I think it's a better midrange card, that gets better against controlling decks. So it actually shores up the weakness in the midrange deck's toughest matchup. It's a fine card for control decks too, but I think Bribery's actually better in midrange decks.
I guess the only blue mid rangy deck we see is UG ramp and there again it's well down on the list of 5+ cc cards we'd want to see. As I said, it's obvious the card is good, we just had too spotty a play record with it and we're underwhelmed by its performance.
Forgot to mention how awesome it is to look through your opponent's deck and figure out what they could have in their hand, or more importantly what they don't have. The amount of times I've been searching through a deck after casting a Bribery and been like "oh sweet, there's that card, that means they won't be able to cast it and this/next turn I can do..." or "oh crap, that card isn't there, that means it's in their hand and I shouldn't do..." has been too many to count. For me, that is a *huge* bonus in Bribery's favor, because after g1--or even during g1 if you've already seen the deck in action against other players/during deckbuilding--you have almost complete and full information on what they can draw into and what they likely have.
Forgot to mention how awesome it is to look through your opponent's deck and figure out what they could have in their hand, or more importantly what they don't have. The amount of times I've been searching through a deck after casting a Bribery and been like "oh sweet, there's that card, that means they won't be able to cast it and this/next turn I can do..." or "oh crap, that card isn't there, that means it's in their hand and I shouldn't do..." has been too many to count. For me, that is a *huge* bonus in Bribery's favor, because after g1--or even during g1 if you've already seen the deck in action against other players/during deckbuilding--you have almost complete and full information on what they can draw into and what they likely have.
Really good point. At a 8-man table, this helps a lot because you get the chance to analyse other decks during all the games you can watch end after yours.
Forgot to mention how awesome it is to look through your opponent's deck and figure out what they could have in their hand, or more importantly what they don't have. ... For me, that is a *huge* bonus in Bribery's favor, because after g1--or even during g1 if you've already seen the deck in action against other players/during deckbuilding--you have almost complete and full information on what they can draw into and what they likely have.
Totally agree with this. Quoting myself from earlier in this thread:
I'm not talking about Tempo as a decktype, I'm talking about Tempo as a fundamental Magic concept that involves making better use of your resources in comparison to your opponent relative to how it impacts the board.
So am I. I know the difference between a tempo deck and "tempo" as a Magic concept. It's clear from how you have responded to me (not just in this thread but others) that you don't think I know the game very well. But I assure you that I've played for many years and while I'm no Jon Finkel, I'm not incompetent and I do understand how this game works.
Even in a slower, bombier format, Control Magic is still a stellar card. When your opponent taps out for their 6-drop, and you take it with Control Magic, you just removed their best creature, got a 6cc creature for yourself, force the opponent to waste 6 mana (while getting +2 on value for yourself) ...all for 4 mana. The value generated by that card is infinitely better than the value generated by Bribery outside of the corner cases where you're stealing a creature that's better than their 6cc bomb.
You make a solid argument, it simply isn't how the two cards have played in my experience.
Control Magic has always felt powerful but it can often be played around. For one thing, you don't always have to answer it immediately. They took your guy and that hurts, but it isn't always crippling depending on what they took (which if you are aggro is often a lot more useful to you than them). And by the time someone plays control magic and you absolutely have to get rid of it NOW (in the 6 drop scenario for example), you typically have ways to do so. Even if it means doing something painful like doom blading your own dude (and 2 for 1 ing yourself in the process). Red decks often have to do that with burn to get rid of a must-kill target (not even talking about control magic but just a fat road block or something that will destroy you if your opponent untaps with it). Welcome to cube where pretty much every card played after turn 2/3 is powerful enough to completely alter the game state. This type of stuff is par for the course.
Just talking as a general rule here, by turn 4 the midrange/control deck is going to do something really bad to the board position. They just are. If they don't, they've probably lost the game already (they certainly have against a strong aggro or tempo deck). Control Magic is usually a really good play. But so is Nekrataal, Flametongue Kavu, and many others that provide similar tempo swings (never mind a wrath which can just completely hose you if you overextended). At least with control magic I can get back the dude you stole. That's a card that can backfire on you because I have an opportunity to swing the tempo back my way (where as many cards do not give you that option). If I'm playing midrange (where this card hurts the most), it's usually a Gx or Wx deck where you have the best and most numerous disenchant effects. U/B is very often control and has counters to prevent control magic from happening or sac outlets to nullify it or bounce or blink (or they ripped that control magic from your hand already). Rx is almost always aggressive where this hurts much less I think.
If you take my 6 drop and then I disenchant your control magic, you basically got a 4 mana fog effect and are in the same bad game state you were before you played control magic. It really isn't a silver bullet unless I drop a bomb in play that I can't answer and will lose to if you take it from me. And if I did that without having any way to protect it, well that's on me.
But what can you do against Bribery besides counter it (Ux only), bounce it after the fact (Ux again) or force my opponent to discard it before they play it (Bx only)? They get the creature permanently with no strings. I can't disenchant the effect or sac my dude in response or choose not to play it so they can't take it. I'm just screwed. And getting the ETB effect of the creature is being greatly undervalued here. There are so so many creatures in cube with very desirable ETB effects and you are almost guaranteed to find one in your opponents deck, even aggro decks. And it's not any ETB effect, it's the best one in your opponent's deck for the board state. Bribery is basically an entomb zombify combo card that targets your opponents library.
The extent to which Bribery can be used is vast. It isn't just about stealing bombs. While not amazingly well costed, I see absolutely nothing wrong with casting Bribery and fetching something like Eternal Witness (to get back my wrath or vital card). For 5 mana, I deprived you of your regrowth on legs, got the effect for myself and then used your dude to chump block to save me some life on your next attack. Can Control Magic do that?
Green decks in particular are just completely shafted by Bribery. And do we really need more cards that make that matchup worse for green? From a balancing perspective, this card does all the wrong things IMO. And as severals have pointed out, you get to rummage through my deck and see what I'm playing too (pour some vinegar on that paper cut why don't ya?). I have found this card to be the anti-thesis of casual fun. To each there own though. I know some like a more cutthroat meta and I totally respect that (play Bribery, it's right up you alley). But it's a very bad fit over here. In powered cubes where games are often over by the time you get to 5 mana (especially in aggro focused cubes), I understand why your experiences are different.
It's okay to think someone's incorrect and not be elitist.
It's not what you say it's how you say it. I'm not the only person to call you out on your social etiquette. One would think at some point you'd come to the conclusion that it's you and not the other guy. But then again, maybe not since this pattern of play just continues.
I'm not incompetent and I do understand how this game works.
Based on how you wrote out what you did, I seemed like you were discussing tempo as a deck, and not as a concept. Because nothing you posted addressed the tempo advantage granted by Control Magic, and you implied that the speed of the cube influences the importance of tempo as a Magic concept, which is doesn't. So it wasn't clear if that was a concept that was totally understood.
Quote from ahadabans »
*Bribery stuff*
We're not in total disagreement here. I think Bribery is a stellar card, and it has matchups where it's better than Control Magic. The crux of the argument is that saying it's "light years better" than Control Magic is a statement I consider to be inaccurate, and the cards are actually really close in powerlevel. And I don't think that the environment is going to change that, for the reasons I illustrated.
Quote from ahadabans »
It's not what you say it's how you say it. I'm not the only person to call you out on your social etiquette. One would think at some point you'd come to the conclusion that it's you and not the other guy. But then again, maybe not since this pattern of play just continues.
In all fairness, you're also not the first person to overreact to someone thinking you're wrong. It's okay for us to disagree. It's okay for me to consider your statements incorrect. And it's okay for me to illustrate the reasons why. If you say something that I think is just blatantly wrong--surprisingly wrong, it's okay for me to say so. If it's because I think your statement is inaccurate and it's because you may be misevaluating certain cards or not understanding certain Magic concepts, then so be it. Don't be so easily offended. It's okay for me to say your statement was wrong without you needing to get all up in arms and start calling me elitist.
I'm not incompetent and I do understand how this game works.
Because nothing you posted addressed the tempo advantage granted by Control Magic, and you implied that the speed of the cube influences the importance of tempo as a Magic concept, which is doesn't.
I don't think it's that cut and dry. In a high powered environment (power and speed are related), losing tempo can be more damaging because you often won't have time to recover from it. The easiest way to illustrate this I think is to compare how cube played back in 2008 (pre-M10) versus how it plays today. In today's cube environments, how often does an aggressive deck win once midrange/control gets to 6 mana? Is it more or less than it used to be? I'd argue less simply because the power of cards has increased.
Sure, aggro has it's hero of bladehold's now. Power increased everywhere. But trying to beat Grave Titan/Wurmcoil is immensely more difficult than trying to beat a Kamigawa Dragon. There was a time when Kokusho was an uncuttable flagship finisher and Skeletal Vampire was playable in larger lists. You aren't even running Kokusho at 540 and the idea of running Batman probably makes you laugh (rightfully so when compared to something like Grave Titan).
Bear in mind my context comes from playing a cube that is closer period wise to 2005 than 2015 even though I run a lot of new cards. And in that meta, I'm telling you Bribery has been the stronger card by far.
You've mentioned several times that you can't easily compare how well a card does in one environment (say standard) and apply that to another (cube). Different metas entirely and that can drastically change how a card plays. Well, the same I think can be said for different cube lists. Someone mentioned this in another thread, but we are at a point where rare lists can be dramatically different from one another - both in card selection and power level. And because of that there are considerably fewer black and white truths. It's all about context now.
Control Magic has a more impactful effect on tempo (which is more important in a high powered environment) whereas Bribery is a more powerful effect in the abstract (and therefore better in an environment where the tempo loss from control magic is less severe). How about we meet in the middle and acknowledge both arguments?
The crux of the argument is that saying it's "light years better" than Control Magic is a statement I consider to be inaccurate
And I'll concede that was an exaggeration colored by my great dislike for the card.
In all fairness, you're also not the first person to overreact to someone thinking you're wrong. It's okay for us to disagree. It's okay for me to consider your statements incorrect. And it's okay for me to illustrate the reasons why. If you say something that I think is just blatantly wrong--surprisingly wrong, it's okay for me to say so. If it's because I think your statement is inaccurate and it's because you may be misevaluating certain cards or not understanding certain Magic concepts, then so be it. Don't be so easily offended. It's okay for me to say your statement was wrong without you needing to get all up in arms and start calling me elitist.
Which would be fine if that is what you did. But you didn't. Here's exactly what you wrote:
Obviously the concepts of tempo, resource advantage and board impact are irrelevant to your Magic experience for some reason.
I'm not sure how you can think I'm overreacting to that. This is a disrespectful way to make your point.
Can we please take tone arguments etc. to PM's? I don't really think a thread meant to discuss a specific card and its place in cubes is the best place to have them.
On bribery - I used to think this card was an absurd, 1st pickable bomb. It's not remotely close to that anymore in small-to-medium, streamlined cubes, but whether that's because of how much faster cubes have gotten or how much I overvalued the card initially, I'm not sure. Regardless, bribery is probably not realistically close to getting cut in most cubes, it's just a middling (for cube power levels) blue card rather than a great one IMO. Now, with regards to it vs control magic effects. If you have a cube with a higher CMC or a "dragon cube," Bribery is probably better given the slower environment.
In control, I'd rather have control magic in almost every deck, as control magic helps against aggro in a way bribery doesn't. Bribery is also, IMO, way worse than treachery in control, but pretty much everything is way worse than treachery so that's not really a super fair comparison =P. Bribery is probably about equal to CM in the control v. midrange matchup, but the deck doesn't need a ton of help in those games, and while bribery is better than CM in pure control v pure control matchups (as even if they answer the briberied card, it's usually going to their GY/exile and that means you've removed one of what are probably very few finishers from the deck), having a card that's better against aggro is so much more important for control that I would pretty much always rather have control magic than bribery in my deck.
In midrange, the opposite is true and I think that bribery is better. It shores up your worst matchup (control) and you don't care that it's worse against aggro. Bribery is a great post-wrath play, and there's too many times where control magic is effectively dead against hard control decks.
I don't think you really play bribery outside of midrange on control. It's a sideboard card in tempo decks against super ramp or hard control, but I can't imagine wanting to MD it (whereas these decks love control magic) and it's also pretty much a never play in aggro (where, again, you'd happily take control magic as it helps you against midrange - assuming your cube supports UX aggro).
Another issue with bribery is that in the matchups where it should be the best - against the unfair reanimator, super ramp, and eureka/show & tell decks, it's often too slow. Reanimator can often have a fatty in play on t2, almost always on t3, and so if you're on the draw you are in serious trouble by turn 5. Control magic is much better against these "resolve one threat super early" decks. Bribery is probably better against super ramp, as that deck has more threats and is a bit slower. With eureka/show & tell, I'd again almost always rather have control magic, because I either get to put it into play last with eureka or get to follow up on t4 and take the one threat you played. Again, bribery suffers from being a t5 play here.
TL;DR - Both bribery and control magic probably aren't getting cut anytime soon, I like control magic more than bribery, but this may be due to me massively overvaluing bribery initially and then coming down hard on it.
And I'll concede that was an exaggeration colored by my great dislike for the card.
Fair enough. I'll concede that my reaction was also exaggerated partially due to the boldness of your original statement. As I've said multiple times, my argument was that the cards are very close in powerlevel, which was kinda the exact opposite sentiment of your original post. And the concepts in my initial response are the justifications for my position, and I can't see your original statement being accurate given an understanding of how those theories apply to games of Magic.
And I'll concede that was an exaggeration colored by my great dislike for the card.
Fair enough. I'll concede that my reaction was also exaggerated partially due to the boldness of your original statement. As I've said multiple times, my argument was that the cards are very close in powerlevel, which was kinda the exact opposite sentiment of your original post.
Cool. I can accept that.
And the concepts in my initial response are the justifications for my position, and I can't see your original statement being accurate given an understanding of how those theories apply to games of Magic.
Do you not buy into the idea that power/speed of the meta changes the importance of tempo? I know we've beat this horse pretty dead, but it's an interesting discussion because it applies to more than just the Bribery/Control Magic debate.
Do you not buy into the idea that power/speed of the meta changes the importance of tempo? I know we've beat this horse pretty dead, but it's an interesting discussion because it applies to more than just the Bribery/Control Magic debate.
I buy into that idea in some cases. Aggro decks get worse when the expectation is that the vast majority of the table will be playing midrange archetypes that beat up on them.
But in the Control Magic vs Bribery debate specifically, it doesn't apply, and it's not relevant. Because A) both cards scale in value based on the anticipated average size threat in the opponent's deck/board and B) tempo plays are still crucially important in each in-game scenario ...regardless of how the metagame as a whole is sped up/down.
Tempo, resource advantage and board impact are all critical aspects of each game of Magic, no matter what the format is or what the matchup is. And tempo is especially important when it's paired with circumstances that give you those other advantages simultaneously. In a slow, grindy game, the player that gets the tempo advantage from a card like Control Magic, or the resource advantage from a card like Control Magic, or the board impact a card like Control Magic has when you take their best threat away from them and add it to your own board is going to be at a tremendous advantage.
When cubes were slower and more midrange/control focussed than they are now, Control Magic was even a better card than it is now. Which is why, regardless of how slow and big the format is, these two cards will be very close to each other in terms of power, and they'll scale up and down in average expected value together.
The argument wasn't that Bribery could have a slight edge in your meta; the argument was that it's not Light Years Better than Control Magic by any stretch of the imagination ...no matter how the cube is constructed. Because of the way these cards powerlevels scale together, and because of the fundamental Magic concepts that are always at play giving merit to effects like Control Magic.
I agree, I think Bribery is a card that belongs in every cube of every size. It always has been. Bribery's actually better in my cube now than it was years ago, as the strength of the high-end fatties in the cube is just so high that Bribery's ceiling continues to be raised. And even with the absurd strength of modern 3-4cc creatures, the floor on Bribery is coming up too. As long as they continue to print great creatures, Bribery will continue to be great.
Bribery hit cards like hellrider a bit too much for me to be comfortable agreeing it should be in every cube no matter how fast/small. I will be putting one back in my cube for the time being however, due to the praise its recently reacquired. I swear a year ago everyone hated it because it was too slow.
It's a good card but I don't run it because I do prefer Control Magic, Treachery and to an extent Shackles and Sower. Not that Bribery is a bad card -- but I do prefer the other ones (for different reasons) and I don't want to allocate more slots to that effect since I run a small list. I also found that having too many of them discouraged reanimator/ramp.
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!
http://cubetutor.com/cubeblog/993
http://www.cubetutor.com/cubeblog/23690
Also, follow us on twitter! @TurnOneMagic
Really good point. At a 8-man table, this helps a lot because you get the chance to analyse other decks during all the games you can watch end after yours.
Zetsu's Cube on CubeTutor.com
Zetsu's Ebay MTG Online Store
Zetsu's Poker Draft Method
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!
So am I. I know the difference between a tempo deck and "tempo" as a Magic concept. It's clear from how you have responded to me (not just in this thread but others) that you don't think I know the game very well. But I assure you that I've played for many years and while I'm no Jon Finkel, I'm not incompetent and I do understand how this game works.
You make a solid argument, it simply isn't how the two cards have played in my experience.
Control Magic has always felt powerful but it can often be played around. For one thing, you don't always have to answer it immediately. They took your guy and that hurts, but it isn't always crippling depending on what they took (which if you are aggro is often a lot more useful to you than them). And by the time someone plays control magic and you absolutely have to get rid of it NOW (in the 6 drop scenario for example), you typically have ways to do so. Even if it means doing something painful like doom blading your own dude (and 2 for 1 ing yourself in the process). Red decks often have to do that with burn to get rid of a must-kill target (not even talking about control magic but just a fat road block or something that will destroy you if your opponent untaps with it). Welcome to cube where pretty much every card played after turn 2/3 is powerful enough to completely alter the game state. This type of stuff is par for the course.
Just talking as a general rule here, by turn 4 the midrange/control deck is going to do something really bad to the board position. They just are. If they don't, they've probably lost the game already (they certainly have against a strong aggro or tempo deck). Control Magic is usually a really good play. But so is Nekrataal, Flametongue Kavu, and many others that provide similar tempo swings (never mind a wrath which can just completely hose you if you overextended). At least with control magic I can get back the dude you stole. That's a card that can backfire on you because I have an opportunity to swing the tempo back my way (where as many cards do not give you that option). If I'm playing midrange (where this card hurts the most), it's usually a Gx or Wx deck where you have the best and most numerous disenchant effects. U/B is very often control and has counters to prevent control magic from happening or sac outlets to nullify it or bounce or blink (or they ripped that control magic from your hand already). Rx is almost always aggressive where this hurts much less I think.
If you take my 6 drop and then I disenchant your control magic, you basically got a 4 mana fog effect and are in the same bad game state you were before you played control magic. It really isn't a silver bullet unless I drop a bomb in play that I can't answer and will lose to if you take it from me. And if I did that without having any way to protect it, well that's on me.
But what can you do against Bribery besides counter it (Ux only), bounce it after the fact (Ux again) or force my opponent to discard it before they play it (Bx only)? They get the creature permanently with no strings. I can't disenchant the effect or sac my dude in response or choose not to play it so they can't take it. I'm just screwed. And getting the ETB effect of the creature is being greatly undervalued here. There are so so many creatures in cube with very desirable ETB effects and you are almost guaranteed to find one in your opponents deck, even aggro decks. And it's not any ETB effect, it's the best one in your opponent's deck for the board state. Bribery is basically an entomb zombify combo card that targets your opponents library.
The extent to which Bribery can be used is vast. It isn't just about stealing bombs. While not amazingly well costed, I see absolutely nothing wrong with casting Bribery and fetching something like Eternal Witness (to get back my wrath or vital card). For 5 mana, I deprived you of your regrowth on legs, got the effect for myself and then used your dude to chump block to save me some life on your next attack. Can Control Magic do that?
Green decks in particular are just completely shafted by Bribery. And do we really need more cards that make that matchup worse for green? From a balancing perspective, this card does all the wrong things IMO. And as severals have pointed out, you get to rummage through my deck and see what I'm playing too (pour some vinegar on that paper cut why don't ya?). I have found this card to be the anti-thesis of casual fun. To each there own though. I know some like a more cutthroat meta and I totally respect that (play Bribery, it's right up you alley). But it's a very bad fit over here. In powered cubes where games are often over by the time you get to 5 mana (especially in aggro focused cubes), I understand why your experiences are different.
It's not what you say it's how you say it. I'm not the only person to call you out on your social etiquette. One would think at some point you'd come to the conclusion that it's you and not the other guy. But then again, maybe not since this pattern of play just continues.
http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/modular-cube-5-colors.800/
Retro combo cube thread
http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/retro-combo-cube.1454/
Based on how you wrote out what you did, I seemed like you were discussing tempo as a deck, and not as a concept. Because nothing you posted addressed the tempo advantage granted by Control Magic, and you implied that the speed of the cube influences the importance of tempo as a Magic concept, which is doesn't. So it wasn't clear if that was a concept that was totally understood.
We're not in total disagreement here. I think Bribery is a stellar card, and it has matchups where it's better than Control Magic. The crux of the argument is that saying it's "light years better" than Control Magic is a statement I consider to be inaccurate, and the cards are actually really close in powerlevel. And I don't think that the environment is going to change that, for the reasons I illustrated.
In all fairness, you're also not the first person to overreact to someone thinking you're wrong. It's okay for us to disagree. It's okay for me to consider your statements incorrect. And it's okay for me to illustrate the reasons why. If you say something that I think is just blatantly wrong--surprisingly wrong, it's okay for me to say so. If it's because I think your statement is inaccurate and it's because you may be misevaluating certain cards or not understanding certain Magic concepts, then so be it. Don't be so easily offended. It's okay for me to say your statement was wrong without you needing to get all up in arms and start calling me elitist.
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!
I don't think it's that cut and dry. In a high powered environment (power and speed are related), losing tempo can be more damaging because you often won't have time to recover from it. The easiest way to illustrate this I think is to compare how cube played back in 2008 (pre-M10) versus how it plays today. In today's cube environments, how often does an aggressive deck win once midrange/control gets to 6 mana? Is it more or less than it used to be? I'd argue less simply because the power of cards has increased.
Sure, aggro has it's hero of bladehold's now. Power increased everywhere. But trying to beat Grave Titan/Wurmcoil is immensely more difficult than trying to beat a Kamigawa Dragon. There was a time when Kokusho was an uncuttable flagship finisher and Skeletal Vampire was playable in larger lists. You aren't even running Kokusho at 540 and the idea of running Batman probably makes you laugh (rightfully so when compared to something like Grave Titan).
Bear in mind my context comes from playing a cube that is closer period wise to 2005 than 2015 even though I run a lot of new cards. And in that meta, I'm telling you Bribery has been the stronger card by far.
You've mentioned several times that you can't easily compare how well a card does in one environment (say standard) and apply that to another (cube). Different metas entirely and that can drastically change how a card plays. Well, the same I think can be said for different cube lists. Someone mentioned this in another thread, but we are at a point where rare lists can be dramatically different from one another - both in card selection and power level. And because of that there are considerably fewer black and white truths. It's all about context now.
Control Magic has a more impactful effect on tempo (which is more important in a high powered environment) whereas Bribery is a more powerful effect in the abstract (and therefore better in an environment where the tempo loss from control magic is less severe). How about we meet in the middle and acknowledge both arguments?
And I'll concede that was an exaggeration colored by my great dislike for the card.
Which would be fine if that is what you did. But you didn't. Here's exactly what you wrote:
Obviously the concepts of tempo, resource advantage and board impact are irrelevant to your Magic experience for some reason.
I'm not sure how you can think I'm overreacting to that. This is a disrespectful way to make your point.
http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/modular-cube-5-colors.800/
Retro combo cube thread
http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/retro-combo-cube.1454/
On bribery - I used to think this card was an absurd, 1st pickable bomb. It's not remotely close to that anymore in small-to-medium, streamlined cubes, but whether that's because of how much faster cubes have gotten or how much I overvalued the card initially, I'm not sure. Regardless, bribery is probably not realistically close to getting cut in most cubes, it's just a middling (for cube power levels) blue card rather than a great one IMO. Now, with regards to it vs control magic effects. If you have a cube with a higher CMC or a "dragon cube," Bribery is probably better given the slower environment.
In control, I'd rather have control magic in almost every deck, as control magic helps against aggro in a way bribery doesn't. Bribery is also, IMO, way worse than treachery in control, but pretty much everything is way worse than treachery so that's not really a super fair comparison =P. Bribery is probably about equal to CM in the control v. midrange matchup, but the deck doesn't need a ton of help in those games, and while bribery is better than CM in pure control v pure control matchups (as even if they answer the briberied card, it's usually going to their GY/exile and that means you've removed one of what are probably very few finishers from the deck), having a card that's better against aggro is so much more important for control that I would pretty much always rather have control magic than bribery in my deck.
In midrange, the opposite is true and I think that bribery is better. It shores up your worst matchup (control) and you don't care that it's worse against aggro. Bribery is a great post-wrath play, and there's too many times where control magic is effectively dead against hard control decks.
I don't think you really play bribery outside of midrange on control. It's a sideboard card in tempo decks against super ramp or hard control, but I can't imagine wanting to MD it (whereas these decks love control magic) and it's also pretty much a never play in aggro (where, again, you'd happily take control magic as it helps you against midrange - assuming your cube supports UX aggro).
Another issue with bribery is that in the matchups where it should be the best - against the unfair reanimator, super ramp, and eureka/show & tell decks, it's often too slow. Reanimator can often have a fatty in play on t2, almost always on t3, and so if you're on the draw you are in serious trouble by turn 5. Control magic is much better against these "resolve one threat super early" decks. Bribery is probably better against super ramp, as that deck has more threats and is a bit slower. With eureka/show & tell, I'd again almost always rather have control magic, because I either get to put it into play last with eureka or get to follow up on t4 and take the one threat you played. Again, bribery suffers from being a t5 play here.
TL;DR - Both bribery and control magic probably aren't getting cut anytime soon, I like control magic more than bribery, but this may be due to me massively overvaluing bribery initially and then coming down hard on it.
375 unpowered cube - https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/601ac624832cdf1039947588
Fair enough. I'll concede that my reaction was also exaggerated partially due to the boldness of your original statement. As I've said multiple times, my argument was that the cards are very close in powerlevel, which was kinda the exact opposite sentiment of your original post. And the concepts in my initial response are the justifications for my position, and I can't see your original statement being accurate given an understanding of how those theories apply to games of Magic.
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!
Draft my cube!
Watch me stream!
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!
Cool. I can accept that.
Do you not buy into the idea that power/speed of the meta changes the importance of tempo? I know we've beat this horse pretty dead, but it's an interesting discussion because it applies to more than just the Bribery/Control Magic debate.
http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/modular-cube-5-colors.800/
Retro combo cube thread
http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/retro-combo-cube.1454/
I buy into that idea in some cases. Aggro decks get worse when the expectation is that the vast majority of the table will be playing midrange archetypes that beat up on them.
But in the Control Magic vs Bribery debate specifically, it doesn't apply, and it's not relevant. Because A) both cards scale in value based on the anticipated average size threat in the opponent's deck/board and B) tempo plays are still crucially important in each in-game scenario ...regardless of how the metagame as a whole is sped up/down.
Tempo, resource advantage and board impact are all critical aspects of each game of Magic, no matter what the format is or what the matchup is. And tempo is especially important when it's paired with circumstances that give you those other advantages simultaneously. In a slow, grindy game, the player that gets the tempo advantage from a card like Control Magic, or the resource advantage from a card like Control Magic, or the board impact a card like Control Magic has when you take their best threat away from them and add it to your own board is going to be at a tremendous advantage.
When cubes were slower and more midrange/control focussed than they are now, Control Magic was even a better card than it is now. Which is why, regardless of how slow and big the format is, these two cards will be very close to each other in terms of power, and they'll scale up and down in average expected value together.
The argument wasn't that Bribery could have a slight edge in your meta; the argument was that it's not Light Years Better than Control Magic by any stretch of the imagination ...no matter how the cube is constructed. Because of the way these cards powerlevels scale together, and because of the fundamental Magic concepts that are always at play giving merit to effects like Control Magic.
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!
Zetsu's Cube on CubeTutor.com
Zetsu's Ebay MTG Online Store
Zetsu's Poker Draft Method
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!
thats my cube