Soshi's Lorwyn - Morningtide Cube

[Soshi]

Hi all,

I've been wanting to make a Lorwyn-Morningtide (and potentially Shadowmoor-Eventide) cube for a long time. Recently I broke down and decided to use another cube list as a base.

My current singleton cube list is here; http://cubetutor.com/viewcube/7875 [Edit: This is the old link, the current cube link is now http://cubetutor.com/viewcube/7997 ] and is 281 cards. I'm looking for feedback on balancing it, and for advice on how best to expand it up to 360 cards. Anything in LM or SE blocks is fine by me.

Thanks for any advice, I'm very excited to be getting into cubing.

Soshi

*edit, looking through the forum threads and will re-edit/repost with specific questions.

 

[Laz]

Ok, so Lorwyn-Morningtode / Shadowmoor-Eventide... So you are looking at tribes and colours. Luckily, Shadowmoor had similar tribes to Lorwyn (Elementals/Goblins/Elves/Faeries/Merfolk), so that makes pushing Tribal easy. I feel that you have to push more than just tribal though, otherwise you risk each drafter settling into a tribe and having no real competition for cards. I know Lorwyn solved this a little by making Elementals tie it together, but there is probably a decent way to just push tribes without making the cube be about 'picking an open tribe'.

I am not sure what themes you could use to complement this with if you are only allowing a couple of sets, but instead of tribal being first and forefront, seed cards like Horde of Notions, Thundercloud Shaman,Mad Auntie, etc. throughout the cube to support tribal play. Similar to how the Human-tribal in a more conventional cube is something like a 4 card package of some mix of Champion of the Parish, Mayor of Avabruck and Xathrid Necromancer. Such a tribal deck simply relies on the general availability of quality Humans in a Cube. A similar thing could be done for Elementals/Goblins/Elves/Faeries/Merfolk/etc by simply adding generally good cards with the creature type to the cube and a small set of 'Tribe support' cards. Jason does a good thing with an 'Elemental-tribe' package in his Eldrazi Domain cube, with cards like Flamekin Harbinger, Horde of Notions and Smokebraider to tie together an 'Elemental Tribe' deck, which complements the rest of the generally pick able elementals. (Forgive me Jason if I named a card you are not playing. It has been a little while since I checked out your precise composition)

I probably wouldn't stick too hard to the 'only those sets' restriction, since it makes mana atrocious. At least bring in a more conventional cube mana-base, especially if you choose to push colours a little more.

 

[Soshi]

I definitely agree that making sure tribes are flavorful without being too archetypal is one of the major challenges of the cube. I think (without having a great deal of cube experience) that there are a few options

1. Include hybrid cards where possible to make tribes dynamic/splashable
2. Include a fairly high density of changelings to give players the ability to glue different tribes together with a high degree of synergy

I'm not sure if these theories will pan out yet, but they are my current notions.

For the manabase, LM-SE has a few types of fixing lands readily available
Vivids
"Tribal" Lands (reveal an "X" or it comes into play tapped
Filter lands

I am happy either making these non-singleton, or adding something like shocks eventually if it is necessary.

 

[Jason Waddell]

Hey, welcome to the site. CML will be in here soon enough to profess his love for Eventide soon.

I would imagine that there are cool cards from Theros (Devotion) that work well with the hybrid density in these sets.

Laz, yeah, all of those are in my Eldrazi-Domain cube. It was an overlapping tie (Evoke) to one of the set's major themes (Morbid).

 

[anotak]

add a reflecting pool so people can go vivids + reflecting pool

 

[Soshi]

Reflecting Pool is a great idea,

so, I made a decent number of changes to the cube, I added 2 sets of each of the filters, 2 reflecting pools, the elemental-tribe land (Primal Beyond), and added a few cards to address what looked like tribal balance to me, bringing the cube overall to 306 cards now.

with 12.7% lands (which will go down slightly as I add cards up to 360) the fixing should also be significantly better.

So far, I am still in LM-SE blocks, and I think that as soon as I can get everything proxied and played, I will begin looking at tribe/color strength balance, and curve. I plan to add some duplicates to help balance things out.

 

[anotak]

do you plan to add any cards from outside the block at all?

 

[Soshi]

I'm not dead-set against it, and was actually just talking about adding Lotus Cobra to the green section, but I'd like to do any oob adding significantly later in the process, as part of refining the cube rather than developing or defining it.

 

[Eric Chan]

Welcome to the forums, Soshi!

I'm going to second your notion of increasing the changeling density. I didn't play back in that era, but as I understand it, one of the key problems with Lorwyn draft was that you basically picked one of the eight available tribes, hoped that no one at the table picked the same one as you, and pretty much put your blinders on and took cards from that tribe. Essentially what Jason calls the Poison Principle - that Boggart Harbinger is good in one deck, and one deck alone. To offset this, I'd look perhaps at tripling up on the common changelings and doubling up on the uncommon ones, at the very least. Avian Changeling may not win any awards on power level, but it can help any of the three white tribes, and is something that is playable in multiple decks (it's a pretty sweet giant for Thundercloud Shaman!).

Another possibility is paring down the number of supported tribes from eight to something like four or five. This means you'll have to create your own themes in the colour pairs without a preset tribe, but this might not be a bad thing, as an all-tribal cube only has so much longevity to it. To that end, Modern Masters may be a better draft set to take inspiration from than Lorwyn - it layered a light tribal theme on top of many interconnected elements, which allowed (almost) all of themes to flourish without needing to cram the packs with too much narrow tribal filler.

Either way, let us know how this project goes!

 

[Soshi]

I want to thank everyone for the welcome, and the responses. Just getting started with an actual cube list and having some feedback/pushback has helped a lot. Getting started building a cube is still fairly intimidating for me, especially in terms of creating a design space. That said, I wanted to put down some of my thoughts here to give people context.

If you are short on time or patience, I've tried to list the current questions/problems I have at the end.

Cube Goals:
- Cube size between 180 and 360 cards
- Create a (Mostly) L/M/S/E cube which encourages three color decks and feels open.
- Maintain a mostly singleton format to avoid repetitively gameplay
- Create a cube which encourages splashing tribes to build dynamic games, and avoid repetitive gameplay
- Begin actually designing/working on/playing a cube using a constrained design space & intentionally smaller cube size
- Intended uses
- Teaching cube for casual players
- As a diversion for 2-4 person limited formats for experienced players, particularly experienced players who do not currently play magic actively

Design Decisions:
-No tribe should be strong enough to draft on its own, mono-tribe decks should be hard and/or impossible to draft
-Add non-LMSE cards later in cube design, after fully exploring the available design-space.

Major Tribes
Kithkin (W/G)
Elves (G/B)
Merfolk (U/W)
Goblins (B/R)
Elementals (R-All)

Minor Tribes:
Shapeshifters (changelings) - All
Faeries (U/B)
Treefolk (G/B-W)
Giants (R/W)
Missing Colors for Minor Tribes (WB/RUG)

Current Issues & Questions:

I know this is all TLDR, but hopefully the above was helpful. That said, these are my current problems/issues that I'd like feedback on.

- How much changeling support is desirable? too little makes it hard to glue tribes together and get the synergy you really want out of tribal cards, too many encourages mono-tribe decks

- Supporting Aggro, in particular supporting Kithkin & Goblins, I'm happy to add duplicates at lower CMCs to help support these tribes, but I'm not sure exactly how

- Red "tribes", I'm concerned about if Red is able to be a primary color in the draft, or if it is by necessity a secondary color. I think I need to revisit the red creature-selection and possibly duplicate Smokebraider... Elementals have the greatest potential for splashing heavily with the additional fixing from Smokebraiders, and the added land support (10-12% fixing lands in the 'final' cube I think?)

- Color asymmetries in minor tribes - do people think this is likely to be an issue as long as the overall # of cards per color/creatures per color is balanced?

- I am currently considering cutting all of the hideaway lands except for Windbrisk Heights, at least for the time being. I think that they are low impact/hard to trigger.

Thank you to everyone who has taken the time to read through all of this, and also Jason for the multiple helpful articles.

 

[Soshi]

Hi all,

I did some work, and attempted to incorporate the suggetions above. I've rebalanced for 5 tribes (elves, goblins, kithkin, merfolk & elementals) with some minor-tribe support in places where the color pie isn't equitable (faeries in u/b). I also duplicated the changelings, and some tribal cards to make the cube flow better. I think it is putting out fairly fun 2 color decks now. Again, the cube is meant to be playable for inexperienced or inactive players, with either 2 person draft formats (grid draft, solomon draft, sealed, winchester) or as a 4-person pod.

I'd like feedback on any cards in the cube which are either unbalancing, or unplayable/unfun, since I just want to tighten it up to be playable now before I move on to more meta-design concerns (like forcing colors or moving the cube up to 360 cards). If people would leave comments and/or just save draft decks on cubetutor I'd appreciate it!

The new list can be found at, http://cubetutor.com/viewcube/7997

Thanks,

Soshi

 

[CML]

WB: toss in some humans if it wouldn't be too unflavorful, otherwise clerics i guess? some white zombies?

hoo boy i dunno if you wanna design this cube for newer players given the on-board complexity and inversely correlated sales figures of those blocks. i love them and you love them, but it may work, since the guys that come to cube aren't the eight or eighty year olds wizards has to design for, presumably.

when we were first starting to draft again, after a decade-long hiatus, my friend brought over m11. though it was a joy, we then switched to time spiral and it's not like we didn't have fun screwing around with all these whacky mechanics and getting drunk. so!

 

[Soshi]

Did lorwyn actually not sell well? I guess I don't know since at the time I only drafted it, and I think my play group at the time drafted it extra.

Also, the set isn't completely rife with mechanics, aside from tribal. Maybe I'm blind to the onboard complexity. I believe, there is Evoke, Changeling, Prowl, Champion in the cube, and maybe one card with clash.

 

[Chris Taylor]

There's a lot of activated abilities on common creatures, which make the board more complicated than it looks.

 

[Eric Chan]

Yeah, from what I understand, the keywords were manageable. It was more that there were plenty of creatures granting universal buffs, creatures with activated abilities that scaled, and creatures that affected combat math, among other things.

 

[Soshi]

So, extremely valid points. Admittedly my first thought was "All those cards are fun"...

 

[Soshi]

I'm getting ready to proxy out the cards I'm missing and bring the cube out to my FLGS for testing. But I'd like to reiterate, if people would just log in and jam a few draft decks (and save/comment on any impressions you have) I'd greatly appreciate it. It's worth noting that because the cube is small the drafters/packs need to be reset (3 bots, 15 card packs).

again, the cube link, http://cubetutor.com/cubeblog/7997

 

[Tom]

gw: http://cubetutor.com/cubedeck/95618


ub faeries: http://cubetutor.com/cubedeck/95627


First let me say, I have no idea what I'm talking about having never played this format/cube. But here's what I think!

I love the art and lore of this block, so this project sounds very cool to me. However, while drafting I noticed a few things that might be potential problems:
1) With such a small cube and such a steep power curve the bombs seem like they may dominate the format. It may come down to who gets the most planeswalkers and/or "Elemental Incarnations", but maybe not.
2) Secondly, tribal just seems so... "poisonous" I think is the word? I tried to force faeries during the second draft after the first few picks and very few showed up. I ended up picking a bunch of changelings in my colors and hoping for the best. It may be frustrating to not only have consider only cards in your colors, but also only creatures of your type. It's kind of hard to explain, but I felt like I was kinda on autopilot "pick all cards of creature type X".

I like:
1) Breaking singleton
2) Heavy changelings
3) The complete set of original walkers and commands

You might consider creating packs of 1 rare, 3 uncommons, and 11 commons? (using stickers?) This might end up with something that plays more like lorwyn limited and less like "bomb infused lorwyn limited".

I'd be interested to hear how the playtesting goes.

 

[Soshi]

Hi Tom,

Thanks for taking the time. Tribal is definitely known as a poison issue, and unfortunately in this cube Faeries are not supported as a 'main' tribe, which is probably why the second deck ran into issues. It's certainly something I'd preface when explaining the cube in-person.

I will definitely take all the points under advisement.

 

[Soshi]

Got my first plays in of the cube yesterday, 2 rounds of Winchester drafting! Things went quite well overall, with the cube feeling powerful but not allowing players to run a single-tribe in most cases. However, Deathrender emerged as an issue due to a lack of disenchant effects (Reveillark equipped with Deathrender is simply nasty.

The other point of comment was the amount of removal available in the cube, which is slightly low. I haven't made an effort to duplicate all of the removal, even though some of it was printed at common yet, and I'm wondering if this needs to be addressed.

TLDR; could readers,
1. Suggest disenchant effects for all of the non-green colors? outside of block is acceptable, something which fits in theme/spirit wise preferred
2. Make suggestions about the level of removal appropriate in cubes overall, and/or the level of removal in the cube currently?

As always, thank you for reading.

 

[Soshi]

I really dislike having Cinderhaze Wretch in the cube, but needed a black creature of at least 3 CMC to fill in an update. I don't like having +1/+1 and -1/-1 counters in the same cube. I'm looking for something 'midrange' that isn't already in the cube. Any ideas?

 

[Alex Blanton]

For removal, have you considered the creature-type-matters cycle from Morningtide? Pack's Disdain, Coordinated Barrage, Roar of the Crowd, and Distant Melody sometimes vary heavily in utility, but they are good spells. Luminescent Rain probably isn't worth a slot, though.

These are all in-block(s) and fairly low-power, but most can still answer Vigor et al.
Spitebellows
Violet Pall
Eyeblight's Ending
Rivals' Duel
Shard Volley
Weight of Conscience
Prison Term
Recumbent Bliss
Dream Fracture
Sage's Dousing
Curse of Chains
Snakeform
Last Breath
Outside LMSE, there's Journey to Nowhere.

Wispmare, Elvish Hexhunter, and Shinewend are the enchant removal you aren't running. You'll probably want an actual Disenchant spell. Blue can use Disperse, and Red has Smash to Smithereens and Tuktuk Scrapper, which has interesting (unwanted?) implications with changelings (Sea Gate Loremaster? Harabaz Druid? Joraga Bard?). Another option is to cut the targets. People won't take Smash if Deathrender is the only reason to have it.

To allay Tribal toxicity, you could try more Morningtide. The added tribes might give more outs to players who find their tribe/colors being cut. Or it could just make the draft more complicated and ruin signals.

Cairn Wanderer is pretty midrange-y. So are Maralen and Hornet Harasser.

 

[Soshi]

I kind of glazed over the creature-type matters spells, to be honest. I need to go back and just read through the Morningtide visual spoiler probably, comb it for missed cards. I'll definitely add another 'set' of disruption/removal, with a lot of excellent suggestions in there.

Currently, I'm lacking sufficient playtest data, but the approach of adding changelings, putting a ceiling on the number of tribal cards per color (by ratio), and offering a lot of fixing has encouraged 2 tribe decks in 2-3 colors reasonably well.

My dilemma is that Deathrender and Dolmen Gate both require answering (although I've won through DG), but I don't want to cut artifacts and enchantments out of the cube, since I think WOTC has pushed the 'creatures must be best' theme way too far. I need a break from that in other formats. I'm more likely to splash some additional artifacts into the cube and provide answers, although artifacts/enchantments increasingly seem 'poison'ish by their nature of being hard to interact with.