Check the Wizards visual spoiler, that's been entered in error.
As far as Perilous Research goes, it might be better to just have a Divination in a flooded situation so you can save those islands for Capsize or whatnot, even though instant is great. But what do you cut at 360? I don't like it so much without damage on the stack.
Updated my cube list after two years... woah, what a mission!! Thanks for all the great stuff on these boards, it's been really useful.
Basking Rootwalla could perhaps be compared to Darkthicket Wolf. He's not worth the mana if you're holding a two drop, but if you can drop him on turn one it's still keeping to your gameplan to attack on turn two for three, even if you miss your curve. I like him for patching up that hole in the early game but he's the weakest green one drop and I would take Pouncing Jaguar first.
On that note, I find Wild Dogs prone to backfiring with all the burn that runs around.
G'day g'day! First post on MTGS in awhile. Huge update - the entire list completely overhauled after no updates for two years. Have a good look in the main post and tell me what you think. Cheers!
White removal is very dense and it's hard to split Pacifism/Temporal Isolation/Journey to Nowhere, but they're all very quality. Faith's Fetters is so high quality for the extra mana in tempo races, but I think Arrest can often be overpriced when compared to the two mana removal (though still excellent).
Guardian, Cenn's, and Troubled Healer all end games against many decks single-handedly. Troubled Healer is ineffective against black or blue based decks, but red and green run into big problems when you shut off all of their removal. In contrast, Cenn's is best against grinding control as it is impossible to discard or permanently shut off.
Role-filling aggro creatures like Soltari Trooper and Steppe Lynx do make white tick, and it's a mistake to ignore them for splashier cards. Deftblade Elite trades up, and Kitsune Blademaster is usually unblockable 2 damage each turn or a 3/3 First Strike on defense.
So, long time since I've posted here! I've kept tinkering with my cube in my spare time, but no time to do anything much with it or update my thread unfortunately. Did get through a draft today though, matchups were 2-0 against Naya Zoo and 2-1 against UBr Control.
Match 2 vs. Dimir Control splash Red.
Match two starts off terrifying. On the play, my opponent lands Hymn to Tourach before my second turn, then Chittering Rats on his third. Pouncing Jaguar trades with the Rats only to have them be brought back by Cadaver Imp, which blocks my Stormfront Pegasus all day and leaves me with a crippled hand when I meet Rats again. It took a while for him to finish me off but I had essentially lost here.
Game two he has lots of card draw and finds both Windrider Eel and Shimmering Glasskite. He hits landfall every turn but I somehow stabilise with Cenn's Enlistment and Faith's Fetters to buy time. He's forced into a bad trade to get rid of Glasskite, and I muscle through on a whisker. He was a mountain off his splashed Fireball for the win!
Overall very happy with my draft and it was pretty fun for everyone. Windrider Eel again was good for us. Pouncing Jaguar is still awesome and trades up. Mold Shambler may be pushing overpriced and is no bomb. Trusted Forcemage is good but requires tight play or it really opens you up to blow outs!
Havengul Fengraf
Land
T: Add 1 to your mana pool. 2 or 3, T, sacrifice Havengul Fengraf : Return a creature card at random from your graveyard to your hand.
This seems pretty good. There's not much of a benchmark to evaluate against, but this is the most complex land we've ever had at a common slot, so that's at least something! It's an instant speed late-game Gravedigger effect with the downside of the late-game being where you're more likely to get something you don't want since presumably your bin is fuller. Taps for mana in the meantime, no CIPT, and actually seems really good to me.
I'm going to have to disagree here and say that Tragic Slip should be top-class removal. Easily one of the top 5 removal spells in black for me is Vendetta, due to the 1 mana cost. As an instant speed spell that doesn't require you to hold any more than 1 mana up in anticipation for its trigger, Morbid should be fairly simple to activate. Cheap removal like this is perfect for playing it and then dropping a threat in one turn, which is exactly what you have to do to capitalise on the tempo swing.
Forge Devil is nothing spectacular, but it's probably better than Mogg Fanatic in some situations. Will probably make it in until I cut down.
Gather the Townsfolk may be playable, but I'm still on the fence here. The 5 life or less trigger is a bit ridiculous to me - by that point any creatures with evasion of any kind or even most burn will kill you on your opponent's next untap. Lots of 1/1s usually won't guarantee you much safety at five life unless you're against green with nonevasive beaters, and most green decks splash for red burn or blue fliers anyway. May be cubeable at the very lower end, but by no means a high pick.
Loyal Cathar seems excellent and a perfect aggressive card as it needs to be answered twice. I agree that it's worse than several other options, but this is still very solid and not something I would want to face with a control deck. Paired with something like Bonesplitter, it becomes a must-answer too. White based aggro really does want its curve centred on two as much as possible, and a surplus of these solid beaters only makes those decks better. I'd probably cut from the 3CMC range first. Things like Thermal/Nightwind Glider or Shu Cavalry are usually going to be worse.
Headless Skaab has a really nice toughness to shore up aggro, and this might be the perfect sort of thing to slow those aggro rushes. This is of course provided you can bin a creature by turn 3 or 4, but hopefully you can throw something like Pestermite in the way (or even better, use a spellshaper like Waterfront Bouncer).
Faithless Looting is a bit of a gimmie. Just perfect for a colour that dies to drawing too many of its lands.
Everything else is probably unplayable, although I do kind of like Executioner's Hood as a mediocre equipment, though I don't really know what you play this in. Hunger of the Howlpack might be better than Giant Growth too, but Growth has never been a top green spell and you lose a lot of combat tricks that turn it into removal with Hunger.
I think Flame Jab might be better than Geistflame in some instances. Geistflame is just a hornet sting until you hit four mana, and hits twice while Jab has the ability to be played more over the course of the game with a low curve. Having it sitting in your graveyard as reuseable at any time just seems really good, especially as it gives you more ways to burn through your excess lands.
Fireblast: This really isn't usually removal, but rather a way of starting your opponent at 16 life. Generally speaking it should be the last spell you play, saccing lands for the game. Keep in mind that T1.5 burn decks aren't the only ones which run this - Zoo has too, and with cards like Steppe Lynx, Kird Ape, Wild Nacatl, Wild Dogs/Pouncing Jaguar and etc regularly cubed, this kind of gameplan can be replicated in Pauper cube with some success. Aggro decks to require this to give them reach should the ground get clogged.
Aftershock: This is best in a G/R deck. It deals with larger creatures that burn can't hit and is much more reasonable with green ramp. Overpriced in most other decks though, bu there's not much to fill this niche.
Rift Bolt: I certainly don't play this the way I would in Burn. The idea with that deck is to drop this on turn one, but this functions as removal you can slot into your curve nicely with something like a two-drop + this on turn three. 3 damage for one mana to a creature still remains good, even if the slower speed can be annoying. If it's late-game, you can just hardcast. Like you say that's not why you cube it, but it does mean that if you're not getting value out of its lowered cost you'll not have to worry about the suspend kicking in slowly.
Elephant Ambush: You're right that it's slow, but against a control deck it's also golden. Flashback makes it very hard to counter profitably if you play against a blue-based or black-based deck which plans on grinding you down. I would usually side this out against an aggro race. It's not a top pick in green though, and since your cube is quite small I think it could reasonably be cut.
Daze: I'm not sure how this can be considered worse than Force Spike. Bouncing a land might be a tempo loss, but this shouldn't ever be more of a tempo hit than your opponent's creature resolving. Daze requires no mana to be held up and is thus extremely difficult to see coming, and provides an excellent answer to aggressive creatures dropped between turns 1 to 3, which is when it is used in Legacy too. I'm not sure that it's true to say every deck wants their curve to go up to 5+ lands or be out of the game - cards like Wild Mongrel provide excellent reasons to be curving out early with lowered curves in green (sometimes + white or red) aggro decks.
Viridian Longbow: I definitely see where you're coming from. Its expensive equip cost is frustrating, and there are usually better things to be playing, like dedicated removal or a proper body. I've sided it in before but would usually not maindeck it. This is probably a result of the lack of that many high quality artifacts in Pauper cubes. Seems cuttable to me at 360.
Thanks for going through these; I reckon it can definitely be too easy to get caught up with how good cards are supposed to be instead of actually are.
Haha awesome! Not sure how that course works, but it definitely sounds right up my alley. I'm doing HSFY at Otago unfortunately. =/ It was a toss up, but the couch burning sealed the deal really.
At any rate my family has a property up in Akl so I should end up there (as the muscle for chasing rent) at some point, so it'd be awesome to catch up and get a shot at drafting your cube then (although who knows when, but I'll give you a heads-up!) at a local shop or something.
Travel Prep - the card is better seen as a glorious anthem than a pump spell (in GW it's better than anthem. Not even kidding) as it allows your dudes to swing unhindered more than it deals damage directly or creates card advantage. Much better than sigil blessing, not close.
Nevertheless, travel prep is almost as amazing when they don't have an answer (and you have 2+ dudes)
Yeah, it's probably because I'm not used to seeing that many creatures on the board due to my oppressive and excruciating 4-creature Landstill-like decks. But seriously though, I'm probably being too rough on Prep since any match-up where you're having major trouble sticking creatures is not going to be all that great with Cloak either (and maybe even better with Preps as it forces you to answer more threats).
Eg. Dedicated Matyr looks like a potential option until you remember Matyr of Sands (though neither are actually good).
Sounds good. I actually think Martyr of Sands is pretty good, but I don't see decks which can go that heavy white being drafted often/ever. Would you guys say around 3-4 cards is where it gets playable (read: playable over anything else usually cubed in W)? I think it's somewhere around there.
@Izor:
Prohibit is decent, but I'm not sure what you'd cut from blue for this as there's already plenty of very solid counterspell options. When talking about soft counters, it doesn't beat out Leak, Condescend, Miscalculation, Daze... maybe Force Spike? I think you can argue that, deck-dependent.
Skulking Ghost is awful, but gets better if you run less tappers and pingers (although why would you not cube with these?). Keep in mind creatures like Spined Thopter and Fledgling Djinn exist though, so an evasive 2/1 isn't anything to bend over backwards for. This looks especially horrible when contrasted with Djinn.
Cenn's Enlistment can't be considered a traditional creature due to the fact that it's essentially uncounterable. There's enough good blue control cards to cube that facilitate decks which completely roll to this card with good backup (and less so to counterable, but not killable, Sprout Swarm). Icatian Crier doesn't fill this role as above.
Dash Hopes is pretty bad, but I'm still not sold that Blazing Salvo is rubbish. Provided you can aim it at a decent creature, you should get a Lava Axe for one mana, which seems a steal for just R. Say it's aimed at something like a Stormfront Pegasus or other generic evasive beater of which there are many. Usually the right call is to take the damage and keep your board presence. It's instant speed too, so I guess there's that.
Wei Ambush Force is pretty good, but has the usual problems with pingers (not that this is any less common than most of the other black 2 drops). I do prefer Child of Night, because if you get an opening through removal to swing in once or twice, the lifelink can become seriously problematic in a tempo race.
The problem I have with Rancid Earth is that it's in a colour with lots of creatures that will fall to a 1-damage ping, and the Threshold is non-optional. This given that the kinds of decks you want it in are probably tempo-based and contain some of the relevant vulnerable two-drops. At any rate, Choking Sands is still fine (though I'd rather have removal like Hideous End at this part of my curve).
There actually aren't that many excellent artifacts in Pauper Cube, but Drooling Ogre is still kinda bad. The thing is that if you drop it early when it'll be decent, they have all game to find an artifact and send it back your way. Spined Thopter and Porcelain Legionnaire's ability to be played in literally anything also makes me cautious. Red aggro is kinda trashy. =/ I'm having a bit of trouble with red to be honest, as the majority of the playable cards don't lend themselves to a reliable strategy as a main colour. It's fine as support for burn, but splashing either white or black usually offers up plenty of similarly good removal with good creatures to go along with it. Unless we try something weird like Mogg Conscripts, Jackal Pup, Mogg Flunkies... (though I doubt that would work out at all well).
For GY hate, try things like Faerie Trickery or Syncopate. Dedicated cards are going to wheel every time, even those which replace themselves like Relic.
Granger is not fantastic because, as Lanxal says, the ramp it provides is usually too late to be relevant. Additionally I would rather have removal (i.e. Shock) than a Rampant Growth in most games, but Shock is not cubed with as it has been marginally improved upon far more times than Rampant Growth has. I don't even use Growth, myself.
While we're on obscure cards:
Peer Through Depths seems like a better Impulse for control (which is the deck you want Impulse in anyway), and a > 1 in 10 shot (assuming 51 cards in library by turn two) of hitting your Capsize or Sprout Swarm seems good. Even digging for your counter to back up a key play or stall you for time is alright. Does notably miss Flood, and key finishing creatures.
Flame Jab looks good, and I just really love Retrace. Who's tested it? I think some aggro G or B decks would be pretty cold to this.
Sandstorm: Green doesn't get effects like this often/ever, and for a single G it might just be good tech against Cenn's or the 2/1 evasive creatures it can't stop. I know I for one would never see this coming. If there's a colour that's going to get into the red zone and capitalize on this, it's green.
Runes of Protection: Most notably Rune of Protection: Red, and maybe White or Green. They deal with evasion like Shadow and are much better than the COPs as they can be maindecked and cycled away. This might be considered a bit too 'unfun,' but I mainly play Legacy so I really have no idea. =/ They completely shut whole decks down though. The lack of consistency seems fine if you board it out game 2 and cycle game 1 if you have to.
G'day guys Sorry about falling off the planet. I've been prepping to head into pre-med at uni next year, but still have my cube and hope to update it properly soon (before DA, argh). Plan on cutting right down. People in general just want packs to be even stronger, and the problem I always have is the amount of red burn exceeds the amount of red people are actually able to play - I mean, things like Fireblast or Searing Blaze shouldn't be last picked, but when one person already has Capsize, one has Pestilence and the other has Sprout Swarm (or equivalent commitment) =/. The thing to keep in mind is that below 400 you are definitely going to lock certain decks out of being buildable, so the tension between things like Dauthi Slayer and Crypt Rats means certain colours need to either pull one way or be bad at two things. In theory.
As far as Qasali Pridemage and Armadillo Cloak: I did test Preps and found it really good as you have, but Cloak wins you the game if not answered and Pridemage is usually a Disenchant bear and a situational pump spell. Travel Preps relies on a good board already to gain an advantage, but Pridemage answers bomb enchantments or ench-based removal, and gives you board presence alone (while swinging as a 3/3). It's not so bad thanks to the Flashback, but Preps a little bit 'win-more.'
Is Travel Preparations better than Sigil Blessing? I think they're fairly different cards. The idea with Blessing is to blow your opponent out after blockers are declared, but Travel Preparations offers no such surprises. By turn five onwards you're looking at boards which might allow you to cast + flashback into a strong position, and that's probably a little earlier than Blessing which has the potential to be more impactful (and 2-for-1), but requires a more specific board to work.
Love the idea of reviewing all the cards Rubin - maybe you could do a series of 'Vintage' set reviews and release them set by set?
I don't play Stax so I can't comment on most of this, but a few things jump out to me.
The sideboard definitely needs work (Weatherseed Faeries?) but you probably know that. Also, 6x Seat of the Synod? Are those meant to be Island?
Serendib Efreet is a pretty subpar finisher, and you'd be better with something like Vendilion Clique there, even if it does fill a different role. There's other options for that below.
Oops! I don't see Dross Golem or Pith Driller in your list, both are better IMO (though Golem isn't amazing). Vault Skirge is another card I'd consider, but it'd mess with your curve changing them directly (in a good way, IMO).
I don't mind the Dross Golem, Vault Skirge or Pith Driller suggestions, but I'd say I can find something to take this slot from Innistrad which is probably better than both.
Manalith and the Hulk are pretty bad cards, but the other three are at least pretty decent.
I really don't like Manalith or Phyrexian Hulk much, either. Hulk was being tested as a way to up your playable creature count in something like a long game control deck where the mana cost was irrelevant provided the creature was big. A good example where this would have worked in that draft I reported on in the All Commons Cube thread where I resorted to Gathan Raiders. That said, the majority of decks can't use him, so I'll be cutting him. The difference between Manalith and Darksteel Ingot is pretty insignificant, but it probably doesn't need to be there either since I don't think I need two of this one.
Strider Harness and Armillary Sphere are worse than the last two cards, I think, though the sphere is also pretty good. The harness is not. I've always liked Opaline Bracers, especially.
Sphere is decent enough, but Harness is really good in corner cases and again, less so in the rest. If you have a very top-heavy curve the card is great because it comes down before the majority of your creatures are played, and acts as a pseudo-global haste enabler as you drop a big creature each turn. This was actually working really well with the four and five drops in R, but now we have more decent two drops from Innistrad the curve should be coming down and I don't see this having the same place as before now that the cube should be a little bit quicker. I will be cutting Bracers for a similar reason, but I'll outline that further with the Innistrad cube update. I guess it worked for some other people running it, but it's been consistantly not good enough when I've tested it, unfortunately.
Yeah, I suppose we're looking for different things in the same slot. Pillory is pretty much just support for my beloved WB control deck. With that deck, if they trade 1 for 1 with Pillory it isn't much of a problem as there is plenty of extra removal in the deck normally. Plus, they've probably already got the opportunity to blow up enchantment removal as it's pretty common in the deck, and in white in general. Anyway, the main thing is that the life difference matters a whole bunch in that deck.
Oh right, I see what you mean. That's cool, I can see how that would really work in a deck like that. I never see anyone build anything like that though, so like you say, it's apples and oranges!
Maybe redundancy in conditionless spot removal is better, but there's another thing about unmake - it's annoying to cast (because of the cost). And pretty boring. Though that's hardly a strong argument.
I'd say that within the contexts of cube that's actually a pretty fair argument! Yeah, the cubes are all pretty personalised and if you find a card isn't fun (like people find with Centaur Courser, for example) it seems perfectly reasonable to not include it to me. Personally, I just ignore that sort of thing (which is partly my Spike-ish Legacy streak, I guess...) but I can definitely see what you're talking about.
Also, I'm not even running Rend Flesh at the moment (though this could possibly change) so I really can't justify playing unmake, but pillory is more acceptable as it's pretty different. I do realize that's pretty silly, maybe I'll cheat a bit and add Dega Disciple (I don't have any slots for wedge cards).
Dega Disciple is a decent card, and adding one extra wedge really shouldn't matter too much! I've snuck Thornscape Apprentice in before, too. I do really recommend Rend Flesh though, since it's splashable removal that kills almost everything in the cube at instant speed. Can't go wrong
Thanks for that, was sure it was instant. o_O Regardless I still think it's very cubeable, as we're still lacking instant speed removal in green to compete with (unless you count Provoke, Lace with Moonglove, or Hornet Sting...)
Having unbalanced multicolour quantities will have a bigger effect as the size of your cube decreases, but as this section makes up a small amount of the cards in a cube, this shouldn't have a massive impact. The best thing I can suggest is to try to figure out what strategies frequently appear and do well as legitimate archetypes, and figure out how those are helped/hindered by the changes. Although having equal numbers of cards in each section is a useful (and organised) way of balancing the cube, but due to fluctuations in the actual use of different cards this does not always provide total balance. You may be able to do this in a way that's beneficial t oyour cube, but that also depends on how important the 'equal number of cards' thing is for you.
Check the Wizards visual spoiler, that's been entered in error.
As far as Perilous Research goes, it might be better to just have a Divination in a flooded situation so you can save those islands for Capsize or whatnot, even though instant is great. But what do you cut at 360? I don't like it so much without damage on the stack.
Basking Rootwalla could perhaps be compared to Darkthicket Wolf. He's not worth the mana if you're holding a two drop, but if you can drop him on turn one it's still keeping to your gameplan to attack on turn two for three, even if you miss your curve. I like him for patching up that hole in the early game but he's the weakest green one drop and I would take Pouncing Jaguar first.
On that note, I find Wild Dogs prone to backfiring with all the burn that runs around.
02 Capsize
03 Mulldrifter
04 Foresee
05 Deep Analysis
06 Exclude
07 Narcolepsy
08 Compulsive Research
09 Mana Leak
10 Counterspell
11 Condescend
12 Miscalculation
13 Illusionary Forces
14 Waterfront Bouncer
15 Looter il-Kor
16 Undo
17 Stitched Drake
18 Shimmering Glasskite
19 Muddle the Mixture
20 Preordain
02 Troubled Healer
03 Faith’s Fetters
04 Porcelain Legionnaire
05 Cenn’s Enlistment
06 Oblivion Ring
07 Temporal Isolation
08 Journey to Nowhere
09 Pacifism
10 Seraph of Dawn
11 Noble Templar
12 Kitsune Blademaster
13 Arrest
14 Kor Sanctifiers
15 Kor Hookmaster
16 Soltari Trooper
17 Steppe Lynx
18 Gideon’s Lawkeeper
19 Disenchant
20 Deftblade Elite
White removal is very dense and it's hard to split Pacifism/Temporal Isolation/Journey to Nowhere, but they're all very quality. Faith's Fetters is so high quality for the extra mana in tempo races, but I think Arrest can often be overpriced when compared to the two mana removal (though still excellent).
Guardian, Cenn's, and Troubled Healer all end games against many decks single-handedly. Troubled Healer is ineffective against black or blue based decks, but red and green run into big problems when you shut off all of their removal. In contrast, Cenn's is best against grinding control as it is impossible to discard or permanently shut off.
Role-filling aggro creatures like Soltari Trooper and Steppe Lynx do make white tick, and it's a mistake to ignore them for splashier cards. Deftblade Elite trades up, and Kitsune Blademaster is usually unblockable 2 damage each turn or a 3/3 First Strike on defense.
Disenchant and Kor Sanctifiers are always maindeckable as your catch-all answer to weird problems like Flood or Gravedigger/Tortured Existence, as well as dealing with a large amount of enchantment removal or important artifacts like Porcelain Legionnaire or Bonesplitter.
Match 1 vs. Naya Zoo.
Zoo started crazy with Porcelain Legionnaire meeting Temporal Existance and Stormfront Pegasus meeting Pacifism, but I responded with Wickerbough Elder and Qasali Pridemage to get them back. I get momentum and he doesn't come back.
Game two I gain board control with a Trusted Forcemage and army of Cenn's Enlistment, but he finds Fireslinger to blow me out. I have Serrated Arrows ready to go and respond, but he still has Pyrotechnics and leaves me empty. My hand is still full and Kitsune Blademaster and Spined Thopter are too hard for him to slow.
2-0
Match 2 vs. Dimir Control splash Red.
Match two starts off terrifying. On the play, my opponent lands Hymn to Tourach before my second turn, then Chittering Rats on his third. Pouncing Jaguar trades with the Rats only to have them be brought back by Cadaver Imp, which blocks my Stormfront Pegasus all day and leaves me with a crippled hand when I meet Rats again. It took a while for him to finish me off but I had essentially lost here.
Game two he has lots of card draw and finds both Windrider Eel and Shimmering Glasskite. He hits landfall every turn but I somehow stabilise with Cenn's Enlistment and Faith's Fetters to buy time. He's forced into a bad trade to get rid of Glasskite, and I muscle through on a whisker. He was a mountain off his splashed Fireball for the win!
Game three he has a much slower hand. I resolve turn three Blastoderm off Llanowar Elves into Guardian of the Guildpact, and he can't stop it. Journey to Nowhere answers his Eel and it's soon game.
2-1
So, my list was:
1 Llanowar Elves
1 Pouncing Jaguar
1 Flayer Husk
1 Qasali Pridemage
1 Sakura-Tribe Elder
1 Porcelain Legionnaire
1 Spined Thopter
1 Wall of Roots
1 Stormfront Pegasus
1 Trusted Forcemage
1 Grazing Gladehart
1 Borderland Ranger
1 Kitsune Blademaster
1 Blastoderm
1 Wickerbough Elder
1 Cenn's Enlistment
1 Noble Templar
1 Mold Shambler
Spells
1 Journey to Nowhere
1 Faith's Fetters
1 Serrated Arrows
1 Selesnya Signet
Land
9 Forest
8 Plains
1 Penumbra Spider
1 Wild Leotau
1 Crushing Vines
1 Haunted Fengraf
Overall very happy with my draft and it was pretty fun for everyone. Windrider Eel again was good for us. Pouncing Jaguar is still awesome and trades up. Mold Shambler may be pushing overpriced and is no bomb. Trusted Forcemage is good but requires tight play or it really opens you up to blow outs!
Land
T: Add 1 to your mana pool.
2 or 3, T, sacrifice Havengul Fengraf : Return a creature card at random from your graveyard to your hand.
This seems pretty good. There's not much of a benchmark to evaluate against, but this is the most complex land we've ever had at a common slot, so that's at least something! It's an instant speed late-game Gravedigger effect with the downside of the late-game being where you're more likely to get something you don't want since presumably your bin is fuller. Taps for mana in the meantime, no CIPT, and actually seems really good to me.
Forge Devil is nothing spectacular, but it's probably better than Mogg Fanatic in some situations. Will probably make it in until I cut down.
Gather the Townsfolk may be playable, but I'm still on the fence here. The 5 life or less trigger is a bit ridiculous to me - by that point any creatures with evasion of any kind or even most burn will kill you on your opponent's next untap. Lots of 1/1s usually won't guarantee you much safety at five life unless you're against green with nonevasive beaters, and most green decks splash for red burn or blue fliers anyway. May be cubeable at the very lower end, but by no means a high pick.
Loyal Cathar seems excellent and a perfect aggressive card as it needs to be answered twice. I agree that it's worse than several other options, but this is still very solid and not something I would want to face with a control deck. Paired with something like Bonesplitter, it becomes a must-answer too. White based aggro really does want its curve centred on two as much as possible, and a surplus of these solid beaters only makes those decks better. I'd probably cut from the 3CMC range first. Things like Thermal/Nightwind Glider or Shu Cavalry are usually going to be worse.
Headless Skaab has a really nice toughness to shore up aggro, and this might be the perfect sort of thing to slow those aggro rushes. This is of course provided you can bin a creature by turn 3 or 4, but hopefully you can throw something like Pestermite in the way (or even better, use a spellshaper like Waterfront Bouncer).
Faithless Looting is a bit of a gimmie. Just perfect for a colour that dies to drawing too many of its lands.
Everything else is probably unplayable, although I do kind of like Executioner's Hood as a mediocre equipment, though I don't really know what you play this in. Hunger of the Howlpack might be better than Giant Growth too, but Growth has never been a top green spell and you lose a lot of combat tricks that turn it into removal with Hunger.
I think Flame Jab might be better than Geistflame in some instances. Geistflame is just a hornet sting until you hit four mana, and hits twice while Jab has the ability to be played more over the course of the game with a low curve. Having it sitting in your graveyard as reuseable at any time just seems really good, especially as it gives you more ways to burn through your excess lands.
Fireblast: This really isn't usually removal, but rather a way of starting your opponent at 16 life. Generally speaking it should be the last spell you play, saccing lands for the game. Keep in mind that T1.5 burn decks aren't the only ones which run this - Zoo has too, and with cards like Steppe Lynx, Kird Ape, Wild Nacatl, Wild Dogs/Pouncing Jaguar and etc regularly cubed, this kind of gameplan can be replicated in Pauper cube with some success. Aggro decks to require this to give them reach should the ground get clogged.
Aftershock: This is best in a G/R deck. It deals with larger creatures that burn can't hit and is much more reasonable with green ramp. Overpriced in most other decks though, bu there's not much to fill this niche.
Rift Bolt: I certainly don't play this the way I would in Burn. The idea with that deck is to drop this on turn one, but this functions as removal you can slot into your curve nicely with something like a two-drop + this on turn three. 3 damage for one mana to a creature still remains good, even if the slower speed can be annoying. If it's late-game, you can just hardcast. Like you say that's not why you cube it, but it does mean that if you're not getting value out of its lowered cost you'll not have to worry about the suspend kicking in slowly.
Elephant Ambush: You're right that it's slow, but against a control deck it's also golden. Flashback makes it very hard to counter profitably if you play against a blue-based or black-based deck which plans on grinding you down. I would usually side this out against an aggro race. It's not a top pick in green though, and since your cube is quite small I think it could reasonably be cut.
Daze: I'm not sure how this can be considered worse than Force Spike. Bouncing a land might be a tempo loss, but this shouldn't ever be more of a tempo hit than your opponent's creature resolving. Daze requires no mana to be held up and is thus extremely difficult to see coming, and provides an excellent answer to aggressive creatures dropped between turns 1 to 3, which is when it is used in Legacy too. I'm not sure that it's true to say every deck wants their curve to go up to 5+ lands or be out of the game - cards like Wild Mongrel provide excellent reasons to be curving out early with lowered curves in green (sometimes + white or red) aggro decks.
Viridian Longbow: I definitely see where you're coming from. Its expensive equip cost is frustrating, and there are usually better things to be playing, like dedicated removal or a proper body. I've sided it in before but would usually not maindeck it. This is probably a result of the lack of that many high quality artifacts in Pauper cubes. Seems cuttable to me at 360.
Thanks for going through these; I reckon it can definitely be too easy to get caught up with how good cards are supposed to be instead of actually are.
Haha awesome! Not sure how that course works, but it definitely sounds right up my alley. I'm doing HSFY at Otago unfortunately. =/ It was a toss up, but the couch burning sealed the deal really.
At any rate my family has a property up in Akl so I should end up there (as the muscle for chasing rent) at some point, so it'd be awesome to catch up and get a shot at drafting your cube then (although who knows when, but I'll give you a heads-up!) at a local shop or something.
Cheers, I'll probably swap them.
Yeah, it's probably because I'm not used to seeing that many creatures on the board due to my oppressive and excruciating 4-creature Landstill-like decks.
Sounds good. I actually think Martyr of Sands is pretty good, but I don't see decks which can go that heavy white being drafted often/ever. Would you guys say around 3-4 cards is where it gets playable (read: playable over anything else usually cubed in W)? I think it's somewhere around there.
@Izor:
Prohibit is decent, but I'm not sure what you'd cut from blue for this as there's already plenty of very solid counterspell options. When talking about soft counters, it doesn't beat out Leak, Condescend, Miscalculation, Daze... maybe Force Spike? I think you can argue that, deck-dependent.
Skulking Ghost is awful, but gets better if you run less tappers and pingers (although why would you not cube with these?). Keep in mind creatures like Spined Thopter and Fledgling Djinn exist though, so an evasive 2/1 isn't anything to bend over backwards for. This looks especially horrible when contrasted with Djinn.
Cenn's Enlistment can't be considered a traditional creature due to the fact that it's essentially uncounterable. There's enough good blue control cards to cube that facilitate decks which completely roll to this card with good backup (and less so to counterable, but not killable, Sprout Swarm). Icatian Crier doesn't fill this role as above.
Dash Hopes is pretty bad, but I'm still not sold that Blazing Salvo is rubbish. Provided you can aim it at a decent creature, you should get a Lava Axe for one mana, which seems a steal for just R. Say it's aimed at something like a Stormfront Pegasus or other generic evasive beater of which there are many. Usually the right call is to take the damage and keep your board presence. It's instant speed too, so I guess there's that.
Wei Ambush Force is pretty good, but has the usual problems with pingers (not that this is any less common than most of the other black 2 drops). I do prefer Child of Night, because if you get an opening through removal to swing in once or twice, the lifelink can become seriously problematic in a tempo race.
The problem I have with Rancid Earth is that it's in a colour with lots of creatures that will fall to a 1-damage ping, and the Threshold is non-optional. This given that the kinds of decks you want it in are probably tempo-based and contain some of the relevant vulnerable two-drops. At any rate, Choking Sands is still fine (though I'd rather have removal like Hideous End at this part of my curve).
There actually aren't that many excellent artifacts in Pauper Cube, but Drooling Ogre is still kinda bad. The thing is that if you drop it early when it'll be decent, they have all game to find an artifact and send it back your way. Spined Thopter and Porcelain Legionnaire's ability to be played in literally anything also makes me cautious. Red aggro is kinda trashy. =/ I'm having a bit of trouble with red to be honest, as the majority of the playable cards don't lend themselves to a reliable strategy as a main colour. It's fine as support for burn, but splashing either white or black usually offers up plenty of similarly good removal with good creatures to go along with it. Unless we try something weird like Mogg Conscripts, Jackal Pup, Mogg Flunkies... (though I doubt that would work out at all well).
For GY hate, try things like Faerie Trickery or Syncopate. Dedicated cards are going to wheel every time, even those which replace themselves like Relic.
Granger is not fantastic because, as Lanxal says, the ramp it provides is usually too late to be relevant. Additionally I would rather have removal (i.e. Shock) than a Rampant Growth in most games, but Shock is not cubed with as it has been marginally improved upon far more times than Rampant Growth has. I don't even use Growth, myself.
While we're on obscure cards:
Peer Through Depths seems like a better Impulse for control (which is the deck you want Impulse in anyway), and a > 1 in 10 shot (assuming 51 cards in library by turn two) of hitting your Capsize or Sprout Swarm seems good. Even digging for your counter to back up a key play or stall you for time is alright. Does notably miss Flood, and key finishing creatures.
Flame Jab looks good, and I just really love Retrace. Who's tested it? I think some aggro G or B decks would be pretty cold to this.
Sandstorm: Green doesn't get effects like this often/ever, and for a single G it might just be good tech against Cenn's or the 2/1 evasive creatures it can't stop. I know I for one would never see this coming. If there's a colour that's going to get into the red zone and capitalize on this, it's green.
Runes of Protection: Most notably Rune of Protection: Red, and maybe White or Green. They deal with evasion like Shadow and are much better than the COPs as they can be maindecked and cycled away. This might be considered a bit too 'unfun,' but I mainly play Legacy so I really have no idea. =/ They completely shut whole decks down though. The lack of consistency seems fine if you board it out game 2 and cycle game 1 if you have to.
As far as Qasali Pridemage and Armadillo Cloak: I did test Preps and found it really good as you have, but Cloak wins you the game if not answered and Pridemage is usually a Disenchant bear and a situational pump spell. Travel Preps relies on a good board already to gain an advantage, but Pridemage answers bomb enchantments or ench-based removal, and gives you board presence alone (while swinging as a 3/3). It's not so bad thanks to the Flashback, but Preps a little bit 'win-more.'
Is Travel Preparations better than Sigil Blessing? I think they're fairly different cards. The idea with Blessing is to blow your opponent out after blockers are declared, but Travel Preparations offers no such surprises. By turn five onwards you're looking at boards which might allow you to cast + flashback into a strong position, and that's probably a little earlier than Blessing which has the potential to be more impactful (and 2-for-1), but requires a more specific board to work.
Love the idea of reviewing all the cards Rubin - maybe you could do a series of 'Vintage' set reviews and release them set by set?
The sideboard definitely needs work (Weatherseed Faeries?) but you probably know that. Also, 6x Seat of the Synod? Are those meant to be Island?
Serendib Efreet is a pretty subpar finisher, and you'd be better with something like Vendilion Clique there, even if it does fill a different role. There's other options for that below.
Some more ideas: Lodestone Golem, Tangle Wire, Phyrexian Metamorph, Ensnaring Bridge, Engineered Explosives, Back to Basics, Academy Ruins
I don't mind the Dross Golem, Vault Skirge or Pith Driller suggestions, but I'd say I can find something to take this slot from Innistrad which is probably better than both.
I really don't like Manalith or Phyrexian Hulk much, either. Hulk was being tested as a way to up your playable creature count in something like a long game control deck where the mana cost was irrelevant provided the creature was big. A good example where this would have worked in that draft I reported on in the All Commons Cube thread where I resorted to Gathan Raiders. That said, the majority of decks can't use him, so I'll be cutting him. The difference between Manalith and Darksteel Ingot is pretty insignificant, but it probably doesn't need to be there either since I don't think I need two of this one.
Sphere is decent enough, but Harness is really good in corner cases and again, less so in the rest. If you have a very top-heavy curve the card is great because it comes down before the majority of your creatures are played, and acts as a pseudo-global haste enabler as you drop a big creature each turn. This was actually working really well with the four and five drops in R, but now we have more decent two drops from Innistrad the curve should be coming down and I don't see this having the same place as before now that the cube should be a little bit quicker. I will be cutting Bracers for a similar reason, but I'll outline that further with the Innistrad cube update. I guess it worked for some other people running it, but it's been consistantly not good enough when I've tested it, unfortunately.
Oh right, I see what you mean. That's cool, I can see how that would really work in a deck like that. I never see anyone build anything like that though, so like you say, it's apples and oranges!
I'd say that within the contexts of cube that's actually a pretty fair argument!
Dega Disciple is a decent card, and adding one extra wedge really shouldn't matter too much! I've snuck Thornscape Apprentice in before, too. I do really recommend Rend Flesh though, since it's splashable removal that kills almost everything in the cube at instant speed. Can't go wrong
Innistrad update coming soon!
Having unbalanced multicolour quantities will have a bigger effect as the size of your cube decreases, but as this section makes up a small amount of the cards in a cube, this shouldn't have a massive impact. The best thing I can suggest is to try to figure out what strategies frequently appear and do well as legitimate archetypes, and figure out how those are helped/hindered by the changes. Although having equal numbers of cards in each section is a useful (and organised) way of balancing the cube, but due to fluctuations in the actual use of different cards this does not always provide total balance. You may be able to do this in a way that's beneficial t oyour cube, but that also depends on how important the 'equal number of cards' thing is for you.