I'm looking for some input and opinions for this cube before I order the cards. The players at my LGS haven't really offered anything other than "K, we'll draft it". I haven't actually played any games with it only drafted the cards on cube tutor. The archetypes are pretty standard but I have two overall themes for the cube - Graveyard matters and +1/+1 counters in Sultai and Abzan respectively but I tried putting in as many cards with incremental synergies as I could. *snip*
Is there a good reason to be at 420 besides the memes? There's quite a few suboptimal multicolor choices.
Your cube doesn't seem too slow, so Crystal Shard should be fine. It only really becomes a problem if your cube is too durdly.
No, that combo doesn't have a consistent payoff.
Board wipes might be weaker in peasant, but so are aggro cards. Aggro is actually fairly weak in the average peasant cube, usually midrange is king unless the environment is tuned.
If anything, your dredge/reanimator section isn't supported enough. With only 5 reanimate spells a consistent deck might be hard to accomplish.
Thanks guys for the responses. I love getting criticims so I can look at my cube more effectively.
I know there is still a power balance issue and several of the card choices are personal, based on personal play history or friend's requests.
Two cards I will defend are: Perplex: its a build around card that enables tutoring for cmc 3 which is a key cmc for blue and Black and further can be brutal if you know how to use it. It can function as a One with Nothing on yourself when needed or can normally be a brutal choice for a counterspell for others.
and Fiend hunter: it fits my orzhov aristocrats archetype more than Fairgrounds Warden as you can respond to the ETB.
Tribal is one that has come together several times but will probably be getting cut soon due to it has been under-performing.
Thanks guys for the responses. I love getting criticims so I can look at my cube more effectively.
I know there is still a power balance issue and several of the card choices are personal, based on personal play history or friend's requests.
Two cards I will defend are: Perplex: its a build around card that enables tutoring for cmc 3 which is a key cmc for blue and Black and further can be brutal if you know how to use it. It can function as a One with Nothing on yourself when needed or can normally be a brutal choice for a counterspell for others.
and Fiend hunter: it fits my orzhov aristocrats archetype more than Fairgrounds Warden as you can respond to the ETB.
Tribal is one that has come together several times but will probably be getting cut soon due to it has been under-performing.
I concur with this response. I also do not think it is a 'brutal choice'. It's a Cancel (of which there are plenty of strictly better options for us to cube) with additional options for the opponent. Cancel always counters your opponents game winning (or otherwise critical) spell. If that Ahn-Crop Crasher on the stack is going to let them get in for lethal, they don't care about discarding the last few cards in their hand. Cancel would just stop it cold. And once the opponents hand is empty, you are pretty much relegated to it being a tutor. Yes, that is upside, but I don't see that being the primary mode you want to use often.
In the... month since I posted, I've been working on an overhaul of the c/ube which removes the conspiracies, mostly because I've built a multiplayer cube where they're much more appropriate. They were just cool cards I wanted to play with. Most of them were very much first picks, though the only one I think that was "too good" was Double Stroke.
I try to keep the artifact/enchantment hate high enough (and encourage people to maindeck it) so 'clamp has not caused a ton of complaints so far.
Has cartouches_and_hondens.dec come together?
Hondens are kind of a fan favourite for my group. Naya control with the respective hondens is quite popular and ends up being pretty good. I only wish the other two were on the same level. I haven't had enough testing with the trials/cartouches, they are also probably a bit below power level, but if they end up being as popular with my drafters as hondens they'll stay in. Would love some more enchantment payoff cards, though.
Clone is fine but I'm bothered by playing cards with a rare symbol and I haven't bothered to get a very old Clone yet. I would worry about it being good against anything other than ramp, though - I'd sooner add in more Mind Control effects.
Never been a fan of Talrand's, though I guess it would support skies. Dunno. Never felt like it did much.
I can't imagine Wild Nacatl working consistently enough without fetches and shocks.
It's often enough a 2/2 for [G] which I think is solid. I mean, if I had shocks and fetches, would a G/W deck pick up a G/R land just to make its Nactl bigger? Seems fringe.
The archetypes are probably pretty obvious and might be too forced, 3 of the gold cards in each color pairing are meant to support the archetype while the other two are goodstuff cards in general. The manabase has been sanitized a LOT, because I want 2 color decks to be easy and 3 color decks to be possible if you spend picks to get good fixing. It probably is still way too generous, lmk.
Hopefully any suggestions will be civil and help with what to replace the cards that are bad with.
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Top 16 - 2012 Indiana State Championships Currently Playing: GBStandard - Golgari Safari MidrangeBG RBWModern - Mardu PyromancerWBR RLegacy - Good Old Fashioned BurnR
Ulamog's Nullifier -- what ways do you have to exile creatures? Seems like a lot of times this is going to be a 2/3 flash flying for 4. Perplex -- was just discussed above why you might want to reconsider.
BW is missing Maw of the Obzedat.
Is GB both +1/+1 counters and -1/-1 counters? Seems like a nombo. For the +1/+1 counter theme, add Ridgescale Tusker
Izzet spells matter without Delver of Secrets? Also, Electrolyze is a great card.
Seems like GW is enchantments. I'd definitely consider adding Rancor then (which is already a great card in and of itself), maybe Utopia Sprawl too.
Ulamog's Nullifier -- what ways do you have to exile creatures? Seems like a lot of times this is going to be a 2/3 flash flying for 4. Perplex -- was just discussed above why you might want to reconsider.
BW is missing Maw of the Obzedat.
Is GB both +1/+1 counters and -1/-1 counters? Seems like a nombo. For the +1/+1 counter theme, add Ridgescale Tusker
Izzet spells matter without Delver of Secrets? Also, Electrolyze is a great card.
Seems like GW is enchantments. I'd definitely consider adding Rancor then (which is already a great card in and of itself), maybe Utopia Sprawl too.
1) There aren't a TON of ways to exile cards, but there are some. Dissipate variants, Reality Shift, Withered wretch, Scour, Bojuka Bog, and Tormod's Crypt come to mind. And honestly I don't see a value 2/3 flash flier as being terrible.
3) What do I cut for maw? Harsh Sustanence seems like the least bad cut.
4) yes GB is +1/+1 and -1/-1, I have marked counters of both types in ample supply. Ridgescale Tusker does seem really good, I think cutting plaguemaw Beast for him is acceptable?
5) Delver is a deliberate avoidance because the sleeves are slightly too translucent, and I don't want to dig out checklist cards. Electrolyze I'm not sure how I missed, it'll replace Izzet Charm.
6) Rancor I left out because I felt it might be too powerful. Do you think there's enough removal to not make it OP?
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If anyone has anything else they'd like to comment on, please do so! I plan on taking this cube to Gencon starting on Thursday!
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More thoughts to type up later but Countersquall kinda blows. Are your blue decks excited to play Negate? If not then you shouldn't use Negate Plus as a dimir card
But in case I forget later, please replace the blue 1/3 for 3 with literally anything else
...That's supposed to be Aether Adept and I'm not sure how I missed it. Thanks.
For Perplex, I'll replace it with Dinrova Horror, which seems to be a card that is becoming popular in Dimir colors.
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It's been a while. Thinking of slimming down my cube to 450. Don't know where to start I have too many fond memories with cards that are probably trash now.
Remove Dark Deal I don't ever see this being good Forge Devil It's be decent if it was a may ability Cinder Wall Seems like a bad creature only burn spell Ambush Krotiq Bad Red Elemental Blast Is it really worth a limited spot in your cube for such a narrow sideboard card? Autumn's Veil See Above
Any card requiring colorless mana as you have so few sources to produce it.
Hey guys, I'm ready for you to rip a hole and criticize my cube.
Here it is. Its a 180 Peasant Cube, for 4 players. I have it at this size because we usually only have 6 players to draft, and I wanted to be able to carry it around easily. Plus the way it plays out is a little different than most big Peasant cubes I feel. You draft it by 5 packs of 9 cards.
Right off the bat I don't get how you could use it to draft with 6 players if it can only accomodate 4 pools of 45 cards. Do you usually only have 6 people at every draft, or are there only 6 people in your cube which rotates depending on the day and time?
Decided to dive down the rabbit hole and figured I should post here before I start collecting... It's my first attempt at a peasant cube, but don't be gentle:
It's important to note that I've restricted the cards I'll put in the cube to those that are in a modern frame (both for aesthetic reasons and because I play with a lot of new players, so reminder text is useful, and old cards often have archaic/unintuitive rules) and those that have actually been printed at common or uncommon in a draft environment (so no baleful strix or curse of predation).
I also didn't want to necessarily make this a cube of all the best peasant cards for their slots (this forum and other places has already done a pretty good job of that!), but instead support a lot of themes that I think will make a fun/unique/explorable draft environment. So I'm happy to lower the power of the cube to increase diversity/feasibility of other cards. Along with good stuff midrange and control, the supported themes are:
WU - Blink/EtB Value
UB - Ninjas/Evasion Matters
BR - Proliferate Aggro
RG - Energy/Bloodrush Aggro
GW - Enchantment Pants
WB - Death by a Thousand Cuts
BG - -1/-1 Counters Matters
GU - Flash Tempo
UR - Counterburn
RW - Token Aggro
WUBRG - Hondens, because 5 slots for a whole archetype is a pretty good bargain.
I'm mostly concerned with the curves of each colour, and numbers for certain types of cards (are there enough fixing/burn/counter/ramp/removal/sweepers etc)), but criticise away!
Edit: @gsethi I'm not experienced enough to rip a hole in your cube, but I love the idea of a tiny 180 card cube, and it looks like you've done a good job. One thing to look at though might be your curve in white, you have four 2 drops (one of which is ww) and eight 3 drops
20 archetypes (not counting Hondens which is literally 5 cards) seems quite a lot to support. Some of them might have overlaps, but I'm still skeptical that all of these are going to be feasible.
Fixing seems fine in terms of the proportion of the cube. Maybe slightly on the high side, but you are planning to support 3-color archetypes, so it's probably fine. If I were you, I'd play the gainlands instead of the just-ETB-tapped-duals, they are slightly better.
You have a lot of guild cards. The problem is that these are much less flexible than single-colored cards obviously. At 360, most cubes run 3-4 guild slots, so at 450, I don't think I'd run more than 5.
Your black removal is quite expensive. I don't know if that was a deliberate decision - You have all the regular "best" red burn and white exile spells, but no Doom Blade, Murder, Tragic Slip etc.
Overall curves look fine at first glance, but I'd consider adding more red 1-drops.
Comments about individual cards:
Shefet Dunes seems much worse than the other monocolored lands. As far as I can see, it's the only desert, so it can only sac itself once for a measly +1/+1 at sorcery speed. I guess that synergizes with token / swarm, but I'd still rather have something like Forbidding Watchtower in my list.
In your UB guild section I see only one card that goes in your UB archetype specifically... Is that on purpose?
GW: Did you omit Behemoth Sledge for power level reasons? If not, it is definitely missing.
I drafted a RG aggro deck. Unfortunately CubeTutor crashed before deckbuilding, but I managed to grab a screenshot of the picks. First pick was Bloodbraid Elf:
Are Skullclamp and the conspiracies too powerful?
Has cartouches_and_hondens.dec come together?
No Clone or Talrand's Invocation?
I can't imagine Wild Nacatl working consistently enough without fetches and shocks.
Is there a good reason to be at 420 besides the memes? There's quite a few suboptimal multicolor choices.
Your cube doesn't seem too slow, so Crystal Shard should be fine. It only really becomes a problem if your cube is too durdly.
No, that combo doesn't have a consistent payoff.
Board wipes might be weaker in peasant, but so are aggro cards. Aggro is actually fairly weak in the average peasant cube, usually midrange is king unless the environment is tuned.
If anything, your dredge/reanimator section isn't supported enough. With only 5 reanimate spells a consistent deck might be hard to accomplish.
Maze and the hammers seem really strong here, but there's probably enough removal to deal with them.
No Dryad Militant?
How often do games end with top-decking?
Warning: Not for the durdly-hearted!
I'm not sure that it's worth it to play Goblin General or Shaman of the Pack. Has the tribal deck ever come together?
Putrefy and Mortify are good cards, but they seem too boring to take guild spots.
Why not replace Fiend Hunter with Fairgrounds Warden?
I know there is still a power balance issue and several of the card choices are personal, based on personal play history or friend's requests.
Two cards I will defend are:
Perplex: its a build around card that enables tutoring for cmc 3 which is a key cmc for blue and Black and further can be brutal if you know how to use it. It can function as a One with Nothing on yourself when needed or can normally be a brutal choice for a counterspell for others.
and
Fiend hunter: it fits my orzhov aristocrats archetype more than Fairgrounds Warden as you can respond to the ETB.
Tribal is one that has come together several times but will probably be getting cut soon due to it has been under-performing.
and crap I forgot to re-add Dryad militant
I know there is still a power balance issue and several of the card choices are personal, based on personal play history or friend's requests.
Two cards I will defend are:
Perplex: its a build around card that enables tutoring for cmc 3 which is a key cmc for blue and Black and further can be brutal if you know how to use it. It can function as a One with Nothing on yourself when needed or can normally be a brutal choice for a counterspell for others.
and
Fiend hunter: it fits my orzhov aristocrats archetype more than Fairgrounds Warden as you can respond to the ETB.
Tribal is one that has come together several times but will probably be getting cut soon due to it has been under-performing.
and crap I forgot to re-add Dryad militant.
!!!!!!!!
WiJ
Peasant 540 Cube
So then it's a slow tutor for a narrow band of cards. nah
//
It looks like you're supporting blue aggro so there's no excuse not to run cloudfin raptor. And enclave cryptologist is also mussing from the ones.
I don't think that clockwork hydra would be a b+ card if it was just a 4/4 that pinged when it attacked. Shrinking is terrible.
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
In the... month since I posted, I've been working on an overhaul of the c/ube which removes the conspiracies, mostly because I've built a multiplayer cube where they're much more appropriate. They were just cool cards I wanted to play with. Most of them were very much first picks, though the only one I think that was "too good" was Double Stroke.
I try to keep the artifact/enchantment hate high enough (and encourage people to maindeck it) so 'clamp has not caused a ton of complaints so far.
Hondens are kind of a fan favourite for my group. Naya control with the respective hondens is quite popular and ends up being pretty good. I only wish the other two were on the same level. I haven't had enough testing with the trials/cartouches, they are also probably a bit below power level, but if they end up being as popular with my drafters as hondens they'll stay in. Would love some more enchantment payoff cards, though.
Clone is fine but I'm bothered by playing cards with a rare symbol and I haven't bothered to get a very old Clone yet. I would worry about it being good against anything other than ramp, though - I'd sooner add in more Mind Control effects.
Never been a fan of Talrand's, though I guess it would support skies. Dunno. Never felt like it did much.
It's often enough a 2/2 for [G] which I think is solid. I mean, if I had shocks and fetches, would a G/W deck pick up a G/R land just to make its Nactl bigger? Seems fringe.
Draft my Peasant Cube.
Cube Link
The archetypes are probably pretty obvious and might be too forced, 3 of the gold cards in each color pairing are meant to support the archetype while the other two are goodstuff cards in general. The manabase has been sanitized a LOT, because I want 2 color decks to be easy and 3 color decks to be possible if you spend picks to get good fixing. It probably is still way too generous, lmk.
Hopefully any suggestions will be civil and help with what to replace the cards that are bad with.
Currently Playing:
GBStandard - Golgari Safari MidrangeBG
RBWModern - Mardu PyromancerWBR
RLegacy - Good Old Fashioned BurnR
Clan Contest 3 Mafia - Mafia Co-MVP
Ulamog's Nullifier -- what ways do you have to exile creatures? Seems like a lot of times this is going to be a 2/3 flash flying for 4.
Perplex -- was just discussed above why you might want to reconsider.
BW is missing Maw of the Obzedat.
Is GB both +1/+1 counters and -1/-1 counters? Seems like a nombo. For the +1/+1 counter theme, add Ridgescale Tusker
Izzet spells matter without Delver of Secrets? Also, Electrolyze is a great card.
Seems like GW is enchantments. I'd definitely consider adding Rancor then (which is already a great card in and of itself), maybe Utopia Sprawl too.
1) There aren't a TON of ways to exile cards, but there are some. Dissipate variants, Reality Shift, Withered wretch, Scour, Bojuka Bog, and Tormod's Crypt come to mind. And honestly I don't see a value 2/3 flash flier as being terrible.
2) Noted. How does ******ersquall look?
3) What do I cut for maw? Harsh Sustanence seems like the least bad cut.
4) yes GB is +1/+1 and -1/-1, I have marked counters of both types in ample supply. Ridgescale Tusker does seem really good, I think cutting plaguemaw Beast for him is acceptable?
5) Delver is a deliberate avoidance because the sleeves are slightly too translucent, and I don't want to dig out checklist cards. Electrolyze I'm not sure how I missed, it'll replace Izzet Charm.
6) Rancor I left out because I felt it might be too powerful. Do you think there's enough removal to not make it OP?
Currently Playing:
GBStandard - Golgari Safari MidrangeBG
RBWModern - Mardu PyromancerWBR
RLegacy - Good Old Fashioned BurnR
Clan Contest 3 Mafia - Mafia Co-MVP
Very well then. Making the following changes tomorrow.
IN:
OUT:
If anyone has anything else they'd like to comment on, please do so! I plan on taking this cube to Gencon starting on Thursday!
Currently Playing:
GBStandard - Golgari Safari MidrangeBG
RBWModern - Mardu PyromancerWBR
RLegacy - Good Old Fashioned BurnR
Clan Contest 3 Mafia - Mafia Co-MVP
...That's supposed to be Aether Adept and I'm not sure how I missed it. Thanks.
For Perplex, I'll replace it with Dinrova Horror, which seems to be a card that is becoming popular in Dimir colors.
Currently Playing:
GBStandard - Golgari Safari MidrangeBG
RBWModern - Mardu PyromancerWBR
RLegacy - Good Old Fashioned BurnR
Clan Contest 3 Mafia - Mafia Co-MVP
http://www.cubetutor.com/viewcube/5484
My 540 CU/be thread
Similar Card Swaps
Forsake the Worldly > Revoke Existence instant speed and cycling are easily worth the 1 mana
Relief Captain > Meadowboon Meadowboon isn't bad but Relief Captain is amazing
Gryff's Boon > Angelic Gift Helps fit enchantment theme and is better at the same time
Sea Gate Oracle > Augur of Bolas Augur doesn't hit enough
Night's Whisper > Altar's Reap or sign in blood
Boggart Brute > Bladetusk Boar Brute is more consistent and being cheaper helps alot too
Dynacharge > Trumpet Blast Single target mode gives options and it's usable on defense.
Abrade > Smelt Much more versatile
Kujar Seedsculptor > Satyr Grovedancer
Regrowth > Recollect
Add Suggestions
Jetting Glasskite
Cage of Hands
Prison Term
Faith's Fetters
Blossoming Defense
Nature's Way
Clear Shot
Remove
Dark Deal I don't ever see this being good
Forge Devil It's be decent if it was a may ability
Cinder Wall Seems like a bad creature only burn spell
Ambush Krotiq Bad
Red Elemental Blast Is it really worth a limited spot in your cube for such a narrow sideboard card?
Autumn's Veil See Above
Any card requiring colorless mana as you have so few sources to produce it.
Here it is. Its a 180 Peasant Cube, for 4 players. I have it at this size because we usually only have 6 players to draft, and I wanted to be able to carry it around easily. Plus the way it plays out is a little different than most big Peasant cubes I feel. You draft it by 5 packs of 9 cards.
Recent update was to lower the power of kill spells, such as:
Shriekmaw -> Nekrataal
Ultimate Price/Go For the throat -> Murderous Cut/Murder
Also I only added these from HOU:
Fire//Ice -> Bloodwater Entity
Stonecloaker -> Sunscourge Champion
Thriving Grubs -> Burning-Fist Minotaur
Affinity
Legacy:
GBCombo Elves
EDH:
GEzuri, Renegade Leader's Elf Ball
Cube:
180 Peasant Micro Cube
Also, follow us on twitter! @TurnOneMagic
Affinity
Legacy:
GBCombo Elves
EDH:
GEzuri, Renegade Leader's Elf Ball
Cube:
180 Peasant Micro Cube
http://www.cubetutor.com/viewcube/86449;jsessionid=04B55B8EA93184746B9B84CEA477618F
It's important to note that I've restricted the cards I'll put in the cube to those that are in a modern frame (both for aesthetic reasons and because I play with a lot of new players, so reminder text is useful, and old cards often have archaic/unintuitive rules) and those that have actually been printed at common or uncommon in a draft environment (so no baleful strix or curse of predation).
I also didn't want to necessarily make this a cube of all the best peasant cards for their slots (this forum and other places has already done a pretty good job of that!), but instead support a lot of themes that I think will make a fun/unique/explorable draft environment. So I'm happy to lower the power of the cube to increase diversity/feasibility of other cards. Along with good stuff midrange and control, the supported themes are:
WU - Blink/EtB Value
UB - Ninjas/Evasion Matters
BR - Proliferate Aggro
RG - Energy/Bloodrush Aggro
GW - Enchantment Pants
WB - Death by a Thousand Cuts
BG - -1/-1 Counters Matters
GU - Flash Tempo
UR - Counterburn
RW - Token Aggro
WUB - Solar Flare (Reanimator)
UBR - Spell combo
BRG - Proliferate Midrange
RGW - Token Swarm
GWU - Walls Control
WBR - Sacrifice.dec
UGR - Ramp
BGW - Enchantments Matters
RWU - Creature Control (Pingers, tappers, untappers and onboard tricks)
GUB - Graveyard matters
WUBRG - Hondens, because 5 slots for a whole archetype is a pretty good bargain.
I'm mostly concerned with the curves of each colour, and numbers for certain types of cards (are there enough fixing/burn/counter/ramp/removal/sweepers etc)), but criticise away!
Edit: @gsethi I'm not experienced enough to rip a hole in your cube, but I love the idea of a tiny 180 card cube, and it looks like you've done a good job. One thing to look at though might be your curve in white, you have four 2 drops (one of which is ww) and eight 3 drops
Modern:
WBG
Legacy:
WBG
Comments about individual cards:
I drafted a RG aggro deck. Unfortunately CubeTutor crashed before deckbuilding, but I managed to grab a screenshot of the picks. First pick was Bloodbraid Elf: