General MODO Cube Redesign

[Lucre]

No Grillo... I love fiend, I hate maggot. I don't know why people keep missing that. Often Maggot feels super awful to me in any format I'd want to play 2 power 1 drops or pushed 3-4 drops. Fiend is ludicrously more fun to play with, offers more options to you, and removes a very important one from your opponent that makes it more exciting. Not being able to kill it in response is really important to that card to me.

It's like combat damage. I don't want to "get" any one unless I've gone out of my way and earned it. I want them to have to play around realities that make cards better in slight but significant ways.

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

Well, thats more fair, and helps narrow a nebulous question. To answer it, I run both because I like the added diversity, and don't like to break singleton if I can avoid it. However, if the specific removal scenario you mentioned starts to come up, I could see cutting the maggot and running double fiend.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

Funny. I hate Mesmeric Fiend and love Brain Maggot for exactly the same reasons. I think the sac in response play is annoying and counterintuitive, and I'm happy WotC has moved towards a templating that's more in line with the intended play. I even errataed Parallax Wave. I think the only card with the old wording I still run is Tidehollow Sculler, but I might very well errata that as well in the future.

 

[James Stevenson]

My players love those kind of tricks, myself included. I'm liking the look of Eidolon of Blossoms, though, so I might run Brain Maggot over fiend and see if I can get enough enchantments in the cube. But probably not.

 

[Meltyman]

start running Cloudstone Curio and you might find funny enchantment synergies with Brain Maggot

 

[Jason Waddell]

Eidolon seems similar in power level to Oracle of Mul Daya, which didn't really cut it in most cubes. But maybe I'm wrong.

 

[James Stevenson]

Eidolon seems similar in power level to Oracle of Mul Daya, which didn't really cut it in most cubes. But maybe I'm wrong.

Really? We always found it to be pretty nutty. Ramp isn't too good these days though.

 

[James Stevenson]

Supposing Wizards is interested in making their cube fun, and also trying to stick to singleton, I'm guessing now's the point where they do actually start printing cards with cube in mind. Makes sense, right? If we see another recursive black one drop in the next few sets, the recursive black aggro archetype is actually going to become viable in a singleton cube.

 

[Chris Taylor]

Man, you know what would make brain maggot real sweet? being a 2/1
Then he could properly attack!

 

[Jason Waddell]

Supposing Wizards is interested in making their cube fun, and also trying to stick to singleton, I'm guessing now's the point where they do actually start printing cards with cube in mind. Makes sense, right? If we see another recursive black one drop in the next few sets, the recursive black aggro archetype is actually going to become viable in a singleton cube.

I like a diversity of effects that have play to them.

Can anybody speak to the power level of that Raid recursive 1-drop compared to Gravecrawler?

 

[Chris Taylor]

I like a diversity of effects that have play to them.

Can anybody speak to the power level of that Raid recursive 1-drop compared to Gravecrawler?

Love him, he brings up the bottom and down the top, if that means anything

He's way better in random non-dedicated crawler decks, and isn't as bonkers at gunning down people's board with goblin bombardment or some shit. I'd probably run more of him than gravecrawler if I wasn't so lazy.

Also the interplay between lands brining ghast back, attacking bringing him back and zombies bringing crawler back is cool and interesting, just unpredictable enough to be fun.

 

[Jonas]

It's neat that you only need to attack once to bring him back a million times. And being human is cool, if you like champion of the parish.

 

[Jason Waddell]

Human recursion (Raidcrawler, dash guys) seems like a legitimate aggro angle now.

 

[Eric Chan]

Yeah, the human theme in black very quietly got a pretty big boost this block. I'm not ready to expunge all the Gravecrawlers from my list quite yet, but I can see a day where I don't need to worry about supporting zombie tribal anymore.

 

[FlowerSunRain]

Shit, I was just thinking about beefing up my zombie theme, I am going backwards here?

 

[Jason Waddell]

Shit, I was just thinking about beefing up my zombie theme, I am going backwards here?

It seems like a matter of taste / intention now.

 

[Chris Taylor]

I just do both

 

[Eric Chan]

Why do they add Pack Rat... that card has no interesting value in a cube.
Most of the time the best decision is just to make rats until your opponent has died...

To add one more voice to the topic, I played a really interesting game against Pack Rat today. After a long back and forth left us with a semi-gridlocked board state and me at 5, my opponent figured out that his best bet was to simply discard his card each turn to the rat, in order to build up an army of 4/4s or 5/5s and go on the offensive. It was an interesting puzzle on both sides of the table to keep the rat tokens under control, and while I eventually took the game by a hair's breadth, it could have gone my opponent's way had he been slightly more aggressive, or gone all-in on the tactic sooner.

I think there's more play to this card than there was when it dominated its limited format, as figuring when to discard your high quality cube cards to it is usually not obvious. Particularly in fast environments, it's not easy to find three spare mana, and that first Pack Rat token to give you two 2/2's is decidedly underwhelming, when you could simply be casting your cards to develop your board. For that reason, I think it's actually a pretty sweet cube card.

 

[CML]

Really? We always found it to be pretty nutty. Ramp isn't too good these days though.

yeah me too wtf wadds

i actually dont hate pack rat in cube as it's roughly the right power level for most of us, the decisions are not uninteresting, the ability to come from behind greatly overstated.

I just do both

where da vamps at

 

[Jason Waddell]

yeah me too wtf wadds

i actually dont hate pack rat in cube as it's roughly the right power level for most of us, the decisions are not uninteresting, the ability to come from behind greatly overstated.



where da vamps at

I don't know, it always took up a dreaded 4-slot and was so fragile. Courser was a godsend.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

I don't know, it always took up a dreaded 4-slot and was so fragile. Courser was a godsend.

I run two and they're awesome. Then again, I had to cut Pack Rat for really being too oppressive, so I guess my cube is a bit lower on the power scale.

 

[Chris Taylor]

where da vamps at

I've never understood this BTW

Semi-Interesting Vampire Cards:

Conditional doom blade? SIGN ME THE FUCK UP

Man if this was on something smaller and less one sided it might actually be interesting OH WAIT

This card is just super narrow blood artist.

Maybe before, but just compare this fucker to brutal hordechief thesedays

Oh hey look it's that card that does for only vampires what like 9 cards do for literally all creatures

I suppose it's kinda interesting giving your dudes first strike in a color that can so rarely block, but I think it's more stupid than anything

This I do like, but at BB? and skipping your attacks?

Man, remember Mul Daya Channelers? Man, we should do that again and make it the only good vampire card!

Wait I think I found my favorite one!

 

[Lucre]

Funny. I hate Mesmeric Fiend and love Brain Maggot for exactly the same reasons. I think the sac in response play is annoying and counterintuitive, and I'm happy WotC has moved towards a templating that's more in line with the intended play. I even errataed Parallax Wave. I think the only card with the old wording I still run is Tidehollow Sculler, but I might very well errata that as well in the future.

Having your opponent play the spell you wanted to take with maggot feels like shit and it's even worse when they remove it with the card you wanted to take. If you are playing with someone who knows how to play magic the fiend is just a card with less feel bad to it for the player and if you aren't playing against someone who knows what they're doing just be a good human being and explain it and let people take stuff back. I loooove that there is a drawback to trying to get out from under fiend. I've eaten that drawback to play instants under the trigger many times and it's a really rewarding decision to have made correctly.

I've really never had a problem explaining it either. When my card died it and would have triggered the return it had yet to take anything. So my dude says it wants to take your thing, you preempt that, killing it and triggering the return, which can't happen yet because nothing has been taken, then my etb ability finally resolves. I mean, I've had more trouble explaining things before. I just can't believe what a difference it makes in how bad brain maggot turns out to be.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

I have really never had a problem explaining it either.

Me neither, but the thing is, I can't pay attention to multiple matches simultaneously, and this is seriously something they would miss. Throw in the enchantment subtheme in my cube and I have multiple reasons to want Maggot over Fiend. Anyway, I'm not faulting you for choosing Fiend. For experienced players it does have more play to it, but I simply don't hate the way Brain Maggot plays like you do, and I have a vested interest in keeping things, well, not simple, it's still Magic after all, but transparent.

 

[Lucre]

to me it's a personal insult. I guess it might be okay with eidolon.