MTG Salvation

http://mythicspoiler.com/newspoilers.html

Clan Abilities:
Jeskai: The return of Rebound =)
Abzan: Bolster again
Sultai: Exploit (Optional sacrifice)
Temur: Formidable (Group Ferocious)
Mardu: Dash again

And, Megamorph (bad name, interesting turn on Morph)

Stampeding Elk Herd looks pretty solid; Hollowhenge Beast was on the edge of playability for a long time, it's possible that granting your team trample is the kind of ability that green wants to play a 5/5 for 5. I might prefer it to Sentinel Spider even; that 5th point of toughness makes it much harder to trade 2 cards for.

The 2/2 flying token with rebound is borderline, but reasonable for larger cubes. Seems a LOT better than Rise of Eagles for my money.

The 5-drop with Exploit (-3/-3 if you sacrifice) seems okay. It's obviously got a high cost if you don't push the whole tokens for sacrifice fodder thing, but it's definitely got a good payoff.

Yeah, I thought the same about the Stampeding Elk Herd (what a name, man).
The Ojutai's Summons seems nice, too. It's basically an Air Elemental more resilent to removal, but that has only 2 power on the first turn it attacks.

I like Megamorph as a concept. It gives you 3 creatures per card (the 2/2, the normal creature, and the +1+1 creature), that's a lot of flexibility. But the name of the ability is awful

I'm actually pretty interested in Sprinting Warbrute as well. 5/4 is just huge. I had good experiences with Tenement Crasher in earlier iterations of my cube, and this guy compares very favorably, I think. Better most of the time because it's just so much cheaper.

I'm actually very excited for Sandcrafter Mage. It has a couple cute +1/+1 counter synergies and it seems really good with 2/x or 1/x fliers. As runner said it does non-bo with tappers and other utility white one drops but I do think it will make the cut for me. 3/3 for 3s have also proven their worth so it seems very solid. The face-smashing red player in me loves Sprinting Warbrute as well! It seems similar to a pauper Obzedat. It's hard to remove and a fast clock.

Sandcrafter Mage: A 3/3 for 3 on an empty board is ok, but nothing special. It would need First Strike to become competitive. Unless you run +1+1 synergies, bolster could even be useless - borderline.
Ojutai's Summons: Maybe something for the spells matters archetype. Has synergies with Mnemonic Wall. Archaeomancer - boderline/cubable
Silumgar Butcher: It costs 1 to much for my taste and its only useful in fringe situations. At least its a Zombie. Still, im not impressed. -bad
Sprinting Warbrute: An upgraded Viashino Cutthroat. This card was really good in ´98 sligh. If we get a 4th playable Dash creature Im going to add Mogg Conscripts and Goblin Cohort - cubable
Aerie Bowmasters: unexiting and unmorph way overcosted. I also thought megamorph would get you 3/3 morphs, as is, it doesnt need a new keyword. -bad
Stampeding Elk Herd: Its a really solid finisher in stalled board situations. Im going to run it for sure. -cubable

Sprinting Warbrute - Seems really solid. I've been looking for better 4 drops in red.
Stampeding Elk Herd - Looks playable. Worst case scenario a 5/5 for 5 isn't bad. Best all your creatures gain trample. Will test this one.
Sandcrafter Mage - I actually really like this card. We have gotten quite a few +1/+1 counters matters cards in green white lately. I may finally try out that as a theme if we get one or two more good cards with bolster.

Everything else seems subpar. I want to like Ojutai's Summons, but it is overcosted by 1. Definitely excited to see rebound back though.

Quote from fluttershy69 »

I want to like Ojutai's Summons, but it is overcosted by 1.

At common a vanilla 2/2 flying usually is CC3, so this is already above curve. A 4/4 flying for CC4 would be insane. An being a spell is a big upside.

Yeah, I'm with Humphrey on Ojutai's Summons. I like the card. It's not a plain 4/4 flying for 5 because the second token doesn't attack on your next turn, but in exchange it isn't killed by terror-like stuff, and is a noncreature spell that triggers twice. With Mnemonic Wall stuff is really cool.

And I think we can start speculating about white token generators with rebound. What do you Expect?

2WW
Instant
Put 2 1/1 warrior tokens. Rebound sounds too powerful?

Correct me if I misunderstood, but does this mean that we don't get to see any common dragon in DTK =( ?

Category 1: The common Dragon (NOTE: This got bumped up to uncommon during Development.)

Category 2: Uncommon gold cycle

Category 3: Uncommon monocolored cycle

Category 4: Rare gold cycle

Category 5: Rare monocolored cycle

Category 6: Mythic rare legendary gold cycle

Category 7: Uncommon mana stones (NOTE: Do these turn into Dragons? Hmmmm....)

Category 8: Cards that care about Dragons

http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/feature/its-about-time-2015-03-02

Quote from Runner5678 »

Are you seriously going to cube Ojutai's Summons over Mulldrifter, Aven Surveyor, Gryff Vanguard, Mnemonic Wall or Prescient Chimera? Those are the slots it's fighting for and I just don't see it being better. Chimera could be close and I can see not playing Surveyor to avoid of ETB bounce saturation but if I'm not playing those I'm not sure I even value Summons over Faerie Invaders or the ETB loot from Scars.

I rated it borderline/cubable and thats what it is. Depending on the supported archetyoes, I could see myself running it over Vanguard, Chimera and Surveyor. I dont like the wall that much either, but its synergistic, so it would be stupid to cut it.

Quote from Merovingiann »

Yeah, I'm with Humphrey on Ojutai's Summons. I like the card. It's not a plain 4/4 flying for 5 because the second token doesn't attack on your next turn, but in exchange it isn't killed by terror-like stuff, and is a noncreature spell that triggers twice. With Mnemonic Wall stuff is really cool.

And I think we can start speculating about white token generators with rebound. What do you Expect?

2WW
Instant
Put 2 1/1 warrior tokens. Rebound sounds too powerful?

Rebound exiling itself is a non-bo

We also need a decent Rebound draw spell.

2 Cards @ Sorcery Rebound, even at 3uu is probably too good.

1 Card @ Sorcery Rebound for U is just fine, but probably 1U

However, Rebound White being more than Life gain would be nice. But Sorcery protection is meh, even if it is economy.

Quote from Night_Hydra »

Quote from Merovingiann »

Yeah, I'm with Humphrey on Ojutai's Summons. I like the card. It's not a plain 4/4 flying for 5 because the second token doesn't attack on your next turn, but in exchange it isn't killed by terror-like stuff, and is a noncreature spell that triggers twice. With Mnemonic Wall stuff is really cool.

And I think we can start speculating about white token generators with rebound. What do you Expect?

2WW
Instant
Put 2 1/1 warrior tokens. Rebound sounds too powerful?

Rebound exiling itself is a non-bo

Rebound exiles the spell on the initial casting, then when it gets cast from exile on the next upkeep, goes to the graveyard upon resolution. Hopefully that's how you've been using Staggershock all this time or you've been missing out on some value.

Thinking Cipher... close enough, move along, move along.

Anticipate - 1U
Instant
Look at the top three cards of your library. Put one of them into your hand and the rest on the bottom of your library in any order.

Impulse is really good, and this is also nice.

While it's a good card, I don't think these kinds of card selection spells are good enough that I'm interested in playing both Impulse and worse-Impulse.

EDIT: Don't get me wrong, this is a very good card; I just don't feel that my cube is in need of more cantrip effects. Though it is quite possible that it's better than Ponder on average in our format with very few shuffles, I prefer the 1-mana effect for diversity.

I am excited for Anticipate, and will definitely be running it since my cube is modern pauper. Impulse is good, and this card is slightly worse, but still solid. Probably wouldn't play it in a normal cube at 360, but for larger cubes, having a second impulse would be worthwhile.

well I support spells matters in my tier1 cube and I run Impulse, Ponder, Preordain and Serum Visions. I rate all of them higher, especially for tempo reasons.
There is no room for Anticipate and my Tier2 cube doesnt need it, I prefer to run plain card-draw there.

I'm not sure if I even have room for the Warbrute. My current red 4-drop slot is Goblin Heelcutter, Gorehorn Minotaurs, and Slash Panther at 360

Quote from Dismember »

I'm not sure if I even have room for the Warbrute. My current red 4-drop slot is Goblin Heelcutter, Gorehorn Minotaurs, and Slash Panther at 360

Id cut the Panther or move it to colorless section

Epic Confrontation 1G
sorcery
target creature you control gets +1/+2 until end of turn. It fights target creature you don't control.

We just got Savage Punch, and now we get a slightly better version (being always online). Looking forward to adding this one, likely replacing Pit Fight. Being an instant hasn't been relevant really, and I've liked these cards being pump spells as well as removal. Very green, and also good.

Also, it's Surrak punching a DRAGON. That's EVEN MORE AWESOME than him punching a bear. Fortunately it's equally playable!

Man I definitely can't choose between the two. Maybe I'll have to run both.

Epic Confrontation seems really nice. Instant speed is what really makes it good.

Also, I'm a bit surprised a bunch of people here don't play Impulse, but do play things like Think Twice or Ponder. Cheap, instant-speed card selection in blue is really good. I can definitely understand not having room for Anticipate; it's so hard for new cards to make it into blue.

Quote from Al_Z_Heimer »

It's a Sorcery.

Well, not sure why I thought it was an instant. Significantly less interested now, green has enough other interesting things than somewhat situational sorcery-speed removal.

Quote from Al_Z_Heimer »

I think the only good card quality cards (without card advantage) in blue are:
1) Looter il-Kor
2) Merfolk Looter/Thought Courier
3) Preordain
4) Impulse or Sigiled Starfish/Omenspeaker if you prefer creatures
I think this list is long enough, so you don't need to consider any other card with a similar effect, especially when you take into accout, that effects like these are in no way essential to any archetype and the cube would work pretty much the same way without any of them.

Yeah, those cards are the best card quality / selection cards, although I think it's really hard to rank them since they're all good in different ways -- for instance, Looters are best for consistent card selection, Impulse is way better for enabling surprise counterspells / removal, and Preordain is just an all-around good card.