All my Phyrexian mana spells are in a weird subset call "colorless", meaning it's not artifact; just colorless. I treat Birthing Pod as a artifact classification. I guess it's interesting to see what people think about classification. And it's nice to share as well.
Abrupt Decay and Courser are awesome cards. 3cmc 2/4s are few and far. We should appreciate "un-square" stats creatures. I like that Courser also makes Goyf bigger.
I think it depends on Cube size and it's nowhere near a slam dunk. Some people run it & have a lot of success. I loved playing with Birthing Pod in constructed decks but it was never good enough for our 540 in the Cube world.
My advice is always to test cards to see how they play in your environment. Worst case scenario is you cut it after a few sessions but at least you tried it You can end up finding some gems that way (like Ashiok which is now a top 50 drafted card on my Cube Tutor and is truly excellent).
There's a whole thread discussing Birthing Podhere. Long story short, it's a build-around-me card that happens to have a lot of synergy with a lot of creatures that tend to go into cube anyway. Some cubers love it, others tried it and cut it.
I'm running it in my cube, and I really like it. If you can pick one up early enough, it's a really fun and interesting challenge to draft and build a pod deck.
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Every time I play a cube with Pod and attempt to build around it, even after getting it early, there's always a serious gap in my chain. Perhaps it's just bad luck. It'd be a fun card if it worked out, though, and it's not bad even without a full chain of creatures up to something big in some decks.
I think the key for Birthing Pod to work is to have enough creatures at 2cmc to 4cmc.
See that's never my problem with it. My problem is always competing with the ramp/reanimator/artifact/control players for their big game enders. If I'm going to play pod in a cube draft, I want to make a bridge from 1-8 or 9 with at least a little redundancy. I've regularly drafted perfect cube decks... except with no 6 drop, making the 7/8/9 unplayable and ruining the entire point. People don't want to play pod as much like a toolbox (like Melira pod) and want to play it more like the old pod decks from standard that actually got up to Elesh Norn and beyond. In my opinion, anyway.
My players tend towards toolboxes and shenanigans more than big stuff, and some play me lira pod in modern , so that kind of pod deck is right up their ally. I also push a R/b sac them, which brings a lot of great pod cards, and a u/w etb/blink theme. Zombie pod is also kind of a thing in my cube
What I'm implying is built Pod such that you can chain them reliably through 2-4, with a few 5 and 6s. We're talking about 40 cards here, not 60. Because there numerous times where you draw one of those chain cards and tilt.
I drafted Journey Into Nyx this weekend and came across the card Worst Fears. While it costs less total mana than Mindslaver, it is not colorless and 8 mana is a lot of mana...thought it was a cool card but am not too sure if it's cube worthy. For that matter, is Mindslaver? I have played with it in a cube before and it was sometimes too clunky, other times it won someone the game.
What about a card like Mishra's Workshop if it's errata'd to allow the mana to be used to also pay for abilities of artifacts? Casting spells and activating abilities of artifacts could make it legit in a cube.
I love this little guy. Turns Stormblood Berserker on and still gets his damage through after they have landed blockers you can't deal with. Played early, he can dish out a huge amount of damage. Been a very solid 1 drop for me.
Abrupt Decay and Courser are awesome cards. 3cmc 2/4s are few and far. We should appreciate "un-square" stats creatures. I like that Courser also makes Goyf bigger.
UR Melek, Izzet ParagonUR, B Shirei, Shizo's CaretakerB, R Jaya Ballard, Task MageR,RW Tajic, Blade of the LegionRW, UB Lazav, Dimir MastermindUB, UB Circu, Dimir LobotomistUB, RWU Zedruu the GreatheartedRWU, GUBThe MimeoplasmGUB, UGExperiment Kraj UG, WDarien, King of KjeldorW, BMarrow-GnawerB, WBGKarador, Ghost ChieftainWBG, UTeferi, Temporal ArchmageU, GWUDerevi, Empyrial TacticianGWU, RDaretti, Scrap SavantR, UTalrand, Sky SummonerU, GEzuri, Renegade LeaderG, WUBRGReaper KingWUBRG, RGXenagos, God of RevelsRG, CKozilek, Butcher of TruthC, WUBRGGeneral TazriWUBRG, GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
Sure. They're both good cards.
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Is something like Birthing Pod a slam dunk add or is it dependent on cube size?
My advice is always to test cards to see how they play in your environment. Worst case scenario is you cut it after a few sessions but at least you tried it You can end up finding some gems that way (like Ashiok which is now a top 50 drafted card on my Cube Tutor and is truly excellent).
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You really should look at the cube comparison data that eidolon has posted in the cube lists section. It'll give you all this information and more.
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I'm running it in my cube, and I really like it. If you can pick one up early enough, it's a really fun and interesting challenge to draft and build a pod deck.
450 card Peasant cube thread. Draft it here.
UR Melek, Izzet ParagonUR, B Shirei, Shizo's CaretakerB, R Jaya Ballard, Task MageR,RW Tajic, Blade of the LegionRW, UB Lazav, Dimir MastermindUB, UB Circu, Dimir LobotomistUB, RWU Zedruu the GreatheartedRWU, GUBThe MimeoplasmGUB, UGExperiment Kraj UG, WDarien, King of KjeldorW, BMarrow-GnawerB, WBGKarador, Ghost ChieftainWBG, UTeferi, Temporal ArchmageU, GWUDerevi, Empyrial TacticianGWU, RDaretti, Scrap SavantR, UTalrand, Sky SummonerU, GEzuri, Renegade LeaderG, WUBRGReaper KingWUBRG, RGXenagos, God of RevelsRG, CKozilek, Butcher of TruthC, WUBRGGeneral TazriWUBRG, GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
See that's never my problem with it. My problem is always competing with the ramp/reanimator/artifact/control players for their big game enders. If I'm going to play pod in a cube draft, I want to make a bridge from 1-8 or 9 with at least a little redundancy. I've regularly drafted perfect cube decks... except with no 6 drop, making the 7/8/9 unplayable and ruining the entire point. People don't want to play pod as much like a toolbox (like Melira pod) and want to play it more like the old pod decks from standard that actually got up to Elesh Norn and beyond. In my opinion, anyway.
UR Melek, Izzet ParagonUR, B Shirei, Shizo's CaretakerB, R Jaya Ballard, Task MageR,RW Tajic, Blade of the LegionRW, UB Lazav, Dimir MastermindUB, UB Circu, Dimir LobotomistUB, RWU Zedruu the GreatheartedRWU, GUBThe MimeoplasmGUB, UGExperiment Kraj UG, WDarien, King of KjeldorW, BMarrow-GnawerB, WBGKarador, Ghost ChieftainWBG, UTeferi, Temporal ArchmageU, GWUDerevi, Empyrial TacticianGWU, RDaretti, Scrap SavantR, UTalrand, Sky SummonerU, GEzuri, Renegade LeaderG, WUBRGReaper KingWUBRG, RGXenagos, God of RevelsRG, CKozilek, Butcher of TruthC, WUBRGGeneral TazriWUBRG, GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
We found Mindslaver to be too expensive and too clunky. But it's much, much better than Worst Fears, IMO.
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Well, it's Mishra's Workshop, just errata'd to allow mana to be used to also pay for abilities of artifacts.
If you're okay with using house rules and custom cards, it would make Workshop better, if that's what you're asking.
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I love this little guy. Turns Stormblood Berserker on and still gets his damage through after they have landed blockers you can't deal with. Played early, he can dish out a huge amount of damage. Been a very solid 1 drop for me.
UR Melek, Izzet ParagonUR, B Shirei, Shizo's CaretakerB, R Jaya Ballard, Task MageR,RW Tajic, Blade of the LegionRW, UB Lazav, Dimir MastermindUB, UB Circu, Dimir LobotomistUB, RWU Zedruu the GreatheartedRWU, GUBThe MimeoplasmGUB, UGExperiment Kraj UG, WDarien, King of KjeldorW, BMarrow-GnawerB, WBGKarador, Ghost ChieftainWBG, UTeferi, Temporal ArchmageU, GWUDerevi, Empyrial TacticianGWU, RDaretti, Scrap SavantR, UTalrand, Sky SummonerU, GEzuri, Renegade LeaderG, WUBRGReaper KingWUBRG, RGXenagos, God of RevelsRG, CKozilek, Butcher of TruthC, WUBRGGeneral TazriWUBRG, GTitania, Protector of ArgothG