Both Endless One / Chimeric Mass are at its worst in aggro, the deck that plays the least lands to make the most out of its X casting cost. Chimeric Mass at least survives my opponent's sweepers, which are aggro's biggest hurdle.
Both Endless One / Chimeric Mass are at its worst in aggro, the deck that plays the least lands to make the most out of its X casting cost. Chimeric Mass at least survives my opponent's sweepers, which are aggro's biggest hurdle.
Part of our disagreement I think stems from our definition of aggro. 2 power 1 drop aggro (the kind with zero late game) is a niche flavor of aggro in my cube (and by niche I mean almost nonexistent). Aggro/midrange is more what aggressive decks look like here (more in line with limited style decks than constructed). And there you aren't gold fishing on T4 generally. You usually have to push through your final points of damage on T5/T6 and Endless One can help you do that in ways many 2,3,4's can't. That won't always be true of course (hellrider on an empty board is way better than Endless One even as a 5/5 95% of the time). But it will happen enough to where the extra value of scaling the threat makes it much better than some are suggesting.
Chimeric Mass in hard aggro is a really bad card IMO. You do not have 1 mana for upkeep for a generic threat, so it's unplayable early. And later in the game (especially in cubes running Titan's, et all), this guy is also worthless because he won't get through. It won't matter that your generic 4/4 can dodge Wrath of God if it has to fight through Grave Titan. For that matter, Endless One is in the same boat. The difference being you can still be aggressive with it early without committing 1 mana each turn. And it can randomly be cast for a big enough creature later that your opponent is forced into making an undesirable trade. If my opponent has a 5/5, I am in a much worse position with a 4/4 or less versus having my own 5/5 (or even 6/6). That scenario will come up and Endless One will feel like the best card in your deck when it does. Generic or not. Chimeric Mass has that advantage too, but only the late game scenario where 1 mana upkeep no longer matters. And that's why it is uncubable IMO (the scaling flexibility is not actually flexible because it's not playable early).
Ahadabans, supposing there were no limits on the number of copies you would be able to run, would you ever play a deck in which every creature was an Endless One?
I'm not invested one way or the other, but it seems like that's the logical conclusion to draw from your full-throated advocacy of the card.
I really think people are undervaluing the flexibility this card offers. I don't disagree this is bogus in constructed, but cube is a completely different animal (it's much closer to limited).
Everyone keeps comparing it to cards with the same CMC, but that is not how this is going to be played most of the time. You will have 4 lands in play and have no 4 drop in hand. In that scenario, you can play a 3 drop and not use all your mana, but if you are the beatdown that is suboptimal play most of the time. You can play two 2 drops (assuming you have two), but that overextends you potentially and are they impactful enough that late in the game? That is where a 4/4 will start to look really damn good. And this scenario just improves as the game goes on.
The problem here seems to be that your cube environment differs more from the traditional "play the strongest cards possible" formula than you and/or those argueing against you realize. (Also, "aggro" decks in your cube seem to be way closer to what aggro looks in regular limited, while most other cubes around here feature aggro decks closer to their constructed brethren.) The lower the power level is and the closer your cube environment resembles traditional limited, the better Endless One becomes. I believe that the card is fine in your cube, but that doesn't make it universally good for all cubes. In a high powered environment, this just won't make many decks, because most drafts will leave a player with two dozen stronger cards.
You are right that there will be situations were a player would be happy to have EO in hand and where it is just the right card to fill a gap in the curve or to be a beefy threat in a topdeck war. However, the same can be said about many other cool, but ultimately underpowered cards. Or just narrow effects. If I remember correctly, your cube runs a low number of artifacts and/or none of the really strong artifacts? Would you always maindeck a Disenchant? There will certainly be games where you would wish you had one in hand, but since your environment doesn't have all those strong artifacts, it isn't really necessary to maindeck it in place of a card that would always be good for your deck.
Everyone with a high powered environment is in a similar situation with EO. I realize that I compared a narrow card to a flexible card here. That seems like the direct opposite, but this comparison actually works for the point that I am trying to make. In both cases, the deck builder is reluctant to maindeck a card that seems subpar compared to the other options for the deck. And even if there will be situations where this particular card will shine, the general gameplan without those cards in with universally stronger cards will be superior. So, the deckbuilder will just weigh their chances and assume that those particular situations won't come up enough to justify including a card that is weaker than other available options.
...
@ everyon still comparing EO to Chimeric Mass: Please stop that. They might look similar, but they actually work quite different. And outside of one or two specific deck types, EO is just superior to CM, because it can attack and block without mana investment.
Ahadabans, supposing there were no limits on the number of copies you would be able to run, would you ever play a deck in which every creature was an Endless One?
I'm not invested one way or the other, but it seems like that's the logical conclusion to draw from your full-throated advocacy of the card.
Hmmm... that's an interesting question. Let's take it a bit more realistic though. Endless One is a horrible one drop. But it's serviceable after that point. So would I replace every single creature in my aggro/midrange deck (excluding 1 drops) with Endless One's? Maybe. If you built around it. You'd probably want to make it a ramp style deck (with a CA engine of some kind) since making huge Endless One's would be what the deck is about and you'd need a way to replace them as they die. It would be super consistent I think, at least from the standpoint of being able to get meaningful threats on the table at every point in the game. I doubt you 3-0, but I bet it competes.
The problem here seems to be that your cube environment differs more from the traditional "play the strongest cards possible" formula than you and/or those argueing against you realize.
That is definitely true.
You are right that there will be situations were a player would be happy to have EO in hand and where it is just the right card to fill a gap in the curve or to be a beefy threat in a topdeck war. However, the same can be said about many other cool, but ultimately underpowered cards. Or just narrow effects. If I remember correctly, your cube runs a low number of artifacts and/or none of the really strong artifacts? Would you always maindeck a Disenchant? There will certainly be games where you would wish you had one in hand, but since your environment doesn't have all those strong artifacts, it isn't really necessary to maindeck it in place of a card that would always be good for your deck.
I wouldn't maindeck a disenchant effect not attached to a creature or other effect for reasons you state. In fact, my cube doesn't run any of those cards anymore. But EO doesn't strike me as narrow. It strikes me as the exact opposite - it will be useful in almost every deck and every game. Because it can be what you need as the situation arises. Is it a windmill slam move? Very rarely. But it's also not this dead card you can't do anything impactful with.
Everyone with a high powered environment is in a similar situation with EO. I realize that I compared a narrow card to a flexible card here. That seems like the direct opposite, but this comparison actually works for the point that I am trying to make. In both cases, the deck builder is reluctant to maindeck a card that seems subpar compared to the other options for the deck. And even if there will be situations where this particular card will shine, the general gameplan without those cards in with universally stronger cards will be superior. So, the deckbuilder will just weigh their chances and assume that those particular situations won't come up enough to justify including a card that is weaker than other available options.
And I don't mean to keep going around and around on this point. I agree with you that most people are going to do exactly what you said - find something stronger and just run that instead. But I still hold that the flexibility in the actual game is being underrated. I realize my testing was limited and I was biased going in. Fair enough. I just know from all the thousands of games of magic I've played, you put cards in your deck that are powerful but many of them are only truly outstanding in certain circumstances. And many times you play a game and cards that should be ridiculously good are either very marginal or in some cases literally dead in your hand. Think of the best removal spell in existence. It's a dead card if you have no target right? What if my opponent can blank my removal with some hex proof effect? My doom blade might as well say "discard this card: get nothing". That is what I'm talking about.
The Kitchen Finks example above was perfect for what I'm describing. Finks is sweet. It's a top tier 3 drop by all measures. It's got 3 power. It comes back to life. It has an ETB effect. It's can be combo'd. It's retarded and makes Endless One (cast for 3 mana) look stupid. But against a creature on the other side of the table with 4 toughness, Finks isn't doing jack for you as an offensive threat (outside some combo shenanigans). It's effectively a dead (or greatly minimized card at the least). A 4/4 in that scenario is 10 times more useful. This is not an unusual scenario in Magic. Happens all the time. I know cube is heavily "good stuff" so suffers less than other formats as far as situationally good cards go, but it's still going to be true. Vendillion Clique is probably one of the best (if not the best) 3 drop ever printed. Against a 5/5 dragon and with no cards in hand, it is pretty damn worthless though. If you had 6 land, what would you rather have? Endless One or Vendilion Clique in that situation?
I'll happily concede that the more limited your cube meta the better Endless One. And that some guys are running such tight lists, that they might as well be playing Legacy. That's cool. I can dig it. If that describes 99% of the people posting here, I apologize for wasting everyone's time with this back and forth. But for those who have looser metas, I recommend you check this card out because IMO it is better than the theory craft says it is.
I just think this card is bad. At every CMC I would rather have any card in my cube than a generic dude. Sure there are times you could draw it and it would be good, but I dont want to take a spot in my deck for that. Id rather play a card that actually does something.
In that scenario, you can play a 3 drop and not use all your mana, but if you are the beatdown that is suboptimal play most of the time. You can play two 2 drops (assuming you have two), but that overextends you potentially and are they impactful enough that late in the game? That is where a 4/4 will start to look really damn good.
I'd rather play my other 3-drop and not use all my mana than play a 4 4/4. What aggro deck would rather cast that than a 3-drop that was good enough to make your final 40?
Quote from ahadabans »
Every creature based deck can take advantage of this card.
Or no creature deck can take advantage of this card, because it's not powerful enough to make the final 40 in anything, despite its flexibility.
This is the Blaze of creatures, and it's just not efficient enough anywhere on the curve to justify replacing a truly cube-worthy card from your deck to play it.
If you exclusively play formats that struggle to reach 23 playables (like Grid drafts, 90-card Winston and occasionally Sealed) than this might be good enough to occasionally make a final 40 out of desperation. But in a regular cube draft? I've never drafted a cube list, powered or unpowered, casual or competitive, that I would remove a card from among 23 playable cube cards to find room for this. I was pretty low on this card to begin with, but after playtesting ...it showed that it was even worse than I thought.
Quote from ahadabans »
Against a 5/5 dragon and with no cards in hand, it is pretty damn worthless though. If you had 6 land, what would you rather have? Endless One or Vendilion Clique in that situation?
This is all well and good, but it makes no difference during deckbuilding. I'm never leaving Vendillion Clique in my sideboard to play Endless One in case I need a worse card in some corner case situations. For the same reason I play Incinerate and not Blaze. Incinerate is pretty damn useless against a 4-toughness creature, but that doesn't mean that I'm cutting it from my final 40 to get a terribly inefficient spell in there just in case that situation arises.
There are going to be occasions where the scaleable body will be useful, but they're not going to outweigh the really high cost of cutting a good card from your deck to make room for it.
@ everyon still comparing EO to Chimeric Mass: Please stop that. They might look similar, but they actually work quite different. And outside of one or two specific deck types, EO is just superior to CM, because it can attack and block without mana investment.
Nope, they're competing for the exact same cube slot therefore they need to be compared. I consider Endless One and Chimeric Mass unplayable outside those "one or two specific deck types" because I'm always having trouble cutting down to 23 cards, not adding up to.
To get it out of my system, here's every commonly played card that Chimeric Mass is generally immune to. I'll go through my 540 unpowered cube as reference. It's quite an extensive list...
I think it's human nature to compare with similar things. It's behaviors like these that aren't forced, and are hard to stop/prevent. Endless One and Chimeric Mass are indeed similar.
Wizards have been doing these for years. They just switch up the dynamics to make formats (especially for limited) fresh. Not comparing them seems disingenuous IMO. What we do as cubists/cubers is like shopping at the market. You pick the freshest fish. Naturally we compare.
@ everyon still comparing EO to Chimeric Mass: Please stop that. They might look similar, but they actually work quite different. And outside of one or two specific deck types, EO is just superior to CM, because it can attack and block without mana investment.
Nope, they're competing for the exact same cube slot therefore they need to be compared. I consider Endless One and Chimeric Mass unplayable outside those "one or two specific deck types" because I'm always having trouble cutting down to 23 cards, not adding up to.
To get it out of my system, here's every commonly played card that Chimeric Mass is generally immune to. I'll go through my 540 unpowered cube as reference. It's quite an extensive list...
I'd say that one being a creature and the other being a non-creature permanent that turns into a creature makes them play quite differently. Also, one is cited as an option for a specific archetype (the artifact deck), while the other is not archetype specific and generally useable.
But fine, if we are comparing them, then Endless One is clearly better. It is an X/X for X, while Mass is an X/X for X where you need to pay 1 for every attack or block. In an artifact deck or some control deck with lots of mass removal, CM's advantages might make it better than EO, but in every other deck, EO is better. (Also, I don't really buy the mass removal thing. You can just play your finisher after the mass removal.) Even in a Wildfire deck, CM is not better than EO, because you can cast EO as a 5/5 the turn before Wildfire.
As for your list, the list of commonly played artifact destruction cards is also quite extensive and probably at least as long as your list. So, they cancel each other out. I can't comprehend why people keep bringing up "it dodges sorcery speed creature removal" as an advantage for CM while ignoring its clear vulnerability to another type of removal.
What I wanted to say above is this: It would be best if we just stop comparing these two cards. It's going nowhere. And it is ultimately pointless, because the majority of people making these comparisons have said that they would cube with neither of these cards.
I'd say that one being a creature and the other being a non-creature permanent that turns into a creature makes them play quite differently. Also, one is cited as an option for a specific archetype (the artifact deck), while the other is not archetype specific and generally useable.
No, they're both "generally useable" but one is also an option for a specific archetype. That's a big difference.
My list contains 42 spells that Chimeric Mass is immune to that Endless One is not. Sure, there are a lot of things that hit artifacts, but a good chunk of them are cards like Vindicate / Oblivion Ring that also hits creature types. Can you honestly say that your cube (or anybody else's) has 40+ artifact removal spells that doesn't also hit creature types?
As for your list, the list of commonly played artifact destruction cards is also quite extensive and probably at least as long as your list. So, they cancel each other out.
That's about 1/3 as much, so no, they don't really cancel each other out.
Endless One fills any holes in the curve for aggro/midrange decks that want to tap out in the early game that can also be a serious threat as a late game topdeck. In my limited testing, it's performed decently in that role. And I do think that there can be a real need for this. Options good beaters are thin at a lot of spots in many cubes, such as red 3-drops, black 2-drops and four drops, and green 2s and 3s.
Chimeric Mass's main selling point is its immunity to removal as a late game finisher, but the "upkeep" cost to attack or block makes it nearly useless for decks looking to beat down. Even as control finishers that are immune to sorcery speed removal go, manlands fill this role far better, and we have 3 new ones on the way. That means Chimeric Mass just isn't all that appealing to me as a control finisher, but I can see Endless One filling a real need in more aggressive decks.
So far, I've only gotten to play one match with Endless One, and I did really appreciate its versatility. I got to play it on Turn 2 as a Grizzly Bear to apply early pressure, as a 5-drop that was scary enough to eat my opponent's last removal spell, and I even played it as a 1/1 to Skullclamp away when I had exactly 2 left for the turn. No single other card could have done all of that as efficiently. Full disclosure, I was playing sealed deck, and the main reason I was so happy to include Endless One is that I only had one other 2-drop in what were otherwise the strongest colors in my pool. I still don't have a handle on how highly I or anyone else I play with would take it in a draft, but that's part of why I want to keep testing it.
This discussion is really going nowhere, but it is a discussion forum so what can we expect?
For me Chimeric Mass is a lot more cubebable. A couple of years ago, we played it for a while and ended up cutting it even when our cube was alot bigger(550-600?). So nowadays you would need a big cube for it to make the cut.
The reason I like Chimeric Mass better is that it is a role player. It works well in control builds (Wildfire, WU Control, RU control, RW Control) as it survives your own mass removal. In all other decks it is mediocre. It would be almost playable in ramp, but far far from cube worthy.
Endless One is just to mediocre for me in every mode. Sure it is versatile, but to me its versatility is not worth its crapiness (to me). that being said, I can follow Ahadebans sometimes a 2/2 for 2 is just fine, often a 4/4 for four can be just fine. Sure it should have trample or something, but who cares if you are really swarming or if your opponent has no creatures? All true, but our decks are too streamlined to include a versatile filler card like this.
I don't get the versatility people are talking about here. At the end of the day, this is just a mediocre beatstick. Period. The end. Sure you can play it at multiple sizes, but it will ultimately be an inefficient dude that dies to every piece of hard removal in the cube. This isn't like a charm where you get the choice of creatures, removal, card draw, pump, etc.
Also, Chimeric Mass sucks pretty badly. Who is that desperate for colorless creatures in this day and age? This is the era of Hangarback Walker and Phyrexian mana guys. We have cards with the exact same body efficiency as Endless One (Wildcall, Grenzo) and pretty massive upsides. Mana sinks have been getting more and more prolific. Aggro decks have stopped playing curve filler and now get to play cards that are actually good.
I like to think of every card in the cube as a tool for building certain kinds of decks. This card is a tool for building bad decks with no synergy or plan.
I have not tested Endless One in my cube, but I am quite sure he would be lackluster. I have played both with and against him in both BFZ sealed and draft. While he definitly is good in that format, at no point did I feel I was doing something very unfair or efficient. I often reevalute some cards after crushing with them in limited and seeing how they play, but playing with Endless One just reaffirms my initial suspisions.
However, I think he fits _very_ nicely into a "begginer" cube. I see some people build lists specially for newer players where they stick to cards with smaller text boxes and evergreen mechanics. In that context I think Endless One is absoloutely perfect, the design is very clean, it is easy to understand that he `goes in every deck' and I think it helps newer player really think about what the curve means for a deck.
Overall a cool limited card due to it's versatility, but not powerful enough for a regular cube, be it powered or unpowered.
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Let me attempt to shed a different light on this discussion; I VERY regularly cube with only two people. Glimpse, grid, and winston. In this environment, if your deck is even remotely aggressive, this card seems very valuable to have. Much of the time in a 2 player draft, it's really hard to set up a nice aggro curve, and sometimes when you do it's color intensive - for example, it's extremely hard to pull off mono-red or mono-white in a 2 player draft environment so usually you're in two colors. In, say, a boros aggro deck, your two-drop slot might have like, Kargan Dragonlord and Eight and a Half Tails or something along those lines, which means if your opening hand has T1 Goblin Guide and one of those white cards, you aren't doing anything on turn 2, but i'm happy to slam Endless One as a 2/2 in that situation. Same thing applies to being able to drop a turn 1 Isamaru and not getting stranded with the Dragonlord or Eidolon with no turn 2 play. Or if you DO have a decent early curve, having a 4/4 on turn 4 is a huge difference in pressure if you didnt naturally draw one of your 4 drops. What I like about this is that in aggro, you DON'T want more than 2-3 four-drops, and it's usually hard to get the exact ones you want in 2-player (usually Hellrider/Koth). And yes, obviously a vanilla 4/4 is lame compared to a Koth or Hellrider, but Koth or Hellrider don't also do double duty as fine aggro 2 and 3 drops, do they?
That's why I don't think it's fair to be comparing Endless one to any of its on-curve creature options, because you simply WONT ALWAYS HAVE THOSE on curve, whereas this card is a fine one to have in my opener or to topdeck at most stages of the game.
In this environment, if your deck is even remotely aggressive, this card seems very valuable to have.
If you're playing it in aggressive decks, you're going to be much better off with Chimeric Mass, because the "drawback" of not being as good on defense doesn't matter, and dodging sorcery removal and sweepers is going to be even more important.
Quote from ELPsteel »
And yes, obviously a vanilla 4/4 is lame compared to a Koth or Hellrider, but Koth or Hellrider don't also do double duty as fine aggro 2 and 3 drops, do they?
This concept as already been discussed in detail multiple times in this thread.
Even if I can occasionally play this as a vanilla 4/4 for 4, I'd still rather put any cubeable on-color 2-drop into my aggro deck than this card.
That's why I don't think it's fair to be comparing Endless one to any of its on-curve creature options, because you simply WONT ALWAYS HAVE THOSE on curve, whereas this card is a fine one to have in my opener or to topdeck at most stages of the game.
Yeah, that has been my main argument. While it's not an exact correlation, I think you can compare this somewhat to model spells. Take Izzet Charm as an example. Each thing it does is terrible value on it's own. UR for shock is ROFL bad. UR for a single use Faithless Looting is equally terrible. And same UR spell pierce. Why then is the card playable? Because it can do any one of those things and be whatever you need it to be depending on the in game circumstances.
I think a lot of people arguing against it have not actually tried it in their cube and so they are undervaluing the flexibilty aspect of the card. With that said, some groups may be running super tight lists where they are drafting essentially constructed level decks, in which case the flexibility of Endless One probably doesn't outweigh how far below curve it is in all its modes.
The comparison to Izzet Charm doesn't work for several reasons. Mainly, the only way a spell's flexibility is going to outweigh its powerlevel is the number of roles it can play. Charm is a counterspell, and a removal spell, and it digs for outs. So even if none of the modes are cost-effective, one of them will be applicable. With Endless One, all it ever is is a creature, and it's never good. It's never even acceptable. When Izzet Charm kills a creature for 2 mana, it's a standard play. Whenever it counters a spell for 2 mana, it's a standard play. Both of those plays are comparable in terms of mana efficiency to other cards in the cube. But Endless One is never a standard play in comparison to other cube-worthy creatures, regardless of where it's played on curve.
Edit: But man, replying to this thread felt like a waste of time like halfway through this post, and it probably is. We played it, and it was even more terrible than I imagined it would be. Outside of being a desperation 23rd card for a sealed pool gone wrong, this doesn't have a place in cubes that play powerful cards in them.
Belated testing results. This card has been seriously fantastic for us and a very high pick ever since I slammed it into my cube last fall. One guy in my group has gone on record saying he picked this ABOVE Jitte, P1P1. If you need a 2/2 on curve you have it. If you need a 3/3 on curve you have it. If you need a 5/5 on curve you have it. And seriously, 7 mana for a 7/7 that can profitably block Prime Time in combat is not even close to a bad deal. This card deserves more love.
My High Octane Unpowered Cube on CubeCobra
Part of our disagreement I think stems from our definition of aggro. 2 power 1 drop aggro (the kind with zero late game) is a niche flavor of aggro in my cube (and by niche I mean almost nonexistent). Aggro/midrange is more what aggressive decks look like here (more in line with limited style decks than constructed). And there you aren't gold fishing on T4 generally. You usually have to push through your final points of damage on T5/T6 and Endless One can help you do that in ways many 2,3,4's can't. That won't always be true of course (hellrider on an empty board is way better than Endless One even as a 5/5 95% of the time). But it will happen enough to where the extra value of scaling the threat makes it much better than some are suggesting.
Chimeric Mass in hard aggro is a really bad card IMO. You do not have 1 mana for upkeep for a generic threat, so it's unplayable early. And later in the game (especially in cubes running Titan's, et all), this guy is also worthless because he won't get through. It won't matter that your generic 4/4 can dodge Wrath of God if it has to fight through Grave Titan. For that matter, Endless One is in the same boat. The difference being you can still be aggressive with it early without committing 1 mana each turn. And it can randomly be cast for a big enough creature later that your opponent is forced into making an undesirable trade. If my opponent has a 5/5, I am in a much worse position with a 4/4 or less versus having my own 5/5 (or even 6/6). That scenario will come up and Endless One will feel like the best card in your deck when it does. Generic or not. Chimeric Mass has that advantage too, but only the late game scenario where 1 mana upkeep no longer matters. And that's why it is uncubable IMO (the scaling flexibility is not actually flexible because it's not playable early).
http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/modular-cube-5-colors.800/
Retro combo cube thread
http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/retro-combo-cube.1454/
I'm not invested one way or the other, but it seems like that's the logical conclusion to draw from your full-throated advocacy of the card.
My Cube on Cube Tutor
You are right that there will be situations were a player would be happy to have EO in hand and where it is just the right card to fill a gap in the curve or to be a beefy threat in a topdeck war. However, the same can be said about many other cool, but ultimately underpowered cards. Or just narrow effects. If I remember correctly, your cube runs a low number of artifacts and/or none of the really strong artifacts? Would you always maindeck a Disenchant? There will certainly be games where you would wish you had one in hand, but since your environment doesn't have all those strong artifacts, it isn't really necessary to maindeck it in place of a card that would always be good for your deck.
Everyone with a high powered environment is in a similar situation with EO. I realize that I compared a narrow card to a flexible card here. That seems like the direct opposite, but this comparison actually works for the point that I am trying to make. In both cases, the deck builder is reluctant to maindeck a card that seems subpar compared to the other options for the deck. And even if there will be situations where this particular card will shine, the general gameplan without those cards in with universally stronger cards will be superior. So, the deckbuilder will just weigh their chances and assume that those particular situations won't come up enough to justify including a card that is weaker than other available options.
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@ everyon still comparing EO to Chimeric Mass: Please stop that. They might look similar, but they actually work quite different. And outside of one or two specific deck types, EO is just superior to CM, because it can attack and block without mana investment.
Uril, the Miststalker RGW -- Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre C -- Vhati il-Dal BG -- Jor Kadeen, the Prevailer RW -- Animar, Soul of Elements URG
Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker R -- Maga, Traitor to Mortals B -- Ghave, Guru of Spores BGW -- Sliver Hivelord WUBRG
Hmmm... that's an interesting question. Let's take it a bit more realistic though. Endless One is a horrible one drop. But it's serviceable after that point. So would I replace every single creature in my aggro/midrange deck (excluding 1 drops) with Endless One's? Maybe. If you built around it. You'd probably want to make it a ramp style deck (with a CA engine of some kind) since making huge Endless One's would be what the deck is about and you'd need a way to replace them as they die. It would be super consistent I think, at least from the standpoint of being able to get meaningful threats on the table at every point in the game. I doubt you 3-0, but I bet it competes.
http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/modular-cube-5-colors.800/
Retro combo cube thread
http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/retro-combo-cube.1454/
That is definitely true.
I wouldn't maindeck a disenchant effect not attached to a creature or other effect for reasons you state. In fact, my cube doesn't run any of those cards anymore. But EO doesn't strike me as narrow. It strikes me as the exact opposite - it will be useful in almost every deck and every game. Because it can be what you need as the situation arises. Is it a windmill slam move? Very rarely. But it's also not this dead card you can't do anything impactful with.
And I don't mean to keep going around and around on this point. I agree with you that most people are going to do exactly what you said - find something stronger and just run that instead. But I still hold that the flexibility in the actual game is being underrated. I realize my testing was limited and I was biased going in. Fair enough. I just know from all the thousands of games of magic I've played, you put cards in your deck that are powerful but many of them are only truly outstanding in certain circumstances. And many times you play a game and cards that should be ridiculously good are either very marginal or in some cases literally dead in your hand. Think of the best removal spell in existence. It's a dead card if you have no target right? What if my opponent can blank my removal with some hex proof effect? My doom blade might as well say "discard this card: get nothing". That is what I'm talking about.
The Kitchen Finks example above was perfect for what I'm describing. Finks is sweet. It's a top tier 3 drop by all measures. It's got 3 power. It comes back to life. It has an ETB effect. It's can be combo'd. It's retarded and makes Endless One (cast for 3 mana) look stupid. But against a creature on the other side of the table with 4 toughness, Finks isn't doing jack for you as an offensive threat (outside some combo shenanigans). It's effectively a dead (or greatly minimized card at the least). A 4/4 in that scenario is 10 times more useful. This is not an unusual scenario in Magic. Happens all the time. I know cube is heavily "good stuff" so suffers less than other formats as far as situationally good cards go, but it's still going to be true. Vendillion Clique is probably one of the best (if not the best) 3 drop ever printed. Against a 5/5 dragon and with no cards in hand, it is pretty damn worthless though. If you had 6 land, what would you rather have? Endless One or Vendilion Clique in that situation?
I'll happily concede that the more limited your cube meta the better Endless One. And that some guys are running such tight lists, that they might as well be playing Legacy. That's cool. I can dig it. If that describes 99% of the people posting here, I apologize for wasting everyone's time with this back and forth. But for those who have looser metas, I recommend you check this card out because IMO it is better than the theory craft says it is.
http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/modular-cube-5-colors.800/
Retro combo cube thread
http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/retro-combo-cube.1454/
https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/3pq
I'd rather play my other 3-drop and not use all my mana than play a 4 4/4. What aggro deck would rather cast that than a 3-drop that was good enough to make your final 40?
Or no creature deck can take advantage of this card, because it's not powerful enough to make the final 40 in anything, despite its flexibility.
This is the Blaze of creatures, and it's just not efficient enough anywhere on the curve to justify replacing a truly cube-worthy card from your deck to play it.
If you exclusively play formats that struggle to reach 23 playables (like Grid drafts, 90-card Winston and occasionally Sealed) than this might be good enough to occasionally make a final 40 out of desperation. But in a regular cube draft? I've never drafted a cube list, powered or unpowered, casual or competitive, that I would remove a card from among 23 playable cube cards to find room for this. I was pretty low on this card to begin with, but after playtesting ...it showed that it was even worse than I thought.
This is all well and good, but it makes no difference during deckbuilding. I'm never leaving Vendillion Clique in my sideboard to play Endless One in case I need a worse card in some corner case situations. For the same reason I play Incinerate and not Blaze. Incinerate is pretty damn useless against a 4-toughness creature, but that doesn't mean that I'm cutting it from my final 40 to get a terribly inefficient spell in there just in case that situation arises.
There are going to be occasions where the scaleable body will be useful, but they're not going to outweigh the really high cost of cutting a good card from your deck to make room for it.
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Nope, they're competing for the exact same cube slot therefore they need to be compared. I consider Endless One and Chimeric Mass unplayable outside those "one or two specific deck types" because I'm always having trouble cutting down to 23 cards, not adding up to.
To get it out of my system, here's every commonly played card that Chimeric Mass is generally immune to. I'll go through my 540 unpowered cube as reference. It's quite an extensive list...
WHITE
- Balance
- Wrath of God
- Day of Judgment
- Gideon Jura
BLUE
- Man-o'-War
- Jace, the Mind Sculptor
- Sower of Temptation
- Control Magic
- Treachery
BLACK
- Nekrataal
- Skinrender
- Shriekmaw
- Chainer's Edict
- Go for the Throat
- Ruinous Path
- Liliana of the Veil
- Toxic Deluge
- Consuming Vapors
- Damnation
- Languish
- Living Death
- Profane Command
RED
- Flametongue Kavu
- Inferno Titan
- Mizzium Mortars
- Arc Lightning / Flames of the Firebrand
- Exquisite Firecraft
- Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker
- Wildfire / Burning of Xinye
- Earthquake / Rolling Earthquake
- Bonfire of the Damned
GREEN
- Okay, green just pwns Chimeric Mass, it's much more susceptible to removal than it is resilient.
MULTICOLOR
- Dragonlord Atarka
- Dragonlord Silumgar
- Dreadbore
- the Lightning Helix part of Ajani Vengeant
- Ral Zarek
- Sarkhan Vol
- Supreme Verdict
COLORLESS
Uhh... Can't be bolted by Ugin, the Spirit Dragon???
My High Octane Unpowered Cube on CubeCobra
Wizards have been doing these for years. They just switch up the dynamics to make formats (especially for limited) fresh. Not comparing them seems disingenuous IMO. What we do as cubists/cubers is like shopping at the market. You pick the freshest fish. Naturally we compare.
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
But fine, if we are comparing them, then Endless One is clearly better. It is an X/X for X, while Mass is an X/X for X where you need to pay 1 for every attack or block. In an artifact deck or some control deck with lots of mass removal, CM's advantages might make it better than EO, but in every other deck, EO is better. (Also, I don't really buy the mass removal thing. You can just play your finisher after the mass removal.) Even in a Wildfire deck, CM is not better than EO, because you can cast EO as a 5/5 the turn before Wildfire.
As for your list, the list of commonly played artifact destruction cards is also quite extensive and probably at least as long as your list. So, they cancel each other out. I can't comprehend why people keep bringing up "it dodges sorcery speed creature removal" as an advantage for CM while ignoring its clear vulnerability to another type of removal.
What I wanted to say above is this: It would be best if we just stop comparing these two cards. It's going nowhere. And it is ultimately pointless, because the majority of people making these comparisons have said that they would cube with neither of these cards.
Uril, the Miststalker RGW -- Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre C -- Vhati il-Dal BG -- Jor Kadeen, the Prevailer RW -- Animar, Soul of Elements URG
Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker R -- Maga, Traitor to Mortals B -- Ghave, Guru of Spores BGW -- Sliver Hivelord WUBRG
No, they're both "generally useable" but one is also an option for a specific archetype. That's a big difference.
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No, it's not even close. Not even close by half.
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Disenchant
Manic Vandal
Smash to Smithereens
Reclamation Sage
Uktabi Orangutan
Wickerbough Elder
Acidic Slime
Kolaghan's Command
Sundering Growth
Trygon Predator
Dack Fayden
Pithing Needle
Phyrexian Revoker
That's about 1/3 as much, so no, they don't really cancel each other out.
Endless One fills any holes in the curve for aggro/midrange decks that want to tap out in the early game that can also be a serious threat as a late game topdeck. In my limited testing, it's performed decently in that role. And I do think that there can be a real need for this. Options good beaters are thin at a lot of spots in many cubes, such as red 3-drops, black 2-drops and four drops, and green 2s and 3s.
Chimeric Mass's main selling point is its immunity to removal as a late game finisher, but the "upkeep" cost to attack or block makes it nearly useless for decks looking to beat down. Even as control finishers that are immune to sorcery speed removal go, manlands fill this role far better, and we have 3 new ones on the way. That means Chimeric Mass just isn't all that appealing to me as a control finisher, but I can see Endless One filling a real need in more aggressive decks.
So far, I've only gotten to play one match with Endless One, and I did really appreciate its versatility. I got to play it on Turn 2 as a Grizzly Bear to apply early pressure, as a 5-drop that was scary enough to eat my opponent's last removal spell, and I even played it as a 1/1 to Skullclamp away when I had exactly 2 left for the turn. No single other card could have done all of that as efficiently. Full disclosure, I was playing sealed deck, and the main reason I was so happy to include Endless One is that I only had one other 2-drop in what were otherwise the strongest colors in my pool. I still don't have a handle on how highly I or anyone else I play with would take it in a draft, but that's part of why I want to keep testing it.
450 card Peasant cube thread. Draft it here.
For me Chimeric Mass is a lot more cubebable. A couple of years ago, we played it for a while and ended up cutting it even when our cube was alot bigger(550-600?). So nowadays you would need a big cube for it to make the cut.
The reason I like Chimeric Mass better is that it is a role player. It works well in control builds (Wildfire, WU Control, RU control, RW Control) as it survives your own mass removal. In all other decks it is mediocre. It would be almost playable in ramp, but far far from cube worthy.
Endless One is just to mediocre for me in every mode. Sure it is versatile, but to me its versatility is not worth its crapiness (to me). that being said, I can follow Ahadebans sometimes a 2/2 for 2 is just fine, often a 4/4 for four can be just fine. Sure it should have trample or something, but who cares if you are really swarming or if your opponent has no creatures? All true, but our decks are too streamlined to include a versatile filler card like this.
I feel compelled to repeat everything I hear
Also, Chimeric Mass sucks pretty badly. Who is that desperate for colorless creatures in this day and age? This is the era of Hangarback Walker and Phyrexian mana guys. We have cards with the exact same body efficiency as Endless One (Wildcall, Grenzo) and pretty massive upsides. Mana sinks have been getting more and more prolific. Aggro decks have stopped playing curve filler and now get to play cards that are actually good.
I like to think of every card in the cube as a tool for building certain kinds of decks. This card is a tool for building bad decks with no synergy or plan.
Cubetutor Link
However, I think he fits _very_ nicely into a "begginer" cube. I see some people build lists specially for newer players where they stick to cards with smaller text boxes and evergreen mechanics. In that context I think Endless One is absoloutely perfect, the design is very clean, it is easy to understand that he `goes in every deck' and I think it helps newer player really think about what the curve means for a deck.
Overall a cool limited card due to it's versatility, but not powerful enough for a regular cube, be it powered or unpowered.
That's why I don't think it's fair to be comparing Endless one to any of its on-curve creature options, because you simply WONT ALWAYS HAVE THOSE on curve, whereas this card is a fine one to have in my opener or to topdeck at most stages of the game.
If you're playing it in aggressive decks, you're going to be much better off with Chimeric Mass, because the "drawback" of not being as good on defense doesn't matter, and dodging sorcery removal and sweepers is going to be even more important.
This concept as already been discussed in detail multiple times in this thread.
Even if I can occasionally play this as a vanilla 4/4 for 4, I'd still rather put any cubeable on-color 2-drop into my aggro deck than this card.
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Yeah, that has been my main argument. While it's not an exact correlation, I think you can compare this somewhat to model spells. Take Izzet Charm as an example. Each thing it does is terrible value on it's own. UR for shock is ROFL bad. UR for a single use Faithless Looting is equally terrible. And same UR spell pierce. Why then is the card playable? Because it can do any one of those things and be whatever you need it to be depending on the in game circumstances.
I think a lot of people arguing against it have not actually tried it in their cube and so they are undervaluing the flexibilty aspect of the card. With that said, some groups may be running super tight lists where they are drafting essentially constructed level decks, in which case the flexibility of Endless One probably doesn't outweigh how far below curve it is in all its modes.
http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/modular-cube-5-colors.800/
Retro combo cube thread
http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/retro-combo-cube.1454/
Edit: But man, replying to this thread felt like a waste of time like halfway through this post, and it probably is. We played it, and it was even more terrible than I imagined it would be. Outside of being a desperation 23rd card for a sealed pool gone wrong, this doesn't have a place in cubes that play powerful cards in them.
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!
You too ahadabans.
Have I ever told all you regulars how much I love you?
Endless One. Forever.