Hello I have not really touch my cube much since Kaladesh. I figured with Amonket coming out and the fact the commander decks, MM17, and Aether revolt have released since I have really made any changes. Mainly looking for the newer cards that a lot peasant cubers have been enjoying.
AKH: there's not many cards that stick out as must-adds aside from the crop captain, but there are quite a few cards that might be fun to play. definitely worth looking into the spoiler yourself because I don't know all the cards, I'm just listing the ones I thought were fun and strong enough for my cube. Honored Crop-Captain Ahn-Crop Crasher Bloodlust Inciter Bone Picker
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~400 Peasant++ : List : Draft
Warning: Not for the durdly-hearted!
Loyal cathar (ok, maybe on the cusp at 540)
War priest of thune (and wispmare. When do I want to board this in? Except against curse of predation/curse of shallow graves? More interested in Soltari visionary since it doesn't wait in hand)
Stonehorn dignitary (I guess it's cute with crystal shard, but otherwise is bad)
Hapless Researcher (Not unless I'm casting animate dead on pelakka wurm on turn 2)
Cloud of faeries (I don't believe you have a robust enough blue aggro section to support such a card. Even if you did... I don't weant to play this over 1 drop evasion that people usually avoid)
Phantom warrior (Should be latch seeker)
Spellstutter sprite (I have to assume it's not good too often)
Illusionary servant (doesn't have the risk reward)
Slip through space (again, just don't have the blue aggro deck for it.)
Gatekeeper of malakir (I assume, perhaps wrongfully, that this takes waaaay too long on average to be worth it.)
Knight of dusk (this card is worse than phantom warrior)
Geth's Verdict (Edict effects aren't that good, and this one is just a bad version of one)
Dark Dabbling (I think three mana is too much, but it can be a 2 for 1. Hm...)
Blackmail (getting their third worst card at best is sketchy. You don't have the information needed to choose properly)
Spitebellows (I don't think I want to play murder, and not as a sorcery)
Rootwalla (It doesn't threaten for enough damage to be relevant)
Llanowar mentor (Making llanowar elves is quite a poor place to put your resources after turn 2 or 3. Certainly not for a card)
Sacred Wolf (I don't want to target your 3 mana blade of the sixth pride (although it could work with stuff like armadillo cloak)
Warrior's lesson (good luck reliably getting two creatures in for damage)
Lead the stqampede (I don't even know which version of this effect this is, but they are all terrible)
Overrule (I may be too harsh, but this never becomes mana efficient)
Ethercaste knight (Inefficient. Gold spaces are precious)
Illusory Demon (When is this a play you want to make?)
Lurking informant (I have this card in my "bad cards only cube")
Souls of the faultless (Perhaps not embarassing in some traditional skies deck?)
Desecrator hag (You wouldn't play 2GG etb draw a card, and that's almost what this is.)
Zameck guildmage (I would assume it's too clow)
Quicksilver dagger (Takes too long to outpace divination)
All 1 mana equipment that give +1/+1 or less (I don't find these to be worth a card. Infiltration lens is interesting but I'm a pessimist)
Things you should probbaly add at your size:
Barter in blood (especially with all the things that scream "play me in aristocrats"
AKH: there's not many cards that stick out as must-adds aside from the crop captain, but there are quite a few cards that might be fun to play. definitely worth looking into the spoiler yourself because I don't know all the cards, I'm just listing the ones I thought were fun and strong enough for my cube. Honored Crop-Captain Ahn-Crop Crasher Bloodlust Inciter Bone Picker
Those are good suggestions. Also I did not think about Creeping Mold being better in peasant. It can hit artifact creatures for instance. Just generally thought Bramblecrush was better, but there are no planeswalker cards in peasant.
Loyal cathar (ok, maybe on the cusp at 540)
War priest of thune (and wispmare. When do I want to board this in? Except against curse of predation/curse of shallow graves? More interested in Soltari visionary since it doesn't wait in hand)
Stonehorn dignitary (I guess it's cute with crystal shard, but otherwise is bad)
Hapless Researcher (Not unless I'm casting animate dead on pelakka wurm on turn 2)
Cloud of faeries (I don't believe you have a robust enough blue aggro section to support such a card. Even if you did... I don't weant to play this over 1 drop evasion that people usually avoid)
Phantom warrior (Should be latch seeker)
Spellstutter sprite (I have to assume it's not good too often)
Illusionary servant (doesn't have the risk reward)
Slip through space (again, just don't have the blue aggro deck for it.)
Gatekeeper of malakir (I assume, perhaps wrongfully, that this takes waaaay too long on average to be worth it.)
Knight of dusk (this card is worse than phantom warrior)
Geth's Verdict (Edict effects aren't that good, and this one is just a bad version of one)
Dark Dabbling (I think three mana is too much, but it can be a 2 for 1. Hm...)
Blackmail (getting their third worst card at best is sketchy. You don't have the information needed to choose properly)
Spitebellows (I don't think I want to play murder, and not as a sorcery)
Rootwalla (It doesn't threaten for enough damage to be relevant)
Llanowar mentor (Making llanowar elves is quite a poor place to put your resources after turn 2 or 3. Certainly not for a card)
Sacred Wolf (I don't want to target your 3 mana blade of the sixth pride (although it could work with stuff like armadillo cloak)
Warrior's lesson (good luck reliably getting two creatures in for damage)
Lead the stqampede (I don't even know which version of this effect this is, but they are all terrible)
Overrule (I may be too harsh, but this never becomes mana efficient)
Ethercaste knight (Inefficient. Gold spaces are precious)
Illusory Demon (When is this a play you want to make?)
Lurking informant (I have this card in my "bad cards only cube")
Souls of the faultless (Perhaps not embarassing in some traditional skies deck?)
Desecrator hag (You wouldn't play 2GG etb draw a card, and that's almost what this is.)
Zameck guildmage (I would assume it's too clow)
Quicksilver dagger (Takes too long to outpace divination)
All 1 mana equipment that give +1/+1 or less (I don't find these to be worth a card. Infiltration lens is interesting but I'm a pessimist)
Things you should probbaly add at your size:
Barter in blood (especially with all the things that scream "play me in aristocrats"
Not a comprehensive list, just skimming my memory banks
Also, try to cut 1-2 gold cards per section. Gold cards clunk up packs.
A lot to read think about here, but definitely gives me some things to think about though. I wish people who draft cube would do stuff like this more often. However, I have been wanting to swap out Illusory Demon and Lurking informant for U/B, but I have been not sure what to put in their place. So those cards kinda have been floating around as fillers.
Also, completely off-topic, but have you tried the TH16 demo? I found the new characters and music pretty awesome, even if the game itself is super easy thanks to the new mechanic.
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~400 Peasant++ : List : Draft
Warning: Not for the durdly-hearted!
Or cutting down on bad guild cards. I doubt anyone would miss Judge's Familiar, Ethercaste Knight, Lurking Informant, Bane Alley Broker, Illusory Demon, Forerunner of Slaughter, Rakdos Shred-Freak, Vithian Renegades, Colossal Might, Watchwolf, Selesnya Charm, Souls of the Faultless, Sin Collector, Restless Apparition, Drooling Groodian, Desecrator Hag, Zameck Guildmage, Simic Charm, Quicksilver Dagger, Swerve, Squee's Embrace or Goblin Legionnaire.
(Listing them, a lot are just aggro space-fillers. Aggro doesn't normally do well with Gold cards anyway; by just replacing them with mono-colored 2-drops, you'll improve the archetypes those cards are there to support in the first place.)
Really less gold cards? I was shooting for about 1-2 gold card per 15 card pack. 80 gold cards in a 540 card is 2 gold cards out every 13.5 cards. I did not think that was too bad.
you need a loooot of fixing to support that many gold cards, as well as doing traditional booster draft only. gold cards really only filter to one player per draft so they just clog up the packs. even traditional cubes with fetch/dual/shock mana bases dont have that many gold cards and their mana is a lot better.
Anecdote: with a set of fetches, 2 sets of shocks, and higher power 5 color fixing lands and artifacts in 360, I found 4 cards per guild slot was still clunky and made every pack end in golds. Your fixing is objectively worse, so if you're running proportionally 133% more gold cards than I did, your drafts might end up with lots of golds on the cutting room floor.
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~400 Peasant++ : List : Draft
Warning: Not for the durdly-hearted!
Let's say you fire an 8man draft
If the azorius card is not in his deck's plan: Dead card. (Maybe I should consider all purpose gold cards for this reason) If he just prefers two monocolored cards, same problem.
Then consider that there are more guilds than players. And that in pack one people avoid gold cards. And you might be putting some "kinda gold" cards in monocolor.
I think the ratio is fine, but some of the guilds have a really high drop in quality after the 6th or 7th card so there's not much you can do to maintain it. I'm at 60 gold cards at 360, and I haven't found packs end up with that many gold cards. It's not like people are scraping for playables in cube; I've gone some drafts with 42+ playables.
Wow, I couldn't imagine 6 gold cards per guild at 360. I have 3 per pair at 380, with one or two lands included in those slots per guild, and going past 4 would give me a stroke.
I like gold cards as archetype signals, I currently run 4 per guild at 405. If a gold card ends up last pick that's fine imho, but I wouldn't want to run more than four.
Honored Crop-Captain has been good so far. Truefire Paladin can really warp both attackers and blockers. Lightning Helix is obviously strong. I'm trying out Renegade Wheelsmith, but it looks good. Rally the Peasants represents an insane amount of damage after a couple token producers, and Goblin Trenches can take over games really easily. The Boros cards (ignoring Trenches) aren't anything fantastic, but they are good redundancy that are better than the mono-coloured options. I've had way more difficulty with Golgari than Boros.
I like the larger guild section for a few reasons: signals are more obvious, you get rewarded more for following signals, there are a few more interesting decisions in draft (splashes, try to wheel or not), 3 colour decks come up more, and you get more synergy. If everyone is in a different colour combination then there aren't any problems, and, if that isn't the case, you are rewarded for changing into the open colours.
I mean, you still reduce card choice per pack so I wouldn't say there are "no" problems. Even if everyone went into 8 different guilds P1p1, 1/5th of the gold cards are still unplayable and 9/10ths of the gold cards are dead to any individual player.
A larger card choice is the main thing that is lost, but I both don't value that super highly and don't actually think it's impacted as much as people make it out to be. Lets take the numbers of 57 for each colour, 30 for multicoloured, 25 fixing lands, and 20 colourless cards, which I think is a pretty normal distribution at 360. I have -7 monocoloured cards for each colour, +30 multicoloured, +13 fixing lands, and -8 colourless cards in comparison. A strictly 2 colour deck will have about 18 less cards that they can play, which is about 87% of the initial list's playables or about a 0.75 card difference in a 15 card pack. A 2 colour deck that can splash a colour will have about 12 less cards that they can play, which is about 91% of the initial list's playables or about a 0.5 card difference in a 15 card pack. 0.5-0.75 cards is the 6th playable in the pack, and not really something you're looking to pick most of the time considering those are presumably the among the bottom cards in their colours. I don't value the 28th or 29th playable in my pool that is just not good enough, so I replace those cards with much more interesting cards that are either one of the better cards in your deck or are dead cards, which is the same as being the 28th card.
"not really something you're looking to pick most of the time considering those are presumably the among the bottom cards in their colours"
This is something of a good point, even though the bottom card in most colors (sorry, white) is probably still a good card. It's not like the modo cube where large swaths of cards are bad because their decks are bad.
In my list, for example, the last green card is Hermit druid, which is bit player but a card a certain green deck does really want badly. In blue, it's probably omenspeaker, which is less narrow and a card most slow decks will consider for their 40.
Your argument is probably strongest for larger cubes (or real magic sets), when the dregs of society are filling up slots more commonly. Like bloodhunter bat, or something else.
But at sub-400 the worst cards in a color probably still get decked a lot (just by a particular archetype, instead of being a multipurpose card that doesn't do it's job particularly well)*
/
Thanks for pulling out math, though. Can you explain how you got to the "6th" playable in a pack figure? I just wasnt able to put two and two together on that one.
\\
*Tangent:
when you're stretching for cards to fit in your cube, should we be reaching for more niche cards? Niche cards will be possibly valued highly by someone, unlike some broad stroke mediocre card that would fit Purple's definition of a card "you're not really looking to pick" to every drafter of that color.
My cube
http://www.cubetutor.com/cubeblog/31752
Also if you see any sub-par choices. I am always open to suggestions.
I loathe creatures! Praise Prison and Land Destruction!
My Peasant Cube (looking for feedback)
For real though, Aether Revolt brought a lot of good ***** to the table, and I'm going to test some Amonkhet this weekend.
AER: these cards are all just very solid for their cost, there are quite a few more niche cards worth looking into, there's just too many to list
Aether Chaser
Gifted Aetherborn
Ridgescale Tusker
Scrapper Champion
Skyship Plunderer
Untethered Express
MM17: the only easy add is probably Anthem, these other ones are kinda weak or slow and up to your discretion
Gaea's Anthem
Goblin Assault
Mystic Genesis
Soul Ransom
AKH: there's not many cards that stick out as must-adds aside from the crop captain, but there are quite a few cards that might be fun to play. definitely worth looking into the spoiler yourself because I don't know all the cards, I'm just listing the ones I thought were fun and strong enough for my cube.
Honored Crop-Captain
Ahn-Crop Crasher
Bloodlust Inciter
Bone Picker
Warning: Not for the durdly-hearted!
Ghostly Flicker - Strictly better than Displace
Creeping Mold - Strictly better than Bramblecrush
Kessig Prowler - Strictly better than Jungle Lion
Manglehorn - Strictly better than Viridian Shaman
Interesting/Crazy Strong cards from new sets not in your list:
Ridgescale Tusker - Unbelievable Bomb
Renegade Freighter - Huge stupid creature for any aggro deck
Untethered Express - Huge stupid creature for aggro-midrange decks
Winding Constrictor - Counter archetype support
Monstrous Onslaught - Fine fight card, huge potential upside
Voltaic Brawler - Huge stupid beater
Gaea's Anthem - Not exactly the right color for an anthem, but the best Peasant Anthem beside Curse of Predation
Cytoplast Root-Kin - Counter Archetype support.
Sprite Noble - Flyer Archetype support
Angler Drake - Pure goodstuff
Loyal cathar (ok, maybe on the cusp at 540)
War priest of thune (and wispmare. When do I want to board this in? Except against curse of predation/curse of shallow graves? More interested in Soltari visionary since it doesn't wait in hand)
Stonehorn dignitary (I guess it's cute with crystal shard, but otherwise is bad)
Hapless Researcher (Not unless I'm casting animate dead on pelakka wurm on turn 2)
Cloud of faeries (I don't believe you have a robust enough blue aggro section to support such a card. Even if you did... I don't weant to play this over 1 drop evasion that people usually avoid)
Phantom warrior (Should be latch seeker)
Spellstutter sprite (I have to assume it's not good too often)
Illusionary servant (doesn't have the risk reward)
Slip through space (again, just don't have the blue aggro deck for it.)
Gatekeeper of malakir (I assume, perhaps wrongfully, that this takes waaaay too long on average to be worth it.)
Knight of dusk (this card is worse than phantom warrior)
Geth's Verdict (Edict effects aren't that good, and this one is just a bad version of one)
Dark Dabbling (I think three mana is too much, but it can be a 2 for 1. Hm...)
Blackmail (getting their third worst card at best is sketchy. You don't have the information needed to choose properly)
Spitebellows (I don't think I want to play murder, and not as a sorcery)
Rootwalla (It doesn't threaten for enough damage to be relevant)
Llanowar mentor (Making llanowar elves is quite a poor place to put your resources after turn 2 or 3. Certainly not for a card)
Sacred Wolf (I don't want to target your 3 mana blade of the sixth pride (although it could work with stuff like armadillo cloak)
Warrior's lesson (good luck reliably getting two creatures in for damage)
Lead the stqampede (I don't even know which version of this effect this is, but they are all terrible)
Overrule (I may be too harsh, but this never becomes mana efficient)
Ethercaste knight (Inefficient. Gold spaces are precious)
Illusory Demon (When is this a play you want to make?)
Lurking informant (I have this card in my "bad cards only cube")
Souls of the faultless (Perhaps not embarassing in some traditional skies deck?)
Desecrator hag (You wouldn't play 2GG etb draw a card, and that's almost what this is.)
Zameck guildmage (I would assume it's too clow)
Quicksilver dagger (Takes too long to outpace divination)
All 1 mana equipment that give +1/+1 or less (I don't find these to be worth a card. Infiltration lens is interesting but I'm a pessimist)
Things you should probbaly add at your size:
Not a comprehensive list, just skimming my memory banks
Also, try to cut 1-2 gold cards per section. Gold cards clunk up packs.
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
Yes a lot of those are pretty strong looking. I was already looking at bone picker, and Honored crop-captain.
Those are good suggestions. Also I did not think about Creeping Mold being better in peasant. It can hit artifact creatures for instance. Just generally thought Bramblecrush was better, but there are no planeswalker cards in peasant.
A lot to read think about here, but definitely gives me some things to think about though. I wish people who draft cube would do stuff like this more often. However, I have been wanting to swap out Illusory Demon and Lurking informant for U/B, but I have been not sure what to put in their place. So those cards kinda have been floating around as fillers.
I loathe creatures! Praise Prison and Land Destruction!
My Peasant Cube (looking for feedback)
I think Far / Away isn't quite good enough, but it could happen. Or dinrova horror if you want to be boring.
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
Lurking Informant -> Countersquall
Illusory Demon -> Dinrova Horror
Maybe Bane Alley Broker -> Blizzard Specter
Also soul ransom is an interesting choice with it's rarity shift.
I am still thinking about other swaps.
I loathe creatures! Praise Prison and Land Destruction!
My Peasant Cube (looking for feedback)
To be frank, why would you run awful cards like Countersquall and Blizzard Specter when there's much better Dimir options you're missing like Forbidden Alchemy or Ribbons of Night?
Also, completely off-topic, but have you tried the TH16 demo? I found the new characters and music pretty awesome, even if the game itself is super easy thanks to the new mechanic.
Warning: Not for the durdly-hearted!
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
(Listing them, a lot are just aggro space-fillers. Aggro doesn't normally do well with Gold cards anyway; by just replacing them with mono-colored 2-drops, you'll improve the archetypes those cards are there to support in the first place.)
uh I don't really want a Neg--
SHHHHHHH
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
I loathe creatures! Praise Prison and Land Destruction!
My Peasant Cube (looking for feedback)
Warning: Not for the durdly-hearted!
If the azorius card is not in his deck's plan: Dead card. (Maybe I should consider all purpose gold cards for this reason) If he just prefers two monocolored cards, same problem.
Then consider that there are more guilds than players. And that in pack one people avoid gold cards. And you might be putting some "kinda gold" cards in monocolor.
It's just gonna add up to weaker decks over all
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
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
I like the larger guild section for a few reasons: signals are more obvious, you get rewarded more for following signals, there are a few more interesting decisions in draft (splashes, try to wheel or not), 3 colour decks come up more, and you get more synergy. If everyone is in a different colour combination then there aren't any problems, and, if that isn't the case, you are rewarded for changing into the open colours.
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
This is something of a good point, even though the bottom card in most colors (sorry, white) is probably still a good card. It's not like the modo cube where large swaths of cards are bad because their decks are bad.
In my list, for example, the last green card is Hermit druid, which is bit player but a card a certain green deck does really want badly. In blue, it's probably omenspeaker, which is less narrow and a card most slow decks will consider for their 40.
Your argument is probably strongest for larger cubes (or real magic sets), when the dregs of society are filling up slots more commonly. Like bloodhunter bat, or something else.
But at sub-400 the worst cards in a color probably still get decked a lot (just by a particular archetype, instead of being a multipurpose card that doesn't do it's job particularly well)*
/
Thanks for pulling out math, though. Can you explain how you got to the "6th" playable in a pack figure? I just wasnt able to put two and two together on that one.
\\
*Tangent:
when you're stretching for cards to fit in your cube, should we be reaching for more niche cards? Niche cards will be possibly valued highly by someone, unlike some broad stroke mediocre card that would fit Purple's definition of a card "you're not really looking to pick" to every drafter of that color.
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