Maybe some of you put Kessig in with lands or something, but I rank it as gold. I think it comes down to how much G aggro is supported. If Gruul aggro is going to work, it needs the support of Ape, if it's going to be more midrange, I think Domri gets the nod.
We ran it as a test for a short period and it was pretty bad relative to the other fringe options like BTE, Huntmaster and Savageborn Hydra.
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Calling Kird Ape critical for the archetype underlines the main issue with green aggro: it has some strong cards, but just not enough of them. Imo you are just wasting the gold slots on something with such a small impact on the game as a 2 power vanilla creature with a drawback.
I've seen you post some variant of this in several threads, but I don't understand reading that Kird Ape 'doesn't have enough impact on the game for a gold card'. What does that even mean? By that logic, should we only play 6+ CMC cards in our gold sections, which have more 'impact'? You have to compare 1-drops to 1-drops. In that case, he's a 2/3 for 1 most of the time. T1 that is a huge impact. Later in the game he is lower impact, but that is true of nearly all 1-drops. If you feel that gold cards should be reserved for big flashy spells then that's fine, but you can't tell people that they're wasting slots by just playing the most cost effective cards available within the archetypes they want to support. People's G/R aggro decks will absolutely always want the Ape, regardless of how exciting you feel it is or isn't.
If you don't support Green aggro, then that is a valid reason to exclude the Ape.
I'm looking to get rid of it for the Hydra. It gets picked late even though my crowd has a heavy pro-planeswalker bias (but doesn't the game in general?)
I gave Domri an extended run in our Cube & it wasn't good enough. We've been running Ghor-Clan Rampager & it's been doing pretty well. I only run two other true R/G cards (BBE & Kird Ape). The remaining cards (Tattermunge Maniac, Flinthoof Boar & Boggart Ram-Gang) can all be cast in 1-color decks.
While I agree with you that the card's average early game performance is not bad, I can't leave the most stay there uncommented. I mean - most of the world population is male is an equally true statement, although the numbers are about even. In case of monkey, you are only looking at an ~60% chance of being able to attack for 2 on turn 2 even if it is in your hand on your first turn. If you are interested in the games where you draw it at a later point in the game or don't have a way to get it to full size, we are already talking about 2/3 of the times.
'Most' of the time is not an errant or misleading statement, and there is not much point to state more precisely in my original point how much 'most' constitutes, since that qualifier depends intimately on the makeup of your deck. Having a decent chance to be one of the largest one-drops available in the cube is worth the chance that he will be only a 1/1 in some scenarios.
The relative powerlevel of equal cmc gold cards compared to mono colored cards is similar, therefor the absolute power level difference is much higher when you can upgrade a more expensive mono colored card with a gold card in your deck compared to something like a 1 or 2 drop. Yes, in some way I want "big and flashy" gold cards, although I am not talking about the 6+ mana monsters, but more some 3-4 drops that actually give me a reason to play this color combination.
The 3-4 mana options are perhaps more exciting, but you should also take into account the options firstly available in the gold slot already and the options at the same point in the curve in those colours. I run Sarkhan Vol and the green/red four drops are very good, so I'm happy to run something a little cheaper where those colours' aggro one-drops need shoring up a bit. The other option, Huntmaster, doesn't do something particular unique compared to other cards I already have, but there aren't many 2/3s for 1 around. It won't draw me into G/R in all games, but that's not something that is a turn off for us. Sometimes it will though.
With unlimited gold slots there would be a lot of cards that you can include that are going to have a very high maindeck percentage. That does not mean that it is going to be the right choice.
Of course, but I would continue to pick the more mana-efficient ones as my primary choices, based additionally on the needs of its colours. There are probably a lot of subpar but palatable choices in U/W, for example, that would see more maindeck play than something like Geist of Saint Traft, where its deck doesn't always come together, but I would still opt for the very powerful card where I can.
I like rade, but for me gold cards need to draw someone in or be perfect in the decks for that guild. Around here we are almost exclusively Maya aggro, jund aggro, gruul midrange, and Jund midrange. And here is the pick order
The problem with Domri is that decks always went for burn like char or flames of the firebrand, and hope he would wheel. He didn't send anyone into gruul. And he was cut a lot in when creature counts were too low.
Bloodbraid Elf is number four on your list of Gruul cards that aggro decks want?
I am not saying that it is number 4 based on power level, it is just how it seems to shake out. None of my group played during BBE power era so they draft it a little differently.
Their aggro decks are so focused on 1-2 drops and they prioritize those. As far as 3-4 drops they generally go for equipment first followed by removal/burn like char, than some of the high impact creatures like silverblade or hellrider.
That is is part of why I don't run Domri. I think he is great but I know I will be seeing him lap more than than I would like.
As a side note, whenever someone goes for a pod deck they always grab him.
Maybe some of you put Kessig in with lands or something, but I rank it as gold. I think it comes down to how much G aggro is supported. If Gruul aggro is going to work, it needs the support of Ape, if it's going to be more midrange, I think Domri gets the nod.
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I've seen you post some variant of this in several threads, but I don't understand reading that Kird Ape 'doesn't have enough impact on the game for a gold card'. What does that even mean? By that logic, should we only play 6+ CMC cards in our gold sections, which have more 'impact'? You have to compare 1-drops to 1-drops. In that case, he's a 2/3 for 1 most of the time. T1 that is a huge impact. Later in the game he is lower impact, but that is true of nearly all 1-drops. If you feel that gold cards should be reserved for big flashy spells then that's fine, but you can't tell people that they're wasting slots by just playing the most cost effective cards available within the archetypes they want to support. People's G/R aggro decks will absolutely always want the Ape, regardless of how exciting you feel it is or isn't.
If you don't support Green aggro, then that is a valid reason to exclude the Ape.
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'Most' of the time is not an errant or misleading statement, and there is not much point to state more precisely in my original point how much 'most' constitutes, since that qualifier depends intimately on the makeup of your deck. Having a decent chance to be one of the largest one-drops available in the cube is worth the chance that he will be only a 1/1 in some scenarios.
The 3-4 mana options are perhaps more exciting, but you should also take into account the options firstly available in the gold slot already and the options at the same point in the curve in those colours. I run Sarkhan Vol and the green/red four drops are very good, so I'm happy to run something a little cheaper where those colours' aggro one-drops need shoring up a bit. The other option, Huntmaster, doesn't do something particular unique compared to other cards I already have, but there aren't many 2/3s for 1 around. It won't draw me into G/R in all games, but that's not something that is a turn off for us. Sometimes it will though.
Of course, but I would continue to pick the more mana-efficient ones as my primary choices, based additionally on the needs of its colours. There are probably a lot of subpar but palatable choices in U/W, for example, that would see more maindeck play than something like Geist of Saint Traft, where its deck doesn't always come together, but I would still opt for the very powerful card where I can.
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Aggro: Kird Ape, Flinthoof boar, Ghor clan, BBE, Domri, Huntmaster
Midrange: Huntmaster, BBE, Ghor clan, Kird Ape, Domri, Flinthoof
The problem with Domri is that decks always went for burn like char or flames of the firebrand, and hope he would wheel. He didn't send anyone into gruul. And he was cut a lot in when creature counts were too low.
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I am not saying that it is number 4 based on power level, it is just how it seems to shake out. None of my group played during BBE power era so they draft it a little differently.
Their aggro decks are so focused on 1-2 drops and they prioritize those. As far as 3-4 drops they generally go for equipment first followed by removal/burn like char, than some of the high impact creatures like silverblade or hellrider.
That is is part of why I don't run Domri. I think he is great but I know I will be seeing him lap more than than I would like.
As a side note, whenever someone goes for a pod deck they always grab him.