cant we get it managed, that we play our cubes online with our community? like every (2nd?) week we draft and then play matches in our spare times. all we need to manage to get 6-8 people online at the same time for estimated 30-60mins to draft. like on sunday.
id love to draft my cubes with you and i also like to draft your cubes to see new interactions and to evaluate certain cards better. my playgroup has fallen apart last year an im lucky to get 2 drafts a year started.
id have to check the options, but i know there is at least one site that allows for multiplayer drafting and then you can play out the games on cockatrice or some other magic client. mtgo would be my last option honestly.
ok, you can livedraft cubes on http://tappedout.net if youre registered. As client id recommend cockatrice, because it like magicworkstation, but more stable and there are no incompatibilities
Well your 1cc is the hardest in all but Red as they have good removals at that cost. The "overall" rules you are looking for is somewhat defined by the balance pf your cube itself.
form follows function. meaning there is no set rule. you could have spells only in green and be happy about it. rule of thumb would be around at least 50% creatures overall and you should have a reasonable curve. overloading the cc3 slot wont make enjoyable draft decks in the end.
I will be picking up the new Snap for the artwork. It's like a million times better than the old.
I was thinking about Minotaur Sureshot and then once again pondering why I see so few green 3 drops with reach in people's cubes. There are a lot of 1 toughness two and three drop flyers about in most cubes. All you ever see is Crocanura though. Defensive reach creatures make good defenders all round. It seems most other options are ranked as borderline or bad.
The old classic Woolly Spider blocks every flyer in pauper cube and survives. It kills all two drop flyers and even a lot of three and four drop flyers. It also has acceptable artwork for an old card. That seems pretty awesome to me. The double green on turn three is a bit of a doozy, but it is relevant all game so doesn't always have to come down on curve.
Ember Weaver I have cheated this into green before as it becomes a boss in red green decks. However, as a strictly green card it is merely acceptable.
Netcaster Spider Quite reasonable as it does its job early and will trade for the bigger flyers. It can go in for the attack and put out damage if required.
Sporecap Spider is unexciting, but it blocks everything your opponents can throw at it until turn 5 most likely, flying or otherwise. It will happily kill all 2 drop flyers.
Silhana Starfletcher Not as resilient as the other two options, but it also fixes and ramps. It seems to be a jack of all trades, master of
none.
Frostweb Spider Everyone always seems to hate on this card saying that you will never get counters on it. However, if this isn't getting counters on it, then surely it is doing its job and has delayed your opponent's early flyers from attacking?
Pincer Spider is acceptable on curve and still has relevance when drawn late. Neither option really blows the mind though.
Oran-Rief Recluse doesn't really do enough on curve, but the six mana version kills a flyer and leaves you with an unimpressive blocker on turn six. It also seems like a sideboard only card most of the time. I think I would prefer a Tangle Spider and be limited to only being able to eat an attacker, but getting a more useful body in return.
Honourable mention goes to Juvenile Gloomwidow at the two drop spot. Unfortunately the double green makes it unacceptable.
Is the main drawback to these spideys the fact that most of them are unimpressive when you need to put the hurts on your opponents? The 2 power variants seem acceptable at the 3 mana slot.
which is more than enough in my book. the most problematic flyers are the 4power blue guys anyway, but i definitely wouldnt run the suboptimal spiders you mention there. if i had more slots id run the big spiders from the t2 as well.
Juvenile Gloomwidow (borderline) & Garruk's Companion (cubeable) I think that double mana on any two drop you really need to play on curve is unplayable. I think they are both borderline. Although 3/2 on turn two is nice, it still trades with everything and won't be castable on turn two half the time. If Terrain Elemental is cubeable then it either needs to go to staple or Garruk's Companion needs to go to borderline as the elemental is way ahead due to being reliably cast on turn two.
Werebear is cubeable and Ulvenwald Captive is borderline. Outside of a deck that is looking to mill for delve which in itself kind of plays against threshold, although it does give you another card that can cash in on cards in the graveyard; I would prefer the opportunity to guarantee my mana dork turning into a 4/6 beater for 7 mana that can still also provide an extra 2 mana. I also think being unpingable is a solid positive of the captive. Defender is largely irrelevant as you would so rarely find the chance to attack with either until they transform. I think the Werebear suits more aggressive decks, but do you really want to spend your second turn ramping in such decks? Has anyone had a chance to play Ulvenwald Captive much? Also compare it to cubeable Voyaging Satyr, the satyr fixes double mana and can combo off with one or two other cards in your cube that enchant land, but the body will never be relevant and this card is junk when drawn late, unless you have those land enchantments when it might ramp you to your 7 or 8 drop. It is rated cubeable. Unless I had Utopia Sprawl or Overgrowth in my deck I would take the other two every time.
Quilled Wolf A pet card of mine. Is being a 2/2 on turn two bad enough to put this at borderline, even though this is a totally acceptable manasink draw late game, unlike the majority of green 2 drops? Wandering Wolf is rated cubeable, but similar to the Voyaging Satyr it is only of any value when comboed with a handful of auras, unless you like using combat tricks pre-combat. Unless I have a decent number of auras in my deck I would take the Quilled Wolf every time.
If you can't tell, I place a lot of value in two drops that are good when drawn on curve or drawn late.
the ratings are many years old now. werebear might have been playable at one point, but it definitely isnt anymore. my impression is the ratings were influenced by its performance in constructed though. I had it in my cube in the beginning as well and outside of deep gy strategies unplayable.
Id never run Ulvenwald (bad) and defintely never the satyr (horrible). who did rate it cubable in the first place?
Gloomwidow is just bad and ever was. no idea why its borderline. Companion definitely looked better back then and is just borderline now.
Wandering Wolf is borderline, because it can work in aura-archetype. The Quilled Wolf is just bad. Ive tried it during my last drafts and you definitely never find the mana to pump it just for one turn.
If wandering wolf gets a borderline for archetype support then surely any card that becomes useful in the non-powered cube archetypes should get some consideration as well, such as the captive. In my cube, games go long all the time, partly because of what is in the cube and largely because most of my mates aren't very experienced deck builders or magic players. Any cards that give additional benefits lategame seem good to me.
i kinda remember we had a similar discussion about ulvenwald. thing is, it doesnt add anything special to any archetype. its just a useless wall with horrible stats until it becomes an overcosted beater with horrible stats and a useless ability. i cant think of any situation where id run it above Wirewood Guardian or Elvish Aberration or simple Wall of Roots
also it ended being borderline which is fine for me and got the consideration.
having mediocre drafters or force them to play with bad cards to fill the curve doesnt make them better
cut them, theyre really bad.
if you want to have a strong and filled out multicolor support run 10 bouncelands, 10 signets, the 2 fetchlands and ash barrens.
So I'm getting back into pauper cube after a year or so of not playing MTG at all, so obviously I have a lot of catching up and playtesting to do
My two main questions right now while I start playtesting stuff are:
(a) Over the last year or so, what are the main archetype-level or color-defining shifts you've noticed in your cube? What new archetypes are increasingly viable that weren't really before, what archetypes do you see drafted the most because of newer cards, and what older archetypes just can't keep up anymore?
(b) What "old school" pauper cube staples/cubeable cards have you noticed starting to fall off with each new set? I spent 2012-early 2016ish putting a *lot* of effort into my pauper cube, so I'll readily admit that right now my card evaluations skew in favor of older cards that I have a lot of playtest experience with; it would be helpful to get some other opinions from people that have played a lot with the more recent cards.
Failed Ideas & Mechanics
Delirium
Colorless-matters
Madness (added stuff but nothing worth changing for)
Artifacts-matter & Energy (still not enough)
Sacrifice (Exploit) got toys but imo, not enough to make the Archetype better than Fringe
"Duh" updates:
Green got more efficient fatties at 4+
Red's 2cc is clogged Tandem Lookout got downshifted. It is awesome for any x/u deck. Ash Barrens is another useful "fetch" you basically need to have.
RG Beats got some nice additional tools and make the archetype more consistent.
UR Spells matters were a little bit underwhelming lately, but direct support are only 2 gold cards anyway.
Depending on your last update, blue got a bunch of Manowars which builds strong tempo decks.
Some nice downshifts in Moma lateley.
Archetype driven cubes got even more support for tokens and some stuff for discard and sacrifice shenenigans.
I know some will jump on the chance to hate, but Amonkhet adding a few cycling fatties and some versatile middle-of-the-pack cards helps Sealed and lowered power cubes (i am a powered down cuber).
The Ash Barrens and Terrain Elemental usual require TCGplayer to find as they are product exclusives.
Thanks for the replies, everyone! A few follow-up questions:
a) The last time I really did stuff with my cube, aggro/tempo and tempo/control decks seemed waaay too good. Is that still the case, or have some of the other archetypes been able to catch up? It looks like traditional midrange good stuff is still solid, stompy aggro has got a lot of tools recently, and hexproof / auras might have gotten a bit better, but how do more traditional control decks fare? Or have those basically disappeared?
b) It looks like a lot of people have given up on supporting ramp as the card pool has gotten a lot more efficient and ramp finishers haven't kept up. That's fine with me (I remember ramp being pretty mediocre a year ago anyway ...); that said, for those of you who have drastically cut ramp support, how has that changed your evaluation of non-green cards that worked really well with green ramp cards like Capsize, Troubled Healer, or the red X-damage spells? Also, apart from the obvious ramp targets, etc., how else did you change up your green sections when you cut out ramp support?
If you run mtgo-only commons and have access to Battle Screech and Beetleback Chief swarm becomes more and more viable as an archetype, that can compete in a power oriented environment.
I don't use online-only commons, unfortunately :/ It looks like there's still a decent number of options, but not having those two cards hurts. Questions on the token deck:
c1) How often does the token deck actually come together in either or both draft and sealed? The big issues for me with this archetype is that I probably won't have a full 8-person draft (and even then, I have a 450 card cube) or I'll be playing sealed. That means if I want to push an archetype, it needs a higher density of cards that are both synergistic and potentially playable even if the archetype deck doesn't come together.
c2) Are the token / swarm decks you see primarily R/W or do you see a lot of R/G or Naya token decks? I purposefully don't include much fixing to try and push two-colored decks, so I'm hesitant to push a token archetype if it often needs three colors to really work.
-Ramp slots became aggro slots
-I cut X-Spells in red and Capsize to encourage healthier, tighter, play.
**Not having Screech and Chieftan imo hobbles the chances at good Swarm. Their CC was everything, other Army-in-a-can cost too much or don't do enough. RW's other identities seem weak by comparison. /SoapBox
-Aggro/Tempo really is the best if the cards come together.
-Real control has less and less 2-for-1's in recent sets. And not having Chainer's Edict is a rougher time. That said, the new cycling cards for U/B help. Unburden from Onslaught is joined by Wander in Death, Hieroglyphic Illumination, and Shimmerscale Drake.
++Tokens lost most of my green support with the inclusion of Screech/Chieftan. They are better. But if you wanna push Green Swarm, you have a few from Battle for Zendikar to meet Zendikar's Eldrazi Spawn bodies. Using enough GW gold cards to support multiple targets could work. But the best Mass Pump will be from White. May even have to use the Body + Token guys from Kaladesh they aren't great, better in Sealed.
××Ramp & Swarm are friends:
-Eldrazi green bodies that also give tokens work in both strategies.
-Ulvenwald Captive is Ramp+threat all in 1.
Ive never run ramp in the T1, so I didnt change anything there. I still run all the strong endgame spells nonetheless.
Control has been and is still almost exclusive to a Bx shell and needs a heavy dedication of black for it to work. The archetype got some nice tools as well.
Imo,to have a reliable tokensupport you have to dedicate basically 50% of whites and reds section to that archetype to make it useful. Green has maybe 5 strong tokencards as well, but you could also keep it exclusive to RW. Whether or not you want to make that sacrifice its up to you.
Saddleback is.. Um.. passable in a Swarm Archetype. But WG has better cards as well as White or Red. If anything, Swarm dovetails with Aggro and Midrange to ask for value bodies.
id love to draft my cubes with you and i also like to draft your cubes to see new interactions and to evaluate certain cards better. my playgroup has fallen apart last year an im lucky to get 2 drafts a year started.
T2 powpercube Value https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/37t
I've had the parrot in every cube I've ever made, it's embodied perfection
I've had some good times with wordmail too, as part of a larger auras/enchantments package. Usually +2/+2 unless you get the wombo combo like blade of the sixth pride or order of the golden cricket. 5/5 syndic of tithes isn't bad. Randomly wombos with some out of color guys too like sentinels of glen elendra becomes a 6/7 flier.
Knowledge is power, money is power, time is money, you are actually gaining time by reading my posts
check out my EDH and Pauper EDH decks here
Loose Change Pauper Cube-cast
Pauper Cube Article #1
Pauper Cube Article #2
Personal Enjoyment Cube
Or are you interested in a Fiora flavor cube? Conspire and win!
Level 2 Judge
T2 powpercube Value https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/37t
i made a thread
http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/the-cube-forum/pauper-peasant-discussion/772085-actually-drafting-and-playing-our-cubes-online
T2 powpercube Value https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/37t
I myself have this: Cube By Curve.
Overall I try to keep Aggro viable above all else as it needs the most curve assistance.
Loose Change Pauper Cube-cast
Pauper Cube Article #1
Pauper Cube Article #2
Personal Enjoyment Cube
T2 powpercube Value https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/37t
Or are you interested in a Fiora flavor cube? Conspire and win!
Level 2 Judge
I was thinking about Minotaur Sureshot and then once again pondering why I see so few green 3 drops with reach in people's cubes. There are a lot of 1 toughness two and three drop flyers about in most cubes. All you ever see is Crocanura though. Defensive reach creatures make good defenders all round. It seems most other options are ranked as borderline or bad.
The old classic Woolly Spider blocks every flyer in pauper cube and survives. It kills all two drop flyers and even a lot of three and four drop flyers. It also has acceptable artwork for an old card. That seems pretty awesome to me. The double green on turn three is a bit of a doozy, but it is relevant all game so doesn't always have to come down on curve.
Ember Weaver I have cheated this into green before as it becomes a boss in red green decks. However, as a strictly green card it is merely acceptable.
Netcaster Spider Quite reasonable as it does its job early and will trade for the bigger flyers. It can go in for the attack and put out damage if required.
Sporecap Spider is unexciting, but it blocks everything your opponents can throw at it until turn 5 most likely, flying or otherwise. It will happily kill all 2 drop flyers.
Silhana Starfletcher Not as resilient as the other two options, but it also fixes and ramps. It seems to be a jack of all trades, master of
none.
Frostweb Spider Everyone always seems to hate on this card saying that you will never get counters on it. However, if this isn't getting counters on it, then surely it is doing its job and has delayed your opponent's early flyers from attacking?
Pincer Spider is acceptable on curve and still has relevance when drawn late. Neither option really blows the mind though.
Oran-Rief Recluse doesn't really do enough on curve, but the six mana version kills a flyer and leaves you with an unimpressive blocker on turn six. It also seems like a sideboard only card most of the time. I think I would prefer a Tangle Spider and be limited to only being able to eat an attacker, but getting a more useful body in return.
Honourable mention goes to Juvenile Gloomwidow at the two drop spot. Unfortunately the double green makes it unacceptable.
Is the main drawback to these spideys the fact that most of them are unimpressive when you need to put the hurts on your opponents? The 2 power variants seem acceptable at the 3 mana slot.
My singleton Masters Cube
why comment on woolly spider, when Netcaster Spider is the strictly upgrade anyways?
glancing over my t1 ive got the following solutions in green
Deadly Recluse
Thornweald Archer
Crocanura
Penumbra Spider
Nessian Asp
which is more than enough in my book. the most problematic flyers are the 4power blue guys anyway, but i definitely wouldnt run the suboptimal spiders you mention there. if i had more slots id run the big spiders from the t2 as well.
in my T2 i 9 flyer more and adjusted green to have a little better defense and tried some of your stuff, but only
Silhana Starfletcher made the cut besides
Giant Dustwasp
Aerie Bowmasters
Thrashing Mossdog
Sentinel Spider
Somberwald Spider
and ill probably readd Longshot Squad as well
T2 powpercube Value https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/37t
Juvenile Gloomwidow (borderline) & Garruk's Companion (cubeable) I think that double mana on any two drop you really need to play on curve is unplayable. I think they are both borderline. Although 3/2 on turn two is nice, it still trades with everything and won't be castable on turn two half the time. If Terrain Elemental is cubeable then it either needs to go to staple or Garruk's Companion needs to go to borderline as the elemental is way ahead due to being reliably cast on turn two.
Werebear is cubeable and Ulvenwald Captive is borderline. Outside of a deck that is looking to mill for delve which in itself kind of plays against threshold, although it does give you another card that can cash in on cards in the graveyard; I would prefer the opportunity to guarantee my mana dork turning into a 4/6 beater for 7 mana that can still also provide an extra 2 mana. I also think being unpingable is a solid positive of the captive. Defender is largely irrelevant as you would so rarely find the chance to attack with either until they transform. I think the Werebear suits more aggressive decks, but do you really want to spend your second turn ramping in such decks? Has anyone had a chance to play Ulvenwald Captive much? Also compare it to cubeable Voyaging Satyr, the satyr fixes double mana and can combo off with one or two other cards in your cube that enchant land, but the body will never be relevant and this card is junk when drawn late, unless you have those land enchantments when it might ramp you to your 7 or 8 drop. It is rated cubeable. Unless I had Utopia Sprawl or Overgrowth in my deck I would take the other two every time.
Quilled Wolf A pet card of mine. Is being a 2/2 on turn two bad enough to put this at borderline, even though this is a totally acceptable manasink draw late game, unlike the majority of green 2 drops? Wandering Wolf is rated cubeable, but similar to the Voyaging Satyr it is only of any value when comboed with a handful of auras, unless you like using combat tricks pre-combat. Unless I have a decent number of auras in my deck I would take the Quilled Wolf every time.
If you can't tell, I place a lot of value in two drops that are good when drawn on curve or drawn late.
My singleton Masters Cube
Id never run Ulvenwald (bad) and defintely never the satyr (horrible). who did rate it cubable in the first place?
Gloomwidow is just bad and ever was. no idea why its borderline. Companion definitely looked better back then and is just borderline now.
Wandering Wolf is borderline, because it can work in aura-archetype. The Quilled Wolf is just bad. Ive tried it during my last drafts and you definitely never find the mana to pump it just for one turn.
T2 powpercube Value https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/37t
My singleton Masters Cube
also it ended being borderline which is fine for me and got the consideration.
having mediocre drafters or force them to play with bad cards to fill the curve doesnt make them better
T2 powpercube Value https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/37t
Or are you interested in a Fiora flavor cube? Conspire and win!
Level 2 Judge
if you want to have a strong and filled out multicolor support run 10 bouncelands, 10 signets, the 2 fetchlands and ash barrens.
T2 powpercube Value https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/37t
My two main questions right now while I start playtesting stuff are:
(a) Over the last year or so, what are the main archetype-level or color-defining shifts you've noticed in your cube? What new archetypes are increasingly viable that weren't really before, what archetypes do you see drafted the most because of newer cards, and what older archetypes just can't keep up anymore?
(b) What "old school" pauper cube staples/cubeable cards have you noticed starting to fall off with each new set? I spent 2012-early 2016ish putting a *lot* of effort into my pauper cube, so I'll readily admit that right now my card evaluations skew in favor of older cards that I have a lot of playtest experience with; it would be helpful to get some other opinions from people that have played a lot with the more recent cards.
Failed Ideas & Mechanics
Delirium
Colorless-matters
Madness (added stuff but nothing worth changing for)
Artifacts-matter & Energy (still not enough)
Sacrifice (Exploit) got toys but imo, not enough to make the Archetype better than Fringe
"Duh" updates:
Green got more efficient fatties at 4+
Red's 2cc is clogged
Tandem Lookout got downshifted. It is awesome for any x/u deck.
Ash Barrens is another useful "fetch" you basically need to have.
Loose Change Pauper Cube-cast
Pauper Cube Article #1
Pauper Cube Article #2
Personal Enjoyment Cube
UR Spells matters were a little bit underwhelming lately, but direct support are only 2 gold cards anyway.
Depending on your last update, blue got a bunch of Manowars which builds strong tempo decks.
Some nice downshifts in Moma lateley.
Archetype driven cubes got even more support for tokens and some stuff for discard and sacrifice shenenigans.
check my cubes for the cards ive included.
T2 powpercube Value https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/37t
The Ash Barrens and Terrain Elemental usual require TCGplayer to find as they are product exclusives.
Loose Change Pauper Cube-cast
Pauper Cube Article #1
Pauper Cube Article #2
Personal Enjoyment Cube
a) The last time I really did stuff with my cube, aggro/tempo and tempo/control decks seemed waaay too good. Is that still the case, or have some of the other archetypes been able to catch up? It looks like traditional midrange good stuff is still solid, stompy aggro has got a lot of tools recently, and hexproof / auras might have gotten a bit better, but how do more traditional control decks fare? Or have those basically disappeared?
b) It looks like a lot of people have given up on supporting ramp as the card pool has gotten a lot more efficient and ramp finishers haven't kept up. That's fine with me (I remember ramp being pretty mediocre a year ago anyway ...); that said, for those of you who have drastically cut ramp support, how has that changed your evaluation of non-green cards that worked really well with green ramp cards like Capsize, Troubled Healer, or the red X-damage spells? Also, apart from the obvious ramp targets, etc., how else did you change up your green sections when you cut out ramp support?
I don't use online-only commons, unfortunately :/ It looks like there's still a decent number of options, but not having those two cards hurts. Questions on the token deck:
c1) How often does the token deck actually come together in either or both draft and sealed? The big issues for me with this archetype is that I probably won't have a full 8-person draft (and even then, I have a 450 card cube) or I'll be playing sealed. That means if I want to push an archetype, it needs a higher density of cards that are both synergistic and potentially playable even if the archetype deck doesn't come together.
c2) Are the token / swarm decks you see primarily R/W or do you see a lot of R/G or Naya token decks? I purposefully don't include much fixing to try and push two-colored decks, so I'm hesitant to push a token archetype if it often needs three colors to really work.
-I cut X-Spells in red and Capsize to encourage healthier, tighter, play.
**Not having Screech and Chieftan imo hobbles the chances at good Swarm. Their CC was everything, other Army-in-a-can cost too much or don't do enough. RW's other identities seem weak by comparison. /SoapBox
-Aggro/Tempo really is the best if the cards come together.
-Real control has less and less 2-for-1's in recent sets. And not having Chainer's Edict is a rougher time. That said, the new cycling cards for U/B help. Unburden from Onslaught is joined by Wander in Death, Hieroglyphic Illumination, and Shimmerscale Drake.
++Tokens lost most of my green support with the inclusion of Screech/Chieftan. They are better. But if you wanna push Green Swarm, you have a few from Battle for Zendikar to meet Zendikar's Eldrazi Spawn bodies. Using enough GW gold cards to support multiple targets could work. But the best Mass Pump will be from White. May even have to use the Body + Token guys from Kaladesh they aren't great, better in Sealed.
××Ramp & Swarm are friends:
-Eldrazi green bodies that also give tokens work in both strategies.
-Ulvenwald Captive is Ramp+threat all in 1.
Loose Change Pauper Cube-cast
Pauper Cube Article #1
Pauper Cube Article #2
Personal Enjoyment Cube
Control has been and is still almost exclusive to a Bx shell and needs a heavy dedication of black for it to work. The archetype got some nice tools as well.
Imo,to have a reliable tokensupport you have to dedicate basically 50% of whites and reds section to that archetype to make it useful. Green has maybe 5 strong tokencards as well, but you could also keep it exclusive to RW. Whether or not you want to make that sacrifice its up to you.
T2 powpercube Value https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/37t
- Peema Outsider
- Eyeless Watcher
- Kozilek's Predator
- Nest Invader
- Scion Summoner
- Saddleback Lagac
- Symbiosis
Saddleback is.. Um.. passable in a Swarm Archetype. But WG has better cards as well as White or Red. If anything, Swarm dovetails with Aggro and Midrange to ask for value bodies.Loose Change Pauper Cube-cast
Pauper Cube Article #1
Pauper Cube Article #2
Personal Enjoyment Cube