Nice write-up Zetsu. There are a lot of cards I'd be looking at at 600.
As for my changelist:
There are surprisingly few new cards going in from Kaladesh for me: Thethreevehicles warrant testing properly, so will need a few weeks to try out. On paper, Fleetwheel is a really good aggro curve-topper guy, and Copter plays the most like a Vehicle feels like it should. Skysovereign has lots of upside and is generic removal. Angel of Invention, Scrapheap Scrounger and Chandra are the slam-dunks. I really like Verdurous Gearhulk a lot, but don't know if there's room.
Finally I'm readding Sylvan Caryatid as a defensive, resilient mana creature and giving Custodi Lich a crack based on the positive feedback he's gotten.
For my ~ 600 card power cube with focus on synergy, I will be testing out the following:
White Angel of Invention: Fits into many of the white archetypes I support with the ability to generate tokens, be an anthem, gain life, and be blinked. Even has the added bonus of being a Reveillark target.
Blue Torrential Gearhulk: Currently the only Gearhulk that interests me given the flexibility. Can be used to re-buy removal, counter or draw spells. The flash makes it a decent trick. Being an artifact creature makes it more vulnerable but also a Tinker target.
Black Weaponcraft Enthusiast: Not confident it will make the cut but 3 permanents/creatures for 3 mana is a pretty good rate given the sacrifice theme in black.
Red Cathartic Reunion: Two additional cards is a steep cost but could be worth it. I run many madness cards and support graveyard synergies(Dredge, Delve, Reanimation)so it might be good enough. Chandra, Torch of Defiance: Very easy include as I currently run both 4 mana Chandras and this one is obviously better. Pia Nalaar: Not the most exciting but fits into the minor artifact theme present in red. Spark of Creativity: Pseudo cycle effect in red, probably not good enough but would like to see how it plays.
Green Nissa, Vital Force: Seems pretty comparable to Worldwaker which I don't run but I like regrowth type effects and having an ultimate that is easily reachable while not being an automatic game ender.
Multi Dovin Baan: Would like to try this over Narset Transcendent as they both fit in similar shells but Dovin can impact the board on its own. Saheeli Rai: I generally like to try 3 mana planeswalkers because they can come down so early (especially powered cube) and shape the flow of the game. It does not protect itself but has to potential to generate interesting interactions with the -2 ability.
Others Aether Hub: Nice untapped color fixer Bomat Courier: Interesting ability worth trying but not sure how reliable it will be. Cultivator's Caravan:I like mana rocks with upside as it can be good early for acceleration or later be a threat. Filigree Familiar: A lot of value and playable in many decks. Ghirapur Orrery: Interesting build around card that could lead to fun game-play but hard to predict how it fits in to existing strategies. Panharmonicon: Want to try just to see how many interesting interactions come up in the cube. Could be a do nothing but potentially game breaking. Scrapheap Scrounger: Worst case it's a Gore-House Chainwalker that is more vulnerable to artifact hate but the ability to recur makes it fit the black recursion/sacrifice theme. Smuggler's Copter: Probably the top Kaladesh card that will get played the most in my cube. A colorless loot effect that can enable many strategies while still applying pressure.
The update to my 720 powered cube is gonna look like this:
Drag Under in for Clutch of Currents - I think Awaken is a cool mechanic and I wanted it to be more relevant so I gave it a chance. Drawing cards is just better.
Angel of Invention in for Karmic Guide I'm not crazy about this update either but you guys keep saying Angel is crazy good so I'm holding each and every one of you responsible if she doesn't win every single game:p
Multi: I like Dovin Baan but I'm not sure what I would cut for him. I'll also test Saheeli Rai. I don't think I'd cut Dack or Ral for her, so I'm concerned with having three planeswalkers among my five Izzet cards.
Did a few drafts last night with my powered 540 Cube and seeded 17 Kaladesh cards. I had at least limited experience with 12 of the cards & figured I'd post it here. We aggressively test cards from new sets to avoid missing potential gems plus it helps to mix things up and keep the Cube fresh. The biggest downside of this new set is how quickly it was released after Conspiracy 2. I almost seeded the C2 cards & the Kaladesh cards but in the end I just seeded cards from Kaladesh. The 12 cards listed below are sorted by my current rankings.
Chandra, Torch of Defiance was a house. All of the abilities were relevant between helping to ramp, getting free cards & FTKing an enemy creature. Best card of the set & it showed its worth in our games. Scrapheap Scrounger did work in a black aggro deck. Other colors will even run it in a pinch but it was recurred and going straight into play is a big game. I'd put this as the #2 card in the set. Verdurous Gearhulk is a card that I really didn't want to include because I'm happy with my current suite of 5 drops but it did some serious work. Being able to spread the counters to different creatures helped mitigate the risk though the player who used it primarily used it to +4/+4 another creature. This combined with a 4/4 trampler quite the combination. I love Wolfir Silverheart but I think this card may be better. Giving the base creature trample is huge and can't be chump blocked repeatedly like Silverheart & his friend. Saheeli Rai is a card that I actually had in both drafts (Izzet deck & Worldknit deck). It definitely exceeded expectations. The best thing I did was use the -2 ability to copy Myr Battlesphere in one match & Grave Titan in another. Getting Saheeli in play first then making two Myr Battlespheres was too much for the opponent to deal with. I know these are two great finishers to copy but in Cube you'll copy something worthwhile. I'm giving serious consideration to running all 3 Izzet walkers because she has impressed me so much. The +1 wasn't impressive but maybe that's just because I only used it a few times. That -2 was seriously insane and I didn't even have any good non-creatures to copy with it. I can imagine copying sweet equipment or even ramping by copying Mana Vault/Grim Monolith/Sol Ring. This definitely won't replace Dack Fayden but it's worth testing in Cubes of all sizes. Nissa, Vital Force did way more than I expected it to do. The player who drafted it had a great mostly green ramp deck that had Oracle of Mul Daya, Courser of Kruphix, Cultivate, Harrow, Tribe Elder, etc. The player mainly played it on turn 3 & sometimes on turn 4. He would +1 it to protect Nissa then ultimate her the next turn. He cast her in many games and got to ultimate her 4 times. He went 3-1 in those games & drew a ton of cards. He drew 10+ cards two or three times. He definitely had a deck built to maximize Nissa but it was quite impressive. I think I still like Nissa, Worldwaker better but this card has earned an extended testing at the very least. Fleetwheel Cruiser is awesome because it has trample and haste and is colorless. Every time I looked over this card was beating down the opponent. There is the potential for tapping a creature and having it die before attacks but I really like this card as a hasty 4-drop finisher in non-red aggro decks. Angel of Invention didn't see play very many times and when it did I was way ahead of the player using it so it wasn't as good as I expected. That being said I still think this card will be good enough for my 540 but not by a significant margin. I think the aspect I'm most excited about is that it's anthem on a stick & that's not an effect seen in Cube very much. I would rank it behind Cloudgoat, Geist-Honored Monk, Baneslayer & Reveillark, on the level with Avacyn and ahead of Archangel of Thune (which I still run) so that will be the swap.
I feel like the previous 7 cards will make the Cube but his is the breaking point where I'm not sure how many of the following cards will make the Cube. Regardless we will test them for a few more sessions.
Noxious Gearhulk should cost 5. But it doesn't. I guess I have to judge it based on its actual cost. The player who drafted it said the ETB trigger was fine but the real highlight was the Menace. He said the best part of killing a creature was making it so Noxious Gearhulk couldn't be blocked. Menace is becoming one of my favorite keywords in Cube and I look forward to getting more quality cards with Menace. Will continue testing this card. Gonti, Lord of Luxury seemed so underwhelming when it hit the board against me. The ruling where the card can be cast even if Gonti leaves the battlefield is the only saving grace of this card. Looking at other black 4 drops in the Cube I don't like this better than any but again the question is can it replace a different CMC card? I don't think so but we'll see how many broken cards it will get & how often this card can be paired with cards like Mimic Vat/Recurring Nightmare/Saheeli Rai. My instincts say it's not good enough. Torrential Gearhulk is another card that costs a bit too much, lacks evasion and is too narrow because it only targets instants. Being able to flashback a counterspell, removal spell or broken card like Recall is sweet but the player who had it wasn't a fan because he often wanted to target a sorcery. As his opponent I could tell he waiting to get to 6 mana to cast it when having something a little cheaper or more impactful when he hit 6 mana would have been better. I'll give this card one more session then I'll likely stop testing it. Aerial Responder is no Vampire Nighthawk. It can't trade up and Vigilance is definitely not better than Deathtouch but the Responder is still...just okay. I don't like it better than any of my other white 3-drop creatures so the question is can it replace a different CMC card? I didn't have this card ranked significantly higher on my initial reaction but it's the card that I'm most disappointed in because I thought it would actually be good enough. I don't think that will ultimately be the case. Combustible Gearhulk is a card that I didn't even want to test but I did just to try the entire cycle. A perfect example of a Punisher mechanic that makes people dislike them. One time the opponent was at 20 & so milled 3 and took 13 damage. It was a lot but the opponent quickly stabilized and won the game 2 turns later. Another time the opponent was more concerned about the cards so 3 cards were milled and they were all lands. I feel like the average case scenario from a damage perspective will be 3.5 damage. It's a big body but no evasion. I'm not willing to test this card anymore. Not worth testing for Cubes 720 or less. I can't speak to larger Cube inclusion.
I have opinions on these 5 cards but I'm mainly trying to share actual gameplay results & not speculation because all of us have thoughts on cards but not many people likely have any data with the new cards.
I'm hoping to get two more drafts in next Friday & if I have any other results worth sharing I'll post them here!
not sure if they will all last. I just cut my colourless matters package so the vehicles are replacing reality smasher, thoughtknot, etc. should be fun testing!
I typically tend to test a lot of cards, but this set I've been a bit more reserved.. I'm liking where my cube is at currently, so a bit more hesitant to do anything drastic.
The vehicles are competing against equipment and cards like tangle wire for slots in agressive/midrange decks, which I didn't feel like there was much of a need for prior to this set.
Fleetwheel Cruiser for example is directly competing with cards like Bloodbraid elf , Hellrider and hero of bladehold for agro curve topper slots... Making the bar much higher for inclusion.
So far out of all the vehicles only the skysoverign has seen extensive testing, and it's had mixed results.
Have been away grinding poker in LA, so havent cubed much in past couple weeks.
100% Include:
Chandra, Torch of Defiance
75% Include:
Scrapheap Scrounger (My duplicate heavy black section makes the competition tough for this lil guy, otherwise hed be 100%)
Filgree Familiar
Angel of Invention
Cards I'm paying close attention to:
Nissa, Vital Force (My pick for sleeper of the set)
Saheeli Rai (Initial testing was decent, but decided I like the current izzet suite better)
For our 270 Power+Unserious+Conspiracy+Snow+Combo Cube (with 90 card add on module to get to 360 when necessary):
Aerial Responder: nice card but our white is very offensive
Aether Hub: Could be ok with our colorless/Eldrazi package but highly doubtful. We already don't use Tendo Ice Bridge
Aetherflux Reservoir: pretty nice pick up for Storm it seems like but we need to see how well you can build around it
Angel of Invention: All white 5s are overrated in my group's opinion and none of them are truly "staples" (Gideon Jura maybe?). This one dies so easily to damage sweepers its not funny.
Blossoming Defense: probably better than Vines of Vastwood in Cube where the GG is an issue. Personally, not supporting combat tricks at all in Cube is kind of dull and against the spirit of the format
Fastlands: Probably below Painlands due to the C for colorless cards
Gearhulks: only the Green one seems plausible (see below)
Chandra, Torch of Defiance: at 270, one PW per color feels right especially since curves get REALLY squished at such a high power level. And this is almost certainly the best red PW. Koth more or less functions as a finisher/curve topper and there are so many other options for that role. Not sure what that means for Daretti -- the "niche" PWs (Tezz Seeker, Ral, etc) are kind of in their own separate category anyway.
Dovin Baan: at 270 you can support max 2 true gold cards (not counting hybrids). Dovin doesn't really compete. Also, U control REALLY skews the color balance and, to be honest, U tempo (with a heavy side dish of combo) is just better.
Fleetwheel Crusier: pretty much a must play if you have any kind of colorless/artifact theme
Fumigate: I don't even think the 4 mana sweepers are that good in Cube because most decks are creature centric and there are cheaper/more flexible sweepers vs jackal pup decks.
Inventor's Apprentice: nice but probably too hard to activate by turn 2
Nissa, Vital Force: not a bad card but midrange-y 5 mana stuff doesn't do that much in our Cube
Paradoxical Outcome: this is a bit of a stretch for Cube but my friend wants to build Condom Combo with it
Saheeli Rai: it has some uses but it would have to find a particularly strong niche to make it. Just on the basis of Scry 1, no way
Scrapheap Scrounger: its like a Reassembling Skeleton that beats rather than blocks. Big plus for being an artifact.
Skysovereign, Consul Flagship: not close
Smuggler's Copter: easy include for us, surprised its not a consensus 360 card on mtgs
Thriving Grubs: not even sure its a 360 level beater
Verdurous Gearhulk: the biggest issue is that its quite a bit worse with Immediate Action than the other 5 mana green beaters and without IA they're all kind of poor. If you put the 4 counters on something else, its only a 4/4 so neither mode is truly awesome.
Voltaic Brawler: its a nice beater. Personally, I think its ok to bend the gold color count for green aggro a bit since it is the most likely to go 3 color.
Wildest Dreams: seems poor
e:
Fragmentize: sorcery speed is not what we're looking for
I had a chance to play with some of the new cards in a powered cube last night and built a blue/white splashing green control deck. I was running the white and blue gearhulks along with the skyship. I was able to use tinker to great effect pulling the gearhulk or skyship, and managed to flashback mystic confluence twice with the blue gearhulk.
Skyship was very swingy and not going to the dome with 3 damage actually lost me a match!
Overall I think the new inclusions added a lot of fun and flair to the cube.
Also, most of the gearhulks survive wildfire which is relevant.
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As for my changelist:
There are surprisingly few new cards going in from Kaladesh for me: The three vehicles warrant testing properly, so will need a few weeks to try out. On paper, Fleetwheel is a really good aggro curve-topper guy, and Copter plays the most like a Vehicle feels like it should. Skysovereign has lots of upside and is generic removal. Angel of Invention, Scrapheap Scrounger and Chandra are the slam-dunks. I really like Verdurous Gearhulk a lot, but don't know if there's room.
The other KAL changes are going to be based around re-adding some fast mana: Tezz 1.0, Gorilla Shaman, Tolarian Academy.
I'm also adding more pay-off for tokens.dec, which has been lacking a few silver bullets, with Gaea's Cradle, Nissa, Voice of Zendikar and Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite.
Finally I'm readding Sylvan Caryatid as a defensive, resilient mana creature and giving Custodi Lich a crack based on the positive feedback he's gotten.
On spoiled card wishlisting and 'should-have-had'-isms:
I like how people are getting interested in the artifact cube. I think partly because there are significant blocks/worlds that can support it.
White
Angel of Invention: Fits into many of the white archetypes I support with the ability to generate tokens, be an anthem, gain life, and be blinked. Even has the added bonus of being a Reveillark target.
Blue
Torrential Gearhulk: Currently the only Gearhulk that interests me given the flexibility. Can be used to re-buy removal, counter or draw spells. The flash makes it a decent trick. Being an artifact creature makes it more vulnerable but also a Tinker target.
Black
Weaponcraft Enthusiast: Not confident it will make the cut but 3 permanents/creatures for 3 mana is a pretty good rate given the sacrifice theme in black.
Red
Cathartic Reunion: Two additional cards is a steep cost but could be worth it. I run many madness cards and support graveyard synergies(Dredge, Delve, Reanimation)so it might be good enough.
Chandra, Torch of Defiance: Very easy include as I currently run both 4 mana Chandras and this one is obviously better.
Pia Nalaar: Not the most exciting but fits into the minor artifact theme present in red.
Spark of Creativity: Pseudo cycle effect in red, probably not good enough but would like to see how it plays.
Green
Nissa, Vital Force: Seems pretty comparable to Worldwaker which I don't run but I like regrowth type effects and having an ultimate that is easily reachable while not being an automatic game ender.
Multi
Dovin Baan: Would like to try this over Narset Transcendent as they both fit in similar shells but Dovin can impact the board on its own.
Saheeli Rai: I generally like to try 3 mana planeswalkers because they can come down so early (especially powered cube) and shape the flow of the game. It does not protect itself but has to potential to generate interesting interactions with the -2 ability.
Others
Aether Hub: Nice untapped color fixer
Bomat Courier: Interesting ability worth trying but not sure how reliable it will be.
Cultivator's Caravan:I like mana rocks with upside as it can be good early for acceleration or later be a threat.
Filigree Familiar: A lot of value and playable in many decks.
Ghirapur Orrery: Interesting build around card that could lead to fun game-play but hard to predict how it fits in to existing strategies.
Panharmonicon: Want to try just to see how many interesting interactions come up in the cube. Could be a do nothing but potentially game breaking.
Scrapheap Scrounger: Worst case it's a Gore-House Chainwalker that is more vulnerable to artifact hate but the ability to recur makes it fit the black recursion/sacrifice theme.
Smuggler's Copter: Probably the top Kaladesh card that will get played the most in my cube. A colorless loot effect that can enable many strategies while still applying pressure.
Drag Under in for Clutch of Currents - I think Awaken is a cool mechanic and I wanted it to be more relevant so I gave it a chance. Drawing cards is just better.
Saheeli Rai in for Brutal Expulsion
Oath of Nissa in for From Beyond
Skysovereign, Consul Flagship in for Captain's Claws I am no excited for vehicles but this one and copter seem like they might be okay.
Rashmi, Eternities Crafter in for Master Biomancer
Chandra, Torch of Defiance in for Anger of the Gods
Angel of Invention in for Karmic Guide I'm not crazy about this update either but you guys keep saying Angel is crazy good so I'm holding each and every one of you responsible if she doesn't win every single game:p
Thriving Grubs in for Gore-House Chainwalker
Smuggler's Copter in for Epochrasite
Scrapheap Scrounger in for Erratic Portal Muh blink cards:(
Dovin Baan in for Detention Sphere
Fumigate in for End Hostilities
syndicate Trafficker in for Gatekeeper of Malakir
Fretwork Colony in for Vault Skirge
Scrapheap Scrounger
Chandra, Torch of Defiance
And testing Filigree Familiar, but he almost definitely won't make the cut. Sad, he's so cute.
White: Aerial Responder (definitely in the C/Ube; will test for the Legacy cube but I think it'll just miss), Angel of Invention, Fumigate. Maybe Cataclysmic Gearhulk but I don't think it'll make the cut.
Blue: The only card that really interests me is Torrential Gearhulk and I just don't think it's good enough. What a meh set for Blue. :/
Black: Scrapheap Scrounger. I really wish Noxious Gearhulk were good enough. Also, I'm not usually a flavor guy, but I almost wish I cubed Diabolic Tutor. The new one is sweet.
Red: Chandra, Torch of Awesome.
Green: Will test Verdurous Gearhulk. Will not get too optimistic.
Multi: I like Dovin Baan but I'm not sure what I would cut for him. I'll also test Saheeli Rai. I don't think I'd cut Dack or Ral for her, so I'm concerned with having three planeswalkers among my five Izzet cards.
Artifact: Fleetwheel Cruiser, Smuggler's Copter
Land: Aether Hub
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Chandra, Torch of Defiance was a house. All of the abilities were relevant between helping to ramp, getting free cards & FTKing an enemy creature. Best card of the set & it showed its worth in our games.
Scrapheap Scrounger did work in a black aggro deck. Other colors will even run it in a pinch but it was recurred and going straight into play is a big game. I'd put this as the #2 card in the set.
Verdurous Gearhulk is a card that I really didn't want to include because I'm happy with my current suite of 5 drops but it did some serious work. Being able to spread the counters to different creatures helped mitigate the risk though the player who used it primarily used it to +4/+4 another creature. This combined with a 4/4 trampler quite the combination. I love Wolfir Silverheart but I think this card may be better. Giving the base creature trample is huge and can't be chump blocked repeatedly like Silverheart & his friend.
Saheeli Rai is a card that I actually had in both drafts (Izzet deck & Worldknit deck). It definitely exceeded expectations. The best thing I did was use the -2 ability to copy Myr Battlesphere in one match & Grave Titan in another. Getting Saheeli in play first then making two Myr Battlespheres was too much for the opponent to deal with. I know these are two great finishers to copy but in Cube you'll copy something worthwhile. I'm giving serious consideration to running all 3 Izzet walkers because she has impressed me so much. The +1 wasn't impressive but maybe that's just because I only used it a few times. That -2 was seriously insane and I didn't even have any good non-creatures to copy with it. I can imagine copying sweet equipment or even ramping by copying Mana Vault/Grim Monolith/Sol Ring. This definitely won't replace Dack Fayden but it's worth testing in Cubes of all sizes.
Nissa, Vital Force did way more than I expected it to do. The player who drafted it had a great mostly green ramp deck that had Oracle of Mul Daya, Courser of Kruphix, Cultivate, Harrow, Tribe Elder, etc. The player mainly played it on turn 3 & sometimes on turn 4. He would +1 it to protect Nissa then ultimate her the next turn. He cast her in many games and got to ultimate her 4 times. He went 3-1 in those games & drew a ton of cards. He drew 10+ cards two or three times. He definitely had a deck built to maximize Nissa but it was quite impressive. I think I still like Nissa, Worldwaker better but this card has earned an extended testing at the very least.
Fleetwheel Cruiser is awesome because it has trample and haste and is colorless. Every time I looked over this card was beating down the opponent. There is the potential for tapping a creature and having it die before attacks but I really like this card as a hasty 4-drop finisher in non-red aggro decks.
Angel of Invention didn't see play very many times and when it did I was way ahead of the player using it so it wasn't as good as I expected. That being said I still think this card will be good enough for my 540 but not by a significant margin. I think the aspect I'm most excited about is that it's anthem on a stick & that's not an effect seen in Cube very much. I would rank it behind Cloudgoat, Geist-Honored Monk, Baneslayer & Reveillark, on the level with Avacyn and ahead of Archangel of Thune (which I still run) so that will be the swap.
I feel like the previous 7 cards will make the Cube but his is the breaking point where I'm not sure how many of the following cards will make the Cube. Regardless we will test them for a few more sessions.
Noxious Gearhulk should cost 5. But it doesn't. I guess I have to judge it based on its actual cost. The player who drafted it said the ETB trigger was fine but the real highlight was the Menace. He said the best part of killing a creature was making it so Noxious Gearhulk couldn't be blocked. Menace is becoming one of my favorite keywords in Cube and I look forward to getting more quality cards with Menace. Will continue testing this card.
Gonti, Lord of Luxury seemed so underwhelming when it hit the board against me. The ruling where the card can be cast even if Gonti leaves the battlefield is the only saving grace of this card. Looking at other black 4 drops in the Cube I don't like this better than any but again the question is can it replace a different CMC card? I don't think so but we'll see how many broken cards it will get & how often this card can be paired with cards like Mimic Vat/Recurring Nightmare/Saheeli Rai. My instincts say it's not good enough.
Torrential Gearhulk is another card that costs a bit too much, lacks evasion and is too narrow because it only targets instants. Being able to flashback a counterspell, removal spell or broken card like Recall is sweet but the player who had it wasn't a fan because he often wanted to target a sorcery. As his opponent I could tell he waiting to get to 6 mana to cast it when having something a little cheaper or more impactful when he hit 6 mana would have been better. I'll give this card one more session then I'll likely stop testing it.
Aerial Responder is no Vampire Nighthawk. It can't trade up and Vigilance is definitely not better than Deathtouch but the Responder is still...just okay. I don't like it better than any of my other white 3-drop creatures so the question is can it replace a different CMC card? I didn't have this card ranked significantly higher on my initial reaction but it's the card that I'm most disappointed in because I thought it would actually be good enough. I don't think that will ultimately be the case.
Combustible Gearhulk is a card that I didn't even want to test but I did just to try the entire cycle. A perfect example of a Punisher mechanic that makes people dislike them. One time the opponent was at 20 & so milled 3 and took 13 damage. It was a lot but the opponent quickly stabilized and won the game 2 turns later. Another time the opponent was more concerned about the cards so 3 cards were milled and they were all lands. I feel like the average case scenario from a damage perspective will be 3.5 damage. It's a big body but no evasion. I'm not willing to test this card anymore. Not worth testing for Cubes 720 or less. I can't speak to larger Cube inclusion.
Other cards we tested but I didn't see in action:
I have opinions on these 5 cards but I'm mainly trying to share actual gameplay results & not speculation because all of us have thoughts on cards but not many people likely have any data with the new cards.
I'm hoping to get two more drafts in next Friday & if I have any other results worth sharing I'll post them here!
My 540 card Powered Cube last updated March 2022
W
Angel of invention
fairgrounds warden
cataclysmic gearhulk
U
torrential gearhulk
B
noxious gearhulk
scrapheap scrounger
R
combustible gearhulk
G
verderous gearhulk
X
fleetwheel cruiser
cultivator's caravan
smuggler's copter
filigree familiar
RG
Voltaic Brawler
not sure if they will all last. I just cut my colourless matters package so the vehicles are replacing reality smasher, thoughtknot, etc. should be fun testing!
Torrential Gearhulk > Sphinx of Jwar Isle
Scrapheap Scrounger > Silumgar Assassin
Verdurous Gearhulk > Titania, Protector of Argoth
Angel of Invention > Cloudgoat Ranger
Fleetwheel Cruiser > Crucible of Worlds
Skysovereign, Consul Flagship > Captain's Claws
Chandra, Torch of Defiance > Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker
Smuggler's Copter > Cursed Scroll
The vehicles are competing against equipment and cards like tangle wire for slots in agressive/midrange decks, which I didn't feel like there was much of a need for prior to this set.
Fleetwheel Cruiser for example is directly competing with cards like Bloodbraid elf , Hellrider and hero of bladehold for agro curve topper slots... Making the bar much higher for inclusion.
So far out of all the vehicles only the skysoverign has seen extensive testing, and it's had mixed results.
Have been away grinding poker in LA, so havent cubed much in past couple weeks.
100% Include:
Chandra, Torch of Defiance
75% Include:
Scrapheap Scrounger (My duplicate heavy black section makes the competition tough for this lil guy, otherwise hed be 100%)
Filgree Familiar
Angel of Invention
50% Include:
Smuggler's Copter
Fleetwheel Cruiser
Verdurous Gearhulk
35%
SkySoverign, Consul Flagship
Cards I'm paying close attention to:
Nissa, Vital Force (My pick for sleeper of the set)
Saheeli Rai (Initial testing was decent, but decided I like the current izzet suite better)
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Aerial Responder: nice card but our white is very offensive
Aether Hub: Could be ok with our colorless/Eldrazi package but highly doubtful. We already don't use Tendo Ice Bridge
Aetherflux Reservoir: pretty nice pick up for Storm it seems like but we need to see how well you can build around it
Angel of Invention: All white 5s are overrated in my group's opinion and none of them are truly "staples" (Gideon Jura maybe?). This one dies so easily to damage sweepers its not funny.
Blossoming Defense: probably better than Vines of Vastwood in Cube where the GG is an issue. Personally, not supporting combat tricks at all in Cube is kind of dull and against the spirit of the format
Fastlands: Probably below Painlands due to the C for colorless cards
Gearhulks: only the Green one seems plausible (see below)
Chandra, Torch of Defiance: at 270, one PW per color feels right especially since curves get REALLY squished at such a high power level. And this is almost certainly the best red PW. Koth more or less functions as a finisher/curve topper and there are so many other options for that role. Not sure what that means for Daretti -- the "niche" PWs (Tezz Seeker, Ral, etc) are kind of in their own separate category anyway.
Dovin Baan: at 270 you can support max 2 true gold cards (not counting hybrids). Dovin doesn't really compete. Also, U control REALLY skews the color balance and, to be honest, U tempo (with a heavy side dish of combo) is just better.
Fleetwheel Crusier: pretty much a must play if you have any kind of colorless/artifact theme
Fumigate: I don't even think the 4 mana sweepers are that good in Cube because most decks are creature centric and there are cheaper/more flexible sweepers vs jackal pup decks.
Inventor's Apprentice: nice but probably too hard to activate by turn 2
Nissa, Vital Force: not a bad card but midrange-y 5 mana stuff doesn't do that much in our Cube
Paradoxical Outcome: this is a bit of a stretch for Cube but my friend wants to build Condom Combo with it
Saheeli Rai: it has some uses but it would have to find a particularly strong niche to make it. Just on the basis of Scry 1, no way
Scrapheap Scrounger: its like a Reassembling Skeleton that beats rather than blocks. Big plus for being an artifact.
Skysovereign, Consul Flagship: not close
Smuggler's Copter: easy include for us, surprised its not a consensus 360 card on mtgs
Thriving Grubs: not even sure its a 360 level beater
Verdurous Gearhulk: the biggest issue is that its quite a bit worse with Immediate Action than the other 5 mana green beaters and without IA they're all kind of poor. If you put the 4 counters on something else, its only a 4/4 so neither mode is truly awesome.
Voltaic Brawler: its a nice beater. Personally, I think its ok to bend the gold color count for green aggro a bit since it is the most likely to go 3 color.
Wildest Dreams: seems poor
e:
Fragmentize: sorcery speed is not what we're looking for
Skyship was very swingy and not going to the dome with 3 damage actually lost me a match!
Overall I think the new inclusions added a lot of fun and flair to the cube.
Also, most of the gearhulks survive wildfire which is relevant.