I like that thought. Coul you list some "aggro finishers" that arent just good stuff midrange?
Would stuff like Keldon Champion and Hellrider fall into that category?
Would stuff like Keldon Champion and Hellrider fall into that category?
Sigh, a Cube
- Thread starter sigh
- Start date
A great question! To be perfectly honest, I haven't put enough thought into how to make the distinction. I think a perfect example from Alfonzo's deck is
The card is fine in a generic deck, it's good, but it's absolutely stellar in an aggressive deck with even a backup plan of going wide. And I like that it's a centralizing threat, but is answerable both via removal and by controlling the rest of the board. I like the balance there.
Honestly, a challenging cate gory to define! Another couple I can think of, maybe:
This just basing off of my cube. The cards you mention are both good examples for their respective formats also.
Did a draft!
Strong first pack, seemingly bent to blue. I choose Jace, vryn's prodigy over Counterspell and Clique as good first picks.
It resulted in this solid-looking Jeskai list:
Strong first pack, seemingly bent to blue. I choose Jace, vryn's prodigy over Counterspell and Clique as good first picks.
It resulted in this solid-looking Jeskai list:
slovakattack's draft of Sigh, A Cube on 25/11/2016 from CubeTutor.com
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A solid looking list indeed! One card that I'm really loving in my white section is
Curving recruiter into Whirled Rogue sounds awesome, but it also finds removal from man o war. Very happy that card was printed. Was a little surprised at one card I found in the SB:
Any particular reason she didn't make the cut? I think Anafenza deserves a spot on the bench for this one.
Love seeing the value Kiki, especially with recruiter
Curving recruiter into Whirled Rogue sounds awesome, but it also finds removal from man o war. Very happy that card was printed. Was a little surprised at one card I found in the SB:
Any particular reason she didn't make the cut? I think Anafenza deserves a spot on the bench for this one.
Love seeing the value Kiki, especially with recruiter
A solid looking list indeed! One card that I'm really loving in my white section is
Curving recruiter into Whirled Rogue sounds awesome, but it also finds removal from man o war. Very happy that card was printed. Was a little surprised at one card I found in the SB:
Any particular reason she didn't make the cut? I think Anafenza deserves a spot on the bench for this one.
Love seeing the value Kiki, especially with recruiter
Loving Recruiter in my own cube. He's just a fantastic cogpiece. The initial thinking to have Anafenza instead of Soulfire was to try and leverage the Brago blink effects more, but now that you mention it the SGM is probably way better. That was a drafting error on my part. (I tend to think of SGM's activated ability as trinket text for the most part.)
End of Year Updates - 12/04/16
A lot of theorycrafting, investigation, discussion, since the last time I updated, but no IRL drafts! Wo is me. Regardless, I carry on my merry way tinkering with my cube, though I should probably have a couple drafts soon to finally test out all the new cards that have snuck in since last time. There are a couple main reasons I've been working on an update in the past few weeks:
). Started of with one victim from each color. Out:
Sarkhan is just... not really needed, I think. Very goodstuffy, not actively trying to help any of my themes, all around meh.
Monastery Siege has been in and out so many damn times, and it honestly just feels like it's a scapegoat slot at this point.
Blackmail is a fine card, but I've got other updates that supercede it, so it's just a slot that isn't really needed right now.
Citadel Siege is OP. Glad to see this guy come out for something more synergistic (and hopefully not also OP).
Krosan Tusker is finally bowing out. Green needed to be doing something else, and the Tusker is outdated enough to get the boot.
I ended up swapping in:
Only adding three multicolor cards, but taking the time to bolster my artifact section a little more, as it is a theme I'm at least lazily attempting to support.
Cruel Ultimatum is a reinclude. Too much fun if you manage to pull it off, I just had to try it out again.
The Tower is definitely an experiment, but since I'm trying to support spell decks of multiple flavors, I think having a nice colorless roleplayer will be a solid inclusion. It's my first energy card, but it runs itself so well I don't even know if somebody unfamiliar with the maechanic would notice.
Animation module is another little experiment. It goes super well with Daretti and that deck, both potentially making fodder to scrifice, and Profilerating Daretti. We'll see where this one goes. I have some great other avenues for the card to explore, like anafenza, kin-tree spirit and drana, liberator of malakir
Goblin trenches comes in for my ongoing quest to turn lands into a valued resource. Recently added Crucilbe of worlds, and that makes for a mean addition to the engines available to the RG deck.
Simic Charm comes in as I move to build and support spells. It's the perfect spell for the deck, both pressuring and protecting.
Next up, I recently wrote a bunch of words on how I think bant can be a spells deck. To that end, I'm moving to fully support it and test it out in my environment. Turns out I already had a lot of the tools I am postulating for the archetype, so I'm trimming up a little. Out:
Angel of Finality is a nice card, but it's an easy flex slot IMO, being that's it's more of an incidental effect on an otherwise vanilla beater.
Decree of Justice is just another token-maker, and right now I'm letting Secure the Wastes hold down that particular fort.
Evolutionary Leap was a hard switch to make, as I love this card quite a bit. I feel like it's just not as much what my (theoretically) more controlling green section wants right now.
Voice of Resurgence was another killer swap, not lessened by the fact that all my Voices are signed. Luckily I have a prerelease Dromoka's command, so my conscience is clear in that regard, and Voice is a rather generic control-hate card.
Deadbridge Goliath is pretty boring. And I don't know if I've ever seen the Scavenge aility used.
What I swappped in:
Ojutai Exemplars feels like just the more combat-focused "prowess" card my Bant Spells deck wants. It's a respectable body on its own, and both protects itself while clearing blockers out of the way. I'm definitely excited to see what this card can do.
Enlightened Tutor is just a really cool card, and I hope to see it doing some interesting toolbox stuff, including by not limited to searching up auras, the new Sylvan Library, or a finisher like Torrential Gearhulk.
Sylvan Library I feel is more in line with what I want my green decks to be doing. If is interacting more with noncreature spells, Evolutionary Leap start falling out of place as a proper CA engine. Sylvan Library takes that role well, and combos nicely with some of the incidental lifegain in Gx.
Dromoka's Command is a very powerful spell for GW, and will be killer in the spells deck, I think.
Call of the Herd is simply a lower CMC version of what the Goliath is doing. Still a little boring, ut it's a spell, so it plays into the archetype better.
Next, Onder had a very valid critique in one of the more recent Draft Exchange exchanges: There's not very much delirium! So I'm working to slowly course correct:
Found a couple of slots that can be laid to rest:
The common theme here is that the cards I'm taking out don't really do anyhting to further the Themes I want to push and explore with my environment. Mayor of Avabruck especially is very out of place, as both the only Werewolf, and not having much of anyhting to do with anything. (bsides being a promo).
Bringing in/back in a couple delirium cards
Topplegeist is coming back in. White is starting to look like it can interact with delirium better than I initially thought, so Booplegeist gets another day in the sun
Descend is a straight swap for Terminus. Not only do I not like the random blowout potential (especially considering it's going to be more random and top-deck hero in my format than in others), but Descend keeps up the incidental GY hate train while providing some cool GY interaction of it's own.
Obsessive Skinner has always been high on my list, as it's a incrementally growing aggressive threat that plays well in go-wide and go-tall. Happy to try him out.
A couple more random and non-related switches that have been on the backburner for a while now:
Out:
Liliana's Reaver is generic goodstuff incarnate, and not super good to boot.
Nameless Inversion is just the wackiest of this particular slot, and so was the chosen one for swapping out.
Treasure hunt is very cool, and I still like it, but I'm trying out a more GY-based card
Swaps in:
Braids nothing if not loved around here at RTL, and she does seem like an interesting self-contained "archetype", making the drafter tilt their drafting around her to an extent. Nice.
Brutality is taking up the mantle of several slots, providing a discard outlet, utility removal, and hand control all in one!
Strategic planning is more suited towards GY based themes. Allows you to, for instance, keep the Body Double and dump a Soul of Shandalaar in the Grave, to be Body Doubled and later used for their ability from the grave.
That's all for now. Really need to get some IRL testing in to see how my format has been shaping up over the past couple of months. Thanks for reading!
;k
A lot of theorycrafting, investigation, discussion, since the last time I updated, but no IRL drafts! Wo is me
. Regardless, I carry on my merry way tinkering with my cube, though I should probably have a couple drafts soon to finally test out all the new cards that have snuck in since last time. There are a couple main reasons I've been working on an update in the past few weeks:- The gold-aggro/rethinking Gold slots thread. This has wanted me to flush out my gold section, so I'm taking one of my weakest or OP cards from each color and shift them around to multicolor or artifact sections.
- My recent investigation into Bant Spells/Tempo.
- Onderzeboot getting Grumpy.
). Started of with one victim from each color. Out:Sarkhan is just... not really needed, I think. Very goodstuffy, not actively trying to help any of my themes, all around meh.
Monastery Siege has been in and out so many damn times, and it honestly just feels like it's a scapegoat slot at this point.
Blackmail is a fine card, but I've got other updates that supercede it, so it's just a slot that isn't really needed right now.
Citadel Siege is OP. Glad to see this guy come out for something more synergistic (and hopefully not also OP).
Krosan Tusker is finally bowing out. Green needed to be doing something else, and the Tusker is outdated enough to get the boot.
I ended up swapping in:
Only adding three multicolor cards, but taking the time to bolster my artifact section a little more, as it is a theme I'm at least lazily attempting to support.
Cruel Ultimatum is a reinclude. Too much fun if you manage to pull it off, I just had to try it out again.
The Tower is definitely an experiment, but since I'm trying to support spell decks of multiple flavors, I think having a nice colorless roleplayer will be a solid inclusion. It's my first energy card, but it runs itself so well I don't even know if somebody unfamiliar with the maechanic would notice.
Animation module is another little experiment. It goes super well with Daretti and that deck, both potentially making fodder to scrifice, and Profilerating Daretti. We'll see where this one goes. I have some great other avenues for the card to explore, like anafenza, kin-tree spirit and drana, liberator of malakir
Goblin trenches comes in for my ongoing quest to turn lands into a valued resource. Recently added Crucilbe of worlds, and that makes for a mean addition to the engines available to the RG deck.
Simic Charm comes in as I move to build and support
spells. It's the perfect spell for the deck, both pressuring and protecting.Next up, I recently wrote a bunch of words on how I think bant can be a spells deck. To that end, I'm moving to fully support it and test it out in my environment. Turns out I already had a lot of the tools I am postulating for the archetype, so I'm trimming up a little. Out:
Angel of Finality is a nice card, but it's an easy flex slot IMO, being that's it's more of an incidental effect on an otherwise vanilla beater.
Decree of Justice is just another token-maker, and right now I'm letting Secure the Wastes hold down that particular fort.
Evolutionary Leap was a hard switch to make, as I love this card quite a bit. I feel like it's just not as much what my (theoretically) more controlling green section wants right now.
Voice of Resurgence was another killer swap, not lessened by the fact that all my Voices are signed
. Luckily I have a prerelease Dromoka's command, so my conscience is clear in that regard, and Voice is a rather generic control-hate card.Deadbridge Goliath is pretty boring. And I don't know if I've ever seen the Scavenge aility used.
What I swappped in:
Ojutai Exemplars feels like just the more combat-focused "prowess" card my Bant Spells deck wants. It's a respectable body on its own, and both protects itself while clearing blockers out of the way. I'm definitely excited to see what this card can do.
Enlightened Tutor is just a really cool card, and I hope to see it doing some interesting toolbox stuff, including by not limited to searching up auras, the new Sylvan Library, or a finisher like Torrential Gearhulk.
Sylvan Library I feel is more in line with what I want my green decks to be doing. If
is interacting more with noncreature spells, Evolutionary Leap start falling out of place as a proper CA engine. Sylvan Library takes that role well, and combos nicely with some of the incidental lifegain in Gx.Dromoka's Command is a very powerful spell for GW, and will be killer in the spells deck, I think.
Call of the Herd is simply a lower CMC version of what the Goliath is doing. Still a little boring, ut it's a spell, so it plays into the archetype better.
Next, Onder had a very valid critique in one of the more recent Draft Exchange exchanges: There's not very much delirium! So I'm working to slowly course correct:
Found a couple of slots that can be laid to rest:
The common theme here is that the cards I'm taking out don't really do anyhting to further the Themes I want to push and explore with my environment. Mayor of Avabruck especially is very out of place, as both the only Werewolf, and not having much of anyhting to do with anything. (bsides being a promo).
Bringing in/back in a couple delirium cards
Topplegeist is coming back in. White is starting to look like it can interact with delirium better than I initially thought, so Booplegeist gets another day in the sun
Descend is a straight swap for Terminus. Not only do I not like the random blowout potential (especially considering it's going to be more random and top-deck hero in my format than in others), but Descend keeps up the incidental GY hate train while providing some cool GY interaction of it's own.
Obsessive Skinner has always been high on my list, as it's a incrementally growing aggressive threat that plays well in go-wide and go-tall. Happy to try him out.
A couple more random and non-related switches that have been on the backburner for a while now:
Out:
Liliana's Reaver is generic goodstuff incarnate, and not super good to boot.
Nameless Inversion is just the wackiest of this particular slot, and so was the chosen one for swapping out.
Treasure hunt is very cool, and I still like it, but I'm trying out a more GY-based card
Swaps in:
Braids nothing if not loved around here at RTL, and she does seem like an interesting self-contained "archetype", making the drafter tilt their drafting around her to an extent. Nice.
Brutality is taking up the mantle of several slots, providing a discard outlet, utility removal, and hand control all in one!
Strategic planning is more suited towards GY based themes. Allows you to, for instance, keep the Body Double and dump a Soul of Shandalaar in the Grave, to be Body Doubled and later used for their ability from the grave.
That's all for now. Really need to get some IRL testing in to see how my format has been shaping up over the past couple of months. Thanks for reading!
;k
Beginning of Year Updates - 01/07/17
Happy new year everybody! with AEther Revolt spoilers freshly spoiled, time for some swap-ins, some cleaning up, and so on. First thing I'm noticing is that the number of cards I have on the docket for inclusion is steadily decreasing. I think I only ended up with... 6? cards from this set for initial inclusion! And that's from what is definitely one of the coolest and most powerful sets we've seen in a while. I think what it comes down to is format maturity, honestly. I think I've kinda found the groove for the format, and it's becoming more difficult for new cards to find a slot. My cube is primarily monitored on an excel sheet I have, and one metric I keep track of is my net "cardflow", much like a cash flow graph, it's my currently balance of changes to make.
I've put the (messy) set symbols from the four most recent sets. If this was a board meeting, everyone in the room would be talking up a storm about the last three months since Kaladesh. From about last new years, the peak balance of changes every spooiler season has been pretty consistent at about the average balance (~30), except for the last three months. Now it's a steady downward slope to a new "average", which I have yet to fully visualize or define. Interesting to note that the "Average" line almost perfectly intersects with the cube's first inflection point, which was the crossover from exploratory design into whatever 2016 would be defined as. Anyway, thought that would be fun to talk about. Seems like 2017 will open this cube up to the next phase in it's lifecycle. Nice!
On to the set at hand, it definitely is a powerful set, and there are some great inclusions. Here's what I'm looking at right now:
And I think that's it for now! Honestly, surprised myself with this, but I really didn't see a lot of the cards in the set fitting into what my formats wants to be doing. For one, I haven't really jumped into either vehicles or energy, so that pushes a large portion of space out of both Kaladesh sets. But the cards that the set did provide will be great for the format. Restoration Specialist is a super cool white incentive to do something interesting with recursion, which my format is of course on board with. Recurring a Bauble and O-Ring seems like gas. Solemn Recruit has dethroned my signed Mirran Crusader (finally lol), and is probably my favorite of the 2/2 double strikers to date. Very cool in the Sac deck. Baral, chief of Compliance is another kingpin 2 drop for U control and tempo decks, and I love the card a lot. Looting as an incidental effect is just so powerful, and cleanly replaces Curious Homonculus (rip). Baral wouldn't be complete without his disallow, which is a card I feel a lot of cubes have been looking for, for a long time. Yahenni, Undying Partisan is a great black sacrifice engine, and will grind the opponent well if unchecked. Finally a card in the proper power level, I think (as opposed to flesh carver and nantuko husk extremes of the spectrum). Last but not least, Renegade Map is my new favorite "bauble", thanks to it's minimal mana investment. This really helps fluch out my low end artifact section with utility and support effects designed for almost any deck. Love it.
A couple more cards I could see including, maybe:
But I think I will need to see some testing in other cubes and formats before I pull the trigger on anything here. Paradox Engine is my current first-at-bat, because some goldfishing with it has yielded immensely fun results without feeling overly unfair.
Thanks for reading! Anything you think is a shoe-in for me, and I've totally missed out on?
Happy new year everybody! with AEther Revolt spoilers freshly spoiled, time for some swap-ins, some cleaning up, and so on. First thing I'm noticing is that the number of cards I have on the docket for inclusion is steadily decreasing. I think I only ended up with... 6? cards from this set for initial inclusion! And that's from what is definitely one of the coolest and most powerful sets we've seen in a while. I think what it comes down to is format maturity, honestly. I think I've kinda found the groove for the format, and it's becoming more difficult for new cards to find a slot. My cube is primarily monitored on an excel sheet I have, and one metric I keep track of is my net "cardflow", much like a cash flow graph, it's my currently balance of changes to make.
I've put the (messy) set symbols from the four most recent sets. If this was a board meeting, everyone in the room would be talking up a storm about the last three months since Kaladesh. From about last new years, the peak balance of changes every spooiler season has been pretty consistent at about the average balance (~30), except for the last three months. Now it's a steady downward slope to a new "average", which I have yet to fully visualize or define. Interesting to note that the "Average" line almost perfectly intersects with the cube's first inflection point, which was the crossover from exploratory design into whatever 2016 would be defined as. Anyway, thought that would be fun to talk about. Seems like 2017 will open this cube up to the next phase in it's lifecycle. Nice!
On to the set at hand, it definitely is a powerful set, and there are some great inclusions. Here's what I'm looking at right now:
And I think that's it for now! Honestly, surprised myself with this, but I really didn't see a lot of the cards in the set fitting into what my formats wants to be doing. For one, I haven't really jumped into either vehicles or energy, so that pushes a large portion of space out of both Kaladesh sets. But the cards that the set did provide will be great for the format. Restoration Specialist is a super cool white incentive to do something interesting with recursion, which my format is of course on board with. Recurring a Bauble and O-Ring seems like gas. Solemn Recruit has dethroned my signed Mirran Crusader (finally lol), and is probably my favorite of the 2/2 double strikers to date. Very cool in the Sac deck. Baral, chief of Compliance is another kingpin 2 drop for U control and tempo decks, and I love the card a lot. Looting as an incidental effect is just so powerful, and cleanly replaces Curious Homonculus (rip). Baral wouldn't be complete without his disallow, which is a card I feel a lot of cubes have been looking for, for a long time. Yahenni, Undying Partisan is a great black sacrifice engine, and will grind the opponent well if unchecked. Finally a card in the proper power level, I think (as opposed to flesh carver and nantuko husk extremes of the spectrum). Last but not least, Renegade Map is my new favorite "bauble", thanks to it's minimal mana investment. This really helps fluch out my low end artifact section with utility and support effects designed for almost any deck. Love it.
A couple more cards I could see including, maybe:
But I think I will need to see some testing in other cubes and formats before I pull the trigger on anything here. Paradox Engine is my current first-at-bat, because some goldfishing with it has yielded immensely fun results without feeling overly unfair.
Thanks for reading! Anything you think is a shoe-in for me, and I've totally missed out on?
Platonic Ideal Daretti Deck from CubeTutor.com
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Goldfished this deck on CT a little while ago, and I LOVE it. This is everything I want out of the artifact.Dec (and more tbh). It really hits a lot of notes of what the deck should be doing. I think it operates fine without the main engines operating, just as an Izzet midrange sorta deck. But! It does have a robust artifact interacton setup. There's a small trinket mage package which can grab fixing, draw and/or removal. There's a Daretti package with the ultimate artifact bomb, the battleball. There's redundancy to that package with feldon!
I might not end up with the goggles IRL due to low target count, but I have decent swap in options like Ashling for a bw. I also wish I had one more trinket mage target. My sights are set on maybe adding
Pacification array is one of the best artifacts to come out of Kaladesh. Do it!
Pacification Array has been unreal every time I've gotten to play it. There was a game in Kaladesh limited where it was able to hold off a Cataclysmic Gearhulk for like 10 turns while Vengeful Rebel and Felidar Guardian went to work.
Tapping end of turn and then again on your turn to remove 2 blockers when you're ready to swing for lethal is nice as well.
Tapping end of turn and then again on your turn to remove 2 blockers when you're ready to swing for lethal is nice as well.
Three Day Weekend, Haven't Updated in a While Updates - 05/26/17
Pretty long time since I've updated! Sadly, I'm not entirely sure I've had an IRL draft since before my last updates. I think I did have a couple 3 man drafts and sealed's, but its been a little hard getting anything going. Ah well, so is life. Have been plugging away at cube maintenance nonetheless. I think I've started to shake off certain preconceived notions I've had around cards that might've once been concrete staples in my eyes. I think this is starting to help me take some fresh looks at what the format I'm crafting truly needs. Ahadabans, I believe, brought up a good example just recently:
This card is really good. Its amazing. Its also pretty boring, and does it really do anything for what I'm trying to have the format be? Is there something else that can provide more net gain for the decks I want to be seeing? loaming Shaman? caller of the claw?? Tilling treefolk???? Haven't had the time recently to really put myself to the grindstone (nor the playtests), but I can feel putting my sights on cards that may detract from exploring.
Beyond that, Amonkhet is a gift from above for me! I wasn't expecting two very heavy graveyard blocks so close together! This combined with the return of cycling has me all-around hyped. IMHO, cycling is probably one of the most perfect mechanics printed, especially for a singleton style format. Being able to run niche cards and use them as canaries, or to dig yourself out of a tight spot is so good. I've always had an eye for finding ways to reduce nongames, and to have consistent and diverse ways to dig for fixing, and cycling fits perfectly. Very happy sigh.
Besides updating with cards from Amonkhet, I've been exploring what other card inclusions I can work with, and I think I have some cool stuff to test out.
->
->
This little square dance switcheroo is me trying to liven up this GB creatures-graveyard-matter section. Spider spawning wasn't biting with my group, and I've got Sidisi for playing around with creature milling. Grizzly Fate I think is a much better inclusion for me. It keeps the flashback my format loves, while sticking to monocolor where it can find homes in all sorts of cool brews. GR loam vortex deck as a finisher? UG deck utilizing the U draw-discard package? Sadist deck still? Think I will like. Lol-troll I'm testing as another discard outlet that doubles as a sticky threat. I've found that protecting a 'queen' can be a vital strategy/plan B in my format, as the games can really grind back and forth, and keeping pressure on can keep the opponent from finding the time to swing the pendulum.
->
The UW blink components really don't need Bravo. He's extremely overkill, especially if you e grabbed a couple mana rocks. Vanish is a sweet flicker spell, and work just as well in buying you time as it does with flickering ETB effects. Testing for now, knowing that it might not grab in the group/format, with a potential back up plan in goal ol' momentary blink.
Some other swaps I'm trying out.
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->
Common thread here: unsticking buried head from the sand. Feeling of Dread was dreadful. Survived so long because flashback? Yeah. Eternal dragon bolsters a new cycling mini focus throughout the format, and is a decent beater. Spikeshot elder, dreadful. Goblin welder actually supports a distinct and cool GY deck I want in my format. World breaker is honestly not great top end for cube. Especially in a GY format, not interacting with recursion is very meh. No need to drag my heels 'because
mana'.
Amonkhet. Great set. 10 cats out of 10. Got a goodly number of includes just from set number one. Anticipate a good follow up.
-> , ->
-> , ->
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Trying out PtF because playable combat tricks are fun, flashbacky stuff is fun, and its two types for delirium. Cast out is solid gold, nuff said. Rotting rats is another victim of me having rose-tinted glasses RE: flashback. Miasmic mummy is a solid bear, simpler card, all-around better include. Archfiend is a BEAST. Maybe too strong. But I want it to fail strong then to never have seen play. Never to Return is probably as close to a true staple for me as something's going to get. Murder variant with a follow up token + gy hate is so perfect. forsake is a great cycling card, great sb card, but you can run it Mb. Incidental gy hate too! Nissa is incredible, and I'm pretty sure Kiora never saw play. Honored Crop Captain comes in, because eh. I like that it doesn't need another card to function, and signals the color pair. MOUTH.
Still think I can sum up my new focus in 2017 as really a buckling-down on cards that I've just turned blind eyes to for too long. Hopefully I can really push my format even farther than it is now, with the help of a little tough love.
Also hoping I can start getting back into some drafting with this, so I get to see where my tinkering have taken me. Thanks for reading!
Pretty long time since I've updated! Sadly, I'm not entirely sure I've had an IRL draft since before my last updates
. I think I did have a couple 3 man drafts and sealed's, but its been a little hard getting anything going. Ah well, so is life. Have been plugging away at cube maintenance nonetheless. I think I've started to shake off certain preconceived notions I've had around cards that might've once been concrete staples in my eyes. I think this is starting to help me take some fresh looks at what the format I'm crafting truly needs. Ahadabans, I believe, brought up a good example just recently:This card is really good. Its amazing. Its also pretty boring, and does it really do anything for what I'm trying to have the format be? Is there something else that can provide more net gain for the decks I want to be seeing? loaming Shaman? caller of the claw?? Tilling treefolk???? Haven't had the time recently to really put myself to the grindstone (nor the playtests), but I can feel putting my sights on cards that may detract from exploring.
Beyond that, Amonkhet is a gift from above for me! I wasn't expecting two very heavy graveyard blocks so close together! This combined with the return of cycling has me all-around hyped. IMHO, cycling is probably one of the most perfect mechanics printed, especially for a singleton style format. Being able to run niche cards and use them as canaries, or to dig yourself out of a tight spot is so good. I've always had an eye for finding ways to reduce nongames, and to have consistent and diverse ways to dig for fixing, and cycling fits perfectly. Very happy sigh.
Besides updating with cards from Amonkhet, I've been exploring what other card inclusions I can work with, and I think I have some cool stuff to test out.
-> -> This little square dance switcheroo is me trying to liven up this GB creatures-graveyard-matter section. Spider spawning wasn't biting with my group, and I've got Sidisi for playing around with creature milling. Grizzly Fate I think is a much better inclusion for me. It keeps the flashback my format loves, while sticking to monocolor where it can find homes in all sorts of cool brews. GR loam vortex deck as a finisher? UG deck utilizing the U draw-discard package? Sadist deck still? Think I will like. Lol-troll I'm testing as another discard outlet that doubles as a sticky threat. I've found that protecting a 'queen' can be a vital strategy/plan B in my format, as the games can really grind back and forth, and keeping pressure on can keep the opponent from finding the time to swing the pendulum.
-> The UW blink components really don't need Bravo. He's extremely overkill, especially if you e grabbed a couple mana rocks. Vanish is a sweet flicker spell, and work just as well in buying you time as it does with flickering ETB effects. Testing for now, knowing that it might not grab in the group/format, with a potential back up plan in goal ol' momentary blink.
Some other swaps I'm trying out.
-> -> -> Common thread here: unsticking buried head from the sand. Feeling of Dread was dreadful. Survived so long because flashback? Yeah. Eternal dragon bolsters a new cycling mini focus throughout the format, and is a decent beater. Spikeshot elder, dreadful. Goblin welder actually supports a distinct and cool GY deck I want in my format. World breaker is honestly not great top end for cube. Especially in a GY format, not interacting with recursion is very meh. No need to drag my heels 'because
mana'.Amonkhet. Great set. 10 cats out of 10. Got a goodly number of includes just from set number one. Anticipate a good follow up.
-> , -> -> , -> -> , -> -> , -> -> Trying out PtF because playable combat tricks are fun, flashbacky stuff is fun, and its two types for delirium. Cast out is solid gold, nuff said. Rotting rats is another victim of me having rose-tinted glasses RE: flashback. Miasmic mummy is a solid bear, simpler card, all-around better include. Archfiend is a BEAST. Maybe too strong. But I want it to fail strong then to never have seen play. Never to Return is probably as close to a true staple for me as something's going to get. Murder variant with a follow up token + gy hate is so perfect. forsake is a great cycling card, great sb card, but you can run it Mb. Incidental gy hate too! Nissa is incredible, and I'm pretty sure Kiora never saw play. Honored Crop Captain comes in, because eh. I like that it doesn't need another card to function, and signals the color pair. MOUTH.
Still think I can sum up my new focus in 2017 as really a buckling-down on cards that I've just turned blind eyes to for too long. Hopefully I can really push my format even farther than it is now, with the help of a little tough love.
Also hoping I can start getting back into some drafting with this, so I get to see where my tinkering have taken me. Thanks for reading!
And have to say, I am exquisitely happy that my section is working as smoothly as it. The fact hat it can support both of the decks below, and they both look very competitive is a very positive sign for proper depth in that guild. I think my work on my Green section, and its suite of multiuse value generation components is working better than I could have ever hoped. Genesis looks solid in both lists.
section is working as smoothly as it. The fact hat it can support both of the decks below, and they both look very competitive is a very positive sign for proper depth in that guild. I think my work on my Green section, and its suite of multiuse value generation components is working better than I could have ever hoped. Genesis looks solid in both lists.RG tokens from CubeTutor.com
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rampy/controlly gruul from CubeTutor.com
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Hey, I drafted that!
Five Man Cube Draft - 06/04/17
Got a five-man draft together this afternoon, and it was fantastic. Got to see a lot of new cards in action, and got some nifty insights into how the cube format is interacting with itself. Couple interesting patterns that I might have to ponder over a little bit more. Also got a good test of having cycling lands in the BLB, which I think worked out well enough, though I think there were missed opportunities to utilize it. I also think this is one of the most even distribution of basic lands I've ever seen, which seems like a positive sign to me, as semi-arbitrary as the benchmark is. We had:
: 10
: 9
:15
:12
:14
Each color was represented in at least 2 decks, and the two greatest shares were in three. This makes me very happy, almost happier than any individual interaction or deck I saw during play. It shows to me, at least in a way, that the format is very diverse and interactive, and I'm reaching a very good spot in ironing out dead spots and color weaknesses. The games were also very interactive, and I think only one or two matches ended in 0-2 results. Here are the decks we had:
This deck ran like a hot knife through butter. Might as well have been a modern bant company deck. Really combined the blue digging package with a good GW etb/tempo suite, and backed it up with a souple very solid finishers. Recruiter of the Guard was an all-star in the deck, and is a card that I think is perfect for the format. It would get either Edric to power up a draw engine, or a Monastery Mentor to power up the board. Anafenza also did work in this deck, having relatively few tokens to non-bo with, and providing critical boosts to otherwise duds (like recruiter. I didn't face this deck, but I do not think I would have had an easy time of it. Also saw a nasty combo of Titania -> fetch + crack -> galepowder -> Fetch + crack... woo boy
This deck also ran very smoothly, though the focus was a little split between aggression and grindy engine-stuff. It worked in the end, largely powered by the trifecta of Braids, Gitrog, and Tireless Tracker. Tracker is on my hit list, because it had ridiculous advantage for relatively little effort. played out largely like a GB rock deck, using abundant removal and recursion to consistently tip the board in their favor. Very cool deck, and exactly what I want the color to be doing. Just have to put a keen eye towards some pieces that may be slightly oppressive. Did get to see the Bitterblossom/Braids combo out at least once, and it was a punishing time for the opponent, though the opponent did win in the end with some beefy flying power they managed to keep around. Also saw a T3 Gitrog Monster, which gave me pause about the number of 1 drop dorks I have, because the Mystic enabled the Bloom tender via a Carrion Feeder. That was followed up with a Tireless Tracker, and the game was easily locked. Hmm... I may be in the market for a Tracker replacement, because that was really the card that won the day (two clues a turn?)
Me! And boy was I happy with the deck I ended up with! A truly functional RUG Engine deck! The first pick was a wildly speculative Daretti, with a Molten Vortex in the pack. The second and third colors didn't really start to shape themselves easily. I trended green with the pickup of Nissa, who was a double splash at the time, and things like Harmonize. Decided to truly go three color with the pickup of the Torrential Gearhulk, who was perfect with Daretti, and grabbed a couple key cards while being a solid finisher. Deck played out exactly like I hoped it would have, with dorky creatures playing the long-game with board-stalling blocks, backed up with Red interaction and wipes, to allow time for the Blue/Red draw-discard engine enough time to fully come online so I could secure a winning position. Molten Vortex was a slightly speculative pick, but was firmly included with the pickup of Crucible of Worlds, which also made the draw engine much better. Very Happy with the deck and the archetype as a whole, and it doesn't seem out of the question for someone else to pick it up, because the cards largely existed on their own merit. Didn't face either of the above decks, and I'm not sure I would have been as successful against those decks, but still feel like the deck was very contemporarily placed in the night's meta. Did miss out on a Life from the Loam, though, which would have put the deck to 100, I think. All in all, very happy, and saw effectively three engines working together to keep me ahead:
- Daretti/artifact engine, also used as filtering. Got me important components like Pyromancer's Goggles back from the grave and helped me dig deep.
- Red/Blue draw-discard suite combined with the recursion creatures led to a sweet draw engine that set up my kills
- Molten Vortex + Crucible was a critical control component that bought me time against dudes that were trying to go wide, and provided some reach.
One of the decks I faced, this deck was a sold concept, but an unfocused execution. I think this playtest definitely showed that you can't really dick around with you gameplan too much, because decks with solid synergies fully online will beat you. There's at least three or four cards here that would be much better served as things in the SB. The cards that come to mind are Monastery Swiftspear, Goblin Bushwhacker, and Abbot of Keral Keep (Not run Abbot!??), so I think that dampened their chances somewhat, as well as having chaff like Kiki-Jiki in their deck. I think they could've tightened their mana curve, gone to 16 lands, and had a much better time getting their damage in on schedule. Also, this deck should have definitely taken advantage of the cycling lands in the BLB, like, the Archfiend! The deck also didn't need Entomb for the one good target, and they actively seemed to warp their play around getting that creature out for some reason. May need to evaluate the Scourge for this reason. This deck also brings up an important format realisation, in that the Scourge and Soul ended up being game-ending liabilities against at least me because of bounce. Only solidifies how powerful Bounce is, but is something I have to keep in mind. The deck would have much rather had a Rorix Bladewing, for instance, and that gives me a little pause to think about things. Overall, had great potential, but needed to focus more on the wide and small ground game the deck could play very well. Also, much like the next deck, it seems they were sitting in slightly poor seats for their deck, which didn't help.
This deck came from the (former) uncontested champ of this format, with something like a 15-2 match win record, or some similarly ridiculous win rate. Today they were firmly unseated by Bant and RUG, and I think again this highlights that a deck really has to have a tight gameplan in order to properly interact in the format. The general idea seems to have been based on UW blink, but the actual implementation of that was middling, and the surrounding cards seem again to be slightly unfocused. This deck, for instance, didn't really want to be using the Disallow, it really wanted the Mana Leak or Force Spike, as it was trying to play the tempo game more than the control game. I see similar arguments against Cryptic, but that does have decent value no matter what. Compare to the Ojutai's Command, though, which successfully works along the axis of recurring small ETB bodies while providing other card advantage. The splash for black is also intersting, and likely reduced deck consistency for little gain. I do think this deck was extremely poorly palces in the table, being downstream of not one, but two blue decks, and also being downstream of another UW deck. I can see pieces from the bant deck above that would have made this deck pop a lot harder. Overall I think
- missing enough focus on the ETB tempo/value plan, but largely due to draft positioning.
- trying to make up for it with combinations of control and tokens strategies, but nothing overall consistent enough to function well.
- could have really worked with red over black and I think been happier, utilizing cards that ended up in peoples SB's at the end of the day, like Secure the Wastes, Battle Screech, Goblin Bombardment, and Rally the peasants (draft allowing it, of course).
Overall still think this deck was just at the wrong table position, which is unfortunate. Bant deck upstream cut their meat/tatoes hard, like a sb'ed Sea Gate Oracle
Overall, very fun evening of cube (and some EDH). The format really showed itself off, imo, and that is of course heartwarming. As usual I've also been offered an opportunity to see where I can improve. First off, everything I take away from this has to be weighed against the cube pool, which was like 55% of the card pool. So I definitely need to ask myself "How much of this was just card pool?". The blink player might have been fine with a larger pool that included powerhouse hits like Whirler Rogue, Mulldrifter, and Karmic Guide. Next time I may have to insist on Tenchester, simply to start getting some current data from both sides of the wall. Tentitively though:
- Blue seems to be fitting in well as a draw color alongside other other colors, especially and . My deck utilized all three colors of draw, and all played an equally important role. Very cool. The Bant player had a select suite of blue card selection/advantage tools, but generally shaped their draw aroung Recruiter and Edric, a very creature based and creative take on things. Very Cool x2.
- Green also seems to potentially have overshot a little? At the end of the day, the decks playing green won games, and the ones without didn't. Don't know exactly what that says, but I thin k it means that my green section is running very smoothly. Veeeery smoothly. May have to keep an eye on ways to rein in overbearing pieces. Tireless Tracker is public enemy #1 in that regards. I may just also have too many good cards in green? Like Titania was ridiculous, TBH.
- Red may have a slight issue thriving in this format, especially with green so vibrant, it becomes difficult for red to stick damage through. Will need to keep checking on this. Also could inversely be due to how much interaction there is, and maybe need to tone some down. This I won't do based on one draft, because the pool can easily be removal heavy, and this can wildly swing Aggro's success rate compared to other decks that are more card advantage based.
Thanks for reading. No intentions of any drastic anything based on this one draft, but definitely gives me some things to think on.
Got a five-man draft together this afternoon, and it was fantastic. Got to see a lot of new cards in action, and got some nifty insights into how the cube format is interacting with itself. Couple interesting patterns that I might have to ponder over a little bit more. Also got a good test of having cycling lands in the BLB, which I think worked out well enough, though I think there were missed opportunities to utilize it. I also think this is one of the most even distribution of basic lands I've ever seen, which seems like a positive sign to me, as semi-arbitrary as the benchmark is. We had:
: 10: 9:15:12:14Each color was represented in at least 2 decks, and the two greatest shares were in three. This makes me very happy, almost happier than any individual interaction or deck I saw during play. It shows to me, at least in a way, that the format is very diverse and interactive, and I'm reaching a very good spot in ironing out dead spots and color weaknesses. The games were also very interactive, and I think only one or two matches ended in 0-2 results. Here are the decks we had:
Bant Company
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This deck ran like a hot knife through butter. Might as well have been a modern bant company deck. Really combined the blue digging package with a good GW etb/tempo suite, and backed it up with a souple very solid finishers. Recruiter of the Guard was an all-star in the deck, and is a card that I think is perfect for the format. It would get either Edric to power up a draw engine, or a Monastery Mentor to power up the board. Anafenza also did work in this deck, having relatively few tokens to non-bo with, and providing critical boosts to otherwise duds (like recruiter. I didn't face this deck, but I do not think I would have had an easy time of it. Also saw a nasty combo of Titania -> fetch + crack -> galepowder -> Fetch + crack... woo boy
GB Attrition
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This deck also ran very smoothly, though the focus was a little split between aggression and grindy engine-stuff. It worked in the end, largely powered by the trifecta of Braids, Gitrog, and Tireless Tracker. Tracker is on my hit list, because it had ridiculous advantage for relatively little effort. played out largely like a GB rock deck, using abundant removal and recursion to consistently tip the board in their favor. Very cool deck, and exactly what I want the color to be doing
. Just have to put a keen eye towards some pieces that may be slightly oppressive. Did get to see the Bitterblossom/Braids combo out at least once, and it was a punishing time for the opponent, though the opponent did win in the end with some beefy flying power they managed to keep around. Also saw a T3 Gitrog Monster, which gave me pause about the number of 1 drop dorks I have, because the Mystic enabled the Bloom tender via a Carrion Feeder. That was followed up with a Tireless Tracker, and the game was easily locked. Hmm... I may be in the market for a Tracker replacement, because that was really the card that won the day (two clues a turn?)RUG Engine Combo-Control
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Me! And boy was I happy with the deck I ended up with! A truly functional RUG Engine deck! The first pick was a wildly speculative Daretti, with a Molten Vortex in the pack. The second and third colors didn't really start to shape themselves easily. I trended green with the pickup of Nissa, who was a double splash at the time, and things like Harmonize. Decided to truly go three color with the pickup of the Torrential Gearhulk, who was perfect with Daretti, and grabbed a couple key cards while being a solid finisher. Deck played out exactly like I hoped it would have, with dorky creatures playing the long-game with board-stalling blocks, backed up with Red interaction and wipes, to allow time for the Blue/Red draw-discard engine enough time to fully come online so I could secure a winning position. Molten Vortex was a slightly speculative pick, but was firmly included with the pickup of Crucible of Worlds, which also made the draw engine much better. Very Happy with the deck and the archetype as a whole, and it doesn't seem out of the question for someone else to pick it up, because the cards largely existed on their own merit. Didn't face either of the above decks, and I'm not sure I would have been as successful against those decks, but still feel like the deck was very contemporarily placed in the night's meta. Did miss out on a Life from the Loam, though, which would have put the deck to 100, I think. All in all, very happy, and saw effectively three engines working together to keep me ahead:
- Daretti/artifact engine, also used as filtering. Got me important components like Pyromancer's Goggles back from the grave and helped me dig deep.
- Red/Blue draw-discard suite combined with the recursion creatures led to a sweet draw engine that set up my kills
- Molten Vortex + Crucible was a critical control component that bought me time against dudes that were trying to go wide, and provided some reach.
RB agro-midrange
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One of the decks I faced, this deck was a sold concept, but an unfocused execution. I think this playtest definitely showed that you can't really dick around with you gameplan too much, because decks with solid synergies fully online will beat you. There's at least three or four cards here that would be much better served as things in the SB. The cards that come to mind are Monastery Swiftspear, Goblin Bushwhacker, and Abbot of Keral Keep (Not run Abbot!??), so I think that dampened their chances somewhat, as well as having chaff like Kiki-Jiki in their deck. I think they could've tightened their mana curve, gone to 16 lands, and had a much better time getting their damage in on schedule. Also, this deck should have definitely taken advantage of the cycling lands in the BLB, like, the Archfiend! The deck also didn't need Entomb for the one good target, and they actively seemed to warp their play around getting that creature out for some reason. May need to evaluate the Scourge for this reason. This deck also brings up an important format realisation, in that the Scourge and Soul ended up being game-ending liabilities against at least me because of bounce. Only solidifies how powerful Bounce is, but is something I have to keep in mind. The deck would have much rather had a Rorix Bladewing, for instance, and that gives me a little pause to think about things. Overall, had great potential, but needed to focus more on the wide and small ground game the deck could play very well. Also, much like the next deck, it seems they were sitting in slightly poor seats for their deck, which didn't help.
Esper Control-Tempo
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This deck came from the (former) uncontested champ of this format, with something like a 15-2 match win record, or some similarly ridiculous win rate. Today they were firmly unseated by Bant and RUG, and I think again this highlights that a deck really has to have a tight gameplan in order to properly interact in the format. The general idea seems to have been based on UW blink, but the actual implementation of that was middling, and the surrounding cards seem again to be slightly unfocused. This deck, for instance, didn't really want to be using the Disallow, it really wanted the Mana Leak or Force Spike, as it was trying to play the tempo game more than the control game. I see similar arguments against Cryptic, but that does have decent value no matter what. Compare to the Ojutai's Command, though, which successfully works along the axis of recurring small ETB bodies while providing other card advantage. The splash for black is also intersting, and likely reduced deck consistency for little gain. I do think this deck was extremely poorly palces in the table, being downstream of not one, but two blue decks, and also being downstream of another UW deck. I can see pieces from the bant deck above that would have made this deck pop a lot harder. Overall I think
- missing enough focus on the ETB tempo/value plan, but largely due to draft positioning.
- trying to make up for it with combinations of control and tokens strategies, but nothing overall consistent enough to function well.
- could have really worked with red over black and I think been happier, utilizing cards that ended up in peoples SB's at the end of the day, like Secure the Wastes, Battle Screech, Goblin Bombardment, and Rally the peasants (draft allowing it, of course).
Overall still think this deck was just at the wrong table position, which is unfortunate. Bant deck upstream cut their meat/tatoes hard, like a sb'ed Sea Gate Oracle
Overall, very fun evening of cube (and some EDH). The format really showed itself off, imo, and that is of course heartwarming. As usual I've also been offered an opportunity to see where I can improve. First off, everything I take away from this has to be weighed against the cube pool, which was like 55% of the card pool. So I definitely need to ask myself "How much of this was just card pool?". The blink player might have been fine with a larger pool that included powerhouse hits like Whirler Rogue, Mulldrifter, and Karmic Guide. Next time I may have to insist on Tenchester, simply to start getting some current data from both sides of the wall. Tentitively though:
- Blue seems to be fitting in well as a draw color alongside other other colors, especially
and . My deck utilized all three colors of draw, and all played an equally important role. Very cool. The Bant player had a select suite of blue card selection/advantage tools, but generally shaped their draw aroung Recruiter and Edric, a very creature based and creative take on things. Very Cool x2.- Green also seems to potentially have overshot a little? At the end of the day, the decks playing green won games, and the ones without didn't. Don't know exactly what that says, but I thin k it means that my green section is running very smoothly. Veeeery smoothly. May have to keep an eye on ways to rein in overbearing pieces. Tireless Tracker is public enemy #1 in that regards. I may just also have too many good cards in green? Like Titania was ridiculous, TBH.
- Red may have a slight issue thriving in this format, especially with green so vibrant, it becomes difficult for red to stick damage through. Will need to keep checking on this. Also could inversely be due to how much interaction there is, and maybe need to tone some down. This I won't do based on one draft, because the pool can easily be removal heavy, and this can wildly swing Aggro's success rate compared to other decks that are more card advantage based.
Thanks for reading
. No intentions of any drastic anything based on this one draft, but definitely gives me some things to think on.One thing I'm thinking is that mebbe I can actually make a couple of cuts? Because I use Tenchester sometimes, I probably want to stick to 400 for 10 packs of 10, so that only means 5 cuts. Doesn't have much of an impact during normal drafting (about 1% different pool ratio), but it does mean Tenchesterfield would be a tight draft for either 4 or 5 people (packs of 8 for 5 player). That would be nifty. So the first place I looked to is an opportunity to trim some of the worst midrange over-value offenses. Round one of this is "cut planeswalkers?" This alone would help red thrive a little more, and puts more focus on value-oriented drafting over just power picks:
This certainly doesnt feel ideal to me, because I like planeswalkers.. Sometimes, maybe, those are barriers we have to jump over. I can see keeping Jace, because he feels very good for U control, which has a slight hard time in this format as is. But then what to cut? One of the U draw suite? Thirst for Knowledge? One of the counters? Exclude, because I have Ojutai's Command? Interesting dilemma. Could 'easily' see the others go, though. Makes first picks more interesting, at the very least?
As for Tireless Tracker, not sure what to do with them yet... First thing that comes to mind is
Which provides a non-embarrassing body while providing a sweet incidental function that GY decks can capitalize on, or even non GY decks for incidental value by shuffling removals and killed things to improve deck quality.
This certainly doesnt feel ideal to me, because I like planeswalkers.. Sometimes, maybe, those are barriers we have to jump over. I can see keeping Jace, because he feels very good for U control, which has a slight hard time in this format as is. But then what to cut? One of the U draw suite? Thirst for Knowledge? One of the counters? Exclude, because I have Ojutai's Command? Interesting dilemma. Could 'easily' see the others go, though. Makes first picks more interesting, at the very least?
As for Tireless Tracker, not sure what to do with them yet... First thing that comes to mind is
Which provides a non-embarrassing body while providing a sweet incidental function that GY decks can capitalize on, or even non GY decks for incidental value by shuffling removals and killed things to improve deck quality.
Had a nice chat yesterday with my top drafter, and he confirmed lots of what I've been pondering recently. He summarized in thre succinct points:
- board wipes are good
- value can lose to pure power
- tempo is still important
I did not ask him what his definition of tempo is. The point I lasered in on is point number 2, perhaps unsursprisingly. What power pieces were you seeing that overshadow value? Well, green, it's just a little better at everything. Drawing cards, ramp, bodies, might as well go green. He called out Titania specifically as "5 mana 10 power lol". This is while ramping you. He went on to mention that green just has too much synergy and directions to go. This mirrors my supposit in that I may have overshot a little as I focused on the color. I find myself happy overall with this verdict. Tells me the green system works, and I actually have dials to play around with!
His statement about wraths was also an interesting point of discussion. He mentioned it being hard for control once they've fallen behind, with it being very hard to catchup once the deck is on the back foot. Three spells dropped out as discissor points
All of these have potential merits and downsides. Right now I'm honestly just looking at Wrath. My format is shaping up to be rather punishing and high pressure, even though games aren't overly fast. Probably something to be taken from that, but that's for another time. Some other spells I'm thinking about that could be helpful in stabilization:
Beyond that, now I I solidly have three green cards on the swap list atm:
The elf is representative. Likely it'd be Avacyn's Pilgrim. Saw some unfun stuff happening with too many 1 drop dorks. Not sure exactly what any of these are going to become. Can see bringing lil ol Sylvan Ranger in place of a drok, for some filler-level support of the engine archetype. Arborback Stomper? Loaming Shaman as mentioned?
This has got to be one of my favorite things about cube. This iterative push for a great format, gets my designer gears churning like none other.
- board wipes are good
- value can lose to pure power
- tempo is still important
I did not ask him what his definition of tempo is
. The point I lasered in on is point number 2, perhaps unsursprisingly. What power pieces were you seeing that overshadow value? Well, green, it's just a little better at everything. Drawing cards, ramp, bodies, might as well go green. He called out Titania specifically as "5 mana 10 power lol". This is while ramping you. He went on to mention that green just has too much synergy and directions to go. This mirrors my supposit in that I may have overshot a little as I focused on the color. I find myself happy overall with this verdict. Tells me the green system works, and I actually have dials to play around with!His statement about wraths was also an interesting point of discussion. He mentioned it being hard for control once they've fallen behind, with it being very hard to catchup once the deck is on the back foot. Three spells dropped out as discissor points
All of these have potential merits and downsides. Right now I'm honestly just looking at Wrath. My format is shaping up to be rather punishing and high pressure, even though games aren't overly fast. Probably something to be taken from that, but that's for another time. Some other spells I'm thinking about that could be helpful in stabilization:
Beyond that, now I I solidly have three green cards on the swap list atm:
The elf is representative. Likely it'd be Avacyn's Pilgrim. Saw some unfun stuff happening with too many 1 drop dorks. Not sure exactly what any of these are going to become. Can see bringing lil ol Sylvan Ranger in place of a drok, for some filler-level support of the engine archetype. Arborback Stomper? Loaming Shaman as mentioned?
This has got to be one of my favorite things about cube. This iterative push for a great format, gets my designer gears churning like none other.
Regarding Tireless Tracker :
Thoughts on shipping Kitchen Finks over to the green section and replacing them with a white value engine (like Bygone Bishop)?
That way you can even out the CA over different colors and keep those sweet sweet clues!
Thoughts on shipping Kitchen Finks over to the green section and replacing them with a white value engine (like Bygone Bishop)?
That way you can even out the CA over different colors and keep those sweet sweet clues!
That is a very good suggestion! I have run the Bishop before and he was definitely a solid include. I could totally see makin that swap, thanks!
Think this might be a miss for most formats, so I'll squirrel this away here where I think it can have a unique niche inside what my RG is trying to do. With the lands-engine, this should be hitting Murder-like status pretty much on curve with the game, the sort of removal the long-game archetype needs. The backside I think is gravy as a way to refresh the deck, especially with two Crucible effects and Loam helping trim the land count in the 'yard. By the time you Survive, you should be drastically improving your deck quality for a final push through the last couple/few turns. Also incidental GY hate if needed, which is cool.
Might at least try it out for a couple spins. Signals the importance of lands and can provide some utility function later? I'm on board for now.
Mono U! from CubeTutor.com
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Something about the fact that this works, and looks playable in the context of the format, it makes me irationally happy. It was a very unique draft table, likely, but I like seeing this sort of unique-boring deck be possible. And it even has angles! Besides being able to body double the sphinx, the double can be used post counter to use a wincon of another color against the caster. The mind control effects are another cool wincon angle for this sort of deck.
I love the big blue/artifact control archetype. Academy Ruins is really fantastic to reuse your small amount of threats (Torrential Gearhulk), and recur sweepers like Engineered Explosives and Nevinyrall's Disk.
Academy Ruins is a great idea! My currwnt Ux draw land has been desolate lighthouse, but I haven't seen it do much really.... ruins has a lot of great targets in my format (Like Disk), including Aether Spellbomb in color.
Nice!
First of all, huge Thank You to cstick for literally a dozen drafts of my CT! It was very cool seeing the decks pop up one by one. Really neat stuff, and lots of useful tidbits of info. One deck caught my eye in particular. It's, in cstick's own words, a "sweet" Goggles deck:
I'd say this is one artifact recursion piece away from a platonic ideal Goggles deck! Really like the red focus, but with tight and well supported splashes into other colors for important effects. There's an Adarkar Wastes in the sb I might run, but solid besides that. Besides the Goggles, I'd say this is the best representation I've seen yet of Mizzix's Mastery being a legit wincon in it's own right. Later in the game, it can overload upwards of 15 damage to the face in one shot! All of that is couched in the fact that this is a creatureless deck, effectively (bar Crater Hellion)! That's so awesome! I can definitely see this deck using it's burn early to extend the game against creature decks, and then pivot into a combo-style later game where you try to close out the game in a turn or two with face burn. Love it!!
There's some sweet pieces in here playing their part in multi-faceted ways:
Geistblast is a cool piece of redundancy to provide a copy effect for something like Stoke the Flames later in the game, but still provides the key function of keeping the board clear early on. Lightning Axe is here because the combos! Geistblast's best friend. Dynavolt Tower also looks really good in this deck, as you can grind out the game pointing burn at creatures, but still power up burn to the face, or visa versa.
This deck is so cool! I would love to see this sort of deck pop up from one of my drafters IRL
It was very cool seeing the decks pop up one by one. Really neat stuff, and lots of useful tidbits of info. One deck caught my eye in particular. It's, in cstick's own words, a "sweet" Goggles deck:Goggles from CubeTutor.com
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I'd say this is one artifact recursion piece away from a platonic ideal Goggles deck! Really like the red focus, but with tight and well supported splashes into other colors for important effects. There's an Adarkar Wastes in the sb I might run, but solid besides that. Besides the Goggles, I'd say this is the best representation I've seen yet of Mizzix's Mastery being a legit wincon in it's own right. Later in the game, it can overload upwards of 15 damage to the face in one shot! All of that is couched in the fact that this is a creatureless deck, effectively (bar Crater Hellion)! That's so awesome! I can definitely see this deck using it's burn early to extend the game against creature decks, and then pivot into a combo-style later game where you try to close out the game in a turn or two with face burn. Love it!!
There's some sweet pieces in here playing their part in multi-faceted ways:
Geistblast is a cool piece of redundancy to provide a copy effect for something like Stoke the Flames later in the game, but still provides the key function of keeping the board clear early on. Lightning Axe is here because the combos! Geistblast's best friend. Dynavolt Tower also looks really good in this deck, as you can grind out the game pointing burn at creatures, but still power up burn to the face, or visa versa.
This deck is so cool! I would love to see this sort of deck pop up from one of my drafters IRL
