Looks like a solid update, man. I don't know that that white needs this many 1-for-1 removal spells, so I'm not sure if I'll be testing out Grasp of Fate or not. Was the Scatter to the Winds cut mostly just a like for like swap or do you feel like it was under performing at all? October was quite busy for us, so I've only gotten one draft with BFZ in so far. Oh and on bringing back Desolation Angel. She's a pet card of ours as well and we love making opponents scoop to her.
Scatter was a like-for-like cut, the new big counterspell replaced the current biggest counterspell.
I'm a fan of "3-mana, answer anything" spells. Grasp is boring, but it's a good card. Plus, it looks like Oath of the Gatewatch is going to have a lot of cards in it that push Two-Headed Giant. If that set has a big impact on the cube, and we wind up splashing in more 2HG drafts, Grasp is going to be a monster.
And ya, we (mainly I?) missed Desolation Angel and Thornling, even if it was mostly for flavor reasons.
And the gold changes have needed to happen for a while. Too many middling 'walkers and 4-5cc stuff; needed to trim down the CMCs and streamline some of those sections.
White's 3cc creature section is so stacked and so deep right now, and he's the only one that's just a dude. A 3cc white creature was the needed cut, and all the other ones actually contribute to a deck in addition to being an efficient body.
I like those new changes. I am interested in your evaluation of the Xenagos, the Reveler --> Kird Ape change. I haven't been impressed by Xenagos and I am considering to switch it with Atarka's Command in my cube.
I am a bit surprised by the switch from Murderous Redcap to Terminate though. Is it better than other black 2CC removal spells considering its more difficult mana cost?
I like the Scatter to the Winds cut for Mystic Confluence. I wanted to do that too but I needed SttW to be tested a little bit more. In order to do that, I choosed Tamiyo for now, but I might change it back soon.
I'm a bit suprise by the Venser <-> Sphinx's Revelation swap though. I'm pretty much sure I've already seen a post in which you were debating about Sphinx's Revelation being some kind of bad and that Stroke of Genius was better because it can be played in any blue deck. I understand the point of reincluding it, but I'm just a bit curious about the reflexion behind it. Mainly becasue SR is on my radar since I trim down the guild section.
Another swap you've made that suprise me is the Dack's Duplicate <-> Electrolyze. I heard some good stuff on DD in the past few months from your part and was wondering the reason why you've made the switch in this update. Was the haste clone inconstant?
Desolation Angel is also a interest inclusion. I can't wait to see testing results on that one.
I like the Scatter to the Winds cut for Mystic Confluence. I wanted to do that too but I needed SttW to be tested a little bit more. In order to do that, I choosed Tamiyo for now, but I might change it back soon.
I cut Tamiyo a few months ago and never looked back. I absolutely LOVED her when she first came out, but power creep did not do her any favors.
I like those new changes. I am interested in your evaluation of the Xenagos, the Reveler --> Kird Ape change. I haven't been impressed by Xenagos and I am considering to switch it with Atarka's Command in my cube.
Mainly the cut is for curve purposes. Both red and green need additional aggro beaters, so Ape will help, and I'm glad to be cutting a 4cc gold card.
I am a bit surprised by the switch from Murderous Redcap to Terminate though. Is it better than other black 2CC removal spells considering its more difficult mana cost?
It can be. I like that it's unconditional removal, and when you're facing down black and/or artifact creature targets, it's nice to be able to blast them. It's not a stellar card, but it'll make the cut in BR decks, and it allows me to lower the curve and cut another 4cc card.
I like the Scatter to the Winds cut for Mystic Confluence. I wanted to do that too but I needed SttW to be tested a little bit more. In order to do that, I choosed Tamiyo for now, but I might change it back soon.
Scatter was good, it was just the easiest cut. I haven't played Tamiyo in years.
I'm a bit suprise by the Venser <-> Sphinx's Revelation swap though. I'm pretty much sure I've already seen a post in which you were debating about Sphinx's Revelation being some kind of bad and that Stroke of Genius was better because it can be played in any blue deck. I understand the point of reincluding it, but I'm just a bit curious about the reflexion behind it. Mainly becasue SR is on my radar since I trim down the guild section.
My initial opinion on Rev was that the lifegain wouldn't be enough to justify the multicolor nature of the spell. But it has been. This isn't the first time Rev's been in my cube, so I know what to expect. It is to Xcc draw spells what Lightning Helix is to 2cc burn spells, if you want to evaluate it that way. I wanted to cut some 'walkers, and I wanted to reduce the 4-5 drops, so cutting Venser met those goals, and adding this in gives my UW decks a big curve-topping spell.
Another swap you've made that suprise me is the Dack's Duplicate <-> Electrolyze. I heard some good stuff on DD in the past few months from your part and was wondering the reason why you've made the switch in this update. Was the haste clone inconstant?
Duplicate is a stronger overall card, but I wanted to make the sections leaner. 4cc cards are deep (and red just got a new one) so cutting this for a playable-in-everything 3cc card seemed like a good choice at this point in time.
Crossposting this from the playtesting results thread...
Early testing notes:
Grasp of Fate - The difference between the effect you get from Oblivion Ring and Council's Judgement isn't that big. The number of times that I'm exiling a permanent that can't otherwise be targeted or that my O-Ring gets destroyed is pretty small. When those instances do show up, it's certainly significant, but on average, the two cards do the same thing about 90% of the time. So if someone asked me if I'd cube a card that was 90% of a Council's Judgement, I'd say yes. 3-mana kill anything is a good recipe for a cube removal spell, and even if it's redundant and unexciting (which it is), it's definitely good enough. Also, it looks like Oath of the Gatewatch is going to push some cards with a Two-Headed Giant theme, and if that set is big for the cube, and we start incorporating more 2HG into our cube drafts, Grasp will gain value there, as it's a bonkers multiplayer spell. Good enough at 540 until we have so many O-Rings that we can't play any more.
Mystic Confluence - This card is sick. Jace's Ingenuity as a floor is a great place to be. Counter & draw 2 is savage. Counter and double bounce is savage. 1-sided Evacuations are savage. You should test this card out if you're not currently doing so. Card's pretty busted; can't imagine letting it go for any reason.
Magus of the Wheel - A 3/3 for 3, that can swing a couple times and cash itself in later on to refill your hand. And it can activate at instant speed, allowing you to time the effect in such a way that you're the first player to have all your resources available with a fresh set of 7; the same situation that makes Time Spiral such a powerful effect. And it has great interactions with graveyard-based red decks like reanimator and the artifact.dec, and works really well with Feldon of the Third Path. I'll keep it around for the foreseeable future.
Fiery Confluence - 6 direct damage is a lot, and it adds a secret 4th mode to the spell, because it can kill planeswalkers. Red midrange and control decks featuring sweepers don't have a lot of good options at the 4cc slot, so this card is most welcome in those builds. Pyroclasm + Shatter is good, being an Anger of the Gods is good, shooting a 'walker for 4 + Shatter is good ...there's just a lot of things this card can do. I think the sweeper function adds a lot of flexibility to the card, so it's a card I've liked a lot more in midrange and control decks rather than aggro decks so far, but it's a fine card to play in any red deck. Will probably see long-term cube play.
Meren of Clan Nel Toth - This creature is okay. There are games where it runs away with card advantage, but that only really occurred in the midrange mirror. I really wanted this to be a good card for midrange to grind out wins against control, but a 3/4 body that has to stick around to generate that value isn't ideal in the control matchup. Sometimes it just gets killed by instant removal. Other times, it dies on the following turn, after being cast and getting a card back (making it like a big Gravedigger of sorts). I've seen it "go off" once too, where it just churned out a ton of card advantage, built up some experience and dominated the game. On average, it'll play kinda like a hybrid between Master of the Wild Hunt, Gravedigger and Graveborn Muse. The 4th toughness is a nice boost, but being multicolor and relying on having a stocked graveyard can be rough. I don't know if it'll stay in forever, but we'll continue to test it for now.
Appreciate those reviews. We plan to test hard this week. Meren of Clan Nel Toth won't be tested. The others, well we expect to have similar results that your testing has shown! This is good initial news.
There are windows where the card is really powerful, but a lot of the time it's a Plains. You can build around it, using it to protect your own legends or abuse legendary ETB triggers, and it's sweet when you do so. I like it okay; it's good enough to stay for now.
I was wondering how you were feeling about the Horizon Canopy move. As I am really cartesian, HC taking the spot of a guild spell seems a bit rough. Is that move has been legit until now of ryour playgroup? To me, it seems like the guild loses a important piece to their playable spell options. Not talking that much about Voice of Resurgence itself, but just talking about the fact that Selesnya is down of one spell comparing to the other guilds. Furthermore, GW drafters also end up with more fixing options. Doesn't that make the cube technically unbalance?
Not anymore unbalanced than it was before. Since Horizon Canopy is played in off-color decks by players who are playing white OR green as a way to play a land that can draw a card, when you count Canopy as a land card, Selesnya arguably has one less mana fixing option than the other guilds. So it actually drafts more like a hybrid card than a fixing land a lot of the time. It's a move I've wanted to make for a long time, and I classified it as a spell when I played a 360 cube.
Quick update. Experimenting with additional mana rocks for Wildfire/Upheaval kinds of decks, and turned Meren back into Deathrite Shaman already. OP, CubeTutor and tappedout updated.
I can understand cutting Icy Manipulator and Sword of the Animist at 540, but what's your reason for Ankh of Mishra? Underperforming, underdrafted, or just experimenting?
A little of all three. The 2-drop saturation is a little higher than it was at my 450 iteration, so I have some room to play at that CMC for aggro. And with the extra landfall guys that I play that others don't (Leopard, Kudzu, etc) I may be playing aggro decks that want to put more lands to the table than other groups. That, and we also love Loam/Crucible strip and chain fetch shenanigans in our aggressive decks too, and that eliminates a lot of potential value for Ankh. Ankh is good against those strategies, but those strategies aren't good against aggro, so I don't need the tool to fight it in my aggro shells.
I guess we decided that if we wanted to use a card that was good at grinding out advantages in the long game against decks that were light on removal, we'd rather use the one that only costs 1 mana. Meren is a fine card, but it's another cog in the 4cc machine, and there are a lot of redundant effects that provide incremental card advantage that are only one color that we don't even play.
I notice your cube runs both Check and pain lands in some guilds. I assume that when the rest of the new duals are spoiled you will put the cycle into your cube like you did with the BFZ duals. Which will you be keeping/dumping and why? Specifically curious about boros, golgari and izzet guilds.
I will be keeping Pain lands across the board if all we get are the enemy Manlands. I think they're better than the Check lands. Providing colored mana on T1 is relevant no matter what color combination you're playing.
Edit: Assuming you're talking about the enemy Manlands. If you're talking about enemy Battle Lands, if we get them, there won't be any Pains or Checks left after this block.
^The Manlands cycle will also be completed in the next set, right? If that happens, it should push out all the painlands as well and should give us a perfectly balanced fixing suite of Duals-Fetch-Shocks-BFZduals-Manlands.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Vintage Workshops
Legacy:
Death and Taxes
EDH: Arcum DagssonMake Paradox Engine Great Again!
Urza, Lord High Artificer
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
MTGS Average Peasant Cube 2023 Edition
Follow me. I tweet.
I'm a fan of "3-mana, answer anything" spells. Grasp is boring, but it's a good card. Plus, it looks like Oath of the Gatewatch is going to have a lot of cards in it that push Two-Headed Giant. If that set has a big impact on the cube, and we wind up splashing in more 2HG drafts, Grasp is going to be a monster.
And ya, we (mainly I?) missed Desolation Angel and Thornling, even if it was mostly for flavor reasons.
And the gold changes have needed to happen for a while. Too many middling 'walkers and 4-5cc stuff; needed to trim down the CMCs and streamline some of those sections.
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!
My High Octane Unpowered Cube on CubeCobra
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!
I am a bit surprised by the switch from Murderous Redcap to Terminate though. Is it better than other black 2CC removal spells considering its more difficult mana cost?
I'm a bit suprise by the Venser <-> Sphinx's Revelation swap though. I'm pretty much sure I've already seen a post in which you were debating about Sphinx's Revelation being some kind of bad and that Stroke of Genius was better because it can be played in any blue deck. I understand the point of reincluding it, but I'm just a bit curious about the reflexion behind it. Mainly becasue SR is on my radar since I trim down the guild section.
Another swap you've made that suprise me is the Dack's Duplicate <-> Electrolyze. I heard some good stuff on DD in the past few months from your part and was wondering the reason why you've made the switch in this update. Was the haste clone inconstant?
Desolation Angel is also a interest inclusion. I can't wait to see testing results on that one.
Zetsu's Cube on CubeTutor.com
Zetsu's Ebay MTG Online Store
Zetsu's Poker Draft Method
I cut Tamiyo a few months ago and never looked back. I absolutely LOVED her when she first came out, but power creep did not do her any favors.
My High Octane Unpowered Cube on CubeCobra
Mainly the cut is for curve purposes. Both red and green need additional aggro beaters, so Ape will help, and I'm glad to be cutting a 4cc gold card.
It can be. I like that it's unconditional removal, and when you're facing down black and/or artifact creature targets, it's nice to be able to blast them. It's not a stellar card, but it'll make the cut in BR decks, and it allows me to lower the curve and cut another 4cc card.
Scatter was good, it was just the easiest cut. I haven't played Tamiyo in years.
My initial opinion on Rev was that the lifegain wouldn't be enough to justify the multicolor nature of the spell. But it has been. This isn't the first time Rev's been in my cube, so I know what to expect. It is to Xcc draw spells what Lightning Helix is to 2cc burn spells, if you want to evaluate it that way. I wanted to cut some 'walkers, and I wanted to reduce the 4-5 drops, so cutting Venser met those goals, and adding this in gives my UW decks a big curve-topping spell.
Duplicate is a stronger overall card, but I wanted to make the sections leaner. 4cc cards are deep (and red just got a new one) so cutting this for a playable-in-everything 3cc card seemed like a good choice at this point in time.
No testing results needed. I've probably cast that spell 50 times in the cube; so happy to have it back.
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!
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!
Early testing notes:
Grasp of Fate - The difference between the effect you get from Oblivion Ring and Council's Judgement isn't that big. The number of times that I'm exiling a permanent that can't otherwise be targeted or that my O-Ring gets destroyed is pretty small. When those instances do show up, it's certainly significant, but on average, the two cards do the same thing about 90% of the time. So if someone asked me if I'd cube a card that was 90% of a Council's Judgement, I'd say yes. 3-mana kill anything is a good recipe for a cube removal spell, and even if it's redundant and unexciting (which it is), it's definitely good enough. Also, it looks like Oath of the Gatewatch is going to push some cards with a Two-Headed Giant theme, and if that set is big for the cube, and we start incorporating more 2HG into our cube drafts, Grasp will gain value there, as it's a bonkers multiplayer spell. Good enough at 540 until we have so many O-Rings that we can't play any more.
Mystic Confluence - This card is sick. Jace's Ingenuity as a floor is a great place to be. Counter & draw 2 is savage. Counter and double bounce is savage. 1-sided Evacuations are savage. You should test this card out if you're not currently doing so. Card's pretty busted; can't imagine letting it go for any reason.
Magus of the Wheel - A 3/3 for 3, that can swing a couple times and cash itself in later on to refill your hand. And it can activate at instant speed, allowing you to time the effect in such a way that you're the first player to have all your resources available with a fresh set of 7; the same situation that makes Time Spiral such a powerful effect. And it has great interactions with graveyard-based red decks like reanimator and the artifact.dec, and works really well with Feldon of the Third Path. I'll keep it around for the foreseeable future.
Fiery Confluence - 6 direct damage is a lot, and it adds a secret 4th mode to the spell, because it can kill planeswalkers. Red midrange and control decks featuring sweepers don't have a lot of good options at the 4cc slot, so this card is most welcome in those builds. Pyroclasm + Shatter is good, being an Anger of the Gods is good, shooting a 'walker for 4 + Shatter is good ...there's just a lot of things this card can do. I think the sweeper function adds a lot of flexibility to the card, so it's a card I've liked a lot more in midrange and control decks rather than aggro decks so far, but it's a fine card to play in any red deck. Will probably see long-term cube play.
Meren of Clan Nel Toth - This creature is okay. There are games where it runs away with card advantage, but that only really occurred in the midrange mirror. I really wanted this to be a good card for midrange to grind out wins against control, but a 3/4 body that has to stick around to generate that value isn't ideal in the control matchup. Sometimes it just gets killed by instant removal. Other times, it dies on the following turn, after being cast and getting a card back (making it like a big Gravedigger of sorts). I've seen it "go off" once too, where it just churned out a ton of card advantage, built up some experience and dominated the game. On average, it'll play kinda like a hybrid between Master of the Wild Hunt, Gravedigger and Graveborn Muse. The 4th toughness is a nice boost, but being multicolor and relying on having a stocked graveyard can be rough. I don't know if it'll stay in forever, but we'll continue to test it for now.
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!
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!
What do you think about Karakas? As has been run with it?
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!
I was wondering how you were feeling about the Horizon Canopy move. As I am really cartesian, HC taking the spot of a guild spell seems a bit rough. Is that move has been legit until now of ryour playgroup? To me, it seems like the guild loses a important piece to their playable spell options. Not talking that much about Voice of Resurgence itself, but just talking about the fact that Selesnya is down of one spell comparing to the other guilds. Furthermore, GW drafters also end up with more fixing options. Doesn't that make the cube technically unbalance?
Zetsu's Cube on CubeTutor.com
Zetsu's Ebay MTG Online Store
Zetsu's Poker Draft Method
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!
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!
My High Octane Unpowered Cube on CubeCobra
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!
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!
Edit: Assuming you're talking about the enemy Manlands. If you're talking about enemy Battle Lands, if we get them, there won't be any Pains or Checks left after this block.
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!
WorkshopsLegacy:
Death and Taxes
EDH:
Arcum DagssonMake Paradox Engine Great Again!Urza, Lord High Artificer