MTG Salvation

Quote from Runner5678 »

Sure. We could use Lanxal's because he's never around anymore.

Haha man yeah sorry I've been completely gone, university has been taking up all my time. I'm sad that I don't have time to be a regular in this community anymore, but you guys are doing awesome things without me and that's pretty rad. 2014 Power Rankings looks very baller. (Added to the OP, because I can at least still do SOME things to help. :armscross:)

That's a little bit too offtopic for my tastes. However, I understand the desire for a place for off-topic discussion within this community, so I've made a thread here where Pauper & Peasant cubists can weigh in on the merits of a possible Off-Topic Thread.

Wind Zendikon is an efficient creature (a 2/2 for 1), but it costs you a land, which really hurts in the earlygame.

Basically what you said is correct. Early on the lost land reeeeeally hurts, so it's basically relegated to a very efficient lategame card. The problem is, with lategame cards you want impact over efficiency. Have your friends compare it to the 4/5/6drops and they should see why you don't play it.

Quote from k_alk

I could do the project for this year; it's definitely worth having someone do it, especially since the pauper cube card pool has gotten quite a few new good cards this last year, not to mention how useful of a resource it is.

You are absolutely welcome to have a go at it! You should be warned that the number crunching does take a bit of work, though, although you don't have to put in all of the additional statistics I have around. The main thing is the average listing, which isn't terribly difficult to put together.

Hey guys! I haven't been around for a while now, owing partly to myself being busy with a combination of life and MTGSalvation and partly to graduation from high school cutting down my Pauper Cubing opportunity to basically nil. I just find that I have no time to participate in the Pauper Cube community these days, which makes me sad, but which has been something I've had to accept to not go mad with grief. =P And plus, you guys have been trucking on gloriously without me.

What it does mean, though, is that I won't be able to host the 2013 Pauper Power Rankings. I really want to, we've been doing it for three years now and I don't want to end it here, but it is quite a lot of work collecting and crunching the numbers. This is especially true with the MTGS beta (which you might have noticed from the very conspicuous announcement above is still trucking towards completion) on everybody's plate in the coming months.

Things might change for 2014, when I settle into university life, but for now the Pauper Power Rankings project will have to be put on hiatus. D=

Oh a happier note, Merry Christmas to everyone!

Quote from jonboyjon

Common removal now looks like Sip of Hemlock or Assassin's Strike.

Interesting point: Sip of Hemlock is an exception because of the design constraints of Theros. Because of the heavy Auras theme (MaRo has gone on the record to say that Bestow was the backbone of Theros), not to mention Heroic and monstrosity which would both also play badly against unconditional removal, Theros removal, especially on the level of commons, had to be less unconditional and more expensive to make Limited work. You can really tell from the extremely small swath of unconditional removal spells like Sip of Hemlock amidst the Theros spells.

I'm not saying that the trend being discussed isn't true, because Doom Blade reprinted at uncommon certainly is strong evidence for it, but Sip of Hemlock isn't appropriate evidence because it was influence by other contextual concerns.

Quote from Volcanon

Every set since the dawn of time has had overcosted crap removal. They are reducing the number of absolute answers at common but we're still going to get stuff like stab wound. Theros they deliberately underpowered removal so you can play with your rawr monsters.

I read this after I made my post. But yes, basically this.

Usually 16 - 17 is a good number. I'm more often compelled to cut down to 15 (probably not the best idea in most of those situations but sue me) than go up to 18, usually because my control decks have cards like Shoreline Ranger.

It performs a role as a cheap creature that you can cast T1 or along with another spell later in the game. Very often I will use the Fanatic to kill a cheap creature on my opponent's side, at which point it's done a fair job. Not all cards in the cube need to have a major effect, and it would be boring if I just cut the Fanatic for another burn spell. The Fanatic plays in a way that is unique without costing too much in terms of power level, and that's really enough for me to justify it.

The Gnarlid is one of the best cards for the Auras/enchantments theme. It may be good enough already to run, but I'm not confident to do that until I get more Auras in there.

It's pretty much the worst of black's 2mana removal spells. Still playable, but gone the next good Doom Blade variant they reprint.

It begins with a few Theros spoilers!

Dawnglare Invoker is insane, and Frostwind Invoker isn't terrible either.

The levelers are also quite quite strong. They're our go-to manasinks.

I don't want to comment too much on Bestow and Monstrosity until we get some cards, but I think they have a lot of potential for some great cards to come out. It just depends on how far they push those mechanics at common. I hope some of the Bestow cards will be good enough to push the Auras subtheme into gear.

Quote from k_alk

I'd definitely recommend trying out Rock Slide - it plays very differently from the other x spells and is pretty good. Control decks are often happy with it as early as turn 3 or 4 (and then want it pretty much every turn after that), and aggro decks like it for breaking open stalled board states late game at instant speed. We have very few good mass removal spells anyway, and a one-sided, instant-speed wrath for 6ish mana is highly playable for us.

Pretty much this. Rock Slide isn't insane or a cube staple, but it adds something pretty cool and different to the cube.

We pretty much always do 15, but 14 or even 13 will still give you great decks.