Card/Deck Your top 5 cards of all time!

ravnic

ravnic

I really enjoyed the most recent lucky paper episode where they talked about there top 5 cards each, why they love them and a little bit of history on that. And since I love hearing, talking and reading about cube cards, I thought that would be a neat little thread.

5.


It sucks that I can't determine which version gets shown here. From a mechanical point of view, Order of Midnight would be in my top 100 probably, but not my top 5. But oh god have you seen the showcase version of this card? It is THE most beautiful Magic card I have ever seen. I also don't mind an evasive Gravedigger suited for more proactive decks. But primarily, this is just a stunning piece of cardboard. There are some cards you just have to gaze upon occasionally, and Order here is my number one in that regard (honorable mention: og Watchwolf).


4.


No, of course I don't have any affiliation with any guild. Unless maybe there was one that controls everything unnoticed in the shadows.

When Ravnica came out I bought my first advanced starter deck (60 cards black bordered, core sets only had 40 card decks back then). And not only does my love for the world of Ravnica last until today, it's also House Dimir that I am fond of. It was also the time that I discovered mill and I was super fascinated with that whole alternative win con (shoutout to Vedalken Entrancer). Ultimately, Szadek gives me that cozy nostalgic feeling and is my favorite card from my Ravnica Block Cube.


3.


I am hyped to draft any cube that has FoF in it. It is the sweetest draw spell, period, and if you have time to cast it, that means the environment is not too breakneck-fast to be fun for me. FoF is always different and adds a cool layer of mind games – it's a card that excites me every time I see it in a pack or cast it, and it does that for decades already. Whenever I cast this card, my brain makes happy chemicals. It's just so cool.


2.


Simply a perfect magic card. It reads super clean, one simple effect and flashback, but it gets so so much play from how they turned the knobs on it. It's the exemplary Casual Champions Cube card. Easy to understand, but hard to fully understand. You can use it as a ramp target that beats spot removal, you can be a grindy dredge deck and get value from milling it, or you draft my favorite, madness, and see this as a great payoff for discard. Additionally, this artwork is as epic as a wurm can be. I wish there were just more cards with flashback costs cheaper than their mana cost, but I'm not sure they would ever beat this card.


1.


It's summer 2005. My best friend and I had the brilliant idea to switch from yugioh to magic, because almost nobody played that, so it must be cheaper. Right. Well, anyway, we visit a store and each of us buys one 9th edition starter deck. While Sami got "Lofty Heights" and still has a soft spot for his Mahamoti Djinn, I fell in love with Nightmare from my "Dead Again" starter deck. Incredibly powerful (in my 11yo eyes) with a haunting artwork.

When I crafted my CCC, I wanted to just find a way to play my old buddy again. On face value, it might be the worst card in my cube today, but I designed the environment with Nightmare in mind: heavy support for mono color, flying tokens to chump are very hard to come by, and a lot of removal can't kill a black flying 6/6 (or bigger). I think I managed quite well to create a cube that is appealing to a wide audience, with dynamic game play, synergies and strategic depth – where Nightmare is still playable.

I love you Nachtmahr (one of the few cards where I cube the german version) and I always will <3


And now I would like to hear your stories. What are your five most favorite magic cards – and why?
 
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Seeker

Seeker

Not in any particular order. I can't choose between my five favorite categories of children... well, actually, the fifth one is an individual card rather than a synecdoche, but the other four are categories.

1)
I'm a sucker for a rare red enchantment with a million words on it that's a card advantage machine (secretly, because people never read them even if they're just one sentence) that I can maybe wheel:

Sure, people figure them out faster these days, they don't wheel nearly as often, but you know what I mean.

Mindmoil's the OG in that category for me, because people took forever to figure out Karoos, so you ended up with decks like the funniest triple-Ravnica deck I ever had, 32 cards I've forgotten (definitely no more than 11 basic lands) plus:

Probably also Fiery Conclusion because "just" milling 5+10+20 with Szadek doesn't kill through Junktroller so you gotta stack the 20 damage and sac him to the Conclusion. That's just math.

2)
There are exactly 3 Force Spikes:

The cowards at WotC never have actual Spike in and omit Tithe half the time from Vintage Cube these days, despite them only having gotten better over the last 15 years as every point of mana is more important and the good cards worth countering come down sooner. I still love getting people with Censor or Jwari Disruption or whatever, but that's not a real Force Spike. The real ones are one mana and nobody plays around it.

3)
Another synecdoche, for "one drop that is worth a full card". I started this format thinking Devotee was unplayable and ended it having Devotee as literally top mono-white common, over Salt Road Packbeast. One of my decks had three Devotee and three Fire-Rim Form for the full "cards I was pretty sure were stone unplayable on day 1 of the format" hand.
(17lands numbers settled on probably Packbeast marginally better, but Devotee still had a GIH WR above Static Snare in Boros)

Took me a long time to get on the one-drop train, but when I did I made up for it by going all in.

4)
From picnic tables when I was 12 to every single draft format that I enjoy, I just want to pay 2 mana, receive a pittance of a creature, and get a full rectangle from my opponent. I don't get excited to get a bonus rectangle, I'm still fine with getting a boring rectangle and some mill, but I am absolutely stoked, every time, to take a rectangle away from someone else.

5)
Oft imitated, never surpassed. Three blue's a big ask, so I'll probably cut it from my cube someday, but the versatility is still there and creatures are only getting stronger so the tap mode is getting better...
 
K

Karshtakavaar

In no particular order:


The absolute star of my favourite ever Standard deck in my favourite Standard format. Esper Drownyard decks were infesting my local meta, with their Sphinx's Revelations and their Syncopates. Have fun turning a Dissipate into a Think Twice, I'm turning this Tibalt into a Nicol Bolas. You have not known joy until you have had multiple spectators watch you absolutely dumpster the hometown hero PT grinder at Table One as he slowly loses his mind realising he cannot deal with a resolved Possibility Storm, and that triggers from multiple copies stack to great effect when your cards actually do something as opposed to 'counter, draw, board wipe'.

Incidentally, Seeker is 1000% right about wordy red enchantments. Absolute gold mine.

Honorable Mention in the "Do-nothing permanent" category goes to Knowledge Pool for my kitchen table '16 pool' deck that just made and cloned Knowledge Pools and shuffled a lot of cardboard around.

Another favourite from Standard, but also with amazing Phyrexian flavour. I think I like this even more when you aren't going for combo wins off it and just using it to toolbox/find silver bullets, but the possibilities are endless.

Honorable Mention in the "Fun tutor" category goes to Fleshwrither for going into almost every black EDH deck I made for a solid decade. I think I have like 20 copies of this guy.

Beautiful card that adds so much to so many decks. Fantastic even at its floor, but also has a thousand angles to exploit it. I like cards that are worth fighting over in the draft, but are wanted for different reasons by every drafter in the pod, and this is like the poster child for that to me.

No 'Honorable Mention' in this category, the card is inimitable even within card filtering and untap effects.

And back to Standard stories: This got my my first ever FNM 1st. After weeks of crushing defeats, I managed to find a much of terrible red burn spells in the bulk bin and bought them for about 2 bucks, then traded friends for some of the 'bad' red creatures they didn't want to play in their casual decks. Rocked up to FNM with a 26-land burn deck, sad because I only had one Lightning Bolt. Had a frantic look through the bulk bins one last time half an hour before the event. Playset of Lightning Bolts in a penny sleeve. Totally worth the 50c each.
As a poor highschooler with no job, a $5 deck and $6 entry fee got me enough sweet stuff from prize support I could actually self-fund my Magic habit, and I managed to maintain that for about eight or nine years solid, moving from constructed to draft and back multiple times. Wouldn't have been able to start without Lightning Bolt.

Honorable Mention in the "Red deck go BRRR" category goes to Bloodcrazed Goblin, Goblin Guide and every other overstatted red one drop with a drawback (Not you, Ragavan). Trading friends who didn't see your true worth for cards like you won me many games.

My first ever deck was Zombies, built to play in 5 player kitchen table games. I tried so hard to get wins with Shepherd of Rot, but it was too much of a lightning rod. Found some copies of Gempalm Polluter in the bulk bin a my FLGS and thought "Well, I guess it'll do as a backup win con that they won't see coming". Guys, I don't know if you know this, but counterspells don't stop activated abilities. And 'cycling' means you get to draw a card. And sometimes when you get stuck on 2 mana, you can cycle it straight away and find that extra land so you can play your Zombie Trailblazer next turn! I think this guy is why I'm still so obsessed with Cycling as a mechanic to this day.

Honorable Mention in the "My First Deck" category goes to Undead Gladiator because I spent like 18 months hunting to trade for like, two whole copies to go in my Zombie deck because you could cycle it more than once.

Actual first place, no question. Also, no questions. Card is perfect I will not be taking feedback at this time.
 
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Nanonox

Nanonox

(Sorry for the big images, but had to use the same one from my deck or it's all wrong).

5.


Artifacts are my favorite card type in Magic. Master here is the first Black artifact payoff that really piqued my interest (sorry Guardian Beast) and in no small part because of Fabricate. There are so many hooks to this card that allow drafters to get creative.

4.


It looks like I am building a deck with this top 5...This artifact does nothing really. It just slow cantrips. But it's so much more. A spell cast, a sacrifice, a card type in the GY. It's a way to have fewer cards in hand for Balance. Manamorphose, Frantic Search and Gitaxian Probe are all in this same category of "free" cards I love. Bauble gets the edge for being an artifact.

3.
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Combo might be my favorite archetype and old-bordered Magic brings me back to when I started playing in Revised.

Dark Ritual also has competitive memories for me because my first foray into competitive Magic was in Vintage back in the 2000s. My first deck was Suicide Black and Ritual is representative of those fun times (still remember the devastated look on my veteran opponent when I beat his all toploader "The Deck" and he complained about his rating losing to a noob). A turn one Hypnotic Specter was a real threat, but there was also Sinkhole, Duress, Necropotence, Nether Void, Hymn to Tourach and surprise damage on Nantuko Shade.

My cube still makes good use of it with Bolas's Citadel and Yawgmoth's Will.

2.


Did I mention I like combo and spell velocity? I discovered the card on these forums and it's fantastic. You can go fair or unfair. You can care about the GY, the discard, the pump or the untap. Maybe all of the above! Honorable mentions go to Agatha's Soul Cauldron and Paradox Engine that are in the same vein. It's a one card engine that you can design to be as fair or unfair as you want.

1.
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I also like control decks a lot and this sweeper is my favorite. You have to break the symmetry to get ahead and it's also a great equalizer in case the game goes poorly. I've gotten people so good with it and have also been wrecked by a Balance. It creates both memorable and miserable stories. I also really enjoy prison/stax so blowing up lands and cards in hand makes me happy.
There also might be some nostalgia for Saint Seiya that I used to watch and Libra was a cool character (the toy armor had so many weapons!).
 
TekLazar

TekLazar

5.
My love for dimir actually started with an "uncastable" fattie that only rarely milled someone out. I have fond memories of trying to make this card work, like flinging it at people's faces with a counterspell in hand, or going full turbo mill with wight of precinct six and jace's phantasm and mindcrank (back when it didn't cost my children's fortune) and just having CA as a one-of. It perfectly shows off the jank fatties that I love. And I still find myself creating decks that make people suffer rather than be consistent.

4.
This thing really only exists here because I had to find a sort of low-power card that could cast adventure cards from the graveyard for my friends who didnt understand the above card works with adventures, but Daring waverider and Goblin Dark-dwellers doesn't (don't ask why it just doesn't). I have always loved the Dark-dwellers, but while it was played, it never quite found the right home. While this thing will always have the right control or combo shell, and is undoubtedly my favorite blue 5 win-condition.

3.
There is nothing I love more than a card that completely changes how you play the game. It is the only card in my cube that says "you get three" and it's still a wildly inconsistent deck. But my love is so high, from making Myr Superion look good, or making 0 mana sorcery speed shocks, and to making an absolutely slow and abysmal card look like a perfect win condition.

2.
This thing was another casual love of mine. It perfectly encapsulates something that seems so normal, but then when you get under the hood there's just so much jank that you can do. (I guess honorable mention to splinter twin? But it is not as cute so...)
I have tried to make this be a "you get three" as well, but semi-fast colorless ramp just was too strong, and this card had to go if my other myrs were gone too. Eventually I am going to make that golems, constructs, and myr artifact cube and this card is the first thing that I will throw in.

1.
Ah yes, the stupid thing that makes me completely change how I build my deck (goodbye mana leak, hello judge's familiar) and it also lets me play my favorite cards: un-interactive blue fatties
The deck has gotten a lot of interesting upgrades throughout the years, and I love to play it because it takes skill, but it is also mindless and wildly inconsistent. One of my beginner decks that I love to see others play.

0.
I'm not explaining this, and I have really only cast it legitimately like once, but that high is why I have my profile picture.
 
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