The 2013 Optimal Multiplayer Cube - Legacy-Legal Version - CadaverousBl00m Blog - User Blogs

The Optimal Multiplayer Cube - 2013

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The Legacy-Legal Version

A lot of people playing at kitchen tables like to stick to the Legacy banned list in the name of fun and balance. We can quite easily apply this to the optimal cube.
The following cards in the initial version of the cube are banned in Legacy:

Thankfully, we replaced most of these in the Budget list, so we'll stick with the same replacements. The only things left after that are Balance, Contract From Below, Demonic Consultation, Demonic Tutor, Flash, Skullclamp, Sol Ring, Tinker, Windfall, Yawgmoth's Bargain and Yawgmoth's Will.
Let's break it down by colour again.

White
Balance is the only card here. We can drop it for another reset, so long as we realise we're not getting another one for CC2. Last year, we replaced it with Cataclysm, and that remains a pretty good match.

Blue
Blue has the following changes in the budget version already:
-1 Ancestral Recall
-1 Mana Drain
-1 Timetwister
-1 Time Walk
+1 Visions of Beyond
+1 Counterspell
+1 Frantic Search
+1 Arcane Laboratory
We'd put Frantic Search in for Timetwister again, but that's banned in Legacy too! We threw in Dream Halls for one of the other non-budget cards, and that's fun enough.
-1 Frantic Search, +1 Dream Halls
We also have Flash, Tinker and Windfall to worry about here.
Last year, we swapped Tinker for Shape Anew and Windfall for Compulsion, which is good enough.
-1 Tinker, +1 Shape Anew
-1 Windfall, +1 Compulsion
We didn't have to worry about Flash last year, though, and there isn't too much that replaces that! About the only thing close is Show and Tell, which is already in. Sigh... about as close as we get is putting a copy into play. Cackling Counterpart is the closest match in terms of casting cost for that effect.
-1 Flash, +1 Cackling Counterpart

Black
Black doesn't enjoy this much - it loses all of its tutors. :-(
From above, we lost Vampiric Tutor for Dark Ritual.
After that, we still have Contract From Below, Demonic Consultation, Demonic Tutor, Yawgmoth's Bargain and Yawgmoth's Will to worry about.
Last year, we made the following changes that we may as well stick with:
-1 Demonic Tutor, +1 Diabolic Tutor
-1 Yawgmoth's Bargain, +1Decree of Pain
-1 Yawgmoth's Will, +1 Oversold Cemetery
The only other spell that draws multiple cards at 1CC for black is Skeletal Scrying. That will do as a replacement for Demonic Consultation.
But nothing replaces Contract From Below. We might as well just go with the best card draw spell we can muster. Given we want to stick to a low CC, that's probably Night's Whisper.
-1 Demonic Consultation, +1 Skeletal Scrying
-1 Contract From Below, +1 Night's Whisper

Red
Red had a single change earlier, swapping Wheel of Fortune for Molten Psyche.

Green
Green had a single change earlier, swapping Survival of the Fittest for Cream of the Crop.

Gold
Gold doesn't require any changes.

Colourless
From before, we made the following changes:
-5 Moxen, +5 Ravnica Signets (e.g. Dimir Signet)
-1 Black Lotus, +1 Lotus Petal
That leaves Skullclamp and Sol Ring, all of which we had to swap last year too. Let's stick with the best of those changes again.
-1 Sol Ring, +1 Mox Diamond
-1 Skullclamp, +1 Sensei's Divining Top

Nonbasic Land
Only two forced changes here - Library of Alexandria and Tolarian Academy.
Nothing quite replaces the Library of Victory. About the closest of the things we added to the budget version was Vesuva. Which is about as close as Brushwagg, but oh well. :-(
-1 Library of Alexandria, +1 Vesuva
The Academy is a similar story, but we've already got Academy Ruins in. We might as well just go with the budget replacement that knocks out the most mana.
-1 Tolarian Academy, +1 Cabal Coffers