I may make this a tradition. SCD threads are great for the mainstream cards, but a lot of cards fly under the radar. A lot of cards were never meant to be mainstream cubeable, but are still worth playing in some archetypes. But if a card turns out to be great, it should get it's own SCD thread. I made threads for Grim Initiate and Deathsprout which both more properly belong here. I also made a thread for the planeswalkers, most of which have some application, so I won't talk about them here.
So what do we have so far:
If anybody is interested in a land to support five-color superfriends. Karn's Bastion is a better Superfriends land in general, but if you want color support for it, here it is.
Utility lands are good. Land recursion obviously works well with this, but it's nothing broken. There's not really an archetype that needs this card, but if one arises, there isn't going to be another card quite like this one.
Redundancy is redundancy. However, I don't think all that many people need a Zulaport Cutthroat in their guild sections.
I'm still looking for the perfect rainbow card. In a five-color-stuff deck in my cube, I can't imagine this not getting value. It's not the card I'm really waiting for, but it's probably a little better than Chromanticore in that slot.
This card is just good. It's pretty far behind the best of the best. As a matter of fact I like both Deathsprout and Leyline Prowler better, but it's undeniably good. If you can get an attack, you can generally get pretty great value out of this. Being able to get back a planeswalker with a -X ability is particularly useful I think.
Are you kidding? This card is nuts! An artifact focused ramp deck can get loads of use out of this. It makes the opponent's life miserable, and even provides a slow but inexorable clock. Sure this is slow, but it's horrible to play against. Imagine getting this in a deck with things like Propaganda and Magus of the Tabernacle.
Getting a dude out of your "counterspell" is never a bad thing. Nevertheless, this comes nowhere near the good 1U counterspells since it only stops targeted removal and hand disruption.
Mmm, keyword soup. A BoP activation is no small keyword to add, and lifelink and deathtouch are both good in different ways when you're behind. This card is sweet. It's a shame there aren't really cubes for it to shine in. Maybe peasant, but guild slots are probably too tight there too.
Getting spells back is no small thing. There aren't a lot of efficient cards that do it. This does an adequate if uninspiring job in that department. Sacrificing the creature makes it easy to recur in a lot of decks. This doesn't quite get there for me, but I'm very hungry for playable versions of this effect.
This gets huge. Pyre Hound proved to me how powerful this effect is. It's too fair for any traditional cube, but in a weaker cube with a spellslinger theme, this slides in alongside the Hound very well, though I think Hound's trample makes it a sidegrade.
Also for a spellslinger theme. I like this less. What I do like is that it's a noncreature spell itself that provides a board presence for a spellslinger deck. However I like it less than more traditional token generator spells like Hordeling Outburst for that purpose.
This has just enough extra abilities to make the Gaea's Skyfolk base decent. If you want to build a proliferate theme, this is neither the best nor the worst card for it. I might be playing this.
This is a straight aristocrats card, and I think you'd usually do better with a less narrow card. It punishes fetchlands pretty nicely, and works well with a lot of things, so maybe this is good enough if you're really pushing the archetype. The ceiling here is awfully high, but of course guild slots are murder.
Good with counters. Also good with blinks, but you're playing this for counters support. It's great that it has a backup option for when you don't have anything to proliferate. You can really build a counters theme several different ways now. It's pretty cool.
A more stompy, and less important version. This is probably a little better than Quarry Hauler, but I love the ability to remove a counter. Kiora's Dambreaker is an even stompier blue version, but seems less playable.
Eldritch Evolution is a little awkward for cube, and so is this. In constructed you can really plan for what to sac and what to fetch to optimize. Nevertheless, this is a pretty good card. It's especially worthwhile if you support a bant blink archetype, sine ETBs are what this does best.
If you think I missed any that are worthwhile and don't have or need an SCD thread, please note them. Or if you think anything here is worth having its own thread (God-Pharaoh's Statue maybe), feel free to make one.
Top out of these for em is Neoform. I really like toolbox cards and have gotten plenty of mileage out of Eldrich Evolution, Natural Order, GSZ, etc. As an instant it would be in, but it will probably be out but I will keep one around if I want to support it. Bring to Light had a nice spin for me as I am not really excited for the creature creatures or walkers in this color combo because the mono-colored are so strong.
Spellgorger Weird. Not good enough but I am really pumped that they are playing in this space. Maybe a 1/1 for 2 with the ability ?
Cruel Celebrant. For a gold card I wish it had the blood artist text
Niv-Mizzit. I am waiting for a rainbow creature that is really good with reanimation, sneak attack, and natural order. This isn't it.
I do think the beacon is great for heavy walker cubes. But this set makes me glad I am keeping a lid on them.
I think Mizzium Tank is exactly what I want in a cube card - it bridges multiple archetypes, as an aggro threat that dodges Sorcery removal, as an undercosted fatty for spellslinger and for its random synergy with Red artifacts-matter effects. Before testing, it looks like the baseline power is there, and it seems like a healthier use of a slot from a cube design standpoint than a random Rampaging Ferocidon or Ahn-Crop Crasher. It’s on my short list for testing.
I think Mizzium Tank is exactly what I want in a cube card - it bridges multiple archetypes, as an aggro threat that dodges Sorcery removal, as an undercosted fatty for spellslinger and for its random synergy with Red artifacts-matter effects. Before testing, it looks like the baseline power is there, and it seems like a healthier use of a slot from a cube design standpoint than a random Rampaging Ferocidon or Ahn-Crop Crasher. It’s on my short list for testing.
It's definitely an efficient card. Being an artifact gives it extra synergy, and crew 1 is not hard to do even when you aren't casting spells. You're right that it bridges multiple archetypes, which is important. I might have underestimated it. 1RR is annoying though.
I missed these because they aren't on the main page yet:
Kor Skyfisher is a good card, and a 4/3 flying for 4 is reasonable. Skyfisher showed me how often you want this ability. It sucks that it misses lands though, as an extra landfall trigger can be a big deal, and bouncing and replaying a land is a common Skyfisher play. Also 2UU is a much less appealing cost than 1W for the effect, and part of Skyfisher's appeal is that it is an undercosted beater, which this isn't.
Thrummingbird is a personal pet card. It's not the most powerful, but it has worked as a decent engine in my cube enough times to earn a little respect. It's an ability that only gets better with more redundancy. White can use proliferate at least as well as blue I think.
This card is extremely efficient. If you have a slot for a red/blue burn spell, this is a very good one. At first glance, I rank it above Electrolyze, but still slightly below Fire // Ice and Izzet Charm.
This is worth noting as Black’s first true Dragon Fodder variant. Other 2-drops will get you two bodies if they die, activate their abilities, etc, but this is the only one that actually produces two bodies immediately. For those that support sacrifice-heavy strategies in black or feature Zombie synergies, this card deserves consideration.
This planeswalker is not terribly behind the curve. It produces two threats, protects your whole team, and digs for your next plays. The power level here is not obscene and the competition is fierce, but this card has a relatively high floor for a planeswalker and could be a useful replacement-level card for creature-based blue decks.
A lot of cards in the set are really intriguing to me, I think because I'm really trying to exchange out a lot of generic good stuff for cards that help build interesting archetypes. Although they might be behind the power curve for most of us, I'm actually really curious to see if anybody else is kind of on the same plan, or maybe has some novel ideas they'd like to share. So, I really appreciate this thread and I'm gonna keep an eye here (and on the PW thread) to see what ya'll come up with.
There’s no world where Parhelion II is a card, right?
I mean I’m having fun trying to figure out how it’s supposed to do anything, but that will probably be a lot less fun when it’s the 15th card in a pack. :/
Parhelion II is a classic trap. It will only serve to fool players into thinking it's playable when it isn't. Maybe someday there will be enough vehicle support of the right kind though.
Card selection plus life gain is nice. Getting any permanent is nice too. I really want decent card draw in green, and it's hard to come by. This is low tier, but it's serviceable.
There are a ton of interesting cards in WAR, but at first glance I think "Almost Playable" is going to be moniker of all the top cards in the set for my (power) Cube. However, it seems like there are more hard-to-evaluate cards than normal so the door remains open (well, ajar)
In general I imagine we will play with plenty of these cards, but it will be in other situations because the threshold for (power) Cube is way up there. (I honestly think it is higher than is generally appreciated on this forum)
There’s no world where Parhelion II is a card, right?
I mean I’m having fun trying to figure out how it’s supposed to do anything, but that will probably be a lot less fun when it’s the 15th card in a pack. :/
Parhelion II is perhaps the most unnecessarily win-more card I've ever seen. To make it function you'll need eight mana (or a way to cheat an artifact into play), enough power on board to crew it, and a full turn before it can swing (or a haste enabler). Even then a single swing isn't actually lethal, though it's pretty close. But if you have all those things already and your opponent can't break any of them, you were in pretty good shape to begin with. You had better options than this card.
I like the idea of Soul Diviner. Removing persist counters from Glen Elendra Archmage, or speeding Thing in the Ice's flip is sweet. Even trading Planeswalker loyalty for cards is essentially like having Jace Beleren in play. 2/3 for 2 is also a decent body. Dimir is way too stacked, though, for it to be a serious consideration.
I really wish soul diviner could remove counters from opponents cards as well. Don't think it wold be too powerful but would make it that much more interesting.
Nissa's Triumph is powerful, but it's so heavy green (only getting basic forests on top of costing GG) that it's pretty hard to justify. Monogreen just isn't much of a thing in cube.
Casualties of War is crazy. That's a lot of advantage off of one card. I like it a lot, though BBGG is the pits. I'll try it if I open it. It's too cool and too powerful not to.
Soul Diviner definitely belongs on this list, but it loses out not being green, since green has lots of counters, and has more use of a card-draw engine than Dimir, which has plenty of that. I hate that this doesn't work with sags.
Edit: Adding Oath of Kaya
1BW for sorcery speed (blinkable) Lightning Helix is a good floor. If you care about the planeswalker text, this is a respectable card, even if it's nowhere near the top of Orzhov.
So what do we have so far:
If anybody is interested in a land to support five-color superfriends. Karn's Bastion is a better Superfriends land in general, but if you want color support for it, here it is.
Utility lands are good. Land recursion obviously works well with this, but it's nothing broken. There's not really an archetype that needs this card, but if one arises, there isn't going to be another card quite like this one.
Redundancy is redundancy. However, I don't think all that many people need a Zulaport Cutthroat in their guild sections.
I'm still looking for the perfect rainbow card. In a five-color-stuff deck in my cube, I can't imagine this not getting value. It's not the card I'm really waiting for, but it's probably a little better than Chromanticore in that slot.
This card is just good. It's pretty far behind the best of the best. As a matter of fact I like both Deathsprout and Leyline Prowler better, but it's undeniably good. If you can get an attack, you can generally get pretty great value out of this. Being able to get back a planeswalker with a -X ability is particularly useful I think.
Are you kidding? This card is nuts! An artifact focused ramp deck can get loads of use out of this. It makes the opponent's life miserable, and even provides a slow but inexorable clock. Sure this is slow, but it's horrible to play against. Imagine getting this in a deck with things like Propaganda and Magus of the Tabernacle.
Getting a dude out of your "counterspell" is never a bad thing. Nevertheless, this comes nowhere near the good 1U counterspells since it only stops targeted removal and hand disruption.
Mmm, keyword soup. A BoP activation is no small keyword to add, and lifelink and deathtouch are both good in different ways when you're behind. This card is sweet. It's a shame there aren't really cubes for it to shine in. Maybe peasant, but guild slots are probably too tight there too.
Getting spells back is no small thing. There aren't a lot of efficient cards that do it. This does an adequate if uninspiring job in that department. Sacrificing the creature makes it easy to recur in a lot of decks. This doesn't quite get there for me, but I'm very hungry for playable versions of this effect.
This gets huge. Pyre Hound proved to me how powerful this effect is. It's too fair for any traditional cube, but in a weaker cube with a spellslinger theme, this slides in alongside the Hound very well, though I think Hound's trample makes it a sidegrade.
Also for a spellslinger theme. I like this less. What I do like is that it's a noncreature spell itself that provides a board presence for a spellslinger deck. However I like it less than more traditional token generator spells like Hordeling Outburst for that purpose.
This has just enough extra abilities to make the Gaea's Skyfolk base decent. If you want to build a proliferate theme, this is neither the best nor the worst card for it. I might be playing this.
This is a straight aristocrats card, and I think you'd usually do better with a less narrow card. It punishes fetchlands pretty nicely, and works well with a lot of things, so maybe this is good enough if you're really pushing the archetype. The ceiling here is awfully high, but of course guild slots are murder.
Good with counters. Also good with blinks, but you're playing this for counters support. It's great that it has a backup option for when you don't have anything to proliferate. You can really build a counters theme several different ways now. It's pretty cool.
A more stompy, and less important version. This is probably a little better than Quarry Hauler, but I love the ability to remove a counter. Kiora's Dambreaker is an even stompier blue version, but seems less playable.
Eldritch Evolution is a little awkward for cube, and so is this. In constructed you can really plan for what to sac and what to fetch to optimize. Nevertheless, this is a pretty good card. It's especially worthwhile if you support a bant blink archetype, sine ETBs are what this does best.
If you think I missed any that are worthwhile and don't have or need an SCD thread, please note them. Or if you think anything here is worth having its own thread (God-Pharaoh's Statue maybe), feel free to make one.
Low-power cube enthusiast!
My 1570 card cube (no longer updated)
My 415 Peasant+ Artifact and Enchantment Cube
Ever-Expanding "Just throw it in" cube.
Spellgorger Weird. Not good enough but I am really pumped that they are playing in this space. Maybe a 1/1 for 2 with the ability ?
Cruel Celebrant. For a gold card I wish it had the blood artist text
Niv-Mizzit. I am waiting for a rainbow creature that is really good with reanimation, sneak attack, and natural order. This isn't it.
I do think the beacon is great for heavy walker cubes. But this set makes me glad I am keeping a lid on them.
I missed these because they aren't on the main page yet:
Kor Skyfisher is a good card, and a 4/3 flying for 4 is reasonable. Skyfisher showed me how often you want this ability. It sucks that it misses lands though, as an extra landfall trigger can be a big deal, and bouncing and replaying a land is a common Skyfisher play. Also 2UU is a much less appealing cost than 1W for the effect, and part of Skyfisher's appeal is that it is an undercosted beater, which this isn't.
Thrummingbird is a personal pet card. It's not the most powerful, but it has worked as a decent engine in my cube enough times to earn a little respect. It's an ability that only gets better with more redundancy. White can use proliferate at least as well as blue I think.
This card is extremely efficient. If you have a slot for a red/blue burn spell, this is a very good one. At first glance, I rank it above Electrolyze, but still slightly below Fire // Ice and Izzet Charm.
EDIT: Added Ral's Outburst
Low-power cube enthusiast!
My 1570 card cube (no longer updated)
My 415 Peasant+ Artifact and Enchantment Cube
Ever-Expanding "Just throw it in" cube.
This is worth noting as Black’s first true Dragon Fodder variant. Other 2-drops will get you two bodies if they die, activate their abilities, etc, but this is the only one that actually produces two bodies immediately. For those that support sacrifice-heavy strategies in black or feature Zombie synergies, this card deserves consideration.
This planeswalker is not terribly behind the curve. It produces two threats, protects your whole team, and digs for your next plays. The power level here is not obscene and the competition is fierce, but this card has a relatively high floor for a planeswalker and could be a useful replacement-level card for creature-based blue decks.
Cubetutor Link
I mean I’m having fun trying to figure out how it’s supposed to do anything, but that will probably be a lot less fun when it’s the 15th card in a pack. :/
Cubetutor Link
Card selection plus life gain is nice. Getting any permanent is nice too. I really want decent card draw in green, and it's hard to come by. This is low tier, but it's serviceable.
Low-power cube enthusiast!
My 1570 card cube (no longer updated)
My 415 Peasant+ Artifact and Enchantment Cube
Ever-Expanding "Just throw it in" cube.
In general I imagine we will play with plenty of these cards, but it will be in other situations because the threshold for (power) Cube is way up there. (I honestly think it is higher than is generally appreciated on this forum)
While this card is not playable except in the weirdest of cubes, I ******* love super decimate.
375 unpowered cube - https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/601ac624832cdf1039947588
Draft my cube! (630 cards)
Parhelion II is perhaps the most unnecessarily win-more card I've ever seen. To make it function you'll need eight mana (or a way to cheat an artifact into play), enough power on board to crew it, and a full turn before it can swing (or a haste enabler). Even then a single swing isn't actually lethal, though it's pretty close. But if you have all those things already and your opponent can't break any of them, you were in pretty good shape to begin with. You had better options than this card.
Even in WAR limited it's gonna be a trap.
[180 classic cube]
Casualties of War is crazy. That's a lot of advantage off of one card. I like it a lot, though BBGG is the pits. I'll try it if I open it. It's too cool and too powerful not to.
Soul Diviner definitely belongs on this list, but it loses out not being green, since green has lots of counters, and has more use of a card-draw engine than Dimir, which has plenty of that. I hate that this doesn't work with sags.
Edit: Adding Oath of Kaya
1BW for sorcery speed (blinkable) Lightning Helix is a good floor. If you care about the planeswalker text, this is a respectable card, even if it's nowhere near the top of Orzhov.
Low-power cube enthusiast!
My 1570 card cube (no longer updated)
My 415 Peasant+ Artifact and Enchantment Cube
Ever-Expanding "Just throw it in" cube.
Eldrazi Skyspawner is a good card. This is... slightly worse, but not a lot worse. Lots of great creature types going around.
Once upon a time, this would have been top of the pile.
If you're into artifacts that cantrip and want to be recurred.
The set is now fully spoiled. Anything we missed?
Low-power cube enthusiast!
My 1570 card cube (no longer updated)
My 415 Peasant+ Artifact and Enchantment Cube
Ever-Expanding "Just throw it in" cube.