Definite include. My only concern is that I don't run green aggro but some of my drafters don't get that and try to force it anyway? So I worry that this card will end up being a bit of a trap.
I see bant aggro appear around collected company with green sun zenith , Armageddon, strong blue broken cards etc. That deck likes noble hierarch and maybe joraga.
Hexdrinker is perfect here. Mana sink, must kill, fetchable etc
I like this card, but am lower on it than most. I don't support Green Aggro, but there are assertive G decks in my cube (usually a fires strategy).
I have a rule where cards that are suuuper hard to interact with have to require some hoops (e.g. No thrunn, no TNN, but the cheatty cards are fine. Carnage Tyrant is about the line I want to draw).
So I will probably try this out as an efficient midrange card, but I'm not super excited about it.
I like this card, but am lower on it than most. I don't support Green Aggro, but there are assertive G decks in my cube (usually a fires strategy).
I have a rule where cards that are suuuper hard to interact with have to require some hoops (e.g. No thrunn, no TNN, but the cheatty cards are fine. Carnage Tyrant is about the line I want to draw).
So I will probably try this out as an efficient midrange card, but I'm not super excited about it.
You can still kill him in response to the level up, that can only be done at sorcery speed. In that time window, he dies to a ping. If you don't have an instant speed answer, a sorcery speed one will catch the snake unless the entire 8G is spent in a single turn.
I’ve been patiently waiting for more green 1-drops like Kessig Prowler to draw more people into green aggro. I think this card is a fantastic complement to Kessig and would hope to find a cut elsewhere.
I’ve been patiently waiting for more green 1-drops like Kessig Prowler to draw more people into green aggro. I think this card is a fantastic complement to Kessig and would hope to find a cut elsewhere.
I guess you’re right. Green aggro is scary.. between this, Kessig Prowler, Experiment one and Pelt Collector,
They can easily grow into midrange sized creatures. Seems good for green’s aggro theme.
In bigger cubes (I'm at 720 for instance) trying to support aggro in green can still be a challenge compared to white, black, or red, which all seem to have a myriad of 1cmc creature options nowadays, so Hexdrinker will be much appreciated.
The most obvious cut is a 1cc card, but even something like Thrun, the Last Troll is a fair cut.
That being said, I still feel that green aggro is not as good as ramp, and at 360 powered I don't have the space to fully support green aggro when green's relative strength is clearly ramp, which no other color can do. Conversely, red and white, and maybe even black, do aggro better than green.
-All other colors can ramp thanks to powerful mana rocks in Cube.
-You can get the best of both worlds by pairing green with a Mardu wedge aggro color - you get to run insane creatures like this guy plus the upsides of the other colors (reach, disruption, recursion, etc).
Got to test this today in a Green White Aggro Deck.
I played around 18 games with the deck.
Hexdrinker was easily the best card in the deck. Often the best line was to simple play it, and level it as fast as possible, and watch the opponent die. Dropping this on an already developed board and directly leveling it to level 3 was also highly relevant. Knowing which removal spells your opponent plays obviously makes the decision when to level a lot easier.
The reaction of my playgroup was mostly "damn is this pushed", if you ever had to play against TNN + any clone you can imagine how such a game plays out.
I can easily see first picking this card and being pulled into green by it.
(For reference I play a 405 card cube that plays anything powerful besides: AB Moxen, Black Lotus, Sol Ring, Mana Crypt, Time Walk and Ancestral Recall)
Got to test this today in a Green White Aggro Deck.
I played around 18 games with the deck.
Hexdrinker was easily the best card in the deck. Often the best line was to simple play it, and level it as fast as possible, and watch the opponent die. Dropping this on an already developed board and directly leveling it to level 3 was also highly relevant. Knowing which removal spells your opponent plays obviously makes the decision when to level a lot easier.
The reaction of my playgroup was mostly "damn is this pushed", if you ever had to play against TNN + any clone you can imagine how such a game plays out.
I can easily see first picking this card and being pulled into green by it.
(For reference I play a 405 card cube that plays anything powerful besides: AB Moxen, Black Lotus, Sol Ring, Mana Crypt, Time Walk and Ancestral Recall)
I think it’s an autoinclude at every size regardless of if you run green aggro, but dang this review is hyping me up even more.
This is my leading candidate for best non-land card in the set.
To simplify my argument, It's a must kill one drop that is great on turn 1 and on turn 100.
It doesn't become must kill until you sink a lot of mana into it, but i'd guess it's very easy to do so organically without messing up your curve.
A card like figure of destiny can set you back significant tempo if they kill it in response to a 3-6 mana activation.. It also requires 6 lands to ultimate... Hexdrinker suffers from neither of those set backs and requires zero mana before it's already a clock.
This is the kind of pushed card I don't like. It doesn't seem very fun to me. My cube is what it is by avoiding cards like this. But for a traditional cube, this is everything you want. I'm happy to see level up again anyway.
Definite include. My only concern is that I don't run green aggro but some of my drafters don't get that and try to force it anyway? So I worry that this card will end up being a bit of a trap.
I'm just curious, what's make your drafters to be incline to force green agressive decks at the moment if you don't have the support for it?
For us, the decision can be based on what's open. If someone's drafting a black sacrifice package and mono-red is being scooped up, green can serve as a good secondary color for hitting critical mass of aggro creatures for your deck. It also provides oversized bodies for the cost, like 'Goyf and friends, to provide some bigger bodies in the matchup against midrange where most nongreen aggro bodies can become woefully outclassed very quickly. Several of the utility creatures are still good in aggro, as getting access to Naturalizes and Shatters without having to play non-threat cards can be valuable. There's also great multicolor support; cards like Bloodbraid Elf and Edric are pretty beastly cards, but often don't fit the strategy unless your deck has an aggressive slant. Rancor is good extra pressure without overcommitting to the board, Plow Under is a monstrous top-end spell, and cards like Lotus Cobra can be unique to the shell; providing a ramp effect without conceding pressure. Several of the green aggressive bodies scale exceptionally well as the game progresses too. Nacatl, E1 and Pelty-boi are often 3/3 attacking bodies, as is Warden of the First Tree. Both Hexdrinker and Kessig Prowler can convert themselves into mid/late-game threats that compete with larger board presences from the opponent. By supporting the aggro 2-power 1-drops that scale, good mid-costed bodies and the other green cards you want to play anyways, green serves as a very solid secondary color to back-up aggro plans with, since the oversized bodies help to compete in matchups aggro can often struggle with. Not to mention that Loam and Excavator (and now Wren and Six) can give you repeatable fetches and strip mines to give you card advantage engines and additional disruption that aggro can often find themselves wanting for. Other random green dudes like Tireless Tracker can grow out of hand, and green can give both size and card advantage to decks that often have neither, and it can do it without sacrificing pressure or changing the "turn creatures sideways" gameplan that aggro wants to adhere to. I've enjoyed the redundancy and utility that green provides to aggro decks, and I look forward to watching Hexdrinker slot perfectly into those decks and provide more redundancy for all the advantages green already leverages for aggro.
This is the best sales pitch for green aggro I've seen yet. Well said! I run pretty much all the pieces and enjoy drafting the deck myself. My group, on the other hand, never drafted Jungle Lion and whined about how "feel bad" Plow Under was so I cut it years ago. With the addition of Hex Drinker I'll be cutting Jungle Lion and finding a way to add back Plow Under. My playgroup has matured a bit over the years many of them have started playing competitive constructed formats, so hopefully they are a little more receptive to Plow Under.
This is in fact a great pitch for green aggro! I do run the green aggresive package though and understand its benefit for the cube. I was mainly asking the question to icculushfb42. I edited my post just to make sure it's received the right way.
Everyone is talking about this for green agro, and I think its because of the 2 power 1 drop angle but I think this is just a good card.
I think I would play this in most green based decks; it is an early beater, an early blocker, an ok top deck, a mana sink or just a finisher.
Every time you have spare mana you can just tick this guy up and your opponent has to deal with him quickly or always keep removal up once you can threaten to get him to max level.
Warden of the first tree is a solid card and whilst this loses the instant speed activation it has no need for a second colour and can pay in smaller increments.
Exactly. I'll run this, but not as support for Green Aggro, but as a creature that scales and remains the biggest threat through multiple stages of the game in the same vein as Warden of the First Tree or Figure of Destiny. This might actually replace Warden for me. Not sure yet.
Definite include. My only concern is that I don't run green aggro but some of my drafters don't get that and try to force it anyway? So I worry that this card will end up being a bit of a trap.
I'm just curious, what's make your drafters to be incline to force green agressive decks at the moment if you don't have the support for it?
If I'm being honest, some drafters just not quite understanding the environment. I have said that green aggro isn't a thing in my cube but it just hasn't quite sunk in.
Just an update from tonight's cube experience. Hexdrinker was extremely dominant in multiple games. Do not sleep on this card and don't believe you need a green aggro section to justify it, you don't.
Not that anybody thought this card was bad, but this hasn been the fifth consecutive draft where Hexdrinker was a monster. We don’t support green aggro, but I’m convinced Hexdrinker can go into literally any green deck at this point it’s just so insane.
Hexdrinker is perfect here. Mana sink, must kill, fetchable etc
I have a rule where cards that are suuuper hard to interact with have to require some hoops (e.g. No thrunn, no TNN, but the cheatty cards are fine. Carnage Tyrant is about the line I want to draw).
So I will probably try this out as an efficient midrange card, but I'm not super excited about it.
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You can still kill him in response to the level up, that can only be done at sorcery speed. In that time window, he dies to a ping. If you don't have an instant speed answer, a sorcery speed one will catch the snake unless the entire 8G is spent in a single turn.
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I guess you’re right. Green aggro is scary.. between this, Kessig Prowler, Experiment one and Pelt Collector,
They can easily grow into midrange sized creatures. Seems good for green’s aggro theme.
I would slot this over many green cards.
The most obvious cut is a 1cc card, but even something like Thrun, the Last Troll is a fair cut.
That being said, I still feel that green aggro is not as good as ramp, and at 360 powered I don't have the space to fully support green aggro when green's relative strength is clearly ramp, which no other color can do. Conversely, red and white, and maybe even black, do aggro better than green.
360 card powered Chicago cube:
https://cubecobra.com/cube/overview/e7r
2020 Numerical Power Rankings:
https://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/the-cube-forum/cube-card-and-archetype/817969-2020-numerical-cube-power-rankings
2018 CubeTutor Power Rankings:
https://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/the-cube-forum/cube-card-and-archetype/803301-cubetutor-power-rankings-2018-by-color-and-cmc
-All other colors can ramp thanks to powerful mana rocks in Cube.
-You can get the best of both worlds by pairing green with a Mardu wedge aggro color - you get to run insane creatures like this guy plus the upsides of the other colors (reach, disruption, recursion, etc).
http://www.cubetutor.com/cubeblog/63569
I played around 18 games with the deck.
Hexdrinker was easily the best card in the deck. Often the best line was to simple play it, and level it as fast as possible, and watch the opponent die. Dropping this on an already developed board and directly leveling it to level 3 was also highly relevant. Knowing which removal spells your opponent plays obviously makes the decision when to level a lot easier.
The reaction of my playgroup was mostly "damn is this pushed", if you ever had to play against TNN + any clone you can imagine how such a game plays out.
I can easily see first picking this card and being pulled into green by it.
(For reference I play a 405 card cube that plays anything powerful besides: AB Moxen, Black Lotus, Sol Ring, Mana Crypt, Time Walk and Ancestral Recall)
I think it’s an autoinclude at every size regardless of if you run green aggro, but dang this review is hyping me up even more.
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=484979
To simplify my argument, It's a must kill one drop that is great on turn 1 and on turn 100.
It doesn't become must kill until you sink a lot of mana into it, but i'd guess it's very easy to do so organically without messing up your curve.
A card like figure of destiny can set you back significant tempo if they kill it in response to a 3-6 mana activation.. It also requires 6 lands to ultimate... Hexdrinker suffers from neither of those set backs and requires zero mana before it's already a clock.
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I'm just curious, what's make your drafters to be incline to force green agressive decks at the moment if you don't have the support for it?
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I think I would play this in most green based decks; it is an early beater, an early blocker, an ok top deck, a mana sink or just a finisher.
Every time you have spare mana you can just tick this guy up and your opponent has to deal with him quickly or always keep removal up once you can threaten to get him to max level.
Warden of the first tree is a solid card and whilst this loses the instant speed activation it has no need for a second colour and can pay in smaller increments.
If I'm being honest, some drafters just not quite understanding the environment. I have said that green aggro isn't a thing in my cube but it just hasn't quite sunk in.