Card/Deck Single Card Spotlight

[Chris Taylor]

That's why I split out M10 and Zendikar block, I think everything before that can be considered old by today's standard. There's something to be said for Lorwyn as well though, it is after all the set that introduced planeswalkers. Anyway, as you can see in my original post, 61% of the creatures is from M10 or a newer set, but only only 28% of the spells. The lopsidedness is there.

I definitely agree, but whenever this comes up I kinda wonder about the bit magic had in the middle.

Like say, Remand. is that a powerful old spell, or a powerful new spell? looking back at the block cards like watchwolf look utterly pedestrian now, but Dark Confidant are there, and Frenzied Goblin is pretty modern, and Carven Caryatid is a strong card

Does Incinerate get points for being first printed in mirage or points for basically existing today, save a few words that were tacked on in the first place?

 

[Aston]

I had a sweet Rakdos sealed deck that killed multiple people without attacking via Rix-Maadi and Stab Wounds.

 

[ahadabans]

I think power has increased across the board - both spells and creatures. The spell power creep shows up less (hardly at all) in cube because spells were basically OP back in the day so you just aren't going to ever displace things like counterspell and what not.

It was a domino effect in my mind. Walkers added a card type to the game that generated free CA each turn. Pretty sure you can count on one hand the number of cards printed before walkers that could be played and used each turn for free that generated effects which are worth a card (and all of those cards are busted and wouldn't be printed today). Add in the fact that walkers have an ultimate that usually outright wins the game, and you suddenly have created a new urgency to the game. The best way to interact with walkers is via creature combat, so creatures had to get better. It wasn't an option honestly. But truthfully creatures needed to improve anyway because they were garbage, so it was killing two birds with one stone. But then you created new problems. With all these creatures, you need better answers to deal with them.

Wizards made pretty major changes to the game when they introduced planeswalkers. It feels like they've finally found a sweet spot with power levels though and are now starting to explore some new design space within those parameters (the recent set is really amazing in my mind).

 

[Onderzeeboot]

I definitely agree, but whenever this comes up I kinda wonder about the bit magic had in the middle.

Like say, Remand. is that a powerful old spell, or a powerful new spell? looking back at the block cards like watchwolf look utterly pedestrian now, but Dark Confidant are there, and Frenzied Goblin is pretty modern, and Carven Caryatid is a strong card

Does Incinerate get points for being first printed in mirage or points for basically existing today, save a few words that were tacked on in the first place?

It's probably more correct to divide Magic into "ages", but I'm struggling a bit where to draw the lines. Alpha, Beta and Unlimited should be their own age, the dawn of Magic, I think. The second age would run from Arabian Nights through Alliances, as Mirage was the first true block. The third age would run from Mirage through Masques block. I think Invasion truly set a new bar as far as block design goes. So, the fourth age starts with Invasion, but where does it end? Mirrodin is kind of a milestone, with its new border and smaller large set, but did it really set a new bar in design? Ravnica was truly a masterpiece in set design. Time Spiral was a hot mess, but heaven for experienced players. Lorwyn introduced planeswalkers. Alara introduced mythic rares. Zendikar was the first block fully designed with NWO in mind. I think, tentatively, that I would have the first age run from Invasion through Champions of Kamigawa block. WotC had learned how to design and develop decent blocks, and was trying out different tweaks, gimmicks if you will, to change the feel of blocks from block to block. The fifth age runs from Ravnica block through Alara block. These blocks are the formative years of NWO. Ravnica set out a new approach to designing blocks, from a more overarching point of view, Time Spiral led to the realization that curbing mechanical complexity is important, Lorwyn introduced planeswalkers and marked the realization reducing onboard complexity is kind of a big deal as well, Alara added mythic rares. Combine every lesson learned, and you enter the sixth age, from Zendikar through Khans of Tarkir block. This is firmly NWO territory, where the bread and butter of limited (i.e. commons) forms a clear and calm basis for fun limited environments (at least that's the idea). Does that sound about right?

 

[FlowerSunRain]

If this card is real, it is pretty badass. Tons of damage to the face isn't exactly too interesting, but the power level is there. Either you can cast 1 red spell to clear the way and attack to flip her or you can cast two red spells to flip her, and once you do, you get a one sided vortex that can ping creatures if needed (anthems/equipment could get around needing a red spell). And she adds 1 damage a turn +1 for each red spell you cast while you wait. Her trigger being "red spell" puts some deckbuilding restrictions on her, but its a pretty broad restriction. I'm not sure if I'm in the market for this effect, but its definitely an option.

 

[Diakonov]

http://mtgsalvation.gamepedia.com/R&D

MaRo has divided magic into ages based on lead designer philosophies.

Golden - Alpha through Alliances

Silver - Mirage through Prophecy

Bronze - Invasion through Saviors of Kamigawa

4th Stage - Ravnica through Rise of the Eldrazi

5th Stage - Scars of Mirrodin until now

He also claims that NWO began in 2008.

I have a long term goal of building a cube for each of the first three ages.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

If this card is real

I don't think it is. The copyright line says 2014 on the creature side and 2015 on the planeswalker side.

http://mtgsalvation.gamepedia.com/R&D

MaRo has divided magic into ages based on lead designer philosophies.

Golden - Alpha through Alliances

Silver - Mirage through Prophecy

Bronze - Invasion through Saviors of Kamigawa

4th Stage - Ravnica through Rise of the Eldrazi

5th Stage - Scars of Mirrodin until now

He also claims that NWO began in 2008.

I have a long term goal of building a cube for each of the first three ages.

Nice! I was pretty accurate! He doesn't split ABU into its own stage, and has the last age start after Zendikar block instead of with Zendikar block. Not bad!

 

[Jason Waddell]

yo

World Eater? I hardly know 'er...

 

[Chris Taylor]

If this card is real, it is pretty badass. Tons of damage to the face isn't exactly too interesting, but the power level is there. Either you can cast 1 red spell to clear the way and attack to flip her or you can cast two red spells to flip her, and once you do, you get a one sided vortex that can ping creatures if needed (anthems/equipment could get around needing a red spell). And she adds 1 damage a turn +1 for each red spell you cast while you wait. Her trigger being "red spell" puts some deckbuilding restrictions on her, but its a pretty broad restriction. I'm not sure if I'm in the market for this effect, but its definitely an option.

I'm not so sure on the confirmation here either, but here's what I feel about the card:

3 mana pingers with summoning sickness are okay, and being slightly worse gelectrode is a decent base. I like that you can flip her by blocking + pinging, but the walker side doesn't really impress me: I feel like she should be more than Isochron Scepter + Shock
Also that is a boring ass ult. Big pile of player only burn, whoo hoo -_-

I'm not sure I'd add it to be honest

 

[Jason Waddell]

I'm not so sure on the confirmation here either, but here's what I feel about the card:

3 mana pingers with summoning sickness are okay, and being slightly worse gelectrode is a decent base. I like that you can flip her by blocking + pinging, but the walker side doesn't really impress me: I feel like she should be more than Isochron Scepter + Shock
Also that is a boring ass ult. Big pile of player only burn, whoo hoo -_-

I'm not sure I'd add it to be honest

What on earth can she block without dying?

 

[Onderzeeboot]

What on earth can she block without dying?

You'ld have to be pretty daft to attack into this with a 1-power creature

I like that she makes combat tricks better though.

 

[Chris Taylor]

What on earth can she block without dying?

Attack + Red spell works too, but good point

 

[Jason Waddell]

My wish for red is to have more creatures that work in aggro and control, and this doesn't really seem to tick that box.

 

[GenericZero]

I seriously hope that's fake, as Chandra has had enough bad cards for such a popular planeswalker. She currently has 4 versions of herself and only 2 of those are playable with 1 being fairly debatable on its playability. I got the vibe that the flipwalkers would have powerful flipsides to make up for "meh" bodies and needing to meet certain conditions to flip. This flipChandra reads like they took OG Chandra, gave her a better +1 and made the rest of her just worse.

 

[RavebornMuse]

Doom Blade is absolutely better than Terror most of the time. And Go For The Throat is better than Doom Blade as it has more targets (outside a super heavy artifact theme). I guess I just meant that the upgrade isn't necessarily going to have a positive impact on your meta. Doom Blade made artifact creatures more vulnerable. Go for the Throat made black creatures more vulnerable. Dismember made it so all color decks can kill a 5 toughness creature for 1 mana and 4 life. Is all that good? Depends on what you want.

I sort of liked the design where black removal (outside really expensive options) couldn't kill black creatures or artifact creatures (the removal version of reverse fear!) [emphasis mine]. Part of how you evaluate a creature is based on it's resistance to removal. Black and Artifact creatures were always a little more resilient because of the terror clause. That also made cards like terminate, mortify, putrefy special and highly sought after in that they were unconditional creature removal (but cost two different colors - and 3 mana for the additional utility in the case of the latter two). To me that was a cool design.

I think a lot of newer more efficient removal is throwing a lot of that out the window. It's fine I guess, I just don't think the original parameters were broken is all. And so I'd prefer to run terror and/or edict type effects in black because they feel closer to the original design of the game to me. Again though, I'm sort of stuck in 2005 as far as where I think Magic peaked (for me at least). And that is what I want my cube to feel more like.

Hello, everyone! First-time poster, but I've devoured most of these threads over the past week - so much useful information! As someone who began from a base of a 540 Power-Max design that I was unhappy with, it's been very liberating finding this forum!

I've been curious myself about what other people's thoughts were about black removal, and the bolded text above in particular captures a thought of mine I've been wrestling with. I'm not one of the camp to keep removal super weak per se, but I've been trying to tailor their power level and was curious about "nonblack creature" clauses. Has anyone tried keeping a majority of their black removal "nonblack" only? I'm currently aiming for a strong recursion/graveyard theme in my cube, but, even considering the recursive threats, black's creatures are a tad underwhelming, especially at 3 and under. I feel like loading up on nonblack-only straight removal (e.g. Terror versus something like Tragic Slip which requires work) helps to buff up black a bit in a flavourful way without menacing the environment, but my drafting partner had a bit of skepticism about going all-in on this idea. Currently, about 30% of my black removal has the nonblack clause, but I'm inclined to push that harder (up to around as much as 70%).

What are other people's thoughts about this? Is it making black too strong if it has pseudo-protection from a majority of its own removal?

 

[FlowerSunRain]

I have to say I've never thought about the subject of the intrinsic qualities of a creature having a color other then in the case of devotion and a few other narrow cards that I generally avoid. Having "being black" be an advantage (can block fear, can't be doom-bladed etc) could work out particularly if you feel that black creatures are somehow behind the curve in other ways. Black 3 drops are really good, but the two drops are a mixed bag serious deckbuilding constraints (Dark Confidant, Blood Artist), filler (Dauthi Horror) and stupid (Pack Rat). I run 4 custom cards at that CC, which is more then any other. I'm not sure this is really a solution, because all those cards still get burned and take journeys to nowhere and only gives you an advantage over your opponent when you are playing black creatures against black removal but not vice-versa?

I think overall it would be more interesting to have a variety of removal that has different upsides so different decks match up differently each draft. Unless you think focusing your removal will enrich your gameplay experience somehow, I don't recommend it.

 

[Dom Harvey]

Porcelain Legionnaire is a good black 2-drop IME

 

[Chris Taylor]

Porcelain Legionnaire is a good black 2-drop IME

I'll admit, I lold

 

[Onderzeeboot]

Interesting? Good? OP?

 

[RavebornMuse]

I have to say I've never thought about the subject of the intrinsic qualities of a creature having a color other then in the case of devotion and a few other narrow cards that I generally avoid. Having "being black" be an advantage (can block fear, can't be doom-bladed etc) could work out particularly if you feel that black creatures are somehow behind the curve in other ways. Black 3 drops are really good, but the two drops are a mixed bag serious deckbuilding constraints (Dark Confidant, Blood Artist), filler (Dauthi Horror) and stupid (Pack Rat). I run 4 custom cards at that CC, which is more then any other. I'm not sure this is really a solution, because all those cards still get burned and take journeys to nowhere and only gives you an advantage over your opponent when you are playing black creatures against black removal but not vice-versa? [emphasis mine]

I think overall it would be more interesting to have a variety of removal that has different upsides so different decks match up differently each draft. Unless you think focusing your removal will enrich your gameplay experience somehow, I don't recommend it.

The bolded points are exactly why I'm considering upping the count of "nonblack" removal spells; in my opinion, most black creatures are rather underwhelming compared to their White, Green, and Red counterparts. While Black 3-drops are generally much richer than White or Red 3-drops, there is immense competition among White, Green, and Red 1-drops and 2-drops. The same can hardly be said for black, and yet, at least in my cube, black offers the clearest answers to splash for, with white having less removal and red removal being either wrath-esque mass burns (which require some thought to use effectively) or smaller burn spells that have no trouble frying smaller creatures and struggle to clear the more apple-bottomed creatures in cube. My idea was that, by upping black's resilience against its own colour, the decision tree in drafting became more interesting, and I could direct tools into the right hands. Much in the way that I put Condemn in so that removal will make its way to a control player, cards like Vendetta and Darkblast are most rewarding to black-based aggro and black-based graveyard strategies, respectively. While I think 70% of the removal being nonblack-only is likely too much, I think I may tinker that number up by another card or two and see what happens. While you're right that the emphasis on nonblack-style removal doesn't keep black creatures from being bolted and journeyed, I think that, after a while, it will encourage players to be a bit more critical about their removal choices.


As for Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver; planeswalkers that don't make tokens generally are more fair (IMHO) than those that do, and Ashiok is a solid roleplayer in control. You can mill out your opponent and play their threats, which is fun, but the sluggishness of the card prevents it from ever feeling oppressive. I find it provokes interesting decisions for both players, which is something I look for in card evaluation. If dropped early, does the other player rush the planeswalker before it gets too big, or keep pressuring the (likely) control player? And if it comes down later, it provides a form of inevitability and tension if the control player has the upper hand but no remaining/reliable threats to close out. Given the colour pair, I think it does good work without necessarily being a windmill slam. I'm never unhappy to play Ashiok as a late-game closer or an early speedbump, but I'm also not always eager to snatch one up in a draft, which makes Ashiok a good fit for me. Much like my comments above on Vendetta and Condemn, Ashiok is a useful card that tends to find its way into the right decks without necessarily being poisonous.

 

[MCMcEmcee]

My GW beatdown opponent and I are down to 2 cards. I have Doom Blade and Go for the Throat and I have some powerful cards to draw to so I'm feeling good about this game.
He draws for turn then plays Vault Skirge and puts Rancor on it.

Conclusion: Vault Skirge is probably GRBS or something.

I don't personally think shifting your black removal to mostly only hit non-black creatures is particularly helpful. A lot of the black creatures end up in the decks with the black removal anyways, and a lot of black creatures aren't worth pointing a hard removal spell at either. Too much "non-black" clause removal makes black mirrors kinda stupid without any real benefit against the rest of the field.

 

[RavebornMuse]

My GW beatdown opponent and I are down to 2 cards. I have Doom Blade and Go for the Throat and I have some powerful cards to draw to so I'm feeling good about this game.
He draws for turn then plays Vault Skirge and puts Rancor on it.

Conclusion: Vault Skirge is probably GRBS or something.

I don't personally think shifting your black removal to mostly only hit non-black creatures is particularly helpful. A lot of the black creatures end up in the decks with the black removal anyways, and a lot of black creatures aren't worth pointing a hard removal spell at either. Too much "non-black" clause removal makes black mirrors kinda stupid without any real benefit against the rest of the field.

This is a fair point. I suppose I'll stick to my 30% ratio for now, then, and save the higher count concept for a quirkier cube down the road.

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

The bolded points are exactly why I'm considering upping the count of "nonblack" removal spells; in my opinion, most black creatures are rather underwhelming compared to their White, Green, and Red counterparts. While Black 3-drops are generally much richer than White or Red 3-drops, there is immense competition among White, Green, and Red 1-drops and 2-drops. The same can hardly be said for black, and yet, at least in my cube, black offers the clearest answers to splash for, with white having less removal and red removal being either wrath-esque mass burns (which require some thought to use effectively) or smaller burn spells that have no trouble frying smaller creatures and struggle to clear the more apple-bottomed creatures in cube. My idea was that, by upping black's resilience against its own colour, the decision tree in drafting became more interesting, and I could direct tools into the right hands. Much in the way that I put Condemn in so that removal will make its way to a control player, cards like Vendetta and Darkblast are most rewarding to black-based aggro and black-based graveyard strategies, respectively. While I think 70% of the removal being nonblack-only is likely too much, I think I may tinker that number up by another card or two and see what happens. While you're right that the emphasis on nonblack-style removal doesn't keep black creatures from being bolted and journeyed, I think that, after a while, it will encourage players to be a bit more critical about their removal choices.

By putting the "nonblack" clause on your removal, you're putting a limitation on your removal suite, that can be either good or bad depending on the context of the rest of the cube.

1. What is your existing as-fan for removal?
2. Are you already running ample means for your aggro or midrange decks to disrupt removal (temp protection/hexproof, recursion, dash, protection, hexproof shroud ect.)?
3. What threats are you trying to encourage?
4. Is there a reason to encourage black based attrition decks to diversify their removal suites?

You don't want there to be a constellation of factors in place that make removal impotent. On the other hand, if you already have a high enough as-fan for your non-conditional removal, and little in the way of disruption for it, it might be nice to provide a reason for answer decks to diversify their removal suites.

I'm a little skeptical about using it as a means to buff black based creature decks. I think thats a little too subtle for your average cube drafter to figure out.

 

[Lucre]

this chick seems awesome with Serra's Embrace

 

[vennythekid]

Would Serra's Embrace fall off if you flipped Chandra?