This is a testing/includes thread. Post pictures using /ci or a text list using /c with what cards you plan to include and what cards you plan to test.
Main Cube:
Excited to Test:
(Secret Project):
Including
There is not as much here that immediately jumps out at me as I had hoped, which is unfortunate. I definitely think I am more cautious towards many of these cards since the Universes Beyond frame is so unappealing. As such, I'm mostly having to go with cards which have an alternate art treatment. I am very happy that the frame for all future UB cards is going to be the standard M15 frame going forwards.
Otherwise, I have noticed I tend to be too down on sets before they actually come out– primarily because it's not actually obvious during spoiler season which cards are going to be cool or fun. As such, my initial testing list is shorter than usual, but I think at least one or two of these has a chance.
I still don't have ink eyes nephilim yet. If i find one of those locally before Nu-Lorwyn comes out, then i might be willing to look at flightless birds, engorged cacti, and things that involve the number 9999.
However, what i DO have time for, is advertisements for Cup Noodle. " Lordy-hosephat," as my cousin once explained, " just put the noodles into face until smiles come out! "
Bruised shoulder? Put a noodle on it.
Who are these three boys? Why are they so upset?
Look more closely. None of them have noodles.
Is this final fantasy or is this los angeles?
No one cares. Eat noodles.
Are you covered in sweat, sutures, and stab wounds?
Just cover it with noodles and it'll buff right out.
Magic presents, final fantasy presents,
a cup of forever-plastics for ANY trash vortex you can imagine,
whether that be in the pacific ocean, or in your heart.
I don't have any slam dunks, but some cards are strong contenders. Posting in order of preference.
Love the possibilities here, especially with Agatha's Soul Cauldron making great use of the mana ability. Might be time to shelf Rielle, the Everwise as I cannot find a cut.
A decent rate for a hasty beater with the option of card advantage and 9 mana over 4 turns if it lives. High upside and decent floor makes me want to try. Might have to reconsider Elemental Eruption or Stormscale Scion if we have more ritual effects like this!
I could see this playing well. Hating on one card per turn is going to slow down the GY decks but not shut them down completely and you can always fill your own so you don't depend on what opponent is doing. Triggering on end step is a big plus!
Surveiling for each artifact (token or not!) has a lot of potential and the Raise Dead effect is nice gravy.
Has the potential to be a viable cheat option in Green. Sad it doesn't work in the same decks as Oath of Druids.
Kind of just want to cast it off Teferi, Time Raveler and Time Walk the opponent. Cute interaction aside, this will help go against aristocrats and clean up against the artifact deck.
The idea of casting a Frantic Search or Sevinne's Reclamation to get back impactful 3 drops is sweet. Would give a lot of staying power to Azorius creature decks. The fact that you need matching creatures to the spell's mana value might make this too fiddly to work in practice.
I like the potential here, since I have decks that can abuse it with Second Sunrise or Aftermath Analyst. Even without Bristly Bill pumping her stats, a simple fetch makes it 4 power.
I'm on the lookout for playing lands off the top of the library, but don't love the options. This one doubling landfall triggers can get out of hand quickly and has my attention. Shame the Bird text is there, it's a distraction for my cube.
Uncapped landfall triggers always has my attention. This lets you dig hard for your engines and might be useful with Urza's Saga once in a while.
Potential Persist combo enabler, but also a solid anthem/beater on its own.
For my lower power cube, one of my guiding principal was no UB sets. I dislike the frame and often the art. This set however kind of changes that and there are some perfect designs that I would love to include and I like a lot of the art being a FF fan.
Am I a man with zero will power or one with an iron resolve?
The Chocobocards would fit nicely, unclear if I want to support them for now.
Creature summons
These are really cool. They open up ways to interact with enchantments, up their density and have cool effects. Most Summons are much better defenders than attackers (since they usually only have an attack or two before dying). This means that adding a bunch of them would handicap aggro, so need to be careful.
A mini anthem attached to a decent body.
One of my favorite cards from the set. I love casting many spells and this rewards you in a unique way. It's probably close to Murmuration that already run though, so might not be necessary.
Love this as a Saga payoff. It comes down cheap and let's you keep attacking with your creatures or get repeat value from chapters. Art is ... painful.
A playable Fork? The incentive is there for me to try and maximize future turns, seems fun.
Land ramp, counters and draw. Decent, but not super exciting.
Bounce theme
A bit on the wordy side, but combining artifacts, bounce, counters and spells into one card is quite the feat!
2/1 for 2 with sweet spell velocity trigger. Bouncing this is decent and there are multiple such effects in the set and stacking them is brutal! Really like the art too.
Spell velocity
Ignoring the Partner mechanic, Alisaie looks pretty good at enabling some nice turns. Cast her + Steel Overseer or something on turn 3 and you are off to the races. The snowball potential might be too high for this cube which has plenty of artifacts to cheat out.
Bird tribal is kind of a thing here with Murmuration doing a good job of buffing your team. Would even go in the same deck! Might be too good at staving off attacks though.
Decent rate and cool token. Love this one.
A more open-ended Guttersnipe with some defensive value.
Double strike + Prowess + spell reduction is a very exciting combination of keywords.
Bouncelands
I have a full set of bouncelands in this cube and the Adventure lands look like slam dunks
Cool cards
This is a cool take on Future Sight effects. It can block effectively the turn it ETBs, then you are incentivized to swing in for value.
Sweet clone effect to recur or use Good King Mog to make copies of tokens!
A cheap flyer with counters and artifact synergies is very nice. I like clues here as there is a real tempo cost to using them.
GY hate that doubles as a token maker seems like it should play well. Don't expect to get many counters, but a steady stream of 1/1s is plenty.
Gives counters and more importantly proliferates. Not interested in Persist combo shenanigans, but being able to proliferate a couple of times off some mana dorks is quite appealing.
A nice discard payoff in Boros. Doesn't need to attack itself to get some rummaging going.
I am strongly considering a Zombie theme and this would be a nice way to have it branch into White.
Some cards will play well, but they are kind of generic and I don't see the need to include them given I am not a fan of UB for this cube. Most of these are solid bread and butter effects.
On a final note, had to shout out this silly combo
I agree with this though find the gold cards less offensive. I think it is because the texture is more similar to old frame gold cards than modern frames.
I hadn’t seen this one yet. Oh man, I love it! I’m working on a cube revision that brings wildfire back and this is so good in that archetype in addition to all the self-mill shenanigans. You can Oath into, Goblin Engineer, Unearth, so many positive interactions
Edit: Greater Gargadon works great with this for an alpha strike too
Excited to test:
I’m going to be honest, Final Fantasy isn’t a franchise that I’m excited to test. I know I said I would make custom alters for cards I liked, but some of these cards are inoffensive enough to my taste buds that I might just include them as is. Looking at the majority of the art makes me actively unhappy, though. That reaction is as visceral as some people’s immediate love for this set though. As always, the customer is always right… in matters of taste. I’m pretty sure this set is going to be an all-timer for WotC in terms of sales, so I just have to suck it up. It is what it is.
Will begrudgingly test:
Whitemane Lion hasn’t been playable for years, but it is still a fun effect. The landfall makes it much better on attack, especially because I run fetches. The gating effect protects threats against removal or rebuys etb effects, adventures, Tangle Wire, and other stuff. As a final bonus, it’s a historic card, which also triggers a few cards in my cube. That said, the 2 slot is stacked, so it’s hard to butt your way in.
Hey, normal looking art! This is just a beater, but it has some sweet synergy play to it. Getting card in the graveyard isn’t necessarily easy in white, other than walking your weenies into a Wrath effect, but there’s plenty of reanimation options to grow this.
Set's got some goodies for me. As a big FF fan I don't mind them being UB... but, you know. No clue how I'll feel about Avatar. Except I already forgot Spider-Man, so I meant that.
These are all at least maybes, though I'm sure at most half will stick. I'm trying out a historic theme, so grain of salt.
(honorable mention Venat, Heart of Hydaelyn, who would be a lock at 2W... but I reaaaaaally hate double-pips)
We don't usually get one black 3 that interests me, let alone one and a half (still on the fence about Shadow.)
(Sorry, red cards! Poor Suplex being a sorcery shot the only one I was interested in right in the foot.)
and apologies to Quina, Qu Gourmet, who isn't even in the running despite me liking Chatterfang
(nonzero chance I put Hildi in as mono-W, but unlikely)
and for some reason this set has lots of giant cheat targets that pass my usual test of "does something even if your opponent untaps and kills it" so I'll probably try a couple of:
As is usual for most sets these days, I'm SURE I missed at least one. It's probably Torgal, A Fine Hound because I will never bother to count creature types. It's not Instant Ramen but I sure am sad it isn't.
This cube likes (weak) creature for which you have to jump through hoops. Transform cards are generally amazing for this reason, and FIN delivers plenty. I was also very hyped for the saga creatures, but unfortunately most are very strong even without additional stickers. Only Summon: Choco/Mog and Summon: Esper Ramuh feel weak enough to not benefit too much from a sticker.
Small thing: I really needed creatures with 4 toughness, and this set also delivers on that front!
I've slotted in a massive 35 cards into my main Cube with this set. It's the most-represented set in all of Magic...which I don't feel great about, particularly as someone without an emotional attachment to Final Fantasy. That said, I really like the art in this set, and, more emotionally, I really like the designs here.
To give a little context, I do have a 720 card Cube, so it's easier to find room than with most Cubes. I also generally bot draft it online at least once a day, and it feels like the CubeCobra bots have gotten much better so I find I make different decks more often and it's harder to force / get good cards late, so I've got lots of notes saved of cards that don't serve my goals well. Lastly, and most importantly, I am currently in the process of significantly down-powering my Cube to allow for more interesting gameplay. While it did help newbies get a few wins to have a Ragavan or Sheoldred in their pool, the best players with the most experience were able to exploit the widening power level delta the most, and it made a lot of the themes and synergies I think are more fun much less relevant.
I've only got three definite inclusions for now, will have to take a closer look at the completed spoilers and see if I missed anything else:
I've been actively looking to curb the number of DFC inclusions in my cube over the years, but Cecil, Dark Knight is too sweet of a design to ignore. I'm going to make an exception here. It's the perfect card to really give more an identity to the suicide B/x Aggro decks and differentiate them from the W/x counterparts. It's an aggressive body that can really pressure the board by trading up while still folding to most removal. That's perfect for what I'm looking for. We'll see how well it plays and if it leads to the archetypal inclusions of the likes of Death's Shadow and Scourge of the Skyclaves down the road. Might not quite be there yet, but with one additional piece at 2CMC that might be the critical mass I'm looking for.
Vivi Ornitier is just a really sweet all around card that can slot equally as well in U/R spellslinger, artifact and tempo decks by triggering off any noncreature spells. I can already see some really fun sequences with baubles, burn spells, or even just setting up rocks for a Wildfire turn. I mean just one noncreature spell into Wildfire gives it the 5 toughness to survive the 4 damage and leaves you a threat that can further generate mana to rebuild and close the game out. Once it hits 2-3 power you can sequence a turn of multiple 3-4 CMC spells to really apply pressure and turn the corner. This is one of those build-around cards that gets the wheels turning if you see it in a pack, big fan of this design and artwork. Also it's a Wizard which helps for card like Flame of Anor being even more valuable.
Starting Town is just another 5C land inclusion. I like that you always have the option of colorless mana which makes it more appealing in the later game once the 4C decks have already set up their mana base. It's also great in the early game for aggressive decks letting you hit your colors in the most important turns so that you can curve out effectively and apply pressure before the opponent stabilizes with a big roadblock.
I'm probably not going to run them for assorted neurological reasons, but I'm sorely tempted by the Chocobo cards.
I just think Chocobos are cool, and all their cards are nice, low-key role players centered around Landfall and Flashback, two of the most pleasantly playable mechanics in the game. They'd be great in my Peasant cube.
My favorites:
For my larger Welder's Workshop cube, I may end up running:
EDIT: None of these cards feel "IP-locked" to me. The names are generic high-fantasy names, the art isn't full of recognizable FF characters (and the art for Machinist's Arsenal fucking RULES), plus they're great mechanical fits for my environment. I run Wake the Dragon from UB:LOTR for these reasons already. Summoner's Grimoire is the least likely to make it into the cube just because there's no reminder text on Job Select.[/CI]
Alright, gave the set another look over and have settled on a few more inclusions:
I love Blood Artist effects but we're past the point where a dinky 0/1 can really cut it in higher powered environments. There have been so many variants with a bigger effect or more serviceable bodies that it just hasn't aged well. I can still justify Zulaport Cutthroat due to human synergies, but the classic was looking worse with each year until I finally swapped it out for Marionette Apprentice with MH3. This card gives me the best of both worlds with a more serviceable body, more relevant creature typing, and an actual payoff card if you fully go into the Aristocrats build. You can always use more subtle ways to generate card advantage in aggressive decks and this fits very well into any shell that can create fodder to sac. Makes me want to re-evaluated token options as well in the future especially after we've gotten Mobilize as a mechanic from Tarkir.
I'm not the biggest fan of DFCs in cube and prefer to limit them wherever possible, but this is a pretty straightforward card to process. It's an easier sell to me if it's a familiar effect or an iconic card that doesn't take much to process. I have a feeling this will be a very popular and recognizable card a year from now with how much of an auto-include it's going to be in Commander alone. I'm not sure how often it will actually flip in my cube which also makes it more palatable in my mind despite the dexterity issues.
Honestly if I wasn't already adding in Cecil I'd be more on the fence about this, but I guess the way to justify it is that this small selection of DFCs bring enough in terms of gameplay depth that the juice is worth the squeeze:
Completely overlooked this one but I'm a fan of mini-sweeper effects. I've been running either Anger of the Gods or Brotherhood's End for the last decade and haven't really had issues with either of them, but with the introduction of more burn options to snipe bigger creatures ala Overlord of the Boilerbilges and my re-inclusion of Collective Defiance makes this more attractive. Having a modal option to snipe small bodies in the earlier game and also instant speed makes it very appealing. Wombo-combo with Sephiroth on the field to kill all x/2 bodies sounds fun.
The Landfall package. It just made sense once I re-evaluated the small theme that was already in my cube and it seems like a no-brainer in a double-fetch environment. Sazh's Chocobo has a higher ceiling than Experiment One and a similar floor where if you can get it to 3 power that's already a fine payoff for the 1 mana investment. Tifa rewards good sequencing and can lead to very explosive turns for an aggressive G/x deck. Just a single fetch and correct trigger stacking with a Bristly Bill, Spine Sower on the field can get her to ten power which is pretty sweet. And everything just goes insane if Traveling Chocobo is present at all. But everything is manageable within a certain window which introduces counterplay to the equation with targetted removal and sweepers. I'll have to figure out some more swaps but I'm excited to give this a run and bring more of an identity to green as a whole.
Speaking of landfall, I missed this one which has huge potential
Ignore the saga part for now. This is a 2 mana rummager that isn’t capped! You get to see so much of your deck by just playing the game normally. Fetches are (as always) busted and don’t get me started on Aftermath Analyst or something. You can fill the GY, trigger madness, trigger draw 2, …
Then if you run sagas, you get a way to gain value from the cards you’ve discarded. You are even paying retail cost, no added fee. Urza’s Saga is the obvious broken candidate, but at almost all power levels you can slot some interesting ones in your cube.
Highly recommend if UBs are not a problem this is a super cool glue card.
