I know this may not be a "Cube" idea per se, but bear with me a moment.
I always enjoy experimenting with peasant power level, and when jumpstart came out I got to thinking Huh, what if my peasant cube was like Smash Up, where I just make archetype packs and smash them together to play.
But then I wondered what a battle box would look like- 60 card decks vintage constructed peasant* (or artisan or Silver Black) and THAT's why I came here!
So to all the C/Ube nerds out there, what's your best Artisan Constructed deck look like? what would a sideboard entail? I'm interested in what the price tag would look like too, to get an idea of how expensive it'd be to get my poor friends into a janky format.
I started making this list around WAR and decided to throw all of the 'walkers in to fill space. Now that a few more sets are out, I'm looking to replace most of them. Interplanar Beacon can definitely come out too.
This is my current project. A travel cube for 2-4 players. I made it for budget reasons and for a bit of a challenge.
I'm not settled on the pack composition, but I usually end up doing one of each color, colorless, and guild, then shuffling the rest and dealing out a total of 4 10-12 card packs for each player at 4 players.
I'd love to know what the community at large would like to say.
A note about the land base: the single color deserts are available like basic lands are, up to a max of 6 per player.
Will probably have it built and drafted sometime next month. I wanted a cheap 4 man cube for when we only have 2 to 4 drafters and don't want to mess with the big one. So far, its drafting like I want it to... A little worried about UW archetype. I want it to be something other than just flyers, but with two lords it seems inevitable. I'd have to switch up some cards to support the archetype...
I personally don't have a problem necessarily with using downshifts. Some people may.
I judge more on card complexity, power, synergy etc. Clone was in the first iteration, but I took it out.
I might switch the spells matter cards for an archetype that requires less cards. Artifacts perhaps? Open to suggestions!
Edit: and in my experience with the Cubetutor drafting, this cube rewards staying open and really punishes forcing an archetype. I end up with about 3/4 two color, 1/4 three color decks, and no mono color decks as of yet.
A 40 card deck is going to have 33-34 cards on turn 0. Assuming you kept 2-3 lands, and run at least 10 creatures, keeping 1 or 2 of those in your starting hand, about 24 of those cards in your deck are gonna stick on the board when you play them. Without self-mill, it's gonna be hard to hit 10 cards in the graveyard before a 5/5 is just 'on curve' on turn 5 or 6. You get the benefit of mana efficiency, but are incredibly weak to bounce. at 10B, you're not gonna recast that for 1 or 2 until the game is very nearly over.
I think the math works against the delve cards once you increase each price by about 2. You only have so much deck, and you still want to get SOME value out of your cards, unless you want to self-mill turbo those suckers out, in which case, you might have better options (reanimator perhaps).
Here is a 240 4-person cube I slapped together. It seems pretty draftable to me... A lot of the cards are ones I tested out and just didn't make the cut for the normal 420. Let me know what you think! The average power is pretty low, but plenty of staple cards from recent sets make an appearance. Still working on the archetypes, and could use some help deciding what the guild cards should be. Gonna test out all the planeswalkers for now, and side out the ones that no one plays.
EDIT: Forgot to mention that in addition to basic lands, I intend for each player to have access to up to 4 cycle deserts from Amonkhet, so keep that in mind when evaluating the desert synergies.
With the new format announced, I'm inspired to make a little 4 player cube of Pioneer Peasant cards. Seeing as it is pretty similar to frontier, I was wondering if anyone here would have some advice or good example cubes? Frontier cubers, do you plan to expand to Pioneer? What cards would you add from previous sets if you did?
Unless you convoke your meager 1/1 who can't get through, then its a 5/5 flyer for 5. In an aristocrats deck (what I assume the angel is played in most times) it can gain some value and be an imitation venerated loxodon. The counters are more permanent, but it isn't a sac outlet like the angel is.
I'd say its worth testing, but the flexibility of sac outlets are pretty important to the combo decks in my cube
I would advise very heavily against making "slots" for walkers. Play cards that are better than bad ones, regardless of card type
I disagree with this statement whole heartily.
Everyone on this forum plays some number of cards that are worse than others, that is just a fact. People lower the power of their cube or want to have a specific synergy or archetype, you don't have to just play the best cards available. Many people also increase the size of their cube, it just happens. I started at 360 and have overtime increased it to 380 when I felt it was appropriate.
PWs are a lot different than any other type of magic card and it adds another dimension to the game. I think for the most part the PWs are pretty strong cards and will play out better than most imagine they will. Increasing each of my mono-colored sections from 57 -> 58 cards is negligible and going from 380 -> 390 cards overall is also negligible.
I have been really happy with where my cube is at, but I am also happy to increase the overall size of my cube by ~2.6% to include another aspect of the game that we have previously not had the opportunity to play with in our limited format.
Uh, none of this actually justifies the "slot" idea
If Tayo works out, great. If he's last-pick trash and you're adamant about using "slots", you force yourself to do one of three bad options:
1. Keep a useless card in your cube for the sake of 'balance'
2. Switch to what's likely an even worse alternative (The Wanderer)
3. Cut the other four mono-colored Walkers, even if they're performing well
Fourth alternative, run two more x/White hybrid walkers.
Or, just take it out. No one at the table cares if there is 379 or 380 cards in the cube.
I'm gonna run the walkers as mentioned in my previous post, with their own slot in each booster. This will be how I know which ones work for my cube. Not by theorycrafting.
Personally, I think Teyo, the Shieldmage and Huatli, the Sun's Heart could be a lot of fun to run in a tetsuko deck with high alert and/or assault formation, but that's besides the point.
People were surprised at the effectiveness of some of the sagas, because they worked differently from any other card. That made them hard to judge without firsthand play experience. I think it's suggestible to jam as many planeswalkers now and worry about cuts after they perform (or don't). Just because some of these cards 'seem bad' doesn't mean they'll play bad.
I think, in my 420, I'm gonna jam each and every planeswalker at the start, and cut one of each mono color and the lowest 5 played hybrids. Let the players decide... I'll just make 25 packs and add each as a 16th card. The ones that end up in decks after a few drafts will end up in the cube. But, if I were to pick ten...
I think Jaya could be good if you support Big Red, because she plays nice with Pyrohemia and friends and potentially 2 for 1s... I'd snap her up for a RB sweeps deck.
Teyo, the Sheildmageseems great for me because I want to shift my WU section to control/ pillow fort, possibly with a high alert wincon.
I'm not sure if Ob or Davriel is my favorite black walker. One seems like a great aristocrats value topper, especially in an engine with Hidden Stockpile or the thopter foundry engine. Dav seems good in a topdeck situation in a black mid/aggro deck. I think the edge goes to Ob Nixilis
As for hybrid walkers, I would ideally be running a balanced cycle of 5 of them:
U/G Kiora
U/R Saheeli
W/R Nahiri
B/G Vraska (more deathtouchers needed.)
W/B Kaya (meh)
Or if the W/G Walker is good, I'll run that and both Black walkers!
I was thinking somewhere along the lines of Animus of Predation where for the case of tron/artifact lands/etc. It could read:
Draft ~ face up.
As you draft a card, you may remove it from the draft face up.
At the end of the draft, for every land card you removed you may add [tron land, artifact land, etc.] to your deck.
Then, if someone wanted to draft tron, they would first get the voucher and then "burn" three more picks to guarantee they got the three lands.
4 Chain Lightning
1 Shard Volley
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Rift Bolt
4 Light the Stage
2 Keldon Megaliths
2 Fireblast
4 Needle Drop
4 Monastery Swiftspear
4 Chandra's Spitfire
4 Lava Spike
4 Electrostatic Field
4 Barbarian Ring
4 Spikefield Hazard / Spikefield Cave
2 Shrine of Burning Rage
2 Ramunap Ruins
1 Skullcrack
1 Smash to Smithereens
1 Ghitu Lavarunner
1 Tibalt, Rakish Instigator
1 Pyrostatic Pillar
1 Heartfire Immolator
1 Searing Blaze
1 Searing Blood
1 Martyr of Ashes
1 Breath of Darigaaz
1 Heartfire
1 Flame Rift
I always enjoy experimenting with peasant power level, and when jumpstart came out I got to thinking Huh, what if my peasant cube was like Smash Up, where I just make archetype packs and smash them together to play.
But then I wondered what a battle box would look like- 60 card decks vintage constructed peasant* (or artisan or Silver Black) and THAT's why I came here!
So to all the C/Ube nerds out there, what's your best Artisan Constructed deck look like? what would a sideboard entail? I'm interested in what the price tag would look like too, to get an idea of how expensive it'd be to get my poor friends into a janky format.
I started making this list around WAR and decided to throw all of the 'walkers in to fill space. Now that a few more sets are out, I'm looking to replace most of them. Interplanar Beacon can definitely come out too.
I'm not settled on the pack composition, but I usually end up doing one of each color, colorless, and guild, then shuffling the rest and dealing out a total of 4 10-12 card packs for each player at 4 players.
I'd love to know what the community at large would like to say.
A note about the land base: the single color deserts are available like basic lands are, up to a max of 6 per player.
I judge more on card complexity, power, synergy etc. Clone was in the first iteration, but I took it out.
I might switch the spells matter cards for an archetype that requires less cards. Artifacts perhaps? Open to suggestions!
Edit: and in my experience with the Cubetutor drafting, this cube rewards staying open and really punishes forcing an archetype. I end up with about 3/4 two color, 1/4 three color decks, and no mono color decks as of yet.
I think the math works against the delve cards once you increase each price by about 2. You only have so much deck, and you still want to get SOME value out of your cards, unless you want to self-mill turbo those suckers out, in which case, you might have better options (reanimator perhaps).
EDIT: Forgot to mention that in addition to basic lands, I intend for each player to have access to up to 4 cycle deserts from Amonkhet, so keep that in mind when evaluating the desert synergies.
I'd say its worth testing, but the flexibility of sac outlets are pretty important to the combo decks in my cube
I think Jaya could be good if you support Big Red, because she plays nice with Pyrohemia and friends and potentially 2 for 1s... I'd snap her up for a RB sweeps deck.
Teyo, the Sheildmageseems great for me because I want to shift my WU section to control/ pillow fort, possibly with a high alert wincon.
I'm not sure if Ob or Davriel is my favorite black walker. One seems like a great aristocrats value topper, especially in an engine with Hidden Stockpile or the thopter foundry engine. Dav seems good in a topdeck situation in a black mid/aggro deck. I think the edge goes to Ob Nixilis
Jiang Yanggu, Wildcrafter is easily my favorite green walker. xG counters is a thing, and this dude is Experiment One's best bud.
As for hybrid walkers, I would ideally be running a balanced cycle of 5 of them:
U/G Kiora
U/R Saheeli
W/R Nahiri
B/G Vraska (more deathtouchers needed.)
W/B Kaya (meh)
Or if the W/G Walker is good, I'll run that and both Black walkers!
Draft ~ face up.
As you draft a card, you may remove it from the draft face up.
At the end of the draft, for every land card you removed you may add [tron land, artifact land, etc.] to your deck.
Then, if someone wanted to draft tron, they would first get the voucher and then "burn" three more picks to guarantee they got the three lands.