I see people talk about how there are too many dead cards in 1 on 1, and this really help alleviate that issue. When there are cards that neither player want, they just end up getting naturally burned, so I find that you don't need to change your cube really at all for this. Also I think the power level in pancake drafting is generally more comparable to a proper draft than something like rochester.
Thanks, we haven't tested this one and I will try to introduce it. She tends to prefer the drafts that are quick, but she also like hate drafting so I'm hopeful.
We have also tried grid drafting, but I didn't like that we had perfect information.
Edit: I didn't like that she had perfect information. It was a bit too easy for her to hate draft :-P
I know Leelue often draft with 2 players, and I'm curious to hear which decisions others have made to improve the experience for 2 players.
My wife and I started with peasant cube about 3 (4?) years ago. We started with a 360 modern border peasant cube called "draft all stars". We used Winchester draft and had fun, but 2 colour decks never came together. With 60 guild cards, 20 dual lands and 10 trilands, there were too many dead cards.
The cube has developed over time, and what we did were the following steps:
1. Cut guild section to 40 cards, then 20 cards.
2. Implement the hybrid system
3. Cut dual lands
4. Reduce the cubesize to 180, cut trilands and reduce guild section to 10.
5. Implement new drafting system. This allowed us to increase cube size to 200 by including trilands and 10 guild cards for signaling.
We also changed our drafting method to improve the decks we end up with. Each player gets 15 packs of 5 cards. Pick 1 card, pass the remaining 4. Then pick 1 of the 4 and discard the remaining. Each player also gets 5 tokens that can be used to pick another card from a pack. We end up with a draft pool of 35 cards. This way we use 150 of the 200 cards in the cube, increasing the probability that a strategy will come together.
This problem of the dead cards is especially exacerbated for a guy like me who is most likely not drafting with a full table, but one other person.
This is why I also like them. I draft with one other person, and dead cards was an issue. I recently added the trilans as I wanted a bit more fixing than the 10 rainbow/vivid lands I allready had. The trilands will be replaced and I guess I will add 1 card in each colour.
Gingerbrute seems like the most questionable of that bunch. It's compares poorly to slither blade (if blue aggro is a thing for you) unless I'm missing something. And unless something has changed I am pretty sure I like slitherblade more than basically anyone and I still don't run it.
I don't support blue aggro. Having a colourless 1 drop helps support aggro in the other colours, especially WRB. Since I have a small cube (200 cards), it is difficult to find room for a lot of 1 drops. I agree that it is not the most interesting card, and suggestions for swaps are welcome.
I'm looking forward to see which updates you will make. Your cube is one that I often look to for inspiration.
Good to know, because I didn't really gave that wall of text enough thought.
This was why I didn't included it, since I'm usually drafting with my wife. Other cards might have more lines of text, but the amount of conditions might be a bit overwhelming. Also, I'm not sure if I would like to replace shriekmaw or vampire sovereign for it.
Hi Leelue, the cards I have included in my 2 player peasant cube (200 cards) and are quite certain will stay:
Anax, Hardened in the Forge
Chainweb Arachnir
Order of Midnight
Gingerbrute
These are perfect for my 2 player peasant cube (200 cards). As FunkyDragon points out they fit into 40 % of 2 colour decks as opposed to 30 % for trilands.
I considered doing something similar after buying into pioneer. I had cards for red aggressive decks, but couldn't decide on which splash I wanted to play. I considered splitting the cards into two identical (sealed) piles, and each player would have to build a 30 card deck with max 2 duplicates in the list. The possible lists would include mono red, izzet prowess, boros burn and attarka red. I also considered making two sealed pools with my abzan cards.
Perhaps it is not neccessary to include all 5 colours? Some ideas if you want to include a lot of multicolour cards:
1. Pick only 3 colours. This will leave you room for more gold cards
2. Focus on 1 or 2 colours with options to splash for powerful gold cards.
I have a two player peasant cube with 180 cards. To make 2 colour decks viable, I had to cut down to 1 gold card pr. guild and only include lands that can fix for any colour. I guess fetch+shock lands will be an option when including rares.
Treasure keeper's trigger is bloodbraid elf's cascade, but it's on a much much slower creature. If it's suitable for anything, it would have to be for some sort of value deck. But what kind of "cascades" would be worth it in a value deck? If BBE hits lightning bolt, it's comparable to flametongue kavu, but if this guy hits lightning bolt he's comparable to mudbutton torchrunner. If BBE hits a 2 drop, it applies pressure on a board where a 2 drop may still be good. If this guy hits a 2 drop, it's like... Seed guardian? Except it doesn't have 4 toughness, or reach, or the upside of making a 5/5.
So I think it's not worth running.
Squirrely is crazy, but is trying hard to support some deep graveyard strategy by looking at the bottom of the barrel. If you could get it going reliably, a 3/3 haste that pumps the team is ridiculous, but that probably isn't average case scenario.
Pyrewild shaman is a card that I have been trying a little, but I think I need to take it out. It costs too much for conditional reach.
There are too many great selesnya cards to justify using Wayfaring temple. Scion of the wild just isn't really playable and this guy requires you to be way ahead to actually get better than the monogreen card.
Supreme will is always a card that works. Worth a filler spot.
Gaea's anthem is pretty good, but it is second fiddle to curse of predation. The curse is OP and has been banned by a couple of people, btw.
Skywhaler's shot
You know, this is almost murder. It would probably be a fine card, except white has like 89 Oblivion rings to take its place.
Thank you Leelue for your description. I will probably keep Gaea's Anthem and Supreme Will, the rest will be replaced.
Squirrely is crazy, but is trying hard to support some deep graveyard strategy by looking at the bottom of the barrel. If you could get it going reliably, a 3/3 haste that pumps the team is ridiculous, but that probably isn't average case scenario.
Centaur Chieftain is indeed one of the cards I'm trying as part of some sort of aggro graveyard deck. If you make sure you have enough burst self-mill (think dredge, Grisly Salvage/Commune with the Gods/etc, even Faithless Looting/Careful Study), getting to threshold is not that hard to do. Chieftain is not a card that you play on curve and expect it to be kicked most of the time AND have creatures to pump. Though, having your self-mill/dredge on creatures (Satyr Wayfinder, Glowspore Shaman) makes it a little more likely. But hey, some decks are fine with simply curving out with a 3/3 haste guy on turn 4.
Having said all that, Centaur Chieftain is not great and is not a card I'd recommend to most people. It's not bottom of the barrel, simply because the card has a pretty high ceiling, but it's definitely not top either. In the end, it all comes down to specific cube set-up and cube philosophy. I prefer having some weird pay-off cards as 'finishers', and go out of my way to support them, but I do recognize that some of my pay-off cards are more funky than good.
Thanks Squirrely, I will find a replacement for now. I remember playing with this card back in Torment, so if threshold often comes up during play it might find its way back!
This is my first post here, so thank you Bacchus for creating and maintaing this thread and to everyone who has contributed! It has been very useful for creating my own peasant cube.
I went through the Excel version and compared to my own cube, and there were 29 cards rated as no reason to cube. I went through the "No reasons to cube" lists, but there were a few I couldn't find. I also searched the thread, and there seems that some of them have been rated:
Treasure Keeper - Suggested a rating of 1 or 2 in this thread.
Thanks, we haven't tested this one and I will try to introduce it. She tends to prefer the drafts that are quick, but she also like hate drafting so I'm hopeful.
We have also tried grid drafting, but I didn't like that we had perfect information.
Edit: I didn't like that she had perfect information. It was a bit too easy for her to hate draft :-P
We also did quite a bit of sealed in the beginning, but both of us prefer to draft. Drafting also makes it easier to create a more streamlined deck.
My wife and I started with peasant cube about 3 (4?) years ago. We started with a 360 modern border peasant cube called "draft all stars". We used Winchester draft and had fun, but 2 colour decks never came together. With 60 guild cards, 20 dual lands and 10 trilands, there were too many dead cards.
The cube has developed over time, and what we did were the following steps:
1. Cut guild section to 40 cards, then 20 cards.
2. Implement the hybrid system
3. Cut dual lands
4. Reduce the cubesize to 180, cut trilands and reduce guild section to 10.
5. Implement new drafting system. This allowed us to increase cube size to 200 by including trilands and 10 guild cards for signaling.
We also changed our drafting method to improve the decks we end up with. Each player gets 15 packs of 5 cards. Pick 1 card, pass the remaining 4. Then pick 1 of the 4 and discard the remaining. Each player also gets 5 tokens that can be used to pick another card from a pack. We end up with a draft pool of 35 cards. This way we use 150 of the 200 cards in the cube, increasing the probability that a strategy will come together.
https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/5edbb58ed65648101a043535
This is why I also like them. I draft with one other person, and dead cards was an issue. I recently added the trilans as I wanted a bit more fixing than the 10 rainbow/vivid lands I allready had. The trilands will be replaced and I guess I will add 1 card in each colour.
Sorry, this was directed at Leelue's cube list.
Rhox Veteran
Ephemerate
Watcher for Tomorrow
Orcish Hellraiser
Mother Bear
Trumpeting Herd
Soulherder
Rotwidow Pack
Rhox Veteran and Soulherder might be my favorites.
I don't support blue aggro. Having a colourless 1 drop helps support aggro in the other colours, especially WRB. Since I have a small cube (200 cards), it is difficult to find room for a lot of 1 drops. I agree that it is not the most interesting card, and suggestions for swaps are welcome.
I'm looking forward to see which updates you will make. Your cube is one that I often look to for inspiration.
This was why I didn't included it, since I'm usually drafting with my wife. Other cards might have more lines of text, but the amount of conditions might be a bit overwhelming. Also, I'm not sure if I would like to replace shriekmaw or vampire sovereign for it.
Anax, Hardened in the Forge
Chainweb Arachnir
Order of Midnight
Gingerbrute
My 2 player peasant cube
Edit: Fixed link
Perhaps it is not neccessary to include all 5 colours? Some ideas if you want to include a lot of multicolour cards:
1. Pick only 3 colours. This will leave you room for more gold cards
2. Focus on 1 or 2 colours with options to splash for powerful gold cards.
I have a two player peasant cube with 180 cards. To make 2 colour decks viable, I had to cut down to 1 gold card pr. guild and only include lands that can fix for any colour. I guess fetch+shock lands will be an option when including rares.
I am tempted to test the new trioms and the Amonkhet cycle lands. This gives each color pair 2 lands that fix their color.
Thank you Leelue for your description. I will probably keep Gaea's Anthem and Supreme Will, the rest will be replaced.
Thanks Squirrely, I will find a replacement for now. I remember playing with this card back in Torment, so if threshold often comes up during play it might find its way back!
I went through the Excel version and compared to my own cube, and there were 29 cards rated as no reason to cube. I went through the "No reasons to cube" lists, but there were a few I couldn't find. I also searched the thread, and there seems that some of them have been rated:
Curious what you think of the cards above.