One upon a time, I made a pauper cube. It is fun, and people loved it, and even thought the drafting was fun and tactical I never felt there was much player interaction. The drafting felt all business and little game. People would typically settle into a quickly and get comfortable without exploring their boundaries or paying enough attention to what the players around them were drafting. I decided to add shenanigans to it to help introduce new deck ideas and promote awareness.
Three types of Shenanigans
Conspiracy Artifacts: I realized that the conspiracy drafting artifacts are not actually powerful cards by themselves and instead add shenanigans without being overbearing. They are nice artifact bodies that
Cards in Gimmick:
2 Lurking Automaton – One Lurking Automaton is 5/5, two is a first pick. Guaranteed to catch someone off guard the first time, and absolutely bonkers with Agent of Acquisitions.
2 Cogwork Librarian – Want to draft specific decks, but just don't have the right cards? Improve consistency with Cogwork Librarian today!
1 Deal Broker – Want to trade a bomb outside your colors for another in your colors?
1 Lore Seeker – Can't quite make the strategy you need work? More cards is always the answer.
1 Agent of Acquisitions – Ever wanted to draft all of the cards in one pack?
Conspiracies: The Conspiracies themselves add creativity and consistency to deck building and buff my next gimmick.
Cards in Gimmick: Worldknit – Drafted a pile of trash? No problem. Planned on piloting a pile of trash? Have fun with your monstrosity. Power Play – Buff your unbeatable aggro deck by always going first. Advantageous Proclamation – Need just a little more consistency in your gimmick? Well here is your answer. Brago's Favor, Iterative Analysis, and Muzzio's Preparations – Buffs sets of cards significantly and makes them more palatable in addition to being small buffs otherwise.
Sets of Cards: No I don't mean like having two Llanowar Elves in the cube. That's boring. I mean having cards like Accumulated Knowledge that get better the more of them you have in your deck. The rule of thumb is that they should be ok plays by themselves should you only get one, but they should get amazing by the second or third. Accumulated Knowledge is a great example. The first one is just cycling, but the second one is already bananas.
Cards in Gimmick:
Cleric of the Forward Order – This one choice was tough. It was between this and Squadron Hawk. Two things tipped this over. One Cleric of the Forward Order is better than one Squadron Hawk. Cleric of the Forward Order is comparable to Lone Missionary which is another popular pauper cube card.
Accumulated Knowledge – Honestly probably the best one in the set. Aether burst is really good too.
Surging Dementia – Kinda lame by itself, amazing if you can chain them together. This is pretty effective if you managed to get 3 of them and one of the conspiracy buffs. The scary thing about discard I feel is when you can chain them together not so much when you can trigger them is isolated instances. Might get replaced for Mind Burst if it ends up being underwhelming. Strongly considering adding Liliana's Caress and/or Megrim to make the discard strategy more viable.
Flame Burst – First is kinda bad, the second is on par, and rest are great. An important thing to note about Flame Burst and Accumulated Knowledge is that they say all graveyards. So its Nos rules. Whomever uses their Nos first loses.
Timberpack Wolf – Pretty solid creature. Even in pairs it can be pretty scary.
I thankfully have most of the cube, but I need some help filling out the final slots. I was hoping to reduce the size of the cube of my existing normal pauper cube from 425 to 375 (15 extra for Lore Seeker). Right now I have 55 of each color which is unfortunately too much. The smaller card size should enable the gimmicks to surface better, and allow the more card dependent archetypes to come together more often. If you think a slightly larger cube would still be able to support the additional gimmicks gracefully please let me know. If possible I would love to make the artifacts a real archetype and be able to add some of the best metalcraft cards in addition to the Myr Servitor.
Extra gimmick suggestions are always welcome.
Cube Makeup – 375
50 White <-- Extra 5
50 Blue <-- Extra 5
50 Black <-- Extra
50 Green <-- Extra 5
50 Colorless (includes conspiracies) <-- Missing 5
45 Multicolor
25 Lands
@metalevolence
You might be right. I honestly have not been able to test this yet. I just kinda messed with the balance a lot and wanted some feedback. Have you actually played with the other conspiracies?
Three types of Shenanigans
Conspiracy Artifacts: I realized that the conspiracy drafting artifacts are not actually powerful cards by themselves and instead add shenanigans without being overbearing. They are nice artifact bodies that
Cards in Gimmick:
2 Lurking Automaton – One Lurking Automaton is 5/5, two is a first pick. Guaranteed to catch someone off guard the first time, and absolutely bonkers with Agent of Acquisitions.
2 Cogwork Librarian – Want to draft specific decks, but just don't have the right cards? Improve consistency with Cogwork Librarian today!
1 Deal Broker – Want to trade a bomb outside your colors for another in your colors?
1 Lore Seeker – Can't quite make the strategy you need work? More cards is always the answer.
1 Agent of Acquisitions – Ever wanted to draft all of the cards in one pack?
Conspiracies: The Conspiracies themselves add creativity and consistency to deck building and buff my next gimmick.
Cards in Gimmick:
Worldknit – Drafted a pile of trash? No problem. Planned on piloting a pile of trash? Have fun with your monstrosity.
Power Play – Buff your unbeatable aggro deck by always going first.
Advantageous Proclamation – Need just a little more consistency in your gimmick? Well here is your answer.
Brago's Favor, Iterative Analysis, and Muzzio's Preparations – Buffs sets of cards significantly and makes them more palatable in addition to being small buffs otherwise.
Sets of Cards: No I don't mean like having two Llanowar Elves in the cube. That's boring. I mean having cards like Accumulated Knowledge that get better the more of them you have in your deck. The rule of thumb is that they should be ok plays by themselves should you only get one, but they should get amazing by the second or third. Accumulated Knowledge is a great example. The first one is just cycling, but the second one is already bananas.
Cards in Gimmick:
Cleric of the Forward Order – This one choice was tough. It was between this and Squadron Hawk. Two things tipped this over. One Cleric of the Forward Order is better than one Squadron Hawk. Cleric of the Forward Order is comparable to Lone Missionary which is another popular pauper cube card.
Accumulated Knowledge – Honestly probably the best one in the set. Aether burst is really good too.
Surging Dementia – Kinda lame by itself, amazing if you can chain them together. This is pretty effective if you managed to get 3 of them and one of the conspiracy buffs. The scary thing about discard I feel is when you can chain them together not so much when you can trigger them is isolated instances. Might get replaced for Mind Burst if it ends up being underwhelming. Strongly considering adding Liliana's Caress and/or Megrim to make the discard strategy more viable.
Flame Burst – First is kinda bad, the second is on par, and rest are great. An important thing to note about Flame Burst and Accumulated Knowledge is that they say all graveyards. So its Nos rules. Whomever uses their Nos first loses.
Timberpack Wolf – Pretty solid creature. Even in pairs it can be pretty scary.
I thankfully have most of the cube, but I need some help filling out the final slots. I was hoping to reduce the size of the cube of my existing normal pauper cube from 425 to 375 (15 extra for Lore Seeker). Right now I have 55 of each color which is unfortunately too much. The smaller card size should enable the gimmicks to surface better, and allow the more card dependent archetypes to come together more often. If you think a slightly larger cube would still be able to support the additional gimmicks gracefully please let me know. If possible I would love to make the artifacts a real archetype and be able to add some of the best metalcraft cards in addition to the Myr Servitor.
Extra gimmick suggestions are always welcome.
Cube Makeup – 375
50 White <-- Extra 5
50 Blue <-- Extra 5
50 Black <-- Extra
50 Green <-- Extra 5
50 Colorless (includes conspiracies) <-- Missing 5
45 Multicolor
25 Lands
5 ?????
http://www.cubetutor.com/viewcube/38098
I need to work in a Pyretic Ritual and a Seething Song.
Alternatively if 55 of each color is more manageable I would rather keep it this way, but the priority are the gimmicks!
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
The other conspiracies seem too obnoxious to me though. Getting some kind of free advantage in-game is just frustrating to play against.
Power play especially is really unfair.
In general I think the cards that explicitly affect drafting are fine, but the ones that give you free stuff in-game are not.
Knowledge is power, money is power, time is money, you are actually gaining time by reading my posts
Click here and check out my Formerly Pauper Cube.
check out my EDH and Pauper EDH decks here
I thank you.
@metalevolence
You might be right. I honestly have not been able to test this yet. I just kinda messed with the balance a lot and wanted some feedback. Have you actually played with the other conspiracies?