Shamim's Cube

[shamizy]

Alright, another quick update since I've already wrangled up 10 people interested in my next cube session in about a month. It's wild how much easier it is to get people to commit if you can provide space (thanks Alesmith Brewing!) and some free food. I'm very inspired and motivated to really work through different cube ideas at the moment after mostly being off from updating/engaging with cube all of last year. I think it's FIN that got my gears turning again with individual card interactions so I'm gonna channel all my writing right now. After reading Dom's recent musings I also want to revisit ideas I've had for Aggro design just sitting around in my head for a while now that should finally be written up. Maybe I'll even turn it into a CubeCobra article at some point.

Anyway, seeing as we'll be drafting the full 450 again soon I'm going to list out a number of cards that will be tested out in the next session:



We've already had discussions about each of these cards in the CBS thread earlier in the week so I'm not going to dive too deep into them, but I'm convinced that each of these will able to play an effective role for me. Warden giving aggressive decks additional options in a board stall situation and eventually turning into a Serra Angel is pretty sweet (and synergizes with my counters theme in G/W) while Planisphere just does a little bit of everything to make it a very palatable 2-drop spell. They both seem like versatile options to really branch archetypes and maintain critical the critical mass to enable them. Bristlebud is just a big beefy boy to make G/x decks feel substantial. I like that it's a big potentially threatening body that can generate some card advantage via eating food, but is also vulnerable to removal. I will gladly be swapping out Questing Beast for this and probably won't miss him aside from the very aggressive G/R decks that would come together once in a blue moon. I've added in Roast in a recent update to help deal with big beef on the ground, could also see myself bringing back Valorous Stance back again to give more potential tools (and a pseudo-protection spell for G/W Landfall decks).



I enjoyed the ceiling of what Wrenn and Seven could do when it was first spoiled back in Midnight Hunt and ran it for a while, but it ended up being a little too fiddly when actually playing with it. It was very neat when you had the engine assembled but otherwise it was just another churn value walker that didn't make a big enough in-game impact most of the time. I think Summon: Titan simplifies the play pattern of filling the grave and then recurring lands with a Splendid Reclamation impersonation while also providing a proactive 7/7 body to smash it for some damage. This can serve as a big finisher for decks featuring Tifa Lockhart or Mossborn Hydra if you've stocked your graveyard a bit. Also it provides me with another Saga target that will hopefully make Rydia, Summoner of Mist's 2nd ability more than just flavor text.

Phlage, Titan of Fire's Fury is just a powerful and flexible incentive card for any deck playing RW be that aggro or midrange. I'll take another Lightning Helix in either of those decks and being able to give a lower to the ground aggressive deck an actual finisher card when the pace of the game gets bogged is very appealing. Showdown of the Skalds was alright, but it only really came together once in a while in the ideal deck. Refueling your hand is gas for an aggressive deck with burn, but the more mid-range the more of a trap it would feel like. Phlage gives us more flexible action lower in the curve which is very important for aggressive builds.

Steel Overseer has been brought back to flesh out the artifacts archetype a little more. We had a bunch of decks in the last draft with some artifact synergies but I couldn't actually find my copy to put into my cube and instead used a Cogwork Librarian(still fun in draft, will need to find a permanent slot at 450). It's been in the binder for a few years now and I'd occasionally come back around to see if it was time, but now I think we have the critical mass of playable artifact creatures to where it can really shine at my power level.



These are the only cards from EOE thus far that I'm definitely going to test out, have to give the final spoilers a lookthrough to see what else I missed. Trooper does everything I want out of a white two drop by growing my smaller guys and promoting more plays later in the game. Human and +1/+1 synergies will make this a very nice roleplayer that can create explosive plays off a Champion of the Parish. I'm not a fan of one-off appearances of most keyword mechanics in my cube, but I think the play patters justify the inclusion here through I will be looking at even more options for inclusion as people post their experiences with these new cards.

Scout for Survivors seems like a more versatile version of Sevinne's Reclamation. I think it'll play much better than it looks and very low to the ground aggro decks will gladly take the chance to bring back 6 power worth of creatures onto the battlefield. Even more if you're bringing back Champion of the Parish and friends! We'll see how it actually performs in practice.

Finally I'm fully drinking the kool-aid for Sunset Saboteur. It's possible that the base case scenario is that it's too easily dealt with on the ground, but I can't get over how much damage this can represent at 4 power that early in the game for an aggressive deck. If you can get 6 damage out of a two drop in an aggressive deck I think that's a pretty good rate of return, but this can take that all the way to 8 and potentially trade for two cards when it's finally dealt with. Just seems like a very powerful piece for all of the B/x Aggro decks that come together in my cube that also has additional lines of play to it. Pair it up with targeted removal and it feels like it could be an absolute beating. Menace and Ward is such a powerful combination, I still have a soft spot for Sedgemoor Witch which was a solid card throughout its run and may come back someday, but this just has a higher ceiling in the decks that want it.

 

[shamizy]

With the re-establishment of a semi-active playgroup for cube that will likely be firing off a pod every 4-6 weeks moving forward (maybe more often), now is the time for me to really dive into cube design again. Been spending a lot of time reworking and refining different parts of my cube and I'm interested in hearing what people are running in their Utility Land Draft set-ups nowadays.

I've found that the best way to run this is setting up the ULD up away from the main draft and letting players get up and take a look whenever they want during a lull in the main draft. Afterwards I hand out a land to each drafter and the odd man out (ex. 7 Swamps and 1 Mountain) is the first overall pick for the ULD. We then go in a clockwise pattern for a 3-round snake draft with picks going 1-8 then 8-1 then 1-8 to close it out.

I let players make their picks in their own time during deckbuilding process before playing our games and it comes down to just letting the next person know when they're up. I'll monitor a little to keep it moving and to see where we're at picks-wise. This has been smoother than keeping people hostage for the mini-draft before deckbuilding. Each card from the ULD has a red sticker on the bottom-right corner of each inner sleeve (all my draft enhancement cards entering outside the 450 have stickers on the bottom right) so that I can easily parse through and remove them after we're done with cube.

Here's a breakdown of what I'm still running nowadays:



Artifact land suite has even greater utility nowadays than ever before. Seat of the Synod and Great Furnace were common picks for Welder decks as an additional way to inflate the artifact count. Vault of Whispers and Tree of Tales have been neat for delirium type stuff and also turbo-ing out an Emrakul, the Promised End. But nowadays with the proliferation of artifact synergies there is a lot of value to just playing them out to buff a board or tutor off a Brightglass Gearhulk. They help grow Karnstruct tokens and my newly added Arcbound Ravager so these will probably never leave the ULD.



I think manlands in general have always been a great option for cubes to serve as a mana sink, even though many of them are no longer as powerful an inclusion as they used to be in the main cube. I still run the best options in Celestial Colonnade, Creeping Tar Pit, and Raging Ravine which all still see relevant play but the others have all fallen by the wayside into my cube binder. I've seen all of these utility lands from the DND set get played multiple times over the years with different levels of efficacy, but I don't think any have ever been a bad inclusion. When there's so much back-and-forth with removal and combat being able to close out games with your leftover threat is a nice fallback option.



The white section is definitely more flexible than it has been in the past, a lot of different options to work with here. Flagstones can synergize with random cards as a legendary permanent for Yoshimaru, Ever Loyal or a way to maintain land parity by saccing to a Sylvan Safekeeper for protection. Eiganjo is just a solid combat trick bundled into a land and it's always a higher pick. I'm not sure if Dalkovan is good enough to stick around, but making extra attacking bodies isn't a bad thing if the game has bogged down. I like that it's firmly centered in Mardu and a card that both W/B and W/R Aggro decks would have interest in running.



Shelldock Isle has long been a staple for me and I've moved it in and out of the mainboard, but I think it'll just live here in the ULD from now on. It's not quite as powerful as it was in the earlier iterations of my cube a decade ago but it's still a solid inclusion for most U/x decks. Otawara is just great all the time, handy to have another piece of interaction not take up an actual card slot in your 23. Conclave is middling but effective, might seek out other options here longer term.



Love Tower and Takenuma; both have led to multiple interesting lines of play in games that they've been featured. I actually lost a game to Phyrexian Tower my last draft serving as a sac outlet for a Gravecrawler that gave the mana necessary to recast twice into a Carrion Feeder + a Blood Artist effect to put me in lethal range from two other attackers. Great Arashin City has yet to prove itself but I like the idea of cashing in non-recursive bodies for some board presence later in the game if necessary. Also a niche way to trigger a card like Gau, Feral Youth for surprise damage.



Probably the section that's had the most changes over the years, red has a handful of interesting lands worth trying out. Arena is probably good enough for the main cube but I think I'd rather use that slot for another card since the ULD is ever present. Both Sokenzan and Monastery have been solid from what I've seen.



Lots of different options here, one of the most versatile sections of the ULD ranging from big-time ramp via Castle Garenbrig to delirum trickery with Shifting Woodland to the classic manland of Treetop Village and finally trinket token utility in The Shire. The last one is a next addition, but I'm interested in seeing what can be done with more options for food tokens ala Bristlebud Farmer or Gilded Goose. Someday we will hit the critical mass of food tokens at my power level to give Wicked Wolf a run!



The 5C options with a caveat. I like both Courtyard and Cavern to bolster aggressive Human decks that can extend into Mardu colors while Field has been a neat inclusion with any land recursion to set up big sequences. I've seen it used to some effect in Wildfire decks providing a way to rebuild a little quicker once the board has been simplified. I could see some fun lines in the future with Summon: Titan.



Lands with colored activated abilities. Gavony is more niche in the decks that it can go in, but with G/W a reworked archetype in the last year I think I might be seeing it more often now. Both Academy and Stronghold have always been great sources of recursion and shine in the decks that can fully maximize them.



The fixing suite in case someone was unlucky in the drafting portion. Both cards had been in my main cube in the past, but I think I just prefer swapping those out for the 2nd copy of Urza's Saga and Prismatic Vista instead. Saga is just a card that is nice to double-up on in my environment and Vista is just preferable for more aggressive decks looking to curve out where a tapped land in the first 3 is usually terrible to have. Never had any issues with either card, just nice to offer additional options to drafters through the ULD.



Two all-time useful manlands and 4 Wasteland to keep greedy decks honest. I've had Wasteland in the main draft now and then but have found that there are diminishing returns after a while and especially if they show up late. I'm all for giving more concentrated decks (especially Aggro) additional tools to deal with midrange decks so 4 Wasteland is just find with me. Also if someone wants to go full hater after drafting Ramunap Excavator or Wrenn and Six I want them to live that dream.

Previously I'd keep this set-up capped at around 35 lands, but I'm more willing to expand now that it looks like I can gather 8-10 drafters more frequently than before. And so the final ULD set-up that will run in next month's draft will be:

 

[Nanonox]

So jealous of a ULD, you get to include so many roleplayers.

I think your selection is really good, but maybe a few slots could be optimized for archetype support. I am thinking of the lands archetype primarily.



This is a one card archetype, mostly for Green decks. A ramp payoff that doesn’t take a “real” deck slot that works with all the land package (fetches and recursion).



Some fuel for the grindy lands deck. Triggers Gitrog, you can recur them with Loam. A single one of these goes a long way to changing the land’s deck endgame.



Soeaking of endgame, this can be a win condition late and has game in aggressive decks too.



Sometimes you’d like to have a bunch of landfall triggers and this delivers. Also nice to hit land drops and an extra card kind of. I think the Simic and/or Selesnya ones make most sense.

Stax support



Port cuts off mana and is rock solid in a lot of decks. Hatchery is kind of narrow, but amazing with Braids and Smokestack. Gargadon and Safekeeper have game with it too.



A free card off a land for aggressive decks. Entering tapped isn’t ideal for those decks, but it’s nice token support.



This one can spell inevitability on a land. Loop it with Cryptic Command to lock opponent out. Also just good to get back a counter or card draw. Both Sanctuary and Heights benefit from bouncelands.

 

[shamizy]

The only unofficial rule I have for ULD is that I don't like to include multi-color fixing so Bouncelands will probably be out and Horizon of Progress as well. Maybe I'll have to revisit if we hit a critical mass of lands that make me change my mind, but this has been a nice way to keep things balanced over the years.

Field of the Dead and Mystic Sanctuary will likely make the cut at some point, I'm also looking to add a Fountainport soon. Field was iffy for a few years but with the cycle of surveils as well as me eventually flipping a 2nd cycle of shocks to the battlelands (once they complete the printing of the enemy ones), it will be more consistent to trigger without being backbreaking. Barbarian Ring could also be a fun inclusion as some additional reach for R/x decks, but I think I might just go back to Ramunap Ruins at that point. Threshold might be tough unless they've got a decent amount of burn.

I had the Onslaught cycling lands in a long time ago, but they were consistently last picks and often times left undrafted as we got more and more powerful options so I ended up cutting them sometime 5-6 years ago. Maybe there's enough nowadays to justify them because I do have fond memories of churning through Jund with Barren Moor alongside Wrenn and Six in Modern a few years ago.

Port and Hatchery look like potentially interesting inclusions, I'll keep them in mind. Windbrisk Heights unfortunately was always way more clunky in practice than theory where a tapped land is kind of brutal when curving out and kind of bad if you can't stick an actual big mana impact card underneath. I cut that pretty early and haven't really missed it much.

I need to think about how many choices I want available during the ULD because there is a point where it becomes information overload. Cycles are easier for players to parse through and understand so the Onslaught cyclers wouldn't be too difficult to bring back. I think I'll probably max out at 50 for initial drafts and slowly refine it down to 40 by the end as I get a sense of which cards get picked consistently.

 

[Erik Twice]

I love Windbrisk Heights because you can use it, alongside Collector's Cage or other versatile cheat spells like Reanimate, to add a bit of spice to wide decks. Decks, particularly wide creature-based ones, tend to focus very heavily on cheap spells, heavily limiting how they can be built and played. By adding tools to hit costlier targets (5 mana is more than enough) you get more variety and justify running more "curve-toppers"

 

[shamizy]

I love Windbrisk Heights because you can use it, alongside Collector's Cage or other versatile cheat spells like Reanimate, to add a bit of spice to wide decks. Decks, particularly wide creature-based ones, tend to focus very heavily on cheap spells, heavily limiting how they can be built and played. By adding tools to hit costlier targets (5 mana is more than enough) you get more variety and justify running more "curve-toppers"

Collector's Cage can definitely go on the watch-list, I think that could put in some real work as a neat option, but I just think Windbrisk Heights reads way better than it plays. Hideaway on lands is a lot clunkier than on other permanents. I used to run it a long time ago but it never quite came through how I wanted. A tapped land is so much tougher to play nowadays with so many good land options available to players compared to 2013 when I first put this together.

This was pre-ULD and there's a lot more flexibility so maybe I'll give it a run next draft and see how it plays if I have a copy lying around.

 

[Nanonox]

I like the idea of Heights + Cage, but like shamizy I am a little skepitcal. I think I a few cards would be really good with those two though



These two are nice hits off the hideaway and they also fit into an aggro game plan. I’m sure there are other nice targets, but none come to mind right now.

 

[shamizy]

It's about time to revisit reanimator in my cube, specifically the U/B variants.

This deck seems to come together every other draft, but I can't recall it ever winning outright. Lots of cool sequences and memorable games but it doesn't seem like it has ever been enough to win it all against more streamlined decks with a much lower curve. For a long time I was against the idea of playing the premier reanimator threats dominating Cube, but with the proliferation of more powerful threats lower in the curve as well as premier removal, big creatures really need to be at a premium to be worth jumping through all the card disadvantage hoops to get them out ahead of schedule. Especially when drawing cards and assembling engines is so easily accessible nowadays; going down on multiple resources to power through one of these targets puts you behind and many times unable to recover.

For a long time I've been a bigger fan of the "fair" reanimator options with creatures that have an impact when cheated out early but are possible to overcome:

​

This suite served me well for a number of years, and all have been playable even outside of strict reanimator builds (which is something that I prefer), but bridging the gap once the threat is dealt with has become harder over time.

Noxious Gearhulk is probably a forever staple just due to how many synergies it has throughout and being a very nice stabilizer in the later game (and Menace is just one of the best keywords around). Sheoldred, Whispering One is still an effective card if it can stick around, but the stabilizing force is just not there like it was in the past unless the board is completely at parity and we've reached the grindy stage of the game. Herald of Anguish is a card I have a soft spot for because I do think being able to force discard is underrated in draft environments, but I will admit that it feels a turn too slow in general and a little too small to really be worth the hassle. Phyrexian Fleshgorger is just a perfect card to me, fills a similar role to Gearhulk mentioned above and prototype plays really nicely in playing double duty for the reanimator deck as an early roadblock and potential late game closer.

If these cards can stick around then awesome, the game can be closed out shortly therafter, but I think that similar to Thrun, the Last Troll and Wurmcoil Engine which were boogeymen a decade ago reanimation targets need to be re-evaluated in the context of my 2025 environment. Both of those creatures can still be powerful in the right match-ups, but they aren't anywhere near the rate of return compared to the rest of the field as they were back in 2015. With aggressive decks getting more tools and creatures just being bigger on average, a 4/4 like Thrun only really shines against the control decks where there aren't creatures big enough to contest it on the ground. A 4/4 isn't quite as imposing as it used to be, though he can still be a house if you find a way to keep growing him via +1/+1 counters because Hexproof is still very good. Wurmcoil Engine can be dealt with very cleanly nowadays with way more exile based removal including new spells like Suplex from FIN or Exorcise from DSK or a good old fashioned O-Ring variant in Leyline Binding. And who could ignore the various ways to attack a hand ala Grief or Elite Spellbinder, much less ways to obsolete Wurmcoil on the battlefield as a blocker like with Phelia, Exuberant Shepherd.

With my last update I brought back the OG:

​

And it wasn't some GRBS like it might have been in the past; ended up playing fine for the reanimator player. There is a real tension now with paying the 7 life to draw 7 cards with how readily you can be punished by the opponent. If you get to untap and stabilize then great, but if it's a mid-game reanimation then it's absolutely possible to just lose even after putting him into play. Sometimes they can just snipe the Gris and then continue on with their gameplan to close it out with burn or just good old-fashioned combat. It's still an incredibly exciting card to play and activate, leads to the types of swings in gameplay that are very memorable without feeling unbeatable, and I think it's the exact power level that makes sense for my environment nowadays.

We're probably at the point where the premier reanimator target is worth giving a run:

​

It's the kind of card that gets you excited if you're already in the archetype and see it later in the pack; a clear reason to jump in fully if you've drafted reanimation. It's still a 6/6 flyer in the air which is bigger than almost everything in most cubes so it comes with it's own clock in about two turns to end games uncontested. It's a slower death with inevitability if it sticks around, but that also opens up a window of interaction to draw an out. It's a different play pattern compared to Gris, but it could be just as fun for the reanimator player allowing them to accrue some card advantage with the platter of effects that trigger on ETB.

Thus, my big creature options for reanimation (above 6 CMC) across all colors now looks like:

​

At this point it just becomes a matter of providing situational tools that can interact early enough without obsoleting the game. And for that I'm a big fan of more conditional removal like Valorous Stance and Unholy Heat coming back into the main list along with splash hate ala General Kudro of Drannith. Scrabbling Claws was a recent addition that I feel will play pretty well as a bauble and piece of interaction. I especially like the weird potential interplay of Heat vs. Archon where you could discard in a way that unlocks delirium and lets you deal with the threat despite losing so many resources at once. There are still unconditional removal pieces that will serve as premier removal to snap up during the draft, but it's nice to have more modal spells to make decision-making interactive and engaging. If you can just fire off exile removal at everything it just trivializes the back-and-forth, but knowing when to use a "lesser" spell and save the good stuff is way more interesting.

We'll see how it all shakes out in the next draft later this month. If I get ten drafters again I should be able to see this deck come together but otherwise it'll be interesting to see if there's enough to cross the finish line in a traditional 8-man.

 

[shamizy]

Hosted a draft last summer (back in late August) at a local brewery with a full pod of 8 but I forgot to post this re-cap. Been sitting as a draft on my Google Docs until now, but figured I’d get it up since I’ll be posting my latest cube draft from last month soon. Hopefully I can get that out sometime later this month, it's like 80% complete. The silver lining for this one is that I had most of it completed as far as gameplay recaps go a few days afterwards.

Anyway, we had a nice variety of decks in this session and it’s always interesting to note what ends up wheeling around late in packs with what drafters are focusing on in a traditional pod. Whenever I get to draft with 10 we get to see every card, so theoretically all archetypes are possible, but when 90 of the cards are left behind it does let me get a clearer idea of as-fan for given archetypes.

I went with a P1P1 Traveling Chocobo to see if I could make a lands deck work centered in GW or Naya. P1P2 I decided to keep options open by picking up an Archon of Cruelty thinking that maybe this could also be a viable strategy with UB Reanimator if things work out. This early into a draft I like either putting out feelers for core cards to base a deck around or keep myself open with fixing via lands. While I didn’t end up seeing any more lands or stand out G/W cards that would have pushed me into the archetype, I did settle into a decent U/B Midrange deck with removal and interaction with the rest of the pack.

Picked up one reanimation spell in Dread Return, but it wasn’t a premier piece or enough at that point to commit that early so I kept most of my Reanimator shell as a fallback if it came together with more picks. P2P1 I was able to open up a Sheoldred, the Apocalypse and later followed up with a Morbid Opportunist that put me more in the midrange camp and with reanimator less likely, but then the third pack put me right back into it with a Phyrexian Fleshgorger and a Griselbrand early on. I was able to pick up a copy of Life // Death, a Living Death, and some decent filler to help pitch cards into the graveyard that helped form the final deck:

Dimir Reanimator [Shamim]

The Frantic Search and Fact or Fiction are what really helped to give this deck enough action to filter through cards and make it work when they came around to me in pack three. Overlord of the Balemurk was also a sweet option to play on two to fill the grave or naturally play it at 5 or even as a value reanimation target if pitched early enough. The may option on the Raise Dead is great if you just want to keep your stuff in the grave to try and set up for a bigger backbreaking Living Death.

In the first round I went up against Nolan playing a 4C midrange deck:

4C Midrange [Nolan]

Game 1: Back and forth for a while before sticking Sheoldred, The Apocalypse on board to stabilize. I didn’t have the game locked up, but was probably going to dig myself out in a few turns. This prompted a scoop a turn later that felt premature, but I also didn’t know the contents of this Naya deck so maybe it was the right call after I gained some life. But after looking over the deck list I don’t think it was a given since I was around 12 and that was plenty of time for a Falkenrath Aristocrat to come down with pressure backed by other cards, but I’ll take it.

Game 2: Lots of back-and-forth with me answering his creatures and having to try to stabilize in the mid-game. Surrak, Elusive Hunter forced me to use my removal early to get him out of the way and then again when it was recurred with Pre-War Formalwear. That card is exactly what a stompy midrange deck wants and the combination of 4 trampling power and some minor protection is a real beating. I ended up at what felt like a safe life total and able to eventually stick an Archon on the field after reanimation, but I died to a Fiery Confluence with 6 to the face.

Game 3: A ton of back-and-forth with big plays from both sides and I ended up in a position again with Sheoldred to stabilize before dropping a Griselbrand after casting a Life // Death to bring it back. I knew of the Fiery Confluence from earlier and he would have enough mana to chain that + another burn spell to kill me on his turn. From what I remember he had two cards in hand here so I went for the fuck it play dropping from 8 to 1 to try and draw 7 + gain 14 with the Sheoldred out to protect myself from that scenario. Unfortunately for me he had a Burst Lightning in hand that was available to take me out at instant speed.

I probably could have played tighter there to get the win with an untap and play around more burn sequences, but I wanted to live the dream and style instead. I have no regrets. What’s the point of a cube if it isn't to put together cool decks and try for sweet plays?

In the 2nd round I got paired up against Jamo who was drafting my cube for the 2nd time:

Tifa’s Limit Break [Jamo]

From what I remember in G1 I took a massive hit from Tifa Lockhart early dropping me all the way to either 5 or 6 life after which I was able to use a few pieces of interaction to get her off the board alongside other threats. It was a precarious position for a few turns, but being able to reanimate an Archon of Cruelty once I stabilized a bit got me back into the game and let me get the win.
In Game 2 I was able to play my game while managing his board for the most part, but there was a lot of pressure as time went on and I got really close to dying before getting my board set. The only problem was that I had used Overlord of the Balemurk to get myself back into it and I ended up teetering extremely close to decking myself. When I finally played out an Archon, I just didn’t have enough cards left in my library to ensure that I’d get two untaps to close it out. I wracked my brain for a bit looking for an avenue to deal the final points of lethal damage while avoiding self-decking, but no matter what I was going to be 3 points short of lethal. Scooped it up and went to G3.

Game 3 I had a pretty greedy keep with lands and interaction and some card draw, but I ended up not really being able to draw into anything relevant while he set up a board that was able to quickly pressure me. By the time I had gotten some board presence out I was already too far behind to catch up and I died to good old fashioned beats.

Finally, in my third game I got matched up against Henry who drafted a kind of Mardu Aggro deck:

Mardudes [Henry]

Henry couldn’t really get going in either of the two games against me as I was able to stabilize my side of the board each time while also managing to pull off big sequences like a Living Death or a value reanimation play ala early Overlord to strand him. It got kinda close at times, but my timely removal for his graveyard hate was able to keep things in check and let me find openings to fill the grave before branching into the late game and close things out.

All in all, I really liked my reanimator build and felt it was a solid representation of what this kind of deck should be in my environment; not completely overwhelming but will definitely put the opponent on a clock if left uncontested.

The other decklists from this session included:

UG Midrange [Scott]

UR Artifacts[Laser]

Moist Jund[Peicong]

Azorius Midrange [Will]

Some of the biggest takeaways from this session:



Even at my power level, which is basically Legacy Unpowered, Strip Mine is pretty disgusting in the correct shell. If you were to play it in something like an Aggro deck like in 2014 with limited recursion options then it’s probably fine, but once you introduce cards like Wrenn and Six or Crucible of Worlds it can quickly just run away with the game. Especially if you get to go dork into W6 on T2; that’s probably not much of a game. I’ve avoided it for years for good reason, but figured it was at least worth a look with the expansion to 450 this year to see if the extra 30 card padding dilutes the draft pool enough. Nope, turns out it’s still busted with just one other piece.



Wasteland in the ULD had become too free with the plethora of recursive options (I’d say that Icetill Explorer was the tipping point for critical mass), so I figured a split was worth trying out for one session. I’m just going to swap back from 1/1 split to just two copies of Wasteland in the main cube and call it a day. Still powerful, still punishing if you’re very greedy with the mana-base, but can absolutely be played around with measured sequencing. That should be better in the long run.



Tri-color cards have definitely been played more often ever since the squadron system was implemented a while back, but the triomes are the real pick most of the time with the creatures being filler. That’s pretty much the opposite of what I wanted so triomes are being cut completely and I might try out Multiversal Passage instead for each squadron pick. I think that should hit the correct balance of helping to fix for a three color card without delving straight into goodstuff builds.



I’ve been mostly fine with the double shock/double fetch split over the last year, but I had mostly been waiting for the enemy cycle of BFZ lands to be completed. These are the ideal complementary cycle alongside shocklands and surveil lands that I’d like, and this has been my position for years now. With the printing of the Boros and Golgari options in the EOE commander product my hope is that all of this cycle will be available by the end of next year (and ideally with foil versions of each!).

I think in the meantime I’m going to swap back to the allied colors on BFZ lands until these are completed and readily available for use. I like that they incentivize players towards 2 color decks and promote sequencing decisions be that playing tapped early or playing out basics before they come into play untapped on T3. It’s a really clean design that helps to subtly influence deckbuilding and how games should play out.

Finally, some individual card highlights:



Powerful card, we all know this, but this was the first run of seeing just how good it would be in my cube. And I’d say that the power level is right where it needs to be in order to hang with everything else available in my environment. It’s a threat that’s well worth jumping through hoops to recur early and while it won’t end things right away, if you get to untap you definitely get your money’s worth in terms of impact and stabilization. There is definitely a real cost to using a Reanimate or Life // Death on it, especially if you play against decks with burn available, but that’s a nice bit of tension. If you can go with the nuts T1 Entomb into T2 Reanimate then you’ll probably win if it’s not dealt with soon, but I think that level of Magic Christmas Land is fine at this power level.

The problem with powerful reanimation targets occurs when there is no counterplay to it, but we've gotten so much efficient removal nowadays that it's a way different proposition that a decade ago.



Been in my ULD since being printed but I think this is the first time I’ve actually drafted it. Won me G3 in a tight match-up where the exile mode was very relevant against an Aggro deck that featured Alesha, Who Laughs at Fate recursion. Menace was also the key in closing things out when paired alongside my Phyrexian Flesghgorger with both of them crashing in for lethal damage.



Good showing from this guy, a 4/3 trampler for three really puts a ton of pressure early and especially if you can get it out T2 with a dork. Being able to protect your board and make your opponent think before firing off their targeted removal is very powerful (and also inadvertently bumps up the value of wrath effects in the long run). A 4/3 is the perfect body that is a threat left unchecked, but also something that can be dealt with just via combat and blocking correctly. I ended up needing two spells to deal with this long term after it was brought back with a Pre-War Formalwear which made it into an incredibly big threat.



A really fun card; I went up against it in the 2nd round and it can be very threatening when left unchecked. If there’s any way to get to 3+ land drops in a turn it can quickly put you into the danger zone and will often force a chump block before trampling over for 3-4 damage. Curving this card into a fetchland as the T3 land drop along with a Harrow was a pretty powerful sequence jumping it all the way from 1 to 2 to 4 to 8 to 16 and taking off a massive chunk of my life total. If your two drops draw premier removal and become a must answer threat that just opens things up for the rest of the deck.

Thinking about both Crop Rotation and Entish Restoration coming in for the next one to better enable this and other Landfall cards. Restoration is especially appealing in that while the lands enter tapped unlike Harrow, there is the potential with Tifa after a fetch to jump all the way to 32 once she’s hit 4 power. Pretty cool!

I've got another cube draft report from last month currently being cleaned up. Will hopefully post that sometime soon along with updated thoughts from a variety of inclusions and swaps in the last 7 months. And hopefully the cardfetcher gets fixed sometime before that to make these decklists legible.

 

[shamizy]

Monsters and Myths

I started building out my cube in the Summer of 2014. This was the first summer after I had transferred to my university and had gotten very involved with Magic as a major hobby over the previous year. The Magic club on campus was very active and I participated in a ton of events to break up the doldrum of classes and grind of midterms and projects.

It was sometime in Spring 2014 that an older member of the club wanted to host their own cube draft and posted about it on the Facebook group. I looked over the Excel spreadsheet, didn’t recognize the vast majority of the cards at that point, but still attended the draft on campus to see what it was about. Had never heard of cube and I was just starting to build up a love of Limited as I drafted a ton of Theros in Fall 2013 slowly building up my skills. The idea of your own custom draft environment that you didn’t have to pay for in the future ($15 was a LOT as a broke college student going 1-2 at best at FNM), was mindblowing to me.

I went to the cube draft and I got my ass kicked.

My knowledge of Magic was mostly cards from the last two years worth of Standard beginning from Innistrad through RTR block so everything else that graced this cube ranging from Elite Vanguard aggro beatdown to Galepowder Mage blink was wholly lost on me. I just didn’t know the archetypes or synergies. But I had a great time playing in the environment and decided that I would look into building my own beginning from that summer. It would be the most cost effective option long term.

I started off with a few popular lists online as the base template then slowly made my swaps here and there before eventually finding this forum online after reading some of Waddell’s articles on CFB back in the day. I didn't get an actual cube draft in with a full pod until later that Fall once I was back on campus and could host one in the early weeks of that fall quarter. But I was hooked after the first one and couldn't wait to get back to tinkering and fixing up things that I wanted to improve.

Back then there were a number of format defining cards that warped whole games; what we refer to as GRBS or game ruining bullshit. The delta between a powerful card versus removal options from the time were tough to balance. An unopposed haymaker could dominate boardstates or warp the game into a simple answer-me-or-die scenario. And for years it would come down to a process of trying out certain cards, labeling them as GRBS whenever appropriate, then sidelining them into my cube binder or selling them.

Remember when Jace, the Mind Sculptor, Bloodbraid Elf, and Stoneforge Mystic were unbanned in Modern? A bunch of boomer Standard players swore the sky was falling and that these cards would completely warp the whole Modern meta around themselves. The first month had a lot of decks forcing these cards to try them out, often with 4 copies in each decklist, but then it turned out that they were completely fine in a new meta that had drastically shifted. While these may have all dominated during their times in Standard, the steady power creep of the game towards greater efficiency had pushed them to a reasonable level.

A card’s power level is always environmentally contextual.

It’s why Opportunity at uncommon in M14 was absolutely nuts; that card advantage in a summer core set put you so far ahead in that type of format. If it were present in an environment where aggressive decks could overrun you a la Amonkhet, all of a sudden you don’t have that luxury to tap out for 6 mana for 4 new cards. Tweaking the competition a creature has to go up against in combat or the speed of removal that can efficiently deal with threats will define the gameplay experience for your drafters. The key is to provide the necessary tools and have them discover those for themselves.

In recent years I’ve gone back through my cube binder housing these former format boogeymen and re-evaluated them for inclusion and second runs in an environment that is much more readily available to include them.



I remember how much of a beating this card was back in 2014. Two plus abilities that impacted the game either by providing a blocker to protect itself or by jumping an attacker into the air with +3/+3. The size of creatures back then was such that OG Elspeth could dominate boards until potentially reaching that ultimate to fully lock up the game. 4 mana was the perfect spot where Aggro decks could curve out with this as a finisher or midrange decks could really start laying down the beats by turning something into a 5/5 or a 6/6 breaking through a board stall.

Hero’s Downfall in Theros was our first taste of planeswalker targeted removal and was a revelation as a kill anything instant speed option. 3 mana at instant to shoot down a walker or ANY creature?! All of a sudden those pesky planeswalkers were reachable even behind an army of blockers. It didn’t dramatically shift the meta when it came to cube, but the influx of multiple options that could target this card type directly in the coming years helped to bring them down to a more reasonable level. We had a stretch of like 3 years with every big set bringing some kind of planeswalker adjacent removal option at premium rarity.

In 2026 this is still a strong but fair walker. I honestly think its underrated compared to other Elspeth cards which tend to end the game a bit faster, but I think this is definitely the cleanest design. It’s not very flashy like many of the planeswalker designs we’ve gotten post-WAR, but it gets the job done and provides a clock for decks interested in attacking on that specific midrange axis. I’ve loved the gameplay utility in both W/R and G/W decks as a way to get evasive and push through that extra damage to move your opponent from safety to the danger zone.

It features one of the most iconic art pieces in the game to me; I remember being struck by how beautiful the piece was when it was reprinted in the first Modern Masters set as I was getting back into the game. That's the copy I run in my cube and I love being able to see it whenever I get a chance to play it in a deck.



The premier reanimation target for most of Magic’s history after it was printed. The sheer card advantage you’d generate after one activation was enough to put away most games back in the day. It was incredibly difficult to deal with an early resolved Griselbrand unless you had the exact piece of interaction necessary to keep it in check and this mostly consisted of exile based removal in Swords to Plowshares or an Oblivion Ring. Damage based removal just couldn’t get there to clear a 7/7 and any cube-worthy bounce effects were usually higher up in the curve and often too late for interaction before the opponent had already jumped far ahead.

Scavenging Ooze was one of the few maindeckable pieces of graveyard hate that would make your final 40 even if you weren’t going up against a graveyard centric strategy. The base body and growth rate were just completely on point and an Ooze with enough food could dominate a board. Other options were cards like Relic of Progenitus or Tormod’s Crypt which were strictly sideboard fodder unless you were that guy trying to scrap every last piece of value trying to make a Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas deck a thing (I was that guy. Those decks sucked). Nowadays we’ve got main deck redundancy with a white ooze in Lion Sash, a ton of splash hate being printed set-to-set like Heritage Reclamation, and I’d say the biggest factor is really just how much faster the game is. You can get run down very quickly by a curve-out that even an early Griselbrand might not be able to stabilize or race. Dropping your life total that low is much riskier now with efficient options to both punish you and answer this threat.

I’ve been running it for the last year plus and haven’t had any issues with it at all. I generally prefer the suite of reanimation cards that can be naturally played or cheated out in other archetypes like Phyrexian Fleshgorger or Myr Battlesphere, but I do think it is important to ensure that there are specific cards will end up going to the players that need them the most. Pure reanimation targets like a Big Gris or an Archon of Cruelty are very welcome in my cube nowadays if only to give that Reanimator player the high of opening their perfect bomb.



An immovable object. Back then the 4/4 body was quite large while dominating most combats and board states. Being able to play this alongside other options like Troll Ascetic made for very sticky on board threats in G/x decks that were difficult to deal with.

Hexproof on such an efficient body was a problem for a long time. Funnily enough people didn’t care about similar protection on Sagu Mauler from KTK years later, but that was probably because the mana investment was so much and trample would end games. Thrun would stick on the board with no clear way of getting rid of it while providing a roadblock that just couldn’t be targeted. You could just sit behind Thrun until you stabilized before advancing your game further.

What changed? Creatures in general are just much bigger. This struck me a while back when I still had Lovestruck Beast in my cube thinking wait this is straight up a 5/5 for 3 with a minor drawback. Why is Thrun on the sideline if this is where we’re at? If you look across the curves across different colors you can almost assume that each CMC is on average 1 point higher in either power or toughness than it might have been in the past. The likes of Surrak, Elusive Hunter and Adeline, Resplendent Cathar are straight up 4 power threats with upside that can hit hard and often after coming down on 3 rather than 4.

Green is a color that needs to be the one posing a question: here is my threat, can you deal with it? Every other color has various methods of interaction, but green being left by the wayside and having its unique niche as an aggressor to force an answer is important to maintain. I like Thrun as a sticky threat that plays well with the explosion of +1/+1 counter support we’ve gotten over time. Once it becomes a 5/5 it’s a real threat to pull off an impression of The Abyss as you continue to whittle down the opponent’s side of the board with each chump block.



The period of Standard and Modern right after Theros: Beyond Death arrived was miserable to follow with the proliferation of Uro decks. It was just so much value packed into one hyper efficient card. Being able to draw a card AND gain life AND ramp a land was nuts on a 3 mana card. Multiple copies just served as another Growth Spiral on your way to eventually escaping one from the grave. It wasn’t a card that needed to stick around to have an impact; being able to advance your board with extra mana while staying card neutral cycling itself was an absurd sequence to have to deal with.

In cube, much like with reanimator, the proliferation of graveyard hate has made it much more manageable. If you get to untap with it after an escape sequence it can pull off a lot of work, but there are so many random removal spells like Eliminate or Exorcise that can efficiently keep up and answer the threat. I also believe that the lack of multiple Uro cards for redundancy is a big factor in keeping it from feeling overwhelmingly oppressive. When you could just churn through multiples it was so consistent and backbreaking, but with just one copy in your deck the threat is much more manageable and comes through as more a unique inclusion with an very rare mechanic.



Good old Swagtusk. I remember a time when this card was too powerful and splashy for my environment to be worth inclusion. 5 Life stapled to a 5/3 that leaves behind a 3/3 was an absolute terror and nigh unbeatable for those simple W/x Aggro decks from that time period. If you had any way to maximize it further a la Restoration Angel that was a scenario that most decks just couldn’t recover from at all.

But like the case for Thrun, the rapid growth of creatures across the board has made it such that an x/3 body is very brittle. So many cards can just trade up or boards put you under so much pressure that spending T5 on just a blocker + 5 life may not be enough. I also think the proliferation of Menace and other evasive keywords lower in the curve on relevant bodies have helped tremendously to push damage around a Thragtusk.. Damage based removal also plays a factor here with the printing of efficient options years later like Roast or Supplex as clean answers. And if they get the 3/3? No big deal; that’s not as “real” a threat as it was in the past when you might just have a 3/4 or a 4/4 body ready to deal with it.

I like it nowadays as a fun card that G/x decks wouldn’t mind ramping into early or Bant blink decks looking to curve into it so they can stabilize and move to the late game. It's just a really memorable card from right around the time that I was getting deep into following pro Magic. There were few things as game-changing as the Thragtusk into Resto line to completely stabilize and turn the corner.



I remember when you could not describe Wurmcoil Engine as anything less than GRBS. Splashable in any midrange deck with a colorless cost, would immediately stabilize any game for you and take over the board, and to top it off non-exile removal would only result in two more bodies that needed to be dealt with later. It was pure value all around and WAY above rate for cards in that era of design.

Nowadays 6 drops are seemingly the new 8+ drops where most decks aren’t in the market for a card at that CMC. Lower to the ground strategies make a 6 mana stabilizer a card that you might never reach in time. Also the sheer amount of efficient removal that cleanly deals with a Wurmcoil is much more available than a decade ago. Cards like Exorcise (a personal favorite of mine) and Suplex are clean and efficient answers. Great complementary interaction to artifact destruction and counterspells that have traditionally been available to deal with this card.

I brought it back for a run in my cube beginning from sometime in 2025 and have had no issues. Slots readily into a ramp deck as a finisher or into an artifact deck as additional support for Goblin Welder or Daretti, Scrap Savant to bring back early. Alongside Phyrexian Fleshgorger and Myr Battlesphere I get the critical mass of big artifact creatures that also slot in as pieces for a reanimator deck. It’s not warping games like in the past and it’s been an exciting nostalgia hit for players that remember the good old days when this was an absolute scourge.



I remember how this card definitely flew under the radar for many people when it was first spoiled. The lack of a relevant ETB had many cube curators waving it off as another ineffective Baneslayer variant but then it began to clearly showcase its power in the Standard format that followed. And it earned its spot as a dominant threat that wasn’t wholly game-ending. Weirdly enough it kind of takes on the role that many big green cards do as an answer me or face the consequences threat, except it trades in trample damage and a swift beatdown for a protracted slow drain.

As cubes continue to gain more and more ways to draw cards and filter through their deck, the more powerful an effect like Sheoldred’s static ability becomes. It serves as a roadblock on the ground with a 4/5 body and Deathtouch while slowly whittling away an opponent’s life with each card drawn. However, even when facing it down from the other side of the board I never feel like I’m completely locked out of the game. For me it becomes a puzzle to figure out how to navigate or answer. Cards that can shift a game in a way that isn't overbearing are great additions to an environment. With the continued push towards cheaper creatures with more effects stapled in, a symptom of Commander's many all-in-one designs, a 4 drop is much more manageable and less oppressive than it might have been in a Standard format where it was an absolute staple.

In my last cube draft I had a ton of draw 2 effects in a U/R deck to churn through and fill my grave, but a resolved Sheoldred made me have to really re-think my gameplan and sequences. I had answers in my deck with cards like Flame of Anor and Roast, but should I bank on drawing into these naturally or did I need to take a huge chunk of damage just to get there with looting to dig to them? Sheoldred's success in my cube made me add (and keep) Razorkin Needlehead from DSK which has been fun as a lesser version that doesn't outright dominate the board, but serves as a nuisance for red decks trying to chip in a few more points of damage over time.

And now I’m looking at bringing in an Aggro curve-topper that will wheel to the R/x Aggro deck instead of being snapped up as a generically powerful 4 drop ala Headliner Scarlett or Pyrogoyf. I recently picked up a copy of a classic from nearly ten years ago:



I honestly forgot that this card existed until seeing it in some random list recently, but I think it might be exactly what I’m looking for.

It gives aggressive decks a sticky threat that can only be maximized once you go all in on a low curve deck going wide early. It is a card that should wheel much like Griselbrand for the Reanimator deck (especially with how many cards generate card advantage nowadays). It works well alongside cards like Inti, Seneschal of the Sun and a plethora of the self discard cards we’ve gotten in recent years. Iron-Shield Elf is a fun one to pair alongside it in a R/B deck that could go into turbo mode and all of a sudden pull off a swing for 8+ out of nowhere. I like that it can pair with my Duplicate Voucher options in Marauding Mako and Hollow One to extract additional value. A 5/4 Indestructible body can hit hard and will win just about every battle on the ground as it slowly whittles down an opponent’s chump blockers.

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I find myself leaning more towards that nostalgia with these memorable cards as we get fewer sets nowadays that feel like classic Magic to me. Just looking at each of these cards when I get to flip through my cube just bring back a ton of memories from when I was most involved and into the game. We all spend a ton of time tinkering with new cards and inclusions alongside cards we've put on layaway for future evaluation once support is there, but I think it's a ton of fun to revisit these old iconic and standout options and see if they can find a home in your current environment.

I'm going to take some pics of these actual cards sometime when I next go through making physical swaps later this month just to bring some more color to this blog. It's been a long while since I last did a rundown of my current set-up so it's also great time to revisit that.

Thanks for reading!

 

[Nanonox]

These certainly provide that nostalgic hit.

Personally, I'm allergic to midrange, so I tend to avoid a lot of these. I'm especially wary of those with a big body that also gain life passively or on ETB. I am talking about cards like Sheoldred, the Apocalypse, Thragtusk and Bristlebud Farmer. These put the squeeze on aggro in two different ways whether they answer the big body immediately or not.

Compare to Wurmcoil Engine where the lifelink can be danced around (removal, bounce, sacrifice the blocked creature) and a 6/6 body is reasonable for 6 mana. Same idea with Phyrexian Fleshgorger or Batterskull.

Does this echo your experiences?

Take these two curves (heavily exaggerated to illustrate what I mean)

-> ->

Here you passively gained 8 life, have 2 foods, plus extra bodies with Uro and Thragtusk should they answer it.

-> ->

You have some extra life, extra bodies and a tough to deal with creature, but it feels less oppressive somehow.

 

[shamizy]

These certainly provide that nostalgic hit.

Personally, I'm allergic to midrange, so I tend to avoid a lot of these. I'm especially wary of those with a big body that also gain life passively or on ETB. I am talking about cards like Sheoldred, the Apocalypse, Thragtusk and Bristlebud Farmer. These put the squeeze on aggro in two different ways whether they answer the big body immediately or not.

Compare to Wurmcoil Engine where the lifelink can be danced around (removal, bounce, sacrifice the blocked creature) and a 6/6 body is reasonable for 6 mana. Same idea with Phyrexian Fleshgorger or Batterskull.

Does this echo your experiences?

Take these two curves (heavily exaggerated to illustrate what I mean)

-> ->

Here you passively gained 8 life, have 2 foods, plus extra bodies with Uro and Thragtusk should they answer it.

-> ->

You have some extra life, extra bodies and a tough to deal with creature, but it feels less oppressive somehow.

I think it really comes down to how you design and give other archetypes tools to combat midrange. I think a combination of the three main archetypes (Aggro/Midrange/Control) is necessary to make a healthy environment in the long run, so it mostly comes down to how you tweak things for all of them to compete. Providing different axes of gameplay for different archetypes is mostly what I try to do nowadays with card inclusions into my environment.

For Aggro I think the ideal lists in my cube need to establish board pressure early and then prioritize efficient removal to round out the deck and snipe roadblocks. If you can have a bunch of threats that can grow vertically over time ala Champion of the Parish with Humans or just cards like Luminarch Aspirant and Siege Veteran to go tall, that becomes a better way to keep midrange on their toes. If you can go big early enough and/or leverage tempo effectively I find that a lot of midrange decks can struggle just to establish themselves in games against a well constructed Aggro list. If they stumble at all curving out they could be down to 7-8 life and really struggling to stick around.

If a big threat sticks on the board that is a problem, but the combination of burn/life loss for reach and removal is also usually enough to answer or get around it. I think the key is to find unique options that you can bank on coming back to the specific decks/archetypes that need it. For example, I'm a big fan of the following:

​

These are uncommon options for removal with many wore than the "better" options, but they can all be top picks for an Aggro deck whereas others might be searching for the universal removal. These also double as ineffective removal options against Aggro decks for the most part which helps them to wheel in a draft to a player that might be able to maximize it. You can also consider niche cards like General Kudro of Drannith which I find to be a really cool signpost card and flexible design that gives a B/W Humans deck a lot of options. Getting the tools to the players that need them is very important in my overall design nowadays.

Disruption is also the main axis that needs to be focused on with midrange threats. Coming from playing a lot of EDH, you realize with each passing year of designs that a lack of interaction is the biggest issue leading to midrange decks/archetypes snowballing out of control in games. Having the removal options available is key to preventing something too wild to overcome.

For that reason I'm a big fan of cube cards that disrupt curve outs ala Thalia, Heretic Cathar and Zhao, the Moon Slayer in cube. Hand disruption is another option to consider. It just doesn't work in a multiplayer formats unless you're hitting everyone at once, but it's something that should be utilized in traditional 1v1 more frequently in my opinion. I've embraced a LOT more discard inclusions in recent years beyond staples like Thoughtseize and Inquisition of Kozilek with the additions of cards like:

​

Sniping the threat before it gets deployed lets you attack on the same level as blue can with counterspells. If these get paired alongside efficient removal I don't see why midrange would be that oppressive unless you run into a completely resilient nut draw from the opponent while you're drawing blanks. Decks need to be able to proactively apply pressure on board while being able to disrupt the Midrange curve-out to keep them in check.

Another factor is being aware of the number of x/3 and x/4 bodies you have in the format. A few here and there is fine to ensure that you don't just get out-tempoed by ever 1-2 mana removal spell, but if you have too large a number of these then that will choke off Aggro decks far more than a single beefy threat every could.

That's probably one of the main reasons I'm excited to try out Hazoret, the Fervent again soon as both a curve-topping beater and a resilient way to push damage. When you can pair it alongside some other cards in my environment there are very sequences that can be pulled off putting a durdly deck on the backfoot.

Also my cube is a 450 nowadays so there's a high possibility that many of these cards just won't be assembled together in a way that would be extremely oppressive unless someone assembles a crazy build. It could happen once in a while, but I find that it's mostly self-balancing in the long run with pure variance. If I were at a smaller size I'd definitely be more wary of that possibility if it was more common.

 

[Nanonox]

Appreciate the in depth write up! Just to be clear, I agree with what you are saying and couldn't hope to formulate it as eloquently. I wanted to touch on this sentence

I think it really comes down to how you design and give other archetypes tools to combat midrange.

You've made compelling arguments about using different removal options, the choice of aggressive creatures and the types of disruption to combat midrange. I guess my point is that another tool at your disposal is the choice of midrange creatures themselves.

Thrun is really cool because it works well against control and aggro alike, but also gives you some wiggle room to deal with it. You have a 5 turn clock to find a wrath and you can also chump block it to buy even more time. It stonewalls aggro pretty hard with regenerate, but that's where Elspeth, Whirler Rogue and Siege-Gang Commander come in to give you reach.

Sheoldred is a lot more vulnerable comparatively, but also gives you a pretty short window before you've gained too much life or opponent is passively dead. Actually, maybe my point is that I dislike Sheoldred in cubes similar to our power level. But you and your group seem to enjoy it so that's cool!

Another angle to go around midrange for aggro is aggro-combo. I'm talking Aristocrats and burn mostly, but discard can get there too with Hazoret that you are testing. Or tokens with Purphoros and so on.

These also double as ineffective removal options against Aggro decks for the most part which helps them to wheel in a draft to a player that might be able to maximize it.

I like this take on removal that is inefficient against aggro itself. It's not an angle I've given much thought, but will now.

You can also consider niche cards like General Kudro of Drannith which I find to be a really cool signpost card and flexible design that gives a B/W Humans deck a lot of options.

This on the other hand is right in my wheel house. Synergistic removal that pops in the right deck is something I love and use abundantly.

I'll end by sharing a card that I've been convinced to try again (thanks Dom) that was once an oppressive power house and is now more "reasonable" (in my cube at least)



Don't get me wrong it's still a fantastic card, but with curves getting lower and lower, you are more likely to snag a 3 drop than a 6 drop. It's still a big tempo swing as you're double spelling and using one of their attackers as a blocker. However, you might end up stealing a tapped creature which won't block for a while. A lot of creatures have their value tied up with an ETB trigger which you miss out on. Treachery stays on the battlefield meaning you can bounce the creature or destroy the enchantment to negate its impact.
What tips it over the line for me is using it with lands that produce more than one mana, also making it a ritual in some cases.

 

[shamizy]

You've made compelling arguments about using different removal options, the choice of aggressive creatures and the types of disruption to combat midrange. I guess my point is that another tool at your disposal is the choice of midrange creatures themselves.

Thrun is really cool because it works well against control and aggro alike, but also gives you some wiggle room to deal with it. You have a 5 turn clock to find a wrath and you can also chump block it to buy even more time. It stonewalls aggro pretty hard with regenerate, but that's where Elspeth, Whirler Rogue and Siege-Gang Commander come in to give you reach.

Sheoldred is a lot more vulnerable comparatively, but also gives you a pretty short window before you've gained too much life or opponent is passively dead. Actually, maybe my point is that I dislike Sheoldred in cubes similar to our power level. But you and your group seem to enjoy it so that's cool!

Yeah, Sheoldred, the Apocalypse is definitely the most powerful of the midrange options but the way I see it is that much like retail Limited there should be outlier cards in cube that players are excited for as a P1P1 option. You don't want too many of these to warp an environment, but you should have these as a hedge for different players at different skill levels. And again the way to deal with these threats comes down to card inclusions with removal; you don't want to end up like THB Limited where a resolved Dream Trawler was hopeless to play against.

Once you start refining removal spells that can deal with it cleanly, it's much more feasible to handle:



A lot of these options came about from me thinking from the perspective of a specific deck. I've got 9 power on board split across multiple bodies and burn in hand, but their single 4/4 is gumming things up for me. How can I get past this? And for that uncommon removal like Witchstalker Frenzy for a low curve R/x deck or Flame of Anor for the U/R deck with Wizards is excellent.

An experienced drafter can harness the power of a synergistic Hogaak Dredgevine deck as they navigate a draft, but a newer player needs those familiar fallback options to shortcut their first run. For that reason I think some haymakers and big beefy green creatures ala Bristlebud Farmer as a fallback is an important thing to support; you generally want your environment to be readily accessible to players new and old. Might not be the most appealing to me when I draft as I'm trying to force synergies and see whether what I've designed works or not, but if a friend of mine only gets to play once or twice a year then reducing that complexity helps whenever possible.

Another angle to go around midrange for aggro is aggro-combo. I'm talking Aristocrats and burn mostly, but discard can get there too with Hazoret that you are testing. Or tokens with Purphoros and so on.

Absolutely, recursive creatures have been a foundational block for this cube from the beginning with Gravecrawler and the like and being able to expand them into Aristocrats with reach ala Blood Artist effects is very important. I want to establish various different axes of attack for my drafters and when we get a more experienced pod there are so many interesting and unique decks. Just last time we had a player pull off a Collected Company into a Sephiroth, Fabled Soldier to drain for the final points of damage in a game.

It's very rare that a single deck will just completely stomp to a 3-0 and 6-0 in games; the vast majority of the time I see rounds are going to G3.

I like this take on removal that is inefficient against aggro itself. It's not an angle I've given much thought, but will now.

It's one thing that I've really focused on as I've refined my cube in recent years. I think early on when we were getting Hero's Downfall variants every year it was easy to jam more of them in and call it a day. But then you run into a problem where if it's all just efficient removal then they just become wholly interchangeable and you're missing that draft tension.

In retail Limited for a long time you just didn't get premier hyper efficient removal all the time at lower rarities. Sometimes you settle for that 5 mana deal 5 at instant speed because you just NEED some kind of removal. But if you do pick up that premium uncommon removal, like a 1B kill most cards in the set at instant speed, you learn to use them most effectively when trying to answer your opponents threats. Like sometimes it's a matter of thinking yeah I can take this 3 damage here because I'll stabilize once I play this 4/4 next turn. Save this removal spell for their next big threat because I need this 4/4 to win on the battlefield before I can turn the corner with this 6 drop in my hand once I draw into my 6th land.

When cards and actions are too efficient or readily available it cuts out a lot of the tension that makes Limited formats so appealing. I think that tension just leads to better games of Magic in general and you miss out on that if your removal becomes too efficient at all times. Definitely keep some of the cream of the crop, but having a range of removal efficiency and niches makes it way more engaging to me (partially why I've never played with Baleful Mastery).

Whenever you can introduce micro decision points it becomes a richer experience for experienced players.