at this point in time, i think cubetutor is an amazing way to monitor my cube. it breaks down my cube content in multiple ways and allows me to see mana curves, color breakdowns, creatures vs spells, and compare a bunch of other metrics. i know you know this.
the main thing i find cubetutor lacking is actual draft data. yes i can look at the cubetutor draft data, but that only shows me what i (and a couple friends) like to draft. i'm not a cubetutor champion so i'm not sure how great their AI is. (i was in the beta, and it seemed awesome).
but in addition to seeing traditional draft trends, i also want to keep track of my friends' draft records and preferences IRL, as well as gauge the overall "evenness" of my cube. so after each live draft i have each player write down their name, w-l record, name of their deck, and up to 3 cards that shined brightest in their deck. then i take a picture of the deck and sideboard of each player.
after every draft i enter all this data in my spreadsheet. deck info (w-l, colors, drafter, archetype, theater) and individual card info (main vs sb, w-l, "high impact") are all entered. i unfortunately don't draft as often as i like, but over the past year and a half i've accumulated 34 drafts, 129 decks and 161 matches. below is the link to my spreadsheet. i am hoping looking at this type of information is as useful to a newer cuber as it is to my veterans, and is as interesting to drafters as it is to the cube manager. rather than a huge list of cards to process, it gives an idea of what decks you might expect to have to play against, gives some archetype ideas, and helps me make sure my colors and theaters are staying somewhat balanced and helps me keep an eye on cards that may be cut in my next update for being bad or too good.
the main reason i'm posting is to see if anyone else keeps track of similar data, or different data they think is more important. i've been told before that the most important information on my cube is what drafters tell me directly, but does anyone think this kind of information is at least somewhat useful? does anyone else keep a spreadsheet in addition to their list on cubetutor for analyzing IRL draft data?
tl:dr here is my cube spreadsheet. not looking for advice on the cube itself, but on the draft data being collected. is it interesting? informative? anything important i'm missing? the summary tab has charts, the meta analysis has tables, the other three tabs are data feeders.
tinyurl.com/shuflw (i used a tiny url, but it's 100% a google sheet and not spam)
I tried for awhile to record all the data I could from actual drafts, but it ended up being too much work during the time I wanted to simply enjoy myself cubing. It would get pretty obnoxious real quick both for me and my drafters if I interviewed them all afterwards, made them fill out a form, or whatever. It would take a lot of this data collecting to be able to do anything meaningful with it and besides, most of the problems will make themselves known anyway. People will let you know they think a card is OP or if it sucks and doesn't belong (or you'll just notice it won't show up in games and is a consistent last pick).
If we had automatic access to MTGO cube levels of data on our cubes, that would be amazingly useful and interesting. But the process of manually collecting it is too much administration work, in my opinion. It is fun sometimes to take a formulaic approach to cube to try to perfect it to an extent, but at some point it can definitely become overkill.
i do wish i had mtgo cube levels of data. heck, i'd be interested in even looking at the data for the mtgo cube and not my own. it is a bit of a process, but my drafters know to fill out that little bit of information at the end of each cube session (name, w-l, deck name, 3 all-stars) and then i snap a quick photo to come back to. it usually doesn't take more than a few minutes, but i'll admit we rarely draft 2+ times in a row either. then the deck photos sit on my phone for a few days until i enter the data. i'll admit i like messing around with excel sheets, so all the data entry doesn't feel like too much work to me.
i actually think the photo approach can be as informative as listening to drafters. sometimes during a draft someone will say "this card sucks," but more often those cards will just sit in sideboards un-discussed. more often than not i will find cards in maindecks that i undervalue or have less experience with, so those cards jump out at me as neat that someone found a way to make them work.
thanks for replying though. if you found the data entry too much work for your own cube, would you find the data charted in my sheet interesting when playing a friend's cube or a new cube? or screw the charts, let's just draft!
I wish cube tutor would implement a way to have a live draft on line, Each player could then have a card list, make there deck and then the cards could be sorted. This would also allow for card tracking in case a card disappears.
It's definitely interesting data as a cube manager and for your spikier players, but may be overwhelming for the average drafter who is just looking to sit down and play. There is also some data I'm not sure I would want out there either. A list of card rankings would be fine to let newbies know what cards they should be looking for, but deck win percentages I'd rather keep hidden. Not to take advantage of or anything, but to allow people to play what they want and find fun, as well as to encourage experimentation without them feeling bad for not drafting UW control.
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the main thing i find cubetutor lacking is actual draft data. yes i can look at the cubetutor draft data, but that only shows me what i (and a couple friends) like to draft. i'm not a cubetutor champion so i'm not sure how great their AI is. (i was in the beta, and it seemed awesome).
but in addition to seeing traditional draft trends, i also want to keep track of my friends' draft records and preferences IRL, as well as gauge the overall "evenness" of my cube. so after each live draft i have each player write down their name, w-l record, name of their deck, and up to 3 cards that shined brightest in their deck. then i take a picture of the deck and sideboard of each player.
after every draft i enter all this data in my spreadsheet. deck info (w-l, colors, drafter, archetype, theater) and individual card info (main vs sb, w-l, "high impact") are all entered. i unfortunately don't draft as often as i like, but over the past year and a half i've accumulated 34 drafts, 129 decks and 161 matches. below is the link to my spreadsheet. i am hoping looking at this type of information is as useful to a newer cuber as it is to my veterans, and is as interesting to drafters as it is to the cube manager. rather than a huge list of cards to process, it gives an idea of what decks you might expect to have to play against, gives some archetype ideas, and helps me make sure my colors and theaters are staying somewhat balanced and helps me keep an eye on cards that may be cut in my next update for being bad or too good.
the main reason i'm posting is to see if anyone else keeps track of similar data, or different data they think is more important. i've been told before that the most important information on my cube is what drafters tell me directly, but does anyone think this kind of information is at least somewhat useful? does anyone else keep a spreadsheet in addition to their list on cubetutor for analyzing IRL draft data?
tl:dr here is my cube spreadsheet. not looking for advice on the cube itself, but on the draft data being collected. is it interesting? informative? anything important i'm missing? the summary tab has charts, the meta analysis has tables, the other three tabs are data feeders.
tinyurl.com/shuflw (i used a tiny url, but it's 100% a google sheet and not spam)
my cube excel sheet, with metagame info and charts!
If we had automatic access to MTGO cube levels of data on our cubes, that would be amazingly useful and interesting. But the process of manually collecting it is too much administration work, in my opinion. It is fun sometimes to take a formulaic approach to cube to try to perfect it to an extent, but at some point it can definitely become overkill.
i actually think the photo approach can be as informative as listening to drafters. sometimes during a draft someone will say "this card sucks," but more often those cards will just sit in sideboards un-discussed. more often than not i will find cards in maindecks that i undervalue or have less experience with, so those cards jump out at me as neat that someone found a way to make them work.
thanks for replying though. if you found the data entry too much work for your own cube, would you find the data charted in my sheet interesting when playing a friend's cube or a new cube? or screw the charts, let's just draft!
my cube excel sheet, with metagame info and charts!
http://www.cubetutor.com/cubeblog/63569