My first thought was an emphatic "No", but from how I understand your endeavours from your explanations I think I can understand where you want your Cube to go.
Would it be accurate to say that you want to promote cards typically played for their role in an archetype (Reanimator, Lands, Flicker, ...) to function also as the cards played within more generic theatres (Aggro, Midrange, Control)? This you achieve by cutting cards that are catering mainly to theatres, which makes cards from archetypes the next best alternatives.
The two cards you mentioned function mainly as white Aggro beaters, so essentially you'd be nerfing your white aggro suite by cutting those and have people resort to archetype beaters (like Anafenza). This is an interesting idea, but I think you might need to do the same thing for control-finishers and midrange generic value spells. I.e. something like Griselbrand or Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite would need to be your control Finisher instead of the more generic Torrential Gearhulk. Likewise, instead of using goodstuff cards like maybe Questing Beast, you'd need to play Vengevine or whatever suitably caters your archetypes.
I hope I understood your endeavour. If I didn't, I'd be happy to see an in depth explanation of your thinking.
My knee-jerk reaction would be to say that at the moment both Vanguard and Aspirant are uncuttable Aggro beaters and are fantastic, but that is in the framework of simply havin the strongest aggro creatures available.
With Snow Lands provided I'd definetly go for Dead of Winter. CMC 3 is really good, allowing you to cast it in a pinch earlier - if you have to do that, most creatures don't have 4+ toughness anyways. Also it's splashable.
Since you mentioned it, how have Tainted Pact and Field of the Dead worked for you? I'm very interested in both cards but they always felt a little too hard to make work.
Collected Company is also one of the cards that lately caught my interest. Over the last year I have fallen in love with creature centric combo and Maverick style decks in cube. I feel Collected Company will serve those decks in a similar manner as Sevinne's Reclamation does. It is an amazing tech in decks that otherwise seem a little clunky for operating on sorcery speed and rather fragile creatures. With the Adversary Cycle in Midnight Hunt I finally picked up a Collected Company alongside a Klothys, God of Destiny and have very high hopes to see those cards do good work!
Regarding the Mana Dork discussion, I think you are right concerning 2 CMC Dorks, allowing only premium 2 CMC dorks to exist. I would consider Sylvan Caryatid and Lotus Cobra (in a very loose manner) to count as premium, and at my size (about 540), I don't need to stock up with the Utopia Sprawl versions. In short, a 2 CMC mana dork needs to ramp more than 1 or provide rainbow fixing (here Sakura-Tribe Elder is an outlier - I still like it for all the small interactions though).
Also thank you for the good discussions everywhere on this forum and for your innovations!
If you are interested in this card, do you also play Galvanic Relay in your Cube?
I don't support Storm, but I'm curious whether you'd consider it similar since it is also a big setup card for a Combo Deck.
I think I get the idea, but isn't this card way too slow?
Pointing discard at my opponent on turn 5 is rarely what I want to do, and I'm not even guaranteed the card is doing anything at all, since my opponent could already be in topdeck mode or have just 1 card in hand.
It feels like an Armageddon, in that it essentially enhances the importance of the current boardstate, breaking symmetry by having a better boardstate or inherent recovery. But it just seems way worse at doing this. If I have a Crucible out for example, I'd rather resolve Armageddon than this, which is already one Mana cheaper.
I tend to go either of two directions with archetypes or kinds of cards I feel are lacking good or enough pieces.
1. Adjust the powerlevel of my Cube to be able to cater a certain archetype - I did this for the Lands-deck, Dark Depths and the Persist Combo. I love those archetypes and thus have possibly suboptimal cards in my cube (Thespian's Stage, Crop Rotation or The Gitrog Monster).
2. Wait until enough fitting pieces are printed - This kind of goes into the same direction as both the Polymorph and the Persist Deck. Both were possible to support, but only if you were willing to go really deep on weird cards. At some point however the necessary number of cards existed (Transmogrify, Lukka, Coppercoat Outcast, Renata, Called to the Hunt, Grumgully, the Generous were a few of the necessary printings) such that you didn't need to litter your Cube with the nichest of cards.
Regarding Discard effects I feel the same way as you do. I'd really like to have more, but the options out there at the time really don't cut it for me, and so I simply wait for new stuff to be printed.
Was more trying to make my point about the weaker green mana dorks, which is off topic anyway.
I think we had a discussion that went into that direction in the Gilded Goose Thread. I've had the same feeling towards Dorks that tap for G and I feel Gilded Goosr to be the superior card. Anyways, off topic.
While not having played with a Cradle so far, I'd say it probably opens up more archetype support than the Village. I guess it depends on how the ramp deck is doing versus how midrange decks are doing in your cube right now.
I still really like Oblivion Ring and Banishing Light. Simply seemed to work out for me quite a lot. But I'm also one of my drafters focusing on Enchantment Removal the most, so most other drafters have little to no answers to my O-Rings.
Regarding Earthquake - I've actually been killed a lot by my Aggro opponent playing Earthquake for 7 when I considered myself safe in the late game, so I like to keep it in as a weird form of reach and also a very useful, albeit conditional sweeper.
Seems like a good time for a Necro, since the last year, starting with Zendikar Rising, has blessed us with amazing low CMC cards and that trend is now continuing with the adversary cycle of new Innistrad. For those in particular, they'd be a reasonable hit in the very late game where you can pay for the EtB "Kicker"
As a Mana dork, it might not be needed, but I like the card for everything else it brings to the table. When the time comes and another Hierarch is printed, I'm not sure whether I'll cut Gilded Goose or something like Llanowar Elves. I'm already at the number of 1CMC Mana Dorks I like, so I don't need to include another one and sacrifice such a versatile creature like the Goose for it.
Would it be accurate to say that you want to promote cards typically played for their role in an archetype (Reanimator, Lands, Flicker, ...) to function also as the cards played within more generic theatres (Aggro, Midrange, Control)? This you achieve by cutting cards that are catering mainly to theatres, which makes cards from archetypes the next best alternatives.
The two cards you mentioned function mainly as white Aggro beaters, so essentially you'd be nerfing your white aggro suite by cutting those and have people resort to archetype beaters (like Anafenza). This is an interesting idea, but I think you might need to do the same thing for control-finishers and midrange generic value spells. I.e. something like Griselbrand or Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite would need to be your control Finisher instead of the more generic Torrential Gearhulk. Likewise, instead of using goodstuff cards like maybe Questing Beast, you'd need to play Vengevine or whatever suitably caters your archetypes.
I hope I understood your endeavour. If I didn't, I'd be happy to see an in depth explanation of your thinking.
My knee-jerk reaction would be to say that at the moment both Vanguard and Aspirant are uncuttable Aggro beaters and are fantastic, but that is in the framework of simply havin the strongest aggro creatures available.
Since you mentioned it, how have Tainted Pact and Field of the Dead worked for you? I'm very interested in both cards but they always felt a little too hard to make work.
Regarding the Mana Dork discussion, I think you are right concerning 2 CMC Dorks, allowing only premium 2 CMC dorks to exist. I would consider Sylvan Caryatid and Lotus Cobra (in a very loose manner) to count as premium, and at my size (about 540), I don't need to stock up with the Utopia Sprawl versions. In short, a 2 CMC mana dork needs to ramp more than 1 or provide rainbow fixing (here Sakura-Tribe Elder is an outlier - I still like it for all the small interactions though).
Also thank you for the good discussions everywhere on this forum and for your innovations!
I don't support Storm, but I'm curious whether you'd consider it similar since it is also a big setup card for a Combo Deck.
Pointing discard at my opponent on turn 5 is rarely what I want to do, and I'm not even guaranteed the card is doing anything at all, since my opponent could already be in topdeck mode or have just 1 card in hand.
It feels like an Armageddon, in that it essentially enhances the importance of the current boardstate, breaking symmetry by having a better boardstate or inherent recovery. But it just seems way worse at doing this. If I have a Crucible out for example, I'd rather resolve Armageddon than this, which is already one Mana cheaper.
Agonizing Remorse and Divest are the two I'd play next. Remorse over Divest in unpowered and vice-versa if in powered.
1. Adjust the powerlevel of my Cube to be able to cater a certain archetype - I did this for the Lands-deck, Dark Depths and the Persist Combo. I love those archetypes and thus have possibly suboptimal cards in my cube (Thespian's Stage, Crop Rotation or The Gitrog Monster).
2. Wait until enough fitting pieces are printed - This kind of goes into the same direction as both the Polymorph and the Persist Deck. Both were possible to support, but only if you were willing to go really deep on weird cards. At some point however the necessary number of cards existed (Transmogrify, Lukka, Coppercoat Outcast, Renata, Called to the Hunt, Grumgully, the Generous were a few of the necessary printings) such that you didn't need to litter your Cube with the nichest of cards.
Regarding Discard effects I feel the same way as you do. I'd really like to have more, but the options out there at the time really don't cut it for me, and so I simply wait for new stuff to be printed.
I think we had a discussion that went into that direction in the Gilded Goose Thread. I've had the same feeling towards Dorks that tap for G and I feel Gilded Goosr to be the superior card. Anyways, off topic.
Will take a closer look at my persist enablers and might just swap Grumgully, Good-Fortune Unicorn or Renata for Arlinn.
Regarding Earthquake - I've actually been killed a lot by my Aggro opponent playing Earthquake for 7 when I considered myself safe in the late game, so I like to keep it in as a weird form of reach and also a very useful, albeit conditional sweeper.
As a Mana dork, it might not be needed, but I like the card for everything else it brings to the table. When the time comes and another Hierarch is printed, I'm not sure whether I'll cut Gilded Goose or something like Llanowar Elves. I'm already at the number of 1CMC Mana Dorks I like, so I don't need to include another one and sacrifice such a versatile creature like the Goose for it.