General Riptide's P1P1 Thread

Time for a trickier one - here's a pack from Gaslight, Gatekeep, Green, my contest cube with all of the Forest duals in the basic land box and 30 copies of Land Grant.

Mondschwein, the "joke" behind the cube is that Green is effectively colorless because all of the mana sources except for one are either Forests (because Land Grant) or are able to produce {G} (in other words, something like Dromoka's Command is effectively mono-white - one of the exciting parts of putting together the cube was that I could throw in a ton of Gx gold cards without having to worry about them taking up limited gold slots). There are also enough copies of Land Grant that everyone in the four-person draft is going to end up with 6-8 copies.
I would pick Fire Covenant. Looking at your list there are a lot of creatures with power 2 or less, making it fairly cheap in terms of life cost for an instant speed, one-sided wrath. The only mark against it is that it is the only true gold card in the pack. I wonder if it might be too good for this cube despite that.

Looking at your Cube Cobra list helped me get the joke behind the cube. At first I couldn't understand why Selesnya cards were mixed in with the white cards, then I got what was happening. The project is intriguing, but I'm not sure whether green mana symbols in the costs are just noise that my brain has to learn to ignore when I am appraising cards. Given that being a gold card is treated as an additional cost by WotC play design, won't {W}{G} cards tend to be more powerful than {1}{W} cards? Other cards seem to get worse, for example Thirst for Discovery will always require you to discard two cards (unless duals are treated as basic lands in this cube).

Drafting any new cube requires you to appraise how powerful cards are in the context of what they can be drafted with. This cube also requires me to reappraise the value of gold cards with altered casting cost. I think I would need to draft it to find out whether it is a fun puzzle or just makes my brain hurt.
 
Looking at your Cube Cobra list helped me get the joke behind the cube. At first I couldn't understand why Selesnya cards were mixed in with the white cards, then I got what was happening. The project is intriguing, but I'm not sure whether green mana symbols in the costs are just noise that my brain has to learn to ignore when I am appraising cards. Given that being a gold card is treated as an additional cost by WotC play design, won't {W}{G} cards tend to be more powerful than {1}{W} cards? Other cards seem to get worse, for example Thirst for Discovery will always require you to discard two cards (unless duals are treated as basic lands in this cube).

The Cube is 100% kinda clunky/unfocused right now since I put it together in a day or two for a contest - a lot of vibe-based decision making went into this thing. For example, Thirst of Discovery (along with a few other cards) are in there to encourage you to run basic Forests to justify having "Wastes" in the BLB. Is this the best way to do things? Probably not, but the cube is full of decisions that probably weren't terribly good in restrospect.

Gold cards being stronger than their monocolored counterparts is certainly a thing, but I think that the variance in card power in Magic is broad enough that it's less of a problem than you'd think it is. There are 100% some inclusions that I'm questioning in retrospect, but that's where playtesting comes in.

As for the distraction of the green pips... if I had the time for it, I'd definitely make some "mono-colored" alters for the cube that make it clearer that, say, Advent of the Wurm actually costs {3}{W}. It would mean that I'd probably have to replace Soul Reap, since it suddenly wouldn't be clear whether or not it could blow stuff up, but that's not really that major of a problem (I mean, it'd be a shame because it otherwise fits so cleanly with the cube's core concept...)

EDIT: As a side note... maybe I need to classify Land Grant as a "land" in Cube Cobra, just so that people's draft results don't get so cluttered up? Would that screw up the bots? I legitimately don't know!
 
I've done a couple of drafts and I think the cube is fun, but less because of the mana shenanigans and more because you have multiple copies of a card that can potentially be cast for free. Spellweaver Helix seems like a lot of fun, but magecraft and other spells matter effects can also really go off. I wonder if it would be helpful to have cards that allow you to play more than one land per turn, so you can keep playing Land Grant for free?
 
I've done a couple of drafts and I think the cube is fun, but less because of the mana shenanigans and more because you have multiple copies of a card that can potentially be cast for free. Spellweaver Helix seems like a lot of fun, but magecraft and other spells matter effects can also really go off. I wonder if it would be helpful to have cards that allow you to play more than one land per turn, so you can keep playing Land Grant for free?

The mana shenanigans (and duals in the BLB) are mostly a side effect of Land Grant only being able to grab Forests. Realistically, the "mana shenanigans" are just a result of treating green as a secondary color for every deck - I don't think you could have a Land Grant focused cube where green was actually an independent color, and treating green as colorless makes it easier to curate the cube on my end (I've also had "make a cube where the four guild pairs that all share a color are the colors" on my to-do list for over a year now, so...).

I'm not actually sure how much extra land drops would matter in the grand scheme of things? Sure, casting Explore to keep up the free spell + land chain would feel awesome, but it'd only really matter if your hand was, like, Explore and 3+ Land Grants. And you're pretty unlikely to need extra land drops to clear multiple lands out of your hand, since having a bunch of Land Grants actively encourages you to run a low "real" land count. If push comes to shove, failing to find is a thing if you're just spewing off Land Grants to fuel magecraft/prowess/etc.

(Maybe I should make a cube blog for this project instead of hijacking the P1P1 thread... EDIT: I did that.)
 
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Probably Wasteland, mana screwing people is sick. Fury and then Grief also seem like pretty solid P1P1 busted cards that can go in a lot of decks.

Here's a pack from Sharzad!
Mental Misstep is kind of tempting. I think Urza's Saga is the most powerful, but I don't want to commit myself to picking artifacts.

Red and Black are pretty cool colors so I'm not above picking a Blood Crypt. Either that or Ponder.


Sequence Cube

 
Fun pack! I think I start on Dreadhorde Arcanist, the ceiling on that card is just absurd and it fits into shells that I really enjoy playing. "When in doubt, pick the card that's banned in an eternal format" usually doesn't fail me. Second pick probably Vengevine, another card with really fun potential that goes right in the kind of decks I like to pilot.

How has Death's Shadow been for you here? I've always liked the idea of putting the card in a cube but I've never really gone for it.

Here's something a little different. Pick a grid draft column or row:




From the Mini Midrange Artifact Cube, which is designed for formats like grid and winston.
 
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How has Death's Shadow been for you here? I've always liked the idea of putting the card in a cube but I've never really gone for it.
I finally got around to ordering a physical copy of my cube which arrived pretty recently, so I'm excited to hopefully be able to answer questions like these soon. I would guess it's currently very hard to make work though, but I don't think it's entirely implausible. I was going to rotate out a set of shocklands for the surveil lands before I figured my Death's Shadows would probably be crippled if I did. Here's a very funny UB DS deck I drafted in an earlier iteration.

Also I would draft the top row because Wishing Well seems like a funny card, if perhaps rather hard to pull off.
 
I finally got around to ordering a physical copy of my cube which arrived pretty recently, so I'm excited to hopefully be able to answer questions like these soon. I would guess it's currently very hard to make work though, but I don't think it's entirely implausible. I was going to rotate out a set of shocklands for the surveil lands before I figured my Death's Shadows would probably be crippled if I did. Here's a very funny UB DS deck I drafted in an earlier iteration.

Also I would draft the top row because Wishing Well seems like a funny card, if perhaps rather hard to pull off.
Oh I'm dumb lmao it's supposed to be Witching Well. But you're right Wishing Well does seem fun maybe I should add it...
 
Last Gasp looks like it could be premium removal? That's my pick. In a different mood I might take Gingerbrute or one of the ramp pieces (talisman/bounceland)

EDIT: I liked the grid draft pack above! Here's one from sharzad. I think it's interesting and there's a couple compelling ways to go. Remember that your draft partner gets to pick from the remaining 6!

 
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Onderzeeboot

Ecstatic Orb
Last Gasp looks like it could be premium removal? That's my pick. In a different mood I might take Gingerbrute or one of the ramp pieces (talisman/bounceland)

EDIT: I liked the grid draft pack above! Here's one from sharzad. I think it's interesting and there's a couple compelling ways to go. Remember that your draft partner gets to pick from the remaining 6!

I mean, that left column looks mighty fine, but how busted is Mana Drain in your cube? The right column has two premium counterspells and card draw, which looks like a very solid start. I’ll worry about the threats later!
 
I am so curious about how Laboratory Maniac plays in this cube. Do people maindeck and win with it in like, self mill graveyard synergy spider spawning style decks? Because if so that kicks ass.
 
No that I do seeded packs, I thought maybe I could revive this thread.


I'm probably grabbing Skyfisher hoping to wheel Guidemother. It's one of my favorite cards....has good base stats on curve with room for shenanigans. It's a safe choice that has some fun upside.

Taking Lab Man expecting to wheel one of Crawling Sensation or Thought Scour is another option. I'd probably rather pick up Lab Man mid-way into the first pack once I have some preliminary signaling and know what I'm working with/against rather than taking it p1p1.

Feed the Swarm is a good choice. I'm not really compelled by the rest of the black in the pack so I'd rather send it off to bait someone else. Just my personal preference.
 
Does the Hatchling get played? It seems like a step down compared to the rest.
It does, I can say more to Voracious Hatchling though. I'd say that one is a solid C, whereas Shrewd Hatchling might be a C- or D+ in the cube. Two things help them: People cast a lot of spells in most decks and creature stats are rather old school, so a four mana 6/6 is a real payoff that's not too hard to reach.

I am so curious about how Laboratory Maniac plays in this cube. Do people maindeck and win with it in like, self mill graveyard synergy spider spawning style decks? Because if so that kicks ass.
Oh yeah, it is very real. You can go really hard on self mill with stuff like Codex Shredder and Golgari Grave-Troll but there is enough card draw, self mill, actual dredge, looting and rummaging, that different shells, like landfall or spells matter, can attempt to draw their whole deck and win with the lab man.
 
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I would take Feed the Swarm here. Non-committal, efficient and sure to make my deck if in Black.

If I were feeling spicy, then Laboratory Maniac would be the pick hoping to wheel the Crawling Sensation.

Does the Hatchling get played? It seems like a step down compared to the rest.

I'm an absolute sucker for labman selfmill decks but I would 1st pick sensation in hope of labman getting wheeled because you usually want the deck to come together with a critical mass of selfmill and value, eventually picking up win cons like the blue maniac or token producers that count cards in your gy
 
I'm an absolute sucker for labman selfmill decks but I would 1st pick sensation in hope of labman getting wheeled because you usually want the deck to come together with a critical mass of selfmill and value, eventually picking up win cons like the blue maniac or token producers that count cards in your gy
I can understand that, however if I am drafting a labman selfmill deck, I want that labman! I am not risking it wheeling when there are a myriad of other self-mill enablers but only one or two payoffs similar to labman. I think it's such a sweet card that I fear others might take it as a sign that self-mill is open. Sensation is good, but not a huge pull into the archetype IMO.

If you are ok with labmanless labman selfmill then it's a fine pick, but not for me!
 
No that I do seeded packs, I thought maybe I could revive this thread.

Pretty sure I'd go with Hollow One. Colorless, cycling, and 4/4 for 5 is decent-ish in a terrible situation. I'd just keep my fingers crossed for a faithless looting or more discard support in the cube.
 
I think I'd take Waterfront Bouncer here, it just has this like inherently bullshit quality to it and it also lets you do cool discard payoff stuff if you can make that happen.

Here's a pack from a similar cube I'm working on:
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opposition is a very silly card
personally I'd just go with ftk because I hate opposition and ftk fits my preferred playstyle better.

Edit: jackal pup might be a bad signal though and there is no other blue card in the pack. Opposition feels right, I'd still go with the kavu lol
 
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