At a base level Looting is good to great whenever you have a lowish curve, which is a lot of red decks, and get a medium draw, and it only really gets better from there: it fuels any graveyard synergies fantastically, lets you keep suspect hands, smooths out your draw, and gets to your important cards. It would take a really specific deck to have Looting be among the best cards in the deck, but I would be pretty happy to have looting in the vast majority of red decks.
Funnily enough, I think you need to be able to target your own stuff for Æther Mutation to really be good. It's fine on it's own, but when you are staring down 2 drops and a 4 drop with a etb it can be awkward, especially when your opponent isn't aggressive. I had a bunch of games that would go to the late game and it was just a 5 mana make 4 1/1s, but then I played a game when my opponent played it on their Baloth Null, which was disgusting.
A single blue to cycle is just not really a cost. I'm typically happily cycling Miscalculation on turn 7+, but you can cycle Censor on turn 5 and not have it affect your turn. If your opponent plays on curve Censor is good, and if your opponent has a more mana heavy hand there just isn't a relevant cost to cycle.
Adding a bit to Bone Picker being okay. I kind of like the spot it's in a lot tbh. It gets better with a critical mass of removal, in more aggressive decks, and in sac decks. You can't throw it into just any black deck and have it be great, but it is stronger with a variety of support or even playing differently.
There are certainly advantages and disadvantages of running a larger guild section. I don't value the seven cards you cut from your 30 playables very highly, and because of that I want to put more power into the 23 cards you do play, though that is at the cost of cutting down from 7 cuts to 3 or 4. I like the other things more guild cards bring, and don't care a ton for what they remove.
Slap_phillips, when it comes to most things evidence is what matters to me. I need to justify something with something else, so saying something without reasoning behind it or reasoning that is not apparent to me is really frustrating. If there had been a simple dismissal of the cards, and a single simple reason then it's not a problem; I acknowledge the information, maybe change my view, respond simply and move on. But you provided no justification, used very strong terms with no acknowledgement of when the cards could be good, and presumed you knew how my cube works better than me, which is a least a bit insulting, especially considering the presumption seems to be that my argument is invalid because I'm overlooking the simplest thing. Let me redo my "who the hell has ever maindecked trash like..." argument, and I hope you see the difference between the two in terms of relevant feedback. I played Pious Evangel for quite a while as it supports lifegain (which I supported at the time) and is an additional Blood Artist type effect for the decks that want them. The problem with the card is that the body is bad, and both of the effects are underwhelming, so it quite often just didn't do anything terribly relevant the entire game. I love cards that let you get value out of tempo, and Honored Hierarch is certainly a design I like. Unfortunately, unlike Goblin Glory Chaser, there are no good ways in green to get past a 2 drop on the play. This makes the card much more inconsistent than other 1 drops, and the benefit isn't enough to make it relevant in the late game. I may have overreacted, especially with the last line, but I don't think it's at all unreasonable to expect a reason for a strong opinion.
I apologize that this thread has been really sidetracked.
Totally, but what a larger guild section does is hopefully make that 6th card the 2nd best instead of the 4th best for the archetype.
I've been okay with interesting options outside of my main 2 aggro guilds (Gruul and Boros). Gruul does have a few more interesting options, but it's not really what I support. Boros does not have very many interesting guild cards. I'm still testing the 5th and 6th Golgari cards, and while those 2 cards may not be good, they are interesting. I will be replacing Lightning Helix with Spitemare because it is true that Helix is not that much better than the mono-coloured options in aggro.
Presuming you're solidly in a colour by late pack 1, a single late good red card means red is probably open, but a late good guild card in your colour means the guild is almost always open. Worst case scenario with the guild card is that you end up with the guild cards, cards of your base colour, and some good mono colour cards in the colour that's cut. The guild card will also probably have a higher upside because it will likely be stronger than the mono-coloured card and/or be more important in the archetype. Signalling in general is probably too specific to each draft to speculate about too much, but a guild card will have a higher payoff than a mono-coloured card, especially late in the pack.
I assure you that I know what is being maindecked and what is not. I certainly do not appreciate your vile for cards while you provide no explanation or evidence. I will admit I forgot to put a testing tag onto the guildmage, but have you ever played with the card? I've been happy with the card most of the time I've seen it in play as it makes blocking incredibly difficult for the opponent. It may be too specific in the end, but the hatred you have for it seems entirely unjustified. Similarly, how do you have such malice against a card that has the fail case of cycling? I have been looking for a suitable replacement for Azorius Charm as it has been in my list for a long time, but I've found nothing that particularly appeals to me and it isn't a high priority for me to replace. Your unsupported opinion and rude phrasing has done nothing but make your future comments more questionable to me, though perhaps it would be fun to respond in kind: who the hell has ever maindecked trash like Honored Hierarch or Pious Evangel?
White: Gust Walker has been solid; it's just about what I expected. Vizier of Deferment has been medium so far, but I haven't managed to get it in a good flicker shell. Cast Out is about what you expect; a solid inclusion. Haven't been able to test Devoted Crop-Mate and Oketra's Attendant yet.
Blue: Labyrinth Guardian has been unimpressive so far, it's not bad by any means, but unimpressive (also, embalm combos with Standstill). Censor has been good. I think Angler Drake costs a bit too much, but it still needs more testing. Still need to test Cryptic Serpent.
Red: Bloodrage Brawler has been relatively insane for me. I haven't seen it against a removal heavy deck, but in the 4 or 5 games where it landed turn 2 it dealt 8+ damage really easily. Ahn-Crop Crasher has been one of my best red creatures. Warfire Javelineer has been consistent enough for me, and I like that spells decks can more easily get an FTK. I'm trying out Deem Worthy as an attempt to diversify red removal, but haven't played with it yet. Is Bloodlust Inciter considered an insta-add at this point? I'll test it, but I don't play many 2 mana 3/2s, so I'm a bit hesitant.
Green: Scaled Behemoth has been a welcome inclusion to the green high drops. Shefet Monitor has been solid. I think I've played Exemplar of Strength once, and it just traded, so more testing is required.
I think the only cards I would strongly advocate for are Bloodrage Brawler, Ahn-Crop Crasher, and maybe Scaled Behemoth. I've added a lot of cards from the set, but most have been good, not amazing.
For the last 7 cards, I find that they are playable in most decks, but only really maindeckable in one, and are just average to good in that deck. If something like Emancipation Angel is among the bottom cards and I want to support UW blink then I would prefer something like Momentary Blink, which is slightly less all around playable, but quite a bit better in UW blink, which is the only deck Emancipation Angel was good in. I think there is still enough power variance at 360 that there are cards that fall into this category, though I am making some omissions due to powerlevel. Hermit Druid is a very good counter example, because the repeatable mill outside of Nyx Weaver is difficult to find, but cards that support an archetype that well are hard to find in my experience (this reminds me that I need a Hermit Druid).
139/360=38.6% playables in the initial list, 121/360=33.6% playables in a 2 colour deck, 127/360=35.3% playables in a 2 colour deck that's willing to splash. In a 15 card pack that's 5.79, 5.04, and 5.29 playable cards respectively.
As long as niche cards are played somewhat consistently or almost always preform I'm happy with them. I was fine including Temur Battle Rage because someone wanted to Pychatog combo easier, but it got the axe after it was rarely played and was wildly inconsistent (occasionally would 20-0 you through blockers, or would have Pychatog trade with a green fatty).
Getting a good red card later than normal doesn't necessarily mean that red is super open. If you're in the same scenario and see a late Cloudblazer after seeing blue cards go later than normal it's easier to jump ship cause there is some certainty that you'll get most of the other Azorius cards.
A larger card choice is the main thing that is lost, but I both don't value that super highly and don't actually think it's impacted as much as people make it out to be. Lets take the numbers of 57 for each colour, 30 for multicoloured, 25 fixing lands, and 20 colourless cards, which I think is a pretty normal distribution at 360. I have -7 monocoloured cards for each colour, +30 multicoloured, +13 fixing lands, and -8 colourless cards in comparison. A strictly 2 colour deck will have about 18 less cards that they can play, which is about 87% of the initial list's playables or about a 0.75 card difference in a 15 card pack. A 2 colour deck that can splash a colour will have about 12 less cards that they can play, which is about 91% of the initial list's playables or about a 0.5 card difference in a 15 card pack. 0.5-0.75 cards is the 6th playable in the pack, and not really something you're looking to pick most of the time considering those are presumably the among the bottom cards in their colours. I don't value the 28th or 29th playable in my pool that is just not good enough, so I replace those cards with much more interesting cards that are either one of the better cards in your deck or are dead cards, which is the same as being the 28th card.
Honored Crop-Captain has been good so far. Truefire Paladin can really warp both attackers and blockers. Lightning Helix is obviously strong. I'm trying out Renegade Wheelsmith, but it looks good. Rally the Peasants represents an insane amount of damage after a couple token producers, and Goblin Trenches can take over games really easily. The Boros cards (ignoring Trenches) aren't anything fantastic, but they are good redundancy that are better than the mono-coloured options. I've had way more difficulty with Golgari than Boros.
I like the larger guild section for a few reasons: signals are more obvious, you get rewarded more for following signals, there are a few more interesting decisions in draft (splashes, try to wheel or not), 3 colour decks come up more, and you get more synergy. If everyone is in a different colour combination then there aren't any problems, and, if that isn't the case, you are rewarded for changing into the open colours.
I think the ratio is fine, but some of the guilds have a really high drop in quality after the 6th or 7th card so there's not much you can do to maintain it. I'm at 60 gold cards at 360, and I haven't found packs end up with that many gold cards. It's not like people are scraping for playables in cube; I've gone some drafts with 42+ playables.
I like Nearheath Chaplain at a 2. It goes in basically every white deck that isn't aggressive and is solid. I ended up cutting it because it was so incredibly boring, but it does do good work.
I was never very impressed by it when I ran it; it's fine, but not great. Playing it on 3 when stuck on lands and without a 2 drop in hand just doesn't feel great against someone who isn't attacking. Double green is a bit too much of a cost to play in most 3+ colour decks, and, even in 2 colour decks, supporting double G in addition to anything like Aerial Responder, Vampire Nighthawk, or Hypnotic specter really strained your mana base.
Malach of the Dawn at 1 is really pushing it; it's double W to cast and triple W to regen on a mediocre body. Lightkeeper of Emeria is a bit more interesting. It's probably pushing too far into sideboard territory for me to give it a 1, but I could see some situations where I might want it.
Adding a bit to Bone Picker being okay. I kind of like the spot it's in a lot tbh. It gets better with a critical mass of removal, in more aggressive decks, and in sac decks. You can't throw it into just any black deck and have it be great, but it is stronger with a variety of support or even playing differently.
Slap_phillips, when it comes to most things evidence is what matters to me. I need to justify something with something else, so saying something without reasoning behind it or reasoning that is not apparent to me is really frustrating. If there had been a simple dismissal of the cards, and a single simple reason then it's not a problem; I acknowledge the information, maybe change my view, respond simply and move on. But you provided no justification, used very strong terms with no acknowledgement of when the cards could be good, and presumed you knew how my cube works better than me, which is a least a bit insulting, especially considering the presumption seems to be that my argument is invalid because I'm overlooking the simplest thing. Let me redo my "who the hell has ever maindecked trash like..." argument, and I hope you see the difference between the two in terms of relevant feedback. I played Pious Evangel for quite a while as it supports lifegain (which I supported at the time) and is an additional Blood Artist type effect for the decks that want them. The problem with the card is that the body is bad, and both of the effects are underwhelming, so it quite often just didn't do anything terribly relevant the entire game. I love cards that let you get value out of tempo, and Honored Hierarch is certainly a design I like. Unfortunately, unlike Goblin Glory Chaser, there are no good ways in green to get past a 2 drop on the play. This makes the card much more inconsistent than other 1 drops, and the benefit isn't enough to make it relevant in the late game. I may have overreacted, especially with the last line, but I don't think it's at all unreasonable to expect a reason for a strong opinion.
I apologize that this thread has been really sidetracked.
I've been okay with interesting options outside of my main 2 aggro guilds (Gruul and Boros). Gruul does have a few more interesting options, but it's not really what I support. Boros does not have very many interesting guild cards. I'm still testing the 5th and 6th Golgari cards, and while those 2 cards may not be good, they are interesting. I will be replacing Lightning Helix with Spitemare because it is true that Helix is not that much better than the mono-coloured options in aggro.
Presuming you're solidly in a colour by late pack 1, a single late good red card means red is probably open, but a late good guild card in your colour means the guild is almost always open. Worst case scenario with the guild card is that you end up with the guild cards, cards of your base colour, and some good mono colour cards in the colour that's cut. The guild card will also probably have a higher upside because it will likely be stronger than the mono-coloured card and/or be more important in the archetype. Signalling in general is probably too specific to each draft to speculate about too much, but a guild card will have a higher payoff than a mono-coloured card, especially late in the pack.
Blue: Labyrinth Guardian has been unimpressive so far, it's not bad by any means, but unimpressive (also, embalm combos with Standstill). Censor has been good. I think Angler Drake costs a bit too much, but it still needs more testing. Still need to test Cryptic Serpent.
Black: Bone Picker has been okay; it gets cast for 4 more than I would like. Supernatural Stamina is just Undying Evil so far. Stir the Sands and Wander in Death both need more testing, though I think they are both fine.
Red: Bloodrage Brawler has been relatively insane for me. I haven't seen it against a removal heavy deck, but in the 4 or 5 games where it landed turn 2 it dealt 8+ damage really easily. Ahn-Crop Crasher has been one of my best red creatures. Warfire Javelineer has been consistent enough for me, and I like that spells decks can more easily get an FTK. I'm trying out Deem Worthy as an attempt to diversify red removal, but haven't played with it yet. Is Bloodlust Inciter considered an insta-add at this point? I'll test it, but I don't play many 2 mana 3/2s, so I'm a bit hesitant.
Green: Scaled Behemoth has been a welcome inclusion to the green high drops. Shefet Monitor has been solid. I think I've played Exemplar of Strength once, and it just traded, so more testing is required.
Multi: Honored Crop-Captain is just a good card. I've been trying Destined // Lead, and I'm hopeful, but really not expecting much.
I think the only cards I would strongly advocate for are Bloodrage Brawler, Ahn-Crop Crasher, and maybe Scaled Behemoth. I've added a lot of cards from the set, but most have been good, not amazing.
139/360=38.6% playables in the initial list, 121/360=33.6% playables in a 2 colour deck, 127/360=35.3% playables in a 2 colour deck that's willing to splash. In a 15 card pack that's 5.79, 5.04, and 5.29 playable cards respectively.
As long as niche cards are played somewhat consistently or almost always preform I'm happy with them. I was fine including Temur Battle Rage because someone wanted to Pychatog combo easier, but it got the axe after it was rarely played and was wildly inconsistent (occasionally would 20-0 you through blockers, or would have Pychatog trade with a green fatty).
Getting a good red card later than normal doesn't necessarily mean that red is super open. If you're in the same scenario and see a late Cloudblazer after seeing blue cards go later than normal it's easier to jump ship cause there is some certainty that you'll get most of the other Azorius cards.
As I said, I have yet to play with Renegade Wheelsmith, but it looks strong. If I could have every single guild card be as good archetype support and as interesting as Nyx Weaver I would take that deal every time, but that is not the case, especially for Boros. Rally the Peasants does tell you something more specific than Renegade Wheelsmith, but Renegade Wheelsmith does tell you more than a staple like Electrolyze. You say Renegade Wheelsmith isn't better than other mono-colour options, but you also say it's doing what other cards do but 10% better. Multicolour cards being just better is true for a good amount of typically played guild cards. I don't know how correct your cubetutor is, but taking some examples from it: Thunderclap Wyvern is just a better Favorable Winds, Ribbons of Night is just a better Essence Extraction, Blightning is just a better Mind Rot, Kird Ape is just a better Rakdos Cackler, Tidehollow Sculler is just a better Mesmeric Fiend, Lingering Souls has a few parallels, Horizon Chimera is just a better Cloaked Siren, Electrolyze is just a better divisible burn spell, Hearthfire Hobgoblin is just a better(?) Scrapper Champion, and Skyknight Legionnaire is just a better Wind Drake.
I like the larger guild section for a few reasons: signals are more obvious, you get rewarded more for following signals, there are a few more interesting decisions in draft (splashes, try to wheel or not), 3 colour decks come up more, and you get more synergy. If everyone is in a different colour combination then there aren't any problems, and, if that isn't the case, you are rewarded for changing into the open colours.
360 Peasant