Honestly part of why I never considered proxying ABU duals is that I really just don't want more gold cards in my cube. At least the manlands I run "add" something. And I haven't really noticed that my fixing is bad for aggro since I run no CC 2 drops and perhaps have just become desensitized to it since I haven't played constructed since the obama administration. First term
Honestly part of why I never considered proxying ABU duals is that I really just don't want more gold cards in my cube. At least the manlands I run "add" something. And I haven't really noticed that my fixing is bad for aggro since I run no CC 2 drops and perhaps have just become desensitized to it since I haven't played constructed since the obama administration. First term
The reason I run the fetch and dual suite is because they do add something. They have synergy with each other and other cards like Tithe or Farseek or Land Grant. They add a minigame to the draft. They can also be graveyard filler or provide shuffling for cards like Brainstorm, Top, Sylvan Library, Ponder, etc.
Power level aside, most other cycles of fixing lands don't have much, if any synergy with each other. But if I'm playing White/Black and I have a Godless Shrine, an Arid Mesa is a card I want. That's neat.
That's why I run most of the fetch/dual suite (sans the trimoes because I think that they're too good) even though I'm not concerned with the cards in my cube being maximized for power. Fetches and duals are just more fun than Kamigawa duals or painlands or whatever and it's not because they're more powerful.
In my 360 I'm running Acolyte and Kongming currently, with Kor Sanctifiers and Palace Jailer rounding out the four drops. I cut Captain for Acolyte because I wanted to keep Kongming in for and extended test, but I think Captain is the better card.
Commander in particular already looked questionable. Would you say Veteran/Crusader are playable? I was somewhat even on the first 4 you listed and listed the last two for completeness sakes, but am also trying to narrow down to 2 I think.
I think they are playable, but probably not at 360 assuming you don't have any restrictions limiting your card accessibility. I've liked four or five 4-drops at 360, depending on what you're running in the 5 and 6 drop slots. I'll add that I run Sanctifiers because my artifact section is a bit larger than what you normally see in peasant lists and I feel like I need the answers. That card could certainly be swapped out if you preferred more aggressive options. Palace Jailer is a staple, IMO, but I can also see why you wouldn't want it if you didn't like the Monarch mechanic in general.
I hadn't really looked at Sanctifiers yet, but will keep it in mind as the rest of the cube comes together. Jailer looks like a lock imo, our group is coming from constructed pauper, so no real worry about the monarch. Calciderm, Guardian of the Guildpact and Master Splicer were others I was considering strongly. Oh, and the spells that generate tokens.
I run Curse of shallow graves, but it's the card closest to be banned in my cube. Curse of predation is probably the second contender. My current banlist consist of cards that are hard to interact with and makes the opponent know they have lost the game, but it will still take a while before the game comes to an end.
I cut Faerie conclave and Treetop village when I reduced my cube size from 360. My cube is now at 240 cards. I doubt I will add them, though access to sweepers might change my opinion.
I have banned Curse of Shallow Graves. I think it's way less problematic than Curse of Predation and possibly the least powerful card out of all the cards I have banned for power reasons, but ultimately it can lead to almost inevitable and thus unfun 'powered cube' situations often enough, which is not what I want in my cube.
I like both Faerie Conclave and Treetop Village, but I'm not very attached to them. I think they're in the lower 30% of cards in their section, but currently it's unlikely they'll get cut. I would cut Treetop Village before Faerie Conclave.
I have not banned Curse of Shallow Graves, but I did swap it out for Curse of Disturbance (which is arguably better when we occasionally have a multiplayer game). Neither one has ever been a problem.
I don't run the manlands. I only have one land (Rogue's Passage) that doesn't fix multiple colors.
Mana Drain/Hymn to Tourach look kinda like bans to me.
If I could afford a Mana Drain, it would be in a Commander deck. I haven't banned it from my cube and would run it if I owned it. Hymn to Tourach I've never actually considered for my cube, though I used to run it in mono-black 60-card decks. Is it really that good in peasant? With double black pips, it often won't be cast until turn 3-4, at which point the randomness isn't as devastating. I also don't have a discard theme, but I could consider it as a stand-alone.
I've banned (or don't play) anything that can't be reasonably dealt with through creatures/single target removal. I think it took 2 games of evasive 2 drop -> Curse of the Shallow Graves to realize it wasn't reasonable to deal with.
I'm not especially attached to either Faerie Conclave or Treetop Village, but I can't imagine a case where either of them are cut. They're both middle to high picks and I'd be surprised if better coloured utility lands were printed to push them out (with mdfcs maybe it's possible, but they'd need significant complexity creep).
I don't have a ban list for my peasant cube, but there are cards that I don't include even though they are technically uncommons. Sol Ring, Sylvan Library, Force of Will, Mana Drain, etc.
Curst of Disturbance is technically better than Curse of Shallow Graves even in two player games, since the zombies ETB untapped. I'm still running both.
Faerie Conclave and Treetop Village are both still great, IMO. Urza's Legacy was one of the first few sets to release after I started playing Magic, though, so perhaps I am a bit attached.
Funky dragon, what is your opposition to monocolored lands?
Eldamir, I remember when crystal shard was undoubtedly godlike in our environment, but I feel like the viability of grindy antitempo strategies has gotten worse as our beaters and tokens have gotten better. Besides the obvious fact that they apply more pressure on the shard-player, the fact that crystal shard nullifies removal means that it is nullifying a smaller amount of the powerful cards in our decks (since removal has always been great, unlike creatures) Perhaps you could revisit the card if aggro and tokens strategies get a boost/you cut the card a long time ago.
//
Anyway, thanks for the responses. I think I have to cut curse of shallow graves in my commander legends update. Alongside swapping artisan of kozilek out of colorless and into green.
And cut the riot enchantment for something else. Suggestions for best non-bloodbraid gruul card?
Funky dragon, what is your opposition to monocolored lands?
Manlands are fun and can be creatures that avoid sorcery speed removal, but I just didn't want to devote too many slots to lands (I currently have 28/400 cards as lands, or 7% of my cube), and I wanted those slots mostly to enable colors so you could play the spells you drafted. I suppose if I thought of them as creatures first and lands second, that could change, but for me have been always lands and only sometimes creatures. Maybe I should consider them.
Eldamir, I remember when crystal shard was undoubtedly godlike in our environment, but I feel like the viability of grindy antitempo strategies has gotten worse as our beaters and tokens have gotten better. Besides the obvious fact that they apply more pressure on the shard-player, the fact that crystal shard nullifies removal means that it is nullifying a smaller amount of the powerful cards in our decks (since removal has always been great, unlike creatures) Perhaps you could revisit the card if aggro and tokens strategies get a boost/you cut the card a long time ago.
My wife wanted us to cut it, but I guess we could retry it. She usually prefers aggressive decks and tokens, while I often go for more synergies. The reason we cut it was that it generated to much card advantage and turned of enemy removal.
And Leelue, thanks for asking me about blue aggro/tempo. I have added blue bounce spells, and for the first time my wife liked playing a deck with blue. It was an aggressive Izzet deck with lots of interaction.
I'm considering changing up my guold sections. I have 2 cards per guild and would love to reincluding Soulherder, but I still want to keep a lord for the flyers deck. Also I would like for both guild cards to be playable in a single deck.
I also think it would be nice if the guild cards had some synergies with cards from other guilds. With 2 players, supporting 3 colour decks would make less cards be dead when drafting. For instance: soulherder conclave mentor sharktocrab skyrider patrol
Soulherder gets 2 counters end of turn, sharktocrab can be bounced to tap an enemy creature each round, skyrider patrol makes conclave mentor into a 4/4 flyer with one activaton.
When choosing gold cards, do you consider interaction between guilds? Do you support multiple strategies in a guild and can they be combined?
Edit: A guild card would have to synergize with 6 out of 9 other guilds. That seems impossible for every guild card.
... I wanted those slots mostly to enable colors so you could play the spells you drafted...
Well the more lands you run, the greater proportion of cards that are drafted will be played. Lands are the 24th and 25th playables. And in many cases the medium-tier 3 drop that you would remove for its cube slot isn't exactly doing any heavy lifting for any archetypes anyway. So I would recommend giving them a little more leniency than the average card.
I say this as I consider dropping my manlands, but still.
When choosing gold cards, do you consider interaction between guilds? Do you support multiple strategies in a guild and can they be combined?
Edit: A guild card would have to synergize with 6 out of 9 other guilds. That seems impossible for every guild card.
While some card effects have a very broad ability to synergize with others (blink especially) it really isn't possible to do across all pairs and triplets.
In my more ambitious youth, I considered making a set of magic cards where the wedges/shards had specific themes. For example, Jeskai may have been the trio that cared about artifacts and Grixis would have been the Madness/graveyard-based colors. So you could do UW artifacts, WR artifacts, BR graveyard, BU graveyard, butRU was both graveyard+artifacts and could do both.
It's technically possible to segregate the colors into a 3:2 ratio of shards:wedges instead of doing 5 wedges or 5 shards, btw.
If you ever want to branch out and have a themed cube, you could do something similar. I have. But it is prooobbabbly too much of a wrecking ball to retrofit into an established cube.
If you ever want to branch out and have a themed cube, you could do something similar. I have. But it is prooobbabbly too much of a wrecking ball to retrofit into an established cube.
I have and maintain three complete cubes, and I'm making final selections for the first iteration of my fourth cube. So, I definitely like themed cubes; each one makes for a very different play experience.
When choosing gold cards, do you consider interaction between guilds? Do you support multiple strategies in a guild and can they be combined?
Edit: A guild card would have to synergize with 6 out of 9 other guilds. That seems impossible for every guild card.
While some card effects have a very broad ability to synergize with others (blink especially) it really isn't possible to do across all pairs and triplets.
In my more ambitious youth, I considered making a set of magic cards where the wedges/shards had specific themes. For example, Jeskai may have been the trio that cared about artifacts and Grixis would have been the Madness/graveyard-based colors. So you could do UW artifacts, WR artifacts, BR graveyard, BU graveyard, butRU was both graveyard+artifacts and could do both.
It's technically possible to segregate the colors into a 3:2 ratio of shards:wedges instead of doing 5 wedges or 5 shards, btw.
If you ever want to branch out and have a themed cube, you could do something similar. I have. But it is prooobbabbly too much of a wrecking ball to retrofit into an established cube.
Yeah, I quickly realised this was impossible across all shards/wedges. I think I'l just go for powerful cards and cards that hint to strategies in those colours.
I guess I also will experiment with different archetypes in a single guild. I really want to bring back Soulherder, but as we still like the flying deck, I will probably keep one of the lords.
Currently running Empyrean Eagle and Thunderclap Wyvern which I will probably cut. I am considering testing Kangee, Sky Warden if I keep a card for flying matters as it should also be a decent finisher in a blue white control deck. Bonus point for being Kangee, because I had a bird deck back in invasion with Kangee, Aerie Keeper. That deck was not good though :-P With no synergy with Soulherder, I might just cut flying matters.
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The reason I run the fetch and dual suite is because they do add something. They have synergy with each other and other cards like Tithe or Farseek or Land Grant. They add a minigame to the draft. They can also be graveyard filler or provide shuffling for cards like Brainstorm, Top, Sylvan Library, Ponder, etc.
Power level aside, most other cycles of fixing lands don't have much, if any synergy with each other. But if I'm playing White/Black and I have a Godless Shrine, an Arid Mesa is a card I want. That's neat.
That's why I run most of the fetch/dual suite (sans the trimoes because I think that they're too good) even though I'm not concerned with the cards in my cube being maximized for power. Fetches and duals are just more fun than Kamigawa duals or painlands or whatever and it's not because they're more powerful.
Ignoring what Magic players say isn't the answer, it's listening to what they have to say and doing the exact opposite that's correct.
I'm thinking:
Basri's Acolyte
Celestial Crusader
Goldnight Commander
Kongming, "Sleeping Dragon"
Relief Captain
Did I miss any notables? Would you put Rhox Veteran in a similar category? How do you feel in general about having that slot in a 360 cube?
In my 360 I'm running Acolyte and Kongming currently, with Kor Sanctifiers and Palace Jailer rounding out the four drops. I cut Captain for Acolyte because I wanted to keep Kongming in for and extended test, but I think Captain is the better card.
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Commander in particular already looked questionable. Would you say Veteran/Crusader are playable? I was somewhat even on the first 4 you listed and listed the last two for completeness sakes, but am also trying to narrow down to 2 I think.
MTGS Average Peasant Cube 2023 Edition
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My CubeCobra (draft 20 card packs, 2 packs.)
430, Peasant, Very Unpowered
Why you should take your hybrids out of your gold section
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How many people have banned Curse of shallow graves?
Also
How many people are very attached to Faerie conclave and Treetop village?
My CubeCobra (draft 20 card packs, 2 packs.)
430, Peasant, Very Unpowered
Why you should take your hybrids out of your gold section
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I run Curse of shallow graves, but it's the card closest to be banned in my cube. Curse of predation is probably the second contender. My current banlist consist of cards that are hard to interact with and makes the opponent know they have lost the game, but it will still take a while before the game comes to an end.
My current banlist:
Mother of Runes
Crystal Shard
Hymn to Tourach
Behemoth Sledge
Skullclamp
Isochron Scepter
Loxodon Warhammer
Grafted Wargear
I cut Faerie conclave and Treetop village when I reduced my cube size from 360. My cube is now at 240 cards. I doubt I will add them, though access to sweepers might change my opinion.
I like both Faerie Conclave and Treetop Village, but I'm not very attached to them. I think they're in the lower 30% of cards in their section, but currently it's unlikely they'll get cut. I would cut Treetop Village before Faerie Conclave.
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I don't run the manlands. I only have one land (Rogue's Passage) that doesn't fix multiple colors.
My banlist:
.
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Mana Drain/Hymn to Tourach look kinda like bans to me.
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I'm not especially attached to either Faerie Conclave or Treetop Village, but I can't imagine a case where either of them are cut. They're both middle to high picks and I'd be surprised if better coloured utility lands were printed to push them out (with mdfcs maybe it's possible, but they'd need significant complexity creep).
Curst of Disturbance is technically better than Curse of Shallow Graves even in two player games, since the zombies ETB untapped. I'm still running both.
Faerie Conclave and Treetop Village are both still great, IMO. Urza's Legacy was one of the first few sets to release after I started playing Magic, though, so perhaps I am a bit attached.
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Eldamir, I remember when crystal shard was undoubtedly godlike in our environment, but I feel like the viability of grindy antitempo strategies has gotten worse as our beaters and tokens have gotten better. Besides the obvious fact that they apply more pressure on the shard-player, the fact that crystal shard nullifies removal means that it is nullifying a smaller amount of the powerful cards in our decks (since removal has always been great, unlike creatures) Perhaps you could revisit the card if aggro and tokens strategies get a boost/you cut the card a long time ago.
//
Anyway, thanks for the responses. I think I have to cut curse of shallow graves in my commander legends update. Alongside swapping artisan of kozilek out of colorless and into green.
And cut the riot enchantment for something else. Suggestions for best non-bloodbraid gruul card?
My CubeCobra (draft 20 card packs, 2 packs.)
430, Peasant, Very Unpowered
Why you should take your hybrids out of your gold section
Manamath Article
2023 Average Peasant Cube|and Discussion
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Useful Resources:
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ManabaseCrafter
My wife wanted us to cut it, but I guess we could retry it. She usually prefers aggressive decks and tokens, while I often go for more synergies. The reason we cut it was that it generated to much card advantage and turned of enemy removal.
I'm considering changing up my guold sections. I have 2 cards per guild and would love to reincluding Soulherder, but I still want to keep a lord for the flyers deck. Also I would like for both guild cards to be playable in a single deck.
I also think it would be nice if the guild cards had some synergies with cards from other guilds. With 2 players, supporting 3 colour decks would make less cards be dead when drafting. For instance:
soulherder
conclave mentor
sharktocrab
skyrider patrol
Soulherder gets 2 counters end of turn, sharktocrab can be bounced to tap an enemy creature each round, skyrider patrol makes conclave mentor into a 4/4 flyer with one activaton.
When choosing gold cards, do you consider interaction between guilds? Do you support multiple strategies in a guild and can they be combined?
Edit: A guild card would have to synergize with 6 out of 9 other guilds. That seems impossible for every guild card.
Well the more lands you run, the greater proportion of cards that are drafted will be played. Lands are the 24th and 25th playables. And in many cases the medium-tier 3 drop that you would remove for its cube slot isn't exactly doing any heavy lifting for any archetypes anyway. So I would recommend giving them a little more leniency than the average card.
I say this as I consider dropping my manlands, but still.
//
While some card effects have a very broad ability to synergize with others (blink especially) it really isn't possible to do across all pairs and triplets.
In my more ambitious youth, I considered making a set of magic cards where the wedges/shards had specific themes. For example, Jeskai may have been the trio that cared about artifacts and Grixis would have been the Madness/graveyard-based colors. So you could do UW artifacts, WR artifacts, BR graveyard, BU graveyard, butRU was both graveyard+artifacts and could do both.
It's technically possible to segregate the colors into a 3:2 ratio of shards:wedges instead of doing 5 wedges or 5 shards, btw.
If you ever want to branch out and have a themed cube, you could do something similar. I have. But it is prooobbabbly too much of a wrecking ball to retrofit into an established cube.
My CubeCobra (draft 20 card packs, 2 packs.)
430, Peasant, Very Unpowered
Why you should take your hybrids out of your gold section
Manamath Article
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Useful Resources:
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Yeah, I quickly realised this was impossible across all shards/wedges. I think I'l just go for powerful cards and cards that hint to strategies in those colours.
I guess I also will experiment with different archetypes in a single guild. I really want to bring back Soulherder, but as we still like the flying deck, I will probably keep one of the lords.
My CubeCobra (draft 20 card packs, 2 packs.)
430, Peasant, Very Unpowered
Why you should take your hybrids out of your gold section
Manamath Article
YeahReflector Mage or maybe Cloudblazer are probably the correct picks if I want synergy with Soulherder.
Currently running Empyrean Eagle and Thunderclap Wyvern which I will probably cut. I am considering testing
Kangee, Sky Warden if I keep a card for flying matters as it should also be a decent finisher in a blue white control deck. Bonus point for being Kangee, because I had a bird deck back in invasion with Kangee, Aerie Keeper. That deck was not good though :-P With no synergy with Soulherder, I might just cut flying matters.
I'm considering just building a 40 or 60 card singleton artisan (?) flying deck based of all my WU cards that I can't put in the cube. I would probably build a lifegain matters deck also, so I could have two decks to pull out if we just wanted to play a quick match. For the WU flying deck:
Kangee, Sky Warden
Empyrean Eagle
Thunderclap Wyvern
Migratory Route
Cloudblazer
Jubilant skybonder
Wall of Denial
Watcher of the spheres