Aether Chaser > Dragonkin Berserker, although I think there's plenty of aggressive red 2-cmc creatures that are better than both of them.
Nightmare Shepherd > Eradicator Valkyrie. Shepherd doesn't die to bolt, and that's a big deal.
Behold the Multiverse > Thirst for Knowledge (allows you to keep riskier hands, Thirst is a slow discard outlet anyways).
Interesting, I think I’m going to go with the opposite on all three! But to be fair it’s all in theory since I haven’t tested the new cards.
Dragonkin upside of making a 5/5 flyer for 5 mana is significant. If Aether Chaser does prove to be better because the dragon never gets created then I’m still not going to run Aether Chaser, so at minimum I think Dargonkin is a great test case.
The lifelink on Valkyrie is a huge deal. Gisela overperformed for us and was often a “kill this now or you’re going to lose quickly” 4-drop. Something interesting is that depending on what bolts and walkers you play the number of targeted kill or bounce effects on walkers is similar to the number of 3-damage removal spells in the Cube. Also Nightmare Shepherd was not good enough for us, so this is another case of might as well test Valkyrie because the alternative given isn’t the best Cube card anyway.
We love Thirst for its archetype flexibility. While Behold does allow for navigating a riskier hand in terms of mana screw, Thirst is actually better in most mana flood hands, and I’d say it’s all-around more powerful in other situations.
We’ve supported snow from the beginning, even when we only had one snow card in the Cube. Faceless Haven is interesting to us as a mono red and mono white aggro support land. The 1/3 for 1U that animates snow lands seems solid.
This card is sweet. I have no idea if it’s good enough because it does so many different things which makes it tough to evaluate against other Cube options... But at minimum it’s a card I’d draft for a blue midrange deck if I saw it mid-pack.
Got a rulings question about magmatic channeler... If you have no cards in hand can you still use her ability? Or do you have to have a card to discard? Thanks.
Discarding one card is part of the cost, so you can only use the ability if you have a card to discard. If discarding were instead part of the resolution of the spell then it would work without discarding if you had no cards in hand.
Maybe I'm dumb, but I had to read this card several times to fully understand it. Some cards in this set are incredibly complicated... I would consider testing if the pump were not only for legendary creatures.
I’m on the fence with this one. My gut feeling is that it’s missing something to make it good, perhaps being smaller than a 5/4 in exchange for costing 2RR and foretelling for 1RR. It’s on the watchlist though, as the foretell ability might play a little better than I’m envisioning, since you’re often not curving perfectly from 1 to 4 and can sometimes exile it on turn 2 or 3 with certain hands.
Even though Azorius is arguably the most competitive guild, this planeswalker seems incredible to me. It’s an interesting combo of powerful upside with flexibility. A three mana planeswalker that nukes something and sticks around for 2+ more cards of potential value is about the best you can ask for in a Walker. Add the ability for the aforementioned three mana play to also be a lategame Sphinx’s Rev effect is incredible. The +1 is gravy because while I don’t predict it being activated often, knowing Cube it will probably be relevant in more scenarios than it seems.
Note the shard synergy with Archon of Angel’s Grace constellation effect is sweet!
How often will it nuke something? It needs to be a tapped creature with 2 or less toughness
Good question - I think how often the turn 3 upside happens will somewhat determine how good this is. Our cube is pretty aggressive with max mana elves, and I envision this being relevant a lot, but we’ll see.
Even though Azorius is arguably the most competitive guild, this planeswalker seems incredible to me. It’s an interesting combo of powerful upside with flexibility. A three mana planeswalker that nukes something and sticks around for 2+ more cards of potential value is about the best you can ask for in a Walker. Add the ability for the aforementioned three mana play to also be a lategame Sphinx’s Rev effect is incredible. The +1 is gravy because while I don’t predict it being activated often, knowing Cube it will probably be relevant in more scenarios than it seems.
Note the shard synergy with Archon of Angel’s Grace constellation effect is sweet!
We’re higher on Sword of Body and Mind than many Cubers seem to be (or at least judging by streamer commentary when I watch Cube streams). We find the green protection to be quite good for pushing through a trigger, and getting a 2/2 plays perfectly with the sword inevitability. I think the time for Sword of Light and Shadow has passed though. It takes too much setup, and the lifegain half of the effect is a bit of a throwaway.
Liliana of the Veil is a top black pick in our Cube.
Acidic Slime is a bit clunky, but we still like it for the synergies. It’s a highly competitive slot, so I’m not surprised when I don’t see it in some lists, but it’s a great synergy card with the green creature tutor engines and works well with some black and white cards.
We actually like Serra a lot and kept her over this court. She’s more than a single angel creature because she threatens to make more quickly. Sort of like a delayed 4-mana broodmate dragon plus benefits with other flyers.
Interesting, I think I’m going to go with the opposite on all three! But to be fair it’s all in theory since I haven’t tested the new cards.
Dragonkin upside of making a 5/5 flyer for 5 mana is significant. If Aether Chaser does prove to be better because the dragon never gets created then I’m still not going to run Aether Chaser, so at minimum I think Dargonkin is a great test case.
The lifelink on Valkyrie is a huge deal. Gisela overperformed for us and was often a “kill this now or you’re going to lose quickly” 4-drop. Something interesting is that depending on what bolts and walkers you play the number of targeted kill or bounce effects on walkers is similar to the number of 3-damage removal spells in the Cube. Also Nightmare Shepherd was not good enough for us, so this is another case of might as well test Valkyrie because the alternative given isn’t the best Cube card anyway.
We love Thirst for its archetype flexibility. While Behold does allow for navigating a riskier hand in terms of mana screw, Thirst is actually better in most mana flood hands, and I’d say it’s all-around more powerful in other situations.
Discarding one card is part of the cost, so you can only use the ability if you have a card to discard. If discarding were instead part of the resolution of the spell then it would work without discarding if you had no cards in hand.
Good question - I think how often the turn 3 upside happens will somewhat determine how good this is. Our cube is pretty aggressive with max mana elves, and I envision this being relevant a lot, but we’ll see.
Note the shard synergy with Archon of Angel’s Grace constellation effect is sweet!
Liliana of the Veil is a top black pick in our Cube.
Acidic Slime is a bit clunky, but we still like it for the synergies. It’s a highly competitive slot, so I’m not surprised when I don’t see it in some lists, but it’s a great synergy card with the green creature tutor engines and works well with some black and white cards.