Graveyard Duels

[kryss]

GRAVEYARD DUELS​

CubeCobra

This is a 180 card cube designed for 2 players, mainly grid drafting.


Design elements

-Low power, high sinergy.

-Low budget, most cards cost less than 1€ and only a few of them cost more than 2€.

-Aimed at grid drafting with 2 players. The power band is as tight as possible and one color was cut so decisions in draft are more interesting.

-Combat based. No overly powerful ETBs and removal is weaker and harder to come by than in other cubes.

-Maximize player agency and variety in the gameplay. I prioritized cards that are flexible and offer a lot of options over simpler ones when possible.


Archetypes

Focusing on sinergy when designing a cube have the danger of making the draft feel on rails. To combat this I combined broader archetypes that include multiple colors with narrower ones. That means decks in the same color combination can feel very different: in Gruul you can make a Fires deck because that's their focus as a pair, but you can also make an Aristocrat deck because they are part of Jund, a big Ramp deck because every green deck can build towards that, an Artfifact deck or you can even end up with a combination of synergies from any of those archetypes.

The main archetypes supported:

- Graveyard Matter
- Sacrifice
+ / - Artifact Sacrifice
+ / - Discard Matter
- Ramp
- Fires of Yavimaya
- Spells Matter
- Landfall
- Evasive Tempo
- Recursive Aggro

I've also tried to make all colors be able to make decks that function at different speeds but didn't always achieve it: while you will be able to make Izzet Spells decks that are more tempo oriented and others that are more control, all your Rakdos Aristocrats decks will probably tend to be on the aggresive side.

In the next posts I will explain with more detail each archetype.

 

[kryss]

Graveyard Matter​

This archetype include cards that fill your graveyard, cards that like to be in your graveyard and cards that benefit from having a big graveyard. Each color like to do those things in a different way: blue usually fills the graveyard with looting effects and cares about having it filled with instants and sorceries, green fills it while searching for cards and cares about having it filled with creatures and black excels at filling it while benefitting from having it filled at the same time and has the ability to reanimate creatures that ended there.

Example Deck: Sultai Graveyard Midrange

Sacrifice​

Black has recursive creatures that can be sacrificed multiple times and both green and red are good at generating expendable tokens (most of the green ones can even sacrifice themselves). All colors have tools to sacrifice those creatures for value. Finally, all colors have cards that care for things being sacrificed.

Example Deck: RBg Aristocrats Aggro

Artifact Sacrifice​

Some of the sacrifice outlets let you sacrifice artifacts and some other cards care specifically about sacrificing artifacts, combine them with artifacts and artifact producers and you can have a different flavor of the Sacrifice deck. Red will be the main color here, having most of the core pieces of the archetype.

Example Deck: Jund Artifact Sac

Discard Matter​

Blue and red have lots of looting effects. Blue and black, being part of the graveyard archetype, have ways of gaining value from the cards discarded. Combine this tools with the discard payoffs (and with our friend Squee) to make this deck.

Example Deck: Grixis Discard Tempo

 

[kryss]

Ramp​

Pretty straightforward: green has lots of mana acceleration, combine it with big creatures or with X cost spells and Timmy will be happy.

Example Deck: GU Ramp

Fires​

Do you know what's even better than big creatures? Big creatures with haste.

Example Deck: RG Fires Ramp

Spells Matter​

This archetype revolves around cards that care for you casting or filling your graveyard with instants and sorceries. Some decks will be more tempo and try to build a low curve , play a fast game and use Guttersnipe, Gelectrode and burn spells to finish the job. Others will be more control, surviving with counterspells and removal until they finish the job with a big spell like Rise from the Tides.

Example Deck: UR Spells Tempo

 

[kryss]

Landfall​

Play more lands in your turns thanks to cards like Budoka Gardener or the bouncelands and trigger landfall on your creatures or benefit from the extra lands with huge spells.

Example Deck: GU Lands Ramp

Evasive Tempo​

Both blue and black have good evasive creatures that you can combine with blue card advantage and counterspells and with black removal to make a deck that can apply pressure without losing fuel.

Example Deck: UB Evasive Tempo

Recursive Aggro​

Red and black are the colors with more aggro tools, having the most aggresive 1 and 2 drops and access to red burn. Thanks to the recursive nature of some of those early creatures and cards like Alesha or Inscription of Ruin you won't be afraid of your opponent's removal (mostly).

Example Deck: BR Recursive Aggro

Finally I want to mention some of the build around cards that can make decks work around them:

Cruel Ultimatum is a strong finisher that will make you want to build a control deck that survives until you can cast it.
Example Deck: Grixis Cruel Ultimatum Control

Pyromancer's Goggles and The Mirari Conjecture are powerful pieces that can make your decks be more combo oriented.
Example Deck: Grixis Cruel Ultimatum Combo

Laboratory Maniac is a card that pushes your graveyard deck in a particular direction, where self-milling isn't only a tool to enable delve or flashback but an actual win condition.
Example Deck: Sultai Self-Mill

 

[Erik Twice]

I like your archetypes so far! The actual Fires of Yavimaya may be a touch too weak, but I do like the archetype

 

[kryss]

I like your archetypes so far! The actual Fires of Yavimaya may be a touch too weak, but I do like the archetype

Yeah it might be, I included it instead Rythm of the Wild because it gives haste to tokens and I liked the interaction with Siege-Gang Commander and the likes, but maybe rythm would work better in my power level?

 

[kryss]

I've made changes to the initial list, some of them are made to include interesting and fun cards that fit the themes of the cube, others are minor tweaks but the most important one is a complete overhaul of the Simic section.

I had doubts about the flash archetype from the start and when I decided to include Laboratory Maniac I wanted to add Hedron Crab too and that gave me the idea of replacing the Flash package with a Landfall one. These are the changes I've made for now:

Spoiler: Out

Spoiler: In

Also, I changed one of the cycles of scrylands for one cycle of bouncelands. Some thoughts about the new inclusions:

Retreat to Coralhelm and Zendikar's Roil: I've included these two as landfall payoffs but I don't know if they are a good fit in terms of power level. Another payoff I would like to include is Scute Swarm, which would increase token generation in green but the 3-drop slot is already pretty crowded so I don't know.

Soratami Cloudskater: I opted for this one instead of Trade Routes because being a 2 drop that could fit in a UB Evasive deck was very handy but again, not sure about the power level.

Guardian of Tazeem: I originally thought about having Meloku, the Clouded Mirror here but maybe it is too busted and also I was more in need of a payoff than an enabler.

Primeval Titan: This instead of Multani, Yavimaya's Avatar because I wanted a creature that could also serve as a generic ramp target in decks that use non-land ramp.

And a general worry I have is that the lack of land-based ramp (because having ramp based on eldrazi spawns and treasure tokens helps the sac decks) makes this whole idea too clunky to work out.

Also here are the some of the other changes made to the list:

Spoiler: Out

Spoiler: In

 

[kryss]

I've made some changes and I think the landfall package looks better now:

Spoiler: Out

Spoiler: In

Zendikar's Roil -> Scute Swarm: I wanted the swarm in as a landfall payoff that also worked as a token generator for sac decks and the roil was the best cut. Having too many 3-drops is a much less important problem than having too narrow cards.

Merfolk Branchwalker
-> Sakura-Tribe Elder: I included the branchwalker as a 2-drop that had good utility in lands and yard decks. The elder fills that spot a bit better I think, being land-based ramp that puts a creature in the graveyard. Not so sure about this change tho.

Golgari-Grave Troll -> The Mending of Dominaria: The troll was good as a pick that attracted drafters to the yard deck, but the saga ties with lands and I value that more.

Reatreat to Coralhelm -> Trade Routes: I don't think retreat was very good and with trade routes in I can test how comparable is it to Soratami Cloudskater.

Siege-Gang Commander -> Goblin Dark-Dwellers: With the replacement of Fires of Yavimaya with Rhythm of the Wild I wanted a red 5 drop that didn't create tokens.

 

[kryss]

I'm almost satisfied enough with the list to finally order the cards, but there are some things I'm not sure about and any help with them would be much appreciated:

-I chose Goblin Dark-Dwellers as the substitute for Siege-Gang Commander and while it certainly will perform in the spells deck I'm not so sure with the fires one. What I need in this spot is a red 5 drop that fits in the fires deck (so no haste) and that will also tie with the other red decks (sacrifice, spells or artifacts, maybe discard if there isn't any good fit for the others). For the momment haven't found anything that makes it for me.

-I could maybe make the artifact deck instead of if I include cards like Whirler Rogue and Emry, Lurker of the Loch. I think I can make the space for them, what I'm not so sure about is if this would dilute the identity of the colors, maybe even making blue a possible sacrifice color.

-The simic lands deck seems to be more cohesive with the rest of the cube than the flash deck was, but I don't know if Tatyova, Benthic Druid, Courser of Kruphix and Ramunap Excavator are enough to draw people in. Other powerful cards like Life from the Loam or Oracle of Mul Daya are a bit too expensive for me to include, but maybe if they would fix this problem I could consider them.

 

[Nanonox]

What I need in this spot is a red 5 drop that fits in the fires deck (so no haste) and that will also tie with the other red decks (sacrifice, spells or artifacts, maybe discard if there isn't any good fit for the others).

a few suggestions (none are perfect for your needs)



The Cavalier is a big dude that plays well in the discard deck obviously, but also grants haste for the Fires deck. It has some GY/lands and kind of sacrifice thing going on. 3 Red pips sucks, but the card is versatile.

The Hellkite is 4 mana, but has a lot going for it (I figure that if you can replace a 5 drop with something cheaper, that’s nice).
It’s a great beater for Fires, rewards you for playing non-creature spells for that deck and you are incentivized to sacrifice the tokens since they disappear.

 

[kryss]

a few suggestions (none are perfect for your needs)



The Cavalier is a big dude that plays well in the discard deck obviously, but also grants haste for the Fires deck. It has some GY/lands and kind of sacrifice thing going on. 3 Red pips sucks, but the card is versatile.

The Hellkite is 4 mana, but has a lot going for it (I figure that if you can replace a 5 drop with something cheaper, that’s nice).
It’s a great beater for Fires, rewards you for playing non-creature spells for that deck and you are incentivized to sacrifice the tokens since they disappear.

The Cavalier is a good recommendation I didn't think about, thanks!

 

[kryss]

I've finished the cube primer and added example decks for all the archetypes!

Also I finally ordered the cards so there won't be any more changes to the list for now although there are some cards that I still have doubts about:

Bloodbriar: I added it because I thought green needed a sac payoff to be a good sac color, but maybe it is a bit too narrow and weak, and green surely has enough 3 drops already. If I had to cut it I think the replacement could be an aggresive 1 drop like Elvish Reclaimer or a combat trick like Blossoming Defense.

Blood Bairn: A bit of the same case for this card, even worse because black already have good sac outlets, the thing is that this girl is a pet card of mine. If I had to replace it for something it would probably be Vile Entomber as a more versatile card in a less crowded spot in the curve.

Primal Command: The option to totally destroy the opponent graveyard could be problematic in my enviroment. The replacements would be the same as for Bloodbriar or maybe a 5 drop that could serve a useful role in the cube, like Ant Queen.

All my blue two drops: The problem I have here is that all of them have a loot ability and that seems a little bit more samey than what I would like. I don't know which one I would cut tho, nor what I would replace it for.

 

[Karshtakavaar]

Drafting your list inspired me to have a crack at making my own (just in BUG), and I had so much fun doing so I think I'm going to just buy the few things I'm missing and have it be the travel MTG for my partner and I. Thanks for the idea <3

 

[LadyMapi]

I question the lack of Shigeki, Jukai Visionary in this list. It fits in multiple archetypes, after all.

 

[kryss]

Drafting your list inspired me to have a crack at making my own (just in BUG), and I had so much fun doing so I think I'm going to just buy the few things I'm missing and have it be the travel MTG for my partner and I. Thanks for the idea <3

So glad that my cube served you as inspiration!

I question the lack of Shigeki, Jukai Visionary in this list. It fits in multiple archetypes, after all.

It is in my list of possible inclusions, I didn't want to have too many 2 mana 1/3 creatures so aggro can do its thing but it definitely could end up being included.

 

[Karshtakavaar]

I've tried it out a couple of times on CubeCobra, and while I had fun I feel like the manabase is a little... off?

Temples + Karoos make sense for the Gx landfall deck, especially in Simic, but surely something like Sulfurous Spring/Blackcleave Cliffs would be a better pair for the much more aggressive B/R decks? This would fit with the philosophy from your first post about having different archetypes play at different speeds. Also holds true for the other colour pairs.

Spoiler: Nitpicky land maths

Plus there's only 12 duals between 2 players. Assuming one player is 2 colour and the other is 3 colour, there's either two or three pairs neither wants and a 50/50 shot of a pair they're fighting over - so half of the lands are dead picks, which leaves 8 dual lands between two decks.
Assuming both are three colour decks, they're definitely fighting over one pair, and one pair is dead, so that's 10 duals between two players.

If someone playing aggro is hoping to cast Herald of Torment and Chandra's Phoenix in the same deck (BTW love both of those cards), they need 12 black sources of mana and 12 red sources of mana in their (presumed) 17 lands, so 7 of their lands need to provide either red or black in order for them to have a ~90% chance to cast one of them on curve - not either/or, not one on t3 the other on t4, just one of them. If they get exactly half of the lands in the pool including both of their duals, they have 6. All of those 6 either enter tapped or cost mana, which can make them effectively skip a turn that early in the game, which is less than ideal for a gameplan involving turning dudes sideways before all the scary 4 and 5 drops turn things around.

[edit] Bearing in mind the first paragraph, they're more likely to have 4 or 5 nonbasic lands that fit their 2c deck, which is enough to give the above odds if they were hoping to cast Blood Artist and Young Pyromancer in the same deck.

The maths is about the same for a two colour deck hoping to cast Cavalier of Flame, a 2ccc card isnt that much harder to cast on curve than a 1cc card.

Put that deck that's stumbling on mana up against a BoP or Gilded Goose or Pteremander with a Bonesplitter, and a Bazaar Trademage in hand - that deck only needed basics to reliably cast all of those on curve and its threats are just as scary but come with upsides. It doesn't matter that its duals are slow cause it doesn't have to run them - and if it did, it didn't need to sacrifice tempo playing them to maximize its options.

tl;dr: Consider another approach to the manabase - thriving lands and cryptic spires are less likely to be dead picks than the current duals for example, and definitely keep it budget, or maybe you get a nice stack of lands after the draft or something and those slots in packs turn into more room for you to flesh out archetypes. Better mana in decks means more spells getting cast rather than getting stuck in hand and fewer non-games to manascrew. Access to the right colours of mana on curve can only bring up the floor when it comes to power level, not raise the ceiling. A decent rule of thumb for me has been 7 duals in a 2c deck, unless I'm going for them Retail Limited Vibes(tm)

 

[Karshtakavaar]

As a separate point, I'm surprised you haven't included this lad:



He sure likes being discarded and goes in right into Fires

 

[blacksmithy]

Better mana in decks means more spells getting cast rather than getting stuck in hand and fewer non-games to manascrew. Access to the right colours of mana on curve can only bring up the floor when it comes to power level, not raise the ceiling.

Bless you

 

[kryss]

tl;dr: Consider another approach to the manabase - thriving lands and cryptic spires are less likely to be dead picks than the current duals for example, and definitely keep it budget, or maybe you get a nice stack of lands after the draft or something and those slots in packs turn into more room for you to flesh out archetypes. Better mana in decks means more spells getting cast rather than getting stuck in hand and fewer non-games to manascrew. Access to the right colours of mana on curve can only bring up the floor when it comes to power level, not raise the ceiling. A decent rule of thumb for me has been 7 duals in a 2c deck, unless I'm going for them Retail Limited Vibes(tm)

Yeah the manabase is definitely a weak part of the list, I just went for the more budget and simple options for now but it can totally be improved. Bouncelands are not only good in landfall tho, they also help Grixis discard decks (and they would help even more if I include cycle lands). I don't personally like thriving lands and cryptic spires very much and the next update I'll do to the cube won't be budget-restricted because I will be using proxies, my first options for other lands to include would be cycle lands (with the option of using customs for the missing pairs) or fastlands, and they would either substitute non-green + Gruul bouncelands or my prefered choice, 1 Ash Barren + 1 Evolving Wilds + 4 other cards, adding one dual for each color pair.

As a separate point, I'm surprised you haven't included this lad:



He sure likes being discarded and goes in right into Fires

I just don't like very much the judgement incarnations personally.

 

[Karshtakavaar]

Bouncelands are not only good in landfall tho, they also help Grixis discard decks (and they would help even more if I include cycle lands).

I do like the Dimir one for the virtual +1 card - only needing to keep a two-lander to get to three mana is really nice in the guild that wants to keep its options open and be ready for anything, and is happy to take a tempo hit to do it.

I'd consider breaking symmetry on cycles to suit the specific decks you want to encourage. While Fetid Pools is 100% what I'd pick first for Dimir, Creeping Tar-Pit as an extra acts a finisher in a control list and as some reach/flood insurance in an aggressive deck should the board get too clogged.
OTOH, Izzet might go for a Sulfur Falls (Wandering Fumarole, which nobody asked for, continues to sit unloved in trade binders all across the land) for better access to both UU and 1RR on curve, wheras Gruul cares about that turn 1 Rabbit Battery or BoP too much so it goes for the Game Trail over Rootbound Crag - even though its a way worse topdeck when you just need to cast that 5-drop, green has the ramp to cover that weakness.
Then given that you're open to customs, Rakdos might get a Horizon land - comes in untapped, extra gas when topdecking, sacrifice synergies, and who even cares about your life total?

This is all just spitballing, obviously, and I don't know if there are any other design constraints you have in mind. Maybe it's fetches and tricycles because with access to both a land is basically never dead in pack even if you dont care about one of the land types. Maybe that doesn't suit you.

Also hard agree on the cryptic spires - mostly because they're ugly.

I just don't like very much the judgement incarnations personally

Totally fair, I have the same feeling on Wonder and Filth unless you're very careful with them.