There's quite a few cards I want to test and/or include, both from Ikoria itself, and from the accompanying Commander 2020 set. More than I had expected, to be honest. Here's my thoughts on each of my potential includes (and some others), sorted by color. Buckle up, because it's a list!
Fight as One. I currently run
Ajani's Presence as support for a tiny heroic package, spearheaded by
Feather, the Redeemed. It's the only strive spell in my whole cube, and the ability is almost never used, so this seems like an easy upgrade.
Luminous Broodmoth. The Broodmoth looks like it combos really well with sac outlets, and I like that it doesn't invalidate its own ability by being an overstatted fatty, like
Doom Whisperer, for example. That said, lately I've found that I easily pick up more 4 drops when drafting white decks than I can play. This suggests that I need to lower the mana curve in white/orzhov/boros. In addition, the card's price has exploded recently. For both of those reasons, while I will be testing this card, I'm slightly pessimistic about its chances.
Mythos of Snapdax. This was the first card that had me going: "Oh snap!" That said, after thinking it over a bit longer, it might not be the right choice to replace
Tragic Arrogance. I'm very consciously pushing 5 cmc wraths in my environment, to follow up the 3 cmc mana rocks I run. Moving to a 4 cmc wrath, even though it signals Mardu really well, might not be what I want after all, despite how pumped I was when I first saw this.
Splendor Mare. I like the very solid base stats here, and the cycling ability looks pretty useful as well, if you have a larger threat up.
Stormwild Capridor. Yeah, okay, this warrants testing alright! A great and terrifying combo with both
Pyrohemia and the two
Wildfires in my cube, this is a great way to extend the theme to white.
Cartographer's Hawk. How playable this is will depend entirely on how easy it is to control its triggered ability.
Stormfront Pegasus is a respectable pick in a white based aggro deck, and ramping your mana when you have nothing better to do than replay your Hawk is really powerful. Note that this doesn't search just basic Plains as well, it can actually fix your mana if you play nonbasic Plains! I am very curious how good this card actually is!
Verge Rangers. The other white ramp tool C2020 gave us. Again, this is a totally respectable body, as a 3/3 first strike for 3 can have quite an impact of the battlefield. Each trigger you get out of this is effectively drawing you a card, which means this has the potential for some great card advantage, as long as your opponent is ahead in mana.
Frostveil Ambush. Cycling for one mana makes expensive cards so much more palatable. In the late game, this can be a pretty nutty stall-breaker, tapping down their two largest threats for two turns, maybe giving you the opportunity to get in some (or enough) damage in the meantime. In the early game, where this is absolutely rubbish, this simply replaces itself for a negligible 1 mana!
Gust of Wind.
Repeal,
Blink of an Eye, and
Repulse are all very playable bounce spells. While the requirement is not negligible, there are a fair number of flyers in my blue section, including some cheap ones. I think this warrants some testing, because when you do get the prerequisite online, it's a cantripping
Boomerang!
Neutralize. 3 cmc
Counterspells are a bit of a liability. Sometimes they can get stuck in your hand, when you'ld rather be deploying your board. This one is great because it can replace itself, which is probably better than the surveil 1 on
Sinister Sabotage.
Ominous Sea. This is a neat build-around, and quite a potent combo with
Sylvan Library.
Sea-Dasher Octopus. I think this competes with the ninja package, so there's a big chance I can't find the room for it, because I want to keep the ninjas, but I do like this as a way to greatly upgrade an evasive creature at instant speed.
Shark Typhoon. I cut the spell matters theme from blue completely after reshuffling the color wheel, as prowess is now a subtheme in RW, which can't reach U in the new wheel. While I absolutely love the cycling part of Sharknado, I fear it sends the wrong signal to blue drafters on the front side of the card.
Startling Development. With some ninjas running around in blue (and black), blue has a bigger focus on combat than most cubes. The problem with the blue combat tricks I tested before is that they can be pretty dead in hand when you can't (afford to) play them. Startling Development scoots around that problem by having a very handy and affordable cycling cost.
Voracious Greatshark. Well this is a 5 drop! Nice that it interacts with artifacts as well.
Ethereal Voyager. I don't think we need to talk about why this is cool, everybody here will get that
Tidal Barracuda. This is basically a mini-
Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir! It's a lot more splashable though, and a mana cheaper!
Bastion of Remembrance. Hey, a
Zulaport Cutthroat that can be fetched by
Zur the Enchanter! 3 mana is worse, but the fact that this is harder to interact with is nice.
Call of the Death-Dweller. I don't yet know how I feel about ability counters, but this one makes great use of the mechanic. That's a really nifty reanimation spell!
Grimdancer. And this is another card that makes great use of the mechanic.
Gloom Pangolin. This card is useless, but I
love love love the art!
Memory Leak. Raise of hands. Who else thinks this would have been so, so sweet at
and useless at
?
Everquil Phoenix. This is the mutate card that I'm most excited about. For 4 mana you get a 4/4 hasty flyer, that returns to the battlefield for next to nothing, and at
instant speed (i.e. the end of your opponent's turn), when your opponent deals with it. However, I don't feel like including just one mutate card, and it's a 4 drop, so this might very well not get into my cube, despite being a cool design.
Flame Spill. I do like Super-Duper Death Ray, but this card is black-bordered and has a cleaner template.
Forbidden Friendship. The best
Dragon Fodder ever! Might be good enough to see play, actually, though I'ld like to see them push this effect even more.
Heightened Reflexes. This is a great combat trick. For 1 mana, you probably save one of your own creatures, and kill one of your opponent's, and you improved your own creature by a lot for the future. First strike is an awesome ability to permanently grant to a creature.
Pyroceratops. This is it. Confirmation that Wizards knows about my cube! Think about it. Is there any other cube out there interested in dinosaur tribal, elemental tribal, noncreature spells matters,
and 4 drops that can survive Wildfire? You can't remember any? I thought so!
I've ran
Pyre Hound in the past, and it was adequate, but triggering on
any noncreature spell and having an additional relevant tribe puts this over the edge, I think. It's a 4 drop though, so I'm going to think long and hard about what to cut, but it seems just wrong to not play this!
Weaponize the Monsters. I'm currently on
Makeshift Munitions, and while this has a higher activation cost, and is less flexible in what you can chuck at your opponent's face, creatures and planeswalkers, 2 damage is
a lot more than 1 damage, and it has a lower cost up front, so it's easier to sneak it into play.
Yidaro, Wandering Monster. A massive dinosaur that cycles, but eventally comes back when you do. I think this is a great ramp target, as an 8/8 hasty trampler definitely has an impact on the board, and it isn't dead in hand, in fact even helps you, while you're not there yet and digging for early game resources. Normally getting shuffled back when hitting the graveyard is annoying for reanimation decks, but black isn't allied to red in my cube, so that's not even much of a problem. Lovely design!
Fireflux Squad. Another 4 drop, and much less on theme than Pyroceratops, but this is a spicy trigger with all of the token generators in my cube. Probably a bit too unpredictable though. Also a 4 drop, which is problematic.
Excavation Mole. Solid baseline as a 3/3 trampler for 3, with an ability that is occasionally very valuable. I wish this was an elemental or dinosaur though, instead of a mole.
Wilt.
Naturalize with cycling is pretty solid, but I think I'ld rather have other upsides.
Cazur, Ruthless Stalker. I used to cube
Predatory Curse long ago, and it was waaay too strong. I tested
Curse of Stalked Prey as a replacement, but that was still too snowbally half the time. Eventually I gave up on the effect, and now they print this. It's higher up on the curve, which is a pro in my book, and it comes on a creature, so it's easier to interact with. That said, this is a very powerful effect, and it has a partner with ability that can actually be relevant in my cube! It's probably the only green card in these two sets that I'm actually interested in. Curious!
Genesis Ultimatum. I currently run
Guided Passage. A remnant of older days, there's simply not that many Temur cards that excite me. This Ultimatum, however, reads as a very nice ramp reward. Draw 5, play any number of permanents in those 5, can make for some pretty powerful swing turns.
Ruinous Ultimatum. Oof. That might be a bit too harsh, and seven mana is sooo much in non-ramp colors. That said, this would be pretty awesome in a Mardu control deck. Will have to test.
Kalamax, the Stormsire. Hey, another elemental dinosaur! Cute! I love this design, and I very much look forward to trying this out!
Ukima, Stalking Shadow. Here's Cazur's counterpart, and it actually has some relevant synergy with my cube! Ninja's are a thing, and this might be one of the best targets to return to your hand!
Lurrus of the Dream-Den /
Gyruda, Doom of Depths /
Keruga, the Macrosage /
Jegantha, the Wellspring /
Zirda, the Dawnwaker. The companions were likely a mistake from a constructed point of view, and they might be too strong for cube. They are, however, interesting in that they really change how you draft. For that reason alone, I want to at least test these five.
Springjaw Trap. This might be an interesting sidegrade to
Scalding Cauldron. 4 mana is a lot more than 3 (for the activation cost), but this has two advantages over the Cauldron. First, this deals damage to any target, instead of only to creatures. Second, this has flash, which actually can make for some nice instant speed historic triggers!
Bonder's Ornament. As you might know by now, I love 3 cmc mana rocks in my environment. This one looks to be a worthy addition. It's great in slower, controlly decks, where it both gets your wrath online a turn early, and finds additional gas in the late game.
Esper Triome /
Zagoth Triome /
Ketria Triome / Naya Triome /
Savai Triome. I've written about these on the forum, and I'm still undecided. Testing will need to reveal how much more likely 5 color good stuff decks are to spring up when I replace ye olde trilands with these new ones (including two customs). I run fetches in my environment, so these are miles better than the originals, but should fetches really be able to get three colors? Testing, testing, testing. It's the only thing that can answer this. Well, and simply including them and seeing what happens, I guess, but I prefer testing
