General Starting my own cube

[Sander]

Hey guys,

After playing Jason's cube a few times, I decided building one myself. Considering I recently sold pretty much my entire collection, I first opted keeping the cube peasant. No fancy stuff, no budget rares, just commons and uncommons.

First off this seemed the route to go (guildgates, ravnica boucne lands and signets would deliver the necessary colorfixing), but during a little chat Jason pointed out that specific fixing would leave aggro-ish decks chanceless due to the tempoloss. Jason opted for a more budget friendly solution with painlands.

Before deciding which route to take, I'd like to get some more input on this matter.

Budget could be a cool route to take (more options for the cube), but as we all know "budget" is a relative thing.

Ideas, thoughts, suggestions?

 

[Eric Chan]

Go budget. You could either set a maximum dollar amount limit on what you want to spend on the cube (e.g. $200), or a dollar amount limit per card (e.g. $1). There are a ton of older rares that are sweet for cube and fulfill the aggro quotient quite nicely without breaking the bank.

 

[FlowerSunRain]

I think all restrictions that you make for your cube should be purpose based. That is to say, the reason you chose to run a card should be based on something tangible and meaningful, like its cost or its effect on gameplay.

 

[CML]

a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds -- ralph waldo emerson, on the MTGS cube forum

i'm excited to see how this turns out, not a lot of pauper / peasant talk up in here. i've been wondering how our principles might apply to a power cube and a budget cube.

you can always proxy lands too

 

[Spiderdoofus]

I think the pain lands work well in peasant cube. I've used them there, and they worked fine.

I will say the one issue I had with peasant cubes is that I felt like some games would drag on. A lot of time it wasn't easy to close a game out. I ended up adding some budget rares that were either functional reprints of cards printed at c/u or were not played in most cubes. It was fun to see stuff like Tradewind Rider and Galepowder Mage be sweet, but if I were to do it again, I would do it more thoughtfully than just adding pet cards. I think it's important for colors to have themes and strategies, rather than just a collection of good cards, and it was hard to introduce rares. Eventually, I just made my cube to follow the consensus of MTGSalvation cubes.

 

[Sander]

Considering the themes I'd like to include, I think it will be best to take the budget route.

An other dilemma has been keeping up all night: how do you guys decide on playing singleton or including several copies of specific cards.
Jason already stated that he did it to ensure his balance levels and consistency for several archetypes he included in his cube.

So what convinces you to play singleton/several copies of a few cards?

 

[Jason Waddell]

I'd take a look here: http://riptidelab.com/cube-academy/breaking-singleton/

 

[FlowerSunRain]

Reading that article always brings tears to my eyes.

In a good way.

 

[CML]

the article is almost perfect, except Mother of Runes >>>>> any other 1-drop dude ever

edit: i've been playing with mom for over a decade and she continues to be quite unbeatable, it's the only card from my childhood that has aged well (ironically since she's a middle-aged woman)