I’m still playing and enjoying this card at 360, so I’d recommend it if you haven’t tried it. Card is even better in cube where you can Geddon and kill their blocker or value creature or mana rock in the same turn while tapped out. Card is stupidly good in standard, and is pretty great in cube.
Pieces of the Puzzle seems like a very narrow Forbiddn Alchemy / Strategic Planning variant. Digging deep and fueling the graveyard is nice, but only getting instants / sorceries is pretty narrow, plus a lot of reanimation effects are enchantments.
To be fair, Peices of the Puzzle has seen legacy play. I’m not sure it’s Cubeable at small sizes, but it’s good to think of it as a mega-Compulsive Research, or even a double Impulse than as a simple card draw spell. Card is definitely good in constructed, not that I can give input on its limited playability as it never made my maindeck in SOI/EMN drafts.
Huh, I never considered this card before, but at 360 where Dig Through Time and Treasure Cruise are too greedy, there’s a lot less graveyard value shenanigans, so this card isn’t at its best. Unfortunately, that also means that the competition is at its highest and this card likely doesn’t make the cut (I haven’t tried it before though, I could be mistaken). This card is pretty sweet in modern as a one or two of in UWx control, and I guess it’s probably decent in larger cubes that also struggle to get the necessary counterspell density. I wouldn’t play this one at 450 because of space issues, but anything bigger than that might want this. Good find!
I’ve found the card to be only good with Craterhoof or Griselbrand or Emrakul, as they are generally a focal point of certain creature decks. Overall, the card’s not especially good and I’ve cut it recently to make specs for Pelt Collector.
Artisan is the nuts. Card is awesomely powerful and fun.
You mentioned that the cut deep-feind from the MTGO cube to make space for it, and I’m honestly surprised that Feind ever even made it into their cube in the first place. I’ve never tried any of the Emerge Ccards in cube, are any of them any good? I can’t remember any good ones, but I do recall the arts on almost all of them looking incredible.
I’ve been playing 3 copies of it in standard since before the set even dropped, and it’s been really good, but only in hyper-aggreive red aggro decks with lots of cheap burn. Card is good, but I don’t think it would hold up in a cube setting. Who knows though, maybe I’m wrong and it’s just as good here as it is in standard.
I'd second steve_man's suggestion of Scuttling Doom Engine for tier 2 six drop of choice. FWIW, I like Soul of New Phyrexia more as well. How big does a cube need to be to want three or more colorless six drops? I'd say pretty darn big.
I completely disagree with this statement. Colorless fatties are leagues better for cube than colored ones for countless reasons, and I’d happily play heaps of colorless fatties if it meant that they would push out the colored ones, as colorless fatties can actually be used in more than Oath/Sneak Attack and Reanimator.
It looks like it has a lot of versatility on paper, but in reality it lacks it. The shock ability is hardly ever useful in aggro and midrange, and the artifacts destruction comes up in at most a quarter of matches.
The discussion was regarding 2 drops in red midrange decks, not red two drops. Similarly, I’d pick Porcelain Legionare far over this card in red aggro.
For midrange, I’d pick Arc trail, Young Pyromancer, Smuggler’s Copter, amen Dire Fleet Daredevil over it. I’d compare it to Collective Brutality in modern: it’s a good mainboard card because of its versitility, but it’s usually not especially powerful in most matchups, and for that reason I don’t think I’d pick it especially early if offered more on-theme cards for my deck.
I put this card in my group's cube about a month ago as part of a Mishra's Workshop package, and although Shops has been mediocre at best, Hellkite's been putting up great numbers. It's weak to unconditional single target removal, but a single connection from Steel Hellkite has single-handedley ended every game that it's happened in to date, no matter how far behind you were before the attack step. At 360 we're maybe being too ambitious once we cut Shops, but until then it's staying in. I haven't seen Hellkite in other cube lists to date and I think it's definitely worth testing out if you're interested. The closest thing I can compare it to is Hero of Bladehold, and it even comes down on the same turn most of the time.
My playgroup has been testing this card over Boros Charm, and the takeaway is that this card is at it's best in a white deck plashing a bit red, similarly (or would it be oppositely?) to how Boros Charm is at its best in red decks that splash a bit of white. I don't love the card, but I think I like it better than charm (and I really like charm!). I haven't tested Aurelia at all, but I'm guessing that angel is just a bit too slow compared to a creature like this.
We've been testing this for a while now, and although it's been solid in reanimator, 5cmc has been really difficult to reach for the black aggro decks. The card is still going to keep its spot in our cube for a while until we come to a full conclusion, but so far we've simply remembered how hard it is to reach 5 mana in all the other aggro colors, and this card doesn't make an exception. That fact makes me a kinda sad, as I thought this card would be good enough to warrant the extra land in your deck, but turns out that it isn't as good as it looks in aggro, at least not for us.
I've had this card in my cube since its release and I haven't ever been disappointed, but how does it compare to Teferi? Supreme Verdict is our #1 Azorious card and this is our #2, but is this better or worse than Teferi in the 5cmc UW Control/3-5C Goodstuff Midrange Slot?
I think this card is the new best red 2 drop (yes, I’m putting it above Pyromancer and Kari Zev).
Got to play it today and it was absolutely nuts. Gets in beats early, pairs with bolts to take out larger threats late, and pressured your opponents mana (and Ugins).
I added it in and got to see it play a few rounds over the course of two separate drafts, and although it was a better than I expected, I still wouldn't consider it a 360 staple (probably a 450-540 staple). And it isn't even remotely close to the best red 2 drop imo, I could name a handful of 2 drops I'd pick over it in my red aggro or midrange decks. It's a solid all-around card, and can occasionally do something especially silly, but in like 50% of games it's literally just a bear that gets brick-walled by an opponent's 2 or 3 drop after a single attack.
We’re currently testing Hellkite because it’s so good with Shops, and in the few games we’ve had with it so far, it’s actually been pretty cool. Not sure if it’s great yet, but with even a single connection, no matter how far behind you are, it allways catches you up. It can also be used to help with Metalworker and Tinker support. Not sure if it will, stick but so far I want to keep testing it.
Revoker over Karn? I thought I’d never see the day! Any other opinions on he change? I think the edit seems sound, but I lack experience with needle effects so I might be valuing Revoker wrong.
To be fair, Peices of the Puzzle has seen legacy play. I’m not sure it’s Cubeable at small sizes, but it’s good to think of it as a mega-Compulsive Research, or even a double Impulse than as a simple card draw spell. Card is definitely good in constructed, not that I can give input on its limited playability as it never made my maindeck in SOI/EMN drafts.
You mentioned that the cut deep-feind from the MTGO cube to make space for it, and I’m honestly surprised that Feind ever even made it into their cube in the first place. I’ve never tried any of the Emerge Ccards in cube, are any of them any good? I can’t remember any good ones, but I do recall the arts on almost all of them looking incredible.
I completely disagree with this statement. Colorless fatties are leagues better for cube than colored ones for countless reasons, and I’d happily play heaps of colorless fatties if it meant that they would push out the colored ones, as colorless fatties can actually be used in more than Oath/Sneak Attack and Reanimator.
The discussion was regarding 2 drops in red midrange decks, not red two drops. Similarly, I’d pick Porcelain Legionare far over this card in red aggro.
Steel Hellkite
I put this card in my group's cube about a month ago as part of a Mishra's Workshop package, and although Shops has been mediocre at best, Hellkite's been putting up great numbers. It's weak to unconditional single target removal, but a single connection from Steel Hellkite has single-handedley ended every game that it's happened in to date, no matter how far behind you were before the attack step. At 360 we're maybe being too ambitious once we cut Shops, but until then it's staying in. I haven't seen Hellkite in other cube lists to date and I think it's definitely worth testing out if you're interested. The closest thing I can compare it to is Hero of Bladehold, and it even comes down on the same turn most of the time.
I added it in and got to see it play a few rounds over the course of two separate drafts, and although it was a better than I expected, I still wouldn't consider it a 360 staple (probably a 450-540 staple). And it isn't even remotely close to the best red 2 drop imo, I could name a handful of 2 drops I'd pick over it in my red aggro or midrange decks. It's a solid all-around card, and can occasionally do something especially silly, but in like 50% of games it's literally just a bear that gets brick-walled by an opponent's 2 or 3 drop after a single attack.
Revoker over Karn? I thought I’d never see the day! Any other opinions on he change? I think the edit seems sound, but I lack experience with needle effects so I might be valuing Revoker wrong.