When designing your cube, you have to make a choice about the powerlevel of your removal. A lot of us have toned down their spot removal suite (at least a bit) but what about mass removal?
I feel like we missed that one out (or maybe it's just me) but it is of utter importance to balance your whole removal suite rather than just your spot removals.
Personally, I'm not a fan of t4 wraths, as I want to give breathing room to my aggro decks. They aren't too pushed, but they are draftable and have some tools to deal with mass removal, which are key for Control decks to stand against aggro. But you know what? Control got some tools to fight aggro early on in the game, so even a t5 wrath seems to be too good, and if you think about it, mass removal in general is a pretty powerful effect, and as my cube is on the lower side of power, I consider a lot of choices. I'll just throw them all in:
White
Black
Red
Cataclysm, Death Cloud and Wildfire aren't really sweepers, but they fulfill that role in certain situations, and are interesting build-arounds.
Which of those cards do you consider generally cubeable and which do need some support, which look poison-y/unplayable?
When designing your cube, you have to make a choice about the powerlevel of your removal. A lot of us have toned down their spot removal suite (at least a bit) but what about mass removal?
I feel like we missed that one out (or maybe it's just me) but it is of utter importance to balance your whole removal suite rather than just your spot removals.
No unconditional 4-mana wraths is one of the cornerstones of my environment, together with 3 cmc mana rocks to power out the 5 mana wraths on turn 4, so there's at least one person who didn't miss that I've brought this up multiple times around here as well (most recently in CulticCube's thread), so I'm guessing more people at least heard of the idea.
Currently I run the following "wraths":
What!? That dinosaur kills everything when it hits the field, I'm telling you!
It's pretty funny that, apart from Wildfire, you're considering none of the options I run. Fumigate is perfect, because you can get under it as an aggro deck, but if you cast it in time, it stabilizes you a bit. Tragic Arrogance is a "wrath" that is also excellent outside of control decks. Scriptures and Dusk//Dawn are nice build arounds that ideally affect your opponent's board more than yours. Crux is the only real wrath effect in black at cmc 5, very weird you missed that one! Wildfire is Wildfire (and yes, I do run two), just a great build around. Duneblast is a saucy late game wrath.
I didn't miss them, as I wrote that even cmc5 wraths seem to be a bit strong, at least for me. Maybe it's not a good start for a thread if I only put the cards in that I consider.
Do you like Tragic Arrogance better than Cataclysm? And I totally forgot about Dusk/Dawn, will edit it into the starter. Not long ago, you adviced me on trying that card.
Yes, because both players get to keep playing Magic after it resolves. Also, the caster gets to choose what's left behind, meaning the opponent gets to keep their worst creature instead of their best, their worst artifact instead of their best, etc. Even better if they control an artifact creature, because then they get to keep that one artifact creature instead of both an artifact and a creature.
I've also quietly become a fan of Phyrexian Scriptures. The fact that the wrath gets signaled a turn ahead and can be interacted with is great! Don't sleep on it
Some random thoughts from someone who still hasn't revised their mass removal.
1) Avoiding T3 Wraths is absolutely necessary. Quite simply, I don't think playing a creature-heavy strategy is a good idea when you can get your board wiped.
2) Density is as important as power. That is, a deck being able to field a large number of wipes is as powerful, if not more than a single quick one. You can recover from having your board wiped, you can't recover from having your board wiped three times. I had a problem with Reanimator being able to field Crater Hellion and Massaccre Wurm on top of other effects.
3) Toxic Deluge is busted. It's very much not a Pyroclasm/Firesprout variant. It's a brutal sweeper that leaves your best guy on the table and is very easy to splash.
4) 5C are more interesting and varied but a bit on the weak side. I really think there are better or more interesting options than Fumigate but they require a bit of work, both on the behalf of the cube designer and the drafter. I've seen a lot of people talk about Wave of Reckoning, for example, but none that tweaked their cube to make it shine.
Yes, because both players get to keep playing Magic after it resolves. Also, the caster gets to choose what's left behind, meaning the opponent gets to keep their worst creature instead of their best, their worst artifact instead of their best, etc. Even better if they control an artifact creature, because then they get to keep that one artifact creature instead of both an artifact and a creature.
I've also quietly become a fan of Phyrexian Scriptures. The fact that the wrath gets signaled a turn ahead and can be interacted with is great! Don't sleep on it
Creature Wraths
So I was testing the 5 mana wraths cleansing nova and crux of fate so far I've liked both, but I worry they're a little too good. I think 6+ wraths are best for my environment, but then my control decks will suffer. Phyrexian Scriptures seems like it would help my control decks more than a 6 mana wrath will, while also being an arguably fun card.
Taking an extra turn (or more) you can somewhat achieve a stimulated 5+ mana wrath, but the turn the wrath comes out is incredibly useful because it lets the control deck get onto the board right after the wrath, this is punishing for the aggro deck, but the midrange deck should be able to recover. It's super flavorful so I like it.
I don't have an artifact theme so it seems interesting, for one mana more you can also get Scourglass, this is also great for a non-artifact based cube. Both of these are probably too strong in an artifact environment imo. I do feel they can be too punishing at times and not very interactable (other than you just decide not to cast a creature for the turn cuz you don't have an artifact or enchantment removal) so I want something better
Probably the most interactable and interesting wrath. No lightning bolt cube will want this, but it's a wrath that can be dealt with and the caster has to lose some card advantage to wipe the board.
I hope I don't need to explain interactable. It means red burns, blue counterspells, white and black destroy, and green cries. Mageta was the original Thanos snap. He feels good, it looks cool, few midrange decks will want to play it, and it's pretty bad nowadays. I just don't think he can cut it anymore except in the slowest cubes, but he's commendable because he's much more likely to be interacted with than phyrexian scriptures ever will.
And I want wraths like him, I don't think the enchantment and artifact wraths are quite there, black certainly can't deal well with either of those.
So I found and recommend
Since creatures have gotten better our creature wrath arguably needs to get better, so yes he can't block like Mageta, but he's slow like Scriptures, and more interactable. In more powerful cubes he even lives through bolt. Play two if your environment needs it. The only downer is that he kills all your artifacts and enchantments... I guess we'll have to play planeswalkers and man-lands in the control deck (if you hate that, it's amazing what a sharpie can do).
I think creatures that take a turn to tap and wrath (or ramp and wrath) would be the best for a slow environment, but the problem is that there aren't enough. (Kederekt Leviathan or Sunblast Angel wraths are fine, they end games, they ask to be played in slower decks, but I don't want my games to be determined on if a player draws their bomb card or not)
There's nothing wrong with sorcery (and even instantspeed) wraths, they help keep the game healthy, but wraths too fast and control dominates, too slow and aggro dominates (neither is always true depending on your other cards, but keep it in mind). It's a slippery rope that few have been able to perfectly balance. I really want more creatures like Magus (or more planeswalkerswhose ultimatesare wraths)
I just don't see it happening very soon, my environment desires fun wraths.
The only other creature wraths that I want to mention are Hythonia the cruel for those with black ramp, and Kagemaro, first to suffer as a card that works best in a control deck (but if you have the mana the opponent will just have to cry, I'd like him with a tap symbol more). Magmasaur is the only other card that's similar to Magus, he's pretty darn powerful. I've been too afraid to test him, but I'm sure he'd make good stories.
Also one other argument against creature wraths is that green won't be able to deal with it very well. But black can't deal with artifacts and enchantments, so either one of your colors will have to suffer, or you play both types and they both suffer (or you could go the arbitrary way and give greenpretty good removal and/or black pretty badartifact destruction)
Creature and Conditional Removal (I hope that people consider this on topic, but this is something I found out recently and it kind of ties in with the rest of my post)
So for my environment I have 4 mana instant speed removal for black and 4 mana sorcery removal for white, that means I should get a 5 mana instant speed exile for black, and a 5 mana instant destroy for white?
That's not a terrible idea but I would argue that creature tap removal (there's a nickname for this somewhere) is way more interesting and better.
Wizards argues that you need bad removal in a set so that the player who didn't get any will get some removal at the end. I sort of agree, but as cube designers we're not making sets that have to adhere to standard, modern, and bad limited players (Or maybe you are, I don't know your player group). We're (probably) just trying to make a fun limited environment. So here's my point.
is way more interesting than ever will be.
He's so elegant, so masculine, so willing to piledrive Ghalta, Primal Hunger, and if he's patient, he will. And maybe you don't want to cast him right away cuz you know that the person who has Ghalta will not be an idiot and cast Ghalta because there's an Intrepid Hero waiting to absolutely Shadow of the Colossus that 12/12
Now that's fun and good gameplay. It's the same type of gameplay that comes from interacting with seal of fire
Or if intrepid hero is too bad (you monster) you really need something like
and/or
Because there NEEDS to be more than one way to kill each creature in your cube. Seems like a duh moment, but if true-name nemesis lived in a hypothetical 360 cube environment where there were 8 wrath of gods, he'd only be above-average.
If you bring in creatures that have removal/cheap conditional removal, won't that mean midrange decks will dominate? I would argue yes and no. Yes midrange will get a resurgence due to having access to cheaper removal. Against ramp midrange (and control) now has a tool to destroy fatties, but for every intrepid hero there's a shock to go with. So while intrepid hero is cool, he's not useful against every deck.
Can you flipping believe that if you bring in creatures with removal (or just faster conditional removal) that people may actually sideboard cards that aren't artifact and enchantment related??
Cube isn't Hearthstone (and semi-recent streamed magic arena tournaments) and while making a perfectly well-oiled deck machine is fun, in Magic the game can be decided just by the sideboard (and that's cool yo)
Semi-back on topic
flavorful, but need a sacrifice theme in white to be incredibly good, if not then it's kind of bad (My opponent had a 1/1 army and I cried) more combo than wrath, but nothing gets people more scared except maybe love this card, it's not even very good imo. I also love there's always a right answer (It's somewhere around 7-10), but it creates more interesting decisions than Sorin's vengeance tested this over Kagemaro, first to suffer cuz I didn't have Kagemaro at the time, not that bad but Kagemaro is better the only fair 3 mana wrath if you're ahead you can destroy all lands, if you're behind you can destroy all creatures. Really cool, but if you can reliably get to 6 mana though it's probably too strong for many cubes Recommendation for power cubes, cuz this card is incredibly good but no one uses it. If you don't have horsemanship creatures in your cube this hits all creatures including flyers, one of the best x wraths imo my pet card, the slow but incredibly explosive wrath, I'll probably keep it forever cuz I find In Garruk's Wake/Plague Wind too boring.
With my next cube I'll probably test some of these again, I'll report back eventually
I've brought this up multiple times around here as well (most recently in CulticCube's thread), so I'm guessing more people at least heard of the idea.
