MTG Salvation

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Cube List

W White W

Creatures (66)

Noncreature (39)

U Blue U

Creature (39)


Noncreature (67)

B Black B

Creature (49)



Noncreature (57)


R Red R

Creature (56)

Noncreature (50)

G Green G
Creature (71)

Noncreature (35)


X Colorless (81) X

Creature (20)


Noncreature (61)

WRGBUMulticolor (72) WRGBU


Land + Mana-fixing (97)

Reserved for changelog.

M11

Scars of Mirrodin

Mirrodin Besieged

New Phyrexia

Commander

M12 changes, July 2011

Innistrad

pre-Dark Ascension

Sure, eidolon! The only reason I maintained the old thread was to keep the deckstats link up to date for my own use. Cleaning up the actual list on the forum here was a nightmare (I ran into about four unique glitches that slowed me down considerably) so I decided to scrap it and start from scratch. That discussion died over a year ago so I wouldn't really call it active, I didn't want to necro a dead thread, and the cube has changed enough over time that a fresh start and new discussion was called for.

Plus, I can compare my fully updated cube to others in the comparison thread! It's always been a valuable tool that I wanted to take advantage of. Now I can actually provide a usable list for you (I'm not sure what format you'd want it in though).

It was a dark and stormy night. The moon, like a baleful eye, glared down upon my work. As I put the finishing touches upon my piece, a flash of lightning illuminated the dancing shadows in the chamber. A moment later, the rumble of thunder provided a deep and ominous drum for the mad peal of laughter dancing across the walls. The sound died on my lips as my fingers flickered over the masterpiece like a pianist across the keys of his favorite baby grand.

The brief moment of light burned the magnificent sight into my eyes. Limbs of sinewy strength grown massive and knotted in death, more limbs than I remembered, for it had started stitching more of its own. It stuttered and twitched with a spark of energy. Yet it needed the kiss of life, and until tonight, it had been denied. Tonight, the very elements had come together to witness its birth. As my hand fell on the switch, I allowed myself one last glimpse of my darling child, who would soon join us on this glorious unhallowed night.

The switch came down. Somewhere above us, thunder roared and diabolical machinery screamed in unison as my grand creation rose from its rest.

"IT LIVES!"

If I'm going to necro my thread, might as well do it in style.

Innistrad Update: Attack of the Wolves Bears
In which some choices are explained, while others are left to the reader to puzzle over

Do you dare face the dreaded Wall of Text? If not, skip down to the spoiler for the card choices and explanation behind them. Skip alllll the way down for the shortlist. I put a lot of time into this and I might cry if you do that, though. Here I discuss how I went into the Innistrad update with two issues to try and resolve:

1. The weakness of aggro decks. Using wtwlf's tool to measure the ratio of aggro to control, and taking the idea of the fundamental turn in cubing as explained by TakeABow, I consciously tried to lower the curve by substituting cheaper cards for more expensive ones, and specifically including pure aggro cards. Hence the name of the update. I stopped short of what I consider cube dilution, which reduces the quality of the cube in favor of pushing a specific archetype (e.g. including cards that are either untested, hard-to-evaluate, or bad at first glance like Reckless Waif and Stromkirk Noble).

2. The prevalence of multicolor. Multicolor was still proving somewhat detrimental to drafts, as a lot of gold cards ended up sitting in sideboards, while adding very little to the drafting process. My objective was to cut 1 card from each guild section and 1 card from the 5-color section. This would allow 2 extra cards for each color and 1 extra card for artifacts, providing me with wriggle room for Innistrad and its follow-up.

Without further ado, here be cards:

IN --> OUT

Black

Green

White

Red:

Blue

Land

Multicolor

Shortlist:

Conclusion:
I'm fairly happy with Innistrad. I think I did almost everything I set out to do - reduced multicolor, provided aggro support and pushed the average mana cost just a teeny bit further down. Thoughts and responses are welcome, as long as they include naked girl pics discussion related to the above.

I am specifically interested to see how you like Nether Void and The Abyss. Comments on how these cards play out would be appreciated!

Nether Void is totally boss. I like it a lot.

Sure! I can elaborate on these:

You might know this already, but Nether Void plays like a black Armageddon. It works great in aggressive decks that want to lay down early beats and then clear the board of lands to stop the opponent from matching or reducing your board presence. I had a draft with B/W aggro where I picked up Nether Void and Ravages of War. The games where I was able to cast Nether Void after a couple bears were auto-wins. But after turn four, its value tended to diminish since the opponent would start dropping bigger threats than my aggro dudes, making Nether Void a weaker play.

Other examples of it performing fantastic was when it got paired up with land destruction, particularly in red. Stuff like Sinkhole, Molten Rain and Avalanche Riders made the Void's value go way up.

It's also decent to great in some midrange decks. I'm thinking of GB Rock-style decks where you want to slowly accrue an incremental advantage with 2-for-1 spells. Of course, one of these decks already had Wasteland-Loam recursion for the win, so the Void was mostly a formality, but again - mana denial combined with Nether Void makes for very strong plays if you have threats online - or at least, the ability to play threats through a Nether Void.

I'd like to explore the value of Nether Void combined with planeswalkers. Black only had two walkers until recently (and expensive ones too) which made it really hard to do the ideal play of casting a threat and following it up with Nether Void. Liliana of the Veil might change that since she has the ideal cost of three mana.

One way NOT to use it is as a Propaganda-style effect in control decks. It's easy to only look at the good side (slowing down your opponent's play), overlooking the symmetry and how it can seriously slow down your strategy. This can expose your deck to faster decks or aggro strategies if you don't have a line of play that can deal with them while Nether Void is running interference. It also makes control's finishers a lot more expensive, drastically lengthening the amount of time you have to go without them.

The Abyss - well, I've played with it and against it, and it's similar to Moat, being a little less effective and a little more splashable. It won't kill artifact creatures or shrouded dudes, which when combined is probably roughly equal to the number of flyers that Moat won't stop. It's still such a huge swing in the Abyss caster's favor. Like the Moat though, it's rare that a deck is stuck without outs to it. I had to fight through an Abyss recently with a GR aggro deck. In the first game I had Squee, Goblin Nabob + Skullclamp on board and had to go digging for my Nantuko Vigilante, since my board position was miserable after several removal spells got slung my way. In game two I faced it again, but had a Spined Thopter to punch through the last few points of damage. In game two and three I opted to change up my strategy and go midrange, since I had access to anti-Abyss tech in my sideboard with Bramblecrush and Hornet Queen.

Overall, I'd say the Abyss is one of those cards that forces the player across the table to either answer it or adapt to its effect. It can occasionally just lock your opponent out of the game. In certain corner cases a Wrath can be better, like when you're about to get hit by an alpha strike. When it's in your deck, it's usually one of your biggest bombs, being fairly easy to build around, with manlands, token-generators and walkers everywhere.

@PyreDream:
Thanks for the insight. I added Nether Void to my 720 unpowered Cube this week, and I look forward to testing it on Friday. I really love what it does for the black aggro archtypes.

I would like to play The Abyss, but there isn't much I would want to cut for it. Barter in Blood is probably the slot it would take, but I don't know if I'm willing to make that kind of change for a prominent Cube staple like Barter in Blood. Also, Barter seems playable in more decks, but it doesn't quite have the pick volatility of The Abyss. It seems like The Abyss has the potential of going as a VERY high pick for certain archtypes. I notice you play both of these cards, but I just don't think I can pull that off in mine (mine is a tad smaller I suppose).

So I guess another question: Which plays a more prominent role: Barter in Blood or The Abyss?

Bah I would really love to play The Abyss. I need to find room for it. Seems like a great card for the U/B artifact control deck.

Barter in Blood is an excellent sweeper, and it should be a staple at any size. I love Smokestack effects, so I don't think I could ever cut The Abyss. I would rather cube both. If you had a cube list available somewhere I could look at it and discuss if there was a better cut and if The Abyss would be better or worse in your cube (dependent on lots of factors like the number of wraths you run, whether you support token strategies, the density of artifact/enchantment removal).

Quote from PyreDream

Barter in Blood is an excellent sweeper, and it should be a staple at any size.

I disagree. BiB was mediocre. There were many times when it sat in my hand because I would be in a worse position if I cast, or I cast it and it didn't make any difference. Sometimes it was Damnation 2.0; once in a great while it was better than Damnation; sometimes it was actively bad. I mostly don't like cards that are that variable in my cube. I cut it and don't miss it at all.

Cheers,
rant

I was never much of a fan of it either. But at 900 cards? It's probably good enough.

Quote from wtwlf123

I was never much of a fan of it either. But at 900 cards? It's probably good enough.

True. I wasn't thinking about the size of the cube so much as I was responding to the comment that BiB belongs in a cube of any size. I think my 500 is too tight for it, but I'd probably run at 600 and certainly would run it at 900.

Cheers,
rant

That's really surprising. It hasn't shown up often. When it does it's always played like a Damnation that was occasionally a blowout and sometimes mediocre. But actively bad? I'm not sure how that's possible. I haven't really seen any situations where that happens, unless it's something corner-case like having one finisher on the board versus your opponent's three or four creatures. Maybe if you have token strategies enabled and/or facing down something like Deranged Hermit. But that kind of card or strategy tends to diminish the value of edict effects anyway. Might as well consider Innocent Blood actively bad too. I don't think it's difficult to affect the game state to make it an advantageous play.

Quote from PyreDream

That's really surprising. It hasn't shown up often. When it does it's always played like a Damnation that was occasionally a blowout and sometimes mediocre. But actively bad? I'm not sure how that's possible. I haven't really seen any situations where that happens, unless it's something corner-case like having one finisher on the board versus your opponent's three or four creatures. Maybe if you have token strategies enabled and/or facing down something like Deranged Hermit. But that kind of card or strategy tends to diminish the value of edict effects anyway. Might as well consider Innocent Blood actively bad too. I don't think it's difficult to affect the game state to make it an advantageous play.

In my experience, I'd say about a quarter of the time I had BiB in hand I'd either get no advantage out of it (opponent had more creautres than me before and would have more after, or because the opponent had enough creatures that I wouldn't be able to get rid of the creature I really needed to get rid of) or it would've been actively bad (it would take out my blocker or blockers while leaving my opponent with a threat). It was really too inconsistent for my liking.

Innocent Blood is a totally different card. First, I don't expect as much for 1 mana as I do for 4 (4cc may be the tightest spot in the entire cube). Innocent Blood also isn't meant to be a sweeper. It's meant to deal with a Tinkered/reanimated threat during the first 1-3 turns. And, I don't think Innocent Blood will be in my cube much longer, again because it is too inconsistent (and because Liliana 2.0 is badass!).

Cheers,
rant

Fair enough! I concede the four mana club is insanely hard for cards to break into. But in the same way that Innocent Blood is ideal turn 1-3, Barter in Blood is ideal turn 4-5. There's that window where your opponent doesn't have enough creatures to reduce BiB's effectiveness. And, since Eidolon mentioned it, I don't see how something like Bane of the Living can be much better; Bane usually takes an extra turn, the morph cost can be prohibitive, and it is easily removed. That seems like a lot of drawbacks in return for the flexibility of the morph cost and a body which isn't likely to survive its morphing. I love both, but I'm not sure why the Bane should be favored.

Quote from eidolon232

If some of you are complaining about casting the card against a token deck, just try to play it in a token deck - trading 2 Cloundgoat / Elspeth / Bitterblossom Tokens in exchange of your opponent's army then swing for a bunch is pretty insane.

Awesome. Also pretty ridiculous in a GB deck with stuff like Hermit, Genesis and any Garruk

Bane is a win condition in addition to functioning as a sweeper. And the fact that you control the value of creatures he kills lends him to being more asymmetrical in your favor than Barter. But mostly, it's the effect + creature thing that makes it better.

Wtwlf sums up my thuoghts on Bane vs. Barter. I really like Bane and have found him to be pretty consistently good.

Cheers,
rant

Here's a question for y'all: What would you consider cuttable in my cube? I'm trimming the bottom tier of cards for a pre-Dark Ascension update, and I'm very interested to hear thoughts from fellow cubers. Everything is fair game (except multicolor, which I have solved for now).

P.S. I'm hoping to pull enough players together for an actual, physical Rotisserie draft tomorrow, so watch this space for a potential draft + tourney report!

Eidolon's list looks pretty good. I'd start with those.

No hate for Redirect? I'm a fan of Deflection effects but I admit it's usually better to have another actual spell. Or am I confusing the reasoning with Fork effects?

As for the Rotisserie draft: we had an unfortunate turnout, as two of the eight players backed out at the 11th hour. Bah! I thought. Surely a six-man Rotisserie is even more exciting! So we went ahead with that thing where you choose cards and stuff.

As expected, blue seemed like the most desirable color at the table, but there were some very unusual developments. I must preface by apologizing for not taking any notes during the draft - I was already tasked with monitoring the pick order and timing the picks to ensure a timely draft (in addition to participating myself), and I didn't have anyone else who could step up and be the scribe. The decklists also went unrecorded, so while I have every player's cardpool, the numbers are a wee bit wonky around the edges since I have to reconstruct five cube decks from memory. We'll have to make do with the highlights!

Black Lotus was the first seat's pick, but then somewhere along the way there were a couple very unusual first picks. One player first-picked Stoneforge Mystic, and another first-picked Crucible of Worlds. I was lucky enough to be on the wheel. In classic fashion, this meant I got Survival of the Fittest and Recurring Nightmare as my first picks. Only one Mox was drafted in the first round! Planeswalkers were similarly undervalued, which meant I was able to snag them two at a time and almost hurt my deck by picking too many walkers and not enough critters. The Ancestral Recall went to the 5th seat. In the second round I got to snag both Mox Jet and Mox Emerald. I felt like I was off to a pretty durned amazing start. And when you can pick from the best cards in Magic, two-card combos are amazing. It seemed everyone took my pre-draft advice to heart, what with the Crucible and Stoneforge Mystic going very early so the players could build around those cards.

Once players had settled into a groove, the rest of the picks came fairly quickly. There were a couple snags as the two blue players clashed for picks, and I was surprised to see the first-pick Black Lotus going into GB after my picks would bring us into conflict, but overall we prioritized different cards. We ended with:

1. A Junk deck with Crucible/Loam recursion and a red splash for Greater Gargadon;
2. A Boros aggro deck with an unfortunately high curve and some awkward draft choices (Maze of Ith and Duplicant stood out as particularly strange);
3. A BW Deadguy aggro deck with excellent pick choices (Hymn to Tourach, Demonic Tutor, Dark Confidant, Stoneforge Mystic + Batterskull + Jitte) but a weak manabase;
4. A dedicated UW control deck with three walkers, Bribery, Moat, Recall, Mana Drain and Isochron Scepter with some decent targets (Mystical Tutor, Counterspell, Enlightened Tutor, Recall, Drain)
5. The artifact deck; both Tezzerets, Sensei's Divining Top, Tinker, Inkwell Leviathan + Darksteel Colossus (but no Myr Battlesphere or Sundering Titan! I believe this was a mistake), Academy, Mana Crypt, Metalworker, Sol Ring...
6. A RecSur deck, courtesy of yours truly - Survival, Nightmare, Squee, Genesis, Library of Alexandria, a couple Swords, a couple Moxes, four walkers (three were Garruks) and hilarious amounts of ETB creatures meant I was more than ready to grind my opponents out.

I've posted the decklists below so you guys can dissect the card choices in detail. I've already mentioned what I thought about the other decks, but my own concoction had a glaring weakness that I didn't notice even though it had been staring me right in the face during draft - I didn't have a way around shroud/hexproof. I had simply stared in blissful ignorance while the 1st seat took Troll Ascetic and Thrun, the Last Troll on the wheel. My deck really wanted a Fleshbag Marauder or Gatekeeper of Malakir. But I didn't cube with the former and the latter had been snapped up early by Deadguy. This cost me a game against the Junk player. I also had no artifact creatures, which became relevant against protection colors or Swords.

The highlights:

My first round against the Junk player had me fearing the Strip Mine + Crucible play when he dropped the artifact on the third turn before I could set up my own recursion. A snap Sex Monkey put a damper on that line of play, but then my own Survival gets answered by Krosan Grip. I manage to end the game with Genesis recursion.

My second game goes poorly. I can't do anything relevant before he drops a Troll Ascetic, followed by a Thrun. I get trolled hard while I stare at the Nekrataal and Bone Shredder sitting in my hand.

The third game goes down to the wire, with some impressive plays from both ends of the table. I land a first turn Library of Alexandria and get about three activations out of it before it gets Slimed. I'm staring down a turn two Bitterblossom, but I have a turn two Fauna Shaman. I get to untap with the Shaman in play, and it's like Magical Christmas Land. I start a Survival chain with Squee and Genesis and get my Indrik Stomphowler before the fairies eat up too many life points. I try to stick a Survival to go nuts, but he has insane removal and I only get one activation out of it. I go for the plan B and manage to stick Garruk Relentless, who takes out a fairy token to transform into his cursed version. At some point, Greater Gargadon gets suspended and I have to puzzle over his inclusion of four colors. It's revealed a couple turns later. We fight over board position, but his Damnation sweeps my superior army into the dustbin. I start rebuilding with Genesis and Eternal Witness, recasting Garruk Relentless and landing a Liliana Vess to force him down to his last card. On his turn he floats two mana, sacrifices all his lands to leave one counter on the Gargadon, then uses the two mana to play his last card, the almighty Balance.

That right there should have been game. But I still have a Garruk Relentless and a Liliana Vess, and best of all, I was holding an Obstinate Baloth when Balance wiped my hand out. Now I can hold off the Gargadon long enough to create a stream of never-ending wolves. My opponent concedes after what should have been his game-winning play, staring down a Liliana about to go ultimate and a Garruk full of wolves.

My next opponent is Boros aggro. I'm fearing the first-turn Goblin Guide, but his deck is way slower than I expected. I still get surprised by his hastey creatures. My first Garruk gets burned out. A Hero of Oxid Ridge sneaks past my Sakura-Tribe Elder and takes out a second Garruk, and things go downhill from there. The Hero picks up a Loxodon Warhammer and gets a swing in before I can take out the Hammer. To my credit, I manage to take out his Mother of Runes with a Nekrataal before it goes online, making his Hero look a bit worse. Baneslayer Angel shows up, and it also gets a hit in before I can take it out. I start to build up a ground army after being on the defensive, but Inferno Titan drops and I can't recover from losing my creatures.

Game two was an uphill battle for me all the way. An early Fauna Shaman eats burn. A misplay on my part loses me Garruk Wildspeaker to another burn spell. A Mirran Crusader shows up late to the party - protection from my entire deck, you say? Well then. From then on I'm desperately trying to keep my opponent from overwhelming me with creatures, while simultaneously trying to manage my graveyard with Survival and Genesis tricks. A misplay on his part (he plays it safe by not attacking with Crusader, wanting to attach to a Warhammer first) buys me a turn and I remove the equipment. The game ends with me one mana away from going nuts with Recurring Nightmare. He has Hero of Bladehold and Baneslayer Angel, and I have Bone Shredder and Recurring Nightmare with only enough mana to cast one of them.

My third opponent is Deadguy. Unfortunately, neither of these games are close. The first game sees a second-turn Stoneforge, but I can kill it and snap Sex Monkey his equipment, a very relevant Sword of Feast and Famine. He manages to Vindicate a Survival or a Garruk, I forget which, but I just drop another similar card and ride it to victory.

The second game sees him mull to six. This was where the lack of manafixing cost him heavily. He ends up drawing all swamps with a hand full of white cards. I, on the other hand, open with Library of Alexandria, as all real Magic players are wont to do. With no real pressure on me, I can take my time coming up with Survival and Squee. He Wastelands the Library much later. His Winter Orb slows the game down heavily, but I have a Mox to mitigate the effect, and it appears to hurt him more than me, so I leave it alone and work on his other artifacts, a Jitte and a Cursed Scroll. To add insult to injury, his Hymn to Tourach takes my Obstinate Baloth, and he folds under a landslide of card advantage.

With the artifact-deck player forced to leave early, I agree to a last informal match against the UW player. This looks like one of the most tightly-drafted decks at the table, with the main weakness being a lack of spot removal (both Swords and Path were taken by Deadguy). To be fair, the deck had various ways of generating card advantage against creatures, whether it was through a Vedalken Shackles, a Moat, Wrath or planeswalkers.

This is why I'm surprised when my RecSur deck handily wins in two. I ended up generating so much card advantage from my ETB creatures that his Wraths were actually putting me ahead for the long game, thanks to all my graveyard shenanigans. He has no grave hate for that, and importantly, he doesn't have any exile removal aside from a Brittle Effigy which he (correctly? incorrectly?) points at my Indrik Stomphowler. Without planeswalkers on his side, our games are characterized by him trying to delay the inevitable graveyard onslaught. Moat comes down on his side. Genesis ends up in the yard, and Moat is eventually taken out by Woodfall Primus. Sower of Temptation takes my Woodfall Primus, but I Bone Shredder my own Primus to get a persist trigger and take out a Shackles. Sower of Temptation gets taken down by Garruk Relentless. Bribery takes my Grave Titan, but I have deathtouching Wolf tokens to deal with it. The game ends in a flurry of Survival triggers.

In game two I open with Library of Alexandria, as all real Magic players are wont to do. I get one activation out of it before Pithing Needle comes down. Early attempts at Sex Monkeying the needle are denied, so I go with the usual Survival plan. A Mindslaver + Academy Ruins discards all my creatures to Survival and threatens to unceremoniously boot me out of the game, but the UW player doesn't have thirteen lands and I have Woodfall Primus. The second game goes much like the first, with a long war of attrition that slowly ends up favoring me.

After two stunning back-to-back wins, I'm ashamed to admit I let overconfidence gain a hold of me. I suggest a grudge match to let the UW player regain some dignity. Karma being a female dog, I am trounced as the UW deck subsequently goes into beast mode. A Scepter imprints Counterspell, and a draw-stepping Vendilion Clique steals a Survival right out of my hand. I throw away a Putrefy in a breathtaking display of arrogance. I am soon stuck with a crucial decision: which of the three Garruks in my hand do I want to resolve? I decide that the mighty Garruk 3.0 is absolutely the only one who can get me out of my current faerie-infested predicament.

Accordingly, I throw out Garruk Relentless as Scepter bait, and it works. My Sex Monkey resolves as the UW player does not have the mana for another counter. Garruk 3.0 comes out next turn, but I am getting dangerously low on life. I start making Beasts in an attempt to race. I try to follow up with another bomb, but it eats a Cryptic Command. I am now in dire straits. I draw three cards with Garruk and I have the removal for his lethal Clique. He has a Snapcaster Mage with a flashbacked Cryptic Command.

1. WGBr Junk

2. RW Boros aggro


3. BW Deadguy aggro

4. UW control


5. UB artifact


6. GB RecSur

Yeah, I think we'll have to attribute that one to Black Lotus' legendary status among players. The Sol Ring did get first-picked by the artifact deck.

Quote from eidolon232

I can understand Balance in GB, but the Greater Gargadon splash without nonbasics seems too greedy imo.

I have to agree at this point that it might have been too cute for a Rotisserie draft, but it didn't seem too greedy with all the green manafixing. The three land-fetch spells maindeck meant he had access to red or white at almost any point in the game.

Quote from eidolon232

The RW deck is everything but an aggro deck.

I call it an aggro deck because it mostly just wants to lay down some beats and kill you as fast as it can - admittedly, not too fast. Including high-end creatures like Baneslayer or Inferno Titan meant it gave up some early-game advantage in exchange for just being able to brute-force through the opponent with giants.

Quote from eidolon232

The BW deck looks awesome as long as you don't get problems with your mana base.

I discussed this with the Deadguy player and he also agreed that Fetid Heath needed to be in there at the very least. It's a deck that wants a 2nd turn BB for Hymn or WW for a creature. There was generally a scramble for manafixing as most players neglected to draft it until practically the last five picks (you can see that from the low amounts of fixing in each deck). The colorless lands were a huge drawback in this deck too.

Quote from eidolon232

The UW player ended up with a 46 cards 16 lands deck with only 1 mana artifact, which isn't remotely enough for a control deck.

Quote from eidolon232

The Ub Artifacts.dec has a lot of synergies (The Abyss!), but it could be so much better if the player would not have added 9 extra cards.

You'll have to take the UW and UB decklists with a grain of salt, as I'm afraid I just wasn't able to accurately reconstruct them without contacting the players themselves. As I recall, UW decided on a 45-card deck. If I had to venture a guess, I would say that the land issue was probably justified on the strength of the deck's low-cost cards, allowing it to survive until the late game.

Quote from eidolon232

I really don't like that the GB player kept the Birdies in the board in a deck with such a high mana curve (a total of 4 cards with cmc 1/2)m especially when there are 5 cards that give you some value out of your Bird if you draw it in the late game.

Oh dear. Here I thought I was going to catch flak for excluding the Library and Scroll Rack

But the decision to exclude Birds was probably the hardest one I had to make in construction. For me, the choice was between Sakura-Tribe Elder and Birds. When I had my deck's mana curve arranged in front of me, I felt like I needed a two-drop. I also wanted that two-drop to be a mana dork that could chump AND accelerate me to four mana on turn three, so I could either drop a walker, a midrange creature, or a Survival with two activations. The Elder also got the nod for being abusable with Genesis or Nightmare, although it never really came up.

Post-games, I'm still pretty much on the fence about it though. Birds would have been good in some matchups and terrible in others, while Elder was always generally decent. BoP would have eaten burn against Boros, denying me that crucial mana, but it would have been highly relevant against Vendilion Clique and Moat (especially since I actually have seven cards that give me value if I include my two Swords :P)

Hope everyone had a great Christmas!

I've had some time to digest Eidolon's list of cuts. I was highly amused to discover that it was almost card-for-card the same as the list from the cube comparison thread. Eidolon, you ran the comparison before I even thought to ask, you sly rascal you!

So the first order of business: I've cut down to 870 cards. The details are in the changelog. Basically, I was getting tired of seeing 24th picks everywhere in the drafts. At this time, and at this size, it is impossible to run a successful cube and still maintain the power level I want. Now drafts are more enjoyable since there is way less chaff to deal with.

The long-term challenge is to reduce the cube's size as much as possible, thereby bringing it to a more appropriate power-level. I'm going to be slicing cards in periodic increments of 15; by the time Dark Ascension rolls around, I'm hoping for an 855-card cube.

Let me preface the next point with a statement: I think about bad cards a lot. I think about how to get rid of them all the time. But trying to exclude cards based on the idea of "strictly worse" is a bit of a challenge for me. So the new order of business: discuss, in detail, what possible cuts I should be making. I'll be paying close attention and trying to elucidate meanings from the suggestions received. I'm hoping it'll spark some debate around the seldom-seen, dark and dingy bottom sections of the cube.

So, the question that currently occupies my time, and hopefully yours: What are my three worst white cards?

Thanks! I wouldn't feel any compunction about dropping the Whipcorder - he's mostly there to give each color the appearance of hidden information with morphs, and the WW cost sucks too. But I'd like to explore the issues with the other two.

Revoke Existence, I feel, is a good to great card in most cubes considering the targets it hits. Do you or your players find that sorcery speed is often a problem when contrasted with the exile clause?

As for the War Priest, does the 2CC cost harm the card's value compared to the 3CC cost of stuff like Uktabi Orangutan? Unlike the Kami and Unicorn, you can't drop the War Priest for damage and use it up later to get rid of something - you have to hold it back, which is potentially a bad line of play for the aggressive decks it usually finds its way into. So I can see this guy getting the axe too.

While we're on the subject, what's up with people being down on Cloudchaser Kestrel? I've been told by multiple players that it's a bad card. It's an Uktabi Orangutan for enchantments that trades splashability for evasion (and a bonus ability that is occasionally relevant). A 3CC card with WW in its casting cost should be an order of magnitude easier to cast than a 2CC card with WW in its cost, right? The destroy trigger is mandatory, which is potentially a drawback - but that mandatory trigger appears on every similar ETB creature, whether it's a Keldon Vandal or the aforementioned Sex Monkeys. Is there some fundamental difference between artifacts and enchantments that makes this card worse?

I'd keep Revoke Existence at 870 for sure. There aren't enough Disenchant effects in a cube this size without it.

Quote from PyreDream »

Is there some fundamental difference between artifacts and enchantments that makes this card worse?

Ya. There's about 5 times as many artifacts as there are enchantments. Making it about 5 times worse.

Hmm. A 5x difference could be a reason to cut it, but in my cube I see approximately 44 targets versus the 116 or so artifacts. That's only about 2.5x difference. Does that affect its value?