I was out all weekend, so let me respond to everyone with some bullet points. Thanks for your comments!
Spectral Procession - I'm still waiting to pick up a copy. My LGS didn't have one, and I'm waiting to put together an online order to save on shipping.
Kor Sanctifiers is already in my cube, maybe you missed it since I list it at CMC3 and not 4?
Celestial Crusader - This card is on my watch-list, but the white creatures only clause made it seem kind of insular.
Steppe Lynx - I never played Zendikar block, so I only threw this guy and Plated Geopede in because I saw them on lots of other peasant lists. I wouldn't hate seeing either go, since as said above, the lack of fetches make them very inconsistent.
Wickerbough Elder - I think you guys are right and this will come back in. My main concern is that I feel like G/x mid-range and ramp are very easy to draft due to a lot of card redundancy relative to most other archetypes. Red aggro is also pretty stacked, but has an issue of people poaching burn for other decks.
Blasting Station - Got this in my Winston pool this past week but it was sideboarded without second thought. After some consideration, I'm not sure what deck wants this effect. Mortarpod is a better pinger/sac outlet.
Judge's Familiar - Thinking of testing this in my "bonus hybrid 1-drop" section along with Cackler and Militant. It'd certainly be the weakest of the three, but a 1/1 flyer with a conditional upside could help me push U/x flyers/tempo.
A few people asked about them before, so I wanted to give an update and say that the Honden cycle is playing very well so far.
Two weeks ago in a six person draft, another player had the white and green ones in a Naya deck, and he said he'd happily pick any shrine that came his way in future drafts. Last week during a Winston draft, I had the red, blue, and black ones in a Grixis deck. As you might expect, a single shrine is decent, but not unbeatable, but any time more than one hit the board, that player ran away with the game.
I don't think a Honden-based deck will come together every draft, but it seems like a very viable subtheme for my cube and I'm happy to give them their slots.
-----
What do people think about Sun Droplet? It can almost single-handedly stop an aggro deck if cast on turn two, but it's also a pretty bad topdeck late game. It feels like the type of swingy card that might be better left out of the cube. Any thoughts?
Here's a proposed list of changes. Due to Thanksgiving, I've got at least a week before we cube again, so there's time for feedback before I go through with things:
Finally, I'm going to test out Tattermunge Maniac and Judge's Familiar in my standalone hybrid 1-drop section. They're obviously not as strong as Cackler and Militant, but since Modern has a limited the number of 1-drops available, these might be viable in the short term until more playable cards get printed.
I've decided to take the plunge into a full peasant cube instead of only using Modern-only cards. This means I'm going to have a couple big updates over the next month or so as I collect the older cards I need to round things out. You're welcome to offer advice, but If there's a classic card you think I'm missing, it's probably because I don't own it yet.. So don't worry, I haven't forgotten about Swords to Plowshares, Control Magic, or classic set staples.
I'm also purging all the functional reprints since my now larger card pool means I have more toys to play with.
Hurricane is awesome in any sort aggro deck with green in it. It doubles as an anti-flyer card and a direct damage finisher. Unlike other green direct damage spells (i.e. Unyaro Bee Sting) it's as mana efficient as its red counterparts. It works best in R/G, but can probably fit in other decks.
Gemstone Mine is the best peasant fixing land for aggro after City of Brass. Not coming into play tapped is almost always worth the trade-off of eventually getting used up. Most of the time you won't need to drop it on your first time, which means it should last until turn 5 or 6, and by that point an aggro deck should be well on its way to winning.
This reminds me that I need to add City of Brass since I'm willing to treat Arabian Nights U3s as uncommon.
A couple more quick swaps, mostly just getting old-bordered functional reprints:
Out -> In
Flames of the Firebrand -> Arc Lightning
Act of Treason -> Threaten
Fireball -> Kaervek's Torch
Rakdos Guildgate -> Urborg Volcano
Haunted Fengraf -> N/A (Cutting to 362)
Demonic Taskmaster -> Skittering Horror
Augur of Skulls -> Nightscape Familiar
Child of Night -> Wretched Anurid
Grasp of Darkness -> Dance of the Dead
Benthicore -> Capsize
Into the Void -> Exclude
Forbidden Alchemy -> Fact or Fiction
Nevermaker -> Stormscape Familiar
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The familiars are a test to help out non-Green control with mana ramp, and will get cut if they play worse than I expect.
Vandal out for Scrapmelter is another test. Red is stacked at the 3-drop slot and most really dangerous artifacts cost 3 or more, so waiting an extra turn for a bigger body seems like a reasonable tradeoff. Easy enough to swap back if it doesn't work out.
Green had gotten a bit top-heavy, so I'm going to push it a bit more as a secondary aggro color. I don't expect X/g aggro to get played every draft, but as we've talked about on the forum before aggro needs more cards to choose from than midrange or control.
Finally, what are people's experiences with Blastoderm/Calciderm? Obviously they're some of the best 4-drops available, but they seem pretty oppressive against aggro if cast on curve. Their non-interactiveness annoys me a bit as well and it seems dumb to add in edict effects just for use against two creatures.
I don't like the Fireball, Urza's Factory, and Grizzly Fate cuts. I like the other changes though. I'm not a huge believer in green aggro, especially 1drop beaters.
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Factory was not often a factor in any wins over here so i could see how someone would cut it. But grizzly fate? Not so much. Stomphowler, spider, or overrun would be my candidates if a 5 drop would go.
Obviously four bears for five mana is incredible, but do people really trigger Threshold that often in Cube? It seems like without self-mill or looting that most games get wrapped up before you hit 7 other cards in your grave. And without the bonus, Grizzly Fate seems lackluster compared to other midrange/ramp targets. It's possible that it occurs more often than I realize, so I'll definitely keep a mental note of how often I or my opponent hit 7 cards over the next couple weeks.
As for green aggro, I have no illusions that it will often be the backbone of aggro decks, but still think it's worth including the best aggro cards for X/g decks. I have no plans to push it further unless green starts getting some great aggro support in upcoming sets. Unless aggro decks start winning way more than their fair share of games, I'd like to err on the side of too much aggro support than too little.
Playing only the best green aggro cards is like playing only the best storm cards. It only serves to dilute a color(s) and doesn't really support an archtype.
I think I've cast Grizzly without threshhold once or twice, and even then the flashback was threshed, and I love drafting/playing it so I've cast it a lot. It goes really well in GXx midrange and ramp decks. You kill their guys, you trade with some value 2/2, then you make 4 bears into 4 bears and GG. Also at its worst it is a slightly overcoasted Moan of the Unhallowed, still pretty good.
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I think the benefit that X/g aggro decks will get from Jungle Lion more than make up for the single slot lost by mid-range and ramp decks. I'd agree that there might be a dilution problem if I was running worse/riskier aggro creatures like Pouncing Jaguar or Wild Dogs, but I'm not.
I dislike colors being super narrow and think that each color can offer a few strong cards to archetypes outside of their usual strength without diluting their primary identity.
A couple more quick swaps, mostly just getting old-bordered functional reprints:
Out -> In
Flames of the Firebrand -> Arc Lightning
Act of Treason -> Threaten
Fireball -> Kaervek's Torch
Rakdos Guildgate -> Urborg Volcano
Haunted Fengraf -> N/A (Cutting to 362)
Why cut Fireball? I think that's one of the most flavorful, fun, and powerful spells. The 2-for-1 potential makes it the 2nd best red X spell in peasant imo (behind Rolling Thunder).
It's funny
City and I have the same arguments over and over because we are in other ppls cube threads
I like having jungle lion. Xg aggro happens a lot thanks to heavy hitters like bloodbraid and Briarhorn. Until red and white get up to black's level with the one drops, jungle lion gives those decks a needed support beam.
Comparing it to storm is downright silly. This is supporting an existing deck by giving it more tools. Besides, it works across all aggro combinations, unlike storm which only can function in specific alignments.
I finally have an updated list up. It's just in a Google spreadsheet for now until I have time to get it formatted for deck tags. My old Modern-only list is saved in the second post for anyone who's interested in that.
Got to draft tonight after a long dry spell due to being out of town for family issues and the holidays. Some of my players were nice enough to donate 2/3rds of what I need for Gatecrash testing, leaving me to track down a Simic Guildgate, some Charms, and a few other cards.
I drafted a pretty decent U/B control deck with all 3 mind control auras, but only got to play one match since we had 5 players and usually volunteer to be the first spectator. My LGS is at the local mall and closes at 9pm, so we don't have as much time as I'd like. I'm hoping to move cube day to Sunday afternoon after the Superbowl so we have more time to play.
I feel like things are going well for my cube. One regular brought two newbies tonight because he'd had such fun in the past. One of them was very new to Magic and had never drafted before, but was able to pull together a decent R/B aggro deck without any assistance. I don't think he won his matches, but none of his losses were blowouts. I think he had fun, so hopefully we've added another regular that'll get us closer to having full draft pods soon.
I'll likely be posting a large update soon with cards from Gatecrash as well as an expansion of my bonus hybrid section, containing more cards with a single hybrid mana in their cost.
This update ended up much bigger than I expected, but after adding a good number of GTC cards, adding a standalone hybrid section, and swapping out some other cards that weren't performing as well as I'd hoped I was left with a lot of swaps.
Here's the change log:
White
-Akrasan Squire
-Kor Skyfisher
-Crusader of Odric
-Benalish Cavalry
+Miraculous Recovery
+Syndic of Tithes
+Daring Skyjek
Blue
-Force Spike
-Aether Adept
-Dismiss
-Capsize
-Relentless Skaabs
+Cloudfin Raptor
+Latch Seeker
+Memory Lapse
+Agoraphobia
+Niblis of the Breath
Black
-Pulse Seeker
-Cower in Fear
-Entomber Exarch
+Thrull Parasite
+Ashes to Ashes
+Keening Banshee
A bunch of gold cards and the two Phyrexian mana cards were moved to the hybrid section. As you may have noticed, I had to make additional cuts in white, red, and green in order to help balance out the color totals of my hybrids.
After RTR and GTC, I'm pretty happy with my gold section, but I'd love to see a strong hybrid for Dimir and Golgari (I may test Canker Abomination, but I feel it's much more of a black card than a true hybrid due to it's mechanics and green's lack of removal).
Torch Fiend - I've been unimpressed with it. Neither mode is great, and I haven't found the flexibility to be worthwhile. It kills an artifact on the same turn as Manic Vandal, has a worse body, and is modal instead of providing purely additional value. Without the two hammers around, there aren't many artifacts that need to be dealt with immediately, making Vandal and Scrapmelter better for my cube.
Plated Geopede - Not a bad card, but I feel like it's comparable to most of the 2-drops I have remaining. Might come back in after I see how the current lineup goes.
Acidic Slime - I wanted to cut one of Slime, Wickerbough, or Indrik and this guy is the least splashable. I'm testing out running fewer Natualize effects in order to make drafters pick them higher.
I cut indrik ages ago. It's the only one of the three that has the potential to sit in your hand so you don't 2-1 yourself.
Since there are less artifacts that have to be dealt with immediately, doesn't that make the "I can be played anytime" value of Torch fiend better than the 2-1 upside of Manic vandal? And of course, there's always the lack of a may turning into a problem when you draft Bonesplitter.
Spectral Procession - I'm still waiting to pick up a copy. My LGS didn't have one, and I'm waiting to put together an online order to save on shipping.
Kor Sanctifiers is already in my cube, maybe you missed it since I list it at CMC3 and not 4?
Celestial Crusader - This card is on my watch-list, but the white creatures only clause made it seem kind of insular.
Steppe Lynx - I never played Zendikar block, so I only threw this guy and Plated Geopede in because I saw them on lots of other peasant lists. I wouldn't hate seeing either go, since as said above, the lack of fetches make them very inconsistent.
Wickerbough Elder - I think you guys are right and this will come back in. My main concern is that I feel like G/x mid-range and ramp are very easy to draft due to a lot of card redundancy relative to most other archetypes. Red aggro is also pretty stacked, but has an issue of people poaching burn for other decks.
Blasting Station - Got this in my Winston pool this past week but it was sideboarded without second thought. After some consideration, I'm not sure what deck wants this effect. Mortarpod is a better pinger/sac outlet.
Judge's Familiar - Thinking of testing this in my "bonus hybrid 1-drop" section along with Cackler and Militant. It'd certainly be the weakest of the three, but a 1/1 flyer with a conditional upside could help me push U/x flyers/tempo.
Two weeks ago in a six person draft, another player had the white and green ones in a Naya deck, and he said he'd happily pick any shrine that came his way in future drafts. Last week during a Winston draft, I had the red, blue, and black ones in a Grixis deck. As you might expect, a single shrine is decent, but not unbeatable, but any time more than one hit the board, that player ran away with the game.
I don't think a Honden-based deck will come together every draft, but it seems like a very viable subtheme for my cube and I'm happy to give them their slots.
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What do people think about Sun Droplet? It can almost single-handedly stop an aggro deck if cast on turn two, but it's also a pretty bad topdeck late game. It feels like the type of swingy card that might be better left out of the cube. Any thoughts?
First, some cuts to help get me closer to 360:
A few other swaps, including a couple reversions from my last changes:
Out -> In
Mammoth Umbra -> Kor Skyfisher
Grasp of Phantoms -> Relentless Skaabs
Keening Banshee -> Razorjaw Oni
Naturalize -> Wickerbough Elder
Crushing Vines -> Wildsize
Finally, I'm going to test out Tattermunge Maniac and Judge's Familiar in my standalone hybrid 1-drop section. They're obviously not as strong as Cackler and Militant, but since Modern has a limited the number of 1-drops available, these might be viable in the short term until more playable cards get printed.
My CubeCobra (draft 20 card packs, 2 packs.)
430, Peasant, Very Unpowered
Why you should take your hybrids out of your gold section
Manamath Article
I'm also purging all the functional reprints since my now larger card pool means I have more toys to play with.
Out -> In
Gideon's Lawkeeper -> Mother of Runes
Stormfront Pegasus -> Icatian Javelineers
Angelic Benediction -> Deftblade Elite
Halimar Depths -> Force Spike
Essence Scatter -> Counterspell
Spiketail Drakeling -> Man-o'-War
Guul Draz Vampire -> Carnophage
Festering Goblin -> Snuff Out
Shrieking Affliction -> Unearth
Ruthless Cullblade -> Diabolic Servitude
Mind Rot -> Hymn to Tourach
Razorjaw Oni -> Twisted Abomination
Keldon Megaliths -> Ancient Hydra
Kruin Striker -> Keldon Champion
Searing Spear -> Ghitu Slinger
Ronin Houndmaster -> Suq'Ata Lancer
Tormentor Exarch -> Flametongue Kavu
River Boa -> Grizzly Fate
Mire Boa -> Roar of the Wurm
Borderland Ranger -> Krosan Tusker
Briarpack Alpha -> Hurricane
Hungry Spriggan -> Centaur Glade
Dimir Guildgate -> Salt Marsh
Azorius Guildate -> Coastal Tower
Selesnya Guildgate -> Elfhame Palace
Gruul Guildgate -> Shivan Oasis
Transguild Promenade -> Gemstone Mine
Dread Statuary -> Mishra's Factory
The Rack -> Strip Mine
Ancient Ziggurat -> City of Brass
I'll update the OP sometime tonight or tomorrow, but I wanted to get these changes up.
peasantcube.blogspot.com
Hurricane is awesome in any sort aggro deck with green in it. It doubles as an anti-flyer card and a direct damage finisher. Unlike other green direct damage spells (i.e. Unyaro Bee Sting) it's as mana efficient as its red counterparts. It works best in R/G, but can probably fit in other decks.
Gemstone Mine is the best peasant fixing land for aggro after City of Brass. Not coming into play tapped is almost always worth the trade-off of eventually getting used up. Most of the time you won't need to drop it on your first time, which means it should last until turn 5 or 6, and by that point an aggro deck should be well on its way to winning.
This reminds me that I need to add City of Brass since I'm willing to treat Arabian Nights U3s as uncommon.
Glad you decided to embrace the old borders, there's a lot of sweet Commons and Uncommons that just wouldn't fly at that rarity nowadays.
EDH Decks:
- Reya Dawnbringer // - Mistform Ultimus // - Balthor the Defiled // - Urabrask the Hidden // - Mirri, Cat Warrior
Out -> In
Flames of the Firebrand -> Arc Lightning
Act of Treason -> Threaten
Fireball -> Kaervek's Torch
Rakdos Guildgate -> Urborg Volcano
Haunted Fengraf -> N/A (Cutting to 362)
Out -> In
Rupture Spire -> N/A (cut to 361)
Urza's Factory -> Desert
Grizzly Fate -> Jungle Lion
Bestial Menace -> Blastoderm
Maul Splicer -> Fallow Earth
Boar Umbra -> Elephant Guide
Blood Ogre -> Jackal Pup
Vithian Stinger -> Fire Imp
Forked Bolt -> Reckless Charge
Manic Vandal -> Oxidda Scrapmelter
Demonic Taskmaster -> Skittering Horror
Augur of Skulls -> Nightscape Familiar
Child of Night -> Wretched Anurid
Grasp of Darkness -> Dance of the Dead
Benthicore -> Capsize
Into the Void -> Exclude
Forbidden Alchemy -> Fact or Fiction
Nevermaker -> Stormscape Familiar
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The familiars are a test to help out non-Green control with mana ramp, and will get cut if they play worse than I expect.
Vandal out for Scrapmelter is another test. Red is stacked at the 3-drop slot and most really dangerous artifacts cost 3 or more, so waiting an extra turn for a bigger body seems like a reasonable tradeoff. Easy enough to swap back if it doesn't work out.
Green had gotten a bit top-heavy, so I'm going to push it a bit more as a secondary aggro color. I don't expect X/g aggro to get played every draft, but as we've talked about on the forum before aggro needs more cards to choose from than midrange or control.
Finally, what are people's experiences with Blastoderm/Calciderm? Obviously they're some of the best 4-drops available, but they seem pretty oppressive against aggro if cast on curve. Their non-interactiveness annoys me a bit as well and it seems dumb to add in edict effects just for use against two creatures.
peasantcube.blogspot.com
Let me know if fallow earth works
My CubeCobra (draft 20 card packs, 2 packs.)
430, Peasant, Very Unpowered
Why you should take your hybrids out of your gold section
Manamath Article
As for green aggro, I have no illusions that it will often be the backbone of aggro decks, but still think it's worth including the best aggro cards for X/g decks. I have no plans to push it further unless green starts getting some great aggro support in upcoming sets. Unless aggro decks start winning way more than their fair share of games, I'd like to err on the side of too much aggro support than too little.
I think I've cast Grizzly without threshhold once or twice, and even then the flashback was threshed, and I love drafting/playing it so I've cast it a lot. It goes really well in GXx midrange and ramp decks. You kill their guys, you trade with some value 2/2, then you make 4 bears into 4 bears and GG. Also at its worst it is a slightly overcoasted Moan of the Unhallowed, still pretty good.
peasantcube.blogspot.com
I dislike colors being super narrow and think that each color can offer a few strong cards to archetypes outside of their usual strength without diluting their primary identity.
Why cut Fireball? I think that's one of the most flavorful, fun, and powerful spells. The 2-for-1 potential makes it the 2nd best red X spell in peasant imo (behind Rolling Thunder).
peasantcube.blogspot.com
City and I have the same arguments over and over because we are in other ppls cube threads
I like having jungle lion. Xg aggro happens a lot thanks to heavy hitters like bloodbraid and Briarhorn. Until red and white get up to black's level with the one drops, jungle lion gives those decks a needed support beam.
Comparing it to storm is downright silly. This is supporting an existing deck by giving it more tools. Besides, it works across all aggro combinations, unlike storm which only can function in specific alignments.
My CubeCobra (draft 20 card packs, 2 packs.)
430, Peasant, Very Unpowered
Why you should take your hybrids out of your gold section
Manamath Article
I'm going to eventually pick up some Collector's edition staples and then it'll probably come back in.
I drafted a pretty decent U/B control deck with all 3 mind control auras, but only got to play one match since we had 5 players and usually volunteer to be the first spectator. My LGS is at the local mall and closes at 9pm, so we don't have as much time as I'd like. I'm hoping to move cube day to Sunday afternoon after the Superbowl so we have more time to play.
I feel like things are going well for my cube. One regular brought two newbies tonight because he'd had such fun in the past. One of them was very new to Magic and had never drafted before, but was able to pull together a decent R/B aggro deck without any assistance. I don't think he won his matches, but none of his losses were blowouts. I think he had fun, so hopefully we've added another regular that'll get us closer to having full draft pods soon.
I'll likely be posting a large update soon with cards from Gatecrash as well as an expansion of my bonus hybrid section, containing more cards with a single hybrid mana in their cost.
This update ended up much bigger than I expected, but after adding a good number of GTC cards, adding a standalone hybrid section, and swapping out some other cards that weren't performing as well as I'd hoped I was left with a lot of swaps.
Here's the change log:
White
-Akrasan Squire
-Kor Skyfisher
-Crusader of Odric
-Benalish Cavalry
+Miraculous Recovery
+Syndic of Tithes
+Daring Skyjek
Blue
-Force Spike
-Aether Adept
-Dismiss
-Capsize
-Relentless Skaabs
+Cloudfin Raptor
+Latch Seeker
+Memory Lapse
+Agoraphobia
+Niblis of the Breath
Black
-Pulse Seeker
-Cower in Fear
-Entomber Exarch
+Thrull Parasite
+Ashes to Ashes
+Keening Banshee
Red
-Flame Jab
-Kaervek's Torch
-Goblin Shortcutter
-Torch Fiend
-Plated Geopede
-Ghitu Slinger
-Threaten
-Keldon Champion
+Madcap Skills
+Manic Vandal
+Kruin Striker
+Ghost-Lit Raider
+Traitorous Instinct
+Firefist Striker
Green
-Acidic Slime
-Rampant Growth
+Experiment One
Gold
-Brainbite
+Ghor-Clan Rampager
+Dinrova Horror
+Gerrard's Verdict
+Armadillo Cloak
+Truefire Paladin
+Fire Covenant
Hybrid
+Snakeform
+Frostburn Weird
Colorless
-Thunderstaff
-Juggernaut
-Tumble Magnet
-Tectonic Edge
-Stalking Stones
+Su-Chi
+Triskelion
A bunch of gold cards and the two Phyrexian mana cards were moved to the hybrid section. As you may have noticed, I had to make additional cuts in white, red, and green in order to help balance out the color totals of my hybrids.
After RTR and GTC, I'm pretty happy with my gold section, but I'd love to see a strong hybrid for Dimir and Golgari (I may test Canker Abomination, but I feel it's much more of a black card than a true hybrid due to it's mechanics and green's lack of removal).
What's going on?
My CubeCobra (draft 20 card packs, 2 packs.)
430, Peasant, Very Unpowered
Why you should take your hybrids out of your gold section
Manamath Article
Plated Geopede - Not a bad card, but I feel like it's comparable to most of the 2-drops I have remaining. Might come back in after I see how the current lineup goes.
Acidic Slime - I wanted to cut one of Slime, Wickerbough, or Indrik and this guy is the least splashable. I'm testing out running fewer Natualize effects in order to make drafters pick them higher.
Since there are less artifacts that have to be dealt with immediately, doesn't that make the "I can be played anytime" value of Torch fiend better than the 2-1 upside of Manic vandal? And of course, there's always the lack of a may turning into a problem when you draft Bonesplitter.
My CubeCobra (draft 20 card packs, 2 packs.)
430, Peasant, Very Unpowered
Why you should take your hybrids out of your gold section
Manamath Article