One of my favorite decks from way back, was Big Red in the original Mirrodin block. It kind of surprises me how little the archetype itself is discussed outside of something like a GRWildfire deck. Something I have been wanting to play with in Cube is Extraplanar Lens and Gauntlet of Power to maybe push some bigger mono color decks that are much more midrange. Big Red has been one of the archetypes I really like using these because it gets access to some pretty sweet finishers (in my opinion) like Butcher Orgg, or Akroma, Angel of Fury. Some red ramp support and some artifacts to add some control elements along with sweepers like Sudden Demise, Starstorm and other quake effects - and I feel like this could be a fun archetype in Cube. Cards like Dualcaster Mage, Reverberate, Wild Ricochet seem fun too. Short list, I am sure there are a lot more possible cards:
I've tried it, but it's kind of difficult to support a full blown Big Red archetype since it clashes with Red's usual strategy. I've had to settle for just adding a couple targets for it besides the usual suspects in that list (Inferno Titan, Thundermaw, Siege-Gang, FTK, etc), Bogardan Hellkite and Form of the Dragon. Those have been pretty fun, but it's kind of impossible to make a full monocolored Big Red deck (like I'm assuming you are looking at doing by including Extraplanar Lens and Gauntlet of Power in that list) since Red is so heavily skewed towards aggro.
Not that it wouldn't be possible to do, you would just have to decide how much you want to dilute aggro in Red, since the cards you would be adding for Big Red would be going in pretty much the opposite direction as aggro. Those 2 cards were enough for us.
I've tried it, but it's kind of difficult to support a full blown Big Red archetype since it clashes with Red's usual strategy. I've had to settle for just adding a couple targets for it besides the usual suspects in that list (Inferno Titan, Thundermaw, Siege-Gang, FTK, etc), Bogardan Hellkite and Form of the Dragon. Those have been pretty fun, but it's kind of impossible to make a full monocolored Big Red deck (like I'm assuming you are looking at doing by including Extraplanar Lens and Gauntlet of Power in that list) since Red is so heavily skewed towards aggro.
Not that it wouldn't be possible to do, you would just have to decide how much you want to dilute aggro in Red, since the cards you would be adding for Big Red would be going in pretty much the opposite direction as aggro. Those 2 cards were enough for us.
Yeah, I assumed as much. To be honest, I really like skewing the colors and their usual roles in the cube. I have been trying to push Blue aggro a bit more and want to get into black aggro as well so I can lean off green or red aggro in favor of more midrange archetypes for them. My current cube does not really do a whole lot of big green ramp stuff and it tries to really just play an aggro game or accent other slower color set ups. I like that less red aggro and more red control elements can really get people for trying to audible draft.
Is Form of the Dragon actually playable in cube? I've always thought that was a cool card, but it's expensive and having 5 life is perilous (even with Moat). I'm really intrigued though. Tell me more. How does it generally come together?
It's a really fun card, and one of my favorites. I think it's too expensive for what it does, but it's been in and out of my cube as a true "pet card" of mine for a while now. I may bring it back sometime in the future, just because it's so damn awesome.
It's a really fun card, and one of my favorites. I think it's too expensive for what it does, but it's been in and out of my cube as a true "pet card" of mine for a while now. I may bring it back sometime in the future, just because it's so damn awesome.
Is Form of the Dragon actually playable in cube? I've always thought that was a cool card, but it's expensive and having 5 life is perilous (even with Moat). I'm really intrigued though. Tell me more. How does it generally come together?
Usually I will play it in some kind of U/R deck with ways to filter it away if I have no chance of casting it. Just last week, I put it in off an opponent's Show and Tell and completely blanked their Ulamog, so it works really well as a target for that.
Most of the time, anything that could threaten you in the air will just die to the 5 damage on upkeep. Anything that doesn't can usually be cleaned up by the burn you should also be playing. Also, you regen back up to 5 at the end of every turn, so they can't just slowly chip away at you. The real fear is that they just Disenchant it EOT and kill you on the ground, but if you played the card correctly, that would have killed you anyway.
If you're playing a 360 cube of only the best of the best I might not include it, but the card is just so much fun to play. Having it stick and getting that first free 5 damage is probably my most favorite thing to do in cube. Plus, it's only one card. It's kind of like Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker that way. It doesn't show up every draft, but the times it does are so awesome that it's worth the slot.
I have minimal room for expensive red cards simply because (like most cubes here I think) red is generally played in aggressive decks. I'd probably have to cut Wildfire to test this, which I'm not opposed to because that deck has been in my cube for some time now and it's a bit long in the tooth (still a very good deck, just played out is all - I haven't seen it drafted recently). If I still have my foil Form of the Dragon, I may put it in and see if anyone drafts it. The effect is so unique.
Another Big Red card you might try is Ember Swallower. It plays nicely in midrange strategies as well as decks that are looking to go big, and it survives Wildfire on top of having its own pseudo-Wildfire effect. It's also easier to cast than Cyclops Gladiator or Obsidian Fireheart.
Speaking of pseudo-Wildfires on a stick, how about Crater Hellion? Hellkite Charger is the red 6 I have my eye on if I ever expand my cube, and it could also be a pretty sweet finisher in a dedicated Big Red archetype.
Yeah, depending on power level of the cube, Ember Swallower is nice. I'm less a fan of Crater Hellion, but it can do a decent job in Big Red midrange for sure Hellkite Charger is also sweet and do really shines in unpowered environment where big creatures rule the game.
Those are some really sweet card suggestions, many of those cards I am familiar with but had just completely spaced when thinking of cards. What had actually got me thinking about Big Red was that my opponent the other day pulled off a turn 1 Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker and had a bunch of burn and other removal to keep me off the board long enough for him to knock me down to next to nothing for life. I managed to tutor up a Maelstrom Pulse and get to Grave Titan to save myself from dying to Mutavault. I really did not have any sweepers in the cube he could have used to get back to a winning position after that but I wish I had - as fun as it was to come back from that position using 0 fast mana, and actually win.
Yeah, depending on power level of the cube, Ember Swallower is nice. I'm less a fan of Crater Hellion, but it can do a decent job in Big Red midrange for sure Hellkite Charger is also sweet and do really shines in unpowered environment where big creatures rule the game.
Ember Swallower is a great fit for those Wildfire decks, and there aren't all that many four drops that fit that criterion.
I've not considered Devastation... it's certainly better than the seven mana Wildfire variant for 5 (can't remember its name). Could be big game with any decent PW, although the opposite is true if your opponent has a strong one.
Ember Swallower is great. Such a great body for the mana cost and the effect is great in wildfire decks. He works both as a redundant creature version of the LD half of the spell and as a guy who survives the effect on the actual spell.
Ember Swallower is quite good in big red / red control / Wildfire decks. He comes down early enough to be a serious roadblock for aggressive decks (4/5 is huge). And your own deck should have an easier time to cope with his monstrous land destruction than the opponent's. Lastly, he is not a pure control or midrange card, since he can even work as a 4-drop in an aggressive deck that didn't get any better ones.
I still like Crater Hellion. Echo is way less of a bother if it happens at the top of your curve. Mass removal + big creature is a good combination for a card in cube.
I really wanted Destructive Force to work, but it was far worse than Wildfire. A real letdown.
Devastation is probably a better alternative. It keeps your manafacts and planeswalkers in play, but deals will all opposing creatures. It doesn't have the unfortunate moments that Force has where the opponent drops a Titan-sized creature the turn before you can cast it.
I dislike Jokulhaups because it destroys your manafacts, which I find essential for big red / Wildfire decks.
Chandra Nalaar is a good planeswalker for this archetype.
I love Jokulhaups. While losing your own artifact mana can suck, blowing up all your opponents as well is sometimes better. Plus you can float mana ala Upheaval and be in a way better position more consistently. With the powered cubes, I find a lot of match ups are artifact mana deck vs. artifact mana deck, and the floated mana from Jokulhaups lets you even out the playing field more + putting you on top with that floating mana. It's a card that punishes you for solely relying on your pre-jokulhaups board position but rewards you for making a bunch of extra mana and saving 1 or 2 spells in your hand, something that can be back breaking. I think it's a generally underrated card, and if you find that people like drafting those artifact mana decks with your cube it should do good work as you get to have that proverbially last laugh.
Also Jokulhaups is good friends with the Planeswalker Superfriends Deck, which I love.
Also-also, the card is named Jokulhaups. It could be a 6 mana spell that did nothing and I would have a hard time not running it for the name reason.
This may not excactly be within the 'Big Red' archetype, but I saw some interesting red cards yesterday while looking for more support for a Titania/Loam package that I would like to discuss.
The first one is Impending Disaster. It may not be a red Armageddon, but I think it can work similarly. The main problem about this card is that it allows your opponent to get ahead on board before the lands are destroyed. However it only costs 2 mana and you can therefore play another 2-drop along with it when there are 7 lands in play. It seems pretty good in a Aggro-shell or Titania/Loam shell.
The other card is Devastating Dreams. A Firestorm-like spell that supports both Wildfire, Loam and Reanimation to some extend. The 'random' clause hurts the card, but it might be testable in a big cube. What do you think?
Impending Disaster is terrible. Your opponent gets the last actions before it goes off. Don't use this card.
Devastating Dreams is not much better. The problem is that it just sets you too far back. The random discard hurts, but having to discard spells to it makes it too hard to make asymmetrical.
Is Impending Disaster really that bad? If you construct a deck with 90%+ low-on-curve permanent cards, you are likely to be ahead on board position by turn 4 (when 7 lands are in play) even if your opponent gets a turn to do something. I agree that it is fringe and won't always work, but I don't think it is 'terrible'. The low casting cost also allows you to advance on board even more the turn you play it.
Devastating Dreams probably won't work. I was toying with ideas for Loam and it came up. If more cards 'play lands from GY' ever cards are printed, I think Dreams should be considered.
I can imagine Impending Disaster being good against control, where the control deck may not have a board presence by your 4th turn and you could get way ahead. Even that's not guaranteed though. If they get the chance to play their 4th land they can wrath, pretty much putting things back to square one except now you're out of gas.
I don't think it does much of anything to hurt midrange, which is aggro's worst matchup. (And if your plan is to establish a board presence and go turn 4 2-drop + Disaster, you're an aggro deck.) So the midrange deck has potentially a 2/3ish and/or 3/4ish on the board, stonewalling your attacks for the next few turns. Or maybe they have a mana elf and a 4/5, putting them even farther ahead during that rebuilding phase. I'm with wtwlf, I just don't see it playing out well.
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Not that it wouldn't be possible to do, you would just have to decide how much you want to dilute aggro in Red, since the cards you would be adding for Big Red would be going in pretty much the opposite direction as aggro. Those 2 cards were enough for us.
Yeah, I assumed as much. To be honest, I really like skewing the colors and their usual roles in the cube. I have been trying to push Blue aggro a bit more and want to get into black aggro as well so I can lean off green or red aggro in favor of more midrange archetypes for them. My current cube does not really do a whole lot of big green ramp stuff and it tries to really just play an aggro game or accent other slower color set ups. I like that less red aggro and more red control elements can really get people for trying to audible draft.
http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/modular-cube-5-colors.800/
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Usually I will play it in some kind of U/R deck with ways to filter it away if I have no chance of casting it. Just last week, I put it in off an opponent's Show and Tell and completely blanked their Ulamog, so it works really well as a target for that.
Most of the time, anything that could threaten you in the air will just die to the 5 damage on upkeep. Anything that doesn't can usually be cleaned up by the burn you should also be playing. Also, you regen back up to 5 at the end of every turn, so they can't just slowly chip away at you. The real fear is that they just Disenchant it EOT and kill you on the ground, but if you played the card correctly, that would have killed you anyway.
If you're playing a 360 cube of only the best of the best I might not include it, but the card is just so much fun to play. Having it stick and getting that first free 5 damage is probably my most favorite thing to do in cube. Plus, it's only one card. It's kind of like Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker that way. It doesn't show up every draft, but the times it does are so awesome that it's worth the slot.
Thanks for the replies.
http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/modular-cube-5-colors.800/
Retro combo cube thread
http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/retro-combo-cube.1454/
Speaking of pseudo-Wildfires on a stick, how about Crater Hellion? Hellkite Charger is the red 6 I have my eye on if I ever expand my cube, and it could also be a pretty sweet finisher in a dedicated Big Red archetype.
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A spell that hasn't been mention yet and that I like very much is Devastation. In a Big Red shell that use fast mana and a bunch of planeswalkers, the card is absolutly bonker! Play it with Sarkhan, the Dragon Speaker, Elspeth, Sun's Champion or even Daretti, Scrap Savant and you'll be highly reward.
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Ember Swallower is a great fit for those Wildfire decks, and there aren't all that many four drops that fit that criterion.
I've not considered Devastation... it's certainly better than the seven mana Wildfire variant for 5 (can't remember its name). Could be big game with any decent PW, although the opposite is true if your opponent has a strong one.
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I still like Crater Hellion. Echo is way less of a bother if it happens at the top of your curve. Mass removal + big creature is a good combination for a card in cube.
I really wanted Destructive Force to work, but it was far worse than Wildfire. A real letdown.
Devastation is probably a better alternative. It keeps your manafacts and planeswalkers in play, but deals will all opposing creatures. It doesn't have the unfortunate moments that Force has where the opponent drops a Titan-sized creature the turn before you can cast it.
I dislike Jokulhaups because it destroys your manafacts, which I find essential for big red / Wildfire decks.
Chandra Nalaar is a good planeswalker for this archetype.
Uril, the Miststalker RGW -- Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre C -- Vhati il-Dal BG -- Jor Kadeen, the Prevailer RW -- Animar, Soul of Elements URG
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Yeah, that's pretty much why I do rank Devastation > Jokulhaups. Nice card though. I used to it to run it for a while when cube was 810 and powerless.
Agree. She can do a fine job in that archetype. Also use to have it in the cube when it was bigger.
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Also Jokulhaups is good friends with the Planeswalker Superfriends Deck, which I love.
Also-also, the card is named Jokulhaups. It could be a 6 mana spell that did nothing and I would have a hard time not running it for the name reason.
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The first one is Impending Disaster. It may not be a red Armageddon, but I think it can work similarly. The main problem about this card is that it allows your opponent to get ahead on board before the lands are destroyed. However it only costs 2 mana and you can therefore play another 2-drop along with it when there are 7 lands in play. It seems pretty good in a Aggro-shell or Titania/Loam shell.
The other card is Devastating Dreams. A Firestorm-like spell that supports both Wildfire, Loam and Reanimation to some extend. The 'random' clause hurts the card, but it might be testable in a big cube. What do you think?
Devastating Dreams is not much better. The problem is that it just sets you too far back. The random discard hurts, but having to discard spells to it makes it too hard to make asymmetrical.
I'd play Tectonic Break or Boom // Bust over the Disaster, and something like Jokulhaups or Destructive Force over the Dreams.
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Devastating Dreams probably won't work. I was toying with ideas for Loam and it came up. If more cards 'play lands from GY' ever cards are printed, I think Dreams should be considered.
I don't think it does much of anything to hurt midrange, which is aggro's worst matchup. (And if your plan is to establish a board presence and go turn 4 2-drop + Disaster, you're an aggro deck.) So the midrange deck has potentially a 2/3ish and/or 3/4ish on the board, stonewalling your attacks for the next few turns. Or maybe they have a mana elf and a 4/5, putting them even farther ahead during that rebuilding phase. I'm with wtwlf, I just don't see it playing out well.
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