I think Thassa is able to get there as a blink support piece due to the 3 additional upsides it carries, chiefly the indestructibility. Teleportation Circle breaks records in efficiency for white recurrable blink, but it still “does nothing”.
Gideon’s just plain good. Profoundly boring, but considerably effective.
Divest > Despise > Check for Traps > Agonizing Remorse
Divest vs Despise really depends on the count of artifacts vs planeswalkers, but even unpowered you probably have more non-creature artifacts than planeswalkers.
Frost Titan > Ethereal Forager > Agent of Treachery
As someone that ran a black discard package, here is my long answer:
The best 1 CMC black discard that isn't commonly played outside of the 3 is Blackmail - its a lot better than you think. For 1 CMC, I primarily stuck with Divest in powered environments as creature ETB have been a problem + artifact removal has been harder to come by. It was a pretty good card in alot of fair decks.
2 CMC black discard (unconditional) are generally good filler cards - they're literally playable in every single archetype - Combo, control etc. (even good sideboard pickups for aggressive decks) and they're really good for supporting slower cards like Experimental Frenzy, Season's Past, Bedlam Reveler, Kroxa, Titan of Death's Hunger if your cube wants to go in that direction.
My cube needed to support a mix between grid drafting, 4 player drafting and 8 player draft + my environment was combo heavy, which is why I opted to add a heavier 2 mana discard package. They were just good answers overall in a format that often lacked good answers and were good playables during drafts were a much smaller draft pool was opened.
I personally wouldn't play conditional black discard unless your archetype needs the graveyard for Delve, Escape etc. or if you have slower cards to recoup the card disadvantage.
But in general,
If I had to pick, I would probably choose the 2 mana discard spells - but this depends more on your cube's goals.
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I'm actively maintaining a comprehensive article to help explain to new cube players how some complex vintage level cards work in a cube environment. Vintage Cube Cards Explained
I put Lair of the Hydra first and say the other two depend on the rest of your cube, but I don't use either anymore because I feel they are veeery slow.
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!
Gideon’s just plain good. Profoundly boring, but considerably effective.
Gideon > Teleportation Circle.
This is still the best place for high-power-level cube chat & debate.
Here's to many more years at MTGS *clink*
(since a believe Divest > Despise in powered environments)
2 - Ethereal Forager vs Frost Titan vs Agent of Treachery ? What order ?
[card]
3 - Skinrender vs Bone Shredder ?
2 - Frost titan > Forager > Agent
3 - Skinrender > Bone Shredder
[180 classic cube]
Divest vs Despise really depends on the count of artifacts vs planeswalkers, but even unpowered you probably have more non-creature artifacts than planeswalkers.
Frost Titan > Ethereal Forager > Agent of Treachery
Skinrender > Boneshreder
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Cheers,
rant
My Cube
CubeCobra: https://cubecobra.com/cube/overview/5f5d0310ed602310515d4c32
Cube Tutor: http://cubetutor.com/viewcube/1963
As someone that ran a black discard package, here is my long answer:
The best 1 CMC black discard that isn't commonly played outside of the 3 is Blackmail - its a lot better than you think. For 1 CMC, I primarily stuck with Divest in powered environments as creature ETB have been a problem + artifact removal has been harder to come by. It was a pretty good card in alot of fair decks.
2 CMC black discard (unconditional) are generally good filler cards - they're literally playable in every single archetype - Combo, control etc. (even good sideboard pickups for aggressive decks) and they're really good for supporting slower cards like Experimental Frenzy, Season's Past, Bedlam Reveler, Kroxa, Titan of Death's Hunger if your cube wants to go in that direction.
My cube needed to support a mix between grid drafting, 4 player drafting and 8 player draft + my environment was combo heavy, which is why I opted to add a heavier 2 mana discard package. They were just good answers overall in a format that often lacked good answers and were good playables during drafts were a much smaller draft pool was opened.
I personally wouldn't play conditional black discard unless your archetype needs the graveyard for Delve, Escape etc. or if you have slower cards to recoup the card disadvantage.
But in general,
If I had to pick, I would probably choose the 2 mana discard spells - but this depends more on your cube's goals.
Vintage Cube Cards Explained
Here are some other articles I've written about fine tuning your cube:
1. Minimum Archetype Support
2. Improving Green Archetypes
3. Improving White Archetypes
4. Matchup Analysis
5. Cube Combos (Work in Progress)
Draft my Cube - https://cubecobra.com/cube/overview/d8i
Temporal isolation vs Portable hole
https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/5f79d238debf310362d43d47
Portable Hole
[180 classic cube]
Den of the Bug Bear >>> Castle Embereth
- Den is much more versatile than Castle Embereth, which only really shines in aggro.
Portable Hole >>> Temporal Isolation
- Assuming you have a good amount of targets for Portable Hole, it's a lot better than most 2-cmc white creature removal spells IMO.
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Den by a mile.
Hole by two miles.
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!
Cubecobra
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Magic Cardmarket Profile
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DCI Rules Advisor
Cheers,
rant
My Cube
CubeCobra: https://cubecobra.com/cube/overview/5f5d0310ed602310515d4c32
Cube Tutor: http://cubetutor.com/viewcube/1963
I feel compelled to repeat everything I hear
Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite vs Iona, Shield of Emeria
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Elesh Norn >> Iona
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!
Cheers,
rant
My Cube
CubeCobra: https://cubecobra.com/cube/overview/5f5d0310ed602310515d4c32
Cube Tutor: http://cubetutor.com/viewcube/1963
Smokestack vs Mindslaver?
If you're playing some number of those cards and like stax games go smokestack otherwise mindslaver.
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!
e: Going to plan to cut Satyr since the other cards have a larger variety of decks they can fit into.
[180 classic cube]
As far as a pure aggro threat, I like Dragon's Rage Channeler the least of these.
My High Octane Unpowered Cube on CubeCobra