It happens left to right on every fuse card. So you bounce first, then they sac.
They're all designed to trigger in order.
... and you can't intervene between the two parts. It's all one resolution. Just to have that mentioned.
And to everyone saying that five mana is a lot: YES. But this is not a five-mana card, it's a 2+3 splitcard with fuse. That's not the same. That means that you can also cast either half if that's good for you. No, the card won't do as much. No, a 1U ain't good. No, a three-mana edict isn't good. No, a combination of them at five mana isn't good. Being able to choose between the three is awesome.
Specialities about the cube: U tempo, B aggro, R slow-ish are supported. G aggro is not.
Currently trying to support tokens in all colors but blue, in different ways: W pumps them, B sacrifices them, R suicides them, G has decent-sized ones.
cube list outdated
*literal C/U definition according to gatherer
**some cards are banned. Library of Alexandria, Land Tax, Sol Ring.
I am very surprised to see the negative feedback on this card. I understand that the blue half is overcosted by a mana and black half by about half a mana, but I think the full package is quite a bit better than something like Fire // Ice or even Into the Roil.
It's not difficult to get full value off of this card without having to add more than a single dual land to your deck. I also disagree that either side of this card is unplayable without access to the other color. The effects are not so overcosted that I would exclude these because I wasn't able to pick up a couple off-color duals.
On the subject of whether it should be in a "Dimir" section, I just don't think this should be competing with something like Shadowmage Infiltrator or Dimir Charm. Unlike something like Kird Ape, this card is perfectly playable in a deck without those colors (obviously many of you disagree). These days I've been much more lax with allowing additional multicolor cards into my list, but I'd probably rather this spell be pit against something like Into the Roil, Cyclonic Rift, Vapor Snag, Chainer's Edict, or Slaughter Pact. The other half of the spell is just gravy. If your compulsion to pigeonhole this into your multicolor section keeps this out of your list because it's the 10th best Dimir card or whatever, that seems disingenuous. This seems like one that's much more powerful than people are giving it credit, and I believe it should be tested.
I am very surprised to see the negative feedback on this card. I understand that the blue half is overcosted by a mana and black half by about half a mana, but I think the full package is quite a bit better than something like Fire // Ice or even Into the Roil.
It's not difficult to get full value off of this card without having to add more than a single dual land to your deck. I also disagree that either side of this card is unplayable without access to the other color. The effects are not so overcosted that I would exclude these because I wasn't able to pick up a couple off-color duals.
On the subject of whether it should be in a "Dimir" section, I just don't think this should be competing with something like Shadowmage Infiltrator or Dimir Charm. Unlike something like Kird Ape, this card is perfectly playable in a deck without those colors (obviously many of you disagree). These days I've been much more lax with allowing additional multicolor cards into my list, but I'd probably rather this spell be pit against something like Into the Roil, Cyclonic Rift, Vapor Snag, Chainer's Edict, or Slaughter Pact. The other half of the spell is just gravy. If your compulsion to pigeonhole this into your multicolor section keeps this out of your list because it's the 10th best Dimir card or whatever, that seems disingenuous. This seems like one that's much more powerful than people are giving it credit, and I believe it should be tested.
How can an organisation system (or a compulsion to include a card under such) be 'disingenuous'? Misguided, perhaps?
People are just saying that it is unplayable with one side only. I pretty much agree with that assessment. Therefore, I would only play it in a deck with access to both colours. That's the sticking point here - if you're happy to run one side of it in a deck, then more power to you, and if you have a system that differs and allows you to include the card at no detriment to the other colour, then there's nothing wrong with including it, at all.
I like the card a lot, but because I wouldn't play it without both colours in my deck, it HAS to compete with 'Tog, Seer and Finkel in the structure I consider best. There's nothing at all 'disingenuous' about that.
How can an organisation system (or a compulsion to include a card under such) be 'disingenuous'? Misguided, perhaps?
People are just saying that it is unplayable with one side only. I pretty much agree with that assessment. Therefore, I would only play it in a deck with access to both colours. That's the sticking point here - if you're happy to run one side of it in a deck, then more power to you, and if you have a system that differs and allows you to include the card at no detriment to the other colour, then there's nothing wrong with including it, at all.
I like the card a lot, but because I wouldn't play it without both colours in my deck, it HAS to compete with 'Tog, Seer and Finkel in the structure I consider best. There's nothing at all 'disingenuous' about that.
Sure, misguided is probably the better word.
Etymology aside, we have a couple things happening here. First, I think the card is quite a bit better than people are giving it credit. And two, I think this shouldn't be competing for a multicolor slot. It's more like Lingering Souls or Unburial Rites than it is a Probe or Dismantling Blow. I think this is a completely respectable blue or black card in decks that want that effect. I understand that many of you feel it's just not a good cube card if you can't have both effects, but unless your mana fixing is stone awful, I see no reason why this shouldn't be easily played for both modes in the same way Lingering Souls is in a WW/x deck. Then again, I wouldn't ever pit Lingering Souls against a card that requires both colors of mana, and I am perfectly happy to include it in my white decks without the ability to reliably flash it back. It's in the cube because you can do both and it's flexible. This card is no different.
I am getting wildly different feedback from cubers in other groups on this. I don't know if it's a matter of multicolor philosophy or power-level differences. It's very interesting.
How can an organisation system (or a compulsion to include a card under such) be 'disingenuous'? Misguided, perhaps?
He had the right word. Disingeuous. The fact is that its NOT an organization system when it also decides which cards are included and which cards are not. At some point it becomes a letter vs spirt of debate. Yes, you can have formal color balance by forcing a fixed number of guild slots for each combination. In fact, that fails to preserve color balance and tends to lead to color IMbalance instead.
Its not a "neutral" organization system; its not properly speaking an "organization" system at all. For whatever reason, it seems to produce a slavish desire to force fit cards to cater to a very inflexible and past-its-expiration-date rubric
For instance, it leads to inane comments like "I'm not playing this card because its only the 5th best Selesnya card". On this basis a card may be excluded despite being better than every Izzet card.
Etymology aside, we have a couple things happening here. First, I think the card is quite a bit better than people are giving it credit. And two, I think this shouldn't be competing for a multicolor slot. It's more like Lingering Souls or Unburial Rites than it is a Probe or Dismantling Blow. I think this is a completely respectable blue or black card in decks that want that effect. I understand that many of you feel it's just not a good cube card if you can't have both effects, but unless your mana fixing is stone awful, I see no reason why this shouldn't be easily played for both modes in the same way Lingering Souls is in a WW/x deck. Then again, I wouldn't ever pit Lingering Souls against a card that requires both colors of mana, and I am perfectly happy to include it in my white decks without the ability to reliably flash it back. It's in the cube because you can do both and it's flexible. This card is no different.
I am getting wildly different feedback from cubers in other groups on this. I don't know if it's a matter of multicolor philosophy or power-level differences. It's very interesting.
I just disagree on the point that I would run this in a deck without both colours. I will concede I might, might run the black side alone, in the event that my draft went totally tits up. I wouldn't run Lingering Souls in WW or the blue side of F//A alone though, so that's clearly where we disagree. Nothing wrong with that.
I would like to point out the under my current system of including hybrids and split cards and gold cards in one group, the flexibility is still welcomed. I mean, my deck is more flexible containing a card like F//A than a Duskmantle Seer in that if I get colour-screwed, the card has some use to me. That is something I take into account when mentally ranking the sections, even if it seems to you like I'm kind of ignoring it. Increased flexibility is great in that section.
Let's say for a second I totally agreed with your assessment and that I would play both sides alone in a deck with one colour available. I would still end up putting that in the same section, firstly because that's where it's best, and (much more importantly) I don't have anywhere else to put it! It would, however, mean that I would rank it a lot higher than I currently do, and it would certainly make the grade. But because my inclination is that I require both sides, it suffers a little on the scale. It only barely misses out by a couple of cards anyway. I think it's great.
He had the right word. Disingeuous. The fact is that its NOT an organization system when it also decides which cards are included and which cards are not. At some point it becomes a letter vs spirt of debate. Yes, you can have formal color balance by forcing a fixed number of guild slots for each combination. In fact, that fails to preserve color balance and tends to lead to color IMbalance instead.
Its not a "neutral" organization system; its not properly speaking an "organization" system at all. For whatever reason, it seems to produce a slavish desire to force fit cards to cater to a very inflexible and past-its-expiration-date rubric
For instance, it leads to inane comments like "I'm not playing this card because its only the 5th best Selesnya card". On this basis a card may be excluded despite being better than every Izzet card.
How does that make any sense?
dis·in·gen·u·ous
/ˌdisinˈjenyo͞oəs/
Adjective
Not candid or sincere, typically by pretending that one knows less about something than one really does.
It's not the right word. Are you calling me insincere about my organisation of my own cube? I should hope not.
It is, by definition, an organisation system. Using terms like "past-its-expiration date" (lots of us use it, so it clearly is not), "slavish" (we have full control over our guild sections, so this is an incorrect term), and "inane" (...) doesn't make this somehow not be the case. I find it works best for me, and if you don't then I have no problem with that. And yes, a card may be excluded despite being better than every Izzet card. However, I am happy with every card in my section now, and see no reason to reduce the number of cards available to a given archetype by cutting what I perceive as 'poor' Izzet cards. It is perhaps the greatest weakness of the system, however, which I freely admit; yet, its strengths are also numerous.
I would never run unburial rites without consistent access to both colors. Lingering souls I could see running with limited access to black but not without it. And once again, "it's not a gold card because I can splash for it with duals" is not an argument that makes any sense at all to me.
Without artifact deck support, I think dimir is actually kind of a weak guild, so in a medium size cube this isn't a bad choice. It's better in a slower cube.
He had the right word. Disingeuous. The fact is that its NOT an organization system when it also decides which cards are included and which cards are not.
None of this is correct. Disingenuous is inaccurate here and is also kind of rude in this context (as is a lot of the rest of your post). I don't understand the second bit at all, since cube organization is really about what is included and what isn't and nothing more.
At some point it becomes a letter vs spirt of debate. Yes, you can have formal color balance by forcing a fixed number of guild slots for each combination. In fact, that fails to preserve color balance and tends to lead to color IMbalance instead.
Its not a "neutral" organization system; its not properly speaking an "organization" system at all. For whatever reason, it seems to produce a slavish desire to force fit cards to cater to a very inflexible and past-its-expiration-date rubric
For instance, it leads to inane comments like "I'm not playing this card because its only the 5th best Selesnya card". On this basis a card may be excluded despite being better than every Izzet card.
How does that make any sense?
I agree with the majority of the content here, if not the tone. I think it's better to just run the best cards, although I do try not to overload or underrepresent each color pair and I keep a close eye on gold percentage. I prefer strict numbers on monocolor just because it's easier but I think it's probably better unbalanced by numbers. It's a lot more of an issue in gold because the section is so much smaller.
When I see Healing Salve, I'm often like "Oh girl, I wish I could turn every card into this." Thanks they removed the gain life part, otherwise this would have been broken.
He had the right word. Disingeuous. The fact is that its NOT an organization system when it also decides which cards are included and which cards are not. At some point it becomes a letter vs spirt of debate. Yes, you can have formal color balance by forcing a fixed number of guild slots for each combination. In fact, that fails to preserve color balance and tends to lead to color IMbalance instead.
Its not a "neutral" organization system; its not properly speaking an "organization" system at all. For whatever reason, it seems to produce a slavish desire to force fit cards to cater to a very inflexible and past-its-expiration-date rubric
For instance, it leads to inane comments like "I'm not playing this card because its only the 5th best Selesnya card". On this basis a card may be excluded despite being better than every Izzet card.
How does that make any sense?
"I'm not playing this because it's too bad for white, I'd definitely cube it if it were in green."
Why do we have the same number of white, blue, black, red and green cards? Because we care for balance. And we should. Every color should be represented equally, so every color can (ideally) be drafted equally. If you don't think balance is important, we're not on the same page and we can't argue with each other. Also, it's important to stick to these systems as good as we can. Tiny deviations are unavoidable, but I disagree with "meh, balance is impossible anyway".
So, because balance is important, we seek to preserve it in all places as good as possible. White gets as many cards as black, each dual land is represented, etc. I expand that to multicolor subsections. GW cards should be just as numerous as UR cards because of balance. Now, the tricky part starts, namely the classification of gray zone cards. Lingering Souls, Kird Ape and split cards come to mind as examples.
My approach is "looks like one, is one". Kird Ape gets drafted and maindecked in much the same situations that RG cards do, namely in decks that are red AND green. Kird Ape plays just as if he was RG, competition in drafting and requirements ingame are the same. Hence, he is RG multicolor.
Kitchen Finks is different. It's good if it's cast for 1WW, and it's good if it's cast for 1GG. It's played by GW, Wx and Gx decks alike, i.e. by decks that are white OR green. Competition in drafting and maindeckability are different from those of Qasali Pridemage, Kitchen Finks is therefore hybrid. Fire//Ice has two decent halves, to the extent that you're probably fine playing it being in one color. Red and blue decks fight over this, just like they would over a hybrid card. Fire//Ice is hybrid.
Now to Far//Away. My assessment of the card is that it's only good in decks that are both black AND blue, I wouldn't deck one half without access to the other. That drafts and decks like Shadowmage Infiltrator and not like Deathcult Rogue.
TL;DR: Far//Away needs access to both colors to be playable. That's more akin to a multicolor card than to a hybrid card, so it's classified like a multicolor card and should indeed compete with Jon Finkel and Psychatog.
Specialities about the cube: U tempo, B aggro, R slow-ish are supported. G aggro is not.
Currently trying to support tokens in all colors but blue, in different ways: W pumps them, B sacrifices them, R suicides them, G has decent-sized ones.
cube list outdated
*literal C/U definition according to gatherer
**some cards are banned. Library of Alexandria, Land Tax, Sol Ring.
"it's not a gold card because I can splash for it with duals" is not an argument that makes any sense at all to me.
To me neither. I can splash for Bloodbraid Elf with a Taiga and two fetches, does that make it a non-gold card too? If you're splashing for Lingering Souls' black, you're splashing for it. Yes, there is the difference that it's not completely useless till you have the splash color, but that's still a splash. Like you would for Bloodbraid Elf.
Specialities about the cube: U tempo, B aggro, R slow-ish are supported. G aggro is not.
Currently trying to support tokens in all colors but blue, in different ways: W pumps them, B sacrifices them, R suicides them, G has decent-sized ones.
cube list outdated
*literal C/U definition according to gatherer
**some cards are banned. Library of Alexandria, Land Tax, Sol Ring.
It's not a gold card because you don't need both colors of mana to cast it.
Lingering Souls and Unburial Rites are not gold cards. Hybrid cards are not gold cards. Dual lands and signets are not gold cards. Split cards are not gold cards.
Far // Away plays out much more like a 2.5 mana hybrid removal spell with a huge upside than a gold card. At the end of the day it's just optics, but regardless of color discussion, this card is more powerful than it's being given credit. I'll cover it in my set review for SCG/Joy of Cubing.
And two, I think this shouldn't be competing for a multicolor slot. It's more like Lingering Souls or Unburial Rites...
I wouldn't ever put this card into a deck without both blue and black mana available to me. That makes it a blue/black card, plain and simple.
Same goes for Lingering Souls and Unburial Rites too, so I don't know if we're ever going to be able to agree on this topic.
What kind of cube deck would play a 1U Unsummon? Or a 2B Edict? Hopefully none. Far/Away is good, but it's only good because you can cast either/or or both. It's completely unplayable with only one casting option available.
Quote from KBH »
For instance, it leads to inane comments like "I'm not playing this card because its only the 5th best Selesnya card". On this basis a card may be excluded despite being better than every Izzet card.
That's not inane at all. Believe it or not, extra Selesnya cards don't help my Izzet decks win drafts. The best blue card in my on-deck binder may be better than my worst green card in the cube, but that doesn't mean that I should just start slashing green support from the cube to run more blue cards. That's not what's best for the cube.
Quote from kojiro »
It's not a gold card because you don't need both colors of mana to cast it.
It should be classified like a gold card because I need to be playing both colors in order to draft it.
Pretending it can hack it as a blue or black card would be the only decision that's disingenuous.
Quote from kojiro »
this card is more powerful than it's being given credit.
This card is good, but it's not as good as the other cards with the same restrictions (needs to be in a Dimir deck in order to be played).
Got some testing with Far//Away last night. The person who drafted it said it played pretty well in his U/B/W deck. He cast the edict side twice & fused it once. The fusion occurred against Pack Rats & the opponent lost two of them. He ultimately lost that game but that definitely bought him some time with the 2-for-1. He cast the edict side against me one time & it was pretty strong (taking out my big flier). Extra instant speed edict effects (even overcosted by one) is something that many black decks want more of. This card especially will help players deal with hexproof creatures.
I keep thinking back to Fire//Ice, as it's the only split card that I run. With "Fire" we're paying 1 extra mana for a Forked Bolt at instant speed. It's tough for me to find a comparison to Ice. The closest ones I have are Gigadrowse/Dream Grip with a 1-mana cantrip attached. That being said the blue side doesn't seem overcosted (even though the comparison cards are very lackluster by Cube standards). I definitely wouldn't Cube with either card on their own (like most Cubers I would guess). It's the flexibility that makes it so sweet.
Is Far//Away better than Fire//Ice? I don't think so. My point is that Fire//Ice is a card that is held in really high regard here & Far//Away has similar versatility to it and gets even better in the late-game. We are overpaying by one mana on both sides of the fuse card to give ourselves options.
I think this card is worth testing at any Cube size. I'm not married to any of my Dimir cards (even though cards like 'Tog & Finkel are considered staples). I am willing to give this card an extended test run in my Cube to compare its viability to the other cards in its guild.
Apparently we're not having the same conversation. We're talking about function, not looks. If you splash for lingering souls, it's the same as splashing for bloodbraid elf. If you wouldn't play lingering souls in a deck without black mana sources, it's a black/white card in practice. Is it easier on your mana? Yes, in a deck heavier on white than black.
If you would maindeck one half of this card in a deck without any black or blue, as if it were a monocolor card, then I encourage you to treat it as a true hybrid in your cube. But I would not, so in my cube it would be treated as a gold card. That's based on how it affects the drafting process, which is my only concern when classifying a card as gold.
When I see Healing Salve, I'm often like "Oh girl, I wish I could turn every card into this." Thanks they removed the gain life part, otherwise this would have been broken.
If you would maindeck one half of this card in a deck without any black or blue, as if it were a monocolor card, then I encourage you to treat it as a true hybrid in your cube. But I would not, so in my cube it would be treated as a gold card.
This sums it up perfectly. If you're comfortable playing Far/Away with only one of the colors available, go hog wild. Count it as a hybrid card, or put it in the black section or something. But despite being able to be cast as a blue or black card, I would never (never ever) play it in a deck that can't reliably cast both options. That makes it clearly a blue/black card for our purposes. It's really not complicated at all.
I agree with both of the above but I'll also say it doesn't make an awful 22nd card in your blue or black decks. Of course most non-mtgo cubes don't like to put so much emphasis on devoting slots to sideboard and 23rd spell style picks.
I have to say though, I'm really happy to see this direction from blue black again. I've been super sick of all the blatant mill support and all the abilities that trigger on combat damage from such heavy control and combo colours. Not like I don't like disruption guys and putting things in the graveyard but this just feels right and I hope to see more of it.
When I see Healing Salve, I'm often like "Oh girl, I wish I could turn every card into this." Thanks they removed the gain life part, otherwise this would have been broken.
I guess you could call it an edict with some serious opportunity bonus when also playing blue. Umm there's also a build around me aspect to drafting it where any opportunity to get painless multicolor fixing goes up, but everyone always wants to be in blue anyway right?
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Muhaha:D
I am sure Nof should just cube this as she will be able to appreciate this art to the fullest.
I feel compelled to repeat everything I hear
IE if I bounce a creature and get the player to sac it, can I bounce a creature THEN the opponent chooses which creature to sac?
Or does it happen simultaneously? Actually effects the power level of the card slightly...
Last Updated 02/07/24
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They're all designed to trigger in order.
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!
... and you can't intervene between the two parts. It's all one resolution. Just to have that mentioned.
And to everyone saying that five mana is a lot: YES. But this is not a five-mana card, it's a 2+3 splitcard with fuse. That's not the same. That means that you can also cast either half if that's good for you. No, the card won't do as much. No, a 1U ain't good. No, a three-mana edict isn't good. No, a combination of them at five mana isn't good. Being able to choose between the three is awesome.
450, Peasant*, unpowered**
Specialities about the cube:
U tempo, B aggro, R slow-ish are supported. G aggro is not.
Currently trying to support tokens in all colors but blue, in different ways: W pumps them, B sacrifices them, R suicides them, G has decent-sized ones.
cube list outdated
*literal C/U definition according to gatherer
**some cards are banned. Library of Alexandria, Land Tax, Sol Ring.
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!
https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/3pq
When you do, you can only cast one of the two options. But it's still good.
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!
It's not difficult to get full value off of this card without having to add more than a single dual land to your deck. I also disagree that either side of this card is unplayable without access to the other color. The effects are not so overcosted that I would exclude these because I wasn't able to pick up a couple off-color duals.
On the subject of whether it should be in a "Dimir" section, I just don't think this should be competing with something like Shadowmage Infiltrator or Dimir Charm. Unlike something like Kird Ape, this card is perfectly playable in a deck without those colors (obviously many of you disagree). These days I've been much more lax with allowing additional multicolor cards into my list, but I'd probably rather this spell be pit against something like Into the Roil, Cyclonic Rift, Vapor Snag, Chainer's Edict, or Slaughter Pact. The other half of the spell is just gravy. If your compulsion to pigeonhole this into your multicolor section keeps this out of your list because it's the 10th best Dimir card or whatever, that seems disingenuous. This seems like one that's much more powerful than people are giving it credit, and I believe it should be tested.
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How can an organisation system (or a compulsion to include a card under such) be 'disingenuous'? Misguided, perhaps?
People are just saying that it is unplayable with one side only. I pretty much agree with that assessment. Therefore, I would only play it in a deck with access to both colours. That's the sticking point here - if you're happy to run one side of it in a deck, then more power to you, and if you have a system that differs and allows you to include the card at no detriment to the other colour, then there's nothing wrong with including it, at all.
I like the card a lot, but because I wouldn't play it without both colours in my deck, it HAS to compete with 'Tog, Seer and Finkel in the structure I consider best. There's nothing at all 'disingenuous' about that.
On spoiled card wishlisting and 'should-have-had'-isms:
Etymology aside, we have a couple things happening here. First, I think the card is quite a bit better than people are giving it credit. And two, I think this shouldn't be competing for a multicolor slot. It's more like Lingering Souls or Unburial Rites than it is a Probe or Dismantling Blow. I think this is a completely respectable blue or black card in decks that want that effect. I understand that many of you feel it's just not a good cube card if you can't have both effects, but unless your mana fixing is stone awful, I see no reason why this shouldn't be easily played for both modes in the same way Lingering Souls is in a WW/x deck. Then again, I wouldn't ever pit Lingering Souls against a card that requires both colors of mana, and I am perfectly happy to include it in my white decks without the ability to reliably flash it back. It's in the cube because you can do both and it's flexible. This card is no different.
I am getting wildly different feedback from cubers in other groups on this. I don't know if it's a matter of multicolor philosophy or power-level differences. It's very interesting.
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He had the right word. Disingeuous. The fact is that its NOT an organization system when it also decides which cards are included and which cards are not. At some point it becomes a letter vs spirt of debate. Yes, you can have formal color balance by forcing a fixed number of guild slots for each combination. In fact, that fails to preserve color balance and tends to lead to color IMbalance instead.
Its not a "neutral" organization system; its not properly speaking an "organization" system at all. For whatever reason, it seems to produce a slavish desire to force fit cards to cater to a very inflexible and past-its-expiration-date rubric
For instance, it leads to inane comments like "I'm not playing this card because its only the 5th best Selesnya card". On this basis a card may be excluded despite being better than every Izzet card.
How does that make any sense?
I just disagree on the point that I would run this in a deck without both colours. I will concede I might, might run the black side alone, in the event that my draft went totally tits up. I wouldn't run Lingering Souls in WW or the blue side of F//A alone though, so that's clearly where we disagree. Nothing wrong with that.
I would like to point out the under my current system of including hybrids and split cards and gold cards in one group, the flexibility is still welcomed. I mean, my deck is more flexible containing a card like F//A than a Duskmantle Seer in that if I get colour-screwed, the card has some use to me. That is something I take into account when mentally ranking the sections, even if it seems to you like I'm kind of ignoring it. Increased flexibility is great in that section.
Let's say for a second I totally agreed with your assessment and that I would play both sides alone in a deck with one colour available. I would still end up putting that in the same section, firstly because that's where it's best, and (much more importantly) I don't have anywhere else to put it! It would, however, mean that I would rank it a lot higher than I currently do, and it would certainly make the grade. But because my inclination is that I require both sides, it suffers a little on the scale. It only barely misses out by a couple of cards anyway. I think it's great.
dis·in·gen·u·ous
/ˌdisinˈjenyo͞oəs/
Adjective
Not candid or sincere, typically by pretending that one knows less about something than one really does.
It's not the right word. Are you calling me insincere about my organisation of my own cube? I should hope not.
It is, by definition, an organisation system. Using terms like "past-its-expiration date" (lots of us use it, so it clearly is not), "slavish" (we have full control over our guild sections, so this is an incorrect term), and "inane" (...) doesn't make this somehow not be the case. I find it works best for me, and if you don't then I have no problem with that. And yes, a card may be excluded despite being better than every Izzet card. However, I am happy with every card in my section now, and see no reason to reduce the number of cards available to a given archetype by cutting what I perceive as 'poor' Izzet cards. It is perhaps the greatest weakness of the system, however, which I freely admit; yet, its strengths are also numerous.
Also, please avoid being rude to other posters.
On spoiled card wishlisting and 'should-have-had'-isms:
Without artifact deck support, I think dimir is actually kind of a weak guild, so in a medium size cube this isn't a bad choice. It's better in a slower cube.
None of this is correct. Disingenuous is inaccurate here and is also kind of rude in this context (as is a lot of the rest of your post). I don't understand the second bit at all, since cube organization is really about what is included and what isn't and nothing more.
I agree with the majority of the content here, if not the tone. I think it's better to just run the best cards, although I do try not to overload or underrepresent each color pair and I keep a close eye on gold percentage. I prefer strict numbers on monocolor just because it's easier but I think it's probably better unbalanced by numbers. It's a lot more of an issue in gold because the section is so much smaller.
"I'm not playing this because it's too bad for white, I'd definitely cube it if it were in green."
Why do we have the same number of white, blue, black, red and green cards? Because we care for balance. And we should. Every color should be represented equally, so every color can (ideally) be drafted equally. If you don't think balance is important, we're not on the same page and we can't argue with each other. Also, it's important to stick to these systems as good as we can. Tiny deviations are unavoidable, but I disagree with "meh, balance is impossible anyway".
So, because balance is important, we seek to preserve it in all places as good as possible. White gets as many cards as black, each dual land is represented, etc. I expand that to multicolor subsections. GW cards should be just as numerous as UR cards because of balance. Now, the tricky part starts, namely the classification of gray zone cards. Lingering Souls, Kird Ape and split cards come to mind as examples.
My approach is "looks like one, is one". Kird Ape gets drafted and maindecked in much the same situations that RG cards do, namely in decks that are red AND green. Kird Ape plays just as if he was RG, competition in drafting and requirements ingame are the same. Hence, he is RG multicolor.
Kitchen Finks is different. It's good if it's cast for 1WW, and it's good if it's cast for 1GG. It's played by GW, Wx and Gx decks alike, i.e. by decks that are white OR green. Competition in drafting and maindeckability are different from those of Qasali Pridemage, Kitchen Finks is therefore hybrid. Fire//Ice has two decent halves, to the extent that you're probably fine playing it being in one color. Red and blue decks fight over this, just like they would over a hybrid card. Fire//Ice is hybrid.
Now to Far//Away. My assessment of the card is that it's only good in decks that are both black AND blue, I wouldn't deck one half without access to the other. That drafts and decks like Shadowmage Infiltrator and not like Deathcult Rogue.
TL;DR: Far//Away needs access to both colors to be playable. That's more akin to a multicolor card than to a hybrid card, so it's classified like a multicolor card and should indeed compete with Jon Finkel and Psychatog.
450, Peasant*, unpowered**
Specialities about the cube:
U tempo, B aggro, R slow-ish are supported. G aggro is not.
Currently trying to support tokens in all colors but blue, in different ways: W pumps them, B sacrifices them, R suicides them, G has decent-sized ones.
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*literal C/U definition according to gatherer
**some cards are banned. Library of Alexandria, Land Tax, Sol Ring.
To me neither. I can splash for Bloodbraid Elf with a Taiga and two fetches, does that make it a non-gold card too? If you're splashing for Lingering Souls' black, you're splashing for it. Yes, there is the difference that it's not completely useless till you have the splash color, but that's still a splash. Like you would for Bloodbraid Elf.
450, Peasant*, unpowered**
Specialities about the cube:
U tempo, B aggro, R slow-ish are supported. G aggro is not.
Currently trying to support tokens in all colors but blue, in different ways: W pumps them, B sacrifices them, R suicides them, G has decent-sized ones.
cube list outdated
*literal C/U definition according to gatherer
**some cards are banned. Library of Alexandria, Land Tax, Sol Ring.
Lingering Souls and Unburial Rites are not gold cards. Hybrid cards are not gold cards. Dual lands and signets are not gold cards. Split cards are not gold cards.
Far // Away plays out much more like a 2.5 mana hybrid removal spell with a huge upside than a gold card. At the end of the day it's just optics, but regardless of color discussion, this card is more powerful than it's being given credit. I'll cover it in my set review for SCG/Joy of Cubing.
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I wouldn't ever put this card into a deck without both blue and black mana available to me. That makes it a blue/black card, plain and simple.
Same goes for Lingering Souls and Unburial Rites too, so I don't know if we're ever going to be able to agree on this topic.
What kind of cube deck would play a 1U Unsummon? Or a 2B Edict? Hopefully none. Far/Away is good, but it's only good because you can cast either/or or both. It's completely unplayable with only one casting option available.
That's not inane at all. Believe it or not, extra Selesnya cards don't help my Izzet decks win drafts. The best blue card in my on-deck binder may be better than my worst green card in the cube, but that doesn't mean that I should just start slashing green support from the cube to run more blue cards. That's not what's best for the cube.
It should be classified like a gold card because I need to be playing both colors in order to draft it.
Pretending it can hack it as a blue or black card would be the only decision that's disingenuous.
This card is good, but it's not as good as the other cards with the same restrictions (needs to be in a Dimir deck in order to be played).
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I keep thinking back to Fire//Ice, as it's the only split card that I run. With "Fire" we're paying 1 extra mana for a Forked Bolt at instant speed. It's tough for me to find a comparison to Ice. The closest ones I have are Gigadrowse/Dream Grip with a 1-mana cantrip attached. That being said the blue side doesn't seem overcosted (even though the comparison cards are very lackluster by Cube standards). I definitely wouldn't Cube with either card on their own (like most Cubers I would guess). It's the flexibility that makes it so sweet.
Is Far//Away better than Fire//Ice? I don't think so. My point is that Fire//Ice is a card that is held in really high regard here & Far//Away has similar versatility to it and gets even better in the late-game. We are overpaying by one mana on both sides of the fuse card to give ourselves options.
I think this card is worth testing at any Cube size. I'm not married to any of my Dimir cards (even though cards like 'Tog & Finkel are considered staples). I am willing to give this card an extended test run in my Cube to compare its viability to the other cards in its guild.
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Apparently we're not having the same conversation. We're talking about function, not looks. If you splash for lingering souls, it's the same as splashing for bloodbraid elf. If you wouldn't play lingering souls in a deck without black mana sources, it's a black/white card in practice. Is it easier on your mana? Yes, in a deck heavier on white than black.
If you would maindeck one half of this card in a deck without any black or blue, as if it were a monocolor card, then I encourage you to treat it as a true hybrid in your cube. But I would not, so in my cube it would be treated as a gold card. That's based on how it affects the drafting process, which is my only concern when classifying a card as gold.
This sums it up perfectly. If you're comfortable playing Far/Away with only one of the colors available, go hog wild. Count it as a hybrid card, or put it in the black section or something. But despite being able to be cast as a blue or black card, I would never (never ever) play it in a deck that can't reliably cast both options. That makes it clearly a blue/black card for our purposes. It's really not complicated at all.
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My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
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My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!
Cube talk, design community and much much more!
To be fair, the other half is much, much more likely to see play in a nonblue deck.
Cube talk, design community and much much more!