I should really build a deck that is legal in a real format. Another "new" old school deck. This deck is a blast to play though.
This deck is so sweet. Not sure if you've seen this video, but watching Mike Long play this deck is both infuriating and awesome. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HLa8GMQAMu4
Graduated acupuncture school. Gave notice at my soul-crushing job and my last day will be Friday. Will start working for my acupuncturist as soon as my license arrives. Getting married June 3. My life is on such a good track right now I'm almost scared to talk about it, lest I invite Fate to eff with it.
I certainly understand the feeling that everything is coming together. I had this highly reflective period at the end of the last school year, my first as a teacher, when I realized that I had absolutely crushed my first year teaching, that I had found my calling, that that my marriage was going better than ever, and that I was expecting my first kid in a few months. Now, with a week until his due date, and starting my second year of teaching, I feel like I'm entering the productive, hopefully happy, hopefully very long middle third of my life.
Plus I get to cube once in a while, and that's fun, too.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I can't say I'm pleased to see you and must warn you I may have to do something about it.
EDH: UGEdric
Pauper: URDelver
Modern: UGRDelver
Draft my cube: Eric's 390 Unpowered
So good to read all the good news, rant! See how Fate is already trying to mess with you by wielding the power of Fear? Do not let it, instead enjoy what is to come!
I've got good news too - my wife has finished all the main parts of cancer treatment. She goes back every once in a while for a little infusion, but she is officially cancer free!
I've been wondering about something related to internet cube communities in general and I thought this would be as good a place as any to ask, certainly not worth its own thread. I hope this doesn't spark anger, but...
Can someone who's been involved with this cube forum and/or others for a long time explain why there's so much animosity towards MTGS on other forums or reddit? And why, in general, cube forums seem kind of isolated from each other? I've been going through reddit, RiptideLab etc. and people seem to generally have negative opinions of other communities, this one in particular, but rarely really explain why this is. I understand that people can feel strongly about their design philosophies and not want to associate with people who feel differently, but is this the only reason or has something happened in the past? Even given design philosophies it seems to me that the most respected cube managers on e.g. reddit don't differ THAT much from people here.
I haven't posted much here but I've been pretty happy with this forum. People seem helpful, and I've found tons of useful information for putting together my own cube. It feels so weird to see the comments about this place in other communities.
I've been wondering about something related to internet cube communities in general and I thought this would be as good a place as any to ask, certainly not worth its own thread. I hope this doesn't spark anger, but...
Can someone who's been involved with this cube forum and/or others for a long time explain why there's so much animosity towards MTGS on other forums or reddit? And why, in general, cube forums seem kind of isolated from each other? I've been going through reddit, RiptideLab etc. and people seem to generally have negative opinions of other communities, this one in particular, but rarely really explain why this is. I understand that people can feel strongly about their design philosophies and not want to associate with people who feel differently, but is this the only reason or has something happened in the past? Even given design philosophies it seems to me that the most respected cube managers on e.g. reddit don't differ THAT much from people here.
I haven't posted much here but I've been pretty happy with this forum. People seem helpful, and I've found tons of useful information for putting together my own cube. It feels so weird to see the comments about this place in other communities.
This forum have always been very lightly moderated, and have been community driven over the years. People can have strong opinions and it have always been encouraged to discuss things (but keep them civil). Over the years some persons have made the mistake of thinking discussions are the same as aggro or unwelcomeness.
As this forum is the oldest and biggest cube forum, some find that people in here always think they know better and come off as arrogant. So instead of arguing their case if they think they have one, they go to their corner and rage about things. Especially reddit is good as this (and it's not isolated to /r/mtgcube).
Furthermore from the beginning of various other cube outlets, there have never to my knowledge been any attempts to mend the bonds and create a community together, but rather to take over the user base and profit of it.
-This forum has generally had no interest in discussing non-cube cubes i.e. non-singleton formats. You typically come here to discuss what the singleton format entails, and a lot of people become frustrated when no one here wants to discuss their non-singletone/standard cubes. Are there off-shoot cubes here? Yes. Is there discussion of non-standard cubes? Def. But if you peruse through all the threads here the general, they all evaluate cards based on the singleton cube experience.
-wtwlf, our most prominent member, is a polarizing figure. There's no beating around the bush--a lot of the major blow ups and arguments have directly involved him. I've left these forums myself for some periods of time because of arguments we've gotten in and feeling like I was being attacked or treated like *****. When I posted my articles here, members actually messaged me telling me not to get discouraged by his posts. Like, that's insane.
That being said, I would be remiss to say that in the 3 years since that's happened, wtwlf has considerably calmed down and has become more even-keel. But, reputations are hard to shake, so it is what it is. I think a large part of what changed it for me was hearing him on MerfolkMagic's podcast--he sounds like a regular dude who really enjoys what he does, and nothing about him came across as rude. When you understand the person a bit better behind the name, it's easier to read language as just expression instead of attacking. Tone is tough to account for in text, especially when it's as casual as
And frankly, a lot of the people who argued with him and left were pretty *****ty in their own right, at least the vocal ones. Trunkers made a whole forum because he did;t agree with us and we didn't really want to talk about different cube ideas, is incredibly dismissive, and one time talked ***** about Sky (my writing partner) and I i.e. TurnOneMagic in general, on a stream--like that's some ******* bull***** that wtwlf has come no where close to. hopefulhawkeye would *often* spar with wtwlf, but really being a whine-bag because wtwlf didn't agree with him. I remember one time he did a set review and complained that he wasn't getting the forum 'likes'/recognition that are at the bottom of a post. That should've been an embarrassing moment for him, and I felt pretty embarrassed for us too when we gave in and liked his post a bunch because he complained about it.
At the end of the day, I can see why people would've been turned off by his attitude, but I frankly don't think it's a problem anymore. People have become less interested in convincing him that their way is right and in turn getting into arguments where people get butt-hurt, and are now treating him like they would any other user--as someone who has an opinion that you should take with a grain of salt.
But it's a lot easier to get rid of a body than a ghost. By that I mean, you can change how you act, but you can't change how others think.
-There are definitely some ins-and-outs that can be a pain to get used to if you don't like learning how to do things a certain way. We've seen people post here once and get turned off by being told a million different ways how to change things, people don't like hearing their pet cards suck, people don't like...people just want their biases to be confirmed a lot of the time.
-As a jump-off from that, cube owners are typically prima donnas. I mean that in the nicest way, but we are all the lords of our own format, often being the only ones in a group with a cube or the one who works on their cube the most or etc. People have strong opinions about the cards they run and don't run, and like bondafong said discussions are often misconstrued as aggro or unwelcomeness. For example, I think Smokestack is garbage and I rarely see it do anything, and there are probably people on these forums who think I'm a ******* idiot for saying so and have no idea what I'm talking about. We can either take that mind-set, OR you realize people have different experiences with different play groups. I try and do the latter, and it makes discussing anything a lot easier.
------------
At the end of the day, I love posting here and discussing cube cards with everyone, but this forum is certainly not for everyone. I don't mean this in a dismissive way at all, but it takes a mature certain type of individual who is able to discuss without attaching too much emotion and let things slide off their shoulders to post here in the long term.
I've noticed that riptidelab in particular seems really different than this forum. So many of the people there are playing non-singleton, which is fine but isn't what I'm after, and are overly concerned, in my view, with making their formats 'fair' by taking out good cards that are 'unfun.' That's the sort of stuff that drives me nuts about some EDH groups, where the green ramp player with 15 mana on turn 6 gets mad when you cast Armageddon, and it's exactly what I don't want my cube to be about. I want a chance to cast sweet spells that I can't cast elsewhere. And no complaining about bad beats. Just reshuffle and play again.
That said, I think the reddit community is fine, based on google searches for particular cards. I think in general there is a little different design philosophy there, but it's not as wildly opposite as riptidelab's.
And I have noticed when reading through old threads here that wtwlf used to have really thin skin. It actually comports with a shift I've seen on all the forums where I've been a longtime member, where people generally have become more polite, caring, understanding, and less trollish in general in the last ten years. Like now we're all used to the internet just being an extension of our real worlds, so we don't behave differently anymore. Wtwlf has always been a helpful member here, certainly through my short tenure and even back when he used to get in tussles with other members, but now I think disagreements can just be left at that with almost everyone here. That's a good sign.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I can't say I'm pleased to see you and must warn you I may have to do something about it.
EDH: UGEdric
Pauper: URDelver
Modern: UGRDelver
Draft my cube: Eric's 390 Unpowered
Hivemind comes to mind when I think back on what drove some people away from here. It was really easy to get the impression that there was a "right" way to construct a Cube and many "wrong" ones. Cube was defined as a singleton format with the most powerful cards ever printed. Power rankings and the Cube comparison thread listed the "must-plays" (or, at least, some users seemed to read it that way instead of using those resources as a starting point for their own ideas) and everyone excluding cards of that category was told that they are wrong. It was hard to get an actual discussion going on the merits of certain non-standard ideas.
I am less active in recent years (I have only so much tinkering in me, and these days I spend it mostly on my job and not on my Cube). That said, I get the impression that things have changed and that now it's easier to discuss different ideas. With all the powerful cards printed in recent years, we now have the ability to build Cubes with different cards but similar power level. I think that helped with shifting the discussion from "which card is more powerful" to "which card supports this archetype better".
Is 'singleton-only-powermax' supposed to be an insult?
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I can't say I'm pleased to see you and must warn you I may have to do something about it.
EDH: UGEdric
Pauper: URDelver
Modern: UGRDelver
Draft my cube: Eric's 390 Unpowered
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 49th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from MKM!
Calvin and Hobbes
Cube Tutor
I think you can guess my response!
My Stupidly Large Number of Current Decks
PucaTrade with me!
The Multiplayer Power Rankings
Cube: the Gittening (My Multiplayer Cube) - MTGS Cube List | @ CubeTutor
The N00b Cube (Peasant cube for new players) - MTGS Cube List | @ CubeTutor
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HLa8GMQAMu4
CubeTutor: www.cubetutor.com/cubeblog/72
Thread: http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=512410
Calvin and Hobbes
Cube Tutor
Cheers,
rant
My Cube
CubeCobra: https://cubecobra.com/cube/overview/5f5d0310ed602310515d4c32
Cube Tutor: http://cubetutor.com/viewcube/1963
MTGS Average Peasant Cube 2023 Edition
Follow me. I tweet.
I certainly understand the feeling that everything is coming together. I had this highly reflective period at the end of the last school year, my first as a teacher, when I realized that I had absolutely crushed my first year teaching, that I had found my calling, that that my marriage was going better than ever, and that I was expecting my first kid in a few months. Now, with a week until his due date, and starting my second year of teaching, I feel like I'm entering the productive, hopefully happy, hopefully very long middle third of my life.
Plus I get to cube once in a while, and that's fun, too.
EDH: UGEdric
Pauper: UR Delver
Modern: UGR Delver
Draft my cube: Eric's 390 Unpowered
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 49th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from MKM!
450 card Peasant cube thread. Draft it here.
"What am I looking at? Ashes, dead man."
Konfusius, that's a good thing to keep in mind. And you made me think of Scott Pilgrim: "Rant has defeated Fear and earned the Power of Optimism!"
Cheers,
rant
My Cube
CubeCobra: https://cubecobra.com/cube/overview/5f5d0310ed602310515d4c32
Cube Tutor: http://cubetutor.com/viewcube/1963
I've got good news too - my wife has finished all the main parts of cancer treatment. She goes back every once in a while for a little infusion, but she is officially cancer free!
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 49th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from MKM!
Cheers,
rant
My Cube
CubeCobra: https://cubecobra.com/cube/overview/5f5d0310ed602310515d4c32
Cube Tutor: http://cubetutor.com/viewcube/1963
450 card Peasant cube thread. Draft it here.
Draft my cube!
Watch me stream!
Can someone who's been involved with this cube forum and/or others for a long time explain why there's so much animosity towards MTGS on other forums or reddit? And why, in general, cube forums seem kind of isolated from each other? I've been going through reddit, RiptideLab etc. and people seem to generally have negative opinions of other communities, this one in particular, but rarely really explain why this is. I understand that people can feel strongly about their design philosophies and not want to associate with people who feel differently, but is this the only reason or has something happened in the past? Even given design philosophies it seems to me that the most respected cube managers on e.g. reddit don't differ THAT much from people here.
I haven't posted much here but I've been pretty happy with this forum. People seem helpful, and I've found tons of useful information for putting together my own cube. It feels so weird to see the comments about this place in other communities.
This forum have always been very lightly moderated, and have been community driven over the years. People can have strong opinions and it have always been encouraged to discuss things (but keep them civil). Over the years some persons have made the mistake of thinking discussions are the same as aggro or unwelcomeness.
As this forum is the oldest and biggest cube forum, some find that people in here always think they know better and come off as arrogant. So instead of arguing their case if they think they have one, they go to their corner and rage about things. Especially reddit is good as this (and it's not isolated to /r/mtgcube).
Furthermore from the beginning of various other cube outlets, there have never to my knowledge been any attempts to mend the bonds and create a community together, but rather to take over the user base and profit of it.
My Tribal cube
My 93/94 old school cube
My Artifact cube
My Hearthstone Quiz App for iOS
-This forum has generally had no interest in discussing non-cube cubes i.e. non-singleton formats. You typically come here to discuss what the singleton format entails, and a lot of people become frustrated when no one here wants to discuss their non-singletone/standard cubes. Are there off-shoot cubes here? Yes. Is there discussion of non-standard cubes? Def. But if you peruse through all the threads here the general, they all evaluate cards based on the singleton cube experience.
-wtwlf, our most prominent member, is a polarizing figure. There's no beating around the bush--a lot of the major blow ups and arguments have directly involved him. I've left these forums myself for some periods of time because of arguments we've gotten in and feeling like I was being attacked or treated like *****. When I posted my articles here, members actually messaged me telling me not to get discouraged by his posts. Like, that's insane.
That being said, I would be remiss to say that in the 3 years since that's happened, wtwlf has considerably calmed down and has become more even-keel. But, reputations are hard to shake, so it is what it is. I think a large part of what changed it for me was hearing him on MerfolkMagic's podcast--he sounds like a regular dude who really enjoys what he does, and nothing about him came across as rude. When you understand the person a bit better behind the name, it's easier to read language as just expression instead of attacking. Tone is tough to account for in text, especially when it's as casual as
And frankly, a lot of the people who argued with him and left were pretty *****ty in their own right, at least the vocal ones. Trunkers made a whole forum because he did;t agree with us and we didn't really want to talk about different cube ideas, is incredibly dismissive, and one time talked ***** about Sky (my writing partner) and I i.e. TurnOneMagic in general, on a stream--like that's some ******* bull***** that wtwlf has come no where close to. hopefulhawkeye would *often* spar with wtwlf, but really being a whine-bag because wtwlf didn't agree with him. I remember one time he did a set review and complained that he wasn't getting the forum 'likes'/recognition that are at the bottom of a post. That should've been an embarrassing moment for him, and I felt pretty embarrassed for us too when we gave in and liked his post a bunch because he complained about it.
At the end of the day, I can see why people would've been turned off by his attitude, but I frankly don't think it's a problem anymore. People have become less interested in convincing him that their way is right and in turn getting into arguments where people get butt-hurt, and are now treating him like they would any other user--as someone who has an opinion that you should take with a grain of salt.
But it's a lot easier to get rid of a body than a ghost. By that I mean, you can change how you act, but you can't change how others think.
-There are definitely some ins-and-outs that can be a pain to get used to if you don't like learning how to do things a certain way. We've seen people post here once and get turned off by being told a million different ways how to change things, people don't like hearing their pet cards suck, people don't like...people just want their biases to be confirmed a lot of the time.
-As a jump-off from that, cube owners are typically prima donnas. I mean that in the nicest way, but we are all the lords of our own format, often being the only ones in a group with a cube or the one who works on their cube the most or etc. People have strong opinions about the cards they run and don't run, and like bondafong said discussions are often misconstrued as aggro or unwelcomeness. For example, I think Smokestack is garbage and I rarely see it do anything, and there are probably people on these forums who think I'm a ******* idiot for saying so and have no idea what I'm talking about. We can either take that mind-set, OR you realize people have different experiences with different play groups. I try and do the latter, and it makes discussing anything a lot easier.
------------
At the end of the day, I love posting here and discussing cube cards with everyone, but this forum is certainly not for everyone. I don't mean this in a dismissive way at all, but it takes a mature certain type of individual who is able to discuss without attaching too much emotion and let things slide off their shoulders to post here in the long term.
Also, follow us on twitter! @TurnOneMagic
I've noticed that riptidelab in particular seems really different than this forum. So many of the people there are playing non-singleton, which is fine but isn't what I'm after, and are overly concerned, in my view, with making their formats 'fair' by taking out good cards that are 'unfun.' That's the sort of stuff that drives me nuts about some EDH groups, where the green ramp player with 15 mana on turn 6 gets mad when you cast Armageddon, and it's exactly what I don't want my cube to be about. I want a chance to cast sweet spells that I can't cast elsewhere. And no complaining about bad beats. Just reshuffle and play again.
That said, I think the reddit community is fine, based on google searches for particular cards. I think in general there is a little different design philosophy there, but it's not as wildly opposite as riptidelab's.
And I have noticed when reading through old threads here that wtwlf used to have really thin skin. It actually comports with a shift I've seen on all the forums where I've been a longtime member, where people generally have become more polite, caring, understanding, and less trollish in general in the last ten years. Like now we're all used to the internet just being an extension of our real worlds, so we don't behave differently anymore. Wtwlf has always been a helpful member here, certainly through my short tenure and even back when he used to get in tussles with other members, but now I think disagreements can just be left at that with almost everyone here. That's a good sign.
EDH: UGEdric
Pauper: UR Delver
Modern: UGR Delver
Draft my cube: Eric's 390 Unpowered
Hivemind comes to mind when I think back on what drove some people away from here. It was really easy to get the impression that there was a "right" way to construct a Cube and many "wrong" ones. Cube was defined as a singleton format with the most powerful cards ever printed. Power rankings and the Cube comparison thread listed the "must-plays" (or, at least, some users seemed to read it that way instead of using those resources as a starting point for their own ideas) and everyone excluding cards of that category was told that they are wrong. It was hard to get an actual discussion going on the merits of certain non-standard ideas.
I am less active in recent years (I have only so much tinkering in me, and these days I spend it mostly on my job and not on my Cube). That said, I get the impression that things have changed and that now it's easier to discuss different ideas. With all the powerful cards printed in recent years, we now have the ability to build Cubes with different cards but similar power level. I think that helped with shifting the discussion from "which card is more powerful" to "which card supports this archetype better".
"What am I looking at? Ashes, dead man."
My Tribal cube
My 93/94 old school cube
My Artifact cube
My Hearthstone Quiz App for iOS
EDH: UGEdric
Pauper: UR Delver
Modern: UGR Delver
Draft my cube: Eric's 390 Unpowered
I read Riptide Lab from time to time to get new ideas and impressions, but I always found the animosity towards MTGS weird and off-putting.
Uril, the Miststalker RGW -- Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre C -- Vhati il-Dal BG -- Jor Kadeen, the Prevailer RW -- Animar, Soul of Elements URG
Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker R -- Maga, Traitor to Mortals B -- Ghave, Guru of Spores BGW -- Sliver Hivelord WUBRG