I know how you feel wtwlf. I recently cut my cube down from 450 to 360 because I usually am running 4-5 people tops. It was "easy" to find the cuts to make. However, actually going forward with it was harder. The cuts and change lasted for 3 game days but after that time, I missed the cards that I had cut. So now I am back up to 450.
I will be interested in how you feel about the cuts and what you decide to cut too.
Interesting that you pulled out Personal Tutor and Sylvan Tutor. I was just about to include them in my own list owing largely to your full-throated advocacy of those cards. Did it transpire that they weren't as amazing as they were during initial testing? Or are they just less necessary now that you've cut down on a lot of the narrower archetypes?
It's nice to see the cut to a leaner cube. I've always been very happy running 360 cards and we regularly get 8 people to draft. You can actually support a decent amount of archetypes with a small cube.
Again, very appreciative of your cube as a point of reference every time I need to make a difficult cut or addition.
Apart from that, almost all differences between our lists can easily be explained by our respective choices on supported archetypes, or pet cards (for me Domri Rade, Knight of the Reliquary and Isochron Scepter, among others, for you things like Exalted Angel and Triskelion). That's encouraging.
Apart from that, almost all differences between our lists can easily be explained by our respective choices on supported archetypes, or pet cards (for me Domri Rade, Knight of the Reliquary and Isochron Scepter, among others, for you things like Exalted Angel and Triskelion). That's encouraging.
Interesting that you pulled out Personal Tutor and Sylvan Tutor. I was just about to include them in my own list owing largely to your full-throated advocacy of those cards. Did it transpire that they weren't as amazing as they were during initial testing? Or are they just less necessary now that you've cut down on a lot of the narrower archetypes?
It is not because of their powerlevel. It's because I don't think they're as necessary with the smaller size and the scaled back dedicated archetype cards.
It's nice to see the cut to a leaner cube. I've always been very happy running 360 cards and we regularly get 8 people to draft. You can actually support a decent amount of archetypes with a small cube.
Again, very appreciative of your cube as a point of reference every time I need to make a difficult cut or addition.
360 lists can look quite different from mine if the intention is to regularly be drafting it with 8 players. You can support any archetype you want in that kind of environment. But since I'm averaging 2-6, I had to be careful trying to support decks that will be hard to have come together right in Winston, Sealed and 4-player drafts.
Apart from that, almost all differences between our lists can easily be explained by our respective choices on supported archetypes, or pet cards (for me Domri Rade, Knight of the Reliquary and Isochron Scepter, among others, for you things like Exalted Angel and Triskelion). That's encouraging.
1) Force Spike vs Daze is close. Spike is better if you play more control, Daze is better if you play more tempo. Not knowing which direction my playgroup might lean at 360, I erred on the side of caution and kept Spike in for now.
2) I really think it is. I ranked Stronghold in my top 20 for black this year. It's a powerful card for recurring specific toolbox creatures you might need, it's got spectacular synergy with Sneak Attack, and it allows you to topdeck nothing but gas when you've got dead critters to get back.
3) A little of both. I like the surgical nature of EE's removal, and it's better against moxen and tokens. I found it increasingly harder and harder to find the perfect deck to make Disk asymmetrical, since control has evolved into using more artifacts, removal enchantments and utility creatures as a regular pert of their gameplan. The deck where Disc is truly monstrous is rarer than it used to be (although it's still there, and Disc is very good in it when it does come together).
4) Yes, once I scaled down to 360, it's just Sage and Rabblemaster.
And I agree with the encouraging note regarding the variance at 360. I still have room for some cards that are personal favorites of mine, and it will still be different from other small cube lists.
..........
Thanks for the comments guys! It's important to note 2 things here:
1) I may not stick to this size, it's going to be an (albeit extensive) trial run.
2) I will be tinkering with the current list, so this isn't necessarily my perfect 360 composition ...just the first draft.
None of those changes surprised me except for the cut of Genesis and the addition of Huntmaster. Can you talk about these two changes?
I probably would've kept Curse of Shallow Graves if at all possible, but I'm not sure that would be the right choice.
Cheers,
rant
The cut of Genesis was largely due to the increased anticipated speed of the newer list. Even against control, I expect the length of the average game to go down by roughly a turn, which damages the value of a card that's intended to grind out wins in the supreme late game. However, I freaking love Genesis. If that expectation turns out to be unfounded and midrange continues losing long grindy games to control, he'll go right the hell back in.
The addition of Huntmaster was due to a few things. First off, the deck that really wanted Xenagos (super ramp) was purged. The necessity for Maniac dropped. So, I basically had a free slot. Given the loss of a life-gain creature trigger (Missionary), creatures that can damage other creatures and players directly (Redcap) and a 4cc token maker (Xenagos) I thought that Huntmaster could slide in and simultaneously fill three roles that were slightly reduced in the drop to 375.
So, I just read trough the changes and I found myself agreeing with you on most cuts.
Force Spike vs. Daze: I'd go with Force Spike as well if I could only have one, I think there are more decks that want it than Daze. I really wanted to suggest a different cut so you can keep both (because Daze is great in blue tempo, a deck that I love), but I did not find one.
I like Flickerwisp more than Mirror Entity and Mirran Crusader. I think Mirror Entity is too mana intensive in most games. My issue with Mirran Crusader is mostly the protection part, I don't like protection because it is randomly either very good or irrelevant. In constructed, you include protection creatures to target specific decks that you have trouble beating, but in limited you include protection creatures because they are in the right color and have the right mana cost and you really hope to play against a deck where the protection kicks in because otherwise the creature is a bit underwhelming.
I did not do the math, but I feel like I would try to keep Vampire Lacerator in even if it is the worst of the 2 power one drops. These creatures are always good in order to pressure your opponent. For possible cuts, because of mana curve considerations, I'd look at three drops where Hypnotic Specter or Master of the Feast strike me as somewhat expendable. Nezumi Graverobber or Dance of the Dead (if that leaves you with enough reanimation spells, which is not the case I guess because otherwise you would have kept something else in over the Dance) are other possible cuts.
I perfectly understand the Tattermunge Maniac cut. Did you have the chance to see it in play? I'm curious to read about your experience with the drawback.
Thanks for the feedback! Ya, I really like both Force Spike and Daze, but I think Spike will see slightly more play, so I kept that one.
I also really like Flickerwisp (and kinda missed it for the Blink/Bounce deck), and was looking for another potential cut. I like Entity quite a bit (for Token/Anthem support), but I'll keep my eye on the Crusader. Thanks for the suggestion.
In our in-draft experience, I had more than enough black spells that my aggro decks wanted to be playing on turn 1. This is largely due to the fact that it can pick up redundancies from the spell section, with Duress, Inquisition, Thoughtseize and even Dark Ritual serving as viable (and often times preferable) T1 options. I found myself cutting Lacerator as an unnecessary 8th or 9th 1cc aggro spell for our 2cc aggro decks, and that was at 465. I think I can get away with one less aggro beater at 375, but be assured I'll be keeping a close eye on it. As an aside, if you consider Master of the Feast expendable, I suggest playing it a few more times. I made a grave mistake not including it on my black top 20 list this year. I think I need Dance as a redundancy for reanimator, especially if I anticipate doing a lot of 4-player drafts. I'll freely admit that I have an unnatural attachment to both Specter and Graverobber, so maybe that's playing a bigger role in my evaluation.
Maniac was just a cut based on necessity, not for powerlevel. It's a fine filler aggro beater if both the red and green sides are valuable. If you only support aggro in one of those two colors, it loses a lot of its value. The reason why I think it's a 450-worthy spell is largely in part to its flexibility, which requires green aggro support to take advantage of. The drawback is relevant, but the value of playing it in so many aggro decks more than makes up for it. I ranked it higher than Kird Ape this year.
I tried that before, and it was a logistical nightmare. In addition to the change in design parameters depending on archetype support and synergy between the two sizes, etc. Especially as the cube continues to evolve. I still have those 90 cards sleeved up and ready to go if the need arises, but I'm not going to spend the time and effort required to manage what will ultimately equate to two separate cube lists.
However, it's certainly possible to do if you're inclined.
As an aside, if you consider Master of the Feast expendable, I suggest playing it a few more times. I made a grave mistake not including it on my black top 20 list this year.
OK, good to know. Thanks! I'm a bit behind with updating my list because if I play Cube at all these days it's other peoples Cubes, but looking at my Cube thread I find Master of the Feast only on the "interesting cards" list. I'll make sure to find room at 450 now.
Maniac was just a cut based on necessity, not for powerlevel. It's a fine filler aggro beater if both the red and green sides are valuable. If you only support aggro in one of those two colors, it loses a lot of its value. The reason why I think it's a 450-worthy spell is largely in part to its flexibility, which requires green aggro support to take advantage of. The drawback is relevant, but the value of playing it in so many aggro decks more than makes up for it. I ranked it higher than Kird Ape this year.
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Word. And as much as I initially thought it was an aggro-only card, it's really not. Every deck wants a 5/5 flier that only costs 3 mana. It's awesome in Wildfire decks, and I've tutored for it with Enlightened Tutor in a BW control deck.
I'll be hopefully running this list on Friday. My playgroup has also been finding it hard to get together in large numbers. Far more useful to have a smaller cube for the random 4 man drafts that happen more frequently.
I've got a quick question for you guys. Do you think that Æther Searcher's value would go up in a smaller cube because the overall average card quality is higher, or go down because the concentration of more expensive spells is lower? Would love feedback on this.
I posted on the subject elsewhere, but I would say that it's basically a wash. I value Aether Searcher pretty highly as a borderline hardcastable AND reanimatable AND tinkerable AND colourless finisher for any deck. That's four boxes out of five ticked (being Green for NO is another). So it is inherently playable in a number of decks. Now if we look at what it does - I'd say in our experience, which is about four drafts so far, it represents good enough value with nearly anything costing four mana or more. There are a fair few 3 CMC effects stapled to it which are fine as well (Recurring Nightmare lol), and anything costing 5+ typically makes it very hard to come back from. You aren't weakening your deck by including the other card which you would have played anyway.
Now regarding cube size, I'd say that perhaps the only issue is the competition at the colourless slot costing 7. I prefer (only slightly) Myr Battlesphere, but I play Searcher above Karn who doesn't fulfil enough of my criteria for an expensive card. I have yet to see Aether Searcher attached to something that would be less explosive than Karn, and seeing as it's also much more versatile it's an easy include for us. Upping the number of colourless finishers and reducing the coloured ones has proven to be a good move in general for our cube, so two 7 mana cards has been OK.
I'm not sure wether it has been discussed in the previous 389 pages of the topic, but if you don't ban any vintage-legal cards from your cube why isn't Jace Memory Adept in there?
- Why did Jace, Memory Adept get out of the cube? Because for my group it has been a bomb
Several reasons. First off, the card has a narrow window to cast it in. You're either ahead and he wins the game, or you're behind and he does basically nothing. He's the fastest win-con in the cube, but it needs to be played in a window where he can get three uncontested activations off in a row. Secondly, other finishing cards can help me stabilize when I'm behind. I can use something like Frost Titan to block attackers and lock down threats, even if it's a slower win-con than Jace 3. So even though Jace is faster, it useful in less situations. Lastly, Jace is uninteractive and unfun. I don't cut cards exclusively for these reasons, but it's certainly a contributing factor. It's not fun or intuitive winning with or losing to that card.
Kalonian Hydra is everything I ever hoped Jace, Memory Adept could be. It wins just as fast, but it can protect me the turn it resolves, it pulls in the same direction as the rest of my win-cons and if it only connects once before being removed, it at least gave me some value. Jace is a fine card, but I think there are better ways to win at the end of my curve in blue.
I will be interested in how you feel about the cuts and what you decide to cut too.
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Again, very appreciative of your cube as a point of reference every time I need to make a difficult cut or addition.
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Some questions (to help me review my own new 365 list):
1) Is Force Spike over Daze a close call at all?
2) Is Volrath's Stronghold really that good to warrant a spot over things like, e.g. Yawgmoth's Will, Living Death, or Curse of Shallow Graves?
3) You cut Nevinyrral's Disk and kept Engineered Explosives? Does this have anything to do with your continued support for Tokens (more than I left in my purge, at least), or do you think it's a better card in general?
4) What M15 additions do you intend? I guess (from what you've said previously) Goblin Rabblemaster over Prophetic Flamespeaker and Reclamation Sage over Viridian Shaman? Anything else?
Apart from that, almost all differences between our lists can easily be explained by our respective choices on supported archetypes, or pet cards (for me Domri Rade, Knight of the Reliquary and Isochron Scepter, among others, for you things like Exalted Angel and Triskelion). That's encouraging.
A Comprehensive list of Cube Archetypes
Some questions (to help me review my own new 365 list):
1) Is Force Spike over Daze a close call at all?
2) Is Volrath's Stronghold really that good to warrant a spot over things like, e.g. Yawgmoth's Will, Living Death, or Curse of Shallow Graves?
3) You cut Nevinyrral's Disk and kept Engineered Explosives? Does this have anything to do with your continued support for Tokens (more than I left in my purge, at least), or do you think it's a better card in general?
4) What M15 additions do you intend? I guess (from what you've said previously) Goblin Rabblemaster over Prophetic Flamespeaker and Reclamation Sage over Viridian Shaman? Anything else?
Apart from that, almost all differences between our lists can easily be explained by our respective choices on supported archetypes, or pet cards (for me Domri Rade, Knight of the Reliquary and Isochron Scepter, among others, for you things like Exalted Angel and Triskelion). That's encouraging.
A Comprehensive list of Cube Archetypes
Thanks man. It'll be a fun testing period to see how the smaller cube list goes this time around.
It is not because of their powerlevel. It's because I don't think they're as necessary with the smaller size and the scaled back dedicated archetype cards.
360 lists can look quite different from mine if the intention is to regularly be drafting it with 8 players. You can support any archetype you want in that kind of environment. But since I'm averaging 2-6, I had to be careful trying to support decks that will be hard to have come together right in Winston, Sealed and 4-player drafts.
1) Force Spike vs Daze is close. Spike is better if you play more control, Daze is better if you play more tempo. Not knowing which direction my playgroup might lean at 360, I erred on the side of caution and kept Spike in for now.
2) I really think it is. I ranked Stronghold in my top 20 for black this year. It's a powerful card for recurring specific toolbox creatures you might need, it's got spectacular synergy with Sneak Attack, and it allows you to topdeck nothing but gas when you've got dead critters to get back.
3) A little of both. I like the surgical nature of EE's removal, and it's better against moxen and tokens. I found it increasingly harder and harder to find the perfect deck to make Disk asymmetrical, since control has evolved into using more artifacts, removal enchantments and utility creatures as a regular pert of their gameplan. The deck where Disc is truly monstrous is rarer than it used to be (although it's still there, and Disc is very good in it when it does come together).
4) Yes, once I scaled down to 360, it's just Sage and Rabblemaster.
And I agree with the encouraging note regarding the variance at 360. I still have room for some cards that are personal favorites of mine, and it will still be different from other small cube lists.
..........
Thanks for the comments guys! It's important to note 2 things here:
1) I may not stick to this size, it's going to be an (albeit extensive) trial run.
2) I will be tinkering with the current list, so this isn't necessarily my perfect 360 composition ...just the first draft.
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I probably would've kept Curse of Shallow Graves if at all possible, but I'm not sure that would be the right choice.
Cheers,
rant
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The cut of Genesis was largely due to the increased anticipated speed of the newer list. Even against control, I expect the length of the average game to go down by roughly a turn, which damages the value of a card that's intended to grind out wins in the supreme late game. However, I freaking love Genesis. If that expectation turns out to be unfounded and midrange continues losing long grindy games to control, he'll go right the hell back in.
The addition of Huntmaster was due to a few things. First off, the deck that really wanted Xenagos (super ramp) was purged. The necessity for Maniac dropped. So, I basically had a free slot. Given the loss of a life-gain creature trigger (Missionary), creatures that can damage other creatures and players directly (Redcap) and a 4cc token maker (Xenagos) I thought that Huntmaster could slide in and simultaneously fill three roles that were slightly reduced in the drop to 375.
Cheers Rant, and happy cubing bud!
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Force Spike vs. Daze: I'd go with Force Spike as well if I could only have one, I think there are more decks that want it than Daze. I really wanted to suggest a different cut so you can keep both (because Daze is great in blue tempo, a deck that I love), but I did not find one.
I like Flickerwisp more than Mirror Entity and Mirran Crusader. I think Mirror Entity is too mana intensive in most games. My issue with Mirran Crusader is mostly the protection part, I don't like protection because it is randomly either very good or irrelevant. In constructed, you include protection creatures to target specific decks that you have trouble beating, but in limited you include protection creatures because they are in the right color and have the right mana cost and you really hope to play against a deck where the protection kicks in because otherwise the creature is a bit underwhelming.
I did not do the math, but I feel like I would try to keep Vampire Lacerator in even if it is the worst of the 2 power one drops. These creatures are always good in order to pressure your opponent. For possible cuts, because of mana curve considerations, I'd look at three drops where Hypnotic Specter or Master of the Feast strike me as somewhat expendable. Nezumi Graverobber or Dance of the Dead (if that leaves you with enough reanimation spells, which is not the case I guess because otherwise you would have kept something else in over the Dance) are other possible cuts.
I perfectly understand the Tattermunge Maniac cut. Did you have the chance to see it in play? I'm curious to read about your experience with the drawback.
"What am I looking at? Ashes, dead man."
I also really like Flickerwisp (and kinda missed it for the Blink/Bounce deck), and was looking for another potential cut. I like Entity quite a bit (for Token/Anthem support), but I'll keep my eye on the Crusader. Thanks for the suggestion.
In our in-draft experience, I had more than enough black spells that my aggro decks wanted to be playing on turn 1. This is largely due to the fact that it can pick up redundancies from the spell section, with Duress, Inquisition, Thoughtseize and even Dark Ritual serving as viable (and often times preferable) T1 options. I found myself cutting Lacerator as an unnecessary 8th or 9th 1cc aggro spell for our 2cc aggro decks, and that was at 465. I think I can get away with one less aggro beater at 375, but be assured I'll be keeping a close eye on it. As an aside, if you consider Master of the Feast expendable, I suggest playing it a few more times. I made a grave mistake not including it on my black top 20 list this year. I think I need Dance as a redundancy for reanimator, especially if I anticipate doing a lot of 4-player drafts. I'll freely admit that I have an unnatural attachment to both Specter and Graverobber, so maybe that's playing a bigger role in my evaluation.
Maniac was just a cut based on necessity, not for powerlevel. It's a fine filler aggro beater if both the red and green sides are valuable. If you only support aggro in one of those two colors, it loses a lot of its value. The reason why I think it's a 450-worthy spell is largely in part to its flexibility, which requires green aggro support to take advantage of. The drawback is relevant, but the value of playing it in so many aggro decks more than makes up for it. I ranked it higher than Kird Ape this year.
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However, it's certainly possible to do if you're inclined.
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Thanks for sharing!
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The Shotgun Wedding - Don't commit early unless you absolutely have to.
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Edit:
Also, My M15 article is done! Link in my sig!
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Now regarding cube size, I'd say that perhaps the only issue is the competition at the colourless slot costing 7. I prefer (only slightly) Myr Battlesphere, but I play Searcher above Karn who doesn't fulfil enough of my criteria for an expensive card. I have yet to see Aether Searcher attached to something that would be less explosive than Karn, and seeing as it's also much more versatile it's an easy include for us. Upping the number of colourless finishers and reducing the coloured ones has proven to be a good move in general for our cube, so two 7 mana cards has been OK.
On spoiled card wishlisting and 'should-have-had'-isms:
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