MTG Salvation

Where does Kiora, the Crashing Wave come down for you guys? I'm going to reduce my guild section to three cards per guild, and Simic is my toughest reduction.

She's somewhere between #3 and #5, IMO, depending on the needs of the section and what archetypes/theaters you play in Simic. Somewhere in the mix of Edric, Spymaster of Trest, Mystic Snake, Trygon Predator and Simic Sky Swallower. I think the top Simic cards are all relatively even in terms of powerlevel, so I suggest just adding in the ones that will help out your decks you play the most.

I think Mystic Snake and Kiora are my two favourite Simic cards, with Trygon my third and Edric next in line. Trygon is better with fast mana, Edric as a dedicated tempo bomb. Kiora plays really well in the natural U/G decks that come up with us and we love it.

I love Edric, so he's not going anywhere. I like Snake quite a bit, and we run Portal and Shard, so Snake fits very well. We do not, however, run Moxen, though other powerful artifacts, like Jitte, etc. are present. I'd like to keep Kiora too, as she's fun, and I like more control-oriented UG. I'm leaning towards dropping Predator right now.

Kiora has been OK, but not amazing here. Her Follower has done infinitely better.

Simic is by far the color combo that you can most easily mold to the needs of your archetypes. Trygon Predator keeps powered cubes in check, Edric, Spymaster of Trest is one of the best tempo support cards available to cube, Mystic Snake and Shardless Agent are two great value creatures for a deck trying to play a fair game (and trying to abuse ETB triggers), Simic Sky Swallower is a fine fatty for ramp/NO strategies that need something reliable, and Kiora, the Crashing Wave is a great midrange utility knife. I don't feel comfortable with a ranking for these options: all are worthy of a cube slot, but I wouldn't feel obliged to play any of them without the right support.

Progenitor Mimic has been great in my cube. It may be out of the top 5 but i run 10 from each guild so it easliy makes the cut over something like Prime Speaker.

I run:
Mystic Snake
Trygon Predator
Kiora
Kiora's Follower
Progenitor Mimic
Prophet of Kruphix
SSS
Simic Charm
Edric
Coiling Oracle

10!? How big is your cube?

767. 100 of each color, 10 of each guild, 60 artifacts, 100 lands including abu duals, fetches and shocks and 7 hybrid cards.

It works well and is always different. There are some cards that never seem to come up so sometimes testing is hard but we play often (at least once a week) so we get there eventually. I need to upload it one of these days.

14% gold/hybrids is a hell of a lot. I like 10% as a rule of thumb, but as the quality drops off rather a lot after the first 3 or 4, I'd probably go for 5-6 each guild including hybrids in a 700-750 card cube.

I used to run around 10 per guild, but that was including hybrids. Also it was a 900 cube. I would try and prune a bit unless you enjoy the prevalence of the old three or four-color dragon-style decks, in which case, as you were! That list is interesting if you've ranked it by power level tho

That list is most certainly NOT ranked by power. If it was, Prophet of Kruphix would be at the bottom of the list. That being said, we end up playing a lot of multiplayer games and in that format we all know how powerful prophet can be.

In other news, this guild still has almost nothing exciting. Edric is really the only "exciting" card for me, though some others are at least powerful enough to make the cut. Thinking about running Kiora's Follower or Simic Charm just to mix things up. So tired of seeing Trygon Predator be a last pick.

Quote from Goodking »

14% gold/hybrids is a hell of a lot. I like 10% as a rule of thumb, but as the quality drops off rather a lot after the first 3 or 4, I'd probably go for 5-6 each guild including hybrids in a 700-750 card cube.

I'm at 8.333333% counting Kird Ape, Loam Lion, Wild Nacatl, Nightscape Familiar, and Sphinx of the Steel Wind as gold cards (in addition to the ~5 gold cards I run in each guild and some storm support) in my 720. I also had a 8.33333% in my 360, and my 540 is actually around 8.25%ish IIRC.

What's a good colorless percentage, Goodking? My 720 right now is 16.6666% colorless not counting guild lands.

Quote from happyjosiah »

In other news, this guild still has almost nothing exciting. Edric is really the only "exciting" card for me, though some others are at least powerful enough to make the cut. Thinking about running Kiora's Follower or Simic Charm just to mix things up. So tired of seeing Trygon Predator be a last pick.

Trygon Predator is only a last pick if nobody is in UG. If Predator is a last pick, I don't know what Follower and Simic Charm would be. They don't even go into a lot of Simic decks. At least Predator goes in every deck that can cast it.

Is Edric worth running without green aggro support? See lots of blue/x tempo decks but never green and I'm not sure if it's worth running.

It's definitely a card that's good enough to test out even if you're not supporting green aggro.

My opinion on cards that most people run or think highly of is that they're like that for a reason. Even if your cube doesn't have the ideal setup for them, you should just test them and see how they play. If they're good enough, maybe give them some more pieces. If not, you can always give them more pieces to see if that makes your cube environment better, or you can just drop them and say they didn't play well for you but you didn't have a ton of pieces in place.

Whatever the case, it's a fun experiment, and you'll have more to contribute on the forum and in your playgroup no matter what.

I know I started off playing storm in my cube because I wanted to see if it was good enough, half my playgroup loved it and half my playgroup hated it, so we made some changes and got it to a better spot and have stuck with it. People at my store have run cubes similar to mine because they liked seeing how it played and wanted a cube for their friends. One of the guys that made a 360 powered cube that supported storm put in cards he likes, and it's a good bit different than mine and I definitely disagree with some of the choices he's made, but he enjoys them and that's what counts.

Simic is a fine guild as it is right now, they have a bunch of top tier cards.

Edric is really easy to deal with, but on the other hand he just takes over a game incredibly fast if you don't have the removal. I'd say he's worth splashing G for in U/x tempo, and it's not like green doesn't have other stuff to offer that archetype. There are lots of 1G creatures in particular that are great in that deck. He's also very playable in ramp where your creatures are huge and hard to block, and he generally immediately replaces his card.

Sagu Mauler. I like that one can play it in mono white.

I'm actually not really excited by a single card in Simic. I think there are some good cards but nothing that doesn't feel replaceable. I haven't had Kiora in long enough to really see how powerful she is, so she might change my mind.

Cheers,
rant

Quote from rantipole »

I'm actually not really excited by a single card in Simic. I think there are some good cards but nothing that doesn't feel replaceable.

Exactly

Quote from Bolas, the Mindsculptor »

Sagu Mauler. I like that one can play it in mono white.

I must be missing something. How do you play Sagu Mauler in mono white???

Flickerwisp / Glimmerpoint Stag / Momentary Blink effects

In addition, I think Icefeather Aven could be up for consideration.

There are at least six cards I would play before icefeather aven.