Card/Deck Vanilla creatures

[Grillo_Parlante]

Can somebody explain to me why this card mentions tokens?

When tokens die they make the zone change to the graveyard zone before they cease the exist. This means any abilities triggered by something entering the graveyard zone will still trigger. Rest in Peace prevents that from happening by making the tokens immediately make the zone switch to the exiled zone.

 

[ahadabans]

As a result, right now I am running loam lion to push people more into the G/W direction, but not kird ape, since I have not observed a problem with people wanting to explore G/R. Loam lion is a powerful early beater; and as such, is a reward for someone to go into an aggressive G/W deck early in the draft. I guess I don't really see it as an issue of hiding multiplayer cards, but more as a problem solving tool to provide draft structure.

It's a valid approach and I understand why you are doing that (GW is a problem for my group too - it is regularly under drafted). With that said, by putting Loam Lion in your white section you are in effect giving non-GW Wx decks fewer options. It effectively limits your choices when building Wx decks. Again, that might be the goal though (to make WG the more appealing Wx flavor).

I'm a semi-hyprocrite here though since I am running Lingering Souls in my white section (which amounts to much the same thing, though I'd argue not quite as restrictive).

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

It's a valid approach and I understand why you are doing that (GW is a problem for my group too - it is regularly under drafted). With that said, by putting Loam Lion in your white section you are in effect giving non-GW Wx decks fewer options. It effectively limits your choices when building Wx decks. Again, that might be the goal though (to make WG the more appealing Wx flavor).

Exactly, and you are 100% correct about the disadvantage of the approach, and it is exactly why I am running loam lion, but not kird ape, and can't see myself likely to ever run wild nacatl again. I weighed the pros and cons and came to the conclusion that I was ok with giving Wx decks slightly fewer options, but not in the case of Rx decks.

Part of what also went into the decision was that my white section runs 8 total one drops and a dryad militant, while my red section runs 6 and arakdos cackler--and one of the red one drops is a grim lavamancer. I can reasonably assume that a Wx drafter won't be being easily cut out of 1 drops if the lion shows up while they aren’t in green; however, the red drafter could be in trouble in that same situation.

 

[ahadabans]

Exactly, and you are 100% correct about the disadvantage of the approach, and it is exactly why I am running loam lion, but not kird ape, and can't see myself likely to ever run wild nacatl again. I weighed the pros and cons and came to the conclusion that I was ok with giving Wx decks slightly fewer options, but not in the case of Rx decks.

Part of what also went into the decision was that my white section runs 8 total one drops and a dryad militant, while my red section runs 6 and arakdos cackler--and one of the red one drops is a grim lavamancer. I can reasonably assume that a Wx drafter won't be being easily cut out of 1 drops if the lion shows up while they aren’t in green; however, the red drafter could be in trouble in that same situation.

That's well thought out actually. You are making me want to consider this. I'm not married to my white one drop section.

 

[Eric Chan]

Fair enough. When you get down to the math, I see your point.

With all the artifacts I've removed recently, I might be able to put my hybrids in the colorless section and have them compete with artifacts. Hmm.... tempting actually. The only thing I like about having them in mono colored is it forces me to balance them better and when I'm off it's more obvious (I'll have 4 hybrids in white and 1 in blue for instance).

Still, I might have to think on making this change. There are definitely mono colored cards I'm not running that I'd like to run and losing an artifact to do so would be an easier cut I think (which is what this move would amount to).

There are cards like Boggart Ram-Gang and Boros Reckoner that you still probably want to keep in your respective mono-colour sections, and then your Kitchen Finks and Murderous Redcaps that are super versatile and go into almost every deck. If you have an eight-man, I'd wager that only one person at the table wouldn't be able to cast a Redcap, assuming you run halfway decent fixing.

This is why it's not a stretch to consider a lot of hybrids to be artifacts, since they're essentially competing for space with the colourless cards. It also allows you to lower the bar for playability on hybrids, since nearly every deck can run them. As an example, Curse of Chains might not make the cut in either monowhite or monoblue, but it's decent enough of a removal spell that can go in most every deck. Enough so that I've been running it for over two years at this point, and seen it do solid work.

I think we all agree the scale for ease of casting goes:
Colorless >> Hybrid >> Monocolour >> Gold

If you classify your cards into only three sections (colorless/mono/gold), I'd split the batch of hybrid cards between colorless and mono, based on how you typically see them used. Just.. just don't lump them with gold. Ever.

 

[anotak]

personally
colorless > double hybrid > mono > 2/X hybrid = triple hybrid > gold ~ double mono > triple mono > multi gold

 

[Chris Taylor]

There are cards like Boggart Ram-Gang and Boros Reckoner that you still probably want to keep in your respective mono-colour sections, and then your Kitchen Finks and Murderous Redcaps that are super versatile and go into almost every deck. If you have an eight-man, I'd wager that only one person at the table wouldn't be able to cast a Redcap, assuming you run halfway decent fixing.

This is why it's not a stretch to consider a lot of hybrids to be artifacts, since they're essentially competing for space with the colourless cards. It also allows you to lower the bar for playability on hybrids, since nearly every deck can run them. As an example, Curse of Chains might not make the cut in either monowhite or monoblue, but it's decent enough of a removal spell that can go in most every deck. Enough so that I've been running it for over two years at this point, and seen it do solid work.

I think we all agree the scale for ease of casting goes:
Colorless >> Hybrid >> Monocolour >> Gold

If you classify your cards into only three sections (colorless/mono/gold), I'd split the batch of hybrid cards between colorless and mono, based on how you typically see them used. Just.. just don't lump them with gold. Ever.

Eh, to me Boros Reckoner is never realistically getting cast in a RG aggro deck.

Finks on the other hand, perfectly fine. Same with Dryad Militant.

And while it's been a while since I've seen one in a cube, stuff like Deus of Calamity certainly doesn't belong in a monocolor or artifact section.

 

[Eric Chan]

That's crazy talk, and you know it.

I mean, everyone I know who cubes Deus of Calamity stashes it in green, alongside their Primalcrux and Khalni Hydra.

 

[Jason Waddell]

Unless you really run monocolor decks in your environment I consider cards like Reckoner to be effectively gold.

 

[Jason Waddell]

Let's work on a practical spectrum of 3-drops:


Different order on anything or any missing combinations?

 

[Laz]

The type of three drop you are missing is:


There is also the possibility of C/C/Hybrid, but none of those exist as far as I know...

 

[Changling Bob]

Is it worth considering 'how many decks can this sensibly go in' rather than direct ease of cost (with regards to whether snakeform is blue, green or simic)?

ie: there should be roughly balanced numbers of 'can go in mono G' and 'can go in mono U', and roughly balanced numbers of 'can go in UG' and 'can go in RB'? This would take significantly more paying attention to things, but probably gets results closer to how things play.

 

[Jason Waddell]

Is it worth considering 'how many decks can this sensibly go in' rather than direct ease of cost (with regards to whether snakeform is blue, green or simic)?

ie: there should be roughly balanced numbers of 'can go in mono G' and 'can go in mono U', and roughly balanced numbers of 'can go in UG' and 'can go in RB'? This would take significantly more paying attention to things, but probably gets results closer to how things play.

I think this is at a higher level of resolution than we really need. I think it's mostly to point out to people that cards like Snakeform should probably be far more prevalent in cube lists than it currently is.

 

[Jason Waddell]

The type of three drop you are missing is:

Are any of these actually played? I haven't Voidslimed in a long time.

 

[Laz]

Are any of these actually played? I haven't Voidslimed in a long time.

Absorb? Maybe? I don't know.

I used to just count hybrids as 0.5 toward their respective mono-colour sections, but now I just set rough goals for number of playables and don't concern myself with perfectly balanced sections. I don't think that being a stickler for numerical balance is too important, an extra 2 cards in one section over another means very little on a draft-by-draft basis, especially given that there is very rarely a struggle to find that last playable card, and the mana in my environment is really good.

 

[Chris Taylor]

I at one point had a UUR 2/4 flying who drew cards if your oponent ever took damage from a spell of yours, he was okay.
Mostly because of dat but tho

 

[ahadabans]

Let's work on a practical spectrum of 3-drops:


Different order on anything or any missing combinations?

I might move Lingering Souls more towards the easy stuff simply because you don't need both halves to be useful. This is especially true of Lingering Souls. 2 1/1 flyers for 3 mana is not all that bad, especially if you are running a token theme. If you have a Bx deck with mass discard, the second part of Lingering Souls is a steal for 1B even if you can't cast the W portion. This card is certainly much better in WB, but it's not unplayable in Wx or Bx (with discard).

We often think of cards in ideal scenarios, and that's all fine and good. But a lot of times you draft a deck and it doesn't perfectly come together and you are faced with cards which are square when you really want a round one. Not all final 40's are going to be the nuts.

So IMO, from a practical real world standpoint mixed color flashback cards are harder to place on the spectrum.

 

[Jason Waddell]

 

[CML]

why is arrogant wurm arrogant? he's only a 4/4. on a recent car ride we decided the arrogant cards were arrogant because they were insecure about being just 4/4's.

 

[Diakonov]

Absorb? Maybe? I don't know.

I used to just count hybrids as 0.5 toward their respective mono-colour sections, but now I just set rough goals for number of playables and don't concern myself with perfectly balanced sections. I don't think that being a stickler for numerical balance is too important, an extra 2 cards in one section over another means very little on a draft-by-draft basis, especially given that there is very rarely a struggle to find that last playable card, and the mana in my environment is really good.

I use the 0.5 card system and it works well for me. It's definitely the most accurate way of categorizing them, if that's the concern.