also draws you a free 3/3 that lets you cast a discounted Heroic Reinforcements every turn is insanely pushed!

Also, I really think the high complexity level of these cards is being overstated. I think it takes a minute to understand them for the first time, but once you know what they do, they're easier to understand than things like the DFC sagas, Sparkers, and even the OG werewolves. Surprisingly, I think this set has some of the cleanest DFC executions of any set to use the technology as of yet. If you're hung up on complexity, I'd suggest playing these before making any judgments, they're honestly not bad at all!
 
If you're hung up on complexity, I'd suggest playing these before making any judgments, they're honestly not bad at all!

I believe you. However, I just don't think they accomplish much in my current iteration of cube. There are already a lot of cards that I am not including in the cube, I don't feel the need to introduce a new card type to get more cool build arounds or glue cards. So it's not just complexity, although...
I singled out 3 types of complexity I notice when drafting, to see where Battles land for me.

Single card complexity: Battles are a new dual-faced card type, making them decently complex. I am cubing with more complex cards, but those have the advantage of being more familiar for now.

Draft complexity: Here Battles don't add much complexity. My format is about trying to build a cohesive and synergistic deck and Battles fit in just like any other card.

Gameplay complexity: This is another place where I think Battles lose some points. MP boards are already complex with 3 opponents to be attacking while not dying. Adding more decisions to the board isn't necessarily great for gameplay I think.

Thinking about it more, I see Battles as gameplay build arounds. Which is a cool design space I haven't thought about before. You drop the Battle and then try to create scenarios where you can flip it without falling behind or sacrificing your board. Obviously the deck you draft influences what you can and cannot do during gameplay, but in a typical deck with creatures, flipping it should be within reach.

I think this card is actually busted:
407d6723-bf58-403e-b2ac-ba52c51d356f.jpg
Thanks for the review. The frontside is good enough that I could see myself cubing this Battle if I decide to add some.
 
I recently expanded my utility lands to include a second copy of Urza's Saga. I added Currency Converter as part of the Saga package and would like to add a few more enablers for it. I realize it's a self-contained game piece, but if I include a card in the cube, I like it to have different ways to utilize it.

Red and Blue have a lot of ways to discard cards, so I'm exploring other colors or colorless cards. Here are a few that I have my eye on, would love to hear opinions or other suggestions if you have any.



The Cookbook is cheap, free to activate and creates more artifacts. The recursion ability might be relevant, but not in many cases I would imagine. Welder decks and Reanimator decks seem like a prime targets for it, but I could see some White recursive decks using Serra Paragon and Sevinne's Reclamation for value. Or maybe using the extra artifacts for Arcbound Ravager.

It would replace Codex Shredder as a slightly different way to fill the GY and keep the density of 1 mana targets for the Saga.

Blood Fountain looks similar to the Cookbook as a cheap discard outlet that recurs creatures down the line. The discard aspect is a one shot deal, but in a long grindy game, it can be recurred with Emry, Lurker of the Loch, Lurrus of the Dream-Den and Serra Paragon among others. Bringing back 2 creatures is also a big game especially since the ability can be used at instant speed.

I am eyeing Mire Triton as a cut, because the deathtouch and 2 life is brutal for aggressive decks which need all the help they can get.

Voldaren Bloodcaster would be added with a custom sharpy edit to remove the backside and transformation text. The ability is really powerful as it is uncapped and even triggers off of itself. This adds yet another aggressive Black 2 drop (Blade of the Oni, Scrapheap Scrounger, Triarch Praetorian and the Blood Artist effects) which gives me pause. At the same time, aggro is often a game of density and having a lot of cheap threats is great for that.

Just like the above cut, Ophiomancer would be the swap as it's even worse against aggro than the Triton. I had it here as an Aristocrat plant, but in practice, slower decks just pick it up and gum up the board. It's also a 3 drop for a deck already saturated by 3 drops.



On another note, I'll be making a small swap

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Same P/T, same mana value and same recursion cost. The Champion only asks you to attack to trigger it (it can act as fodder itself) but cannot block. The Conscript can block which is huge IMO and only asks that a creature other than itself dies for you to go off with it. It can also be activated on the opponents end step which the Champion cannot. The Human type line means nothing in this cube which is traditionally a positive for the Champion.
 
Got together with some friends for a 3 player draft of my pre-pandemic cube:
https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/fnmp

It follows the spirit of my main cube by pushing a low curve and having synergy decks compete with good stuff decks. However, the card pool is mostly limited to Eldraine (late 2019) and before since that's when we stopped cubing a lot.

We played 3 free-for-all MP games, with these lists:

Pat (2 wins)










A solid control deck with cheap removal and great finishers. The finishers all felt answerable, but pushed the game towards its conclusion. Griselbrand was disappointing during the games, as Pat was always too low on life to use the card draw, so it was a 7/7 lifelink dork on defense.

Med (1 win)










Med had a super grindy deck, with lots of recursion which made it difficult to attack him and deal with his threats. With some more disciplined cuts down to 40 cards, I think his deck would have been amazing. He was missing some card draw (a Painful Truths or two) and was forced to rely on top decks more than Pat or me.

Me (0 wins)










My deck had it all! Broken equipment, reach, card draw and protection. So why didn't I win? I misplayed pretty badly a couple of times and lacked the killer instinct during the games to win with aggro. For example, there was a board stall and I had Winds of Abandon in hand to clear the way. But it was a cool game and I decided to try and win without cheesing everyone out. I'm not sure why I don't go for those types of plays if I chose to play aggro, but here we are!



Cool plays

I won't go into full game recaps, because it takes a lot of time. I will post some cool plays though!

Pat cast a Syr Konrad the Grim with Kess, Dissident Mage on the battlefield and a Living Death in the GY. Upon realizing the damage potential, we were going to team up with Med and take him out. before he could cast the Living Death. He then decides to cast a one mana Treasure Cruise exiling the problematic card and greatly diminishing his threat level. We still took 3 damage from Konrad, but that was fine.

I have a huge board and just need to untap to win. I can deal with any sort of attacks no problem. So Pat uses Ob Nixilis, the Fallen and domes me for 3. He then attacks with a Creeping Tar Pit for 3 and finishes me off with the draw option from Wretched Confluence for a total of 9 unblockable damage when I was at 8 life.

I cast Krenko, Tin Street Kingpin. Med says "Oh, I was afraid it was the good 4 mana Krenko!". On my turn, Showdown of the Skalds adds a +1/+1 counter, Skullclamp gives it +1/-1 and two Jitte activations add another +4/+4 for a total of 8 power and 8 goblins and obviously an attack towards Med. The three mana version isn't so bad after all!

Probably the biggest blunder of the night. I have a Winds of Abandon to clear the board and set up lethal with Throne of the God-Pharoah. I forgot about Felidar Retreat on Med's side of the board and instead of wiping his stuff, I ramp him and give him 6 landfall triggers. Doh!

I have the Monarchy thanks to a Palace Jailer which has one of Meds creatures under it. He negotiates with me to let him get the Monarch to deal with Pat. As soon as he gets to draw his bonus card he starts going off, running his mouth and trash talking everybody since he was now king. It was really fun to see and I should probably get a crown for the next draft night.



Gameplay

The games were fun with a lot of back and forth. Win or lose, each player had his moment to shine and threaten victory. The games were close too, with players ready to win within a turn of each other. All the early drops assured that life totals weren't too high in the late game, mitigating board stalls.
The amount of removal also felt right as not everything was removed on sight, meaning you had a chance to make some cool plays (like with Krenko), but you could also remove must kill things, like a Consecrated Sphinx.
I am super happy with how the cube felt and this reinforces that I am on the right track with my current design choices.



Synergy

This is a little less encouraging, because while our decks had pockets of synergy, they weren't the crazy beasts I had imagined. I can think of several explinations:
- Lack of familiarity with the environment. This is our first draft of this cube in a year or so.
- The cube we played is a watered-down version of my actual cube. I intentionally made it easier to navigate the draft by removing some build arounds.
- Player experience. We usually play my friend's power max cube which is more about drafting good cards than building a cohesive deck.

All that being said, one of the goals of the cube is to have synergy decks and good stuff decks both being viable. Med was a Blood Artist + Altar of Dementia away from being a grindy/combo Orzhov midrange deck. Pat had all the pieces for an artifact deck except the payoff. Finally, I had a little Blink package that I could have pushed harder during the draft.



Equipments

A lot of the aggro cards that I included certainly fit the archetype and are powerful enough to challenge the midrange/control decks. However, they tend to make the game resolve around them once they resolve.
I'm talking about some usual suspects



This was exacerbated by two factors:
1. I have less enchantment/artifact removal in this version of the cube. Missing Skyclave Apparition, Loran of the Third Path and Cathar Commando was definitely an issue.
2. I drafted 2 copies of Stoneforge Mystic. With how powerful the tutor targets are, I think I will go back to singleton in both cubes.

So I think they are still worthwhile includes, but the answers need to be there to make the games more interesting and dynamic. My opponents still found ways to pressure me and take the wins despite my overpowered equipment which was encouraging (MP formats are pretty forgiving in that regard). I am now looking for more artifact removal in Red with Embereth Shieldbreaker as a candidate among others. I want to avoid the Vandal Blasts of the world as that would be too much for the artifact deck to deal with.



Strong performers



The evasive body and steady card advantage made this a real threat, but not so much that you have to remove it. Chipping in for 3 damage a turn was perfect too.



These had a really good showing. The vigilance and flying are great abilities to have in addition to the rest of the card text. Med had an Altar of Dementia in the SB which would have taken these cards to the next level (infinite even with Animate Dead and the Titan).



An oppressive mechanic in 1vs1, but a really fun one for MP games. So much so, that I want to include more of it. I'm considering Court of Cunning and Fall from Favor as options. Not because Blue needs help drawing cards, but because the color could use more incentives to attack. The Initiative on the other hand still doesn't appeal to me because of the complexity.



The flexibility on this is definitely worth the mana cost. Pat usually removed 2 threats and recured a Snapcaster Mage or Baleful Strix for a ton of value. Then flashed it back with said Mage or Kess which was difficult to compete with. It never felt unfair though and the options allow the caster to feel smart which is a nice bonus.



Activation costs

It was very difficult to find the time and mana to equip a Bloodforged Battle-Axe or level up a Figure of Destiny. I was afraid of the blowout potential of spending mana and getting the card removed, so I prioritized adding to the board instead. I never ran out of cards and things to do which seems crazy to me in a Boros aggressive deck. On the other hand, Med with his BW midrange deck was lacking card draw and used Batterskull to great effect. Swinging in with 10/10 lifelinking Sun Titans or turning his dorky Cat tokens into threats.

I am using this draft as a data point that I may have included too many mana sinks for the aggressive decks and not enough for the slower ones. I am looking at some of the new Eldraine adventure cards to give incidental card draw in addition to a threat.

Thanks for reading!
 
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Deck showcase

Got to draft a wild one that showcases the new Lich-Knights' Conquest.











It's a 5 color mess that wants to bin as much of your deck as possible into the GY and then reanimate it with Lich-Knights' Conquest. From there, Anger and Terror of the Peaks provide a burst of damage.

As fodder, you rely on Samwise Gamgee and Lonis, Cryptozoologist to spam artifacts and the random Spirited Companion as an enchantment. That seems limited, but at the same time, Survival of the Fittest and Fauna Shaman are tutors for them. Jinnie Fay, Jetmir's Second adds another reward for creating these little artifacts. The blink package helps fill the board with said tokens, but also goes off with the Terror of the Peaks and acts as a value engine with Spirited Companion, Eternal Witness and Sun Titan.

What I am really happy about is the layers of synergy working together. You have ETB, GY, artifact and sacrifice synergies all woven together inside a coherent deck with explosive potential.



Another deck that I drafted with a bunch of synergies working together (CubeCobra didn't allow me to save the deck, so screenshot):

5 color Ascendancy.png

At it's base, this is a Paradox Engine/Jeskai Ascendancy deck that uses Earthcraft and artifacts for it's mana. Emry + Bauble is infinite storm for Chatterstorm or Thopter tokens (Sai, Master Thopterist). You can also win the fair game by chaining non-creature token makers and having Balmor + Ascendancy buff them for a lot of damage.

I don't remember where I read it, but someone said "the worst cards in your cube should be the best cards for certain decks", which I think makes sense. Chatterstorm is a perfect example here as a very narrow combo payoff, but in shells like this, it's a win condition, an enabler for Earthcraft/Springleaf Drum and a payoff for Ascendancy/Balmor.

I like that these wacky decks can exist and cohabit with more tame versions of an UB control deck with some artifact synergies (https://cubecobra.com/cube/deck/46849aa7-3204-4287-94f2-7df36c357439).



WOE includes

This cube is very heavily artifact-centric and I don't have the room for enchantment matters cards. For that reason, I won't be considering the Role mechanic although they seem really amazing as support for that theme. I am including a lot of cards and omitting some very cool ones. Space is tight even at 450 and this set is making me consider going up to 540.

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I think the Conquest is a fantastic build around. The payoff is huge and there isn't a single clear way to draft it. I am trying it instead of Incarnation Technique which has also been good. I will miss the self-mill and self-contained engine that the Technique provides, but the Conquest asks a little more of you for a higher ceiling. Meshing artifacts, tokens, sacrifice and GY into one card is perfect for my themes.

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Two things sell me on the Search: The instant speed and the self-mill potential. I've often found that Black is lacking a bit at filling the GY and being able to mill/surveil 4 is perfect. I'll be trying it instead of Painful Truths a card that I love. On average, it's a step down in power level, but a step up for synergy and play patterns.

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Not super excited about the King, not super down on it either. Ophiomancer is too good at stalling the board, but I want to keep some token fodder. The GY disruption is welcome, but I don't see Lord Skitter staying very long in the cube.

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I am excited for the Cookie! 2 artifacts and a mana sink to pump your random tokens without committing to the board is perfect. I recently added Academy Manufactor as a Green artifact payoff, so this fits right in.
Jolrael was ok, but I was lacking a bit of draw outside of Red and Blue. I would need some more mono Green card draw like Abundant Growth to make it a non-Temur card. Back to the Maybeboard for now, but I do think she will be back.

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2 scalable flyers to chose from. I like the early game board presence of the Goose and random artifact synergies more than the late game draw + counterspell resilience of the Krasis. The floor being a 3/3 flyer + food for 3 is very good!

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I am really enjoying all of this incidental GY hate and the Food is also welcome. The 4/4 body is bigger than most creature lands too. Losing an untapped dual isn't ideal, but there are plenty of opportunities to squeeze them without taking too big of a tempo loss.
I've found my players shying away from the Horizon lands because of the life loss, even in synergistic decks. Not saying it's right, but if they don't get played, might as well maximize the slot!

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Big evasive beater that can disrupt blocks or enhance attacks.

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Swapping out a replaceable one drop with a potentially hard hitting Cookie with cool artifact synergies. The Pest was there as a way to boost Blue token decks that often can go wide, but have few payoffs for doing so. With the addition of Jeskai Ascendancy to go along with Paradox Engine, I think that Steel Overseer will be more inline with my go-wide needs. That's a cut for another day though.

That's it for now. There are a lot of other cards I am debating, I'll make another post talking about them.
 
I had Temples and Bouncelands among the first iterations of my cube back in 2013. The idea was to offer card advantage and draw smoothing for MP games where mana screw is a death sentence and watching others play for another because you couldn't play MTG sucks. It was good but there were two big problems:
1. Too many tapped duals
2. Not enough fetchable duals

Enter Surveil duals. These are more powerful than Temples, keeping the draw smoothing and enabling GY synergies. With Bouncelands, the whole package becomes an option again because Surveil duals are fetchable and I run a lot more fixing than before, keeping the amount of untapped duals high. Each color pair's fixing now looks like:



To achieve this, I dropped the Triomes and creature lands all of which were already tapped. It's definitely a blow to aggressive decks who could use the "free" mana sink and threat late game so I'll have to keep that in mind with some swaps. It's also a blow to decks splashing left, right and center, but there is still a decent amount of fixing, you just have to be more aware of what you are doing.

The fun part is this opens up a bunch of strategies that weren't as viable as before. Here are some adds I think would be a good fit:



Easy ways to produce a lot of mana. There wasn't the density of worthwhile lands to untap before, but now untapping Bouncelands is great, but you also have Lotus Field, Urza's Saga, Tolarian Academy and Gaea's Cradle as even more busted options.



White catchup ramp gets even better now that you can return lands to hand.



In addition to triggering Landfall again, you can now play some MDFCs early and bounce them late giving you more gas than before. The issue here is that these are more tapped lands, which isn't great for aggro.

This update implies a huge overall of the cube, but I think it will be for the better. I'll be trying to post updates when I have some significant insights.
 
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